Tag Archives: family

Fathers and Sons, Righteous riffs

A whole new day ….

So, um, all of this happened.

Even if I had the time or inclination to squeeze it all into a smaller suitcase for you, I’m not sure I would. 

It’s just too damn good. 

Not the writing itself … just the events as they unfolded. 

This is me reminding myself that the most important choice is not this word or that word … it’s picking up the pen in the first place. 

__

Couple weeks ago when the big blizzard hit, I was supposed to be in Lexington with my oldest for a boys weekend I’d gifted him / us for Christmas.

Our annual-ish pilgrimage to Kentucky to see the Wildcats men’s basketball team play. 

Given the forecast I couldn’t see us making it back home on Sunday, which would’ve made a mess of Monday … which would’ve spilled all over the rest of the week. 

So the night before the Friday we were supposed to leave, I made the tough call to cancel. 

It was the responsible choice … even though it broke my heart.  

Got screwed on our Air BnB, as our host had sub-zero interest in even a partial refund. 

Lost out on our tickets, too, which weren’t at all cheap when I’d got ‘em at Christmas, and rendered all but worthless by the weather.

The heart-breaking part, though, was missing out on spending time with my son. 

He’s just good light to be around.  

Bummed and with nothing to do but wait for the snow that would require so much shoveling, I made a conscious choice.

I spent time imagining the weekend we might have had. 

What we might have done. 

Seen. 

Tasted. 

Noticed.

Wrote my imaginings down in my journal. 

In minute detail. 

Wasn’t the same, but it was warmer than wallowing. 

And it allowed me to lavish some of my ever-fraying attention on what I appreciate about the gift of spending time in my son’s good light.

For the rest of the weekend, when I wasn’t shoveling or snow-blowing, I was imagining. 

Treated it as if I was making myself a big ole’ pot of soup with no recipe.  

Had no intentions of doing anything with it. 

Just wanted to metaphorically stand in front of a boiling pot and inhale the steam while it all cooked down and the snow fell. 

Nothing more than an exercise to keep my attention productively occupied.

Until a couple days later, I remembered that I owed my friend Jim a letter. 

Had not sent him anything yet in the new year. 

I try to make my letters worthy of Jim’s attention. 

In reciprocity for the treasure he shares with me. 

Jim’s a gifted poet. 

In his 90’s. 

Health has been failing him as of late. 

Still writes. 

Often achingly, always beautifully. 

I can’t tell you how much I appreciate the act and the substance of what Jim shares with me. 

For starters, he hand writes everything … in wobbly but persistent, near-calligraphic penmanship. 

Sends me photocopies of his hand-written stuff. 

The intentionality of just that — let alone how he makes words dance — fills my heart. 

Our last correspondence was a golden phone call one evening a couple months ago, when he called just to let me know how much our correspondence means to him … and apologized that his short breath has kept him from going upstairs (where the printer is) to make me photo copies of his latest poems. The act of him, despite his circumstances, calling me … just to let me know that? 

Better than getting a letter in the mail, let me tell you. 

Though lately confined to the downstairs of his house, Jim’s aperture on the world remains wide.

He lets so much light in.  

Despite his body failing him from a long life’s wear, his poet’s eye, ear and heart remain undiminished. 

I find myself often saying aloud how I hope to someday write as well as Jim does in his 90’s.

In the days after the blizzard … seeing all the snow on the ground, I imagined that he probably felt even more cooped up than we did. 

I tried to think of something I could send him that he might appreciate, but nothing came to mind. 

I hadn’t written anything lately that I felt was worthy. 

Then it hit me. 

Maybe he’d appreciate some of the soup I’d been toiling over … about the weekend I never had.  

So I sloppily ladled some of it onto a page, stuffed it into an envelope, and dropped it into the mail. 

This is what I sent … 

__ 

“Thursday, Jan. 27, 2026 7:49 a.m. 

Dear Jim,

I hope this note finds you keeping warm. Karry just left for work, I think it’s one degree out. I am working remotely today so am anticipating a day of not having to leave the house, other than to walk to the mailbox and drop a postcard in the mail for Emma. 

Oh, the weather of the world. 

This past weekend Peter and I had planned to make our annual pilgrimage to Lexington to go see the Kentucky Wildcats play. We’ve done it for three or so years. Thursday night we decided to cancel our plans. I didn’t see us being able to make it back on Sunday, and we both needed to be home for work on Monday. The Air BnB host wouldn’t give us a refund, and we lost out on our tickets, but most of all, I just missed the experience of spending the weekend together with Peter. So, rather than wallow in disappointment, I decided to alchemize my circumstances … decided to write a story as if I was writing a journal entry commemorating the trip I imagined us having. Since I approached it as a journal entry, I allowed for the requisite frayed edges … 

A brief excerpt 

Saturday 

I’d be the first one up, maybe a small pot of coffee, a deep inhale from a half-full bag before scooping grounds, let myself be seduced by the slow, gurgling percolation … pour a half-cup into one of the host’s old mugs fished from the cabinets, scribble a few words at whatever desk or counter, a weekend post card from Kentucky to Em … coax Peter awake early enough for … a cold walk over to Stella’s, ceremonially donning our Big Blue gear before heading out, he lending me a jersey from his collection, I’d pick John Wall given the choice.

We’d wait for two together at the counter to open up, and I’d rub my hand over the old coin embedded in the worn and weathered wood … confirmation.  

Soak it all in like maple syrup … the tattoos and bleary-eyed chatter of the staff too young too early for a Saturday morning, listen for whatever they’re playing, maybe Tyler Childers … 

… scan the poems framed on the walls on the way to the bathroom, one about Fallingwater … catch clips of expectant, game-day banter buzzing from the tables as I pass through. 

Warm my hands around a mug of black coffee Kentucky straight from a fresh pot … 

… agonize with Peter over our day’s biggest decision … go with Stella’s Hot Brown – the work of the angels — or just eggs, bacon, home fries well-done and those biscuits I sometimes dream about … yeah, proly that, leave the Hot Brown to legend. 

He’d ask the girl about the steak and eggs … sometimes we’re just looking for someone in this world to help us say yes. 

After ordering, the expectation and my topped off cup enlivening our conversation, I’d ask him his top 5 favorite Wildcats of all-time, and he’d give the cosmic question the attention it deserves … Herro, SGA locks for him, me, I’d proly reach all the way back to my first favorite, Kenny “Sky” Walker, who used to glide so gracefully from on high when he’d throw ‘em down … we’d refine and adjust our lists like safe-cracking thieves listening for confirming clicks til our waitress returns to put our plates down in front of us. 

Us just staring like beggars for a couple respectful seconds … and before reaching for the salt and pepper … one of us would certainly say Grace out loud … and oh my gosh … is there anything better than first bites?

Couple years ago a wise person gifted me the notion that, wherever we are, whenever we are, it’s an opportunity to ask the question, “What’s for me here?” It’s baked in the idea that things don’t happen to us, they happen for us. That we always have agency despite our circumstances. That’s among the reasons I remain soooooo inspired and grateful for both the act and the substance of your writing, Jim. I remind myself that the most important choice that you make is not this word or that word … it’s picking up the pen in the first place. 

Keep writing, my friend …  “

__ 

Got home after 9 p.m. just this past Friday night, after meeting my wife and son for a comfort-food-filled dinner after a long Friday that dropped anchor on an already long week.

Proceeded upstairs, slow-dragging eff bombs across a few of the steps, sloppy-mop-style, as my right knee reminded me it is just not happy with me these days.  

But before trudging down the hallway to get ready for bed, I stole a glance at the dining room table to see if there was any mail. 

Saw an envelope on the place mat in front of my chair. 

Stepped close enough to see my name scrawled in Jim’s persistent near-calligraphic hand. 

Thanked the universe aloud for giving my Saturday something to look forward to.

Next day … I exercised monk-like restraint in waiting until I was sitting in the front seat of my car in the parking lot across the street from where I’d just finished a transcendent Saturday morning coffee date with my niece …  to pluck Jim’s letter from my bag.

Whereupon I melted in place. 

There were two pages in the envelope. 

They weren’t photocopies. 

They were the genuine articles, hand-written on notebook paper. 

First page was a letter, dated Feb. 4. 

With Jim’s permission, this is what he wrote to me. 

“Pete, 

Thanks, your letter of imagining, shaking me out of my accustomed lethargy. 

Eliciting an immediate response, to your creativity — woke me up today. 

Dull winter days, lasting forever chill, testing my old will to find something new and challenging to do. 

Friends, like you, willing to take the time, and energy, to remember, with compassion, a lonely old man, far away, appreciated greatly — as we wait the renewed spring of life’s productivity. 

I daily, nightly, pray for all your family, for love, God’s strength, to enliven your hopes and activity. 

Keep sharing, and God be ever with you all. 

Love and care, 

Jim”

The note itself, poetry. 

But the second page contained the poem. 

Signed, dated and … 

"Dedicated to Pete and Son's Imagined day,"

Imagine That!

I salute man's unique gift of imagining,

bringing life to an entirely new world, 

of what might have been, 

setting his feet on streets where he's never been, 

feeling an intimate touch of impunity, 

looking into eyes never meant for me. 

Imagining, escape from a world of set destiny, 

freedom to create, in god-like accuracy, 

people, places and things, 

of sheer, imagined fantasy, 

perfectly fashioned and enjoyed, if only momentarily

my own separate world of autonomy. 

The coffee is perfect, the eggs even better,

the son at my side, a co-conspirator, 

not hindered by time, or other places to be, 

we idle, an hour, in a diner's protective imagery, 

reality forever bypassed, in this freedom's play,

to make a day go entirely our way. 

Having had our opportunity, in spite of a short dismay, 

life always has a way of disappointing us, 

I have created a whole new day, 

paper and pen and who's to say, 

which of the two will last the longest, 

in our time-clouded memory?

__

Oh my gosh.

I hope to some day write as well as Jim writes in his 90’s. 

My heart was singing the entire 37-minute drive home from where I’d met my niece for coffee. 

Had to pee by the time I pulled in the driveway.

Climbed upstairs and made a beeline for the bathroom that sits off my bed room. 

On my way back through, I instinctively grabbed an old journal off my unmade bed. 

Cracked it open to some random page that, it turns out, wasn’t random at all, and read the words I’d been moved to scribble on a page on some forgotten day some years ago … with only a vague hunch that my someday heart might need them to help me make sense of a cold world. 

A quote from Rick Rubin. 

“We share our way of seeing in order to spark an echo in others. Art is a reverberation of an impermanent life. Enduring affirmations of existence.”

__ 

From the thaw of a weekend-ruining blizzard … a poem for this world that would have never otherwise existed … 

… If I hadn’t imperfectly imagined what was lost … and shared my way of seeing it like thrown together soup

… to warm an old poet’s heart … moving him to write and share spring once again.

Every bit of all of it … nothing more and nothing less than the reverberations of impermanent lives. 

Enduring affirmations of our existence.   

A whole new day, paper and pen and who’s to say … 

which of the two will last the longest?

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Righteous riffs

Thinking of you ….

Was downstairs and at my desk early yesterday morning. 

Didn’t sleep much or well. 

I was up and asking Alexa for the time every 20 or 30 minutes all the way from 2 until I pulled myself outta bed in surrender at 5:48.

Headspace is a fragile thing when I don’t sleep. 

Vultures circle. 

Downstairs I cracked open my laptop as mechanically as if brushing teeth, with nothing on my mind or heart.

Just started typing ….

“Dried out and crispy, flicking flint on stone, desperate for a spark.” 

Then I received a text.

Was early for a text. 

“Can you chat this morning?” 

Old college roommate.

Seeing his name made me smile.   

Lives on the other side of the state, doing the work of the angels. 

We’ll sometimes schedule cup-filling calls on our respective morning commutes.

Don’t recall a chat ever being impromptu. 

It’d been a few months since our last one.

Didn’t figure myself for good company, but I called him right away. 

Me: On your commute? 

He: Already parked and walking for coffee. 

Me: Is it a London Fog morning? 

He’s a big fan of the London Fog — Earl Gray tea, steamed milk, vanilla, hint of sugar.

“Tastes like a warm hug,” to quote my old roommate quoting one of his office colleagues. 

Sometimes I find myself ordering one when I see it on the menu.

Always makes me think of him.  

He: Ha, yes! I’ve been trying to cut back, though.

Me: Everything in moderation … to quote Ben Franklin. 

He: I just walked past his grave, actually. 

He really did … he passes Christ Church in downtown Philly on his morning pilgrimages for Warm Hugs. 

Our conversation was as spontaneous as his text.  

We bounced across topics like skipping stones … sleep, dispiriting Eastern winters, kids, family, work … making our days count. 

During which I began to feel the gears of my heart start to loosen.

In passing I mentioned a friend’s recent retirement. 

He said he’s got his own date, about a year out. 

He spoke about ‘ending well.’

Said it’s something that’s been on his mind a lot.

He referenced one of our previous conversations that’s stayed with him.  

I’d forgotten about it ’til he reminded me. 

During one of our previously scheduled caffeinated commutes, I talked about how there’s a big difference between things that end, and things that have an ending. 

How there’s a whole school of thought on the topic … called “endineering.” 

How it’s an under-appreciated facet of experience design in my, um, experience. 

How there’s a sturdy body of research that posits that the way an experience ends disproportionally weights participants’ memories — what they take away, what they remember — about it. (look up “Daniel Kahneman” and “Peak-End Rule,” ICYI).

 And yet … most things in our lives just … end.  

Friendships. 

Marriages. 

Jobs.

He said he’s mindful of the legacy he wants to leave with the people he touches … for those that come after him.

Not for the first time, I found myself inspired by my old roommates’ example.  

We were about 15 or so minutes into our chat when I guesstimated he was on his way back to the office with his London Fog. 

He affirmed such was the case. 

So I made sure our conversation … ended well. 

I broke the fourth wall.

Told him how perfectly timed his text was.

Thanked him for thinking of me.  

Let him know his simple text had single-handedly re-directed the trajectory of the day I was headed for. 

Reminded him to never underestimate his capacity to be awesome. 

He made a point to remind me of the same.

___

I can’t overstate the power inherent in the simple act of letting folks know when you’re thinking of them.

You will be astonished by the flowers that bloom from parched earth.

Your timing will never not be perfect.

It scatters the vultures. 

At least long enough to give our Thursdays a fighting chance. 

I will go to my grave (while mentally walking past Ben Franklin’s) shouting it from the rooftops.

The work of the angels, it is.

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Excursions

Time, an appreciation ….

“But if you really learn how to pay attention, then you will know there are other options. It will actually be within your power to experience a crowded, hot, slow, consumer-hell type situation as not only meaningful, but sacred, on fire with the same force that made the stars: love, fellowship, the mystical oneness of all things deep down. Not that that mystical stuff is necessarily true. The only thing that’s capital-T True is that you get to decide how you’re gonna try to see it.” — David Foster Wallace, “This is Water,” Commencement Speech to Kenyon College, 2005

__

Walked into the post office yesterday morning carrying the hand-written card and extra copy of Dave Eggers’ “The Captain and the Glory” I was sending to a best-friend for his January birthday. After picking out and addressing a padded envelope, I went to take my place in line … just as a mom and her young son were walking in. 

The boy, maybe eight, was carrying a package at least half as tall as he was. Could barely peek over its top. Based on the way he was waddling, the contents had some heft. 

Carrying the lighter of our respective loads, I let ‘em go in front of me.

The post office people behind the counter were in the process of switching shifts — logging in and out and whatnot — so our patience was, um, appreciated.

Mom asked the boy if wanted to put the package down while they waited.

“I’m holding it,” he said, defiantly, standing on one leg for a sec so he could adjust his grip.

I smiled at such innocence.

Obviously, his first time waiting in line at the post office. 

Within a few seconds he was grunting.

Mom moved her suggestion from the interrogative to the imperative. 

He remained a stubborn helper. 

However, his strength timed out before the glacial logging in process. 

He put the box down. 

Looked around and noticed the floor-standing carousel of gift cards strategically placed near where the line begins. 

Asked Mom if he could have a dollar for a Roblox gift card. 

Upon which she proceeded to explain the business concept of disintermediation to her child. 

Told him it was ‘cheaper’ to just purchase credits from the site, rather than going through a middle man. 

She wasn’t merely patient. She was generous.

You could tell they spent a lot of time together for how easy their conversation was. 

Reminded me how much I enjoyed conversing with our kids when they were young. 

How much I learned from the way their minds worked. 

“Thank you for your patience, can I help the next customer?” 

The son cupped his hands back under the box. 

Hoisted. 

Waddled over to the counter and heaved it up there himself. 

“I see you brought your helper,” said the freshly logged-in counter person. 

“She can’t lift with her one arm, so I have to carry things,” said the boy, carrying the conversation as responsibly as he did the box.

Over the next couple minutes of the transaction, the adults left space for the boy’s participation.

He complemented the clerk on her gift cards, relaying how he wanted a dollar one, but his Mom said it was better to buy credits online.

“Have you ever gotten a gift card before?” the clerk asked, as she processed the postage for the box. 

“Yes,” he said. “Sometimes my Mom gets me one … when I do good things.”

I inferred from the small sample size I was witnessing that he had a few credits in the bank. 

Meanwhile, a line began to form behind me, headed by a white-haired, tightly-coated, tightly-lipped older woman. 

Who was out of both stamps and patience.

As the boy elucidated on his upcoming birthday and that one time he was late for football practice, the woman’s huffs under her breath were oddly comparable to the boy’s grunts under the box.

I made smiling ‘what-are-you-going-to-do?’ eye-contact with her a couple times to give her frustration a chance to froth over. 

She returned a couple huffy head shakes and an unsmiling eye roll. 

In these moments I like to remind myself that the exact same experience is experienced differently by the folks experiencing it. 

The reasons for a tightly-coated elder’s impatience can be just as valid as a Mom’s inexhaustible well. 

The post office can sure test both. 

Sandwiched in between — both me and time standing still — I saw life flash in front of me. 

And over my shoulder. 

Before me … a Mom doing her best to teach her boy how the world’s supposed to work, while protecting him from how it actually does with her one good arm.

Behind me …  the world’s grumpy restlessness to just get on with it.

“Thanks for your patience … Can I help the next person in line?”

I waited an extra second so I could watch the boy reach for his Mom’s hand as they left the counter.

What to the world looks like an eight-year-old’s obliviousness to time … the 55-year-old knows is, in fact, the keenest appreciation.

 

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Excursions

The 12 Days of T-Shirts Intermezzo / Torso at the Crossroads

We made it, and yet we haven’t made it … yet. 

For 13 days straight we celebrated a different treasure from my — chooses adjective carefully — “consequential” T-shirt collection. 

But it’s still 11 days before Christmas, not to mention 17 until the calendar turns over, which means over 400 hours left in our present fast where — in a fit of hubris mixed with a spasm of poor decision-making — I pledged to Karry that I could make it the rest of 2025 without buying another t-shirt. 

Or what the supportive members of my family have dubbed the “You’ll Never Make It” Tour.

As the supportive members of my family are quick to attest, the act of my setting out to accomplish something and actually accomplishing it … is no small accomplishment.

Outside of the bags of frozen Reese’s Cups I deplete on a regular and consistent basis (which is EXACTLY what eight-year-old Pete imagined adulthood looking like), my track record for finishing tasks within specified parameters is what the historians would call ‘pock-marked.’

Since the odds of future goal-setting-and-accomplishing suggest betting the Under, we thought it appropriate to seize this rare ‘mission-accomplished’ vantage point for a reflective moment, much like we do in the sugar high afterglow following double-digit Reese’s consumption.  

I think it’s fair to say alchemizing my t-shirt affection through a retrospective lens has proven successful, at least in the recent modest sample size, in curbing my appetites for acquisition. 

So my torso and I find ourselves at a Crossroads.

A.) Keep the retrospective going

(B.) Declare myself ‘cured’ and — for the next 17 days — trust in my newfound ability to resist the algorithms massing at the gates of my feeds hurling temptations like so many flaming projectiles launched from medieval trebuchets

(C.) Give in and hit ‘launch’ on my 2026 T-shirt Registry, which is almost-but-not-quite-as-full as my closet

(D.) Empty a bag of frozen Reese’s trees while we decide

(E.) Both A & D, with possibly a C chaser. 

When you put it like that, is it even a question?

Gauntlet thrown. 

By which we mean Japanese cat tribal warrior t-shirt added to the ’26 registry, bitches.

Can we keep the streak going? 

Can we perpetuate the momentum? 

Can we make it to ’26? 

What will run out first … my will power in the face of great odds? The number of clean t-shirts in my closet? The Reese’s currently in my freezer? 

As we step out in faith into uncharted territory towards an unexplored map with unknown temptation and peril waiting at every turn, we look — as all great explorers do — to Ernest Shackleton, famed leader of three expeditions to the Antarctic,  for inspiration. 

*Adds to ’26 registry.

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Excursions

The 12 Days of T-Shirts / Day 2: Franktuary

Spill a little mustard on your shirt for Franktuary, which sunsetted its brick and mortar a few years back, but still operates a food truck here and there I hear. 

Reverently prepared hot dogs.

Peter and I used to pilgrimage to their Lawrenceville location for boys day out Saturday lunches. 

And like the great philosophers of antiquity, we’d spend the purgatory between our ordering and our munching engaging in spirited, hangry debates over the universe’s cosmic questions. 

Does ketchup belong on a hot dog? 

Answer: as you will consistently find across both your meat-eating eastern and western religions, the creator intended ketchup for hamburgers, mustard for hot dogs. 

Are Franktuary’s fresh cut fries with garlic aioli better than Shorty’s fries with gravy?  

Answer: What, in life, is truly objective? Just as Plato and Kant tussled with that hot potato across centuries … Peter and I staged “The Great Potato Debate” across many a table over the years. He was unequivocally Team Frankturary. Me? I was polytheistic on the matter. For the ultimate answer … ask God next time you see her. 

Without irony, I believe that you can test the mettle of a good cathedral by the questions and conversations it engenders. 

Once, while Peter and I were debating metaphysics, Heidegger, and the nature of being — by which I mean whether honey mustard was a salad dressing (Peter) or a condiment (me) — a father and young son, both dressed in Pirates jerseys, sat down at a booth across from us. 

No sooner had they taken their seats when the son, maybe eight or nine, asked his Dad, “Who’s your favorite baseball player of all time?” 

Which settled the question of God’s existence for me once and for all. 

In dogs we trust. 

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Excursions

Introducing: The 12 Days of T-Shirts (Man Of Action edition)

Couple weeks ago we’re in the kitchen when Karry asks me about a charge on our credit card that looked suspicious. 

Read aloud the name of a company she didn’t recognize. 

“No, that’s me,” I said. 

Was kinda’ hoping that would end her curiosity. 

Had the opposite effect … like most of my good intentions.

“What did you buy?” she asked.

“It’s … a surprise.” 

As an aside … that’s pretty good for me as far as comebacks under pressure go.  

But it was late October. She knows I’m not that proactive with my holiday shopping. 

“What did you buy?” she repeated.

“A t-shirt,” I confessed. 

She: You bought a $35 t-shirt? 

While it might seem like a yes or no question, the answer … was nuanced. 

Me: No, I bought a $28 t-shirt.

She: (silence) 

Me: Seven bucks for shipping.

Karry tends not to put on her cheaters to appreciate nuance. 

For context, I love t-shirts. 

My family prefers the word ‘addiction.’

It’s my only one. 

Yep, T-shirts and postcards. 

And, um, books.

T-shirts are among the reasons I don’t get tattoos. 

I’m too easily seduced. 

I fall in love too frequently … and fleetingly. 

I mean, just when you see a design of a badass skull made up of tiny cats ($28 + $7 shipping), your feed serves up a silhouette of a man’s arm coming into frame to fist-bump a similarly silhouetted cat who looks like one of the cats who live in your house (Viktor).  

The family staged an intervention a few years ago. 

Unbeknownst to me, they harvested a bunch of t-shirts from my closet and had them made into a blanket … like parents do when their kids leave for college. 

They were sneaky. Did it under the guise of my birthday and presented it as a ‘gift,’ … which forced me to suppress my immediate reaction, which was along the lines of, “You did  … what ???!!!”  

Some (most) of the shirts were still in regular rotation … including one of my all-time favorites: the orange GI Joe “Man of Action (With Lifelike Hair)” number that I found in a comic book store in Houston, Texas many years ago. 

Joe’s head on the t-shirt had the same life-like hair as the action figure doll I had in the 70’s. 

Glorious. 

Over the years many wide-eyed smiles and fist-bumps from kindred spirits, most (all) middle-aged men, most (all) of whom proceeded to lose their sh*t when I pointed out that Joe’s coiffe was, in fact, life-like. 

At night, when I am under the blanket, I can sometimes hear Joe softly sobbing.

Since the thoughtful-birthday-gift-slash-intrusive-intervention (still stings), we’ve operated under an uneasy detente.

For any new t-shirt I bring into the collection, I must remove one from my closet.   

So I felt cornered when Karry called me out in the kitchen on my latest acquisition. 

“It’ll be my last one of the year,” I blurted. 

She: Yeah, right. 

Me: No, seriously, last one of the year. 

She: (silence)

Me: It’s only, like, two months. I can make it.

She: (silence)

While acknowledging that historical precedent would suggest, shall we say, an uphill climb, I pointed out that a little encouragement would, you know, go a long way.

She: You’ll never make it.

__

Couple weeks later, I’m downstairs when I hear yelling from the laundry room.

“Wait, did you get another t-shirt?”

While it seems like a yes or no question, the answer was … nuanced. 

At the storytelling thing in the city I went to the night before, Jacob the producer gave me the t-shirt I won a couple months ago. They were out at the time. 

I hadn’t bought it, so therefore had not violated the embargo. 

I assured her that my t-shirt fast was still holding strong. 

Then she did the thing she does sometimes … where she held her gaze a couple extra seconds without saying a word … letting me know she’ll be keeping an eye on me … until midnight strikes on Dec. 31.

Which I received as, you know, encouragement.  

Recognizing that I still have about four weeks to go in my fast — which, let’s be honest here, will be brutal for the holiday algorithms ramping up to tempt me at every turn — I thought it’d be healthy to channel my energies away from my feeds and towards counting my blessings, by which I mean the treasures hanging in my closet.

Which history suggests are only ever a stealthy intervention away from being permanently removed from circulation.

So I’m here today to officially launch the TWELVE DAYS OF T-SHIRTS … a celebratory ‘greatest hits’ retrospective befitting, you know, a man of action with life-like hair. 

The ones that bring me joy.

The ones that keep me in Cozy Mode as I clumsily navigate the world around me. 

The ones that I impulse bought in spasms of poor decision-making somewhere between my second and third Moscow Mules. 

Each one with its own story to tell.

Full disclosure: knowing that the odds of my following through to 12 are only marginally better than my resisting t-shirt temptation for the next four weeks … I will be receiving any and all feedback (including silence) as encouragement. 

Tomorrow: #1 Tuscan Serenade

Apologies in advance. 

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Postcards

Recipes ….

Left the house yesterday morning to meet my sister for coffee. 

There are few more lovely reasons to leave the house on a Saturday morning. 

Figured I’d swing by the post office first to pick up some stamps.

Planned to write my daughter her weekly postcard after having coffee with my big sister. 

No line when I got inside. 

Saw Maria standing behind the counter … which made me smile. 

Maria’s worked at the post office for 28 years, if I remember correctly. 

She told me last time I picked up a lasagna from her. 

Not at the post office.

At her tender restaurant A la Maria’s, on LeMoyne, where she spends her weekday evenings … lovingly making her Mom’s old Italian recipes.

Maria’s place holds a special place in my heart. 

When Karry and I got married and moved into the World’s Tiniest Apartment in East Washington, Maria’s mother ran a restaurant out of the basement of her home a couple blocks from us. 

In our early Kraft-Mac-and-Cheese-Can-of-Peas-for-Dinner days, Paesano’s was our one monthly splurge. 

Saturday night.

If the weather was nice we’d walk. 

It was BYOB so we made a ritual of picking up a $10 bottle of wine.

Made sure we were in our seats by 7 o’clock, so we could watch X-Files re-runs on the big TV that hung in the dining area …

… while slow savoring food made with love from an Italian mother’s kitchen.  

We’d take our time walking our full bellies back home — the next day’s leftover lunch in my left hand, Karry’s hand in my right. 

Everything my Saturday night could ever want back then. 

Maria’s lasagna is perfection. 

Architectural is the best way to describe it. 

Sharp corners. Rectilinear. Towering. 

Don’t know how she does it.

Every lasagna we’ve ever made at home comes out of the pan (deliciously) gloopy.

Maria’s could serve as a tornado shelter. 

Comes with about a 1/2 inch of standing red sauce pooling in the bottom of the to go container. 

Every time I get home and crack open the styrofoam box, Pavarotti sings ‘La donna è mobile’ in my head.

Comes with two thin slices of Italian bread, essential sponges for sopping up every last drop from the plate when you’ve sadly run out of lasagna.

When I put my sopped-clean-post-lasagna plate in the dish washer, the other dishes are like, “I think you meant to put this back in the cabinet.” 

So it should come as no surprise how it made me smile to see Maria behind the counter at the post office yesterday morning.

“Miss Maria,” I greeted.

“Mr. Riddell.”

“Postcard stamps?” I asked. 

“Cleaned out. Election folks bought ‘em all up.”

“Awwww. Really?”

Asked her when they might get more in. She said they’re on order, from Kansas.

“They send them regular mail … so, who knows?”

Coming from a post office person, the “Who knows?” struck me as funny. 

She said I could try the McMurray store. They have everything there. 

I thanked her for letting me know, and exhaled defeatedly, as I didn’t have the time nor inclination for a special trip. 

Was just about to say out loud that my visit wasn’t in vain, though, since I got to see her …  

… when Maria interjected. 

“Otherwise, you’d have to go two busses and some grapes.”

“Uh …. I’m sorry, what?”

“To make up the 61 cents,” she said.

Pre-caffeinated, I wasn’t following at all. 

She pulls out her drawer, takes out a couple packs of stamps. 

Starts to do math. 

Explains the busses are 28 cents … 

“So two of those …. plus a five cent stamp,” she says, holding up a pack of grape stamps. 

“So you’d need a lot of stamps,” she chuckled.

“Wait …,” I said. “Postcard stamps are 61 cents?”

“Yep. Regular stamps are 78 cents, post cards are 61.”

I had no idea. 

In my mind I thought postcard stamps were like 19 cents.

Sixty-one cents …  for such little real estate.  

I felt dumb … for having hundreds of post cards at home. 

She started to put the booklets back in her drawer, when I interjected. 

“I’ll take the busses and grapes,” I said. 

“Oh, you want to do that?” she asked.

“Just to get me through today,” I said. 

What I meant was that I’d just take a booklet of each as an interim solution. 

“Oh, so you just want enough for one?” she asked.  

I didn’t think you could do that.

I smiled at the smile on her face as I watched her tearing off a postcard’s worth of individual stamps from their booklets. 

“I guess I’m going to have to write smaller,” I said out loud. 

She broke apart the three I needed, laid them loose on the counter. 

Then an idea popped into her head.

“Here’s what you do ….” 

I watched her pick up a bus, peel it off, and carefully lay it across the other bus. 

Wasn’t sure what she was doing … maybe just consolidating onto one piece rather than sending me out with three loose stamps? 

Then she peeled the grape and surgically laid it across the second bus. 

“There …. That’s what you do,” she said. 

Proudly. 

“Leaves you more room to write,” she said. 

Oh. 

“So you can lay them across each other like that on the post card?” I asked. 

“Yep,” she said. “Only the ‘USA’ needs to be showing.” 

And I giggled out loud …  like a five-year-old who’d just seen an adult perform magic.

You should see what she does with a lasagna, I’m tellin’ ya. 

In the town where I live, there’s a person who will not only let a clueless, pre-caffeinated little brother cobble together a postcard’s worth of stamps … but will take the time to bunch ‘em as tight as the law allows … so he has as much room as possible to write to his daughter about how much he misses her.

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And after just the loveliest visit with my big sister …

… I took out my favorite pen …

… and the postcard I’d plucked special from my massive, impractical inventory …

… took my time writing small and neat …

… doing my best to make every word count …

… with all the reverence I could muster …

… as I imagined a mother might …

… writing down her favorite recipes for posterity.

Everything my Saturday morning could ever want.  

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Postcards

Taco Night

I don’t remember if it fell across a couple years, or just one. 

Don’t remember exactly how old we were. Early 20’s I think. 

Don’t remember how often, or how many instances of it there were. 

I just know that when Bill would drop Taco Night on the calendar … 

… some of us would fast like it was Ramadan. 

Mrs. Sochko makin’ tacos. 

I remember the first time I attended … popping into the kitchen to say hello and thank you, and noticing she was pan frying the tortillas. 

In our house we just opened the box and took the shells out of the plastic bag. 

I remember thinking, “What is this sorcery?” 

I can’t even remember who all would show up. 

Just that there was always a table-full: Bill, his older brother Danny, and Mr. Sochko in their assigned seats, and the rest of us filling in the others. 

Looking back I can’t fathom the amount of provisions she must’ve secured in advance. 

I mean, the Sochko men and a table full of post-teenage boys.

I don’t remember her ever cutting us off.

If we were still eating, she’d keep making.  

The tacos were just the best. 

Mortals like me would fill ourselves full and tap out after seven or eight. 

Matt was usually good for a couple more. 

Bill, Danny and John? 

In another league. 

I remember one night in particular. 

Somewhere north of double digits Bill called it quits. 

Danny and John, though, kept goin’.  

Defending home court I think Danny took it as a point of pride. 

John, skinny as a rail, was simply enjoying himself. 

I think Danny tapped out around 14 or so. 

Meanwhile John just kept going … and going. 

I don’t remember how high he climbed that night. 

The number in my head is jumbled, like the way the older boys at Areford playground would keep track of their home runs back in a day. 

I only know that John’s performance that night cemented his Taco Night legacy for all time. 

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For the record, Taco Night was one of two truly epic happenings hosted at the Sochko residence. 

The other: Trivial Pursuit. 

With Mr. Sochko.

While all of us enjoyed hanging out with each other, Mr. Sochko was the main attraction whenever we played. Big B we called him (he was a Bill, too). 

Though it’s been more than 30 years, mention “TP with Big B,” to any of us post-teenagers and watch the smiles conquer our faces. 

It wasn’t just that Mr. Sochko was the wisest person any of us knew. 

Oh my gosh he knew so much. 

It was how he delighted in knowledge.

The best part of our games was when he’d expound on the answers. I can still picture him peering over his glasses and smiling as he’d elucidate on a topic. 

His was the kind of smile that made you lean in as you listened.

The kindest of smiles.   

And we were as ravenous for Big B’s wisdom as we were for Mrs. Sochko’s tacos. 

Big B kicked our asses pretty much every time. 

I mean, he was a wizened citizen of the world playing with boys who didn’t yet know all they didn’t know.

But as I recall his record wasn’t undefeated.

What made that more special was that Mr. Sochko delighted as much in seeing one of us win (for the record, I’m not sure I ever won). In his congratulations he’d share the same generous smile as when he was sharing wisdom. 

There’s a wisdom in that, too, now that I think about it. 

To win a game of Trivial Pursuit when Big B was at table? Not sure our neighborhood offered higher accomplishment.

For me the common thread between Taco and Trivial Pursuit nights was that, in those moments I knew enough to know that I was in the best company.

My friends. 

Bill’s family.

I mean, the best company.

And that knowledge — that wisdom — is as alive and nourishing to me now as when we gathered around Bill’s dining room table.

I know some post-teenage boys — who now know what they don’t know — who would say the same.

And though Mr. and Mrs. Sochko aren’t with us anymore, in my heart it will always be a short walk to Connor Street … to lingering a couple seconds on the front porch before knocking, just to take in the scent of tortillas frying in the pan. 

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Postcards

Page’s

We pull in to the packed lot

tuck the Jeep between two parked

with their hatches open,

occupants saying “Ah,”

legs dangling like fishing lines over a dock

kicking lazy with life

we attach ourselves to the end of the long line

— last but not for long —

hugging three sides of the building

before unfurling

free

for ever and ever like a kite string

the longer the better

always the perfect length

for the moment’s the day’s the summer’s biggest decision

the choosing and unchoosing

and choosing, waffling, going back, entertaining, dismissing

granting ourselves wishes and permishes to change our mind

all of us, in all our shapes and seasons

every flavor of the same love

equal and equals in our expectancy

all of us, standing

under an ugly bridge upon cracked pavement

ice cream sandwiched between used car lots and abandoned buildings

a stop light and every so often

some poor motherfucker trying to make a left across a double line

coaxing occasional grace

but mostly impatient car horns and angry curse words out the window

from a world holding them accountable to knowing better

even though they are soooooooo close

until finally

we gain sight of the two windows in front

— the Swirly Gates —

and then …

it is

Time.

and despite 40 minutes in the car

and another 40 to decide

we still ask the young girl

we hope will always be here

for as long as there is a summer

to help us pick

between the extra large banana

or the large chocolate chip cookie arctic swirl

the oreo we had before

or the turtle we’ve never tried

and even after he makes his choice,

he hedges …

asks if it’s too late to change

— it’s not. It’s never too late here —

and so goes for the Large Marge Sundae

fuck yes he does

and we step back and wait

for the girl who took our order to make it herself

that’s how they do it here

she can take as long as she needs

take her own sweet time … we’re good.

Everybody here is good.

When she calls from the window our orders back to us

the kids in all of us spring forward, say thank you

and one-hand snap a few extra napkins for everybody

for the mess we always make

and for a few minutes we linger out in front

with the others still waiting, and us spooning,

just to be amongst

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Fathers and Sons

Keeping time ….

Was saddened to learn of the recent passings of a couple humans who were both significant figures in my musical growings up … Bob Mascia and Ralph Bill. Sending love and condolences to their families and to all that loved them and will miss them.  

They both influenced a ton of young musicians, having both served as band directors at Brownsville High School. I believe Bob may have actually followed Ralph in the role. 

I was not one of their band students. 

And I only really knew them for a fraction of my life, which was even a smaller fraction of theirs. But though I hadn’t seen either in decades, knowing them was — and will always remain — meaningful.

As does the fact that I’m writing this on an otherwise nameless summer Sunday afternoon.  

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I was 13 years old and standing in the kitchen after school one day while Mom was getting dinner ready. 

When Dad came home from Sherwin Williams, walked in the kitchen and promptly informed me — outta nowhere — that he’d signed me up for drum lessons. And that he’d already met with the teacher, and made it clear that I was to learn all styles of music, “not just rock,” (I can still hear Dad’s voice emphasizing those words) … including waltzes, bossa novas, cha-chas, rhumbas, tangos, and of course, jazz and swing. 

The specificity with which he relayed his expectations made it all feel like a foregone conclusion. But I was an agreeable kid, and drums were cool … so my reaction was along the lines of, “Ok.” 

Bob was my drum teacher. He graduated high school with my older sister Missy (she reminded me that Bob played the lead in the high school musical their senior year – The Music Man — while she played piano).

At the time of Dad’s kitchen conversation, Bob was playing steady in a local rock band and filling in with a few others, including the group my Dad played with — Sammy Bill’s Orchestra. 

Gave drum lessons on the side downtown at Ellis’ Music Store.  

First thing I learned?  

Drums don’t start cool.

I got a pair of sticks and a rubber pad the size of a piece of Texas Toast. 

Was informed that I had to learn snare drum before I’d be allowed anywhere near a set. For my parents, it was like a stay of execution. 

Bob taught me how to read music, how to count quarter notes, eighths and sixteenths, what triplets were, how to bounce my sticks for open rolls. Graduated me to Charles Wilcoxin’s rudiments … paradiddles, drags and ruffs, and rolls of every dynamic, shape and size: fives, sevens, nines, seventeens, with an odd eleven and thirteen thrown in for good measure(s). 

I was always somewhere between good and bad, never quite religious in my practicing.

But I stuck with it.  

And a couple years into lessons, Dad surprised with the best Christmas present I’d ever receive — a set of Pearl drums from Ellis’.

I began alternating my weekly lessons with Bob between set and snare. 

I remember my very first lesson on set, Bob teaching me the building blocks of how to assemble a couple basic beats. 

Eighth notes on the hi-hat with my left hand (I’m a lefty), backbeat on two and four with my right on the snare, opening the high hat with my right foot on the ‘and’ of one and closing it on ‘two.’ Gave me two variations for the bass drum — four on the floor, and an alternate where the kick drum hit on “one” and “three-and.”

I still remember the exhilaration of the first time getting all four limbs to hold a groove. 

It was a teenager’s equivalent of pedaling a bike under your own power for the first time. The inexpressible freedom that comes from being responsible for your own locomotion in the world. I can tell you the feeling’s the same whether the locomotion is physical or sonic. The Big Bang it was to me.

At last, drums were cool. 

Occasionally I’d arrive a few minutes early for my Saturday morning lesson, climb to the top of the steps and find Bob just messing around on the kit. 

Oh, was he a monster. 

Every time I heard him play, from the first time to whenever the last may have been, I was in awe.

Got to hear him play once with Sam’s band. Though he held back for the kind of dance music they performed, he still couldn’t help overflowing the banks with his prowess. 

It’s hard to keep a Ferrari tame. 

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Fast forward to the summer after ninth grade. 

I was in the kitchen on an otherwise nameless Sunday afternoon, Mom fixing an early dinner since Dad had a gig that night. They played every third Sunday at the Moose in Perryopolis, three easy hours for an always appreciative crowd. Dad always loved that gig. 

It had rained all afternoon, torrential summer thunderstorms … the kind that percussively pummeled and waterfalled rain on the aluminum awning on our tiny front porch.

The phone rang and I remember walking from the kitchen to answer it. It was Sam, calling to let my Dad know that the Moose had lost power from the storms and that the gig was cancelled. 

I remember Dad being bummed, but also relieved to get his Sunday night back so he could prep for work the next day. 

About 45 minutes later, we were eating dinner at the table when the phone rang again. It was Sam calling back to say that the power had come back on at the Moose … so the gig was on.

So Dad resumed his gig-prep ritual, getting a shower, doing his teeth (which took a good 30-45 minutes. I’m not sure there was ever a trumpet player more meticulous about his teeth), laying out his suit, his mute bag, etc.

No big deal. 

Until the phone rang for a third time. Sam again. He’d gotten a hold of everyone except Bob. In the age before cel phones, when answering machines were still a novelty, you either got a hold of someone or you didn’t. Sam figured that Bob must’ve gone out to eat or something after learning that the gig was off.

“Tell Pete to get ready, just in case Bob doesn’t call me back,” Sam told my Dad.

Upon which I promptly started freaking out.

I’d tagged along on a couple of my Dad’s gigs, had listened to a couple cassette tapes of the band he’d given me, so I wasn’t completely unfamiliar with the music. But my drums had never left my practice room. I didn’t even have cases for them. I remember taking them apart that afternoon for the first time, afraid I wouldn’t remember how they went back together. When I wasn’t freaking out, I was praying that Sam would call back saying he’d gotten a hold of Bob. 

Alas, a fourth call never came.

The rain had long since stopped by the time Mac came to pick us up. I remember carrying my cymbal stands out one by one, gingerly laying them down in the back of his Chevy Suburban, covering them with blankets so they wouldn’t be tempted to roll.

When we were done loading the truck, Mac commented, “They look like dead bodies.”

Not the encouragement I was looking for.

When we got to the Moose, Dad helped me set things back up and bought me a Pepsi to calm my nerves. Sam loaned me an oversized tux jacket, and a gratuitously large, velvet, clip-on black bow tie that wore crooked.

I’ll never forget his only instruction to me, which he delivered with his signature calmness: “As long as you begin and end with the rest of the band, you’ll be fine.”

By the time everybody tuned up and gathered on the bandstand, I was in full panic. I gave my full attention to Sam’s every word and gesture, locking into the tempos as he counted off the tunes. 

But once a tune shoved off from shore, one person became my life preserver — Ralph, Sam’s son, who played keyboard. I hyper-focused on Ralph’s left hand, which he used to play the bass lines. Ralph’s left hand told me everything I needed to know about each tune … whether it was a foxtrot, a jump tune, a bossa nova, cha-cha … on down the line. 

I remember little else about that evening other than surviving the longest three hours of my life … thanks to a constant stream of advice and encouragement from Alice (our singer) and the guys in the band.

When it was over, I gratefully collected their smiles and handshakes, and then collected myself before turning my full attention to trying to remember how to tear my drums back down.
Then Sam came over to me. Asked me to put out my hand.

Into which he put $25 … my share of the evening’s take.

I still can vividly recall my 15-year-old self’s feeling of surprise and exhilaration as I stared at the money in my hand. It felt like a million bucks to me.

In that humble transaction, I went from being a scared-shi*tless 15-year-old to being a professional musician. 

I remember Bob making a point of that during my next lesson.

“No, I’m not,” I tried to quickly dismiss. 

“You were paid for your services … that makes you a professional,” Bob informed me, setting the record straight.

Sam paying me was only the second most significant thing he did that night, though. 

He asked if I’d be his regular drummer.

He said he was looking for someone who could make all the gigs. Bob sometimes played with other groups, forcing Sam to find subs. He wanted someone steady.

I can tell you with 100% certainty that there was nothing in my performance that evening that earned me the invitation. And I never grew to be more than one-tenth the drummer Bob was.
But I never gave Sam a chance to reconsider his offer. 

And, you know what? Bob never said a single word about my displacing him. 

So, for the next 13 years, I got to share a bandstand with my Dad.

And with Ralph, too.

__

When I think of Ralph, I think of how much fun he had while playing music. When his hands weren’t on the keys, he kept the band in stitches telling jokes. From the moment we’d arrive at a hall through set-up. Between sets. While we were tearing down and loading up. How he loved making people laugh. 

And, oh how he loved good food, too. The more unpretentious the surroundings, the better, as far as he was concerned. I can still hear Ralph saying, “You can’t eat atmosphere,” a line that I still quote to this day whenever I find myself enjoying delicious food in less than fancy surroundings. I credit Ralph every time I quote him. 

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As I was driving Route 40 towards Brownsville a couple Wednesday’s ago to pay respects at Ralph’s visitation, I found myself thinking of all the New Year’s Eve gigs we played together. After playing Auld Lang Syne at midnight, the band would stand up and we’d shake hands. I always set my drums up next to Ralph’s keyboard, so Ralph’s was usually the first hand I’d shake in the new year. I can say as I write this I now consider that an honor.

When I got to the funeral home, I spent a few minutes looking at the old photos they had placed around the room, mostly of Ralph’s life in music and love of family. There were a couple pictures of Sam’s old bands, one from the very early days, and a later one from when we played together. Sam in the front row in his white tux, Ralph smiling from behind the keyboard. Dad in the middle of the trumpet section, and me in crooked bow tie and glorious mullet. 

“So many of them are gone, now,” Ralph’s wife Hillary said of the photo, when I offered my condolences. “Sam, now Ralph, your Dad … Roger … Diz.”

It’d been about 25 years since we’d last seen each other. Hillary used to come on some of the gigs. I invited Karry on a couple New Year’s Eves and they’d keep each other company. 

“I remember the first time you played,” Hillary recalled. “You wrapped your drums in blankets.” 

I told her that Ralph’s left hand was pretty much responsible for getting me through that first gig. And how much I treasured those times. 

On my way out, I signed the registry, taking note of the names of some of the guys I was fortunate enough to play with all those years ago. 

I didn’t stay long. 

Just long enough to be reminded of days of Auld Lang Syne, and what good days those were.

Learning of Bob’s passing barely a week later … I was reminded that none of those days would have even been possible without Bob’s presence in my life … and his absence one rainy Sunday afternoon.

There’s no such thing as a nameless Sunday.

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