DAZED BY ZEPPELIN - 2014

Everyone in the world has a phone. I can call Fenway's mom in Thailand and Mam will pick up the phone on the other side of the world. This is a miracle, considering only twenty years ago phone service to foreign countries was a costly expenditure. Now international connections are linked by communication satellites circling the globe to transmit billions of cellular calls and SMS messages to their distant destinations, yet this Sunday no one has called me at the Fort Greene Observatory.

And it was not the advent of the Zombie Apocalypse.

Planes and helicopters flew over Brooklyn and cars hummed along Lafayette Street, so I'm not Mada, Adam's dead end, but twelve hours have passed since my last spoken word. That stretch of silence is not a record. I have gone longer, since Sundays have been my traditional day of silence.

Back in the last century I lived in the East Village. My apartment was small, but comfortable. My Sundays were spent watching football or basketball, reading a book, luxuriating in the bath or all of the above. Every once in a while I'd check the phone to see there was a dial tone.

The phone was in perfect working order.

No one wanted to speak with me, until I started dating Ms. Carolina. She liked talking. I couldn't blame her. Ms. Carolina lived in a redneck community south of the Mason-Dixon Line. Some of her neighbors entertained funny thoughts about the intermingling of races and religions.

Early Sunday service at her husband's church lasted two and a half hours. Baptists wasted the entire morning in prayer. Her congregation was very advanced for the area. They believed blacks had a soul.

Around 11am the telephone rang and Ms. Carolina recounted the preacher's ranting sermon in accent. I didn't have to say a word.

She was originally form New Jersey. Her family was Old Yankee same as half mine. We had more than those genes in common. I knew her husband. He was a good man. Ms. Carolina spoke low and ended with the wish, "Good luck with your vow of silence."

Luck had nothing to do with my Sunday's silence, because my mouth was silted with the residue of Saturday night drunk.

Wordlessly I hung up the phone with my vow intact. My function was to listen to a woman's yearning. I was good at it.

As a junior in 1968 my girlfriend Kyla suggested that we spent the weekend on a spiritual retreat at a suburban monastery. The buxom cheerleader felt guilty about the sexual stirring. Two weeks earlier Kyla had confessed to the parish priest that she and I had come close to sex.

Our pastor had convinced the 17 year-old cheerleader that our wanton behavior was Satan's work, even though dry-humping wasn't proscribed by the Bible.

"You sure this has nothing to do with your mother?" Kyla's mom was a devoted church goer same as mine.

"No, I feel something in my heart calling me to Jesus. I want you to feel it too."

"Okay." The weekend cost nothing and no priest could shake my lack of faith in God.

"I only want you to do this, because I love you."

"And I love you."

Kyla and I had never gone all the way. Our sex was blunted by her unwillingness to be naked. I respected her wishes. My hands were not so obedient.

"I want to be pure as snow." Her skin was whiter than baby powder.

"I'll do whatever you want."

I signed up for the retreat. Chuckie Manzi, feared losing me to the priesthood.

"They might drug you with LSD holy water."

"I'll be okay." I had been faking my belief in God since my best friend drowned in 1960. A weekend was not likely to test me.

My mother was ecstatic to hear of the weekend. Her uncle was an arch-bishop. She had been praying for one of her four sons to answer God's calling. She never thought it would be me and on Ascension Weekend a bus rolled down our street with Kyla and fifteen other couples. My mother kissed me on the cheek and said, "Open your heart."

"I'll do my best." I looked over her shoulder.

Chuckie stood on the lawn. His eyes said good-bye forever and I got on the bus to sit next to Kyla. The bus pulled away from my house and we drove ten minutes to a wooded monastery underneath Big Blue Hill.

We were met by priests and nuns; one for each couple.

"Purity is the one true love." The habited nun raised her hands with welcome.

"I know you are all virgins." The head priest was tall and bald. His smile beamed sanctity. "God knows you are pure and purity is the best way for young people to show your love for God and Jesus, so you are going to be separated by sex."

"All weekend?" I was holding Kyla's hand.

"Except for prayer meetings and Mass." A young priest with a guitar motioned for us to move apart.

The Nuns of Chastity escorted the girls from the monastery to a nunnery hidden by tall pines.

"See no evil." The Pastor led the boys inside a separate building. "Hear no evil."

I stifled a groan.

This was going to be a long weekend.

That evening we ate beef and mashed potatoes followed by a lengthy prayer session in the basement. The girls were on one side of the room and the boys the other, as we discussed our immortality of our souls and the temporal existence of our bodies and souls.

The head priest noticed my looking at Kyla.

"Saving her soul is more important than your desire. Do you understand that?"

"Yes, Father." I loved the girl with the green eyes more than physical pleasure or so I thought in this basement.

We hit the beds early. The lights went out at nine. I heard several boys masturbating under the blankets. Two of them went to the bathroom together. Without girls we left on our own.

The next morning started with Mass. I took Holy Communion for the first time in years and stuck the wafer in my pocket once I reached my pew. After the service we ate breakfast and the nuns led the girls to chapel. The boys sat under a tree with the guitar-playing priest.

The day was warm and the sky was free of clouds. The priest indoctrinated us with the ways of God. I couldn't stop thinking about Kyla. The priest strummed his guitar and said, "A woman will steal your precious fluids. Women were the handmaidens of Satan. Touch one outside of matrimony and you'll brut in Hell forever."

Some of the other boys confessed their sins of thought and deed. I wanted to run for the woods, but I wasn't leaving without Kyla. After dinner we listened to religious rock on the stereo. God was never far from us on this weekend.

That night I had spilled my seed twice. Other boys joined my one-handed prayer. Masturbation was our most holy sacrament.

On Sunday morning the priest and nuns celebrated the ancient mass and the head priest preached about the eternal satisfaction of serving the Church. The climax of the weekend was the grand one-on-one session with an older priest in the basement. He was the exorcist for the diocese.

"What do you have to say for yourself?" His rheumy eyes were skilled at searing into souls.

"My love for my girlfriend is untainted by penetration."

"But you have touched her?"

"Not the way you think?"

"Have you ever touched a man?"

"No."

"Have you ever thought about a naked man?"

"No."

"Are you asking everyone this, because the only other times I heard these questions were from drivers trying to pick me up hitchhiking. Do you do that? Isn't that a sin?"

"The Holy Trinity absolves our trespasses." He put his hand on my thigh. I pushed it away, then heard an electric guitar blast from the stereo in the meeting room. The priest looked up. This music was not on the program and I recognized the guitarist as Jimmy Page from the Yardbirds.

"I gotta go." I ran upstairs to find Chuckie by the stereo.

"I just got this from the record shop in Mattapan Square." He held up the cover of the Hindenburg crashing in flames. "It's Led Zeppelin. You got to hear this."

Chuckie turned the stereo up to 10 for DAZED AND CONFUSED.

Bass and guitar.

High-pitched vocals and then the avalanche of drums.

6 minutes and 25 seconds later I went upstairs and packed my bag. Chuckie put on HOW MANY MORE TIMES and the rest of the boys joined my flight.

The priests tried to stop Chuckie from playing the album. He had a Boy Scout knife, which was sharp enough to fend off the soft palms of the church. We stormed across the lawn to the nunnery. The girls had heard the music and were already to go. We walked to the road. Chuckie had somehow organized enough cars for escape. He was a good friend.

"I love that music." Kyla touched my hand.

"It is pretty cool." Her touch was nicer than that of the priest."

"Let's go to the beach." Chuckie shouted 'Nantasket' out the window.

It was a day fit for the gods.

None of us attended Mass after that weekend. We defied our parents' deity. Our Sundays were centered on breakfast at the local diner and I celebrated the Sabbath with simple words.

"Bacon and eggs over easy."

Kyla and I never went all the way. Led Zeppelin was a huge hit. My older brother and I saw them at the Newport Jazz Festival. Kyla and I broke up a week before the Senior Prom and she married a boy from our hometown. They made a good couple. She would never have been a groupie for Led Zeppelin.

My present vow of silence endured into the darkness of night. I didn't have to be anywhere until tomorrow, but felt like a beer in the company of others and there's no where better in Fort Greene to have a beer than Frank's Lounge with the lovely bartender, Rosa. She's a girl who doesn't like silence, then again most women like the sound of voices. It's part of their nature and no one knows that better than a man.

TO HEAR JAKE HOLMES ~ Dazed and confused

Holy Saturday - 2009

In April of 2009 AP and his family left Fort Greene for the Easter Weekend. I spent the time alone in the brownstone of Oxford Street, feeding the cats, turtle, and fish. My sense of worth was low and I treat the self-loathing with beer, preferably Narragansett. That lager tasted of New England.

Saturday morning morning I finished re-writing IN HEAVEN ABOVE, my comedy script about a bankrupt nation fending off their debtor by outfitting their decrepit Space Shuttle to hold a lottery with the winning prize a trip to the stars and the chance to be the first man to make love in orbit. After writing THE END I brewed a cup of tea.

As the teabag seep its essence into the water, I sweetened the cup with a spoonful of sugar and then poured in milk. It had gone bad and I cursed the cruddled container, then threw on my coat to get another quart at the local deli, Ralphs.

I stepped out of the house and closed the door.

As soon as the lock clicked shut, I checked my pockets for the keys.

They were upstairs on a hook.

"Fuck." I was speaking to my alter ego, Johnny Fuck-Up.

I called AP. He gave me the nanny's number. There was no answer. I called Joe the Plumber, the neighborhood handyman. He came over and said, "$50."

"Could you do it for $20?"

"Not a chance." He had his pride.

"Then I'll wait." I was hoping for a counter-offer.

"It's your party, but if you change your mind, you know my number." Joe was playing hardball. It was Easter weekend.

I wandered down the street to Mullane's on Lafayette. The Bruins were playing an early afternoon game against the Flyers. I ordered a beer. The telephone rang. It was the nanny. She was down the street.

"I have keys for you."

"You are the best."

I met her and got back into the house.

The turtle was happy to see me. They know how to grin and I poured him a little 'Gansett'

MADE ON HONOR, SOLD ON MERIT SINCE 1890.

Painting by Tristam.

To The Nines 2011

Easter was a special holiday for our family. My mother was a devout Catholic. My father had converted from agnosticism to marry his Irish bride. The Bowdoin College grad was a good dresser and they attired their six children, as if we were the jewels of empire. Every Easter we wore new clothes from tie to shoes. Our family's fashion statement for the holiday was the high water mark for our parish south of Boston.

My mother and father have been promoted from this mortal coil. I never confessed my rejection of their faith. The truth would have only pained them both and my apostasy is a private matter, however this Easter as every Easter before it I dressed to the nines. Not a stitch of old on my limbs. Tan suit, white shirt, Celtic green tie. White shoes. My mother loved white shoes and this Easter Day was a day for white shoes.

A misty morning had surrendered to the will of a balmy afternoon. The long winter was gone and the youth of new season was blooming on the trees. My mouth broke into a smile at the sight of the white flower of the ornamental pear trees.

I walked over to Frank's Lounge in my finery. No people on Lafayette were dressed for the occasion. I spotted Raldo on Fulton. The old high-lifer was slick as an otter in his racing red sweater, flannel trousers, and panama hat. The rakish style icon rarely sports a jacket in warm weather, so the police know that he isn't carrying a gun. They can't believe the light-skinned Prince of the Strip has retired from the game for good. Most of his friend share the sentiment. Raldo and I have no history and 80 year-old greeted me with a nod.

"Hey, there, white boy." The salutation has no bite. Raldo doesn't know my name. "Looking good."

"Thanks."

"But I don't know about the rest of these folks." His eyes shuttled from left and right terminals. His vision took in the whole street. Disappointment scrunched his grin and he hitched up his 30" waist trousers. Raldo weighed as much as the wind. "Low-assed jeans, a sloppy tee-shirt, and fat. How did those young people get so fat. Damn, they so fat they put the Fat Man of the Carnival out of work."

"It's a plague." I didn't say more. It had been a long winter. Comfort food warmed the flesh. My estimate on my weight was 10 pounds off. I had to lose my girth and I sucked in my stomach. It almost hurt. "And catching."

"You better watch out, white boy." Raldo tipped his hat.

"Do too."

Raldo looked over his shoulder with a snap of his head.

"I'm good." He sauntered up the hill with women on his mind.

I headed down Fulton to the bar across from the statue of General Fowler. The Civil War general fought at dozens of engagement against the South. This winter an admirer covered his cold shoulder with a cape and wrapped a wreath of Xmas lights around his head. It was a good look.

I entered Frank's. The Celtics-Knicks game was on the TV. Tom the bartender whistled with appreciation. His two octogenarian friends applauded my effort. I bought the three immortals a round. We toasted my parents. The Celtics won the game and I returned home.

Happy.

I hadn't spilled a beer on my new suit. My white shoes were spotless. Messing them up is for a day other than Easter.

Man O Manischewitz 2012

In 2012 Fort Greene was a friendly neighborhood. People said hello to each other. I smiled greetings, glad to be here. It was a 'we' world, although I wished I was in Thailand with my family.

Across the street an elderly Trinidadian woman collected beer cans and bottles for the deposit money. I gave Jinny all my empties, at least ten a week. At five cents a can my annual contribution added up to $25.

One rainy afternoon I exited from the Fort Greene Observatory, Ginny was struggling to drag her cart loaded with plastic soda bottles onto the sidewalk. Her daily effort financed her yearly visit to the casino. She loves the slots.

"Wait there," I shouted and walked over to help maneuver her load out of the street.

"Thank you, sweetie." She smiled and scurried back to her basement apartment, "I have something for you. Watch my things."

"Sure." I estimated that she had collected over two hundred bottles this morning or $10 for her battle with the one-armed bandits of Aqueduct. Thirty seconds later she emerged from her flat with a plastic bag.

"This is for you." Ginny handed me a bottle of Manischewitz Concord Grape Wine, 100% kosher for Passover.

"Thank you." I accepted the bottle with gratitude. No one had given me a Christmas gift let alone a Passaich gift. I had first drunk the kosher wine at the age of twelve. 1964. it had been sweeter than Coke. "I'll drink a toast to you with my landlord AP."

"He is such a good man. And those children are lovely."

"Yes, they are." I pointed to her cart. "You need any help with that?"

"No, I'm going down to Pathway to redeem the money. I think I might go to the casino on New Years Day."

"Then I wish you luck." 2013 was a long way away.

I returned to AP's brownstone and showed my friend the bottle.

"Man O Manischewitz." AP made a face. His palate was used to more sophisticated wines.

"I can't remember the last time I drank it. It must have been back in the Zapple and Boone's Farm years." I examined the bottle for percentage of alcohol. "It says 11%. Care for a glass?"

"Not right now." He had just eaten pasta with clams for lunch, which calls for white wine and certainly not glatt kosher wine. Of course clams are tref, but AK loved his seafood and bacon too.

"Later?" I hated drinking alone.

"Much later."

I had no reason to wait and cracked open the bottle in the top-floor apartment. The bouquet was pure sweetness. I poured a glass and brought it to my lips. A simple sip renditioned me back to 1966.

Man O Manischewitz.

Some things in life never change.

"Here's to you, Ginny."

Black At Last 2010

Frank's Bar on Fulton Street is black. It's not Black Panther 'Black' or Malcolm X 'Black' but it's blacker than any other bar in Fort Greene. Since 1972 too. I've been hanging out there for the last year. I have never pretended to be anything more than what I am. A white boy from Boston and the regulars of the bar have accepted my whiteness. I speak with Homer about the Knicks. We agree that they suck. Billy in the corner tells me tales of the 50s. He is that old and Tim, the owner's brother, drinks with me on Sunday afternoons. Ain't no one else there but me and him. He's 75. I'm 57. We've seen some of the same things, but I was a white boy cracker.

Until tonight.

Before leaving the Plaza Retail floor in the basement, I stopped at Demel's Chocolatier in the Plaza. THe Austrian franchise was closing on Friday. Business in the Plaza Hotel was horrible. THe Israeli owners were real estyate dealers and not cordial hists., plus only three things work in a basemetn; a boiler, a bar, and a brothel.

Attila, the owner's son, packed a box of cakes. He asked where I was going, thinking I might be trendy, after all my boss Richie Boy had been in the Boom-Boom club the other night.

"Going to the in spots is not my game. I'm strictly Frank's."

It was three blocks from my apartment in Fort Greene and Rosa was tending the bar. The Chino-Mexicana was funny, hot, and poured free beer.

Upon my arrival at the establishment on Fulton Street, I arrived with chocolate cakes. All the girls at the bar cooed with expectancy seeing the chocolate cakes. They were chocolate-lovers to the bone. I fed them pralines, dark chocolate mousses, super chocolate pies. All the sisters were ecstatic and the largest, Darleene, said, "Thank you, Mr. Chocolate."

"Mr. Chocolate?" I pondered the enormity of this appellation and said, "Having reasched the promised land when a white man can be recognized as chocolate. Chocolate City I love you."

Everyone laughed except for one young man. A stranger with a glower.

"You ain't no brother."

These were harsh words and I stuck out my arm. It hadn't seen the sun in six months.

"I white than you is true, but I have the power of chocolate." I offered his a Chocolate tart.

Darleene's right. You are the Chocolate Messiah.

Everyone laughed harder. Even the brother darker than the white boy # 1.

I do love this bar.

In Defense of Spike Lee

Back in 2014 a Abraham Lincoln lookalike visited Fort Greene on President's Day to promote Quicken Loans. They promo team offered $25 to put a photo of the ersatz Abe and #quickenloans on your Facebook page. I tried on my cellphone without success. The young girl gave me a card for trying and I purchased two bottles of wine for $18 at the liquor store on Fulton.

Some things never change.

Spike Lee doesn't feel the same way about Fort Greene with good reason.

At a speech at Pratt Institute the film director had attacked gentrification as an invasion of uncool white motherfuckers who call the police to quiet his jazz playing father and white couples bogarting Fort Greene like it was their birth right.

He's actually very funny about how realtors changed Bushwick to East Williamsburg, why there's more police protection and better schools.

This telling of the truth was met with anger by the newcomers and Uncle Tims like John McWhorter of Time Magazine without any mention of economic cleansing of Harlem, the Lower East Side, the East Village, and Brooklyn.

Spike Lee was speaking against reverse migration and for affordable housing.

"Where are we going to go?"

"People can not afford to live here anymore."

I know the story.

I was moved out of my place on East 10th Street.

I had lived there almost thirty years.

They and we know who they are don't want us here.

In Russia they call it a pogram.

'They' want the poor, minorities, and the disenfranchised to leave without a forwarding address.

Well, we ain't going right yet and I applaud Spike Lee telling the truth.

It has to be said and said by 'us'.

Not them.

To see Spike Lee's speech at Pratt Institute please go to this URL

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GI73SRbi8AQ

Battle Of Long Island 1776

After successfully ousting the British from Boston on March 17, 1776, General George Washington assembled the 10,000 strong Continental Army in New York to deny King George III's Royal Navy access to the harbor. Throughout the spring and summer Washington's commander's prepared defenses in Manhattan, however in July the British task force landed in Staten Island and General Howe gathered over 30,000 troops for his offensive.

After making landfall on August 22, the redcoats strengthened their numbers with Long island loyalists. Still believing the city to be the prime target, Washington sent over 1500 troops as reinforcement to General Isaac Putnam's command.

It was not a feint and on August 27 the first assaults on the forts of Long Island took the rebels by surprise with overpowering force of arms.

The battle was a disaster for the Americans.

The bravery of the Maryland 400 forestalled defeat, but at day's end Washington and his troops were trapped under Brooklyn Heights. One more push and the rebellion would be quashed with traitors hanging from every available tree in New York.

The the finishing coupe never came that night.

The British had been taught a deadly lesson at Bunker Hill.

They dug ditches ever closer to the American lines.

In the morning the redcoats discovered that Washington and his soldiers had been evacuated by John Glover's Marblehead regiment. Fishermen, whalers, and sailors.

9000 troops had escaped the trap and the war wasn't destined to end until General Conwallis' surrender at Yorktown six years later.

Not a victory.

Most certainly not a defeat.

More a draw with the British realizing that the world would turn upside down one day.

But not on August 27 for General George Washington.

The Last Christmas Tree

After Thanksgiving Christmas trees crowd the sidewalks of New York.

On the corner of Fulton and St. Felix Streets the holiday franchise has been run by Laurent and Amy, who have transported evergreens from the northern forest of Quebec for the last six seasons. We spoke in French with their accent a provincial Quebecois and my r-less speech betraying my Boston roots.

Last year they gave me a small tree for my bedroom at the Fort Greene Observatory. I called it Ole Tree.

I thanked them with a bottle of wine, which we drank together right before they returned to Canada.

"Merci." I was sad to see them go, but they said, "Next year."

We hugged good-bye and I returned home to adorn the two-foot tree with Buddhas, ribbons, and a silver star.

Most of our neighbors tossed out the drying trees after the New Year.

I kept water in the small bowl beneath the severed trunk and Old Tree remained green throughout the winter. AP's kids liked Ole Tree. We ate cookies in the Observatory, while I told them stories of the north woods. Lizzie and James liked my tales of lumbermen along the St. John's River. I had heard them from my grandfather.

The winter was a cold one and I told my landlord and his kids about burning Christmas trees on a lake in Maine.

"The ice is a foot thick and everyone brings out their orange-dry trees to pile them high. Someone tosses a match and the trees go up in the whoosh of flames. I wish they did that here."

Instead the city mulches the dead trees with a wood-chipper.

"Just what the city needs. A bonfire to burn down all of Fort Greene." AP was a good dad, but I had the feeling that Lizzie and James wouldn't have like to see Ole Tree in a bonfire.

"When are you throwing out your tree?" asked his wife.

"Soon."

January became February with March rolling into the city with a vengeance. April was also cold. Finally winter relinquished its grip in May.

Ole Tree seemed comfortable in my room, despite its needles turning orange.

"It's time for it to go." AP rightly considered the tree a fire hazard.

"Soon."

"You've been saying that for months."

"What if I burned it in the backyard?" A good fire was an honorable ending for Ole Tree.

"Not a chance. Those trees burn hot." AP had gone to RISD. He knew New England and New Englanders. People from cold climes are into flames.

In May I traveled to Thailand and visited my children. There were no pine trees bordering the rice paddies.

Upon my return AP said, "My wife wants the tree gone. Actually she wanted it gone long ago."

"Ole Tree's a ghost of Christmas past," protested James. He was my good friend.

"Christmas was six months ago. Get rid of it."

I didn't want to say good-bye and a few more weeks passed, then the summer turned up the heat. AP was worried about instantaneous combustion and I had to admit Ole Tree presented a clear and present danger.

On a hot July morning I apologized to Ole Tree and carried it down to the street on my way to work. I didn't want to leave my old friend in the trash, so I walked to the corner and poised the tree on the wall of a church.

"You be good."

"I walked away, expecting never to see Ole Tree again, but upon coming back from work at the diamond store I discovered Ole Tree had moved to a stump on the sidewalk. James and Lizzie went outside to speak with Ole Tree. AP thought I was crazy, but he was a New Yorker and not a New Englander.

A week passed before Ole Tree hit the road and vanished forever.

It didn't leave a forwarding address, but winter will be back and so will Laurent from Quebec with a new crop of firs. A new tree will become this season's Old Tree, but I still think about the old Old Tree.

I love thee for a long time and will love the Son of Ole Tree just the same.

Bien Sur.

Dangerous At Any Age

Old Bill from Frank's Lounge had been a numbers man for decades. We drank in the afternoons into the evening. Always dressed suit jacket and tie.

"You know what's bad about getting old. People don't think you're dangerous." He opened his jacket. In the left side of his chest rested a .38. "This changes their mind."

That winter he fell in love with a younger woman at an Easter New York bar. Her boyfriend was younger. Old Bill came into Frank's beat up. Rose Li the Mex-Chinese asked what had happened.

"I found out I wasn't as tough in East New York as I am in Fort Greene."

I respect that now more than ever

Like the late Malcolm X I'm all peace and love.

You can't separate peace from freedom because no one can be at peace unless he has his freedom." Malcolm X.

General Fowler's Statue - 2013

Last weekend an exhibition portraying the possible renovation of General Fowler's Triangle was presented to the residents of Fort Greene. The proposed alterations included new trees, larger public space, and changing the location of the General's statue.

"I don't know about that. I like the General just the way he is," I told one of the reps for the plaza's restoration. "I sit in Frank's and stare out at the General and he stares back at me. He certainly is a comfort."

"Moving him would create more room on the other end of the plaza." The well-dressed man showed me the plans. He was right. There would be more room.

"Would you change the direction of his gaze?"

"Some people suggested down Fulton Street." The middle-aged man must have sat at board meetings.

"Into the sun?" I shook my head. "Up north all Civil War statues face the South to remind the living of those who fought to free the slaves."

"I didn't know that."

"In New England every town has a statue facing south." At least I thought they were facing south. "And every southern town has a Confederate facing north. Those things aren't supposed to change."

I recalled in Lewiston, Maine a florist raised money to redirect the Civil War monument from looking East to the City Hall to a southern gaze. His effort was resoundingly raised $15.

"I'll mention that to the committee."

I wandered away thinking that the committee had already decided what they were going to do without ever telling the public of their plans until now.

Later that afternoon I researched General Fowler. He had served as a colonel with Brooklyn's 14th Regiment or the “Red-Legged Devils. His regiment fought at the First and Second Battles of Bull Run. At the later engagement the regiment suffered 90% casualties. After recovering Fowler was appointed commander of a military hospital, earning the gratitude of wounded soldiers from throughout the Union. Fowler returned to active service in the summer to 1863 to capture the Mississippi Brigade at Gettysburg. Subsequently his regiment fought with distinction during the Wilderness Campaign and the battle of Spotsylvania. He mustered out of the Army in late-1864 to reside in Brooklyn at 178 Fort Greene Place.

I also learned that the General had originally been erected in Fort Greene Park, however in the early 1970s scrap metal thieves attempted to to steal the bronze monument from its lonely posting and forced the city to relocate his statue to the present setting in 1976.

That evening I was sitting at Frank's Lounge with LA Larry and told him about the plans for the plaza and he laughed before taking a sip of cognac.

"Two years ago some of other new people to the neighborhood protested that the statue should be moved, because it was looking at Frank's Lounge like he wanted a drink."

"You're joking?" Some people have nothing better to do.

"Not at all. I can't blame the General for staring at Frank's. It's been here as long as he has and standing in all kinds of weather can work up a man's thirst."

"Better than pigeon pee." Rosa quipped pouring me another Stella beer.

"But what's strange is that until that protest I hadn't even noticed the statue." LA Larry turned his head and raised a glass to the General. "Ten years of sitting on this stool and not even notice him. It's not like it's a small thing."

"You watch other things out that window." Rosa worked Sundays and Monday. Everyone liked drinking with the Chinese bartender. Her beauty was a sight for sore eyes and her sense of humor was as sharp as a meat cleaver.

"Not so loud. My wife had good ears."

"All women do." We clinked glasses and back home I checked about the protest thinking LA Larry might have been funning me, because I'm one of the new people too ie white ofay.

Sure enough a Martin Horowitz was urging the city to rotate a statue of Gen. Edward Fowler about 90 degrees so that he’ll properly greet oncoming traffic from his perch at the intersection of Lafayette Avenue and Fulton Street instead of Frank’s Cocktail Lounge.

I like seeing the General looking my way.

He was a good man.

And every time I see him I raise my glass to Old Ned.

It's a good thing.

Sadly Frank's Lounge closed in 2017. General Fowler still stares at what once was Frank's and also ever vigilant to the South.

General Tso's Blizzard

From 2011

Prior to Christmas of 2009 my younger sister insisted on my spending the holiday with her in Boston. She was worried about my head, since our beloved father wasn't faring well and my wife and kids were on the other side of the world in Thailand.

"I don't want you to be alone."

"I won't be." I planned to pass the holiday solo.

"Not if you come up here." The lawyer erased any further reservations on my part by booking a ticket on the Chinatown bus. "Think of it as an early 60th birthday present. Get on that bus at noon and we'll have a nice time."

I surrendered to her better wishes and headed north to Boston. Our old next-door neighbors held a large party on the South Shore. Everyone discussed the big snow storm. My father told about a great storm in Maine.

"Nothing was worse than the one in 1978," argued Franny, my old car mechanic.

"That was a bad one."

"Twenty-nine people died in Buffalo," said Chuckie, my best friend throughout grammar school

We traded tales of that blizzard, which was topped by Frannie's recounting of a famous myth.

”Supposedly a father had left his house to buy milk for his children. He never returned that night or the next week or the ensuing month. His neighbors suggested that the husband had taken advantage of the snow emergency to runaway with another woman. The Spring thaw proved their suspicions wrong. The man was found frozen to death only feet away from his house with a carton of milk in his arm."

The classic urban legend had enough truth to it that the gathering shivered in remembrance of 1978.

"No one should go out in that kind of weather." My father believed in safety first. He and my later mother had spawned six children.

"I know. None of us ever went out of the house without a snow outfit."

Back in the 50s snow gear was thick and colored red, so a child could be found in the snow.

"Not all the time," my younger sister volunteered and then added, "Mom used to chain you on a harness to the clothing line."

"Chained?" Frannie guffawed almost spewing his whiskey.

"Yes, that way she could do household work, but you and your brother were too smart for your own good." She glanced over to Frunk. He was a year older than me and a lawyer like her. "You stripped off your parka and snow pants and then went down to the pier at the end of the street.”

Our youth had begun on a bluff over looking Portland Harbor.

"Mom found you naked on the pier."

"I guess it wasn't that cold."

"You had a 103 temperature for a week." My father remembered everything I had done. Most of my sins had been forgiven. "People die in the cold."

"But not tonight."

I refilled a glass of white wine and checked the weather online. The meteorologists warned of hazardous conditions for late Christmas Day. My older sister said, "Looks like you'll be stuck here."

"There are worse places than Boston in the snow."

"Like Logan," her son countered with a frown. "They just cancelled all flights out of Boston and I have to be to work on the 26th."

"That's why I think Christmas should be a moveable feast, so it can be a long weekend."

"Jesus was born on Christmas Day." Our host was a loyal believer. Christmas was Christmas only on the 25th. We toasted the manger in Bethlehem and I muttered 'Free Palestine' under my breath. Politics and religion were banned subjects on Christmas Eve.

The next day I woke at my father's apartment. I checked the low gray sky.

"Looks snow."

"That it does."

New Englanders read the signs of winter with a learned eye for the weather.

We exchanged gifts. I gave my father two bottles of Merlot and he handed me a check.

"Go see your kids." They were across the globe in Thailand.

I hugged him. He was a good father and my best friend, but the old Maniac had become a treacherous driver in his 80s. The ride over to my older sister's house off 128 was scary for the other drivers and terrifying for me.

"How was the ride?" asked my older sister's husband.

"Don't ask."

"How about a vodka-tonic?" David had retired this past summer and enjoyed his new position of local leisurologist.

His son was on the phone.

"Find a way back to DC?"

Matt gave me the thumbs down.

"There's always the Chinatown bus."

Everyone groaned about that option. Fung Wah had the most dangerous drivers in New England this side of my father.

"I don't think we have a choice."

And we didn't.

After a sumptuous turkey dinner Matt and I packed within minutes and my older sister drove us to South Station. We caught the 11AM bus. The snow was light, but the traffic was heavy. People were trying to get home before the storm worsened to trap them far from home. No one in their right mind was traveling. Both of us slept on the trip. I had drunk a few vodkas too many. Matt had done the same with wine. Upon our arrival in Chinatown I offered Matt to stay at my place.

"I got to be in work tomorrow."

"No one is going to work tomorrow."

"I will be."

Matt worked for an internet company, which was not affiliated with the CIA. At least that was his cover and I had been brought up to not ask questions about jobs in DC. I put him on a DC-bound bus and took the F train over to Brooklyn. It was only 4PM, so I stopped in Frank's Lounge for a beer.

Several of the regulars were in their Sunday seats. We talked of our Christmases and drank several rounds before looking out the window onto a terrifying scenario. The snow storm had upgraded to the wintery tornado. The accumulation was already ten inches and there was no sign of let-up. The TV announced the trains were being taken out of service.

"We where we are and nowhere else." Homer was happy to be in Frank's. It was our favorite bar, but we were hungry. He made several phone calls for take-out.

"Ain't no one going out in this weather?" Rosa the Mexican bartender said with a laugh. "Hell, I'm thinking of sleeping here."

"I'm leaving soon."

"That's because you only live two blocks away from that stool." She had a sharp tongue for such a beautiful face.

"You wrong about that?"

"Wrong about what?"

"About no one going out in this weather. The Chinaman always comes. Heck, back in 1978 I called a Chinaman and they delivered Chinese food through two feet of snow."

"Better than the US Mail."

"Through snow or sleet."

"And it comes late."

"Then I'm making the last call." Homer dialed the Chinese restaurant up the block.

"What you want?"

"They answered?"

"Sure, they did." I ordered the General Tso's Chicken extra chili. Homer followed suit.

"You know General Tso's Chicken doesn't exist in China." It supposedly was invented by the Hunnan chef T. T. Wang in 1972.

"How the hell am I supposed to know that. I ain't ever been to no damned China." Homer traveled mostly on a straight line. Brooklyn to Mississippi.

"Well, I have." Only one time to Yunnan, Sichuan, and Tibet in 1995. "And there was no General Tso's Chicken."

"I don't care about no China. I'm here in Brooklyn."

The traffic on Fulton had been extinctized by the snow. We feared that our food wasn't coming and we would have to survive on the packets of chips from behind the bar, but the door banged open for a small man covered by snow. He held two bags of food. We cheered his arrival and Homer gave him a $5 tip.

"That's because Tipping ain't no city in China and a Chinaman will deliver your food even when the US Mail can't get through. Here's to the Chinaman."

We raised our glasses and ate like this was the last meal on Earth.

Looking out the window that's just the way it felt on the night before Snow Day.

Rent-Free Hell 2016

Yesterday was Easter Sunday and on the C train between Hoyt-Schemmerhorn and Lafayette Street a young man was preaching about the wrath of his lord. "God loves his flock, but hates a sinner. All you sinners will have a special place of torment in Hell." He glared about the subway car like Josef Mengele, the SS Angel of Death at Auschwitz-Birkenau. I met his stare with cold blue eyes, but smiled as I asked, "Are those places rent-free?" Most of the passengers were immune from his rant. Their headphones and earplugs filled their head with song. A few were free of any device and they laughed at my quip. The preacher was not amused and pointed a finger in my direction. "The end is coming soon." "Not soon enough for me, if it means you'll be taken to your holy heaven and I don't have to listen to you anymore." The train stopped at Lafayette and I stepped onto the platform, half-expecting the preacher man to follow my exit. He stood at the door of the subway shaking the Bible at me. "You're lost." The preacher scowled without joy. There are no jokes in hell for the Christians. "Not lost, but found in the beauty of humanity and the glory of love." "Damnation." "And I couldn't be happier." The subway doors closed and the preacher was dragged deeper into Brooklyn. I exited from the train station to enjoy the cool evening air thinking about the Jesus-lover celebrating Bunny Day with an egg hunt. No humor was one thing, but no fun was another, then again stranger things have happened to the faithful. Even to those without a sense of humor. I'll be laughing my head off in Hell. Rent-free of course.

A Night Without Northen Lights 4/13/2013

Fort Greene April 13, 2013 From my roof I sought the Northern Lights The moon shone silver in the clear night Vanishing the aurora borealis from sight Banning the promised show from a city too bright. Clouds soon blanketed the heavens with a soft white Disapointed I descended from the roof's heights To my room and drink beer to soften the plight Of Man's futile search for the Northern Lights. and I don't have to rythme anything with beer, because the dance of the sky is always there after the sixth beer.

Blizzard Conditions

In 2015 no snow fell on Christmas Day in New York.

None fell on New Year's Day north in Duchess County either, although snow clung under the rocky shadows in the woods.

The North Atlantic states were experiencing an extraordinarily warm winter, despite my prayers to pagan snow gods.

Two days ago the weathermen predicted a change. It had nothing to do with my prayers.

A spectacular Nor'easter was scheduled to up the Eastern Seaboard spraying epic snowfalls on the coast

They were not wrong.

Washington DC recorded 24' of the white stuff, while Fort Greene in Brooklyn was covered by 30", which was the second deepest snowfall ever to hit New York. Mayor DeBlasio declared an emergency and the city shut down for the duration of the blizzard.

As the snow tapped off in the evening, I emerged from the Fort Greene Observatory to see the accumulation of snow on the street as well as find someplace open.

Motorists were obeying the mayor's edict and not a single car was on Lafayette Avenue.

Now out of the house I thought about getting a drink.

A beer.

Fort Greene was known for its bars.

One had to be open.

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DA AUTUMN LEAVES by Peter Nolan Smith

Written October 2010

Back in the 60s my family home on the South Shore bordered on a small woods and every October the trees beyond the old stone wall turned brilliant reds, yellows, and oranges. The glorious explosion of color lasted several weeks, then the colding wind ripped the weaker leaves from the branches and they fell by the millions into our back yard.

My brothers and sisters loved running through the rustling layers of decay, but come the weekend the fun ended with my father ordering my older brother and me to rake the leaves into piles. Once the lawn was visible my father lit our labor afire and the smoke of those gathered leaves filled the yard with the fragrance of another burnt autumn.

Of course the next morning the leaves were replaced by their cousins. Less than before, yet throughout the next week my brother and I reaped another harvest of leaves and my father lit another fire. This Sisyphean ritual was repeated until the trees were bare.

I hated raking leaves. The task seemed as senseless as mowing the lawn, which was a chore my father demanded from his sons and we performed his command without question. Young boys in the early 60s were prized for their devotion to obedience. Merit badges and gold stars paved the avenues of success. My older brother followed the path through university and law school.

In the 70s I rejected the lawn, the station wagon, the two-car garage, and raking the lawn.

The East Village became my home.

The tenements were wrapped by concrete sidewalks and the the wind disposed of the leaves from the ornamental pear trees on East 10th Street. I didn't touch a rake for most of my adult life and loved this freedom from the fetish of neatness tormenting the suburbs, although I missed the smell of a good autumn fire.

Recently my good friend AP spoke of an Easthampton client who ordered the landscapers to blow errant leaves from the estate's 20-acre lawn. Before the ground crew finished the job, the billionaire came out of his mansion and requested that the workers pick out the finest leaves for a pristine pile of leaves for his children to run through after school.

"That's the way of the rich." AP deals with such people all the time as a architect.

We laughed at their excess. That 1% knows how to spend the 95% of the wealth.

After hearing that story I went to shoot baskets at my local park on deKalb Avenue. No one was on the court, but several park workers were raking leaves. I thought about my father and the East Village and then the rich guy in Easthampton. No one could escape raking leaves and upon leaving the park I commented to one worker about this task and he said, "Yeah, we're bringing them to another park, so the kids can run through them. They love that."

Same as rich kids in Easthampton.

And me too.

It does make a pretty sound.

For the rich the poor and the in-between.

$69 Watermelon

The price of everything in New York City is determined by a multi-layer of costs; taxes, rents, transportation et al. Fort Greene's merchants ticket their merchandise, as if the one-time black neighborhood was a suburb of Paris. The other day I wandered into Provisions on Fulton Street. Its AC was a relief from the heat, which was 98 in the shade. Watermelon the size of Civil War cannonballs lay by the cash register.

They were organic.

I picked up one.

Watermelon originated in Africa. The Chinese were wild for them. They were introduced to the Americas in the 1500s. 8% sugar and 92% sugar watermelon also contain citrulline, which relaxes the blood vessels.

My blood was boiling from the heat wave and I waved a c-note, asking, "How much?"

The cashier weighed the melon. The register printed out the slip. I read the amount.

$69.

"You have to be kidding." My query was mired with shock.

"No, I don't think so." The laser scanned the sticker.

$69 again.

"Holy shit." A black jumbo watermelon in Japan had sold for $6100 in 2008.

Those were good times.

Not now, so this had to be the most expensive watermelon in New York.

I put my $100 back in my wallet. I had children to support. I walked up Fulton Street with an empty cloth shopping bag. I was doing my part to save the planet. I entered the Green Grape wine store and told the boys at the counter about the $69 watermelon.

"Had to be a mistake."

"Yeah, but it looked so perfect."

"69 dollars?"

"Yes."

We were in awe.

I bought a cheap but cheerful bottle of rose wine from Aix-en-Provence.

It was only $11.

With ice in the glass I got real relaxed for cheap.

Fuck the $69 watermelon.

Hurry Hurry to Nowhere

June 22 marked the summer solstice, but the America's calender is governed by the July 4th holiday and nothing says summer more than the Independence Day Traffic Festival. Millions of cars, trucks, and motorcycles hit the highways for fun, sun, BBQs, beer, beaches, pools, lakes, and mountains.

Anyplace, but home and the bottlenecks, accidents and overheated cars create monumental traffic snarls, doubling or tripling the length of journeys. Tempers are short and drivers suffer Tourrette's Syndrome epidemic.

This year I opted out of the festival.

No Sarasota. No Nantucket. No Hamptons. No Jersey Shore.

I'm in Fort Greene and plan on drinking beer at Franks's on Fulton.

No traffic and cold beer.

Paradise enow.

Danger Old Man

In 2008 I left my family in Thailand and moved to Fort Greene. The neighborhood abutted the closed Brooklyn Navy Yard, which had employed 80,000 during the War Years. Bars, brothels, opium dens, and gambling rooms dotted the slope up to Fulton Street, serving as the inspiration for Hubert Selby Jr.s LAST EXIT TO BROOKLYN. After the Yard's closure in 1966 combined with the completion of the BQE or US 278 destroyed the neighborhood. Sin was replaced by danger and drinking by drugs. Only the toughest joints remained protected by loyal customers, but after Sellers shut its doors the only local bar left was Frank's Lounge.

I've drunk at hundreds of bars around the world. Only a few have been home; Concannon and Sennett's in Brighton Mass., tHe Gaslight Pub in Park Slope, CGGBs, le Pere Tranquille in Les Halles, the Soho House in London, and the Buffalo Bar in Pattaya.

Coming bck from the city I got off the C train and spotted a bar across Fulton Street. It looked old school. The second I entered the bar into Frank's Lounge, I know knew where I was. The ceiling was stucco whit4e. The TV was an old Trinatron. There were three people in the bar. Buddy Guy was on te stereo.

Hey white boy," a big man drawled with a lifelong Delta accent.

"Firstly while I ain't as old as you, I ain't no boy."

"I turned to young Chinese-Mexican bartender.

"If you serve gin and tonics really strong, then I'm a happy man." I signaled the Chinese bartender." "You got the right place and Homer, stop harassing the customers, I'm trying to make money." "Please make mine a double .Put in a big glass. Twice the gin half the ice."

"And get 'Homer' a Heineken." "I don't need a beer, Cracker." He stuck all his drawl in every word.

I had been a race traitor in Boston and said with a hard no-H South Shore, "I ain't no cracker."

"What you know about crackers?"

"The crack of the whip."

"Homer, shut your hole," said a nattily dressed man in his 70s. He stuck out his hand and said, "Old Bill. don't mind Homer, he's harmless."

"Excepting when I'm not." Homer said and shook my hand. "Sorry White Boy, but you all look the same to me." ,

THE NAME IS FENWAY by Peter Nolan Smith

I was born in Boston in 1952. My childhood, teenage years, and college career were spent within the confines of New England. My heart belonged to the Celtics and Red Sox. These allegiances were never challenged by my decades of living in New York or anywhere else in the world.

When in 2004 the Red Sox came back from a 0-3 deficit to defeat the Yankees, I was sitting in a bar in Thailand. The only fan in the bar. The other drinkers were finishing off the night. I cheered the ending of the Curse of the Bambino by buying everyone at the bar a drink. We toasted the triumph. None of them cared since they were Thai or English wankers.

I was sober and they were drunk.

I got my way and celebrated the victory by buying everyone at the bar a drink. After my explanation of the Curse of the Bambino, we toasted the the Red Sox. Few of them cared about baseball, although the Brits understood the pain, since England hasn't won the World Cup in over a half-century.

Four years later my Thai wife Mam announced that she was pregnant with a boy and I consulted my overseas friends for a name.

Jesse James Smith sounded good, until someone informed me that the Missouri outlaw had owned slaves. Malcolm X Smith was a little too heavy a name to carry through his life. My favorite runner as a teenager had been 2OO-meter champion Tommie Smith, who had raised his fist in protest of racism at the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City, but Tommie Smith Smith was too much Smith for my boy.

"What about Fenway?" suggested Shannon Greer on a long distance call to Brooklyn. We were good friends, despite his status as a Yankee fan.

Four years later my Thai wife Mam announced that she was pregnant with a boy and I consulted my overseas friends for a name. Jesse James Smith sounded good, until someone said that the Missouri outlaw owned slaves. Malcolm X Smith was a little too heavy a name to carry through his life. My favorite runner as a teenager was Tommie Smith. He had raised his fist on the medal podium at the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City.

Tommie Smith Smith was too much Smith.

"What about Fenway?" suggested Shannon Greer. He's a New York fan. We are good friends.

"Fenway Smith." I liked it and googled Fenway Smith. None showed up on the search for Smith, Jones, Williams, Lee, Sanchez, Miller, or Martin. I explained the origins of the name to Mam.

"Can not name your son Fenway Park Smith."

"Why not?"

"Everyone think he Korean not Thai with name Park."

She was right and we have a loving son Fenway.

His middle name is Superstar.

Back in 2012 I had to leave Thailand. I traveled back and forth every 2-3 months until COVIDS hit the world. Fenway is always in my mind as are the rest of my children; Fluke, Noi, and Angie. My younger sister disapproved of naming my son 'Fenway'.

She's a lawyer. They have strong opinions.

"You'll see why it's stupid."

She's has a funny way of being right, but Fenway has many names; Wey-wey, One-way, and always Superstar.

Presently I live in Brooklyn. It's more Mets territory than Yankee land. My friends at Frank's Lounge appreciate the name and on many occasions I proudly tell people, "My son's name is Fenway."

Last week I bought him a Red Sox suit. I walked back to my brownstone and saw a young man with a small dog. He was wearing a Red Sox cap. We spoke about our faith and I asked him, "What's your dog's name?"

"Fenway."

I didn't tell him about my son, but several days later I ran into another young Red Sox fan with a dog. Once again the mutt's name was Fenway and I understood the reason parents don't name their kids 'Fenway' is because young men name their dogs after the Bosox park.

But I'm not a young man anymore, yet I have memories.

Back in the early 60s my father took me to see the KC As at Fenway. I sat on the steps of the 3rd base line for the 1975 World Series. 2004 I was halfway around the world. A Red Sox fan to the core and my son is Fenway Superstar Smith.

One day I'll take him to the temple and that destiny is written in the stars.

The Death of the Road

In 2013 my summer holiday plans fell apart one by one. An ex-girlfriend's Nantucket house had too many guests, my mate in Millbrook had accepted an invitation to the Rockefeller’s’ Adirondack estate, and my sister was leaving Maine for a conference in Boston. All the flights to Thailand were out of my budget and Labor Weekend came with a harsh realization.

I was stuck in New York.

At least it wasn’t New Jersey.

Earlier in the day I had bought a small painting off the street for $1. It hung on my kitchen wall. Telephone poles outlined against a cobalt sky. The words HIT THE ROAD in the corner spoke the ancient language of wanderlust and I contemplated hitchhiking across the USA, following Jack Kerouac’s route in ON THE ROAD.

“That’s a great idea.” My landlord AP loved adventure. He had two kids. His freedom was linked to their attaining 21 in the year 2025.

“Have you seen any hitchhikers?”

“Not on the LIE.” AP drove once a week from Fort Greene to Hamptons to check on his building site. “Or anywhere else.”

“Me neither.” The spring of 2009 I had traveled over 2000 miles through Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Iowa, Minnesota, and Wisconsin without seeing a single hitchhiker on the roads. I called several friends in Florida, Maine, and California. None reported a sighting.

“Maybe they’re extinct.” AP was puzzled by their disappearance and I rethought my trans-American travels. Denver was a good two days from New York by car. Maybe 3-4 by thumb. If I left Monday morning, I wouldn’t get to Colorado until Wednesday. Another 2-3 days to the coast. Saturday or Sunday. Online flights one-way from San Francisco to JFK cost over $300. I had $700 in my pocket, plus two kids in Thailand.

Instead I went to Ralph's Deli and bought a six-pack of Modelo.

I wasn’t going anywhere.

But I had known that all along.