New York State Of Mind - 2012

Last night I was sitting in Frank's Lounge bemoaning the Patriots 20-18 loss to the Cards.

"It was a fix. That holding charge against Danny Woodhead was weak. You know when the refs blow a call, when the TV doesn't show the replay." I was on my fourth beer and speaking loud to Paco and Vince.

"So you saying the game was fixed?" Paco was a few years my senior. The Giant fan knew football.

"Maybe." Games were only fixed by referees and the NFL.

"The point spread was already blown and the over-under was 48, so tell me who was to gain from a bad call."

"Add six points to the 38 and a conversion."

"That makes 45. The under is still safe." Vince didn't bet on games. He was a school administrator for math. He was good with numbers.

"Not if the Cards came back and score a field goal." I was deep in an alternative universe.

"That's not what happened, besides this is New York. We don't give a shit, if New England wins." Paco had Brooklyn-born.

Our argument wandered through several topics until we got to best song about Boston and New York. The three of us agreed that DIRTY WATER was Boston's theme song, but none of us thought that Sinatra's NEW YORK NEW YORK was a shoo-in for top New York song.

"I used to listen to it in Boston and think, "Yeah, start spreading the news."

"That's because you come from Boston. New Yorkers don't about New York like that, because we don't leave New York." Vince was younger than both Paco and me. He had been to North Carolina twice. "Plus Sinatra is from New Jersey."

"Only one song I consider # 1." Paco got up from his stool and played Jay Z's EMPIRE STATE OF MIND backed by Alicia Keyes. "This is a song by New Yorkers. The sample comes from LOVE ON A TWO WAY STREET by Sylvie Robinson. She's from Brooklyn and Angela Hunte and Jnay wrote EMPIRE. They Brooklyn too."

"So EMPIRE is a Brooklyn song? Not New York."

"Fool, Brooklyn is New York."

"I know that." I had moved to Park Slope in 1976, thinking I was commuting to Manhattan, the real New York, but not anymore. Brooklyn was my town, but another song slipped onto my mental charts. "I think you have a good argument, but what about Billie Holiday's AUTUMN IN NEW YORK or NO SLEEP TILL BROOKLYN?"

"I know what you're trying to do?" Paco pointed a finger with a smile on his lips. "You're gonna say that the Pogues' FAIRYTALE OF NEW YORK is your song. You Irish are so predictable."

"No, I wasn't."

"Oh, yes, you were," Rosa the bartender had been listening to our every word. The Chinese girl had big ears and a warm heart for this city. "EMPIRE is # 1, NEW YORK NEW YORK is # 2, and FAIRY TALE is # 3. And that's it. Anyone have a problem with that?"

Paco, Vince, and I shook our heads. Rosa was the boss at Frank's Lounge and all three of us were old enough to know that a woman is never wrong.

And I mean never.

To hear EMPIRE STATE OF MIND please go to the following URL

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0UjsXo9l6I8

DO BE DO BE DO

"To be is to do"-Socrates

"To do is to be"-Sartre

"Do Be Do Be Do"-Sinatra

"Yaba Daba Doo!"-Fred Flintstone

Jobim AGUAS DE MARCO

Some music never goes out of fashion.

TOM JOBIM & ELIS REGINA - AGUAS DE MARÇO

The inventor of the Bossa Nova avoided collaborating with Elis Regina for years until this amazing duet.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qle1OrunKnE

I love the words to this song.

Here are the English lyrics

Waters of March

It is wood, it is stone It is the end of the way It is the rest of a bole It is a bit in loneliness

It is a shard of glass It is life, it is sun It is the night, it is the death It is the tie , it is the hook ...

It is peroba do campo It is the knob in the wood Caingá, candeia It is matita-pereira

It is madeira de vento The fall of the bluff It is a profound mystery It is the "want it or not want it"

It is the wind, blowing It is the end of the slope It is the beam, it is the span Festa da Cumeeira...

It is rain, raining It is a talk in idle of the waters of March It is the end of the tiredness

It is the foot, it is the ground It is the trail on the road Bird in the hand Stone of slingshot

It is a bird in the sky It is a bird on the ground It is a stream, it is a fontain It is a piece of bread ...

It is the bottom of the well It is the end of the way A woe in the face It is a bit in loneliness

It is a thorn, it is a nail It is a tip, it is a point It is a drop, dripping It is a bead, it is a tale ...

It is a fish, it is a gesture It is the silver, shining It is the morning light It is the brick, coming

It is the firewood, it is the day It is the worstest after the worst It is a bottle of cane Fragment on the road ...

It is the project of the house It is a body in the bed It is the car in breakdown It is the mud, it is the mud

It is a footstep, it is a bridge It is a frog, it is a frog It is a rest of bush... under the morning light

They are the waters of March, Closing the summer And the promise of life in your heart ...

It is a snake, it is a stick of wood It is João, it is José It is a thorn in the hand It is a cut in the foot ...

They are the waters of March, closing the summer... and the promise of life... in your heart

It is wood, it is stone It is the end of the way It is the rest of a bole It is a bit in loneliness

It is a step, it is a bridge It's a frog, it is a frog It is a beautiful horizon Interminent fever

They are the waters of March, closing the summer... and the promise of life... in your heart

-Esto, -Oco, -Ouco, -Inho -Oite, -Orte, -Aço, -Zol...

They are the waters of March, closing the summer... and the promise of life... in your heart

Of course Jobim had no trouble performing with Old Blue Eyes.

FRANK SINATRA & TOM JOBIM - TV SHOW - 1967

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XP64PDhcs4Y

Bossa Nova forever new.

Do Be Do Be Do

"To be is to do"-Socrates "To do is to be"-Sartre "Do Be Do Be Do"-Sinatra "Yaba Daba Doo!"-Fred Flintstone

Could I Have This Dance?

Frank Sinatra liked skinny. Nancy Reagan fit that description. He had an affair with the 1st Lady in the White House. I don't know if that's rumor is true, but this photo says a million words and all of them is 'adultery'.

ONLY A FEW REGRETS by Peter Nolan Smith

"Regrets I have a few, but not too few to mention." Frank Sinatra sang in MY WAY. I myself only have regrets about the things I have not done for I can live with those I have done; the good, the bad, and the in-between, however other people are not so self-forgiving.

The other day I ran into female friend from the 80s at a restaurant in the Meat Packing District. Her face had graced the covers of French fashion magazines. Men fought over her beauty with fists and compete for her attention with money.

My attempts to seduce Valla ended in unrequited frustration and I resigned our relationship to friendship along with many of the other models populating Paris. We bid farewell in 1988.

Decades passed without our seeing each other until this chance encounter.

"I heard you were living in Paris."

"Yes, I have a family there."

"Children?" Valla explained about traveling between France and Africa for her clothing line.

"Four and you?"

"One, but she's all grown up and following her mother's footsteps."

"A model?"

"Cover girl." Valla was still beautiful in the way that beautiful women are when they refuse to be anything else but beautiful.

We had a few wines and then a drink. I was feeling a little more of the wine than the drink. Her hand touched my arm. "You want a night cap at my hotel?"

"I have to go to work tomorrow." It was almost midnight and the L train was shit after that witching hour.

"You could always sleep over." Her touch became a caress.

I had wanted this woman so badly twenty years ago. I would have set myself on fire to get her in bed. Now I could only say, "Not really."

"Not really." Her face adopted hard lines. No one had said no in a long time. "You know I was talking about you and several of my friends. We all asked why none of us slept with you."

"And what the answer?" I could see her at a table in Paris. All these great beauties reviewing their love affairs. I had been with none of them

"We always thought you were with one of us."

"Oh." It was too late to relive the past and I pulled away my arm. My Thai wife would be happy with my decision.

"Guess it is getting late."

"I guess so." I walked her over to the hotel. She was gracious enough to not repeat her request and I kissed her on the cheek, smelling the same perfume I had breathed 20 years before. There will always be regrets, but only for the past and not the present and I'll avoid those to prevent getting run down by those naked fantasies. They are too many to count on any man's fingers.