Conservatives and Impeachment, Through the Years

After an eighteen month absence from this blog, I expect you certainly might wonder, why this, why now?

It was all innocent enough. I finally got around to rummaging closely through my late father’s papers. Big old dusty accordion files of 1960’s-1970’s vintage, cloth bindings, legal size. Military records. His Harvard transcript (mostly Cs and Ds), his BU Law transcript (magna cum laude). Press clippings. Private correspondence between him and others. “Dear mom and dad” letters from summer camp, from my brothers and me. Amazing stuff.

Among some assorted documents from the 1990’s was a copy of an “Open letter to the Members of the United States House of Representatives and the United States Senate.”

The letter concerned the highly-contentious matter of whether or not the Congress should take up an impeachment inquiry into the conduct of President Bill Clinton following the discovery of Clinton’s perjurious testimony in his Paula Jones deposition. The letter itself is undated, but was intended to respond to an October 28, 1998 letter from 400 historians opposed to impeachment, which was followed by a concurring opinion of some 430 law professors. Since Clinton was impeached by the House in December of that year, it’s safe to say the letter was written in the month before the impeachment vote.

The author of the letter is unidentified, and I doubt Charles H. Morin had a significant hand in its drafting, or else it would have been much, much better. Nonetheless, I’m certain he had a hand in its circulation and solicitation for signatories, among them the conservative elite in national government, academia and legal practice. Names like William Bennett, Robert Bork, Mark Levin, Edwin Meese, William Bradford Reynolds, and dozens of law professors and historians.

And Charles H. Morin.

You see, for the past eight years or so, I have wondered how my dad, the rock-ribbed, hard-core conservative Republican, would have reacted to the election of Trump, his administration, the changes in the Party leadership, the wholesale adoption of Trumpism as the dominating principle of government, and Trump’s impeachments – both of them.

I did have a firm idea how he felt about Trump – he absolutely detested the man. It might have had something to do with dad’s 1970’s works as Chairman of Nixon’s Commission on the Review of the National Policy Toward Gambling, which long preceded Trump’s entry into the casino business, but Trump had been sniffing around and trying to insinuate himself into the public hearings for publicity, and my father generally had a pitch-perfect bullshit meter and absolutely no patience for stupid people. During one of the many visits to Florida before he left us, I remember watching an early episode of The Apprentice with mom and dad (both total Boob Tube junkies). The same word kept coming out of their mouths: “fraud.”

So I’ve had some faith that, as I would have hoped, my most brilliant father would have been horrified when Trump used the Presidency to attempt to extort Ukraine’s foreign aid, and certainly when he fomented an insurrection. I’d faithfully put him in with Liz Cheney, Adam Kinziger, Bill Barr, Mark Milley, Michael Luttig, et al – the brilliant, principled conservatives who hadn’t already melted down their moral compasses. I’d heard him say enough contemptuous things about Falwell and “the Moral Majority” and the “Tea Party” movement (not that he disagreed with the policies, just with the idiots leading the charge). He thought these assholes (his word) were “ruining conservatism.” Nonetheless, he admired Dan Quayle and considered Nixon the smartest man he’d ever met, so who can ever know?

Now then, the letter, and the obvious questions that must be asked of all of the signatories to this letter: How do you feel about impeachment now, given our recent experiences with Trump’s two and the House’s current parodic pursuit of the “Biden Crime Family?”

Let’s look at the text:

This letter from twenty-five years ago provides a compelling illustration of how far the conservative standards for presidents have fallen.

“When the President defies the constitutional rules applicable to him, there must be no escape by narrow sophistries and linguistic maneuvering.” Do you hear that, Supreme Court?

“Impeachment is as much a part of the Constitution as the First Amendment. In fulfilling their constitutional duties, neither the courts nor the Congress should be deflected by public opinion polls.” Do you hear that, spineless, MAGA-fearing incumbents?

If a president can lie with impunity to the American people about his own disgraceful behavior and his multiple perjuries, who can henceforth expect any truth to issue from the Oval Office?” Oh, thud, I think the horse has left the barn.

I’m going to encourage someone of more media heft to reach out to the remaining living signatories to this letter, listed here:

Save Me a Spot in Your Foursome, Stevie

Time to say goodbye to another dear, dear friend.

Stephen O’Neil, the unelected Mayor of Hyannisport, the de facto general manager of property maintenance in Hyannisport, the encyclopedia of home sales, keeper (and teller) of secrets (depending on whose they were), raconteur, joke-teller, and Big Liver of Life, died peacefully at home with his family this morning. I was on my way down to visit him when I got the word.

Stevie and I played an awful lot of golf together. He was also my handshake “business partner” (some flyer than never materialized), client (when “something came up”), and host for the Hyannisport Member-Guest, and therein lies a story worth telling. *Lest anyone feel I am divulging private, sensitive information here, this story has been told many times, several times by Stevie himself. He was never bashful about these things.

Back in 1995, when we moved from the Cape to Scituate, I was faced with the vexing decision of whether or not I should give up my membership at Hyannisport- because who’s going to drive from Scituate to the Cape on Saturday morning in July to play golf? Ultimately, I made the “right decision” and faxed a resignation letter to the club secretary in February of 1996. When I proudly announced this to my wife, she exclaimed, aghast, “I paid the dues bill while you were gone last week!”

As I reflected on my great fortune to have a wife such as she, my cell phone rang (this was way back in the pre-historic days of the bag phone). It was Stevie; he had a little temporary cash flow problem – he was about to be posted for not paying his dues bill on time, and he wasn’t due to get his annual lottery payment (he had one of the million dollar scratch tickets) for a few weeks. Could I front him the dues money? Knowing that the club already had my money and I would have to call them and ask for it back, I knew the answer already, but I had to get something back in the bargain, right?

So I told Stevie I would pay his bill, but in exchange, he would have to invite me as his guest (at the club I was a member at for 14 years). He happily agreed (to the detriment of his older brother), and for 5 years or so, I was a guest of the O’Neils in Hyannisport and Stevie’s playing partner.

To my knowledge, this photo is the only evidence.

Dashiel Hammett and Wang Dang Doodle

I was listening to Koko Taylor’s version of the iconic Wang Dang Doodle this morning at the gym. It’s a beauty – which I prefer to Howlin’ Wolf’s version (or any other) of this classic Willie Dixon hit.

For some reason, every time I hear this song, I am struck by the nicknames of the characters and instantly reminded of what I consider to be one of the best mystery short stories in American literature, Dashiel Hammett’s The Big Knockover, published in 1927.

Here are Willie Dixon’s original lyrics, recorded in Chicago in 1960:

Tell automatic slim
Tell razor totin’ jim
Tell butcher knife totin’ annie
Tell fast talkin’ fanny
Tonite we’re gonna pitch a ball
Down to that union hall
Gonna romp and tromp ’till midnite
We’re gonna fuss and fight ’till daylight
We’re gonna pitch a wang dang doodle all night long

Tell poodle I’ll tell him here
Tell albert I’ll see him near
Tell old pistol pete
Everybody gonna meet
Tonite we need no rest
We’re really gonna throw a mess
We’re gonna break out all the windows
Gonna kick down all the doors
We’re gonna pitch a wang dang doodle all night long

Tell fats and washboard sam
That everybody’s gonna jam
Just shake it boxcar joe
We got sawdust on the floor
Tell chicken head till I die
We’re gonna have a time
When the fish head fills the air
Be snuff juice everywhere
We’re gonna pitch a wang dang doodle all night long

I was never so taken by a short story as I was by The Big Knockover, especially how the names of the army of characters lent so much body to the atmosphere. Hammett’s roster of bit players was the impetus for my inclusion of so many oddballs in Diary of a Small Fish, an editorial decision not all readers agreed with.

Here is a list of the Hammett characters from The Big Knockover, all having their own special role in a theft of epic proportions.

Red O’Leary

The Shivering Kid

Itchy Maker

Darby M’Laughlin

Happy Jim Hacker

Alphabet Shorty McCoy

Donkey Marr

Rumdum Smith

Lefty Read

Toots Salda

Sylvia Yount

The Dis-and-Dat Kid

Bernie Bernheimer, alias the Motsa Kid

Sheeny Holmes

Snohomish Shitey

Bluepoint Vance

L. A. Slim, from Denver

Spider Girrucci

Old Pete Best

Fat Boy Clarke

Red Cudahy

Pogy Reeve

Tom Brooks, who invented the Richmond razzle-dazzle and bought three hotels with the profits

Big Flora Brace

Nancy Regan

Denny Burke, Baltimore’s King of Frog Island

Bull McGonickle, still pale from fifteen years in Joliet

Johnny the Plumber

Paddy the Mex, an amiable conman who looked like the King of Spain

Paperbox-John Cardigan

Angel Grace Cardigan

Toby the Lugs, who used to brag about picking President Wilson’s pocket in a Washington vaudeville theatre

Chick Corea

I was on elliptical at the gym this morning, listening to Chick Corea Radio on Pandora. Lots of Chick, Gary Burton, Pat Methaney, Stanley Clarke. Happy music, is what I’ve called it since the late 1970’s.

Chick and I go “way back,” in a way. I “met” him in 1976 or 1977 in Burlington, Vermont. At the time, I was the Arts and Entertainment Editor for the UVM school newspaper, the Vermont Cynic. When Chick Corea and Stanley Clarke were scheduled to perform with Al DiMeola and Lenny White at Burlington Memorial Auditorium, it did not take me long to decide who got the assignment. I secured my front row seat and backstage pass, loaded up my crappy hand-me-down Minolta camera with a large roll of film, and headed off to my assignment.

Unfortunately, the band was late, so I didn’t get any pre-concert interview (or post-concert, as it turned out), but both Chick Corea and Stanley Clarke assured me as they were about to take the stage that, if I just paid attention, they would make it up to me. Chick nodded at the camera and said, “don’t put that down.” They then proceeded to burn the house down, and in doing so, they mugged for me like they were being paid for every face. I really remember only one picture (I long ago lost the negatives): As Chick was attacking his keyboard in one of his spectacularly melodic elegies, he turned toward me (sidestage), crinkled his eyes shut and stuck his tongue out between clenched teeth. SNAP!

I left that concert with one thought: that guy really, really loves what he does!

At the beginning of the pandemic lockdown in the Spring of 2020 (holy crap, a year and a half ago!), I was reminded of the concert (and the many times since that I have seen him) when Chick turned to Facebook every afternoon at about 4:30 or so to live stream his practice sessions. Just Chick and his grand piano, at his home, with piles and piles of sheet music on the piano. He would rummage through the pile, pull something out, explain what it was, when he wrote it, usually a little story about it, and then he launched into 10 minutes of what he does in a truly inimitable style that separates him from the field. Here’s a sample of him combining Mozart and Gershwin.

For several weeks, I tuned in daily, iPad in my lap, and allowed Chick Corea to wipe away the worry and strife of those horrible days, often with tears streaming down my face — HAPPY MUSIC, it was, and I remembered the look of pure joy on his face as he bit his tongue in Burlington 43 years ago.

Less than a year later, Chick Corea died of a rare form of cancer, and I wondered if he knew – if he chose this way to say hello and goodbye to his fans. Whether intentional or not, it was a fitting coda to the life of a man who loved what he did to the very end.

[Research note: I have been unable to confirm through any internet source the dates of the concerts I witnessed at Memorial Auditorium. The primary source, concertarchives.org, lists none of them. Chick Corea and Stanley Clarke, Gary Burton Quintet (with Pat Methaney), Billy Cobham and George Duke, all between 1976-1977. Prove me right!]

PANDEMIC BLUES

When the global pandemic washed across the world and brought the global economy to a standstill, I think it’s fair to say that most of us were in something of a daze, facing a future of indefinite uncertainty we’d never, ever had to contemplate. When the lockdown first took effect, I couldn’t help but think of the title of the sci-fi classic, “the day the earth stood still.”

Confined to our homes, unable to anticipate when work might resume, or what life would be like if we ever made it through this, millions of us turned to projects that would fill time, be productive, distract us from the dire state of things. The dumpster business was vigorous as all kinds of household clutter found its way into landfills in April and May. Garden shops and greeneries did gangbuster business, and new or expanded gardens sprouted. Old hobbies were resumed. Paint sales were brisk.

There was a great deal of emotion in this period. Sadness, anger, fear, despair, worry seemed to be at the top of the list, as there wasn’t much to be positive about. It was difficult to be suddenly confronted with isolation from your friends, family and workmates, unable to pursue the expressive outlets you had come to rely on for peace of mind and happiness.

The lockdown barred me from the weekly blues jams that had fulfilled my happiness outlet for the past twenty years. To fill the void, I spent many nights writing and recording songs on my simple Garageband iPad app. Just me, recording my own voice, guitar and bass and adding drums and piano from the app.  Each time one was finished, I shared it on Facebook. I called them the “Coronavirus Isolation Blues Series” (since shortened).

Over six weeks, I published ten songs in all on Youtube, some quite unremarkable. If you were to listen to them chronologically, I think you would find an evolution in my emotional state – first bewildered, melancholy, darkly humorous, devolving to sarcastic, then downright indignant! One might even characterize one or two of these as “protests songs!”

One of my favorite music friends is Jay Psaros, a talented, industrious, smart, and hard-working musician. Shortly before the pandemic hit, Jay had rented some space in  Scituate and built out a recording studio, which he now couldn’t use, except alone. An opportunity had become a worry. Jay took the opportunity seriously, and produced several superb “Facebook Live” shows from the studio that were quite successful. In another inventive promotional effort, he had his fans video themselves lip-syncing one of his songs, cut and spliced them all together, and published the compilation as a new music video.

Still, dozens of music venues had closed indefinitely, with no certainty that they would ever reopen (and less certainty today!). Performing artists had no place to play. Like Jay, they also turned to Facebook and other social media platforms to try to preserve their livelihood with virtual performances. Suddenly, we could watch Chick Corea’s practice sessions every day at 5:00, and for so many well-established performing musicians, Venmo/Paypal became “the door.” “Live From Home Open Stage” became a thing, open to anyone brave enough to click the green button. Much of it was very bad. Some of it was brilliant.

In early June, Jay and I talked about recording a few of the songs in his studio. I contacted Andy Bergsten (who was locked down in Florida) to ask for his musical direction and bass skills, and he agreed… once he was permitted to leave Florida and cleared quarantine at home.

I had this wild idea that someone might actually contribute money to this music project, so asked Andy for a few ideas, and the first words from his mouth were “Magical Moon Foundation” in Marshfield, the creation of Donna Green, a talented local artist and great humanitarian. More on Donna and the Foundation below.

Over a few days in late July, four songs were recorded. Then in August, we added Bobby Mroz’s brilliant keyboards and harmonica, and all was then mixed and produced by Jay at “PB & J Records.” The songs are presented chronologically – see if you can detect the emotional shift!

They are offered to you as a gift of good will, along with a request that you pay that good will forward by clicking the link right below and help us save the Magical Moon Farm.

Here is the link to the Pandemic Blues Series on Soundcloud.

Here is the link to Magical Moon Donate

If you want to know more about these songs – or the ones that weren’t recorded – you can find a more thorough discography here.

A final word about the civil unrest and protests following the murder of George Floyd and the many victims of racial violence. I initially wondered if the pandemic songs had been rendered irrelevant by superseding events, and perhaps I should rewrite the songs to incorporate the protests. As I watched the nightly videos and reports of what was happening in Minneapolis, Seattle, St. Louis, Washington D.C., and other cities, I decided that the subject deserved a focus of its own, and and not with the whimsy that is displayed with these songs. It would take much more thought before I feel I could deal with that subject in a credible, and creditable, way.

But on that very important subject I want to leave you with a song just published by my dear friend, Chuck McDermott, in which he captures, as only a master songwriter can, the moment of our collective dilemma, in Here’s the Thing About America:

“Here’s the thing about America:  she’s as dirty as she’s clean, she’s as gentle as she’s mean, she’s everything between shear hell and fantasy…

…She’ll sing a harmony, as if she means every word, as if all those cries were heard, as if color lines were blurred, just don’t sit next to me…”

I hope this has been fun for you to read, and that I have added something to your listening. It is my most emphatic wish that we are all able to join together again, in close space, side by side, to enjoy live music and the magic of its work on our souls.

–Pete

_____

“The Magical Moon Foundation” strives to nurture and empower children with cancer and other life-threatening conditions, supporting children and their families by teaching healthy ways to deal with challenges and stress. While there are many wonderful organizations that support research, Magical Moon uniquely strives to empower children to manifest miracles in their lives. At Magical Moon Farm children can feed their bodies with our nutrition programs, and can feed their minds and spirits with our educational, arts-themed, magical grounds. It is a safe haven for guards to be let down, for emotions to be expressed, for experiences to be shared, and for kids to simply relax and experience some fun and joy.

More important to the music community, with Andy Bergsten’s guidance and crew, MMF constructed an outdoor performing arts center where musicians could safely perform and an audience of hundreds could safely listen, with all of the social distancing that a five acre farm would provide. Magical Moon Farm has all the potential to be a… MAGICAL new-“normal” antidote to the no-live-music blues.

Pandemic Blues Discography

Discography and Psychology of the Pandemic Blues Series

Here’s the story behind all ten of the lockdown songs:

Fake News was the first song to hit Facebook (April 3). It is a laundry list of grievances against our fake President, presented with sarcasm. A demonstration of poor Garageband production capabilities, I learned several things from this: (1) it takes a long time to assemble photos and add visual content to be able to produce with iMovie (thus, I curtailed it substantially); (2) I can’t sing, and (3) this was fun, I had more to say, and I’d better improve my Garageband skilz. I almost deleted this one.

Don’t Touch Me (April 5) reflects a melancholy sense that I (as a cancer survivor) really might face death if I wasn’t careful doing something as essential to survival as buying whiskey. This was before the fight over masks, social distancing and stay-at-home had really begun in earnest. The lustrous organ of Bob Mroz in the final recording and mixing of the song really added a whole new dimension.

Bye Bye Corona (April 8) represents a shift in attitude, a bit more optimistic (in hind sight, tragically pollyannaish) that we would “do what we must do to beat her at her game.” Boy did “we” fuck that up, and I don’t mean me. With Andy’s beautiful bass lines and Bobby’s classic piano, the final recording of Bye Bye Corona represented a vast improvement.

Be Thankful (April 10) was written and recorded in a single night when I was back in a blue mood, but by this time, Elizabeth and I had been quarantined together for some time, and we were really enjoying it together as we researched “the next great cable series” and set forth to exhaust all remaining new content. The lyrics will date me when I refer to “Dick Van Dyke, the Lucy Show and Ephrem Zimbalist,” but I swear, I did find all three, although not on the same channel. And the “afternoon of cooking shows” was very much my choice.

In Payroll Protection Blues (April 12), the blue mood continued, but this song shortly followed the announcement of the “Payroll Protection Program,” around which time “my temperature began to rise and my blood run cold,” when my bank of 45 years (the biggest bank in the country) told me I was ineligible. The cynicism is starting to take over.

Things got more sardonic with The Beginning of the End (April 15), which was written and recorded the night after Trump announced that he, as President, would make all decisions on which states would get pandemic support and which wouldn’t. “When the governors suggested that his facts were contested, he threatened them with the power of his purse.” I wanted to include this in the recordings, but by late June, the lyrics had become dated already, as closely aligned to the news of that day as they were. So I wrote new lyrics to the same song, and redubbed it, “We’re Community.” It preserves the sardonica, but finishes on a more upbeat message. “What we build we build together, because we’re community.”

When the gun-toting crazies invaded the Michigan State Capitol building with assault rifles, ammo belts and camo, screaming in cops’ faces about the tyranny of a face mask order, I almost threw something at the television, and I was back in the dark mood. Pandemic Blues (April 19) targets the obscene disconnect between Trump’s maliciously partisan and incompetent war with the states over managing a virus that was then beginning an inevitable climb to an apex that still hasn’t come. I was still thinking about the Michigan covidiots, though.

On April 23, I hit another low point with the almost molasses-sluggish Got Your Back. I was totally depressed by the incomprehensibly violent reaction of so many Americans to the idea of shared sacrifice for the common good, so I went after those morons a little bit. “Free speech is a priceless thing, but when subversion is your thing, that’s a bird of a whole different feather.”

The Same Boat (April 30) was inspired by a few of the early stories about big crowds flouting all the safety warnings, egged on by the exhortations of Trump. The crowded party boats in the Ozarks inspired the name. “We’re all riders at the mercy of the Captain of a ship in a time of tempest, and he sure has lost his grip.” Honestly, as I listen to it now, I don’t know where the optimism came from.

Do Your Duty (May 15) is the last of the project, coming right as Trump’s exhortations to “LIBERATE” the states and open up the economy were reaching a fever pitch. I was outraged that such recklessness and perfidy would continue to be humored among so many other Republicans. He was openly abusing democracy. “When armed men storming Capitols demanding the right to spread disease are praised as decent people, we all better get on our knees,” “we got to work together to do what we can to end this nightmare and restore accountability.” The song got reworked some in the studio, and the title was changed to Abusing Democracy, which just makes more sense.

–Pete

Birdie Barage

At a particular portion of Minot Beach in Scituate, just to the north of “Bar Rock,” is a tiny cove, well-protected from the storm surge by a series of offshore rock outcroppings.See?
When a strong storm blows through, the surf naturally stirs up a lot of seaweed, and currents and wind direction dictate where that seaweed ends up. As you might note from the photo, the northern corner of this cove is a natural spot.

And sometimes, it piles, and it piles, and it piles – into large berms. And when the berms build, the seaweed coming in after it has nowhere to go. So it sits in the languid surf, sodden slop. For days upon days. And it begins to rot and stink. It is one of those “low tide” smells that only lovers of the seashore welcome, even perhaps inhale with a sigh. “Ahhhhh, the ocean!” I have visited dairy farmers who exclaim similarly, but I don’t quite smell the equivalency. Because I’m from the shore.

All of this decomposing flora, naturally, attracts millions of bugs, winged and wingless.

And those bugs attract birds! Lots and lots of birds. [Don’t lie – you had no idea where this was going. You were expecting a rant about stink from a cranky old man.]

I have been to this spot many, many times in the past 25 years, whether the seaweed has been piled four feet high or been sucked out with the tide. The “Bar Rock” beach is an attractive spot for family beach going. Nice protected waters, cool rock to climb, periwinkles and crabs. My son jumped off Bar Rock a hundred times. I walk to the end of the beach at the top of the photo, and climb out onto the rock lege that juts a good 300’ into the surf. At low tide, you can walk out to the end, sit 8’ above the crashing waves, and charge your Mojo big time.

Each time I visit the shore, it is a different discovery.

This past weekend, I popped down for a little me time. The weather wasn’t terrific and the seaweed was stinking pretty good, so the beach was quiet of people. Not so, the shore birds, who were there to get fat.

I walked up to the upper end of the cove. The sea weed was piled 2’-3’ to the high water line, with maybe 15 feet of sand before the wall. You can see the big lawn at the top? There’s a nice 3’ stone wall along that line, good for planting your butt in the soft, dry sand, leaning back, and watching the action.

So I did that. For a good hundred feet to either side of my spot, dozens and dozens of shore birds foraged the seaweed. Least sandpipers, spotted sandpipers, semipalmated sandpipers, sanderlings, lesser yellowlegs, plovers, and my favorite new find, the “Ruddy Turnstone.”

Can you dig that? (Not my pic)

This was all fun, naturally, but then I discovered why my spot against the wall was so advantageous!

The shore birds were doing fine picking the bugs out of the weeds, but what about all those flies? Who was going to feed on them?

These guys showed up, and the show started.

.

They were there to take care of the flies, and they were very efficient at it. For some reason, it appears that the flies enjoyed the area closest to the wall, and so that is where the swallows hunted most aggressively. They would circle off of the seaweed heaps and then race in a straight line down the length of the wall…where I was the only obstacle.

And so there I was, watching barn swallows head straight for me at head-level, and flick off to evade me by a foot. I could feel it and hear it. They circled back repeated their routes. After a few passes, they got used to me, and passed closer. It got so ridiculous, I closed my eyes to see if I could tell when they passed by. I broke out laughing at the discovery that indeed, I could.

The world is in an awful place right now. Awful. Moments like these have taken on a vastly more important role. Make them happen, and make use of them for your peace of mind.

A Lesson in Pool

While doing some housekeeping on my Youtube homepage, I spied a video in the sidebar feed that brought back a lot of memories.

The video was an old (and badly kept) film of a pool match between Willie Mosconi and Minnesota Fats. The emcee for the competition was Howard Cosell. The year was 1978, and I was living at home in Washington, D.C. during the winter, working as a staffer in Senator Edward Brooke’s office. I was twenty-two.

I watched that match on live television with my father, while my mother watched from the kitchen while she cooked. It turns out, we were three of twenty million to tune in – the largest television audience ever for a pool game.

I’ve remembered that day as often as any other lifetime event. We watched silently as Cosell emceed the competition. Willie Mosconi felt both players should keep their jackets on during play (his was a tuxedo jacket). Fats disagreed. He said, “A pool player with a tuxedo is like putting ice cream on a hot dog.” My father groaned – a man who put on his blazer to go to the grocery store. The jackets came off.

Mosconi was a man of few words, and went about his business with an effortless precision while Fats was shooting off his mouth, playing the role of comic hustler. He was obnoxious, and not funny. He was a huckster, and I didn’t like him from the get-go. At one point while Mosconi was setting up a shot and Fats continued to run his mouth, Mosconi looked up at the referee and asked, “are you going to let this continue?”

Mosconi had class. He let his pool cue do the talking. He kicked Fats’ ass at 9-ball, 8-ball, and rotation, ending the competition before they even got to the straight pool game.

My father asked me if my pool game was any good. I said it was okay for a bar room. He said, “In pool, and in life, be like him,” pointing to Mosconi, “not like him,” pointing to Fats.

Some years later, I have no idea how many,  I was visiting my parents at their place in Kennebunk Beach one summer. It was a cold, rainy day. Dad invited me to come along to his afternoon game of pool, played with a half-dozen of his old pals from the past 30 years. Really just an excuse for the gentlemen to begin their scotch drinking a little earlier than usual. They had all known me since childhood, and their children were friends of mine, so it was comfortable for me. I stood to the side and kept a little quiet while the gents worked through their first game of 8-ball.

Then it was my turn, partnered with dad, playing for $5 a head. I broke, then quietly worked my way around the table and finished off banking the 8-ball into the side pocket.

Charlie Shriner, my dad’s best friend for the past 30 years, handed him his $5 and said – in mock disgust, “leave the fuckin’ kid home next time.”

The lesson was remarkably simple. Be a doer, not a talker. Don’t tell people how good you are, show them by example. And wear your blazer.

Fake News

I raised this blog from the dead because I have too much time on my hands.

I have this iPad with Garageband on it. I wrote some thoughts about the current situation, formed them into some words and put them to some music. It’s just me, the production is a little rough, but here’s FAKE NEWS.

Don’t Give Me a Hand!

If there any followers of this blog left to get this, HI! How ya doin’?! Life sure has changed, hasn’t it?

For new visitors: this blog became dormant years back for the reasons blogs go quiet. I’m glad WordPress didn’t delete the blog for non-use, because I can think of no better therapy, and I have the time I haven’t had.

Call this… the Coronavirus Awakening.
________

I want to say a few things about hands.

I was just washing my hands with a much greater thoroughness and sense of purpose than I ever have – ever! – and it occurred to me how much I miss the simplest physical contact of a handshake. I thought back to the routines of my former life to try to assess how often I shook hands and reflect on what the gesture means.

Some people are good at handshakes; they put some effort or meaning into it. To others, it is a perfunctory act. You can tell a lot about someone, right off the bat, with a handshake.

One handshake can ignite an instant affinity or attraction that makes you want to know that person better. If I compare my top 5 friends with the quality of their handshakes, I would say there is a high degree of overlap. I don’t happen to have any friends with bad handshakes.

I shook the hand of a very famous celebrity lawyer, at a professional dinner where he collected another award. His hand was sweaty, warm and limp. His gaze was elsewhere. I have a very low regard for the man.

I don’t trust people who don’t look me in the eye when they shake my hand. How do I make that calculus now?

Notable people whose handshakes were memorable to me for their quality: Tip O’Neil, George H.W. Bush, Howard Baker, Joe Moakley, Dan Quayle, John Boehner, Dapper O’Neill, Chuck Colson, Bill Weld and Willie McGinnest. Bill Weld has large hands, but Willie McGinnest has catcher’s mitts that’re so big, he has to be very careful not to squeeze.

Sometime within the past 10-15 years, the “bro hug” began to take over, and the handshake became “step one” into the bro-hug motion. A lot of my contemporaries haven’t quite picked up the bro-hug thing. A few of them relish in taking it to extremes, with ferocious bear hugs that lift you off your feet. I love that shit.

This summer, I’ll really miss that shit. A lot. I hope I don’t have to miss it forever.

I did not expect to celebrate my 65th birthday with the realization that a handshake could literally be deadly.

Stay healthy everyone! #elbowbump