No Blues On Your Birthday

Well, let me tell you about a party we had a Geno's Tuesday.

No, lemme 'splain ....

You go outside my front door, cross the street and enter the empty lot that leads to Congress Street - the lot we've dubbed "Bosnia", back in the day when it was full of rocks and detritus working its way up from the buried foundation of the old Kotchmar theater.

The Kotchmar (named for Hermann Kotchmar, Portland's first municipal organist and the inspiration for the Kotchmar Organ in City Hall) was a combination vaudeville hall and movie palace, active on Congress Street until the mid 70's.  It hung on, sadly, as a steadily deteriorating hulk, eventually masked by a false front.

The Children's Theatre looked at it briefly, during our valiant (but ultimately vain) attempt to find a place to call a permanent home.  The renovation would have cost twice the value of the land - and the City was not thrilled about such a prime piece of real estate being taken off the town tax roll for non-profit use.

They'd be even more so now.

Anyway - turn left after the rocks marking the end of the lot - or the start of the sidewalk (after the bars let out on Friday night they're just another hazard like the cracks in the sidewalk) and you run into Geno's - "Geno's Rock Bar" to use the full name.

It's a genuine jive dive.  Originally it must have been a small, respectable business - then for years it was the "FIne Arts Cinema", showing the best in hard core porn ("hard core porn" - don't those three words go well together - quite a verbal manage a trois - but I digress).  Then, when the porn theatre business was done to death by DVD's and home rentals - much less the Internet (who knew?) it was sold to some well-meaning but very, very, very naive folks who turned it into an "alternative performance space"

Then, Geno Senior - or just "Geno" - who used to have his bar farther down Congress and around the corner on a short side street - you had to descend a long staircase to the basement - lost his lease.

About three years ago his building was sold and Geno - or really  his son, Geno Junior - or "J.R." - moved the place to it's current home.

It hosts live bands and serves a critical purpose in the food chain of performance venues in PLand.  

I like it on off nights.  You see the most INTERESTING people in there.  It's a clientele that is totally at variance to the folks I worked with as a teacher, actor or board member of a non-profit - even my church friends are rarely replicated there.

And so it was the other night.  I've been locked in mortal combat on a new piece, a string trio for my friends "the Barefoot Strings" and it's not been going well.  Can't seem to find the line of the piece.

So, I counted up my quarters and shuffled out to Geno's braving the rocks of Bosnia in Tevas to get an adult beverage at my local jive-ass bar.

There were streamers hanging from the ceiling.  A table set up, down below the rail on the dance floor (such as it was).  Covered with food - Buffalo wings, potato salad, onion rolls, a big tub of American Chop Suey, deviled eggs - the only thing missing was something to drink and JR was ready to take care of that.

Most delightful of all is a charming African American lady - Dee Dee - who is celebrating an un-numbered but obviously well-lived birthday.  A white, sequined evening dress, with cape and really nice rhinestone encrusted pumps.  A tasteful amount of impressive decolletage showing.

She immediately invited me to fill up a plate - CVS drugstore's best "Happy Birthday" paper plates - which JR was saving for his kid's ninth birthday party.

She was on the arm - if you can call a ham hock an "arm" - of a biker guy, bearded, avuncular and very large.  He helped me down - or I helped him help me down - the steps to the table, where I filled a plate with basic, non-pretentious party chow.

I suppose it was only a matter of time - the jukebox fired up and there we were, listening to Aretha Franklin singing "Respect".

Dee Dee hails from upstate New York and claims to have some Cherokee blood.  I'll give her the benefit of the doubt - I suppose her lively nature and willingness to party have to have some Native source.

So that's how the evening went - the last 40 minutes of Dee Dee's birthday, certainly filled with music and stories about growing up and watching the parade of Portland.  As always there's some profound lessons to be had here.

For the life of me, I can't seem to find it.

Hanging in Negative Space

Facebook gallery is here.

One of my favorite groups of people - amongst many I sample from time to time here in Portland - is the Cat Dancer and his supple, clever and creative friends.

Saturday past at the Farmer's Market was enjoyable for several reasons - I walked down with the W's and their dog, the weather was as close to mid-summer perfect as one could even conceive of wishing for, the food and flowers for sale were lovely.

And the scene was accented by the Cat Dancer on slack rope and his female compatriot on the braided rope, performing on the slope by the stone bridge.

I've always wanted to learn the slack rope.  The Cat Dancer told me he started by learning while leaning on a long pole to keep himself on rope until he got the total hang of it and gradually worked himself away from it.

He made it sound very easy and I suppose in certain contexts it is - but not just yet - I have to lose a bit more weight before I attempt it.

But attempt it I will, if not this Summer then next.

For right now I'll stick to diablo and keep my feet on the ground - especially if they're going to be walking around the Orchard all day.

More later.

Sweet Mercy Is Nobility's Truest Badge

As I said in an earlier post I have a funny relationship with exercise.  It's sort of half exhilaration, half degradation and altogether strange.

I love running - when it goes well.  There is  focus and intensity to it that can be similar to the feelings I have when writing a piece of music.  I become completely absorbed in action, in problem solving and totally lost in the moment.

The problem comes with contemplation of how well so many of my friends live in their bodies - they take yoga, run, hike, dance and have played competitive sports with great comfort and success for most of their lives.

I've always hated sports (note - I said "sports" not "physical activity") and formal exercise.

I trace this self-deprecating attitude to my third grade year.  As a Cub Scout (don't get me started) I took part in a Cub Scout Olympics at Lee School on a Saturday afternoon.  

My father (he who studied with Jim Thorpe's trainer Pete Pitchlynn) really wanted me to be fast - however even then I had the solid build I have now - "Husky" was the nice way to put it.

The final event was a 50-yard dash between only two kids - me and Bill Floyd, literally the fasted kid in the school (and that I can remember his name over 4 decades later is telling - actually a really nice kid).

Were it done today I would have done two heats - and tried to beat my time on the second.  Under no circumstance would you place a child (or any impressionable person) in the position where some version of success - especially in the eyes of one's father - was literally impossible.

But I was enjoined to "do my best" to try to beat Bill.  I complained, loudly, that winning was impossible.  I didn't have the nerve to walk away, or say it was "unfair" - ("unfair" was not part of the vocabulary of the male underdog in the 1960's - only someone with obvious superiority could complain about fairness back then).

So the whistle went off and Bill was true to his nature and flew down the track.

I got about halfway down, just stopped and walked off to the side.  I think right then I could hear a door slamming shut on part of life that so many other kids shared with ease and grace.  

It felt like I was cut off from an experience of myself as someone who could win, for whom participation and success, comfort and pride in oneself, was a natural and rightful part of life.

I suppose it was a sense that even if you couldn't succeed at that moment, you still could succeed if the circumstances allowed.

And so now decades later, I run.  It's hard to do when running outside, like today (for the first time in seven years) but inside I use my little iPod - and the music accompanies me on my imagined run into an Olympic Stadium - Barcelona, usually.  John Williams Olympic Fanfare plays as I enter - not winning, but just getting to the end - like the guy who finished his marathon in Barcelona outside the stadium, even as the closing ceremonies were happening.

That's all I want to do - finish with honor.  FInally.  FInally that race will be over - and the next one will begin.

The Definitive Biscuit

I admit it - I'm a chowhound.

This is a radically different mindset from being a "foodie" - foodies possess a pathetically variable sense of taste, sadly at the mercy of whatever culinary winds pass from the arbiters of taste in the New York Times or Boston Globe.

Mind you, I like a good display of cooking skill as much as the next person.  My mother was a housekeeper for one of the Old Oil Money mansions back home in Tulsa, much in demand for her practical approach to housework and cooking.

At least the cooking part stuck.

I've mentioned the Farmer's Market before - A. and I - and two of 2/3 rd's of the kids and the dog - and a red wagon, come to think of it - hit the Market this morning.  She and S. spent the last two weeks at her dad's in Canada and they were stocking up to redo their lawn.

So now I have strawberries again (hulling berries while watching "Deadliest Catch" - irony, anyone?) and this evening on the way down to JavaNet I scored two free biscuits at my uptown bakery, thanks to the other two of the set being used as samples.

And thanks to C., who handed off about a pound of Manwich beef she wasn't eating.

There are a lot of wonderful places to eat in this town.  Check out the New England listings on Chowhound and you'll see what I mean.  I'd like to eat at Vignola or Fore Street - I'm sure their quality would not be wasted on me.

Still, perhaps I am missing something but fresh strawberries, a potato salad using my Mom's recipe, or her frybread, or veggies bought today, picked this morning - or even a hot dog from Marks' or from the guy in Monument Square - there is food that feeds your ego, food that feeds your muscles and food that feeds your soul ....

... and I think you really may need appropriate portions of all three.

In moderation of course.

The Notes Between Crusis and Anacrusis

C. pointed out that I repeat myself a lot - in this case "I've never been young".

Which is true - I seem to remember hanging with adults and worrying about adult problems and ideas much before I left elementary school, for good or ill.

Which is why this space between ending teaching and starting in the Orchard is so strangely stressful in its non-stressful way.

I'm spending a lot of time writing music and looking at the city.  No pressure of any kind - it's kind of neat.

I could get to enjoy this - the dial is slowly turning back from "11" to the normal "8.5" I run at.

I've walked around the entire city twice in the past few days - at some point I'm going to have to run it like I did before I tore up my knee in 2001 - but until then I'm going to just work and write, feed the cat and enjoy the space.  Who knows who I will be when it's done?

Freedom Trial - Freedom Trail

A lot of walking around today.  Facebook gallery is here.

Farmer's Market: No tomatoes, no peppers, no cukes - nothing to make gazpacho, so I had to let it go.  Very nice chat with M.  Brought her up to speed on going to work in the orchard.  Much joy - and relief.  

She says I an generally quite charming - even engaging, on occasion.  Small wonder I got it.

Thence over the peninsula to the first of three dedications of plaques of the Portland Freedom Trail - at 11 a.m. the first was that of Deacon Brown Thurston - this at the suggestion of his great grandniece, T., who plays in Tango Mucha Labia.

This was at the corner of Danforth and Union - up from Three Dollar Deweys (this is how I navigate this town...by triangulating off my favorite bars), across from the monstrosity of the Portland Harbor Hotel (catalog-chosen architecture at its worst).

There was a small crowd - many of the usual suspects I see at a lot of these events.  Are they ever going to learn some basic marketing?

And over in the background - you can see in one of the pictures - a small crowd of very interested and very confused Japanese tourists came by - they instantly started snapping pix:  I suppose they knew something important (well, relatively) was going on and they weren't going to miss a chance to photograph it.

I've been running this George Harrison song in my head all through today - it's in the earlier post, the closing credits from "Time Bandits".  It just matched my mood, this wonderful, odd sense of having come through a storm and in good order.

It was in my head as I stopped at Big Mama's for pancakes - I'm rather limited on funds for the moment but dammit, I wanted pancakes and maple syrup.  And boy, did they taste good - "a scrap in freedom tastes better than a feast in captivity".

While there I ran into a former student - Eli, just graduated from Greely, now entering Yale (!?!) to study political science or ecological politics.  We chatted and I told him I was very proud (and that his mom and dad should come to dance tango).  He still intends to play tuba and he was very kind in crediting me with his basic training in music and rehearsal focus.

It is kids like him - and some who are still in classes at Lewiston, Litchfield, Cumberland, Harvard and elsewhere - that let me leave public school teaching with a clear conscience.  What a gift.  I feel I've done some good.

So off I tramped to Munjoy Hill - the very top, by the Observatory.  Monument Two was for one of the barbershops of Charles Frederick Eastman, a freedman who helped runaways by changing their appearance in his shop.

Here it was my turn to run into Sam (who's last name I can't remember) who was in the MSDI/CTM "The Tempest".  That was quite a production and a baptism by fire - if anything has ever taught me the importance of taking the blend of corporate cultures into account that was it.

T. (whose email alerting me to this started the whole thing) and Sam and his 6-week old niece (in a carrier) with her mom, chatted our way down the Hill to the last station.

And a block party.  The monument was dedicated to Amoes Noe and Christianna Williams Freeman.  He was the first called pastor to the Abyssinian church.  She was an officer of the African Foundling's school in New York during the Draft Riots of the Civil War.

This town has some big historical guns in play.

Speaking of playing it was fun to listen to the KoKo Experience - a local world-beat band.  Charlie, one of the guitarists for the Bernard Tshimangoley Band was playing with them - I was introduced as "available" and who knows what might come of it.

So I ate yams, collard greens (not as good as Mom's poke salad but good on a hot day) and cornbread while the band played, using Nairobi intonation to match vocals.

Wow.

I suppose I should sum up.  Twilight is here, I'm sitting in the cool of the evening on the stoop of my apartment house - My Lord Sebastian is perched in the window, meowing at me, meine Deutches freund E. and I had sushi and it has been a full, full day.

Sometimes you just have one like it - totally connected to those around you, to the land - and to yourself.

Again - thank you.  Thank you.  Thank you.

I Got It

Do you want to know what coming home feels like?  Listen to this video.

"Charlie, remember what happened to the man who suddenly got everything he ever wanted".

"What happened?"

"He lived happily ever after".

I could say a lot - but I'll let George Harrison sing for my heart right now.

Don't just hear - listen.  Don't just look - see.

Just for today - this is what happy sounds like.  I can't stop laughing.

Thank you.  Thank you.  Thank you.

Tuesday Is Less Than A Dog Day

Dogs have it easier than cats but cats are smarter.

You couldn't hitch up a bunch of cats to pull a sled across the Iditarod - it just wouldn't happen.

The Dog Days actually happen in August and are signaled by the star Sirius - the Dog Star that follows the constellation Orion.

As a licensed poodle groomer in the state of Oklahoma I have to say I think that would be pretty cool - if it wasn't so damn hot...

So, "now these hot days is the mad blood brewing".

My interview was yesterday.  I think it went pretty well - I had fun and liked the two guys running it.  There was a background check, of course, which included a credit check - I'm not profligate but neither am I a blue chip.

Well, we shall see.

Works has begun on a new tango.  It's nice to get into that mindset - solving problems and imagining how  it will work is fun.  I dance a lot in the room.

Finally I did go to the gym to run.  I want to start running in longer chunks in preparation for heading out in the street.  Sooner or later I have to reach for a level of intensity that will get me into five mile runs.

I've had a mixed relationship with exercise - mixed feelings.  My dad was a runner in college - he was even an extra during the filming of "Jim Thorpe: All American" at Bacone College just after WWII.  He took off running during a race scene and had to be reminded by the AD that Burt Lancaster (Jim Thorpe) was the one who had to win the race.

After that I stopped by Geno's for a tonic (gin is only for the weekends) and listened to a first rate story teller - Laura Packer (whose website is here) - it was only for a moment as she'd been going for a while, but she really gets her point across.

So it's been quite a day - hopefully tomorrow will be just as full of incident and action.

How was yours?

The Ducks of Portland, Maine

I've been to Deering Oaks before with C's camera to get to know the ducks.

Facebook gallery is here.

A very lovely day today, really one having all the hallmarks of Summer in Maine - hazy, warm, a cooling breeze off the ocean.

After processing strawberries (which are nearly done) I studied more for my interview tomorrow - the third one and deciding one for my dream job.

There has been a flurry of online activity because of last week's zombie kickball game - has it really only been a week?  People are posting about Daid Elvis and the general madness of it all.

So it was nice to get out for a while late this afternoon after a nap and manic dish-washing session.

Deering Oaks (or "Deering's Oaks") are a feature of the Portland landscape going back even to the time of my hero John Adams - I think he mentions them in one of his journals.  Apparently you could launch ships from them - so what we now call Back Cove went in much further.

As redone by Fredrick Law Olmstead (who also did Central Park and Merle Nelson's house) they are a jewel of urban design.

What was once a ravine - and a fairly skanky ravine at that - was turned into a fountain around 5-6 years ago.  I remember it in it's first incarnation when it served as the site for the Maine Summer Dramatic Institute production of "Midsummer Night's Dream".  That production is how I got involved with MSDI until it merged wit CTM.

CTM's waterlogged but very watchable production to "The Tempest", for which I wrote the music (my second go at it) opened the fountain - from what I can tell no one has tried to use it since.

I love the ducks that inhabit the main pond.  They are always being fed by folks - I was down there today to get rid of a foccacia (I can't afford real caccia) that was moving past its prime - besides which I worry that the ducks aren't getting enough olives in their diet.

It's always a fight between feeding the ducks and the predatory seagulls who share the space with them.  The gulls are sensitive even to the sound of a bag being rattled and will come flocking with loud vulgar cries to snag food out of the beaks of the ducks.

The pigeons are an afterthought.  Squirrels are on their own.

And then there are people who use the park.  Come to think of it I was there to use it as well.

One of my favorite people was there.  The Cat Dancer, a regular on Summer Friday evenings in the Old Port, was there practicing.  I have every admiration for people who are good at walking the slack wire - it's one of my goals in life.

C.D. was just doing technique and muscle memory work.  He and his compatriots practice on Monday evenings at W.'s school and I was invited to come participate.  That will be a blog post to remember.

I try to find one new thing to learn each Summer - something that I just can't do, that reminds me of what students go through when they're totally new at something.  It's a good reminder and I shouldn't get out of the habit even though i have my final interview tomorrow in the late afternoon.

So it was a good afternoon, full of experience and learning.  We'll see what I do with it tomorrow.

Boom! Oooo! Boom! Ahhhh!

Facebook photo album is here.

I can think of few things more dramatic than a well-done fireworks display.  

There is a crowd, waiting in patient anticipation for something they know is going to happen - but simultaneously ignorant of what exactly might occur.

C. came by with her aunt and cousin A. - said cousin being a very nice young man from Kuwait, of all places (still not exactly sure how the family tree is growing here - but who cares?).

A. had not seen an American fireworks display before and it was kind of fun to watch him watch the crowd.  He's a remarkably cosmopolitan guy who seemed very much at home in the diversity of the event.

This should probably not come as a surprise - in my experience most people who travel to the U.S. tend to be rather more cosmopolitan that the average American.  This is not a slam on America as someone who comes over here is willing to mix it up by definition - people in their home environment can be a little provincial - if they don't, the visitors will have nothing worth seeing when they visit.

This makes sense to me, at least.

So the four of us sat out on the side of the Promenade in the gathering gloom.  It really was quite a mix of folk.  Above the hill we could hear a djembe being played - I could identify the drumming as Middle Eastern - A. caught the voices as Iranian.

I don't think i could have caught that in a million years.  It's kind of like telling the difference between Japanese, Korean and Vietnamese faces.

So the fireworks went off below of and exploded above us.  I just lay back with my new camera and took shots of varying shutter speeds.

One neat trick was to set for a long exposure and snap kids as they waved sparklers or rainbow-colored wands.  C. and I both are working developing Pika-pika photoshoots, which is basically stop-motion animation using lights.

It's a cool effect and I'm interested in seeing if I can do one long enough to be worth writing a score for.

So the evening progressed quite nicely.  Of course, the snacks were far too carb-based, which I had to improvise.

All told it was an enjoyable evening and, again, I have to say how much I enjoyed seeing so many people in one place, sharing one experience.  

Down the slope was a group from what I thought was the Greene Memorial African Methodist Episcopal church from Munjoy Hill.  They have a step group and they were doing some cheers and moves for the crowd.  

Next year we're going to have to have some kind of drumline set up to play for the crowd - it's too much fun not to do. 

Zombies, part "arrrgggghhhh..."

The Lewiston Sun Journal has a story on Zombie Kickball here.

Video they shot is here.

Cool or no?

Looking at the orchard...

Looking at the Apple store in Boston, on Boylston Street.  It took a little walking to get here from the T stop but it seems to have worked out.  I've chatted with some really neat people - and did a quick shot of the staircase.

There is a really neat vibe here.

Everyone is alert to possibilities.  I like that.

The train ride down almost didn't happen - I made it right at 5:59 a.m. and was "encouraged" to run down the ramp to catch the train.  

And that, right there, is a major difference between air and rail travel - you can't jump onto a plane when it leaves the gate.

While on it I discovered a limitation of train travel - the WiFi wasn't working - I offered to fix it but they had an "expert" in yesterday and it didn't happen. 

However I did meet Georgianne Gallagher and Vince Larkin, also teachers. retired and moving to Ogunquit.  They've been summering there for a while and it was neat to compare notes about how we felt about winters both in New Jersey and Oklahoma - in contrast to those in Maine.

I did get a chance to show off my Mac Book to them and the Trainriders Northeast rep - a very nice lady whose name I totally didn't get (UPDATE: her name was Jean - the TRN person going north just told me) - with any luck she'll be on the train going back - of course, the WiFi may not be working on that train either so she may not get on this blog.

So after getting off at the Prudential Center and triangulating the position of the store I've chatted with some Creatives and others - also looked at software (which just doesn't exist in Maine with this level of luxuriance) and getting the vibe.

Right now I have to start back to the train - I have a lot to think about and put together in my head.

I'm blogging from the Apple Store on Boylston Street in Boston.

How freakin' cool is that?

Yes, Virginia, There Is Zombie Kickball

Farmer's Market

Every Wednesday a wonder descends on Monument Square.

"Our Lady of Victories" was dedicated after the Civil War - I think that was when the Great FIre broke out, but I can't be sure.

The picture of that ceremony is positively iconic - you can see copies of it in coffee shops all up and down the peninsula (though I don't think there is one here in the North Star - every other kind of art, but not that picture).

No, this wonder is the Farmer's Market.  I think they pull in about 6:00 or so to set up.

The food is usually picked something like that morning or just the day before.  The flowers are fresh and so are the people.  There is a wonderful, positive energy about the place - the women tend to be floating like blossoms in all sorts of colors - fleets of children, both on vacation and in summer school, thread the crowd, some with cameras, some with baskets, all completely engaged in the experience of learning and having fun.

For myself, I prefer later in the season - there is a greater choice of food (I've really no use for plants in pots unless it's a stew cooking) and the Brussels Sprouts are in, which is the best reason for the thing in the first place.  

A riot of color, it is.  It's a gathering place for the town, which is something I'm all in favor of. 

Oddly, it puts me in mind of the Zombie Kickball game.

Not so much about the doing the game, but watching the crowd have a good time - seeing them cheerfully buy into all the madness going on.  Just like a good band concert or a parade - or Shakespeare in the Park - when you take an audience into account you measure your success in the experience they have - counting missed cues is useful but only part of the measure.

Or, to quote Shakespeare "A jest's prosperity lives in  the ear of him who that hears it - never in the tongue of him that makes it".  I think that might be why I get in trouble so much - or why people misunderstand what I was trying to do as a teacher.

You know, the other good thing is that the Market repeats itself on Saturday down in the Oaks.  Maybe there is a lesson there as well.  Either way, I've got some strawberries calling my name back home - I think I should attend them.