Thursday, November 22, 2018

let's talk turkey

I think turkey may be the only thing left we can talk about...well, that and that latest episode of (fill in the blank)...not NY sports...there ain't enough Zantac for Giants and Jets fans...Mets fans have to bite nails thinking about losing Syndergaard...which according to Mike, unless the trade would involve Hank Aaron, well you get it...we could spend three minutes discussing the weather...and whether we should kill all the weather forecasters...the divide is deep...it could easily rip down the middle of your beautifully set table today...so on this day...this Thanksgiving day...perhaps we need to look inside and what drives the divide...and mostly it is fear...fear of random violence...it is all we see and hear...it moves closer and no longer sits at the proverbial six degrees of separation...it is fear of losing that job...that check...the one thing that might separate you from that guy sprawled at the bottom of the subway stairs in Penn Station...or maybe you are getting older...seeing it all from new perspective...and your deepest fear is that there might be fewer hands to grasp around your bountiful table next year...so let's skip over the intensely politically incorrectness of a holiday rooted in the premise of how happy the Indians were that we took their magnificent land, trashed it, pushed them to near extinction, left them on reservations...ahem...let's just give thanks for what is around our table...and if the conversation gets heated...turn on the tv...turn up the game...pass the stuffing....Happy Thanksgiving!

Sunday, November 11, 2018

open your eyes, look up to the skies....

one of the most ironic moments in "Bohemian Rhapsody" comes when snippets of music critics reviews of the song flash on the screen...not very flattering...were they talking about the same song?...I had to laugh inside...it was just like the snippets of the movie's reviews...and for this hard core movie goer...critical many times...gotta tell you...when the movie was over the critics really didn't matter to me...and I saw every criticism glaring in front of me...like swiss cheese...and it didn't matter...perhaps there is another movie script out there...one that is less sanitized...rougher...created without the surviving members of Queen over a writer's shoulders...a film with one director...and certainly not PG-13...Freddie Mercury was not PG-13...and I'd love to see that one...but back to this one...perhaps you need to be of a certain age...an age where you vividly remember first hearing that voice soar from the radio...maybe you need to have actually owned "Bohemian Rhapsody"...as a 45...worn it to shreds...or the sheet music...what a beast for the piano...maybe you need to remember how as a society there was a time when we liked to keep our artists closeted...put them way up on pedestals and never thought what their personal life was like...how their needs to please us denied them that ultimate luxury...maybe you remember what it was like to toss off youth and become an adult in a decade of monetary excess...while horrific death from a disease that at first had no name slithered along...watching Mercury's genius, vulnerability and loneliness broke my heart...every note and lyric took me back in a way that few movies have...last week was a week in this country where pressure meds didn't cut it...blood in the streets and fire in the sky...but once there was a boy...not a "Paki" boy...but a boy with a voice that soared to the heavens...and sent shivers down my spine...still does...

Saturday, October 27, 2018

The Silent Amidah...

again...this time in a synagogue...Saturday morning...Shabbos morning...a piece of shit spewing hatred of Jewish people...(hey, Sherri, we give you off for Christmas, how come you don't give us off for your holiday?)...our President condemns but never says the word "Jewish" (my mom told me I can't dance with you at the 5th grade party because you're a Jew)...the left and right raise pointed words as swords...twitter tells me my second hottest news trend is "Jews"...(we study the Holocaust in history class, and someone comes from behind me in the hall...hey, Sherri, don't stand too close to the oven)...the President now says that someone should have been packing in the synagogue...to protect them...us...from who? from whom? very fine people?...I can't shake it...I picture those people...wrapped in a faith I cannot seem to always embrace...were they whispering the silent Amidah...praying in Shabbos joy for world peace when it shattered for them?...(he's not anti-Semitic, his daughter is Orthodox...but she tweeted on Shabbos...covering her father's repetitive sins of omission?)…this is today's news bite...it will fade...there will be some new tragedy to swarm twitter...but this one I cannot shake...it is stirring the memories deep inside...I am 58...and little has changed being Jewish in this world...it is not time to forget...but act...and this comes to mind..."if I am not for myself, who will be for me?"...let me widen that...if we, as Jews, are not for ourselves...well, you get it...

Friday, September 28, 2018

Fear of Flying

the sharp divide cuts deep this week...but here's the bottom line...or several bottom lines...Dr. Ford, by stepping forward, has essentially ruined her life...although, by watching her testimony what happened to her at 15 already started that process...Kavanaugh came into the lion's den with everything to lose...whether telling the truth, or telling what he has convinced himself is the truth...all he had to do was be calm,speak somewhat eloquently...kind of like, love her or hate her, Hillary did when skewered in hearings...and he failed miserably...oh, I know...many of you are reading and saying...what if it were your life and family and reputation on the line...you would have done the same thing...but you are not poised to take a seat on the Supreme Court...what Kavanaugh showed is that he does not possess the temperament for this honor...and when I looked at him and his cheering squad...Graham...Grassley...Cruz...and even Trump from behind the keys of his cell phone...I saw floating images...of entitled boys at dumpy bars in the eighties...you remember them...Live Bait...Chevys...need I go on?...boys to men in the cesspool workforce culture of the eighties...where talk and touching and intimidation, at best...full out sexual assault at worst...permeated all industries...oh, why didn't you come forward?...to whom I will answer you!...to the few women in mid-level power hanging on by a thread?...to the few sympathetic male ears trapped by the need of a paycheck and fear of retribution?...I went to a work reunion a few months ago...and with MeToo permeating the air many of us talked...everyone had a story...vivid and real...why didn't we come forward?...it haunts many to this day...but I wonder...if those we talked about were suddenly thrust into the public eye for some great humanitarian honor...what would we do?...would be able to remain silent?...who would open her mouth to have her world implode?...not so easy, right?...there are good men and women from both parties buried below the shit we are watching...it's time to clean house...sweep the shit from both sides to the curb...talk about how we as men and women can move forward from the hurt...our sons and daughters are watching...oh, and you uptight, need-to-retire assholes who grilled Ford over that fear of flying...crack a fucking book...you know, Erica Jong's "Fear of Flying"...the joke's on you

Monday, August 27, 2018

Dear John...

Dear Senator John McCain...since your passing, we have given you wings and elevated your memory to lofty heights...perhaps, it is because your death has occurred during this sad period in our nation's history when there is little but discourse and apparent lack of civility...or maybe it is that despite the fact that many did not vote for you, and probably would not do so if given the chance again...that these same people admired you, and your willingness to serve the nation before your own ambition...we admired your courage, survival and your commitment to public service...the years of torture in Vietnam could certainly have left you in despair and darkness...faith and love of country dissolved in the years of solitary...it is a testament to your character that the path you chose was the opposite...you pushed through personal pain and political disappointment and fought till the end...those who knew you in the political arena...from both sides of the aisle...their voices all crack with tears as they share memories and prayers...and so, as you are eulogized, and honored...I remember you too...I try not to judge you alone by your hawkish errors...or for unleashing Sarah Palin...instead I hear your speech after your loss to Obama...sadness, but great hope for this nation...and so, in your name I challenge those who now sing your praises...the Senators, Congressmen...to roll up their sleeves and reach across the aisle...it is such a small distance when compared to that long road you walked with dignity for the country you loved so dearly...rest easy, citizen McCain...

Friday, August 3, 2018

Stop! In the Name of Love...

the dog days are upon us...New York has been under a soupy sky...humidity rising every day...and I am looking like the long lost Supreme...Diana's distant middle-aged cousin with the Jew-fro, Sherri Supreme...there is no product strong enough these days...so it's the ponytail, with curls escaping, then frizzing...or just letting it go...I keep thinking back to the endless winter...the torturous cold spells...the spring that wasn't...and I feel I shouldn't kvetch...but then I find myself longing for those three or four days of crystal blue skies and no humidity...hell, my hair could have made like page 65 of Vogue then...but it is not to be...the thunderstorm symbol dots endless days in the forecast...I glimpse the sun symbol in the distance...and hope it remains...last night a tornado warning flashed on my cell...I did a double take and turned the TV on...and there was Lee Goldberg and his white teeth showing some shitty red cell of torture floating over parts of the tri-state...I scratched my frizzy head and thought...where's that Glinda bitch when you need her...ugh...baby, baby, baby...where did the sun go???

Monday, July 16, 2018

Mamma Mia, here I go...

a few weeks ago my daughter, Lauren, got engaged...it wasn't what you would say a total shock...I'd known her fiance had the ring for a few weeks...and when she crossed the threshold of our apartment, and held up her hand...my stomach flipped...but just a little, as if the reality of it all had not been fully absorbed...about a week later, Mike and I were off for a long-planned vacation to celebrate our upcoming (November) 30th...timing...resting up before the roller coaster ride of planning...of doing your best to gently blend two families...to not offend although it is a given that someone will get pissed...and I thought back to my own wedding planning...and how I thought I knew it all...I looked at old wedding albums...a miniature of my mother's...my own...scrutinizing pictures of my mom and grandmother...mothers of the bride...and I realized that I am older now than any of them were then...deep pause...when I came back from the vacation, and even while away...I attempted sleep while lists of people danced in my brain...a daunting to do list...how much would I or should I do without morphing into a Momzilla?!?!…and I'll admit that it really did hit me as Mike and I pulled out of the catering hall parking lot, ink still fresh on the contract...my eyes welling up on the Meadowbrook...the planning, the agita, the joy will be here and pass so quickly...as it always does...I hope I can savor more than I might have as a bride...maybe the passage of time gives deeper appreciation of the gift of pure joy...I sigh...pass up on the cookie...dress shopping in the distance...hideous three-way mirrors...Lord, have mercy...and bless them...

Monday, June 18, 2018

whole lotta love...

the summer solstice is almost upon us...we are in the twilight of spring...a season ripe with celebrating earth...and our mothers...our fathers...and often the memory thereof...of the hopeful new beginnings of June weddings...joyful endings with graduations...and the outdoor concert season...there I found myself praying to the weather gods two nights last week...praying for dry weather so I would not schvitz under a cheap rain poncho...and the weather gods listened...I will talk about the two concerts in reverse...Dead & Company at Citi Field on Friday...this my first time seeing this incarnation of the infamous Grateful Dead, a band that played in the background my life essentially...I vividly remember many fellow students in the spring of '79 at Binghamton who did see them...the concert where someone tripping on acid, most likely, fell over the rail and later died...the story becoming more discussed than the setlist...flash forward to last Friday, a gorgeous night in Queens...and I tried embracing the experience of songs that had no beginning, or end...some I knew, some I didn't...I enjoyed the first set...found the jams of the second too long, too indulgent...musical masturbation...yeah, maybe I'm not a Deadhead...last Wednesday...Forest Hills Stadium...Robert Plant...oh, Lord, this was the bucket list item I waited a long time for...I admire him as an artist...pushing the envelope...trying new partnerships...new musicians...for many it is a disappointment that he refuses to reunite with Page and Jones and head out for that longed for Led Zeppelin reunion...but I get it...and he does too...he heard the faithful and sprinkled in old Zeppelin tunes...so that the gray roots, receding hairlines, extra pounds and aching bones we all shared Wednesday night faded away...in the encore, with that first note of "Whole Lotta Love" I swore I saw a rock god...lustrous golden curls, vest and bell bottoms...wailing against time in its infinite cruelty...oh, Mr. Plant...ramble on any time you want...

Thursday, May 31, 2018

twit or tweet

I first thought of titling this blog entry, we will have grace...haha...but in this world of immediacy...we are in twitter hell...I really think that everyone should be forced to write a tweet...pen and paper...let it sit for an hour...then read it and wonder if it's still that little gem you think you've crafted...ah, Roseanne...the woman...the show...but here's a somewhat relevant aside about the need to "reboot" every show that met the dust, yet somehow, we yearn for once more...the world...our world changes faster than our own perceptions grasp...what was daring and dear to us over twenty years ago does not necessarily "fit" moving forward...Roseanne, the show, the writing...in its original incarnation was at times brilliant and revelatory...and at times, lazy...I watched some of the reboot...in terms of writing, it seemed more the latter...Roseanne, the woman...her show ended its first run in 1997...think back...there were no IPhones, no Facebook, Twitter, Instagram...just the chance of winding up in a gossip column with overheard conversation...or a public misstep on a late night show...or for Roseanne, just a horrific clip of a mocking rendition of the National Anthem...ah...how would that play now in our incendiary culture?...but here's the basic truth...the first discussion show be about the tweet in and of itself...not to compare it to rogue and ruthless tweets, or on-air conversations of others...because if we can't agree on the ugliness of the first, we will never get to the table to discuss the second...until that time, I hope for the grace that an open heart can give...and for a serious pause before we all race off that ledge...

Saturday, May 5, 2018

whoa, ah, mercy, mercy me....

oh, things ain't what they used to be...how sad that Marvin Gaye's lyrics still stand so many decades later...but for me, when I hear that song, it is not the sadness and dismay of pollution rotting Mother Earth that I hear...it is the ocean waters of Brooklyn...it is the cry of vendors, "get your knishes here...ice cream here...coca cola"...it is the cry of mothers warning their kids not to wade too deep...it's the songs blasting from transistor radios...and I smell Coppertone, and sand and sea...I cannot tell you why...but it is good...it is more than good to go back to that time and space...where for a few brief hours the world and it's violence were buried in a sand castle...my worries thinking about that first day of middle school a few short weeks away swept out in the waters off Coney Island...and so, last week...turning up the A/C as we slipped from winter to summer in a spring minute...Marvin came on the radio...and I smiled...and turned it loud...and forgot about every news story...twitter feed...and a daunting and boring to do list...I cranked that song up and I was eleven again...burying my brother in the sand...giggling and freckling and not giving a shit about any of it...still tasting that chocolate fudgesicle in the corners of my lips...no worries about what it would do to my hips...there is magic in the music...ah, mercy, mercy me...sometimes memories are just what you used to be...

Thursday, April 12, 2018

whoever saves one life saves the world entire....

Yom HaShoah...in April, sandwiched between days of wet snow and trees aching to bloom...this day begs remembrance...the time of oratory from survivors at libraries, community centers, school and temples is dwindling...the survivors aging out of a world so violent it begs their testimony...and Jews...our assimilation complete in so many ways...and then, once again, we are targeted, scapegoated...often enabled by complacency and reluctance...sin of omission or commission?...the irony that our children now study  abroad in cities where so many of our people were rounded up like cattle...their memory crushed under the wheels of putrid train cars teeming with our brothers and sisters...it is so much easier to forget...the pain of history is often soul crushing...for me it is not a choice...an option...it is a necessary mitzvah...for people I did not know...relatives reduced to a Yahrzeit candle...to affirm that the Holocaust is not just a paragraph skimmed in a text book...to memorize for question #42 on some ridiculous standardized test...it is a chapter from the dark history of my people...of all people...for the sorrow...the guilt...for looking at the ugliness that is man...we remember...for what was lost...we remember...but mostly, as Anne Frank said so eloquently, "look at how a single candle can both defy and define the darkness"...

Tuesday, March 13, 2018

Tee (time) for the Tillerson

I am exhausted...we are approaching 14 months of this presidency and I have lost track...who's on first?...the latest casualty in the White House revolving door...the dinosaur, T-Rex...and then we all smack ourselves lamenting the firing of an oil executive...to be replaced with Pompeo...not Ellen Pompeo, of "Grey's Anatomy" fame...no, Mike Pompeo, of CIA fame...if that is anything worthy of fame these days...I mean, I hear CIA...and I'm thinking of my pals on "Homeland"...Mandy Patinkin and Claire Danes...and I'm getting wrinkles as my face contorts following the newest season...because "Homeland" always seems to be one step ahead of the curve...and if it is, and you don't watch it...well, don't watch it...it is all too real, and you'll never stop throwing up!...and I am jumping all over the place...but I am just following the lead from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue...because the hiring, the firing...the tweeting..this is really elevating distraction to an art form, isn't it?...something to think about jumping the snow piles for green beer this weekend...but someone please tell Pompeo not to unpack so quickly...he's gonna need more than the luck of the Irish!...

Monday, February 26, 2018

Paws, and reflect...

it would be the ultimate sin of a writer searching for greatness...to sprinkle cliches into a piece...but such is the sin of grief, and I sprinkle this freely...my cat, Donut, passed away yesterday...he was 15, would have been 16 this May...and he was adopted at the age of 5 months from a shelter...and so goes the expression we attribute to all rescue pets...did we rescue Donut, or did he rescue us?...I do remember vividly how painfully nervous he was when we brought him home...until I set the table for dinner that first night, and without hesitation, he hopped onto our fourth chair...so, this was the way it's going to be, I thought inside...much like a story Lauren wrote in elementary school...Donut was our "human cat"...as we poured over old photos last night, I had to smile...remembering the antics of kittenhood...and one episode in particular...an episode of "Friends" on our television...Joey and Chandler at the foosball table...Donut's emerald eyes zeroing in...and the high jump against the screen, paws attacking that foosball table in earnest...ironically, repeats of "Friends" late at night would be his joy, burrowing into his blanket on Lauren's bed...a strange affection for Matt LeBlanc's voice...which prompted us to call him at 11pm..."Donut, the Joey show is on"...he endured so many health issues...which has prompted me to attribute 99 lives to his story...and when it seemed his time on the 16th...he defied all odds and was home the next day...allowing us another week with our furry boy...part of me will always think he did this for us...struggled so hard to repay the love we showered on him all those years...I don't know how I feel about this "Rainbow Bridge"...but I'll tell you what I do know...when my Donut passed to a better place...and saw all those beautiful cats and dogs and other pets...he probably said, "no way"...and detoured through another door...where he would be welcomed by my Dad, who never got to meet him...my Dad would say, "Donut, that wasn't very nice of you to scratch your Grandma like that!"...and Donut would smile, and tilt his head and stare back...and Dad's frown would turn upwards...a warm smile...then he'd pet Donut's head and say..."We've got some catching up to do...but first...a tuna sandwich"...

Monday, February 19, 2018

Guns and roses...

World Trade Center, 1993...Oklahoma City, 1995...Columbine, 1999...9/11 2001...Sandy Hook, 2012...and last week, Parkland...Valentine's Day...Ash Wednesday...literally, ashes to ashes...this blog is not a line in the sand...that has been drawn most eloquently by hollow-eyed teenagers bloodily thrust into adulthood in Florida last week...this blog is more a reflection and genuine pause in despair...how does this country overcome our collective PTSD inflicted by tragedy after tragedy?...because all responses...the ones I carry deep in my heart on one side...and the ones I often cannot fathom on the other...are both generated by a deep sense of fear and rage and hopelessness...for every technological advance since that first WTC attack, we have regressed as a people...technological advances have slowly but surely erased genuine human interaction...so, we use generalized terms...our mission du jour is to eradicate bullying...you do realize as each of you reads this...perhaps from my Facebook post...that for all of you with children in school, or who have graduated out...while some of you may have witnessed the cruelty of bullying in the new social media age...your children, or relatives...some of you have also been parents to the bully...it's statistics...I've watched school districts pat themselves on the back for their bullying programs and assemblies...yet, I know how they mishandled and backed off from putting teeth into platitudes for years...we do not really appreciate, nor do we want to, the deteriorating mental health of our youth...we do not understand the depth of hurt to be hung out to dry on social media platforms...we can't if we did not grow up with it...if we are not part of generation "thunder thumb"...but we do despair of it...so how do we move forward?....disarming the dangerous is a no-brainer...at least in my brain...I don't want to take away your gun...but current laws and restrictions are not working and it's time for Washington to roll up it's shirt sleeves and work quickly...and then...and then...Parkland...we really need to look how this young man got so far-gone...how each arm of the adult community failed him...this is painful...this is not easy...it's time to put the phones down a little...to realize that the most perfect rose has thorns...and get to work...

Thursday, February 8, 2018

one flu over the cuckoo's nest...

but February made me shiver...no, it really made me shiver...last week, Michael called me from work and said, casually, between the "hold on" and "what's for dinner?", that his throat hurt...I thought...hmmm...when he came through the door, I thought somewhere deep inside...oh, shit...dry cough, fever...next day he went to the doctor...came home and said the ugliest word in the English language...flu...he was banned to the bedroom...I ran around with Lysol, wipes, and did laundry like a crazy person...but two days later, coughing like Mimi in "La Boheme" I made a pilgrimage to the Urgent Care...bronchitis...within days Lauren was down for the count...my life has consisted of doling out meds...which are hard to come by...every pharmacy is out or running low...I've noticed a little panic in the eyes of pharmacists...flu...it seems to be the only story on the news...which is what I've been told...I haven't made the eleven o'clock news in days...too tired to stay awake or give a shit...too depressing...all these meds make for restless sleep...and crazy dreams...like I swear that I heard about 45 asking for parades...and tanks...and adoration...and I drifted back to sleep...where I see money being tossed out of windows...windows of a very big white house...I think the street address is Pennsylvania-something...but the money never reaches the ground...where there are many homeless men...veterans...but back at the windows everyone is eating Napoleons...and the music is blaring...it is catchy...very Broadway...this should be a hit, I think...Matthew Broderick and Nathan Lane are crooning me to sleep in top hats and tux...ah yes, "Springtime for Hitler"...but, it's all a medicinal dream, right?...gotta go read those Tamiflu side effects again...

Friday, January 19, 2018

Learning to fly...

it's another cold January day...it is raining...no, it is snowing...not quite...it is snaining...and I am in the JetBlue terminal at JFK bound for the second Holy Land...Florida...despite the weather, it would seem we are leaving on time....but as I look around the gate I see many children...more children than I have ever seen on one flight...this is after flying south so many Christmas breaks...February nightmares...Passover kill-me's...I can't figure it out...but I am realizing that these are Orthodox families...it must be a break week for their religious schools...oh...I try to be nice...these are my people, I think...until the level of "geschreing" reaches levels that are making dogs howl in Cleveland...and I start to panic...how long is this flight?...how many minutes?...but I think...well, I'll put on the headset and watch a stupid movie and poof...we'll be landing...I look at my watch...we will be boarding soon...that should take about 5 hours with the strollers, and car seats...and, then I see the weather looks worse...and a man is davening at the window...it is morning prayers or does he think we are going to crash or is he praying his kids pass out after take-off?...oy, can it be tomorrow, I think...we finally board...our plane needs deicing...half the plane needs Children's Tylenol...the other half straight up martinis...we finally take off...the volume is not working on my tv...neither is Mike's...the poor woman to my right has a message for three hours that her screen is rebooting...I can't fall asleep...and half-way through, thanks to the delay...I have to crawl over the humanity to the bathroom...over mothers with many screaming kids...and attendants passing out salty snacks that make everyone drink more and have to pee...and omg...this is like my worst nightmare and favorite musical all in one morning...I am flying the friendly skies of Air Anatevka...I thought that was Fruma Sarah with the extra legroom!...and now, enjoying our visit in frigid temps for Florida...I wonder about our flight home...praying for a headset that works...calm  skies...a safe flight...right?...of course right!!!!

Wednesday, January 10, 2018

Back to Black

2018...and we're out of the gate...and heading deep into awards season...from #metoo to #timesup...2017 is still burning in the rearview mirror...and so, with award show #1, we swam in a sea of black...familiar faces side by side with those who should be familiar...the women in the trenches far from the paparazzi of Beverly Hills...these women had a lot to say...but for the most part the "E" idiots gave them 20 seconds before cutting to celebrities who were not nominated, and really just on the very fringe of the film industry...sometimes I felt the urge to shout "yes" in solidarity...but then sighed at the prospect that the message may have been lost...this wasn't funeral black...or interview black...or camouflage the extra 10 pounds black...it was Armani Prive...and Christian Siriano...and drop dead jewelry...and the weeks of not eating prior to the notice to toss the emerald for black still showed in the size -20 pantsuits...the sexual assault issue in Hollywood is real...and raw...and ugly...Oprah got me off my seat...after a year of starving for the beauty in language...and powerful speech writing...there was a glimmer...but really, it was Natalie Portman who summed up the "Golden" bullshit with one line...presenting best director..."And here are the all-male nominees"...this is the essence of the fault in the bigger picture...and all harassment...the lack of equal representation in management...without it...without a clear and safe and legal harbor for reporting...the risk of job loss for whistle-blowing is all too real...and we are never going to move forward...instead of harnessing this golden opportunity...with a chance for change...we will just go back to black