Paging Joseph Heller

The county park web site is showing that their sledding hills are closed due to inclement conditions (snow).

The Christmas Story

A radio talk show host was just touting “The Christmas Story” as one of the better seasonal movies. Within the past month, several people have asked me if I have seen it, as is the case every year. Yes, and even better. The movie was produced in 1983, but its roots date well back from that. It’s an amalgam of some short stories written by Jean Shepherd. Most delight in the movie but fail to take the step closer to nirvana of tracing it to the wellspring. I discovered Jean Shepherd in the early 1970s while manning a post that mostly demanded the skill of staying awake. Sometimes, you were lucky enough to inherit a piece of reading material from the prior occupant. On one such evening, I was bequested a well-thumbed edition of “Playboy.” I had already seen it and had done a thorough evaluation of the photographic art. So, on this particular evening, after a quick refresher of the visuals, I turned to the verbiage. The reviews of gold watches, exotic sports cars and clothing priced congruent with the status of their logos held little interest. I was scrambling to break even with my personal finances. Likewise, I had no interest in the advice for maintaining simultaneous intimate relations with more than a half dozen partners. That was not a problem I was grappling with. I landed at “Lost at C,” a short story by Jean Shepherd. Steeped in boredom, I tentatively began to read it. Within a few paragraphs, I was rapt. It simply resonated with me. A school boy shows up for class totally unprepared and prays he will not get called upon. Who couldn’t relate to that? It was the story of my educational life. Of course, he is called upon to come to the blackboard and solve an equation in front of everyone. To go further would digress from this story. This sampling ignited a lust for Shepherd’s writing. I was ecstatic to discover that he had stories published in prior issues and eventually hunted them down. They were even better than my initial taste. Even better, I learned that there were books of compilations of his stories, which I purchased and consumed over and over. Fast forward almost a decade and I’m a magazine publisher. I had written for publication since sixth grade but still considered myself “aspiring” and revered a number of accomplished authors. I was able to leverage my position to meet some of those who still drew breath. Jean Shepherd was at the top of my list and fortunately resided in a city that I frequented for business. I was able to lure him out for lunch. I never had a fan mentality and am far from a gusher, yet I found myself telling him just how much I treasured his writing. Jean smiled kindly and politely corrected, “I’m not a writer. I’m a story teller.” That he was. And his greatest gift was telling stories that reverberate deep in the hearts of many. My gift to you this season is to admonish not to shortchange yourself by simply partaking of “The Christmas Story.” It’s just an appetizer. Treat yourself to the entire menu.

War Stories

Tales of personal experiences, often overcoming a challenge, hardship, peril or other obstacle. Best when shared with others. The second sentence is more mine than the first. Last week, I attended a women’s college basketball game. Not the hottest ticket in town but a friend’s daughter was playing and I was there to support them. That was appreciated because, like my son’s college swim meets, the audience is largely family and friends. Afterwards, a group of us went out for an informal dinner. The older folk discussed the coming holidays, the price of gas and other “adult topics,” virtually oblivious to the young women at that point. The latter were exchanging insights about the game; things no spectator could’ve picked up. One had a contact lens go wonky while taking foul shots. Another accidentally tripped an opponent and it didn’t get called. The opposition’s number five was wearing cologne that would wake up a dead mule. I knew some of this would be retold and enjoyed for years if not decades. My friend caught me eavesdropping. “War stories,” he whispered. “Bet you miss that since you retired.” True. I’ve been lucky to share some good times with great people on the job. While a lot of us stay in touch, it isn’t the same as the weekly beer after work. The same is true with old class and team mates. Few things compare to the ride home in the team bus after a game. I suppose it helps that we never lost. Fortunately, the one tie was a home game. Even then, it was played under monsoon-like conditions that turned the field into a swamp and would be rich fodder for future stories of epic proportion. There I go, digressing into one of those sagas. I pondered my friend’s observation for a few days, wondering why I hadn’t felt the pang. Then, I kayaked with some friends in our paddling group. We went for a late lunch afterwards. And there they were. The war stories. A rich vein of ten years worth of laughs, missteps and wondrous experiences. Enjoyed together over a decade. Like whiskey, they get better with age. So that’s plugging the gap that work would’ve filled. Thankfully so. War stories are part of the glue that binds us together.

Fire Escapes

There was an episode of “Car 54, Where are you?” (responses of “Huh?” will not be brooked kindly) in which a famous architect was hired to create a modernistic apartment building in the blue collar Bronx neighborhood that was the setting for the series. He excitedly presented his creative concepts, but agreed to the request that the residents have input. The first of numerous observations was that his conceptual drawings showed no fire escapes. He responded that it was designed with fireproof materials and fire suppression systems, so the unsightly structures were unnecessary. They scoffed at his ignorance. Fire escapes aren’t for emergencies. They’re for your plants or sitting out on during hot summer months. And so it went until the last scene. The final drawing was unveiled and it depicted a building exactly like every other archaic existing structure, complete with fire escapes, which drew applause from the audience. He sat there, a crestfallen and beaten man. I’m looking at a web site that has evoked this long dormant recollection. It contains an article I wrote. At least, I think that’s what it is. The origins of this are an email I received from a partner in the web site a couple weeks ago. They’ve been fans of my writing for some time and would be honored if I would consider being a contributing editor for their site. “Contributing editor” is publishing-speak for “no pay,” but the real red flag was that they would be honored. I looked over their stuff, thought I could add another voice and agreed to do it. That was greeted with squeals of delight, email-wise, and a small caveat. Did I mind being edited? I assured them that I have been writing for some time (probably longer than the combined ages of the web site partners) and am used to having my work polished. Fired up by the prospects of a new frontier, I hammered out my first missive. I considered it a good sign that I was provided with a password to post directly instead going through a sieve of editing. I checked back a day later to ensure it remained loaded correctly. It had, but had also acquired a limpet along the way. Appended to the column was a rebuttal penned by one of the partners. This is new. I have written for and even edited many media. In a few instances, I have seen disclaimers by management stating the opinion was that of the author. But, I have never seen it essentially averred that the writer didn’t know what he was talking about. Some facts or conclusions might’ve been questioned during editorial conferences, but not for public viewing. I decided against refuting his position in that forum or even making an issue of it at all. Part of the reason for that was that a new article hook had occurred to me and it lent itself to a lot of creative word play. I was eager to get cracking, wielding puns and metaphors with unbridled largess. It practically wrote itself and was soon in print (or, electrons, as the case may be). Given the prior episode, I checked back almost hourly to see if the feckless youth had had another go at me. None. Maybe even he was stilled by the sheer genius of it. Turns out, he was just ruminating. Part of my morning ritual is powering up the box to attend to the web sites for which I have some managerial responsibilities. I accomplished that today and clicked through to my new article. It had been assaulted in the wee hours of the morning. I should’ve suspected he’d turn out to be one of the night people on the web. The damages were minor and I wrote it off to his just marking his territory. Essentially, he took sentences that were comprised of a series of nouns and converted them to bullet points. I felt this subverted the conversational and humorous tone of the piece, but moved on to another site before I was tempted to shoot him a hot email with an editorial tutorial. I had other things to do this morning anyway. They were enjoyable things so I was in a buoyant mood when I returned to my lair. And, committed the error of returning to the scene of the crime. The title was no longer the clever turn of phrase that set the tone of the article. In its place stood a bland statement of the subject matter. He could get that from an autofill app, what did he need me for? Life’s too short to engage simpletons, nuts and other assorted defectives, so I let it pass. The body remained unscathed, save for the bullets that had been shot through it. Once again I err in referring back to the site, now. Every witticism, metaphor, pun, wry commentary and other scintilla of creativity has been bleached out, leaving a prosaic, declarative manuscript of what I had to say, which is essentially nothing. The pith was in the art, not the content. It was like he had replaced the Mona Lisa with a sample snapshot snatched from a picture frame sold in Wal-Mart. Is it just me or did that sound a tad pompous? Nonetheless, as I sit here looking at the equivalent of a schematic with fire escapes, I shoulder the blame. After all, I said I was open to editing.