Singing the Song of Illinois

As I raise the shades on my bedroom windows and behold the leaden grey sky and newly fallen snow that coats my backyard, it strikes me that I have been looking at Illinois all wrong.

I promptly discard the notion of a t-shirt which reads 'You don't have to be a masochist to live in Illinois—but it helps' and instead, consider the state where I have spent the majority of my life in a new light.

It's not a place of maddening congestion, sodomic property taxes and bottomless political corruption. Or even endless expanses of really crappy weather. 

It is a place of abundance. I just didn't see it.

For example, the community in which I live isn't a far-flung backwater removed from all that I want to see and do. Instead, it provides an invigorating navigational challenge as well as ensuring my car gets a proper workout every time I take it out.

As with our bodies, the maxim of 'use it or lose it' also applies to automobiles.

The network of two-lane roads I must use to get everywhere aren't clotted with traffic signals every half-mile. No, they are festooned with yellow-stemmed road blossoms which provide me with opportunities to ruminate and even meditate at strategically-placed intervals.

Thusly, I arrive at my destination newly-refreshed despite the elongated travel times.

Similarly, the roads I travel aren't choked with inattentive or squeamish drivers unwilling or unable to travel at the posted speed limit. Like the aforementioned road blossoms, these drivers present multiple opportunities for contemplation as I creep along at roughly two-thirds of the allowable speed.

What's the old expression? Slow down and smell the roses?

The fragrant, pre-climate change springs I recall haven't disappeared, only to be replaced by the meteorological equivalent of bonus months of winter. No. This climate-based algorithm is actually driving down the pro-rated cost of my winter apparel!

I mean, that awesome puffer coat I just had to have last October is getting cheaper by the month when I'm wearing it well into April, right?

Which is a good thing, because in this year of record-high natural gas costs, the weather has thoughtfully dovetailed with that dynamic and required my furnace to remain in service well beyond the established norms.

And that's okay, because my expense-adjusted wage will automatically compensate for it. Wait. It won't. Shit. 

And let us not forget that while it doesn't remove the risk entirely, it is a fact that interminable stretches of cloudy days lower one's chances of melanoma.

Finally, I endeavor to ignore the fact that the annual property tax I pay on my exceedingly modest (it blushes when I roll up the shades) Illinois abode would translate to a four-thousand square-foot opus in my locale of choice.

The new me directs his thinking to the schoolchildren my local taxing body insists are the beneficiaries of this theft and how they no doubt embrace it as they ignore their teachers and concentrate instead on their social media accounts, the coming weekend's hook-up and/or the multifaceted outrage that is life without the latest generation smartphone.

Sigh.

Like the header says, 'Tart. Cheeky. And definitely not for everyone.'

Don't say you weren't warned. : )

Center Stage Debate

Cheers to the guys at the Athletic, who unanimously voted for Nikola Jokic as the NBA's 2021/22 Most Valuable Player. In the gentlest, most-inoffensive manner possible, I am tempted to ask: why is it even up for debate?

Let me explain.

Way back on October 20^th, Jokic took the court against the Phoenix Suns minus his number-two guy, combo guard Jamal Murray. Murray was (and remains) out for the year with a torn ACL. Eight games later, he lost his number-three guy, small forward Michael Porter, Jr. for the remainder of the season owing to a back injury.

All Jokic did was put these once and future contenders on his sizeable back, work in Murray and Porter's replacements and lead the Nuggets to 48 victories and the number-six seed in the Western Conference.

(Heaping a little irony onto the debate, how ironic is it that in this era when the importance of the center has been marginalized, the three leading candidates for the MVP award are, well centers?)

Yes. You are correct. Giannis Antetokounmpo spent portions of the season without teammates Khris Middleton and Jrue Holiday, even playing out of position in lieu of center Brook Lopez's availability. But do I even need to clarify the difference between 'portions of a season' and 'out for the season'?

Like Michael Jordan, one could cast an MVP vote for Antetokounmpo every season for the remainder of his career and have it be entirely defensible. Except in one as unique as Jokic's.

Seventy-sixer center Joel Embiid is in the thick of the conversation, as well he should be. But compared to Antetokounmpo and Jokic, I have to feel he did less with more. Granted, Ben Simmons' absence was a distraction and an on-court loss, but second-year guard Tyrese Maxey proved to be a more-than-adequate replacement and had to be a delight to all within the 76er organization.

And um, let's not forget Embiid spent a quarter of the season with a guy named James Harden. Yet he won just three more games in a less-competitive conference with a mostly-intact roster than Jokic did in a harder one minus two all-star caliber colleagues.

If the definition of a most valuable player is how badly the team would fare without him, the choice for MVP becomes still-clearer. The 2021/22 Denver Nuggets without Jokic would be the Oklahoma City Thunder.

Philadelphia without Embiid? Milwaukee without Antetokounmpo? Mediocre, but hardly in line for a lottery pick. In the time-honored fashion, Jokic made those around him better. Neither of his competitors could say the same.

Then there is the statistical singularity of Jokic's season. Not even Wilt Chamberlain, ladies and gentlemen. Not even Wilt fucking Chamberlain.

Finally, in a time where everything has become so incredibly polarizing, where every choice takes on the weight of a divisive, gauntlet-lying Supreme Court decision determining the future of western civilization, can we keep in mind this is merely an award given to a professional athlete?

If the professional observers who determine these things don't agree with me, it's fine. My life will continue, as will Nikola Jokic's.

Play on, gentlemen.

2449 N. Lincoln Ave.

I never really fit in—at least on the surface. It was the clothes. Never partial to the neon colored hair, piercings and crudely-ripped clothes of first-wave punk, I looked quite the outsider with my feathered hair, aviator wire-rim glasses and waffle-stomper hiking boots.

I screamed mainstream. No. Worse. Suburban mainstream. But those were just clothes. The inner (and more-important, to my way of thinking) connection to the music was as absolute as an ARC weld.

In fifteen short years my favorite music had gone full circle—f rom rhythm and blues-inspired two and-a-half minute singles through the excesses (not all of them bad) of the acid and art rock era back to concise, highly danceable singles.

And when the record reviews in Trouser Press lit an inner fire that demanded their purchase, the place to get them was a two-flat on Lincoln Avenue with a white, glazed brick facade. That was where Wax Trax! lived, and where a five-year battle over my discretionary income would ensue.

Clearly under the influence, I bought freely. Some might even say lavishly. Rent? Car repairs? Food? Meh. They could wait. How were such mundanities supposed to compete with the new Jam single? Or that 7” Clash EP? Or an import copy of A Kiss in the Dreamhouse, its cover art a million-times more radiant than any domestic printing plant could manage?

Those were important.

And so it went in my youthful, inverted world.

As my appearance shifted ever so slightly (I lost the feathered hair and replaced my Yes and Led Zeppelin concert tees with ones from the Psychedelic Furs) and my visits bordered on weekly, I gained an ever-so-slight amount of cred from the Wax Trax! clerks. They pointed me towards Magazine and A Certain Ratio and the Fall.

And despite my lack of enthusiasm for the sartorial considerations of punk and new wave, it should be noted that when on multi-store shopping trips, other record store's purchases somehow always ended-up within my Wax Trax! bag. Go figure.

Self-conscious artifice? Fashion? I leave it to you, dear reader.

But change is the only constant, and spurred by Wax Trax's high-profile success, they soon had multiple competitors. And, it shames me to admit, most of them were easier to get to. And park at. And whether it was cash flow problems or managerial ones or the success of the in-house record label, the up-to-the-minute inventory began to lag.

The import 45 fixture with yellow dividers painstakingly hand-lettered with red and black felt-tip pens became dog-eared and neglected. Things were changing. Most-tellingly, guys who looked like me sat behind the counter.

Wax Trax's moment had passed.

But like so many groundbreaking things, its impact isn't measured in duration. It's measured in, well, impact. And Wax Trax! left a giant footprint on Chicago's music community.

Sadly, I found out too late about Julia Nash's online petition to have the store front at Lincoln and Montana designated as a local landmark. 

Here's hoping.

Apparently, It's a Slow News Season in the NBA

Dear national sports media,

I have something to share with you. Please listen carefully.

I DON'T CARE IF THE FUCKING LOS ANGELES LAKERS FALL OUT OF THE PLAY-IN TOURNAMENT! I LESS THAN DON'T CARE! IT GOES INTO NEGATIVE INTEGERS HOW LITTLE I CARE!

THE LOS ANGELES LAKERS ARE THE ORLANDO MAGIC! THE WASHINGTON WIZARDS! THE INDIANA PACERS! AND THE OKLAHOMA CITY THUNDER—COMBINED!

I DON'T CARE! NO ONE DOES!

PLEASE! WRING YOUR HANDS OVER THIS UNDERACHIEVING, ILL-FITTING BAND OF INJURY-PRONE AND HAS-BEEN SUPERSTARS IN PRIVATE WITH YOUR FELLOW LAKER SYCOPHANTS!

THERE, YOU CAN COLLECTIVELY MOURN THE DEATH OF PROFESSIONAL BASKETBALL! WHATEVER! THE NBA (NOT TO MENTION LIFE ITSELF) WILL GO ON—SOMEHOW!

TAKE A STEP BACK! SEE THE FOREST, NOT THE TREES! STRIKE 'LAKERS' FROM YOUR VOCABULARIES! MAKE-DO WITH TWENTY-NINE PROFESSIONAL BASKETBALL TEAMS! 

IS THAT SUFFICIENT? DOES THIS PROVIDE YOU WITH A SUITABLE NUMBER OF STORIES AND STORY LINES? CAN YOU CONTINUE AS PROFESSIONAL SPORTSWRITERS WITH BUT 348 PROFESSIONAL BASKETBALL PLAYERS TO SCRUTINIZE, CRITICIZE AND IDOLIZE?

CAN YOU?

IN THE INTERESTS OF SUSTAINING YOUR PUBLICATIONS AND YOUR READERSHIP (NOT TO MENTION YOUR CAREERS), PLEASE TRY.

Best Regards,

La Piazza Gancio (Laker-free since birth.)

 

The Self-Administered Muzzle

Sigh. We've gone and done it again. In our abject fear of defeat, we play not to lose. Which of course only ensures we will.

OK. WTF? you ask. Let me explain.

Last Saturday, President Biden uttered the strongest, most-decisive words of his presidency. Speaking in Poland, he said Vladimir Putin “cannot remain in power.”

Yay.

Vladimir Putin is a toxin. In the relatively giant world of 1900, his toxicity would have remained largely contained to Ukraine and environs. In the shrunken, interconnected world we inhabit in 2022, it overflows and contaminates vast swaths of it.

Like his orange-haired counterpart in the U.S., Putin has been given far too long a leash by a global community more intent on avoiding conflict and provocation than protecting sovereignty. We have collectively given Putin an inch, and spoiled child he is, he has taken a yard.

He is deserving of Biden's words. And so much more.

But then the Democrats fucked it up.

Fearful of letting such strong words stand, they scurried to walk it back. Spinmeisters rushed to the world's press and nervously clamored “No! What Joe meant to say was...” In doing so, they opened the door to the always fragrant opinions of Putin-bitch Dmitry Peskov, who saw the opportunity and ran with it like an NFL running back charging through a four-foot hole.

Dear DNC: Has it ever crossed your mind that to win a game, it might be highly-profitable to play to win, as opposed to playing not-to-lose? Has it ever occurred to you that instead of remaining fearful at incurring the opposition's wrath, it might just be enormously-profitable to energize and engage your base?

To stand tall and say “We are Democrats! We believe in inclusion! Democracy! Equality! Law! And order!” To stand tall and shout “Vladimir Putin is a shit! And it's okay to call a shit a shit!”

I mean, ever?

Granted, you did once. When you stood in direct opposition to the blatant racism and discrimination that prevailed in the United States. Remember?

Once and for all: Stop apologizing!

Let's fire up the meat-grinder (literal or metaphorical—either one works) and make Vladimir Putin victim number-one.

Let's be proud not only of who we are, but who we are not.

Learning What We Don't Want to Know

Learning is largely a voluntary affair. We pursue the things we want to know and take the steps to learn them. Then there is the stuff we don't want to know. What I call involuntary learning. What does it feel like to lose a job? Undergo chemo? Bury a child? Those things that forcibly insert themselves into your life like foreclosure or violent crime. What is that like?

I found out. It was two-years ago today that I became a widower. It was the worst day of my life—and that was with the knowledge my wife's battle with early-onset Alzheimer's only had one outcome.

(Prior to that, I learned what it was like to be a twenty-four/seven care-giver. The stress and fitful sleep aside, that was only the second-hardest thing I ever did.)

You see, my wife was the most luminous soul I had ever met, and to my utter disbelief she liked me. She thought I was funny and smart and nice. Not counting the six-months or so we worked together before becoming a couple, we spent something like twelve-thousand twenty-one days together. For me, she was it.

Naturally, it wasn't all unicorns and rainbows. No marriage is. For example, frustrated one day by my bottomless enthusiasm for washing and waxing cars, she said to me (as only a wife can) “If I put the %$#@! bathroom on four wheels will you clean it then?”

Yeah, she could be a pistol. More often, she was the person who couldn't continue a walk because we'd come across a rabbit who'd been critically injured by a car and who wouldn't sleep until it was attended to by a veterinarian.

Or the one who whipped up a pan of double-chocolate brownies while I was in the backyard one hot summer afternoon, attempting to clear it of bindweed.

So yes, taking care of her was a no-brainer. And to my eternal surprise, it gave me a sense of purpose I had never known. Her descent was a slow one, which gave me time to adapt to the latest round of changes. And unlike many Alzheimer's patients, her personality never altered. There was no acting out, no violence.

We were largely able to continue our lives as a couple. We continued to make our weekly trip to Jewel and go to Lincoln Park Zoo and the CSO and just be together (something which I now understood had an expiration date).

The Great Recession had kicked us down a long flight of stairs, to the point where we lived in my parent's basement. But even that misery contained a silver lining: she was next to me. Things like holding her hand, kissing her hair and having her in my arms became impossibly redolent. Decadent, even.

She was an island of comfort in a sea of shit.

Nothing changed after the onset. The here and now—having her with me—was everything.

The emotional contours of care-giving feature guilt. Exhaustion. Anger. Hopelessness. Self-doubt. Endless adjustments. Even after my wife had entered hospice, I reflexively responded to her CNA's remark that I was a good care-giver with the thought “Then why isn't she getting better?”

The cruel reality, newly reinforced, haunted me deep into the night. Tears and vodka flowed.

Yes, I was learning.

It shouldn't have been surprising that my wife, who was probably the most-intelligent person I had ever known, was still teaching me.

Then, on a damp, overcast Thursday afternoon, she was gone.

<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Death brings with it a whole new understanding of the word 'forever'.

It answers questions, such as how can survivors hand over ludicrous sums of money to people they believe can contact their loved ones?

It makes you wish for incredibly mundane things. Things like sitting next to each other watching TV. Or hearing a giggle—one last time.

Depending on your spiritual inclination, it may even challenge your notion of the afterlife. For example, even as a lapsed Lutheran, I refused to believe my wife was just...gone. How could all she said and thought and felt—all that she was—just be gone?

The answer, of course, is that it isn't. It's in me.

Lucy? You were a place.

And whenever I was with you, I was home.

Unfinished Business

So Tom Brady has pivoted and now wants to return for a twenty-third season.

Normally, I'd celebrate the accomplishments of such a late-round pick quite enthusiastically, but in his case there's a old expression that comes to mind, something about fish and houseguests beginning to smell after three days.

Tom? How are we ever to miss you if you won't go away?