Celebrated party-giver Elsa Maxwell got it right when she said:"Laugh at yourself first, before anyone else can!"
Right about now, there's a great deal to laugh at in America. Or, more correctly, about America. While the Great Recession has joyfully generated some amazing acts of kinship and kindness, it has also triggered some laughable contradictions. As in the case of: More information side by side with less wisdom...more traffic accidents side by side with less cars....more political leadership side by side with less political challenge.
It's true, being a mix of different cultures we Americans are famous for our many contradictions. But at this writing, some contradictions are in the classic category of the ill-winds-that-blow-no-good. Consider...
Our body of knowledge is exploding exponentially each and every day. In 2006 the world produced 161 "exabytes" of digital information. That's 3 million times the amount of information contained in all the books ever written since the beginning. Next year, according to the "Columbia Journalism Review," that 161 exabytes will spike to 988. And yet with all of that information, Americans in only four states have found the wisdom to accept gay marriage.
One is left to wonder how long it will take for the historically inevitable -- filing away this absurd primal fear along with other discarded fears such as witches, black cats, and mental illness!
In a second peculiar contradiction, Detroit is projecting 6 million fewer car sales this year, and yet Americans persist in its growing number of traffic accidents. Each year, more than 100,00 incidents yielding 40,000 injuries and 1500 deaths.
You ask yourself how can we keep killing ourselves on the road faster and faster with fewer and fewer cars. Answers range from the fact that Americans are sleeping less to the hunch we simply prefer speed to safety!
The third contradiction afoot these days is more political leadership side by side with less political challenge. This, to be sure, is more opinion than truth, and yet there are some truthy examples out there to support it. On one hand we have a new president who has unveiled an ambitious array of plans and programs. On the other, we have the loyal opposition exercising their right to dissent, yet making this more comedy than drama. That's because today's dissenters-in-charge are the likes of mushy-mouthed critics like Rush Limbaugh, Glen Beck and Anne Coulter.
I'm not a card-carrying Republican, but even an Independent has to yearn for the classier days of dissent by a Wendell Wilkie, Barry Goldwater, William Buckley and Newt Gingrich. They didn't shout as loud, but they did think better!
But, hey, if you like your America in sharp shades of clanging contradictions, this is your day...
Monday, April 13, 2009
Sunday, April 12, 2009
A SECOND WEDDING RING
Look at your fingers. An evolutionary work of art. Now look at your keypad. An electronic work of science. Whenever you put art and science together, you get remarkable results. Sometimes even historic ones...!
However, even though my computer-poised fingers can reach out to the farthest limits of our planet and to the deepest layers of our knowledge, what most intrigues me about them is my second wedding ring. It rests right next to my first, and together they afford me a comforting sense of human continuity. When you hear their story, you may want to get a second ring for yourself
The first is the gold wedding band Joan slipped on my finger that sun-lit April at Holy Name Cathedral. The second was given by J to L in the year of our Lord 1803. Now I don't exactly know who J and L were, but this 18K gold band has passed down through the generations of my Mother's family ever since. I wear it to remember the generational beads of continuity that constitute my family's necklace of life. Whenever I start to think the world began the day I was born, I look at that 206-year-old ring.
.
There's more than sentiment at work here. All too often our commanding arsenal of personal computers and Iphones can seduce us into believing today has so much to offer, that our yesterdays were merely pale preludes. Not true! Each year we uncover more of the mysteries and marvels of the Ancients, of their long forgotten inventions and accomplishments. The same truth fits our own families as well.
When I study my hands, my eyes, my vocal inflections, even my beliefs, I have to wonder what small part of these were inherited from J and L. Just like the J's and L's in your own family history, there were entire genetic galaxies circling around each of the births throughout each of those ensuing 10 generations.When J loved L, Napoleon ruled Europe, Thomas Jefferson was in the White House, slavery was in the ascendancy, and some of their grand-children were destined to fight and die in the Civil War.
Some of what and who I am today traces back like a time-machine to that mysterious J and L. Were the young...beautiful... bright...Christian or Jew, rich or poor, city or farm? What made them laugh? What made them dream? What were their origins? You and I may never know such answers, but each of us is living some of those answers. And if this is true of our two families, then so is it true of the millions of families we call America.
Today, we millions seek new and safer futures for each of our own genetic galaxies. And that is entirely proper. At the same time, though, our search benefits whenever we pause to look back from where the search first began. At Holy Name Cathedral that long ago April, the priest spoke of the Church's belief in "the communion of saints." That article of faith that holds that every life from the beginning of time to the present and into the unborn future are all in some way bonded together
In our American ethos of rugged individualism, communion and community and collectivism are sometimes left behind on the trails of rugged progress. But whenever I look at this second wedding ring, I can't help hearing J and L whispering to me from somewhere: "No man is an island entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent..."
This poet, John Donne -- I notice his name begins with a J.....
However, even though my computer-poised fingers can reach out to the farthest limits of our planet and to the deepest layers of our knowledge, what most intrigues me about them is my second wedding ring. It rests right next to my first, and together they afford me a comforting sense of human continuity. When you hear their story, you may want to get a second ring for yourself
The first is the gold wedding band Joan slipped on my finger that sun-lit April at Holy Name Cathedral. The second was given by J to L in the year of our Lord 1803. Now I don't exactly know who J and L were, but this 18K gold band has passed down through the generations of my Mother's family ever since. I wear it to remember the generational beads of continuity that constitute my family's necklace of life. Whenever I start to think the world began the day I was born, I look at that 206-year-old ring.
.
There's more than sentiment at work here. All too often our commanding arsenal of personal computers and Iphones can seduce us into believing today has so much to offer, that our yesterdays were merely pale preludes. Not true! Each year we uncover more of the mysteries and marvels of the Ancients, of their long forgotten inventions and accomplishments. The same truth fits our own families as well.
When I study my hands, my eyes, my vocal inflections, even my beliefs, I have to wonder what small part of these were inherited from J and L. Just like the J's and L's in your own family history, there were entire genetic galaxies circling around each of the births throughout each of those ensuing 10 generations.When J loved L, Napoleon ruled Europe, Thomas Jefferson was in the White House, slavery was in the ascendancy, and some of their grand-children were destined to fight and die in the Civil War.
Some of what and who I am today traces back like a time-machine to that mysterious J and L. Were the young...beautiful... bright...Christian or Jew, rich or poor, city or farm? What made them laugh? What made them dream? What were their origins? You and I may never know such answers, but each of us is living some of those answers. And if this is true of our two families, then so is it true of the millions of families we call America.
Today, we millions seek new and safer futures for each of our own genetic galaxies. And that is entirely proper. At the same time, though, our search benefits whenever we pause to look back from where the search first began. At Holy Name Cathedral that long ago April, the priest spoke of the Church's belief in "the communion of saints." That article of faith that holds that every life from the beginning of time to the present and into the unborn future are all in some way bonded together
In our American ethos of rugged individualism, communion and community and collectivism are sometimes left behind on the trails of rugged progress. But whenever I look at this second wedding ring, I can't help hearing J and L whispering to me from somewhere: "No man is an island entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent..."
This poet, John Donne -- I notice his name begins with a J.....
Saturday, April 11, 2009
FROM INVINCIBLE TO INDEFATIGABLE
The other morning I received two deliciously different items in the mail. A large, colorful seed catalog; a large, colorful class reunion invitation. The cunning counter-point here was almost symphonic....!
Each was typical of what you might expect in spring. One a tribute to new life, the other a tribute to lived lives. Not too unlike America itself this springtime, as we hesitate between a triumphant past and an unsure future. All springs are a hesitant interlude between one season and another, between the known and the unknown. And while we look forward to new births, we can't help but find new deaths.
You study the seeds, and you understand how each must die in the ground before yielding its blossoms for you. You study the faces in your graduation picture, and you understand how each death among your ranks yields rich memories for you. Call this what you will -- gardens or reunions, joys or sorrows -- but at root what we're dealing with are transitions. Those sometimes subtle, often slapdash changes which are the recurring theme key to our symphony.
I'll plant some of these seeds and I'll attend this reunion. Just like my country is once more planting and attending those things which my grand-children will read as history. The funny thing about transitions, personal or national, is that you rarely realize them while they're happening. How does the fish know it's swimming in this thing called an ocean when this is all it knows? How will our grand-children know they're competing in a different world than we knew when their world will be the only world they know?
Any coming transitions in my backyard or from my re-gathering with old friends will be something I can see and touch. On the other hand, the historical transitions of a nation are far less perceptible, because not even the historians can see and touch them until they're over. Helen O'Connell -- who was a popular big-band vocalist in the 30s and 40s -- put it succinctly at age 80. During a big Hollywood tribute to her and to the big-band era of Tommy Dorsey, Harry James, and Glenn Miller, she blushed at the microphone and said: "Gee, if I only knew I was living in an 'era' I would have enjoyed it more!"
Looking through my catalog and my invitation, I feel like Helen. Gee, I lived through the "heroic forties," the "fabulous fifties," the "revolutionary sixties," and all the while it didn't seem like an "era." Just everyday life. And so will it be with America when in some future time, folks look around and feel what they are is what they always were.
But that won't necessarily be so. Because in that future springtime, America may no longer bear the glory and the burden of leading the "American era." We'll perhaps be just one more great power among several great powers. And the name on our proud flagship will not have to be the USS Invincible, but rather the USS Indefatigable.
Frankly, I wouldn't mind a transition like that. After all, look what happens to my backyard when I let these seeds die into new life....!
Each was typical of what you might expect in spring. One a tribute to new life, the other a tribute to lived lives. Not too unlike America itself this springtime, as we hesitate between a triumphant past and an unsure future. All springs are a hesitant interlude between one season and another, between the known and the unknown. And while we look forward to new births, we can't help but find new deaths.
You study the seeds, and you understand how each must die in the ground before yielding its blossoms for you. You study the faces in your graduation picture, and you understand how each death among your ranks yields rich memories for you. Call this what you will -- gardens or reunions, joys or sorrows -- but at root what we're dealing with are transitions. Those sometimes subtle, often slapdash changes which are the recurring theme key to our symphony.
I'll plant some of these seeds and I'll attend this reunion. Just like my country is once more planting and attending those things which my grand-children will read as history. The funny thing about transitions, personal or national, is that you rarely realize them while they're happening. How does the fish know it's swimming in this thing called an ocean when this is all it knows? How will our grand-children know they're competing in a different world than we knew when their world will be the only world they know?
Any coming transitions in my backyard or from my re-gathering with old friends will be something I can see and touch. On the other hand, the historical transitions of a nation are far less perceptible, because not even the historians can see and touch them until they're over. Helen O'Connell -- who was a popular big-band vocalist in the 30s and 40s -- put it succinctly at age 80. During a big Hollywood tribute to her and to the big-band era of Tommy Dorsey, Harry James, and Glenn Miller, she blushed at the microphone and said: "Gee, if I only knew I was living in an 'era' I would have enjoyed it more!"
Looking through my catalog and my invitation, I feel like Helen. Gee, I lived through the "heroic forties," the "fabulous fifties," the "revolutionary sixties," and all the while it didn't seem like an "era." Just everyday life. And so will it be with America when in some future time, folks look around and feel what they are is what they always were.
But that won't necessarily be so. Because in that future springtime, America may no longer bear the glory and the burden of leading the "American era." We'll perhaps be just one more great power among several great powers. And the name on our proud flagship will not have to be the USS Invincible, but rather the USS Indefatigable.
Frankly, I wouldn't mind a transition like that. After all, look what happens to my backyard when I let these seeds die into new life....!
Friday, April 10, 2009
THERE'S A DIVINE PURPOSE TO POTHOLES
Mr. Mayor, every spring you get no respect. Why? All these potholes...!
But you and your potholes are getting a bad rap. You'd almost think they had no grand, divine purpose in our life. But you and I know they do. Every ugly one of them is communicating a beautiful message. We simply have to listen for it.
Engineers may tell us potholes come from shifting weather. Republicans may say they come from shifty liberals. Democrats may insist they come from shiftless conservatives. But there are those of us who just know they come from God. Or, if you have a problem with that, from cosmic Evolution.
Here's our spring-tested logic. Potholes make us mad...that makes us realize things have to be maintained.... that makes us pay more attention to life's maintainers. Not just street crews, but cops, firefighters, power-line climbers, flood-control teams, ER staffers. Think about it -- when you need them, are there any more beautiful people in the whole wide the world?
And the beat goes on, because life's maintainers also include stay-at-home moms, crossing guards, mail carriers, dog-walkers, meals-on-wheelers, baby sitters, and oh yes grandparents. Without these quiet armies, the planet would spin a lot less efficiently.
So to all my disgruntled fellow-commuters, think of it this way. The next pothole you hit is actually the thud your memory needs to remember all those under-appreciated maintainers who help make it possible for you and me to be -- well, to be you and me!
But you and your potholes are getting a bad rap. You'd almost think they had no grand, divine purpose in our life. But you and I know they do. Every ugly one of them is communicating a beautiful message. We simply have to listen for it.
Engineers may tell us potholes come from shifting weather. Republicans may say they come from shifty liberals. Democrats may insist they come from shiftless conservatives. But there are those of us who just know they come from God. Or, if you have a problem with that, from cosmic Evolution.
Here's our spring-tested logic. Potholes make us mad...that makes us realize things have to be maintained.... that makes us pay more attention to life's maintainers. Not just street crews, but cops, firefighters, power-line climbers, flood-control teams, ER staffers. Think about it -- when you need them, are there any more beautiful people in the whole wide the world?
And the beat goes on, because life's maintainers also include stay-at-home moms, crossing guards, mail carriers, dog-walkers, meals-on-wheelers, baby sitters, and oh yes grandparents. Without these quiet armies, the planet would spin a lot less efficiently.
So to all my disgruntled fellow-commuters, think of it this way. The next pothole you hit is actually the thud your memory needs to remember all those under-appreciated maintainers who help make it possible for you and me to be -- well, to be you and me!
Thursday, April 9, 2009
How Do 'The Folks' Compare With 'The Experts'?
Here's a test anyone from presidents to patients, from celebrities to crackheads, should take. Ask yourself what's gotten you further in life -- what you heard from your family or learned from your books? A really terrific little question, because the answer has traditionally confirmed that, right or wrong, our personal perceptions usually become our public realities. However recently, fellow recession-ers, tradition has changed.
Consider...
Mom used to say, "Always keep your day job." In recent years, Wall Street said, "If you can dream it, you can do it." Dad used to say, "Save for a rainy day." The stock market said, "Saving is wasting." In looking back over these last 30 years -- Reagan to Obama -- a lot of us are discovering that some of our best-selling books may have talked us out of some of our best-learned advice. Now with our latest bubble busted, we're left to wonder who we should believe in more: "the folks" or "the experts?"
The question is an ancient one: How best do you mix your paints to achieve your best economic picture? Perhaps dabs of optimistic yellows and spendthrift greens subtly worked into cautious blacks and thrifty blues? Well, yes, but the real master painters always know the exact degrees and blends needed for a true masterpiece. Who are the masters today? Those old-time pictures from home face all sorts of new-time experts confidently hoisting their brushes and holding up their canvasses. These painters come from the White House, the Congressional Budget Bureaus, the International Monetary Fund, the G-20, even a few that survived their own rubbled bubble to paint again. And yet, not a one of us knows for sure which of their paintings to bid on.
This could be one of the biggest bids in our lifetime, so how to choose?
Darned if this doesn't sound like the classic battle between old cliches and new statistics, around-the-kitchen- table wisdoms vs new global-economy charts. While they're still unframed, everyone's painting looks spectacular. Until, that is, the next one is held up. And so once more, we have this gluttony of choices, this plethora of solutions. The old tug from what we learned in Mom's kitchen and Dad's workshop still has the feel of time-tested folk wisdom. After all, they didn't do so bad!
Still, this is a far more educated and sophisticated time. Can old Uncle Harry's home-spun intuitions about making-an-honest-buck stand up to Ben Bernacke's and Tim Geithner's computer-spun projections about the GNP, COLA and CPI? Darned if I know! Or they know!
So we're left to ponder. Has our world become too complicated and sophisticated for the little guy to understand it...? Or is our world just another emperor whose clothing is an illusion that takes a little guy to see through...? Like you, I'm just in the crowd standing on my toes to see if I can tell the difference.
Consider...
Mom used to say, "Always keep your day job." In recent years, Wall Street said, "If you can dream it, you can do it." Dad used to say, "Save for a rainy day." The stock market said, "Saving is wasting." In looking back over these last 30 years -- Reagan to Obama -- a lot of us are discovering that some of our best-selling books may have talked us out of some of our best-learned advice. Now with our latest bubble busted, we're left to wonder who we should believe in more: "the folks" or "the experts?"
The question is an ancient one: How best do you mix your paints to achieve your best economic picture? Perhaps dabs of optimistic yellows and spendthrift greens subtly worked into cautious blacks and thrifty blues? Well, yes, but the real master painters always know the exact degrees and blends needed for a true masterpiece. Who are the masters today? Those old-time pictures from home face all sorts of new-time experts confidently hoisting their brushes and holding up their canvasses. These painters come from the White House, the Congressional Budget Bureaus, the International Monetary Fund, the G-20, even a few that survived their own rubbled bubble to paint again. And yet, not a one of us knows for sure which of their paintings to bid on.
This could be one of the biggest bids in our lifetime, so how to choose?
Darned if this doesn't sound like the classic battle between old cliches and new statistics, around-the-kitchen- table wisdoms vs new global-economy charts. While they're still unframed, everyone's painting looks spectacular. Until, that is, the next one is held up. And so once more, we have this gluttony of choices, this plethora of solutions. The old tug from what we learned in Mom's kitchen and Dad's workshop still has the feel of time-tested folk wisdom. After all, they didn't do so bad!
Still, this is a far more educated and sophisticated time. Can old Uncle Harry's home-spun intuitions about making-an-honest-buck stand up to Ben Bernacke's and Tim Geithner's computer-spun projections about the GNP, COLA and CPI? Darned if I know! Or they know!
So we're left to ponder. Has our world become too complicated and sophisticated for the little guy to understand it...? Or is our world just another emperor whose clothing is an illusion that takes a little guy to see through...? Like you, I'm just in the crowd standing on my toes to see if I can tell the difference.
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
Everyone Has That Split-Second
Quick, what's 3l,536,000 times 78....?
That's the average number of seconds each of us has in this lifetime. At least according to the latest actuarial projections. How you feel about this depends a lot on your age and your faith in actuaries. Or, for a better gut-check, ask yourself how you feel about the hundreds of lives just lost in the recent Italian earthquake? Or in last year's Chinese earthquake? Or in that Asian tsunami a few years back? Or what about in that volcano at Pompeii two thousand years ago?
Here's the point. With each tick of each second of our lives, we are one more second closer to that split-second. To that sudden slicing shard of time which forever splits our lives asunder into "before" and "after."
Our split-second needn't be some abrupt catastrophe (although they seem the easiest to recall), for it can also be some abrupt cadenza. That moment your graduating class cheered your valedictory...that surge when you first saw him or her across the room...the flush when you first held you first child...the joy that morning when the blazing sunrise seemed all of a sudden to light up all the shadows of your doubts.
These split-seconds that click so emphatically into place are, at best, mysteries. Neither religion nor science can really predict them; neither faith nor fortune can actually explain them. Perhaps our best guides among these clicks of our lives, those eyes which can best pierce such mysteries, are our artists. The poets, playwrights, composers and directors whose works are entirely familiar with mystery, for their gifts of expression are likewise inexplicably sudden and staggering.
You and I, we thrive in an age of enormous science and technology. It has helped our species probe so many of the eternal mysteries of our physical bodies and our planet. Geologists, archaeologists, chemists and physicists have made the world around us more explainable. Now, science is taking up the still greater mysteries of the world within us. Psychiatry is being joined by neuro-science and biology in order to tour the inner-sanctums of our being and our behaviors. This passion to know is our specie's first passion, and these passionate seekers seem to be entering the real final frontier.
It has been said that as these scientists travel further, they will eventually meet the theologians who got their first!
There may be a better answer to this ancient riddle between science and theology, between reason and faith. Our artists....! They seem to have a mighty footprint in both those paradigms, for the artist works with the cognitive skills of a scientist, at the same time with the affective intuitions of a theologian.
Throughout their lives they experience these split-seconds which permit them to suddenly fathom our split-seconds. Michelangelo who suddenly sees the touch of God upon our lives there in the barren plaster of the Sistine ceiling...Rodin whose sudden swift sculptor's chisel finds our seeking souls in marble....Mozart and Beethoven and Stravinsky whose fingers suddenly fly across keys that sing clarity amid our confusion...Frank Capra, Steven Spielberg, Francis Coppola suddenly splash their sudden insights onto the great screens of our lives.
Art is the fusion of all that is best about both our reason and our faith, our science and our theology? I don't know how many seconds are left to tick, but at this point I'm inclined to believe it is our artists who are best gifted with the mortal means to explain these mysteries to us.
That's the average number of seconds each of us has in this lifetime. At least according to the latest actuarial projections. How you feel about this depends a lot on your age and your faith in actuaries. Or, for a better gut-check, ask yourself how you feel about the hundreds of lives just lost in the recent Italian earthquake? Or in last year's Chinese earthquake? Or in that Asian tsunami a few years back? Or what about in that volcano at Pompeii two thousand years ago?
Here's the point. With each tick of each second of our lives, we are one more second closer to that split-second. To that sudden slicing shard of time which forever splits our lives asunder into "before" and "after."
Our split-second needn't be some abrupt catastrophe (although they seem the easiest to recall), for it can also be some abrupt cadenza. That moment your graduating class cheered your valedictory...that surge when you first saw him or her across the room...the flush when you first held you first child...the joy that morning when the blazing sunrise seemed all of a sudden to light up all the shadows of your doubts.
These split-seconds that click so emphatically into place are, at best, mysteries. Neither religion nor science can really predict them; neither faith nor fortune can actually explain them. Perhaps our best guides among these clicks of our lives, those eyes which can best pierce such mysteries, are our artists. The poets, playwrights, composers and directors whose works are entirely familiar with mystery, for their gifts of expression are likewise inexplicably sudden and staggering.
You and I, we thrive in an age of enormous science and technology. It has helped our species probe so many of the eternal mysteries of our physical bodies and our planet. Geologists, archaeologists, chemists and physicists have made the world around us more explainable. Now, science is taking up the still greater mysteries of the world within us. Psychiatry is being joined by neuro-science and biology in order to tour the inner-sanctums of our being and our behaviors. This passion to know is our specie's first passion, and these passionate seekers seem to be entering the real final frontier.
It has been said that as these scientists travel further, they will eventually meet the theologians who got their first!
There may be a better answer to this ancient riddle between science and theology, between reason and faith. Our artists....! They seem to have a mighty footprint in both those paradigms, for the artist works with the cognitive skills of a scientist, at the same time with the affective intuitions of a theologian.
Throughout their lives they experience these split-seconds which permit them to suddenly fathom our split-seconds. Michelangelo who suddenly sees the touch of God upon our lives there in the barren plaster of the Sistine ceiling...Rodin whose sudden swift sculptor's chisel finds our seeking souls in marble....Mozart and Beethoven and Stravinsky whose fingers suddenly fly across keys that sing clarity amid our confusion...Frank Capra, Steven Spielberg, Francis Coppola suddenly splash their sudden insights onto the great screens of our lives.
Art is the fusion of all that is best about both our reason and our faith, our science and our theology? I don't know how many seconds are left to tick, but at this point I'm inclined to believe it is our artists who are best gifted with the mortal means to explain these mysteries to us.
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Wrigley Where the Real Game is Off the Field
Let me state at the outset of this new season. I am a fair-weather Cub fan. And, frankly, proud of it. I suffer enough pain in real life to invite for any more by living and dying with my team's 100-year battle against the gods of destiny...!
This confession does not, however, keep me from going to gloriously green Wrigley. Here where the game off the field is usually far more fascinating than the one on. Because these players don't realize they're being watched. What's more, they don't even realize they're performing in uniform. Let me explain.....
First, come those waves of libidinous humanity lapping against the walls of the friendly confines. These are the tight-dressed blondes and their would-be partners gaggling inside the surrounding pubs. Wading through these noisy enclaves to get to the field is an adventure in itself. Especially for old, well-tamed husbands. Spectacular necklines plunging down almost to the point where unbelievable tights begin inching up, these off-duty feminists keep the on-duty hunters thinking anything but pennants!
Next come the ticket-takers and aisle-ushers. The first, a stoic study in I-got-this-job-through-my-alderman indifference; the second, uniformed platoons of failed lives at home now at last with a piece of power before the world. Can you find me a player on the field with any greater complexity to such character-studies!
The vendors are, of course, the featured players in this off-field game. Each playing their part with a different brand of gusto -- some yapping with toothless grins, others intimidating with barking demands -- but all straight out of central-casting which auditions only the city's most incredibly unique!
Now come the stars of this game -- those amazing fans around you. Amazing because most of them are in attendance for almost anything you can think of besides baseball. Grisly old-timers bathing in the sun of old memories together...young parents working hard to feed their fidgeting offspring...downtown execs here to swap stories and close deals...the silver-ladies who bussed in from Appleton for some good time together, even with the distraction of those teams down there...oh, and the blondes from the surrounding pubs here criss-crossing the aisles to the impressed whistles of the boys-of-summer in the stands whose baseball card collections no longer seem quite so interesting!
Rounding out this team of unpaid players are the cops and the sellers in the food booths. Chicago's finest at Wrigley are usually not chosen for their marksmanship or their athletic prowess. There's a place for that in our city streets, but here they usually come in much thicker sizes. Wrigley is a nice assignment for the nicer types, and so when they're not swapping Mayor jokes, they're helping lost kids believe there really are Officer Friendlies in our town. As for the booth sellers, one in a hundred has a smile for you. The other 99 are here to prove there's nothing friendly about their food, so pay up and move on, pal!
The next day I usually read about the relentless fastballs and spectacular catches I missed. I simply can't help myself. The game off the field is just so damn interesting. What's more, for me it's always a win. Can you match that record, Lou.....?
This confession does not, however, keep me from going to gloriously green Wrigley. Here where the game off the field is usually far more fascinating than the one on. Because these players don't realize they're being watched. What's more, they don't even realize they're performing in uniform. Let me explain.....
First, come those waves of libidinous humanity lapping against the walls of the friendly confines. These are the tight-dressed blondes and their would-be partners gaggling inside the surrounding pubs. Wading through these noisy enclaves to get to the field is an adventure in itself. Especially for old, well-tamed husbands. Spectacular necklines plunging down almost to the point where unbelievable tights begin inching up, these off-duty feminists keep the on-duty hunters thinking anything but pennants!
Next come the ticket-takers and aisle-ushers. The first, a stoic study in I-got-this-job-through-my-alderman indifference; the second, uniformed platoons of failed lives at home now at last with a piece of power before the world. Can you find me a player on the field with any greater complexity to such character-studies!
The vendors are, of course, the featured players in this off-field game. Each playing their part with a different brand of gusto -- some yapping with toothless grins, others intimidating with barking demands -- but all straight out of central-casting which auditions only the city's most incredibly unique!
Now come the stars of this game -- those amazing fans around you. Amazing because most of them are in attendance for almost anything you can think of besides baseball. Grisly old-timers bathing in the sun of old memories together...young parents working hard to feed their fidgeting offspring...downtown execs here to swap stories and close deals...the silver-ladies who bussed in from Appleton for some good time together, even with the distraction of those teams down there...oh, and the blondes from the surrounding pubs here criss-crossing the aisles to the impressed whistles of the boys-of-summer in the stands whose baseball card collections no longer seem quite so interesting!
Rounding out this team of unpaid players are the cops and the sellers in the food booths. Chicago's finest at Wrigley are usually not chosen for their marksmanship or their athletic prowess. There's a place for that in our city streets, but here they usually come in much thicker sizes. Wrigley is a nice assignment for the nicer types, and so when they're not swapping Mayor jokes, they're helping lost kids believe there really are Officer Friendlies in our town. As for the booth sellers, one in a hundred has a smile for you. The other 99 are here to prove there's nothing friendly about their food, so pay up and move on, pal!
The next day I usually read about the relentless fastballs and spectacular catches I missed. I simply can't help myself. The game off the field is just so damn interesting. What's more, for me it's always a win. Can you match that record, Lou.....?
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