profkf's Blog

This is truly one of those tomes where all the above is true. It is one day shy of a week when our world turned truly upside down. It has taken at least this long to even try to find a way to express with words, what the emotions are, and honestly even by the time I get to the end of this I don’t know if I will have even been marginally successful, but likely if you stay around until the end of what will be not much more than a stream of consciousness some of it may resonate or at least make sense.

The land that became the United States of America was colonized partly by people fleeing the rule of a kingdom, partly by wealthy merchants looking to build more wealth, partly by people looking for religious freedom, partly by people looking to improve their own economic lives and to become land owners. There were other reasons, but these seem to be among the most categorized and “taught”. Some of the indisputable facts are that much of the land we stand on, that we built on, was either stolen outright or stolen through shady “treaties” and “deals” from the indigenous residents who were here already. It was also developed on the backs of enslaved people who were either brought here for that purpose or locals who were enslaved or conscripted by those with more power, more wealth, more arms or a combination of all three. The point here is that our land of opportunity was not handed over by divine fiat and that we live with the history of this.

The other point is that the horrors of our history have never truly been exorcised. They have, over some generations, been addressed with attempts to make it better, to recognize what was done and to try to make sure that those things don’t ever repeat or worse, get worse. It is no accident that the phrasing is “all men are created equal” as it was written by the patriarchy and that even the male members of the enslaved communities were never considered men, only property. There are many to this very day, who by both actions and words, still consider the women as “owned” or at the very least, somehow sub-human.

I have written before about having been through multiple political cycles with people and policies I agreed with and those I disagreed with so I won’t recap all of that here. I think what troubles me the most is the fact that disagreement has become divisive to the point where true aggression, chest pounding, fact manipulation, lies (both willful and mistaken) have become the norm. Simple facts, those that are measurable, quantifiable and supportable have given way to edicts from god, concepts, supposition and ludicrous statements that become by repetition “facts” (I will only use one example here…the claim of “post birth abortions” being possible) that by their repetition strike fear and that fear is then played upon.

When the hellmouth was originally thrown wide open in 2016, the mantra was “give them a chance, don’t judge on supposition” and that was, at that time, a bit comforting for those of us who couldn’t quite reason as to why it happened. This time there is none of that, we have seen with our own eyes the lack of human decency (again just one example: Jan 6th 2021 and the inability to pass the baton peacefully, all the while continuing the “big lie”)

I think I’ll close this up by saying my real hope is that when I write about the results in 2028, I will lead with the fact that I was totally wrong in 2024 and that none of what I feared came to pass, that would be the best result of all. That said, my plan is to spend 90% more time reading, listening to music, continuing to be educated on events while avoiding the overwhelming noise and bluster of the bully pulpit soundbites and continue to hope that freedom of speech, expression, religion, is not manipulated to mean freedom to only have one kind of speech, expression, religion, lifestyle, and that one day before I transition that the phrase “All men are created equal” can really be interpreted as “all human beings are created equal”. Also that “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness” means exactly what TJ intended back when it was written:

Thomas Jefferson’s incorporation of the phrase “pursuit of happiness” into the Declaration of Independence was based on the work of John Locke. Locke believed that the pursuit of happiness was the foundation of liberty, and that it freed people from being attached to any particular desire. He believed that the pursuit of happiness was about making decisions that would lead to the best life possible for a human being. 

I want to start this by saying I know how lucky I am. 72+ years up the line. I can still swim (slowly but steadily) a lot of laps in a pool. I average between 50 and 80 most sessions. I will be “off” for the next few months due to our pool closing and the town pool (the only other option) being out of commission until at least Feb 2025. However, there are a lot of things that age brings with it that make me melancholy. I have such annoying arthritis in my feet that I need custom orthotics if I even try to jog even more annoying is that, while they work and help on the feet and arches, they change the fit of the shoe and that creates another issue. I love to jog (I used to say “run” but even when I said it, it was stretching the truth), it was something I did for a long time and when I had the sleeve surgery in 2015 I started up again with a goal of finishing a half marathon. A goal I accomplished in October of 2016, still for me personally, one of my top accomplishments.

I also have played (at) golf since I was 13 years old and was introduced to the game by a school friend, Jimmy Paturas, in the Bronx. I played a lot in college, got pretty good, but life, family and work got in the way for a while. I took it up again after my sleeve surgery and again got to a point where I was very comfortable with how I was playing (think a handicap of 17 at the low) and felt confident playing even the toughest courses. Now, my hands (also some arthritis) make that hard. I did finally manage to get the “warning” sign from the first tee at Bethpage Black (one of the best courses I’ve ever played and one that has a warm history due to being introduced to it by Uncle Dominick P. Starace) and while I was overjoyed when it arrived and when I put it up, today I am looking at it as something else lost to the time tunnel of age

When I was young, I happily body surfed and for a short while, really surfed. Again, age has pretty much put the kibosh on that in perpetuity.

When I had my sleeve surgery I swore I would never get uncomfortable with my weight again, and while I am nowhere near where I was pre surgery I now look in the mirror and am both uncomfortable and angry with what has comeback. The really annoying part is that I know exactly how to drop back to where I am comfortable. The incredibly annoying part is that everything I do seems to have almost no impact, it’s as if my body is now saying “fuck you, you old shit, you can keep doing whatever you want but we ain’t giving in” So again I am at a stage where even the slightest variation causes nothing to happen weighed against the fact that at this stage on the cradle-grave timeline, how much joy and pleasure do I want to put aside? And, I have no answer…when I do swim it is very motivating, though swimming does NOT help the weight loss (it didn’t even when I was close to 400 lbs and was still able to swim..after all fat floats)…Running (ok, jogging) did…but that’s pretty much off the table at the moment and seemingly for the foreseeable “future” (again, needing to emphasize the idea of “future”)

I anticipated a lot more travel after retiring and moving to where our economics were stable and actually “friendly”…but the inability to take quick spontaneous trips due to Abbey the dog needing to be attended to (and she is also showing a lot of age) and the cost associated with making those arrangements, if we even can, has kept things pretty minimal. I feel stuck and there are days, like today, where I feel like my tomorrows are so far away that it has me a bit spinning…

So, this is my version of conversing about it, by writing I talk to myself. Sometimes it is immediate relief, sometimes it gives me a path, sometimes it simply takes up some time where I’m not lamenting what seems to be more and more of what I have a hard time doing that I like (or should I say liked). Even today, Sue had me try her new favorite toy, her Meta Occulus VR headset, with the thought of giving me something to try exercise wise without the impact of running until the pool is again available. It was fine and seemed to have promise…until I took the headset off and realized that both while it was on and for a good 30-40 minutes after I took it off I was off balance and almost dizzy. Falling is not something I’m interested in doing any longer so I don’t know if that has any future either.

My plan, when the pool closes, is to try to start jogging again by starting very slowly…say 1/10 of a mile and then some walking (with the orthotics in) and if that works, give it a day off and then try to add a few yards every other day…the benefit of living in a warmer climate is that remains available all year especially in the milder and not humid winter months…am I optimistic, well if you’ve read this far, I’m assuming you see that while hopeful, optimistic would be a major stretch…I also have not been swimming as many days as I’d like as a visit to a very good local Orthopedist confirmed that I do have “swimmer’s shoulder” and while I do exercises to try to alleviate it, it hurts like hell after a swim…requiring a regimen of advil-tylenol all day every day, something else I had stopped doing after my hip replacements and sleeve surgery…

Anyway…it seems like my self therapy session has timed out and I’ve really nothing more to say to the screen…other than

…to be continued.

Squall’s out on the gulf stream
Big storm’s comin’ soon
I passed out in my hammock
God I slept ’till way past noon
Stood up and tried to focus
I hoped I wouldn’t have to look far
I knew I could use a bloody Mary
So I stumbled next door to the bar

And now I must confess
I could use some rest
I can’t run at this pace very long
Yes it’s quite insane
I think it hurts my brain
But it cleans me out then I can go on

And so opens Jimmy’s song, the title of which I “borrowed” for this exercise…

I originally was going to title this piece “I’m Tired” but it was not enough so this song rang truer to my thoughts, given that we are just a short bit out from Helene and are now hoping that Uncle Miltie (#iykyk) turns out to be more comedic than tragic.

I am worn down by the current massive divide. I’ve been around since “I Like Ike”, Camelot and Dallas, The War on Poverty, Vietnam, Watergate, Iran Hostage, Just Say No, Read My Lips: No New Taxes, Don’t Stop Thinking About Tomorrow, 9/11, Yes We Can, The Golden Escalator. At no point during those transitions was there anything greater than disagreements, no matter how vocal, the best interests of the US, democracy, choice, international relations was always paramount and in the forefront of policies on both sides. Each Jan 20th was a joyful spectacle, one incoming and one exiting, shaking hands, leaving messages for each other and vowing to support the person coming in.

Then comes January 6th, 2021. While the cracks in the always divided nation became wider and more apparent, while acrimony, insults, and fear replaced discourse, negotiation and policy. The events unfolding in front of our eyes on that day marked a dramatic change of course. There was not peaceful transition, there was no handshaking, notes, well wishes, only lies (subsequently proven to be exactly that, lies) and to this very day the inability to accept the results, and ongoing threats.

I am tired and I am totally dismayed by the fact that even in my very small circle, people who I know to have been warm, friendly, kind, and incredibly helpful have taken the “difference of opinion” to levels approaching worrisome. Sue and I are a couple of small “blue dots” in our new, chosen state, something we knew ahead of time, but what we didn’t know was the vitriol and the concern. The atmosphere has become such that we think two or three (hundred) times about the possibility of putting a Harris-Walz sign up on our lawn, something we never would have worried about pre Jan 6th. There are frequent stories on social media about people who have had tires slashed, lawn signs stolen and untoward comments made when they show or express their “difference of opinion” throughout this one town alone.

The “loudest voices” seem to have so many folks ignoring the facts of just who does control prices, climate, etc. One example is the gas prices that rose quickly (and for the record, have now come back to reasonable) happened not because of anything the govt. did, they happened because big oil colluded with the Middle East suppliers to cut production so they could raise their prices after they fell dramatically during the very little use during the pandemic. Grocery prices are set by the corporations and the distributors who are making record profits, think about that…prices go up on necessities, the companies make record profits and, btw, are taxed less because of the prior tax changes.

I am tired, I am tired of the noise that has no substance, name calling and lies that are given more air time than facts and policy and results. I am tired of being afraid for my 4 granddaughters that the world they will live in will put them in positions to have less control of their own well being that my grandmothers had. I am tired and aghast that so many organizations that have had such positive effects on our great nation are in jeopardy should certain things go wrong. I am tired and more than afraid that even if the vote goes the way I hope, that the events of Jan 6th, 2021 will look tame by comparison to what could becoming. I am old, I am Caucasian, I am male, yet I am tired and concerned.

Take us out Jimmy….

Well the wind is blowin’ harder now
50 knots or there about
There’s white caps on the ocean
And I am watchin for water spouts
It’s time to close the shutters
It’s time to go inside…

And now I must confess
I could use some rest
I can’t run at this pace very long
Yes it’s quite insane
I think it hurts my brain
But it cleans me out then I can go on
Yes it cleans me out then I can go on
Yeah, it cleans me out then I can go on

I’ve been watching a lot of the US Open tennis matches the past week or so and there are simply some things that immediately take you back so this will be a look back, pretty far back in fact.

When I was just leaving my teen years and had just bought my first car at 18, we would summer in Far Rockaway. We started on Beach 52nd street, moved to Beach 40th and finally ended up on Beach 26th where we spent most of the summers there (The city kept closing down the blocks, ostensibly to work on casinos that never happened, the bungalows were owned by folks who rented them out but the land was owned by NYC and just leased to the owners, so when the city stopped the leases, the bungalows became worthless and were left to decay…today there are some that have been bought and restored but not many). Labor Day weekend always marked the “end”. It was joyous (parties, gatherings, card games etc), usually the surf was up, the “labor day swells” were pretty epic some years and always the best of the season mostly due to the atlantic storm season in full bloom. It was also very sad, folks that were like family for two months of the year would all, mostly on Monday afternoon, load up the cars for the trip back to the Bronx (where most of us lived) or other places like Hoboken, Brooklyn or a few other places. As I got older, had my own car (as did most of my friends) we would make the trip back to the bungalows for the next couple of weekends, weather dependent (there was no heat so if it got too cold it was a bit testy) as most of the owners were fine with Sept 30 as the deadline move out date so they could board up, shut the water and let them sit till the following summer. Most of the families rented the same unit year in and year out so it was only clothing and perishables that needed to be loaded up. Kitchen materials, sheets, towels etc were left there to be stored in the boarded up units (the boarding up was to prevent theft and squatting, more than worry about winter weather). The final goodbyes were always accompanied by hugs, smiles, chuckles, one last walk up to the boardwalk and down to the ocean, and of course, tears. It was way, way before the internet and smartphones so the only communications were the occasional land line phone calls but most of us were busy in our 10 month lives and rarely got together during the Sept-June period that did not diminish the feeling of family when we did gather again.

I remember even now, the last time I drove away from B26th for the last time. It was the summer of 1981, my daughter Kate was about to turn 1 that coming October, we had moved from Lenox, MA to Greenwich for me to start a new teaching job at and we stayed for a few weeks with my folks who, it turns out, were renting for the last time (they didn’t know it till the following spring when the owner said they were no longer renting). When we left that Labor Day Monday, with Kate strapped into her safety seat, I drove very slowly, with the window down, to breathe the ocean air deeply one last time on B.26th and it was probably a few miles later that I teared up almost to the point of being unable to drive. It marked the end of one chapter of what was a magical decade of summers. Some 43 years later I can still smell the air, hear the seagulls, feel the breeze, and hear the sand under the tires as I drove down the block. Some memories are indelible.

In years subsequent, as Kate and then in 1984, Drew were growing up, we were invited each Labor Day weekend to Eleanor and Frank Lunardi’s summer home in Shirley, LI along with a rotating group of a lot of folks. It was the most relaxed and casual chaos I’ve even known till this very day. While we were “guests”, it was made clear that we were on our own, the very first time we were given a quick tour of the house, told where we would sleep, where the essentials were and that the kitchen was wide open. There were no locks on the doors so coming and going was not an issue. It was one food fest, didn’t matter who slept how long, either Frank or El was always seemingly up preparing meals or taking orders for meals, laughter was never in short supply and the nightly poker games were epic and would sometimes go until the wee hours of the morning. There were two other staples: The Jerry Lewis Telethon that was always “must see” and the US Open tennis. One or the other was constantly on (sometimes both, one on each TV) and there were people either clustered around the TV sets (they had one in the main living room. and one on the screened in porch) or they were simply background noise…the tennis was not all day coverage like it is now, but CBS used to do a good job of having it on most of the day Sat-Mon.

Then, inevitably, Labor Day Monday would arrive and the decision of when to leave for CT became the major discussion…early ahead of traffic or very late, behind the Hampton’s folks leaving (Shirley is, by no means “The Hamptons” it was working class hard won, summer homes for the most part with about 70% year round residents) as there is only one way on or off Long Island, and at exit 68 on the good old LIE, it was a long way back to CT. Regardless of the decision, after the car was packed, (and you had your Eleanor/Frank “doggie bags” for the road “just in case it takes a long time”) there were smiles, jokes, hugs and yes, tears. Even though these were folks we saw occasionally during the year, those 2.5 days were so precious and enjoyable that it felt like something was being ripped away for the last time.

Eventually, Eleanor and Frank stopped going and sold the Shirley home and so that too came to a conclusion. What remains to this day, now that we are scattered to the wind and down here in SC are 1000 miles removed from those we are closest to, is the US Open matches. I still find something joyful, and soothing in watching them sometimes with great focus and sometimes as background, and it keeps the glimmer of those most pleasant memories alive and well…along with the memories of those players long gone from this plane, though still very much alive in my thoughts.

Yesterday, for no particular reason other than it seemed interesting I fired up Netflix and watched the movie The Long Game. It seemed to be a mash up of Hoosiers and Stand and Deliver. It was very enjoyable and had moments of laughter, and some of tears. After enjoying the movie for a couple of hours I did a small dive into it and found that it was based on a true story (I think I missed that at the beginning) but did see the reference over the closing credits and statements here’s what I found: the movie is based on the true story of the San Felipe High School golf team, the Mustangs, a Mexican American golf team that overcame segregation and discrimination to win the Texas state high school golf championship in 1957. The movie is an adaptation of Humberto G. Garcia’s 2012 book, “Mustang Miracle.”

After the movie I started to think back about how far we had not come by 1977. Why, you ask, do I pick 1977? Well…in 1977 I was teaching at Blessed Sacrament High School, a small all boys high school in New Rochelle, NY and Pat DeRosa, the tennis coach, took a job at a public school and I was asked to take over as tennis coach for that year. I was happy to do it since it meant some extra money (very little but anything extra was good) and the team he was leaving me was a very solid team with some really great kids. We sat down and he explained to me that in addition to being the coach I was also the team van driver both to practices and to matches. Again, let me stress, small catholic school…minimal budget…so minimal, in fact, that at the beginning of each school year Bro. Thomas Patrick O’Dwyer, the assistant principal and also financial person, would give us each ONE 500 sheet ream of paper and remind us that ream was the ONLY one we would get all year and to use it wisely. This was also back in the days of the “wet” ditto machine so even trying to use both sides of the paper was virtually impossible. For reference I taught 5 mathematics classes across four grade levels and each class averaged 35 young men per class…500 sheets of paper….tests/quizzes/handouts…500 sheets of paper for the year…think about that the next time you complain that your copy machine is broken…

Anyway, I am again on a tangent so let’s get back to the real point of this post…Pat also explained to me that our home matches were to be played at the Beach and Tennis Club on Davenport Road in New Rochelle, a short drive from the school, and that’s also where we would practice and I should call a particular person to arrange our practice times and give him our home match schedule, the team had practiced and played there for years they were used to “us” and it shouldn’t be any problem.

I did that, it was very easy and the gentleman was very nice, we arranged for our first practice and I thanked him and hung up. Now, we played schools who were much larger than us, Mamaroneck HS was perhaps the largest, they had a huge club population to choose from, lighted courts I remember at least 10 separate courts, and when we played them we played matches that were 3-4, that is to say three singles and 4 doubles. When we placed in against other smaller division schools we played matches that were 3-2. I had three very strong singles players Steve Becker, Barry Dixon and his brother Greg, and a very good #1 doubles team. The rest of the team had a great deal of heart, were decent players but up against many kids who had grown up with private lessons in local clubs it was a demanding task (I’ll cut to the end of the season: we went 3 and 1 in our 3-2 matches but 0-7 in our 3-4 matches not that we didn’t win some of the individual games but to win a 3-4 match you had to, as a team, win 4 of the 7 matches, and if any one of the 3 singles players lost which they occasionally did, we were in trouble). That did not stop the incredibly hard working team from BS from entering every single match with a positive focus.

The first day of practice, we arrived at the Beach and Tennis Club and I went to check in with the gentleman I had previously contacted to ask which of their multiple courts we could use and for how long we could use them (there was no one playing when we arrived and very few folks around the club). He kindly pointed me to six courts and told me to take my pick of any or all of them, Give that we only had 11 players just enough for 3 singles and 4 doubles, we really didn’t need all 6 courts at any one time so I thanked him again and off we went to hit away.

About a half hour into our first practice, he came down to the courts and pulled me aside. He said he was incredibly embarrassed but he made a huge mistake when we spoke and it seemed that every afternoon between 2:30 and 6 pm the members needed all the courts for their own use and clinics that were going to be held. I asked if that included that very afternoon (remember, not a person in tennis whites was even around and there were many other courts) and he said “yes, something was going to start very soon which is why he came down to tell me as soon as he was told”.

Well, it didn’t take a rocket science degree, only a call to Pat DeRosa, to figure out that in the past Blessed Sacrament’s tennis team had been lily white, but this year the two brothers in my singles rota were not so upon showing up to practice and have some of the members who were simply sitting around sipping, notice our team, we were told it was no longer available for us to use. That is why what little hair I have stood up on the back of my neck as the movie was unfolding.

For the rest of the season, every match we played was an “away” match…all the competitor schools were more than happy to oblige moving the matches to their locales. We practiced AFTER each match since it was the only time we could get a facility (each AD was very gracious giving us the space and time). So after a full day of classes, playing very competitive matches, frequently losing the overall match a 3-4, these fabulous young men practiced for another two hours, all because a few entitled jackwagons did not like what they saw on their courts.

So from 1957 in the deep south to 1977 in New Rochelle, NY did we really. make any progress? Further, have we really made any progress now or are we simply backsliding out of any gains we, as a society, have made? I guess hope springs eternal but it also remains to be seen…

PS: a word of thanks to John Breunig, another former player, now a good friend, who filled in the names for this old and in the way senior….

Why do we never get an answer when we’re knocking at the door
With a thousand million questions…

For most of my adult life I had a dream of exiting the winter and spending it in a warmer climate. That dream became a reality back in August of 2021 when, with a lot of moving parts meshing just right (though it certainly didn’t seem like it at the time) we sold our 20+ year home in Norwalk and bought, sight unseen, a brand new build in Bluffton, SC.

There are a LOT of things to love about Bluffton. The proximity to the ocean on Hilton Head, the real lack of anything even resembling cold, a slower pace, a pool where I can swim laps for 6-7 months of the year, lower ordinary living costs. All of this exponentially compounded by the luxury of being retired and not having to give anyone or anything a “piece of my time” unless I choose to.

Of course, Hurricane season is longer than snow season used to be and while having the whole house generator eases a lot of that concern, a blizzard is not as concerning as a major ‘cane. While CT could be humid, it has nothing on the Stephen King like humidity dome that descends around early May and stays firmly in place until sometime in late Sept or early October. I never anticipated the incredibly horrible drivers who seem to always be out and about (as witnessed by the fact that our car insurance is actually higher here than it was in a much more highly populated CT).

I came to the conclusion this morning whilst walking Abbey THE dog that I really miss living in CT. I miss having a home without and HOA and having a home where there was space between the homes. I miss having a home with character and the bones of age and history. I miss the food, the access to the arts and concert venues, I miss family, both my blood family and my “chosen” family.

Again, many of those “misses” come with added costs….the older character drenched homes have a lot more associated costs. Having more land requires more and more costly maintenance and upkeep, and yes, heating the home in the winter is a major expense. (The food expenses are pretty much a wash though the far better quality and choices still win out back in CT). There also was no pool to swim in easily as there is now (that is a huge plus in SC).

Being, as we are, two retired teachers, it is not possible to have two places (that would be ideal) and the thought of wintering in the winter is still off putting. We are constantly think of alternatives that could help the balance…it is, in the long run, simply a question of balance…a balance that at this point swings up and down like the old Bronx park see-saw….