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Chase The Devil

Rooftop of Antoni Gaudi's "La Pedera" apartment building with Gaudi's "Segrada de Familia" in the distance 2012
Rooftop of Antoni Gaudi’s “La Pedera” apartment building with Gaudi’s “Segrada de Familia” in the distance 2012

Just yesterday we read that Pope Francis signed a decree recognizing Antoni Gaudí’s “heroic virtues,” putting him on the path to sainthood. Should two people pray to him and have their wishes granted he will be confirmed. Since I don’t believe in miracles (not even yesterday’s big one with the Easter bunny) Gaudi is already a saint in my book. Today we read Max Romeo’s and Pope Francis’s obituaries. First we listened to “Chase The Devil” from “War in a Babylon” and then we looked at the photos we took in Barcelona of Gaudi’s Catalan Modernisme masterpieces.

I gave up on religion a long time ago but I am still drawn to the rituals and I had a soft spot for the Latin American Jesuit, Pope Francis. We loved Wim Wenders Pope Francis movie, “A Man of His Word.” Francis never came clean on sexual abuse in the ranks but he pushed the world toward old school, progressive change. His defense of migrants was a cardinal principle. He called Trump’s bashing of immigrants a “shipwreck of civilization.”

It is fitting that the Pope’s last visitor was J.D. Vance, a recent convert to Catholicism. J.D. has a lot to learn. His interpretation of “Ordo Amoris” (order of love) misses the whole ball of wax. Using the medieval concept to defend deportations J.D. says “You love your family, and then you love your neighbor, and then you love your community, and then you love your fellow citizens in your own country, and then, after that, you can focus and prioritize the rest of the world.”

In response Francis sent a letter to US bishops that read, “Christian love is not a concentric expansion of interests that little by little extend to other persons and groups. The true ordo amoris is open to all, without exception.” Francis for sainthood.

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Love Earth

Neil Young "Coastal" movie at Tinseltown
Neil Young “Coastal” movie at Tinseltown

We have only been to Tinseltown twice. Once for “Shine a Light,” the Martin Scorsese movie about The Rolling Stones and on Thursday for Neil Young’s new movie, “Coastal.” If we can believe what Neil says in the movie, these were his first live dates in four years. He has gotten older and he is not afraid to show it. The movie moves at an old man pace. But the songs, all gems, sounded better than ever.

We walked through the park and then along the lake before turning around and coming back the same way. We usually construct some sort of loop but the blossoms were so pretty we need a double dose. The scent of the magnolias is heavenly. Today it was mixed with ganja, coming from a parked car.

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Steaming Battle

I constructed playlists of my current favorite 45s (scratchy records) in two streaming services, Apple and Spotify. I subscribe to Apple Music and not to Spotify so there were a few hurdles. I had to download a Spotify desktop app in order to rearrange songs but every time I searched for a song Spotify was there to recommend another song based on patterns from other users likes. I didn’t take advantage of that this time, I was on a mission, but I can see how this would be great for constructing sets on the fly. Apple had every one of the songs I was looking for. Spotify could not come up with a copy of Edith Piaf’s “Sudan One Vallée.”

Found photo (speed boat) - $1 at Lucky Flea
Click this photo for 45s2go playlist in Apple Music

45s2go playlist in Apple Music

Vs.

Found photo (speed boat) - $1 at Lucky Flea
Click this photo for 45s2go playlist in Spotify

45s2go playlist in Spotify

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Living In The Park

Backyard sculpture, "For Bill," in sun
Backyard sculpture, “For Bill,” in sun

Sam, who lives down below, told us he bought a book on the history of the Durand Eastman Park. There is section in there that talks about how the area we live in was supposed to have been part of the park but it was sold to developers in 1920’s. He told us he bought the book at the brew pub up on Titus. We made a note to stop by there. He also told us he heard a big tree come down in the woods behind his house. So Peggi and I tucked our pant legs in and walked through the woods to the park today. There were so many big trees down we couldn’t determine which was the new one. The last time we were down here we were on skis. Climbing over the debris I was remembering how effortlessly we moved through the woods on skis.

Out on the golf course we saw they had one of the fairways all torn up. Plastic drain pipes were laying in the bottom of long trenches. One full day of sun and the white magnolias were popping in the arboretum. There was a creepy pick-up parked along Lakeshore with a bumper sticker that read “Gun Control Is Hitting Your Target.” The workers have opened the roads in the park to car traffic. I like it better when they’re closed but it is not my park.

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Does Anybody See That White Bag?

I took my pole saw down to Jedi’s around noon today. He was still in his pjs when I rang the bell. I told him I was going to cut the white plastic bag down that had been trapped in his tree all winter, sometimes billowing at full sail as we walked by. Jedi told me he had tried to get it but he couldn’t reach it. I suspected it bothered us more than it bothered him.

The plastic fitting that allows the pole to extend was locked so Jedi, outdoors in his slippers, hung on to one end while I pulled on the other. Like a tug of war I pulled him into the pachysandra before we got it free. I cut the bag down and went home to fix the pole saw fitting. While I was in the garage Rick stopped by to borrow a wrench. He was getting his his bike ready for spring. I told him I had cut the white bag down that was in Jedi’s tree all winter. He didn’t know what I was talking about.

I didn’t have the right wrench to fix my pole saw either so I went down to Jared’s. He was outside talking to John and I showed them my problem. We went into Jared’s garage where he found a “thin walled” socket that did the trick. I told him I had cut the white bag down from Jedi’s tree and he said he had never noticed it.

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Orange Hat

Joe Ziolkowski at his photo show at Colleen Buzzard's Studio
Joe Ziolkowski at his photo show at Colleen Buzzard’s Studio

I remember Peggi’s father wore a bright orange hat in retirement. We have friend who wears an orange hat in NYC so we can keep track of him. Joe Ziolkowski’s hat looked particularly striking against his cyanotype cloud photos (we bought one, out of view) in Colleen Buzzard’s Studio.

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Overflow

Creek on Durand Eastman Beach
Creek on Durand Eastman Beach

It is warm and sunny today with clear blue skies. The beach looks nothing like this. This photo was taken yesterday. This creek on the beach is the overflow from Durand Lake (across the road to the right.) It flows into Lake Ontario on the left. Depending on the rainfall, the wind and the roughness of the big lake, this creek is always different. It is constantly rearranging itself and then sometime in the summer it just disappears. When it gets warmer we take ours shoes off but often we just turn around. I was able to get across on the log this time. Peggi decided not to try today.

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We Want The Funk

Road art by town employees
Road art by town employees

PBS’s “We Want The Funk” was fantastic. They could have subtitled it “Give It Up for James Brown!” He was rightly featured in a full two thirds of the one and half show.

8-9 PM on Wednesday does not work for us. We’re usually watching soccer. So we catch up with “Magic Records,” our brother-in-law’s’ WAYO show, on Mixcloud. Blondie’s “Dreaming,” June Tyson’s a cappella “Astro Black” and Suicide’s “Rocket USA” sounded better than ever! We tuned in to Kevin Patrick’s WPKN show just in time for a live version of Kraftwerk’s “Radioactivity” and listened all the way up to Dr John’s “Right Place Wrong Time.” Made plans with my neighbor to head leave for the HOG at 8:30 tomorrow for Record Store Day.

I think Margaret Explosion had a pretty good night last night. There were five of us there (last week was a just a trio) and Phil Marshall was in the crowd. The first set was a little messy but things began to gel in the second set. And there was a bunch of young people there who had never seen the band. So good to hear from them after the set. We met Nacelle from self-described krautrrock band Ellaar and streamed some of their songs on the way home. Particularily liked the song called “Kim Gordon.”

I had a short circuit in the first set, started a beat and then stoped before anyone else had come in. Peggi laughed and asked if I was all right. I didn’t like what I was playing so I stopped. Might have been an age related move. We’ll listen to the recording after we walk.

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Bats Left, Throws Right

Eddie Mathews Topps baseball card
Eddie Mathews Topps baseball card

I don’t follow baseball anymore and it is not just because the designated hitter rule. A long time ago I was a rabid fan. Eddie Mathews was my favorite baseball player. That’s not his autograph, it was printed on the card. An antique dealer, who we did some work for, gave me the card. It is so off register it is not worth all that much. Mathews played for the Milwallkee Braves (before they moved to Atlanta.) He batted third and played third base (my position.) I had a hat just like his. It is hard to see but the underside of the brim was a restful green (like the background of the card.) The Braves were my favorite team. They beat the Yankees in the 1957 World Series.

Jason Wilder is working on a baseball project and he sent me an outline so it got me thinking about the game. My mom told me she got Stan Musial’s autograph when he was with the Rochester Red Wings. I thought that was pretty cool. I used to love going to the Wings games. Rather park in the parking lot my father would drive up and down those small streets that run off Norton and pick out a parking spot on someone’s lawn (for a small fee, arranged with the owner.) My father would buy me a scorecard and I’d keep score, working those little diamonds. Mostly, I love the billboards in the outfield, all the local brands, the hole in the sign that paid a bonanza if someone hit a ball in there. I remember my brother getting a hole burnt in his jacket when he leaned back on a guy who was smoking a cigar behind us. 

When I was seven or eight an older kid down the street gave me a stack of cards from the fifties. There was a corner store near our house on Humboldt Street called Fessner’s and I bought my first cards there, a nickel for five random cards and a stick of gum. My family moved to Webster when I was ten and I inherited a paper route from a kid who was moving. With all that disposable income my collection grew enormously. So did my tally of cavities.

I was thirteen, at the peak of my buying power, when I lost interest in playing with them. My cards from 1963 remained in mint condition. (I had three of Pete Rose’s rookie cards.) When I moved out my mother said, “Take this shoebox of cards or I’m gonna throw them out.” A few years later I saw a sign for some sort of baseball card convention. I took my shoebox and showed them to a guy who turned out to be my high school math teacher, Mr. Setek. He said, “I will buy these and I will give you a fair price but I can’t do it here. I’ll come to your house.” I can’t remember the total but he gave me enough for us to take a week long trip to Cartagena, Columbia. At the time it was the cheapest tropical destination.

Margaret Explosion at Little Theatre Café 7-9 pm - photo by Jason Wilder
Margaret Explosion at Little Theatre Café 7-9 pm – photo by Jason Wilder
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Up Day

“Radiant” by Margaret Explosion from recent release, “Field Recordings”

Before you click on the video above notice the old downtown Rochester Public Library Building. It is still part of the library but a new, much larger building sits across the street from it now. The streams of water coming out of the building are old races, running off the Genesee River, left over from the days when Rochester was know as the Flour City because of the many mills. And the double decker bridge to the left used to carry the Erie Canal across the Genesee.

I raided Peggi’s hard drive for the footage in this video, her sweeping panoramas of river downtown, the beach in Costa Rica, the psychedelic swans and the guy playing bagpipes in the park. If anybody knows who that guy is I would like to credit him for his performance.

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Impeach The Beast

Protester at Cobbs Hill in Rochester, New York
Protester at Cobbs Hill in Rochester, New York

I expect to wake up one day and Trump will have made slavery legal again. So the “Super Callous Fragile Racist Sexist Nazi Potus,” Alexa . . Please Change the President,” “Impeach the Beast,” “Just Stop Fucking Everything,” “Follow Your Leader” (pic of Hitler shooting himself), “Know your Parasites”, ” (3 pics, dog tick, deer tick, luna tick) and the 4000 fellow Rochesterians protesting the administration in Cobbs Hill Park was a site for sore eyes.

When is the next protest?

Protesters on Monroe Avenue
Protesters on Monroe Avenue
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The First Friday Of The Rest Of Our Lives

Rolanda JW Spencer work entitled "Mothers - Witches" at RIT City Space
Rolanda JW Spencer work entitled “Mothers – Witches” at RIT City Space

John Gilmore stopped by on Friday afternoon. He snuck in while Peggi and I were playing the basement and he spooked Peggi when she came upstairs. We planned make seven First Friday stops and we got a late start. We ran into Boo Poulin and Joan Lyons twice so we knew we made the right choices. We had an opportunity to tell Joan how much we liked her piece in MoMA’s Robert Frank retrospective.

I particularly liked Rolanda Spencer’s earthy, sensual “yami Aje: Mothers + Witches” installation at RIT’s City Space.

Steve Piper Photo At Lumiere Photo show "Souvenirs, Visits to America's Agricultural Fairs"
Steve Piper Photo At Lumiere Photo show “Souvenirs, Visits to America’s Agricultural Fairs”

We hardly had enough time to study all the photos in Steve Piper’s “Souvenirs, Visits to America’s Agricultural Fairs” show at Lumiere. Later at Colleen Buzzard’s we saw Jon Gary leafing through a book of Steve’s photos from the show so purchasing a book sounds like the ticket. Steve’s photos are black and whites with the entire grey scale well represented. The ordinary situations are multi-layered. There’s humor in the melancholy.

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No Draft

Ron Giel defending goal for RL Thomas, Webster 1967
Ron Giel defending goal for RL Thomas, Webster 1967

I wish I had finished my soccer deep dive a little sooner. Ron would have loved it. I hadn’t seen or heard from him since one of the early reunions. I sent a link to a few of my former teammates and just a week later one of them let me know of Ron’s passing. Ron was a sensational goalie. His family held a celebration of his life at place in Webster called “The Filling Station.” I imagined the place might be where Finn’s Garage was, the Texaco station operated by Andy Finn’s father that I remember for their nickel Coke machine and bicycle pump. It turned out the sports bar was right next door, across the street from Barrett Law Offices where Joe’s father and two of his brother’s worked. Ron apparently spent a lot of time in here.

I rode out to Webster with Jeff and he turned out to be the only other member of our team that was there. We met Ron’s son and gave him our condolences. Three other member of our class were there and we all stood near the back of the bar and talked about the old days. We never did get a drink or partake of the chicken wings.

I had not seen Jim since high school. He was easily the best athlete in our class, center on the basketball team and quarterback on the football team. He had told us about a crazy motorcycle accident he was involved in where a kid pulled out in front of him. Jim was scooped up and flown via helicopter to the hospital where he got two new hips and a long metal rod in his leg. Still bowls he told us.

We all lost a mutual friend by “friendly fire” so Viet Nam came up. Jeff had driven Rex to the physical while unsuccessfully trying to talk him out of going. Bob had a sports injury where his shoulder would go in and out of its socket. He was able to disengage it while in line for his physical. I was classified 1A at the time, having dropped out when college when it provided you a deferment. I was saved buy a high lottery number.

Jim had the best story. His birthday was number one in the lottery. His brother was already serving and Jim didn’t want to go so he called the Selective Services office to see how close he was to being called up. The woman who answered kept trying to get his name and Jim didn’t want to identify himself but he finally he gave in. She looked up his name and told him he was 4F and he could forget about getting drafted. No further explanation.

I wish Ronnie could have been there.

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LIberation Day

Peggi planting spinach seeds at the end of March
Peggi planting spinach seeds at the end of March

“Today is the greatest day of deregulation our nation has seen. We are driving a dagger straight into the heart of the climate change religion to drive down the cost of living for American families, to unleash American energy, to bring auto jobs back to the U.S. and more.“ – Lee Zeldin, Environmental Protection Agency

Do I have to say how sad I find this.

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My Outie Is Becoming An Innie

Old pay phone, Sea Breeze
Old pay phone, Sea Breeze

I was really enjoying “Severance” for the first season. I loved that there was snow on the ground when the characters were in their “outie” stage. The two episodes we watched each night felt like a disorienting but pleasant drug experience. More surreal than sci-fi. I loved the four primary actors and the sets were fantastic. The color choices were sensational. The plots were good enough to keep me awake but relaxing. Then came the season finale where my confusion felt frustrating. Peggi had a Severence dream that night where she was trapped in a B&B in our neighbor’s house.

Pete and Gloria came over with their brand new car, a Honda. We got in the back seat and they took us for a ride in our neighborhood. In fact we drove the same route that Peggi and I had walked earlier. We pointed out where we picked the pussy willows, the flowering Red Bud tree, the eagle’s nest and the marsh which is coming alive with irises and red winged blackbirds. In the back seat it was like we were in our “innie” stage but getting glimpses of our “outie” lives.

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Cute Cocktail Napkins

Tom Orsini painting at estate sale on Turk Hill Road
Tom Orsini painting at estate sale on Turk Hill Road

I like this bird’s eye view of a house on Turk Hill Road. Us humans get to look up at it on a hill. Peggi was alerted to the sale by our friend, Kathy. She saw the listing described as a Don Hershey house. Peggi has been cataloguing the homes that Don Hershey built in this area on her website, DonHershey.com, and she did not have this one. The previous owner did this painting of his house. An $800 item, it was my favorite piece. This arrangement below was the only place in the house where I could rest my eyes.

Items at Turk Hill Road estate sale
Items at Turk Hill Road estate sale

Practical things were pretty expensive here and the unpractical items were as loud you can imagine. Lime green and purple walls, lots of glassware, a tabletop display of sun glasses you could imagine Elton John wearing, extra large tropical style shirts, dozens of unopened packages of cute cocktail napkins.

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Out For Lunch

Rusty sign along Lake Road in Webster
Rusty sign along Lake Road in Webster

It bugs me when we pass somebody who says, “Nice day for a walk.” I always want to shoot back, “Any day is a good day for a walk.” That being said, we could not have picked a better day to walk across the swing bridge into Webster. The bridge closes on April 1 and we had not been down this way in a bit. We walked to the end of our street, into the woods, out to Culver and then down to the lake where the road gently curves and follows the lakeshore as Lake Road. In the photo above the bay is behind me and the lake is on the other side of this mound, the old Hojack rail line. We turned around at the end of the new Sandbar Park. There was a time when we walked all the way around the bay in preparation for the Camino. Turning around here would make for eight miles or so.

Culver Road is my favorite road in the city and the north end of it is the coolest. In the day it ended on Hot Dog Row. Today it has more of an international flair. The bowling alley has changed hands. The mural outside slants youthful. Their sign in the window is looking for bowling league members. The Parkside Diner was packed at noon and the Asian place was all lit up. We went to the door of Frametastic to check on Joan but a small note on the door read, “Out for Lunch.” The parking lot for the Irish bar was full. Union Tavern looked like they were open. Nick’s, where my father met his Kodak buddies for lunch for years, had a sign that read, “Open for Dinner Only.” The pizza place looked busy and Anatolia’sl was hopping. We would have had lunch at the Bayside if they hadn’t torn it down. We stopped at Don’s Original on the way back for a chocolate Almond Custard. It was stuffy inside so we sat outside in the sun.

March snow showers on Broad Street Bridge
March snow showers on Broad Street Bridge

I mentioned above that any day is a good day for a walk. Yesterday was too. We parked at the CoOp and walked downtown. The city looked like an expressionist painting.

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Our Project

Blind Turn sign on road down below
Blind Turn sign on road down below

We spent a day in the garden before getting back to “our project,” one that took us the better part of three days.

First, the garden, because that was a breeze. We went down there intending to plant lettuce and arugula but we discovered our mache lettuce, sometimes called “corn salad,” had survived the winter. It had spread from its original location so we transplanted the clusters back to where they belonged. We did a bit of weeding and and turned over the earth for two new rows of lettuce and arugula. Peggi counted at least a hundred garlic sprouts. She picked some collard greens to bring home. They were left from last year as well. We tried to do a little raking but it got too windy to keep all the leaves in one place. So windy in fact we heard and then saw the top of large white pine snap off and land in our neighbors’ yard.

Yesterday we finished “our project.” One of our oak trees fell, away from the house, and it landed in a way that one of the branches kept the tree mostly off the ground. A lot of really good firewood, except we had enough firewood. So we let the tree lay there for three years before tackling the project. I cut the branches off and we carried them down our hill and piled them up by the road. I made log length cuts in the trunk and let the chunks roll down the hill. Peggi was down there but safely off to the side, making sure there were no cars coming by. It was impossible to control where the big logs would roll. Some crashed into trees on the way down, others careened across the road. We rounded them up, rolled them up a board into our car and drove them up to our woodpile.

While we were down there I took a photo of the new road sign. It’s kind of an eyesore.

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Cuica Magic

Madison and Bennie at Little Theatre Café for Margaret Explosion gig. Photo by Jason Wilder.
Madison and Bennie at Little Theatre Café for Margaret Explosion gig. Photo by Jason Wilder.

I saw Jason Wilder recently at a Margaret Explosion gig and told him I missed his blog. For some reason it had gone dark. He told me he had switched hosts. I checked back in today and found he had made a few new entries and one was about that gig. I particularly like Jason’s photos. They are full of mystery. I grabbed the one above from Jason’s post.

Bennie, standing to Madison’s right, often sits in with Margaret Explosion on a few songs. She usually travels with at least one Brazilian percussion instrument. Here she is instructing Madison, our number one fan, on how to play the cuica. Madison already has a drum set and she just purchased an imitation P-bass. She plans to take lessons form Margaret Explosion’s bass player, Ken Frank. Someday Madison will able to sub for Ken.

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Checking In

Andrea and Rich standing, Dave, Peggi, Paul, Kim and Steve down front, San Francisco 1980
Andrea and Rich standing, Dave, Peggi, Paul, Kim and Steve down front, San Francisco 1980

Not sure who took this photo. Kim had a journalism degree but her camera is in her lap. I’m thinking it was Rich with a timer. He looks like he just slid into place and is trying extra hard to be nonchalant. That is just a guess. Rich and Andrea had a darkroom. Peggi and I did too but there is no way I could get that comfortable after releasing the shutter.

Peggi and I had driven to Mississippi where Steve was living and the three of us got in his pickup and drove all the way out west. We slept in the back. I remember Peggi playing her sax back there while Steve drove and I rode up front, not the whole time of course, but long enough to nail the Hi-Techs recording of “Boogaloo Rendezvous” when we got back.

We stopped in LA to spend some time with Peggi’s sister and then drove up the coast to San Francisco where Kim and Dave and Rich and Andrea were living. It is time for another visit, planning stage anyway. And we are adding another leg to see Matthew and Louise in Honolulu. We will do this one by air.

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