Season to Taste

The other day, getting a coffee while out on an errand, the young person behind the counter (his name tag said he was the manager), handed me the Styrofoam cup and my change while offering 'if I don't see you have a happy holiday.' 

Non-plussed I stammered that I was hoping to be back in his shop before Christmas.

Christmas?! 

HA! He was thinking more Halloween, he explained patiently as if an elderly pinhead in line purchasing coffee today couldn't grasp the concept. Well, boo to you buddy boy, guess which Jacob Marley stunt double will be buying his coffee elsewhere while out running on America (or something). 

But you go ahead and have a Merry Little Chri---nevermind. Have some candy corn on me.

-bill kenny

This Time Next Week

If what follows seems familiar, it should. I've offered it before though I'm not sure to what effect so your mileage may vary. 

If you haven't registered to vote, then the good news is that you can skip this space today and move on to the yard sales advertisements or the legal notices because I have no words for you.

If you're an unregistered voter,  I'm not sure why you're content to live with the consequences of other people's choices, but if you're not troubled by your own lack of engagement and an absence of involvement in your own life and that of your community far be it from me to pass judgment on you, unless (of course) I just did. Oops.

For the rest of us, by this time next Wednesday, Election 2019 will be all over except for the lawn sign pulling up and collecting part of The Day After the End of the World because Our Candidate Didn't Win.

Except as we both know the world will not have ended (I admit to having no inside information confirming this but a conclusion based on a statistical analysis of voter outcomes since the Founding of the Republic (and a wild guess)).

I'll admit our lawns probably needed the aeration the metal stakes on those campaign signs provided and they gave the wind this past weekend something else to blow around aside from all those fallen leaves.

If I could just as easily rationalize the sticky residue left behind on our cars and trucks from where we're removing those bumper stickers (unless we're poor sports), my life would be a little smoother.

Come to think of it, why the heck do we call them "bumper stickers" in the first place since most of us don't actually have chrome bumpers to stick anything on and so we end up attaching them to our back window or to the trunk or cargo hatch of whatever we are driving, somehow forgetting that what we are driving serves as a signal flare of our politics.  

I've read where political scientists (I have a sci-fi movie in my head whenever I think of a political scientist as someone in a lab coat mixing beakers containing the essences of an elephant with those of a donkey) are fearing for the future of our democracy because we the people seem to have lost both interest and faith in it, in nearly equal parts. That is very definitely NOT a good thing. Everything comes with a price and a cost so while our elections may be free, in some form or other, we all pay for the results.

Don't be that person next Tuesday when the polls are closing who meant to vote but didn't. Find the ten minutes it takes to actually cast your ballot. Elections are about the future so make sure you have your say next Tuesday.

Too many people around the world would give their lives for what we have. Far too many in our history sacrificed their lives so we could sit out election day and say it doesn't make a difference. If you feel that way, you're right, it doesn't. Shame on you.
-bill kenny

Crisp Days Come to Call

I'll admit my primary problem with Autumn has a lot to do with what happens next. Having said that, there are moments as we shift from summer to winter that can be truly golden and I had one of those yesterday morning out walking.

Close to the edge, down by the river. Down at the end, round by the corner. 
Seasons will pass you by. Now that it's all over and done. 
Called to the seed, right to the sun. Now that you find, now that you're whole. 
Seasons will pass you by.
-bill kenny

Bare Trees

Bare Trees. Grey Light. Oh yeah, it was a cold night.

I was alone in the cold of a winter's day. You were alone and so snug in your bed.

Bare Trees. Grey Light. Oh yeah, it was a cold night.
-bill kenny

Too Much Sorrow Is Too Much Madness

At least in the course of my life here on the ant farm, we've been a nation willing to discuss all matter of issues great and small with one another. But and maybe it's just me, in recent years, we've become more brusque with one another, and less willing to listen to viewpoints that diverge from our own.

Tree of Life Synagogue Victims

Today, a year ago, we reached a new low in intolerance and have seemed since then to continue to plumb new depths. 

Outrages and heartless, thoughtless events have seemed to both proliferate and accelerate leaving fewer memories to hold on to and yet, if we try, today can be a day of both reflection and a redoubling of resolve to become a nation that is greater than the sum of its tears and fears, daring to dream large and loud and big enough to include everyone.    
-bill kenny 

Because We Can, Should We?

I have so much TV I could watch it's possible I'd need to be reincarnated at least ten times to view it all (and not forgetting my Amazon Prime subscription and through it, both Acorn TV and Britbox), so what did I stumble across yesterday afternoon? 

Very nearly that classic adaptation of Jane Austen's masterwork, Pride and Prejudice. Almost but not quite. Actually, it was far worse on the not-nearly scale, closer to zero. It was Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.  

As I've never seen Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter nor read the book so I don't know which one is worse but the only thing smaller than my knowledge of either movie is and will always be my complete lack of curiosity to find out.

It's like adding ketchup to mayonnaise. Just because we can, doesn't mean we should.
-bill kenny

The Faster I Go, the Loster I Get

If you believe in evolution and the triumph of survival based on innovation in a species, when you look to your left or right around your workspace on any given workday, or when wandering the aisle in a supermarket or (in my case) just looking in the mirror, you have to be getting sweaty palms when you read a local newspaper or check out the evening TV news.

We're watching the world try to break its dependence on fossil fuel as a source of energy (we could quit anytime, we tell one another as we scout for gas stations with the cheapest price) and perfect alternative technologies such as electric cars or hydrogen fuel vehicles.

The turmoil this type of challenge produces is evident in the marketplace where familiar names like Pontiac, Oldsmobile, and Plymouth have all already gone the way of the dinosaur with others, perhaps, to follow to make room for new products from new manufacturers--intentional or not.

Into all of that, comes this. At one time you could easily find other media outlets with more fulsome accounts of this as opposed to NPR's 'brevity is the soul of communications' approach to reporting, but if wishes were horses beggars would ride so saddle up what we have and ride off into the sunset, which happens earlier and earlier every day. 

The only things I can't figure out is the top speed of the chair, how many miles per gallon it gets (regular or super) and what the opening bid at the police auction will be for it. You don't suppose the La-Z Boy folks themselves are hoping to snag it for their museum, assuming they have one (and if not, what an incredible first acquisition). 

If so, do you think (hope) they'll drive it back to corporate headquarters, maybe in a motorcade of armored ottomans? And assuming such an event is televised what should we be sitting on to watch it?
-bill kenny

Never Trade Luck for Skill

I came across that suggestion the other day and, single-minded cretin that I am often (with reason) accused of being, thought of the ten of thousands if not hundreds of thousands of small and quiet decisions that households across this nation make on a daily and weekly basis as the economic tides ebb and flow and threaten to pull so many of us under.

A non-economist acquaintance once shared with me 'when you're out of a job, it's a recession; when I'm out of a job, it's a depression' and I suspect there's more to that than meets the eye. On Tuesday near mid-day, the last time I checked, the Dow Jones Industrial Average has been 'flirting with  27,000 points'. I have absolutely NO idea what any of that preceding sentence means, but I've heard it repeatedly and parrot it like I know what I'm talking about.

All of us do. We all assume or did until it turned out the whole house of cards decided to reshuffle itself more than a decade ago, that someone somewhere knew and understood what it was we were doing for most of the last decade. Like Wimpy, offering to gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today knowing full well we would have no money on Tuesday, we just kept adding days to the calendar and hoped Tuesday wouldn't arrive.

When the economic ship of state started taking on water, I didn't really understand the big picture and, like so many, haven't been as successful as I'd like in appreciating the fuller impact. Conversely, with Mnuchin in the Seventh House and Kudlow aligned with Mars (or something like that) am I alone in detecting a tone of barely-controlled euphoria by broadcast and print news reports on economic growth? Except I'm still not "getting" it.

Why isn't it all this just Accidental Excellence (not this one)? When we got it right, we had no idea what we did to produce those positive results so, not surprisingly we couldn't duplicate them, so when things started to go south, we went with them. 

It's hard to not be superstitious, wash your face and hands until you get the bill at the end of the month for soap and water. In times of stress we rely more on routines, they offer us the appearance of the familiar, the known and the comfortable and serve, in their way, as a mantra against a world we cannot otherwise manage. Some of us think these are turbulent times whose end is hard to determine, others see only blue sky while yet others who've never known other than hard times wonder what all the hand-wringing is about.
-bill kenny

New Rope Sold Separately

One of my projects this past weekend was rearranging the machinery in my garage that surrounds our car. I'm not the only one who marks the changing of the seasons with this ritual as a walk around my neighborhood the other day revealed. 

During the spring and summer, on the left-hand side of the garage is where the lawnmower is stored, with the work gloves resting on the handle and the gas can underneath the gloves on the garage floor. I've been impressed this past mowing season with how much larger the lawn around our house is now that we own the house. I've been told this is a trick of the tail and nothing more. I certainly hope it doesn't hold true for snow as well. 

Speaking of snow, the snowthrower spends the summer months against the far back wall of the garage though I did move it a couple of weeks ago to allow its pickup and transportation to a repair place in Groton as a consequence from my one and only use of it late last winter (that sort of blizzard in February that dumped a lot of snow on us). 

In trying to clear the drive which we share with two houses on Lincoln Terrace that connects us to the street I managed to pick up a large enough stone that wedged itself between the augur and the shroud  just long enough to cause the cotter pin to shear off, immobilizing the blade and effectively eliminating the throw from the snowthrower. I did a lot of wishing for warm weather immediately afterward and it seemed to work. 

The repair shop returned the snowthrower last week and placed it back in my garage, ready (I hope) for whatever weather is to follow though I am never unhappy when we have winters when I don't need to ever use it. 

I grew up in New Jersey which gets its fair share of snow, so I shouldn't complain about what we have here, though I still do, and not just about the snow. of course. And as I learned during the week from an article by Tom Breen in the Connecticut Mirror, an online-only newspaper focusing on public policy and politics here in The Nutmeg State, we seem to have more complainers per square foot than other states.

His op-ed is called, "Shut Up, You Unbelievable Connecticut Crybabies," and with such an inviting title how could I not be drawn to it? His tongue is slightly in his cheek as he expands and expounds on what he feels is a tendency here in the Land of the Round Doorknobs to be unhappy no matter what. 

You should really read it for yourself; it's not very long and I think you'll smile at his humor, but perhaps also agree with his point. My favorite line is "This is no longer a state where a retired couple can realize the humble American dream of owning three homes, seven cars, a modest yacht, and an underachieving racehorse" although that dream makes mine of pony rides for my birthday pale in comparison. 

Yeah, to some extent he's arguing our glass is half-full rather than half-empty which is a truism that also happens to be the truth but I think the biggest and most personally satisfying takeaway is his final paragraph which I will not quote or summarize (because I want you to read his entire article) but if we took it to heart right here in our neighborhoods and across our city I think we'd be a damn sight better off and if not, at least not so grumpy with one another.
-bill kenny

 

#ShaysLastLaugh

I was raised to believe there are two types of people in this world: those who are Irish and those who wish they were. 

If you are among the latter, try NOT to be jealous of Shay Bradley.

"To be Irish is to know that in the end, the world will break your heart."
-bill kenny

It Seems Like Just a Moment Ago

Today, on this date in 1977 at 1020 in the morning in the Offenbach am Main Rathaus in (West) Germany. Sigrid Schubert and I were married. Forty-two years ago. Sigrid says it often feels a lot longer than that but that's because, I hope, the Germans use the metric system. I mean, what else could it be? 

How lucky can one guy get, eh? I've never known what she saw or sees in me (aside from a great personality, rapier-like wit complementing a puckish sense of humor, a body like Adonis (Joey Adonis from West Orange near Prospect Plains)), all hobbled by a nearly crippling sense of modesty that is my lifelong cross to bear; oh, and delusions, almost forgot those) but she is my entire world.  

She is everything I have wanted to be or to do and she makes me want to be a better man than I am by knowing that she loves me, often despite who I am. I can remember the most minute of details of that day and have driven her and both of our adult children almost to distraction by recounting them incessantly AND on an annual basis, so I'll skip them here, but they know what will happen, just not when.

I hope with all my heart wherever in this world you find yourself that you also have and keep someone who will hold your heart forever as she has mine. I don't remember often enough to tell her I love her though I will today and vow to be better every day we have together for all the days that remain. Happy Anniversary, angel eyes. 
-bill kenny

Another Reason to Be Fearful?

Every time we pause to think of ourselves as the Crown of Creation, which (by the way) I truly believe we are since we have the only ballots cast in that election, Mother Nature pops up with a hurricane, a blizzard, a typhoon, or a rain of frogs (or was that The Lord? I get confused) to take us down a peg or more. 

Physarum polycephalum or The Blob has, as I read this article, been around for a million or more years, so I guess that means I'd get up and give it my seat on the subway and it seems to have skills and abilities I will never possess. 

I thought of a particular Frank Zappa song when I read the article but let's face it that's pretty hard to hum so, after reading about its preferred habitat, I changed my mind to something I think that's more suitable.
-bill kenny

Another Somber Road Trip

We're up early in my house today and out on the road headed to the Jersey Shore. As a carefree kid at Rutgers I can recall hitting the shore throughout the late spring and summer weekends (and depending on the class, maybe some spring weekdays too). The days and the promise they seemed to contain stretched on and on to beyond the horizon.

But we all grow up or old, in my case. I think the last time I made this drive, Sigrid and I were heading to a memorial service for my Mom. One of the brighter moments of that day was reuniting with nearly all of my cousins (Mom came from a big family) and especially those of Mom's younger sister (and sole surviving sibling) Clare and grabbing some group happy snaps so they could share them with their mom.

Time moves on and memories fade. Today we'll gather to celebrate and remember Clare's life. There will be. I know, some tears, some smiles and some memories shared by and with her children and perhaps her grandchildren as we keep her in our thoughts as those closest and dearest to her hold her in their hearts. 
-bill kenny

Within You, Without You

If I had a dime for every time recently that I've said: "This certainly was a weird week, wasn't it?" I could just about erase the national deficit. So much shouting and pointing but so little conversation and direction. It's not that we have too many distractions. We are the distraction.

And to see you're really only very small and life goes on within you and without you.
-bill kenny

Beyond Summer's End

The days are getting shorter and colder in my neighborhood as the chill of autumn takes longer every day to lift and we all learn again to pace ourselves accordingly. 

Among the half dozen or so squirrels I used to feed during the dog days of July heat there's now one visitor who leaps from the ground to my back stoop avoiding the stairs entirely, some thirty-eight inches (yes, I measured it) high and leans against the double-pane thermal glass in the storm back door to peer through it to see what the peanut-dispensing biped is up to because he isn't throwing legumes out into the backyard.

More often than not, he gathers two peanuts together (there's a market for squirrel shopping bags, I imagine, but I don't know how to collect their money) and scampers off, but not too far, to bury the nuts somewhere on the property or near it where I'm assured he remembers where they are, though I have no idea how he pulls that off 

As the colder months approach, that squirrel along with his colleagues(?) seems more single-minded about this routine with every passing day. I'm trying to imagine what the animal uses in October to find the buried peanuts in January. Eco-location?

The squirrel hurries back where the thrown peanuts are scattered because he's in a race with the blue jays who swoop down, grab a peanut and then give themselves a headache, I believe, standing on a tree branch holding it in their beaks while slamming it into the tree until the shell cracks. I can understand why they prefer bugs and slugs.

There was a day recently that a squirrel and a bird had a difference of opinion that I joined, already in progress. The audio cue had been that annoying yell that blue jays never tire of-ever. He just kept at it and kept at it. No less incessant, but barely audible was what I at first thought was a bike tire losing air-a soft, low steady hissing. I looked out the window and saw a squirrel facing off with the bird over a thrown peanut.

One hopped while the other stepped. One cocked its head to one side and scolded loudly and the other stood on its hind legs as if to bow. I threw out some more peanuts hoping to defuse the situation but it was too late-they were captured by the conflict. It was on and gone. All I could do was close the door after promising to feed whichever one showed up the next day.
-bill kenny

We Are Worth the Effort

As we near the first Tuesday in November and hopefully (finally) think more about the large issues that afflict and affect us locally (and how they often are a reflection of our national concerns) maybe it will help to see our local elections as a way to work on solutions from the bottom up.

What is looking like the one and only opportunity to hear from all of those seeking places on both the City Council (six seats are up for grabs) and the Board of Education (which has nine members), ask questions, hear explanations, policies, positions, and maybe (if we're lucky) some hopes and visions will be next Tuesday at NFA's Slater Auditorium. 

Doors open at five with the BoE candidates' debate from six to seven followed immediately by the City Council debate. Government is a contact sport so make the time to be at Slater Tuesday because each of us needs to get off the bench because we have skin in the game and need to behave like it. 

I know you're busy with kids in school, jobs, projects around the house and a hundred other tasks clamoring for your attention. Who isn’t? The effective range of an excuse is less than a meter, so your choices are to show up Tuesday or to shut up about how things get done around here.   

Not unique to Norwich, admittedly, but as true here as it is elsewhere, we have streets in need of paving, neighborhoods transitioning, infrastructure renewal and replacement that’s been postponed and delayed for decades (not just years), public safety systems addressing more institutional, physical, and mental health challenges no amount of funding can ever address, and schools where the tasks facing teachers and the instructional staff stretch far beyond the classroom walls requiring a wholesale reinvention of public education that no one wants to think about because we've invested so much in what we have.

All of that is on all of us. You've read it here before; we are all we will ever have to rebuild and reinvent where we live. And that's fine by me, as we are all we should ever need. For too long we believed if we did nothing, we did nothing wrong but forgot every Next Thing begins with a leap of faith and good works to back up our words. We chose to live where we choose to be, and it's what brought us all to this place and this moment we are in. So many people in the same device.

All that we carry is all that we are-and it includes our hopes for a better city for our children and ourselves. We cannot continue to allow those whom we have selected to elect to be so cavalier and unmindful of our dreams. There's an old Spiritual that sings about "I am but one-but I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something." We are not too late and we are not too few. Make the time to be in Slater Tuesday because we are worth the effort. 

-bill kenny

Paddle Faster. I Hear Banjo Music.

I saw that on the bumper of a Jeep in front of me at a stop signal while I was out on some errands. I'm not sure what it meant, but I can probably guess and if I were Ned Beatty I'd keep the windows rolled up and the doors locked at the traffic lights.

The car next to the Jeep was the puzzler. It was a red Hyundai of some kind (our daughter used to drive  one so I'm tried hard to learn all the flavors of their rainbow only to realize there are scads, believe me) which had a bumper sticker that read 'Buy American.' I looked to my left to see if the driver of that car got the joke, too, but he was alone with his thoughts in his prison on the road and then it occurred to me it might not be a joke.

I drive a vehicle usually thought of as Japanese but it was made, I believe, in an assembly plant in Indiana. I spent the Summer of '75 in Indianapolis and the people there seemed to be as American as, well, as American as you and me or the driver of the Hyundai (for all I know).

When you're approaching Indianapolis via the interstate the trick is to remember (I think; insert obligatory bad memory joke here) that it encircles the entire city so, depending on where you got on it, you can be traveling east in order to go west and vice versa. Don't pay that any mind, that's a mistake I made for a couple of months which got me very lost very quickly and I'd wind up in the corner of the state that periodically switched from Eastern to Central time for reasons I never grasped and without warning ever given.

You do not have to show your passport however, which is one of the ways I figure out where I'm not and when I'm not there. I did have to show my license proving I was over twenty-one to get served a beer in a cocktail lounge at Weir-Cook Airport (no, they didn't name it after Bob, I asked), which Pete F, from New Hampshire (all eighteen years and three months of him), thought was hysterically funny as the waitress had already brought him his beer.

He wasn't laughing quite so hard when I ordered a glass of milk after I put my license back in my wallet and had the waitress give Pete the glass of milk while I drank his beer, a Stroh's fire brewed draft if I remember correctly (and I do). That was the summer I also learned to drink beer fifty/fifty with tomato juice. I was young and the summer was very warm. I was crazy in the heat--that's as close to an explanation as I can offer.

Anyway, I'm not sure if the Hyundai is made on this side of the Pond or not and if it takes you where you need to go I'm not sure we're not talking difference without a distinction. I never got the chance to ask the driver what the point of the bumper sticker was supposed to be or even where the bumper sticker was made. 

Remember that from a couple of years ago, one of those organizations handing out little American flags to 'encourage' patriotism (and discourage what they regarded as dissent) learning their flags were all from some off-shore sweatshop? Talk about a quiet night in the old sleeping bag...
-bill kenny

A Baker's Dozen (of Years)

The more things change the more they remain the same. That's a truism because it's the truth. This is the very first scribbling I offered in this space a dozen years ago today and while the geography addressed in it has changed the underlying issues driving the discussion have not (at least to me). 

At the time I was channeling Dr. Seuss and called it:

And To Think That I Saw It on Norwich's Streets

Driving past Washington Street this morning, it looks a good growth industry might be the hardware business; selling neighbors large plywood sheets and paints so they can erect signs to yell at one another on the issue of spot zoning.

New signs insisting on the right to do with their property what they wish, possibly from those who've sold options to developers, angry at 'the select few' (as their sign says) who insist this commercial endeavor be turned away.

Another sign boasts about the increase in tax revenues and the additional (service) jobs a new mini-sprawl, I meant mini-mall, will bring to Norwich (even though the pharmacy hailed as 'new' will be the existing one from across town and right around the corner from the one my family uses now).

Jobs, much like Einstein's matter, can neither be created nor destroyed, at least in development models. If we take six inches from the front of the blanket and put it on the back, the blanket is NOT a foot longer no matter how long the PowerPoint presentation to the contrary.

Everyone's signs ignore or seem to, our continuing inability to look ahead and plan accordingly. When you don't know where you're going, any road will get you there in much the same way as every book is a mystery if you never finish reading it.

Right now, most of us think any movement, even the circles in which we are continuing to turn, is the same thing as direction. Most don't know the difference between smart growth and economic development (all ducks ARE birds but not all birds are ducks) and until we learn that, we're fated to waste a lot of time thinking we're having a contest between 'property rights' and 'NIMBY' when that's not really what this is about.

Meanwhile, those whose agenda is not and will NEVER be that of advancement and enhancement of Norwich will prosper while residents remain reactive instead of proactive.
-bill kenny

In 1492 Columbus Sailed the Ocean Blue

And I, for one, think it was very thoughtful of him to land on a Monday so we could have a three-day weekend and some smokin' mall sales. Talk about as 'economic stimulus package' (that's what we, here in CT, call a giant plastic bag with redeemable for the nickel deposit water bottles. We are so Livin' Large here in The Nutmeg State.). 

In keeping with the holiday today I'm headed to the port of New London to keep an eye peeled for any ocean-going Serta Perfect Sleeper mattresses which, I'm led to believe, Chris was sailing on as journeyed from the Olde World to this one. 

-bill kenny

Flat Earth Membership Cards Honored Here

When we were kids, today, October 12th was Columbus Day and it was a big deal. In New York City the Department of Public (almost dropped the L off that; awkward) Works used to paint the white line on Fifth Avenue purple for the annual parade that was always held on October 12. In light of so much more I, as a man now know that as a boy of twelve I didn't about the Rape of Paradise which ensued after Columbus' arrival, I think perhaps blood-red might have been a better choice of colors. 

When I was a kid, all I ever cared about was the day off, just like kids across the country. We all recited the rhyme because that's how we knew what we did know about Columbus and since there wasn't a snappy couplet about genocide we didn't hear anything about that aspect of discovering the New World (I also don't remember the Arakawa natives part but some of the little gray cells have had some rough days).

Looking at the world as it is and how all settlement and civilization has developed, I'm not sure it's just Old Chris we should be putting in the defendant's dock and charging. I'm thinking a look in the mirror, as well as a glance out a window, might increase our catch significantly.

And compounding the cacophony of facts clashing with opinions is the realization that not only did Columbus not discover the New  World, but he also wasn't the first anything anywhere. We've spent hundreds of years observing a historical event that is neither historic nor actual. Sort of like being the second runner-up in a three-legged race.

And now, as sure as it's the dot on the "i" on the upcoming Monday holiday, we have another excuse (and sales opportunity) to buy bedding or is that just me watching a steady stream of TV ads over the last couple of days? I'm not sure there's any more of a connection between Captain Chris to a Serta than there was to India from Bermuda back in the day. 

Speaking of which, you have to cross an ocean from a basement warehouse at Bertramstrasse 6 in Frankfurt am Main to get to a certain city in Ohio. All I know for sure is such a journey can take decades and cost you more than you ever believed you could pay when you first started as both Chris H and I can attest. 
But it's worth every penny, for your thoughts and otherwise.        
-bill kenny

I Wish to Amend My Previous Lament

Earlier this week I somewhat wistfully observed the very low water levels of the Yantic River at one of my favorite places to pause and refresh in Norwich, the Uncas Leap at Lower Falls.

Seemingly within minutes of my posting my complaint to the world or as much of it as cares to read what I post, the heavens clouded up, the skies darkened and rain, sometimes softly, other times haltingly and at yet other times alternating between a drizzle and a drowning started and continued through yesterday afternoon.

I'm not complaining about the results as reflected in the Lower Falls. Not me.
-bill kenny

Where Did He Have the Money?

After what feels like many years without rainfall (I just received my hyperbole booster shot and it may have already kicked in), we're sitting in some genuine (and desperately needed if not always appreciated) rain here in Southeastern Connecticut. 

I hate grey days and search frantically for points of light and I think I found one, right here. 

So I'm guessing not every fireman needs to wear red suspenders to keep their pants up, especially if they're not wearing any.
-bill kenny

Pizza Cake

I may not be able to tell fortunes like Bruce Springsteen's Madam Marie could, but I predict you can have pizza for dinner next Wednesday evening at Foundry 66 with the City of Norwich's Planning and Neighborhood Services Department if you take part in "A Community Conversation."

The pizza (from 6 to 7:30 PM) is very nearly free-but you will need to share your thoughts and ideas about zoning, be it downtown or wherever it is you live in Norwich with the city's Planning and Zoning Staff. I know, you're pretending to be unsure if you have anything to share but let's be honest, we all have opinions and ideas on the manner and method by which we've been developing the blueprint of the ongoing reinvention of our city. 

When it comes to explaining what we want Norwich to look like both to one another and for those whom we hope to attract to join us here, both zoning maps and text (for ordinances and/or amendments) are really a combination of the Rosetta Stone and a Swiss Army Knife when it comes to creating and developing the language to define us in the years ahead. 

Walk down Broadway and admire the efforts of energetic entrepreneurs who are working hand in glove with a variety of staff from various city agencies and then walk the length of Main Street, in both directions to see how far along that revitalization has come (and how much is yet to begin). Big things, if I read the same newspaper you do, are around the corner, literally and figuratively for Franklin Square. But…

The saying goes, "Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted," and I believe we already have all the experience we need to finish rebuilding the Chelsea District and our entire city. Energy and engagement along with a double dollop of hope are essential but none of them, by themselves or together, is a plan and a plan is what we’re being asked to help with. 

This is our moment next Wednesday evening. Of course, bring your appetite but make sure to bring your ears and an open mind to listen and evaluate what we each share with one another as well as the Planning and Zoning Staff and make sure your thoughts are reflected in the plans that will be developed after all the pizza is gone. 

Don't hold back. We need to be relentlessly honest with one another and to speak in clear, unambiguous language that doesn't need a decoder ring or subtitles. Where yes and no are clearly understood. Perhaps most importantly we need to agree that it's okay to disagree without becoming disagreeable. 

We should collaborate to create from the very best individual suggestions and ideas even better communal ideals to drive us forward together. I love a quote from Henry Ford who made quite a name for himself by improving ideas who said,  "Coming together is a beginning. Keeping together is progress. Working together is success." 

Make sure to share a pizza your mind next Wednesday night.

-bill kenny

Dog Day Afternoon

Driving home yesterday on Washington Street I saw a lady walking with two dogs-one barely a dog at all, in terms of carbon footprint while the other looked like a Great Dane crossed with a Brick House. I flashed on that expression always attributed to people from the South about 'it's not the size of the dog in a fight but the size of the fight in the dog.' while looking at the pair take their mistress for a pull.

She had her hands full. The big one, whom I named Lenny, was slow and plodding just taking it all in. The tiny one, George, was pushing to get ahead and move on--possibly not even sure where he was heading, but making great time while doing it. He barked at every falling leaf as Lenny moved seemingly in slow-motion while we were back up in the booth reviewing the replay.

It was entirely possible that one of Lenny's umm, movements (quick save on my part) would probably weigh more than George with his leash and collar on and from the distance that George kept from Lenny it seemed, perhaps, he had come to the same realization. A chopped Honda with a rear spoiler, because that's what keeps the rear wheels on the ground when the nitro kicks in on the 1.8-liter engine, went Humpty-bumpy down Washington, windows wide open, the driver sharing his music with the world.

The microscopic rep from the Canine Kingdom was the first to voice his displeasure, I suspect because the bass was so overdriven (cracks seemed to appear in the sidewalk and birds and bugs were plummeting stone deaf and dead to earth) it was probably painful for such sensitive ears. George, as befit his size, actually sounded like a squeak toy as he registered his protest.

Lenny, on the other paw, seemed at first to not notice or mind, as he plodded on oblivious to the SOHC of the Apocalypse heading in his direction, boom chakalaka boom. When the Honda could have been no more than ten feet from him, Lenny let out a HUGE bellow, the force of which may have actually slowed the Honda down and stepped into the street, dragging his dog-walking companion with him.

The Honda hot rod stood on the brakes, at least as good as his subwoofers, and Lenny stood on his back legs with his front paws on the car's hood and howled in a piteously pathetic tone that simultaneously told you he was hurting and promised he wouldn't be in pain alone for much longer. Even I, who have difficulty telling which end of the dog to pet and which not to, knew there was no translation needed from the Dog Whisperer.

The driver fell out, more than exited from, the car, frantic that he'd hit the dog. He should have had such luck, instead, he had the animal's fullest attention. The woman was struggling to control George who was doing that small dog classic barking while straining on the leash routine that translates as 'let me at him and I'll murder the bum!'

Meanwhile, woebegone Lenny yelped for relief from forces he could not perceive. Eventually, the driver realized the sound system was the culprit and turned it all a tick to the left of eleven, the dogs quieted down and he got back into his ride. I drove past all of it just as George, always quick to hold a grudge I suspect, christened the guy's front tire. I figured as angry as he'll be about that later, he should be grateful Lenny hadn't followed George's lead.
-bill kenny

Grey Skies and Thoughts

I'm pretty sure I don't have Seasonal affective disorder, SAD, though I do more often feel lowercase when Autumn rolls around except when some asshat is guessing a leafblower to move the autumnal deciduous celebrants from their lawn to the sidewalk and street to share with the rest of us. And do yourself a favor and don't get me started on my mood when winter arrives.

Out for a quick walk yesterday morning (it is Walktober in these parts you know so I thought I should get with the program even if only in a limited manner) with overcast skies, for the most part, and temperatures warming up from the lower forties where they spent the night into the upper fifties as I made my way.

We're had a dry time for the last couple of months, except when I have gotten the car washed, of course, and then everything short of a rain of frogs has happened. I mention the lack of rainfall because I stopped at the Lower Falls of Uncas Leap and it is, as always, beautiful, but it was more rocks than roaring and rushing waters than at any time I can remember over the last nearly twenty-eight years.  

Suspect the rains, soft and otherwise, will fall in due course and then I'll complain about that as well.
-bill kenny

More than Meets the Eye

You may have seen this photo earlier last week (actually considering how quickly it went viral it would have been harder to NOT have seen it).

But the story behind the photo is heartening to me because it demonstrates how we can get along by going along, even with other species. That's my lesson for Sunday.
-bill kenny

Ring Around the Rosary

This is from almost exactly ten years (and a day) ago. At the time I called it:

Gratitude is an Attitude

Was in my neighborhood Mickey D's yesterday morning for breakfast-I've discovered almost nothing goes as well with my local almost newspaper as an almost-breakfast. I'm the only person I know who admits to eating in fast food places, though they seem to be everywhere and always filled with people. 

I smile when I hit these joints (yesterday was a blustery day around here, even Winnie agreed the weather was bad) not because I'm happy to be in the places but rather the contrast between the television portrayal and the reality always cracks me up. I get the same meal every Saturday morning because my middle name is Patrick and NOT Adventure and it's always the same 'associate', silent and sullen behind the counter.

Do you remember when we were kids and how the cafeteria ladies always wore hairnets if they were on the serving line? What happened to those rules and who decided a ball cap (if we're lucky, otherwise a visor for the most part) offers the same protection from hair in my food as the old school hairnets? 

When I sat down at my table and looked up there were two women seated across from one another at a table near a window, closer to the outside than I cared to be, heads bowed, hands clasped, saying a prayer before beginning their meals. From their age and attire and the simple silver bands on their left hands I realized I was looking at two nuns in mufti and not folks who were seeking Divine Help for the McGriddle.

I flashed on a childhood recollection of 'saying grace' at our family table before tucking in-a prayer that, as we grew older in my parents' house, became more of a race to see who could finish first and get started while the food was still hot since Mom always made a big deal about letting things get cold as you picked at them. I can only hope the Lord grades that kind of behavior on a curve but fear I know better.

I smiled, here in the present, to realize that it was good that someone (in this case, TWO someones) remembered to say thank you as the rest of us were oblivious to the gift we were receiving this day in Southeastern Connecticut. 

For many of us, it was a day to miss if not mourn what we did not have, rather than celebrate what we did possess. Later I learned it was Saint Francis of Assisi Day (the Hallmark store has no cards; I checked) and smiled again as I thought of the two witnesses on their pilgrimage through the world and why, for more reasons than are between Heaven and earth, breakfast is still the most important meal of the day.
-bill kenny

Words Fail

Ukraine.
Australia.
China. 

I already have plans for the next presidential election. Guess who ain't in 'em.
-bill kenny