Locating a Large Sieve

I've been looking since late mid afternoon yesterday and still haven't found it--an update on one of those grotesque 'where are they now?' stories that forty PLUS years ago had everyone talking.

Before Perez Hilton, TMZ, and ten tons of tattle-tale twitter titters and two bit nitwits, the American public was fascinated by Hollywood stars and starlets-truth to tell, in much the same way as we are now. There was more effort and artifice at the time--we had the benefit (I use that word loosely) of star-maker apparatus that worked to promote careers both on behalf of actors/actresses as well as the film studios for whom they toiled. The machinery was more apart of the scenery, but it was all there.

Now, in the age of cellphone cameras and the ubiquity of connectivity, anyone, anywhere at anytime, can become Billy Joel's definition of a 'star'-a ball of gas surrounded by flame. I'd offer a few examples but it's a target-rich environment, and like Lay's, it's impossible to stop at just one. Besides, you have your list and I have mine.

If you're a pop culture historian, his name, "Tex" Watson, will sound familiar as one of those knee deep in gore as a follower of Charles Manson. Manson was a malevolent maniac who heard Helter Skelter as an incantation and exhortation for every LSD-laced looner and peyote button basket case to kill as many people as they could put their hands to. Tex and his tribe were very good at answering the call.

Long before Meredith Hunter and Altamont put the exclamation point on the end of both the era and error of The Summer of Love, the Manson Family murdered on a scale and scope rarely seen up until that time in our country's history. But in a culture where yesterday is only vaguely and fuzzily recalled, forty-two years ago is a look back few of us can make (and fewer, still, who would want to).

Thirteen hasn't been a lucky number for Tex. That's the number of times his requests for parole have been denied and I'm assuming (presuming is probably the more accurate word) that we've now passed the threshold of the baker's dozen. We're all familiar with Portia's assessment and assertion, and can appreciate, at least in theory, the notion that people change.

But truth to tell, it's that fear of change and more especially the fear of the consequences that causes us to waver at the lintel before crossing the threshold. Somewhere, we can hear Merry Clayton, the menace behind the Mickster, "Ooh, see the fire is sweepin' our very street today. Burns like a red coal carpet (a) mad bull (who) lost its way." It's that lost part that frightens us the most.
-bill kenny

Overcoming Triskaidekaphobia

New Englanders are made of hardy stock, I'm told-both those who arrived on the Mayflower as well as those whose goods and furnishings came in one of their moving vans. There's a long tradition in these parts of independent thinking and action that predates even the ready for anything state of mind the Minute Men came to embody in the War of Independence.

Generations of selfless sacrifice seemed to run into a stone wall Tuesday a week ago on Election Day at least here in The Rose of New England. There's nothing more local in the body politic than municipal elections and that's what we had here. Or at least that's what I thought was going on.

As you should know by now, the voter turnout left a lot to be desired. My initial reaction when seeing the actual turnout percentage,13.5%, was to assume many of us had succumbed to our fear of the number 13, triskaidekaphobia. I leapt, more like lurched, into action and attempted to reach Hugh Laurie, TV's Dr. Gregory House, and persuade him to facilitate the return of everyone's favorite 13, Olivia Wilde, to the show.

But like Saul on the road to Damascus, I had an epiphany. William Vaughn, a columnist for the Kansas City Star, once observed "a citizen will cross the ocean to fight for democracy but won't cross the street to vote in an election." I'm not sure he was joking, but I do think I caught a glimpse of his larger point.

When people have the right to vote, it follows as night the day, they also have the right to NOT vote if they so choose. As George Jean Nathan, who gave cynicism a good name once observed, "Bad officials are elected by good citizens who do not vote." When the top vote-getter in this year's City Council election was named on less than 10% of all registered voters' ballots and still won handily, that's a reflection of systemic, not individual, failure on a scale and scope beyond a drive-by observation in a blog. Or should be.

In years past, we had candidate forums from shortly after Labor Day through Halloween at least once a week. This year we had less than half a dozen total and they were spottily attended (I'm being charitable). Despite my belief that my neighbors weren't happy about the rate, pace and direction of changes in Norwich, the turnout suggests they were and perhaps decided they had better things to do than vote for what many may have seen as more, or less, of the same flavor.

We've all heard "Success has a thousand fathers and failure is an orphan." We can spend the next two years running paternity tests on every registered voter we can put our hands to, or we can join our hands together and continue (as halting sometimes as our progress has been) to attempt to design and build the city we want to live in tomorrow and the day after tomorrow.

-bill kenny

Decades and not of the Rosary

Twenty years ago this morning my wife and children first awakened here in the New World. They had flown from Frankfurt am Main to Philadelphia where they were slated to remain overnight and then fly to Groton-New London Not Quite International Airport but I decided my fun meter was pegged out and went to PHL to welcome them to their new country.

Things had already changed before they had touched down. I had gone from driving a BMW 518 to something called an Isuzu I-Mark (I was to have another name for it in very short order. but I digress) that labored for every mile of the 11.2 million miles it seemed to be from where I had set up our new home and the City of Brotherly Love.

Sigrid, my wife, had been in the USA on two occasions-a bit more than a year after we'd been married, sort of one of those victory lap visit things I do so poorly, and did this time as well, and a visit the summer after my Dad died. She was always proud she got on so well with my father-and rarely appreciated it when I told her she was only related to him by marriage not blood and that made all the difference.

Patrick and Michelle had never been to their father's country. Both Sigrid and I had discovered the year previously, when my mom, "Oma America" as Michelle, barely three at the time, kept calling her, came to visit that Patrick spoke English. It served him well as well as Michelle even more in the first few months on this side of the pond as he was Michelle's translator for our neighborhood and beyond.

Patrick was nine when my job disappeared in Germany and grasped far more of what was happening and its impact on his life than I would've liked. Michelle, however, was much younger and stepped off the plane clutching a clockwork pig, the only toy the packers who descended on our apartment in Germany hadn't managed to seal up in a giant shipping crate.

As toys went, the pink pig would have won no prizes--it would take three steps forward, offer a pair of oinks, and then take a quick step back. She had had it for a few months prior to the Westward Migration and that night in Philadelphia, she held on to it as if it were life itself. I'm pretty sure she still has it and would not be surprised if she keeps it forever.

All three were the last ones to clear customs and immigration because of some truly stupid advice I had been given in Germany by the lawyers who worked for my bosses. Two decades later, I'm not quite so angry about all of that. (Though I do still hope all of them are as dead as I wished them very intensely that evening.)

I stood in the arrival terminal as streams of passengers brushed and rushed by me, willing my family to appear. Sigrid, drawn and gaunt, holding Michelle, with Patrick venturing ahead by a few steps, came into view and I had one of the most amazing moments in my life in the most unlikely of locales, holding all three in an embrace whose memory I wanted to last a lifetime. So far, so good.

We collected suitcases and headed to the car with Michelle rubber necking in every direction and repeating that "Amerika ist sehr dunkel." When she's right, she's right; besides I saw no point in telling her it was eleven PM. The trek north on I-95 included a Roy Rogers restaurant at a rest stop somewhere on the Jersey Turnpike to refuel our son, whose appetite had survived his Atlantic Crossing intact.

It was very late, or early, you decide, when we arrived/returned home/back to Norwich to sleep on mattresses loaned by co-workers as all of our furniture and furnishings were bobbing around in the North Atlantic in a container ship, not to arrive for another few weeks. Patiently and with skill and love, Sigrid, a stranger in a strange land, worked to turn a curiosity of a house into the heart of our home. Two decades ago this morning we awakened to begin to dream again.
-bill kenny

We Could All Together Go Out on the Ocean

This is the time of year when there's a hum of heightened activities coming from most of our homes. We all love the holidays, but some of us (me) aren't big fans of the extra work-luckily we usually have a someone to not only watch over us, but to make all the decisions that help make this time of the year special for our families and friends.

There's more than enough going on around here at the municipal level as a glance at the city's website calendar shows, and, as we demonstrated conclusively last Tuesday, there's always room for increased resident involvement.

This afternoon at five there are two different meetings in City Hall (the website suggests they are in the same room but they are not) with the Ethics Commission holding a regular meeting in Room 319 with another request to hear a complaint on the agenda while a floor below, in Room 210, it's a special meeting of the Redevelopment Agency (first of two with another on the morrow) to review Requests for Quotations on services as the agency continues to marshal resources for their enhanced role in downtown.

Tuesday we have almost as many meetings as there hours in the day starting with the second (or other) special meeting at five this time in Room 210 with the second wave of responders to Agency's request for quotations.

At 5:30, in the Buckingham Memorial, it's a regular meeting of the Public Parking Commission and perhaps their first meeting since June, assuming there's a quorum.

Also at 5:30, across town in the Latham Science Center on the campus of the Norwich Free Academy, it's a regular meeting of the Board of Trustees. A review of their October meeting minutes offers a better insight into the scale and scope of activities within and without NFA.

And since all good things come in threes, why not a third meeting at 5:30, of the Norwich Board of Education in the Kelly Middle School Library, says the City's website, or in the Jacqueline Owens Auditorium as it says on the Board's website. I can't offer you their October meeting minutes to review though there's a link to their September meeting minutes, except there isn't really a link at all. "If you feel there is an error, please contact your <>." I'll get right on that, as soon as I figure out what a <> is.

At six in City Hall, Room 319, it's a regular meeting of the Personnel & Pension Board, whose most recent meeting minutes, from September, are here.

Also at six, a bit of a drive from City Hall, possibly a four iron, it's a meeting of the Norwich Golf Course's Budget Subcommittee in their Mark Twain conference room.

At seven, in the Planning Department's Conference room in the basement of 23 Union Street is a regular meeting of the Commission on the City Plan and within that meeting is also a special meeting of the Commission on the City Plan Plan of Conservation and Development (POCD) Subcommittee. Last month had a presentation from Jason Vincent of Planimetrics who helped create the previous Plan and who have been hired to work on the new one, that offered a very informative (= even I understood it) handout, "Planning Primer."

Wednesday morning at eight thirty in their offices in the Norwich Business Park it's a regular meeting of the Southeastern Council of Governments. They had a special meeting on November 2nd-those meeting minute are here.

At nine in the Dime Bank Community Room at 290 Salem Turnpike it's a regular meeting of the Norwich School Readiness (Council Children First) whose work may be very important, critical perhaps, but whose ability to tell the rest of us about any of it by posting meeting minutes on their own website remains absolutely execrable.

There's a note on the city's calendar for a meeting at three in Room 319 of City Hall of the Emancipation Proclamation Committee, though I can't find anywhere an index telling me the Council resolution that created it, a listing of its members or its statement of purpose. Reminds of at least one other 'volunteer panel' that seems to be both invincible and invisible

At 5:30 in the Norwich Arts Council Cooperative at 66 Broadway it's a regular meeting of the Downtown Neighborhood Revitalization Zone, whose most recent meeting, based on the published minutes, was in July. Every one's term seems to have expired ten months ago so holding meetings may be a bit problematic.

Also at 5:30 in the Planning Department's conference room at 23 Union Street, it's a special meeting of the Dangerous Buildings Board of Review whose posting of meeting minutes is beyond pathetic.

Thursday afternoon at five in Room 319 of City Hall, it's a regular meeting of the Historic District Commission (I think we can lose the note on the prompt start of the March meeting). If you're intending to go, go here first and review all the notes for the meeting.

At six, in their facility on the New London Turnpike, it's a regular meeting of the Norwich Ice Skating Authority whose most recent meeting, in reviewing the city's website, seems to have been in September.

And Friday morning at nine in Room 319, it's a (perhaps) regular meeting of the Chelsea Gardens Foundation about which not one word can be found on the city's website. Having watched one member of this foundation up close in a funding venue of a different kind last May, I am impressed at how so little shared information has so far carried.

If you can't find the time to attend a meeting about something you're interested in (and I can't complain in light of how few of us could be bothered to vote), try visiting here on the city's website and completing the survey monkey on improving the city's website. You can definitely suggest 'pony rides for birthday', but NOT indefinitely. Don't ask me how I know this.

See you at something?

-bill kenny

This is Jeff's Fault

I am a reasonably political animal, though describing my politics is difficult, even for me. I call myself a relentless pragmatist and find myself more often leeward than windward in my orientation as we sail the ocean of political science (as oxymoronic as that term tends to be).

I had some intention, though not very much or for very long, to watch those (or some of those) seeking the Republican Party nomination for President next year as they debated foreign policy. The longer I thought about that idea as my Saturday night, the funnier it actually became. In light of the luminaries on the stage seeking the nomination and their cumulative experience in the real world, much less the globe beyond our borders, I couldn't imagine what they'd do to fill up the first two minutes of the program.

Harvesting dental floss sounded like a much better investment of my time though it's hard to get a van loaded and on the road to Montana on such short notice. And then Jeff, my boon companion a little more than two years ago on a star-crossed crusade we both knew was doomed from the get go, but still we slogged on, and into the Valley rode the Six Hundred (minus 598), shared a clip with me and I knew my viewing would never include the Seven Dwarfs. Not last night or any night.

I've spent a great deal of time contemplating how, at the time of the Founding of the Republic we had so many people more than qualified to be President when only one could be, and how, 235 years later, we could have such a gaggle of idiots clamoring for our votes. Did they lose their way or have we? All you can do sometimes is give a woodchuck a tuna melt. At least one of us can.

These are complex and complicated times and we need more than simple (and simple-minded) solutions or drive-by, voice byte insights. There's a lot of hard work ahead of us and we need serious thinkers to create opportunities for all of us to contribute to the Renaissance of this country. Yeah, it takes all kinds of people to include less than sane, I guess. Speaking of which, waiter, check please.

And how precarious a state must we be in to find Mike Tyson, of all people, to be the best Herman Cain since, well, since Herman himself. Chocolate might be the flavor of the week, my friends, Romans and Countrymen, but crazy is the taste Republicans never tire of.

-bill kenny

Nittany Lyin'

Veterans Day yesterday confused me as the afternoon turned into the early evening (and not because I have a tendency to sundown) because it felt a little like a Saturday. It was brisk in these parts yesterday, and all of my parts were cold as a result, and I stretched out on my Lennon love seat, as I call it (about the size and style of John Lennon's favorite couch), so that my feet hang over as I watch TV.

Shortly after four when I turned it on and Ellen DeGeneres was dancing up the center aisle of the studio bleachers with her audience (I think that's what the kids call it) and that's when I realized I wasn't going to watch any college football in the afternoon because it was Friday, vice the day before Sunday.

Speaking of football and vice (you saw that coming, didn't you; I guess I'm slowing down), unless you've been stuck in an elevator with Kris Humphries, you're familiar with Jerry Sandusky, Penn State University, the firing of Joe Paterno and the Million Moron March at State College that ensued in light of the synergy among the first three items.

My alma mater regularly got the snot stomped out it by JoPa's charges. The Nittany Lions humiliated the Scarlet Knights for what felt like forever, but that has nothing to do with my anger at puerile football fooligans who think an eighty four year old man who chose deliberately and with calculation to not know information that was his responsibility to know, was somehow the (not a) victim, which meant the pedophile on his staff and on his program's payroll, destroying dozens of lives in a decade and a half was no more than part of the overhead of so-called big-time college football.

Don't even think of scrolling down to the bottom of this page to 'tell this a-hole off'. I will have none of that. Instead read this, especially, "Victim 2" starting on page 6. You will be physically sickened by what a graduate student watched a grown man do to a child, I guarantee it. And then when you drop me a line to counsel mercy and forgiveness, make sure to explain to me why the football game today against Nebraska should have never been played, but rather forfeited. Very much like any opportunity for happiness that every one of Sandusky's victims had happen to them. And then we'll talk about the campus riot, but not for very long, I suspect.

Am I calling for collective responsibility and accountability by everyone who wears the Blue and White and screams "We Are Penn State" on autumn Saturday afternoons? You bet your ass I am and speaking of ass, if you don't agree with me, you are one.

-bill kenny

A Sky Full of Holes on Remembrance Day

Today is Veterans Day-we once called it Armistice Day because that's what the day on which World War I ended was called, back before we had to put a roman numeral after World War (we are the smartest species on the planet, the crown of creation, but we still had to have two worldwide conflagrations to realize how horrible they were).

"Elizabeth, that thundercloud is creeping up the Empire Hill. There's shadows on the overpass and puddles in the old dirt path. Peoria lay silent still in the belly of the overgrown; all quiet on the open plain. Footprints to the family plot where evermore will restless sorrow sleep in a broken heap."

Many nations across the globe, to include our neighbor to the north, call today Remembrance Day and I like that title. We have a day to recall those in uniform who gave their lives for our country, Memorial Day, and I have always appreciated the idea of a separate day set aside to honor everyone's service.

"Elizabeth, our fathers came and settled where the ground was flat; drew water from the Indian wells, cut timber from the rolling fells. Grandaddy-o, bled hearth and home for oiling the company gears. No rest for the errant ones. Godspeed their reckless sons who evermore play their forefathers' hands On the foreign sands."

We had people serving in the military before we even had a country. After all, this is where the American Revolution started with farmers and shopkeepers grabbing muskets and forcing the world's most powerful nation at that time, the British Crown, after a profuse flow of blood, to concede to the inevitable and allow all those up and down the Eastern Seaboard to become the United States of America (not that we've always been or even are to this day).

"Cemetery Guns go bang, bang, bang, shooting all the sky full of holes."

And while it's hard sometimes to see the line from the Battle of Lexington to Lexington Avenue and from low rent districts everywhere to the streets of the District of Columbia, it's all a part of what every veteran made possible by her and his service. The best way to say 'thank you' is to safeguard and use wisely the freedoms that service and sacrifice made possible and make them a part of your legacy for those who will follow you.
-bill kenny