A Long Strange Tryptophan

If you're looking for pithy, clever, cute or cuddly, just like every day, you are SOL, Pilgrim. Today's title is about the height of my reach for bright remarks and as we both realize my vertical leap can use some help.

Truth to tell, I have as close to nothing to do today as is humanly possible. I'm looking forward to our son and daughter both joining us for turkey and what seems to be all the fixings. Sigrid has been at the food preparation for a number of days and I have been told in no uncertain terms I can help best by staying out of the kitchen and resisting the temptation to offer to set the table, get the dinnerware, locate the utensils. I am one who helps best by not helping-I suspected this for many years before marriage. I was overjoyed to be proven correct (last time in this life).

I hope, too, you can have your family with you wherever you are. We both know lots of people who can't because they're working-folks at Forward Operating Bases in places neither of us have ever heard of, ships at sea and in foreign ports, in a thousand different directions all the way back to and through the cops on the corner, emergency response teams and all those who drew short straw on 'skeleton crew' duty or "Let's Beat Black Friday" staffing.

Unlike the original Thanksgiving celebrants, for us it's not the food nor the calendar that makes this a holiday. It's the people with whom we share it. Some of us will spend part of today counting our blessings, and pining over what we don't have. Some of that inventory and regret is what makes us who we are, as a species, I know, but perhaps in the 86,400 seconds that are today, we can spend one of them just being grateful for all that we have. Or perhaps two. Happy Thanksgiving.
-bill kenny

Let Grateful Days Be Endless

Maybe where you live the preparations are already underway. We're borrowing chairs from neighbors who were planning on borrowing them from us. A search party to locate card tables has been formed, place has been cleared for the kids' tables and the aromas already emanating from the kitchen are causing mouths to water.

Thanksgiving may be the only holiday in America where many of us become, if just for the day, math majors as we try to compute how many hours how large a turkey needs to be in the oven at how many degrees so that it can feed a houseful of family and friends we've invited to join us for dinner. And let's not forget how many side dishes and who's bringing what--all important elements on our national Day of Thankfulness.

No matter how rough times have been leading up to this week, and for a lot of us they sure have been tough, we still make that extra effort as we put a smile on a care-worn face and enjoy the warmth of home and hearth.

Let's face it, the smiles have been in short supply in recent years as times turned bad and then stayed that way. Many of us have seen local businesses fade and then close and neighbors move on and away in search of something more than we have right here, right now. And in those households still here, a lot of us are doing a little more with a little less than we did last year.

Despite what you may think, we're the fortunate ones. When you talk to those who help out at food pantries and kitchens such as Saint Vincent de Paul Place, they'll tell you how the need is again greater this year than it was last year and we all remember how last year too many were in need of too much.

We already knew that. The army is stretched thin-in this case, I mean the Salvation Army, which has been deployed with its red kettle and ringing bell for more than a week now and who'll use anything you can spare and share. So thanks in advance for your generosity.

There's a Winter Coat Giveaway, sponsored by TVCCA, Goodwill and Easter Seals, this Saturday morning from ten until two next door to the CVS at 315 West Main Street. Whether it's a donated coat or a kind thought, whatever can warm another's heart and soul is needed and welcomed.

And while the big headlines on newspaper front pages this morning scream about the Super Committee and trillion dollar deficits, closer to home, many whisper and worry about the cost of heating oil and a winter that has yet to arrive.

There's light among the shadows, of course. Norwich Free Academy hosts New London High School tomorrow morning at ten as two old rivals renew their adversarial acquaintanceship and by game's end some one's Thanksgiving gets off on the right foot, even if it's wearing a turf shoe.

And Saturday at half past one is the Winterfest Parade followed by Light Up City Hall. The parade kicks off, where else, at Chelsea Parade, and concludes in what, for decades, was the heart of downtown Norwich, Franklin Square. From there, it's a short walk for all the activities planned around an afternoon near City Hall capped at six when Santa himself illuminates the building.

Ready or not, the holidays are here and as we gather family and friends closer to celebrate, and hopefully in the rush and crush of events we can remember strangers are friends we haven't yet met and light up a life the way we'll light up City Hall as we give one another hope when we celebrate Thanksgiving.

-bill kenny

Family Snapshot

I arrived on the planet the same year Dwight Eisenhower was elected President. I mention this not merely to illustrate how old I am (I have other, far sadder, proofs, believe me) but to help place the distance we've traveled in a larger context. In our neighborhood everyone went to church on Sunday-I assumed they went to different Masses. Only after Neil from next door and I started riding the bus to New Brunswick to attend 'parochial school' did I learn about other religions. I had always stayed close to the tribe and was surprised to learn how wide and big was the new world.

We're a different country now-not better, not worse, just different. In 2010, we elected a man of African-American heritage to the Presidency and while I'm sure in some circles there was murmuring, that was about all there was. Fifty years ago, a Roman Catholic sought the Presidency. I can tell you as a kid in the weeds (literally), it was an issue very much talked about aloud and loudly. I was only eight and I could hear every meaning, and its subtext, very clearly.

John Fitzgerald Kennedy, to a generation of children in developments flung across the country, hugging rail and bus lines so fathers could go to 'the city' for work, was like a being from another planet. If the term had existed, we'd have called him a "rock star." He didn't seem much older than our parents and he was a lot younger than any of the people we saw on TV from Washington. Ike, the man he succeeded in a very close election, was about the age of my grandfather and while I didn't know the phrase 'the changing of the guard', I knew something had happened.

Looking back, I can't really remember color, though, of course, our lives were lived in color. Televisions were the fireplaces of the suburbs and we gathered around them every night. There were no remotes but there was little need for them as, if you were lucky, you had ABC, CBS and NBC (We also had WNET, the educational channel) and most towns had a local daily newspaper, with a morning and an afternoon edition. And then it all stopped.

Today forty-eight years ago, John Kennedy was murdered. I was in a basement classroom in school and he still died despite all of the prayers Sister Immaculata, our principal, led us through as across the country everything moved very slowly and then much too quickly. You felt as if you were in a fever dream and when you finally awakened, it was hard to remember the life you had once had. While we in the basement that day were too young to grasp the scale and scope of the shift in the world, we knew from the first announcement of trouble in Dallas, Texas, that today is different, today is not the same.
-bill kenny

Holly Days

This is the week on the calander that really brings home the idea that time races by. It doesn't seem all that long ago we were making plans for summer vacation and now we're staring into the shopper's abyss that is Black Friday. Where has this year gone?

It's a reasonably full calendar of municipal meetings in The Rose of New England with the Senior Affairs Commission meeting at nine this morning in the Rose City Senior Center. If the city's website is up to date (deep breath), they haven't met since April and have only had two meetings since last November (they meet six times a year).

The final convening of the current City Council is tonight at 7:30 in Council Chambers in City Hall. The agenda makes me smile a bit as we had a lot of snow last winter, a lot of snow that never seemed to get removed from sidewalks as someone who does a lot of walking would notice. The solution, looking at the Council's agenda, is not to enforce the current ordinance but to quadruple the amount of time people have to (NOT) clear snow from their walkways.

I wouldn't be surprised if the police wrote zero tickets last year for failing to comply with either the removal or the parking ordinances. And now we'll positively reinforce and reward negative behavior but then wonder why sidewalks still don't get cleaned or streets cleared. I'd like to see us use NYC's alternate side of the street parking rule for snow removal where you park on the odd or even side of the street depending on the calendar date so the public works crews can clean the entire street. But not to worry, it'll never happen.

There are a lot of housekeeping resolutions on the agenda and since I don't know when otherwise I'll get the chance, thank you to Rabbi Charles Arian for your work on the Ethics Commission. We are a better city for your efforts and those of your colleagues. And speaking of a better city, very sad to read about Resolution 10 (which, I suspect, is why there's an Executive Session on the agenda) though item 4 may bring some closure.

Tuesday afternoon at 3:30 in the Central Office, still known by many as the John Mason School, is a regular meeting of the Board of Education Policy Committee, though it doesn't show up on the school's website (because they're held every other month). None of the minutes of any previously held meetings are posted because they are only added every other year (my guess is as good as yours, maybe better).

The Harbor Management Commission meeting is cancelled but I can offer you a double header, kind of, as the Board of Public Utilities Commissioners and Sewer Authority meet at six in the offices of the Norwich Public Utilities at 16 Golden Street. The postings of the most recent meeting minutes of both boards on the NPU website are not in compliance with public law as they are out of date, and I'm probably not making friends by pointing that out.

The Golf Course Authority meets at seven in their clubhouse on New London Turnpike. They held a special meeting last week, at which they got nothing done. I guess there's just not enough hours in the day....might want to update the expiration dates of the members' appointments on the city's website-though if they're accurate it would help explain the absence of a budget.

Wednesday afternoon at 3:30 in the Central Office conference room, it's a regular meeting of the Board of Education Building and Space Committee (we've gotten the word on the March 2010 convening, thanks). And there's no point in heading to the BOE website in search of meeting minutes as there are none, again.

Wednesday evening the Recreation Advisory Board meets at six in the Recreation Department at Dickenman Field. There no postings of meeting minutes or agenda for the entire calendar year of 2011-have to admire the consistency of effort to achieve that, because what else can you do.

Sort of as a second dessert after Thanksgiving and a kick-off to the holiday season, on Saturday afternoon, it's the Winterfest Parade, starting at 1:30 in Chelsea Parade and finishing in Franklin Square. From there, it's a short hike to City Hall for festivities that start at 2:30, capped by the Lighting of City Hall at 6:00. Always a great time for the young and for those who are young at heart, and the perfect time to recapture your own sense of childlike wonder and sing the changes. Speaking of which, if your mom lets you cross the street, see you at something? Happy Holidays!

-bill kenny

I'd Know that Smell Anywhere

Connectivity is a twin-edged sword. Anything shared between two people electronically these days can, and often is, part of a much larger conversation in circumstances neither can control.

Last Saturday evening, the University of Michigan and the University of North Carolina played a basketball game on the US Navy aircraft carrier Carl Vinson to cap Veterans Day observances around the country. Whether converting the flight deck of the Vinson to a basketball arena was the highest possible use of a billion dollar weapons platform is a debatable topic, but one for another time.

There are life lessons from sports that have nothing to do with sports. One of the most amazing things about the Carrier Classic, for me, was watching the ninety (or so) second time lapse video that depicted the transformation of the ship which aired (seemingly) as part of every bump on ESPN for the days running up to the game. I didn't know it at first but learned--the clip was shot and edited by a US Navy Sailor, working as a videographer and producer, Lowell W..

I met Lowell when he and his colleague, Sally F, came north east almost two years ago for a project in which I was only tangentially involved but received a large amount of credit for when it was a smashing success. Who's your daddy? Turns out, I was. REMF rule! I spent eight years hating 'em all and in my dotage became one. Who says God has no sense of humor?

Each branch of the service has a very small number of active duty military who work in the audio visual arts and sciences (yeah, that sounds pompous, but it's true). They put in long hours for short money and no glory. You don't even realize they're there until they're not. All those Victory at Sea episodes and the aerials in Top Gun? All courtesy of military broadcasters, photographers and mopic maniacs. You know more of them than you think, and if you don't, Nat, Lee, Dave, Floyd, Rik, Roger, the other Bill, Chris, Sara J and MVT, can help you make a list.

Anyway, Lowell's clip blew up-I think that's what the kids call it when folks like something a lot. He didn't have Justin Bieber in it, no cameo by Katy Perry and everyone kept all their clothes on and still at some point by game time last Saturday night a quarter of million hits had been registered on You Tube. Not meaning to get all mathy on you, but that's about 250,000 more hits than you and me, together, have gotten even counting those Rick Rolled clicks.

Maybe Steve B. knows how we roll and then some. Who? This guy, and watch carefully and listen even more carefully at 1:23 into a feature on a Fox LA TV morning show. "That was my time lapse," says Steve. And that's the truth, except for the lie part, which is the entire statement. You'll notice when you watch Steve's upload to You Tube the imposition of his corporate logo on the original U. S. Navy Video credit. Well, that is awkward.

Yeah. Zero points for original effort and even less than zero for ham-handed theft, badly if brazenly executed. I'm not a cowboy, but I know that aroma and contrary to Duvall's contention, it's not victory. Don't stand down wind of Steve or you'll never get that smell out of your clothes.

-bill kenny

Fast Food Nation

Here's a little something to think about the next time you talk into the clown's head: if we are what we eat, what has all this fast food turned us into? And talk about a growth industry, make sure to factor in clothing and the purchase of new and larger apparel for those of us who graze at the neon signs of casual dining everywhere.

Imagine Jared knocking back a Happy Meal while wearing a BK crown, covered in the Colonel's Secret Recipe and sitting in a Wendy's. Sorry. Sometimes I get the portobello and psilocybin mushrooms confused but only on days of the week that end in y (because we like you). Anyway, we now live in such flamboyant times that if a tree falls in the forest and there's no one there to hear it, who posts the fall on Facebook and sends out the tweet that alerts the google plus circles?

Hell with hypotheticals! I have one for you torn from the pages of real life but a question to preface it: what would your choice of locale be for a discussion on a topic as intensely personal as two people who love(d) one another could ever share. Don't say it aloud, just think about it. Then click here, read the story and tell me with a straight face, yep, "I'm Thinking Arby's!" Where is Greg Kihn when I really need him?

And if your fast food fervor becomes a fever, I've got your poster girl for Nucking Futs, right here. Talk about Cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs, baby girl is crazy in the heat of the deep dryer. If only Dan and John could have seen her as the roof rack, she'd have eaten at their joint for free forever, which came a little soon for one of them. I imagine her ardor cools slightly when she gets a gander at the back of one of those tray liners and checks out the caloric content. That stuff really puts the relaxed in relaxed fit jeans.
-bill kenny

Memories and Mobility

This time last week many of us were starting a three day weekend created by Veterans Day. The reasons for the day and the commemorations across many communities were more quietly handled, like Colonel Cathcart's demand of Chaplain A. T. Tappman in Heller's Catch-22 for a prayer that doesn't mention waters or heaven or God. In theory, many of us think military service is a fine idea-for other people, no one we know.

One of the nicer things in recent years, from my perspective as a Cold War Vet, has been the warming across the country to the notion of thanking those who serve in the armed forces, especially at this most fragile of moments. Many of us cannot imagine life in uniform and have no frame of reference for it while others have spent their lives, or given them, in the service of of country.

Thanks to news on demand and 24/7 video channels, we can watch world wide conflicts on our cellphones. Ain't technology grand? And we've done a fine job of reducing our dispatches from the front to a nearly sterile exercise in accounting. We've got the Action News Team giving us a body count and we mentally skip over the costs and carnage in lives and damage that's always just below the surface. But you can peek behind the curtain.

I've had the privilege of assisting an online acquaintance in a fundraiser he created for the Veterans Village of San Diego, and have been involved with hundreds and thousands of others I'll never meet in other forms of assistance that don't really require a lot of skill (ideal for me as I don't have any). We're heading towards the Season of Giving and if I can impose upon you long enough to get in a mention of the Wounded Warrior Project and all the good they do.

It hurts to see all of these agencies struggling to help those whom we've hurled into the maw of Endless War while forging our own 'please excuse my child' notes so our own lives remain undisturbed. They are bailing out the ocean with a teaspoon and we should be angry.

But, as happened Wednesday afternoon (thanks LR), I had the opportunity to meet Captain Gregory Galeazzi, USA, who observes Veterans Day everyday. And as you're about to find out no matter what kind of a day you're having today, click here, and be uplifted.
-bill kenny