Across All the Boroughs

My brother Adam laces up his sneakers on behalf of Stomp the Monster one last time this morning as an entrant in the (return of) New York City Marathon. Since I get exhausted just thinking about 26.2 miles, much less running it, I've resurrected some previous near-thoughts on Adam's efforts. It's possible he'll have finished running his race before I get to the end of the paragraph. That would not be as surprising as it might once have been.

If the past as prologue is accurate, ordinarily over 50,000 people would take to the streets today for the 2021 New York City Marathon, though these are not ordinary times and the Marathon did not happen last year because of COVID Concerns and the actual number of participants this year has been reduced.  

I know of only one runner this year, and he has been in previous NYC Marathons so you can go ahead and root for whomever you wish but I'm pretty much locked in on my point of focus. When all is said and done, and run to be accurate, we can meet up around here and compare notes.

I'm still working on the clocks falling back earlier today and why it's so dark to start this morning and my brother is pounding the pavement with the equivalent of an army division alongside him. 

It's altogether fitting and proper that there be a Kenny back on the streets of the Big City, and this time around, one who has trained for it and whose heart is open to the thrill of possibilities. Go Adam!
-bill kenny

A Tick Too Soon or Too Late

Tomorrow morning in the wee, dark early hours, we fell back an hour (I've always liked how we keep that straight, 'spring ahead' and 'fall back' and that 'wander stupidly like a drunken lemur' I hear so often is, I guess, only used to describe me) all across the country.

I've never been clear how much of the rest of the world does this time-travel-but-standing-very still-stuff although daylight savings is utilized across significant portions of the earth's Northern Hemisphere. I've always wondered about hourly employees working overnight shifts when the clocks change directions....do they work seven and get paid for eight in the Spring and then work nine and get paid for eight in the fall? 

Is there a law or a workplace practice that covers this and why on earth is a sixty-nine-year-old guy, pecking away at a keyboard in Norwich, Connecticut, worrying about stuff like this? When you have no life, interest in the obscure becomes a crusade.

The why we move clocks forward and back is the part I will NEVER understand no matter how erudite (or not) the explanation. As a matter of fact, technically we'll all be an hour older when Sunday becomes Monday than when yesterday became today. Science makes my hair hurt. And that's another thing I don't understand.

Melting Clock At Moment of First Explosion

We share the planet with a nearly infinite number of other life forms from single-celled amino acids to the full scale and scope of the abiogenesis catalog (now available for only three easy payments, and if use your credit card right now...), and none of them have watches much less the concern for time and its division and measurement that we, Homo sapiens, have.

Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day/Fritter and waste the hours in an off-hand way. And then we look up in surprise and dismay at the time and wonder where it's gone when it hasn't gone anywhere. So much energy expended on endings from the end of a television program, a movie, a radio serial, or other entertainment, through a relationship with another person, or a business relationship or political alliance. All gone, their races run.

You don't have to be Richard to have misgivings about time and what we do with it. Merely being human will qualify. I'll leave the sun behind me and I'll watch the clouds as they sadly pass me by...I can see the world and it ain't so big at all. This time tomorrow.

-bill kenny

Hanging on 'til February 26

As we all know, the Atlanta Braves won the World Series Tuesday night amidst all the election hoopla by shutting out the Houston Astros (a/k/a 'The Cheaters') in Houston 7-0 to take the Series in six games. 

I always root for seven-game world series because the last game of any world series is the last game of baseball for that entire calendar year. I am not known for my patience and as the late Tom Petty so succinctly put it, 'waiting is the hardest part' though I was never clear if he was speaking as a Marlins or Rays fan.

Spring Training 2022 games start February 26, 2022, so this will have to hold us for a while.
-bill kenny 

Nearly a Public Service Reminder

I don't why we do forth and back with our clocks and watches, but we do and this weekend we will do it again. I know, in light of the yet-again-shit year we've had, why would anyone want an extra hour of it? 

Preach, brother and sister! Though you're already talking to the choir.

I'm already looking forward to the clock I'll find just about this time next week whose hands I completely forgot about during the great Fall Back of 2021. 
-bill kenny 

Same Boat, Different Oceans

This morning by the dawn's early light we can analyze yesterday’s election results and when all is said and done, very little will have been changed regardless of the outcome. 

No matter your politics or ideology, the Forces of Evil (however and whoever you perceive "them" to be) didn't win and the parting on the left is now parting on the right (and the beards, such as they are, have all grown longer overnight). 

There will be words written about what has happened or what hasn't today and in the next few days, but here's a few right now: no matter the weather and the clouds' presence/absence on the horizon, the sun will come up whether the persons you supported or opposed won or lost. 

That's the beauty of our democracy. The opportunity for revolutionary change without revolution. We are the envy of much of the rest of the world, and the scourge of those who don't envy us, because of the peaceful revolutions we have when we vote. 

I'm hoping we had at least a fifty percent registered voter turnout here, though one hundred does have a nice ring to it, because if all you do is complain about how awful things are, but you won't do anything to change the road we’re on, then you're part of the problem. It's been my experience that it's never eaten as hot as it's served, so enjoy your breakfast because we have a lot of work to do. 

First, thank you to all who offered themselves as candidates. We all benefited from your generosity of spirit. For those who are our Mayor, City Council members, and those chosen for the Board of Education as you’ve probably already guessed, campaigning was a lot easier than governing will prove to be. 

I grew up in New Jersey where 'vote early and often' isn't just a suggestion but a mantra. Yeah, we used to grumble, but we (also) went to the polls. Around these parts too often all we do is gripe to one another about how we're not going to take it anymore. Except, that's what we said at the last election, and the one before that and the one before that. We seem to forget nothing ever happens if you don't make it happen. 

I’ve written this before Election Day, but history suggests that all of us realize as of today some will say we elected too many/not enough new people, and we'll spend the next two years wondering if one or the other is true. 

In any event, I hope, as I always do, that we haven't simply chosen new brooms to sweep old dust because while this is the country of unlimited opportunity, there are only so many second chances we can have before one of them proves to be our last. 

Today, the day after the election is the time to stop arguing about who did what to whom and why or how and to look instead to those whom we’ve elected as leaders to help us all grab an oar and pull as hard as we can for shore. Otherwise, we’re going to swim until we can't see land. And no good has ever come from that.
-bill kenny

Not a Curse

When I was very young, and despite your snicker I actually was young (once), going through the primary grades of St Peter's (sic) School in New Brunswick, New Jersey, this day, aside from Good Friday, was the saddest day of the year.

Today is All Soul's Day. When you're nine and have transferred to 'the Catholic School' from Pine Grove Manor in Franklin Township because there was finally room in the class near the start of the fall for you and Neil, your next-door neighbor who is now suddenly promoted to best friend, the more you think about the implications of All Souls' Day, the sadder it gets.

As I've aged (badly) I've developed quarrels with the Catholic Church in which I was raised but most of that churn is what I've taken to calling middle-level management. With all due respect to the priests, bishops, and even His Holiness, the Pope, I'm not sure how much of the edifice the one true church (as it calls itself when it finds/feels itself under attack) has created since Jesus Christ founded it, Petrus, would pass the 'R U Serious?" test with the Lord.

We're not grading on a curve, either, guys. Wanted to pass that along. But one of the things I still believe, regardless of my exact grid coordinates in the theological hemisphere, is that there can be nothing more tragic than to be forever forgotten. As a primary grader on this night, I used to fall asleep trying to remember every single person I had met in my life-a tough enough job when you're nine but when you're nine and sixty as I now am, it borders on the impossible.

But maybe that's what 'heaven' actually is-the memory of you by another person. Look at history-much of it is a tale told by an---well, never mind who's doing the telling, but pay close attention to who's doing the remembering. Is forgotten the opposite of famous? And who prays for the souls of the faithfully departed when no one remains who recalls who they were? When facts fade, faith must suffice. 
-bill kenny

Same As It Ever Was

We spend so much time saying we are working on solutions to our problems when all we're actually doing is looking for someone to blame. It's not a Norwich Connecticut thing, or a New England thing or an American thing. It's human nature.

We feel better when we can tag someone with the responsibility for what's gone wrong, Scapegoats have existed long before we started to call them that. In German, it's a Sündenbock or a Karnickel but it always comes down to the same thing: someone other than ourselves. 

24/7/365. The song remains the same.

Tomorrow all across the country. it's Election Day with as many people seeking to serve in as many offices as there are stars scattered across the heavens. Here's a little something to take with you as you mark your ballot.

Thanks for coming to my TED Talk.
-bill kenny