Confessions of a Lapsed Catholic

Confessions of a lapsed Catholic

The wheels fell off the religion chariot very early for me. Not sure if I was a cynic in the womb but shortly thereafter for sure. I know that I drove my parents, especially my Mom who is myopically religious, crazy. It was right around the time I realized that Santa Claus was a fictional character, created by the adults, that I realized that this Jesus character might need a closer look too. I figured, if adults made up Santa to make Christmas a little more enjoyable for us kids; well maybe they were making up some other stuff too?

At Immaculate Heart of Mary School in Brooklyn, in the early 70’s, we received the sacrament of holy communion in the second grade. Then in third grade we practiced to receive the holy sacrament of confession. If you asked me, I thought this was backwards. I mean they taught us how bad we were. The priests and nuns taught us that our virginal white souls were pockmarked with the heinous taint of “original sin.” Glancing over a few rows at my angelic Susan Shaughnessy, in her maroon plaid skirt, patent leather shoes and white socks, it was hard to picture that she could be tainted with ANYTHING. Sitting there in my desk, playing with my blue tie with the little IHM embroidered on it, I’m thinking, Shouldn’t we have purified our souls of this horrible imperfection before we received the body of Christ? Just one of the many questions I had.

Sister Christine, my third grade teacher, was an ancient, elongated, veiny woman. What I remember most was her skin was practically see-through. And that after she blew her nose, a fog-horn, phlegmy sound, she kept her handkerchief tucked up her black and white sleeve. I wasn’t sure why, I guessed they didn’t have pockets on the nun’s habits.

About mid-year, Sister Christine is preparing us to receive our first confession.
Monday morning comes, our class walks down Fort Hamilton Parkway, to IHM church. We gather in the little side pews next to the confessional booths; and Sister Christine is teaching us step-by-step directions to receive confession. “Now boys and girls, you walk into the confessional. Kneel on the cushioned kneeler in front of the screen. Wait for the priest to slide the screen open. Then say, “Bless me father for I have sinned. This is my first confession.” Sister tells us that then you are supposed to tell the priest all the bad stuff you have done. As we are waiting in church to “practice” my friends and I are whispering and snickering, Sully says, “What do you think you get for cheating on a test?” Timmy Boyle pipes in, “Or stealing a Milky Way?” Chrissy Ryan, “What if you stole a car!?” Mark Bowen, always the smartest of us, ”What if you murder someone? Do you have to tell the priest? And if you tell him, does he have to turn you in?”

Something about confession just didn’t sit right in my third grade brain. All during the practice week I pester my mother with questions but her answers have been lacking. After a few days of practice, I am annoyed with the power this gives the priest. The major fly in the ointment for me is, Why does he have to know what everyone is doing? Sitting in class one morning, I raise my hand. “Yes, James?”

“Uh, Sister Christine, I just have a question about this whole confession thing.”

“Yes?”

“Well, I don’t understand why I have to tell the priest everything? Why does he have to know?” “You see Mr. Spinner, the priest is like the mailman. He brings your sins to god.”

“Well, didn’t you teach us that god was all-seeing and all-knowing?”

“Yes, and what is your point?”

“Well then doesn’t that mean that god sees and knows all of the bad stuff, and good stuff, I am doing? So couldn’t I just confess my sins to god?”

“No, it doesn’t work like that. You have to tell your sins to the priest to get absolution.” That explanation didn’t sit well with me.

Towards the middle of third grade, we all started to connect the dots on the Santa Claus thing. Sitting in the school cafeteria, eating our peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, my friends and I are discussing…Sully, ”How does Santa know the houses that have Christians? I mean how does he know how to skip the Jewish kid’s houses? Is there a star of David on the roof?” Jimmy Quinlan, “How does he fit down the chimney? And what if you don’t have a chimney?” Mark Bowen,“How many people in the world? And he gets to them ALL in one night?”

From Santa, my thoughts turned to Jesus. Exactly how did he turn a few loaves and fishes into enough food to feed the hundreds gathered to hear him talk? And if he really had this power, why was Jesus so selective with the miracles? I thought, If I could just make food out of thin air, and turn water into wine, then it would just be a miracle frenzy! I envisioned that Jesus had a little “Barbara Eden/I Dream of Jeanie” twitch he would do and BAM, Lazarus rises from the dead. I couldn’t imagine how anyone with this power wouldn’t be miracle happy. Wouldn’t you just be sprinkling miracles around pell-mell for the masses? If I was Jesus and I came upon a sick boy in the village. "How sad, you need a kidney?” BAM “There you go kid. Ah, don’t mention it, it was nothing, I’m the son of God for Christ sakes. Ooops"

The more I learned, the more questions I had…If Jesus could perform miracles in biblical times, why is he so stingy with the miracles today? Why do we still have people starving all over the world in 1973? People have been praying to him for almost 2000 years. And god has been, for the most part, saying no for 2000 years! Think of all the unanswered prayers! In 4th grade, in Mrs. Gaglio’s class, we joined “Friends of Animals” to prevent the clubbing of the baby seals and other atrocities against animals. Why couldn’t Jesus help us with the baby seals? Our whole class, pious little boys and girls, praying for the baby seals; and still the baby seals become fur coats. How could god say no to all of his little uniformed disciples?

I envisioned that god was up there in heaven, cooking dinner and watching t.v. and stuff and he ignores pretty much every request he gets. Jesus and God and the Holy Spirit (don’t even get me started on the Holy Trinity) are up in heaven trying to watch Password and they keep getting interrupted with people’s prayers… “Ah, what’s her name is praying for her husband again. Why doesn’t she just leave me alone? Take that thing off the hook will ya?”

The more I learned about world history, the more I thought of all the horrible things that god could have prevented. And didn’t. I mean if he was a merciful and christian god…He couldn’t step in during the Holocaust to save 6 million jews? How many wars could have been prevented? Couldn’t god step in and make sure Archduke Ferdinand doesn’t get shot? Why wouldn’t you make sure Hitler got into art school? Then he wouldn’t have been so angry. I mean if he had an outlet you know?

At the end of my days at IHM, by papal decree, they took away Limbo. We were taught there was heaven, hell, purgatory and limbo. Limbo, we were told, was this nebulous place for unbaptized babies. I pictured all of the cherubic babies floating around on clouds. One day the priests and nuns just told us that limbo was "out." We weren’t doing limbo anymore. Gazing up at the ceiling in my classroom I wondered what happened to all those babies floating carefree in the stratosphere? I worried that they might get hit by a plane or a rocket. Did these babies get an automatic upgrade to heaven? Was it a lateral move to purgatory for a few years? Or maybe worse?

So many questions…Hmmmm, if they could get rid of Limbo, just like that. I had the feeling then that heaven and hell, like Santa Claus, were constructs to make life a little more enjoyable. I thought, If Thomas Jefferson and Abe Lincoln and Thomas Edison and Lou Gehrig and my grandparents, were all in heaven, I mean, how crowded would it get? If all the people, who EVER lived were either in heaven or hell, I mean, that's a lot of people. If you did go to heaven, what age would you be? If you died at 96 would you be 96 or would you be able to choose? The thought of our loved ones up there, with all of the other people we knew who died was just so appealing. I mean what a nice thought. But then I realized, similar to Santa Claus, this heaven thing was just to make us feel better. Death itself makes us sad, it’s hard to grasp the concept, so we create this nice place in the clouds where everyone is happy and that makes us all feel better.

Catholicism is not a religion that cottons to questioners well. The answer to most questions is, “It was God’s will.” Or, “You just have to have faith.” If you don’t get what you want by praying, you still have to keep having faith. Despite all of the evidence I accrued over the years that prayer did not work, and this Holy Trinity just might be the same as Zeus and Poseidon, people would say, “You just have to have faith.” If you ask too many questions, if you are unsure, they call you a Doubting Thomas. Now Thomas was the first guy in the bible, that I had any respect for. Here was a guy with a brain. Here was a guy thinking like me. All Thomas was saying was, “Alright, if you really were crucified and came back to life, let’s see the scars, let’s see some proof." The little cynic in me liked Thomas. I knew if I was there, little Jimmy Spinner would have been right next to Thomas saying, “Wait, Jesus, I just have a few questions about this whole 40 days in the desert with no food thing.”

Baby Face Finster

The summer of 1980, I packed my Brooklyn wise-guy self off to the woods. That June, I started a junior counselor job at a YMCA camp in Sussex County New Jersey. According to the brochure, the camp was in the Hamburg "Mountains." But those of you familiar with geography in the east know that they were, I would say, "verdant hills." I jumped into the Silver Lake culture whole-heartedly. There were many people to meet, traditions to follow and camp songs to learn that added to the fabric of day to day life. To this day, Silver Lake was the best job I have ever had.

Most of the skits and songs were connected to various personalities. During my time at Silver Lake I recall-Glen Gruder with his Oscar Gamble afro and Larry Montanye with his bushy, boy-scout troop leader mustache as they donned their togas to spit water on each other in “the Greek Water Boys.” And I see a red-faced Steve Swierczek, feathered blonde hair in 80’s style, sneakers, shorts and a two-colored baseball shirt as he leads the Silver Lake dining hall in a rousing rendition of "Little Rabbit Foo-Foo." I could go on about the personalities I met at Silver Lake, still some of my best friends to this day. But this piece is about someone in particular…

The family name Quinn at Silver Lake was a brand-name. As a counselor, you knew if you had a Quinn in your bunk you got a whole bunch of freckles, a permanent smile and a kid who would brush his or her teeth before bed without having to be asked. The Quinns: Judy, Corey, John and Connor were from Franklin Lakes, New Jersey. I can still picture Mr. and Mrs. Quinn dropping their brood off in the wood paneled station wagon. The scene always made me smile because I knew the Quinn house was a warm house, an active house. I always pictured a house where the muddy soccer cleats were piled near the door, opening a closet meant a surprise of baseball gloves and or Christmas ornaments. I pictured big meals of Irish stew with a lot of laughter, the Quinns poking fun at each other for their various idiosyncrasies. And of course I see the scene after dinner. The table would be covered with school books because Mr. and Mrs. Quinn ran a pretty tight ship. Yes there was time for laughter and a hug from Mom and Dad too but you don’t raise four responsible kids without some expectations.

This past March, decades removed from Silver Lake, I was skiing Mount Snow Vermont with a few friends. We were, three dads in their mid-40’s, enjoying a St. Patrick’s Day weekend without our respective families. Late in the day, I was scanning the crowd as we inched our way toward one of the ski lifts, and I see a familiar face. I spied Corey’s Quinn-ness through her hat, goggles and parka. I yelled across four lines of people. Actually I had my buddy Ian yell because for some reason I was being shy. “Corey!” She turned, looked around. I waved. She peered through the crowd and I said, “Spinner, it’s Jim Spinner.!” She dragged her husband and their two kids across the entire ski-lift line, to say hello. Those Silver Lake bonds are strong.

We continued to inch toward the lift and after some introductions, Corey and I played catch-up and I said… “Last I heard, Judy was in Rochester, New York and she was a nurse......Last I saw Connor, I had gotten him an internship with me at The Carson Group............

I can see now that Corey had to know what was coming. That the subject must come up all the time and it must cost all of the Quinns a great deal of anxiety. I continued, “Last I saw John, we were up here. I rented your mom’s ski house for the weekend and she asked if it was okay if John and his friend overlapped with us for a day or so. Of course I said that was okay. We had a great time skiing for a few days. If I recall, John was about to leave for Central America to do some work for the Peace Corps or something.” As her family schussed to be the next on the lift Corey said, “Oh, you haven’t heard, my brother John was murdered.”

What do you say to that? I stammered something, I think? Corey added some details and then she and her family were on the lift. I was left standing there with my two buddies, baby-stepping our way onto the lift with the sound of “My brother John was murdered” echoing in my head.

I knew my buddies didn’t know John, but they had heard enough of my camp stories to have some clue. “Jesus. I don’t believe it. John Quinn was murdered.” I proceeded to tell them a bit about John and the word Sweet kept popping up. John Quinn was truly one of the sweetest guys you'd ever want to meet. The kind of guy who'd help you move. The kind of guy you'd want your daughter or sister to date. I mean why else would he be down in Honduras teaching kids to speak English? What kind of a guy graduates from The University of Vermont and decides that he wants to help people in a third world country have a better life? John Quinn, that’s who.

The news weighed heavily on me as we continued to ski. I’d look out at the snow covered mountains, enjoying the view and I would think, John Quinn was murdered. Doing the après ski beer thing, we were singing along to "Brown Eyed Girl" and the thought pops into my head again. How? Why? Who would do such a thing? To John Quinn?

After I got back to Connecticut that Sunday night, I felt the need to connect with some old camp friends who knew John. I didn’t want to be the guy who calls with bad news, but I really had to talk to someone, someone who knew John. Eventually I got in contact with Gray Goldfarb, he and John were the same age and we all worked in Ranch Camp together. I knew he would want to know, and that it would be good to talk to him. Gray’s a New Yorker, born and raised on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. Gray was one of the first white kids I knew who was really into rap. I stumbled through the conversation to eventually reveal, John Quinn was murdered. I had uncovered some of the details of John’s death through Corey’s emails and a few Google searches. So I told Gray--that as far as the family could tell, John was living in Honduras, his second trip down there, and someone stole his CD collection. John and some friends were at a bar in Honduras when John recognizes the thieves. And in his "Aw Shucks" manner confronts these apparent gang members and one of them shoots him in the face. Gray’s response, in his cynical New York way was, “You see that makes sense. John Quinn would get murdered in Honduras. That wouldn’t happen to you or I. First of all, John would be the one to go down there to help people, something you or I wouldn’t do. And then, he would be just naïve enough and just pissed off enough, because John always knew right from wrong, that he would confront these gang-bangers from Honduras. You see Spinner, you or I would have seen these guys for the bad people they were and we would have said, they can keep my CD collection.” I knew that Gray was upset. And I was shocked at what Gray was saying. I felt as if he were trampling on his grave or something. And I was glad that Corey or the Quinns couldn’t hear it.

Then I realized, Gray was saying, that’s how pure John was, that’s how innocent, he couldn’t imagine a world, or a person evil enough to shoot someone in the face over a CD collection.

I just wish we lived in a world where John Quinn was right.

John’s story was so touching and so heart wrenching that the local Jersey congressman, whose district includes Franklin Lakes, talked at length about John on the floor of the House of Representatives. Do a little searching on the internet, take some time to remember or at least think about John Quinn. In talking about John, my buddy Gruder said to me, "Didn't we used to call him "Baby Faced Finster?" I told him, "Yes we did...but that nickname never stuck, he was too sweet a guy."

Ahhh, Summer Reading

Winter:1990/1991. I was a ski bum in Colorado. After work, most of the guys that worked the mountain at Beaver Creek would go to The Coyote Café. If you were a local, you got a mug with your number on it and it was dollar drafts all season. The Coyote was an interesting combination of hippy-infused, ski bum dudes and the well-heeled clientele who could afford to ski Beaver Creek on vacation. At some point, mid January, I am at the bar, talking to Billy, the bushy-haired bartender. As is the way in bars sometimes, I eventually wind up chatting up this woman as Billy walks away to help another patron. If I was 27 she was probably early 50’s. We got on famously, we chatted, animatedly for two hours. And the entire time, the stoners I worked with on the mountain, combined their brain cells to try to figure out what I was doing. I know this, because my companion and I could hear every word the shredders were saying. "Dude, what do you think Spinner’s doing? That chick’s gotta be twice his age.

"Man she’s really old. Do you think he’s actually attracted to her?"

"Man, somebody’s gotta stop him.”

At the end of our conversation, I tucked a bar napkin into my wallet and walked calmly back over to the guys.
“Yo, you got her number?”
“No.”
“You talked to her for two hours and you didn’t get her phone number?”
“Didn’t ask for it.”
“So what did she write down on that napkin?”
“Something better, a list of book recommendations.”
“I told you man, Spinner’s weird. He reads books.”

I thought that was an appropriate story to begin a blog about…Reading.

Ahhh, summer, time for unfettered reading time. That’s the second best thing about teaching. Of course I have to say, all that extra time I can spend with my family is number one on the list. That’s why I am in the local library typing on my lap top right now. The best thing about being a teacher, I get to read anything I want, all summer long.

What is it about reading that does it for so many of us? I can tell you, the second thing I packed for my honeymoon, was a stack of books, that’s how much I love reading. If I am buying a gift for someone I really care about, I will go to the bookstore and spend quality time to find just the right book. One of the best gifts I ever gave, (if I do say so myself) was for my buddy Jim Conroy and his wife Zoe. They got married right after 9/11, out in San Francisco. In an effort to do something thoughtful, I gave the newlyweds a Barnes & Noble gift certificate and enclosed a list of recommendations. Composing that list was a labor of love. I walked around the bookstore for 3 hours with a yellow legal pad and, with Jim and Zoe in mind, jotted down numerous titles I thought they would enjoy.

After I have chosen a book for someone, I become a literary pit bull. (It’s on my list of things I have to work on) I will hound them every time I see them, “So, did you read it yet?” A few years ago, in her continuing effort to better me, Kira (my wife) says, “Jim, don’t you think if they read it, knowing that you gave it to them, that they would say something without you asking?” So, I stopped asking.

Taking a class at Columbia a few summers ago, I like to put the Columbia thing in there because I have a state school guy’s insecurity. Truth is anyone could have walked in off the street and taken this class but I think it makes me sound smarter. “I was taking this class at Columbia….and the keynote speaker, in this huge, old, lecture hall walks over to the podium. She waits, and waits, while 800 teachers quiet down. Teachers are worse than the kids. When we are all quiet she says, “Writers write and readers read because they are searching for soul-to-soul contact.” Silence. In unison, 800 teachers shook our heads in the affirmative. I reached for my journal, to write down verbatim what she said.

She was right. That’s one of the reasons why I read, to feel less alone. I always think back to the first time I read a whole book in one night. (Besides anything featuring Curious George) I loved Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye because in the midst of my teen angst, here was Holden Caulfield, speaking the same language and feeling the same things I was feeling. At some point Holden talks about finishing a book and wanting to call the author on the phone. I knew what he was talking about because I wanted to call J.D. Salinger to tell him how much I loved his book.

Of course there’s more to it than soul-to-soul contact…I read to learn “stuff.” Knowledge is power and over the past 15 years or so, most of my reading has been non-fiction, it makes me feel like I am doing something worthwhile. I got hooked on non-fiction when I picked up a copy of Doris Kearns Goodwin’s No Ordinary Time. It’s narrative history about the FDR White House during WWII. That book is one of the reasons I became a history teacher.

We also read to see how others are playing the game of life and in turn to reflect on how we are playing the game. Isn’t it fun to read a biography of someone we admire, say Lou Gherig, and find similarities in our lives? Hey, the Iron Horse played stickball on the street just like we did! We make judgments of character’s actions. We put ourselves into the book’s situations and decide, what would I do if I were Ponyboy Curtis and Johnny stabbed the Soc?

We read to stir our emotions. Roddy Doyle is one of the few writers who can make me laugh so that fluids come out of my nose. I remember reading The Van on the F train on the way home from work during my Wall Street days. It’s about these bumbling, working–class, Irish guys who buy a delapidated fish and chips van. They hatch their capitalist scheme as Ireland is making a run in soccer’s World Cup. The protagonist and his compadre figure the entire country will be drinking and thus eating more fish and chips as Ireland continues to win soccer games. Picture Ralph Kramden and Ed Norton move to Ireland. Reading Doyle’s novella during my evening commute, I was snickering to myself and eventually burst out laughing. When I looked up, the other passengers were moving away and staring at me as if I might be deranged. Of course, having a looney on the subway would not be out of the question but I remember thinking, “You are all crazy, you should be reading this book, it’s that funny.”

We read to be sad…English teachers always talk about three dimensional characters, whatever that is. I liked Vonnegut’s advice to aspiring writers, “Give a reader at least one character to root for.” I love that! That’s what I am looking for. How can you not root for McMurphy against Nurse Ratched in Kesey’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest? I cried at the end of Edwin O’Connor’s The Last Hurrah. That’s how much I cared. O’Connor created this fictional world, based on Mayor Curley’s old-ward Boston, where I really cared about the people in it. To think that he could do it so convincingly that I could be moved to tears, shows you how powerful these little paper rectangles are.

We read to live vicariously through others. I read to be a Kennedy, if for just a few hours. To be in the room with Jack and Bobby while they are deciding what to do with Castro and Kruschev during the Cuban missile crisis is enthralling. I read to be there when Paul McCartney meets John Lennon for the first time at the church fete. Talk about a moment, “This is my friend Paul, he plays a little guitar.” I read to explore the new continent with Lewis & Clark as they see the Great Falls of Montana for the first time. To be on the dunes at Kitty Hawk with the Wright Brothers and to climb Mount Everest with Jon Krakauer…

We read to be inspired. How many times when I'm moaning because my 4 year old spilled another juice box in the car, and I am sitting in traffic, do I think to myself, Morrie Schwartz (from Mitch Albom's Tuesdays with Morrie) would love to be sitting in traffic, he would relish the chance to clean up another juice box spill. Here was a guy fighting a losing battle with Lou Gherig's disease and appreciating every day and every moment for what it was, something he was never going to get back.

We read to escape. We want to visit fanciful worlds, sometimes full of wizards, werewolves or vampires. That’s why Harry Potter and the Twilight series are so popular. Reading takes us away from the stresses and or the boredom of our humdrum lives as we join Bilbo on his quest.

To think that these little symbols on this white page can make us laugh, cry or hold our breath in suspense is nothing short of a miracle.

William Blake once said, and I am paraphrasing, “My wish for my granddaughter is that she will enjoy reading and writing as much as I did.”

A few friends asked me to do a post about reading. My friend Tracy said she wanted to know what books I would recommend. That’s one of the nicest things anyone has ever asked of me. Maybe I don’t get that many compliments. So my friends thank you for reading my thoughts about, well Reading. Can I leave you with a few summer reading suggestions?…and then you can share yours with me?

Novels

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon
Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry
Trinity by Leon Uris

Memoir

The Tender Bar by J.R. Moehringer
Final Rounds by Jim Dobson

Nonfiction

The Bedford Boys by Alex Kershaw

And That is Where the Children Play

It’s the end of the evening; the homework is done, the dinner dishes are drying in the rack. Now it’s reading time. I send my two oldest boys, Nick who is 10 and Brian 8, upstairs to read by themselves. I tell Charlie, my four year old, to go upstairs and grab us a book. We usually read in the living room. You see, I read aloud with Charlie, and my one foot voice is really more like a twenty five foot voice. We read downstairs so as to not disturb the big boys. Charlie scampers down the stairs with Margaret Wise Brown’s Big Red Barn. I smile. He’s excited, “Hey dad, I found this book! It looks like a good one.” Somehow, in the reading rotation, we have not seen this classic in a while. I say, “I know Charlie, that’s a special book. It’s been in the Spinner household for a long time. Nick got that when he was a baby. It’s gone through all three Spinner boys.” Something clicks. What are the chances? I think. A few hours before, Nick got off the school bus and asked me about “the movie.” We have been hearing about “the movie” for a few years now. Apparently towards the end of fourth grade, the boys and the girls go to separate rooms to see The Puberty Movie. As Nick says, "We learn about growing hair in weird places. And we are not allowed to laugh or we get sent to the principal’s office.” Not allowed to laugh? I’m having suppressed laughter just thinking of this "ABC After School Movie"/knock-off about growing up. A movie starring some Mister Rogers-type dad where the teacher talks about private parts and pubic hair. Not laugh. Fourth graders? My sentimental moment radar is tingling. I notice that Charlie and I are about to read a book we received as a gift when Nick was first born. And tomorrow morning my little Nicholas is going to learn about perspiration and hormones. I hug Charlie a little closer and I begin to read, “By the big red barn In the great green field…” While I am reading I am thinking…who gave us the book. I think it was Murph, Nick’s godfather, I'm thinking it was one of Kira's high school friends, Heather Burke. “There was a pink pig Who was learning to squeal.” What house were we living in when I first read this book to baby Nicholas? “There was a great big horse And a very little horse.” How many houses have we lived in? The “River House” in Oxford. When did I first read this book to Brian? Arden Road in Waterbury? Then the move to Middlebury...

“And on every barn…” I hear footsteps on the stairs. Nick peeks his head into the living room and says, “Dad I have to get my…Hey, I remember that book.” And he walks over, head tilted, with a quizzical look on his face. So I say, “Nick, you want to read it with us?” Because he’s ten, I’m thinking he might say no. “Sure.” Nick snuggles up next to Charlie and I. I think about how long until Nick recognizes this moment too. Those apples don't fall far from the tree. I continue to read. Nick says, "Hey I remember this part! On the next page the bats come out of the barn." I'm thinking this is going to be it. I continue to read, looking at the back of Nick's head and my voice cracks. Nick picks his head off my shoulder to look at me. He doesn’t say anything but I can see he’s getting emotional too. Charlie hears the emotion in my voice and cranes his neck and says, “Daddy, why are you crying?” To which I say, “I was just thinking about how long we’ve had this book. And that my Nicholas is growing up and sometimes I don’t want him to grow up.” And Charlie says, "I know Dad, me too." Then it’s three boys, a group hug and quite a few tears.

Parenting’s a lot of work but moments like that make it all worth it. “There was a big pile of hay And a little pile of hay, And that is where the children play.”

Road Rage

Road Rage

Kira and I were sitting on our front porch recently with another couple as our six boys played football in the backyard. Something I like to call a family play date. Melissa Migliaccio, our close friend asks, “Jim when’s the last time you washed your car.” She wasn’t being rude, just trying to point out that it needed a wash. Like you would point out to your roommate that his shirt was wrinkled as he was leaving for work. I smirked because I knew the reaction my response would get. Melissa and her husband Mark, both successful lawyers, drive fairly nice cars and make an effort at upkeep.
“Never.”
Mark’s head snapped. “Never!? You’ve never washed your car?”
“Not the outside. The rain does it for me.”
“What about road salt!? That stuff will eat at your undercarriage, it will cause rust.”
“Miggie, it’s a ‘98 Nissan Altima for Christ sakes, it lasted this long, what do you want from me?” Enjoying the game a little I continue, “I wash the inside; every once in a while I take a little Windex to the windows. That counts right?”

Honestly, I never saw the sense in washing the car when I could be reading a book or playing basketball. Most of the guys I knew in Brooklyn who washed and primped their cars were usually doing it to impress women. I always thought, You really must have no personality if you have to use your car to get a date. I could never fathom wanting to date a girl who would be attracted to you because you drove a shiny car with some nice rims and a spoiler.

As you can see, I’m not a car guy, for me, a car is a conveyance. I suppose the utilitarian nature of the automobile was ingrained by my urban upbringing. In Brooklyn, you didn’t need a car. I took the F train to get to high school. When I joined the work force after college, the F train proved very handy then as well.

I would have loved it back in the day when Henry Ford’s assembly line was pumping out Model T’s in only one color, black. I wonder what the early car entrepreneurs would think of all of today’s makes, models and accessories. When did this movable appliance become so caught up in our image? Why does this material possession seem to say something about us? I suppose in America, this kind of thing was bound to happen.

100 years or so of mass-produced cars and some interesting things have happened. People use their cars as mobile bulletin boards. Let’s dispense with the most obvious, the cost of the car telling everyone how successful you are. Given that, it also seems that certain makes and models seem to attract certain kinds of people. What this amounts to is one giant high school clique…clearly the worst are the Jeep owners.

“You wouldn’t understand, it’s a Jeep thing.” I see this phrase on the tire cover of some dude filling up at the pump in front of me at a local gas station. I’m not sure but I think I may have laughed out loud. I may have even said, under my breath, “How cool are you?” Have you seen these Jeep people on the road? One giant fraternity/sorority waving to each other as they drive past each other? What they are saying is… “Hey, you’re a Jeep guy, I’m a Jeep guy aren't we so cool?” Big deal. So you bought the same car. And now you are compelled to make goo-goo eyes at all the other 4.5 million Jeep owners on the road? I mean how hard is it to get into this club? You go to the dealership, fill out some paperwork, and wallah, I’m a Jeep guy! Puhlease. These guys are one step away from the dork in your office who always points out when you are wearing the same shirt.

Speaking of making goo-goo eyes. When the nice weather comes to the NW corner of Connecticut, it’s time for riding motorcycles. And apparently, like the Jeep guys, if you join this frat, you must wave at every other motorcycle guy or gal you pass. And there's a lot of them! What’s up with this? I mean I am all for being friendly but, shouldn’t these motorcyclists keep both hands on the wheel?

Back to the cars. Not only are we buying our cars to impress, or to make a statement, Americans use their cars to tell us all manner of things about themselves. Bumper Stickers? Do you think this is what James Madison and our Founders had in mind for the first amendment? Was the Constitutional Convention fighting for my right to free speech so that I could tell you that I Cruise? Like I care? A lot of people choose to brag on their bumper about all of the really cool places they’ve been. ADK, BI, ACK. If I were to put one on my car it would say, BFD.

Once I was behind a mini-van cueing up to school and I read, “Don’t even think about talking to me until I’ve had my coffee.” I chuckled and I’m thinking, How much would I have to love a beverage to go to all that trouble?

I guess Ben Franklin and company would be heartened by Americans using their vehicles to persuade fellow voters to choose their respective candidate. (Obama/Biden, yes!) I do see some benefits to bumper stickers, at least they give us something to look at while we sit in traffic. I often wonder at the wisdom of espousing radical opinions on the bumper of your car. No matter which side of the Pro-Life/Pro-Choice issue you land, we all know there are zealots on either side. If these people get worked up enough about this issue to blow up a clinic, what do you think they might do to the Honda Odyssey you left unattended in the mall parking lot while you went to pick out lawn furniture?

I laugh heartily at the red-necks who drive their pick-ups around all-white, rural, enclaves with their Confederate flags announcing their rebel (read racist) nature. I’d love to see Mr. Lynard Skynard wind up with some car trouble in Hollis, Queens on the way to Kennedy Airport. Wouldn’t that be a scene? Big old pick-up rumbling off The Van Wyck Expressway in a neighborhood that would not take too kindly to the Stars and Bars.

And aren’t some things private? Why should we be announcing our sexual leanings on our vehicles? Do I want to know what you are doing in your bedroom as you careen past me on the Merritt Parkway? It’s mostly members of the gay community that feel compelled to show their true colors to other motorists. Should heterosexuals do this too? My buddy Steve likes his wife to dress up as a cheerleader. Should he tell his fellow commuters that? I mean just to be fair?

Lastly, I have to talk about Vanity plates. Just the name itself is a turnoff to me. If I even get past that, I can’t imagine purchasing something that would have me spending more time in the DMV. Is there any word or phrase, composed of 9 characters or less, that I would want on my car for the life of the vehicle? Isn’t this tantamount to a tattoo for your car? I am paralyzed trying to think of some witty phrase that I could use to entertain and impress for the next 3 years or 36,000 miles.

What’s the deal with people who talk in code on their license plates? How the heck are we supposed to figure out what all the letters and numbers mean? Well, if I did get a vanity plate, I suppose I might actually do something in code. I think I would like, FA Q. If that is taken I suppose I would settle for FA Q2.

Happy Motoring!

Victory Garden

Out Plowing the Back 1/4 of an Acre

As I hopscotched the canyons of Wall Street my first ten years of employment, I actually learned a few things. One of the most important, which I use often in teaching 8th graders, involves the ability to sell. The Dean Witter brass taught us to “sell the benefits.” Mark Kelly, my manager, would say, “You are not selling a stock, bond, or mutual fund. You are selling the benefits of buying that investment. It’s a different kind of sale, you are selling an intangible. If your client puts down 40,000 dollars on a car, he or she gets a car, something they can touch, sit in and drive. You are asking them to give you $40,000 for an idea. You have to sell the benefits.”

Considering the fates of the markets recently…I have something I would like to sell you that has myriad benefits. I like to get the word myriad in whenever I can. This product is really more of a system, or life change. I DO NOT want to be preachy, I can only tell you what it did for our family, you can make your own decision. I can tell you if you try what I am asking you to do you will: 1) Get more exercise, 2) Bring your family closer together, 3) Save money 4) Live a Greener lifestyle, 5) Teach your children valuable life lessons, 6) Decrease our country’s dependence on foreign oil, 7) Become the envy of your friends and neighbors 8) And gather hundreds of dollars of fresh, tasty produce.

Of course I am suggesting that you start a family garden, if you have the space. I have to say, as we were putting away the beach toys and cleaning out our locker at the town beach this past September, Kira, my wife, asked me, as she always does, “What was your favorite part of the summer?” This time it was a no-brainer, as we stood on the sand of Lake Quassapaug with the late summer sun setting I said, “The family garden.”

There was a certain vindication in my answer. For once I was right. I have been asking to do a garden for the past 5 or so years. My motivation being that I HATE to mow the lawn. I figured if we had a garden, less grass to mow. I also figured at least we would get something for our labors besides poison ivy. Standing in our kitchen last April 5th, I know the date because it’s my son Brian’s birthday) I said to Papa Bill , (My boy’s grandfather is an organic farmer of some note) “I’d like to do a garden with the boys, what do I have to do?” To which my lovely bride chimed in from somewhere else in the house, “It’s a lot of work. Don’t think I am going to help you with that because I’m not!” Kira was obviously thinking of the Jim Spinner who despises yard work, who hates to continuously hack back the encroaching forest, who once a year gets poison ivy so bad he needs intravenous steroids. She could not have known that Farmer Jim was a different Jim, a motivated Jim.

So with Bill and Suzanne’s (Kira’s mom) expertise, support and their compost, the Spinner boys started a garden. Believe it or not, the boy from Brooklyn actually put down The Times, got up off the couch and did some farming. Whenever I say farming Kira laughs. "Jim, when your farm is the size of your living room, it's called gardening." So every time I do farm, just to annoy my wife, I put on my overalls and my farming boots. It's always funny too.

The hardest part was removing the grass, we had to spade it out by the shovelful. Admittedly, it was back breaking work but Nick, Brian and Charlie helped me. It felt like we were doing something healthy; all of us sweating in the sunshine, clearing the land for our “crops.” It was a lot better than working the rowing machine at the Waterbury Y.

Usually I have to beg my boys to feed the dogs; a job which takes 47 seconds, I timed it. To get one of them to fill the dog’s dishes with a few morsels of chow is like trying to get the Israelis and the Palestinians to throw a block party on the Gaza Strip. But this farming stuff, they were doing it willingly. I can’t tell you how many times, once the garden was planted and fenced off, that I would ask Kira, “Where’s Brian?” and she would say, “Look in the garden.” I’d look out the window, and there’s my little toe-head, up to his wrists in dirt, weeding the furrows.

It did bring us closer together. Threee generations, working together for a common goal, a family garden, proved motivational. We talked while we gardened, about all manner of things. And to see the boys put their elementary school science lessons to work, not using a mimeographed sheet but real live earth worms in the soil was really cool. Having the boys explain to me the benefits of earthworms in the soil gave me hope for the future. To see them identify the stages of the water cycle as it relates to our garden, just confirmed that we were doing the right thing. Of course Charlie wanted to know, “Daddy, where does pee come in on the water cycle?”

If you are rolling your eyes at this point, I apologize. I have actually been avoiding writing a piece about our garden because I could not figure out a way to do it without sounding like a Hallmark card. But with the planting season on us, I really wanted to get this one posted. If this sounds like one of those saccharine Christmas letters that your friends send you about how perfect their family is (just once don’t you want to hear about their neuroses?) that is not my intention. I promise I will do another piece about how neurotic my family is. But I digress.

All we needed was the cost of the seeds (which Grandma and Grandpa Duesing thankfully paid for) and the family’s labor. To think that our tomatoes did not have to come prepackaged and shipped on a truck from Florida made all of us feel good. As gas prices were skyrocketing last summer, not only was a lot of our produce free, we didn’t even have to drive to get it. And I was conscious of the fact that this was good for the environment. And in some small way, it was good for the United States, that we were doing our part to decrease our country’s dependence on oil. Not to mention how good everything tasted. I have not had a tomato since last September that was even close to what we grew in our little patch of land. The heirloom tomatoes were my favorites. Of course as the first few ripened I told Kira we had some mutant tomatoes and I thought we should throw them out. Those heirlooms wound up being my favorite, once I got past the look of them.

Eventually we got so much produce, we got to give it away. A little bit of Christmas in August. We would dole the veggies out to our friends and family. I’d fill up a little brown bag and tell my boys to head over to the McNamara’s next door. And it made us feel good, we wanted to share our bounty. We’d go to see Kristen and Pat Lewis for a barbeque and just before leaving I’d say to the boys, “Go grab Miss Kristen some cucumbers and tomatoes and put them in this bag.” And I could see my boys beaming, choosing some choice cucumbers and some heirloom tomatoes to give to our friends.

So if I could try and sell you on the benefits of the family garden, from someone who hates to work in the yard. This garden was a rousing success. We learned about working hard, about working together as a family, about caring for the earth, about how veggies grown taste just a little better than veggies bought. Gotta go. Out to plant the back 1/2 of an acre.

P.S. We really could not have done this garden without Grandma and Grandpa Duesing. If you need a little advice from Papa Bill Duesing or Suzanne I am sure they would be glad to help, as this is part of their life's work. If we all do our little part to make the earth a little healthier it might go a long way.

Innocents Ablaze

March 25, 1911 was an early Spring Saturday. Kate Leone, age 14 rose early in the fourth floor apartment she shared with the rest of her family. Careful not to wake her little brothers as she got dressed, she double checked that she had her lunch as she closed the apartment door behind her. Walking down the stairs Kate is warmed by the smells of breakfast cooking as she passes the apartments of the other, mostly Italian immigrant families. She smiles at the pleadings and the familiar voices she hears of her neighbors getting ready for another day in the big city. Waiting for Kate on the front stoop of 515 East 11th Street are the other girls she walks to work with most every day. As they walked west on East 11th Street the conversation turned more than likely to some holiday celebrations as Passover and Easter were both on the horizon. Probably they talked about boys. Fanciful thoughts of a new skirt or hat for the holidays would not have been out of the question as Saturday was a day of possibilities, Saturday was payday.

Sadly, Kate and her friends would never cash their checks, or buy those special holiday treats. At about a quarter of five, as the girls packed their belongings at the end of a long work day, a fire broke out on the 8th floor of the Asche Building, home to the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory. It was a perfect storm for an industrial tragedy. The factory was crowded with seamstresses packed close together to maximize profits. The women were told to dump the scrap fabric right at their feet to limit time away from the machines, leaving an abundance of fuel. Most of the girls were Italian like Kate or from Eastern Europe like her friend Ida Brodsky, age 16. The girls had never been trained in what to do in case of a fire. So as the conflagration spread, they panicked. Screaming, hundreds of young women headed for the exits. Most Americans familiar with this story have heard that the owners of the company locked the doors to keep the girls at work and to keep them from stealing fabric. Investigations later revealed that the doors opened inward and the crush of bodies in a panic prevented the girls from simply stepping back and opening the door. The owners of the factory were later aquitted of manslaughter charges.

Some workers found a way to get down. A few lucky girls rode the freight elevator which apparently made only one trip. With the elevator stalled, some girls attempted to slide down the elevator cables, some actually made it, many were found later in a crumpled heap of bodies on top of the elevator. A number of girls found their way to the only working fire escape. This worked for a while until the fire escape collapsed under the weight of so many women. Killing many who were so close to saftey. With the fire spreading quickly and the FDNY ladders only reaching the 6th floor, many girls were left with no choice. According to an eyewitness...

"I walked through Washington Square Park to get closer to the commotion. As I neared the corner of Greene Street and Washington Place I noticed a bale of dark dress goods come out of a top floor window. I thought that someone was trying to save expensive cloth. Then another bale came down, and another. One caught the wind and opened. It was not a bale of goods, it was a young woman." Driven to the choice of burning to death or plummeting 8 or 9 stories to the concrete, many girls chose the latter. Many of the girls, too scared to jump alone, actually held hands in pairs or large groups and jumped together. It was this image, seared into the minds of so many New Yorkers, that proved symbolic of the tragedy of the Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire.

I first learned of this fire in History of The American Labor Movement, a class I took at SUNY Buffalo. Haunted by the stories of these girls I continued to read all I could about the fire. Home on break my junior year I took a pilgrimage to the very spot. I worked on the assumption there would be a small museum, or something to commemorate the 146 people who died in the fire. Before 9/11, this was the worst workplace fire in New York City history. I got off the F train, and like the eyewitness, I walked through Washington Square Park. As I neared the corner of Greene Street and Washington Place I felt myself looking up towards the 8th, 9th and 10th floors. Once in front of the building, I checked the lobby for a list of tenants, figuring the museum would be listed there. Nothing. I asked a few pedestrians, all I got was blank stares. And then I saw it, as I was standing on the corner, the only thing to remind New Yorkers as they pass this historic spot during their workaday lives, a small commemorative plaque on the corner of the Asche Building.

November 22, 1963

December 7, 1941

September 11, 2001

Kate Leone and all of the young women who died that fateful Saturday deserve to be remembered. March 25, 1911 should take it's rightful place alongside the other dates we rightfully commemorate every year.

I would imagine Kate's family and the families of the victims could eventually take solace in the what happened after the fire. News of the fire captivated New Yorkers immediately. A huge public outcry called for: safer working conditions, mandatory fire drills and sprinkler systems among other things. And change came quickly. The FDNY started the Fire Commission, and the State of New York gave it some authority to actually enforce the new laws.

P.S.

I can't explain why I have been so drawn to this story. One of my more "mystical" friends says she thinks I must be related to one of the victims. If you have any interest, Cornell University has a great site devoted to the fire. And David Von Drehle's book was very readable narrative history.

Triangle : The Fire that Changed America by David Von Drehle

http://www.ilr.cornell.edu/trianglefire/