N My Name is Nigel and More on Nine Days of Av

People have been asking me to explain more about my reference to the 9 days of mourning that began today.  It is a rainy day here in Philadelphia so it is sort of setting the tone for somberness.  Instead of my own drivel which, as you know is verbose and long-winded, I am going to share with you a recent letter I received from the found of Hazon, Nigel Savage.  Earlier this year, I sang on and on  about this wonderful Jewish environmental organization, so it comes as no surprise to me that Nigel offers a well-balanced, palatable, Torah-based look into and explanation of this auspicious time in on the calendar. I have referenced recently two other Nigels who I feel have made excellent contributions to society.  One is a Nigel of fiction, the other is a Nigel of soul.

Without further delay, I introduce to you Mr. Nigel Savage:

July 19, 2012 / 29 Tamuz 5772

Hazon’s theme quote, from the late Reb Shlomo Carlebach z”l,  is “The Torah is a commentary on the world, and the world is a commentary on the Torah.” It’s a quote that means, essentially, if Jewish tradition matters at all, it has to be in a relationship with the world in which we live.  We see this easily in relationship to Passover – themes of slavery and freedom are on the one hand traditional ideas in Jewish liturgy, and also animate contemporary discussions about food justice or Darfur or women’s rights.  But it’s more of a challenge to see this play out 365 days a year.  In what ways is the Torah a commentary on our daily lives, and how does the world we live in shift our understanding of Jewish teachings and Jewish ideas?

Tisha B’Av commemorates the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem and other tragedies in Jewish tradition (photo via Wikimedia Commons)

We’re now in the period of the Three Weeks, a period of mourning between the 17th of Tammuz and the 9th of Av.  It’s a part of the Jewish calendar that is only minimally observed in the non-Orthodox Jewish community today.  At a basic and traditional level, the period is marked by restrictions on eating meat and drinking wine.  Most Jews haven’t heard of it, and for those who have it is often not a deeply meaningful part of the tradition.  How could or should we make sense of it?

On one level, it prompts me to think that we have something to learn about mourning, and the rhythm from mourning to joy – played out in Jewish tradition in the move from the fast of Esther to the joyousness of Purim; the fast of the first born, and then the great celebration of Pesach. I am always struck when I am in Israel over Yom Ha Shoah  how completely the country comes to standstill.  The restaurants close, the cars stop, people stop, the siren wails.  There is literally a nationwide moment of mourning.  The same on Yom Hazikaron – memorial day  – and then the transition into deep joy with the celebrations  of Yom Ha’Atzmaut.  The ancient move from commemoration to celebration informs those two new days.

I’m struck that contemporary western society on a whole does mourning and commemoration quite badly, and perhaps that also makes it hard for us truly to celebrate.

9/11 in New York somehow doesn’t feel quite right to me. Already the commemoration seems formulaic, the day for most New Yorkers passes as normal. If it were up to me, feeling the rhythms and wisdom of Jewish tradition, and wishing to apply them more widely in our world, I’d do it differently. In the morning, when the towers were struck, we’d sound a siren, and the city would stop, twice, each time for 2 minutes – a powerful moment of memory and commemoration. In the morning the ceremonies at the site, reading the names. And then from noon, the biggest streetfair in the world in Manhattan – a great celebration of life and light and creativity and energy and people and traditions and pluralism, the celebration of the antithesis of what those people came to do. A positive affirmation of New York City and being alive and all that we enjoy as free people in this country.

This is some of what I think of as I think about Tisha b’Av, the 9 days, Shabbat Hazon – in 8 days time, this year actually the day of the 9th of Av, but the fast being commemorated the next day. I learned from Dr. Michael Kagan the way in which the internal architecture of Tisha b’Av mimics our mortality, prompts us to think about that. And then in the afternoon of tisha b’av we start to come to life; we great friends, we resume normal ritual. Our tradition teaches that mashiach – the messiah – will be born on the afternoon of Tisha b’Av. And then 6 days later, at the full moon, we have Tu B’Av, the celebration of love and physicality.

Tisha B’Av has this rhythm as well – 6 days after the day we mourn the destruction of the Temple and a whole host of other calamities throughout Jewish history, is the holiday of Tu B’Av, a lovers holiday where young people would go out into the fields in borrowed clothes (so no one would know who is rich or poor) and essentially have a, literal, romp in the hay.

We’ve lost touch with the mourning of Tisha B’Av, and the celebration of Tu B’Av.  Some people argue that we live in a time of relative peace – and indeed, the State of Israel exists as a soverign nation – so do we in fact need Tisha B’Av any more?  What does a period of commemoration and mourning look like in a time of relative peace? But I write this the day after a group of Israeli tourists were murdered in Bulgaria for the crime of being citizens of the state of Israel. We do live in relative peace and freedom,  but the commemorations are still needed, until the world truly is at peace.

So I leave you with questions and thoughts and invitations.  What do we mourn, what have we lost, what causes us pain, what are our destructions? As individuals, families, as the Jewish people, as citizens of the world? What and how do we remember those losses? And what, arising from the ashes, do we choose to celebrate? Where lies our hope and our belief, and how do we reflect that also?

I write this as I head out to Madison to rejoin our Cross-USA riders – cycling hard in 100 degree weather, because they choose to push themselves, because they choose to be in community, and because they seek not only to have the experience of a lifetime but also to do good – to learn and to teach – as they do so.

Follow this link to see a 2-minute clip of some of our riders on NBC last week. And this link to join us this week in Madison, Oconomowo, River Hills, Glencoe, Geneva, and Chicago.

Shabbat Shalom,

Nigel Savage
Executive Director, Hazon

A Musical Royal Ball this Thursday Night, The New Moon

Tonight my glass slippers will be stowed away at home, as I do not attend live musical performances during the first Nine Days of Av, a historically sad time - - a mourning period - -  for the Jewish people.  But for those of you who do partake on this auspicious night of Rosh Chodesh Av, I can not suggest higher to attend the Royal Family Ball featuring Soulive and Lettuce at this year's Gathering of the Vibes festival in Bridgeport, Connecticut.  Granted, this show is happening in just 1 hour or so, but if you are able to somehow get yourself there, you will receive the musical royal treatment from numerous prince charmings.


I recently had the distinct privilege of seeing Adam Smirnoff, "Shmeeans," of Lettuce perform at Mountain Jam, and what can I say other than he was super fantastic.  And a nice guy, too.  I would love to see Adam Deitch and Eric Krasno.  They are also supposed to be great.  Talk about funk!  What a groove party they throw (see below for a look at their recent album, Fly, release party at the Brooklyn Bowl).  At least there's always the Pandora channel.  I say that because I don't think I have stated it here officially but I do not own an iPod nor do I have the time to maintain an iTunes account.  I know that sounds pretty lame, but that is my reality.  My car, where I would listen to much of my music, doesn't even have an MP3 player.  I know, how crazy is that, I have an  '07 Odyssey with no MP3 but Stango has an '05 car and it does have such a plug-in.

This crew puts out terrific music:  would you think anything less of a bunch of Berklee College of Music graduates?  They don't just know how to jam, they know how to rage.  And I didn't just see them perform, I joined with friends who know him well.  That made it all the more fun.   I simply love to rage from backstage!  Not sure if Mr. Nigel Hall is joining in with Soulive and/or Lettuce, but if so, the soul sounds that emit from his lips are sweet words that stick with you for a long time.  Mr. Hall clearly, as my friend the Coach has suggested, is the best soul singer out there today.  That's no joke.  Perhaps I am just naive, just a mama, but I beg to differ.  I know good stuff when I hear it.

There is the slightest chance I will make it up to GOTV this Sunday, but for work purposes only.  I would love to further my very fun Facebook group  "I Love Lot Shirts," and take a bunch more photos.

Here is one wook who definitely won't be up in Bridgeport this weekend but is my very own 7 year old Prince Charming, and his name is the Wolfman.

Gotta love the Star Wars shirt

"Mama, why are you so into clothes?"  As if this good stuff could be found in a store!

People Still Idle in their Cars?

Even though New York City has had a hard time enforcing its no-idling law passed in 2009, a number of years ago I took on a personal initiative to limit idling in my car to a maximum of one or two minutes.  It is simply bad for the environment and bad for our health.  I am the first to admit that I can not do without air-conditioning in the summer - I.love.air.conditioning -  but I also don't like the idea of all the toxicity leaking out into the air in a concentrated area while I am not driving.

Mike Bloomberg recently got a lot of press when he debuted his modified home air conditioner installed in his SUV.  If I were his driver just waiting around all day for Mike to show up, I'd be pretty happy, too.

Living here in the suburbs I am reminded that I pretty much live in a bubble.  If I were living in an environmentally and health-conscious place like Portland, Austin or Boulder, surely I wouldn't be inspired to write this blog entry.  But in the suburbs, people idle.  People idle for 1 minute, for 5 minutes, for 20 minutes.  I am astounded.  Maybe people think that since there is plenty of space out of the city they can idle.  In New York City everyone is packed in like sardines so it makes sense to have a no idling law.  More likely they simply don't think at all.

So, parents waiting for your kids who are 30 minutes late from a camp trip pick up:  

Get out of your car and enjoy the outdoors!

Yesterday, even the old school classy grandpa, dressed in his golf whites, checking in with his wife via cell phone in his seasoned Philadelphia accent, managed to turn off his engine and hang out near Cricket Field for 30 minutes until the yellow school buses rolled in.

Cricket Field

My LL Bean Boat & Tote

Grew up with these excellent bags - they were our "swim club" bag.  The.best.qualilty.bag.of.its.sort.  LL Bean has improved the bag tremendously over the years with various sizes, a zipper top option, and different colors.

I have no clue if other people have done this, but here is how we personalized it.  We brought the patches to a shoe maker.  Unless you have a heavy duty sewing machine, don't kid yourself that you can take this on by yourself.  The canvas is thick and if you want a good, solid job done, pay the approximate $5 per patch to have it sewn on and do it right.  No, you can not rely on the iron-on stickiness on the back of the patches.  Don't be cheap.  Bring it to your shoemaker.  And if you bring more patches, maybe you can strike a bulk deal.

It is still a work in progress, there may be more patches to come, but this is it for 2012...

Our patched up LL Bean Boat & Tote Bag.  It has an outdoorsy, New York State, Canadian, heady feel.  We so LOVE our bag!

From top left, clockwise:  Lake Placid, NY, Appalacian Trail (The "AT"), Canadian maple leaf (with deep Canadian roots, I can legitamately state "Oh Canada, my home and native land"...BTW do yo know how long this patch has been sitting around?  Likely since 2000!  Time to use up the stuff lying around!), and 2012 Phamily (purchased at the recent Atlantic City  Phish show, from Phanbadge...btw how thrilled was I to find this?  I suggested to Brian, the purveyor of Phanbadge, that he check out this blog, since I surmised he was a family guy however just like most folks, this stuff is still quite verbose so little expectation there).

Long Lake, just one of the many stops we have made in the Adirondacks over the years, Stealie - Grateful Dead 

From top left, clockwise:  Bronx Zoo, our backyard playground for 5 years when we resided in the Bronx, NYS Environmental Conservation Junior Naturalist acquired when we car camped when Concealed Light was 3 and the Wolfman was 1, Swimmer vintage circa late 70s/early 80s this person definitely was a star swimmer! (I personally never got to swimmer level, only to Intermediate, don't think American Red Cross uses these designations anymore, but do you remember Beginner, Advanced Beginner, Intermediate, Swimmer, and what was next?)

other side of the bag

From ADK Outlet in Lake Placid; I waxed poetic about them in another post

Here is what LL Bean wrote to me:

Dear Ms. Loonin,

Thank you for contacting L.L.Bean with the great story of your Boat and Tote bag. It brought smiles to me and my peers faces.  I have forwarded you email to our Corporate Office to let them see your Boat and Tote bag.

Thank you again for contacting L.L.Bean Ms. Loonin. I am hoping someday to see an update with more patches.

Sincerely,
Heather B.
L.L.Bean Customer Service
            800-441-5713      
llbean.com

100 Years of Satisfied Customers
Shipped for Free | Guaranteed to Last

Reason #613 Why I Love Listening to NPR

But this would be a local reason*, not a national reason, as referenced in my prior post.

Because when talking about potentially having to share bike helmets in NYC's imminent bike-share program this morning, Brian Lehrer, on his morning show on WNYC, used the word yucky.

And pronounced it properly.


*obviously his other guest, Pete Seeger, is also a huge huge huge draw to today's show.

Reason #127 Why I Love Listening to NPR

Because Terry Gross, on her show Fresh Air, just found the opportunity to use the word doctrinal.
And pronounced it properly.

The Best Mayonaisse In the World

Aside from making it yourself, that is.
If you say Hellman's or Best Mayonaisse, you haven't lived.

Thomy Mayonaisse is a household name when it comes to mayo.

If you are from Switzerland, that is.

And are limited to Kosher-certified mayonaisse.

Here are the things I can say about Thomy:

* European-Style taste goodness.
* German product, Swiss-made.
* Made with sunflower oil...not soy for those of us with soy allergy.
* Produced by Nestle.  This could be an issue if you boycott Nestle due to their support of the infant formula lobby in Washington which undermines breastfeeding.
* It is unavailable in the US in the preferred, Kosher packaging (which is not marked Kosher, you gotta have the Swiss "list" of products).

Ya going to Switzerland soon and want to pick me up some tubes?

courtesy of Umamimart

Nucking Futs Mama

This is pretty brilliant, especially for all of my fellow 1972 babies who are 39 turning 40.  Wow, half of you already turned 40.  Wow.  What a year, what a year.

from Nucking Futs Mama on Facebook:  unclear yet as to the original creator, but she shared it so I'm sharing it here

I am loving Nucking Futs' name:  It sounds a lot like the parody t-shirts I loved seeing in Dead and now Phish parking lots or even Art Spiegelman's original Wacky Packages and, later, Garbage Pail kids.  Plays on words are fun.  Lots and lots of fun.

Felt down so I did a little home improvement

Ever suspicious of my own writing, it felt pretty bad when I received negative feedback from a magazine editor on a piece I submitted recently.  That feeling of inadequacy settles in pretty quick, especially since it feeds on my own insecurity.  Let's face it:  only my friends and family are reading this rag, and my writing is sub par!

So I turned my energy towards repurposing some gorgeous satin ribbon I bought a number of years ago.  I spent about $16 on the project.  Originally I used the ribbon to make a ribbon-wand that I saw in a boutique toy store.  But then a kid stepped on the ribbons and it pulled off the wand.  Glue guns only go so far.  I saved the ribbon for about 3 years.  Since I am majorly purging, the timing was right.

I came up with this:

a little bit of cheer lifts me from an ego-crush

Bill the Boy Wonder: The Secret Co-Creator of Batman

Now that my boys, the Wolfman and the Wolfman's brother, are ages 7 and 5 respectively, I am learning more about superheroes.  You read that gender-biased statement correctly:  my daughter, Concealed Light, followed my own childhood interests and expressed zero interest in any person made of steel, plastic, iron or was mutated in some bizarro chemical spill.  Of course I loved  the original Adam West Batman TV show, but that was mainly for the intro theme song and not the show itself (except I loved the cartoon animation in between the people actors).  I fell asleep in the movie theater on one of my first dates, where I was brought to the 1989 film Batman (bad choice, you nice but geeky teenage boy!  Needless to say, there wasn't a second date.).

And yet I am so excited to report that my friend Marc Tyler Nobleman just published what sounds like a fascinating story about the unknown creator of Batman:  Bill Finger.  Buy the book and at the very least watch this informative and entertaining video, which I am sure was not intentionally planned to be the length of 4 minutes and 20 seconds.  Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.  Marc was, from the time I have known him in high school, always an innovative creator of skits and plays, so this video is sure to be a fun watch.

Always the humorist, Marc wrote about the trailer: "warning:  contains tights."




How happy did it make me to see listed among the credits of this trailer a few of Marc's high school friends with whom he is still quite close.  I have long understood that my dear friend Marc and his high school buddies (with whom I also had good times during high school and college) are fantastic all-American guys.   But don't go thinking they were rough-and-tumble quarterbacks and line-receivers!  Most of them were and still are wholesome jokesters, although Kevin was a pretty good baseball player.  They are so lucky to have each other even until today.  Their ruach (positive energy) was always infectious!

Marc worked on the book for 5 years...that surely is a labor of love!  I feel terribly honored to be his friend and am thrilled to blog about Bill the Boy Wonder in my teeny tiny little corner of cyberspace.

Toss Away Stuff You Don't Need In The End

Yesterday I performed the task that many Jewish moms time immemorial have done once their daughters have gone off to camp:  cleaned out the room.

And I have conflicted feelings about it.
Because I should take the advice of my own mother and sit down with her to organize together.
But I just couldn't wait until August.
I had the time yesterday, so I started seizing the moment.

Let me clarify a few things.  I wrote to my daughter, Concealed Light, who is happily enjoying her 2nd year at camp for the month of July, to inform her that I would be tidying up in her room.   And that was just a reminder.  I told her before she left for camp that I would be cleaning up.   I haven't been able to get in there in recent months even simply to dust, as she insists on leaving her play-school set up with school supplies, dolls, and various other props on the floor, thereby preventing a thorough cleaning job.  I would just be moving things aside and putting like together with like to get rid of all the dust bunnies.

But one thing led to another.
Can I admit here that I was cleaning and organizing in there for 4 hours on Sunday morning?
I got so entrenched that I missed Will Shortz's puzzle on NPR.
Oy!
And I couldn't just tidy up.
I was putting so much like together with like.
I discovered things she couldn't find and could use at camp.
And then came all the scraps, a dead insect, tiny piles of dried up flowers, bits of yarn.
Time to purge some of it.
Time to scrape off the stuck-on glue stains, markers, mounting tape.
And there was so much stuff, my gut wants to convince myself that she won't notice.


Here are some things I found (and left a bunch behind):

• Full box of silly bandz (isn't that fad like 2 years too late?)
• Shredded tissue paper 
• American Girl self-help spiral notebooks and teeny tiny notes
• treasure boxes filled with beads, gems, stones, craftable items
• Pony beads.
• scraps of fabric.
• unopened birthday gifts from last summer
• Mini oragami fortune tellers.
• Baby clothing she took out of storage (for her dolls).

She will notice.
True to my word, though, I didn't touch the dollhouse.

And, there you have my conflict:  The desire to clean up, and the desire to respect her space and retain her trust.  Just when you start assuming that I violated my daughter's privacy, I must tell you that I didn't go through every drawer.   I replaced personal items after dusting the area underneath them.  I am not the nosy mom.  I am not the controlling mom.  I am not the I wanna-be-best-friends-with-my-daughter-cooler-than-my-own-mother-though-I-love-love-love-my-own-mother mom.

Again, the conflict:  I sortof have some of those qualities.

I hope to remind Concealed Light that she still has tons of stuff and I was only trying to help clear some space (why hold onto sealed-shut nail polish bottles?) and she'll continually get new stuff and there is still purging that needs to happen and let's do that together when you get back from camp.

I remind myself that Other Moms do this on a continuing basis.
Concealed Light is lucky that I don't typically ransack her room.
And remember, this wasn't a ransack.
This is a delicate once-over.
A once-over that generated 5 bags of garbage and 3 bags of paper recycling.

I discovered that Concealed Light is somewhat of a hoarder, but I realize that we have only gone through her stuff together once or twice, so I can't blame her for not learning the skills.  It is my job to do this type of thing with her together, and I feel bad that I haven't been able to find the time yet to do this.

Uh oh, The Wolfman's Brother came in to the room in the afternoon and said, "Mama, it looks like we are moving because there is nothing on the floor."

Yes, it is important to retain the important stuff, but to quote the song "Theme From the Bottom" which is the title of this blog post:

Toss away stuff you don't need in the end, but keep what's important and know who's your friend 

Here are some other things I found and/or accomplished:

• That laptop that she said wasn't working?  Cable was simply unplugged from side of laptop.
• 100% cotton nightgown purchased in a fancy boutique store stuck under her dresser drawer, covered in dust bunnies
• Shira Goodman's* school supply box, filled with useless pencil stubs about 2 inches long
• nail clipper she misplaced from last year at camp:  It was buried in her overstuffed LeSportsac cosmetic bag.
• Goo-goned a ton of marker stains of her vintage white formica furniture (translation:  my childhood handmedown) and mounting tape my husband thought would be helpful to use to mount her reading lamp
• shook out the Pottery Barn braided oval rug.  Discovered a lot of dirt stains.
• sharpened all of her colored pencils
• threw away old markers
• gathered all of her temporary tatoos and Indian "bindi" facial stickers, putting them in a care package to her at camp with instructions to share with her friends at camp.

*name changed to protect privacy

I realize a difference between me and Concealed Light is that she is way more creative than I ever was, and certainly more intelligent than me.  My sister, Reba, also expressed a creative streak from a young age, and her room, too, was often in disarray.  My own childhood room was relatively tidy and I regularly went through my stuff.  I also didn't have as much stuff as C.L.  There were not Dollar Stores,  Five Below or Claire's where we could get fun stuff for cheap.  I treasured my Hello Kitty items, but there was no purchasing knock-offs in Chinatown, so I only had a few very prized Sanrio products.  Concealed Light, however, has access to so much more stuff.  She has a small library compared to her friends, but way more books than I ever owned:  My mom was a staunch library patron.  My sister was always making projects, as is Concealed Light, but I wasn't as much of the creative type.  I treasured my rug hook set that I worked on for years, leaving it always safely at the top of my closet in its plastic Woolworth shoebox.  I had only one or two sketch pads, and prized my smelly markers and Marvy markers that I received from my Manhattan cousins who lived in Lincoln Towers for years.  Concealed Light is constantly making her own books, writing stories, creating doll clothes:  a real independent, original, creative spirit.   

I hope one day if she ever reads this blog post she will say, "Mama, I could have expressed those same thoughts in a very concise manner where your blog readers didn't actually tune out after the 2nd paragraph."  Let this entry serve as a reminder that we can all learn so much from our children.  I know she will be a great writer one day.  She already is great at expressing herself through the written word at the young age of 8.  Her stories are funny, witty, and to the point.  Me?  I always said that I liked doing the research and could improve upon my writing skills.  I am more of the ideas person.  I have a lot of ideas.

With that I leave you the title of this blog entry. 

Click through to 2:45 for the quotation.

And if you are so inclined to view the video in its 7 minute entirety, fully check out this incredible light show.  I was at the Atlantic City show the day after (this was a 3 day Phish festival in June).  Chris Kuroda, the band's 5th honorary member and talented light engineer, as they say in Phish parlance, "killed it."

Finally Got Into Dave Matthews Band

For whatever reason, I just didn't get into DMB.  It's not that I didn't listen and enjoy when he played on the radio in the '90s, no, not at all.  I just didn't go to any of his shows.  Nothing against him or anything, just wasn't my thing.  Who remembers those "white hats" that DMB fans wore?

But check out Dave who performed this past June at SPAC (Saratoga Performing Arts Center:  if you haven't been there for a show, get yourself there!  And in August you can go to the track!) with the fabulously talented Nigel Hall.

It's my opinion that Nigel is the real star here:  he is the best voice of soul and funk out there today.

Click forward to 4:05 to see Nigel at the mic and really RAGE it out.

Upcoming Phamily Phun in Philadelphia!? With DJ Scribe

now *this* is a fun, chill, inexpensive phamily phun event in philly!  Sadly, the Whole Phamily will be unable to attend but I encourage each.and.every.one.of.you who lives in Philadelphia and is looking for something to do in a week or so to GO GO GO!!!  DJ Scribe looks fully funkadelic.  Check out DJ Samson, too, cuz word on the street, yo, is that pisher can spin some mad wax!

While we currently have no plans on attending, I saw this ad in Philadelphia's The Jewish Exponent for the upcoming Jewish Heritage Night at a Phillies game which jumps on the"PH" bandwagon.  I can't speak to previous years since I am a recent New York transplant, but did they market the event this way in the past?Or, did a wise person at Philadelphia Federation (ahem, Phederation) stumble upon this blog and dig my vibe?  In all of my humble modesty, though, I am currently humming the words of Carly Simon to the tune of  "You're So Vain."

My sister Reba calls me an internet jewish cosmic freakazoid.  Would anyone else pick up on this advertising detail other than me?

pre-game phamily phestival.  The Whole Phamily is happy to join you if we are invited.   Partnerships are good.  Laminates/guest lists/VIP treatment are even better.

I have my feelers out already with their marketing folks, so I am curious what the story is...

Meantime, check out Carly from 2 years ago.
Remastered/remixed classic song from the excellent year of 1972.
Now, that is one very fine vintage.
I speak from personal experience.
Dig the whole Morningside Heights and Columbia University vibe.
If that isn't Butler Library, I don't know what is.
And a chassid vibe, to boot!
The fever is spreading.

Great Use of Glowsticks

We just got back from our lovely July 4th celebration.  They had fireworks.  There were a lot of tarps and blankets.  There were a lot of glowsticks  for sale.  Preferring to save money, the boys got to enjoy collecting them as groundscores after the event. For those of you who don't share my musical interests, you likely have not seen what is known in show-parlance as a "glowstick war."  Individuals who love glowsticks will bring in huge tubes of them and gather them together to throw into the air all at once.  Or get them sent to the venue for pick up inside.  But we're talking big numbers here, like 400 at a time.  This distribution of the glowsticks happens all at once and it is a free-for-all.  Good folks doing good things for the greater community.

A few weeks ago a video was made of how they launch 2,000 glowsticks all at once.   Many people and a large tarp are involved.  As well as inspiring music.

Click here to get to the video, it is worth it!

And that wonderful tune Age of Miracles in the video was a subject of a blog post of mine last January.

The Loss of an Icon

Nora Ephron's loss is tremendous.  Upon finding out the news just now at 11:15 pm, my husband's reaction was, "oh?!"  Typical somewhat benign/bland reaction.

So, I called my mom.  What else was there to do?

Screams, shrieks, and great sighs of sorrow.  (And validation for my own deep pit of the heart emotion felt).

My dad, yelling from the other room, said, "Oh, did someone die?"  Upon finding it it was "just" Nora Ephron, he was only blandly annoyed.  Benign at best.  "I wanna go to sleep."

But us women, and the men among us who have worked with her like Tom Hanks, Steve Martin and Billy Crystal, all have expressed their deep gutteral pangs of sorrow.  Nora Ephron was a giant.  A great of our time.  She could write, sure, but she was more than just a writer.  She was the voice of women, crossing generational gaps.

Is it coincidence or not that just a few weeks ago at my local JCC I picked up an original copy of her 1971 book Crazy Salad, complete with yellowed pages and falling-apart spine.  I wasn't terribly impressed by the writing, her being somewhat early in her career.  It wasn't as witty and sharp as I loved in Heartburn.  Last week I ordered her latest book from the library I Remember Nothing, thinking I am two years behind schedule with reading one of the funniest, wittiest, smartest women of our time.  I even as recently as a couple of weeks ago tweeted her sister Delia, as I have ramped up my Twitter life and searching for those folks important to me such as Nora Ephron only to find her not on Twitter, but Delia is also a great woman and tweeted me back.

Nora Ephron could write, boy could she write.  Always a source of inspiration:  everything is copy, she said famously.  Wanting so much to emulate her style, Nora has often been a lurking existence in my brain.

May her memory be a blessing, and may we continue to use her writing as fuel for all of our inklings to be go-getters.  She was one of those rare gems and will be tremendously missed.

In lieu of me being able to write anything good, here is a great piece, remembering Nora.  I am certain we will be flooded in the next day or three.

I thank my sister Reba for reminding me about this scene, which, when I first saw it in high school in 1989 was completely mind-blowing and truth-revealing.  At the time, I just wanted to be friends with my junior prom date, a nice, good guy who I simply wasn't attracted to and couldn't view as a boyfriend.  I couldn't understand why the feeling wasn't mutual until I saw this scene, which explained it all.


 

School's Definitely Out...ABC, 123

With summer vacation in full swing, I loved hearing this 2009 remix of the Jackson 5's ABC from their Remix Suite.  With the reggae beat, this got me in the happy mood for summer.





Then again, Boogie on Reggae Woman is pretty good, too.





Even better when sung by my favorite band.

 

Mary Jane, A Mysterious Friend of Mine...An Original Poem

Written by my eldest child, Concealed Light

**********

Mary Jane is a friend of mine,

she is really friendly and very nice,

but she is quite weird and mysterious,

and wait until you hear this:

she can turn a wrench into a hen,

a hamster-feed pellet into some men.

And don't ask me how Mary Jane does this,

because as I told you,

she is mysterious.

************

picture of the author, Concealed Light

As the mother, naturally I kvell and admit that I am biased:  everything my children do is great.  But trying to remove myself from the parental role, I gotta admit this is pretty good.  Wacky and fun, Concealed Light has written a great poem.  Way better than I ever did in 3rd grade.  It was published in her school's first-ever literary publication, and while the town library judges made a grave error by not awarding her a prize for its entry in this year's poetry contest, there is more great stuff where that came from.   She says she wants to be a writer.  Oh, how I would love to send her to a writing workshop.  One day maybe that will happen.  Until then, I encourage her to keep on reading and writing.

Its It's & Its Zildjian

Perhaps one of my greatest pet peeves resulting from the proliferation of technology use today via blogs, Facebook, Twitter, and the like is the misuse of the apostrophe in the word "it."  A college professor told me many moons ago about a peril of email:  spelling errors would will increase exponentially, and he had little tolerance for such mistakes.  This is when, if we wanted to use email, we had to go to the computer cluster.  There was no such thing as dorm rooms being connected to the Internet.  This is also when I didn't know how to properly spell liaison.  Jump forward twenty years, and autocorrect and spell check are partially to blame.  Granted, people are busy and lazy and simply either don't have the time or desire to go back and make a correction.

But still.

Come on, people.

We all make spelling and grammatical errors more frequently online, and I am certainly not exempt from making this mistake.

And for that reason, I thank my brother for reminding me that the spelling of the famous cymbals is Zildjian, and not Ziljan as I previously wrote.

Wikipedia image

I can't imagine what Professor Whitfield is thinking now.

When The Levee Breaks...Obama Will Surely Win 2012

Let me introduce you to Led Zeppellin IV, if you haven't already been introduced.  If you don't know your Zosos from your Ziljans, stick with me, keep it nice and sticky, and I can show you a thing or two.

Or three.

In the lyrics of When The Levee Breaks, you will hear, among other things, the following:

• Leaving Home
• Keeping Your Baby Safe
• Keeping a Happy Home
• Mountain Men Who Wander...

and,

GOING TO CHICAGO.





Anyway, it's all there in The Levee Breaks.

We all know Chicago is where Obama is from, and we know here at the Whole Phamily it is important to keep a happy home as well as be mindful of mountain men who wander.

If you have seen the light of a reverberating Ziljan cymbal, you will understand why I feel that this song explains the winner of this year's Presidential Election.  Question my reasoning, fine, but at least acknowledge I am onto something.

And that is the way it is for 2012.

What shall be in 2016 is the question.  If you're experienced like me, you will agree that none of this and yet all of this is truth even unto its innermost parts.  Meaning, how can Rachel use a classic rock tune to validate the result of the upcoming election?

I can't explain it, truthfully.  Too complicated.

Be prepared, keep everything in their own pockets, have proper gear, and stick together with your family, or you can stick with the Whole Phamily and see better, happier days of goodness and love and ultimate redemption.

In the meantime, you can rage with our machine of the Ganse Mishpucha (Whole Phamily).





If you want to talk Grapes of Wrath, dudes, (aka Tom Joad, the Cats, and all that Dust), perhaps you should look for purple glitter rather during this post-9/11 era than dust of the bowl  (better to be two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl year after year than a bunch of red dust flying around the air during the Great Depression).   Or just watch Henry Ford playing Tom Joad.  That's easier.  Even if it's just a 4 minute clip.  You can handle a brief clip, kids, can't you?





My take away from all of this is to grow my own food.

And that's exactly what we're starting to accomplish this year with our organic garden.

Michelle Obama's got that one right.

Thanks, First Lady!

Moonrise Kingdom, Yes I Love Wes Anderson

My writing skills and ability to express myself could never, ever give proper way to a discussion of Moonrise Kingdom.  They say it's not good to start in the negative.  So let me start over.

The newest film by Director Wes Anderson is yet again a perfect world of great design, conversation, sound, music, placement.

Just watch the  trailer!

 


This is good.  This is very, very good.  I love you, Wes Anderson.  Well, not really you as a person.  I don't know you.  But I love Wes Anderson.  I love him, yes I do.  But I don't know you.

I love your movies.  I love them a lot.  I love them like all of your disciples love them.  The style.  The music.  The dialogue.  The message.  The story-line.  The clothing.  The imagery.

I love it/you like the way I love wide wale corduroy on men who listen to the Kinks.

And Charles and Ray Eames.

But I really love my husband who is accompanying me to Mountain Jam this weekend since I really want to go.  This will be such a good thing for our whole family.

Heading to the Mountain

While all of my observant Jewish friends are still popping their Lactaid pills after last week's dairy-laden Shavuot holiday, I am packing for the next adventure.  We reenacted going up to that humblest of mountains, Mount Sinai, where we received our holy Torah thousands of years ago.  All the while eating a lot of blintzes.

The journey to another mountain continues, this time to Mountain Jam at Hunter Mountian, New York.  My family which as you know include my husband Stango and our children Concealed Light, The Wolfman, and the Wolfman's Brother, has been long-looking forward to this weekend-long music festival.  So much so that we temporarily suspending cleaning help to save funds for tickets.

I'll be experiencing first-hand a music festival with three children under the age of 10 in tow.  We are camping on the grounds and shlepping everything up the mountain by Radio-Flyer cart.  Stango and I have never camped at a music festival together, so this is all new territory.  But since live music is the one thing we simply love to experience together, what could be better as a family outing?  The kids want us to take them to music that we like, but the shows all run too late and aren't kid-friendly.  Mountain Jam is different.   Lucky for us that we also have an extended network of friends to enjoy the weekend with.  The Nunever is coming, and he has graciously offered to wear my new Whole Phamily t-shirt.  Delights such as Awareness Village, Karma Wash and an entire area dedicated to family activities await.

Hopefully my experience as a mama bringing her children to their first music festival will not only be recorded here.  Time will only tell.

See you on the mountain!

Just One Word: Proteins. There's a Great Allergenic Future in Proteins

We are all scratching our heads...why are there so many more allergies among kids today than there were when we were little?

Remember when Dustin Hoffman is told, in the movie The Graduate, the one word, the future in business is  PLASTICS?

Well, my dear friend, I bring you the future of today, and when it comes to food allergies, it is the one.  The only:

PROTEINS

Check out self-described type-A personality, former food industry Wall Street analyst Robyn O'Brien's brilliant talk at last year's TedX Austin.

 

Her organization, Allergy Kids Foundation, is making great strides to help protect American families from the additives in our food supply.

Even Erin Brockovitch is cheering her on.

If it takes a polished, professional, educated, smart, savvy, communicative, organized, type-A personality woman to get the message across to our country's citizens (rather than a grassrootsy type...ahem, in the words of Miss Piggy, moí?), so be it.





Shhh...nuf said.

That's a deal.

Mama's Night Out

Stango and I got to hear some music over the weekend.  A local Connecticut band, the Juicy Grapes, were playing at the Acoustic Cafe in Bridgeport, Connecticut.  Back in high school I didn't get out to this type of activity, so it was like I was having the night I never had in 1989.  Lots of fun.  In between sets my kind of music was playing on the speakers, and it was all good.

This was a set list for a different band

Love the smart logos...though the other women there didn't know about Lululemon.  I guess this could be a generic omega and not a rip on the famous yoga clothing brand logo

A running music-head rabbit with a guitar.

Does this mean I can't display the cute logo from the cafe table (bunny rabbit above) on my blog? 

When I'm 64...Happy B-Day Israel!

Am I really the only person out there who thought of this?  Happy Birthday to Israel, who turns 64 today.  Happy Israel Independence Day!





Would love to get back there.  It has been since 1997 for me.

What's that?  Did I hear that Phish is playing their first shows there this year on December 8, 2012?  Before you get all over your Phantasy Tour with that, I will take credit for all the out-there reasons I came up with.  Just please remember to add me to the crew.

Mama's gotta dream.  Isn't there something about vision boards and affirmations that people are all into?

Yom Ha'Atzmaut Sameach, people.

Loving the Early Childhood drop off

It is so easy to forget how sweet and innocent the 4s and 5s are.  Just now at drop off, I reminded my youngest, The Wolfman's Brother, to enjoy his day in preschool as a four year old.  He looked at me with that creeping 5 year old just around the corner look of, "c'mon, mama, don't embarras me now." How does he know that already?

The early years slip away too fast.  Like Ferris said, if we don't stop to look around every once in a while, we could miss it.

My 4 year old will soon be 5, and that babyness (yep, he is the youngest, which compounds this burst of sentimentality) is quickly melting away.  It is so bittersweet.  What could be better than a morning of duplos followed by starting a school garden?

Gotta eat it up while I can.

The Pity Post

There comes a time in every mom bloggers blog-of-a-life where she is granted the opportunity to bitch and moan*.  In honor of my 188th post, I hereby grant you a peak at some of my current grievances.  Keep in mind I haven't bitched much here at all.  The whole point of the Whole Phamily is to seek out the good.  But I felt it high time to let out a barbaric yawp, bloggy-style.

I think it all boils down to a few (ahem, um, I meant 20)  key points, which are, in no particular order:

1. lack of focus.
2. more fun to procrastinate.
3. my writing sucks balls.
4. I go on and freakin' on.  And on and on and on.  Point well taken:  there are too many bullet points here for any reader to follow.
5. Other Women have it better.  Who are these Other Women?  Mom bloggers who know more than me, successful women, ivy-educated women who market themselves well, community college grads who market themselves well, 13 year olds who market themselves well (oh, wait, that is a boy), socialites who haven't dipped into the bowl of botox yet, self-proclaimed type A personality women.
6. Along the lines of #5, I am neither a hard worker nor come from money.  I'm so screwed.
7. Making lemonade out of the proverbial lemon is too hard.
8. I have good things to say and I think no one will ever listen (aside from you, dear reader who is one of my 20 or so loyal ones).  
9. I'd rather be dancing at a Phish show.
10. I'd rather be dancing at a Dead show (oh, wait, Jerry is dead).  Still, no one is comping my tix or putting me on any guest lists for any shows that I know of.
11. I'd rather be dancing.  Thank you, Capezio.
12. I want it now (along the lines of Veruca Salt, but I don't want to go down as a bad egg).
13. Easier to live vicariously through other people (similar to #5).
14. Too hard to create my own, but...
15. ...I'm too opinionated to keep my mouth shut.
16. Want someone else to do the work for me.
17. Still not a Skinny Bitch.  You thought I wasn't a bitch?  My nickname at age 6 was crab, but I hide the shell and claws well.
18. Still not just plain ole' skinny.  Don't give me any of that "well, you don't want to be too skinny" bullshit because what I'm talking about is just being thin, not anorexic, okay?  And just fitting comfortably into clothing.  No, I'm not a plus size.
19. Everything is too itchy.  I like cotton and stretch but not too much stretch because that irritates my skin.  No silk.  No wool.  Only some synthentics.  Is my best case scenario relegated to a life clad in Eileen Fisher?
20. As of yet, still not a  fag hag.  Derek Blasberg and Jonathan Adler, we can still be buddies.  But since #17 and #18 exist, I doubt I fit the bill.

And yet, I have a lot to be grateful for:

Kids
Husband
Health
Parents living
College degree
Masters Degree
Not being able to outsource one of my favorite activities:  sleeping
First crack at working in 8+ years.

Maybe I should actually get to work to try to make some bucks so we can rehire the cleaning help.   More on my decision to temporarily let go of our cleaning help for about 3 months so we could save $ to afford Mountain Jam coming your way, soon!

More about my new venture another time...If Jamie did it in DC, then I can do it in Philadelphia!






Thanks to Liz Gumbinner for that lift.


*this is based on no scientific data.  I just made that up cuz I wanted to bitch and moan.  Time to go back and fluff the pillows.

Call Me Maybe

Yep, trusty spin class keeps me honest.  I actually really, really like this new tune which debuted nearly 2 months ago and has gone viral to over 30 MM (that's million, for you non Wall Street types.)

Carly Rae Jepsen, or at least her stylists, did good by me with the sweet placement of the VW Jetta.




Seems like I have a new tune I can listen to with Concealed Light and maybe be the cool mom I think I am.

God knows she is sick and tired of listening to Bob Marley, Phish and the Grateful Dead.

Maybe.