Reveries & Relevance, Issue 2

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R &R REVERIES & RELEVANCE Issue II

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October 2021

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Kathryn J. Jones E

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Ben Small A R T

D I R E C T O R

CONTRIBUTORS Elizabeth Allen, Jeff Bond, David Budin, Nicole Draffen, Steve Falko, Karen Koblitz, Frank Kunstel, Inga Smith, Sheldon Zoldan

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o here we are with issue two of Reveries & Relevance, which is coming out around Hallowe’en time. Hallowe’en is really my favorite holiday and it’s my favorite time of year. Let me explain.

I live in the northern part of the U.S. because I need the four seasons. It’s in my DNA. I love each season, that is, I love them until I hate them. I’m thrilled at the first snow in November but by May, if it’s still snowing, I’m ticked off. Love those first hot days in June but after slogging through a long, hot & humid summer I am ready for the weather to cool off. I’m writing this in mid-October and it’s 80 degrees outside and, that’s right, I’m ticked off! Make with the autumn weather already. Anyhow, when things go as they were intended by the weather gods, late October is wonderfully cool & crisp, the smell of burning leaves is in the air, football weather, apple cinnamon, pumpkin spice, all that garbage. I feel energized at this time of year and then Hallowe’en comes along with the embrace of macabre things, making the scary into the fun and I find it exhilarating. It’s the time of year when we laugh at death, we make light of darkness.

We devote the first section of the magazine to reflections on Hallowe’en both profound and silly. Really, the whole magazine reflects this relationship between the light and the dark. We feature among other things, gorgeous and important artwork, visit briefly with a family facing the most difficult situation imaginable and coming through it with incredible courage, we have six sentence stories, fun and informative musical offerings, an eye-opening book excerpt on the marginalization of certain Americans, we continue our travels to China, and end with me goofing around with my wife’s face.

Kathy & I hope you find this issue a frighteningly good read!

— Ben Small

TABLE of CONTENTS

The Hallowe’en Number Kids from Other Neighborhoods 6 Monster Haiku Workshop 8 COLUMNS every issue Six Sentence Stories 7, 31 Artist of the Past 12 Artist of the Present 16 Songs of the Day 34 Notes from a Surly Art Director 36

The Illustrated History of ...

9 Halloween 1971 10

FEATURES this issue Excerpt and Q&A 22 A Brief and Impactful Life 24 Travel: Beijing 28 Stories Well Told 32

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any thanks to those who contribute their wonderful creative endeavors to this magazine. Art Director Ben Small and I greatly appreciate their generosity and talent.

In addition to being a talented artist, Ben has written a number of features, including a spooky piece that appears in our special Halloween section. It will run a chill down your spine.

Also by Ben, our “Artist of the Past” is Henry Hering, the sculptor of The Guardians of Traffic, which at least partially inspired the Cleveland baseball team’s new name, the Guardians.

This issue’s “Artist of the Present” is renowned Los Angeles-based ceramic artist Karen Koblitz. A full bio on page 16 precedes examples of her work.

We also have a Q&A with Nicole Draffen, author of Hyphened-Nation: Don’t Check the Box. In her book, she argues against ethnic hyphenation such as African-American because it limits economic, educational, societal and cultural growth, she says. Nicole gave us permission to run a short excerpt.

And we have photos by Inga Smith, a professional photographer and retired teacher who has traveled the world telling stories through her images.

A special thank-you to Los Angeles-based author and freelance writer Jeff Bond, who allowed us to publish a condensed version of his yet-to-be published tribute to his late son. It is powerful and beautiful.

— K.J. Jones

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Contributor Bio

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ontributor Elizabeth (Betsy) Allen, who wrote the clever “Monster Haiku Workshop” in the Halloween section, holds a BA in journalism from The Ohio State University, and an MA in English and MFA in fiction writing from George Mason University (Fairfax, Va.). Over the years, she has worked as a corporate communications specialist, public relations manager, creative writing workshop leader, and freelance writer and editor.

Elizabeth currently teaches Advanced Composition at George Mason. She has written numerous short stories published in dark fiction anthologies, and two plays, “Beehives of the Dead” and “#gratitude #blessed,” featured on the Between Acts audio theater podcast.

She lives in Alexandria, Va., with her husband and a noisy Corgi. In her spare time, Elizabeth indulges a crossword puzzle obsession and frets about her children and grandson. She believes in the transportive power of stories — to take us places we’ve never been, to make travel companions of strangers, to see the roads less traveled but still ours for the taking.

And In Their Own Words …

David Budin, Kids from Other Neighborhoods Sometimes people ask me if I’m going to retire and I say no, I have nothing to retire from. I mean, I’m a writer and a musician, but I don’t work for a company. I used to: I was the editor of Northern Ohio Live and then another city magazine that shall go unnamed. But that was kind of a long time ago, and I’ve been freelancing since the day I fled in terror from the second publication, after a long year of trauma. The two years I was homeless in New York City, as a teenager in the late ’60s, were, literally, better than that year. I was in NYC as a singer-songwriter, eventually recording for a major label, and producing and arranging music, which I still do, mostly from Cleveland. I’ve also been working on three books for the past few years – writing, not reading.

Steve Falko, Beijing: The Square, the Forbidden City and, a Dream Come True, the Wall I worked for General Motors, in one form or another, for more than three decades. I spent my career in service engineering, and I was extremely fortunate to be assigned to a wide variety of interesting positions.

Along the way, I developed a little knowledge about many of the various service operations roles. This led on occasion to my being assigned to conduct start-up training. Generally, this would happen when we were working with teams from other countries that were not familiar with our (GM’s) processes.

Over the years, I was lucky to spend considerable time working with teams from Korea, Russia and China — both here and abroad.

At the time I was picked for the Shanghai assignment, my wife Joyce was working from home. Our plan was for her to accompany me on this four- to five-month project. Just prior to its start, she was presented with an excellent job opportunity.

We decided she should accept, which led to me spending most of my time in Shanghai away from her for the first time in 35 years. But she was able to visit me in China, and this excerpt is about the two of us as tourists in Beijing.

Frank Kunstel, 6 Sentence Stories When I retired from corporate America, one of things I thought I would do with my newfound time was some creative writing.

I wasn’t aiming for the Great American Novel but wasn’t sure what it might be — a blog, poetry, service contract for a cell phone provider, instruction manual for a fun way to put together a grill (there is no such way). Whatever it would be, I thought I should first be able to craft a really good sentence.

As I experimented with that, I became intrigued with the notion that everybody has a personal story, and we often don’t know each other’s story. I couldn’t convey such a story in one sentence, so I challenged myself to write a set of stories each within the confines of exactly six sentences. Like this bio.

Sheldon Zoldan, Songs of the Day I didn’t think I would miss writing after retiring from journalism after almost 50 years, but that was before the pandemic when I could go to the gym and volunteer at the Humane Society.

I had to do something, but I don’t remember how the Song of the Day came about, only that it filled in the black hole of boredom. Now, the goal is an entire year, 365 days of them.

Then it’s back to the gym and dog walking. R

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Hallowe’en

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Photo by David McBee from Pexels

Kids from Other Neighborhoods

BY DAVID BUDIN

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ne of the first Halloween costumes I remember wearing was that of the Scarecrow from The Wizard of Oz. I was in the second grade at Coventry Elementary School. Every year, on Halloween, students were allowed to wear costumes after lunch for the rest of the afternoon. My Scarecrow costume was pretty close to the one Ray Bolger wore in the movie. But I insisted on dressing as the Scarecrow before Dorothy took him off his pole, when he had a broomstick or something through his sleeves to make his arms stick straight out at his sides. So my mother used a broomstick, minus the broom, for my costume.

But, of course, then I had to walk back to school with my arms sticking straight out at my sides — and of no use to me — and then sit in class, with my arms sticking straight out at my sides. I began to lose the feeling in both of my arms, and my

back and neck started hurting.

Still, I refused to forfeit the authenticity of my creation.

I was being crucified. I was suffering for the sake of my art.

I actually continued that pattern for many years, eventually graduating from a broomstick in my shirt to homelessness 12 years later.

But at least when I was homeless, I could put my arms down.

One of my last Halloween costumes, which I wore in my late 20s, was a real clown outfit but with the addition of a black cape over my back and a pillow under the cape. I wore makeup that was half clown and half dark and scary, and a nametag that read “QuasiBozo.”

I kept the clown costume, and a few years later, when I had a child of my own, I wanted to put it on to amuse him. Except

that he was afraid of clowns and would scream when he saw one.

And why not? His fear increased, though, and was beginning to reach a level that I thought might be unhealthy. So for Halloween when he was 3, I thought it would help him if we dressed him up as a clown. I got him a little costume and a wig and a nose, and put a bit of makeup on his face. When he was ready, I held him up to a mirror so he could see how cute he looked dressed as a clown. He screamed.

I whisked him away from the mirror and he calmed down.

We went out trick-or-treating and I avoided anything that could act as a mirror. He collected a lot of candy and as soon as we got home, I removed all traces of the clown getup.

A few years later, when we had two kids trick-or-treating, they collected tons of candy. When we came home, they always wanted to eat it. We decided that we should let them.

The rule was that they could eat as much as they wanted to — that night—but then we’d put the rest away, to be consumed gradually, over some period of time (maybe until they received their Easter baskets).

Our theory was that they would make themselves ill eating so much candy and then they wouldn’t want it anymore.

That experiment failed completely. They ate a ton and wanted more, every day.

But the candy never lasted nearly as long as we hoped it would, mainly because we, the parents, ate some of it every day until the supply became depleted.

When our kids were little, our street and its surrounding neighborhood were full of little kids. We got into the habit of buying lots of candy to hand out to trick-or-treaters. Over the years since we’ve lived in the Cedar-Fairmount area — the neighborhood closest to Cleveland Heights’ western border, just a few streets away from the city of Cleveland — we’ve seen fewer kids from our neighborhood trick-or-treating (because there are fewer kids). And we’ve seen more kids from what I assume are neighborhoods in Cleveland, across the imaginary border.

They come, accompanied by supervising adults in cars and station wagons and minivans, with large bags, often pillowcases, for their Halloween hauls. Sometimes the adults come to the door, too, with their own bags. (Why didn’t I think of that when my kids were little?)

At first, it was confusing — “I’ve never seen those kids before,” I’d say. And then it became annoying — “Why should we give our candy to kids from other neighborhoods?” And then I started seeing it a little differently — “Why shouldn’t we give them candy? There aren’t very many kids in this neighborhood anymore. We have plenty for the ones who do live around here and for these other kids.”And then I started seeing it even more

clearly: We have a lot around here; they don’t. Maybe people where they live can’t afford to buy and give away candy. These kids deserve to have fun as much as any kids do. I can’t afford to give a lot of money, but I certainly can afford to buy bags of Halloween candy (and giant bags, too, from Costco). And after the dozen or so kids from my street come for theirs, what am I going to do with 150 leftover pieces of candy—eat it myself?

Believe me, I’ve fantasized about doing that. But no, I’m not going to. Any kid (and the occasional adult) is welcome to it.

Finally, it became something I started looking forward to.

The year that I stopped being mad and grudgingly handing over a mini-Butterfinger bar, I started talking to the kids who came to my door—about their costumes, or the weather, or whatever.

I do that still. They almost always seem shocked that I want to talk to them. That’s heartbreaking. And it’s certainly worth the $9 a year I spend for the candy.

by Frank Kunstel

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hen I got pregnant with Jenny, we decided to have a “Natural.” It’s not like we could have afforded a Genetically Modified Human anyway, but I do wish we had bought at least one upgrade package. Already I can see Jenny is going to be intelligent, and maybe pretty too, though it’s too soon to tell for sure. But if we had wanted to be certain, we could have purchased the GMH Beauty package for $40,000 and the Intelligence package for $35,000 (I know, the market for Beauty is higher than it is for Intelligence). Then there was the Athletic package for $30,000, the Empathy/Collaboration personality package or the Leadership/Authority personality package for $27,000 (can’t do both, they’re incompatible), and the Health/ Strength package for $20,000. Clearly, families like us are at a disadvantage compared to rich families, so I wonder if Naturals and GMHs will be willing to mate, and if they do, what the results will be.

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Monster Haiku Workshop

by Elizabeth Allen

Hallowe’en

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Howling at the moon Tortured by eternal pain Out of flea/tick meds — Wolfman Black suit, white shirt, cape Blood stains wool so badly, and Aren’t I overdressed?

—Dracula The doctor’s stitching Is upsettingly shoddy

There is no greater Cosmic horror than trying To pronounce my name

I fall to pieces

— Cthulhu

— Frankenstein’s Monster Got wrapped up trying To walk like an Egyptian — The Mummy

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You gave me a Reese’s Cup I will stomp you last ❤

Gets old pretty fast

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October rampage

— Godzilla

Halloween, 1971: We were out trick-or-treating and had to pass through Priors Woods to get to the houses with the good candy. My shoe came untied. I stopped, but the other kids kept moving. “Wait up!’” I yelled.

They didn’t. “Bastards!” I knelt to fix my shoe and heard a noise. I turned to look and could barely see a figure slowly walking down the hill toward me. It looked like a little girl with a homemade costume of old rags. “Hey kid,” I said. She said nothing and continued down the hill. “Nice costume! Where did you get that, at the ... uh ...” I choked up, I couldn’t speak. As she neared me I could see into her mask and in that mask I saw nothing, just blackness. I jumped up and ran, my untied shoe flying off my foot.

I was an adult before I walked on that road again ... in broad daylight ... with other people who didn’t leave me all alone.

– Ben Small

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Artist of the Past

L Born: February 15, 1874 ~ New York City

Died: January 17, 1949 ~ New York City

creation by Henry Hering has been in the news recently because the Cleveland baseball club made the fairly progressive move of changing the team name from Indians to Guardians. This name is, at least in part, inspired

by The Guardians of Traffic — eight huge, grim-faced stone men on four pylons of the Hope Memorial Bridge which crosses the Cuyahoga river in downtown Cleveland. The bridge leads you directly to the baseball stadium.

Hering was educated under the great sculptor Augustus Saint Gaudens.

He studied in Paris from 1898 to 1901 at the Ecole des Beaux Arts. On his return he became an assistant to Saint Gaudens until 1907, then began his solo career.

Hering’s projects also include the pediment on The Cleveland Orchestra’s Severance Hall and elaborate, Parisian-influenced scenes on Chicago’s Michigan Avenue bridge towers. R

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Left, The Guardians of Traffic being created and below, as they appear today.

Below middle, sculptures on Chicago’s Michigan Avenue bridge towers.

Bottom left, the pediment of Severance Hall, Cleveland.

Artist of the Past

L The Guardians of Traffic in Cleveland.

Photo Courtesy of V1DroneMedia

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Artist of the Present

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Karen Koblitz

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aren Koblitz is a Los Angeles-based artist and an Associate Professor Emerita, University of Southern California, where she was on faculty for over 20 years.

She holds a BFA from California College of Arts & Crafts (now the California College of the Arts) and an MFA from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, both degrees with an emphasis in ceramics. She also studied in Osaka, Japan, and Florence, Italy.

Solo exhibitions include Earth Tones (2009) and Facing East (2007) at the L2kontemporary Gallery in Los Angeles. Her one-woman exhibition, Patterns of Influence (2004), was held at the All Russian Museum of Decorative, Applied and Folk Arts, in Moscow, Russia. Karen’s work has been featured in national and international group exhibitions throughout the United States and in Australia, Azerbaijan, Canada, Czech Republic, Ireland, Italy, Russia, Switzerland, Turkey and Uzbekistan.

Tiled mural commissions include Hava Nashira: Come Let Us Sing (2013), Temple Isaiah, Los Angeles; Si Se Puede: A Tribute to Cesar Chavez (2011), Santa Fe Springs (Calif.) Public Library; and nonFICTION, the Cerritos (Calif.) Public Library.

She has lectured at the USC Pacific Asia Museum, Pasadena, Calif. (2015); Bezalel Academy of Art and Design in Jerusalem (2010); J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles (2004); and The American Center, Moscow, Russia (2002). Grants include a U.S. Department of State Cultural Envoy Grant, Umm El Fahem, Israel (2010); USC Advancing Scholarship in Humanities and Social Sciences Grant, Azerbaijan (2008); Durfee Foundation Grant, Los Angeles (2004, 2007); and Alumni Achievement Award, University of Wisconsin (2002) Karen’s work is in the permanent collections of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; the Renwick Gallery of American Art of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.; the Contemporary Museum, Honolulu, Hawaii; the Charles A. Wustum Museum, Racine, Wis.; and the Fuller Craft Museum, Brockton, Mass. She is featured in numerous magazines and books including the Masters of Earthenware by Matthias Ostermann; Susan and Jan Peterson’s The Craft & Art of Clay; World Contemporary Ceramic Art by Zhang Yushan (China); and Craft in America: Celebrating Two Centuries of Artists and Objects by Jo Lauria.

For more information, please visit KarenKoblitz.com

My Obsession Series #2, 1998, 8.75” ht. x 14”w x 14”d, earthenware clay.

Column #6 – Italian, 1991, 27.25”ht. x 11”w x 11”d, earthenware clay.

Bpak (Marriage), 2005, 12.5”ht x 21”w x 15.5”d, earthenware clay.

Artist of the Present

L Globalization #3, 2001, 18”ht x 11”w x 9”d, earthenware clay.

Globalization #5, 2001, 15.25”ht x 9”w x 9.75”d, earthenware.

Orvieto Red Rooster Lunette, 1994, 23”ht x 41.5”w x 7”d, earthenware clay. Permanent collection of the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC.

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Gina’s Journey: Tree of Life for my Daughter, 1996, 30.75”ht x 24.25”w x 5.75”d, earthenware clay.

Cultural Diplomacy, , 2015, 13”ht x 16.5”w x 12.5”d, soda fired stoneware.

R&R October 2021 LA Landmark Series – Venice, Watts Towers, Beverly Hills, 2004, 11” diameter each, maiolica ceramics, designed by Karen Koblitz, produced by the Grazia Factory, Deruta, Italy.

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Artist of the Present

L Si Se Puede: A Tribute to Cesar Chavez, 2010-2011, 4 ft. ht x 55 feet w x 6”d, handmade and glazed tile, earthenware clay. Permanent Installation in the garden of the Santa Fe Springs Library, Santa Fe Springs, CA. This mural celebrates Cesar Chavez’s dedication to education, literacy and the environment.

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Sunland-Tujunga Public Library bench, 1995, 25”ht x 8 ft w x seat depth 18”, hand-painted/glazed commercial tile floated on a cement bench, earthenware paver tiles, Sunland Tujunga, CA. . The theme of the bench is the natural Sunland-Tujunga wash area, featuring indigenous flora and fauna.

R&R October 2021 Hava Nashira (Come Let Us Sing), 2013, 6 ft ht x 21 ft w x 1”d, handmade and hand painted commercial tile. Temple Isaiah, Los Angeles, CA. This commissioned work was created in honor of the temple’s Cantor, Evan Kent, who retired after 25 years of leading the congregation in song. Temple Isaiah, Los Angeles, CA.

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An Identity with No Hyphen

Excerpt

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W hen Nicole Draffen contends that hyphenation creates separation, she’s not referring to the punctuation mark itself but rather the underlying meaning of putting people’s ethnicity before their nationality. This, she explains, “all too often is used divisively to compartmentalize and marginalize.”

Learn more in this excerpt from Hyphened-Nation: Don’t Check the Box, reprinted with permission from the author.

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hether it’s African-American or African American, Asian-American or Asian American, Hispanic or Latino or whatever, to live your life as a hyphenated American or with some other label thrust upon you is to not be put into a category with others that you may have something in common with; it is to be put into a box that separates you from those who, for whatever reason, need you to be separate.

Instead of serving as a racial identifier of the colored tile in the so-called mosaic of America you belong to, it identifies you as something that doesn’t quite belong in the picture of America that those with the real power have long seen as the real America. It is equivalent to saying, “Stay back! You are almost an American, but not completely, because of your ethnicity.”

How shameful it is that in America I am categorized by my race first, nationality second? I am an American – period! I have had countless conversations with family and friends regarding this subject. Some believe the hyphen is a reminder of our cultural roots, of our African ancestors, kidnapped and forced into servitude, and that African American honors them, and we should not sever that link. However, as I have never stepped foot on African soil, nor would an actual African ever think of me as African, why am I forced to accept the label?

And what is African anyway? Egypt is in Africa. So is Burki-

na-Faso, Morocco, Madagascar, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. There are 54 countries on the continent, with 3,100 ethnic groups speaking more than 2,100 languages.

What about people born in Africa of Caucasian ethnicity?

Are they forced to call themselves “European- Africans” if they have never set foot in Europe? America is a nation of immigrants. Every person in America, excluding indigenous people, is the descendant of an immigrant who arrived here after 1500.

The only people who are not compelled to hyphenate their nationality or adopt some other label that puts ethnicity before nationality are of Caucasian European descent. Does that make sense?

Yes, I genuinely believe that in terms of the opportunity to achieve dreams and be successful, America is unbeatable.

But the hurdles people of color must overcome to make those dreams are beset with inequities that riddle most of our institutions, whether they are educational, political, or economic.

Atop that list of inequities is the issue of identity, of self-determination. What is the toll on people who yearn and strive for their piece of the American dream, but who are considered not as Americans, but only partly Americans, the second part of that hyphenated term? At what point do they start believing that and acting, or not acting, accordingly?

Q&A with the Author: Nicole Draffen

derstand and would never have understood had I not traveled and lived among my global friends. I initially wrote this book Q: Nicole, you describe yourself as a builder, fixer and chal- to benefit my nieces and nephews to ensure they understood that travel provides you with the opportunity to understand lenger. What do you mean by that? the world with a much broader perspective. I was compelled to A: I love tearing things apart to understand them, and then write; I couldn’t get my experiences out of my head until I put try to prove or disprove their merit. This allows me to move them on paper. through life with an air of certainty about what I know, and also what I don’t know. So naturally when I lived abroad, the social Q: So this awareness kicked in, you felt compelled to write and cultural consciousness of the people I met, and the things about it, and then what happened?

I observed inspired my natural inclination to understand and study the value of cultural norms. The more I traveled overseas, A: I learned how important it is to speak our truth: I erased so the more I grew to understand certain aspects of the American much and wrote and rewrote my book based on a fear of what perception of culture. My journeys inspired me to write a book. other people would think. When I finally stopped concentrating on other people’s reactions, and just wrote, I was able to Q: In Hyphened-Nation: Don’t Check the Box, you say that hyphen- really begin my story. ated and even non-hyphenated descriptors, such as African-American and Asian American, serve to separate people rather than unite them.

When did you become aware of this?

Q: You’ve said that this concept of America being a hyphened-nation almost feels non-relevant.

But it’s actually important, isn’t it?

A: Without the hyphenation, a person would get to know you as a fellow American rather than an other-American. You’re not other, and you’re not confined to the boxes that institutions attempt to restrict you in. I lived that experience and it was an epiphany.

A: Running plays a lead role in my backstory. I always wanted to travel, but I’m the kind of person who prefers traveling with purpose.

Running gave me that purpose and the Snowdonia Marathon in Wales, UK, gave me the opportunity.

It only took a very short while during that vacation to realize that people did not interact with me in a way that was mindful of the color of my skin. They reacted to me merely because I was American, and of course, that was only when I spoke. To the reader, this concept may sound so simplistic to the point it almost feels non-relevant. However, as an American person of color, it is the most relevant and soul-enriching situation to be in. I was seen as an American, not a Hyphenated-American, and that is a momentous statement. That short vacation led to a year-long exodus living in the United Kingdom.

A: The movement encourages Americans to shed the hyphen.

All people deserve to experience self-definition, unfettered by a hyphen. The battle cry is: Remember! You. Define. YOU. The name of the movement is Don’t Check the Box, which is the subtitle of my book.

Q: What led you to take the next steps and write a book?

Q: What’s next for you?

A: It hearkens to one very well-used saying: “The trouble is that once you see, you can’t unsee it. Once you’ve seen it, keeping quiet, saying nothing, becomes as political an act as speaking out. There’s no innocence. Either way you’re accountable.”

I grew to understand that the world outside of the United States was, in many ways, more advanced in their treatment of their countrymen. I understood this in a way that I did not un-

A: I have an entire book in my head just based on the stories and experiences people have shared with me from living in a hyphened-nation.

Q: Hyphened-Nation was published in 2020 followed by an audio book that came out in June of this year. Now, there’s an actual grassroots social movement based on the ideas in the book.

Please talk about that.

Nicole’s book is available on Amazon in print, on Kindle and on Audible. For more information, visit the Hyphened-Nation website or Facebook page.

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Memoir

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A Brief and Impactful Life For months, experienced medical professionals — including two teams of ER doctors — failed to provide a definitive reason for baby Braeden’s neck discomfort or his slow motor development, increasing irritation, skin blotches and, eventually, difficulty swallowing and breathing. Even the “superhero team of doctors” at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles were unsure what was wrong with Braeden until an MRI revealed a rare condition: an inoperable tumor that encircled his spinal cord where the neck vertebrae met the bottom of his skull. The following is an excerpt from a yet-to-be-published memoir by Braeden’s father.

BY JEFF BOND

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n October 3, 2008, our son Braeden died of complications from a tumor that had grown at the base of his skull.

Braeden and his brother Logan were fraternal twins, conceived in vitro, and they were our first children. To this date, Logan is alive and healthy — incredibly, incredibly healthy. But my wife Brooke and I still think of Braeden every day.

There’s no doubt that when I started writing this remembrance, I was so stricken by what had happened that I think I was trying to extend Braeden’s life in a way that we and his

doctors were never able to do. I found myself living and reliving moments at Cedars-Sinai where he spent the last six weeks of his life. We experienced incredible hope and despair there, but Braeden was alive and while he was alive, we always had hope.

A good friend made a point to say how sorry he was about what had happened to Brooke and me. I gave my glib, standard response: a rueful “So are we.” But later I thought that in trying to give us comfort, people — including our grief counselor — sometimes got the emphasis wrong. What happened didn’t happen to

us, it happened to Braeden. And the pain that we feel isn’t so much for what we went through as it is for what he endured.

We miss him, we feel he was robbed and, at the same time, I’m unimaginably proud of the way he lived his short life.

Braeden never spoke, so maybe what I want to do most with this story is to speak for Braeden and somehow get across that he was a person. And before he died at 11 months of age, I think in a way he became a man.

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vocal patterns long before Logan was and his voice had a beautiful cooing sound to it.

It’s hard to remember when we started noticing problems with Braeden. He may have been bigger, but he lagged behind Logan who started holding his head up or getting into crawling position. Braeden would fuss if he had to hold his head up for more than a few minutes at a time and just seemed more content to be still and quiet.

There was something soulful about Braeden. Our nanny Alison said she had never seen a baby who always seemed so deep in thought as Braeden. As early as late February, there’s a photo of Braeden where he just looks forlorn and sad — not fussy like a baby, hungry or angry — just deeply sad and lost. But around the same time he began really smiling, reacting to our presence, and to see him smile was almost unbearably joyful.

Brooke and I had the boys on November 13, 2007 — after a long time trying. They were premature and they each had their problems. Logan wasn’t digesting well, and Braeden had trouble breathing but that concern lasted only a day or so and then he seemed to be doing fine.

Logan was tiny compared to Braeden, who looked almost like a full-term infant. Logan was red and shriveled and he looked like Yoda. But even early on, Logan By late March, Logan was regularly holding showed himself to be the rambunctious kid his head up while on his stomach and clearly he would grow up to be. He had a lot of en- As Braeden grew older, getting ready to crawl. Braeden still appeared ergy and one day, while dwarfed by his incu- sometimes at night we’d hear nowhere near doing either of those things. bator, he managed to wriggle his way from He looked big, healthy and happy, though, him chattering to himself. and our pediatrician and a number of other the middle of it all the way to the headboard, something the nurses said they’d never seen He was experimenting with sources assured us kids developed differently. a child his size do. sounds and vocal patterns Logan and Braeden weren’t identical so there It was amazing how the boys had two towas no reason to expect them to develop at long before Logan was and the same rate. My parents often asked about tally different personalities. Braeden was just a big goofball. I started calling him Crazy his voice had a beautiful it, and Brooke and I would defensively assure Guggenheim after the comedy character on them that the kids were fine and perfectly cooing sound to it. the old Jackie Gleason Show who made all sorts normal. of wacky facial expressions. Braeden’s eyes Brooke and I had high hopes for Braeden would roll, he had a new expression seemingly and Logan’s relationship as brothers, although every minute, and he was fat, happy and content. By contrast, the first few months they didn’t interact because their eyes Logan seemed fragile, like a wizened old gnome. weren’t able to focus on each other easily. But as Logan beOver the next few months the boys grew, and we were less came more active and Braeden didn’t, it became even harder worried about them. Braeden’s head was so perfectly round, he to find a moment when they really acknowledged one another. looked like the comic strip character Charlie Brown. Logan still With enough support, Braeden could sit up in the cradle of his had a little bit of a troll look to him, but he began to vocalize a “bouncy” exercise chair or in a circular, foam rubber baby chair. lot. We started calling him Logie and we would swear we could Their Aunt Marleen had given the boys wooden footstools with hear him say “Logie!” or “Hi!” although he didn’t speak actual removable block letters built into them that spelled each of words until much later. Braeden too jabbered adorably. their names. If we sat Braeden into his foam rubber chair, he It was exhausting taking care of two children and every day could sit at the stool as if it was a desk or table, and spread out it seemed we would just barely make it until we put the boys his toys. to bed. Logan always threw a fit when he went into his crib, One day, when Logan could sit up by himself, we sat him but for Braeden it seemed like the happiest part of the day. next to Braeden at his little stool to videotape the boys togethHis face would light up in a trusting, beatific smile as he would er. Logan was looking at the camera and laughing, but I could look up at us and then he would take one arm and curl his little see Braeden occasionally sneaking glances over at his brother, blanket around his shoulders, roll over onto his side and sleep. a joyful smile playing across his face as if he were delighted by As Braeden grew older, sometimes at night we’d hear him the sight. chattering to himself. He was experimenting with sounds and Then Logan lost his balance and toppled over. He fussed

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and tried to right himself, annoyed and irritated. Braeden had three little toys on the stool and he watched his brother for a moment, unsure how to react. Then he tentatively held out one of the toys toward Logan, as if the gift might make his brother feel better and stop his crying. When Logan righted himself and crawled toward his brother, Braeden reached down and pushed all three of his toys off the stool to fall in front of Logan. His movements, so tentative and fragile that they might have been missed, seemed like such a touching, selfless gesture coming from an infant only a few months old.

Memoir

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In June, we enrolled the boys in a daycare. Right away, Logan took to the infant environment, which was filled with padded risers and obstacles, while Braeden understandably didn’t engage in a lot of activity. He couldn’t do much on his own. But Braeden appeared to be making progress. He could sit up and play with toys on his stool and, when he was lying on his stomach, he started pushing himself up on his hands and raising his head.

The kids were good sleepers once we had them in their own room, but one night we were awakened by an ear-piercing shriek from Braeden. The sound was truly terrifying, starting low and rising to a shattering scream. We attributed it to a nightmare, but it happened several more times and seemed to be an omen of something worrisome.

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By July, Braeden’s neck discomfort began to become pronounced and the boys were recommended to a cranial expert for plagiocephaly, a condition in which twins develop asymmetrical skulls from being pressed into different positions in the womb or spending too much time on their backs. By this time, Braeden often cried when he was made to sit up, and he no longer liked his bouncy chair. Logan was really crawling now — sometimes he would crawl right over Braeden in their playpen — but Braeden seemed more and more immobile.

Brooke, who was always concerned about Braeden, remained convinced he had some sort of health problem even though doctor visits always produced the same verdict: the kids were healthy and growing.

When we saw the skull specialist, we mentioned Braeden’s stiff neck and he demonstrated that Braeden had full range of motion and recommended exercises to loosen up his neck muscles. We would lay Braeden on his back and slowly, gently move his head all the way from side to side, but it was clear that when he looked to his left side it was painful for him.

One way to calm the boys down when they were fussing was to take them for a walk or put them in the back yard in

their car seats. They loved being outside. But now, taking Braeden outside started having the opposite effect. His eyes would water and his nose would run; he would cry and fuss terribly. It seemed obvious he had developed some kind of allergy, but early tests showed nothing. And, more and more, Braeden would get strange reddish blotches on his face and body, especially his stomach, often when he was feeding. The blotches looked almost like a scale pattern or cobblestone, but again no one could pin this symptom down to anything specific.

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I took Braeden and Logan to Cranial Technologies to be measured for the plastic helmets that would reshape their little heads to be more symmetrical. The place was full of toys and distractions to keep babies occupied while they were measured and fitted. Logan sat up while attendants distracted him with a spinning light toy as he was photographed; then an elastic stocking was put over his head while he was laser-scanned.

When it came time to do the same with Braeden, he was redfaced and crying so much that most of the photographs couldn’t be taken properly and he could wear the stocking for only a moment.

As the summer wore on, it became increasingly difficult to keep Braeden happy. We continued his neck exercises, which were agonizing for him, but the doctors assured us his neck muscles would loosen up and he’d be in less pain as long as we exercised him regularly.

For all the discomfort he was in, Braeden kept things together in his own way. He had an eye for detail and would hold his toys and books and carefully examine them. And he seemed to know that we were watching him expectantly, looking for signs that he was going to start moving more. He would roll himself over on his stomach on the floor or in his crib, get his little arms underneath his body and push himself up and look around, always wearing a big smile of accomplishment when he caught our eye.

I felt like he was doing this entirely for our benefit. He wasn’t comfortable moving around a lot, but it was as if he knew it would make us happy so that made him happy.

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A few weeks before Braeden was hospitalized he had started a very interesting kind of verbal communication, something Logan wouldn’t master until much, much later. He would chatter to himself often and sometimes say something to the effect of “Bop bop bop bop bop.” My parents had seen him doing it in a videotape we’d made of him playing with a ball and were certain he was saying “ball,” but as cool as I thought that sounded I didn’t think he was there yet. But one day he again repeated “bop” five times.

I caught his eye and also said, “Bop bop bop bop bop.” Braeden looked at me in this searching, almost surprised way, then frowned and concentrated and repeated “Bop bop bop bop bop” back to me. It was a game, but for someone just 9 months old, it seemed sophisticated, especially with the look that Braeden gave me. The look somehow seemed to say, “Why is he doing this? What will he do if I repeat that back to him?”

In Braeden’s first hospital room, before he was moved to the pediatric intensive care unit (PICU), I read to him and a number of times we played this game, repeating “bop” to each other. I didn’t know it then, but this would be one of the last times I would hear my son’s voice.

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In his first few days in the PICU, before the chemotherapy that ultimately didn’t work, I started to see something in him that I had never seen before. He was becoming a soldier, a fighter. With the feeding tubes and all the blood tests, electrocardiogram and other sensors attached to him, Braeden was regularly poked and prodded.

Now when doctors or nurses entered the room, I would see him look at them with an alert, wide-eyed scowl, a fight-orflight war face I had never seen on such a young child before.

It was a look that seemed to say, “You touch me one more time with that thing and I will kick your ass!”

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After three weeks in the hospital and treatments to reduce his tumor that were initially successful, Braeden went into septic shock from an infection and never regained consciousness. We spent three weeks conferring with doctors who very gradually acclimated us to the realization that he would not recover from the infection. Brooke and I always discussed how we felt as if Braeden in some way exercised control over his own destiny, and that he hanged on tenaciously to life after his infection, almost as if he was giving us the time to adjust to the reality of his condition. Ultimately, in October 2008, we had to make the decision to take him off life support.

In June of 2013, we had a third child, Veronica, who has grown to be her own startlingly unique personality. But in the first year of her life, Veronica looked amazingly like Braeden.

That first year, felt like some kind of cosmic do-over, watching a child who looked so much like the one we’d lost, but this one growing and thriving free of pain and debilitation. We will always feel that there’s some part of Braeden in Veronica and in Logan, his fraternal twin.

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Travel

On September 17, 2004, Joyce Falko arrived in Shanghai to visit her husband, Steve, who was there on a four-month assignment for General Motors.

Veteran travelers, the couple soon took off to explore other parts of China. Here is an excerpt from Steve’s log about their whirlwind visit to Beijing.

Beijing The Square, the Forbidden City and, a Dream Come True, the Wall

BY STEVE FALKO

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e left for the airport early Tuesday morning and by around noon we had checked into our hotel in Beijing and were eating lunch. I had arranged for a driver and a guide to be available to us for the three short days we would be here. Early in the planning stages of the trip I determined, correctly as it turned out, that the extra cost would be offset by the convenience and an ability to see and do more in the limited time available. I was trying to make things as comfortable as I could for Joyce, who was still jet lagged and recovering from the 20-hour trip over here.

I had a more difficult time deciding on a hotel. GM gets a very attractive rate at the Sheraton Great Wall. I have stayed there before and it’s OK. But there was a new Marriott that I imagined would be better. It cost about twice as much and not having been there, I had no way to gauge if this would be a good

value. When we checked in, the desk clerk mentioned that due to overbooking, our room was being upgraded. I generally stay at Marriotts when I travel, and I am with them enough that receiving upgrades is not uncommon to me. However, getting bumped up into a two-story penthouse suite is. I have never stayed in a suite this large. Two giant bedrooms with walk-in closets, three baths, one with a sunken hot tub, a full kitchen, a lovely formal dining room and a living room filled with overstuffed furniture. I guess it turned out to be an OK value.

The guide, a Mr. Xue Liang Wang, picked us up again around 12:30. That afternoon, we visited first Tiananmen Square, then the Forbidden City.

I have neither the desire nor the ability to turn this into a straight-up tour guide. But I’ve learned a few things that I won’t possibly remember if I don’t write them down. Actually, and

quite sadly, probably not even then. In any case, the following information is an amalgamation of stuff I learned from our guide, from the various guidebooks I have, and from my good friend Google. Any errors are, of course, not my fault. They are most assuredly due to someone else doing something incorrectly.

Tiananmen means The Gate of Heavenly Peace. Tiananmen Square is a modern creation. China is not a place where large public gathering places are traditional or common. The Square is huge. Nearly a kilometer long, it covers 440,000 square meters or more than 100 acres. It is worth noting that these 108 or so open acres are located smack in the middle of one of the largest cities in the world.

At the north end of the Square is Tiananmen Tower. Tower construction began, along with the rest of the Forbidden City, in 1417 during the Ming Dynasty. The Square was the front door of the Forbidden City. Until 1911, when the last feudal kingdom was overthrown, imperial offices that were a part of the Forbidden City occupied the area. No one could enter the Tower except for the royal family and aristocrats. Construction of the square broke down some of the walls of the Forbidden City.

A granite Monument to the People’s Heroes is located at the center of the Tiananmen Square. Built in 1952, it is supposedly the largest monument in China’s history. It is inscribed “The People’s Heroes are Immortal,” which was written by Chairman Mao. On the west of the Square is the Great Hall of the People. Also, built in the ’50s, it is the site of the China National People’s Congress meetings. This is not a small place.

The Great Auditorium behind the central hall seats 10,000, the banquet hall has 5,000 seats. I can almost hear the announcement, “Wen Jiabao, party of 5,000, your tables are ready.”

The Mao Zedong Memorial Hall is at the south side of the Square. Chairman Mao’s body lies in a crystal coffin here. I guess I’m pretty lucky. I got to visit Lenin’s tomb in the ’90s, and Mao’s in the ’00s.

After zigzagging our way through a mile or so of Tiananmen, it was time to enter the Forbidden City. As everyone knows, I seldom stop talking, so I’ll have more words following this paragraph. But in a word — WOW! Forbidden City was built for the exclusive use of the emperor. And his wives. And concubines.

It’s good to be the emperor. Construction started in 1417 – 75 years before “Columbus sailed the ocean blue.” For nearly 500 years, from 1421 until 1912, 24 emperors of the Ming and Qing Dynasties ruled China from inside the Forbidden City.

The complex as it currently exists covers over 180 acres.

Not including the moat. Surrounded by a thick, high wall that is in turn surrounded by a moat as wide as a river, Forbidden City is one of the largest and best-preserved palace complexes in the world. It is magnificent. Incredible as it is, the place used to be even bigger than this – remember that portion of it was turned into part of Tiananmen Square If you’ve seen the movie The Last Emperor, you have seen

a lot of this place. The movie was filmed on location in the palace. I understand the film is not a paragon of historical accuracy, even by Hollywood standards. But it is beautiful to look at and shows more of the grounds than we had time to see. Although there weren’t thousands of splendidly attired servants, guards and advisors when we were there, there were thousands of tourists.

The child the movie portrays is Hsuan Tung (P’u Yi). He was the last emperor from the Qing Dynasty, which ruled from 1644 until 1912 when, having just turned 6 years old, he was forced to abdicate. This ended about 2,000 years of Chinese royal rule.

This entire, amazing, beautiful place was built for the personal use of the emperor and his wives. And concubines. Can’t forget the concubines. And it turns out that this isn’t the only place the emperors used to hang — there is a Summer Palace that we will see in a day or two.

I did not bother to count but supposedly, at least at one time, the Forbidden City’s room count reached 9,999. This is either because nine was a lucky number, or because there were 10,000 rooms in the palace in heaven and it would have been disrespectful to have the same number of rooms. Or both. Or neither. Conflicting information abounds here. In any given instance, I am not particularly convinced that the locals know the one true story or even that there IS one true story to be known.

There are over a million rare and valuable objects in the Museum that used to be F.C. Interestingly, many objects are on display with little or no protection from the elements. This is at once wonderful and disturbing to me. It is great getting to see and often touch rare and ancient artifacts. But they won’t last if this continues.

Fortunately for me, when we returned for the evening, Joyce was pretty tired. We had walked 10 or 15 miles and I was beat. So, after free drinks and apps from the hospitality suite, we soaked in the tub for an hour or so. We then elected to have room service delivered to “our” beautiful dining room. Average food but nice surroundings and GREAT company. I am trying not to type, “I really, really, really missed Joyce and am really, really, really glad she is here” every other sentence.

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The next day, we did not have much scheduled: Just a visit to the Ming Tombs, followed by a several-kilometer walk between the 18 pairs of giant stone statues that line the sacred path.

Then a break for lunch, followed by a visit to a jade factory and a visit the unrestored Huanghua section of the wall. Finally, after a beautiful drive through the mountain countryside and several picturesque villages, we would see the reconstructed Mutianyu portion of the wall.

Well OK, maybe that schedule was a bit aggressive. But we did it and it could not have been done any better. The weather

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Travel We entered the Huanghua wall through this gentleman’s private property, he charged admission to pass through his yard. At the time 2 yuan was worth about twenty cents. The smallest bill I had was a 20, worth a little less than 2 bucks. I told him (via the interpreter, of course) that I would gladly let him keep the change if he would let me take his picture. He had no idea why I would want his picture, saying something like he was just an unimportant peasant. Joyce takes most of our pictures because I don’t have the eye for it. Of the ones I have taken, this is one of my favorites.

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was absolutely perfect. Once we got out of Beijing, there were crystal clear cerulean blue skies, crisp mountain air, and beautiful mountainous countryside. It was around 65 F in the morning when we started and warmed to around 80 F by the afternoon.

The tomb area was very interesting. We went about 90 feet below ground to see the mausoleum of Emperor Zhu Yijun.

Above ground, we saw the Changling tomb and the Lingsi Palace, which is unique as it is the only Chinese palace made of wood, mostly camphor.

The walk along the sacred path, between the statues was very pleasant. The statues represent palace guards, elephants, camels, horses, lions and mythical animals such as unicorns, phoenix and, of course, dragons. Each of these massive stone carvings is magnificent. By the way, I find I am running out of superlatives. I guess if your culture hangs around long enough, you start to accumulate quite a pile of really cool stuff. On the other hand, there may be more to it than mere longevity. It is hard to imagine anyone holding a lifelong ambition to visit the world’s first McDonald’s, for instance, or the Old Executive Office Building in D.C., or anything currently standing in Las Vegas. Enough digression.

At the factory, I learned a bit about jade, fell in love with some pieces I cannot afford even in my dreams, and bought a few small pieces. Joyce suffered her first shopping crises of the trip. I have long held the theory that men shop while women actually fondle. This theory was formed after countless hours observing Joyce in the act of fondling. She requires time, a lot of time, to determine the perfect purchase. I tend to trot

through a store, grab whatever I am passing, and figure that is close enough. There are disadvantages to both of these styles of shopping, but at least I am back home in time to watch the game on TV. Anyway, the jade place was a storefront in a small town maybe 50 kilometers from Beijing. It looked like it might have two or three shelves of goods. It turns out the place extended back from the street for about 500 or 600 feet. There were tens of thousands of pieces of carved jade, from insignificant, roughly carved animals going for about a dollar each to huge, incredible pieces that were worth tens of thousands. Poor Joyce could not figure out where to begin. There was no time to fondle since the wall was “calling” her. She did not want to waste time shopping, but when would we be here again? What a dilemma.

After some waffling, we settled on a couple of pieces. I must admit I could have spent a few more hours there myself.

Seeing the wall has been a dream of Joyce’s for at least as long as I have known her. I would have been happy for her to have this opportunity no matter how it turned out. But if Hollywood was going to write a script about two young lovers along the wall on a perfect day, this is exactly what would have been created. Well, OK, two young-at-heart lovers.

The Huanghua was, I think, Joyce’s wall dream come true.

There was breathtaking mountain scenery, with a picturesque village nestled into the hillside. There were portions of the wall relatively intact while others were crumbled and overgrown. We were completely alone on this portion of the wall.

During our entire visit here we saw no one else. Way, way, cool!

Both times I visited the wall, I’ve been struck by how steep and inhospitable the countryside is. The mountains alone would deter me; the wall would have been redundant. I guess folks were MUCH tougher in the old days. This portion of the wall, like almost the entire wall, is completely unrestored. It amazes me that I can touch and walk on a structure that is in the vicinity of 3,000 years old. Not only are large portions of it standing, there would be even more, and in much better shape, if people had not been pillaging bricks from the wall for their own construction projects for hundreds of years.

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It was now time to head for the Mutianyu wall. Ordinarily, the driver would have headed back towards Beijing, connected with the highway, and followed the normal route from the city to the wall. We would have traveled in a 100-kilometer “U,” ending up about 40 klicks east of where we started. There are many reasons we think we were extremely fortunate in the guide we selected.

Mr. Wang was quite willing to work with us, exceptionally knowledgeable and remarkably interesting to listen to. Since we had no input into his selection, meeting him was pure serendipity.

But the number one reason we were delighted with Mr. Wang turned out to be the fact that, unlike many Chinese, he prefers to spend his free time traveling around the countryside. He has spent countless hours exploring the woods and fields north of Beijing and he knew of a shortcut. Would we like to try it?

You don’t have to know Joyce or myself very well to guess the answer to that question. We spent the next hour or so on narrow mountain roads that rose and dipped and curved over rushing rivers, through claustrophobic tunnels and clung precariously to the hillsides. We got to see the local farmers harvesting walnuts and chestnuts. We drove through several tiny mountain villages where, among other sights, we witnessed a unique method of threshing grain. It was placed on the road for vehicles to run over. For me at least, this portion of the trip rivaled seeing the wall again, and would not have been possible had we not been lucky enough to meet Mr. Wang.

Fortunately for us, our final stop of the day, the Mutianyu wall, has been reconstructed. This is fortunate because part of the refurbishment includes a cable car that runs to the top of the wall, eliminating the need to climb the thousand steps.

I am reliably informed that what is called the thousand steps actually consists of a mere 455. At this point in our travels, that was probably 454 more than I was ready to tackle. Even while on the wall, one is constantly climbing up and down steps or going up or down ramps. The longest level stretch that I have seen can’t be longer than 100 feet. So we paid a few extra yuan and sat in a car, arriving at the center of the rebuilt wall rested and ready to see the wall before heading back to our hotel.

Joyce and I were beat, so we spent more time in the Jacuzzi tub, then room service again. It was a great day. Really great.

Z On day three, since we had an evening flight back to Shanghai, we just had time to visit the Summer Palace, a pearl outlet, Tiantan Park (the Temple of Heaven) and a cloisonné factory before being dropped at the airport.

To me the Summer Palace makes living in the Forbidden City seem like a hardship. The buildings are similar, having been built by the same folks at about the same time. But the Summer Palace is on a hillside overlooking a good-sized lake.

And it is larger than the F.C. Wonderful gardens, a very impressive collection of bonsai, ponds, streams, fountains all in addition to beautiful buildings that were home and office to the emperor. And his wives. And, of course, the concubines.

The weather was again perfect, and we strolled the grounds for several hours until it was time for lunch and more shopping.

Although the pearl place was interesting, neither of us was particularly tempted. This was possibly because Joyce has some pretty good pearls already. In any case, we looked a bit but bought nothing. At the cloisonné factory however, poor Joyce suffered her second shopping crises. There was just too much beautiful stuff to choose from. Still, somehow she managed to buy a little.

After the Forbidden City and the Summer Palace, the Temple of Heaven seemed bit anticlimactic. It is a huge, impressive place with more fascinating construction, beautiful painting and tile work, striking statues and extraordinary marble carvings. It just did not move us the way the earlier spots did.

It could be that we were just toured out. For certain, though, I am absolutely “typed out” — for now.

by Frank Kunstel

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fter his covid recovery, Dan tried to capture it on canvas. Maybe something in black, gray and brown with a somber horizon. Not that, but maybe jagged lines and shapes in intense reds. Nope. He always painted with imagination, impressions and impulses flowing through his arm, into the brush and onto the canvas, but now it’s all inchoate. Suffering is supposed to produce great art, but the damn thing took his mother and four months of his life, and now it’s stolen his talent too.

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Stories Well Told

Travel

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hotographer Inga Smith has been taking pictures since her father gave her a Kodak Brownie camera for her 10th birthday. Now a vibrant 89, Inga has devoted herself to photography for much of her life, teaching, traveling the world and telling stories through her art.

“I combine my love affair with travel and my love affair with the camera to photograph a wide, wide range of subjects,” says Inga, a longtime resident of the Clintonville neighborhood in Columbus, Ohio. “As a self-taught photographer, I rely on my eye and my instincts to capture images I like.”

Songs of the Day SHELDON ZOLDAN

HANG ON SLOOPY Hang on & take it easy

L Rick Derringer performing you know what with The Ohio State Marching Band.

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rivia question: What is the official state rock song of Ohio? Of course, I gave the answer away. The bigger question might be why does Ohio even have its own rock song? Didn’t the state legislature have better things to do in 1985 when it passed a resolution making “Hang on Sloopy” the state’s rock song, or was that the only thing they could agree on?

Ohio, apparently, is the only state to have an official state rock song, although the State of Washington’s “unofficial” state rock song is “Louie Louie.”

Who wrote the song and who was Sloopy? Nobody knows if this version is true, but it is the most noted: Ben Berns and Wes Farrell wrote the song in the early 1960s, according to a story in Columbus Monthly magazine. They were no slouches. Berns wrote the classic “Twist and Shout.”

One story has the duo in a New York bar where Dorothy Sloop, who happened to be from Steubenville, Ohio, was playing piano. They sat with her during breaks and learned her nickname was Sloopy. When patrons began giving her a hard time during her set, the musicians yelled out “hang in there, Sloopy.” A few months later, there was a song with the same

title. A couple of years later, the McCoys, a band from Dayton, Ohio, ended up releasing the version that hit number one on the charts in October 1965.

Rick Derringer, the guitarist and singer from the McCoys, said that story is unlikely. He said Berns purchased the song from a 17-year-old kid from St. Louis and it was about no one person. That still doesn’t explain how it became Ohio’s rock song. Go back to 1965 when an arranger for the Ohio State marching band thought it was time for some untraditional marching band music and talked the director into allowing them to play “Hang on Sloopy” on Oct. 9, 1965. The song got a tepid response, but a week later it got legs and it has become a staple of every game ever since.

Fifty years later, in September 2015, Derringer performed “Sloopy” with the band.

Click here to read OHIO HOUSE CONCURRENT RESOLUTION NO. 16 Visit YouTube to hear the song.

TAKE IT EASY

Easy statue, Winslow, Arizona.

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hen Jackson Browne and Glen Frey wrote “Take It Easy,” in 1972 and the Eagles made it into a hit, little did they know they were tossing a life preserver to Winslow, Arizona, a town that had twice fallen on hard times.

The Standin’ On the Corner Foundation on September 10, 1999, dedicated Standin’ on the Corner Park, which included a mural and a life-sized bronze statue named “Easy,” inspired by the singers of the 1970s. The foundation added a statue of Glenn Frey after his death.

Winslow, in northern Arizona, once flourished as a railroad town, then as a stop along Route 66. Airlines killed the railroad and the interstate killed Route 66. Travelers skipped past the town, using Interstate 40.

It took the line, “I’m standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona and what a fine sight to see, it’s a girl, my Lord, in a flatbed Ford slowin’ down to take a look at me” to give the town a third life. The corner draws more than 100,000 people annually.

Browne started writing the song in 1971 but had trouble coming up with a second verse. Browne once was stranded in Winslow when his car broke down, but the story he told Frey was about a girl in a Toyota pickup in Flagstaff. Frey lived in an upstairs apartment and kept hearing Browne playing it, and he loved it. Browne eventually accepted Frey’s offer of help, and he came up with the “it’s a girl my lord in a flatbed Ford” line.

That’s all he added, but it’s all Browne needed to finish it.

The song ended up on the Eagles’ debut album instead of Browne’s, as originally intended. It reached number 12 on the Billboard singles chart. Browne recorded a version for his second album. Taylor Tritt recorded a version for the 1993 Eagles tribute album. The band even performed in his video. It was the first time they played together after their acrimonious breakup.

Visit YouTube to hear the Eagles’ version of the song.

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Notes

from a surly Art Director

Zits?

I’ll zap ’em!

CAN’T reTOUCH THIS

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by Ben Small Eyeglass chafing ring? I’m on it.

raphic designers are often called upon to retouch photos, that is use Photoshop to remove any factor that may diminish the attractiveness of the photo’s subject, be it a blemish on a model’s face, a telephone pole ruining a nature scene or a flea on the family mutt. Every time I look at Facebook I see someone posting a mountain waterfall with a sunset that has been so obviously and poorly manipulated it’s laughable but of course they get a lot of oohs & ahhs and a hundred Likes.

Where does a designer draw the line? Many have no line. Just look closely at a cover of a People or Us magazine, they retouch the living hell out of those celebrities. I would retouch my fair share but I wouldn’t do everything that was asked. Here are some examples of what I would and wouldn’t do, with the assistance of our very kind model.

Unwanted facial hair? I’ll mow it down.

Big old Sam Elliott stache?

No way. Take a shave before the shoot.

My basic rule is: If it’s a temporarily on you, I’ll retouch it.

If it’s permanently on you, I won’t.

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Change the hair color? No. Hair is difficult to manipulate and most times it looks fake.

Dingy teeth? I’ll whiten them but with care, they still have to look real.

Exotropic eyeballs?

Sorry, not changing that. I actually once had an editor get mad at me because I wouldn’t do this!

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