The Ash Creek Papers

There are 61 days left before the Ides of March… don’t say I didn’t warn you!

Look… if only Julius Caesar had paid heed the course of Western Civilization would have been altered. First, he would still be here. Next, Rome would still be a huge power… sandals would be OK in the work place, no confining under garments for women would still be the order of the day, the menace of Communism would never had appeared, “double coupon” days would not be limited to Wednesdays, not only would we be on the moon — there would be a Coliseum in the Sea of Tranquility (which would have been named the “Sea of Mirth, Merriment & Slaughtering of Extraterrestrials”), baseball would be played in periods instead of innings (the losing team would immediately be put to death), and Christie Brinkley would never have been allowed to marry Billy Joel.

For all you Y2K freaks who were worried about the new millennium… that pales in comparison to the power of the Ides of March.

So… wake up folks… let’s not get caught with our pants down… life as we know it may hinge on your preparations. Now go and have a pleasant day (and be sure to look both ways when you cross the street).

I think that Zack must have been in grade school and he had an assignment that related to “careers”. You know… what do you want to do when you grow up? The idea was to start the kids thinking early about career directions… prepare for the choices in course study that would support a path to this career or that.

Zack loved dinosaurs (he still loves dinosaurs… in fact, I still love dinosaurs). I made a couple of calls to Yale’s Peabody Museum & actually got to speak to the head of the Paleontology Department. He was nice enough to FAX me the course requirements for getting into the program… and then he put down a few ideas about what the career entailed… what it cost, what it paid… that sort of thing.

Lucky for Zack… at an early age he identified that, as far as dinosaurs went, he enjoyed the product of other people’s efforts; but “no thank you” to spending summers in the Utah desert with a pick and a brush, eating dust, battling flies, and sweating your balls off. “I’ll just go to the museum, watch specials on cable, or leaf thru oversized books.”

Still the question remained… what do you want to do when you grow up?

One day we were driving around town… and it hit me. Look at all the nice homes in the area. Who owned them? Not everyone is a Doctor or a Lawyer or a highfallutin’ Investment Banker. And further, not everyone went to Wharton, or graduated with a fancy degree in whatever. There were folks who made a very nice living, owned a home, a nice car… a condo in Florida and a big frigging boat… Just like Dave Smith who pumped gas at the Shell station.

Well… that’s not exactly the story. His father actually had owned the station… turned it over to Dave… and now Dave has turned it over to his sons: David, Sean and I forget the third son’s name.

None ever went past Norwalk High.

And Dave? Today he’s well tanned, works when the boys need him to fill in… he has a new girl friend, big car (several) & everything else previously alluded to.

So much for paying 35K per year to go to an Ivy School.

But this is not a story about career decisions or opportunities on Monster.com, Zack, Dave Smith, or the cost of a college education.

This is a story about an improbable appearance.

My Dad had intoned… “At the 21 Club there is always a Kriendler at the door… at Chipp there will always be a Winston at the door.” And so when I launched my career at the ripe age of 22, not knowing the difference between a “four-in-hand” and a “Windsor Knot”, I was given a simple task of greeting people when they walked into Chipp with a smile, a hello & how can we help you?

This was necessary because our salesmen only wanted to greet their customers… and they didn’t want to waste time helping a guy who was picking up his altered clothes, or selling a $10 tie when there were bigger fish to fry.

So there I stood, not knowing shit from shortcake, not recognizing one of the “Captains of Industry” (as Dad liked to call them) from some schnoerrer wannabe… and all I could think about was I hope I don’t look stupid... which of course I did (much to the amusement, I might add, of the store salesmen who were many years my senior).

Then there was the day that I greeted this customer as he entered the store. He was about my height but stouter in shape, he was wearing a medium grey herringbone 3 piece suit (and this was at a time before vests regained their popularity), a crisp white shirt with french cuffs jutting out the correct length from the suit sleeve, a white linen handkerchief folded with precision into his breast pocket, and then a subdued English print silk foulard tie to complete his attire. His hair was silver and combed straight back… and I thought, this isn’t a Captain of Industry… it had to be at least a ‘Major’ or maybe a ‘Light Colonel’…

“Good morning… may I help you?”

He gave me a good look over… made a quick assumption about who I was, and then said, “Tell your father that Mr. Hoffman is here…”

Now if either Paul or Alan were on the floor at this time, I am sure they were hard pressed to stifle their laughter…

But in short order the purpose of Mr. Hoffman’s visit was made clear. His assistant soon entered the premises carrying the tools of their trade… you see Mr. Hoffman wasn’t a customer, Mr. Hoffman was our plumber and he was responding to my Father’s call that we were having difficulty with the commode (commode? don’t you love the word commode?) in our basement stockroom.

I was told to escort Mr. Hoffman (and his assistant) to the offending toilet… we trooped downstairs… when we got down to the bathroom I figured Mr. Hoffman was going to tell his assistant what to do and then observe the handiwork. Not so.

Mr. Hoffman surveyed the scene. Then I realized that the assistant was behaving more like a “caddy” for Arnold Palmer. While Mr. Hoffman decided what “club” to use, he took off his suit coat and put it on a hanger that had been proffered for him by the assistant, he carefully took off his cufflinks putting them in his vest pocket, rolled up his shirt sleeves, loosened his English silk tie, unbuttoned the collar button, asked for his “seven iron” and then got busy fixing up the toilet…

He wasn’t long at the task. When thru, he washed his hands at the adjacent sink, buttoned his shirt, pulled up his tie, rolled down his sleeves neatly, put on his cufflinks, the assistant helped him on with his suit coat, he then checked his appearance in the mirror, putting final adjustments to the tie, combing his hair and then summoning his assistant to follow him up the stairs… It was like they were walking from the green to the next tee…

Before leaving he said to me, “Tell you father everything is in order…”

So forgive me if you catch a big warm smile on my face right now… I just love this story. And while you’re at it, ponder this… I wonder who dressed better — Mr. Hoffman, or the head of Yale’s School of Paleontology?

Guilty! Yes, I freely admit to it. Things I see, hear, taste, smell or feel today will often put me in mind of things that took place in the past. Do I live in the past? Hardly. But I do cherish the memories & I find new appreciation of the world I experience today by reflecting on the richness of what has taken place yesterday.

I was in the mood for tea. Now understand this… for much of my youth tea meant two things. First, it was the beverage to drink with Chinese food (which we did somewhat regularly). Next, if I was sick with a sore throat, Mommie Soph would prepare me the other elixir… a cup of tea with lemon and honey.

While drinking tea for me was a clearly defined event, for Mommie Soph it was a pastime. She brought to this country the Eastern European approach to consuming this hot drink. First, you drink it every day. Next, tea while put in a cup, the cup was referred to as a glass (or more specifically, a glessela… meaning a small glass, although it rarely was). Then, true to Russian/Polish custom, a piece of brick hard sugar was wedged between the teeth & the tea was sipped thru the sugar.

But as I say… one day I was in the mood for tea and I happened to be strolling the aisles of Costco looking for Claymore mines when I saw a box containing eight different flavours of herbal tea… some of the flavours actually contained some green tea. But for sure, none of the flavours represented would have been found in the Far East (New Haven’s popular Chinese Restaurant) or in Mommie Soph’s glass.

I tucked my “variety pack” of tea under my arm and headed back to work. My body ached & I couldn’t get warm… I was surrounded by wine; but the remedy at hand was my “party” box of tea. I made a selection: chamomile.

I put my bag into a steaming glass of water (yes… I actually drink my tea in an oversized wine glass). I love the soft fragrance of chamomile that fills the glass like the bouquet of a beautiful wine. The very smell begins to work its magic effect… it’s like I just stepped into an herb garden brimming with summer sun.

I sip and remember the taste… and this time I am brought back to the first time I tried Chamomile Tea… it was in the 5th floor office at Chipp and I was 20 something (an early 20 something). I picked up the tea from Charles & Co on Madison Avenue. I don’t know why I picked it up; but I lucked into a flavour that had a soothing effect on me. It wasn’t like I was a “no caffeine” freak or anything… I simply liked its slightly medicinal taste.

But there was someone in the office who did not appreciate my excursion into this herbal tea: Ada Weingreen. Ada worked part time for us, filing away the copious amount of paper records we had. She was an older woman and I loved her. She was a little blonde Irish woman… a little blonde Irish Jewish woman… and she had a brogue you could cut with a knife. Talk about anomalies! My ear is accustomed to Jewish people sounding a certain way… hearing Ada speak with that distinctive Irish lilt was as improbable as hearing Bill Cosby tell a Jewish accent joke…

Ada was powerfully proud of both her heritages. She pointed out that the Lord Mayor of Dublin at that time was Jewish, and she herself marched in the St. Patrick’s Day Parade with a small contingent of Hebrew Friends of Erin.

Ada was very well read and was delightful story teller. But the day I made Chamomile tea, she was lightening quick to tell me how she found the very smell of chamomile tea to be purely vile. I thought she was kidding.

No. The very next day I was brewing up another cup of chamomile tea, when she repeated that the smell was making her nauseous. In disbelief I questioned her, “You must be kidding, Ada…”

“No I’m in earnest. When I was a little girl and if I was sick or had an upset stomach my Mother would make me drink chamomile tea. And the very thought of drinking that tea makes me sick all over again. In fact I can’t possibly imagine that you are actually enjoying it… it would make me throw up!”

Each to his or her own, I guess. Maybe her Mother didn’t know about regular tea… with honey and lemon.

I take another sip of my tea. Smile at the warm memory of Ada. Feel the warmth of the tea beginning to restore me… the delicacy of the flavour softening the ache and the chill. I look around the room… any new objectors to chamomile tea? No. Good. Time to get serious about enjoying this glessela of tea.

Well it certainly is nice to hear from some folks… a few of the faithful have questioned putting Hitler on the same plane as humus… and rather than give a very clever and amusing retort, let me say that the list was meant to include a variety items that relate to the flexibility of how we use the word hate. Sometimes the word has to be taken more seriously than other times… in much the same way that we use the word love…

And just to show you that I’m not stingy, I am sending along a “second edition”….

ENEMIES LIST… the sequel

Guacamole It’s funny, I actually like avocado… I have a favorite “California” sandwich: avocado, bean sprouts, crisp bacon on whole wheat. But guacamole? What a horrible looking mess… something that your body produces when you have bronchitis… or something that Linda Blair threw up in the Exorcist.

Traffic This is not news to anyone who has ever driven with me. It’s not just the red lights… it’s the stop and go on the highway, or the long line at an uncooperative intersection. My road rage is confined to using colourful language in the car, and giving the appearance of “simmering”.

Books I had to read for High School English There wasn’t one single book I enjoyed reading at Hamden Hall. Moby Dick, A Tale of Two Cities, Silas Marner, The Scarlet Letter… I hated them all! I am still trying to burn them from my memory. I didn’t even like the Cliff’s Notes. Once I left Union, I started to read with an all consuming passion… one time I actually thought I was going to go back and read the “classics” that I so roundly despised as a High Schooler… but that thought passed like a bad fever.

Bad weather on a Sunday For so many of my “adult” years I have had to work on Saturday’s. It placed a higher level of importance for the weather to be “right” on the half of the weekend that I was at liberty. And “right” had to fit to the seasons… sunny and warm with puffy clouds and blue sky in the summer for the beach; crisp tinge in the air & dry for kicking in the leaves and picking pumpkins in the fall; snow beating against the windowpanes & accumulating by the ton in the winter; a fresh warmth and sun of a spring day. Anything less than the above is a disappointment.

Waiters & Waitresses who tell me their nameI mean do I sit down and tell them, “Hiya my name is Jim and I will be your patron tonight”

Roadrunner I love cartoons… the old ones, that is. Sorry Zack, I can’t get into the Japanese graphics or the primitive style of South Park. Give me Warner Bros. & Looney Tunes. But do me a big favour… kill the Roadrunner. After one episode it ceased to be funny. And it’s not like I loved the Coyote… it simply became too repetitive. Speedy Gonzales is a close second in the hateable category.

White Zinfandel You had to know this was coming. This is worse than asking for a ‘Pink Squirrel’ at a bar. True Zinfandel happens to be a heady red wine. White Zinfandel is an aberration… even in the Bible it is referred to as an “abomination” and deemed slightly worse than sodomy.

Soft mattresses I like firm, firm, firm. And a good carpeted floor in my book is pretty darn good. Soft is good for couches, shoulders and ice cream.