Binderama60for60

A Life So Far

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Get ready for some glorious over-sharing, from childhood adventures to career triumphs and tribulations, life’s hard knocks and the wisdom gained, awesome people and tales of joy. I invite you to join me as I turn a big fat calendar page on life.

March 13, 2025 – March 12, 2026

  • 45|60 Fraternity Days

    45|60 Fraternity Days

    I spent four years as an active brother in the Kappa Sigma Fraternity, Lambda Sigma Chapter at James Madison University. I made bonds that will last a lifetime, some on the deepest of levels. It’s proven to be one of the most consequential decisions of my life.

    It was everything the 80s were: loud, confusing, euphoric, conflicted. Lots of shiny day-glo, acid-washed, hair-gelled, synthesized fun. Thanks to Kappa Sig I learned much, lessons that I conjure on the daily. Sometimes fondly, sometimes with a wince. Sometimes wondering how I am still alive.

    There was leadership and governance, camaraderie, honor, community, trust and friendship. Competition. Charity. Humility. Avarice. Racism and homophobia. Misogyny. Bodily functions, odors, casual nudity, purposeful nudity and some real freaky-deakies. Prigs, pies and rednecks, rockstars, sports stars, Reaganites and Prince wannabes, There was chew, smokes, ledge beers, tequila shots and hairy buffaloes, medicinal shampoos, cheap cologne, lines, rails, tabs, hits, boomers, inhalants and activities that only started after 2AM.

    Ready for some 80s? If not, turn back now. Serious.
    Photo courtesy of Tracy Toth

    This was five years after “Animal House.” I saw it when I was in the 8th grade. The film was a boon for the Greek system: recruitment soared. It was also a curse: chivalry and decorum suffered. Gratuitous 70/80s-style indulgence and male chauvinism saw an opening and went for it. Through the lens of the time, it made sense and was pretty awesome. No apologies. Okay a few.

    Until recently–and honestly until this 60|60 exercise–I didn’t fully appreciate the value of my Kappa Sigma experience. But as I’ve looked back and mapped the journey, I see that this place and time made a HUGE impression on my beliefs, ethics and loyalties, for better and worse.

    DISCLAIMER: Some Guardrails

    Fraternities are based on trust and a level of secrecy and discretion. So for this post, I won’t name names in any matter that might shade someone’s reputation. Like when XXXXXXXXXXXXX and XXXXXXXXXXXXXer brought XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX to the house along with some XXXXXXXXX XXXXXXX and XXXXXXX until XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXX Oh, man. That was a night!

    Another disclaimer: I also shared some drafts of this piece with a few KS brothers. Some of their feedback led to edits. My choice.

    The Best Friends You Can Buy for $75

    That was the what a semester’s dues was back then, including a cut for Nationals. It covered brotherhood and rituals, parties and beer. Yeah, sometimes we had to pass the hat, but our accounting-nerd CFOs could really stretch a beer dollar.

    At JMU back then, Greek Row was on campus and governed by the university. The houses stretched along a walkway, uniform and dormitory-like, each housing 28 students. Several houses–two, three or four–connected into a single structure; Sig Ep was easily accessible through the fire door.

    Each house had a communal room downstairs, maybe 1000-1200 square feet, with a small kitchen and a few side rooms for fraternal activities and storage. It was the kind of utilitarian space that you could hose down without worry and where the ceiling tiles were gone a month into every semester. There was raw wood wainscoting around the perimeter, topped with a drink ledge. The 3-tap bar and DJ booth were also wood, finished with some Kappa Sig branding.

    XXXXXXXXXXXXXXand I painted several of the walls. We did a mural at the entrance to the room, a take on the Kappa Sigma rush poster: “The most wanted man on campus.” Another, spread across a 40-50 foot wall, was inspired by the label of Virginia Gentlemen, a local bourbon. It had a Colonial Virginia vibe and was pretty cool, I must say. I imagine it’s still there, buried behind 40 years of paint.

    The Row backed up to the “shore” of Newman Lake, the burial site of countless couches, mattresses, several pairs of spent Vans, and likely a bit of evidence. Swimming was discouraged, though some souls were dispatched into the deep involuntarily.

    We took our meals at the campus dining hall(s). Brothers, little sisters and pledges sat together at a few 10-top tables in one corner of D-hall. Most every meal featured plates of french fries for sharing. We were close to the milk dispenser. Further from the salad bar.

    Why?

    As a freshman, at 18, I felt like a loner, awkward. I didn’t mix well. I knew hardly anyone at JMU. I needed and wanted to break out of my shell. Joining a fraternity seemed like one way to do that.

    In the summer before my freshman year, I worked with XXXXXXXXXX. He was Yogi Bear to my Captain Caveman at Kings Dominion. He talked up the fraternity life and invited me to visit the house when I got to campus for freshmen orientation. Seemed like nice guys, most all from Virginia and the mid-Atlantic. I “rushed” at other houses too. Each had a vibe but I felt most at home at Kappa Sig.

    It was a fateful decision and I still question it 40 years later. College is the time to experiment and explore, to take risks and grow. I aspired to be creative, to push myself outside a comfort zone. To live a purposeful Beat life, whatever that meant.

    On the surface, joining a fraternity seems anathema to that: I would travel in a pack, have a limited group of friends and connections and a more ritualized schedule. And free-thinking is not always a virtue in the cloistered cast of a fraternity.

    At the time, my want for acceptance and belonging outweighed all that. I wanted Animal House.

    “Chug, Pledge!”

    I juggled a lot that first semester, living away from home and adjusting to new freedoms and myriad temptations. Oh right, and school, aka, academics. My first-semester’s 2.3 GPA wasn’t something to be proud of. Pledging a fraternity demands a lot of time and focus, and it’s a damn sexy mistress for a geeky teenager. My Dad seemed okay with the trade-off.

    Hell Night

    At the end of pledging comes Hell Night. It’s had plenty of portrayals in popular culture and, occasionally, in tragic news stories. We pledges had no idea what to expect. None. Just check your inhibitions at the door. Do what you are told.

    I had the time of my life. Gonna try to be discreet here. There was alcohol, chanting and singing, screaming, mild hazing and humiliation, a dip in an ice-cold stream, more alcohol, friends and brothers, little sisters, nudity, autographs signed on various anatomies, Polaroids, nipples and peanut butter. And a whole lot of laughing, hugging and a few bruises. Like emerging from a cocoon, it was revelatory.

    Stardusters

    There were young women who liked us enough to want to be little sisters, an auxiliary chapter to the fraternity chapter. They were called Stardusters, after a song penned by brother Hoagie Carmichael (Beta-Theta, Indiana U., 1925). This was a spirited bunch, staunchly loyal to the brotherhood, and really more like family (I never had sisters). They were ever-present at meals and gatherings, they planned parties and cheered on brothers. They also kept the otherwise-unbridled Paco Rabanne-drenched-machismo from becoming too suffocating.

    I’m not supposed to say it in these woke days, but they were some hotties. And they could hold their drink better than a lot of brothers.

    Anyway, everything they witnessed and contributed to during these days prepared them for anything the world–especially men–would throw at them. Sadly, the national office disbanded all Starduster chapters in the late 80s, for liability reasons. It wasn’t entirely successful.

    Culture/Politics

    There was no cable TV in the house or phone service beyond intra-campus lines. Obviously, no wifi or internet. Internet? No one owned a computer yet. Or a personal phone.

    This was Virginia in the mid-80s. South of the Mason-Dixon in Appalachia. JMU was well-integrated by then, I believe, but it wouldn’t resemble a patchwork from a distance.

    The makeup of the chapter was largely from areas within a 2-4 hour drive of Harrisonburg, some from rural climes, lots of suburban kids, and a few city boys thrown in. Preppies, Parrot Heads, a punk or two, some early grungers and stoners, cheerleaders and dream boats, a few academic types. Majors ran the liberal arts gamut: Poli-sci, finance, econ and accounting, business management and marketing, a couple of English majors. Pre-law, pre-med, pre-CIA. Pre-elected-office. We excelled in sports and partying but self-sabotaged at Greek Sing and philanthropy.

    More important than all that diversity, there were disparate beliefs and opinions among the brotherhood, sometimes expressed vigorously.

    Note: The next paragraph I’ve altered, based on feedback from brothers who I asked to give this post a look. Suffice to say, the story behind the story touched some nerves. And writing it gave me some humbling clarity, even if I am deleting it here. My choice.

    I’ll cut to the quick: in the mid-1980s, no men of color were pledged or initiated into the chapter. The by-laws did not require a majority to rule on such things, just a small number in opposition to a candidate. There were heated debates and some enraged, disgusted brothers on both sides. I knew it wasn’t right. I know others felt the same. But I went along. That’s hard and it stays with me.

    No one was really “out” back then. This was just as AIDS erupted, though JMU was not affected, as far as any of us knew. Despite rumors and innuendos, the so-called “don’t ask, don’t tell” rule was evident in the chapter. Why two topics in quotation marks for this paragraph? It is what it is.

    Okay, back to our regularly scheduled debauchery.

    There were also the politics of partying, and of beer in particular. We had 5-7 kegs on a typical weekend party night. The cheapest was Goebel; we opted for a French pronunciation, a soft G with emphasis on the second syllable. Joe-belle. At some point, Schlitz Malt Liquor started pouring through the taps with greater frequency. It was a little more expensive but a lot more intoxicating. It really did a number on one’s GI system. Rough nights, rough mornings.

    When the topic was debated at a Sunday meeting, concerns over health–and the negative impact on female attendance–were key. Finally, XXXXXXXXXXXXX took to the floor and proclaimed: “We do not drink beer for thirst or taste! We drink beer to get drunk!” It was a Patrick Henry moment. Schlitz would remain in the taps.

    Parties

    Blah blah brotherhood blah blah. Let’s get to the meat.

    Our style of party was dark, crowded, hot, sticky and messy. Loud. Stale beer and other dubious fluids had permeated the linoleum floor and wooden wainscoting for years. So at every party, those latent, stanky molecules reactivated and spun airborne to shroud us all in an immersive, sweating scratch-n-sniff. A lot of history.

    I credit our in-house professional DJs for creating a party trajectory throughout the night and making our parties feel unique on the row. Start with some crowd favorites and classics (U2, Bon Jovi, Icicle Works, Van Morrison, Lynyrd Skynyrd), then pop and dance (Madonna, New Order, Michael Jackson, Buffett, beach music), then some sexy funk (Prince, Kurtis Blow, Cameo). I’ve just been informed by one of said DJs that the mix was “more nuanced” than my depiction and that they were “artists.” Can’t argue.

    The weekly schedule

    Forget Sunday and Monday nights. They were for academics, healing and reflection. Okay.

    On random Tuesdays, we’d summon the current pledge class to the house and challenge them to make a party: get girls, now. Go door to door if you have to. Get some beer too. A lot. Wednesdays were reserved for hanging at JM’s, a bar across from campus where our DJ brothers DJ’d. Thursday was Ladies Night at the house. Sounds classy. Friday and Saturday were generic parties at the house, depending on the season.

    A few times a year, we’d host more exclusive, “proprietary” themed parties, in partnership with a sorority. Yeah, keep reading.

    Pimp and Whore

    I’m shocked just writing that now, but it was a damn good party back in the 80s. Sorority women dressed as, well, yeah, and the guys tricked out as, okay, you get it. On entry, the guys received $1000 in play money. The object of the affair was for the ladies to make as much money as possible, through whatever means. And yes, every year, sororities clamored to partner with us. Btw, I designed and printed the money, so my conscience is still conflicted (plus, I skimmed).

    Casino Night

    We actually splurged for real booze for this one. It was a classier vibe, with cocktail dresses and gowns and tuxedos, a la James Bond, if James Bond lived off the interstate in the Shenandoah Valley. I’d like to say that proceeds went to charity.

    Playboy Mansion

    Guys in pajamas and smoking jackets, girls in Bunny attire and lingerie. I know, right? One year XXXXXXXXXXX and I made name tags ID’ing ourselves as “Official Bunny Tasters.” Surprisingly, it worked almost too well. It was the 80s. And it was pretty innocent, really. Really? Yes. Yes? I said, yes. Okay!

    Bonus

    We had wine and cheese mixers during rush. Cheap jugs and cheddar, but with better plastic cups and plates. Each semester, the pledge class was responsible to design a theme party. My class did a Titanic theme. The tag: “be the first to go down with the ship.” We also had formals every winter, usually at a nice hotel near D.C. or Richmond. Or on a boat in the Chesapeake. Ask XXXXXXXXXXXXXX and XXXXXXXXXXX how they liked that one.

    Oh, and Belinda and Charlotte from The GoGos came to a party at our house after a Saturday concert on campus. It was a scene. A few of us whisked them up to XXXXXXXXXXXX andXXXXXXXXXXXXXX’s‘s room, 202. We made extremely lame chitchat for about 20 minutes, until someone, mercifully, pulled the fire alarm to flush them out. They escaped through the SigEp fire door.

    Bonus ++

    A few times each semester, a character named G. Fred McDude would make an appearance at a party. His headshot was on our annual composite, so technically he was a brother, even an officer. G. Fred was indeed a brother, wearing a rubber mask and nothing else, save for a layer of strategically placed shaving cream. He’d streak through the crowd, accost a few folks, dance and leave. Any questions before we move on?

    Also, a few times a semester, a party would devolve into water sports. The hoses came out and the party room was flooded with a few inches of hot water. Brothers and a few brave little sisters would take turns running down the hall, sliding across the floor (standing or belly-flopped) and crashing into the opposite wall. Or each other. Most of the folks were moderately clad, others not.

    Any night might continue upstairs, elsewhere, or across the interstate at Howard Johnson’s for a Breakfast Grand Slam. After sun-up came the walks of shame, the hair of the dog and the boisterous sharing of sordid tales. And commiserating about the gastro-effects of malt liquor.

    Takeaway

    Might sound lofty, but I feel like I became a man and a leader in those four years. I certainly became more confident and strong of will from the experience. Like I said, some of my best friends and memories were made there. Even though those friends live a thousand miles away, I feel close to them; we’re meeting up more often in our imminent dotage.

    We took care of each other, watched out for each other, got brothers and little sisters home safely. Encouraged everyone’s success. Celebrated and challenged them. And pranked them whenever applicable and deserved. Which was often.

    “The Breakfast Club” came out during this period, in 1985. If you did a mashup of that with “Animal House” we’re getting really close, somewhere between Otis Day’s “Shout” and Simple Minds’ “Don’t You Forget About Me.” Apt.

    In Club Speak: We weren’t woke. We were rednecks and reprobates, athletes and scholars, pretty boys and beer-bellied sloths, loners, lovers and a naked guy in a rubber mask.. Reckless and respectable. If you judge us by our behavior back then, be sure to apply the lens of the cultural zeitgeist of the 80s, when hair was big, jeans were tight, sex sold and greed was good. It might feel toxic in hindsight; we’ve come a long way.

    Even though I was an English major, I used Google to confirm this quote from William Blake. “The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom.” There were excesses and indiscretions, no doubt. I think those paved the way–eventually–for richer insights and empathy, and a greater willingness to adapt to the world as it evolves. Life was big and still is. The palace still looms on the horizon.

    Was it the right place for me? Doesn’t matter. It made me who I am: the mostly good, the righteously bad and the pompously ugly.

    A.E.K.D.B.
  • 44|60 Bucket List

    44|60 Bucket List

    It’s about to become 2026. Another year. They keep coming. And they keep coming faster! How many more of these are there going to be?

    Good question!

    That was a key impetus for this whole 60|60 series: mortality. I’m grateful for all that I’ve experienced in 60 years, no doubt. There’s not a lot more I could even wish for, at least in some reasonably, realistic fashion, not to mention morally, legally and ethically.

    But, hey, I got only so many years to go, so what are 60 things I should do before I kick. A few of these are realistic, some reasonable, most highly unlikely, some impossible. A boy can dream.

    Buckle up!

    1. Write a novel. Sell one or two. Or not.
    2. Break even in Vegas. Not just for a single trip, but for all accounts dating back to 1998.
    3. Finish the FREE 72-ounce steak, along with shrimp cocktail, baked potato, rolls and salad at the Big Texan just off the interstate in Amarillo.
    4. Visit Stonehenge at dawn for the Solstice. Maybe a few days early or late, avoid the crowds.
    5. Watch all of Kevin Costner’s movies that aren’t about baseball. I kid!
    6. I’ll take the ranch, bbq AND honey mustard. Thank you!
    7. Become a Notary Public. Just for the seal/embosser/stampy tool thing alone. Btw, it is not Noter Republic, as so many people believe.
    8. Find the most comfortable shoes that also look stylin’.
    9. Win a participation trophy. I am long overdue.
    10. Wake up in Honk Kong, go to sleep in New York. I did that once, in a single day. Now I’d settle for doing either. One at a time. Whenever. No particular order.
    11. Complete the idiom decathlon: drink from a fire hose, herd cats, poke the bear, cut a rug, fly by the seat of my pants, paint the town red, kick the hornets’ nest, put lipstick on a pig, say the quiet part out loud, and open the kimono.
    12. Look good in jeans.
    13. Down a whole tub of Cool Whip, no utensils.
    14. Finish a sleeve of Pringles in one long head-back, shovel-n-chew sort of arrangement.
    15. Live Matthew McConaughey’s life for 24 hours. Not in a row, just as needed, charged by the minute.
    16. Be served fried asparagus at a restaurant in western Michigan after mid-June. IYKYK
    17. See my grandchildren do great things. Note: If ever I tell you that my grandkids are doing great things, have me committed.
    18. Get a tattoo. Of course I could do this tomorrow if I really wanted to. If I did, it would be Captain Caveman or “MARY” or Bowzer or the Colonel.
    19. Go skydiving. Of course I could do this tomorrow if I really wanted to. But I have something.
    20. Get pierced. Of course I could this tomorrow if I really wanted to. Unless it’s a Prince Albert, in which case it’s a no. Depends though: how much have we been drinking?
    21. Build an empire like the Byzantine one which I learned about in high school though I didn’t actually retain any of it. I could brush up I guess. Or think smaller.
    22. Write a sentence as masterfully mathematical, funny, empathic and perfect as what constitutes the whole of first paragraph of footnote 111 in David Foster Wallace’s essay A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again.
    23. Suffer a serious injury by rescuing a puppy or an old lady from some bad situation, instead of suffering a serious injury by slipping in the bathroom or setting the kitchen on fire.
    24. Pay it forward, seriously. Caveat: I will need to know what “it” is. Are we talking drive-thru coffee? Or an organ donation? Or some kind of surrogacy situation?
    25. See all the good stuff.
    26. Ride every roller coaster.
    27. Get tased. I don’t know why either. Curious I guess.
    28. Re-popularize the term, “Sorry doesn’t feed the admiral’s cat!” One of my Dad’s faves.
    29. Survive to see justice served.
    30. Fully appreciate the difference between parsley, cilantro and oregano. And share my insights with others. At every opportunity. Even at other tables. At length.
    31. Achieve total consciousness. Sober. With time to spare.
    32. Live so close to a Buc-ees that we can walk there but far enough away to not hear the highway. But still close enough we can use their bathroom, if needed.
    33. Have the guys at the country club call me a “ball striker.” Just not in the sauna.
    34. Make “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” make sense. Was I tripping as a toddler?
    35. Expertly fold a fitted sheet. Or I’m good to keep balling it up and hiding it in the stack between the folded flat sheet and pillow cases.
    36. Fly a plane. And land a plane. Thing is, I have no depth perception, so a lot of people would die.
    37. Speaking of planes, I’d take a 747 from a rogue nation. No, make it an A380. And a pilot.
    38. Share a Pike’s Peak at Farrell’s with all my friends to celebrate my birthday. Gimme the whole song and dance too, drums, sparklers, singing, etc.
    39. Get captured behind enemy lines. Not in a war or anything, just like a charity benefit sort of “jail” scenario. You take Venmo?
    40. Learn how to ice skate or roller skate or ski or skateboard or snowboard or surf or anything that involves standing and moving at the same time without a strap to hold onto.
    41. Sit behind the president at the State of the Union address. Don’t need to displace anyone, just add a third chair and some bottle service.
    42. Relive a day in “Groundhog Day” fashion so that I can learn lessons, make better decisions, become a better person. Screw that! I get to choose the day to relive. And I’ve got a few in mind that I could do again and again without changing a thing, maybe a few tweaks near the end. Gimme one of those days! (Is this what a coma feels like?)
    43. Go shirtless and be celebrated. Without pity.
    44. Achieve world peace by whatever means necessary.
    45. Judge a TV cooking show on a night that features KFC, Arby’s, a 72-ounce steak, bacon and my Mom’s mac’n’cheese.
    46. Overcome my greatest fear: eat a bowl of beets, Brussel sprouts and chicken livers while being stalked by crocodiles and that freaky kidnapper from “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.”
    47. Succeed at the “trust fall.” Alone.
    48. Make the Dewey Decimal System great again. Low priority.
    49. Go all-in on a wingnut conspiracy theory. Bucket bonus: start one.
    50. Become an MVP for some sports team somewhere, just so I get comped for rest of my life at the local Applebees.
    51. Stay hydrated, stretch and get at least 20 minutes of exercise every day. I hear that’s important, people.
    52. Patent something. Maybe something easy like a better potato masher, or something useful like universal shower controls that are the same in every friggin’ hotel room I will ever stay in(!), or something hard like a vehicle for time travel.
    53. Regarding above: time travel. Post-patent, pitch some ideas to Michelangelo for the Chapel ceiling (“what are you trying to say with this one?”); get Shakespeare to include a character named Doug, a bit of a rogue and fierce lover, painfully witty. As to the future, renew my Spotify in order to convince the people of 2525 that there was once a #1 song called “In the Year 2525,” and also ask them if there’ve been any breakthroughs in universal hotel shower control technology.
    54. Complete a series of artworks. Paint, print, sketch, whatever. Sculpture? Just do it.
    55. Have a reason to buy a new suit that doesn’t involve a funeral.
    56. Stop consuming the news of the day. I’m a geek for the stuff, but it is just not healthy anymore.
    57. Grow back a full head of hair, just by sheer will.
    58. Experience something again for the first time. I’d intended this item to be more specific, but there are so many things. So very many.
    59. Spend the rest of my days living and laughing and savoring with Mary, Bowzer and lots of good people.
    60. Ring in the New Year at actual midnight, local time.
    Happy New Year!
  • 43|60 Life in Christmas Cards

    43|60 Life in Christmas Cards

    This post will be better viewed in a browser: www.binderama60for60.com

    There was a time when people exchanged holiday cards. Every year, it’s what you did.

    The cards were mostly store-bought and hand-written with the freshest family news. My Mom spent hours writing personal notes to dozens of people on her list.

    If she didn’t receive a card from someone in a given year, she assumed they were dead and crossed them off her list.

    When I moved to New York in 1994, I started designing and printing personal Christmas cards. I don’t know why, but I think it was a marketing ploy, at first. More than that, I was loving Photoshop 2.0. So it became a thing.

    In my apartment on E. 87th Street, I jockeyed my Mac Quadra 660AV, fueled by a whopping 8 MB of RAM. I had only a blocky, laggy mouse to draw and paint. A few years later I upgraded to a PC laptop, with that little nipple/eraser button in the middle of the keyboard. My index finger was an omni-dexterous and magical thing. Though I’d say 90% of the clicks were Undo commands.

    Once done, I’d take a floppy to Kinkos at two in the morning. I used their faster machines to tweak and calibrate hues, and their color printer and copier to make enough prints. Every minute and print was on the meter. It added up quickly. Back at home, I’d cut each out and glue it into one of those photo-frame cards. Ugly. I addressed each envelop by hand and off they went.

    These days the process is much more polished and professional. But the brain-racking introspection and infinite-rethinking are the same. Until this year. You’ll see.

    Like this 60|60 project, the cards have been a narcissistic but purposeful pursuit, to understand and convey my place in the world at a given time. With the cards, I try to tell a story with a single frame (or strip). Looking back, the series feels cohesive to me: a careening, jigsaw narrative of highs and lows, dark days and bright, vanity and bravado. Depression and elation.

    And imperfection and vulnerability. Lord knows.

    One rule, which I actually broke this year: I/we need to be visible in the card. Often it’s been as a shape or a shadow, but some years, it’s more prominent (see above, re: vanity).

    Ultimately, I’ve always hoped them to bring a little holiday smile to friends and family. And for this 60|60 post, some holiday nostalgia.

    New York: 1994-1999

    I was pretty full of myself that first Christmas in NYC. Cringey. And the color balance was off.

    The city got me humble pretty quick. Lonesome too. The final year I was there, I went ephemeral with the card, with me leaving only a snow angel behind as I departed the scene. A version of this illustration had a taxi racing into the intersection from the left. Too cynical even for me.

    1994
    1996
    1997
    xmas99.7
    1999
    Las Vegas: 2000

    If you know me or have followed this blog series, you know that my time in Vegas was one of excess, gluttony and not a little anguish. Definitely a period of emotional and spiritual stressors. Even so, I still love the place; it’s loud, ugly, filthy, greedy and beautiful.

    This card was a fun one to design; I didn’t try to hide my cynicism. I still wonder why there isn’t a Vegas show called Naughty on Nice. Plus, it kept me out of the bars for a few nights.

    Los Angeles: 2001-2005

    The first card in LA I’m not even including in here. Uninspired and not very relevant to my experience. Some years are just better than others.

    The next two years were more on-point and self-deprecating. Living in Santa Monica can make one feel, well, invisible. With a little nip/tuck, though, I would be cock of the walk among the pretty people strolling up Montana and down Ocean Avenue. I’d get my daily scrub at Equinox, maybe a wax, and then valet my hog down at the Ivy, take lunch at my usual table.

    2002
    2003

    2004 was the only Christmas with Binger, sadly. He epitomized the spirit of the Grinch’s Max times 100, 24 hours a day. Still love this card and miss the Binger.

    Given the mood after losing Binger in December 2005, there was no card that year.

    Silicon Valley: 2006-2020
    2006: A Big Move

    Mary and I moved in together in Mountain View. I’d spent time in Northern California and I was up on the news. Seemed to me, a lot of people in that part of the country sat in trees for extended periods. Status-wise, I’d say that’s better than being a mere tree hugger. This was Mary’s debut in the series.

    Miscellaneous Years

    Living and working in Silicon Valley, my head defaulted to data viz and business-think. It was…limiting. Apparently my go-to Pantone for the holidays is 19-1540, burnt henna. I tweaked that green on the HOPE card so many times. Made proofs. And it still looks nuclear.

    Not my favorite cards of this period, but worthy for conveying some meaning.

    2009: My Favorite Card

    Speaking of technology and favorites, this will always be a favorite.

    It was the height of the great recession. My business was in the tank, my confidence was fried and my inspiration dulled. When this concept finally came to me, it was such the obvious direction. So simple. What if all of my imagined friends from Christmas fiction were connected with me on this new thing called Facebook? Eureka!

    Once that fell into place, the build-out of trivia and voice was a ton of fun. If you can’t read all this goodness, shoot me a note and I’ll send the original.

    2010: Mixed Bag and Gift Cards

    The 2010 holiday card was barely meh. It was an imagined neighborhood in the global melting pot of Sunnyvale, CA. All the world’s religions and beliefs were celebrated in grand, garish, blinding American style. Not especially well-executed. Plus, my Brother Mike pointed out that my intended peace sign was actually a Mercedes-Benz logo.

    Doh!

    I tried to atone. Mary and I were headed back to Virginia to be with Family. Our gift for everyone: gift cards. Yep. Gift cards. Movies, hardware, dinner out. Good son, brother and uncle. I figured I’d make light of my lameness with some gift tags for the gift cards.

    All in all, not my best Christmas showing. But these make me smile.

    2011: The Year Pop Passed Away

    This was going to be a difficult Christmas. I’d considered a tribute, but I feared it would have felt heavy and not appropriate to the series. Revisiting a lifetime of Christmases, I recalled this true story from 30-some years before. The illustrations and copy blocks were a blast to craft.

    This was a favorite of my Brother Tim’s, a true illustrator, writer and humorist. “Can you imagine how proud he was to show that off to his family that night? ‘Open it, Daddy!’”

    Yeah, ‘fraid this is the Binders’ kind of humor.

    2015: Grief and Gratitude

    Mary and I got married after ten years of shacking up. The year leading up to our wedding day in October had been sorrow-filled. Mary’s Mom had passed the previous October. Then my Brother Tim died suddenly in January. My beloved Aunt Jeanne passed in April. And Uncle Larry would pass a month after the wedding.

    Turned out to be the year we learned a lot about loss and even more about gratitude. Both make you feel more alive and awake and wise.

    Goal: express all that on a 5X7″ greeting card. Still love it 10 years on.

    Most of the illustrations started with paper sketches; I was feeling “authentic.” A harbinger for the next few years to come.

    2016 & 2020

    There was a lot to process in the last months of 2016. IYKYK

    Our message: no matter what’s going on out there, we are chill. We are warm, safe and at peace, together. Joyful. We wish the same for others.

    One recipient inquired if I was moving into my Blue Period. Not intentional but okay. Four years later, that comment was still with me and inspired the 2020 card.

    2020: The end days were certainly at hand. We were locked down in the midst of a global pandemic. California was on fire, the air was acrid and the sky was orange for weeks. Plus, the summer prior, my Mom and our dog Rampage had died within two days of each other.

    When the concept of this design-reprise bubbled up, I was dubious. Was I incapable of landing an idea that would more creatively express the true panic, dismay and uncertainty we were all experiencing? And do it in a way that feels Christmas-y?

    So with a few clicks and sliders in the Adjustments pull-down in Photoshop, et voila.

    I still appreciate that often the best solution for telling good stories is simplicity. And some continuity. As ever, we were still chill, safe and together. And joyful.

    2018: Overachieving

    Holiday carding is a hella competitive field, mostly because I’m competing with myself.

    I was into my Authentic Period, so for 2018, I went old-school. I used the silk-screen press that Mary’d bought me for my birthday. Yep, we are putting paint to paper, just like Ben Franklin and Banksy.

    The art started with pencil sketches, scanned into Adobe Illustrator (okay I can see the irony). I sent a vector file to a company I found on the internet to create the screen (yes I see the pattern). And then it was my brute strength and precision that forced paint onto thick card stock. I colored in Rampage’s nose on all 100+ copies. By hand.

    Each card was enclosed with a box of pencils for everyone’s coloring pleasure. Best of all, we got some really cute photos of kids and families taking pencil to paper to bring it all to life in a way that was all their own. Very merry.

    2021 & 2022: The Long, Strange, Winding Road Back

    Like everyone, we had a lot to deal with during the pandemic. At the same time, we were dealing with some other stuff.

    Mary and I had bought my Family’s summer home on Lake Michigan during the pandemic (a week before my Mom passed). Months later, we’d been vaxxed and the lock-downs were lifted. Mary and I put our California house on the market and headed east. Just before our departure, we had to put down our dog Ruckus. Then we got word that my Sister-in-law Martha had passed after a relapse of cancer.

    All of our California stuff went to Michigan, where we spent the summer of 2021. Meanwhile, Mary rented us a place for the winter in Nashville, smack-gosh-dang-dab in the middle of the madness on Lower Broadway. Ground zero for everything. It was a crazy, exciting gig! Even locals were like, that’s too much.

    That fall and winter, we were spinning dizzily inside the belly of the beast (albeit safely). That’s where the two-headed serpent metaphor came in. Slurp it up and puke it out. Binge and purge.

    Each one of the dozens of hand-drawn drafts got friendlier, bendier, fattier. I’d wanted to keep it chronological but also mostly-legible. Plus it needed some fun and clutter to convey what we were going through. I like to revisit this one; seems like ages ago.

    By 2022, things had calmed. A bit. We’d left Nashville and moved to Scottsdale for the winter. Perhaps every winter to come; we’ll see. It was a relief to turn down the volume and have everything in one place or the other.

    Phew. I wrote each card by hand with two colors or Sharpies. We considered an exclamation point, but it was that kind of Phew.

    2023: It’s Beginning to Look a lot Like A.I.

    It was all the rage, the new greatest thing ever. Powerful and mysterious, like the first time you ate Pop Rocks with a Coke.. Times a billion.

    So why not call on artificial intelligence to explain and convey what Christmas is all about. Herewith, the 2023 Christmas card.

    The first thing you might notice is that AI isn’t really good with text. I asked for Joy to the World, I got this–and another few dozen even more illegible variations.

    For the big thematic picture, I prompted Photoshop’s generative AI program Firefly to give me a lake at sunset and a few dunes, add a snowy cactus and a rollercoaster in the foreground. Make the colors bright southwestern. Brighter. There were hundreds of layers and iterations to get me to about 70%. Then it was time to add some details manually: a ribbon and a sign, Santa and a life preserver, a tree and a hummingbird, and a couple sitting on the beach. Oh, and let’s ramp up those colors a little more. Okay, a little less.

    The best part: it really did capture the brilliance, color and excitement of that year.

    There were two inscriptions inside and on the back. The left is a pure AI response; the right is a forged one.

    2024’s card sucked.

    I was distracted.

    2025: It Had to be You

    I had this year’s card done before Easter. A first, by about six months.

    Bowzer came home with us exactly a year ago today, December 18, 2024. We adopted him from the AZ Animal Welfare League where he’d gotten deposited after a month in quarantine for Parvo. Sad for a puppy. A survivor.

    We rushed home with him that day so I could get on a call while Mary acclimated him to the condo. Admittedly, we hadn’t dog-proofed the place. I could see from the office that things were in motion: he was bounding over the furniture like Evel Knievel–launching himself across the coffee table and the couch and almost taking out the glass console table behind it, loaded with curios. This wasn’t the zoomies; he was just nuts. Mary was almost in tears before I could get off my call.

    Even back then, in between his moments of reckless mayhem, this was his typical pose. He’ll park a few feet away from you, at attention, all prim and proper, and lock eyes. Gentle head tilt. The sweetest, gentlest being, nothing but serenity and love. And he’ll stay like this until he gets his way. Which he does.

    He totally owns us.

    Merry Christmas. Happy Holidays. Have a Fantastic 2026!

  • 42|60 Did Anyone Enjoy Middle School?

    42|60 Did Anyone Enjoy Middle School?

    I had nailed life.

    At 12, I was BMOC at Louise Archer Elementary in Vienna, Virginia. Good grades (on the gifted track no less!), all my teachers adored me, most all the kids liked me, including some girls and even some of the kids who beat me up. I was in student government, on the safety patrol sporting the bright orange belt thing and playing crossing guard. I won awards for art, attendance and good citizenship. I was a soccer prodigy.

    Coming out of the 6th grade, the sky was the limit.

    And then…

    Middle school. Henry David Thoreau, to be exact. For two years in the late 70s, my life turned to hell. Everything I thought I knew and loved about the world was stripped away like <poof!> I was starting over, and it didn’t feel good. Still doesn’t. We’ll get to that.

    According to A.I.

    As I was developing this post, I asked ChatGPT about what actually happens to kids in middle school. I wanted to gauge if my memories are too dramatic or have been warped over time.

    The feedback was comforting: my recollections are spot-on. It was also alarming as hell: my recollections are spot on.

    At 12, the adolescent brain is busy wiring and rewiring itself, which explains why every minor mishap feels like the end of the world. Puberty riles up the stakes for embarrassment and humiliation, inside and out. Peer approval is like oxygen; identities and styles morph daily in order to survive. And school itself, according to A.I., “emphasizes compliance over curiosity.” Sounds familiar.

    So yes, pseudo-science and artificial intelligence confirm my memories and feelings about those days. Middle school sucks.

    Picture this.

    Doug, circa 1977. Start with all the curses of puberty. Then apply thick, horn-rimmed glasses. Braces. A mop of ill-barbered hair that could not be combed a la mode. Persistent and ripe but natural B.O. A shiny patina of dread. And somehow, I suddenly became shy, uncoordinated and physically awkward. My Mom, bless her heart, once tried to console me by telling me that most boys my age are “unattractive.” She meant well.

    That’s the baseline of what we’re working with for this post.

    There were other boys who were already tall and buff, with peach fuzz and hair feathered like Andy Gibb. They were confident and popular alphas, and they knew it. Their families went skiing at Christmas and spent the summer “at the beach.”

    Between 6th and 7th grades, girls got some weird growth spurt. They were also getting a little fuzzy and filling out. They seemed more mature. Honestly, I’m glad I wasn’t a girl because I know those are some seriously rough years.

    A Day-in-the-Life

    Every school-day morning started by schlepping to the bus stop, sometimes before dawn, sometimes in the rain and snow. Some days toting a trombone case. The stop was at the intersection where I had been a crossing guard the year before. The salad days. Back then, I was an authority figure, respected by the underlings, with the power literally to stop traffic.

    On the bus, I somehow became relegated to sit in the second row on the left side, directly behind the bus bully. So by the time I got to school, I was a traumatized, nervous wreck with disheveled hair.

    The gifted/talented thing followed me. That’s not a humble brag. It meant I was shut in with the same 20-25 kids most of the day. The only time we were released into the general population was for lunch and P.E.

    Let’s talk P.E. So this kid, me, who’s suddenly lost in the world, yet cloistered and cocooned, is forced to spend 30 minutes every day getting tackled in flag football, outrun on the blacktop, humiliated at the bottom of a chin-up bar and rope climb, pinned on a wrestling mat, striking out, sitting out, losing out.

    Plus, there was the everyday, tacit threat of getting wedgied in the locker room; I might have actually witnessed one and since blocked it. And stay alert near the toilets, the menacing air of an imminent swirly was ever-present. Or way worse: a chunky swirly.

    If that’s not enough, let’s make all the pubescent boys arbitrarily get naked to take a shower, under the watchful eye of our creepy gym teacher. Not libelous, I assure you.

    At lunch on the first day of school, the social order and proximity were established and codified. I and the only kid who was more of a dweeb than me circled with our trays until I spotted an old friend from my soccer days. He looked up, horrified, as I approached. The kid he was sitting with was all, “no, not here, uh uh. No way.” We sat.

    Fond memory: within a few months we were shucking and giggling about “Animal House,” the “WKRP” turkey drop and Steve Martin’s “King Tut” on SNL. (“Freaks and Geeks” conjured the SNL event, starring a similar clique of outcasts.)

    Then there was band. I had neither the aptitude nor attitude for the trombone. I hated to practice. I found the many scales to be arbitrary and pointless; I still do. Rote learning is not my thing, and pressing the mouthpiece hard against my braces for an hour a day was bloody unpleasant. I quit after 7th grade. I was a quitter now too.

    Oh, and Girls

    Along with all the other symptoms of puberty comes those funny “feelings.” I’ve related in another 60|60 post my dreadful experiences at school dances. Despite my enthusiasm, I was a trembling wallflower. I simply didn’t have the rap or confidence. But I did have thick glasses and braces and probably hyper-B.O. from the stress, so, “let’s do this, ladies!”

    I knew of some classmates who were dating, so why can’t I? It took me weeks to muster up the nerve to ask a girl to the movies. Julie was sweet, smart and pretty. I called her up. I didn’t present well. I panicked. I swerved and crashed. Flames. She rightly shot me down. If you’ve been through that, you know how it stings at that age (or any). Worse yet, she told her network. Long before social media, word-of-mouth shame was just as cruel and bitter.

    It wasn’t all bad.

    There were a few teachers who made a positive difference for me.

    • Mr. Dallas taught social studies and was cool, and he had this killer handwriting on the chalkboard. I adopted it, and it occasionally comes out, to this day.
    • Mrs. Williams was my English teacher in 8th grade and encouraged me to push myself and write outside the lines, although she did have to pull me back in on many occasions.
    • And Senor Timmons, a small and spritely Spanish teacher was the most positive fella there was. He was my homeroom teacher too. The first day I tried out contact lenses in school, anxiously, he made me feel like a million bucks.
    After all these years?

    Valid question: why am I still reliving this? If you’ve ever been in therapy, you know that step one is to find a way to blame everything on your parents. But they’d get a lot further, I think, if they started with middle school.

    It was a formative and defining chapter of my childhood. It took the wind out of my sails and nearly sent me adrift, at a really important time. It instilled in me a sense of lowliness, of social ineptitude, and the lack of control over any of it.

    Yes, yes, I suppose it made me stronger in ways. Blah. I’m still not that confident that the trade-off was worth it. The scars of isolation, anxiety and inferiority still itch.

    And then…

    The summer before I started high school, I got my braces pulled, my contact lenses became a daily thing, and the latest in deodorant technology worked wonders.

    My life was perfect.

    The end.
  • 41/60 HBD Matt

    41/60 HBD Matt

    I’ve known Matt Palmer for 40 years. He hates when I share the story of how we met. I respect that. And since we’re such good friends, I will save that story for the third or fourth paragraph of this post.

    This ongoing 60|60 project features 60 essays about things that are relevant to me, that have been important to my life and in my world. Just a precious few of the posts are about specific people, for whom I can dedicate 1000 or more words. Matt is one of them.

    1990
    2024

    Today is Matt’s 60th birthday. December 7th, “…a day which will live in…” He bristles at that too. So where is he celebrating this milestone? He’s in Japan. Hiroshima. Yeah, I know. I wonder if he’ll score a free beer at the local izakaya.

    Anyway, we’ve both lived some lives since we met back in 1986. Off and on for the first few years we were roommates and/or officemates. We worked together, drank together, ate together, road-tripped together, dated together, dieted together. But we never took a steam together.

    1990 Credit: Kevin Kolczyniski

    He engineered the best surprise party for my 25th birthday. The best. I was in his wedding, a killer destination event. We competed for jobs; I won some, he won others. We’ll cover all that.

    Since those days, Matt raised a family, begat three sons, took on a number of jobs, including some at the high-muckety-muck level, and he moved around a lot. Ditto for me, except for the family part and the muckety. We were in sync, geographically, in Orlando, then New York and later Los Angeles. We’ve kept up through the years, though there’ve been periods of radio silence.

    In recent years, our friendship feels rekindled. I hope so. It’s an important one for me.

    Him?

    Here’s the story of the first time I met Matt. As I described in a recent post, I’d rented an apartment for the summer across I-4 from Disney. Four other roommates signed on, including Steve Watson. While I returned to JMU for May session, the others agreed to get the place set up, rent furnishings and the like.

    In late May, when I pulled in after a 13-hour drive from Virginia, the place was raging with a party spilling into the parking lot. I mingled into the apartment, looking for my roommates. That’s when I discovered there was no furniture. No couch, no beds, no TV, no tables, no nothing. “WTF” I asked when I finally located Steve. He told me to relax, we’ll figure it out. “Oh, and by the way, I think we found a sixth roommate.”

    “WHAT? We’ve already got five guys sleeping on the floor of a two-bedroom.”

    “Just meet him,” Steve said, pointing, “he’s over there.”

    Him? The guy sitting on the floor, propped against a wall, not talking to anybody, barely even looking up. Him? JFC, you want HIM to be our sixth roommate?

    Anyway, Matt became our sixth roommate.

    We each probably saved about $15 in rent. A couple of cases or a carton of Marlboros back then. It was a good summer. A hella good summer. Matt and I, and Steve, along with a another roomie named Mike Driscoll, spent much of it working in operations on Main Street USA and partying until dawn; there’s more explicit detail on that in the Disney post linked above. Suffice: Matt and I became good friends that summer.

    A (wonderful) blur

    Fast-forward to sometime late in 1988, after we’d both graduated college. I had a gig in Disney PR, Matt was working in the event office I’d helped to establish the year before. They were planning for the G.O. of the Disney/MGM Studios. After it opened, Matt became an actor in The Great Movie Ride. He met a girl named Missy there. He also spent stints slinging luggage at the airport and shilling gym memberships and/or stereo components (is there a difference?).

    That’s the blurry part. The next few passages are also a little blurry and not chronological because, well, life isn’t chronological, most assuredly when it’s screened in hindsight. And it was a long time ago. And beer.

    We became roommates. First in an apartment on Vineland Road and later in Middlebrook Pines off Kirkman, a pretty stellar place for two broke bachelors on the rise. We had a killer AV setup, thanks to Matt hitting Circuit City for a pricey big screen, a high-end VCR and sound system, and then forgetting to return it all within 30 days.

    As for the bachelor lifestyle, I will err on the side of discretion, other than to say, there was a lot going on. We were popular and had a robust social life. There were parties. There were girls. There was stuff.

    I could go big-salacious, but I’ll settle for the mundane. After we left the bars (Sneakers, JBs, CJs, Rosie’s and later Finnegans), I’d go buy a six pack at 7-Eleven while Matt grabbed a $5 pizza from Dominos. We’d meet back and the place, eat, drink and fall asleep–me on the couch with a beer in my hand, Matt in the recliner with the empty pizza box on his lap. It was the best time.

    We road-tripped a few times to Key West where Matt’s brother was F&B manager at a resort at the end of Duval. Highlights included the typical dives, a performance by an obviously-pregnant stripper who exploited her condition for tips, and a surprise run-in at a bar with a old fraternity brother of mine who was now a well-armed DEA agent loaded with “candy.” That was a fun night and a rough morning.

    Look at us!

    Within a few months, I left Disney for a job in publicity at Universal Studios. The soundstages were up and working, but other than a few construction offices, the only other visible feature on-site was the Psycho House, sitting on a hill out in the middle of the giant dirtscape. Six months later, Matt came aboard. Our cubicles were across from each other in a space that had been a storage closet. Who cares, we were pulling down 19-grand a year. That’s right.

    We appeared on the news a lot, doing hits on local TV, radio, in the papers and trades. It got a little competitive. One of us would get quoted on the front page of The Orlando Sentinel, the other would do a call-in with a morning-drive team in Atlanta. One got 30 seconds of face time on the Today Show, the other was live on GMA, riding Earthquake alongside an excitable weatherman. One would corral all the stars from the “Back to the Future” trilogy for a grand opening, the other would spend days with a dozen legends from TV and movie westerns. And on and on.

    Every day at work, we rode the rides, whether open or still in testing. It was part of the job description. There were a few real stomach-turners, especially the early revs of Back to the Future: the sync was way off and there were scenes still missing. We were unfazed. “Let’s do it again!”

    Five or 10 years later, we met up for a crew reunion and visited Islands of Adventure. Two rides in, I needed water and a bench in the shade. Our tour guide was way miffed. And just last year, Matt and I rode the VelociCoaster together at IOA, in the last row. Cruel and relentless. For me: bench, shade, water. Knowledge.

    Then…

    Matt and Missy got serious. I liked her: I still have a picture of her draining a bottle of vodka into a watermelon. Wife material. When she moved to California a year or so later, things became strained, as they often do. Long-distance angst, mixed emotions, late night arguments, etc.

    One Friday afternoon, Matt told me he was flying to LA that night to “take care of something.” From his tone, I gathered this would not be a pleasant task. I felt for him: breaking up sucks. When he got to work on Monday, fresh off the red-eye, I was ready to console him. Instead, he told me he had proposed to Missy and they were getting married. Gobsmacked was I.

    I was in his wedding. It was a destination event, a long weekend spent in and around Mahwah, New Jersey. The first night, he and I shared a room with his Mom at the Courtyard, due to crossed wires on the reservation. She and I smoked a lot of cigarettes on the patio.

    Some of the boys staged a bachelor party in New York City. It was full of the requisite douchey dude diversions. There was a visit from a (aged) Penthouse Pet and then a well-financed session at Scores. Matt knows that I have the photos from that night. He is tired of me reminding him about that. But I have the photos.

    Side note: On his honeymoon it was discovered that he still had the Pet’s lipstick in a place he couldn’t see on his own. Also, I have photos. He doesn’t care anymore. I shoulda’ played them earlier.

    So it goes and goes

    Matt and I competed for a few jobs back then. I got promoted to the production group at Universal, while Matt became the PR lead at Nickelodeon Studios. We’d moved out and gotten our own places by then. In a few years, I moved to New York. Matt and Missy had their first boy, Luke.

    Before I left Orlando, Matt and I had dinner. He asked me what my plans were. I didn’t have a clear answer, because I didn’t really know. I just needed a life-disruption. I asked him the same. Straight up: I want to be a CEO. Clarity and grit. Admirable. Matt.

    A few years later, he moved his family to New York, still working for Nickelodeon and later for the Blue Man Group. I moved to Los Angeles via Las Vegas in 2001. Matt detoured to D.C. for a job with Discovery and then made his way to LA for a role with Disney Television. Ever heard of “Hannah Montana” and “High School Musical”? Both are on Matt’s resume for award-winning marketing work. Somewhere along the way, he started getting invited to Heidi Klum’s Halloween parties. Yeah, she was inviting Matt to her world-famous, star-studded parties. HIM! Was I jealous? Hell yes!

    He threw me a few lifelines along the way, hiring me freelance to produce videos and events for Nickelodeon and later for some start-ups he was managing. All much appreciated.

    We didn’t see a lot of each other during those years in LA. He was busy with work and family, living in Pasadena; I was near the beach in Santa Monica and too lazy to drive east of the 405.

    40 years

    Both of us have had some good fortune, and bad. I’ve had some big years and some crap years, made some smart moves and dumb ones, squandered some opportunities, lucked into others. I believe Matt’s journey has been not so different. That’s life, if you’re lucky.

    I’ve met up with him a few times in the past year or so, once at Universal for the annual reunion, in Las Vegas for my 60th birthday, and another time when he was passing through Scottsdale. That night was dense with reminiscing and revelation, sharing the kind of stories of triumph, tribulation, titillation and fuck-ups that men of a certain age share. There might have been a tear or two. And a beer or ten. Probably a mellow cabernet too.

    Today, I think we’re both in a good place. I hope so. I’m happily married, and we’re figuring out our next chapter. Matt has been with a good woman, Sheri, for over ten years. In a picture posted on Facebook recently, my wife noticed a ring on Matt’s finger. I reached out: Did you get married? No, he said, it’s an Uora ring. I had to look it up. That is Matt.

    Though our paths diverged, as paths do, there’s not much distance between us. I treasure that. He’s been a friend to me for two-thirds of my life. He’s contributed greatly to my life experience, some of it endearing, some smart, some very human. And some of it idiotic, craven, reckless, wasted, drunken, degenerate and deranged. I hope I’ve delivered in kind.

    Happy Birthday, Mattchew!

    Or, as they say in Hiroshima…

    マシュー、お誕生日おめでとう！
    Mashū, otanjōbiomedetō!
  • 40|60 Thanks. Giving.

    40|60 Thanks. Giving.

    It wasn’t always this way.

    I didn’t start out being thankful. As a kid, and a fortunate one at that, I took a lot for granted: This is just the way life is. It took me decades to appreciate how much I’ve had to be thankful for, and too often it’s been in hindsight.

    Now, I’m trying to be thankful in the moment. That’s a key learning for me from the 60|60 project so far. Be happy now or even preemptively, for all I have in my life.

    It’s a Thursday

    When I was a kid, Thanksgiving meant a long weekend. Gran came to visit every other year or so. I’d wake up and hear her and Maw in the kitchen, prepping the stuffing and the bird. The parade was on TV.

    Leaves might get raked, backyard soccer played, the Brothers might fake-wrestle on the living room floor; Timbo would make Mike and me suffer a little, and laugh. We’d put up the large dining table in the dining room which served as the TV room every other day of the year. Classy linens came out. The good china and flatware. Glasses for water. Goblets for sparkling cider. Candles. The whole shebang.

    Maw would sneak some black olives out of the can, just for me and her. Not everything came out of a can, but there were a few cans: those crunchy French onions, natch. The roasting stuffed turkey would fill the house with a warm, savory aroma all morning and into the afternoon. It would fog up the windows some years. Maw would get to work on the giblet gravy while Dad carved, saving the drumsticks for himself and Timbo. We’d say grace, one of two times every year that we did so. It was mostly about Family at the table, and a few others in our thoughts.

    Dinner commenced. Plates were passed: Brussel sprouts, green beans, corn, dressing, cranberry “sauce,” crudite, salad, and so on. (My Brother Mike just reminded me of the celery stuffed with Kraft pimento cheese. Yeah.)

    Gran and I liked the white meat; everyone else had to battle for the dark. My plate overflowed with mostly turkey and mashed potatoes drowning in gravy. A dinner roll. And some black olives. (This arrangement has not changed much). End with pumpkin pie under a generous dollop of Cool Whip, right out of the tub.

    Clearing. Cleaning. Dishes, Naps. Relocate the dining table to make room for football viewing. We’d always be thankful to see Detroit win their game and the Cowboys lose theirs. Chances are, leftovers were mined in the early evening and noshed into the night and probably for days.

    That’s what Thanksgiving meant to me.

    Until I didn’t have that anymore.

    Once I was on my own, living a thousand miles away, I didn’t often make it home for that Thursday. I usually worked on the holidays during my 20s. Anyway, I figured I needed the alone time to be thankful within. I think I was right.

    That’s when the first seeds of a deeper meaning of thankfulness and Thanksgiving took root. Being out in the world, being among strangers and in strange places and situations showed me just how fortunate I was and had been.

    Even at times when I was struggling personally, financially or in other ways, I came to recognize all that I had to be thankful for: decent health, friendships, the warmth and security of place, opportunity and periods of good fortune. And I had Family.

    I’ll be blunt: I don’t often pray or worship, but I’ve become a person who gives thanks on the daily, for the big things and the small. As important, I give thanks for the things I DON’T have to be thankful for, like overcoming disease, tragedies and other close calls. But even in loss, I’ve learned to be thankful for the experience and the memories, however sad.

    I admire folks who are thankful for having kids and growing families. Sometimes I think I’d like to be thankful for having children and grandchildren. That’s not going to happen. It’s something for which I am occasionally give thanks, and then I move on. That reads as ambiguous. I’ve been blessed and I know it.

    Thanks. Giving.

    About the title of this post: I’m sitting here at the desk writing this post (last week), and I’m thinking: Good for me, Happy Thanksgiving! But what am I doing to help others have more to be thankful for? Today and every day, now.

    To be sure, I’m not a Scrooge, but there is room for growth. Perhaps this 60|60 experience will change me from a seasoned narcissist into an mid-level altruist. I’m definitely open to that.

    Thanksgiving: The Day

    Thanksgiving is on my calendar every year. When I met Mary’s Family, they got together every year, sometimes a couple dozen of them, usually in the southwest or California. But time moves on, the Family has splintered, as families sometimes do. Grateful though that even a small group will be together today in Palm Springs at Bob Hope’s old house (it’s pretty epic). And with two dogs, for which we are also thankful.

    A favorite recollection

    As my own Family splintered in the 90s, starting families and lives of their own, I won out. Mom and Dad would travel to be where I was on the holiday. It started in Orlando, then continued on to New York, Las Vegas, Santa Monica and the Bay Area. They liked to travel, and we made some great good memories.

    Dad had always talked up New York, sharing stories of his business trips from back in the day. And he loved a good sandwich. The Reuben was a favorite.

    One year, on Wednesday, the eve of the big day, I took the Folks to a matinee of “Masterclass” on Broadway. Patti Lupone as Maria Callas. Spectacular. It was cold and nasty when we exited the theater. Miraculously we scored a cab in short order. I sent the Folks uptown so they could dry off and get warm in my apartment. And then I trudged a dozen blocks north to the Carnegie Deli, uphill and against the wind and rain.

    The place was jammed with last-minute shoppers, most of them buying tongue. When I became “next!” I ordered a Reuben and a corned beef sandwich straight up. Some sides and pickles. The Reuben overflowed a pie tin, the corned beef was a 10-inches tall. I raced east, always against the wind, over to Lexington Avenue and the 4-5-6 subway. The bags were heavy and smelled so good on the subway, cutting through the dank smells of the fetid wetness. I could feel the eyes upon me.

    Then down 86th Street and up the stairs to apartment 4W. After a little reheating, I presented Dad with his Reuben. Mom and I shared the corned beef. There was wine and cocktails.

    It felt good.

    That night, we were safe and warm in my New York City apartment. We were healthy. We enjoyed good food and good fortune. We were together. We were Family. Thankful in the moment. Ever since, thinking back, I get a tingly, all-over wave of gratitude.

    The next day was Thursday. Thanksgiving. We watched the parade (on TV) and some football, took a walk down the street to Carl Shurz Park along the East River, among the fallen leaves. I made a turkey and opened a lot of cans and boxes. Mom made gravy. Dad carved. There were black olives. And leftovers for days.

    Happy Thanksgiving

    Thanks for the warmth, friendship, Family and everything else. And to God for the good health and prosperity. I wish the same for you and yours. Today and every day.

    Bonus content!

    20-some years ago I was working in Las Vegas over the Christmas holiday. A show-boy, back when I had the sparkle, a nice butt and good knees. Thankful.

    I kid.

    Thank you to the McClains, John and Dawn, for inviting me to their home for dinner with the other Misfit Toys. They served a dressing that was so good. Our Family has made it for Thanksgiving ever year since. The recipe’s been shared far and wide, more each time we welcome someone new to our table.

    McVEGAS STUFFING RECIPEDownload
    Enjoy. You are welcome!

  • 39|60 Disney Part Two

    39|60 Disney Part Two

    Note to subscribers: Posts are often better viewed in a browser. Click here.

    So much goodness and the longest of the series!

    Today is Mickey Mouse’s 97th Birthday. To many of you, that’s trivia. To others, like me, it’s a big thing.

    Back in 1928, the cartoon short “Steamboat Willie” premiered in movie theaters. I honestly never enjoyed watching (and especially listening to) that thing, but it was what put Walt Disney on the world stage. From there, he, along with his brother Roy, forged through decades of business and creative ventures, along with a few financial scrapes and certain doom. Walt’s been dead for almost 60 years and yet his name still gets emblazoned on some amazing new places and things every day.

    Anyway, in 1988, I worked on what is my all-time favorite gig: Mickey’s 60th Birthday at Walt Disney World. It was special in many ways, impacting the lives of thousands, including my own. I’ll get to that.

    A Lifetime

    While this post contains a lot of spirited recollections from those days, what’s vital to share up top is that my Disney experience laid the groundwork for so much that came after.

    Every Disney newbie starts with training, a relatively short program called Traditions. There’s a whole Disney University that offers lots of follow-on courses as one matriculates through the system. (I’m hoping that a number of those instructors emeriti—who’ve become authors and keynoters themselves—will read this post. To them I say, forgive me for several of the passages to come, though some of you were complicit. I’m looking at you Chuck Simikian, Jake Poore, Mike Donnelly, et al.)

    What’s more, every day at WDW the teachings of Traditions are reenforced on the job, whether on the front lines or in a back office. Even the scruffiest, most cynical of the bunch (I’m right here!) inspired empathy and positivity in others, all in service of the guest experience. It’s a tradition, a mission, but not a cult. But if you were to join a cult, Walt’s would be a good place to sip the Kool-Aid and chase it with a whiff of the Pixie Dust.

    Though I spent only three years at WDW, the lessons I learned are with me whenever I engage with customer service–on the daily. I am a stickler for good customer (and audience) experiences and will call out service both good and bad.

    As for my creative and, I certainly aspired to (but rarely rose to) Disney-level experiences. I carried with me the absolute reverence for purpose, investment and planning. These are simple words. But of course, in the real world outside of Disney, that triad is a rarity.

    Spoiler

    There is a lot of well-intentioned dereliction in this post, and some tangential debauchery, lots of beer, a night in jail, and a lot of good people. Yes, goodness abounds!

    A few weeks back I shared this 60|60 post as the backstory of my love for the place, my earliest days as an intern and the massive influence it’s had on my career, friendships and life.

    Here’s about where left off…

    In spring 1986, after a semester interning at WDW in operations on Main Street USA, I did a May session up at JMU in Virginia. Then I drove back south 13 hours to the apartment I’d rented with friends in Lake Buena Vista. It would become known as Club 433.

    The place was raging when I pulled in that night, a party spilling outside into the parking lot. Cool.
    What wasn’t cool is that my roommates–i’m looking at you, Steve Watson–had done nothing to furnish the place in the month I was gone. No beds, no couch, no TV, no nothing. Just a whole lot of nothing and beer. Okay. That’s also the night I met Matt Palmer for the first time. I’m gonna save my Matt stories for a later post. December 7.

    A group of six friends posing happily on a couch in a living room, holding drinks and enjoying each other's company, with colorful posters on the wall.

    So, six guys from all over, living in a two-bedroom southwest of Orlando (with no furniture) and working at Disney. Our lifeguard roomie worked early mornings, our custodial friend had the day shift at Epcot, and the rest of us mostly worked nights on Main Street.

    The only constant: beer. Pretty much every night, one of us would be released from work around 11, just as the evening’s last parade was stepping off. Their job was to get a 12-pack (or four) of Busch at one of the 7-Elevens along 535 and meet back at the apartment.

    Then we’d walk around the complex–which housed all the kids from the international Epcot Fellowship program–carrying beer like attache cases. Is this the Canada party? What are the Brits and Mexican kids up to? The Moroccans are killing it tonight. Repeat.

    This is the time in one’s life when you should be learning about boundaries and limits, finding direction. Noted.

    Names to drop here: Tom Eberts, Alison Swanson, Jennifer Campbell, John Rogers, Bill Brett. More, I’m sure. Feel free to tag others that I’m remiss in including.

    Opportunity

    Somewhere around July of that summer, I got tapped to join the marketing office planning WDW’s 15th Anniversary event, thanks to my spirit guide Janis Petrie from the college program.

    Here’s another revelation about scribing this 60|60 series: I’ve come to understand and fully appreciate how certain people and very specific moments and decisions craft a life. This wasn’t meant to be a paean to Janis, but there you go. Thanks, Janis!

    For the 15th gig, I reported to an actual office Monday through Friday, wearing a tie and pants. This is when folks like Eric Hartness, Ken Kreafle and Gary McKechnie enter the picture. The first two months we were there, nothing happened. We sat around, went to lunch, sat around some more and went home. After happy hour.

    Once one enters the junior executive ranks, or junior-junior-junior executive ranks, no more do you roam endlessly into the morning, 12-pack in hand. Instead, you go to happy hour at one of the hotels in Hotel Plaza, which surrounded the Sun Bank building, where my “office” was.

    Good, cheap beer and free food. It’s the kind of food that people my age liked: free.

    My fave was the Laughing Kookabura–the Kook–at the Palace Hotel. They did taco bars and carving stations and had a punch card for sampling every one of their 99 beers. The Plaza Hotel was more disco, but they had a lovely buffet of crudité. Didn’t care for the Hilton or the Viscount.

    Eventually, we got our assignment for the 15th: to arrange for the airlift and housing of 10,000 media people (producers, writers, editors, talent, etc.) to be at Disney for three days in early October, 1986. Invitations went out, RSVPs returned. Essentially, we were a phone bank. Every day was spent on the phone with those who would attend, helping them make arrangements.

    Because a few of us in the office were hoping to get into media and creative work, some convos went on longer than others. And because we were calling from Disney, even the coldest of the bunch would thaw and offer advice.

    It was good for the Rolodex. (Google “Rolodex.” While you’re at it, ask your Gran about a time when you had to dial a 9 to get an outside line. And for good measure, look up the term Telex; I got to chat with people in Moscow late at night because of my killer typing skills. I might have become a Russian asset?)

    Fun side note, my Dad was one of the invitees, being a magazine editor. He attended with Mom.

    It was a big to-do, the largest media event in WDW’s history. They had Dolly Parton and Willie Nelson and Jimmy Buffett and piles of shrimp and lobster. Everyone in the office was invited to the parties; it was like having the caddies to the pool in “Caddyshack.”

    When the party was over, a few of us aspired to stay in marketing afterward. Yeah, no. We had to find somewhere else to go. Since it was in the middle of a school semester, I elected to stay at Disney and was invited to train for Guest Relations.

    MK Guest Relations

    As hourly jobs go, GR carried some prestige: you got to sport a brass-plated brooch identifying you as a tour guide or host, pinned to a jaunty blue and plaid ensemble. The girls carried riding crops and wore equestrian helmets. Yeah, Walt had a thing (or maybe I’m imagining that). Our chief task though was to man the counter in City Hall. We handed out maps, helped guests get oriented, sold stamps, mailed postcards and occasionally dealt with unhappy guests.

    Side note: There was a rule of honor amongst my roomie tribes back then: If you can’t get three hours of sleep before a shift, don’t even bother. So I’ll admit there were some morning shifts where I was running on pure adrenaline and nicotine. I was way-overcompensating and it paid off. Colleagues heaped praise on me for my energy, my way with guests, my Disney spirit. Seriously, I was killing it.

    GR is where empathy and tact are key, along with Disney knowledge and and fortitude. People are at their best and worst when visiting Disney. It can be overwhelming for some. This is when I came to appreciate the maxim, “be kind because you don’t know what other people are going through.” It might not be that they’re grieving over something, but that they feel lost, frustrated, hapless. We all do at times, and it’s nice to be met with kindness. The other maxim, hospitality-specific: “We work while others play.” Truth.

    We heard stories and pleas all the time. It was up to us to assist when we could or console when we couldn’t. Sick kid? Ok, we can make that better. You had a bad spot for the parade? That’s unfortunate. That’s a thing about Disney and other “fantasy” destinations: people let their guard down and think they’re protected, insulated. We were trained never to say “I’m sorry” for an inconvenience; really, it’s not our fault that you didn’t plan or pay attention.

    The other thing I learned that I carry to this day: when something goes wrong, you can do more than just correct or compensate for it. You can turn that unfortunate moment into a precious memory. It doesn’t take much. And even to a cynic like me, it feels really good.

    Another summer. Another flophouse. And the pokey.

    The following summer, 1987, I roomed with another bunch of guys at a place on Kirkman, Summerfield Apartments. Once again, we all worked different shifts, so the only time most of us were together was on Wednesday nights when we’d throw parties following nickel-beer at Rosie O’Grady’s downtown. The parties grew bigger every week and the police began showing up. Proud.

    By August, we were getting too popular. One Wednesday night, the police nearly broke down the door, looking for under-age drinkers. Instead, they found an Orlando Sentinel newspaper vending machine in one of the bedrooms.

    Oh yeah…that.

    Let me explain. A few weeks earlier, a friend and I might have allegedly dared each other to do something risky, something that might get us into trouble. We were still technically in college, so we figured, if we got caught, it wouldn’t go on our “permanent record.” We weren’t looking to do any damage or hurt anyone, just couple of madcaps running a bit of caper late at night. My partner’s name might rhyme with Spike Connelly. Allegedly.

    Anyway, so there’s this machine sitting in the apartment and I’m the only roommate who’d ID’ed himself. I get cuffed, hauled to the 33rd Street jail, strip-searched, locked in a holding cell with one guy tripping balls and two others trying to get their attempted-armed-robbery stories straight. Thanks to my Brother Tim the lawyer in Virginia, I got out the next morning. None of the roommates had a clue I’d been arrested and been absent all night. I’m looking at you, Bob Bates.

    PSA: Theft isn’t cool. You do the crime, you do the time. Bad decisions have consequences, unless they work out in your favor. If you’re going to be intentionally stupid, do it early in life. Fun fact: Newspaper vending machines are worth exactly $301, making their theft a felony by a dollar…according to the OPD.

    It gets more complicated.

    I returned to JMU for my final semester and graduation in December. The thing was, I had to stand trial in Orlando the following February. Once again, with a little help from some friends, I got a six-month quasi-internship with General Motors, doing PR at their attraction at EPCOT.

    Like I said earlier, life unfolds in tiny moments and decisions.

    General Motors

    I hope I don’t offend when I say this: this was the worst job I have ever had. The role was to walk the Transcenter, a collection of GM-centric tech exhibits. We’d engage with guests, offering insights and answering questions. There were also a half-dozen cars in a showroom-like setting for guests to explore.

    I knew nothing about cars, had no interest in cars and had little capacity to learn about cars. Plus, this was GM during their “Roger & Me” phase. My boss was actually in a scene of the film confronting Michael Moore at the Detroit HQ. Oh, and when I purchased a Honda Civic halfway through my stint, my parking privileges are revoked.

    Other names to drop here. So shout out to my GM-colleagues Barb Wilhelm, Terry Theis and Matt Schulte. For this series, I’m calling out folks with whom I still have connection, however thin.

    Roommates during these dark days were Paul Buss and Brad Moore. We lived in the Fountains off Kirkman, a stone’s throw from the scene of my arrest. Our Christmas parties were pretty lit. They’re both empty-nesters now. Note to their sons: your dads were once cool. I know.

    Oh, and thanks to my Brother Timbo, the charges against me were dismissed in February. But I still had months to serve on my GM gig.

    More Opportunity

    Through Janis, I met more Disney legends-in-the-making. I mentioned Jody Carbiener and her husband-to-be John Dreyer in my earlier 60|60 Disney post. Their friendship and generosity made a big difference in my Disney experience. Jody had been the WDW Ambassador when I was interning and then she moved into PR. John ran the press office for WDW. (They both went on to illustrious Disney careers in California.)

    Those connection led to my role on Mickey’s 60th extravaganza. Like I said, it remains the pinnacle of projects in my portfolio–for scope, team, purpose, execution and learning.

    Kristine and Jody

    When I met with Jody in her office for the project kickoff, I also met Kristine Vorpagel. I recognized her as she approached. She’d been in my apartment a few months before, when she and her friend Dorothy rolled in late and toasty with my roommate and another friend. Not auspicious, kinda sketchy. Now we exchanged the head-tilt “huh” look.

    Anyway, she and I became fast friends. Kyle Shields was our other office mate. He and Krissy got married a few years later; I was in the wedding. Their twins just graduated college.

    Mickey’s 60th

    Here was the idea: to celebrate the icon/logo/brand’s birthday, WDW would bring 5,000 disadvantaged children from around the world to WDW for an epic, three-day party. Disneyland would do likewise. 100 cities were identified to attend the WDW party, including plenty of major US markets, as well as internationals like Berlin, Sao Paolo, Mexico City, Tokyo, Beijing, Sydney and even Moscow.

    The mayors of each city were enlisted to select and escort 10-500 kids of their choosing to bring to the party. The criteria was up to them: the children might be from homeless or foster programs, food banks, shelters or hospitals. They might also be high-achievers. (Yes, there was some frauding too, sadly.)

    For three months, Krissy, Kyle and I occupied a makeshift office well off-property and beyond rigid oversight. The walls were covered with charts and logistics stuff, the desks lined with phones. We also had tons of merch and big boxes for shipping swag to the kids beforehand.

    As for happy houring, now that I’d been elevated to a junior-junior executive, we would hit the classy places in Winter Park on Fridays and maybe a few other days. It was a long way from Nickel Beer and the Big Bamboo in Kissimmee. And the Kook was still a destination.

    Spokesmanshipping

    No publicity was planned for the 60th, I was told. The purpose wasn’t to get ink but to just do good, without recognition. The ink will come, in other ways. A few weeks out, though, press releases and media kits were distributed broadly. I was too junior to know anything about that. But I was tapped to be a spokesperson for the event. Even as I went about my logistics role, I was fielding calls from newspapers and TV stations, going live on drive-time radio around the country (and a few internationally). I liked it.

    And apparently, it like me. I used those skills to evolve the next steps in my career at Universal and beyond. Still use them today.

    The Perfect Event

    We heard feedback from mayors and chaperones, about kids sleeping in a bed for the first time, getting to choose what to watch on TV, seeing fireworks and laser shows and all the rest, eating as much cake as they wanted, having the run of worlds they’d only dreamt of. They were appreciated, even celebrated. It was life-changing for some. Me being one of them.

    Not many companies commit to event production like Disney. Experience is their brand. Exceeding expectations is their jam. What I took away from my own experience with Disney inspired the rest of my career, even if I wasn’t able to bring them all to bear, consistently.

    Here are three key things. None of this is novel, but as I grow more distant from the day-to-day work, I am reminded about what a quality experience necessitates.

    • Purpose. Never lose sight of the reason for the event. Keep purpose at the core. Make it matter to the audience, to their lives. Ensure they take away the message, spirit and impact you want to deliver. Purpose must be evident at every touchpoint. For the 60th, the purpose was to make some kids smile, laugh, feel valued and loved.
    • Investment. Invest what’s needed to make the event effective. If you can’t afford it, don’t overreach or try to stretch a nickel. Cheapness is visible to the audience and affects their experience, as well as the staff’s morale. This has been a major challenge in my later career, as corporations have sharpened their event pencils.
    • Planning. Establish leadership, build consensus and nail the vision. Manage for change, but also acknowledge that with every deviation from the vision and purpose, the experience becomes thinner and weaker and probably more expensive. See notes above.
    Disney Learnings

    I was going to list a few of the many of the things I learned from my Disney days. But this post is already reading at 17 minutes, according to the bot. Makes me wish Walt had a bot to tell him that “Steamboat Willie” was a little long, repetitive and screechy. But here we are; Walt did good. There will def be more good Disney insight in the penultimate 60|60 post.

    Pixie dust sticks to you, with you, inside you. Along with the friends, beer and magic. For the rest of your life.

    Thanks for reading, and…

    Make sure you have all of your personal belongings with you before you exit this blog post. And be sure to come see us again!

  • 38|60 Mary & Those O’Neills

    38|60 Mary & Those O’Neills

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    Happy Birthday, Babe!
    Here’s a story about the Family I married into.

    A while back, Mary’s niece Emma was accepted into Colorado College. She was the latest in a long line of O’Neills to matriculate there. Her application was stellar: activism, volunteering, world travel and adventure, fish mongering, a black belt. Overall an upright citizen, a kick-ass prospect.

    A few weeks later, just before Christmas, she received another letter from CC. Based on her deeply empathic bona fides, Emma was being welcomed into an exclusive program called the Second Chance Academic Rehabilitation and Reformatory program (SCARR). She would be partnered with a less-advantaged student in hopes of helping them get their life back on track. The news was shared at a big family holiday dinner in Palo Alto. Obviously, all were immensely proud! This is pure Emma! She’s so got this!

    A few days later, another letter arrived in her mailbox, this one introducing Emma to her roommate-to-be, her SCARR “Sister” Jennifer. According to the enclosed dossier, Jennifer had recently been released from Zebulon Pike Detention Center and accepted into CC as part of a new outreach initiative. Her photo was tough to look at, reminiscent of the Faces of Meth memes.

    Emma’s role would be vital to Jennifer’s recovery. Her mandated duties included monitoring Jennifer’s ankle bracelet, enforcing strict celibacy, and administering her antipsychotic meds daily.

    The Family’s enthusiasm took an extreme turn. WTAF! How could they? This is horrifying! Oh hell no!

    Emma’s parents, Kay and Peter, both CC alums, phoned the Dean of Housing on his cell; he was on Christmas break in Hawaii. He assured them that he knew nothing of the program, that it sounded absurd (even for CC). None of this made any sense. They were being punked.

    Curious, no?

    Turns out, this was the work of Emma’s cherished cousins, Ben and Tyler, identical twins and pranking masterminds—savants!—along with their dad Harn. I’m happy to say I had a little something to do with it, some minor Photoshopping and finessing the acronym for SCARR. To be clear: I did not have anything to do with the mail-frauding part of this.

    Once the jig was up, Emma, Kay and Peter quickly and rightly suspected the culprits and called them out. Ben and Tyler fessed up. Guilty.

    At Emma’s wedding last year, the guys staged a passion play recreating the drama for the uninitiated. There was dancing and singing, some costumes, a dream sequence. I narrated. Raves.

    Eerily, there has been no retribution.

    Yet.

    Such is life in the O’Neill Family.

    At First Sight…

    I met most of the O’Neill cast back in the early aughts. It was a party at an apartment near UCLA. Ben and Tyler’s 21st birthday. Mary and I were not yet an item, but I lived just on the other side of the 405, so why not. Harn was grilling, Kay was mixing drinks, Mary’s oldest sister Karen was mingling, Ben had just gotten back from a football game at the Rose Bowl and Tyler was hauling in gear after a day on a film shoot.

    That’s the thing about the O’Neills, they come at you fast, all at once and from all sides. Relentlessly charming.

    A year later, Ben graduated from UCLA and Tyler from USC. That’s when I met Mary’s Parents, Gene and Jane. Gene was an imposing and gregarious figure, a successful businessman and a bit of a dapper cat, a 23-skidoo sort of fellow. He looked good in a Fedora. Jane’s sparkle was simply irresistible and contagious. Her eyes could light up a room, along with her smile, grace and curiosity. They were big dancers, which I learned in short order.

    That weekend, we all met up at The Grove for lunch. I drove. Mary was in the back seat, Gene rode shotgun. He asked me what I did for a living. Thirty minutes later, as we pulled into the parking garage, and after much back and forth, Gene still had no idea what I did. Neither did I, at that point. Mary stayed silent the whole time.

    It wasn’t until I moved in with Mary in Mountain View a few years later that I completed the set: Kay’s husband Peter and their kids Emma and Griffin. I think Griffin approved because I wore Vans and had Green Day’s “Longview” as my ringtone. Kids dig me that way.

    Back then, the three sisters lived within a few miles of each other, up and down the 101 in Silicon Valley, so we got together often. Side note: At our wedding reception, Mary, Karen and Kay performed “Sisters” from “White Christmas.” Apparently it wasn’t their first time. It doesn’t take much to incite a reprise.

    All the kids are married now. And to good people: Neil, Dralla, Niko and Nopo. Gene and Jane have passed. On special occasions, I sport Gene’s Fedora proudly.

    Just a Family sitting in a meadow a few miles from the Grand Tetons, all sporting blue
    There’s Something (Else) About Mary

    Today is Mary’s birthday. I won’t say which one. It’s an odd number but not a prime. It’s one of those numbers that gets you special discounts the rest of your life, usually before 5:30 PM. She’s not the type to exploit such things, but it’s good to know in a pinch.

    I did a whole post last month about me and Mary, in honor of our 10th wedding anniversary. Meet cute, world travel, dogs, houses, careers, lots more. But I left a few things out.

    Btw, Mary, if you’re reading this, just scroll down real quick. A little more. More. (She’s a very private person.)

    Truth be told, she approved this post. Mostly. It was an early draft.

    A T-shirt design from a few years ago.

    Mary is the youngest of four. Her Family called her Sonny for a few years in her youth because of the haircuts her Mother got her. Her Dad called her a “Weirdsmobile,” a moniker she has applied to every dog we’ve had. Speaking of dogs, Mary is a dog whisperer extraordinaire. It doesn’t affect Bowzer’s behavior in the slightest, but it is the sweetest thing to overhear first thing in the morning and late at night and throughout the day. It’s actually happening right now in the other room.

    She grew up near St. Louis. There’s a thing they do there, when meeting another native: “Where’d you go to high school?” The answer offers up lots of socio-economic insight and spurs further conversation. (Not so different from dogs sniffing butts IMO.) Mary went to a private school called John Burroughs. So whenever the question comes up, every few years, the conversation is over. Record-scratch, eyes askance, awkward silence. Fun fact: Jon Hamm, Ellie Kemper, Sam Altman and Danny Meyer are alums.

    She is the child of a grocer. When other couples go on vacation, they might explore museums or hip neighborhoods or just sit on the beach. We do all that but we also hit the local food stores and markets. For fun.

    Gene was a player in the grocery business and started several chains, including Shop’n’Save and Save-A-Lot. Mary worked punch-cards for his company in her early teens. She can also bag some serious groceries, a masterclass for the checkers and assistant managers. Until a few years ago, there was a Save-A-Lot across the street from a Shop’n’Save in Ludington, nearby our Michigan home. But alas.

    Mary is a planner and a doer. She makes things happen. At 15, she had her own catering business. In her career, she’s made things happen for Marriott, Intel, Cisco and ServiceNow. When we hosted Meat Days in California, Mary crafted the menu, including meatball-dipping bars, ceviche shots, bacon fatties (DM me), brisket, chicken wings, salmon and tuna, ribeyes, ribs and more. I think there was a vegan option. But why? it’s called Meat Day! Mary is nice that way.

    Meatball dipping bar

    Fun note: She likes a good reveal. On weekends during the pandemic, we became watchers of HGTV, while solving jigsaws on a card table a few feet from the HD. So these days, if the TV is on and whatever football game sucks, we’ll tune to channel 41 at about 10 to the hour to watch the finished product for a house we will never visit and owners we will never meet. Doers get it done. Closure. But what’s with that wallpaper in the bathroom?

    Mary & The Binders

    She met my Mom and Dad at Lake Michigan in 2005, halfway through a roadtrip from California, via St. Louis. And then Christmas with my Folks in Virginia, where f-bombs were dropped and oysters shucked. Read all about it here and here. We didn’t marry for another 10 years, a source of scandal to my oldest Brother Tim. He and Dad passed before Mary and I did marry. Mom was there, in Scottsdale. Family, friends and more. Gene had to cancel at the last minute, sadly. My Brother Mike offered up the first toast. Tim’s widow Gina delivered a real glass-hoister, timely and spot-on.

    In the summer of 2019, just before the pandemic hit, Mom announced that it would be her last season in the house on Lake Michigan. It was just too much to maintain and navigate. The thought of losing the house from the Family was excruciating to me. When I suggested to Mary we should buy it, she rightly noted that it was impractical: we lived 2500 miles away and had jobs and offices and business travel and old dogs and lives.

    But since our Families have scattered and dwindled, Lake Michigan is the only place where we have a nexus of kin and where extended Family and friends can visit–not easily, mind you, but still. Karen, Ben and Tyler visited two summers ago. They haven’t been back since. Might be something about administering my meds?

    Mary made a huge sacrifice to keep the Lake house in the Family–if only for one more generation–and for that I will be eternally grateful. We’re finishing some reno and upgrades on the place my Folks built for their golden years back in the early 1980s. This will play a big part in our next chapter.

    We’re Off to See the Wizard

    Today, on Mary’s quantifiably-confidential birthday, we’re in Las Vegas. We spent a lot of time here as part of our jobs, but we still love visiting the place. Shows, sights, chow, vices and all. I still enjoy a little nicotine contact-high. We’ll be taking in the late matinee of “The Wizard of Oz” at the Sphere and then having dinner with the Cousins and BFF Gberg. Chinese. Mary’s choice.

    Tomorrow night, we’re re-celebrating our 10th anniversary at Hugo’s Cellar. (On our actual anniversary last month, we were in Bentonville, Arkansas. We got Vietnamese take-out to bring back to the hotel room to watch football. We’re easy like that.)

    Hugo’s is an O.G. classic on Fremont Street and the site of an early dinner–as friends–20+ years ago. It was during the awkward period. There was a tiara.

    Ben and Tyler probably aren’t here. Or maybe they are. Wait, is that Jennifer? Or is that Ben dressed up like Jennifer? Or Emma. With a tiara.

    With this Family, one never knows.

  • 37|60 Creativity

    37|60 Creativity

    This one’s gonna be messy.

    I’ve been grateful to spend much of my career being creative. Writing, design, illustration, theater, film and video, live events. Mostly business stuff. Corporate. Some award-winning, some esoteric. Most of it was never seen by more than a few thousand peeps, rarely in the light of day. Or night. Or ever.

    Even so, it’s been a satisfying career. But I never did make “a big great movie,” as the Indigo Girls put it. Okay yes, I totally misrepresented and mangled their words, intent and more. Seriously, I only just learned that the actual words are “B-grade movie.” I claim creative license.

    What is Creativity?

    I don’t know. I don’t care. It doesn’t matter. What’s the meaning of life? Or the health insurance marketplace. Or extra guac. Or another margarita (yes, please).

    It’s just a thing. Everyone is creative in some way. Whether you decorate the porch for Halloween, embellish your Mom’s chili recipe, dress up your cat as Sabrina Carpenter or lie under oath at a congressional hearing. Dang, I gotta stop being so cynical in this post. Wait, maybe cynicism plays a role in creativity. Huh.

    Some people have a lot of it. I’m glad to have known a few of them who’ve carved out some spiffy careers for themselves and lots of fans. A few have gone far with their creativity, really far, builders and CEOs with global recognition. Others–some of the most creative people I’ve known–have not. Did not. Won’t. Sorry. I’m with you. L’chaim.

    Here’s what I do know. Creativity is messy. And a gift. I was lucky to have been born into a creative lot. Our Parents nurtured our creativity generously. They themselves were also touched with the bug, in many ways. Dad was a writer, photographer and journalist. Mom was a puppeteer, a seamstress and a teacher. Both raconteurs. For Christmas, we Boys got sketch pads, pens, pencils and markers. And a Gameboy. All along, we got positive though critical reinforcement from the Folks.

    Back in pre-school, age 4-ish, I got raves over some Christmas project I’d done, involving a muffin pan or an egg shell. Mom wrote about it in her diary. In second grade, I won a poster contest and was awarded 31 scoops from the Baskin-Robbins in a strip mall east of 123 in Fairfax. (Photo below.) When my third-grade teacher, Ms. Cherry, read one of my stories aloud, she said I was a very good writer and I should pursue it. As a sophomore in high school, I painted a Big Mac onto the front window of the Vienna McDonalds. It took me four days, I made $20. Lots of hard, valuable and creative lessons learned there. Don’t let yourself get screwed. But you still will, on occasion; deal and move on.

    In college, an English professor critiqued an essay I’d scribed and gave me some advice. His comment blew my mind. Seriously, I saw the light, like a door opening into an all-new, super shiny dimension. It unlocked all new creative perspectives for me, not only in writing but in all sorts of art and expression.

    I sure as hell wish I could remember what he said to me. I’d always planned to thank him in my Oscar acceptance speech, but I don’t remember his name either. What’s the opposite of creativity? Reality? Aging? Shut up.

    A few years back, a former boss sent me a note, commenting on a book I’d just self-published. Paraphrasing: “You are one of the most creative people I have ever known. Do you know what that means for me to say that?” This guy’s career included running a $10+ billion-dollar travel and entertainment juggernaut, managing huge global creative teams of Imagineers, architects and ad agencies. Yeah, gobsmacked, and grateful for the shoutout.

    So What Happened

    Why didn’t I go as far as I wanted to with all these gifts and support and tools and advantages. One answer might be that I can be a demanding, egotistical, loner asshole at times. I’ve known a lot of assholes who went far, but I guess they were better at it than me.

    As likely, there were other forces–real and imagined–telling me that I wasn’t good enough. That creativity isn’t a career. It’s not lucrative or sustainable. It’s healthier as a hobby, an avocation. Go get a real job.

    In hindsight, I accept that I never tried hard enough or took enough risks or took my work seriously enough. I could have pushed harder, sold myself better. Or maybe, I should have been better, produced better stuff, proven myself with product. I didn’t make a deep enough commitment to an idea or a project; I’m too fickle, restless, shallow.

    Demons!…though not with entirely unreasonable notions. I suppose I largely sided with the demons.

    And I don’t discredit the role of luck and timing in all this. In everything.

    How To Be Creative

    You can’t. You don’t to it. It does you. When it’s ready.

    My advice: give it time and room to grow inside you. Invite it. Let it well up. Wake up at night to take notes. Try to understand the vision even if you can’t see it yet. Be patient. Be lost. Be alert. In time, the context, content and creativity will force itself out of you. Onto a page or a canvas or a screen or whatever outlet is your jam!

    It’ll burst, erupt, ignite, explode. Gotta love those violent, virtuous verbs. Messy!

    But why take my advice.

    I Tried

    Before I started my first (and only) novel, it had been percolating inside me for years, oozing, bubbling, boiling. Then one day, it all came out. It just came. Wave after wave, like a refreshing all-out barf. It felt so good! Three weeks–and four cartons of Marlboro Lights–later, I was up to page 267. Characters were developed, conflicts defined, stakes set, a massive plot twist teased on that last page. Halfway home, I thought.

    Yeah, well. I think this is a good time to tap the brakes. Let’s read it back and do a little editing. I mean, what’s even in here? Let’s see where this next chapter needs to go. I know how I want it to end, I just need to find a way there. Make sure the second half is as good as the first. These characters. Like that Jackson James character, is he still believable or relatable? Too arrogant? Does the story even need him? Or should he be the main character, in the first person omniscient? Where is this narrative voice even coming from? It’s a bloody piece of crap! (Demons.)

    My Brother Tim, in an encouraging spirit, cautioned me that, “the world is full of half-finished novels. Just finish it.”

    People who read the draft of the first half back then gave huge raves (which is why they were tapped to review it, I suppose). But I was stuck. I couldn’t stoke more conflict or keep the stakes escalating. In screenplays, it’s called a third-act problem. My confidence crumbled. I couldn’t, wouldn’t finish my half-finished novel.

    I never did get beyond page 267. Good news: the 267 pages are in the cloud. So, suck on that, Future of Creativity! Fingers crossed it makes history, posthumously. Just like John Kennedy Toole. Who offed himself, sadly. Don’t be like him. Or David Foster Wallace or people that are so creative and tortured and unfulfilled that they off themselves.

    Also, stop smoking.

    Over the years, I have written three screenplays and a book. I had readings of two of the screenplays in New York, optioned one for a dollar, and now they are in the cloud to be savored for meta-eternity. (Back then, you’d print out your 120-page document and take it to Kinkos to have them run off a few dozen three-holed-punched-bound copies, and then you’d go to the other side of the store to get them shipped off to agents you’d flagged in the Writer’s Market catalog.)

    The book I self-published back in 2020-something sold a few hundred copies, made it into Amazon’s top 10,000 for a while, and I haven’t sold one in months. With creativity, the journey is the passion. Sales and attention are so bourgeoisie. Sigh. Gulp. Guh.

    Blank Canvasses

    To some people, there is nothing more beautiful than a blank canvas or a blank page. Tabula rasa.

    Fuck ’em.

    To someone who aspires to be creative, blank spaces are a challenge. Setting aside my cynicism: yes, they can be exciting, but as often they can be agonizing, sometimes spiteful. They mock. Sure, in a month or a year they might become something. Maybe beautiful. Maybe not. Art, poetry, epiphanies, masterpieces. Or garbage.

    I bought a bunch of mid-sized canvases yesterday. They’re the blank white variety, propped up under my dusty drafting table, across from my desk and next to where all the brushes and paints and markers and pencils are stocked. Those canvasses, they’re just staring at me. Staring through me. Staring! Snickering. Cruel…

    …And now I am feeling that “something” bubbling up inside of me. I don’t know what it is yet. Might not know for a while. It might never come out. Still, I am putting those canvasses on notice. Tomorrow might be the day. Stand back and stand by! Prepare to be painted! And mounted and framed and hung. Or shredded. Or delivered to Goodwill. Or all of the above!

    Why do we fill blank spaces? I think it’s like climbing a mountain: Because it’s there.

    Oh, look. A link!
    Process

    Meh. You do you.

    Traditions & Habits

    Early on, I heard about writers who would be up at 4AM writing, and then they’d go off to do their day jobs. That was never me. Though I do spend a few hours on sleepless nights staring at the ceiling and brooding on words and themes and designs and just plain lexi-effluvia. I’ve actually sold lots of work based on those solitary, insomnia-charged sessions. Each one is now represented by a line underneath my eyes.

    Every morning in 2021, I posted a haiku on my socials. I didn’t need a reminder; it just came out. Easy: put together 17 syllables to capture my mood and thoughts for the day. Sometimes I posted more than one; some days I kept the haiku private because it was too dark or too deep or I didn’t want it being introduced into evidence at my inevitable congressional hearing.

    I highly recommend this exercise. Not only is it good for getting your head in gear, checking and expressing yourself, it’s also a grand way to learn to economize your words, to get to the meat of the thing.

    That last sentence is a prime example of irony.

    For one of the 60|60 posts coming up around Christmas, I’ll post a retrospective of the holiday cards I’ve been designing and sharing since 1994, my first year in New York. Looking back at some of them, I am catapulted into the best times of my life and the most challenging, lonely and lost. With the exception of a few years, these cards always start with a blank canvas. What does this Christmas mean to me right now? Who is in my life? What’s happened this year? It can be agonizing to find the right tone, the right message, the right visuals. Some years go down to the wire. Some are personal, others topical, others random. Some just suck. Some I still revisit, even after 20 or 30 years (2009 still cracks me up). Btw, one criterion for the card: Mary and I must be present in the art, even if hidden.

    The 2025 cards are already getting printed, weeks ahead of schedule. Thanks to a little something called Bowzer. “OMG! You’re doing a Christmas card with your new dog on it? So creative!” As for my image in the card, this is the first I will be absent. Adulting. Or humility. Or this dog doesn’t need a supporting cast. You’ll see.

    Armor

    Ten or so years ago, a colleague–a seasoned creative director–pitched ideas to an internal team. They had notes, some not so constructive. The CD told me that they were devastated with the feedback. They’d broken into tears. I asked them what other creative outlets they had in their life, hoping to bolster and compliment their innate creative instincts. Nothing. “This job is how I am creative.” I wanted to cry, myself.

    More unsolicited advice: Don’t go to work to be creative. Be creative to go to work. No matter what you do. Unless you’re keeping count (of hits, followers or books sales), others’ opinions don’t matter. Yes, in the creative profession, you’ll need to build consensus, but do not let other randos shit on your ideas.

    You go be creative, love yourself and respect your work, and everyone else can fuck off. I think my cynicism is showing.

    Almost lastly: People who like blank canvases also have no idea how hard it is to fill them. And share them.

    A Mess

    In closing: yes, I edited this piece, tried to steer it into some cohesion, positivity and purpose, trimmed it, even ran it by A.I. at the end. ChatGPT gave it raves, and a few notes but I don’t care. Now I am putting it out there, into the cloud, for as long as my credit card is renewed or until it gets tapped out.

    On the bright side: I didn’t routinely capitalize the word creativity in this post. Nor did I use the term innovative anywhere. You are welcome.

    Early drafts included a few words about storytelling. Yeah, no, not worth it. “Fetch is not going to happen!”

    This one is messy, I warned you. I’m okay with that. Go get messy.

    I Lied. There’s More

    At the end of its review of a draft of this essay, ChatGPT offered up some advice.

    “The only thing missing, perhaps, is a turn toward universality near the end — a brief moment where your story widens into insight for others. Something like:

    ‘Maybe creativity isn’t about making something lasting. Maybe it’s about staying awake to the urge, even if it never sees daylight.’”

    Bot can talk some smack!

    N.F.W!

    I’m not going to let A.I. write the ending to this one. At the risk of sounding even more pretentious than I have throughout the rest of this lecture, I’ll say this:

    Living a life of creativity is not to see or make “a big great movie,” but to live a big great life.

  • 36|60 Roadtripping

    36|60 Roadtripping

    We just finished a seven-day roadtrip from our Lake house in Michigan to our other home here in Scottsdale. It was a utilitarian trip, facilitating the need to get from one place to another efficiently and with a dog. This time though, we spent a little more time smelling the roses along the way. Spoiler: no roses, no smells of note. But we did see a bronze statue of a big pig. Bowzer freaked.

    That’s the thing about a roadtrip versus other modes of travel: you can go at your own pace, take detours, slow down or speed up. Smell things. You don’t even need to have a plan at all. If you know us, though, you know that we are planners, down to the mile and the minute. Even so, we called some audibles on this trip, extending stays (e.g., in Bentonville, Arkansas to visit Crystal Bridges and the pig) and abbreviating others (Gallup, New Mexico, yikes). Also, any chance you get to gas up at a Buc-ees, take it. You’re welcome.

    2025

    Here’s what I took away from our most recent trip: in a time when the country feels so divided–state against state, ideology against morality, intellect against insanity, the rich versus the poor–a 2000-mile drive along interstates and backroads offers a different take.

    We moved seamlessly across the country, witnessing little or no societal disruption along the way. State lines bore little significance beyond changes in speed limits, road-surface conditions and quality of rest areas. Some states spend the money, others do not. I’m looking at you, New Mexico. Trucks were omnipresent the whole way, and we saw plenty of double-stacked trains on tracks paralleling the road; supply chains seem to be robust.

    The trip had continuity. The forests of Michigan gave way to the concrete sprawl of Chicago and then rose into the hills of Missouri, the flat lands of Oklahoma and Texas, and the twisty, white-knuckle roads through the surprisingly lush, green mountains of Arizona. We passed through a few cities, separated by hundreds of miles of farms and grain elevators, truck stops and antique malls, trailer parks and shotgun shanties, and subdivisions of McMansions impossibly built onto postage-stamp lots set fast along the interstate-proper on vast prairies far away from anything.

    In some of the hard-luck-looking places, where piles of junk and rusting lots of cars stood guard around crumbling houses and decrepit single-wides, there was still a sense of community. We didn’t stop to chat, but in my imagination, I want to believe the residents and their kin were contented with what they had, in an H.I. McDunnough sort of way.

    We did America. The good and the bad, the kind and the asinine, the bold and the humble, the ugly and the proud. We saw refreshingly few signs for Trump and Brandon. But plenty for Jesus Christ. And casinos. And CBD. And personal injury lawyers. And fireworks. America.

    A Marvel

    I’ve long considered the interstate highway system as one of America’s greatest achievements. It would be impossible to launch and execute in this day and age. The thing runs nearly 50,000 miles. When you look at it in the macro, it makes sense: east-west routes are even numbers, north-south odd. It needs work in places, lots of work in some. And remember, as we were so often reminded: bridges get icy before the rest of the roadway. Also, if you kill a road worker in Michigan, you’re in for $7500. I think it’s ten grand in Indiana, so plan accordingly.

    Approaching St. Louis via one of its labyrinth spaghetti bowls of intersecting highways, on-ramps and off-ramps, it’s like being in a bustling travel hub where you’re forced to commit to your destiny in the blink of an eye. Don’t blink! Do you want to go to Memphis or New Orleans or Dallas or Kansas City or Minneapolis or Indianapolis or back to Chicago or into that concrete barrier. Make up your mind! Even the GPS lady isn’t really sure about which of the myriad tentacles to take. “Um,” I think she said, and then we rolled the dice.

    Also, these days there are a lot of flashing lights on every government, safety and commercial vehicle out there. Could this be the reason for the rise of epilepsy and autism?

    Waxing historical, I often think back on the pioneers who migrated west early in the 19th Century. What a slog! They’d spend days and weeks traversing a valley and climbing some ridge or mountain in the hopes of a revelation, a sign, progress(!), only to find another seemingly endless tract ahead of them. Again and again and again. And again.

    On this trip, Mary tired of me proclaiming “the Pacific!” every time we crested a horizon. Can’t say I blame her.

    Wayback

    I was roadtripping in utero. I don’t know that to be true, but it seems plausible. Mom’s roadtrip of 1969 was something, and it still stands as the most epic of all time: ten weeks, three boys, one tent and no McDonalds. Check out Marge Binder’s Epic Adventure, a series I put together back in 2019 using her diary from the day, along with vintage maps, guide books and triptiks. I still have the trove of the resources I used for this, all purchased on Ebay. I need to find a respectable way to share them with the next generation. Oh, and check this out: Dinah Shore belting out See the USA in your Chevrolet!

    My Family roadtripped a lot. Every summer we’d head to Michigan from Virginia, and some Christmases we’d go south to Walt Disney World. Dad was keen to visit the battlefields and monuments of the mid-Atlantic, at first in our tent and then in an 18-foot Terry trailer. We went to the 1976 Montreal Olympic Games in that trailer.

    Mom’s M.O. on long trips: pack the night before and be out of the driveway before dawn; that made time for swimming and recreation in the afternoon. She also had a system for maintaining silence: be quiet for a full hour and earn a quarter. Make a peep and the clock starts anew. We Brothers were not a supportive bunch, so noise-provoking antics in the back seat and wayback were common. Still, we usually ended up with enough coin to feed the campground’s arcade for a while.

    Stupid Roadtripping

    When I was of-age and with license, I navigated my own roadtrips. I actually got my first (and only, so far) speeding ticket on my first roadtrip to the Lake with a high school friend. Lesson learned (not).

    On one of my first Fridays as a freshman at JMU, I was kidnapped by brothers of the fraternity I was pledging, plucked from the sidewalk as I was returning to my dorm by Don Parr and Ted Farnen. A few hours and beers later, we were at the Virginia Tech Kappa Sig house in Blacksburg. We went to a Romantics concert, because…yeah, Otis Day and the Knights were booked. We serenaded girls on the campus of Hollins College. We slept on random floors. On the trip home Sunday, we stopped at Natural Bridge, a pretty special place off the 81 south of Lexington. I missed my 8:00 AM Monday physics lab. Honestly, I simply forgot.

    A lot of other roadtrips back then were utilitarian, like driving from JMU to Richmond for work on weekends. That entailed drinking until late at a fraternity rager on Friday night and then piling into someone’s hand-me-down coupe and careening across the Appalachians in the misty, twisty darkness, and then sleeping in the car until our shifts began as security guards at Kings Dominion. I wince as I write this.

    The JMU kids spent spring break in Key West. Four or five fraternity brothers packed into Dan Harvey’s olive-green Delta 88 for the drive. Ten hours in, we celebrated crossing the border into Florida, dumb to the fact that the trip was barely half done.

    When I lived in Orlando after college, my buddy and roommate Matt Palmer and I would make quick eight-hour trips to Key West, where his brother was F&B director at a resort. Because we wanted to arrive around dawn, we’d leave on Friday at midnight. But to get to midnight, we had to stay awake. And that meant pitchers of beer and plates of wings at CJs or JBs or Sneakers. Then a 12-pack for the road. The Florida Turnpike is flat and straight, so it’s easy to fall asleep. Or worse yet, to hallucinate onto the dark, desolate highway ahead: broken-down big rigs, swarms of alligators, clowns. But that armadillo is real!

    A favorite Florida roadtrip was one I planned for a girlfriend’s birthday. We woke up in Orlando and drove the Beeline to Cocoa Beach pre-dawn. We watched the sun rise over the Atlantic, sipped champagne. And then we headed west and down I-4 to Clearwater on the Gulf of Mexico to watch the sun set. I’m a solar-celestial romantic that way.

    If you want to test your compatibility with a partner, roadtrip together. There’s just enough silence, tedium and stress to bubble any foibles to the surface. Do they read every billboard aloud? Do they sing along with every song? Do they snack loudly? Is their G.I. up to the task? Do they have an odor?

    Mary and I roadtripped together for the first time in 2005. It was a mix of utility and pleasure. I started out from Santa Monica and picked her up at her Folks’ place in St. Louis. We drove to Lake Michigan where she met my Folks for the first time. Then we headed back west to her place in Northern California via Des Moines, Oglala, Aspen and Reno. For the next few months, I roadtripped back and forth from Mountain View to Santa Monica every few weeks, until we finally moved in together up north.

    A few years later, we roadtripped coast to coast, up to Michigan and down to Florida, with our two dogs in tow. Not as long as my Mom’s trip, and we tended towards AirBnBs and Residence Inns as opposed to a tent. Still, a grind.

    Stupider

    Who remembers what happened in March of 2020?

    Mary and I made a good decision. And then a bad one. We had reservations for Cabo San Lucas to celebrate my birthday. The night before our flight, news of the corona virus was reaching a fever pitch and chatter about closing the borders became a thing. Friends warned of dire risks, urging us to cancel. We did. Then we tried to conjure a good alternative. Hawaii? No, they were talking quarantine. Portland? Why. Vegas? Our jobs took us there every month back then. Anyway, do we really want to get on a plane right now?

    Idyllic

    ROADTRIP! Something familiar and pleasant, down the coast to my old hometown of Santa Monica. Lovely!

    The first day on Highway 1 heading south along the coast was beautiful, though the twisties at the cusp of the cliffs and views of the hungry ocean down below were panic-making. I’m not a physicist, but the catastrophic potential at the vortex of momentum, inertia, gravity, guardrail fallibility and my own dull reflexes seemed quite viable.

    We took a break and basked over a nice lunch at Nepenthe, overlooking the woodsy Pacific coast (highly recommend). We decided to overnight in Santa Barbara. By the time we got there though, the weather had turned sour. We braved the rain to run across the street from our hotel to a supermarket for provisions. That’s when things got weird. We saw other people running into the store, appearingly stressed, even frantic. The place was packed, some shelves picked clean, and the lines were overwhelming. It was chaos. It was scary. It was real.

    Santa Barbara and Santa Monica

    The next morning, my birthday, Friday the 13th, we continued south toward Santa Monica, undaunted. As we drove into the dark clouds over Los Angeles on the 101 (one of my least favorite highways), NPR reported a pandemic had been officially declared. Schools were closing. Disneyland and Universal were closing. The president was shucking and jiving. And we kept driving. Down the 405 to the 10 and west to Ocean Avenue.

    We dined across the street from our hotel on the beach. The next day was beautiful, so we strolled and shopped along Abbott-Kinney and the Venice Promenade, Third Street and Montana Avenue. We made plans for drinks with friends and a family brunch the next day. (Name drop alert: Our drinks were planned with my friend Cheryl Hines and her husband RFK Jr., vaccine skeptic and the future secretary of Health and Human Services. I still love Cheryl!)

    Somewhere along the way that Saturday, the vibe changed. Almost instantly. The buzz amplified, a whiff of paranoia and a twinge of fear. People kept their distance. By dinnertime, we made a decision: cancel everything and go home.

    So we did. Drove north six hours the next morning, went inside and didn’t leave for a year. Yes, a little hyperbole.

    Come June 2021, we packed up everything we owned, sold the house and left California.

    And then we roadtripped!
  • 35|60 Mary & Me

    35|60 Mary & Me

    Today is our 10th anniversary

    Yes yes, I know what you’re thinking: “Doug, are you really going to publish a blog about your marriage. And surprise your Wife with it? On your anniversary? That sounds like a really bad idea.” Heard.

    Here we go!

    Christmastime in Virginia, mid-aughts. It was one of our first visits as a couple to see my Parents. One morning I awoke to the sounds of Mary and my Dad already up and watching television downstairs. They were gabbing and jiving about whatever old TMC movie Dad had cued up. It might have been “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner.” As I headed down to join them, I heard Mary drop the F-bomb. To my Dad. In fun but with gusto. WTAF! I hastened my pace down the stairs to defuse the situation, but apparently my Dad was familiar with the term and laughed along, out loud. A few hours later, when Mary brought home fresh oysters from Wegmans and shucked them for my Folks for lunch, Dad was sold. I was too. Still am.

    Awright, let’s get serious: if not for Mary, I would probably be dead or deranged by now. Or both.

    I am so grateful to have her in my life. I treasure this human, this person, my Mary. Honey. Babe. Baby. She’s easy on the eyes. She’s smart, intelligent and educated, and moderately woke. She helps to keep me engaged (or at least awake). She drives me to stay healthy and active, and she faces strong headwinds at all times. She whips up some mean chow. She makes me laugh, think and grow. She helps me express myself and share. She makes me mad. But you know me: focus on the laughter.

    We cook together, travel together, raise dogs together, shop, walk, drive and celebrate together. We’re pretty much together all the time. In fact, we’ve only been apart maybe 20 days in the last five years. By that, I mean we wake up together, go to sleep together and spend most of the day together. Before that, we’d each spend weeks and months on the road. And yet, it’s never boring. Okay, we sometimes get bored. But we do it together. Just last week, Mary described this sometime disposition as “happily bored.” Yep.

    Her highest compliment for something I’ve done or created is, “it makes me smile.” I like to make her smile.

    We’re having a good ride

    Speaking of rides: on this, our 10th anniversary, we are on a roadtrip somewhere between Michigan and Arizona, as part of our now-biannual migration from home to home. I wrote this last week, so I think we’re in Bentonville, Arkansas, a place Mary’s wanted to visit. If we’re not, more stories to come. I hope we’re celebrating at a Steak & Shake tonight. Or maybe an Applebees or Chilis. Or an Arby’s, Canes, BK, DQ, Buc-ees, Taco Bell or Sonic. She’s low-maintenance like that. But she won’t deign permit KFC within her olfactory perimeter.

    To be sure, when we get back to Scottsdale, there will be an emergency date night or two at Nobu across the street. We miss expensive fish.

    We met “cute.” Eventually

    The first time we met it was 30 seconds of face-time while staging an event in New York City. She was on the client team. She agreed with me on some aesthetic matter of no significance. It wasn’t that cute.

    The next time we met, a few weeks later, it was the opposite of cute. We were embarking on a week of site surveys for an upcoming Intel tour of South America. The survey entailed visiting five far-flung cities in five short days. A hectic and fragile itinerary, to say the least. When I met up with our group at the departure gate in Miami, I re-introduced myself to her. She gave me the once over and asked: “where’s your luggage?” When I explained that I’d checked it, she was not pleased. “Do you know how much time we’re going to waste waiting on your bags?” I did not.

    Fast-forward four days, probably on the flight from Lima to Caracas. We were sitting together in first class with a couple of pisco sours, watching “Notting Hill.” A few feet under us in the luggage hold was my checked bag, now crammed with all the stuff Mary had amassed along the way: venue swag and collateral and a few bottles of wine from Argentina and Chile. I had become her mule. It was getting cute.

    Yada yada yada, we became good friends and continued to work and travel together. She bought me a season pass to Great America near Intel HQ so we could ride rollercoasters. Odd, I thought. I reciprocated with a pasty tiara. Over a business dinner in Las Vegas, she’d expressed fascination (and envy) with a woman wearing one at a nearby table.

    One of my fondest pre-coupling memories is of being in Beijing and meeting Mary for a jet-lag-induced stroll at dawn. We walked to a nearby park, already well-bustling with locals exercising, meditating and enjoying a beautiful morning. We heard strains of “Moon River”–my Parents’ song–and followed it to its source: an asphalt lot with dozens or hundreds of couples ballroom dancing. It was a powerful vibe. It was a good morning.

    And then yada yada yada, things happened a few years later at the JW Marriott in Hong Kong, and then, yada yada yada, we moved in together. Probs not how we’d explain it to the grandkids. Won’t be a problem.

    The next few years were fun but fraught. We spent time in Mountain View, Willow Glen and Sunnyvale (the first house we bought together). While Mary was gainfully employed through most of it, the great recession kicked my butt. It was cruel and relentless. I was staring down failure, depression, bankruptcy. Then my Dad passed, her Mom passed, my brother passed, all in a short time (and there’s been a lot more loss since then). Every time, Mary was on it; she had a go-bag and reservations in a matter of minutes–even in the middle of the night–in order to get with Family. She’s a planner and I’m a worrier. I think that’s what hardened us and made us appreciate more than ever that we truly needed each other. We’re good for each other.

    We called ourselves “partners” for 10 years. That works in California, but in other places we got questions like, “what kind of partners? Law partners, business partners?” Even my Folks asked us how to introduce Mary at church. “Friends,” I said.

    We got married
    Our wedding invitation featured those gifts that we shared near the beginning—rollercoasters and tiaras—as well as the pups we had at the time, Ruckus and Rampage.

    I staged one of the worst marriage proposals ever. I won’t describe it here (it’s actually hard to relive), but my bigger regret is that I dragged a couple of Mary’s talented nephews into it. Yeah, so anyway, she eventually said “yes.” It might have just been “ok.” Anyway, it happened.

    Ten years ago today, we were married at the base of Camelback Mountain near Scottsdale. We chose that venue because Mary’s Family spent many Thanksgivings in the area; her parents were snowbirds for years. The resort’s restaurant, T Cooks, was also a fave of her parents.

    We kept the gathering small, just close Family and friends. It became even smaller when peeps canceled at the last minute. Who does that? They know.

    We lit candles on the altar to honor those who weren’t with us in life but with us in spirit. Mary’s nephew Ben officiated. I hear it was good. Unbeknownst to us at the time (we were a little distracted), a hummingbird hovered over the altar. I’ve been told that’s a thing, and hummingbirds have become our adopted spirit animal.

    We’ve adapted

    I was 50 when we got married; for me, it was my first. I think that our maturity and the wisdom and emotional callouses we share are what makes us work. We’d led full, vibrant lives apart, suffered our bruises and regrets before we met. I know Mary won’t like this, but I think we were two well-meaning, high-achieving, flawed shnooks who found each other in this big world. At last. And it’s working.

    We’ve grown and adapted, together. I’ve heard that the most stressful life events are the loss of loved ones, moving, job change or loss, financial pressures. We’ve run the table on those. We’re on our fourth and fifth residences together. Our fourth dog, with Bowzer. We’ve endured a number of jobs and career disruptions. Lots of funerals. Our last trip to Hawaii (yeah, we’re done). A few health scares but mercifully few, so far. Some of the other known stressors, like divorce and birth of a child, don’t apply. Never will. As for retirement, we’ll cross that bridge when we get there–maybe in our scooters and walkers. Stop honking!

    And we still have some knock-down-drag-outs every so often: too salty or too citrusy, too cold or too hot, too loud or “what?”

    We still get up early to greet the day, read the papers, do our puzzles, feed the dog and exercise. We walk a lot, on the beach and to the lighthouse in Michigan; we stroll the ritzy, dog-friendly mall when we’re in Scottsdale. That sounds way more idyllic (and boring) than it is. Full sensory-excitement: knees crack, backs crack, I limp on occasion, people drive too fast. The muzak is loud.

    Otherwise, we don’t go out as much as we used to. If we do, it’s to a farmers market, a dog park, Lowe’s for whatever and, soon, Nobu for happy hour. No matter, we’re home by 9:30 to put on our loungers and watch crap TV or maybe a movie or Frasier. There might be popcorn or chocolates. Then I fall asleep and Mary goes to bed. Then I go to bed. The dog figures it out.

    We still laugh and relish our time together. All of it. Every frigging day. Day after day. Happily bored.

    And happily 10 years married. Love you, Honey. Baby. Babe. Mary. You.

  • 34|60 Disney Part One

    34|60 Disney Part One

    Posts are sometimes better viewed in a browser: https://binderama60for60.com/

    I could write more than 60 blog posts about just one topic: Walt Disney. And just as many about Walt Disney World.

    As I am planning out this post just now (in July), I am feeling JAZZED! The memories overwhelm. Originally I intended to do this as single post but the thing was getting to be a long, fun read and a real scroll roller. Part Two drops November 18. IYKYK.

    I was a fan of Walt Disney from my earliest days. The movies and TV shows amazed me. Disneyland astounded me. Walt Disney World changed me. Changed my life. These memories still bring joy to my core. Odd though: I rarely visit the parks anymore and I don’t think I’ve seen an actual Disney movie in a theater since the re-release of “Fantasia” many moons ago. I fell asleep, again, as I’d done every time I tried to watch it.

    While WDW offers its customers and guests amazing experiences, what it gives to engaged employees is so much more. The impact of Walt and WDW has played a massive role in my personal and professional life, informing and inspiring my creative pursuits for my entire career. And I only worked there for three years.

    I recall my experiences on the daily. All manner of customer service, experiential design and storytelling, , management, people movement, curiosity, corporate organization, seizing opportunities, networking and lifelong friendships. Some of the peeps I worked with went far with the company, like legendarily. A few are doing well in publishing and on the speaking circuit talking leadership and service, others are still bringing the Disney magic to the millions on the front lines. And many, like me, cherish the gift of Disney early in our career.

    We’ll get to all that. For now, let’s go back to the beginning.

    The First Epiphany

    Walt Disney World opened on October 1, 1971, 54 years ago today. My Family visited in the spring of 1972, just a few months later. I was six or seven. By this time, I was well aware of the Disney brand, having enjoyed movies like “Mary Poppins,” “Pinocchio,” “Bedknobs….” “Herbie…’” and all the rest. I likely screened them in a theater back then, or they might air on Disney’s weekly Sunday night series, appointment viewing in our home. Plus, I’d been to Disneyland a few years before so I thought I had a pretty good line on what WDW was all about. I had no idea.

    Months before, Mom had requested, received, filled out and returned our reservation paperwork, along with a check. She booked us and our trailer into Fort Wilderness and lined us up with tickets (books of tickets) to the Magic Kingdom. Dad drove us 900 miles south on 1-95, pulling the trailer and arriving at the most beautiful campground and campsite we’d ever seen, like something out of the movies.

    It might have been the first morning that we walked through the misty stillness towards the boat launch to the Magic Kingdom. I looked around and thought, I want to live here one day. There was something in the air. Not sure if it was landscape of the place or the sight of other families revving up for excitement or the vibes I was getting from my Parents. Most certainly it was just in my imagination, but my mind set a course.

    Fast-forward 14 years and I was sitting in an office building a few miles away along the I-4 planning for the 15th birthday of the place. In a matter of a few years I learned multiples of lessons and forged memories and stories, far more densely than in any other period in my life. It was a good time and wonderful place to turn 20.

    Again, I am getting ahead of myself; a lot happened in the interim.

    Mom Does Disney

    The Family visited WDW in the 70s and 80s nearly every other year around Christmastime, the absolute peak high season. We always stayed at Fort Wilderness. The place was special, and “Mickey” left a big candy cane and card on our trailer steps Christmas morning.

    Back then, WDW had one park and a few resorts. A simpler, more focused time. While Dad was tactical, given his stint in the Navy and his career as editor-in-chief of Army Magazine, Mom was the strategic savant. DDE would have been proud.

    • Up before dawn
    • Hearty breakfast at the trailer
    • Walk to the boat launch to travel to the Magic Kingdom
    • Be there for the rope drop and then run like heck
    • Hit a few of the majors: Space Mountain, Small World, Hall of Presidents, Jungle Cruise. Experts will note we navigated the park using the counter-clockwise route. Shrewd
    • Leave the park for lunch and then go swimming (after an hour of digestion) at the Contemporary or Polynesian, and a few years later, River Country
    • Back to the trailer to regroup and change before returning to the park for some of the lesser rides, nighttime parades and fireworks
    • Or we might stay at Fort Wilderness, shop for treats at one of the Trading Posts (I can still smell the sweet, smoky goodness of those places) and stay out for the evening bonfire, movie and character visits
    • The best nights ended at the Trail’s End with make-your-own-pizzas for me and Mike and pitchers of beer for the Folks. Raucous piano player, even a little risqué. Hubba hubba.
    • Walk back to the trailer which was visible from afar for all the lights we festooned, like a pinball machine, and drift off to fantasy land
    • Repeat

    Mom and Dad would skip the park on Christmas Day when the place was teeming. Years later I worked the morning shift on Main Street for the televised Christmas Day parade. Sheer madness; an old guy raised a fist at me at 7AM. tried to spit on me. The Folks were right.

    Doug Does Disney

    It’s my junior year in college. I see a sign for WDW internships outside the student union. A no brainer. I interview with Duncan Dixon, who would reappear in my life a few times in the coming years. And I get the gig. Better yet, I get a full 16 hours of college credit for the semester. Say what you will about a communications major but…well, it worked.

    In January 1986, I roadtripped 900 miles to Florida in my late-model Toyota Celica with some clothes, a lot of Coke and cigarettes, and a tennis racket. I checked into Snow White Village. It’s a trailer park in Kissimmee, operated by Disney, for the sole purpose of housing participants in MKCP, the Magic Kingdom College Program. It wasn’t quite like living at Fort Wilderness as I had imagined years earlier, but there were no adults either. Just a few hundred teenagers spending an entire spring in Florida. It was like college but with more booze and less clothing, and only one class each week. Each trailer housed eight of us, with four bedrooms, a kitchen and two bathrooms. Trailer 33, near the laundromat and pay phones. Rent came out of our paychecks.

    A little primer on my Disney journey before we continue: I interned in Main Street operations, then landed a nice five-month gig planning for the WDW 15th anniversary. I ran out another semester away from college working in Guest Relations in City Hall. Then I helped to establish a new event office for Mickey’s 60th birthday. Finally, I landed a coveted hourly job as a coordinator in Public Relations. All in three years, while also going back to Virginia for a semester or two of school. Oh, and those two events I mentioned just now–the 15th and 60th– they’re still two of my career highlights, and I hadn’t evened turned 23 yet.

    Mickey’s Mafia
    I sketched this poster after a guest suggested our work keeping the peace was that of Mickey’s Mafia. It was a badge of honor.

    Main Street USA operations was my post for the MKCP stint.

    A couple of very cool things about this role:

    • It’s at the center of everything in the park, where everyone has to pass at least twice a day. It’s got a perfectly framed view of Cinderella Castle, the main draw for the eyes and a prime photo opportunity. It’s where the parades start or finish, where the fireworks are best viewed, where media and celebrity moments and big events happen. It’s also where you can get your hair cut (with the Dapper Dans hanging out between shows) and do your banking before or after your shift.
    • The wardrobe most days was a dark blue three-piece suit, skinny black tie and a conductor’s hat. Polyester yes, but not the weird space-age, skipper or sailor cosplay togs. (No offense.) On hot, sweaty days we could lose the blazer and roll up the sleeves, like something out of a beefcake calendar. And when you drove the fire engine, you got to wear a cool red blouse with brass buttons. So boss. A little tight on me now.

    Okay, there’s more.

    • Back then it was an all-male crew, save for a lead named Barb. It was a Disney HR loophole wherein they claimed employees are actually cast members, playing roles. The roles we played as a bus driver and train conductor in Walt’s version of an early 20th century town was men’s work. (That has since changed.) Funny, though: we weren’t allowed to have facial hair or to smoke or swear or spit on the job, like in the old days.
    • I’m not dissing all the other roles in the park, but well, I guess I’m just saying that ours was the best. Don’t hate the playa.
    My First Day: Revelations

    After a day of orientation, called Traditions, at Disney University, I had a 7 AM shift in the park. The office was under the train station in Town Square, shared with the boys who made the trains run on time. Congenial but masculine. Cool men wearing cool suits and hats and train engineer overalls. (Looking at you, John Rogers.) It was dubbed the bomb shelter for all the noise–of trains rolling overhead and of guests all around, starting and finishing their day.

    My first assignment that morning was to man the rope line just south of the hub, the one Mom had us primed for years earlier. It was cold and barely light yet; guests were not yet in the park. As I learned was not unusual, a swan from the Castle moat approached our group aggressively. It focused its wrath on one of my colleagues–Dave Contaxis. I was told that Dave and the swan had a long-running feud. As it charged at him, honking madly, Dave took off his conductor’s hat and swatted at it, landing a few blows. I was beginning to see Disney behind the curtain, and it was awesome. Btw, detente was established before guests reached our post. I opened the Magic Kingdom for my first time.

    Five hours later, the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded within view of the park. I was on my lunch break in the tunnel when I saw people rushing toward the televisions. The American flag on Main Street was lowered to half mast (as is Disney’s policy). All afternoon, guests approached and inquired; I’d been given no training for how to respond.

    On my first day, the curtain had been pulled back and the real world had exploded into my Disney bubble. I didn’t know how to react in proper Disney fashion. No one did.

    S.O.P.

    I wish I still had a copy of the thick looseleaf notebook–Standard Operating Procedures–that contained almost every detail of my role in Main Street operations. I can tell you this: there was nothing in there about combatting angry swans or rockets exploding. I was learning on the fly.

    Here’s how things went down on Main Street USA back in the mid-80s, including some editorializing.

    Buses, jitneys and cars

    If you were on the early shift, you’d spend a lot of it driving up and down Main Street, from Town Square to the Castle and back. We had a spiel that we could embellish, but not as drastically as those guys in the safari togs over on the Jungle Cruise. I’d never driven a manual transmission but I learned fast. Gotta say, trying to pilot the double decker bus through the oblivious crowds wandering hither and yon, while spieling and clutching and shifting, was scary-making. Give me the fire engine any day.

    What I didn’t learn, or remember: Where is the gas station. On one of my first days, I’d been driven there in one of the jitneys by my lead Joe Schott, along with my MKCP colleague Chuck Simikian. All I remember is Joe was showboating on one of the back roads and I almost got thrown out of the car. Seriously! I didn’t really remember much after that. So anyway, I never put gas in the car because I didn’t want to admit that I didn’t know where the gas pump was.

    Then, natch, one day I ran out of gas. In the middle of Main Street USA, with a car full of guests. Word got to my supe Barb; she rescued me and steered while I pushed. She insisted we go all the way (uphill) to the Castle and then back down, rather than a simple U-turn. Extended humiliation and sweat, but I sure learned where the gas station was after that. Btw, Joe Schott is now a Disney muckety muck, having been GM and President of parks all over the world.

    Then there was The Disney Story and Arcade

    The former was simple: walk the museum and answer questions about Walt, and twice an hour give a spiel before and after the film. Great attraction that’s been replaced. The Arcade was hellish: you sat in a cage and changed bills for coins for a bunch of amped-up little brats whose parents abandoned them there to just make noise. There was an older guy, Bill, who loved that gig. He’d trade anytime, as long as you relieved him for a smoke every hour or so.

    Speaking of smoking. Obviously you were not permitted to light up on the job. Until you got backstage. Amazing how fast you could get a cigarette from your pocket to your mouth, light it and take a good long drag. Alice in Wonderland was expert.

    Guest relations

    As I noted, Main Street is the first and last area that guests traverse inside the park. So we spent a lot of time helping them understand how to navigate the place (clockwise or counterclockwise) and how to exit and find their way home. We actually have a little competition when walking the length of Main Street, akin to Name That Tune: “I Can Walk That Street in XX Questions.” Can you make it back to the bomb shelter and answer only eight questions, or five, or three. The usual queries were:

    • Can I sit here? Answer: Probably a no.
    • What time is the 3:00 parade? Answer: Really? 3:00.
    • Where is the Magic Kingdom? Answer: Here, you’re in it. This whole place is the Magic Kingdom. People often confused the Castle with the Kingdom. I had a friend who wore one of the weird outfits–Haunted Mansion host–who claimed that, when a guest would not accept that Cinderella Castle was not actually the Magic Kingdom, he directed them to head to the Castle, turn down Main Street and then exit the park, catch the monorail back to the parking lot, disembark, go down the ramp and then follow signs for the Magic Kingdom. Which, of course, would put them back on the monorail and to the place they had departed like two hours ago. I want to believe that.
    Crowd control

    This was central to the Main Street Ops S.O.P. most afternoons and into the night. There were shows at the Castle a few times a day. The 3:00 parade started in Frontierland then headed to the Castle and down to Town Square. At 3:00. And in peak season, the nighttime Electrical Light Parade (ELP) went north at 9:00 and south at 11:00. There were other special events and staged happenings to protect as well.

    Here’s what you learn, in short order.

    • Rope. Rope is key to crowd control. As my colleague Gary McKechnie used to proclaim to guests as we tried to make way: “We’ve got rope here and we’re not afraid to use it!” Here’s the thing: you’ve got to splice rope to ensure it’s taut. No limp, saggy ropes on our watch. The ropes at Disney are made of plastic. So to splice together two pieces of rope, you use a lighter to cauterize one end and then shove it into the other end, which is slightly unspooled. Then you melt them together. Strange how satisfying that is to me as I write this. Wish I had some. Off to Lowe’s.
    • Stanchions. These are the heavy, ornate pillars to which we’d connect our taut ropes to cordon off areas and throughways. Too heavy to carry, so we rolled them. To do so, you palm the top of it–it’s an orb–then tilt it about 45 degrees and spin it forward. It seemed impossible at first but within a few weeks, I could roll one with ease, and then a bit later, two at a time.
    • Cheese. In order for the parade floats to navigate Main Street, the horse trolley tracks must be filled in at Center Street on the north side of Town Square. An hour before each parade, we’d haul into the street about a dozen long strands of rubber called cheese, so-called for their yellow color. They weren’t that yellow, though, because they were caked in years of horse manure and urine. Pretty gross, but then we’d all get a quick break and go to the cafeteria.
    • Once secured, Main Street USA is a picture worth framing: thousands of people lining it and not a soul loitering between the curbs from the Castle and Town Square. Except for Mickey’s Mafia, keeping the peace.
    • Crosswalks. No one is showing up at 3:01 and thinking they’re parking that stroller in an area roped off, tautly, for emergencies. Stand back, and cross the street when I say you can cross the street. No lingering, no lollygagging. Get moving or get out.
    • Backstage. To get the parade floats and performers from the entertainment warehouse to the gates entailed some traffic control. One of us would stand guard at the train tracks behind the Jungle Cruise, signaling for floats to pause when a train was coming through. On the other end, at the conclusion of the parade, we’d signal for backstage car traffic to yield to the floats heading back to the warehouse for the night.
    • Back on Main Street, when the last float passes, the ropes come down, meticulously. No one gets in front of the rope. Keep it taut as you spool it on your shoulder, walking at the pace of the float until you reach the next stanchion where a comrade begins their own rope spooling. Precision!
    • Trust me, that ELP soundtrack is addicting. You will never, ever, EVER get it out of your head. Do NOT click on that link above. I warned you. Crap, I’m hooked.
    Most important

    Much of the crew would be released at 12:15 AM during the summer, after the fireworks and last ELP. But a few would get off around 11. Their assignment: Grab a $7 case of Busch beer at 7-11 and meet us back at the place. Some things are just sacrosanct.

    Fun side story: I think it was the only New Years Eve I worked on Main Street. As the fireworks were ending and 50,000+ guests were exiting the park after midnight, we got the call. I don’t remember how we got that call; it might have been like the bat signal in the sky. Anyway, we all were told to race out of the park and report to a stretch of road where trams were ferrying guests back to the parking lot. The sprinklers along the road had come on, spraying ice cold water on guests as they passed through on a chilly night. I, and my brothers, were told to remove our hats and place them atop one of the many sprinklers. And then to stand on those hats and those sprinklers. Water gushed up to our knees, our waists and higher. But we stood there and waved at guests exiting the park after a helluva day. You wanna talk about customer service and Disney magic? Right there!

    And the end of the day

    When the night shift ended, most folks would head backstage to the tunnel and walk underground back to wardrobe and the bus back to the employee parking lot. As often as I could, I would walk up Main Street USA all by myself. The lights still twinkling, the Castle still radiant, the street silent. All of the magic of the Magic Kingdom just for me.

    And a coupla’ cold beers waiting at the crib.

    Name dropping for this post:

    Duncan Dixon, Janis Petrie, Matt Palmer, Steve Watson, Dave Contaxis, John Rogers, Jim McPhee, Eric Hartness, Jeff Bond, Bill Brett, Allison Swanson, Jake Poore, Tom Eberts, Brad Moore, Paul Buss, Ken Kreafle, Joe Schott, Gary McKechnie, Jennifer Campbell, Mike Donnelly, Chuck Simikian, Robert Teinowitz, Dennis Snow. There are likely dozens of omissions here, but if they’re not my friends on Facebook, they’ll never know.

    Next time

    We’re just getting started! The next 60|60 Disney drops on November 18, including:

    • The 15th Anniversary office
    • Guest Relations
    • GM, ahem
    • Mickey’s 60th Birthday office
    • Public Relations
    • Roommates, roommates and more roommates, and some play dates
    • Onward
    More names to drop…

    Jody and John Dryer. Kristine and Kyle. Plus more Janis, Eric, Ken, Paul and Brad, Gary, Matt, Steve, Fletch, Brett, Jennifer, Chuck, Donnelly, and lots more.

    There’s an expanded cast being introduced in the next post. With names like Bob and Booger and Kitty.

  • 33|60 HBD Kimmy!

    33|60 HBD Kimmy!

    “Enthusiast” is a good descriptor of Kim Anschultz. She gets excited about almost anything; it is contagious. The girl can talk your ear off. Without peer. It’s all the good stuff in the world: family, friends, neat experiences, new opportunities. She doesn’t dwell on the bad stuff. And she can go for days on her beloved nieces and nephews.

    It’s that enthusiasm that has made Kim a friend for life to me and Mary and many others.

    As I’ve mentioned in previous 60|60 posts, one of the key drivers for this series has been to celebrate some people who have brought such joy to my life, and to do it while we’re all still here. There are hundreds who fit that bill, but just a few who I can go on and on about. Kim is one of them.

    Orlando

    We met way back at Universal Orlando, working in the production department. Our offices were situated in a doublewide behind the backlot, next to the commissary and across from the ops building and King Kong. She wore a lot of pink, as I recall. And a fanny pack. Or was that me?

    Kim and I shared many cigarettes in that trailer. Until one of us “quit.” Then the rest of the trailer denizens voted to make the place a smoke-free environment. I don’t think she was happy about that. So when I predictably fell off the wagon a few months later, she and I shared a lot of smokes on the front porch of the trailer, chatting up passers-by as they came and went for lunch and sometimes breakfast and dinner at the commissary. Production never sleeps!

    This has to be about 1992. Finnegans at Universal Orlando, for beers (and smokes) with other lifetime legends Paul Meena and Susan Skeen

    She was also the production lead on one of my earliest big events, The opening of the “Back to the Future” Ride. It was a star-studded but stormy affair. The ride was huge for Universal Orlando, reversing the fortune of the place after a tough first year, as I know many can attest.

    Vegas and the World

    Our Orlando era ended in the mid-90s, but just a few years later we were reunited in Las Vegas. Amy Henry, another former Universal-ite, was working for Encore Productions back when they were looking to expand their offerings (and long before Freeman and others bought them up). She brought in Kim and others from Orlando, including Julie Zimmerman, Joe Morris and Genon Rost. And me. (I might be off on some of the details, but if you knew my Vegas posture back then, it shouldn’t be surprising.)

    Bill Welter drafted both of us onto the team he was building for the Intel account at Encore. There I met Robert Laney, Darryn Cray, Gregg Stokes, Eve Lenzner, Peter Gordon, Dona and Jeffrey Peters, Jonny Sudbury and many others. This is also where I met besties like John and Dawn McClain, John Masse, Julie Gilday-Shaffer, MJ Coveny and lots more. I could go on and on, but enough name-dropping. This is about Kim! Let’s get into travel and destination-dropping!

    Kim and I traveled the world together, producing main stage events for Intel’s CEOs and others. Along the way, she and I hiked the Great Wall of China, shopped the “silk” markets of Beijing, navigated the backstreets of Hong Kong, scarfed sushi at a favorite izakaya in Tokyo. I have video of Kim singing opera outside La Scala in Milan and “reacting” to a giant marble phallic fountain in Amsterdam. We bounced all around South America. There’s footage of Kim learning Spanish on that trip: she really wants to say “hasta mañana” but keeps blurting out “hasta la mama.” And “buenos dias” and “buenos noches” become “buenos aires” repeatedly. Endearing jet lag.

    And, as endearingly heart-strong as Kim is, she’s also pretty head-strong. On that South America trip, I remember with a wince a moment when she and I were having a minor disagreement in the production office. When I held my hand up, palm out–talk to the hand–I immediately knew I was done for. She knew I was done for. Everyone in the office knew I was done for. Yeah, I was done for. I’m sure though, by the end of the day she wished me a “buenos aires.”

    Family

    Because of those travels, Kim’s known me and Mary as a couple probably as long as anyone.

    She was at our wedding, actually helped to coordinate on the day. That was a lot to ask of her. But that wasn’t enough for Kim. No. She served up M&Ms with our faces printed on them. She designed a lovely embroidered tablecloth with our names and the date, and lots of airplanes to signify our many travels together. She painted a cowbell. We still cherish it all; the cowbell is ever-present and the tablecloth is in a safe place until it comes out on our anniversary.

    Still not enough for Kimmy. We hosted a gathering for Family and close friends the night before the wedding. It was meant to be a low-key affair. And then a mariachi band knocked on the door and the place got lit. Mary and I are control freaks so it took us a moment. My Mom loved it! So did everyone else. There should be a sitcom: “That’s So Kim!”

    At the ceremony at sunset near Camelback Mountain, Mary and I were awaiting our cue (from Kim), standing among the trees out of sight. She snapped a random photo on her phone. We had our game faces on; it was a moment. A big moment. It’s one of our absolute favorite photos.

    For my recent birthday, she also jumped in to help Mary with the planning for three days in Las Vegas. And once again, she was on it. Everything, including showgirl headdresses. But no pasties. And that’s okay. I carry.

    Side note: there’s a recurring theme in this 60|60 series which is my own narcissism. For instance, the art on our walls at home is either mine, or a classic signed by Nagel, or something of sentimental value. Kim’s art is the only other art on display, three framed panels she created and gave to us 10 or 15 years ago. Those will always be with us. Every time we look at them (which is often because they’re right by the flat screen), we think of Kim and it makes us smile.

    Me and Kim at Finnegan’s 30 years later after the photo above, along with besties Matt Palmer and Andrew Kral
    Life!

    As is life, Kim and I have been through a lot of the highs and lows. We haven’t been through all of it together, but we’ve been through it. We’ve shared, empathized and sympathized, and we understand what it’s all meant and what it all means. We appreciate each other on an even deeper level. I think so anyway.

    Kim visited us a few weeks ago up here at the Lake. She hasn’t lost a step and we haven’t missed a beat. The girl can still talk. Oh yeah, she can talk. I will tell you this: she is the proudest aunt and sister I have ever known; her stories of kin just sparkle with pride and joy. You all be sure to take good care of our Kim.

    Love you, Kimmy. Happy Birthday!

  • 32|60 Thomas, David & Brian

    32|60 Thomas, David & Brian

    Today is Thomas Morrison’s birthday. I don’t know which one but I’m guessing in the high 50s. This post was originally all about him back when I mapped out this 60|60 thing; he deserves it for being my friend for a long time. As I started to script this post, I realized that over the many years I’ve known Thomas, a vital clique has forged that includes Brian Johnson and David Mauroff. Those guys have a tight bond between them. I actually think they share a common language that is unintelligible to the rest of us.. A few other names will be dropped in here as well.

    As this post continued to percolate into pixels, I came around to appreciate how much a single decision affects a life; then times that by a million. Back in the early 80s we all made the decision to attend a certain university and join a fraternity. As I write this, I realize how un-frat we all are, and yet, here we are 40 years on.

    Thomas

    The first time I actually spoke to Thomas Morrison was when he showed up at my door at Kappa Sigma with his pledge book and two packs of Marlboro Reds. I’d never met him before; he was an odd bird IMO. He had the stature and sparkle of the Indian in “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.” Hell Night was around the corner and he needed my signature in his book before then. As for the smokes: “I’m the only pledge you never sent for cigarettes.” That was almost 40 years ago, and he still surprises with his slow-burning grace, compassion and a cultured aesthetic.

    In music and audio, Thomas is a savant. Back in college, he spent a few years running the fraternity DJ’ing business called Flashback. He made tons of mix tape cassettes which were the lifeblood of the enterprise and protected like the holy grail, if the holy grail could have been destroyed by a single spilled Meister Brau.

    A prized memory from college is me returning to the Kappa Sig house after a holiday break. The place was empty but beats were bouncing from downstairs in the party room. I went to explore and was hit with a wall of fog; Thomas had hosed down the floor with hot water and opened the doors to the frigid air outside. There might have been some strobes. He was playing the soundtrack from “Apocalypse Now” at full volume, in particular the sounds of heart-thumping helicopter blades–woomp woomp woomp. Somewhere in the middle of the room I found Brian Johnson sitting on a chair, nod-nodding his head to the sound. No words were spoken.

    When I decided to move to New York City back in 1994, sight unseen, Thomas and our friend Mark Kimsey were the first ones I called. They’d moved there together right out of college, a ballsy decision. They were most generous and supportive, offering me the couch in their place and condemning their two other current crashers to the floor (Davids Mauroff and Aldridge). This was August, mind you, and the fourth-floor walk-up apartment had no air conditioning, one lousy bathroom and century-old wiring that was the very portrait of a mass-casualty fire in the making.

    515 E. 87th Street, Apt 4W. It was a railroad apartment in an old tenement in an area called Yorkville. It was a block from the East River and Carl Shurz Park, and right next to Gracie Mansion where the mayor lived. The subway was five long blocks uphill at Lexington Avenue.

    New York City can be a little intimidating and Thomas helped me to acclimate to the city. He toted me along to clubs and parties and shows, until my modest curfew sent me home. After-hours he ran in exotic circles. Still does, but not as late. We adopted as our neighborhood haunt a place called the Sandbar on First Avenue. A nice dive with barkeeps who were like family.

    Within a few months, Mark bought a place in midtown and moved out. The Davids found other accommodations. So it was just me and Thomas for a few years or so. After that, he was one of the first people I knew who moved to Brooklyn. Ten years before that was cool. Decisions.

    Fun note: Thomas was late for everything. That was his thing. I could analyze it here but what would that possibly achieve. He was late. Always. Full stop. He was late to join me and Mark at Brother Jimmy’s, a BBQ place down around 71st and 1st. We were there watching the Knicks in the playoffs when Tom Brokaw broke in with news of a white Bronco. I called Thomas to ask where he was, and I remember hearing in his voice a sense of dread for O.J. The unfolding crime was affecting him deeply; Thomas had a conscience, even as the rest of us were screaming at the TV to go back to the game. He got there eventually, on Thomas time.

    When his friend Craig opened The Room on Sullivan Street just south of Houston, Thomas started his career as a bartender. It was lively, douchey crowd of hipsters, actors, writers and the like. I became a habitue, visiting several times a week, usually on the early side when Thomas was getting the place opened (see above, curfew). It served only high-end beer and wine, things he became an aficionado of. More important, he managed the tunes, unleashing his passion onto the pretty people of the night.

    Thomas is a legend in bar scene of NYC and has witnessed three lifetimes-worth of humanity, urban chaos and reinvention. I gotta think he’s already been immortalized in music or books by some of his patrons. If not, he deserves to be. And to speak out of school, he was known to date some cuties, which is a miracle if you know Thomas.

    He still sends me a photo of the season’s first snowfall in NYC, remembering how much I enjoyed getting out and walking in it. Day or night.

    David

    We called him the Idiot in the fraternity. He wore the moniker proudly and credibly, sometimes shockingly. There was really no line I can remember that he wouldn’t cross in order to carry on the mantle, the burden of being the Idiot. But you could tell he was smart, aware and empathic, somewhere deep down under the Idiot’s armor.

    Seems that he let those traits emerge after I graduated. David became president of the fraternity and a bit of a force on campus. After he graduated he became a community activist and leader, going out to San Francisco to immerse himself in waning days of the AIDS epidemic and more. He had dreads. Blond dreadlocks. He had blond dreads. Another decision. Blond dreads.

    I can’t be sure exactly what Dave was up to for the intervening decades, but I know he moved on to other pressing issues in the Bay Area (take your pick) like addiction, homelessness, bail reform and myriad other matters. He’s sat on boards and panels and committees. The guy can talk to anybody, any level, any color, any ideology. He also played on a gay softball team. I hear he was good; never saw him play. He rides his bike everywhere in the Crazytown and he’s still alive.

    Brian

    Brian is this kind of person: Everyone has a story to tell about him, and I doubt any two are the same. He’s enigmatic, extremely chill, a chameleon, a guy who is up for anything even if he doesn’t know what it is and especially if it sounds like a really bad idea. He’s got a grin that begs for misadventure. I know he and David have visited the emergency room together. They sounded like fun nights but glad I wasn’t there. Decisions. Or not.

    I’m going to be indiscreet for another sec: Brian dated the hottest girls in college. I don’t know how he did it and I’m not sure he knows how he did it. To his credit, he won’t divulge details, even after much “cajoling.” To be honest, I’m not sure he remembers.

    True to his compassionate spirit he went to work for a cause, like David did. Brian’s been working for NOAA for many years now. I can’t imagine how he’s navigating the general insanity coursing through society, government, oceans and air these days.

    Brian was sporting mutton chops a few years back (a decision, like David’s dreads). I don’t think I’ve ever known someone with mutton chops, but it was kinda working for him. I’ve seen him since and I think he gave up on emotive facial hair altogether.

    The Boys

    The Boys got together in December. It’s an annual thing at an almost-nice-enough-to-be-a-shitty-dive-bar in the Haight nabe of San Francisco. This was Thomas’s first time in attendance, I believe. The place has dozens of tap beers of various seasonal pedigree and notoriety, none of which I am familiar with. The table then fills up with three or four glasses at once, all shapes and sizes, until there’s no more room. There are usually 8 or ten other guys in attendance, friends of David and Brian, as well as some familiar old faces like Mike Ross and Barry Peters. A lot of the revelers share glasses, as if it’s a tasting event. That’s probs not a good idea. On reflection just now, I’m going with: it’s a really bad idea. Bad decisions, especially post-COVID. Cough.

    I used to take the train up from Sunnyvale but now I fly in from Arizona and spend the night. Trust me, it’s not for the beer. Or the restroom. Or the surly cash-only service, the fetid ambience, the crusty clientele, the sandwich place next door, the location or the shoddy adherence to fire code. I’m there to be with friends.

    This latest event we snuck away from the dive several times to visit a nicer full bar down the street. We did shots. A few. Or more. I ask you: at my age, why am I doing shots? Doing shots was never that much fun, so it must be about something else, like celebrating all the bad decisions we’ve made by making even more.

    I think that’s what draws us together. Decisions. Good and bad. Decisions that have directed our lives in wildly disparate trajectories, with all the ups and downs, the this way and that, and a few oh shits and oh boys. I don’t know what it is but I’m thrilled that we are still in touch and in tune, even if I only see them once a year or never again.

    When the music/arts festival poster catapulted to trite pop-prominence a few years back, I invited Thomas to curate the imaginary festival of his dreams, and I would create the poster. David and Brian chimed in; they know music (or what they call music), but Thomas was the ultimate decider. The result:

    The more I write in this 60|60 exercise, the more I return to loyalty as being central to a good, fulfilling life. It’s actually something I feel I’ve fallen short on my whole life. This blog series might be my attempt at atonement. No matter, I appreciate those who’ve been loyal to me, who’ve stayed in my life, added to it, even tangentially.

    David’s still a muckety-muck in do-goodery for the people of San Francisco, married with kids going off to college. Brian’s got a family and moved to the suburbs a few years ago. (Spin up some Nickelback!) Thomas has been a entrepreneur in NYC hospitality and works the morning shift at a bar in Soho. It’s a place we used to go in the afternoons to watch old men drink their day out of a bottle. Apparently they can start at 8AM every day, thanks to Thomas. Save me a stool.

    If you’d told me on that day when Thomas knocked on my door that I’d be his roommate in NYC, a good friend 40 years later and posting a blog about him, I would have said you were crazy. First off, I won’t be alive in 2025, at the rate I was going and the decisions I was making. And secondly, WTF is a “blog?” Serious, you never know who is going to stay in your life until it’s already happened. Friendship isn’t about the future; it’s all about the past that you’ve shared and the moments you’re enjoying in the present.

    I don’t think you can make people stay; that wouldn’t be a healthy or successful pursuit. It’s a choice and a decision. Life and experience and some emotional alchemy are what makes them stay. After four decades of wildly inconsistent contact, I’m glad Thomas, David and Brian are still in my life.

    Boys, let’s run out the clock. But can we go to a different bar next year?

    No need to decide right now.

  • 31|60 Mom & Dad

    31|60 Mom & Dad

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    According to her diary, Margery Rose “met an Irish pre-med student” at a square dance on October 29, 1948. She stayed up late. She saw him again a few nights later. Based on these two diary installments (which I cite with Mom’s tacit permission), I’ll start with this: Dad was never a pre-med student, at least not as far as we know. And he was kind of a little bit Irish. She was 17, he was 22.

    Two years later, they married on September 5, 1950, 75 years ago today. In the decades that followed, Marge and Jim would start a family and become my Mom and Dad. My Maw and Pop.

    That’s how it all went down at Central Michigan College, now Central Michigan University. This photo appears to be from a college ball. Mom is beaming and Dad looks to be in a little over his head. When I shared it on social a few years back, a friend commented that we should all have pictures of our young parents courting. Given technology these days, everyone will someday.

    Dad was going to school on the G.I. bill after serving in the Navy aboard the Miles C. Fox in the Pacific during the last years of World War II. Mom was valedictorian at her high school in Ithaca, Michigan. By college graduation, they were the big couple on campus: Dad as class president, Mom salutatorian. They were also on the cover the of the school magazine. Yeah, I know.

    Okay, enough about them.

    My oldest brother Tim came a couple years after the Ithaca wedding, Mike seven years after that. I arrived four years later in 1965. The Folks bought (maybe) their first house in Northville. Mom taught school and worked towards her Masters at U. of Michigan. Dad was a newspaper man in and around Detroit, including at few years at The Free-Press. When he got a new gig as editor-in-chief of ARMY Magazine in Washington in 1967, we packed up and moved. Mom told me stories about driving out of Michigan when Detroit was on fire and arriving in Virginia when DC was on fire. A lot of things were on fire at the time. Vietnam, race, inequality, take your pick.

    Now, the Folks could have bought a house way out in Clifton or Ashburn back then, maybe a few acres in what were sparsely populated areas, long before Yuppies, data centers and defense contractor campuses came along. That’d be worth a fortune today. Instead, they settled us into a newly-built house in Vienna, Virginia, about 15 miles outside DC. Not bitter. They told me years later that they wanted us to be exposed to a racially diverse area. It was. I’ll go that in greater detail in an upcoming post about my hometown.

    All three boys got good educations and were well-cultured, thanks to the Folks. I played soccer and the trombone, both requiring some sacrifice from the Folks, mostly in time, patience and putting up with atonal noises blaring through the house. They made certain we were well-versed in the many museums, monuments, activities and theaters around DC and up and down the mid-Atlantic. We were a creative bunch; every Christmas morning was chock full of sketch pads, pens, paints and pencils. We all became artistic in our own ways, though none of us pursued art as a career.

    Side notes: there was other stuff under the Christmas tree. Every year, on the day after Thanksgiving, Mom would request our “lists” from the JC Penney and Sears catalogs. She’d fill out the order forms and send them in. And she’d also hit up Zayre and Hecht’s for some surprises. When applicable, Dad would stay up late assembling bikes and other contraptions.

    The holiday seasons were pretty great at our house. We forged traditions over the years for Christmas Eve and Christmas morning, including Mom’s still-famous Eggs McBinder.

    Over the years they came to be known by a few monikers: Marge and Margey, Mom, Maw, Moomaw and Mauzy Broadway (some nonsense I applied based on a highway sign along I-81 in Virginia). Jim, Jimbo, Jazzbo, Dad, Pop, Blood. He was professionally known as L. James; when some ill-informed direct mail company began sending ads to Skull James, that also stuck. There’s lots more about Mom in this 60|60 post for Mother’s Day. And for Dad on Father’s Day.

    There will be even more when we get to matters of travel, Walt Disney World (October), the holidays, and my Brothers (February). Speaking of which, my big Brother Mike, the only other surviving member of the clan, likely has a different take on Mom and Dad; that’s just who we are, and it’s all somewhat subjective. But I am right because I am putting it in writing.

    For now, we’ll skip ahead a few decades. Our Family was fortunate that we didn’t suffer a lot of tragedy or sadness, beyond the usual conflicts and drama and expected though sometimes untimely losses. We were a remarkably unremarkable Family.

    Mom and Dad plied their careers in teaching and journalism until they retired. That was going to be a big time, a big week back in 1993. They had earned it, and the timing coincided with Dad’s birthday and Father’s Day. So many plans for their next chapter together.

    Badness

    To celebrate, they headed to Wolf Trap with my Brother Tim and his wife Gina on a Saturday night: the National Symphony. Leaving the parking lot after the program the car lurched into a crowd of pedestrians. No one was killed but several people sustained some bad injuries. Dad’s name was on the front page of The Washington Post. I’ll leave it at that, as to the details, except to say that the car Dad was driving was an Audi 5000.

    The week that Mom and Dad had planned for years–their retirement–turned very dark indeed. They could have lost everything they’d worked for–their houses, their savings and more. Obviously they were devastated and feared what might happen next. We Brothers went ahead with the retirement party we’d planned for the Lake a few weeks later. Gina was pregnant with Richmond, their first grandchild (Helen would come a few years later). We played Family-strong but there was a looming sense of dread.

    Tim, my lawyer Brother, worked to defend Dad in the courts and the media through the summer and into the fall. Working with Audi, he was able to extricate Dad from liability. Whether that’s right or wrong, I can’t say, but it was a relief. Mom and Dad were able to live securely and happily for many more years.

    Goodness

    For decades, they split their time between being close to their grandkids in Northern Virginia and spending summers at the Lake, which I’ve also written about in 60|60. Back in the 80s, they’d built a home on a bluff overlooking Lake Michigan, as part of a Family compound; they dubbed it Binders’ Beachhead.

    No matter where they were, they walked every day. In Vienna and then Woodbridge that meant a trip for coffee at Roy Rogers or McDonalds. At the Lake, they’d head north on the beach and pause at the Mac Woods turnaround and photo spot.

    They traveled the world (again), to Asia and Europe, including a 50th anniversary trip to Italy. And they visited me on many Thanksgivings wherever I was living at the time: Orlando, New York, Las Vegas, Santa Monica or Silicon Valley. One of my favorite times in New York involved a matinee of “Master Class” on Wednesday afternoon. I’d planned to take them after for Reubens at the Carnegie Deli, but it was cold and rainy when the theater let out. Miraculously, I was able to hail a cab and send them uptown to my place while I weathered the dank. An hour later, I was on the Lexington subway toting two bags of salty, stinky, meaty, cheesy NYC goodness. Seriously, these sandwiches were enormous and overflowing their pie tin serving platters. The stares of other passengers were intimidating. That was a warm and sumptuous night and weekend in the city.

    Eventually the Folks slowed down, as I guess we all will. I hope I still have their verve when I get as far as they did.

    We sons put together a video to celebrate their 50th anniversary in 2000 and a book to chronicle their 60th in 2010.

    This is the final spread of the book, featuring a picture I took back in the mid-aughts: after 60 years, holding hands, surrounded by Family. We pulled quotes from past letters and conversations with the Folks in the later years.

    Mom wrote, “I want to spend the rest of my life just like I’m living now, especially sharing it with your father.”

    Dad, on the secret to 60 years: “The great love we have for each other and…your mother’s heroic and everlasting patience. Your mother has stuck with me through it all.”

    Dad passed on a Sunday night with Mom close by. The last thing I had said to him earlier that day was, “Love you, Pop.” Mom passed nine years later, a Friday, with my Brother Mike by her side. I was able to speak to her on the phone minutes before. I didn’t have words.

    They’re buried a few miles northeast of the Lake house, on the way into town. There’s a bench astride their plots, something Dad wanted in order for visitors to sit a spell, reminisce, have a cocktail and enjoy the leafy surroundings and gentle breezes. We do that a few times during our summer stretches here at the Lake, living now in the home they built 40 years ago. Before we leave the graves, we sprinkle some Jim Beam onto the turf on Mom’s side, some Stoli for Dad, along with a few olives.

    The final page of the book heralds their 75th, which would have been today. For the living, it is today.

    Here’s to the love you made, the Family you nourished and all that you left in the world.

    Happy 75th to Maw and Pop!
  • 30|60 HBD G-berg

    30|60 HBD G-berg


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    Mike Goldenberg is one of my very best friends, has been for more than 40 years. When he visited me at the Lake a few weeks ago, we went to a bar for lunch. We had a few drinks and shared a bowl of soup with extra crackers, and more extra crackers. That’s friendship. We didn’t share a spoon, that would have been weird.

    Our lives have diverged greatly over the past decades, but he hasn’t changed much. Yes we pick up like we never left off, which is typical with good friends. But there’s so much about G-berg that’s familiar. He’s got the same guttural though mild Philly drawl. He sighs a lot. When something doesn’t add up or I say something dubious, he still does that thing where he contorts his face from his brow to his chin, twists his mouth and closes one of his eyes. He doles out spot-on references from movies from the 80s and 90s. When he laughs, he kinda doubles over a bit. He’s funny but not in a haha way. He talks with his hands, often about some seriously stupid shit.

    I kid! He doesn’t use his hands that much.

    As I stated in the introductory post to this series, a key impetus for 60|60 is to share things that should be shared with people while we’re all here. I want them–and others–to know how much they’ve enriched my life. Of course there are hundreds of people who I could say that about, and I hope I’ve called them out in this series. But there are a precious few who get 1000+ words. G-berg is one of them.

    Here we go

    Imagine the voice of Morgan Freeman from “Shawshank…”: Yeah, I think it’d be fair to say I liked G-berg from the start.

    We met freshman year at James Madison University in Virginia. I had pledged Kappa Sigma in my first semester, G-berg came along in the next. He seemed smart and affable; we got on quite well. I actually lobbied to have him as my “little brother” but a senior brother swooped in and poached him. On “hell night” that semester, I did something immature and ignorant, not directly affecting G-berg. But he called me out. He was right. That told me everything I needed to know about him.

    Three years went by. There was a lot of drinking and stuff, some of which we’ll cover in a later post about the Kappa Sig days (mostly NSFW). G-berg became a good friend. As important, he proved himself to be a hard working, industrious soul, holding down jobs and creating opportunities for his friends to make some money. He tapped me to sell sodas at football games. $35 was righteous bucks in those days. He was also on an honors track, which I respected. Except that he was majoring in hospitality and restaurant management. So…whatever.

    Skipping ahead to our final semester, senior year, G-berg and I roomed together in the fraternity house, room 206. We each needed just a few credits to graduate, so our class load was not challenging, I can assure you.

    The fraternity hosted parties most every Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday, and sometimes Tuesday. That meant on Sunday and Monday G-berg and I took turns picking up a six pack of beer on our way home “from the library.” Go ahead and chalk up codependent enablement as the foundation of our friendship.

    Fun fact: G-berg’s middle name is S, no name or initial. If you know about Harry S Truman, you’re probably impressed. No matter, let’s move on. [We can’t just move on because G-berg just informed me his middle name is J, not S. Yeah, that happened today, August 21, 2025.]

    Fun story: We visited Pargo’s, Harrisonburg’s best eatery, for lunch one day. He ordered the prime rib French dip. After he took a bite he summoned the manager to inform him that this was not prime rib, just roast beef. The manager seemed baffled but G-berg held his ground. It took me about 10 years to understand just how right he was. Give it up for the HRM major, with honors!

    We formed a creative business that semester, designing, printing and selling T-shirts on contract and on spec. Clients included college organizations and events. We also got hired to paint the hallways of a new sorority on the Greek Row. We lost money, but hanging out in a sorority house every afternoon for a few weeks is the thing of bad (good) 80s movies.

    In the party room of our own house, we painted murals of a Kappa Sig rush advertisement (The Most Wanted Man on Campus) and a sprawling rendition of the label for Virginia Gentlemen, a local bourbon. I can only assume both are now hidden under many coats of industrial paint.

    With the money we made from our endeavors, we flew to Lincoln for the Nebraska-Oklahoma game, billed as the game of the century. We crashed with friends I’d made the previous summer as an intern at Disney. Horrible game, Nebraska lost, we drank a lot and flew home. Nobody in the house had missed us.

    So we decided we should make a statement. Because we would often stay up later than the others, we’d place our stereo speakers in the hallway at 3 AM and blast the video version of New Order’s “Bizarre Love Triangle.” Just the 10-second musical break that featured a couple arguing: the woman says, “I don’t believe in reincarnation because I refuse to come back as a bug or as a rabbit!” To which the man responds, “You know, you’re a real ‘up’ person.” And then the song would kick back in. We actually lost a few friends over that! Petty.

    In the weeks before we graduated we got all deep and self-important and Zen-esque, as one does at that age (thanks Robert Pirsig!). This photo of us was taken up in the mountains of the Shenandoah. We carried sticks, stood on rocks in the river, talked about heady stuff and buried a bottle of good whisky to recover someday, probably right about now. G-berg just informed me that we drank the whisky before we could bury it.

    And then we graduated.

    A man of firsts

    G-berg was one of the first of our class to get a real job, get married and start a family. Probably the first to pull the complete trifecta.

    While the rest of us were paying to have our resumes typeset on nice paper in order to find entry level work, G-berg landed a gig at Marriott HQ as an internal auditor. He made good money to travel to Marriott’s flagship 5-star resorts for weeks at a time. No doubt he worked hard, but local GMs felt the need to kiss his ass to ensure he was happy with his experience. Upgraded rooms, nice dinners, rounds of golf with management, etc. A 20-something could get spoiled by that. Not G-berg. Much.

    When Mike and Pattie got married a few years out of college, I served as best man. I’d been a best man before, but I learned a lot from being G-berg’s best man. I learned that the best man is actually there to make sure the groom gets to the altar, especially when the rabbi is stuck in traffic, guests are growing restless, and the escape would be so easy. I learned that when the groom rents the cheapest van he can find and employs an intern to shuttle people from their hotel to the venue 30 miles out in the country, and then the van breaks down and won’t start, it’s up to the best man to “just come back and tell me that you fixed it.”

    I also determined that if you judge the quality of a wedding toast by its length, I gave one of the best ever, maybe five minutes, maybe ten. It included an anecdote about Mike and Pattie’s recent visit to Disney, when I worked there. They wore matching shirts with big letters: Girl and Boy. In public. Unironically. They took pictures. It was the 80s. (Sorry to bring Pattie into this but she was rocking a serious 80s do! Jelly)

    They started a family a few years later. Three boys eventually. All good guys making good lives for themselves and still coming home at every opportunity. A testament to their parents. But still no grandkids. What up wit dat, fellas?

    Grownups

    He’s been one of the most loyal people I’ve known. I hope I’ve returned in kind but I’m not so sure. I’ve moved around a lot over the years. G-berg and Pattie have too: Virginia, Akron, El Paso, Georgia, Florida, and probably a few other places in between, all the while raising a family. On top of that, and as I said at the top, our lives have diverged in so many ways: children, interests, careers, life’s distractions. I credit Mike’s loyalty for us staying close.

    We’ve met up plenty of times over the years, at his place or mine or in some far-flung locale, often when one of us was on business (hello, Vegas). We did a week in Australia. G-berg got us a room in a high-rise hotel overlooking the Sydney Opera House and the Harbour Bridge. We even climbed that sucker. I have photos of a double rainbow embracing the Opera House. Stunning. By the time we left, we were so done with that Opera House.

    Both of us have played a lot of different roles in our careers, and those careers have been rocky at times. After his posh gig at Marriott (and a few stints as hotel GM), G-berg returned to his entrepreneurial passions, embracing technology at the right time. He started companies, built companies, managed companies. But life isn’t fair, as my Mom used to say. G-berg’s faced headwinds and overcome. He’s never claimed to be the victim or on the short end of anything. I’ve had some really hard times too, but I blame the gub-ment, natch.

    A few years back we made an epic new memory. G-berg and I met up with another dear college friend, Dan Harvey, in Athens, Georgia. I’ll skip the backstory; suffice it to say it had to do with our fave college band REM. We acted like college kids but with ample funds, achy joints and a curfew. Detouring from a bar crawl, we stopped by the legendary 40 Watt Club to pick up tickets for that night’s show, Houndmouth. Curious, what time does the headliner go on? The lady did the math aloud and suggested, maybe 10:30. G-berg: At night??? We all took naps and made it to the show. The kids in the crowd were very polite. Why are you here? they asked. We mentioned REM and asked if they’d heard of them. OMG, yeah, I DO have a DAD! they exclaimed. And we weren’t even the oldest people there. The lead singer’s parents hung back with us at the bar. Respect.

    On G-berg’s recent visit to the Lake, the topics of conversation had evolved in predictable ways. We still hash out pop culture. He’s hipper than me: he knows about music that’s been made in the 2020s and he is amped about a few streaming movies and shows. I enjoy reruns of “Frasier” and rewatching “Shawshank…” Apparently he doesn’t approve of the latter, and I don’t really care–there’s a lot of room for growth with him. He knows sports but is an Eagles fan and proudly wears swag with their stupid logo on it. These days, conversations inevitably veer into topics of health, pain, bowels and mortality. And thats…okay. As long as we keep the conversation going.

    And so on

    I’ll close by twisting another movie quote, this one by Jennifer Coolidge from “Best in Show.” We have so much in common. We share bowls of soup. We love talking…and not talking. We could not talk or talk forever, and still find things to not talk about. Goddamn right.

    Happy Birthday, G-berg. Thanks for the friendship and everything else.

  • 29|60 Summer of ’85: Wolf Trap

    29|60 Summer of ’85: Wolf Trap

    One morning in June, the legendary performer Dickie Smothers sneered at me, “shame on you.” I was late to pick him and his brother up at National Airport because I’d overslept after my buddy Chris Castle and I had roadtripped to Virginia Beach and back in the previous 20 hours, as one does at that age. The town car was parked a long way away from the terminal because I still hadn’t learned where the limo lot was; this wasn’t starting out well. Tommy Smothers sat up front with me and lightened the mood as I drove them to the Marriott at Tysons Corner. It turned out to be a fun few days.

    Such was the summer of 1985. “Back to the Future” premiered, as did New Coke and the advent of wokeness with “We are the World” and Live Aid. Madonna was still hot and almost barely kinda “Like a Virgin,” Sting spoke for all of us with “I want my MTV,” and my parents were out of town a fair bit. All in all, it was a pretty damn good summer.

    The Job

    I can’t remember how I landed this gig but it was rad, as we said back then. I was a driver for Wolf Trap, a theater and national park in my hometown of Vienna, Virginia just outside D.C. My brother Mike had spent a previous summer working maintenance there, doing lots of manual labor in the hot sun. As I’ve mentioned in other posts: back in our youth, if Mike went left, I went right. There would be no sweaty manual labor for this chain smoker with soft, supple hands and too-often boorish behavior, and a penchant for celebrity fondling.

    There were four drivers that summer, and we were assigned to fetch visiting artists (and their crews and sometimes gear) from Dulles or National Airport and deposit them to their hotels and to the theater. We also fulfilled the contract riders of the performers and their entourages, going on massive shopping sprees at the Giant store in Vienna on show days. Five pounds of brie, a veggie platter, two handles of Stoli, six pairs of tube socks, three roasted turkeys, a dozen scented candles, whatever was called for in the contract. And then we’d set it up in the dressing rooms backstage. On occasions when artists had tour buses, the trove would be cleaned out and loaded for the road even before the show had ended. But most of the time, the bounty was barely touched, so we might enjoy some of the leftovers in the kitchen backstage.

    The rest of the time, we hung out in the organization’s low-key offices next to the home of Wolf Trap’s founder, Mrs. Filene-Shouse, or somewhere around the theater and backstage. We could watch rehearsals and shows almost every day and sit at stage door to watch the action come and go.

    If you’ve followed this 60|60 series, you’ll recognize my fascination with fame. Once again, I’d found myself really close to the artistic fire without having to get burnt. And so it was, in the Summer of 1985, that I reveled in the magic of theater from the wings and at just over minimum wage.

    My nostalgia gland secreted some recollections of some of that summer’s celeb encounters and weird moments. Yes, many of these characters might seem ancient to you now–it was 40 years ago–but think about it: Wolf Trap acts in the summer of 1985 had been huge in the mid-60s. Following that weak logic then, acts that were big in the aughts are probably showing up at Wolf Trap this summer. We also had a few fresh names like Billy Crystal, Randy Newman and Pat Metheny. Oddly, acts like Chicago, James Taylor and Bonnie Raitt never went away; they were there in the 80s and they’re still turning up at the Filene Center four decades on. Anyway, sorry if that sounds defensive or tortured. Here we go.

    Opening Night

    The opening night gala was historically star-studded with the board members Nancy Reagan, Elizabeth Taylor, Burt Reynolds, Beverly Sills and others serving as hosts. Scores of congressfolks and cabinet members were in attendance, along with D.C.’s old money and social elite. Air traffic was diverted from the area. The National Symphony Orchestra performed a special, much-anticipated program for the occasion every year.

    But on opening night in 1985, the buses carrying the orchestra got lost. I was sitting at stage door when panic set it. There were no cell phones back then, so the only known was that the stage was set for a symphony and there was no symphony. While the curtain was held indefinitely, announcements were made, the audience grew restless and state troopers were notified to be on the lookout for a convoy of wayward buses somewhere in Northern Virginia.

    Then, just like in the movies, the stage door suddenly burst open and in scrambled dozens of musicians in tuxes and gowns with their instruments already assembled. At long last, the 1985 summer season would go on!

    A Name-dropping Potpourri (Oldies Edition)

    My parents could have attended almost any show that summer. Pop, rock, opera, comedy, dance, symphony. The only one they requested: Ferrante & Teischer, the velvet-tux-wearing, hairspray-encrusted, canned-bantering piano duo from the 50s. Parents, amirite? Btw, not great tippers.

    Frankie Valli emerged from the Holiday Inn on 123 and asked if the Four Seasons–whom I’d picked up earlier that day–had tipped me. I said no. He apologized and greased me a 20.

    Peter of Peter, Paul and Mary pursued my stage door colleague (and my crush) relentlessly. To no avail. For either of us.

    Pop star Laura Branigan, may she rest in peace, had to be carried by the bellhops from the lobby bar to her room.

    Tommy Smothers closed the lobby bar every night he was there. He also asked me to procure a little contraband for him, which I did.

    Wynton Marsalis’s piano player was flying into National. I was at the top of the jetway as the passengers disembarked (back when you could do such a thing) holding up my Wolf Trap sign. Our signs were discreet: no names, just the Wolf Trap logo. I waited until everyone had passed and still no piano player. I went to baggage claim and held my sign high. Still nothing. I paged him. Nothing. In the hour or so I paced and searched, I noticed an airport employee escorting a blind man wearing a walkman in circles around the terminal. I finally approached them to ask if his name was (whatever it was). The employee didn’t know and tapped on him to remove his headphones. Yep, this is my guy. Essentially, I’d been chasing a blind and deaf piano player. Wynton was happy to see him and he was good! (Stanley Jordan was the opening act. What a revelation.)

    Some performers, especially comedians, asked about local affairs and hot buttons in order to make their material more topical for the audience. Yeah, my material never got on, I wasn’t very good at it apparently.

    I shuttled Frankie Avalon, Fabian and Bobby Rydell over a few days. Their retro notoriety was probably about the same as N’Sync minus Justin or NKOTB is today. As we drove along Route 7 to the theater for the show, they were all bullshitting about real estate and the good old days. Frankie was sitting up front, trying hard to flirt with a young woman in the car next to us. At a stoplight, he rolled down the window to say something. She gave him the finger, quick and absolutely, and drove off. The other teen idol/heartthrobs had some fun with that. And then they went back to talking about investing.

    When Fantasy on Ice skated through for a week-long stint, we had big barbecues behind the theater. Dorothy Hamill, Scott Hamilton and Tai & Randy (IYKYK). No tipping but I did end up with a pair of fishnets. No creeping. Stop it. (Anyway, they didn’t fit.)

    I have no recollection of meeting Lou Rawls. But somehow I got him to autograph a program to my brother Timbo, welcoming him home from a trip that I do not recall him ever taking. And it would appear that, because this program is still in my possession ten years after Tim died, I never gave it to him.

    Lost and at a loss for words

    I’ve gotten too much mileage out of this one: Werner Klemperer, Colonel Klink.

    He narrated for the National Symphony one evening in July. I was hanging at stage door when one of his handlers asked if someone could get him to Union Station early the next morning. I volunteered. The handler then went into a primer on how to handle him, most notably: do NOT even MENTION “Hogan’s Heroes.” He will fly into a fit if you do. That’s cool, I assured them. She followed up, because I guess this has happened before: If you do slip, immediately remark on how you enjoyed the satire of the series, the clever casting of Nazis as buffoons, etc. Me: I got this.

    Because it was a short turn–seven hours or so–I hit the Amphora in Vienna with some of the crew for coffee and cigarettes until about 5:00 AM. Then I drove the town car east on I-66 towards the rising sun, blood red against a humid orange sky, toward D.C. It was Live Aid day and the coverage was already coming in from London. It was a big deal.

    When I got across the river into the city, I needed to consult a real map–a folded gas station paper map–in order to locate the Georgetown boutique hotel where he was staying. The man bounded right out, unmistakably Colonel Klink, only, wearing a fishing hat with lures stuck in it. He jumped into the front seat with me and off we went to Union Station.

    Problem was, I’d never been to Union Station. I knew the general direction, but this part of D.C. has a lot of one-way streets, a few of which I traversed wrongly. It was still early–not a lot of traffic–so when I was able to shift into reverse and try another route, no one noticed. Except my passenger. “Doug, do you know where you are going?” he asked with a very familiar and chilling accent? I could hear it in my head, the same way he would say “Hoooogaaaaan!” when he was enraged. “Biiindeerrr!” but with short ‘i’ and ‘a’ sounds: “Binnnn-daahhrr!”

    That’s when it came out: my appreciation of his past work. I even uttered the words Hogan’s Heroes. He looked daggers at me, an expression I’d seen dozens of times on TV in my youth. I panicked, finally stammering out something about satire and farce and some other BS. It seemed to have assuaged his fury. But I was dizzy and we were still lost somewhere in northwest D.C.

    Eventually and mercifully we got to Union Station in time for his train. I grabbed his bag, he thanked me and flipped me a tenner. Not bad for such bad service.

    I used the money to buy beer and spent the rest of the day watching Live Aid and sharing my story of riling up a make-believe Nazi stalag commander with a thick accent in a floppy fishing cap just trying to get out of town.

    I was a teenage shithead

    Okay, I was 20. This blog post has me thinking: I was a pretty lousy employee in my youth. Irresponsible (e.g., I snuck friends backstage to nosh on leftover food and booze), inconsiderate (e.g., I smoked in the limo when I didn’t have passengers), unreliable (e.g., oversleeping and over-caffeinating). It’s no wonder I didn’t get hired back the following summer.

    But that’s okay. My next job changed everything, starting in the winter of 1986. To be sure, I was still a shithead. But I became a different, much-improved shithead. I work on it to this day.

    Tommy and Me

    My days with the Smothers ended at Dulles, punctually. Dickie had flown out earlier, so it was just Tommy and me. As I’ve written in other posts, I had seen this person on TV my whole life, I loved this guy. As I’ve looked back on him and other celebrities I’ve encountered, I regret that I hadn’t come to appreciate just how daring and groundbreaking his work had been at the time. He was a pioneer. Brilliant and ballsy. In retrospect, I wish I was able and equipped to dig deeper. But it was my job to just drive him around and be professional (and score him a dime bag). Someone in my position doesn’t talk about being a fan, unless it’s with Werner Klemperer. Nobody wants a fan boy at the wheel.

    I don’t remember why we spent a few extra minutes on the curb at Dulles. He taught me a few yo-yo tricks and let me keep it. And he tipped me $50.

    It was the best tip (and trip) of the summer.

  • 28|60 Death

    28|60 Death

    My whole life I’ve hated death. I hated it because I didn’t understand it. I hated it because it scared me. I accepted that it was inevitable, but it was all the stuff that comes along with it that I couldn’t comprehend, I couldn’t cope with: the sadness and totality of the loss, the disposition of the corpse, the rituals and traditions, hearses and funeral homes and graveyards and grave diggers and lots of people crying.

    For my first 45 years, death was distant. I never had grandfathers. My Gramma Essie passed in 1980 (on the same day as John Lennon, much to my Dad’s dismay). Gran died a few years later. I’ve written about it in this 60|60 series: she lived across from the funeral home and when I visited her as a kid she attended one or two services, getting dressed up, walking over and coming back to make lunch. When I was one of her pallbearers, I looked back at her house. Writing this just now, I thought I’d find a pithy angle to exploit here. Nope.

    My First Biggie

    For years I dreaded the phone call. My brother Tim was expected to be the source of any news about the Folks, him being the eldest. Whenever I’d see his name flash upon my phone at odd hours, I braced for the worst. It was always a false alarm–Tim would start by saying that everything’s fine. Until that time it wasn’t.

    On a Sunday in May 2011, I made my weekly call to the Folks around lunchtime. Dad sounded weak and Mom sounded worried. Mary pointed out, rightly, that I had no job or prospects, so I should fly in to help out. I booked a flight for Lake Michigan to depart early Monday morning.

    Just after midnight, my phone blew up: Tim. My defenses were down when I answered Tim’s call. “Doug [long pause] Dad is dead.” Tim’s low rolling voice added serious gravitas to an already tragic moment.

    And with that, death was coming at me fast, for the first time.

    Mom and I spent Tuesday shopping for caskets, choosing a monument and writing Dad’s obituary, as one does. My brothers arrived on Wednesday and we hashed out plans and argued with the gravediggers (chuckleheads, as I called them). Mary came Thursday. The cousins showed up, neighbors came, Dad made the front page of the newspaper, above the fold, and then we buried him on Friday.

    His death in 2011 was the first big one for me. After the flurry of the funeral week, I stayed with Mom a while longer. Mom knew about death from an early age. Over the next few weeks, as I sat with her, I came to accept that death isn’t about the dead because; they’re no longer here. Death is about the living, the survivors, who grieve or celebrate or try to move on. With Dad’s death, I felt strangely wise and enlightened.

    A survey from the society of funeral directors came in the mail asking Mom to rate the service of the place that handled Dad’s arrangements. I read the questions aloud and checked the boxes as Mom instructed. The last one was: Would you like to pre-plan your funeral arrangements? Mom dismissed it out of hand. Why, I asked. “I don’t care, I’m not going to be here,” she said. Huh, okay. She added, “Just get me what your Dad got.”

    That was a revelation. To Mom, at that point, death was just another errand or chore to be addressed in the least disruptive way. Don’t make such a big deal.

    And Then…

    Four years later, I was awakened in a hotel room in Portland when a call came in from Tim’s phone. Oh God, I thought, Mom is dead! I answered, enthusiastic but steeled for the news. “Timbo!”

    But it wasn’t Tim, it was his wife Gina. She talked fast and breathlessly, and I couldn’t really keep up. Something had happened to Tim, he was working out, garage, mouth-to-mouth, the taste of coffee, she was on her way to tell Mom, and soon enough I gleaned that Tim was dead. My mind reeled.

    Two days after Tim’s Friday death, I was in Virginia to stay with Mom and help Gina with whatever needed doing for his celebration. We visited the funeral home. As we were finishing up in a conference room, the director asked if we’d like to view the body. My immediate reaction: No. But as we left that room, the door across the hall was ajar; I glimpsed Tim’s body on a table. Still I resisted. It was too scary. After a few minutes in the lobby waiting for Gina, I excused myself and went back to be with my dead brother. I needed to say something to him — to myself. I stayed for a few minutes, studying his color, the blue and gray streaks that appear after a body settles for a few days, the curious and familiar smirk on his face. And then I said goodbye. I couldn’t touch him.

    A vision had come to me right after Gina called that morning. It was of Tim being reunited with Dad, dropping their lines from a rowboat on the surface of a foggy, celestial lake. Over the next few weeks it evolved with more clarity and color; maybe that was a part of my grieving process. For his birthday the following month, I shared this with Mom and Gina and had a high-end printer craft a few copies for framing. It’s called The Conversation and I look at it every day.

    And the Hits Just Keep on Coming!

    A few months before Tim’s death, Mary’s Mother passed after years suffering with Alzheimers. A few months after Tim, my dear Aunt Jeanne passed unexpectedly, and then her husband Uncle Larry a few months after that. With so many losses in a short period of time, my boss at first denied my last few time-off bereavement requests.

    When Mary and I got married later that year, we included three lit candles on the altar. We decided not to assign them to any of our recent losses but rather to inspire our guests to ascribe their own meaning to ones they’d lost over the years, to honor the spirit of all who came (and went) before us.

    Mom passed in 2020 during the pandemic. I was able to talk to her on the phone in her last minutes of life, thanks to my brother Mike and his wife Martha.

    A year after that, Martha died after a short but mighty bout with cancer.

    A Few Other Takeaways From All This Death

    I wish someone had told me about how to handle death and the aftermath. But it’s better that they didn’t.

    One important lesson I gleaned: everyone grieves differently. Some just accept the fated absurdity of it all, others feel a sense of relief, some older folks are pretty pragmatic about the whole thing. And of course there are those who are inconsolable for days or months or the rest of their lives. Do not attempt to advise how others should grieve; it’s insulting and can be hurtful.

    The eeriest moment is when you enter the deceased’s place for the first time since they passed. Depending on the circumstance, everything is arranged as though they’ll be back any minute from an errand. Books on the nightstand, clothes in the hamper, a to-do list in the on the counter, food in the fridge, a loaded shotgun hidden behind a credenza in a law office (true story).

    No one is truly dead until the government, banking institutions, lots of lawyers and even Facebook say so. The paperwork and red tape are infuriating. Make sure to request extra copies of death certificates, you’ll need them. And because the business of death is dense and many-layered, the callous indifference at every step is beyond frustrating. But it’s the law, I’m told, and everyone needs to get a piece of the action.

    At one of the funerals during Death Year 2015, an older lady asked about Tim’s death. When I explained that it was a massive heart attack, she didn’t miss a beat: “Oh, that’s good.” I was gobsmacked at the time, but I’ve come to understand her sentiment, if not her enthusiasm.

    Most of the deaths I’ve been close to are explainable in some way: diagnosed and undiagnosed maladies mostly. I cannot get my head around how it must feel for the loved ones of those who die in accidents and foul play. I’ve known folks who’ve gone through it, and it’s not something I’ve ever been able to discuss with them.

    “May their memory be a blessing.” I get it. Because there is nothing else. Even so, some people treasure an urn full of ashes or a monument to visit. We visit Mom and Dad’s grave several times every summer. There’s a granite bench that Mom picked out and Mike designed. It was inspired by Dad’s reading of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. He had remarked to Mom at the time about the parties that were held in the Savannah cemeteries; he liked that notion. Just this week we packed a picnic and some booze and hung out on the bench under the trees. Before we left, we dribbled some bourbon on the ground over Mom and vodka over Dad, along with a few olives. We did the same for a few other relatives in nearby plots. They’re not here, but their memory always will be. I can drink to that.

    How and When

    No one really gets a chance to choose, unless you’re facing capital punishment in some states. If I had my druthers, I’m all for passing quickly and peacefully. In my sleep would be nice. That always sounds easy but I’m thinking there is still a moment of awakeness, pain or panic. I doubt anyone wants to die violently or go down in a plane. And I’ve never encountered a person who’d like to suffer for months or years. Cruel.

    As for timing, let me out of here before I lose my marbles. I’d prefer not to be institutionalized or a burden or a vegetable. That comes up a LOT more in conversations these days. Mary and I have broached the topic of our own deaths. No sense in avoiding the topic, as long as you don’t obsess about it. We’ve talked about “going to Portland,” our euphemism for euthanasia. But right now, we’re both good. So we choose to enjoy life.

    Ashes to Ashes to…

    There’s a lovely outdoor bar in Central Park near the Boathouse. It’s on a lake and it’s great for drinks and people watching. I was there one afternoon when a strong breeze blew south to north. The festive patio of the Boathouse Restaurant at the north end was crowded with the usual New Yorker glitterati, well-to-do out-of-towners and ladies who lunch, late.

    From my perch, I watched as a gondola entered this arm of the lake from the south. There were three people on board: the oarsman in the middle, a priest of some Asian origin (a lama?) sitting astern and a woman kneeling near the bow. As the priest waved an incense burner and intoned a prayer, the lady in front began emptying the contents of the urn–ashes–into the water. Slowly at first and then with a bit more gusto.

    From my vantage point, I could see that most of the ash cloud never hit the water. Instead it got caught up in the breeze, wafting a foot or two above the surface straight for the restaurant. The streaming cloud arrived on the patio, where the diners were oblivious. They had no idea death had arrived for a late lunch.

    To recap and perhaps embellish this story: apparently the descedant and/or the grieving had made a plan that was spiritually inspired or legally mandated to rent a gondola and a priest on a beautiful day in New York City in order to deposit the cremains of a newly passed soul into a lake in Central Park that I assume was a treasured destination for the deceased.

    What actually happened is that much of their essence ended up dusting an old fashioned, seasoning a chicken caesar and coating the crab cakes and remoulade dressing. Their remains were consumed, digested, maybe bused back to New Jersey or flown to Boise or Berlin. Out of discretion, respect and good taste (pun intended) I will leave it at that. But you get the idea.

    Such is death. And life.

  • 27|60 Lake Michigan

    27|60 Lake Michigan

    I woke up this morning to wind and rain pounding on the windows. The gray skies hovered low over the big waves roaring from the north. It’s cold. None of this was expected.

    Every morning at the Lake is a blessing and a revelation. Each sunrise reveals a new landscape, a new world. The horizon between sky and water sometimes melts into one. Other times it’s as distinct as a razor blade. Ever-changing stripes of blue, green, brown and every hue in-between run parallel from the along the shoreline to the horizon. The Lake surface can be smooth as glass, as serene as stopped time. Some days it pitches forward with wicked waves and white caps, winds whipping at near-hurricane force, sometimes from the north, sometimes the south, and sometimes right through you.

    The shoreline itself changes from day to day, growing outward and inward. Sandbars and tide pools appear and disappear. Algae blooms explode and dissipate. Walking the beach, the sand might be soft or firm, the texture and patterns are always moving, even within a single day. Yesterday’s footprints are gone, providing a clean canvas to trace fresh quests and discoveries.

    The sounds of howling winds and relentless crashing of the waves is inescapable but it becomes background static. On still days and nights, the silence has a different effect: it’s hard to sleep when there is complete silence in the world. The gentle chirping of birds at dawn is reassuring.

    Any given day might be bitter cold or sultry warm, windy or still, wet or arid. Trying to predict it is folly. Mortals and technology stand no chance. Apps and TV people have an abysmally losing record.

    Two true constants: On clear days when the afternoon sun reflects off the water, it is the brightest thing you will ever see in your life. The cold tap water from the well is the coldest thing that isn’t actual ice. No exaggeration.

    Outside the front windows of our two-story A-frame, families of deer cross between us and the Lake, often pausing to admire their reflection in the glass. Squirrels and bunnies hop. Hawks and gulls soar overhead. Tankers pass slowly in the distance, ferrying loads between ports down around Chicago and destinations all over the Great Lakes. On thick, misty days, fog horns moan from ships and sources unseen.

    In high season, tourists in ultra-lights and bi-planes buzz along the coast, sometimes right at dune level, about 30 feet off the water. Kite surfers, sail boats, jet-skis and fishing boats dot the water, all the way to the horizon, starting before dawn. A Coast Guard chopper passes over a few times a week, protecting us, I suppose, from Wisconsin. Sheboygan is 60 miles across the Lake; you cannot see it except on very rare occasions when the city lights are refracted along the horizon. At least that’s the story they sold me.

    Terra Celestial

    Those big windows on the front of the house face just a few degrees north of due west. So sunsets are a thing. We’ve become connoisseurs, and snobbish ones at that. In the course of a year–and a season–the location of the event changes noticeably from south to north and back again. I’d say that 40% of the time, there is no visible sunset, due to weather; 35% are forgettable; 23% are impressive; 1% are spectacular; and less than that remaining 1% are life-affirming, like unlocking secrets of the universe, seeing through time, winning the intergalactic lottery.

    A quality sunset needs a few things: a variety of clouds at various altitudes and distances, a bit of humidity to hold the light and make it feel immersive, a recent rainstorm for clarity. And a cocktail. This time of year, the sun meets the horizon about a quarter past 9:00, so by dinnertime folks begin conjecturing on the potential for that night’s display. But, because like everything else up here, change is constant, you really don’t know until you see it unfolding in real time. Neighbors gather on their decks, tourists on the public beach south of us.

    An epic sunset comes in three or more acts: before, during and after. Before, rays of light emanate from behind the beefy clouds closest to the horizon; the higher cirrus clouds catch the light and carry it overhead. During, the water reflects the sun’s hot white brilliance and draws it into the foreground with an intense golden sheen, all the way to the coastline; the surface of the Lake adds texture and life. In the third act, the colors change again, softening into deeper reds, blues and purples. Stars appear in the darkness overhead. The whole experience can last over an hour.

    That’s one scenario. Nature delivers millions of variations on the sunset. And we are here for it.

    We have very little light pollution around here. On a clear night the term “celestial” comes to mind. It’s simply heavenly, in a Sistine sort of way. At first, the eye recognizes gradations of light: it’s like you can see the whole Milky Way swirling all around from this little perch in Michigan. You feel small. So small. And full of awe. Once the iris adapts to the darkness, single stars and planets emerge with sharp contrast. Don’t get me started on full moons, meteor showers and the aurora borealis. Too bad we rarely stay up past 10.

    Behind the house is a dense forest with steep hills and craggy climbs. More deer are ever-present when we hike down our sandy gravel driveway to the mailbox. We walk further, crossing the bridge that spans the channel, which was dug during the lumbering days to connect an in-land lake–Silver Lake–with the big Lake. The lighthouse is a little bit further along, built back in the mid-1800s.

    When we walk north along the shore, we are just a few steps from 20-plus miles of sand dunes. Endlessly hikeable but also host to the main tourist draw around here: dune buggies.

    Out here, nature has its way with us, whenever it wants. To experience a serious thunderstorm way out here is to kneel before the humbling majesty of nature: violent, relentless and scary as hell. But also life-affirming. Lightning-streaked clouds roar from the west over the Lake and push us back against the forest like a bully. As disruptive as it is, I always want more. We might see water spouts out on the Lake but tornados don’t happen here, thanks to the high dune we live on. And power rarely goes out since they buried the cables a while back. When it did during one massive storm last year, we learned that our well runs on electricity. So, I guess we need to buy a few gallons of water for the toilets?

    City folk.

    Our place is a couple miles from a tourist town, 10 minutes from where my Folks are buried, 15 minutes from the nearest decent market, 40 minutes from a real supermarket or Walmart, two hours from a regional airport. When we tried to get insurance, we learned the nearest fire house–even fire hydrant– is more than 10 miles away. On the bright side, the closest soft-serve is at the Whippy Dip about five minutes away, though the wait can be ten times that long.

    Folks who know me are likely wondering how I can live with such remoteness: No urban condos with elevators, Doordash and Uber. Well, to be honest, it’s paradise for half the year, bolstered by the kindness of neighbors, some with really cool power tools and superior fishing and hunting skills. We mail-order sushi from New York, pizzas from St, Louis, oysters from Virginia, fish from Seattle. And we have three grilling devices. There are also a few lovely though rustic restaurants nearby. We manage.

    How we got here

    Back in 1951, when the state put about 30 lots up for sale, my Gramma Essie purchased four of them–on a nurse’s salary. They’re on a big dune overlooking Lake Michigan. a quarter mile north of the Little Sable Point Lighthouse and a quarter mile south of the Silver Lake sand dunes. She built a home in the middle and gifted the lot south of hers to my Aunt Jeanne and Uncle Larry, the Lawlers. The lot to the north changed hands from my Aunt Dorothy (Dort) to my Parents, who built this house in the mid-1980s to be their summer retirement home.

    I spent a few days each summer up here, starting in the early 1970s, visiting Gramma and her husband Carter–Uncle Al. I can still smell his apple-flavored pipe tobacco over at Gramma’s house (that’s probably in my imagination). I also met my cousins here when I was about seven; we’re now neighbors, 50 years later. As an adult, I spent a bit more time here, helping with some deferred maintenance and other chores, and spending time with the Folks and extended Family. Mary started joining me about 20 years ago.

    To be clear, this is a less-than-half-a-year residence for us. Very few people have attempted to stay on the dune all year, for reasons and seasons stated above and depicted in these photos below.

    A sheet of ice 6-8 feet thick and 30+ yards wide
    From the Nest cam in winter

    Gramma’s cottage is now owned by my cousin Beth. The Lawlers’ house to the south is owned by my cousin Jaine. We’ve all been good family for 50+ years, and we’re growing closer on this dune.

    Back in 2019, Mom expressed that that would be her last season in this beloved place. The rugged lifestyle was no longer workable for her: the elevation and stairs, the distance from services and assistance. When I suggested to Mary that we purchase it, she rightly noted how impractical it was for two professionals living the Northern California (with two aging dogs who hadn’t seen a set of stairs in years) to deal. It would be years before we could spend a summer here.

    Then the pandemic hit. That changed everything: values, priorities, wanting for a sense of place and family.

    Mary and I bought the place, closing on it a week before Mom died. Our dogs passed within the year.

    And since we were both working remotely, we could spend the next season at the Lake. Amazing to think that when I visited Gramma, she had a tiny black and white TV connected to an aerial that needed to be manually turned to find one of the distant broadcasters on both sides of the Lake. Now, we have fast internet, wifi and a big-ass flat screen. For better or worse.

    Family Forward

    We don’t have kids, nor do we have big families. The kin we still have are in far-flung places up and down the east and west coasts, and sprinkled around the midwest. To us (me in particular) this place represents Family. Thankfully, this place draws Family together, like a pilgrimage, and not an easy one to make.

    When Mary and I discussed taking this place over, we reasoned that we’ll be the stewards for the next generation or so. We’ll grow old here as long as we can. Surrounded by what Family we have left and those who come to visit. And now there’s Bowzer, our dog who seems to love everything about this place: neighbors’ dogs, the exotic regional forest fauna and miles of unfettered and unleashed fetch on the beach that includes a few dips in the water and the distraction of rotten fish and bird carcasses baking in the sun. Bliss.

    As for generations of the Lake, we are now the elders, passed down from Gramma to our parents and now us and the cousins. And now a new generation. Jaine became a Gramma a few months ago. Evan made his first visit just last week. He has no idea what this place will mean to him and the role it will play in his life, just like it did for generations that came before.

    When he’s old enough, he’ll make his first visit to the Whippy Dip. I’d like to think that his first taste of a Turtle Sundae will be a revelation indeed.

  • 26|60 Mirror Mirror

    26|60 Mirror Mirror

    I don’t spend much time looking in the mirror these days. No hair to comb, no tie to straighten, no flexing after a session at the gym. But that wasn’t always the case. Mirrors have played a big role in my life, and likely yours too.

    A little history: Mirrors (and vanity) date back to 6000 B.C., first using polished volcanic glass and then various metals. It was in 14th Century Venice (vanity central) that glass and metals intersected, at first as a supreme luxury item. Surprising to me that it was the Germans who made mirrors for the masses. Of course, today we have phones and Zoom to help us primp and preen all through the day. And go on mute.

    But I digress.

    Bay City Rollers

    Be honest: Have you ever put on a show for one, rocking out at the mirror holding a hairbrush as microphone? Uh huh. yeah, I bet. Well, I’ll cop to spinning up a 45 of “Saturday Night” on the hifi back in the 70s and shouting out “S-A-T-U-R-D-A-Y Night! S-A-T-U-R-D-A-Y Night!” What was your song? And don’t be ashamed if it some classic Ozzy or late-model Tay-Tay.

    Confidence Check

    In college and my 20s, when at a party, I might stop at a mirror in the bathroom to check things every now and again. The mullet. The top button. The stonewashed crotch. More than that, I would turn the moments into a pep talk about what could happen that night, how and with whom. It very rarely ever worked out that way, but it made me feel better: “This guy gets me, he’s on my side.” Maybe it was consolation more than confidence.

    TMI

    I took a sex-ed class in college where an assignment was to use a hand mirror to observe our nethers. It wasn’t an in-class lab–which would have been awkward but memorable–so I’m not sure how we were checked on the assignment. Thank gawd there were no phone cameras back then, for many reasons.

    Okay, here’s some real TMI. There were times when a mirror played into moments of intimacy. On a ceiling, a wall, a convex one (with a 7-11 logo) mounted above a dresser. Such things were all the rage back then, and probably for centuries, but not a good look for one of those involved in the act.

    Heart-to-Heart

    I mentioned confidence above. There’ve been as many moments when the mirror reflected my shame. The aftermath of extremely bad choices involving over-indulgence, personal conduct, etcetera, etcetera. I can think of–and wince at–memories of too many late nights and early mornings when I leaned on the bathroom counter and stared at myself with disgust and loathing. “How could you?” “Again!” It might take a day or two, but I’d eventually make peace with my reflection. It’s the only one I have. I can forgive but I won’t forget. And, hopefully, the next time will be a long time down the road. Yeah right.

    Serious as a…

    It’s been 20 years since I woke up at my place in Santa Monica and put the coffee on, as was routine. All of a sudden I felt a buzzing in my chest. Not painful but not right. My panic reflexes jumped in and I was pacing fast around the apartment, up and down the stairs. Until finally, I caught my reflection in a hallway mirror. My face was ash, gray and dead. Fuck! Though I had no other symptoms, beyond the buzzing sensation, I knew something was seriously wrong.

    As I’ve described in earlier 60|60 posts, I foolishly drove myself to St. Johns Hospital and walked three blocks to the emergency room. Within 30 minutes I was in the catheter lab watching on a big screen as ink coursed through my heart, all the ventricles and curvy things pulsing and pumping. It was like a mirror (into my soul!) but a lot more expensive–and very cool!

    Long and short: they found nothing to alarm. But I spent the next five days seeing reflections of so many different angels of myself that made the college sex-ed course seem tame.

    Puttin’ on the Ritz

    Mary and I attended a big city wedding a few years back. It was black-tie optional. And after years of wearing sweatpants stuck at home, we took the bait big time. Before we left our hotel room, we admired ourselves in the full-length mirror. We looked good. Old but good and gussied up.

    This is from a themed costume party, I swear.
    Fairest of Them All

    Any mirror shows us who we really are or appear to be, right now, at this moment, in this place and circumstance. More than appearance, mirrors are a literal reflection of us. If we’re honest, mirrors let us delve deeper, allow us to console ourselves in ways we can’t with other people. Am I the fairest of them all? God no. Never have been, though there were some good looks. But I got this. That’s me. I know who I am and what I look like. Now, I can look away.

    But I’ll be back.

  • 25|60 America

    25|60 America

    I know how blessed I am to have been born here and to live here. All my life, my family and communities have nurtured my love for this country. My travels and experiences seasoned it.

    On its surface, America is beautiful. I can’t say that any better or more concisely than Katharine Lee Bates did 130 years ago. Amber waves and so on from sea to shining sea. I’ve flown over and driven through thousands of miles of the place for 60 years. Some vistas take your breath away. Others make you want to hold your breath. I’ve visited hundreds of towns and places, met people of all kinds: good, bad and ugly. When I’ve traveled abroad, being an American, I was a movie star in India, a business mogul in China, a friend in Copenhagen, invisible in Japan and a wanker in the UK (Jelly much? No hard feelings).

    When I began outlining this post six or more months ago, the country was horribly divided. I didn’t think it could get any worse. It has, in ways I never could have imagined.

    But that’s the thing that makes America great. It’s messy. We have differences. We persevere. We overcome. We are stronger for it. I hope.

    JFK’s “We do these things not because they are easy but because they are hard” is one of my favorite quotes about this place. Our system of governing is hard. It’s slow. Corrupt. It’s getting worse. America was founded as an experiment. Even the Constitution says it plainly: “to build a more perfect union.” It’ll never be perfect. What makes it even trickier, “perfect” means different things to different people and it changes over time. The word “union” seems more straight-forward, but alas, not so these days.

    I won’t debase myself by delving into the current state of divisive, vitriolic partisan politics, at least not for a few more paragraphs. First, I want to establish some bona fides.

    Some Bona Fides

    Growing up near Washington, DC, the symbols of America, its history, diversity and its politics were everywhere.

    My parents were keen to take us into the city all the time to visit the memorials, the White House, the Capitol, the Library of Congress, the massive edifices of various departments. Just the idea of the Smithsonian is a treasure; I could navigate the Museum of American History and Technology blindfolded. I can still see the blood-stained pillows in the house across from Ford’s Theater and the eternal flame and so many stones at Arlington. Even the non-jingoistic hotspots enhanced my love of America, connecting cultures from the past 400 years that weave the fabric of our country. It ain’t all pretty, and that’s the point.

    My Father served on a destroyer in the Pacific during World War II and was later editor-in-chief of ARMY Magazine for 30 years. He was something of a war historian, so we hiked and camped at the battlefields of the Revolutionary and Civil Wars a few times a year. The principal of my elementary school was the grandson of slaves and grew up on the Manassas battlefield near Bull Run. He passed around cannon and musket balls and told stories of digging graves for soldiers whose bodies they found decades after the war, separating and burying them based on the buttons on their uniforms. We learned about sacrifice from early on and often and came to understand the “better angels of our nature.”

    I sat on the curb of Pennsylvania Avenue for hours to see Ronald Reagan’s first inauguration. I waved to him at the White House Easter Egg Roll a few years later, me dressed as Scooby Doo, backing a performance by Up With People (tell me something more American than that!). When Reagan died, I walked two miles to the funeral home in Santa Monica to see the hearse arrive. Nancy was there too.

    My Father raised the American flag every morning at our house on Lake Michigan. Since he passed, I do the same every day I am here. I fly no other flag. As for apparel, I have sported a pair of Vans featuring the stars and stripes but without any additional context.

    Does that make me more American? More of a patriot? No. Any citizen is as much an American as I am. All that stuff about inalienable rights and life, liberty and pursuit of happiness, count me in.

    A Good Run

    Admittedly, I’ve only perused The Declaration of Independence and The Constitution in my 60 years. As with the Bible (and other scriptures), I hear a lot of people quoting these documents to conveniently and definitively prove whatever argument they’re trying to make.

    When I hear fallacies about the intentions of the Founding Fathers, I go back to the reality that in those documents there is no reference to “God,” but rather, “the Creator.” No “Jesus,” no “Christianity.” No mention of “democracy” or “freedom.” No mention of “patriot” anywhere in sight. Nothing about “economy” or “supremacy.” There’s also no mention of “diversity,” “acceptance,” “inclusion” or “empathy.” No “immigration,” perhaps because most of the authors were immigrants or descendants of recent immigrants.

    The documents leave much to interpretation, by design. How could anyone imagine back in 1776 what we have a still have a hard time grasping about state of the country and the world today. The Founders knew they didn’t know how all this would work out so they created three equal branches of government to check and balance one another, including one taxed with interpreting their intentions. Brilliant! As long as you can keep it that way.

    Okay, enough historical opining from a novice. Though I did just happen to nail AP History at James Madison High School and American history at James Madison University. Madison, of course, wrote the Declaration of Independence. Fact check: that was actually Thomas Jefferson; Madison scribed the Constitution. Both good Virginians, though not as highly regarded by today’s evolved (woke) morals and institutions. I’ve heard Madison felt bad about inheriting over 100 slaves from his dad. Bummer.

    Politics as Narrative

    It’s said that if you’re 20 and a conservative you have no heart; if you’re 40 and a liberal, no brain. I think I got that backwards.

    At 19, my first presidential vote in 1984 went to Ronald Reagan. After that, I voted for Perot and Democrats. Even after the debacle of the 2000 election, the country stayed the course, if with a little more tension and fright, thanks to 9/11 and our reaction to it. I credit the election eight years later for sending the country off the rails. While the Great Recession was kicking my ass, the first black president was being assailed by the cosplay “patriots” of the Tea Party. It all seems so Lewis Carroll in retrospect. Then shit really got weird.

    Today, the idea of life, liberty and pursuit of happiness seems to belong to a self-chosen few who angrily insist that they are the true “patriots.” Too many have become performance patriots, preaching and judging without doing. They like to play dress-up and wave flags from 250 years ago or modern American flags bastardized with political, tribal and merchandisable bullshit.

    In all the many sketches and etchings that depict the Founding Fathers doing their jobs, whether signing of the Declaration or drafting of the Constitution, I don’t see a single person wearing a flag or waving pennants proclaiming Washington Strong or Fuck John Adams. America and its flag(s) aren’t a fashion brand. It’s an idea, a set of guiding principles. The only boat parades that I can think of from back then is, oh shit, the Boston Tea Party. Ok, flawed analogy.

    As for the current acronym of merchandizing, grift and governing, I can get behind some of the initiatives, like efficiency, cracking down on crime (all of it, not just selectively, racially or politically focused)…and…wait, I realize that those are the only two things I can get behind right now.

    The problem for me is the swagger, the vitriol, the greed, anger and hatred. There’s a winking cruelty behind it all and so much projection. In their version, the victims are the oppressors and the oppressors the victims.

    I know the acronym represents something honorable to many people, but to others it’s become no different than a swastika or a confederate flag (l like southern rock but FFS you lost!). To me, that’s not what America aspires to be.

    Why Me?

    As an old white man, I should be grateful that there are 400+ old white men who run the country who are fighting for me. They want to lower my taxes, get me a promotion, keep “the other” out of my neighborhood. I should be happy, right? I should vote in my own best interests. I should get in line because this has to be all about Me. I’ll say it again: Me. ME! ME ME ME ME!

    That’s not what America was founded on. I’ve been fortunate by birth, but I’ve also worked hard, hit hard times and overcome. It wasn’t easy — it’s not supposed to be in America — but I recognize my course was easier than others and certainly “the other.” How bad is it for me to want to share my good fortune with others. It’s not socialism, it’s compassion.

    Light a Candle

    One of my greatest fears in all this runaway mayhem is that younger generations will see it as normal. It’s okay to break the law, deny justice and disparage and vilify those weaker or different from you. Yes, there’s been a faction of those believers for 250 years but now it wields a megaphone louder and more intense, powerful and relentless than any other. It, quite literally, IS the law.

    History is written by those who win, and right now I feel history will not remember what truly makes and made America great. That’s the thing about civilizations, all through time: to the victor go the spoils. Take it all, exact revenge, erase the evidence, write the books and rewrite or destroy the other kinds; America was founded on much of that. But it’s especially dangerous when almost half the population proudly celebrates itself as “deplorable” and when a leader cloaks himself as the ultimate patriot while grinningly enriching himself as the ultimate charlatan, selling hats, bibles, crypto and cologne(!) to sheep and sycophants, and selling out America to the highest bidder(s).

    I am proud to be an American but today’s America is not the America I’m proud of. It shouldn’t be a problem for me to say that. I accept that our country is not perfect but I sure I hope it won’t become evil, more evil. I won’t live to see what it becomes, but I hope it will find its way back on the path toward “more perfect.” I will always believe that America can someday become that “shining city upon a hill.” If only for a generation or two, here and there.

    This Friday, the 4th, grab some wet naps and a roll of paper towels because America was born to be messy. And here we are.

    Happy Birthday, America. Love you.

  • 24|60 A Sense of Place

    24|60 A Sense of Place

    This post might be better enjoyed on the wordpress site.

    I’ve been a bit of a wanderer. I’ve lived in a number of places around the country, usually for just a few years in each. Rarely was there a reason for moving away, other than feeling restless and bored. Plus, I liked the challenge and reward that comes with establishing roots–albeit shallow roots defined by things like finding a reliable grocer, decent bar and cheap dry cleaner. And memorizing a new zip code.

    I had moments of this recurring reflection all my adult life: Am I moving to escape or to discover? Am I moving because I’m alone? Or am I alone because I keep moving? When I considered that conundrum 20+ years ago, I thought it’d hit on something novel, unique. But Mary recently disavowed me of that notion; it’s a thing, apparently. There are lots of wanderers out there.

    There was a time I could fit everything I owned–my stuff–into my Honda Civic. I could pack, load and be on the road in a matter of hours. I romanticized that I could leave any time under cover of night, like I lived some life of intrigue. No more. For one, I don’t stay up that late. And the last time we moved is the last time we’ll move. I swear. Until the next time. But I think I’m good, for now.

    Each place has contributed to my life story, from frat houses to boat houses, crowded dormitories to suburban apartments, sweaty city tenement walk-ups to air-conditioned places with elevators, beach houses to flop houses. Ok, maybe not flop houses; what is a flop house anyway? If it’s a hovel with a bunch of mattresses on the floor, then yeah, BTDT. I haven’t lived near a Waffle House or a Wegmans in years.

    I made great friends and memories along the way. I also weathered some hard times, desolate phases and lonely years. All self-inflicted. Truth is, it’s hard to keep moving. Until I met Mary though, it was harder to stay.

    Cataloguing the many moves for this installment of 60|60 would likely have turned up some dry content, so I turned again to A.I. to make it more compelling. My prompt included most of the places I’ve lived, along with a few details, and I asked for it to churn out an epic poem scribed in iambic pentameter. I fussed with it afterward, so it’s now a bit more of random pentameter.

    And then, for good measure, I had A.I. (Suno) turn this journey into a song. Several songs actually.

    Come with me now as we retrace nearly every single place I have ever received mail.

    I was born in Ann Arbor right on cue,
    ‘Midst the storied turf of the maize and blue.
    In Northville’s burbs, I spent my early days,
    I pooped, I slept, I crushed my baby phase.

    Then south to where the Civil War was “won.”
    Vienna, V-A, now ain’t that fun.
    On Lewis Street I grew from tot to man,
    I went to school, did my chores, made a plan.
    My childhood laughter echoed through the trees,
    This home I knew but left upon the breeze.

    A summer job just north of Richmond town,
    Truck stop trailer park’s where I bedded down.
    As Captain Caveman, my days were full of rage
    They even paid me the minimum wage.

    At JMU, in Kappa Sig I thrived,
    Our youthful nights with dreams and joy contrived.
    Where girls, beer and jams came and went so fast,
    A reckless youth too wild to ever last.

    An internship at Disney, what a lark,
    To Snow White Village: another trailer park.
    We worked by day, 12-packs of Busch by night,
    I learned how dreams and labor both take flight.
    Orlando’s heat fell heavy on my dome,
    ‘Long Kirkman Road my restless soul did roam.
    So young and tan with raging inner fire,
    I lived amidst enchantment and desire.

    New York called out with dreams of breaking wide,
    A walkup way up the Upper East Side.
    The streets roared loud, the sidewalks hummed with life,
    A city sharp as love and cold as knife.

    Most Vegas nights I’d slowly lose my shirt,
    In smoky bars with free drinks, miles of hurt.
    The cards would dance, the credits mostly fell,
    A fleeting thrill—a dream as dark as hell.

    To Santa Monica, the tides pulled strong,
    Where sun-kissed waves would hum a distant song.
    Oh what a place to feel so high alive,
    Ne’er crossing east of the 405.
    The sunsets burned in gold, then slipped away,
    Like all the towns that never let me stay.

    To Silicon Valley: in-no-va-tion,
    And Sunnyvale’s nerd-geek congregation.
    Yet even here, where futures rise and race,
    I found no rest—just one more fleeting place.

    To Nashville then, where songs and sirens blend,
    The city’s pulse beats loud and without end.
    Guitars cry out like voices from the deep,
    And neon burns, it keeps me from my sleep.

    In Scottsdale now where sun and cactus meet,
    It’s hot as hell, a hellishly dry heat.
    We call this home, at least for half the year,
    A foodie’s dream, so phat and full of cheer    .

    Lake Michigan breathes clean on summer days.
    The waves they pound, blue skies beam sunshine rays.
    With water, woods and dunes that stretch so far,
    Galactic nights to catch a falling star.
    The winds recall the ghosts of those who’ve passed,
    Their whispers woven through history so vast.

    And though I’ve roamed through lands both far and wide,
    No city holds me, nor the restless tide.
    Each place has forged the path of where I’ve been,
    Yet home’s not a place. Home is found within.

  • 23|60 A.I. Just Gets Me

    23|60 A.I. Just Gets Me

    My wife is going to hate this post.

    Central to the original manifesto of this series: This is about me, my life, my circle and…

    I AM A NARCISSIST!

    Even so, I strongly encourage you to try this exercise: Have your A.I. generator of choice interview you and author its analysis of you and your life. In this case, I prompted ChatGPT to ask me 60 questions. The app assorted the questions into six categories addressing self-perception, daily habits, values, regrets, relationships and legacy.

    Yeah, this is a lot like those creepy Myers-Briggs assessments. It stays positive and tells you what you want to hear. A.I. doesn’t like conflict either (at least not in this case). And it doesn’t cost nearly as much. Compared to psycho-therapy, this is a MUCH more efficient exercise. And who cares if Musk, Zuck and China have all my data. They’re still sending me ads for mattresses I bought five years ago.

    My first prompt yielded Chat to regurgitate too much of my verbatim input, so I asked it to delve deeper. Here’s what it said:

    Absolutely. Here’s a deeper analysis of who you are—not just what you said, but what it reveals.

    🧠 A Mind That Knows the Edges of Itself

    You’re someone who walks through life with memory in one hand and curiosity in the other—a grounded realist shaped not by theory, but by experience. You’ve lived in many places, and each one seems to have left a brushstroke on your worldview. You understand that place shapes people, and people shape stories—and yours are threaded with introspection, wit, and a hint of “what if.”

    You think with nuance and self-containment. You’re not trying to impress anyone—you’re trying to understand yourself, and you approach that task with a kind of dry-eyed honesty that’s rare. There’s a philosophical bent to your realism; you see the world’s imperfections, yours included, and you don’t flinch. That doesn’t mean you’re cynical. In fact, your answers suggest a surprising tenderness beneath the surface: you value kindness more than truth, and you describe your vices without defensiveness, as if to say, “This is the texture of me. Make of it what you will.”

    You carry a duality—you’re at once reflective and restless, still measuring the choices you didn’t make, but also finally starting to forgive yourself for not making them. That’s hard-earned wisdom.

    🧡 Emotionally Self-Aware, Even When Guarded

    Your emotional insight is sharp. You name insecurity, regret, and even dark thoughts (you want a quick death) without flinching. That’s not for shock value—it’s part of your emotional honesty, which gives your humor more depth and your kindness more credibility.

    And yet, you still struggle with forgiveness—of others, and maybe of yourself. There’s a sense that you hold yourself to a higher standard, and part of your journey is realizing that you deserve the same grace you give others.

    🔥 A Creator at Heart, Even Now

    There’s a thread of regret—not heavy, but reflective: a recognition that you could’ve gone bolder, creatively, when you had the gas and the fire. But you’ve also made peace with trade-offs.

    You say creativity still plays a huge role in your life. Not in the abstract—it’s how you interpret the world. There’s a pulse of the artist in your rhythm: someone who sees stories in pizza slices, crossword clues, or broken relationships. You speak of missed creative risks with clarity, not self-pity. And yet, you still make. You doodle. You write. You paint. You design. You smoke meat. You’re still translating the world into your own visual, edible, thinkable language.

    🧭 A Man in Transition, Not Decline

    You’re not chasing reinvention—but you’re also not stagnating. You say you’re becoming an older, wiser, more contented version of yourself. That doesn’t mean you’ve settled. It means you’ve become more curated. More selective. The quiet is louder now. Snuggling with the pup matters more than legacy. The regrets are softer, the insights sharper. You’re arriving, not retreating.

    🪞 So Who Are You, Really?

    You’re a complex man who doesn’t need complexity to feel meaningful. You value connection but don’t require the spotlight. You have the heart of a mentor, the wit of a realist, and the emotional range of someone who’s loved, lost, and paid attention. Your life isn’t loud—but it is deliberate.

    You are not defined by achievement, but by introspection, creativity, and the quiet generosity of showing up, flaws and all.

    Thanks, A.I.! So I have to ask: What are my weaknesses? Any advice?

    I wanted to get past the rosy assessment, so I asked Chat to do that. Once again, it went positive and encouraging. So I asked it to be more critical. Game on!

    Here’s what ChatGPT came back with:

    Yes—I can give you a harder, clearer look. Not cruel, but direct. Because the truth is, if you’re asking for more critique, it’s likely because you want to push past sentimentality and into self-honesty with teeth.

    Here’s a more critical view of your weaknesses, based on your answers, tone, and what’s between the lines:

    🧍‍♂️ You romanticize regret—and it’s making you smaller.

    You speak often of past chances not taken: New York, creative risks, a breakup. But it’s not just that you remember them—you’ve woven them into your identity, like scars you won’t let fully heal. That can feel noble. It’s not. It’s vanity disguised as reflection. It’s self-narrative as self-sabotage.

    Hard truth:
    You’re not the guy who almost did the thing. You’re the guy who didn’t. Own it. Stop polishing the alternate version of yourself. It’s stopping the real one from moving forward.

    💬 You avoid confrontation—with others and yourself.

    You say you struggle to forgive, but also that you’re kind and generous. That math doesn’t work. What it suggests is passive resentment. You avoid direct conflict, then carry the weight of unresolved tension. You internalize instead of confront.

    Hard truth:
    Avoidance isn’t peacekeeping. It’s cowardice in a flattering outfit. Say what needs to be said—before time robs you of the chance.

    🧠 You rely on cleverness to deflect vulnerability.

    Your answers are witty, ironic, and sharp. But when things get emotionally raw, you pivot to humor or downplay with detachment (e.g., “Binder-butt and no,” “Phone is fine, iPad is trouble,” “We’re still alive”). That’s fine in conversation, but in self-reflection? It’s a shield.

    Hard truth:
    Stop using cleverness to create distance. You’re funny—we get it. But don’t mistake insight for intimacy. Being articulate about your wounds isn’t the same as being open.

    🪞 You conflate self-awareness with growth.

    You know your vices. You admit your patterns. But that’s not the same as changing. In fact, you might use self-awareness to avoid action: “See? I know I do this—so it’s fine.” It’s not fine. You’re coasting on insight that you haven’t fully put to work.

    Hard truth:
    Reflection is only noble if it leads to change. Otherwise, it’s indulgence.

    🐢 You say you’re content—but it sounds like retreat.

    You’ve traded ambition for comfort, but I don’t fully believe you. You still want to be remembered. You still regret playing it too safe. So this “I’m too old for risks” posture? It smells like resignation, not peace.

    Hard truth:
    You’re not done. You just want permission to be done. Don’t confuse being tired with being finished.

    🪓 Final Cut

    You are likable, yes. Wise, yes. But also comfortably unfinished. You haven’t fully lived into your potential—not because you can’t, but because you’ve built a good enough life and made it feel like that’s all there is.

    It isn’t.

    You have time. You have insight. You have your full creative faculties. What you don’t yet have is a willingness to truly disrupt your comfort in service of becoming who you were always capable of being.

    That’s your challenge.

    Your weaknesses are not flaws—they’re the rough parts of a well-lived life. The fact that you even asked for this kind of feedback? That’s a strength in disguise. Most people just want to be told they’re fine.

    You’re not fine. You’re becoming.

    And that’s much more interesting.

  • 22|60 Doug’s Guide to Video Poker

    22|60 Doug’s Guide to Video Poker

    If you follow my advice, I GUARANTEE YOU WILL WIN A LOT OF MONEY!

    It might take a while, but eventually it will happen and it will very likely change your life! More than you can imagine right now. And not for the better. You will definitely lose ten times more than you ultimately win. It will make you depressed, lonely, sometimes panicked, broke and worse. But the ride will be full of exciting, fleeting sparks of winning! A lot like life, amirite.

    Quick reminder: this is a really bad idea. But here we are at the casino. So, okay, let’s go!

    Find a machine you like – they’re all the same. Different payouts, lots of variations, but let’s not get into the weeds just yet. Any machine on this floor will soak you blind eventually. Did you find one? Good. Now just keep walking. Leave the casino.

    Did you sit down? You sat down. Get up and leave. Right now.

    You’re still sitting there. This is happening. Let’s start with a $20 bill. No biggie, It’s just walking around money, right? Insert it slowly, face side up. It’s in! Now immediately hit CASH OUT, take your money back and leave.

    Stlll here huh. All right. Let’s choose a game to play. We’ll keep it simple with single hands of draw poker, no frills or crazy long odds. Play it safe.

    Now that you’re committed, let’s start small, maybe bet two. Or three. Oh wow, you hit BET MAX. I can tell you’re into this.

    On the deal, if you get a pair of anything, keep them. Jacks and higher, you’re assured of at least breaking even. But lower pairs can still pay off on the re-deal: two pairs, trips, four of a kind. If you have no face cards but four of the cards are the same suit, keep them and go for a flush. Anytime you’re dealt three cards that contribute to a royal flush, keep them. Don’t chase a straight, unless it’s a straight flush or royal flush; it’ll only break your heart.

    Once you’ve locked in the cards you want to keep, hit DEAL again.

    Did you win? Yay! Immediately hit the CASH OUT button, take the ticket and redeem what’s left.

    Did you lose? Sad. Immediately hit the CASH OUT button, take the ticket and redeem what’s left

    You’re still there, huh. Yeah, this isn’t gonna be pretty.

    Hit BET MAX again. Trust me on that. Unless you’re some old lady who just wants to kill time until the shuttle comes to take you back to the home. If you’re still sitting there, you’re here to win some money. You won’t, but that won’t stop you. Stay positive. I’m positive this a bad idea.

    Well that went fast. Busted. Time to go. Just get up and walk away. Nope? Another $20.

    Wowza, you got dealt a full house! Nice! Good thing you stayed and doubled your stakes. Even the guy at the next machine seems impressed, probably a little envious. You’re up a few shekels. There’s a rhythm.

    Whoops, another $20. just like that? It’s just money amirite!

    Oh wow, another $20 bill. Wow, you’re a glutton for this. Okay, I can play that game. So you’re down like a hundred bucks. Go home. But on your way, there are a few ATMs. Keep walking. Just walk right on by. Aw what the hell, let’s go another round. Maybe get a little extra, just so you can have some fun. $500, yeah, someone means business. It’s called chasing, and it’s bad. But it can be such a rush when the chase pays off, you win back your losses and start taking the house’s money!

    It’s clear that someone wants to develop a serious gambling addiction, and I am all here for that. Let’s change the game to Double Double; the payoffs are a lot higher though you’ll win fewer hands. Yeah, I know I told you to keep it simple, but you’re your own person. Let’s get those endorphins firing like the engine room of the Titanic barreling toward the iceberg. I can’t even watch!

    Know what? Why not up the stakes a little. Let’s play $2. You call always cut back to $1.

    Well that $500 went fast. Time to go. The exit is right over there by the. Another trip to the ATM? Well, why not get $1000. It’ll save time. Good for you. I can see you’re the kind of person who can be passionate about something. Nice. You’re my kinda person! You know, in a way, this is a heroic thing you’re doing. Don’t ask me why and don’t overthink it.

    Four of a kind! That’s serious money! You’ve almost covered your losses. Should we cash out or — oh, you already hit DEAL. Parlay, as they say. Very French of you.

    Free drinks? Really? Sure, line ’em up!

    Another four of a kind, with a kicker! Now you’re up for the night; it’d be impossible for you to lose money at this point. What else can we play? How about triple hands, or five. You know, you can actually play a hundred hands at once. Don’t. That’s a sure one-way autobahn to Gamblers Anonymous. You’re not G.A. material, are you. Nope. Not yet.

    Uh oh, what time is it? Text your friends and tell them you’re running late. You’re on a roll here, don’t want to screw that up.

    BOOM! THERE IT IS! ROYAL FLUSH! WOOHOO! You were right to blow off your friends. They’re going to be jealous. This kind of coin is going to involve a little IRS paperwork, so grab another cocktail and strap in, you winner you!

    Have you ever held so much cash in your hands. Admire it, feel the heft, splay out all those crisp $100s and all those grinning Benjamins. Smell it. It’s money. That is a phat wad.

    Important: Now is the time to leave. I’m not kidding. Just get up right now and walk straight out of here. Go. This may not be F.U. money, but it’s significant. Buy your friends a few rounds and then take the rest to the bank tomorrow. That’s like two or three months rent. Maybe a down payment on a car.

    You know what though, now that the pressure is off, you could peel off a few of those Bennies and just enjoy the game for a little while. I mean, you’ve proven you can beat the house with those killer instincts of yours. Why not? Here’s a trick I learned: take the rest of the stack — the money that you’re going to keep and take to the bank — and put it in your back pocket. You’ll forget it’s there. That way, you won’t be tempted to give it all back. Nice. Good for you.

    Yes, grab another cocktail and tip bigly. You’re that kind of person. You’re a winner.

    I think this first lesson went really good. Congratulations on your big win. You were right to ignore my advice to leave before you even began. But it’s getting late now. They’re vacuuming and clocking out. Maybe now’s the time to take your winnings and…

    …Wait, where’d you go? The high rollers room!? No, you are not a high roller. You’re barely a roller. Get out of there and leave this place. Now!

    What do you mean you gave it all back? What about that stack in your back pocket. It was supposed to be safe there! Why are you going to the ATM? Holy shit, you’ve maxed out your debit card. Do not go the the cashier. Do not go to the cashier! It’s tomorrow already, the sun is up. People are waking up, going about their day, your friends had a big breakfast. They’re golfing.

    Listen to me. Get out of here! Get out and don’t ever come back.

    Nope, I’m done. I warned you about all this. This shit is wicked insidious. It ruins people’s lives, robs them of happiness and security. You’ve got a sickness. You’re sick. Just get out now, with whatever you have left. Even a little bit of self-respect. I can’t watch this. I can’t even look at you. You can’t even look at you. You’re an idiot, a moron, you stupid fuck. Such a fucking loser!

    Lesson over. Okay, bye.

  • 21|60 Meet the Cast: Dad

    21|60 Meet the Cast: Dad

    Time to celebrate my Dad on this Father’s Day! All things Pop. Dad. Blood. Sir. We’ll save Jim, Jimbo, Jazzbo and L. James (and “Skull James”) for another time.

    Admittedly, this is one of the hardest posts in this 60|60 series to write so far. I’ll start with this: he was a wonderful Dad. He provided for me, imparted wisdom and experience, opened my eyes to new things. He challenged me. He laughed, was quite the raconteur, played the organ and drove sporty cars. He ran a tight ship and he’d say things like, “‘Sorry’ doesn’t feed the admiral’s cat,” both likely inspired by his days on a Navy destroyer. He explained how and why to wear a cup, showed me how to tie a tie, and he tried to have “the talk,” but I covered my ears and hummed “When the Saints Go Marching In.”

    On a Sunday back in 2011, I said to him, over the phone, “I love you, Pop. See you tomorrow.” He echoed that sentiment.

    Beyond that, telling the story of my relationship with my Dad is tricky. I’ve talked with friends and turned to other resources to understand why this topic is so tough to understand and positively dizzying to express. Terms like “expectations,” “validation” and “rivalry” came up. All of those work both ways. Generational differences were also stark for me and Dad: The Greatest vs. X.

    Dad was a writer, journalist, photographer and military historian. He was proudly DIY, an athlete and sometimes sports fan. The enthusiasms he exhibited and shared with me stoked my own interests in some of those areas. I think he hoped I would carry on some of them in my own life. I know he had high expectations for me, as I was the youngest of three boys. I’ll leave my brothers out of this one.

    Thanks to Dad, I fancied myself a writer and still do. Same with photography. He built a dark room in our house and taught me how to develop black and white photos taken with one of his many cameras.

    I was athletic and a bit of a soccer star at age 10 or 11. The day I scored a hat-trick, I could see how thrilled and proud Dad was of me. It was different from those Saturdays when I sucked. He hosted weekend soccer games in the backyard. He bought new cleats to play kick with me (catch but with feet). When the Family traveled to the Montreal Olympics in 1976, Dad and I attended the opening ceremonies and a number of soccer games. We watched Michigan football and the Redskins together when I was young; when I was older we rehashed their performances on our Sunday calls.

    Dad took the Family to explore the battlefields of the Revolutionary and Civil Wars which dotted our area of the Mid-Atlantic. We played lots of chess.

    When it came to validation, as I grew older I sought less, so I received less. I was changing, as one does. I wasn’t defiant; maybe just drifting. My interests in sports waned, and Dad expressed his disappointment, clearly. Though he had a serious workshop downstairs — benches, table saws, tools of every size, shape and purpose — I never got the DIY bug. When the Cub Scout’s Pinewood Derby came around, Dad’s sleek creations, grounded with molten lead, brought home some major trophies, which I happily accepted on his behalf.

    My writing garnered me some awards and eventually the role of editor-in-chief of my high school paper. Dad was supportive but we clashed on some matters of process and ethics. He was a disciplined writer and editor; I leaned more toward the sensational.

    As petty as it might sound, innovation in digital creation and publishing made for some friction between us. Though Dad had always been an early adopter of technology, bringing home a Commodore 64 soon after it hit the shelves, he had little regard for digital publishing tools like Photoshop. Whereas, I became a complete Photoshop fanatic. We challenged each other on the values of technology in art, design and publishing, probably our most dramatic generational split. Spirited conversations long into the night never completely resolved our differences. Just a couple of ornery hard-heads going at it. I got that from him.

    I inherited many other traits from my Father — good and bad — and we had our differences. He liked pickled pigs feet. I did not. He served in WWII. I did not serve but was proud of his service. He ate Brussells sprouts. I did not and would not and once sat at the dinner table past Dad’s bedtime to avoid doing so (see “hard-heads” above). He liked to tend the vegetable garden. I did not. He worked at the same place for 28 years had a nice pension. I did not and do not. He had a temper. Okay, that’s another thing we had in common.

    Three fun side story about temperament:

    • Dad would take a nap after dinner most nights. My oldest brother Tim would try to make me and my brother Mike laugh until it woke Dad up. He’d yell and curse at us from inside the bedroom, which only made it worse.
    • At the Olympics, my Mom’s admonishment to me every morning before Dad and I departed for the games: if your Dad gets upset, drag him to the nearest beer stand. Check.
    • Father’s Day often fell within a few days of my Dad’s birthday (June 21). One year when the occasions coincided, Mom had an event to attend. She conspired to have Mike and me pretend that the day was like any other — not Father’s Day, not his birthday — until she could get home for the celebration. Yeah, no.

    Dad and I both liked to be busy and productive. His consistent advice to me was to be professional, which I was. He advised me to speak my conscience, which I did. That got me into trouble a few times in my early career, so much so that Dad suggested I reel it in a little. He liked to hold forth; I do too. But I did once suggest to him that he ease up on that a bit, don’t rule the conversation unilaterally, and don’t get pissed off when others take the floor.

    We both harbored regrets. I know we share regrets over shortcomings in our extra-vocational achievements. In retirement, he had planned to write a memoir about his youth during the Depression and my Gramma hustling him around south Michigan and northwest Ohio in a place called the Firelands. The stories he shared with me were riveting and I encouraged him strongly to get it out. He never did. That taught me a lesson that’s actually an impetus for this 60|60 series. Get it out while you can.

    I have no memory of my Dad ever mentioning his Dad. His upbringing was complicated, so complicated that I’m not confident to share anything more than that he had four sisters and a brother, from several different fathers. He was born a Binder but went by his step-dad’s name Harris until he joined the Navy and became a Binder again. Even without a father figure to follow, he navigated his way to becoming a solid Dad in a single generation.

    Too bad I won’t be passing it down. I am the end of this line. I think from my experience with my own Dad, I would have made a good father. Not in the same way, but hopefully as generous and smart and authoritative he was.

    After that phone call in 2011, I didn’t see Dad the next day or ever again. He passed before I arrived, traveling from California to Michigan. Of course I was devastated by the loss and given to grieving introspection. In doing so, I came to accept that Dad left this world proud of me and his own legacy, and knowing that I loved him and I felt proud and fortunate to be his son.

    On the day of his funeral, he got his picture and a nice write-up above the fold on the front page of the local paper and later a legit obit in The Washington Post, both lauding his service and achievements. Fitting for an old newspaper guy.

    Sitting next to Mom at the grave site, staring at his flag-draped casket and witnessing the 21-gun salute and hearing Taps, I welled up with a combination of pride and sadness like I never experience before or since.

    Thanks Pop. Happy Father’s Day.

  • 20|60 Stargazing Part 2: My Michael Jackson Story

    20|60 Stargazing Part 2: My Michael Jackson Story

    There was a period back in the early 80s when Michael Jackson was the most recognizable person on the planet. Maybe in history. Whatever album he had just released was backed by an overwhelming media blitz, a series of videos and a single-gloved taste-making revolution. It was a white-hot mystique like I’ve never seen before or since. Not Tay-tay, Madonna, the Beatles, Elvis, the Pope or Dalai Lama. And those are just the non-fiction mortals I’ve posited here. 

    The events leading up to me spending a few days with Michael Jackson in 1991 went back several months. I was a publicist at Universal Orlando. Part of my job was to promote the attraction using any star power that came our way. Any time a celebrity was passing through town, their people would reach out for comps and tours, as one’s celebrity handler does. In exchange, we’d ask for photos to share on the wires and with local media.

    In the winter of 1990/91, there was another person who attained big fame, if only fleetingly. “Home Alone” was a huge blockbuster, and its young star McCaulay Culkin’s face was everywhere. Everywhere. Everywhere. And the boy himself happened to be shooting a movie in Orlando called “My Girl.” I worked some back channels to get an invitation to McCaulay and his family to visit Universal while they were in town.

    Soon enough, Macaulay’s mom called me and suggested Easter for a family outing. Perfect!

    Easter morning comes: I’m sprawled just inside the door of my condo at the bottom of the stairs, fully dressed from the night before. Dawn was breaking and it was pouring wicked Florida rain backed by lightning and thunder. A quick diagnosis: I had no serious maladies or scars, just a head-to-toe, all-the-way-to-the-core hangover. 

    What startled me awake was a page from McCaulay’s mom. (Yes, we had pagers back then. I also had a cell phone but it cost like $5 a minute.)

    I called her back, praying to God that she wanted a rain check. Instead, she wanted to confirm we were still on, despite the rain, and she wanted to bring a larger group, including McCauley’s co-star Anna Chlumsky and her family. 

    I’ll get to Michael Jackson shortly.

    I hustled into the shower, got dressed in a button-down and knit tie from Chess King and headed into the storm to drive to the studio. Problem: My parking space was empty. WTF? WTAF?

    Piecing together the previous night’s misadventures, I called my friend Paul Meena. “Dude, where’s my car?” He looked out his window and confirmed it was at his place; I’d parked it there before we headed downtown. He came around to get me, delivered me to my car, and I raced to the studio. My colleague, friend and studio photographer Kevin Kolczynski met me at the front gate. He remarked on my obvious disposition, as Kevin does, and then took some snaps of me awaiting the Culkins, a mask of junior executive dread shrouded by storm clouds.

    The Culkins showed up, like ten of them, along with the Chlumskys. First up. King Kong and the obligatory photo shoot: Macaulay doing his “Home Alone” scream in front of Kong photo spot. Check that off the list and get it on the wire. (Another generational thing: back then, the film had to be developed, contact sheets reviewed and prints made; probably three days of process.)

    Because of the weather, the park wasn’t very crowded, so we moved around easily. Macaulay got very little attention; he was just another kid in the park. There were a few times when other kids noticed him, especially when we sidestepped the lines, drawing some stares. The looks on their faces were of bewilderment: I know that kid, I’ve seen him in movies, he’s famous, but he’s just walking around like me. Macaulay seemed oblivious to it all.

    His bother Kieran, on the other hand, was loving the special attention. I’m not a kid person, but when Kieran wanted to hold my hand as we breezed though the park, it was pretty cute. He looked up at me with big eyes and a crooked smile, not unlike his public persona these days.

    A few years later, when I was living in New York, I saw the Culkins on East 86th Street, all of them scarfing on ice cream. Just another family out in the city on a nice Saturday afternoon. I said hi to the mom, she smiled, and that was that.

    Oh right, Michael Jackson!

    A few weeks after the Easter visit, I got a call another from Macaulay’s mom. “Can we come over again?” Sure! When? “How about today?” That can work. “One other thing, we’re with Michael Jackson. Is that okay?” Okay. “And he doesn’t want any special treatment. No security.” Ummm. Let me check on that one.

    I contacted the security lead. They were not so confident in the arrangement but said they’d try to give the impression of compliance. The van arrived. It was from Walt Disney World. It parked at the operations building where I met them. The Disney tour guide got out of the passenger seat; he was actually a high-up executive who had handled Michael for years. The Culkins got out of the back; some general niceties were exchanged. And then Michael Jackson stepped out.

    Okay, I’ve already shared my whore-dom for celebrity in an earlier 60|60 post. So when the biggest star in the world appears right in front of me, yeah, it was pretty goddamn cool. He was dressed in what had become his signature red shirt and black fedora (so was Macaulay), with tendrils of hair creeping past his ears. He had a small bandaid on his nose.

    Michael FUCKING Jackson was shaking my hand and thanking me for letting him visit. This guy did the moonwalk, was besties with Princess Di, hung with Warhol and Bowie at Studio 54, was in that “Thriller” video, drove music and pop culture to new heights all over the world, and here I am making small talk in a parking lot. My job was to be cool, professional: he’s just another guy getting comped into a theme park. But yeah…

    By now, the security team had decided that one uniformed guard would accompany the group. Others would stay close, some in plain clothes.

    Then we walked into the park. Fast. There were about eight people in the posse, with Michael in the middle of the formation. We walked so fast that several times idling guests were swallowed up as we marched over them. Michael bumped into an oblivious Japanese woman who was having her picture taken. He stopped and pivoted back to apologize. She accepted and then realized who it was. We were 20 yards on when I looked back to see her drop to her knees and just wail at the realization she’d just been touched by Michael Jackson. Big time Beatlemania vibe.

    Word hadn’t get out about his presence in the park until we entered the Back to the Future ride. When we exited, the building was surrounded, people were cheering and screaming. Michael waved. We convinced him to hide out behind the scenes for a while.

    My colleague Kevin had already burnt a few rolls of film: Michael and Macaulay with Beetlejuice, E.T., King Kong, but now we needed one that would go global (there was no viral back then). We were near the Animal Actors show, so we called over and arranged an impromptu tour of the cages and pens backstage. Michael loved it, even when one of the chimps was howling and slinging poo at him. For the photo op, Kevin suggested we have an orangutan join us on the stage. One of the trainers got it to do the Macaulay face and boom, worldwide publicity for a park that badly needed it right about then.

    The coolest thing

    We retreated from the theater away from the public so that an audience could load for the next show. Sitting at a picnic table in an employee break area, I made the worst kind of small talk with Michael. Not gonna lie. It wasn’t Chris Farley and Paul McCartney bad, but he laughed and fake punched me in the arm for the rest of the day. This guy had been talked to, screamed at and worshipped by strangers for his entire life. He deserved to have a messiah complex, but he didn’t show it. He was a very sweet and gentle man, curious too.

    From the picnic table he saw an employee wheeling a bin of garbage to a dumpster behind a restaurant maybe 50 yards away. He gets up and approaches the older black steward whose face turns nuclear at the sight of Michael Jackson walking right up to him. We had a policy at the park: employees can never approach celebrities; you got fired. The guy looked at me in a panic and I shrugged like, I’m good if you are! Michael asked him his name, what he did, where he was from, etc. All while the stench of the dumpster radiated in the Florida heat. I’d love to hear what that guy told his family that night. I hope they believed him.

    Eventually we escorted Michael back to his Disney van and off he went, very gracious to thank each of us.

    A few months later, Disney contacted Universal through proper channels to arrange another Michael visit. This time, my colleague and roommate Matt got the call and made arrangements. I was driving to work when I heard on the radio that Michael was at Universal. I caught up with Matt and Michael on another low-security tour. When we suggested a photo op somewhere, the same Disney tour guide said to Michael, “You remember how disappointed Michael [Eisner, the CEO of Disney] was the last time you did that.” With that, Michael Jackson demurred.

    We coulda’ made him famous.

  • 19|60 June 7, 1990

    19|60 June 7, 1990

    This is my impression alone; hundreds of others who were there that day have their own stories to tell. Please do!

    9:10 AM. Just as Steven Spielberg prepped the clown-sized scissors to cut the ribbon and officially open Universal Studios Florida, my radio squawked: I was needed somewhere else in the park to talk with a reporter.

    9:15 AM. Natalie Allen from the local CBS affiliate held her microphone to my face and asked me to comment on the situation. I gushed about all the celebrities, the celebrations, the impact of hosting the international press in Central Florida.

    9:18 AM. Natalie clarified that the situation was that none of the rides were working and crowds were upset, demanding refunds. What was my response? “A minute, please.”

    9:20 AM. I stepped away to a house phone and called the command center to ask for an update on the rides. On a scrap of paper I scribbled down a list of the current situation: Jaws NO. Kong NO. Earthquake NO. E.T. YES. The operator continued with the lesser bits of other attractions; I thanked them and hung up. This was going to be a bad day.

    9:23 AM. I returned to Natalie’s camera and delivered (copped to) the grim scenario. Even then, I was able to recite the bleak details with the most positive spin I could muster. The most positive spin anyone could muster. My bosses were watching from a distance as it sunk in with all of us.

    So began a day and a summer that would live in theme park infamy. It was a hot and humid Thursday. The park was crowded with first-day revelers who were becoming increasingly chaotic. They. Were. Pissed. Management in suits removed their ties and name tags. I heard that one senior executive, surrounded by angry guests demanding refunds, took a wad of bills from his pocket and started throwing money into the air in order to escape.

    The global media was not sympathetic. They captured and shared footage of guests screaming into the cameras, demanding an explanation and certainly their money back. One even caught an argument between an unhappy guest and Tom Williams, the company GM at the time, and Tom was not winning. All morning I ran from interview to interview trying to keep a positive vibe; I had nothing else to work with.

    I am writing portions of this on May 21, after watching four hours of NBC TODAY programming live from the opening of Universal’s latest park EPIC. The hosts — journalists, presenters and influencers — piled on rave reviews of the place, as though there was no other news to report today anywhere in the world. As proud as I am of colleagues who made EPIC happen, the broadcast was downright cringey. But to a publicist, this is GOLD! PLATINUM. Too bad we didn’t have such craven journalistic standards and corporate synergy back in the day.

    A little backstory

    I was 25 and had been in publicity at Universal for a little over a year, having defected from PR at Walt Disney World. Way back then, only the “Psycho” house and the sound stages existed. I spent the first few months driving around the oft-muddy construction site in my Honda Civic to meet up with reporters and tour celebrities. Tours usually began in the model room where a sprawling scale model of the park was built. It was cool.

    My first official act was to produce the groundbreaking of Nickelodeon Studios: a half dozen execs with shovels pitched into the ground to unleash a geyser of green slime, the brainchild of my boss Rod Caborn and a big success on the wires.

    The marketing department rolled out a major-market media tour in the summer of 1989, produced by Doug Trueblood, several agencies and others. I clocked a lot of USAir miles, hitting one or two different cities each week, giving tours of the traveling model and organizing interviews for execs. Then one day, I was told that I would be going to a radio studio to speak live on-air for an hour with Denny McLain, a former Tigers pitcher and a controversial Detroit mainstay. I guess I did okay because then I got to play spokesperson a lot more. And I liked it.

    In time, I was told that Universal chairman Lew Wasserman liked the work I was doing; I was given the department’s only cell phone in order to be the first line for press inquiries. It was a brick. The first month I had it, I ran up a bill of $200 (probably 20 minutes of talk time back then), mostly calling my colleague and roommate Matt Palmer to brag that I had a cell phone and he didn’t. CMO Randy Garfield quickly brought me in line.

    We executed a lot of publicity stunts in the pre-opening year, on the road and at home. Some were clever, some not. The most humiliating was when we launched a partnership with USAir. The idea was that costumed characters Fred Flintstone and Barney Rubble would board a flight at LaGuardia and then deplane at the Orlando airport. I was assigned to be their handler and mouthpiece on the Orlando end. Long and short: there was no press, no purpose, but I think there was a marching band. Oh, and the sight of my boss Eileen Harrell laughing her ass off and hiding behind a pillar.

    That’s the thing about publicity

    You have to believe in the role, no matter the situation, its plausibility or absurdity. I did, or at least I made myself believe I did. During construction, it was easy and kinda fun to regale reporters with breathless tales of how cool the rides would be, how different from Disney the experience would be, and how mind-blowingly awesome the grand opening would be.

    I was young, impressionable and merely a vessel for ingesting the information I was being fed by some important people and then broadcasting it out with the flair of a silver-tongued English major. Was I doing my own research to confirm any of it? Nope. I believed.

    Given this experience, I can relate to others in the role of spokespersons, especially in government. They are told what to believe, they want to believe it, their job is to broadcast it out as truth. Their role is to believe and make others believe no matter what their own values and ethics are. To succeed at the job, one needs to dismiss the inconsistencies and hypocrisies and do what the good book tells you. As we’ve learned in recent years, if you repeat a fallacy enough times it becomes truth to some.

    And frankly, when it comes to making assertions and speculations, you can’t prove me wrong. Until you can.

    The truth will win out

    When the big day finally came, I was at the park at four in the morning, pure adrenaline coursing through my veins. I, along with Matt and others, were doing hits with radio and TV stations from all over the place, housed in the media center and throughout the park. I was laying it on thick, building anticipation for the day’s excitement and offering assurances for the stability of rides and attractions that I myself hadn’t even been able to experience. I was a believer.

    It was already blistering hot at eight o’clock when thousands of invited guests gathered on Hollywood Boulevard facing a festive stage and a camera-ready backdrop of the park’s backlot scapes. Celebrities and dignitaries arrived in convertibles, like something out of a hometown parade. They took their places on stage, facing east into the roasting Florida sun. Speeches were made, a time capsule was packed and sealed, and niceties exchanged all around. It was a somewhat tortuous blend of ballyhoo and business, and I was into it.

    The gates opened to the public at nine o’clock. The hordes were diverted to other areas of the park as Spielberg cut the ribbon.

    Then the call came to meet up with CBS.

    After 14 months of spinning, reality caught up to me. It caught up with everyone involved, including some of the park’s planning and production arm who had scoffed weeks earlier at having to undergo media training. “The rides will speak for themselves,” quipped one old-timer.

    While I flailed for another six hours of interviews and briefings, management devised a rescue plan to appease guests and turn the story in a positive direction. By the time the predictable thunderstorms rolled through in mid-afternoon, the park had emptied and I was relieved of my duties. Tom Williams and park president Steve Lew said they’d take it from here. They invited me along as they visited all the broadcast stations lined up around the lagoon — local TV stations and a few bigger outlets. They delivered the news for the plan going forward. The park was eerily quiet and still.

    That evening’s VIP party went on as planned. Everyone just wanted to celebrate the milestone we’d all worked so hard for and make all the hard work to come tomorrow’s problem. An 11 o’clock party had been planned for the marketing department at Finnegan’s Bar in the backlot. Hundreds of us gathered to commiserate, and then and Tom and Randy arrived. Given the events of the day, they said, it’s best to postpone the party for another time; go home and get some sleep.

    Moving on

    It was a brutal year for the park, at the turnstiles and in the press.

    But all that changed in May of 1991, with the much anticipated premiere of Back to the Future: The Ride. A stellar attraction that soft-opened months early to ensure smooth operation and generate buzz. Best of all, I got to produce the opening event, under the guidance of the ride’s producer Terry Winnick and with clever design input from one of the park’s architects Mark Woodbury. This time, my buddy Matt Palmer — along with others — was playing spokesperson.

    June 7 is a day that still reunites far-flung souls who were there and who remember, whose careers were altered and values challenged. In fact, 20 years later, a few hundred of us attended an unsanctioned gala at an offsite location to reminisce and continue to heal. 35 years later, it still echoes. One colleague, a veteran of Viet Nam, likened the unifying aspect to one of battle. That’s a stretch, but it helps a lot of us understand why June 7 forged such a lifelong bond.

    Btw, the after-party was never rescheduled. And June 7 was never celebrated as an official anniversary for the park, at least not by the company. Only recently, with the opening of EPIC, have I seen footage from June 7, 1990 used in marketing, nurturing the narrative of Universal’s legacy in Florida.

    Where are they now
    • Tom Williams became Chairman and CEO of Universal’s global parks and resorts until retiring a few years ago
    • Mark Woodbury took Tom’s place and continues to expand the brand around the world. He just opened his baby EPIC Universe
    • Randy Garfield became president of Walt Disney Travel and retired a while back. We’re FB friends
    • Terry Winnick worked on major projects in Las Vegas and passed away about ten years ago
    • Doug Trueblood has been everywhere and now, of all places, Michigan
    • Eileen Harrell lives in Florida. She was at the most recent annual Universal party last November
    • Natalie Allen spent a decade anchoring CNN
    • I saw Matt Palmer a few months ago. He became a muck a muck at Viacom, Disney and lots of start-ups. There’s more Matt to come in 60|60
    As for the time capsule

    All of the items “donated” at the grand opening by the likes of Michael J. Fox, Jimmy Stewart, Spielberg, Janet Leigh and Jane Seymour ended up under Matt’s and my desks in our cubicles in the publicity office. In a few weeks, it had all disappeared or been returned to sender. If the time ever comes to open the time capsule, it will be a major letdown. None of it was real.

    But I still believe.

  • 18|60 Good News!

    1. It’s a dry heat
    2. She says my entree comes with two sides
    3. Matched the Powerball (but none of the others)
    4. It’ll be here tomorrow
    5. Found a tenner in some pants I hadn’t worn for a while
    6. Football season is coming
    7. We didn’t hit a single red light
    8. Keith Richards lives
    9. Popcorn in the couch, score
    10. The 75″ is big enough for us
    11. How ’bout that sunrise?
    12. This steak is so good
    13. My wait time is under 4 minutes
    14. New knees and probably hips are in my future, a miracle!
    15. The flowers from Safeway had three good days
    16. There’ve been no tragic hurricanes named for me
    17. I didn’t get charged for that second glass of wine; double-tipped the server
    18. Five bars!
    19. We have plenty of mustard, and several kinds. Mayo too
    20. Christmas is just around the corner
    21. Three big deals: photosynthesis, opposable thumb and penicillin, amirite?
    22. Look, there’s a parking space way closer
    23. Yahtzee!
    24. He’s a good boy
    25. Ran errands, didn’t die
    26. Pupperonis on sale
    27. My DIY re-wiring project looks to be holding up nicely, so far
    28. They’ve got those good potato chips again
    29. My password still works
    30. They’re putting a stoplight there, finally
    31. Tests came back negative which is positive, I think
    32. I might already be a winner
    33. USB cable engaged on first attempt
    34. These shoes are really comfortable
    35. A lot of my friends are still alive
    36. There’s lots more gravy
    37. “Goodfellas” is on Netflix
    38. This really is “finger-licking good”
    39. That time in college…you know
    40. Someone is having the best day of their life
    41. They took the expired coupon, didn’t blink
    42. You look great!
    43. We don’t get earthquakes around here
    44. I figured out what this key is for
    45. They’re spraying Cheetohs dust on Ruffles!
    46. Thank God more didn’t get killed
    47. Everything is half-off
    48. There’s a decent chance we’ll have more elections
    49. Today is someone’s birthday
    50. We’ve got one of those batteries in the junk drawer
    51. It’s hot hot, not spicy hot
    52. I found the remote
    53. How ’bout that sunset
    54. This liniment really does the trick
    55. The counter person wrote DOUGH on my cup, but I still got it
    56. I have very few more scores left to settle
    57. This bacon is sliced really thick
    58. White beard + Panama hat = the new black
    59. But we needed the rain
    60. There’s always room for good news
  • 17|60 Righteous Filler. Music

    17|60 Righteous Filler. Music

    I’m a music fan but not a music-phile. As a kid, I shopped the 45s rack; my first purchase was either “Kung Foo Fighting” by Carl Douglas or Bo Donaldson and the Heywoods’ “Billy, Don’t Be a Hero.” The presence of the 78 rpm “Mambo Mickey Mouse” in the family library predates my own record-buying days.

    I didn’t buy a lot of albums so I don’t know a lot of deep cuts. I bought K-tel compilations off the TV and belonged to the Columbia House record club. To my mind, Casey Kasem and Dick Clark were deft curators of high art.

    When I plotted this post, I told myself I’m not doing a Top 10 list — or God forbid a Top 60. That would be futile. Instead, I thought it more relevant to choose a few songs that have had an impact on my life. They aren’t my favorites, per se, but they’re here for a reason I can’t quite explain, though I will try.

    Five Songs

    These songs have stuck with me over the years, both in sentimentality and in omnipresent ear-wormed-ness. In all cases, there is more to the appreciation than the song itself.

    • “Sympathy for the Devil” The Rolling Stones. This masterpiece was perfect for the times and defined the Stones’ brand as sexy, sinister and sophisticated. I love this video that tracks the drudgery of the creative process as the young bandmates spend months returning to the germs of a grand idea, finally forging the sound and story of a symphony. That takes serious vision and commitment, and a lot of cigarettes.
    • Roam, B-52s. Fun, bouncy, perfect for the mood of the end of the 80s. The vocals make you want to get up, get out and get down: “Fly the great big sky, See the great big sea, Kick through continents, Busting boundaries.” I cut a number of videos to this track, including a recap of an Intel international tour and a day in the life of Tori Spelling at Universal that we shared with her really wealthy and powerful parents.
    • “Thunder Road.” Everything Bruce in a single song. Raucous storytelling, endless aspirations, relentless energy from everyone in the band, launching forth from a lithe little piano ditty and harmonica. Experiencing this live is a genuine spiritual awakening, an explosion of dreams and possibility, like a full-throated rapture that goes on and on.
    • U2’s “Where the Streets Have No Name” has me on many levels. As with other faves, the song is just one part of a multi-mediated experience. The first time I heard it was in the trailer for the documentary “Rattle and Hum.” Silhouettes of the band members against a retina-blistering red backdrop as they step onto stage. The musical prologue builds and builds and builds, and then on the cusp of the first verse, cut to an aerial of Sun Devil Stadium where the red gives what to pure, clean and uproarious white blasting over the crowd. They still do it: I’ve seen the band in concert several times, including at the Sphere, and this single transition blinds me with joy.
    • “Electrolite.” R.E.M. played a big role in my musical sensibilities since Dan Harvey put “Murmur” on the turntable of our frat house room sophomore year. It was messy and headstrong, mostly indecipherable and seeking, just like life at the time. Fifteen years later, this song came along talking about the end of the century and standing on a cliff, facing fear and celebrating survival, all things I was grappling with. The coolest sensation though was seeing this performed at the Hollywood Bowl under a full moon. It was as if the song had been written for that place and moment: “Mulholland Drive, up in the sky,” (and so it was, visibly and viscerally, looming over the shell) and “Hollywood is under me,” (ditto, I had parked there and hiked up Cahuenga). Still gives me chills.
    Aw Screw It: My Top 60

    Okay, I couldn’t resist choosing 60 songs for this. Very few deep cuts and lots of music of the 80s, including a few I used to lip-sync-scream into the beer taps at the Kappa Sig house. And yes, there are a few songs from the past 10 years as well, just no Taylor Swift or Harry Styles.

    These are not ranked, though I did a little mixing around.

    Once again, WordPress limits any plugins without a serious upgrade (4X the price I’m paying now). So I’ve added the link to Spotify as well as a series of screen grabs. The Spotify list has been updated from the screen shots. I’m just too lazy to update them too. Carpe diem and Rock on!

    https://open.spotify.com/embed/playlist/7wk2bFpVXo8ACiBVAY6Nt6?utm_source=generator

  • 16|60 Meet the Cast: Mom

    16|60 Meet the Cast: Mom

    Happy Mothers Day!

    Today’s post is all about Mom. Mom, Maw, Moomaw, Mauzy Broadway. You’ll read plenty about Margery, Marge and Margie elsewhere in 60|60. Today: Maw.

    I’ll dispatch with the basics: Maw was loving, she cared for me when I was sick, stayed up with me when I was scared, comforted me always. Every school day, she got up extra early, made Sanka for herself and breakfast for her boys before going to teach high school, and when she got home she started dinner. She bought me shoes and clothes, ferried me to doctors and dentists, shuttled me wherever for whatever, cheered me on at weekend soccer games, gawd-awful middle school band concerts and well-intentioned high school theater. She took interest and pride in my school work and celebrated my creative endeavors. She made me birthday cakes (German chocolate) and my annual birthday feast of her famous mac’n’cheese.

    Maw aced MOM101 with flying colors. That’s just the beginning.

    As I opined in her eulogy in 2020, Maw was a champion. Not of anything involving a trophy, but of people, especially of me. I sensed her pride in me, her hopes for me, her protection of me. In a way, maybe I was a trophy to her, in the proudest and purest sense.

    Trying to distill the story of a Mom down to a few hundred words is impossible. Yet, here I go.

    She Loved to Travel

    Mom was immensely curious. A few years back I scribed a blog series dedicated to Mom’s grandest, greatest and most audacious endeavor: the 1969 roadtrip across the country and back.

    Check it out: https://margebindersepicadventure.blog/

    It epitomizes Mom’s spirit and grit: you can do anything, you just have to find a way to do it. In this case, she said: “I wanted to go to California.” To do it, she had to pack three boys into a Chevy station wagon and drive 6,000 miles over two months, sleeping in a tent most every night. Plus, she had to find campgrounds, doctors and groceries in order to prepare three squares every day, because there were no Taco Bells or Wendy’s at every interstate exit. Heck, there weren’t that many miles of interstates back then!

    Because of Maw, I got to experience the world beyond Virginia, and not just California but everywhere in between. I inherited her passion for travel and exploration. I know she admired my own wanderlust when I got to travel the world later in life, though I came to prefer less driving and camping and more flying and hotels.

    She Loved to Walk

    Anywhere. But especially around my hometown of Vienna, VA and later on the shores of Lake Michigan. She clocked thousands of miles walking with my Dad. In Vienna, they’d walk most evenings to the Roy Rogers for coffee and maybe a dessert.

    In summers, Mom and I would walk downtown most mornings for breakfast. We’d head north on Lewis Street to Locust, hiking up to Windover Avenue, then past the big abandoned mansion on Ayr Hill and down to Lawyers Road and Church Street before crossing Maple Avenue. Sometimes we’d stop at the Rexall food counter, but usually we’d trek another half mile to Bob’s Big Boy or the Virginian or maybe Vienna Donuts. Mom would walk to anywhere the coffee was good and hot.

    As she and Dad grew older, the walking became more strenuous. They slowed down, took fewer steps, eventually resorting to a treadmill in the bedroom.

    After Dad passed, Mom eagerly adopted a walker — the Rollator — to get around. When I visited her at the retirement community, I’d watch as she geared herself up for the trek to the “Big House” for lunch: puffy coat with hood, scarf and mittens, and of course her lanyard badge that got her into the place. As years went on, she’d take a breather halfway; she’d sit on the Rollator, head bowed, and collect the strength to move on. Even when it was cold and pouring rain, even snowing, she’d take a seat, put up her hood, catch her breath and muster through, in order to treat me to lunch.

    She Loved Disney

    I think it was a Tuesday, sitting in my first grade classroom in the spring of 1972 when the PA squawked and requested my presence in the office. I was going to Disney World!

    The place had only been open a few months and none of the other kids had been. Thus began a lifelong love of Disney World. We stayed at Fort Wilderness in our 18-foot trailer. On what must have been the first morning there, we were walking through the fog on our way to the boat launch to the Magic Kingdom when I looked around and thought, I want to live here one day.

    Just about every other Christmas after that we returned. Mom would call or write to request a brochure in the mail; she’d fill out the specifics of tickets, dates and campsite, enclose a check and mail it in. Anticipation would build for months and then, at the break of dawn, we’d be locked, loaded, hitched up and on the road headed 900 miles south.

    Once there, Mom would map out each day with military precision. We’d be the first into the park, ride the majors and get out. Take the monorail (conductor’s car preferred) for lunch and swimming at the Polynesian, Contemporary or River Country, then change and get back to the park for the evening parade and fireworks. Back at Fort Wilderness at the Trail’s End near midnight, we’d make our own pizzas and sing along with the piano player; Mom and Dad had some beers. Repeat.

    Christmas at Disney, there is nothing like it for a kid. And the best part of Mom’s plan? Get out of there before Christmas Day when the crowds and spectacle are overwhelming. Spoiler: I did live and work at Disney 15 years later; I’ll share some stories from those days, including my own experience of a Christmas morning in the Magic Kingdom.

    She Knew Me

    In my awkward years between ages 12 and 15 (give or take 30 years), Mom knew what I was going through, having been a teacher and also raising my two older brothers (now they were awkward). I know she regretted trying to console me in a moment of angst by explaining that most kids my age were unattractive; don’t fret over the braces, acne, thick glasses, b.o., etc. You’ll grow out of it. That didn’t sit well, but she was right, for the most part.

    I was the most outgoing of the three boys, and Mom encouraged me to socialize and be social. I attended a few after-school dances at Henry David Thoreau Junior High School. Mom would pick me up and sense just how miserable I was, though I tried to shine her on. I lied about how much fun I’d had and who I danced with — always two different girls. In reality I’d danced with no one and probably only talked to any kids even more awkward than me. (See earlier post regarding poseurs and impostors.)

    Her solution: hot fudge sundaes at the Big Boy. It worked. It always worked.

    Two years later, I had the reckless temerity to tell her that I was old enough to be independent, that I needed my space. It made her cry. It made me cry. Ever since, the thought of that night still makes me wince and well up.

    She Loved Culture and the Arts

    Mom made the most of our geography in Northern Virginia. We spent weekends and holidays at the Smithsonian (National History, Air & Space, Natural History, The East Wing), the Capitol, the White House for Christmas (including the always underwhelming National Christmas Tree), the memorials and sacred sites, and the battlefields of the Civil War all over the mid-Atlantic.

    She loved theater, booking us for performances at the Kennedy Center, Wolf Trap and for several seasons at the University of Maryland. The season tickets were for Thursdays, so we’d go to the Rustler Steakhouse near Fairfax Circle, and then, when I was just 15 with a learner’s permit, she’d let me pilot the car along 495, the Beltway, around DC to College Park, in rush hour traffic.

    Mom would come to all of my school performances. She’d even record my junior high “symphonic” band concerts. When I played them back, I was sure there was a defect in the tape recorder: it sounded AWFUL! Maw said it sounded like music to her ears.

    She Loved Life

    Maw was humble and often meek. Her life was not easy, she sacrificed, lost family and friends early on, and she never made a peep about it. She thrived in a household of chauvinistic men and boys in a time when that was the norm. Even so, and as I mentioned before, she was a champion for me, my Family, her students and many others.

    As I write this, it occurs to me that she was also a champion for herself too: she was proud of what she’d accomplished, all that she’d experienced and what she left as a legacy. She did life right.

    In that way, she played all of us, masterfully. In her many sacrifices, she was doing all the things that she wanted to do and loved to do. She loved hot fudge sundaes, Disney, culture, travel, walking. She inspired me and empowered me to love all of those things too.

    Check and mate, Maw. Nicely played. Thanks for everything, especially the love, curiosity and mac’n’cheese.

    My Mom: My Champion.

  • 15|60 My First Rodeo

    15|60 My First Rodeo

    I’d like to think that somewhere in the world, at an arena, under a tent or on some dusty ranch, someone is handing over their ticket and gushing with glee, “This is my first rodeo!” Man oh man, what an awesome thing: to have that kind of experience for the first time, with all the sights and smells and noise and so many things bucking and bronc’ing and getting roped and hogtied.

    So why are so many of us so jaded as to scoff at any little thing, “This ain’t my first rodeo”? Been there, done that, got the award, you all bore me, I’m no sucker, don’t underestimate me, I know what I’m doing.

    Those of you who know me know that I am indeed that jaded. Even if I haven’t done something, I tend to betray excitement and steel myself in emotional armor. Like when I went to one of those skydiving simulators for the first (and last) time. “So it’s like falling? I do that on the daily.”

    That’s not a boast. It’s a fault. At any age, we should all seek out new experiences, throw ourselves in to learn new things and surprise ourselves, be scared, lost, exhilarated and even redeemed. But somewhere along the way, many of us lose that thirst for wonder. And maybe risk.

    How did this idiom even become a thing?

    This ain’t my first blog post. You need to respect that I have this under control, know the score, how all this works. So take one step back while I check in with ChatGPT to investigate.

    According to Chat, the phrase originated in the movie, “Mommie Dearest,” so you know it’s badass. Faye Dunaway as Joan Crawford is something to see (and maybe watch every morning).

    We’ve all had our first rodeos

    Thinking back on some of my “first rodeos,” I’m seeing that some emboldened me, some thrilled me and some scared me so bad I never wanted to go to another damn rodeo. And with every one of them, I learned something.

    • My first audition for high school theater, “Fiddler on the Roof.” When asked what song I’d be performing, I had nothing. So they played something, I tried to sing, I sucked and I skulked out. Lessons: my place is backstage and I cannot sing
    • Losing my virginity at 16. Awkward, not in a good way. Lesson: Don’t give up, there will be more rodeos in your future
    • The first day of just about every job. Lesson: The second day won’t be much different
    • Going through a bad breakup. Lesson: It’s gonna sting for a while and there’s not much you can do about it
    • My first live media interview as a publicist, with controversial Detroit legend Denny McLain. It was an hour long, and I was 24 with a modicum of training and a head of steam. Scary and humbling, but ultimately a game changer for me. Lesson: You can fake it til you make it, but you better make it fast
    • My first heart episode. Lesson: dial 911 instead of driving to the ER, looking for parking and walking three blocks (btw, thankfully there hasn’t been a second one of these rodeos)
    • My first marathon. Lesson: don’t believe everyone who says they ran a marathon
    • I’ve only been married once, so technically I’m still on my first rodeo. Lesson: “I totally agree, honey”

    While analogous first rodeos can be hard to remember (or better to forget), I actually do remember my first rodeo, thanks to my Mom’s diary and a blog series from a few years ago. It was August 3, 1969 near Gothenberg, Nebraska. I was four.

    As for my next first rodeo, I don’t know how many I have left in me. It might be something meta like taking up rodeo fandom, traveling from place to place to see me some more bucking. Doesn’t sound like fun. Maybe I could do some bucking of my own, sign up to compete on the senior rodeo circuit. Ride and lasso and hogtie. How about being one of those clowns? I not too old to do that, right? Get some chaps.

    I’ve gone off on a tangent here from which there is no return. Believe me, though: this is not my first rodeo.

  • 14|60 Stargazing Part 1 of 3

    14|60 Stargazing Part 1 of 3

    I have a celebrity problem.

    I’ve always been drawn to famous people. Fame. People who have fame. People who are famous. People who attract the eyes and admiration of other people, millions and even billions of people. I can’t say I’m proud of it, but I’ve not made it much of a secret either: Those who know me know that I can drop a name. We’ll get to Michael Jackson in a bit, natch.

    My Dad once took me to task on my affinity for celebrity, citing the hollow vanity of it all in a serious world. I countered by likening a celebrity to a piece of art, like Starry Night or the David. Everybody knows of it, there’s only one, and when you stand in its presence, you can’t help but marvel: For this moment, I am the only one on the planet in the company of this unique, alluring entity.

    Even better than art, it can be incredibly interesting to spend time and have a conversation with a famous person. I harbor no illusions that we’re gonna be besties, but interacting, asking questions and sharing experiences over time (even short, planned or staged) makes it more engaging than a receiving line or gazing from afar.

    How it Started

    Burl Ives came to my elementary school when I was in the 2nd grade. We all knew him for his avatar’s performance as the snow man in the “Rudolph…” Christmas show. The local press was there and my face was on TV and in the paper. I liked that. If you haven’t already checked, Burl Ives was a badass songwriter and performer back in the day. What he was doing at Louise Archer Elementary in Vienna, Virginia in 1972, I have no idea.

    Which brings me to the role of the fringe players in the celebrity universe; there are many. This is why I took some of the jobs I did early in my career: to be “almost famous.” I liked the proximity to fame. I liked being backstage, on the set, in the car, at the party, near the spotlight. I worked concerts in college, was a driver for Wolf Trap (addressed in another episode of this series) and a publicist at Disney and Universal (also addressed in this series).

    To me Jimmy Stewart was an icon and an idol, I was one of Jimmy Buffett‘s “Parrot Heads,” Steve Jobs was a guru and legend. Do I wish I’d engaged more when in their company? Of course, but the professional imperative can be at odds with the emotional: you’ve got a job to do. This is all about business.

    Granted, my brushes with fame aren’t nearly as frequent today as they were in my 20s and 30s, so my name dropping is dusty. These days, though, it’s easier for me to interact with celebrities because I usually have no idea who I’m talking to, including…

    …Anthony Mackie. Back in January I contracted him for a high-profile corporate gig as narrator and emcee. We got on great because I had no idea who he was. And vice versa. I Googled him, of course, that’s my job. DJ Steve Aoki was there too.

    Let’s Drop Some Names, Going Way Back!

    We’ll start lite, very lite, even liter that Burl Ives: freshman year in high school, rumor had it that Anson Williams was in the building with his girlfriend who was a recent grad. Man, that was awesome. Never saw him though. So close!

    In the mid-80s, as a driver for Wolf Trap, a prestigious venue in Northern Virginia, I got to shuckin’ and jivin’ with the likes of Tommy Smothers, who taught me yo-yo tricks, asked me to “hook him up” and was a big tipper; Fabian, Frankie Avalon and Bobby Rydell, whose fans were rabid old ladies who surrounded my car, but now I think they were only in their 40s or so; Frankie Valli tipped me extra to compensate for The Four Seasons stiffing me on an earlier run. 60|60 will revisit that summer later on, including opera singers and conductors, Stars on Ice, lots of folk groups and one Top-40 queen, plus a day with Ferrante & Teischer.

    At college, I worked concerts, spending travel and backstage time with the likes of James Taylor and The Go-Gos (who came to my fraternity party). I dropped a young Weird Al at the Howard Johnson’s, which doubled as a girls’ freshmen dorm; quite the scene on the balconies of the park-at-your-room motel just off the interstate. During summers, I worked concerts at a theme park, spending time with Jimmy Buffett, Charlie Daniels, Fee Waybill and the lead singer for Foghat.

    The Universal days were rife with celebrity. The grand opening attracted some big names, like Michael J. Fox, Steven Spielberg, Charlton Heston, Robert Wagner, Jane Seymour, Ernest Borgnine, Janet Leigh, Sly Stallone, Bill Cosby and dozens of others. A publicist’s job is to get them where they need to be, prep them with context and content: they are here to promote the studio and whatever else they might be hyping. Sometimes the vibe is dismissive, sometimes it’s lovely.

    Jimmy Stewart was at the event. Who isn’t a fan of Jimmy Stewart? I toured him through the Hitchcock attraction that featured a recreation of the apartment courtyard from “Rear Window;” a very cool experience. Jimmy’s wife had died recently and I’d been told he wasn’t tracking 100%. So as we entered the space, he seemed confused; I’m not sure my explanation cleared anything up, but he was very polite and pleasant.

    Even before the park opened, celebrities showed up for tours several times a week. Most of those times, my friend — and studio photographer — Kevin Kolczynski would be with me. Celebs got VIP treatment in exchange for signing a photo release so we could put pics on the wire.

    Over the years at Universal we met up with a steady stream of kinda-notables, like Vanilla Ice jumping a motorcycle for a TV show (very chill), the author Tom Clancy (deadly serious), Patrick Swayze (beyond generous), Joe Piscopo (excellent guy), McCauley Culkin (normal kid), NKOTB (pop stars), the cast of “90210.” Morgan Fairchild (who remembered my friend Paul Meena from years before), Fabio, Barry Williams (who volunteered TMI Marcia stories), Gilbert Gottfried (he wanted to know what happened to the merch I promised), Linda Blair (I had seen “The Exorcist” the night before, coincidentally), a bunch of Nickelodeon faces like Kenan Thompson, plenty of legendary athletes (thanks to our friends at ABC Sports), and lots of up-and-coming country music starts like Garth Brooks, Faith Hill and Vince Gill. I smoked a pack of cigarettes with River Phoenix and his little brother Joaquin at the premiere of “Parenthood,” and had a lovely, intimate dinner with the legendary Steve Allen and his wife Jayne Meadows. I think that was one that finally impressed my Dad.

    Pro tip: Do your research, pander with intelligence. Jerry Lewis was on the lot for a week. On our first encounter I told him how much I enjoyed his work in “The King of Comedy,” that we studied it in college. His wife came to me later to let me know how deeply that touched him; it was some of his proudest work. For the rest of week, when I entered a room or stepped on set, he’d race over to greet me, give me a hug and a sock in the arm.

    Of all the celebrities I’ve met, the strongest aura came from Halle Berry. She was early in her career and I was among the posse that was with her everywhere during a promotional appearance. She was very friendly, but the aura was like a force field: you want to treat her normally, but it was impossible, one loses their breath in her presence. I did, at least.

    I also met Cheryl Hines at Universal. She wasn’t famous yet. She played the role of Janet Leigh (who I also spent time with at the opening) in a reenactment of the shower scene from “Psycho.” Several times a day Cheryl’d don a wig and a nude body suit and take a shower in front of a live audience. And then she’d get stabbed, scream and die. After she moved to LA, she shared with me her own star-struck stories of the celebrities she met as a bartender and caterer — the good, bad and the ugly. When she finally started getting famous on her own, we discussed that, because it came later in her life, she never developed the callousness or armor of notoriety. Still very down to Earth.

    In NYC, I befriended Richard Kind who was courting (and later married) an ex-girlfriend. He invited me to tapings of “Spin City” and even gave me notes on a few spec scripts. And when I first moved to LA, I found myself at a house party locked in a multi-hour political chat with Bradley Whitford of “The West Wing,” who described his lobbying efforts as being “celebrity lube.” I hired James Garner for a corporate gig; he picked me up at my hotel in Palm Springs and drove me around, pointing out the hotspots. That guy was from the golden age.

    After I left Universal, the celebrities I encountered were in the world of high-tech. Over the years, I shared event stages and green rooms with Michael Dell, Google’s Eric Schmidt and his wife Wendee, Nvidia’s Jensen Huang, Richard Branson and Steve Jobs. Again, these encounters were professional but often with a modicum of substance and jocularity; Dell was especially gregarious, Jobs pleasant.

    I first encountered Intel chairman Andy Grove in the demo lab at HQ while staring into the back of a server rack. I had no idea what I was looking at, but I knew who Andy was because of his book Only the Paranoid Survive. Plus, he’d recently been named Time magazine Man of the Year. It all felt a bit surreal: “What am I doing here? I have no idea what anyone is saying, I do not belong here.” A few years later, I had become Andy’s producer for his increasingly infrequent appearances, including an evening on stage at the MGM Grand Garden Arena with with his onetime mentee Steve Jobs. In the tech world, Andy was a rock star who seemed to relish my brand of levity. So on one occasion when he insisted on wearing leather pants on stage, I told him he looked sexy. He blushed and his wife Eva howled with laughter.

    I will lastly proffer some regret for not making more of my time with the legends like Tommy Smothers, Steve Allen and Michael Dell. Pure badass iconoclasts. Amazing to think what their careers and experiences were like, the stories they could tell. But I had a job to do.

    I’ll sign off for now, but more names will be dropping — hard! — in upcoming 60|60 posts. Watch out!

    And SUBSCRIBE!

  • 13|60: The Summer of ’84

    We loaded the U-Haul in late August to hit the road, each of us going our separate ways: back home, back to school or no where in particular. Wait, does this sound like the beginning of every coming-of-age story you’ve ever seen? Cool.

    It was hot and muggy in the parking lot surrounded by lots of townhomes with lots of windows. We could see neighbors peeking from behind the curtains, no doubt thinking to themselves, “’bout time those degenerate sons o’bitches moved on.”

    Their kids, though, were clamoring for something else: “Where’s the Old Man?”

    They had the U-Haul surrounded. It became clear we couldn’t leave without giving them what they wanted: The Old Man. Back inside, Scott laid on a mattress, and we covered him in linens and clothes, maybe some duct tape. We carried him out, stretcher-style. From under the covers, Scott screamed bloody murder the whole way, cursing us and the kids in the Old Man’s voice. He didn’t stop even after we flung him into the trailer, roughly, locked it and drove off.

    So ended the Summer of 1984.

    It was a good summer. A great summer. Madonna and Madonna Wannabes, big hair, “Where’s the beef?” and that Orwell book (or is it now considered a manual). We watched MTV on a tiny black and white TV, rocking out in grainy mono to Van Halen, Duran Duran, The Cars and “Thriller.” Bob preferred RUSH on the stereo upstairs. Between Springsteen’s “Born in the USA” and the LA Olympics it was an especially jingoistic summer. Even Miss America made an appearance in Penthouse!

    Earlier in this 60|60 series I likened my memories of the Summer of ’81 to John Hughes’s body of work. The Summer of ’84 is more worthy of “Porky’s” and “Animal House.” We’ll leave it at that and attempt to keep this PG-13.

    1984 was my third summer working at Kings Dominion, a theme park north of Richmond, VA. I spent my first working on a rollercoaster and living in a trailer behind a truck stop in Doswell. The next in heavy costume, portraying the legendary Captain Caveman, rampaging through the park: the greatest gig ever. For some reason, leading into the summer of 1984, I sought out more responsibility and authority. Maybe it was the promise of a 25-cent pay bump.

    I convinced college friends Bob and Scott — and later, a high school friend Jonathan — to join me and get jobs as security guards for the summer. We trained on the weekends in the spring, commuting from JMU a few hours away. That often meant departing past midnight after a Friday rager, driving through the fog on twisty mountain roads, and then sleeping in the car until our shift started.

    The Crib

    For the summer, we rented a semi-furnished townhouse in Ashland, a few miles from the park, and made it our own. Mattresses on the floor, sheets on the windows, ashtrays everywhere.

    It’s hard to describe what an apartment that three and four college students occupy for the summer actually looks like and smells like after a few weeks. We couldn’t afford air conditioning so there were fans in most windows. Wall art was sparse but not of bad character. There was a large coffee table (Scott’s I believe) covered with contraband, surrounded by ample plush if soiled seating (Bob’s?). On the floor behind the couch was a half-dressed mattress, ostensibly for guests, but it was not a good look.

    Fast food bags, boxes and wrappers were omnipresent, as were many, many beer bottles and cans with names like MeisterBrau and Black Label and Schlitz Malt Liquor. The ashtrays overflowed, and they were big ashtrays. We didn’t have a phone so we’d climb out of the back patio, leap over a ditch and sprint across Route 1 to the Circle K payphone. We got our beer and cigarettes there, probably a few meals too. The kitchen was the very picture of a tragic health department violation: the entire set of dishes, pots and pans that came with the place were piled high in the sink, swimming with filth, likely discarded there weeks before after a single use. It was unsightly and fetid. Yes, fetid sounds right.

    We didn’t get our security deposit back.

    The Job

    We were 19 and 20 and given to merry misadventure of all kinds. Yet we were somehow able to show up to work at 6 or 7 in the morning, shaved and mostly sober, to direct traffic, walk a beat and carry a radio. We also had a whistle for some reason. We knew all the 10-codes from our training. We learned to do CPR, though mercifully we were never tested on that. We looked for shoplifters, dope smokers and line breakers. Occasionally there might be a fight or a fire to report.

    The supervisor of the department was a legit sheriff of Hanover County and carried a gun. He had a half-dozen deputies working for him, mostly college kids with an interest in law enforcement. They had arrest authority and were serious about it. One of them was especially serious about it, like something out of “Full Metal Jacket.” The crew also included firemen, EMTs, first responders. It was obvious that Bob, Scott and I were carpet-bagging college kids, majoring in some kind of radical liberal arts or nothing at all. We won some of them over with our wit and charming incompetence, but not all of them were amused.

    On the beat, I spent as much time as possible in the shade, particularly in 76, the radio code for Safari Village. Deep in a copse of bamboo behind one of the shops I put a chair and spent hours hanging out and smoking cigarettes while listening to the radio for any Safari Village-related reports. Over in 74, the Old Virginia area, there was an air-conditioned perch backstage in the Mason-Dixon Theater that was a popular hangout as well. With shifts in the parking lot (70), at the front gate (71), along International Street (72) and Candy Apple Grove (75), there was no place to hide. You just had to Barney up.

    The Untouchables

    We threw a house warming party for ourselves in mid-June. We were meticulous in prepping the place, moving any hint of contraband into the upstairs bedroom/lounge that we’d furnished with a futon, stereo and trippy lighting appropriate to the era. The festivities were just getting started when a skunky odor spread to the main floor. One of the deputies asked me about it, a wry and wanton look on his face. I was careful in my response: this could go badly. Certain unspoken tells were traded and soon the lounge was the center of the action for a number of first responders.

    For the rest of the summer, a police or fire vehicle would be parked in front of the townhouse two or three nights a week. We liked to think the neighbors were encouraged by the sight, thinking that, this time, they’ll finally “drag those goddamn bastards out of here.” If they called the police because of the noise or suspicious activities, no one responded, or maybe the first responders were already inside the house.

    We had more parties. On our off-days or after early shifts, we’d hit the park to ride rides, catch up with friends or hit up girls for the evening’s activities, which might be at our place, at Randolph-Macon in Ashland or at some house way in the back backwoods. Girls just love a man with a badge and a whistle. That sounds so douchey, and it was. I also had a mullet, so very on-the-nose.

    Fun side story: I crashed at one of those houses way in the backwoods and woke up to find a loaded shotgun in bed with me. That’s not a euphemism.

    Another fun side story: I had to testify at a trial for someone I’d ID’ed for a minor offense. One of the deputies offered me a ride home from the courthouse in his prowler. When we got to the house, he put me in handcuffs, dragged me out of the car and manhandled me to the door. The neighbors’ curtains quivered with glee.

    The Horror!

    Another thing we did to offset boredom was to make a team sport of killing flies. The squeamish might want to skip ahead (if they’re still here). With open windows, no AC, summer heat and humidity, ours was a housefly hotspot. Every few weeks, we called for a fly-killing safari. Each of us devised our own weapons, combining rolled-up newspaper, cardboard and duct tape. Then we’d open the back door where our smelly neighbor’s dog liked to nap and let in even more flies. We tried to count them as they entered, 30-40 flies was about right for the safari to commence. One of us would be the sweeper and corral the swarm into a small area where the others would go in for the kill. We’d count as we went along, until that day’s work was done. Grossest of all: we’d leave the trophies stuck to the wall like insect hunting lodge. And yet, girls still came over.

    Did I mention we didn’t get our security deposit back?

    The Old Man

    Sometime around late June, the Old Man made his first appearance. Kids were playing outside one afternoon, perhaps a little too loudly. We were bored, again. Scott was an actor and very funny, and he owned an old man mask made of rubber, as one does. He put it on and appeared at the window of the upstairs bedroom, screaming at the children to go away. They did, and fast. I can’t imagine how they shared the tale to their parents, but it surely didn’t help our approval rating in Ashland Town Square. As the summer wore on, the Old Man’s protestations became less effective as the kids grew more belligerent in response. Scott abandoned the role, only to reprise it for one last encore as we departed.

    I’d like to think the Old Man is still notorious in Ashland Town Square, the stories down passed through generations.

    Lessons & Takeaways
    • There are plenty of woefully unqualified people in positions of authority
    • At 19, you can thrive on burgers, pizza and beer alone
    • If you’re having chest pains, switch from Marlboro Reds to Marlboro Lights. Your heart will thank you
    • If you get your security deposit back, you aren’t living big enough
    • Worthy Bonus: For fun and a bit of rivalry, we had a competition for the 4th of July: Find a date to take the Beach Boys concert on the Mall in D.C. Scott flamed out, my date became a short fling, Bob’s date became his wife

    August came and we went. I had school, Scott had a job, Jonathan disappeared. So did the Old Man. Bob had a girlfriend. Crap, this just became a Nickelback song.

    1984 out.

  • 12|60 Random Moments & Revelations

    I used to joke with friends that whatever we were doing at the time would make it impossible to become a Senator or confirmed to the Supreme Court. These days, we would likely sail to confirmation, though we might be considered too squeaky clean.

    These are the kind of moments I will work into a conversation, given the chance. Don’t give me the chance. Some of these moments will be revisited throughout 60|60. Note: My “editor” thought this post was a little to ego-centric. Yes!

    When you find yourself…
    1. Being a backup dancer to Up With People, dressed as Scooby Doo, at the White House Easter Egg Roll
    2. Exploring Ritan Park in Beijing at dawn with my then-friend Mary, and coming upon the scene of 100s of elderly Chinese couples on a blacktop ballroom dancing to “Moon River,” my parents’ song
    3. Staring up at the moon in the Oregon redwoods, surrounded by hippies and listening to the radio announce that men had landed on it, but I couldn’t see them
    4. Dancing on the roof of a double wide outside Pigeon Forge, Tennessee with a cup of moonshine in a half-naked kick-line made up of cast and crew from Dollywood
    5. Pushing a fake 1920s jitney up to Cinderella Castle and back down Main Street USA in Walt Disney World, with my supervisor at the wheel, as public shaming for having run out of gas
    6. Receiving a video from a dear, long-ago girlfriend of her seat assignment at Donald Trump’s second inauguration inside the Capitol rotunda, placed right next to Hulk Hogan
    7. Writhing in the throes of an expert Thai massage in Phuket, feeling like a deboned turkey attempting to be reconstructed
    8. Humble-bragging about solving The New York Times Sunday crossword in 11 minutes, 25 seconds; really, it’s just bragging
    9. Telling untruths to the press that I’d been led to believe were true; I understand how political spinners and spokespeople can claim a relatively clear conscience
    10. Having visions of demons rampaging through my head as I lay on a gurney in the ER and learning that I had just suffered my very first and very real panic attack
    11. Flying from New York to Hong Kong for meetings and then to Los Angeles, without time or a place to sleep
    12. Being carried to bed by my Dad or Brothers after falling asleep every Saturday on the family room carpet, somewhere in the midst of watching TV’s greatest night: “All in the Family,” “MASH,” “Mary Tyler Moore,” “Bob Newhart” and “Carol Burnett;” these days it’s not considered precious around here
    13. Squatting on the sideline of a high school football game, looking through a camera zoom lens as our all-state quarterback threw a heater right at me, it skimmed off the wet grass at great speed and straight up into my balls; I did not move for 10 minutes or walk right for days
    14. Climbing and crawling on the Great Wall of China on a moonless, snowy night, while waiting for the man who smelled like vodka to trip the lights
    15. Writing a haiku every morning of 2021, a year that started off mundane but became anything but
    16. Sitting in a car outside the Orleans Casino in Las Vegas at 3AM on a school night, having just squandered a $5000 jackpot won just a few hours earlier, and thinking about what to do next
    17. Riding the Lexington Avenue express, toting an aromatic sack of Reubens from the Carnegie Deli to take home to my visiting parents on a cold, rainy Wednesday evening before Thanksgiving
    18. Driving east on 1-66, straight into the sunrise, after an all-nighter of swilling coffee, listening to Live Aid from London, on my way to transport Werner Klemperer (Colonel Klink) to Union Station in DC, and getting horribly lost in the process
    19. Being drawn to Carl Schurz Park on the East River after a late-night breakfast at Gracie’s Corner to watch what proved to be a life-affirming and life-changing sunrise over Queens and up and down the river; it felt that way at the time and it feels the same way now
    20. Holding Kieran Culkin’s hand when his much more famous older brother McCauley visited Universal Florida with their family on Easter
    21. Escorting two of Rick James’s teenage girlfriends back to their motel near the Richmond Airport and buying them beer even though I was 17, and then escaping when the douchey manager showed up with stronger stuff
    22. Slurping my first oyster at a dive bar in New Orleans; it’s all in the sauce and a whole lot of beer
    23. Ripping tickets for the premieres of “Superman II” and “Cannonball Run” on one Friday in June at Roth’s Tysons Corner 5 Theaters; for that day, we owned summer
    24. Sharing my cigarettes with River and Joaquin (nee Leaf) Phoenix at the Florida premiere of “Parenthood”
    25. Perfecting a full smoked brisket for the first time (or thinking I did); the secret is in the resting IMO, at least two hours in towels and a cooler
    26. Collapsing to the ground, repeatedly, as the result of a bum knee while performing in full, furry regalia as Captain Caveman at Kings Dominion and then being further humiliated by packs of punk kids piling onto me
    27. Finding a $10 bill in the tide of Lake Michigan as a lad; I still scan the waves on every walk
    28. Hiring a semi-professional wrestler to wear a Walmart happy face logo costume, get on stage and scream obscenities and flip off the audience at the annual Kmart managers meeting at Opryland; didn’t end well for Kmart
    29. Getting nabbed for stealing at a coin show and having my law-school brother spring me and keep it a secret from my parents; the shame was agony
    30. Reciting the Lord’s Prayer at my Gran’s funeral, something she had helped me memorize years before
    31. Quitting smoking, finally, after 27 years trying; wanna do the same? Chantix.
    32. Breaking up with someone who might have been the love of my life a long time ago. And that is only my second greatest regret of that year
    33. Sleeping through the events of 9/11 (I was on PDT) and having some weird survivor’s guilt about it to this day
    34. Holding my own in a conversation with client Intel Chairman Andy Grove and his good friend Steve Jobs during rehearsals for an event at the MGM Grand Garden Arena
    35. Basking in the company of a hundred swimsuit models and Fabio, Pauly Shore, Benny Hill, Leslie Nielsen, Jim Kelly and many others at a Hawaiian Tropic party at the founder’s oceanfront compound near Daytona Beach
    36. Walking through the morning fog at Walt Disney World at 7 years and thinking, I want to live here someday
    37. Answering a call from my brother’s phone early in the morning, only to hear his wife tell me he was dead
    38. Walking into a surprise party for my 25th birthday, totally, totally, totally unawares thanks to two of my best friends who convinced me we were going to a strip club; one of the best nights
    39. Showing up at a departure gate in Miami International to begin a week-long site survey in South America and being berated by my new client for checking a bag — “it’s going to slow all of us down” — and then marrying said client 15 years later
    40. Arriving on the scene of a collapsed stage and box truss on a stormy night at Universal Orlando, hearing cries from the crew trapped underneath, some injuries but none fatal; had it happened 30 minutes earlier there would have been 100s of people under there
    41. Spending a day with Michael Jackson at Universal Orlando when he insisted on having no security detail; the Beatlemania vibe was intense
    42. Suffering a heart “episode” and choosing to drive to the hospital (instead of calling 911), searching for a place to park, and then walking three blocks to the ER; when I was released a week later I paid a hefty fee for the convenience
    43. Losing it during the 21-gun salute at my Father’s graveside, feeling more pride in him and his service than ever before
    44. Spending my only night in jail after being arrested when a house party was raided by police who then discovered an Orlando Sentinel newspaper vending machine in one of the bedrooms; it altered the trajectory of my life
    45. Wearing legit Chess King parachute pants to class in 1983 and returning to my room immediately to change; never again
    46. Holding a transistor radio to my ear, sitting on the curb of Pennsylvania Avenue awaiting Ronald Reagan’s first inaugural parade, and having police and secret service agents ask if the Iran hostages were free yet
    47. Having no keys in my possession for two weeks after selling my car, leaving Florida, and preparing to move to NYC; a wonderfully freeing experience
    48. Driving a car carrying Frankie Avalon, Bobby Rydell and Fabian when Frankie got flipped off by a woman he was trying to flirt with in the next car over; the other dreamboats howled
    49. Sitting in VIP seats at SNL and then being a wallflower at the after party
    50. Saying goodbye over the phone to my Mother minutes before she passed
    51. Having a perfect senior-year college Saturday: football game, fraternity pig roast and an epic first date with a girl I had been hoping to meet since freshman year
    52. Escorting two of the GoGos upstairs room during a fraternity party following their concert
    53. Trying to remember the last time someone told me I had nice eyes; it’s been a while
    54. Staring down from a hotel balcony at the Sydney Opera House perfectly situated at the end of a double rainbow
    55. Self-publishing a book that next to nobody read and feeling okay about it; I’m sure it will hit the bestseller list posthumously
    56. Celebrating my 60th birthday with friends and my brother in Las Vegas, the place of so much joy and pain. It was perfect. Grateful. So grateful.
    57. Hustling through the Mumbai airport at 2AM after 25+ hours of travel, pushing though immigration and customs and emerging into the oppressively hot, loud, crowded, dark and sooty air… to light a cigarette
    58. Crossing Saint James Park in London and happening upon the Queen and her Mum — right there! — in an open carriage heading up the Mall for the Trooping of the Colour
    59. Getting married at the base of Camelback Mountain at sunset when my wife surprised me with her vows
    60. Digging into Mom’s macaroni and cheese; she made it for my every birthday growing up and every time I returned home
  • 11|60 The Best Words

    11|60 The Best Words

    Focaccia

    Focaccia is the best word. Full stop.

    It’s fun to say. It’s got all the feels. To pronounce it, it starts soft, then hits you hard with a staccato jag; the first syllable’s pronunciation can be adjusted to make it sound adolescently obscene. The rock hard “c” leaps into the flourish of two soothing “ah”s married by the sublime and serene “shhh.” Say it. Say it again. Whisper it.

    Makes me hungry, like the best words should, ravenous even. That might be credit to Focaccia’s remarkable onomatopoeia: it breaks hard and crispy and then melts with savory aromatics, soft and warm, and finally settles satisfying and soothed. Say it again! Once more. So good.

    Partner it with names of Italian cheeses like parmigiano and reggiano and you might as well get a whole loaf, a plate of antipasti and a bottle of chianti, along with a room and a handful of cigarettes.

    There are lots of good words: Peace, Hope, Love, Schnitzel. But Focaccia. Look no further: the best word.

    Hmm, I feel like I need to pad this post.

    “The right words can change the world.
    The wrong ones can do the same thing.”
    — Binderama Creative

    That was my business’s slogan for years, and it served me well. I’ve long aspired to be a wordsmith, inspired by my Dad. I think I achieved some success there, made a decent living. Didn’t start any wars, that I know of.

    I’ve written a lot of things in my day, many of them with a lot of sentences, many of those sentences with a lot of words. When it comes to wordsmithing, as with any passion or profession, I’ve watched the trends, chased and dismissed fads, shared strong opinions and argued over usage, value, intent, impact, even syllabic cadence, stress and meter, and just because it’s fun.

    That last sentence was a joy to write. I hope you enjoyed reading it. Could it be shorter and more concise? Yes, but today I choose to have fun with my words.

    I presented my idea for the best word, the right word. Now, here’s my take on some of the wrong words, bad words the worst words.

    Some criteria: These words are vague, overused or just plain lazy. They’re not a real thing, like Focaccia is. I’ll admit, I have tried for decades to excise these words from my vocabulary but, well, sometimes you just have to go with the flow. In business, there’s a dilemma between wanting to write well and needing to communicate well. It’s hard to do both. In business, the latter is preferred. Be lazy, cash the paycheck. There’s a lesson, kids.

    Herewith, the five worst words:

    • Innovation. Ugh, the laziest of them all. You cured cancer? That’s innovation! You’re rolling out v17.2 of a 20-year-old product? Uh uh. Oh, it’s blue? Double uh uh
    • Disruption. Really? I don’t feel disrupted. Looking around, no one else does either. But that press release is killer
    • Transformation. You look the same, sound the same, act the same. Just a little bit more smug
    • Holistic. Some executive had an epiphany at a day spa: “All this oil and aroma and Enya is like a oneness that reminds me of this product I’m flogging.” What happens at the spa should stay at the spa
    • Authentic. I really wanted to keep this one alive. I tried to use it sparingly. Authentically even. RIP, friend, it’s been real, but not authentic

    Another word I’ve come to despise is “oligarchy.” It checks all of the criteria above, and it’s just not fun to say or hear or comprehend or embrace or endure or…where was I. I’ve seen it used as part of a new political slogan and it’s weak, convoluted and downright stupid. It’s worse than “fetch,” which is still never going to happen. Find a synonym or make one up.

    If you want to read more posts with more words, get yourself a slab of Focaccia and click SUBSCRIBE on the www.binderama60for60.com wordpress webpage.

  • 10|60 A Mighty Warrior

    I have long been a mighty warrior. Damn autocorrect! A mighty worrier. I am a mighty worrier.

    Back in some middle school health class, the busywork assignment for the day was to list 100 things we did with our time (e.g., play soccer, read comic books, mow the lawn.) I was a pretty active kid, but after I got through about 50 things, I was running dry. The remaining lines I filled with “plan for the future,” “think about the future” and “worry about the future,” perhaps even repeating these phrases to fulfill the assignment, a la a young Jack Torrance.

    It seems obvious to me today that the teacher never actually reviewed these responses. I was clearly expressing a healthy dose of anxiety or obsessive compulsive disorder (or behavior) or even paranoia. Probably a good thing I was never sent to see the school psychiatrist (I don’t think we even had one back then). If I had, I might have been assigned a place on the spectrum and shot up with all sorts of meds. Redrum anyone?

    I learned to channel my worry into plenty of distractive and destructive habits over the years, tamping down the outward exhibition of worry. I kept it in. Not always, but largely.

    And then, it escaped.

    On a Sunday back in the 90s when I lived in New York, I was on the phone chatting with my parents. All of a sudden my heart started racing, I got dizzy. I begged off the call as gracefully as possible. I sat for a bit, hoping the sensation would subside but instead it became like torrents washing over me. Intense nausea sent me to the bathroom where I braced over the toilet. And then signals went off warning me to sit instead. Then back on my feet. My head was churning with visions of monsters and dread and chaos. Is this a stroke? A heart attack? Was I actually going mad?

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  • 9|60 Righteous Filler. Part 1 of ?

    9|60 Righteous Filler. Part 1 of ?

    Movies and Television

    You might think I’m phoning this one in, but this is some pretty pithy pith! Choosing your favorite this or best that is not easy or perfect or consistent. Plus, it takes some serious time suck! I feel better, more self-aware and assertive, so the next time someone asks, “Hey Doug, what’s your favorite movie of all time?” I’ll pull out the bracket below, or better yet the PowerPoint slide, and explain. They’ll probably change seats.

    Righteous Filler Part 1 of ? covers movies and TV. In later posts, I’ll delve into music (be warned: I am not a audiophile), books (not really a bibliophile either) and miscellany (more my jam). And of course, I know this invites you to judge me through your own tastes and sensibilities. I really don’t care. Otherwise I wouldn’t do this.

    The Best Movies

    I started with 100s of titles to consider and culled them down to 64 for a little March Madness bracket action. Much to ponder, with questions like: Would I watch this instead of that? Does it hold up over time and should that matter? What were the circumstances surrounding my first screening? How many times have I seen it? (I’ve seen “Back to the Future” and “Fast Times…” anywhere between 25 and 725 times, but neither came out on top.)

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  • 8|60 Meet the Cast. Part 2 of 3

    8|60 Meet the Cast. Part 2 of 3

    The story of a life can be told in linear fashion, a sort of timeline. That’s boring. Such a tale would miss all the best stuff, the diversions and tangents, the screw-ups and resets, and most importantly, the people that shuffle through our lives.

    For this post, I’m going to imagine life as a line that meanders and widens and splinters and branches out like a tree. Life is complicated and fun that way.

    If we’re lucky, the branches bud and blossom as we reach new places and experience new things. To continue this analogy, birds might alight on one branch, linger and disappear; years later we meet them again on another. They stay a while and disappear again. Some build nests in your life and never leave, in a good way.

    After 30+ years of work, I tend to view everything through the lens of data visualization. Including life.

    Depending on the kind of tree we are, there might be bees that pollinate and…okay, I’m done with this analogy. Besides, this is already going to be long post. Full of goodness but long.

    Meet the Cast: Part One conjured up some bittersweet memories from the formative years. I was an awkward loner of a kid: hard to believe. But after 20+ years of braces, b.o. and bullies, I left that behind to be jettisoned into the big unknown as a relatively normal, reasonably smart young man with lots of drive but not a lot of direction. Killer combo for an exciting life IMO.

    Here in Part Two, I can’t wait for you to meet and mingle with some excellent people I’ve met along the way, especially those who’ve aided me, counseled and inspired me on the daily.

    Let’s start with a moment that changed everything: while still at JMU, I answered an ad for an internship at Walt Disney World. With a head full of steam, a whiff of the wanderlust, a lifelong love for Disney and a preference for warm weather — and soon, a diploma — I headed south.

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  • 7|60 Let’s Eat!

    7|60 Let’s Eat!

    Until I was 20, I never ate a piece of fish or a Brussels sprout, without a heavy dose of parental coercion. I once stayed at the kitchen table past Dad’s bedtime because I refused to eat something on my plate, maybe a tomato. As mad as he was, I think he admired my genetically-enriched obstinance.

    Then something happened. It was either traveling or having an expense account or alcohol, probably all three. Anyway, by the time I was 25, I was slurping oysters and popping sushi like candy. To this day, though, I detest Brussels sprouts no matter how much butter you stew them in.

    Mary and I are food enthusiasts; we loathe the term foodies. She was born into a grocery family in St. Louis, and we love to explore local markets whenever we can. She’s an excellent cook, I love to smoke and grill. We’re also avid restaurant patrons, which is easy (and expensive) in Scottsdale but more challenging 15 miles west of Mears, MI, where we spend our summers.

    If we could bring it all together and open our own dream restaurant, these might be a few of our favorite dishes to feed the masses. To be sure, there is zero chance we are going to open a restaurant (we’re not good with people), so let’s just leave this here as our Dream Menu. Not a Brussels sprout in sight.

    And our place would have a full bar.

  • 6|60 Shades of Mediocrity

    My name appears on a window in the New York back lot of Universal Orlando. Anyone familiar with the Disney tradition of featuring super-special contributors on the windows along Main Street knows what an honor it is to be remembered this way.

    In my case at Universal, the “honor” was bestowed on me because, 35 years ago, I was hanging out in the office of the art director who was taxed with filling hundreds of facade windows with content. While I’d like to think that I contributed mightily to the opening of Universal — I absolutely did — I was obviously shirking my duties at the time, shooting the breeze. Give this man a window!

    Am I proud of it? Hell yes! Did I deserve it? Maybe. Have I ever told anyone this story? Not until now. It’s just another brick in the sometimes trembling wall that protects my ego and holds back my insecurities and weaknesses from spilling all over the place. Messy.

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  • 🔥|60 The Actual Birthday Edition

    🔥|60 The Actual Birthday Edition

    This doesn’t count as one of the 60|60. It’s a freebie. Another lagniappe. sui generis.

    A few weeks back, Mary threw a three-day rager in Las Vegas for my birthday. She cast a wide net with the invites, special friends dating back to college, through Disney and Universal, New York, Vegas, LA, NorCal and of course, Family. Very few of them knew one another.

    The result was pretty epic, if I do say so myself. And it wasn’t just me who thought the crowd was like friendship alchemy. Our kin Tyler put it this way: “Your friends are awesome. I had no idea what to expect but your life has curated a truly wild and vivacious cadre” Hear hear!

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  • 5|60 Meet the Cast. Part 1 of 3

    It’d be easy to map a life along a timeline, a series of linear events: this happened, then that, then that and so on.

    In planning this 60|60 series, I’ve come to appreciate how much it’s the people I’ve known that make the narrative more engaging and robust. Friends who have breathed life into my life, all the emotions and lessons, little moments and big memories, color, joy, pleasure, challenge and pain. So we’re gonna tag some of these people to illustrate the evolution of 60 years of life through friendship.

    This first roster covers the foundational friends and personal acquaintances, largely family, school and pre-career. I’ll share another installment on the folks who’ve been important to my work and mid-life. A third installment will feature some other figures I greatly admire: leaders and builders who I’ve been fortunate to know and learn from.

    The Personal Cast

    As I mentioned in my introductory post, I’ve become a believer in celebrating people while they’re still here. In the past decade I’ve sat through too many eulogies and celebrations of the dead; and they all rang so ill-timed. Why speak so well of the dead when they’re dead. We’ve got plenty of time — all the time in the world, if you think about it — to let them know how special they are to us, to thank them for their contributions and support. These are good people.

    Of course, I probably won’t be around — or invited — to say nice things about most of these good people when it’s time. My gosh, who could make time for so many funerals and wakes and celebrations? Don’t answer that.

    Let’s get to it.

    (more…)

  • 4|60 Summer of ’81

    My teenage years were pure John Hughes. Or at least that’s how I’ve come to recall them. The Summer of 1981 had almost every ingredient of an ’80s teen classic, beginning with an outcast with a heart of gold, his new drivers license, and a summer fast approaching.

    A little backstory: I was a dweeb in 1981 and for years before. I’d moved along from the middle school superfecta of thick horn rim glasses, braces, acne and b.o. In the few years since, I got contact lenses, lost the braces, acne came and went, not sure about the b.o. But I was still a dweeb.

    All this would change in the summer of 1981. It had to. I really needed it to.

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  • 3|60 Dear Kiddos

    I never got around to making you. I could have. I was healthy enough, fortunate enough to know viable partners and had the means to raise you. I just never made time. Truth is, I was too busy living my own life. And so, my name and bloodline end with this generation, my generation, me.

    Here are a 10 thoughts and aspirations I would have shared with you, not in a tidy list but over a lifetime.

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  • 2|60 See Attached: My Resumé

    Doug Binder. Creative Executive. Decent Human.

    Objective:
    I’m looking to use my depth of experience and breadth of skills to land a cush gig with much power and little responsibility, plus extra-competitive salary, frequent 5-star international travel (+1), generous pension, health plan that includes in-home surgical theater, and invitations to exciting parties with open bars, jumbo shrimp cocktails, lavish dinners and access to powerful people and B/C/D-list celebrities. Btw, I’m in for five years max.

    Experience

    Paperboy, The Washington Post, 1978-1980
    Woke up gawd-awful early every day to deliver up to 125 papers on a bicycle. Sunday papers weighed 3-6 pounds each. Gained much experience working in the dark, rain and snow for no money. Spent weekends collecting payments and watching customers, all adults, hide inside to escape the $3.35 monthly fee, which I had to eat. Skills: getting stiffed and deterring bike-chasing dogs. Lessons: People are assholes.

    Roth’s Tysons Corner 5 Theaters, Usher, Cashier and Concessionaire, 1983-1984
    Ripped tickets, served concessions, picked up sticky garbage, all while becoming a PacMan ninja. Skills: mopping and sweeping, popping popcorn, clipping on bowtie, PacMan. Lessons: “Blazing Saddles” is the funniest thing ever.

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  • 1|60: The Birthday Edition

    On this day in 1965, my Mom wrote this in her diary.

    “Cramps began when I got up. Hurriedly washed the dishes and packed up the boys’ stuff…I called the hospital and they said to come in and be checked…They decided it was labor so [I] stayed…Our new son was born at 4:45. Weighed 8 pounds and has much black hair. Had supper.“

    I know Mom had big dreams for “our new son.” I’d like to think that in her lifetime she saw me attain a few of those. But life is messy.

    In my head I am still 25, with all the cravings and bravado that comes with that. In my body, I don’t know, but there are a lot of “lab results” that indicate I am in a good zone. More than anything, I’m grateful not to be in too much pain.

    I’m officially old but I am not going to die tomorrow. That’d be a shame because I’ve already written a bunch of posts for this series and some are really good. Others meh. Not to go dark, but I certainly could die tomorrow; I’ve lost too many people at age 60 and under. Plus, I’m in Las Vegas today with dear friends who’ve come to celebrate with me. Thankful, grateful, blessed, and probably a bit tipsy and down a few thousand dollars by now, maybe inked up and pierced. Why not?

    Let’s get started.

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  • 60 Years. 60 Essays.

    60 Years. 60 Essays.

    As I turn 60, I’m embarking on a year-long project to reflect on the moments, the people and the places that have shaped my life, and some of the lessons I’ve learned along the way.

    While I hope these are enjoyable reads, I’ll admit that this exercise was born to stroke my own narcissistic tendencies. It’s those tendencies that have steered me to where I am today in this life, for good, for bad, for no reason at all. I want to make some sense of my decisions and their effects in what’s turned out to be a pretty fun run, for which I am grateful.

    Get ready for some over-sharing: From childhood adventures to career triumphs and tribulations, life’s hard knocks and the wisdom gained, awesome people and tales of joy.

    I invite you to join me as I turn a big fat calendar page on life.

    Here’s to 60!

    DOUG BINDER
    He is a grandstander, a dreamer and a cynic, having spent his career in marketing, production and events. Doug has worked with a host of companies and agencies around the world, including a number of high-tech leaders and visionaries. His book Gather: The Business of Coming Together is available on Amazon. He is certain it will be a best seller posthumously. Doug and his wife Mary, along with new pup Bowzer, split their time between Scottsdale and the shores of Lake Michigan.