Rant #2,946: Candle In the Wind

With all that explained to you yesterday about what is happening in my life, I completely forgot that yesterday, August 5, was the 60th anniversary of the death of one of the major Hollywood icons of all time.
 
I just have to say “MM” and you know who I am talking about.
 
Marilyn Monroe died 60 years ago yesterday, under still mysterious circumstances.
 
Did she die of a self-inflicted drug overdose, or was her death forced upon her by forces that sat at the very top of our government?
 
Was she rubbed out by the Mafia, or some foreign power, as she simply knew too much about what was happening at the time?
 
Or was she simply some wayward person who had suffered mentally for years, and this was the last chapter of her life, like it is for so many who can’t cope?
 
We probably will never know the real reason she died that summer day, but Monroe has almost had a second life in death, and like Elvis Presley, she lives on as one of the icons of a past generation.
 
I know to some younger people, she and Elvis are almost comic book characters, nothing but Hollywood creations, but they were real people coming from humble beginnings who lit up the sky like a comet, and plummeted to earth almost in the same breath.
 
Monroe was special to so many people—yes, certainly men, but many women, too—for different reasons, of course.
 
For men, she represented the ultimate sex symbol, the ultimate testament to womanhood in an era where the topic was somewhat repressed and not too often spoken about.
 
For women, she was the ultimate human soap opera, a beautiful woman who had one crisis after another—marriage, divorce, miscarriage, mental illness—that fit the axiom “Truth is stranger than fiction.”
 
And yes, the two observations certainly crossed over from male to female, creating perhaps the greatest, most ultimate sex symbol Hollywood has ever had a hand in creating … and her power lives on 60 years after her death.
 
And it lives on for me, too.
 
Here is what I had to say about Monroe and her untimely passing in Rant #2,206 dated August 21, 2018:
 
“In my house, Marilyn Monroe was the IT girl.
 
My father absolutely adored her, and at an early age, I knew the name, if not really who she was or why my father loved her.
 
It is amazing that looking back so many years ago, I can still remember very, very clearly when I had heard that she had died.
 
She died on August 5, 1962, so I was a little more than five years old when she passed.
 
It was the middle of the summer, my family and I lived in Kew Gardens Hills, Queens, New York, in a somewhat notorious area where two other women--Alice Crimmins and Kitty Genovese--became nationally known figures because of horrid misdeeds involving them, literally nearby or right around the corner from where we lived.
 
Anyway, I was five years old, and just getting to live my life. The Kennedy assassination was still many months away, but my very first memory that I had was George Reeves' death when I was about two years old.
 
I mean, how could Superman die?
 
But during the summertime of 1962, I was busy as a bee in the house that particular day.
 
I was in my room, the room I shared with my little sister, who was two years old at the time, and evidently, it must have been late morning when I heard about Marilyn.
 
I was playing with my Kenner Give A Show Projector in my darkened room, which was basically a flashlight with a slit that you could put cells of pre-made photos, and it would flash on the wall or anything you wanted to flash it on.
 
There were even some blank ones that came in each package of the toy, with crayons, so you could literally make your own cells to flash on the wall.
 
Generally, popular cartoon characters cells came with the toy, and I guess I was flashing them in my room. I remember being absolutely fascinated with this toy, and played with it so much that I think my parents bought me another one because I had completely burnt out the first one.
 
Anyway, I was playing with the toy in my darkened room when I heard what had happened. My mother used to have the radio on all the time, and I did not know what station it was on at the time, but it used to blare through the house. You would have to be stone deaf to not hear the radio.
 
Well, the announcer or DJ or newsman came on and said the Marilyn Monroe had died.
 
I heard this, became as scared as I had ever been at that time in my life, shut the projector off, and put the light on in my room.
 
I guess I knew that my father loved Monroe, and became scared when the announcer said that she had died.
 
That was one of the most seminal moments of my young life. I had experienced George Reeves' death, but I was too little to really understand what "death" was, even though I did wonder how Superman could die.
 
But I was a bit older in 1962, and when I heard that Monroe died, well, I guess I "got it" a bit more than a couple of years earlier.
 
And looking back at the whole thing, I guess that is why I became absolutely fascinated, transfixed to the TV for days, when JFK was assassinated.
 
Again, I was older then than I was during the Reeves and Monroe deaths, and "got" the whole thing even better than I did when I was younger.
 
By the time of the Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King assassinations, I guess I was fully engaged, with the Reeves, Monroe and JFK deaths fully setting me up for these other tragedies.”
 
So as I personally look back at her life, and death, now that she has been gone for 60 years, she was part of my childhood, too, in a strange way.
 
As I said, I could not have possibly contemplated the passing of Monroe tor its true meaning way back when, but my memory has allowed me to look back and not only process what her passing meant to that era, but I can also look back at my own maturation through the untimely deaths of George Reeves, Monroe, and ultimately, JFK and RFK and Martin Luther King Jr.
 
However horrible those deaths were, they have imprinted memories on my brain that will never leave me.
 
Have a good weekend, and I will speak to you again on Monday.

Rant #2,945: Better Things

Today has not started off very well.
 
After a night where I was up and down—I must have awakened four or five times, as I was very restless last night—I got up at my usual 6 a.m. or thereabouts, and went into the bathroom to shave and shower—
 
The problem was that my electric razor wouldn’t turn on, and I tried some other razors that I have, which I save for parts—mainly the head of the razor, just in case one falls apart on me—and none of them worked either.
 
So now, I have to go out and buy an electric razor.
 
Then after showering, I went out to get the newspaper and move the garbage pails from the curb and to the curb for the next pickup, and I got stuck in a morass of spider webs, all over me.
 
I even picked a spider off my glasses, but the webs were in my hair and my clothing, and I am not sure at this moment if I got them all out.
 
Then I went to the computer to type out this Rant and prepare for my day as a freelancer, and the computer would not go on, as it is still giving me problems, not that I thought the problems would just vanish while I was on vacation.
 
I did get it to turn over, but the state of the computer remains a constant problem.
 
And did I mention that the lesion that I had removed, the pre-cancerous lesion on my head, is dripping puss, and I am treating it at home but may have to go back to the skin doctor to get it looked at, as I suspect it may be infected?
 
And through all of this, my allergies are terrible, and tomorrow I have to venture far away from my home to get my allergy shots?
 
Very little is going right for me since I have returned from vacation, and honestly, I am not telling you the half of it, not by a long shot.
 
Things are simply not right with me at this point in time … nothing life threatening, just disheartening and frustrating.
 
I seem to take two steps back after taking one step forward, and why is that?
 
Case in point is our pool, which is a green bog right now because the motor that we purchased at the beginning of the season is dead as a door nail right now.
 
The pool man finally called yesterday evening, and he has another motor for us, but at this point, my wife and I have written off the season as just a colossal waste of time and money.
 
Let’s see what happens with that; my hopes are extremely low that we can get into the pool again, which would only be the third time we would be able to do so since the pool was opened in June.
 
(We were able to go swimming twice when we were on vacation, but that is not the point right now.)
 
And then, on a much lesser note, as I mentioned to you a few weeks back, the freelance job that I applied for at Newsday turned into a colossal waste of time, which I fully expected it to be.
 
If you remember, this freelance job that fit me to a “T” miraculously was advertised in our local newspaper about two weeks before our vacation, and for the first time in two years, I actually applied for a job, thinking that maybe I could add this on to the freelance job I already have.
 
But I knew what the outcome would be as I sent my application and resume out to Newsday, that being that they would never contact me for the job, and even without the clairvoyant skills of Kreskin, I was right on the money.
 
And it has to do with my age, a decrepit-to-some-people 65 years of age, but go prove it.
 
It is funny that a newspaper that has written about such age discrimination actually fosters that very discrimination with their own practices, but again, go prove it.
 
If I could, I would have a very nice lawsuit against them, wouldn’t you agree?
 
But ageism is the hardest employment infraction to prove, so it more often than not goes by the books and into the ether.
 
But at least I tried, even though I knew the outcome beforehand.
 
I guess that is really starting to become the story of my life; I seem to always know the outcome of things before they happen, but I go through with all the work anyway.
 
I could say that I am a victim, but what good would that do?
 
I guess I am just an unlucky person in many ways, but I am so lucky in others that they simply cancel themselves out.
 
At least I tell myself that … and again, I am only telling you part of the story about why I am a bit perturbed this morning and really, since returning home from a great vacation.
 
Better things ahead … ?

Rant #2,944: Back Home Again

Yes, I am back where I belong …
 
That pre-cancerous lesion that I told you about is supposedly history after yesterday’s skin doctor visit.
 
But on the other hand, I know that my vacation is really over right now.
 
I went to the bank yesterday to deposit some money into two accounts, and it was my encounter with the drive-thru teller that reminded me that I am back home, and back home to total and complete frustration.
 
As I pulled up to the drive-thru after taking my son to work, I noticed that the lane was empty, so I figured it would be a quick 1-2-3 to get my money deposited.
 
I put the money in the drive-thru’s drawer, and told the teller this:
 
“Two hundred in savings and $100 in checking.”
 
Very easy to understand, or so I thought.
 
The teller did her thing, and drawer came back out to me, and I noticed one slip of paper coming out to me, not two--one for each account--as I had expected.
 
I checked the receipt, and she had put the full $300 in my checking.
 
“No, I wanted $200 in my savings and $100 in my checking.”
 
The teller said she was sorry, she did not hear me, and she said that she would simply switch and extra money from one account to the other.
 
I had to sign another receipt to let her do this, and she proceeded to switch the money.
 
Two receipts came back to me, she again said she was sorry for the mix-up, and I drove a few feet past the window so that the car behind me could move up to the window.
 
I then discovered that the teller did transfer over the money, but she did the opposite of what I told her to do—she put $200 in my checking and $100 in my savings, so she simply took $100 that didn’t belong in the checking from the original $300 that she errantly put into that account and put it in the savings account, which is not what I wanted her to do.
 
If there wasn’t a car being taken of behind me, I would have walked back to once again get this fixed, but since someone else was being taken care of, I pretty much threw up my hands in disgust and drove away.
 
It really isn’t a big deal to not have what I wanted switched, because I don’t ordinarily use these accounts that much, but it made me realize, once again, that I was home.

And my pool ... fuggedaboudit! I discovered that the new motor we had put in is no longer working, the water is green as a Martian, and what's more, I am still waiting to hear back from the pool company I used to open up the pool this year.

What a waste of time and money this whole thing was this year!
 
Also bringing me down to earth were the recent passings that we have heard about of people who have had some type of impact on out lives.
 
I heard about most of these while away, but I really couldn’t dig down deep into any of them until I returned home.
 
Tony Dow … Bill Russell … Nichelle Nichols … Bob Rafelson … Pat Carroll … and now that I am firmly on my usual terra firma, Vin Scully.
 
My childhood is once again dented my these untimely deaths … as if any death is timely.
 
Tony Dow was everyone’s big brother on “Leave It To Beaver” … Bill Russell was not only a mammoth on the basketball court with the Boston Celtics, but he stood up for his principles and never allowed himself to be a victim … the same thing could be said about Nichols, but her victories were punctuated by her role on the small screen's “Star Trek” …Bob Rafelson was the director//producer and creative mind behind everything from “The Monkees” to “Five Easy Pieces” …Carroll was the ubiquitous comic actress who was on just about every sitcom there was in the 1960s and 1970s …
 
And now we have Scully, the voice of baseball, the last link to the Brooklyn Dodgers and a living legend if there ever was one until his passing.
 
We are all getting older, and our icons are aging with us, proving once again that for all their accomplishments, they are no different than we are.
 
We are all human beings, and nobody lives forever, although our love and admiration for them makes us wish that they would.
 
But their lives are etched in stone,, the stone of audio and video, and one just has to go on YouTube or onto one of the retro TV channels to see and experience them when they were at the height of their powers.
 
I turned on the TV yesterday, and while watching “Leave It To Beaver,” it finally hit me that the only member of the Cleaver family that was still with us was, as the announcer said on each show, was “ … [and] Jerry Mathers as ‘The Beaver.’”
 
With Dow now gone way too young from cancer, that line really hits the target now, and in the future, when I see these other icons at their best, it will hit me that they are also not with us anymore … but look at what they left behind!
 
Yes, I am back home again, for better or worse, and these things I talked about today really put a punctuation mark on the realization that my vacation is finally over.
 
Back to reality … .

Rant #2,943: Reality Bites

 

I have returned!
 
Yes, it was a great week away.
 
We did everything we wanted to do, and more.
 
Our first vacation in three years was a memorable one, and I have to say, it was really good to get away for a little bit.
 
It was good to see something beyond our usual four walls of home, and venture out and do something different for a change.
 
We drove a total of around 2,000 or so miles, and it was almost all fun, whether we were in Baltimore or in the outskirts of Atlanta, and we learned many things about the so-called “new” reality, among them:
 
• Cash is not the preferred way of paying for anything. Using plastic—your debit or credit card—is not only preferable,, it is mandatory in many places.
 
You might have hundreds of dollars in cash on you, but it isn’t worth anything if you try to use it in many places.
 
It isn’t even a “mere” bag of shells; it is less than that.
 
• “Housecleaning” in hotels and motels is merely giving guests fresh towels and little more.
 
These places to stay will not do your rooms—make the beds, throw out the garbage, etc.—while you are still there and using them.
 
It isn’t too bad if you are staying in a room for a night, but once you get to multiple days, it is kind of unsettling when you have to make your own beds, just like at home.
 
• Overall service is bad, and I do mean B-A-D. Whether we were in a Hilton Hotel’s restaurant, or a Hardees fast food outlet, the level of service is pretty much non-existent, or certainly several rungs lower than what it was.
 
Maybe they just don’t have the help … maybe people simply don’t care anymore … but we found that service was incredibly bad, period.
 
Look, a lot of this bewilderment comes from the fact that we live in the state of New York, and I guess we expect certain things to be handled in certain ways like they are here, or at least used to be handled in certain ways, and probably aren’t done here anymore, either.
 
There are lots of differences between the south and where we are … we even went to one neighboring country to where we were staying, and little did we know that getting a fast food meal was going to be such a hassle … such restaurants in this county close down at 4 p.m., so you cannot get a Big Mac after that time if you want one.
 
I still want the rationale for that to be explained to me; how can these places make any money if they are not open for the dinner crowd?
 
But we managed, and these “new reality” things were just footnotes to a great trip, whether we were in Camden Yards in Baltimore or the State Farm Arena in Atlanta or the Babe Ruth Museum in Baltimore or the Coca-Cola Museum in Atlanta or--
 
But when you come home from a trip like this, reality sets in pretty quickly.
 
You have one spectacular week, but what about the other 51 weeks of the year?
 
We knew we were back in New York when we crossed the Verrazano Narrows Bridge in Staten Island … or should I say tried to cross it.
 
There was an accident at the adjoining Belt Parkway at Bay 8th Street, and we literally sat in traffic right on the bridge not moving for probably two hours.
 
It was so bad that motorcyclists actually stopped riding their bikes and were talking to drivers right on the bridge.
 
It added about two hours to our long trip home, but there were some other things that brought us back to reality.
 
Two of them actually happened on the trip.
 
First, I had a reoccurrence of “Jumper’s Knee,” something that I first experienced more than a year ago and that at the time, found me really hobbling, to the point that I had to go to the orthopedist.
 
It isn’t nearly as bad this time, and my right leg is slowly getting back to where it was, but I was really bad for the last two days of our trip, with me walking like Walter Brennan did on the old “The Real McCoys” TV show.
 
And yes, I got this, again, while turning over in my sleep in bed.
 
And while we were seeing the sites in the Coca-Cola Museum. I received a call from my dermatologist telling me that I have a pre-cancerous growth that has to be removed, and I scheduled an appointment for tomorrow morning to have that done.
 
And when we finally got home, I really knew that we were home when I went through the mail that built up during the week and saw a bill that is out of this world and which I will have to call up on for an explanation.
 
And once again, I am having trouble with my computer, and it took four tries to start it up this morning.
 
So yes, it was a great trip, maybe the best car trip we have ever taken.
 
But reality sure sets in quick, doesn’t it.?
 
(And as I mentioned, I have a very early appointment at the dermatologist tomorrow morning, so I might have to skip tomorrow’s Rant.
 
We will see how things go, but right now, I will speak to you again on Wednesday.
 
Wish me luck!)