HANGING IN THERE

I know a lot of wonderful people...really good people. They care about one another, they help when help is needed, they care about the environment, they vote, they listen, they learn......and very very few of them go to church. I don't go when I'm "supposed" to go, but I still consider myself a Catholic, and I think I always will. After attending Catholic schools all the way through grad school, lots of my friends are Catholic...and only a minute handful want much to do with the church. Anytime the subject comes up and someone says "are you Catholic?", I'm very accustomed to hearing " Well I used to be" or "not anymore"or "abba dee abba dee....no."

I had cousins visiting from Tennessee whom I hadn't seen for years, but always loved.

Their Mom was a "devout" Catholic until the day she died, but these folks said that they had all stopped going to church over the years. I kinda dragged them with me for a Sunday Mass because my men's choir was singing. The homily that day was about "indulgences"

and for twenty minutes we heard about how many days your time in Purgatory would be reduced if you did this or that, or said this or that prayer. Twenty minutes. After this torture was over the youngest daughter said "that's why I don't go to church."

I used to drag my partner to church once in awhile for the music also...especially Christmas and Easter. A few years ago the Easter sermon was about how gay people and their campaign for equal marriage rights was threatening the whole world. He rarely sits in a pew now. One of my best friends in the world took his new boyfriend to his hometown church last year, and when the priest railed on and on about homosexuals being sinners, they both walked out.

Now my theory is that I won't leave the church because I just might have more "clout" from the inside. I often feel as though I'm hanging on by an ever thinning thread...but I'm still hanging on. While the official church would say that I am in a gravely sinful relationship...I remember a wonderful priest who told me that while he'd be going through the rituals of Holy Thursday and I'd be facilitating a support group for people with AIDS, that he wondered if Jesus just might be even more present with me that night. Because of people like him, and another priest who feeds the homeless, lets them sleep in the vestibule (against the Bishop's orders) and works in Appalachia every summer....I just can't lump all the clergy

together. While I wait for the women to be treated as equals, there are still a few good men.

20 Reasons why I'll vote for Barrack Obama

With the presidential campaign pretty well narrowed down to Obama and Romney, I've decided that I'll vote for Obama in November. I don't like the pace of his withdrawal of our troops from Afghanistan, but I wouldn't trust Romney to do anything different. I don't want to see those tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans remain in place...because if those cuts were supposed to create more jobs...well they've been around since George W's reign...and the jobs never appeared. I remember all too well the state of this country that Obama was left with after Bush and Cheney, and all things considered, a few more years with those two and we'd be MUCH worse off.

So here are a few reasons why I'll vote for Barrack Obama..

1. He reversed Bush's bans on stem cell research....I have friends who are only alive today

because of stem cell procedures.

2. He signed the Christopher Reeve Paralysis Act....This aims to improve the lives of my

friends living with paralysis.

3. His "failed stimulus" package SAVED jobs for policemen, firemen, and auto workers.

Romney wanted to let the industry go

into bankruptcy.

4. He put a stop on the fraud and wasteful defense spending by the pentagon.This "weapons acquisition act' stops congress and the pentagon from contracting for weapons that the military doesn't even want.

5.Put an end to Cheney's pet project of "enhanced interrogation" of prisoners.

If my loved ones in the military were to

be captured I would not want them to

tortured....waterboarded etc.

6. He established the " Credit card bill of rights"

No more arbitrary rate increases on my

Visa or your Mastercard.

7. Health Care Reform Bill... I won't be denied health insurance as

I was once in the past because I take a

blood pressure pill.

8. Health Care Reform Bill My niece and nephew can stay on my

brother's insurance until they get their

feet on the ground, and pay off more of

their college loans.

9.Tax cuts for small businesses. Like my brother's !

10.Expanded Medicaid coverages. So maybe one day my friend won't be

forced to pay four hundred dollars a

shot for an antibiotic to save her life.

11 Added 4.6 billion for Veterans Mental Health... Check out the current suicide rates

for our veterans..it will shock you.

12 Increased funding for fighting violence against women. The GOP's vaginal ultrasounds ought

to be one of the targeted areas.

13.Allowed Cuban Americans to visit their relatives.... Kinda like a basic human right?

14.Expanded hate crime legislation.... Remember when Matthew Shepard

was hung on a fence to die because

he was gay?

15.Cut Medicare prescription drug costs.... Like mine.

16 Provided 12 billion for people with disabilities for education.

A BIG help for my former special ed

students.

17,Extended Benefits to same-sex benefits to federal employees.

Changed the lives of my gay friends

who work for the government !

18.Actually created more jobs than were created during the entire Bush years.

19. Signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair pay act for women.

It's about time !

20. Signed the repeal of Don't Ask Don't Tell.

Mitt Romney has said that he would

work to have that re-instated...so once

again, only straight people would be

allowed to die for their country.

When George Bush was president, it was not popular to be an American. From cab drivers in Canada who were incredulous that this country had elected him TWICE, to ordinary Europeans who let their feelings about him be known even when they didn't speak English, it's a whole different perception of this country with our current president. He's not perfect...but so far nobody has thrown their shoes at him...and he'll get my vote (as long as I remember to bring my photo ID.)

WORLD RECORD HOLDER FOR THE 9 MINUTE MASS

I played the organ as the accompanist for our church's boys choir for quite a few years while I was in High School and later when I attended Duquesne University. I played every morning and was paid one dollar per day. In those days being a Catholic Church organist was considered more of a gift to the church than a "real" job. I've only had a handful of music lessons...always played by ear the way my Mom still does, but I always knew the liturgy well enough to know what the music should "feel like". This was a problem when I'd play for any choir that was singing in harmony...because the notes on the page that they were singing weren't necessarily the ones I was playing....but heck in those days it was only a buck that we were really dealing with...easy come...easy go.

My first higher paying gig was at an old German parish in Carnegie, Saint Joseph's. It was a beautiful old church with the school on the first floor and lots of creaky old steps up to the organ loft upstairs. The grand old pipe organ was a bit intimidating, and my audition was complicated since I could play all the required pieces...by sight, with my own made up left hand...but the kindly retiring former director liked me and how I played, and also promised to teach me more about the foot pedals which he did.

The pastor was Sylvester J. Kress, and to say that he was unusual would be accurate by any one's standards. Lots of Catholics have always gone to Mass in order to "get it over with"....and if you were one of those folks in Carnegie...Father Kress was your man. He was able to say the Mass, speak or read a letter to the congregation, give out Communion, and squeeze four hymns into the service in about 30 minutes on Sunday morning. The weekday Masses were another story however. Mass was at 8:00 every morning, and I had one of those "real jobs" teaching a special education class about 20 minutes away, where school began at 8:30. I was never late for school. The 8:00 Mass would begin at about 7:55 and was over by 8:11...with four hymns and Communion for the kids who came to Mass every morning. His all time record was a nine minute Mass....I remember because I had a more leisurely drive that day.

Fr Kress hated the choir that I put together....and would regularly turn off the lights while they were still singing the final hymn. When I once went to the rectory on a rainy day to discuss a problem with half of the congregation singing in English for Benediction while the others were still singing in Latin, he left me standing in the rain with the door barely cracked open. After his usual "what do you want?"....and me posing my question, he quickly barked out " I don't care if they sing it in Polish" then slammed the door.

Fr Kress's sister would often come to Mass and sit in the front pew. Every once in awhile she'd holler out "SLOW DOWN"....and he'd glare at her. Once when he was gobbling down the host she yelled " PIG !". That one caused the kids to all start laughing, and almost stopped the Mass. The only other major disruption that I remember was when a mentally deranged woman entered the church holding a picture of Jesus on the top of her head and marched up the center aisle shouting about the end of the world. She and Sylvester almost came to blows when he chose to argue with her. The kids all started laughing and screaming...the nuns went wild trying to keep control....but the verbal battle raged on until the woman processed back down the aisle and left. Other than a dog attack one warm spring morning when Father Kress was revealed to be afraid of little black poodles...when he was in the middle of the Consecration, life went on like clockwork...very fast clockwork.

My organist pay gradually increased, I learned to read music...a little, and the stories of the fast track Mass in Carnegie became legendary...as are the tales of the very unusual Sylvester J. Kress.

I JUST MIGHT HAVE TO PLEAD THE FIFTH

I think most people can enjoy a new movie, or a best seller, or a great play, or a visit to a remarkable and memorable place, and then go on with their normal lives.  For me it's always been different. When I was a kid and saw a great movie I'd come home with a plan to re-enact it, or create my own version of it. No sooner would I get home after one of those cowboy and Indian movies than I'd have all the kids in the neighborhood painting their faces and trying to build a wigwam in our back yard. If my Dad took me to one of those great old movies about a haunted mansion, it was only a matter of time until our garage became a spooky old castle with black bats hanging on strings from the ceiling...and me wearing a cape for the next few weeks. When my friend Susan broke her arm trying to be Godzilla on roller skates....it was kinda my fault.

After one of the trips to Veronica's veil, I came home and begged for a big cardboard theater stage thing that I'd seen in a toy store, and after I quickly discarded the puppet that came with it I started work on my own version of a Passion Play. I made a curtain from an old velvet skirt of my Mom's, and dug out a set of those big old Christmas lights, and prepared to stage my own drama. I remember my parents and my ever faithful Aunt Katie sitting on old chairs in the basement while I played my little Magnus organ, and opened and closed the curtains as tableaus of Jesus in the garden or on the cross or rising from the dead "entertained" my indulgent audience.

Although our church was actually "modern', the priest was into very traditional liturgies, and my cousin and I always had altars in our bedrooms...said Mass regularly, and of course had elaborate vestments made from pillow cases. My cousin actually had an altar boy named Paul. Paul was younger...and impressionable...and my cousin seemed to have convinced him that all of this was "real". I think I put a damper on my cousin's grand plans when he wanted me to make a visit as the Bishop. I did occasionally draw the line.

With May once again approaching, I will of course still be erecting a "May Altar"...( a nice statue of Mary...blue and white crepe paper...and lots of flowers.) I got into just a smidgen of trouble as a kid when I called our local florist and had flowers delivered and charged to my mother for my much anticipated " May Crowning". Aunt Katie was the only one who attended that year...my parents stayed away in protest.

Something about all of this has never changed for me. When I read " Brideshead Revisited" a long time ago, Lady Marchmain had her own private chapel...many of you already know how that one played out around here. When my partner and I went to Capri we stayed in a hotel whose entrance walkway was covered in giant old Wisteria...which we now have on out back walkway. I read " Gone with the Wind" when I was twelve years old...I guess that partially explains why there are three whalebone hoop skirts in our attic.

Enough for today...someone might dig some of this up...it would certainly make it easier to put me away.

MY 15 MINUTES IN 2008

PITTSBURGH POST-GAZETTE 2008 GREAT GARDENS CONTEST WINNER, SMALL GARDEN CATEGORY
It's not that Dick Marshall is contrary. He just likes a challenge:
"As soon as people say, 'That doesn't grow here,' I do it," the Crafton gardener says, smiling.
As a result, pink, white, lavender and red crepe myrtle bloom in the long serpentine beds that slither down a hillside next to his brick Victorian. Some are newer cultivars of this Southern favorite that are hardy to Zone 6, the USDA climate zone that includes parts of southwestern Pennsylvania. But most are older, more tender plants he picked up at Home Depot and other big-box stores on trips down south. Sure, most die back to the ground every year. But they and the tougher white-flowered crepe myrtle push out their signature papery blooms every summer here.
Successes like this and the care Mr. Marshall takes to cultivate his garden of both unique and familiar plants earned him first place in the small garden category (under 1/4 acre) of the 2008 Great Gardens Contest. The competition, now in its sixth year, is sponsored by the Post-Gazette and Botanic Garden of Western Pennsylvania. In addition to a feature story in the paper, winners in the three size categories receive a Brenckle's Farm & Greenhouse gift certificate, a one-year membership in the Botanic Garden and tickets to its 2009 Open Gardens Day tour.
Mr. Marshall, a finalist in the 2004 contest, has been gardening around his restored 1899 mansion practically since he moved in 30 years ago. Ten years ago, he bought the adjacent carriage house and property that came with it. That purchase gave him the space to really indulge his taste for tropical and tender shrubs, which thrive here until sometime in October, when the most tender are dug up, potted and packed away in his basement or other parts of his 3,000-square-foot house.
It's a chore that gets more difficult each year, says the Green Tree native. But the payoff is seeing a mature specimen of the orange bird of paradise (Strelitzia reginae) flower in December in his formal dining room. Right now, its huge fleshy green leaves look perfectly at home next to a philodendron (a house plant) and other tropicals at the top of the hill, closest to the house. But in winter, if you're lucky, a shoot extends, bent like a bird's slender neck, and gives rise to 6-inch-long flowers. Each "head" has orange plumelike sepals on top and purplish-blue petals that look like a tongue.
"With the Internet, it's pretty easy to find one now. But 10 years ago, I had people scouring everywhere," Mr. Marshall said. "A friend brought it back on a plane from California."
Gardenia, with shiny green leaves and a few white flowers, thrives in pots on the back steps.
"It's the hardest thing I grow," the gardener said.
Mr. Marshall's garden has little formal design beyond its serpentine grassy path, flanked on each side by beds filled with small trees, shrubs and perennials. The plants are so tall and bushy that it's hard to see beyond the bend.
"I like that people don't know what's around the next turn," he said.
In this meandering plot, climbers like night-blooming jasmine and white sweet pea took turns scenting the air as the summer sun set and rose. But the flowers have disappeared from the sweet pea and 'Flying Saucer' morning glory that covers an arch. Nearby, an old wooden arbor is collapsing under the green weight of purple Chinese wisteria.
Walking further down the twisting path reveals lilacs, peonies, beautybush, oleander, angel's trumpet and a curly willow tree that started as part of a funeral bouquet for Mr. Marshall's father, who died eight years ago. Near the carriage house at the end of the path are English and other shrub roses, anemone and "those big old-fashioned marigolds."
Soaker hoses half-buried in the raised beds help keep everything watered. For divine inspiration, there are statues of angels and saints, a bit of overflow from the chapel Mr. Marshall built onto his house five years ago. The chapel, featured in the Post-Gazette in July 2005, is filled with holy water receptacles, stained-glass windows and other religious pieces the organist and longtime choir member has collected.
A statue of St. Jude now watches over the withering sweet pea vine. Known as the patron saint of lost causes, he is called by another name here:
"He's the patron saint of the impossible," Mr. Marshall says.
In this garden of the improbable, anything seems possible.

NUN BASHING

Last week the Vatican announced that it was finally going to crackdown on American nuns. Most of them belong to the "Leadership Conference of Women Religious"....there are almost sixty thousand of them. They were accused of falling prey to "radical feminism" and failing to speak out against homosexuality and contraception. I always had a hunch that the nuns were the big problem in the church....what with all their caring for the sick, and reaching out to the poor, helping the disenfranchised...who do they think they are? Jesus? Why the last time I marched in the streets to protest the war in Iraq there was actually a group of Catholic nuns marching right beside me...you'd think they were actually feeling blessed as peacemakers or something. The Vatican has it's hands full with these women...and their social justice ideas, especially

when it's still dealing with things like pedophilia, bishops with kids, problems with that pesky IRS stuff, and the very IDEA that a person without male sex organs would think they were worthy of the priesthood.

As far as "speaking out more about homosexuality", the community of nuns in this country through their many outreach programs are too busy taking care of the victims of hatred, abuse, and discrimination...often CAUSED by men of the cloth.

Just because these women go about their daily lives quietly helping the least of us, it doesn't mean that they aren't a real problem for the guys in the fancy dresses and pretty hats in Rome...they've been found out !

Years ago we went to a funeral in West Virginia..in a Catholic church for a friend who had died of AIDS. I had my seat belt on for the homily..wondering if we'd hear the usual gay bashing that is all so common. The priest however spoke about the time when he visited Mother Theresa's AIDS hospice in New York and told her that he didn't know how to deal with or even how to think about the whole issue, especially in the gay community. Her response was to lead him up and down the wards and hug each and every one of the patients. Then she said to him .... "That's how you deal with it".

Perhaps many of the nuns in this country are just a little too busy doing things that really matter..while the American bishops and the guys in Rome are on the wrong road...with the wrong priorities, and could learn a lot from the Little Sisters of the Poor when they're out begging for food on Saturday morning.

RANDOM THOUGHTS ON A FRIDAY MORNING

---------Watching Mitt Romney turn up his nose at the Bethel Bakery cookies was telling...

Insulting your host when they offer you something says something not so nice ....

---------- Watching the Bishop from Peoria (I think) compare the president to Stalin and

Hitler was disgusting....I hope the IRS cracks down.

------------How about the Bishop in Seattle who wants the parishes to sign petitions to over-

turn the equal marriage law...and the priest in one parish who announced that he

would not comply....and the congregation gave him a prolonged standing ovation.

------------I doubt that we've heard the last from Rick Santorum...but you've heard the last

blog from me about him.

----------- My nephew's High School musical is better than the last two shows I've seen by

the "professionals". Amazing to see the talent in young kids....and the people who succeed

               in drawing that talent out.

----------- I wonder why I'm not more outraged at those naughty secret service and military

guys who got caught in Columbia? Maybe because things like the ongoing war

in Afghanistan, and seventeen year old murder victims seems much more

important to me.

----------- I'm about ready to start "nursery trolling"....average last frost date here is April 22

It's still risky business to plant....but as they say "life without risk is no life at all."

----------- My Mother has been voting for almost 75 years, but unless she acquires a photo

ID she won't be able to vote in the Fall...If my former special ed student can't get

someone to drive her downtown for a photo ID she won't be able to vote either.

One of my best friends who is in a wheelchair will not be able to vote unless she

opts to request ACCESS to pick her up, then return to get her...usually not a

speedy option. Just how much voter fraud has there been in our state to warrant

this new ID law ? I smell a rat.

------------Someone told me that if you go outside at this this time of year, and you aren't

aware of the birds singing...you're either too busy or too stressed. Woof and I

are heading out to the garden....she says the robins are waiting for us.

DEAR RICK

Dear Rick

Well it's all over for now...watched you packing it in last week and heading back to your little house in Penn Hills Pa and getting the kids back into our public schools...wait...come to think of it, you never really did live there, you just used that address so the folks in Penn Hills would pay to educate the kids...but they actually have been home schooled with the new cyber programs. But what the heck, you let the Penn Hills people pick up the tab. I had forgotten about all that.

I was thinking that maybe you dropped out of the GOP race before the election next week in PA because a lot of us here just weren't ever going to vote for you. You made some really dumb comparisons about gay people and animals, and you said some really stupid things about public education and college and stuff like that. You also made women pretty angry with your ideas about who should make decisions about their bodies and careers, and then trashing JFK's thoughts about keeping religion out of politics sounded kinda crazy Rick. Your views about science scared a lot of people as well, you seemed just a few decades behind on that one.

But you know Rick there was one thing that I'd really forgotten about while you were campaigning this time. That was about you going down to Florida and getting involved with the Terri Schiavo case. Talk about government intrusion into personal lives...Rick you made things so much worse for everyone involved there. This was a horrible tragedy for everyone involved, and you added to the pain. People have suggested that you also just "happened to be there" for a fundraiser, but I hope you didn't take advantage of the situation. You even got congress involved with this sad family issue.

I wonder how you would have felt when your family had to make the decision about whether or not your wife should have labor induced before your son was stillborn? That was such an awfully private matter....what if some senator had taken your case on...and brought it to national attention...and tried to make you do what they wanted? You and your family were afforded the privacy that every one of us deserves in such painful and critical moments in our lives. Just as you've denied so many others the basic respect of all humanity, you denied a mother,father,husband, and wife the one thing that they needed the most.

So Rick, it was best that you gave up....while I don't know if you could have won Pennsylvania or not, be assured that there are lots of us who have steel-trap memories of you from the past, and parts of that past are both scary and disgusting. Perhaps another time. Perhaps.

HE'S BAAAACK WITH A VENGENCE

Hearing Dick Cheney slamming Obama just a few weeks after he received a new heart shocked me....slightly. For some reason or other I'd hope that having a second chance at life due to some unfortunate but generous gift from a fellow human being might somehow cause Mr. Cheney to embrace life in a more gentle and appreciative manner. During his speech last week, he called the current president "an unmitigated disaster". Those words and his general attitude brought back some very vivid memories of what I consider to be the disaster that was Bush/Cheney in this country.

The Supreme Court's decision to stop counting the votes in Florida and crown George and Dick was only the beginning. When the horror of September 11 nearly paralyzed the country...the new president and his powerful VP did the logical thing...started preparing for a war...but not with the country that attacked us. While Osama was nearly captured in Afghanistan, all the attention was switched over to Iraq. That war killed almost 4500 Americans...was based on lies, and resulted in uncounted suffering for Iraq.

If my memory is correct, it was Bush and Cheney who were so intent on the rich becoming richer, that the deregulated banking industry needed a massive bailout. The answer was to make sure the super rich had super tax cuts, while the wars cost trillions, and average Americans were loosing their shirts.

Throw in the images of the Katrina disaster..when the head of the relief and rescue operations did such a "heck of a job". Bush and Cheney seemed unconcerned while the poor and unfortunate citizens of New Orelans suffered and died. These guys were more concerned with tearing the fourth amendment apart....snooping into people's mail...illegal searches and wiretaps...looking for terrorists everywhere but in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan where they came from.

Cheney's secret deals with the energy companies, and the administrations record on the environment was deplorable. Health insurance skyrocketed, and the idea of any sort of universal public options that would help the poor was never even seriously considered. Mr Cheney and Mr Bush took very good care of that now famous 1%.

When I hear Mr Cheney continue to support torture..waterboarding in particular...I just shake my head. Torture is torture...and if our country does it to our enemies...our enemies will do it to us. I don't know why I thought that Dick Cheney would somehow spend the rest of his new gift of life with a new attitude, or at least a less abrasive one...but since he's obviously chosen to stick to his guns...(DUCK ! )...I 'm pretty sure I'm going to stick to mine. He's not getting off the hook.

PONIES, SPIES, AND MEATLOAF

Things got a little more confusing in Kiddeland since we now had not one, but two "Helens". As the summer wore on, and we got to know more of the summer staff, the more unusual they seemed to be. "Lubby" was in charge of the Kiddeland rest rooms, but her job description must have been extremely vague. Lubby was what my Mother would call an "Immense" woman. She sat on a lawn chair in front of the rest room. We never saw her move...all summer. She was pleasant enough, but far from busy. Marie was in charge of the hot dog trailer along with an unpleasant young girl who didn't seem to realize how lucky she was to be working with Marie instead of with Helen and Helen and Maggie and me in our own private Bedlam. Marie had some sort of a nervous condition that caused her to make her fingers "walk" across the counter while she was asking what you wanted on your hot dog. Any conversation other than queries about mustard and relish would cause her hand to go into high gear, and sometimes we'd see her hand start up the side of the trailer.

The ponies were directly across from us...downwind fortunately...and overseen by a rather elderly man. To say he was unusual would of course be stating the obvious after a few of these tales. EVERYONE was unusual in those days at West View Park. One hot afternoon while the four of us were sitting in the dark with the shutters down for an unexpected break, Maggie announced that she'd befriended the pony man, and felt sorry for him especially on these hot days. She said that while there was plenty of water for the animals, he didn't seem to have access to any. We had a hose behind our trailer which she had generously offered to him "any time the poor soul needs a drink...I told him to feel free to go back there and use our hose". She said he was a kind old man, down on his luck, lifting little kids on and off of the ponies all day. This was all well and good until we arrived one day to find the whole back of the trailer flooded because the hose had been left on all night. " That damned old fool..." Maggie ranted and raved....shouting across the walk..."you stay away from this trailer or I'll report you." There were no second chances in Maggie's world.

The only thing the employees feared more than Labor Day was the presence of what they called a "spotter". That was basically a spy from the superintendent's office who would be incognito of course....but who would report any untoward activity by an employee. Everyone was constantly suspicious of all of the park goers. "be careful...I think that man (woman) is a spotter". "Lubby says there was a spotter near the men's room yesterday for sure". "Watch that man over near the tilt-a-whirl...I heard he was a spotter". My cousin and I quickly picked up the lingo and tortured our coworkers a lot...there was no quicker was to jump start the two of them.

I don't remember if we worked a nine hour day and made seven dollars, or if we worked a seven hour day and made nine dollars, but I think it was the former. We got more than enough money to fill my gas tank, and more than enough memories to last a lifetime. On our last day of that summer Maggie backed into my car alone because Helen rode the street car because they'd had a "falling out"...something about the nice dinner that Maggie had made for some friends and their mutual shock when Helen jumped across the table and took the meatloaf. Now some things even I can't just make up. My Helen remembers the very same story....you go ahead and ask him someday. So there.

WEST VIEW PARK PART 2

The lines in front of our little trailer never seemed to get any shorter and on days when there was a special school picnic at the park we never stopped...unless Maggie (as we were now encouraged to call her ) decided that we all needed a break. Out of the blue she would suddenly unhitch the big wooden shutters on the front of the trailer... closing up the front completely......oblivious to whomever was standing in the line...after announcing "THAT'S IT". Then the four of us would lean against the counter or sit on a milk crate in silence until Maggie and Helen would decide to re-open and face the kiddies again. Every once in awhile when my partner and I are working on some necessary but tedious project I'll eventually say " That's it." He's pretty well trained at this point and will act accordingly.

Selling Ice Balls on a hot summer day in Kiddeland will quickly fire anyone's imagination. Doing that in a cramped little trailer with two kinda big women with mild to serious mental conditions will enhance that vision. My cousin was about 15, and a capable ice ball server. We always featured two flavors in the upside down jugs with little on and off faucets. In spite of my cousins' expertise, Maggie was his nemesis, and she really got in his way. If a little kid couldn't decide if he wanted cherry or orange she'd just give him anything and say "next". If he wanted cherry and she was in the midst of giving him orange, she'd simply slip the ice ball from beneath the orange and pour on the cherry.

Then there were the bees. Summer sun....a crowded stand....very sugary syrup....and the bees were everywhere. Sometimes they'd get into a jug of our syrup, especially when Maggie would place a pail under the syrup dispensers to save the dripped liquid....then pour that into an empty jug and call the brownish concoction "tutti fruitti"...(with an occasional bee floating in it). This horrified my cousin, the ice ball king at this point, but his pleas fell on Maggie's deaf ears (literally). The show had to go on.

Now I'm three years older than my much referred to cousin, thus I had a car, and we decided at one point to give "the girls" a ride home. I had a two door Chevy at the time, and getting these two women into the back seat was a monumental task for some reason, and it seemed to challenge everyone involved. They both tried to somehow back into the car, with Maggie shouting " Get IN Helen...GET IN!". Now it crossed my mind at some point that perhaps these two had never been in an automobile before...but that seemed unlikely, and whatever the problem was, we were changed forever more. By the next morning when I picked him up for work I was already shouting " Get IN Helen " before he even reached for the handle. From that day until the present, my cousin has been called "Helen"....by me...by my family...by our friends...and once in front of one of his co-workers.

The look he gave me was memorable. Through the years he's tried to make " Maggie"...or "Margaret" stick to me....but it's never been etched into my life the way that "Helen" has stuck to him. The last part of the West View experience will have to be tomorrow...I need to take a break and call Helen.

WEST VIEW PARK

   My first "real" job was at West View Park where I sold cotton candy,popcorn,and ice balls. My uncle knew someone somewhere in the world of amusement parks and he secured summer jobs for me and for my cousin.  By now it has probably obvious that my cousin and I shared most of our childhood experiences together. We had no training for our new positions, but were simply directed to a concession "trailer" in Kiddeland where we were introduced to our co-workers...two middle aged women...Margaret and Helen who had been working at the amusement park every season for years and years. We eventually became familiar with a lot of our co-workers who worked at the park every summer...and then seemed to vanish for the rest of the year. They were an unusual group.
  Helen and Margaret always worked in Kiddeland, although neither one seemed very patient or particularly fond of children...a fact that immediately became obvious. We were ALWAYS very busy...with long lines all day long...very close quarters...and an odd mix of personalities to say the least. Margaret was what people refer to as "slow"...regularly storing her jar of stewed tomatoes in with the blocks of ice that we'd attack with ice picks all day...for the ice ball machine.  Helen had authentic coke bottle glasses that didn't seem to help her very much, and every few days she'd be chopping ice and suddenly scream when she'd hit Margaret's stewed tomatoes and we'd all have to pick the glass out and throw the red ice away.  Now this wasn't any kind of a learning experience for either one of them...my cousin and I just eventually learned the ropes.
  Helen and I were often on cotton candy duty together...each on our own side of the big silver bowl, and we'd each swirl our paper cones on our own sides of the machine....half for you...half for me..usually.  It didn't take me long to figure out that Helen was trying to distract me every once in awhile so that she could swipe my share of the cotton candy...and thus create a beautifully full mass of airy pink cotton while mine took forever to take shape. After about a week on the job I began to notice that our machine was often malfunctioning... sending out scary black smoke, and thus being shut down until it cooled off. My cousin actually solved the mystery one day when we were busier than ususal, and Helen was in an unusually foul mood about the stewed tomatoes.  He watched her change the sugar and some other additive for the cotton candy machine and moments later the black smoke emerged and Helen announced that the machine was broken...
   Cousin was usually on ice ball duty.....and that's a story unto itself...I'll get into that one on Monday.

VERONICA'S VEIL

Every Easter season, starting with the first weekend in Lent, what was billed as "America's Passion Play" was performed at Saint Michael's auditorium on the South Side of the city. This was a big deal every year since about 1910, and sometimes as many as 25,000 people would attend the performances each year. There were purple signs all over the city advertising the annual event, and when we were in grade school we were taken there every year.

I remember the first year we went to see the production, and the sea of yellow school buses that were packed onto Monastery street...hundreds of school kids from all over the city for the special weekday performance. We climbed up what felt like a thousand steps from the street below, and then a thousand more to the second floor of the old school building to an enormous auditorium that held almost a thousand people. I remember my cousin whispering to me that our mother's would call the place a "fire trap" as the nuns herded us into our seats.

There were some kind of monks or priests who eventually came out and attempted to settle us all down before the play began. The most curious thing he seemed to talk about was how there would be some loud thunder during the play when Jesus died on the cross, and that we should all remain silent and reverential when that happened. There were a lot of murmurs about just what he was talking about...but my cousin and I exchanged an odd look...I could tell he was considerably alarmed by this unusual warning. Telling a thousand kids that something was probably going to startle them resulted in a wave of both anticipation and nervous excitement.

The play was well done....well rehearsed....with beautiful scenery and costumes...and some real Pittsburgh accents from two thousand years ago.

We were awed by the organ music and the tableaus of the Agony in the Garden, preceded by a DaVinci Last Supper, and the kids were all very quiet and reverential as we were instructed to be. Then came the crucifixion scene, with the centurions milling around, and the women lamenting, and some distant rumblings of what sounded like real honest to goodness thunder. Some of the kids were actually crying softly as Jesus's life was slowly ebbing away. After He uttered the few last words....it happened.

The loudest, scariest,earth shattering clap of thunder shook that old auditorium like a nuclear bomb. All hell broke loose in that very young audience...kids screamed, kids stood up as if they were going to run for their lives...the nuns went ballistic...the monk stopped playing the organ, and my cousin and I (to use my mother's expression) nearly jumped out of our skin.

The bedlam verged on hysteria for what seemed like forever. Poor Jesus was hanging dead, the action on the stage had come to a temporary halt, and then what was undoubtedly nervous laughter began.Pretty soon the place was roaring.

The show of course went on...the nuns were actually pretty understanding as we rode home later, probably because they were practically scared out of their wimples that day too. The next year when we were all packed into that place like sardines again, we knew what to expect...were duly warned again pre-performance about the impending shock...but once again Jesus died, and the place went crazy. Someone told us that the thunder was actually created by huge sheets of metal that were struck by something or other, but my cousin and I are still convinced that after all these years nothing has ever scared either one of us the way that fake thunder did....although he thinks we screamed exactly the same way when we went to see "The Creature with the Atomic Brain"...( I think he was actually just as vocal when the TINGLER was supposedly loose in the Fulton theater). It still seems strange to say that the scariest thing I ever remember was being ten years old and watching a Passion Play.

STICKS AND STONES AND BILLBOARDS

Have you see these billboards yet? Riding by them reminds me of driving down South with my parents when I was a kid and seeing signs on the restrooms saying "whites only". While that might sound like an unfair comparison to some people, it doesn't feel that way to me. The "men only" policy at the country club must give rise to similar feelings, as does my church's all male clergy... for lots and lots of people. ( watching the beautiful Easter liturgies from the basilica in DC with hundreds of men taking part but not one woman feels more and more uncomfortable to me ).

These billboards are sponsored by a vast number of groups who are hell bent on denying us gay folks the same rights that they have. I'm an adult, and I have no problem speaking up about things that I think are wrong in the world.
( DUH!), but I remember all too well how these messages felt when I was still struggling to find out just who I was.

Messages like these make it clear that there is something wrong with being gay, and that if you are, you have no right to ever fall in love and make a commitment to another person that society and your church will encourage and support. You are devalued, and less than your straight friends, and that you are only acceptable if you either stay celibate, or lie about who you are and do something (like marry a woman) that perpetuates your lie while the world around you lavishes you with blessings and approval of that painful dishonesty.

While the website PA4MARRAIGE.ORG is sponsored by the usual bigoted groups, it is also sponsored by

Catholic Dioceses
Allentown Diocese
Altoona-Johnstown Diocese
Erie Diocese
Greensburg Diocese
Harrisburg Diocese
Philadelphia Archdiocese
Pittsburgh Diocese
Scranton Diocese Many of these gave a considerable amount of money to anti-marriage campaigns in the past. While some deny those contributions, the NATIONAL CATHOLIC REPORTER has the proof.

These words appear innocuous, but if you're gay, they hurt like Hell.

Dioceses major contributors to repeal same-sex marriage | National Catholic Reporter (conc. MAINE)

VISIONS, TRAUMAS, MONSTERS, AND SNAKES

I fell madly in love one rainy day while I was walking home from school. That's when I happened to glance across the street and first noticed the girl with the blue and white polka dot raincoat.....and her matching umbrella. She was younger by one year, but as our relationship developed, the age difference mattered less and less. I was seven and she was six. As fate would have it, our school was small, and consequently the first and second graders were both taught by Sister Cecilia in the same classroom. Not only was the object of my affection and fascination destined to be my classmate...her family also moved on to my street that same month, and I was basking in the sunlit smiles of the gods.

I've actually maintained a relationship with Susan ever since those early days of my life.

We had lunch a few years ago, and before we even took a sip of our Chardonnay, she offered a toast...."to our magical childhood." I thought that was both a lovely sentiment and a real jump start on our lunchtime conversation. From then on it was "remember when we........". One of the things she mentioned was our constant rehearsals for a play that we never actually performed....perhaps because the title was " The Miracle of Our Lady Of Fatima", which was of course my choice for a premier in our garage. When I mused about why we never actually got the show off the ground, Susan said she thought it was because I always secretly wanted to play the part of the Blessed Mother. In the interest of full disclosure....I think Susan was right.

Now these were days when social norms were different...when we played hospital I was the doctor and Susan was the nurse...if I was the boss Susan was the secretary, when I was the Bing Crosby priest, Susan was the Ingrid Bergman nun..( funny that the woman is STILL never the priest ). My Dad took me to all the monster movies...which we both loved, and when I'd get home we'd play monster. Once when Susan was the fifty foot woman...when she enhanced her height with roller skates, she fell and broke her arm. Her mother was mad that Susan had been playing the monster...but Susan said she would have done anything for me.

When my Mom went to the hospital to have my brother, my Godmother came to watch me for about a week. I had seen a nun movie about an African hospital and off went my imagination's light bulb and in the blink of an eye Susan and I had transformed our gameroom into a M.A.S.H. like infirmary. We hung sheets as dividers, rounded up all the kids in the neighborhood, and quickly created a trauma-like atmosphere. Eventually the chaos from our basement caught my Godmother's attention and she gasped when she came down the steps from the kitchen. I think the stream running down the middle of the basement floor from the hoses on full blast probably put her over the edge. She shut us down pretty quickly....and shooed us out into the backyard. I don't think she ever did tell my mother.....I really loved my Godmother.

It wasn't all peaches and cream with Susan. Once while she was snoozing in their hammock on a gorgeous summer afternoon, my friend and I threw a dead snake on her.

That was almost the worst thing we ever did....next to mailing her a package with the same snake in it the next day. Bill and I thought we were probably going to be sent to reform school that summer....and definitely going to be sent to Hell eventually. Susan didn't stay mad for too long....maybe like seven years...eight at the most. The snake stuff seemed to dampen the luncheon conversation a bit, but soon we were on to more pleasant memories...like the idol worshipping Indian tribe that started some serious neighborhood discussions about "what the kids are up to in the woods all day.."

THE IMPATIENT GARDENER

My friend Kel can knows the name for every plant I've ever seen...and he can also tell you the Latin name. Mark can do the same thing but it's the knowledge eludes me. Kel lives north of me...and Mark grew up to the south of here, so we all deal with different planting and weather issues. I'm a risk taker...my palms and ferns have been shivering on our front porch for more than a month, as are two big potted geraniums that I've saved for a couple of years. All three will take some cold obviously. Should be dip below 32 in the next month or so I'll haul them inside for a respite.

Lots of stores are selling those big beautiful palms now, but if you buy one remember that they don't like direct sun at all, and they like to dry out between watering...people think of them as wanting just the opposite. Pansies are everywhere now...have you noticed? The newer types will almost always last through the winter if you buy them in the Fall, and the ones they're selling now will easily take any dips in the temperature.

Once again beware of pot sizes. Lowe's was selling 3 pansies in a six inch pot for 2.98, and the same pansies in a six pack for 1.88. More and more places, including the best nurseries are pushing the bigger pots...so no matter what I'm buying, I'm searching for six packs or at least a four pack. They'll all look alike when they go into the garden.

As much as I like to jump the gun on Spring planting, and in spite of the box stores especially looking like it's May....it's still TOO EARLY ! I'll be chomping at the bit for the next few weeks, but rather than getting those disapproving looks from Kel and Mark, I'll be planting most things in the garden by the 20th of this month. So there.

SINGING IN THE CHOIR

Last night I sang with my men's choir in an old, massive, gorgeous former cathedral for the evening liturgy. There are about eighteen of us when we're in full force, and if I do say so myself we're pretty good. We're a really mixed group of guys, all ages, all sorts of occupations of course, and varied backgrounds, and from all over the area. My brother and his seventeen year old son also joined us last night...after a smidgen of coaxing from me. Ive been in choirs or accompanied them on the organ since I was ten years old...for many reasons.

Muriel Barbery wrote about how everyday life vanished when the choir begins to sing. She writes "you are suddenly overcome with a feeling of brotherhood, of deep solidarity, even love, and it all diffuses the ugliness of everyday life into a spirit of perfect communion." The stress goes away, all the heartaches, hopes and fears and challenges that we're all dealing with seem to quietly slip out beneath the ancient stained glasswindows. We all surrender to the music.

Sometimes in the middle of something like Mozart's Ave Verum I get a lump in my throat and tears in my eyes...and it's hard to sing. I forget all about Rick Santorum, the weeds in my garden, and the challenges of being a therapist.

I'm just a part of the whole magnificent sound that these guys create together.

Ms Barbery says it this way "...it's so beautiful, in the end I wonder if the true movement of the world might not be a voice raised in song." I know for myself that those moments of creating this music with these guys always transforms my world...even if it's only for one hour at a time, it's one of the most precious gifts in my life.

HOLY WEEK

Going to church during Holy Week was always very important to me. I loved the familiar rituals and how the triumph of Palm Sunday turned more and more solemn during the week.

On Passion Sunday which is two weeks before Easter, all the statues in our church were covered with purple cloths. Very few churches do that anymore, and somehow that really diminished the visual atmosphere for me. Palm Sunday was always a joyous celebration of Christ's grand entry into Jerusalem, but then it became "The second Sunday of the Passion" and only the first half of the Mass was joyous, while so much great music was squeezed out of the service in the second half.

Holy Thursday was when the organ played and all the bells were rung during the "Gloria" and then the organ and the bell towers fell silent until Easter. Few churches go for the a cappella singing after the Gloria now. We always sang the "Pange Lingua" during the procession at the end of the Mass on Thursday, and when they started to sing those gorgeous lyrics by Thomas Aquinas in English...they lost me. Now the Latin is at last creeping back into the Catholic liturgies. The churches were always open all night on Holy Thursday and I remember my Dad signing up to spend an hour there in the middle of the night..."keeping watch". Now most of the churches are locked up by midnight.

I guess going to church for me years ago was always an "uncommon experience" as Joseph Campbell called it. The language was uncommon, the buildings didn't look like nice meeting halls or spaceships, the music was ancient, and even the light and the air seemed different...( maybe it was from all the candles burning...before the electric ones were brought on the scene ). Walking into church for a Holy Week service was to enter into an unusual space, where something different from our everyday lives occurred, and while there is still beauty to be experienced in today's modernized ceremonies, I miss the tradition of the covered statues, the wooden "clacker" that replaced the bells, and the all night vigils.

Somehow hearing the organ on Good Friday just doesn't feel right...but then again it's 2012.

THOUGHTS ABOUT COMING OUT

I think it took about twenty years for people to stop asking me "when are you going to get married?" It happened a lot at weddings, when the relatives were altogether, or at holiday celebrations and reunions. I always had a polite answer or at least a clever response like "well as soon as the right one comes along." It got to the point where I'd sometimes say " I'm not.".....but that would only set me up for yet another embarrassing query. When Miss Manners was the new Emily Post as far as etiquette was concerned, someone asked her how someone ought to respond to the question and she suggested "Why do you ask?"

It's amazing that just two words can have such tremendous impact on a person's life. "I'm gay" can change everything, and it very often does. I know that when I first said those words I wasn't even sure that it was true. I grew up with very few role models (to say the least!) There was Christine Jorgensen who was one of the first publicly acknowledged transsexuals, and I somehow associated the word "gay" with her. I knew that I didn't mean I was like her, nor was I like the man in the trench coat leaning against a lamp post in the fog with the word "homosexual" above his head on the cover of LIFE magazine. Young gay kids today at least have some great and courageous role models.

That line about "love the sinner but hate the sin" is what Rick Santorum would call BULL____. Telling people that as long as they never fall in love, or want to share their lives with another person, or want to make love will guarantee someone else's approval is nonsense. There is a tremendous amount of negative, hurtful, and damaging rhetoric aimed at gay kids...and unfortunately a great deal of it comes from the pulpit.

Coming out of the closet is risky business. It can jeopardize the future, threaten one's employment, and change relationships forever. It can also be such a breath of fresh air and honesty... It's all about mental and spiritual health.

Aligning oneself with the truth..the whole truth...and nothing but the truth, is the only way to make our lives really worth living. Our individual truth...the quest to be who we really are ought to be our universal goal as human beings. After all this is our brief " blink of an eye" existence...it's not just a dress rehearsal, and the air is very refreshing out here...much better than it is in the closet.

CLOSE ! (but no cigar).

Bless me Father for I have sinned. Over the last few months I've actually changed my mind about Rick Santorum. Wait !!! don't hit the delete key and please don't call me that ! What I've actually done is come to realize that he's not stupid. He's a good debater, he's articulate..( except when he says the word Bull___, he's energetic, he believes what he says, he's a good family man...(except when he talks about the stillborn baby that he brought home), and he seems authentic.

But he's also much too extreme to even be considered to run this country. His views on public education are ridiculous...the idea that every community ought to be responsible to educate their children wouldn't work in most of the country. His eradication of the line separating church and state would lead to even more divisiveness for the country. His lack of trust in the scientific community would impede progress like never before...stem cell research and environmental protections would be stymied, and Planned Parenthood would no longer be able to address crucial women's health issues.

Rick Santorum would never advocate for gay people. He would reinstate Don't Ask Don't Tell, try to change the constitution to block equal marriage rights, and anti discrimination policies would surely bite the dust. While he'd do all in his power to protect the unborn..he's been trigger happy for a long time to start a war with Iran.

I do give him credit for getting as far as he did in the GOP primaries..but as far as I'm concerned, it's now time for him to gather up his toys and go home.

We can't and won't have an extremist calling the shots when so much is at stake. We can all go to church to hear about sin and evil, we don't need to listen to it blasting out from the Whitehouse.

A DAY AT THE OPERA

When the AIDS epidemic was ravaging the gay community the world lost a great deal of talent. There were writers and musicians and actors and poets and so much creative talent lost during those awfully sad years. The straight community certainly suffered as well, but the gay artists were dying by the dozens. One of those tremendously talented young people was my friend Paul.

I knew him as a kid, and followed his career all through his very abbreviated life. Paul was a composer and a performer, writing and recording beautiful music until he died...and he died by inches, over a long long time.

Paul and I discussed Opera on one occasion, and as I confessed my general ignorance about it,  he spoke about how he approached such high minded and challenging levels of music. Paul told me that he loved the idea of entering a whole different world...of sound and sight and talent. He advised me to start anywhere and just sit back and wait for even one singular moment when the music gave me goose bumps and maybe even brought a tear to my eye. Paul also said that he loved to go to the matinees...when you don't have to worry about how late it is...or how dark it is...or how you have to get up early the next day.

We saw TOSCA yesterday, at the Sunday matinee, and as I've done for many years now, I waited for that glorious moment when the hair on my arms stands up, and my eyes begin to water...and once again I was swept away. It always happens, and I'm always so deeply grateful to Paul when it does.

I told my young niece and nephew to watch "Moonstruck" with Cher...and to pay attention to the clips from "La Boheme"...it's a start, and I think it just might be a catalyst to guide them into the opera house. Trying to plunge head-first into the majestic world of grand opera is pretty intimidating, but exposing yourself to the possibility of those moments that almost take your breath away can add a glorious and memorable experience to an ordinary Sunday afternoon. Thanks Paul.