Pavarotti on the town

 It breaks your heart to walk around New York City these days. 

 

Of course many of us have had our hearts broken here before, whether through an event like the attack on 9/11 or some personal matter. 

 

This city is not a place for the faint of heart.

 

To say that it’s now a ghost town would be an overstatement. People are working away, adapting to this time of pause, making the best of things. There’s just an overall pervading feeling of “what’s coming next?”

 

Will this new Covid-19 variant sweep through the city like the original did in Spring 2020?  Will the new president succeed in taming the pandemic where his predecessor so dismally and cavalierly failed?

 

One thing seems likely, many beloved Irish bars and restaurants will not reopen. However, New York City will rise again – just not in the old familiar way.

 

I’ve always considered the city to be a magical place – right from the first smoggy June afternoon I arrived on a student work visa.

 

New York was a very different city back in the 1970’s. Times Square was like a circus, but not of the Barnum and Bailey type, more an arena with adrenalized gladiators on the make.

 

One had to be either very aware or fleet of foot to escape being mugged on a regular basis. 

 

I once had a bayonet stuck in my throat by a very nervous junky who was wary of me putting my hand in my pocket to surrender my few dollars. It took Kissinger-like diplomacy to emerge broke, but otherwise unscathed, from that encounter.

 

Back then New York was unpredictable. This scared the hell out of many, but as a musician it was important to not know what was coming next, for fear you’d throw your hat at it and return to the Emerald Isle with your tail between your legs.

 

Still there was usually magic in the air. One such time was when my parents visited and I took my mother on a cultural jaunt around town. 

 

We visited The Met, The Frick, had lunch in some over-priced restaurant, and as we passed by Lincoln Center I told her how I’d never seen her favorite, Luciano Pavarotti, perform there, but had thrilled to him in Central Park with 200,000 others as he nailed Nessun Dorma.

 

She adored that man and delighted in every detail I rattled off about that legendary free concert.

 

It was a beautiful summer day but I could tell she was tiring from the humidity and the heat rising from the pavement. I knew the cure – some first class air-conditioning.

 

She said she’d love to wander around one of the big department stores so I suggested Bloomingdale’s.

 

I had never been there myself. Why would I? They didn’t sell the tight black jeans and t-shirts that were de rigueur on the Lower East Side.

 

Her eyes lit up at the expensive jewelry, perfume and couture then fashionable on the Upper East Side. But after a couple of floors of such excess I could tell she was fading and asked one of the clerks where we might buy some coffee.

 

He directed us to the Italian exhibition and intimated that the Cappuccino served there would be free – a bonus in itself.

 

We were ushered into the exhibition by an agitated Italian man who bade us stand just inside the door.  We hastened to obey for we could hear a multitude of footsteps thundering behind us.

 

The door was thrown open and in glided, for want of a better word, Pavarotti himself.

 

Obviously expecting some sort of formal reception he held out his huge arms to my mother. She fell into them as if she had been awaiting him forever. He shook hands with me and moved on, gaily greeting the line that had gathered behind us.

 

My mother was flushed and excited in a way I’d never seen her before.

 

“Did you know about this,” she gushed. “Did you plan this for me?”

 

I almost lied but it didn’t seem quite right.

 

“No, Mam, that’s New York for you.  Haven’t I been telling you for years that this city is magical.”

 

It is, and it will rise again bigger and better, if somewhat different than many of us can imagine.

Fake News and Other Mindbenders

What a year it’s been - so many people dead from a pandemic that at the least could have been handled in a better manner. Even as I write more Americans are dying daily from Covid-19 than perished during the attacks on 9/11.

 

But help is on the way from two vaccines, although the number of people who say they will refuse inoculation is staggeringly high.

 

That will change as they see family and friends take their shots and become immune to this highly contagious disease.

 

The same cannot be said for another malady that is gnawing away at a pillar of our democracy – the attack on the very concept of truth.

 

The phrase “fake news,” popularized by our soon to be ex-president, is top of the pops among other Trumpian truth-benders such as “alternative facts,” “Russian hoax,” “deep state,” et al. 

 

“Fake news” is the ultimate verbal weapon for it can be breezily tossed off to dismiss any fact or opinion that one disagrees with.

 

As an Irish Echo columnist my gig is to give opinions on various subjects. 

 

Simple as pie, you might think, but as pleasurable as it is I still have to check and validate every concrete statement I make or quote.

 

Take my opening homily on “fake news” a few lines back. Although Donald Trump claimed to have originated the phrase, it was actually coined by Craig Silverman in 2014 while he was running a research project at Columbia University.

 

Since Mr. Trump takes credit for so many innovations it behooved me to check out the truthfulness of his claim; accordingly, I was forced to change “originated” for “popularized.”

 

Luckily I have an editor who would likely have caught my error before “yer man from Pearl River” would have taken me to task with a scathing public letter and cost me a free drink at the Echo Christmas party.

 

Personally I read the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal for news. I’ve found that both esteemed newspapers invariably print the same informed facts.

 

Their opinion pieces, however, wildly differ. Yet you can tell even those have been given the factual once over by experienced editors. Besides, both papers have “apology” columns where factual mistakes and misstatements are corrected within days.

 

And yet so many people get their unfiltered news from Facebook, Twitter, and friendly Russian bots.

 

That’s like hearing “facts” at Paddy Reilly’s at 4am with 6 or 7 pints aboard. 

 

Recently I was informed by a number of social media adherents that, “Joe Biden intends taxing our 401(ks) and IRAs.”

 

I reassured these troubled souls that they should rest easy – it’s unlikely that our future president would wish to commit political suicide before even being handed the keys of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

 

Upon looking into the matter I discovered that Mr. Biden had mentioned a desire to give more 401 (k) tax breaks to lower and middle income earners to bring them up to par with the relative breaks afforded upper income earners

 

The truth, apparently, got skewered intentionally in the telling.  But without truth and a modicum of decency where will we be?

 

This year we’ve lost two journalists who are the epitome of truth and decency.

 

Mark Shields has retired after 33 years of giving opinions on PBS NewsHour. I haven’t always agreed with him but there’s something so utterly American and sensible about the man.

 

After the invasion of Iraq he stumped David Brooks, his conservative partner on the popular show, by inquiring if he really thought that an American Christian occupying force would succeed in subduing a Muslim country?

 

One of the measures of Shields’ influence is that Brooks has moderated his views over the years and become a thoughtful and very informative centrist.

 

Pete Hamill is another case in point. I happened to be in a group with him when someone ventured that given the catastrophe of 9/11 the practice of waterboarding terrorists was justified.

 

Pete didn’t even raise his voice when he replied, “We’re Americans, we don’t do torture.”

 

He didn’t need to elaborate for he had made a simple but profound statement.

 

Let’s hope in 2021 we’ll aspire to be more than we are again, and return to core American values, in particular, truth and decency.

Happy New Year's Eve

 What a year it’s been - so many people dead from a pandemic that at the least could have been handled in a better manner. Even as I write more Americans are dying daily from Covid-19 than perished during the attacks on 9/11.

 

But help is on the way from two vaccines, although the number of people who say they will refuse inoculation is staggeringly high.

 

That will change as they see family and friends take their shots and become immune to this highly contagious disease.

 

The same cannot be said for another malady that is gnawing away at a pillar of our democracy – the attack on the very concept of truth.

 

The phrase “fake news,” popularized by our soon to be ex-president, is top of the pops among other Trumpian truth-benders such as “alternative facts,” “Russian hoax,” “deep state,” et al. 

 

“Fake news” is the ultimate verbal weapon for it can be breezily tossed off to dismiss any fact or opinion that one disagrees with.

 

As an Irish Echo columnist my gig is to give opinions on various subjects. 

 

Simple as pie, you might think, but as pleasurable as it is I still have to check and validate every concrete statement I make or quote.

 

Take my opening homily on “fake news” a few lines back. Although Donald Trump claimed to have originated the phrase, it was actually coined by Craig Silverman in 2014 while he was running a research project at Columbia University.

 

Since Mr. Trump takes credit for so many innovations it behooved me to check out the truthfulness of his claim; accordingly, I was forced to change “originated” for “popularized.”

 

Luckily I have an editor who would likely have caught my error before “yer man from Pearl River” would have taken me to task with a scathing public letter and cost me a free drink at the Echo Christmas party.

 

Personally I read the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal for news. I’ve found that both esteemed newspapers invariably print the same informed facts.

 

Their opinion pieces, however, wildly differ. Yet you can tell even those have been given the factual once over by experienced editors. Besides, both papers have “apology” columns where factual mistakes and misstatements are corrected within days.

 

And yet so many people get their unfiltered news from Facebook, Twitter, and friendly Russian Bots.

 

That’s like hearing “facts” at Paddy Reilly’s at 4am with 6 or 7 pints aboard. 

 

Recently I was informed by a number of social media adherents that, “Joe Biden intends taxing our 401(ks) and IRAs.”

 

I reassured these troubled souls that they should rest easy – it’s unlikely that our future president would wish to commit political suicide before even being handed the keys of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

 

Upon looking into the matter I discovered that Mr. Biden had mentioned a desire to give more 401 (k) tax breaks to lower and middle income earners to bring them up to par with the relative breaks afforded upper income earners.

 

The truth, apparently, got skewered intentionally in the telling.  But without truth and a modicum of decency where will we be?

 

This year we’ve lost two journalists who are the epitome of truth and decency.

 

Mark Shields has retired after 33 years of giving opinions on PBS NewsHour. I haven’t always agreed with him but there’s something so utterly American and sensible about the man.

 

After the invasion of Iraq he stumped David Brooks, his conservative partner on the popular show, by inquiring if he really thought that an American Christian occupying force would succeed in subduing a Muslim country?

 

One of the measures of Shields’ influence is that Brooks has moderated his views over the years and become a thoughtful and very informative centrist.

 

Pete Hamill is another case in point. I happened to be in a group with him when someone ventured that given the catastrophe of 9/11 the practice of waterboarding terrorists was justified.

 

Pete didn’t even raise his voice when he replied, “We’re Americans, we don’t do torture.”

 

He didn’t need to elaborate for he had made a simple but profound statement.

 

Let’s hope in 2021 we’ll aspire to be more than we are again, and return to core American values, in particular, truth and decency.

Truth, Decency, and 2021

The recent six-weeks Irish National Lockdown designed to stop the gathering spread of Covid-19 was sold to a fatigued public as Save the Christmas.

 

What a compelling title and it resonated with this emigrant, though it’s been many years since I experienced an Irish Christmas. Still, the memories remain vivid.

 

Christmas, of course, is a cherished holiday in the US but its Irish equivalent exists on a different plane. 

 

Perhaps that’s because Thanksgiving occurs in late November over here and there’s no corresponding feast in the Irish autumn. Thus the long, dark Irish evenings seem endless in the chilly, damp weather.

 

But it’s more than that. In the Wexford of my youth Christmas began around December 20^th and lasted until January 6^th, the Feast of the Epiphany or Women’s Christmas.

 

It always used to stun me when I first arrived in New York City that stores would gaily open for winter sales on Dec. 26^th. as I lay hungover and homesick in my East Village bed.

 

In a way it was a relief. All guilt and grief about failing to make it home could be extinguished in the company of other subdued ex-pats at Malachy McCourt’s Bells of Hell.

 

Festive lights were already being taken down around the city. Commerce and capitalism were back in full swing.

 

How different back home! You couldn’t even buy a bottle of milk on December 26th or St. Stephen might have arisen in fury and smote you at this insult to his sacred lockdown.

 

He might also have thundered that Christmas in Ireland is about home and the desire of all Irish people to celebrate it there.

 

Thus, from Dec. 20^th the streets of Wexford began to fill up with this annual homecoming pilgrimage.

 

Very few Wexicans ventured to these shores; no, it was all about the UK. Like most communities Wexford had suffered mightily from Éamon de Valera’s deflationary economic policies.

 

Simply put there were few jobs in our town and most families had someone over in London, Birmingham, or wherever they had roads to repair, buildings to construct, or cars to assemble.

 

Many fathers came home twice a year – a week in the summer and another week at Christmas.

 

My own father returned from sea every three or four months and usually managed to stretch his stay over Christmas.

 

There was an intensity to the Yuletide homecoming, for unlike in summer so many returned at the same time.

 

The streets would resound with shouts of welcome and recognition, and the pubs were stuffed. 

 

The music and gaiety within could only be imagined by flirtatious boys and girls traipsing by; is it any wonder we all turned to drinking at the earliest age possible?

 

The shenanigans would build to a climax on Christmas Eve and after last call hundreds of revelers would head for Midnight Mass at both Catholic and Protestant churches. Hymns and carols were sung with fiery gusto at cathedral and chapel.

 

Christmas Day was spent strictly at home, as was St. Stephen’s Day, although members of the extended family were welcome to visit.

 

December 26^th was the big dancing night of the year. Ballrooms in the town and countryside were packed, for it was rumored that a romance struck up on St. Stephen’s night could very well lead to marriage.

 

December 27^th was a day for getting out and about. Hundreds walked out to the Norman Castle at Ferrycarrig, others chased packs of Beagles through the fields, while those with means, or access to some manner of a nag, attended the Hunt.

 

The pubs steadily built to a roaring business that culminated in a farewell debauch on New Year’s Eve.

 

On New Year’s Day the boat train began to steadily empty the streets and by January 6^th wives, mothers, girlfriends, and sisters had a free, if lonesome, day with all the émigrés well on their way to London’s Paddington Station and beyond.

 

I’m sure things have changed in Wexford; Zoom, FaceTime, and the Internet have diminished distance, if not dislocation.

 

Whatever, a very happy Irish-American Christmas to all of you and let’s meet safe and sound again in 2021.

Like A Rolling Stone

 Has a song ever really affected your life? 

 

I suspect it has since I get many emails about such matters at Celtic Crush on SiriusXM – especially in the month preceding Christmas.

 

Something about this time of year tends to stir the embers of memory. It’s usually to do with an old romance, instantly resurrected at the first notes of some musical “blast from the past.”

 

My song has no such romantic connotations; yet, I might still be living back in Ireland if I hadn’t heard it at a certain point in life.

 

I was an adolescent living with my widowed grandfather in a big barracks of a house in the heart of Wexford town. His once large family had dispersed leaving only his oldest son who spent most nights in the lounge bar of the County Hotel.

 

Since my grandfather was hard of hearing I could blast the old cloth-covered wireless in my bedroom to my hearts content.

 

I must have been much smarter back then for I could read Shakespeare and listen to ear-rattling music at the same time. Now I have trouble enough doing either.

 

Anyway, I was tuned into Radio Luxembourg – “the station of the stars” – and reading to my heart’s content when the first chunky chords of a Fender Stratocaster blasted forth, shaking the dust off the glowing tubes of the wireless on their exit.

 

Of course I didn’t know a Strat from a hole in the wall back then, possessing only an acoustic guitar of dubious vintage that I had purchased from “Jap” O’Brien’s furniture store on the never-never system.

 

Nor did I recognize the B6 Hammond Organ that swelled through my bedroom but I was in no doubt as to whose caustic voice declared:

 

“Once upon a time, you feel so fine

Threw the bums a dime, in your prime

Didn’t you?”

 

It was Bob Dylan at his sneering best, ripping apart the pretentions of whatever girlfriend was causing him problems back in 1965.

 

I cast my book aside and sat bolt upright - all ears in that frigid, damp bedroom.

 

By the time Mr. Dylan had reached the first chorus I was hooked forever, as he whined in outraged accusation: 

 

“How does it feel to be on your own?”

 

Up until then singers were either falling head over heels in virginal love or bemoaning the heartache visited upon them when they were inevitably dumped by the object of their affections.

 

Like A Rolling Stone, on the contrary, was like a Rock ‘n’ Roll Nuremburg Tribunal. The very skin was being flayed off Bobby’s offensive paramour.

 

And the seething lyrics only intensified over six glorious minutes and 11 seconds. Even back then, musically unlettered as I was, I could tell that this track had been recorded red-hot live as Mike Bloomfield on lead guitar and Al Kooper on Hammond organ struggled to keep time with Dylan’s impassioned performance.

 

No one in this crack band knew what was coming next as Bob spat out the words in fury while skidding around “the pocket” of the beat; by the same token I recognized that each musician was playing at their instinctive best.

 

And that, in a nutshell, is what great Rock ‘n’ Roll is all about – spark and spontaneity.

 

Finally it was over and some pop inanity followed. I switched off the wireless for fear the magic would dissipate.

 

Those six plus minutes had synthesized so many thoughts and dreams, and I knew I’d never experience any of them if I stayed in Wexford.

 

I followed that song to New York City and sang it in every band I’ve played with – always at night’s end when the whiskey is flowing and inhibitions are few.

 

Was it worth the journey? Well, there have been a lot of ups and downs, but never a dull moment.

 

I heard the song recently; it stirred all the same emotions, and I thought what a perfect song for this “time of pause.”

 

Give it a spin and sneer along with Mr. Dylan – it’s therapeutic and puts this damned pandemic in context. C’mon now, give it a shot, there’s no one listening, and so what if they are!

 

 “How does it feel
To be on your own
Like a complete unknown

Like a rolling stone.”

Winners & Losers 2020 Elections

Who are the winners and losers of the 2020 political campaigns?

 

Donald Trump is perhaps both. Love him or hate him he has changed the political landscape in four dizzying years.

 

His Republican Party has so far managed to hold on to Senate power and clipped Speaker Pelosi’s wings in the House, but Mr. Trump has been unceremoniously shown the door.

 

Yet watching him barnstorm the battleground states in the final week of the campaign I could only marvel at the man. He singlehandedly battled the entire Democratic Party to a standstill, and had the campaign lasted an extra week he would likely still be president.

 

God alone knows how much illness, and even death, he caused at his super-spreader events, but he still made Mr. Biden and his masked Democrats seem anemic and often self-righteous.

 

What a force for good he could have been if he wasn’t poisoned by his own toxic narcissism.

 

And so he conspires and tweets away his remaining days in the White House, unable to face any reality except his own.

 

And what of Joe Biden? Talk about a comeback! The Scranton Kid will become president on this his third attempt, hopefully restoring decency and competency to an office once universally admired.

 

For better or worse, the new American order will be comprised of Biden, McConnell and Pelosi – three pragmatists who worked their way to the top by sheer grit and resolution. 

 

An exhausted nation turns its eyes to them in hope that commonsense will reign again in Washington DC. 

 

And not a moment too soon, for the COVID-19 pandemic is surging across the country and will not be stopped until there is a unified Federal response.

 

Forget about Mr. Trump, with his head full of vengeful fantasies, and so much cable television to critique, he doesn’t even have time to support a badly needed economic stimulus. 

 

Meanwhile millions sink further into poverty, with one in eight households having less than enough to eat.

 

When we do finally come through this crisis there’ll be two inevitable consequences – Mr. McConnell’s new Republican party will have once again become fiscally hawkish, and financial inequality in the US will be even more pronounced. 

 

The former occurs every time a Democrat becomes president, the latter is just a fact of American life.

 

Apart from President-Elect Biden, who was the biggest winner in the recent election? 

 

Stacey Abrams, without a doubt. When she lost the gubernatorial contest in Georgia two years ago she set about organizing and registering voters. Last week she turned Georgia blue.

 

I wouldn’t use the term loser on Staten Island Congressman Max Rose. He was a rare bridge between blue and red, and like Ms. Abrams he will turn this defeat into victory and go on to bigger things in DC or NYC.

 

The big loser was the Democratic Party. It neglected the Latino vote and magnanimously ceded the white working class to a reactionary Republican party.

 

True, Democrats won Arizona and the presidency, but they suffered what may turn out to be debilitating losses in both the Senate and the House. They have yet to learn that raising money is no substitute for boots on the ground in a political campaign.

 

However, on January 5^th they have a chance for redemption in Georgia’s two run-off Senate races where Stacey Abrams and her activists will once more go to bat for them.

 

Meanwhile Mr. Trump raves on, refusing to admit defeat until every obtuse legal option has been exhausted. With 9 weeks to go before he unwillingly vacates the White House, anxiety is rising that he may have some surprise up his sleeve for us.

 

And what of the next four years?  Will he play golf and write his memoirs, or become another Mussolini searching for his balcony?

 

Time will tell, but the real winners in the election were the American people. Despite a raging pandemic many stood on line for hours to exercise their democratic right to vote.

 

Here’s to the new triumvirate – Biden, McConnell, and Pelosi. We can only pray that they’ll overcome old rivalries and speedily enact a new stimulus bill that will both rid us of this pandemic, and begin to address the inequality that has dimmed the lights of this shining city on a hill.

 

The Ospreys have flown

The ospreys are gone. They’ve been like friends through much of the pandemic. I knew they’d head south in the fall and yet I came to dread the day they’d leave.

 

As it turned out the parting was no big deal: I got preoccupied with some small crisis or other, and one morning realized I hadn’t seen them for a while.  

 

Since they can travel up to 170 miles a day, they’re probably already down in South Carolina replenishing themselves before taking off for Southern Florida.

 

From there it’s on to summer in South America, forsaking us in the chilly North East.

 

I’ve been attracted to hawks ever since my father pointed them out to me on the farm outside Wexford town.

 

They ruled the skies above those lush fields, swooping down on unsuspecting mice and unlucky rats. 

 

Ospreys, though from the hawk family, only eat fish and thus live close to the sea or inland lakes and lagoon.

 

About 20 years ago I began to take notice of hawks again. I was then traveling the roads of America with Black 47. The journeys were long and rambunctious, punctuated by long periods of silence when you became keenly aware of the passing countryside.

 

The hawk is hard to miss for it tends to hover on high before swooping down on its prey.

 

Over the years their numbers seemed to multiply and it was a rare journey when I wouldn’t catch multiple sightings.

 

When I mentioned this to an amateur ornithologist he said their numbers had increased since DDT was banned in 1972, at first slowly but in leaps and bounds since the 1990s.

 

What an effect we humans have on all species we share the planet with; and how odd that in our own season of pandemic and pause I should become more aware of the ospreys.

 

This year I was hell bent on finishing a novel that I had dithered over for a long time, and thus was rising in darkness and working through the dawn.

 

In ways it was idyllic for I have a view of a large bay. The darkness faded early and there was an hour or two of gorgeous muted light before the sun surfaced on the horizon.

 

It was in that time that I first noticed the ospreys.

 

Occasionally I would see two of them, but after the first month more often than not it was just the one. 

 

I took it that the female had finally laid her eggs and was guarding them while the male scouted from as high as 100 feet before diving spectacularly into the bay.

 

He moved so swiftly I thought he went head first into the water, but later I noticed that he pirouetted just before breaking the surface so that his talons could grab hold of the fish. 

 

As he rose back into the sky he methodically turned the fish head first to lessen air resistance on his journey back to the nest.

 

My ornithologist informed me that the chicks thrived on this diet of live sushi and can usually fly within 60 days of hatching.

 

Writing novels is a solitary business but never a lonely one – your head is full of characters and their ways; it throbs with the thwarted logic and inanities of the human condition until you want to cast the whole shebang away from you.

 

At such moments I would break away from the accursed laptop and gaze out the window. Soon enough the osprey would appear from the west.

 

What a majestic flyer with a wingspan approaching five feet! He could cover football fields in seconds before hovering gracefully, then plunging swiftly below the waves.

 

One morning in September five of them appeared, three young hawks learning to hunt under the watchful eye of the male and female. I almost cheered. They had raised three healthy offspring in the midst of our crisis.

 

They came every day and my spirit soared. By then I’d finished the novel. Cornell University Press will publish Rockaway Blue on March 15^th.

 

I hope that you and I and all who read this column will be hale and hearty when the ospreys return a month or so later.  It’s something to look forward to.