Citius, Altius, Fortius

“Citius, Altius, Fortius” (“Faster, Higher, Stronger”) - Olympic Motto, Father Henri Martin Didon

Yes, I am an Olympics junkie. I have been in Nirvana for the last two weeks as I revisit the wonders of the Nordic combined, half-pipe, skeleton, short program, and best of all - curling! I am perfectly willing to sit glassy-eyed in front of the tube, evening after evening, breathlessly waiting for the big hill ski jumper from Kazakhstan to hit his telemark landing on his third and final jump to the roar of a crowd of, say, 50 to 60 very cold spectators.

Equally odd is that the rest of the time, I wouldn’t be caught dead watching a couple ice dancing to the music of Love Story, dressed in something out of John Phillip Sousa’s worst nightmare. I couldn’t tell you who the reigning world champion is in any sport requiring snow or ice, let alone who is America’s best at anything remotely related to winter sports and skin tight sequined suits. I can tell you, however, where this odd, every-four-year obsession of mine originated from: the convergence of a world-wide sports event with that great world-wide media, television.

I was 11 years old in 1968 - a pretty memorable year for many folks, but on a personal level it was the year I discovered two gloriously flawed cultural icons in my life: The Olympics and color television!!!

Now don’t get me wrong, I didn’t grow up in a cave; a television was part of my consciousness almost as far back as I can remember. I can still see John F. Kennedy’s funeral and The Beatles on Ed Sullivan as clearly as anything, but for me, those images will be forever etched in black and white. I grew up in a black and white world as far as media was concerned, with the exception of the glorious full color of Life Magazine every Friday, so I suppose pageantry and pomp and hoopla would always leave me a bit cold. But sometime in the fall of 1967 my neighbors got the most magnificent machine I had every beheld - a Zenith (I still remember the brand!) color TV! It was about the size of a davenport, as I recall, and featured lots of cabinetry and knobs and fabric, and took about ten minutes to warm up, BUT IT WAS A COLOR TV! I worked hard to find excuses to hang around and get a glimpse of the Holy Grail-like appliance, but back then children were expected to be able to occupy themselves without the electronic babysitter, and besides, there was that issue of the radiation from the color tube cooking your eyeballs to little cinders if you watched for more than a few minutes at a time. Watching color TV for more than, say, an hour at a time was considered to be just one step below staring at the noontime sun. Then it would be, “Outside, kids! It’s only 20-below out there, it’s good for you!” Plus the networks hadn’t really gotten programming for 11 year old boys down yet. Kid’s shows were lame and parents tended to dominate primetime with junk like Gunsmoke, and Father Knows Best…yuck!

But as February rolled around that year, my neighbors told my parents that they were going out of town for the unheard-of span of two weeks - and they needed my brother and I to “check on the house and the pets while we’re gone, and if they want to watch a little of the TV, that’s OK too….” Needless to say, we jumped at the idea, and a few days later we were ensconced on their couch in full winter gear (the neighbors insisted the heat be kept very low during their absence), watching Charles de Gaulle preside over the opening ceremonies of the 1968 Winter Olympic Games from Grenoble, France in living (if somewhat fuzzy) color. Over the next week or so, we thrilled to the heroics of Jean-Claude Killy in alpine skiing and were smitten with figure skater Peggy Fleming, who won America’s only gold medal. Apparently we weren’t the only ones who were swept up by the 1968 Winter Olympics, because the combination of the first satellite broadcast of a live sports event and the first color broadcast of an Olympics has been identified by scholars as the beginning of the world’s infatuation with all things Olympic.

All I know is that, from that moment on, my brother and I were hooked. Unexpectedly, the Olympics have provided me with life lessons ever since, and while not all of them have been pleasant, they have been important. Tommy Smith and John Carlos’s black power salute during the medal ceremony that very summer in Mexico City would raise my awareness of issues regarding race and human rights. In 1972, my brother and I sat in stunned horror as the terrorist age dawned on live TV in Munich. In 1980, I vividly remember trying to tune in the USA vs. Russia hockey game on the AM radio in my old Ford Maverick while driving in central Ohio on a snowy night. I rounded a hill and picked up the last few minutes of the biggest victory of what would become the “Miracle on Ice.” Politics reached frenzied levels in the 1980 and ‘84 Olympics, when boycotting seemed to be all the rage and became something I could only lament as a great concept dragged into the mud. The non-sport related happenings have continued, but they don’t tarnish the central concept for me. Now I know that at some level the Olympics are certainly political, and that I often measured great triumphs and disappointments in terms of whether we won or lost. But that boy in me who was thrilled in 1968 still likes to believe in the principle at the heart of it all - competing together as brothers and sisters regardless of language or cultural barriers - and I still stop what’s going on in my world to take it all in. I still see it in all its bright and shining colors.

Have a great week!

Follow Your Bliss

I want to take the time today to pay tribute to a life well lived.

I haven’t figured out the great big questions of life just yet during my tour on the planet, but one thing I think provides a true measure of a person is how many lives have been impacted by them for the better, and how deeply they cared about others. Our world lost a person last week who embodied that concept - a quiet man who made an impression with his deeds more than his words, and with his passion even more than his works. His name was Greg Stiles.

I knew Greg only peripherally; his youngest daughter and my stepdaughter are best friends, but he certainly made an impression on me. He was a big bear of a man with a flowing ponytail who struck you as a person who did not suffer fools gladly, and who clearly was a leader who had his feet solidly on the ground. Many of you may know him through his two professions, both of which he approached passionately: teaching and music.

Greg taught science at the Cleveland School of the Arts, where he was known as a no-nonsense, “old school” kind of guy, who nonetheless cared deeply for his students and their welfare. He expected a lot from those who entered his classroom, but they knew that he would return their commitment back to them threefold if they were up to the task. At his memorial service last Saturday, one student after another spoke of the influence he brought to their lives, and how his legacy lived in them still. He expected every student to be the best they could be and didn’t tolerate a half-effort. Not surprisingly, the students who embraced his approach felt it to be a profound source of strength in their lives from that time on. What better lesson could a teacher give than that?

But Greg’s real passion was music. He owned Heights Guitars on Lee Road in Cleveland Heights, and played in various bands and venues over the years, lately performing in a local bluegrass band. From testimonies provided during the service, it was clear that Greg’s true voice was music; it’s when he was most eloquent and pure, and the medium through which folks could best read what was going on in his mind and in his heart. He was rarely far from a guitar, as the candid family photos filling the room attested, and music was his pathway to grace.

What struck all of us at first was the tragedy of the story: a strong and vital man in his prime who was struck down by an illness, suffering a shockingly rapid decline and untimely passing. A family and large group of friends were left with little time to prepare for the silencing of his voice. But what we all began to comprehend over the weekend is that Greg led a life on his own terms, in his own way and at full speed ahead, but it was a life that he opened up to so many others in such a generous way. Think about it: he chose to engage the world in entirely unselfish ways. He was a teacher, giving of himself tirelessly for years to an unending line of young folks who really needed to know that there were adults who expected great things of them and who didn’t just phone it in year after year. He was a teacher who challenged them and then rewarded them as they blossomed. He was a true mentor, the kind that changes a person’s life forever. He was also a musician and a performer, who attracted a wide circle of fellow musicians seeking him out for both performances and conversations, and for the fellowship that is shared by creative people banding together to make something much greater than the range of their individual talents. His store became a Mecca for those seeking to understand the creative process, the complexities of chord progressions, or the meaning of life. They’re really all the same thing, don’t you think?

Greg spent his life reaching out to people in the most personal way, through expression, expectation, and sharing, and so many people received what he gave. His life was relatively short, yes, that can’t be denied. But it was full of joys, and it was lived on his terms. He filled it daily with the joy of music, family, learning, and full-out living. We all can understand, admire, and even envy the life he lived, but we can also learn from it.

Share your gifts with those you love and with those around you; be quiet and listen to the melodies of this crazy world, and then join in the harmony with everything you’ve got.

Godspeed, Greg, and thank you for the lessons. We will try to live up to them.

Have a great week!

I'll See You in the Funny Pages

“I’ll see you in the funny pages!” Bugs Bunny

Happy Groundhog Day! No matter what that rascally woodchuck decides, let’s hope sunshine is on the way.

OK, it’s time for some pop culture. A couple of items came up in the news today that caught my eye. They are both topics that hold special places in my pantheon of personal preferences: movies and the funny pages.

Item #1 is the announcement of the Academy Award nominations today, inflated for 21^st century tastes, of course. I admit that I watch only one awards show each year: that glorious train-wreck, the Oscars. I have been known to sit glassy-eyed in front of the tube long into the night as all the rest of my clan have hit the sack and are snoring away. Now that the number of nominees for Best Picture has been doubled, the thought inspires worries that I’ll be staying up even later than usual to discover the soon-to-be-forgotten news of who won what this year. I wonder if they will add twice as many mini-tributes of nominated movies now, and allow space for significant face time for key actors from each flick to the evening as well? Maybe they’ll do the right thing and eliminate any production number nightmares from the proceedings to best keep within the four or so hour format. Honestly, it seems like presidential campaigns are finished faster than the Oscar broadcast, yet I’m still a sucker for them. What can I say? I’m a cinephile from way back. When you get right down to it, I really only have one real complaint about the event - bring back Billy Crystal as the host, please!

On to Item #2. There are folks out there that know of my addiction to the funnies, the comics, the daily cartoons. I was very fortunate as a child to enjoy one of the golden ages of the daily serial: Lil’ Abner, Gasoline Alley, Blondie, Wizard of Id, Beetle Bailey, Steve Canyon, Prince Valiant, Peanuts, and my favorite, Pogo, were just a few of the beautifully drawn, insightful and thought-provoking masterpieces of humor and drama that brightened a few minutes of every day. As my sons were growing up, I got to pass along the joy through some of my favorite funnies as well as new ones, such as Garfield, Fox Trot, The Far Side, Hagar the Horrible, and Jump Start, which were just as deserving of time and attention. For me, one of the truly exciting aspects of gaining stepdaughters has been that I can keep passing along the fun uninterrupted, thanks to Get Fuzzy, Pearls Before Swine, and Rhymes with Orange, right up to the arrival of grandchildren and so on, ad infinitum. I do not doubt that in doing so, I have helped improve literacy, imagination, and an ear for dialect in those I have read them to and with, and had a lot of fun along the way.

The item in the news that brought this to mind was a front page article in the Plain Dealer about the 15^th anniversary of the end of publication of one of the finest comic strips ever, the short-lived but magnificent Calvin & Hobbes, which is also one of several comic strips to be commemorated by the U.S. Postal Service with its own stamp later this year. Calvin & Hobbes was my sons’ absolute favorite strip - intelligent, thoughtful, self-effacing and artistically brilliant, and by a Northeast Ohio artist to boot! It was a black day in my house when Bill Watterson folded up his tent and quietly crept away, but the article in the PD shed new light for me on the situation. One thing he mentioned that particularly rang true was that he wanted to step away before he became stale and his work suffered in the eyes of his fans. That certainly has been the case in several comic strips over the years. The challenge of when to end such a personal expression is always a tough one, subject to much conjecture and second-guessing. It’s a struggle we all wrestle with to some degree.

Take me, for example. I started writing this weekly journal/blog a little over a year ago, and have enjoyed it immensely, but I recognize that the content has lately become a little less than I had hoped for in terms of interest and impact. It is with the wisdom of Bill Watterson in mind that I have decided to scale back my effort a bit to help strengthen the value of this message to you who choose to read it. Beginning with today’s installment, I am going to cut back to roughly two entries a month, issued as the spirit moves me, and with the value of your time in mind. I welcome suggestions and contributions to the content, and plan to continue to keep in contact with all who are interested in the goings on at The Music Settlement and beyond.

Thanks for your support, and have a great week!