Coming Around Again

So, about a year ago at this time, I had pretty much hit rock bottom. I’d been forced to take a position at my job that I didn’t want, for no good reason. That was the straw that broke the camel’s back, and for all intents and purposes, I had the biggest meltdown I’d ever had in my life. I literally stayed in bed for two days, and even at the height of my depression, I’ve never been one of those stay-in-bed-all-day types. I thought about everything from quitting my job to consulting an attorney.

Once the dust cleared a little bit, I came to a realization, and that realization was that if I was going to make my life any better than it was, I was going to have to do most of the heavy lifting myself. They say when you’re at the bottom, then there’s nowhere to go but up, and although things aren’t perfect now, they’ve come a long way.

The biggest and best decision I made was to start seeing a therapist. Over the years, I’ve come to internalize a lot of the things that bother me, simply because lashing out seems to get me into more trouble than it would if I just kept my mouth shut. Of course, when you hold things in it just makes the explosion more fantastic. But therapy allows me to get my grievances out in a controlled environment with someone who is completely impartial to either side of the situation. It’s calmed me down and cleared my mind quite a bit. Hey, I’d have never started working out again if it wasn’t for my therapist challenging me to join a gym. I’d have never written a letter to my mom (a letter that I should have written fifteen years ago) if not for my therapist challenging me to do that.. In a year full of changes, finally deciding to sit and talk to a professional on a weekly basis has been the most rewarding of all the changes.

Again, not to say my life is perfect or that I still don’t have a lot of work to do on myself, but I’m taking this moment to at least give myself a small pat on the back, because I’m in a way better place than I was just a year ago. There’s a lot to be said for realizing you’re fucked up and taking steps to improve your way of life. Most people are either too scared to do it or don’t realize how messed up they are.

The Randomizer

Here I am, finding myself awake at yet another weird time of morning. I got home from karaoke at about 20 after 1, barely managed to get undressed before falling asleep, and now find myself awake…not only because I had to hit the can, but also because I have this weird throbbing pain in my ass and I don’t know where it came from (OK, I hear the smart remarks. Enough.) Strangely, I feel more awake now after four hours of sleep than I did yesterday morning after…(thinking)…well, a lot more than four hours of sleep.

Since I can’t think of one specific thing to blog about, here are a couple of random things that are going through my head right now. I think I’d like to try my hand at photography again, something I haven’t been interested in since high school…I really use ellipses too much when I write…I hate the fact that people don’t take their bulky backpacks off on crowded trains (it happens on the subway in NY, on the PATH in NJ and on the T here in Boston and it annoys the shit out of me every time)…I use parentheses way too much when I write…Jack Daniels is evil (I had trouble staying upright on the way to the bathroom)…those people who watched the kid in Florida kill himself on webcam don’t exactly give me the most hope for the future of our society…why am I carrying a torch for someone who treated me like shit and lied to me?…why do I ALWAYS find myself carrying a torch for people who treat me like shit and lie to me?…I had the best hamburger I’ve had in years yesterday near Harvard Square…how sore is that woman who sang AC/DC and Joan Jett’s throat gonna be when she wakes up this morning?…Why does something tell me she hasn’t even gone to sleep yet?…I have a fantastic idea for a book but have no one to help me with it and no time to do it myself…I need to do a ton of work on the site this weekend…I think I’m gonna have pancakes at least once this weekend…maybe it’s time for me to go back to bed.

(Just Like) Starting Over

So, I’ve been reading other peoples’ blogs over the past couple of days and I came to a conclusion.

I miss blogging. Not that I don’t love the music blog, but that’s not about ME. It’s about music. And egotistical so-and-so that I am, I need a space where I can tell you about ME. Hmm. I like capitalizing the word ME. ME. ME. ME. Stuck on myself much? Ha!!

Those of you who know me well are aware of how flighty I can be with these things, and I’m not promising anything at all, but right now I feel the inspiration, so we’ll see where it takes us, I suppose.

It’s 3:17 A.M. and I’m wide awake. Why, you ask? Well, a combination of the meds I’m on and having consumed a fair amount of alcohol the night before left me exhausted all day today. Seriously, it was a chore keeping my eyes open. So I was asleep by 8 P.M. God, that makes me sound like such an old man. Shit, I could probably sleep another 7 or 8 hours, which was initially the plan when I decided to take today (Friday) off work.

So, what’s the plan for the day? Lunch with Mose, followed by a couple hours of housework (because my apartment is even more of a disaster area than usual), and my first karaoke jaunt as a Boston resident with Pat, Becky and others. Should be a fun time.

Anyhow, just wanted to drop this note to let y’all know I’m back, and I intend on sticking around this time. Whether I actually do or not…well, why don’t ya come around every once in a while and see?

Unexpected Props

I returned home from the beach on Sunday (t’was fun…thanks Becky) to one of the most satisfying e-mails I’ve ever read in my life.

Those of you familiar with urban music journalism should know the name Scott Poulson-Bryant. Scott was one of the founders and the former editor in chief of Vibe magazine. He’s written for the New York Times, the Village Voice, Spin, he’s published two books and most importantly, he appeared on VH-1’s “I Love The…” pop culture retrospective series. Well, most importantly to me, anyway.

He sent me a Facebook e-mail telling me that he loved MHW’s blog, that I was one of the inspirations for him to start his own blog, and that he, too liked “Garth Brooks…in the Life of Chris Gaines” (we’re in a very small minority, brother).

That’s like Michael Jackson sending me an e-mail saying “Hey, kid. You can sing a little bit”.

I spent the rest of the day walking on a cloud. An affirmation like that keeps me believing that this writing gig is not just a pipe dream. Next time I feel like this isn’t all worth it, or like I’m a hack, I’m gonna go back onto Facebook and read that e-mail again.

More Dream Analysis

One weird thing that differs between Boston and New Jersey is my internet connection, which is doubly strange because the same company (ComCast) is/was my service provider in both states. But I get tossed off the internet at least once a day on both my work laptop and my “non-business” laptop. Whenever I go onto a site that I guess takes a little more work to get to, I freeze up for a moment, get thrown off IM and then have to restart. It’s a pain in the ass. But since it happens on both computers, I can’t blame the hardware. As much as my (fairly new) work laptop is a pain, the interruptions in service don’t appear to be it’s fault. Anyway…

As I’ve stated a couple of times here, I occasionally have very bizarre dreams. Last night/this morning was strange because I had two of them. I’m not sure whether they were connected or not-I woke up briefly around 6 (my apartment is so bright, I usually wake up at the crack of dawn. I usually go back to sleep for another hour or so, though). Anyway, here’s what I remember about each of them.

Dream #1: I was still working at my New York City office, and I’m showing my buddy Drew around the office when we decide it’s time for lunch. We walk up 14th street to this fried chicken spot that doesn’t actually exist in real life, and there’s a Hispanic girl behind the counter who I want to say is Carmen, AKA the woman who was supposed to be my instructor for Friday’s ill-fated driving lesson. At any rate, we place our orders, pay and then Drew decides he has to use the bathroom. I wait around for a few minutes (wondering what’s taking him so long) and then decide I have to go myself. I use the facilities (which are pretty grimy) and when I come out, Drew’s edging towards the stairs with bags of food in his hands, like “Let’s go”. As I turn to leave, Counter Girl stops me, pissed off, and says something like “You need to tell your friend something. He messed up the bathroom and I don’t want you guys coming back here”. Knowing that the bathroom (and the restaurant) are in pretty nasty condition anyway, I head out with Drew and we’re halfway back to the office when I realize I never got my change. So I run back to the restaurant, jog up the stairs and collect my change. However, while I gave Counter Girl a $10, she’s giving me back change for a $100. After having a slight crisis with my conscience, I decide not to let her know that she’s given me back more money than I’m owed and leave the restaurant. Once outside, Drew and I laugh at my good fortune and we continue to head back to the office. However, in order to get there, we have to cut through this field that’s covered in pins (like pushpins) and sharp objects that attach themselves to the bottom of our shoes and occasionally lodge themselves in our feet. We get through the path as quickly as we can, and once we get to the end of it, we’re standing there pulling sharp objects out of our shoes when we see these two biker dudes, each one with a dog, walking through the same path. The last thing I remember about that dream is wondering why anyone would take a dog through a path covered with sharp objects. I’m not sure if that’s when I woke up or if it just somehow segued into the other dream, but here’s the second dream.

I’m out with my stepfather, driving on a two-way street that looks a lot like Utica Avenue in Brooklyn. I’m in the passenger seat, and he gets out of the car to do something or other. We’re parked, and there’s music playing. I’m tapping my feet to the music, when all of a sudden I notice that the car is moving, and it’s moving towards a parked truck. I look down and realize the car is in park, so I’m wondering why the hell the car is moving. I hit the brake-or at least what I think is the break, and it turns out I hit the gas harder and crash into the truck in front. My car doesn’t even make a dent on the truck, but it’s front is all smashed up, although it still works. My stepdad comes out of wherever he is and he’s like “Don’t move!”, but I somehow manage to make a U-turn around a median so I’m now going in the opposite direction-which turns out to basically be one very long downward slope. I’m still in the passenger seat, trying desperately to stop the car from crashing and somehow I end up at the bottom of the hill without sustaining any further damage to the car. At some point, my stepfather (who is now joined by my mom) has caught up with me and surprisingly he’s not pissed. He says something to the effect of “well, you’re still learning how to drive”, but they have somewhere to go that night and they’re not within walking distance of home, so they need to find a ride. Somehow, we end up at the house of these people that they know. Although they’re not home, we make ourselves comfortable in their place, all the while I’m wondering if these people are gonna be pissed because we basically let ourselves into their place without warning and we’re just lounging like the house is ours.

I actually can’t remember what happens next except that we somehow make our way home, but it was a very strange dream, and here are a few factual things that I think factor into the dreams somehow, I’m just not sure how:

*Since returning from Boston, my mom has called me on two separate occasions. The first time I was asleep, the second time I was at the gym. She hasn’t left a message either time, and I haven’t called her back either.

*I’m obviously still a little (actually, a lot) pissed about friday’s driving class incident and realized over the weekend that I actually have to call them back and postpone Thursday’s lesson, because it’s between 9 and 11 and I have a doctor’s appointment at 11. And I know I’m gonna hear shit from the guy that owns the school, even if I’m like “Dude, I have a disease. My health is way more important than a fucking driving lesson”.

*I have a deathly fear of being involved in a car wreck.

*I got an email from one of the VPs at my company Friday night basically putting pressure on me to finish driving (said in a way that was supposed to be humorous, but I got the message), so I’m feeling quite a bit of stress to ace these last hours of instruction and get my license.

Anyone else able to read anything into these dreams?

The Spin Doctor

The best Christmas gift I ever got was one of those Fisher-Price record players. In retrospect, the sound was probably awful, but that present (recevived when I was 5 or 6) put me firmly on the path to a life as a music lover. By the time I was 7, I was walking four blocks to the local record store and buying 45s for $1.25 a pop…which was a bit of a change from the year or so when I would get 45s for free because one of my relatives was going out with the owner.

Anyways, a good deal of my adolescence was spent standing or sitting next to the turntable in my grandmother’s house, playing the large stack of records that I’d inherited from all my aunts and uncles that moved out. I bought my first stereo system at age 16, and although I had at that point graduated to cassettes (CDs were still too expensive), that stereo still had a record player, and since at that point vinyl had become relatively passe, I could walk into some store’s clearance outlet (or record shows) and pick up albums for dirt cheap.

I can’t remember what happened to that stereo (I might have left it behind when I left home), but even though I’ve progressed from records to tapes to CDs (which is where I think I’m gonna stop…mp3s have no personality, not to mention the fact that music should be tangible), I’ve always had a soft spot for records…especially since there are still a lot of albums from my youth and teenage years that were either never made available on CD or have been taken out of print.

When my former boss Brian and his girlfriend Adrienne moved to Jacksonville three years ago, I inherited their turntable. However, the turntable didn’t have a pre-amp, and…well, you can’t enjoy music if you can’t really hear it, right? By the time I’d decided to look for a DJ store and purchase a pre-amp (much harder than it sounds), I’d heard about USB turntables, which allowed you to burn your record collection into mp3 format, a concept that pleased me since I don’t go to the bathroom without my iPod. A co-worker’s husband sold me a USB turntable (brand new, in the box) last year, but the damn thing didn’t have a stylus, so I was stuck again.

Finally, last week, in the midst of all my life’s bullshit, one thing made me smile.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hopefully, amid all the other junk, you’ll make out the turntable. Ain’t it pretty? And the transferring of songs to computer is pretty damn easy, although it has to be done in real time.

Anyway, once you get a turntable, the next step is to get records, right? Well, at the same time that I bought the needleless turntable last winter, I’d found a couple of spots that sold cheap vinyl-Princeton Record Exchange, Vintage Vinyl and Tunes in Hoboken. Even if you have nothing to play them on, records for $1 are a good deal for the simple fact that they can double as cool artwork, right?

When I moved, I realized that I’m only blocks from a store called “In Your Ear”, which is a record collector’s wet dream. Tons and tons of albums-most for $3 and under. I traded a handful of CDs in (because I really don’t need to keep Boyz II Men singing the classic hits of Motown) and wound up buying 31 albums for seventeen bucks. No matter how you look at that, I made out like a fucking bandit.

So, because I’m a music geek, and because I like to show off, AND because I feel guilty for you having to read everything I’ve posted in the past couple of weeks, here are some of the cool things I’ve bought recently.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

How much do I love Michael Jackson? “Off the Wall” is the only album that I currently own on vinyl, CD AND cassette. Better believe that if I find an 8-track somewhere, it’s mine.

So, yeah, I’ve got “Off the Wall” on vinyl. “Thriller”, too. Big deal. But I bet not a lot of people have

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Did you know that Michael’s big brother Marlon made a solo album? It’s called “Baby Tonight” and it came out around the same time “Bad” did. Needless to say, it wasn’t quite the success that “Bad” was. Nevertheless, it’s not an altogether terrible album, and it was a dollar. Why not, right?

I also happen to be a huge Stevie Wonder fan. He released an album in 1979 called “Journey Through the Secret Life of Plants” that I’ve always been interested in hearing. However, a double CD set that’s also the soundtrack to a movie about plant life is a bit of a dicey proposition, and I’ve never seen the thing on disc for less than 25 bucks. But for $3.99? I’ll give it a shot.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

No, I don’t know why I’m making the Robert Parish stinkface either.

Hip-hop is a genre that was basically founded on vinyl. Early emcees recited their lyrics over the instrumental versions of popular records spun by deejays in parks and clubs and at house parties. So it makes sense that I’ve gotta have some hip-hop on wax, right?

(this picture loader on WordPress is a pain in the ass)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is a rarity that I don’t think has ever been released on CD. A remix album by A Tribe Called Quest that popped out in between “The Low End Theory” and “Midnight Marauders”. Pretty interesting. Certainly a rarity.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Speaking of rarities, Main Source’s “Breaking Atoms” is one of hip-hop’s most beloved (in an underground sort of way) albums. It’s been taken in and out of print several times over the years, and finally showed up on iTunes two or three weeks ago. No matter. I have the record! (which is probably worth a decent chunk of change).

Finally (because uploading these pics is starting to get frustrating), I’m sure you are aware of the song “Genius of Love” by the Tom Tom Club, who were a side project formed by Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth of Talking Heads (one of my all-time favorite bands). Three of the Club’s four albums are now available on CD (and I own all three), but for whatever reason, their second album “Close To the Bone” has not been reissued. You know where this is going…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is actually a bit better than their first album, which was the one with the hits! Funny how that works out.

Anyway, loading these things onto my iPod has been pretty fun, and you’ve got to admit that there’s a certain character involved in owning and playing and listening to records that you certainly can’t get with a file, and you honestly don’t get as much with a CD, either.

God, I Feel Like An Old Man…

So it’s now been (give or take a week or two) 90 days since I was diagnosed as diabetic. After ignoring symptoms for years, I figured it was a good time to get checked out, and it turned out to be a good decision. Physically, I feel quite a bit better. I’m not tired all the time. I don’t have pain in my legs all the time or that sharp stabbing pain in the bottom of my feet anymore. Since I’ve changed (well, not changed…more like adjusted) my diet, I don’t have near as many upset stomach issues as I used to have. When I went out to dinner for the past year or two, I used to suck down two Immodium just as a precaution so I wouldn’t have to excuse myself in the middle of a meal. Not happening anymore. This is a good thing. This might also be because people that work at restaurants in New York (and Jersey City) are fucking nasty and don’t wear gloves half the time, but…I prefer to blame it on the diabeetus (as Wilford Brimley and CJ hilariously put it).

Not to say the big “D” is all roses. There have definitely been some very aggravating long-term consequences that I won’t go into detail with on this blog. There’s a LOT of shit I can’t eat anymore unless I want my sugar to go sky high. No more tubs of Haagen Dazs. No more eating half a box of Chips Ahoy in one sitting. No more rum and cokes or screwdrivers (stab me in the heart, why don’t you?). I’ve got to go easy on things like rice (are you seriously asking someone who’s part Spanish to not eat RICE???), taters (doesn’t matter if they’re mashed, baked or fried…but I ain’t giving up french fries for good..just saying) and pasta (come on, why take away the single man’s staple of Kraft Mac and Cheese? That ain’t right!!). Not to say I can’t-or don’t-cheat. I had a Toll House ice cream cookie last night (I’m sorry…you’ve got to give in to the craving sometimes). There’s the aforementioned fries that I need to have once a week. And the fact of the matter is that I really don’t cook, so when you’re eating out you’re always gonna be tempted. But I also am more active than the average diabetic (gym 3 times a week, lots of walking), so I can cheat every now and then without any major effects.

Look at it this way: when I was diagnosed in May, my average blood sugar for the three months prior was around 320. Average blood sugar for a person is supposed to be somewhere between 90-130. So I was in deep doo-doo. Since then, I’ve been testing my sugar 4 times a day every day, and my average has been hovering around the 150 mark for the last month or so, with last week’s average 132, and two of my three readings today have been under 110 (unfortunately, my morning, post-ice cream reading was 188…oops!). And having to jab myself in the gut with a syringe twice a day is a small price to pay for how much better I feel physically after only a short time of treatment.

Now if I could only get my brain to follow suit…

So…

So I had another weird dream last night/this morning. From the parts I remember, I was supposed to go and visit my friend Patrick, but I stopped near his house to get something. Next thing I know, I’m talking to Alec Baldwin and Alec is telling me that he and Patrick are lovers and they want me to participate in a three-way. Or maybe I asked to participate in a three-way and they turned me down. I just thought it was funny. Believe me, I’ve been friends with Patrick for 16 years and I met Alec Baldwin back in ‘95 (with Kim Basinger) when I worked at Tower Records. Only way I’d kick either of ‘em out of bed is if Alec called me a “vile, thoughtless pig”.

At any rate, the 3 of you who read this on a regular basis are probably wondering how last night’s dinner with Mom went.

Eh, I don’t really have a lot to say. It was pleasant enough. We went to Pizzeria Uno and ordered the same thing. Made some semi-uncomfortable small talk about my illness and family gossip. Picked up some food for my stepdad (who was out running and didn’t join us for dinner). She invited me back up to their room and we made more small talk for a half hour, even though my stepfather was salty because we didn’t wait up for him. Oh, well.

It kinda is what it is, you know? I can resign myself to knowing I’m never gonna have *that* feeling, but it doesn’t mean I wouldn’t like to have it every once in a while.

I’m supposed to meet up with them tomorrow, but I’ve got a morning meeting and then I’m off to the opthalmologist eye doctor to get my pupils dilated. Not sure if I’m gonna be up for a repeat of that ordeal.

Back In The Apple…

For just about an hour, I’m a New Yorker again. As I type this, I’m sitting at my gate in the JetBlue terminal at good ol’ Kennedy Airport, waiting for the connecting flight from D.C. that’s gonna take me back home to Boston. Once I get in, I’m gonna take a breath, kiss the cat, turn the A/C on full blast and maybe take a nap (I’ve slept so little the past few days that I doubt Wellbutrin’s well-documented insomnia problems will keep me from enjoying a few hours of slumber). I’ve also got a bunch of new music to listen to, thanks to George’s and CJ’s music collections. I’m pretty excited about the three Zappa albums I obtained.

It’s funny. Me and Joan were talking a few days ago about how New Yorkers seem to slide back into a character when they’re here, and it’s true. I think that’s just the nature of the city. Once you smell that New York air, you put your guard up and the screw face goes back on. Your voice drops a couple of octaves and your walk becomes more purposeful, more attitudinal. I don’t think I’ve been in Boston long enough to shake it. I was on my way to my regular diner a couple of weeks back and an older black gentleman stopped me on the street. “Brother, fix your face”, he said. “You look like you’re about to kill someone”.

On the agenda next week: doctor’s appointments, therapy on Friday, reschedule driving lessons, speed up my bike search, hit the classifieds, and try to stay upbeat. That last one is much more difficult than it looks sometimes. But there are people who get by with a smile on their face in much worse situations.

Each day I live, my goal is to be a better person than I was the day before. That came to me at some point this morning as I was waiting for my plane in D.C. I think it’s a good way to live your life.

Remembering Mr. H.

Today marks 16 years since my grandfather passed away. I’m 32 now, so he’s been gone for literally half my life. For most folks, a grandparent passing away is a sad occasion. However, my grandfather was the first (and for a number of years, the only) father figure I’d ever known. Not too many days go by when I don’t think of him.

Things I remember about Grandpa: he loved his Heineken, he was a massive Yankee fan (Billy Martin was his hero), he fostered my lifelong addiction to the New York Daily News, he was the only person I knew who wore boxers over briefs,  he was a passionate union leader (although, strangely, to this day I don’t know what he did for a living), he let me cut his hair when I was a teenager even though I was (and still am) one of the worst barbers on the face of the Earth, he gave me my first sip of beer (I think it was Schaefer or something like that), and from what I’ve been told, I had him wrapped around my tiny fingers when I was a little kid.

Not to say our relationship was peachy. We argued-a LOT. Well, let me rephrase that. The arguments usually consisted of him screaming at me for essentially being a bonehead kid (paraphrasing here…I don’t think he ever used the word “bonehead”). The man didn’t exactly have a bedside manor, working himself into a frenzy on many an occasion. Listening to him and my grandmother argue was like listening to a verbal clash of the titans, hearing them scream at one another practically made me fear for my life sometimes. However, those two were deeply in love. Married for nearly thirty-five years, my grandmother forgave my grandfather through his (usually alcohol-fueled) rants and a whole lot more.

Even at 16, I was naive in a lot of ways. I didn’t exactly understand the concept of sickness and death. I knew Grandpa was losing weight, but he attributed it to high blood pressure and had cut back on the drinking (even though I saw him sneak a beer every now and then) and had my grandmother prepare healthy meals separate from what the rest of us were fed. When my grandmother, during a walk to a drugstore, said “I think we’re going to have to bury your grandfather soon”, I was disbelieving. When he gave me his favorite watch, around the same time, I had no idea what the symbolism meant.

Things I remember about July 18, 1992: it was hot as hell, it was the day Whitney and Bobby were getting married, I got up to the sound of my grandmother’s Mitsubishi van warming up in the driveway. At this time, I was sleeping in the house’s basement, participating in a program for aspiring journalists at Queens College during the week and I’d just gotten a paid internship at Newsday. I remember excitedly telling my grandfather as he rested in bed that Friday night. I also remember it rained cats and dogs that Friday and I came home soaked. What I also remember, although it didn’t really make sense to me at the time, was that all of my aunts and uncles were back home in Brooklyn, in addition to my mom.

Anyway, my grandfather was sitting in the backseat of the van along with my uncle Tony. Both my grandmother and I had been unsuccessful at finding a piece of paperwork that was needed for whatever they were doing, so my grandfather got out of the car to look for it himself. As he got out of the car, he collapsed, although he was still alive at the time. My grandmother mentioned something about him scaring the hell out of her, somehow one of us found the paperwork, and they were off.

Maybe twenty minutes later, I heard the van back up into the driveway. I was watching “Soul Train” and probably eating a bowl of cereal. I remember being surprised at the fact that they’d returned so quickly. Something told me to go outside and find out what happened. When the driver’s door opened, I realized it wasn’t my grandmother in the car. It was Dr. Pete, a physician friend of ours who lived around the corner. My grandfather was in the back seat. Gone. I could hear my grandmother wailing from all the way down the block. Shortly after he collapsed and came to, he closed his eyes for the last time.

What happened from there is still sort of a blur, although there are a few things I remember clearly. Me and Pete lifting my grandfather’s body out of the van, back into the house and laying him on his bed. The stunned silence as I sat on my front stoop, waiting for the ambulance and cop cars to come, and telling my neighbors, who’d come outside amid all the ruckus, that my grandfather had passed away. Walking into the house and seeing that my aunt’s husband had placed Grandpa’s favorite Yankees cap on his head.

I have literally no recollection of the next couple of days. I know I skipped out on the workshop for a couple of days and the director of the workshop was a little pissed at me for doing so. I remember going to the wake and seeing his body in the casket, noting that he looked better in the casket than he had in quite some time. I remember at the end of the wake, literally collapsing in my grandmother’s arms. She had to literally support me as we left the funeral home. It’s the only time in my life that I recall being absolutely hysterical.

All this time later, I know I’ve picked up some of his habits. I use his favorite profanity (“Goddammit to hell!!) liberally. I have quite the taste for Heineken. I burn incense religiously. For a while, I even inherited his hair-trigger temper. Still other things remind me of him: The smell of Old Spice. Garlic (in his later years, he chewed on cloves of raw garlic religiously). George Michael’s song “Praying for Time” (I remember driving home with him and an uncle while playing the cassette single and him asking me if it was John Lennon singing). Whenever I’m in New York and I hear someone playing 1010 Wins, I think of my grandfather. Whenever I watch a Yankee game, I can feel his spirit. He appeared in my dreams for years after he passed.

I try to live my life by a phrase that he repeated to me almost daily: “Michael, in life, always try to do the right thing”.

I wonder what he’d think of my life now. I wonder how my life would have been different had he lived. He certainly had the option: he hid the fact that he had cancer for nearly three years, and never accepted any treatment, I don’t think. The hurt feelings from the arguments and beratements have obviously died down over the years, and I fully accept the fact that even though his methods may have been a little rough (he was an immigrant, arriving in this country in 1971), and even though he may never have said as much verbally, there was a lot of love there.

If you’re gonna talk about anyone who’s shaped the man that I am today, flaws and all, Grandpa would be a the very top of that list.

And after all those years, I still have that watch. The battery’s long since gone, but that and my high school yearbook are the only things that have survived that initial move from home fourteen years ago.

So, all this to say, thank you, Grandpa, for everything you taught me directly and indirectly. I miss you, and I hope you’re relaxing in paradise.