Falling into a nostalgia funk

Lately, I've been in a serious nostalgia funk. It's one of two "funks" I get into a lot, music being the other one. (I might delve a little into the music funk in a subsequent post).

I've been reflecting back on so many different things in my life -- high school, college, post-college work years and family. When that happens, I often find myself on the Internet, trying to find people who were important in my life.

Actually, some of that time on the Internet isn't entirely random. About a year ago or so, I began a "project" to compile a sort of "where are they now" narrative of people who were in my freshman class at a private high school in Milwaukee but did not stick around at the school to graduate (they transferred out to other schools before senior year).

My freshman class numbered 91; by the time we graduated four years later, the number had nearly halfed -- it totaled 47. Three students joined us sophomore year, and one of those left after junior year. That left me with 45 people to chase down.

I'm somewhere between a third and halfway through the endeavor. Along the way, I've come across some very neat stories. Some people, especially with those with very common names, have been difficult, or in one case, almost impossible to find. I'll keep trying, though. I'm tempted to buy a subscription to newspapers.com, which a couple people have told me is a good source of locating things, especially obituaries. (From my online searching, online obits are plentiful and have been around since around 2005 or thereabouts, but before that, it's difficult).

In my search for information on those 45, I've also learned about four deaths -- again, so far. There are seven deaths -- that I know of -- among the 47 graduates, so I realize I'm likely to come across a few more among the 45 as my research progresses. I say "that I know of" about deaths among the grads because some guys have sort of vanished. They never responded to reunion invitations.

I've also recently purchased a yearbook featuring the graduation class of the public school I would have attended if I had not gone to a private school. Most of the kids with whom I went to grade school (also a private school) in Greendale, Wis., attended the village's public high school. It's been many, many years since I've seen any of them -- in most cases, not since we left St. Alphonsus for the last time.

Some of my Internet searches also have included some of the people I have worked with through the years. I've had four employers since I left college -- one radio station, one weekly newspaper (both of those in Wisconsin) and two daily newspapers, one in Iowa, the other in Indianapolis.

Doing this is the best way I can think of to stay in touch with my past ... and remembering people who intersected my life along the way.

The day the email 'dinosaur' kicked me real hard

While putting together this post, a big part of me felt like Rip Van Winkle. I haven't posted anything here since 2011! In that interim, I've been dutifully maintaining a photography blog ... and clumsily launched and tried to maintain a craft-brewery enjoyment blog.

I could use today's post to catch up on some of the above, but instead, email is what compelled me to log a new post here after seven years of idle activity.

I joined the cyber world in 1997, when I obtained my first computer and opened an email account with American Online, much better known today as AOL. 1997 also was the year my oldest son graduated high school, and it was the year The Indianapolis Star -- where I worked from October 1978 to April 2012 -- converted its newsroom editing system to digital pagination.

But I digress. Back to email ... A newsroom colleague was responsible for getting me to check out AOL once I told her I had just obtained my first computer. Kim, who worked on the photo desk, told me she was an AOL member, and she handed me a floppy disk (yes, that was the popular technology for digital storage back then) containing a program to give me a free trial on AOL.

This was back in the days of dial-up; your access to the Internet was dependent on your telephone line, and "access" -- at least in terms of what we experience today, thanks to fiber-optic cable -- was incredibly slow. So getting booted offline inadvertently was a painstaking process. You often weren't able to get back online for 5 to 10 minutes or so.

Sometime after the new millennium, AOL saw that its members were converting to the newer higher-speed access options -- DSL (digital subscriber lines) and cable, and taking their email business elsewhere as well. That meant fewer people viewing the ads AOL used to generate revenue.

So in order to keep members coming to the AOL homepage and using its email service, AOL notified members it was waving the monthly membership fee (which were around $20, as I recall) to members who had high-speed access ... and wanted to keep their email accounts with AOL. I was one of those who didn't want to mess with starting a new email account, and notifying all of my contacts (including bank, credit card, etc.) of the change.

AOL's email service has served me pretty well through the years. There have been occasional annoyances, but I became very familiar with its functionality and adapted to any oddities if or when they developed.

When hotmail, juno, yahoo and gmail emerged, also offering free accounts, I explored those options. I opened an account with yahoo, but really didn't use it much. In the past seven years or so, I've been teased a few times for clinging to what several folks describe as a "dinosaur" in email.

AOL email has been an "issue" for me only one time that I can think of. A few years ago, not long after I left the newspaper, a former work colleague, who had left the newspaper several years before me and eventually launched a one-person own public relations and marketing company, contacted me and asked me to do some document editing for her business. I did that for a few years, but during that period, she had trouble receiving and sending emails at my AOL address.

Mind you, she had her own email system, and on several occasions I suggested that perhaps it was her system that was causing the trouble. She countered that she has had issued in the past with AOL email accounts and that she has had no issues with email from other email servers. So, in the spirit of compromise, I opened a gmail account, and we used that briefly to communicate and exchange documents.

Not long afterward, she decided to cut costs and no longer use me to do editing work for her. I wasn't offended; while I usually found lots of small things in virtually everything of hers that I read, there weren't too many instances when I caught major issues. There were some issues, for sure -- and she appreciated it -- but VERY huge things were few and far between.

The very first instance when my relationship with AOL was put to the test happened a couple weeks ago. I couldn't get into my account. I was flummoxed; at first, I thought it was an AOL glitch, so I waited overnight hoping that everything would be cleared up by morning. Alas, the problem remained the following day, so I got on the phone to try and clear it up.

The conversation I had with AOL people was one of those laborious exchanges that made me want to pound my head against the wall. When I finally reached someone who knew what the problem was, it was about 45 minutes after I first dialed the number. It turns out ... that AOL's "terms of service" -- the agreement I signed off on when I first joined AOL 21 years previously -- prohibited members from having more than 5,000 emails in their various boxes (in box, out box, sent box, etc.). I had well over that amount (the actual number is way too embarrassing).

AOL agreed to give me 24 hours to clean out the mailboxes or, they said, I'd get locked out again. I worked furiously for the next several hours to rummage through all my "valuable" emails (there actually were a lot that were expendable; it was a matter of separating those from the ones I really wanted to hang onto).

I don't think I technically got myself under the 5,000 threshold, but I do think I came within a few thousand. I braced myself for getting booted from AOL again the next day. I told myself if AOL indeed kicks me off after being with them 21 years, it would me ample motivation to put the dinosaur to rest and move on to something more current.

But the next day, I was still able to access my email. And so, I'm somewhat relieved to say I'm still one of those apparently few remaining Internet users who use AOL for their email.

A long overdue catching up

With so much busy work falling onto my plate since I last posted in November, I hadn't even stopped to visit this blog in the interim. Tuesday (March 1) was the first chance I'd gotten in more than three months.

I used the opportunity to re-read my last post, and I had to chuckle ... and shake my head. The last post requires some updates:

*** The mayor who hadn't acknowledged my request when I wrote the original post in November ... finally did so -- in January. Keep in mind that I'd sent him the request in October. He explained in his brief response that he was just now (in January) catching up with email. Now, as mayor, he has to be deluged with email that would require him (or, at the least, an executive assistant) to not only read but also respond to, so this obviously struck me as one of those "what he said" vs. "what he really meant to say." We already know the first part -- the "what he said." So, what he meant to say was "I'm just now acknowledging and responding to email that I'd initially put on the deep back burner when I first opened it three months ago. Hope you're not pissed!" And oh, in his response, he also referred me to someone else. Talk about insult to injury. Why couldn't he have just done that in October? I would have understood.

*** I sent a second email to the contact in the local band to whom I had dropped an inquiry regarding me doing a possible photo shoot of the band's New Year's Eve performance in Fishers, Ind. He did respond to the second email inquiry, first explaining that it's one of several email accounts he has and one he doesn't check in on very much. But he also said, "Let's do it!" Although there were a few bumps in the planning process leading up to New Year's Eve, the short of it was that I did do the shoot, and afterward I posted some of the images at my photo blog, "Photo Potpourri."

*** The theater troupe never officially acknowledged (accepted) my offer to provide them -- free of charge -- images from their performance of a Shakespearean drama in September. And yet ... shortly after the new year (some three months later) it uploaded into a gallery 60+ copies of my images at its website, no doubt obtaining them from a DVD I had burned for the September production's costumer. I didn't howl or complain; the troupe had the courtesy to give me a photographer's credit with the gallery post, which is all I was looking for.

*** I never heard a peep from either the community jazz band or the editor/columnist about the offers of free images for those respective shoots.

Why? ... or why not?

I think everyone has experienced the sensation of human interaction "silence." Huh, you ask? I'm not talking necessarily about unrequited romantic interaction, although that certainly would fall into this category if it applies to you. I'm talking about attempts at simple one-way social and business interaction. You know -- you put out the feelers, and get zilch by way of response.

It's happened to me more times than I can think, as I'm sure it has for many, many others. I'm stopping to compose this post because it seems to have happened to me such an inordinate number of times in the past month or two or three that, well, it bothered the hell out of me, and I figured I needed to vent somewhere. Somewhere privately -- I wasn't about to do this on Facebook, which I've come to realize is a place you cannot put your heart on your shoulder without being dissected every which way but loose ... or without being judged one way or another.

The funny thing is ... none of my recent overtures was of a romantic nature, which, I'm sure, is by far the most common of this type of social slight. To wit:

** I dropped an email inquiry to a mayor in the Indianapolis area, hoping he might be willing to help me get access for a photography quest I really wanted to accomplish. I sent the request three weeks ago. No response.

** In August, a community jazz band performed a free outdoor concert in a park near where I live. I attended, and took pictures. Afterward, I offered the band, via email, copies of my images to post at its website (do you know what's coming up next?) free of charge. I did so because I saw that they posted pictures of their performances at their website. I told them I'd burn the pictures onto a CD and send it to them. All I needed was an address. No response. Again, there were some very decent-quality images involved here. Nada.

** I sent a request to a guy, a front man of a pretty hip pop/soul band in the community, pitching a request to photograph his band's New Year's Eve performance (I figured, New Year's Eve -- what a great photo opportunity, right?) -- and at no cost to him or his band ... other than allowing me free admission to the venue). I even told him in my pitch that he would not have to worry any expenses to feed me for the night. I just wanted to shoot pictures. And, that I would get him a copy of my best images, on CD, at no charge. No response.

** I dropped a note to the editor and a columnist at the newspaper where I work, mentioning that I'd gotten pictures of a marching band of a inner-city public high school at a parade in September. This high school had been the subject of a yearlong -- and much read -- series of periodic columns about the struggles, trials and tribulations going on at the school, a school that -- among other things -- was strapped for cash, lacking seriously in academic success stories and had little community support. When I saw the school represented in the parade with a marching band, it occurred to me that the series we were running must have been doing some good; I would not have seen this a year ago. I offered to provide the editor and the columnist my pictures -- at no cost. No response.

** In September, I shot a ton of pictures of a play performed at an amphitheater near my house. The play -- a Shakespearean drama -- was produced by a fledgling theater troupe, to which I offered copies of my images -- at no cost -- to post at its website at no cost. I did so because I saw that they posted pictures of their performances at their website. No response. These involves some pretty decent quality images, mind you. I made copies of the images for the play's producer, in fact, and he lauded the professional quality of the photos.

OK ... I suppose I can "get" where some people might be suspicious about overtures of this sort, stuff being offered for "free" from someone you don't know -- and fearing there's got to be an angle. In the instances of my photographs, all I asked for -- if the images were used -- was a name credit. I sought only exposure. No cash. You know, something to add to my portfolio/resume. In return, these people -- certainly the play and jazz band -- would be getting something they could not ever again get, anywhere else. Not, at least, for those particular performances.

So, what am I not seeing here? What is the big "scare off" that I simply cannot grasp?

RIP Box Tops' Alex Chilton

A short post to note the passing of Alex Chilton, raspy lead vocalist of of the 1960s pop group the Box Tops, which scored hits with "The Letter," "Soul Deep" and "Cry Like a Baby." He was 59.

Those years probably were Chilton's best in the profession; he went on to perform with Big Star, which brought him less mainstream success but made him a cult hero to other rock musicians, as evidenced by the title of the 1987 Replacements song "Alex Chilton." Big Star's three 1970s albums all earned spots on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest.

"The Letter" undoubtedly was the Box Tops' biggest score. The song, composed by Nashville songwriter Wayne Carson Thompson, reached No. 1 on the Billboard charts in July 1967 and stayed there for four weeks. "The Letter" went on to be recorded by countless musical artists, including the Jefferson Airplane, Joe Cocker (a fabulous rendition) and even a somewhat psychedelic version, in 1969, by the Arbors that charted modestly on Billboard.

"Cry Like a Baby" reached No. 2 in 1968, and the Thompson composition "Soul Deep," in summer 1969, became the Box Tops' last single to hit the Top 40.

Chilton died at a New Orleans hospital after experiencing what appeared to be heart problems.

AOL has more on Chilton and some video and music clips. Click on the link on Chilton's name here.

LYRICS of "The Letter" by Wayne Carson Thompson:

Give me a ticket for an aeroplane
I ain't got time to take a fast train
Lonely days are gone
I'm a-goin' home, because my baby just wrote me a letter

I don't care how much money I’ve got to spend
I’ve got to get back to my baby again
Lonely days are gone
I'm a-goin' home, my baby just wrote me a letter

Well she wrote me a letter, said she couldn't live without me no more
Listen mister, can't you see
I’ve got to get back to my baby once more?
Anyway, yeah, give me a ticket for an aeroplane
I ain't got time to take a fast train
Lonely days are gone
I'm going home, because my baby just wrote me a letter

My baby just wrote me a letter

Battling cancer ... and staying upbeat about it

I'm at work, and probably shouldn't be trying to sneak in this post, but ... given the subject matter, and the the fact that it's fresh on the brain (no jokes solicited), I thought I'd do it anyway.

A work colleague, Carl Sygiel (pictured), has been undergoing treatment for prostate cancer for about a year now. He did the prostate removal surgery, went through a battery of chemotherapy and now is in the final stretch of a seven-week radiation treatment. Even though tests and image screens indicated his cancer had barely entered nodes and spread marginally outside the prostate, his doctors recommended the maximum treatment to avoid taking any chances.

Carl has held up remarkably well; he lost what little hair he had (he's mostly bald) during chemo, but that little bit is coming back now, and the only real "change" is that he's gained weight. Odd thing about that, too, is that his doctors don't want his weight to fluctuate during the radiation treatment. So Carl, who was pretty active in the years before he began tackling the prostate cancer (he's participated in several bike tours in recent years, including at least three or four annual 72-mile America's Most Beautiful Bike Ride in Lake Tahoe, Nev., to benefit the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society). I'm sure Carl is not too thrilled about the weight gain thing, but he realizes it's a small price to pay to ensure he bounces back from this.

The reason I'm posting this is that Carl, who turned 60 last December, has taken an unusual step through all this: keeping friends and family informed with periodic -- and upbeat -- notes about his treatment and progress. His latest arrived today, and it was such a fun read, I thought I'd share it with any of you who might be interested. The accompanying picture is a bit dated; it's probably eight years old.

Here's Carl's update today:

Greetings all:

We are nearly two months into 2010, we've buried the Colts, the snow has buried us, the Olympics are in full swing, Tiger Woods has confessed his sins, and I hope by now everyone has decided how they are pronouncing the new year. Do you say two-thousand ten, or do you say twenty-ten? I don't know that it qualifies as the burning question of the day, but I guess some people do get worked up over things like that. But once again, I digress.

Whatever year this is, it has ushered in the final phase of my three-pronged prostate cancer treatment. I began radiation treatments in mid-January and am cruising down the home stretch. The schedule called for 37 treatments, and I've done 27 so far. It's every day, Monday through Friday, with weekends off for good behavior. The first few weeks, the treatment times were all over the map, but now I've settled in at 8 a.m. It means getting up early, but at least it doesn't interrupt my workday.

I had no idea how all this worked, but I've since learned, and actually, it's pretty fascinating stuff. Radiation beams are like powerful x-rays and they kill cancer cells. Unfortunately, they can also damage good stuff that gets in the way. Things like kidneys and colons and bladders and other, uh.... kinda important organs in the area. Radiation used to be doled out in sort of a one-size-fits all approach. The latest technology is called IMRT or intensity-modulated radiation therapy. The rays are delivered in varying doses and shapes from different directions by this enormous piece of equipment called a linear accelerator or more formally, something that looks like a giant water faucet.

In my case, the faucet head turns around counterclockwise and zaps me from seven different positions. There are 71 zappings each day. Trust me, I've counted them: 13-14-3-7-14-12-8. I've even gone so far as to play those numbers in the lottery. Hey, winning that would be one of those side effects everyone could like.

The rays come through tiny different shaped openings formed by small, lead Venetian-blind-like shades. Imagine putting a stencil on a paper and then scribbling over the top with a pencil. You lift the stencil and the shape is left on the paper below. It could be a circle, or a box or maybe even the state of Oklahoma. The rays race through like Danica Patrick and then crash into the area being treated --- come to think of it, also like Danica Patrick. Most of the radiation is absorbed, some is diffused, which is why all the techs scurry out behind a door that's about 8 feet thick.

The New York Times recently ran a frightening story on what can happen if radiation treatments go awry. Once the oncologist maps out a plan, the machine is programmed and pretty much runs on its own. The therapist is supposed to keep an eye on everything on their own computer screen and as long they aren't asleep at the wheel or sexting somebody, it all runs like clockwork. I brought the article in, however, just to keep everybody on their toes.

Remember the tattoos I wrote about? I've got 'em now. Three specks, one on each hip and a third in the groin. Laser beams come from the ceiling and the walls, hit the tattoos and line you up precisely on the table. I've been told not to lose weight or gain weight during the seven week process because it will throw off the dimensions. Like they don't want you eating a whole pizza before your treatment because your stomach will be bigger and closer to the machine, and they will have to adjust the table. Seriously.

They say radiation is supposed to make you tired and make your skin red. I've experienced a little of both, but for the most part, it's been pretty tolerable. The whole daily process takes about 25 minutes. I've done the math and at the end of the 37 days, I will have been zapped 2,627 times. If I've been glowing with excitement lately, you know why. I meet with the doctor every Wednesday, and when you go to the same place 37 times, you get to know the techs, the nurses, even the women in the office. I brought 'em all doughnuts for Valentine's Day, figuring they didn't have to worry if their stomachs got bigger.

Meanwhile, I'm still making monthly trips to Methodist Hospital for a Lupron shot and a Zometa infusion. That will eventually space out to every three months with a target date to finish of 11/11/11, about a year and a half from now. And of course, there are the daily pills (Casodex, Avodart, calcum, etc). I take about seven a day. It really is a long process, but they run blood tests every month and so far each time, the numbers are good: negligible PSA, good white and red blood cell counts, and whatever else they stick you for.

It's amazing how fast time flies. It's been just about a year since I first went to the doctor and got the news that started this ball rolling. I've been asked hundreds of times by friends, "So how are you feeling?" The answer is "Great," and to be honest, it's a question I never get tired of answering.

carl

A whistle out to Mozart ... and those like him

S o it’s a Saturday morning, and I’m sitting here typing this ... while whistling Mozart.

The great composer is my current obsession, and it isn’t the first time. I’d written a draft of a post for this blog in October that I never finished and, consequently, never posted, that was about the motion picture Amadeus. Which is about, of course, Mozart.

And a little over year before that, I went a solid nine months without listening to any music except Mozart  — not on my car CD player or at home on my computer media player or living room stereo. And to think that when I was a child, taking piano lessons that I absolutely detested, I had to play ... and practice ... so much Mozart. Such began my hate-love relationship with this fascinating composer.

Before I go further, in case you’d like to get in sync with me musically, the music I’m listening to while whistling is “Mozart: The Piano Quartets,” featuring instrumentalists Emmanuel Ax (on piano), Jaime Laredo (on viola), Isaac Stern (on violin) and Yo-Yo Ma (on cello). 

An acquaintance from a classical music discussion group at the business networking site LinkedIn pointed me to this recording about a month ago, and it’s been difficult for me to listen to anything else since. I absolutely adore it, which I’m sure explains why I’m whistling along right now.

Which gets me back to the point: love-hate relationships, or hate-love relationships. 

Most people, when they use or grasp that phrase, think of things that are simultaneous. You know, there’s someone you really love ... for reasons that developed over time in your interaction with him/her/them, but these also are people who tend to hurt you in ways they (and possibly even you) don’t fully understand or appreciate, so ... you keep distance between you and them, whether that distance is physical or emotional.

With me, and in the context of this post, the phrase refers to a “former/current” thing, and hence why I call it hate-love instead of love-hate:

** I used to hate Mozart, but now ... I adore him.

** I used to hate the Electric Light Orchestra’s song “Evil Woman” (and yes, there’s a bit of a story there, too); now I really like it ... and a lot of what ELO has done.

** I detested hip-hop music when it first hit the scene; now, I can abide some of it ... most of it, even. Recently, I even spent an hour plus watching a cable channel documentary on Tupac Shakur and another on one of the HBO channels, the 2009 motion picture “Notorious,” a biopic about the late Notorious B.I.G. (aka Biggie Smalls, real name Christopher Wallace). B.I.G. and Shakur were the coastal focal-point stars of the much-written-about East Coast/West Coast hip-hop feud/war.

** I used to think gardening was something for people who had nothing better to do; for the past five years, however, I indulge the activity quite earnestly in warm weather months.

** I used to detest spicy foods, but now I put black pepper on lots of things, I season my frozen pizzas with hot pepper flakes, love cajun spicing and put hot mustard (if I have it) on my Chinese meals. I will note that despite this turn-around, I still cannot stomach foods prepared with or containing very strong or high concentrations of garlic (e.g., garlic bread) or raw onions. At all.

** I used to think reading fiction was a waste of time. You know — it’s fake, so why bother? So whenever I’d look to find reading material, the books I’d line up would be only non-fiction — history, biographies and such. Alas, for the past 15 years, it’s been largely the other way around, and it opened my door to John Grisham, Patricia Cornwell, Clive Cussler, Lawrence Sanders, Daniel Brown and their ilk. In that 15-year period, I've probably read fiction to non-fiction in a 15:1 ratio ... a ratio that might have to slip a bit because of my reading material of late. The last two books I finished — and the one I'm reading right now (“Open,” retired professional tennis player Andre Agassi's autobiography) — are non-fiction.

You get the idea. I’m sure there are others. Again, characteristic of each item on the list above is that they are all hate-love situations — things I once disliked but I now like a lot. Are there any love-hates I can site, you might ask? Sure.

Foremost are professional sports, with baseball, football and basketball right up there at the top ... primarily because of how the business and commercialization sides of them have transformed the importance and relevance of each into something astronomically beyond what they deserve and, as a result, have warped the reality of so much of our populace.

The sad part is that the vast majority of people can’t and don’t see it. Collectively, these sports-as-a-business have sucked valuable community resources from areas where such resources are far more deserving and needy — education, welfare, education, infrastructure, education, public safety, education, and the arts, to name a few. Oh, wait. Did I mention education? If not, I apologize. Please add that to the list, and send it to the top with a bullet.

Which kind of gets me again back to point (yeah!). Mozart struggled financially in his short life (35 years and 11 months) on this earth. And yet, he amassed a voluminous, and quite stunning, body of work in operas, symphonies, concertos, minuets, quartets, sonatas and liturgical works. Unfortunately, he never enjoyed the wealth that should have come with such profoundly meaningful art; tragically, he was buried in a pauper’s grave. But I bet he would be pleased to know that there are people like me — some 200+ years later — sitting at a fancy, high-tech piece of equipment like a computer and listening to his works on a media player.

Obsessing, enjoying his music ... and whistling while they work.

Note: All of the images in this post are in the public domain and can be found at Wikipedia’s entry for Mozart.