Journal

Now that sanity, and that elusive sense of the ephemeral realizations of equality, reason and scientific thought has returned to the State Capitol in Helena, I have a few questions regarding procedures and protocols.

The Legislature wants us to be able to fully protect ourselves and others, so we no longer have to wear masks, but we can carry guns. What I’m wondering is if I’m at the grocery store and an unmasked person sneezes in my direction and he is not six feet away can I shoot him right there in the produce aisle or do I need permission from the department manager?

He has, after all, endangered me and I apparently have the right to protect myself. Or does this just apply to violent attacks—like a shoot-out on Main Street or a back alley rumble with the Crips or the Bloods? Although I do tend to think that infecting somebody with a potentially lethal disease is a fairly violent act, I’m not sure if an inconsiderate act of an uncaring and mean-spirited individual is deserving of a deadly vigilante reaction.

And yet, somewhere in the backs of the tiny little brains that much of the Legislature seems to possess, there was a sense that while schools and bars are completely safe places to have guns, they won’t be allowed in the Capitol building because that could jeopardize their safety.

Guns in bars and schools bother me but mostly in bars. Bars serve alcoholic beverages that have been known to alter a person’s simple reality. Add guns to the mix and tell me what could possibly go wrong. I’m just not comfortable sitting anywhere near a guy with a pistol setting next to his bourbon ditch. I understand that might be sheepish, so b-a-a-a.

Returning to beat what should by now be a dead horse over the mask issue, Governor Body Slam sees the wearing of masks as being a huge stumbling block to making money, although tax cuts for his wealthy friends can be done from behind masks that will also disguise his snarky smiles as he heaps more misery upon the underclass. He certainly doesn’t seem to have the best interests of the people he’s taken an oath to serve much in mind. When it comes to heeding the advice of medical and science experts, he follows his own moronic instincts.

Remember, he’s the only U.S. governor who believes that “The Flintstones,” was a documentary, and that the six-hundred-year-old Noah didn’t deplete the U.S. treasury by drawing social security entitlements. This guy makes Judy Martz a beacon of light and hope.

Turning to other medical news, the Montana House Judiciary Committee just passed HB 415, sponsored by Rep. Jennifer Carlson (R-Manhattan), that would prohibit hospitals, child care providers, governmental entities, employers, and others from requiring that employees, customers, or others be vaccinated against communicable diseases, or from “discriminating” in any way against those who choose not to be vaccinated. This comes right out of the QAnon playbook and plays into the hands of dangerously stupid people, many of whom now carry guns. I have a pale white spot on my arm from a childhood vaccination against polio. It worked.

People with actual knowledge of such matters are opposed to HB 415. And the dimwits who liken vaccines to Auschwitz, should—if they’re even capable—read some history. Just yesterday, I had a rough day after getting my second Covid-19 vaccine. In no way did it seem like an incarceration in a death camp. Not even remotely.

To even suggest such a comparison does not only show the depth of one’s ignorance, but it serves to be completely disrespectful to the memory of the six million innocent Jews who died in the Holocaust. And yes, it happened.

Rep. Jedediah Hinkle (R-Belgrade), another willing consumer of the Kool-Aid, said that this conspiracy-driven anti-vaxxer tripe is “the most important bill of the session.” Second in line must surely be the one that addresses youth sports in which there might be transgender participation. I’m guessing that third in line must have something to do with legalizing discrimination against the entire LGBTQ+ community. Where’s the progress on behalf of human rights and decency? Who are these repressive-minded people whose lives are not in the least bit affected by some stranger’s sexual orientation?

Weaponizing education against those who are educated has been a favorite pastime over the last four years for about a third of Americans. It doesn’t seem to be abating in Montana—at one time a pleasantly purple state whose alluring moniker, The Last Best Place, has served as inspiration to those who want to keep it that. From the dynamic and progressive Mike Mansfield, we’ve sunk to being represented by Steve Daines, an avowed Trump toady.

The Montana House passed HB 269 which seeks to dismantle local public health authority and replace it with a rule to require elected officials to approve rules and regulations for wastewater. This is a job that has been done by local boards of health and trained municipal staffs for decades—efficiently. Besides trying to fix things that aren’t broken, these yahoos seem to just want to wrest away power from people who actually know what they’re doing.

I’m not sure how wastewater is managed but, since there doesn’t seem to be much of a backlog of it, I assume it’s being dealt with successfully. Beyond suspecting that the wastewater from our house somehow ends up at a filtration plant where it is bottled by a subsidiary of Nestle’s and then sold at convenience stores, I don’t want to know.

I’m satisfied to know that I am competent at a few things. For everything else, there are the Yellow Pages.

But what would a week of law-making have been without an invocation and a moment of silence to honor bigotry, misogyny, homophobia, and racism all wrapped up in the name of the hate-filled Rush Limbaugh, a man who was as deserving of a Medal of Freedom as I would be for Olympic Gold for watching a diving event on television?

And let’s not forget to thank the Legislature for keeping Montanans safe from a group that doesn’t exist, while ignoring those that do, and which pose quite real threats. That’s right, Antifa has been declared a terrorist organization. It is quite possibly the first time since the Middle Ages that a mere idea or concept has been declared an act of heresy.

Meanwhile, the Oathkeepers, Proud Boys, the KKK and any gathering of three with AK-14s and cell phones are upstanding, law-abiding, God-fearing organizations that exist to protect the rights of the evangelical extreme right wing of the crumbled Republican Party.

As has been noted, General Eisenhower was antifa.

And just for good measure, the Legislature is trying to stick its collective nose into the state’s higher education system which, as it turns out, is in violation of the Montana Constitution—a document they have sworn to uphold and protect. Nowhere, however, does that oath suggest that even a cursory reading of that document is necessary.

There are few entities the far-right hates more than NPR and its member stations. They’ve already shown their contempt for divergent ideas, so they propose HB 542, which would defund public radio and prohibit universities from entering into licensing agreements with public radio.

If you don’t like what somebody says, after all, make sure they have no voice with which to say it.

Photo illustration by Courtney A. Liska

Tomato Soup

Many tomato soups strike me as bland and watery. This one is neither. Dare I suggest a grilled cheese sandwich as an accompaniment? This is comfort food in a time of great discomfort.

1/4 cup unsalted butter
10-15 sprigs thyme, tied together
1 medium onion, coarsely chopped
2 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
1/4 cup tomato paste
2 28-ounce cans whole tomatoes
1–2 tsp. sugar, divided
1/4 cup (or more) heavy cream (optional)
Kosher salt, freshly ground pepper
1 tsp. Aleppo spice (4:1 — sweet paprika:cayenne)

Melt butter in a large heavy pot over medium heat. Add thyme, onion, and garlic. Cook until onion is completely soft and translucent, 10–12 minutes. Increase heat to medium-high; add tomato paste. Continue cooking, stirring often, until paste has begun to caramelize in spots, 5–6 minutes.
Add tomatoes with juices, Aleppo spice, 1 tsp. sugar, and 8 cups water to pot. Increase heat to high; bring to a boil. Reduce heat to medium. Simmer until flavors meld and soup reduces to about 2 quarts (8 cups), 45–55 minutes. Remove soup from heat; let cool slightly. Discard thyme sprigs. Purée soup until smooth. Add cream , if using, and reheat.

Dear Sam,

You’ve been gone a long time now, but your memory is for a blessing in so many ways, which might be about the most for which any of us can hope. It has been my blessing.

I not-so-long-ago spoke with your granddaughter, Amy, whose birth I remember. I would have been in my early teens when you and Harriet were blessed with your first grandchild and there was great excitement at your house on Bristol Avenue in Westchester, just minutes west of Chicago.

She’s doing fine. You’d be proud of her. She’s made much of her way in life by representing working people through labor unions. From our too-brief telephone conversation, I could sense that she was well aligned on her family’s political spectrum.

When we spoke, Amy told me how she’d turned down an early opportunity to earn a Master’s degree to accept an internship with the International Ladies Garment Workers Union. She said her mother was not pleased, but Harriet, who I remember as having worked as a seamstress, as had my grandmother, was delighted.

I remember when I got my first union card from Chicago Local 10 of the American Federation of Musicians, at about the time it merged with 208, the Black local. I was pleased to have my ticket, as it allowed me to pursue good jobs for fair pay and decent working conditions; you were border-line ecstatic. It was a coming-of-age moment and you were like the proud Uncle at the bar mitzvah I’ve yet to have.

You might remember our house on 18th Avenue. It was kind of a B-flat, brick split-level on a postage-stamp sized lot in a blue-collar neighborhood. It was where you came to give my sister Jo her weekly marimba lessons. You gave music lessons at Frank and Sylvia Triner’s music store on Roosevelt Road (as well as at schools all over Chicago), but there was no marimba there, so you schlepped your leather briefcase, crammed with manuscript papers, scores, sticks, mallets, a sandwich (tuna salad, wasn’t it?) snacks, and a plaid-patterned Thermos of black coffee the block or two to our house.

From a child’s perspective, that three- or four-block stretch of Roosevelt Road on the West Side was a complete world. You must remember. My dad’s True Value hardware store was there. It was a real hardware store with a wood-plank floor where he sold nails by the pound, cut glass, mixed paint, and threaded pipe for the trades. There was a Ben Franklin, where I would buy my mother a lace handkerchief for Mother’s Day and could add to my baseball card collection, secretly chewing the gum that my mother forbade me to chew. Uncle Joe had his medical practice there. Mr. Wolff, who drove a snazzy red T-Bird, had his photography studio just off the corner of Roosevelt and 17th. There was a pizza parlor and a Chinese restaurant, a coin-operated laundry, and a Rexall drug store. And there was Vondrasek’s hobby shop, the smells of airplane glue and Testors enamel filling the shop in a heady swirl; Mimi’s sandwich shop and soda fountain; Hildebrand Sporting Goods sold guns, brightly colored Rapala fishing lures with menacing treble hooks, and baseball gear, including a Wilson’s Roy Campanella catcher’s mitt I so coveted; Barthell’s dry cleaners, where they blocked men’s hats and did alterations; and the three-chair barber shop with a myna bird whose wolf whistles would redden the faces of passing girls as the customers leaned forward in their chairs for a better look, and where I’d thumb through Argosy magazine, awaiting the butch cut I sported. There was a small corner grocery store where the fresh, in-season produce was placed into brown paper sacks, their prices written in grease pencil, and the meat came wrapped in white paper, sealed with a piece of paper tape. Wisconsin Farms was a deli and fresh dairy with off-street parking. It was there that I would lunch on smoked whitefish and dill pickles, sometimes with a chocolate Yoo-Hoo, and it was there that I redeemed the soda bottles I’d have scavenged in the neighborhood’s alleys for 2¢ each. There was the savings-and-loan, whose philandering president had been a Notre Dame football star, that gave me a Brownie camera when I opened a passbook savings account with a $10 deposit.

And there was Triner’s, my favorite store, where Sylvia (we shared a birthday and celebrated them together with a chocolate soda at Mimi’s; she turned 61 the day I turned 16) gave private lessons on the Hammond organ and Frank taught piano and they rewarded their students with gold stars. There were six or seven teaching and practice rooms in the back of the store; when they were filled, there was a pleasantly noisy cacophony made by trumpets and flutes and clarinets and violins and it sounded like a beehive. There were racks of sheet music with cover pictures of Doris Day and Bing Crosby, Nat King Cole and Rosemary Clooney, and there were bins of LP records and 45s and displays of shiny brass and silver and ebony band instruments, violins, and violas. A sparkling silver Ludwig drum kit sat on a pedestal in the center of the store and Zildjian cymbals—sizzles and rides, crash and hi-hats—hung on painted pegboard behind the cash register. I could listen to records there through clunky headphones like the ones worn by radio announcers and deejays. I’d pretend I was Wally Philips or Dick Biondi as I listened to “Purple People Eater” or “Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polkadot Bikini” or “Chantilly Lace.” Sometimes, I’d find a song I liked on a record and then buy the sheet music for 15 cents and I’d take it home for my mother to play on the Starck spinet piano her parents had given her as a wedding present. Can you believe it? I still have that piano.

Jo had a three-and-a-half octave Musser marimba, its rosewood tone bars suspended over dulled aluminum resonators, and you would sit next to it on the piano bench (I still have that, too, its needlepoint seat having been crafted by my grandmother) giving my sister a half-hour of instruction that usually lasted an hour. I would stay in the kitchen and bang along on a couple of pots with wooden spoons.

My first lesson from you came when I had been assigned to play a drum in the kindergarten pageant at Lindop Elementary School. The drum was a deep, marching-style tenor snare with a painted wood shell and a calfskin head. My mother wanted me to learn how to hold the sticks and play something appropriate for the pageant.

With its sling adjusted to fit me (sort of), the bottom of the drum reached my ankles. You showed me how to hold the sticks in the traditional style and actually wrote out on a piece of pale green staff paper a four-note military tattoo (you might have called it a “ruffle”). At age five, I couldn’t read anything more basic than “See Spot run,” but I mimicked what you played while I stared at the music paper: Flam, stroke, stroke, roll; Flam, stroke, stroke, roll.

Not only could I play a drum, I could read music!

I was your youngest student and within a few weeks of that rather auspicious kindergarten debut, I was taking weekly lessons. Jo had her lesson, with me accompanying her from the kitchen, and then I would have mine.

Dad built a practice pad for me out of scrap wood and a thick square of rubber (it hangs above my office desk) and from Triner’s I got a pair of Ludwig 2B sticks (those I don’t have).

That practice pad was my life for a year or so before I got my first snare drum, a Ludwig model whose “sparkling gold” finish was the percussive definition of kitsch. Guess what? I still have it.

Soon after I had my first complete kit, built slowly piece-by-piece over time, my parents suffered some kind of financial set-back (they never really talked about such things) and we moved to a small, third-floor walk-up apartment on Roosevelt Road, the traffic passing noisily below. You continued to give Jo her marimba lessons, with our new downstairs neighbors erupting into joyous celebration when, after weeks of trying, she finally got through a difficult passage of Brahms’s Hungarian Dance No. 5. (The mere mention of my grandmother’s goulash always triggers that melody.)

Drums were not allowed to be played in the apartment building and I begrudgingly returned to the practice pad. You solved the problem as only Sam Dean would: The Kluzak boy was one of your students and Tommy played his drums in the basement of his parents’ funeral home, which was right on my way home from school, and you had arranged for me to practice there. For the next couple of years I would go the funeral home, check out the dead people laid-out in each of the four viewing rooms, and go to the basement and play as loudly as I wanted among the stored caskets.

“You can’t wake the dead,” George Kluzak would say, laughing as only a mortician could.

I remained your student—off and on—for almost fifteen years.

You were the kind of teacher whose methods, sadly, have gone out of style. You never mollycoddled me (today—would you believe it?—they give out participation trophies) but you coaxed, coerced, cajoled, threatened, yelled, screamed, threw things (sticks and mallets), stormed out of the room, then stormed back in with a renewed sense of purpose. There were times I wanted to cry, but I never would. I’d fight back the tears. You’d light a cigarette, take a deep drag and, exhaling two thick assertive streams of blue-gray smoke through your nostrils, say, “Are you ready?” Then you’d swat the music paper with a drumstick and say, “Again. From the top.” On several occasions you quit as my teacher, claiming that if I wasn’t going to put in the effort to learn then you sure as hell weren’t going to waste your time or my parents’ money.

On those occasions I cried…just never in front of you.

You see, Sam, you were the best teacher I ever had and like all great teachers you had a profound sense for knowing what a student could accomplish and you simply wouldn’t settle for anything less. Your sense of fairness would never have allowed it.

It’s not the way things are done today, but you were building my self-esteem by helping me to be good at something. There were no gold stars for showing up. Trophies went to winners.

I don’t even have to close my eyes to picture you—you with the dark sharkskin trousers, pointy-toed Italian slip-ons, knit shirts and cardigan sweaters. (Your sartorial style was passed down to me when you recommended I buy my tuxedos and band clothes from Smokey Joe’s on Maxwell Street—there was no other place that could outfit an entire band with matching sequined tux jackets off the rack.)

When I first knew you, you towered over me. Of course, your physical stature lessened as mine increased, but you were always an imposing figure. I’m guessing you were around five-foot-eight, and you were very thin. You were dark-skinned, had slicked-back black hair and a long, hawkish nose. I remember your teeth, of which you seemed to have several more than most people; they were nicotine-stained from the ever-present Pall Malls that dangled from your lips. You were incredibly articulate, your words delivered in brisk staccato bursts that seemed fittingly percussive, your tongue charging violently against the backs of those teeth.

I still have the red, three-post, two-pocket binder that I neatly labeled the Sam Dean Book of Drumming. It’s dog-eared and full of hand-written patterns and figures and exercises, with scrawled notes and instructions. There are such notations above a practice routine as “as written”; next to it, the “as played” instructions. You taught me all the basics of swing, blues, bossa nova, the rhumba, the waltz, and the cha-cha-cha; hand-drawn illustrations showed brush patterns, the left hand swishing in a looping, clock-wise circle while the right hand dodged the circle in any number of rhythmic patterns.

With only the rudimentary basics, I started playing with Frank Triner—at your suggestion—as a nine-year-old kid (“Little Jimmy at the drums” read the marquees) and as I grew older I began working in various rock ‘n’ roll bands, small acoustic combos for dances, proms and parties, weddings, bar mitzvahs, graduations and club dates. From week to week, I’d have to give you complete rundowns of every gig I played, demonstrating the rock rhythms I was learning from my friends armed with cheap Silvertone guitars and Vox tube amplifiers and, at your insistence, even singing my chorus parts on “Gloria” (G-L-O-R-I-A) and “Louie, Louie” (A-Lew-ee Lew-I, oh no, Me gotta go, Aye-yi-yi-yi). Talk about embarrassing!

And then I got my first gig playing with a big band. In rock, the drummer must be loud and powerful, but mostly loud; in jazz combos, the drummer’s job is to be rhythmically insistent and display great finesse. The big band thing calls for driving power and finesse. I brought the charts to my lesson and I started playing them for you.

By then I was taking my lessons at your house on Bristol Avenue in Westchester, just a mile or two from my early childhood home. You had a basement studio, paneled in knotty pine with black-and-white photographs hung rather haphazardly around the cramped space. There was that wonderful charcoal caricature of you behind a drum set, your nose drawn like that of an Arab sultan. There were a couple of drum sets (one belonging to your youngest son, Hal, whose life’s story turned so sad), a marimba, a xylophone, a vibraphone, conga drums, timbales, Chinese temple blocks (my favorite), and a closet filled with various hand-held percussion instruments—a batterie of tambourines and cowbells, triangles and finger cymbals, whistles and bongos and castanets (“Everything but the kitchen sink,” you’d say)—all of which I learned to play there.

Do you remember this, Sam?

Anyway, I played through the first chart, or started to, when you stopped me and asked, “What are you afraid of?”

It was less a question than an observation.

“Nothing.”

“You’re playing like you’re afraid.”

“What do you mean?”

“Look. You’re behind the wheel of a 14-piece band and you’re in charge. That’s the drummer’s job and you’re playing namby-pamby like you’re in a little trio. Play! Drive the band!”

I started from the top.

“No! No! No! Play it like you mean it! Be in charge!”

I tried again.

“No! What? Afraid you’ll make a mistake, and everyone will hear it?”

I shrugged.

Sam, you then taught me the most important thing I’ve ever learned in my life; a lesson I’ve tried to apply to everything I’ve attempted since.

“If you make a little mistake and nobody notices, so what, right? No one’s the wiser. But what have you learned? Nothing, not a damned thing. You just play along making the same little mistakes over and over and over because they don’t matter, because you think nobody’s heard them. Play like you mean it. Be in charge. Make every note count. And when you make a mistake, make it a big mistake and you’ll never make it again. That’s how you learn.”

The last time you quit me was bittersweet. You told me and my parents that you had nothing more to teach me which, on the face of it, was a lie. You sent me, the reluctant graduate of the Sam Dean School of Drumming, off to Northwestern University to study with the erudite and exacting Terry Applebaum, and fall under the influence of Gordon Peters and Al Payson—symphonic percussionists with college degrees who’d written scholarly treatises about prehistoric xylophones and inter-tribal drum communications. From then on, I spent my Saturdays in Evanston, with regular stops at Frank’s Drum Shop and Rose Records on South Wabash Avenue along the way, and then a couple of summers, adding theory and ear-training and arranging to my studies. Then I headed off to Interlochen Arts Academy for my last two years of high school to study with Rick Kvistad, whose teaching skills and performance talents were clearly leading him on his way to becoming a percussion legend, and to play with an orchestra every day of the week, along with colleagues Peter Erskine and Clark Chaffee—friends to this day. There, I also played with chamber groups and percussion ensembles and in any number of spontaneous groupings.

On holiday breaks I returned to Bristol Avenue and you and I would go down to your studio and I’d show off.

Do you remember coming to the Oak Park-River Forest Auditorium and, a night or two later, coming to Chicago Orchestra Hall to hear me play with the Interlochen orchestra again? We played a concert program that included Shostakovich’s Fifth Symphony. I had played the xylophone, orchestra bells and triangle parts and you told me how proud you were of me. That really meant a lot, Sam. It really, really did. My parents were proud as well, but they didn’t understand what it took to play those parts, to get to that place.

Only you did.

I went to a few of the concerts of “legit” music you gave with community orchestras around Chicago during my college years. (I’m convinced you became a Shriner just so you could play in the Medinah orchestra. And how appropriate it was for you to join the Masonry, essentially a labor union whose discipline is based on the teachings of King Solomon.) Those were great concerts drawing on the symphonic repertoire, played for free by great musicians in some pretty sketchy, inner-city neighborhoods.

“Playing music is an act of giving, an act of love,” you’d say.

You’d drive us to those gigs, and we’d smoke cigarettes and stop for corned beef sandwiches piled high on rye bread, topped with chopped liver and onions, and drink cream sodas, and then I’d help you set up—everything in its due and proper place, like a line cook prepping his station for dinner service. And after the concerts, we’d go back to your house and we would go downstairs and you’d show me how you had played that xylophone passage, or the snare drum part, or how you “primed” the tam-tam so the attack would sound right on the beat.

“You never shake maracas. You hold them in front of you, parallel to the floor and then tap them with your index fingers. They’ll cut through a full orchestra. A triangle needs to be struck away from the break, it lets the sound out.”

You were always teaching.

Then we’d go upstairs to have coffee and poppy-seed or cheese kolacky at the kitchen table with Harriet, and we’d all smoke cigarettes and talk about politics and unions and civil rights and the persisting horrors of anti-Semitism.

I don’t remember there being a record player in your house, and I can’t recall your ever talking about other musicians or any drummers you might have admired. You worked nights as what you called a “jobbing musician,” meaning that you could do it all: nightclubs, concerts, weddings, parties, clubs, jingles. You probably didn’t have the time to hear much music that you weren’t making.

By the time I last saw you I had quit playing and was making my way as a jazz writer and critic in Los Angeles. We talked about music, of course, and I remember mentioning the great jazz drummer Shelly Manne and how I had come to know him and how much I admired his playing.

“He was always my favorite,” you told me.

“Really?”

“I taught you to play brushes just like him. He was the best.”

I might argue with you, Sam. You were the best.

Photo illustration by Courtney A. Liska

Kolacky (Bohemian Cookies)

4 cups flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1 lb. Crisco
1 small can Pet milk
1 egg, well beaten
2-1/4 tsp. yeast

Combine yeast, egg & milk. Let stand for 10 minutes.
Combine flour, salt & Crisco; work like pie dough.
Add yeast mixture to dough.
Roll in damp cloth & refrigerate.
Roll out into thin sheets; cut into cookies.
Place on ungreased sheet pan.
Top with a scant tsp. of your choice of fruit mixes (Solo brand).
Bake at 400 deg. 20-30 minutes.

As a child growing up on the west side of Chicago, I was afforded no Second Amendment rights.

My father, having served under fire as a Captain from D-Day at Omaha Beach until a third bullet wound landed him in a hospital in Paris for six months, had little use for guns. He would frequently say that he’d seen all the guns he could ever have wanted to see in the war.

For similar reasons, he didn’t care for fireworks displays.

After serving nine years in a “well regulated Militia,” which he called the Army, he had little sense of needing to protect himself from the government he had served.

Our family included no hunters, preferring to buy our animal proteins from the butcher shops along Cermack Road on Chicago’s west side. We loved the pheasant, duck and squirrel brought to us by friends who did hunt, however.

We lived in a compact home on a quiet street, just off Roosevelt Road—one of the busiest thoroughfares in the city. There was a one-car garage with a window placed oddly high, and behind the frame building was a narrow sandbox I shared with the neighborhood cats and where I dug trenches with a rusted yellow Tonka steam-shovel.

One summer afternoon, I scaled the boxes beneath the garage window and opened the cedar chest that contained the remnants of my father’s Army service. The chest had not been declared off limits; in fact, I don’t recall noticing it until that day. There were pleasant and intriguing aromas of wood and wool, oil and mothballs; there was his dress uniform wrapped in crinkly brown paper and there were colorful campaign ribbons and shiny brass pins, loose black-and-white photographs, manila envelopes closed by strings between paper discs, and a stack of onion-skin correspondence with my mother’s handwriting neatly bundled with frayed, brown cord.

These were strange and intriguing things—things I didn’t know existed.

There was also a handgun—an Army-issued sidearm—that I removed from its oil-stained holster and proudly carried out of the garage and down the driveway, its muzzle pointing to the pavement. I remember looking at Dad crouching in the narrow driveway when he looked at me and slowly stood erect, and in a firm and steady voice said, “Stop. Don’t move.”

I froze in my tracks. My eyes met his. I glanced around, looking for my mother and sister who seemed to have vanished. I can’t see them in my memory, although they had been there only moments before.

I hadn’t the time to move before my father had rushed to my side and disarmed me, swiftly dumping the shells from its chamber onto the driveway—their brass casings clinking musically as they bounced on the cement—with a deftness he must have retained from Basic Training.

He picked up the shells, shoved them into his pants pocket and stormed away. I was not yet five years old and I stood there scared and ready to cry. Dad had disappeared into the house and Mom seemed to appear from nowhere, standing outside the kitchen door, my sister clutched in her arms. They stared at me with looks I had never seen, fear and anger deeply set in their eyes.

Suddenly, Dad was back in my view.

“Get in the car.”

I climbed onto the front seat of the faded emerald green Ford coupe. He got behind the wheel, tucked the pistol between his thigh and car’s bench seat and started the engine. He gave my shoulder a comforting squeeze as he turned to back down the driveway.

We drove in silence for what seemed an eternity, though it was only a few minutes. We arrived at a house I didn’t know in a neighborhood of grim, red-brick row houses with no driveways or front yards. Dad pulled to the curb, stuck the gun into his jacket pocket and bounded up the few steps to the house. A fat man in a white T-shirt answered my father’s knock and my father disappeared through the front door. Mere minutes elapsed before he returned to the car, his expression unchanged from that moment in the driveway when he had told me not to move.

“He’s a gun collector,” he said by way of explanation. We drove home slowly, his deep-set, steely blue eyes looking straight ahead.

My parents fought that night, as only my parents fought—a cascading torrent of all the imaginable “what-ifs”.

AN OLD FRIEND OF MINE DIED a couple of weeks ago. In laic terms, he was what could be considered a “gun nut.” He worried deeply about the “what-ifs” that could befall him if he weren’t appropriately armed for every occasion.

I imagine that his biggest death-bed regret was that he never had the opportunity to take up arms against the government, of which he was woefully suspicious. The thought made me chuckle.

His politics were libertarian and his racism slowly emerged in concord with his abandoning a comfortable suburban life for a hardscrabble existence on a patch of arid dirt on which he raised chickens. A one-time business executive had devolved into a racist red neck.

His racism was, if fact, what ended our friendship.

At the time we met, I was developing an interest in hunting and he became my mentor. He taught hunter education and we went hunting once together.

I had a rather romantic notion of hunting—one in keeping with the imagery of Robert De Niro in The Deerhunter—adherence to a “one-shot” philosophy while afield.

Our hunting location was near Paso Robles, California. An abandoned almond orchard to which we had access was home to a small herd of Coastal deer. They were about the size of German shepherds, with dappled buttocks. After spending the day lounging around the pool at our motel, we drove to the orchard, unfolded our lawn chairs, and sat waiting for the deer to come into range. When they didn’t, we packed up and drove to nearby Templeton for steak dinners at A J Spurs Saloon.

It was there that we spoke about gun control, which at the time didn’t allow public carry or the ownership of machine guns or other fully automatic weapons.

And it was there that I saw the emergence of a man who believed that everybody should have as many guns in as many styles as one wants to protect themselves from—you guessed it—the government.

Had he not heard of tanks?

Photo illustration by Courtney A. Liska

Hunter’s chicken (poulet sauté chasseur)

In Italy, there are as many ways to prepare the hunter’s chicken (pollo alla cacciatore) as there are grandmothers. In France, this classic dish is well-defined—with variations not necessarily encouraged.

3-4 lb. chicken, cut into eight pieces
1/2 cup plain flour
1-2 Tbs. unsalted butter

For the stock
Wings, backbone, and neck from the butchered chicken
1 carrot, chopped coarsely
1 medium onion, chopped coarsely
2 cloves garlic, crushed
2 Tbs. tomato paste
2 cups canned beef stock
Trimmed mushroom stems
1 bouquet garni (bay leaf, thyme, parsley stems)

Brown the chicken pieces to a deep color without burning. Add the carrots, onion and garlic and cook until fragrant. Stir in the tomato paste. Add mushroom stems, bouquet garni; cover and simmer for 30-40 minutes.

For the sauce: Prepare and have ready
2 Tbs. shallots, minced
8 oz. white mushrooms, halved
3 Tbs. cognac
1/2 cup dry white wine
2 cups chicken stock
2 Tbs. unsalted butter
1 Tbs. fresh tarragon (1 tsp. dried)
1 Tbs. flat leaf parsley
Salt and pepper to taste

Season chicken pieces with salt and pepper, and coat with flour. Melt butter in a Dutch oven and add the chicken, skin side down. Cook until the pieces are golden-brown. Cover and place into a 350° oven for about 25 minutes. Remove chicken and cover to keep warm.

Sauté the mushrooms in butter over medium heat for a couple of minutes. Add the shallots. After a minute or two, flambe with cognac and cook down. Deglaze with the white wine and reduce. Add the chicken stock and reduce.

Off heat, whisk in some butter. Stir in the herbs. Add the chicken pieces to warm. Serve with rice or potatoes, garnished with a sprinkling of fresh parsley.

It’s been widely rumored that Marjorie Taylor Greene is an imbecile—a dangerous imbecile, but an imbecile, nonetheless.

I first noted that in this space last August when she was in a run-off election in Georgia with John Cowan, a Republican who ran ads during the campaign saying, “All of the conservative. None of the embarrassment.” Cowan, a neurosurgeon and businessman, seemed like an old-school, reasonable Republican whose unwillingness to embrace Trumpian politics cost him the election.

He told Politico, “She is not conservative—she’s crazy…She deserves a YouTube channel, not a seat in Congress. She’s a circus act.”

Even Mitch McConnel has described Greene as a “cancer” on the GOP, although I have suggested that he’s the cancer and Marjorie is just an embarrassing prom-night zit.

While most of her bizarre notions seem too farfetched to even consider, she might be onto something with the whole Jewish laser thing. You know, her theory that we, the Chosen People—however unlikely this may seem considering some aspects of our secular culture—somehow got our hands on some space lasers from the Topeka outlet of Pep Boys (Manny, Moe & Jack) that we launched into the upper atmosphere to zap California into flames.

Jesus, the Jewish kid whose birth coincided with much of the world stopping to count the calendar years backwards, might have been there to direct laser fire. Who really knows about these things?

Forest fires, despite what Smokey Bear might have said, don’t just happen after all. Here’s a new slogan for the National Park Service: “Only Jews can prevent laser fires.”

The thinking (?) behind Greene’s position is that a cabal of Jewish bankers, brokers, and hedge fund managers, along with a passel of unemployed Italian busboys and Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) linemen for the counties, headed by a French winemaker named Baron Philippe de Rothschild, wanted to establish a high-speed rail system that could provide passenger service between San Francisco and Los Angeles, a trip that would take about 17 minutes. Naturally, the most efficient way to establish track beds for this venture is to burn everything in sight and hire illegal immigrants to start laying the rails.

The only reason to find this somewhat plausible is to discover why Elon Musk, the founder of every business that wasn’t founded by Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg or Jeff Bezos in this century, vacated all thirty-seven of his California mansions (they later burned to the ground), and moved to a Texas outpost on the streets of Laredo. He and Marty Robbins built an adobe mission-style house there with dirt floors and an antique Taco Bell sign. They seem to be as happy as you can be in Texas.

I happen to know Elon, or “Mr. Musk,” as only his closest friends call him.

A couple of years ago I was trying to get back into the free-lance writing business. I was also in a coma in a Denver hospital at the time, which may have added some new dimensions to my memory.

I’d heard from a saxophonist and little-known, one-hit rap artist I hadn’t seen in almost three decades. He read about my re-employment plans on Facebook and friended me. Zarf, who goes by Lil’ Zarf when rapping, told me that he was going into space on Mr. Musk’s first voyage to provide a solo sax soundtrack.

Then we talked about a bar mitzvah we had once attended near Springfield, Illinois, where about seventy-five 13-year-old boys in yarmulkes spent most of the afternoon vaulting over the buffet tables, as the 13-year-old girls sat on the sidelines contemplating their futures with such idiots.

Zarf figured I could document the voyage for The National Enquirer or Watchtower, the only news outlets Mr. Musk trusted.

I said I was very much interested, despite my fear of flying—and crashing. Especially crashing.

To help seal the deal, Zarf promised me he wouldn’t rap.

Zarf, Mr. Musk, and I met at a restaurant in Santa Maria, a California coastal town settled by Portuguese immigrants sometime during the final season of Gunsmoke and where there is absolutely nothing to eat but grilled tri-tip beef, Pinquito beans and Dixie cups full of a creamy Cole slaw with celery seeds.

There used to be macaroni-and-cheese, but that fell out of favor.

Even people who live in Santa Maria can only eat tri-tip, beans, and slaw. It’s a law. Or an ordinance. I don’t know the difference.

Mr. Musk’s plans for the maiden space launch for his company, SpaceX, whose stock shares were valued in the neighborhood of $109,033.19 each, far eclipsing the value of Tesla, whose stock was the same per share as the cost of one of the actual cars, were considerably more modest than anything put together by NASA.

Mr. Musk showed us the pictures of our space craft.

It appeared to be a four-man, pop-up blue tent sitting atop what seemed to be about 16-feet of rusted oil barrels that had been welded together. He had bought the tent at Walmart for $129.95, on sale, and had retro-fitted it with the barrels that housed an engine, fuels tanks, an accelerant, and WIFI. Once in space, he enthused, the barrels would fall away, cutting out our cell service, but allowing us to orbit once around Mars, which he thinks should be a democracy administered by Jim Jordan and Matt Gaetz, before we would return to earth pinpointed somewhere between Santa Barbara and Nashville.

When I asked about how we would re-enter the earth’s atmosphere and land without power, he coolly asked, “Have you not seen The Wizard of Oz?”

“S-o-r-r-y. Geesh.”

The trip went well, if one thinks spinning around in a rip-stop nylon tent in outer space with an eccentric billionaire and a saxophonist who played like Boots Randolph (I had forgotten about his mediocre skill set) is something having gone well. After 40 days of “Yakety Sax (Don’t Talk Back)” I kept hoping the 81-year-old Lil’ Zarf would emerge to rap a few choruses of his 2013 chart-topping “Gimme Some Old, Old, Really Old Booty.”

If Mr. Musk could have figured out how to open the tent flap, then only two of us would have landed in a parking lot at a synagogue in Holyoke, Nebraska, where there are no Jews. Yet another metaphysical mystery on life’s immense journey.

As it were, the three of us enjoyed a post-orbit repast of Rocky Mountain oysters, sweet potato fries with a Miracle Whip and paprika dip, and Coors Light, which may or may not actually be beer. The jury is still out.

There was also a relish tray—something anybody under the age of 62 won’t have a clue about.

A couple of years have passed since Zarf, Mr. Musk and I orbited the earth in the tent. Did I mention it had a waterbed, a tapestry depicting the French revolution, and delicately laced throw pillows from J.C. Penney? Probably not.

Anyway, the swearing-in of Rep. Greene and the announcement of her unfounded QAnon theories led me to call my close friend Mr. Musk.

“My people are being accused of setting fires in California with lasers from outer space,” I said. “Can we go up into the stratosphere to investigate?”

Mr. Musk is a man of few words.

“No,” he explained.

Photo illustration by Courtney A. Liska

Santa Maria Tri-Tip

A road trip from Los Angeles to San Francisco, and back, was never complete without stops at one of the many open-pit grill joints that offered tri-tip beef roast with Pinquito beans (I found some canned by S&W at my local Albertson’s) and a crisp diner-like slaw in Santa Maria. Each place—a few of which served mac & cheese as a side—had its own take on the rub. This is mine. In nicer weather than we’re currently enjoying, this cut of beef begs to be grilled over a wood fire.

Rub (enough for a 4 pound roast)
1 Tbs. Kosher salt
1 Tbs. coarse ground black pepper
1 Tbs. garlic powder
1 Tbs. onion powder
1 tsp. cayenne
1 Tbs. dried oregano
1 tsp. dried rosemary
1 tsp. ground mustard seed

Rub the tri-tip roast with the rub described. Wrap in plastic wrap and keep in refrigerator overnight, or for at least four hours. Remove one hour before cooking.
Heat a small amount of oil in an oven-safe pan and deeply sear the tri-tip, fat-side down.
Turn the roast over and place in an oven at 425°.
Roast for 10 to 15 minutes per pound.
Allow roast to rest for 10 minutes before carving across the grain.

There was a time, not all that long ago that, if I grew tired, I would simply find some place to lie down and go to sleep. This was not an expression of sleeping around. It was a simple fact that, like my father, I had no problem sleeping whenever I needed to.

My father could sleep standing up. He acquired this talent as a soldier in WWII when he was being shot at on a somewhat regular basis. Apparently, he could lock his knees much like a racehorse, lean against a wall or a tree and catch some ZZZs. Later in his life, he could sleep in a variety of sitting and prone positions, most notably during evening newscasts of the day’s events.

I, on the other hand, don’t fall asleep watching the news that comes on at 5:30. I wait until the ten o’clock news because it’s local to a place I don’t live (Billings) and reports of the current rodeo standings really don’t interest me all that much.

I’m scheduled to soon become 70—an age about twice what I thought I would ever attain considering the lifestyle I chose to pursue when I was about 18. So eager was I to experience every chance, opportunity or possibility, I taught myself to sleep a mere three hours each night. Why, I reasoned, would I want to spend a third of my life sleeping when eternity awaited me? When I lived in New York, I would retire after work at 3 am and awake to watch reruns of “Rocky & Bullwinkle” at six. This was a purposeful use of one hour each morning.

It was only when we moved to Montana (I was 42) that an extra hour appeared in my sleep routine. I assumed it had something to do with the altitude.

But back to sleeping around.

I was at Gatwick Airport in London in 1977, awaiting a flight to Los Angeles, when some sort of labor dispute put a stop to air travel. I was traveling with Geri and for three days we wandered aimlessly around the terminal, sleeping on the cold tiled floor with our heads resting on carry-on bags.

I thought of it as building character, much like wearing a felt hat in the rain. Geri was more than eager to move on to Scotland by train.

Now that I’ve grown older, sleep has become a lot more involved and demanding.

The litany begins with the damage done to my ulnar nerve in my left arm. Being right handed, I assume this was caused by leaning on bars, back when there were still ashtrays. The ulnar nerve is part of the brachial plexus system and gets its name for its proximity to the ulna bone. Fascinating, huh? That nerve starts in the neck and travels through the shoulder and down into the wrist and fingers.

In my case, the ulnar nerve meets my carpal tunnel at the base of my hand, before numbing my pinkie finger and the aforementioned tunnel.

There are surgical options for both of these conditions. A surgeon I spoke to about the ulnar problem, in a moment of refreshing candor, advised against it because he said that a lot of the time it doesn’t work.

Carpal tunnel surgery has a better success rate, but I’ve been advised that I’ve yet to suffer from the syndrome badly enough so it’s really not an option. Why is this not good news?

The first steps in my bedtime routine involve taking a handful of pills to deal with my ailments as I sleep—only one of which is supposed to help me sleep. It doesn’t. Next comes the challenge of removing the knee-high compression socks that keep the veins in my legs from decompressing (?) during daylight hours. Putting them on in the morning is so arduous a task that I frequently fall awake reading for an hour or two before getting out of bed.

The nightly routine continues with the slipping on of the elbow brace—an expensive article of medical fashion that seems only to make the inside of my elbow sweat. Next comes the semi-rigid wrist brace which tightens with a boa constrictor’s grip via three tabs of Velcro. The brace was manufactured in China. A label warns against ironing it. For the life of me, I don’t know why one would.

I’m glad that I don’t have nerve or tunnel ailments in my right arm and hand. If I had to wear braces on both wrists, I’m not sure I could muscle up enough strength or finger-curl to pull up the covers.

I used to smoke cigarettes, then cigars, then cigarettes again. My lung problems—caused by a rare disease called Mycobacterium kansasii—are unrelated to my inhalations of tobacco for half of my lifetime. I’m certain they didn’t help, however. I enjoyed smoking, although I would advise that others not start. Most all of my friends are ex-smokers, but I can practically guarantee that if any one of them noticed that their “use by” date was Thursday, each would buy a carton and chain-smoke until, well, sometime on Thursday.

I have sleep apnea, a potentially serious sleep disorder in which my breathing repeatedly stops and starts. That does strike me as serious, if not downright deadly. To stave off death for as long as possible, I have taken to sleeping with a contraption called a CPAP, an acronym for what the machine provides: continuous positive airway pressure.

The machine features some tubing that wraps around my head like a halo designed by a committee. It’s connected to a humming device by a flexible hose. There’s a soft-plastic thingy that covers my mouth and nose. The whole thing is secured with straps and magnets and Velcro.

It’s like sleeping in full scuba gear, minus the flippers.

To keep me tethered to machinery, I now have oxygen which is delivered through forty feet of a sinister-looking iridescent green hose that seems to be a self-coiling trip wire. They still haven’t delivered the adapter hose to allow me to use it in conjunction with CPAP, but I’ve been assured it’s on the way.

Oh, goody.

The indoor unit is about the size of a clothes hamper with casters. When you first turn it on, it lets out a deafening shriek before settling down to the quiet rumble of a ’59 Buick. The portable tank is in a shoulder bag, designed to look like a drummer’s stick bag, except for the plastic tubing that connects the bottle inside to your nose, which announces to the world that you’re no longer adept at breathing and to not light a match anywhere close. The six bottles they delivered are still full because I’ve yet to venture out of the house since having started to inhale manufactured air.

With all the accoutrements that accompany me to bed these days, I’m afraid that I might spill a glass of water in the middle of the night and be electrocuted.

But the good news is that I was recently diagnosed with essential tremor disorder, a neurological condition that causes my hands to shake rhythmically—but only when I’m doing something active, like using a kitchen knife or eating soup. I don’t know what’s so damned essential about these tremors, but there are both medicinal and surgical remedies.

The good news part is that Scotch is also a remedy. Works like a charm.

Photo illustration by Courtney A. Liska

A Buck Two-eighty Soup

I love soup, and like most cooks, I can craft several from the odds and ends lurking in the recesses of the refrigerator and pantry. They usually take about 20-30 minutes from start to finish, and are almost always tasty and nutritious. They are also inexpensive, hence the name: my father’s stock answer to how much something cost that he didn’t think was anyone else’s business.

I always start with small amounts of chopped onion, carrot, and celery (mirepoix) as a base, sauteed for a few minutes in equal amounts of butter and oil. Sometimes I add some minced garlic. Then I start the adding the fun stuff. A small potato, peeled and cubed; a leek if I have one; a mushroom or two, chopped; a handful of torn spinach or salad greens; whatever. Don’t get carried away, however. Add only stuff you can identify.

From the freezer, I grab a few tablespoons of peas, corn and/or Lima beans and add them to the pot. Then I add 3 cups or so of water, a tablespoon of chicken or vegetable base, and maybe a 1/4 cup of uncooked rice or orzo. A can of white beans is a welcome addition. My favorite herb is thyme, so I add a couple pinches, along with a bay leaf (if I remember), salt and pepper. Top with a favorite cheese or some oyster crackers.

The first sign of trouble came early Wednesday morning when the God-less Democrats filed into the Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle in Washington, D.C. The fact that they were accompanied by congressional leaders called Never Trumpers and RINOs—the two branches that remain of the embattled Republican Party—was only a clever ruse to mislead the American public. Even the whole St. Matthew thing is a bit suspect. A repentant tax collector, Matty somehow became the patron saint of civil servants, many of whom work for the IRS. Ha!

And then, on the Capitol steps where Proud Boys made their stand contesting the November election, there was a couple of hours of pomp and circumstance—a Shakespearean phrase meaning an “ostentatious display of ceremonial grandeur with oddly dressed pop singers and military bands.” Included were some prayers, songs, poems, and speeches—but very few dirty jokes. A utopian future was promised by all. Then the television cameras turned their focus onto a fleet of limousines filled with—you guessed it—liberals, most of whom live in the Hollywood Hills, Beverly Hills, or other hilly places in Southern California where property taxes tend to approach six figures and the swimming pools are filled with Perrier.

At the head of all this political folderol was Joe Biden, a commie-socialist pinko if ever there was one.

Sure, he looks harmless enough, hiding behind that blue tie and black topcoat, but did you happen to notice his squinty little eyes? Where were the aviator sunglasses he used to wear when he worked for the foreign-born B. Hussein O.?

After what seemed like a whole day of the ceremonial transfer of political power, Comrade Biden then signed what seemed like a ton of documents. He signed seventeen so-called “executive orders” with what appeared to be fountain pens rather than using the Sharpie left behind by T****  in the top drawer of the Resolute desk. He never held up any of the documents for the American people to see, which indicates one of two things: 1), he didn’t do well at Show & Tell in elementary school, or 2), he doesn’t want the American people to know what’s going on.

I think it’s the latter. Whatever happened to the promised transparency?

And of course you noticed that Bernie Sanders was there, sitting by himself with his back to the wall and wearing a down jacket and mittens so typical and emblematic of the proletariat class. He was clutching a manilla envelope with a suspicious-looking (as in foreign) postage stamp that was rumored to enclose a speech he wrote entitled, “Free at Last, Free at Last! Everything You’ll Want Is Free at Last!”

As the in-coming Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Bernie, whose inaugural image has become a meme (which I don’t even think is a legitimate word) has pretty much made most of the U.S. Government and all of Wall Street, including the janitors who sweep up the ticker tape at the end of each trading day, nervous as all hell. With the mere tap of his gavel, he’ll be able to turn himself into the congressional equivalent of Robin Hood—taking back trillions from the one percent to provide free school lunches for poor children and other things that really, really rich people hate.

It is Bernie who will control the purse strings of a government practically guaranteed to quadruple in size over the next four years as the private sector diminishes to a collection of dead-end service industries with minimum-wage jobs for those under-served by an educational system rendered useless by Betsy DeVos. Pretty soon, Bernie will help devise a national budget that will provide a shovel for every citizen on which to lean as we rebuild our roads, sewers, bridges, sports arenas, and drive-in movies, now that we’re going to have to social-distance for at least eight years.

While this new approach to operating government might sound like a bunch of free handouts, the truth is that each citizen will actually have to show up at the job site to lean against a shovel for eight hours each day.

Mind you, this is no handout.

President Biden, late Wednesday night, removed the portrait of Andrew Jackson from whom his predecessor drew great inspiration. Instead of the expansionist author of the Indian Removal Act whose legacy was the Trail of Tears, a portrait of a fat guy who believed in science, enjoyed flying kites and establishing democracies now hangs in the Oval Office. (For the record, Joltin’ Joe bruised his thumb hammering the picture hanger into the wall.) From a certain angle, Benjamin Franklin, an American revolutionary who founded a retail five-and-dime store franchise and was the first to suggest that his portrait appear on the $100-bill, looks a tad like Friedrich Engels, the socialist revolutionary who partnered with Groucho to write a comedy manifesto, minus the beard.

In other interior news, Biden has selected busts of such leftist radicals as Cesar Chavez (not the Argentinian), Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., Robert F. Kennedy, Rosa Parks and Eleanor Roosevelt—each renowned for their championing the causes of fairness and justice—to adorn the nooks and crannies of his office.

Damn commies.

He’s also taken down the gold-weaved symbols of the T**** bourgeoisie that celebrated the ruling of the eighteenth century.

Also, there are now portraits of the anti-American Franklin D. Roosevelt (socialist), Abraham Lincoln (abolitionist), George Washington (naturalist who saved a cherry tree), Thomas Jefferson (anti-Federalist and wine enthusiast) and Alexander Hamilton (the hip-hop star of a Broadway show to which admission to a balcony seat costs about 80 of the bills on which he’s depicted).

Many of the above were also Freemasons, which suggests a really sinister government reality shrouded in secrecy with oddly bizarre handshakes, rituals involving goats, and funny hats and aprons that suggest an allegiance to Ukraine, Belarus and the south Jersey shore.

Biden is not a Mason. He is a member of the Trilateral Commission, a non-governmental, non-partisan discussion group founded by David Rockefeller in July of 1973 to foster closer cooperation between Japan, Western Europe, and North America. They meet annually at the Bohemian Club near San Francisco to walk around naked and urinate against giant redwoods.

I tried to warn you. This Joe guy is a vicious, blood-thirsty commie who wants to take prayer out of the schools and make granola and broccoli America’s national foods. He does, however, wear a Rolex watch. He’s also a scratch golfer who has yet to play a single round in his Presidency.

And guess who’s helping advance his red-tinged agenda? The Carters, the Clintons, the Obamas, and George W. Bush.

Laura wants no part of it.

Photo manipulation of two old Jews and a dog by Courtney A. Liska

A Winter’s Meal

I’ve been making this onion tart for as long as I can remember. It is like my paternal grandmother’s, but I think I might have copped it from the NYT International Cookbook. Whatever, it’s delicious. I like to serve it with a cucumber salad and some warm rye bread.

Onion tart

2 Tbs. unsalted butter
4 medium onions, cut in half and diced
A sprinkling of granulated sugar
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
3 large eggs
1-1/4 cups heavy cream
A pinch of freshly grated nutmeg
1/3 cup finely grated Gruyère
1 partially baked tart shell in a 10-inch porcelain quiche pan or a 10-1/2- or 11-inch metal tart pan

Heat the oil and butter in a skillet. Add the onions and sugar, season with salt and pepper, and sauté over medium-high heat, stirring frequently, until lightly browned. Lower the heat and continue to cook the onions until soft and evenly browned, stirring frequently, another 30 to 40 minutes; you may need to add a little more oil. When the onions are done, transfer them to a strainer and drain.
Heat the oven to 375°F. In a bowl, whisk the eggs and cream. Season with 3/4 tsp. salt, a scant 1/2 tsp. pepper, and the nutmeg. Add the drained onions and half of the cheese and blend thoroughly. Fill the prepared tart shell with the onions and custard. Top with the remaining cheese and bake until the tip of a knife comes out clean and the top of the tart is puffed and brown, 40 to 45 minutes. Let cool for at least 15 to 20 minutes before serving.

Cucumber Salad

1 shallot, minced
1/4 cup sour cream
1 Tbs. white vinegar
1/2 tsp. dried dillweed
1 garlic clove, grated
1/2 tsp. kosher salt
Fresh ground black pepper
1 large English cucumbers

Mix dressing ingredients. Add sliced cucumbers.

For a long time now I have been under the assumption that medals were awarded to those esteemed for acts of courage, heroism and valor, as well as to those Olympic athletes who can run faster than their nearest competitor from Belarus and survive the performance-enhancing-drug tests that follow.

I have a medal. Unlike my father’s Purple Hearts, mine is not to honor any act of courage, heroism, or valor. Neither is it for my athletic prowess, which would by now find me unable to outrun an inanimate object.

No, my medal is a participation medal awarded in the days before they became known as that. Today, they are as common as dirt and are awarded to anybody who regularly shows up for no particular reason. “Last place in the standings? Good job. Have a medal.” “Eliminated in the first round of the spelling bee? ‘Fig’ isn’t that hard to spell, but OK, here’s a medal.”

Unlike Trump, kids know when they lose.

Geri found my medal in a box in the garage and asked me why I had never told her of my great medal-winning accomplishment. I told her that it wasn’t much of a story. It was an Award of Excellence for having competed in the American College Theater Festival in 1971. I was a part of a writing/performing team that put together a rock ‘n’ roll adaptation of Aristophanes’ “The Birds.” It was topical, campy, colorful, musical and loads of fun, and it was chosen to be the first show of the competition. The festival itself was the first event held at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Arts.

It was a very heady week in Washington, D.C. The band component of our show performed at Ford’s Theater, which, as the site of Abraham Lincoln’s assassination, may be the most historic place I’ve ever been. During a break in an encore performance at the National Press Club, I accidently flicked a cigarette ash into the martini I was drinking while talking to Eric Sevareid, the erudite political commentator on the CBS Evening News.

We were chauffeured around for a few days in black stretch limos—I actually arrived late because two days before we were to leave Cleveland for Washington, I had to detour to Chicago to fail my draft physical. We stayed at the Hay-Adams, and one night we dined at the famed (now a parking lot) Sans Souci restaurant with a host who seemed possibly to be the majority owner of our nation’s capital.

(He also arranged for a private tour of the then-closed medical section of the Smithsonian Institution. I had expressed an interest in seeing a preserved human leg infected with elephantiasis I had read about, and he didn’t want me to be disappointed. This man could pull some strings.)

Anyway, Aristophanes’ “The Birds” failed to impress the jury as much as it did the Cleveland Playhouse audiences where we subsequently ran for a few SRO months.

Today, my bronze medal hangs framed with a green velvet background in our dining room. Several times a day I am reminded that we lost. It’s humbling.

Although Trump has managed to turn most of everything he’s touched into dangerous folly, some of his choices for the Presidential Medal of Freedom are, if nothing else, just kind of peculiar. Considering that there are no restrictions on who he selects to receive the nation’s highest civilian honor, he can stand in a schoolyard and hand them out like cheap cut-outs on Valentines’ Day should he please.

Obviously, rich donors to his campaigns and his failed businesses are rewarded first. And next, those of his staunchest supporters are rewarded, including such egregious toadies as Devin Nunes and Jim Jordan who are about as deserving as Pol Pot would be for a humanitarian commendation. Rush Limbaugh, the provocateur of the racist, hysterical right, hasn’t even managed to win a Peabody Award. And yet there he was in the U.S Congress accepting his Medal of Freedom during a State of the Union address that sadly illustrated our state of the union.

I thought it odd that Tiger Woods received one, back when he made his comeback to win the Master’s. His winning wasn’t particularly brave or heroic—it wasn’t as if he had snatched a drowning child from Augusta National’s swimming pool, after all. He managed to win a four-day golf tournament that, between purses and endorsements, places him in the suspicious company of Jeff Bezos.

Last week, more golfers joined the ranks of American freedom fighters, despite two of them being foreign nationals (not that there haven’t been other foreign awardees) and one of them long dead. But considering Trump’s disdain for foreigners, it surprised me. No, it didn’t. Nothing surprises me anymore.

We’ve known all along that Trump was forgoing his love of golf to run the country. Well, that didn’t pan out so well, but I suspect that the soon-to-be ex-President wants golfers to accompany him to the awaiting bunkers, armed with sand wedges to fight insurgent caddies.

(I once placed thirty-sixth in a field of forty in a golf tournament. At the time, I wasn’t so much worried about freedom as I was of not missing a fifth putt on any given hole.)

I’m not of fan of country music or bluegrass. I have nothing against it, really (although my medical record at UCHealth in Denver does list country music as an allergy), I just like other music better. So, for me to have even heard of Ricky Skaggs and Toby Keith is a testament to their success. Good for them. I’m guessing that they are nice guys who love their children, don’t kick dogs, and have mastered the necessary nasal twangs required by their professions.

But I can’t quite imagine that their abilities to entertain line-dancing audiences with snap-buttons on their plaid cowboy shirts go much toward advancing the cause of freedom or helping create a lasting peace. Lots of fun? For many, absolutely!

Of course, I could be wrong. I frequently am, as Geri reminds me.

I’m also not much of a football fan which, along with my disdain for songs about pickup trucks and divorce, makes me somewhat un-American. I’ve nonetheless learned over the years that the bellicose Bill Belichick is nobody I would want to meet. He’s been caught and fined for cheating with his New England Patriots, all the while defending quarterback Tom Brady from charges of his own infidelity to the rules of the game.

Not that it matters, but Coach Belichick earned a little of my respect this week for refusing the freedom honor offered him by Trump in the wake of the January insurrection.

There are those who will shoot themselves in the foot to get a Purple Heart.

And there are those who won’t.

Photo Illustration by Courtney A. Liska

Pork Chops alla Bamonte’s

If you’ve ever eaten at the red-sauce Italian restaurant Bamonte’s in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and not had the joint’s pork chop with cherry peppers, you’ve missed something special. I served my take of this dish from time to time at my Montana trattoria, Adagio. The secret is in the brine.

2 (1-1/2″thick) bone-in pork chops
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
3-4 Tbs. olive oil
6 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
12 pickled cherry peppers, halved
1/2 cup dry white wine
1/2 cup veal or chicken stock

Brine the pork chops overnight. Add to four cups of water, 1/4 cup kosher salt, 2 Tbs. dark brown sugar, 1 tsp. black peppercorns, 1 bay leaf, and 1 sprig of fresh rosemary. Bring mixture to a boil and allow to cool completely before adding the chops.

Heat oven to 450°. Rinse and dry the chops before seasoning with salt and pepper. Heat 2 tbsp. olive oil in an oven-proof skillet over medium-high heat. Fry chops, flipping once, until browned, 4 to 6 minutes. Transfer pan to oven; roast until pork is cooked through, 14–18 minutes. Transfer chops to a plate and cover. Return pan to medium heat, add remaining oil, garlic, and peppers; cook until garlic is golden, 3–4 minutes. Raise heat to high, add wine and stock; cook until reduced by half, 3 to 4 minutes. Spoon sauce and peppers over the chops and serve.

And then suddenly, just like magic, I was $600 richer.

SIX HUNDRED DOLLARS!!! OMG!!!

Even to the least contemptuous members of Congress—each of whom is paid $174,000 per year, plus bribes and kickbacks—that figure is apparently an example of what is a lot of money for your average American. At last, I’ve been led to believe that with such an increase in my bank balance I’m suddenly a member of the elite.

With such new-found wealth at my disposal, it seemed like a good time to weigh the various ways I might spend it.

Not to ignore the obvious—food, utilities, car repairs, insurance, medical care—but I want that new-found wealth to be discretionary, to be spent willy-nilly on the luxuries enjoyed by my now-fellow one-percenters.

I might feel more comfortable with my sudden wealth if I dressed more like the other guys at Club One-Percent, now that the venerable 21 Club has closed for good. A new suit, perhaps, and a cashmere sweater for those casual days when chinos seem appropriate.

Brooks Brothers is a reputable men’s clothier and for just $998 (sale price) I can get a Madison Fit Stretch Wool Two-Button 1818 Suit. I don’t know exactly what that means, but the suit looked pretty nice on a guy thirty years my junior. Of course, I’ll need a dress shirt with French cuffs ($75), diamond cuff links ($400), a silk necktie from Passaggio Cravatte ($160), and Brando Semi-Brogue Oxford shoes from Paul Evans ($399). For casual days, those chinos will cost in the neighborhood of $150; that cashmere sweater, a mere $223.

No wonder I feel so impoverished buying a pair of jeans from Costco for $19.

My new-found wealth should allow me to take up golf again. I played Hillcrest Country Club in Los Angeles once and found it to be much to my liking. (Milton Berle was having lunch at the next table.) Founded in 1920 as an alternative to other clubs that didn’t allow Jewish members, the initiation fee today is a mere $185,000. My game would probably be passable there, as the average age of members is 80—each one a pedigreed alta cocker.

Obviously, there are monthly fees. But, as I’ve heard some say, “If you have to ask, you can’t afford it.”

Speaking of affordability, one advertisement I’ve being seeing recently announced that flying hither and yon on private jets is finally affordable. How affordable these luxurious flights are is difficult to ascertain. Skipping around the various websites to hundreds of references in search of pricing led me to believe that perhaps “finally affordable” might apply only to those who don’t have to ask, or at least have a black American Express card—that card with a credit line that allows for the easy purchase of islands, yachts, and helicopters.

I’m looking into making those purchases, although I would prefer a half-mile of private beach in Malibu, a reasonably short limo ride to Hillcrest.

From what I could determine, the easiest way to fly around the country in luxury would be to become a profiler in the Behavioral Analysis Unit (BAU) of the FBI on “Criminal Minds.” My favorite part of the show was whenever the agent leading the far-flung investigations in crime-ridden suburbs of Topeka says, “wheels up in thirty.” And the end is always good, as well, when everybody is having cocktails and playing chess, while the narrator reads pithy quotes from Thoreau, Proust, or Groucho Marx.

The super-rich, of course, don’t stand in lines to deal with the pesky TSA, which is why they flit about the world in private jets. They also don’t own Barcalounger chairs with cup holders, or their own bowling balls. What they do share in common is the ownership of influence, which may come in the form of politicians and others charged with public service. It used to be that only members of the organized criminal class owned police captains, judges, and senators—the pezzonovante, as Michael Corleone would say—because nobody else really needed them.

That’s changed, hasn’t it?

Like any of the things mentioned above, I doubt $600 worth of bribes would go too far toward the purchase of unbridled and loyal influence.

I’ve been told that some of the powers-that-be have advised Americans to use their windfalls to start businesses. Short of selling beaded necklaces and trinkets from a blanket on some urban street corner during tourist season, I can’t think of any business start-up one could fund with $600.

Hell, even the Cash Cow Hot Dog Cart will set you back more than three grand, plus delivery.

And besides that, there have been countless, well-established businesses that have haven’t been able to weather the storm brought on by this pandemic. It doesn’t seem like there’s a lot of opportunity on the current business front.

For anyone to suggest that we take $600 and make investments in our futures is about as cynical as one can get. I would imagine that such advice comes with a full serving of condescension and a pat on the head.

My advice is to treat yourself to some small luxury that will ease some of the pain of the last ten months.

Photography by Courtney A. Liska

Soupe aux Choux (Cabbage Soup)

This is my variation of the classic French cabbage soup. Fresh cabbages are blanched, sliced and cooked with smoked sausages, carrots, onions, and chicken stock. The chunky pieces of cabbage and sliced sausages give this hearty soup its character. The soupe au choux, typically made with pork belly, is one of the most iconic French soup there is.

1 medium size cabbage (Savoy or white cabbage)
8 cups of homemade chicken stock or water
1 “horseshoe” of smoked sausage, sliced
1 medium carrot, cut into chunks
1 onion, halved
3 cloves
1 Tbs. butter
salt and pepper
4 slices of bread, toasted and cut into chunks

Quarter the cabbage and place into a pot of cold, salted water. Bring to a boil, then drain and rinse under cold water. When cool enough to handle, coarsely cut the cabbage into chunks. Melt the butter and add the carrot and one half of the onion, chopped. After a minute or two, add half of the cabbage. Layer the sliced sausage on top and nestle in the clove-studded half onion. Cover with the rest of the cabbage and add the chicken stock and season with pepper. Cook over low heat for an hour or so. Serve with the toasted croutons.

The call came Saturday. It was not good news, but it was what spurred me to jump into action to prove—once and for all—the efficacy of Jewish penicillin. I’ve concocted this widely recognized panacea countless times, but I didn’t know how effective it might be against the Covid-19 pandemic.

It was a call to action.

I’ve been making chicken soup for nigh onto 50 years. I don’t really have a recipe. I just recall how my grandmother used to make it and go on from there, although I doubt she used leeks.

I was prepared to take copious notes from this latest batch to forward to Tony Fauci. (I’ve dropped the honorific and adopted the familiar version of his given name ever since sending him an email wishing him a happy 80th birthday.) I placed my order for the necessary ingredients and met the young delivery woman who didn’t seem to need a coat in 22° weather. Once in my kitchen, I unpacked the bags and learned that the supermarket had, apparently, run out of chicken.

No chicken? How does something like this happen? What kind of a world do we live in?

My efforts had to be delayed and so, after finally obtaining some chicken, I set to work early Tuesday. The stock was made, and the shaped bread loaf was resting under a white towel. I had only another hour or two to finish the soup, and bake the bread. I needed to complete this latest batch to see if it worked and then forward the double-blind test results to Tony.

The cellphone dinged and I heard the news that my soup was too late to test. Our very dear friend Eve Art had succumbed to the virus Covid-19. We are beyond sad. Devastated, in fact. At times like these, people frequently claim that there are no words and then they continue to talk.

I’m one of those people.

It is sadly ironic that Eve, who, along with her husband Mike, worked tirelessly toward providing comfort and grace to the guests they welcomed at Chico Hot Springs, would fall victim to a disease that is still thought to be a hoax by the least thoughtful of people. There was nothing stuffy about their hospitality, and there was no shortage of humor. (She told me once that she continued to see Mike after their first date because “he was funny.”) They worked to provide safe harbor, good food and good times. They cared about the well-being of others.

The last time I spoke with Eve was one day last week. She was angry that some people were still ignoring the mask mandates and still not practicing safe-distancing. She was not one to suffer fools gladly. She told me she couldn’t wait for all this to return to normal so we could all go back to having fun together. And give each other hugs again.

She also was eagerly looking forward to January 20, 2021.

Eve was born to a well-to-do family in Czechoslovakia. Their wealth diminished considerably when they had to flee Prague, with only what they could carry, to Paris. Later, the family arrived in New York and Eve grew up on Long Island. She mourned the fate of her cousins who perished in the violence of the Holocaust. She attended college at Adelphi University in New York, where she met Mike. Moving to Cleveland to start their married life, she earned her master’s degree at Case-Western Reserve University. It was there that she began a career in elementary education.

Eve was multi-lingual, an avid reader, a devotee of concert music, opera, and Elton John. She was outspoken on most any subject. She could be demanding, but I believe at its root was a sense of her wanting to draw the best out of people, helping them to be the best they could be. It’s what the best teachers do.

Education was a top priority for Eve, writing to me once saying, “I think geography, spelling and legible handwriting should be mandatory, grade 5 through one’s lifetime.”

She went on to write, “When we moved to Montana, relatively smart Cleveland kids asked us if we needed passports. When we settled here, relatively smart Montana kids asked us where Ohio was.”

For many years, Eve and I would attend Bozeman Symphony Orchestra concerts on Sunday afternoons. She always came prepared, knowing the program and spending the day before listening to recordings of the music we were going to hear. After the concerts, we’d stop on the way home so she could get that day’s New York Times.

Eve savored life in many ways. We missed Passover and Hanukkah this year, hence the chicken soup, and she enjoyed many a Bohemian meal I would prepare from my memories of my grandmother’s cooking: bread dumplings (knedlíky), sauerkraut (zeli), and marinated beef (svíčková na smetaně). It reminded her of her family, she told me. One time many years ago, she and Mike had just returned from France where they had dined in a roadside country inn. They said they had been served the best roast chicken they had ever had. Eve proceeded to tell me the story of the AOC-designated poulet bresse gauloise, describing the chicken’s strict pasture diet of bugs and seeds, and the finishing with buttermilk-soaked grain.

I had never heard of this bird, nor thought about any chicken’s diet, let alone its pedigree, and I felt remiss in not going at once to La Bresse to have one for myself. Someday, perhaps, I will, and I’ll raise my glass to Mike and Eve’s memory.

She was enthusiastic about most of life’s enjoyments. She loved the mountains of Montana and the beaches of the Bahamas and Mexico. She found as much satisfaction from a loaf of good bread with some salty olives and a glass of wine as she might from an elegant four-course dinner. She understood perfectly, the value of conversation at the kitchen table. She liked to share good times with those she loved. She enjoyed intelligent discourse, disdaining small talk and idle gossip. She loved all dogs.

Eve pretended to not understand the computer when, if fact, she just preferred hand-written notes and greeting cards. She was thrifty, and yet, generous to a fault. She and Mike raised two wonderful daughters, Andy and Jackie, both of whom treat us like part of a very loving family that indulges as often as possible in raucous laughter.

Geri, Courtney, and I will miss Eve greatly, but we’ll always have the cherished memories of a much-loved friend.

Photography by Courtney A. Liska

Chicken Stock (reprinted from my essay https://jimliska.com/tattooed/, a Holocaust story from March 15)

Known as Jewish penicillin, chicken soup soothes the soul. It may even be effective in our current crisis. I’m hoping that none of you will be charged to test its efficacy. This recipe is the basis for many soups and sauces. Stay well. Wash your hands. Make soup.

2 pounds chicken backs and necks
2 leeks, white and pale green parts, coarsely chopped
2 carrots, coarsely chopped
1 medium onion, peeled, studded with 2 whole cloves
2 stalks celery, coarsely chopped
2 cloves garlic, unpeeled
8-10 whole peppercorns

Bouquet garni
4-5 sprigs of parsley
2 sprigs of fresh thyme
1 bay leaf
celery leaves

Wash the chicken under running water. Blanch the pieces in boiling water, 3-4 minutes. Rinse under cold water and reserve.
Place the chicken pieces in a stockpot and cover with four quarts of cold water.
Bring to a boil. Add the other ingredients, bring to a boil and then simmer, partially covered, for about two hours. Be sure to skim the fat and foam.
Strain through a fine sieve and let cool. Remove all of the fat (schmaltz) that rises to the surface.

The end of any year holds the hope and promise for an even better year to come, while urging us at the same time to reflect on what has transpired. At the dawn of 2021, I can’t think that I know anybody who would like 2020 to stick around for even a minute more than is required.

It’s been one for the books, as the sports guys say.

The hardships and pains of this year have taken their tolls on each of us. I have countless friends who are musicians, many of whom I’ve known over the span of five decades. Most of them haven’t worked since March or April. While their bank accounts are hurting, so are their spirits. Musicians are musicians to create music for those who can’t. It is a calling. And going without music—for both player and audience alike—wreaks havoc upon the human soul.

The same can be said for actors, directors, and the crews whose stages went to black at the beginning of the pandemic. Few cries of “action” have been broadcast over the sound stages that dot our landscape. Television shows have been put on hiatus, while the late-night satirists are working from what appears to be the corners of their own living rooms.

Some of the activities we take for granted have been curtailed or altered to states being unrecognizable.

Personally, I’ve been to one restaurant since March 13. It was an uncomfortable lunch with a dear friend. As another friend noted early on in this adventure, “I’m a New Yorker. I go to restaurants.”

Baseball, with its cardboard cut-out audience, was unbearable. Even the song says, “take me out to the crowd.”

I’ve tried to turn a deaf ear to those who deny the existence of a virus that has killed more than 330,000 Americans, and who refuse to be just decent enough to do whatever one can to help defuse the time-bomb that could kill their friends and families. But I can’t. I’m angry at those represented by Proud Boys who believe their knowledge of infectious diseases somehow usurps that of Dr. Anthony Fauci.

There were empty seats at our Thanksgiving tables, and even more at Christmas. Hanukkah seemed hollow, lacking the laughter that so perfectly accompanies the latkes I learned to make from my grandmother. I can only imagine that Kwanzaa, which began its celebration just last night, might be missing something as well.

Even those who lack a spiritual or religious grounding, I would hope find value to the one idea that is shared by all religions: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. How basic can it get? How base can we be to deny kindness?

There are shops and salons and bars that will never see my business again because they chose their “freedom” and their “rights” to deny me mine. This is not what we used to be. We were a proud “can-do” nation in which some have morphed into belligerent and peevish “won’t-do” citizens.

That can-do spirit is clearly held by the first responders, as well as the medical staffs who are putting their own health and safety at risk during a health crisis none have ever experienced. Many have yet to share a meal with their families since early in the pandemic, let alone celebrate the holidays meant to foster peace, love and charity.

Their own mental health is at great risk as well. They fight depression, frustrations beyond the norm, and debilitating sadness over those who have suffered or died. They hold the hands of dying strangers whose families await word in hospital parking lots.

I’ve had a host of health issues over the past eight years and have seen first-hand medical professionals at work in careers that I hope are deeply satisfying and meaningful for each of them. How could they not be? Four hospitals and a care facility were my homes for a total of about ten months. I got a life-flight to Denver without knowing I was aboard an airplane. I was intubated and put on a ventilator. For 16 days, I was in an induced coma and on life support. I spent another 30 or so in ICU at UCHealth. I remember little about it.

My memory has been cobbled together from memories belonging to others.

When I was transferred to the skilled nursing home facility that we called Shady Pines, I couldn’t stand without assistance, let alone walk. The body’s muscles atrophy quickly in ICU. I wasn’t strong enough to endure the surgery I needed—the last (knock wood) of six. I had a feeding tube because I didn’t have the energy or strength I needed to eat. For nine weeks, twice every day, I was pushed and prodded and pushed some more in both physical and occupational therapy programs.

The young woman doing all of the pushing was named Stephanie. I called her Sarge.

She never let me quit and never let my hopes fade. She was a cheerleader for the good-health world she wanted me to rejoin. I re-learned how to eat, stand, walk, and use the bathroom.

I’ve thought of Sarge often during this unnecessary pandemic. She was a Jewish woman, engaged to an Asian man, and they were building their first home in a Denver suburb. I loved hearing the progress reports of their future.

Stephanie works taking care of the sick and the elderly, a group that is most susceptible to the Covid-19. And, as we all should know, nursing homes have been hardest hit.

While I was in Denver, I had a couple of bouts with nosebleeds, one of which landed me back at UCHealth for four days. There, stuck with a Rhino Rocket deep into my sinus cavity, I was being monitored in-room. One of the nurses, whose name, I’m sorry to say, I can’t remember, asked me to order my breakfast for the next morning. I said that I didn’t really care. Then I carped a bit about the cafeteria not having espresso. Off-shift, that nurse returned to my bedside with a triple espresso.

An act of kindness (mitzvah) is something to be cherished, as well as something to which to aspire.

Sarge visited me at the hospital while I was awaiting the surgery for which she had helped me prepare. She brought me two gelati. She squeezed my hand as she said goodbye.

I am so grateful for the nurses, doctors, lab technicians, therapists, and housekeepers who are in charge of our care. They work hard and they deserve our unflagging support and respect. They seem to have an inner strength and desire that the rest of us don’t. They do the jobs that most of us flinch away from in disgust.

Hospital patients are usually treated and cared for by health-care professionals who seem to rotate on and off shift in no particular order. Also, because patients are ill and taking any number of medications, the memory is perhaps not open to easy recall. That’s my excuse. While I may not remember their names, I remember their care and kindness, their compassion and patience.

I know they’re all wearing whatever protective gear they need—and then some. I just wish they could get that mask message across to their prospective patients.

Photography by Courtney A. Liska

Cuban Black Bean Soup

Close to the top of my bucket list is to visit Cuba, a trip which will be expertly guided by my friend Michael Sanders. Until then, I will stay warm on wintry nights with this soup.

1 pound dried black beans
1 medium onion, finely chopped
1 medium green bell pepper, finely chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 ham bone or smoked ham hock
1/2 c. olive oil
2 tsp. salt
Freshly ground black pepper
1/3 c. distilled white or apple cider vinegar

Rinse beans, then place in a large (4 quarts or larger) Dutch oven or soup pot with a lid and cover with enough cold water so that it comes to one inch over the top of the beans. Soak overnight.

Drain the beans, then return the beans to the pot. Add enough cold water so that it covers the beans by an inch. Add the onion, pepper, garlic, ham bone or hock, olive oil, salt, and a generous quantity of black pepper. Stir to combine

Bring to a boil over high heat. Skim off any foam, then reduce the heat to low and cover. Simmer until the beans are soft, and the soup is creamy, not watery, 4 to 5 hours. Check after 2 hours. If the beans seem dry add another cup of water. The final consistency should be velvety and thick, and the soup should coat the back of a spoon.

When the soup is nearly finished, stir in the vinegar and simmer uncovered for 15 minutes more. Pull the ham bone out of the pot, coarsely chop the meat, and return to the pot.

Serve over rice if desired, garnished with chopped raw onions, red bell peppers, and/or sour cream.