Word
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Peter Wolf
Blues in Harvard Square
By: - Dec 25th, 2015Harvard Square's rock legend, Peter Wolf, started with The Hallucinations while moonlighting as WBCN's first rock DJ. He quit to join the J Geils Band which cut a bunch of sides and some classic hits. That was long ago when rock was young.
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Dad Cooked
In the Kitchen on Christmas Eve
By: - Dec 24th, 2015During the Holidays Dad gave the gift of food. His spicy Sicilians dishes were not always appreciated by our Irish cousins the Sullivans.
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Berkshire Christmas
Tanglewood Shed Shuttered Until Summer
By: - Dec 24th, 2015Hey Charles- I like that! With my white beard and ample belly, I could join the club with you and Santa. Below is one of a long line of my holiday poems, first written in 2005 and updated this year. Merry Christmas!
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Visiting Santa
No Snow in the Berkshires
By: - Dec 22nd, 2015It's a few days before Christmas in the Berkshires. In all of December not a flake of snow. Predicted to hit 70 on Christmas day. Yikes, Global Warming is really mucked up. How will Santa land his sled? Kids are getting worried. On behalf of children of all ages I visited Santa for a reassuring chin wag.
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Julia Child
America's Original Top Chef
By: - Dec 20th, 2015Julia Child was a neighbor in Cambridge. Her butcher, Jack Savenor, was my landlord. During the 1960s her PBS show, The French Chef, introduced Americans to fine dining. At six feet she towered over gourmet kitchens.
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Winter's Tale
Ancient Secrets
By: - Dec 20th, 2015Secrets dancing in the flames through the dead of winter.
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Madam Bricktop
Miss Otis regrets she's unable to lunch today, Madam.
By: - Dec 20th, 2015Ancient and elegant, tall and slender Madam Bricktop, hostess of the Lost Generation, slowly and with measured grace sang Miss Otis Regrets. Cloe Porter wrote it for her. Then in her 80's it was a memorable night at Lulu White's in Boston's South End.
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Grade Inflation
B- the Old C+
By: - Dec 20th, 2015Imagine driving over a bridge or visiting the emergency room in the hands of an engineer or doctor who was a C+ student. Kids now party and float through college. Not that we were different. But we read the books.
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Toledo
Once Home to Scholars
By: - Dec 19th, 2015Classical learning returned to Europe through Islamic, Christian and Jewish scholars in medieval Toledo. That stopped after the ethnic/ religious cleansing of Spain by Ferdinand and Isabella. That's what Trump proposes by sealing borders, deporting illegals and banning muslims.
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Pope Francis
Rubbing Noses
By: - Dec 19th, 2015Last night Pope Francis was in town. As a member of the media I got a one on one. The love was palpable. Everything you read about him was true.
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Straitsmouth Light 2
By the Sea in Winter
By: - Dec 19th, 2015Lobster traps piled high for winter. When the dogs go south.
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Alice's Restaurant
Now Fifty Years Ago
By: - Dec 18th, 2015Can you believe it? Alice's Restaurant now fifty years later. Still accused of writing a scandalous article. Actually a cover story for Boston Sunday Herald Traveler Magazine. Nobody remembers that. Alice now lives in P'Town.
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Playwright Robert Brustein
Over Exposed
By: - Dec 16th, 2015During graduate school I ran the candy concession at the Loeb Drama Center. When Robert Brustein left Yale to form American Repertory Theatre we were season subscribers. Each year one play was brilliant, two or three just so so, and one an absolute stinker. After a few seasons it wasn't worth it. Arts Fuse editor, Bill Marx, harshly reviewed his new play.
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Paella
The Sound of Silence
By: - Dec 16th, 2015On a bright, clear, radiant Sunday morning in Barcelona we visited the Picasso Museum. Wandering down side streets we explored to find a neighborhood bistro for lunch. There we observed something that still haunts us.
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Bilo
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Classics
Ode to Thalia Howe
By: - Dec 15th, 2015At Brandeis I studied the classics with one of the worst professors, the dreadful C+ Earle, as well as the best, Thalia Howe. She was beautiful and Greek a perfect synergy to love her as much as poetry and theatre. During a later trying time she was caring and kind.
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Stuff
Treasures and Trash
By: - Dec 14th, 2015Baby boomers all at one, a tsunami, retired. Empty-nesters downsize from house, to condo, to Florida then assisted living. Along the way dumping stuff from treasures to trash. Dealers and appraisers say the market is flooded. Nothing is worth what you thought it was. Don't believe the Antiques Road Show it's just for entertainment.
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Will There Ever be Peace?
My Response to Erika Marquardt's Book
By: - Dec 14th, 2015On December 1st BFA published an article, or call it a review of Erika Marquardt's book, 'Memories of a War to Come: A German Girl Growing Up in the 2nd World War.' It ends with a poem, my own response to Erika's poetry and collages of life-long lasting war memories:
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Penelope
Stay at Home Mom
By: - Dec 14th, 2015The true hero of the Odyssey is not Odysseus but in fact his fair and faithful wife Penelope. Some twenty years on she waited for his return.
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Free Willie
At 83 Still on the Road Again
By: - Dec 13th, 2015The IRS claimed Willie Nelson owed them $32 million. That's a lot of scratch that near to done him in. Got past that but nixed the retirement fund. Now 83 he's still touring with a nice buzz on. Standing tall for Outlaw Country in the land of the almost free.
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Der Alte Stil
The Darkening Late Works of Artists
By: - Dec 12th, 2015In the arts the term Der Alte Stil defines the torment and life experience of the late works of artists. There is a contrast with the bright, sensual optimism expressed by the notion of juvenalia. It is common that with time and the trials of life the arts morph exploring the depths of the dark side.
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Fresco Cycles
From Archaic to Classical
By: - Dec 12th, 2015In fresco cycles we see how artists morph and become more experimental and expressive from beginning to end. The act of making art and the commitment to a sustained project changes both the work as well as its creator. Consider the process as the morphology of self.
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Absurd but True
I Lost It at the Movies
By: - Dec 11th, 2015As Dan Quayle said "One's mind if a terrible thing to loose." Not that it really mattered.
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Great Spirit
Lost Tribe
By: - Dec 11th, 2015Many Americans who go back a few generations claim remote Indian ancestors. Selling beads and rugs its a sales riff. When asked I had a different answer.
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Stoop to Conquer
Simple Tasks No Longer So
By: - Dec 11th, 2015Cutting back, slowing down, getting rid of stuff. Phase of life when mundane tasks and routines are not so. As Kurtz said in the cave "The Horror. The Horror." But not so dramatic more the murmur of quiet agita.
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