Existing in New York City: Soon to Not Even Have a Pot to Throw Up In

Foto by tgw, "Manhattan Under Fog," New York City, March 2012
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Say Goodbye to: Peter Bergman--one of the members of the wonderful Firesign Theater team I first heard on WBAI-FM (they broadcast out of Pacifica's KPFK in Los Angeles) when I came to NYC in the late 60s and early 70s--Bergman along with David Ossman, Phil Proctor, and Phil Austin were absolutely comedic geniuses in their use of tape, sound effects, sound bites, scripting, and programming to form the Firesign Theater, still to this day some of the funniest stuff ever made in this country of boring comedians. Peter Bergman, 72, American comedian (The Firesign Theater), leukemia. Give a listen to one of the more famous Firesign Theater episodes--with Phil Bergman playing Det. Bradshaw in a Nick Danger adventure: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sCzgdF_WjOg
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Pay or Die
I woke up yesterday morning feeling wonderful. I was grasped from the proverbial jaws of death by a truly wonderful bunch of my fellow New Yorkers 3 weeks ago...but yesterday morning, that was all shot down. It lies in my soul now a burning wreckage while my heart valiantly tries to follow orders and heal itself. Last night I was encouraged when I read a report from Swedish cellular biologists who said they have discovered that cardiomyocytes (heart cells) can regenerate themselves over a matter of time. I had an appointment with a cardiologist at my hospital yesterday and I was looking forward to discussing this with him or her. Instead, what happened was I was driven out of the Garden of Eden and into a desert. Into a desert where now I'm on my own. "Heal thyself." That's the edict I've been handed.

All who know me know that I have lived outside the real most of my life. Even my real name is not real. I have been successful under different names at several different professions. I've been a published poet. I've had two commercially successful books published. I've been a successful editor and rose in that field to become a Director of Editorial Services for a large financial firm. I've become a successful medical editor in the pharmaceutical advertising game. I've been the lead singer of a downtown Manhattan cult band. I've played numerous club dates with my own groups and several friends's bands around New York City, New Jersey, Connecticut, and on Long Island. I've had a recording made and issued by a professional record label. I at one time was a successful copywriter. I've even been a writing consultant. So being me is a boatload of variety full of many spices of life.

I have had affairs and marriages with some of the most beautiful and intelligent women on earth.

In a left-wing libertarian sense I've taken care of myself in many grand manners. I've lived on cash for as long as I could. I've kept an independent mind about all aspects of my life, one aspect being I've been blessed with perfect health all of my life...that is until three Sundays ago when after a wonderful woman tricked me via generous care and while I slept called EMS when during that process I discovered I was having a heart attack.

I sit here at my computer tonight remembering reading A. (for Al) Alvarez's very impressive book The Savage God, a beautifully and poetically written book about suicide. I think back now over how many of my literary heroes committed suicide: Ernest Hemingway, Hart Crane, John Berryman, Virginia Woolf, Stefan Zweig, and Dr. Hunter S. Thompson. Alvarez's book moved me; yet, even though these great writers committed suicide, I never thought of myself ever doing it. I just couldn't do that to myself, I thought. I followed rather writers who loved living, like Henry Miller. Especially Henry Miller. A man who though totally impoverished most of his life; a man who didn't publish his first book until he was nearing 50; a man who lived totally as a writer, as a writer is supposed to live, wide open, full throttle ahead, never looking down, always alive and always spinning off into another writing dimension. Writing book after book about life as being even in times of utter chaos merry and bright, even in times of desperate love, even in times of being jilted by love, still writing down long rows of words that pulled him out of despair and always into cosmic hope. But since this heart attack and since the reality that hit me full face today, now I'm no longer so sure there might not come a point in what life I have left that like Papa and Dr. Hunter S. Thompson I might have the guts to get a fancy Belgium hunting rifle or a 9mm Glock and just point one of them into the roof of my mouth and blow my brains to kingdom come.

Here is Alvarez writing about Sylvia Plath's suicide in The Savage God:

Why, then, did she kill herself? In part, I suppose, it was "a cry for help" which fatally misfired. But it was also a last desperate attempt to exorcise the death she had summed up in her poems.

I have already suggested that perhaps she had begun to write obsessively about death for two reasons. First, when she and her husband separated, however mutual the arrangement, she again went through the same piercing grief and bereavement she had felt as a child when her father, by his death, seemed to abandon her. Second, I believe she thought her car crash the previous summer had set her free; she had paid her dues, qualified as a survivor and could now write about it.

But as I have written elsewhere, for the artist himself art is not necessarily therapeutic; he is not automatically relieved of his fantasies by expressing them. Instead, by some perverse logic of creation, the act of formal expression may simply make the dredged-up material more readily available to him. The result of handling it in his work may well be that he finds himself living it out. For the artist, in short, nature often imitates art. Or, to change the clichè, when an artist holds up a mirror to nature he finds out who and what he is; but the knowledge may change him irredeemably so that he becomes that image.

I think Sylvia, in one way or another, sensed this. In an introductory note she wrote to "Daddy" for the B.B.C., she said of the poem's narrator, "She has to act out the awful little allegory once over before she is free of it." The allegory in question was, as she saw it, the struggle in her between a fantasy Nazi father and a Jewish mother. But perhaps it was also a fantasy of containing in herself her own dead father, like a woman possessed by a demon (in the poem she actually calls him a vampire). In order for her to be free from him, he had to be released like a genie from a bottle. And this is precisely what the poems did; they bodied forth the death within her. But they also did so in an intensely living and creative way. The more she wrote about death, the stronger and more fertile her imaginative world became. And this gave her everything to live for.

I suspect that in the end she wanted to have done with the theme once and for all. But the only way she could find was "to act out the awful little allegory once over." She had always been a bit of a gambler, used to taking risks. The authority of her poetry was in part due to her brave persistence in following the thread of her inspiration right down to the Minotaur's lair. And this psychic courage had its parallel in her physical arrogance and carelessness. Risks didn't fright her; on the contrary, she found them stimulating. Freud has written: "Life loses in interest when the highest stake in the games of living, life itself, may not be risked." Finally, Sylvia took that risk. She gambled for the last time, having worked out that the odds were in her favor, but perhaps, in her depression, not much caring whether she won or lost. Her calculations went wrong and she lost.

It was a mistake, then, and out of it a whole myth has grown. I don't think she would have found it much to her taste, since it is a myth of the poet as a sacrificial victim, offering herself up for the sake of her art, having been dragged by the Muses of that final altar through every kind of distress. In these terms, her suicide becomes the whole point of the story, the act which validates her poems, given them their interest and proves her seriousness.

When I worked in the juvenile detention world, I was just out of college, I had to deal with kids constantly threatening to commit suicide, especially those just brought in and scared to death of being incarcerated. I remember one night a beautiful tall Black girl was brought in by the cops. I still to this day have a clear picture of this young lady. She had been picked up after her mother reported her incorrigible, a typical mother's charge when it came to calling the cops on her children. "Mister Wolfe, I just can't control this child anymore. You take her; she might learn a good lesson from being locked up she'll never forget."

After this girl was put in a cell, locked up, I monitored the cell via the cell's intercom, a normal process for new incarcerations, and soon heard her quietly praying. Not to a familiar god, but a god in her head. "Give me the strength to do it...give me the strength to do it, " she kept repeating over and over again. Then she started screaming, "I want to commit suicide! I want to commit suicide!"

As a young man, I had no idea how to handle this type of person. So I went to the senior social worker on the floor and consulted with him.

"Girls threatening suicide are looking for attention," he instructed me. "Here's how I would handle this girl. Go to her cell with the woman night worker and take some double-edge razor blades with you. Have the night worker open the cell and hand the girl one of these razor blades and then show her how to cut her wrists. Leave, and I guarantee you, she'll not think of suicide any more."

Wow. That spun my head around. "Isn't that risky?" I asked. "What if she slices her wrists?"

"Then you're there to administer first aid to her."

Cold. Jesus, I thought, this guy's a Sadist.

I went and found the girls's area night worker, an older woman social worker, and told her she'd better keep an eye on this Black girl in cell 1 that she was threatening suicide.

"Ah, she's a phony. All these girls have no idea what suicide is, they just babble that in order to get our attention. I'll talk to her. Did old Stone give you his razor-blade therapy?"

"Yeah, and I thought that was damn cold of him."

"It works most of the time, though. You didn't know that?"

I never knew what happened. The tall black girl was still alive the next day when I came to work. In fact she became one of the easiest girls to deal with we had in lock up at that time. The boys on the other hand never threatened suicide no matter the seriousness of their charges. In fact, the Black boys always asked for razor blades as that was the way they cut their hair in those days.

That was my first experience with suicidal threats. In my family, we had had a suicide. A distant cousin, a poet, jumped off the highest building, a 16-story hotel, in my hometown. Years before I was born. But as a kid I heard his story usually told in enduring pity by my mother's mother, my grandmother the poet/librarian.

I was taught that suicide was something a human being just didn't do. According to the Christian religion, suicides hadn't a chance in hell of getting into heaven.

The next suicide I recall happened after I left Dallas and had moved to New Orleans. In Dallas, one of the workers I worked with at the juvenile home was a strange little cat, an ex-semi-successful boxer who had gone to college and gotten a degree in Sociology and then had worked on his MSW, his Master's of Social Work. Like I say, he was in spite of his work with juvenile delinquents a strange cat, so strange a cat, he portrayed himself as a bitter mean guy most of the time. Everyone who knew him, even the kids he worked with, knew he was one tough cookie and he'd use his boxing knowledge to lay you out should you cross him with threats of violence. This mean response later got him fired from the juvie after he punched a kid on his watch so hard it knocked several of the kid's teeth out.

My roommate at the time, another juvenile home worker, was this cat's best friend. As a result, this cat visited our apartment a lot. It was this dude who introduced me to smoking marijuana, a dangerous pacification in Texas in those years because if you were caught with a roach or even seeds on you or in your car, you could face life in the Texas State Prison in Huntsville.

The first time I got high with these cats the elevation for me was truly ethereal. Soon I was uncontrollably laughing my ass off and feeling like my feet weren't touching the ground. Though in my sense of euphoria, I noticed the boxer wasn't euphoric at all but rather more deeply serious than I'd ever seen him. While we were high, we all piled into my Cadillac and went down to a bar 3 blocks away. Once in the bar, I again got involved with a laughing fit, as did my roommate. The boxer on the other hand got terribly paranoid and started warning us that several of the other people in the bar looked to him like FBI agents. "You guys have to stop laughing. Those FBI dudes are going to figure us out." He stayed in this mode the rest of the night.

I knew the boxer had been married. And to a very nice respectable Dallas girl, too. I knew this because he had dated my girlfriend before me and she had told me all about his marriage and how brutal and mean it was, both of them so incompatible they were in constant combat; yet when she filed divorce papers on him, he had lost control and whimpered like a baby for her to reconsider and take him back and save the marriage. At about this same time, I met my future wife and broke up with this girlfriend, though, even after I was married and moved to New Orleans I kept in contact with her in order to get Dallas information about all the people I had worked with at the juvenile home.

In July of 1964, my parents were killed in an automobile accident and in order to clear up their estate and to get what they had left my brother and me in their will, I had to return to my hometown, 200 miles west of Dallas. After receiving my portion of the estate--it left me independently momentarily fairly well off--my wife and I returned to Dallas and gave a big party for my old juvenile home friends and compadres. My ex-girlfriend showed up at the party. Later in the evening, and I have no idea what brought him up, I just happened to say I had always wondered what had happened to the boxer. My ex-girlfriend looked at me with tears in her eyes. "Didn't W.M. get a hold of you?" she asked. "No," I replied, "I haven't heard from him since just before I moved to New Orleans." "Well, we're all shook up...those of us who intimately knew him." "What happened?" I asked. "He and his wife...," she was shook up; I knew she had fallen for the guy when they dated. "Yeah, what, they got back together...." "Yeah, they got back together if you believe tying yourselves together and sticking your heads together in an oven and gassing yourselves to death is getting back together."

I couldn't imagine what kind of situation would have driven my wife and I to do that. My God, I couldn't imagine sticking my head in an oven...I mean, it was unthinkable to me.

From then on, my life took a turn toward the celestial and I thus started my various journeys under my various names through life. I moved to New York City and got involved in the wonderful swirls of life possible in this great city back in the 1970s.

All throughout the 70s and 80s, I lived high on the hog in the Big Apple, a wonderful time to live in this town--with its wonderful plays, and its jazz, and its club and bar scene, and the opening up of Artist in Residence lofts in the old manufacturing lofts of SOHO and NOHO and BLOHO. And I lived in the heart of that scene, hanging downtown at the Ear Inn with celebrities and nobodies alike, with Phil Glass, with Cameron Brown, with my own musician friends, with even Christo (that fakir), with even Dan Ackroyd and John Belushi (I've awakened outside John Belushi's old bar/home in my neighborhood one morning drunk on my ass right next to John drunk on his ass), with many eccentric performance artists, including Wendy O. Williams--an eventual suicide--with my writer friends, with Werner Herzog, with Henry Miller's first publisher in this country Bern Porter reading out of seed catalogs, and Rhys Chatham doing his thing, Ned Sublette doing his thing, and Laurie Anderson doing her thing, and some of the US's first futurists doing their thing. And then I got divorced and I started meeting such talented women and having wonderful affairs of all night partying and then making love in every possible way the rest of the night and into the next days--and life was good and we had creative balls and I never had a health problem. In fact, one doctor after checking me out said I was as healthy as the proverbial horse, a verdict I took to mean I might even live forever. Suicide was as far a cry from my thoughts as could be--even when it was determined that the rock critic Lester Bangs, who I knew, had killed himself drinking cough syrup, didn't hit me as suicide; I never knew Lester to hate living--it was just ferocious living, which we all were doing, that did him in.

In fact, up until three weeks ago, I prided myself on my excellent health. I bragged about it. Several of my best friends began to die, my best friend with cancer, my second best friend from a heart attack, my oldest friend in life (from junior high on) from cancer, my ex-wife from cancer, my brother from cancer, my primitive artist nephew while being operated on in an L.A. hospital. And then, one day, out of nowhere, suicide reared its ugly head directly in my face. One of my nephews went into a California State Park and in a very dramatic way blew his brains out with a shotgun. Still that didn't phase me. My nephew was crazy and he'd been loopy all his life--so his method of death didn't surprise me...but then it gnawed at me in the sense I wondered just what in the hell got so depressing that he found it necessary to die that way. I thought back to my years in the juvenile home and that senior social worker telling me suicides were phonies simply looking for attention. And I recalled A. Alvarez's The Savage God and his explaining Sylvia Plath's suicide in that accidental sense. And then Hunter Thompson did it.

I sit now facing either salvation through medical help or the end of my world should I now find myself involved in the pay-or-die healthcare system in this country. Now I seethe with anger as I go to Bellevue Hospital and see the hoards of down-and-outers suffering all kinds of illnesses, some worse than mine, like a lady getting cancer therapy there who spent an hour one day telling us all how she was thinking of moving to Canada where she could get cheaper meds, the cost of her meds killing her more loudly than the cancer she was so-far successfully battling.

Finally, yesterday, the demon of hospitals for profit reared its ugly head in my life. I was told by Bellevue finance that from now on my visit to the coumadin clinic (coumadin is warfaren a blood thinner that I was told is saving my life) would cost me $220 a visit--and I've got a coumadin clinic visit tomorrow because they're concerned about my blood now getting too thin and putting me at a risk for serious external and internal bleeding that must be controlled--and instead of being happy about it, I'm depressed--because I'm going to need to go to these coumadin clinics maybe twice every week--which means $440 a week until they get my bleeding under control and my blood able to clot again. And I'm sitting here reading this Swedish cellular biologists report saying cardiomyocytes (heart cells) can regenerate over time and I'm thinking, yeah, but how do I get my income to regenerate at the same time? And then the evil little thought hits me. What if these Capitalist sons of bitches ruin me? What if this hospital presents me with an outrageous bill...like a $20,000 bill, which would pretty much wipe me out and leave me dangling helplessly over debtors's hell? Would I be able to end my life given such a hopeless situation?

Tune in tomorrow for the next chapter in this continuing saga of my battle with life and inevitable death. Treat it like a mystery story.
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Hospitals for Profit
The fact that our country hasn't got a National Single-Payer Healthcare Program is to me criminally ludicrous. The fact that when Obama started touting his Obamacare he firmly stated when he gathered his healthcare experts, all criminals from the healthcare insurance industry, the hospitals-for-profits industry, and the big pharmaceuticals, that single-payer healthcare would not be on the table. To make sure this wouldn't happen he chose a criminal senator from the low-life backward state of Montana (a playground for the filthy rich), Max Baucus, a criminal whose main political donations came from these criminal institutions who rob with impunity the sick and dying in this country who have no insurance due to their losing their jobs and their homes and their pensions and their savings, over 50 million people and probably many more than that--or even people who have healthcare insurance and yet due to the outrageous deductibles and high-end co-payments are still reduced to pay-or-die situations should a major disease event happen in their lives, like a battle with cancer, or perhaps the sudden invasion into their lives of an unexpected heart attack. How will they react when a hospital has the nerve to tell them, "You either come up with all the money in the world or we will withhold your treatment!" WOW. That to me is criminal. Inhumane. And add onto that that We the People of the USA pay the highest prices for drugs in the world, drugs that cost these pharmaceutical company pennies to manufacture; yet yield them billions upon billions in profits, profits enough that their criminal executives dance around the Maypole every year with huge bonuses and huge salaries, driving fleets of BMWs, jetting around the world in their own fleet of jets, setting up golf outings and doctor drinkathons and convention parties and tons of whores and party girls available--and you don't think that's true? These are companies whose toxic drugs kill hundreds of thousands of patients every year and yet they are never held accountable for any of these deaths.

I blame Obama for promoting this inhumane and insane pay-or-die healthcare in this country and trusting the very criminals who are benefiting from this type of inhumane insurance to come up with these bogus national healthcare plans, Obamacare actually going to force Americans to buy into one of these plans whether they can afford it or not or else suffer a tax penalty.

And our doctors and nurses! Why aren't they protesting this? I know for sure the nurses at Bellevue Hospital are under strains shoved down on them by their millionaire administration people who force them to work long hours, two or three days at a time before getting a couple of days off--going off and recruiting nurses from the Philippines, from the Caribbean, and doctors from India or Pakistan. Amazing. Amazing.

Like why couldn't we have free clinics around a city as large as New York City? Free clinics where one could get free exams, free tests, free blood work, free meds.

I'm astonished that our politicians are so dead set against a single-payer health insurance system. These millionaire politicians and their many bureaucratic lackeys and goons have the finest healthcare in the world thanks to We the People, this Congress of millionaires who hate poor people, who hate sick people, who hate people who can't afford this pay-or-die insurance. Like that asshole Ron Paul said, and please don't be fooled by his phony stances, he would let his best friend die rather than give him free healthcare; yet, this bastard still takes the best healthcare in the world from these worthless poor folk--those living on individually less than $20,000-a-year.

I'm ranting so hard my heart is pounding a little too fast for my mental comfort. I'm one tick away from dying; and I soon may be several thousands of dollars away from being saved.

I leave you with some healthcare statistics:

Health Insurance

• The United States is the only wealthy, industrialized nation that does not have a universal health care system. Source: Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences
• In 2006, the percentage of Americans without health insurance was 15.8%, or approximately 47 million uninsured people. Source: US Census Bureau
• Among the 84.2% with health insurance in 2006, coverage was provided through an employer 59.7%, purchased individually 9.1%, and 27.0% was government funded (Medicare, Medicaid, Military). (There is some overlap in coverage figures.) Source: US Census Bureau
• The primary reason given for lack of health insurance coverage in 2005 was cost (more than 50%), lost job or a change in employment (24%), Medicaid benefits stopped (10%), ineligibility for family insurance coverage due to age or leaving school (8%). Source: National Center for Health Statistics

• More than 40 million adults stated that they needed but did not receive one or more of these health services (medical care, prescription medicines, mental health care, dental care, or eyeglasses) in 2005 because they could not afford it. Source: National Center for Health Statistics
• Medicaid, which accounted for 12.9% of health care coverage in 2006, is a health insurance program jointly funded by the federal and state governments to provide health care for qualifying low-income individuals. Source: US Census Bureau
• Medicare, a federally funded health insurance program that covers the health care of most individuals 65 years of age and over and disabled persons, accounted for 13.6% of health care coverage in 2006. Source: US Census Bureau
• Medicare operates with 3% overhead, non-profit insurance 16% overhead, and private (for-profit) insurance 26% overhead. Source: Journal of American Medicine 2007

From www.healthpaconline.net

thegrowlingwolf
for The Nonprofit Daily Growler

Existing in New York City: While Our Permanent Billionaire Mayor Toots His Own Horn

Foto by tgw, New York City, March 2012
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Our Billionaire Mayor Has His Own "Horn-Blowing" Teevee Channel
I was sitting here recuperating from a heart attack watching teevee when I accidentally came across New York City's Billionaire Mayor's constantly (24/7) running television show, usually called something like "Access to the Mayor" or something simple and honorable like that. This teevee show--it must cost thousands of dollars a day to produce--is totally Mayor Mikey Bloomberg's channel and his mug is on it most of the day, every day, and, like I said, the channel is on the air 24/7. Today as I accidentally came across it, Channel 25.2 on NYC commercial pap HD teevee, a woman, a White woman, was on it praising the Mayor's support for the fashion industry and as she spoke, there he was, Mayor Mikey himself, squatting by her side. He's a really short person who thinks he's super sexy and handsome. This White woman, rather frumpish looking to be a fashion-industry spokesperson, continued trumpeting in government-speak how the New York fashion industry is currently on the rise and providing jobs for nearly 175,000 people. Then Mikey himself got up and started blowing his own horn, something he's a tried-and-true expert at--although, to be honest, all NYC mayors have in the past done photo-op after photo-op in which they blow their own horns--Ed Crotch (Koch) was famous for it and so was Rudi "Mussolini" Giuliani--but neither of these two boobs were on their own teevee channel 24/7 like Little Mike is. So then Mikey started singing his own praises over the NYC fashion industry. All the while, I'm thinking: "Wait a gol-darn minute...I live on the outskirts of what was once the thriving alive and in-the-streets-evident NYC fashion industry (the Garment District)--From 5th Avenue over into West 30s--from the Fashion Institute of Technology on 7th and 26th over to 8th Avenue and up 8th Avenue from 26th on up to near 42nd Street. I see no evidence of that once great area of hustle and bustle left...." The Mayor was humming on about how he's brought the fashion industry back...blah, blah, blah, 175,000 jobs...blah, blah, blah. And I'm hollering "WHOAAAAA!" at the teevee set.

OK, there is still a fashion industry here, yes. But, in my point of view, it's the penthouse variety and not the actual manufacturing variety. Very few, if any, designer fashions are manufactured in New York City anymore. Oh, yes, there are sweatshops all around the boroughs; sweatshops in Chinatown; sweatshops out in Queens; sweatshops over in Jersey. But 175,000 jobs? Who are these 175,000 fashion-industry workers? Does our mayor include Betsey Johnson as a fashion-industry worker?

I recall back in the 70s when the fashion industry manufacturing up and left New York State and moved to Communist China, Hong Kong, Macau. All the French houses, too, joined this movement to cheap labor. So what are the 175,000 jobs still here in New York City? And out of 9 million people, almost 9% of whom are out of work, what the hell does 175,000 jobs mean? To Little Mike the Billionaire Mayor it means he's bringing jobs to NYC. He also toots about how TOURISTS with billions of bucks (our mayor thinks in terms of billions) come to NYC for the fashion seasons--and yes once or twice a year the fashion shows fill Bryant Park with tents and runways and rock bands and the fashion elite, but I don't see any Chinese piecemeal workers at these shows. I don't see any old Cuban ladies doing lace work at these shows. I don't see any Mexican ladies doing handstitching at these shows. I do see a lot of Hollywood fops at them. I see Betsey Johnson doing cartwheels at 60 years old at them. I see a lot of paparazzi and big-time buyers at them. I probably would see Donald Trump at them; maybe Sean "Puffy Diddy Diddler Puffed-up" Colmes at them--but then he's a fashion guru isn't he? I see a lot of that crap at these shows. But I don't see the final product being made in New York City.

Here's fashion fop Alexander Wang's (a young wonderboy designer who's fucking Lenny Kravitz's daughter) sweatshop manufacturing in NYC--I suppose the Mayor claims these jobs are part of the overall 175,000 jobs.

"FANS call him chic, but his workers say he's a taskmaster.

"Thirty workers claim they were forced to work 16 hours a day or longer, without overtime, in a suffocating, windowless, 18sq m room by the acclaimed fashionista, who earned a whopping $25 million in 2011.

"Wenyu Lu and dozens of co-workers charge that Wang, 28, and his brother Dennis Wang violated numerous New York State Labor Laws at their operation at 386 Broadway.

"As a result, Lu and the others have suffered injuries and illness and lost time from work, according to the suit filed in Queens Supreme Court.

"Lu claims he was hospitalised for several days after he passed out at his work station because he was forced to work 25 hours straight - without a break - and was told he'd be fired if he didn't follow orders.

"Lu, 56, a three-year employee of the Wang factory, claims he was also ordered to 'perfect a professional grade leather trouser from cut to finish in four hours.'

"The job normally takes 12 hours, and results in a pair of pricey pants that can retail for $300, the suit says.

"When the four hours passed, Lu claims he was insulted and called names by Dennis Wang, who ordered him to not take a break or go home until the job was completed, the lawsuit says.

"Lu was ultimately fired on Feb. 16 after complaining about the labor law violations, bad working conditions, and applying for worker's compensation, said Ming Hai, his lawyer.

"The designer's reps said they had no comment because they hadn't been served with the lawsuit yet.

"The California-born phenom burst onto the downtown New York scene when he launched his first women's ready-to-wear collection in 2007.

"Since then, he's become known for his casual, weathered T-shirts, tank tops, dresses - and outrageously high-heeled platform sandals.

"Retailers including Barneys, Neiman Marcus and Bergdorf Goodman all feature his lines."

So there ya go. There's some of the 175,000 fashion-industry jobs Mayor Mikey Bloomberg has brought to NYC.

Funny, isn't it, how an Asian-American businessman uses his own people like slaves. Or am I being prejudice?

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Check Out the Labels in Your Clothes
I don't buy clothes if the label says "Made in China." And it's hard to find clothes that don't say that. Especially affordable clothes. I've been to K-Mart and shopped recently. I bought some very stylish tee shirts and a couple of nice pullovers, which when I brought them home found that two of my new shirts had holes in them. All these shirts said "Made in Pakistan." Pakistan! I can imagine the horrors of making shirts in Pakistan. Most of my old clothes I bought from an old friend of mine who had a man's clothing store on Park Avenue. All his clothes were labeled "Made in Italy." He had a deal with a designer in Milan. "Made in Italy" clothes I don't mind, though surely there are sweatshops in Italy, especially Milan, a city I visited way back when I worked for Viacom International in the pre-Mel Carmazin era. I noticed especially how my Milanese host, a VP with Italy Radio and Television, wore the most beautiful suits and shirts and shoes--and that impressed me enough I got on an Italian kick, though I found Italian design the slickest around at the time, still some of their quality in terms of stitching and coming unstitched left a lot to be desired. Like Italian cars are nicely designed but in terms of solid built, well there's some problems there. I once almost bought a Lancia back when I had money but while test driving it, it not only stalled out at a red light, but when turning a corner, one of the door handles fell off. On the other hand, I hate Fiats, especially those little tacky toy cars that are currently flooding the US market now that President Obama gave Chrysler away to Fiat.

Currently due to my lowered income, I buy minor-league baseball teeshirts and old golf fashions on eBay. Every now and then I get a "Made in China" tee, but it's surprising how the older-era ones are all proudly made in the USA. Still, it's hard to find any clothes today that aren't made somewhere along the Pacific Rim. They use formaldehyde in their clothes, by the way.

As a New Yorker, I find it so embarrassing now to go through Times Square (now it might as well be called Disney Square) and see all the Disney clothing stores selling cheaper-than-cheap Mickey Mouse teeshirts all made in China by slave labor--or how about child labor? Like I say, the Chinese treat their cheap labor force like slaves, which is what happens when a Communist country becomes the world's most successful Capitalist country.

Ah the ironies!

thegrowlingwolf
for The Daily Growler

Existing in the Police State of New York City: Protected From Evil Muslims by the NYPD

Foto by tgw, New York City, March 2012
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Say Goodbye to: Don Mincher. Don played his whole long career as a first baseman in the American League: for the Washington Senators, Oakland As, Minnesota Twins, Seattle Pilots (before they were the Mariners), the new Washington Senators that went on to become the Texas Rangers. I recall in 1966 when Don was a part of a baseball record when he and 4 other fellow Twins hit 5 home runs in one inning--one of the other Twins being Harmon Killebrew.
Don ended his life as president of the Southern League, a minor league. Don Mincher, 73, American baseball player.
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Sittin' Here Thinkin'
My friends think I'm nuts for besmirching President Barak Obama's record during his 1st term in office. They assure me he will be better his second time around. One friend sites the following as Obama's accomplishments: Obamacare; getting the troops out of Iraq; putting the economy on a recovery track; making General Motors profitable again; and responsible for the successful assassination of bin Laden.

I can't argue with them. They ignore my cynicism (they do not read the Growler). I say, wait a minute, Obamacare is a pay-or-die healthcare scheme put together by the health-care insurance, hospital, and pharmaceutical industries's lobbyists that doesn't take effect until 2014.

I banter on with my friends: Obama continued G.W. Bush's and Hank Paulsen's idea that banks are too big to fail and continued the bank bailouts when he could have stopped them dead in their tracks when he took over. I then try to tell my friends that the stock market rising to 13,000 again is good for people who have 401Ks, IRAs, bonds, or tons of mutual fund investments, but it really has nothing to do with economic recovery in a whole sense. The stock market is easily rigged by the large pool investors like state pension-plan managers and huge block investors. Like in what sense does it being at 13,000 help people who have lost their asses in the housing bubble burst (housing prices are still falling; new home construction is still on the negative side) and the bank fraud schemes that caused the bubble to burst?

As to ending the War in Iraq: there are still 100,000 contractors there; and Hillary Clinton has a State Department army of 7,000 combat troops there to protect the world's largest-ever Embassy. Why not blow that damn thing up and bring these mostly security-company-based contractors home, too, along with our worn-out, injured, and mentally fucked-up troopers?

I spout on saying Obama has continued to OK British Petroleum's going full ahead with offshore drill, drill, drilling policies, currently encouraging more offshore drilling than ever before. Obama has limited BP's "punishment" to a measly chicken-feed 7 billion or so dollars which when they pay it then their case will be closed (like a limited-liability out for them--which means the victims of the oil spill can't sue the investors (stockholders) only what the company itself is liable for)--and this pay-out punishment is like a slap on their wrists to the foreign petroleum company for wreaking god-knows-what damage on our Gulf Coast waters. You can't Google any adverse effects on the Gulf by that oil spill now several years later. There's all praise for British Petroleum on the Internet for miraculously cleaning up the worst oil spill in US history--BP says most of the spill simply evaporated. I just read a high-praise-for-BP article that says the oyster population in the Gulf is "coming back magically" due to BP's clean up efforts. Not back to the way it was before the spill, of course. Gulf Coast hotel ads rave about how responsible BP was in cleaning up the beaches--why, hell, the beaches are now even cleaner than they were before the spill. Amazing. BP is a God-blessed miracle company.

Plus, insanely in my way of thinking in terms of the devastation still being revealed by the Fukashima nuclear plant diaster, Obama has approved the building of two new nuclear power plants in Georgia without a contest. And he touts nuclear energy as clean energy. That's idiotic to me. Especially when We the People of the USA assume the brunt of the huge costs it takes to build these monsters.

Barack Obama has also taken advantage of G.W. Bush's giving himself executive privileges to give himself even more and more ruthless executive privileges, like his now being able to assassinate US citizens (he's already assassinated 3 in Yemen) if he deems them enemy combatants (a G.W. Bush invention)--all he has to do is give the word. Like the recent dumbass, truly dumbass, NATO goof of openly burning Korans in Afghanistan, a dumbass move that has gotten NATO troops including Americans killed; yet no one in the upper-room ranks have been held responsible for this. Where did the order come from? What stupid ass command person ordered it and have they been thrown in the stockade over it? President Obama is our Commander in Chief. Wouldn't you run something like that by him before you did it?

President Obama has also continued G.W. Bush's policy of now allowing U.S. Army regular forces to be active on US soil. He has also continued the Bush policy of spying wildly on US citizens. Hell, he's continued this insane War on Terror that Bush started with lies. He allowed NATO forces to bomb the bejesus out of the Libyans in the meantime ignoring the same progressive movements going on in Bahrain and Yemen. On top of this, Obama, in love with drones, has authorized 20,000 drones to fly over the USA to spy on American citizens.

And as to the car industry's recovery. One of the reasons for this recovery is in the bailout agreements of the whole bailout scheme of General Motors in which Obama reached a deal with the Auto Workers Union to where the senior workers got to keep their $23-an-hour wages BUT new hires were limited to $15-an-hour. Think about that. Just look at it and make up your own mind. And here's another fact no one knows: the average number of years people are now driving cars has risen up to 10.5 years. This year's recent spur in terms of buying new cars? Peoples's old cars are wearing out and they are being forced to buy new cars but with money they really don't have, which means in order to buy a new car, they're having to cut back in other areas, like healthcare, food, and clothing, etc. [The Marxian Economist Richard D. Wolff explains this much better than I can. Go to the The Daily Growler "My Blog List" on the right and scroll down to Richard D. Wolff's Economic Update on WBAI-FM radio--an hour program and give a listen.] Also, remember, Obama gave Chrysler to the Italian company Fiat; plus Japanese Toyota's sales are up, too.

Hype. Election year distractions. Like this current bullshit over contraception! A distraction from our REAL problems.

Obama has never blamed any of this on G.W. Bush. He never mentions the man--except remember, he did appoint this fool to co-chair the rebuilding of Haiti (something that yet has never been done) with Slick Willie Clinton. We have only two more years to legally prosecute G.W. Bush for his many heinous crimes against the American people; after two years, this little spoiled brat prick will have gotten away with lying us into two supercostly economy-wrecking wars, spying on American citizens, and this insane idea of enemy combatants and the reason for Guantanamo (by the way, didn't Obama promise to close Guantanamo?).

I could go on, but that's enough. No, I wouldn't like to see Rick Santorum as president. No, I wouldn't want to see Mitt Romney as president. And I definitely wouldn't want to see Jeb Bush, that vote-stealing little bastard, as president (the Repugs are talking him up as a convention stealer). But I still just don't trust Obama.

My friends tell me they have no choice but to back Obama. They're even donating money to him. Gary Null, one of my favorite muckrakers, has given up on trying to bring about debates with Obama this time around--he's focusing on the 2016 election year now and says progressive Americans should be putting all their energies into finding a candidate then who is a true changer and not just a man of "Yes, We Can" sloganizing.

I'm still thinking of not voting for any of these creeps.

I just noticed that Sarah "Paleface" Palin--remember, she was John "Failed Mission" McCain's VP running mate in 2008--has endorsed Allen "Hat in Hand" West. Maybe she knows something the rest of us don't know.
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Watching PBS Fundraiser Tonight
Let me tell you the music lineup PBS (our Public British Broadcasting Co.) dragged out on stage tonight. How about John Tesh! Howard Stern called this Hollywood idiot "the blond Frankenstein." But oh glory, there John was tonight, fronting a huge big orchestra, singing pop songs a wee bit lower than Harry Connick, who everyone knows I despise. And then if John Tesh was blemish enough, right after the Blond Frankenstein sung pap songs, guess who they brought out to pander subscribers for them? How 'bout the B-52s!!!! The B-52s. Where the hell did they dig them up from? They're all middle-age and sagging all over the stage now.

Don't worry, I didn't vex my achy-breaky heart listening to one note of any of these two musical American embarrassments.

thegrowlingheartlesswolf
for The Daily Growler

Existing in New York City: Billionaires's Heaven/Poor Man's Hell

Foto by tgw, "The Sun Over Lower Manhattan," New York City, February 2012
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Say Goodbye to Barney Rosset, Jr. I noticed Barney died while I was in the hospital fighting for my life but then so many other good folks died, I lost track of Barney's death. Barney's Grove Press and Evergreen Review introduced Americans to so many great writers who before Barney published them were considered indecent writers or just plain pornographic writers. Barney introduced us to D.H. Lawrence by finally publishing Lady Chatterly's Lover in an unexpurgated form. He also beat the censors and published the great Henry Miller's wonderful Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn. Rosset also published Samuel Beckett, William Burroughs, and Pablo Neruda, et al. What a man! One of the great publishers of all time. Barney Rosset, 89, American publisher (Grove Press) and free speech advocate
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The Billionaires Who Now Own Us Lock, Stock, and Barrel
I just read a unbelievable article in Utne about the horrible gap between the poor and the rich in my hometown, New York City. Did you know that of the 9 million people who make up the citizens of New York City, around 90,000 people control 44% of NYC's wealth? Here's an excerpt from this Utne article that first appeared in Orion, written by Christopher Ketcham, a NYC journalist:

"These top wealth recipients—let’s call them the One Percenters—took for themselves close to 44 percent of all income in New York during 2007 (the last year for which data are available). That’s a high bar for wealth concentration; it’s almost twice the record-high levels among the top one percent nationwide, who claimed 23.5 percent of all national income in 2007, a number not seen since the eve of the Great Depression. During the vaunted 2002–07 economic expansion—the housing-boom bubble that ended in our current calamity, this Great Recession—average income for the One Percent in New York went up 119 percent. Meanwhile, the number of homeless people in the city rose to an all-time high in 2010—higher even than during the Great Depression—with a record 113,000 men, women, and children, many of them constituting whole families, retreating night after night to municipal shelters.

"But here’s the most astonishing fact: The One Percent consist of just 34,000 households, about 90,000 people. Relative to the great mass of New Yorkers—9 million of us—they’re nobody. We could snow them under in a New York minute."

As a modified Marxian-Leftwinger Sociologist, the above figures bring up my ire. I see fiery red as I look at them. These 90,000 criminals (and, yes, they are all in the financial industry--they are all stealing their incomes through Wall Street skulduggeries) have an average income of 1.7 million a year. The rest of the 9 million are extremely lucky if they make over $100,000-a-year, though most New Yorkers only make on average per family $46,000-a-year. The poverty level in NYC is around $26,000-a-year (and unless you have a rent-controlled apartment, there's no way any human being can live on $26,000-a-year in this metropolis, not paying $2,000-a-month rent (under our Billionaire Mayor the new base rent in Manhattan), which means your rent takes $24,000-a-year or even more for a family of 3 or 4 who need 2 bedrooms ($4,000-a-month)).

These rich bastards are living supercomfortable Playboy lives (Thorstein Veblen, the brilliant US Sociologist/Economist, called them the leisure class) while all around them the ordinary New Yorker is struggling to stay afloat, also hoping without hope that a sudden tragedy (like my recent heart attack) doesn't hit them and totally wipe them out and send them packing into the streets and into an NYC city shelter. These New Yorkers include policemen, firemen, school teachers, people in advertising, the service industry, secretaries, bank tellers, store clerks, etc. It's not limited to the born poor or unsuccessful or the illegal immigrants.

To really get an eyeful of this inequality, all you have to do is visit Bellevue Hospital, the largest of New York City's city-controlled hospitals. I have been an outpatient there under their Ambcare for two weeks now. Most weekdays I have to report to various clinics and the pharmacy for very long and boring days of sitting among the other patients for most-times 5 hours at a time waiting to be seen by a nurse or a doctor. Patients daily have to report to 2nd-floor modules where first you register, then you're told to go take a seat, and, if you're lucky, 3 hours later you may be seen by a staff member--my average time waiting when I go has so far been 5 hours. In these waiting rooms--they are low-ceilinged unventilated rooms without enough seats for the hundreds of patients using them--are the true poor and downtrodden of this once cultural center of the world.

The first thing I noticed as a White man sitting in these rooms is that...I'm the only White man or woman in the room. Except for the doctors, who are all White (I include Indians from India as White people), I'm the only White patient. I sit for hours hearing them call out, "Manuel Ramirez, are you here?" or "Mercedes Escobar, are you here?" or "Tamilita Lopez, are you here?" or "Consuela Ortega, are you here?" There is one guy who looks White to me, but when they call his name it's a Spanish name. Finally, I hear, very clearly, "Mr. Wolfe, are you here?"

I am a member of the Bellevue Hospital herd. Why am I at Bellevue? you ask. Because it's a free hospital--they must take you whether you can pay or not; whether you have insurance or not, pay-or-die health insurance that I can no longer afford (my COBRA after I got fired would have cost me $5,000-a-year), so being a citizen of New York City, I go to Bellevue.

I'm not saying all these people are Spanish, though the most of them are. There are poor Chinese in the mix; there are poor Haitians in the mix; there are, yes, many poor Islanders (Caribbean) in the mix; and there are many Muslims in the mix. But it's obvious, there aren't many White people in the mix.

Racism has always been the dividing peg in this country's class struggles. Blacks and people of other colors have always been oppressed and kept down since the White man "conquered" this country through the Capitalist trading (slave trading, too) companies that actually were the invaders and occupiers of this once Native American homeland.

I grew up in segregated Texas. Texas has been a racist state since old Mr. Sam Houston kicked the Messkins's asses in what is still today called the Texas Revolution. I was lucky in that my family, though of course they were racists via being White Texans, I was forbidden to use the N word and I was taught to love all people no matter their color. My great-grandmother and my grandmother the poet had many long tales involving them as pioneer White women being harassed by what were then called Nightriders, pre-Ku-Klux-Klan bands of ex-Confederate psychopaths who rode about Texas looking for both freed slaves or White people who befriended them or safe-harbored them.

The Story of My Great-grandmother and Grandmother's Adventures With the Nightriders (from an earlier The Daily Growler post)
One of the most-told stories in my mother's family was about the time my greatgrandfather (J.L. for John Lytle) had gone off to do one of his concerts at a nearby town, leaving my greatgrandmother and my grandmother alone in their dugout house just outside of Youngsport, Texas, in Central Texas. These pioneer White folks would find a nice fairly steep hillside, dig a large hole (manmade cave) in it, put a timber front on the hole, a couple of small windows ("Big enough to stick a rifle through at least") and that was that. This was a time in Texas when ex-Confederate soldiers unhappy with the results of the Civil War and the freeing of slaves went renegade all over this part of the world, from Texas over into New Mexico, on up the cattle trails into Kansas. These renegade Rebels formed into units that called themselves "Nightriders." These weren't Klansmen, but that was their reason for being. They used Klan-like hoods and sheets and one of their missions was to raid freed blacks's homes and either kill them or torture them mercilessly. They also went after any Whites they heard who were hiding former slaves or being nice to freed Blacks--they'd raid your ranch and drive off all your cattle; or they might go so far as to burn your house and barn down and perhaps even shoot you and your family if they felt like it. Texas was so brutally racist about losing the Civil War, it was several years before some Texas slaves found out they had been freed, so these Nightriders would also capture blacks and take them down to Galveston and sell them back into slavery or if they knew they were freed they would simply lynch them or set them on fire--you know, the typical White way following God's word.

So on this night, with my greatgrandfather off singing and swilling (yep, he drank Scotch whiskey; in fact, he drank too much Scotch whiskey, especially after he'd just finished singing and the Scotch was passed around liberally amongst his fellow Clansmen (in the Scottish sense of the word and not in the KKK sense of the word), leaving his women back in their dugout house all alone.

My grandmother, who was but a young girl at the time, told the story in her high thin twangy South Texas voice. She said, her eyes wide open and her voice suddenly very serious and full of drama, that while she and her mother were alone in that dimly lit dank dugout, scared to death, sensitive to the smallest sound, her mother suddenly perked up her ears. Suddenly she shushed her daughter and whispered that she thought she heard something shuffling about in their bare-dirt front yard. She told her daughter to blow out the light in the coal-oil lamp and to pull the shutters down quietly over the burlap-covered windows--just slits really--and then she told her to be quite as a mouse until it was clearer just who or what was making the sound she had heard.

They were used to wild animals coming in the yard at night--white-tailed deer, mule deer, skunks, armadillos, bobcats, wildcats, even panthers--or it could have been Comanches, too, who at that time were still able to wander free over that part of Texas and Oklahoma Territory and were very feared by White folks, especially White women.

As they listened intently in the dark stuffiness of that dugout to that sound in the yard, they soon heard a slight scratching at the door. They stayed stock still. Then through the scratching they heard a voice. "Hep me," it said in just a whisper. "Hep me, pleezz!" It was a woman's voice. My greatgrandmother went to the door and asked who this woman was? The reply came back, "Hep me...the Nightriders is comin' back a ways, pleez hep me." The woman was a black woman. My greatgrandmother could tell. She took the timber bar that barred the big timber door firmly out of its rack and opened the door just a crack. There was a very young Black woman hunched up by the door. She had a bundle in her shaking hands. "Honeychile, " my greatgrandmother said, "you know I can't let you come in here if the Nightriders are after you." "I jest wants you to takes mah bay-bee...." "Your baby?" "Yes'um, mah bay-bee girl. I kin run faster without her. I kin run real fast, but I don't want 'em to git mah bay-bee if they gits me."

My grandmother said her mother turned to her and told her to take the baby from the woman. She protested, "Mama, are you sure?" "Take the baby," her mother told her. The baby was what was wrapped up in the bundle the young woman was holding. When my grandmother extended her arms to take the baby, the Black woman pulled it back, opened up the wrapping and kissed the baby, then handed it through the door and in the next second was gone off into the night.

After rebaring the big door, my greatgrandmother relit the lamp and they checked out the baby. She looked as though she couldn't have been more than a week or two old. Also she was clean as a whistle and as my grandmother put it, "Smelled as fresh as a sweet flower." The baby looked up at these two White women with its big brown eyes full of curiosity though not making one peep, as though already knowledgeable about breaking protective silence. Soon, my greatgrandmother blew out the lamp again and told my grandmother to take the baby all the way back in the farthest far corner of the dugout and to make sure she kept the baby perfectly quite.

Both women could now hear the hooves of the Nightriders's horses coming from a short distance it sounded to her like down the trail (road) that ran a hundred of so yards across a field from the dugout.

They shivered together in silence, two White women and a Black baby, cuddled in the far back corner of the now pitch black and cauldron-hot dugout. Afraid to even breathe; the baby quite and behaving itself magically it seemed like.

The horses hooves got closer. The women could even now hear men's voices over the hoofbeats. Men shouting and whooping it up.

And then they were so close it seemed like they were already in the front yard. They heard one horseman sounding like he was riding right toward the front door, the horse's hooves quaking the hardpacked ground.

Then it was obvious, the yard was full of men on horseback. Nightriders.

The two women didn't dare move. The baby hiccoughed one time and my grandmother put her girlish hand over its mouth. They didn't dare speak even in the quietest whisper. They were holding each other very tight now, with the baby between them tucked under them. The baby began to gurgle. My grandmother again placed her hand over the baby's mouth but the gurgling kept on coming. Then the baby started giggling.

The Nightriders were up close to the front door now. Soon there was a heavy thud against the door. My greatgrandmother put her hand on her daughter's arm and squeezed it. They were both so tense their limbs were beginning to stiffen up forcing them to have to shift their bodies. My grandmother got a cramp in her side. The baby was still lightly giggling. She was beginning to have fun innocently unaware of the deadly situation she was in. My greatgrandmother held her tight against her bosom.

There was another thud against the door. "Hey, open yere door in thar! Open it or we gonna break it in."

The women were now frozen stiff with tension and trying to stay quiet.

"Thar ain't nobody heah, Young, let's go," they heard another man say.

"That nigger gal's around heah somewhar; I kin smell her."

"She's prob'ly off across over that a'way. Back in them woods out thar."

There was then a series of heavy poundings on the sturdy door. "If'n I knocks this door down and find somebody in thar, I'll beat ya good, I tell ya I will."

The women remained quite.

Then the baby sneezed.

"You heah that?" one of the Nightriders said.

"What?" another one asked.

"I heard somethin' in thar!"

"Come on, Young, yore hearin' things. Let's go git that nigger gal."

There was one more thud on the door, then there were smaller thuds against one of the shuttered windows.

"Awright, dammit, I 'spose there's nobody heah. You think that bitch went over toward that thar woods...let's ride around by the Bailey place and come in back of that patch. Le's go."

There was then a burst of horses hooves and horses snorting and then the hooves thundered off out of the yard and then faded off into the distance.

My grandmother sighed and said outloud, "Mama, that was so...." Her mother put her hand over her mouth. "Shhhhhh, honey, they may have left a scout behind. Stay quiet and let me check." My greatgrandmother went over and slowly loosened one of the shutters on the far right window slot. Then she raised the burlap just enough to peek out. The yard was empty and so was the field between the yard and so was the road.

Then the baby started crying and my greatgrandmother lit the lamp again and took the baby in her arms. "Oh golly she's wet herself. Help me with her diaper." She was diapered with the diaper of the day, a cleaned and bleached flour sack held on the baby by two big rusty snap-closed pins. Just as my greatgrandmother was loosening that diaper, they were startled by a quiet knock at the door.

My greatgrandmother blew out the lamp and held her breath. My grandmother grasped her mother's wrist so hard it hurt but she didn't mind the pain knowing how frightened her daughter was.

Then they heard a voice. It was a woman's voice. "White ladies!" it said. "White ladies, it's me, the bay-bee's mama."

My greatgrandmother then took the big timber bar out of the racks and cracked the big door slightly open. She took a big chance that the girl wasn't with the Nightriders, but the chance had to be taken.

The Black girl was there. My grandmother pulled her into the dugout. She then relit the oil lamp and they got their first look at the baby's mother. She was pretty but tough looking, too. She was hardbodied, her legs sturdy and big like small logs.

"How did you get back here? The Nightriders just left here 'bout 15 minutes ago."

"I never left yore yard. I hid up over your house, just up the rise in that clump of cedar trees up there."

"So what are you gonna do, girl? You can't stay here; nor can you leave your baby here...she's so precious; never made a sound the whole time those Nightriders were here. What's her name?"

"Effie."

My grandmother said, "That's my name, too."

"Effie?" the Black girl asked.

"Yes, Effie, that's my name, too."

The Black girl took little Effie in her arms after my greatgrandmother had rigged up a diaper out of an old pillow case she took off her and her husband's bed.

"What are you gonna do, girl? Where you goin'?"

"I got my places where I can go...back the other way from those Nightriders...."

"Yeah but they're just over on the other side of the Bailey farm...."

"That's fine. Let 'em stay there," the Black girl said, "in the meantime, I'se be long gone thataway." She pointed toward the West.

My greatgrandmother let the Black woman and Little Effie out the door and she watched as the woman soon disappeared into the darkness headed out across the field just to the west of the dugout.

"Mama, will she be alright?"

"I 'spose she's used to runnin', child. I know what runnin' is; runnin' with babies, too."

And that woman did know what running was. She had married a 72-year-old Republic of Texas Army officer when she was 12 and when he'd tried to consummate the marriage, she'd kicked him in the nuts and went to her room and refused to come out. This old man sent his sons in to kick some sense into her and both sons tried to rape her and she resisted them. Then one son took out a revolver, pointed it at her, and told her to start running. He said he might give her a five minute start but she had to hurry. "After five minutes," he reemphasized, "then we're coming after you to kill you." My 12-year-old greatgrandmother jumped out a window with nothing on but a thin dress and ran like a lizard out across the lowlands of Lampasas County in the Central Texas swamplands that ran from where she was down to the Lampasas River. She spent a week in those swamps running from those brothers until she finally made it to the river and then followed the river up 20 miles to a little river town where she had relatives that took her in.

That was how the story ended.

That grandmother, my mother's mother, told that story over and over; I've heard it at least 7 times, each time told in the same way with the same dramatic effect. This story was always followed by my grandmother's talking about Black people and how wonderfully kind and gentle they were and what good mothers they made and how awful White people treated them, to the point that one day God would punish White people severely for their treatment of his special Black people. This is also when she taught me that the Civil War was anything but civil. She told me that thousands upon thousands of young men were killed over slavery, whether it was right or wrong. She said all decent White people knew slavery was wrong and the South had made a big mistake defending slavery as being righteous under God. That's when she also taught me that Negroes were not niggers, to which my mother backed that up with the threat of washing my mouth out with lye soap should she ever hear me using that word.
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Racism in New York City
I came to New York City from Santa Fe, New Mexico, in 1969. It was at the height of the Civil Rights and Anti-Vietnam War protests. In fact, the day I arrived here there was a riot in Harlem and there were rallies in Central Park held by the Black Panthers over the jailing of the Panther 21. There were also attacks on the NYPD (a racist police force still) by the Black Liberation Army. One day when I was visiting my nephew on the Upper West Side, we heard gunshots up the street. On checking it out, we found that the cops had raided a bar up there and as a result had found H. Rap Brown in the bar attempting to rob it. The cops had taken him into custody.

When I first came here, I lived with my brother-in-law out in Morris Plains, New Jersey. There were no Blacks anywhere in that area that I ever saw. My brother-in-law, though a highly educated man (Columbia University), was a stone racist. Once I asked him to take my wife and I to Harlem and he said, "I'd be a fool to go up there...a White man in a Cadillac (he drove a big long black Cadillac--he was a drug company executive) driving into Niggerland is just asking for trouble. You guys wanna go to Harlem, you go on your own."

When my wife and I finally did move into Manhattan, we took an apartment on East 56th Street just off Sutton Place. The only Blacks I ever saw in my neighborhood then was one day the Duke Ellington Orchestra opened up a health spa in a new high-rise luxury apartment building up on First Avenue and E. 56th.

One day after I'd just come to Manhattan, I flagged down a cab. The driver was White, a Jewish guy out of the old school when it came to hack driving--yes, the cab drivers in those days were mostly old New Yorker White guys. In the cab when I told him where I was going, he suddenly said, "You're from the South aren't you?" I told him Texas. He then said, "You're gonna find out quick what's wrong with this city...." He didn't wait for me to ask him what but quickly added, "....there's too God-damn many Por-toe Ree-cans and Niggers in this town."

Since then though in the 70s it looked like this city was finally integrating--this was when I met my future Black wife and was introduced to a Black photographer who was to become my best friend here--that soon it was obvious, both through their suffering racism and unveiling it to me and my own experiencing it through my White bosses and White friends, that New York City was, yes, a divided city in terms of races. NYC was a racist city--and, it still is, folks; it still is.

thegrowlingwolf
for The Daily Growler

Existing in New York City: Is CHAOS Finally Announcing Its Rule?

Foto by tgw, New York City, February 2012
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Just in: It seems the Mitt Man, backed by the Angel Moron-i, has barely won the Repub Michigan (his home state) primary--due to women, the Yahoo media says. It was only a few-point win over Little Ricky Santorum (who the hell votes for this dipstick?).
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Recovery
I heard this one dude talking about paying off the national debt. His point: we'll never be able in a million years to pay down the debt Reagan, G.H.W. Bush, and G.W. Bush drove us into (a debt larger than the total debt (over 200 years) George Washington down to Jimmy Carter ever got us into--and that includes paying for the Revolutionary War, all the 19th Century wars including the Civil War, WWI, WWII, the Korean debacle, the Vietnam debacle, etc., etc). Here's a "truth" about the debt from zfacts.com/p/461.html:

Some Debt Facts:

• Social Security is $2.6 trillion in the black. In 2010 it ran a $68 billion surplus.
• Clinton reduced the debt as a percent of GDP.
• G. W. Bush restarted the deficits with tax cuts for the rich.
• Red ink hit a peak rate of $1 trillion in 100 days just before Obama.
• The Obama stimulus was only $0.08 trillion.
• Only $1.2 trillion is owed to China.
• $10 trillion is owed to America.

Now you see why these Conservative cheapskate rich-boy assholes want their filthy mitts on Social Security (my personal feeling is G.W. Bush borrowed SS broke and filled it with IOUs). Check out the last two bullets. We owe China (a communist country) $1.2 trillion--but the US Government owes We the People of the USA $10 trillion. As the gentleman who said we'll never in a million years pay down these trillion-dollar debts, neither will the Government ever pay We the People back that $10 trillion it owes us. Do we, any of us, have any idea what 1 trillion dollars amounts to? Also note, too, that this debt doesn't include the 15 trillion in bailout bucks the Wall Street pirates (including that pompous ass fool Warren Buffett) stole right out from under our stupid noses.

I've said over and over that We the People of the USA have to be the stupidest people in the world. We are suckers and as W.C. Fields said, "Never give a sucker an even break." And trust me, in this country a sucker is fleeced before he's educated to these facts.

We are currently, whether the stock market agrees or not, in a recession (I say it's a depression, but then we're arguing Economics 101 semantics and Economics is not a true science; it's an empirical science based on number crunching for its "facts"). This recession was brought on by job losses and wages being driven down to Third World status. Our great corporations turned traitor on us during the 1980s and during the 1990s through a whole series of merging with European corporations to form a new nation now known as the Global Market Place. I was in the financial industry during the 90s and saw this whole thing transpiring. I saw that with these new global corporations, our largest corporations could turn traitor against their US charters and responsibilities, abandon their obligations to maintaining their US factories and their US labor force, totally turn their noses up at US regulatory laws (like this Free Trade bullshit that Slick Willie Clinton (an Arkansas hick) forced on us) and state laws to do as they pleased by shutting down US factories and putting millions out of work, selling our factory machinery to their newly found cheap labor pools in China and India and Singapore and Indonesia (remember when Nike went to Indonesia to make their overpriced sneakers?), countries ruled over by dictators who hate their own people and via hooking up with US global corporations inviting a return to slavery as the cheapest labor there is.

I have also said this many times, the Republicans are White racists, all of them. All rich White people are racists no matter their names or their party affiliations. President Obama is trapped in this. The Repug presidential candidates know this--name me someone Black other than the same ole Uncle Toms (Clarence Uncle Tom-ass; Herman "Yassuh Boss" Cain) who's a high-ranking Republican? Like Jesse Jackson recently said, Obama is in the sights of a Republican racist firing line. They seem to be begging for some nutjob to take a potshot at and hopefully hit President Obama. That's not saying Obama is not an Uncle Tom himself. I mean come on, he needs a billion dollars to run for president and what average American can afford to contribute that much money to his campaign? He's got to kiss some rich White ass in order to gain that money advantage.

I'm not at all happy with Obama's presidency. He's missed so many opportunities to be the greatest president we've ever had. Have you noticed he hasn't spoken much about his grass roots support this year; he hasn't ever mentioned FDR and the New Deal; he never mentions that all of this mess we're in now is the fault of ignorant Republicans like Ronnie Reagan (remember the dollars stretching to the moon?), G.W.H. "Pappy" Bush (Voo-doo economics), or G.W. Bush. He has never said that our involvements in these superstupid wars, all of them unnecessary and foolish and downright illegal, are the biggest reasons for our country's dilemma. He has never said Republicans historically have always been pro-rich and a threat to our poor and downtrodden, those that Statue of Liberty that stands so obvious out in my hometown's harbor is supposed to welcome to our shores, the oppressed in the world seeking liberty, equality, and fraternity (remember it was a gift from France).

Of course, a hell of a lot of White Dumbocrats are racists, too. My ex, a Black woman, truly believed in her heart all White people are racists when you pin them down. If White people aren't racists, then why is the world's largest prison system filled with Blacks and Latinos? The White men who came up with these financial schemes that have left the nation bankrupt go free without even getting their wrists slapped. BP, a White (England) oil company that practically wiped out our beautiful Gulf Coast waters and beaches, got off with barely even getting their wrists slapped.

Ask yourself, how can a numbskull idiot like Rick Santorum be a close call in Republican primaries in Michigan, Minnesota, Colorado? Think about the racial divisions in those three states. Michigan that has allowed its greatest city, Detroit, to become a no-man's land. All the Whites fled the city and left it to poor hopeless Blacks. Or Flint, Michigan. Once a proud city with plenty of factory jobs (Buicks and Chevrolets (now made in Mexico or Canada) were once made there) is now the #1 most dangerous city in the USA. And Minneapolis. Come on. How many Blacks have any influence in Minneapolis? And Colorado. Check back in Colorado's history and you'll see its White history is full of murderous actions against Native Americans and Blacks and Latinos. I can recall when the Democrats held great presidential campaign rallies in Cadillac Square at a time when our unions had gotten us off the 6-day work week; had gotten overworked workers overtime pay (name me a corporation today that pays overtime). I remember a time when benefits were incentives for workers to do better work--benefits like decent health care to keep your workers healthy; benefits like life insurance policies in case something tragic happened to a worker or his family; benefits like holidays; benefits like sick leave.

I have said over and over that the perfect Capitalist labor is slave labor. It breeds slave labor. These big White-run corporations are making record-breaking profits; yet, workers in this country not only are losing their jobs every day (to hell with Obama's adding new jobs--he's lost more jobs than he's created new ones--it's easy to check if you have sense enough to use Google); they are having their salaries cut to the bone; they are having their pensions stolen out from under them; they are losing their homes, their land...Jesus, it's so damn obvious; yet, We the People of the US are so stupid we can't see the truth for the boldface lies. Like Newtie "the Excused Adulterer" Gingrich promising if he's elected he'll bring the price of gasoline down to $2 a gallon. That my friends is a boldface lie. Our president has nothing to do with the prices on the world oil market.

The Global Market Place is a plantation system. Cheap labor has always been the goal of this bunch of fat-cat authoritarians. There is currently a big fight over the minimum wage, which is $7.50 an hour. Think about that. Let's say you work your overworked ass off at Walmart (now a Chinese company though still managed by the racist hayseed Walton family out of the backwoods of Arkansas) for 8 hours a day 6 days a week. At $7.50 an hour, you're making $360 a week. Whoooo! Big bucks right? But, wait, they are taking 60 bucks a week out for taxes, which leaves you with $300. $300 x 4 (weeks) = $1200 a month. 1200 x 12 = $14, 400 a year. WOW! In the meantime check out Walmart's profits. They're soaring. While you're making $14, 400-a-year some worthless Walton hick is offshore banking multimillions--all inherited money. Remember, G.W. Bush, that little worthless criminal prick wanted to do away with the Estate tax and Obama has ass-kissed Repuglicans into exempting these sorry bastards $5 million bucks. This is why you see the worthless Kennedy kids driving around drunk in BMW sports cars.

Who Votes for These Fools?
It makes no sense to me why anybody, even a true believer, would vote for this Republican superpack of Yahoos. Yet, somebody does. I actually heard on corporate teevee a woman seriously being interviewed by a "serious" talking-head pundit who gave "serious" reasons why she was voting for Rick Sanatorium. Then you have to remember, our worst president in our history, G.W. "Baby Boy" Bush got elected--OK, so he stole the election--he only had to have his brother Jeb steal 50,000 votes to win in 2000 (a true grey day in our history)--and then he was re-elected in 2004--again, so he stole the vote he only had to steal a few thousand in Ohio to win. In both elections both Dumbocrat candidates caved in and conceded without a fight [those two big spoiled-brat rich phonies, Al Gore and John "Fake Vietnam War Protester" Kerry].

I think it would be quiet interesting if Rick Santorum became president. Think about it. He's an idiot so he'd probably stumble-bum worst than G.W. "Baby Boy" Bush, our worst-ever president to date. Maybe start World War III. How grand would that be? Plus, he'd try to declare Christianity as our national religion. I'd love the chaos just that alone would create. You think Rick would be bold enough to bring back Black slavery--after all, Blacks are condemned by his God to serve the White man.

The Way to Pay Off the Debt
How 'bout we just print up trillions of new dollars and just pay it off?

thegrowlingwolf
for The Daily Growler

Existing in New York City: The Heart Being a Lonely Hunter

Foto by tgw, New York City, February 2012
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Say goodbye to: Mike Melvoin, a truly fine jazz pianist with a lot of blue notes in his competent style. I first heard him in L.A. with old crazy Frank Rosolino, the absolutely unbelievable trombonist (crazy because he came in one night and shot and killed his wife and kids and then himself) and then later Mike appeared with Frank on one of Oscar Brown, Jr's, 1962 jazz teevee shows, Jazz Scene USA. I hate to see these cats leaving the coil; jazz pianists don't live much past their mid-seventies. Mike Melvoin, 74, American jazz pianist and composer, cancer.

Say goodbye to: Red Holloway, the tenor sax man who was on all those old blues jump recordings that the late Etta James made back before she hooked up with Houston Pearson. Red Holloway, 84, American jazz saxophonist (Etta James), stroke and kidney failure.

Say goodbye to: Maurice Andre, the great classical trumpeter. Maurice André, 78, French classical trumpeter.

Say goodbye to: Louisiana Red: Last time I saw Lawsbanana Red was at a WBAI-New York benefit. He was married to Odetta and they were working together. Louisiana Red, 79, American blues musician, stroke.
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Bellevue Hospital
Leonard Feather was a rather foppish Brit dude who came to this country as a jazz pianist, promoter, journalist, and jazz aficionado who rose to a prominence in the field especially being known for his "Blindfold Tests" in Down Beat in which he played jazz recordings for famous jazz people and then had them try and identify who they thought were the cats playing on those records. In 1945, Dinah Washington with the Lionel Hampton Sextet recorded Leonard's "Blow Top Blues" (Leonard's on piano on the recording). The last verse was:

Last night I was five feet tall/
Today I'm eight feet ten/
And every time I fall downstairs/
I float right up again/
When someone turned the lights on me/
It like to drove me blind/
I ended up in Bellevue/
But I left my mind behind/
I'm a gal who blew a fuse/
I've got those blow top blues

As a very young kid in the process of becoming a jazz aficionado myself and crazy about anything Lionel Hampton put out, I bought a 45 rpm Decca recording of "Blow Top Blues." And that was my first impression ever of Bellevue Hospital. Yes. Bellevue was a crazy house. A rubber room. A funny farm. And then once I had Bellevue pegged as such, I heard the comedians and Hollywoodians making fun of the little men in white jackets from Bellevue coming to get us all.

In jazz, crazy was a big word. "Crazy, man, crazy." And a lot of jazz guys went crazy off and on. A lot of jazz guys had to visit Bellevue. Some were in the crazy bin there; others were sent there by the NYC cops after drug busts.

It is a city hospital. Oldest hospital in New York City. It's the oldest public hospital in the USA. Founded in 1736.

Bellevue Hospital, 1878

But, yes, Bellevue still rhymes with "loose screw" and "purview" and "boo-hoo" and
"unstuck glue" and "fuck you." But also it is a "free" hospital. Did'ja hear me? A free hospital.

Getting to Bellevue
When I was a loose screw, around 8, 9, 10, my family once took a trip over to Palestine, Texas, to visit one of my maternal grandmother's cousins, a man named Mack Dockery. Palestine, named for the Holy Land (truth up: Palestine, Texas, was named after Palestine, Illinois (the oldest city in Illinois--1811), by a weird-side Baptist preacher named Daniel Parker (check out his Wikipedia entry to see how weird he was) who had moved to Texas from this Illinois area (near the Indiana border) named by French explorer Jean Lamotte who first gazed upon this region in 1678. He gave it the name Palestine, as it reminded him of the promised land of milk and honey, as written in the scriptures)--and, yes, Palestine used to be the Holy Land, though now it's the lowest most dog-driven-down country in the Middle East; Israel having taken over now as the Holy Land (a huge portion of the Columbia spacecraft wreckage (remember, it crashed during G.W. "Georgie Porgie" Bush's faux-first-presidency)(in 2003) came to earth just outside Palestine, Texas; ironically, this was the flight on which the first Israeli astronaut died).

When I was young, Palestine, Texas, was home to an annual dogwood festival celebrating the dogwood tree, a Middle Eastern tree that was said to once grow as tall and mighty as an oak tree with a wood so hard and solid, the Romans used it to make the crosses they hung criminals on. Some backwoods Christian legends say Jesus himself was hanged from a dogwood cross and that three days after this fabulous man's death and after his fabulous resurrection all the dogwood trees in Palestine began to wither and die and that after that, too, the dogwood flower had the sign of the cross burned into it.

A Pink Dogwood Blossom--like all Christian legends, it takes a huge imagination to believe them--like this blossom, do you see the sign of the cross in it?

Palestine, Texas, was also a major railroad town back during the 19th and into the 20th Century and is still to this day home to the Texas State Railroad, one of the oldest Texas railroads, which is now a railroad museum and historical site.

Uncle Mack Dockery had worked on the railroad. I, as a little kid, was one curious little dude. I poked my nose into anything that caught my desirous fancy, and Uncle Mack was one of those fancies. When we drove up in Uncle Mack's yard--very few people from that era ever had car garages or driveways with their houses that had been built back before the automobile was invented so you simply parked your car up in their yards--very few houses had grassy lawns; only hardscrabble earth. Trees, yes, and Uncle Mack's house had two huge dogwoods at each corner of the house. Hung on the front of his house was a huge wooden porch embraced by flowering vines like honeysuckle and many pot plants of gardenias, a shady place for cooling off during the hot Texas summers. Like most porches, too, in those days, Uncle Mack's porch had a porch swing and a clustering of other chairs, mostly straightback kitchen chairs.

As we got out of the car I thought I heard a heavenly music. I'd never heard such music before. My ears perked up and I couldn't wait to find out where the music was coming from. Out of the car, we were soon met by Uncle Mack's wife, Aunt Dosie. "Oh, my goodness," she said, "Cousin Elfie and the Wolfes. My goodness gracious alive, I ne'er thought you folks would ever make it over here to see the likes of us. Come on in the house and rest your weary bones." Damn the greetings, I was looking for the source of the music. It got louder as we trooped up onto that porch and soon Aunt Dosie was saying, "Mack, Cousin Elfie and her daughter and her husband and chile are here." The music stopped and soon we were in the presence of Uncle Mack Dockery. "Hickory, Dickory, Dockery, a bunch of Dockeries ran up the clock; the clock struck 15, but another 30 got away."

Uncle Mack was a short man very neatly dressed in a starched white shirt, buttoned up all the way to the top but without a tie, and tan gabardine pants, highwater pants since the cuffs ended way above his shoetops, and were held up even higher by a brace of plain brown suspenders. His hair was solid white grey. I was poking with my nose trying to see if Uncle Mack had been the source of that heavenly music I'd heard on exiting the car. I looked at his hands. In his right hand he held a small metal-looking object; it was shining silvery in the afternoon sunlight.

"What's that?" I suddenly asked with wide-eyed curiosity.

"That's'a French harp," Uncle Mack replied, holding it up high so I could see it clearly.

"It makes music?" I asked.

"Yeah, pretty music," he said, lifting it to his lips and blowing.

Yes, that had been the heavenly music I had heard, Uncle Mack playing his French harp.

I watched intensely as he finished the tune I didn't recognize at all. I watched him huffing-and-puffing blowing on that small silvery metal and wood object. Another matter though soon caught my attention as I watched him take the harp down from his mouth. Uncle Mack didn't have all his fingers on either of his hands. Finger stumps on both hands, mostly long fingers, his little fingers and thumbs still normal.

"How did you hurt yourself?" I asked.

"What'cha mean?"

"You got no fingers...."

He laughed. "Oh, that. I was a brakeman on the old Groveton, Lufkin, and Northern. As a brakeman, I had to hook the cars together. We used what they called a link and pin coupler in those days, which meant as soon as the engineer backed the train into the uncoupled car, I had to quickly drop the pin into the hole that hooked the cars together. Occasionally I got a finger caught in the coupler while trying to drop the pin in and a piece of my finger would be pinched off." He held his hands up. "I lost first the top of a finger, then the next joint, then the middle joint and so forth."

Then Aunt Dosie came out of the house. "Are you two comin' in? We're having some lemonade right now and I'm fryin' up some chicken for supper. Mack, would you go out to the well and bring me in some water. And bring in some ears of corn from the cellar."

Later I would find out what Uncle Mack was playing was more commonly known as a harmonica. Yes, they were also called French harps or just plain harps. I would not see another one until I was married and living in New York City--we had just moved here from Santa Fe, New Mexico, and that fall we got an invite to visit friends on Cape Cod in South Wellfleet. While there, one day we drove into Provincetown and went to the Atlantic House whose music venue at the time was the Blues. In one counter in the store area, they had a bunch of harmonicas for sale. On a whim and remembering Uncle Mack's French harp, I bought one. It was a Hohner Marine Band and for several hours I just looked at it, afraid to try and play it. I had no idea really how to play it.

I don't know what happened to that original harp I bought. All I know is I didn't figure out how to play one until further down the line. I really got into harp playing during the 1980s, after being a keyboardist and vocalist with a downtown cult band and with bands that theryefarmerfromqueens and I put together. I have an old recording of my playing the harmonica with the rye master and it's not bad but it's not good either. One other time I suggested I play harmonica with him and he said, "Do you really think you can play a harmonica?" I put it away and that was that for several more years.

Eventually, late 80s and into the early 90s, thebigrig and I formed a band called the New Gringos. We didn't want any keyboards in the band, so I suggested they let me try blowing a harp with the group. Our first gig was a total success. It worked. I was a harmonica king. I blew the dust out the thing and gave it a new life. (Actually, I now carry around 12 harmonicas to my gigs.) I might add here that the harmonica is one of the most difficult instruments to truly master in terms of sucking and blowing. In playing blues, you suck up for your key--like if you are blowing on a C harp, to play the Blues you suck up on it and you're in the key of G. It takes a lot of power and wind to blow on steadily correctly.

The New Gringos lasted several gigs and then thebigrig moved to Chicago and that was that.

Friday one week ago, thebigrig, now back in New York City for several years, called me and said he had gotten a gig at a downtown Manhattan joint (in SOHO) and he wanted me to come sit in. And that's what I did.

My gal and I trucked down to SOHO to the joint and we got a table in front of the bandstand and ordered drinks and food and then the band started playing. About midway through the first set, the Rig Man called me up to do a tune, "Natural Ball," a really open-eneded wild Otis Rush version I had done years ago with this band--up tempo, vigorous, mean--and I went up and started blowing. Immediately I felt myself losing strength. I had to sing wide open, exhausting, but then I tried to take a wild harp solo and halfway through it, I realized, I was totally out of breath. After the tune finished, I went back to my table and I had a bad case of heartburn, I thought.

Sitting there gasping for breath, I remembered one time years before I had gone in my fav bar at the time and I said something about having an upset stomach and the bartender said, "I've got the answer to your problem," and he went and made me this drink and I threw it down and soon my stomach was mellowed out and I felt great. "What was that you gave me?" "A Campari and so-deee," he replied. So remembering that I stopped drinking beer and ordered a Campari and soda and after one sip, my heartburn went away and I felt like a king on a throne and soon the band was calling me back up and I did two tunes, Herman Parker, Jr.'s, "Drivin' Wheel," followed by Fats Domino's "Josephine" and I starred like the champ I am and got great rounds of applause and went back to my table and people started coming over and telling me how great I was, which I love. No musician can resist praise and all that praise made me feel invincible.

I got home that night and my babe left me saying she'd be back the next day late and she came back around 8 at night and stayed here until around 10:30 and I left with her and we parted and I trotted on around on Fifth Avenue and got me a big meal, came home, and chowed down heartily.

At one in the morning I awoke with a tiny stabbing just behind my breastbone. I tried to belch it off but it wouldn't go away. Around three I felt terribly sick at my stomach and I got up and I vomited mightily, upchucking food I didn't even know I had eaten. And then I went back to bed but a few minutes later I was back up throwing up again. The slightly little bugger of a pain still stuck behind my breastbone. I couldn't sleep the rest of the night.

Around 10:30 am, my girl came back bringing with her some Starbucks java. She immediately on seeing me said, "God, you look awful, are you all right?" I macho-ed it up and told her, "Yeah, I've got a little touch of heartburn...it should go away as soon as I get up and get active." But it didn't go away. Finally, my glorious woman said, "I'm calling 9-1-1. I think you're sicker than you think...like you could be having a gald bladder attack...blah, blah, blah." In my best male machismo stance I told her, "Naw, don't do that, I'll be OK." She was by now in a panic mode and I was berating her, "Come on, babe, don't fret over me, I know my body, this will clear up. All I need is a little sleep and I'll be alright." So I went up and got in bed and soon I had dozed off into the netherworld and lost track of civilization. Then I heard my lady waking me up. "I called 9-1-1 and the EMS crew will be here any minute now." I again donned my most male peacock arrogance and said, "Oh, baby, call 'em back and cancel it...besides, I can't afford an EMS trip...they charge out the ass." She went out into my hall pretending she was canceling the order and came back in and said, "It's too late, I can't cancel it, they're already here."

Next thing I know, the EMS guys were here and they put me in the little green-canvas chair with rollers on it and were wheelin' me out to the ambulance, which was parked across my street. In the chair as I exited the building, I was campaign shoutin' and waving at passers by like a Southern politician (from Chuck Berry's "Nadine"), having a young ball until they got me in the back of the ambulance and they got me laid back on a stretcher and one guy immediately hooked an EKG device up to me. The EMS guy, and they were great guys, too, I must add here, looked at me suddenly and said, "Pal, you're having a heart attack...we're taking you directly to Bellevue--they've got a cardiac team ready and waiting for you."

And off I went on my first-ever ambulance ride. Through the streets of New York City. And soon we arrived at the Bellevue ER where I was wheeled on through to the cardiac salvation center like a VIP and next thing I know doctors were inserting the angioplasty tools into my groin and I passed out and when I woke up I was in CPU and feeling fit as a fiddle.

"Wha' happened?" I asked the attending doctor on waking up. "You had a blood clot in the first of the three main arteries that enter your heart, right at the top of your heart. If you'd have waited another hour, you'd be in bad shape, brother, if not dead."

I had undergone angioplasty--the little balloon had been blown up and opened up my artery and after sucking the blood clot out they inserted a bare metal stent. The whole procedure had taken only a couple of hours. "We'll keep you here in CPU for two or three days and watch you carefully and we'll start you immediately on medications...we've got a nitro drip in you now. The problem is the lower half of your heart may be dead--we're worried it's not squeezing the blood out and we've got to thin your blood so a major clot doesn't develop in that end of your heart. You're lucky to be alive. Instead of two in the afternoon, you should have come here at two in the morning. The damage may be irreparable...."

Cool as a cucumber I was. "Do you know where you are?" one doctor asked me, a typical question all patients are asked after such a procedure, and I said, "Yeah, I'm in Bellevue...though I hope I'm not in the psych ward."

And that was that. I had a heart attack.

Five days later I was sent up to rehab and after a horrible night dealing with a crazed Puerto Rican roommate (he had a full-time guard sitting with him), the next morning I told my doctor, a Dr. Wolfe, by the way (remember my parallel-line theory of those you meet), "Doc, you better get me out of this fuckin' psycho's room or I'm gonna go psycho."

By five o'clock the Thursday after I'd enter the hospital on Sunday afternoon, I was released and sent packing after I picked up a paper sack full of medications from the pharmacy--seven different medications, plus an RN taught me how to give myself injections of coumadin, a blood thinner that is an amazing drug--it's also known as warfarin.

Back Home
I've been back home in the saddle now for two days. I'm feeling fine. As fit as a cheap fiddle if not a Stradivarius. I just returned from a big dinner up at my fav Irish pub where they now have me my own table. I've had to give up beer for the moment; certainly no more whiskey; although my Doctor Wolfe said that in the near future, he thought a couple of beers with a very lean steak would be just fine--as long as I didn't overdo it. SMOKING is the big no-no and since the only cigarettes I've ever smoked in my life are Mexican roll-your-owns, and I've certainly giving those up, too, I'm told I should recover nicely and, if I'm lucky, the bottom half of my heart is just stunned and these injections of warfarin I'm giving myself may one day get it to squeezing the blood on through once again.

The Daily Growler almost had to give a "Say goodbye to: our own Wolf Man...blah, blah, blah."

My life was saved by a woman friend I've known for 22 years; I hired her as a proofreader but also got her into editing and got her an editing job where we worked after I was fired. After moving on up to become a director of editing with this world firm, she's now a successful free-lance editor working out of Poor Little Rhode Island. Her insistence to get me to Bellevue has me now obligated to her for as long as my new-old heart can hold on and continue pumping life into me.

And what a great bunch of friends I have; musicians are so lucky when it comes to friends for life and I'm no exception to the rule.

My closing remarks, "It's great to be alive."

thestilltickinggrowlingwolf(tooyoungtodie)
for The Daily Growler