What's more illusionary than Christmas morning? Sun doesn't care. Birds don't care. Trees rustle in a breeze like any other morning. It's pure human fantasy, albeit a mega-hyped one more aligned with Capitalism than Christ, for most. After the exultations of childhood it requires practice, for rituals only become so through dogged persistence and resistance to change.
Two things greatly lacking in my life.
Gave myself a gift yesterday. Watched a favourite film from the '70s, Mel Brooks' 'Blazing Saddles'. There's a scene where Cleavon Little and Gene Wilder convince the threatened townsfolk of Rock Ridge to build a fake version of their town for marauders to destroy. It all goes well until Slim Pickens kicks one of the buildings over -- and discovers there's no structure behind the facade.
Kinda like playing Christmas songs on Christmas morning when there's no family, no tradition, no celebration. No joy. Just the voices of Elvis, Nat King Cole, Mathis, Sinatra and Stevie Wonder accompanying the usual cacophony of what-if, what-should-be, what-a-fool-I've-been, what-am-I-doing, where-am-I-going ...
Before a Vince Guaraldi song comes on and something cracks. Not, as Leonard Cohen sang so beautifully, a crack where the light gets in. There's a bit of time travel, a memory of sitting before a bank vault-sized TV set at the house on 20 Dayton Road, the smell of my mother's perfume, my little brother in his pajamas, my father's footsteps upstairs, Charlie Brown and Linus and Lucy, a passageway that fills with water and threatens to pull me under, a torrent of torment that will wash away only when my heart beats its last.
In this self-made setting Christmas is a day of reckoning. No wife, no kids. Coupla cats, who are laying peacefully beside me now, but without a tree adorned with ornaments to destroy even they get shafted by my hermit-like existence and resultant Christmas morning facade. I've learned -- hell, I've been taught by professionals -- to live in the present, appreciate the little things. But Christmas is big. Too big for cognitive massaging. It's one day of the year my mind wants to believe in the whole enchilada, swallow it down whole. But we reap what we sow, as the cliche goes. A life of solitude isn't rewarded on a day of giving. Nor should it be.
Here's something I posted on Facebook two days ago: 'Just played secret Santa for a country Victoria bloke who dropped his wallet on a Balaclava sidewalk. $9 to mail it to him after finding no other means of contact. Judging by the battered state of a condom wrapper found tucked inside, the guy's overdue for a bit of luck ....'
If I'm willing to help a stranger, the least I can do is try and help whoever may be reading this, whether it be friend, foe or someone in-between. 'Help' is probably too strong a word, for I'm not sharing anything you don't know. However, like every Christmas fable, hymn, carol, movie and TV show Christmas episode ever made, there's a moral tacked onto this tale:
You got people around you? Love them. Let go of the cynicism. Make the illusion of Christmas real. Knock on a neighbour's door, shake his or her hand, give their kids chocolates and a smile. Visit family and make this the year their bullshit doesn't get under your skin. Enjoy the stories, laugh at the jokes, even if it requires an extra glass of wine.
More than anything, do the one thing I find impossible: Love who you are. And do that every motherfucking day of the year.
If this blog post has made you sad ... don't be. If it reads like a call for help ... it isn't. All that I can truly call upon from this hunk of junk I call myself is honesty. My blessings are many, my burdens few. Love someone today. A lot. And wish them a heartfelt Merry Christmas.
2017 was a busy year for Dave Wright & the Midnight Electric, so it was fitting they ended it with a packed Christmas Spectacular at Fairfield's Grandview Hotel. Myles O'Neill Shaw, stalwart host of PBS 106.7 FM's 5 Ft High and Rising on Saturday mornings, spun a mix of alt-country Christmas tunes. Ben Mastwyk played a set of acoustic country that've packed 'em in at any Texas honky tonk. The Woodland Hunters followed with a righteous blend of Hank meets Hendrix before DWME sent Santa scurrying back up the chimney with a six-string roar. Dave later said he thought the band's never sounded better.
Amen to that, chooch.
The set was a scorcher. Kicked off with 'Coming Home', the opening track of 2017's HWY album. Three cuts from 2014's Lucky Country -- 'Hang Me High', 'Into the Big Blue' and 'Father' -- got the crowd singing along before Dave introduced the new 'Hazelwood' with a thought for the families of those left unemployed by that Victoria town's shuttered power station. Fan favourite 'Streets of This Town' led into an elegaic 'Avenues of Honour before 'Drinking Days' knocked everyone on their asses. The next two songs were the evening's emotional high points: a raucous, prayerful 'Terry & Jenny' followed by a merciless 'Blacktown'. A rare one-two of very different driving songs -- 'Happiness' and 'HWY' -- closed the main set. Dave begged for unnecessary patience before an unrehearsed full-band cover of Tom Petty's 'Crawling Back to You' led into a celebratory final trio of 'Sweet Caroline', 'Rain' and 'Lucky Country'.
Ben Mastwyk knows how to wear a cowboy hat. His Mornin, Evenin LP's a cracker, too.
Ben picks the first winner of a gift from beneath the DWME tree with help from a relaxed Dave and Santa's loveliest elf, Dave's sister-in-law Nicky. That's Myles between the laptop and Christmas trees on the right.
The Woodland Hunters played songs off their latest release, Let's Fall Apart. A great band, with ample swagger.
A much more formal Dave helps Andrew Tanner of Woodland Hunters pick another winner.
DWME's set of songs spotlighted the guitar chops of Mr Robert Barber.
Daryl Johnson does his Benmont thing ...
Rock and roll may be festive in December only.
The DWME family was out in full force: Rita, Piera, Aggie, Rebecca, Mary, Jamie and Stew.
Rebecca was a lucky -- and happy -- winner.
Best-dressed Santa and a dramatically lit elf.
Dave Wright & the Midnight Electric.
The cosy Grandview was high energy, both on-stage and off.
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/UNZbP3ZVem4" frameborder="0" gesture="media" allow="encrypted-media" allowfullscreen></iframe>Saw the Smithereens many times in the late '80s -- most memorably a Stone Pony show broadcast live on WNEW-FM before which Edward Natoli and I visited a Palace Amusements overrun with crack dealers -- but my favourite Pat DiNizio anecdote occurred when the band opened for Squeeze at Jones Beach. 'We're the Smithereens!' cried DiNizio. Silence. 'We're the SMITHEREENS!' he cried again, eliciting weak applause. 'We're the FUCKIN' SMITHEREENS!' The Long Island crowd went wild. A band that good shouldn't have had to work so hard to be appreciated. Maybe DiNizio's passing at 62 will bring long-overdue acclaim. RIP to the pride of Scotch Plains, NJ.
When I first landed an editorial gig in April at a respected travel company my brain bubbled at the prospect of writing about a universally loved subject. Beats the hell out of waxing poetic about OTC antacids or sleep apnea devices, both subjects of credulous creativity in my professional past. It was inevitable that the novelty of describing small group travel destinations would wear off; what wasn't inevitable was a growing appreciation for the culture of Intrepid Travel's corporate office in Melbourne's CBD, and a genuine respect for the people I got to call colleagues.
This photo (left) was taken Friday night in the 'beer garden' section of the Intrepid office, which inhabits the entire 7th floor of a Collins Street highrise. At 4 pm on Fridays the company provides a fridge-full of beer, cider and wine in its vast kitchen area, to which the beer garden is adjacent. The gentleman beside me is Mark Hewitt, of the Ringwood Hewitts (sorry for that, mate). When I joined Intrepid's brochure team I'd been freelance writing for years and was still doing overnight shifts as an Uber driver but had not held a full-time office gig since a comically bad stint with Optus in North Sydney in 2007. Fair to say I was trepiditious about fitting in as a rusty 51 year old. To use one of Mark's favourite expressions, 'this fuckin' guy' was as helpful and patient as anyone I've ever worked with, regardless of the field. I thanked him in front of the team on Friday, my final day at Intrepid, and I'm thanking him again on my goddamned blog because everyone should be as lucky to have a guy like this beside him/her when you feel like a bridge troll in an office full of young, smart and disturbingly attractive men and women.
Parramatta Yankee was once a means to show people back home what life was like in Australia but I stopped doing that when my life became something I disliked. So consider this a throwback post. Here's a chronological look at my first experience as a Melbourne CBD Working Boy, starting with a South Melbourne sunrise snapped in April (below) and ending with photos from my final day on Friday.
As I was still Ubering in April I'd park in South Melbourne, have a coffee and chin wag with Dave at Jimmy the Saint, and walk to the Intrepid office on Collins Street. One morning the sky over Southbank, which sits across the Yarra River from Melbourne's CBD, glowed cotton-candy pink.
Piano man Julian and I became fast friends even before he invited several folks from Intrepid and I to a Sunday afternoon lunch at he and his wife Meera's home in Clayton. Neesha, their oldest child, is propped upon Meera's lap, while Lucy, one of the Outstanding Humans of Intrepid, sits alongside.
After realising working 9-5 and leasing a car for Uber was a hamster wheel of financial futility, I returned the car and began taking the train to Flinders Street Station and walking to the office near Spencer Street on the western edge of the CBD. On this morning, menacing clouds gathered over the CBD.
Morning view of the pedestrian bridge to Southbank.
Steps of the Immigration Museum on Flinders Street painted in support of the Yes vote in Australia's ridiculous (non-binding) referendum on marriage equality. Here's hoping Aussies do what their gutless representatives cannot: acknowledge the rights of fellow citizens to marry the partner of his/her choice. Pretty fucking simple.
If a Southern Cross train was about to pull out of Flinders Street as my Sandringham line train arrived (perhaps the most Melbourne-centric collection of words I've ever typed) I'd hop on to save a few minutes. Here's the view looking north at the CBD, featuring a prominent Immigration Museum.
A new chi-chi restaurant seems to pop up on Chapel Street every week, but every now and then I'd get off the train at Windsor and determine a beer and (chicken) burger were necessary and head to the nearby hipster-free Parlour Diner for a healing dose.
On the subject of healing doses ... while full-time colleagues are seemingly happy with Friday beers, my fellow contractors and I expanded the range to include spirits. In this case, the favourite spirit of Liz, the woman in the 'Home Is Toronto' sweatshirt, whose workspace was opposite my own.
Walking back to my St Kilda East apartment through a moody Alma Park.
Exceptionally ordinary apartment buildings on Flinders Street.
As I've lived in proximity to Australia's finest bagels for ten years in Balaclava, I was hesitant to visit a bagel shop near the office favoured by my colleagues. After overcoming my bias I quickly became a fan of NJ-native Zev's shop, called 5 and Dime Bagel, especially when I went in one day and he was wearing a t-shirt reading 'Boonton Coffee Co'.
To celebrate the conclusion of a successful 'brochure season', Intrepid organised an afternoon of lawn bowls at the Melbourne Bowls Club in Flagstaff Gardens. Thanks again, Belinda.
On Friday the rising sun glowed bright down Fulton Street as I began a final morning commute.
My last morning as first (or second) into the office.
I could write a few thousand words about 'Tin of Win', a Friday tradition of the Intrepid marketing department. For the purposes of this blog post, however, I'll stick to the basics: If something good happened during a workweek, we'd jot it down on a slip of paper and shove it in a tin. At around 4:30 the dept would gather, drinks in hand, pull random slips from the tin, and read them aloud. On my final day I was humbled by both the quantity and subject matter of many of those slips of paper, especially this one -- kudos to whoever perfectly described my 'generally marketable voice-over-voice'.
Amen. (Thanks, Cluny.)
Dusk view in the beer garden. Outstanding Humans of Intrepid Pippa, Emily and Justin are barely visible in foreground shadow.
On Saturday morning I pulled this, a departing gift from Home Is Toronto Liz, from my backpack and placed it in a place of prominence. I'll do the same with memories of my six months at Intrepid.
Laying in bed, Tom Petty songs playing in my head …
It’s six days since news broke on Monday morning about Petty’s demise from cardiac arrest at the age of 66, which a few hours later became a dismaying death watch after initial reports proved premature. The official announcement, which came Monday night, said he passed surrounded by family, friends and bandmates. Comforting, but way too fucking soon.
The usual social media testimonials followed, and touring bands covered Petty classics that were quickly uploaded to YouTube. Couple of decent articles recounted his musical journey from Gainesville, Florida to 80-million-record-selling rock icon. He and the Heartbreakers had concluded a critically lauded 40th anniversary tour only a week earlier at the Hollywood Bowl. As if everything that needed to be done had been done and once he was back in his Malibu home his heart finally said, well, I’m done too.
Like many I’ve been listening to his music all week. And last night, like every night since he died, I was laying in bed, Tom Petty songs playing in my head, when that chronic condition boiled down to a thought that got me out of bed to make a benign observation: Petty was his songs. Absolutely nothing more, and nothing less. My brain is stuck on a 24-hour Petty loop because there’s nothing to short-circuit the jukebox. His songs are the beginning, middle and now, sadly, end. There have been videos and tours and cameo acting appearances but his legacy cannot be pinned to a particular epoch – his songs are timeless – or endeavours extraneous to songwriting – every Petty video featured the same look of bemusement at everything around him – or concert tour – his laconic off-stage demeanour was identical to the one he brought to hundreds of honky tonks, clubs, theatres, arenas and stadiums. No ever-changing personas (other than a Wilbury name not taken by George, Roy, Bob or Jeff). No makeovers. No on-stage histrionics. No gossip-rag romances.
Just a lifetime of songs written to be heard and destined to be cherished.
In an industry designed to build up and tear down, Petty cheekily grinned his way through setbacks and trudged along like a shaggy haired, guitar-slinging tortoise. Of course he suffered personal losses and battled substance abuse and band crises – hell, the Heartbreakers’ second bass player and main backing vocalist slowly killed himself with drugs. In a scenario impossible to imagine in a typical ego-larded rock band, original bass player Ron Blair rejoined the Heartbreakers just before Howie Epstein OD’ed in February 2003. There’d been no banishments or war or words between Petty and Blair, who’d known each other since they were teens, as he’d known guitarist Mike Campbell and organ player Benmont Tench. They’d come out of Florida and conquered the world. All remarkably unassuming. All pitched in service to the songs. All prominent in forging a sweet noise called Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.
‘Here Comes My Girl’ is off Petty’s third album Damn the Torpedoes, released in October 1979. I was 13, soon to be 14. I bought the album the following spring and can remember sitting in my NJ bedroom listening to it repeatedly along with Springsteen’s Darkness on the Edge of Town and Elvis Costello’s This Year’s Model, which had both come out in ‘78. All dark albums, all brilliantly produced (Jimmy Iovine manned the boards for Torpedoes and Darkness), but I wasn’t listening to these records – I was inhabiting them. When Torpedoes vinyl laid on my turntable and the needle eased into its groove I left suburban NJ with a crackling snare and entered track 1, ‘Refugee’, a sun-drenched space adorned in signature Heartbreakers’ flash: Tench’s oceanic organ, a soaring Campbell solo, Blair’s blue-collar bass, original drummer Stan Lynch’s no-bullshit fills. My 14-year-old ears were locked onto Petty’s voice, of course, a voice as tricky and mysterious as the ghosts lurking in my hormone-mad mind. Yes there was a ‘Refugee’ video but in pre-cable, pre-MTV days it was relegated to late-night clip shows. Petty’s only solid form stared at me from that red album cover. He lived and snarled and wailed in a 3-and-a-half-minute ransom note, ‘Right now it seems real to you / But it’s one of those things you’ve got to FEEL to be TRUE …’ The song was a hit, an instant classic, a radio staple of my youth, Petty’s ticket out of critic’s darling hell to platinum-selling rock stardom.
But then came track 2. ‘Here Comes My Girl’ kicked off with a smouldering Campbell ricochet riff that curled to the ceiling like pool hall smoke. Petty’s voice followed in a similar register, like he’d just woken to the bottom of a tumbler beside an ashtray brimming with lipsticked butts, an Elmore Leonard loser laying out his plight on page one. While a few cheesecake posters hung on the walls of my wood-paneled room – anyone remember Charlene Tilton from the tv show Dallas? – my 14-year-old passions were relegated to the Yankees, Rangers, Knicks, Giants ... and rock and roll. ‘Here Comes My Girl’ was about as raw a love song I'd ever heard, yet still melodic and compelling and hopeful to a kid oblivious to the delights of the opposite sex. It's little wonder it was the conduit to a sadness that nearly brought tears in a silent office building, a galaxy away from a NJ bedroom on a sticky summer night in 1980 – Petty’s voice a time-traveling force:
You know, sometimes, I don't know why,
But this old town just seems so hopeless
I ain't really sure, but it seems I remember the good times
Were just a little bit more … in focus
Then, as Petty’s voice climbs and gains speed, the chills came.
But when she puts her arms around me,
I can, somehow, rise above it
Yeah man, when I got that little girl standing right by my side,
You know, I can tell the whole wide world, and shout it,
HEY, here comes my girl, here comes my girl,
Yeah, she looks so right, she's all I need tonight
A little while later Petty's voice again mimics his lover's and he sings with frantic vulnerability:
And then she looks me in the eye, says, "We gonna last forever,"
And man, you know I can't begin to doubt it
No, because this feels SO GOOD and SO FREE and SO RIGHT,
I know we ain't never goin' change our minds about it
Who else in 1979 could have sung ‘Here Comes My Girl’? Maybe Joey Ramone. Maybe Bowie, in high irony. Definitely Patti Smith, whose Springsteen-penned, Iovine-produced ‘Because the Night’ was all over the radio at the time. No, nobody could have sung this song but Petty because no one could get inside its complicated skin like Petty. Almost 40 years after its release the song stopped my old, broken body in its tracks in a Melbourne, Australia high-rise, called me from someplace far away and long gone, literally rippled my flesh like a cypress tree falling into a Florida swamp, gifting me a joy as strong as the one that once did battle with a morose teenager sprawled like a corpse in suburban NJ, trapped in a heavenly prison of Heartbreakers sound.
Laying in bed, Tom Petty songs playing in my head …
AFTERWORD: Here's the 'Here Comes My Girl video. It's TP and Heartbreakers goofing around while lip synching. An abomination. Play it, hear it, but be sure to keep your eyes closed.
There are two types of people in the world: Those who do because it's in their blood, and those who do only if they directly benefit. This is a photo of Carmen YulÃn Cruz, mayor of San Juan in hurricane-ravaged Puerto Rico. She's spent the past 10 days watching the people of her city suffer while urgent pleas for assistance from the United States, of which Puerto Rico is a territory, have been achingly slow to gain traction. As shown here, Mayor Cruz isn't asking for help while doing nothing -- it's fair to say wading chest-deep in sewage-contaminated water is the opposite of nothing. Meanwhile, President Pussy Grabber, possibly contaminating New Jersey water with homemade sewage while teetering atop a gold-plated toilet on yet another country club getaway, mobile phone in his tiny hands, Oompa-Loompa face turned ochre with narcissistic rage and constipation, has discerned that the only personal benefit from this tragedy is signalling to his white-nationalist base via another shameless Twitter rant that Puerto Ricans 'want everything done for them'. There is no more abominable creature on the planet than someone who sees human suffering, has the means to remedy it, and chooses to scapegoat those in need for political gain. He's specifically targeted Mayor Cruz, of course, because nothing gets under a bloated racist's skin like a strong, brown-skinned woman. While Carmen YulÃn Cruz inspires with her courage, President 'Some Nazis Are Nice People' drills down through ever deeper levels of human depravity.
If the first half of my life was a rope, it would consist of three strands: the Walls (dad side), Whites (mom side) and Natolis (extended family side). A mere three blocks away, the Natoli house at 4 Fairfield Road was a mirror image of the one my father and brother and I inhabited at 20 Dayton Road. As in, built by the same homebuilder and common throughout our suburb, but literally flipped: their living room was on the left, ours on the right; their upstairs master bedroom on the right, ours on the left; etc. This would have doubtlessly passed for distinctive style back in the 1960s but it was a less precious age, when a neighbourhood where kids could be set loose (unsupervised!) to play and work out their hellacious and best-left-unspoken urges held more sway than square footage or designer faucets or imported paving stones – any ostentatiousness, really. Where we grew up it was okay to stomp through a front garden while shooting hoops in the driveway, a regular occurrence at 4 Fairfield in the late ‘70s/early ‘80s. Just as our suburban streets were playing fields for kickball and running bases, yards were expected to be explored and exploited, not roped-off like rich men’s domains.
Now, as I’m writing this on the sad occasion of Mr Natoli’s passing at age 86, I must point out his pronounced affinity for a lush, properly mowed lawn. It was no secret. Everyone knew Mr Natoli adored his fairway-like side yard, a rarity in the evenly apportioned properties of our North Jersey suburb. Edward and/or Gene, his twin sons whom I’ve known since they both attended my second – aged two – birthday party, may have more to offer on the subject but I never once heard Mr Natoli complain about the damage our most recent touch football game may have done to his hallowed turf. That’s not to suggest he would have held his tongue if he felt aggrieved. Just the opposite. Mr Natoli was blunt when necessary but never harsh. He was suitably gruff but quick to smile. In other words, a Jersey City guy. He was like most of the adults of my childhood – men and women who grew up with much less than their kids, who’d perhaps avoided outright hardship but carried memories of want rather than privilege. They built middle class lives they were proud of and took pleasure in but would never take credit for. If the kids were OK and the house was paid for and you could spend a couple weeks down the shore in the summer, what was there to complain about?
The Cardinals. I’m sure Mr Natoli could find something to gripe about regarding his beloved Cardinals, but as St Louis has long been one of baseball’s most successful franchises, even that potential angst would have been tempered by an appreciation that he wasn’t a Mets fan. (Had to toss that in, Edward.)
I imagine to Mr Natoli I was akin to a minor player on a cheesy sitcom, a one-note-Johnny who’d pop by unannounced, utter a few catchphrases, and exit quickly. For me, of course, those cameos at 4 Fairfield were more meaningful, as they invariably meant speaking with Mr Natoli, seated in a chair near the kitchen, and Mrs Natoli, either on a couch facing a TV or in a chair near the front door. I can literally – and I mean literally – hear Mrs Natoli saying ‘Oh, hiya Joe!’ in her Irish/Jersey voice, followed seconds later by Mr Natoli’s burly ‘Hello Joe’. Mrs Natoli would ask about my brother Kevin and niece Amanda, Mr Natoli would ask about work, I’d sit on the couch and reel off details about my needlessly complicated life, looking at photos of the twins and oldest daughter Mary on the walls, those photos crowded later by in-laws and grandkids. They’d listen patiently, Mrs Natoli asking questions, Mr Natoli offering advice. They were polite, but caring. (I could always tell the difference.) The house at 20 Dayton and the Natolis’ may have been designed on the same drafting table but this ritual, this comforting routine of speaking with Mr and Mrs Natoli before walking upstairs to cajole Edward out of his wood-panelled cave, this FEELING of a house completely given over to the affairs of family, was something I craved. This isn’t a knock at the home my father provided Kevin and I, and I’m not claiming to have been the Judge Reinhold character on ‘Seinfeld’ swooning at the feet of Jerry’s parents, but I genuinely craved the feeling of genial entanglement that hit me the moment I walked into 4 Fairfield. It was something I could rely on, even when I couldn’t rely on much else, and I sheepishly soaked up as much as I could with each visit.
Adding to this dynamic was a slightly Shakespearean subplot involving Mr Natoli’s sister Anita and my uncle Mike, long ago my godparents before an acrimonious divorce. I am the oldest son of Mike’s oldest brother Joseph Patrick Wall (‘Pat’ to everyone, including Mr Natoli) and it sometimes felt like Edward and I – best friends for nearly 30 years until I moved to Australia in 2006 – were the Romeo and Juliet of the Natoli/Montagues and Wall/Capulets. Did I ever get this feeling from Mr or Mrs Natoli? Hell no. We may live in an age where even the most miniscule of grievances are encouraged to bubble to self-absorbed surfaces but Mr Natoli was an honourable man. I might have heard dribs and drabs of my godparents’ marital demise but never from Anita’s protective older brother. Just like it took me many decades to understand and appreciate the quiet dignities of my dad, I can think back to the options before Mr Natoli during those years and admire his selflessness, his old-school intolerance for petty nonsense, his class ... his fatherly-ness.
As my interactions with Mr Natoli were limited mostly to those living room encounters I don’t claim a deep understanding of his history, but I can relate a pair of anecdotes that long ago cemented my respect for him. Probably the most memorable was the result of, shall we say, liberal restrictions enforced at 20 Dayton. During some gathering that probably involved a critical Rangers or Knicks game, a bunch of us put away copious amounts of alcohol before my dad got home. (Unbeknownst to me, Edward and another lifelong friend – Rich Manhardt – spent large chunks of the evening sharing a bottle of unspecified spirits in my backyard.) My last memory of Edward on this evening was watching him jump up and down in the front yard of a neighbour’s house down the road in what I later learned was an attempt to snag a St Christopher medal he’d gotten stuck in a tree. Sometime later, after everyone had left and my dad had gotten home, came a knock at the door. I was upstairs in my bedroom but heard my dad answer. Mr Natoli’s voice boomed like the thunder of a vengeful god. My dad, knowing nothing about what had taken place but always poised to defend his dopey oldest son, spoke calmly to Mr Natoli, who was concerned we’d all been doing drugs. A lot of foolish behaviour got displayed at 20 Dayton over the years but drug use was never one of them. I went downstairs and squeaked my ignorance. The two men at the door shook hands and Mr Natoli left. It turned out Edward had walked the three blocks back to 4 Fairfield, staggered into the living room where Mr and Mrs Natoli were watching TV, and hit the carpet face-first. Who could blame Mr Natoli for storming to my house to find out what had happened? It’s what a dad did. A caring dad. The only kind that mattered.
Anecdote #2 took place a few years before that. One Halloween Edward and I and a couple of neighbourhood kids (Edward’s brother Gene may have been with us – my memory is less reliable than Trump’s moral conscience) were trick-or-treating after dark and got mugged by a group of older kids. Those ratbags weren’t after wallets (we had no money) or sneakers (we wore Sears best) or electronic devices (there were no electronic devices) – these lowlifes stole our pillow cases full of candy. Crime was exotic in our neighbourhood then and all I remember is running away from the creeps, swinging my lumpy pillow case at them like a knight in Hershey’s army, until I got back to 20 Dayton, winded and bewildered. An embarrassing defeat got turned on its head during a phone conversation with Edward, who relayed how he’d returned to 4 Fairfield and told his dad what happened and Mr Natoli had immediately set out in pursuit of the candy thieves. I don’t recall the precise details of what happened next but I DO remember how goddamned good it felt to hear Edward relay how his old man went out and meted justice to the douchebags who’d considered us easy marks.
This is the sort of story I wish I could share with Edward and Gene and Mary and Bill and little Anita and Michael and Nicole and everyone else back in NJ over a bottle of fine whiskey. Mr Natoli, an Italian-American who married an Irish-American, is a man for whom Irish wakes were first conceived. There’s so much I don’t know about his life. Yet I know the more I learned, the higher I’d lift my glass in salute.
All my love to Mary, Gene and Edward. All my everything to Mrs Natoli, Mr Natoli’s wife of 55 years. Hope you read this someday, Mrs Natoli, and know how much you and Mr Natoli have meant to me over the years. Truly wish I could have attended his services. Please know I was there in spirit.
When I was a kid, the satisfying crux of Christmas was its ritual. Going up to the attic on some ethereally ordained date. Bringing down boxes from another lifetime, before my parents divorced, like an elementary-school-aged mayor unsealing a time capsule every December. There'd be an NFL game on TV, grey sky outside, maybe a flurry or two skipping through bare branches. It being the '70s we had an artificial tree, and it being the only kind of tree we knew, my brother Kevin and I never thought we were missing anything. That tree was crap but I loved every one of its forever mangled, color-coded branches that fit like gnarly pipe cleaners into a green-spray-painted stump. When that tree was upright and adorned with lights the size of XXL eggs I'd stare at it like baby Jesus himself looking up at a sea of wino-looking faces gobsmacked by the kid with a shiny halo around his lumpy skull.
What's this got to do with listening to Asbury Park rock and roll, raising money for charity and drinking the finest craft beer in Melbourne? Nothing, except that as I ponder my motivation for holding five Sundays at the Stone Pony, I realise I'm never happier than the moment I step back from the Local Taphouse's rear wall and gaze upon our pseudo Stone Pony banner hanging exactly as it does in that shitty little brick building on the corner of Ocean Avenue and Second Avenue in Asbury Park. So much of my former life is gone forever but for a few hours the Pony breathes life into my adopted hometown of St Kilda, as far from New Jersey as you can get without boarding a spacecraft. When the first notes of Southside Johnny's 'This Time It's for Real' scream through the speakers I can smell the Atlantic Ocean and sense the ghosts of Palace Amusements and the Casino on the Asbury Park boardwalk of my youth.
I'm going to miss that. Because the magnificent Stone Pony banner that my friend and 'Sunday at the Stone Pony' colleague Piera made back in 2014 will never again grace the Local Taphouse. I'm done trying to tap into whatever fellowship Springsteen's appearance on these shores the past 3 out of 4 years has created. The people have spoken. They don't care. That's life.
We raised a little over $1000 for Lifeline Australia at Stone Pony V but that was due to the obscene generosity of a handful of attendees -- I'm looking at you, Stewie -- and a large contingent of colleagues from the Intrepid Group who boosted attendance numbers that would have otherwise depressed the fuck out of me.
I wouldn't bother to post about something so wildly successful except for the two women who never, and I mean never, fail to humble me with their selflessness and undaunted spirit. I've already mentioned Piera -- her spiritual sister and rock and roll troubadour is Mary. To me they're literally the finest people I've come to call friends during my ten years in Melbourne.
They're two of the finest humans you'll ever meet. They're both genuine Chris Cornell fans and were devastated by his suicide back in May. We never discussed it but held matching opinions that a suicide prevention organisation would benefit from another Sunday at the Stone Pony. They're shown above speaking about the need to raise awareness about suicide, their experiences as teachers working with vulnerable students, firing people up to throw a couple extra bucks into the coffers.
Thank you both. It's been a good run. And thanks to everyone who's come over the years.
Last-minute silent auction preparations.
A small portion of silent auction items.
Mary and Piera even arranged for exclusive Stone Pony V t-shirts to be made.
Selena, Jamie, Piera, Stew and Carly ... legends all.
The Wonder Twins and a Big Galoot.
Dear -- and exceptionally photogenic -- friends Ashmin and Rose.
One last group photo in front of the almighty Stone Pony banner.
