The dawn light gives objects back their color  the blue cars, red stop signs, green monk parakeets in Brooklyn and it all happens before the worst of all – the sun rising and the silent gong of a new day ..read more

They were fraternal twins, Eddie and Henry Moogins, named after Milwaukee Braves players Eddie Mathews and Henry Aaron. They used to canoe all summer day, in search of fish and along the way, would laugh, a belly aching laugh. It didn’t matter if the fish haul had been a success or not; they laughed a long laugh, so long that they forgot what they were laughing about in the first place. And when the sun set and they returned home to where dad had built a decent enough cabin, the eight pane window leaning against a redwood tree was still there, screaming a beautiful Greek god siren sound, seduc ..read more

Gordy Wineman didn’t really know himself. I mean he knew he had a nose and mouth and legs and felt pain when he left his finger too long on the stove top, just like everyone else, but he didn’t know why he liked coconut milk or felt exhilarated by thunder, or where his ancestors originated or oceans and wind and elephants either, a creator? Magician? Extra terrestrial computer program like the Matrix? Gordy let his hair grow long, let the brown strands lay on his back like wet spaghetti, greasy from not showering, not to look different or be a rebel; he was just afraid of water. He couldn’t be ..read more

Depending on the person you ask while waiting in line at the post office,  a crow appearing on the table where you fill out forms might be deemed strange or eerie or divine and a fourth guy or gal might say nothing, just smile and hand out fliers for free drinks between 9 and 10 that night at multiple watering hole to celebrate the Brewers completing a two-game sweep of their commissioner-appointed rival Minnesota Twins. I’m far away from my Milwaukee home in Montreal so I’m going to impose some Walter Mitty syndrome on myself and daydream me in Milwaukee Sunday night and wandering drunk ..read more

He was the son of a big leaguer, a successful one too. Dad played 10 years in the majors, 2 teams, 100 career home runs and an OB% near .400. Nicky was awarded wonderful opportunities as a child, from playing pepper with dad’s teammates, to having all his baseball cards signed to seeing so many games from wherever he wanted, in the lower box, upper deck, or bleachers.  Nicky, from an early age, liked expressions, specifically baseball metaphors, none more compelling than where he learned how to carry out a hot foot…..in the bullpen. That word bullpen resonated with him and this frustrated ..read more

The fringes dangling down, the let it go beard, the bible, the heat, the solution to the riddle of existence. If only Demitri Von Dunkin’ had been raised that way, he’d endure friends and foes mocking him as a blind believer sheep, the judgments dwarfed by his happiness and sensitivity to the miracles, the pearl drops on morning blades of grass, the shapes of clouds, the fruits of friendships, skyscrapers, trains, defibrillators, and late inning defensive replacements. Demitri fashioned a cape out of his mom’s left over sewing materials for he knew it was possible, that one day he might fly an ..read more

He had so much going for him – the pock marks on his face, the long, wobbly gait, and dreams, the most recent involving a caravan of people including himself being led through a maze of rooms and stairwells and along the way a Sri Lankan chef who promised to bring them coconut milk chicken when they reached their destination, wherever that was. I met him at the Oriental Pharmacy on Milwaukee’s East side. More than just a pharmacy, it featured a half moon diner and all kinds of tools and mops and coffee filters and mouse traps and screws, a nice medley of options and there he was sitting at one ..read more

There’s the periodical table and telescopes and microscopes and science is amazing. We can speculate on the lifespan of human beings from the Palaeolithic era…..apparently, it was somewhere between 22-33 years and like advanced baseball metrics, this number is based on multiple variables. As of 2000, our expiration date had only jumped to 75.6 years for females and 70.8 for males which makes sense in that women seem to eat better and take care of themselves where men…..well, bar rails? They tend to be filled with men, but 75.6? And to think Methuselah from the bible lived to be 969 years old ..read more

Eric Tremblay was an old roommate of mine, in fact one of my first roommates.  There were six of us who lived at 2345 Murray on Milwaukee’s east side. I looked it up on google maps and they changed the exterior color from green to blue and Wax Stacks records across the street is now a Repairs and Restoration store as that old Gerard Nicosia keeps echoing in my mind – Accept Loss Forever. Milwaukee has a great reputation for summer music festivals, maybe none more than Summer Fest, an 11 day blast along the Lake Michigan shore. All kind of music and when in high school a time to get drunk ..read more

It’s true what they say about remembering exactly where you were and what you were doing when something newsworthy happened. One of my earliest recollections is the attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan in 1981. I was in elementary school when Andy Wesley  came flying down the corridor steps screaming that Reagan had been shot. He seemed excited. I remember that he chewed on wood and later on learned that there’s an actual name for this unique habit – Xylophagia. We had a basketball backboard and rim attached to our garage. I was pretending to be Marques Johnson in April of 1986 while ..read more