Caroline Davis reminds me to love jazz

Posted on November 5, 2012 by 9591iris

The other night, fretful about our East Coast friends, we went over to the Elastic Arts Foundation in Logan Square, to see the Caroline Davis Quartet.  It was my first ever visit to Elastic and the first time I’d seen her, and what a thrill and balm it was.

I’m not going to go into intense descriptions of this pure, exhilarating show, except to say two things.  She showed us all that she gets the origin stories of jazz, especially with a low, super-sultry “Stairway to the Stars”; and, with her own intense composition, “Passive Cloud,” she gave us what we needed to hear in this week of storm and aftermath. Her work is chamber music, when the chamber is our collective existence; music for loving the world, for surviving a hurricane, for facing a life and living it. We are excited to know we are in the same city as this powerful, very interesting young musician, so we can watch what she does next.

You can too. Chicago friends, the record release party for the Caroline Davis Quartet’s new CD, Live Work & Play, is this Wednesday at Jazz Showcase.  Go. And find out more about Caroline Davis (and purchase music) here.

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Stranded, in the dark

Posted on November 3, 2012 by 9591iris

By this morning we’d heard from, or about, most of our friends along the East Coast.  Some did fine all along.  Some got their power back just last night, at 4 AM.  Some got through with adequate supplies and great neighbors. Some are not doing well at all – no electricity, no heat, no water, their homes ravaged, the weather turning colder and families to keep alive.  For them, after a few days, it has become obvious the end point is not anywhere nearby, and all this is no longer a terrific adventure.  They are stranded. They are angry.  And so would I be.

We can’t all be heroes, and for us to wade into this situation would only take resources away from the people who really need them.  You know what does help? Money.  This page lists several relief organizations that are in place already.  At our house, we have already given to the Humane Society of America (which helps pets, wildlife and farm animals); Community Foodbank of New Jersey; and Feeding America.

This is something you can do. So do it.

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Panic button Monday says Free Pedro Infante!

Posted on October 29, 2012 by 9591iris

Every time I push the panic button, this shows up.

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Welcome to the new normal, frankenstorm edition

Posted on October 28, 2012 by 9591iris

Today we are worrying for our many friends and family members in the vast path of the frankenstorm.  A little front that passed through here a couple of days ago is meeting up with gigantic Hurricane Sandy, plus a wintry storm coming down from Canada, plus a full-moon tide.   Millions of North Americans will be affected, including nearly 30 percent of the population of the US and 70 percent of the population of Canada.

Sandy has been working itself north from the Caribbean for a few days now, and its death toll is already at 65 at this writing.  A huge volume of water is on the move. Right now most weather models predict the storm surge will come onshore in New Jersey tomorrow night. Massive evacuations were ordered yesterday along the US coastline.  Subways will shut down in New York City tonight, with some predicting a 50 percent chance that they will flood.  But this storm is not just a coastal event.  Rain, wind, snow, flooding are on their way. To give you an idea of the brutal size and force of this storm, flood warnings are in effect as far from the Atlantic as Toronto.

It’s another one for the record books, folks – I wonder if the record books are tracking the number of weather records that are being broken month after month.

We keep telling the people we love: buy batteries, stock up on shelf-stable food, charge your computer, gas up the car. But what we mean to say is: we love you.  We hate and fear this weather.  We hate and fear that this is the new normal.

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It’s weather, not a belief system

Posted on October 26, 2012 by 9591iris

On Sunday, when I took this picture in Toledo, we were walking around the Old West End in short sleeves, and we came back to a week in Chicago as heavy and sunny as any in July. The last few days have been really warm, midsummer warm, and damp. People in my office come back from lunch declaring it’s beautiful out!  We love it!  You should go outside!

Of course, I think they’re nuts. I prefer my autumn days crisp and snappy – sweater weather, not flip-flop weather.  When there’s rain, I like it to be a steady downpour, cold and heavy, soaking into the ground and helping the trees unburden themselves of leaves.
I don’t like my autumn days all hot and muggy and with the threat of a thunderstorm at the end to freak me out. Didn’t we have enough of that drama in, oh, August?  It feels wrong.

Now we are in the midst of more drama.  The high today was 78 and tonight it will bottom out at 39.  This weird weather system, by the way, is on its way east to join up with Hurricane Sandy and a full moon tide. Look out, friends around New York City.

This is why I wanted to share this picture with you: the lost keys, lying on that stone.  All of this weather feels wrong, because it is wrong.  We’ve lost the keys to the way it should feel.

And you people who don’t believe in climate change: it’s weather, not religion.

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Breathing in

Posted on October 24, 2012 by 9591iris

In the last day it’s rained a lot, on and off, in these intense, brief rushes that have knocked half the leaves from the trees; then this evening, it was weirdly warm, and damp, and everything smelled spicy and rich.  All of this rain doesn’t reverse the drought deficit, and the drought is why the colors this fall are so drab.  But the air is so fragrant.  Wherever you are going, you just have to stop and take a long slow breath and for half a minute be within  it all.

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Panic button Monday would like to borrow this truck for a month or two

Posted on October 22, 2012 by 9591iris

Every time I push the panic button, this shows up.

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A visit to Columbus

Posted on October 21, 2012 by 9591iris

This artwork is in the Columbus Museum of Art.  It is an installation of 33 glass boats by Lino Tagliapietra, one of the world’s masters of art glass.  This view of it, this glimpse of one of its ends, is how we first approached the installation.  Its name is Endeavour.

In Chicago, the phrase “civic pride” usually is all about the cynical subtext, saluting projects crafted to funnel public money into private pockets.  Today, in Columbus, we have been hearing people use that phrase in a different way.  When they talk about civic pride, they are trying to indicate they are, get this, Chicago, proud of their town. They want to make it better for everyone there.  They mean it, too.

We have been seeing much the same thing in other Midwest cities, most notably Detroit – this quiet sense that this part of the world is a great place to be, and worth building up.  But here is the difference between here and other parts of the Midwest.  The level of thinking is the same – sophisticated, earnest, insightful – but in Columbus, the baseline is more solid.  Columbus, never having fallen, can just build.

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When you choose a President

Posted on October 18, 2012 by 9591iris

Here is the Indiana countryside, at dawn on a recent fall day, from the window of a train.  On that long train ride there was plenty of time to look out the window at our beautiful land and think about us, about all of us.  Here is one thing I thought about:

When you choose a President, you choose more than one office holder.  You choose a multitude, a culture that breathes, acts, decides.  They all together create the new normal, or dig the old one in even deeper.

That’s what I think about, when I make my choice.

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Panic button Monday will just nod off here for a second, thanks

Posted on October 15, 2012 by 9591iris

Every time I push the panic button, this shows up.

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