Category Archives: Men

A New Year. A New (Slimmer) Me

05 Monday Jan 2015

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My Weight-Loss Chart

My Weight-Loss Chart

BY FRANK TERRANELLA

And so another new year is upon us. To those of us in the 50+ club, all years that start with a 2 are inherently foreign. When I hear that we are now beginning 2015, it sounds to me like someone saying it’s the 45th of September. It just sounds wrong.

My 91-year-old stepfather has a similar reaction. When I tell him we’re starting 2015 he jokingly puts his hand up and says, “Check, please.”

I’m not quite ready to check out yet, but 15 years into the 21st century, I do sometimes feel like it’s getting close to closing time. Longtime readers of this blog may remember that in July 2013 I wrote that I was resigned to the Hitchcock look of a massive gut for the rest of my life. So when my cardiologist told me to lose weight or have bariatric surgery like Chris Christie, I was initially skeptical that any sustained weight loss was possible for me.

But in order to comply with my doctor’s orders, I started with Weight Watchers in late June 2014. At my first weigh-in I tipped the scales at a hefty 224 pounds. Just about every week thereafter I have lost some weight. Sometimes it was just two-tenths of a pound. But by the end of December I was down to 184, a loss of 40 pounds. I have lost four inches around my waist. But I’m still about 10 pounds from what I initially set as my goal weight, and 25 pounds from the weight that the experts say is appropriate for my height and age. So it’s a process. I saw my cardiologist in December and he was extremely pleased at my reduced size and healthy blood pressure. I have had similar compliments from friends and family.

Weight loss is not a mystery. It involves simply eating less and exercising more. Anyone who tells you otherwise is wrong. I have lost weight by cutting down on sweets and hitting the treadmill on a daily basis. Notice that I didn’t say that I have eliminated sweets. Weight Watchers is not into complete deprivation of anything. In fact, we are encouraged to have weekly treats. The trick is to be conscious of everything we’re putting into our mouth. More candy and cake means more treadmill and weightlifting. So far it’s been reasonably easy to live with.

The new year is the time for resolutions and I am sure that we will be seeing new people at the Weight Watchers meetings in January. Weight loss is a noble goal because you do it not only for yourself, but for your loved ones. But like all things that are worthwhile, it takes some effort. Sustaining that effort over time is the challenge of weight loss. I fully expect that I will gain some weight back some day. But I also know that I can lose it again. I know that because I’ve done it.

My doctor has been preaching weight loss to me for over a decade and until six months ago I was not sufficiently motivated to do anything about it. What changed in 2014? The truth is that it wasn’t just the doctor and his threat of bariatric surgery. In 2014 I became a grandfather, and I realized that if I didn’t start listening to medical advice I was not going to live long enough to see Bryce grow up. And I needed to be in shape to keep up with him. Funny how a baby can change your life in completely unexpected ways.

So I don’t have any New Year’s resolutions other than to try to finally reach my goal weight and stay there (or at least in the neighborhood). Next year at this time I’ll report back. Until then, have a healthy and happy 2015!

Tree Disposal, and Other Post-Holiday Musings

02 Friday Jan 2015

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tree

BY BOB SMITH

If Christmas is the most wonderful time of the year, as the song claims, the time following Christmas and New Year’s must be the most dreary.

The days are short and cold (in New Jersey, anyway), and any anticipation of upcoming holiday gifts and celebrations is gone.

Then there’s the Christmas tree, still gaudy and lit for a party that ended last week; a houseguest past its prime.

How long do you leave it up? The traditional date in many Catholic households is January 6, the feast of the Epiphany. But the unofficial date in our house is when the tree starts to die. Once it stops taking up water, or we stop giving it water (it’s a chicken and egg thing), it really starts drying out. So when we see a circular green halo of fallen needles on the floor, it’s time to kick the tree to the curb.

As if blindfolding a hostage, a lot of people put a jumbo white plastic bag over their tree before they drag it out for the garbageman. But what does that accomplish? The tree doesn’t need protection from the elements, and the trash collectors know it’s rubbish whether you bag it or not – it’s just a dead evergreen.

Is the big white bag just a way to avoid extra cleanup, by preventing the tree from dropping dried needles everywhere? I say put one less plastic bag into the world and sweep up after yourself. But hey, I also like the way the vacuum cleaner smells, even a month later, stuffed with those fragrant needles.

Whenever you take it down, and however you dispose of it, the tree disappears, and the ornaments and lights go back in their boxes. We squirrel them away in a corner of the basement, along with the Santa statuettes, metal greeting card holders shaped like reindeer, angels, holly sprigs, candles, and other festive paraphernalia that’s been strewn about our house for the past month.

Thankfully, the Christmas carols and pop songs that have been playing ad nauseum on every radio station, elevator speaker, and department store Muzak track since Black Friday stop dead after Christmas Day, not to be heard again until next November. But in the lull between Christmas and New Year’s, the popular radio stations trot out and overplay a 1980 Dan Fogelberg song called “Same Old Lang Syne,” in which he describes a chance Christmas Eve encounter with an old sweetheart.

The song depresses the hell out of me, mainly because it’s snowing in the beginning of the song. But by the end, when the former lovers have reminisced until there’s nothing more to say and he’s walking home alone, the snow turns into rain. And following that lyric, the song trails off into a lonely saxopohone solo of “Auld Lang Syne.”

New Year’s Eve comes and you have a date or you don’t. You stay up until midnight or not, drink or abstain, and, with varying degrees of conviction, make resolutions that for the most part evaporate like hoarfrost on New Year’s morning.

By the time January 2 rolls around, I’m quietly glad it’s all over, even though this signals the start of months of bleak weather with no major holidays in sight.

But in the end, it’s all good. Whether you’re looking back at the old year with regret or fondness, or forward to the new with anything from trepidation to boundless joy, be grateful – you’re still looking.

A Seasonal, Sentimental Journey (Love You, Mom)

29 Monday Dec 2014

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Ken and mom

Christmas, 2014.

BY KENNETH KUNZ

My mom reached 87 this year. God bless her. Sure hope she gave me some of her genes!

Mom also taught me how to laugh.

For much of her life, even before I was born, she could be cold and stubborn, gracious but rude, liberal and conservative, accepting and very judgmental, controlling and demanding, submissive and coy. All with an extremely, self-centered, strong ego and vanity second to none. Your mom too? I sometimes refer to her as a drama queen/diva. She is also one of the more intelligent people I know, and can be extremely generous. Much more than I could ever hope to be. I really do love her. And beneath all of this, she is quite sentimental and emotional. I remember when I was a teen laughing and teasing her as she teared up watching what seemed, at the time, a corny scene in an Elvis Presley movie, of all things. I’ve witnessed her shedding tears many a time at similar instances, which I thought to be trivial, both in movies or real life.

Now some of you may be familiar with the late Jimmy Valvano, a college basketball coach who founded the V Foundation for Cancer Research. Shortly before he passed on, at the first ESPN Espy Awards, he received the Arthur Ashe Courage and Humanitarian Award. During his acceptance speech (which you should all Google and experience), he mentioned three things we should do every day: laugh, think, and have your emotions moved to tears (for happiness or joy). I surely think a lot. I try to laugh whenever possible, but boy oh boy can I be moved to tears every single day, even over the most trivial sentiment (except any part of any Elvis movie — never liked any of them). It is, by far, the easiest thing to do.

So many things to bring out our emotions — the fragility of our existence; a child struggling with cancer; the innate goodness of man moved to a selfless act; the beauty of nature; a truly corny Hallmark movie (some real good ones lately); a certain hymn at Mass; a firefighter who perishes attempting to save someone; a daughter hugging her “Poppy” returning from war. So many things. So many things. I’ve shed more of these tears than all those I’ve seen coming from my mom’s eyes. Such a sentimental fool am I. Truly, truly thankful I have those genes from my mom. Truly.

This is a most emotional, sentimental time of the year is it not? Of our life on this orb, yes? Love is the word.

Peace and Merry Christmas. God bless us … everyone.

A (Smith) Spin on Christmas

24 Wednesday Dec 2014

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night 2

BY BOB SMITH

Although Christmas is celebrated worldwide by millions, I believe little is known about the birth of Jesus.

A baby was born in the Middle East approximately two thousand years ago. His mother, Mary, was probably no more than 14 years old and either engaged, or only recently married, to a man named Joseph. No one knows how old Joseph was at the time – he could have been anywhere from 15 to 99.

The two had not yet slept together, so when he learned Mary was pregnant, Joseph planned to leave her and move on with his life. A compassionate man, he considered a private divorce because if he publicly denounced her as having been unfaithful, Mary could have been stoned to death. However, despite his reservations, Joseph relented and decided to stay – reportedly, an angel appeared in a dream and reassured him that Mary had done no wrong, and that, nonetheless, she was bearing a very special child.

The baby was born shortly thereafter, and they named him Jesus. Those bare facts aren’t seriously disputed (although many would quibble with whether an “angel” had actually appeared). But beyond that, little is certain about the circumstances of Jesus’ birth.

They say he was born in Bethlehem, but for the rest of his life, he was known as “Jesus of Nazareth,” which is eighty miles away. There appears to be scant or no historical support for the belief that Joseph had traveled to Bethlehem to be counted in the Roman tax census, when whatever property he owned (and on which the taxes would have been levied) was back in Nazareth. And it doesn’t make much sense for the couple to have embarked on a four (or more) day journey when Mary was so close to giving birth.

Many believe the Bethlehem birthplace was a fiction, created merely to make the birth of Jesus more closely conform to Old Testament prophecies about the coming of a great savior.

We don’t even know the exact year, or the exact month and day, when Jesus was born. Some say December 25 is unlikely for a number of reasons. For instance, the shepherds supposedly tending their flocks would not have had their sheep outdoors overnight during that cold and rainy time of the year. And December 25 was already popular as Saturnalia, a pagan holiday celebrating the birth of the sun god. Did the Roman Catholic Church pick December 25 as the date we commemorate the birth of the “son of God” (our very own “sun god”) as a convenient replacement for a holiday with which their doctrine disagreed?

It’s also unclear whether Jesus was born in a manger, as the story goes, or in someone’s home. And apart from Mary and Joseph, there appears to be little or no historical evidence for believing that anyone else attended the birth – if the magi were there at all, they likely arrived some time later. Some speculate that it could have been months before any “wise men” showed up bearing gifts. And while there may have been three of them, the historical record (the book of Matthew, the only known account of the magi and the “Christmas star”) merely refers to them in the plural, so there could have been two, four, or ten of them for all we know.

So what do we know? About two thousand years ago, a boy named Jesus was born in the Middle East. That’s not unusual – today, at least four people are born every second of every day. And his parents were poor; nothing new there. But we also know that the accounts of this boy’s life and death, and his teachings, have been preserved and passed on for centuries. And we also know that, whoever you think he was, Jesus has had, and continues to have, an enormous positive impact on the lives of billions of people.

Given the passage of millennia, and the fact that we’re talking about someone who many worship as the son of God, is it surprising that the story may have been “spun” by some, or that elements of fable have crept into the record? I think I can live with that.

A Christmas Letter from Grandpa

23 Tuesday Dec 2014

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Bryce having pre-Christmas fun with Dad.

Bryce having pre-Christmas fun with Dad.

BY FRANK TERRANELLA

Dear Bryce:

So, at the age of 10 months, you may have noticed a great deal of unusual activity recently. Your parents have probably been spending more time in stores. When they come home, they wrap colored paper around what they bought.

“What’s up with that?” you may ask.

In your first visit to New York City you probably were wondering why your mother and father took you to see a big tree full of colored lights. And you probably have noticed that your neighborhood also has a lot of these same colored lights around. And you may have seen some people wearing a lot of red, particularly fat men with big white beards.

“What’s the story, grandpa?” you may ask.

OK, here’s the skinny. It’s called “Christmas” and it comes every year at this time. It’s sort of a big deal, particularly for kids like you because — and you better sit down for this — it’s a day that people give you lots of neat stuff to play with and to eat. They even ask you to make a list of what you want and then — and here’s the best part — they get it for you!!

And you know all that colored paper — you get to rip it off and you get to play with it and the box too. You may even want to play with what’s inside. (Although this year it’s probably gonna be mostly things to keep you warm through your first winter in Vermont.)

Now you may be thinking, what’s so special about this Christmas day that makes people act so strangely?

Well, it started out as a celebration to mark the day a really nice man named Jesus Christ was born a really long time ago. It’s called a birthday. You’ll get your own celebration in a couple of months. We’ll call yours “Brycemass” if you want.  Anyway, people liked this guy so much that when he was born, strangers traveled great distances to bring him presents. And we continue that tradition today. Only now we give presents to each other. Neat, huh?

Well if getting stuff from your mom and dad and your grandparents, aunts and uncles wasn’t good enough, there’s someone else who brings things to you at Christmas. He lives up at the North Pole. Don’t ask me why. I don’t know. Maybe he likes snow. Anyway, this guy is old and fat and always dresses in a red and white suit. His name is Nicholas but everyone calls him Santa Claus. He has a bunch of reindeer and a sled and every Christmas he packs it up with all the toys that boys and girls want and he delivers them while you’re asleep — sort of like the UPS man only without having to sign anything.

But just like the NSA, Santa sees you when you’re sleeping and knows when you’re awake. He has a database of who’s been naughty and who’s been nice. You have to be on the “nice” list to get presents. Word is that you can get presents even if you’re naughty sometimes, just as long as you’re mostly nice. Santa knows that no one’s perfect.

It’s an imperfect world and so people sometimes act naughty. But the thing about Christmas is that people make an effort to be nice. They’re not always successful, but most people try. That’s what really makes Christmas special.

About 50 years ago, when I was a kid, people were worrying about how people had forgotten why we celebrate Christmas and instead were focused on buying things. So a wise doctor named Seuss gave us a story about a Grinch who found out that people could celebrate Christmas without “things.” And an artist named Schulz gave us a story about some kids who get so wrapped up in decorations and Christmas plays that they forget the reason for the season. A boy named Linus reminded them.

Well if Christmas was too much about “things” 50 years ago, the years since have only given us more of the same. We now start “celebrating” Christmas beginning in October. We have a shopping day after Thanksgiving that is so crazy they call it “Black Friday.” What’s worse, storekeepers have come to rely on people buying stuff to excess in the last three months of the year as part of their business plans, and the media makes it almost un-American and certainly anti-capitalist to resist this command to buy.

But we can resist the urge to make Christmas about “things” and I hope that you will. Oh, I know how great it is to get new toys, and you will certainly have your share in the Christmases ahead. But always remember the lesson that Linus and the Grinch tried to teach us many years ago. The spirit of Christmas is not in the decorations, the presents, the trees or even the songs. It is in what you can do at Christmas and every day to assure that there is “peace on earth and good will to all men.”

Love always,
Grandpa Frank

P.S. I hear that if you leave some cookies for Santa, he can be extra generous. Even Santa works for tips.
IMG_3159

No, Bob, There is No Santa Claus

18 Thursday Dec 2014

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Jimmy (partial face on the far left), Barbara, Karen, me, and older sister Mary in the back.

Jimmy (partial face on the far left), Barbara, Karen, me, and older sister Mary in the back.

BY BOB SMITH

I grew up in the 1960s, and until I was almost 10 years old, I absolutely believed in Santa Claus.

My older brother, Jim, and I shared a bedroom that was right over our garage, so it was chilly in there on winter nights, and you could always hear the door below rumbling open when Dad got home late. Our beds were under the two windows, and during the holidays each had a plastic plug-in candle glowing on the sill. I recall burrowing under the covers on Christmas Eve, asking Jim if he thought Santa would come soon.

“I dunno,” he murmured, staring somberly at the ceiling. “I guess so.” His face was an orange mask in the electric candlelight. “Sure he’s comin’.”

Jim, 10 years old, already suspected that Santa, like the Tooth Fairy, the Easter Bunny, and Bigfoot, was a fiction.

“How’s he get in? We don’t have a fireplace,” I said, worried.

“I dunno,” he smiled in the half-dark. “Maybe he’s got a key.”

I thought that not only unlikely, but impractical in the extreme — how could Santa possibly carry enough keys to get into all the houses he needed to visit on Christmas Eve?

“We got a chimney, right?”

“Right — but it’s for the heating system,” Jim replied, clearly enjoying my dilemma. “If Santa came in that way, he’d get stuck inside the furnace.”

“How does Santa know which houses have a chimney he can use, and which ones don’t?”

“Whatta you think, Bobby?” he grumbled, tired of baiting me.

“I don’t know. Magic or somethin.”

“Yeah, okay, Bobby — that’s how Santa gets inside all the houses in the world, and delivers a gazillion toys and other stuff, all in one night. Call it magic.”

At age eight and a half, that was good enough for me.

Jimmy, Santa, me, and my older sister Mary.

Jimmy, Santa, me, and my older sister Mary.

The next year, two weeks before Christmas, I raised the subject again. By now, we’d seen “Miracle on 34th Street” and I knew Santa’s existence was a real subject of debate. I’d heard rumblings around the schoolyard too — the ranks of nonbelievers were growing.

It was a Saturday afternoon. Mom had gone to the store, and Dad was upstairs asleep. For the past few years, right after Thanksgiving, he’d taken a part-time job stocking shelves at the local toy store. He always got home after we were in bed, so on Saturday he got to sleep late.

Jimmy tugged at my sleeve, urging me down the basement stairs. Nothing amiss — Mom’s sewing machine was off in one corner, and the washer and dryer in another. In the center of the room were two long folding tables pushed together and piled with junk.

“Over here,” Jimmy whispered, pointing at one lumpy pile covered with a sheet. He lifted the bottom, peered up, and waved me inside. I could hear my breath in the dim humid space, and my heart kicked over in my chest — the sheet hid a stack of games and toys in gaily-colored boxes.

“There’s Christmas,” he smiled, triumphant. “There’s no such thing as Santa.”

It was as if he’d said the sun wouldn’t come up any more, or that grass didn’t grow in the spring. At the same time, though, it made total sense. I couldn’t deny the obvious.

A few nights later, as we slept in the orange glow, I heard the rumble of the garage door. I could hear Mom’s voice and Dad laughing about something, so I knelt at the head of my bed and peered out the window. Up close I could see the fake wax drips molded into the body of the candle, and the bulb, like a miniature sun, warmed my cheek.

Dad’s brown Fairlane was backed up to the garage with the trunk open, and he and Mom were carrying boxes into the basement.

“That’s the last of it,” Dad said, slamming the trunk lid. “I’m done with that place.”

“Till next year!” Mom prompted, smacking him affectionately on the cheek.

Dad worked for the electric company, climbing poles for a living. We lived okay, but he didn’t make enough money to buy all the toys and dolls and bicycles six (later seven) kids expected to see under the tree at Christmas. The shelf-stocking job was four nights a week, 6 t 10, and they paid him in toys.

Jimmy was wrong. There was a Santa Claus, and he was full of magic. He came into our house right through the garage door.

Santa delivered.

Santa delivered.

My Pre-Taped Holiday Music Tradition

16 Tuesday Dec 2014

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christmas tape

BY FRANK TERRANELLA

If you live to be more than half a century you find yourself repeating certain things over and over. For example, you may eat Chinese food every New Year’s Eve, or you may vacation at Cape May every summer. And then there are the little things. You may get a Cafe Mocha at Starbucks every Thursday or a bagel every Friday. We are creatures of habit. There is comfort in sameness and predictability.

Well if you do something on the same day every year, and year after year, it’s safe to say you have created a tradition. Traditions start out innocently enough. There is a spark of inspiration and an act that is received well by others.

“Let’s host a Halloween party,” you may have said innocently back when such parties were rare. Now, 20 years later, you are still hosting that party. It’s a tradition.

As readers of this blog know, I was married on the day after Thanksgiving in 1978. So after my new bride and I returned from our honeymoon, it was time to prepare for Christmas. Back then, the Christmas season did not actually start until Santa arrived in the Macy’s Parade on Thanksgiving. And since the official Christmas season began later, it was not unusual for people to begin shopping just a week or two before Christmas. I was just at that point.

If you’re like me, one of the first things you did as a new couple was to merge your book and record collections. And so on a Monday afternoon in early December 1978 I merged my Christmas records with my wife’s. Back then, my work schedule got me home several hours before my wife. So after looking at all the combined Christmas music, I decided that I had some time and we needed a mix tape highlighting the best Christmas recordings from our respective collections.

I wanted to use tracks from the Carpenters Christmas album because it was one that we both loved. I put the needle down on the record and heard Richard Carpenter’s ethereal voice reciting the words to “O Come O Come Emmanuel” at the start of a great instrumental medley of songs. But I didn’t want to start the mix tape out cold with a solo voice. Just then, I noticed that my Philadelphia-born wife had in her collection a recording of Christmas music by Eugene Ormandy and the Philadelphia Symphony. And as luck would have it, there was a beautiful string-heavy recording of “O Come O Come Emmanuel.” I had my opening to the Christmas mix tape. We would go from the lush sounds of the Philadelphia Symphony right into Richard Carpenter’s solo voice and then on to that great medley.

It continued that way throughout the tape. I would use an instrumental followed by a vocal of the same song. Herb Alpert’s Christmas album (one record in both our collections) provided many of the instrumentals. My collection provided vocals by Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby. My wife’s collection provided the same from Andy Williams and Perry Como. At the end, we had a beautiful mixing of our favorite Christmas music. My wife liked it so much, she put a label on the cassette box naming this “The Good Christmas Tape.”

That could have been the end of the story, but here is where tradition comes in. The next year, on the Sunday after Thanksgiving, we came home from church, having celebrated the first Sunday of Advent. One of the hymns traditionally sung in Catholic churches on the first Sunday of Advent is “O Come O Come Emmanuel.” Having that tune in my head, as soon as we got home, I put the “Good Christmas Tape” in the cassette player and the beautiful sounds of Eugene Ormandy’s version of “O Come O Come Emmanuel” filled the apartment. A tradition had begun.

The following year on the same Sunday I played the same tape, and the year after that, and the year after that. And so it was that when I played “The Good Christmas Tape” this year (transferred to a CD sometime in the ’90s), I announced it as the 36th consecutive year. It’s amazing how fast the years have gone by, and how great it is to have a tradition to herald the season. Because after all, tradition is what the holiday season is all about.

Christmastime in the City: It’s Palpable

11 Thursday Dec 2014

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Christmas tree. Rockefeller Center.

Christmas tree. Rockefeller Center.

BY FRANK TERRANELLA

There has long been a dichotomy among Americans. Some love cities; some love the country. Over the course of the last 200 years, Americans have been voting with their feet and cities have been winning. Still many prefer the rural life, at least some of the time. But whether you’re a city or a country person, most people agree that at Christmastime our cities shine.

Tourism in our great cities like London, Rome and New York increases dramatically in late December. People flock to see the store windows, the churches and the Christmas trees. Christmas music and Christmas theater abounds. In New York, the Rockettes head up a Christmas Spectacular at Radio City Music Hall. Our concert halls and churches echo the glory of Handel’s “Messiah.” The Salvation Army rings its bells on street corners. It’s the scene saluted in the popular song “Silver Bells.”

City sidewalks, busy sidewalks.
Dressed in holiday style
In the air there’s a feeling of Christmas
Children laughing, people passing
Meeting smile after smile
and on every street corner you’ll hear
Silver bells, silver bells
It’s Christmas time in the city

I think that Christmas time in the city is magical. It is the one time of year when avowed country people are willing to put up with the city crowds. In New York they flock to Rockefeller Center, to Macy’s, Saks and FAO SCHWARZ. They marvel at the decorations on Fifth Avenue. They enjoy ice skating, walks in the park, and of course, the sound of silver bells.
And as the song says, “In the air there’s a feeling of Christmas.” I swear, it’s palpable. There’s nothing like a city at Christmas.

My Thanksgiving Leftovers Include Extra ‘Thanks’

08 Monday Dec 2014

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Overstuffed.

BY BOB SMITH

Thanksgiving’s over, and we’re just now getting ready to trash the last leftovers haunting our refrigerator. Pies seem to keep for a very long time, begging to be eaten because, although they may grow dry and crusty around the edges, the centers are still sweet. Week-old stuffing and string beans, on the other hand, have lost all their charms, slowly dissolving into too-moist masses of faded flavor.

We’ve got to clear that stuff out to make way for the invasion of Christmas foods a mere three weeks from now. We’ll dutifully keep those leftovers for a week, then discard them to make room for the New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day feast-leavings. It’s a tough season for those of us fortunate enough to be faced with the problem of far too much of everything.

Somewhere along the way it feels like we’ve missed the message. Did anyone actually give thanks on Thanksgiving? I don’t mean a pro forma prayer recited over an overladen table as a gang of relatives salivated, hovering over plates with utensils in hand, half listening to broadcast football and hoping you don’t drone on too long.

No, I mean really give thanks. As in sitting alone and quietly reflecting on the many blessings, great and small, that fill your life. My list includes a loving wife, and our uniquely beautiful, funny, and wonderful children; my six siblings and elderly Mom whom I love dearly; a spacious, comfortable home; clean clothes; enough food in our two refrigerators and basement freezer to feed an African village for a month; a really good car; a clean bill of health. A sweet dog who wags his stubby tail like a runaway metronome whenever we come home.

There’s more — mundane but meaningful blessings like health and dental insurance coverage; a good mattress on the bed; lots of great books to read; two acoustic guitars that sing better than I do; a view of the ocean from our front porch; fresh parsley in the yard we’re still harvesting despite the coming cold.

Thanksgiving has become rote:  there’s a big parade in New York, a big meal on the table, football on TV, and almost unbearable hoopla over the start of the Christmas season. That was last week. Now it’s quiet, and every day, I’m quietly giving thanks.

 

My One and Only Favorite Song

01 Monday Dec 2014

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my one an donly loveBy FRANK TERRANELLA

When people ask me what my favorite standard song is, I often reply that I have at least a dozen favorites. For example, I love Make Someone Happy (music by Jule Styne,  lyrics by Betty Comden & Adolph Green), Someone to Watch Over Me (music by George Gershwin, lyrics by Ira Gershwin) and What Are You Doing The Rest of Your Life (music by Michel LeGrand, lyrics by Alan and Marilyn Bergman).  I used the last of these to propose to my wife.

But if someone really presses me and won’t take more than one song as an answer, I confess that my all-time favorite is My One and Only Love by English song writers Guy Wood and Robert Mellin.  I think it’s a masterpiece, and judging by the number of recordings of it, many people agree with me.  It has a fascinating tune as it climbs the scale with its first six notes.  But it is the lyric that clinches the deal for me. It starts:

The very thought of you makes my heart sing

Like an April breeze on the wings of spring

And you appear in all your splendor

My one and only love

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The shadows fall and spread their mystic charms

In the hush of night, while you’re in my arms

I feel your lips so warm and tender

My one and only love

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The poetry is just breathtaking to me. And the words fit the music perfectly. Interestingly enough, these were not the original words to the song.  When Guy Wood wrote the music back in 1947, the lyrics were by Jack Lawrence and the song was called “Music from Beyond the Moon.” It was recorded by Vic Damone in 1948, but was a flop.  The lyrics then went like this:

The night was velvet and the stars were gold

And my heart was young, but the moon was old

I was listening for the music

Music from beyond the moon

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

You came along and filled my empty arms

And my eager lips thrilled to all your charms

When we touched I heard the music

Music from beyond the moon.

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Is there any doubt why this original version didn’t make it?  Not only is the lyric nonsensical (beyond the moon, really??), it doesn’t  scan correctly.  Guy Wood wrote six notes as the end of each verse (mirroring the six notes of the beginning of each verse).  The words “Music from Beyond the Moon” require seven notes.

Poor Vic Damone must have felt like the unluckiest guy around when Frank Sinatra recorded the revised version with the Robert Mellin lyric in 1953 and had an immediate hit. Of course, the definitive version of My One and Only Love is the one by Johnny Hartman that he recorded with John Coltrane in 1963.

The bridge of the song is nothing special musically, but again Robert Mellin’s lyrics shine:

The touch of your hand is like heaven

A heaven that I’ve never known

The blush on your cheek whenever I speak

Tells me that you are my own

And finally, the last verse of the Mellin lyric draws inspiration from the second verse of the original Lawrence lyric, but Lawrence had a base hit. Mellin hits it out of the park:

You fill my eager heart with such desire

Every kiss you give sets my soul on fire

I give myself in sweet surrender

My one and only love

Now that’s a song!  It moves me whenever I hear it. It’s not the music of my generation, but then neither is Bach or Beethoven. It’s classic Tin Pan Alley — one page in the rich American Songbook that Jonathan Schwartz has spent a lifetime promoting.  And you don’t have to be over 50 to love it.