The Last Day

This is a bad selfie I took of myself some time back, riding the North Line Metra train from Main Street in Evanston down to Chicago's Loop.  Back in the olden days, B.C. (Before Covid-19), masses of eerily quiet people dressed in suits and sensible dresses would cram into these aging coaches daily, to be  pulled by ancient locomotives spewing diesel fumes to their offices or cubicles in high rise buildings.  I convinced myself that I liked it.  I used to call it "a civilized commute" since I wasn't stuck in my own passenger car, in traffic on the Kennedy Expressway.  I did this for many years.  The routine was broken by frequent trips to other cities, when I would schlep to O'Hare and go through the multiple indignities of air travel - mobs of people, security screening, crowded planes, the wait for ground transportation at the other end.  I spent 42 years living this life of white collar striving.

Today is my last day.

It is a weird transition, to be sure.  The Coronavirus pandemic derailed my routine,  I have been in my apartment, working from my home office, since March 14.  I decided to accelerate my retirement because I have conducted business through direct connection, face-to-face interactions,  I find it difficult to make that type of connection via Zoom.  The past 108 days have been a slow wind down.  I decided in May that I would retire a little early.  I don't think the fancy-pants executive life I lived will be possible for quite a while.

Looking back on my career is only helpful if it allows me to draw some lessons on how to behave today and how I should prepare for the future.  I made so many mistakes through the years - bonehead business errors and screw-ups in my personal life.  But I am glad for all of the experiences, both good and awful.  It was the excruciatingly painful events that finally made me a better human.  And now I can feel reasonably calm as I face uncertainty as a non-entity, an old retired guy.

I don't know what will happen.  I am totally comfortable with this ambiguity.  I know I won't miss trying so hard to satisfy and impress people that don't really know me as a person. I spent way too much time deriving my self-worth from the opinions of others.  Maybe I will finally get to know who I am.

One thing for sure - there will be more music in my life now.

Time to talk music -Vulfpeck

I guess I learned about Vulfpeck about three or four years ago.  This group has attracted quite a bit of attention, and there are some great articles about the fellas.  The origin story is appealing - a group of killer musicians met in Ann Arbor while studying at the University of Michigan, started playing together and dialed into the tightest funk groove I have ever heard. 

Vulfpeck was launched in 2011 sort of by accident, I guess.  It is a DIY effort - no manager, no record deal,  all millenial viral internet genius at work that led to a sold out gig at Madison Square Garden on September 29, 2019.  They are really the gold standard of the funk genre now, and many awesome artists have sat in with the group - vocalist Antwan Stanley, guitarist Cory Wong, trombonist Melissa Gardiner and saxophonist Joey Dosik collaberate regularly.  So does MacArthur Genius Grant mandolinist and NPR star, Chris Thiele.

My old bandmate, the late, great guitarist Osee Anderson, used to tell me, "Look for the pocket masters."   The guys in Vulfpecks are  the Jedi Knights of the pocket.  Joe Dart's bass lines are absolutely ridiculous - funk bass is really tough to play well, I think. The band can also lay down some heartbreaking R&B - check this out.

So if you love funk and high-skill  R&B, get deep into Vulfpeck.

Re-Booting

Sometimes I just stop doing something for no particular reason.  I used to have a blog.  It was a vanity project, something I did in an effort to seem wise and important.  I was, and am, neither of those things, of course.  But I did put some time into it.  For a while, I posted regularly and with some passion.  Then three years ago, I stopped.

No one noticed.  That isn't a surprise.

So today, for no particular reason, I have decided to re-boot the blog.  I am less wise, and certainly less important, than I thought I was when I was an active blogger.  But I can make time for this.  I do have a lot on my mind.

Covid-19 and extra-judicial murders of Black people by policemen has created an apocalyptic vibe in the U.S.  In Chicago, we also have the everyday carnage that results in many more deaths of Black folks - on May 31, less than 2 weeks ago, 18 people were murdered as the Chicago police disappeared from the south and west sides of town to attend to the demonstrations and looting in other neighborhoods - the lack of police presence gave shooters a free pass to kill, according to folks in the neighborhoods (they were quoted in the Chicago Sun Times).   

Like almost everyone, my life has been upended by the pandemic.  In the past few weeks, the outpouring of grief and anger triggered by the killing of George Floyd has added more heavy stuff to ponder.  I am an older white man, but I do have a deeper connection to Black folks than others in my demographic.  I have two bi-racial grandchildren; they are in the next room, watching National Geographic on the Disney Channel right now.  Will they be targeted by the police someday?  Or by gangbangers?  My ability to keep them safe is limited once they hit their teenage years.


It makes sense to ration one's consumption of news reports in order to hold on to some vestige of calmness.   I'm hiding at home, dodging the virus, tamping down the nausea caused by all of the violence - it makes me feel like a coward.  But I am in one of the Covid-19 risk groups, so I wash my hands a lot, wear my face mask and avoid crowds.  No demonstrations for me - I can't afford to get sick, let alone die.  I have work to do.

I return to the core truth - I can only control myself.  I can't control anything else, or anyone else.  I can take action to protect the people I love.  I can take action to persuade others to change their behavior or viewpoint.  I have little control of the outcome of my efforts when I am trying to protect or change others.  I only have control over my own actions and reactions.  

This is a wild and crazy time, but the core truth doesn't change.