Happy and/or Holy Holidays 2007-2008

This photo is what you may or may not receive in an envelope along with our somewhat annual letter/card for the holidays. It goes like this:

'Twas the year 2007 and with our usual shtick,
Here's our annual letter along with a pick.
(The event was the wedding of Zaid & Amelia.
MJ was the Parson who pronounced them "Zamelia".

You see, Mary Jo was ordained in our house,
On a spiritual website, with a click of the mouse.
So now while she arbitrates , knits, weaves or spins
She just might agree to forgive you your sins.

Tony's here in Med School (he has his white coat),
And Erica's ed. doctorate is not so remote.
Angie's in SF, her life still awhirl,
You can give it a look-see at one of these URLs:
http://www.newprogressivecoalition.com/
http://schiavonifiles.blogspot.com/

In Feb. Jim turned 60 and now's unemployed
But he's a pensioner, baby, and so not annoyed.
This fall he and MJ toured Canada and the U.P.
Went rock pickin' and camping on the shores of Gitch Gumee

So as we all wonder what the New Year portends
Here's to the health and happiness of family and friends
And as we close this epistle with one final rhyme

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL...AND TO ALL, A GOOD TIME.

Jim & Mary Jo

P.S. We hope this ain't cryptic, a drag or a bore,
but email or call us if you want to know more.
sturvoni@tds.net

October 18, 1967: Dow Day

Forty years ago, just about this time, 2 p.m., Ron Hughes and I were in Bascom Hall in a Spanish Literature class. We had been in Madison a little more than a month. Living away from home for the first time. And we were 20 years old (two years at "the Stench"; the University of Wisconsin, Marathon County Center but previously the University "Extension", hence, the Stench). Four guys (incl. Tom Jehn and Bruce Green) from Wausau sharing a two bunkroom apartment at The Regent, a glossily promoted upscale dorm kinda place dangled by our guidance counselor as a cool place to live. And four green guys from the Northwoods bought into it.
So...here we were. In Spanish Lit and listening to considerable noise and commotion in the parking lot three stories below. We know that the Dow company was interviewing and recruiting at the business school next door and students had been picketing that manufacturer of napalm. We also knew one of the picketers, Roland Olson, big brother of another Regent foursome from Wausau, Matt Olson. Roland was unusual because he was carrying an infant (not many little kids on campus back then and he was the first of our generation that we knew wearing wire rim glasses). The prof said that important things were happening and he would let us go early, but he did not. The bell finally rang and we ran outside Bascom Hall and were confronted with a very angry, very loud and very large crowd of students whose focus was a paddy wagon with students visible in the windows and ringed by armed cops with helments and face shields. I had never seen emotions so intense in a group of people although high school football games begged for a silly comparison.
Anyway, after a few minutes of orientation and, mostly, confusion, I heard a pop and then a smoking object landed about six feet to my right near the curb of the drive. Holy shit! It was tear gas and then more pops and more smoking cannisters. Chaos! Hughes went in one direction and I another, northeast, toward the lake, which happened to be upwind, which allowed me to escape the gas after running about ten yards into the trees. People were, of course, screaming in rage as well as pain and I managed to help a few people to their feet.
The crowd generally dispersed, but mainly into small groups talking and arguing about what the hell was going on. I was not particularly politicized about Viet Nam yet but I was now confronted with it. Yes, it was traumatic. My first act of rebellion followed as I made my troubling walk back to the Regent. I bought my first pack of cigarettes, Salems, and, dammit, lit one up.

Up North

So I'm heading out into the woods tomorrow. Finally for a period longer than a 3-day week-end. Got plans to do things like build a funky woodshed, repair stuff, hike around, maybe even fish; although fishing to me is almost as much work as felling trees and splitting firewood, which I really do enjoy. Gotta check out the beaver pond on the back forty and see if the water level as risen enough to give the beavs any problem with their dams. They have two dams now within 20 feet of each other. The lower one captures a small tributary that flows in, very slowly, beneath the much larger structure so they have created a rather sizable body of water. There is a convenient tree to lean back on there and just soak it all in. Total nature immersion. And there are no invasive species (save for me) that I recognize. No buckthorn, honeysuckle, wild grape or locust. Just sugar maple, birch, oak, alder and basswood. And blueberries, wintergreen, lycopodium, mosses, lichen and rocks. And deerflies and mosquitos at certain times, too. Keeps out the riff-raff. But the sandhill crane family, loons, turkeys and bald eagles offset the insects, somewhat. And we have a sizeable black bear hanging around the neighborhood, too.

The moon is waxing and I'll be up there when it's full on the 28th. Won't see as many stars but I'll be able to walk around at night without a flashlight. Of course, its likely to be overcast and, therefore, no night sky to speak of. But I have a lot to read (current novel: Orhan Pamuk's "The Black Book) and a lot to ponder...and hummingbirds to feed.

ट्रांस्लितेरेशन Transliteration

Transliteration...or, how did I acquire the ability to render this in Hindi? Threw me off my game. Changed the title from something about crickets. Finally figured it out. दुह । Crickets are almost constant now here in southern Wisconsin। They ratchet up their sawsound about the time the back-to-school sales begin and football news starts crowding the pennant races। But I am sadly unilingual and am as likely to carry on a conversation in a language other than English as carry on a discourse with crickets. You know the joke ( I heard it in the film The Blue Diner ): You ask "what do you call someone who speaks two languages?"; the answer, of course, is 'bilingual'. Then you ask the same for three languages, answer; trilingual. Many languages? Multilingual. Then you ask "what do you call someone who speaks and understands one language? The answer..."American". There are those "americans" who are so obsessesed with creating a law that would make English the national language. Must be because its the only one we know. Its kinda hard calling someone who speaks or understands more languages than you, ignorant.

Speaking of cultural differences...what's up with americans and anise? Anise, fennel or licorice, that wonderful, universal flavor whether from licorice root or anise/fennel plant, shows up just about everywhere I've traveled or sampled off liquor store shelves but it is getting more difficult to find even a Twizzler licorice in a convenience store or pitstop anymore. And "red licorice" is not licorice, godammit. Italy even had licorice Skittles! And in different flavors. Consider mint licorice. Alcoholwise, Italy has Sambuco; France, Pernod; Turkey, Raki; Greece, Ouzo. What does America have? Anisette. Little more than a flavoring agent. And for what? There seems to be a national aversion to anise flavored anything. At least in the mass market. And why? As a nation of immigrants why hasn't anise stayed with the population. Could it be that immigrants weren't fleeing religious persecution or economic disasters but anise? Sometimes I wonder...

Passages

In the month of June 2007, four of the Schiavoni/Sturm/Johnson/Maxwell clan pictured in a photo of a photo from about 15 years ago celebrated their respective milestones of graduations, a marriage and an enlistment. The photo photo was taken at Nick Schiavoni's high school granduation. In the holiday photo, he's fourth from left on cousin Bri Schiavoni's lap. At his graduation party, June 16, the valedictorian & boxing champ posed with his posse. The bluish guy at far left in the old photo, Zamilia (Zaid Maxwell & Amelia Styer) were married in Chicago on June 30. No contemporary photo of Ohio college grad, Mark Schiavoni was available. He did not have a party. He's on Angie Schiavoni's lap 5th from right. Next to Mark, on Tony Sturm's lap is Gabe Johnson. Young Gabe joined the Navy in June and left his tearful mother, Lisa Schiavoni, shortly after Nick's graduation blowout. Lisa says she cried when he left but would cry harder if Gabe is returned.

Congrats, of course, to all, including everyone else who may not have had so obvious a transition as these four or who did not have the good fortune to stumble in front of my camera during their respective festivities. Those in the "Holidays in Wisconsin" photo photo not mentioned, Joe and Dan Schiavoni and Max Johnson, were huge influences on the level of revelry at each and every event they attend. As did Tony, Angie and Bri who donated their laps to their l'il cousins so long ago. Although Gabe's passage was not shared by the rest of the family in the form of a hall and a DJ, it is understood that he shared his joy in joining the Navy with the rest of north central Florida around his Gainesville home. And, although he did not have a college graduaton party, Mark was give a bash just like his brothers four years earlier.

And how about the Reverend Mary Jo Schiavoni who conducted the Zamelia wedding ceremony? After seconds of rigorous study she was ordained online just days before their Chicago wedding. And a spectacular wedding it was. My photos of both events are on my web album which are open to the public but I cannot, for the moment recall how to link it up. Prosit!

Greensburg, Kansas

June 4, 2007: We left Albuquerque at 9 a.m., passed through the panhandles of Texas and Oklahoma and into Kansas on U.S. 54 and we're getting hungry. All the towns listed in the Atlas are small or virtual ghost towns with no cafes. But Greensburg is listed on most mileage signs and at a crossroads so that's our goal figuring that, if it merits a sign, it must have a place to eat. We're looking for Kansas steaks, by the way. At Bucklin, eight miles before Greensburg, we find an open cafe with meat and potatoes and chow down. I pick up the Hutchinson, KS Leader, the local paper, and the headline has a One Month Ago Today headline with a big photo of a flattened Greensburg. The tornado struck Greensburg on May 4. We drove the eight miles. Highway 54 goes right through Greensburg's north end. The grain elevator (every town in Kansas, seems to have one) on the north end was the only structure to appear to be undamaged. Everything else was mostly flattened with just a few beat-up structures for relief. It was similar to what I saw of Katrina over 90 miles on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, meaning it was total destruction. There's nothing left for a round 2. Greensburg had a high school and a city hall. Just some brick walls remained. The Guard or Army Reserves has trucks and tents on the track and foot ball field. The rest of the photos I took will be on my photo site.

Off to see the Lizards

Hey, I have a photo blog http://picasaweb.google.com/sturvoni/OkefenokeeKayakRide?pli=1but have only one of many albums submitted. For now. And we're off, too, to the Bay Area, to see the wizards and wizardesses of that Ozzie land. After 4 days or so of hanging with the Turners, Tony, Erica, and Angie, its another Road Trip! To the Grand Canyon, Carol in Sedona and Merle in Albuquerque.

pogo

Here I am with my friend, Pogo Possumhttp://www.pogopossum.com/index.htm at the north entry to the Okefenokee. We were turned away from this entry because of the emergence of the wildfire that's burned in the area since then. Fortunately we were able to enter at the southeastern entry for the refuge http://www.fws.gov/okefenokee/

Albert?

Ok. Here's one of our friends checking out our kayak in the Okefenokee.

Al McGuire

Even though it's a "busy being born" theme, I'm busy seeking an identity, or at least a blogger sense and purpose while self-consciensely trying to avoid pretentiousness. So I've carried around a stagnant list of "blogits" that stopped after:
Al McGuire
Should have said at 60th
Urban/Wild Dinner
During the NCAA madness (of which I am afflicted) the NYTimes ran a piece by Ray Glier on April 1, on the inimitable Al McGuire the second paragraph of which, in its entirety, says:
"McGuire, who was 72 when he died of leukemia in 2001, would suggest to his players that they spend six months bartending and six months driving a cab after graduation. They would be better prepared for life, he said."
In 1964, Marquette basketball coach, Al McGuire was the speaker at my Wausau Newman High School athletic banquent. He gave that same advice to us all-white, dumbass, midwest Catholic jocks. I was so impressed. He spoke to us as people, not as kids or subjects. He was...comfortable and sensible, as far as I could see. I don't recall any other adult figure in my life, teachers, friends or family that hit such a home run with me. Bart Starr certainly didn't the next year as our speaker. Stiff, remote, irrelevant, the evil twin of Al. And Bart was the superstar. Al's celebrity was waiting for the NCAA championship in 1977, the year he retired from BB. And so I finally got it together and signed on as a bartender in 1972. And Al was right. I'll follow up on this some other time.
I signed in today because of a random restaurant review in the Capital Times today of the restaurant called The Old Fashioned and its old Wisconsin menu that included string potatoes which triggered a recollection of my encounter with string potatoes, or the potato chip like snack food that came in bags or cans. This must have been in about 1960 or so when I spend much time walking the shore of the Wisconsin River which wound through Wausau and approached within a few blocks of the childhood home. An early scavanger (a family tradition) I found floating in the "hardest working river in the world" a sealed No. 10 can with no label. I took it home and Dad and I opened it. Of course, it was a commercial size can of shoe string potatos. Ever practical Dad noted the previously sealed contents and said, without any concern for where the can was found floating for who knows how long; "Let's eat". This, of course, was on course with the dump garden experience where a produce company dumped a load of old stuff early one spring and by fall all sorts of stuff had sprouted and Pa reasoned that it had to OK and we harvested lots of stuff. We also hunted rats in that same dump.

Something

Yes. Retirement is OK. We just got back from a 2 week road trip with an endpoint in St. Augustine, FL. and we will be flying out to SF on May 24 and driving our old van back with whatever Tony and Erica want to send with us. Speaking of Tony and Erica, those two and I went up north the day after the party and continued the sap run and boiled down another gallon of syrup (about 40 gallons of sap). And if you are interested in T, E & Angie making sausage a couple of weeks ago, check this out...
http://www.ethicurean.com/images/slideshows/salumi2007/
mmmm...

Savannahland

Just returned, April 24, from the Southeast Coast; Savannah and St. Augustine where, serendipitously, we got a personal tour of the renovation of possibly the oldest house in the USA. And with the owner, a product of Wausau, no less and also a graduate of Newman H.S.; she, the class of 61, me, '65. The house, the surviving walls and facade of which are made of coquina, a sedimentary rock made of shell fragments, was, according to the national historic place plaque, orginally constructed about 1583, or so I recall (I forgot my camera as well as just forgot). The Newman grad is just completing a massive renovation and rehab and was going to spend her
first night there along with her sister and brother in law the night of the day we visited.

We were all in the area for the wedding of Carl Jehn, Tom and Heidi's son, just south of town. MJ and I had left Madison on the 11th for an arbitration in Springfield on the 12th followed by a night in Paducah and lunch the next day at the Mothership Barbecue http://www.nashvillescene.com/Stories/Columns/Dining/2006/07/13/Smokin_/index.shtml in Nashville before moving on to Cousin Jimmy and Jean at their new home in Rome, GA. Then on to Savannah and a couple of days getting acquainted with the quaint. On the way down to Gainesville and Lisa, we pulled into the Okefenokee Swamp to pay respects to Pogo, Albert, Churchy, Howland, Porkypine but mostly saw Albert's Alligator friends on our kayak trip into the swamp. And these were the big guys and up close and personal. Of course, there were ibises, sandhill crannes, egrets, comorants etc. but the gators dominated and got us pretty juiced. Once I figure out how to insert photos here, I'll do it. Same with hyperlinks.

Third trimester?

Thirty years ago I was thirty. Now I'm 60. Thirty years from now I'll be 90, or not. At my 30th birthday party a very wise and cool friend, Cecil Sutphen, advised me not to sweat turning 30 because, having just turned 40, he was at the top of his game and 30 was just kid stuff. At last week's 60th party, no 70 year old said anything like that. I should have invited Cecil. By the way, today, March 30 is Mary Jo's and my 33rd wedding anniversary. To each other. And, because I started this blog yesterday and noted the day of my first blog entry, I somehow remembered that March 30 also had some resonance. Thirty-three years ago. A stealth wedding. Only the immediate family, slouching down State Street. You see, marriage was not very cool back then. At least not in Madison, not for a radical feminist. Certainly not for a 602 Club bartender. So why did we do it? Parents. Less stress. Moving to Baltimore with a couple of law degrees. Could use the money. Money? A reception, a few weeks later in Youngstown. The central Wisconsin Wausau boy, from a nuclear German family was immersed into a very extended Youngstown Italian clan. Talk about dazed and confused. And 3 years and 8 months later, at 30, I became a father.
30

The first blog post of the rest of my life

Date of birth; February 6, 1947. Last day at the office; February 23, 2007. The celebration of both; March 24, 2007. Family, friends, workmates, Point Beer, ouzo, leg of lamb and baklava. Like a wedding reception...or a wake. And I was more alert (but less sober) than I was on the first occasion or will be on the last. Now what?