Acknowledgements

Thank you to those people who have had a tremendous effect on my life - Walt Disney, J.R.R. Tolkien, Uriah Heep, Harlan Ellison, and Martha Stewart.

When I was growing up, summer vacation meant a trip to California. Not only a trip, but a train trip! During the 1960s, travel by rail was still the way to fly, and such names as the Santa Fe Super Chief and the San Francisco Zephyr fired the imagination with the promise of untold adventure. This was way before the government had to step in and nationalize the passenger train system, and the AT&SF (Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe) still ran from coast to coast.

We boarded at the grand, old, cathedral-like, Joliet train station, that stood at the junction of a north-south and east-west crossing. We played among the tall wooden benches in the nearly deserted main hall, and studied the Arrivals and Departures board that was still filled in by hand with white chalk. We talked to the ancient, black baggage master, and followed the large, antique luggage cart, making sure our suitcases were securely perched on top. We stood at the very edge of the platform and watched for the engine to appear in the distance.

I remember having a sleeping compartment only once and it was cramped and inconvenient. I much preferred traveling by coach. The freedom of movement, the camaraderie with fellow passengers, eating in the dining car, spending the day in the club car playing cards and watching the endless scenery roll by, and the stop in Albuquerque where we were allowed to get off the train and buy handicrafts from actual Indians (they were not Native Americans in those days). My brother and I loved hanging out with the porters as they stood by the open windows in the lower baggage compartments.

One year, when I was thirteen, I wrote a poem my parents suggested I submit to Santa Fe. They had a full-color employee magazine and a short while later I received a letter on corporate stationery to congratulate me and inform me they were publishing the poem. I received a complimentary copy of the magazine, that alas I no longer have. I do remember the poem started, "Trains are better the boats I think / because a train is hard to sink.…"

Our excitement rose as palm trees and stucco buildings replaced the cactus and adobe shacks of the desert. When we disembarked at the Pasadena train station, we could still feel the swaying of the cars as we ran to greet our grandparents.

My mom's whole family lived in southern California: Great-aunts Ann, Esther, Kitty, and Jean; her husband Great-uncle Bill, an early settler of the state; my mom's older brother, her only sibling, Uncle Howard, a Korean War vet, LA County juvenile probation officer, and philatelist; Aunt Lynn, famous for her super-fresh peach pie; and my cousins Sabra (a kissing cousin), and Shawn, who could walk on his toes.

We stayed with my mom's parents, Grandma Rose and Grandpa Irv, who managed an apartment complex in Canoga Park, a suburb of LA. My mom took the guest room, and the five of us kids took turns sleeping on hide-a-beds, couches, or wrapped in blankets on the floor. We lived like the Angelinos, swimming in the pool with the other residents, grocery shopping at Ralph's, and running barefoot with the kids from the neighborhood.

My dad was a young lawyer at the time, and he could only be away from the office for a few weeks. He would drive by himself cross country and meet us out there. That short time was a non-stop whirlwind of all the fun-filled tourist attractions a kid could want. Knott's Berry Farm, Magic Mountain, Farmer's Market, excursions to San Francisco and rugged Big Sur in the north, and San Diego and Tijuana, Mexico in the south. But the big one for sure was Disneyland, the uncontested "Happiest Place On Earth." Then he'd head back, and we'd finish our stay. At the time, I had no idea of the sacrifice he made in money, time, physical endurance, and loneliness.

Walt Disney was a genius.

Many people say Disney bastardized our culture. Some say he was a bastard to work for. I say, more power to him.

When he began building Disneyland in 1954, it was called "Walt's Folly." When Disneyland opened in 1955, it was called "the world's biggest toy for the world's biggest boy."

I loved the place. One of the fondest memories any kid could have is boarding the Disneyland and Alweg Monorail in the parking lot, gliding around the Matterhorn, and swooping over the Submarine Lagoon into Tomorrowland.

From there it was like being a kid in a candy shop of imagination. One minute you're staring into a giant eyeball as you're being studied under a microscope on the Adventure Thru Inner Space presented by Monsanto, and a few minutes later be on a launch in deepest Africa surrounded by hippos wiggling their ears.

As I've written previously, my childhood was not a happy one. The Disney parks embodied the way life was meant to be lived. History and learning were made fun, adventure was made accessible, magic and fantasy were made palpable, and the hope of a better tomorrow was made possible.

Disneyland, and later Walt Disney World, were not dreams to me. They were my only reality.

By 1973, my junior year of high school, I was deeply entrenched in the counterculture. I now had friends who shared common bonds of music and partying. I was no longer at the whim of bullies. I let my hair grow wild, and learned how to mentally and physically handle myself. Even with, or because of, my drug use, I excelled in school. Due to my double-promotion in grade school, I was only fifteen years old, but I was doing work at the college level. In fact, for my senior year English class, the school implemented a special independent-study program for me and three other students.

[As previously detailed in this blog, for my self-study period, I sat in the back of Ms. Brown's junior year honors English class. For their final assignment, and a large part of their grade, each student in the class had to give a ten to twenty minute presentation based on a piece of original creative writing. There were no criteria, and each student was allowed and encouraged to include audio-visual aids and anything else they could think of. The few of us in the self-study group were also required to do the assignment.

Most of the kids simply read their poems and essays, several had artwork and poster boards to support their projects, but I had informed Ms. Brown that I would need the entire period for my project, and would need a pass from class for the previous period to set up my presentation.

The students filed in to the classroom to find all the shades drawn, and a large table set up in the front of the room with all kinds of strange equipment. As class began, the lights were turned off, and two flicker bulbs came on framing an easel that displayed illustrations by my friend Jack. Gordon, hidden behind the easel, cued up a track from a Uriah Heep album. As the song ended, I lit a candle on the podium I stood behind, and read my story called "Nightmares of the Mind," a Tolkienesque walk on the dark side.

After each section of my story, Jack would flip over the next illustration, and Gordon would cue up another song. We had so timed it, that the last song was playing when the bell rang. The astonished students filed out to the closing strains of Blue Oyster Cult's "Astronomy."

Each student presentation was followed by a brief discussion and feedback session, including final comments by Ms. Brown. But the next day, class commenced with the next series of projects, and for whatever reason or circumstances, I was denied the opportunity to receive feedback on my project. The fact that I received an A for the project, and for the class, did little to assuage the feeling of disappointment.]

One day, in my third year, my young, attractive, English teacher, Ms. Buczyna, asked me to stay after class. I rapidly scanned my memory for whatever possible trouble I could be in, and came up blank. My hormone-driven, adolescent brain then conjured fantasies of illicit trysts and being taught the ways of love by an experienced woman. As my classmates filed out, I quickly realized neither of these were the case. The reality turned out to be better than I could ever have imagined.

Ms. Buczyna handed me a well-thumbed, paperback book, and simply said it wasn't on the reading list, but she thought I might enjoy it. I looked at the cover. The title was The Hobbit by an author named J.R.R. Tolkien.

The rest, as they say, is history. The mind-blowing, eye-opening trilogy that followed this “childrens” story shaped and inspired my worldview and writing style in ways that reverberate to this day.

At the start of my senior year in September of 1974, Ms. Buczyna sponsored a new extracurricular group called The Tolkien Society, and I became its first president. About a dozen kids signed up, and we met every other week to discuss Tolkien's writings.

It so happened that the entire freshman and sophomore class were called into an assembly in the auditorium to hear from representatives of the school's sports teams and clubs. I was asked to give a brief introduction about the Society. My friend Jack wanted to get out of his gym class to attend the assembly, so he and I approached the gym teacher Mr. Kraznowski, an old-school drill sergeant. I explained about the assembly, and that I was scheduled to talk about The Tolkien Society. Mr. K asked, "What do you do at the Tolkien Society?" and without missing a beat, Jack spouted out, "We toke!"

I cringed, and Mr. K didn't think it was funny, but he signed Jack out of class anyway. Student leader after student leader, got up before the assembly and described what each team and organization did, extolling the benefits and virtues of each. Finally it was my turn, and I got up and delivered a fifteen minute speech about "pipeweed."

As I left the stage, most of the teachers and students sat stunned, except for a smattering of applause and giggles. The next period, I was called to the office of the vice-principal, the school's chief disciplinarian, who informed me that I was getting a one week suspension for my speech, and it was going on my PERMANENT RECORD!

When my dad found out what happened that evening he went berserk. Only this time his fury was not bent on me, but on the school. He stormed into the office the next morning with me in tow and demanded to see the principal, Mr. Scheid. My dad and Mr. Scheid knew each other, not only from my father's frequent summons to the school on my behalf, but also from outside community activities where my dad did pro bono work.

The secretary started to give my dad lip service about needing an appointment, and my dad told her to just tell the principal Mr. Dunn wants to see him. The secretary did as she was told, and we were immediately ushered into his office. Mr. Scheid was aware of the situation and explained the school's position, but my dad immediately took the offensive and told the principal that if the suspension, and the notation in my PERMANENT RECORD were not immediately expunged, he would file a civil suit in federal court for violation of my 1st Amendment rights. Of course, nowadays, students have no rights. Mr. Scheid revoked the suspension, and I returned to class.

One of my major regrets in life stemmed from my senior yearbook. For some reason, either playing hookey at home, or cutting class, I was not in school when they sent around a sheet requesting each student to fill in what school affiliations and honors they would like printed underneath their photos in the yearbook. When I returned to school, no one called this to my attention.

In addition to serving as president of The Tolkien Society, I was also a member of the honor society, the chess club, the AV club, a library volunteer, and a participant in the self-study program. But when the yearbook came out, and even the biggest slackers in the class had things written under their pictures, the space under my photo was glaringly, embarrassingly, unjustly, everlastingly blank.

I am embittered at the school, at myself, and at fate to this day.

Before I went to college and became exposed to more groups and styles of music than I ever dreamed existed, Uriah Heep was my favorite band, right down to the Roger Dean album covers. The Demons and Wizards album featured such songs as, "The Wizard," "Traveler in Time," "Rainbow Demon," and "The Spell." Their follow up record, Magician's Birthday, continued the dungeons and dragons theme, before the phrase was even coined, and inspired a personal ritual I still look back on with fond memories.

I would turn on the blacklight, queue up the album, lie in my bed (my brother and I shared a room, and I had the upper bunk), and fire up what I reefered to (get it – 'reefer'ed to) as a “Magician's Birthday Joint,” a fat doobie, perfectly rolled, usually in fruit flavored papers. My mind would range over vast landscapes, carried by the music and the smoke. High times, indeed.

Although the heavy medal music drew me to the band, there was much more to this versatile group. In 1971 Uriah Heep released their second album, Salisbury. It contained enough heavy metal and rock ballads to satisfy the fans of the first album, but it also featured the sixteen-minute and seventeen-second title track. This orchestral composition served as a showcase for the band's talents collectively and individually.

Paul Newton's bass work throughout the entire piece is phenomenal, a perfect symbiosis with Keith Baker's drums. Brass and woodwinds surround the percussion, opening the gates for keyboard impresario, Ken Hensley to take the stage. Thus is the multi-textured canvas upon which lead vocalist, David Byron, paints this simple picture of love won and lost with passion. He uses the power of his voice as a counterpoint to Mick Box's extended guitar solo that is nothing short of awesome.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQBSeclvMV8 (Salisbury)

“Come Away Melinda,” written in 1963 by Fred Hellerman and Fran Minkoff of the Weavers, is one of the most powerful anti-war ballads ever written. The song has been performed by Harry Belafonte, Judy Collins, Mama Cass, Kenny Rankin, Tim Rose, Bobbie Gentry, and UFO. But in my opinion, the best cover by far is the haunting track on the album ...Very 'Eavy ...Very 'Umble by Uriah Heep and the plaintive vocals of front man David Byron.

There is some discussion as to whether the song was written about WWI, WWII, or possibly the aftermath of a future WWIII. To me, it is no matter. This sweet, sad song should be listened to by every parent, and every president before sending people off to war.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kmbw2RRGGbk (Come Away Melinda)

Uriah Heep still has a large and devoted cult following. They continue to tour and release new material. But my son, who grew up hearing and enjoying their music, recently pointed out that they do not have a social media presence. In online discussions and threads that refer to 70s bands, Uriah Heep is not one of the names that comes up.

It should be mentioned that David Byron died of alcohol related complications at his home in Reading, England, on Thursday, February 28, 1985. He was 38 years old. His death was barely noted in the music press.

College opened the floodgates to new experiences and ways of thinking that challenged my eager, young mind. During this formative time, my roommate introduced me to a short story writer named Harlan Ellison. By the time I “discovered” him, Ellison was an established author in the sci-fi genre, and had penned the Star Trek script for, "The City on the Edge of Forever," which won the 1968 Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation, and is one of the most critically acclaimed episodes of the series. The only problem was he didn't write science-fiction.

Ellison, who refuses to be pigeonholed, has largely been pigeonholed as a writer of "speculative fiction."

Speculative fiction is a broad literary genre encompassing writing with supernatural, fantastical, or futuristic elements. Wikipedia explains that in its broadest sense, speculative fiction captures both a conscious and unconscious aspect of human psychology in making sense of the world, reacting to it, and creating imaginary, inventive, and artistic expressions, some of which underlie social and cultural movements, scientific research and advances, and philosophy of science.

The written history of speculative fiction began with the works of the ancient Greek dramatist, Euripides. William Shakespeare explored the genre in "A Midsummer Night's Dream," and Tolkien's writing falls under this umbrella.

All young writers exposed to Ellison fall into the trap of trying to write like him, most with minimal success, and many never being able to move beyond Ellison and develop their own voice. I sincerely hope, by the time you have gotten this far in the blog, you will determine that I have succeeded.

My writing, as juvenile as it was, was already outside the box, but under Ellison's tutelage, the box was set aflame, so that the constraints of the corrugated paper walls transformed into so many flakes of ash borne away on the breath of exhaled pot smoke. And this does not take into account the striped cats that leaped from the box and chased each other around my writing desk in a blur until they melted into butter that I spread on my pancakes. But that's another story.

Ellison exhibits a take-no-prisoners approach in his personal and professional life. He does not suffer fools, and as he says on his website, “Copying or distributing any part of this piece for personal use, commercial use, or any other use you can come up with is strictly forbidden. Breaking this rule will result in the author coming down on you like the proverbial Hand of God or, barring the author finding out, your being forced to spend 15,000 years in Purgatory watching the same three episodes of 'Perfect Strangers.'" I had actually intended to use a short passage from one of his essays as the epigraph to this book, but my written request for permission went unanswered. In a fit of pique, I considered removing this acknowledgment, but his influence cannot be so easily denied or dismissed.

I am known as Holidayman. I take great pride in that. As all my friends and family, and especially my son Nik, who has to do all the heavy lifting, know, I take it seriously. I owe it all to a brave woman named Martha Stewart.

Martha is a woman for whom I have the utmost respect. I've heard her referred to as a lifestyle guru, and I have loved her since her first PBS special in 1986. The Thanksgiving themed show featured pumpkin-squash soup served in a hollowed-out pumpkin, pumpkin pie with a baked pastry-dough leaf on top, a warm root vegetable salad, and a magnificent puff pastry wrapped turkey. But what resonated even more with me than the over-the-top recipes, was her passion for collecting and decorating. Passions I shared. "I'm a firm believer in displaying one's collections and one's accumulations of things.... It's...fun to have them out so everybody can enjoy them," she said, and I became a firm believer in her.

During the show, Martha took out a beautiful yellow ceramic bowl, proceeded to fill it with bread cubes, and then kept adding ingredients: sauteed veggies, porcini mushrooms soaked in cognac, Italian sausage balls, piles of fresh herbs, diced apples, and lightly beaten eggs till the ridiculous mound was double the height of the bowl.

She then somehow managed to thoroughly mix the stuffing without spilling one homemade bread cube.

So now, whenever my wife or I overfill a bowl, we call out, "Hey, you're pulling a Martha Stewart!"

www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmGLBn1CNDE (Holiday Entertaining with Martha Stewart (1986), Part 1)

She also visited a cranberry bog. In late September of 1993, we went up to northern Wisconsin, to enjoy the fall color, pick up some cheeses, and visit the Three Lakes Winery, where we got to sample and select fruit wines for the holidays. We decided to take the boys on a bog tour.

We boarded a big, yellow school bus at the entrance to the vast cranberry farm, and made our way to the back as the bus filled with senior citizens.

You have to understand how cranberry bogs are set up to appreciate the situation. There are large square or rectangular areas that contain the cranberry plants. They look sort of like vines running along the ground. Along the side of the plant areas are deep ditches filled with water. A narrow, raised sand berm runs between the ditches. In the fall, for harvesting, a sluice is opened and the water floods the fields of cranberry vines. The water causes the buoyant berries to float to the surface (still attached to the vines) and the harvesters "comb" out the berries and herd them to the collection area.

We got underway, and soon the bus was driving down the raised sand road and the driver was explaining about the bogs and that the ditches on both side of us were 10' deep and currently filled with water.

I was on the left side of the bus with Nik, and Shellie was on the right side with Ben. I was looking out the window when Shellie said, "We're getting awfully close to the edge over here."

"Don't worry about it," I said. "The driver knows what he's doing."

A moment later she said, "Hon, I'm not kidding. I think we're going over the edge."

At that instant, the front of the bus swung out and tipped to the right. I could feel the back of the bus slipping and tilting up.

The front exit was useless because it now hung over a ten-foot moat. I jumped up and popped the rear emergency exit. I climbed down with difficulty and turned around. The floor of the bus was at my chest level. Shellie handed me the boys and I set them down, and then taking her under the armpits, lifted her down. I took the boys hands and started moving away from the bus, but Shellie said, "Steve, those people can't climb down by themselves. You're going to have to help them."

I had smoked a little bit of pot before arriving for the tour, and all I wanted to do was keep to myself, look out the windows, and enjoy the tour. But I suddenly found myself coming in extremely personal contact with every person on the bus.

As each of the elderly tourists approached the exit, I grabbed them by the arms, or around the waist and set them roughly on the ground, telling them to back away. Some of the men tried climbing down, but I grabbed them like the others to get them out of the way. I knew the bus could go over at any time, and I wasn't sure I could repeatedly dive into the freezing water to rescue those trapped below.

Finally, like the captain of a ship, the wide-eyed and speechless driver appeared in the doorway, and as I helped him down, I said, "Is everyone off?" All he could do was nod.

I walked to the front of the bus, and was shocked at the precariousness of the situation. It was a miracle no one was killed. We all ambled around as we waited for a tractor to pull the bus back on the road. I was truly the man of the hour. Many people wanted to take my picture in front of the bus, and a few of them asked for my name and address. (I did, in fact, receive several thank you notes and copies of photographs.)

While I was standing up front, noting that one hand laid on the side could send the whole thing over the edge, Ben looked up at me and whispered, "Dad, push it in!"

I was tempted, but decided that would NOT be a good lesson in parenting.

In her book, Mona Lisa - A Life Discovered, Dianne Hales writes, "According to the nineteenth-century scholar Jacob Burckhardt, this historical period [the Renaissance] ushered in the first attempts 'consciously to make of the household a well-regulated matter, nay, to make it a work of art.'" Although I lay no claims to being a Renaissance Man, this has been my guiding principal for most of my life.

I treat my home like a work of art. God (yes God – don't bite my head off) blessed me with a beautiful, 1896 farmhouse with fabulous interior wood trim, pocket doors, and built in butler's pantry. People who come into the house remark on how wonderfully our furniture and furnishings fit the house. The truth is, we did not buy one stick of furniture or decoration since we moved into our home eight years ago. It was like we had been collecting our entire lives for that one house. I am thankful for every day I can be here.

Like Martha, I strive to create a full-immersion environment. The sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and things to touch combine to enhance the theme. Each room has its own ambiance, but wherever you look, new vistas beckon.

At the time Martha was gaining media recognition, the emphasis was on style over substance. We all strove for that upper middle-class lifestyle we saw everywhere, but was just out of reach. Martha showed us the way. A woman of hard-working, Polish peasant stock from Nutley, New Jersey elevated housekeeping and entertaining to an art and a science. Homemakers now had a voice and a leader who showed them their own domestic realms could be perfect.

Plus she taught me to make my bed every morning.

Lastly, I acknowledge God, and/or Nature, and/or Fate, and/or Superior Beings, and/or AI simulations, for making this all possible.