The Oppenheimer Report 12/30/13

Ho Freakin’ Ho in Toronto! For the residents of Toronto (and all the retailers who relied so heavily on last minute Christmas shoppers to bump up their bottom line) this was not a particularly merry Christmas, as a crippling ice storm devastated the GTA and left hundreds of thousands without power or heat for almost a week (longer in some cases). In fact, Hydro crews are still working on restoring power for some and it will be a long time until all the debris from fallen trees, destroyed property, and power lines is cleaned up. In the true spirit of the season, people came together from all over the country to help Toronto recover from what may go down as the worst ice storm in the city’s history. I begin this report on Christmas day and very sober Mayor Rob Ford is giving a press conference on our continuous news channel. There’s nothing like a natural disaster to erase past transgressions. Just as Hurricane Sandy gave Obama a bump in the polls at a crucial point in his re-election campaign, (even if he is a Muslim terrorist without a birth certificate) this ice storm may be Ford’s much-needed crap deflector. Then again, some residents, and even his deputy mayor Norm Kelly, are saying he should have declared the city a disaster area, which he did not. That decision will be debated ad nauseam in the months to come, but get real people, this was a huge storm.

Of course there are the fundamental concerns about providing food, water and shelter to the most needy, and there were emergency warming centers set up throughout the city where beleaguered residents could go to avoid the bitter cold. While this storm was nowhere near as devastating as the recent typhoon in the Philippines, or the earthquake in Japan, or the many other bigger natural disaster stories around the globe, it is a major weather event for Canada, and the coincidence of  arctic cold made this storm all the more dangerous. Roads and highways were like skating rinks, and thick layers of ice covered just about everything, impeding all rescue attempts and slowing down response times for fire trucks and ambulances. As well, many stubborn residents, including Shauna’s mom, refused to leave their homes for the crowded warming centers, and when the mercury dipped, some were living in subzero temperatures for days. There are reasons why they say households should have a disaster plan, but it is usually after a disaster strikes that people actually start to form one. Flashlights, batteries, radios, non-perishable goods, a manual can opener, a camp stove … these are the things everyone realizes they need, after the fact.

 Because so many were without heat or light for days, and when people became desperate to stay warm, they sometimes did imprudent things. In the GTA alone there were over one hundred reported incidences of carbon monoxide poisoning, and two people actually died of CO poisoning. People trying to stay warm fired up their outdoor gas grills in their homes, or set up unventilated generators in their garages. This problem was compounded by the fact that very few of the affected residents were capable of listening to the news to heed the omnipresent warnings about this. Not a bad idea to have a few battery powered CO detectors in the house to warn of impending CO danger. Shauna’s mom, who was without power for six days, did have one, but it was a plug-in and did not work when the power went out. Thanks to a good Samaritan (and boyfriend of one of our caregivers), who lent her a generator, we were able to get her furnace working for her, but the generator had to be placed in the attached garage, and we were concerned that CO fumes might leak into the house. Finally, one of her guardian angels went to Crappy Tire and bought her a battery-powered CO detector. We are soooo grateful to all the people who stepped up to keep her safe in our absence. The good Samaritan boyfriend not only provided the life-saving generator, but he also assisted Hydro crews on her street by cutting up some of the fallen limbs impeding restoration of electrical service. What a hero. As Blanche Dubois said, “I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.” Shauna and I struggled to provide the Taylors with loyal caregivers, but that effort has paid off in spades. The multi-talented boyfriend was an unexpected godsend.  

That storm was devastating to the flora and many of Toronto’s beautiful old trees will disappear or be truncated as a result of this storm. Layers of ice covered old growth trees and eventually they could not withstand the weight and came down, on buildings, cars, and on power lines. This happened in Buffalo years ago, and the scars are still apparent throughout the city. New growth trees, planted after a plague of Dutch Elm Disease had literally denuded Buffalo of many of her beautiful trees, were just beginning to mature when the ice storm necessitated radical pruning. The trees that did survive now look like bushes with thick trunks. I suspect Torontonians will be hearing  the buzz of chainsaws for quite some time, and predictions are that this cleanup will take 4-6 weeks. Hydro crews from across Canada have been flown in to assist in the monumental job of restoring power, and hats off to all the volunteers and workers who gave up their holiday to provide their much needed assistance to the beleaguered city.

Once the electrical mess is cleaned up, and the trees are cleared, and damaged cars are repaired, and all the spoiled food is thrown out, and the water damage from burst water pipes is cleaned up, and the roofs are repaired, and on and on, the residents of Toronto can celebrate Christmas. What a kick in the butt for retailers!  

Happy New Year to my loyal readers, I'll toast all of you on First Night with a Shirley Temple ( in a dirty glass)

 

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

 

 

The Oppenheimer Report 12/23/13

Merry Christmas to my Twelve Loyal Readers!

One of the downsides of living in a house with a lot of glass is that, inevitably the odd bird flies into that glass. We’ve had a few of bird accidents in the years since we built the new house, and of course it is not something we enjoy. I guess it's harder on the birds. Shauna pasted some decals on the window to warn of the danger, and we put up some of those kiddie windmills to try and keep the birds away from the house, but despite our best efforts, there are still a few casualties each year. Sometimes, if a bird hits the window, it will be stunned and lying on the ground. If this happens, I usually go outside, assess the situation, and  determine if this is a rescue operation or a lost cause. Lost causes get tossed down the hill. A rescue operation involves an attempt to revive the unconscious but breathing bird, stroking its head gently, and perhaps moving it to someplace where it can recover out of reach of predators. I’m certainly no bird doctor, and there are no attempts made at mouth to beak resuscitation, or at the mending of broken wings. With these window crashes, it’s usually a harmless knockout or a broken neck. The other day we all heard a very loud crash, and we discovered that a rather large dove had crashed into the window. It was now laying head first in the snow, legs sticking straight up. Judging from the sound it made when it hit the glass, I was fairly sure this one was a “lost cause.” I went outside, confirmed my suspicion, and sadly tossed it down Bird Boot Hill. Later on that evening I was looking out the window, and noticed a mark where the bird had hit. Upon closer examination I realized that the mark was a perfect outline of the victim - I mean down to the beak and eyes, and it was kind of creepy. Shauna and I cannot figure out exactly what is the material sticking to our window, perhaps some bird expert out there can enlighten us. This is the first time that there has been a mark like that. There might be the odd feather sticking to the window but never the entire imprint of the bird. Anyhow, we have so far left the mark untouched. I find it fascinating, and I prefer to let that incredible mother which is nature wipe it clean in time, or not. Feathers to feathers, dust to dust.  

I used to think birds were uninteresting and not very smart, but changed my mind about that when we started hiking out west. In fact it was those visits to the Canadian Rockies that gave me a newfound respect for all forms of wildlife, both flora and fauna. We named one bird who visited our loft balcony regularly “Broke Toe” because he/she was missing one claw. I presume he was in a bar fight or something. Broke Toe was a Clark’s Nutcracker, a species of bird known locally in Banff for its annoying, fingernails-on-a-blackboard song, but if ever a bird had personality and attitude, it was Broke Toe. He became a member of our dysfunctional family, and would occasionally hang out with us for no special reason. I think he liked Shauna more than he liked me. Every year we stayed in the same hotel room in Banff, and every year, without fail, Broke Toe came to visit us. Sometimes he would bring along members of his family. I learned that these particular nutcrackers will store food in thousands of different hiding places, and they remember every location. Out in Banff there were Whisky Jacks, huge Common Ravens, Dark-eyed Juncos, Snow Owls, Eagles, and dozens of other interesting birds, but Broke Toe was hands down our favorite bird.  

It is now Sunday afternoon and at present Toronto is dealing with a major ice storm. Right now about 300,000 are without power, including my mother-in-law. What a mess it is. Trees are down all over the city and the current estimate is that many will be without power for 72 hours, maybe longer. Of course, power outages are much more serious in the winter, and with colder weather in the forecast, I am concerned for the safety of Shauna’s mom. Thankfully she has a caregiver with her, but there is really nowhere to go, and no supplemental source of heat or power.  A lot of people figure that a gas generator is a good idea, and it is, if you buy a decent one. The cheap ones you can buy at Walmart may or may not work when you need them, and I’ve heard a lot of complaints about generators that fail. There are going to be a lot of utility workers who miss Christmas this year in Toronto, and like so many weather-related disasters, the severity of this one is still being assessed. Up here in the GWN, we’ve had snow, but nothing special. I have raked the carport tarp twice in the past 24 hours, and we will likely need to have the driveway plowed again (it was plowed yesterday). I am watching Toronto news right now and our bellicose mayor just announced that he is not declaring Toronto a disaster area. He may need to lay off the crack for a couple of days to handle this latest crisis. Ford should be kissing Mandela’s butt for dying when he did, because that took the spotlight off him.

Merry Christmas to those who partake and remember, if you are going to get toasted, do it in front of an open fire and not driving your car out on the open (and icy) roads. Ho friggin’ ho, and don’t be one. . I’m really hoping one of those wild turkeys doesn’t kamikaze into our window.

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 12/16/13

Let it snow, let it snow, let it SNOW! Last Tuesday I took my mother-in-law into Huntsville for a medical appointment, and it was snowing steadily as we headed in to town. As we drove home it was turning into a whiteout. When we finally arrived home, we passed our snowplow guy on the road, heading out after plowing our driveway. Our first plow of the season. That was at around 6PM, and by the time I took Jasper out for her last pee of the night, the snow was already deep enough that we needed another plow. You know you’re in for serious snow up here when the forecasters speak in terms of centimeters per 12 hour period. Jasper went up to her nose in the snow and then looked back at me as I to say, “WTF, if this keeps up I’m doin’ my business IN the house.” I realized that I would need to do some heavy duty snow blowing the next morning. I later heard that, shortly after we had arrived home, they closed the highway from Huntsville almost all the way up to Powassan because the squalls were so bad. Nearby Bracebridge got walloped. Based on the storms that have been hammering Alberta and the Midwest, I knew it was only a matter of time before we got hit with some heavy lake effect snow, and Tuesday night was a direct hit. And COLD!

I don’t mind the snow, but what makes winter a little more treacherous up here is the freezing and thawing. Accessibility becomes an issue. Last week, our 500 meter long driveway, which is at least a 100 foot drop down to the lake, was a skating rink. Wednesday I couldn’t get traction with the ATV in 4 wheel drive. I think the MDX will get up the road if I desperately need to get out, but when the weather is like this, it’s better to stay put. We have lots of food, and barring an extended power outage (we have a propane-fueled generator), the propane tank should hold out or a few more weeks. Keeping the propane topped up is a legitimate concern up here. In Toronto, I could take an elevator to the basement and pick up anything I needed. There was little chance our apartment building would ever lose heat or electricity, and if it did, there were plenty of people to take care of the problem. Up here, if the power goes out, we can go through a tank of propane in no time, and because we also heat with propane, we need to keep the gas flowing. I had a few nervous weeks last December, wondering if the propane truck would make it down our driveway. I suppose we could always burn the furniture.

We had plans to put a clear Lexan roof on our carport last summer, both to protect the log structure and to create a greenhouse off our back porch, but an unreliable supplier and the unfortunate events of last summer combined to throw a wrench in our plans. Life happens and, barring any more unforeseen circumstances, it will be spring before we revisit that project. In the meantime, the roof is covered with a heavy duty tarp, which has survived one winter but may not survive this one. Every time we get a heavy snow, I go out and rake it off while it is still light and manageable. Wednesday morning I did this and almost got buried in an avalanche. Sometimes I amaze myself with my own stupidity. Up here in the Great White North, it’s just me, my wife, my mother-in-law (for the time being), my Miniature Schnauzer, my snow rake, my Ariens snowblower, and my will to survive. Grizzly Oppenheimer. Right now, I am a little starved for male companionship, and my best friend lives in Buffalo. Most of my other male buddies don’t live around here, and my two best friends up here are my plumber and the guy who plows our driveway. They’ll only hang out with me because I pay them.

The wild turkeys have returned, and they have decided to take up residence on our property. Actually, I'm not sure if they are turkey buzzards or wild turkeys, and I can't tell from the internet pictures I googled. The other day I counted five of them, but one fall we had sixteen on the property. They are more fun to watch than a girl fight on Jersey Shore. When I took Jasper out Saturday morning, three of them were hanging out high up in the trees, bracing for the winter storm. I didn’t even know they could fly, and I’ve only ever seen them on the ground. They make a lot of noise when they fly.

Attended the pre-Christmas Coffee House musical review in Burk’s Falls last Friday, and it was the best one yet. My favorite performer of the night was a guy named Jamie Clark, formerly of the group Lewis and Clark. He has a great voice, and he's a good songwriter to boot. I’m making a list of the performers up here on my wish list to cover my songs, and yesterday, at the Katrine Jamboree, I met a bassist in a local band, who has better recording equipment than I do. Perhaps he and I will be able to do something together . I’m not sure how long it will last, but I quit drinking booze the day my father-in-law went into the hospital on July 6th, and now I need some musical diversions. Up here in the Great White North, snow is not the only winter hazard, and many a poor soul has succumbed to the evils of cabin fever and demon alcohol.

 

 

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 12/9/13

It has been months since I last griped about the perils of technology, so I am long overdue for today’s rant. I don’t know to which device I would rather take a ballpeen hammer, my cell phone or my GPS. I despise touch screens, and these days everything has a touch screens. Our electric oven uses a touch screen. I suspect that the reason Windows 8 has incurred the wrath of so many of its users, myself included, is that it was designed to be used with a touch screen, and so does not always operate properly without one. Perish the thought that some of us have not made that quantum leap yet to a touch screen laptop.

My not-so-smart cell phone has a touch screen, as do most other cell phones these days. If my hands are cold or wet, a touch screen does not operate properly, and sometimes I find that I cannot answer a call because of this. As well, I find I am now more inclined to ass dial people. Ass dialing, in case you are over 65 and/or unfamiliar with the expression, is a modern day phenomenon whereby one inadvertently touches the phone screen, with some body part other than one’s hands, and speed dials one of the people on one’s caller list. I get ass dialed on a regular basis. One of my musician friends in Alberta does it to me on a semi-regular basis, usually at two in the morning from some gig he’s playing. I’m flattered to be one of his top ten speed dialees, but do not want to hear him walking around, or listen in on his private conversations with other people.

Then there is my infernal GPS. I have a TomTom and more than anything use it as a wireless “hands free” (Bluetooth) speaker device. Technically I should not be talking on my cell while driving the car, but at least this way it’s a hands free call, and I can have both hands on the wheel (which I hardly ever do anyway). What I had not anticipated is that, when I walk away from the car, and forget to turn off the GPS, the phone may continue to communicate with it. Half the time the wireless feature doesn’t work properly when I am in the car, much less 50 yards away from the car, but the other day I drove to nearby Burk’s Falls to pick up some groceries, and Shauna called me on my cell to remind me to pick up some things. While I was talking to her in the supermarket, my phone cut out, and it kept happening. She would call, I could hear the phone ring, but when I answered the call there was silence. I finally figured out that my phone was communicating wirelessly with the GPS in my car parked out in the lot. I was screaming “Hello! Hello!” in the store and she was screaming “Hello HELLO!” to the speaker in my car. Ridiculous! I consider myself average in my technological skills, maybe a little below average, but these days, I feel pretty stupid. Now that the Christmas rush has begun, have you noticed that almost every gift idea has something to do with phones, computers, or new and improved stuff for your T.V.? The other day I saw an ad for a PVR (digital recorder for the television), which will record four different shows simultaneously.  Do I need this? As it is, I hardly ever watch half the crap (and I mean crap) I record; do I really need to quadruple my inventory of crap? I know, I’m turning into one of those grumpy old Muppet codgers in the balcony, but as I become more and more dependent on this stuff I somehow lived without for decades, I feel that I’ve reached the saturation point.

And speaking of high tech, did anyone see that segment on Amazon’s proposed delivery drones? I can think of one hundred reasons why drones are not a wise idea for delivering packages. Has anyone considered the possibility that one of those little things, with its ten mile range, could be used by our enemies to attack us. It doesn’t take a genius to see how that technology could backfire.

Nelson Mandela died last Thursday, and most would agree the world has lost a truly great man. Strangely, he passed away on the night when the premier of the biopic about his life Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom had just been released. Obviously the man was a great and charismatic leader, but apart from his monumental accomplishments of dismantling apartheid in South Africa, and preventing his country from imploding, Mandela amazed me most by his ability to forgive his enemies. Having served 27 years in prison the man could have been understandably bitter towards his white oppressors. How does one walk away from that kind of loss of freedom? I understand that complications from a persistent lung infection he contracted in prison finally did him in. He was 95 when he passed, how long would he have lived if healthy? I read some famous quotes attributed to the man, and the one I liked best was: “Lead from the back – and let others believe they are in front.” As we wrestle some feeble old lady to the floor in WalMart over the last remaining IPad in the store, let us take a nanosecond to reflect on the selflessness of this one great man. Will we ever learn? So far I haven't.   - Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 12/2/13

As I begin this report on Thursday, I am sitting in my living room watching the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, and this has been one of my favorite parts about Turkey Day since I was a little boy. Learning machine that I am I googled the Macy’s Day Parade and, of course, there is a lot of conflicting information about the early years. The event originated in 1920’s (1924?). According to what I read, there were no balloons in the first parade, but they did parade animals on loan from the Central Park Zoo. Apparently, in the early years, the balloons were released at the end of the parade. I was worried that the giant balloons would not be in the parade this year (Snoopy was always my favorite) because of high winds from that most recent winter storm. Luckily, it was a perfect day for the event, and the balloons floated down the street as they always have. The American Thanksgiving will always be my favorite holiday. Traditionally, it was when my family gathered in Buffalo, along with a few obligatory strays, and sat down to a Thanksgiving feast, and I mean feast, hosted by my mom and dad. There is no other holiday which is as meaningful to me, and though the hosts of that party are now gone, the warmth of the celebration will be with me forever. I know it’s maudlin to say this, but I am thankful to have had that experience for so many years. Rather than whine about the loss of family, I turned it around this year and called a bunch of friends and family with whom I have not spoken in a while. I talked to Edmond, my shut in friend with MS from Buffalo to whom I used to deliver meals for Meals on Wheels, I spoke with one of the nurses who took care of my mom and dad, and to my cousin who lives in Oregon. Vicariously, I soaked up some of the good vibes I always used to feel at my parent’s house.  

There was an article in the NY Times yesterday which caught my eye concerning a developing technology that falls into the “big-brother-is-watching” category. We’ve all heard of face recognition software which can assist authorities in apprehending the bad guys. Faces are recorded by a camera and sent to a database which can then determine if the subject is on any criminal watch list. With cameras popping up more and more in public places, there is the ongoing debate about what violates a person’s privacy. Now there is a developing software which uses algorithms to read facial expressions and determine what a person is thinking or feeling. It isn’t much of a stretch to presume that computers will one day be able to read people’s minds, and this is a little unsettling. There is an expression, “owner of one’s thoughts, slave to one’s words.” Perhaps we are approaching the point where we have become a slave to our thoughts as well. Or at least our computers.

11/30/13 - Well the insanity has begun, actually it began shortly after Halloween, and Shauna just told me there was a news clip on CNN about some holiday-related violence in a Wal Mart. Some predatory shoppers rioted over the last computer tablet on the shelves. If it isn’t Tickle-ME-Elmo, or a Cabbage Patch Doll, or Pet Rocks, it’s always some thing that brings out the worst in human holiday behavior . The news is always chock full of negative stories about the downside of Christmas - gunfights in shopping mall parking lots over the last parking space, one of Santa’s helpers caught exposing himself in public, or a Christmas tree fire that wipes out an entire family. Misfortune doesn’t only happen at Christmas, but Christmas always seems to highlight the suffering. It seems stories of goodwill don’t stand a chance when put up against the intoxicating allure of yellow journalism. This is probably why Santa has had so many emotional problems, but I’m not even going to go there.     

And speaking of overweight guys with public relations problems, on a lighter (heavier?) note, disgraced Toronto Mayor Rob Ford was asked not to attend this year’s Santa Claus Parade, because the promoters thought he might be too much of a “distraction.” Ouch.  Somebody’s getting a stocking full of coal this Christmas. For those members of my tribe, I wish you a Happy Chanukah, which began at sundown last Wednesday night. I don’t read or understand Hebrew, but I googled Chanukkah prayers so I could recite the prayers phonetically as I lit the candles. Presently we have Shauna’s mom up here with us in the Great White North and, while she is still grieving the loss of her husband, I think she has been enjoying her time in this winter wonderland.

I am thankful for the good friends and family in my life. May your holiday season be absent stress and pain, and the last tablet computer from Wal Mart.

 

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c 2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 11/25/13

Demolition of the old cottage in 2007

This was the week when winter arrived with a vengeance. All over North America there was crazy weather, with snowstorms in the west and destructive tornadoes in the mid-west. As I begin writing this report on Sunday, we’re in the deep freeze up here in the Great White North, and the mercury is hovering around 8 degrees F. Jasper has officially donned her polar fleece Canadian-flag design winter coat for the season. When it gets really cold, as it has been the past few nights, I also put her boots on. She hates the boots (“Mutt-Luks”) and tries to kick them off, which is pretty funny to watch, but without them her paws freeze up within minutes. She gets as far away from the house as we walk and then lifts one paw as if to say “I’m cold now, pick me up and carry me home.” The night before last we had a significant snowfall and there is more in the forecast for this week. Tomorrow the Blizzak snow tires go on the SUV, and what a difference those babies make. We need radial snows up here. Just in time, as I head down to Toronto later this week, through lake effect alley, to pick up Shauna’s mom for a Chanukah visit.

Because I embrace winter weather with the resignation of an Eskimo, I have some excellent winter gear. From our hikes in the mountains, I have knee-high gators for keeping snow out of my boots. For heavier duty snow play I have snowmobile pants (we used to call them leggings), fleece-lined snowmobile boots, a down vest, a face mask, and plenty of long underwear. The one thing I have never been able to keep warm are my hands, and no matter how heavy duty the gloves are, when I’m out on the ATV zipping along at 40-50MPH, wind chill is a factor. This year I researched heated glove liners and finally bought a pair manufactured by a Canadian company called MotionHeat. They seemed to be the best electric glove I could find. Of course these liners were in high demand and were on back order, but last week, just in time for the first arctic blast, they arrived. Once I figured out the wiring harness, how to attach it to the 12 volt outlet on my ATV, and how to adjust the temperature – I know, it sounds like a lot of bother – they worked perfectly. I took a long ride in the arctic air and everything stayed warm, including my hands. These electric glove liners are not cheap, but they are a lot cheaper than the grip warmers I was about to buy for the ATV, and they come with a rechargeable lithium ion battery good for 3 hours of off-the-grid warmth. Bottom line, they work, and comfort in this cold northern climate is worth a lot. I only wish these things had been around when I was still an avid snow skier. Some of those lift rides in the mountains of Vermont were pretty darned frosty.

We had a scare last week when it was reported to me that our snowplow guy, Harvey had passed away. News travels fast in a small town, but it turned out it was another guy in the community with the same name (even the same middle initial!) who had died. For about two hours I was mildly freaking out. First of all, he is the best snowplow guy in the area; always reliable and fair. But more important, he’s a buddy, and I enjoy his company. I called his house to send my condolences, and he answered the phone. We had a good laugh, and I later sent him one of my historic Buffalo post cards with a note on the back saying “I was relieved to hear that news of your untimely demise was greatly exaggerated.”

I watched Toronto Mayor Rob Ford body check some council woman to the floor as he attempted to address some hecklers in council chambers. Talk about video gold, the news had a field day with that footage. Hulk Hogan, stand back. There was much talk in the news this week about a deal with Iran that will ensure their nuclear program will not be used to produce weapons. All of this is allegedly verifiable, but  Israel is predictably skeptical, and so am I. Last week marked the 50^th Anniversary of JFK’s assassination. I remember where I was. In my sister’s bedroom in Buffalo watching it on a portable black and white T.V. I can’t believe that was fifty years ago. A pre-emptive Happy Thanksgiving to all my buddies stateside, hope you all have a great bird with your families!

                           - Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 11/18/13

Last Friday night I had the opportunity to play a few my songs at the monthly Burk’s Falls “Coffee House”, and it is always gratifying to play a couple of my songs for a receptive audience. I dragged Shauna out with me and I think it was therapeutic for her to let go of her grief and to meet some new people. These coffee houses provide a good chance to meet like-minded people in the community who share a love of music and good song writing. I’ve been playing open stages for over thirty years now and I have yet to play a better venue for songwriters than this one. On Friday, I met two good writers who performed their own songs, and we sat with an older guy named Sam Fattore, who moved up here from Hamilton recently. Sam played several good covers of older country songs (George Jones, Hank Williams, etc.) and I ended up buying his CD, although traditional country music is not my favorite genre. We talked guitars and swapped war stories about the worst venues we’ve played. A few weeks ago I acknowledged the passing of rock icon Lou Reed, and I alluded to the fact that he had influenced my song writing. One of the songs I played last Friday night was Dear Dirty Dublin, one of my favorites in my repertoire, and Lou Reed figured significantly in the writing of that song.

Dear Dirty Dublin recounts the story of an all-night party in which I participated, back in 1977, in a suburb south of Dublin. The Irish know how to have a good time and my Irish partners in crime and I drank a lot of Irish whisky, smoked some home grown weed, and all night long we listened to Lou Reed and Bruce Springsteen albums. As the party was winding down in the wee hours of the morn, someone had the brilliant idea to continue the celebration at some skid row bar in the bowels of Dublin. That decision required a bus ride into the city, and still loaded from the bender, we boarded the double decker 6A bus headed for Dublin. Because it was the first bus of the morning, it was filled with all the bus drivers who were to be dropped off at their respective stops along the way. You can imagine how strange it was to board this bus, inebriated as we were, and to see it full of uniformed bus drivers going to work.

 “…The trees are black cracks against the diesel sky/ And through my reflection I watch the cars go by/ Dublin Bay is on my right the water cool and still/ Rid me of this vagrancy, I’m gonna drink my fill.”

I remember everything about that long ride into town, and I remember we ended up at a skid row bar along the Liffy River in the industrial section of downtown Dublin. We arrived just before the doors opened, and tinkers (what the Irish call gypsies), were milling about outside waiting for first call. When the doors did open shortly thereafter, we entered a world I had not seen before and have not seen since. I felt as if I was half immersed in this foul underbelly of vagrancy, and it was a real life lesson. We drank at this bar for several hours and then staggered back into the city centre, making an obligatory stop at the Trinity College campus to view the Book of Kells (which, as it turns out, is even more interesting to view smashed), before heading home to sleep off what had been a legendary bender. At the time, I was in a literature class and studying Joyce’s Ulysses, hence the title of the song and the general theme of exile.

 “…That pub down by the Liffy, tinkers circling outside/ Soon they’re shooting whiskey and spilling Irish jive/ From delirium to paradise is such an easy slide/ This ain’t no kissin’ the Blarney Stone, it ain’t no tour bus ride/ No sir this is the 6A bus to the bottom of the line/ Dear Dirty Dublin, I think I’m out of time.”       

Hitting rock bottom is part of what that song is about, and as I watch the Rob Ford scandal unfold, I think I’m watching it happen to him. From SNL to CNN, Ford has become the laughing stock of the world, and he is taking Toronto down with him. How a man can in his right mind presume his glaringly public and deplorable behavior will go unpunished, especially under the microscope of the media, is beyond me. Today Toronto City Council votes, I think on whether or not to strip Ford of his operating budget. Last week they voted almost unanimously to strip him of his staff. Ford says he will challenge their decisions in court, at the taxpayer’s expense, if his power is taken away, but one way or another, this pathetic man is going to need a bulldozer to pull him out of the political quagmire into which he has fallen, head first.

                             - Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 11/11/13

REMEMBRANCE DAY 2013 ...

For Canadians last week, the big news focused on political scandal. In an ongoing Senate scandal, three senators, Pamela Wallin, Mike Duffy, and Patrick Brazeau, were suspended without pay until the next election in 2015, for their various acts of fiscal impropriety. As Jon Stewart quipped, thank goodness it was the Canadian and not the U.S. government for a change! Some Canadians think the senate should be abolished altogether, and these stories of waste and fraud certainly reinforce their case. But the real story last week, and the one that has provided fodder for comedians across the globe, is the scandal that broke in Toronto.

Our rotund “I’m-going-to-cut-out-the pork” Toronto Mayor Rob Ford finally admitted that he had in fact smoked crack cocaine about a year ago “in one of his drunken stupors.” This earth-shattering revelation came after repeated allegations by The Toronto Star that there was a video showing the mayor with a bunch of lowlife gangsters smoking crack. That video apparently surfaced back in May of this year, but then it mysteriously disappeared before it could be made public. There was the (above-pictured) photo, splashed all over the news, of his honor arm in arm with a couple of gang members, and one of those gangsters was subsequently shot to death (coincidentally, not long after the news of the video was reported). The whole thing was a huge scandal when the story broke but, when no one could produce the smoking gun video, it faded away for a while. The media “maggots” (Ford's words) would not let go of the story, and last week, not only did the police announce that they had recovered the video from a confiscated hard drive, but concurrently, the media came after Ford with guns a-blazin’. It was Quasimodo in the public square. There were photos of Ford wasted at The Taste of Danforth street party; reports of him stewed to the gills in City Hall, carrying a half empty bottle of booze and accompanied by some strange women; photos captured from a surveillance video insinuating some kind of drug deal or payoff; and my absolute favorite: a photograph of his honor pissing in the bushes, in some public place. Videos went viral; one showing Ford ranting menacingly in a drunken rage about someone who had dissed him and his family, and another of  Ford embarrassingly drunk in public, falling down while trying to pass a football. In short, last week was a train wreck for the Toronto mayor, and he is now being tried harshly in the court of public opinion.

Ford needed a good spin doctor when the feces hit the fan, but like so many men in power, he thought he could keep a lid on his bad behavior. The guy has a drinking problem, and whether he is an alcoholic, or a binge drinker, or just a guy who can’t handle his booze, his public behavior is clearly inappropriate for a mayor of one of the largest cities in Canada. As much fun as it can be to lampoon the ridiculous behavior of an elected official, I do not enjoy watching this man embarrass himself in public. When Ford did finally admit that he had in fact smoked crack, his attitude seemed to be, “ Hey, haven’t you ever been so hammered that you did something stupid, like smoke crack, or shoot heroin, or get a giant tattoo on your butt that says “This way to the Lincoln Tunnel?” The media has literally hung him out to dry (out) and he is the now laughing stock of the world, at least until the hyenas move on to the next wildebeest on the savannah. Oh, please Mylie Cyrus, do something really stupid again and take the spotlight off our mayor! While history is full of questionable behavior by politicians (former President Bill Clinton and U.S Senator Packwood immediately spring to mind), Ford has clearly crossed the line. He got caught with his tent-sized pants down, and the real problem, for him and for the taxpayers of the City of Toronto, is that so far he has refused to step down, or even to take a leave of absence. It is almost impossible for anyone else to force him out of office, unless he is found guilty of a crime, and by refusing to step down, he has begged the police to come after him criminally. This guy has more skeletons in his backyard than Pol Pot, and my suspicion is that his past is going to bite him in his quadruple X derriere. Ironically, his approval rating actually rose when the scandal was unfolding, and many of his constituents think he has done a good job for the Toronto taxpayers. He could have beat this scandal had he played his cards right. History sanitizes misbehavior, and Marion Barry is proof positive that scandalous behavior can be overcome.

In more significant news, last week Super Typhoon Haiyan hammered the Philippines as a Cat 5 storm, with sustained winds of around 275 KPH. It is being called the most powerful storm ever to make landfall. There may be as many as 10,000 or more casualties from this super storm and the pictures of tornado-like destruction tell the story. Tacloban city in the central region of the Philippine Islands took a direct hit and is now a pile of rubble. Finally, it is Remembrance Day, so let us all give thanks today to all the veterans, dead or alive, who sacrificed so much to protect our freedom. Despite the bad behavior of some of our public officials, we honor and appreciate your service to our countries.   

                             - Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 11/4/13

10/31/13 – DATELINE HALLOWEEN – MOTHER NATURE TRICKS TREATERS! I begin this report on the afternoon of Halloween. When I got up this morning, I turned on the Weather Channel, as I often do, and I was confronted with the red screen of death: a Meteorological Alert for Burks Falls and surrounding area, warning of heavy rain and damaging winds. My big boat is out of the water, and our dock is finally up, but my folding boat was still pulled up on the shore. I scurried down to the lake before the heavy rain started, flipped the little boat over and put the motor in the shed. I’m not ready to admit boating season is over just yet, and I have yet to winterize the motor, but I might as well batten down the hatches in the meantime. When I lived in Buffalo, I used to moor my big boat in Lake Erie off our Canadian summer home near Crystal Beach. Almost like clockwork, the weather would turn around mid-September and it was wise to be out of the open lake by then. I tried to stretch the season a couple of times, only to endure a few sleepless nights watching the wind-driven waves toss my boat around like a bar of Ivory soap on the open seas. You don’t want to mess with Lake Erie when the wind kicks up. I once watched my vintage 1957 Chris Craft drag its mooring (a cement-filled truck tire with 100’ of chain for scope), 200 yards during a bad storm. I finally went out in the middle of the storm and secured it with two Danforth anchors off the bow to keep it from beaching. It came to rest about 10’ from a neighbor’s steel boat lift, with about five inches of clearance between the bottom of the propeller and the lake bottom. That was close. Up here in the Great White North we get some heavy wind, but with a secure dock, snubbers, bumpers, and dock whips, I don’t worry about my boat in a storm.

 Every year when Halloween rolls around, I quietly pine for the days when it meant more to me. At the checkout counter in the local supermarket, all the cashiers were in costume for Halloween, and it made me a little nostalgic. I always had a costume for Halloween. My self-made tuna costume was legendary, and if I do say so myself, my dead lawyer was pretty good too. One year I dressed as Abe Lincoln after he was shot. That one was somewhat derivative in that it was a little like the dead lawyer, but with more blood, a beard, a hole in my head, and a bow tie instead of a necktie. I have always been a Halloween purist, and believe that creativity is an important part of the gig. Anyone can go out and buy or rent a Lady Gaga costume, and if I had a dollar for every Chewbacca suit I’ve seen, I’d be a rich man. How many tuna fish costumes do you come across? Sometimes the concept is more important than the actual costume. Once, my buddy Bob dressed up as the Pope, put a noose around his neck, and billed his costume as “Pope on a Rope.” One girlfriend I knew came to our Halloween party dressed as a whale stuck in a block of ice. She cut a big hole in a sheet of Styrofoam for ice. Genius! Another friend filled up a clear trash bag with dead leaves, made a giant “Salada” sign, taped some cloths line to it and to herself and came as a giant tea bag. Sadly, Halloween is becoming a big retail money maker, and therein lies the death of creativity. Come September, even the dollar store is a sea of orange and black plastic and crepe. I read somewhere that Halloween greeting cards are now very popular. I think it is sacrilege to buy a tube of fake blood and some fake fangs and “phone in” your costume. Go big or go home.

These days, the part I like best about Halloween is the scary movies. I can catch up on all the horror flicks I have not yet seen, or have not seen in a long time. Just watched or recorded The Ring, Sinister Movie, Evil Dead, Hostel (yikes!), and several others. One thing I can say about today’s scary movies – they don’t leave much to the imagination. Still, I think guys like Lugosi, Cheney, and Price had a corner on the creepy market. One final note about Halloween. I realize that, in this increasingly dangerous world, parents must be vigilant in protecting their young kids from malevolent treat-givers, but I saw something on the news the other night that made me bristle. Instead of treats, one woman in Toronto was handing out letters to the parents of overweight children reprimanding them for allowing their kids to eat candy. There’s one in every crowd! While child obesity is a growing problem in some parts of the world, come on lady, do you need to spoil Halloween? Pelt that self-righteous baby-on-boarder with candy korn and give her thirty lashes with shoestring licorice. Save your buzz kill for Christmas like the rest of us!

11/4/13 The storm has passed, and now it’s just very cold (25F last night). We had some trees down on the property and were without power for a few hours, but had no major damage. I hate to admit it, but perhaps boating season is over. Time to dust off my elf costume.     

-        Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report - 10/28/13

R.I.P.

The Friday before last I attended this month’s Burk’s Falls Coffee House series. Having missed the last three sessions I wanted to see what was brewing on the local talent scene. Turns out, quite a lot. The musical talent was pretty good this month, and as a special treat, the last show featured the youngest performer I have yet to see on that stage. Singing I believe a Shania Twain song, the little girl was about 4 years old. She nailed it. One guy did a karaoke set, which I’ve also never seen at one of these open stages, and all his music and lyrics were in a karaoke program on his laptop. He had a pretty good voice, but while he was singing one of my (only) favorite Elvis tunes, Suspicious Minds, there was a technical glitch – something to do with a connection on his computer – and it caused his musical accompaniment to go haywire. The poor guy was up on the stage twisting in the wind. At one point he was trying to sing almost a cappella and it wasn’t pretty, especially considering he was supposed to be singing a rather complicated harmony to his own muffled voice. The sound man eventually fixed the problem, but the guy was so flustered by that point that he never really regained his groove. It was a shame, I thought he was pretty entertaining. Having experienced technical problems on stage myself, I know how humiliating and off-putting sound problems can be.

One of the performers that night was a professional musician named Sean Cotton, who lives in Burk’s Falls and who hosts an open mic in nearby Huntsville every Wednesday night. He bills his open mic as an “acoustic karaoke,” which means he will accompany singers on the guitar, but he does not provide the lyrics with the bouncing ball (or whatever those karaoke machines do). He also welcomes anyone who wishes to perform solo, or with his accompaniment. He had a long list of songs he can play and it amazes me what some of these open mic hosts will do to entertain. Oftentimes, bar audiences are unreceptive and to get their attention takes a bit of doing. Hosts must be diplomatic, and delicately negotiate the inebriated egos of their would-be performers. It is not a gig most professional musicians would choose to do and I’ve experienced some abysmal hosts. Sean was pretty good, and he can play anything from Marvin Gaye’s Let’s Get It On to Blow at High Dough by The Tragically Hip. His rhythm section sounded like a drum machine but in fact was simply his boot tapping his guitar case, to which he had taped a tambourine. It was low tech for sure, but it sounded pretty good. Long ago, before I wallpapered my house with rejection notices, I had it in my mind that I would make my living “doing what I love,” playing music for the masses. That was also before I realized that the seventeen year old parking lot attendant in our office building had more talent in his pinky finger than I would ever have. I am constantly amazed by the number of talented musicians and songwriters out there who have hit the wall, pounding the pavement to make a living in music.

 If the past week is any indication, this might be a harsh winter. It has snowed up here for the past three nights, and while none of it stuck, it may be portents of bad weather to come. Seems to me the weather used to be nicer in October. Up here it’s hit or miss, because on our little lake, we often miss the lake effect streamers that blow off Georgian Bay. Every so often those squalls shift a little to the north and then we’re in trouble. My dock is still down and I’m waiting for the dock guy to come and fix a worm gear before I hoist it up. One year, shortly after we had the retractable dock put in, we were held up in Toronto because my father-in-law had contracted c-difficile and ended up in the hospital for a month. That year the weather turned bitter cold practically overnight, and before we could get home to lift up the dock, the lake froze solid. We had to have one of the guys building our house chain saw it free so we could lift it out. Nature can be a mother. 

We had another flying squirrel in the house the other day, and we found this out because the alarm company called us 4:30 AM to tell us the little bastard had tripped one of our motion sensors. Jasper and I finally got him (or her), but it wasn’t easy. A moment of silence for Lou Reed, legendary singer songwriter and founding member of the seminal rock band Velvet Underground, who passed away this weekend at 71. A lot of people probably remember Reed for his song Walk on the Wild Side, but when I think of him I am reminded of my six month university stay in Ireland back in ‘77. One particularly debauched evening, while we were drinking and smoking up a storm, and playing music at the Irish home in which I was living, I remember listening to a live Lou Reed album. That was the first time I ever got his music, and I remember how cool it was hearing him break into a live version of “Sweet Jane.” That moment, and the events which ensued, were my inspiration to write one of my all-time favorite songs. So thanks Lou, count me among the countless songwriters who have been influenced by your music.

 

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report - 10/21/13

It’s almost World Series time again and, as always, I don’t care. As any of you who know me can attest, I do not enjoy the game of baseball. An avid Blue Jays fan, my mother-in-law assures me this means I am un-American. I realize that my aversion to baseball places me in a very small minority of sports fans, and I wear my shame proudly. I simply have never been able to embrace the game of baseball, or football for that matter, and I find them excruciatingly boring to watch. The aversion to football may be more a result of following the Buffalo Bills for about thirty five years. I admit any live sports event is more exciting to watch in person, but give me hockey any day. I heard a statistic on the news the other night which made me chuckle, and the general fact applies to both baseball and football. Basically it stated that in the average 3 hour baseball game there are less than 15 minutes of actual playing, and the rest of the game is close-ups of guys in the dugout, spitting out tobacco, or managers looking worried, or discussions on the mound about whether to yank the pitcher, or some other non-action nonsense. Shauna assures me that I don’t like baseball because I don’t understand the intricacies of the game. That’s probably true, and perhaps if I was more in tune with why this or that pitch should have been a curveball, I’d be more into the game. Nevertheless, I go back to that troubling statistic: fifteen minutes. That’s a lot of waiting around for something exciting to happen. Give me hockey any day. Even if it’s a lousy game, there is a lot of action, the players move around for at least 60 minutes per game, and there is likely to be at least some blood. I’ll likely watch the last game of the World Series, but will probably only pay attention to the last few innings.

The one time I actually got somewhat excited about a baseball game was during a World Series, back in 1993. I was in a sports bar watching the game with my future wife and avid Jays fan Shauna, and I saw Joe Carter knock in the legendary winning home run to win the Blue Jays the World Series. That was fun to see. The city of Toronto exploded in fandamonium for the next 24 hours and it was something I had never before experienced. I was in downtown Toronto on Yonge Street that night along with one hundred thousand Blue Jays fans and it was quite a celebration. At one point I actually feared for my life, not because anyone was violent, but because I found myself in a crowd surge and was pushed up against a car with nowhere to go. Toronto fans are very enthusiastic. I also attended one of those Yonge Street fan parties when the Leafs uncharacteristically made it to (I believe) the semi-finals, over a decade ago. I cannot imagine what the city would do if they became Stanley Cup contenders. They may be knocking on the door soon, because they looked strangely competitive at the end on last year’s abbreviated season. That is something Leafs fans have not seen in a long time.

Big earthquake in the Philippines. Typhoon Wipha hits Japan, the worst one in ten years. They recovered that Chelyabinsk meteorite from a lake in Russia - the one that landed recently and from which the shock wave injured about 1600 people. All those injuries were caused by a chunk of rock that is about the size of a coffee table. This leads me to wonder, what happens if a really big one hits? While the odds are low, it often strikes me as amusing and ironic that human beings assume it will be a manmade disaster that takes out planet earth, when in fact it might be something uncontrollable, like a seismic catastrophe, or a big meteorite, or a cyclical shift in our climate. Certainly, we can and probably should rethink poisoning our water supply by fracking, or invent some more earth friendly solutions to ozone-depleting energy production, but come on, we are one cosmic burp away from annihilation. Won’t all those pandas, and rhinos, and snow leopards, and Appalacian snail darters be laughing in heaven when the big one sucker punches mankind. It’s the cosmic Darwin Award waiting to be presented. And speaking of the laws of natural selection …

Stateside, financial crisis has been averted, that is until February. Everyone in Washington has agreed not to agree and they have kicked the can down the street a few blocks, raising the debt ceiling to some newly ridiculous level. We live to procrastinate another day. Did any of you catch the 60 Minutes segment last night, dealing with the onerous issue of campaign finance reform in the U.S. government. I leave you with my righteous indignation – in what universe is it ok for elected officials to abide by a set of rules that would be considered criminal behavior in the civilian sector? I guess none of this will matter when the cosmic hammer comes down. I hope it happens during a baseball game.

Go Leafs.

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 10/14/13

It’s that time of year again, when the boats go in for storage, the docks come out, and the fallen leaves make our front lawn look like a Van Gogh painting. It is also the time that I desperately scramble to get in as much warm weather toy time as possible. Before we know it winter will descend upon us in a tsunami of snow, and all toy usage will require a parka and snowmobile pants. Friday, about an hour before dusk, I got a call from my friend the plumber, who wanted to return a CD I’d lent him. I told him I’d run over to his place to pick it up because it was a nice, warm evening, and I thought I’d get some use out of the ATV. We live on a system of three lakes, and he lives on the southern end of the furthest lake south, about a fifteen minute ride from here. I figured I’d be down and back before sun down. The ride down was great, zooming down the twisting back roads a little too fast, with the spectacular pink dusk sky to light my way.

When I got to his place, he started talking about an old tractor he’d just fixed and used to start clearing a road on his land. People up here get very excited about their farm equipment. Would I like to see what he cleared? Sure I said, if it won’t take too long. I waited five minutes while he finished stacking his wood, then he hopped on his ATV and said “follow me.” This guy has 140 acres of land, and where he took me was to the opposite end of his property. We looked at the land he’d cleared, and I was duly impressed, but noticed it was starting to get dark. I said I’d like to see more, but perhaps in the light of day, so we walked back to our bikes to head back. Then, he couldn’t get his ATV started, and it took a few minutes for him to determine that he was out of gas. I drove him the mile or so back to his home on my ATV and he said he’d take care of his ATV later. Ever my mentor in bluegrass music (we was a good banjo picker himself before he had a stroke) he wanted to loan me a CD to take home with me. By the time I left his place, it was now dark, and cold. Remember, this is rural Ontario, and there aren’t a lot of streetlights where he lives. The ride home was a little uncomfortable, because all of those dirt roads I’d travelled on the way down were not so much fun to travel in the dark. I barely missed two deer crossing the road, and the lights on my ATV only lit up about twenty feet in front of me. Although my night vision is still pretty good, for the same reason I never liked riding my motorcycle at night, I didn’t enjoy driving the ATV in the dark. Something about open air riding in the dark makes me feel more vulnerable. Besides, if anything goes wrong, there I am out in the middle of nowhere, in the dark, with dodgy cell service. Let’s just say the ride home took a little longer than the ride out. 

 Back when I was in my late twenties, I bought a 1967 Triumph Spitfire off a frat brother in college. This was hardly a classic – I think I paid $400 for it- and when the frat brother bought it, it was painted red. Turned out that red was watercolor paint, and when he took it through a car wash, it came out green. I really enjoyed that little bucket of bolts, and spent the next two years fixing it up, mostly on my own. This is something I heartily recommend doing, once. I had just rebuilt the motor and the car was running great. The next item on my repair list was the suspension, but one fateful night, before I had a chance to fix the suspension, I flipped the car on a country road. Operator error. I was tooling down a particularly twisty road near our summer place in Ft Erie, and I took a turn too quickly. I lost control, went up an embankment, and the car flipped over on me. People seemed impressed (by my lack of driving skills) when I tell them I flipped my Spitfire, probably assuming that this was a high speed crash. In fact, I was probably going 35 MPH when the crash occurred, and had it been properly suspended, the car might have been more forgiving of my incompetence. Luckily the windshield acted as a roll bar and I was able to kick out the broken windshield and escape. I could have been trapped very uncomfortably until someone happened by. This all occurred around 2AM and this was not a well-travelled road. I can still remember hearing the sound of car giving one last sigh as it expired, and I remember the sound of one hub cab rolling down that deserted country road. Maybe this is why I don’t like open air rides at night.

Well it’s been more than a week now and the government shutdown over Obamacare is still going strong. Did anyone see The Daily Show early last week? Clearly, Jon Stewart is no friend of the Republican Party, and he made an amusing point. He basically said to the elephants, look, if you think this health care plan is a big enough threat to the country that it is worth shutting down the government, then own up to that conviction. “Don’t fart and point at the dog.” I love that. Once again partisan politics paralyzes the U.S. government, and whether you are a donkey or an elephant, you are probably in agreement that this is shameful behavior on the part of the jokers we elected to lead us. Who is really failing to negotiate? We all think we know, but are not both sides guilty of playing the spin/blame game?  Regardless, today is a good day, and I am truly thankful for my freedom, for my health, for my beautiful wife, and for all the good fortune I have known these many years. Happy Canadian Thanksgiving !   -Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 10/7/13

Shauna and I drove down to Toronto last Wednesday for a concert at Massey Hall, and also to look in on her mom. As much as her mom was probably relieved to see us leave her house after we’d been there for two and one half months, I imagine it was also difficult for her to be there, absent the man with whom she had spent the past 68 years. With some protest, she accepted our strong advice that she should retain the 24-7 caregivers we had hired for Syd. Clearly she should not be alone, and we convinced her, at least for the time being, that even if she did not need them right away, she might need them soon. They have been trusted and loyal employees, and those are not so easy to find these days. As I have learned from experience, it is better to be proactive about such things. Whether or not Mom Taylor decides to stay in that house will of course be her decision. By my logic, everything has been repaired or replaced in the past ten years, including the electrical, the major appliances, the plumbing, and the roof. The basement is again dry, which took some doing.  Why not remain in the familiar surroundings of one’s own home? That was what my parents wanted, and what I think I will want as well, but perhaps the memories will be overwhelming for her.  

As Shauna and I drove back up north after the concert, we stopped for gas somewhere around Orillia, and Shauna pointed out an unusual vending machine at the gas station. There right outside the door to the convenience store was a live bait vending machine. While I see live bait advertised all over the Great White North, I was not aware that one can buy it 24-7 from a vending machine. I was so amused I took a picture of it.

Tomorrow, with any luck, I will turn 58, and as the Grateful Dead put it so eloquently, what a long, strange trip it’s been (so far). I remember at the time thinking to myself that 40 was not such a traumatic event, though everyone told me it would be. I saw a photo recently taken of me on my 40^th birthday. In it I was grinning like a fool and making a 4-0 gesture with my hands as Shauna and I cruised down the Magnetawan River in her father’s boat. I remember the chocolate birthday cake Shauna presented to me that night, with a colorful racing motorboat design on top. Then Poof! The candles go out, eighteen years blow by, and I find myself wondering in clichés … where did the time go, it seems like only yesterday; how did I get this old? A little creakier, perhaps a bit wiser (but probably not), I have in the past few years become a little more conscious of my mortality. When I get on a tall ladder to wash the windows, or I carry a heavy load of wood from the woodpile, or I pull up the dock for the winter, I wonder to myself, how much longer will I be able to do these things without help? If the codgers up here are any indication, I’ve got another eighteen years at least. Harvey, the guy who plows our driveway in the winter, and whose grandson now works for us, is still going strong, and he’s almost 80. Every winter, in the worst kind of weather, we count on Harvey to come rumbling down our driveway, usually at night, with his big plow rig, accompanied in his heated cab by his hound. Guys like Harvey put “cidiots” like me to shame. I love that derogatory expression, used by the locals to describe a particularly onerous breed of big city jerks who come up on to cottage country on the weekends and spread their unique brand of anxiety and stress.

Final notes. A substantial amount of snow fell on South Dakota last weekend (really, already?), a big typhoon is pummeling southeast China, and it rains cats and dogs up here in the Great White North. Video of the week award goes to the footage of that Indy crash in Houston yesterday which sent racer Dario Franchitti to the hospital. I can’t believe Franchitti survived relatively unscathed. I’d like to see that new movie Rush about Formula 1 racer Niki Lauda. I count myself among the posers who have at one point in their lives been intoxicated by the thrill of speed, but these days, maybe because I am now so freakin’ old, I don’t go quite as fast as I once did. I watched a motorcycle race the other day, and for me that is one crazy sport. UN weapons inspectors have begun to destroy Syria’s cache of chemical weapons. Violence has once again erupted in Cairo, just as two Canadians, detained without charge, were about to be released.

For my birthday this year I think I’d like some Ibuprofin and perhaps a case of Pepto Bismol.

 

“Lately I’ve been thinking that my time’s passing faster, and I feel some sense of dire urgency/ In a month or so I’ll usher in my fifty-first year and I’m nowhere near where I thought I should be/ Over halfway through my life with nothing much to show, and outside, the wind begins to blow …”

 

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 9/30/13

We have been back up north for a little over a week now, and re-entering this house was a bit like opening up a short term time capsule. It is as if summer was put on hold July 6th, and everything froze. We left here in a hurry on that day and short of throwing out some leftovers from the fridge and cleaning up a bit, we did not really close up properly before we left. There is a bathing suit still hung over the post on our bed to dry, plastic flower containers still litter the property, bags of peat moss are stacked on the porch. There is a can of stain lying near the front door, because I had been in the middle of staining some of the porch furniture. I drove the ATV into Burk’s Falls the other day just in time to see what was likely the peak of Fall colors on that route. So much about the past two months is out of focus, a flash of time.

Back in 2001 when Jordan passed away, I made a makeshift flagpole out of a narrow pine, and from the dock we flew a flag of the planet earth at half mast. Jordan had a company called Planet Earth Productions , and the flag was something we found while we were cleaning out his apartment in Florida. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen anyone else flying such a flag, much less at half mast, from a dead tree, but we did. Because he was a veteran, Syd had a Canadian flag draped over his casket, which was presented to the family after the service. A few days ago, I bought a proper flagpole and installed it on our dock, and we raised that flag to half mast to commemorate Syd. I do not know if we were even supposed to use that flag, or what the proper protocol is for flying it at half mast, but that’s what we did. As we did with Shauna’s brother we will scatter a little of Syd’s hair on the lake and recite The Mourner’s Kaddish. This property was his favorite place in the world to be, it is only fitting that a little of his DNA should remain here. I suppose everyone has their own little ceremony for their departed.

For the past week we have been receiving correspondences from people from all over, expressing their condolences and talking about what a good man my father-in-law was, and what happy memories they have of him. Some were patients, some were old friends who knew him from his childhood days. A lot of people have paid their respects. Shauna was worried that, as her family shrinks, it will be forgotten, and I remember raising that existential question when my father passed away four years ago. To me, my dad was an exceptional man, and I think a lot of other people felt the same way, but who would remember him in 20 years? He did not invent a cure for polio, he did not end the Cold War, there are no monuments to his greatness. The same is true of many other good people, destined to be forgotten as generations pass; but that is how it has always been. Unless some gifted author choses to tell their story, many great people are forgotten after they die. When Jill and I went to the Forest Lawn mausoleum in Buffalo to inter my dad’s ashes, we were handed a blue cardboard box to place in the crypt. I remember thinking to myself that we should have bought a fancy urn, but thinking about it, a cardboard box was exactly what my father would have wanted. No fuss. For the same reason he chose to be cremated, not something sanctioned by the Jewish religion, he would have eschewed all ceremony and unnecessary expense. Why pay for the fancy urn when it will be placed behind a stone and never seen by anyone?

I had a stormy relationship with my dad in my early teens, but he and I worked it out, and I grew to love and respect him very much. The same is true of my mom, although I don’t think I gave her as hard a time. Now that they are gone, I feel their life lessons indelibly burned into my soul. Who they were is in me now, and how I choose to lead my life from hereon in is the legacy that will either honor their memory or sentence me and my family to the anonymity I fear. The same is true for any family member or friend I have loved and respected and who is no longer here. How do I best honor the dead; certainly not by grieving incessantly? Whether I believe in the afterlife, or re-incarnation, or that nothing at all happens after we die, it is my life with which I am concerned. Do I matter, can I make things better, have I done more in my life to make my parents proud than ashamed; have I known love; more important, have I given love? I feel the influence of all these departed, and I hope I do not disappoint them.


“I am a shadow on the coat tails of fame, you’ve seen the face but don’t know the name/ I guess in some respects we’re all the same, when we play the imposter’s game …”

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report - 9/23/13

 

The service for Shauna’s dad was last Monday, and given the short notice I was impressed with the attendance. The fact that he died on the Eve of Yom Kippur is I understand considered to be a great honor in the Jewish religion. I found it somewhat amusing that he passed at 11PM, because Syd always stayed up to watch the 11 o’clock news on CTV. The service was beautiful and meaningful. His wife Ethel spoke first, telling the story of their 73 year love affair, and of their 68 years of marriage. Shauna then got up and spoke. She read a poem about a nickname that her dad had picked for himself in jest over 50 years ago. When she asked, he told Shauna to call him her “Handsome, rich, clever daddy with the big brown eyes.” The eulogies were emotional and heartfelt. Then I got up and said something. To follow is my attempt to honor this man I grew to love over 20 years …
 

My Eulogy for Dr. Sydney Taylor - 9/16/13

 I have much to say and little time to say it, so instead of trying to put my many feelings about Syd Taylor into words, I’m going to talk about photographs.

 The last two months have been extremely challenging for the Taylor family, as we struggled to make Dad Taylor as comfortable as possible, knowing that his demise was imminent. One day last week, after we drove home from a particularly long day, I opened up my laptop and, as I often do for diversion, I started looking through old family photographs. I have A LOT of old family photographs from both sides of my family. Many of the Taylor photos show happier times up north at the old cottage in Katrine. Fishing was one of the things Syd loved to do up there. He was an excellent fisherman, probably one of the best on our lake, and he almost always came home with a string of presentable fish. In one of my favorite photos of Syd – he was a young man probably in his early thirties – he is standing next to his father Ike, and Ike is proudly holding a string of big fish, with a huge grin on his face. Next to him is Sydney, with an embarrassed smile on his face, holding up one of the puniest fish he would ever dream of keeping. You know Syd caught those big fish. The loving son, with a great sense of humor.

 One picture speaks a thousand words…

I paged through the volumes of photo files, through the old holiday pictures of the Taylors, at the dinner table, at family gatherings, during holidays, at the cottage, at bar mitzvahs and weddings, etc., and I was for a moment distracted from my current distress over Syd’s declining condition. I was instead reminded of a man who had lived a long, happy, and mostly healthy life, who loved nothing more than to excel at his chosen profession, to spend time with his family, to travel, to eat good food, to fish, and to laugh and joke. You could see in his face how proud he was of his family, how much he adored his children and his wife. That kind of love is not hard to spot. I particularly love one picture of Dad with Shauna perched on his lap grinning – she must have been about two or three -- and she was looking particularly adorable. In that photo I see the protective, nurturing man I came to know so well. He loved Dean Jordan, Shauna, and he loved me. The loving, protective father.

One picture speaks a thousand words.

 As I was paging through the family photos I came across one in particular that made me chuckle and then I teared up. It was dated September 17^th 2010, almost three years ago to the day, and it is of a day I remember very well. Syd and Ethel were up visiting us in Katrine. In large part due to their generosity, Shauna and I built as our primary residence a beautiful log home on the site of the old cottage, and they were visiting in the Fall. Syd was still ambulatory but was beginning to have difficulty walking. We knew he missed fishing, and we were not sure how many more chances he was going to have to fish, so I suggested we go out. Of course that meant driving fifteen miles away to find the minnow bait he required. We then rushed home to get it in the lake before the minnows died. Then, because he wanted to troll, we decided to take the little dingy. As he was stepping into the boat he slipped and got wet enough that he needed to change into dry clothes. Finally, after some difficulty, I got him into the boat, and as I was getting ready to start the motor, I heard a crash, to see that he had lost his balance and fallen backwards off the seat. In so doing, he had managed to get a fishing hook caught in his chin. Now he’s bleeding, and as I got him back on the seat, he looked at me with a sheepish grin as if to say, maybe this wasn’t such a good idea … wherein I gave him the Jewish pep talk: “look you SOB, I didn’t just drive all that way to Magnetawan, then race back here, then wait for you to change your clothes, then struggle to get you in the boat, just so you could wimp out on me etc. Here’s some Kleenex now cowboy up, we’re going out!

 Long story short we did go out, and Shauna photographed us, Syd all bundled up in a winter coat, both of us grinning as we trolled around the lake. We didn’t catch anything that afternoon, but we watched a beautiful fall sun set together, and we joked and enjoyed our putt around the lake. My memory is of a man who despite the ever increasing limitations of old age, was willing to embrace life, with a smile on his face and a light- hearted insult for his beloved son-in-law. One picture speaks a thousand words.

 I spent many, many happy times with Dad Taylor over the twenty years I grew to know him, and what I will always remember is how completely he embraced me as one of the family, and treated me like his own son. And I treated him like a father. Whether it was closing up the cottage, or attending a Leafs game together, or just sitting around the dinner table laughing, I felt that profound and indescribable sense of family and I loved him, and I love Mom Taylor, more than they will ever know … He was a kind, gentle, intelligent, wonderful man – the best dentist I have ever had -- and an inspiring role model for his love and dedication to his adoring family.

 I was blessed to have known this good man, and I expect that he is now reunited with the departed family members he so cherished, now that he has been released from this world. Thank you Dad, it was an honor.

 That was my eulogy.

One final note. There was a baby monitor video camera in the Taylor’s bedroom, pointed at their ensuite bathroom. The caregivers used the wireless monitor to keep an eye on Syd when they left the room, and while Syd was in the hospital, and Shauna had the monitor turned on in our bedroom. Shortly after Syd passed away, the night she was writing her eulogy, Shauna looked in the monitor to see three, clear night vision apparitions on the screen. One was Syd, dancing around joyously, clearly happy and fully ambulatory, no longer a prisoner of his body. To his right was his son Jordan, grinning and pointing to his dad, as if to say “I told you there was an afterlife!”, and behind the two of them, with his head sticking out between them, a hand on both their shoulders, was Syd’s father Ike, grinning proudly. All of them looked younger, and very happy. I suppose a skeptic would say this was a wishful hallucination, but Shauna has many times before astounded me with her prescience. I prefer to believe what she saw was how it really is, and that the suffering we endure on earth is but a whistle stop on a very long journey. So far it has been an interesting one.

 

“Some people say they saw you, and you were dancing in the clouds/ Who knows where the illusion ends when the spirit cries out loud” 

                                    - excerpt from “Jordan”

 

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED