Planet Pretty – Dear Sheila, Day 1
Posted on September 14, 2014 Leave a Comment
I’ve been wrestling with writer’s block for a couple of weeks. So, when the other day I heard a woman mention that she wrote a letter to God every morning, it struck me as a great way to start my day – and a useful tool to push through this wrtiing plateau. So, here goes…
Dear Sheila,
I’m concerned about the planet. All the unrest in the world leaves me feeling, at times, that the world is coming to an end – or we’re at a major crossroad in human history. Please take care of us and guide us as we pass through these challenges.
Also, I’ve been increasingly aware of beauty amidst all the chaos. The September Eleventh anniversary, for example, filled me with sadness. But, as I watched the blue memorial beams of light shooting up to heaven, I was struck with a sense of awe. Right there amidst the destruction, death and heart wrenching sadness, beauty thrives. The waterfall memorial and the new Freedom Tower are more beauty that’s emerged from that ugly place. It’s such a complicated world – this world of yours. I don’t think I’ll ever understand it fully.
But, I’m so grateful to be alive at this time in history. Our future seems bright. Here on Planet Pretty, beauty and sadness can co-habitate, and that’s awesome, in the truest sense of the word.
Thanks for life, Sheila.
* …and voila, I’m writing again!
Ode to Joy – Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony
Posted on September 3, 2014 Leave a Comment
The Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Op. 125 (sometimes known simply as “the Choral”), is the final complete symphony of Ludwig van Beethoven (1770–1827). Completed in 1824, the symphony is one of the best-known works of the repertoire of classical music. Among critics, it is almost universally considered to be among Beethoven’s greatest works, and is considered by some to be the greatest piece of music ever written.
The symphony was the first example of a major composer using voices in a symphony (thus making it a choral symphony). The words are sung during the final movement by four vocal soloists and a chorus. They were taken from the “Ode to Joy”, a poem written by Friedrich Schiller in 1785 and revised in 1803, with additions made by Beethoven himself. Today, it stands as one of the most played symphonies in the world.
The poem that inspired it is below.
Oh friends, not these sounds!
Let us instead strike up more pleasing
and more joyful ones!
Joy!
Joy, beautiful spark of divinity,
Daughter from Elysium,
We enter, burning with fervour,
heavenly being, your sanctuary!
Your magic brings together
what custom has sternly divided.
All men shall become brothers,
wherever your gentle wings hover.
Whoever has been lucky enough
to become a friend to a friend,
Whoever has found a beloved wife,
let him join our songs of praise!
Yes, and anyone who can call one soul
his own on this earth!
Any who cannot, let them slink away
from this gathering in tears!
Every creature drinks in joy
at nature’s breast;
Good and Bad alike
follow her trail of roses.
She gives us kisses and wine,
a true friend, even in death;
Even the worm was given desire,
and the cherub stands before God.
Gladly, just as His suns hurtle
through the glorious universe,
So you, brothers, should run your course,
joyfully, like a conquering hero.
Be embraced, you millions!
This kiss is for the whole world!
Brothers, above the canopy of stars
must dwell a loving father.
Do you bow down before Him, you millions?
Do you sense your Creator, o world?
Seek Him above the canopy of stars!
He must dwell beyond the stars.
Here’s a taste of Betthoven’s genius.
I need your help
Posted on September 1, 2014 Leave a Comment
I have some unfinished business and I’m launching a new one. When I left my job about a year ago, I had two goals: 1 – write my first book. 2 – finish the NYC Marathon in under 4 hours. Well, I accomplished one of the goals – I wrote and published Stonewall to Obama. But, on November 3, 2013 I finished the NYC Marathon in 4 hours and 4 minutes. I missed my goal by 4 whole minutes – an eternity in marathon time.
I’m not one to let goals go unfinished and I never accept failure. So, I set out to run the marathon again in 2014. The problem was I missed getting a number in the race lottery so, I turned my attention to finding a philanthropic group that I could run with. I’ve partnered with LifeBeats, Music Fights AIDS to raise money to support those living with HIV and AIDS.
This is where it gets interesting and personal. You see, I’ve been living with HIV for over 25 years and I watched two boyfriends and countless friends die of AIDS in the eighties and nineties. Miraculously, and with the help of modern medicine, I’m still alive. The fight is not over though. We still need to find a cure and I sure hope I’m alive to see that day. But, in the meantime, we need to raise some money to help those still living with the disease, educate a new generation, stop the spread of the disease and finally end this disease for good. We will find a cure!
That’s where the new business part meets my unfinished business. When I left the corporate world, I also wanted to focus my energies in a philanthropic direction. Running the NYC Marathon with LifeBeats is allowing me another chance at a sub 4 hour finish while I raise money for a cause close to my heart.
There are three ways you can help me support LifeBeats.
1. Donate directly to LifeBeats via my fundraising page here.
2. Buy my book Stobewall to Obama for $4.99 and I’ll contribute $1 to Life Beats from every book sale from now untill Nov 2nd, race day. Buy here.
3. Buy the Stonewall to Obama T-Shirt for $44.00 and I’ll contribute $5 to LifeBeats from every T-Shirt sale from now until Nov 2nd, race day. Buy here.
Please join me this fall as I meet several of my goals and race with LifeBeats towards the finish line. The cure is so close. We can end AIDS. Thanks for your support.
The September Issue
Posted on August 19, 2014 Leave a Comment
Vogue, September 1906. Illustration by Stuart Campbell.
I’m knee deep in research for my new book, Compulsive Consumption. It explores the events leading to the demise of the Gilded Age, including the murder of Stanford White, the sinking of the sister ships Titanic and Lusitania, WWI, the implementation of income tax and the stock market crash of 1929.
They say history doesn’t repeat itself, but it does rhyme – and as we sit on the precipice of WWIII it’s sounding and looking a lot like deja vu. It seems we’re trudging a similiar path to the one our ancestors walked a century ago.
I was honored, I guess that’s what you’d call it, to witness the collapse of the World Trade Center in 2001. I also got a front row seat to watch the Freedom Tower rise to completion as the company I worked for, Incisive Media, moved into its new offices at 120 Broadway in 2008, just as the structural beams began to rise from Ground Zero.
Now, as Conde Nast prepares for its move downtown, as the premier tenant at One World Trade, I thought it would be a good time to review the 2007 documentary, The September Issue. The film documents the making of the largest issue of Vogue in history – 644 glorious pages. It’s also loaded with flip phones, and push pin layout walls and paper, paper, paper. The film made a star of the best kept secret in the fashion world, Grace Coddington. It’s worth watching for anyone interested in the demise of print media.
Of course, the 2014 September Vogue is about 2 inches thinner than its 2007 sister. That’s the point here! We’re all glued to our iphones, ipads and soon to be iwatches as an industry spirals downward in decline and the world falters toward a world war. Look up people. Take your loved ones by the hand and rejoice. We’re alive at the end of one age and the dawning of another. Can’t you feel the ground shifting under your feet. Wake up, it’s digital deja vu.
A little more on the shifting ground in downtown Manhattan from another casualty of the digital age – NYTIMES
Behind every great lawyer there’s a great legal team
Posted on August 18, 2014 Leave a Comment
For a country lawyer to make it to the US Supreme Court, it takes an amazing legal team – and behind every great man there’s a great woman. The Hon William E. J. Connor was blessed with several great women to support him as he climbed to the highest court in the land. He had a great mother, wife and three amazing daughters. But, the woman that was the backbone of his legal career was his legal secretary, Mae Millman.
Aunt Mae was always present in our lives, if only from a distance. Every Christmas under the tree at 345 Allen Street we would find an extra special gift from Aunt Mae. When we were small it was usually something from FAO Schwartz in New York City. As we got older, the toys turned into crisp twenty dollar bills. By the time we’d graduated from high school, the envelopes were stuffed with freshly minted Benjamins…
More…
The Ionic Column
Posted on August 17, 2014 Leave a Comment
The story of 345 Allen Street can not be told without mention of a sister building located at 441 East Allen Street. Its the ionic columns that hold the secrets of greatness. Ionic is one of three column styles developed in ancient Greece. More slender and more ornate than the earlier Doric style, an Ionic column has scroll-shaped ornaments on the capital, or top. The ionic column is a classic architectural support used to convey grandeur, power and strength. Ionic columns have been used to display dominance at the Jefferson Memorial, Federal Hall, New York Stock Exchange, US Supreme Court Building and, of course, the White House. The ionic column was a favorite of McKim, Mead and White.
But the story of the ionic columns at 441 East Allen Street is unique…
Olana
Posted on August 15, 2014 Leave a Comment
Olana was the 19th century home, studio and designed landscape of Hudson River School artist Frederic Edwin Church (1826-1900), his wife Isabel and their four children. The 250 acre historic estate features an elaborately stenciled, Persian-inspired mansion filled with original sketches, studies and paintings by one of the mid-19th century’s most famous artists. A diverse decorative arts collection includes objects from around the world. Five miles of carriage drives, many of which are now pedestrian-use only, traverse a property developed in much the way Church created his canvasses, with strategically revealed vistas of one of the most strikingly beautiful places in the Hudson Valley. –
See more here…
A Typical Soldier’s Death
Posted on August 14, 2014 Leave a Comment
“Canadian Chaplain Tells of Heroic End of Malcolm Gifford, Jr.
Hudson, Jan. 26, 1918 – It was in the terrific fighting for the possession of Passchendaele in a recent great British offensive that Malcolm Gifford, Jr., of this city, was killed, according to information received here by his father from the Rev. George C. Taylor, chaplain of the Thirty-sixth Battery, Canadian Artillery. The young man’s death was previously reported.”
The chaplain, in his letter, stated that Gifford fell after twenty days’ fighting at the utmost point then gained in the British advance.
“To die in such a struggle was to crown a life with glory,” the chaplain wrote. “It has been said that the Victoria Cross should have been given to every man who took part in it. The work had been tried again and again by others but, when all had failed, our boys brushed aside ‘impossibility’ and carried all before them. Day after day, no German fire could divert them from their guns. Your brave boy and another fell together. It was a typical soldier’s death.”
George Orwell got it wrong
Posted on August 12, 2014 Leave a Comment
It was 1979 and it was the spring semester of my sophmore year in high school. At the urging of my father, I’d elected to take Advanced Literature in an effort to raise my SAT scores to get into a top college. Mrs. Miller was the the fiftyish teacher who, at the time, seemed ancient to me. What could this relic from the past possibly teach me that I didn’t already know? “You boys and girls are the cream of the crop. You are the brightest, most talented and smartest students of your graduating class. I am here to enlighten you on the magic of the written word.” Mrs. Miller droned on…. “Let’s begin with George Orwell’s 1984,” she said as she handed out freshly minted paperback copies of Orwell’s classic tome. To this high school sophmore 1984 seemed like light years away.
Obscure but getting hotter
Posted on August 11, 2014 Leave a Comment
In 1914 Franklin Delano Roosevelt was still an obscure figure. Sure, he was a fifth cousin of the US president Teddy Roosevelt. He had all the priviledge of an aristocratic childhood in the Hudson Valley – wealth, education, charm and social grace. But, as Assistant Secretary of the Navy, he was hardly a player on the world stage. All that would change with WWI.
Culver McCall 