tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-84586725163848801822023-07-17T23:27:46.379-07:00 The RuminatorA few more words from David Kalish, a writer of short stories, plays, and the new novel, The Opposite of Everything.David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.comBlogger49125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-90111542808894592082015-07-17T06:45:00.002-07:002015-07-17T06:51:40.810-07:00What I Have in Common with Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad and Donald Trump<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; font-family: helvetica, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21.466667175293px;">Just a humble Times Union blogger, I'm honored to see my blog post "<a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/my-top-ten-reasons-for-hating-top-ten-lists/1492/" target="_blank">Top Ten Lists</a>" featured at the top of the Op-Ed section of today's newspaper. But is the Times Union trying to send me a message? Today I shared space alongside Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad; a month ago I was photo buddies with</span><span style="background-color: white; clear: right; color: #141823; display: inline !important; font-family: helvetica, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21.466667175293px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhy5OMrNRJBjhkWdYBEHljxF0fl_9FeD-YmDqD6rKlVFrjiq2LPso2zVzBjQOmSzldaL5vaDIQtl-NVTUmiGcI9LVr4uT52iHy11kMY81Uy4atY6asR8asjkPz6H0UtUHZZiZHYzpVSpKE/s1600/11647390_10153208098767550_688477120_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="background-color: white; clear: right; display: inline !important; font-family: helvetica, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21.466667175293px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"> Donald Trump. Sure, there's a bright side here -- they're famous, and I'm not. Who am I to complain? Still, I find myself fantasizing that perhaps next time, they'll put me alongside Jennifer Lawrence (my daughter's heroine), or maybe even Brad Pitt. </a></span><br />
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The blog that was featured was "<a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/my-top-ten-reasons-for-hating-top-ten-lists/1492/" target="_blank">My Top 10 Reasons For Hating Top Ten Lists</a>." With so many Top Ten Lists floating around nowadays, I just couldn't help but come up with my own. </div>
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<br />David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0New York, USA43.2994285 -74.2179326000000437.3314465 -84.545081100000033 49.2674105 -63.89078410000004tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-41130332738303334942014-12-10T06:48:00.002-08:002014-12-10T06:48:44.779-08:00A Thank You to Fellow Cancer Survivors<span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.4444446563721px; line-height: 21.466667175293px;">A great big THANK YOU to all my friends who helped support the <a href="http://www.thyca.org/" target="_blank">Thyroid Cancer Survivors' Association </a>by buying my book during special times this past year. As a result of your purchases of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Opposite-Everything-David-Kalish/dp/1937178439/ref=sr_1_1_title_0_main?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1378126734&sr=1-1&keywords=9781937178437#" target="_blank">The Opposite of Everything</a>, it was my pleasure last month to donate $500 to ThyCa in keeping with my pledge to give a portion of my book proceeds to this essential organization. (I also added a personal donation to bring the total to what I felt was a good level). As a comedic fictional twist on my struggles with Medullary Thyroid Cancer, I hope my book brought a smile or two to both readers and ThyCa. Happy Holidays to all! </span><br />
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<em style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12.7272720336914px; line-height: 18px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><strong style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.7272720336914px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">David Kalish is author </em><em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.7272720336914px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">of </em></strong><strong style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Opposite-Everything-David-Kalish/dp/1937178439/ref=sr_1_1_title_0_main?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1378126734&sr=1-1&keywords=9781937178437#" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.7272720336914px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">The Opposite of Everything</a>, <em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.7272720336914px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">an award-winning comedic novel based on his struggles with thyroid cancer and marriage.</em></strong></em>David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-58252507323667700932014-09-12T06:36:00.000-07:002014-09-12T06:37:29.843-07:00Auditions for my play, The Gringo Who Stole Christmas<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhf_1mhpvPZs_8PpiI27I-g9U7MY0vFV-M4gscr7_BZNj1JBqrSgMR2eY05plOHKFGFsZ20bgzrJHrI2OzBNsgBwXguNcC4vhh9zUKERnworKvtVYsc0cFjj9luWvvEX9vL1mYvdSAWajM/s1600/Gringo+Logo+Final.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhf_1mhpvPZs_8PpiI27I-g9U7MY0vFV-M4gscr7_BZNj1JBqrSgMR2eY05plOHKFGFsZ20bgzrJHrI2OzBNsgBwXguNcC4vhh9zUKERnworKvtVYsc0cFjj9luWvvEX9vL1mYvdSAWajM/s1600/Gringo+Logo+Final.jpg" height="171" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;">DKAT Productions, Inc. will be holding auditions for the musical comedy I wrote, <a href="http://www.dkatproductions.org/dkatproductions.org/Gringo.html" target="_blank">THE GRINGO WHO STOLE CHRISTMAS</a>, to be performed at Proctors' GE Theatre in December. We are looking for Hispanic and non-Hispanic perfor</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; display: inline; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;">mers to fill several roles. There are 4 male roles available ranging in age from 20 to 50 years of age, and 3 female roles in the same age range. We will be casting both principal cast and ensemble roles. Auditions will be held on Sunday, September 14th and Wednesday, September 17th starting at 7:00 PM in the downstairs education space at Proctors Theater (stairs by the box office). Performances will be held on December 12-14 and 19-21, 2014 at Proctors Theater in the G.E. Theater. You will be asked to sing 16-32 bars of a song of your choice (standard musical theater or contemporary pop) and you will be asked to do a cold reading of a monologue. If you have any additional questions please feel free to contact us at dkatproductions@yahoo.com.</span>David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-18958863235839746142014-09-08T04:41:00.001-07:002014-09-08T04:41:56.106-07:00My Literary Return to the Green Mountain State <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQhsGNlGga0jJU5cb6Mu67W1BTBqzTdMPrkC-KnFb-942Fdw7WEy707LZ_Lhg8h4hDr7OsIl2JKots4OfelMsxdBqh5sm3j66WjzsajunQqzjjR7VnkisUN6G8xSJd-utiaMORGA-n_Mc/s1600/flyingpigstore.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQhsGNlGga0jJU5cb6Mu67W1BTBqzTdMPrkC-KnFb-942Fdw7WEy707LZ_Lhg8h4hDr7OsIl2JKots4OfelMsxdBqh5sm3j66WjzsajunQqzjjR7VnkisUN6G8xSJd-utiaMORGA-n_Mc/s1600/flyingpigstore.jpg" height="320" width="400" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;">I used to live in Vermont in another lifetime as a reporter for United Press International, covering state politics in Montpelier. Next week, after a two-decade career as a journalist, I head back to the Green Mountain State to build on my </span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #141823; display: inline; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;">second career -- novelist.</span><br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #141823; display: inline; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;"><br /></span>
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #141823; display: inline; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;">I'll read from my novel <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" target="_blank">The Opposite of Everything</a> at <a href="http://www.flyingpigbooks.com/" target="_blank">Flying Pig Books</a>, a quaint store in Shelburne, about 20 minutes south of Burlington. A homecoming, you might say. And I'll read alongside Rebecca Coffey, a Vermont humorist who's signing copies of her own comedic novel, Hysterical. Hope you'll join us there. If you think you can come, please RSVP to the <a href="https://www.facebook.com/events/290250894514730/" target="_blank">Facebook event invite</a>.</span><br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #141823; display: inline; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;"><br /></span>
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #141823; display: inline; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;">My novel, which took me thirteen years to write and nabbed a couple of awards this spring, is a comedic twist on my struggle with cancer and divorce. Interestingly, it's full of Jewish humor and I'll be reading from it in a book store with a decidedly non-Kosher name, "Flying Pig." The Yiddish word for non-Kosher is traif.</span><br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #141823; display: inline; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;"><br /></span>
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #141823; display: inline; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;"><span style="font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 19.91111183166504px;">Here's the nutshell of my novel. When Brooklyn journalist Daniel Plotnick learns he has cancer, his fortunes fal</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 19.91111183166504px;">l faster than you can say Ten Plagues of Egypt. His wife can't cope, his marriage ends in a showdown with police, and his father accidentally pushes him off the George Washington Bridge. Plotnick miraculously survives his terrifying plunge, and comes up with a plan to turn his life around: He’ll do the opposite of everything he did before. In the darkly comedic tradition of Philip Roth, THE OPPOSITE OF EVERYTHING was named Top Literary Novel in the Somerset Fiction Awards.<br /><br />About HYSTERICAL: Imagine growing up gay in a household where your world-renowned father calls lesbianism a gateway to mental illness. And it is always, he said, caused by the father and curable by analysis. Now imagine that he analyzes you. Liberally salted with the lowbrow humor that may have saved her sanity, HYSTERICAL: Anna Freud’s Story is the fact-based, fictional autobiography of Sigmund Freud’s funniest daughter. Booklist called HYSTERICAL “an avidly researched, shrewd, and unnerving first novel” that is “complexly entertaining, sexually dramatic, [and] acidly funny.”</span></span><br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #141823; display: inline; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;"><br /></span>
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #141823; display: inline; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;"><br /></span>David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-38605437081627320032014-09-02T06:05:00.001-07:002014-09-02T06:05:59.990-07:00In Honor of Thyroid Cancer Awareness Month<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; line-height: 20px;">Good morning, everyone! September is one of my favorite months (I'm obviously not a student), and it's also Thyroid Cancer Awareness Month. In honor of this month, and as a thyroid cancer survivor, I'm donating half of all profits from my novel, <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" target="_blank">Th</a></span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; display: inline; line-height: 20px;"><a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" target="_blank">e Opposite of Everything</a>, to the <a href="http://www.thyca.org/" target="_blank">Thyroid Cancer Survivor's Association</a>. (ThyCa) If you are looking for something fun but deep to read, a comedy with a serious subject -- cancer and divorce -- think about purchasing this novel. (<a href="http://www.amazon.com/Opposite-Everything-David-Kalish/dp/1937178439/ref=sr_1_1_title_0_main?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1378126734&sr=1-1&keywords=9781937178437#" target="_blank">Click here</a>) As a friend of mine says, you will be donating to a cause close to my neck!</span></span><br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; display: inline; line-height: 20px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; display: inline; line-height: 20px;"><span style="color: #333333;">Laughter is the best
medicine, and it's how I survived what I went through. A </span></span><span style="color: #333333;">comedic twist on my own personal struggles, The Opposite of Everything nabbed two awards -- finalist in the humor/comedy category of the Next
Generation Indie Book awards, and top literary novel in the Somerset Fiction
Awards.</span></span><br />
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<!--StartFragment--><span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></span><!--EndFragment-->David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-50888776643394648962014-08-04T08:37:00.003-07:002014-08-04T08:37:47.655-07:00Book Tour Hits Stride Five Months After My Novel's Launch<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqGPgDzZdylZQCjiys9JiHPYel47bslt2iO-3YyS2JmdjXkA2uRRgl2UIqRmCXZxDNKQFFweZre4K3_eC66o1qG2GDwAIKkFpeCN_NtTRCDPMz6XrhP6FSNROAS_4TSxfEMdB89YZycfM/s1600/OppositeEverything_CVR_SML+(1)+(1).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqGPgDzZdylZQCjiys9JiHPYel47bslt2iO-3YyS2JmdjXkA2uRRgl2UIqRmCXZxDNKQFFweZre4K3_eC66o1qG2GDwAIKkFpeCN_NtTRCDPMz6XrhP6FSNROAS_4TSxfEMdB89YZycfM/s1600/OppositeEverything_CVR_SML+(1)+(1).jpg" height="320" width="213" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;">My book tour hits its mid-summer stride this week, veering into Albany, N.Y. for back-to-back events, as my comedic novel <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Opposite-Everything-David-Kalish/dp/1937178439/ref=sr_1_1_title_0_main?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1378126734&sr=1-1&keywords=9781937178437#" target="_blank">The Opposite of Everything</a> celebrates its five-month birthday. </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;"> </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;">The first event is Tuesday, 12 noon, at the <a href="https://www.facebook.com/events/273159236223114/" target="_blank">Albany Public LIbrary</a>, sponsored by -- you guessed -- Friends of Albany Public Library. Then Wednesday, 3 p.m. at the <a href="http://www.jfsneny.org/david_kalish_event/" target="_blank">Albany Jewish Community Center</a>, an event sponsored by Jewish Family Services of Upstate New York. (This one requires an RSVP; just click on the link). I feel relaxed going into them, but excited on anoth</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; display: inline; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;">er level to see who shows up and what each venue brings to the experience. Wednesday's JCC event, for instance, will be a Q&A format conducted by my good friend and fellow author <a data-hovercard="/ajax/hovercard/user.php?id=1558000588" href="https://www.facebook.com/lale.davidson1" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; text-decoration: none;">Lale Davidson</a>, a creative writing professor, and the excerpt I read will reflect my Borscht Belt humor</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;">.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;">I can't wait to meet my readers. It's the part of the job I love -- interacting with people who are curious about my writing process and want to learn more about how I built this book from scratch. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;">So if you're around, please do drop by!</span>David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-89593646483185074342014-07-01T08:46:00.000-07:002014-07-01T08:46:20.951-07:00Help Bring the Capital Region's Newest Musical Comedy to the Stage<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;">Dear theater lovers, fans of cultural inclusiveness, fellow writers, and folks with a desire to support local arts and artists (did I leave anyone out?): </span><br />
<br />
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<span style="color: #37404e; font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 10.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Please help support the Capital Region's newest musical comedy,
<i>The Gringo Who Stole Christmas</i>, which I wrote. It's cast and booked for
Proctors' GE Theatre in Schenectady in December, but needs your financial help to become a reality. <a href="https://fundabilities.com/the-gringo-who-stole-christmas" target="_blank">Click on the link</a>; donations are tax deductible and will help pay for
everything from rehearsal space to set design to costumes. Remember: every
little bit helps (and big bits help too). <i>Gringo</i> is a Latin twist on <i>A
Christmas Carol</i> with a family friendly, hip-wiggling message of cultural
inclusiveness. It's incredibly exciting for me to bring my script to life on
the stage, and I'd love if all my friends joined me on this journey.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #37404e; font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 9.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"><a href="https://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Ffundabilities.com%2Fthe-gringo-who-stole-christmas&h=kAQGKLcuOAQEPZTc5bz1OLOGl89xXcu5Z-opzFCEG9uCHtA&enc=AZPueoXHS4UUoHs4aZ3Zv1xuHnF_Z6vpAK4vKKo4Ctcm-LCa3sNZXpWOtdC6c3cOyV8hPCB3YoKpxj9EaHBfP8x7"><span style="color: #3b5998; text-decoration: none; text-underline: none;"><br /></span></a></span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #333333; display: inline; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.44444465637207px; line-height: 20px;">And please share this post with your friends.<br /><br /><a href="https://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Ffundabilities.com%2Fthe-gringo-who-stole-christmas&h=7AQH4mrbW" rel="nofollow nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">https://fundabilities.com/the-gringo-who-stole-christmas</a></span>David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-28713118076945453182014-04-14T03:35:00.001-07:002014-04-14T03:36:32.224-07:00Giving Back to the Cancer Group that Helped Me<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzRKP0AleRHY4ffn9mlkVFrD4_AmusipMGYxpkc7GkzX_mDLyx1iR2oRlEh7AJI7Hj2-WlG29Q4pvXiU1EXZTSq2QlnoX9xemW1OmaxXTkorXVwr9Xk3xbqAbc05E_CwW-1Nl0z-XIAn0/s1600/OppositeEverything_CVR_SML+(1)+(1).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzRKP0AleRHY4ffn9mlkVFrD4_AmusipMGYxpkc7GkzX_mDLyx1iR2oRlEh7AJI7Hj2-WlG29Q4pvXiU1EXZTSq2QlnoX9xemW1OmaxXTkorXVwr9Xk3xbqAbc05E_CwW-1Nl0z-XIAn0/s1600/OppositeEverything_CVR_SML+(1)+(1).jpg" height="320" width="213" /></a></div>
<h3 class="post-title entry-title" itemprop="name" style="font-family: Georgia, Utopia, 'Palatino Linotype', Palatino, serif; font-size: 36px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; position: relative;">
<span style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><a href="http://www.thyca.org/" target="_blank">The Thyroid Cancer Survivors' Association,</a> <a href="http://www.thyca.org/" style="color: #6699cc; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">ThyCa</a></span><span style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">, has helped me through some rough times during my long struggle with Medullary Thyroid Cancer, and now I'd like to give something back. </span></h3>
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Starting today (Monday) for a week (April 14 - April 20), in honor of "Head and Neck Cancer Awareness Week," I will donate one-half proceeds from sales of my cancer-themed novel to the Thyroid Cancer Survivors' Association.</div>
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As some of you know, my novel, The Opposite of Everything, is a comic twist on my journey through MTC, divorce, treatment and new love. A finalist in the Somerset Fiction Awards, it’s available on Amazon (<a href="http://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Famzn.to%2FIEvXtn&h=ZAQE_rLPM&enc=AZPseZldH48nAcAP5JQNAQAFHy8D8wGDSb1wsnWSqoN2w1zHTPoQ59DlhdFHKJKpkbdn2RhvXYfpTG4_juJnrxIyZe-9popmSeXWahCEAo6E8J0hvvjjhNbXfDb6OThheuXb8VKSStixjt67f2tTYJf1dO-dPVCeChgkM8tQi4fm3Q&s=1" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">http://amzn.to/IEvXtn</a>) and at book stores along my tour this spring (<a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">www.davidkalishwriter.com</a> lists tour stops).</div>
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Giving back to ThyCa is one way for me to show thanks to the organization that has helped me find an amazing community of fellow MTC survivors as well as a clinical trial for Caprelsa, which has given me a new lease on life. I also believe laughter is strong medicine, and my novel is strong on comedy.</div>
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Going forward, I plan to donate one-half of my book's proceeds to ThyCa in September, during Thyroid Cancer Awareness month, and during the week of ThyCa's annual conference, in October, when I'll be presenting alongside Bill McClain and others on the subject of Art as Therapy.</div>
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David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-60401548907431495532014-04-03T06:37:00.000-07:002014-04-03T06:37:17.713-07:00My Membership in the Extremely Empathic Husbands Club<br />
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(Ruminator’s note: This essay is a factual retelling, more or less, of events depicted in my new novel, <em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13px; font-style: italic; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">The Opposite of Everything</a>)</em></div>
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<a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/04/ultrasound-of-baby.jpg" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><img alt="ultrasound of baby" class="alignright size-medium wp-image-891" height="187" src="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/04/ultrasound-of-baby-300x187.jpg" style="border: none; display: inline; float: right; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 4px 0px 12px 24px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" width="300" /></a>For a brief and painful time in my life, I accomplished what every man since probably Adam has tried, and failed, to do.</div>
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I felt<i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"> </i>what my wife was feeling.</div>
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Now, I can hear all you guys, and gals, scoff. A resident of Mars cannot possibly live on Venus. Men and woman are fundamentally different creatures. There are situations, ranging from menopause to morning sickness, a man cannot pretend to know, or understand. But as a cancer survivor, my situation was special. It drew my wife and me closer than you can imagine – closer than I felt comfortable with. It deepened my understanding of not just my wife, but what I was going through.</div>
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The year was 2000. July. Two months after getting pregnant my wife, Ingrid, began to suffer morning sickness. Around the same time, I underwent chemotherapy treatment for thyroid cancer.</div>
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The morning after my first treatment, our symptoms collided. I awoke in our Brooklyn apartment, listening to the sickening whir of my portable fanny pack pumping chemo through a tube into my chest. I turned to ask my wife Ingrid to hand me my anti-nausea pills from the night table but she, for some reason, wasn’t around.</div>
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A wave of nausea washed over me. I staggered to the bathroom, made a beeline for the toilet, and loudly hurled. Just then Ingrid teetered in, looking as sick as I felt. As if to demonstrate the correct method, she vomited too, but quietly, like the Queen of England might pour tea, leaving scarcely a droplet on the rim. She wiped her lips with a tissue, and dabbed Crest on her toothbrush.</div>
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“Daniel,” she said, after gargling, in a weary voice. “Do you know the story of Jonah? He was spit out by a whale that sneezed. Just a sneeze forced him out!”</div>
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“I’m not sure … ”</div>
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“I mean, you should be afraid you may lose something you need. Like your soul.”</div>
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“I’m not following.”</div>
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“You need to vomit softly. I don’t want to hear your inner pig. You don’t know how sick I feel.”</div>
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“But I think I do,” I said, weakly.</div>
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As if on cue, my gut spasmed again, jetting the rest of its contents into the toilet.</div>
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Ingrid shook her head in disappointment and left the bathroom. I flushed the toilet, unsure where this nightmare was leading. I saw what I had suddenly become: an involuntary member of the Extremely Empathic Husbands Club. I would have done anything to quit. The last thing I frankly needed in my delicate state was retching lessons from a pregnant woman.</div>
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It was the sort of closeness I never expected or desired when Ingrid and I decided earlier that year to make a baby. Honestly, until that decision, having a child was the last thing on my mind. Ingrid, a recent immigrant from Colombia, was busy studying for her medical boards; I was a reporter at The Associated Press in Manhattan, just promoted to economics writer in Mexico City. All set to move, we’d sublet our Brooklyn apartment, changed our health insurance to international, sold our car, booked international movers. Lastly we married so Ingrid, on a student visa, could travel freely across borders with me.</div>
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<a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/04/tumor-ultrasound.jpeg" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><img alt="tumor ultrasound" class="alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-893" height="150" src="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/04/tumor-ultrasound-150x150.jpeg" style="border: none; display: inline; float: left; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 4px 24px 12px 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" width="150" /></a>But three weeks before we were to board a plane for another life, a routine scan revealed my thyroid cancer, until then stable and confined to my neck, had spread to my lungs. In a stunning reversal, I was forced to stay stateside for chemotherapy, instead of jetting around Latin America with reporter’s pad in hand.</div>
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Then came the clincher. Since chemo can hurt sex cells, the oncologist urged us to try to conceive before my treatment. Though I worried I’d feel too sick to chase after a kid with a leaky diaper, the doctor’s insistence won out.</div>
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Ingrid and I, wouldn’t you know it, were successful right away.</div>
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At first, I was too busy reversing my life to worry about the consequences of our success. I had to change my health insurance back to domestic, pay the subletters $2,000 so they wouldn’t sue me for breach of contract, relinquish my deposit on a car in Mexico City, and shop for one in Park Slope. I settled back into my old position on AP’s international desk, editing overseas stories by reporters stationed in exotic places that reminded him, painfully, of the one I’d given up.</div>
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Then came chemo and its clash with pregnancy. At first, I didn’t know what to make of my weird bathroom encounter with Ingrid – our odd physical convergence. What does it mean to share nausea with one’s spouse? I was still processing this weird coming together when, a week later, things grew even more awkward.<span id="more-889" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div>
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That Saturday morning, I spied a clump of hair in the shower drain. Examining it closely, I determined it was mine. As I dried myself with a towel, feeling emasculated, Ingrid strode up. Rolling up the bottom of her shirt, she revealed seven short black hairs sprouting around her naval.</div>
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“See? Isn’t it terrible? And that’s not the worst. Look.” I examined her in the fluorescent light. Fresh fuzz clung to the underside of her upper neck.</div>
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“Woop-di-doo,” I said, showing her the hairball in my hand. “Thanks to chemo, I’ve got a <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">clump.</i>”</div>
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She drew back. “Oh David! First we share stomach problems. But now we’re becoming opposites, in a similar way.”</div>
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She touched my head as if to share her new sense of solidarity with me, but I nudged away her hand a bit too forcefully. I was frankly in no mood to celebrate. I wanted to cling onto to my last shreds of dignity, much as I wanted to cling onto my hair. “Please don’t touch. My hair’s liable to fall out if you feel it. I’m trying to hold onto what I have.”</div>
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“If your hair bothers you so much,” she said, “why not let me shave you? Lots of sexy men are bald. Bruce Willis. Agassi. No need to look like a bad lawn.”</div>
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“Sure,” I snapped, thinking of a barbershop from <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Village of the Damned</i>. “But first let me shave your peach fuzz.”</div>
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Her eyes moistened with hurt.</div>
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“Don’t give me your look,” I said. “That’s what you wanted to do to me, right? Shave me? Why can’t I say the same thing to you? Fair is fair!”</div>
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She switched off the light above the mirror. “Is it fair I look like an old woman with fuzz? Is it my choice? And now you would shave me so it grows back as stubble? Like a man with—how do you call it?—five o’clock shadow?”</div>
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Ingrid stalked out of the room, leaving me to stare in the mirror. <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">A bad man with bad hair. That’s what I look and feel like.</i></div>
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It wasn’t so much I didn’t sympathize with her. It’s that I had less tolerance. We went days without talking after that. I blamed her anger on pregnancy hormones. Maybe they swam inside Ingrid in tempo with the chemicals eroding my insides. Researching over the Internet I learned that “human chorionic gonadotrophin” helped nourish the fetus by diverting nutrients from the mother’s bloodstream, provoking nausea.</div>
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One night, I had a dream about lump reversal — Ingrid birthing a tumor, and a fetus surgically removed from my throat. I jerked awake, famished and nauseous, squinting into the low morning sun through the window. I left Ingrid sleeping in bed, her back to me like an icy fortress, put on a baseball cap over my patchy scalp and went outside to forage for food that wouldn’t make me gag.</div>
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My first stop was at a café on Park Slope’s Seventh Avenue, where I ordered a cappuccino, but after one sip I spilled it down a sewer grate. When I gazed up, I saw I stood in front of a bodega, overripe platanos displayed in bins. An idea came to me.<i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"> </i>I went inside and bought a loaf of Bimbo, a crunchy bread Ingrid once told me she liked. Returning to the apartment, I showed her it and uttered the only four-syllable Spanish word I knew: “<i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Mantequilla</i>?”</div>
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She seemed too stunned to answer; I brought a stick of butter from the kitchen and spread some across a slice for her. Shutting her eyes, she crunched down.</div>
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She blinked as if waking from a dream. “Wait till I tell my mother you’re feeding our child Colombian food!” She crunched some more. “I remember toast for breakfast every Sunday in my home. And the fruits! In Colombia, the papayas and guanabanas so ripe and sweet and large.” A tear slipped down her cheek as she ate a second slice, rambling on with nostalgia.</div>
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“You are eating,” I whispered, happily. Struck with empathy worthy of the club I belonged to, I handed her a razor. A smile lit up her face. She pulled me to the bathroom, ran the water warm, splashed it across my scalp, and sprayed foam from her leg-shaving kit into her hands. For the next twenty minutes, as she hummed a Colombian melody, she spread foam and stroked the razor across my patchy skull, tracking its bumps and lumps gentle as a mother bird preening its fledgling.</div>
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“<i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Gracias,” </i>she said, when she was done, admiring her handiwork. “I felt I was living with a sick person. Now you’re sexy!”</div>
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<a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/04/bald-man.jpeg" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><img alt="bald man" class="alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-897" height="150" src="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/04/bald-man-150x150.jpeg" style="border: none; display: inline; float: right; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 4px 0px 12px 24px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" width="150" /></a>Taking a deep breath, I gazed at my reflection and touched my smooth glistening skull as if it were someone else’s – someone cool with the situation, not angry and bitter over it. I realized something about Ingrid. <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">She needs to nurture her sick husband, because if she can, her helpless unborn child should be a cinch.</i></div>
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The unspeakable tension in me lifted a bit. I imagined my lump having a one-on-one conversation with hers, breaking the communications barrier. A tête-à-tête, perhaps. “Maybe,” I joked, “we can get a group rate on lumpectomies.”</div>
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She kissed my scalp. “Please don’t refer to our future child as a lump.”</div>
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I wasn’t done paying my dues, staying bald and nauseous for the duration of pregnancy. But five months later I got my money’s worth. Ingrid gave birth to a healthy eight-pound girl named Sophie, and I felt, in a sense, that I’d given birth too.</div>
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That was thirteen years ago. I’ve since begun an experimental drug treatment that keeps my cancer at bay, and the only hair loss I experience is age-related. Next spring my daughter celebrates her Bat Mitzvah. Of her parents’ rival growths Sophie is the one who survived, thanks to a most unusual time in my life – thanks to my membership in the Extremely Empathic Husbands Club.</div>
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<strong style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13px; font-style: italic; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">David Kalish is author of the new comedic novel,</em> <a href="http://amzn.to/IEvXtn" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">The Opposite of Everything</a>, <em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13px; font-style: italic; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">a finalist in the Somerset Fiction Awards. Next stop on his book tour is Thursday, April 10, 6:30 p.m., at Saratoga Springs Public Library. <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">Click here</a> for more information. </em></strong></div>
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David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-65563833807454066272014-03-28T03:27:00.000-07:002014-03-28T03:27:12.502-07:00Brooklyn Rocks! My Big Apple literary debut<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNt3thD80IKiDEkGnD8Xqd1Mg0tsghQhcgvXPUyZmTF_prKd2QIyjW6PA24Ian9koVtDQDqwmJQrE1M4LPHJaGc4NWT2lXfHa3nIKUMj2Dc1utosvv1Fmv6jn7Kx6gK70loiOSIfdy_Vk/s1600/20140327_184455.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNt3thD80IKiDEkGnD8Xqd1Mg0tsghQhcgvXPUyZmTF_prKd2QIyjW6PA24Ian9koVtDQDqwmJQrE1M4LPHJaGc4NWT2lXfHa3nIKUMj2Dc1utosvv1Fmv6jn7Kx6gK70loiOSIfdy_Vk/s1600/20140327_184455.jpg" height="150" width="200" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17.940000534057617px;">Woke up at 4 a.m. thinking about my signing last night at <a href="http://powerhouseon8th.com/" target="_blank">Powerhouse on Eighth books</a> in Park Slope.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0qyirERz2CKMMT9G0VupJ9_7cPL5uTgjSG4pAPNo6Wow-u3B9rjLyzzBMHuX3LQQwxAdPcqBoOLlSguEUJSx9-R7qCL0VOy7IRurIrCjGEc6sSbOvRILQYJb2zssaSaxC0MnVyIn6BPE/s1600/20140327_192744.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0qyirERz2CKMMT9G0VupJ9_7cPL5uTgjSG4pAPNo6Wow-u3B9rjLyzzBMHuX3LQQwxAdPcqBoOLlSguEUJSx9-R7qCL0VOy7IRurIrCjGEc6sSbOvRILQYJb2zssaSaxC0MnVyIn6BPE/s1600/20140327_192744.jpg" height="320" width="240" /></a><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17.940000534057617px;">About 35 people showed up, filling the small space to capacity. So many friends, people I haven't seen in years, in some cases decades. From Brooklyn, Manhattan, Long Island, New Jersey, and as far away as Philadelphia. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17.940000534057617px;">My voice is weak and there wasn't a microphone but none of that seemed an issue as I read an excerpt from my novel and answered really good questions. What can I say? The bookstore sold out its stock and then sold some of my personal stash. </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRdOivUX4KwJWVoq7MrXyk95oEownBFqilBzzskX2TKCc23EDcJ0bJTOtgFlX-stVVFDi8KiCtcj0E4-tSkDdH_zmuMXzPoB3V9JzFCb0FGiiCHZVLYcr7c2pAstqF9pDYKT73fAN5KcE/s1600/20140327_184351.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRdOivUX4KwJWVoq7MrXyk95oEownBFqilBzzskX2TKCc23EDcJ0bJTOtgFlX-stVVFDi8KiCtcj0E4-tSkDdH_zmuMXzPoB3V9JzFCb0FGiiCHZVLYcr7c2pAstqF9pDYKT73fAN5KcE/s1600/20140327_184351.jpg" height="320" width="240" /></a><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17.940000534057617px;">But one of the most touching moments for me was meeting Michelle, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17.940000534057617px;">a fellow survivor of </span><br />
Medullary Thyroid Cancer, who's from Texas but happened to be in the area and came with her husband Sam. I'd never met her before and here I was able to share my comedy about cancer with her. She's a five-year survivor and going on strong.<br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17.940000534057617px;">Also reunited with </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17.940000534057617px;">fellow Park Slopians I hadn't seen in more than a decade. </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17.940000534057617px;">Lots of former Associated Press colleagues, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17.940000534057617px;">and Binghamton alumni. Not to mention my family from Long Island. </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17.940000534057617px;"> </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17.940000534057617px;">So last night was a homecoming and a literary debut I'll never forget. Thanks to more people than I can reasonably mention here. Here's some photos taken by friends, including my faithful matey, </span><a class="profileLink" data-hovercard="/ajax/hovercard/user.php?id=1591485136" href="https://www.facebook.com/douglas.boettner" style="background-color: white; color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17.940000534057617px; text-decoration: none;">Douglas Boettner</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17.940000534057617px;">.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17.940000534057617px;"><b>David Kalish is author of the new comedic novel, <i>The Opposite of Everything, </i>finalist in the Somerset Fiction Awards, which can be purchased on <a href="http://amzn.to/IEvXtn" target="_blank">Amazon</a> or at bookstores. For more information,<a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" target="_blank"> click here. <i> </i></a></b></span>David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-32068083715027776972014-03-19T07:07:00.002-07:002014-03-19T07:42:42.788-07:00Giving Something Back to the Cancer Group that Helped Me<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">The Thyroid Cancer Survivors' Association, <a href="http://www.thyca.org/" target="_blank">ThyCa</a></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">, has helped me through some rough times during my long struggle with Medullary Thyroid Cancer, and now I'd like to give something back. As I kick off my book tour this week, st</span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #333333; display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">arting tomorrow night at Northshire in Saratoga, I've decided to donate one-half of proceeds from my book to THYCA during special times such as Head and Neck Cancer awareness week (in April), Thyroid Cancer Awareness Month (September), and the week of ThyCa’s annual conference in October. I will keep you updated on details. Thank you to Cherry Wunderlich at ThyCa for helping me arrange my donation.<br /><br />After several operations, chemotherapy, and experimental treatment, I'm grateful to the group that's provided me with a community of survivors and helped me research and find an effective treatment. THYCA has been in the back of my mind as I've written my novel, The Opposite of Everything, a comic twist on my journey through cancer, divorce, treatment, and renewal. Here's my <a href="http://amzn.to/IEvXtn" target="_blank">Amazon link</a>, and my <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" target="_blank">Web site</a>.<br /><br />I can't wait to see my THYCA friends at the annual conference in Denver in October, where I'll be presenting alongside Bill McClain on the subject of Art as Therapy.</span>David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-86567918337820856892014-02-26T05:56:00.000-08:002014-02-26T05:56:47.559-08:00My Fifty-Second Year<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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My wife urges me to play “52” on the lottery. Because this is your lucky year, she says. Your first novel is being published. Your musical comedy,<i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/659888944052761/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Gringo Who Stole Christmas">The Gringo Who Stole Christmas</a>, </i>will be performed at Proctors Theatre in December. Your blog appears twice a week on the <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Times Union</i>Community Blog site. You fixed the snow blower all by yourself, and kept the driveway clear without paying someone else to do it.</div>
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<span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Not so fast, I counter. Who says anyone will buy my book beyond my family and friends? So far Amazon ranks it 200,000 among books in terms of sales. The ranking is the same as the population of</span><a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=population+of+akron+ohio&oq=population+of+Akron+Ohio&aqs=chrome.0.69i59j0l5.4999j0j7&sourceid=chrome&espv=210&es_sm=91&ie=UTF-8" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Akron">Akron, Ohio.</a><span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"> The play is $70,000 and nearly a year away from a performance. And the </span><em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Times Union</em><span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">, while widely read in the capital region, is surely no</span><em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">New York Times</em><span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">.</span></div>
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You are your worst enemy, she says. You will sabotage the good things. I search her voice for irony. Finding none, I remind her I’m on the bottom rung of a very tall ladder. I picture gazing up at the well-worn soles of thousands of respected authors before me. Ernst Hemingway. Philip Roth. Lorrie Moore. Tennessee Williams. Plenty of writers like me have clasped the first rung and climbed no higher. Plenty of writers like me have clung to the first rung and fallen off.</div>
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My wife insists I shoot the lock off my wallet and play the lottery when the jackpot hits $52 million. But the publisher of my novel is small, I counter. I am like a vacuum cleaner salesman, going door-to-door to book stores to get them to stock my book. I remind her the play I wrote needs money and actors. My <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Times Union</i>blog appears in the Lifestyles category, near gardening tips and dating adventures, an uncertain platform for an author’s literary debut.<span id="more-754" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div>
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My wife urges me to look at the greater fabric of my life. How the first reviews of my novel on <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Opposite-Everything-David-Kalish-ebook/dp/B00IIUUSKG/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&sr=1-1&qid=1378126734" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">Amazon</a> are all positive. How I wrote my new comedic musical in collaboration with Alex Torres, a well-known known musician and composer, and a reputable director and producer have climbed aboard – a step up from my last play, performed for my daughter’s sixth grade class. How auditions are being held this week to pick a cast. How the <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Times Union </i>has tripled the number of people who see my posts compared to when I used Blogger.</div>
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I remind her that my book is merely one of hundreds of thousands of new books hitting the market each year. A lot of perfectly good books have fallen to the wayside. Gone up in smoke. “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust,” I say, purposely using clichés to demean my profession.</div>
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My wife is fed up. Take out the garbage, she suggests. Do something useful instead of wallowing in self-pity. I grow defensive but hold back. Fortunately, it’s morning, and I feel positive about life. Then, like clockwork, around 11:30 a.m. the bottom drops out. By mid-afternoon I’m inconsolable. Everything turns dark. I wrack my brain for answers. Low blood sugar? Did my body digest that donut too fast? By mid-afternoon I am performing mental self-torture. My writing sucks. I have no new ideas. I’m not going anywhere. My life is a waste.</div>
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Then my brother emails me that he read my book, which he pre-ordered. He said he laughed out loud on the airplane. His wife laughed out loud at the dentist’s office. I feel better. After all, my novel is meant to be funny. I feel like jumping up and down and celebrating. I’ll hang on another day. Or at least a few more hours. I check my wallet and spy a wad of dollars. Maybe they add up to $52. Maybe there’s a lottery ticket out there with my number on it. Perhaps the jackpot’s closing in on $52 million.</div>
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Hey, you never know.</div>
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<em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">David Kalish is the author of the novel, </em><span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The Opposite of Everything, </span><em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">which will be published in March and is available for purchase now on <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Opposite-Everything-David-Kalish-ebook/dp/B00IIUUSKG/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&sr=1-1&qid=1378126734" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">Amazon</a>. </em><em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">His <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Author events">author events</a> this spring are in Saratoga, Brooklyn, and Long Island. </em></div>
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David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-89761828405643183492014-02-25T09:06:00.004-08:002014-02-25T09:06:44.585-08:00My First Two Five-Star Reviews!<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">I'm honored to say my novel, which hits bookstores next month and is now available on Amazon, has received its first five-star reviews! It's been a long journey for me (emphasis on long), and to see this reaction makes me feel like everything is worth it. Here's the Amazon link. And if you purchase from Amazon, please leave a customer review! The link: </span><a href="http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Famzn.to%2FIEvXtn&h=LAQH-1vqA&s=1" rel="nofollow nofollow" style="background-color: white; color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">http://amzn.to/IEvXtn</a>David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-73873775880046307462014-02-25T09:06:00.000-08:002014-02-25T09:06:04.580-08:00Feeding My Soul, and Others, at the Meatloaf Kitchen <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Sometimes I need a refresher course in humanity. I see the ragged people walking around Saratoga Springs with their canes, sitting forever in the nook tables at the library. I categorize them in the mental file called: People whose eyes I avoid. There’s an overweight man dressed in layers with a shopping cart who spends a lot of time on a bench on Division Street. I make a wide berth. I think: <em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Get a job.</em></div>
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We have a tendency to file into simple categories people who are different, whose lives we don’t understand. Each time my mind leapfrogs to those thoughts I become a little less human. On Saturday I regained a bit of humanity, revisiting a soup kitchen on the Lower East Side of Manhattan for the first time in twenty years.</div>
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I caught a bus down from Albany to New York City for a few days and showed up around 9:30 a.m. for the morning shift at the <a href="http://www.meatloafkitchen.org/about_us.html" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Meatloaf Kitchen">University Community Soup Kitchen</a>, which serves up equal portions of hot food and dignity to those in need of both, in a restaurant-style setting.</div>
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I broke down some personal class barriers I’d erected in the interim I’d been away, reopening a place inside that has been under lockdown during my suburban life in upstate New York.</div>
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I poured coffee for dozens of down-and-out folks. They said thank you again and again. I chatted in basic Spanish with a nice Cuban man. I tried to talk people into less sugar in their coffee. “Four teaspoons,” several said. “Five,” one said. We laughed about it, though the word “diabetes” flashed through my brain. I handed out peanut butter and jelly slathered across slabs of bakery bread. They eagerly took them and said thank you again. We had no deep discussions, just simple friendly interactions.</div>
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I spent an hour spreading frosting and slicing cakes donated by area bakeries. I collaborated with young volunteers who were optimistic, hard-working, and eager to help. I felt if this was the future of the world, then perhaps, after all, we’re in OK shape.</div>
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The Meatloaf Kitchen, as it’s known affectionately by locals, has a special place in New York City. Guests come by the hundreds every Saturday, shuffling up in worn shoes, sleep-deprived and destitute. By foot, bicycle, and subway, from as far away as the Bronx, they make their way to the Lower East Side, and check their indignities at the door.<span id="more-741" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div>
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Sure the meatloaf’s to die for, and the coffee’s hot and fresh. You can’t beat the peanut butter and jelly sandwiches – or the price: nothing. But these ragged folks also come for something else. Respect. A smile from the waitress. Friendly words from fresh-faced volunteers.</div>
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This past Saturday, volunteering after twenty years away, I took some nourishment there myself.</div>
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<a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/02/photo-55-e1393246286256.jpg" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><img alt="photo (55)" class="alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-747" height="150" scale="0" src="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/02/photo-55-e1393246286256-150x150.jpg" style="border: none; display: inline; float: left; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 4px 24px 12px 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" width="150" /></a>A friend of mine who manages the place, Steve, who used to be my editor at The Associated Press when I worked there in the 1990s, had encouraged me to revisit and help out. Something inside me was ready. It was time to re-lower the barriers, I knew. To rediscover that the people I often step around are in fact human beings.</div>
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It was a needed homecoming. For a period of ten years in my life, in the 1980s and early 1990s, I served meatloaf on Saturdays to down-and-out folks here. At the time the University Community Soup Kitchen was run in the basement of a church several few blocks from its current location. After serving hundreds of people and cleaning up the place, a bunch of us would head out tired but exuberant and eat out at a nearby Italian restaurant, Frutti de Mare, or Kiev, the Ukranian joint. Then we’d play pool and drink cold beers. We’d often see the people we served wandering the streets, and exchange a friendly glance or a few words with them.</div>
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The kitchen was started in 1982 by two university professors at a time of explosive homelessness on New York City streets. They had a unique idea—to provide not just a hot meal but an oasis from cold streets. A place where the destitute could replenish their bodies and dignity. A restaurant without a cashier, where the volunteers would eat the same food they served to guests.</div>
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“We try to duplicate a restaurant situation with one exception—no cashier,” Steve said, addressing a group of two dozen volunteers Saturday, during a break in the morning shift. “If you’re walking in today and someone says the meatloaf isn’t cooked enough, we’ll take it back. We only serve food in a manner we’d want to be served in.”</div>
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Acceptance works both ways. Steve related to me a story. He was riding home early one morning on the No. 1 train, on the Upper West Side, far from the soup kitchen. “It was about 1 a.m. and I was tired and I’d had a few drinks so I was kind of nodding off, when I saw a group of shady looking men get on the train. I was worried at first, and started to think whether I should get out at the next stop. But, in a couple of seconds I recognized them as members of a Doo-Wop group who were regular soup kitchen customers, and who even sang for us at our annual volunteer appreciation party a couple of years earlier.”</div>
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They were preparing to sing when they noticed Steve. The leader stood up and announced to everyone in the car, “Hi everybody, we’re going to sing for you in a minute, but first I want to introduce Steve, here, who runs the Meatloaf Kitchen downtown, where you can get a great hot meal every Saturday. We’d just like to say thanks to Steve and all the volunteers at the kitchen and sing this song for them.”</div>
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They launched into an old favorite from the 60s. It left Steve both embarrassed and happy. “I saw that we really do make a difference in people’s lives, and they remember us for it.”</div>
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As for the other subway passengers, well, they just looked down of course, and tried not to be noticed, just like any other time. “I didn’t care. It made my night,” Steve said.</div>
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<em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">In addition to</em> <em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">working at the </em><em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">soup kitchen</em>,<em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"> David Kalish is the author of the novel, </em><a href="http://amzn.to/IEvXtn" target="_blank">The Opposite of Everything</a>, <em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">which will be published in March and is available for purchase now on <a href="http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00IIUUSKG/ref=cm_sw_r_fa_dp_WYkbtb1GAJBPP" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Kindle offer">Kindle</a>. </em><em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">His <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Author events">author events</a> this spring are in Saratoga, Brooklyn, and Long Island. </em></div>
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David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-73500327363416364422014-02-21T03:41:00.000-08:002014-02-21T03:41:29.115-08:00Debunking the Reality of My Fiction<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNQrVoX0amYMW9whrI4HcHLuCYQ8FlHpPZFRQB9a1V33UAHRelX9I407N2NywJs64vOGwTq-wGOXcj4iafE1NEw6Ffe4DI4ZrZOSXR_r1QvummNFnQhqcjQaNUkyC5aXqsqE99DU3qChY/s1600/Opposite+cover.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNQrVoX0amYMW9whrI4HcHLuCYQ8FlHpPZFRQB9a1V33UAHRelX9I407N2NywJs64vOGwTq-wGOXcj4iafE1NEw6Ffe4DI4ZrZOSXR_r1QvummNFnQhqcjQaNUkyC5aXqsqE99DU3qChY/s1600/Opposite+cover.jpeg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #888888; font-family: Arial;"><span style="background-color: #f1f1f1; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;">My new novel is the opposite <br />in many respects of my life <br />on which it's partly based</span></span></td></tr>
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As my novel <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything"><i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">The Opposite of Everything </i></a>marches toward publication – it hits bookstores on March 11, and became available to Kindle users this week — I’d like to get a couple things off my chest.</div>
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<span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">I never wore a nose ring or pierced my skin for decorative purposes.</span></div>
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I never went Gothic.</div>
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My father never pushed me off a bridge, even accidentally.</div>
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My mother does not speak in a Yiddish accent and embraces my wife’s Hispanic culture.</div>
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My wife and I never tried to conceive a baby at my father’s home with his help.</div>
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My father supported me during my health and marital problems, and showed up for my police showdown with my first wife – the opposite, in some ways, of how the father character is depicted in my novel.</div>
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At my second wedding, I never canceled the caterers, never corralled guests to help cook, and never replaced the priest with Buddhist monks.</div>
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I hate heavy metal music.</div>
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I could go on with this list for a long time. Because it turns out that my novel, <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">The Opposite of Everything, </i>is the opposite in many respects of my life on which it’s partly based.<span id="more-729" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div>
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All fiction writers draw from real-life experiences for material, some more than others. But novelists with a rich past are in a particular bind. Like me. Back twenty years ago, in one week flat, I learned I had cancer and required surgery to remove my thyroid, lymph nodes, and a sliver of trachea. As all this was happening, my first marriage fell apart.</div>
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Writing about one’s own troubles can be overwhelming. You’re forced to revisit all the ways life hurt you and those around you. Lots of writers do it, of course – bookshelves and Amazon are crammed with tear-extracting cancer memoirs. But my own temperament is different. When I first sat down to write, I couldn’t stomach reading back my own words. The words “predictable” and “melodramatic” sprang to mind. Too many sentences sounded sappy. My characters felt like stick figures manufactured to highlight milestones on my journey.</div>
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My life felt too hot to handle. So I distanced myself from it. I told the story in third-person. I replaced real names with offbeat ones (“I” became Daniel Plotnick). I searched for humor in tragedy, stretched truths for dramatic effect, and made characters do crazy things their real-life counterparts would never consider.</div>
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In reality, for instance, my first wife had a predictably strong reaction to my diagnosis of cancer. With no treatment on the horizon, she supported me in her own way. One thing she did was buy several pounds of green tea, touting the benefits of anti-oxidants to keep me healthy. For my novel, I amped up her reaction. She shops in a panic at the health food store. Bursts through the door laden with groceries. “Handfuls of dark green leaves. Flax. Wheatgrass. A vial of primrose elixir. Pumpkin seeds, pine nuts, dried pomegranate. The kitchen filled up with the ripe odor of vegetables and nuts and fruit on the verge of turning. Plotnick gazed back down at the crossword puzzle to divert his attention from the hub-bub, but a large Kale leaf now blocked the Across clues.”</div>
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In reality, my first wife gained some weight amid our craziness. But for the novel, the wife character gains a lot. As a writer, I upped the ante. Troubled by his wife’s weight gain, Plotnick goes Gothic. In a climactic scene, he walks drunkenly through the door dressed in his black duds and stumbles across her as she binges on premium ice cream.</div>
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Of course, I face the danger that readers will see more in my book than actually’s there. Here’s the question that strikes fear in my heart – and in the hearts of all novelists mining their personal past: Nice book, but why did you make me look so bad?</div>
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So when the question came to me last year from someone I won’t name, my gut felt sliced open like a watermelon. <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">But I’m just doing my job as a fiction writer</i>, I thought.</div>
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So consider this blog post my effort to make a point of clarity. To pre-emptively answer any questions that might come up. Toward that end, I hereby reprint the first paragraph of my Acknowledgment from my novel:</div>
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<span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span><span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">“This book is a work of fiction, pure and simple. As fiction authors do, I drew for material from my own experience, and went to town with it. My overriding goal was to create a fully realized story, rich with drama, comedy, and a narrative arc. Toward that end, the characters I invented to populate my story are precisely that – invented. Any perceived resemblances to real people are coincidental to my goals as a novelist.”</span></div>
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<span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">That said, I will always mine my past for material. Currently working on a second novel, and a musical comedy <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/GWSC2014/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Gringo Who Stole Christmas"><em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The Gringo Who Stole Christmas</em></a>, which will be performed at Proctors in December, I stretch things for impact. I look to situations where comedy reveals painful truths about dying, broken hearts, and busted dreams. I free myself from the shackles of facts. As long as I am able, I’ll write my way out of this pickle I’m in.</span></div>
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<em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">David Kalish is the author of the novel, </em><a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">The Opposite of Everything</a>, <em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">which will be published in March and is available for purchase now on Kindle. </em></div>
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David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-72140786662026050712014-02-17T08:55:00.002-08:002014-02-17T08:55:49.215-08:00Never Stop Dancing<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi37Q4Pc-csF5ENNqiYIv3BJoqec3Dzzdro2bOHYu_nv1kAGueaakYcWOLdN7DrY7bgVPcE0i1DOuuSgjGJIkdNb4DdHTBdMOed5MH797yQ0x73PqLNadfeN9GFbrEVrrGTAj2Yjk2-2Fg/s1600/photo+(54).JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi37Q4Pc-csF5ENNqiYIv3BJoqec3Dzzdro2bOHYu_nv1kAGueaakYcWOLdN7DrY7bgVPcE0i1DOuuSgjGJIkdNb4DdHTBdMOed5MH797yQ0x73PqLNadfeN9GFbrEVrrGTAj2Yjk2-2Fg/s1600/photo+(54).JPG" height="320" width="203" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mary Flynn with my wife, Dr. Ingrid Bermudez</td></tr>
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The first time Mary Flynn rode a motorcycle was thirty-five years ago. She was hooked by the feeling of freedom. The cool wind through her hair. The tug of acceleration. If she had a bad day she’d just get on her bike and ride, shaking the cobwebs from her head. Right from the start, Mary was a biker chick. Even today, after everything that’s happened, she thinks of herself as one.</div>
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The last time Mary Flynn rode a motorcycle was August 10, 2013. It was a pleasant Saturday afternoon under blue skies. Warm wind washing her face, Mary, 61, roared down the road on her black 2012 <a href="http://www.harley-davidson.com/en_US/Motorcycles/1200-custom.html" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Harley Davidson Sportster">Harley Davidson Sportster 1200</a>, headed to her sister’s house in Halfmoon. She was in a good mood, having just painted the trim on a room in her house where her grandkids slept when visiting. Mary looked forward to lounging by her sister’s pool and catching up with a friend visiting from Florida.</div>
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About 100 feet from her sister’s driveway, Mary slowed—the speedometer read 28 mph, she later recalled. A gray pickup truck moved up a side road toward her, but she wasn’t too concerned. “I said to myself, ‘that’s alright, he has a stop sign.’”</div>
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But the truck didn’t stop. Her Harley plowed into it. Mary flew into the air across two lanes of road and landed on the pavement on other side, rolling into a culvert. Her leg was just about severed. She’d broken her shoulder, all her ribs, chipped her hip bone, tore her spleen. She had tendon sticking out of her fingers.</div>
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She was bleeding heavily as “severely ungodly pain” ripped through her.</div>
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<span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">It had been a tough few years for Mary. In 2010, she lost her husband to esophageal cancer. They’d married when she was fifteen years old and he was 19, and of course they both rode bikes. His last few years of life she’d taken care of him and watched him die.</span></div>
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After her accident, a cruel irony welled up in Mary. She lost her husband on August 13, 2010. She lost her leg on August 10, 2013.</div>
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The dates helped her understand some deeper purpose at work.</div>
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“I figured if I could make it through my husband’s death and take care of him for so many years,” she says, “I could handle this.”</div>
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The road that gave Mary her freedom had taken it away. And she knew she had to claw her way back to regain it.</div>
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Mary lay in the culvert, drifting in and out of consciousness. At one point she looked up from her broken body and saw the driver of the pickup truck, an elderly man, staring at her. She begged him to call 911 but he just stood there. Was he in shock? Somehow, she managed to throw her motorcycle helmet up in the road, hoping someone would see her.</div>
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<a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/02/helmet1.jpeg" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><img alt="helmet1" class="alignright size-full wp-image-721" height="187" scale="0" src="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/02/helmet1.jpeg" style="border: none; display: inline; float: right; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 4px 0px 12px 24px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" width="269" /></a>A woman heard her screaming and a man who’d been driving the opposite way came back. There was a younger boy with a belt, and the man and woman cinched Mary’s leg with it, both pulling tightly to stop the bleeding.</div>
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As they waited for an ambulance, the woman talked with Mary, trying to comfort her. But Mary felt herself drift. She felt herself floating above her body, looking down.</div>
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<i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Don’t let go. Stay awake, </i>she told herself.</div>
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Lying there in pieces, she thought of her grandsons, 12-year-old Josh and nine-year-old Michael. How she wanted to be there for them. Play ball with them again.</div>
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The ambulance driver and police officer couldn’t believe she was still coherent. But she was determined not to let go, even through the unbearable pain.</div>
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When I interviewed Mary last week, six months after her accident, the first thing I noticed is how cheerful she was. A patient of my wife’s, Mary rolled up to me in her wheelchair after her medical appointment, smiling. A pretty woman with short blond hair and stylish glasses, she was neatly dressed in a sweater. Her earrings were silver crosses. The stump of her right leg is covered with a silicon cap to protect the skin.</div>
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“I wanted to walk in here for <a href="http://www.drbfamilymedicine.com/Family_Medicine_of_Mechanicville/Dr_Ingrid_Bermudez_MD.html" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Family Medicine of Mechanicville">Doctor Bermudez</a>,” she said of my wife, apologetically, as I jotted notes in a small pad. “But I’ve been using the prosthesis so much, I rubbed my skin raw. I was way too excited. I had my hallway worn out.”</div>
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Mary had hoped they could save her knee. After passing out in the emergency room at Albany Medical Center, she woke up many hours later and saw her daughter, Michaele Ann, and her sister. Mary looked down and saw half her leg was gone. But the knee was still there. Through the fog of painkillers, she felt hopeful.</div>
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After two surgeries and six pints of blood, however, too much tissue had died to save the knee. Doctors removed the knee in a third operation. At <a href="https://www.nehealth.com/Medical_Care/Sunnyview_Rehabilitation_Hospital/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Sunnyview Rehab">Sunnyview Rehabilitation</a> in Schenectady, she learned how to get around in a wheelchair, in and out of bed. Because of her fast progress, they kept her only a few days. “I was bound and determined to do everything I could myself. I didn’t want to be an invalid.”</div>
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Mary lived with her daughter, Michaele Anne, for two-and-a-half months. She sold her 2011 pickup truck because she couldn’t drive and couldn’t afford the $600 monthly payments.</div>
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The thing that got to her was her loss of independence. “I felt like I was never going to play ball with my grandsons again. I used to ride dirt bikes with them.”</div>
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One day her grandsons asked to see her stump. She was nervous about it, but when they peeked under the sheet they reacted OK. They wanted to help her. “Do you need more bandages?” they’d say, offering to grab them off the shelf or table. “I felt relieved,” Mary said. “They took it a lot better than I thought.”</div>
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Last October, her friends and family held a fundraiser, to help Mary pay the medical bills, at the American Legion hall in Mechanicville. Some four hundred people showed up, just about all of them bikers. Her daughter, Michaele Ann, who sings in a rock band, serenaded her mother. Her mother was in a wheelchair as Michaele Ann danced around her, singing lyrics.</div>
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On Facebook, where they posted a video of the pair dancing, a friend left the comment: “Nothing holds Mary Flynn down. NOTHING.” “Three months after the accident, and look at her!”</div>
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“Never stop dancing,” a third wrote.</div>
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<a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/02/Screen-shot-2014-02-17-at-9.52.55-AM.png" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><img alt="Screen shot 2014-02-17 at 9.52.55 AM" class="size-medium wp-image-718 alignleft" height="300" scale="0" src="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/02/Screen-shot-2014-02-17-at-9.52.55-AM-152x300.png" style="border: none; display: inline; float: left; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 4px 24px 12px 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" width="152" /></a>She was fitted with a prosthesis and taught by the therapists to walk with it. It was a complicated leg with a computer chip in it. It cost $70,000, and Mary had to pay $11,600 of it.</div>
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She’s hoping to be proficient by spring. Day doesn’t go by now that Mary doesn’t think about the extra Harley Davidson still sitting in her garage. It’s a 2006, a big bike, and she used to take her two grandsons on it. She biding her time. A little more practice on her new leg, she’s gonna give it an whirl.</div>
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Because even after everything she’s been through, Mary is still a biker chick. She getting back her independence. She still has her own home, and though she can’t ride right now, she knows she will soon.</div>
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She’s prepared for anything. One worry is that the big bike might fall on her $70,000 leg, damaging it. Her Plan B is to ride a “trike”—a three-wheeled motorcycle.</div>
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“I will be riding a Harley Davidson again,” she says, with a hopeful smile. “I just don’t know if it’s the one I have at my house.”</div>
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<em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">David Kalish is the author of the novel, </em><a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">The Opposite of Everything</a><span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">, </span><em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">which will be published in March. </em><em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">His author events this spring are in Saratoga, Brooklyn, and Long Island. <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/#!news-and-events/c1pz" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">Click here for more information</a>.</em></div>
David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-18790900248221144782014-02-13T03:42:00.000-08:002014-02-13T03:42:08.778-08:00Of Crabgrass, and Letting Go<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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As I stare out the window at our frozen backyard, bracing for yet more white stuff to fall, I think of what lies beneath. I think of our patchy lawn. Crabgrass, sleeping in seed.</div>
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For now it remains buried under layers of snow. But one day soon, spring will come. It always does. And the crabgrass will spread across our half acre of lawn like a pale dishrag, massing against our house. Its unruly blades will poke up as if Mother Earth were giving me many middle fingers.</div>
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Because I’ve picked my battles in life. And they don’t include my lawn.</div>
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Once again, I will let go. A little more this time. A little more deeply.</div>
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At the age of 52, I’m letting go.</div>
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Of my precocious daughter, who turns thirteen on Sunday and holds her Bat Mitzvah in May. Of my novel, which will be published next month after I coddled it for thirteen years.</div>
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Of the lawn, which is already 90 percent crabgrass.</div>
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I remember the stages I passed through to get to this point. How it felt for me giving up the idea our grass should look like a golf course.<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />Growing up on Long Island, I learned weeds are bad — to be controlled, pulled up, and generally reviled. A melancholy Billy Joel sang about his suburban dad who “never lets the crabgrass grow too high.” So when my wife and daughter and I moved upstate in 2003 to our four-bedroom house on a half-acre, one of my first calls was to a lawn care company.</div>
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<a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/02/crabgrass.jpg" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><img alt="crabgrass" class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-703" height="199" scale="0" src="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/02/crabgrass-300x199.jpg" style="border: none; display: inline; float: left; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 4px 24px 12px 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" width="300" /></a>But the applications of herbicide, announced in cautionary yellow flags stuck in my lawn, made me nervous. As our puppy and daughter played on the lawn that first summer, I worried about liver cancer. I imagined weed poison stunting my daughter’s growth. The second season I told the lawn company to skip some treatments. Seizing the opportunity, crabgrass sprouted around the edges of our property. The next season I thought of my own slow-growing cancer, which I’ve battled for many years. I fretted over poisoning the water and earth, for the sake of aesthetics. Something snapped in me. I cancelled the lawn care company. The hell with the neighbors. The crabgrass was ecstatic.<span id="more-696" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div>
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At first I saw the spreading patch-quilt as a blemish on my reputation. I figured my neighbors were judging me. I’d return to my house under cover of darkness, when the lawn was invisible, like a criminal returning to his lair. I looked forward to fall and winter, when the crabgrass slept. I particularly liked snowstorms which blanketed everything under a carpet of sameness.</div>
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But time, and crabgrass, marches on. Next summer, I know, it will again stubbornly shimmer across our lawn, a jade-green testament to what happens when you let go. Oh sure, some patches of Kentucky Bluegrass will poke through here and there, ghosts of an old life, reminders I was once locked in battle for control of my lawn.</div>
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I’m reminded of other areas in life. I think of my daughter, my impulse to try to control what she does and where she goes. I tell her she must practice cello and piano before her playdate. I forbid her from eating a marshmallow fifteen minutes before dinner. She reminds me she excels at music and always cleans her plate. Sometimes I flash back to her J<a href="http://www.chabad.org/theJewishWoman/article_cdo/aid/1541/jewish/The-Mikvah.htm" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">ewish mikvah</a> for comfort.</div>
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She was six months old, when the rabbi told me I had to submerge her in the ritualistic pool for three seconds. I had to let her go. Like God commanded Adam and Eve to go from the Garden of Eden. Like Moses beseeched Pharaoh, “Let my people go!” I held her tiny body against my bony chest. I dropped her. She gazed up at me through the water with pale eyes. Her tiny arms flailed, seeming to wave goodbye. By some automatic reflex, my hand jerked and scooped her back up and clamped her to my chest. Through the din of her screams, the rabbi checked his stopwatch and smiled sadly, shaking his head that not enough time had passed. By the third try, though, I finally got it right. My daughter was Jewish.</div>
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<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />Letting go of <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">my novel</a>, which I started when my health was in crisis, was especially hard. I could have tended to it until the day I died. But when a publisher offered me a contract last year, I gave up the notion of perfection to someone who was not me. When I stand up before <a href="http://www.northshire.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Northshire Bookstore">Northshire Bookstore</a> at 7 p.m. on March 20, presenting my novel to a crowd, I will release it to the public, signing it away.</div>
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I’ve learned that change comes in patches. First crabgrass appears along the edges of driveway and on lawn fronting the street, in the sunniest parts of the lawn. We try to fight it with herbicide.</div>
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But when the snow finally melts, the crabgrass will surely win. And in a backward sort of way, so will I.</div>
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<em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">David Kalish is the author of the novel, </em><a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">The Opposite of Everything</a>, <em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">which will be published in March. </em><em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">His author events this spring are in Saratoga, Brooklyn, and Long Island. <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/#!news-and-events/c1pz" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">Click here for more information</a>.</em></div>
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David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-74771622385192643392014-02-11T05:03:00.000-08:002014-02-11T05:03:07.659-08:00Like Bread and Torah<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOY5g3r_uGQ4mnb3gfypM0tcYnKZwWd2RGwfaoBP2tat4TtWZlYiw5v3UBL-1ogyovfjSo7ORx3MWHadwNVDZnmA81Berzw7p91BV9y1D-cRjvK1GtXoZfAMEOsL-j08SHE_Bs2esgwe0/s1600/photo+(49).JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOY5g3r_uGQ4mnb3gfypM0tcYnKZwWd2RGwfaoBP2tat4TtWZlYiw5v3UBL-1ogyovfjSo7ORx3MWHadwNVDZnmA81Berzw7p91BV9y1D-cRjvK1GtXoZfAMEOsL-j08SHE_Bs2esgwe0/s1600/photo+(49).JPG" height="320" width="240" /></a></div>
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Every successful couple has their special recipe for getting along, for living with each other’s differences. Bingo on Tuesdays for him, bowling on Wednesdays for her. Then there’s Jonathan Rubenstein and Linda Motzkin. He makes the bread; she makes the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torah" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Torah">Torah</a>. His passion is kneading and braiding dough into traditional Jewish challahs; hers is using a turkey quill to faithfully hand-write on animal hide, over years, the roughly 300,000 Hebrew letters of the first five books of the Bible. Somehow it works for them. They get along.</div>
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Of course, Jonathan Rubenstein and Linda Motzkin are no ordinary couple, and their secret sauce isn’t so secret. They are co-rabbis of Temple Sinai, a reform synagogue in Saratoga Springs. They were the first husband-wife team in the United States, if not the world, to job-share a rabbi position, and after twenty-eight years co-officiating at Temple Sinai, they’re still going strong, as is the temple.</div>
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<a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/02/LInda.jpg" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><img alt="LInda" class=" wp-image-669 alignleft" height="239" scale="0" src="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/02/LInda.jpg" style="border: none; display: inline; float: left; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 4px 24px 12px 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" width="211" /></a>Yet at the heart of their relationship, which stands as a role model for the congregation’s 200 families—including mine—is a basic tenet of getting along. They give each other space to pursue their separate passions. They come together where it makes sense—whenever they chant arm-in-arm in front of the congregation, say, or team-teach Bar and Bat Mitzvah students. What works for them, works for the community they lead. Because the lines are blurred.</div>
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Because the truth is that bread and Torah aren’t that different, after all.</div>
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“Without bread there is no Torah. Without Torah there is no bread.” So says the Talmud, the venerable compendium of Jewish teachings and commentary. Inspired by that ancient message—sustenance of body and spirit go hand in hand—the rabbis in 2004 created the Bread and Torah Project, a one-of-a-kind program that unites their distinct areas of focus. The couple travels to schools, conferences and retreats to give participants hands-on experience. Participants split into groups—one focused, say, on the processing of deerskins into Torah parchment panels; the other kneading dough into long spindles and braiding them together. Then the groups switch.</div>
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To those who might scoff that baking yeasty dough has little in common with scribing animal skin, the rabbis are quick to elaborate on the Talmudic explanation. Both activities involve rolling, they explain to their students—one of dough, the other of scrolls. Both are sacred processes involving blessings or statements of sanctification. Tree taps are used for each— for both maple syrup to sweeten Rabbi Jonathan’s bread, for acacia trees for gum Arabic crystals, an ingredient in Torah ink.</div>
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<a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/02/gothic.png" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><img alt="gothic" class="alignright size-medium wp-image-670" height="300" scale="0" src="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/02/gothic-219x300.png" style="border: none; display: inline; float: right; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 4px 0px 12px 24px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" width="219" /></a>Then there’s the whimsical answer seen in a photo of the rabbis that’s posted on the <a href="http://breadandtorah.org/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Bread and Torah">Bread and Torah website</a>. Paying homage to the farm couple in Grant Wood’s <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Gothic" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="American Gothic">American Gothic</a> painting, Rabbis Linda and Jonathan stand side-by-side, absurdly grim-faced, clasping similar-looking plants—she holds a bunch of reeds, which are sometimes used to make Torah quills; he holds a bundle of wheat, which of course goes into dough.</div>
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“This is another area where each of us, being who we are—pursuing our own interests and passions—turns into something, almost magically, that’s perfectly complementary,” Rabbi Linda told me last week, as she took time from her rabbi duties to chat and sip a hot beverage at Coffee Traders in Saratoga.<span id="more-666" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div>
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But even as they’ve embraced Torah and bread making, Jonathan and Linda, who have a socially liberal bent, have turned these traditional roles on their heads.</div>
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Trained as a <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">soferet, </i>or Torah scribe, Linda—who has the slender, strong-looking hands of a writer—is one of the tiny handful of women in the world engaged in a craft traditionally dominated by men. And she is unique among female scribes in that she is the only one who hand-makes her own parchment, using deerskins donated by local Adirondack hunters for the Torah scroll she is currently writing.</div>
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Rabbi Jonathan, for his part, runs Slice of Heaven, a bakery located in the temple that makes challahs, a bread traditionally in the hands of women for special occasions like Shabbat and life-cycle rituals.</div>
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“There’s something delightful about the areas we’ve staked out,” Rabbi Linda says. “The male is in the kitchen baking. The female is out there handling hides from hunters and fleshing dead animal skins.”</div>
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Rabbi Linda’s first passion in life was art. She is an experienced calligrapher, which she describes as an expression of the artist’s vision and ego. But another side of her, later in life, was drawn to the structure of Torah scribing. A scribe gives up his or her ego and becomes a “channel for transmission of a sacred text you didn’t create,” she observes. In 2007 Rabbi Linda completed a scroll of Ester and now is at work on a full-length Torah. And now she’s bringing together, in a sense, these two parts of her life. Her latest project is illustrating animal hides that are damaged or otherwise unfit for use as Torah parchment. In June, she opens a show of her parchment artwork, called “Sacred Scraps,” at Spring Street Gallery in Saratoga.</div>
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<span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">A defining event in Rabbi Jonathan’s passion for bread making came decades ago when he was twenty-seven years old, living at home with his parents and his 96-year-old grandfather, a former baker who’d given it up because of age.</span></div>
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One day Jonathan was kneading a challah. His grandfather looked up from the couch. A light came into his eyes. With a great effort he staggered over, nudged Jonathan aside, and began to knead the dough.</div>
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<a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/02/photo-50-e1392090977662.jpg" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><img alt="photo (50)" class="alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-678" height="150" scale="0" src="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/02/photo-50-e1392090977662-150x150.jpg" style="border: none; display: inline; float: left; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 4px 24px 12px 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" width="150" /></a>“He really wanted to get his hands in that dough and feel the process,” Rabbi Jonathan recalls. He’ll never forget that moment. It was when Jonathan realized he too loved the process of shaping and braiding and letting the yeast do its miraculous job. He felt inspired to write a poem. “For Shabbat, the dough gives its gift of rising,” sings the last line.</div>
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“Every time I go away the bread rises,” he explains. “I feel like I’m participating in this elemental and miraculous process. It probably sounds a little romantic. But I love making bread. I love everything about it.”</div>
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Bread and Torah. Jonathan and Linda. There you have it.</div>
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<em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: italic; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">David Kalish is the author of the novel, </em><a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">The Opposite of Everything</a>, <em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: italic; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">which will be published in March. </em><em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: italic; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">His author events this spring are in Saratoga, Brooklyn, and Long Island. <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/#!news-and-events/c1pz" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">Click here for more information</a>.</em></div>
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David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-67442194737277025662014-02-07T09:18:00.001-08:002014-02-07T09:18:04.751-08:00The Grim News About Cow Flatulence<br />
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Yesterday, as I relaxed in front of our fireplace after snow-blowing the driveway, feeling toasty under a blanket, an Associated Press headline crossed my computer screen:</div>
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“Flatulent Cows Cause Methane Explosion at German Dairy Farm.”</div>
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Honestly, that’s what it said. Naturally, I was unnerved. I drew the blanket closer. What concerned me was not the obvious fact that a barn exploded due to cow farts and burps. After all, the barn was located thousands of miles from my home, and my family was safe. It was the larger global implications.</div>
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As local German police told the AP, the explosion was caused not merely by a few cows expelling methane gas — but by <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">ninety at the same time.</i>The incident was one more reminder that the already faltering effort to curb global warming has run into, well, headwinds. You don’t need a degree in Bovine Digestive Tract Disorder (BDTD) to know methane is a huge contributor to climate change. It’s 20 times more likely to trap greenhouse gases than carbon dioxide. The planet’s 1.5 billion cows, according to a U.N. report, might be more dangerous to Earth’s atmosphere than trucks and cars combined.</div>
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<span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Evidently detonated by a static electric charge that “caused the gas to explode with flashes of flames,” according to German police, the barn explosion just slightly damaged the roof and only one cow suffered light burns on a lightly used udder. But the larger global threat is worsening. The U.N. estimates that agricultural methane output could increase by 60 percent by 2030 if the world doesn’t curb its growing appetite for meat and milk. </span></div>
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“Overall, we conclude that methane emissions associated with both the animal husbandry and fossil fuel industries have larger greenhouse gas impacts than indicated by existing inventories,” wrote the authors of a study recently published in the journal <a href="http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/11/25/new-study-finds-u-s-has-underestimated-methane-levels-in-the-atmosphere/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Cow gas study">Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.</a></div>
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It would be an oversimplification to conclude that if the cow flatulence rate doesn’t drop, lower Manhattan could become an underwater reef. Still, every time we bite into a Big Mac, it’s not only our own gas we have to worry about. But that of every cow that had a part in the creation of that hamburger patty and American cheese slice.<span id="more-649" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div>
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As a world citizen worried about rising seas, drought, and the possibility of catching malaria while visiting Montreal, I want to look on the bright side. Today, ninety-seven percent of climate scientists – practically all of them – agree that climate-warming trends over the past century are very likely due to human activities. Maybe the overwhelming consensus <em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: italic; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">will </em>trigger action. Maybe the planet <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">will </i>get its act together and curb the greenhouse gases that cause global warming before it’s too late. Maybe solar and wind power and other alternative fuels will become economical replacements for fossil fuels. Maybe people will stop clear-cutting the Amazon. Maybe there’s hope for our great great grandchildren, after all.</div>
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It will take innovative thinking, that’s for sure, and I’m willing to contribute my two cents. For instance, has anyone considered putting <a href="http://www.beanogas.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Beano">Beano</a> in the cow feed? While untried on cows, as far as I know, it might be worth a shot.</div>
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Perhaps if we put the issue front and center of every American, as I’m doing with this blog post, people will grow concerned enough to take action.</div>
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Hollywood could be a big ally in this regard. Perhaps Vince Gilligan should consider a sequel to his immensely popular TV crime drama <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0903747/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Breaking Bad">Breaking Bad</a>.</i> It would be<i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"> </i>called, you guessed it, <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Breaking Wind</i>.</div>
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Instead of an ailing middle-aged teacher who turns to making a highly explosive substance that upsets the social order, it’s about an ailing middle-aged teacher who turns to making a highly explosive substance that upsets the social order.</div>
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Right. Next topic.</div>
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<em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: italic; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">David Kalish is the author of the comedic novel, </em><a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">The Opposite of Everything</a>, <em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: italic; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">which will be published in March. </em><em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: italic; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">His author events this spring are in Saratoga, Brooklyn, and Long Island. <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/#!news-and-events/c1pz" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">Click here for more information</a>.</em></div>
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David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-32365534342797530492014-02-04T08:35:00.000-08:002014-02-04T08:35:25.276-08:00Four Decades Later, Finding What I Lost on Long Island<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My sister and our Weimaraner, circa 1973</td></tr>
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I’m not exactly sure when I forgave my parents for moving to East Meadow, Long Island. The year was 1971; antiwar protests raged across America, but all I knew, at the age of nine, was I missed my friends from Brooklyn. Then our dog went missing. One day Rusty, a beagle — the one friend I was allowed to bring from Brooklyn – nudged open the front door with his nose and ran away, never to return. Presumably, I thought, back to Brooklyn.</div>
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Or maybe, if he was lucky, he’d find the meadow I couldn’t find in <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Meadow,_New_York" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="East Meadow">East Meadow</a>—a meadow located east of nowhere in particular. Looking around, all I saw were detached houses flanking a maze of empty side streets. My sole consolation for getting yanked from my urban life – where you could pick up a football game just by stepping outside – had been the thought of bounding across a grassy field filled with snakes and salamanders. But that wasn’t happening.</div>
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One evening a neighbor, who’d heard of our loss, brought a stray dog to our house. He was a sleek silvery <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weimaraner" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Weimaranar">Weimaraner</a> with a threatening bark that had been hanging out in alleys, scaring the neighborhood kids. My mother had a thing for strays, put him in the backyard, and asked me if I wanted to take on the responsibility. That night, I gazed into the dog’s clear blue eyes. I named Silver under a moon that color, figuring what the heck.</div>
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Muscular and noble, Silver won me friends. He was like the <a href="http://www.schwarzenegger.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Arnold Schwarzenegger">Arnold Schwarzenegger</a> of dogs. One day a neighbor, Andy, rode up on his bicycle and seemed impressed by Silver’s muscles as I walked him around the block. We took Silver and Andy’s dog, a German Shepherd, to a large sump near my house, letting them romp unleashed.</div>
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One time after a snowstorm Andy and I tied a rope from Silver’s collar to my <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexible_flyer" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Flexible Flyer">Flexible Flyer</a> sled at the snowy bottom of the sump. I sat on the sled and grasped Silver’s leash while Andy called the dog from afar. The dog tugged fiercely, got the sled gliding fast. I braced myself against the cold wind, the world blurring past, laughing uncontrollably.</div>
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Though I was mostly oblivious to current events in 1971— Charles Manson sentenced to death, three million people killed in what was then East Pakistan – I began to ask myself: where was the world I thought I knew? How would I make my way in this strange new place? Like the rest of America, I was searching for something. I gradually discovered an answer. A hidden side to East Meadow. Neither concrete nor country, but rather somewhere satisfyingly in between. Because I had two feet, a banana-seat bicycle, and a maze of streets to get lost in — the perfect neighborhood for reckless riding. By the time I graduated to a Nishiki ten-speed, tires spitting dirt, my diploma was written all over me: one well-chipped front tooth, a scarred chin that had seen more stitches than I had bike spokes, and several pretzeled bicycle rims.<span id="more-641" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div>
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At some point, I forgave my parents for moving to East Meadow. It was partly the dogs, partly the bikes, partly the fact that parents brought home my newborn sister Shari, giving me a little friend to babysit and bond with. Possibilities opened up along East Meadow’s less traveled roads. Summers, I kept lazy pace with her tottering steps as we walked the mile down the hot tar of Powers Avenue to Veterans Memorial Park on Prospect Avenue. There, in the suspiciously warm shallows of the kiddie pool, I became co-captain of her Fisher-Price houseboat, connecting with her through play.</div>
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Pedaling the streets with fellow bicyclists, we ventured into forbidden places. Through a hole cut in a fence, we’d enter the strip of woods insulating the expansive split levels of East Meadow’s western border from Meadowbrook Parkway. We’d corral our bicycles by a near-dead brook. The water weakly murmured, but in our imaginations we thought we heard rushing rapids in the whoosh of parkway cars.</div>
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When my friends and I got our drivers’ licenses, the era of bicycle riding came to an end, signaling an end to a carefree era, of pointing our handlebars toward no place in particular. In 1979, I graduated from East Meadow High School and went away to SUNY-Binghamton. After that I returned to visit, yet drifted from the places and people that connected me to Long Island.</div>
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But while I’ve lived in several places since—Brooklyn, Vermont, and upstate New York—none gives me pause like East Meadow. I wouldn’t call what I feel nostalgia, because I often felt lonely growing up there. Yet I’m tugged back to the feeling of discovery. Back then, I tried everything. Even today, I try to relive that feeling of discovery, using East Meadow as a benchmark.</div>
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Mornings, I drive to a forest near my upstate New York house and wander the paths with my two small dogs, unleashed, like my thoughts. We go off path and crunch through undisturbed snow. Here, the low sun cuts through the bare trees, splashing paint balls across the trunks. Squirrels scurry up tall pines. Mourning doves coo. Along this path, as before, dawn arrives cold and sweet.</div>
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<em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">David Kalish is the author of the novel, </em><a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">The Opposite of Everything</a>, <em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">which will be published in March. </em><em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">His author events this spring are in Saratoga, Brooklyn, and Long Island. <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/#!news-and-events/c1pz" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">Click here for more information</a>.</em></div>
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David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-24714668882288104882014-01-30T06:08:00.000-08:002014-01-30T06:08:00.087-08:00The Incredible Adventures of My Wife's Nose<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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By day, my wife leads a normal, busy life: doctor, business owner, teacher of medical residents. But when she steps through the door at the end of the day, she pretty much turns into one of <span style="font-size: 13.333333015441895px;">the</span><span style="font-size: 13.333333015441895px;"> </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-Men" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="X-Men">X-Men</a><span style="font-size: 13.333333015441895px;"> </span><span style="font-size: 13.333333015441895px;">— with superhuman olfactory powers.</span></div>
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Just the other evening, for instance, Ingrid came home from work, stopped short in the living room, and sniffed the air. “Can’t you smell that?” she said, an edge to her voice.</div>
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“Smell what?” I said, looking up from my computer, where I was writing this blog post.</div>
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“You’re telling me you <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">don’t </i>smell it?” She glared at me.</div>
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Honestly, I smelled nothing. So she led me right to a corner of the carpet two rooms away and pointed out a faint yellowish stain. Suddenly, there came a whining from under the couch. One of our two dogs huddled there, quivering with guilt and fear, evidently having earlier emptied its little bladder on the carpet.</div>
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My wife scolds me for not noticing, as if I’m the culprit in this scenario, and hands me a paper towel roll and a bottle of stain remover. For a brief moment I feel like huddling under the couch next to the dog and whining, “But <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">I </i>didn’t pee on the rug.” But one more look from my wife, and I’m on my hands and knees, scrubbing.</div>
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Such is the power of my wife’s sense of smell. Gotta admire it. Sure, women in general have a stronger sense of smell than men. This is well documented by scholarly articles in science journals. The average guy can’t smell anything less than a pile of rotting garbage. But the average woman can detect body odor from an old man several rows away in a crowded movie theater.</div>
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My wife’s sense of smell takes this truism to new heights. She can smell a rotting apple from 100 feet away. Her heightened olfactory sensitivity stands in sharp contrast to my own. Ironically, I’m the one with the big schnoz. But it fires blanks. There could be a three-month old chicken in the fridge, and I wouldn’t necessarily smell it. She, on occasion, regularly sniffs food and tosses it out <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">before </i>it turns bad.</div>
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Impressed by my wife’s sense of smell, I suggest she join the X-Men, but she waves away this suggestion. Don’t be intimidated, I say. Sure, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolverine_(comics)" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Wolverine">Wolverine</a> has mutant fingernails that turn into claws enabling him to defeat evil mutants. And <a href="http://www.comicvine.com/storm/4005-1444/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Storm">Storm</a> has glowing eyes that trigger major weather systems, such as hurricanes and tornados, beating back the enemy.<span id="more-627" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div>
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But Ingrid also has a superhuman talent that could help improve the world. Perhaps the U.S. Border Control could hire her to sniff for drugs at the airport. She’d not only locate narcotics hidden in old socks in suitcases, but she could tell you country and date of origin, purity, and when the socks were last washed.</div>
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She smiles, thinking I’m making fun of her. But I point out similarities. All X-Men have a backstory as to how their powers originated, and my wife is no exception. Wolverine was born with the “X” gene, giving him retractable claws and incredibly fast healing powers, but his abilities were heightened by government researchers who injected his skeleton with a special alloy that made it indestructible.</div>
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My wife, for her part, was born with the “S” gene, but its potential wasn’t fully realized until she underwent morning sickness thirteen years ago and began detecting smells from several blocks away. At the time, I was undergoing chemotherapy for cancer. She said that the chemo made me smell like, well, chemicals, and more than once insisted I shower before I lay down next to her to go to sleep.</div>
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Today, even though our daughter has long since emerged from the womb, Ingrid retains much of the super-powerful sense of smell she developed back then. Still, my wife is humble about her abilities. “It’s not that my nose is stronger than other people’s,” she insists. “It’s that <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">you </i>don’t have a sense of smell.”</div>
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As she says this, we’re eating salad at a restaurant, but her face has turned long and she’s not eating and she grips hers fork tightly. “The tomatoes are rotten,” she confidently declares.</div>
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“Tastes fine to me,” I say, but chew more slowly. What if she’s right? Perhaps the rotten tomato has been placed there by <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magneto_(comics)" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Magneto">Magneto</a>, the X-Men archenemy who presides over “evil mutants” – those who use their super powers not to help society but to hurt it.</div>
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Just in case, I add a few extra shakes of Russian dressing to my salad.</div>
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<em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">David Kalish is the author of the comedic novel, </em><a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" target="_blank">The Opposite of Everything</a>, <em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">which will be published in March. <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/#!news-and-events/c1pz" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Upcoming book events">Click here</a> for info on his <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/#!news-and-events/c1pz" target="_blank">upcoming book tour</a>.</em></div>
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David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-52140551504768055902014-01-28T05:20:00.000-08:002014-01-28T05:20:57.949-08:00Honey, I Changed the Locks<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">(</i><i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Ruminator’s note: Part of an occasional series, this essay is a factual retelling of events depicted in my upcoming <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">novel</a></i>)<i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"></i></div>
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<i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"> <a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/01/Screen-shot-2014-01-27-at-9.45.24-PM1.png" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><img alt="Screen shot 2014-01-27 at 9.45.24 PM" class="alignright wp-image-612" height="200" scale="0" src="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/01/Screen-shot-2014-01-27-at-9.45.24-PM1-150x150.png" style="border: none; display: inline; float: right; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 4px 0px 12px 24px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" width="250" /></a></i><span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Of everything that’s happened to me in life, perhaps nothing upset my moral compass more than when I changed the locks on my first wife. Even now, thinking back to 1994, it’s tough to believe I did it. Or that it happened at all.</span></div>
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And yet the memory remains vivid, the scene clear as day. It’s late autumn. Evening. I pace the living room of our fourth-floor Brooklyn apartment, sweat dampening my shirt. My father sits on the sofa, watching me from beneath his head of gray hair. The shiny new lock I had installed earlier that day stares out from the front door like an all-seeing, guilt-invoking eye.</div>
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“Make the damn phone call already,” says my father, who I’ve asked over for psychological, and possibly physical support. “Just get it over with.”</div>
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I phone my wife at her mother’s, where she’s eating dinner. I tell her, in my best diplomatic voice, I’ve changed the locks on her. She could come by at a mutually convenient date to pick up her stuff.</div>
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“You changed the effing locks?” she says.</div>
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After she slams down the phone, my father asks how it went. I don’t answer, just stare out the window at the street four stories below. At the tiny cars streaking past.</div>
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It’s been a long year for me – getting diagnosed with <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medullary_thyroid_cancer" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Medullary Thyroid Cancer">thyroid cancer</a> at the same time my marriage went south. As the wound from my neck surgery healed, a wound in our relationship opened up. “It’s like a part of me is dying,” she told me after learning my cancer was incurable. Instead of touching me in a good way, her declaration of empathy seemed to me a sign of weakness. I felt less patient with things that only half-worked. I didn’t have time for half-ass anymore; I didn’t have the luxury of breaking up years down the road. She spent more time at her mother’s; I’d taken to sleeping on the living room sofa. But she’d refused to separate.</div>
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<a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/01/cop-car.jpg" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><img alt="cop car" class="alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-613" height="150" scale="0" src="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/01/cop-car-150x150.jpg" style="border: none; display: inline; float: left; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 4px 24px 12px 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" width="150" /></a>Fifteen minutes after my wife slams down the phone, my father and I hear a car squeal up. Red lights flash across the window. We simultaneously gaze down through the glass panes at the street below. Two cops step out of a squad car. My wife and mother-in-law emerge from the back of the squad car. Thinking fast, I run over to the phone and call my lawyer, who lives nearby, and tell him to come over ASAP.</div>
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After all, it was his idea. Meeting him several weeks earlier, I told him the stress of living with my wife was compromising my immune system. She’d refused to consider separation. The lawyer laid out a method he’d honed with numerous clients. He drew up a letter giving her a month to vacate the apartment. Since I’d bought the place before the marriage, which presumably was of short duration, I legally owned it and could do with it as I wished. But that night she tore up the letter in front of me. So my lawyer went to Plan B.</div>
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At first I argued against it. Honestly, locking her out felt extreme. Wrong. Went against what I’d been taught about marriage. My first wife and I had</div>
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<a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/01/Ketubah_4.jpg" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><img alt="A Ketubah" class="size-thumbnail wp-image-614" height="150" scale="0" src="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/01/Ketubah_4-150x150.jpg" style="border: none; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" width="150" /></a><div class="wp-caption-text" style="border: 0px; color: #888888; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 5px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
A Ketubah</div>
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signed a <a href="http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/477336/jewish/The-Ketubah-Marriage-Contract.htm" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Ketubah">Ketubah</a> before witnesses, a Jewish document declaring I’d take care of her through thick and thin. Still, my heart needed immediate action, and I knew she could just stay at her mother’s. If I thought too much I might chicken out, and I couldn’t endure another day of living with a woman who felt as if part of her were dying. So I OK’d Plan B.</div>
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The downstairs doorbell sounds. I buzz the four of them in and there are the thumps of many shoes ascending four flights of stairs, loudening.</div>
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Twisting the new deadbolt, I open the door.<span id="more-609" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></div>
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A pair of white cops stare back at me like disapproving bookends, on either side of a steaming mad mother-daughter team. My father stands shoulder-to-shoulder with me. For a long awkward moment the six of us linger in the doorway getting the feel of things. My heart hammers against my chest. If <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannibal" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Hannibal">Hannibal</a> could sneak forty elephants and 50,000 men across the Alps in three weeks flat to defeat the Romans, I strain to reassure myself, maybe I could do the Brooklyn version.</div>
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“<i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Ahem!” </i>the bigger cop says, gaze darting between my father and me. “Which one of you gents is Mr. Kalish?”</div>
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“We both are,” my father says, supportively.</div>
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“<i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">He’s </i>the one,” my wife says.</div>
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“I see. Mr. Kalish, did you change the locks on your wife?”</div>
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“I guess so.”</div>
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“Did you or did you not?”</div>
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“Yes, I did.”</div>
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“Sir, you can’t lock your wife out of the marital abode. You got to give her what, forty days notice?”</div>
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“Thirty,” the shorter cop corrects.</div>
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Something hard and small sinks in me. My brain pulses with a nightmare vision of living with a seriously scorned woman, stress fueling my cancer.</div>
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But just then the door buzzer sounds, like the cavalry. I run down four flights of stairs and greet my lawyer at the downstairs door.</div>
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Now, let me tell you about my lawyer. Back then he’s in his seventies, overweight, with bad knees. He meditates on the four flights of stairs. “You got an elevator here?” he asks. <a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/01/stairs.jpeg" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><img alt="stairs" class="alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-615" height="150" scale="0" src="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/01/stairs-150x150.jpeg" style="border: none; display: inline; float: right; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 4px 0px 12px 24px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" width="150" /></a></div>
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I shake my head; he grunts. Lifting one foot, he places it on the first step. He ascends like a gimpy sloth. The third step grows into the fourth. Fifth into sixth. Finally he reaches the top, gasping, and strides over to the cops in the hallway.</div>
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“I’m David’s lawyer,” he declares. “How can I help you?”</div>
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The cops reiterate I don’t have the right to lock my wife out of the apartment because “she’s still his wife.” But my lawyer cites legal code to the contrary, and hands them a document signed by a family court judge. I can’t help but admire my lawyer in that moment: the cops gaze longingly down the flights of stairs, as if dreading a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathmandu" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Kathmandu">Kathmandu</a>-sized mountain of paperwork piling up on their desks into the wee hours.</div>
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“What’s going on here?” my mother-in-law demands.</div>
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The policemen scratch their hats; the taller clears his throat. “<i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Ahem! </i>Why don’t you grab what you need for now, Mrs. Kalish? Pillow, underwear, that sort of thing. Blender. You can arrange to pick up the rest of your stuff at a later date.”</div>
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“There’s nothing I even want,” my wife says in a shaky voice. Her mother reddens, facing me. “We’ll see you in court, you son of a bitch!”</div>
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“You don’t talk to my client,” my lawyer retorts. “You talk to me!”</div>
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“We’ll see about that!” The cops’ eyes dart between my lawyer and my mother-in-law. There’s nothing more to say. My soon-to-be ex and her mother stomp down the stairs, followed by the cops.</div>
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“Congratulations,” my lawyer tells me. “You have your place back. Your peace of mind.”</div>
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I shake hands with him and my father, thanking them both, dreading my lawyer’s bill. Sure, I have my place back. But when they leave me alone in my newly bachelor apartment, it feels eerily empty, as do I.</div>
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I’m alone, truly. When my heart finally stops racing, I feel guilty about the lockout. How could I do that to my wife? I reassure myself she’ll stay at her mother’s place until she finds her own. But a few weeks later, a judge rules that I pay my wife $10,000 to compensate for the loss of her home, wiping away my last traces of survivor’s guilt.</div>
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Memory is funny. Just when you think it fits into a nice pattern – defining who you are today — you come across a part that doesn’t fit. Who you are today doesn’t seem like the same person who did that thing.</div>
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It’s as if I’m writing about someone else. And in fact, I did. For my novel, I changed the names, and twisted reality, to distance myself from the hard truth. Because sometimes we look back and think,<i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Wow, did I really do that? Must have been a twin brother.</i></div>
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Yes, I actually went through those things. But so did my twin brother.</div>
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<em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">David Kalish is the author of the novel, </em><a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">The Opposite of Everything</a>, <em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">which will be published in March. <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/#!news-and-events/c1pz" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Upcoming book events">Click here</a> for info on his upcoming book tour.</em></div>
David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-25612166486574146882014-01-23T06:17:00.000-08:002014-01-23T06:17:39.969-08:00Two decades later, a note of thanks to Ester<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">In 1994</td></tr>
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After my first marriage ended in a police showdown in 1994, and the wounds from my cancer surgery healed, I flew to Mexico for a nine-day vacation in a remote stretch of Pacific Coast. I badly needed to get away. Down there I met a 19-year-old senorita, Ester, who spoke about seven words of English, about the same as my Spanish.</div>
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How we managed to date over the next five years, during my twice-yearly vacations in Mexico, is a mystery to me I’m still sorting through. There were staggering differences between us – of age, culture, and language, not to mention 3,500 miles. Our conversations were confined to basic sentences, often with the help of a Spanish-English dictionary. But sometimes words matter less than actions. My first marriage left me feeling as if I could never love, or be loved, again; my incurable cancer made me feel it didn’t matter. But Ester, from our very first date, showed me a kindness and courage that gradually convinced me otherwise.</div>
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I met her in the developing resort region of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huatulco" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Huatulco">Huátulco</a>, at a souvenir shop where she worked. I bought some pottery there and the next-store shopkeeper playfully urged me to ask her out. What the hell, I thought. I was attracted to her exotic looks – long black hair, dark features, slim figure. She moved with Latin grace. The shopkeeper translated for me; that evening I not only took out Ester but several cousins of hers and other relatives. We went to a local disco where I made a fool of myself on the dance floor. But a few nights later her family allowed me to see her alone, and I took her to dinner at a restaurant on a beach.</div>
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I’ll never forget that evening. The moon, our candlelight. As waves whispered darkly against the shore, the waiter set in front of me an eighteen-inch long Pacific Coast lobster, its shell black and hard as metal. I felt overwhelmed, not knowing where to start. Without my asking, Ester took my plate, plunged a steak knife into the hard shell, slit it down the back, and unsheathed the succulent meat for me. A few minutes later she returned my plate to me. <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Gracias, </i>I said, staring at my lobster in the moonlight.</div>
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I wasn’t used to a woman so caring and direct. On some neglected level it felt right. I’d exited my first marriage thinking, in a misguided old-fashioned way, that the man should take care of the woman, moreso than she of him. Ester’s example reassured me of another possibility that felt closer to how things should be.</div>
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Over the next five years, I returned to Mexico at least twice a year to see Ester. When I wasn’t seeing her, I lived my busy life in New York — working long days at <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Associated_Press" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Associated Press">The Associated Press</a> as a reporter, commuting by subway. And during that time, I went through a string of far briefer relationships with American women. At first I told Ester nothing about them. With each relationship I took mental notes, and none seemed as kind or genuine as Ester. Once, she asked me if I was dating in the United States, and I admitted to it. She asked me if I planned to marry her, saying her relatives asked her all the time. She said they thought I was stringing her along. They were right. I was selfish. I am sorry now; I was going through a certain stage of life back then and if it all happened again I’d probably do it all over. That Ester continued to accept me made me feel even more accepted, though in a guilty way.</div>
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As we walked along quiet beaches in this developing resort area a few hundred miles north of Guatemala, the simplicity of our relationship helped me heal. Because we shared so few words I could focus on the simple back-and-forth of two people getting to know each other on a basic level.</div>
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She taught me, too, that people with very little can be happy. Ester didn’t know she was poor; she slept on a mattress on the dirt floor of a one-room shack and supported her young son, from a previous boyfriend, on the equivalent of $15 a day salary. Meanwhile I stayed at the $200-a-night Sheraton hotel on the ritzy resort strip a few miles away. But there’s a different sort of poverty in less developed places. Ester made do on very little, with help from relatives, not the government. She carried herself with a smile and grace.</div>
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I plotted ways to bring us closer. As a reporter at AP I took Spanish lessons at Berlitz, ostensibly to expand my job skills, but also to deepen my conversation with Ester when I visited. I wrote AP travel stories during my vacations with her, in part to better understand her culture and way of life.</div>
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As I got to know Ester, I knew Mexico better too. Part of me felt as if I were descending deeper into a hidden world. I began to understand the beauty of southern Pacific Mexico’s dry season: cacti spiraling up between trees crisped by months of cloudless, cobalt blue skies. I grew to love the silences at night – together we watched the <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">pescadoras, </i>or fisherman, out on the water, blue lights glowing.</div>
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I talked with her about the possibility of moving closer to each other; those discussions never got very far. Truth is, I feared being with her more than once in a while. Our differences would overwhelm me. We had too much working against us. Not to mention I was Jewish; Ester was a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jehovah's_Witnesses" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Jehovah's Witnesses">Jehovah’s Witness</a>, a religion that believes Jews are largely damned. Honestly, even if we spoke the same language, we wouldn’t have too much to talk about.</div>
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Though I fantasized about rearranging our lives to come together, I realized this was a fantasy. But it wasn’t until I met the woman who would become my second wife that I found the strength to break up with Ester.</div>
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Something about Ingrid, my second wife, bridged both gaps –a certain mix of caring, bluntness, honesty, and grace. She was a professional, closer to my intellect, and fluent in English.</div>
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You never know what draws two people together – and pulls them apart. One day I phoned Ester and told her I wouldn’t be seeing her again. I told her I’d met another woman and she mailed me an angry letter in Spanish, but I didn’t understand everything she wrote. Ingrid translated for me. Ester felt deeply betrayed. For totally good reason. I’d been stringing her along to get through what I needed to.</div>
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Eight years ago, Ingrid insisted we visit Ester so I could tell her I was sorry. The idea intrigued me, and I couldn’t believe Ingrid was suggesting it. I returned to Huátulco with Ingrid and my daughter Sophie, then five years old. I arranged to meet Ester at a restaurant on a beach, not far from where she’d once shelled my lobster. She was with her son, Uriel, who was now fifteen years old. Speaking in bad Spanish, referring to notes Ingrid had written in Spanish on a slip of paper, I apologized to Ester for cutting her off, stringing her along for so many years. I explained it wasn’t a reflection of who she was but rather of the hard times I was going through.</div>
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She nodded with acceptance; the five of us spent a lot of time together over the next week. Sophie chased crabs along the beach with Uriel, and they went swimming in a pool at the villa where we were staying. Ester and Ingrid chatted about kids, how life was in New York. Ester showed us new areas of Huátulco, a deserted beach where the waves were especially strong, another with good snorkling. Ester even suggested to Ingrid that we should explore Jehovah’s Witness as a religion.</div>
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We said goodbye with hugs, saying we’d keep in touch. My family hasn’t been back to see her, but I think of Ester sometimes, especially when I’m going through a rough patch – how she showed me a path I thought I’d abandoned. I am still grateful to her for that.</div>
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Gracias, Ester.</div>
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<em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: italic; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">David Kalish is the author of the novel, </em><a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">The Opposite of Everything</a>, <em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: italic; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">which will be published in March. <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/#!news-and-events/c1pz" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Upcoming book events">Click here</a> for info on his upcoming book tour.</em></div>
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David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-49820511696893086482014-01-20T04:25:00.002-08:002014-01-20T04:25:10.199-08:00Earth Under Attack By Weed Spoof!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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As you may be aware if you follow group psychology, two oddly convincing hoaxes were perpetuated on the American people in the last three-quarters of a century.</div>
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The first occurred in 1938, when <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orson_Welles" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Orson Welles">Orson Welles</a> broadcast<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_War_of_the_Worlds_(radio_drama)" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="War of the Worlds">War of the Worlds</a>, a simulated newscast of a Martian attack on our planet. Mass hysteria seized thousands of radio listeners. Residents fled homes to escape what they thought was a gas raid by aliens. Calls swamped police. People kissed loved ones goodbye, as if for the last time.</div>
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The second oddly convincing hoax happened in <a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/nipping-a-problem-in-the-marijuana-bud/543/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Nipping a Problem in the Marijuana Bud">my blog post last week</a> when I pretended to be freaking out over the wave of marijuana legalization sweeping the nation — and proposed the use of time management techniques, group therapy, and sweat-lodge retreats to keep stoners from wreaking havoc on society.</div>
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“Shouldn’t we nip the problem in the marijuana bud,” I wrote, “before stoned bureaucrats at the Social Security Administration mail out disability checks to several million deceased Americans? Before NASA sends the next multi-billion dollar <a href="http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/overview/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Mars Rover">Mars Rover</a> to Venus by accident, where it abruptly disintegrates upon entering the boiling hot atmosphere? Before a wasted president of the United States, God forbid, mistakenly presses <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">the </i>button instead of the letter ‘T’ on his keyboard?”</div>
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<span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">While my readers didn’t flee into the streets screaming, some took my spoof of pot reform seriously. They suspected I was a right-wing nut job, or at least an old fuddy-duddy — someone who feared that the addition of tens of millions inexperienced or more frequent users threatened the very fabric of American society.<span id="more-570" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></span></div>
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<span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The reaction by some of my public surprised me much as I imagine it must have surprised Orson Welles, who meant his broadcast in fun.</span></div>
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“Allow me to summarize David’s post in four words,” one reader commented: “I’m an OLLLLLLLDDDDDD MAAANNNNN.”</div>
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“Maybe the opposite of your worries would come true,” another commented. “Maybe all those people who pop pain pills illegally or drown their sorrows would turn to marijuana and be safer.”</div>
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One reader thoughtfully pointed out flaws in my proposal. “Trying to put pot smokers on a schedule would be a huge failure, as most of us lose track of time quite frequently.”</div>
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“I think you need to lay off the crack,” another succinctly wrote.</div>
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My first reaction to this sort of reaction was, OMG! Where did I steer people wrong? Because I’m frankly a pretty liberal guy. Confusing me with a member of the Tea Party is like saying Al Gore drives a<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hummer" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Hummer">Hummer</a>. (On the positive side, my post drew more than 700 readers over two days — among my highest two-day totals since I started blogging in September).</div>
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Surely, I’d dropped enough clues that my piece was spoof. The image I <a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/01/3680605252_53a381ef93_z.jpg" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><img alt="3680605252_53a381ef93_z" class=" wp-image-546 alignleft" height="108" scale="0" src="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/wp-content/blogs.dir/2641/files/2014/01/3680605252_53a381ef93_z-150x150.jpg" style="border: none; display: inline; float: left; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 4px 24px 12px 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" width="95" /></a>chose was a satirical poster on the dangers of marijuana, a “weed with roots in hell”: “Weird orgies.” “Wild parties.” “Unleashed passion.”</div>
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“Let’s apply time-management techniques and team-building to control a potentially chaotic situation,” I wrote as a caption.</div>
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Then again, Orson Welles also left clues that his fictional presentation wasn’t serious — evidently not enough, like mine. His War of the Worlds aired a disclaimer at the beginning, but many people tuned in too late to hear it. Compounding the realism, the episode was presented as a series of simulated news bulletins, and the show had no commercials. During the course of the show regular programming “breaks down” as the studio seems to struggle with casualty updates, firefighting, and the declaration of martial law by New Jersey state militia.</div>
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My own mistake, a writer-friend of mine pointed out, was that the first few paragraphs of my satire sounded too serious in tone. So some readers who made it that far figured, maybe, just maybe, this guy<i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">is </i>a conservative nut-job.</div>
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“You’re kidding right?” one reader commented. “I mean, is this satire? Because nowadays, you never know. Some of the ideas people come up with these days are crazier than the satire of a few decades ago.”</div>
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I couldn’t have said it better.</div>
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<em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">David Kalish is the author of the comedic novel, </em><a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">The Opposite of Everything</a>, <em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">which will be published in March. <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/#!news-and-events/c1pz" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Upcoming book events">Click here</a> for info on his book tour.</em></div>
David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8458672516384880182.post-85721658318956601672014-01-16T05:30:00.000-08:002014-01-16T05:30:06.294-08:00How a Show About Nothing Taught Me Something, Two Decades Later<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-22BIgpHVcWHSgJZ_E5-BmAU2zxp2m7hh7QwEil8c-q3OBH2idl_hTFMyYSRVekKRUqbE0cGehIkna3SHhGraarF6SxJZ5bBrUd4S0-fUNLtqNw4LFzW3PrTgLjr_SLsvf_pOzUoS-TY/s1600/Seinfeld.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-22BIgpHVcWHSgJZ_E5-BmAU2zxp2m7hh7QwEil8c-q3OBH2idl_hTFMyYSRVekKRUqbE0cGehIkna3SHhGraarF6SxJZ5bBrUd4S0-fUNLtqNw4LFzW3PrTgLjr_SLsvf_pOzUoS-TY/s1600/Seinfeld.png" height="138" width="320" /></a></div>
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I’m not a big TV watcher, but in the 1990s I was hooked on <a href="https://www.facebook.com/seinfeld" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Seinfeld</a>, the classic sitcom featuring Jerry, George, Elaine and Kramer. As I sat in bed splitting my sides, I hardly suspected the show about nothing would help me frame the theme for my novel, <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">The Opposite of Everything</a></i>, nearly two decades later.</div>
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One episode in particular, “<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Opposite" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">The Opposite</a>,” stayed with me long after it aired in 1994.</div>
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In it, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Costanza" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">George Costanza</a> is so fed up with life he resolves to do the complete opposite of what came normally. He orders the opposite of his normal lunch, and introduces himself to a beautiful woman who happens to order the same lunch, saying “My name is George. I’m unemployed and I live with my parents.” To his surprise, she is impressed and agrees to date him.</div>
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George explains his transformation to Jerry:</div>
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<i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">It became very clear to me sitting out there today, that every decision I’ve ever made, in my entire life, has been wrong. My life is the complete opposite of everything I want it to be. Every instinct I have, in every aspect of life, be it something to wear, something to eat … It’s all been wrong.</i></div>
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The “opposite” concept appealed to me as a novelist on several levels.</div>
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Looking back on the 1990s, I sometimes felt as hapless as George. I was a busy New York City journalist struggling through stress at work, health problems, and a failed marriage. So when I sat down to write my book, long after Seinfeld went into repeats, I drew on the opposite theme for inspiration. My struggle to write the book echoed the life it depicted. At times, I wanted to run away from both. Instead I fictionalized the trauma, viewing my life through a contrarian lens. The further I distanced myself it, the less I felt like a victim.</div>
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Like George, my main character, <a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/davidkalish/a-conversation-with-my-main-character/536/" target="_blank">Daniel Plotnick</a>, partly based on me, resolves to do the opposite of everything that hurt him. Plotnick’s philosophy gels after his father accidentally pushes him off the GW Bridge:</div>
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“While the opposite concept was not new to him, never before had it resounded so emphatically, as he lay in a hospital bed, lucky to have survived at all. He resolved to go when the proverbial light was red. Stop on green. Eat chocolate ice cream when he craved vanilla. Choose a woman not at all like his ex-wife. Never go to the Catskills again—or talk with his father.”</div>
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Deciding to get remarried, he plots to make his second wedding the perfect opposite of his first. He cancels the caterer, corrals guests to cook, and replaces the priest with Buddhist monks. But his contrarian strategy collapses when he undergoes chemotherapy during his wife’s pregnancy.</div>
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Their side effects scarily converge. They both turn queasy. He loses hair; she grows hair in new places. Something grows inside each of them. Ultimately, the birth of their daughter reaffirms Plotnick’s faith in a more benign growth — the one to be nurtured with love and caring.</div>
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<em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">David Kalish’s comedic novel, </em><a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="The Opposite of Everything">The Opposite of Everything</a><em style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">, will be published in March. For more info on upcoming book events, <a href="http://www.davidkalishwriter.com/#!news-and-events/c1pz" style="border: 0px; color: #104a8e; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; font-style: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank" title="Book store events">click here</a>.</em></div>
David Kalishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11939570517893378528noreply@blogger.com0