Beer: Grendel’s Ale
Brewer: Grendel’s Den
Source: Draft
Rating: ** (6.5 of 10)
Comments: This is the house tap at the Harvard Square bar & restaurant although I doubt it is brewed on the premises, there is no note of who brews it for Grendel’s. It’s a deep, golden beer with a firm head that has a nice creamy, malty flavor. I appreciate it for being a cheap draft to go with a happy hour meal.
Month: January 2014
Remembering Pete Seeger
Pete Seeger died on Monday night. He is perhaps my greatest hero as I’ve long been inspired by his music and activism. His long life was a tireless effort to right wrongs and to bring people together in peace. He leaves the world a better place than he found it. And if you’re pessimistic about the world today, just imagine what it would be like without there ever being a Pete Seeger. Among the many things he accomplished in his 94 years, Pete:
- agitated for the rights of the poor and working people by organizing labor
- stood up for American civil liberties before the House Un-American Activities Committee
- participated in the Civil Rights movement
- lead a generation in the Vietnam anti-war movement
- in the vanguard the environmental efforts to clean up the Hudson River aboard the sloop Clearwater
- inspired millions that they could change the world by joining together in song
- continued as an activist through his final years, supporting the Occupy movement
I don’t recall when I first heard of Pete Seeger. His music was part of my childhood. He even appeared on Sesame Street. I remember watching the movie Alice’s Restaurant some time in my teens and not recognizing him until my mom told me who he was. Probably what really got it started for me was his performance leading a singalong of “This Land Is Your Land” on the Folkways: A Vision Shared tribute album. Through high school and college and beyond, I picked up some albums, read some books by and about him, and tried to teach myself banjo using his book. On two occasions, I was fortunate enough to see him perform in person. Once in 1995 with Arlo Guthrie at Wolf Trap in Virginia, and then again at Clearwater’s Great Hudson River Revival in 2002.
It’s kind of the whole point of Pete Seeger that there are no “Pete Seeger songs.” Sure, he got writing credit on some songs but he was the first to admit that he stole bits and pieces from other songs and cobbled them together to make something new. And he wanted you to to take pieces of his song and make something else. And share it with everyone. At his famous Carnegie Hall show, one entire set is Pete promoting the songs of new, young musicians (and Malvina Reynolds who was young at heart). The other set was the music of the Civil Rights movement. The whole point of the entire show was other people’s music and the community of music as he got the audience at Carnegie Hall singing along as well as many who’ve listened to that album over the years.
Nevertheless, one can’t help but think of the best Pete Seeger songs on this occasion. His music is a gift he leaves behind, both through the many recordings he made as well as being a living link between the roots of American music and the many artists he inspired and supported over the years. I looked in my iTunes and discovered that I have 215 Pete Seeger recordings! Of those, his most essential albums are We Shall Overcome (a live recording of his historic Carnegie Hall concert in 1963) and Singalong: Sanders Theatre, 1980 (perhaps the quintessential concert recording as summed up in the article “Pete Seeger And The Public Choir “). I perhaps felt closest to Pete when I performed with the Revels at Sanders Theatre and tried my best to do my part to engage the entire house.
Below are a handful of the most meaningful Pete Seeger songs, followed by rembrances collected all over the net.
“If I Had a Hammer”
“We Shall Overcome”
“Waist Deep in the Big Muddy”
“Old Devil Time”
“Abiyoyo” from Reading Room
“Sailing Down this Golden River” performed by Sarah Lee Guthrie
“This Land is Your Land”
WBUR: Pete Seeger And The Public Choir
“Pete Seeger understood something fundamental about humans and music, which is that many people can’t sing on key, but all crowds can. Even without rehearsal, public choirs can be stunning to listen to and thrilling to be part of. And he believed that everyone should do it, that people should retain the ability to get in a room and sing, because it was good for you, and because it taught people to pitch in and be brave.”
WGBH: Pete Seeger Had A ‘Soft Spot For Boston And Cambridge’ by Bob Seay
American Songwriter: American Icons: Pete Seeger
The Nation: Pete Seeger: This Man Surrounded Hate and Forced it to Surrender
“Pete Seeger outlasted the bastards.
But he did so much more than that. He showed us how to do our time with grace, with a sense of history and honor, with a progressive vision for the ages and a determination to embrace the next great cause because the good fight is never finished. It’s just waiting for a singer to remind usthat “the world would never amount to a hill of beans if people didn’t use their imaginations to think of the impossible.”
Smithsonian Folkways: A Tribute to Pete Seeger (1919-2014)
Bill Moyers: Remembering Activist and Folk Singer Pete Seeger
As recently as 2011, Seeger, a veteran of the labor, peace and civil rights movements, led an Occupy Wall Street protest through Manhattan. “Be wary of great leaders,” he said two days after the march. “Hope that there are many, many small leaders.”
Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub: Farewell, Pete Seeger
He told a story about showing up at a PTA meeting in Beacon to talk on some issue, and some local guy told Pete that Beacon didn’t need outsiders telling them what to do. This hurt Pete, since he’d been living in Beacon at that time for more than 30 years, in the house he built by hand. Pete told me that he realized a world reputation doesn’t count for much if you can’t use it to make things better in your home town.The “local project?” He said he wanted to get an old sloop, and sail the Hudson River signing to get people to clean it up.
WBUR: Pete Seeger, Folk Music Icon and Activist, Dies at 94
“For all of his social activism, Seeger said more than once that if he had done nothing more than write his slim book How to Play the Five String Banjo, his life’s work would have been complete. …
“If Pete Seeger didn’t save the world, he certainly did change the lives of millions of people by leading them to sing, to take action and to at least consider his dream of what society could be.”
The Atlantic: Pete Seeger and the American Soul
His critics often called Pete Seeger anti-American. I think the opposite was true. I think he loved America so much that he was particularly offended and disappointed when it strayed, as it so often has, from the noble ideals upon which it was founded. I don’t think that feeling, or the protests it engendered, were anti-American. I think they were wholly, unabashedly American.
Feministing: RIP Pete Seeger
Q with Jian Ghomeshi: Remembering Pete Seeger (1919-2014)
On Point with Tom Ashbrook: The World According to Pete Seeger: A Remembrance
The Atlantic: ‘This Machine Surrounds Hate and Forces It to Surrender’
How did Seeger take an instrument—one with no inherent properties of justice, as evidenced by its history—and assign it a new cultural value?
There is no way to answer this but to observe the rarity of a force like Pete Seeger upon the Earth.
Sure, the banjo has a jaunty, inviting sound. Sure, it can be played in a variety of ways, making it suitable for a range of musical genres. But these qualities did not prevent it from being a prop of racist entertainment. They did not make it a symbol of community. They did not transform it into a “machine [that] surrounds hate and forces it to surrender.”
That was the work of man. One man, really.
Arlo Guthrie’s Facebook status
“Well, of course he passed away!” I’m telling everyone this morning. “But that doesn’t mean he’s gone.”
Phil Sandifer: Pete Seeger (1919-2014)
Later in the set, it started to rain just a bit. Only a few drops – nothing major. But a couple people had umbrellas and popped them open, at which point Seeger stopped playing and calmly explained that he would not be continuing until the people who were under the tree and thus still dry passed their umbrellas to the people not under the tree so that everybody could be dry.
It remains the only time I am aware of in which an artist has actually created, however momentarily, a socialist utopia.
Related Posts:
Write a Letter to Help Fix Cambridge Street
[cross-posted from my Boston Bike Commuter blog]
Wednesday is the deadline to help fix Cambridge Street by signing Fix Cambridge Street‘s community letter to MassDOT at http://tinyurl.com/CambridgeStreet.
Please also send an email to dot.feedback.highway@state.ma.us with your own comments (mention “Project File # 606376”).
Keep up with news on Facebook and Twitter.
My letter to MassDOT is below.
January 27, 2014
Richard Davey, Secretary and Chief Executive Officer
Frank DePaola, Administrator, Highway Division
Massachusetts Department of Transportation
10 Park Plaza,
Boston, MA 02114
RE: Project #606376 Cambridge Street bridge over I-90, Allston, Boston
Dear Secretary Davey and Administrator DePaolo:
I’m writing in regards to the Cambridge Street Overpass in Allston, Project #606376. I appreciate that in recent public meetings and plans that community concerns have been incorporated onto the Cambridge Street renovations. However, the street design is still geared toward high-speed / high-volume motor vehicle traffic, increasing the risks for bicyclists and pedestrians.
I work in Allston and live in Jamaica Plain, and whenever possible I prefer to commute by work. Any route I take to work must cross the Massachusetts Turnpike, but crossings are few and far between with the majority of them designed almost exclusively for automotive traffic with wide lanes and high speeds (this includes Cambridge Street, as well as Carlton/Mounfort St, Beacon St, and Charlesgate). These crossings are intimidating to bicyclists at best and downright dangerous at worst. While the Cambridge Street crossing is the most direct route, I often go miles out-of-the-way to Massachusetts Avenue to avoid the stress and risks of biking on Cambridge Street.
With this in mind, and the concerns of Allston community members, bicyclists, and pedestrians, I would like to encourage the following modifications to encourage the goal of slowing automotive traffic speed and creating a safer street for pedestrians and bicyclists:
- Do not install a median fence.
- Reallocate excess space from roadway to bicyclists and pedestrians
- The new pedestrian crossing should use a standard red/yellow/green traffic signal
- Plant landscaping in the median between the Mansfield Crosswalk & Lincoln Street.
- Use permanent coloring to distinguish the sidewalk and cycletrack
Thank you for your consideration and attention to my concerns and those of others who wish to transform Cambridge Street into a safe, accessible and attractive gateway to the Allston community. Working together we can the project to remake Cambridge Street something we can all be proud of.
Book Review: Every Day by David Levithan
Author: David Levithan
Title: Every Day
Publication Info: [New York] : Listening Library, 2012.
ISBN: 9780449015230
Summary/Review:
This novel is told from the perspective of a person – or perhaps just a consciousness – named A who awakes each morning occupying the body of a different person. Over the years, A has come up with practices and ethics to not interfere in the lives of the bodies occupied, but this all changes at the age of 16 when A becomes obsessed with a girl named Rhiannon. A reveals the secret identity to Rhiannon and tries to find some way to maintain a relationship. Along the way we get sympathetic vignettes glimpsing into the lives of several teenagers each facing their own joys and struggles. Levithan’s writing is well-done and the story works both as ripping good yarn and as metaphor for the teenagers’ search for identity.
Recommended books: The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger and Fade by Robert Cormier.
Rating: ****
Book Review: A Tear at the Edge of Creation by Marcelo Gleiser
Author: Marcelo Gleiser
Title: A Tear at the Edge of Creation
Publication Info: New York, NY : Free Press, 2010.
ISBN: 1439108323
Summary/Review:
Gleiser’s work is an attempt to offer an alternate route to the scientific notions of Grand Unifying Theories and symmetry in nature with the idea that the truth may be found in an asymmetric universe. Gleiser sums up the history of cosmology (bringing me up to date since it’s been 20 years since my college course in cosmology) in easy-to-understand language. It’s a good accessible primer in physics (with some chemistry and biology as well) with an interesting central thesis on the manner in which humans will continue to learn about the universe.
Favorite Passages:
“The loss of elegance is the gain of generality. Our cosmos does not need perfection to exist.”
“If we can never know all there is to know, we will always have an element of uncertainty about the natural world. There is no final unification to be attained, only better models to describe the physical reality we can measure. Even as we improve our tools and increase our knowledge, we also expand the base of our ignorance: the farther we can see the more there is to see. As a consequence, it is impossible to contemplate a point in history when we will know all there is to know.”
Recommended books: The Tao of Physics by Fritjof Capra, Six Easy Pieces by Richard Feynman, and 13 Things That Don’t Make Sense by Michael Brooks
Rating: ***
A Tour of Massachusetts’ Author-Illustrators
I recently had the epiphany that a great number of 20th-century author-illustrators (chiefly of children’s books) have Massachusetts connections. Not only that, but many of them have some sort of landmark in the Commonwealth. So here’s a tour of seven author-illustrators
Eric Carle – The Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art – Amherst, MA
The creator of The Very Hungry Caterpillar lived in Northampton, MA for more than 30 years and this unique museum of picture book art is located in nearby Amherst.
Dr. Seuss (Theodore Geisel) – Dr. Seuss National Memorial Sculpture Garden – Springfield, MA
Geisel was born in Springfield, immortalizing that city’s Mulberry Street in the book And To Think I Saw It On Mulberry Street!
Edward Gorey – The Edward Gorey House – Yarmouth Port, MA
The only artist in this list not associated with children’s books, although that doesn’t mean children can’t read them. The Gashlycrumb Tinies would make a good bedtime story. The Cape Cod house where he lived his later years is now a museum.
Robert McCloskey – Make Way For Ducklings statues – Boston, MA
McCloskey studied at the Vesper George Art School in Boston in the 1930s and the time spent in the Public Garden feeding the ducklings inspired his creation of Make Way For Ducklings. The book is now the official children’s book of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and Nancy Schön’s statues in the Public Garden are always a hit with children.
H.A. Rey & Margret Rey – The Curious George Store – Cambridge, MA
The creators of Curious George moved to Cambridge in 1963 and nearby their former home in Harvard Square is the location of the world’s only Curious George store.
Richard Scarry – Boston, MA
Scarry was born in Boston in 1919, which may have been the inspiration for Busytown and notoriously bad driving of Scarry’s characters. Sadly, I haven’t been able to locate a landmark for Scarry in Boston, but here’s an entertaining literary travel story.
I’ve personally only been to the Boston and Cambridge sites on this list, but a wider tour of the Commonwealth is on order.
Book Review: The Lowland by Jhumpa Lahiri
Author: Jhumpa Lahiri
Title: The Lowland
Publication Info: Knopf (2013)
ISBN: 9780385367431
Summary/Review:
Lahiri’s novel, like many of her works, deals with Indian expatriates assimilating to life in the United States and coming to terms with their past in India. The Lowland tells the story of two brothers Subhash and Udayan. While Subash leaves for America to study in Rhode Island, Udayan is drawn to the Maoist Naxalite movement. The Lowland is also about a woman named Gauri who is connected to both brothers.
A big spoiler here, but after Udayan is killed by the police, Subhash marries the pregnant Gauri and takes her to Rhode Island to help her escape living with her oppressive in-laws. The marriage built on expediency cannot sustain and the desires of Subhash and Gauri to pursue their own goals and carry on in their lives with the memory of Udayan drive the conflict of the narrative. It is in many ways a quiet story with a lot of the passions tempered under placid exteriors and one that offers a sympathetic but not nonjudgmental look at each of the characters.
Rating: ***
Beer Review: The Tap Snowbound English Old Ale
Beer: Snowbound English Old Ale
Brewer: The Tap Brewing Company
Source: 22 oz. bottle
Rating: ** (6.5 of 10)
Comments: This beer is designed for sipping in front of a fire in a pub on a cold winter’s eve, and it fills this role well. It’s a dark brown beer, with a thin head, and lots of bubbles. The aroma is malty with a red wine scent. The taste is very malty with hints of burnt chocolate and raisins. The beer leaves light lacing on the glass.
Budget Cuts for Boston Public Schools?
Last night at the Parent Council at my son’s elementary school in Jamaica Plain, it was announced the Boston Public Schools are requesting that schools prepare for drastic budget cuts. It’s been reported that these cuts will be for as much as 20% of the current budget. The immediate effects of such cuts to my son’s school and to other schools in the city will be loss of staff, Playworks, learning interventions, the learning center, and even shortening the school day. Public schools are already making do with limited budgets while being assailed from all sides in political battles, so further cuts will have drastic consequences to providing quality innovative education to all children in the city. So far there has been coverage on Universal Hub (http://www.universalhub.com/2014/bps-schools-told-prepare-cuts) and social media, but the news has not been disseminated through traditional media.
If you live in Boston and value public education, please join me in the following steps:
- Attend a Boston School Committee meeting. The schedule is here: http://www.bostonpublicschools.org/Page/253
- Write a letter expressing your concern to BPS Superintendent McDonough (superintendent@bostonpublicschools.org and jmcdonough@bostonpublicschools.org) ,Mayor Marty Walsh (mayor@cityofboston.gov), and the School Committee (moneill2@bostonpublicschools.org, cmartinez6@bostonpublicschools.org, mcampbell5@boston.k12.ma.us, hcoleman2@bostonpublicschools.org, ggroover@bostonpublicschools.org, mloconto@bostonpublicschools.org, mmckenna4@bostonpublicschools.org). Feel free to copy other city leaders and local media.
- Share your thoughts on Twitter to https://twitter.com/bostonschools and https://twitter.com/marty_walsh. Use the hashtag #bospoli to draw attention to your tweet! And retweet others in our community).
- Share your thoughts on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/VoteMartyWalsh?fref=ts and https://www.facebook.com/bostonschools?fref=ts
- Do whatever else you can to share this news with others, make your feelings known, and in general make a big noise to let the BPS know that we will not accept cuts to our schools.
Below is the content of the email sent to the Mayor and Superintendent. Please feel free to crib what you like for your own message. It does not have to long, or eloquent. Just write to make sure that your thoughts are heard.
I am discouraged to learn that Boston Public Schools are being instructed to make severe cuts to their budgets for the upcoming school year. It’s been reported that cuts of up to 20% are being requested. My son Peter, six years old, is a Kindergarten 2 scholar at the Boston Teachers Union School in Jamaica Plain. At his school, such drastic cuts will lead to the loss of staff, Playworks, learning interventions, the learning center, and even the length of our school day being shortened. This is an innovative school striving to provide equitable education to the children of our city, but it cannot do so without the proper finances and resources. Like many, if not all, public schools in Boston, the BTU School is already struggling to make do on limited resources. I believe further cuts to our schools’ budgets will have drastic consequences
Public education is something I value highly. I believe quality education for all children regardless of their economic, social, or racial background is one of the most important things our community and government provides. I also believe in holding accountable leaders of the schools and the city to follow through on this promise to our children. The city of Boston cannot prosper without a thriving working class and middle class who feel that their children can get a quality public education.
The Boston Public Schools have proclamations that our schools are high-performing, but this will be possible to maintain without the proper funding and resources. Mayor Walsh declared “I will not cut back on the education budget,” (Boston Herald, 12/5/2013), and I expect him to hold to that promise. I ask of all the leaders of our schools and city to work toward restoring the budge to previous levels, and, hey perhaps even a little bit more to help increase quality, innovative education in Boston. Our schools should be the first priority for our city, our children, and our future.
Book Review: Gregor and the Curse of the Warmbloods by Suzanne Collins
Author: Suzanne Collins
Title: Gregor and the Curse of the Warmbloods
Publication Info: [New York, N.Y.] : Listening Library, 2005.
ISBN: 9780739353950
Summary/Review:
The third volume of The Underland Chronicles is another ripping yarn but also one where the quest is really a metaphor. Revelations of the Underland’s past are made and the morality of the human’s position in Underland society is questioned. Gregor’s family also become a greater part of the story, as Gregor’s mother visits the Underland for the first time and also succumbs to the plague that afflicts the mammals of the Underland. It’s great that Collins can maintain the high quality of adventure while unfolding the ongoing plot of the chronicles.
Favorite Passages:
Recommended books:
Rating: ****1/2
Panorama of the Mountains 