It's good to see you. Come on in, leave your shoes in the hallway, we've got fire on the stove preparing lunch for later. In the meantime, browse the bookshelves and plunk down on the sofa with one, or pick out some tunes from the music library or come in to the kitchen to help with the cooking. Our special blend of tea is steeping and will be right up.

Make yourself at home...

I wrote this three years ago this past Spring. There were no kids on the horizon. Was just still burning with the residual feeling of a community, through the rebellion, education and universality that came from Dreaming in Public while at Occupy. After Occupy I'd look for hope and comrades any-and-every-where.

There on a late Spring day it was comforting and fulfilling to just connect with myself and a sense of home, through meeting three young teenagers in the park...

"To the Next Generation: Forgive Yourselves"

When I got up in the early afternoon it was the kind of day I relish. Overcast, quiet and so inviting. It calms something in me, allows me to connect with the stuff I love, while being slightly melancholy. I was ready to bound out of the house to enjoy the park.

There the world seemed held in check by a delightful, blanketed overcast grey canopy, which had the effect of tucking us cozily in. There was a slight drizzly mist, with only a few people out. Best of all, every thing was shades of that verdant green, the grass, leaves and vegetation all sharply pronounced in washed vitality against the sullen sky. The trees seems like long lost friends who you’ve been neglecting. And of course, it's all the more enjoyable because the douchebags are kept at bay.

I began packing appropriately for the trek acorss the street. While the espresso was on the stovetop, I strummed the guitar in the kitchen until it percolated and had the computer plugged in to recharge the battery.

Settled on a park bench along a curved part of the walkway. There, I comfortably strummed a little, with a small Japanese sake cup filled with espresso to my right, then answered a couple of emails and read a bit. Mostly though I couldn't resist just basking in the Hobbit-like world that had transformed the park and gazed about contentedly. Was at total peace with the world, pensive, open and slightly euphoric with it all.

I recorded a short video of a guitar theme that came to me for a recently-departed college buddy, and sent it to a good friend who was his best friend, but the phone wouldn’t allow a file of that size. Checked Twitter and saw a response from someone apparently in the UK who retweeted my #Justice4Cecily tweet, something regarding the NYPD thugs who brutalized her and then lied about it, which was after she announced that she would not be vacationing in America because of the horrifying injustice she had experienced. Her Twitter account says she's the biographer of some political figure, which upon further scrutiny of it looks to be a satirical story. Felt good to have connected on Twitter with high profile activists, with people like actor Matthew Modine, whose short film "Jesus Was A Commie" is a must-see, and a politically undaunted and active satirist as Cecily McMillan.

Few people were out. Some runners, a couple of jaunty, hair-pulled-up, blonde, corporate types and the odd older guy walking by.

So it was noticeable when a group of three adolescents walked by, two boys and a girl. I didn’t catch enough of them to form an immediate impression but did gather something vague. I recognized slightly a familiar vibe, gait, buoyancy, mischief, sense of adventure, and that other thing that makes me think of myself and the people I was attracted to at that age and hung around with. It was a combination of restrained wonder that the school day often squelched in its rote teachings and heavy-handed discipline, an overwhelming desire to tip the scales from those authoritarian constraints to allow for one’s young self to flourish and explore, which often leads to a playfulness both uninhibited but more often awkward and a mischievous simply borne out of natural questioning and interest.

What they possessed overall was that something I keep trying to understand, because it was in me and those kinds of kids I hung around with, that sort of old soul, adultness before our time. More to the point, perhaps, would be that there was a sense of rebellion against a world of teachers and parents, who ironically knew better in wanting to keep that innocence of childhood there for you for a little while longer. But we were a breed discontent with it all, desperate instead to rush headlong into unlocking all those mysteries of music, sex, inebriation, and individuality.

I smiled and thought back to that time 35 years ago to some really fun and formative days amidst the dark brooding and questioning of adolescence.

There they were, headed for the massive trusses of the bridge, which serve as the ultimate, slightly dangerous, perfect teenage hangout spot to contemplate their seemingly overwhelming travails, or smoke a joint and laugh, or both.

I got back to doing what I was doing, answering a couple of emails and reading a little more, and fumbling around my learner's spot on the guitar.

Familiar teenage shouts, a laugh and general carrying-on ringing out brought my attention back their way. There was something going on by one of the trees that had them excited. The girl shrieked, the darker boy was warning of something to the others and the longer-haired boy just seemed to laugh at it all.

When that was through I looked back and I recognized a scene I had been in many times. The caring or adoring girl was gently pulling back the boy’s hair to put it into a ponytail, while his friend waited by patiently. They all seemed to be comfortable and relaxed in each other’s company. And I thought of the many times I basked in similar warmth, a friend by my side and a girlfriend doting on me. Familiar terrain.

They began to walk in my direction. I continued to play, wondering if they’d be like teenagers of today and pay me no mind as a relic of a foregone time they knew little about and cared even less about. So I was surprised when I noticed the longer-haired boy, who had the kind of wavy, floppy style kids in my Catholic high school had, was wearing a Guns N Roses t-shirt, the darker, more reserved boy had on the Shepard Fairy “Disobey” shirt and a long blond-haired, slightly heavy and sweet girl with open eyes.

Just as they walked by the GNR kid looked back and said, “can you play Stairway To Heaven?” The déjà vu of it all clicked in and brought me right back to those days. I retorted the challenge by saying, “That’s too hard for me. But I can maybe play Patience,” referencing his t-shirt. They slowed their pace respectfully and he said, “ok, maybe next time.”

The small interaction was just enough to lift my spirits. They were of the abysmal music generation, but they were most certainly not of it. It almost felt like these kids were plucked out of my past and delivered onto the pathway of Astoria Park, just so I wouldn’t lose faith in the younger generation’s desire and passion for R&R. These were literally like kids from the 1970’s, but here today.

A little while later I saw that they were headed back my way, possibly having downed munchies at the corner deli. As I continued strumming in my rather clumsy way they came upon me and stopped in a half circle. The long-haired boy in front of me, the other one to his left and the girl took up on the bench next to mine, cuddled up in that way girls of that age who like music do and rocked along softly, as if she were a 60’s kid and not born in the 21st century.

He asked what else I knew, and since I had been playing the chords of “Down By The River,” told him, Neil Young. “Do you know him?” Yeah, they said. I was surprised. I asked what kind of music they liked, and at first they said similar things. Curious and mesmerized, I thought to broach some bigger topics, the obvious ones to me. “How do you guys find out about music?” and looked in the girls direction. They were all respectful and waited their turn. She said she had older siblings and found out that way, through cd’s and Itunes I surmised. They talked about Foo Fighters, which led to a talk about Dave Grohl, and then into Nirvana, from which he mentioned Them Crooked Vultures and I said Queens of the Stone Age. Said for new artists I liked Joanna Newsome, to which the girl, who I was expecting would reply in the affirmative, instead said her Dad did too. The GNR kid said his Dad had turned him on to stuff. So, are you guys Zeppelin fans? Yes! “What about Deep Purple?” he said. Yes, I love them too. He mentioned Rainbow and Dio, all in the same family tree. He was, as I had thought previously when watching him caressed by the girl, similar to how I was at that age - a serious, obsessed music fan. He liked the first Zeppelin album, remarking how great "Good Times Bad Times" was and commenting on the drumming. I regaled them with stories of seeing GNR, Black Sabbath, and talked about how magical Zeppelin was, after he saying he thought Zep might have stolen a lot of their stuff, incorrectly citing Black Dog. It was as if we were peers, hanging out after school and deepening our friendships, through music. Just as I did at their age.

They told me that in the middle of the park, and pointing out to where a couple of people were at that moment, that there was a dead duck there. That was what the girl had shrieked about before. I asked if they were sure it was a duck, and not a pigeon or a seagull. They said no, it was a duck, and it was black. "Wow," I said. "I’ve never seen a duck in this park before. And a black one. I have, however, seen a hawk once swoop down and grab a pigeon and take it up into a tree." “A hawk?! Really?,” they said. "Yeah man, right in the great lawn middle of the park."

At some point I asked where they went to school and what grade they were in. Unsurprisingly they fit the mold I had been fitting in my mind and confirmed it was 8th. I smiled deeply and said it was my favorite year. And then got pensive and even more open-hearted.

“Those were my favorite days. In fact I still feel like I’m fourteen. There’s a lot of expectations for you now, but don’t let that trouble you. You’re finding your individuality, and your parents and teachers want to control you. It’s ok; they’re just trying to figure things out also. They’re doing the best the can. But just remember: forgive yourselves.”

The quieter boy began to smile and open up. He thanked me. “I wish I could have exactly what you said on a plaque.” I wasn’t sure for what, for school or for your parents to see? “For my bedroom,” he said.

We hung around for some time longer. A weird bond seemed present. I seemed able to look at myself, transported back in time to 1979, yet fully in the moment, hanging out with teenagers in 2014. The mutual recognition of kindred spirits, curiosity and rebelliousness. Together as one. Me of them. They of me.

“Do you play?” I asked of the boy. He said yes, and seemed happy of the invitation as I offered him the guitar. He played wonderfully, and went into a medley of Stevie Ray Vaughn blues, a song that I thought was Traffic (which he said was the Black Keys) and then into the proverbial Stairway, bringing it forward in another generation. His fingers moved around showing a dexterity, demonstrating a passion for the music I so loved at that age too. He responded that he had been playing since he was nine years old, five years. He was better than the guys I was playing with at that age. I told him I just started trying to teach myself to play two years ago because I had been a lifelong drummer and figured it was time to at least learn a few chords.

We lamented as one how it didn’t seem as if there was much reverence for people who actually played music anymore. I told them that they should not to fret, however. That R&R and playing music will always be here. Then encouraged the guitar playing kid to start his own band, which I told him is what I did at the same age. I suggested places to play like we did, telling them how we’d play birthday parties, graduations, church basements and talent shows. They liked hearing those possibilities but seemed to wonder if that was even feasible. I tried to convince them it was.

I hope to see my new friends some time soon. I’ll help bring their equipment in of they get a show, or even offer to drive them there, or lend them some records. Or just a sympathetic ear.

Last year the Pope come out and essentially told people to forgive themselves for having had an abortion. I thought that was a pretty cool, radical and the right thing to do. There's enough misery and self-loathing one goes through having felt there was little choice at the time, for whatever their personal reasons were.

Christianity has been Big Business for a long time. The basic tenets, which are wonderful and universal, have been contorted out of their original meaning and are nowhere to be found among these pretenders. There are no true Christians left, or very, very few. If only 8-12% of them showed up, we'd have a different world literally overnight.

As Kurt Vonnegut wrote of the hypocrisy at the heart of America's religion,

For some reason, the most vocal Christians among us never mention the Beatitudes.

But, often with tears in their eyes, the demand that the Ten Commandments be posted in public buildings. And of course, that's Moses, not Jesus. I haven't heard one of them demand that the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes, be posted anywhere.

"Blessed are the merciful" in a courtroom?

"Blessed are the peacemakers" in the Pentagon?

Give me a break!”

Those kids don't need a confessional booth, or to "say penance," or to be laden with feelings of guilt by the authorities over them, or by an old man in the sky who knows every thing they think and do.

They can forgive themselves.

So, what's going on with you?

Back in the kitchen we're listening to:

Led Zeppelin "Bombay Sessions '72"

Reading/Browsing List:
The Brothers Karamazov - Dostoyevsky
Brainpickings article "Ten Days at the Mad-House: How Nellie Bly Posed as Insane in 1887 in Her Brave Exposé of Asylum Abuse"
Lies My Teacher Told Me - James W. Loewen
Who I Am - Pete Townshend

Quinoa with stir-friend vegetables, and a side of bok choy

While cooking quinoa in a pot of boiling water (2 to 1), heat olive oil on medium in a stir-fry pan. Add thinly sliced onions. After browning, add slices, carrots, mushrooms.

In another pan, heat canola oil on medium high. Add chopped ginger to start, then sliced boy choy. At the very end add Braggs Amino Acid sauce (healthy substitute for soy sauce). Grind white pepper over the top just before serving.

Place quinoa at the bottom of the bowl, then add cooked vegetables, and top with sliced avocado and garlic scape pesto and a quick splash of olive oil and black pepper.

Lemongrass Chai Blend

heaping scoop of dried Thai lemongrass
shards of cinnamon bark
a few cardamom pods
a few black peppercorns
A few cloves
fresh chopped ginger