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“Rain, rain go away.” “I don’t want to friggin’ mow my lawn again today!” I’ve been uttering that ditty all summer and fall because of all the !@^%$! MOWING I’m doing because of all the !@^%$! RAIN. (Editor’s note: Upper case letters and exclamation points signify that the writer is really @^%$! PISSED OFF!!!!!) My lawn has more mow lines then the outfield at Fenway, and they are deep enough to grow corn. My life revolves around a series of repeated lawn aggravations: Mow. Wait for rain to stop. Mow. Repeat. I have a double lot, and the adjacent lot is nothing but grass. I call it the “North 40,” but of course it’s not really 40 acres. (It’s more like 38-39 acres). It also has a hedgerow that is so long it covers two time zones and takes me four time zones to trim it. My lawn is so large, that when I’m done mowing the last of it, I have to go back and mow the first section, because the grass grows so fast. The high and thick grass hides the gazillion piles of dog poop from my dog, neighborhood dogs and even dogs from outside the hood, who bus in just to do their business on my lawns. It’s a regular poop-o-rama. I mow with a TORO self-propelled push mower. What I need is a John Deer S690 combine and thresher. My TORO is a mulching mower. It cuts the grass into tiny pieces and deposits them back into the lawn. All that mulched grass has increased the height of my lawn so much, that when I mow, I can see the curvature of the Earth on the horizon. I used to reward myself with a cold beer after mowing, but not anymore, because I can’t afford to buy that much brew and my liver can’t afford any more cirrhosis. To get a better idea of my mowing blues, here is the ten-step procedure I endure each time I mow: I search through the garage clutter for the gas can, only to discover that it’s empty because I neglected to fill it the last time I used it. So, I have to go get gas, but first I have to refinance my home to afford the ridiculously high price of gas. I try, but can never, fill the mower gas tank without spilling it over the mower, my hands and my sneakers. For the rest of the day, I smell like a Molotov Cocktail. As I try to weave the mower out of my cluttered garage I clip bikes, a gas grill, a kayak and a recycling bin, tattooing them with dents, twists and scrapes. My mower, like all mowers, is designed to never start until I pull the cord so many times, my arm falls off. (It is during this “yank period” that I unleash my most torrid, raw and venomous string of cussing. Sometimes I kick the mower, stub my toes and dance about in pain.) The triceps in my right arm are three times the size of their left arm counterparts. Once I regain feeling in my arm, I yank away at the starter cord until it breaks (swearing, kicking and dancing in aggravation) or the engine eventually turns over. My mower has a deadman safety lever, on the handle, that I must hold closed while mowing or the engine will stop. As I move the picnic table, lawn furniture or neighbor kids out of the mower’s path, I must lift them with my right hand, because I’m dragging the mower (with lever held tight) behind with my left. My left arm is now three inches longer than my right. (Yes, I know I should move those obstructions prior to mowing, but that’s not how I do it, OK! If you don’t like it, you do it, you snotty-nosed know-it-all!) It rains so often, that the grass doesn’t have time to dry. Wet grass and dog poop clogs up the underside of the mower until it’s too heavy to push and the rpm’s drop so low that the grass actually giggles from the slow-turning blade tickling it. To remove the clogged grass, I turn the mower on its side, gasoline leaks all over the hot muffler until it smokes or bursts into fiery explosions. I have to go to the garage to get a screwdriver, skin my shins on the “who left this damn kayak in the middle of the floor?” return to the mower, use the screwdriver to stab away at the thick carpet of congealed mower grass and leave behind a steaming wet pile of clippings large enough to ski down. At least once, while mowing, I mow over a hidden tree root or rock and the mower blade screams out in a shrill and loud metallic pain or stops all together. (I also mow over the screwdriver that I forgot and left lying in the grass). The blade has more nicks in it than my shins. 10. When done, I return the mower to the garage, leaving behind a trail of wet grass and dog poop skid marks, from the mower’s wheels, on my driveway, sidewalks and garage floor. 11. Wait. I forgot. There is one more step in the process. My once-white sneakers are dyed chlorophyll-green and covered with sticky wet grass clipping, dirt, dog poop and screwdriver fragments. If I forget to remove my sneaks before I go in the house, the remainder of my day will be spent sweeping, scraping and vacuuming up the grass while listening to my wife explain, in minute detail, why I am such a moron. I’ve read about homeowners using goats to maintain their lawns. I’m going to do that. As soon as it stops raining. Jim Pfiffer’s humor column is posted every Sunday on the Jim Pfiffer Facebook page and the Hidden Landmarks TV Facebook page. Jim lives in Elmira with his wife and many pets and is a retired humor columnist with the Star-Gazette newspaper.

Americans are arguing right now. And believe me, I get it. There is a lot going on. Everyone has differences of opinion. But I wondered if we Americans couldn’t put aside our disagreements for a moment, and agree on a few things we love. I’ll start. I love quilting. Quilting bees, quilting circles, quilting parties. Americans didn’t invent quilting, but it’s an American artform nonetheless. I used to watch my mother quilt with dogged persistence. Day after day. Month after month. She used birch-wood quilting hoops, and pieced recycled fabric together. She could take seemingly unrelated scraps and make art. My mother always said, “When life gives you scraps, you make a quilt.” Also, I love jazz. American fiddle tunes. And the way New Orleans smells on a summer morning, after tourists have spent all night urinating in the streets. Stetson hats worn non-ironically. Case knives, butter yellow, dual blades. Moe Howard, Larry Fine, and Curly. Shemp is okay. The old men in cafes who still drink coffee in groups. And the young men who still idolize them. Boys who still ask Santa Claus for BB guns. And their little sisters, who steal their GI Joes because Barbie needs a viable love interest. Kids who still ride bikes. Children who play tag in their backyards, screaming and laughing, without ever once checking their phones. I love Waffle House. An American institution. Yes, I realize eggs are expensive right now, raising the cost of an ordinary omelette to about the same price as a Range Rover Autograph. But I will continue to eat Waffle House fare until my end. Namely, because I have eaten at Waffle House to benchmark the most important moments in my life. I ate at Waffle House the morning after my own wedding. After the funerals of friends and family. God willing, I will eat at Waffle House the day after my own funeral. I love baseball. Not just the game itself. I love the culture. I love how baseball terminology has crept into everyday vocabulary. “Just touching base.” “I’ll go to bat for you.” “He’s out in left field.” “You knocked it out of the park.” I miss the grungy AAA ballparks of youth. The smells of flat beer, cigar smoke, and meat-like rubber served on a hotdog bun. Back when the game was slow, and pitchers still batted. Davy Crockett. Louis Armstrong. Helen Keller. Dorothea Lange. Aretha Franklin. Andy Griffith. Groucho Marx. Lucille Ball. Laura Ingalls Wilder. Dolly Parton. Willie Hugh Nelson. And I love you. Whoever you are. In fact you’re what I like most about America. You’re a great person. No matter how different we might be. No matter how we might disagree. No matter how dissimilar our backgrounds. Maybe I am foolish enough to believe that, even though we appear differently, think differently, and believe differently, it is contrast that makes the scraps of a quilt truly beautiful. Sean Dietrich is a columnist, novelist, podcaster, and stand-up storyteller known for his commentary on life in the American South. His work has appeared in Newsweek, Southern Living, Reader's Digest, Garden and Gun, The Tallahassee Democrat, the Birmingham News, and his column is syndicated in newspapers throughout the U.S. He has authored fifteen books, and he makes appearances on the Grand Ole Opry. To learn more about Sean, visit his website at https://seandietrich.com

@Elizabeth Whitehouse: While I wouldn’t necessarily think “this kind of comment” should get you expelled from a site, I do wonder what purpose you intended for it to accomplish. Long before Social Media facilitated “instant reaction” to written material, we all managed to be exposed to ideas that may or maynot fit our own beliefs....through radio, TV, magazines, newspapers and books et al. And, since the invention of Guttenburg’s printing press, there has never been (and still is not) any imperitive to challenge the author(s) directly. We are fortunate in some nations (like the US) to have the choice of what media we want to consume (or choose not to). It seems like a tragic waste of ones time to seek out content we disagree with for the sole purpose of offering an antagonistic response. I’m curious how you felt that your reply was beneficial to anyone. It’s doubtful you will gain any understanding of Linda’s perspective by replying as you did. Nor is it likely that your curt and disparaging remark will sway Linda or any of her readers to your perspective.

For the past few years I looked at the year 2016 as one of, if not the worst we have had to endure. I’ve long since forgotten most of my issues with that particular trip around the sun, with the exception of our family having to endure not one but two burglaries barely six months apart. So from that alone you can understand why I was happy to see 2016 ride off into the sunset. Or to Hell, it didn’t matter to me. Then 2020 came along and said, “Hold my beer.” Now, I knew 2020 was going to be a challenging year before it even arrived. By this time last year we knew Ginger, our adopted beagle was going to be leaving us. When we visited the vet that week before Christmas I got the news and the advice of, “When it’s time, you’ll know. Call us.” And yeah, we knew. But there was no was in hell we were going to give our sons that news right at Christmas. Doc said we should be able to get through a few more weeks, and we got through the holiday. Shortly thereafter, it was time. On January 17th, 2020 Ginger left us, wrapped in a warm blanket and her belly full of treats. She could be a pain in the ass, but she was our pain in the ass. Additionally, I’d begun mentally steeling myself for the day when our oldest went off to college in the Fall. Granted, he’d only be a couple hours away, but still, there was sure to be an adjustment period as the ‘ol nest half emptied out. There were some good things on the horizon though. Our band was scheduled to headline a major event in Scranton again after several years of not playing there. We’d get to have a big graduation party come Summer. A bunch of other things I can’t even remember at the moment. If this post had a soundtrack, right here is where you’d hear the needle dragged across the record ( “vinyl” as the kids call them these days). That little virus we now all know and hate so well made its debut. Life as we knew didn’t just become crap, it swirled the bowl a few times before becoming a clogged toilet. Event after event was canceled. In fact, life itself seemed to become canceled as shutdowns happened across the nation, including here in Chemung County. "Ready to go to Wegmans?" I’m sure I don’t need to write a list of ways 2020 sucked. ( “Oh 2020, how do I hate thee? Let me count the ways.” ) We all know what happened. A pandemic, a year of heightened civil strife, a contentious election cycle, businesses shut down for way longer than we ever thought, etc. Here on the home front, we knew things would suck and we prepared for it, as much as anyone could that is. Some things threw us for a loop but for the most part we managed to hold it together with each passing month, largely by trying to find the silver lining in those depressingly dark clouds. It missed both the building and my head, so I had that going for me. High school graduation managed to happen, albeit differently than any class before them. Freshman year of college would start online, but hey, it beat having to go back and bring him home after a major outbreak closed the campus down less than two weeks into the first semester. I spent a lot of time at home and when I returned, things at work changed in ways that really make a job I love a little less enjoyable. But it’s temporary, and at least I’m still employed. The holidays weren’t what we wanted them to be, but as I told myself repeatedly, maybe they were the “holidays we needed.” Quiet, subdued, and affording time to reflect. Yet, if you’ve guessed by this point I am Pollyanna-ishly optimistic about the coming year, you guessed wrong mein freund. I will consider it a minor miracle if things stay steady early in the coming year. I think any plans for the next six months need to be made with a huge frickin’ asterisk next to them and written in pencil. Things in the “new normal” ( tired of hearing that yet? ) are going to be different on the other side of this thing, and I just hope they’re different in ways that are good. Because let’s face it, many aspects of the old normal weren’t working so well. James Taylor sang, “The secret of life is enjoying the passage of time,” and if ever there was a time to enjoy changing the calendar, it’s now. I just don’t think I’ll be getting my hopes up too high for what’s to come. Keep the bar set low, and then maybe be able to celebrate the minor victories as they come. And they will, eventually... someday.... maybe....

He was a good kid. You could just tell. He was maybe 11. Twelve at the most. He was in the supermarket. He had his little sister balanced on his hip. You don’t often see boys carrying toddlers out in public. The kid was filling a shopping buggy. He was reaching for a bag of tortilla chips on the top shelf. I saw one of the older ladies in our aisle reach upward and remove a bag of Tostitos for him. They were Tostitos Scoops. The greatest invention by the chip industry, and perhaps the finest human achievement of the last century with the possible exception of penicillin. “Thanks,” the boy said. His buggy was nearly full. He had lots of adultish items in his basket. Coffee. Vegetables. Diapers. The older lady asked where the boy’s mother was. She asked this in a concerned, parental tone. Her concern, of course, is understandable in our modern day. You don’t often see kids wandering around by themselves anymore. During my youth, however, shortly after the close of World War I, kids almost never had parental supervision. We walked to school. Our mothers sent us to the store on errands. We hung out at the mall without supervision. We rode bikes into the woods, built campfires, constructed deathtrap treehouses, and made serious attempts at discovering new ways to break our own legs. We were feral. “Where are your parents?” said the older woman. “My mom’s waiting in the car,” he said. The woman’s brow furrowed. “She let you come in here by YOURSELF?” He nodded, then readjusted Little Sister on his hip. Little Sister had a snot bubble the size of a Canadian territory. “You’re GROCERY shopping?” the woman said. Nod. The lady was aghast. She wore the patented look of disapproval. “You shouldn’t be in here without an adult.” The kid didn’t reply. “Your mother should be with you,” she said in a half-scolding voice. “It’s dangerous. You’re too young to be by yourself.” “But,” the boy explained kindly, “shopping’s not that hard.” “That’s not what I meant. Your mother could get into a lot of trouble for leaving you unsupervised. This is unacceptable. Someone should tell the manager.” Little Sister’s snot bubble reached critical mass. The kid apologized. He looked embarrassed. He left the aisle and pushed his buggy to the cashier lane, often glancing behind him. Like he now realized he was doing something wrong. I watched him load items on a conveyor belt. I saw him use a credit card to pay. Later, I saw him in the parking lot. I saw the idling Honda that contained his mother. I saw Mom sleeping in the front seat. Then, I saw the middle-aged mother crawl from the vehicle. She was a skeleton. I saw her pale skin. The bandanna over her balding head. The hospital bracelet on her wrist. The bandage on the bend of her elbow. She was trying to help her son load groceries, but she struggled to lift a single bag. When they finished, the boy gave her a hug. And they held each other for a long time. Longer than a normal hug. Because, as I say, he was a good kid. You could just tell. Sean Dietrich is a columnist, novelist, podcaster, and stand-up storyteller known for his commentary on life in the American South. His work has appeared in Newsweek, Southern Living, Reader's Digest, Garden and Gun, The Tallahassee Democrat, the Birmingham News, and his column is syndicated in newspapers throughout the U.S. He has authored fifteen books, and he makes appearances on the Grand Ole Opry. To learn more about Sean or to purchase his books, visit his website at https://seandietrich.com

by Jeff Minick Actress, mother of two, and school activist Sophie Winkleman began her recent address on children at the 2025 Alliance for Responsible Citizenship Conference in London by describing a recent scene from a packed London bus. Standing over a young man and a young woman, both intent on their smartphones, Winkleman noticed that each was on a dating site, “reading profiles of men and women who presented as extremely similar to the two of them.” She concluded: "Our bus reached Piccadilly Circus and both happened to alight at this stop. I watched the two of them as they walked away from each other, one towards Shaftesbury Avenue and the other towards St. James’s. I don’t need to labour the point of what I witnessed with this couple never to be. They were side by side, both seeking companionship or love, but they didn’t even register each other’s existence." In the brilliant and passionate address that followed – I don’t use those adjectives lightly – Winkleman turned to the effects of smartphones and classroom technology on adolescents, which she called “the digital destruction of childhood.” She continued: "We left the doors to our children’s classrooms, their bedrooms and their minds wide open to the world. Perhaps we thought we were giving children the right to access everything which might be good out there, but instead we’ve given everyone else – the good and the bad, access to our children." Winkleman spends part of her talk examining data familiar to many parents: the horrifying rise in teen suicides and self-harm incidents, the massive increase of anxiety and depression among the young, the fact that 97% of Britain’s 12-year-olds now possess a smartphone, and that children ages eight to 18 now spend an average of over seven hours every day on one screen or another. She further notes, “Hospital admissions for children with eating disorders in the UK have risen sixfold in a decade, the ‘contagious influence’ of social media cited as a major factor.” Winkleman also cites mountains of evidence demonstrating that digital classrooms offer inferior education to those centered on teachers, books, paper, and pencils. “The Karolinska Institute in Sweden,” she told the audience, “recently published research concluding that, ‘there’s clear scientific evidence that tools impair rather than enhance learning.’ Sweden has taken note and been the first country to kick tech out of the classroom, reinvesting in books, paper and pens. They had the courage to admit that EdTech was a ‘failed experiment’.” So why, given this abundance of data and the visible harm screens bring to so many of the young – and to many adults as well – do parents and schools continue to pair the young with screens and smartphones? For parents, the social pressures felt by their children are a factor. “My friends all have iPhones, why can’t I?” Many parents also fail to understand that screens are addictive, electronic drugs in a plastic case designed to stimulate dopamine in the brain. As for classroom use, screens can reduce the duties of teachers while often better capturing the attention of students. Winkleman reminds her audience that childhood itself is at stake here. The playing fields of the imagination – books, backyard games, the engagement with others in face-to-face encounters, and so much more – are being rapidly replaced by digitalized games, social media, and the artifice of screens. Regarding education, she offers wise observations such as this one: "Reading books and handwriting work is a deeper, not to mention a calmer, way to learn. Screens manage to be both caffeinating and numbing – where books are decompressing and absorbing." Reading and handwriting are also harder in a good way. Friction and struggle are a necessary part of the learning process. Make everything too easy and it’s like feeding ten-year-olds puree when they need to chew. Jonathan Haidt is the author of the extraordinary bestseller, “The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness.” Haidt praises Winkleman’s address as “the best talk I’ve ever seen on what computers and tablets on the desktops of children do to the child’s education.” His article includes the full video of the talk and a transcript. At the end of her talk, Winkleman says: f we want to produce a generation of responsible citizens, we must flip the current argument on its head. "Rather than constantly having to prove that screen use is blighting childhood, we should ask simply: where is the evidence to prove that it’s safe?" I would up that question a notch and ask, “Where is the evidence to prove that it’s beneficial?” Jeff Minick lives in Front Royal, Virginia, and may be found online at jeffminick.com. He is the author of two novels, Amanda Bell and Dust on Their Wings, and two works of non-fiction, Learning as I Go and Movies Make the Man. This article appeared on IntellectualTakeout.org and is shared under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

Welcome to Small Potatoes, a new column designed to help those who believe their income level prevents them from participating in the stock market to growing their savings. Investing using “Small Potatoes” is an idea that came to me one day when I visited a Wendy's in Owego, NY. While waiting for my order, I had the opportunity to speak with one of the employees there and was surprised to learn he was unaware that Wendy's was a listed stock that he, and anyone else can own. I thought about it for a while, wondering how many people were working in similar entry-level, minimum wage jobs, believing investing was beyond their reach. I’m here to tell you it isn't beyond your reach, that owning stock is achievable for you. All you need is about twenty-five dollars, access to a computer, and the willingness to take the steps listed here. (If you do not have a computer, you can use one at your local library.) Step 1. Find a brokerage firm that will allow you to open an account without a cash balance. CharlesSchwab.com is one, and they are available to answer questions 24/7. Step 2. If you are without a checking account, open one now so that you can transfer money to your brokerage account online. Brokerage firms are very willing to assist you in every step of the process. Step 3. Determine what type of investment account you can use. Two of the most used are the Roth IRA or a Traditional IRA. Roth IRA’s use money on which you have already been taxed and therefore earn “Non-taxable” income when withdrawn later. The traditional IRA allows you to invest earnings before being taxed, but at the time of retirement, you will be taxed. I personally do not want the government to share in the growth of my investment, so I lean towards the Roth IRA. Stock Selection: You may be wondering how to pick stocks to invest in. I have made picking stocks easier by finding the names of the companies that make the products I put in my shopping cart each week. For example: do you use Tylenol? What breakfast cereals do you eat? What is your favorite brand of coffee? Etc. Make a list of these products, including the manufacturer, so that you can find out what stock market name and symbol the product(s) are listed under. For instance, the symbol for AT&T is “T”. Using Google Search, you can find just about any stock in which you have an interest. In some instances, you may have to search "Who owns this product", as it may be only a distributor listed on the package and not the name of the company who is listed on the stock exchange. Google search will also provide you with the stock symbol, and price per share of the company stocks you are considering investing in. I am ending this article here, as those of you who are interested in following the above steps have a good-sized assignment. If you have any questions, you can contact me by email at investsmallpotatoes@gmail.com. Otherwise, be sure to check this site again for more Investing with Small Potatoes. Raymond Maratea is a retired small business owner who has had some experience investing in the stock market (not a financial advisor or broker/dealer). Having started investing with small amounts, on individual investor platforms, Raymond is offering his experience to individuals who would like to invest, but who feel that because of their income level the stock market is out of their reach. Disclaimer: The author of “Small Potatoes” is not a registered investment, legal or tax advisor, or a stockbroker/dealer. All investment/financial opinions expressed in the “Small Potatoes” articles are from the personal research and experience of the author of the articles and are intended solely as educational material. Although best efforts are made to ensure that all information is accurate and up to date, occasionally unintended errors and misprints may occur. The information given in these articles must not be understood as “risk free” investing. The user must be careful about the quality of stocks being selected.

There’s been commentary from some officials and 2022 candidates regarding the current redistricting that the County Charter tasks the Legislature with after each census. With some time browsing the County website, one can piece together minutes, videos and audio recordings located on various pages. In the interest of discerning fact from opinions, I encourage everyone to make the effort. Those records provide a revealing glimpse at conduct and sentiments of some local officials. To address the mandate to “reconsider its representation, and, if necessary, redraw legislative district boundaries”, the Legislature seated “The Legislative Redistricting and Efficiency of County Government Operations Advisory Committee” in early 2021. The original proposal for a $48,000 study from the Center for Governmental Research (CGR) was scrapped after the County Executive and Treasurer advised it wasn’t authorized in the 2021 budget. What was the Legislature’s reaction to this news from its counterparts in other branches of government? Under the guise of “Efficiency of County Government Operations”, discussion turned to matters far outside the realm of “redrawing legislative district boundaries”. Namely the notion of abolishing the offices of County Executive and Treasurer. The Executive’s misgivings on contracting with CGR were well founded. Their presentation to the committee during the first meeting indicated that their efforts would be dedicated to crafting a report to suit the Committee’s agenda. Not only was transparency in question, CGR assured secrecy. They promised that any findings that the Committee didn’t like would be hidden from the public: Once Census data became available in December, another group (from SUNY New Paltz) was brought in. Their presentation January 14th was professional and encouraging. Joshua Simon objectively outlined legal requirements and changes in election law. He advised ranking priorities that fall outside legal parameters to generate multiple map choices. He also stressed the importance of public involvement throughout the process, recommending multiple public presentations and input/listening sessions before Public Hearing on the final proposal. In his experience, he noted, transparency and partnership greatly increase the likelihood of a mandatory referendum passing. Some in attendance were receptive to his advice of seeking public input. However, some louder voices have been dismissive of the idea during the entire process. Those louder voices may prevail, but I’d like to offer input anyway, as a member of the public that Mr. Simon encouraged involvement from. First, abandon the idea of eliminating other elected branches. Countywide officials are elected by considerably more voters than any of the 15 legislators in individual districts. Installing appointed staff, serving at the Legislature’s behest, erodes the power balance on which democratic representation is built. And offers no savings to taxpayers; qualified appointees would receive compensation comparable to current elected officials. This is not the first time the Legislative body has sought to eliminate the elected Executive & Treasurer positions. The very first Legislative term passed a resolution in 1977 to do the same thing....and that Charter Amendment was defeated by voters in the mandatory referendum. Secondly, seek public participation at every stage in the process. A handful of legislators on one committee taking it upon themselves to define priorities for 84,000 constituents is presumptuous. The last half-century shows voters have repeatedly rejected Charter Amendments for redistricting and restructuring county government. When the Legislature provides final proposals that don’t reflect constituents’ priorities and wishes, they must start over next year – expending more time and taxpayer resources. After the 1990 Census, voters rejected redistricting plans in 1992 and again in 1993 before finally approving the plan presented in 1994. Current legislators should consider why such attempts by their predecessors have failed, and rather than blithely skipping down the same path, strive to do better. Otherwise, legislators will face voter rejection again when offering yet another ballot proposal that ignores constituents’ voices. Kathleen Reed is a Town of Catlin resident. "Guest View" is a column written by readers from the Southern Tier. For information on how to submit something for a Guest View column, email us at twintiersliving@gmail.com

I see that Kanye West legally changed his name again, this time to “Ye,” with no middle or last name. For real. He said he did it because Ye is the most common word in the Bible, as in “Yo Ye. Thou art a narcissist.” Most rap and hip-hop entertainers change their birth names, like J-Z, Dr. Dre, 50 Cent, Eminem and my main man Snoop Dogg, whose many monikers helped him go from rap star to Martha Stewart to the pinnacle of stardom, TV beer commercials. Snoop was born Calvin Broadus Jr., and went by prior names of Snoop Doggy Dogg, Snoop Lion and just Snoop. (Truth: His mom called him Snoopy because he loved Snoopy in Charlie Brown cartoons). Why do they do it? According to my Internet research, hip-hop’s first artists were in gangs, which gave out street names to create a bond and protect identities in times of crimes. (I’d need a sick load of aliases to cover-ID all my stupid stunts, capers and pranks). Real names aren’t always catchy or easy to remember. Ice Cube is easier to recall than, O’Shea Jackson Sr., his birth name. It’s not just rappers who name change. Retired NBA player, Ron Artest, rebranded himself “Metta World Peace.” (Metta gotta a lotta work ahead of him). Some stage names are creative and reflect the artist’s desire to quickly roll in the bling, as in “A$AP,” whose birth name is Rakim Mayers. (He could have changed his name to “Rakim-In-The-CA$H,” and it would have been just as dope). Names are important. They elicit images, can make life difficult or embarrassing, reflect your lineage and can just be plain dumb, like Richard Head (real name of a kid I knew in my youth). His parents must have been huffing glue when they named him. I’m happy with being James Michael Pfiffer, although my last name is pronounced “Pie-fer,” not “Fife-er,” as it’s spelled. I’ve been called “Pa-fifer,” “Piper” “Pisser” and “Pie face,” by my good friend, Stoney, when he’s had a few beers. I’m a man of many names, most of them bestowed upon me by schoolteachers. I liked to have fun, create laughter, play the dare devil and generally be the center of attention. My classmates called me “class clown.” My teachers called me “a future drain on society.” Don’t get me wrong. I loved Southside High School in Elmira. It was six of the best years of my life. I found it odd that I repeatedly got sent to see the principal, Mr. Harrigan, for “being smart,” as in “don’t get smart with me, mister!” Isn’t getting smart the purpose of education? When a teacher told me to stop being “smart,” I cleverly replied, in a low and slow voice, “Duhhh. I’ll try to be dumber in the future, teach.” That resulted in a trip to Harrigan’s office, where I was a regular. Had my own desk and chair. The office secretary asked me why I was there, again. I sarcastically explained that I was “guilty of being smart in class.” She glared at me, and even more sarcastically, retorted “Are you, some kind of a wise guy?” So, you see, I was right back where I started from – too smart for my own good. That’s why teachers routinely labeled me: “troublemaker,” “immature,” “instigator,” “incorrigible” and “the F#!@>* reason I’m quitting teaching and joining the F#!@>* French Foreign Legion!” My favorite moniker was “rambunctious.” I thought it meant I was joyful and lively. I looked it up and discovered it means “uncontrollably boisterous” (see: “fidgety loudmouth with ADD”). Bummer. An English teacher called me a “provocateur,” which I liked because it had a savvy French-sounding sassy sound. I even wore a beret to better provoke. A visibly angry and shaking substitute biology teacher told me that I was “waaay out of line.” I replied, “Whaaat line should I be in?” Another visit to the principal. I didn’t know the meanings of many of the labels affixed to me, like pernicious, truculent and insolent. I assumed they all meant bad things, so I didn’t look them up. I’ve had enough given names. Now it’s my turn. I’m considering adopting a hip-hop street moniker. A good columnist needs to keep current and hip to the slangy language of the people. A totally coolio name might attract younger readers. Know what I’m sayin’? I checked online to learn the latest hip-hop lingo. I think I got it down pat and won’t sound like a Boomer when I rip-rap this riff: “I was a high school pranksta’, Not a ballin’ gangsta’. Teachers didn’t know me, Tried to mofoe me. Gotta see the principal again, Rap some more with Harrigan. Don’t matter, cuz nothin’ t phaze me. I’m not lay-Z or cray-Z. I’m flexin for ‘shizzle, Off da hook in da drizzle. I’m stillin’ ‘n’ ‘trillin,’ Cuz I’m willin’ and chillin’.” You feel me? I’m going to initially change my name to “Pfif Daddy.” Has a nice and easy to remember three-syllable cadence. When my column goes viral, I’ll change it to “P. Daddy,” “P. Diddy” or maybe “P. Diddy Daddy.” When I publish my first book, I’ll shorten it to “PD.” When I shoot my first rap video, I’ll cut it to “P,” which is what I must do now cuz I drank too much green tea. Word! Jim Pfiffer’s humor column is posted every Sunday on the Jim Pfiffer Facebook page, Hidden Landmarks TV Facebook page and TwinTiersLiving.com. Jim lives in Elmira with his wife and many pets and is a retired humor columnist with the Elmira Star-Gazette newspaper.

As a mental health counselor, I am witnessing an emotional ass-beating unlike anything I’ve ever witnessed before. People are coming into my office defeated, exhausted and some, barely able to function. Others are restless, uneasy, walking out of jobs and even marriages without a second thought. Some are fleeing, making big moves, a futile attempt to escape themselves. Some are consumed with rage, guilt and shame. Prior to COVID, it wasn’t unusual to have parallels between my story and the stories I have the honor of holding space for, but I wasn’t in my client’s battles. Now, I feel as though I am experiencing this ass-beating right along with them. I have days when I can hardly function, finding myself grateful for an unexpected cancellation so I can curl up on my couch and take a nap. A couple weeks ago, I told my husband I was ready to move. It was a toss-up between New Hampshire or the Netherlands, I’ve never even been to the Netherlands. The slightest inconvenience, my child being sick, feels like a monumental stressor. There is the emotional weight of worry, what if they have COVID? What if I get COVID? And then there are the moving pieces, where can we go to get tested? How long will it take? How am I going to navigate remote schooling while trying to conduct virtual sessions? It would be one thing if this happened every so often, but we are less than a month into school and we have had two weeks with way too many moving pieces. And then there is the guilt and shame that immediately follows as I can’t help but think, others have it so much worse and as a counselor, I should know best how to navigate this season we are in. A week ago, I found myself in my primary care doctor’s office in tears, my chest hurt so bad I wasn’t sure if I was having a panic attack or a heart attack. The diagnosis from my doctor was that I am human and have stress. In a recent article in the Washington Post by Amy Cuddy and JillEllyn Riley, they coined the term, “Pandemic Flux Syndrome” to describe what people are experiencing nearly 18 months into this collective trauma. The article resonated deeply with me and gave words to my experience and what I am bearing witness to with those I see. The article goes on to explain reasons we are feeling this way, “for many people, our brains and bodies are simply fatigued, and recalibrating to the new circumstances is too much to bear.” They refer to the concept of ‘surge capacity,’ which you can read about in an interview with psychologist Ann Masten and science journalist Tara Haelle. In the healthcare field, surge capacity refers to the ability to manage and care for a significant increase in volume of patients. Outside the healthcare field, it refers essentially to our capacity to draw upon our internal resources to manage a crisis. A crisis or trauma spanning the course of a year and a half, takes a toll. Brene Brown recently did an interview with Amy Cuddy discussing this concept further. Many of us were hopeful over the summer, we felt the end was in sight, we could see the light at the end of the tunnel. And then, it was as though someone flipped the switch on us. Some of us are hyper focused on whom they perceive has turned off that light. Lines are being drawn and we are taking our beaten emotional minds and body into battle with others, sometimes with our own family and friends. I believe we have a hard time accepting what we cannot understand and for many, this seems impossible to comprehend so we cope by lashing out, by trying to find the why, the seemingly elusive solution. So, what can we do? How can we cope with this emotional ass-beating? I have a few thoughts I would like to offer. First, we need a ‘what the flux friend’ or better yet, ‘what the flux friends.’ We need someone who can hold space for us to express how we feel, whether that is rage, anxiety, sadness, grief or shame. Connecting with someone we can be open and honest with can help us heal our bruised minds, we need someone to encourage us to return to battle. We also need to know we are not alone and hopefully in reading this and other articles, you realize you are most definitely, not alone. We need to move and not out of state. Most self-help articles around caring for our mental health during the pandemic mention the importance of exercise as a form of movement, along with eating healthy, staying hydrated and getting enough sleep. Moving our bodies can serve multiple purposes though. When I can, I go for walks with my clients. The cooler fall weather is perfect for being outside and the changing color of the leaves offers a beautiful backdrop. One of my clients recently said, ‘I like walking when we are talking about hard things.’ Movement, whether that is walking, running, hiking or dancing, can help us not only to feel physically better, but can also serve as an outlet to our emotional experiences. There is a saying, ‘emotions need motion.’ If we don’t tend to the thoughts and feelings arising within us, they will not dissipate on their own. To prevent an external or internal eruption of these emotions, it is best if we can acknowledge and tend to them with compassion and intention. The other day, my 8 y/o daughter lathered soap on her hands and arms, she told me the soap represented her ‘worry thoughts.’ My daughter then turned on the water and scrubbed her hands and arms vigorously, effectively ‘washing away’ those painful thoughts. We all need to find a way to release and wash away what comes up for us throughout our day. Create, get outside, meditate, spend less time doing and more time being. I believe whole-heartedly in this quote by Rumi: “We carry inside us the wonders we seek outside us.” I truly believe what we need is within, we must quiet the noise to be able to access that wisdom and right now, there is a lot of noise. We need to create quiet pockets of time, even if that is just a couple minutes a day where we can take a couple breaths, tune into how we are feeling in our bodies, minds and hearts and just let that be. Notice what is coming up from a space of compassion and tend to those emotions arising, maybe you are feeling overwhelming anxiety and you need a couple breaths to create more internal space. Maybe you need a good cry or maybe you haven’t had anything to eat or drink. Maybe you need to step outside and feel the fresh air on your skin, maybe you need to turn off the News for a while. I know it can be hard in a society where we are constantly on the go, but now perhaps more than ever we need to pause, breathe and just be. Be Kind. It’s truly that simple. Yesterday, I was waiting in a long line at a store, a trip that was supposed to be a quick ‘in and out.’ I had ice cream in the car and it was an unusually warmer Fall day. I could feel the heat rising in my face and tension throughout my body, why is there only one person working? What is taking so long? I was so consumed by my own gunk that I didn’t notice the man in front of me. “You have the most beautiful mask,” he said sincerely. I snapped out of my anger trance. Such a simple statement and suddenly, the anger and irritation I felt melted away, kind of like the ice cream most likely was in my car. With kind words, we can bring people into the moment, we can extend our light and illuminate their light through a compliment or just a simple gesture that communicates, ‘I see you.’ If we could all be more intentional about extending random acts of kindness, I think we would all feel a little less fluxed. I want to end by pausing and creating a space to acknowledge and honor the lives we have lost, those left behind and those living with long-term effects of COVID-19. We are all living in the midst of this collective trauma and I believe we are all connected by a collective experience of grief as well. Even if we haven’t lost someone we love, we likely know someone who has. And while some of what I have written is in jest, I know there are those experiencing waves of anxiety and depression and others who feel like they are drowning. If you feel this way, there is help and support: SAMHSA’s National Helpline: 1-800-662-HELP (4357) National Domestic Violence Hotline Psychology Today, Find a Therapist For residents of NYS: NY Project Hope If you are in crisis, please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 Renae Carapella-Johnson is a licensed mental health counselor and owner of Ray Of Light Counseling & Consulting in Savona NY.

Knowing someone we love is facing the journey to her heavenly home soon, and thinking of those who have recently lost their loved ones, I wanted to share this poem and reflective thoughts today. Sometimes… the pain that life hands out is just too much to bear. You’ve lost a dear loved one, perhaps a beloved pet, or an awesome job which was an extension of yourself, maybe you live with chronic illness, or perhaps an incurable disease… And in those difficult times, isn’t it a wonderful feeling to have someone who truly cares come alongside you… someone willing to listen to your heart, to help ease the grief, to share your tears, to speak a few words of wisdom, to help you deal with a particular hurdle, or just to be there to hold your hand while sitting quietly with you? This poem was written several years ago as we continued to face my husband’s chronic illnesses. It all began in the fall of 2008 with statin drug muscle damage and rhabdomyolysis (excretion of blood from muscles), polymyalgia rheumatica, and constant dizziness - with numerous diagnoses (comorbidities) added to the list since then with multiple hospitalizations, and near-death situations too many times. This is a new way of life for both of us... certainly not the life we dreamed of when we got married. Gone are the easier and somewhat carefree days. Gone is the freedom for Ed do what he enjoyed doing, like stacking his own firewood, being able to take care of our yard and other household chores with ease, or going for evening walks up the road… all the things we used to take for granted. No longer are we able to travel as a couple beyond doctor appointments, or enjoy an evening out to dinner. We enjoyed going to Cooperstown, New York for our 20th anniversary and later with our kids – to the Baseball Hall of Fame and The Farmers’ Museum. We’d hoped to take a dinner cruise on the Erie Canal some day. We long to just get in the car and go visit our children and their families; but, sitting in the car, even for doctor appointments, takes a toll on Ed with increased pain, stiffness, and a generalized sick feeling. So much of what the rest of us can do and take for granted takes great effort on his part due to various limitations. Yet, we both know very well we are not alone in this journey. You, too, are likely facing your own difficult struggles… and our hearts and prayers go out to each and every one of you. For God never promised that this journey called life would be easy just because we put our faith in Him… and may we know He is still in control no matter the circumstances. A few verses come to mind that we cling to during the hard days and which give us a sense of peace (all Scripture from the New International Version): 1) “But he said to me [the Apostle Paul], ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.” 2 Corinthians 12:9 2) “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him…” Romans 8:28 3) “So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.” Isaiah 41:10 4) For “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” John 16.33 In your most difficult times, may you feel the comforting presence of loved ones helping to ease your pain, just as you feel the presence of our Lord wrapping His arms around you in love… as He covers each one of us with His peace amidst the turmoil… Sometimes… Linda A. Roorda Sometimes… The hurt just cuts too deep As you watch your loved one Face endless days of pain. Sometimes… You feel abandoned When prayers seem unanswered As waves of despair set in. Sometimes… You stand alone along the side Holding their hand in love Helpless to assuage the hurt. Sometimes… Tears that flow from out the soul Tenderly touch the heart When words cannot even convey. Sometimes… A hand that reaches out To hold, to steady, to calm Brings precious comfort to the weary. Sometimes… The voice of wisdom Gently whispers in your ear As the love of God gently enfolds. Sometimes… To understand the trial Is simply to accept God’s hand is still in control. ~~ 09/09/15 ~~

Down in The Valley, Waverly to be precise, there is a hidden little gem of store/bakery/pizza place/a whole lot of stuff. I discovered the Sopranos about 9 years ago while working and needing lunch. I challenge anyone to walk into this place and not buy something. Lunch time is always a magical time there. They have daily specials on top of a full hot and cold sub menu. At least 6 different types of pizza. They also sell fresh pasta and pasta take and bake dishes. I am also told they have great veal cutlets. Finally the bakery with fresh breads, cookies, brownies, pies, cupcakes and more. Finally onto my lunch. Country fried steak and gravy with a double helping of mac & cheese. At the time of the picture it was cooled down because I couldn't get to it right away. Even reheated this was delicious the gravy was nice and peppery the steak still nice and tender. The mac and cheese as always on point. I prefer the orange cheese over white. It was an internal struggle to not eat the whole thing. However I now have a delicious lunch tomorrow. Sopranos in Waverly you are Fat Guy approved!

For me personally, quarantine began on St. Patrick’s Day 2020. I remember because I spent the day teaching our daughter how to draw leprechauns and unless I’m mistaken, I’m hard-pressed to think of another reason why I would be teaching a four-year-old how to draw leprechauns. Well, I guess if we were big Notre Dame fans but no, that is not the case. So it was St. Patrick’s Day and now it’s almost another St. Patrick’s Day and this has lasted a year. The four-year-old is now a five-year-old and there’s also a six-month-old kicking around the house. Our dog first enjoyed us being around so much, but now I think she’s kind of over it and headphones have become my best friend. They’re probably the dogs as well. She’s not as into Soundgarden at an extremely loud volume as I am. Her loss. But all of this is most likely not exclusive to my quarantine experience and for the most part, I would assume plenty of other people have similar tales and anecdotes. Well, except for young people who live alone or maybe with a significant other. The idea of living this quarantine life sans children is still beyond me and I don’t think I’ll ever fully be able to understand it. There are definitely days where such a life seems too good to be true and there are also days where I may or may not pine for such a life. Of course, there are days where I’m good with how things are currently constructed around these parts but where is the fun in that. The grass is always greener, especially amidst a pandemic. With the one-year anniversary of quarantine life coming up, I, like a lot of people are looking back and taking stock of everything that has transpired over the past year. Or at least I’d like to be doing that. Unfortunately, I’m distracted by something far more pressing, something incredibly more serious. My board shorts are starting to fall apart. Stop, this is important. These aren’t just any board shorts, my friend. These are the board shorts I have worn EVERY DAY since quarantine life started. And they are starting to rip, starting to show signs that the end is near and I’m sorry but it’s very sad. Once these babies go, I don’t know what I’ll do. I don’t even want to think about it. Of course, I have, but I don’t want to. It’s too painful. These board shorts of mine, they’re lime green and white. On the left leg, it says “Rip Curl” in black lettering. They’re probably a couple of years old, so it’s not as if quarantine life did this on its own, but it definitely played a part. Early on in quarantine life, I put on pants during the week, usually jeans. I did this because I felt like I should. That first month or so was all about trying to make things feel normal. But even with a few hours each day spent wearing jeans, I still wore the board shorts before and after. Once the warmer temperatures started though, the jeans fell by the wayside and it was all board shorts, all the time. It was likely around mid-April when they became a full-time starter as opposed to a valued bench-player, so it was also around that point that their days became numbered. You are probably wondering why board shorts? Would board shorts actually be comfortable enough to wear so often? Yes, yes they would, especially if they’re older and a little stretched out, meaning you could throw on some boxers underneath. But I’m not here to go inside baseball on you. Just trust me when I tell you that they have been the most comfortable pair of shorts imaginable and the best partner in crime a quarantined man such as myself could ask for. At one point, I had a gift card for the local surf shop here and while I would have normally used it to buy a new button-up shirt, what was the point in that. So I purchased a new pair of leisure shorts. They’re like sweat pants, but shorts. Seemed like a slam dunk and as my wife hoped, these newer, cleaner shorts would replace the older, dirtier board shorts. That was not the case. The new shorts are fine, but fine isn’t going to replace gold, which is what these Rip Curl board shorts have been. And still are! Despite a slight rip here and there (and there and here,) they are still wearable. Everything is good. But not for long I’m afraid. I know how this goes. The rips start small, then gradually get bigger. They make friends; new rips emerge. I wasn’t washing them a lot to begin with me, but now I fear that every spin through the laundry seems to shorten their life expectancy even more. It’s a dicey game I’m playing. Wash them, keep them somewhat clean but hurt their long-term chances of survival or don’t wash them and just flat out keep them. Spoiler: I’m not washing them very often. I’ve had something like this happen before, a treasured and valued article of clothing gradually slip away from me. It was a hooded sweatshirt and I loved that hoodie with every ounce of my being. But nothing lasts forever and eventually, the frays started to overtake the sweatshirt, creeping up around the hood and at the sleeves. The sweatshirt began losing some of its integrity, becoming more of a moo-moo than a sweatshirt and as the days went by, it was worn less and less, partly to preserve and partly because it just wasn’t fun to wear anymore. It was a damn shame. I think about the sweatshirt often. And now here I am, stuck in a similar situation with these board shorts, these lovely, comfortable, very broken in board shorts. I’m not giving up just yet. They still have some life to them. But that life is much closer to the finish than the start. It’s almost as if it is a race against time. Either quarantine ends and I start dressing like a grown-up again, thus buying these shorts an extra month or so or this quarantine life continues and these shorts disintegrate into nothing, leaving me left to find a new pair of shorts to wear every single day. But it wouldn’t be fair to those new shorts, having to now live up to the expectations of replacing the old shorts. The Patriots are struggling to replace Tom Brady and I will no doubt struggle to replace these shorts. It is quite literally, the exact same thing. Until that day though, I ride with these shorts. I live with these shorts. I dad the shit out of things with these shorts and go pick up dinner with these shorts. I take out the trash and recycling and I get the mail with these shorts. Sometimes I forget and sleep with these shorts and sometimes I don’t forget and sleep with these shorts. Could I have made it through this past year without shorts? Hard to say. But what’s not hard to say is that I don’t even want to think about such things. Thank you, green and white Rip Curl board shorts. Now let’s enjoy what time we have left, shall we? Ryan harbors a constant fear of losing his keys, prefers flip flops and will always choose cereal if it's an option. He maintains his own blog, Giddy Up America and hasn't gotten a speeding ticket in over the year. He has previously contributed work to UPROXX & Heavy. Ryan is on Twitter: @ryanoconnell79

Let me start this review by saying I am ashamed of myself for waiting so long to give this place a try. You voted for it (mail-ins not accepted) and after a few months I am giving you my review of The Starlite Room. Right off the bat I knew I would like the place. They offer online ordering and in my opinion everyone should offer it. I can stare at the menu for hours customize my meal and I don't have to sound like a tool on the phone. So now down to business. My meal tonight was the philly cheese steak peppers and onions with a side of onion petals. So my first thoughts when opening the container was maybe I should have got two. Oh how WRONG I was. This thing was packed full and the roll was not split at the bottom. You would have thought Snoop Dogg rolled it. The roll itself was nice and soft the onion and pepper ratio was perfect. Everything was chopped up so no big chunks. I had to take the 1/2 eaten picture to show you how stuffed it was and then how much cheese. You knew you were eating a cheese steak. Also this slowmo just realized he didn't even put any condiments on it. I am usually a ketchup on my philly guy but I think it would have ruined the flavor. The onion petals were good the batter/coating was thicker which was good and I recommend the boom boom sauce for dipping. I am going to say at this point it was the best cheese steak I have had in a long time. If you made it this far I also had the pleasure of trying their mac & cheese. What you see was just a side order. I do not think there is another like it in the area. It has almost an afredo taste to it definitely unique and delicious. Finally I also got to try the Starlite burger it had a good char grilled flavor to it very good. The owner of said mac & cheese and burger said it was something they would order again. That compliment almost out weighs this Fat Guys approval of The Starlite Room.

It has been over a year since we became aware of the Covid virus in this country. So far hundreds of thousands of Americans have died from it and thousands more continue to die each day. Every American death diminishes each one of us. We are all connected in this web of life. Thankfully we now have vaccines that can protect most of us from the potential ravages of this terrible virus. These vaccines were tested on a total of about 70,000 people and their efficacy has been proven. There is hope for the future. I know there’s been a lot of controversy surrounding the new vaccines. As a scientist and a physician I would like to present to you, my friends, the latest information about the Covid 19 virus as well as some of the major therapeutic options we now have. I want to start by defining a few terms in order to clarify our understanding of the issues involved with the vaccine. Stay with me. I’m going to simplify the relevant science for your understanding. CELL A cell is the most basic unit of life. It is a “building block” of life. There are over 30 trillion cells in the human body. There are many different types of cells in our bodies. Most cells have two parts; an inner part(inner chamber) called the Nucleus and an outer part(outer chamber) called the Cytoplasm. (See picture) Think of it as a large balloon with a smaller balloon inside the larger balloon. The smaller balloon is the Nucleus and the space outside the smaller balloon is the Cytoplasm. Another example is a one-bedroom house. The house is a cell. When you open the door and walk into the house you are standing in the outer chamber/living room called Cytoplasm. If you continue to walk ahead, you open a door that leads you to another chamber/bedroom called Nucleus. Got it now? Easy isn’t it? The Nucleus (the inner chamber/bedroom ) is the ‘mission control’ center of the cell. Our precious genetic material called DNA resides in the nucleus (in the bedroom). You hide all your precious stuff in the bedroom, right? All instructions from what color your eyes should be, to how much estrogen should be produced in your body, comes from the DNA in the nucleus. The Cytoplasm(the outer chamber/living room) is the “manufacturing, assembly and packaging” part of the cell. So, my people! How does the factory (in the living room/cytoplasm) know what kind of hormone or protein to manufacture for Vivian or John or Veruschka? Answer: The instructions are sent by the DNA (in the bedroom/inner chamber/nucleus!!!). How do those instructions get from the DNA in the nucleus(inner chamber) to the Cytoplasm (outer chamber) where manufacturing takes place? Answer: The instructions are carried by a messenger called RNA. (Messenger RNA or simply mRNA!)-the delivery truck! In summary, if the body wants to manufacture something, whether it is a hormone or a protein that your body needs or an antibody, whatever it is, the instructions for making that item come from the DNA in the nucleus(the inner chamber) and these instructions are carried/transported/transferred by a messenger called RNA(mRNA) to the outer chamber which we call Cytoplasm where the manufacturing facility is located. After the item is manufactured it is then packaged and then a ‘door’ opens and releases the final product outside the cell. Therefore mRNA’s job is mostly to deliver instructions about how to make things! FUN n EASY STUFF! Hang in there with me..... What is a VIRUS? It is an independent particle which comes in various shapes. Inside that particle is the genetic material of the virus which is either RNA or DNA. A virus will not survive without your help. It cannot reproduce itself! It needs to enter your cell, hijack your cell, take over its manufacturing plant and then instruct your cell to produce more viruses. After your cell has produced many copies of the virus, it releases these new viruses outside so that they can infect other cells to produce more copies of the virus. The virus has an envelope/covering which is made up of either protein or fat material or combination of these. This envelope surrounds and protects the important genetic material(DNA or RNA) of the virus. Often times you can tell what kind of virus it is by its covering. How can you tell the car you’re looking at is a Cadillac GTS? By its shape and its Cadillac emblem! Therefore just like the Cadillac sedan, the coronavirus has its own ‘emblem’ on its surface/coating/envelope which distinguishes it from other viruses. It can use that same ‘emblem’ to attach itself to a cell in your windpipe. And then that cell in your windpipe opens its door and allows the virus to enter. Once it enters your cell, as I explained above, it instructs your cell to begin manufacturing many more copies of itself. This is how the virus works. REMEMBER... bacteria on the other hand does not need you or your cell. It can multiply on its own. The virus cannot do this so it needs you to produce copies of itself! So if I have you in a toll booth on the highway and I instruct you to stop every Mercedes Benz car that is trying to pass through, how would you do that?. Obviously you will look at the Mercedes emblem which is specific to Mercedes. Every car that comes by that has that emblem on it, you will stop it from passing through the gate. The same is true for coronavirus. When your body sees a virus that has an ‘emblem’ of a coronavirus on its surface it produces antibodies to target that specific emblem therefore arresting the virus. The new vaccine by Pfizer and Moderna is an RNA vaccine. Specifically it is a messenger RNA vaccine(mRNA). We know that the job of messenger RNA is to carry instructions from the DNA in the nucleus out to the manufacturing facilities within the cytoplasm. The messenger RNA in this vaccine has instructions (already coded in it) about how to make an ‘emblem’ of the coronavirus. Exciting stuff!!! And easy too! The messenger RNA vaccine when injected in your muscle enters one of your muscle cells and stays in the outer chamber of that cell where the manufacturing facility is located. There it delivers the instructions already programmed in it about how to make a coronavirus ‘emblem’. Please note that the messenger RNA in the vaccine DOES NOT go into the nucleus (the inner chamber where your DNA is located!). (No need to! It already has the instructions in it!) Therefore it cannot influence your genetic information! This is extremely important for you to understand because so many of the vibrant conspiracy theories out there are talking about messenger RNA doing things to your genetic mechanism (your DNA) when it is injected in your muscle as a vaccine. This is absolutely wrong! Now you see why! When your muscle cell factory produces the coronavirus ‘emblem’, (based on instructions it received from mRNA vaccine) it spits it (the ‘emblem’) outside where it can be seen by your immune system. The cells of your immune system immediately grab it and process the ‘emblem’. Then these immune system cells send instructions to your lymph nodes to produce specific antibodies to completely destroy the ‘emblem’. Now that the body has recognized the ‘emblem’, the next time a real coronavirus(with its known ‘emblem’ on its surface) enters your body, these antibodies which are now primed and ready will recognize that ‘emblem’ on the surface of the virus and annihilate/destroy the virus immediately. This my people, is how the vaccine works! WHAT WE KNOW. Over 50% of Covid transmissions may occur via asymptomatic people!!! About 70,000 people were enrolled in clinical trials for this vaccine and received two vaccine doses each. It is a safe vaccine. Major complications from any vaccine (measles, HPV, mumps, yellow fever, polio, etc) are usually appreciated within 2 months of receiving it. It’s been 2 months since the trial ended. The vaccine is about 95% effective. If you have had Covid, you should still take the vaccine. We do not know how long you are protected after a Covid infection. Monoclonal antibodies for emergency use authorized by the USFDA are available for those who test positive for Covid and are at risk for severe disease! This treatment can keep at risk people out of the hospital. Therefore if you test positive and are at risk for severe disease you must ask your doctor why you are not being given one of the FDA authorized antibody therapies. As of January 6, 2021, over 400,000 doses have been delivered to inpatient and outpatient facilities in the US. Pregnant women who have a Covid infection may not pass the virus to their newborn. The coronavirus has mutated! There is a new strain here! Another is on its way from South Africa. This new mutant strain is 50% more contagious! Every indication tells us that the vaccine will also work on this new strain. The best test for coronavirus is the Rapid Polymerase Chain(PCR) test which is about 97% sensitive. The Saliva Spit Test (which involves coughing and clearing the throat before spitting) stacks up well against the gold standard for COVID-19 test which uses a deep swab in the back of the nose. Home test kits are not as sensitive at this time. They work best within 5 to 7 days of contracting the virus, when the viral load is still high. In an effort to vaccinate more people using the currently available amounts of vaccine, some European nations have suggested delaying the second vaccine dose so more people can be vaccinated. This issue is being debated vigorously over there and here in the USA. There is concern that a long interval between doses would lead to resistant strains of the virus. Also the information we have about the effectiveness of this vaccine is from studies where people received two doses of it, NOT one! RECOMMENDATIONS 1. Facial covering. 2. Hand washing. 3. Social distancing. 4. Vaccine. 5. Monoclonal antibodies for Covid positive who are at risk for severe disease. Best wishes to all and a Happy 2021! N. A. Zama, MD, PhD. Dr Nche Zama, MD, PhD is a cardiothoracic surgery specialist in East Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania and has been in practice for 35 years. Twin Tiers Living would like to thank Dr. Zama for giving permission to reprint this guest column.

What is it about a small town that can help us curb the spread of a virus? Is living in a small town safer? And, is all this change going to affect how we interact as a community? Two words. Population density. Population density is a major consideration when it comes to the spread of viruses. As we saw in the early stages, viruses spread rapidly in dense populations like major cities. Small town life allows us to interact with our community and get what we need without having to expose ourselves to lots of risks. What are some of the things we can learn, especially from the small-town life of the past, that can help us today? Obtain Products Locally If you remember in April when covid first began to spread many of the meatpacking facilities had to shut down. The cost of meat immediately doubled, or more. This wasn’t the only supply chain affected. Milk and produce also were interrupted. Huge waste occurred. And the virus spread quickly through large facilities. This highlights the need for small-scale local production as opposed to large-scale production and transport. In most of the world, local food production is still very much a reality. By obtaining as many goods as we can from our community we grow our local economy, and ensure that they don’t have to travel through lots of hands to get to us. Return of the Schoolhouse We all know that it wasn’t too long ago every neighborhood had its schoolhouse and it contained a small number of students, and a teacher or two. The tiny schoolhouse has its benefits. Students create bonds with the local community, and teachers are very accessible to the parents. This prior model is ideal in a world where large masses of people is not a good idea. It may be possible that students going back to school this fall is the major contributor to the numbers skyrocketing again. I’m sure people will resist switching to the small schoolhouse model, finding it difficult to justify the expense of current large schools. But, it seems that the mass production of our children’s education is no longer in our best interest. The Resurgence of the Small Business The shift in our society since the onset of covid-19 has been devastating. Families have lost loved ones and livelihoods. But, this change in our lifestyle is going to present new economic opportunities. If we can roll with these changes, maybe people can find growth within our communities. The idea of getting in my car and going to the store is not appealing to me. Fighting traffic for 45 minutes, bustling through a parking lot to grab ahold of a shopping cart that 200 other people have held that day, push it through a crowded store trying not to touch anything, knowing that we’re all sharing the same immediate space and everyone has got their hands on everything anyway! I know I would love to have someone delivering milk, eggs, and bread. Yes, large companies are rushing in to pay people next to nothing to grocery shop for you and bring it to your door, and they charge you a fortune to have it delivered. We don’t have to let it go this way. The situation presents opportunities. I would rather pay a local person to deliver my food from a local grocery store. When that large company isn’t skimming 90% of the delivery, everyone else makes out better in the end. By taking some lessons from our roots, and considering how these changes in our lives are going to affect us on a local scale, as well as a global scale, it will be possible for us to affect the way our community cares for itself. Maybe we could be stronger than ever. Twin Tiers Living welcomes Mathew to the Local Writer's section. His blog, RambleNewYork.com, offers a look at some of the best New York State has to offer. Born and raised in Upstate New York, Mathew lives in a wooded valley north of the Susquehanna River with his wife and kids. His first book "Simple Sutras" was published in 2014.

Once upon a time, when I was still a paramedic and we’d just finished a particularly unusual call, I remarked to the E.R. doctor that someday I was going to write a book about what it’s like in that world. “Honey, they’ll never believe it,” she said. And I know now that she was right. Between my time on the streets and later when I worked in the emergency department, I spent sixteen years of my life, from age nineteen to my mid-thirties, seeing and dealing with the worst that humanity has to offer. Blood, brains, guts and more… If I knew then what I know now, I’d go back to 1994 and stop nineteen year old me from walking in that door for an interview. Then again, maybe not. Because I also know that with the bad came some good. That every now and then someone got a second chance, some are still alive today, because I was there and told Death, “No.” It’s what any medical provider can take pride in, and I do. But the job takes a mental toll, as you can well imagine. Things are changing now for the better, but there was still a time, not that long ago, that you didn’t talk about that. You sucked it up and kept going. That pressure needs a relief valve though, or it becomes dangerous. For some, it can even be deadly. And though I didn’t realize it until much later, for me that relief valve was writing. So I began doing just that, writing down the good, bad, and ugly of those years with the intent of someday publishing them. However a few years ago it occurred to me that, while the stories were mine to tell, they didn’t belong to just me. These are the stories of someone else’s life, their loss, etc. Who am I to reveal that to the world? And so I decided that they would remain untold. However while going through them this morning, one stood out that I think is rather timely considering all that’s going on in the world. And a little part of me thinks that, if we were able to ask him, the old man would want me to. ******** The old man couldn’t talk. A previous stroke left him that way, and he was probably having another one now. Well into his seventies, time was taking its toll on him, and he was taking one more trip to the hospital. First order of business was a blood pressure. As I pulled his arm out of his sleeve I saw it there on his forearm. The tattoo. Faded blue numbers told me what he couldn’t. He was a Holocaust survivor. It stopped me dead in my tracks. After all, I’d heard about these but I’d never seen one before. Of course the old man watched me stop and stare at it. I looked at him, and as his eyes met mine a silent affirmation passed between us. He knew that I knew what I was looking at. Sitting here now if I close my eyes I can see him looking back at me. If I were an artist I would draw him so well his own family would recognize him all these decades later. His gaze seemed to burn into my very soul. Time had slowly robbed him of what the Nazis tried and failed to. He had seen and endured horrors I couldn’t begin to imagine, and a stroke left him unable to tell me. Yet in his eyes I could sense something pass between us, an unspoken message. Those eyes spoke a testimony and a message, if only in one word: “Remember.” I’ve never understood how anyone can try and deny that the Holocaust ever happened. And, for as much as I believe in the right to free speech, it’s one of the rare conversational red lines I have. I simply won’t tolerate it. Because I know better. The old man told me everything I need to know. Chris Sherwood writes from his home in North Chemung. He is the author of the In Times of Trouble trilogy a post-apocalyptic series set in Upstate New York. To learn more, go to cmsherwood.com

Yes, it is still February! February has the fewest days, making it the shortest month, but it doesn’t feel so. Most of us are so tired of heavy coats and boots that February seems to take much longer than necessary; sort of like adding insult to injury. Our attitudes tend to “drag us through the month”! Of course, winter won’t last forever but as another front comes through, we do wonder. This week is COLD!! I have said (probably too often) “This too shall pass,” when something truly annoying or dire comes into life. And of course, it will, but knowing that, often doesn’t help in the moment. Charles Dickens must have agreed, though, when he wrote, in A Tale of Two Cities, this observation: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.” We are in those times----- temporarily, in February ----- longer-lasting with our country and the world! My guess is that no one born on earth, escapes this puzzling situation of wonderful mixed with dreadful. And despite good intentions, it is no easy thing to switch our perspectives into hope and joy when in the midst of negatives. Late February weather does little to help us in this dilemma. Remember the old adage, “As days lengthen, cold strengthens.” We have just celebrated Valentine’s Day, which may have brightened last week. And President’s Day is also just past, a day off for many. There are available activities that might add zest to our February days; we have people ice-fishing on the village pond and there are pancake breakfasts offered by the Fire Company and the Masonic Lodge. Ithaca and Elmira (25 miles away) offer concerts and a variety of other options. Locally, the schools give concerts and plays, and maple syrup festivals (depending on the weather) are beginning. Attending some of these may help with our winter attitudes ----- for one’s attitude and perception are all-important in whether we meet mornings with a smile, or spend the day in grumbling. I do a bit of both, usually immediately upon rising! What a wonderful wood-fire in the stove. 😊 WHAT??? Two degrees below ZRO??! ☹ Grumbling comes so easily. There’s the weather, the news, the flu, the odd noise from the furnace, the rattling in the dishwasher. In addition, then there are so many issues today that both irritate and appall me. It would be so easy to fix them if I were just granted a magic wand for a few days. Wars would cease, food would be more equitably distributed so that no one went hungry, animals would be cared for with compassion and good sense, schools would take individual needs into consideration and education would be fun, nursing homes would have ample care-givers who were well-trained and kind, diversity would suddenly become acceptable to all, and kindness would be the “in” way to live. Health care would actually be healing and not atrociously expensive. And there would be a French bakery in every village. Life would be ideal ---- my ideal! Of course, that it is exactly what potential dictator’s say: You give me that scepter and crown, and I’ll make everything wonderful.” However, my ideal and your ideal (and their ideal) may be miles apart, and good-looking, glib-tongued fairy- godfathers or godmothers, too often, morph into goblin-tyrants. Looking back at history, there may have been one or two kindly and benevolent dictators, but not many. And even those rare individuals who intended to be good rulers, eventually succumbed to a lust for power, or those who surrounded them did, and they were assassinated. Since I’m very human, I probably couldn’t be trusted with that magic wand either. No one can! Which is why we must put up with the arguing and tediousness of a democratic republic; it seems to be fairer than any other form of government, frustrating though it might be for those who want what they want - yesterday! Even though we cannot always control the world around us, we can decide whether we wish to face life kindly and generously; carrying our own inner happiness or not. Situations may occur that affect our happiness, making it necessary for us to adapt ---- divorce, theft, fires, mudslides, unpleasant attitudes, deaths of people we love. All of these certainly require a time of healing and adjustment, and they may change us in some ways. Certainly, other people can contribute bonus happiness to our happiness with their love and thoughtfulness. But no one, other than ourselves, can be responsible for seeking that inner joy that becomes part of us. We decide how we will meet what life brings. No one ever said it would be easy but it does bring growth and wisdom. Gratitude helps with that inner joy. When life around us is discouraging, or even calamitous, we probably should remember that quote: “There is nothing new on earth.” (I think that might be from Ecclesiastes.). All of the emotions we feel, all of the dire happenings, all of the losses and the unfairness, have happened to someone before. So, we are not being singled out. Even amid hard times, when we think of all the things we have, both material things and wonderful, usable qualities, we should have no trouble being grateful. Gratitude transforms our emotional state. If we focus on all the things we think we lack, we immediately become unhappy. Some people spend their entire lives gathering more and more and are never satisfied. I’m guessing that their happiness is short-lived and dependent on what money/possessions they can get into their hands. There is a good book called “If You Give A Moose A Muffin.” It is an amusing, well-written book for kids, on greed. I once made a gift of that book to Amo Houghton, to share in Congress. He thought it was good too, and we laughed over it, but I doubt that he ever read it to his colleagues. Those people who have made the decision to live happily with whatever it is that they have, become joyous spirits who are shining lights to the rest of us. We all have a choice! Naturally the world being what it is, there will be days when it is quite impossible to summon a good attitude.Those are the days to curl up in a corner of the couch and read a comforting or inspirational book while listening to good music and sipping a cup of whatever seems good. We also have a choice about February. We can be despondent because winter is taking so long to depart, or we can make every day a scavenger hunt; looking for signs of spring. In addition to checking often for swollen buds on trees, for a bit of green grass in the boggy places, skunk cabbage showing its tips, and red-winged blackbirds, there are some fun things that may brighten up this late winter month. On a relatively warm day, cut some forsythia branches and put them in tepid water. In a week or so, yellow blossoms will bud and soon you will have a vase-full of spring right in your kitchen. Other shrubs can be forced to bloom early too, but I’m not sure which ones. I do know that lilacs are reluctant. You might find experimenting with this a fun project. While thinking about this, I relived a February memory of fun I had back when I was more agile and resilient. I was a freshman in college at SUNY Plattsburg, on the shore of Lake Champlain. My roommate, Barbara, and I, thought it would be fun to skate on that lovely, large lake, and we did. And had a great time, though the ice was a little rough since no one had cleaned it off. We discovered later why it wasn’t cleaned off; that no way should we have been skating there, especially by ourselves. Apparently, the lakes have huge air bubbles and fractures in the ice, that could give way and plunge us into icy water. Our guardian angels must have been alert, and thankfully, that didn’t happen. As February’s days come to an end, we can look forward to winds, mud, and a few more snow squalls. But also, we’ll have starry, frosty nights and sunny, melting-snow days. So perhaps this poem, “February Twilight,” by Sara Teasdale* will inspire us to enjoy what comes: “I stood beside a hill smooth with new-laid snow, A single star looked out from the cold evening glow. There was no other creature that saw what I could see --- I stood and watched the evening star as long as it watched me.” May you find magic moments in the rest of February. Carol writes from her home in Spencer. She may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net. *Sara Teasdale ---American writer and poet. 1884-1933.

by Walker Larson Recently, I was in search of trout, but my search resulted in more than just fish. I’ve been a fly fisherman for over a decade, but when I moved to Wisconsin a few years back, I lost easy access to my favorite haunts. So I was searching for a new stretch of untouched waters to fish near my home, a journey that led me through the winding backroads of the coulees in my area, as the evening summer sun soaked the little fields in liquid bronze and made the tree line glisten. I headed to a stream a few valleys over from my own. I’d been through the quiet recesses of this valley before, seen many of the farmsteads from the road as I drove past, but I didn’t know who lived in them. I didn’t know many people in my area, apart from those living on the dead-end road I call home. The decision to talk to the natives was partly one of self-preservation. In Wisconsin, you can legally fish any navigable waterway as long as you enter at a public access point and keep your feet wet. Still, I’m reticent to assume that all my neighbors know this law. I’d hate to end up on the wrong end of a shotgun of some backwoodser with hair sprouting from his nose and ears, faded baseball cap cocked atop his ragged hair, glaring with wild eyes at the presence of an intruder on his land. I thought I’d better get permission from the landowners before venturing into the creek to avoid such an encounter. In reality, of course, everyone I spoke to was nothing like my imaginary backwoodsman. They were all well-shaven, friendly, remarkably helpful, and deeply interested in identifying our mutual acquaintances (of which there turned out to be more than I expected). Somehow, the fact that most of them knew the people on my road better than I did made me feel more at home. In a flash, my own lane and the people on it was not some isolated rural outpost, but rather a place and a people familiar to a wide network of families living in the area. And, conversely, this new valley I was exploring suddenly took on a little of the flavor of home, for there were old bonds of friendship and shared history between my immediate neighbors and my new acquaintances, some of whom seemed as permanent as the hills themselves. The folks I talked to knew the exact house I lived in, which they referred to affectionately as “Robinsons’ place.” Of course, my home does not belong to the Robinsons and hasn’t for some time. But in those valleys, memory and tradition hold strong, and my presence of two years hardly amounts to more than a pit stop in the eyes of the locals. Somehow, I know that the acreage I call home won’t truly be “the Larsons’ place” for many years to come, not until generations of us have lived and died here. We haven’t earned that designation yet. One of the men I talked to–a thin, leathery fellow with a weather-worn face–drew me a verbal map of the valley and the interwoven streams and tributaries that flow through and around it, like veins on the back of a hand. “I used to trap mink and rats all up through there,” he said, eyes fastened on the distant ridges, or maybe on the distant past. I had a confused image flash through my mind of enormous mousetraps out in the marshes and woods. Who would go to the trouble of trapping a rat? Can there really be that much skin on a rat? And who would buy a rat pelt? Gross. Then it dawned on me. “Muskrats?” I asked, innocently. “Muskrats, yeah,” he said, turning to me with a puzzled look, as though there were no other kinds of rats in existence. “I’d get 30 or 40 rats through the valley, but they’re all gone now. I don’t know what happened.” Another woman I spoke with told me how she’d lived in the same house for 33 years, there beside the creek. I looked at the house–an old white one, a little dirty and worn, but solid-looking–and thought of how many scenes of one family’s joys and sorrows its walls had witnessed. The woman (we’ll call her Harriet) had spoken a little briskly to me at first, when she wasn’t yet sure who I was or what I wanted, but she soon softened, and her warmth was as palpable as that of the muggy, summer evening. She had an odd habit of ending almost every sentence with, “And that,” or sometimes, “and that. So.” (“We’ve lived here for 33 years, and that. So.”) It was as if every item of conversation were added to some imaginary list of all the things that are. It made each remark somehow homey and also more significant. This quirk in her speech made the next thing she said more poignant than it otherwise would have been: “You know Dane? On your road?” Harriet asked. “Yeah, I’ve met him.” “He passed away.” I hadn’t known this until a half hour before, when the muskrat trapper told me. “I just heard that.” “He was one of our best friends. A groomsman in our wedding, and that.” “I’m sorry. I didn’t know him well. He seemed like a really good guy.” He had plowed my driveway once in the winter, refusing any payment except my promise to visit him sometime. “Yeah, he was an amazing guy.” “Cancer, wasn’t it?” “Yeah, cancer, and that. So.” Half an hour later, as I stood in the shimmering water, cold as a Wisconsin winter, staring at the bejeweled back of a brook trout, I knew that in my fishing trip I had caught something more than the shadowy, elusive fish who own these little pools and little riffles under the canopied banks, where the drowsy summer flies buzz and the many-voiced water sings an endless song–I’d snatched a little scrap of human connection, of old stories and relationships, of history unique to the valleys where I live, that I didn’t have before, that I didn’t even know existed. It had been there long before my arrival and, no doubt, will continue long after I’m gone. Of course, the pressures of modern technology, transportation, economics, political divides, and the general fragmentation of society threaten this scrap of old-fashioned human community. But I was gratified to know it still exists in some places. The realization didn’t come without regret, however. If I had been more integrated into the local community, if I’d met more of my neighbors sooner, I might have known the ordeal my next-door neighbor was undergoing. I didn’t even know he was sick, let alone that he had died, until I talked to other people in my area. What breakdown of local culture must have occurred so that a man living right next to me had gone through his final days, died, and been buried, and I’d known nothing of it, driven past his house every day none the wiser? If I had known, perhaps I could have done something for him. At the very least, I could have fulfilled my promise to visit him in payment for his plowing my driveway. Walker Larson holds a BA in writing and an MA in English literature. Prior to becoming a writer, he taught literature and history at a private academy in Wisconsin. He is the author of two novels, Hologram and Song of Spheres. When not working on his acreage or spending time with family and friends, he blogs about literature and education on his Substack, The Hazelnut. This article appeared on IntellectualTakeout.org and is shared under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

For the past several years I’ve considered writing an open letter to the graduating class of each June, but never got around to it. As graduation loomed closer for our oldest son I thought about it more. That was in 2020, and we know too well what a shit show that year ended up being. The last thing a bunch of kids needed at that time was me writing something that could be summed up in this pic: Not that I think anyone should be mollycoddled, but it was a difficult time for everyone, and there was no sense in adding to it with something unhelpful as a meme. Same for the Class of 2021, which still saw major disruptions to what we knew as “normal.” When it came time for the Class of 2022, well, I was busy releasing a second book and plumb forgot all about it. So here we are now. Perhaps it’s my age or perhaps it’s because I’ve spent more time with the younger generation here at home and overhear some of the conversation. But the admittedly unsolicited advice I would have delivered a couple years ago isn’t the one I hope to deliver now, it’s a kinder, gentler message I think. And hopefully more helpful. If I’ve learned anything in the thirty two years since I graduated it’s this: Your education isn’t over, it’s just begun. Certainly you’ve been given some tools to take with you into the world ( and missing some you should have been given ) but keep in mind going forward, now is the time when your education truly begins. Until now you’ve had people there to support you, to pick you up when you fall. You still will going forward, but it’s a little different now. The world is gonna knock you on your ass from time to time and the best thing for you now and then will be to pick yourself up whenever you can. It will make you stronger, harder to knock down. One of my favorite quotes along these lines comes from the show Deadwood ( NSFW - Language ) A little extreme maybe, but there’s some truth there. Please don’t mistake this as me being overly pessimistic, it’s just the way life is sometimes. But there’s an upside to all of this going forward as well. At your commencement there were sure to be speeches, and someone may have referred to high school as “…the best years of our lives.” What a crock. The best years of your life are just beginning, trust me. Ahead of you is the time to explore and find your place in the world. You will not only establish yourself in the world professionally, but more importantly as the person you were born to be. This is a time for change and growth that, hopefully, will end only when you’re dead. Trust me, decades from now when you think of “the good old days”, it most likely won’t be high school that comes to mind. At least I hope not. Along with the change I mention above will be the change in your relationships. You may be feeling some anxiety about you and your high school friends going your separate ways. Of course social media has changed this somewhat in the past few years, but it will happen nonetheless. There’s a good chance you won’t see each other again even. And it’s okay. More than that, it’s perfectly normal. Sometimes personal growth, as well as life in general, draws you apart. However at the same time it’s pushing you towards someone else. By all means, keep those ties if you choose to and able but don’t give way to anxiety about drifting apart either. It’s just one of those things that happen. They have their own journey, their own path to walk. It might not run parallel to your own. Remember then fondly, wish them well on their own growth and should a time come when your paths cross again, by all means, celebrate! As this happened, you may well find that your circle of friends ( meaning in real life, not social media )gets smaller, but that circle becomes stronger as you find people who share your values and interests. Be a fiercely loyal friend, but not blindly loyal, there’s a difference. Be sure to have one or two friends that challenge you, to keep in in check along the way as well. Sitting here, three decades past where you are now, I feel like there’s so many things I could tell you. However I think it’s best to close with what I think to be a great piece of advice, disguised as a poem, by Rudyard Kipling: “If” If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you, If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too; If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies, Or being hated, don’t give way to hating, And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise. If you can dream—and not make dreams your master; If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim; If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster And treat those two impostors just the same; If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools, Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken, And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools. If you can make one heap of all your winnings And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss, And lose, and start again at your beginnings And never breathe a word about your loss; If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew To serve your turn long after they are gone, And so hold on when there is nothing in you Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’ If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch, If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you, If all men count with you, but none too much; If you can fill the unforgiving minute With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run, Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it, And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son! Chris Sherwood writes from his home in North Chemung. He is the author of the In Times of Trouble and In Times Of Trouble: Aftermath, a post-apocalyptic series set in Upstate New York, and is currently working on the third book in the trilogy. To learn more, go to cmsherwood.com This column originally appeared on Chris's website in 2023

What lush, thoroughly-enjoyable days we are in. Who wouldn’t like May? Birds are everywhere; scarlet cardinals are flying through purple lilacs and the colors don’t clash at all! Dogwood blossoms make white clouds against the dark spruce trees. In the musical, Camelot, they sing: “Tra la, it’s May! The lusty month of May! The lovely month when ev’ryone goes blissfully a-stray…..”* I’m not sure about the astray part, but it is surely easy to feel blissful right now. The month’s name came from Maia, the Greek goddess who oversaw the growth of plants. The Romans celebrated “Floralia”, a five-day festival to honor the goddess, Flora – the Roman equivalent. For some Native Americans, May is the month of the Full Flower Moon. On the western Christian church’s liturgical calendar, the Easter season is ending with Pentecost, this year, on May 19th. The cinnamon ferns in my shade garden have unrolled like so many green, leafy scrolls. They are now high enough to hide the path created by the “family” skunk, who has a burrow over that way, and who comes out at night to dig in the lawn for grubs. They are so tall that I can no longer see the bird feeders from my chair in the dining room. This is too bad, because the rose-breasted grosbeaks, cardinals, chickadees, nuthatches and woodpeckers are constant visitors. Baby raccoons will be out of the nest very soon, raiding the cat food. Bluejays have also added cat food to their daily diet; I think it may be a game with them, birds vs. cat! The world is full of life in technicolor, both flora and fauna. May is another way to define a new word I found (I like interesting words) ---" Yugen” ---- a profound, mysterious sense of the beauty of the universe that triggers a deep emotional response”.** This response seemed to be true, world-wide, when so many people watched the eclipse. I feel it when there is the dark tracery of trees and shrubs on a moon-lit lawn or in a quiet, lavender twilight when birds’ soft cheeping morphs day into night or when everything sparkles at sunrise and the sky is streaked with rose and gold. The beauty of the universe is so vivid in May. Our pastor gave us an assignment one Sunday for the next Sunday to “find Sabbath” somewhere other than church. It was a fairly easy assignment for me, but not, apparently, for everyone. To feel the reverence and rest of Sabbath while in the garden, or on the lake shore or under a blooming tree is just natural. I do appreciate stained glass and beautiful organ preludes, but I can find awe and delight in all the wonders of what is around me. I can find love and delight in being with family and friends. The world surely has gaping wounds and is filled with grief and destruction in many places. But we can still be bathed in the natural wonders; gifts to those of us living on this earth --- so many beautiful places and ----the opportunity to be with incredible people. Nature’s gifts lead me to consider human gifts. One of the things we recently tossed around in our Friday AM women’s study was how everyone has intrinsic gifts but are not always realized by those who have them. Helping others recognize their gifts is an affirming part of loving/caring. Some gifts/ talents are quite visible; those individuals who pour out music, those who dance as lightly as thistledown, those who bring roles to life on stage, who turn oils, acrylics, and water colors into pictures that speak to the heart, those who take a flat piece of fabric and turn it into clothing, quilts or collage, gardeners who “paint” the landscape with flowers and foliage, people who bring life to wood, stone and metal via sculpture, furniture, and carvings those who draw us into stories until we feel we’ve lived there. So many beautiful things come from our gifts/talents. There are also wonderful, but less evident, gifts. Attentive listening is a precious gift when we need someone’s ear. We don’t necessarily want anyone to “fix” our problems as much as a quiet acceptance, and the feeling that someone hears us; that we are not alone in our feelings. Then there are those individuals who teach in a way that makes learning exciting ---- often helping us with inner growth as well. There is the gift of hospitality; people who always make me feel that they are glad I am with them. There are the comforting huggers, leaving a trail of affirmation in their wake. I am not, by upbringing, a very “huggy” person, but I almost always appreciate a hug from someone who thinks I need one. Another rare gift would be in people who notice small things, and express their gratitude or appreciation. We may not work for rewards, but it does the heart good when someone notices. Going out of one’s way to do something feels better with “Good Job” encouragement along the path. Gifts can be huge visible ones or small quiet ones, but we all have them, and should share them and our appreciation of others’ gifts extravagantly. We might not consider events as gifts, but celebrations, good times of many kinds, are gifts that give us breaks in our routines. May begins a train of celebratory events. Since we live only one-half hour from Ithaca and Elmira, we are very aware of college graduations. Ithaca College graduation is this weekend, and Cornell’s ceremonies are on Memorial Day weekend. We appreciate these events from afar; we try to avoid driving where there is an influx of parents, along with students packing up to go home. This brings me to another subject, which is sort of about wasting gifts. Students tend to leave heaps and piles of perfectly usable stuff behind to be picked up by garbage trucks and deposited in a landfill. This lack of concern about waste bothers me. I think kids should be taught to take good care of their possessions. Feeling “entitled” to everything one wants is not the way to become a responsible adult. It is no gift to a child to be the parents who do not speak to this lack of gratitude and care. There is a happy ending to this messy and profligate exodus. The surrounding community is very aware of this annual “leaving behind,” habitual behavior so the “gleaners” come to the rescue. Potential waste has become, instead, an exercise in re-using and re-purposing. Wasting gifts of any kind, material items or those things of the spirit just shouldn’t happen. In Camelot, because it is May, they obviously believed in letting the good times roll. Here, in addition to the graduations, there are oodles of possibilities for going “astray”, or at least getting out and about. There are parks with waterfalls, lakes and rivers, several garden centers, Farmer’s Markets, The Wind Mill, the Finger Lakes Ice Cream Trail and a plethora of yard sales -- all fun things to give us a break from the very daily lives we tend to live. Check your community’s offerings and be a part of them. Living vibrantly at all ages is using our personal gifts well. And planned recreation for ourselves is as important as planned maintenance for our equipment or functioning factories. We all grew up with the idea that working hard is a virtue, which it certainly is, to a point. Working to achieve goals is a good thing, but learning to contemplate and take reasonable rest is an excellent thing too. Moderation has never been a popular concept in the U.S.; our general population, historically and currently, has tended to bounce rapidly from one extreme to another, and we’ve glorified that “work for the night is coming” hymn. Corporations have made people think they must work 24/7 if they wish to be considered loyal, ambitious employees. There are entities who, even knowing it is illegal, expect their employees work overtime without compensation. And we do it to ourselves; push-push-push until we are exhausted. If we have been raised to believe how much we accomplish in a day measures our value, then having fun may seem frivolous and self-indulgent. Not so!! Taking breaks is a healthy, as well as a creative way to live. We need to re-learn and believe that we are enough just as we are. Personal growth and delight in the world around us are valid parts of living, as well as whatever it is that furnishes our bread, butter, and shoes. Perhaps that was our lesson from our unusual Sabbath. We may not need to go blissfully astray to celebrate the month of May, but maybe we could indulge in just a bit of wandering. Taking time to really see the world blossoming and growing green, actually hear the singing of birds, create a picnic in the park, instead of dinner at home, do something different and fun! Spending just a little time in our own personal Camelot adds elan and value to our lives. “In short, there’s simply not a more congenial spot for happy ever aftering than here, in Camelot!”* Carol writes from her home in Spencer. She may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net. *Camelot ---Created for the stage in 1960, produced as a movie in 1967. The story/legend of King Arthur’s court and the brief, wonderful time of Camelot. Written by Adam Jay Lerner and music by Frederick Loewe. **definition of “Yugen” found on Pinterest from “Singing Grasses.”

Several months ago, my wife, Shelley, and I lost our best friend and soul mate. Her name was Sammy. She was our pet dog of a dozen years. She had cancer and we had to end her suffering. I’m still grieving the loss. I’ve had pet dogs all my life and I’ve had to decide when to end the lives of five of them. It never gets easier. I’m never sure if I’ve made the right decision. Did I end their lives too soon, when they still had many “good days” ahead of them; or did I wait too long, because I wasn’t ready to “goodbye,” and my pets suffered needlessly? It was more than a dozen years ago that Sammy came into our lives. She was a beautiful brindle-hued Heinz 57 mix that we adopted from the local SPCA. Before that, Sammy had been a stray that animal control officers caught while she was eating from a deer carcass in the grass median of Route 328 in Pine City. I became her adopted dad and she became my best friend, always eagerly and excitedly waiting to greet me at the door every time I returned home as if I had been away at war for years. She would meet me with a smile on her face and her tail wagging so rapidly it wiggled her rear end. Her tail wagged through her heart. Dogs instinctively know how to be kind and share unconditional love. It takes people years to do the same. That’s probably why dogs don’t live as long as we do. They are born with life’s lessons deep in their hearts. She shared those lessons with me. I learned so much from her. She was my constant companion and a respite of happiness and stress relief at the end of a difficult day. She loved to be loved and petted. She would lie next to me on the couch with her head on my lap, as I read or watched TV. If I stopped petting, she would gently nudge me with her paw or nose to get me back into petting gear. She was friendly to everyone she met. She taught me not to judge people and to not be too hard on myself when I made mistakes. She loved car rides, with her head out the window, ears flapping in the wind, and her nose savoring the countless fragrances that blew by her. Sammy didn’t chase sticks, play catch or do tricks. Instead, she fetched fun and love in everything she did. She showed me how to enjoy life’s little moments of glee and wonder. To love and be loved by a dog is one of life’s greatest pleasures. We spent hours hiking in the woods, cross-country skiing on nature trails or sitting in the grass next to the river on a sunny day. Often, while hiking, she would run ahead of me, and I would duck behind a tree and hide. When she would look back and see that I was gone, she would stop and perk up her ears, before darting back to find me. I would jump out from behind the tree to startle her and send her tail and butt into hyper-wag, as I laughed hysterically. She would tilt her head quizzically and look at me as if to say, “You’re so immature. What am I going to do with you?” Then she was off and running ahead again searching for more fun and adventure. Now, when I hike those trails, I envision her up ahead, glancing back to be sure I was still in pursuit. At times like those, her loss feels unbearable. She was the most lovable dog I’ve known. If I sat down and leaned forward, she would come up to me and rest her head against my forehead, and just sit there quietly, head-to-head, as I rubbed her belly. At night, she lie next to my wife and me in bed, slowly taking over more and more of the mattress as the evening progressed, until I would awaken precariously balanced on the edge, about to fall to the floor, while she comfortably hogged the rest of the bed, snoring, with legs outstretched and head tucked into her chest. Dogs, like all animals, are good a hiding their pain and infirmities, an evolutionary defense that keeps them from being preyed upon by predators looking for the weakest in the pack. After he cancer diagnosis I paid close attention to her behaviors, physical condition and her eating and sleeping habits, looking for signs that would tell me “It’s time, Jim. It’s time.” As her health grew worse and I struggled with making the heartbreaking final decision, I took her to one of our favorite outdoor spots, beneath a quiet stand of shady white pine trees in Big Flats. She laid next to me on a soft bed of pine needles as I petted her, prayed and asked the universe to give me a sure sign that it was time to bid her farewell. Tears filled my eyes, as they do as I write this column. She crawled closer to me and rested her head on my shoulder to tell me that it will be okay and that she would let me know when it was time to say farewell. I hugged her and wept like a baby. Sammy taught me that it was okay to cry. They say that losing a pet is one of the saddest and most difficult traumas we deal with in life. It’s true. Her death was a double whammy because she was my rock of strength and she always made it easier for me to deal with loss and sadness. Her death carved out a hard emptiness inside me that I’m still struggling to fill. Sammy was true to her word about telling me when it was time to say goodbye. One day, in a matter of hours, she started showing signs of a “vestibular disorder,” of balance. To her, the room was in a never-ending nauseous spin. She couldn’t stand up or walk without stumbling and falling over. I knew it was time. I called the veterinarian, who came to our home to help us end Sammy’s suffering. The farewell was painless for Sammy. She died softly and comfortably in our arms, amid our hugs and tears. I try to ease my sadness by telling myself that my deep grief shows that Sammy was loved and had a great life. Sammy, old girl, this one is for you in honor of your life, our wonderful times together and all the love and happiness you shared with us. You made my life more enjoyable, joyful and meaningful. Best of all you taught me to be a better man. And that is one damn good tail-waggin’-and-butt shakin’ Father’s Day gift. Jim Pfiffer’s humor column posts every Sunday on the Jim Pfiffer Facebook page, Hidden Landmarks TV Facebook page, West Elmira Neighborhood, SouthernTierLife.com and ElmiraTelegram.com. Jim lives in Elmira with his wife, Shelley, and many pets. He is a retired humor columnist with the Elmira Star-Gazette newspaper and a regular swell guy. Contact him at pfifman@gmail.com.

At this point, what do we, as a county, have to lose? Simply look at what has happened to our beloved county in the last 50 years, businesses are leaving, people are leaving, Chemung County is turning into one big "ghost town"... Charlie Lechliter

by Jeff Minick “All aboard!” North Carolina writer Anna Raglan was delighted to find that Amtrak’s conductors still called out these words to passengers before departing the station. In her new travelogue The Train From Greenville, Raglan, a kind and wise friend of mine, describes a journey she made by rail from Greenville, South Carolina, to Seattle and back again. A wife, mother, and professional in her mid-50s, Raglan was apprehensive about the trip. She packed and repacked her luggage, had a friend help her make the reservation by phone, and nervously kept an eye on her luggage while onboard. Raglan takes her readers along with her on her way across the country and shows them the pleasures of train travel, which include the opportunity to see the American landscape and to meet people from all around the country. The Train From Greenville is a good book, wise in its observations of Raglan’s railway companions, accepting of their eccentricities, and gentle in tone, but that’s not why I am writing about it here. No—what deserves a deeper look is the sadness of this book, a sorrow entirely unintended by the author. You see, though The Train From Greenville is newly published, Raglan made her trip in 2011. That time, and the people she describes, seem to have lived not just a decade ago, but a century. It is startling looking back at who we once were. On that train were blacks and whites, Hispanics, Asians, and at least one Native American. Raglan spent a good bit of time with a tattooed man who loves drag racing and the music of Bruce Springsteen. Eventually, he told her a harrowing story about how he killed a man who had tried to assault him in self-defense. She conversed with a Native American hired by Amtrak to share stories of Indians and the West with the passengers. Her seat companions ranged from a female veteran of these trips to a quiet young man wearing dreadlocks. And though Raglan overheard a few political conversations, nowhere on her train do we encounter the acrimony so commonly found today in our mainstream media. Black Lives Matter, Critical Race Theory, the savage political assaults on presidents and politicians, and the laments over America’s faults: not a word. And of course, the COVID pandemic with its fearmongering, lockdowns, masks, and mandates were not even a whisper in the wind back in 2011. No, these trains, the beauty of the country they rolled through, and the Americans who rode them represent what America was about back then, a people united in purpose—in this case, getting to a destination—and helping one another along the way. Again and again we see these men and women offering assistance to their fellow travelers, helping a blind woman find a seat, sharing food and treats, and making certain not to crowd the person seated beside them. Other than a nervous, easily angered woman Raglan refers to as Birdie, and a man upset by a delay in the timetable, these people displayed those traits foreigners have long thought of as American: optimism, cheerfulness, and a can-do attitude with lots of smiles. Above I mentioned the miserable contrast between now and 10 years ago. But as I reflect on the matter, I also see The Train From Greenville as a sign of hope and rejuvenation, a reminder of who we were and who we are. Surely all of us know friends, family, and neighbors like those on the train, good-hearted people who looked out for one another and who have carried on through these last two miserable years. We are a people who were born in a revolution, fought a civil war, who helped to save the world from fascism and communism, and who, despite our flaws, have made enormous changes throughout our history, looking for justice and liberty for all. The fearmongering of the current pandemic, the heavy-handed efforts by government to order us about and so diminish our liberties, the insane spending by Congress, the foreign policy failures: these have damaged the American spirit, but they cannot kill it—unless we throw in the towel out of despair. One chapter of The Train From Greenville is titled “We Are Here Together.” Let’s make those words one of our banners. Let’s turn our backs on those contemptible people working so hard to divide us and remember we are all Americans. Jeff Minick lives in Front Royal, Virginia, and may be found online at jeffminick.com. He is the author of two novels, Amanda Bell and Dust on Their Wings, and two works of non-fiction, Learning as I Go and Movies Make the Man. This column was republished with permission from IntellectualTakeout.org

Hello everyone your friendly neighborhood fat guy bringing you another review with questionable grammar and little or no punctuation. So besides having some of the best wings in the area they have a heifer of a cheeseburger sub. Aptly named The Big Harry it was definitely a mouthful. I get it dressed mayo lettuce cheese and bacon. Burger was cooked all the way no pink which is how I like em. Bacon was good and crispy.Nice hoagie roll soft with a bit of crust. Overall a well made and tasty sandwich. There is something about a cheeseburger sub that in my opinion makes it better than your standard on a bun cheeseburger. I like to keep my reviews honest so it was a little light on the fries for a charged upgrade. However that wouldnt stop me from ordering it again. Honestly they probably did me a favor. Meal in total was around 13.00 with fries the added bacon and being dressed. Well worth the price in my book and yes id still order it with fries. So Harry's Inn The Big Harry is Fat Guy approved and pretty funny to order.

We’re quickly coming upon the time marking one year since the world was turned upside down thanks to a tiny little organism known as Covid-19 came into our lives. I remember very well the sense of foreboding, the heaviness we all felt in the beginning. I sat our teenage sons down, one of them a high school senior, and we talked about it. I told them in no uncertain terms, “This is going to suck.” No one had been through what we were about to experience in 100 years, so we'd be making this up as we go along. “We’re gonna have to roll with the punches,” I told them. Looking back, I think that helped them cope and kept everything in perspective. Yes, this was going to suck, but we’d get through it. I just didn’t know how right I was. The “suck factor” would be off the charts. We all experienced “the suck” in our own ways, no use in rehashing that. On the flip side however, there were small glimmers of positivity, at least here in my own little world. Probably yours as well. At the very outset, right around the time of the shutdown, I felt strongly compelled to reach out to friends to make sure they were doing okay. I later learned this was a common reaction, and really, how awesome is that when you stop to think about it? I got in contact with to someone I hadn’t talked to in nearly two years. Someone I really respect and admired, and I'm glad I listened to that little voice in my head that had been there all along, but had become much louder. Being relegated to staying home, I needed something to keep me from going crazy. So I resolved to finish the book I had been working on for the better part of four years, an “end of the world” story funny enough. I even set myself a deadline of June 1st. Three months to make it happen, and it did. And I gotta say, our lawn never looked better than it did last Summer thankyouverymuch. Our oldest son’s senior year of high school was decimated, but the resilience he and many of his classmates showed with each disappointment was remarkable. And in the end, while they didn’t have prom and all the other stuff, they did get a graduation ceremony. And I have to say it again, kudos to the staff and administration of the local schools for making it happen. Through all the ups and downs throughout 2020, I kept telling myself if we could just have a nice holiday season, things would be okay. Uh huh, sure. Like millions of others, I think we threw ourselves into it head first. Damn it, we were gonna be jolly no matter what. And you know what? I think it worked. I for one enjoyed the houses all lit up everywhere. Add to that an epic snowstorm, it was hard to feel down. This holiday season was different, but it wasn't all bad. Our family did things a little differently than usual this year. My wife, sons and I had Thanksgiving dinner here at home, just the four of us, for the first time ever. Same for Christmas, we visited family, briefly and masked, then came home to enjoy a nice dinner, the four of us. While I missed the parties, seeing family and all that, I have to admit folks, I didn’t miss the chaos. Interestingly enough, there was none of the usual “post-holiday letdown” I and perhaps millions of others feel. As I’ve said repeatedly, it wasn’t the holidays we wanted, but maybe it was the holidays we needed. And when 2020 finally came to an end, we all breathed a sigh of relief. Is 2021 going to say “hold my beer”? The jury is still out on that one I think. I guess my point to all this is, if we look hard enough, deep enough, we can find some silver lining to the black cloud that was the past year. Perhaps now is a good time for all of us to do a little reflection on the lessons we learned and what changes we can make going forward. For all the talk about the “new normal”, none of us knows what that’s going to look like. But maybe we have a chance to shape it for the better. Did you have any positive experiences the past year due in part to the pandemic you'd like to share? Let's hear them.

Our flight from Philadelphia was at around 11 in the morning on Saturday. My wife and I said goodbye to our daughter and to our dog and also to my sister and our niece. They had come up the night before to watch over our daughter and pup. Then we hit the road, knots in both of our stomachs. This was not a normal trip. This was not a vacation and this was not for a wedding. This was a mission; a mission to get our daughter, who was currently resting comfortably in the womb of our surrogate, who lived in southern Florida, about a half-hour north of Miami. It had been a long time coming, us getting to this point in making the trip in the middle of August. Before the drive to Philadelphia, there had been plenty of decisions and discussions, followed by more discussions and decisions. There had been two miscarriages and subsequently, more discussions and more decisions. There were doctors and nurses, waiting rooms, various procedures, lengthy calls with insurance, car rides, tiny cups, paperwork, lawyers, notary publics, and paralegals. And then there was a pandemic. But for the most part, that was all behind us. Well, not the pandemic. That was still very much surrounding us, hanging over us like a dark and ominous cloud. Everything else though was largely buttoned up with the important parts tucked neatly into a brown folder in my trusty red backpack. If the drive to the Philly airport was Step 1, then Step 2 was checking in; checking in specifically with Spirit, an airline I have trust issues with. A few years back, we learned the hard way that you can make a reservation with Spirit, but that reservation will only get you so far. You need to also reserve a seat. What’s the point of the initial reservation, then? I still don’t know and probably never will but we had a credit with them courtesy of a canceled family trip that had been planned for April, so for at least one leg of the journey, we would be using Spirit. As with any large-scale operation with a lot of moving parts, each step seemed to have its own unique hiccup or hurdle. With Step 2, there was some slight concern on my part that even though Spirit’s policy clearly stated that they would check car seats and strollers for free, the current absence of a baby in either might prove problematic. All good though, as the lady at the counter didn’t even bat an eye. Our two bags both came in under 40 pounds too (also a concern,) so it was onto Step 3. Step 3 was security. That was relatively painless. Then there was Step 4, killing time in the terminal before our flight left. In my past life, this would have been a no-brainer, most likely ending with me saddling up to a bar somewhere. Not the case this time though, despite me being so keyed up that a drink would have done me good. Instead, I settled for some deep-breathing because that’s what Darin on Zac Efron’s Netflix show had recommended and that show is fantastic. Step 5 was getting on the plane. And again, there was another potential bump in the road because we were looking to board early with families despite one part of our family not yet currently with us. We made our way to the gate and the gate attendant, who without looking up, asked how old the child with us was. “TBD,” I replied. She looked at us, looked down at the empty car seat. Then she got it and waved us along. It was a full flight. Only a week earlier, when we made our reservation (for both the plane and the seats,) it hadn’t been, and that made sense. Florida was a hot zone not just in terms of temperature but also in regard to the number of COVID-19 cases in the state. Why the hell would someone be traveling to Florida right now if not for the birth of their child via surrogate? I was confused. And frustrated. Shotty mask wearers were all over the place, about every third person who boarded the plane was guilty of wearing their mask incorrectly. It was amateur hour in the midst of a pandemic, which scientifically speaking, is not ideal. The plane finally took off and I again leaned on Darin’s breathing advice as well as a live version of Phish’s “NICU” to take the edge off. Both helped but I could feel a headache coming on. I chugged water, I breathed in and out, I listened to “NICU” again and eventually, the threat of the headache quieted down. A couple hours later we landed in Fort Lauderdale. Another step completed. We wanted to see the hospital where our daughter would be born before heading north to Kim’s parents’ place and after getting our rental car, we headed in that direction and as we did, the rain came. It was pouring, it had gotten dark and we slowly made our way to the hospital. Then we saw it. It was right there. Looked fine; looked like a hospital. With our older daughter, who was also born via surrogate, we had been able to go in and tour the hospital, check out the maternity ward. But not this time. This time the tour had been virtual, enough to get the idea, which was the same with our drive-by of the place – we got the idea. Now it was time to head north. The rain really hadn’t let up and every place we stopped at for coffee was closed. That was a sign. Let’s wrap this up and get back to base. Before that though, we needed to stop at the grocery store and as we did, I got a voicemail from a New Jersey number. I listened to it as we walked up to the store and my heart started to beat faster. A knot in my stomach came back. It was the Immediate Care that we had gone to a few days earlier for a COVID test and they were telling me that they had my results and to call them in the morning. We had taken two tests, one of which was rapid. It had come back negative. I thought everything was cool, but now, what if it wasn’t? That would be a hell of a hiccup. I tried calling them back then but no one answered and I had no choice but to wait until the next morning. We did our best to remain calm and I worked on convincing myself that it was probably just an insurance issue because it’s usually always an insurance issue, regardless of the situation. Nothing to worry about. Everything was fine. I was going to have a Mahi sandwich. In Florida, Mahi and dolphin are the same thing. That was incredibly disturbing to me for a while before I realized it wasn’t the cute kind of dolphin, but Mahi, for some reason calling itself dolphin. Now I can laugh about it and hopefully, by the time I got in touch with Immediate Care Sunday morning, I could laugh about that as well. That night we watched Jaws. Kim, myself, Kim’s mom, and Kim’s dad, all crowded next to each other on a couch watching it on my laptop. It was adorable. Sunday went as follows: Tried to sleep in, but was woken up by the cable guy Called Immediate Care, results were negative, which was nice but they really could have just left a message Confirmed that tomorrow our surrogate would be induced Kim made sure the hospital bag was ready to go I looked up the plots of the Jaws sequels and trust me, it’s not pretty As Sunday wound down, Kim and I went for a walk and braced ourselves for the week ahead and what that might bring. *** Our surrogate was to be at the hospital at 5am on Monday morning. We also wanted to be there then but were told to by the nurse to stand by as there was no sense in us being there then. So, we did as we were instructed but it didn’t last long. As we ate breakfast, we were told to head down and that Kim could come in whenever. As for me, I would still be standing by. The nurse said that she was hoping to talk to some people over at Mother/Baby and that once labor was underway, maybe I could be let in. She was going to try but she also wasn’t making any promises. This was not new information. A few weeks earlier, while speaking with the head of Labor and Delivery, we were informed that due to COVID-related restrictions that had been put in place since March, the hospital’s policy was that each patient was allowed only one guest. The surrogate was the patient until the baby was born and naturally, we wanted her husband to be with her, meaning that was her one guest. Given that our situation was unique, an exception could be made and Kim would be allowed in as kind of a plus one. Once the baby was born, Kim would become the baby’s guest. All I could do was wait the entire process out from outside the building. We had had some time to process this news, but that time didn’t make things any easier. That time gave us an opportunity to talk ourselves into believing that everything would be fine. But that was fool’s gold. It was a bummer and it would continue to be a bummer. I would be missing the birth of my daughter and wouldn’t see either her or my wife until they were discharged at least two days later. Yet while it would certainly be tough and it would definitely be hard, it would be the way things were to play out and there wasn’t much we could do about it. As long as our baby girl was delivered and was safe and healthy, nothing else mattered. So, with that in mind, we got in the car, picked up coffee, and drove south. When we were in a similar situation with our older daughter and were headed to the hospital, the soundtrack of the car ride was Pearl Jam. So it was only fitting that we again turned to Pearl Jam when headed to another hospital to get our other baby girl. At noon, we arrived at the hospital and I walked Kim to the entrance. We said goodbye and that was that. She walked in and I stayed outside. I stood there for a moment or two, not entirely sure what to do next. I had to do something though, so I decided to get gas. I needed an objective; a purpose. Having a plan made things a little easier and on the way, I saw an old dude chopping at a palm tree with a machete. I then made my way back to the hospital and the parking garage. I drove around looking for a spot with good cell reception, a notoriously hard thing to do in parking garages. I finally set up camp in a spot on the ramp leading up to the closed-off top level. It was the best I could do. And then I peed in my empty Starbucks cup. And then I watched Avengers: Endgame. And then I waited for text messages from Kim. And then my stomach nearly collapsed into itself and tears formed in my eyes each time I received one, most of which were updates about how not much was happening. This was going to take time. Our other daughter couldn’t be born quick enough. Not so much this go around. I would need to find a spot out of the sun because I was going to be there a while and the southern Florida sun was merciless. Over the next few hours, I finished Endgame, thought about time travel, wrote about the Foo Fighters, and then got out to stretch my legs. I walked around the top deck of the parking garage, taking pictures of the clouds. In one direction I saw a building that looked like a giant guitar and in another direction, I could see the ocean. I did some light stretching and I stared off into the distance. There’s a good chance that I most likely raised an eyebrow or two if anyone happened to be watching me, wondering A) what this dude was doing walking around aimlessly on the top deck of the parking garage and B) if it was the same guy who has so far dumped two Starbucks’ cups full of urine out of his car today. You bet, buddy. The day dragged on and it was getting close to dinner time. Our surrogate’s husband recommended a burger spot nearby and I got something there. They had outside seating and there wasn’t anyone around, so I felt comfortable staying there and eating. Some places in Florida allowed inside dining, which made absolutely no sense to me. You had to wear a mask when you entered, but not once you sat down. But the staff wore masks and I just think that nothing makes sense anymore and this pandemic might last forever. On the plus side though, I had a Mahi burger and it was amazing. Storm clouds were rolling in; things were getting dark again. But no really, this pandemic might never end. While the rains once again came down outside, back at the hospital, nothing much had changed. Our baby girl was still too high, but also a tad bit on the big side so while our surrogate was trying for a natural birth, a C-section seemed likely. Whatever the method though, Monday night looked like a quiet one. The move for me was to head north for the night and come back in the morning. But there was something keeping me from doing that, something making me unable to go through with the decision or even make a decision at all. I hated leaving Kim, but at the same time, it’s not like I was physically with her and I knew I could be just as supportive up north at her parents’ place as I could sitting in the parking garage. The rain started to let up and I pointed the rental car north. To the west, the sunset was really something, bursts of orange, yellow, and purple exploding from behind the heavy, dark clouds. It was an easy drive and I was in an easy state of mind. Tomorrow would be another day, but tonight the Bruins were on. I would just have to try and get some sleep, see what happens on Tuesday. *** Tuesday started the same way Monday ended, with not much having changed. Our baby girl was still too high and with each passing hour, a C-section was more and more likely. I hadn’t slept but I had nothing to complain about. Kim got about 20 minutes. Sleeping in a hospital is statistically impossible. By 10am, I had resumed my post in the parking garage, but feeling adventurous, I wandered around and found a couple of picnic tables with umbrellas. I asked the man sitting underneath one of the umbrellas if I could open a closed one. “They’re all broken,” he replied. So being outside was not meant to last. It was already 90 degrees and it felt like 100. Soon I was back in the car, queuing about an episode of The Wire. As someone who likes to have something of a plan in place, the uncertainty of the day was unsettling. I had no idea what the next hour would bring. Every text message was met with a rush of energy even though most of them said that again, not much had changed. Kim was able to come outside at noon and for the first time in 24 hours we got to see each other. We went for an aimless walk around the hospital grounds and with our surrogate sleeping, Kim felt she could stay outside for lunch. And it was nice. With a whirling dervish of uncertainty guiding our every move and our every decision, the sense of peace that came with just sharing a meal with Kim was perfect. We barely even talked about what would come next. I don’t think we even talked much at all. We just enjoyed being with each other. I brought her up to what we were now calling my office and she closed her eyes, lounging comfortably in the passenger seat as I continued to watch The Wire. As our time together crept closer to ending, we decided that our best course of action would be to book a hotel room close by for the night, that way I could be in the area and she could stay there if it looked like it would be another quiet night. The hotel room was then confirmed but everything else was far from certain. I walked Kim back to the entrance where she again went in while I again stayed outside. I stood there for a few moments, just like yesterday, not knowing exactly what I should do with myself. The doctor was supposed to come by around six and presumably, a decision would then be made about a course of action. I would wait until then and go from there. Six o’clock passed and so did quarter after six. At half-past, I needed to change things up and take a break from The Wire. I opened the windows, turned the car off and now on the passenger side, sat there with the door open as a light breeze made its way through the parking garage. Up on the fourth level, it was quiet. It was just me and the pigeons. Anyone else who parked on that level had left. It was almost peaceful. Like I did on the plane, I turned to Phish to help settle my nerves. The song “Everything’s Right” came on and as it played, I started wandering around level four. The song’s chorus spoke to me and I started singing along as I walked and I felt good, I felt okay. “Everything’s right, so just hold tight.” Our baby girl was going to be born, either tonight or tomorrow. Maybe even the day after. She would be safe and healthy and so would the surrogate. I couldn’t be there and would still be out here in this godforsaken parking garage peeing in cups, but it didn’t matter. All that mattered was that she would be born. “Everything’s right, so just hold tight.” In the middle of listening to the song again, Kim texted saying that they had all talked to the doctor. Not only was it going to be a C-section and not only was it going to happen soon but some strings had been pulled and I was going to be able to be let in. I needed to get my act together. I needed to pack up my office. I needed to pee one more time. I did all these things and then waited, waited for the word from Kim as she waited for word from the doctor. Then the word came. I grabbed my trusty red backpack. I bid the parking garage adieu and hoofed it around the building to the emergency room entrance. I was sweaty. It was hot. There was a line to get in, people waiting to be screened because of COVID and I told the nurse at the door that I was going to Labor and Delivery, that my wife and I’s surrogate was about to give birth and he waved me in through a side door. I told the same thing to the security guard, who waved me on, giving me directions, which are always the same directions in a hospital. Go down that way, make a right and then a left, then look for these elevators and take them to this floor and when you get off make another right and go down the hallway past this area until you get to the double doors and the security guard waiting there. It doesn’t matter where you are going in a hospital, the directions are always the same. I got to the security guard outside of Labor & Delivery and she too waved me in and when passing the nurse’s station, a nurse called over to me, saying I must be Mr. O’Connell. She led me to the recovery room, telling me that they had a room for us tonight but we’re sure about tomorrow. Us. She kept saying “us.” I had initially thought I would miss the whole thing but now I was going to be able to stay over with Kim and the baby, just as I had with our other daughter. I didn’t need the hotel room, didn’t need to worry about when to leave. It was a good thing I had brought some extra shirts with me. “Everything’s right, so just hold tight.” With it being a C-section, Kim would be in the recovery room with me as only our surrogate’s husband could be in the operating room. So, we waited together. We waited and listened intently each time the door opened, waiting to hear a baby crying, our baby crying. I think we waited 20 or 30 minutes but it felt significantly longer than that. Our parents kept texting for updates and at some point, I stopped responding. We just kept waiting. Not even talking really. Just waiting. And then finally a nurse appeared, the same nurse as before and told us our daughter was here. I cut the umbilical cord and we watched as she was weighed and measured. Yes, she was big; the biggest baby one nurse said she had ever delivered, but she was here and she was perfect. “Everything’s right, so just hold tight.” A little while later, as the three of us sat peacefully in our area of the recovery room, that same nurse from before came by to congratulate us and say goodnight. We said goodnight and thanked her for making sure we had a room. It was her pleasure, she said and then, before turning to leave, she wanted to remind us that only Kim and the baby could stay overnight. When it was time for them to go up to the maternity ward, it was my time to leave. “But what about tomorrow?” I asked. “Would I be able to visit tomorrow? Or the next day.” Nope, not unless Kim wanted to leave and we wanted to swap out. If not, then the next time I would see them was when they were discharged and needed a lift home. We sat dumbfounded. Again, we had prepared for this, knew that it was going to go down this way but amidst the confusion of the C-section decision and it suddenly being go time, miscommunication had reared its ugly head and wires had been crossed. It had all been too good to be true because it was just that, too good to be true. I couldn’t complain, though. I had come down to Florida under the impression that I wouldn’t be able to be in the hospital at all but by sheer goodwill and kindness, had been allowed in for a few hours following the birth. I got to cut the cord, I got to hold my newborn baby girl and I got to sit beside my wife as she did the same. I couldn’t complain at all. Still, though, hope found its way into the conversation. When another nurse came to bring Kim and our baby girl upstairs, I said that I guess I should leave and she was surprised, asking why wouldn’t I also go upstairs? So, I did. I walked with them down the hallway, past the random patients who smiled seeing us and said congratulations. I went up with them in the elevator and walked with them to the room; was there as they got settled in. But it started to get awkward. I knew I had to leave, but maybe they didn’t know I had to leave. So now, who is to say I couldn’t just hang out until someone who did know caught wind of the situation and gave me the boot? That would probably happen at three in the morning, though. Would it be worth riding it out for a few hours or should I just leave? What kind of terrible decision is that? Do I be honest and leave my wife and newborn baby or do I be sneaky and stay with them, knowing I’ll have to leave at some point, no doubt at the worst possible time. I still had the hotel room, but I didn’t want to go, but I also did because I knew I had too. I just wanted to lie down on the bed with my baby girl. Let her fall asleep on my chest as I rubbed her back. I wanted to stand with my wife and look at our daughter as she slept in that clear bin they had her sleeping in. I just wanted to be there. But I had to leave. The nurse in charge came in to make it clear that it had to happen and also make it clear that she felt terrible about it. This wasn’t a situation exclusive to us. Since COVID, one parent getting the boot had become an ugly standard practice that no one was happy with. The nurse must have apologized a dozen times and told me I could stay for a little bit longer if I wanted. And so I did, but only for a few more minutes. Then I left. I left Kim and I left our new baby girl. I walked past the nurses’ station and none of them looked up. I don’t think that was intentional but it still made me feel like I didn’t exist. I walked slowly down the hallway and slouched against the elevator wall as it took me down to the first floor where I then slowly walked down more hallways, all of them quiet as it was now past one o’clock in the morning. Outside it was still hot but it was now incredibly still. Nothing doing here. Even the pigeons had left and I climbed into the rental car. I turned the A/C on but kept the windows down. The air from both felt good and as I pulled out of the garage and off the hospital premises, “Waiting On A Sunny Day” by Bruce Springsteen came on. I think Spotify knew it was what I needed because it’s been my happy song since it helped get me through my uncle’s death a few years back. It was a ten-minute drive to the hotel and I listened to the song twice. I thought about stopping at a gas station for a beer but I drove past the one next to the hotel without a second thought. I just wanted to lay down. Over the next few hours, I Facetimed with Kim a handful of times and slept briefly, keeping the light on the whole time. I didn’t feel right turning it off, making myself too comfortable. I wanted my experience to mirror hers as much as possible. Morning came and I felt weirdly refreshed. I felt good. I made some coffee and opened the curtains. I turned on the news and sat down, just trying to take stock of what had happened over the past 12 hours. It was a lot to make sense of but all that mattered was that our baby girl had been born and at least Kim could be there with her in the hospital. But for how long? A place for Kim to stay that night was far from a given. I had gotten a late check-out at the hotel, so we had until 2pm to make a decision. If Kim could stay in the hospital, I’d head north to her parents. If she couldn’t, our baby would go to the nursery and I’d get another hotel room for both of us. Once again, we were in wait-and-see mode. I busied myself getting things done, securing a local pediatrician for a follow-up visit later in the week, checking in with our lawyer, booking our flight home, extending the rental car, and outlining the next steps with insurance. I didn’t pee in a cup once. It was nice to feel so civilized. By the time it was 2pm, they had moved Kim and our baby to our surrogate’s room, which they would all share for the night. I checked out of the hotel and found some lunch and coffee, soon resuming my post in the parking garage with the pigeons. But I wasn’t sure why I was there. Kim was good, set up for another night in the hospital. It didn’t make sense for me to be either in the parking garage burning gas by running the car so the A/C would stay on and it didn’t make sense for me to get another hotel room for the night. The only thing that seemed to make sense was to head north even though at the same time, that didn’t seem to make any sense at all. Why would I put more distance between us? Why wouldn’t I stay close? Because it did make sense to leave even though it didn’t make sense. It didn’t make sense thinking in traditional terms because this was not a traditional situation. I couldn’t think of it in traditional terms. I needed to look at the situation clear-eyed and almost emotionless. I was going to drive north and that was that. It rained again. It rained a lot. I drove through three or four different storms and watched lightning bolts touch down all around me. Then there was traffic and then there was more rain and then there was more lightning. A drive that should have taken a little less than an hour and a half stretched out longer than two hours but finally, I got to Kim’s parents and sat in the driveway for a few moments. Just quietly sat there. My brain just sat there; my heart just sat there. Everything just sat there for a few moments. Then I did some laundry and ate some dinner. I watched the Celtics and watched Obama speak at the Democratic National Convention. And that was that. I passed out just as he was finishing up. I wasn’t out for long though. All night I kept waking up and once again, I slept with the light on, still trying to recreate the experience Kim was having in the hospital. Relaxing was impossible. Letting myself go so I could fall asleep was tough sledding and while I did doze off a few times, every time was short-lived and by 5am I gave up. I just lied there, waiting. I wasn’t sure what I was waiting for exactly. I was just waiting. Once 6am came around, I turned on the news and stared at it blankly. I couldn’t really concentrate. All I could think about was Kim, our baby girl, and not being with them. *** After a while I got cleaned up and had a good Facetime with our oldest daughter. It went much better than the one the night before where she mistook me saying I was heading to Nana and Poppa’s as me saying I was heading home to get her. My folks said it was tough after that but like me, eventually, she just passed out. She was in good spirits this morning and around 11:30, I headed back down south again, back to the parking garage and the pigeons and the limited cell service. There was reason to be excited because my girls were supposed to be discharged at some point in the afternoon. All of this would be over and we’d be together again. It’s all I wanted; for us to be together again but it had proven to be such an elusive goal, so unattainable. Now it was so close, though. I just had to watch a few episodes of The Wire and wait for the word to pack things up and go scoop my gals. Afternoon came and went. At some point, maybe around 5 or so, Kim thought she was close to being discharged and I ran to get coffee and snacks for her. I set up shop in a new parking lot for a bit, taking some time to shore up the appointment with the pediatrician, make an appointment for some lab work and get our ducks in a row. The time kept ticking away and I still hadn’t gotten word about the girls being released. Once again not sure what to do with myself, I headed back to the friendly confines of the parking garage. I didn’t know where else to go and didn’t want to even think about figuring out where else to go. The parking garage had begrudgingly become my safe haven and at this point, all I wanted was a safe haven. I needed a light breeze, which is what I got by the upper deck and for the first time since I had become a part-time resident of the parking garage, the temperature wasn’t that bad. It was tolerable. I didn’t want to stay in that garage for a minute longer but if I had to, things could have been worse. And then I got the text: “pull up in front of the main lobby now.” It was 8:10pm. Kim had gone into the hospital at 12:15pm on Monday and now 80 hours later she was leaving. And she was leaving with our baby girl. It had all been worth it; it had all worked. If I could have safely driven straight off the edge of the parking garage roof onto the street below to speed things up I would have but instead, I circled my way down to the bottom, one last time going around and around and around, down from level 4 to level 3 to level 2 and finally to the gate at level 1. For the last time, I gave the attendant my ticket and the money I owed and pulled up to the main entrance. Two lanes had been created with cones and I assumed the closest lane was closed off because of COVID so I parked in the far lane and started looking. I just kept staring at the door, waiting to see my girls. It reminded me of our wedding, where I just kept my eyes on the church door, anxiously waiting to see her emerge from them. I couldn’t wait. Of course, that closer lane wasn’t closed due to COVID and a minivan pulled up, blocking my view of the door and damn it, man, did he NOT realize I was trying to have a moment? I pulled up some and resumed waiting, resumed looking. And then I saw Kim and if I could have exploded with a mixture of relief and happiness and joy and gratitude all rolled up into one. I jumped out of the car to meet them and that was it, it was everything I had wanted, everything we had worked so hard for. It was beautiful. Our baby girl was perfect and we buckled her into the car seat and soon she was fast asleep. I cautiously pulled out of the driveway and onto the road that led to the highway, passing houses, buildings and businesses that had become all too familiar to me over the past couple days. Kim and I talked a little bit but soon the car grew quiet as we watched as lightning once again shot down from the sky off in the distance. The Ghost of Paul Revere played loud enough for me to hear it and for the girls to sleep or in Kim’s case, relax some and close her eyes. We headed north and we headed north together. There was more to this mission; it was far from over, but the most important part had been completed. It didn’t matter if I was physically there or not. We had gotten what we came for and that was all that truly mattered. The parking garage is all yours, pigeons. Treat her well and yes, that is pee. I’m not going to apologize. Ryan harbors a constant fear of losing his keys, prefers flip flops and will always choose cereal if it's an option. He maintains his own blog, Giddy Up America and hasn't gotten a speeding ticket in over the year. He has previously contributed work to UPROXX & Heavy. Ryan is on Twitter: @ryanoconnell79

Thirty feet below Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn, there’s a tomb of stone. Its story is of a steam locomotive suspended in time, a man with a vision, and a city that holds all the keys. The world’s first subway tunnel was nearly forgotten until an urban explorer located it 120 years after it was sealed. The question is, did he also find a locomotive buried under Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn? In 1844 the Long Island Rail Road chose to bury a section of the line under Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn to avoid accidents between the train and local pedestrians. Fifteen years later the Cobble Hill Tunnel was sealed, possibly with a locomotive inside, and its location was lost in history. Fast forward to 1980. A Brooklyn man named Bob Diamond hears a comment on a radio show about an unknown tunnel underneath the city. Using old maps, he digs his way from a defunct utility hole 30 feet under Atlantic Avenue. With the help of friends, Bob Diamond hauled off the dirt bucket by bucket from the hole in the middle of the street. All his digging paid off when he reached a concrete wall. He says that when he smashed through, a rush of cold air came out. Diamond found himself peering down into a vast, open space. He knew he had located the Cobble Hill Tunnel, and it was intact. The tunnel was half a mile long and massive, with enough room for two train tracks side by side, A 17′ arched stone ceiling, and limestone block walls 22′ apart. An absolute engineering marvel for the age. Wooden stairs had to be built to get Bob and friends down to the floor. The far end of the tunnel is capped by a very thick stone wall. Diamond spent the next 30 years leading tours in the tunnel. He started a trolley museum with plans of opening up and running trolleys through Cobble Hill’s famed tunnel. One thing remains a mystery. The tunnel is said to have been sealed with an 1836 wood-fired locomotive inside. It was noted in a historical book as being the place that John Wilkes Booth may have hid his diary. That locomotive has yet to be found. Diamond’s logical conclusion is that it, along with the tunnel’s lost marble station, existed on the other side of that stone wall at the other end of the tunnel. A private engineering firm was hired to scan the area from above ground with special equipment. They determined that there was a large steel object buried below at the end of Atlantic Street. The story caught the interest of the National Geographic Channel. They worked together with the city and Diamond to plan an excavation of the wall at the end of the tunnel and film a documentary about the process. In 2010 the whole thing came to a halt. The city and the executives at National Geographic are rumored to have had disagreements. The city canceled the documentary and sealed the tunnel once again, banning Diamond and everyone else from entering. The city is denying access to this day, and the story is fading into history once again. It seems we may have to wait another century before we know the truth. Why is it so important that we save this tunnel? So what if there’s a locomotive buried under Atlantic Avenue? A rich history makes for a prideful neighborhood. And a prideful neighborhood makes for a good neighborhood. If the tunnel were opened and the trolleys installed, it would increase business and tourism. Maybe Cobble Hill Tunnel will see the light of day again. Visit Bob Diamond’s website, www.BrooklynRail.net Born and raised in Upstate New York, Mathew lives in a wooded valley north of the Susquehanna River with his wife and kids. His first book "Simple Sutras" was published in 2014