9/11 Ramblings

Thursday September 11th, 2008 - Milwaukee, WI/West Bend, WI

I love my country. I really do. I’m grateful and proud to have been born in a place where there is so much abundance of opportunity and I don’t take it for granted for half a second but I just can’t watch any more coverage of 9/11 on TV. It makes me both sad and sick.

Whether there was any kind of conspiracy or not is a moot point. It ended up with moot people who are now dead for no real reason other than they were in the infamous ‘wrong place at the wrong time’. Boy do I know that feeling all too well. I‘m still alive but barely.

None of us are ever going to know the true story of what really happened and why and I don’t want to get into any arguments because like with religion and abortion and politics I am not going to change anyone’s opinion. I have my own and so do you but who’s right?

I think we can all agree that our hearts go out to every innocent person who had to be in the line of fire seven years ago today no matter how or why or who had a finger in making it happen. I wish life didn’t have to be so random and I’m just disillusioned with it lately.

I heard from a high school classmate named Wendy Stanz out of the blue. She wrote me a nice email telling me how she has been doing and it struck a sour note that she does not have any children. If anyone in this world should have been a mom it was Wendy Stanz.

All she ever talked about was how she loved kids and wanted to be a wife and a mom of a house full of children and what a mom she would have been. We went out a few times a long time ago and looking back on my life if I should have married anyone it should have been her. She was good looking and sincere and smart and a sweeter soul there never was.

It’s none of my business why she couldn’t or doesn’t have children but she said she has been married 16 years now and that’s just so wrong to me. Idiots and pinheads pound out babies by the dozen and leave them in garbage cans and behind Walmart dumpsters but a wonderful soul like Wendy Stanz has to go without something she really wants. It’s sick.

Wendy is very Catholic and I can tell by her email she’s still very into all that. I think it is all hogwash and that’s my own opinion but I know if I talk to her she’ll run all of it past me and I’m just not up for that right now. She wants to talk on the phone but I don’t think I’m up for a lecture on how the Catholic church is going to make up for my cynical bent.

I wish there was something to be hopeful about but I can feel myself sliding into the big abyss of cynicism my grandparents swam in as they raised me. Gramps was always funny but still would make his points and as a kid I thought he was nuts. Now I know he wasn’t.

There is something wrong with this world. Any free thinking person can see that but the fact is none of us can change it no matter how hard we try. We can change a few things in our own little corner of it sometimes but not everything. I’m sure Wendy Stanz would not be childless and neither would I. I’d have that family I always wanted but still don‘t have.

A person who does have a great one is my old comedy buddy Dave Rickert. I finally got a chance to hook up with him today since I was up in Milwaukee appearing on the D-List radio show on ESPN Radio 540. I told him I’d call and I did and we got together for a bit.

He looks exactly the same as he did the last time I saw him and it was great to reconnect with someone from so long ago. He’s still a firefighter and his wife is a physician and I’m thrilled that his life turned out so well. They have three great kids and it was fun to visit.

Dave is a very sharp guy and always was. He’s still funny but he has found a life doing what he really loves. I didn’t realize being a firefighter could be a passion but I can see it is for him and that’s fantastic. I always thought stopping fires was just a necessary chore in life like being a garbage man. Someone has to do it. No offense. Dave loves his job.

I’m sure there are some garbage pickers who must get into that but I never met any. My grandfather was a dispatcher of garbage trucks for the city of Milwaukee and his brother drove a garbage truck for years and they hated it. The only reason they did it was money. There was never any passion there. Dave and I talked of how important passion really is.

I still have a passion to be an entertainer. I love the show part but everything else is just a warm up to doing the next show. That could be a radio show or a comedy show or even a baseball card show. I just love the show part. Entertaining people who enjoy it is a thrill that never gets old. Dave still gets that concept and it felt great to talk about it in detail.

After visiting with Dave and his family I drove over to pick up Steve DeClark. Steve is another guy I’ve known forever and he has us both booked tomorrow at a small theatre in Muskego, WI. I knew he was off tonight so I asked if he wanted to open for me at a place called ‘Jug’s Hitching Post’ just outside of West Bend. It was their first night of comedy.

This came through Marc Schultz at the last minute by way of another booker. The club owner had a show booked through some fly by night oil can he met on the internet out of Florida of all places but that guy disappeared and he had spent money on ads for a show.

I had to replace myself at my show in Lake Villa at the Blackthorn Grille I started doing last Thursday but money is money so I did. I spent time on the phone yesterday and today rounding up people to do the Blackthorn gig while I was up in Milwaukee doing the radio show, visiting with Dave Rickert and picking up Steve to make the drive to West Bend.

All of this is a lot more hectic than it sounds and what ruined it was getting to the gig to find nobody there. ZERO people showed up. That’s always awkward and we waited for a little while and then the owner paid me and I paid Steve and we drove back to Steve’s car.

This is not why I got in the business. I want to WORK. I wish there was a packed house so we could do a killer show for them. Yes I got paid for doing nothing but that’s not very satisfying even though it sounds like it should be. I felt bad for the guy but a deal is a deal and he cut it with the other booker who called Marc and he called me. I took the money.