From my journal

We made our way past the Vietnam War Memorial which is a very solemn place, and to the WWII memorial, which was very majestic, towards the Washington monument. Ryan and I had a small debate on the legacy of George Washington and as we neared the end of the National Mall he purchased some roasted almonds.

The National Kite Festival was going on and it is a sight I will never forget. There were thousands of kites, shaped like snakes, birds and dragons flying in the clear sky near the monument. We watched for a few minutes as a kite battle took place where they attempted to cut each others lines before we moved on to the MLK and FDR monuments.

Both were very moving and in a way depressing given Trump's election. Here there were, written in stone, inscriptions demonstrating the value of peace, tolerance and kindness. Meanwhile Americans just elected a man who stands against religious freedom, has been successfully sued for rental discrimination and who has continued to promote misogynistic speech.

Recently Trump admitted he does not know that slavery is the reason why the Civil War was fought. Months after that night I spent in the newsroom watching the results come in I am still disgusted with people who voted for someone who has no business being president.

Rhelia and took our picture in front of several cherry trees blossoming and we made our way to the Jefferson Memorial. There was a party going on, a young girl's Quinceanera, and Mexican-Americas were dancing with strangers on the steps overlooking the water. Music was playing and it was very beautiful.  

 A White House helicopter flew over. We discussed how it wasn't Trump, because it was the weekend he was most likely at his Florida resort golfing. 

The greatest died last night

Muhammad Ali died last night.

I heard the news from a friend. He called me when he saw it on TV, and I'm glad it happened I found out that way. It makes a little more sense to me, it's a little more human, to find out that someone died from talking to a person rather than through a text message or Facebook post.

For more than a decade, Ali lived less than 20 miles from my house in Berrien Springs, Michigan. On Facebook countless people I went to high school with posted pictured of themselves with the boxer. Ali still made appearances at bank openings and community college events in my hometown even though he was deep in the fight against Parkinson's disease.

One of the coolest stories I read was by a woman that went and saw the Will Smith movie “Ali” and noticed the man himself walk into the theatre just as the film started. He signed her movie ticket afterwards.

I never met Ali, but my dad did and got him to autograph a pair of boxing gloves to my brother and I. The signature is faded now, but my mother still has those gloves, and if I had to grab a handful of things out of a burning building, those gloves would be one of the items.

My father was one of the guys that would buy PPV boxing fights and have a couple of friends over for beers when I grew up. I still remember being able to stay up late and watch Tyson-Holyfield I and II with them, and my dad told me he had a collection of fights he had taped (on a VCR) from over the years.

My junior and senior year in high school I started training as a boxer, with a man who had won several “Toughman” competitions. We trained in a barn in the summer in and I jumped rope and sparred in 100 degree heat.

Later I trained to fight in Holland at an abandoned church and in Benton Harbor at a community center for troubled youth. I fought in a Golden Gloves tournament in Grand Rapids and lost.

Ali was never far from my, or any other boxers in the area's mind. We all knew he lived in Michigan. My trainer in Benton Harbor had told me Ali had come and watched people work out in the old building before. Every kid hitting the heavy bag hoped he would stop by again.

One thing you learn when you box if what it's like to be hit. The first few times it happens you can't help but close your eyes and flinch, but eventually you get used to taking a punch.

Ali will be remembered for his speed, for his humanity and for his charisma. However whenever I think about the fights he had both in the ring and outside the ring in his life, I think what set him apart was how he took a punch.    

He was knocked down, but he always got back up. He had the heart of a champion, not just the talent.   

Follow Nicholas Grenke on Twitter @NickSJ86.

B.B. King shows the blues to me at 16-years-old

When I was 16-years-old I was in love with the blues.

The money for my first job working at a bar went to CD’s, music lessons and a black Gibson Les Paul guitar. I would work as a bar back at Barney’s Boathouse until 3 a.m. and come home in the dead of night and plug in the basement and work on the 12-bar blues, minor scales and the difficult ba-bump rhythm that defined the backbeat that a second guitar player should have. I still wasn’t that good; but it made me happy to play, like I was working through something I couldn't explain.

It was with money from that job that I went to my first concert in Kalamazoo to see B.B. King.

It was the start of Spring Break and while other kids in my high school were getting on planes to Cancun, Puerto Vallarta and Daytona to get drunk and get laid, I was a virgin looking forward to getting my wisdom teeth removed on Monday.

That Saturday Cory Ortiz and I drove up to the State Theater to see the living legend. We were amazed we were getting this link to history while he was still alive and we were now getting the chance to see him. I thought it might be the last chance to witness the 79-year-old, not knowing how much longer he would be touring.

Besides, he had a lot of money and when would a man his age play a small venue in Michigan? He would probably never even play the in the state again, I told my friend. 

But we didn't know why he continued to tour at that point. He did so to give the blues to a new generation he said in a Guitar World interview a few years later. The fact that King toured for 10 more years shows how much B.B. King loved performing and sharing the blues with everyone.

It was one of the first trips I ever took out of my small town without my parents. The one-way streets of Kalamazoo were confusing, and I was panicking that we would miss the show, but we finally found a place to park. 

The opening act took the stage with by himself with just a guitar and played the sound of deep delta blues, like Robert Johnson played. During intermission I met him shook his hand and dumbly said I had heard of him from a short profile done on him in Guitar World a few months earlier.

The State Theater seemed as historic as a Civil War battlefield that night. It could be my imagination, but it was eerily lit by chandeliers and as we waited on the main show. I looked around at all the people. I was surprised to see one of my co-workers, a bouncer who was the size of a small house. We waved at each other and shortly after the lights came down and King walked slowly on stage. He made it over to a chair and made a joke about how he couldn't stand anymore during the whole performance, but he said, "I know the music will still move me."

And he was right. Part of me was worried that the show would seem sad; King being confined to to a chair. But his playing was as inspiring as Eddie Van Halen throwing his guitar around his neck and jumping in videos from 1979. A couple of times he did stand when he was singing a highly emotional lyric and the house went wild, but every time he played guitar he was sitting down, concentrating. 

The backing band was at least 20 deep, and if I remember correctly dressed in red tuxedos. King joked that he was losing money on the tour because he had to pay everybody.

The rest of the concert is lost to memory now. I remember buying a black and white shirt with picture of a young King and old acoustic guitar (see below.) For years afterward whenever, even after he quit work as a bouncer and worked as a florist, whenever I saw Adam we would talk about the concert.

I wish I had a journal from that time in my life, but from what I can recall the drive home the sky seemed as black as the shirt I bought, but I don’t even remember who drove there and back.

However, I do remember when I got home it was late at night and my parents were ready for bed. They asked me how it was and I said it was great, but I didn't linger long talking to them.

I went down to the basement, plugged in my Led Paul and tried to play the blues until 3 a.m.

Old School Review #1 Larry McMurty

Larry McMurty’s first novel starts out with a beautiful passage about life on the plains of Texas. The idealized description of the land hits the reader and brings to life the feeling of being alive. It also explains why the writer felt the need to explain the beauty of the land where he was from.

What continues is a melancholy coming of age story, (Aren’t they all?) about the loss of the narrator’s way of life and home.  

The book I has a sense of desperation and sorrow in it, the good kind. The sorrow is the sad, earnest sense of losing a lover and the desperation feels like that of a maniac, the writing contains the riveting energy of a boxer behind by points in the final round.

I am a big fan of McMurty. His later novels, “Lonesome Dove,” and “Streets of Laredo” are well-known westerns set in the Wild West’s last days. “Horseman, Pass By” like “The Last Picture Show,” are perhaps not as well know, but are both classics. Both were out shined by movie productions starring some of the coolest men to ever step on the screen, Harrison Ford and Paul Newman.

Still, “Horseman, Pass By” will be a favorite of mine because the characters are as real to the reader as a pair of Levi Jeans and a big front porch.

The novel is written from the viewpoint of Lonnie, who lives on a cattle ranch with his grandfather, his grandfather’s second wife, her son Hud, a house keeper and several cow hands. Life is changing on the ranch, and not necessarily for the better.

Revealing too much more wouldn't ruin the joy of reading the book, but I don't want anyone not to read it because they feel the plot has been spoiled. 

The book is set in a time more than 50 years ago, and although a lot has changed since then, people today still feel a bone chilling sense of loneliness from time to time. I wish I read this book years ago, because I could have been able to really relate to the author. 

Below is the Yeats poem the book's title is from. I love books that are as inspired as "Horseman, Pass by" is. 

I don't hate Robin

Comic books are expensive.

Not the single issues, the ones that you purchase for $4. The problem with those is that they take five minutes to read, don’t contain a whole story arc and if the reader misses an issue the he/she misses out on major plot points.

What I’m writing about is a collection in a single bound book sold for $20 at a store. These ones still only take about 30 minutes to read and it’s difficult to justify paying that much money for something that lasts such a short amount of time, while making a waiter’s salary.

The past week I’ve gone to the downtown Kalamazoo library and checked out the collections they have. Comic books are located in the teen room, a marked off area in the basement where there are couches, “The Hunger Games” books and poetry collections. The room was created I think in part to give kids a place to hang out and feel safe. It would have been great when I was that age.

I try to go there during school hours, so I’m not the old guy reading superheroes.

It’s geared towards younger readers and maybe that’s why they have the first couple of collections of DC’s new 52 “Batman and Robin” series. I checked it out the other day in part because it’s nice to read a comic book when there people are in the house. For instance, you can read Superman and get asked to do the dishes without being concern of losing concentration, as opposed to “If on a winter’s night a traveler.”

I’ve never liked the character Robin too much. When I was a kid I was happy that my younger brother always wanted to be the part  for Halloween or when we were playing pretend. The Batman character seemed at odds with having a sidekick and since Robin was put into the comics’ last century solely to sell more books, I wasn’t a big fan of the storyline.

In addition to that, Tim Burton and Christopher Nolen’s movies are much better than “Batman Forever” or “Batman and Robin.”

But writer Peter J. Tomasi and artists such as Patrick Gleason have put together an amazing series (although I just found out Tomasi is leaving the book.) The story line touches the right nerves and balances the father son dynamic without being overdone and corny.

For those don’t read comic books, here is the summary of the current story line of Batman and Robin.

The new Robin is Batman’s son Damien. For some quick background, Dick Grayson was the original Robin and is now grownup and is Nightwing. Jason Todd was the second Robin, was killed by the Joker, came back to life and is now called “The Red Hood.” Tim Drake was the third Robin and is now the Red Robbin.

Now for the comics I’ve been reading. Robin’s mother, who is a bad person, created the current Robin, Damien in a test tube, without Bruce Wayne ever knowing about his “birth.” She raised him to be a deadly assassin from day one and when Robin was 10-years-old he was introduced to Bruce Wayne.

She taught Robin to be a bad guy, so it’s the basic nature/nurture argument there. But Robin decides to be with his dad and she retaliates by putting a $500 million bounty on his head.

Batman is not a great father, but Damien isn’t a very good son either. Batman’s one main code of ethic is that he will not kill anyone, something Robin doesn’t have a problem with, until Bruce Wayne attempts to “fix” the problem.

He doesn’t get along with his “older brother” Robins and puts himself in dangerous situations.

However Robin grows to become a more moral person throughout the series. Although he’s dismissive of Batman and draws disturbing pictures in his journal in the first couple of issues, they eventually get a dog and Robin starts to learn to be more ethical. Alfred and Damien form a great bond. Damien also finds one of Martha Wayne’s pearls and gives it to Bruce.

Then Robin dies protecting his father.

I was surprised the writer would kill such a young character, although I knew he wouldn’t be dead for long. (People are never really dead in comic books.)

Bruce Wayne acts a lot like grieving parents I have known. He blames himself. In the first issue after Robin dies there is no dialog, but lots of strong images, such as the Batmobile driving over the streetlight on crime alley where his parents died.

Batman goes on a spree and arrests a bunch of thugs, ties them up and puts under the Bat Signal for Gordon. He keeps getting more depressed and angry, so Alfred calls up the Robins to talk to him. He also pairs with Catwoman to save a young child.

Eventually he goes through a fight simulator over and over again to see if he could have saved his son. He finds out he couldn’t alone and the last issue of the storyline I read has Alfred taking a simulation and we find out that he could have prevented Robin from leaving the Batcave that night. He cries and Bruce puts his hand on shoulder and says, “I’m sorry I forgot you lost a son too.”

I’m well behind the current story, where Bruce is apparently dead and Robin has come back from the dead with superpowers, but I was very impressed with these books.

I thought the idea of Robin was just for kids, but the story of Batman and his son had great storytelling potential.

Like a Lamb

I was sitting in a bar, waiting for my laundry to next door dry last week. It was nice talking to the bartender, who I hadn’t spoken to for a while, and while I finished my whiskey and ginger ale she asked me where my wife and I were living at now.

“Oh still in the Vine neighborhood,” I said.

“There are days, mostly in the spring,” she said. “When I drive down there and wish I still lived there, everyone is outside riding skateboards or walking their dogs and it looks like fun.”

“But,” she said. “Other times I go down there and can’t help but see all the broken beer bottles and the trash.”

Thursday, spring was in the air and it was one of the days I was able to look past trash.

The boulders of snow were dwindling, the sidewalks were mostly free of ice and our dog, Mr. Bojangles, was terribly excited.

He’s half Yorkshire Terrier and half Jack Russell (we think, he’s a rescue) February was so cold he couldn't walk far without getting frostbite. So with the sun shining and a light jacket on I went outside with him.

We passed a house with a college kid wearing a tank top and basketball shorts was grilling hamburgers on the porch. There were countless cigarette butts on the sidewalk but Bo wanted to go up and get some meat, the kid laughed.

“Sorry that’s for me little man,” he said.

I laughed.

We passed the adult rehab home. The men who stay there scare a lot of people on the street, but they’re trying their best, and from what I have heard, it’s difficult to get into the program.

Last summer there was an older man who lived there that had trouble communicating. He spent a lot of time outside on their steps. He was always nervous and polite when he asked if it was ok to pet Bo,, even though my wife and I always said it was fine. Seeing his smile light up when he petted the dog always gave me a warm feeling inside.

I don’t think he still lives there. If he does I didn't see him this week. The sidewalk is still blocked by a pileup of snow from the nearby parking lot, so I walked to other side of the street.

Further down the street was a group of WMU students on Spring Break. They were drinking PBR and listening to music. They said hi and asked his name, and laughed when I told him it was Mr. Bojangles. After we left, I picked him so he didn’t step on broken glass nearby.

We walked further down Walnut Street. Ahead on the hill was the remains of East Campus. It’s completely covered now in protective plastic and is set to open in June as an alumni center. I look forward to visiting it.

On Davis Street there are two retired couples that live next door to each other. They are part of the minority of people that own their own houses in the neighborhood.

I don’t know their names, but both couples have small dogs, Benjie and Suzy. They call my wife and I Bo’s parents. When we got married in October Benjie’s mom gave a small wedding present, just a coin purse. We have a special place for it.

When I turned the corner to come back to the house near the open field, I passed a teenager watching his younger brother and sister throw a baseball back and forth. He was reading a book in an oversized tire left by the football team, while his siblings struggled to hit swing a large bat.

When I came back home I heard the couple next door fighting loudly. When I tried to fall asleep later that night I prayed the loud explosion was a firework and not gunshot again.

Today, (Monday) Rhelia took Bo for another long walk and saw someone had planted flowers in their yard already. I saw them this afternoon, after her, Bo and I walked in the opposite direction of a loose pit-bull and I again carried him over some more broken glass.     

Goodbye and Thanks for all the Fish

I felt a melancholy sense of sadness during Harding’s “50 Percent Off Going out of Business Sale!” late last week. The store has now closed, but seeing the lone package of frozen potatoes in the freezer section, the nearly gone supply of soup and the inexplicably still there Halloween decorations made me think about my history in Kalamazoo.

I say this because the store has been a constant since I moved to town seven plus years ago. It’s location near a heavy rental property section of town had made it more or less my grocery store for many of those years. I know fearing change is common problem, and I can still drive somewhere else to pick up lunch meat. But for many of my neighbors, Harding’s was the one place they could walk to in order to buy ramen noodles, or an apple, or even a couple of beers.

It’s strange for me to write about a grocery store closing again, because the first article I ever wrote (St. Joseph High School’s “The Wind Up,” circa 2003) which made me think about possibly writing for a living, was about a family-owned grocery store that closed. It had been across the street from my mother’s work and I had gone there as a child after school let out for years.

I interviewed the family that owned the store and they said they simply couldn’t keep up with giant supermarkets invading the area. I talked to customers who were sad to see it go.  

It was pretty good piece of writing for a 16-year-old.  

The response from my journalism teacher, Mr. Holt, was a lot of encouragement. It felt great that I was good at something other than just tackling a quarterback on a Friday night.

But that’s not what this blog post is about.  

In the first house I lived at in Kalamazoo I had four roommates and we were all under 22-years-old and immature. At that time I worked at a pizza place and the chief reason for me to go to Harding’s was to buy bologna (Yes, you can get sick of pizza) and beer. I would sometimes borrow my neighbors humorously basket equipped bike and buy the above mentioned items.

(They were even more irresponsible than us and ended up getting evicted after a couple months.  They didn’t have jobs, however they had a punk rock band, so they seemed pretty cool.)

If it was a Friday I would also cash my work checks there and get money order for my rent. While I was able to eventually obtain a bank account with money in it, there are still many people in the area who need these functions of a store to pay their bills.

On Holidays such as the Fourth of July and Memorial Day, my friends and I would go to the store and buy burgers, hot dogs and if we had a few good days waiting tables, steak. It seemed the good times would never end.

However, a strange thing happened. I got older.

After several crash and burn relationships, I met the woman who agreed to marry me. She lived near the store as well, and I gave up a fear of commitment while we walked alongside the flour and the baking pans.

I know that it is a lame and sexist joke that, “I married my wife because of her cooking.” Still in my case it’s somewhat true. Rhelia is a great cook. She grew up on a farm in the middle of nowhere, where cooking is still an art form.

If you listen to “A Prairie Home Companion,” you’ll understand what I mean. If you don’t well, listen to public radio once in a while, it’s a lot of fun.

We learned to navigate the sales on our tight budget, and she made me great home cooked meals for me in the first time in years. When she wasn’t in the mood to cook, I made some pretty good frozen pizzas.

So when we walked along the emptying isles of the store last week I was sad, not just for losing the convenience of the store, but by losing an important part of the neighborhood. It was crowded, and there were all types of people there. Young people and old people, black and white, people we knew and people I couldn’t have known from Adam.

In addition there were people working the checkout lanes. They were real people, not machines and they checked you out and bagged your groceries instead watching you do it, like at other stores in town.

Even though I don’t know the names of everyone that’s worked there, most of them were nice. The owners of the store said the people could possibly move to other jobs in the company, but most of the 60 people were left without a job, according to an employee I was talking to.

I hope they can find a new job. I hope the location gets a new grocery store, although I don’t have much hope for one. The store was built in 1971 and has been a grocery store all that time. A developer has bought it, but a developer recently bought the Packard Plant in Detroit too.

The difference was the grocery store was still useful.