Camillus, I've Spared You Long Enough

I spent nearly all of the first 21 1/2 years of my life living in the village of Camillus, a nice sleepy little village west of Syracuse. A little escape from suburbia, nestled between a couple hills and close to the main trade routes. It wasn't long ago that "the village", as I shall henceforth refer to the place, was just like any other nice village across this great country of ours. I can remember going to Sherwood's drug store with my sister to go buy candy bars when I was little. The post office was in the village, there was a sewing shop, the chamber of commerce was there, they had a barber shop, a bank, a bridal shop, supermarket, even a saddlery, complete with a horse "mannequin" atop the marquis, which they put an overcoat on during the winter. It was a company town, the world-renowned Camillus Cutlery made its home there right on Main Street, and the one stoplight in the town only ran at 3:30pm when the cutlery let out, just so the workers could cross the street and get to their cars.

However, the ever-growing suburbia to the east needed a big profit center, so they built a good-sized mall next to the high school, the post office moved out there, the chamber of commerce moved to Fairmount, the barber shop closed down, Mr. Sherwood retired and closed the drug store, and the village started a slow decline. There was a period of time in the early to mid-90s when it seemed that the village was dead and couldn't be saved. I would estimate the beginning of that period to be right about the night that some yayhoo who had apparently watched "The Godfather" one too many times cut the head off the horse statue. The saddlery closed soon after that, they tried to put a baseball card/comics shop there and failed, tried to put an arcade there and that failed too. Eventually, they took that storefront and a couple others and closed them up into houses. The sewing shop closed, the building fell badly into disrepair under an absentee landlord, and to this day it still has not been fixed, but the village gave up on trying to condemn it. The supermarket closed as well, and the village newspaper, the Camillus Advocate, got swallowed by a conglomerate and moved out to Dewitt. The village almost ceased to exist, in fact; there was a short-lived movement to drop the village government. Pretty soon, all that was left was two bars, the bank, and the cutlery, and even then, the bank had been swallowed by a slightly larger local bank and the cutlery almost got bought out and moved to Kentucky.

Oh, and the Town Shop was still there. The Town Shop isn't an actual business, it's a youth center, originally owned by the YMCA and run by a couple of ex-hippies (though I could be wrong on that). They take the local teens out rafting and on picnics and doing all sorts of community and outdoor activities during the summer. And then there's the building itself, a three-story former business that is over 150 years old and once had to be uprooted and turned 90 degrees to face Main Street. There are pool and foosball tables, plenty of couch space, a coffeehouse-like setup on the second floor (formerly known as Earthquake Ethel's, I do believe), a couch and TV on the third floor. And plenty of room out on the front porch to hang out and enjoy the warm evenings this time of year. And that's where the problems start...

Despite the fact that nearly every time I've stopped by or been a couple doors down in the village laundromat doing my laundry, I have always seen David Vermilya, the guy who runs the place, out there with the teenagers sitting on the porch or keeping a cautious eye to the kids playing hackeysack (my god, they still play that, cooool) in the alleyway next to the building. However, the town, who took over the operation a couple years ago from the YMCA, believes that the kids are not well-supervised, especially in a three-floor "high-rise" such as their current home. 30 years without a serious incident of any kind, at least none that I know of, and suddenly NOW there's a supervision problem? I do realize that people believe that the people who hang out there cause problems when they are not at the Town Shop, and this has sadly been true to some extent. During those dark days of the early to mid-90s, if you were a boy, you most likely never made it out of the village to go to college or anything like that; if you were a girl, you often didn't make it to 17 before you had gotten pregnant. There were some break-ins, for a while there was a mentality that the adolescents had the run of the place since everything was vacant. One wannabe entreprenuer tried to open a deli and showed up the second day of business to find the front door smashed open, sort of a "go away, we don't want you here" move.

However, the village has rebounded. They redid the sidewalks, planted trees, stuck a park next to Nine Mile Creek, put some money into Munro Park to make it someplace people actually wanted to go to, and of course the Memorial Day parade every year made the village a showplace for one day a year anyway. Main Street is almost at 100% occupancy now; there's a doll shop, a pizzeria, a dance studio, a temp agency, a hairdresser, an antiques store, hell, there's even a pet photography studio. Once again, it's an escape from suburbia, mostly due to the fact that the mall that went up in the 80s is now vacant because the management was completely intolerant of young people and they decided to go to Carousel, and their parents went with them.

And speaking of intolerance for young people, that may just be what the cause of the Town Shop's problems is. The village has seemingly always been more about coddling its elderly population than doing anything to support the young community. They instituted a "no bicycles, roller blades, or skateboards" law because they were afraid young people on skateboards would attack old people. They had to later fix parts of the law because they had been so overzealous to legislate against the teenagers that they had accidentally also kicked the little kids with Big Wheels and tricycles into the streets as well. Now, the town is looking to kick the Town Shop out of its present location, essentially because the old people are afraid of the kids sitting on the porch. They suggested the old post office site next to the Baptist church, but the church got in a huge snit over it because they were afraid that the kids would now congregate in the open space between the two buildings, and then (sound like a broken record yet?) harass old people. This constant fear and misportrayal of young people is something I have ridiculed older people for as long as I've been writing this column (need proof? read column #2) They may now be forced to move all the way out to Fairmount, nearly 4 miles away.

This is all so very unnecessary. I am not, nor have I ever been a regular at the Town Shop, but I think I've had enough exposure to the people who hang out there and the place itself to know that such feared acts of harassment and intimidation never happen, and if they do, they are VERY rare. But, I'll bet it's been the village's hope, especially the mayor's hope for the longest time that they could kick the kids off of Main Street, thus preserving their precious little business disrtrict from any potential problems. Maybe they'd then convert the building into even more apartments for the elderly, like they seem to do with every old abandoned building in the village. However, that is NOT the end of the potential problems. If you kick the Town Shop out to Fairmount, the village teenagers will not go all the way to Fairmount just to have a place to hang around. They'll find new places to hang out that are even more in harm's way or even more of an opportunity to cause potential mayhem, and now without supervision. See, what the village has failed to see all along is the common thread that I have had running through this column; the Town Shop was there when things were good, when things were bad, and now when things are good again. To foolishly toss this institution and proven diversion from crime and mischief just to make a couple of people who will be dead in a couple years happy will rip something much bigger out of the village. The Town Shop, like it or not, is the soul of the village; it would be like New York City telling Greenwich Village to get out. All the young people who benefited from the place over the years, all the present visitors who otherwise would be off somewhere smoking pot and thinking of what to vandalize next, would all be cheated, and they WOULD NOT BE HAPPY ABOUT IT. It's not a threat, just a lesson that I don't want my cherished hometown to learn.

Caution: Different-Looking People Crossing

I often feel moved to take up the cause of the younger people of our society, despite the fact that the overwhelming majority of them wouldn't know good taste if it bit them in the... well, anyway, I still stick up for them. There is a certain segment of the young population that is getting a bad rap here in the Syracuse area despite the fact that they would appear to be more well-behaved and well-meaning than most of their peers. Why is this, you might ask? Purely based on the way they look and the music they like.

See, contrary to popular belief, most of the people who listen to the current rap-metal trend don't want to rip your head off and "Break Stuff". They got a bad rap, pardon the pun, after Woodstock 99 when a bunch of upper middle class frat-boy types decided that the best way to deal with excessive food and drink prices was to try to have their own version of the burning of Rome, complete with the Red Hot Chili Peppers in the role of the fiddling Nero. And so, any time anyone tries to set up a hardcore music festival, people immediately fear another Woodstock 99. It goes deeper than that with these people, however.

Organizer Keith Allen and his ilk are what is known as "straight-edge". This means they don't drink, don't do drugs, and pledge celibacy until marriage. The same admirable attributes you would want in your local church's youth group. They started their annual music festival a few years back, and it is now arguably the largest of its kind in the country, if not the world. Doesn't sound like a problem, right? Well, there's only one thing about these "straight-edge" types. Many of them sport tattoos, different colored hair (green, purple, etc.), have multiple piercings, including some in places you'd just assume they never told you about. It gets better...

They decided to call their little musical get-together "Hellfest" because the heat around here is so bad that time of year, it reminds you of, well, hell. Only the locals don't see it that away. Nope, they heard "Hellfest" and instantly assumed devil-worshippers. Their excuse? "Well, geez, just look at how they're dressed, and they have piercings and tattoos!!!" And so, the town of Salina tossed them out of their planned site for the concert and basically said, "Don't let the door hit your tattooed rear end on the way out!" This despite repeated promises that the organizers would clean up any messes left and tried to jump through numerous bureaucratic and other hoops.

Are we that antiquated in our thinking that somebody having tattoos or piercings automatically equals evil? The war spread to the letters page of the Sub-Standard, oops, Post-Standard, where one Mattydale denizen actually dared to back the organizers up and say that people were wrong to assume these people were bad because of the name of the concert and the way they looked. Naturally, somebody responded with a letter saying basically, "No, they are evil, because they have tattoos and piercings, and they named the thing Hellfest!"

And so, the organizers left Salina, and turned their eyes to Liquids, a nightclub in East Syracuse where they held their little Hellfest last year, without a hitch, they will be quick to tell you. Sure, there was some garbage strewn around afterward, but they went to the extraordinary (these days) step of coming back the next day and cleaning up the surrounding neighborhood, which incidentally is what they had pledged to the denizens of the town of Salina before being told basically that it wouldn't be enough. So, they re-up with Liquids, set up a press conference to announce that the problems were finally over, and they barely get the thing underway when the town of DeWitt Police show up to inform them that they don't have the necessary permits to hold the festival and therefore it's going to be up to another planning board to let them hold it. Am I alone in thinking that there's going to be a repeat of the whole Salina circus again next week when this goes before the town board? They'll have the hearing, more crotchety old people will show up to protest, and they'll get blackballed again. One can only hope this will not be the case, but it won't surprise me if it happens.

It's no secret that too many people prejudge other people too easily and too quickly these days. There are still those who believe that homosexuality is immoral and biologically deviant, that it is learned behavior and not the way you were made. They rail on about how "there is a war going on to define the culture that we bring up our children in." This is NOT a war, and I beg those who see it that way to not call it a war. See, in war, people die. People who want to wage war often-times want to kill people. Note I said "often-times", I did not make the mistake of jumping to conclusions. However, to call this a "culture war" is inappropriate. We don't need to include people with tattoos and piercings as the enemy in this "war".

I cannot understand how you can dismiss the most well-meaning of people over their looks. And to send the police to the press conference on top of it, no, that's not intimidation. You wouldn't have done this for a church youth group that wanted to have a Christian rock festival. I mean, you certainly can't arrest the kids just for looking different, so they did the next best thing and took the wind out of their sales. Look, I remember when I was in high school and kids who were "straight edge" were seen as the ENEMY. The stoners were becoming a force at good ol' West Genny and they harassed "straight edge" kids. While I'm for the legalization of pot, you have to respect people's decision to not touch the stuff. So you see, It's hard enough sticking to your personal beliefs without being harassed over the way you look.

I am wholeheartedly in support of these people, and I hope their concert not only is allowed to go on, but it goes off without a hitch. I've spoken with Keith Allen, he seems like a very committed person, passionate about his desires to just have a harmless way for youth to enjoy what they think is good music (I, of course, differ on that, but that doesn't matter here). This is without seeing him, mind you, I don't know what he looks like. I DON'T CARE what he looks like, and that is my point. Nobody should care what he looks like, and nobody should care that he's calling the thing "Hellfest". Trust is something that is earned, and I believe he has earned our trust. I hope the same may be true someday with the rest of the community.

Bring the Heat

Well, lo and behold, the first major heat wave of the year is upon us, and of course here in Syracuse, that means the temperature finally broke 70. OK, that one's not really funny anymore, especially when you're in a sweltering townhouse with the outside temperature at 90 and muggy, and you can't even open the damn windows because the morons who run this place PAINTED THEM SHUT!!!

Sorry, had to blow off steam. High temperatures often make for short tempers. This is perfect road rage weather, not that I can back that up with any proof, none that I've seen firsthand anyway. However, I do not wish to complain about this heat. I have no right to, as I was the genius who decided to go out in this intense heat and humidity and play basketball the last two evenings. If you're going to do that, do go out around or after sunset (7-8pm). This time of year is excellent for squeezing in those 18 holes or a couple games of 3-on-3 after work, because it doesn't get dark around here until after 9pm. And bring lots of water, at least a good 20 oz. bottle, because sweating is inevitable, and even without the sun bearing down on you, the mugginess of the air will take a lot out of you quickly.

Also be advised that even if you plan on spending just a short time in the sun that you put on sunblock. I was back down in Jersey City last weekend visiting the ex-housemate, and we went out on what was predicted to be a relatively short walk to a local burger joint, only it didn't turn out that way. Over an hour later, we finally arrived at our destination, and mind you we still had to walk back. It was during the worst time to be out in the sun (10am-2pm), and so I managed to get sunburned (again). You would think that after the awful sun-related experience I had last month (see column #41), I would have learned my lesson, but I did not, and thus I relay it on to you.

Most importantly, the other reason I do not choose to complain about hot, sticky weather is the fact that I have been pre-conditioned not to. Just as the Blizzard of '93 completely hardened my resolve in regard to dealing with snow, the summer of '99 forever enabled me to be ever vigilant in the face of, well, hellish temperatures. That summer, I was taking classes at Susquehanna and working in the PR office down there, and it was a scorcher; the temps were nudging up close to 100 degrees every day for nearly two weeks straight, and it was humid on top of that. And I lived in a room of an old house with only the services of a small desk fan to keep cool. If you can survive this, 89 and muggy is a walk in the park. But oh were those 90 cents a gallon gas prices sweet.

Which brings me to energy prices (betcha didn't think I was going to go into a political rant on ya). Here in New York, of course, we survived the awful winter and the high electric bills it brought, and even gas prices are dropping. Out in California, they got bigger problems. You thought the state government here was messed up, at least they didn't try to mess with our energy production. They did just that out in Cali, holding prices down by government decree while they built no new power plants, refineries, nothing. Meanwhile, the population is rising faster than the Mariners' winning percentage, because for some reason, everyone wants to live in California. And why is that, by the way? I don't see any redeeming qualities about that part of the country. They have earthquakes, oppressive heat in the summer, it never snows (snow is nice sometimes, don't get me wrong), there's all the fake plastic people in Hollywood, rich snobs in Beverly Hills, Robert Downey, Jr., but hey, I think you see my point. So all these poor souls go west, young man, and they just plain ran out of electricity. Which means the power companies had to buy it from other states, like Texas. Now, sensing a gold mine (after all, when your desperate, you'll pay ANYTHING for stuff), the outside suppliers charged them an arm and a leg, and since they couldn't hike prices, the power companies all went belly-up and now California has rolling blackouts.

So, since the state government essentially caused the problem, what have they chosen to do about it? Pass the buck, of course; do you ever see anyone in government admit it's their fault when something goes wrong? Their governor now says it's the fault of the oil barons in Texas who sold the poor power companies expensive power, while if he had just invested in a couple power plants, the power companies wouldn't have had to look elsewhere. Of course, the reasoning behind the governor's blaming strategy lies with this simple question: who's the most well-known former Texas oilman today? Answer: President Bush. And so, through this convoluted logic, Gov. Davis has blamed President Bush for the problems in California.

The worst part of it is that now Gov. Davis and his fellow Democrats want Bush to do exactly what got California into this problem in the first place: cap prices. Now, I read the Constitution pretty strictly and to the letter, and I have never seen the words "the federal government has the power to control prices" in the Constitution. Oh by the way, enemies of campaign finance reform, it doesn't say "money equals speech" in the Constitution, either. Gee, I'm such a moderate...

Anyhoo, quite simply stated, the federal government does not have the power, nor should it have the power, to control prices, whether of energy or otherwise. So, what does the Constitution say we do about it. Well, let's flip over to the 10th Amendment, an amendment that doesn't get much attention, but in my opinion, is just as important as the 1st, 2nd, 4th, and 5th Amendments. It says simply, "Powers not given to the federal government are reserved to the states". In other words, (gasp) it's CALIFORNIA'S RESPONSIBILITY to fix this problem. And doesn't that make sense; after all, it's CALIFORNIA'S PROBLEM!!!

So the moral of the story is, hmm, what is the moral of the story? As usual I have managed to fill a lot of space without trying to figure out how it all ties together. I guess the moral of the story is there is no reason to complain. About heat (although I do sometimes), about snow (although I do sometimes), about gas prices (yeah, that too). And also invest in electricity futures, cuz the way things are going so far this summer, somebody may as well make a killing off all this.

Annoying Songs and Other Summer Pitfalls

Yes, it is summer, which means the high temperature here in Syracuse finally just broke 60. Seriously, though, the nation's youth have reached their season of downtime, and in that spirit I present a series of potential headaches that you should all be aware of.

First of all, remember that as with all things, like our nation's highway system and supermarkets, there are times you want to avoid the beach, because otherwise you will have to put up with more traffic, more confusion, and more general all-around awfulness than you could possibly want. After all, this is YOUR time, this is the time of year you spend away from stress, away from the problems of climbing the educational ladder. So, plan your beach time accordingly. I, as would be pretty obvious from the paleness of my skin, suggest "not going".

Next warning: pretty soon you're going to start hearing a sound so horrifying, so grating, so incredibly terrifying that you will instantly turn off your radio for the rest of the summer for fear of possibly hearing it again. That phenomenon is commonly known as "the most annoying song of the year". You know what I'm talking about; there is one song that comes out every year, usually around the summertime, that gets overplayed so much and is so catchy and instantly recognizable that it could drive some either to the bell tower or the rubber room, whichever comes first. In past years, we had such memorable (or not) examples as the theme song from "Friends" (1995), "Macarena" (1996), "MMMBop" (1997), that damned Titanic song (1998, although that didn't come out during the summer), "Livin La Vida Loca" (1999), and last year, it had to be "Bye Bye Bye". Of course, that one sticks out around here because of the Hot 107 DJs who played it over and over again for several hours in the midst of one of those occasional radio pranks. On the other hand, if Destiny's Child finds a way to work "Say My Name" into one more thing, I may change my mind on that one. I can do that, it's MY column.

And speaking of annoying music, it would appear that this summer, as in summers past, we're going to be hearing from a few old friends, er no, wait old annoying neighbor types who never seem to go away, that being the teen-pop acts I prematurely buried a few months back. It would appear that in the words of Mark Knopfler and Dire Straits, "There's warning lights a-flashing down at Quality Control; somebody took a spanner, they threw it in the hole". Translation: somebody (probably Carson Daly) threw a switch, opened the floodgates, and in the span of three weeks, we went from no new Top 40 singles from boy groups or Britney wanna-bees for months to several shooting up the charts. 'N Sync and the Backstreet Boys are back on tour and Britney's Boyfriend and Co. are coming out with (ugh) ANOTHER NEW ALBUM that will probably sound worse than fingernails on a chalkboard and yet still sell 2 million its first week. Then again, they could probably put an album out that is all fingernails scraping on a chalkboard, put "'N Sync" on the cover, and still sell 2 million the first week. I am convinced, today's teenage girls are sheep. Sheep in tank tops. BAAAAAAA!!!

Finally, there's the old problem of money. Which for most means getting the part-time summer job. Now there are good summer jobs to have and bad summer jobs to have. When I was in college, I went for both. I applied for the cool summer job (working at an ice cream parlor), and didn't get it. I applied for the bad summer job (working in a grocery store deli) and of course got that. I'll tell ya, you don't want to work in a grocery store in the summer. First of all, the AC never works, so it's always 100 and muggy. Secondly, you're round meat and cheese all day, there's nothing appealing about that. Thirdly, EVERYONE and their brother wants a sub during the summer, and I couldn't even LOOK at a sub, let alone order one after that experience. Finally, thanks to the in-store muzak system, I was forced to listen to all the most annoying songs of previous summers, endlessly.

No look at the summer, though, is complete without some of the good things that happen during the summer. First and most notably, there is FREEDOM!!! You are no longer confined to your house by the snow and cold of summer or the endless rain of spring. So go out and play some basketball in the park, go to the beach (remembering my earlier traffic info), join a beer league softball team, whatever, just spend time outdoors. Jump in your car, if you have one, and go places, or ride around and enjoy the scenery. Take one precaution, though; with gas prices being what they are, you may sink most of what you made in that annoying summer job on gas alone, so perhaps walking would be better.

Also this summer, as always, we are treated to MTV's edition of summer, which this year is in Key West, and between the MTV Movie Awards pre-show and the other summer fare, it appears that the theme of this summer is "let's see how we can make Mandy Moore and Beyonce Knowles squirm". Arguably, two of the most sweet and innocent of the teen-pop set getting placed with people who will say the things that will only make, well, sick minds like me laugh. Mandy's talk show was a novel idea, giving her more of a role on the channel than last year where she was just a glorified DJ. However, little did we know when the show was billed as "the show that gives you Moore", that it would be Moore, er, more edgy than Miss Moore would have perhaps been willing to sign up for. Her undeniable and limitless cuteness shines through it all, though. As for Beyonce, I can only sum up her pairing with Mark from Blink-182 (you know them, the rock trio that occasionally likes the whole running around naked thing) as a squirm waiting to happen. Which happened at the close of the Movie Awards pre-show, when Mark was asked what the highlight of the evening was. His unhesitant reply: "Shannon Elizabeth's breasts", at which point Beyonce had a look on her face that could only be described as saying, "How much longer do I have to stand next to this moron?" Speaking of the Movie Awards, after seeing Julia Stiles' choice of wardrobe for the evening, I have never been more proud to be a Mets fan...

So have a fun summer and try not to let things annoy you. Make the most of it, especially around here, because as we well know the snow starts flying again here around Labor Day (ok, maybe that's a little exaggerating), so act like that might actually happen.

Americana Ain't So Quaint

Last Monday, of course, was Memorial Day, and nothing brings out the red, white, and blue in a community like Memorial Day. I would even be so bold as to say that the day has become a more patriotic holiday than the Fourth of July. After all, on the Fourth of July, most people have a picnic, take in the big-budget blockbuster at the local megaplex, and watch the fireworks (or in the case of my old neighbors, set off your own). On Memorial Day, however, you do all the same things (minus the fireworks), but first you watch or march in a parade. Memorial Day parades are the stuff of Americana, the whole "motherhood, apple pie, baseball, and Chevys" thing that is romanticized and the thing that people everywhere else in the world are taught to equate with small-town America. However, for those of my age bracket, that being roughly 15-30 (too old to march in the parade, too young to have fought in a war), we downplay it all. Maybe it's our sense of rebellion, how we don't like stuff associated with the "old ways". A co-worker of mine referred to the notion of Memorial Day parades recently as "quaint". She didn't mean this in a positive way, either, it was more like, oh cute, but not something I'm into seeing.

For me, however, the Memorial Day parade in my hometown of Camillus, New York is something I never miss; in fact, I've only missed one that I can remember, two years ago because I had a summer job down at college. Also, it has always struck me interesting that I cannot remember a single year when it rained. This year happened to be cloudy and threatening at times, but not a touch of rainfall, unless of course you were standing under a tree and some of the rain from the previous day decided to fall on you. Not to rip on the town fathers (OK, maybe I am), but this is the one day that the village of Camillus makes itself look like a place you'd want to be in. They clean the place up, mow the lawns, paint the lines on the streets, put flags on every light pole. This is the village's big day, we easily have the biggest and best and most favored parade in the area every year and it gets bigger every year. This year, they even televised the thing.

In past years, it was about being noticed. When you were a kid, you wanted to be in the parade, even if it was to represent your Irish dancing class or to zoom around in your go-cart (nothing against either of those interests, mind you). I marched four times, first for youth soccer, then three times for little league baseball. The last couple years, they've come up with the rather inventive idea to stuff most of them in the payload of a dump truck, but when I was a kid, we all marched. In those days, P&C Markets and Byrne Dairy had a horse and buggy setup that they trotted down Main Street (a.k.a. Genesee Street, we're so screwed up we can't even settle on one name for the main drag). Without fail, we always wound up not directly behind, but pretty close behind the horses, so we had to sidestep horse droppings the whole way. If you were wondering why we didn't look up and smile and wave more, it was because we didn't want to be the poor soul who stepped in the stuff. Our agility should be much appreciated in retrospect, cuz you didn't have to deal with washing that stuff out thanks to us.

The big highlight of the parade is the West Genesee Marching Band, and normally they bring up the rear (after all, how can you top the 12-time defending state champs?) I had friends in the band over the years when I was in high school and just afterward, so it was cool to see them outside of school, and especially on "my turf", since I was from the village, and most of the time none of them would be caught dead down there. This year, however, they did top themselves, as they came up with an Alumni Band. Over 400 former "bandies" going 30 years back, but mostly those of my class and those immediately before and after. It looked like they extended all the way back to Elbridge when you saw them coming. Quite a sight to see, and when I heard the sordid events of their weekend of rehearsals, it was more of a remarkable sight. Long story short, many of the alums saw fit to bring coolers to rehearsal; you can guess what was in them. Conflicting accounts have it that they spent as much time drinking as playing and marching and by the time the afternoon had concluded, the horn section was visibly woozy. A side note: How is it that these stories of mine lately always seem to involve mass quantities of alcohol?

Anyway, back to my point, and you know there always is one to this column, however convoluted it may be (there's a $5 word): even if it is "quaint", Memorial Day is the day when we all stand together as Americans. We put away our political preferences; the Republicans don't boo the Camillus Democrats' entry, and the same goes for the reverse. Still, a couple guys behind me did yell "Pass the budget!!!" at Senator DeFrancisco when he rode by (nice try, but the fact that we may not have one period in this state is enough to make you cry). Still, we're all Americans, and I guess if you're going to say your piece, this is the country when you can do that, and thank god for that. There is still something to be said about this intangible thing known as "Americana". It reminds you of a warm summer day from the past, or for those of us who fought for this country, may unfortunately stir echoes of brutal and gruesome war scenes once experienced but forever etched in the memory. Old friends reunited, families together like they should be, waving your flag, even if it's just for the moron who is dressed up as a bag of Crazy Bread for Little Caesars. That's what America is about. Don't forget that, and reserve your piece of real estate for next year's parade, I certainly will.