The Good and Bad Things About the Olympics

“Like what could possibly be bad about the Olympics?”

“Give me a break da harv. It’s been around even longer than you have!”

To be precise… you can’t really be precise. 

Some say the whole rigmarole began in 776 BC.

According to whatever Greek scribe you happen to read (sports reporting then was as cliché-filled as it is now) much of the outcome of the first Olympics was about a sketchy description of a naked guy named Coroebus, whose vocation was that of a low-end cook. (Rumor has it, not even the Roman soldiers would frequent his establishment.) 

Coroebus was the very first Olympic champion. He won the 192 meters race (210 yards).

The first advertising agency of the day (based in Illinois) was Fluffiest, Puff, & Exageratious. They went bankrupt following the race when it was discovered that the money they took in for TV air buys was for erroneous placement.

          

The hand-picked Czars of the Obamus Tribunal were quick to point out (after a shortened two-year investigation) that no criminal charges would be filed since Fluffiest, Puff, & Exageratious had no way of knowing that the invention of television was still a few years down the road and not exactly what one would call “shovel ready.”

          

Besides, they also weren’t aware Coroebus would be allowed to run in the nude. 

          

Although Coroebus was an instant hit, he bowed out of ensuing races because he wasn’t able to stand the pain of running. All Olympics were consequently put on hold until years later when, a German inventor named Kliener Schnitzel (in a small community in Philadelphia) invented the athletic supporter. The company subsequently moved to another small community (this time in California) known as Oakland.

***

 

With The Bad News Behind Us...

A few years have gone by and all is well and happening.

The 2012 Summer Olympics are upon us. Almost all human eyes and ears will be privy to the exploits of our planet’s greatest athletes - man and woman – as they join forces in the largest spectrum of sports presentation the world has seen to date.

And, the Kalmenson & Kalmenson team will be part of the presentation; albeit not as athletes, but as part of what makes this worldwide extravaganza possible: the commercials.

With less than one month before the first athlete steps onto the treasured soil of London’s Olympic Stadium, our Kalmenson & Kalmenson team is proud to report that we have once again been given a variety of voice casting assignments which will propel our efforts into the living rooms of just about every American home.

Unlike those early days that have since gone by, the miracle of free enterprise continues to create a genre of camaraderie between millions upon millions of people.

And, a toast to our American athletes.

Here’s a special and most prodigious shout out to each and every one of our guys and gals who’ve made it to the top. We’re proud of all of you.

         

I can already hear the Star Spangled Banner being played. 

Enough About God

So this atheist goes into a synagogue, stares at the Ark, the Scrolls, and the Eternal Light and exclaims: “These are just superstitions! If I’m wrong, let God correct me.”

And a great voice came down from Heaven saying, “You’re right.”

***

Before the fighting stopped our chaplains stayed busy. These guys were really good. I mean most of them could perform services in a variety of religions. A chaplain could find himself in an outlying region, far away from a city or compound of any real size, and discover he might have to cater to the needs of a soldier (or group there of) who were believers in a religion other than his. It was a time when we all had a great deal of respect for the next guy’s choice of direction he took in worship. We all ate, slept, drank, laughed, and shared a deep belief and need for a power greater than our own.

Not until the fighting came to an official end did we begin to take heed of those who became overnight heroes; they were known as atheists. I had never been around an atheist before. I found myself listening intently to what they had to say.

Few Warriors are atheists, for they are in daily peril.

Not a particularly different day, just another twenty-four hour stretch of time spent as a count down to the single splendiferous occasion when a soldier’s name was called and it became his special day to mount up, get his gear, and board a truck for the last pleasant ride. This time the ride was to the departure center where he would be mustered and sent back to our United States of America.

Mail call had been completed. Our company chaplain handed out the last letter to the last anxious recipient once again pulling double duty for our mail clerk who was away from the company.

Mail call time often became a good occasion to linger and depending on the weather we might put together a touch football game, or a softball game, or maybe just a couple of us playing catch – anything suitable in order to kill some time and avoid the never-ending beer drinking or card games.

“Wait”, the Chaplain called out to the guy who would be the recipient of a final piece of mail at the bottom of the mailbag.

The Chaplain handed the guy the letter and said, “See…you are blessed.”

The Chaplain knew this guy well as one of the three fellows in our troop who had claimed to be non-believers, atheists.

“Please Chaplain,” the guy said dismissively.

The Chaplain smiled and waved him off thinking it was the end of the conversation.

“Goodbye,” the trooper said in response to the Chaplain’s wave.

“And God be with you as well,” the Chaplain replied.

There was a glimmer of an annoyed look before the Chaplain took over. First came his big broad smile, then his explanation.

“You might want to look it up. When you said goodbye to me, you were echoing the shortened version of God be with you.”

There is no end to this story, only perhaps a beginning. Within the depths of a man’s kindness, lessons are taught and never forgotten.

It’s Not Divine, Trust Me or Trust me, It’s Not Divine.

(Your choice of usage of the above is dependent on what form of sales you happen to be in.)

Words that glide off the tongue disappear more quickly than those words tending to block a happy incident of any kind.  Saying something positive and nice usually helps generate moods free of divisiveness.

There’s the word divine – which conjures up sublime. It doesn’t bother a person’s ear. Nothing about divine could possibly be painful. That is, unless the word happens to be used without practicality.  As an example, one mature (old) person says to another, “Isn’t the aging process divine?”

See what I mean, nothing about growing old is beautiful, magnificent, extremely pleasant, or delightfully perfect. Look at those new little crow’s feet just popping up around both eyes; aren’t they just divine. Not!

It is, of course, the alternative to growing old that warrants the label divine.

“You’ve got a lot more years a head of you,” the doctor tells you.

Tell me again.

Tell me again.

Please tell me again.

I love the way it sounds.

What a divine phrase.

I lingered in the large lobby of the medical building in order to “do my thing.” What kind of a thing would a mature man be doing as a lingerer in the lobby of a medical building?

Not to worry, it’s all good. I’ll try to make my explanation as reasonable as possible though, to some, this is going to come off as if I were doing my Clintonesque version of an oratory about what is – is.

           

Many years ago without realizing it, my Father exposed me to his humorous skills as an observer of life. As we walked or talked together, no matter where we happened to be, he prevailed with never-ending comments as he observed those around us. And as we grew older together I noticed his observations contained a great deal of ridicule as well as a noticeable increase in vulgar language. However, it always remained between the two of us.  No one was ever hurt by our ridicule or lack of pleasant demeanor; they couldn’t hear us.  I never dreamed this habit-forming procedure would become such an important part of my life’s pursuits.

A medical building is a virtual melting pot of humanity. If you’d like to experience a wide variety of folks, then it’s the place to be. How they walk, talk, hurry, scurry, amble leisurely, or reflect on the news they just received from a doctor (or the worried visual in anticipation of what they might hear as the result of a test taken during a previous examination) is what some refer to as a slice of life.

For me, it is life.

Young and old bonding and bonded together as human beings.

A full screen ever-changing scene study/reality workshop set before me to experience first hand in living, three-dimensional color. It is a never-ending method actor’s dream unfolding there, ready for the taking. 

That man could be me. (He must have received good news, as did I.)

I wonder if the little girl will one day be able to stand a little straighter?

I do think that little old lady in the wheel chair was smiling at me. (I wonder if it was because I was smiling at her?)

 Thanks Dad.

In case you didn’t hear, all went well for me at the medical building. Actually, you could say it was divine.

My Oldest and Dearest Friends...

Not as an idle lest we don’t, or refuse to understand

This joyful look is the countenance when confusion

Controls the man.

Yet we may have together allowed him to lead

When never a prayer

Nor ever a prayer allows a dolt to succeed

Mothers read to us, I remember mine so well

About this clumsy clown, less than a prince

His own makings would cause his fell

Stand back, for never will it fail

His clumsy story of lacking seems his destiny to prevail

And when it ultimately comes to an end

The storyline never allows the outcome to mend

Humpty Dumpty went down alone

No people left to cheer him

No favorable reminders

No one wept

Only left behind him, his empty throne.

***

             

Yes, so many of you within earshot of my words shared in the belief and amazement of Mother Goose and her cohorts who, in their own inimitable fashion, helped to raise us. My life and the books I have read have instilled in me an endless passion to make up my own mind thus allowing me to make my own mistakes. I look at the books I have read as my old and dearest of friends.

“All good books are alike in that they are truer than if they had really happened and after you have finished reading one you will feel that all that happened to you and afterwards it all belongs to you; the good and the bad, the ecstasy, the remorse and sorrow, the people and the places and how the weather was.”

- Ernest Hemingway, December 1934

Not my wish to escape

Though it is craved by so many

Sailing to another land and place

Likely my trip for tomorrow’s chosen

When tomorrow comes

If it comes to me

Another page turned

Back to another day lived

For me to see and feel and mostly hear

Then to share with others

As others have shared with me

Stories of war, love, hero’s and God

Of people enslaved,

And how they became free

Always, as the last page is turned

Reliving almost all I have learned

Unbelievably relished

Thousands upon thousands

Of presentments of wordsmiths renowned

Never relinquishing the beauty I by myself have found.

- HK

Looking Forward

Looking Forward

Looking Forward

Looking Forward

But then… is there a time when it becomes more prudent for us to glance back in time?

Glancing is okay; remaining there will usually cause a problem.

 "One must never pray for the past to return for, if it became God’s will to grant that wish, life’s light would certainly have been relinquished, perhaps forever."

- HK, May 17, 2012

“I look forward to an America which will not be afraid of grace and beauty.”

 - President John F. Kennedy, upon receiving an honorary degree from Amherst College, October 26, 1963 and inscribed on the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Washington, D.C.

Aside from good health the greatest gift received to date in my lifetime is unquestionably an ability to take in, in every form possible, the joy of good humor. For me, grace and beauty have always been synonymous with good humor or even raucous laughter.

A momentary glance over my shoulder to such a wondrous light, it served then as it does today – a symbol of grace and beauty. A child laughing with a spark kindled in her eyes, by a seemingly old man cavorting around a sound stage with the same verve a child might display when enjoying bouncing and sliding around a slippery floor following the consumption of too much sugar.

For whatever the reason… it tickled her.

For whatever the reason her laugh created a part of a special day.

The social worker assigned to our production came forward and asked what the child was laughing about.

“Me, I guess,” was the man’s only response.

A four-and-a-half year old little girl had not only captured hearts and provided an entertaining relief to everyone’s day, but she blessed the room’s ambience with a special God-given grace and elegance, single-handedly indemnifying the inscription engraved on a wall at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. 

Blame It On the Ballpark

· I can’t run on this crappy track.
· This gym is too poorly lit for me to shoot baskets.
· The diving board is too springy for me.
· I need a new set of clubs in order to compete.
· What a lousy script.
· It was a terrible audience.

What do all the above lines have in common? 

Losers delivered them all.

***

The Actors Studio, The Groundlings, Stella Adler, Meisner, Kazan, Houseman, and oh yes…Stanislavski. Lemmon, Grant, and hordes of other actors and places…

And what did all of the above have in common? All are winners, rare talent, and places to be.

I can’t recall which of the great studios I was privileged enough to visit first. It really doesn’t matter. What mattered was the teacher and the method they chose to use. None of them ever served as a symbol of opulence. As a matter of fact, the winners in the crowd were almost always the shabbiest dressers and often the most unkempt individuals I’ve ever come in contact with. Often the group itself was so poor they were forced to alternate where they might workout. Scenery or equipment was a challenge for the imagination. 

A broken circle, with the great Strassberg, or Meisner, or Elia Kazan in the middle was all that would be necessary for either developing a backbone or finding out you were born without one.

But of all the lines delivered by perhaps the most stalwart of all, John Houseman, to a young actor was…

         “You have far too much time on your hands.”

The actor looked at Mr. Houseman not understanding what the great man was getting at. Then came the explanation.

         “You are finding fault with all in life which matters the least. It is not the acoustics in this building or the short stretches of this stage which makes you an unfeeling actor. Your expended time in order to complain will always be a culprit in waiting.”

It isn’t the microphone; you’re a lousy actor. A role of duct tape may successfully patch a wall, but complainers rarely find time to improve their skills.