1.The Return

#1 - The Return

    This is a return to my roots as a blogger. So to catch any newbies up to speed. I began a blog in October 2008 that was sporadically updated. It evolved into a travel blog I called In My Footsteps in January 2010. That blog was meant to be professional. Each post was a specific town I visited complete with photos, places to visit, stay, and eat. 

    Along the way, I noticed that I’d end up with some funny anecdotes from my road trips and just from life in general. I decided to create a second blog in May 2010 to highlight these funny and sometimes unbelievable stories. I called it Initial Impressions as I thought each post would deal with my first reactions to road trips and random events with little in the way of rewrites or taking time to let more lucid opinions form. It was purely spur of the moment.

    Over the ensuing years, the blog evolved into a chronicle of my running career before slowing down and eventually being rarely updated.

    In the fall of 2023, I created a Patreon page for subscriptions to support my content. One bit of exclusive content I created was a podcast where I reviewed and tried to shed some light on the fever dream that was the Initial Impressions blog. It was so much fun to relive and I enjoy creating new episodes of that Patreon podcast monthly.

    Recently I thought that since I enjoyed recording those podcasts so much, and since my life is still filled with weird, funny, and odd stories, why not start crafting new Initial Impressions blogs? So here we are in February 2024 with the first new Initial Impressions blog in almost 12 years. 

    These will start as a sort of weekly recap, rather than specific days. It gives me more time to experience more craziness and form odd opinions, and maybe a cryptic post or two.

1. I am a member of a Planet Fitness gym. At times while I’m there a commercial for Planet Fitness will come on one of the TVs. I have to laugh because I’ll look around and say ‘Hey, we don’t have any equipment like that here. No battle ropes, no TRX, no medicine balls, not even any foam rollers.’ It’s like seeing the pristine food in a fast food commercial and then when you get it it looks like someone just stepped on it.

2. I never thought the sound of the Recycle Bin on Windows would be something that brought me nostalgia until it was accidentally turned off for months. When I turned the sound back on and heard that crinkling paper it got me right in the feels.

3. It’s funny how even in a small community if you work hard enough you can avoid seeing someone you don’t want to see for many years. It takes talent to be this good at avoiding someone.

4. I have found myself over the last several years in a constant state of working on, editing, or marketing various creative projects in the hopes of a bigger breakthrough. At times it feels like being on a treadmill where no matter how fast I go I don’t get anywhere.

5. As I look around my place here in the first week of February I see Christmas lights up(well, white string lights), and my mini Halloween pumpkin going strong. I also have sliced turkey in the fridge but not from Thanksgiving.

The Nightmare Before Christmas at Thanksgiving Dinner

6. I highly recommend Exercise With Oxygen Therapy(EWOT) for anyone who has access. The 93% pure oxygen you breathe during cardio has so many benefits, a major one for me is allowing my body to run like it used to, even briefly. The oxygen tricks your brain into thinking it’s not working as hard as it is, thus you feel you can go harder. Here’s a link to explain more: Superhuman Protocol

7. If you had told teenage me that I’d be listening to a ton of downtempo music in my mid-40s I’d have likely shook my head in embarrassment and said I’m getting old. While that is true I find that music triggers something in my focus and creativity, plus there are some great beats.

8. I was training a client the other day, a nice older lady in her early 70s. It was going great until she got irritated at the ‘hip-hop’ music I was playing during the session. The song that was playing? Mickey by Toni Basil from 1981. Jay-Z or 2Pac it was not.

Hip-Hop?

9. Driving down a quiet road in the early morning on the way to work I encountered a raccoon walking directly toward me along the yellow median line. I stopped and eventually, it moved. I had to play chicken with a raccoon. I am now waiting for the day that I play raccoon with a chicken.

10. I have come to realize that some people will just never be happy. They could have everything they want exactly the way they want it and they would still find a reason to be upset. It’s as if they wouldn’t know what to do with themselves if they didn’t have something to be angry about.

Wise Words at the Sagamore Bridge, Cape Cod, Massachusetts

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Child of the 1980's - Introduction to Music

                Music has the ability to conjure up emotion without effort.  A favorite song can make a bad day better.  It can make a workout amazing, a road trip epic, a thunderstorm legendary, and so much more. 

                We all have those songs and artists which bring those emotions up within us.  However do you ever stop to think about where it all began?  Not necessarily how you came to love whatever your music of choice is, but how you were first introduced to music period?

                This question does not need to be relegated to a specific time or age group, someone whose first musical love was Justin Bieber is just as valid as someone who saw The Beatles on the Ed Sullivan Show.  Music is a gateway to the soul. 

                For me as a child of the 1980’s my musical introductions definitely fit the period.  I was a child who owned vinyl albums and a Fisher-Price record player.  I was a child who was amazed by audio cassette tapes and the Sony Walkman.  I was a child who when he became a teenager saw the wide availability of something called a Compact Disc.  It was on compact disc that I purchased the album that changed my life more than any other, Nirvana’s Nevermind in 1991.  I still own that CD despite it having a severe case of CD rot after 26 years.  However I can still remember vividly two musical milestones in my childhood that I will share.  One is the first song I can actually remember playing, two is the first album I remember owning that I really loved.

                The first song that I can remember hearing was (Just Like) Starting Over by John Lennon. 
     I still have a vivid picture in my head of what that song brings up.  The song itself was released October 24, 1980 as the lead single from his upcoming Double Fantasy album.  The album was a comeback for the former Beatle after spending five years in a semi-retirement.  It comes as no surprise to myself looking back that my introduction to music should be connected to The Beatles as my father grew up as a diehard fan, even a member of the fan club during the mid-1960’s. 

                I have fond memories of hearing that song and album at my Nana’s house.  Though I cannot pinpoint that date I know that it must have been early spring of 1981 as I can remember windows and doors open likely as my Nana would have said ‘to air out the house after winter.’ 

                John Lennon would be murdered on December 8, 1980, only three weeks after Double Fantasy was released.  It catapulted the initially lukewarmly received album into the stratosphere.  After (Just Like) Starting Over other hits would come including Watching the Wheels, Woman, and Beautiful Boy.  It became a sad cap to an amazing musical legacy.

                The first album I remember owning and loving should come as no shock due to my age.  Michael Jackson’s Thriller album dropped just after my 5^th birthday in 1982 and I was given a copy as a Christmas present.  The nine songs became the soundtrack to my life for a time.  There were many an occasion when the openings beats of Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’ would be blasting on that Fisher-Price record player that I had conveniently stuck in our living room window so that all of the neighborhood kids could come and dance in the front yard.

                It helped that MTV had videos for Billie Jean, Thriller, and Beat It on constant rotation.  Even if I had not gotten the album for Christmas, I would have been asking for it all of 1983.  The album set all sorts of sales and awards marks.  Representatives for Sony Entertainment who owned Epic Records which released Thriller said in February 2017 that the album has sold over 105 million copies worldwide.

                Michael Jackson became the biggest star in the world and his videos were legendary.  For those under 30 it might be hard to separate the more tragic figure Jackson became from the undeniable musical genius he was in the 1980’s.  Back then he was every bit the King of Pop that he named himself later on.  Thriller is to this day the only full album I have on my iPod.

                What are you first memories of music in your childhood?  No matter what your age is those first memories are strong and can shape your tastes forever.  I can look back today and realize how my parents influenced my musical preferences.  Thanks for reading and stay tuned for more totally tubular 1980’s memories!

Click here to see my previous Child of the 1980's blog about the Rise of Nickelodeon!

                

My Cape Cod Roots

            I feel that I was born at the absolute best time to appreciate Cape Cod for all that it is and was.  I am old enough to remember things ‘the way they used to be’, yet young enough to enjoy the way things are.  For those who are dying to know, I was born in 1977.  I straddle the line between generations that gives me insight into two worlds.  I am of the age where I was able to see and experience a little bit of Olde Cape Cod and watch as my home changed and adapted with the times.

              During my childhood landline telephones and phone booths were common.  I remember waiting for friends to call, and actually having to remember people’s phone numbers.  Yet as an adult I love the convenience and technology of smartphones.  I do not believe I could recite anybody’s phone number today.  However I could still rattle off my old home phone number, my Nana’s number, and a few friends from middle school as well.

            Throughout my childhood I would be tossed outside by my mother during summer to go off and play with my friends, only coming home when it was almost dark.  I do not believe we ever feared being abducted, though I am sure the bad people were not something invented in the last twenty years.  The Cape seemed more innocent though I am sure that it was not.

            I was born at a time when vinyl albums were mainstays.  I had a collection as a seven-year old that might shock people today with artists like Ratt, Twisted Sister, Quiet Riot, Van Halen, and Motley Crue lining my shelves.  Of course I had the first pressing of Michael Jackson’s Thriller as well and used to play it loudly out of my window on my Fisher-Price record player so all of the neighborhood kids could dance in the yard.  I had young hip parents which influenced my style growing up.  However as much as I loved making cassette mixtapes off of stations like Cape 104 and 96.3 The Rose I can honestly say I prefer MP3’s and iTunes to Maxell and Memorex.

            I am old enough to remember walking, or driving, to the video store to rent VHS tapes.  Yet I am young enough to fully enjoy Netflix and Hulu and the instant gratification they provide.  Sure I played Atari 2600 and the original Nintendo but they were bit parts of my childhood.  Admittedly I did spend a good amount of time at the arcade but Rampage wasn’t going to beat itself!  It was a time when walking seemed more common, like after family meals on holidays.  There was always a place to walk as a family.

            I am old enough to have seen the first two schools I attended close.  I went to South Yarmouth Elementary School on Route 28 with Laurence MacArthur as my principal.  The school would eventually bear his name before being closed in 2013 and reopening as a campus for Bridgewater State University in 2015.  I then attended John Simpkins Elementary located on the same plot of land.  It served as the town’s first high school before Dennis-Yarmouth opened in 1957 and housed Grades 3-5 after.  It closed in 2006 and was transformed into the Simpkins School Residences, senior housing, opening in 2014.

            I am old enough to remember the Cape Cod Mall in the days before it expanded.  In those days it was anchored by Woolworth, Filene’s, and Jordan Marsh and had a separate cinema on the property.  I remember spending Friday evenings searching Record Town and Tape World for my next musical interest.  However I am also young enough to enjoy the convenience of what the expanded Mall has brought with so many stores under one roof.

            I am old enough to remember Cape Cod icons such as Thompson’s Clam Bar, Mildred’s Chowder House, Joe Mac’s, and Mill Hill Club.  There were fewer Shaw’s and Stop & Shop’s and more Angelo’s, Purity Supreme, and A&P’s.  I frequented Bassett’s Wild Animal Farm in Brewster and visited the legendary Cape Cod Coliseum, although it was to see Sesame Street On Ice.

            I am old enough to remember the grounding of the 473-foot freighter Eldia at Nauset Beach in 1984 and not believing how big it was.  I saw the breach of North Beach in Chatham in 1987 and am amazed at seeing it healing itself.  Hurricane Bob and the ‘Perfect Storm’ of 1991 made me appreciate the wonders of electricity after losing power for many days.

            My childhood was a time when drive-in theaters were still the norm.  At their peak there were nearly 4,000 drive-in theaters in the United States, as of 2017 that number has dwindled to 338.  The Wellfleet Drive-In is all that remains of their legacy on Cape Cod.  However I have fond memories of being elementary school aged and visiting the Yarmouth Drive-In across from Captain Parker’s Pub.  I was lucky enough to see movies like E.T., Return of the Jedi, and Flash Gordon in the warm summer air.  Other drive-in theaters in Dennis, Hyannis, and Falmouth once dotted the Cape decades ago as well.

            I remember there being more salamanders and fewer turkeys and coyotes.  I was warned about jellyfish stings when stepping into the ocean, Great White sharks not so much.  I remember the noon whistle in Yarmouth scaring me on numerous occasions.  I remember more Friendly’s and fewer Dunkin’ Donuts, Bradlees instead of Walmart.  Cape Cod seemed much larger then.  A family trip to Edaville Railroad in Carver felt like a drive across the country.  Today Chatham, Provincetown, and Falmouth feel an arm’s length away.

            Amazingly for all of the changes I have seen in my time there are some things which remain the same.  The scent of Cape Cod Potato Chips cooking as you pass along the Mid-Cape Highway between Exits 6 and 7.  106 WCOD on the radio.  Delicious ice cream during the summer from places like Four Seas, Lil’ Caboose, and Ice Cream Smuggler.  Kids and families sledding on the golf courses during winter.  The Barnstable County Fair in July, the Cranberry Festival in Harwich in September, the Yarmouth Seaside Festival in October.

            Then there is the natural beauty of Cape Cod.  It is everywhere.  The National Seashore is as close as one can get to how the Cape must have looked when it was first discovered.  Summer drives along the shore routes in Eastham up through Provincetown are heavenly.  Route 6A is a blast to the past with its historic homes and tree shaded scenery, just like I remember as a child.

            Yes I feel I was born as the absolute perfect time when it comes to the history of Cape Cod.  I have watched the Cape change in some ways and stay the same in others.  This is only my story though, what things do you remember about Cape Cod as children?  What changes have you enjoyed?  What changes have you not liked?  Thanks for reading.  

Chris Cornell & My Life

            Another sad, unnecessary loss.  Another voice that hugely influenced my formative years gone.  I know that I am only one of millions who woke up to the heartbreaking news that legendary frontman Chris Cornell was dead.  It makes it even sadder knowing that likely it was suicide.  It’s like a punch to the gut.  Reminds me a lot of Robin Williams, someone who was so loved and so influential yet could not find their own inner peace.

This was going to start off as a tribute to such a great musician and voice, and it still will, but before that I need to address the ‘how.’

            I saw someone on Twitter write today that ‘depression doesn’t care who you are.’  It is so true.  I have dealt with my own bouts of depression over the years.  The worst one came in 2001-2002.  It was at this point that I was on three different medications to combat this illness that is so hard to describe and so hard for people to see.  It is more than just ‘feeling down.’  It is much deeper than something you can just ‘snap out of.’  It just becomes your life, your own prison that you sit in waiting for another shoe to drop, the shoe that brings you back to who you were.

            For me I had a wake up call when my three medications negatively interacted.  I could not get up from my bed, feeling as if my stomach was full of liquid.  I thought it could be a GI bleed.  911 had to be called and paramedics had to come to get me.  They had to literally unscrew my bedroom door off its hinges to be able to get the stretcher inside and wheel me out.  At the hospital when trying to set me up with an IV the nurse missed the vein and ended up filling much of my right elbow with fluid.  It was a bad scene, I was angry at myself, at my head, that I had allowed this depression to take me down this road to where I was being rushed to the ER due to medication complications.  However that was not my true wake up.

            My aha moment was looking off to the right as I was being wheeled out of my house and seeing my 2-year old niece terrified and upset at what she was seeing.  I had never felt so badly as I did then, knowing that something going on with me caused that fear.  She made me fight it.

            I left the hospital and vowed to never take another pill for depression again.  I quit all three meds cold turkey.  Yes, I have had bouts of depression in the 15 years since, including one this year, but no matter what I try to put it all in perspective and keep going one day at a time.  I was lucky to have family and friends who helped see me through it because I let them know what I was going through.

            The sticking point is that last part.  Those going through depression need to summon that strength to tell someone what you are going through.  If not it can mask itself as someone being busy, or being anti-social, or numerous other things.  The thing is Chris Cornell had people that loved him, his wife and two kids and family beyond that who could have helped.  It may feel like you are weak because you are dealing with depression and asking for help, but it is the opposite.  It takes strength to admit you need a hand in life.  I did it and am here today.

            Chris Cornell joins Scott Weiland, Layne Staley, and my non-family hero Kurt Cobain on the Mount Rushmore of Grunge artists who are now gone.  It is amazing how death hits this genre so often.  He had one of the greatest voices I have ever heard in music.  With an unbelievable range and power that could reach through the speakers and slap you in the face.  I will not going into depth about favorite songs, they will be shared below.  Chris could be soft and soothing, or hard and untamable, back and forth.

            His gift was so strong that he made a name for himself with three different bands, Soundgarden, Temple of the Dog, Audioslave, and on his own.  The Seattle scene of the late 1980’s and early 1990’s with Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Alice In Chains, Soundgarden, Mudhoney, and more.  This is the music that I identified with, this is the music I grew up with.  It is sad and yet fitting that the people responsible for creating so much of this music were every bit as flawed and human as me.  This is what made them relatable. 

            I am so sad that Chris Cornell ended his life last night.  His memory will live on in his wife and kids, and of course his music.  Thank you Chris for being a huge part of the years that made me who I am, I will not forget you.  Rest In Peace

            Below I am sharing my ten favorite Chris Cornell tracks, in no particular order.  Take a listen and see why this loss hurts so much.  Thank you.

Soundgarden - Superunknown

Audioslave - I Am the Highway


Chris Cornell - Sunshower



Temple of the Dog - Say Hello 2 Heaven



Soundgarden - Fell On Black Days



Soundgarden - Outshined



Audioslave - Shadow On the Sun



Chris Cornell - Billie Jean



Soundgarden - Rusty Cage



Soundgarden - Birth Ritual

Kurt Cobain & Nirvana 20 Years Later

           20 years is a long time by any stretch of the imagination. I am finding it difficult to fathom that it has been 20 years since Kurt Cobain died.  He was the man, well, part of the band Nirvana, which influenced the direction of my life more than anyone.  I am a writer today because of him.  It’s been 20 years, I still remember like it was yesterday.  Forgive me if this all comes out in a rambling haphazard way, I do not like to write blogs like this in a structured way.  I like it to be free flowing from my mind to the screen with little if any editing.

            Before I can remember the end I choose to remember the beginning.  I’ll never forget that night in August 1991.  I was 13; heading into 8^th Grade, summer was coming to a close.  I had been hanging out with my friend Matt and we were in his bedroom when he happened to turn on the radio.  Coming from the tiny speakers was this sound that was unlike anything I had heard before. 

            I only caught the final minute and a half of ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit,’ but that was all I needed.  I had to find out who made that sound.  It was as if that song in 90 seconds had tossed a brick through the window of my life revealing something amazing on the other side.  I carefully stepped through and never looked back.  Within a few weeks Nirvana’s Nevermind was released and I bought it.  This was one of the very first compact discs I had ever purchased.  I still have it; the thing was played so much that it is coated with scratches and ‘cd rot.’ It is pretty useless now, but the memories remain.

            Kurt Coabin’s angst in his lyrics spoke to me as to what was going on in my own life.  I was part of a divorced family setting with a stepfather who was not kind to me as I entered my teenage years.  I was not happy with who I was or where I was and thought nobody would understand.  Kurt was 10 years older so he was like a big brother sharing what he was dealt with.  I kept thinking if I followed his path I’d end up like him.  I wanted to be a singer/songwriter so I could find a way to express my own inner pain in a way that was creative and inspiring.  I hoped that maybe I could do for others what he did for me.  He made me make sense.

            I would eventually find out I was pretty much tone deaf and couldn’t play guitar worth a lick, but the writing part of the equation was actually quite good.  I would write song lyrics and poetry that were littered with real life raw emotion, things I didn’t like to share.  The poetry later became short stories and novels before evolving into the travel writing which landed me my first book deal.  It is easy to trace the steps back to that night in Matt’s bedroom where I heard that lovely ear-splitting music that changed my life.

            I remember in 1992 or 1993 trying to explain to my Dad that Kurt Cobain was my generation’s John Lennon.  Being a child of the 1960’s and a giant Beatles fan my Dad of course could not see how the scrawny, screeching, feedback blasting kid was anything like the man who sang ‘Imagine,’ ‘Give Peace A Chance,’ and ‘Instant Karma.’  I could not convince him back then maybe because it was still happening, Generation-X was current, not in the past.  These days it surprises me that my Dad can finally see what I was trying to say. 

            Nirvana was to me what The Beatles were to him. 

            Then in a flash it all ended.  The Grunge movement that killed hair metal, that knocked Michael Jackson off the top of the Billboard charts.  The Grunge movement that was so anti-mainstream that the mainstream had to go and find it.  It was over April 8, 1994.

            I remember coming home from school, Sophomore year.  I put on MTV, back when they were actually a music network.  There was the story: A body had been found in the room above Kurt Cobain’s garage.  Selfishly I hoped it was someone else, but deep down I knew better.  In short order it was confirmed who it was.  What made it worse was that he had ended his own life.  As the days and weeks and years passed I would learn so much more about what made Kurt Cobain tick, his stomach problems which led to drug addiction.  It made his suicide a little easier to swallow, maybe that’s just me making excuses for him. 

            In a snap his music and message were a part of history.  Now he is seen as a legend, a mythical figure, in the likes of Jim Morrison or Jimi Hendrix.  I actually get it now too since I was a part of the whole Grunge movement, but it is still a little weird to hear Kurt Cobain spoken of in that same way.  I remember needing to hear more of Kurt’s words so badly that I ended up purchasing every bootleg and B-Side filled disc, this was long before the With the Lights Out boxed set came out to make all of those songs easy to find.

            It’s funny now looking back at the videos and interviews and thinking that Kurt Cobain and Nirvana were larger than life figures but I am now actually older than he was when he died.  It’s weird that Dave Grohl’s band Foo Fighters have actually been together longer than Nirvana now.  I remember that my friend Rob and I had plans to go and see Nirvana as our very first concert during the summer of 1994.  They were supposed to headline Lollapalooza, but of course that never happened.

            I remember I tried to measure the impact Kurt Cobain had on music in general in the years after his death.  I made a chart for college that showed a list of the album sales of other grunge/alternative bands in the 5 years after Nirvana was finished.  It was as if Nirvana left such a hole in people’s musical lives that they scrambled to find the ‘next’ band like them.  There were some very deserving, awesomely talented bands like Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, and Alice In Chains who got the recognition they should have.  Pearl Jam is a stretch since they are usually seen as The Rolling Stones to Nirvana’s Beatles; they were/are every bit as good as Nirvana.

            On the other side though there were some weaker ‘alternative’ bands that saw huge record sales in the same 5-year period, bands like Bush, Live, Collective Soul, and countless others.  Don’t get me wrong, those bands are good, but they only got as big as they did because of the gaping hole Nirvana left.

            I’m not going to turn this into complaining about music after Nirvana though.  I am just amazed that it’s been 20 years now.  April 5 is the actual date as Kurt’s body wasn’t found for 3 days.  So I choose to celebrate his life and music for those three days.  I might never have an album, or play guitar, but I am a writer now and it all goes back to that night I first heard ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ on a little alarm clock radio.   

            I have celebrated his life and message basically since the moment I found out he died.  I think now a lot more people will figure out the impact of Nirvana thanks to it being a round number like 20 Years.  It also helps that there is a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction coming up, plus numerous magazine covers out right now.  I am not saying that everyone has to recognize Kurt Cobain as my generation’s John Lennon, but maybe if you think of who had that kind of impact on your life maybe you would understand what I am saying.  That’s how it will make sense to you. 20 years is such a long time especially when it still seems like yesterday.

Must-Listen: Smells Like Teen Spirit

                    Lounge Act

                    About A Girl

                    All Apologies

                    Aneurysm