AD's Journal 2024

  I don’t at all Recall a time When I felt Your hands on me, The stroke of Your fingers On my flesh, The taste of Your tongue In my mouth, I don’t at all Recall a time When those fingers Soothed me, One slow stroke After another, Until I replied, I can still feel it, If not quite remember it, The tenderness, Seated side by side With everything Either of us might Ever want, Within easy reach, The slow, steady Progress of My forefinger and thumb Popping off Button after button On your blouse, Until they fall out Into the palms Of my hands, To caress, To pinch the tips of, Where I feel you Touch me, If only I could Recall it all, Maybe do it all Again.   2024 journal menu email to Al Sullivan

   I sit on a stoop of a building that used to be a convent, next to what used to be a Catholic school, across from a church that is soon to be demolished to make way for still more luxury housing, bulldozers already pointed in its direction from a lot of rubble that used to be two family houses. This world changing the way it did when my great great grandfather came from Italy to destroy the Dutch farms to pave the way for the Italian immigrants flooding into old Lodi to work in the mills, he and his sons helping to establish churches that would accommodate these families, and to build one family box houses where they could live. From then until recently, all seemed the same, the dreams of people who wanted a car in each garage and a chicken in each pot, and a piece of the American Dream that including a home of their own. Even back in Lodi, the bulldozer roll over the ruins of those dreams like Nazi tanks, destroying more than just buildings, but also a way of life, ...

   She hurt herself dismounting, a tragedy she caught on video, haunting images of pain that go beyond the physical discomfort. Whatever goes on in her life, this served as her refuge, a place she can return to where the outside world does not intrude, and on this day   (after things went well for her last time) disaster struck, a moment when she nearly fell out of the saddle then on top of this ,her coming down too hard on an already injured leg, forcing her trainer to bring over something so she could sit on, to wait for the pain to subside long enough for her to hobble to her car for the depressing ride home. The silhouette of her seated and the pain so potent, I could almost feel what she felt though the deeper injury comes to that part of her that wonders what she did to have fate do this to her, and drawing back slightly -- will she be able to climb back into the saddle again. Is the injury that bad? Will she be brave enough to chance it again. Can she end...

   It feels weird I’ve spent the last two years spilling my guts out about someone I have not seen in over a decade and am not likely to ever seen again. There is no communication, no texts, no emails, no phone calls, no comments on my blog or my Facebook page. So, I have no clue as to what this person thinks about my journal from back then. While I know she reads some of it, maybe all of it, I don’t know who else is. I don’t know if my comments from a decade ago and my assumptions are only pissing her off all the more, or if she wants me to cease. This is a bigger vacuum than back in the day when I thought I could detect a comment or two installed in her poetry (this may be pure fantasy) and believed we had some poetic conversation – not all positive, but not all negative either. I’m coming to a point in posting old journals where I had intended to stop, at that point a decade ago when I last saw her. I didn’t stop writing about her after her departure, and some...

  I toke It makes it worse, A legalized dream machine That manufactures Dreams of her, Waking me In the middle f the night I know not Where I am Or who I’m with, Only not with her Wherever she is. An old man’s fantasy, Stirred up with the coals Of a now-distant past I can’t forget Or let go of, I toke; it gets worse Strolling through A dreamscape That resolves nothing, Only makes me wake With the same ache I had and will always have But must endure A high that makes me Feel so low, I toke; it gets worse And yet Despite all this, All of what once was And can never be again I would have it No other way Manufacturing dreams from which I never actually wake And wouldn’t want to, I toke, And toke, And toke.   2024 journal menu email to Al Sullivan

  I kept thinking about the classic sixties rock song lyric “almost cut my hair” when I petitioned the local barber for an appointment earlier this week, and when I showed up, he wasn’t there. And I was thinking how pathetic all this was after a year of growing it long again to give it up after the first serious heatwave. But alas, I’m just not the hippie I once was, and I foolishly went back yesterday, sat in the chair and waved at my (more silver than) golden locks and said, “do away with it,” and he did. Later, when I looked at the damage in the mirror at home, I realized that this silly beard I have sprouted also needed to go, white as snow, making me feel much older than I already feel (and am) and so, I cut that off in a mid-day shave. The beard was not my idea, but inspired by my wife after seeing the full and amazing beard sported by one of the Jersey City council men, prompting her to ask, “why can’t you grow a beard like that?” “Because I can’t,” I said, trying ...

  I almost missed the posting of a new photo on her Facebook page. There is usually so little new on that page I often do not go there for days. But new photo brought me back to those days when I would wake up to find a new one every morning. And the one she posted yesterday (I think it was yesterday) is so reminiscent of those earlier photos, I stared at it for a while on the screen before downloading a copy. She had the old makeup on, amazingly framed eyes with eye liner and mascara, and red lips. It was like going back in time, and stirred up similar feelings as to those I felt way back then, although with more than a decade of additional experience, the photo didn’t make me quake inside the way they once did. I would like to think she posted the picture for me, but I know better, and it is safer to assume she did not, since there are some things in the past we do not want to revisit. In this photo, she looked professional again, not as stern as one of the photos she...

      I started writing erotica again, which I haven’t done in a long time. I originally started back in the 1990s when inspired by the mafia don’s widow. She would send me a suggestion and I would more or less take off from that. But it was very crude, more pornography than erotica – and there is a difference. Pornography basically focuses on the sexual act, while erotica tends to be more subtle, drying to evoke emotion rather than sensation. For the most part, women tend to write better erotica than men – although I’ve read some women writers who pass off pornography as erotica. I interviewed a few for news stories in the past, and still read their work. I like reading poetry erotica better than fictional, although I write both. I guess I’m inspired by posting old erotic poems and stories, and want to recapture the feelings engendered – with the goal of somehow getting the fictional variety that I write to be as good, as subtle and as emotional as the poet...

   Woke up yesterday to the shaking of our 1888 house. This was not an earthquake, but a backhoe in the street in front digging up the two tree pits on out sidewalk. We had asked the city two years ago to remove the existing trees because contractors from PSE&G had so completely butchered them that they threatened to fall into our house. Uncle Brian – what we call the mayor – sent crews on the coldest day of that year to cut them down. Since then, the pits had remained empty, until yesterday. The other properties up and down our quiet street had been planted prior to the removal of our trees. So, we discussed our options – whether to ask the city to replant or to simply concrete over the pits. Uncle Brian in the meantime must have come down the street and noticed, sending his crews yesterday to give us new trees to replace the old ones, a pleasant surprise, although waking to the rumbling made us wonder if the sky was falling. This is cleanup week for the c...

   Seeing the Rolling Stones cover band last Saturday made me nostalgic, and sent me back to the old recordings I did of Eric Lemon (and the other various names they band had during the 1970s and 1980s). This also prompted me to call Garrick, who was Paulie’s longest friend and was there was the beginning since I was on the west coast or in the army for some of those critical years. I saw the earliest version of the band in Paterson at St. John’s community room in 1968. Pete and John M, along with a drummer I didn’t know, made up a trio. Hank insisted I come and meet Paulie, who was to be invited up to sing, and he did, although the crowd was so thick I didn’t get to talk to him. At year later, while on leave from the Army, I went to the shore with Paulie and others, where they took over the stage of some beach bum band. I didn’t see him perform (except as a solo act at Charlie’s Halloween party in West Paterson in 1970) until I got back to the east coast in early ...

   I’ve restored much of the original blog not really knowing what impact it has, and largely know little about what is currently transpiring in her life. Unlike in the past in which she posted poems and essays, making much of this clear, she posts very little that is publicly available except for her videos. For the most part, I ceased even following her blog back in 2015 and so have very little knowledge about what went on with her in the aftermath of her leaving her political post – though I know she got a new job in New York City around that time. Her move out of the apartment she lived in since 2010 came at a curious moment since it coincided with my moving to a new home a few blocks away, making me wonder if there was some connection. I assumed at the time (with nothing to substantiate this theory) that she had moved in with someone (possibly a romantic situation) into an apartment in upper Manhattan and commuted to work via subway. She gave up her car years ea...

   The old pop song Pops up in my head, “the lips I miss to kiss,” Like a bad penny It keeps coming back, Haunting me, The best part of a bad thing, The sour after something Utterly sweet, Makes me think of the bees, Whose passion Makes them make Way too much honey An excess I appreciate Even if I’ve not tasted Its flavor in years, Recalling how sweet, If not exactly the tang, Lingering on the tip Of my tongue, teasing me, And how soft the embrace The lips I miss, As the pop song goes, Missed but not forgotten, Even if I can’t quite remember It’s exact taste.   2024 journal menu   email to Al Sullivan

   Map of Woodstock from our 2008 trip Unfortunately, we have to put off our spring trip to Woodstock because my wife has to work. Most likely, we’ll take the trip north at some weekend after June 9. In the past, we have stayed at the same motel in Kingston near the exist from the thru way, as I did with my daughter during the summer of 2019. At lot depends on the condition of my car and my finances. The repair today cost $1,000, and there is a likelihood I will have to put more money into the beast shortly – the repairs since the star of the year have been horrendous, not just the usual tire or tune up issue. At one point, I had to replace the sensors, which only last about six or so years. Then, when the car started stalling, I had to replace other parts. Now this latest replacing brakes and aspects of the horn (my inspection sticker still says November 2022.) I don’t know why we keep going to Woodstock once or twice a year when one of the main attractions had been...

    Back to the shop with my car so I can get it inspected.   the horn doesn't work; the brakes squeal and the sticker for inspection is more than a year and a half out of date otherwise it's perfectly legal   perhaps I'm inspired by my birthday having survived for another year makes me wanna put things back in order and perhaps even catch up with all that I'm behind at work with I visited the graves of my great great grandfather, and my great grandfather and grandmother who among the host of other family members interred in Lodi, the town of which our clan sprang after their arrival here from Italy -- actually it was via a short stop in Little Italy in New York I also visited Peggy's grave. The stuffed bear that I left around Christmas with the New York Giants pin on it is long gone snow sleet hail and rain and such but the Angel pin from Easter flowers remained.   I did not get to her grave on Saint Valentine's Day eve as I wanted to which wa...

   I kept expecting the band to break out in the song “ I hear it's your birthday”   though it was Rolling Stones band   and not The Beatles   and what I got   was a rendition of the traditional   happy birthday song sung for one of the fans in the crowd   who had just turned 30 a mere youngster   though the scene brought me   back in time to when   we all were at that age on the edge of becoming old when nobody trusted anyone over 30 and Mick said he did not wish   to be playing rock after that age who is now on tour at 84   all of this a bit too nostalgic   when those I played with   have not survived while I have amazingly 2024 journal menu email to Al Sullivan

  (posted from my phone) it was more than a little irony that the place we chose to go see rock and roll last night was within a few footsteps of one of the regular gigs the band I work for played back in the early 1980s we did not go there for my birthday although it was a kind of celebration and the band was a rolling Stones bar band too many members but more than qualified to play the music we were hearing I forgot just how exhausting the rock and roll life especially after having work earlier in the day when I had to cover an event for the newspaper nothing much really has changed except that the groupies that's hung around the band we're all old like us and overweight and yet it did not stop them from having a great time or for the band to appreciate their loyalty the bands that I played for had similar fans although they ceased playing many many years ago. So the social scene that became such a big part of our life back in the 1970s and early '80s no longe...

  She dances like a robot With her mother on Thanksgiving A male voice off camera Saying he doesn’t want to be On YouTube, A different dance than the one She danced for her mother On Asbury Park beach A month earlier, Real joy exuding from her As if she has finally found contentment (even though I suspect She may be putting on A happy face) She, having breached The age of 40 (perhaps now 44 or 45), Though her face is the same face From all those years ago, Framed by black hair, When I remember it being brown Or near red under harsh sunlight, Waving her arms like a robot, While her mother tries But not successfully To imitate the dance, Both standing around What is likely her father’s Kitchen table Somewhere in lower New York State, Kicking off the holiday season With a video she feels compelled to record For posterity, Life is good. Life is long. Life sometimes gives you gives You never thought you’d need Or want, Yet are grateful to receive Anyway.   2024 journal menu email t...

  Things have calmed down in regards to the hits on my website. Instead of hundreds of hits a day, we’re back to a few dozen. This may be a result of my taking down many of the older posts and my attempt to relocate some of the journal entries onto another page, This may have been a mistake, which I am currently correcting by restoring the journal entries – but not the poetry journal entries. I’m rewriting the poetry journals into a poetry, and restoring them one or two per day, and since there are hundreds of these (plus many poetry journals I haven’t yet even bothered to post) this last aspect will take time. I still have journal entries to post, but will wait until I’m caught up with restoring the previous ones before I start adding additional entries. All of this is largely taking place in a vacuum. In the past, I had access to a lot of material – when she still posted poems and essays, along with the fact that her political enemies were never shy about talking abou...