Harold Ford Sr. represented Memphis in the U.S. House of Representatives for 11 terms — from 1975 until his retirement in 1997. (Photo: U.S. Congress, Public domain,
via Wikimedia Commons)
So what do Donald J. Trump and Harold Ford Sr. have in common? Not political philosophy, that’s for sure. The longtime Memphis congressman and political broker, currently proprietor of the elegant Serenity funeral home, was a true-blue Democrat; the once and wannabe future president has apparently never had any discernible beliefs other than Trumpism, per se.
Yet, when pundits on one of Sunday’s TV talk shows went looking for an analogy to Trump’s current political predicament, Ford’s name surfaced. Once upon a time, the Memphis eminence, like the quadruply indicted squire of Mar-a-Lago, faced legal charges — though nothing like Trump’s 91 felony counts. This was in 1987, in the wake of the catastrophic collapse of United American, a Knoxville mega-bank owned by Jake Butcher, a onetime Democratic gubernatorial candidate, and his brother C.H.
In the fallout of that disaster, the two Butchers were indicted for bank fraud — specifically, for illegally switching cash reserves from branch to branch, a step ahead of bank examiners. The zealous feds of that era’s GOP-dominated Justice Department went looking for more game and settled on several associates of the Butchers, one of whom was Congressman Ford, a borrower and political ally, whom they hung a wire-fraud charge on, as well.
To get ahead of ourselves for a moment, none of the indicted Butcher friends would end up being convicted, though the banking brothers themselves did time. Guilt by association, thundered Ford, whose bank loans were deemed “pretend” affairs by the feds, and he was no mean thunderer when aroused. Therein lies the analogy to Trump, who at the moment is saddled with a gag order in connection with a New York civil trial involving alleged financial abuses in connection with his business empire.
In this case, as well as in regard to his other pending trials, Trump has vilified his courtroom adversaries — including the judge himself in the current trial — in every known vernacular way, attacking their motives, their politics, their morals, and their mental health, and imputing to them an enormous variety of personal perversities.
Hence the gag order, which Trump’s lawyers are currently appealing.
In his case, Ford was considerably more restrained, though he left no doubt he considered his predicament to have been inspired by considerations of both race and partisan politics. He, too, got a gag order which he, too — backed by House Speaker Jim Wright (D-Texas) and Majority Leader Thomas S. Foley (D-WA) — appealed.
A three-judge panel of the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals saw things Ford’s way and struck down the gag order, finding “The defendant, a Democrat, a black congressman who represents a largely black constituency in Memphis, is entitled to attack the alleged political motives of the Republican administration which he claims is persecuting him because of his political views and his race. One may strongly disagree with the political view he expresses but have no doubt that he has the right to express his outrage.”
Besides his MAGA-fans, Trump, too, has legal defenders here and there who argue for his right to express his misgivings, however untidily.
Military victories aside, Napoleon went 0-1 on the battlefield of love.
The theatrical cut of Ridley Scott’s Napoleon should really be called Napoleon and Josephine.
Apple Studios paid a reported $200 million for Scott’s epic, which traces Napoleon Bonaparte’s rampage across Europe from 1793 to 1815, and ends with his death in exile in 1821. Scott, now a sprightly 85 years old, is not the first director to attempt to conquer the conqueror. After he completed 2001: A Space Odyssey in 1968, Stanley Kubrick spent the next two years deep in pre-production on a Napoleon biopic that was to have starred Jack Nicholson. MGM ultimately balked at the cost, and Kubrick made A Clockwork Orange instead. The tens of thousands of pages of Kubrick’s prep work ultimately fell into the hands of Steven Spielberg, who is using the material as a basis for a seven-part limited series for HBO.
Scott’s ultimate vision for Napoleon will be revealed when it is released on Apple TV+ next year. It is reportedly more than four hours long. Joaquin Phoenix, who last worked with Scott in Gladiator, portrays Napoleon not as the brash, confident Frenchman who rewrote the rules of warfare, but as a capable soldier torn by self-doubt who succeeds almost despite himself. Unless you have a working knowledge of European history, The Little Corporal’s military and political career will seem pretty incoherent. I can’t be the only history nerd who turned to his wife when it was over and said, “Where was the Battle of Trafalgar?” With all of the care that Scott put into filming the battle scenes, there’s just no way he wouldn’t tackle the biggest naval engagement of the century, so I assume the HMS Victory is in pieces on editor Claire Simpson’s hard drive right now. The lack of the naval side of the story deprives the film of one of three antagonists who had Napoleon’s number during his life: Admiral Lord Horatio Nelson, who died in the process of proving the French dictator was beatable. The second was the Duke of Wellington, who finally defeated Napoleon at Waterloo by adapting his tactics.
The third antagonist was Josephine, whose defeat of Napoleon on the battlefield of love was complete and total. If you’re like me and have only ever seen Vanessa Kirby in big budget shoot-’em-ups like Mission Impossible, her performance as the Empress will be a revelation. The moment she catches Napoleon’s eye across one of the First Republic’s ever-present cocktail parties, with her fresh-from-the-Terror prison punk haircut, she understands this would-be conqueror needs to be dominated. “What is this costume you’re wearing?” she asks.
“It’s my uniform!” Napoleon huffs.
In Scott’s telling, their epic struggle of wills rewrites the map of Europe. When Napoleon, fresh off victory of the Battle of the Pyramids, hears that Josephine has taken another lover, he abandons his campaign against the Mamluks and rushes home to confront her. When he senses she is attracted to power, he joins in a coup to overthrow the republic, then systematically betrays his allies until he’s the only one left standing.
Scott’s depiction of Napoleonic warfare is equal parts beautiful and brutal. The Battle of Austerlitz, where Napoleon’s troops drive the Prussians into a frozen lake, is sure to be studied in future film classes. Depicting Napoleon as an insecure braggart who lucks his way into an empire is a controversial choice, but when paired with Josephine’s strategic provocations, his arc makes sense. It’s the chemistry between Kirby and Phoenix that gives this epic its fire.
The Memphis cold snap is threatening to roll through any day — or week? — now, and that means hungry Memphis minds will soon turn to hot bowls of soup to get through the long winter ahead. Rather than stick to the classic chicken noodle or tomato soups, we decided to pursue those of a more Japanese tilt. There’s been a bit of a ramen boom in Memphis in recent years, and we set out to try some of the different options. Alas, our stomachs are not bottomless, so we didn’t make it to every spot in town. But our adventures took us to several new and classic spots alike, all staking a claim to having the best bowl of noodles.
Coco curry ramen at Good Fortune Co. (Photo: Justin Fox Burks)
Good Fortune Co.
Got noods? Good Fortune Co. certainly does, and the Downtown Memphis restaurant has been drawing in oodles of diners since it opened in 2021. Co-founded by Sarah Cai and Arturo Leighton, Good Fortune Co. has become more than just an eatery. With its neon “Send Noods” sign hanging near the front, an enormous pastel-bright Ghibli-inspired mural stretching across a full wall, and the always photographable fish-shaped taiyaki desserts, it’s a Downtown destination at 361 South Main Street. Want to have a great time? Start your night at Good Fortune Co.
Leighton and Cai have the food to match those pulsating vibes. What sets Good Fortune apart from other ramen joints is a fervent commitment to make everything by hand. That’s right: Every noodle and dumpling that comes out of the kitchen was made from scratch, and such an approach isn’t for the faint of heart. That means extra hours of prep work every day to make sure there’s enough for the dinner rush. The whole venture is a labor of love, as the two have often said.
My personal favorite at Good Fortune Co. is the coco curry ramen, a delicious, heady dish that incorporates more than 20 different ingredients. In my second life as food editor for Memphis Magazine, the coco curry made it onto my top new dishes list for this year, and got the gears rolling on pursuing a ramen feature here at the Flyer. An OG menu item, the coco curry is perhaps the neatest encapsulation of Good Fortune’s ethos as a restaurant. “[Curry ramen] is not something we’ve seen that people are making from scratch here in the city,” Leighton told me over the phone after one of my many visits to Good Fortune in 2023. “We knew if we were going to put one on the menu, we knew it would follow the ethos of what we do, which is ‘scratch-made’ food. So we make our curry paste from scratch using galangal, ginger, lime, plenty of things like that to give it a unique, Southeast Asian flavor profile.”
The coco curry is served with tofu in lieu of pork, chicken, or other meats. That almost came about as a happy accident during the R&D phase when Leighton and Cai were coming up with a menu. “We’d finished the recipe and found that we had a fully vegan dish, and we thought it was good enough already,” said Leighton. “All the ingredients that go into the curry are totally vegan, there’s no pork fat, no animal fats, it’s just coconut and some amazing aromatics. We thought adding a meat component to it would distract from all of the great flavors we’d put in there.”
And stay tuned: There may be some changes to Good Fortune’s menu next time you walk through the doors. One new item to look out for is the birria dumplings, an Asian-Latin fusion dish. Stop on by to see what other surprises have been cooked up, and enjoy a piping hot bowl of noodles while you’re at it. And don’t forget to order the wings, either. — Samuel X. Cicci
Spicy chicken ramen at Collierville’s Kami Ramen Bar (Photo: Michael Donahue)
Kami Ramen Bar
Regan Chen believes ramen is so good, he and his business partner opened four locations of Kami Ramen Bar in the Memphis area and two in Houston, Texas.
That’s been since the middle of the pandemic.
“First of all, I’ve been a huge Japanese ramen fan from back in the day when I was living in China,” says Chen.
Ramen originated in China, says Chen, but the formula went through several stylistic changes when the idea was taken to Japan. “When the Japanese took Chinese ramen back to Japan, they developed their own Japanese-style ramen in some ways.”
Instead of the way some dishes are “Americanized” when they arrive in the United States, Japan took Chinese ramen and “Japanized” it, Chen says.
Tonkotsu ramen broth is primarily made with pork neck bone, Chen says. “They simmer the bones with all kinds of vegetables over 10 or 12 hours to get the condensed, really creamy broth. That’s the key to tonkotsu.”
Chinese ramen broth is “made with all kinds of bones, like chicken bones, pork bones, beef bones. All kinds of bones. Different regions of the China area have different kinds of ramen.”
Chen got the idea to open an authentic Japanese ramen restaurant when he moved to Memphis five years ago. “Back in the day when I was in Houston, I liked trying different ramen places. Some of the ramen is really good. When I first moved to Memphis, I was trying to find a good ramen spot.”
But he couldn’t find exactly what he was looking for. “So, I decided to open my own ramen spot.”
Chen says he wanted to bring “the real, authentic — and I think it’s great — ramen to the Memphis people. So, I got excited and then I started doing my homework. I was a cook for almost 10 years back in China, so I know how to do Japanese ramen with the help from Japanese friends who own ramen shops in Japan. They taught me the recipe and how to do it.”
Chen opened his first location, Kami Ramen Bar — East Memphis at 5865 Poplar Avenue, Suite 110 — in the middle of the pandemic. Business wasn’t great. That changed about a year later because of word of mouth, he says. “Everyone was coming to try it. A lot of people liked it. We took off.”
On a recent chilly afternoon, I opted for the spicy chicken ramen over the “Slurp Up Cilantro” chicken ramen dish at the Kami Ramen Bar in Collierville. I eat cilantro, but it isn’t on my top 10 list of favorite herbs. According to the menu, the spicy chicken dish is made with chicken stock as well as chicken chashu, spicy bean sprouts, marinated egg, and green onion.
I ordered mine mild instead of the spicy or hot options. The noodles were tasty and the broth was so delicious. And soothing. The perfect dish — along with a pot of hot green tea with lemons — for a cold day.
Some customers prefer the chicken ramen dishes. “The broth is more smooth compared to pork broth. It [pork broth] is creamy. But the chicken broth is smooth and clear.”
But whether they’re ordering the chicken, pork, vegetable, or seafood ramen, Chen says, “Above all, it’s the freshness.”
Chen personally likes the texture of the noodles, which are cooked al dente. The noodles are firm. So, they can be chewed while eating the broth. — Michael Donahue
Shoyu ramen with pork at Alchemy Memphis / Salt|Soy (Photo: Samuel X. Cicci)
Alchemy Memphis / Salt|Soy
There’s a new arrival to Memphis’ ramen scene in Cooper-Young.
Nick Scott now features shoyu ramen on his menu at Alchemy Memphis. According to the menu, the dish is made with a “rich pork broth, wood ear mushroom, marinated egg, green onion, chili crisps, nori, and katsuobushi.” Diners can add tofu, pork belly, and beef hanger steak.
Scott, Alchemy Memphis’ owner, and ramen go way back to when he was a teenager “living on a budget.” “When I didn’t have any money we were buying Top Ramen and really dressing it up.
“This sounds crazy — my daughter is into this — but if you make straight Top Ramen, cook some bacon in it, and throw a piece of sliced American cheese on top of it, it’s fantastic. The cheese kind of melts into the ramen and everything. That’s truly a broke person food.”
Scott began cooking Asian-style cuisine at Wally Joe, which was owned by chef Wally Joe, now owner of Acre Restaurant. “It wasn’t exactly Asian food, but there was always an Asian influence there. He took French and Southern and threw some Asian in there and kind of melded it together.”
Scott went on to do more Asian cooking at the old Bluefin and the old Dough restaurants.
He began cooking shoyu ramen at the old Salt|Soy pop-ups at Alchemy during the pandemic. “It worked well as a to-go food.”
Scott then added it to the menu when he moved Salt|Soy into a brick-and-mortar location on Broad Avenue.
When the Salt|Soy lease on Broad was about to come to an end, Scott decided to combine Alchemy Memphis and Salt|Soy into one restaurant. The Salt|Soy part of the restaurant is the food — “the South meets Japan kind of thing. And Alchemy is the cocktails. We’ve added an Asian influence to some of those cocktails to kind of complement the food.”
Scott’s version of shoyu ramen was a bit different from the one created by Alchemy Memphis chefs John Green and John Taylor.
The version made by Green and Taylor is “very similar” to the one at Salt|Soy, Scott says. They’re both “based on a traditional shoyu ramen. You kind of build it to make it your own. Add proteins and tofu.”
Originally, Scott’s shoyu ramen was “more churched up. Where you take pork belly, roast it, roll it up, slice it, and add the slices.”
Now, he says, “We do a pork belly skewer yakitori style.”
That adds the smokiness to it, he says. “We grill it on the konro grill, which is the traditional grill” in Japan.
Ramen is “a fairly easy dish to pull off. The trick is getting the broth right. You want those noodles to be chewy. There’s a trick to that. Get it out and eat it quickly.”
The ramen in Japan is “unlike the ramen that everybody is accustomed to in America. The noodles aren’t dried. They’re fresh. They get blanched very quickly, rinsed, and then poured into the broth.”
Whether fresh or dried, Scott says, “You don’t want to overcook those noodles. You want them to have an authentic kind of ‘to the tooth’ chew to them.” — MD
Spicy Korean ramen at The Crazy Noodle (Photo: Samuel X. Cicci)
The Crazy Noodle
It seems like The Crazy Noodle has always been there for me. When we needed a quick dinner option that everyone was happy with, we picked The Crazy Noodle. When a snowstorm during college forced most businesses to close their doors, I defrosted my FJ Cruiser, cranked up the four-wheel drive, and braved the icy streets until The Crazy Noodle’s lights shone through the darkness, beckoning us towards bowls of Korean ramen that kicked the spice up a notch and fogged up our glasses.
There’s always a bit of a wait at The Crazy Noodle at 2015 Madison Avenue, but anyone who’s been knows that it’s always worth it. I almost always order the jjamppong (a super spicy seafood soup that catapults the tastebuds straight into the fires of hell, in a fun way), but for the sake of journalism, this time I plumped for the spicy Korean ramen. Korean ramen, I’ve been told, generally uses simpler ingredients than its Japanese counterpart, and the spicy Korean ramen made for an excellent evening of comfort food, just like so many of the other delectable options. The smooth, peppery broth with onions, carrots, zucchini, cabbage, and green onions, mixed in with a little egg, is easy to inhale even as the spices tickle the back of your throat with a light, pleasurable burn.
For a unique dish, try the cheese ramen, boasting a broth made with a mix of shredded mozzarella and mild cheddar, and topped with a fried cheese mandu (dumpling). It was like a grilled cheese in a bowl: simple, delicious, and soul-warming all at the time, with a thicker consistency that reminded me almost of egg drop soup. I tend to stick with spicier options, but when the snow finally rolls in, I may have to make a return trip for more cheese. — SXC
The aforementioned restaurants are but four establishments that serve up a delicious bowl of ramen, but there are plenty of others that deserve a visit, such as Overton Square’s Robata, the two Flame Ramen franchises in Midtown and Downtown, or Subarashi on Highland. Once you’ve tried ’em all, local markets like Viet Hoa have all the requisite ingredients in case you want to try making your own bowl. Whatever the case, don’t be afraid to slurp!
Memphis Redditor u/odddiv took and shared this amazing image of the Andromeda Galaxy, a suburb of our Milky Way, from Bartlett, a suburb of our Memphis.
“Legit Santa”
Redditors also remembered Dan Rokitka, who played Santa near Memphis for 37 years, according to his 2018 obituary.
His Santa was memorable because he wore an earpiece and was fed information from parents hidden in a nearby booth. “Dude knew everything about you, your relatives, how you had behaved that year … it was down right scary,” wrote u/Ten-4RubberDucky, who called Rokitka a “treasure of a human.”
POSTED TO FACEBOOK BY GREG AKERS
Squirrel City
Flyer alums Chris Davis and Greg Akers got rabbit-holed in AI-generated image-making last week and shared their results on Facebook. For the image above, Akers prompted a program to create the “city of Memphis run by squirrels.”
Get around FOMO with some thoughtful planning. (Photo: Pierre Bamin | Unsplash)
*We’re reprinting this column from June 2021 because FOMO is still a thing and because you can still get around it with some thoughtful planning.
One of the most frustrating things about investing can be FOMO — fear of missing out. Most new investors pick their positions by looking at the highest returns in previous periods and buying whatever did the best. Then they engage in an unfortunate game of leapfrog, getting drawn in by the next hot investment after it’s already gone up.
This outcome-oriented thinking not only produces poor returns; it’s also extremely discouraging. It’s the reason that after a setback, investors often start thinking about the markets as an unreliable casino and hang onto their cash, to their long-term detriment. In a way, capital markets are a casino — but the rare one that is in your favor in the long run.
Nobody can guess what will happen this month or year, but if history is any guide, it’s hard to be worse off in the markets as the years turn into decades and the growing earning power of thriving companies begins to manifest in your account.
It’s all about your mindset. Here are three simple statements that process-oriented — and successful — long-term investors tend to believe:
1. For any set of stocks or funds, just one will perform the best over any given period, and sometimes even the best one will go down.
2. Despite statement number 1, investors should stay invested and diversified through good markets and bad, even though much or all of their portfolio will miss that one best thing. They should not chase extreme performance no matter how tempting it may be.
3. Looking backward, investors shouldn’t regret number 2, even if they had a good guess about what would do best or if they see questionable choices of irresponsible investors rewarded with huge windfall profits.
While it’s difficult not to wish for a windfall, here are a few ideas that might help you avoid short-term regret once you’ve made the correct long-term choices:
• Understand that the market outcome for a given period is just one of countless ways things could have turned out. A more conservative allocation might annoy you when everything is going up, but when things go wrong it can be a lifesaver. You never know, in advance, what will go wrong in the economy (Covid-19 anyone?).
• To jump in and out of speculative bets successfully, you have to nail the timing perfectly, twice. You have to get in near the bottom and get back out at or near the top. Getting either decision right is hard. Getting both right is almost impossible. No matter what they say, your friends or people you read on the internet are not consistently successful at this in the long-term.
• The kinds of investments that are likely to double or triple in a short time are also usually the kind that can go to zero very quickly. Believe it or not, if you can just average 20 percent returns a year, in the long run you will be one of the best investors in the world. There’s no reason to swing for the fences all the time.
• Your investments are irreplaceable once you reach a certain career stage and age. A 20-year-old could lose their life savings on a speculative stock and make the money back in a matter of months. A 60-year-old looking at retirement would dramatically impair their lifestyle if they lost a big chunk of their nest egg. There’s just not enough time to accumulate money and get it working in the market to ever recover past a certain point.
Most new investors think the outcome is all that matters and compare their results to the hottest stocks and benchmarks to inevitable disappointment. A process-oriented investor can be confident they made good choices before even seeing the results. A process-oriented investing mindset can help you with the most important thing — staying in the race.
Gene Gard, CFA, CFP, CFT-I, is a Private Wealth Manager and Partner with Creative Planning. Creative Planning is one of the nation’s largest registered investment advisory firms providing comprehensive wealth management services to ensure all elements of a client’s financial life are working together, including investments, taxes, estate planning, and risk management. For more information or to request a free, no-obligation consultation, visit CreativePlanning.com.
Pat Boone with Home of the Blues owner Ruben Cherry (Photo: E.H. Jaffe | Courtesy Bruce Frager)
Memphis has long been Vinyl City, USA, and one reason has been its world-class record stores. That legacy wasn’t born with modern shops like Shangri-La or Goner, or Pop Tunes before them, but in the 1940s with the Home of the Blues record store on Beale Street. It was the ultimate clearinghouse for wax platters back in the day, especially in the underground community of blues, R&B, and soul aficionados.
Elvis Presley famously shopped there, and another fan was Johnny Cash, who wrote in his autobiography Cash, “I loved going to Home of the Blues, the record store. That’s where I bought Blues in the Mississippi Night, the great anthology of Delta blues singers recorded by Alan Lomax, which is still one of my favorite albums (I borrowed a good song title there, too).”
Only a little later, the store was a mecca of sorts to John King, the legendary promo man for Ardent Studios and Ardent Records, and the collector whose vinyl library forms the basis of the Memphis Listening Lab. Upon King’s death last year, his friend Sherman Willmott recalled that “he grew up with rock-and-roll, chasing the records … taking the bus Downtown to Home of the Blues record shop on Beale.”
After the shop closed in 1975, it seemed relegated to the dustbin of history, its name living on mainly through the series of 45s released between 1960-62 on the Home of the Blues record label. But lately, one of the original owners’ family is working to preserve that legacy more proactively. Now living in Northern California, Bruce Frager grew up in Memphis spending a lot of time with his great-uncle Ruben Cherry and his great-aunt Celia Camp Hodge, pivotal figures in the history of Home of the Blues. While Cherry was the ostensible owner, it was Hodge who founded the Southern Amusement distribution company that financed it. “She was sort of a wheeler-dealer,” Frager says of his great-aunt today.
As part of the tightly knit extended family, Frager knew the Home of the Blues record shop well. “Of course, we’re Jewish, so we had all the holidays together — bar mitzvahs, birthdays, all that stuff,” he says. “And we used to take a bus to go Downtown to the record store on weekends. We used to get tickets to go to shows. I saw the Beatles at the Coliseum, and I don’t know how many times I saw James Brown. I have a collection of James Brown cuff links that he would give me when we went backstage.”
When the retail shop grew to host a record label, it made its name signing many significant Black artists of the day, including Roy Brown, Willie Mitchell and His Orchestra, and the 5 Royales. In a 2017 interview with the Memphis Flyer, singer/songwriter Don Bryant fondly recalled his association with the latter group, who recorded one of his earliest compositions for the label. “The 5 Royales recorded my song at a studio down on North Main, Home of the Blues. I wasn’t even allowed to go in the studio, I had to sit out in the lobby. That was one of the biggest deals I could have had in those days because they were one of the most famous groups. My group, the Four Kings, was always trying to imitate them, dance-wise and song-wise.”
Today, Frager says his father Jerry, at 92, is “the only remaining generational family member from the Cherry/Camp/Hodge legacy of the Home of the Blues record store and music label,” and Frager the younger is motivated to preserve the family’s musical legacy partly out of filial love. And so, while home next week for Hanukkah and his late mother’s yahrzeit (a yearly remembrance of someone’s passing), he’s inviting a select cross-section of Memphis music influencers to a gathering with his father on December 10th, hoping to both share and learn more of the history of the Home of the Blues. To that end, he’s also created a Facebook group, Home of the Blues Memphis, where others can share their memories and memorabilia. “This open house in a couple of weeks is sort of me tying it together,” says Frager. “I’m excited to be in touch with people who are connected with [Home of the Blues], who can help me visualize how to take this to the next level.”
John F. Kennedy (Photo: Richie Lomba | Dreamstime)
Editor’s note: This story was originally published in the Flyer in November 2013.
As a young boy, I did not want to grow up to be president of the United States. On a beach vacation when I was 6 or 7, my parents gave me a children’s biography of John F. Kennedy. Along with a similar volume about Abraham Lincoln. Each story had its inspiring moments, of course, but neither ended well. Especially in the mind of a child.
I’ve since become an amateur presidential historian, and, now enjoying middle age, I still don’t want to grow up to be president of the United States. That said, few people outside my family have had an impact on me the way our 35th president has. Considering I was born six years after JFK’s dreadful, history-changing ride through Downtown Dallas, that impact speaks volumes on the importance Jack Kennedy continues to hold in the way Americans shape their values and the way we steer our lives. The calendar never hits November 22nd without making me pause.
Frankly, President Kennedy belongs as much to mythology as he does to history. And this is a component of his legacy that must be accepted every bit as much as his policy decisions, the Peace Corps, or “Ich bin ein Berliner.” He had — still has — a charisma that, before him, could hardly be categorized as presidential. Just picture the men who directly preceded and followed JFK in the White House. Dwight Eisenhower was an American legend before he even considered a presidential campaign. Lyndon Johnson made the Senate his personal playground (and made a more direct impact on the way Americans live than did Kennedy). But neither looked especially dashing in a tux. Neither made women swoon. And neither married Jackie.
Kennedy was polarizing before and during his presidency, and he remains so today. Millions remain inspired by the hope (and yes, glamour) JFK personified, while just as many are repulsed by his womanizing, his manipulative father, and the proverbial silver spoon he had in his pocket on inauguration day in 1961. He may have been a war hero for his efforts in saving members of his PT-109 crew, but Kennedy had blood on his hands for the Bay of Pigs atrocity. Which Kennedy do we choose to remember?
It’s only since I began learning of JFK’s flaws that I’ve felt his influence closer to my own life, more in human terms. Who among us would have handled the life presented to Jack Kennedy better than he did himself? An older brother idolized, only to be taken in a fiery plane crash, a loss that thrust a young man onto a stage he may or may not have welcomed without that legendary fatherly shove. Factoring in his own experience in battle, his debilitating back pain (which forced him to wear a brace that factored into the tragedy of November 22, 1963), and a struggle with Addison’s disease, Kennedy had a sense of mortality most of us keep safely in another compartment of our minds. In succumbing to the lure of women outside his marriage, Kennedy displayed an immaturity in the only form he was ever allowed. No excuse, but a sad truth.
Was Kennedy a great president? Having not completed a term, he belongs in a different category of evaluation. For me, his handling of the Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962 was the stuff of greatness. Diplomacy begins in a room with your friends, your supporters. Kennedy helped avoid World War III by negotiating a policy, first with a divided cabinet and only then with Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev. Did Kennedy save the world? That might be a stretch, but it’s in the conversation.
I’ve been to Dealey Plaza twice. For anyone who’s seen footage of JFK’s last moments, such a visit swallows your thoughts, freezes your tongue, and squeezes your heart. What was once the Texas School Book Depository — now the Dallas County Administration Building, with a museum on the sixth floor — is just brick and mortar. With windows. Such was the platform for a murder that changed the world? I’ve never been able to process this reality, not since first reading that children’s book almost 40 years ago.
I’ve also been to the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library in Boston. Just as Dealey Plaza haunts, the library inspires, a reminder of how very alive its namesake remains. I never knew John F. Kennedy, but I feel like he knew men like me. Indeed, I breathe the same air. I cherish my children’s future. And I, too, am mortal.
Frank Murtaugh is the managing editor of MemphisMagazine. He writes the columns “From My Seat” and “Tiger Blue” for the Flyer.
ARIES (March 21-April 19): As a child, I loved to go to a meadow and whirl around in spirals until I got so dizzy, I fell. As I lay on the ground, the earth, sky, and sun reeled madly, and I was no longer just a pinpoint of awareness lodged inside my body, but was an ecstatically undulating swirl in the kaleidoscopic web of life. Now, years later, I’ve discovered many of us love spinning. Scientists postulate humans have a desire for the intoxicating vertigo it brings. I would never recommend you do what I did as a kid; it could be dangerous for some of you. But if it’s safe and the spirit moves you, do it! Or at least imagine yourself doing it. Do you know about the Sufi Whirling Dervishes who use spinning as a meditation? Read here: tinyurl.com/JoyOfWhirling and tinyurl.com/SufiSpinning
TAURUS (April 20-May 20): Your power creature in the coming weeks will not be an eagle, wolf, bear, or salmon. I don’t advise you to dream of being a wild horse, tiger, or crocodile. Instead, I invite you to cultivate a deep bond with the mushroom family. Why? Now is a favorable time to be like the mushrooms that keep the earth fresh. In wooded areas, they eat away dead trees and leaves, preventing larger and larger heaps of compost from piling up. They keep the soil healthy and make nutrients available for growing things. Be like those mushrooms, Taurus. Steadily and relentlessly rid your world of the defunct and decaying parts — thereby stimulating fertility.
GEMINI (May 21-June 20): Gemini novelist Geraldine McCaughrean wrote, “Maybe courage is like memory — a muscle that needs exercise to get strong. So I decided that maybe if I started in a small way, I could gradually work my way up to being brave.” That is an excellent prescription for you: the slow, incremental approach to becoming bolder and pluckier. For best results, begin practicing on mild risks and mellow adventures. Week by week, month by month, increase the audacious beauty of your schemes and the intensity of your spunk and fortitude. By mid-2024, you will be ready to launch a daring project.
CANCER (June 21-July 22): Cancerian neurologist and author Oliver Sacks worked with people who had unusual neurological issues. His surprising conclusion: “Defects, disorders, and diseases can play a paradoxical role, by bringing out latent powers, developments, and evolutions that might never be seen in their absence.” In not all cases, but more often than seemed reasonable, he found that disorders could be regarded as creative — “for if they destroy particular paths, particular ways of doing things, they may force unexpected growth.” Your assignment is to meditate on how the events of your life might exemplify the principle Sacks marvels at: apparent limitations leading to breakthroughs and bonanzas.
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): I am falling in love with how deeply you are falling in love with new ways of seeing and understanding yourself. My heart sings as I listen to your heart singing in response to new attractions. Keep it up, Leo! You are having an excellent influence on me. My dormant potentials and drowsy passions are stirring as I behold you waking up and coaxing out your dormant potentials and drowsy passions. Thank you, dear!
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): Virgo journalist Sydney J. Harris offered advice I suggest you meditate on. He wrote, “Regret for the things we did can be tempered by time; it is regret for the things we did not do that is inconsolable.” I bring this to your attention because now is a favorable time to take action on things you have not yet done — and should do. If you put definitive plans in motion soon, you will ensure that regret won’t come calling in five years. (PS: Amazingly, it’s also an excellent time to dissolve regret you feel for an iffy move you made in the past.)
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): In contrast to false stereotypes, Medieval Europeans were not dirty and unhygienic. They made soap and loved to bathe. Another bogus myth says the people of the Middle Ages believed the Earth was flat. But the truth was that most educated folks knew it was round. And it’s questionable to refer to this historical period as backward, since it brought innovations like mechanical timekeepers, moveable type, accurate maps, the heavy plow, and illuminated manuscripts. In this spirit, and in accordance with astrological omens, I invite you to strip away misconceptions and celebrate actual facts in your own sphere. Be a scrupulous revealer, a conscientious and meticulous truth-teller.
SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): Scorpio poet John Berryman said, “To grow, we must travel in the direction of our fears.” Yikes! I personally wouldn’t want to do that kind of growth all the time. I prefer traveling cheerfully in the direction of my hopes and dreams. But then I’m not a Scorpio. Maybe Berryman’s strategy for fulfilling one’s best destiny is a Scorpio superpower. What do you think? One thing I know for sure is that the coming weeks will be an excellent time to reevaluate and reinvent your relationship with your fears. I suggest you approach the subject with a beginner’s mind. Empty yourself of all your previous ideas and be open to healing new revelations.
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): Sagittarian poet Nina Cassian said, “I promise to make you so alive that the fall of dust on furniture will deafen you.” I think she meant she would fully awaken the senses of her readers. She would boost our capacity for enchantment and entice us to feel interesting emotions we had never experienced. As we communed with her beautiful self-expression, we might even reconfigure our understanding of who we are and what life is about. I am pleased to tell you, Sagittarius, that even if you’re not a writer, you now have an enhanced ability to perform these same services — both for yourself and for others.
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): “Sometimes I get lonesome for a storm,” says Capricorn singer-songwriter Joan Baez. “A full-blown storm where everything changes.” That approach has worked well for her. At age 82, she has released 30 albums and is a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. She has recorded songs in eight languages and has been honored by Amnesty International for her work on behalf of human rights. If you’re feeling resilient — which I think you are — I recommend that you, too, get lonesome for a storm. Your life could use some rearrangement. If you’re not feeling wildly bold and strong, maybe ask the gods for a mild squall.
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): Science educator Neil deGrasse Tyson tells us that water molecules we drink have “passed through the kidneys of Socrates, Genghis Khan, and Joan of Arc.” The same prodigious truth applies to the air we breathe: It has “passed through the lungs of Napoleon, Beethoven, and Abraham Lincoln.” Tyson would have also been accurate if he said we have shared water and air that has been inside the bodies of virtually every creature who has ever lived. I bring these facts to your attention, Aquarius, in the hope of inspiring you to deepen your sense of connectedness to other beings. Now is an excellent time to intensify your feelings of kinship with the web of life. Here’s the practical value of doing that: You will attract more help and support into your life.
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): I am saying a prayer for you. I pray to the Fates that you will not accept lazy or careless efforts from others. You won’t allow their politeness to be a cover-up for manipulativeness. I also pray that you will cultivate high expectations for yourself. You won’t be an obsessive perfectionist, but will be devoted to excellence. All your actions will be infused with high integrity. You will conscientiously attend to every detail with the faith that you are planting seeds that will bloom beautifully in the future.
“We won with young. We won with old. We won with highly educated. We won with poorly educated. I love the poorly educated.” — Donald Trump
You know who else loves the poorly educated? Tennessee Governor Bill Lee and the GOP-led Tennessee Legislature. In fact, they love the poorly educated so much that they’re determined to make a lot more of them. Let us count the ways. It’s a multi-pronged approach.
Earlier in November, the GOP formed the very seriously named “Joint Working Group on Federal Education Funding” to consider whether Tennessee should become the first state in the nation to turn down federal education funds, which amount to more than $1 billion per year.
On its face, such a move seems really stupid, since we Tennessee taxpayers contribute to that $1 billion with our federal tax dollars. And since much of that rejected funding would have to be replaced by state money, we taxpayers would take a double hit if it were rejected.
But don’t forget, this is the same bunch of loons that votes to reject billions of dollars in federal healthcare funding every year because it has “strings attached,” even as the state’s rural hospitals are folding in county after county due to lack of funds. Brainiacs, they are not.
Similarly, many Tennessee Republicans think the state shouldn’t accept federal education money because, well, “strings” — the strings in this case being requirements that some of that funding must be used for low-income students, students with disabilities, Title IX (which prohibits discrimination on the basis of gender), and school lunch and breakfast programs. You know, the communist stuff.
At any rate, when the very serious task force wrapped up its meetings last week, Republicans had not yet made a determination one way or the other about accepting the education funding, but pledged that more hearings are possible in 2024, and that they planned to invite the U.S. Department of Education to testify before the legislature.
But it gets worse. Much worse. Get ready to say hello to Governor Lee’s new statewide voucher program. He’s scheduled to announce it this week. Here’s how it works: For every school-age child in your household, you get a $7,000 voucher which can be applied to pay tuition at any school in the state — religious, secular, charter, you name it. For a wealthy Tennessee family with, say, three kids at high-tuition private schools, this amounts to a $21,000 gift from the state to go toward sending Aiden, Heather, and Maverick to Hutchison and MUS.
Or, should you choose to do so, you can spend that $7,000 per child voucher to send your kids to Billy Bob’s Jeebus Academy, where science classes are based on the Old Testament. The state doesn’t care. The GOP is doing anything it can get away with to help destroy our public schools. If it also happens to help out the state’s wealthier citizens and its evangelicals, well, so be it.
It’s wrong. It’s even unconstitutional. Article XI, Section 12 of the Tennessee Constitution declares that the state recognizes the inherent value of education and mandates that the General Assembly provide for the maintenance, support, and eligibility standards of a system of free public schools.
Government funding of religious schools strikes at the very heart of the U.S. Constitution’s Establishment Clause, which keeps the government from establishing an official religion or supporting a specific religion: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.” Which means if my neighbor wants to send his kid to a Muslim school — or a Catholic school or a Baptist school — I shouldn’t have to pay for that with my tax dollars.
It’s really simple: Public funds should go to public schools and private schools should be funded privately — by those who attend them. Governor Lee and the Tennessee GOP are determined to underfund our public schools, dumb down the children who attend them, and give our tax dollars to parents to help pay for their kids’ tuition at religious and private schools.
It’s bad policy and it’s bad math. It doesn’t add up.
Jimmy Crosthwait's Zen Clocks are among his artwork featured at this year's WinterArts show (Credit: Michael Donahue)
You might call Jimmy Crosthwait’s art work “Zen and the WinterArts of Motorcycle Maintenance.”
Crosthwait is among the 43 artists taking part in this year’s WinterArts show, which runs through December 24th at 870 South White Station in the old Bed Bath & Beyond store.
WinterArts (Credit: Michael Donahue)
The iconic artist with his trademark gray mustache, goatee, and below-shoulder-length hair is featuring his Zen Clocks, Zen Chimes, and candlestick sculptures in the show.
People know Crosthwait as a puppeteer, artist, and musician. “Some know me as all three,” he says. “I don’t do puppets anymore. I still play music with Sons of Mudboy.”
And he most definitely still does art.
First, the Zen Clocks.
“Well, they essentially look like clocks in that they’re round and have a pendulum, but there are no hands,” Crosthwait says. “I kind of got the idea from either an H.L. Mencken quote or somebody like that when he said, ‘My grandfather had a watch with three hands. One to count the hours, one to count the minutes, and one that never moved for the eternity of his indifference.’”
His Zen Clocks “don’t have hands or moving parts. Like my Zen Chimes, which make the sound of one hand clapping.”
A sign in Crosthwait’s WinterArts booth reads, “The time is now. The time is always now.”
Zen Clocks made by Jimmy Crosthwait at WinterArts (Credit: Michael Donahue)
Crosthwait began making Zen Clocks about five or six years ago. “I hadn’t made any in a while, but a fellow gave me a few of these silver trays. Like serving trays. Silver plated. And I kind of color them with different alcohol-based inks. And some I cut out.”
He adds things to some of them. “I’ll use maybe ceramic disks or found objects that are round and give a good design so that it looks like the clock face has a center. They all have pendulums hanging from the bottom.”
Crosthwait, who has made two dozen or so of the clocks, says, “I’ve got six for my show. And I maybe make one in a week. Not that it takes me a week, but I don’t like to sit down and make them everyday. I have to find the right kind of parts that fit tother. Then I work on a tail or a pendulum.”
But, he says, “I make many more Zen Chimes. It’s like a mobile that hangs from a hook like a wind chime. But mine are not wind chimes. They make the sound of one hand clapping. What is the sound of one hand clapping? It’s essentially the sound of silence.”
His Zen Chimes are made with clay, cut-out steel, and beads with “different dangles,” including glass balls, and granite eggs, that “dangle on the bottom.”
And, Crosthwait adds, “I’m always looking for a new angle on the dangle.”
All the parts are strung together with 50-pound strength stainless steel fishing line.
His silent Zen Chimes, which he began making 30 years ago when he owned the old Eads (Tenn.) Gallery, are “essentially just design.”
Describing his “candlestick sculptures,” Crosthwait says, “I’ll take candlesticks and I’ll drill into them so they can receive a steel rod. I thread the steel rod with different beads. Some that I make and some that I find.”
The candlesticks “usually contain an object,” he says. “Like the top of one is an egg with a Hindu elephant goddess painted on (it). I got that in an antique store.”
Zen Chimes and candlestick sculptures made by Jimmy Crosthwait at WinterArts (Credit: Michael Donahue)
WinterArts is celebrating its 15th anniversary this year, says founder Greg Belz.
Greg Belz at WinterArts (Credit: Michael Donahue)
The criteria to be in the show? “You have to be really good,” Belz says. “And it’s by invitation. You have to be at the top of your field.”
The show, which opened the day after Thanksgiving, runs 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Mondays through Thursdays as well as Saturdays, 10 a.m. to 8 pm Fridays, and noon to 5 p.m. Sundays.
For more information, go to winterarts.org. WinterArts is produced by the ArtWorks Foundation nonprofit.
David Johnson at WinterArts (Credit: Michael Donahue)Lisa and Steve Mergen at WinterArts at Lisa’s clothing art display. (Credit: Michael Donahue)Cyndy Grivich, Kathy McLallen, Lisa Sodini, Susie Jabbour at WinterArts (Credit: Michael Donahue)JP Pickle at WinterArts (Credit: Michael Donahue)Sophie Skillern, Beck Sharpe, and JD Hibner at WinterArts (Credit: Michael Donahue) We Saw You
