Tag: Randy Haspel

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Letters To The Editor Opinion

What They Said (September 11, 2014) …

CREDIT: Greg Cravens

Greg Cravens

About Chris Shaw’s post, “Arrests Made at Fast Food Strike” …

Today, I took to the streets in support of a union for fast food workers. We were peaceably walking down the sidewalk on Poplar Avenue when we were stopped by two dozen fairly polite police officers. They did not want us in front of the McDonalds. They demanded to see a parade permit. This is silly. Why would one need a parade permit to walk peaceably down the sidewalk. Nevertheless, they blocked our path. Apparently, someone had told them not to allow us in front of McDonalds even though we had already walked in front of dozens of other businesses without incident.

The police, though polite, deliberately provoked the crowd by stopping them from a peaceful and lawful walk on the sidewalk. Frustrated about being illegally stopped, some of us, in a moment of enthusiasm attempted to wander out onto Poplar. Several were arrested. No one resisted. We put our hands up and cheerfully shouted, “Don’t shoot!” A paddy wagon appeared magically on the scene. The police, with cameras trained on them, were careful not to be violent. I continued to walk in the street to the front of McDonalds where I stood alone with my sign. Although I had disobeyed them, the police decided not to arrest the older affluent-looking white guy. I don’t feel any antagonism for the boys in blue. It’s a very tough job. I had to walk through the police barricade to return to my car. I said, “Surely a fellow union member will not stop me from helping other folks start a union.” No one did. Looking back, I think the only people who misbehaved were the sorry folks who crossed the picket line to eat at McDonalds.

Bill Stegall

Giving uneducated workers a living wage is another crutch that promotes welfare. It also would cripple small businesses trying to compete with the deeper pockets of large companies, eventually shutting down thousands of businesses that lose their margins because they cant afford to pay for labor, and customers cant afford to pay for food.

B1971

Greg Cravens

Ya B1971, a living wage is unhealthy! We need an undead wage!

Ern

Ern, I think for once you may have something there. Zombie food handlers. Eliminates the small talk and pressure to super size.

But, personally, I find eating food prepared by people who can’t afford health care or have a sick day off adds that extra excitement to dining.

CL Mullins

About Randy Haspel’s Rant about discriminatory night spots …

Thank you for Randy Haspel’s Rant about the demoralizing covert racism in Memphis’s nightlife scene. I can’t recall ever seeing this problem addressed in the Flyer, so I found myself cheering aloud while reading. 

The Flyer frustrates me, as a black Memphian, because many of the venues and hotspots you promote are unwelcoming toward people of color. My white friends have served as unofficial passports over the years, because there seems to be this unspoken rule that our experiences may not be as pleasant if we show up alone or — gasp! — with a group of black people. All of my black friends have similar stories. Some places we’ve even blacklisted. Pun unintended.

I’ve had staff and patrons stare daggers at me for daring to step foot in more than one Cooper-Young bar and had concertgoers equally fascinated with my presence: (“I just think it’s cool you like this kind of music.”) I simply want to eat, drink, flirt, dance, (as my people are wont to do) and catch a St. Vincent show — without any trouble. It was nice to know that someone on the other side can see how screwed up it is around here. 

Taylor Calvert

Categories
Opinion The Last Word

The Rant (August 21, 2014)

CREDIT: FeatureFlash | Dreamstime.com

Several days before the shocking death of Robin Williams, an old friend posted a “confession” on Facebook that read, in part: “I’ve been lying to people for 40 years, and I’m just tired of lying. As recently as this morning, I’ve told people I had a stomachache or the flu when the truth is I’ve had severe clinical depression since I was 20 years old. The kind where you want to kill yourself. The kind where you’re ready to do ANYTHING to stop the pain.Yes, I tried to kill myself. I’ve been hospitalized three times. I’ve taken almost every kind of antidepressant known to man. It has hurt my relationships, my career, my sanity, everything in my life. So many people say suicide is ‘selfish,’ but they don’t understand that depression makes you crazy, and people who commit suicide are not in their ‘right mind.’ By now, I know I’m not going to kill myself because I can push those thoughts aside, but it’s not easy. It’s a real fight…a real struggle. Being able to talk about it helps. YOU HAVE TO TALK ABOUT IT AND GET TREATMENT, OR IT WILL KILL YOU!”

FeatureFlash | Dreamstime.com

Robin Williams

I never knew and commended him for speaking out, and then watched in astonishment as his brief remarks were shared more than 100 times and garnered 500-plus comments, mostly from others who had experienced some form of severe depression — like me. I was diagnosed with clinical depression with an anxiety disorder in 1987, and I have “managed” my illness with antidepressant medication for nearly 30 years. I expect to be on medication for the rest of my days, but I don’t mind, since they saved my life. “Depression” is different than “clinical depression.” No one in this life remains untouched by tragedy or loss, and it is natural to experience pain or grief. These periods of intense sadness, sometimes with the help of an antidepressant, ultimately grow easier to bear while the memories still linger. Clinical depression is a disease caused by an imbalance of chemicals in the brain and needs to be treated with a combination of medication and therapy. Unfortunately, the prescriptions for psychiatric medicine fly off the pads of any doctor holding a pen with “Prozac” printed on it, and patients are left to fend for themselves, deprived of crucial counseling.

It started for me at 19. I asked my friends if anyone else was experiencing these feelings of despair until I believed that it was only me, and I stopped talking about it. I thought that this was my lot in life and probably something I deserved. I rationalized my darkness by believing that there was some nobility in suffering that I would one day understand if I could only endure. I put on a cheerful face although my personal joy was gone.

As an entertainer, I was able to perform for large crowds, then go home and not come out until the next gig. There were groceries to buy, so I shopped at 2 a.m., when the store was empty, rather than run the risk of abandoning my cart in a store full of people and running for the nearest exit. I couldn’t eat in a fast-food restaurant without feeling rage at other people who seemed to be managing their lives while I was in inner turmoil. Then came the questions, “Why me?” and “What did I do wrong to end up here?” I have seen the destruction suicide has caused and would never take my own life out of concern for my loved ones, but I thought about it. I would never have recognized my obsessive introspection as an illness had I not seen my symptoms listed in a self-help book. It took me 16 years of tightly-controlled mania before seeking professional help.

Imbalanced brain chemistry messes with your “fight or flight” response. Under the most ordinary circumstances, your brain suddenly tells you that you are in danger when in reality you are not. This is what causes “panic attacks,” because of the confusion and anxiety. Soon, you avoid those places where an attack occurred to preclude the risk of another. Sadness is a precursor to life, but clinical depression manifests itself in physical ways — among them a tightness in the chest accompanied by a rapid heartbeat. The muscle around the heart becomes sore over time, causing chest pains. In my everyday interactions, I suffered head-to-toe soaking sweats, often needing to towel off after a simple discussion. My greatest fear was having to deal with auto mechanics. If there’s a Latin word for that phobia, I don’t know it. Globus is a condition often described as a “lump in the throat,” but depressives feel a constriction, accompanied by dry mouth and difficulty swallowing. And then there are the headaches. All types of headaches — migraine, cluster, light sensitive, tension. After a self-induced, terror-ridden trip on the interstate, my skull ached so unbearably, I’d take a fistful of Excedrin and lie in the dark, praying for sleep. Insomnia, that’s one more thing.

These are side effects of an illness. If you recognize them, get help from a psychologist or psychiatrist, and if you can’t do that, talk with a counselor or advisor.  In the past, health insurance companies were unwilling to cover mental illness. Now they must.

I was fortunate to find an experienced doctor who put me through a battery of psychological tests called the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory. He then read an intricate description of my mental state that was so accurate I thought he’d been reading my journal. The medication was hardly as advanced as today’s, and I was told that it might be a month before I felt a difference. But within a week, as if by magic, the gloom began to lift from my shoulders. I could talk to people and look them in the eyes again. It was as if my real self had been returned to me. I was never secretive about my illness because I wanted to shout to the world about this miracle.

I can now live my life unburdened by depression, but I know it’s always there. I can still feel it sometimes, but understand that, like the weather, it will pass. Without daily medication, I could never have worked a normal job or written a column or gotten married or even something so simple as gone on a trip. Some depressives take refuge in reading. It can prevent a gloomy mood from turning into something more serious. I hesitate to admit it, as a sedentary person, but vigorous exercise also helps. And although it may be difficult, talk to somebody. An estimated 20 million Americans suffer from depression. You are not, nor have you ever been, alone.

Categories
Opinion The Last Word

The Rant

Last week, Melody and I celebrated our 11th wedding anniversary. Thank you. It was my pleasure. When asked why I waited so late in life to get married, I always reply that I was just waiting for Melody to come back on the market. I’d been kind of interested in her for some time, but she kept marrying the wrong guys.

I first met her 40 years ago, when she was a young hippie chick working in an Overton Square leather shop owned by my former college roommate. She drove a black VW Beetle and lived in a communal house on Edgewood Street. I admired her spunk and good humor, but mostly I was impressed with her sense of independence. Melody could hang with the big dogs and possessed a quick wit that allowed her to give as good as she got. I quickly began eyeballing her as my potential new girlfriend, but she wasn’t studying me. When I was sitting on a tall barstool playing and singing at the Looking Glass, Melody worked in the cloakroom because she was too young to come into the bar. When it was late and the crowd had cleared out, she came in anyway to listen, and I sang the Bee Gees’ song “Melody Fair” for her. I got a hug and kiss but still no dice. I probably should have asked her out on an actual date, but that seemed so passé in the freewheeling ’70s.

Before I could manage to clearly express my feelings, she got married, but we remained friends. I had no choice, because she married my saxophone player. When they moved to California, we lost touch but for secondhand information. I later heard she was divorced and remarried and living on a naval base in the Philippines, and I was bewildered by the thought. Years passed and Melody faded from memory, although mutual friends would occasionally speak of her. Then, my band played for the 30th reunion of the White Station High School class of 1967, and Melody was there with her sister. We laughed and talked, and I was reminded of how fondly I felt about her, but she was still a married woman.

Several eons later, I was playing in a club with an acoustic trio when Melody and her husband came in with a large group. I checked out the lucky guy. He looked like he could kick my ass. It wasn’t that much later when she came back in one night with some girlfriends, and I was told she was separated. We had the obligatory dinner and a movie and shortly thereafter, I concluded that some damn fool had discarded a perfectly good wife.

Our friendship rekindled, I noticed how easy it was to spend time with her and how much we had to talk about. I had just recently escaped an emotionally abusive relationship and was nursing a battered ego, so Melody was like oxygen. After a period of going middle-aged steady and winning the tacit approval of my teenage stepson and stepdaughter-to-be, marriage seemed like the next logical step. I would finally get to hang out with Melody.

We approached the rabbi at Temple Israel and agreed to take Jewish classes in return for his blessing. Melody was charmed by Micah Greenstein, and we both agree that he has so much charisma, if he weren’t a rabbi, he could start his own cult. When he asked if we had any personal additions to our vows, I replied that right after Melody said, “I do,” I would like the rabbi to say to her, “Now, get back in your burqa.” We shared a chuckle and forgot about it until the actual ceremony, where I wasn’t entirely sure that I wasn’t going to pass out at any moment. I made it through the whole deal before God and everybody and was only waiting for the rabbi’s pronouncement when he said, “And now, Randy, it’s time for you to get back in your burqa.” I guess you had to be there, but it sure made me guffaw. Whenever I see the rabbi, I like to tell him that he married us so good, I believe that it stuck.

At 54, I would never have considered living with a teenage high school boy, because all I had to compare him with was me. As a grown-up, I most certainly wouldn’t tolerate living with a teen-aged me. Fortunately, Cameron, my stepson, was already a good guy and the only “dad” thing I insisted on doing was playing catch in the backyard. Melody’s daughter was already off at college, but since I never had offspring, I enjoyed teaching a young man how to tie his tie and drive a car. I was delighted to contribute cuff links and cummerbund to his first formal attire and to advise him that a gentleman always wears a pocket square. The rest of the time, he pretty much stayed in his room, and I would see him when he surfaced to eat. I liked all his buddies, and when they gathered, I was reminded so much of my own youth, I had to restrain myself from participating in their frivolity and risk appearing the old fool.

Now that 11 years have passed, everyone’s grown and on their own. It’s back to just me and Melody once again — if you don’t count the three rescue dogs — and she’s still happy to see me when I come home from work. We recommend late-in-life marriages. Your priorities change from a half-mad, youthful, libido-driven relationship into one of good conversation and companionship. That’s where all that premarital friendship comes in handy. Besides, it’s good to have someone to argue with about what to watch on television for the rest of your life.

Randy Haspel writes the “Born-Again Hippies” blog, where a version of this column first appeared.