NO FRUITCAKE JOKES!

“Oh yeah, well I KNOW all about fruitcake buddy! I’ve worked in Emergency at a hospital, and I’ve SEEN what fruitcake can do to a person!”

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In 1972, when I began my baker’s apprenticeship, I didn’t know the first thing about fruitcake. But that Christmas, at the Seattle bakery where I worked, the candied fruit started to arrive, in 30 lb. boxes, with pecans, blanched almonds, and other ingredients. I can still see that huge stack of stuff, sitting in the corner of the storeroom, on the day I asked my boss, Karl Ekelmann, “Okay, so what are we gonna do with all that fruit?”

Several days later I found myself, shall we say, fully involved in the making of the fruitcake, with hundreds of pounds of those ingredients strewn out onto our 5’ x 12’ maple workbench. Karl and I poured the white colored and rum fragrant batter onto the top of the fruit and nuts, and then, began to gently turn the pile into a spicy, rich fruitcake mixture, using the full length of our arms. It was tiring. Basically, a good fruitcake contains mostly fruit and nuts, and very little batter. We finished, hosed down, and scaled the finished batter into round pans and full sheets, and baked it at a low temperature all day. When it was almost finished, we pulled the pans from the oven, one at a time, and topped all the cakes with fruit and nuts we had held out as topping, after, of course, soaking it all in rum and flavorings, and finally, brushed on a sweet and shiny apricot glaze over all the cakes. The making of that fruitcake, all those years ago, on that day, when I was still in my 20s, the spectacle of it, hooked me on fruitcake. I decided to like it.

I worked as an apprentice for 3 years, and then opened “Richard’s Bakery” in Tualatin, Oregon. Later, I opened my second bakery, “Favourites Bakery”, in Portland. Every year, while I was in business, my staff and I would crank out hundreds of fruitcakes, at Christmas time. Since it was an all day affair, I would try to make it fun, have other foods for the staff, maybe bring in a chef to make us something, sort of a Special Christmas Party For Baker’s Only.

In about 1985, after ten years in business, I began to tire of the plethora of “fruitcake jokes” out there, you know, how there is really only one fruitcake, that gets regifted around the world, since no one will eat it, how they make great doorstops, all that. Since I had been interested in fruitcake for some time, by then, I had been trying other fruitcakes every chance I got, and I was not surprised that fruitcake jokes were all the rage, given the many really lousy fruitcakes in the world. After thinking about it, and developing my ideas about it, I wrote a tract titled “In Defense of Fruitcake”, and placed copies of it on my counter for people to take. The basic idea is, if you make it right, use great ingredients, it’s gonna be good. If you make it cheaply, as is done so many times by wholesalers, and well, grannies, trying to save a buck, its gonna be shit. Later, owing to my attitude about fruitcake, and just for fun, I had some stickers made, depicting a big black circle, and slash, forming the newly invented International Sign for “No Fruitcake Jokes.”

Over the years, “In Defense Of Fruitcake” got around. I had sent a copy to “The Retail Bakers of America”, and through them, others found the article. One year, I think it was 1987, I got several small checks in the mail from newspapers around the country, who had reprinted it.

But the coup d’etat was in 1989, when writer Maria La Ganga, of the LA Times, did her research for an article she was doing about fruitcake, and used me, and my tract, as her springboard. The AP came out to my shop and took photos, and on December 13, 1989, the article came out, and was reprinted that year in many papers around the country. In the article, she refers to me as “the father of the fruitcake revolution”. You can imagine what a kick I get out of that. My usual hundreds of pounds of sales went well over a thousand that year. The article is still available to view online at The LA Times archives.

I didn’t get on Letterman, which woulda been a riot, me an’ Dave hurlin’ crappy fruitcakes offa the NBC roof, to see what kind of damage we might generate, but I did get phone calls from all over the country, from DJs, whose attitudes ranged from interested and nice to downright stupid. I would take the calls, negotiate my way through their questioning, and dumb jokes, all the while supporting my position on fruitcake.

When I sold “Favourites Bakery” in 1995, the name went with the sale, so I had to think of another name for my corporation. After very little thought, and since I can be such an impulsive sucka, I wrote “No Fruitcake Jokes, Inc.”, on the application to change the name of the corporation. I kept that name for a number of years, and it did shock and unsettle a few, when writing checks with the corporation name on them, or using business credit cards. Once, at Costco, when I used my “No Fruitcake Jokes, Inc.”, American Express Card, a management person was called over, and he quizzed me. “Sir, uh, what type of business was it that you have?”


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In Defense Of Fruitcake
Copyright Ric Seaberg 1985

Are you, dear friend, one of the chosen, the enlightenend, the few........who enjoys a good fruitcake, chock full of the freshest pecans and candied cherries and pineapple, bound only by ounces of deliciously spiced and perhaps liquored cake batter? Then bless you!

Or are you, poor soul, the one who spouts at the mention of fruitcake, “Makes a damn good doorstop”, or “I hope Aunt Ruth brings her fruitcake this year, ha-ha, we need another football!?” Then shame on you!

In 1975, when I opened my first bakery, at age 27, I will admit that I had my reservations about fruitcake. I was young, inexperienced, and although I’d been exposed to quality fruitcake baking, I had not yet “discovered” fruitcake. I may have even, at some time in my life, given in to “fruitcake bashing” myself, joining in with the legion of misguided individuals who smear fruitcake, the naive, the palateless.

Five minutes ago, here at 3:30 a.m., I turned by hand 100 pounds of beautiful cherries, pineapple, pecans, walnuts and blanched almonds into rum flavor and rum......to soak, and to be used later as the fruitcake topping. The sight of the fruit mixture and the aroma of the flavors are more than heavenly. I know my assistant, Mary, will arrive shortly and exclaim, in a kind of low, sensual tone.....”OHHHHHHHHH,...........Are we making fruitcake today!!!?

So what’sa matter? How did fruitcake acquire do many foes? Folks who are assured that most people in the group will agree with them as they wince and moan and gesture their fingers down their throats that fruitcake makes a better paperweight than food.....?

Years ago, when Aunt Ruth, and millions of others like her were shopping for their fruitcake ingredients, they found something new on the shelf. Something pretty, something inexpensive..........candied citrus peel!!!! “Wouldn’t that make a fine addition to my fruitcake?”, thought Ruth, “and so inexpensive!!” And so, on that day, millions of pretty, but pretty awful fruitcakes were born.

Marvelous little packages, those Currier and Ive embossed canned hostess gifts, masquerading as fruitcake. Those mountains of chain-store gift boxes for the purveyors of the fruitcake myth. The perfectly merchandised two pound cans of batter laced citron, ready to go for $2.99.

In our business, we sell hundreds of pounds of “real” fruitcake each holiday season. I would like to offer several suggestions if you intend on treating yourself to a fruitcake this year:

1. Try to find an independent baker, whose reputation depends on making “good things to eat”.
2. Be prepared to pay handsomely for a good fuitcake.
3. Chill it before slicing
4. Serve it ceremoniously, sliced thin, with a good quality coffee or tea.

Fruitcake, misunderstood and stripped of it’s former stature by greed and corporate merchandising, needs our help! Enjoy a good fruitcake. Invite some friends! And don’t forget to buy one for Aunt Ruth!

Ric Seaberg’s Fruitcake Recipe 

Single recipe (for 9x13 pan). Double recipe in cups and also weight appear to the right of each ingredient.

3 cups dates, pitted and chopped (chop each date into 3 or 4 pieces) Sugared date pieces also available -6c (31.5 oz or 2 lbs)

2 cups candied pineapple chunks 4c (1 lb-5oz)

2 cups dried chopped mango pieces (Like 3/4 inch pieces) 4c (1 lb-5oz)

1 cup chopped candied papapya (not too small!, use your date pieces to inform your chopping size) 2c (11oz)

2 cups candied (glace, pronounced "glah-say)) red cherries 4c (1 lb-5oz)

4 cups walnut halves 8c (2 lbs)

4 cups pecan halves (your nuts must be fresh, taste one! taste good? Then use'm!) 8c-(2 lbs)

1 -1/2 oz rum extract 3oz

1 -1/2 oz PURE vanilla extract (imitation vanilla should be outlawed) 3oz

2 -1/2 cups all purpose flour 5c

2 -1/2 teaspoons baking powder 5t

1/2 teaspoon salt 1t

5 eggs 10

3/4 cup corn syrup ( I use light, but dark works too) 1-1/2 c

1/3 cup brown sugar 2/3c

1/2 cup vegetable oil (like canola) 1c

1 pint or half a fifth of light or dark rum 

Directions:

Day 1- put all your fruit in a bowl. If any of it is larger pieces, cut it into 1/2”-3/4” size pieces. Pour rum over fruit, stir well and cover. Return to stir fruit in bowl 4-5 times in the next 20-24 hours. This serves to flavor and hydrate the fruit!)

Day 2

1. Grease or spray (I use Baker's Joy) a 1/4 sheet pan (9" x 13"), and cover the bottom of the pan with a piece of parchment paper (double batch use a 1/2 sheet pan-12x18)

2. Mix the batter as you would a cake batter, oil and sugar fist until well incorporated. Then add eggs and other ingredients except flour and mix til incorporated. Finally add flour and mix til well incorporated. 

3.Add the batter to the fruit and nut mixture and turn until well incorporated. Be gentle! I like to mixtape it by hand right on my kitchen counter.

4.Pack the finished batter/fruit/nuts mixture into your pan

5.Bake at 275 degrees (135 degrees C) about 2 hours 15 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool. Ovens vary so check your fruitcake out in maybe 2 hours, if it feels quite firm to the touch, it is probably done.

6. Remove from oven and allow to cool at least 2 hours before cutting. I like to cut it into pieces I can easily place into zip lock baggies or celophane bags

7.Cheesecloth and the booze. Some peeps like to wrap pieces of fruitcake in cheesecloth, and then drizzle or spray a little rum, bourbon or brandy onto their fruitcake each week for several (or many!) weeks until the holidays hit, for that extra punch! Keep your boozy fruitcakes in an air tight container to reduce evaporation. And arrange for a driver ;)

Notes: don’t be too crazy strict

with your ingredient selection. I mean aside from ruling out using any citron whatsoever. Maybe you get a good deal on candied pineapple but the papaya is crazy expensive. So go with a little more pineapple and skip the papaya! As long as your total fruit weight is correct it’s okay to modify your fruit selection some. After you have prepared your pieces of fruitcake to eat or use as gifts, I think it is wise to keep them refrigerated in an air tight container or baggie. Some candied and dried fruits are less stable

than others. So keep cold or frozen to retard spoilage! Mwah!! 😚 

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Dick For A Dowry

The truth is, when a man gets divorced, then, in most cases, it’s time to start over, collecting holiday decorations. The truth is, when a man gets divorced, the children go live with the mom, anyway, mine did, and so, when it’s time to decide who gets what, the holiday stuff, the Christmas ornaments, the tree stand, other display items, like the Santa Moose Puppet and all the stockings, they go where the kids go. When I was divorced, the first time, and my 2 daughters were in their teens, I tried to arrange to keep one of my daughters with me, but she was a great soccer player, and was determined to go to the high school in the school district where her mom lived, to play for her sister's alma mater, and for a coach she admired greatly. So off she went, and any Christmas items that I had retained eventually went too.

There are a few things that have remained with me over the years, and today, when Marie and I were going through the Christmas boxes, and selecting the things we would display this year, she grabbed an ornament, in the shape of a baker, that’s me, an ornament which had been given to me a long time ago by my daughter Amy. I was pleased to see, among the tons of special ornaments that Marie has collected over the years (she kept lots of ornaments in her divorce too), vacation ornaments, ornaments purchased especially with my step-son Blaine in mind, things that Marie and I have bought together since 1997, at least one paltry Christmas thing of mine. As she grabbed it, she said, “Oh here’s the baker”, and I said, “Is that actually mine?”, and she replied, comically,”Yeah, it was part of your dowry!” Standing there, looking at those boxes and boxes of stuff, and my one lone contribution, leftover from my checkered past, I told Marie, “Man, when we met, I didn’t have dick for a dowry.



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Ric Seaberg's Holiday "Knick-Knacks"

This version of “Chex Mix” was first made by my mother, and every year I make it several times for friends and family. It’s a big hit, as a snack, and you can put it in tins or even gallon size zip lock bags to hand out to friends or co-workers as gifts. (Don’t forget the raffia!) Trust me, you’ll make points.

Gather these materials and ingredients:

2 aluminum turkey roasting pans, usually found in the foil section of the supermarket.

1 lb salted cocktail peanuts

1 lb. salted fancy mixed nuts

1 lb. unsalted pecan halves ( 12 oz. is ok, Trader Joe’s has a reasonable price, and Costco usually carries a two pound bag)

2 lbs. salted real butter

1 large box wheat chex cereal or multi-grain chex

1 large box cheerios

1 large bag Rolled Gold or other brand 4” inch pretzel sticks

2 tbsp.Worchestershire Sauce

1/2 tbsp.Garlic powder or granulated garlic (not garlic salt!!!!)

a few shakes of thin hot sauce, straight out of the bottle, like tabasco

Make it like this:

First be sure you wash out those aluminum pans you bought at the store. They will last for several years of making this stuff so treat’em nice. Dry before you add the ingredients.

Before you add the ingredients to the pans, you are going to make a butter mixture, so let’s make that first. Put all the butter, the worchestershire, garlic and hot sauce in a microwavable bowl and heat til it's all warm and mixed together. Or heat it on the stove. It doesn’t have to be real hot. You will definitely NOT need to add salt.

Since you are making two pans full, set them both on the counter, and then dump half of each of the ingredients into the pans. You know, open the cereal, and just eyeball what you think is half, and do that with all the rest of the ingredients too. That’ll be close enough. Same thing with the butter. I think it is a good idea to ladle the butter over the ingredients, such that you wet down as much of the cereal as possible. The cereal is the most absorbent of the ingredients and benefits most from the butter mixture. After your ingredients and butter are in the pans, use your hands or a couple of big spoons to turn it over a few times.

Bake for 1 hour at 250 degrees. Remove, Turn it over again, this time you better use spoons for sure cuz it’s getting hot. Be sure to bring up the stuff from the bottom and try to get that butter mixed in really well. Then bake for 1 additonal hour, and it’s done! Most ovens will accomodate both pans at once. Let it cool, and scarf.

This year I saw a new product which I added and it has been really popular. Snyders of Hanover makes a snack called “Onion Rye Pretzels” which are a 4” stick, about 3/8 inch in diameter, really good. I got’em at Safeway.

Other ingredients which have proved to be popular are Trader Joe’s little square peanut butter filled pretzels, (they also have cheese filled pretzels, I bet they would be good) and another ingredient I favor is the whole pumpkin seeds from Trader Joe’s, the white ones in the 14oz. package, they are inexpensive, look cool, and they are super good for you. But only 1 bag of them for the whole recipe, cuz they are fibrous and won’t appeal to everyone. And lastly, macadamia nuts are a great addition, if you are so inclined. Trader Joe’s has them in a bag too.

Happy Holidays from Ric, Marie, and Blaine, and have fun!!!

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Oh Tuna Tree

I proudly and readily admit that working at either of my two bakeries, first, Richard’s Bakery, in Tualatin Oregon, which I owned from 1975-1985, or at my second bakery, Favourites Bakery, in Portland, Oregon, from 1985-1995, for most of my employees, was a fun, if not wacky, working experience. The boss there, that would be me, tended to be sort of a cut up, not too strict, who loved to laugh. Who still loves to laugh.

The stories are endless, like the time I offered a free pastry to this painter guy who was a regular, if he would allow me to wrap his arm in a fruitcake fruit bag, the bag that lines a 30 lb. fruitcake fruit box, after we had removed the fruit. Lets just say, the insides of those bags are the stickiest, most icky surface ever. And to this guy’s credit, as we slid and slapped the horrible bag onto his arm, and giggled there before the pastry case, while other customer's eyes grew big with disgust and even horror, he played it to the hilt, saying how great it felt, how he would pay ME for such a treat, because he was not going to have to get his arms waxed for the holidays, that sort of thing. Loving to laugh as I do, it was totally worth the effort, however bizarre one might deem it to be. My employees, standing behind the counter, just went about their business, and plated up his free pastry, desensitized and undisturbed.

In about 1990, we decided to host a contest at Christmas time. We called it, “The Tacky Christmas Ornamentation Contest”, which challenged our regular customers and others to cull from their Christmas boxes, as they readied for the holidays, any odd and cheesy Christmas ornamentation they might find, and bring it to Favourites Bakery, to be displayed on a large table we had set up for such amazing artifacts. The response was spectacular, and before long our table, and other tables, were overflowing with the tackiest of Christmas Crafty Stuff, including, but not limited to, rotund Mr. and Mrs. Clauses, fashioned from Reader’s Digests, where you fold the pages just right, and add the facial features, etc, something, don’t quiz me on this. I am certain there are a billion of these things in people’s attics, since it likely came out as the Christmas cover story on Women’s Day in 1962. I am sorry to say that I cannot remember too many of the items, but if you want to know what those tables looked like, just go to the Goodwill or another major Thrift Store around Christmas, and you will find at least one aisle full of it. And it IS funny. I derive a great deal of pleasure from seeing these crazy crafty things that folks come up with, using egg cartons, milk cartons, syrofoam, broken pop bottle pieces, etc. Those of you out there who tend to adore the weird, might want to make it a destination, followed by a nice mug of piping hot mulled wine at home. And if you are with your spouse or significant other, be sure to pick up every other thing and feign undying admiration for the piece, oooohing and ahhhing, and suggesting your mantle as the perfect place to display such a treasure.

The judging of such a contest is so completely subjective, but since I owned the place, I eventually chose a spectacular item we dubbed “The Tuna Tree”, pictured above, which was fashioned by taking tuna cans, removing the tops and bottoms, ( of course you have to save tuna cans in a paper bag on your kitchen floor for months before you can make this decoration), spray painting all the cans, gluing them together in a tree shape, and then hanging little ornaments in the tuna cans using a bobby pin. Amazing! Gorgeous! A Yuletide Masterpiece!

I announced the winner at the Favourites Bakery Christmas Dinner, which was held at Portland’s “Sylvia’s Italian Restaurant” that year, but there was a special treat I had prepared to go with it. As I announced the winner, and pulled it from it’s hiding place, I had one of my staff hand out, as my employees ate pizza and drank beer, a sheet of paper upon which was written words which I had composed to the not so well known version of “Oh Christmas Tree”, titled “Oh Tuna Tree”, which goes like this:

Oh Tuna Tree, Oh Tuna Tree
Your branches tin amuse me
Oh Tuna tree, Oh Tuna Tree
Your meaning still eludes me
I can’t believe, though it is true,
That you once had a fish in you
Oh Tuna Tree Oh Tuna Tree
Your branches tin amuse me

Oh Tuna Tree, Oh Tuna Tree
Your lovely gold is so fine
Oh Tuna tree, Oh Tuna Tree
Your bobby pins blow my mind
You grab our hearts! To thee we sing
You’re groovy in this contest thing
Oh Tuna Tree Oh Tuna Tree
Your branches tin amuse me

Imagine, if you will, 25 or so partially inebriated bakery workers crooning this little tune, at the top of their lungs, in the middle of Sylvia’s Restaurant, before customers, as they swallowed their fettucini and bordeaux, and wait staff, whose jobs had suddenly become a bit more interesting. I think it’s safe to say, though, that one of our waitresses, an older woman who I recognized as a long-term employee from my many visits to Sylvia’s over the years, was alarmed. We took a few photos, finished our meals, paid our bill, and moved on to karaoke at the dive down the street.

Some years later, I turned my step-son Blaine onto the concept of Tacky Christmas Stuff, and he fell hard, hook, line, and plastic poinsettia. It wasn’t long before we found ourselves at The Goodwill, cruisin’ the bins. That year, we found among other excellent crafted ornamentation, and I swear this actually happened, a real piece of toast, from a real loaf of bread, that had been made into a Christmas tree ornament, all glittered and pipe cleanered, and then, had somehow survived through The Olsen’s Christmas Box, and the Goodwill Christmas Stuff aisle, to find it’s way into Blaine’s winter gloved hand, which he held up for my approval saying excitedly.....”OOOOOOOh Ric, check this out!!!!”

When Marie arrived home from work that day, I think she almost cried, when she saw that Blaine and I had already created a lovely display of the ornamentation we had purchased, at various Thrift Stores throughout the City of Portland, on our foyer table, so that when any holiday visitors entered, they would marvel at our awesome finds. I was taken aback, though, when Marie just stood there, frozen, staring at the table, with sort a of forlorn look on her face, as though she had just fallen victim to some of the craziest shit she’d ever seen, committed, sadly, by her lover and dear son. However, I don’t think she’d seen the toast yet.

My story in annoying detail:

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Christmas Lane

Before there were scanners, before there were Xerox copiers, ditto machines, mimeograph machines, thermofax machines, even before there were those trick and most modern “correctable” typewriters, which would allow you to correct your last 25 or 30 letters, and that’s all, there was the “jelly hectagraph”. I have been thinking about the jelly hectagraph my Mother used to use, because for years she would drag it out at Christmas.

The way the jelly hectagraph worked, to make copies, approximately, was like this: first, you would cook some ingredients, that came in a kit, and then pour the thick hot liquid into a very shallow 9 x 12 metal pan to cool. After it was cool, it was quite firm, but still jelly like. My Mother, Lorraine, would instruct us kids to not touch it, to be sure it was pristine for the copy job ahead. I believe she may have had a special ribbon on her typewriter, or one could use a special pencil, to then type or write the message one wished to make copies of. Then, you would lay your message paper onto the jel, carefully, and wait a couple of minutes for the ink to stick to the jel, and then peel the original off of the jel. And lastly, you would also very carefully lay your new paper onto the jel, and you could make 10 or so copies before the ink on the copies would become too faint. If you needed more copies, the process would begin again. It was a big hassle. But when my wife Marie and I met, and I said something about a hectagraph, and she knew exactly what I was talking about, and had used one herself as a child, well, I knew she was the one.


The reason my mother needed copies, was that she was the willing and continually elected secretary of The Harrison Street Homeowners Assn., where we lived at the foot of Mt. Tabor in southeast Portland, Oregon. At Christmas time, Harrison Street had for many years dressed up for the holidays, becoming the city wide attraction known as “Christmas Lane”. Mom’s flyers, which I think she called “The Harrison Street Gazette”, was filled with news of the current year’s Christmas lighting schedule, and other pertinent information, like the time and place of the annual Harrison Streeters Christmas Dinner, usually held at Portland’s popular steak house, “The Old Country Kitchen”, where, if you can put the 72 oz. steak away in an hour, and all the trimmings, it’s free!

Lloyd Hornbeck would drink too much, and his next door neighbor, whom he called “Parksy”, would be right behind him, there at the steak house, as Moms and Dads discussed the coming weeks on Christmas Lane, and how they would be decorating their houses that year. My Mom, bless her soul, always had some wacky idea, and my sisters and I love to recall the white plastic tree Mom favoured, which she would place smack in our living room window, which faced the street, and swath it in early and stiffish turquoise mesh netting, also known as tulle, so it looked like a really fake tree with stiff turquoise mesh netting clinging to it in a sort of haphazard way. But the Boyces lived next door, and since their daughter Charlene had announced to my Mom that “our house is always best”, Mom would try, on a budget, to outdo the Boyces, whose black lit giant white flocked pine tree was all the rage on Christmas Lane.

One year, in addition to our funky tree, Mom decorated the large dining room window like a Christmas present, complete with shiny red wrapping and bow, and the Swedish version of “Merry Christmas” written across it on the green ribbon, diagonally, which read “God Jul”. One evening, maybe Christmas Eve, as my Mother and I stood outside before Mom’s Lovely Christmas Creation, admiring it, as hundreds of cars and pedestrians streamed by, Mom and I were caught unawares by a man whose only sly comment to his wife, as they passed, not knowing we lived there, was, “What in the hell does “God Jul” mean?” To my Mom’s credit, she thought it was hilarious, and that sentence is indelibly etched into our family lore.

Living on Christmas Lane was great fun for a kid, being the center of attention, and my friends at school were obviously jealous. At the end of the street, in the cul de sac, the Harrison Street Dads would construct a creche every year, and place in it the Plywood Baby Jesus, The Wise Men, and the camel and other animals, which were painted by Mrs. Conway, our street artist. As I grew older, I was allowed to show up for the construction of the creche, and I would get the job of collecting downed fir branches from the slopes of Mt. Tabor, which would then be stapled to the sides of the creche. The year I turned 12, I got to do some of the framing, standing alongside the cigar puffing Parksy, and other Dads.

By the time I had turned 14, though, the bud was off the rose, for me, as far as Christmas Lane was concerned, with my raging hormones and general teenage lack of respect. It was difficult to take the family car anywhere, in the evening, when cars lined the streets for miles, even prior to the entrance of our street, so it wasn’t likely my folks would be taking me anywhere. A couple of my buddies from the street and I took to stealing fresh eggs from our home refrigerators, and hiding behind the creche, and hurling them at cars as they navigated the creche turnaround. We could tell if we had made a direct hit, by the sound of the eggs as they landed, where a THWACK” meant we had hit metal, maybe the hood, or the roof, and a chilling and satisfying “SPLAT” was heard on the few occasions that egg hit glass, some nice Christian Family’s windshield, as they considered the manger. Once, after a definite SPLAT, we heard a car door slam, and took off giggling into the woods. We heard a male voice say “SHIT”, as he stood before Jesus and the rest, and then, with considerable anger, hollered, “God Damn You Fuckin’ Kids”, and as we melted further into the forest, I heard my friend Danny, who had run ahead of me, yell back, “Merry Christmas!” Later, at home, my Mother remarked, as I snacked on some of her meringue Christmas cookies, “Gee, I cant believe how fast we’re going through eggs!”

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Avoiding Confrontation

I think it’s fair to say, that like so many others of you out there, I am a guy who tends to avoid confrontation. One whose personality dictates that he or she most often “goes along to get along”. In my case, I have spent most of my adult life avoiding confrontation, and tension between myself and others, even to the point of dishonesty, where I might be a little too kind to someone, to not make them feel bad. So be sure you don’t have a giant chunk of spinach on your front tooth when you come around, ‘cause I might not tell you it’s there.

I like to think that, at this point, I have adopted a more honest way of being, when it comes to confrontation, but it has been hard won, over my life. When I had my business, for over 20 years, and had 13 employees minimum at any given time, I tended to allow the worst of behavior and performance, before I would reluctantly reprimand someone. Or I would just do the person’s job myself, to avoid a confrontation. Dumb, huh? But over the years, I got better at dealing with the less savory parts of management.

There are those, of course, who fall at the other end of the continuum, like Brad Chesterton, Jr., (a name surely lifted from that preppy snob in “Animal House”), whose website “blogg’d” features Brad’s need to belittle, disguised as “critique”, or, as he, himself describes the site, “ destructive criticism at it’s finest”. Brad, Jr. was born with ample tools for confrontation. He courts it. He likes to make trouble. Me, I fall naturally at the other end of the continuum, equally as out of step as Brad, and have had to seek some balance, over time, not by going out of my way to be mean, as Brad Jr. does, but at least, trying to be more honest.

In 1978, I was still a neophyte business owner, 30 years old. My management style was more one of creating connection and friendship between myself and my employees, than one of being a taskmaster, and I mostly felt comfortable running a business. I got pretty good performance out of everyone, most of whom liked their gentle and upbeat boss.

One day around this time of year, late November, my cake decorating apprentice, Theresa, a young small town girl I favoured for her committment and desire to learn, asked me if I would cooperate with her in doing a Christmas present project. She asked if she could buy a 10 pound bar of high quality chocolate from the business, and other ingredients, at cost, so that she could make her own “Almond Roca” candy at home, and give it out to her friends and family as Christmas gifts. As a first term apprentice, Theresa wasn’t making a ton of money, and I gladly agreed to assist. Theresa took the ingredients for her project home and made her candy.

Several weeks later, right before Christmas, Theresa brought a couple of small packages of her Almond Roca in, cellophaned and tied with raffia, at 6 AM, to give to other employees, and to me. As she removed her coat she announced to my baker Stan and me, “you know, after I made the candy, I unfortunately stored it in my coat closet, and I think it has a bit of a taste of the closet, let me know what you think”.

A few minutes later, as I walked to the oven to pull the Danish, I removed the cellophane from my candy and snacked a bite. As I bit down, my nose next to the package, WHAM, it hit me, the full on and way nasty smell and taste of Moth Balls. Oh man, I thought, this poor young woman has blown this whole project. This candy stinks, and she has tried so hard to make something to give out at Christmas, on her limited budget, oh the poor thing. Theresa was watching for me to open my candy, and yelled up to me, “Well, what do you think Ric?” Still in shock, I immediately yelled back, above the din of the radio and oven bearings, “It’s great, T. I can taste that closet thing you were talking about, but I don’t think it’s that noticeable.”
Later that day, after Theresa had gone home, I asked Stan if he had tried his candy yet. “Nope, why?, he replied, as he began to unwrap his little bit of joy. And then, as he bit down, the look on his face said it all. Stan was and is a very nice person, and he immediately said, in his overly concerned way, “OHH NOOOOOOO, Ric, do you think we should tell her?”

Suffice it to say, that nary a word was said. Theresa went ahead and gave out her moth bally candy for Christmas, and likely, no one else said anything either. But I felt really sorry for Theresa, and it still haunts me, and if I had to do it again, having matured, and with less of a need to be likable, I would definitely say something, tactfully, but honestly, let her know her candy was awful.

I don’t know when it happens, when people who go to great lengths to avoid confrontation suddenly grow up, and decide to be more honest. For me, I think it came with age, or maybe it had something to do with the time I almost died of a heart attack. After that, somehow, one loses the sense that saving people’s feelings trumps honesty. I hope that I have come to a place in my life where any criticism I might make is more honest, fair, and balanced. But that Brad Chesterton, Jr. guy, he’s just a mean fuck.

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The Little Things/ Thanksgiving 2005

My buddy Larry emailed me from his home in Seattle a week ago, and among other things, announced that he would be coming to Portland on November 23, yesterday, to watch his step-son David, who starts at center for the Seattle University Redhawks, play The University of Portland Pilots. I told my son Blaine about it right away, and we decided to go to the game, and surprise Larry and his wife Robin.

If you have been here before, you may have read some of “The Adventures of Blaine In His Wheelchair”, because, as you probably know, it can be a mean world out there regarding accessibility. So when we go to a new venue, somewhere we haven’t been before, we are wary enough to go a bit early, just to be sure there are no surprises, or to give us the time to overcome any obstacles we might encounter.

We arrived at The Chiles Center, The University of Portland’s basketball court, and it was pretty easy, though we did have to take a few of the usual detours around things to get to our seats. We saw Larry and his family, and had a brief exchange as we entered the gym, and left the bulk of our visiting for after the game. It was great to see them.

We got to our seats, which were on the main floor, at one end, got a hot dog, checked the situation out. The band was playing mightily, with a real bass player, who looked to be the band teacher, typical band fare, The Theme From Rocky, Proud Mary, The Theme from 2001, with a back beat, and of course, The U of P fight song. It was an upbeat College Basetball Game Scene, really fun.

Right before the game, the starting five for the Pilots were introduced, just like they do in the NBA, with the reserve players making a tunnel for them to run through as their names were announced. After each player was announced, and had performed the popular “chest bump” with one or more of the other starters, he would then toss a small purple Portland Pilots souvenir basketball he had carried out with him into the stands, which would be retrieved by some adoring fan.

When the last player was introduced, whose name and number I didn’t even get, it happened so fast, he ran out to center court, and then, without hesitation, without chest bumping, he ran immediately over to my son, as we sat in the wheelchair section, and handed Blaine his souvenir basketball. That he had noticed Blaine in the crowd, that he had decided to hand off his ball to a guy who is not gonna be scrambling in the stands to get one, well, it was just a very nice gesture, and something that I am thankful for.

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My Horrible Tree

I have a delightful view from my desktop, out my second story office window toward the formerly named Ainsley Street, now, unfortuately renamed the less than poetic 25th Avenue, over Fall leaf-filled rooftops, their red, orange and gold colors flipping about in the wind, as I sit and contemplate my story. With such a lovely Autumn picture, and with Thanksgiving coming up next week, I have been thinking about the Turkey, The Dressing, The Time Off, For Marie and Me, and the chance to meet and greet our loved ones on Thanksgiving Day. This year, we are going to Marie’s sister’s home, and we look forward to our time with them. And my wife’s killer Turkey Dressing.

For many years, even before I entered the picture, in 1997, Marie and my step-son Blaine have made it their ritual to buy a Christmas Tree the day after Thanksgiving, and to decorate it on the weekend. After I moved in, and gladly assumed many of the traditonal male roles, like herking the purchased tree into the back of my van, or, on some occasions, dragging the tree home from the lot in my arms, and standing the tree up in it’s stand, nothing much changed, except that there was a husband sitting nearby, coffee mug in hand, as the tree was trimmed, lighted, and ornaments hung. Blaine wheels out of his room and helps to the best of his ability, and from his wheelchair admirably hangs dozens of ornaments on the lower section of the tree, which have been carefully kept by a diligent saver of a Mom, whose XMAS boxes are jammed with memorial ornaments, collected as Blaine turned one, then two, then three, and on vacations and various other occasions over the years. “Here’s one we got in Maine” she might say, holding up a Shiny Moose for our approval.

Three years ago, after an especially busy Thanksgiving Day, Marie and I decided to bag the tree ritual for the year, and to relax for the weekend. I volunteered, as we testified to our exhaustion, by offering to take care of getting the tree myself the following week, and we gladly agreed that, for once, we would decorate the tree a week late. No problem.

So on Monday, or Tuesday, I drove our van to the Tree Seller, on a vacant lot very close to our home, and began my shopping, walking the rows, reaching in to stand a tree up straight, and then checking out it’s overall shape and condition. At our house, we like a “Noble Fir” tree, a popular variety here in Oregon, where Christmas Tree Farms That Serve The World diligently prune year round to create the perfect and fragrant 90 degree horizontally branched tree for ideal and safe ornament display.

Not being one to dally while shopping, (I once bought a $400 suit in 20 minutes) I soon said yes to an 8 foot tree that looked good to me, paid, tossed it in the truck, and after letting it sit on the porch overnight, lugged it into our living room, and popped it into the stand.

It was huge and bushy, and, as it turned out, a bit tall for the room, so I sought out some sawhorses, and my electric chain saw, and dragged that monster back onto the front porch. All the while, my son Blaine was hanging about, asking me what I was doing, etc., and I would confidently reply, in my best Lumberjackian, “Have no fear, Paul Bunyon is here”.

After having paid nearly $80 for this big tree, I thought I had better cut carefully, at the base of the stem, so I pruned off a dozen or so branches, and made the big cut with my chainsaw, straight as possible. It was at that moment, that I noticed that the tree stem was a bit odd, in that it held two trunks, really, which began about a foot above my cut. I grabbed the tree once again, through the branches, with my leather gloved hands, and brought the tree back into the house, dropping thousands of needles along the way, as usual, passing through the house doors and furnishings. “Now what are you doing?”, Blaine asked, with a tone of caution. “Just puttin’ up the tree, Blainey”, I replied, and hit the floor, wrenching my back and limb, and once again screwing the tree into the stand. A few minutes later I stood, to notice that the tree was crooked as hell, even though I had made a very straight cut. “Shit”, I think was the word I used, as the Christmas loving Blaine wheeled out of his room, quickly, and noisily, his seat belt buckle flappin’ in the wind, and jingling on his spokes. “What’s wrong?”, he responded to my cussin’, and I informed him that THIS particular tree was a bit of a challenge, and that I was gonna have to do some real pro cuttin’ and a’prunin’, to make this thing work, but, NO Worries, ol’ Ricky is up to the task.

I returned the tree to the front porch, sweatin’ bullets, got myself a cup of coffee, and began to study the tree for my best solution. Lessee, with those two wacky trunks, I thought, that’s why the tree is so crooked, so if i cut it diagonally right about there, blah blah blah. I made my mark, and made another cut, removing a good 8 more inches from the tree.

Blaine, who was 22 at the time, was waiting for me as I struggled with the still awkward, but much lighter tree, and I stood it back up in the tree stand, and tightened the screws. I got up once again from my most uncomfortable position on the floor, and, I admit, was immediately struck by how much shorter the tree was, and unfortunately, my $80 tree was still crooked. But, well, when you pay $80 for a tree, and bust your ass for a couple hours to get it to look good, and still fail, uh, well, you rationalize the situation, you say, as you stand exhausted “yeah, that’ll work, that’ll work jus’ fine. Maybe it’s not perfect this year, but we’ll make it work”.

I turned to Blaine, who was sitting in his chair about 2 feet away, arms folded, kinda glum. We were both looking, in silence, at the tree, and then at each other, and then back at the tree. Thinking back, I was standing, and Blaine was sitting, before a ridiculous short and crooked tree.

One thing about Blaine is, he is very honest, not brutally honest, really, but let’s just say, you can count on him to tell you what he thinks. As I stood there viewing the tree, I made some final comment like, “well, it’s not the best tree, but it’ll do”, and then, I looked his way one last time. Sitting there, looking so forlorn and annoyed, his doe eyes had welled up, and in his most honest, and manly 20 something voice he blurted out.............”IT’S HORRIBLE”. I don't think he meant to say it in a mean way, but there was a tiny hint of "you idiot" in the tone of his voice.

At that very moment, I realized that this tree was not gonna cut it. Never mind that I had stretched and strained for hours to try to make it work. Never mind that I had, in typical and criticizable haste, probably chosen a crappy tree in the first place. The truth was, I was gonna have to return the tree, and get another one. End of topic.

I thought the guys at the Christmas Tree Lot might be able to use the boughs, to make swags or something, so I took the tree back to the lot, once again cramming it into my van, and even taking along the largish section of tree that I had cut off.

As I opened the doors to my van, to reveal the tree and it’s hulking 35 lb. appendage, at the lot, one of the guys came over, and I told him my pathetic story, hemming and hawing, that I was bringing it back because I had botched the install, had cut too much off the tree, etc., and I just needed another dang tree, which of course I expected to pay for. He and his co-worker removed the remains of my $80 Noble Fir, and it’s parts, from the van, as I started looking for another, and I could see the two of them over by the wreath shack, in their cheery fucking Santa hats, while an instrumental version of “Chestnuts” filled the lot over tinny speakers, and their breath steamed forward, hardly concealing the best laugh they’d had all day.


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Ric And Blaine Go To The Seahawks Game

There are three people in my world who know a ton about sports, my two daughters, Stacey and Amy, and my step-son, whom I just mostly call my son, Blaine. Blaine Deatherage-Newsom. My daughters come by their knowledge of sports honestly, since they played a lot of sports as kids, as did I. Additionally, they have always had the advantage of being able to draw a great deal of sports knowledge from people in their mother’s family, their uncles, their mom, even their grandmother. But Blainey, he’s a different kinda cat.

Blaine’s mom, my perfect wife Marie, likes some sports, especially the less than violent and time honoured sport of baseball, and she will sometimes watch sports with Blaine and I, especially if it involves a home team, like our Trailblazers, or a team from a school she attended, like The University of Oregon Ducks. We love her company at these times, and don't get me wrong, she gets most of it, the strategy, and the skill required to put the ball through the hoop, with someone's hand in your face. Just dont ask her to give you the definition of the ice hockey term, “icing”. Or watch boxing. So Blaine has come by most all of his vast sports knowledge pretty much on his own.

First, Blaine is a brilliant guy, a numbers guy, and he can follow game stats and players stats like nobody’s business. Secondly, Blaine has a strong natural bent toward competition, having been a chess champion at an early age, and if you know him well, as I do, you just know you are in for a battle if you challenge him on something.

So since I like sports too, that’s one place where Blaine and I find some serious common ground. On Sundays in the Fall and Winter, at about 10 a.m., when the NFL football games come on TV, Blaine always lets me know, as he sits on the edge of his bed getting ready for the day, that it’s time for me to come around his room, by hollering, at the top of his lungs, the simple and Sunday Activity Defining word........”FOOOOTBALLLLLL!”

Since Blaine is disabled, and lives with his mother and me, in an environment designed for his needs, he doesn’t have a lot of room to spread out. He has his room, and a great accessible bathroom, but Blaine’s possessions, his chess trophies, his sports memorabilia, one thousand chess and sports magazines, sports and chess books, on and on, well, let’s just say, it’s everywhere. It is difficult to get him to let anything go, so we mostly don’t. And when it’s time to think of a gift for Blaine, for his birthday, or Christmas, man, dude already has everything. People love this guy. He’s lovable. People give him stuff. So we often try, as we consider a gift, to maybe go for something less tangible than say, another knick-knack. Maybe we get him something like, oh, software, an iTunes gift certificate, or a TV upgrade, or....... tickets to a Seahawks game!!!!!!

Last summer, when Blaine turned 26, his mother (and I) gave Blaine a certificate for two tickets to a forthcoming Seahawks game, for Fall 2005, and Amtrak tickets, along with the promise that I would accompany him. We went yesterday, and watched the Hawks basically crush the St. Louis Rams, 31-16. We had a blast. The seats were great, (inside The Wells Fargo Club) the train was fun, my traveling companion was his typical swell self, and we won!

I have posted photos on two differerent pages, and you can see them all by clicking here:
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Exausted By Trash TV

Is it just me, or did many of you who watched “Trading Spouses” last night, which was the most blatant display of rabid fundamentalism I have ever witnessed, come close to pulling the hair directly out of your head as you watched? Ya gotta love Trash TV, the way those dang producers put people who could be categorized as “the most likely to not get along”, in the closest proximity to each other as possible. It’s a dirty trick, and I must say, it tends to bring the worst out in folks. Just the way us millions of viewers like it.

Some time ago, I squirmed as I watched , on the same show, “Trading Spouses”, a vegetarian family and a family who cooks up alligator at their restaurant in the bayou butt heads. That was bad enough. But last night, watching that over the top nutty Christian Lady try to impose her beliefs on a New Age and Tarro Card Clan, just about eliminated any remaining faith I have in mankind.

Does anyone else think it is a bit odd that, given the basic fundamentals of all religions, like, “Love Thy Neighbor”, and “Thou Shalt Not Be An Intolerant Jerk”, that a person would wretch and weep, like that lady did last night, just because she finds herself within earshot of someone whose spiritual life does not match hers? What gives with that? Don’t the religions teach us that even if others do not believe the same thing we do, that we must always uphold another person’s right to believe whatever the fuck they want to believe, spirtually, and they honour us similarly, and that’s what makes a peaceful world?

At the end of the show last night, after the so called Christian lady had a breakdown, screaming at her own family, saying those old movie phrases like “I rebuke it in the name of the Lord!”, and “I’m a warrior for God”, I made eye contact with my perfect wife Marie, who looked so sad and tired as she proffered, “I feel completely exausted”. No dah. Me too. I don’t know why we put ourselves through watching that trash. But when they went to commercial break right before the show was over, I saw the trailer for the next one, and it’s gonna be good.

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The Crystal Set

I come from a long line of Chicagoans, (Go Cubs!) and was born there myself in 1948, at Grant Park Hospital, in downtown Chicago. My folks, and many of my relatives, made their homes in the Park Ridge area, a suburb of The Windy City. Today, I live in Portland, Oregon, where I have lived most of my life. I love Portland, and I am not surprised that my parents elected to spare themselves the miserable winters and occasional tropical heat of Chicago summers, when they moved here around 1950. I am certain that there were other factors compelling them to move Out West, not the least of which was a young couple’s yearning to strike out on their own.

My Father graduated from The Chicago Technical Institute, which, in retrospect, kind of blows my mind, since he was barely capable of hanging a paper towel holder correctly, and most times, after I turned, oh....., 8, he called on me for most technical chores, like fixing things.

But freshly out of engineering school, diploma in hand, about 1946, and after the war, where he served admirably in the Army, my Dad was employed as a technician at several different businesses, including the family business, “Chicago Tool And Die”, which my grandfather Emil had started years before. I don’t know what happened there, but suffice it to say, my Dad’s future did not lie in Chicago.

My Great Uncle Clair, bless his soul, my grandmother’s youngest brother, was also a Chicagoan for most of his life, and had also been longing to move on, with his wife, my Great Aunt Ruth, possibly to Portland. So my Mom and Dad, and my Dad’s aunt and uncle, moved to Portland, with little Ricky in tow.

My “Uncle Clair”, as I always called him, was one smart sucka, and I always thought he got a lot more out of his engineering education than my Dad. Uncle Clair was a radio and early TV geek, and was always tinkering around at the workbench in our basement, when he and my aunt were at the house.

One Thanksgiving Day, after a sumptuous meal of one of my Mother’s Golden Brown And Super Dry Not One Ounce Of Moisture Left In It Turkeys, Uncle Clair suggested that I follow him to the basement, to help him complete a project he was working on.

When we reached the basement, he proudly showed me a number of small parts, which were lying on the workbench, all organized and ready to use. “We”, he announced, “are gonna make A Crystal Set”, and with that, he took from his pocket a crystal, about 3/4 inch square, and held it up for me to inspect. All these years later, I don’t really know what it was, what kind of crystal, etc., but it looked like a piece of Iron Pyrite, or Fool’s Gold, and had a shiny gold and grey tint to it.

In the hours that followed, he instructed me as we painstakingly utilized each of the parts he had scrounged from the bowels of my Dad’s work bench, and around the house, a toilet paper roll core, copper wire, some old moth eaten headphones that looked like they had come straight from a World War II cockpit, a rather large safety pin. He had also discovered other parts which I am certain had nothing to do with a radio, a metal piece he had fashioned to hold the crystal, and other metal parts that were surely not radio related, but would be useful.

I will spare you an exact and long memorized description of the finished Crystal Set, but it was completely bitchen, and worked great. The tip of the safety pin was positioned such that it touched the crystal. After a time, lying in my bed at night, listening to the Portland Beaver’s Baseball Game, as announced by Sportscaster Bob Blackburn on Portland radio station KPOJ, circa 1956, I became adept at moving the tip of the pin, to receive other radio staions in the area, including good ol’ KEX, before school, when Barney Keep would amuse and offer less than complimentary quips about his wife, “The Ol’ Biscuit Burner”.

I delight in the memory of the building of The Crytsal Set with my Uncle Clair, and I sure wish I still had the thing. I am certain it languished in a shoebox in my childhood closet for a few years, after I had received a brand new and very modern transistor radio for Christmas. Eventually, my Mother tossed it. Lying in bed back then, eyes closed, listening to my Crystal Set, with my shoddy headphones attached, Mom would call up the stairs to my room, “Honey, can I bring you a nice turkey sandwich?” “Nah, thanks anyway Mom” I’d yell back. “I’m not really hungry right now”.

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Whew!

The Official Release Of Ric Seaberg’s TWO 2005 CDs Is Today!

Today we are announcing the official release of my two new CDs, “Who Come Down?”, and “Dubs On Trial”, which have been in production for over a year, since a few of the songs were recorded before 2005. It brings me so much pleasure to record the songs I write, so to be able to finally share it with my friends and others is truly the icing on the cake.

Those of us who have been blessed (or cursed) with a knack for sitting straight up in the middle of the night (sometimes to our partner’s chagrin) with melodies and rhymes, dearly appreciate the support of our friends and families. Because although the songwriting part comes naturally, the road to actually getting one’s music published is hard work, and expensive. When I am in the “mixing” stage for example, attempting to balance all the tracks, trying to get the guitars to swell in just the right place, that sorta thing, I sometimes run through dozens of CD blanks, on just one song! In the recording world, it’s called, “making coasters”, since finalized and moot CD blanks have no use really, (except maybe as coasters!) Or perhaps, when you visit us at Christmas sometime, I will have talked Marie into allowing me to adorn our tree with a thousand shiny and wasted CD blanks!

Did I hear you ask....Why 2 CDs at once? Okay, here’s the story: “Who Come Down?” is the primary CD for 2005. It’s title is taken from a song of the same name. It refers to that “less than still small voice” which drives some artists to greatness, or to ruin, or both. When Marie and I sat down to select the songs for this CD, we had 60 fully recorded songs “in the can” to choose from. First, we did that. When we finished, we were struck by the fact that many of the songs that we truly like were left lying on the cutting room floor, for one reason or another, like say, we already had enough fast ones. In the days to come, it was only natural that I began to explore the idea of publishing a second CD.

These days, with music being sold online, as mp3s, digitally, on iTunes, and elsewhere, it behooves the recording artist to have as many mastered songs out there as possible. One click means a 99 cent sale, which brings the artist anywhere from 60 to 80 cents. So we decided that now was the time to gather up those songs from the cutting room floor, and from the 43 songs left there, we scooped up 16 more for “Dubs On Trial”.

I thank you from the bottom of my heart for your interest and for purchasing these CDs. It will take a few months for the songs to be transferred to iTunes, for those who prefer to download their music, but for now, there are several ways to buy the CDs HERE. Clips of the songs can be heard at CDBaby. Thanks again for your support.

Ric Seaberg
“Who Come Down?” Clips
“Dubs On Trial” Clips


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Ethics

I sometimes wonder whatever happened to George, a disabled guy I knew in high school, who was missing an eye (he had a glass eye), and other problems, flat feet, which required him to walk with an unusual gait, and maybe some other stuff I never knew about. George would sometimes plant himself in the hallway, at Franklin High, here in Portland, and there he would remove his glass eye for girls and others who might be interested, and they would stand around him squealing and exclaiming the first known usage of the word “gross”, in 1964. George would sometimes bear the brunt of disability jokes, because kids can be so completely unconscious and cruel, and I must say that he did tend to bring it on himself too, with his loud and needy personality. I can still hear his ghoulish laughter, reverberating in the halls, as he removed that eye. Kicking a guy when he is down, though, has never been something I can relate to.

I had a few classes with George, and he was mostly quiet, in class, and a decent student. Few paid him much attention, and I felt sorry for him. Occasionally, we would converse about something, and I found him to be a nice person.

My desk was right next to George’s in Creative Writing, senior year, which was taught by one of my favourite teachers of all time, Mrs. Avshalomov, who was the wife of famous composer and conductor, Jacob Avshalomov. Mrs. Avshalomov was kind to me, yet honest, and critical, as she was the time I brought in my guitar and sang and played for her, at her desk, a gruesome and trite ditty I had titled “Time Heals Many Wounds”, which droned on about a failed relationship, a theme I have tended to embrace throughout my life.
“I don’t understand it” I remember her saying.

On one occasion, Mrs. Avshalomov gave us an assignment, which included a very Modern Peer Grading Procedure, whereby each student, at the end of the week, would turn his or her writing over to another student for review and critique. When the day arrived, I ended up with George’s sheaf of papers, and set about reading them, such that I could analyze and make some comments.

But when George turned his poetry over to me, in his own handwriting, I could immediately see that it was all plagarized material. Believe it or not, and I swear this actually happened, as I read the poems, I realized that George had copied, verbatim, an entire side of an LP that I myself owned, titled “The Two Sides Of The Smothers Brothers”, where they had done schtick on one side, and all nice songs on the other. Unfortuately for George, he had handed over his work to a guy who already knew all the words he had claimed to write, by heart!

The first song, for example, was a number titled “Stella’s Got A Brand New Dress” (go ahead, check on it!) and the lyric went....

“Stella got a brand new dress today,
Everywhere she goes the people say
“Who’s that walking down the street,
Pretty little shoes all dainty and petite?
With a brand new way to wear her hair and a
Brand new bright new dress to wear”
Who could imagine a sight so fair as
Stella in a brand new dress?”

I was shocked. George had copied every song on that LP, and had turned it in as his own writing. After class, I waited until the other students left, and shared the news with Mrs. Avshalomov. She took my words seriously, with a frown, and thanked me.

In a couple of days, Mrs. Avshalomov had decided what to do, and basically, she called George on his plagarism in front of the class. George just sat there with his head down, next to me, saying nothing. When it was over, and she had made all of her comments about plagarism, ethics, and life, I waited for the right moment, and said, “Sorry George”.

George and I didn’t have much to say to each other after that, but on the last day of school, he handed me his yearbook to sign, and I happily handed mine over to him. I can remember being pleased at what George had written, given my role in the ethics bust, but all these years later, I regard George’s inscription with deep and heartfelt gratitude. He wrote........

Ric

We’ve known each other for four years and I have enjoyed them very much. You never knocked me for my deformities. You only looked for the good. That is why I like and admire you so well. Good luck and best wishes in the future.

George 1966


George....That’s one of the finest pieces of writing I have ever read. Having your inscription, all these years, sitting there on my bookshelf, for me to read anytime I wish, has helped remind me how important it is to be kind, that I am capable of having an impact on someone by being kind, and it has meant more to me than you will ever know.


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My 9-11 Song

Nothin’ like a little terrorism in your own country to make you appreciate the freedoms we sometimes take for granted. Nothin’ like a little terrorism in your own country to make you appreciate everything from a moonlit night on your front porch as neighbors pass to an ice cream cone after your child’s Little League game. Nothin' like a little terrorism in your own country to spawn all sorts of new art, from breathtaking photos of the aftermath at ground zero, to paintings, poetry, and music.

To be honest, I didn’t expect to write a song about 9-11. I knew many would, and though I was deeply affected by the attack, I couldn’t think of an angle that would not somehow be inappropriate. It was just too huge. What business does one little man who lives in Oregon have, writing a song about such an horrific event, thousands of miles away from those who lived the tragedy?

But one day, with no ”angle” in mind, a song came through, which pays attention to that feeling of taking our freedom for granted, which all of us Americans, I think, can relate to. It appears on my 2002 CD, “Useful Information”, and it is titled, “Don’ Know What You Got”.

Listen to : "Don' Know What You Got"
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Lemon Filling

When I had my first bakery, Richard’s Bakery of Tualatin, Oregon, from 1975-1985, that’s where I learned how to deal with customer complaints. It didn’t take me long to figure out that the best course of action in a retail situation is to just give over to the customer’s complaint, and give them their money back. If a customer comes in and says they got a lug nut in their maple bar, even if they didn’t, the last thing you need is for someone to be standing in front of your bakery case, loudly complaining about biting into a lug nut, in one of your products. On occasion, I would drag my feet while considering compensation, as was the case when a woman said she broke her tooth on a screw that she had bit into in a sponge cake. Luckily, she just went away, and I never heard from her again. Since she was trying to get her dental bills paid, and it was a lot of money, I thought I’d better think it over. She must’ve thought it over too, and decided not to try to scam that nice young man with the bakery.

But most of the time, if a person said their bread was stale, or a turnover wasn’t done, whatever, ya just give’m their money, and that’s that. I can even recall a wedding cake blooper, where the cake was reported to be dry, and we responded by giving the customer a full refund. It’s not likely the cake was really dry. But I had basically assumed the policy of “the customer is always right”, and we lived by it. My second wife, who survived several years of bakery ownership, and I quarreled regularly about my strict adherence to The Nordstrom Return Policy. “Face it, Ric”, she would exclaim, “The customer is sometimes confused”.

One day, early in the morning, I was standing by my 20-pan Reed revolving oven, icing Danish, when a man walked into the production area, carrying a pink quarter sheet box, the kind that holds a quarter sheet cake. As he approached, he had a bit of a twinkle in his eye. “You Richard?”, he asked. “That’s me”, I spoke, “What can I do for you?”. “Well”, the man spoke with kind of a giggle”, “My wife sent me down here, for a refund”. “What seems to be the problem?”, I asked.

Apparently, this man’s wife had been to the bakery the day before, and had purchased the cake from our decorated cake case. It had “Happy Birthday” written on it, and one of the sales staff had added the word “Dad”. She had purchased it especially because it was for her father-in-law, this guy’s Dad, and they were going out for a special dinner in his honor, and taking his favourite dessert, a lemon-filled white cake, from our bakery.

So they went to the restaurant, had their meal, and then, as the “Happy Birthday Dad” cake was revealed, and placed before the honoree, this guy’s wife announced..........”Dad, I made you your favourite cake........white cake with lemon filling”!!!

As the man told the story, I could tell he was working up to something, since he was chuckling more and more. What happened next, at the restaurant, could possibly the best story I have ever heard, illustrating how lying doesn’t pay. Because just as the woman announced that she had made her father-in law’s favourite lemon filled cake, (which, it turned out, had been mismarked in the cake case by my staff) the cake was cut........to reveal a RASPBERRY FILLED CAKE!!!, At that moment, and I swear this actually happened, the man burst into uncontrollable laughter. Can’t stand still laughter. Tears laughter. Of course, myself, being a person who will laugh just because someone else is laughing, he got me going too. So there we stood, utterly engulfed in laughter, about how his wife had been so busted for telling a bold faced lie, for trying to take credit for making a cake she had not made. Then, still barely able to speak, the man says...”So I really need to get the refund, man”, and we both burst out laughing again.

Some minutes later, I gave him the refund, we shook hands, and he took off. As the years have past, I have relived this moment many times, thinking about how that woman must have been squirming, shocked, and embarrased, as they cut the cake. How does one cover up such a lie? How about.....”Oops, I forgot raspberry is not lemon?” In my own life, if I am ever tempted to lie, I just remember the “lemon filling” story, and any further desire to fib quickly recedes.


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Disclosure

Being the caring and sharing kinda male that I am, it has never, of course, been my fault when one of my relationships, or my two previous marriages, have soured. Still, my involvement in these relationships has driven me to a myriad of counselors, thousands of hours of worrying and wallowing in a mire of self pity, dozens of break-up songs, even valium. And in each and every case, I have been TOTALLY INNOCENT!

About 1992, I was involved in a particularly heinous relationship, one that included much yelling, late night squabbling, and a million letters of complaint and hatred lying in wait for me on my side of the bed, and one night, during an especially angry outburst........broken glass. I knew I had to do something.

I kid, above, when I say nothing is ever my fault, and to be honest, I have tended, over the years, to blame myself for everything. And during that relationship, I felt as though I had better do something to change my evil ways, improve, make things all better by being a better partner, more generous, nicer, all that. I felt terrible that my partner was so unhappy, I decided I better go, yet again, to counseling.

And in addition to the counseling, I thought, maybe I should look in the local alternative newspaper and see if I might be able to join, for the first time in my life, at 40 something years old........A MEN’S GROUP! I had read with interest an article about men’s groups, how popular they had become in some parts of the country, men becoming “sudden brothers” as the article said, at about my age, to explore issues like relationships, family, work, health, aging, money, even sexual identity. I thought, “I’m fucked up, maybe this might help”.

I picked up the classifieds for our Willamette Week newspaper, and began to look for a listing for a men’s group. Lo and behold, there was one entry, and only one, listed for a men’s group start-up. I scribbled down the number, and called later.

The guy who answered the phone was very nice. We chatted a bit, and he invited me to the first meeting at his house, in the near future, and said that others had also called. And so, at the appointed time, I showed up.

For the next five years, I attended men’s group once a week with a core group of 7 Portland Men, including me, all in our forties. A few others came and went, but 7 of us were extremely consistent. I guess we all must have been fucked up. I kid. The truth is, it was one of the most interesting and rewarding experiences of my life, meeting with those guys every week, to talk, laugh, sometimes cry.

There are many different ways in which men’s groups operate, and some are founded on a more ancient approach, the “wild man within” movement, the beating of drums, meeting in the forest and having huge bonfires and jumping naked into rivers and lakes, etc. I admit that I find that style of group a bit contrived and silly. But many in that movement have sighted the lack of ritual in our society as the basis for their activities, and who am I to suggest it does not hold value for others, just because it does not for me.

But more than anything, in my men’s group, I relished the opportunity to get together with some guys and talk about shit. We would start each session, which lasted about four hours, with a “check-in”, where each guy would speak for about 5 minutes, tell what’s going on in his life, what his thoughts and concerns were at that moment. Usually, by the end of “check-in”, we knew who needed to talk.

Several months into our group sessions, after we had gotten to know each other pretty well, we decided to embark on a several week course of telling our life stories. Each guy would get a chance to tell his story start to finish. I owned a beach house at the time, and we even went there for a weekend, and did several there. For me, it was a watershed moment.

There is something comforting, something liberating, listening to another man, who has experienced much in life, who has been through a lot, speak openly and honestly about his life, and tell his true life story without reservation. First of all, I felt honored to be in a room listening to another man honestly tell the story of his life, to let me in on that. Secondly, hearing someone openly disclose the true stories of his struggles in life had a huge impact on me, and we are talking deep truth, every last bit of joyous or shameful truth that made you feel like a star, or an idiot, or stupid, or worthless, or invisible, or special, or inadequate, or about the time you had cancer, or drove the getaway car, on and on. It made me, as a listener, midst laughter, and tears, feel so compassionate and close to the person, and grateful for his act of honesty and disclosure. Listening to these guys, every one of them, admit the truth, to hear them tell not only the stories of their childhoods, and later, but also the stories of their acts of questionable purpose or value, of foolishness, or danger, made me realize, when it was my turn, I was gonna have to tell the truth, show these guys, for the first time in my life, the real Ric Seaberg. At the end of each life story, we would all sort of fall into a lump of caring and love and encouragement for each other, which made the prospect of honestly telling my life story much less scary.

So I did it, and I told the truth, and it was a huge moment in my life, to share that way, with other guys, and to be listened to and accepted, and loved, for just being me, and for having the guts to tell my true story. It changed my life, made me feel much better about myself, more confident, worthwhile, strong. I owe you boys a lot, and I thank you all from the bottom of my heart for your ears and input during those years. You know who you are.


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Miss Rice

Hardly a day goes by that I don’t thank my lucky stars that I have a good command of language, and possess a modicum of writing skill. Not long ago, I received an email from an old friend, whom I hadn’t heard from in years. As I read the letter, I realized that it must have been a struggle for this person to write the letter, since it was basically written by someone who is borderline illiterate. I had no idea that this person has an issue with writing and spelling. And it was lovely (and brave) that he wrote anyway. Still, regarding reading and writing skill, I feel for those who, for one reason or another, didn’t get it, when they were in school, or later, in real life.

When I was in grade school, phonics were big. You know, where you sit before a chalk board, or an easel with a big piece of paper on it, and your teacher drills you to death about the sounds certain letters make, and combinations of letters, like “Ph”, for (say it slowly now), “Phone, Physical, Phat Pharm", oh no that’s not right, Fat Farm is spelled with an “F”, which has the same sound a “Ph”, like that, on and on for hours. That’s where I got my reading and writing chops. In the 2nd and 3rd grades.

Her name was Miss Rice, and she was a babe, by 1950s standards, petite, cute, bubbly, warm, smart, well dressed. I thought she was the greatest, and she was a terrific teacher. I can remember my folks being so grateful that I would have her for my teacher yet again in the third grade, after having her in the second. Miss Rice was popular........especially with males. I am certain that in the chain smoke filled teacher’s lunchroom at Atkinson Grade School in 1955 and 1956, there was idle talk, among the men teachers, about what a King Hottie Miss Rice was. Yep, that little Bangs and Bubble Do, and that black tight-weave sweater, mercy.

I could always tell that my Dad thought Miss Rice was foxy, even though I was just a little kid, cuz he would be all starry eyed and different when he was around her, like at a parent’s night or some other school thing. I can remember a group of Dads standing around her, at one school night, trying to keep their tongues from wagging, surely keeping the conversation on school issues, all the while undressing the sexy Miss Rice with their eyes, and right in front of their wives. Ah, the 50s, what a great era.

But I don’t think my brazen Dad was ready for it, one summer in about 1958, when we traveled, as a family, to Mt. Hood for a little day trip, and stopped at Zig Zag for dinner. As we stood in the foyer of the restaurant, waiting to be seated, a completely inebriated and still foxy Miss Rice came stumbling out of the cocktail lounge, much to our surprise. She recognized us all immediately, said her bubbly hellos, gave me the head pat, and then, with no regard for my mother’s presence, gave my Dad this huge hug, and then stood there, with her arm around his waste, his arm around her shoulders, and began speaking and giggling, way over the top drunk. Standing there, the two of them, with Miss Rice slumping into my Dad’s side, all cozy like, they looked like a couple. At one point, she ran her free hand up my dad’s stomach and to his shoulder, and in a sexy little whine, said something like, “I’m a little intoxicated”. But Dad was groovin’ on it, and he wasn’t exactly pushing her away. I was 10. It was weird.

I think my Mom was mostly just speechless, cuz she already knew my Dad was a dope, but I do remember that she made some disparaging comments about Miss Rice, on the ride home in the car. Like “what’s an attractive young woman like that doing getting all drunk, in public, she’s a teacher for God’s sake, not a harlot!” Let’s just say there was a bit of tension, for awhile, after the Miss Rice Caper at Zig Zag, between my folks. It definitely hurt my Mom’s feelings, and it obviously made an impression on me. People make mistakes, and I suppose Miss Rice blundered that day, but........Miss Rice is still a star with me, even in a distant memory, since she taught me how to read and write.

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