SECRET STUFF

Quite often when reading an interview with a celebrity I've noticed the interviewer will pose the question: "What's the one thing about you that few people know?"

Seeing as how I've never been, nor ever will be, a celebrity that is a question I am unlikely to be asked. Despite that, I want to reveal what my answer would have been.

Friends know that I occasionally sing at a wedding , a funeral, a cantata, and maybe even a vascectomy or two.

What they don't know is that singing is not the limit of my musical accomplishments. At one time I played a mean harp. No, not the kind you put in your mouth, but, an honest to goodness string harp.

Rosemarie Botticelli, a semi-retired school teacher at Grove City College, took me under her wing, and taught me how to play her harp 2 or 3 evenings a week during my Freshman and Sophmore years. Rosemarie was a good teacher.

I haven't played in years and for good reason. Harps are not an inexpensive instrument. A Cherub student harp can run $11,000 or more and Venus Gold harps cost anywhere from $26,000 to $54,000 nowadays.

Fortunately, back in the 70's when I played they were much cheaper. I bought mine from a unusual chamber group in Sewickley that disbanded. The harp was really beat up and I suspect it had been handed down from days of yore. The groups harpist let me buy it on time..

I paid the monthly fees out of small gigs where the sound of a harp was needed and/or a chamber group or small orchestra wanted to add one on the cheap.

The most unusual request for my expertise was from a discoteque owner in Youngstown, Ohio . It was really more of a bar and was owned by a Chinese fellow who looked Jewish . His name was Samuel Fran. Everybody called him Sam, but, never Sammy.

Sam was a character, no matter what his true heritage might have been. Like many club owners back then Sam stayed in business , made a steady profit, and was open several hours after midnight due to his weekly payoffs to the local constabulary. He occasionally threw in a couple meals and of course, waived the cover charge.

His reward was a free hand to distribute drugs and host some serious money poker games. His place actually had one of those old Prohibition sliding window things in the back door that allowed his bouncer folks to preview the customers before they were admitted.

Sam had once heard me play in a concert I did with the Youngstown Symphony. He tracked me down via my booking agent in Oakland. It seems there was an emergency at his club. His band lost their piano player in the early morning hours (for keeps) due to an overly generous poker hand he awarded himself.

Sam didn't like the local talent and felt the incident damaged the clubs reputation. He turned out to be a huge harp fan , adored the Marx brothers, and saw this as an opportunity to dress up the club. Go figure!

I had a payment due on the harp and figured playing music in a discotheque wasn't any weirder than a lot of other things I had done in my youth. I agreed to fill in with the group and drove there on a Saturday afternoon so I could go over some of the arrangements with the guys.

Strangely enough we clicked and I had time to enjoy a few "lime rickeys" before the performance.

We had finished a couple of sets for the Travolta look-a-likes when we heard a horrendous noise coming from the direction of the front door. The door was losing a battle with a battering ram.

While Sam had paid off the locals he never counted on being raided by the Feds. Still, he was a cautious sort of guy. All of us scattered down the cellar steps after Sam. They led to a underground hallway/tunnel connected to the building next door behind which Sam kept his Cadillac DeVille.

We all piled in the Caddy and never looked back.

The feds confiscated everything, including my harp. I still owed about half of the purchase price. I eventually paid off the debt with a small discount thrown in for telling my story, but, I never played again.

I think I was permanently scarred from that night when I left my harp in Sam Fran's Disco.

WAITING FOR LE ROCKETTE

When I was a kid I hated Kellogs PEP breakfast cereal. Despite that, I encouraged Mom to pick up a box or two when grocery shopping.

PEP tasted to me like leftovers from food that people ate at parties and then hid in potted plants.. "Then, why eat it,?" you might reasonably inquire.

Well you see, even though the Sullivans were big on Wheaties, Cheerios, Kix, and Rice Krispies, none of them offered the prizes that you could get with PEP.

Oh yeah, you occasionally found hokey prizes in the packages of the above but nothing like what you could order by mail from Battle Creek, Michigan - the site of the PEP manufacturing plant.

Even being able to read the back of the Wheaties package twelve hundred times to learn about Patty Berg or Elmo Lincoln while gobbling your "Breakfast of Champions" was a letdown compared to "the big time offer" of PEP cereal.

Nothing could compare with the PEP advertisement for the soon to be famous "rocket ring" that glowed in the dark and had a secret compartment.( I can't tell you the exact location as I'd then have to kill you.).

All I knew was,just like the ad said, I wanted to be "the first in my neighborhood" to own one. .

I sent away my dime and the order form and started the unbearable wait. I was the original naive and impatient customer - pacing the living room on Saturdays awaiting the mail. During school days I was thinking about the mailman instead of Alexander The Great and his mighty white steed, Bucepalus.

Geography was not my best subject. I didn't know where Battle Creek was but I was sure it must have been one of the sites of the Peloponnesian War. - because no mail should take that long to get to Pittsburgh.

Every day I hurried home from school to see if my rocket ring had been delivered. What could have been taking so long?

I thought about running down Sumner Avenue to the Ardmore Boulevard and visiting Johnny Dicoskey, the grocery store owner. Surely Johnny had some pull with Kelloggs.

Maybe I could send him a ransom note made up from newspaper type and threaten to kidnap his mother (who lived next door to us) if Johnny didn't call in a couple of IOUs and intercede. I then knew I had either been listening to too many FBI - In Peace & War episodes or swallowing too much LAVA soap.

I abandoned the last thought also as Mom would never approve.. Besides, it was very difficult for a 10 year old to disguise his voice on the phone when arranging the exchange point. Finally, I didn't know how I was going to get 70 year old Mrs. Discoskey to agree to ride blindfolded on my bike.

Finally, after what I'm sure must have been 7 or 8 months, my rocket ring arrived. Oh joy of joys! I ripped open the package and quickly read the instructions. (this was unnecessary as I had pretty much memorized the ring from the picture on the cereal box and knew where everything was located.)

Oh yeah. I also noticed the rocket ring was much smaller than the picture on the box.

I ran into the hall closet and awaited the glow from my prize to appear. Nothing! I then tried Mom & Dad's closet. Still nothing. I sat for a while in our kitchen to explore my options and then moved my location to the coal cellar - the darkest place in the house.

Lo and behold, I could see this teeny, teeny glow coming from the nose cone. "Ah yes, success at Lake Success", I shouted to the few rats that still inhabited the unfinished dirt cellar of our rental home on Sumner.

Then I was a child. Now I am a man. I recently ordered a desk and a printer cabinet for my new home office. The store took much too long to deliver same.

Now I'm awaiting the installer technician. . The handyman we hired to assemble my wife's desk in her home office 3 years ago swore after taking several days to put it together, "I'll never do that again for all the money in the world!"

That was enough for "old fumbles" here. I figured it will be worth the C-note I paid up front. But, what in the name of everything holy could possibly take the tech this long to come to our house?

I mean, "Where's he coming from - Battle Creek?"

PITTSBURGHESE

There has been much written about the unique colloquial way of speaking that is referred to as Pittsburghese. Some might argue that "colloquial" has less to do with "location" than it does with "locution" - but, that's a boring interpretation - even for me.

At my age I continue to be amazed when thrown in with a group of strangers from around the country to hear someone say, "You must be from Pittsburgh.". It's not just the expressions I learned growing up in Pittsburgh, but, things as simple as the pronunciation of "downtown" - which turns into "dahntahn" as it rolls out of my mouth.

When you lived in only one place for over 50 years , no matter how much you travelled around this great country of ours, you tend to assume everybody talks like you. They don't.

It was not unusual for us to hear growing up, "Yinz goin' food shoppinat da gint igl n'at." and know it was a critical observation as to how you were dressed on your way to The Giant Eagle grocery store to do some "food shoppin".

No pro ballgame was complete if you didn't hear the vendor yell: "Hay Bir Here."

It wasn't only the language and the expressions that caused Pittsburgh to be unique - it was also the people.

Here's a story I've often repeated: I once took my bride from Harrisburg into Pittsburgh to see my kids and experience the sights. I made her a promise as we were enjoying that amazing view of the "burgh" as we departed the Fort Pitt Tunnels heading into town..

"Phyl," I said, " I guarantee you when we stop at one of the local Tambellini restaurant/bars for their fried Zucchini that it won't be 5 minutes before someone other than an employee strikes up a conversation with you.". Pittsburgh didn't let me down and my wife was amazed as it happened over and over again during our stay. It's a friendly town.

Now, don't get me wrong. I know there are a lot of proud people from a lot of cities and towns around the U.S., and rightfully so, but, our bragging rights are somewhat unique.

We are considered by many to be "a big city" but actually you can walk the perimeter of Pittsburgh proper in a relatively short period of time. Some have referred to the town as the "smallest big city in the world".

The city may be small but the people are not. Recently they demonstrated this loud and clear in assessing their feelings about severing the relationship between their proud "Stillers" and it's two time Super Bowl winning quarterback, Ben Rothlisberger.

One would think when you got a guy who led you to winning those Super Bowls and gave you two years of bragging rights, that you might excuse almost anything in the way of boorish behavior, the possession of a testosterone overload and incredible bad judgment.

"He'll grow out of it", some might say - and did -but not the majority of the folks. As one writer put it, "of course we care whether they win or lose. But we care much more what they stand for."

So, it isn't all about winning? Didn't we hear that from such famous sports gurus as Vince Lombardi? Wasn't it baseball manager Leo Durocher who was quoted as saying, "Nice guys finish last"? Even Tiger made that clear in his post final round interview at the Masters, "I didn't come here to lose!", and Tiger has much bigger problems.

Yeah winning is important - but not the only thing. Not in my town, thank you. They still come out to watch their beloved Pirates anchored by a 17 season losing streak.

"The Steeler Way" sounds a little like the Boy Scout Law. It's about being proud, fair, honest, and playing with a greater agenda. It's the philosophy of the Rooney family, the owners and also their fans, "The SteelerNation" , has come to not only to expect it -but- to respect it.

It's a creed that is very important to it's residents and fans . As a loyal fan base, they are quite supportive when the local management team decides to deep-six a star who doesn't "get it" - even if they might gripe about what "we got in return."

Recently, they overwhelmingly made their feelings known when asked to participate in a survey that was taken of several thousand fans. Many concluded that "letting their star quarterback go" was a viable option.

Post-Gazette columnist Gene Collier - who makes a living from writing about winning teams such as the Penguins and The Steelers - said it most eloquently in a recent column when he concluded that the Steelers could stick with Big Ben and try to rehab him , but, "it is a bathroom I wouldn't want to walk into."

Now, that's a form of "Pittsburghese" for which I am extremely proud.

PERCEPTION & REALITY

My folks taught my two brothers and me: "You will be judged by your actions."



Later in life, when working for a large company, the greater lesson I learned was that "perception becomes reality." If people perceive that you are this or that - no matter how wrong their judgment may be - it eventually becomes their reality first - and sometimes later - it can also become yours.


For a long time - maybe 13 years or so - I was per my job dutues - (hypothetically) part of labor. In the last 20 + years before retiring , I was a member of management.


It was in this latter capacity that the perception/reality thing really hit home. A training film by Morris Massey entitled "What you are is where your were when" made it clear that many of the decisions I would make as a fairly new member of management would be based on my background.


That was scary because as a young man I had made some decisions that were not well thought out.


As a college freshman I didn't know how to write a check. After graduating I was so afraid of public speaking I dreaded having to inroduce myself at a meeting. As I progressed through my twenties I didn't give much indication I had gained a heckuva lot more sophistication or wisdom since that freshmen year. I could dress well - say the right things, mimic that "Good Barry" my mom always talked about - but, I still didn't seem to get it.



I lacked depth and was stubborn. I felt feeling I could make up my own rules as to how my job should be done .



In some areas it worked well. I developed a way of handling my job duties that went against the company rules but which on further examination they chose to adopt.



My biggest transgression was that of a lack of record keeping. I believed the results justified the means and filing detailed reports was simply redundant. I thought I was bigger than the team and failed to observe the name of my employer's identity did not include the surname Sullivan.



I also chose to ingore that my employer's very successful reputation was largely based upon their penchant for accountability. I was placed on probation at one point.


One day - and unfortunately there were many - my boss called me into a private meeting. He made it abundantly clear that he was ready to recommend termination. He admitted there were several aspects of my job I did very well. However, his conclusions were that the bad outweighed the good. I was 40 years old.


I sat there listening to his eloquent recounting of his total frustration with me. I then surprised him by asking, "Instead of firing me - why not consider promoting me to the current opening for entry level management? I think it's a challenge I'm ready for and will do well."



When he finally recovered we discussed my rationale: I needed a challenge, was tired of "knocking on doors", and was "burned out". My boss was a very bright man and was highly

suspicious of my motivation. He agreed to interview me for the job and even then was not convinced. He met with his managment group in speical session to get their input.


Thanks to him going the extra mile and the management teams honest appraisal of my potential I was given the job on a trial basis. Despite my reputation as sort of a goof-off they were willing to bet I could do okay supervising clerical people.


Their perception became my reality and it changed my life forever. After a year in the entry level position they promoted me. I moved around a little and was given more and more responsibility.I gained a lot of confidence and at one point was sent to Atlanta for the purpose of speaking to an audience of about 1,000 people on the subject of 'Ethics In Business".


That's the good news. It was about a positive perception that became for me a positive reality.
But, we all know theres a flip side to this story . The reality is that my story could have just as easily gone in the other direction. The perception that my boss and his management group had of me could have been negative and also turned into a reality.


For many, many Steeler fans in the city in which I grew up , worked, and loved they also have a perception. It is about their formerly beloved quarterback who based upon what they're hearing is now perceived to be something of a "letch" .



Maybe he is - maybe not - but, in their eyes right now ; with two legal accusations partially behind him , two civil actions pending, and the recent allegation of another potentially act of poor judgment, Ben Rothlisberger is walking a tightrope of a negative perception that could become his reality.


My hope and prayer is that he's not stupid enough to wait until he's 40 to address it. His employer's office door does not list the team as "The Rothlisbergers."

THE IGLOO IS MELTING (revised 4/13/10)

The Igloo is melting - and with it - many great memories are being revived. They are not just of the Igloo located at the foot of the Hill District. Thoughts of all of the Uptown section of Pittsburgh revived some good childhood vibes for me.

The Igloo, once called the Civic Arena, and most recently the Mellon Arena - home of the Pittsburgh Penguins - has gone out of style and is being replaced. A new arena is under construction nearby. The current sentiment is to allow for a full fledge Igloo meltdown.

The Arena was not just a sports stadium. It also changed the face of Pittsburgh. Finished in 1961 it was originally built to house the Civic Light Opera. It was better known as the world's first major indoor sports stadium with a retractable roof and , later, home of The Penguins.

I have many fond memories of the Hill and once walked all the way up there to a Fire station around 1960 in order to ask the Captain, and later the grandfather of my children, for his daughter's hand in marriage.

It was at a Catholic Church across from the Arena that I , "a proud prod" once sang Christmas Midnight Mass with my little Irish Catholic mom in attendance .

Friends had asked me to join a pick-up choir consisting of about a dozen people ranging in talent from me, the tenor at the bottom, to the Soprano at the top who later sang the female lead in the San Francisco production of "The Phantom Of The Opera". Mom absolutely loved that mass.

Once a place for the genteel and wealthy, many of the dwellings in the Hill District in Uptown were a victim of age and became compartmentalized . This allowed many immigrant families to occupy the previously upper crust homes from the early 1900's.

I most often frequented the Hill in the 50's and 60's . The whole uptown section was "the deal' for us white kids from the burbs. It was just below the Hill where brother Jim and I bought our Chuck Taylor hightops at wholesaler Yanks Sporting Goods on Forbes Avenue. I also bought a then rare white basketball there. It was a gift for Jim who agreed to be my best man at my wedding to the Fire Captain's daughter.

The Hill population was then about 90% black and loaded with great jazz memories. Bar/restaurants such as the Crawford Grille & Birdies Hurricane featured good jazz on a regular basis for an enthusiastic mixed racial audience. Thus, the Hill provided me with a live introduction to jazz that I might never have experienced at such a young age.

I passed on that experience to my youngest brother Tom who I took with me to the Crawford to see the Ramsey Lewis Trio when Tom was still in his teens. I then abandoned him in a booth sipping his Coke so I could hunt up a Ramsey album on nearby 5th or Forbes Ave which the trio agreed to autograph for him during a break.

The Arena was located at the foot of the Hill and guarded the entrance to downtown Pittsburgh.The building hosted several different interests: Hockey, Opera, Tennis, College and Professional basketball, the Ice Capades, the Circus, Soccer, Boxing, Wrestling, Truck pulls, Roller Derby, and a number of truly incredible concerts.

The last left a particularly warm spot in my heart because my oldest son Bruce managed to "glom" two front row arena seats to see Sinatra and Steve & Eydie in the early 80's. I have never again experienced such an ideal "catbird seat".

The Igloo was the source of so many varied memories. I recall attending a basketball game on April 4, 1968, the year the Pittsburgh Pipers won the ABA chanpionship. Suddenly, like a modern day "wave,"there were shouts of "No!- No! No! as the news of Martin Luther King's death in Atlanta tumbled down to all of us seated in the arena. The riots soon followed.

A more pleasant memory is that of buying a ticket for my Dad so he could meet me and my buds at a uptown bar before we headed for the arena to watch the Dapper Dan Roundball Classic, the site of America's first high school All-Star basketball game. Dad showed up walking with a cane and mentioned he had turned his ankle earlier in the day.

At the end of the first quarter Dad lifted his cane - removed a plastic tip at the end - and distributed to all of us several narrow plastic tubes filled with a variety of spirits - including moonshine. Dad's ankle was miraculously healed.

It was in the Arena during the 60's that I also had the pleasure of exploring the "Walter Mitty" in all of us. This was due to the prodigious marketing skills of a guy named Joe Gordon, just recently retired from the Steelers. He was previously a promotional guy for the Pipers, Condors, and maybe even the Rens professional basketball teams in Pittsburgh..

Joe approached several local banks about the possibility of forming a league and fielding basketball teams to play "prelim" games before his Pro teams took the floor. I was a member of Pittsburgh National Bank's squad. The team and the Arena management agreed to let us have our "fifteen minutes of fame".

We "bankers" hustled everybody we knew, cajoling them to buy tickets for the pro games - and of course as a bonus - get an opportunity to see their sons, nephews, grandchildren etc compete on the huge floor.

One year PNB played PNB - Pittsburgh National vs Philadelphia National - for the mythical "State Bank Championship". This game was scheduled after the Pro game and was to consist of four 8 minute quarters .

That turned into 2 six minute quarters after the half when the Arena managment realized if the game ran past midnight they'd have to pay the maintenance people overtime. It may have been the first BB game played there where the clock kept running during foul shots and time outs.

We won, but, I now realize we were all winners back then.

Friday's Funnies

You're never too old to change.

We Sullivans recently completed our annual budget and decided to make some changes. We are a family consisting of a senior man and woman, and a Chihuahua who has to jiggle the scales to produce a reading of above 2 pounds.

We noticed, as is consistent with folks of our age, that we're using a lot of toilet paper. We decided to economize. Since then we vowed to use toiletpaper only following the 5th visit to the john. While our close friends disagree we insist this is a "change you can believe in."
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On a recent visit to get my haircut I was awaiting my turn and seated in a chair by the window. My "stylist" and I were unsuccessfully practicing our lip reading moves so as not to awaken the many senior women who were getting their hair done.

As I glanced back to the wall in front of me I found myself locked in a staring contest with a young miss of about 5 years of age. "Where did you come from?" I asked mockingly with a wink of the eye. Before she could answer I looked skyward at the ceiling and inquired, "Did you just fall out of there?"

"No- o-o," she replied - purposely exaggerating the one syllable word. She then giggled and continued with that lovely and riveting stare of hers before turning to her mother who was balancing two younger siblings on an expanding lap. The girl repeated our brief conversation to her Mom who smiled.

Apparently, I did so in a pseudo- falsetto voice that awakened the previously sleeping customers who now were actively engaged with smiles and active displays of attention in our direction.

I simply smiled back and the young girl returned to her Mom to whom she again repeated our conversation. I reminisced:

Jennifer was an only child and enjoyed playing in her fenced in back yard beside mine. It occurred to me I may have made a conquest which I often do with children under 9 and women over 90.

It seemed that everytime I came out she would stop what she was doing and approach me by the common fence we shared. It was there I would begin my slapstick routine:

"I love your blue dress", I would say. Jennifer would look down at her garb and reply, No-o-o-, it's not blue - it's green."

My reply was , "No, the reason I know it's blue is because it's the same color as your shoes" - which were a bright and shiny red. She would correct me again.

I then defended my mistake: "Perhaps it's because the Sun is shining in my eyes and making it difficult for me to see this morning".

She corrected me again by advising me she knew it was afternoon as she had just finished her lunch. We just looked at one another for a moment when I offered, "How come you aren't over there playing with your cat?"

That did it.!

"Mr. Sullivan, you really get confused. That's my dog. I'm going to have to talk with your Mommy and ask her to teach you your colors and your animals."

She threw up her hands, went back to her "kangaroo" - or whatever and I got back to my chores.

That was a long time ago - in a different life. Since then my early attempts to repeat this conversational approach in a bar failed to meet with a positive response from the femaale customers adjacent to me.

Obviously, there just weren't many women over 90 that hung out in bars.

Have a great holiday weekend.