The Joe D Memorial Tribute Celebration

We're almost 6 months out and Joe D's friends have not forgotten him
or us. Saturday I went to a remarkable event - the "Joe D. Memorial
Tribute Celebration". Several of Joe's buddies are musicians, some
more talented than others. :) Music was a huge part of Joe's life
(although being a pianist, his tastes did not always extend to the
raucous rock and roll that some of his friends liked to play).
Anyway, about 10 years ago, Joe's friends Tom and Jim Z, Lyle and
Allen put together a band called Crevice Tool that made up for their
musical ability in their willingness to be loud and raunchy. Joe D
told them "Most guys like us just sit around and talk about it
(forming a rock band). You guys actually went out and did it. You
should have just sat around and talked about it." They played in
friends' apartments and other spaces where the band was allowed to pay
the owner for the privilege of playing. The band struggled to stay
together when Tom left Philadelphia to go get his MBA and subsequently
settled in NYC. They broke up forever when one of the 4 decided to
vote for GWB and one of the others refused to be in a band with
someone whom he felt was so clueless regarding politics.

After Joe died, Tom and Jim Z decided they wanted to do something
special to honor him. So they convinced Crevice Tool to reunite for a
one-night only gig and thus the "Joe D Memorial Tribute Celebration"
idea was born. Tom came down from NYC almost weekly since July to
rehearse. They recruited another friend, Craig, who is a classically
trained guitarist, to sit in with them. They recruited our friends
Denis and Cammy who have a alt.country rock band called The Knife and
Fork Band that has been successfully playing small local gigs for
about 15 years to be the opening act. One of our neighbors, also
formerly an attorney for the City, had a connection to a local club
called Connie's RicRac Room (a very dark, funky dive bar / performance
space that Joe D particularly liked). He managed to book the club for
a Saturday night. Crevice Tool (well, Tom) started writing songs
about Joe. They gathered up old photos and made a PowerPoint. We
publicized the event to our friends and neighbors. Crevice Tool also
decided they wanted to donate any profits. I convinced them that the
money should go to the Joseph DiGiuseppe Memorial Fund at the Friends
of The Free Library, which is where donations went at the time of the
funeral.

Saturday night, we had the event. We had somewhere between 80-100
people there. Joe's best friend from high school came up from
Maryland. Folks from Joe's office were there. Lots and lots of
neighbors. All of the friends Joe hung out with when we first started
dating. Many of the parents from Joseph's preschool (Denis and Cammy
and Jim also sent their kids there). We raised about $600 for the
library fund.

There were the usual last minute problems. Jim's viola broke so he
had to borrow Cammy's violin. The owners of the RicRac Room didn't
show up to open the place until 8:00 (show was supposed to start at
8), so there wasn't much of a sound check. Denis' sister Meg, who is
the lead vocalist for Knife and Fork, almost didn't make it because
her son had an appendicitis scare (he's okay). Jim's "dancers" bailed
out on him (don't ask me).

The show was a blast. Knife and Fork opened and played a great set.
Then Crevice Tool came out to much hooting and hollering. They played
some of their old standbys from 10 years ago - tweaked to reference
Joe (they have a song called "40 Ounces" but they changed the
reference from beer to Diet Coke). They got me up on stage to sing
background lyrics to a Husker Du song called "The Girl Who Lives on
Heaven Hill" (some of you may know that in my pre-Joe D., pre-law
school youth, I was a bit of a punk rocker and used to house members
of Husker Du and a few other punk bands when they had gigs in Phila).
They played a song entitled the "Ballad of Joe D and Theresa" which
progressed from Joe living with his parents to meeting me on the
subway to our traveling to Kazakhstan and adopting Joseph. Jim Z. did
his best Ice-T imitation and did a rap about Joe. The absolute
highlight of the night, though, was Tom's song "Fanny Pack" which was
a litany of most of Joe D's opinionated rants about life in South
Philadelphia (if you ever met Joe D on a non-work day, he could be
found wearing a t-shirt, zippered hoodie, grey or black sweatpants,
with a fanny pack (he called it his "black thing") around his waist -
he made quite the fashion statement). I laughed so hard I was in
tears.

The obituary, funeral and the outpouring of love we were shown in May
was one thing - but this, this was a send-off! We are so lucky.
Everyone should have such friends.

Never Too Old to Rock and Roll

So this is a story about Valentine’s Day. Valentine's Day never was my holiday, but for some reason, in life with JR's dad, who is otherwise a rather unromantic sort, it has taken on rather epic proportions (he proposed on 2/14/99, we signed the agreement of sale on our house on 2/14/00, which allowed us to set a wedding date, he usually does plan some type of event that involves going out). This year, he was particularly proud of himself. He made secret plans, arranged for JR's grandmother to babysit, and I caught him last Saturday bragging to some neighborhood moms – although he cut short the brag when I walked in. A few days before VD, he came home with a box which JR and I helped him wrap.

I, on the other hand, barely managed to buy a box of chocolates for his mom and a card each for JR and his dad. The cards were quite uninspired, since I bought them in my office building at 2:00 p.m. yesterday when the selection had pretty much been picked through.

I also came down with a horrible cold on Wednesday night, so I spent most of yesterday wishing that instead of having to go out, I could just go home and crawl into bed.

I got home from work and Memom was there, cooking dinner. JR came home with a stuffed bag of valentines from his classmates (everyone else gave out candy, or valentines with tattoos or lovely handmade confections – we managed to get JR to sign his name to 43 store-bought “Ratatouille” cards).

We had the exchange of presents – my MIL loved her box of chocolates. The boys were gracious about their uninspired cards from me. I was ecstatic to discover that the box I’d wrapped for myself contained John and Kira’s “lovebugs” (handpainted ladybugs of chocolate ganache filled with chocolate truffle). After dinner, we made our way out of the house.

JR's Dad had arranged to rent a car from Philly CarShare (this is actually worth it in our neighborhood, because moving our car off the block in the evening almost guarantees we will be unable to park anywhere near our house when we get home). We started driving deep into South Philadelphia – ending up at “The New Alhambra Sports and Entertainment Grille” at Front and Ritner Streets (this is an industrial wasteland of a neighborhood underneath Route I-95). I’d seen advertisements on telephone poles for boxing matches at “The New Alhambra.” The crowd hanging outside did not (to my relief) look much like a boxing crowd. However, there was far more black clothing, spiked hair, Doc Maartens, and tattoos to make me feel wholly at home in my powder blue parka and pink fuzzy scarf.

Inside, the boxing arena has been converted into a stage and a very loud, very Aerosmith-like band is playing. Above the stage I see a banner which finally explains the reason for our presence: “The New York Dolls” is scrolled across in red script lettering.

We had so much fun. The show was loud and high energy and upbeat and just a blast. For a few hours I got to forget that I just had a birthday and that I live this very conventional familial life where the big event is the occasional potluck dinner at neighboring parents’ homes. We stood in the crowd, cheering and dancing and singing along and feeling like we were still 25.

The first thing JR's Dad said when we got there was that he was sure he wouldn’t know anybody there. Was he ever wrong! First we saw a woman we know (friend of a friend), then we saw the younger sister of one of our closest friends, then we ran into another neighbor couple whose kids are in the same age range as JR. The crowd was interesting – lots of young punk rock types and lots of older folks (some of whom looked much older than us) looking unfashionable and, as they say, too young to die and too old to rock and roll.

So now you know why I love JR's Dad.