12 Days of Christmas: American Dream Mall

American Dream's "Secret Garden."

There's nothing like an ironic visit to a mall in New Jersey to make you question your values.

When my sister visited recently from the Carolinas, I thought it would be a good sight-seeing excursion to schedule a first-time visit to the American Dream Mall. I figured that even if the visit was a disaster (which I secretly presumed it would be), it would be great fun and a story we could laugh about for years.

New Jersey is often known (and maligned) for its shopping malls. Other states took the basic mall concept to another level, on a larger scale with a focus on entertainment (hello, Mall of America). But now American Dream was promising to move the needle on that amp up to 11.

On the site of the Meadowlands Sports Complex in East Rutherford, the sprawling retail and entertainment center was first proposed in 2003. For a while, it was dubbed "Xanadu."

Four scenes from a mall.

Its first backer went into bankruptcy in 2007. Construction started and stopped over the years. There were other ownership changes, financing issues, construction delays, more bankruptcies, and various legal challenges.

Some theme-park attractions finally opened there in 2019, but COVID delayed further openings until just past fall, with many new stores and restaurants... and an indoor ski-slope and giant Ferris wheel to boot.

The current American Dream website lists a panoply of attractions.

I was unconvinced... until I visited with my sister and, unironically, I had fun. I even have photos to prove it.

The "mall" was clean and spacious. There was lots to see and do. It was tech-savvy and family-friendly, and people all around me were happy.

I didn't see that coming, New Jersey.

This must be how Tony Soprano felt before everything went dark.

Me, having fun.

12 Days of Christmas: My Mother's Garden

Mom's garden in May.

I grew up in a black-and-white house in suburban Totowa, NJ. Our backyard was large enough to pass for either a baseball diamond or football field... at least when you're a 10-year-old boy.

It's been many years since then, and it was not long after I went away to college that Mom embarked on an ambitious project to transform much of the yard into a garden.

Mom was born with movie-star good looks, and she has always liked to surround herself with pretty things. She particularly loves seeing her colorful garden in full bloom.

Blooming in July.

Even though Mom is getting older, she insists on tending the garden herself. Beginning this year, I sometimes received text alerts from ADT whenever she was outside in the spring and summer. As she worked in the dirt, she would accidentally hit the button on her emergency-call pendant.

Still, those false alarms have been a small price to pay for the joy her garden brings.

This year, like every other, when I would stop by for a visit, Mom would sometimes say, “Bobby, I want you to take photos of my garden.”

Sometimes, too, she would ask me to post these images on Facebook, so homebound and far-away friends could admire her handiwork.

Tomorrow is the first day of winter, and Mom's 90th birthday is next month. She keeps talking, with anxious anticipation, about wanting to see my Dad again. Dad died 16 years ago, so this refrain is a constant reminder that Mom will soon be planting flowers she will not see bloom.

While this makes me sad, I admire my mother's desire to continue to tend her garden. I also envy her faith in a better life to come.

It relates to something a kindred spirit with movie-star good looks once said.

Like Audrey Hepburn, Mom understands that to plant a garden is to believe in tomorrow.

Mom's garden in December.

12 Days of Christmas: Middletown

Middletown Reformed Church

In early January, I need to return to the Middletown Arts Center to retrieve photos on display there through year-end.

The exhibit, by members of Black Glass Gallery, is open through Jan. 3. Hours are 11-4, Monday-Friday (evenings/weekends by appointment).

The arts center is located on Church Street, and indeed several churches are within walking distance.

Here are three I found there, adding to my collection of church images I post every Sunday on Instagram.

I had dropped off my photos in Middletown before the leaves had fallen; I've a feeling things will look very different when I return.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Found in NJ (@foundinnj)

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Found in NJ (@foundinnj)

12 Days of Christmas: Asbury Park

After posting yesterday about Bruce Springsteen's hometown, I'm posting today about a favorite place that's haunted by the famous former resident's ghost. In fact, it's haunted by many ghosts.

Here's an album of Asbury Park images from visits there for my birthday (in September) and again in late October.

I especially like to go there during the off-season.

As another famous former resident of Asbury Park once wrote:

"Of all the brightly attired city people who throng this place during the summer months not one seems to care a penny for the ghosts that line New Jersey's famous stretch of seacoast…however, some parts of this coast are fairly jammed with hobgoblins—white ladies, grave-lights, phantom ships, prowling corpses."

— from "Ghosts on the Jersey Shore," by Stephen Crane

12 Days of Christmas: Freehold

Waiting for a fire in Freehold.

Given the news yesterday that Bruce Springsteen sold his music and publishing rights to Sony for about a half billion dollars, I thought it timely to post a few images from his blue-collar hometown.

I had visited Freehold for the first time this past summer to catch the "Springsteen: His Hometown" exhibit at the Monmouth County Historical Association before it closed.

At the time, I also posted here that although I enjoyed the exhibit, I didn't buy $650 a seat tickets to Springsteen's subsequent Broadway revival at a theatre on streets surrounded by burgeoning, and since worsening, homelessness.

Something about all this money doesn't seem right. It seems at odds with the Freehold that inspired this performance in 1999, posted on YouTube.

When I think back to my favorite Springsteen song, "Thunder Road," I think back to something my wife said when we visited the exhibit. "He could have only written that song when he was young," she said.

Her point? Passion changes form. You can't replicate an earlier time in your life. Operatic excess ages poorly.

Springsteen pulled out of Freehold to win.

He did, and here's what survives: the local firehouse and pizza parlor, and the remnants of faith, made manifest by its churches.

Overcoming Faith Temple, on Haley Street in Freehold.

12 Days of Christmas: Villa Milagro

Villa Milagro in Phillipsburg.

Tonight, Thursday night, is date night. That usually means splitting a bottle of wine with my best friend (hi, Nancy).

Tonight was no exception, and the destination was a favorite Mexican restaurant, Riviera Maya in Bogota.

Why Mexican?

Because it's December 16th, the first night of Las Posadas (Spanish for "The Inns"). This nine-day religious festival commemorates the journey of Joseph and Mary from Nazareth to Bethlehem.

Why Riviera Maya?

Because the staff is friendly, and the food is terrific. It's festively decorated for holidays, including a Christmas tree lovingly constructed by the owner from all the left-behind BYOB wine corks, some of them undoubtedly mine.

Tonight's wine was from Villa Milagro (Spanish for "House of Miracles") in New Jersey (aka "The Land of Advent Wine Calendars"). Atop this page is an image from a visit there about a year ago.

It's at least a 150-mile roundtrip drive between the vineyard and winery in Phillipsburg in Warren County and the small Mexican restaurant in Bogota in Bergen County. Most of it would offer a scenic view of the New Jersey countryside.

You could always split the driving with your best friend.

The cork tree at Riviera Maya in Bogota.

12 Days of Christmas: New Bridge Landing

The barn at New Bridge Landing is a work of art.

Whenever I've felt the need this past year to escape into another era, I've wandered from my nearby home to Historic New Bridge Landing.

You can read about the park at this Bergen County Historical Society site. As explained there, New Bridge is a collection of historic buildings on a site that served as a battleground, fort, encampment, military headquarters, and intelligence-gathering post in every year of the American Revolution. The historical society lovingly preserves the park.

The society sponsored a virtual event to mark the winter solstice: a balladeer presented prose by Charles Dickens, poetry by Robert Louis Stevenson, and other holiday readings.

It wasn't your average Zoom, but it was in keeping with the unique character of the place.

I love New Bridge Landing because it's not like anything else around its Hackensack/River Edge location. Down a busy street from a strip mall off Route 4, and across the way from apartment buildings, a train stop, and a McDonald's, a distinctive red bar stands magnificently out-of-place, amid a field of cattails.

This is the Ghost of New Jersey Past.

Images from New Bridge Landing in 2021 (from top): the barn in March, a maypole dance in May, "the bridge that saved a nation" in July, and scarecrows in October.

12 Days of Christmas: Budd Lake

Nonno's basement workshop, frozen in time.

This Christmas season, I'm looking back at the past year with appreciation for where I live and the people and things that surround my home in New Jersey.

Recently, a daughter asked what time period I would like to visit if granted a wish.

The question surprised me, but when I looked at my wife, she answered without hesitation: "I'm sure you'd want to visit the future."

She was right. I told my daughter, "About 50 years from now" (after I'd surely otherwise be gone).

I don’t fear the Ghost of Christmas Future. I mean, what did Ebenezer Scrooge think was going to happen to him?

I try to view the world with a little optimism, and I’d be interested in seeing the improvements in society and advances in technology.

More than that, visiting the future would help me make sense of my life (and my daughters' lives too).

Steve Jobs once famously noted, “You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something…”

I’m always looking backwards, trying to connect the dots, trying to gain perspective, and make sense of everything.

Nonna's untended garden.

Visiting my grandparents' old house in Budd Lake, NJ, last month, it felt as if I were walking beside them.

Perhaps I was their Ghost of Christmas Future. We toured Nonna’s now-untended garden and Nonno's suspended-in-time basement workshop.

I took a selfie in the old mirror by the kitchen sink. When I was a boy, I used to watch Nonno shave while standing in his undershirt at that same mirror, stirring a whisk brush into a bowl, contorting his face as he applied lather, and giving me a wink when he saw me watching him from the breakfast table.

During the visit, I trust I showed my grandparents that, even though things had changed, their lives had left an indelible mark on their families.

I still love them.

50 years from now, my daughters can accompany me, and I want to look back on the impact of my own life.

What Happened to All the Books?

Well, this is embarrassing.

Evidently, I took an eight-month lull from reading or listening to books this year... without even realizing it.

Oh, there was plenty of work-related reading; news stories every day; and, I realize now, an obsession with this Audible Original "Words + Music" series...

Pro tip: check out the hour-long podcasts featuring James Taylor and Yo-Yo Ma; I thought they were extraordinary.

After listening to the latest book-book on my list, "Sad Sacked," I vowed to start another.

I picked a book I knew I would finish, "Vanderbilt: The Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty," because of the boxes it checked:

History ✓

New York City ✓

Anderson Cooper ✓

It wasn't terribly long (although I cast a wary eye when I saw it was a "two part" book with an introduction and a prologue before the first chapter). Spoiler alert: the prologue will make you sad.

Still, I gave up on it today. The book was an earnest effort. Everything was as advertised. It simply bored me.

I think nearly two years of COVID-age existence have taken what little was left of my attention span.

Today, at the gym, I randomly listened to music instead of trying to slog through the backstory of another Vanderbilt. I enjoyed hearing Tom Petty sing about Mary Jane's party dress; and there, like an old friend, was an Ingrid Michaelson song I hadn't heard in years.

Then came another piano intro... and Paul McCartney started to sing "Maybe I'm Amazed." I stopped the treadmill to listen intently, and I got goosebumps because the music had stopped time.

I had recently watched every moment of Peter Jackson's marathon three-part documentary on The Beatles. It fascinated me to watch the fragmented creative process of the greatest band of my generation, and I was a bit saddened to see what seemed to be a disintegration of focus.

But now, decades later, I was listening to a jaw-dropping, fully-formed, pop-culture work of art that was written just as the Beatles had collapsed.

Thank you, Sir Paul, for filling me with a little optimism today. I have to admit, when I stop to think about my life and appreciate the beauty that surrounds me, it's getting better all the time.

---------

Here are mini-reviews of books I've read in 2021:

Sad Sacked: A Memoir by Liz Alterman
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Cleverly, expertly, written. This is the first book I've read in a few months, so I give the author credit for engaging me through some pretty rough subject matter: being unemployed (not by choice) and middle-aged, living in New Jersey. Raising a family is tough enough, and there's a moral issue (not explored here) about the willfulness of some employers. Also middle-aged and living in New Jersey, I've been lucky in my own career, but this book brought to mind the harsh realities that so many friends have faced, especially journalists. 

Still, this is ultimately a life-affirming memoir, and the author is seemingly effortless at weaving in humor. I say seemingly, because anything this well-written is surely not effortless.

I can't give it 5 stars though. This is a memoir, after all, and some things written about the husband made me cringe. Maybe one night in Jersey her easily-identified husband and I will run into each other, underneath that one stranded star. I'd like to buy him a beer.

Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Listening to the Audible version, it found it a little disconcerting to follow the narrative at first. It's innovative, not complicated, but still I'd recommend reading the printed version... especially because there were several poetic phrasings here I wanted to save/savor. The author is a wonderful writer, and my wife (who knows me better than anyone) predicted I would love this book. As it turns out, I didn't "love"/love it as much as Nancy thought I would. Which was also disconcerting. 

Making Conversation: Seven Essential Elements of Meaningful Communication by Fred Dust
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

A little long for the content presented... which probably has more to do with my own diminishing ability to focus (and which is one reason I wanted to read this book in the first place!) Anyway, lots of good stuff here: more about designing/planning important conversations than about engaging in conversation itself.

I now know it's ok (and helpful) to doodle while listening to a conversation. And I am inspired by this quote from the author: "The very act of creation is a courageous, generous, and optimistic act."

The Way I Heard It by Mike Rowe
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Highly enjoyable. More of a compendium of podcast episodes than a book. But what's a "book" these days? All I know is, Mike Rowe's storytelling format is engaging, and I kept imagining my grandfather was listening with me. This would have been right up his alley.

I know "right up his alley" isn't great writing... but that's just the point. You don't open or listen to this book for literature. You come here to be entertained, and maybe a bit more informed. And then you remember a loved one, like Nonno, who you know would enjoy this too. 

Post Corona: From Crisis to Opportunity by Scott Galloway
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

If you receive Prof. Galloway's emails or follow him on social media, this will be recent familiar material -- but it's EXCELLENT material nonetheless. Galloway is, perhaps, an acquired taste. If this book were a drinking game and the trigger word was "gangster" as an adjective, you couldn't get past the first two-thirds before passing out.

Still, you'd be entertained along the way by clever quotes ("LinkedIn is the social network we'd always hoped Twitter and Facebook would become") and insights (most university education in 2020 was nothing more than a $50,000 a year streaming subscription service).

Stick around the last part of the book. The word "gangster" disappears, and Galloway has thoughtful observations about income inequality and patriotism, and challenging ideas for positive change in this new year.