Gerulski Family Blogs

Where the Gerulski family shares their experiences

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Oh My, Keeping a Promise

by David

June 29th, 2010 · Family, Feature

Not long ago I wrote about starting a trend. The trend was to return to blogging – on a regular basis.   And though it took some time to get started, I did get started. One of the best parts about writing again was communicating on a regular basis with Tom Collins and enjoying the comments of my immediate family, brothers and sisters.

On July 1 I begin a new job (actually I have been working unpaid for 8 weeks – so its not so new). I am going to begin traveling again and will have to manage a team of individuals. With these additional commitments, I hope that I can keep my promise to continue the trend – and keep posting.

Tom Collins has been trying pretty hard to  ”Call out,” family members on the Vacketta site. I am going to take a page from his blogs and call out the Gerulskis.  Though I appreciate your comments, try writing a blog or two a little more often.  Prod your children, and your children’s children, (Wes certainly has things to say) to post.

My goal to start a trend was not just to encourage myself to write more. It was meant to lead by example. If I wrote, other’s would read, respond and post more themselves. Misery loves company.

Come on folks, help me keep my promise and start a trend.

David

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Strawberry Fields… Forever?

by David

June 22nd, 2010 · Feature, Uncategorized

I’ve got a thing about strawberries. Probably been eating them forever. Yet, my first real memory comes from early Spring of my 4th grade year.  I was 10.

I was living in Westville and wanted to plant a garden.  The widowed neighbor woman next door, Mrs. Hennett.. (Oh man, that REALLY bothers me that I remember that name. I met three guys in a meeting today and can’t remember any of their names.)  ..allowed me to plant a garden in her side yard by the street.  I can remember ordering plants and seeds. Probably from Sears or some other catalog since the Internet was still about 20 years off. One of the plants interned in Mother Earth that Spring was fragaria vesca – the strawberry.

I remember being so excited to get them, and then learning when they arrived that Strawberries would not produce until their second year. Two years! I wanted strawberries next week. What the..?

The strawberries were planted alongside cabbage, onions carrots and the like. The garden was sort of a disaster, as I now recall.  Yes, it produced. In fact it produced some great big cabbages that TudLou picked because I failed to watch (or weed) the garden after the first couple weeks.

The next year Mrs. Hennett didn’t offer to let me garden again. I am not sure I asked. However, those strawberries kept coming up. I think years went by and I would find an occasional strawberry plant next door, growing like a weed.

When you are kid, a bowl of strawberries is always accompanied by a spoonful of sugar. In that mode, the berries are always sweet.

In the years since, I have always been disappointed in strawberries. In my adult mind, strawberries are not to be sweetened by sugar. The perfect strawberry is sweet and flavorful on their own. Sure, you can coat them in chocolate, but even then, you seldom eat a strawberry with flavor on its own.

I read in The Smithsonian magazine recently about a man in Virginia. I think he was a professor of Botany. His dream was to find the perfect strawberry and produce it in quantity. There’s so much about this idea that I find amazing. First, he would go through fields of strawberries looking for plants that had the real essence of strawberry. What is that essence?  Well it’s not odd that you ask because, frankly, good strawberries have not been produced for a long time. Those great big red things you find packed in a plastic container at the grocery. Those aren’t strawberries. They are remnants of a fruit that was once grown in the backyards of 10 year old kids. They have no flavor today, no essence, no natural sweetness. Like Americans, today’s strawberries are oversized remnants of memories past. They are mined in Texas. (The strawberries, not the Americans.)  Anyway, the Botanist, is trying to find a naturally pure, sweet, pungent, strawberry and bring it back to life.  When he finds potential candidates, he self pollinates, and waits two seasons.

Peggy buys the the big strawberries in the plastic grocery tin. (Can a “tin” be made of plastic?) She buy’s them because she has an eye for  good looking things, with potential. That’s how she found me. (But that’s another story.) The plastic containers are placed in the drawer in the refrigerator and I am often found selecting one, and with a little prayer to the strawberry God, insert it in my mouth, only to be disappointed. Mined, in Texas.

So last year I planted strawberries in one of my garden boxes, this time knowing it would take two years for them to produce. And this season, I was blessed with lots of strawberries. The problem was, as Bob noted while the blooms were still under the pollination of the bees, a box was not the proper place to grow strawberries. He was correct, strawberries need to grow on hills, with lots of aeration, away from bugs, and dew.  My strawberries were plentiful. But it was a race to pick them before succumbing to mildew and bugs. Mostly, I was disappointed in their flavor.

Last week on one of my foraging trips into the refrigerator I found another plastic container full of promise. A romantic, I still test the basket, wanting to love again.

It was perfect Texas mined color, big, promising and.. sweet! I mean really sweet. Like a child had poured sugar upon it. The second one was examined under a light to see if someone had put crystals of cane upon it just to fool me. There were no crystals. It was naturally sweet!  I can’t say that those strawberries really had the essence I was looking for. But sweet was a good start.

Twenty minutes ago, before sitting down to write this, I opened the refrigerator drawer and there sat another plastic container of deep red, perfectly shaped fruit. I pulled one from the container. It was a magnificent specimen..

..and it tasted like a Texas strip mine.

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Unabomber

by David

June 9th, 2010 · Feature

I can’t get the picture out of my head.  Hoody, dark glasses covering his face.

Lives in the remote mountains of Montana.

Seldom heard from.

Writes messages in code.

Then BAM!  Straight from left field.

“Sloan” died May 29th, heart attack. while riding his motorcycle. at 2am..

There it is.

I had to read the cryptic email three different times before I could piece it all together.

First off, I am very close friends to a “Sloan.” Greg Sloan. And he rides a motorcycle. And the sender of the above message also knows Greg Sloan.  But if something happened to Greg Sloan, I would have known about it first and sent a much more descriptive email.

So I went back to the email message, titled “Robert S. Martin.”  Then it hit me. Like a Unabomber projectile.

Robert S. Martin is from Westville, Illinois.  He was nicknamed “Sloan” sometime during his youth. Attended school with him.  Saw him just over a year ago in a Westville bar with my two brothers. One of them..

..the una-emailer.

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Philosophy on Life

by David

June 7th, 2010 · Family, Feature

This post started as a comment to Tom Collins’, Youth, Adulthood, and Maturity, posted on the Vacketta site. My brother Frank commented what a good post Tom had written. I agree and started to comment, then thought, the response is worth a post of its own.

Reading Tom’s article made me think about my own philosophy of life. Some of you have heard me say it before, it is often quoted right after I return from the dance floor. It goes like this:

Dance like a 5 year old.
Paint like a first grader.
Run like Phoebe.

The third line is in reference to the TV show “Friends” the episode where Phoebe runs in the park – classic.

I can’t take credit for this philosophy. It’s a compilation of others.

So I thought I would Google the lines to see from whom I robbed and I came across Mark Twain’s philosophy on life:

Dance like no one is watching.
Sing like no one is listening.
Love like you’ve never been hurt and live like it’s heaven on Earth.

Wow! What words to live by.

My brothers Frank and John turned 50 in February. Another, even closer to me, will do the same in a few months. I know all three, are thinking about the half-century number. At 47, I can only guess. ;-)

I don’t want this to sound like advice to the younger generation, because until you are ready, no one wants to take advice. Instead I will just provide a story that I have told before, over a martini.

When I went to college at the University of Illinois, belonging to a fraternity was the “in” thing to do. I joined right out of high school. I never lived in a dorm.

Ronald Reagan was in office, there was conservative movement. Izod and Polo shirts were “in.” Docksider shoes were “in.”  Member’s Only jackets were “in.” I wanted to be “in” and to be just like all my fraternity brothers from Chicago’s North shore suburbs. I was a disaster. In trying to be like the others, I drank too much, studied too little, assumed a lot of debt and failed at just about everything.

Outside our family, some of the people that I am closest to, are from that fraternity. However, I wouldn’t relive those years for anything. My life changed when I quit trying to be like everybody else. When I quit wanting for the life of others; celebrities in magazines, bankers on Wall Street or just keeping up with “The Jones’” in big suburban houses. I became who I am when I decided to do what I like and quit worrying about what others were doing or thought.  And when I did this, life became much easier.

So be yourself. Dance like a 5 year old. Paint like a first grader. Run like Phoebe. And try not to hurt others in the process. Whether you are 50 or 15 it’s a lot easier..

..and way more fun!

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Bloody Stub or Doing My Piece for the Environment

by David

June 5th, 2010 · Family, Feature

I can remember watching Sunday morning cartoons, as a young child. The Sunday cartoons weren’t the typical ones broadcast on Saturday mornings. Sunday’s included Rocky and Bullwinkle, Boris and Natasha and Dudley Do-Right. The interesting thing about these cartoons is they were shown in segments. The plot would build on some story where Nell, Dudley’s romantic pursuit, would find herself secured by Snidely to the railroad tracks with a oversized rope and a train fast approaching when the announcer would interrupt the action with “Join us next time for Nell Looses Her Head or  What’s Up Buttercup.”  And can honestly say, I don’t ever recall seeing both parts to any story (and now wondered if there ever was meant to be two parts).  Which brings to mind the title of this blog, and many others before it. Those simplistic, meaningless cartoons, have had a long term effect on my writing style.  Go figure.

I awoke this morning around 6:15 and pretty much decided before my feet met the floor that I would do good by the environment (and the tire I carry around my waist) and walk the 1.8 miles to the train station. I have taken MARTA, Atlanta’s rapid transit system, home from work but never in. I have even begun packing a change of clothes, so that on the way home, I can change into running shorts and shoes for the final 1.8 miles.

I showered, dressed and began the morning ritual – making coffee for Peggy, feeding the cats, and delivering the newspaper to the widows across the street. The morning was perfect. Warm, not yet hot or muggy.

As I began my walk, it wasn’t long before I had un-buttoned my shirt. (I had misjudged that muggy part.) Walking with the shirt wide open, the wife beater beneath, exposed. By the time I had walked a mile, I was drenched in sweat. By the time the remaining eighth of a mile passed, I had acquired an acute limp.

The air conditioned train was a Godsend. The woman next to me surely regretted her choice in seating.

The walk from the train to the office is only about four city blocks. I tried not to limp or sweat. I did a bad job of both.  Upon entering the office I immediately headed to the bathroom, took off the undershirt, washed it in cold water  and did a quick spit shower using the wet t-shirt for a rag. I put my outside shirt back on and carried the undershirt back to my office.

It was then that I removed my shoe and noticed a spot of blood the size of a playing card on my right foot. It was so grotesque, I limped over to whomever was in the office already and displayed my bloody sock covered foot. One co-worker asked if I had been shot.

I removed the sock to find I had developed a blister the size of quarter and it had already burst. I spent most of the rest of the day with one shoe on and one barefoot. As I write this, I am reconsidering my position on the environment.

Join us next time for, “What’s That Smell?” or  ”Screw It Al, I’m Buying an SUV.”

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I’m Here!

by David

June 3rd, 2010 · Family, Feature

Dan Molina was in town last night.  I met him after work. We shared a few drinks. I had martinis – very dry, up, olives. You know the order. Dan drank Glenmorangie, double, with a single cube. We started at the W downtown. Had dinner at the French American Bistro and closed the rotating bar at the top of the Westin (I had changed to gin and tonics by then).

So I wake up this morning and feel way better than I should. Actually giddy that I am not feeling like crap. Shower. Dress. Peggy drops me at Marta on her way into work. I figure I’ll take the train today. As I am waiting for the train, I keep thinking of Tony.. ..cause I am going to have one of his  3 o’clock hangovers.

So I am a little foggy. Not sick or anything. Just foggy. I get into work, turn on my computer and this is the sight that hits me.


..it’s Chief and a lacrosse ball.

How one picture can make me so happy..

..and so sad.

I took this shot about a year ago.  I had been working on the sprinkler system in the back yard. It was leaking. The result, a deep muddy hole filled with red Georgia clay. Chief brought his ball over and dropped it.  In front of me was the muddy mess. In went the ball. As with Rufus, the only solution to stopping a dog from annoying the shit out of you with a ball is to ignore them. Chief would have none of that. He got his face down in the muddy mess, picked up the ball and held it right up to my face.  That’s when I took this shot.

I miss Chief and here I sit, at my new job, hoping nobody comes by and notices I have tears in my eyes.

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Stories and Questions

by David

May 27th, 2010 · Feature, Thought

As a reader of books, I suspect I am an odd sort.  I remember years ago, in my early twenties, on a car trip with my friend David Cooke, he offered upon watching me read, “Dave, how is it that you can read two paragraphs, stop, and start again?” He continued, “When I read a book, I read almost from start to finish. Or at least I read pages at a time.”

Until then, the way I read, didn’t seem strange. Growing up I had often read books in both ways, cover-to-cover, and short snippets over time.

Tonight I finished Cormack McCarthy’s Cities of the Plain. Mr. McCarthy’s writing has been central in my reading over the past couple years. It all started with a book he wrote titled, Blood Meridian.  And I swear, it took nearly a year to get through the book. I would read it one or two pages at a time before I went to bed. Often it sat for a month or more on the bedside table.  It was unlike anything I had ever read before, detailing North American marauders killing Mexican Indians in gruesome detail. The book was recommended to me by Wade Coleman, a friend and co-worker. It was one of those books that seemed to take forever to get going. In the end, it was moving like a runaway freight train. Heavy, fast and out of control.

Upon completing Blood Meridian I asked Wade what else I should read by McCarthy. His recommendation this time was No Country for Old Men. From the first page it was obvious this book would not sit on my bedside table. I read it in very short order. If you have seen the movie, it didn’t wander from the book at all. Great book. Fantastic screen play.

In no time I was back asking Wade for another recommendation. Next he offered a McCarthy trilogy The Crossing, All the Pretty Horses, and Cities of the Plain. Each of these books was consumed in my own strange pace. There were days I read chapters at a time and months when they sat next to my bed.

In the middle of the trilogy I heard about another movie being made from a McCarthy book. The movie was titled, The Road, after a book of the same name. So I picked up the book and read it cover-to-cover in about two days. There was no setting  The Road down. For one thing, I am not sure one could actually sleep between its pages. It was after reading this book that I went out and bought an AK47 and enough shells to last a good long time.

Tonight I finished the third book in the previously mentioned trilogy and in its last pages contained the following words. I figured since Tom Collins reads this blog, I would post a question to him about the meaning of the words.

.. Bear with me, the man said. This story like all stories has its beginnings in a question. And those stories which speak to us with the greatest resonance have a way of turning upon the teller and erasing him and his motives from all memory. So the question of who is telling the story is very consiguiente.

Every story is not about some question.

Yes it is. Where all is known no narrative is possible. ..

Okay, I had to go to the Spanish English dictionary just to learn what “consiguiente” meant. It means “result.”  Go figure.  But that isn’t really what caught my eye. Rather the last sentence, “Where all is known no narrative is possible.”

I think that’s a pretty cool line. And, the more I think about it, the more it is true. Tom, what’s your take?

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The Tie That Binds

by David

May 26th, 2010 · Family, Recreation

I can’t help but think of the days when families met for a “quiet” day in the park, or afternoon at a relative’s home. I can remember food and cold drinks. The adults played cards, horseshoes, bocci, or sat and listened to the ballgame or the Indy race. Kids of all ages did there own thing – whatever trouble that might be.

Pre-Race Warriors

This past weekend the Atlantans got together for what must have been the oddest event ever to bring us together – the Warrior Dash. I don’t know who came up with the Warrior Dash, but I can thank Paul Chiaffredo for getting the family to participate.

The Warrior Dash, for those who don’t know, is a race, or a costume party, or a festival. I am not exactly sure which. The easiest way to describe it would be to add a link to the web page right <here>. But don’t fall for that trick because I have to explain it first. You can go out and look for yourself after I have finished.

The Warrior Dash is a new nationwide event. Held in ten different locations on ten different weekends, it pits runners against natural (fire) and not so natural (junk cars) obstacles. At 3.2 miles it isn’t a long race, but it is a challenge.  Runners had to maneuver through four feet of  pond water  and mud for the first obstacle. (It was here that Paul lost his shoe and was forced to run the remainder of the course barefoot.) The pond was followed by a plethora of tires, then four walls, junk cars, a rope wall, cargo rope accent and decent, tunnel crawl all interspersed within the forested North Georgia mountains. Upon our decent from the mountain we arrived at a 20 foot long mud trough complete with a barbwire ceiling forcing contestants to knees, elbows and bellies. To our chagrin the end was not yet in sight for ahead was another lake crossing, this one complete with huge floating logs requiring us to slurry over and a short dash with two final jumps over rows of fire – yes fire.

Marin Warrior

Domestic Warriors

Did I mention costumes?  Because you can’t just tie on your running shoes and attempt such a challenge. You must dress up! Of course there were lots of warriors – Roman based, William Wallace, Indian, even domestic (see picture). Tony, Marin and I went as redneck warriors. Each with our own style.

Bob participated, as did Paul, Tony, Marin and I. That’s an age spread of over 40 years from oldest to youngest. Mary, her aunt Linda, Janice, Robby, Joey and Leila came to watch. No longer are the adults and kids separated.

At the end of the race we drank beer, ate turkey legs, wiped mud smears off each others’ face and laughed! We laughed a lot. The family is still getting together. We are just doing things a little differently than the, “Good ‘ole days.”

Now you can click <here> to see the official website.

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Jay’s Math Bumpies Picked as New and Noteworthy

by Jay

February 24th, 2010 · Feature, School, Tech

Hi all,

Just had to share the good news with you all.

Math Bumpies just got picked as New and Noteworthy on the Apple iTunes App Store. That means it’s on the main page of the App Store. Out of 140,000 apps, I’m pretty excited.

Jay
Rookie Labs, Inc.
http://www.rookielabs.com/

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Starting A Trend

by David

January 15th, 2010 · Family, Feature

This social media thing was going to change everything. Our kids have been using Facebook for years, and finally, we adults began logging on. Initially, I thought it would be the tool that would keep us all updated. More pictures would be posted, more content, more comments on the content. The kids would write daily and the adults could really begin to follow what was happening in the extended family.

After nearly a year of use, it occurs to me that Facebook is great if you can afford to follow it in real-time. But, as a historic record, it falls flat. So I think it’s time, time to return to good old fashion blogging. (Did I just call blogging old fashion?)

I for one am probably the most delinquent of all when it comes to family blog updates. Considering I posted to the family blog the most, and have not typed a word in over six months, blame may rest here.

As a heavy user of self-introspection, I have been chewing on the reasons why I have written so little lately. Time spent on Facebook commenting on the atrocities of a government run healthcare plan, spare minutes replaced with Sudoku on the iPhone, new job and hobbies have all been probed as a cause for my prose dysfunction. Sadly, I don’t think the solution comes in a little blue pill.

TV should also be on the list. Not a chronic watcher, I do spend more time in front of one than I did when it did not exist – in our house. And even worse than the absence of writing, my consumption of books is also flailing. Funny thing is, when I have finished a book over the past year, it occurred to me that I should write more.

I have heard it before, though I don’t know where, that “one” does not consummate a trend. But you have to start somewhere. So let’s all start using the family blog a little. And I will try to do my part; write more often, post more pictures, and start an upward trend.

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