FROM PROMISE TO PROMISE...

...that is the title of a song written by Rod McKuen and recorded by Frank Sinatra on their collaboration, "A Man Alone."

And here are the lyrics.

"I sometimes wonder why people make promises they never intend to keep. Not in big things, like love or elections, but in the things that count ~ the newspaper boy who says he'll save an extra paper and doesn't. The laundry that tells you your suit will be ready on Thursday and it isn't. Love? Well, yes, but like everything else, we go from day to day, and we move from promise to promise..." 

Promises have always meant a great deal to me personally. If I give my word to someone, I've always done my best to keep it. (Barring, of course, evil external forces that cause emotional trauma. Then all bets are off.)

I used to work for a record company that had a highly-respected 'classical' catalog. When a doctor I was seeing told me he loved classical music, I promised him a surprise on my next visit. As I gleefully handed over an extensive collection of classical records to him, I will never forget his words:

"Paula, you are going to have a very difficult time in life." When I asked why he said that, he replied, "Most people will tell you things and then forget them. Very few keep their word, as you did today. Because of that, I'm afraid you are going to experience many disappointments in this world."

Decades later, in retrospect, I guess I've had more than my share. And being an extremely sensitive and sincere person, each and every broken promise also put another little crack in that fragile little place where one's heart is located.

The first broken promise that shattered my heart was when I was in high school, and a neighborhood friend casually said that he'd drive by the next day and pick me up in  his car. That was such a big deal, to be picked up by someone with a car, I could not wait until 3:00!

My friends had all left, but I waited and waited outside the school exit until, at 4:30, I finally gave up and walked home, absolutely devastated that someone I loved so much could 'forget' a promise. I cried until I had no tears left, but I continued to believe in promises...I never could vanquish that trusting little child inside, regardless of how many times my heart was broken.

These days, I no longer get as upset as I did when I was young; but I have become a lot more circumspect (if still hypersensitive) about 'promises' and the terrible sinking sensation I continue to feel inside whenever a promise is broken.

The final lyrics of Rod McKuen's song:

"I've had a good many promises now, so I can wait for the harvest. And some of them to come about..."

That would be a nice ending, wouldn't it.....?

THIS IS A TEST: POSTCARD FROM ________________?

Compared to tar and cement?? HA!

As already explained in an earlier blog, I refuse to divulge the identity of my new digs for fear of making it sound too attractive and thereby increasing the population.

And also because a negative connotation of its faded past continues to stubbornly cling to its name, in spite of the fact that it has been rated among the top American cities for safe, affordable and clean living many times over in the recent past, once even coming in at numero uno!

That said, the picture above is just a hint of the difference between __________ and Cement City, also known as "New York City, the capitol of the world!"

Yeah, right....but only if you have the capital of Donald Trump to afford living in the land of sky-high buildings/taxes, absurdly expensive rents (even in the poorest sections of the five miserable boroughs) incessant nerve-shattering noise of the "city that never sleeps" (or bathes...don't even think of using the famous NYC mass transit system in summertime without a gas mask; a haz-mat suit is also recommended) and home to some of the most corrupt politicians ever to exist in modern America, including and especially the state capitol, the infamous Albany, NY.

I am a "native New Yorker" (or New Yawker, if you will) so I am qualified and allowed to not sing the praises of an overcrowded, crime-ridden, noisy, rude and filthy city that I have come to loathe late in life (not that I EVER "loved" it.) And I am not alone, that's for sure. Most native New Yorkers find it almost impossible to leave their "home town" in spite of all the negatives that come with the miserable territory. But not this NNY 'cause in my head, I am "already gone" ("and now you'll have to eat your lunch all by yourself!" ~ Eagles.)

Food prices? Out of sight on the scale of affordability. Public transportation, bridge tolls? Forever going up-up-and-away! The afore-mentioned rents? By far, the 'cheapest' (and poorest) borough for rents is The Bronx. Try $950.00 per month for an "old fashioned apartment just one block away from the world-famous Bronx Zoo" ~ well, that's where I was born and raised, and back then, even the $32.00 monthly rent was too much for what we got in exchange, especially the lack of heat on frigid winter mornings. And what a quaint way of describing an old dump of a building ~ "old fashioned, just one block away from the (uber-expensive) Bronx Zoo." Aww, now that just warms the cockles of me heart!

And now that the past and current mayors have virtually destroyed every last open space in order to build-build-build (= taxes, taxes, taxes!) not to mention turning Manhattan into a warped version of Disneyland, and a new mayor on the horizon (most likely the one who enabled the current mayor to steal a third term) this place is doomed.

Sorry, Billy Joel, but I have serious doubts if I will ever again be in a "New York state of mind." The very thought of it gives me a powerful case of the skeeves (an Italian derivative of a word that translates to disgusting.)

"Some folks like to get away, take a holiday from the neighborhood..."

Yup, but this time the "holiday" is going to be permanent, thank every spirit in the sky.

And so ends another POSTCARD FROM ______________? and my new home!