On Monday I celebrated my 75^th birthday in NYC, so maybe this column should simply be called Surviving instead of Surviving Seattle. After all, my own father was dead when he was my age. I have to accept that, if everything goes perfectly, my life is about 75% complete.

Every day I am grateful for who I am, where I am, and how I got here. I didn’t choose to be born white, or healthy, or an American. But those three things put me in a tiny, tiny group that had a good chance at a good life on this planet at that time. When I get all puffed up about how cool I am and what a good life I’ve made for myself I try to remember that I had nothing to do with the most important factors that have given me a good life. read more

In order to “survive Seattle” I started thinking about a trip to New York last June. It has been five years since Marilynn and I visited NY and we were excited to see what’s new in the museums – renovations at MOMA and the Guggenheim, newer art at the Met, and the always edgy shows at the Whitney. And then there was Broadway; who and what was playing that we couldn’t get in Seattle?

New York is always aiming for a cutting edge experience. Who’s new? Who’s hot? What tickets can’t you get? What restaurants are booked weeks in advance? The answers were surprising this year. There was nothing we couldn’t get tickets for and because we have no tolerance for $500 dinners where waiters treat customers like the peasants in Les Miserables we de-tuned the restaurant expectations. All in all we managed to visit six museums and attend five performances in seven days, and the two that stood out were the George Bellows exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum and the Lincoln Center revival of Clifford Odet’s play Golden Boy. The surprise here is that both Bellows and Odets are artists of the early to mid-twentieth century and both are still searingly contemporary in 2012. read more

This past week was Presidents Week for me. It started on Wednesday night when I heard Jon Meacham, the Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer of Andrew Jackson, American Lion and Franklin and Winston, talk about his new biography of Thomas Jefferson at Town Hall in Seattle .

I’ve seen Meacham interviewed by Charlie Rose and as a panelist on the Sunday morning talk shows, but seeing and hearing him in person was an unexpected treat. He was funny, irreverent, erudite, and consummately in charge of his subject matter. On television he always seemed a bit wonk-ish and stiff, but up close he was confident, relaxed, and very engaged with his audience. He obviously liked and admired Jefferson but was equally clear that this was a deeply flawed individual. As the author of the Declaration of Independence he wrote that “all men are created equal,” but in his private life he was a slave owner who fathered several children by his slave, Sally Hemmings. For various reasons he could not summon the courage to advocate for their freedom and equality. read more

Garrison Keillor has a great sketch about a teenage boy who believes that his parents picked up the wrong baby when they left the hospital. His parents are dull mid-Westerners with no interest in culture while he is a thwarted artist living in their stifling prison of normalcy.

I live a variation of that story but mine is climate related. Neither my parents nor my children love hot weather the way I do. If I could have my way I would live someplace where the temperature stayed between 80-90⁰ day in and day out. Seasons are overrated in my estimation. The last three years in Saigon were nearly ideal – sometimes a little too hot and sometimes a little too humid – but I’d rather be hot and sticky in flip flops and shorts than shivering in a down parka. read more

What do baseball and opera have in common? They are both better viewed in HD than at the ballpark or in the opera house.

I grew up on baseball and loved going to games as a kid, but that was before flat screens and High Definition TV. Now if I go to a game it is really to be part of the ritual not to “see” it. If I want to “see” the game I do it in front of my 42″ flat screen where I can see the pimples on the pitcher’s nose. But, truth to tell, I hardly watch baseball anymore. I might if Seattle had a decent team but it doesn’t, and I’ve totally lost interest. read more