Hugo introduced this year's Spring Show at his school and he was in two performances. Not bad for a kid who was having anxiety attacks in his first performance at this school :). Hooray for Hugo...the dancer! The performer!
Hugo is the second from the left in this video.
And, here, Hugo is the "lead singer" in the white t-shirt to the left of the frame.
Saturday, April 20, 2019
Wednesday, April 10, 2019
On April 7, I lost an old friend. John Wicinas hadn't been healthy for a number of years, and last Sunday morning he succumbed to his illnesses, passing away peacefully at his home in Pennsylvania. Along with dozens of other people, I shared a couple of memories I had about John on his Facebook page. I have posted them below.
• • •
Many years ago, John and I were working at a summer camp at Penn State. We hadn’t met yet, as it was early on in the eight-week session. And so, one night, in the hour before it was “lights out,” and all counselors were on their floors, I had my window and door open to get the breeze to flow through. I was in art school at the time, and while I was waiting to make the rounds and put the kids to bed, I had taped these really "odd" concept drawings on the wall and just sat down at my desk to work on an idea that came to me for a small print. Maybe five minutes into the piece and straight in walks Johnny, like he owned the room, not a word he looks at the work on the walls and says in a low voice, “Dude. I love these.”
Most folks looked at my work back then and wondered what was wrong with me, or if I had a horrible childhood. But not John. He got it. And while we talked about making art, comics, heroes, The Simpsons, metaphor, mythology, chicks (‘“chicks dig me,” he’d say), and devils...I worked on this drypoint engraving. It’s called “The Gift,” and it was not about good or evil. It was about the competing forces of knowledge and wonder that exist within us. John understood that, immediately. To this day, he was the purest embodiment of both I have ever known, he had both in abundance, and I will always love and admire him for it. My life was immeasurably richer for having known a soul such as his.
• • •
In Fall 2004, I was working as an English teacher at a small boarding school in the middle of Wisconsin. I was teaching a British Lit survey course that moved chronologically, and I remember the class starting with Gawain (I think), then we were to move into The Canterbury Tales. And, that year, I had made up my mind to bring in John.
I remember he and I talking in years past about his juvie/court gig he was working, and I remember thinking to myself that it just wasn't a good fit. I knew if I could get him teaching, he would love it. So, my mind was made up; he was to come in and teach two days to two high school classes, four sessions total, about the Canterbury Tales; a subject I knew he was a wiz at since he wrote his Masters thesis at Brown on the Franklin's Tale. No lie, I was a bit nervous about this decision. After all, John tended to be animated when he was dialed up. He could be intimidating. But he seemed collected and put together.
He wore a grey three-piece suit and a tie, covered by a trench coat over the shoulders like a mafia don. We walked over to my office to get his stuff together before class and, five minutes before class, he proceeds to whip out two Mountain Dew Amps, and he pounds those in two minutes. "Are you sure, Johnny?" my eyes wide.
"Pfft! Yeah, I got this," he says.
No lie! He crushed it. He had music playing from the period, he greeted the kids at the door in Old English, he went into detail about what they were about to experience in the reading, and why it was important, and the kids were eating him up. His energy, his animation, his familiarity with the subject, and his love for it—all of that came shining through. The kids particularly liked how he handled the discussion of sex and violence (he kept it PG), and how he portrayed the characters in a way that correlated to the present day.
At teaching, I thought John was a natural, maybe among the best I have seen. And while I have always marveled at his success as a student, I was delighted at his decision to eventually become a teacher. And that's how I want to remember him; in my mind, John was a teacher.
• • •
Many years ago, John and I were working at a summer camp at Penn State. We hadn’t met yet, as it was early on in the eight-week session. And so, one night, in the hour before it was “lights out,” and all counselors were on their floors, I had my window and door open to get the breeze to flow through. I was in art school at the time, and while I was waiting to make the rounds and put the kids to bed, I had taped these really "odd" concept drawings on the wall and just sat down at my desk to work on an idea that came to me for a small print. Maybe five minutes into the piece and straight in walks Johnny, like he owned the room, not a word he looks at the work on the walls and says in a low voice, “Dude. I love these.”
Most folks looked at my work back then and wondered what was wrong with me, or if I had a horrible childhood. But not John. He got it. And while we talked about making art, comics, heroes, The Simpsons, metaphor, mythology, chicks (‘“chicks dig me,” he’d say), and devils...I worked on this drypoint engraving. It’s called “The Gift,” and it was not about good or evil. It was about the competing forces of knowledge and wonder that exist within us. John understood that, immediately. To this day, he was the purest embodiment of both I have ever known, he had both in abundance, and I will always love and admire him for it. My life was immeasurably richer for having known a soul such as his.
• • •In Fall 2004, I was working as an English teacher at a small boarding school in the middle of Wisconsin. I was teaching a British Lit survey course that moved chronologically, and I remember the class starting with Gawain (I think), then we were to move into The Canterbury Tales. And, that year, I had made up my mind to bring in John.
I remember he and I talking in years past about his juvie/court gig he was working, and I remember thinking to myself that it just wasn't a good fit. I knew if I could get him teaching, he would love it. So, my mind was made up; he was to come in and teach two days to two high school classes, four sessions total, about the Canterbury Tales; a subject I knew he was a wiz at since he wrote his Masters thesis at Brown on the Franklin's Tale. No lie, I was a bit nervous about this decision. After all, John tended to be animated when he was dialed up. He could be intimidating. But he seemed collected and put together.
He wore a grey three-piece suit and a tie, covered by a trench coat over the shoulders like a mafia don. We walked over to my office to get his stuff together before class and, five minutes before class, he proceeds to whip out two Mountain Dew Amps, and he pounds those in two minutes. "Are you sure, Johnny?" my eyes wide.
"Pfft! Yeah, I got this," he says.
No lie! He crushed it. He had music playing from the period, he greeted the kids at the door in Old English, he went into detail about what they were about to experience in the reading, and why it was important, and the kids were eating him up. His energy, his animation, his familiarity with the subject, and his love for it—all of that came shining through. The kids particularly liked how he handled the discussion of sex and violence (he kept it PG), and how he portrayed the characters in a way that correlated to the present day.
At teaching, I thought John was a natural, maybe among the best I have seen. And while I have always marveled at his success as a student, I was delighted at his decision to eventually become a teacher. And that's how I want to remember him; in my mind, John was a teacher.
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