Dedicated to Jerry Garcia. 8/1/42 to 8/9/95. He passed at 53 years young and gave us memories for 300 years. All he ever wanted to do was play…. Songs below..

“Let us take our fellow man by the hand, try to help him understand we can all be together forever and ever when we make it to the promised land” My Sisters and Brothers… See below

Good morning Wake and Bakers, Welcome to the most dense, according to some critics, most densely populated state in the nation. That number is 1200 people per square mile. On Long Beach Island today that equals 7500 people per square mile. That means we are simply crazy people with nowhere else to go or we are the most socialized people in the US. As Jerry said about Grateful Dead fans so it is for people from New Jersey…. "We're like licorice. Not everybody likes licorice, but the people who like licorice REALLY like licorice!

Everywhere you go there is a line. We measure our lives in line time. How much time did it take to get donuts? There is only rule to live by regarding lines. No coffee, burger or bagel is worth waiting in line, more than five minutes, with one exception. The exception is quality. Concert, ball game or bagel can be so good one can put up with the line. My favorite exception is Jess’s Bakeshop in Garwood. (Jess and Simon are the best). That sourdough is worth the wait. Here is the easy hack. Get there at noon.

There is also expected etiquette when in a New Jersey line. Know what you damn want! Do not be indecisive choosing between caramel and hazelnut. Do not engage the server in a friendly discussion of what is the best latte at Starbuck’s. They really don’t care what you want. Do not contend you are in a rush and get to cut a line! These interactions are indicative of our general personality. We are busy and in a hurry. We can be rude and direct at the same time. Get to the point already or we will interrupt in mid sentence. Everyone gets an opinion but no one gives a damn about your opinion. If you cut the line we will find you!

Everyone has a favorite local pizza or bagel place. When you are looking for quality it is hard to distinguish yourself from so many restaurants. There are fifteen pizza places within five miles of Westfield, NJ. The Wake and Bake pizza favorite these days is Massa Roman Pizza in Scotch Plains, NJ. Portnoy gave them an 8.3. The newest and coolest pizza is the sourdough pizza served at Bucky’s in Chatham, N.J. The singles, especially the chicken parm, are outstanding. The sit down or take out pies are equally exciting. We stop for bagels, staying local, at Babba’s bagels on East Front Street in Plainfield or Clark Bagels on Raritan Road. The bagels are outstanding but the fun is watching the Jersey locals come and go. Both places are always humming so get there really early for the warm ones.

We are people who say thank you and hold the door for each other. We return shopping carts to the center depot. We are disgusted with littering. Those people should be shipped to Wild Town, Nebraska (See 12/24/ 22). There are rules that should be respected. New Jersey drivers are now redefining road rage behavior. We have people going too slow in fast lanes while we have too many Formula 1 drivers weaving in and out of traffic. If we allow standards to deteriorate further our quality of life will diminish. Suburban New Jersey values those standards. Quality of life depends on the administration of force. There is no move to defund the police. The police officers live in our communities and we are proud of them. "We would all like to be able to live an uncluttered life, a simple life, a good life. And think about moving the whole human race ahead a step or few steps”. J

We are proud of our libraries and our school ball teams. We are proud of our diversity. Nearly one quarter of our population is foreign born. There are more languages spoken in NJ than anywhere except California. We are proud of our beautiful state which has more to offer than most of us can imagine, let alone experience. In a single day I can catch sunrise at Sandy Hook, while seeing the sun’s early light reflect off the Freedom Tower, and finish the evening hiking to Mt Tammany ( at 1521 feet) to see the sunset. And still get back to Manhattan for dinner.

Jersey is a small nation of nine million people. Almost half a million people rise before dawn and commute to Manhattan every day. Every one of us know someone who died in Manhattan on 9/11. We are a tough hard working melting pot who rise early and do not take kindly to lazy people. This column has affectionately lionized those who wake early to feed our sweet tooth. They are part of that Jersey brand of down to earth. Don’t get too full of yourself. Even the mobsters frown on expressions of wealth. Don’t seek attention! Billionaires walk among us every day in Jersey. You may not know them but they could be sitting right next to you. Hey, Is that Springsteen? What a great place to live a wonderful life!

"If you're able to enjoy something, to devote your life to it or a reasonable amount of time and energy, it will work out for you." JG

Peace to Everyone….

The summer is the time for adventure and it was time for the Wake and Bake bus to get back to the road. There was a time, so long ago, when a young man and his trusted companion set out, soul seeking, to see America. The memory that remains vivid, after 50 years, is the majesty and openness of the American landscape. The horizon in Colorado looks completely different than the beach view. When you wake up here, and go out to meet the sun and the bison, you can see 50 miles in every direction. Green mountain tops give way to bare red sandstone. Shades of brown colors the landscape. That feeling greets you every day and lifts your soul.

Friendship has brought Smooth Warren, Hambone and Dr.Rob to the foothills outside of Denver. We are chasing memories at the Red Rocks concert venue. This iconic location, outside of Denver, has incredible views of the Continental Divide and the sunset. The venue was built in 1941 and seats 9,500 people. When you stand at the top of the bowl you can see Denver to the east and the sunset to the west. The giant red rocks reflect all of the natural light and are constantly changing color. At night, the concert lights play off the natural sandstone as the lights change from soft blues to sharp reds. Very cool!

The music tonight will feature the Tedeschi-Trucks band. The band features twelve incredibly talented musicians. They are fronted by the luminescent coupling of Derek Trucks and Susan Tedeschi. Together they pay homage to heartland blues and classic rock and roll tradition. The audience will consist of Gen X and Boomers living in the moment. Today is August 1. Jerry Garcia was born on this day. There are sparks in the air.

The Wake and Bake bus set out early today to see the bison. There is a herd of around 35-40 fully grown and baby bison living in Genesee Park near Golden, Co. That is not something you see in Buffalo Grove, Illinois. The trail system is well maintained around the protected land for the bison. There is a very popular 5 mile loop that we sampled. The pines dominate the steep countryside. Can you tell a lodgepole pine from a ponderosa pine? They take their forest management seriously out here. The trails are free of debris and are well maintained. You live along side wildlife in these Denver suburbs. Do not be surprised by mountain lions or big bucks. Humans are intruding on their land.

The park offers a variety of hiking trails and is one of the oldest Denver city parks. It was built in 1912 and mostly completed by 1926. The bison were brought here from Yellowstone in 1913. There is a safe viewing area now for everyone. The city leaders also built a beautiful event facility, in 1918, in Genesee Park called Chief Hosa Lodge. One can see the Continental Divide from the front veranda. The title Hosa refers to peaceful leaders of an Indian tribe. Little Raven was an instrumental Arapaho Indian leader in the mid 19th century. He passed in 1889. He received the title of Hosa because he negotiated peace treaties between the United States government and multiple Indian tribes. The good people of Denver dedicated this architectural stone mansion in honor of this unknown hero. Little Raven must have been an enormous force for peace.

Any Wake and Bake adventure includes searching for the perfect sweet treat. The East Coast can make food snobs out of the most forgiving of us. It is going to take something special to move the needle. Golden, Colorado has two bakeries that we enjoyed. There were amazing cupcakes, which we consumed over three days including Sunday breakfast, provided at Gold Mine Cupcakes. Gold Mine has been a Golden staple for the last decade. Our favorites were the ALL Vanilla, Carrot Cake and Chocolate cupcake with an oreo cream topping. That chocolate cupcake was so good “I have to give it a 9.1 Frankie”.

We also visited the Grateful Bread company. Do you think they are sending any branding fees to the Grateful Dead Company. We sampled a variety of items. The sourdough bread and bagel were good but Jess’s bakeshop in Garwood, NJ blows them away. The cinnamon sugar croissant and babka roll were very good and any day you can have sweets is a great day. But they were not memorable. Food Snobbery. We were fully loaded with sugar and ready to rock and roll. Soon it would be time to head over to Red Rocks. None of us had ever been there before.

There is always music to chase in the American heartland. Adventure means following the band of your dreams from city to city. There are Deadheads of course. That flying circus was improbable and compelling. What was the purpose of the journey? Bob Weir used to say that the Grateful Dead road experience was one of the last remaining outlets where one could find freedom, adventure and family. We may all be too old to sleep in our cars and eat grilled cheese in the parking lot but we can still chase some of our dreams.

From the moment you enter, Red Rocks meets all expectations. How did the builders conceive of this place. There is a perfect bowl surrounded by ancient sandstone boulders shaped by wind and rain. The child awakens again. The shared human experience with thousands of concert attendees quickens the beat of your heart and amplifies all your other senses. As you gaze up at the rows of people you understand the simplicity of this moment. All we want to do is forget about our troubles, live in the moment and have some damn good fun.

Tedeschi Trucks never fails to deliver. There is an infectious joy that emanates from the stage. The horn section moves in rhythm to every song. Each of the players, sax, trumpet and trombone, gets featured leads. The lady trombone player makes you want to dance and play all night. There are three backup singers. Each one could lead their own group. Every night, when it is their turn to shine, they own the stage. That is the secret sauce that makes TTB great. These musicians love the ensemble. There are 12 members, but it is clear Susan Tedeschi and Derek Trucks, who lead the band, have created a musical space that allows everyone to perform at their highest level.

What an amazing night of music. Susan was in great form especially when she was singing Angel in Montgomery into Sugaree (honoring Jerry Garcia’s birthday). Her cover of Mojo Workin’, the classic Buddy Guy song, brought us all to our feet. We were treated to classic old rock standards like Ohio and Why Does Love Got to Be So Bad. Watching Derek Trucks orchestrate the whole group is amazing. With simple nods and looks he launches the individual players on spirited solos. And we always wait for Derek to finish each song with one of his soaring riffs. There is no one else who plays guitar quite like Derek Trucks.

So there you have it Wake and Bake fans. Get out on the road this summer. August is waiting. Find some fun and adventure. Rob, Warren, Scott and myself will never forget this weekend. Find the time for your friendships. Our time is running down. Share the love that you have in your heart. Let harmony and music continue to bring us joy, peace and fun for the rest of our days.

Peace to Everyone

Midnight in Harlem

Why Does Love Got to Be So Bad

“Do not judge your friend until you have stood in his place, and do not believe in yourself until the day you die.”—Rabbi Hillel 40 BCE.

The story goes that Napoleon Bonaparte was walking past a synagogue in Paris and heard unrestrained wailing, as if someone had just lost a child. He sent his aide inside to find out what was going on. When the aide returned he reported that the Jewish people were recognizing a tragedy, a horrible loss, which was the destruction of King Solomon’s temple, in 586 BCE, by King Nebuchadnezzer from Babylonia. Napoleon remarked that people who still mourn the loss of their land, over two thousand years ago, will surely return to that land some day. Unfortunately it took a Third Tisha B’Av, the Holocaust, for Jews to regain sovereignty over the land of Israel. David Ben-Gurion once said “In Israel, in order to be a realist you must believe in miracles”.

I fasted this past Thursday. It was the first time Tisha B’Av became significantly important to recognize. This is the second holiest day on the calendar after Yom Kippur. It is a no fun holiday. There are five no-nos. No Sexual Relations. No Eating. No Bathing. No Lotions. No Leather. Who would want to have sex with someone who has not bathed, was hungry or wasn’t wearing leather?

The inspiration for the observance is tied to Deja Vu, the sense you have been here before. October 7, 2023 occurs and Israel becomes the aggressor and not the victim. They are accused of being an oppressive colonizer by Westerners who grow up in countries who engineered colonization. Jews, not Israelis, are accused of genocide. Do a simple Google search. Palestinian Population 2020. Compare it to 2026. We are living a flashback as Jews have become scapegoats for the world unconscious fears. Sixty per cent of registered voters between 18-24 say they support Hamas over Israel. The brainwashing has taken hold.

One of the ways to make sense of the mishigas, yiddish for crazy, investing emotionally, is reliving the stories of our written history. There are tremendous lessons with clear warnings and parables for people to consider. This day, the 9th day of Av on the Jewish calendar, tells two stories. The first is the history story about the Babylonians and the burning of Jerusalem and the First Temple. How could the chosen people be dragged off to modern day Iraq. They had survived the desert and had built a great society dedicated to Yahweh. The barbaric Babylonians were to blame. They are not off the hook but that is not the whole story. The second story is about the why. There has to be a why. Jews do not see themselves just as victims. We look inside ourselves to see how we have failed God’s directives.

Apparently, Israel 586 BC, had become corrupt, godless and immoral. The leadership class had become sexually immoral, narcissistic and easily corrupted. There may have been some good ones but idolatry had made a come back. Jewish laws were not obeyed or respected. There was this prophet named Jeremiah who was going around warning everyone and no one listened. “From the north disaster will be poured out on all who live in the land.” And so came the Babylonians. There are lessons, in our written history, that warn our people about conditions that precede breakdown in society. There are expectations, put upon us, that are clearly stated. It is one thing to not believe, but it is quite another to break out the idols.

And so Jews experienced Tisha B’Av over 3000 years ago. Imagine the center of our world being destroyed . 9/ 11 was horrific but life inexorably moved on. New Yorkers continued to live in New York. It is more like Charlton Heston, in the Planet of the Apes, discovering the Statue of Liberty washed up on the beach. Everything you knew was gone. That is the meaning of the destruction of the First Temple. All connectons were severed. Tisha B’Av. As it was, King Cyrus of Persia conquered the Babylonians shortly after 586 BC. He allowed the Jews to return back to Israel and the returnees reconstructed a Second Temple over the remains of the first. That Second Temple was the center of Jewish life for the next 500 years until 70 CE.

Jewish Scholars suggest that the breakdown of Jewish society in the first century was baseless hatred. Jealousy, personal vendettas and petty narcissism characterized the mood of people. There were outward displays of fealty but there were internal struggles between fellow wealthy Jews. That jealousy eventually led to a false accusation which Rome seized upon to break apart the Jewish way of life. As the wonderful Rachel Goldberg-Polin says, “that puts baseless hatred and not following the commandments as co-equal”. It is not enough to go to synagogue if you continue to hold baseless hatred for others. The beauty of our Jewish identity is the gift of this reflection.

How many of our Jewish brothers and sisters paused this past Thursday to recognize the meaning of the holiday? Some were seated on the floor, in Williamsburg and Lakewood, exactly like the men in Paris in 1815, crying and reading Jeremiah’s Lamentations. Most were not and most are not thinking about the haunting similarities between millennia. These are clear warnings now that look like contrails across a clear blue sky. They do not belong there.

The billionaire class is at civil war with each other. They wear the robes of religious people but privately despise each other. Open Source vs Anthropic. Musk vs Soros. Bill Ackman vs Neville Singham. Ben Shapiro vs. Tucker Carlson. Which billionaires are funding protests for the cause de jour. The working class is at civil war with each other. Antifa vs Patriot Front. Masks versus no masks. Defund Police vs Hire more Blue. Girls compete with girls and not with boys who say they are girls. The amount of baseless hatred that is expressed on line between these groups is staggering.

No one can agree on anything. No one can talk about anything. If you are not down with the bullet points of the cause then you are a threat and traitor. Other folk just go around wanting everything to be free. Meanwhile, they want to take your money to make that happen. As Steely Dan once said… “ I heard it was you talking about a world where all is free, it just couldn’t be and only a FOOL would say that.” Hey if you believe manna falls from heaven you can say that. There is a continuing decline in faith, let alone faith in family or country. We have a political leadership class that is corrupt and self interested. These are all hot red blinking signs.

We need to pay heed to our stories. If we do not learn the lessons we will suffer unimaginable pain, even if that may lead to unimaginable growth. Hope is our most powerful gene. We can turn this ship around. Jews went back to the Israel after the exile and rebuilt a second temple. We were thrown out of Israel by the Romans and scattered all over the Mediterranean and Europe for the next two thousand years. Jews have pulled themselves up and out of every expulsion, pogrom and Holocaust.

Great centers of learning and piety developed in the Diaspora. Judaism flourished, outside of Jerusalem, from Spain to Latvia. Now that we have returned to the Holy Land of Miracles it seems we have been tasked by God to ask even harder questions of ourselves. Can we do better? Can Israel do better? Can we demand our leaders do better? Can we listen to our enemies and believe in miracles again?

Peace to Everyone..

Billy Strings. Taking Water. He is the preeminent blue grass musician of our time and future Grateful Dead front man… Mayer and Strings.. I can feel it coming.

Let my inspiration flow
In token rhyme suggesting rhythm
That will not forsake me
'Til my tale is told and done. Robert Hunter.

These are the days between. According to the Hebrew Calendar I was born on the 8th of Av, which corresponds to the Gregorian calendar date of July 22 this year, which is different than my birth date of July 16 (2nd of Av in 2026) The Jewish calendar differs from the Gregorian calendar because it is a lunisolar calendar that corresponds to the appearance of the new moon. It also dates back 5,786 years. The Gregorian calendar was established by Pope Gregory XIII in 1582. Ironically, both calendars have a leap year issue. These days between are a rare opportunity to reflect on what has passed and what is to come. So today I am still 69. Time is not always linear.

My cousin Florence, once a popular name, called to sing HB. We spoke about growing up with “greenas”, mostly Polish Jewish survivors from the Holocaust, and how that affected our experience in our homes and in America. There was no doubt we had an intuitive sense of trauma and death that our parents and their friends experienced. My childhood ritual was to make sure no entity was hiding in my closet or my drawers. I created a protector, Casper the Ghost, who watched over my bed. Yup, that Casper. All of that uncertainty was balanced by parents and community that loved us more than we understood.

They only asked two things from all of us. Remember who you are and where you come from. Translation: You will always be a Jew. “Nowhere to run to baby… no where to hide”. Honor the past and never let anyone forget.

Live life with spirit every day.

That spirit and devotion helped create a monument in a county park without county approval. This was an agreement between like minded individuals who decided to honor my parents and survivors of the Shoah. Ron Zuber was the county bureaucrat who let it happen. Aside… We had dueling rabbis at my wedding in 1986. One was Rabbi Steven Dworken. The other was Rabbi Natan Zuber. Unrelated in life, connected in spirit.

That monument stands at the eighteenth disc golf hole at Oak Ridge Park in Clark, New Jersey. The owner of Drew Memorial in Colonia never charged me for the monument. Leonard Neuringer, may his memory be a blessing, helped design and install the plaque to the stone. No politicians, no press release and no drama. Oak Ridge Park walkers and joggers will stroll past for one hundred twenty years. Pretty good…. pretty good.

Living life with spirit is a challenge we all face. Some of us want to find truth as we live life with spirit. Others want to simply enjoy the ride. What does it mean to almost lose your life at 10 years old. What force stopped a little boy from sliding down Bear Mountain? It seems I was not scheduled for death that day. Compare that fear with the excitement of an eight year old sitting in centerfield for a World Series game in 1964. Sandy Koufax struck out 15 Yankees that day breaking the heart of that little boy. His father, Max Kaufman, was a Dodger fan. Of course! The Dodgers had Sandy!

So here is to Max and Blanche for all the memories and for providing the opportunities. And in honor of an improbable event, that saved a ten year old on Bear Mountain, a sixty year old man started putting Tefilin on every day. Everything becomes possible.

This is a gratitude list.. We all have them.

Summers in the Catskills at the bungalow colony. I was a better swimmer than my parents when I was seven years old.

Long games of Ringolevio.

Turning thirteen was great. Bar Mitzvah parties. Men on the Moon…. Jets, Knicks and Mets won championships.

Parents took us to Hawaii, Florida and Puerto Rico during high school years. They regretted the PR trip. That is where a girl, like Eve herself, invited me to smoke some weed.

I played a eunuch and a beggar in high school plays. Not the leading man type.

My favorite teacher: Richard Sax.

I visited Israel and Italy before I was 18. I was never the same after Italy, if you know what I mean…..Well. it was the David statue in Florence…

Dad paid for Georgetown and almost feinted when he saw the crosses on every building around Healy Circle. As he loved to say when we were in a business together, “not everyone went to Georgetown, Alan.”

Hoya Basketball… in fact all basketball since 1969. Have never stopped reading the box scores.

Ultimate Disc/ Frisbee came to Georgetown in 1976. Played for twenty years. We invested time in our junior and senior years playing competitive ultimate on the college circuit. It was great to be part of something, featured on ESPN TOP 10 highlight packages, that has grown exponentially in fifty years. The documentary FLATBALL is a fond look back at Ultimate in the seventies and eighties. .

USA Cross Country Trip with George Hall. 9/76-12/76. 12,000 miles on the road in a red Buick Century, soul seeking, to become a warrior. America is a beautiful country!

Took LSD more than once. “ What a long strange trip its been.” There is something more than the material world!

Coaching sports and playing sports have been pillars of happiness. We all need to play. My body still allows me to continue to ski, hike and bike. Throwing a disc with my right arm is another matter. Youth was spent chasing one sport after another. Now we chase goofy size balls. Look at all our friends playing Pickle Ball. The benefits of playing far outweigh the risks of falling.

My kids became very solid ice hockey players and I do not know how to skate!

My parents could not ski or swim and my six year old grandchildren ski and swim. That is a good life.

And my grandparents probably had no clue what skiing was.!

There is so much more without going into naming pins on a world map. There are all the people in business who have been loyal to your company. They work with you through good times and bad. A rising tide raises all boats. When we all subscribe to that the world is a much happier place.

Music has been another pillar of happiness. Springsteen at Georgetown in 1976. Tedeschi Trucks at Red Rocks, August 1 2026. The Wake and Bake bus will report live from Colorado that weekend. There have been so many great live shows. Our long life span has allowed us access to the greatest catalogue of music. We have been the fortunate sons and gatekeepers of an enormous treasure of twentieth century creative expression.

At the five minute mark now so let me wrap this up by saying 70 is not a state of mind. Your body reminds you every day that you are 70 . The truth is that the runway is getting shorter. Better get your wheels up more quickly!

Peace to Everyone…. This is all thrown together as it has been beautifully hectic the last four days with family, brown-eyed girl and friends. Wanted to get something out for you all. I am so thankful you keep coming back to read Wake and Bake…

PS>. I SAW A UFO WHEN I WAS 12 over George Petronella’s house..

Two songs for today:

Nick of Time by Bonnie Raitt performed by Lake Street Drive.. “Life is precious when there is less of it to waste” That is Rachel Price singing lead. Great summer vibe here.

Terrapin Station. Live

“Small Wheel turn by the fire and rod. Big Wheel turn by the grace of God. .

The wheel is turning and it can’t stand still. If the thunder don’t get you than the lightning will.”- RH

They say curiosity kills the cat. Jack Nicholson famously said “ You want the truth. You can’t handle the truth.” As my friend’s son said about the Pentagon’s release of UAP/UFO video and internal memos, “hey, I believe all that is possible and true but until you interview one of those small Grays on national television none of it is a big deal.” Most of us simply go about our business because life demands that we pursue our own interest. We do not have time for REAL ALIENS, let alone flying saucers.

When Don Vito was he promised three things. Kennedy tapes, Epstein tapes and UFO disclosure. The Kennedy tapes were a nothing burger. He came up short on the Epstein tapes and this may have more to do with the JP Morgan settlement, valued at 290 MILLION with 191 Epstein victims, than it has to do with his own guilty past. Trump did declassify hundreds of UFO documents. This past June, standing on the steps of the Capital, David Grusch, surrounded by five member of Congress, called for permanent immunity for UAP whistleblowers. He presented compelling evidence of the historical eighty year cover up by the United States Government. The legend of Roswell is now solved. However no one in government is willing to go on the record. Congressional representatives report there is tremendous Intelligence Community push back on disclosure. The rock is almost at the top of the hill.

The last eighteen months we have seen continuous pressure from Congress to release classified video and documents. There have been Congressional hearings. There have been Pentagon releases. There have been NASA releases. Those videos, if you have not seen them, are sensational. There were over 340 million views in the first twelve hours and over a billion worldwide since then. They range from written reports of green waves of objects over American nuclear research facilities in the 1940’s to satellite imagery of unidentified aerial phenomenon.

We have testimony from legitimate establishment leaders that there is something happening here. What it is, ain’t exactly clear. Sounds like a song…. We have national news coverage at 6:30. This is no longer the stuff of midnight radio and Art Bell. Mainstream America is paying attention. There have been over one billion views of the Pentagon videos. Spielberg’s Disclosure Day has grossed near 200 million worldwide. What are parents and kids discussing at kitchen tables? It is on the frigging news people!! Dr. Phil and Neil DeGrasse Tyson are on the same page.

Hey Boomers, this does not even touch the Internet world of Reddit, X or Facebook. The kids can find this stuff easily. The podcast world, from Joe Rogan to Jesse Michels (640,000 subscribers) provides daily and weekly content interest and speculation. Private Journalists Ross Coulthart, Jeremy Corbell and George Knapp have protected whistleblowers and managed the difficult line between truth and fantasy. The appetite for content is growing.

This is a world wide phenomenon and it will surprise no one when other countries start releasing information. It has already happened in Brazil with the Varginha incident from 1996. Japan has its own cottage industry devoted to UFO events. According to the declassified Australian documents, Australia has been aware of American CIA involvement in the program for over sixty years.

There is an accelerated pace to the releases. Every day my algorithm is feeding new images and stories that are revealing. Albert Einstein’s assistant Dr. Shirley Wright 1993 confession tape can be found on You Tube describing the 1947 Roswell spaceship and bodies. Stories are circulating about meetings between Eisenhower and NHI, namely The Grays and The Nordics, at Edwards Air Force Base.

We are way past the X-Files and The Twilight Zone. The most recent declassified documents and videos are from military and intelligence officers. The data is our data from our systems. Grusch is a former Air Force Intelligence officer. His speech was groundbreaking. What was telling was the lack of push back from every one of our intelligence agencies. Usually there is some formal denial, distraction or debunking of sources that comes from the letter agencies. There was none of that last month. None of it. Instead Jared Isaacman, the head of NASA, simply said, “We have captured imagery, based on the data we have within that imagery, we don’t know what it is.”

That is remarkably unassuring since these objects seem to love flying around nuclear sites throughout the world. If our best and brightest are not worried why should the citizens worry. Crafts have probably crashed in countries all around the world. Reports can be found in Russia and China. Everyone is in a race to find something that we cannot comprehend. It is sort of like the Manhattan moment. The world will change in an instant. Imagine unlimited free energy. What would that do to the existing power structure? Can I power the Wake and Bake truck with that energy?

“We are getting ready to find out there are things we can’t explain that WE HAVE IN OUR POSSESSION. Evidence that we can’t explain with concepts that we understand”. This was DR. PHIL this past week. He wss quite concerned about the psychological effects of disclosure. What will humans do when it is revealed humans “are not the top of the food chain.” The reasonable Dr. Tyson simply said, “Is it too much to ask that at this point to for them to just show the alien… “We’ve already been told this, so to say if they rolled out an alien, we’d somehow freak out given the century of alien movies we’d been treated to and alien stories… I don’t see that we’d freak out at all.” Dr. Phil is less sanguine about the effects of Disclosure than Dr Tyson. Perhaps the risk of Disclosure is the price humanity must pay to turn this old ship around.

Peace to Everyone

Please check out the companion piece “They are real”, written in February 2026 .

Genesis 6:4 “The Nephilim were in the earth those days, and after that, when the sons of God came unto the daughters of men and they bore children to them; the same that were the mighty men of old, the men of renown.” Wild trippy stuff. Who the F are the Nephilim. This is right after the creation chapters and generation lists after Adam and Eve. Why is that story even there? Please ask your rabbi or clergy for clarification and watch their eyes twist.

Dear Subscribers, I intend to depart from a normal Wake and Bake this morning and take a long view of our country and the world around us. Pardon me this indulgence. But it seems the right time to reflect on all that has occurred the last few months. Much of my thinking has been shaped by 525 pages of cultural and comparative archaeology in the Graeber and Wenrow book, “ The Dawn of Humanity”. There is much to worry about and there is much to be hopeful. I hope to dispassionately engage the reader to see something they may not be seeing.

Editors Note: This was originally written in July, 2022. Some corrections and additional thoughts have been added.

2026 Insert- Skip to the bottom for a Four Pack of 4th of July songs.. This is a long piece, ten minute read, so play the music and beat the heat today.

“The only passions I have are love of liberty and human dignity”. Alexis De Tocqueville

All you have to do is start walking. That is what families or individuals did when they wanted to leave their community five thousand years ago. Eight million African Americans left the south between 1900 and 1960 and moved to the North and West Coast. I mention this because most of my boomer friends are seriously distressed about the future of our nation state. After the most recent decisions by the Supreme Court and the continuing epidemic of gun violence in our streets and our homes( suicide and domestic violence) some of my fellow citizens are considering leaving the USA. This is not an unusual sentiment that any individual can begin to feel at anytime throughout history. When any ruling body, be it Pharaoh to President, infringes on the “inalienable” rights of the citizens, the citizen has the universal and fundamental right to disobey, to move away or to establish new social ties with other people within that community while being free to move back and forth between communities. If I want to move to Canada today it is much easier to leave town than it was five thousand years ago.

We have seen the erosion of some of our basic liberties the last twenty years in the name of security and safety. Terrorists scored the first victory with the hardening of airport security . 9/11 ushered in a new era of government surveillance with the passing of the Patriot Act. Cameras are everywhere so make sure you are smiling! Technology continues to present new ways to get inside your home and your privacy. Pandemic allowed nation states to disrupt some of our basic human rights such as the right to disobey, limited our freedom to worship and move freely about. Social mobility, the ability to move between economic groups, is also diminishing. Political difference are separating friends and family. Trump fans are not always invited back for dinner in Westport, Ct.

Some of our major cities seem more concerned with protecting criminals and not protecting victims. The Government policy of allowing illegal immigration has not served any useful social purpose. The Supreme Court strips down Roe v Wade eroding the rights of millions of women in pro-life states. Universities and Corporations have imposed cultural touchstones and barriers to free speech and the freedom to communicate those ideas without fear of reprisal. Progressive activists regularly “cancel” random individuals. Institutions did not protect students after October 7, 2022.

Militia groups, right wing and left wing, continue to proliferate. Radical Billionaires inject their fuck you money at existing institutions. They probably compete with each other for all we know. Government and the Bureaucracy exceed their powers on a regular basis. An example of this overreach, in my business life, has been the housing business. The regulatory costs of building a house are over twenty percent of the total building cost of the new home( NAHB 5/5/2021). How can we be serious about building affordable housing if investors have to burn money to employ a bureaucrat?

We are being overwhelmed with social and legacy media. The corporations that run these public companies are more interested in stock price than public interests. Millennials and Generation Z are the least read and the least educated generation in recent history. Graduates from 19th century high school know more than these kids. They are also the least patriotic of any group living in America today ( More In Common-2022) All they know are phones. Tik Tok babies. Be an influencer man. How many followers do you have? That is real power to them and they really believe that is an indicator of who is important. We have lost respect for real people doing real things to help our community. The fireman is less important than the influencer.

The last twenty five years have been leading to this moment. We have lost faith in our institutions and our leaders because they have failed us. Clinton was a reprobate. 9/11 was a tragedy that could have been averted. Iraq was a disastrous exercise of power built around a HUGE LIE. “The Big Short” destroyed hundreds of thousands of families financially. Obama could have been the transformational President. He came up short! We did get more medical care for more deserving people. But that has not worked out well over the last few years. Bring on Medicare for all!

Trump! The Charismatic Leader Syndrome! Pandemic. Lockdowns. Lost Learning Years. George Floyd Protest/ Riots, Antifa Riots in Portland. New lows for the country on January 6th. Followed by Grandpa President Biden who made me miss Ronald Reagan. Now we have the biggest bunch of crooks since Tammany Hall. The total revenue that the Trump family, and close associates of the Trump family, are making is in the billions. It makes Hunter and Joe look like the corner hustlers for the Man in the White House. There is no direction, other than the low hanging fruit of slogans, that is clearly laid out. There is much to worry about July 4, 2032.

This is a time of schismogenesis, a coined term by anthropologist Gregory Bateson, “when people tend to define themselves against one another”. Listen to the phrasing of the Democrat socialist opposition. Disagreement is not tolerated. This is how a discussion about fossil fuels or pandemic can begin amicably, and then after an hour of discussion, an ideological divide opens up and suddenly you are a complicit moderate of the elite or a miserable capitalist.

We both have equal interest in a better future. We both have different ideas of how to get there. Dylan’s line is apropos “ We always did feel the same, we just saw it from a different point of view”. We do the same thing at the nation state level as well. Our WEIRD point of view is sharply defined against the political world of Russia and China. We seem to want to point out our differences more than our similarities. How does David Graeber and David Wenrow give me hope?

Graeber takes the reader on a journey through history reimagining the course of history as a great experiment, rather than some linear progression from caveman to modern man. He is able, through the discoveries of archaeological sites around the world, to reveal the amazing variety of civilizations. This is the most delightful part of this book. Graeber reveals cultures and civilizations of which I had no knowledge. Native American civilizations, like Poverty Point in Louisiana, are over three thousand years old. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. This community, larger than a half square mile, has mounds that are built to specifications that can be found from Louisiana to Peru. This knowledge, well advanced beyond our paternalistic assumptions, was somehow passed from place to place or discovered by advanced thinkers that lived at that time.

The authors also examine the human imagination and its ability to govern itself. We have been experimenting with different forms of governance for ten thousand years. When the Axial Age began, eight thousand years ago, with the introduction of Zoroastrianism, humans have reflected on their place in this world through Abraham, Confucius, Buddha, Plato, and Jesus. We have also worshipped warriors, kings and queens. Is there hardwiring in our brains for hierarchy as civilization becomes more organized?

There are three essential forms of control, that are accepted by the members of that society, that are the extensions of the ruling class. The control of violence, through the use of institutional forms (like the police and the army), is common to most of these cities. Control of knowledge, through the use of courts, an activist bureaucracy and economic specialization (i.e metallurgists and agriculturalist) can lead to control over a population. When you add the potential of charismatic personal power, expressed through an individual or some external unseen power (God or Gods), or both, it is not hard to imagine how a society becomes obedient to that power. That is the Trump playbook. Merge American myths with his charisma. The man loves playing to the flag!

However, Graeber and Wenrow guide us to societies and civilizations, that existed five and six thousand years ago, where there is no archaeological evidence to support an organized hierarchal society. There are no monuments, temples, foritifications or palaces. Evidence of cruelty, sacrificial bones, are distinctly lacking. Female figurines of clay were the most common remains. Pottery is characterized by wide variety of design and color, unique to every individual house, as if each household had its own aesthetic tastesThese type of cultures can be found all over the world. One well known site is in the Ukraine and it is named Taljansky. It was a little bigger than one square mile and it is distinguished by one characteristic, houses.

The common thread is the egalitarianism of the community. Each house was approximately 16 x 32 and the community was formed like a tree trunk, with great rings and concentric spaces between. The innermost ring was a large area and when archaeologists dug there they expected to find something dramatic like buildings or burial grounds. They found nothing of note. It could be a place of common assembly or the seasonal penning of animals. These communities, ranging in population, from 2,000 to 10,000, were actually physically close to each other, no more than 10 miles apart. What is striking, to the researchers, is the diversity of food creation in these societies. They maintained an ecological balance between hunting, gathering and planting. It was “play farming” in small gardens for most families. Graeber characterizes this community as “forming from the bottom up through process of local decision making”.

When reading this I was struck by the similarities to our suburban middle class towns. When you go through parts of Brooklyn, Queens and much of suburban and urban New Jersey, all the houses are similar size and yet they each have an individual quality to them. If you looked inside you would see the same variety of custom and ritual you would have seen 5000 years ago. These communities are also highly organized around a central common area and they cooperated with their neighbors to address any logistical challenges. In our modern world the fire department was an egalitarian response to our local challenges. Communities worked together to protect everyone equally. All politics were local and remained local.

This is my greatest hope for America in the next ten years. If we all start to take a real in the community around us we will be able to learn from each other and return to respecting each other when we disagree. We will be able to find the space to do great things together. There is no reason to resent me, if I am your neighbor, because I feel differently than you about climate change. It is quite normal to disagree but resentment puts it on an entirely different level. Change begins in every small town in America and we can see it happening in front of our eyes.

Look at the demographics of intermarriage in America. There will be no retreat on this trend. Corporations, large and small, are increasingly diverse. Affordable Housing Initiatives are powerful engines for growth and diversity in many communities. The increase of homeschooling has been dramatic in the last five years. The migration away from northeastern and west coast cities will have positive effects on the communities where they settle. Our most recent immigrants have great respect for history, culture and authority and they will be the locomotive that powers changes in some of our cities.

Women will become the majority in all professional classes. There will be a new Thomas Edison, born in many emerging countries, and change will occur at a faster pace than ever before. Ray Kurzweil, science fiction writer, predicts humans ( in 2032- SIX YEARS FROM TODAY) “will reach "longevity escape velocity". This is the point where scientific and medical advancements will add more than one year to human life expectancy for every calendar year that passes, essentially curing aging and allowing people to live indefinitely.” Energy will be free. Food and Housing will be available for everyone. The futurists call it the Age of Abundance. The DSA calls that a political platform. That is some good old Wake and Bake shake Ray has been smoking.

There are many thing I can hope for nationally but am powerless to change them. Let us start a third party and call it the Common Sense Party. Supreme Court Justices, Senators, Congressmen and Presidents should be capped out at 75. Go home, rock the grandchildren and get out of the way. Establish mandatory basic standards in our school system. We should expect students who can read, write, add and think without a hand held device. All political campaigns would be publicly financed and limit any campaign to ten weeks between Labor Day and Election Day. Make public service mandatory at the age of 18, to be administered by each state, for a period of 18 months with no exceptions. The greatness of our country is based on egalitarianism as DeTocqueville wrote in the 19th century. Perhaps we can return to this state of mind. This is my wish for July 4th, 2026.

Hey one can wish for miracles! It is that or I better start walking.

If you have made it all the way to here Thank You..

Peace to Everyone. Happy 4th of July.

Neil Diamond, James Brown, , Grateful Dead, Ray Charles

Or “You are what your record says you are”. Bill Parcells

There it is ! Flashing over and over like a lonely billboard on the interstate. Seventy is here. Seventy is here. A dear friend reminded me that only two out of three of us make it to eighty. Let’s talk about death and then go have some ice cream. There is only one way to handle all of this now. Play the part of the ostrich, keep your ass moving and only come up for music, food and sex. That reminds me of an old Wake and Bake joke.

A man walks into the office of his doctor after prostate cancer surgery. He asks the doctor about his recovery. Well, Doc, What about sex? Doc says, “I have a few words for you; Use it or Lose it. The man says to the doctor, “ Can you give my wife a prescription for that”.. OH GROW UP.. Joan Rivers used to say..

The truth is that our minds and bodies have separated at this point. Imagine this…you have to lift something. When you were young, did you ever think twice. Today it is an emergency planning session. In the old days we did a thing called a box jump. The box height was either 12,18,24, 30 inches or more. Never thought about jumping then but today I think twice about jumping over a fallen log on a trail. It is a short conversation with my idiot younger self, “you really want to do that?”. Where do those voices in our head come from?

Your body and brain literally start feuding with each other. You cannot climb up that crevice filled with giant stones. Yes I can… This is what happens when form and function collide. Stop walking like that. It will hurt if you reach for the radio dial. Don’t be such a baby. Sit up straight, stop drooping those shoulders. Ignore the tingles in your right thigh and foot bottoms. This goes for other parts of your life as well. Perhaps the memory of something or even your sex drive seems to evaporate like morning dew. It is there for a moment and then it is gone.

There are other indignities. The three am visit to the loo is an adventure. You miss raising the seat and then you bruise your leg on the bed frame. Listening to the birds at four in the morning is delightful. They all have different calls. What the hell are they saying to each other. If they are suburban birds they are probably talking about the other mothers. Did you know Fed X flies Newark to Baltimore every day at four in the morning? I would give up cupcakes for life in exchange for seven hours of consecutive sleep.

That is another decision we used to take for granted. We could eat whatever we like. Now everything has a warning like the cigarette box. Consuming these blueberries without running them through osmosis can harm you. Eating red meat will decrease your life expectancy and aggravate your vegan daughter. Never eat swordfish or tilapia. You might as well eat an old school thermometer. Have you looked at your bread lately. There are words that would stump me in a spelling bee. And do not start with me about sugar or butter. If the Wake and Bake truck has to give up sugar and butter there is nothing left to be said. That rubicon will not be crossed.

These days the Wake and Bake bus follows faith in the moment. Find the best food available. Find the best sourdough. Find the best fresh food. Do not give up great dessert. Do not sacrifice quality despite inconvenience. That energy leads me on each day. There are headwinds, certainly, waiting down the road but only life can get me down the road day to day. The chaos, outside our day to day world, is something to behold; but it is meaningless compared to the personal journey each of us will face. Perhaps it is best to play the ostrich.

Instead, we can celebrate who we are. We are worldly because we read the NY Times or the Wall Street Journal. We can be small when we do not want it in our backyards. We can be worldly when we watch CNN or MSN or FOX. We can be small when our pockets are affected. We can love Facebook and have no idea how to use Face Time. We record everything and we watch every new thing. We all want a perfect world but we all know it is not going to happen. We all are very human.

As we approach the 250th let us toast the amazing events we have been lucky to see, feel and experience. Most of it is great. Some of it is tough to forget. Do you remember hiding under desks when you were seven? What is an atomic bomb Dad? Today the kids are asking “ what is an alien Dad”. A President was killed and we all watched it on television. Recently, a President was almost killed in live time.

Neil Armstrong, in an oversized white suit, jumped off a step and bounced around the moon. We all watched it on television. Today we watch Space X rockets return to their original launch sites. Twenty years ago we watched as the Berlin Wall come tumbling down. Million of people experienced the greatest explosion of freedom around the world since the Eighteenth Century. Today the entire world celebrates the World Cup. We have seen Technology free the exponential expansion of universal knowledge. All we need to do is stay alive until 2032. Who knows what will come next?

We have seen women ascend to freedom and power all over the world. It is only a matter of one or two elections until a woman becomes President. One thing is for sure. Her intersectionality rating will not be high but her grandparents will be ex-sixties communists. BTW.. did. you know that short, white, heterosexual Jewish males score poorly. We have witnessed the cultural change that brought about the civil rights revolution. Racism has gone from being acceptable to being shameful in one generation. That is something we can be proud of despite all the protestations of the crazy side of the world.

Joyfully, we experienced the best in rock, jazz, blues and pop. Think of all those names. Chuck Berry, Miles, Muddy or Michael. Do you see the pattern? We also were blessed with theatre, movies and basketball. We can define ourselves by the beauty that we admire. There are so many ways to describe our journey. There was the original Pippin in the 70’s . The great comedies of the 70’s like Blazing Saddles or Holy Grail. The great teams like the Knicks, Celtics and Lakers. Great Comedians. Carson or Colbert. Carlin or Chapelle. Trust the comedians! Distrust the politicians! Those are the memories that the ostrich replays in its head nestled in the soft sand.

Raise the flag! Happy July 4th!

Peace to Everyone.. Slit Skirts 1986..

We all have parents we love but we were not close with. Please imagine a giant multi- trunk tree. There is a giant root of DNA and shared experience. However, there is also more than one trunk that wants to reach the sky. Sometimes one has to have the space to grow and find a way to the light. The space between trunks is also part of life and love with family, friends and significant other. Sometimes the gap never closes fully. That incompleteness is not from lack of love. It comes from lack of acceptance of the gap. Love is always present in the roots.

We are left with memories and traces of who they were. Black and white photos tell a beautiful story. We see young men and women who were given a second chance. There was never one moment we knew anything about their trauma until many years later. They never spoke about those years. As far as I knew life began in May 1945, and the years before, belonged to other souls. But Dad wore the numbers 134271 on his left forearm. Mom suffered physically her entire life because of the German war camps. They were unknowable but they projected light, like other survivors, unlike other parents. This is the shared experience that I have with my sister. We are similar to that multi-trunk tree.

There are phrases and actions that we can never forget. They have been gone for decades and you hear their voice in your voice. They shape us in knowing and unknowing ways. One of their primary lessons was to have reasonable expectations of anyone, including family and friends, when it came to life events. There are going to be people who disappoint you and surprise you, so let the moment unfold. There is more to learn that way.

The conversations with mom, after school, about how one friend said this or that, always led to the same conclusion. “Don’t expect so much from people”. You control how you feel. Do not let someone else have the power to do that to you. She would remind me that taking the easy way was not the best course of action. That has been hard for me to learn. She loved slapstick comedy and showed us how to laugh at ourselves. When we would stub our toe or bang our funny bone she would burst into laughter. She would remind us that paying attention when you walk is a good idea. But that love of someone doing something mindless, without hurting themselves seriously, and hopping away in pain is funny.

Dad was full of life. He would sing songs in the showers and butcher the American lyrics. I could swim better than he could when I was eight. He would remind me that you cannot win a Little League Game by yourself. He was supportive of whatever I wanted to do but he would not let me walk to the Clark bowling lanes when I was 12. Every other parent allowed their child to do so. There was never a time that I felt burdened by their trauma. There was normalcy growing up in Clark. The dark energy was buried deep underground but the heat was always under our feet.

He was the proud cheerleader of my life. There were few parents who took the time to visit their kids in college. He was one of those parents who picked up the tab. Dad loved puncturing the liberal world view of our professors. We were naive students with rudimentary knowledge of the material. He was the experienced Odysseus, strapped to a mast of time, who traveled through the gates of Hades, and saw the world with clear eyes. I would bring him fellow idealists and watch him devour them like the surly rabbit of the “Holy Grail”.

That time was followed by years of playing Morgan Freeman to Jessica Tandy. We would drive from job to job listening to WABC talk radio and talking about the world. We shared the same office for twenty years. “Not everyone went to Georgetown Alan.” He especially disliked politicians who would promise a New World. Our liberal secular world has preached… “We are the World”…mentality for almost sixty five years. They have predicted world food collapse, world economic collapse and world environmental collapse. None of it has happened. In fact the opposite has occurred. We have brought more people, almost eight billion now, out of hunger and into middle class than ever predicted.

That is something Dad would have predicted. He believed economic progress, not politicians, was the wheel that moved culture and society to a better place. He loved Israel and disliked American Jews who criticized Israel. He was a Democrat and became a Republican. His fierce independence is what guides me to this day. He taught me to respect people who put the work in every day. Listen to what they have to say. Those are the people my father loved the most.

We live in a time when there is cultural pressure to draw lines and boundaries between friends and family over personal religious or political beliefs. Interestingly, and noting Jungian synchronicity, the weekly parsha, or Torah reading for June 20, is the Parsha Korech. That Parsha deals with the rebellion of the Korach family against Moses and Aaron before the Israelites enter Canaan. Korach accused the Moses and Aaron of pursuing power and their own interests before the interests of the community. The short story is that it did not go well for the Korach family. The lesson was simple. Israelites doubted the word of God and chosen leaders. Hashem showed the Israelites that it is ok to disagree but do not disturb the roots of the tree.

We all have children and in-laws we love, and maybe, some we are not close with. Imagine that you are a giant multi-trunk white oak tree. You all share this wacky DNA and shared life experience with the white oak trees in the forest. That gives you the strength to grow powerful and independent branches from each independent trunk. Each branch is given its own space to reach the sky. When all branches are free to grow the entire tree becomes the king tree in the forest and in life. The tree has no fear of the gaps because the roots are deep. Hashem only asks that we believe in love’s power in the roots. We must learn to accept the gaps, and the doubts that come with life, because the trunk does not always grow straight and true.

Peace to Everyone- Dedicated to Eric and Amanda, Max, Bella and Ava; Jeremy and Heather, Beatrix Calliope.

Happy Father’s Day…. Father and Daughter. Paul Simon

“Start Spreading the News. I’m leaving today. I want to be a part of it, New York, New York.”

Good morning Wake and Bakers. Disclosure Day, the movie by Spielberg, opened in theaters this past Friday. That movie and all the dissonance will wait for next week’s Wake and Bake. The Knicks own the front page today.

There are moments in a lifetime that will be remembered forever. Each one of us stores those memories in the corners of our mind. They will be there to bring comfort and joy when the time is right. Sport fans can spend an entire lifetime never drinking from the championship cup. It has been 53 years since New Yorkers have celebrated a New York Knicks championship. Names like Frazier, Reed and Bradley are uniforms hanging from the rafters but most of the current fans do not know who they are. They are celebrating Brunson, Anunoby and Towns. One day Brunson, the MVP, will have his uniform along side the legendary champions.

We all were little boys and girls. Those of us who played the games, in our American culture, fell in love with our sports heroes. We all wanted to be Tom Seaver or Walt Frazier or Joe Namath. The joy of winning is something unexplainable to those who do not compete. My friend, Authentic Rick, and I coached youth hockey. We always started the season with a simple phrase. “Winning is more fun than losing kids”. It really is that simple. We can win games but do we win the championship game. Winning a championship game does not come around that often. We can enjoy life but winning in life will test your character. That is the real test of a champion.

Last night was one of those special moments. The reaction of New Yorkers ranged from the sublime to the abhorrent. No one should have their taxi cab, their way of putting food on the table, stomped on or burned. No one should be abused because they are wearing the colors of an opponent. These actions, although regrettable, were a small fraction of what went down last night.

Look at the joy on the faces of those who are experiencing this for the first time. Thousands of citizens packed Seventh Avenue rapping and singing Empire State of Mind. In the old days we sang My Way or New York New York. Sinatra and Jay Z are forever linked with the Knicks. Yankee fans probably claim that too. Imagine the joy of the old timers, like myself, who have waited this long and probably will never get to see it again. For a moment, stand in the shoes of Patrick Ewing. He gave New York 15 years of blood and hard work and was never rewarded with a championship. Until last night. Watching the joy on his face was transcendental.

This glorious hangover will last for a week. There is a parade on Thursday and I have never been to a parade. Perhaps it is time for the Wake and Bake bus to do a Manhattan bakery tour before the parade. Please forward recommendations. Today is a day to sit back and smile, smile, smile. Find a comfortable chair. Look out at the world, and know for this one moment, everything seems right. This Knick team was tough, resilient and likable. They are selfless and conducted themselves with class during this playoff run. No complaining and whining. Just hard nosed basketball. They displayed qualities we all want for ourselves and our fellow citizens. They earned the title of world champion. The memory of this run will last forever.

“Knick fans, this is not a dream, your long long wait is over.” Mike Breen.

Peace to Everyone

When this writer was thirteen, in 1969, there was nothing more important than sports. Knowing my limited genetic luck I poured my eyes over numbers and names that fill up the box scores. In previous generations I may have been studying Torah passages. Instead my father brought home the New York Post and the New York Daily News every night. He wanted me to be an American. That gave me time and copy to know every player, number and statistic. There was competition at the lunch table and might as well be most knowledgeable. When you are the little guy at the table you gotta get your edge somewhere.

That was a special year. We had a knock out bar mitzvah party at the Short Hills Caterers. That was a big deal in 1969. The party feels incomprehensible. My parents survived the Shoah. They followed fellow survivors to America and began to rebuild their own castles. That night was like orange and blue lights casting on the Empire State Building. Thirty million people can all feel the joy that they must have felt that night. That was a special year for New York metropolitan fans. The New York Knicks, dressed in orange and blue, won the World Championship with a legendary group of players. Number 22, Number 24, Number 12. Number 10 and the captain Number 19. Frazier and Reed. You SHOULD know the names.

New York teams were the emotional relief and distraction from a crazy planet that year. The underdog Mets won the World Series. The New York Jets won Super Bowl III. Woodstock drew 500,000 people to a farm one hundred miles from NYC to celebrate the music of our time. On July 20,1969 we landed three humans on the Moon. Those were the gifts. The rest was political and social upheaval. Richard Nixon assumed the Presidency. It was the year of the Stonewall riots for gay rights. The Chicago 8 went on trial for inciting violent demonstrations at the 1968 Democratic National Convention. Bobby Seales, a black defendant, was gagged and chained to his chair during the trial. The Weather Underground, or Antifa with brains, carried out eight political bombings in Manhattan in 1969. The Viet Nam War was raging and the country was too.

Growing up in Clark, New Jersey none of that chaotic stuff mattered. We grew up in the most idyllic way in a town with a notorious racist history, yet I never experienced a single anti semitic incident. All we knew is the time of the next game or the time we were going to meet at Andy’s house. No one cared about what you were or where you came from. Many of us spent our entire lives in one town and knew each other since elementary school. I would imagine that most people who spent most of their young life in the same hometown have hometown friendships long after high school. There is a level of trust that is hard to explain.

As the Wake and Bake bus drives around the last bend in life, I want to see people who played an important part in my early life. We spent more time together than we did with anyone else, except our own family. There was competition in high school, between all of us, but we helped each other because it was for the common good. We graduated future doctors and writers. We have lawyers and police officers. The meritocracy has worked and the American dream has been fulfilled. Last week I had donuts and croissants with my Hebrew school brother and high school classmate. This morning The Mad Bomber and I hiked four miles on Ramapo mountain. We have known each other since the third grade. The Mad Bomber was always shorter than me. He would always say he was funnier. The conversations are psychiatric medication. That and the Animal Face doobie.

The best part of these moments is the perfect spontaneity of the interaction. We pick up where we left off. There is no forced confessions of history or accomplishment. We speak of family and friends as easily as remembering how to ride a bike. There is refreshing honesty born of humility and common experience. We speak about fears of growing old or revealing the wounds we may have taken along the way. Is there any other choice but to believe in living well!

That journey may seem impossible when you are standing at the bottom of Ramapo mountain. All those giant stones and rooted paths seems a hard way to go. The key is to keep moving. Movement is essential to a well lived life. And then, like anything else, you put one foot in front of the other. One hour later and you are at the top of the mountain. “Watch out for the trap doors” is something the writer is fond of saying. When you are on the mountain you better pay attention to the trap doors.

This amazing ability to live in the moment is something to cherish. We did not have to impress the other. We wanted to talk about what is next for our lives. What is the best way to live a well lived old age? How much work should we take on? Who told the kids that we were on call for babysitting? What the F is this President doing? Does anyone know? The two hours that were spent drinking coffee or climbing steep gnarly paths are the moments to live for. Moments like those do not come often unless you make them happen.

If you have been a Knick fan and basketball you know that these moments do not come often. There are only so many opportunities. It will be 53 years since the last championship. That would be 29 years since the loss in the 1999 championship to the same San Antonio Spurs. The 1990’s were nothing but thrills and heartbreak. Before that, Jordan, Olajuwon and Reggie Miller cut out our hearts. Knick fans are hopeful again and have good reasons to believe this team has the grit and talent to get it done.

The box score never lies. There is no television in my house. That is another Wake and Bake story. The advantage is that I know more about these teams by reading the box score than watching the game. There is less emotion. The Knicks are sharing the ball more than they have all season. Each player is great defensively and efficiently offensive. They play unselfishly like the former championship team. The center Karl Towns has become Willis Reed, serious and tough, like an old school sixties big man. And Jalen Brunson, the point guard, has the heart and killer instinct of Walt Frazier. They have won two games on the road and their best player has shot 19-56. Thirty Four percent. It does not matter because defense wins and Towns has been better than the Spurs best player, and future champion, Victor Wembanyama.

There was a young boy listening to the voice of Marv Albert in 1969 on WNBC radio. The excitement poured through the small transistor as the announcer counted down the final seconds. That moment of joy is special because you share that joy with many other people. It is something that lasts past one evening and stretches for days. It is a time when we all feel part of something bigger than ourselves. This is the moment a young boy’s dreams and an old man’s hopes can be reunited. Life can bring incomprehensible joy and brutal disappointment. This coming week may bring us that elusive joy. Let’s Go Orange and Blue…

Peace to Everyone

Sly and the Family Stone. Everyday People. #1 song in 1969..

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Elon Gold, a Jewish Comedian, tells the following joke. “People basically want three things. Sex, food or money. What do you think Jews want most. Someone in the audience yells Money. Elon turns and says “ now. we know the anti semites in the crowd.” Of course the answer is always food. Except for some whose last name ends in s t e i n. Can we insert a cymbal splash here.

Food motivates every Wake and Bake hike. Nourishment is the ultimate material reward. Finding a moment of harmony, with the natural world, is the secret human reward. A weekly journey into the forest allows one’s self to be left behind. It is not easy to let go of one’s ego. What should I be planning for? What event is happening next week? Are you plugged in as you walk? Unplug! That is the first stage of letting go of your image out here. Walk along and begin to take in every sound, smell and sight.

Saturday May 30th feels like fall. That makes two weekends in a row. Puffy white and grey clouds disguise the clear blue sky. It is 56 degrees. The wind is blowing and gusting to twenty five miles an hour. The Wake and Bake bus is heading to Cushetunk and Sweet Melissa’s. The Round Valley Reservoir State Park is surrounded by Cushetunk Mountain and Round Hill. The Cushetunk hiking trail is 14 plus miles around this man made lake. Young ambitious hikers, carrying overnight backpacks, are common in this park. Sweet Melissa’s, on Route 31 in Lebanon Township, may be the best bakery in the state. Both destinations are worth the drive.

Headed onto the Red Trail from the South Parking lot this morning. The total walking distance would be 3.2 miles today. Early morning fisherman cast their lines along the shores. The sound of swaying trees in the northwest breeze are a constant today. Even the jets have a hard time competing with the trees today. The silence was only interrupted by squawking black birds stalking the next meal. They are omnivores! Does my grey head look tasty?

These early morning walks have an intended purpose. One might have had a great week meeting an old friend or playing with the grandchildren. One might have have had a lousy week arguing with a colleague at work or your partner at home. None of that matters in the next few hours. In about twenty minutes, the constant pace of your stride begins to calm the anxious mind. Listen to the breeze. Watch the cottontails sway in the ripples of the wind swept water. Smell the dogwood flowers. Feel the pine needles soften your step as you approach their insular grove. The Pines let you know when you are in their neighborhood.

Sometimes one can sense everything in the moment. Imagine this if you want. This trail we walk on is the result of 100 million years of erosion that produced forests, streams and lakes that we admire. Those hills around Round Valley Lake are igneous stones, covered by forest, that are immortal. Einstein famously said “the distinction between the past, present and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion”. The Lenape Indian, who walked here three hundred years ago, smelled the same dogwood tree as I did today.

Leave your self completely behind. Put all thoughts aside and simply see it all as one. Do not define any of it. Feel the moment around you. Our consciousness is directly connected to the energy one can feel. The forest is one big entire family. Every creature, including yourself, is connected at that moment. If you doubt that, look up the results of reintroducing wolves to the Yelllowstone ecosystem. It seems you need predators in a healthy ecosystem. If you can find a way into that right hemisphere it is possible to feel the energy that connects the earth to everyone. That happened today and it does not always happen.

There was this moment when everything became totally calm and peaceful. There was total gratitude for consciousness. Every single living organism plays a part. That is humility. That allows for windows of consciousness to open. A single deer waited along the trail. It was standing there, staring me down pretty hard. When I moved toward it, the deer moved out of sight. Most deer bound away. This one stayed and waited for me to approach. As I passed it was clear that this deer had something to say. We could have stood there for five minutes looking at each other. It was one of those perfect moments

.That moment drifted away as I drifted down the trail. The trail winds past the shoreline of Round Lake. There were grandfathers, fathers and sons watching the water waiting for their line to jump. Pockets of bright blue sky divided the stratocumulus. It was time to be rewarded for 3.2 miles and 375 feet of elevation gain. Burned 819 calories. All Trails tracks calories too. So the Wake and Bake truck headed to Sweet Melissa’s Patisserie at Payne Road and Route 31 in rural Lebanon Township.

Readers of this column can find other reviews of SM in the archive. This bakery has been voted in NJ.com as the best bakery in NJ for the last five years. There selection of pies and tarts is mouth watering. That will be another visit this summer. Today was another fantastic trip down sugar lane. What a great high after the morning epiphany. The truck left Melissa’s with the treats you see below. Every single bite was outstanding. The first bite made you shake your hand, throw back your head and close your eyes in ecstasy. I shared the treats with my dear cousin Mordy, who is visiting from Israel, and he was blown away as well.

We shared the Peach Crumble, Boston Cream Donut and Glazed Brioche Donut. The Crumble had the perfect crunch. The yellow cake was moist with peach sprinkled lightly within the cake. The glazed brioche melted in your mouth. We cut slices and could see the delicate layers of dough. This was not your ordinary donut. That was before we tried the Boston. This is one of the classics in donut lore. The size of the donut is generously tall. Chocolate frosting drapes the donut. The dough is layered like a bee hive. Waiting inside the hive is smooth and sweet creme. That first bite was as legendary as the Verrelli’s cannoli. Some people eat mushrooms and find the moment. I lean towards a hike and a Boston Creme.

Peace to Everyone….. Mordy Ferber with Tom Oren.. River of Life

The beauty of New Jersey is that you can get away from the noise and completely immerse yourself in nature. The northern and central NJ suburbs are conveniently located near great hiking and great food. That allows for you to be richly nourished after your immersion in the forest. Today the Wake and Bake bus is visiting three great central New Jersey towns that have it all. We wish everyone who visits this page a sweet summer season. Get out and walk. Visit the sweet people at your local bakery and thank them for making your life sweeter.

Morristown is the historical center of New Jersey. There are a variety of hiking options for the beginner as well as the experienced hiker. Jockey Hollow is the most well known park in the area. It is run by the National Park Service because that is where George Washington, and his troops, sequestered in the winter of 1779-1780. The park offers convenient paved walking trails and backwoods trails. This is a park that is characterized by rolling hills, old growth trees and historical buildings. There is a vibe here that cannot be found in other parks. The winter of 1779-1780 was brutal and took its toll on Washington’s army. Maybe, human spirits are still wandering from hill to hill.

If you want an easier hike, not one filled with Revolutionary war ghosts, try the Loantaka Brook Reservation. Bring the stroller and bring the grandchildren. You can probably find frogs and salamanders along the river trails. There is music in the air as the birds sing their own songs. The park borders the northern point of the Great Swamp National Wildlife Refuge. The land is flat and there are paved and natural trails for the hiker. The landscape is quite different than the forest in Jockey Hollow. When the light reflects, the ponds become surreal pools of water. The blue sky, white clouds, black birds and cottontails paint a dazzling display on the cool water

.The after party in Morristown is just as dazzling and diverse. There are no shortage of great bakeries to choose from. The most renowned is The Artist Baker. This bakery is not open on Sunday so plan accordingly. The assortment of pastries and cakes is outstanding. Everything is small batch, so you have to get there early to get your favorite treat. There are tables and waitress service as well. Try the quiches, pistachio granola or the apricot brioche. The atmosphere is calm and inviting. It is a late 19th century vibe. If you are looking for old school Italian please visit Verrilli’s bakery on Martin Luther King Ave. The atmosphere is hole in the wall so do not be dissuaded by appearances. This is where you go for fresh cannoli. They will make you one as you wait. Please have a good cup of coffee ready nearby because the sweetness of the Cannoli is like having a morphine drip. You will be so high that the coffee will be the antidote. And so it goes….

Montclair competes with Maplewood for coolness. If your hair or politics are blue these are great towns to live in. But Montclair has it over Maplewood. Stephen Colbert and Stephen King live there. The Court Jester and the Horror King. Who can beat that? Maplewood is like the Catskills. Everyone is down to earth. Montclair is like Berkeley. Everyone is competing to be the coolest and smartest. Montclair has the better view!

There are great hiking spots for you to enjoy and great food to reward your effort. If you are going to Montclair there are two hiking choices. The Mills Reservation is family friendly and offers clear views of the Manhattan skyline. The two mile outer loop is easy to navigate and appealing for adventurous four year olds. The Garret Mountain Park, which is north of Upper Montclair, is one of the older state parks in NJ. The three mile outer loop presents sweeping views in all directions. These mountains, part of the Watchung Mountain Chain, which stretch from Trenton to New York state, are noted for their immense igneous rocks. Sometimes they appear as a group, like they were dropped into place from the sky, and sometimes they appear like Giants, stoic and solitary, standing in place for two hundred million years. The forest grows up around them and the cycle of nature continues as they watch silently.

When you visit Maplewood you will be delighted with the South Mountain Reservation. It is the jewel of the New Jersey park system and Essex County. The Turtle Back Zoo is there for the kids. There is an old fashioned steam engine for rides into the Reservation. There is a paved walking trail around the reservoir for those who prefer terra firma. For hikers, the attraction are the numerous trails hidden inside the hills, valleys and ridges of the Watchung range. You can find hidden waterfalls tucked into the mountainside. Follow the scents on the river trail. Can you recognize the new flowers? Is there a pine grove nearby? This park can give you the workout you want, as the ascents can be steep and the descents can be tricky. When At Washington’s Rock you can see the city skyline to the north and Route 78 as it rolls to the western horizon. This park can get busy so it is best to get there early

.Let us get to the food because that is what we all crave. Both towns have great variety and different offerings. Montclair features independent bakers like the Le French Dad who specialize in, can you guess, French breads, viennoiseries and pastries. Everything is freshly baked, using non-GMO products, for the daily customer. That is the beauty of European style. Buy for today. Live for today. Eat for today.

The Montclair Bread Company has been around for decades. Located on Level Street, away from downtown, they have an outdoor seating area. It is perfect for this time of year. The featured sweet treat is their doughnut lineup. The sourdoughnut comes in coffee, maple bourbon or horchata (which combines almond, vanilla and a cinnamon glaze. They have croissants and muffins as well. Try the Yum Bun if you need a fix. It is a brioche dough covered in brown sugar and cinnamon, baked, dipped in butter and dredged in cinnamon and sugar. OH MY!! Two more suggestions. If you are looking for French-Asian desserts and want to eat to impress try Tour de Jours. If you are looking for sit down breakfast with treats try Sweet Kitchen on Bloomfield Ave. They have been in Montclair for twenty five years.

Maplewood has amazing bakeries too. The best sit down bakery is Arties, formerly known as Arturo’s, on the Irvington side of town. The space is breezy and open. It is filled with wonderful erudite humans behind their Apple wall. Croissants and brioche treats are as good as you can find in New Jersey. The granola is the best! The Rustic bread is good for two days. Use it or lose it! The lunch menu and dinner menu, featuring their pizzas, is outstanding as well.

The center of all the action in downtown Maplewood is The Able Baker. There is only outdoor seating so the locals gather hoping to be lucky enough to grab a table. Fortunately they are opening a grand new sit down spot in South Orange for their coffee and cupcakes. It does not matter if there is a line ( and the Wake and Bake writer hates lines) because there is a vibe in this bakery that is similar to a coven. It is not a coven of evil witchcraft. It is a coven of love for baking. There are fifteen women, and two who are uncertain, working in a small space. It looks crowded but everyone is smiling. Each is wearing a colorful bandana around their heads of their own choosing. Nose rings and tattoos are standard. The music is metro and contemporary. If it was nighttime this could be a small club scene. But it is a bakery and the ladies are creating magical treats.

When you enter the love cave you are overwhelmed by scents of cinnamon, vanilla and chocolate. Packages of banana bread and vanilla crumb cake are spread out across the entrance table. As you wait in line, your sweet tooth starts to quiver like Pavlov’s dog. Across the glass divide are custom decorated butter cookies. The cookie team never fails to come up with some new face. Scones and pies are their specialty items and change daily. The menu always seems to have something new. Fresh coffee, latte and teas are available too. There is joy in here that has to be experienced. They nourish us with love. That is the secret sauce. There was nothing that made a grandmother happier than baking for family. She knew that the secret sauce is love.

Peace to Everyone

May this be a solemn Memorial Day. We have lost thirteen service members in this “war” with Iran. Their sacrifice should not be forgotten. They are noble warriors against evil.

The Iranian leadership is the most evil theocracy in the world. They assassinated, conservatively, over 30,000 innocent Iranians in the last six months.

Ray Charles…. America the Beautiful

The world is hysterical. This week there was a riot in Brooklyn between Jews and the phony baloney protestors for Palestine. When you demand justice have the courage to take your mask off. The Chicago kids in 1967 were willing to be bloodied to save their fellow Americans from fighting in an unjust war. These pretenders scream for murder and then go out for bagels. This jousting between groups is going to get someone killed like Heather Heyer was in Charlottesville.

That same day the NY Times buried its reputation when it published an article about “super pervert” dogs. It seems the dogs love raping people and merely needed the proper training from their Israeli supervisors. These super libido dogs were then unleashed on the defenseless Palestinian prisoners. This was published as news as if the Lord had written Genesis back in the day. That was Monday.

Of course, there is no connection to the release, this past Tuesday, of the Civil Commission’s Report on the atrocities and sexual terrorism committed against innocent civilians on October 7th, 2023. That horrific day was overshadowed by a story, filled from exceptionally questionable sources, about DOGS. This is the hysterical palace we now inhabit. If that was not enough to send you to the dispensary the world provides even more motivation on a daily basis. Mood break…

Here are some of the other pieces of local and national news to send you out to the forest and never come back. US test scores for the three R’s are at the lowest levels, across all socio-economic measures, since they have been tracking scores. Maybe the kids need to put away those phones and get out into the forest. There is a theme here…. Princeton University faculty voted to insert proctors into the final exam room. It seems 30 per cent of undergraduates are cheating.

Imagine that. One third of our so called future leaders are willing to ( USE AI) cheat to get ahead. Covid Fraud, more cheating, amounted to over 10 billion dollars. The Small Business Association reported more than 70,000 fraudulent loans. Medicare and Medicaid are next. The criminals are sitting across from us at the diner. They are taking are hard earned tax money and making us look like chumps. The next generation of malcontents are sitting in University classrooms, taking their final exams, and plotting how to use AI to beat the system.

All of this anti semitism and signs of civilizational decline is a tough nut to swallow. There is all of that without discussing Russia and Ukraine. China and Taiwan. Aliens and Trump. The only solution to all of that is found in two things. Nature and Classics. Neither involves use of the phone. Disconnect whenever you can. Spend time admiring the beauty that surrounds us. If you have to get out of town to do that, just do it. New Jersey and New York are filled with isolated and beautiful places that allow you to escape the daily grind. You can walk the beach at Sandy Hook. You can be climbing Breakneck Ridge in Beacon, NY. There are bakeries waiting to be discovered near these places. Give me a croissant. Keep your nuts.

Search the forest floor for the flowers that come out in spring. Gaze up into the blue sky through the green canopy. The green in spring shows so many different shades. It stands in contrast to the green symmetry of summer. Follow the cardinal as it moves from branch to branch. The cool pond reflects the blues and greens of the sky and hillside. White clouds hang like morning dreams in your mind. These are the best lessons to teach to our grandchildren. Nature and love of creation is the greatest gift we can give them. There is time for them to see and touch and listen. When you are walking there is time for talking. There is time to talk with strangers. There is time to talk about anything that is on their mind. These moments keep us forever young.

Peace to Everyone.

Two songs today.. Rhododendron by I’m with Her. and of course …. Forever Young….Dylan and The Band…

Music below: Genesis 1980 … Follow the link to Strangelove.. Peter Sellers is comic genius.

Once again man’s hubris brings us to a monumental moment in history. The richest people on the planet are building doomsday bunkers at the same time they are taking orders for garden tools. The richest people on the planet are unleashing an untested technology on a naive and malleable population. The richest people on the planet are doing whatever they can to prevent full disclosure of the UAP/UFO issue. The New Tech Warriors sound like characters from Dr.Strangelove. One recently said nuclear weapons were “one of the most stabilizing forces in history”. He reasoned that we avoided all out wars with our enemies because of nuclear power. All I can see is Peter Sellers, in a wheelchair fighting his own arm, explaining to the President how to survive underground after nuclear war. The Russian ambassador remarks “that is an astonishingly good idea.”

These are the new Materialists. Artificial Intelligence or AI will provide the assistance and knowledge to raise our own humanity. They preach abundance, consumption and compassion. It will be a tool that will make one part of our society much more powerful than those who do not have the tool. Citizens will have equal access to quality health care. Housing will become more affordable due to new technologies. Energy will be cheap and Infrastructure will be restored. People will have more time for community and family. Empathy will become our primary motivator. MAYBE?! None of this accounts for morality. Who will use the tool for good and who will use the tool for nefarious purposes.

This historic advancement in technology is occurring at the same time as attacks continue against Muslims, Catholics and Jews. This is a bigger problem than Islamophobia. In 2024 CAIR reported 40 incidents of attacks against mosques in the USA. The Family Research Council reported over 400 cases against Christian faith centers of which 100 were directed at traditional Catholic diocese. In Canada 33 churches have burned to the ground since 2021. There were 94 cases of arson in Europe in 2024 against Catholic churches. Since 2015 over two million Catholics were forced to leave Syria and Iraq to avoid persecution or death. More than 50,000 Catholics have died in Nigeria in the last decade.

During the last 10 years there have been close to 250,000 deaths attributed to Islamists attacking peaceful Muslims. We have seen Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah attack the most Progressive Western country in the Middle East.Israel protects and promotes gay rights. The Islamic racists punish and oppose gay rights. We have seen the educated and privileged walk in support of those terrorists, racists and homophobes. Many of them have fallen into the rabbit hole of programmed propaganda. That will become more problematic with AI advancement.

We have witnessed the delusional dreams of an indisputable dictator. Putin takes Crimea and our government does nothing. Putin supports the brutal regime of Bashar Assad. ( I kid you not..It says on his Google page Doctor and former President of Syria). He must have made his mama so proud. My son, a butcher and a doctor. Putin invades Western Ukraine and the US government slow walks weapon systems to Ukraine. Four years later and one million men are dead.

There is a story in Genesis, yes, the first chapter of the Bible, that is foreboding. It is Chapter 11 and it is the Tower of Babel story. Genesis is a favorite on the Wake and Bake bus. In 1978, there were five of us who spent four months, with the late and great Jungian scholar Dr. Henry Berne, studying the story of Genesis. We were like Talmudic scholars who debated the meaning of every line in the story. There is importance in the placement of each story in Genesis. And Babel occurs as the first story after Noah and the flood. It is a cautionary tale!

After the flood, everyone spoke the “same language and the same words”. After all, they all were descended from Noah and had spread out over the earth becoming their own nations. There was one place that stood out and many men decided to settle there. Well, what else do you think men are going to do with their time. Not everyone wants to draw hallucinogenic figures on rock face. They decided to make bricks and build something. Well they learned how to build a really fucking big tower. They had no idea the tower was going to be that big. “If, as one people with one language for all, this is how they have begun to act, then nothing that they propose to do will be out of their reach.” AI speaks one language. Maximize control.

So the tale ends with the Lord confounding the speech of men so one group could not understand the other. The people stopped building the tower and scattered across the face of the world. AI is our modern Tower. Are we ready for such a powerful tool in a world that attacks the innocent and threatens thousands of years of morality based in religion. Will our simple life of struggle, redemption and joyful ignorance be positively changed by this powerful new technology?

There is a great deal of caution that is offered in the original narrative. Rather than treat it as true or untrue event, like a rationalist might do, engage the other side of your brain. Babel is a metaphor, a collective memory of a shared history based on real experience. Imagine the power of the machine over so many aspects of your daily life. Your car, bank account and phone will be controlled by a machine. If you drive erratically the car will shut you down. If you deposit some cash the bank notifies the state. Your phone hears everything and records everything. That is the road away from the good. The Tower becomes more important than the people. We may well become modern day prisoners in AI’s cave.

Some people want rich friends who belong to beautiful golf clubs.

Give me the rich guy with the doomsday bunker!

Peace to Everyone….. Genesis 1980.

“I am not what happened to me. I am what i choose to become”. Carl Jung

When i was 12, living in Clark NJ, there were times I needed to get away from my parents. They were different than everyone else’s parents because they spoke in three different languages and dad had this weird tattoo with numbers on his arm. I know they never felt at ease around anyone outside their enclave of survivor families. One of those families lived one block from our house, just a cut through the neighbors yard, and I could be there in less than a minute.

Ester and Ben had known my parents since 1948. Ben was from the same town as my father in Poland. They both had survived Auschwitz. Ester’s son Harold was like an older brother to me and I spent hours in their home playing ping pong and pool. Harold’s parents seemed to embrace American culture more than my parents. My mom did not drive. Ester drove fast! My mom stayed home. Ester went to work in their five and dime retail store in Harrison. They had American friends. Somehow they were more modern. I could go and talk to Ester about my father and mother. She helped me to understand that their overprotective nature came from love. I am eternally grateful for their guidance during my adolescent years.

Ester is 92 today and lives in Mystic, Ct. I would like to share some of her story this holiday weekend. Her story is both tragedy and triumph. There is great suffering and there is great redemption. There is great doubt and there is great strength. Through it all there is an individual, who survived every storm, who has been damaged in life. Every Passover we dip the maror, bitter herb, to remember the bitterness of slavery so one can truly appreciate the taste for freedom. When you speak with Ester you can feel the maror in her tastebuds but you can see hope in her eyes for the people she loves. A week ago we met for lunch with her son Harold. Every time I see her I hope it is not our last lunch.

Ester was born in Busk, Poland in 1930. That town is now part of Ukraine, located near the town of Lviv( Lvov), near the Polish border. Poles, Ukrainians and Jews lived side by side for hundreds of years. There was the occasional pogrom in the 17th century but by 1860 Jews were able to buy property and deal in commerce. Life was very good for Jews in that area during the time Ester and her two sisters were born. Her father had his own lumber business and they lived a comfortable and modern life. To this day, when Ester visits Kaufman Stairs, she relishes the smell of fresh lumber. It returns her to childhood memories when life was sweet with fragrance, play and love.

Things began to change in the late thirties. Anti-semitism became more public and Ester became aware of her identity in public school. Teachers would expel Jewish children from the classroom when they taught catechism. Her parents began to warn her to avoid certain streets in town. By 1939 the Bolsheviks( Russia) and Germany had started a conflict that was abbreviated by a short lived peace agreement between Germany and Russia. However life in Lvov would never be the same. The Soviets marched in and controlled the whole city. Her father’s business was taken away and they were forced to share their apartment with a Russian family. For two years they lived under the control of the Russians.

Things went from bad to worse in 1941 with the abrogation of the peace treaty. German troops marched through Poland and entered Busk on June 22,1941. A Jewish ghetto was established and everyone was herded into the ghetto. The selections, the process of sending Jews to extermination camps, began soon after. Ester was 11 years old. It is unimaginable to understand the day to day life she must have experienced. For the next two years she witnessed selections, humiliations and death. She had to endure the separation of her family when her father arranged for her sisters, under presumed identities, to work on a German farm.

By April 1943 the situation in the ghetto had become dangerous. Her father, her mother and herself moved into the village and home of their maid Bronka leaving Ester’s grandmother behind in Busk. It was a traumatic separation for Ester. Bronka had a storehouse where Ester and her mother remained for the next year. Her father, bereft of hope and restless, left them there to join other men living in the forest. That was the last time Ester saw her father. She was thirteen. In May of 1943 the Germans moved all the remaining Jews of Busk to the death camp in Treblinka.

In May 1944 local Ukrainians burned Bronka’s farm to the ground. They hated Polish people and were forcing their return to native Poland. Ester watched as locals burned the place down. Ester and her mother returned with Bronka to her home town. When they arrived there locals identified Ester and her mother as Jews and refused to accept them in the village. Ester, who was 14, was forced to walk to another village. Try to imagine the moment. A teenager, alone, walking with meager rations down an unfamiliar road, a road to nowhere. What could she be feeling and thinking. Fortunately a young man found her feeding a horse with her meager rations. He showed amazing compassion for the “orphan child”. He would bring her home and his father would find a place for her to stay. Soon thereafter she was able to reunite with her mother in the new village.

For the next two years they lived day to day. After the war ended they drifted to the larger cities in Poland, like other survivors, but it was a precarious life. In 1946 Ester, her mother and two sisters managed to get to the DP camps in Germany. The fact they were all reunited is a miracle in itself. They kept hope of a better life. There were relatives in Brooklyn who had come in the 1920’s. They made contact. Visas were provided and on December 13, 1947 they arrived in NYC. I cannot imagine how they all felt sailing past the Statue of Liberty.

Soon thereafter she met Ben( Umick) Kisner in a hardware store. She spoke to me about their first date and how she knew she had found the right man. They were married in 1950, had two children, Pearl and Harold, and moved to New Jersey to live in Irvington during the 1950’s. They moved to Clark in 1964 about the time we moved there as well. Both her children married and graced Ester with five grandchildren and two great grandchildren. Unfortunately her beloved Ben died twenty five years ago and no one could replace him. Her daughter Pearl passed tragically in 2020. These losses are still with her every day.

Today she remains independent, proud and resigned to the existential challenges that life presents. All of her grandchildren have her strength and belief that life can be made better. Her voice and her eyes light up when she tells you about her winning bridge game! There is so much love and pride in her voice when she tells you about her grandchildren. There is all this pain in her voice when we talk about the losses. She told me that life is both serious and playful. Find the right friends you can trust for life. Do not expect a lot from everyone else. Learn to be self sufficient and find things to do that make you happy and do them. Love your family and let them be independent.

Our visit, coinciding with the spring religious holidays, reminded me of how similar her life experience is to the symbolic stories of persecution, freedom and redemption we tell our families and communities every year. Our survivor clan experienced, as Jesus did, persecution and unimaginable pain and horror. In the Christian story this pain, taking on man’s sins, was followed by resurrection and hope of a better life to come. Survivors resurrection and redemption occurred in their own lifetime. That is a heavy load of lead to carry for a human. They were perfectly flawed as humans, but their souls became living angels and heroes. The triumph of Ester and Ben Kisner over nature’s horror and man’s hate grows every day. Their progeny will continue to tell their stories for generations like the rituals we relive every year. Five hundred years from now someone else will taste the maror, recall the bitterness of Ester’s story, and bring messages of hope and promise.

“Beauty comes of all things”. I pray that this was not our last lunch.

Peace to everyone Max and Blanche Ester and Ben

Ester would have loved this great American song… “The Sound of Silence” Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel.

Allen Road- Sons of Liberty Park-Basking Ridge NJ

There are two really great songs at the end of this.. Play and Read please…

“The only way to support a revolution is make your own”. Abbie Hoffman

This current group of far leftists and far rightists are the sorriest bunch of grifters, phonies and nihilists. Anyone who follows them, or accepts them in any way, needs to have their heads examined. Their whole reason for being is money. Do not let the words fool you. Words are convenient tools to feed your fear and their pockets. They now have massive audiences that are larger than traditional media. Carlson and Owens have more than 6 million You Tube subscribers. Anderson Cooper and his nightly show, at most, has a viewership of 800,000 people. The Young Turks ( TYT Network) is a Progressive news show, featuring Cenk Uyger and Ana Kasparian, has six million subscribers. The evening news shows on the major news networks have between 4 and 8 million daily viewers.

This week has presented new challenges for the public to process. And it is not about the trailer for Disclosure Day. The Department of Justice indicted the Southern Poverty Law Center, founded in 1971, with wire fraud, money laundering and perjury to federal banks. This is the mission statement. "To be a catalyst for racial justice in the South and beyond, working in partnership with communities to dismantle white supremacy, strengthen intersectional movements, and advance the human rights of all people."

A Grand Jury in Montgomery, Alabama found that “Between 2014 and 2023, the SPLC secretly funneled more than $3 million in donated funds to individuals who were associated with various violent extremist groups including the Ku Klux Klan, Aryan Nations, and National Socialist Party of America,”

In short the SPLC was paying Nazis to do Nazi things, so the SPLC could report on Nazi things, inflating white racism into a movement, and using the “paid informants” reporting, to raise more money. They funneled donors money to eight different far right organizations. The money was given to leaders in these organizations. Those leaders were given instructions. Take the money and agitate the public square. They used false bank accounts to route the money. This all was done to raise more money for an organization that was now 55 years old. The ugly truth, or ironically a new truth, may be that racism is not as prevalent as we have been made to fear. Many of my friends and relatives gave generously to this organization for decades. How do you process that.

The New York Times legitimized almost 2 million cretins who follow Hasan Dogan Piker this week. He is an immensely successful influencer, most well known for his support of Hamas, and You Tube creator. Hasan has enjoyed the privilege of two exceptionally successful parents. His uncle is Cenk Uyger who gave Hasan his first media job. He has never had to worry about one dollar in his lifetime and is worth 8-10 million. He is friendly with the current mayor in NYC, the socialist, Zohran Mamdani. They share common beliefs. America needs to be torn down. How do you process that?

That communist mindset somehow qualifies him, an anti capitalist, who is a millionaire, to engage in a discussion about how “the rich do not play by the rules”. Why does the New York Times give him a voice. This handsome radical breezily discussed the concept of social murder, originated by Friedrich Engels, famous as the bass player to Karl Marx, as it applied to Brian Thompson( United Health CEO). In short, social murder is a concept that justifies murder of a systematic oppressor, i.e The HEALTH CARE COMPANY, or representative of that institution. You may recall the cold blooded murder of Thompson by the uber privileged man-child Luigi Mangioni. Insurance companies kill people every day. Therefore, one can feel justified killing the insurance executive. That is not a conversation with nuance. That was murder!

The Times writer and Jia Tolentino joined “political commentator Piker. They also discussed the morality of stealing from large corporations. They call it micro looting today. How do I get back at Bezos, Amazon and Whole Foods. Let me steal some avocados and lemons. This brought back some fond memories and something some of us can identify with. How many of the Wake and Bake readership are willing to admit they stole something. Maybe you do it today with your taxes but back in the day cold cuts were gold. That act of theft was never political. We just wanted the roast beef. The whole scene seems so immature. Let’s protest the system by stealing some roast beef. That is not how we fix affordability.

That memory me back to the earliest influencers. They wrote books. Steal this Book was written in 1971 by Abbie Hoffman. He was a real radical who gave two shits about what he owned and where he lived. The self help book taught readers how to live for free. “To steal from a brother or sister is evil. To not steal from the institutions that are the pillars of the Pig Empire is equally immoral.” One can use less water and less electricity and the charges continue to rise. Our home insurance record can be perfect and premiums continue to rise. One can be the healthiest person one can be and your premiums continue to rise. The social conditions today are more stratified than fifty years ago. All of these issues could be addressed if our government would be more kind. It really is that simple.

We need people to emerge who understand how to address the system. Hoffman’s epic “lets make it rain” moment on the New York Stock Exchange is an example of that. Hoffman and cohorts rained dollar bills and fake dollar bills from the balcony of the Wall Street trading floor. Some traders booed the action. Other traders scrambled to scoop up the cash. This theatrical moment symbolically captured the greed of capitalism and gave Hoffman and friends an audience. The press came after them. They soon became the voice of the anti war movement and none of them became rich. They sacrificed their own freedom to see their goals come true.

He was a genuine revolutionary, unlike the pretender Bernie Sanders, or any other Progressive in Congress. It was never about money or personal power. He owned nothing. If he drew attention to himself it was to bring attention to the greed, fraud and failures in the system. He believed in the redistribution of wealth and power. He believed in universal health care. He believed we should not have one homeless person in America. He believed that CIA adventurism and power should be curtailed. Does any of this sound familiar? The words still ring true fifty years later.

“There is absolutely no greater high than challenging the power structure as a nobody, giving it your all, and winning!”

“Revolution is not something fixed in ideology, nor is it something fashioned to a particular decade. It is a perpetual process embedded in the human spirit.”

“Democracy is not something you believe in or hang your hat on, but something you do. You participate. If you stop doing it, democracy crumbles and falls. If you participate, the future is yours.”

“Above all, what you have as young people that's vitally needed to make social change, is impatience. You want it to happen now. There have to be enough people that say, "We want it now, in our lifetime. " We want to see apartheid in South Africa come down right now. We want to see the war in Central America stop right now. We want the CIA off our campus right now. We want an end to sexual harassment in our communities right now. Be adventurists in the sense of being bold and daring. Be opportunists and seize this opportunity, this moment in history, to go out and save our country. It's your turn now.”- Abbie Hoffman

Peace to Everyone….. Have two Dylan songs for you today…. Don’t think Twice with Susan Tedeschi and Amy Ray.. Great cover

Tangled Up in Blue- Tedeschi Trucks Band…. Awesome……

Good afternoon. Wake and Bake is taking a break to charge the Wake and Bake bus. Here is my spring wish for you.

Please find the time to enjoy the cool early morning spring air. Violets and spring beauties are blooming on the forest floor. The tops of the majestic white and red oak trees are spreading out. The understory is filling out in colors of yellow and green. The sparrow and bluebirds are singing too. Bees and bugs are starting to return to the trail. And that includes the ticks, so be careful out there.

We live in these amazing times that are filled with dread and awe. The simple thing to do is keep your head down and hope the tornado does not blow away your house. Remove the distractions. Focus on family, friends and community. This writer is returning to source material. Learn history. That means starting with Genesis. ( Bereshit) If you have never read the first chapter of Genesis let me offer this guide.

Open your mind, not the logical/left side of your brain, but the other side that loves stories and myths. The story is now more than three thousand years old. There is power in that prose. The numbers that precede each line are purposeful. It is the student’s responsibility to open his personal soul during this reflection. Each number indicates that the sentence has a complex meaning. For example, Genesis 1 says “ When God began to create( or “in the beginning God created”) the heaven and the earth—2 the earth being unformed and void. with darkness over the sufrace of the deep and a wind from ( the spirit) God sweeping over the water”—

What does that all mean? When you watch Netflix you exercise the left side of your brain. Reading exercises the right side. The collective conscious of this world is screaming move to the right side of your brain.

There is so much to unpack here and Wake and Bake will return to Genesis. Thank you for taking the time to come back to this little place on Substack.

Peace to Everyone

Joyful moment: Granddaughter Bella asking me to play Brokedown Palace by the Grateful Dead. She is four years old. Her brother Max is six. His favorite is Fire on the Mountain…

Teach your children well..

"And, as we leave the Moon at Taurus-Littrow, we leave as we came and, God willing, as we shall return, with peace and hope for all mankind". Eugene Cernan. 12/72

Good friends, who know me for fifty years, rarely comment on my Wake and Bake weekly column. Last week they challenged me about last week’s column. They thought the tone was too sanguine and somewhat disingenuous about American life. The whole idea of becoming is learning. The whole idea about learning is about becoming better. The characteristics most suited to learning are openness and conscientiousness. Examine everyone’s opinion and take the time to make sure you get it right. Have the courage to listen, admit an error in judgment and seek an alternative solution.

There is mythology and political propaganda to sort through. What is the American dream today? Is the American dream different in a Red State or Blue State? Is American exceptionalism real or Is America declining the next twenty years? Are we a land of opportunity for all or a land where most humans toil for someone else’s American dream? Will hard work, sacrifice and opportunity allow anyone to affirm their dreams and achieve their goals?

When you look at objective measurements the American dream has fallen out of the top ten worldwide. Life expectancy has not increased significantly over the last fifty years. Japanese people live longer by more than five years. Happiness surveys have Americans listed way below the top ten. Housing is too expensive for eighty percent of available buyers. Median first time home buyer is now forty. Health care costs continue to rise at rates that are unsustainable for most of the population. Those are facts! All of this continues to lead the population down an uncertain future. We are stuck on this road, in a deep fog, unable to see the road ahead, and not knowing when the fog will retreat. This mass feeling has been never been more prominent. And the powers that be, Red and Blue, exploit those fears politically whenever they can.

Remember all the blows the society has suffered the last five years. Covid, March 2020. George Floyd, May 25, 2020. Remember people were forbidden by government to go to church or play in parks but they could march in mass for Mr Floyd. January 6, 2021. After 9/11, no worse day in our lifetime. What a shame on our country! A day that featured a man wearing headdress, a day when American officers were assaulted on the Capital steps and a day when a young woman was shot to death for no good reason.

That was followed with four years of country by committee. Hope Hunter did not have a nameplate. We survived a President who was not physically capable of being President. Some will say we are barely surviving our current unstable President. Stop Putin signs scream about the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. Nuclear threats, bombing of civilian buildings and mass bombing of infrastructure did not get Putin threatened with war crimes. He stole Ukrainian children. The ICC charged him with that crime. US and NATO sent guns and money. Ukrainians gave their lives. Putin is still sending innocent Russian to die for nothing four years later.

October 7, 2023. There is a theory about a canary in the coal mine. Throughout history the Jews have been the canary. The blood libels have risen again from the ashes. Marchers chant slogans like the marchers who chanted slogans 80 years ago. Suddenly, the world believes that the values of radical Islam are less dangerous than the values of the Jewish people. That is mass delusion. History has not been kind to the empires and civilizations that fell after demonizing the Jews.

November 4, 2024 and the reelection of President Donald Trump. That means more Jeffrey Epstein and more No Kings protests. Those suburban protestors probably did not donate their additional savings on the SALT tax. This is a President who is most comfortable on a rollercoaster. The first ride may be fun for some but this guy just keeps getting on line. All that energy, confusion and disruption is not good for culture, government and stability. The national media circus continues to throw wood on a burning fire. How much does social media reward, influence and reinforce the delusions. That uncontrolled energy and their own delusions are driving normal people to the edge.

We have had two Presidential assassination attempts. A single ex-military man blew up his Cybertruck in Las Vegas on Jan 1, 2025. His suicide note called on fellow Americans to wake up! Wake up to what? Aliens, Islamists, or Elitists who eat pizza. The previous evening an Islamist terrorist drove his truck into innocent people celebrating New Years Eve in New Orleans. A seemingly normal 28 year old white boy, who enjoyed all the privileges of the American dream, shoots an insurance executive. Did he think that would change the health care system. We are seeing direct political violence that targets individuals and institutions because people are lost in their delusions. How much does social media reward and reinforce the delusions. We are normalizing crazy behavior.

And then the AI doomers narrative took center stage..And then the bombing began…

And the bombing began again.. What does “obliterate” really mean?

That is a long list of stuff that citizens have had to work through. There is not much time for normalcy when the world is spinning madly. The recent moon mission was exceptionally meaningful because it reestablished normalcy. It allowed us to believe that the American dream was alive and well. My neighbor’s kid could be the captain of that tin can. Geez, it looked no bigger than Apollo modules. We could dream big dreams that dedicated teams could accomplish. We can do that in the USA. That is why the world wants to move here. When a rocket can fly to the moon and back, what is taking so long to build one more gosh darn tunnel from Jersey to Manhattan or a rail line from San Fran to LA.

The truth is that the American dream is struggling to get to its feet while the Staute of Liberty’s gaze is obscured by a fog that refuses to recede. May we find hope and dreams for ourselves in the eyes of our four astronauts.

Commander Reid Weisman described our planet as a "lifeboat hanging undisturbingly in the universe”. "It’s a special thing to be a human, and it’s a special thing to be on planet Earth”. Keep these words close to your heart… It will help with the delusions.. It may not be much but it may be the spark for something bigger than we can see today.

Peace to Everyone. We need this Bob Dylan today!!

PS> Hey West Coast, “I am immensely grateful for the beauty of the world and all of the good things in it. None of it, not a thing, has to do with anything related to faith or belief in some higher Supreme Being, which if it exists, is, at best, pathetic and, at worst, exceedingly cruel and sadistic.”

Wake and Bake will get to you shortly…. with love of course…

“Ya know I just couldn't make it by myself
I'm a little too blind to see”. BD. Precious Angel- Slow Train Coming

Good morning Wake and Bakers.

This is your holiday Dvar Torah( the weekly lesson)

Let us be thankful this morning that the American pilots were not abducted by the IRGC. Let us enjoy the amazing astronauts on their amazing journey. Let us be grateful for this great country which provides opportunity for anyone, regardless of class, race and ethnicity, unlike the rest of the world. Let us be hopeful that the center will hold and the common sense of good people prevails. Let us pray that the light of spirit will be renewed in the populous and that the growth of nihilism be halted. If you doubt that statement please remember that 30 percent of the population believe in nothing. No God. No higher order. Right and wrong are arbitrary depending on circumstance. How else do you explain people marching in support of Nihilism, namely the Islamists of Iran and the followers of Hamas, without any reflection about the evil that they perpetrate.

Easter and Passover are bound together in time, history and values. These holidays are over two thousand years old and half the planet pauses to reflect on our human condition. The story and the lesson remain the same. Bring light, love and justice to the unformed world. This is an individual battle and a communal battle between good and evil. This is an eternal conflict. Do we want the Tower of Babel or do we want peace in Jerusalem?

Imagine you are an astronaut, flying through darkness at 2300 miles an hour, looking out your window. There is a small blue planet, seemingly floating in a sea of blackness, and you pause to think about the human condition. We are all vulnerable. In an instant, we are all expendable. Our tether, to our floating spaceship, is our human connection. When we put humanity first, and not money and power, our consciousness is raised higher. Every single myth or classical religion emphasizes this singular lesson. This has never been an easy task.

Passover comes with great sacrifice and a story of God killing the first born sons of Egypt. Easter comes with great sacrifice and a story of God allowing his only born son to die violently. How do we reconcile these acts of violence with messages of love and justice. Sometimes justice comes with a price and sacrifice. These are real moments in history that are difficult to understand and explain to our children. We speak about peace and being good neighbors but the world does not share those values equally.

We live in a time of spiritual upheaval similar to the time period of between BC and CE. The existing power structure had become corrupted and self interested. There are divisive points of view about religion. We are witnessing this battle in real time. Radical Islam seeks to destroy Catholicism and Judaism. Communist China and Russia seeks to destroy the foundations of Western pluralism. The emphasis on identity, instead of common humanity, has fueled Nihilism. Technology, with the growth of social media, has been the steroid. If MAID, medical assisted suicide in Canada, was ranked as its own cause of death it would be the fifth leading cause of death in Canada, surpassing stroke and diabetes. We are choosing death instead of battling for life. (Of course there are cases where MAID may be a blessing)

The existing power structure had become corrupted and self interested. Rome was imposing its’ will and power over the people of Judaea. Two thousand years ago the general population was ignored by the Jewish Pharisees and the Roman bureaucrats. It was the perfect storm for the “revolutionary” ideas of Jesus of Nazareth. “You were telling him about Buddha, you were telling him about Mohammed in the same breath.
You never mentioned one time the Man who came and died a criminal's death.”

Have we moved closer to the vision of the Man who died a criminals death?

Today, the financial elites and their government agents are imposing their will and power over our general population. Fear has become internalized since Covid. AI gives them the power to move the masses unknowingly. That combination allows for fascism, authoritarianism and mass delusion. When people are confused and scared they are vulnerable to manipulation. What “revolutionary ideas” will emerge this century to counter the faceless God of technology?

Perhaps the revolution begins with the reassertion of Judeo-Christian worldview. We are thankful for the moment we wake. We are conscious of our place in the universe. We are grateful for the knowledge that we sense and for the things we can never understand. We stand in awe of our blue skies, morning birds and fragrant seasons. We care for the vulnerable, the elderly and the misfortunate. “Got to do unto other like you’d have them, like you have them do unto you.” All of this is being tested today. As this eternal battle between good and evil continues, between spiritual forces seen and unseen, we are hopeful that the values of love, family and community will prevail. “Ya either have faith or ya got unbelief and there ain’t neutral ground.”

Peace to Everyone

Happy Easter and Happy Passover. Precious Angel and Do Right to me Baby( Do Unto Others). Bob Dylan

“Let me know your mind, Woah woah. what is want to know is are you kind?” RH

The pink moon, symbolic of the becoming spring, occurs on April 2. Passover is on April 1 and Easter is on April 5. The infamous remote viewer Chris Bledsoe has predicted orbs will rise from the ocean on April 6. A new consciousness will be presented to mankind allowing everyone to love Donald Trump, Benjamin Netanyahu and Vladimir Putin. Moscow and Kyiv will make peace. Iran and Israel will lay down their arms after realizing Hashem was waiting for humans to play out an old bet. Will society be run with kindness and ethics or will it be run by power and the rules of the powerful.

There are Americans who believe we have a King instead of an elected President. There are Americans who believe the President was destined to do the work of the Lord. Neither of those two streams of political thought reflect a government run with kindness and ethics. The current crisis that grips our world fills people with feelings of discomfort that our ancestors felt in the century before the common era. There were two distinct camps of Jewish rabbinical thought at the time. Both of these powerful groups of leaders, let’s think blue and red for fun, competed for the hearts and minds of the people. There were groups who followed the House of Hillel ( The Blue Team) and those who followed the House of Shammai (The RED Team). When it came to matters of Torah and Jewish law they had different opinions. When it came to the state of Israel they also had differing visions for the future of Israel.

Hillel was born in Babylonia around 70 BC. The Rabbinical school of Hillel became the dominant religious authority for the next four hundred years of Jewish Life. The Shammai school became associated with the Pharisees during the Roman occupation of Israel. Jewish life was characterized by internal power struggles and an abandonment of religious practices. The Roman General Pompey conquered Jerusalem in 63BC, quelling a Jewish civil war, and proceeded to control the future of the region. That led to the split in Jewish religious life as the Shammai/ Pharisees controlled Temple ritual life but the Hillel school set the religious laws. For example this week on Passover we have a ritual at the dinner table. We combine the matzoh with bitter herbs and haroset, a sweet paste, which symbolizes the memories, events and emotions in one big bite. That is called the Hillel sandwich, after Rabbi Hillel, who initiated the practice.

Rabbi Hillel had many famous sayings and one can see the direct lines of thought to the Christian Revolution. “ Do not judge your fellow until you come to his place.” “That which is hateful to you do not do to another, that is the entire Torah, and the rest it its interpretation. Go study.” This is the oldest admonition from one older generation to the younger. Go out and work. Make a life before you judge the world that is. Rabbi’s disciples were known to be “agreeable and forebearing”. They were much more open to gentiles than the House of Shammai. The Rabbi and his followers believed life was a joy and living life was a gift. One must balance doing what is right for themselves and doing what is right for family and community.

“If I am not for me, who will be for me? And when I am for myself alone, what am I? And if not now, then when?”

These universal themes became part of the soul of the next wave of religious thought.. The generation of Jesus and the apostles became a voice of change and rebellion against existing Jewish religious law and the Roman administration. Within two hundred years Jews were expelled from Judaea, the Second Temple was destroyed in 70 AD, and the diaspora dispersed to the Galilee, Babylonia and Egypt. Christianity continued to grow through the cracks of the power struggle between Jews and Rome. The openness of Christian beliefs for non believers allowed a small Jewish sect to become an independent force of its own nature. The mystery and beauty of the story of Jesus was consistent with the times. The Jewish community preached similar Messianic themes during the time of Roman occupation.

When the world seems like it is moving at speed and direction towards an awaiting cliff it will lead to exceptional and novel expressions of truth. The seer Carl Jung said..”disorder and meaninglessness are the mother of order and meaning. Order and meaning are things that have become and are no longer becoming.” It does seem we are experiencing this moment. We are in a condition of great disorder with two active wars on two different continents. The old rules of civil discourse, polite behavior and respect for rule of law are rusted relics on a country road. We are struggling to identify if there is any truth. Perhaps all of this disorder will lead to a new vision of order and meaning.

Jung echoed the spirits of Hillel and Jesus. There was great wisdom in the simple words of how to live our lives. The Red Book by Jung is one of the great artistic, philosophical and religious books of the twentieth century. Jung’s words…… “But how can I attain the knowledge of the heart. You can attain this knowledge only by living your life to the full. You live your life fully if you also lived like you have never lived, but have left for other to live or to think”…. “The life that I could still live I should live, and the thoughts that I could still think, I should think.”

There is an amazing synchronicity when Passover and Easter appear in the same week. Humans have lived with these stories for more than two thousand years. Some of us are reimagining our place in the universe. There are stories that we have yet to imagine that may affect how we see our world. . We have created exotic narratives to describe our current relationship with the stars and the unknown. Pink moons and floating orbs are on the horizon. The Pyramids are hiding pyramids deep below. This week is an opportunity to realize we are part of a beautiful chain of love, hope and destiny. The old narratives are still miraculous and compelling. This beautiful planet is a gift from our creator. The stories we tell ourselves carry us through the good and bad times. Let us pray that kindness and ethics will win again.

Happy Passover. Have a peaceful Easter.

Peace to everyone

PS.. The Wake and Bake bus does not do matzah tours or endorse any particular brand of Brooklyn matzah.