Father's Day 2012

Dear Dad, there is so much I need to tell you. How things are with work and with this great, big, ever growing, ever changing city we used to live, work and play in together once upon a time in America.The new buildings going up, the old ones coming down, the ravaged ones getting face-lifts using old and new ways.

I want to thank you, dad, for making me the man I am, for showing me that the only way to survive in this business, in this world, is by being careful. Full of care.

"Take care, I love ya, bud." Those were the last words you said to me, with a wave of your good hand and a smile. That's how I will always remember you. You gave me the tools of wisdom and success in a series of small phrases like: "Get it done." and "Be safe." You will always be my hero, my champion and I live every day to make you proud to be my father as I am to be your son. Your struggle, your pain, your sacrifices for me, your mistakes, your missed steps, are all ingrained in my heart. You are my history. I am your future. Because of you I have grown up to see our city transformed into a garden, an absolute miracle of urban living. A model, a beacon, an exemplar of peace and prosperity at which I marvel each day. There are problems, too, but I want to tell you dad, the good far out-weighs the bad.

Downtown has risen from the ashes and every neighborhood, rich or poor, large or small has struggled to reinvent itself in a better, more civil image. In faith, I know you know, dad, you feel these things as I feel them. On this day, this Father's Day, I think it is OK to get a little sentimental and give thanks to the founding fathers of our nation, of our way of life, of our way of solving problems and changing wrongs into rights. To the fathers of this city, the visionaries, the dreamers, the workers, the soldiers, fire fighters, police, teachers, the leaders and doers of things...and to the followers,folks who believe it is good and decent to be an American, a New Yorker, who live every day of their lives in this city, giving it their life's blood, thank you. Happy fathers day.

Thank You Tribute

The gates of the 9/11 Memorial were thrown open exclusively for rescue and recovery workers of the World Trade Center on May 30th 2012. Mayor Bloomberg, Mayor Giuliani, City Council Speaker Quinn and Governor Pataki were among the dignitaries greeting workers who spent months in toil between the fatal collapse of the twin towers and the beginning of the restoration downtown. As a member of a city agency I participated in many phases of the rescue and recovery from serving on a bucket brigade, to overnight shifts at the Pier 92 command center, I gave some in an effort to honor those who gave all and made the ultimate sacrifice.

We spent a solemn hour listening to choirs, and the sound of ever falling water, looking for friends and co-workers, and reading the names cut in steel around the perimeters of the pools.

The Sparkle

The sparkle darkle
Of your pithy seventh level
Apparent in deep
Onyx oracle hexes
Vexing early morning REM
Hastening my crawl from
Fetal mass to stiff corpse---




Those were black pearls
That were her eyes
Formed of volcanic
Sand from South Pacific
Atolls green and tropical
In the Shanghai of my vision

Exotic in perpetuity like
Wind blown glass captured
By rainbow rings of Saturn---

My rant rains cool
Potable star dust down
On the deaf and blind
Quenching a thirst as yet
Undefined

Quelling this outburst of my mind
for a time with rhyme
not mine
but belongs to the Universal
At large in charge of my anonymity---

I am no one.

I am everyone.

I have lived.

I will die.

I will not come again.

Mark D. Ransom

Christmas Letter 2002

We hope this post finds you all well and sincerely wish the best for you and yours. Here's to seeing you soon and raising a glass of cheer, no matter when, no matter where. Oh, so much has changed in 10 years. We are getting ready for life altering events...new jobs, new computers...so in cleaning out "Ole Bessie" as we have named the lap top, we came across the following and began to get present with where we have been, and where we are going:






December 2002




Hello Friends,

It’s hard to believe another year has passed. We hope this holiday missive finds you all in good health and good spirits. Things are OK here in Brooklyn, New York, U.S.A. Our only regret is that we don’t get to spend more time with friends and family due to the bustle of our “metropolitan lifestyles.”

In the spring of 2002, while Jen was pulling her hair out (or maybe it’s just falling out, we don’t know for sure) writing her Master’s thesis, Mark was diligently recording his spoken word poetry CD Wild Iron Freedom. Jen managed to graduate in June (on time) from Brooklyn College with an M.F.A. in Dramaturgy and Theatre Criticism. Mark’s CD was released this fall. You can find a link to it on Mark’s website: MDRansom.com. In May we appeared together in a small off-off Broadway show directed by Cyndy Marion just to keep our acting chops up.

Immediately upon Jen’s graduation, we were told that “the jig was up,” concerning our two-year illegal sublet. We did some hurried and harried apartment hunting and ended up with a much larger space in the same neighborhood—for only twice the rent! Although Jen did have a whirlwind trip to London this summer, (courtesy of our good friend Miss Babs,) the highlight was our vacation to New Mexico. We flew into Albuquerque and proceeded to spend fourteen memorable days camping (okay, okay, we also spent a couple’o six nights in a Bed and Breakfast) and exploring Santa Fe, Taos, paddling the Rio Grande, and even cruising up towards Cimmaron County.

This fall finds Mark working steadily with the New York City Department of Buildings. Happily, he hasn’t had the kind of emergencies we saw last fall, although the wake of 9/11 continues to be a strong presence for us all. For some strange reason Jen thought it would be a “good idea” to start her Ph.D. work at the CUNY Graduate Center. Suffice to say the challenging nature of these studies keeps her hopping, particularly coupled with adjunct teaching positions at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. Mark managed to find time to perform as narrator/musician in Like a Springsteen Song, which had a hearty run at the Blue Heron in October-November. The Village Voice actually referred to him as a “cover band!” (It’s good to be referred to in the Voice, however inaccurately.) For those who don’t know: we are engaged. Wedding next fall.

There you have it: the Reader’s Digest version of 2002. Please know that you are in our thoughts always, although we are not always in touch. All the best for 2003.

Love, Jen and Mark

P.S Please forgive us for not sending real cards. We know how hard form letters are to put on the mantle, but we were guided by economy—and we knew y’all would want to know what we had been up to this year!

Hope Springs Eterenal

A few weeks ago I treated myself on a Thursday when my beautiful wife was off at a campus interview (more on THAT later...)I decided to treat myself to something I don't recall ever having done before and that is go to an Opening Day of the Major League Baseball season. It was a nice day for early April, sun drenched the field and the blue sky was picture perfect. I got on the G train and switched to the 7 at Court Square and in no time I was standing in line to purchase my ticket (and Club Pass) to Citi Field. It was my first time at the new park built in the parking lot of the now demolished Shea Stadium. A place where I never had a bad time weather my team won or lost. Weather sitting in the press box with the crew from where my mom worked at Major's Supermarket, or sneaking down into the box seats as kids to watch Seaver pitch, or climbing into the upper deck with my hobbled father who gamely followed so we could share that experience...it was seat-cushion night and when Dave Kingman finally hit a home run in a lopsided rout of the Mets, the would-be collectors items rained out of the stands and littered the field in a hilarious delay of game...or when Gary Carter ended a rain-delayed double header with a home run in the second game that went into extra innings...or when Doc Gooden as a rookie pitched a one hitter against the Cubs...or when Strawberry hit a mammoth homer in a play-off game against Houston in '86 and Nails won it with a walk-off shot that just cleared the right field fence where we were positioned to see both very nicely and our feet did not hit the ground until we got home...or at Yankee Stadium when Thurman Munson turned away laughing at the fiasco on the field as a couple of portly security guards tried to coral a streaker...or when Bobby Murcer tom-a-hawked a homer into the short porch in right...Jim Rice taking Ron Davis deep as he turned on a fastball...Reggie calming a heckler down behind home plate who was demanding the slugger get a hit...and then he doubled to right-center starting the rally that won the game...Guidry with two strikes on anybody...Mattingly braking up Moose Haas's no hitter with a line drive double off the padded wall in right... These are not all the stuff of legend, but the minute details that make baseball religion to some...In fact you can take a course at NYU, as reported by Samuel G. Friedman in today's New York Times, with John Sexton in his class "Baseball as a Road to God". To be honest most of my church-going occurred via television where I followed ardently both the Yankees AND the Mets (I know, sacrilegious to some)...I kept score one time watching channel 9 as Tom Seaver was pitted against Bob Gibson in a game that ended with a score of 1 nothing for the Mets with both pitchers going the full nine innings.

The Mets won their opener and began the year in first place with a 1.000 winning percentage. Citi Field is not Shea and I really did not have a feel for it. A visit to the New Yankee Stadium in 2010 left me with a similar impression, but the game is the same and in a very secular way it is a unique harbinger of Spring and Summer, and ultimately the Fall with the World Series and all the new play-off games.

I had my hot dogs, I had my beers and I had a great time. I can check Opening Day off my bucket list. Play Ball!!!

Of Ph. D.'s and Civil Service

My wife is a college professor. Constantly I find myself in the company of scholars and intellectuals and I know I am not one of them. I am a mason, and not the kind that knows the secret handshake either. Rather, the kind who sets stone, lays brick, and places stucco. As a building inspector, I bring my lifetime’s worth of expertise to the duty of enforcing codes in an effort to keep people safe. As I sit with the citizens of New York in a social setting, I am keenly aware of their perception of city workers in general, and of building inspectors in particular. As I embark on a new season of training rookie inspectors, my goal is to ensure that how we are perceived by the public ranks alongside the stellar reputations of Fire Fighters, Police Officers, and Teachers in the pantheon of well regarded, if not heroic, civil servants.

Bad apples are the exception, not the rule, in all walks of life. They garner the most attention because punishment must be public, while praise, it seems, is relegated to a quick sound bite on a slow news day. These are just the facts of life in Gotham and it’s taken me a long time to develop the thick skin required to press on.

I want to take this opportunity to honor all the diligent grunts in the trenches making a difference day to day by paying serious attention to the details of how our city works. The blood and guts of a modern metropolis; its plumbing and electricity, boilers and elevators receive notice only when they fail to work properly and are otherwise taken for granted. The people who work on these systems, designing them, building them, and maintaining them, know better.

The public of this great city, from the mayor to the commissioner of buildings, to your family, co-workers and neighbors, to the homeless people on the streets, are demanding of excellence and insatiable in appetite for a greater New York City. They are tough customers. We owe them and each other our best.

"Port Richmond" 1st 200 words.

"It was a bright, clear Saturday morning...they always seem to be bright, clear mornings. The kind of day when we may forget for a split second that evil could ever exist in the world. Forty five year old Miguel Gonzalez stood by the schoolyard fence at first light. His jet black hair just beginning to be streaked with strands of gray framed his tan face and wicked wind blown tears from his chilled brown eyes. A well worn, insulated Carhardt hooded jacket kept the cold from freezing his bones. He did not like heights, but work had slowed to almost nothing in the past six months, and the weather was just starting to break on this crisp fifteenth of April. The long, bitter winter reluctantly began to loosen its grip. A cantankerous, dirty, dented, old red Ford F 250 rumbled to a stop in front of him. It was laden with the platforms and rope-falls; steel hooks and irons for hanging a scaffold over a parapet wall. Miguel Gonzalez scanned the rig, and the name on the side of the truck: Ceilencio Restoration, and just shook his head in resignation before climbing into the back of a smoke-filled club cab."

Still looking to land an agent, so if you have any leads...give me a shout.