Reading List: Assholes * A Theory

Contrary to popular belief, I am not an asshole. That's right, I have proof.  My sister gave me a book for Christmas titled, Assholes* A Theory by Aaron James.  Who is Aaron James, you may ask?  Well, Aaron James is not a comedian or humorist.  He has credentials that include a Ph.D from Harvard and he is a professor of Philosophy at The University of California, Irvine.

Assholes * A Theory

I have to admit when I received the book, I thought it was going to be a humor book.  Instead it was an academic study of assholes (the people, not the anatomy).  The book was not an easy read, but I'm glad I labored through it.

I've used this term all my life.  I've called teachers, coaches, neighbors, family members, celebrities, and countless strangers this name for many decades.  It may be hard to believe but this word has actually been directed at me a time or two in my lifetime.  I now have a new appreciation of the word and in fact, have academic proof (backed up with references and citations) which proves conclusively that I am indeed not an asshole.

I may have my share of asshole tendencies, but according to James, I am not an asshole. Some may argue the fact that someone who argues publicly that they are not an asshole proves that they are an asshole, but James has done the research and easily dismisses this argument.

The author goes into much detail and gives many examples of real and true assholes. Stripped down to its most basic definition. James defines an asshole as:

(1). Someone who allows himself/herself to enjoy special advantages and does so systematically;

(2). does this out of an entrenched sense of entitlement: and

(3). is immunized by his/her sense of entitlement against the complaints of other people.  (Assholes * A Theory; James, Aaron, 2012; Anchor Books, New York)

Allow myself special advantages?  Nope, not me. Entrenched sense of entitlement? Nada. Immunized by a sense of entitlement against the complaints of others?  Again, I'd have to say, no.

If someone wants to do an academic study on jerks, they may be on to something.  In the meantime, I will relish in the knowledge that for once academia is on my side.

The Battle Between Arturo and Arthur

This week I find myself in a bit of a pickle (pun intended).  I received a text message several weeks ago from my friend Scott that read, "Arturo, I put in for Mt. Whitney.  I will let you know if we win.  I put in for several dates in mid-August.  I'll let you know."

The first clue that I may be in trouble was the way the message started.  Only my high-school buddies call me Arturo.

Before I get to the meat of this story, let's describe how I became Arturo.

I had enrolled in French when I first entered the doors of Derby High School.  I had visited my grandfather in California and he advised me that Spanish was the way to go.

I pondered this during the Summer of 1976 and had made up my mind to drop French and enroll in Spanish 101.

There was just one problem...as a freshman, I kept getting moved to the back of the add/drop lines.    The lines were impossible to negotiate and every time I made some headway a junior or senior would cut in front of me.

As a result, it took me nearly two weeks before I was finally able to drop French in lieu of Spanish.   During those first two weeks, I continued attending French and to this day, the only French phrase I know is, "Je m’appelle Mademoiselle, Heitz.”  Since my name is not Miss Heitz, this phrase has proved to be utterly useless to me.

The first Spanish lesson had the class introduce ourselves in Spanish.  We went up and down each row, starting with Joe Daddio.  "Mi llamo es Jose," he said.  "Mi llamo es Juan, Mi llamo es Nilda, Mi llamo es Maria," and so on and so on.

When it was my turn, I stood up and said, "Mi llamo es Arturo."

Suddenly, Tony Battaglino stood up and yelled in a booming voice, "Arturo!!!"
The class erupted in laughter and Tony was sent to the office for disrupting the class.  That, my friends is how I came to be known as Arturo.

Recently, I must have commented to Scott to let me know the next time he was going on a hike.  You see, Scott has been posting some fantastic photos of his hiking adventures.

I looked up Mt. Whitney and discovered that it has an elevation of 14,501 feet which makes it the tallest mountain in California AND the tallest peak in the lower 48 states.

I had one saving clause is this hike business.  In order to hike Mt. Whitney, one had to be selected in a lottery.  Well, Scott just sent me a message informing me that his group of six (which includes my name) has been selected.  In other words, the hike looks like a reality and is scheduled for August 10th.

Scott provided me the "good news."  "Arturo, we're going to about 8,000 feet and camp for the night, so our bodies get acclimated to the high altitude.  Then, we'll get up before sunrise and hike 11 miles up the peak and then 11 miles back down.  It's going to be awesome."

I could think of a lot of adjectives to describe what I just heard, but I don't know if awesome is one of them.  Tiring, strenuous, insane, and irresponsible, all come to mind, but hey, I'm Arturo.  Arturo would try anything.  Therein lies the problem.

Arturo got me in a lot of predicaments.  Arturo made bad choices.  Arturo was a fun-loving guy, but he knew no limitations.  Arturo had to apologize for his antics to many people.  Arturo ceased to be Arturo in 1988 and became Arthur.

Arthur realizes he needs to train and get in shape for this endeavor.  Arthur should probably say no to this hiking proposition, however, buried somewhere deep inside Arthur, Arturo lurks.

Arturo would never back down to a challenge and guess what...neither will Arthur.  See you in August, Scott.  Mt. Whitney, both Arturo and Arthur look forward to your wimpy little 22 mile walk.

RIP Grandpa

I lost my father-in-law almost two weeks ago.  Although I'm dealing with my own emotions, they pale in comparison to the people I love the most.  My wife lost her father and my children lost their grandfather.

Pasquale (Pat) Altieri (although even after twenty years of marriage to his daughter, I still called him Mr. Altieri) was a tough man.

He was a gifted athlete who was a two sport star in football and track and field.  He graduated from Harding High School in Bridgeport and it's amazing to read all the yellowed newspaper clippings sitting inside a dusty old photo album.  Despite getting letters from The University of Michigan, Yale and other high-profile schools, he decided to attend Brown University in Rhode Island.

He injured his hand at Brown and only played on their freshman teams.

After his injury healed, he chose not to return to Brown.  Instead he enlisted in the United States Marine Corps where he played football and captained the Marines track and field squad.

After serving honorably in the Corps, he received a try out with the Boston Patriots of the brand new American Football League under coach Lou Saban.

The NFL has come a long way from the letter Pat received from the Boston Patriots telling him his first class train ticket and food expenses were covered totaling just over $16.

He started a couple of exhibition games for the Patriots before injuring his ankle.  In those days an injured player was told, "we have a game to play tomorrow, if you are unable to play, you'll be released from the team."

After being released from the Patriots, he returned to Derby and played semi-pro football for the Ansonia Black Knights where he played with his cousin Nick DeFelice (a former member of the New York Jets)  and friend Larry McHugh.  When the Black Knights moved to Hartford, Pat decided to hang up his cleats.  Nick DeFelice recently said, he had no doubt if Pat and Larry joined him in Hartford, the three of them would have been on the New York Jets.

As we were going through the clippings and old photos, my daughters said in unison that they never knew how great an athlete grandpa was.  They further stated if it were daddy, he would have told everyone of his accomplishments.  I smiled because I realized they were right.  Unlike moi, Mr. Altieri didn't talk much.  But when he spoke you knew his opinion.

After his football career he went into the family business and owned Altieri Press in Bridgeport until 1996. Altieri Press was the last union print shop in Bridgeport.

Altieri Press was always printing brochures, stag tickets, programs, and raffle tickets for just about any non-profit group or family friend that asked him for little or no cost.  Don't believe me? Look at any of the old Derby High school programs printed in the 70's and 80's.

When my daughters were born, I saw a change.  He was still the tough guy I had known since I was a child, but he seemed to laugh much more frequently.

It didn't matter what the girls did, he found humor in their shenanigans.

He attended their dance recitals, plays, and athletic events.  When their elementary school was in danger of closing, he became a silent advocate and supporter of the school and attended all the events we hosted to help keep it open.

At 78 years-old he continued to go to work each day for the City of Bridgeport in their print shop. No disrespect to Wal-Mart greeters, but at 78 years-old he was doing a physically demanding job and he would often come home bloodied and bruised.  Yet, he never complained.  I know he continued working so he could give a little something extra to the girls each holiday.

So here's to you Mr. Altieri.  We're going to miss you, but will cherish your memory for the rest of our lives.

L-R Brittany, Grandpa, and Ashley

The Greatest DHS Wrestling Match in the History of History

Whenever you proclaim something the greatest there is bound to be an argument.  Now that wrestling season is in full swing, I thought I would make the case for what in my mind was the greatest wrestling match in Derby High School history.

Let's go back to February 1979.

The first thing one will notice is that I selected a loss as my greatest match.  How could that be? There have certainly been some dominating performances since those early days.

Let me explain.

Derby High wrestling was still in its infancy since the program only began in 1976.  By 1979 we were ready to make our move on the state scene.  If you were around in those days, wrestling matches were routinely dueling with basketball for the big crowds.

This was our last match before the Class S tournament and we had rode a wave of great publicity.  The Evening Sentinel had dubbed our middleweights through the heavyweights "Death Row" because once we hit the middleweights we rarely lost.

We were so good we would calculate how many pins we needed to win the match.  If we forfeited three or four weight classes and were down 18 or 24-0, we never panicked because we knew we would only need to pin the rest of the opposing team to pull out the victory.

You could read the article below, but basically we took it on the chin in the first few matches.  Joe Swinski and Dave Stumpo fought valiantly but ended up a little short.  Don Frasier (who would end up with a bronze medal in the states) got us on the board.  My classmate Scott Snyder (who now resides in California) took care of business and got us back in the match.  Craig Margiano (who would be Derby's 1st gold medalist) inched us closer in the team points.

I was next and was able to pin my guy with six-seconds left in the match to put us ahead.

Alan Tomasko fell victim to a pin and we were back in the hole.

In one of the biggest surprises of the evening Jim Urbano (who would become Derby's second gold medalist) lost a major decision.  This simply didn't happen.  Urbano was part of Death Row and for the first time in a long time we wondered if we could make a comeback.

It was at this point in the match that this meet turned into something special.  Kerry O'Connell (Red) stepped onto the mat.  He was up against an undefeated highly ranked opponent who was expected to give Red a whooping.

Red knew it as did everybody else in the gym that night.  There was just one small problem, Red's opponent underestimated him.

His opponent started throwing Red around like a rag doll.  Red was trying to wrestle carefully and once or twice he got himself in trouble and was fighting with all his might to stay off his back.  As the third period began, Red was behind and it looked like he would suffer a major decision.

With less than a minute to go, Red saw an opening and lo and behold his opponent was on his back struggling to keep from being pinned.  The crowd was going crazy and yelling for Red as the clock continued to tick...15...14...13...12...11...10.  Suddenly the referee slapped the mat.  Red won by pin.

As you can imagine, the crowd went wild and Red's dad ran onto the mat and lifted his son in the air as he gave him a big bear hug.

When I think of that moment of father and son, I am reminded of Rudy, Hoosiers and other great sports movies.

Unknown to many people (except coach Matthews who was livid), the referee had walked to the scoring table and penalized our team one point because a spectator (Red's dad) had run onto the mat.

When things had calmed down, Tim Blake lost a tough decision.

This meant our only chance at a team victory was for Ben Blue (our first silver medalist and then one of Derby's greatest wrestlers) to pin his guy.

Ben tried his best and kept trying risky moves to get the pin, but it just wasn't meant to be.

The final score was Holy Cross 24 - Derby 23.

We went on to place second in the Class S tournament the following week.

To this day, I have never met a single person who was in the gym that night who would have traded that one point we were penalized.

The Christmas Pickle

In Old World

Germany, the last

Decoration placed on

The Christmas Tree

Was always a pickle...

Carefully hidden deep

In the boughs.

Legend has it that

The observant child

Who found it on

Christmas Day was

Blessed with a year

Of good fortune...

And a special gift.

2014 Tree - Can you find the pickle?

Research argues that the German origin may not be true, but it doesn't matter to me.  The Gerckens name is of German origin and since Gerckens has always been confused with the Gherkin pickle, the Gerckens family has always had pickles on our trees.  This year, my tree has five pickles adorning the branches and I'm sure my mother and siblings trees have pickles hidden somewhere in their branches.

A recent tradition of this Gerckens family is to adorn our tree with all the picture cards of our families, friends, children, and pets.  Whenever we walk by our tree all our wonderful friends greet us and remind us of the people who have touched our lives.

So the Gerckens family, or should I say the families Gerckens, or the Gerckens's families (or is the plural of Gerckens, the Gercki families?), in any case we would like to wish you all a happy and healthy holiday season.

The Letter

Nearly five years ago, the Office of Catholic Schools in the Archdiocese of Hartford was considering closing St. Mary-St. Michael School in Derby.  It has been well-documented that a group of parents stepped up and produced a financial plan which ultimately kept the school open.

An important part of that financial plan was to reach out to our alumni and conduct an Annual Appeal.

Our first attempt at an Alumni Appeal was a success but there was one letter that touched many of us.  I believe that it is fitting to share the story today...on Veteran's Day.

The check box next to the name in the database was clearly marked deceased.  As such, an alumni solicitation letter should have never been sent to the address we had listed.  Two weeks into our first attempt at an Alumni Annual Appeal campaign, our principal (Linda Coppola) was separating the letters that contained checks from those that were returned because of bad addresses.  She noticed an envelope with a North Carolina return address, extracted the letter, and read:

Dear Principal Coppola,

I am writing you to tell you that I have received a mailing from your school but I believe you have me mistaken for another individual.

I did not attend St. Mary-St. Michael School.  I believe you are likely mistaking me for a different Joseph Carinci who once resided in Derby.  I only know of this because I once came upon his name while visiting Washington DC.

Unfortunately, where I came upon his name was while visiting the Vietnam War Memorial Wall.  I did find some interest however in him since he was of the same namesake.  I did some research and found that he died in Vietnam while sustaining injuries while serving our country.

I never found a relationship between us; however I am sure that he must have been of strong character and that likely came from a strong structure in life that he had acquired while attending your school.  He was about six years older than me and will keep him and his family in my prayers as his passing in service to our country must have been a terrible loss.  I have enclosed a document I found on the web referencing his service and death.  Hopefully, this will bring some closure to your record of him.

I have also enclosed a small check of donation to your school in honor of him and his service.  May he rest in peace and be remembered as his life was given on behalf of others in this country who continue to enjoy freedom that men like him have afforded us.

Yours in prayer,

Joseph A. Carinci

Joseph Carinci was a 1965 graduate of St. Mary's School in Derby.  He was one of only 24 dog handlers in Vietnam and had been injured several times before a final severe injury.  He was wounded on August 25, 1970 by shrapnel from a "pressure device mine" in Quang Nam Province, RVN.  He was hospitalized, transferred to Camp Butler, Okinawa, and from there to the Saint Albans Naval Hospital in New York.  Joe died of pneumonia on December 30, 1970.  He is buried in Mount St. Peter's Cemetery in Derby.

Each year as I prepare the Annual Appeal for St. Mary-St. Michael School, I reflect on our friend in North Carolina and on the young man who attended our school so long ago.

Thank you to our Veterans and to those who have given the ultimate sacrifice.

I should also take the time to thank the members of my family who served.

My dad, Arthur C. Gerckens, Jr.  US Navy

My brother, David J. Gerckens  US Marine Corps

My brother, Kevin A. Gerckens  US Marine Corps

My cousin, Michael McCall  US Navy

My father-in-law, Pasquale Altieri US Marine Corps

Valley Women Making a Difference...You Bet!!!

I just returned from a luncheon that honored Valley Women Making a Difference at the Grassy Hill Lodge in Derby.  All of the women being honored both past and present are truly some of the unsung heroes of our Valley community.  I wanted to spend some time focusing on one of those women honored today…Gloriann Albini of Derby.

Gloriann is an incredible role model who has a demanding job as a Nurse Practitioner and yet still finds the time to volunteer her time more than anyone I have ever met.

It was just a little more than two years ago that St. Mary-St. Michael School in Derby was rumored to be closing.  As a result of that rumor, parents pulled their children from the school in order to ensure seats for their children in other private schools.  We watched the school graduate 25 eighth-graders and then saw the enrollment drop to 65 children (in the entire school).

The school was on life support and that is when I saw Gloriann the leader in action.

Before moving on I’d like to distinguish between two types of leaders…positional and transformational leaders.  Positional leaders are not really leaders.  They get to lead because of their job title.  Sure, there are some excellent positional leaders, but I think most people would agree that there are many poor bosses and supervisors out there who know nothing about leadership.  They get to lead because of their position or title in the company.

Transformational leaders are a whole other ball game.  They are the leaders who “get it.”  They lead by example and by the way they conduct themselves.  They have the ability to get others to follow them not because of their title, but because people relate to and believe in them.  It may come as a surprise to discover that some of the greatest leaders are those who lead groups of volunteers.  Try getting people motivated to give up their time and money to do something for free.  It takes an exceptional leader to motivate people when there is very little incentive to do so.  When I first watched Gloriann in action, I knew we had a transformational leader among us.

Gloriann was part of a group of parents who went to Hartford and argued to keep the school open.  She was part of the team that created a financial plan that was accepted by the Archbishop of Hartford.  She was also on the hiring committee that hired the current principal (Linda Coppola).

There was a time when the school was between principals.  One principal was retiring and we were waiting for Mrs. Coppola to arrive.  During this period, Gloriann kept the team focused and guided the team through some rough times.  The Duck Race went on, the school was painted, a Summer Institute was started, and the school remained open.

Fast forward to today.  Not only is the school open, it is thriving.  Despite never writing a grant in her life, Gloriann has now written several grants resulting in thousands of dollars of much needed cash.

Look at the school, we constructed a playground, instituted a drama club, our basketball teams remain competitive and this year we even introduced a new sport, soccer. We’ve secured white board technology, iPads for our students, weekly Bingo, and so much more.

The school sends Facebook updates, Tweets, blogs, and never misses an opportunity to get their message to the community nearly every single day.

Gloriann and her husband George, take care of the grounds of the school.  Every weekend, you can find them cutting the lawn and weeding the garden beds.

To make a long story short, the school has undergone a tremendous transformation and much credit deserves to go to one of our transformational leaders.  We have an active and thriving community of children, parents, teachers, friends, and supporters.  Enrollment today stands at 139 students and is on the rise.

When I reflect on where the school was just a mere two years ago and think about where it is today, I get excited to think about where it is going.

Valley Women Making a Difference…you made an excellent choice by selecting St. Mary-St. Michael School’s own Gloriann Albini for this honor.