Buffalo Unbound, page 9
This is not to say that people don’t speed and state troopers don’t catch them, along with the lost cows. They lurk behind trees and around curves, both troopers and heifers. And girls, don’t bother telling no-nonsense New York state troopers that you’re pregnant and needed a restroom. They don’t care if you pee in a cup, wear an adult diaper, or wet yourself. Being with child, in fact, is another very good reason to slow down! New Jersey troopers, on the other hand, are much more sympathetic to this situation. Just be prepared for a police escort to the nearest lavatory.
Though it looks appealingly Euclidean, the Thruway wasn’t a mathematician’s dream but a product of topography. It runs up the Hudson Valley to the Mohawk Valley and into the Great Lakes region to avoid mountain systems created millions of years ago and finished off by glaciers during the last ice age. Speaking of ice ages, as good a road as the Thruway is, you don’t want to be driving on it during a blizzard. This is where the idea for the show Ice Road Truckers originated.
People like to try and pinpoint the decline of Buffalo, and the top three culprits are usually (1) moving manufacturing overseas; (2) the opening of the Saint Lawrence Seaway in 1959, bypassing the Erie Canal; and (3) the building of the Kensington and Scajaquada expressways broke up a number of East Side neighborhoods.
In the early fifties, it was thought that an east–west highway within the city that would link the new suburbs and make the airport convenient to downtown would be just the ticket. However, the Scajaquada destroyed a park and the Kensington a thriving Jewish and German neighborhood called Humboldt Park that was quickly becoming African American. Construction went predominantly unopposed since the residents leaving didn’t care and the ones arriving didn’t have any political clout. Perhaps the ultimate irony is that the park and the Kensington have been renamed after Martin Luther King Jr.
Obviously the contractors didn’t go to the University at Buffalo School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, since they hit bedrock and went bankrupt. As a court reporter, my dad had to listen to this lawsuit every day for years, and when he drives the Kensington all he can think of is typing hundreds of thousands of pages of boring transcripts. In fact, he can’t even watch The Flintstones because it takes place in Bedrock.
Loss of Critical Mass: When the Saints Go Marching Out
Mark Twain once said that you can’t throw a brick in Montreal without breaking a church window. The same is true for Buffalo if you add saloon windows. But it won’t be the case much longer at the rate churches are closing. Fortunately, the bars are still safe as best I can tell. And the two seem to coexist quite peacefully. In fact, on Washington Street there’s a Catholic Charities office just two doors away from alternative rock bar Club Diablo, which features bands such as Stigma and Morgue Riot.
The Catholics of the nineteenth century paid, prayed, and obeyed, but the size of the American flock began declining in the late twentieth century, coinciding with the rising number of just-on-Sunday Catholics (and just-in-case Catholics), who don’t send their children to parochial school, religion class, or Catholic Youth Organization.
Western New York is no longer 80 percent Catholic, the way it was when I was growing up, chock-full of Irish, Polish, and Italian immigrants, with each family hoping to produce a priest. Buffalo’s professionally dominant Germans, who made up half the area population in 1900, were divided between Catholic and Protestant (usually Lutheran). When I was born, in 1965, one-third of all Buffalo schoolchildren attended parochial schools, while 3,300 habit-covered nuns kept the area safe from the ravages of chewing gum. Now, enrollment is just 15 percent and dropping like the mercury in March, while only 950 nuns remain, many of whom are in infirmaries. Apparently, joining a convent has become about as popular as enrolling in finishing school, possibly as a result of the lure of that other Madonna, even though modernization has meant that few sisters still don habits, and it transpires that many nuns do in fact have hair, along with those other body parts we weren’t sure about.
On the ecumenical streets of Buffalo there’s really no way to identify Catholics since they don’t sport yarmulkes or head scarves, or put I Support Non-Prophet Organizations bumper stickers on their hybrids the way Unitarians do. But there is an audio cue—they’ll automatically say, “God rest his soul” after the mention of any dead person, or one who has “put on his heavenly armor,” in local parlance. When I was growing up there were also a number of telltale signs in the home, including de rigueur crucifixes and washed-out watercolors of the Virgin Mary. The classic Italian living room usually contained plastic-covered purple sofas, ridiculously light-colored shag carpeting, and possibly a fountain. No one was allowed in there because it was being saved for a visit by the pope. If a ball rolled into sanctum sanctorum, you had to crawl on your knees with your feet up, as if decommissioning a bomb. You got in and out as fast and carefully as possible, all while Nonna was in the basement kitchen using the home meat slicer on the pancetta and whipping up a batch of sauce.
Still, decades of heavy-duty Catholicism has left behind a rich legacy. “Bingo arms” or “Bingo wings” refers to upper-arm flab on great aunts who can make your ears pop from the change in pressure when they hug you. The ever popular “offer it up” continues to suggest that one embrace the bad along with the good, since celestial points will be gained for sacrifice to God. When I was in school, gym teachers enjoyed applying this panacea to most bruises, abrasions, and hurt feelings. Mothers saved it for when children didn’t get their way or complained about doing chores. One also still hears expressions of surprise or dismay that have Jesus doing various aerobic activities, such as “Jesus Christ on roller skates!” “Jesus Christ on a pogo stick!” and “Jesus Christ hanging from the cross!” Under similar circumstances, Jesus was also given a middle initial, as in “Jesus H. Christ!” According to Wikipedia, the H most likely stands for Harold (as in, “Harold Be Thy Name”?), which you’d probably already guessed. Best of all, we’ve been left to parse, deconstruct, and play backward Led Zeppelin’s “Stairway to Heaven,” wherein the line, “To be a rock and not to roll,” clearly references Saint Peter and the founding of the church.
Since its restructuring effort began in 2005, the Diocese of Buffalo has sold about a third of the seventy-seven worship sites closed or slated to close. Seven former Catholic churches are now used by other religious groups, a few have been turned into museums, several are being converted into living spaces, and Saint Gerard’s is scheduled to move south to Georgia. Honestly, it’s not hard to see how after months of the temperature hovering near zero with a windchill of ten below, a blistering sermon on the fires of hell isn’t going to attract a big crowd. If anything, it’s an appealing travel brochure, although I don’t think anyone expected an entire church to pack up its pews, bells, and basilica and relocate to the Sunbelt.
The church is looking into other cutbacks as well. In the same way that scientists recently whacked Pluto off the planetary list, there’s talk of closing the doors on limbo (Latin for “the edge of hell”). Limbo is the place where, once installed, you’re not subject to further suffering, as opposed to purgatory, which involves continuous suffering and is in no danger of closing its doors anytime soon. Perhaps a merger could save limbo. I know that the Catholic Church and the Academy of Sciences haven’t always seen eye to eye on the issues of the day, but this could be an opportunity for both to reach out and smooth over that whole Galileo business once and for all. Limbo is hot, hot, hot and Pluto is cold, cold, cold. You see where I’m going with this—celestial real estate with no-money-down eternal mortgages. Because we can’t just stand by and let limbo go. Next it will be the conga and then the rumba and finally the macarena, which reminds me of a poem: “When the pope came for the limbo, I remained silent; I did not do the limbo,” etc.
Still, there’s the rip-roaring Irish Festival every August, complete with fiddles, tin whistles, Uilleann pipes, theatricals, baby-kissing politicians, potato chowder, plenty of brown bottles, and Sunday morning Mass. Likewise, Buffalo is home to the country’s largest Saint Patrick’s Day parade west of Manhattan. What the ripsnorting celebration lacks in sobriety it more than makes up for in society, confirmed by the boomlet of wee Conors and Mary Catherines that miraculously arrive right around Christmastime. Saints be praised!
And you can always find a handmade butter lamb for Easter at the famous Broadway market, along with fried Polish angel wings cookies, also known as chruściki. Buffalo now has the largest Dyngus Day parade in the world. For those leading deprived secular lives, Dyngus Day is Easter Monday and marks the end of Lent, forty days of prayer and abstinence between Ash Wednesday and Easter Sunday. Dyngus Day festivities involve squirting people with water, an ancient purification rite, and if you’ve ever seen how clean the garage of an Old World Pole is, then you know they’re not kidding. It also involves consuming copious amounts of Tyskie beer and pierogi pizza and listening to the polka version of Rick James’s “Super Freak.”
A hop-step and a close-step leads us to the Buffalo chapter of Polkaholics Anonymous. Some people might have seen Gary Larson’s Far Side cartoon with the dialogue “Welcome to heaven, here’s your harp. Welcome to hell, here’s your accordion.” Or heard the definition of an optimist: an accordion player with a pager. Or followed this fail-proof safety guideline: hide all of your valuables inside an accordion case.
The polka originated in central Europe in the midnineteenth century and was brought to Buffalo by immigrants, along with kielbasa, golabki, babka, beet borscht, and sauerkraut soup. However, it wasn’t the national dance of Poland, and so the question is, why did it remain popular and not go the way of the gavotte? I think the answer says a lot about why local communities have remained close-knit and egalitarian. The effervescent polka is for all ages and all levels of ability, the band takes almost every request (yes, they know “Who Stole the Kishka?”), the musicians also like to dance (and are usually very good), a wide variety of clothing is acceptable (may I turn your attention to the cowboy fringe and the checkered hat?), individual dance styles are welcome, special occasions such as birthdays and anniversaries are always announced, and the musicians almost all have day jobs. As for the polka-dot pattern, it was indeed named after the polka, when the dance swept London in the late 1800s, but there’s no further connection unless a designer danced too many “Beer Barrel Polkas” and began to see spots.
As a direct insult to Buffalo, the hip-hop-favoring high priests of the Grammy Awards eliminated the category for best polka album in 2009. Over the decades, a number of local squeeze box and tuba-toting musicians had been nominated for the coveted statuette. It’s hard not to suspect that Forbes magazine wasn’t behind this added indignity.
Growing up in Buffalo in the sixties and seventies there were manifold benefits to having plenty of Catholic friends, because church was also a verb that offered a wide range of parties and activities, or a “grand funferall,” as James Joyce might say. They also had terrific holidays. Sorry, Jews, but atonement and fasting are just not that appealing to a child, especially one who worships milk chocolate. Best of all was that the Catholic Church conveniently issued lists of banned books and records, thereby vastly simplifying the search to learn what was cool. Since this was before computers, the church was the most reliable way to find out when a new George Carlin or Richard Pryor album was arriving in stores. Seeing as how the pope recently denounced the Harry Potter books, it would appear that this system is still in good working order, in case you don’t have time to read reviews. My Unitarian church didn’t provide a reading list per se, but they were always nattering on about Emerson and Darwin and Thoreau, which, to a ten-year-old, was about as exciting as watching Walden Pond freeze over.
What is the religious mix in Buffalo today? Everything. Immigrants from all parts of the globe enrich local culture with their traditions, celebrations, and miraculous soccer skills.
Increase the Peace
I was raised in the Unitarian Universalist Church of Amherst, which was created in 1960 by adding a chapel onto an existing mansion. The mostly glass chapel provided a wonderful atmosphere to reflect on nature, and in wintertime its low-slung eaves produced weapons-grade icicles for kids to joust with.
The Unitarians are derived from Christianity, since we believe in one God, more or less. If you think that LGBT is a sandwich, then you’re probably not Unitarian. We’re the weak-tea sister to the Methodists, who are the weak-tea sisters to the Presbyterians, and so on up Jacob’s Ladder until you get to the Evangelicals. We like to say that our spiritual life involves a responsible search for truth and meaning, which largely involves reading the liberal New York Times while asking ourselves, “But is it good for the UUs?”
The first Unitarian church in Buffalo was built on Franklin at Eagle Street by Benjamin Rathbun in 1833. This Buffalo native erected hundreds of buildings in the area, including hotels, businesses, taverns, residences, and even the city jail. After becoming overextended and forging notes, or kiting checks, in today’s parlance, the master builder was arrested in 1836 and had to be tried in Batavia because he was so popular locally. While awaiting his day in court, Rathbun was incarcerated in the very jail he’d built for the city of Buffalo. He eventually spent five years in the Big House, a.k.a Auburn Prison. In 1957, a document was found that suggested Rathbun’s brother, Lyman, may have been ultimately responsible for the fraud.
The English Gothic–style Buffalo Unitarian Church on Elmwood Avenue at West Ferry Street that we know today was built by Edward Austin Kent in 1904. It was most likely his last work before going down on the Titanic, and he’s buried in Forest Lawn Cemetery. Kent was the only Buffalonian to lose his life when, on April 15, 1912, the ship rammed an iceberg off the coast of Newfoundland and sank. On the bright side, he was traveling first class, and he would surely be pleased to know his church is thriving, recently hosting an event featuring a band called the Bloodthirsty Vegans.
The Buffalo area is home to hundreds of beautiful and historic religious sites in addition to the previously mentioned Our Lady of Victory Basilica and National Shrine. Over two hundred of these can be viewed in a photo gallery by Karl R. Josker at www.pbase.com/kjosker/churches. When checking them out in person, one does not want to miss Blessed Trinity, which is considered to be one of the most masterful reproductions in the United States of the twelfth-century Lombard-Romanesque style of architecture. Same with Westminster Presbyterian and its Tiffany windows, Corpus Christi Church, with its six large Madonnas reproduced from famous Marian shrines in Poland, Saint Louis Church, and Saint Ann’s Church and Shrine.
Forty minutes to the north, in Lewiston, is Our Lady of Fatima Shrine, with its breathtaking dome basilica topped by a thirteen-foot statue of Mary. Our Lady of Fatima is the name for the Blessed Virgin Mary who appeared to three shepherd children in Portugal in 1917 and imparted three secrets to them. The first was a vision of hell, the second included a recipe to save souls from hell and convert the world to Roman Catholicism, and the third was a vision of death for Pope John Paul II and some other religious figures. In fact, Our Lady reminds me a little of my friend’s Bubbe Dorothy, since she only tends to get in touch when there’s bad news to impart.
In addition to the statue of Our Lady of Fatima, the magnificent site features over 150 life-size bronze and marble statues, a natural pond, and a heart-shaped rosary pool. There are daily masses and confessions along with sustenance and souvenirs for thousands of visitors. One reason for Fatima’s continued popularity is that her message is known as the “Peace Plan from Heaven.”
Fortunately for me, UUs can still qualify for heaven. The Vatican think tank has produced a doctrine to cope with “invincible ignorance,” a sort of corollary to “papal infallibility,” which basically says that if you don’t know that the Catholic Church is the one true church through no fault of your own, then God will still allow you a shot at salvation. The only problem is that as nice as heaven may sound, Unitarians aren’t really in favor of gated communities.
Life in Amherst
Our Amherst isn’t the famous one where Emily Dickinson holed up in her white dress to scribble about hope, death, and immortality, but rather some marshland drained to create a first-ring suburb northeast of Buffalo. With a population of 116,000, the town has so far produced one American Idol finalist and consistently ranks as one of America’s top five safest cities, based on crime statistics. But see for yourself. Some winter morning at Boulevard or Eastern Hills Mall, join the ardent power walkers in their sequined tracksuits or business attire, carrying free weights or pushing strollers, plugged into iPods or chatting with friends, and near the fountain you’ll find heaps of coats, bags, umbrellas, and energy bars, all for the taking.
My good friend Mary and my mom still live within minutes of where I grew up, though my mom now goes to Florida in the winter. Mary comes from a small Catholic family of eleven people and is the youngest of nine children. (Bedrooms didn’t have TVs back then.) Her house was such a piratical free-for-all of kids and pets and coups d’état that for long stretches of time I don’t think anyone was Mom’s favorite. With raucous games, practical jokes, and heated rivalries almost always in progress, there was excitement in the air, more than a hint of danger, and the very real possibility of a head injury. But you couldn’t take a family of eleven people out anywhere in the Buffalo of the seventies, with all of its various strikes and protests, since you’d have immediately been arrested for unlawful assembly. When all was said and the battles were done at Mary’s house, the life lesson learned from diving headlong into such anarchy was that in the larger scheme of things, we kids weren’t so much special as replaceable.
