Tour of a Christmas Tree: 60 Years of Memories Cluttered through the Branches

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Kevin Walsh
I sat beside the ignored Christmas tree this morning, finishing a novel I'd finally gotten around to, Chaim Potok's The Gift of Asher Lev. I was hit once again by the father-son nostalgia hammer as the dad is walking his 5-year old son through the forest of his childhood vacation spot.  They stopped beside a large oak tree with a low branch he used to lay upon and stare up at the sky through the branches. I was reminded of my dad sharing with his fourth grade boy his favorite thing to do at Christmas time when he was my age--lying beneath the tree and looking straight up through the tinsel and lights. I looked over my shoulder to our beautiful tree, chosen with great... Read More... →

Teacher of Teachers and Human Being Extraordinaire–Al Eidelman

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Kevin Walsh

On December 5, 2021 of one of the greatest men in my life left behind an extraordinary legacy of love and acceptance–Mr. Alan Eidelman–Clawson High School social studies teacher. 

Alan Eidelman (1943-2021)

His love of teaching, students, laughter and  pure acceptance of everyone he met truly left a permanent impact on thousands of Clawson students, many who became teachers because of him, as well as the students from Academy of the Sacred Heart (his longtime retirement teaching position) and for busloads of students who were so moved by his tours at the Holocaust Memorial Center.

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Lynn Eads: Online Parenting Coach & Author

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Kevin Walsh

Most people don’t really consider themselves to be experts in much–for example. My kids once accurately defined our specialized fields: “Dad’s kinda funny sometimes and mom finds stuff.”

But when it comes to hammering out that brief description of yourself in LinkedIn, Twitter or Instagram it can be surprisingly difficult to find much to really brag about–let alone translate it to a full-blown resume.

It’s a lot easier to look at your reflection and see that one tiny zit rather than combed-hair, clean teeth or at maybe even someone who remembers to clean the mirror once in a while.

Lynn Eads, featured … Read More… →

Our Wonderful World: Podcasts for When You Want to Learn Something New

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Chelsy Johnson

From our newest contributor, Chelsey Johnson…

Want to explore anything and everything under the sun, while staying in the same place? Get excited because it’s totally possible and free. You don’t need magic, you just need to grab your device and listen to a podcast!

Podcasts are audio shows that are packed with different stories and lessons. There is a podcast for every topic imaginable — whether you want to learn about how everyday tools are made or want to know more about a show you binge-watched last weekend. If you’re a curious creature itching for more knowledge about the … Read More… →

WandaVision’s Re-Stream of Our Consciousness

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Kevin Walsh

Check out our WandaVision Roundtable podcast.

I’m still processing the remarkable WandaVision and its re-boot of the role of television on our culture, the metamorphosis of its consumption and digestion–and thankful for some friends to help me get some perspective on this tragedy wrapped in familiar sit-com sets with a laughing audience.

The Fonz, Kunta Kinte and Darth Vader’s paternity claim. My first three thoughts while processing WandaVision. Marvel and Disney+ actually had the nerve/guts to stretch out its nine-episodes over NINE weeks, reminding me of my first television cliff-hanger, many years before JR was shot.

Three moments of delayed gratification jump to mind from my childhood–triggered by the weird time-warp that WandaVision so accurately displays–making one week cover 50 years of jokes, … Read More… →

“Peeping Tomb” – Sunlight & Stained Glass in Detroit’s Historic Woodlawn Cemetery

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Kevin Walsh

Original photography by Kevin Walsh. Also featured on Digging Detroit.

Detroit’s Woodlawn Cemetery offers a unique historical walk through Detroit’s golden era, founded in the late 1890s by Detroit’s captains of industry and politics

Founded in 1895 – Woodlawn Cemetery – 19975 Woodward Ave, Detroit

I first encountered the magic of Woodlawn on a walking tour with Bailey Sisoy-Moore, founder of Detroit History Tours. I then was forutnate enough to become a guide in her tour company’s “Buried in Detroit” bus tour of multiple historic cemeteries.

Incorporated in 1895, it offered the opportunity of a … Read More… →

“Hamilton” through the Lens of Cinematographer Declan Quinn–with Podcast

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Kevin Walsh

Third row, center. Pretty good for the hottest show on Broadway–even better when it’s a free seat.

The challenge? To convert a once-in-a generation stage-play into a multi-million dollar budgeted film. So pay attention, right? No stress. For a photographer there’s perhaps no greater thrill–finding that one great angle, great color, great contrast.

Cinematographer Declan Quinn was asked to help bottle the magic of the Broadway juggernaut through an itty bitty lens–or twelve. He joined me in a podcast to discuss the 2016 shoot–and even passed along his camera schematics of the monumental project on a very tight schedule.

“We embraced the sweat, because you know you’re not going to take the … Read More… →

Presidential Report Card from one Teacher’s Lifetime: LBJ to Trump

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Kevin Walsh

Note:  I actually wrote the following in the weeks following Donald Trump’s 2016 inauguration and it has sat in my draft bin ever since. I decided to shelve it and wanted to give some time for Trump’s presidency to actually have some history behind it, feeling that while I graded the new president low scores even after just one month, I had hopes they’d improve–I guess more of an early progress report than a semester grade.

Following innumerable crises and jolts to our system, let alone in just the last 12 months an impeachment, a pandemic, nation-wide protests against inequity and finally the terrifying events at the capital on Wednesday January 6, 2021 I remembered to take another look at this post–as the nation was jolted into a Washington-version … Read More… →

Open letter to my family

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Nicole LaDouceur-Janowicz

This is an open letter to my family before the 2020 US Presidential Election:

It may be difficult to hear what I have to say. I am sorry if you feel polarized by this letter. My hope is that our relationship can be part of a larger healing that is desperately needed in our country.

A song that profoundly influenced my childhood was They’ll Know We Are Christians (By Our Love). Every summer, our family reunion-camping trip began with a Catholic mass in a large field. I remember belting out this song with pride and gusto, and the powerful connection I felt with my aunts, uncles and cousins in our large family. This song reaffirmed my role as a Christian in my child’s mind and heart, … Read More… →

COVID-Journal Day 1: Zoom, Maisel & Drunk Lucy

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Kevin Walsh

It’s been a ton of time since my last post and if I don’t jot down some of the crazy things that have changed the world in the past two months as the COVID-19 virus has crushed the economy and stripped the streets of Manhattan, Rome, Paris and caused the Venice canals to run clean I’d be one pretty lame blogger.  While the government plays ping-pong with the stock market today with suspicious eyes on each side of a slush-fund for the right or a socialist welfare state for the left, there are too many people dying, too many people sick, too many losing paychecks and, frighteningly, far too many people who think it’s not a big deal.

But here’s my narrow experience so far–the first … Read More… →

Father’s Day 101: Seven Tips from Seven Pics

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Kevin Walsh

I was looking for a Father’s Day picture to put on Facebook today. The upside of cracking a rib last winter while wearing socks on carpeted stairs was pooling all my family photos into a server.  Flipping through them I realized the lessons that can be found from each one.

Jim Walsh was only 57 when we lost him 22 years ago but his love of the moment, his family and a good laugh stay with us each day–and his “dad jokes” were passed down from father to father decades before that term became a household term about five years ago.

1. You’re Needed at Full Strength (No matter how tough your day)

I’ve looked at this picture a hundred times, mostly to see us kids–and to try to remember Katie’s full-sized doll’s … Read More… →

An “Impossible Dream” — Not Holding a Microphone Up to the Speaker

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Kevin Walsh

“You’ll be hit by these big waves that’ll sneak up on you.”  That was what Fr. Jack Trese told us about grief at my dad’s funeral in 1997.  But a week ago I got clobbered by one those waves in the form of  a showtune I couldn’t stand–driving south in the middle of Ohio.

These days, my go-to stations on Sirius include “On Broadway,” “The Beatles Channel” and “The Seventies on 7,” especially on Saturdays they reply Casey Kasem’s “American Top 40” broadcasts from the same week from 1970-79.  I was very excited one weekend brought back my transistor radio tied to by handlebars as I listened to WDRQ delivering my newspapers at 5:30 AM.

In addition to the Saturday Night Fever‘s stranglehold on the airwaves that spring … Read More… →

Michigan Charter Schools Attempt Millage-Pillage & 20 Years of Arizona School Carpetbagging

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Kevin Walsh

And from the “Ain’t It Ironic” department…

Charter schools in Michigan decided they want a level playing field.

“We have ten percent of our students who attend charter schools in my county,” said bill sponsor Sen. Dave Hildenbrand, R-Lowell. “And I feel like it’s an equity issue.” (link)

The GOP leaders aren’t satisfied with just dipping their corporate bills into state per-pupil funding (with far less oversight needed than traditional schools), they now want a piece of local districts’ property tax millage.

Michigan Senate Bill 574 proposes a handy crossed-out edit of the 1976 law…

It’s just one little … Read More… →

“So if the election were held today…” An Unscientific Survey of Non-Hillary Voters

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Kevin Walsh

One of my favorite get-togethers has always been the night before a wedding or reunion–everyone’s in town and it’s much more casual in some bar than the big shin-dig the next day.  But one of those great nights was tainted on September 11th, 1998 with the release of Kenneth Starr’s report on Bill Clinton (link).

One year earlier, I had been ridiculed by one of the guys when I admitted voting not once but twice for Clinton.  While I knew many of my friends were clearly planted on the opposite side of the political spectrum we’d always handled our differences smoothly; but that night seemed to move beyond the … Read More… →

10 Tips from 25 Years of Marriage – From Sweetest Day Toilet Repairs to Bathtub Duty

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Kevin Walsh

Twenty-five years ago, I was playing tennis the morning of my marriage.  I don’t normally whack myself in the forehead with my tennis racquet but that was what happened.  Look carefully at my wedding pictures and you’ll see the little knot.  My blushing bride Patrice couldn’t stop laughing and said, “Well that was a dumb thing to do!”

Twenty five years ago–and it just happened–that tennis game, wedding, birth of two kids, two houses, eight cats, four barbecue grills and 4,000 students just happened,

Somehow our marriage keeps moving along at light speed–after just a quick two week period of dating and six month engagement.  We’d eaten lunch together for the first two months of the school year in the teacher’s lounge but it started … Read More… →

House on the Hill or the Shack in the Shade? Bungalows Depart from Suburbs with the Middle Class

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Kevin Walsh

Probably midway through junior high was when I finally put some kind of tie between the size of a house and the income-level of the dad who pulled up in the driveway at dinnertime.  I didn’t notice that one pal’s father was an executive at Ford and the other guy’s dad fixed transmissions (way cooler, by the way).  The most awesome dads coached little league or took us to Tiger games; the coolest moms were den-mothers for the cub scouts or didn’t mind us screaming “Marco Polo” for eleven straight hours in their above-ground pool.

Clawson, Michigan remains a small town with hundreds of ranches on the 1960s “newer” north end of town and the bungalows and frame houses from the twenties when you cross Main street nearly one … Read More… →

Day 28 – The Reichstag Fire, “Dangerous” Immigrants & Emergency Decrees

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Kevin Walsh

“Just cannot believe a judge would put our country in such peril. If something happens blame him and court system. People pouring in. Bad!”

Thus, in typical thin-skin, knee-jerk Twitter-ese, President Trump issues a Don Corleone “and that day may never come” warning in the wake of a court-ruling stalling his seven-country travel ban.

Nothing makes people more willing to give up their rights than an emergency.  And nothing primes the pump better for an emergency decree than a worst-case-scenario actually happening.

Adolf Hitler didn’t take over Germany by force–he was elected chancellor, not dictator in 1932 and sworn in on January 30, 1933.  He promised change, jobs for the working class and most importantly plenty of scapegoats to blame for losing … Read More… →

Back to the Classroom, Slide Projectors, Mountains & Mole Hills

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Kevin Walsh

Four years ago, my intended formula for this blog was pretty simple–pick a form of media (TV show, movie, billboard, cat footprints) and let it take you down a path or two.  But the last path I took was in August, before I returned to the high school classroom for my 26th year.  Being in an office setting since 2012 certainly gave me more physical and creative energy for activities like blogging as well as producing a documentary series, but it also pulled me a bit away from some basic reality-check questions that I’ve always enjoyed from teenagers–beyond “Can you give me passing grade and a pass to go home?”

The days following Election Day produced some poignant conversations for this English major turned video production teacher–with just a minor … Read More… →

Cheers to the 19th Amendment–96 Years Ago Today!

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Bailey Sisoy Isgro

Welcome to MMD’s newest contributor, Bailey Sisoy Isgro, owner of Detroit History Tours!

Speaker_Gillett_Signing_the_Suffrage_Bill

August 18th should be a national holiday. We should make potato salad and grill hot-dogs. Fireworks should be loosed and kids should wear patriotically themed face paint. It’s the anniversary of the liberation and equalization of the largest disenfranchised group in the history of America. Women.  On August 18th 1920 The 19th Amendment, guaranteeing women the right to vote, was ratified into the U.S. Constitution. Ninety six years ago today, women in America earned the right to vote.

The amendment was the culmination of more than 250 years of … Read More… →

Please De-Friend Me! A 12-Step Facebook Litmus Test

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Kevin Walsh

I’m often baffled by anyone who want to be friends with me–particularly about lefty agenda items that can’t be shaken out of my brain through a meme or “But Hillary did worse!” argument.

Maybe they are on an evangelical Karl Rove mission to let me see my folly–or perhaps they’re just fans of NASCAR crashes and fifth grade choir concerts.  It’s like me saying, “You say you sell Amway?  Let’s hear all about it!”

I think the Zuckerbergians in the bowels of Facebook should develop a litmus-test for friends, replacing the holistic score we give folks as we look over our friends “in common” before we let them in our virtual lives of cats, knee injuries and occasional political viewpoints.

No one likes unpleasant surprises, such as finding out your house-closing that your new neighbor can’t … Read More… →