BARBER SHOP MURDER? About a week ago, an old guy who owned and operated a small video store in Orange, New Jersey was beaten to death with a hammer during a store robbery. Orange is an old urban area that has seen better days. It’s really just an extension of Newark. The old guy and his family had operated the store for years and years, back before there even were videos (it was originally some kind of electric repair shop). They moved out to the suburbs, but the guy still kept the old store opened and tried to stay involved in Orange.

Another urban tragedy. But here’s the urban sociology twist to it. I was sitting at my desk at work today, listening to some assistant prosecutors shooting the breeze. (Recall that I work in a county prosecutor’s office, and Orange is located within our county – so this murder is “one of ours”). One of the big wigs said that a barber shop had recently opened near the video store, and was attracting “the wrong element”. Arguably, it was someone from this “element” who did the old guy in (my inference, not an official statement of my office).

Wow, I didn’t know that barber shops were becoming hang-outs for the bad guys. Back in my day, barber shops were mostly for clean-cut guys. Criminals didn’t get their hair cut very much. I guess that things in the city have taken a turnabout. For a while, there hardly seemed to be any barber shops left – they had been replaced by “salons”. But now, barber shops are back – but they may not be the safe and stodgy kind of place that they used to be. Barbershop harmony has a very different beat today.

It feels like a night for random thoughts, so here are three:

First, a memory from last week. I was walking out to my car at 7am one day, getting ready to go to work, when I noticed the full moon setting in the west just as the dawn was breaking in the east. Ah yes, one of those perfect transitional moments in nature. The Queen of the Night was leaving, and the King of the Day was drawing near. It was like some kind of old German clock, where a figurine is leaving thru one door as another comes out of the opposite side.

The second thought is about President Bush’s latest brainstorm about Iraq, i.e. the “surge”. This is a classic example of the stitch that didn’t come in time. Had the US surged its troop strength back when the Iraqis went on their looting binge back in 2003, it might have done some good. But now? It seems to me as though this is a time for biting bullets, for getting real. And getting out, actually. (Although I would support a UN force to occupy the Baghdad area, where there could be a real bloodbath; that is, if a UN force could accept that it might actually need to fire weapons and kill people, and not just hang around with those blue-banded helmets on).

Third thought: I just read that the Mahayan Buddhists believe in a celestial bodhisattva names Manjushri, who cares for learners and students. Being one of this world’s eternal students, I’m glad to learn about Manjushri. I hope that the good Manjushri is looking down right now on me and my messy, book-strewn apartment. And on all those who never gave up on the beautiful act of learning, even when the classroom has been left far behind. Because if you want it, the world can be your classroom. Right, Manjushri?

I don’t get out to the movies much anymore. Movies just aren’t a big part of my life these days. But I did make an exception recently for Rocky Balboa. I’m not a boxing fan, not really a sports fan at all. Nonetheless, I’ve seen all the other Rockys, every one from One to Five. So, I figured that I might as well keep my perfect attendance record going with Stallone. (Not that I’ve seen any of his other movies – thank goodness.)

Rocky Balboa isn’t a masterpiece, but if you liked any of the other Rocky movies, you might like Rocky B. It revolves around a big boxing match – the standard Rocky movie scenario. But there are enough twists to it, bittersweet twists that reflect upon the passing of time and the aging of the body and spirit. And he now runs a restaurant, which is kind of neat.

Again, as with all Rocky movies, the fight is the thing. But coming in a strong second is the fact that Adrian, Rocky’s wife, is dead and gone. Nonetheless, Rocky is still devoted to her memory, spending a lot of time sitting at her gravesite and driving around with her brother Paulie, visiting the decrepit old places in Phillie where it all began (way back in Rocky I). Of course, all of this is accompanied by the same old slow piano and French horn score by Bill Conti.

It’s kind of like watching a sunset from an urban neighborhood. Not quite as dramatic as a desert sunset, but you still get the general idea (and the emotional response to it). In the end, Rocky proves his point in the ring, but saves the final scene for Adrian’s grave. After “talking with her” about the fight, he kisses the gravestone and walks away. The camera follows him a bit, then he stops and just disappears. I guess that Stallone is telling us that the Rocky story is finally over. Hard to believe, given that Stallone is such an egoist and since Rocky is the only thing he came up with that might be remembered fifty years from now. But I can’t see how anyone would take a Rocky 7 or 8 seriously. Hopefully, he knows how to finish a good work of art (I wouldn’t say “masterpiece”, but Rocky was good). “Rocky Balboa” is a much better ending to the story than Rocky V was. Just remember Mister Rocky Balboa as the guy who loved Adrian, and who will always love her. Yea, OK . . . that’s a nice way to end the story.

Oh, just how did I get interested in the Rocky movies? Well, my brother got caught up in the enthusiasm for Rocky I just as soon as it came out, way back in 1977. I was living in the Washington DC area at the time, and one weekend I came up to visit my mother and him (a more-or-less monthly thing) and he insisted that we see it. My brother is a physical guy, and he responded to Rocky by taking up boxing himself. Luckily, he didn’t push it too far after a few experiences in the YMCA ring with some tough kids who grew up in nasty urban neighborhoods. I interpreted Rocky in the more generic sense, the idea that a nobody from nowhere (like me) could somehow catch a break and put out his heart and soul and do some great things. At the time, I was planning to apply to law school and was getting ready to take the LSAT. So of course, I saw it all as my own chance to fight the big one. “Gonna Fly Now” and all of that.

Rocky I became a big movie because it sold a dream, a dream that people liked. But most dreams don’t come true, including my own “Rocky” dream. I never got the chance to change the world. I never went the distance. I turned out to be just another kid from the neighborhood. Law school prepared me for an exciting career pushing papers for government and non-profit agencies. I found a woman and married her, but she wasn’t Adrian and I wasn’t Rocky, and we split up within five years. I’m not the one who will always love her.

Oh well. That’s why they don’t make movies about real life. Still, Rocky B is just a step closer to reality than the other Rocky movies were. And that’s why I’ll always like – but not love – the whole Rocky story.