June 22, 2005
Traditions Have Their Place
What it means when they decline, ignore, or don't understand
By Michael D. Altman
Queen City Forum Magazine editor in chief
A young person is swaggering around the city right now with money pinned to his shirt. The dollar bills are faced, fanned and pressed. There are any number of bills depending on the time of day.
This is not a riddle. In Cincinnati it is a cultural tradition (focused in the African-American community) for a birthday boy or girl to wear a birthday corsage of dollar bills. The same practice of money pinning is common in Poland, the Philippines and Cypress, Greece; however, it is to the gowns of newlywed brides in these cultures.
Seemingly pedestrian cultural traditions like this can go observed without connection to what it means. This may happen by cultural divide or possibly little more than the fact people don’t care enough to think about it. But it is a part of the cultural divide within a city; traditions carried from generation to generation go unnoticed or misunderstood as they are pedestrian in appearance. In politics, when a tradition is overlooked, it is always deliberate and with message in tow.
Local Republican Party stops press
A tradition in the Hamilton County Republican Party: stand with the party or stand alone, according to current executive director Brent Sanders. He was not speaking philosophically; he means physically.
In spite of Sanders insistence, HCRP sources insist that a press conference scheduled for its city council endorsements was halted after top candidate Leslie Ghiz declined to attend due to professional obligations. She then declined attendance to HCRP mayoral candidate Charles Winburn’s press conference in early June.
What is not clear is whether Ms. Ghiz was still upset about not being appointed by Malone to replace Pat DeWine on City Council after DeWine left to act as county commissioner or if her background in service for children who have been abused was rattled by Malone’s alleged extended and severe abuse of his 14-year-old son. (Ghiz has worked with Women Helping Women—now the Rape Crisis Center, Dress for Success, Pro-Kids, and as a juvenile public defender representing kids as guardian ad litem when abused or abandoned.)
Where would Winburn fall into the mix? He stated that Malone “should be commended” for disciplining his child. The question remains: does discipline involve a trip to the emergency room? It seems Leslie Ghiz, though still a Republican, is of the opinion that it does not.
The Rev. Damon Lynch, also a candidate for City Council (but a Democrat) was at Charles Winburn’s press conference. Lynch said he is a friend of Winburn’s and had been asked to be there, but does not support Winburn’s candidacy for mayor. I guess that makes at least two people involved in this column.
Letter teeters on the Fringe of reality
Local organizers of the Fringe Festival ran into a problem the week before the curtain was to open leaving ten traveling professional performance artists out in the cold until further notice.
The Shakespeare festival, which had agreed to house the performers for the 12 days Fringe runs (June 1-12) pulled out because the venue they were planning to use became unavailable. In addition to pulling the festival’s last minute set-up, Jason Bruffy and crew now had an excess of ten bodies for 12 days and nowhere to put them, prompting calls and e-mails requesting help or leads.
With this request came one nasty letter. “Ann Walker” sent her suggestion as to where the performers might stay:
“Might I suggest Rumpke Dump or any dog pound.
They have just the perfect environment for garbage and mongrels,
which would about describe your ‘artists.’
Please practice group abortion - your genetic scum is not required in the human gene pool.”
The vagabond perception of traveling artists is certainly lingering here, and there are shades of it in Peter Bronson’s opinion of the Fringe. These performers are more often than not professional teachers and very dedicated artists. They are also bonded.
Finally, the tradition of traveling is long-honored, and the performers are in this culture. Performers treat the kindness of donated temporary living as an audition for future guests. They don’t screw it up; they need places to stay, and they know that just as their predecessors made it possible for this tradition to continue, so will they.
Not that there’s anything wrong with that
Try to get a haircut where they don’t serve champagne anymore. Go ahead; try it.
Furthermore, try to find a place in Cincinnati where a guy can be a guy since the removal of the gentlemen’s clubs by then-county prosecutor, now-Sheriff Simon Lies’ master plan of Cincinnati, all-American town. A thorough search will lead you through the doors of a downtown hotel. Perched between the Contemporary Arts Center and Nicholson’s, the only thing the Downtown Barbers is missing is a cocktail waitress named Tracy from the west side with a smile that’ll knock you to St. Louis and back.
The cozy two-chair barbershop isn’t a gentlemen’s club, but it’s the closest thing Cincinnati has anymore. It has a subscription to the essential clubhouse magazines: Playboy, Sports Illustrated and GQ. But the clincher is the inevitable Bond movie that is playing and the small television that makes the atmosphere. Always.
Owner Herb Woosley has been in the location in the Metropole Apartments ( 690 Walnut St.) for 6 years and has cut hair in Cincinnati for over 40. The tall, immaculately white-haired man’s disposition, like his shop, is mild and masculine. Neither he nor his establishment is in your face. They are there if you need them.
Between scenes of Moonraker, Herb and his long-time friend Dwayne Peterson, who mans the chair next to him, will talk politics, fishing, downtown and, interestingly enough, Florida for weeks if you let them. Dwayne’s specialty is golf and political anecdotes.
With the entrenchment of the metrosexual in society, the need for such shops seems to have significantly decreased, cutting in half due to closing in downtown Cincinnati alone in the last two years, but Downtown Barbers has continued to rise to the top.
Maybe it is because the haircuts are well-priced ($12, plus tip), or because Herb and Dwayne are great at what they do. Or maybe it’s that you leave the cozy venue feeling like a Kennedy, except the women, drinks and adventure were on the pages of the magazines and the television, not in the Oval Office.
Maybe it is just what it means to have traditions that makes it all seem worthwhile—to be part of something bigger than the city or ourselves. Then again, maybe we don’t even notice.
Michael D. Altman writes “I Don’t Mind Telling You” based on insight into the direction politically and socially of this, the Pepsi Generation (No--- that’s Gen Y?). The fact checker responsible for this confusion has been sacked (fired). The column appears as a weekly feature in QCF magazine.
Contact Information
· michaelda@queencityforum.com
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