Lessons learned… All Photos © Joe DiMaggio

Almost 6 decades ago I worked on Park Avenue – not the same Joe DiMaggio people know in 2024!  I had a short haircut, a Brooks Brother’s suit with button down shirt, and silk tie with a double Windsor knot.   I wore sterling silver cufflinks and a matching vest.  The suit was a  light-weight grey and had black stripes.  Of course, I had wing-tipped shoes with matching socks (hard to envision both for you and me.)  My boss’s name was Bob Cohen.  His boss was the senior VP of Smith-Corona Marchant.  I was ridiculously young.  After 3 months of hire, my boss decided I was going to be a field supervisor with 12 men working with me NOT FOR ME.  I explained this wasn’t going to work because one of the men was a retired NYPD officer with 5 kids and three of his kids, were older than me.  Bob explained to me I could do the job.  Once a week he would take me to a Jewish delicatessen (not Katz’s) and he’d give me a 90 minute lesson on administration and how to treat people.  My dad who graduated NYU, 17 years earlier, was a stickler for honesty, positivity and treating my fellow man always as an equal.  I was never better than anybody else!  Both men, radically different people but they both had similar concepts on humanity and the society we lived in.   One of the ninety minute lessons was – never put a man, woman, or dog in a corner where they couldn’t go left, right, or couldn’t get out.  That was unacceptable!  What’s amazing is now 60 years later that’s imbedded into my brain. 

It seems like the world loves Joe D as long as I says Yes!  The minute I deviate from Yes, things become dark grey, swinging towards black. When I left NYC for Centerport and then relocated to the Upper Delaware (Milford, PA), one thing was obvious, I did not need new clients.  I had plenty from Manhattan to Tokyo, Rome etc.  Many of my friends and I had almost a 40 year relationship.  So, the last thing I needed were new friends.  I already had great friends that would die for me and I for them.  Pat Nap took on 4 men who were beating me possibly to death, when I was just 16, and saved my life.  Brandofino was Pat’s best friend and there was no way he’d let anyone lay hands on me.  They were both 2 years older than I.  So why would I need new friends?  

When it came to the arts I had Dennis Wheeler, a world class artist/art director and all around great human being.  Dennis was a great guy who’d even sometimes baby-sit my son for hours when I met with clients in NY, and taught him how to paint and sketch while doing so.  My son went on to being published in a national Magazine at age 9 (I didn’t get published until I was maybe 23.)  Then there was Paul Laddin another great artist who painted in oil.  A very disciplined artist and a true master.   He was also President of a large Ad agency in NYC on Park Ave. These are just a handful of close friends.  There are so many others. At this point I almost forgot my all time best friend, the great photographer and beautiful JoAnne Kalish.  Yes, she is a better photographer than I and I just have to live with that!  The advantages is that I she has a small ego and I don’t!  

We now come full circle to 3 years and 2 months ago, I decided to join AA.  Anybody who knows me knows the last thing I would do was join any organization and certainly not AA!  The simple reality is without AA my ashes would have been already spread in the Hudson River or the lighthouse at Eaton’s Neck.  My brothers and sisters at AA taught me it’s not about me it’s about us.  I should also add that my concept of not needing new friends was wrong.  I not only needed new friends but want new friends.  I love the new friends as much as I love the old friends, whether they are still on this planet or have moved on.   I love my life and friends and for whatever time I have left,  all I want and need is Health and Happiness for Us All.  These are the only things that are important.  I will always remember to never put someone in a corner and strongly recommend you not do that either.  My “word,”  there I go again… Our “word,” Is more important than anything else.  

This is Joe DiMaggio master of the run-on-sentences, signing off.  God Bless!