In the town of Port Washington, New York, a sleepy little bedroom community of pretty houses on tree-lined streets surrounding a nice little town, something important is going on. It's going to change the world. Not for everyone, mind you, and not overnight, but it's another drop in the bucket of right and good. The schools in Port Washington have mobilized their leading citizens, their children, to help the children of a town a thousand miles away from Long Island, a town devastated by Mother Nature, abandoned by their own government and wracked with poverty. If that place doesn't sound like part of America, guess again. The children of Port Washington want to help the children of New Orleans.
They're not selling raffle tickets or stuffing jars with coins and sending them somewhere and forgetting about the whole thing as often happens in a lot of these kinds of affairs. The Port Washington kids have something more tangible in mind. They're buying and outfitting a Mobile Health Clinic and sending it to New Orleans to give on-site medical care to that city's poor children who have been mostly abandoned by their local, state and federal governments. What has happened to this great American city is a national scandal and the list of tragedies is a long one with plenty of blame being spread around and not a lot of remedies being applied.
Port Washington's kids are not getting caught up in any of that finger pointing. Instead they want to do something tangible and effective and have hit upon a wonderful idea. Towards that end they have contacted a very effective charity called The Children's Health Fund, an organization co-founded in 1987 by singer/songwriter Paul Simon and Doctor Irwin Redlener dedicated to providing quality health care to our nation's most medically neglected children. As well as being strong advocates of children's health care they are also hands-on providers of these vital services. They work in both urban and rural communities in America targeting especially the children of homeless, transient and poor people.
This mobile clinic will be right up their alley and The Children's Health Fund applauds the initiative of the children of Port Washington and will help make their idea a reality. The children of New Orleans will have a better chance at life now thanks to their little pals from across the nation. Maybe when they grow up and someone else is in trouble these children of New Orleans will remember that somebody helped them when they were down and will do so something important to help others. No other thanks is asked for from Port Washington's smallest citizens, and that will be plenty. Helping can be contagious and the bucket of right and good needs all the drops it can get in this hard world. Just having our children learn that lesson makes every effort worthwhile.
My end of this whole deal comes by doing what I do best: singing and playing rock and roll. One of the fund-raising tools for the Medical Van will be a good old fashioned Battle of the Bands in Port Washington's Polish American Hall. I'll be appearing with my good friend and superb guitarist Gary Kroman with Little Sammy and The Sugar Daddies featuring Bob Crespo on Saturday, March 15th around 7PM. There will three other exciting bands, Tiberius, Rock Steady and One Less Joe for your rocking pleasure. Admission is $45 and there will be raffles and auctions too. There will be food and a bar as well.
The location of the bash is The Polish American hall at 5 Pulaski Place in Port Washington, NY 11050. I know very little about Port Washington except that it exists. I've been there a few times and it seems pretty nice. I probably know more about New Orleans and I've never been there. Probably everybody in the nation knows a lot about New Orleans these past four years since the place almost drowned and the government didn't throw anybody a life jacket. I seem to remember our government doing more for other nations similarly stricken by natural disasters over the years and sort of wonder what happened to America to allow one of our most fabled cities rot away, their poor displaced, ill housed and off the government radar.
Well, the kids in Port Washington are proving that the American people are just fine, it's our current presidential administration that's the problem. Bush the Younger, the front man for the biggest gang of thugs and criminals in our nation's history, led by Shotgun Dick Cheney, has nominally presided over the worst government in American history. Shotgun Dick and his gang of killers and thieves have presided over the largest transfer of wealth from the working classes to the very rich in anybody's history. They've also committed so many crimes they make the late John Gotti look like a Boy Scout by comparison.
But this this not about those punks who have no souls. This is about children helping children, Americans coming to the aid of their brothers and sisters in their time of need. Little children are leading the way in Port Washington and their schools and parents have been galvanized to help. I was recruited by Sam Fox of Port Washington who has school-aged children. He would be the Little Sammy of Little Sammy and the Sugar Daddies. Also with the band is Port Washington's Eric Salzman on drums and Larry Vedilago on keyboards as well as Gary Kroman on guitar and me on guitar and lead vocals. We're rehearsed and ready to go out and win this Battle of the Bands, something I haven't been a part of for thirty five years but the competitive juices still flow.
We plan to kick ass and take names. We're going to leave our audience in a rock-induced coma and the other bands afraid to follow our set. Like John Wayne once said: "No brag, just fact." Come on Saturday night, March 15th at 7 PM and see if the Sugar Daddies and I can back up my big talk. We'll be playing one of the songs I wrote that appears on the bobcrespo.com SONGS page, "Where You Been So Long" and some of my other compositions including my show stopper "Stormy Sky." You will also hear songs by Stevie Wonder, The Temptations, The Rolling Stones and New Orlean's own Doctor John. Those other bands had best be on their game in a big way or they'll be toast, even their own fans will vote for us. You hear me, guys? Little Sammy and The Sugar Daddies will be practicing a scorched earth policy and we'll be taking no prisoners! In the immortal words of the Wicked Witch of the West: "Surrender, Dorothy!" We will make you our bitches and you will like it! And we'll be eating your lunch too, punks.
Fighting words? You bet. This is a Battle of he Bands, right? And it's a fight for the children of New Orleans that America forgot. Well, Port Washington didn't forget them and the Children's Health Fund didn't forget them and Rock and Roll never forgets. So instead of spending your hard-earned that weekend on stupid crap like groceries or rent come to Port Washington and drop some dough on the kids in New Orleans who need us now, four years after their whole world fell in on them. The Government of the United States let them down, the State of Louisiana let the down and their city is still a shambles. Let's not let these children down anymore. Let them know that they are our little brothers and sisters and America cares about them. So come out, contribute to the cause and have a real good time in the process. Giving back is going to be a lot of fun that night, two reasons to feel good. I guarantee it.
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