Family's Motorcycle Act Part of the Three-Ring Fun at Ringling Circus
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INSIDE WEEK OF DECEMBER 22-28, 2011 www.FloridaWeekly.com Vol. II, No. 11 • FREE Plan your NYE BARNUM See a special listing of events, where to go. B1 w Urias Family: Melvin BASH Urias (left), Olga Surnina and Erwin Urias ride motorcycles in the globe, while Jodie Urias (rear) performs acrobatics. Networking See who’s out and about in Palm Beach County. A17-19 w Time is money Antique clocks can be valuable. Family’s motorcycle act part of the A14 w three-ring fun at Ringling circus BY SCOTT SIMMONS Barnum & Bailey’s Barnum Bash Dec. ssimmons@fl oridaweekly.com 27-31 at the Palm Beach County Conven- tion Center and Jan. 6-8 at Germain Arena ERWIN URIAS WAS BORN TO RIDE. in Estero. In a ball. But back to Mr. Urias’ being born to The stunt motorcyclist is a member of ride. the fourth generation of his family to take “The first time I was on a motorcycle to the clan’s famed Globe of Death. and in the globe, I was 6 months old,” he And Florida audiences can see them when they appear in Ringling Bros. and SEE BARNUM, A8 w Pets of the Week 4th annual Chanukah festival to light the night over the Gardens Cody and other animals need homes. A6 w SPECIAL TO FLORIDA WEEKLY show, free sufganiot (traditional Chanu- Mia Szymonowicz, 13, of Palm Beach The Chabad of Palm Beach Gardens’ kah doughnuts), face painting, glow-in-the- Gardens, said, “The lights and Menorah fourth annual Chanukah celebra- dark Menorah necklaces, music out in the open in last year’s celebration tion will light the sky on Dec. 22 at and Chanukah gelt for every child was my best part because I felt like I was Download Downtown at the Gardens. in attendance. lighting up the world.” our FREE The free, public event begins at Said city councilman Eric Jablin, The annual festival is sponsored by the 6 p.m. It includes a light show and in a statement: “Even if you’re not Schmooze weekly Jewish radio show, the App today a 14-foot Menorah that will be lit a member of any synagogue, I urge only Jewish radio show in Palm Beach Available on by Gardens city council members. The you to participate in this beauti- County. For more information see jewish- the iTunes App celebration also includes an illusion magic ful event simply because the city of Palm gardens.com. Store. w Beach Gardens is celebrating Chanukah.” PRSRT STD ROGER WILLIAMS A2 BUSINESS A15 FILM B7 U.S. POSTAGE LINDA LIPSHUTZ A12 REAL ESTATE A20 NETWORKING A17-19 PAID FORT MYERS, FL PETS A6 ARTS B1 PUZZLES B6 PERMIT NO. 715 ANTIQUES A14 EVENTS B4-5 SOCIETY B8-9, 12-13 A2 NEWS WEEK OF DECEMBER 22-28, 2011 www.FloridaWeekly.com FLORIDA WEEKLY COMMENTARY Crossing the other Delaware: a personal view of Christmas laboredl in frigid darkness toward the Jersey the love and thanks of man and woman. facing the river. shore.s Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; Charles Dickens, the great British novel- None of it was pretty. In sloppy, strug- yet we have this consolation with us, that ist, knew the music of this tune intimately, rogerWILLIAMS glingg fashion commanders and a regiment the harder the conflict, the more glorious which was why he wrote, “A Christmas [email protected] ofo experienced seamen from Marblehead, the triumph.” Carol.” Mass.,M with others, finally landed the force No doubt many would have settled for an In any case, something has to be faced mostlym intact at Trenton, on the east bank easier conflict and reduced rations of glory and changed. And you have to face it and In the American cultural vernacular, of the river. along with a hot meal, but they weren’t change it. which may prove as confusing to you as it There, things changed forever. That fact given the choice. Christmas is a time to do that, just as it frequently does to me, the first Christmas remains the nation’s most singular Christ- For all those Americans, including was for Washington and the men, women did not occur 2,011 years ago. mas gift to itself. women, children and the old people left and children who faced his Delaware River. Instead, the first Christmas took place The Americans caught the winter- to gather food, feed families and manage For somebody I never knew, here’s one exactly 235 years ago, on a frigid night a few encamped Hessian troops (competent pro- farms and homes, Christmas Love required more river. Late on Dec. 24, 1976, I drove out miles north of Philadelphia. fessional soldiers in the pay of the British sacrifice and the recognition of imminent of the gates of Camp Lejeune, North Caro- In this whimsical, transformative nation, army) completely off guard and besotted mortality. lina, home of the Second Marine Division, holidays that began as one thing inevitably from Christmas revelry. Thus they won the To all of them, everything must have bound toward Wilmington, 50 or so miles to become another — and none more so than first real victory in our history, at the end of seemed tenuous. the south. I was bent on attending midnight Christmas. what had been a very bad year. I’ve always thought of Christmas that Mass at an orthodox church. During the evening of Dec. 25, 1776, Had Washington been killed or captured way, too — as a time when existence can The narrow two-lane blacktop ribboned Christmas Love (defined as the love of (a distinct possibility since he was among become, paradoxically, both sumptuous and a North Carolina night so black in the flat Christ come, for Christians) must have the first to land on the far shore), history desperate. piedmont that I could see nothing beyond seemed as remote as the North Pole to would have gone barking up a different tree. In such a time, each of us must cross our my own headlights for miles, until a flash- the 2,400 men who crossed the Delaware It almost did, anyway. Previously, his own Delaware — which means that each ing of red and blue came distantly into view. River out of Pennsylvania. They moved men had succeeded only in having their of us must define Christmas Love as any I slowed, approached and passed. Two out in sleet and snow equipped with newly rear ends kicked out of New York and force or energy that allows us to make the cars had collided head on. The bodies of issued flints for their weapons on George chased all over New Jersey by the British crossing, no matter how tenuously or what five dead lay under sheets near the devas- Washington’s command, gathering on the and their allies. shape it takes. tated wreckage. Midnight was 90 minutes riverfront from positions near McKonkey’s But only six days before Christmas, If, for example, you haven’t spoken to a away. Ferry. Thomas Payne came out with a feisty pam- relative or an old friend with whom you’ve At the church, a packed Christmas cele- At that point the self-declared United phlet called “Common Sense,” in Phila- fallen out, you’re facing the river. bration of such candlelit, incense-infused States of America — where you and I will delphia. It included the most famous lines If you haven’t forgiven yourself for a magnificence occurred — with chanting, eat to our heart’s content this Christmas he ever wrote. The language was so com- mistake made in another time — which bells, the sprinkling of holy water and all — amounted to 174 days worth of upstart pelling that against all reason it boosted means confronting your own weakness or the sensuous ornamentation of celebra- nation. Brand new, the nation was also morale among the half frozen, half sick, blindness, and moving on — you’re facing tory life — that I’ve never been able to under siege, wrapped in a winter storm, woefully undernourished Americans. the river. forget either the blood or the glory. and starving. “These are the times that try men’s If the echoes of the dead or the memories And now it’s only Christmas Love I Most of Washington’s men couldn’t souls,” Mr. Payne wrote. “The summer of Christmases past become not the voices want for those who may still love the vic- swim, but they swallowed their fear. Ice soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in of angels but a chorus of tyrants beckoning tims of that long ago night. May they, with floes in the river presented a significant this crisis, shrink from the service of his you to surrender the joyous moment in all of us, find it in themselves to cross the danger to their heavily-laden boats as they country; but he that stands it now, deserves order to suffer the once-upon-a-time, you’re Delaware. ■ WHY EXPERIENCE The more heart emergencies that a team handles — the more angioplasties and MATTERS heart surgeries it performs — the better the outcomes. The better the results. This is a fact. Experience is what it takes IN HEART to deliver our kind of heart care. This is what it takes to get the job done. CARE. The way we do it. THE HEART IT’S FREE. ATTACK RISK IT’S ASSESSMENT PRICELESS. pbgmc.com/heartscreenings 561.625.5070 A4 NEWS WEEK OF DECEMBER 22-28, 2011 www.FloridaWeekly.com FLORIDA WEEKLY OPINION Publisher Michelle Noga [email protected] Editor & Circulation Director The myth of the new Newt Betty Wells [email protected] leftl by saying poor kids should work; the cation.