Monday, October 29, 2012

Larry Bloch

Yesterday was a gray day. Around the time the sun was setting, around the time the light began to fade, Larry Bloch left us.

It's the next morning and still, everything I start to write seems to be inadequate, to come out wrong.

Larry created and ran the Wetlands Preserve, a famous rock club in New York City which featured social activism as part of its ethos. The club was just a couple of blocks from where I used to live, but it opened after I'd left NYC for Boston. But I was lucky - Larry Bloch moved here and I got the chance to know him. Better yet, I got the chance to call him my friend. He was a co-founder of both radio free brattleboro and WVEW-lp, which quite simply and honestly would not exist without him. He opened a store here devoted to clothing made from hemp - he called it "Save the Corporations from Themselves". It had a loft where he kept free copies of the U.S. Constitution, and literature on many local and local-world causes - it was known as the "Activist's Attic". In my mind's eye I can see him changing the community billboard he maintained outside the Common Ground. Larry was a major force for good. I wrote that last as "in this town", but deleted it on purpose. Larry touched lives around the world. And he made the world, and his local community, a better place.

To be continued,
when my heart is not so heavy.



As Larry would have said,
Enjoy the day.




1 comment:

Austan said...

Oh Bunky, I know this is ripping you up. Larry was a big brother to you. You fought wars together to keep the radio station, you've spent many years working together. This is a huge blow. But know that we're all here for you, too. We'll all miss Larry, together. He was one of us.