Creative lines of work can be frustrating.
 
Some weeks, I rattle out a column in 20 minutes — no smart-aleck remarks — other weeks, I’m spinning my wheels for ideas.
 
Same thing with music. I can spend hours, days, weeks trying to get something right and the end product still lacks something intangible.
 
You never can predict if or when a brilliant idea will drop in out of nowhere, just be ready to run with it.
 
Take the case of Milton Glaser, who died last week on his 91st birthday (quite a sense of timing, I might add).
 
He was certainly no slouch. If you are a Dylan fan, you might have had his poster featuring Bob with psychedelic hair at some point in your life. Maybe you bought it at one of those poster sales colleges always had sometime during the first two weeks of the fall semester, along with the obligatory “Dark Side of the Moon” poster.
 
Yeah, I went to college, too.
 
He also was a co-founder of New York magazine, his own design firm, created the Brooklyn Brewery logo among countless others (Trump Vodka, anyone?) and for his work on Mad Men. Yep, that Mad Men.
 
So he obviously brought a lot of talent to the table. Yet, the thing he was best known for was something he called a “little, simple, nothing of an idea.”
 
In 1977, he pitched a logo as part of a tourism campaign for New York State. When it was rejected, he quickly dashed off another idea while sitting in the backseat of a cab.
 
“I 🖤 NY”
 
And thus, one of the iconic advertising catchphrases of my generation was born.
 
Hats. T-shirts. Mugs. Television and radio campaigns. Keychains, stickers and just about anything else you could imagine have carried that logo in the 45 years since. 
 
He gave the idea away for free to his home city and state out of love, according to New York magazine. Scribbled on the back of an envelope that is now part of the permanent collection at the Museum of Modern Art. Could you ask for a better-scripted Hollywoodesque story?
 
While so many tourism campaigns are short-lived and fall by the wayside, “I 🖤 NY” endures. The phrase is as iconic as the Empire State Building, the Statue of Liberty and those hot dogs that have been simmering in that water for a decade. 
 
So iconic was that image that, in the wake of 9/11, he developed an equally-iconic sequel of a bruised heart, “I 🖤 NY MORE THAN EVER” — a proverbial middle finger that forever proves why the terrorists will never win.
 
I have spent the better part of my career, when I’m not spouting off opinion, in creative endeavors. You can put hours, days or weeks into something and think it is a masterpiece for it to be forgotten by the next morning. But something you rattle off in just a few minutes, something truly inspired in subtleness and simplicity, that can have staying power if you can recognize it for what it is and leave it alone.
 
“It just demonstrates that every once in a while you do something that can have enormous consequences,” he told the Village Voice in 2011.
 
Here’s to enormous consequences, Mr. Glaser.

 It has been quite a few years since I was able to spend Father’s Day with my dad. That doesn’t mean we didn’t celebrate but living in another state the celebration tended to be a little more virtual in recent years.
 
In fact, even in his Pennsylvania county that is finally just emerging from shutdown, we managed to get out for a dinner we didn’t have to eat at home or in the car.
 
I guess that’s what made this year so special — against the backdrop of our shared experience this spring — this was the year we got to celebrate together.
 
This year’s visit was especially poignant, as last weekend was likely the final time I’d be inside the house I grew up in. Dad moves to his new home in Florida in the next couple of weeks.
 
As expected, it was bittersweet. 
 
By no means do I begrudge my father for moving. For one thing, it is necessary for his health, and for another, two stories on two acres of ground is more than someone living on their own should have to manage unless they really want to.
 
I should know. I never did, and I made clear several years ago that while I have many good memories of the place, I simply was not interested in the upkeep. I’d like to think that decision made it possible for my dad to consider the move.
 
But that doesn’t mean there wasn’t a flood of emotions saying goodbye to the place that, built for us, has been in my family for nearly 45 years.
 
No room was unchanged from the time when I moved out in the early 1990s (my room, for example, became my dad’s office before my furniture had made it up the ramp into the truck). But the bones were the same. The trees around the property, those I didn’t accidently whack with the lawn mower in my youth, were the same. 
 
Looking across the neighboring two yards, where a couple of my closest friends and I played while growing up, I could see countless football and baseball games. Trees we had climbed. Hills we had sledded on. And so many other things we had done.
 
My mind’s eye could still see the chickens and hunting beagles that the farmer next door, who had once owned the entire property our neighborhood was built on, kept in the back corner. He is long gone now, but I still have fond memories of him telling me to grab my wagon because the corn he grew was ready for picking.
 
I could see my mom working in her flower beds, keeping house, or in the family room where she’d be taking a quick break to watch her soaps when I’d get home from school. Cold cuts and board games with my grandparents, or my dad and grandpop working on some project in the yard. And, so many holidays our little family gathered around the dining room table.
 
I have many friends and reasons to go back to my home town, but I can’t imagine going back to the old neighborhood. That house, like those of my childhood friends, will soon belong to someone else. So, in a few quiet moments Sunday morning, I took some photos, talked to a few ghosts and said my goodbyes.
 
Letting go is never easy. I’ll miss having the “Motel Six” to return to — particularly when I have to pay for a real hotel. But, more important, it was a happy home full of wonderful memories. So much of that was thanks to the man who worked so hard to provide it to us.
 
Thanks. Happy Father’s Day.

This weekend we did something some will find controversial. We went away for a long weekend.
 
Most of us probably have the same assortment of friends and contacts on social media: Those who want to get back to the way things were as of yesterday, those who believe any opening without a treatment or vaccine is crazy, and those of us in between who believe in remaining vigilant, but acknowledging we can’t stay home forever.
 
We all have our reasons to believe what we do, and we all have the right to those beliefs. That right is what makes this nation great, so long as we don’t impose our beliefs on others.
 
We’re I to classify myself, I’d fall in the “can’t stay home forever” group. For one thing, I need to earn money. Without it, I’ll be on the streets, and I’m not the only one in that boat. The economy must function, and I’m simply not someone who believes business failures are just part of the price for this situation.
 
For another, this isn’t going away. Perhaps it will spread less in summer, but we don’t know. Maybe there will be a treatment, the folks at Oxford seem to have hit on something, but who knows? A vaccine? A year if we are lucky. We can’t sit and wait for a year or two. So, for me, that means it’s time to start getting back out in the world.
 
When we moved out of home in February, we promised ourselves a weekend away. It would be the first time we’d been away on our own in a couple of years. Obviously, the lockdowns changed those plans, but with businesses starting to reopen, we seized on the opportunity to escape to the water. 
 
Risky? Some may see it that way. Certainly, even after months of living with COVID-19, we seem to know very little about it. Thus, we took plenty of precautions. We wore masks. We used sanitizer. We kept to ourselves and maintained distance. 
 
We also ate out, stayed in a hotel, and took a boat cruise.
 
All of this was in Maryland, which was among the more cautious states to reopen its economy (here in West Virginia, we have been at this stage for several weeks).
 
Everywhere we went, employees took their own precautions while showing patience and understanding with the new way of doing things to comply with state regulations, and everyone seemed happy to be able to get back to work, help the businesses they worked for and to interact with the people again.
 
A couple of places even had live music, and it felt good to hear musicians, who have been hit so hard by these circumstances, being able to get back to work.
 
From our point of view, the new rules presented their challenges. Certainly, there were longer lines, capacity issues, typical human-based frustrations, and some places remain closed. But, in the end, the weather was beautiful, we had some delicious food and drinks, amazing experiences and plenty of relaxation time.
 
I don’t think our decision was particularly cavalier, and I say that knowing there are people in my family who fall into the at-risk categories. In the end, each of us is going to have to weigh that decision for ourselves, based on what we are capable of doing  and what we believe is necessary for our families. 
 
For my family, both close and extended, we were comfortable with getting back out there. Responsibly.