Meet Him at Mary's Place

My heart’s dark but it’s risin’

I’m pulling all the faith I can see

From that black hole on the horizon

I hear your voice calling me.

-“Mary’s Place”

(Bruce Springsteen)

Pat Roddy (and his eponymous Band) has been a fixture on the Jersey Shore music scene for more than two decades.  As he says himself on his website, "When Roddy isn't drinking in bars, he is playing in them..."  In ordinary times, his website would offer you a wide range of establishments, both in New Jersey and in New York City, where you could enjoy an adult beverage or two while Roddy plays and, thereafter, perhaps share an adult beverage or two with him after the show.  

These are, of course, anything but ordinary times, which is why the "Shows" page on Roddy's website is as barren as the paper products aisle in practically every supermarket here in the State of Concrete Gardens less than an hour after it opens for the day.  Being a Jersey guy, Pat Roddy is not spending all of his awake time bemoaning his fate.  Not even close.  

Every Wednesday evening since March 25, Pat Roddy has performed live on Facebook- from his living room in Belmar.  He started doing it as an entertainment for his fans and, probably, as an elixir for his own sanity. In literally no time, he found a higher purpose for it.  So have his fans. 

The Pat Roddy Wednesday Night Concert From Home Series (a name I just coined for it without solicitation and without expectation of compensation) has to date been dedicated to raising money for Fulfill (formerly known at the Community Food Bank of Monmouth County), Interfaith Neighbors, an Asbury Park homelessness-focused non-profit, and Gilda's Club, a New York City cancer-focused non-profit.  Roddy's two shows benefiting Fulfill raised more than $14,000, which Fulfill used to provide 42,300 meals to the needy and food-poor in Monmouth County.  His April 8 show raised  more than $7,000 for Interfaith Neighbors and, last week, his concert raised more than $10,000 for Gilda's Club.   

Tonight's concert is dedicated to raising money for Mary's Place by the Sea in Ocean Grove.  Mary's Place is, itself, an extraordinary facility of whose existence, I am constrained to admit I was unaware, until reading about it and learning of it from Brooke's great friend Casey, a bad-ass Jersey girl who calls Ocean Grove home and who shares my unhealthy love of the New York Rangers.  

Pat Roddy's concert streams live tonight on Facebook at 7:00 pm Eastern Time.  If you have the chance, tune in and meet him at Mary's Place.  Remember, of course, to turn it up...

...and to let it rain. 

-AK