For years I've managed to get by on a lone bookshelf, one of those single-wide Ikea jobs everyone somehow seems to acquire six months on either side of college graduation. It has proven more durable than much of my other furniture from that Big Blue Box - the key, I've discovered, is to never take anything apart - and has been tall enough to absorb the trickle of new material I occasionally toss up on its shelves.
It's only been in the past couple of years, really, that the shelf has begun to fail me. Its inadequacy emerged innocently enough, when in a rush I placed a couple of volumes horizontally across an upright row of like-sized books. I suppose I could have rearranged a few titles and found some unforeseen space, but I viewed this solution as simultaneously expedient and ingenious; not only had it made use of available real estate, but did so without obscuring the names of nearby books, most of which, honestly, I had never read, nor really planned to read. Like Johnny Carson for all those years on the Tonight Show, it was more important for me to know they were there than to actually flip through their pages. For me they were decorations, symbolic of my interests, but little else.
My disinterest in reading, however, hardly prevented me from acquiring new books. I just knew there'd be some speed-reading frenzy on the horizon and I was desperate to be ready. Before long I ran out of horizontal storage on top of the existing rows of upright tomes, forcing me to apply the technique in front of those rows, starting from the surface of each shelf. At this point the strategy became a victim of its own success, with books jutting outward from the shelf face and scaling upward over the spines of everything else. If a visitor had seen this sight in a vacuum, they would think I was quite prolific reader indeed.
Alas, that same visitor, if he bothered to look around, wouldn't find another book in my entire apartment. I'm into periodicals...
Monday, December 18, 2006
Wednesday, December 6, 2006
Naughty or Nice?
I started Tuesday, quite willfully, with a simple act of courtesy, holding open a door for an attractive woman passing the threshold behind me. I resisted the urge to exaggerate the gesture, careful not to look too closely at her or break my stride to the coffee counter. This was about kindness for kindness’s sake, not some calculated pickup attempt, and I, extrapolating from that moment, wondered how many karma credits I’d end up earning that day. I repeated the gesture on the way out, and watched as, in my mind, the value of my cosmic assets surged upward.
Every ledger, though, has its liabilities, and before long mine were piling up. The problems began en route to work, at a bus stop in a crumbling part of town, where a white haired man pulled himself past the driver and into the aisle, stopping in front of my seat. Normally, the crossword distracts me from these developments, but my failure to conjure the word for “seed coat” led me to his gaze.
He nodded in an inquiring way, and I looked him up and down for signs of ill health, noting his remarkably erect posture and firm grip on the overhead rail. He was nearly smiling, a picture of geriatric fitness! I quickly made my judgment, deciding the time standing would bolster his youthful vigor, or what was left of it, and I returned to the four-letter crisis taunting me from the grid. Was it “rind?”
Later, long after the soccer game, a homeless-looking man approached me as I entered the corner market. The soles of his shoes had pulled away from their upper halves and at least one or two gnarled and darkened toes peeked out from the openings. He used a rope to tighten his pants and wore a t-shirt decrying unprotected sex. I could tell from his glossy glare that he was very eager to speak with me.
“Got any change?” he said, extending a heavily callused hand. I considered his request and thought of the crisp dollar in the depths of my pants pocket, and how quickly I could pass it from that pocket to his hand. But instead I squeezed my fist around the bill and crinkled it, declaring it unfit for further transfer – if one can assume such things – at the local liquor store.
Now I’d learned from experience that the polite use of “no, thank you” and “sorry, not today” often invited unpleasant retorts from pan-handlers, so I uttered my refusal in the most unambiguous and resolute way possible. I glanced in his direction, but not directly at him, and firmly said “no.”
“Fuck you,” he said, rejecting my reply. I walked into the store and used the crumpled dollar to grab a six-pack, then returned outside. More insight was on its way: “You’re an asshole!” he shouted, and then hurled insults as I plodded towards home. With this I re-assessed my cosmic assets and liabilities; turns out that morning’s surplus had transformed into a staggering deficit. But I was still optimistic – despite all the evidence screaming otherwise, I strongly believed, and to this day am certain, that I’m a good person, maybe even a really good person.
Just don’t ask the old guys on the bus.
Every ledger, though, has its liabilities, and before long mine were piling up. The problems began en route to work, at a bus stop in a crumbling part of town, where a white haired man pulled himself past the driver and into the aisle, stopping in front of my seat. Normally, the crossword distracts me from these developments, but my failure to conjure the word for “seed coat” led me to his gaze.
He nodded in an inquiring way, and I looked him up and down for signs of ill health, noting his remarkably erect posture and firm grip on the overhead rail. He was nearly smiling, a picture of geriatric fitness! I quickly made my judgment, deciding the time standing would bolster his youthful vigor, or what was left of it, and I returned to the four-letter crisis taunting me from the grid. Was it “rind?”
Later, long after the soccer game, a homeless-looking man approached me as I entered the corner market. The soles of his shoes had pulled away from their upper halves and at least one or two gnarled and darkened toes peeked out from the openings. He used a rope to tighten his pants and wore a t-shirt decrying unprotected sex. I could tell from his glossy glare that he was very eager to speak with me.
“Got any change?” he said, extending a heavily callused hand. I considered his request and thought of the crisp dollar in the depths of my pants pocket, and how quickly I could pass it from that pocket to his hand. But instead I squeezed my fist around the bill and crinkled it, declaring it unfit for further transfer – if one can assume such things – at the local liquor store.
Now I’d learned from experience that the polite use of “no, thank you” and “sorry, not today” often invited unpleasant retorts from pan-handlers, so I uttered my refusal in the most unambiguous and resolute way possible. I glanced in his direction, but not directly at him, and firmly said “no.”
“Fuck you,” he said, rejecting my reply. I walked into the store and used the crumpled dollar to grab a six-pack, then returned outside. More insight was on its way: “You’re an asshole!” he shouted, and then hurled insults as I plodded towards home. With this I re-assessed my cosmic assets and liabilities; turns out that morning’s surplus had transformed into a staggering deficit. But I was still optimistic – despite all the evidence screaming otherwise, I strongly believed, and to this day am certain, that I’m a good person, maybe even a really good person.
Just don’t ask the old guys on the bus.
Wednesday, November 29, 2006
Save a Life - Flush the Toilet!
I wish I lived in an era where mankind knew a little bit less about bacteria. I'm not saying I would have preferred the days of ritualized bleedings, but I'm finding the current age, replete with anti-bacterial this and that, a little too empowering for the common man. Nowhere has this excess knowledge proven more inconvenient than in the bathroom, where numerous lawsuit-conscious concerns - and corporations with skyrocketing health insurance premiums - have fed the public's fear of disease carrying microbes.
Of course, public toilets have never quite inspired images of cleanliness. If it were at all possible, I'm sure most people would cinch tight their bladders and sphincters if it meant avoiding a pungent, poo-splattered encounter with a messy public commode. Alas, our high fat, high calorie diet all-too-frequently expands our waste processing organs to their fullest capacity, simultaneously "greasing" our plumbing and forcing many a trip to the nearest sanctioned loo. It's here, in the public space, where we find oversized sheets of paper, meant to separate our bums from the toxic surface of the toilet seat; printed exhortations to wipe properly and wash up afterward; no touch faucets and urinals; yesterday's sports section.
All these innovations exploit our fear of bacteria as a known pathogen, drastically changing the way we behave in the communal space. We suddenly kick open doors to avoid handling their knobs and latches, or contort our bodies to slip through doorways as they slowly close or open. No matter that it's impolite to do such things; what's a colleague's broken nose when you've avoided an encounter with millions of infectious bacteria? But now people, and by people I mean men, as I typically avoid the ladies' room, have taken this "no handle" ethos to yet another extreme - increasingly, folks simply refuse to flush the toilet, preferring to let their urine mellow in the basin for the next person to deal with.
While I've long ago reconciled myself to the unpleasant sights and smells of public restrooms, I find it somehow galling that grown men think it's acceptable to leave unflushed puddles of piss in the toilet. I blame it on the bacteria. Had we not known so much about them, how they live and get around, and what they do once they've climbed through your mouth or anus, we wouldn't have this phenomenon. And frankly, I fear it may not be a simple bacteria-avoidance maneuver - I bet most of these guys pretty much just don't want to wash their hands.
Of course, public toilets have never quite inspired images of cleanliness. If it were at all possible, I'm sure most people would cinch tight their bladders and sphincters if it meant avoiding a pungent, poo-splattered encounter with a messy public commode. Alas, our high fat, high calorie diet all-too-frequently expands our waste processing organs to their fullest capacity, simultaneously "greasing" our plumbing and forcing many a trip to the nearest sanctioned loo. It's here, in the public space, where we find oversized sheets of paper, meant to separate our bums from the toxic surface of the toilet seat; printed exhortations to wipe properly and wash up afterward; no touch faucets and urinals; yesterday's sports section.
All these innovations exploit our fear of bacteria as a known pathogen, drastically changing the way we behave in the communal space. We suddenly kick open doors to avoid handling their knobs and latches, or contort our bodies to slip through doorways as they slowly close or open. No matter that it's impolite to do such things; what's a colleague's broken nose when you've avoided an encounter with millions of infectious bacteria? But now people, and by people I mean men, as I typically avoid the ladies' room, have taken this "no handle" ethos to yet another extreme - increasingly, folks simply refuse to flush the toilet, preferring to let their urine mellow in the basin for the next person to deal with.
While I've long ago reconciled myself to the unpleasant sights and smells of public restrooms, I find it somehow galling that grown men think it's acceptable to leave unflushed puddles of piss in the toilet. I blame it on the bacteria. Had we not known so much about them, how they live and get around, and what they do once they've climbed through your mouth or anus, we wouldn't have this phenomenon. And frankly, I fear it may not be a simple bacteria-avoidance maneuver - I bet most of these guys pretty much just don't want to wash their hands.
The End of Fun?
Saturday night is all that matters anymore.
The decline of Thursday, while not exactly telegraphed, coincided with the joint rise of low-rider jeans and exposed thongs as the evening-wear of choice, in effect blunting the once-enduring appeal of dollar beer night.
And then, not much later, Friday night and I had a falling out. It was a mutual parting, actually – I couldn’t, with any reliability, summon my liver and kidneys to her service, let alone endorse to her skull-splitting devotion to both binge drinking and fascist conspiracy theories, a.k.a. “blowing off steam.” After too many years, the standard rationalization – “It was a tough week; I earned that puddle of vomit!” – had really lost its luster, and the couch, unfathomably, replaced the bottle as Friday’s cure for fatigue and disillusionment.
With that bombshell I embraced Saturday night, as not only the last redoubt for my youthful indiscretions, but also a portal to something different, more, perhaps even better. Saturday, in fact, is ideal for quixotic experimentation. It’s a blank slate, free from work-week obstacles and the prying mandates of Jesus Christ, allowing ample time for self-realizing pursuits as well as the gutter. And wedged as it is between Friday and Sunday, Saturday night doesn’t suffocate with cast-concrete obligations – stifling deadlines, appointments.
You’re free to do what your body wills and ignore that harpy ol’ mind; if that means gobbling a half-dozen doughnuts, of the variety you typically bypass if left uneaten in the corporate kitchen – “I can’t handle the carbs,” you might say – then guzzle them down! There’s still room for an a la carte steak later! Saturday night doesn’t judge or reprimand; after all, that’s why God made Sunday.
The decline of Thursday, while not exactly telegraphed, coincided with the joint rise of low-rider jeans and exposed thongs as the evening-wear of choice, in effect blunting the once-enduring appeal of dollar beer night.
And then, not much later, Friday night and I had a falling out. It was a mutual parting, actually – I couldn’t, with any reliability, summon my liver and kidneys to her service, let alone endorse to her skull-splitting devotion to both binge drinking and fascist conspiracy theories, a.k.a. “blowing off steam.” After too many years, the standard rationalization – “It was a tough week; I earned that puddle of vomit!” – had really lost its luster, and the couch, unfathomably, replaced the bottle as Friday’s cure for fatigue and disillusionment.
With that bombshell I embraced Saturday night, as not only the last redoubt for my youthful indiscretions, but also a portal to something different, more, perhaps even better. Saturday, in fact, is ideal for quixotic experimentation. It’s a blank slate, free from work-week obstacles and the prying mandates of Jesus Christ, allowing ample time for self-realizing pursuits as well as the gutter. And wedged as it is between Friday and Sunday, Saturday night doesn’t suffocate with cast-concrete obligations – stifling deadlines, appointments.
You’re free to do what your body wills and ignore that harpy ol’ mind; if that means gobbling a half-dozen doughnuts, of the variety you typically bypass if left uneaten in the corporate kitchen – “I can’t handle the carbs,” you might say – then guzzle them down! There’s still room for an a la carte steak later! Saturday night doesn’t judge or reprimand; after all, that’s why God made Sunday.
Nyuk Nyuk Nyuk
For all its faults, Hollywood succeeds in providing an important public service beyond simple, direct to consumer entertainment. This service in no way enhances the economy, nor does it unite the harried American citizenry with a common cultural thread. Rather, through catchphrases and clever dialog easily etched into the popular consciousness, it provides a general merchandise trove of pith and wit capable of propelling both the dull and feeble-minded to undeserved heights of social prominence.
Among the media, film is most responsible for this trend. Its products can be consumed in a single sitting, generally in less than two hours, and can be viewed again and again thanks to the butt-numbing wonders of home theater technology. The result is a populace awash in stolen words of encouragement, expressions of love, and, perhaps most frustratingly, laughter. More than ever, any lout with a decent memory and outsized ego can ingest hundreds of punchlines, verbatim, and with practice, casually spin them as products of his own wit. As if it wasn't bad enough, in the previous age, when people merely thought themselves hopelessly funny. Now, with their pilfered catalog in tow, they can regurgitate proven winners and claim it as evidence of their genius.
The result? A population funnier than ever before, but, corrected for inflation, still far less funny than the guys connected to anything featuring Ben Stiller. And as annoying as in epochs past. Thanks Hollywood...
Among the media, film is most responsible for this trend. Its products can be consumed in a single sitting, generally in less than two hours, and can be viewed again and again thanks to the butt-numbing wonders of home theater technology. The result is a populace awash in stolen words of encouragement, expressions of love, and, perhaps most frustratingly, laughter. More than ever, any lout with a decent memory and outsized ego can ingest hundreds of punchlines, verbatim, and with practice, casually spin them as products of his own wit. As if it wasn't bad enough, in the previous age, when people merely thought themselves hopelessly funny. Now, with their pilfered catalog in tow, they can regurgitate proven winners and claim it as evidence of their genius.
The result? A population funnier than ever before, but, corrected for inflation, still far less funny than the guys connected to anything featuring Ben Stiller. And as annoying as in epochs past. Thanks Hollywood...
Thursday, April 27, 2006
Gettin' on in Years? Try the Sedgewick!
The forces of gentrification, like commercial-strength Liquid Plumr, are foaming into the holdout buildings and street corners preventing DC from achieving the demographic ideal coveted by the myriad holders of interest-only home loans. All the easy growth has pretty much come and gone, with the bombed out crack houses and brownfields of yesteryear transformed, by this obliging developer or that, into gleaming towers in which no surface goes ungraced by high gloss granite or endures the shame of non-recessed illumination. Oh yes, and there are the Viking appliances; can't forget that. Takeout and Whole Foods fricassee just doesn't taste the same without them.
But with the profits from no-brainer investments long since diverted to the oversized flags fluttering from every crane in the universe - Americans, like beavers, are natural-born builders - a smaller battle rages, building by building, for the remaining real estate unoccupied by people partial to the joint ownership of Metrochecks and BMW 700s. In the new calculus, cash poor homesteaders are selling out to dual-income power couples in an uneven process of organic change. Sure, there are still more new construction projects than you can count on your fingers and toes and teeth, but with homebuyers finally trading their heroin for methadone, it's less likely entire blocks and buildings will be rejuvenated overnight.
This also means rickety rental apartments, once fixtures on the condo conversion watch-list, will remain entry-level dwellings for commitment-phobes and non-profit do-gooders for some time to come. And then there's Northwest's forgotten elderly, who, if they're not living in well-appointed row houses, are often leasing tiny apartments near sunswept patios flooded with margaritas, young scrappers, and puke. Changing economic conditions have surely saved their asses, though I'm certain this blessing doesn't extend to residents of the The Sedgewick on 19th St. just north of Dupont Circle, which is where old folks go to die, unless the management is simply killing them, I can't figure which.
Tonight, for the fourth time in about a year, I came across the possessions of an expired senior splayed on the sidewalk outside the building. The cool spring air deprived my senses of the musty odors no doubt wafting from the afghans, mattresses, and easy chairs clogging the walkway, but this sad fact didn't hinder my inner scavenger from embracing the upside of the circle of life. I spotted a three foot tall table piled onto a heap of plastic bags, its 18-inch square top perfectly sized for my hard to furnish foyer, but an unfortunate split on its surface dashed my hopes to benefit from Louella Barkley's death.
I continued to poke through her things, however, and was intrigued by a pair of brass lamps dumped in a box filled with her old pill bottles - treatments for diabetes and ossified stools. Alas, the lamps were also damaged. I walked away, though, with a wide-angle photo taken in 1936 outside the Agricultural Adjustment Administration, just before the Supreme Court came to its senses and started striking down the communist provisions of the New Deal. Everyone's smiling, perhaps even Louella somewhere among secretaries - trust me, all the women were secretaries back then - packed in the front row. It's a simple piece of history, but I intend to keep it as my own personal treasure, nevermind the disregard the landlord and maybe Louella's family have for the stuff that, in the end, is her legacy.
Hopefully my demise will inspire more recognition, but even if it doesn't, one thing's certain - there's no fucking way I'm moving into that damn Sedgewick.
But with the profits from no-brainer investments long since diverted to the oversized flags fluttering from every crane in the universe - Americans, like beavers, are natural-born builders - a smaller battle rages, building by building, for the remaining real estate unoccupied by people partial to the joint ownership of Metrochecks and BMW 700s. In the new calculus, cash poor homesteaders are selling out to dual-income power couples in an uneven process of organic change. Sure, there are still more new construction projects than you can count on your fingers and toes and teeth, but with homebuyers finally trading their heroin for methadone, it's less likely entire blocks and buildings will be rejuvenated overnight.
This also means rickety rental apartments, once fixtures on the condo conversion watch-list, will remain entry-level dwellings for commitment-phobes and non-profit do-gooders for some time to come. And then there's Northwest's forgotten elderly, who, if they're not living in well-appointed row houses, are often leasing tiny apartments near sunswept patios flooded with margaritas, young scrappers, and puke. Changing economic conditions have surely saved their asses, though I'm certain this blessing doesn't extend to residents of the The Sedgewick on 19th St. just north of Dupont Circle, which is where old folks go to die, unless the management is simply killing them, I can't figure which.
Tonight, for the fourth time in about a year, I came across the possessions of an expired senior splayed on the sidewalk outside the building. The cool spring air deprived my senses of the musty odors no doubt wafting from the afghans, mattresses, and easy chairs clogging the walkway, but this sad fact didn't hinder my inner scavenger from embracing the upside of the circle of life. I spotted a three foot tall table piled onto a heap of plastic bags, its 18-inch square top perfectly sized for my hard to furnish foyer, but an unfortunate split on its surface dashed my hopes to benefit from Louella Barkley's death.
I continued to poke through her things, however, and was intrigued by a pair of brass lamps dumped in a box filled with her old pill bottles - treatments for diabetes and ossified stools. Alas, the lamps were also damaged. I walked away, though, with a wide-angle photo taken in 1936 outside the Agricultural Adjustment Administration, just before the Supreme Court came to its senses and started striking down the communist provisions of the New Deal. Everyone's smiling, perhaps even Louella somewhere among secretaries - trust me, all the women were secretaries back then - packed in the front row. It's a simple piece of history, but I intend to keep it as my own personal treasure, nevermind the disregard the landlord and maybe Louella's family have for the stuff that, in the end, is her legacy.
Hopefully my demise will inspire more recognition, but even if it doesn't, one thing's certain - there's no fucking way I'm moving into that damn Sedgewick.
Sunday, April 23, 2006
Lost in Cerebrum
From time to time I think of leaving DC, permanently, in defiance of my ten-year record of lauding the place top to bottom. And that record is voluminous; just ask those poor fools, among my friends, who insist life's worthwhile in the far-off hinterlands of Bethesda and Arlington, not to mention those more distant upstarts Fairfax and Loudon counties. I've refused many an invitation, in lieu of the polite "no, thank you" my mother has long suggested, with a sophisticated reply of my own choosing, modified as circumstances require, but generally amounting to something like this: "Huh? You want me to go where? I'd have to drive you know. (Sigh)... When are you going to move downtown?"
There's something lovable, I've found, in each of the many inconveniences linked with living in the District, from obvious nuisances including petty street crime and public urination, to the lesser troubles induced by ridiculous taxes and incompetent bureaucrats. Under the right conditions - lots of booze, the psychic safety net provided by one's cushy Northwest surroundings - even the city's most discomfiting sights can prove endearing. The homeless looking man meting out compliments for your spare change. The woman parading down 12th St. in too high boots and a tiny fur coat, and little else, hoping to strike up some impromptu social engagements.
I've found it easy to love them all, but have had a helluva time getting anything resembling reciprocity out of them. I'm a vote to the city councilman, a score to the street hood, an ATM to the man begging for small money by the upscale coffee shop. Yet despite this, I consistently choose the solitude of their company - walking the streets in my law-abiding way, or watching them over the top of my newspaper or book - over that of my friends, the people who care about me, in concept if not fact. Unlike these other folks, the flacks and hucksters I know only by sight or smell, my friends are stubborn organisms. They are forlorn when I demand happiness, inert when I'm looking for action. So often not what I expect and command, so disappointing.
As for those others, they never seem to deviate from my notion of what exactly they are.
Whore. Alcoholic. Homosexual. Whatever. All neatly categorized, all serving their purposes, drip dropping muted smiles and blunted heartache in the day-to-day of my existence, a facsimile relationship borne of familiarity but not knowledge. I've spent countless hours in this milieu, passing up actual human interaction in defense of the pure archetypes, unchanged by time or experience, in my mind. The friends, well, they're consumers, not unwittingly, of the non-stop charming, arrogant, childish, bullying, insightful, combative, hilarious performance that is whatever me I'm trying to sell at that moment in time. You might call it the Un-Me. Or Facet of Me.
I've been in it for the laughs, but, of late, those laughs are mostly bouncing around in my head, echoes of the mirth of yesteryear. Families and careers, or perhaps some problem with the tired haunts and routines of the deposed ringleader, have left me laughing at myself. It's still fun, but with each lonely cackle, another tiny link to everyone else fails and breaks away, like a fleck of paint chipping away from a high-gloss figurine, and I retreat further into my mind and the nameless characters that inhabit it.
People want more than good times, I think. Authenticity. Open arms. Vulnerability. These are the requirements for the new age, my new age, the fourth decade. With some laughs, sure, but with honesty too. I've understood this for some time, but it's amazing how one weekend, 36 hours at an out-of-town wedding, can crystalize the difference between bullshit, the freaks and cads from my beloved hometown, and those wonderful people who've been dragging me down life's path all these years, trying to get me to see.
The irony - and what would this disjointed tale be without any? - is that I stopped kicking and screaming, and took a good look around, not at the behest of my stalwart friends, but through the contrivances of a lovely five-year-old.
There's something lovable, I've found, in each of the many inconveniences linked with living in the District, from obvious nuisances including petty street crime and public urination, to the lesser troubles induced by ridiculous taxes and incompetent bureaucrats. Under the right conditions - lots of booze, the psychic safety net provided by one's cushy Northwest surroundings - even the city's most discomfiting sights can prove endearing. The homeless looking man meting out compliments for your spare change. The woman parading down 12th St. in too high boots and a tiny fur coat, and little else, hoping to strike up some impromptu social engagements.
I've found it easy to love them all, but have had a helluva time getting anything resembling reciprocity out of them. I'm a vote to the city councilman, a score to the street hood, an ATM to the man begging for small money by the upscale coffee shop. Yet despite this, I consistently choose the solitude of their company - walking the streets in my law-abiding way, or watching them over the top of my newspaper or book - over that of my friends, the people who care about me, in concept if not fact. Unlike these other folks, the flacks and hucksters I know only by sight or smell, my friends are stubborn organisms. They are forlorn when I demand happiness, inert when I'm looking for action. So often not what I expect and command, so disappointing.
As for those others, they never seem to deviate from my notion of what exactly they are.
Whore. Alcoholic. Homosexual. Whatever. All neatly categorized, all serving their purposes, drip dropping muted smiles and blunted heartache in the day-to-day of my existence, a facsimile relationship borne of familiarity but not knowledge. I've spent countless hours in this milieu, passing up actual human interaction in defense of the pure archetypes, unchanged by time or experience, in my mind. The friends, well, they're consumers, not unwittingly, of the non-stop charming, arrogant, childish, bullying, insightful, combative, hilarious performance that is whatever me I'm trying to sell at that moment in time. You might call it the Un-Me. Or Facet of Me.
I've been in it for the laughs, but, of late, those laughs are mostly bouncing around in my head, echoes of the mirth of yesteryear. Families and careers, or perhaps some problem with the tired haunts and routines of the deposed ringleader, have left me laughing at myself. It's still fun, but with each lonely cackle, another tiny link to everyone else fails and breaks away, like a fleck of paint chipping away from a high-gloss figurine, and I retreat further into my mind and the nameless characters that inhabit it.
People want more than good times, I think. Authenticity. Open arms. Vulnerability. These are the requirements for the new age, my new age, the fourth decade. With some laughs, sure, but with honesty too. I've understood this for some time, but it's amazing how one weekend, 36 hours at an out-of-town wedding, can crystalize the difference between bullshit, the freaks and cads from my beloved hometown, and those wonderful people who've been dragging me down life's path all these years, trying to get me to see.
The irony - and what would this disjointed tale be without any? - is that I stopped kicking and screaming, and took a good look around, not at the behest of my stalwart friends, but through the contrivances of a lovely five-year-old.
Tuesday, March 28, 2006
Metro Vigilante Assails Minority Muncher
For years, the sight of the impossibly innocent girl drawn crudely on the packaging of Utz snack foods has brought me nothing but joy. I've always been impressed, actually, with how her attire - limited as it is to a matching bow and blouse, her torso obscured by a bag of something yummy - always matches the colors assigned to the specific snack vacuum-sealed into the package. Green for the sourdough pretzels, red for the classic chips, orange for barbeque style anything; it all works, in a fashion sense, with her stubbornly sixties mop, which seemingly requires gallons of gel to achieve its helmet-like appearance.
Alas, as with all things virtuous and good, I'm sad to report this little girl, with her milky skin and cheerful expression, is no longer capable of making me smile. Not after today, when, during the evening rush-hour, unwitting teens instigated an outburst from a fellow subway passenger while consuming a brand of the ubiquitous Utz potato chips.
I was reading an article about Liberia's new president, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, and the ridiculous challenges she's facing trying to turn that decrepit hellhole around, when out of nowhere this guy starts shouting in the sanctimonious tones of an elementary school crossing guard. "No! That behavior is not allowed on Metro transport vehicles! Listen to me; put that down! No! You are not allowed to eat on our trains! You must keep the cars clean!"
While his language, his exact phraseology, could have come straight from the Metro employee handbook, from the "Semi-Confrontational Demagoguery" section, his tone resembled that of HAL in his death throes, an uncertain and plaintive coo which made him somehow endearing even though he was being an asshole. I followed his invective, starting from his quivering self-righteous lips, to the orange bench across the aisle, where a Minority-American duo sat crunching on their snack, oblivious to the cackling mainframe ten feet away.
"I said no! No eating on the Metro; this is how we keep things clean!" He kept repeating this theme, and although he proved quite unable to get the words exactly right during each successive outburst, thus minimizing the effect of his rant, this much was clear: those kids weren't eating those Utz chips today, not on his watch. In traditional teen form, his adversaries invoked the "whatever" retort, which would have disarmed a lesser muckraker, but not our man, who's boiling blood nearly dislodged the yarmulke pinned tenously to his head.
"Oh yeah? Well, I'm gonna take your picture then and... and... and send it to Metro." With that he busted out his fancy pants cell phone cum camera and prepared to snap the perps for posterity. His fiance, withering beside him, shrunk into the deep recesses of her seat, whispering words of encouragement or disbelief, I couldn't tell which.
The camera gambit, while startlingly effective in warding off the Car 4 crumb factory - their half eaten bag of goodies fell to floor, and with it a bottle of juice - it had the unintended consequence of inviting hostile actions from other passengers. Another woman, seated next to the teens, whipped out her own camera phone, pointing it in the man's direction.
"You want to take picture? I take your picture." I seriously wondered what everyone was going to do with all these pictures. One thing was certain - this guy enraged the wrong fucking lady.
"You take my picture? OK, take it!" said the man, pointing his camera phone at the woman. Pretty soon cameras were flashing and everyone was gathering lots of evidence to send to the authorities or, more likely, the oblivion of the trash bin once we reached Metro Center. Finally, the conflict ended when the man's girlfriend, having found a way to get him out of this silliness, made the suspicious claim that no pictures had actually been taken. Then the woman, sensing a possible detente, said the exact same thing.
"I take no pictures." She turned around and said something in Spanish to the chief muncher, and an eerie silence fell over the car. With that, it was all over, and the bottle of cranapple juice, which had dropped to floor moments before, rolled slowly toward the exit doors, underscoring the close of this cross-cultural battle.
I tried to return to the tale of Liberia's rebirth, but, out of the corner of my eye, I saw the Utz girl's smiling face undulating with the movement of our car, and I hated her for her guileless cheer. Maybe someday I will see things once again as I did in my age of innocence, but for now, that girl is one commute ruining slut.
Alas, as with all things virtuous and good, I'm sad to report this little girl, with her milky skin and cheerful expression, is no longer capable of making me smile. Not after today, when, during the evening rush-hour, unwitting teens instigated an outburst from a fellow subway passenger while consuming a brand of the ubiquitous Utz potato chips.
I was reading an article about Liberia's new president, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, and the ridiculous challenges she's facing trying to turn that decrepit hellhole around, when out of nowhere this guy starts shouting in the sanctimonious tones of an elementary school crossing guard. "No! That behavior is not allowed on Metro transport vehicles! Listen to me; put that down! No! You are not allowed to eat on our trains! You must keep the cars clean!"
While his language, his exact phraseology, could have come straight from the Metro employee handbook, from the "Semi-Confrontational Demagoguery" section, his tone resembled that of HAL in his death throes, an uncertain and plaintive coo which made him somehow endearing even though he was being an asshole. I followed his invective, starting from his quivering self-righteous lips, to the orange bench across the aisle, where a Minority-American duo sat crunching on their snack, oblivious to the cackling mainframe ten feet away.
"I said no! No eating on the Metro; this is how we keep things clean!" He kept repeating this theme, and although he proved quite unable to get the words exactly right during each successive outburst, thus minimizing the effect of his rant, this much was clear: those kids weren't eating those Utz chips today, not on his watch. In traditional teen form, his adversaries invoked the "whatever" retort, which would have disarmed a lesser muckraker, but not our man, who's boiling blood nearly dislodged the yarmulke pinned tenously to his head.
"Oh yeah? Well, I'm gonna take your picture then and... and... and send it to Metro." With that he busted out his fancy pants cell phone cum camera and prepared to snap the perps for posterity. His fiance, withering beside him, shrunk into the deep recesses of her seat, whispering words of encouragement or disbelief, I couldn't tell which.
The camera gambit, while startlingly effective in warding off the Car 4 crumb factory - their half eaten bag of goodies fell to floor, and with it a bottle of juice - it had the unintended consequence of inviting hostile actions from other passengers. Another woman, seated next to the teens, whipped out her own camera phone, pointing it in the man's direction.
"You want to take picture? I take your picture." I seriously wondered what everyone was going to do with all these pictures. One thing was certain - this guy enraged the wrong fucking lady.
"You take my picture? OK, take it!" said the man, pointing his camera phone at the woman. Pretty soon cameras were flashing and everyone was gathering lots of evidence to send to the authorities or, more likely, the oblivion of the trash bin once we reached Metro Center. Finally, the conflict ended when the man's girlfriend, having found a way to get him out of this silliness, made the suspicious claim that no pictures had actually been taken. Then the woman, sensing a possible detente, said the exact same thing.
"I take no pictures." She turned around and said something in Spanish to the chief muncher, and an eerie silence fell over the car. With that, it was all over, and the bottle of cranapple juice, which had dropped to floor moments before, rolled slowly toward the exit doors, underscoring the close of this cross-cultural battle.
I tried to return to the tale of Liberia's rebirth, but, out of the corner of my eye, I saw the Utz girl's smiling face undulating with the movement of our car, and I hated her for her guileless cheer. Maybe someday I will see things once again as I did in my age of innocence, but for now, that girl is one commute ruining slut.
Monday, March 20, 2006
World Baseball Classic?
Well folks, it's down the final, and Japan and Cuba are fighting for the title of "World Champion". Actually, I don't think the winner can rightfully make that claim; I believe the victor, officially, will be the "World Baseball Classic Champion", leaving the arrogant front-runner of the US major leagues to lap up the "World Champion" imprimatur sometime in October.
Makes you wonder, really, if the victor in any American sports league - the NFL with it's lunatic battle-gear the lone exception - could ever, with any degree of seriousness, say its dominion extends much beyond the Rio Grande. It would be nice if, as in soccer, the Major League Baseball champion - either the Red Sox or Yankees, I don't care which - had to face the reigning kings of other leagues, in a champion on champion face off to determine club team superiority.
Could the White Sox, those darlings of the South Side, beat the Tigers or Giants of Japan? That would be the truest test of our baseball superiority, if the pampered American squad could fend off the disciplined stalwarts of a foreign club team. Of course, there aren't any MLB team's that would qualify as "all-American" in the Republican sense, but if some Fortune 500 outfit bought the rights to the club team championship series, they'd probably support the Marlins even if they are minority American.
If that couldn't be worked out, maybe the "World Series" survivor could contest the reigning WBC-winning team, either the Cubans or those scrappy upstarts from the Far East, as things stand now. If Japan pulls it off, my money's on them against the American representative - if mullets, per capita, are symbolic of baseball prowess, the US will have no chance. Same goes if we face the Cuban team - obviously our decades-long sanctions-regime just isn't working, not in Havana, and definitely not on the baseball diamond.
Makes you wonder, really, if the victor in any American sports league - the NFL with it's lunatic battle-gear the lone exception - could ever, with any degree of seriousness, say its dominion extends much beyond the Rio Grande. It would be nice if, as in soccer, the Major League Baseball champion - either the Red Sox or Yankees, I don't care which - had to face the reigning kings of other leagues, in a champion on champion face off to determine club team superiority.
Could the White Sox, those darlings of the South Side, beat the Tigers or Giants of Japan? That would be the truest test of our baseball superiority, if the pampered American squad could fend off the disciplined stalwarts of a foreign club team. Of course, there aren't any MLB team's that would qualify as "all-American" in the Republican sense, but if some Fortune 500 outfit bought the rights to the club team championship series, they'd probably support the Marlins even if they are minority American.
If that couldn't be worked out, maybe the "World Series" survivor could contest the reigning WBC-winning team, either the Cubans or those scrappy upstarts from the Far East, as things stand now. If Japan pulls it off, my money's on them against the American representative - if mullets, per capita, are symbolic of baseball prowess, the US will have no chance. Same goes if we face the Cuban team - obviously our decades-long sanctions-regime just isn't working, not in Havana, and definitely not on the baseball diamond.
Sunday, February 5, 2006
My LCD is Bigger Than Yours, and I Know How to Use It
America's coffeeshop culture is really getting me down. What used to be a haven, a neutral territory rewarding introspection and trivial diversions, has for me become a hostile battlefield, overrun with climbers inflamed with visions of success. Sure, you can hang out and read a book if you want to, but if it's just for fun, nowadays, you really get the sense you're just wasting your time. How can you enjoy yourself when there's so much striving going on at the next table?
The problem really began when laptops entered the realm of affordability. Next thing you know, would-be novelists, students, and shouting entrepreneurs are scurrying from shop to shop, like frightened rodents, monopolizing the cushiest chairs and questing for self-realization. Their power cords wind across the floor, entangling the feet of passersby and confirming, in the event of uncertainty, that public safety is a small price to pay for a chance at true success.
What can they all be working on? Should I be working on something too? I wonder, as I page through my City Paper and ponder things to do, if I'm overlooking - or worse, purposefully evading - the hard work needed to achieve my dreams. But then again, what if they're only playing solitaire?
The problem really began when laptops entered the realm of affordability. Next thing you know, would-be novelists, students, and shouting entrepreneurs are scurrying from shop to shop, like frightened rodents, monopolizing the cushiest chairs and questing for self-realization. Their power cords wind across the floor, entangling the feet of passersby and confirming, in the event of uncertainty, that public safety is a small price to pay for a chance at true success.
What can they all be working on? Should I be working on something too? I wonder, as I page through my City Paper and ponder things to do, if I'm overlooking - or worse, purposefully evading - the hard work needed to achieve my dreams. But then again, what if they're only playing solitaire?
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