Dear Mo Rocca, October 30, 2007

I have a big ol crush on you and would like to have you over for dinner some time. My husband is cool with it (you don’t mind if he’s at the dinner too do you? He may even do the cooking). DC is not that far from NYC, and you must get down here once in awhile (I read that you grew up here. Maybe you could point us towards something fun to do).

If that doesn’t work for you, I could come to your place. We can order in.

Wow, this invitation bites. Sorry. I’ll think of something better.

Let me know.

Tupper-Where? October 25, 2007

Where does all the Tupperware go? That’s what I’d like to know. If one of the Presidential candidates can answer me this, then I surely will vote for him or her come next November.

 

I have a big cardboard box that I use to hold my “storage-ware” that I call my Tuppie Box. Currently in this box I have a collection of Tupperware, Rubbermaid, Gladware, and a jumble of mysterious Otherware, as follows: a mini round container (but no matching lid), a round shallow container (again, no lid), two 8 C. rectangular containers (no lids), a snack cup (no lid), two round deep containers (no lids), an 18 C. square container (no lid), a Mega Bowl (no lid), and four square sandwich holders (one lid!), a 14 cup round lid (no matching container), an oval lid (what the hell did this go to?), five (count them, five!) square side dish lids (no matching containers), a mini-square lid (no container), a snack cup lid which does not match the snack cup container that I have (see above), and a mess of “carryout” containers and lids, none of which quite match each other.

 

Now, I’m not the least anal-retentive person, but food Storageware that doesn’t really match, doesn’t really work. Sure it may keep solids or liquids from–say, sliding onto the floor. You can, for instance, put a mess of speghetti and meatballs with sauce into an appropriately-sized container with no lid, and it will stay on the shelf in the refrigerator rather than slithering down and sloshing throughout your refrigerator (which it would do if you spooned it directly onto the refrigerator shelf—Trust me). So, technically, it is better than nothing. But without a lid, food doesn’t really stay fresh in these containers, does it? Of course this pre-supposes you can find an “appropriate” size. If you look into my Tuppie Box—depending on the time of day, the position of the moon, and number of black birds sitting on the telephone wire outside my office window—this probably won’t happen.

 

Surely I’m not the only one with this problem. Or am I? Are the rest of you out there wondering where all your food Storageware CAME from? At least this would explain where mine is going. But it still wouldn’t answer the question as to HOW or WHY my Storageware gets into your cupboards (fiendish Tuppie goblins steal it from my house and deposit it in yours? Leftovers go door to door in search of Tuppies who will run off with them?).

 
This tells you something about me, but last year I got so fed up with not having any usable Storageware when I needed it, that I put it on my Christmas list. No lie. What’s worse, I got it. From two different people! When January rolled around I had so much Storageware (Tupperware, Rubbermaid, Gladware and whatever the hell other brands were bought for me) that I couldn’t even fit it all into my cupboards. I actually had to create an ancillary Tuppie Box in a cupboard in another room to hold the overflow. In fact, I had so much Storageware of varying shapes and sizes that it took me ten minutes to find matching pieces (Usually diversity is a good thing, but in Storeageware diversity creates chaos). But at least I did eventually find a matching set. And oh, how sweet it was. Being able to scoop leftovers into a container, snap on a matching lid, pop it into the refrigerator, and know that my food was safe and fresh… That was living. But now it’s October, not even a year latter, and what I have is the unruly collection of useless plastic leftovers–mocking me.

 
I suspect marital problems. The Gladware sandwich container bottoms are sick of the sight of the Gladware sandwich tops, so they disguise themselves as moldy cheese and escape in the garbage. Or, a Rubbermaid round top finds itself mysteriously attracted to a Tupperware square bottom, and the two of them run off together. Sure they have no chance of making a tight connection. But who cares? They’re in love. And then there are the forbidden loves. The Tupperware round lid who takes a fancy to—gasp–a Gladware square lid? Or, to another Tupperware round lid! This would explain why, even when I buy several of the same-size and shape containers, one day I suddenly have no lids. But where do they go? New York? San Francisco? Miami? Trying to escape the constraints placed on them by a closed-minded society that demands conformity. Trying to escape from me? Because I expect them to couple in a conventional way that suits MY needs?

 
Perhaps if I really want to know where my Storeageware is disappearing to, I need to do some frank soul-searching, so that I can fianlly come to terms with how my own actions are contributing to this problem.

 
In the meantime, I’ll check the closets.

Charming News October 24, 2007

So, I will admit to being a news/commentary junky. NPR is pretty much always on in my house and car (unless The Boy demands to hear “Radio Clash”. Again!). I don’t read nearly as much as I listen. So, here are two items that caught my ear today:

Of course it’s impossible to NOT know about the wildfires in southern California that are burning out of control. One person has been killed in San Diego. Thousands and thousands have evacuated their homes from Malibu all the way down to the Mexican border.

at least 346,000 homes have been ordered evacuated and 1,200 homes and buildings have been left in ruins. President Bush declared a federal emergency for seven counties, a move that will speed disaster-relief efforts. He also sent federal disaster officials to California.

But wait! Before you start getting all weepy-eyed and depressed (the glass half empty and all), there is an UP side to all this destruction:

The financial damage will be significant, but if the wildfires that devastated the region four years ago are any indication, these blazes could help kick start the local economy. A post-fire construction boom could bring back thousands of construction jobs that the region has recently lost.

If you haven’t heard of Naomi Klein’s new book, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, now is the time. RUN to your local bookseller!

And then there’s this charming piece:

Sick of the sight of citizen’s ass cracks, Dallas Deputy Mayor Dwaine Caraway proposed an ordinance against sagging pants.

“This is not just a teenage problem,” Caraway says. “There are people sagging … in their 30s. You know, where’s your mind? You’re not a teenager.” Caraway says that at first, saggin’ was about showing your boxers. Then it was about showing more of your boxers. Then dirty boxers were cutting edge. And now there are guys walking around with no boxers on at all.

But wait! If that’s not enough to signal that the end of civilization is drawing near, there’s a song:

‘Pull Your Pants Up’ – Dooney Da’ Priest
If you stand up straight, bet your pants fall.
Might as well walk around with your pants off.
Pull ‘em up, pull ‘em up, pull ‘em up.
Be a real man. Stand up.
Is that your underwear, man? Pull your pants up.

It warms the cockles of my (insert anatomy).

About The Boy October 23, 2007

Likes: ELEVATORS (riding in and watching them work), riding the Metro, reading, swimming, swinging, bouncy castles, sandboxes, kitties, bandaids on his clothes, tummy trumpets.

Dislikes: Lightening, sudden and/or loud noises, bandaids on his skin, having blood drawn

Fav. Music: The Clash, The Ramones, They Might Be Giants, Mozart, Aretha Franklin

Fav. Songs: Radio Clash, Bitzkrieg Bop, The Alphabet of Nations, What It Is (Rock Steady)

Fav. Food: Chocolate, yogart, olives, pickles, all meat, strawberries, cheese, peanut butter

Fav, color: ORANGE. Also likes white and grey.

Fav. Movie/DVD: The Way Things Go (Swiss artists Peter Fischli and David Weiss have collaborated on kinetic installations since 1979. All of their work to date, whether in photography, film, drawing, or sculpture, has demonstrated a deep interest in the mechanisms that animate the universe of objects.)

Aliases: Rico, Lee

Recent Quote: While playing with his newly purchased chocolate kittie cat, he was heard to say: “What’s that kittie? You don’t want me to eat you? But you are made of chocolate.”

Introducing…The Boy October 22, 2007

So here he is: The Boy. He has saved my life more than he will ever know.

In Praise of Summer in Autumn October 21, 2007

Today was the kind of perfect (summer) day that makes me happy to be alive. The light was diffuse, shining with a tick of gold, the air warm and breezy, and the leaves half green and half gold, orange, or red. A day so marvelous that—like great sex—it makes you wish you could wrap yourself in it and roll yourself around, pressing its gorgeousness in for safe keeping, for days that aren’t so good.

 

It seemed just wrong to go to a movie today, knowing that if I did, when I emerged from the darkened, artificial environment of the movie house, the perfectness would have faded. The sun would have dipped in the sky, the light becoming more blue than gold, and the air would have cooled from it’s lovely skin-caressing warmth.

 

This perfect summer day put me in mind of all those perfect summer days in Oregon in late July, August, and early September. Where every day is warm, bright with no humidity, and it’s all you can to to try to soak as much of it into your skin before the fall and the rains come.

 

It was one of those days that made me miss every wonderful summer I’ve ever had. Until this year (summer in DC), I’ve always lived for the rejuvenating effects of summer. Whether it be Oregon’s perfect biking and camping weather, New York City’s lazy days at the beach or dinner parties on the roof-deck marveling (each and every time without ever ever taking it for granted or losing the sense of awe) the glorious lights of Manhattan glittering through the darkness around us. Or, the Michigan summers where I’d watch daily as the cornfields across our little dirt road grew taller each day, eventually rising up into an 8 ft. wall of living green where, only months before, a flat field rested, quiet and fallow.

 

 

 

 

On a completely different, but related note:

 

I know that someone has to show the fat, lazy tourists who come to DC around. But does he have to be an asshole?

 

Today, I was walking down the sidewalk, thoroughly enjoying this glorious day (see above), wondering how many more we might enjoy before winter descends upon us, and while I’m walking along, basking in the day, sneaking occasional peeks at marvelous old churches or an occasional unexpected art piece in my new home city (read: trying like hell to find the good here), I nearly get flattened by a guy on one of those infuriating two-wheeled pogo-stick contraptions (segueways or sedgeways or whatever the hell they’re called). These things are nearly silent and apparently the idiots who rent them out are either too stupid, or too self-absorbed to figure out that they need a bell. This guy (the tour guide) rides right up behind, so close that he’s nearly touching me with his little “I’m too lazy to walk” machine, which of course scares the shit out of me (I nearly tripped, I DID jump and gasp). And does he say, “Excuse me.” or “Sorry for sneaking up on you (like a dick).”? No. He says, “I know. I get that all the time.” Then fucking change your approach bright boy! To make matters more infuriating, after blowing me off the sidewalk, this guy is followed by no less than twenty-two (that’s 22!) other jerks on these ridiculous vehicles who all insist that the sidewalk is their exclusive roadway. Apparently, as a pedestrian, I belong on the road. Bastards! I can tell you that from now on I’ll be packin’ a big ol’ welcome-to- DC can of oilslick in my handbag. Glug glug glug suckas!

 

It was still a very very lovely day.

Cinema Classics October 19, 2007

When I was living on East 11th Street in NYC, I was fortunate enough to have a dive-y film/coffee/alcohol bar, called Cinema Classics, just two blocks from my apartment. They showed 35mm movies, some that were old favorites, others that you’d never heard of, or had only dreamed of seeing because they were too obscure to be on tape (this was before DVDs). The place was divided into two parts. The front was a coffee house with the regular coffee house treats and people hunched over their books and laptops. The back–which was delineated by a series of large red velvet curtains–was a movie house with a big screen and several rows of those old, bone-breaking, wood and metal theater seats snagged, no doubt, from some dilapidated theater that had upgraded in the hopes of providing comfort, or been torn down–like so many things in the East Village–to make way for condos. There was one sofa tucked into the back corner. And when the lights went up you could see that it was definitely a sidewalk find, made none the finer by it’s new incarnation as a bum bed/make-out seat/self-pleasuring station. It was definitely NOT something you wanted a closer look at.

At the appointed time, a handful of people would line up near the velvet curtain, loaded down with cappuccinos, house-made peanut butter cookies, and rice crispy treats. Then the “film-guy” (who would later run upstairs to run the projector) would–not take your ticket, but hand you your custom-made, computer-generated ticket, which had colorful little pictures from each of the two movies you were about to see (it was almost always a double-feature) printed on it. These were so lovely that I still have a handful of mine. I managed to see all manner of wonderful old movies here: The Manchurian Candidate (original) showing with Seconds; Murder by Death with The World of Henry Orient; Sorry Wrong Number with Dial M for Murder; Treasure of the Sierra Madre and The Cain Mutiny. And one of my favorites: Wise Blood (with Harry Dean Stanton). If you thought Flannery O’Connor stories seem unbelievably weird when you read them, try watching them on the screen. But somehow, like Shakespeare, it actually made more sense to see characters acting it all out. I saw Kris Kristofferson and (again) Harry Dean Stanton in Cisco Pike showing with Dustin Hoffman in Straight Time. Cisco Pike was one of those movies I probably would never have seen otherwise. Kris was young and so hot you wanted to jump up and grab him off the screen. And it was the moment when I finally understood why my mom had swooned over him when I was a kid. Yowza!

I’m not sure if the “film guy” had any sort of overriding theme governing his film choices, but there were loads of great flicks from the 1970’s, which I think turned out to be my favorite era. Oh, and I guess he had a thing for Harry Dean Stanton (and who can blame him?), because he showed up a lot.

I loved this place. The biggest challenge was staying comfortable enough in those awful seats to last through two movies. I took to getting there early and snagging the nasty old couch, despite the fact that had I had one of those CSI blue lights that make all the biologicals available, I know I wouldn’t have been able to sit there. As it was, I always brought an old coat to spread over the cushions and prayed my immune system was good.

I remember sitting on that couch through a showing of Alien (again, Harry Dean Stanton), one of my very favorite movies (see initial blog posting), one that I’d seen dozens of times but was still scared stiff of, especially when I saw that alien coming at me on the big screen, with my good friend C, who was visiting me from Michigan. We squeezed each other’s hands, nearly screaming, trying not to think about the Aliens out there, or the Alien Cooties that were surely crawling all over us.

The weird thing is, that was probably the only movie I ever saw with any of my friends at the Cinema Classics. Going there turned out to be a private pleasure, a secret pleasure, though that was never my intention. It’s not that I’m anti-social: there were plenty of others watching those movies with me. It’s just that I didn’t know any people who wanted to watch those old movies. But it was more than that. Part of it, too, is that if I went to these movies by myself, I had nothing to lose. If the movie stank, I could always get up and leave. If I loved it, but the person I was with hated it, there was no controversy over leaving. Also, no lump in my stomach when someone I know and like, hates my taste in movies.

Of course I missed sharing this pleasure with someone, of talking about what I liked about the movie with someone who cared. But when do I do that anyway? If I go to a movie with someone and we both like it, we end up saying, “Well, that was great!” And that’s about it. If we don’t like it, “That stank.” or “Oh my God!” But we never talk about it. I guess we just assume the other person had the same reaction, thoughts, feelings. Or, that the whole experience is too personal to talk about. Or that it’s just embarrassing and pompous to discuss suchness. Maybe we just don’t know how to talk about films. Are there film clubs out there that discuss these things, like there are book clubs? Or maybe I’m an idiot for wanting to think about a film, rather than just being comfortably numbed and distracted by it.

Some Things I did This Week (in no particular order): October 13, 2007

–signed up for a philosophy class at the Smithsonian called: Philosophy on Tap: Free Will and Personal Identity. Each week for six weeks my hubby and I will meet at The Brickseller, a well-known DC pub in Dupont Circle, with an underemployed Philosophy professor who will ply us with beers and then ask–hopefully in a loud and commanding voice–”Well, did you drink that beer by choice? And just who do you think you are, anyway?” After a few beers who knows what I’ll say. I can’t wait to find out.
–downloaded the new Radiohead album. Listening to it now. Need to look up good noise-canceling headphones (note to self: steal them from The Boy). Sounds good so far. Paid 2 pounds. Hubby says I’m too cheap. I remind him I’m unemployed at present.
–Had dinner with new friends from the pool (For those who don’t know, “The Pool” is the PG Pool which we joined this summer. It’s a working man’s country club. You know, instead of a stern look of condescension and incredulity (and the police) to keep undesirables out, we have a fence and barbed wire). This dinner was actually quite awesome. They have a son the same age as The Boy. We popped both boys into the playroom, shut the door, ate pizza and drank beer and talked about ourselves. It was AMAZING. We had conversations just like grown ups.
–Got my shit together. Well, if only this were true. But I did manage to get my CV together, finally retrieving it from my ancient computer and putting it onto our new, freshly brainwashed computer. But hey, now I can start looking for a job. Subway, here I come!
–Helped my husband through putting his dog to sleep. Eeegad. This is not something one does regularly and not something I recommend doing for kicks. It was icky. There were a lot of tears. We miss Doggy, but he’s in the sweet doggy hereafter doing–for once in his life–whatever the hell he wants, whenever he wants to do it (which sounds pretty good to me).
–visited with my in-laws. Okay this would take its own blog, so I won’t go into details here.

Rules to Being a Straight Woman in America in 2007 October 12, 2007

o Of course you should be beautiful.
o It’s okay if you’re dumb.
o You can be a little smart, but try not to be too smart. If you are VERY smart, try not to let it show.
o You should be thin, of course, and/or trim. It’s okay if you’re “athletic”, as long as you don’t let yourself go and all that muscle turns into flab. It’s expected that you’ll always be mindful of your weight, choosing salads for most meals, denying yourself to gain control and for the pleasure of denying yourself–being a woman is all about denying yourself pleasure. But nothing will turn a guy on more than if you’re VERY thin and like to wolf down meat like a man. The sloppier, the better (please see Carl’s Junior Ads for details).
o Your breasts should be large, even if you are very small. They should also be as close to your chin as surgurgically possible.
o Your teeth should be bright white and perfectly straight.
o Your hair should be shiny, healthy, and smell like an amplified flower at all times. It should be something that makes men want to dive into. Short hair is strongly discouraged.
o Cellulite is out of the question. Don’t do it.
o You should not have any unwanted hair (read: hair that is not on your head). You should be smooth, like a seal, or a child.
o You should know how to keep a house clean and though you may be one of those “liberated” woman, you honestly shouldn’t expect your husband to do much cleaning, even if you both work full time.
o You can be successful, but remember, the more successful you are the less likely you’ll be to find a partner because there will be an ever decreasing pool of men who are MORE successful than you, who you can be with (read: who will put up with you).
o If you have children, you should be a perfect mother. If you don’t know what a “perfect” mother is, shame on you.
o Of course you should not gain any weight after becoming a mother. If you do, shame on you.
o With your children, you should always show perfect restraint and patience.
o Smile as if you don’t have a brain in your head.
o You should have a sense of humor, but this should only be used to laugh at others’ (read: men’s) jokes and witticisms. You, yourself, should NOT be funny.
o Above all else, no matter what your job, no matter how powerful you are, no matter how extreme the circumstances, you must always always always be NICE

The Wild Within October 12, 2007

“We need so damned many things to keep our stupid lives going.”
–Stereolab

The movie Into the Wild is about the tradition of men venturing into the wide wild world to “find truth”. Some–Jack London, Henry David Thoreau–wrote about their journeys–beautifully, beckoning forth the next generation of lost and frustrated young men. Chris McCandless (a.k.a. Alexander Supertram) was one of them.
There is something ancient and seductive about the idea that you can remove yourself from your everyday life, go out into the unknown world, meet strangers, be with nature…That this journey will expand and enrich you, heal you, restore you to something more original, more truthful, the person that you were before becoming stained by living with the people–in the society–who raised you. Who hasn’t at one time or another felt the suffocating choke of commercialism, materialism, expectations, family, the past, the future, something? …and wanted to escape? To find and embrace something larger. To be with nature because it is easier than being with people, because it seems straightforward, because it stimulates something deep in our brains. The idea that in the wild we can learn how to be more human. Better human. Not so that we can be forever apart from society, but so that we can return to function more harmoniously within it.
So when this bright, educated young man takes leave of his family and life of privileged to venture out into the unknown to find his own truth, I gladly went along.
But as a woman, I couldn’t help but envy this young man’s freedom. Along the way Alexander Supertramp was greeted by many generous souls willing to feed him, travel with him, share what they had with him in exchange only for his companionship and infectious energy. People seemed to understand that a young man needs to go out into the world, to “not just be strong, but feel strong,” to test himself. As a young woman, born just one year before Alexander Supertramp, I had heard my own call of the wild. But no path and tradition (literary or otherwise) of going off into the world alone, especially going off into the wild alone, exists for young women. Even now, in 2007, it would be incredibly dangerous for a young woman to venture off on her own with no money or identity. Not just because the wild can be harsh, but because she would be subjected to crueler violence along the way from people , some of whom would treat her, not as someone searching to find herself, but as someone lost from her society, and therefore worthless.

But this is also a movie about love, family, and forgiveness. It’s about the growing pains of becoming an adult and learning to forgive our parents for all the damage they’ve done. To forgive our parents for being all too human. I know plenty of adults in their forties, fifties, sixties and beyond who still cannot bring themselves to do it. Most of them have trouble giving love, accepting love, being loved. “Some people don’t think they deserve to be loved,” Alexander Supertramp tells an older rubber-tramp couple (living and traveling in their camper) early on in the movie. And it’s here we begin to realize that a journey to heal oneself has the powerful effect of healing others.

And so this is a movie about God, as all nature stories are ultimately about God. About the baptism and rebirth that only nature can provide. Isn’t that what London, Emerson and Thoreau were doing out in the woods? Looking for God in nature? In themselves? And trying to understand the relationship between the two. They believed, as Alexander Supertramp believes, that if we can be with nature, we can know God, and our true selves. And, conversely, that if we choke off our connection with nature, the God within us chokes too. This is not nature as metaphor, but nature as portal to understanding our own hearts, minds, and place in the natural world.

And this movie is about the heartbreak of being a parent. And I couldn’t help but cry with the mother who raises her child as best she can only to one day let him go and discover what kind of man he will be. I think of this sometimes when I look into the face of my three-year-old son. Now I can carry him in my arms, squeezing him close. But someday–all too soon–he will walk away into his own WILD (either literal or figurative) and face himself, test himself, endanger himself, live, die. And there will be nothing I can do but stand and watch and hope that he comes out the other side–alive.
My heart started breaking the moment he was born.
This is something I never knew about life until I had a child of my own. No one can explain this to you, no one can prepare you, nothing can be done. Our sons and daughters grow up and become their own people and go off into the world. As parents, all we can do is stand aside feeling helpless and hope that the world is good to them.
It is only as a mother that I’ve come to understand that every coming of age story is ultimately about loss, not just of one’s childhood, but also of one’s children.
But what if my son never ventures out to discover his own truth? What if he quietly takes his place in the adult world, works at a good job, never complains, never challenges the status quo or authority or me and everything I stand for?
This would be a heartbreak of a different kind: a deadening of spirit, a kind of living death.

And this is a movie about hypocrisy. And though I strive to find the truth myself, and to live the truth, how much of my own hypocrisy will break my son’s heart? Will he look at me in disgust for not living up to my own dreams, my own potential? I am compromising every day. And every single day I get tripped up in things I have vowed a thousand times to consciously avoid–materialism, judgementalism, rage, hatred, self-doubt… And now I understand that when I am tripped, it is not only me who falls. Every time I let go of another dream, every time I close my heart to someone, every time I turn away instead of facing my fears…my son goes down as well. How is it that at forty, after all that I have experienced, and all that I have lived and seen, that I am still seeking, still struggling so hard to understand who I am (or am not). How am I still so very very lost in the wild?