Privileged Histories

so the below has been waiting for two months…the conversation prompted an argument with the guy, who ended up saying “i don’t want to fight with you about science.” somehow – ok, along with a lot of other projects – i soured on blogging and didn’t come back to it, but i think it’s about time to push this one out and move on.

I’ll admit it - when it comes to books, I’m happy to be guided by fate – happier, in fact.  In accord with my general lack of organization, times are rare that i’ve heard of a text, written a note to myself and, later, procured it from a library.  And sometimes when I’ve tried, going to the library with a list a few weeks old, the impulse has passed and I find myself wondering if I really need that young adult book about enthusiasms just for a mention of Jane Austen.

I like books that have a physical history … found on the floor of the Mennonite thrift store, sale in a high school basement in Connecticut, lost and found baskets and donations from embittered exes out of the pile he left behind.  Notes from the former owner (especially in poetry) are great and free is even better, so I can feel that I’ve given a book the home it longs for. 

This is a small part of the reason I picked up “The Best American Science Writing 2000″ from a library free cart yesterday. The larger reason is more self-centered.  For some time (perhaps since I labelled the NASA’s landing on the moon “the biggest jack-off in American history”) the guy and I have been having some tense discussions about “science.”  It’s a flash point both because it speaks to many of the contrasts in our personalities, and because it’s a gendered topic that raises my hackles.  He tends to see my mistrust of many established theories as willful ignorance, and in a sense, this is the case.  A bit of the Groucho Marx “club that won’t have me” bubbles up when I remember how quickly my excitement for my very first junior high science class was dimmed by my lab partner’s refusual to let me operate any of the equipment. 

One of the most interesting articles features that buxom buddha the venus of willendorf…and new research (by women, even) seems to point to the use of decorative clothing items both at the time and as represented in the culture’s art.  This leads anthropologists to think that there was a whole world of weaving, sewing, design (in other words, chick stuff) going on that has not made a mark on a modern anthropology, not only because it disintegrates faster than iron or stone tools but because historians were looking for hammers and weapons rather than goddesses.

    

Damn you, Wendy Wasserstein

I began a blog hoping that the ease and impermanence of the medium would encourage me to write more frequently and with less self-consciousness.  ha.  what with stat logs and archives and search engines, it’s not nearly mutable enough = and what would be? notes scribbled on the cheapest Lisa Frank unicorn notebook paper and tossed out the window in the snow on the way to work - or in the old days, rolld into js and ashed out the window of a Ford Festiva.

 which is by way of excusing myself for short, hastily written entries, entreaties and complaints, such as today’s.  I’m enjoying reading a rather schmoopy book of essays, “For the Love of Books,” in which writers frotteurize or defend their old chestnuts, largely from childhood or adolescence.   Mostly predictable, though warm, fare – until Kurt Vonnegut notes that “every vaselined ass in Europe” seems to have won a Pulitzer, or WW notes (in the midst of many more erudite comments on her Chekov fetish) that Frost’s “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” can be sung to the tune of Hernando’s Hideaway.

I. Can’t. Stop.

he gives. his har. ness bells a shake – to ask, if. there. is. some. mis. take.

It did occasion another of these conversations with the guy:

 ”do you want to know something dorky about me?”

 ”there’s more?”

In some period of early adolescence I memorize a poem each night before sleep from a venerable old tome called “A Favorite Book of American Poetry” or “Poems Certain not to Offend” or “A Brief History of American Poetry Featuring Emily Dickinson Poems NOT Related to Masturbation” or something like that.  Frost, of course, was represented. I hadn’t thought of it in years, but as soon as I read that I recalled the poem in its entirety.  I puzzled over what attracted my 13 year old self (ordinarily drawn to the fantastics of Wordsworth and Keats) to a simple poem about the beauty of New England.  It may just be my February mood, but I think I did (and still do) read a Puritan despair regarding the strictures against suicide.  It is, after all, the darkest evening of the year.

 Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village, though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

Into the fray

more doctors, more tests, no conclusions.  it would be satisfying to have some small diagnosis.

I don’t watch football, but I try to understand – for the guy’s birthday, i’ll be making Mother and Child Reunion Salad (that’s right, a chicken and eggs) and singing Paul Simon. I love long and flowery food names, a few weeks ago it was Run-For-the-Roses Pie.

When going to direct Into the Woods, know how to get there…and how to get back. Yet another muddy University production makes me realize afresh that there is a respect and sensibility for the musical necessary to making it satisfying – making it sing. UI don’t got it.

Time for Three

Last night I had the distinct pleasure of attending a concert given by “Time for Three,” a string group that, despite its rather daggy name (a nod to the Kronos Quartet, perhaps?) rocked my face off. 

They played a mix of challenging original work, popular covers, classical and bluegrass – but bluegrass that could only come from the classically trained. Which they are – all three members of the group, two violinists and a charismatic double bass, are graduates of the Curtis School of Music and play with the passion you’d expect from classicists and the humor born of great geekiness and talent.  Their infectious, naughty glee while performing their “too fast” version of the Bach Double caused me to wonder how much great art probably has at its root the student’s desire to simultaneously impress and offend his teacher. 

I enjoyed remembering the meditative headspace where dramatic instrumental music puts me – and grateful to live in a small town where, on a Wednesday evening, a concert hall is packed to give a string trio riotous multiple standing ovations.  

Short Thoughts

A few days ago I told the guy what had been rolling in my head, that the world could be a simple dichotomy divided into those who like Ben Jonson and those who don’t.  From his bemused look I realized that actually there is a third, overwhelmingly larger, group that DOESN’T KNOW OR CARE and that in the end those who love and those who hate Ben have more in common than they’d like.  Perhaps that was my problem with the literally squabbling of graduate school.

BRICK, a movie starring the kid from 3rd Rock from the Sun.  Eh.  The first season of Veronica Mars did teen film noir better.  It got moving in a few places where it took itself less seriously, but ultimately had less charm than that movie where little kids are dressed up as gangsters.

Left Behind

10 items found after the partypocalypse:

case of organic limes

crate of footlights

black garter belt

soy “holiday nog”

white vinyl nurse costume

the Iraq Study Group Report (left purposely on toilet for owner edification?)

brazilian bikini (new with tags, rejected by previous owner to whom it was given as a subtle threesome invite)

kick-ass fresh herb steak rub 

one long scratch and shiny bruise from new years celebratory wrestling

portrait of a salty sea dog – originally offered to liquor store owner for $5, and purchased by party guest for $3

Lucubrator Recommends

for Christmastime: The Dark is Rising, by Susan Cooper.

Mystical, Celtic, pagan and anglophilic – plus ancient carols. I might try to talk the guy into reading it in the car.

ping…BOOM

ping…

Two enter the snow filled valley. Mortars fall with a light, clear sound of a penny dropped in a cave and, a few seconds later, a full, shuddering boom.

first man: shall we stick to the walls, then?

second: no.

first man: i should have brought shoes? my feet will be quite frozen soon.

 second: but you won’t be on them long.

first: no, i suppose not.

They walk in silence for a time, the first man stepping gingerly through the melting patches.

 First: are we almost there?

 Second: no, we’re here.

The second man stops and looks to the right, then thoughtfully lowers himself to the ground.

 First: ah.

 The first man follows suit, laying further in the direction of the path their footsteps have made.  He props his head on his elbows. Silence for some seconds.

First: Strange isn’t it? I feel I should be thinking some important things about my life, but I want to take a nap. Don’t suppose I have time for a last nap?

The second man doesn’t respond, but turns his head away with just the vaguest hint of irritation.

First: I didn’t think so.

A mortar explodes, close but not threatening. The first man shifts nervously, laying his head on the ground.

A shell drops from the sky with a light clang, a few feet from the first man.

First: This is it! AAH!

He begins to move away, then wills himself back into position, eyes screwed tight. Seconds pass as we wait for the explosion that doesn’t come.

First: (nervously laughing) Well. I really thought that was it.

Second: That happens sometimes. Not often.

The first man breathes heavily for some moments.

First man: why am I doing this? There must be a better reason than “why not?”

He rises to his feet, looking first to the sky, and then to the body next to him.

First man: What? It’s doesn’t feel right yet.

The second man stares stonily at him as he retreats down the valley. Then the second man sits up and clasps his arms around his knees.

Second man: (yelling) I never expected someone to be here with me!

Changing the Course

First item in my inbox this morning was an e-mail from Governor Vilsack, urging me to sign his letter to John McCain, a firm denouncement of his policy to deploy an additional 100,000 troops to Iraq. (Perhaps the publicity push on Vilsack’s part comes from Bush’s informative acknowledgement that “we’re not winning, we’re not losing?”) 

I must admit my heart beats faster thinking about writing (or co-signing) to McCain, for whom I’ve harbored that most fragile, innocent and potentially devastating of hopes – the political crush. Not since shortly after I shook Bill Bradley’s hand in a student union basement (and his campaign dribbled out of bounds) have I had it full force, but I’ve always admired McCain’s combination of intelligence and guts.  Additionally, his fair-minded attitude towards his captors can only be described as “sexy.”

Unfortunately, I’m not sure how I’m supposed to make a decision on our “direction” in a country I’ve never been to and about which I know embarrassingly little.  The mass of (American) men lead lives of quiet (ignorance on foreign policy).  I feel almost resentful over the fact that the Democratic victory in November is cast as “America’s call for a change” and the ensuing frantic scramble to discover what that change might be. Perhaps it’s America’s call for new leadership by educated experts who KNOW MORE THAN WE DO.  For that matter, why should I listen to Tommy (an admitted expert on ethanol) over anyone else?

Cause unlike George Bush, all I have is the gut instinct that went haywire on the morning of March 20, 2003.   A rainy, overcast morning inside a car dealership – the darkened glass walls reflecting the two, ceiling-mounted televisions showing continuous footage of tanks jostling across a land so foreign to me, so inexplicable, it was truly awesome to me that my taxes were stretching out their power to effect themselves on other lives I’d never see. 

I don’t feel qualified to tell Mr. McCain how to leave a situation we’ve, in large part, created. But if I find a candidate who saw the invasion that morning and felt not pride but an oppressive, nauseating sense of doom, he or she will undoubtedly have my vote.       

Have it Yourself

Judy Garland tried to shake the Christmas blues, telling “Meet Me in St. Louis” composer Hugh Martin that his new song, “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” was too melancholy for a Christmas standard and eventually convincing him to change the lyrics. 

I think he had it about right.  I chose it to perform at an event tonight because if you can’t fight those blues, you might as well revel in ’em.  Christmas is my favorite holiday, but it’s rough on the heart.  There’s a pattern of sad events happening in December that entwine and reflect each other through the corridor you see in facing mirrors, so that each Christmas in the past is a little tinged, each future one preloaded with a weary nostalgia. 

Much as I love these original lyrics for hitting a basic Christmas truth – those old friends are gone and nothing is certain, especially God’s love – they never would have made the charts.

Have yourself a merry little Christmas

It may be your last

Next year we may all be living in the past

Have yourself a merry little Christmas

Pop that champagne cork

Next year we may all be living in New York.

No good times like the olden days,

Happy golden days of yore,

Faithful friends who were dear to us

Will be near to us no more.

But at least we all will be together

If the Lord allows.

From now on we’ll have to muddle through somehow.

So have yourself a merry little Christmas now 

In our house, my grandfather’s suicide and my father’s conspicious absence, the physical frailty of the women left behind, the cousin in prison and the strained relationships need a jolly smothering rather than a stir.  And you have your own Christmas memories, too.  No one needs to be reminded of sorrow, when the snow falls.

So tonight I’ll make a little leap of faith and “hang a shining star,” instead.

Cause the legend says that even with the new words, Judy made them weep.