Quote(s) of the Period of Time I Randomly Choose

You're never as innocent as when you're wronged.

Monday, December 22, 2008

I Sleep Alone

Her eyes sting as they penetrate me; I cast my glance away, unable to stand our desperate inaction. Words are just an appetizer, I've swallowed them long ago, along with my pride. But conversation is endemic and inevitable in a room crowded with clouded thoughts and rash hopes. So, as we share our already open thoughts, which hang like drapes fastened above window panes quickly wishing the Sun farewell, we fall back into a familiar groove. Only our consciences stave off the transgression of fools.

With touch subdued emotion only seems to grow, washing over me in fits and swells. Deceit and infidelity mark our pasts, but our 'restraint' hardly feels any different. Love is compromise and knowing glances gleaned from across a room of muddled conversation, not desire. An embrace is pure passion, a rash fuck is not. Nonetheless, judgment is the heart's best prophilactic.

And here I am, gently resting upon flat, newly-foreign ground draped in deep red. A visible door reminds me of my place in the pecking order. No wasted tears tonight, for they'll not be seen. I sleep alone.

Monday, November 17, 2008

Hoping for a return of the right

First of all, let’s dispel a common myth. America isn't a democracy. People sometimes call the result of thievery, genocide, assimilation, hard work, ingenuity, manifest destiny, and continual progress by that title, but it's simply not the case. Today, more than ever, America remains a democratic republic. Note the fitting juxtaposition of these two words; it’s democratic republic, not republican democracy. Each word belongs on its respective side, and each remains necessary 232 years in.

After Barack Obama and his fellow Democrats mauled several Republican incumbents and challengers alike, talk of the demise of the Republican Party has surfaced. Many Democrats and moderates fresh off the pleasure of having voted George W. Bush's party out of office around the nation take pleasure in hearing such talk of disarray and infighting within the GOP. But, they are foolish for their glee.

America needs the Republican Party as much as it needs Barack Obama and his promised Change. Failed policies need correcting and an economy receding quicker than Joe Biden’s hairline needs stimulating. Republicans, in the form of George W. Bush and, to a lesser degree, John McCain and Sarah Palin, have shown themselves incapable of doing so at the moment. But, let us quickly forget the folly of the one party nation.

Give Democrats too much power and watch what will happen: just as Republicans did after they followed Newt Gingrich to repeated victories in the mid- to late-'90s, Democrats will falter. Despite what you might hear offhandedly from policy advisers and generals, an acceptable dictator does not exist. And that's what we're staring at right now should the Republican Party fail to find new leadership more in touch with American citizens.

The situation is not as dire as many think, however. Yes, there is a vacuum where party leadership once stood, but after losing an election by a substantiative mark that is no surprise. The people have spoken--old Republican thoughts are not good enough in today's world. But that doesn't mean new Republicans won't rise up to take over that vacated mantle of leadership.

Sarah Palin is not the answer; perhaps lesser known, more modern, moderate Republicans are. The fact that they are unknown shouldn't cause one to fret, either. After all, how many participatory Americans knew much about the Alaskan Governor before John McCain hastily pasted her onto his GOP ticket in late August? As it turns out, even Mr. McCain didn't know much about her either.

So, give Republicans a moment to reorganize. Just as they did following Bill Clinton's run to the White House in 1992, they'll be back. Let’s just hope this time they won't lean so far to the right as to fall over.

America needs them.

Saturday, November 8, 2008

Barack Obama. Yes.

By Kevin Scheitrum

‘And although it seems heaven sent
We ain’t ready, to see a black President’
Tupac Shakur, Changes (1995)

Is this the dream fulfilled?

Is this the day, the day when our country’s little children – and their little children and their little children – have been judged not by the color of their skin but by the content of their characters? When suddenly what wasn’t even considered a possibility becomes a reality? When we turn our backs on what’s come before and look to the future and understand, reminding ourselves of the failures behind us, that we can all make a difference, that we can form, after all, a more perfect union?

He spoke and we listened and in turn, we spoke louder, together and fully. A generation that never had a voice has suddenly bellowed.

How could we have possibly seen this, even four short years ago? Could we have imagined a black man, even in these times, not only winning this election, but defeating a war hero opponent by a landslide?

On this night, we see ourselves atop one of our history’s highest peaks. Of all of the mythologies that galvanize this great continent, few have enjoyed more staying power than the intertwined ideas of the Melting Pot and infinite opportunity, that this country was founded on diversity and possibility, and all it took to ascend indefinitely was a sharp and shrewd mind and a tireless effort.

But before tonight, those allegories have been nothing but words and simple fantasies, tethered to the sad fragments of our past, dark and damning ghosts like Jim Crow, the notion of three-fifths, the bullet inside Martin Luther King, Jr. Over time, the increase of blacks in the workforce and the influx of blacks with college degrees chipped away at racism, while the integration of sports and the importance of blacks in music, from blues to hip-hop sanded more of it away.

But then the Fortune 500 would come out, and as of 2006, blacks occupied only four of the CEO spots. At the end of the same year, median household income for whites stood at $50,673; for blacks, it was $31,969. The stats go on and on, and yes, stats only tell part of the story, but the most glaring message behind these statistics is that, outside of the thin avenues of entertainment and athletics, blacks rose to prominence in so few ways. Terribly few ways.

That mythology of equality, of all men being created equal, had such little resonance under the harsh glare of these facts. Tonight, that idea has roots. Tonight, it is no longer mere floating, hollow words, the preserve of rhetoricians.

We’d be fools to assume that this will change everything. But we’d be missing out on the moment if we don’t think that we just witnessed a moment that will irrevocably change the course of American life.

Sunday, November 2, 2008

McCain's aLive in New York

Check out John McCain's appearance on SNL with "Sarah Palin" at his side. The act has an air of defeat, and Senator McCain sounds an awful lot like Bob Dole did after election night in 1996.

Thursday, October 30, 2008

A Town Chained to Itself


By Kevin Scheitrum

The fine and educated people employed at the Philadelphia Art Museum tolerate the runners, the daily thousands who, for some reason or another, are in Philadelphia and because they’re in Philadelphia, succumb to the compulsion to sprint up the Museum’s steps and turn around, staring down into the core of Philly, jump in the air, hands shot skyward, and yell ‘Adrian.’

It’s either a pity or a triumph – much like the city itself – that the most famous sculpture at the Philadelphia Museum of Art is outside of it. At the base of those famous steps, hidden often in shadow, it stands eight feet, six inches tall, and is more than two millenia younger than its bronze brethren inside. It’s the statue of Rocky, Stallone’s character, the character that’s come to represent, for good and for bad, the Philadelphia identity, the Philadelphia spirit.

And in a time when the nation’s turning its eyes to Philly for reasons other than its position as the ugliest city in America, we see just how pitch-perfect and, thus tragic, Stallone’s distillation of the Philadelphia soul was, and we wonder, if the Phillies do manage to break the curse tonight, will Rocky still ring as true? Without a curse to symbolize the role of underdogs, must Philadelphians start to re-define themselves?

Rocky meant, and means, so much to Philadelphia because of its essential compression of the pain of being Philadelphian. Inside the Stallion’s steel jaw and widowmaking blows were packed the accumulated suffering and disenfranchisement and down-and-out futility of living in a city that’s done nothing but crumbled over the past half-century, a city of perpetual underdogs.

Philadelphia’s poet would never be a writer; it would have to be a fighter, the tragic figure of American sports, a colossal rat in a maze whose successes are momentarily cheered and then forgotten as he gives his brain, his humanity, his life to the crowd.

Rocky gave Philadelphians a way out of this decay, a ticket from South Philly to center stage at Caesar’s. It was the Springsteen story, the one where getting out is all that matters and as long as you can keep pushing back the sunrise, you’ll be ok. More, it was the Alger rags-to-riches, up-by-your-bootstraps, American Dream story, which has become the most dangerous allegory in our time, as it postulates a virtual impossibility yet implies falling short of The Dream is unforgivable, a mark of weakness and inferiority.

Most dangerously, Rocky told its audiences that all you had to do was work hard, work harder, and one day you’ll be there – an idea that, painfully, no longer has resonance. Nowadays, having guts just isn’t enough.

But what Rocky captured above all and, in turn, perpetuated, is the all-consuming acceptance in Philadelphia of the underdog mentality, the stoic acceptance of a difficult, disappointing fate that manifests in crude hatred. Of other regions. Of other people. Of themselves. Those axes-to-grind sublimate into booing and cursing and fighting fans – sports, of course, offer an easy black-and-white crystallization of a greater phenomenon: Boston vs. Philly, per se, is a gimme, with Ivory Tower vs. Row Home – the same fans who dump nacho cheese and beer on kids without hesitation.

But a city of underdogs also manifests itself in a lack of civic progress, a crime rate that hastens every year and a sad, sad sense among people in the city that they are not, and won’t ever, be destined for greatness.

“Nothing ever gets done here – nothing ever gets better,” said our cab driver, bringing us to West Philly after going out in Center City after Game 4 of the World Series. “It’s that god-damned underdog mentality.”

Playing the role of underdog is at once empowering and devastating. At first, it unites against a common enemy, the single greatest agent of cohesion in a group. It’s easy to hate yourself less if you can project that anger somewhere else, say, Mets fans or Apollo Creed. Underdog status.

But at the core of an underdog is the quiet, unspoken acceptance that you’re not quite worthy of where you are – which, of course, makes doing things like playing in the World Series seem like you’re stealing a car. As an underdog, you understand that you don’t belong at the cool kids’ table. So you act out.

There’s a scene in Dostoyevsky’s Notes From Underground in which unnamed the main character attends a party in honor of an old classmate, a soul generally beloved by all but, of course, despised by The Underground Man. At the table, the other guests, who had begrudgingly invited him, attempt to lavish praise on the guest of honor, Zverkov. The Underground Man, his hatred rising up in him like hot tar, lashes out at everyone, holding them all accountable for society’s failures and positioning them as symbols, acting brutally on the occasion of celebration.

Dostoyevsky uses this character for a multitude of reasons, of course, but the two reasons most applicable here are to reveal the unspoken madness inherent in a society (polite conversation being one of them) and to illustrate – and possibly warn against – the danger of inertia, ennui¸ on the part of those kept underground.

This last point is the one our cabbie referred to. Her example was how she couldn’t make a living because, in Philly cabs, it takes 5-6 days to receive the money owed a cabbie from a credit card transaction in the cab, and how, despite her efforts to galvanize support, she found nothing but resignation and a brick wall. She was livid at how few people would wrap their heads around this cause – New York cabs, for example, don’t have this truly absurd problem – and just how impenetrable the fortress of bureaucracy, within which the Powers That Be squash ideas daily, is.

It’s so sad to see these people, these good, hard-working people that are referred to by politicians as The Backbone of America or The Salt of the Earth or America’s Soul or any other trite, condescending term, feel trapped. You see them ending up, like Springsteen said, like a dog that’s been beat too much. And after a while, they just give up. New Yorkers, Bostonians, Chicagans demand progress. Philadelphians demand paychecks, because they don’t have much of a choice. No one fights for them – they’ve stopped fighting for themselves – so they just push on, basking in the reflected light of the underdog.

That’s the saddest part: underdogs are complicit in chaining themselves to mediocrity and dereliction. Considering one’s self as an underdog means feeling uncomfortable when one is not an underdog. Imagine a runner taking a 10-meter lead in the 400-meter dash. Now see him lose sight of the finish line and start looking over his shoulder, veering around the track. See him slowly lag, as everyone overtakes him – and see him cross the finish line with a smile.

It’s a great feeling, yes, in sports, to knock off a juggernaut – ask the Giants from last year. But when that feeling, so powerful in context, seeps into culture, it rips apart a town.

It spawns problems like abandoned youth sports programs, underfunded and nearly useless after-school programs, never-filled pot holes, gun collection programs that rise and fall in the time it takes to empty a clip, politicians who are more concerned with just keeping their jobs than the well-being of those they represent and the certainty among those they represent that these goddamned politicians aren’t gonna do anything anyway so I better scrape together anything I can to get by because we’ll be up a creek soon no doubt, and low voter turnout, ensuring those eunuch politicians get a free ride into office for the next term, until you see a town that’s famous for its murals and its crime and nothing else, because what else is there? When there’s no vision, there’s no progress. That’s the curse of the underdog. You never see beyond the next game, the next obstacle. You, from the first day of your life, have been sold short, and you will, for the rest of your life, continue to do so, reveling in infrequent, modest success.

Rocky told its audience they’d be liberated by perseverance, and in the years after the War, that was true. It’s a pretty idea, the supremacy of hard work, and one that levels the playing field – you don’t need to be big or brilliant to work hard. And people believed it, just like they have since their parents told them that that was the only way to get anywhere, believing always in the criminal fable of the Big Break, as powerful as religion.

But as the century wore on, hard work lost its capacity for elevation. Those jobs on the assembly lines, the ones that created a thick, hearty middle class, have gone abroad. Those that haven’t sure as hell aren’t in Philadelphia, just as they’re not in Newark or Peabody, Mass. Hard work requires getting a big break. But no promoter for no heavyweight champion boxer is going to be paging through the Philly phone book any time soon. And without that break – or an education, or a vision for something greater – all that hard work does is dig a deeper hole.

And even though Philadelphians did realize that no promoter would be dialing ‘215,’ Rocky became more than a fictional story. It became an allegory.

He symbolized everything Philadelphia wanted to be, and he stood, unfalling in the face of everything afflicting the city. Each blow delivered to Philly during America’s transition from a country of industry to a country of lawyers and waiters found its articulation in the fists of Apollo Creed.

Boom. Take away our jobs. Left jab. Boom, right body shot as the kids start dropping out of school at record numbers because the schools can’t afford to teach them or hold them and then take refuge in drugs. Bam, left hook – a haymaker this time – as the welfare state fails and they re-zone neighborhoods and kick people out onto the streets.

Rocky could withstand those punches, and his fighting style was no arbitrary point. He would stand, teetering like a tree in a storm, absorbing everything until he finally fought back and won. Philadelphia was to be the same – it was to swallow those reverberating blows and then, finally, fight back and deliver the winning shot.

But now, we see a town content with absorbing those blows. We see a town of sparring partners, of good, strong and capable people who could have been contenders.

And we see a town, just like every town that’s had its heart ripped out, full of people who believe in the same myth that’s kept other good, strong and capable Americans down: that if you just put in an extra hour on the line, if you just get by, your break will come.

And tonight, in Game 5 of the World Series, if the Phillies do indeed win, this town needs to re-define itself. Nothing so pulls Philadelphians together as their baseball team, not even their football team. And if their baseball team can patch together something beautiful, something better than anyone else did this year – something that hasn’t happened in Philadelphia since 1983, a combined 100 seasons between the four major sports – maybe they can get the courage to do the same.

Monday, October 20, 2008

The Fall Classic

The first post by Kevin Scheitrum.

What one of my favorite baseball bloggers, a Mr. Tim Malcolm of philliesnation.com, remembers most from the 1993 World Series isn’t the crowd fizzing in Veterans Stadium, or the way the runs were scored or the atmospheric rip of a bat connecting with a ball on a late October night.

What he remembers most, as he writes in the blog, is the bunting (not the offensive strategy) – the flags draped from the rafters all around the stadium, dressing the game with the aura of regality.

We lost that year – we lose every year – but the sense still lingered in Malcolm and the scores of the kids who gave their lives to baseball that year (myself included) that they’d been part of something bigger, a chapter in the ever-changing novel of American existence.

I can’t ever imagine feeling the way with the Super Bowl, the grand and almost invariably disappointing culmination of the American machismo, compared to the World Series’ culmination of the American soul. If the Series has an air of royalty, the Super Bowl has an air of carnival, with everything ballooned up to epic, almost cartoonlike proportions, providing you with the sense that you’re part of something prefabricated. For all of the innocence that baseball has given up, it still remains the main attraction at its own event; it stands for itself. For all the ground it’s lost to football in terms of popularity, baseball can still boast the certainty that it’s a bigger deal to win the World Series than it is to win the Super Bowl.

First, there’s the link to history. World Series champs are tied to all who came before. And in terms of history, there’s no comparison here. Winning the World Series puts a team in the company of the 1927 Yankees or the 1906 Cubs, whereas winning the Super Bowl puts a team in the company of, at best, Lombardi’s Packers or the 1972 Dolphins. But you know who Lou Gehrig is, you know who Babe Ruth is and you might even know who Tony Lazzeri is. Who, exactly, (without checking Wikipedia) did Bart Starr throw his passes to?

Baseball is woven into the American existence in a way that football may never be. The best football players are celebrities. The best baseball players, even now, are heroes.

Second, there’s the basic requirement of consistency. To win the World Series, you have to win often. To win the Super Bowl, you have to win once. And while, yes, those stakes mean that the Super Bowl has greater ramifications than any individual WS game, save Game 7, they also ensure that more often than not, we’re left with a wretch of a game purported to be the sport’s pinnacle. With the Series, you have to string together performance after performance; no series comes down to a fluke, not even Buckner in ’86. A city seethes one night and rejoices the next, undulations of emotion that are, at the most generous, compressed for the Bowl.

Psychologically, the Series represents, above all, the end of summer. With it go our long, warm nights and our barbecues, our summer flings and our conversations that run on until morning, our softness of being and our tanned skin. Baseball keeps us young – when it ends, we roll back into adulthood. When the Super Bowl ends, we wait for baseball.

The Super Bowl represents, above all, unabashed commercialism.

The event has been so stuffed with hyperbole that it’s actually reduced the game itself. The sideshows – the commercials, the halftime show (and the nipples involved), Media Day, gambling, the Puppy Bowl – have overshadowed the main act, like bringing in the Stones to open up for MGMT. Save last year and a few other anomalies, the games themselves have done little to warrant anything more than their relegation to secondary status. They play merely the role of host.

It’s along the lines of an entourage, where a cluster of clingers-on get their one chance to shine because of the prominence of one central figure. The same thing goes on whenever a Wal-Mart drops on a town, as a Cold Stone, a Quizno’s and a dry cleaner’s aren’t far behind. Thousands of events crop up in the week before; supermarkets start stocking more queso dip and advertising products for the Perfect Super Bowl Party, and so on.

With the World Series, the games happen so often – most importantly, plurally – that they remain the story. A series produces myriad subplots, like acts in a play. Here, we see Curt Schilling’s bloody sock and a comeback from down 3-0 in a series, or Josh Beckett and the rest of his overmatched pitching staff in Marlins teal out-dueling a Yankees lineup that pelted balls off the Yankee Stadium façade all year. A one-game event doesn’t have that luxury. So, the media and other profiteers are forced to create them. See: Namath, Joe and his prediction; or Peyton finally getting over the hump and winning a championship (the hard and fast media barometer for athletic success, providing Trent Dilfer the ability to flip off Dan Marino at NFL alumni cocktail parties).

So what it all comes down to, for the Super Bowl that is, is foreplay and then no follow-through.

And it’s not that hype doesn’t exist in baseball. It’s that whereas the Super Bowl has 5,000 people instructed to dance around the stage during the halftime show and mouth the words to the song, baseball has bunting.

The games take care of the rest.

Saturday, October 18, 2008

Link Lockdown

  • Barack Obama and John McCain spoke a couple nights ago at an annual charity event in New York City. They were funny. Watch McCain first, then Obama. Refreshing to see them act more like the guys we had grown accustomed to before this loooooooong campaign. Also, the MSNBC.com politics page has some other great videos on it, spend some perusal time.
  • When the Boston Red Sox came back from down 7-0 with two outs in the bottom of the 7th the other night against the Tampa Bay Rays, I remembered why I watch. We spend our time and money hoping special athletes who may or may not be special people (and trust me, several of your favorite players are far from that) will give us the feeling that used to overtake us when we were young. That's what sports is all about--the reclamation of our youthful exuberance. Well, at 12:16 am on October 17th I felt the way I did in 2003 when Derek Lowe threw the greatest two-seam fastball I had ever seen to an unsuspecting Terence Long and followed up his initial wrist action with another, the second of the DX variety toward the Oakland dugout. After J.D. Drew hit a line drive that sailed over the head of Tampa Bay's Gabe Gross, silent screams in the depth of night mixed with leaps of immeasurable height had me feeling 17 again.
  • Barack Obama is planning on buying a half-hour television spot before the start of Game 6 of the World Series. Yes, he's going to talk for 30 freakin' minutes. 30. I can't possibly see the rationale of speaking for that long when the public is growing tired of the longest campaign in history. Not only is he quite possibly going to turn off a few voters simply because they're sick of hearing him, but he's delaying the start of Game 6 for 15 minutes by doing so, further preventing America's youth from forming a love lockdown with the greatest game. Education plans aside, does Barack truly care about the kids? You know John McCain would never do something like this, if only because he'd be scared he might not be able to stay up late enough to watch it live. No matter, however, since the likelihood of the Philadelphia Phillies (what a creative moniker, by the way), the champions of AAAA, extending the series that far against either the Red Sox or Rays is almost nil.
  • PS--I currently sit at 466th overal in unique page views vis-a-vis raking in a gargantuan total of 6 per day at Today.com, the host for The Sports Beat, so please give it a read if you like what you've seen here.

Monday, October 13, 2008

A Tribute to My Idol: Jack Falla

Before my maternal grandfather passed away this past spring and kindly left me his white 2000 Ford Ranger XLT, making it to the one class I couldn't afford to miss in college was a bit of a costly propostion.

Tuesdays and Thursdays at 8:00 am I attended sports journalism, JO514, with the late, great Jack Falla.

Let me emphasize that starting time once again: 8:00 am.

Now, once you've graduated and grown accustomed to working, 8:00 am is no big deal. It's life. But back in college, 8:00 am is impossible for many, and an epic struggle for the rest. I was a struggler--I had painted for portions of the four summers prior to my enrolling in Monsieur Falla's lecture on sports, professionalism, and life, so it was a challenge I was ready for; however, my roommate, the owner of the type of car that repels girls like Off!, a silver Honda Civic Hatchback, was another story.

Julian Rodriguez is not a light sleeper.

Yours truly, Sean, a current roommate (at the time), and Greg, a former roommate, all depended on Julian twice a week to transport us in the early hours of dawn, or sometimes pre-dawn depending on the Sun's mood, down Commonwealth Avenue to the earliest classes BU offered. Needless to say, Boston's sub-freezing winter weather made Julian's ability to drive even more important. The roughly two miles to the warmth of the classroom from the comfort of a rumpled bed cemented Julian's role as our proverbial hockey father.

Despite both bearing the responsibility of ushering adolescents to early morning skates, Julian Rodriguez and Jack Falla were cut from a different mold.

Julian and his fellow engineers, Sean and Greg, with cushy jobs in hand and impressive degrees on the way, could be late. My much less impressive résumé and standard awkward silence response when asked about my "career path" dictated otherwise.

Thus, my winter mornings became routine. Sean, our roommate, would awake first, jumping in the shower at roughly 7:00 am. Following his exit from our grimy cleaning area I would ascertain my options. First, to scrub or not to scrub? In this election the shower beat my black-on-black adjustable Boston Red Sox hat, but with just 52% of the vote. Next, breakfast. Eggs, a bagel and cream cheese, or leftover pasta and ground beef from one of Sean's cooking binges would invariably win out. Time was of the essence after all, heartburn be damned. Sean's offerings often won that primary.

During my coffeeless attempts at waking up (I haven't picked up that bad habit yet, unlike the overuse of parentheses) Sean and I took turns shaking our chauffeur from his gentle slumber.

We followed a tried-and-true recipe of banging on Julian's door, explaining the situation in simple terms--"Julian, get up, we're gonna be late."--and eventually, guilt trips.

"Jules, I can't be late, if you didn't want to go to class you could've told me last night, but now it's too late," I would say flinging all my moral indignation at poor, tired Julian. "You gotta get up..."

No response.

"Now," I would sometimes add for good measure.

Moments later, as I neared my breaking point, usually around 7:47 am, Julian would emerge from his room ready to go. Often his trip would merely be to drop me and perhaps Sean and Greg off before returning to bed, but that was less certain. No matter, his ass had better get mine to class on time, that was for sure. A trip to Brookline to pick up Greg, which prominently featured Comm Ave. and Babcock Street's awkward stoplight spending time like Paris Hilton spends money on glitter, would set us back another 7 to 10 minutes. It was now crunch time.

Arriving in front of BU's School of Communication anywhere from 7:56 to 7:59:38, the race was on. Many days, it would literally be a race to the finish.

Now, my legs are naturally about as fast as Hal Gill's. I probably can sprint a 5.0+ 40-yard-dash and I almost never run at all. Furthermore, around this time I found that I had a degenerative disc bulge in my lower back, so I was in far from peak physical condition, with reverse motivation to boot. On top of my back serving as a convenient excuse not to exercise, I play the one position in team sports that requires almost NO extraneous movement. So much so that Curt Schilling famously aided the New York Yankees in their epic 2004 ALCS choke job on a bleeding ankle that necessitated groundbreaking surgery involving a cadaver's ligaments.

Yup, I'm a pitcher. I don't/can't hit depending upon whom you ask. Despite a love of hustle on the ball field I often hypocritically walk to and from the mound. To maintain my footing, and sometimes just to minimize unnecessary steps to the side and back again, I occasionally switch from the wind-up to the stretch despite there being no one on (and then quickly because there is someone, or multiple someones, on base).

I am not a runner.

But when I had to beat Professor Falla up the stairs, I ran like Usain Bolt. Obstacles like concrete dividers standing four feet high were minor hindrances, stairs meant to be scaled in two or three bounds at most, and doorjambs pylons worth leaping over just before my opponent could tackle me at the goal line. In arriving in this fashion, you can bet there were several awkward entrances inches and seconds in front of the greatest teacher ever to grace the halls of Boston University's School of Communication with the suaveness of Evan from Superbad. No matter, I made it. Every time.

That's how you show you care. Make it. On time. Every time. No excuses.

"The only excuse to miss class is a death in the family," Falla often told us, relaying a line a professor from his undergrad days at BU had thrown his way. "And I'd prefer it be yours."

Well, on September 14th, 2008, a member of the family died.

I left one of my three jobs a few minutes early to make it to my idol's wake three days later at the Doherty Funeral Home in Wellesley. Falla stringently insisted on promptness and putting in all necessary work, but he did have a penchant for leaving early to beat the traffic, so I figured he'd let me off the hook for that one. Reuniting with friends who had taken Falla's class, or classes if they were lucky, we read the eulogy that the church wouldn't allow his son Brian to deliver, looked at pictures from earlier days, and said goodbye. Jack's body lay motionless next to his family; meanwhile the loves of his life, his wife, Barb, and his grown children, Brian and Tracey, stood graciously accepting endless sympathies a mere few feet from his side.

The next morning, I got up early. Jack Falla would be laid to rest in a matter of hours, but I wouldn't be at St. Patrick's in Natick that day. My peace made, I wouldn't watch dirt fly through the air. Instead I got into my Ford Ranger, which still ran despite sustaining a bump or two since my grandfather left it to me halfway through my final semester at BU, and headed to Fenway Park to work as a media relations assistant for the Boston Red Sox--a job, naturally, Jack had gotten me.

My shift would start at 9:00 am. Unlike my 7:59:59 am arrivals in February, I would be there a few minutes early that morning. I no longer had what it took to make it to my desk like a puck careening toward an open pocket of netting before the green light went on.

On that sad Thursday a certain spring in my step was lost forever.

Thursday, October 9, 2008

Panic on the Street!

I guess we can stop pretending there's no recession now, huh?

The Dow just fell to under 8,600. That's freakin' low. We're talking lower than a contortionist can limbo. Lower than attendance at a Marlins-Braves game. Lower than George Bush's approval ratings--that low. Just a year ago we were above 14,000.

Trapped under the falling pillars of capitalism and the trampling of cash-grabbing pandemonium, what should we do?

INVEST!

The shit's hit the fan; someone must clean it up. I'm investing my money in antiseptics. Oh, and batteries, but that's another story.

The irony in all of this is now's the best time to get your money in the Dow. Well, perhaps in a week or so, but once this bailout comes, the arrival of which has been about as quick as Sarah Palin, the market should stabilize. I'm not saying it'll instantly trend upward and get back into the quintuple digits, but it'll stop dropping 500 points daily.

Here's where you step in and provide a little piece of mind for the poor, scared shmucks stuffing their few firesale dollars into cold glass jars in the refrigerator and rolled-up wads under the bed.

This is a recession, not a depression...yet. In a twisted twist, it's not the goverment who will prevent a full-scale depression, it'll be investors like you and me. (OK, and Warren Buffet.)

Read (I was going to write "listen" or "look" but you can't do either since I'm just typing), Mondays always suck, but at this point I doubt Columbus Day will be that dark, even in Palin's backyard. So, please don't follow suit and panic like it's 1929.

I don't have any money to put in the freezer yet and my pantry's almost breadless.

Wednesday, September 24, 2008

Massachusetts Giving Voters A Say

There are three important ballot questions for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts this year. Damn it feels good to type that sentence. Three questions worth voting on, despite the fact that Barack Obama will run away with MA's electoral college booty and lazyness tells you voting isn't necessary because it's not based on the popular vote. Point taken, but you can still participate in effecting change. So do it. Register to vote if you haven't. Then, go online and find out where to vote.

As far as how I'll be voting, here's a little (p)recap for you. Feel free to disagree, so long as you cast your vote, otherwise shut up and read:

Question 1: Hell no.

In a time where public funding continues to drop for important social programs such as art, music, gym, recess, public works, security, health insurance, etc., etc., etc...why the hell would we take away a HUGE source of state income?

The official ballot booklet you should receive in the mail lists the average return to each MA worker as $3,700. Now, considering that's more than I make in two months these days, I'd love to pocket that type of cash. But, since I have less money than most, that means my total would be less. And that means that those who really need it would get less as well, while those who don't need it would be the ones truly benefiting (sounds rather Republican, doesn't it?). Furthermore, while I'd love more cash, I need public services more than a relatively minor dash of cash. Better infrastructure, better schools, and less time spent at the RMV sound good to me. So, I'm voting "no" on 1.

Queston 2: Yes, with some reservations.

It's somewhat silly to claim moral judgement on others in what they choose to do to their bodies. At the same time, marijuana is acceptable in my mind, but other drugs are not. So, do I draw the line after pot, or do I erase it entirely? Well, neither, because I don't get a chance to vote on that issue.

Essentially, it boils down to this: pot's not a killer any more than alcohol (probably substantially less) and most definitely is safer than tobacco. So, let's shift our priorities from busting petty drug users to using that money and time to better schools and refocus our efforts on lowering violent crime and real abuse.

Question 3: Yes.

While there may well be litigation (as opponents of the bill assure) and it will cost the state money, in this case I feel that not abusing dogs is worth it. There's plenty to be said for forcing animals to live in small cages and train them mercilessly much in the same way China trains its gymnasts--oh, wait, no there isn't. It's wrong. (And yet, I still eat veal...sigh, I supposed it's time to give that up too.)

To make up for the lost tax revenue, let's put in a some slot machines in airports, at rest stops, or state run buildings. I'd rather gamble while high in Massachusetts where my income tax helps fund the construction of a state-run casino/local slot machine hall/cash cow that produces smarter students less likely to shoot me than drive to another state and get drunk where they'll take my $3,700 that MA didn't get.

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Hillary Unites Her Party

Tonight, in a nearly perfect speech, Hillary Clinton established herself as human adhesive. With clear words and a calm, sturdy demeanor she united the Democratic Party. While the media's claims of a fractured coalition may have been overstated, it will be difficult to continue playing that same tune now. The Senator from New York urged her followers to "keep going" and reminded them that they were not simply Hillary devotees, but supporters of the causes she and Barack Obama both embody.

With a steady dose of grace and a clever line about George Bush, "her friend, John McCain," and the Twin Cities Hillary established herself as the anti-sore loser. Where Ted Kennedy faltered in 1980, Mrs. Clinton succeeded in 2008. With a strong place in America as one of New York's most powerful politicians and a respected national voice, she doesn't appear to be fading. In fact, the former first lady's husband was often called The Comeback Kid, but it's clear the rock behind President Clinton during his many tribulations remains as dangerous as the Bronx Bombers in the late innings at Yankee Stadium. Hillary's performance in Denver was her rendition of God Bless America.

While the expected order may have been reversed, once Barack Obama has finished with his segment of Change in either 2012 or 2016, look for The Midnight Maiden to reach the White House once again. Barack Obama may not have waited his turn, but don't be shocked if Hillary Clinton gets hers when his clock strikes twelve.

Monday, August 25, 2008

Michelle Obama Is Bomb

About a week ago my life wasn't running so smoothly. Unemployed, uninsured, recently found 100% culpable in a car accident, hampered by a degenerative disc bulge in my lower back, worried about delaying a sinus surgery that I still need, struggling to find the necessary money to pay my bills, and generally stressed from the inevitable end of college life and the formality of moving to a new section of town, I decided enough was enough. It was time to cry.

The only problem was, I couldn't.

***

When I was much younger crying usually eased the pain of the many stressors the world flung in my direction. Tired of being called "Butt" in lieu of my nickname "Buzz," or more to the point considering my long hair and decision to sell lunch ladies scrunchies my mother had made, "Faggot," by classmates in elementary school, I cried. On my thirteenth birthday, when I should have had a Bar Mitzvah according to tradition but instead received a crisp $100 bill from my father in his little apartment, I told him I hated him and cried. After a shouting match with my mother and seemingly no support from my friends watching television downstairs, I headed to the basement for a salty pity party.

But, somewhere along the way toward young adulthood, crying stopped working. The frequency with which I resorted to tears dropped dramatically, to the point where even as the exit from college and the necessary smattering of "real world" reality that comes with it had taken me back to the level of stress that prematurely turned patches of my hair white during a sophomore year of high school in which I learned a pair of wrist surgeries would essentially put my life on hold for enough Xs to fill an entire calendar, crying wasn't even an option.

***

Monday night, when Michelle Obama presented herself to the nation for the first time, her words resonated. In fact, she resonated. America in its purest idealism comes down to family values, freedom of expression, and the unity of disparate groups. Mrs. Obama's speech spoke of these same concepts: the stoic heroicism of her father as he refused to allow a crippling disease to cripple him, her mother's instillment of a sense of duty to one's community, Hillary Clinton's work in shattering glass ceilings, each carefully crafted to portray just what America needs--not change, but a return to the concepts that the world's greatest document, the one a Tea Party in Boston allowed to shape the future of the world, dictates we must follow.

Yes, each element of the night's events was perfectly planned to attack weaknesses and emphasize strengths in the Obama campaign, be it the newly reformed motherly image of Mrs. Obama or allaying fears that Barack is un-American with the substitution of his wife's biography for his own. However, unlike the night's guest of honor, the magnanimous Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy, Obama was not born to be a politician and he has never involved himself in scandal, such as The Chappaquiddick Incident or cheating at Harvard. He made himself into perhaps the world's next most powerful man by playing the game well, and he and his squadron of spinmeisters continued to pitch a shutout on Monday night. But, this just felt different.

When the prospective first lady took the stage, following an introduction from her older brother, she started off a bit slowly. An opening joke missed, drawing only courtesy laughs, and her words came out a bit off rhythm. But as she progressed deeper and deeper into her speech, she began to sense the mood of the crowd and learned to use both her emotions and those of a sea of supporters to express herself in a truer, more heartfelt, much brighter light.

In that light her daughters entered the stage, radiating beauty, happiness, pride in their parents, and a hopeful future. In that light throngs of convention attendees surged to their feet in support of an enthralling woman and her perhaps equally inspiring husband. In that light countless enthused listeners couldn't help but allow the flow of tears to leave their eyes, eyes that had seen failure, disappointment, and disillusionment, and in that moment glimpsed relief and the return of belief.

And it was in that light that a gentle trickle finally fell southward from the corner of my right eye.

Sunday, August 24, 2008

Biden an Uninspiring Choice

In an article in the New York Times, David Axelrod, Barack Obama's chief campaign strategist, spoke about the addition of Senator Joe Biden to Obama's D.C. ticket as VP. “It’s a very personal decision,” Axelrod said. “He approached it in a very serious, sober and reasoned way.”

Well, yeah. I'm not entirely familiar with the living situation once in the White House, but you can be sure that choosing a VP you can get along with is a good idea. But, in this case, perhaps Big Barry should have taken a couple shots before choosing his running mate, because Senator Biden seems to be an altogether too sober selection. Where Obama "falls short" according to most (experience, age, gray hairs, white skin, etc.), Biden helps--he's essentially the liberal parallel to Dick Cheney (although to my knowledge Biden has yet to shoot anyone hunting). But, in terms of fitting the Illinois Senator's calls for change, Biden fits about as well as "mom jeans." (Check out Dad Jeans while you're at it.)



Coupled with the recent airing of Obama's first negative ads since his campaign's inception, the selection of an uninspiring candidate has rubbed away some of the luster of one of my favorite authors's crusade on Washington. In order to do good, you must be elected--this is true. However, the more the Democratic Party's new leader calls for change, the more he becomes the same. And isn't more of the same what he's telling us to avoid in electing John McCain?

As Gandhi said, "Be the change you wish to see." Perhaps Senator Obama could use a quick trip to the optometrist.

Saturday, August 23, 2008

Almost 23

Groggy, hungover, his eyes open.

Nothing happens.

His bed is empty, as is his mind. The previous night's festivities meld into one blurry encounter not easily recalled. Outside is disorder and refracting light; inside there is no light, but otherwise the equation balances.

He has no goals, no direction, just a desire for movement and salubrity. Food, water, cleanliness--they will return him to cogency, normalcy. False words without meaning, like proper grammar, syntax, diction.

He alternates between worlds, a butterfly floating lightly after years in a cocoon. He knows who he is, but cannot see what he is, or what he is to become. It's disarming, relaxing, enraging, stressful, aging, and countless other adjectives. (So post-modern.)

No new line emerges, so he accepts himself, unsure, and leaves labor and love for later. He's off to play in the sand and watch waves wash away castles and dreams.

He's almost twenty-three.

Thursday, August 14, 2008

Message to Spain: Time to Grow Up

At least they're not throwing bananas at soccer players of African descent.

Recently, the Spanish Men's Olympic Basketball Team posed for a full-squad photo. An act that should have been innocuous enough, especially considering the frequency with which it occurs, went slightly awry--as some of you may have heard. The photo, shot for an advertising campaign run by Li-Ning Footwear, featured the entire team pulling its collective eyelids to the sides to play on the "slant-eye" appearance of the Chinese company's billion-strong consumer audience.

Henry Abbott, author of the widely-read basketball blog TrueHoop, shared his opinion on the matter yesterday:

"To my way of thinking, that photo was the exact kind of callous, stupid, and juvenile behavior that used to take place all over the world, but has slowed dramatically now that people have begun to realize that different kinds of people all over the world are complex humans with emotions, too. Call it political correctness if you want, but here, in the United States of 2008, I think just about everyone knows this photo would hurt feelings.

"But I really don't know much about the frame of reference from which these young Spanish men made the call. By their comments in response, the players all seem to think of themselves as innocent and open-minded. They were being 'affectionate' said one. The idea that it was racist was 'absurd' said another."

Quite simply, Abbott is dead on. It's the inability to see the effects of your actions on others that marks immaturity. Why not have a food fight? Someone else will clean it up. Who cares if I make fun of her acne? She should get it fixed if she doesn't want us to laugh.

In my somewhat limited experience with Spanish culture (I've spent about two months in the country), immaturity on racial issues seems to be a serious problem. Absurd advertising that demeans entire cultures is nothing new. While in Spain I saw countless products featuring chocolate babies who couldn't possibly be misconstrued as anything other than a caricature of a monkey infant. Just take a look for yourself.


Deeply disturbed after my first viewing of such repugnant packaging I asked an educated, elegant, enlightened world traveller, Pedro, who hails from Leon, how such a product could sell?

"We don't think like you Americans here," he replied. "We don't think everything is racist."

Now, not thinking like an American is nothing to be ashamed of, but employing willful ignorance is. In short, this train of thought is stupid--we ought to know better.

So how could this possibly happen just in time for the world's most international event? As Chris Chase writes, under the auspices of Yahoo.com's Fourth Place Medal blog, it's nothing short of incredible:

"It's baffling that nobody involved in the picture -- from the photographers to the players -- even seemed to consider that this ad would be looked at negatively. Did it not occur to somebody that it might not be a good idea to mock a large portion of the continent before the world's largest athletic competition that, by the way, happens to take place on that continent. Were they not aware of an invention called "the Internet" that allows pictures taken in Spain to be transmitted all over the world for the eyes of everyone?"

So, for the untold number of people involved in planning and implementing this advertising campaign, as well as those who claim to look past racial differences so far that racism isn't racism, I think it's time to grow up. After all, it's the 21st century, and at least where I'm from, 21 means adulthood.

Tuesday, July 29, 2008

How Not to Be an Asshole at Work

The first post by Free Radical.

I've held a great number of vocations over the last ten years. I helped customers find books on Thoreau, made grilled-cheese sandwiches for whiny children, arranged art on gallery walls, cleaned out buckets of human feces and urine, and served dinner to hundreds of guests. At each job, I worked as hard as possible--not because my goal in life was to be the world’s best bookstore employee/nanny/gallery assistant/companion for the elderly (and as it turns out, also the deranged) all while catering on the weekends. No, my goal was something simple. Work hard to succeed.

My mother raised me to believe that the way to success in life is through hard work. Now I know that lady luck sometimes throws her hand in the equation, and certain people end up on top of the game while others who toil their whole lives never get anywhere. We all know this, but it’s not an excuse to be lazy. Luck does play a role in success, but hard work is the vehicle that carries us to the end.

So while there are a great many of you who share the same philosophy about the working life, there is a percentage of the population that feels so entitled and deserving that even hearing that one syllable word, work, is slightly insulting. These are the lovely coworkers who infuriate you with their insistence on the mediocre. They collect 40 hour paychecks on 20 hours of work, play games on the computer while you hash it out with the boss, take twenty cigarette breaks in 45 minutes, and cause an imbalance in work flow to the point where the rest of the team has to pick up the slack.

Now, it may be that these lazy colleagues are simply unaware of how their actions (or lackthereof) affect others. Frankly, I think they just don’t give a damn.

In an effort to honor the top three, most memorable assholes at work, I have compiled the following list:

1. When you are in charge of 50 screaming, tired, dirty campers do not, I repeat--DO NOT fall asleep and leave your fellow colleagues, who are also screaming, tired, and dirty to take care of the kids you can’t handle. You’re an asshole.

2. At the end of the night, when the wedding guests are falling over in various drunken states and actually dancing to Rod Stewart (…and think they’re sexy), now is the perfect time to clear those tables so that we can pack up and go home. But, wait, what’s that you say? You need to sit down and take a break. You feel faint, your feet hurt, your back aches. Pick up that damn basket and pile it high with dishes. Carry that basket full of dishes (yes, it is heavy) all by your lonesome to the hard working people who are washing the fucking dishes and want to go home some time tonight! You really are an asshole.

3. And most recently…to the princess in her cubicle kingdom to my left, yes organizing your child’s birthday party, ordering dresses, and talking to your husband is pretty tiring, so it’s a good thing you have so much free time. Oh, wait--I forgot, you’re at work, sitting in a cubicle. And the real kicker? You only work part time!!

So you see ladies and gentleman, even when you think no one else at work cares or even notices that “punching in” means absolutely nothing to you, the laziness you emit affects us all.
Your laziness causes others to work twice as hard, which leads to resentment, which leads to you not being invited to drinks after work. Let me break it down for you in simple mathematical terms:

Lazy + resentful coworkers = nobody likes you

Harsh as it may seem, there is a way to reverse the equation. I just don’t feel like putting in the effort to explain it.

Friday, July 18, 2008

Stop Building Prisons, Start Building Communities

Every Monday morning when I walk my unsuspecting, yet overexposed campers down to a small, simple park on the corners of Ellington and Erie streets in Dorchester, I cringe. Not just at the sudden movements toward oncoming cars of blissfully oblivious youths or the harshly pronounced words "nigga" and "faggit" that come out of their mimicking mouths, but at the harrowing scene that awaits us upon arrival.

The local park, a supposed safe haven for the tangible future of America, lies in shambles.

Bashed Budweiser cans sleep like dirty, excessively bearded men on smooth pavement decorated with cheerful blue imagery that perfectly complements the water three small sprinklers spray on screaming, smiling sons and daughters of the surrounding area. Pieces of glass, conveniently located in the one portion of the park allocated to the au natural foot, keep the used and abused can of Bud heavy company. Above, on the grass plot and foolishly positioned wood chips that envelop the slides and other attractions the park has to offer, sunbathe countless other discarded bottles, some with drowning liquids still ready to asphyxiate their next self-chosen victim. Wrappers, paper bags, soiled paper towels and napkins, mastication devices of all sorts, and sometimes even festival aids like firecrackers, depending on the time of year and how lady luck feels that morning, also inhabit the grounds.

***

As we call for and sometimes even receive legislation concerning the economy, energy, crime, and "national security," I can't help but wonder if we're somehow missing our target.

If my kids, with their prospects dimmed by ineffectual schools and neglectful parents, can't even play in a small park without constant reminders of the failings of their elders, how can we reasonably expect them to succeed? Graduating from high school with an inclination towards college shouldn't be the equivalent of winning the lottery, after all.

And yet, simultaneously, we allocate our resources for other purposes. As Lil Wayne talks about on "Misunderstood," the final track on his latest release, The Carter III, we send our law enforcement agents out to collect criminals, but focus on numbers rather than public well-being:
"I was watching t.v. the other day right
got this white guy up there talking about black guys
talking about how young black guys are targeted
targeted by who? america
you see one in every 100 americans are locked up
one in every 9 black americans are locked up
and see what the white guy was trying to stress was that
the money we spend on sending a mothaf**ka to jail
a young mothaf**ka to jail
would be less to send his or her young ass to college
see, and another thing the white guy was stressing was that
our jails are populated with drug dealers, you know crack/cocaine stuff like that
meaning due to the laws we have on crack/cocaine and regular cocaine
police are only, i don't want to say only right, but shit
only logic by riding around in the hood all day
and not in the suburbs
because crack cocaine is mostly found in the hood
and you know the other thing is mostly found in you know where i'm going
but why bring a mothaf**ka to jail if it's not gon stand up in court
cuz this drug aint that drug, you know level 3, level 4 drug, shit like that
i guess it's all a misunderstanding
i sit back and think, you know us young mothaf**kas you know that 1 in 9
we probably only selling the crack cocaine because we in the hood
and it's not like in the suburbs, we don't have what you have
why? i really don't wanna know the answer
i guess we just misunderstood hunh
you know we don't have room in the jail now for the real mothaf**kas, the real criminals
sex offenders, rapists serial killers
don't get scared, don't get scared
I know you saw one them sex offenders papers
don’t trip he live right on the end of yo block,
Mhm yea, that nigga live right down the street from you,
sex offender on the level 3 drug,
convicted ex-con
yea check em out
watch you got, you got a daughter, son, what you got?
hahaa yea, you know what
that’s the good weed,
you know what, I have a f**king daughter
you understand me and why the f**k would you bring my neighbor to jail
jus because the reason why he live next door to me, ain’t the reason I live next door to him
Meaning he didn’t rap his way to my f**king neighborhood
he sold crack cocaine to get to my neighborhood
you move him out bring him to jail for life
and then you move in with a sex offender"--Source.

Now, I'm not saying we should abort all drug laws--clearly that's not the solution. But, as Wayne asks, shouldn't we put the real criminals in jail, instead of some guy whose situation made choosing to sell drugs far more convenient than studying neuroscience?

I would prefer that child molesters and rapists remain incarcerated for the rest of their lives, alongside their more humane fellow sinners, killers. Drug dealers? I'd much rather tax their business than let it go unregulated and cost the public time, money, and effort. At least then maybe we could take the funding wasted on "patrolling" the streets for the type of snow the sun rarely sees and hire some goddamn teachers.

***

As I stoop down to collect another shattered bottle, indulgently pondering the irony of shattered lives, sweet-hearted seven-year-olds begin to pick up black plastic bags with the intention of tossing the weekend's leftover trash into the green basin designated for such remnants that rests less than an arm's length away.

"Thanks, guys," I say. "But that's not your job. Go play. It's dirty and I don't want you guys touching this stuff."

Silently they return to their fierce debates over who tagged whom and whose turn it is to play with the ball. I corral my haul and head to the trash receptacle, where the result of the ghetto's inner workings gather. Sadly, the bin operates at about 5% capacity. The weekend's unchecked party watches from all around, strewn upon the ground.

It's time to stop building prisons and start building communities.

Sunday, June 22, 2008

Applicants of Color Encouraged to Apply


Since I'm currently unemployed, I was doing my due diligence in the fading hours of Sunday afternoon, perusing the Boston-area education job listings on craigslist.com when I saw the first entry at the top of the page.

"Director - (Cambridge, MA)," I read. So I clicked it.

Now, I'm not necessarily interested in directing any preschool, so the hastily written posting failed to pique my interest much--until I read the final sentence of the description: "Applicants of color encouraged to apply."

Isn't that sort of like saying seven footers are encouraged to play basketball? Shouldn't that be obvious enough? Apparently not, which brings up a couple of questions.

First, why do we need to alert job-seeking minorities that if they possess, among other qualifying qualities, "color," then they should apply? I'm pretty sure any job seeker intends to apply if the position fits his or her requirements, one of which ought to be that a prospective employer follows laws that preclude race from entering the decision-making process (well, at least prohibitively; Affirmative Action contradicts this decree somewhat but we'll leave further discussion of that issue for another day).

Second, does this mean a person of "color" is preferred? If so, thereby a canvass-face (Caucasian--I just made up my own hate term/adjective depending on your point of view) is not encouraged to apply.

Except for brief moments during the summer months, my skin lacks pigmentation. I'm actually half-Jewish, which should, in theory, make me a minority, but since my skin more closely resembles the manila folder lying an arm's length away from me than the brown "wood-grained" desk it sits on, I fall under the category of majority. Green Day feels my pain.

My life is not harder because of this fact; quite the opposite, actually. Light skin has certainly served me well thus far: while abroad for months on end in South America and Spain I was often afforded more respect than I would have received had my skin stood up better to the Sun, and as the resident poor kid in a rich town in "liberal" Massachusetts, you can bet being white paid off in not having to deal with the myriad misunderstandings that my few black contemporaries experienced during their time in the same town. White folks still love to emphasize when a character in a story is black, but neglect such detail when it comes to just about any other race or ethnicity America (read: humanity) has to offer.

Just last night, while I attended a friend's graduation party, a bald white man in a pink polo, whose exposed, salt and pepper chest hair hoped to make up for his shining dome's failures, entertained my sister and me with a thrilling tale of a black fitness instructor. No other person's race befell the poetic pages of his enthralling short story. After mentioning the gym employee's race the first time, he mumbled something about not having a problem with it. Phew. He then proceeded to call her "the black girl" throughout the rest of his narrative.

Now, our protagonist is far from a bad man. In fact, he's mostly enjoyable and down to earth. At the very least we know from his booze-based banter he enjoys a brew or two or a few, so we've got something in common. But, his attitude animates major issues America--and the world--have yet to overcome or even address since the sad summer of '68.

Everyone has racial issues. Everyone. Jesse Jackson once used the epitaph "Hymies" to refer to Jews, but he's no racist. Far from it. Lil Wayne freely says "cracker" but seems more racially (and socially) enlightened than most. At the same time, France almost elected an openly racist candidate just a few years ago. George Bush "hates black people," according to Kanye West. Oh, and that Obama guy, he's a Black Muslim Terrorist right?

We could all use some austere, Benjamin Franklin-like self-improvement in this regard, but, damn, do we really need job postings to alert us that applicants of color are encouraged to apply?

It's 2008, and MLK became a martyr two score ago. Will it be another four score before we learn to use parallel sentence structure and call a white man "white" just the same as we call a black man "black?"

What a god damned waste we've let his death become if we can't raise our language to match King's diction.

Friday, June 20, 2008

Beauty Above All Else

Don't pray this doesn't happen to your daughter, guarantee it doesn't with a little parental attention.

Why are we so afraid of aging?

The answer: sagging self-valuation, similar to the dollar.

"I love being hot," said a good friend of mine, she the owner of an atypical combination of an hourglass body and a sound mind.

So does everyone, but unfortunately, some will never know how it feels, never get to fall in love, never get to feel cool.

You can't love another until you learn to love yourself--perhaps the most difficult lesson of all--and this conundrum taxes the mental makeup of many.

Beautiful girls see strange globular shapes in the mirror when they stare intently at the rise and swell of their every curve. Men resort to chemicals to recreate their bodies, and in turn, self-image--we're not talking Jason Giambi here either, but the unimposing quiet type who wants some goddamn attention. Botox needles may soon take the mantle from the addict's syringe as modernity's most popular pointed object this side of the penis.

Angry culture auditors blame the media, and they have a point. Busty bosoms, bursting biceps, and perfect, poreless profiles assault us daily from the safety of magical flat screens, within which technology reshapes these genetic outliers into the Zeuses and Aphrodites we wish to see in our reflections. But really, are we such simpletons that we can't differentiate between the ideal and reality?

I believe it comes back to parenting and community. Remember how much your words weigh when you assure your daughter she'll always be beautiful to you no matter what she looks like, or choose to stay mum on the couch, beer in hand, watching the very instrument that replaces you as a parent. Without your reassurances, the nasty notes she receives in class on folded, lined paper and the lipstick caricatures and alarming asinine hate she reads on the bathroom wall will win.

No matter how many psychiatrists dote upon her ego for dollars or boys treat her like a rag doll in the bedroom, she'll never reclaim that confidence her parents should have instilled into her impressionable mind before all these negative forces had a clean shot from their high perches.

The Empty Room

His friendship is like a mirror, he simply reflects his words off of you to see how he looks.
One-sided, without further dimension.

Her insecurity is a program.
It's binary, either 1 or 0, and you're the coder.

She shines her harsh light from above, the scorn raining downward.
Powder can't hide your facial faults.

He awaits your hands, eager: Open me, please.
The door sits welcoming, begging for attention.

In the middle you remain.
Flesh, bone, blood and brains.
Centerpiece of this chess game.

Finding a Job Is a Full-Time Job

You write, rewrite, and re-rewrite the same email over and over again. You organize your résumé incessantly, each time to more perfectly fit the job description craigslist says is available (even though it's actually already been filled). You lose a couple hours off your nightly repose, or you lie in sweaty, sun-stained sheets to avoid the world informing you you're not worthy of entering the MTV reality show that's standing outside your bedroom door.

And all this for jobs you don't even want.

Even better, most of these jobs you can't get, you can't even afford. "Salary competetive" the lisitings say--maybe for a middle school student, but for a debt-laden college grad, 20K means an existence that mirrors Oregon Trail's "bare bones" status.

The positive: we're young enough to handle two jobs, so 30K might be reachable!

The negative: we're young enough to handle two jobs, so 30K might be reachable!

There's most definitely a light at the end of the tunnel, of this I'm sure. But seeing as I'm near-sighted, my vision won't allow me to see it without my misplaced spectacles. The real question is, "How long can you wander in the dark without deciding to take a nap on the cracked concrete below your feet?"

Ah, youth, hate while you have it, love it when it's gone, and spend your entire life bemoaning either fact.

Monday, June 16, 2008

A Super Gay Day in Cali

One can only imagine what occurred behind closed doors on their wedding night.

Yesterday, January 16th, 2008, California hosted a gay party.

The extravaganza was quite like a college blowout (meaning rager/fiesta/pahty/kegger/etc., not this). The threat of legal recourse clouded the atmosphere like Purple Haze, drunken threats flew through the air like ping pong balls, usually missing their targets, and in the end, everyone just wanted someone to make out with.

To stop being coy and relay some facts, this really was a banner day for human rights. Unfortunately, the banner could go up in flames like America's credibility lately.

California's courts, perhaps only temporarily, allowed for the union of same-sex marriages to count as, umm, marriages. The funny thing is, the debate seems to be based on semantics, not whether or not two consenting adults can do whatever the hell they want to each other behind closed doors, according to Matthew D. Staver, founder and chairman of an anti-civil rights group errantly named the Liberty Counsel (source: NYT article linked above):

“Marriage has traditionally been known, across continents and all geographical regions, as between a man and a woman,” said Mr. Staver, who is 51 and married [presumably to someone who, in fact, looks like a man]. “Marriage between the same sex may be some sort of union, but it’s certainly not marriage.”

Hmm. First of all, I would like to know if Mr. Staver is a Los Angeles Lakers fan, and in turn a Kobe Bryant fan, and in turn a fan of sodomistic rape of women. But I digress. Anyways, here's a nice little list of definitions of the word marriage.

Now there are 10 definitions on the linked list, and quoting a dictionary definition an argument does not make, but let's just have at this for fun.

My favorite is unequivocally number 10: "Obsolete. the formal declaration or contract by which act a man and a woman join in wedlock."

The very definition of marriage merely meaning man and woman is listed as obsolete. Quite telling if you ask me.

Next, let's look at number 5: "any close or intimate association or union." Note the use of Mr. Staver's favorite word: "union."

And lastly, since this tactic is probably getting old, number 2: "the state, condition, or relationship of being married; wedlock."

Same-sex marriage certainly qualifies under the above definitions, and also seems better than this "obsolete formal declaration" thing that meant the husband owned his woman, and could do as he pleased with/to her until the arrival of her merciful death. (Sounds sort of like slavery doesn't it?)

Anyway, if Mr. Staver and his hate mongers want teach their children to hate gay lovers and gay-lovers alike, which might include themselves, and live unfulfilling lives in unhappy marriages, that's their problem. But, please, don't force your definition of life, one you probably mistakenly took from a really Good Book, on the rest of us.

Here's hoping the morality cops don't bust down the door on this innocuous little gathering they've got going on out in the Governator's Crib.

Sunday, June 15, 2008

Obama Ready To Lead

Growing up my father wasn't allowed in my home.

From age six until eighteen, twelve full years, while my mother worked strenuous hours trading in her chosen profession, dance, for the pursuit of dollars and happiness for her children, I was often alone. My big sister, the owner of five extra worldly years on this planet, stood watch, but in a town where the most successful establishment was something called, quite literally, The General Store, safety from others wasn't such a concern.

And yet, my pale blue Ghostbusters blanket could only do so much late at night.

My relationship with my father was tenuous during my most formative years, and I didn't look forward to spending Tuesday and Thursday nights and the entire weekend twice a month sitting in his dingy apartment. We spent most of our time together at his shaggy rug-covered abode in a small living room with quickly enclosing walls. Inside his building hanged an abject emptiness the effusive odors drifting from the kitchens of other, equally downtrodden poor folks failed to mask. Bordering the living room that served as a catacomb for my sister and me were a kitchen and bathroom not much bigger than a walk-in closet, as well as a solitary, dark bedroom.

I knew my father loved me, for my mother had assured me of this fact, but I wasn't sure if I loved him back. He slept elsewhere, after all.

How could I respect a man who made the mother of his son and daughter cry? How could I love a man whose mere presence ruminated threat. If my father were present, in the flesh or even just in my thoughts, the world was not stable. My mind was a sponge and his internal anger invaded it. I was prone to outbursts of fury mixed with private episodes of remorse, guilt, and salty tears regretfully rolling down my troubled face. When we wrestled I would hit him hard, hoping he would return the blow, enabling me to turn my back on him forever. This was no joke; I was a warrior defending my mother's honor.

All this, and my father truly cared.

Years later things have changed. Time has mellowed the man. Pain has been replaced with a strange appreciation for his existence. Our relationship has grown, and I now enjoy my father's company. The scars of his past are still visible, but the aesthetics are easier to take now that his sutures have faded from view. I know I can count on him; in turn, he can count on me too.

The best of a bad situation was made, one could say. But the truth is, the situation wasn't so bad.

The two women in my life, and my home, shaped my existence.

My mother was a rock--unbreakable, indefatigable, heroic. I have trouble picturing another human being of her quality. She was a guiding light in a murky swamp of a childhood.

At the same time, my sister served as an example of what not to become. She had caved under the pressure of an easy erasure. Drugs could delete the ringing in her ears that mommy and daddy's berating each other had left. Once she gathered her fragmented mind, eschewing the easy route of day-to-day survival for cold turkey austerity, I had another perfect example--this time of whom I should strive to be. The screw up became an archetypal ideal, The Teacher.

Meanwhile, sports nursed my ego, bestowing confidence upon me in the way that a father in the home should have, teachers urged me to develop my mind, and friends would eventually become pillars I could lean on.

But it was no sure thing. My life avoided the cliché. Others aren't nearly as lucky.

Untold American youths toil in unsafe communities, fatherless. Dad doesn't live a town or two away in a dingy apartment; he doesn't exist. He simply up and left when he got the news that he had fulfilled nature's instinctual demand. He enacted Light In August in modern times.

Barack Obama also grew up in a fatherless home. Like my sister, he at times lost his way. But, ultimately, the presumptive Democratic nominee gave up self-pity and grabbed the mantle of leadership left vacuous by his lack of a male role model.

Today, on Father's Day, he spoke up.

The New York Times mentioned the outspoken Bill Cosby in reference to Obama's speech in a thriving Chicago church this morning, but the Illinois Senator's tone is different. When Obama calls for parents to be just that, he does so without the disdain that many viewed Cosby as radiating. The Man Who Would Be President eludes nothing more than a steady confidence, and wise words.

"We need fathers to realize that responsibility doesn’t just end at conception," he told a gathering of thousands. "What makes you a man is not the ability to have a child. Any fool can have a child. That doesn’t make you a father. It’s the courage to raise a child that makes you a father."

Obama's speech was not a diatribe, but a truthful assault on passiveness and lassitude. A man is man when he acknowledges that fact and embraces the responsibility it entails.

While Obama aimed his words poignantly at African-Americans, his point transcends race, nationality, ethnicity, or politics. The time is upon us to change America. Our country is great, and contrary to reports of its demise, it will continue to rank as one of the great nations in history for generations heaped upon generations. But, there's no reason it can't be better.

When the final votes are cast in November, the likely winner will be ready to fill the void America has felt for the past eight, arduous years. The nation's father figure has gone missing. With the ascension of Mr. Obama, keepsake blankets once again must provide only physical comfort.

Mr. Accountability is ready. All that's left is for America to declare the same.

Saturday, June 14, 2008

The Opening Act

I've written two or three different initial posts at this point. None has been worth sliding my finger along the mysterious silver rectangle known as a "mouse pad" in order to hit the orange Publish Post button at the bottom of my screen.

I feel like a sixteen year old girl on her way to prom--I want the first time to be special, so I'm trying to talk myself into believing that my horny date with the spiked hair and underdeveloped vocabulary (but omg hes cute lol!) is the one. Because there just simply has to be a "the one." Right?

No. Maybe there is, maybe there isn't, but waiting around for someone who may or may not come is only reasonable when the cable guy enters the equation. So, on that note, this is the inaugural post at youngapathetics.com.

There will be more to come, and invariably, they will be better and more enjoyable keyboard romps than this one. But for now, I'm done waiting for that FiOS guy to shine the light on me.