Boston Cowboys

Today I interviewed an awesome saxophone player in the Public Gardens. As Quack, Lack and Jack were diving under the water for food, he was telling me about Las Vegas, smoking a black & mild in one hand, making a point with the other. He calls himself "The Cowboy." Sometimes I really wonder why I'm in graduate school at all.

I didn't know you were called Dennis.

Saw Kerry Kennedy (RFK's daughter) speak tonight about her new book, which deals with Catholicism in America--fascinating interviews with a huge range of people, many of whom I had no idea were raised Catholic (like president of the Islamic Society of North America, Ingrid Mattson). If all Catholics were like Sister Helen---who told my boyfriend to me nice to me when we met her a couple years ago---I'd probably convert.

Also, landed a gig reading the news for Emerson's radio station. NPR here I come!

And, my new favorite movie:

Bees, trees and he's.

I Love

... That I just found a bee in my hair. Really. A dead bee chose my nest of hair as its final resting place. I feel special.

... That they actually have "seasons" here like they did in the books I scoffed at when I was a child learning to identify "autumn." (Which in Atlanta starts the day after Christmas). For instance, those illustrations of September----school starting, kids in sweater-vests NOT dying of heat stroke----it's really happening here!

... That I go to New York and see my babycakes tomorrow.

The End.

Lobotomobiles

I found myself tonight on Harvard Square wandering aimlessly in search of merriment, when a portly gentleman, as if having read my thoughts, lured me in with an irresistible pitch about the free exhibit downstairs, of dire import, he said, and did I mention free.

So I tripped down the charming brick staircase into a room the shape of the infinity symbol. Its walls were plastered with warnings about psychiatry's grip of terror through the centuries. There you could read reports on or watch mini-documentaries about eugenics, BF Skinner's preference for books over his own children, Frances Farmer, Bedlam and the infamous Walter Freeman, who rode around performing ice pick lobotomies in the name of "healing" in his "Lobotomobile"--with, I imagine, a fiendish ADAM WEST at the helm.

It was interesting enough. And perhaps people are over-medicated these days--though I hardly think psychiatry has been responsible for the deaths of Kurt Cobain and Sylvia Plath, or the hardships endured by Soviet Russians.

When I got to the end of the whole awful timeline, I noticed a solitary chair in front of a screen titled, "WHAT YOU CAN DO ABOUT IT."

And I wondered, what CAN I do about it? I went closer. Pressed play.

Well, then I realized just how badly I had been duped. I had just spent 45 minutes of a perfectly cool, crisp evening locked into an exhibit sponsored by the "Citizens' Commission on Human Rights." Which was founded in 1969 by the CHURCH OF SCIENTOLOGY. Dunh dunh dunnnnnnnh.

That's right. The same people that gave you TOM CRUISE, DIANETICS and BATTLEFIELD EARTH.

L. Ron Hubbard. Voice of reason and justice in America.

Anyway, visit it here and decide for yourself.
http://www.cchr.org/about_cchr/

But be on the lookout for subliminal messages and aliens who resemble John Travolta.



If you want a free copy of "Psychiatry: An Industry of Death," by the way, straight from Harvard Square, I got a free one with my lobotomy at the door.

Tales of Trekkies

My magazine writing teacher talked for an hour tonight, unfurling a long, red carpet of journalism credits that included a stint in Chicago where he would go to the morgue at 4 a.m. to get list of who had died "mysteriously." Like hits by the mob. He and his "team" were the ones that broke the scary Tylenol poisonings. He also told us that once during a bagel run at dawn in New York, he bumped into Rudy Giuliani, walking quickly and quietly without his bodyguards around, assumedly slinking back from his ole mistress's home. "So, you witnessed Giuliani's walk of shame?" I blurted. A proud moment.

Then I got the following text message from Justin, which I have to share because it made me, like, totally "ROFL":

"Heard about an incident where a man had ten gallons of peaches stolen. Sheriff Allen has put out an APB on Brer Rabbit."

Sometimes, when no one is around, I shed a quiet tear for Anson County. Oh Anson, my Anson.

One of the MFA students, "Paul," told a great story the other night, and since I'm fried from eight hours of class, this is how it goes.

For curiosity's sake, he and a couple friends went to a giant sci-fi convention in NYC. When they got there, they snuck their way into one of the forums, led by some actress from Star Trek Voyager. During the talk, she kept dropping the name "Michael Dorn" (who played WORF on Next Generation, as I'm sure you all know). Suddenly, the perfect opportunity dawned on Paul.

When the speaker opened it up for questions from the audience, he walked up to the mic and said, "Uh, who is Michael Dorn?" Immediately, he said the crowd began to boo. BIG TIME. "I mean, my own friends felt peer pressured into boo-ing along," he said.

"Some guy dressed like a hobbit and carrying, like, ten cameras around his neck actually made the SIGN OF THE CROSS at me. Then, out of nowhere, someone yells, 'Amateur!'" Paul and Co. managed to flee through the back door before things got too ugly.

So, this semester I'll be struggling against similar imagined scenarios within my own program.

(SEGWAY!)

For the next four months, I can already feel what a struggle my brain will go through just to concentrate and focus every day. While I feel constantly pulled in different directions by new stimuli (The Center for Diversity, the Emerson radio station), I still lack a real community, which makes it all seem a little strange and... muddled. Hopefully I'll begin to experience more camaraderie soon. Boston: familiar city in new context, where the average age is under 30 but the subway closes at midnight.

Crime and Mel's Demeanor

So orientation is finally over.  Two long days of mostly obvious, boring, patronizing information sessions (including a powerpoint slide entitled "What is a GPA?"  Uh... isn't going to college a prerequisite for grad school?).

But still, the faculty seems erudite, hilarious and generally kick-ass. And I finally locked down a schedule I'm pretty happy about and met some fun people this afternoon. My classes are column writing, reporting and features, and this magazine publishing intro that has me reading one of the coolest books, "The Journalist and the Murderer" by Janet Malcolm.  

I'm about to hang out with some folks from my program at an apartment in Cambridge, including one woman who proudly describes herself as the "Jersey stereotype embodied," who is studying poetry at age 30 and seems to find humor in everything.  In fact, she was laughing so loudly throughout each session, that infectious, full kind of laugh that fills the room--right from the get-go, I knew I wanted to be her friend.

Walking home through Boston Common today, I noticed a cluster of people surrounding what turned out to be Mel Gibson, in fact, filming a DRIVING scene.  Considering Mr. Gibson's track record in the vehicle operation department, I knew it was risky to go closer.  But sometimes in life you just have to take that risk.

I was there for about 10 minutes when a shirtless young dude with a stubbly chin and glazed over eyes flounced over and asked me what was going on.

"They're shooting a movie with Mel Gibson," I said.

"Oh no wayyy, that is so AHSAHM!" he yelled in a voice that, if it were a font, would be called "New England Foghorn."   

Considering how out of it he seemed, I had to keep pointing out where Gibson was. "Oh my god!"  He yelled, "Is that him the KAHHH?  I love you Mel!  I love you!"

Turns out Danny has an interesting story.  He used to live in an apartment that cost $105 a month.  Lately, he has been working for his father selling pools--but since pool season just ended, he spends his days in Dorcester looking for under-the-table jobs so that he can keep collecting unemployment.  

He says this all rather matter-of-factly and then asks whether I'm from here. I say nope, I'm from Atlanta. He asks me how I liked Boston and I say it's really nice. "Yeah," he looks off to the left.  "Just don't wander down that way after dark--people do some crazy shit then." "Really?  Hmm." "Yeah, and don't get on the 23 bus.  That's the most dangerous bus in Bahstahn, I'm telling you.  People get shat up in theah all the time."  He said he once walked through a dried up pool of blood.

So we swap crime stories as a line of people with tiny screens in front of them watch carefully as Mel Gibson talks to himself inside the car. Right behind me, a woman is holding the crumpled figure of a dying squirrel in her jacket.  She taps one of the policemen standing guard over Saint Mel.

"Do you know anyone who could help this little guy?" she pleads. He shakes his head and shoots her a warning look, fingers his holster.

As she went from person to person, in fact, no one seemed to care a whit about the small grey ball of fur that breathing slowly in her hands.  She looked at me with exasperation before she left, to continue a search in vain for the doomed creature's savior.  

The longer I stood there watching, the more I realized how equally apathetic all of us were about watching Holllywood in motion.  The film, "Edge of Darkness" (a title which hints at its destined crappiness), was just something to do. People stuck around, snapping shots with the cell phones, crowding around to marvel at how many times they filmed the same scene where Mel Gibson gets out and shuts the door.   That door slam must have cost $100,000.

Gibson's celebrity, I think, has never quite recovered from that infamous alcohol soaked, anti-Semitic rant; that disheveled, bleary-eyed mugshot; and the failed films he's produced recently.

The process of film-making isn't exactly glamourous either.  It was hot and muggy enough to make you damp and sweaty just standing in place.  Flies were devouring the abandoned courtesy buffet, which was, like the actors, roped off from us peasants.

Out of the 50-strong crew, most of whom stood around chewing cud, one fellow with an important-looking headset came over and told us to move out of Gibson's view because "he's an actor and needs to concentrate."  Now, I've been to a lot of plays.  And I've seen actors who can concentrate with the knowledge that people are watching... but... maybe that's my elitist theater-going bias.

On my way home, sailboats dotted the "Chuckles River," as John calls it.  Ole Johnny boy is headed into town this evening on a bus that should pull into the South Station at 1 a.m.  Just in time for the predicted downpour.

Crazy Train

Ah, Boston. The chowder, the gruff but lovable "sea-men," the immutable hatred of Alex Rodriguez. Who could ask for more?

But there's something distinct about "Beantown" that the guidebooks always forget to mention. And that is, to use the politically correct term, the "Subway Crazies."

Now, I know that every city featured in the Carmen Sandiego them--from Berlin down to Belize?--has its own version of the SC. But I just don't think it gets much richer than what I've seen so far.

That roly poly with a beard and a pink "Harvard Summer Picnic" shirt flail-dancing to a jazz guitar player as we wait.

The slightly scarier version of "The Doc" in "Back to the Future" ranting about red line construction as we putter across the Charles: It's because the bridge, the bridge divides us, and you have the Cambridge side and the Boston side. YOU STAY ON YOUR SIDE. And--and they WANT you to think that this is what they're doing, but they're not fixing it, oh no, no they're not.

Creepy laughter. Adjustment in seat.

A group of teenagers with beach towels draped over their shoulders try to stifle nervous laughter. "You going swimming or something?" he says, dangling by one pale, gaunt arm, eying their towels, careening around as his knuckles grip the pole above our heads. One kid looks around and decides to answer, "Uh, no." He looks back at his friends for help.

"Ah, sorry," the Doc grumbles, "I didn't know if it was a cultural thing or something..."

The kid does a double take, but he doesn't say anything. No one says anything, no one makes eye contact. We just sit there guessing why the train has slowed down. The Doc stays there, shaking his head, having a racist conversation with himself.

And then today, on the blue line out to Revere Beach, I grabbed a spot, not thinking why it might be vacant on such a crowded car. As more and more people squished together, locking me in, I began to notice the man next to me obsessively rubbing his face and scratching his head, making a high pitched noise that is half whimper, half chant. Thinking that maybe I'm making him uncomfortable, I scoot a little to the left. He has this hacking, wet cough, the only noise anyone is making.

When we finally reach the "Coney Island of Boston," his frenzied face rubbing has only increased. I tumble out and smell the salty air, hear salsa music in the distance. There are some nuns dipping their feet in the ocean and laughing. An ice cream shop called "Twist and Shake."

"Shut up or I'll kick your ass!" I hear a woman shout. I turn around and realize that she's talking to her three-year-old child.

Banderas and Me

I have watched the day slowly expire, the sunlight flickering off the "Big Fish, Little Fish" pet shop and Celtic bookstore across the street, pinks and reds from out of the bottom corner of my window.  

For the last 24 hours since I got back from New York, I have become a hermit.  Not that I'm short on adventure.  Going to the basement for laundry was like journeying through the roots of an enchanted tree to a dungeon of discarded mattresses and arachnid kingdoms.  I am surrounded by maps, left by the previous occupant, so I do still know the world exists.  And also that it is flat.  (Thank you Thomas Friedman, you sly bastard). 

Just perched for hours this evening whittling away my time, procrastinating and turning my brain into jelly, looking at a screen, remembering my day--how I wandered over to Emerson this morning, just to catch that old-time undergraduate buzz.  

You know what I mean: Giganto boxes of nametags!  Folders with superfluous information!  Parents, in full pre-empty-nest frenzy, hovering and shoveling out wads of cash with wild abandon!  Purple smocked teenagers with headsets and dopey grins dancing to Kelly Clarkston outside the bookstore!   How old I felt.

Which has brought me to my main point: which is my anger at offensive Anglo adaptations of brilliant Latin American books.  

Random?  Nay.  You knew where you were going with this.  That's cause I'm writing in a pyramid: intro, thesis--I was no fool in 11th grade English.  

Actually, I'm a hypocrite.  Confined to English translations.  But that won't stop me!  (And don't let it stop you, there's candy at the end of this page).

You see, I just finished Isabel Allende's "The House of the Spirits."

Isabel was Salvador Allende's niece, so she has a unique stake in 20th Century Chile.  More than that, she's an amazing writer.  Her book spans more than four generations and encompasses a country's history with clarity and compassion.

And complexity.  The tragic characters are redeemable.  There are no clear villains--not even the sociopathic Esteban Garcia, himself a product of injustice and violence.  You read and read and read and then suddenly realize with amazement how deep and intricate the story is.

So when I found out that they made a movie in 1993 with, whoopee, an "all-star cast," I was intrigued.  It turns out, with a little patience, you can watch the whole thing on youtube.  

And that's when I noticed something... amiss.  That is, the watching part.

You see, for whatever reason (perhaps because she is called "Blanca," and her skin is so WHITE), they cast WINONA RYDER as a bizarre combination of the daughter and the granddaughter characters from the book, when one would be a stretch...

Then you have Jeremy Irons Senator Trueba, the patriarch of the family whose fatal flaw is his uncontrollable rage and inability to see the truth.  Now I love "Jeremy's Iron" as much as the next gal, but for once his pensive physique and rich, polished mahogany accent just felt... out of place?  Not to mention that the scenery resembled sweeping epics set in Italy.

Throughout the book, Trueba grows smaller, as part of his sister's curse.  I wondered how details like this would translate visually... After all, we don't know whether Trueba is REALLY going from grape to raisin, or if it's just the result of the knowledge he holds inside of how tyrannical he's been to his family.  

But none of this turns out to matter.

As Irons ages 50 years, you pretty much get the standard white wig, exaggerated wrinkle-paint and crotchety gum-flapping stereotype.  Which I think basically sums up the level of creative vision throughout.

Speaking of stereotypes, the most bizarre offense is how they cast all American/British actors--Meryl Streep, Glenn Close, etc--for the main family, but characters like the whore or the bad guy go to people with these weird exaggerated foreign ("Spanglish" anyone?) accents.  

Which brings me to the sultry forbidden lover.  Who else could be up for the task than, how do you say it, ah yes!, Antonio Banderas (guitar solo).  Who in the 90s was basically the entirety of Hollywood's "Latino" casting pool.

Oh, and they cut out the two brothers, Jaime and Nicolas, who are key in the book's plot.  But blah blah, we'll be here all night.

Each scene seems to be missing something, and that something is understanding.  It's true that probably no movie adaptation would ever meet my standards, but a director with real vision could have cut through such a giant hunk of work to at least extract the most essential pieces... 

And what's my point, other than that I just spent an hour of my life scanning through youtube clips to make myself angry?  Well, that will have to wait for another night.  There is far too much speghetti to be boiled, far too many suitcases to collect dust on my floor.

Goodnight.