Remember the Lawrences, our old friends from Pasadena? Kate is a housewife; Doug is a bushy-eyebrowed lawyer and Matthew Broderick's real-life father. They live in a nice suburban house with lots of ferns and outdoor seating and their three children. Nancy is a divorcee who is trying to finish law school while every man in California tries to sleep with her; Willie is so sensitive and artistic he dropped out of high school and is both a photographer and a writer, and even though (or perhaps because) he really should be gay he has one tragic girlfriend after another - one who is pregnant, one who dies, etc. Then there's Letticia, the baby. She's a tomboy who insists on being called "Buddy" and who, despite her penchant for wearing overalls and mesh football jerseys, manages to attract the affections of every 70s tween idol who happens by Pasadena. Willie Ames is her boyfriend until he moves down the street to his own TV show, then Leif Garrett tries to pressure her to have sex with him. She wears the football jersey through it all.
Yes, I'm talking about family, my favorite hour of television circa 1976. How I wished my family could be like this! I wished my parents would let me drop out of school and live in an apartment in our backyard decorated with faux antiques and macrame. I wished my parents would be completely understanding if I brought Willie Ames up to my room. I wished I had an older brother who would let me drive even though I was 12 years old. I wished we had a hammock in our yard and that my father drove a Maverick rather than a Buick Skylark.
family is out on DVD and, laid low with yet more poison ivy, I spent last night watching highlights from the first two seasons. I can't believe I once loved this dreck, and I also can't believe how slowly the show is paced. We had a lot more patience back in the days when we only got a handful of channels; the title credits alone last about a minute and a half. What makes this show unique is that each and every episode is a very special episode. Not a week goes by where one social problem or another is not the focus. It's a good thing Buddy didn't have sex with Leif Garrett or she undoubtedly would have gotten herpes in the next episode and pregnant in the one after that. This poor family was absolutely besieged, I tell you.
Which makes sense, because despite its liberal trappings, this is one of the most reactionary shows of the period. Yes, the elder Lawrences take a liberal approach to their single-mother eldest, their drop-out aimless artist son, and their independent tomboy daughter. But it's important to note that all three of these children live at home, even those in their early 20s. The real lesson of the show is that beyond the confines of the family lurks danger. If an old flame comes to visit, he's a speed freak. If an old neighbor visits, she's an alcoholic. If you serve on a jury and the criminal is acquitted he will seek out and attack your child. The family is surrounded by perversion, drug addicts, thieves, dissolution of every stripe. Family is the only defense.
So really, I should be glad that I lived in a home without ferns and macrame, a home where one graduated high school and got the hell out of there for good. America in the mid-70s probably did seem scary. The economy was a mess, Watergate had eroded all faith in government and authority, cities were dying, suburban kids were all smoking pot, polyester was ubiquitous. To say that the nuclear family is an anecdote to social ills in 1976 is to say pretty much the same thing Reagan had been saying all along, and in that sense was an early pop culture manifestation of the conservative revolution that had been coming for years and would be completed in 1980. In many ways family is about precisely that moment when the liberal dreams of the 1960s are transformed, when the garden of Woodstock becomes the manicured lawn of suburbia, and when the focus becomes the family.
Showing posts with label suburban childhoods. Show all posts
Showing posts with label suburban childhoods. Show all posts
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Monday, July 20, 2009
Regularly Scheduled Programming
I must have been as excited about it as everyone else. After all, a cardboard model of the lunar module, some give-away from the gas station, hung from the light over my bed so that I could fall asleep gazing up at it. I remember helping my father put it together, by which I mean watching my father put it together while I jumped up and down. My favorite toys were space toys: Matt Mason figures, the Colorforms outer space men, one from each planet. I must have been excited the week of the moon shot, but 40 years later that's not what I remember.
What I remember is being sick of it before it happened. This was the first event of my life that featured nonstop television coverage, and the first event of my life that I experienced entirely through television, and although I wanted to watch the landing and walk on the moon, I was completely confused by the pre-emption of all my cherished programs for four straight days. They left Earth on Thursday, July 16. I didn't realize beforehand that going to the moon would mean missing two days of Dark Shadows and almost an entire Saturday of cartoons. By Sunday I just wanted them to get there already and get it over with so that my 5 year-old life could get back to normal.
I must have been alseep by the time the Eagle landed Sunday night. My father got me up to watch Neil Armstrong descend from the module. I know I saw the whole thing live, but what I remember is not Armstrong's famous words but Walter Cronkite, so excited I thought he was maybe about to cry. Walter Cronkite, taking off his glasses and saying, "Oh boy!" Forty years later the lesson I remember is not about technology and aspiration and innovation and greatness but instead that the way we know what is important is because not only our fathers but the TV tells us so. Even half-asleep I knew that if Walter Cronkite was moved, I should be moved.
Events with far-reaching implications swirled around that moon weekend. I have no memory of any of them. No memory of Vietnam, probably because my extended family contained no draft-age men. Woodstock several weeks later meant nothing. My mother was 39, my father 46. They listened to show tunes. There was no counterculture in my household. While the astronauts frolicked and planted a flag my mother was realizing that she was pregnant with my sister, another thing I knew nothing about at the time. All I knew, as my father lifted me in his arms to carry me back to bed, was that this particular event had finally transpired, and that the next day Dark Shadows would resume its regularly scheduled programming.
What I remember is being sick of it before it happened. This was the first event of my life that featured nonstop television coverage, and the first event of my life that I experienced entirely through television, and although I wanted to watch the landing and walk on the moon, I was completely confused by the pre-emption of all my cherished programs for four straight days. They left Earth on Thursday, July 16. I didn't realize beforehand that going to the moon would mean missing two days of Dark Shadows and almost an entire Saturday of cartoons. By Sunday I just wanted them to get there already and get it over with so that my 5 year-old life could get back to normal.
I must have been alseep by the time the Eagle landed Sunday night. My father got me up to watch Neil Armstrong descend from the module. I know I saw the whole thing live, but what I remember is not Armstrong's famous words but Walter Cronkite, so excited I thought he was maybe about to cry. Walter Cronkite, taking off his glasses and saying, "Oh boy!" Forty years later the lesson I remember is not about technology and aspiration and innovation and greatness but instead that the way we know what is important is because not only our fathers but the TV tells us so. Even half-asleep I knew that if Walter Cronkite was moved, I should be moved.
Events with far-reaching implications swirled around that moon weekend. I have no memory of any of them. No memory of Vietnam, probably because my extended family contained no draft-age men. Woodstock several weeks later meant nothing. My mother was 39, my father 46. They listened to show tunes. There was no counterculture in my household. While the astronauts frolicked and planted a flag my mother was realizing that she was pregnant with my sister, another thing I knew nothing about at the time. All I knew, as my father lifted me in his arms to carry me back to bed, was that this particular event had finally transpired, and that the next day Dark Shadows would resume its regularly scheduled programming.
Monday, June 29, 2009
Goodbye, Farewell
They bookended my childhood. One came near the beginning, at the crucial point where I was first making choices on my own about what I would wear and listen to, about what I liked and who I was, and the other came at the end of childhood and the beginning of adolescence, at the crucial point where I was discovering how I fit into the world of sexual desire. When they both died on Thursday I thought about them for the first time in years, their passing signifying my march into middle age, their loss the loss of that childhood.
In 1971, in my elementary school, the lines were drawn, and you were one type of person or another. You were Jacksons or Osmonds. Sure, the odd girl had a weird preference for David Cassidy, but the Partridge Family was fake and even the eight year-olds knew it. Jackson or Osmond was the way you defined yourself. I was firmly Jackson, not because of Michael, because neither Michael nor Donny appealed to me, but because I somehow knew that Jackson was danger while Osmond was safe. Everything about the Jackson 5 was just cool. The Osmonds were a band populated by guys with names like Alan and Wayne; the Jacksons had Jermaine and Tito. Osmonds made you want to tap your foot, Jacksons made you want to twirl and shriek. The magazines of the day included pinups that I was supposed to kiss and invited me to compete to win a date with the flavor of the week, and I dutifully kissed my picture of Tito, having decided that he was my favorite because I liked his name. But at that age none of this was sexual, or pre-sexual. It was about deciding who my friends were, what we had in common, who we were and who we were not. It was Coke versus Pepsi, writ large. By 1973 none of my friends would be caught dead listening to an Osmonds 45, but we all owned all of the Jackson 5 albums.
Three years later we were listening to David Bowie and discovering pot when a show about three female detectives premiered on ABC. It was a show I rarely watched, and then suddenly all the guys were wearing t-shirts onto which that pin-up had been screened. The boys' interest in Farrah precisely coincided with my interest in boys, and if Farrah taught me anything it was what boys liked. From 1976 to 1978 they liked girls with small breasts and a lot of feathered hair. She was blonde, lithe, toothy, corn-fed, exactly everything I was not and would never be. She was the head cheerleader; I was the newspaper editor. My teeth would never gleam from a million posters. My sex appeal would not be broadcastable from t-shirts. Whatever kind of woman I would eventually be was still uncertain, but what was certain is what kind of woman I would not be. In the sexual economy, Farrah and I were using very different currencies, and even at that young age I knew it.
Although I really didn't care too much for MJ in his solo career, and paid no attention to Farrah once all the t-shirts and posters were thrown away or shipped off to Goodwill, I still listen to "I Want You Back" and think, "Damn if that isn't perhaps the best bass line ever." I still look at whoever is the sex symbol of the day and think, "This woman and I share a gender and absolutely nothing else." I still am that eight year-old, and that 13 year-old. And now, without them, I will continue to grow old, their place in time solidified and retreating further and further into my past.
In 1971, in my elementary school, the lines were drawn, and you were one type of person or another. You were Jacksons or Osmonds. Sure, the odd girl had a weird preference for David Cassidy, but the Partridge Family was fake and even the eight year-olds knew it. Jackson or Osmond was the way you defined yourself. I was firmly Jackson, not because of Michael, because neither Michael nor Donny appealed to me, but because I somehow knew that Jackson was danger while Osmond was safe. Everything about the Jackson 5 was just cool. The Osmonds were a band populated by guys with names like Alan and Wayne; the Jacksons had Jermaine and Tito. Osmonds made you want to tap your foot, Jacksons made you want to twirl and shriek. The magazines of the day included pinups that I was supposed to kiss and invited me to compete to win a date with the flavor of the week, and I dutifully kissed my picture of Tito, having decided that he was my favorite because I liked his name. But at that age none of this was sexual, or pre-sexual. It was about deciding who my friends were, what we had in common, who we were and who we were not. It was Coke versus Pepsi, writ large. By 1973 none of my friends would be caught dead listening to an Osmonds 45, but we all owned all of the Jackson 5 albums.
Three years later we were listening to David Bowie and discovering pot when a show about three female detectives premiered on ABC. It was a show I rarely watched, and then suddenly all the guys were wearing t-shirts onto which that pin-up had been screened. The boys' interest in Farrah precisely coincided with my interest in boys, and if Farrah taught me anything it was what boys liked. From 1976 to 1978 they liked girls with small breasts and a lot of feathered hair. She was blonde, lithe, toothy, corn-fed, exactly everything I was not and would never be. She was the head cheerleader; I was the newspaper editor. My teeth would never gleam from a million posters. My sex appeal would not be broadcastable from t-shirts. Whatever kind of woman I would eventually be was still uncertain, but what was certain is what kind of woman I would not be. In the sexual economy, Farrah and I were using very different currencies, and even at that young age I knew it.
Although I really didn't care too much for MJ in his solo career, and paid no attention to Farrah once all the t-shirts and posters were thrown away or shipped off to Goodwill, I still listen to "I Want You Back" and think, "Damn if that isn't perhaps the best bass line ever." I still look at whoever is the sex symbol of the day and think, "This woman and I share a gender and absolutely nothing else." I still am that eight year-old, and that 13 year-old. And now, without them, I will continue to grow old, their place in time solidified and retreating further and further into my past.
Friday, June 19, 2009
A Brief History of Summer Jobs
The best thing about being an "adult" is the fact that you no longer have to look for and hold a summer job. Real jobs are bad enough; summer jobs can be awful, if you can even find one. My parents didn't care about me working during high school, probably because they didn't want to give me a car and wanted to ensure that I couldn't afford a car, but beginning the summer before college they were insistent that I at least try to work. I spent the summer after high school graduation at Dunn and Bradstreet looking up companies on microfiche, transcribing some assigned number next to each company's name, for eight hours a day, five days a week. Look up number, write it down, look up number, write it down. Soul-killing stuff, indeed.
The following summer I managed to find a six-week job helping out at a camp for kids with ADD. A friends' mother was on the board of the group that sponsored the camp, which explains why they hired someone with no experience working with such children, no interest in going into health or social services, and no real interest in children in general. I don't remember much from this experience except that it rained a lot, my main duty was handing out Ritalin, and I was miserable.
I spent the next summer in Kenya, much to my parents' chagrin, not because I was going off to Africa at a young age, but because it meant that I couldn't have a summer job. This was, of course, the best summer of my college years. Finally, the summer before my senior year, I got a job with the PA/NJ Bridge Commission. Every summer the Commission hired a certain number of college students to "help out." Really the whole thing was some sort of political kickback; I got the job because my mother spent months pestering our State Senator, who was some sort of family acquaintance.
I suppose EZ Pass has been the demise of this program; my job was to fill in for the regular toll-takers who were out on vacation. Whenever possible I worked the graveyard shift because traffic was light overnight and I could sit in the booth smoking and reading and listening to the radio for hours on end. It was the summer of 1984; if I never hear the song "Sunglasses at Night" again I'll die a happy woman. That summer the bridge was being painted, so traffic was down to one lane in each direction. During the morning rush, there could be quite a wait to get through the booth and across the bridge. Annoying thing number one: if I was the only female toll-taker, the truck drivers would line up at my booth, damn the long wait, just because they felt like seeing a woman. Annoying thing number two: every other car driver would ask, "When are you going to finish painting the bridge already?" During my next break, I'd respond, but traffic jams don't engender much of a sense of humor.
If there were no open toll-taking shifts, I'd be assigned to "help" with the office janitorial staff. Said staff was one woman named Toots. The office was a break room, conference room, storage room, bathrooms, and one large office occupied by the Commissioner. Cleaning the entire building only took Toots a couple of hours, and she didn't want any smart aleck college kid getting in her way, but she also didn't want the Commissioner to know how little work there was to be done. So, days when I was assigned to Toots, she would insist that I hide in the women's room. For the entire shift. 7 AM to 3 PM. Toots somehow managed to spend her entire shift hanging around the hall outside the women's room, and any and all attempts at escape were immediately foiled. She also insisted that I take my breaks with her, since she was "supervising" me (yes, I had scheduled breaks from my toil in the lavatory). I don't remember much about Toots, except that she did not like Gerladine Ferraro, did not like her at all.
Since college I've held jobs that I've loved and jobs that I've hated, but no jobs as random, no jobs as stupid, no jobs as memorable, as summer jobs.
The following summer I managed to find a six-week job helping out at a camp for kids with ADD. A friends' mother was on the board of the group that sponsored the camp, which explains why they hired someone with no experience working with such children, no interest in going into health or social services, and no real interest in children in general. I don't remember much from this experience except that it rained a lot, my main duty was handing out Ritalin, and I was miserable.
I spent the next summer in Kenya, much to my parents' chagrin, not because I was going off to Africa at a young age, but because it meant that I couldn't have a summer job. This was, of course, the best summer of my college years. Finally, the summer before my senior year, I got a job with the PA/NJ Bridge Commission. Every summer the Commission hired a certain number of college students to "help out." Really the whole thing was some sort of political kickback; I got the job because my mother spent months pestering our State Senator, who was some sort of family acquaintance.
I suppose EZ Pass has been the demise of this program; my job was to fill in for the regular toll-takers who were out on vacation. Whenever possible I worked the graveyard shift because traffic was light overnight and I could sit in the booth smoking and reading and listening to the radio for hours on end. It was the summer of 1984; if I never hear the song "Sunglasses at Night" again I'll die a happy woman. That summer the bridge was being painted, so traffic was down to one lane in each direction. During the morning rush, there could be quite a wait to get through the booth and across the bridge. Annoying thing number one: if I was the only female toll-taker, the truck drivers would line up at my booth, damn the long wait, just because they felt like seeing a woman. Annoying thing number two: every other car driver would ask, "When are you going to finish painting the bridge already?" During my next break, I'd respond, but traffic jams don't engender much of a sense of humor.
If there were no open toll-taking shifts, I'd be assigned to "help" with the office janitorial staff. Said staff was one woman named Toots. The office was a break room, conference room, storage room, bathrooms, and one large office occupied by the Commissioner. Cleaning the entire building only took Toots a couple of hours, and she didn't want any smart aleck college kid getting in her way, but she also didn't want the Commissioner to know how little work there was to be done. So, days when I was assigned to Toots, she would insist that I hide in the women's room. For the entire shift. 7 AM to 3 PM. Toots somehow managed to spend her entire shift hanging around the hall outside the women's room, and any and all attempts at escape were immediately foiled. She also insisted that I take my breaks with her, since she was "supervising" me (yes, I had scheduled breaks from my toil in the lavatory). I don't remember much about Toots, except that she did not like Gerladine Ferraro, did not like her at all.
Since college I've held jobs that I've loved and jobs that I've hated, but no jobs as random, no jobs as stupid, no jobs as memorable, as summer jobs.
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Of Heisenberg and the Gosselins
A year ago, I'd never heard of the Gosselins. Although I watch plenty of crappy television, shows about weird, large, or Christian families, or any combination thereof, don't appeal to me. Even though it turns out Jon and Kate and their eight live only about 50 miles from me, I knew nothing about them or their reality fame. Then, suddenly, in March, their names jumped from the cover of every tabloid that stood guarding the supermarket checkout line. Bored one rainy Sunday, I noticed a marathon of their show running on TLC, and watched a few epsiodes throughout the day and evening.
There was Kate during what must have been the first season, struggling to change and dress and feed six babies, showing off her disgusting stretched-out stomach, working long weekend shifts as a nurse to keep them all in diapers and baby food. There was prematurely balding Jon, getting up at the crack of dawn to trudge off to work, helping out evenings with the kids. Everyone looked exhausted, but the babies were certainly cute.
Several hours later, there was a Jon who had clearly gotten hair plugs, quitting his job to "work from home" and help out more. Kate, meanwhile, was suddenly dressed with much less frump, and the family had acquired all kinds of expensive kid stuff, stuff it was hard to imagine a family of 10 with no working parents could afford. Finally, at the end of the night, there was the family getting ready to move into a new million-dollar house, taking a week-long vacation at the Outer Banks, everyone looking even better dressed and better coiffed.
Then the deluge. Jon is cheating on Kate! Kate is cheating on Jon! The kids are being exploited! Kate charges people $20 for an autographed photo! And last night, the premier of the new season, filmed approximately two weeks ago, where Kate, currently sporting some kind of weird Soccer Mom's Mullet (business in front, spikey in back) and Jon, driving a Nissan Nismo, celebrate the sextuplets' 5th birthday while avoiding any kind of contact whatsoever with each other. In confessionals, Jon admits he behaved stupidly, Kate cries and ponders the divorce rates of parents of multiples. The episode was undoubtedly viewed by millions.
Why do we watch this? By watching this we are ensuring an outcome for those children that will almost definitely include drug and alcohol abuse followed by eight memoirs detailing the nightmare that was growing up Gosselin. I have no doubt some are fans of the show because the kids are adorable, and because watching the struggle to get out of the house with eight children, let alone to raise them responsibly, must appeal to parents of one or two or three kids. Some people watch because they see themselves in Jon and Kate, just parents doing the best they can.
Most people probably watch instead because no one can turn away from a train wreck. No matter what the producer's intentions may have been, the show is not documenting the everyday struggles of raising two sets of multiples, it's documenting the way fame and fortune is destroying a marriage, changing the spouses before our eyes. We're watching people become "famous," and not dealing with that very well. We're watching two people go from cute spats to barely tolerating each other. We're watching what looked like decent, normal folks turn into entitled assholes.
In 1973, PBS broadcast An American Family and inadvertently invented reality television. The series was to document the lives of a typical American family, but then during filming one son came out and ran off to the Chelsea Hotel, and then by the end the marriage fell apart. It was a huge hit not because it depicted "real" life but because it depicted real life falling apart. The act of observation changes the nature of that which is being observed. There's no better demonstration of this principle than reality TV.
There was Kate during what must have been the first season, struggling to change and dress and feed six babies, showing off her disgusting stretched-out stomach, working long weekend shifts as a nurse to keep them all in diapers and baby food. There was prematurely balding Jon, getting up at the crack of dawn to trudge off to work, helping out evenings with the kids. Everyone looked exhausted, but the babies were certainly cute.
Several hours later, there was a Jon who had clearly gotten hair plugs, quitting his job to "work from home" and help out more. Kate, meanwhile, was suddenly dressed with much less frump, and the family had acquired all kinds of expensive kid stuff, stuff it was hard to imagine a family of 10 with no working parents could afford. Finally, at the end of the night, there was the family getting ready to move into a new million-dollar house, taking a week-long vacation at the Outer Banks, everyone looking even better dressed and better coiffed.
Then the deluge. Jon is cheating on Kate! Kate is cheating on Jon! The kids are being exploited! Kate charges people $20 for an autographed photo! And last night, the premier of the new season, filmed approximately two weeks ago, where Kate, currently sporting some kind of weird Soccer Mom's Mullet (business in front, spikey in back) and Jon, driving a Nissan Nismo, celebrate the sextuplets' 5th birthday while avoiding any kind of contact whatsoever with each other. In confessionals, Jon admits he behaved stupidly, Kate cries and ponders the divorce rates of parents of multiples. The episode was undoubtedly viewed by millions.
Why do we watch this? By watching this we are ensuring an outcome for those children that will almost definitely include drug and alcohol abuse followed by eight memoirs detailing the nightmare that was growing up Gosselin. I have no doubt some are fans of the show because the kids are adorable, and because watching the struggle to get out of the house with eight children, let alone to raise them responsibly, must appeal to parents of one or two or three kids. Some people watch because they see themselves in Jon and Kate, just parents doing the best they can.
Most people probably watch instead because no one can turn away from a train wreck. No matter what the producer's intentions may have been, the show is not documenting the everyday struggles of raising two sets of multiples, it's documenting the way fame and fortune is destroying a marriage, changing the spouses before our eyes. We're watching people become "famous," and not dealing with that very well. We're watching two people go from cute spats to barely tolerating each other. We're watching what looked like decent, normal folks turn into entitled assholes.
In 1973, PBS broadcast An American Family and inadvertently invented reality television. The series was to document the lives of a typical American family, but then during filming one son came out and ran off to the Chelsea Hotel, and then by the end the marriage fell apart. It was a huge hit not because it depicted "real" life but because it depicted real life falling apart. The act of observation changes the nature of that which is being observed. There's no better demonstration of this principle than reality TV.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Childhood A Go-Go
My ruminations on department stores and alcohol conjured a somewhat related childhood memory. At some point the Falk's Food Basket chain, of the cocktail lounge that would grill your steak fame, closed. I seem to recall this was caused by a tax problem of the sort where failing to pay your taxes leads to a problem. At any rate, the stores were sold off, but Falk's somehow retained the restaurants, which were naturally named Falk's Cocktail Lounge.
I recall driving by one or the other of the two remaining locations as a child and my mother sighing loudly and exhaling, "Go-go girls." I had no idea what go-go girls were, but they sure sounded like fun, maybe even like something I'd like to be one day. My mother's approbation only made these girls seem all the more glamorous. Even at that early age, I innately understood that anything that made my mother sigh was something really, really cool.
At around the same time much sighing would ensure whenever we visited her good friend Judy Kaplan. I loved Judy Kaplan. She always had candy, let me watch whatever I wanted on TV, and cooked crazy exotic food, the likes of which were never seen in our house, such as squash. Over the din of Laugh-In and sighs I could often make out the words "Marjorie" and "go-go girl." As I eventually came to understand, Judy's daughter Marjorie had dropped out of college and was shimmying her way to financial independence at some local watering hole (probably not Falk's, but who really knows). Marjorie Kaplan was undoubtedly the only Jewish go-go girl in the history of go-go girls, but there you have it. I only recall meeting Marjorie once, when she stopped by to visit her mother at the same time that we were visiting, and I indeed recall her wearing tall, white, patent leather boots. Go-go boots!
I had no idea what it all meant, but I was into those boots. I asked once if I could get a pair of boots like Marjorie's, and was disappointed when my request was met with only another a sigh and a definitive "NO." My parents often simply took me out to dinner with them rather than paying a babysitter (and as a consequence, although this is another story altogether, I have attempted to order a peanut butter and jelly sandwich at every upscale restaurant between PA and NYC). Although I spent some months hoping that one day we would patronize Falk's Cocktail Lounge that day never came to pass.
Go-go dancing originated at the Peppermint Lounge in the early 60s, when enthusiastic patrons did the twist on top of the tables. The term is derived from the French expression a go go, meaning in abundance, galore. Although scantily clad, go-go dancers are not necessarily strippers, no matter what my mother thought. By the time I was old enough to go to a bar, Falk's Cocktail Lounge was long gone. I have no idea what happened to Marjorie Kaplan and her white boots. All that remains is this abundance of memories of the sighs galore caused by the simple act of dancing on tabletops.
I recall driving by one or the other of the two remaining locations as a child and my mother sighing loudly and exhaling, "Go-go girls." I had no idea what go-go girls were, but they sure sounded like fun, maybe even like something I'd like to be one day. My mother's approbation only made these girls seem all the more glamorous. Even at that early age, I innately understood that anything that made my mother sigh was something really, really cool.
At around the same time much sighing would ensure whenever we visited her good friend Judy Kaplan. I loved Judy Kaplan. She always had candy, let me watch whatever I wanted on TV, and cooked crazy exotic food, the likes of which were never seen in our house, such as squash. Over the din of Laugh-In and sighs I could often make out the words "Marjorie" and "go-go girl." As I eventually came to understand, Judy's daughter Marjorie had dropped out of college and was shimmying her way to financial independence at some local watering hole (probably not Falk's, but who really knows). Marjorie Kaplan was undoubtedly the only Jewish go-go girl in the history of go-go girls, but there you have it. I only recall meeting Marjorie once, when she stopped by to visit her mother at the same time that we were visiting, and I indeed recall her wearing tall, white, patent leather boots. Go-go boots!
I had no idea what it all meant, but I was into those boots. I asked once if I could get a pair of boots like Marjorie's, and was disappointed when my request was met with only another a sigh and a definitive "NO." My parents often simply took me out to dinner with them rather than paying a babysitter (and as a consequence, although this is another story altogether, I have attempted to order a peanut butter and jelly sandwich at every upscale restaurant between PA and NYC). Although I spent some months hoping that one day we would patronize Falk's Cocktail Lounge that day never came to pass.
Go-go dancing originated at the Peppermint Lounge in the early 60s, when enthusiastic patrons did the twist on top of the tables. The term is derived from the French expression a go go, meaning in abundance, galore. Although scantily clad, go-go dancers are not necessarily strippers, no matter what my mother thought. By the time I was old enough to go to a bar, Falk's Cocktail Lounge was long gone. I have no idea what happened to Marjorie Kaplan and her white boots. All that remains is this abundance of memories of the sighs galore caused by the simple act of dancing on tabletops.
Monday, April 13, 2009
Remembrance of Patty Melts Past
When I was a kid one of my biggest thrills was accompanying my father on his weekly trip to Two Guys. I'm not sure what exactly killed Two Guys - over-expansion? Wal-mart? changing consumer tastes? - but to a child it was a wonderland indeed. It was the source of all toys, a mecca filled with bikes and cap guns and board games and records and record players and pretty much anything a young heart could desire. Two Guys was so vast, so overflowing with manna, that it had its own restaurant and cocktail lounge right by the entrance, providing succor to tired pilgrims. In fact, the lost world I'm mourning this morning isn't Two Guys per se, but the world of stores so comprehensive, so important, that shoppers would linger so long that they would work up an appetite and need to stop for a meal.
When I think about it, nearly every large retailer I can recall had at least a lunch counter and at most a restaurant/bar. Woolworth's, Grant's, Hess's, Falk's, Macy's, Bloomingdale's. I vividly remember my local Woolworth's, where one could purchase a bird or a cat or candy or K-Tel records and then stop for a patty melt before moving on. I don't remember this, but apparently Falk's, a local chain, sold groceries as well as department store items, and one could purchase a steak from the butcher and then take it into the cocktail lounge, order a martini, and have the cook prepare it for you. Why did this all go away?
Unless I'm in a particular mood I don't tend to enjoy shopping. A couple of drinks might help things along. My local Wal-Mart features an Auntie Annie's pretzel stand, but a greasy soft pretzel doesn't come close sufficing in terms of making Wal-Mart tolerable. Several gimlets, on the other hand, might help me to see the beauty of Jacqueline Smith's fashion collection.
The truly cavernous department stores that remain, in large cities, still have restaurants within them, usually on an upper floor, so that even those who are only stopping in to meet someone for lunch are forced to walk though merchandise. I understand that the world now goes to work each day; ladies who lunch are harder and harder to find. The after-work shopping crowd might be hungry, though, and certainly would be in need of happy hour. Putting restaurants back into stores might entice people to linger, to stop rushing around before hurrying home.
People clearly still have an interest in dining in the middle of a shopping expedition. Every big-box shopping center includes fast food outlets, and often includes some mid-price bar/restaurant chain like Applebee's. Every mall has an awful "food court." The difference now is that one must leave the store in order to get to the food and drink. In fact, one probably leaves the store, gets into the car, and drives across the parking lot to get to it, wasting fossil fuel and contributing to obesity by discouraging the simple act of walking. Put the alcohol back into the stores, people, it's just healthier!
What's lost is the sense of wonder and excitement, the notion that a store is a place people want to be, a place people enjoy so much they want to make a day of it. What's lost is the sense that our cornucopia of consumerist plenty is something to be celebrated with steaks, martinis, and patty melts, that the act of purchasing can be, in and of itself, an event.
When I think about it, nearly every large retailer I can recall had at least a lunch counter and at most a restaurant/bar. Woolworth's, Grant's, Hess's, Falk's, Macy's, Bloomingdale's. I vividly remember my local Woolworth's, where one could purchase a bird or a cat or candy or K-Tel records and then stop for a patty melt before moving on. I don't remember this, but apparently Falk's, a local chain, sold groceries as well as department store items, and one could purchase a steak from the butcher and then take it into the cocktail lounge, order a martini, and have the cook prepare it for you. Why did this all go away?
Unless I'm in a particular mood I don't tend to enjoy shopping. A couple of drinks might help things along. My local Wal-Mart features an Auntie Annie's pretzel stand, but a greasy soft pretzel doesn't come close sufficing in terms of making Wal-Mart tolerable. Several gimlets, on the other hand, might help me to see the beauty of Jacqueline Smith's fashion collection.
The truly cavernous department stores that remain, in large cities, still have restaurants within them, usually on an upper floor, so that even those who are only stopping in to meet someone for lunch are forced to walk though merchandise. I understand that the world now goes to work each day; ladies who lunch are harder and harder to find. The after-work shopping crowd might be hungry, though, and certainly would be in need of happy hour. Putting restaurants back into stores might entice people to linger, to stop rushing around before hurrying home.
People clearly still have an interest in dining in the middle of a shopping expedition. Every big-box shopping center includes fast food outlets, and often includes some mid-price bar/restaurant chain like Applebee's. Every mall has an awful "food court." The difference now is that one must leave the store in order to get to the food and drink. In fact, one probably leaves the store, gets into the car, and drives across the parking lot to get to it, wasting fossil fuel and contributing to obesity by discouraging the simple act of walking. Put the alcohol back into the stores, people, it's just healthier!
What's lost is the sense of wonder and excitement, the notion that a store is a place people want to be, a place people enjoy so much they want to make a day of it. What's lost is the sense that our cornucopia of consumerist plenty is something to be celebrated with steaks, martinis, and patty melts, that the act of purchasing can be, in and of itself, an event.
Monday, January 5, 2009
(W)ringing Out the Old
I don't often get stay in bed for 60 hours sick, but when I do it's always on or around New Year's Eve. I have no good explanation for this. It's not as if I celebrate Christmas with a week-long bender, or that I stay up all night waiting for Santa and thereby weaken my immune system. For whatever reason, illness always strikes me on December 31. I missed the whole millennium thing in bed with a wicked flu, and I missed this past New Year's sound asleep as well. Not that I really missed anything except drunk people and a sip of crappy champagne.
Two days either in bed or on the couch provided me with the time needed to devote to the Mad Men Season One DVD set. I'd seen the entire season when it aired in the summer of 2007, but it was worth seeing again. Even more worth it was the plethora of commentary tracks. If you're a fan of the show, you should buy the set for these alone. Not only is there commentary for each and every episode, most episodes have two commentary tracks, one by a writer, director, or producer, and one by several of the actors. The various "making of" documentaries are worthwhile as well, particularly if you're interested in costume or production design, and if you love this series you must be interested in costume and production design.
Revisiting this particular series during the turn of an annum made me think about the reasons why not only Mad Men but anything having to do with post-war America fascinates me. I'm interested in American history in general, but in this period in particular. I always have been. The reason why is so simple I've overlooked it all these years. To be fascinated by our culture from, say, 1945 to 1965 is to be fascinated in the world that my parents lived in before I knew them. My parents came of age in that world, were shaped by it, lived it, were part of it. I obviously only knew my parents as parents, as married people, and they married later in life. I never knew them as young adults. To understand that period is to understand some secret part of who my parents were, some part of them that was inaccessable to me because it predated me.
For me, to observe the inner workings of Sterling Cooper is to have a window, albeit a fictional window, into what the workplace was like for my mother before she married and had me. I watch the executives' attitudes toward work, and toward their coworkers, and see what it must have been like for my father to be part of that environment. To observe the Draper marriage and their assumptions about gender tells me something about the assumptions both of my parents must have had when they married.
These characters interest me as fictional characters, and the series fascinates me as a work of serialized fiction, but what is also at work is a life-long attempt to understand the unknowable: the inner lives of the adults who, in a sense, I knew so intimately, but whose pasts and motivations seemed so mysterious. The "mystery" of Don Draper is nothing more than the mystery that every father is to his child. You know him so well, but he came to you fully formed, and what made him cannot be found on the page because it exists only beyond the margins.
Two days either in bed or on the couch provided me with the time needed to devote to the Mad Men Season One DVD set. I'd seen the entire season when it aired in the summer of 2007, but it was worth seeing again. Even more worth it was the plethora of commentary tracks. If you're a fan of the show, you should buy the set for these alone. Not only is there commentary for each and every episode, most episodes have two commentary tracks, one by a writer, director, or producer, and one by several of the actors. The various "making of" documentaries are worthwhile as well, particularly if you're interested in costume or production design, and if you love this series you must be interested in costume and production design.
Revisiting this particular series during the turn of an annum made me think about the reasons why not only Mad Men but anything having to do with post-war America fascinates me. I'm interested in American history in general, but in this period in particular. I always have been. The reason why is so simple I've overlooked it all these years. To be fascinated by our culture from, say, 1945 to 1965 is to be fascinated in the world that my parents lived in before I knew them. My parents came of age in that world, were shaped by it, lived it, were part of it. I obviously only knew my parents as parents, as married people, and they married later in life. I never knew them as young adults. To understand that period is to understand some secret part of who my parents were, some part of them that was inaccessable to me because it predated me.
For me, to observe the inner workings of Sterling Cooper is to have a window, albeit a fictional window, into what the workplace was like for my mother before she married and had me. I watch the executives' attitudes toward work, and toward their coworkers, and see what it must have been like for my father to be part of that environment. To observe the Draper marriage and their assumptions about gender tells me something about the assumptions both of my parents must have had when they married.
These characters interest me as fictional characters, and the series fascinates me as a work of serialized fiction, but what is also at work is a life-long attempt to understand the unknowable: the inner lives of the adults who, in a sense, I knew so intimately, but whose pasts and motivations seemed so mysterious. The "mystery" of Don Draper is nothing more than the mystery that every father is to his child. You know him so well, but he came to you fully formed, and what made him cannot be found on the page because it exists only beyond the margins.
Monday, December 1, 2008
Turkey Day Without Turkey
My mother always ordered a "fresh" turkey for Thanksgiving. I have no idea what that meant, except that it hadn't been frozen. It was still a commercially-produced turkey from some turkey farm somewhere, maybe even the place in Alaska that Sarah Palin used as a backdrop for her little impromptu press conference the other week. At any rate, once the "fresh" turkey arrived in our house things went downhill from there, and once I describe it you'll see why I don't like and don't ever cook turkey.
My mother's stuffing featured chopped liver. Why anyone would sully perfectly good stuffing with chopped liver is beyond me, but she did. My father would then stuff the bird so full it probably weighed 30 pounds. It weighed enough that it needed to cook no less than ten hours. It was so stuffed that every drop of fat and moisture from the bird was absorbed by the stuffing, resulting in incredibly dry turkey that tasted of chopped liver. By the time we'd eat, somewhere around 8 PM, the adults were always so drunk they probably didn't notice how dry and chopped liver-y was the food, but I always noticed. The only part of the bird I found edible was the tip of the wing, which tasted more of burnt skin than of liver.
My mother's idea of mashed potatoes was to mash potatoes in a pot with some fake margarine added. In other words, these too were dry and inedible. Since the bird had produced no drippings that weren't absorbed by the stuffing, gravy was flour, water, and maybe a bouillon cube. Inedible. Although it was often a runny mess, her homemade cranberry sauce was good, as was the green been casserole. So although I loved Thanksgiving, for me the meal generally consisted of part of a turkey wing, some cranberry sauce, some green beans, and maybe a roll.
Now that I plan my own Thanksgiving I forgo turkey, stuffing, gravy and potatoes. I don't miss it. Here's the best part of all this: unlike the rest of America, I did not need to spend my weekend finding creative ways to disguise and ingest leftover turkey. I did not need to make turkey lasagna, turkey pot pie, turkey croquettes, turkey soup, turkey sandwiches, turkey stew, turkey patties, or turkey tetrazzini.
Wise up, America. Next year, make a ham.
My mother's stuffing featured chopped liver. Why anyone would sully perfectly good stuffing with chopped liver is beyond me, but she did. My father would then stuff the bird so full it probably weighed 30 pounds. It weighed enough that it needed to cook no less than ten hours. It was so stuffed that every drop of fat and moisture from the bird was absorbed by the stuffing, resulting in incredibly dry turkey that tasted of chopped liver. By the time we'd eat, somewhere around 8 PM, the adults were always so drunk they probably didn't notice how dry and chopped liver-y was the food, but I always noticed. The only part of the bird I found edible was the tip of the wing, which tasted more of burnt skin than of liver.
My mother's idea of mashed potatoes was to mash potatoes in a pot with some fake margarine added. In other words, these too were dry and inedible. Since the bird had produced no drippings that weren't absorbed by the stuffing, gravy was flour, water, and maybe a bouillon cube. Inedible. Although it was often a runny mess, her homemade cranberry sauce was good, as was the green been casserole. So although I loved Thanksgiving, for me the meal generally consisted of part of a turkey wing, some cranberry sauce, some green beans, and maybe a roll.
Now that I plan my own Thanksgiving I forgo turkey, stuffing, gravy and potatoes. I don't miss it. Here's the best part of all this: unlike the rest of America, I did not need to spend my weekend finding creative ways to disguise and ingest leftover turkey. I did not need to make turkey lasagna, turkey pot pie, turkey croquettes, turkey soup, turkey sandwiches, turkey stew, turkey patties, or turkey tetrazzini.
Wise up, America. Next year, make a ham.
Thursday, August 28, 2008
Poem of the Week (or month, or year)
We Did Not Make Ourselves
By Michael Dickman
(from this week's New Yorker, and my apologies because the formatting isn't perfect)
We did not make ourselves is one thing
I keep singing into my hands
while falling
asleep
for just a second
before I have to get up and turn on all the lights in the house, one after the
other, like opening an Advent calendar
My brain opening
the chemical miracles in my brain
switching on
I can hear
dogs barking
some trees
last stars
You think you’ll be missed
it won’t last long
I promise
____________
I’m not dead but I am
standing very still
in the back yard
staring up at the maple
thirty years ago
a tiny kid waiting on the ground
alone in heaven
in the world
in white sneakers
I’m having a good time humming along to everything I can still remember
back there
How we’re born
Made to look up at everything we didn’t make
We didn’t
make grass, mosquitoes
or breast cancer
We didn’t make yellow jackets
or sunlight
either
_____________
I didn’t make my brain
but I’m helping
to finish it
Carefully stacking up everything I made next to everything I ruined in broad
daylight in bright
brainlight
This morning I killed a fly
and didn’t lie down
next to the body
like we’re supposed to
We’re supposed to
Soon I’m going to wake up
Dogs
Trees
Stars
There is only this world and this world
What a relief
created
over and over
Friday, August 15, 2008
Cerealized Drama
On with life. Remember Quisp? Back in the day it was my favorite cereal for two reasons. First, I loved Quisp himself, that short outer space man with the propeller on his head. Secondly, because my mother didn't understand that it was essentially Captain Crunch in a different shape made by a different company, it was the only really sweet "sugar" cereal I was allowed to have.
Rules about food in our house were randomly created and steadfastly maintained. For example, my mother wasn't kosher, but she had been raised that way. Our house was in no way kosher, not by any stretch of the imagination. But shrimp were the only shellfish allowed. She'd serve pork chops, but not ham. We had bacon, but not sausage. We also had Christmas stockings, but no tree, so at least she was consistent in her randomness.
What she referred to as "sugar cereals" were bad for me and were forbidden. I understand that packaged food wasn't labeled as thorougly then as it is today, so maybe that explains why I was allowed to have Fruit Loops, Apple Jacks, and Corn Pops; if it had a healthy-sounding word in its name, it must be healthy, right? What I wanted most of all was Captain Crunch, that nirvanna of a bowl full of sweet I encountered at friends' houses the mornings after sleepovers. No way; strictly forbidden. Maybe the docile, smiling Quaker on the label gave my mother a false sense of security (after all, would a Quaker ever endanger America's youth?), maybe it was the word "oats" in the Quaker Oats logo, but for some reason she felt that Quisp and it's brother-cereal, Quake, were acceptable.
Quisp and Quake were exactly the same cereal but in different shapes, and named for different cartoon characters. Quisp was of course from another galaxy and so was not truly sexually determined. His dress and hairstyle seemed to indicate that he was in fact a "he," but his masculinity was akin to that of a stuffed animal. His voice was high-pitched, his mannerisms childlike. Whatever masculinity he had was pre-pubescent, unthreatening. Quake, on the other hand, came from underground. While Quisp's cereal came from the galaxies, Quake's was of the earth, produced by earthquakes. Quake was muscle-bound, deep-voiced, virile. In the commercials shown during Saturday morning cartoons, Quisp and Quake are rivals for our affection. They are presented as superheroes, and in ad after ad they compete to see who can save the earth, Quake with brawn, Quisp with brains.
Naturally, I loved Quisp and hated Quake. After all, I could never grow up to be Quake. I'd never have brawn or a deep voice, but I could one day save the world through intellect and charm. My nerdiness could one day pay off. I don't know if the Quaker Oats marketers introduced two versions of the same cereal so that one would appeal to girls and one boys, but whatever they were thinking it didn't work. Sometime in the early 70s they decided they weren't selling enough of either cereal and to stop competing with themselves; one cereal would be discontinued.
They had a contest, and everyone could vote, including kids. Who do you want to keep around, Quisp or Quake? I enthusiastically voted for Quisp. How could he lose? He was cute, he was smart, he had a propeller on his head, for crying out loud! In what would become a lifelong pattern, I was on the wrong end of the vote. Quisp was toast, relegated to the infinite cosmos of memory.
Proud, defiant, I never ate Quake. Golden Grahams became my favorite cereal (again, the name of the cereal tricking my mother into a belief in imaginary health benefits) until I was old enough to stop eating cereal altogether. I never liked milk, you see. I only wanted sweet cereals to flavor the milk so that I could drink it. Quake also eventually disappeared from supermarket shelves, another victim of free love and disco.
All these years later I am avenged. A Quisp cult has been slowly growing, aided and abbetted by the internet. By the turn of the century, Quisp was again being produced in limited quantities. Today, it's available nationwide, at least according to Quaker Oats. Quisp has his own website, and a very good one at that. If you can't find it at your local grocery store, you can order some from the site. Chalk another one up for the nerds.
Rules about food in our house were randomly created and steadfastly maintained. For example, my mother wasn't kosher, but she had been raised that way. Our house was in no way kosher, not by any stretch of the imagination. But shrimp were the only shellfish allowed. She'd serve pork chops, but not ham. We had bacon, but not sausage. We also had Christmas stockings, but no tree, so at least she was consistent in her randomness.
What she referred to as "sugar cereals" were bad for me and were forbidden. I understand that packaged food wasn't labeled as thorougly then as it is today, so maybe that explains why I was allowed to have Fruit Loops, Apple Jacks, and Corn Pops; if it had a healthy-sounding word in its name, it must be healthy, right? What I wanted most of all was Captain Crunch, that nirvanna of a bowl full of sweet I encountered at friends' houses the mornings after sleepovers. No way; strictly forbidden. Maybe the docile, smiling Quaker on the label gave my mother a false sense of security (after all, would a Quaker ever endanger America's youth?), maybe it was the word "oats" in the Quaker Oats logo, but for some reason she felt that Quisp and it's brother-cereal, Quake, were acceptable.
Quisp and Quake were exactly the same cereal but in different shapes, and named for different cartoon characters. Quisp was of course from another galaxy and so was not truly sexually determined. His dress and hairstyle seemed to indicate that he was in fact a "he," but his masculinity was akin to that of a stuffed animal. His voice was high-pitched, his mannerisms childlike. Whatever masculinity he had was pre-pubescent, unthreatening. Quake, on the other hand, came from underground. While Quisp's cereal came from the galaxies, Quake's was of the earth, produced by earthquakes. Quake was muscle-bound, deep-voiced, virile. In the commercials shown during Saturday morning cartoons, Quisp and Quake are rivals for our affection. They are presented as superheroes, and in ad after ad they compete to see who can save the earth, Quake with brawn, Quisp with brains.
Naturally, I loved Quisp and hated Quake. After all, I could never grow up to be Quake. I'd never have brawn or a deep voice, but I could one day save the world through intellect and charm. My nerdiness could one day pay off. I don't know if the Quaker Oats marketers introduced two versions of the same cereal so that one would appeal to girls and one boys, but whatever they were thinking it didn't work. Sometime in the early 70s they decided they weren't selling enough of either cereal and to stop competing with themselves; one cereal would be discontinued.
They had a contest, and everyone could vote, including kids. Who do you want to keep around, Quisp or Quake? I enthusiastically voted for Quisp. How could he lose? He was cute, he was smart, he had a propeller on his head, for crying out loud! In what would become a lifelong pattern, I was on the wrong end of the vote. Quisp was toast, relegated to the infinite cosmos of memory.
Proud, defiant, I never ate Quake. Golden Grahams became my favorite cereal (again, the name of the cereal tricking my mother into a belief in imaginary health benefits) until I was old enough to stop eating cereal altogether. I never liked milk, you see. I only wanted sweet cereals to flavor the milk so that I could drink it. Quake also eventually disappeared from supermarket shelves, another victim of free love and disco.
All these years later I am avenged. A Quisp cult has been slowly growing, aided and abbetted by the internet. By the turn of the century, Quisp was again being produced in limited quantities. Today, it's available nationwide, at least according to Quaker Oats. Quisp has his own website, and a very good one at that. If you can't find it at your local grocery store, you can order some from the site. Chalk another one up for the nerds.
Tuesday, July 8, 2008
Parting Words
I spent the long weekend reading another long Nixon book, J. Anthony Lukas' Nightmare: The Underside of the Nixon Years. I think I'm finally done with my little study of the Nixon administration, not because a book hasn't been published for each day he spent in the Oval Office, but because the facts are the facts, I've now studied them from all angles, and it's just time to move on. So, these will be my last words on Richard Nixon, or at least my last words until October 20, the 35th anniversary of the Saturday Night Massacre.
Through this book, I learned that not only was Nixon a little crazy, but his aides needed a good civics lesson. Halderman and Mitchell in particular seemed to lack an understanding of the line between use and abuse of power. They all just egged each other on. If Nixon hadn't been taping his conversations the whole thing would have stopped short of the Presidency; those tapes were the only evidence that he was aware of the break-in and cover-up. And if Nixon hadn't been worried about money, he wouldn't have been taping conversations. Apparently it was his intent to donate the tapes to the National Archive or a library somewhere in order to have several years worth of tax deductions.
Why have I been so fascinated with all this? As the 10-year anniversary of his death approaches, I've been thinking of my father. He was completely fascinated with and absorbed by Watergate. Not only did he insist I watch the Senate hearings, and that I not only watch but bring out my tape recorder and record for him Nixon's resignation the next year, but he also tried to convince me and my mother to picket the White House with "Impeach the President" signs when we went to DC to visit a family friend the summer of 1973. I was nine years old and the whole thing was not only meaningless but boring. Watergate was something that interrupted my morning television, nothing more.
He had always hated Nixon, and I think that he experienced the scandal as vindication, proof that he was right about that man and about Republicans in general. Reagan never got his goat the way Nixon did, so he was shockingly sanguine about Iran-Contra. In a way I'm sorry he missed out on the W administration, although I suspect the past eight years might have killed him if the heart disease hadn't gotten there first.
Politics was one of the few things my father and I could talk about. He was a mechanical engineer, and I had no interest in the workings of combustion engines or printing presses. He had no interest in modern American poetry or literary theory. By the time I was old enough to care about politics Watergate was a thing of the past. By learning more about it now I've felt closer to him, even as I realize that the memory of his voice and of his presence is moving farther and farther from my grasp. To care now about the events of 1973 is in a way to care about my childhood and to feel the presence of both my parents, glued to the black and white TV in the family room of their suburban house while dinner cooks.
Just before leaving the White House for the last time, Nixon addressed his family and supporters. "We think that when someone dear to us dies, we think that when we lose an election, we think that when we suffer a defeat, that all is ended," he said. "Not true. It is only a beginning, always."
Through this book, I learned that not only was Nixon a little crazy, but his aides needed a good civics lesson. Halderman and Mitchell in particular seemed to lack an understanding of the line between use and abuse of power. They all just egged each other on. If Nixon hadn't been taping his conversations the whole thing would have stopped short of the Presidency; those tapes were the only evidence that he was aware of the break-in and cover-up. And if Nixon hadn't been worried about money, he wouldn't have been taping conversations. Apparently it was his intent to donate the tapes to the National Archive or a library somewhere in order to have several years worth of tax deductions.
Why have I been so fascinated with all this? As the 10-year anniversary of his death approaches, I've been thinking of my father. He was completely fascinated with and absorbed by Watergate. Not only did he insist I watch the Senate hearings, and that I not only watch but bring out my tape recorder and record for him Nixon's resignation the next year, but he also tried to convince me and my mother to picket the White House with "Impeach the President" signs when we went to DC to visit a family friend the summer of 1973. I was nine years old and the whole thing was not only meaningless but boring. Watergate was something that interrupted my morning television, nothing more.
He had always hated Nixon, and I think that he experienced the scandal as vindication, proof that he was right about that man and about Republicans in general. Reagan never got his goat the way Nixon did, so he was shockingly sanguine about Iran-Contra. In a way I'm sorry he missed out on the W administration, although I suspect the past eight years might have killed him if the heart disease hadn't gotten there first.
Politics was one of the few things my father and I could talk about. He was a mechanical engineer, and I had no interest in the workings of combustion engines or printing presses. He had no interest in modern American poetry or literary theory. By the time I was old enough to care about politics Watergate was a thing of the past. By learning more about it now I've felt closer to him, even as I realize that the memory of his voice and of his presence is moving farther and farther from my grasp. To care now about the events of 1973 is in a way to care about my childhood and to feel the presence of both my parents, glued to the black and white TV in the family room of their suburban house while dinner cooks.
Just before leaving the White House for the last time, Nixon addressed his family and supporters. "We think that when someone dear to us dies, we think that when we lose an election, we think that when we suffer a defeat, that all is ended," he said. "Not true. It is only a beginning, always."
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Wonderful World
I've just spent the first part of the morning searching for images from 1974. Please don't ask why; I'm not even sure I understand my own obsessions. Thanks to all the kids and this newfangled Internety-thing, images from that period abound. One site in particular stands out, and if you haven't already discovered the glory that is the 1974 Weight Watchers Recipe Cards, follow the link to that site immediately. In 1974, weight loss was obviously accomplished by turning food into "food."
Thursday, February 28, 2008
Spring and All
You wouldn't know it from the snow on the ground or my heating bill, but spring is on its way. When I take the dog out first thing in the morning, I'm now greeted by the chirping of various birds rather than just geese, a sure sign that things are about to change. Thank god. I get tired of coats and sweaters and dark arriving before I've made dinner. I definitely get tired of the price of oil. By March, I'm generally tired of everything and in need of rejuvenation.
Last night I spent some time taking this notion of rejuvenation literally, which is to say that for no good reason I pulled out a book that I loved as a child and reread it for the first time in probably 30 years: Dandelion Wine, by Ray Bradbury. I loved this book when I was a preteen (or a tween, to use the 21st century term). What was that 11 year-old thinking?
This book is so sappy the pages morph into maple syrup as you turn them. For those of you who haven't read it, it's a memoir disguised as fiction, and tells the story of one young boy's summer in a mid-western small town at around the turn of the century. It features an entire chapter on the joys of new sneakers. Another chapter describes wet grass at night and running across lawns. Nothing much happens: summer begins, summer ends. Ultimately the text is about time's passage, not only the passing of this one summer, but the nostalgia of the author for the time of his childhood that is lost forever and can't be recaptured, not even in the purplest of prose.
I'm old enough now to well understand nostalgia, the yearning for the simple world of the past, and in particular for the safe world of childhood. But I was a child myself when I loved this book, and I recall loving it because it was elegiac (and no, I probably didn't know what "elegiac" meant at that age nor how to spell it, so don't get any ideas). What past did I feel was lost at such a young age?
It could be that Freud's right and we're born missing the womb, which is to say that we're born into a state of nostalgia. It's as likely that I was somewhat miserable during those early adolescent years, as we all are, and I longed for someone else's past, longed for a childhood that wasn't mine. I probably longed for any childhood other than my own, now that I think about it, because at that age we think no one knows or understands or shares our misery. Time tells us that it wasn't misery and that all we were feeling was the solipsism of the very young. Time tells us all the ways we were wrong about our selves and the world.
Which is why we so often want to be children again, and why we can't be. What we really want is to go back to a time before knowledge, a time before the fall. You can't be nostalgic for what you have, only for what is irretrievable. Grass can rejuvenate. So can tulips. Us? Not so much.
Last night I spent some time taking this notion of rejuvenation literally, which is to say that for no good reason I pulled out a book that I loved as a child and reread it for the first time in probably 30 years: Dandelion Wine, by Ray Bradbury. I loved this book when I was a preteen (or a tween, to use the 21st century term). What was that 11 year-old thinking?
This book is so sappy the pages morph into maple syrup as you turn them. For those of you who haven't read it, it's a memoir disguised as fiction, and tells the story of one young boy's summer in a mid-western small town at around the turn of the century. It features an entire chapter on the joys of new sneakers. Another chapter describes wet grass at night and running across lawns. Nothing much happens: summer begins, summer ends. Ultimately the text is about time's passage, not only the passing of this one summer, but the nostalgia of the author for the time of his childhood that is lost forever and can't be recaptured, not even in the purplest of prose.
I'm old enough now to well understand nostalgia, the yearning for the simple world of the past, and in particular for the safe world of childhood. But I was a child myself when I loved this book, and I recall loving it because it was elegiac (and no, I probably didn't know what "elegiac" meant at that age nor how to spell it, so don't get any ideas). What past did I feel was lost at such a young age?
It could be that Freud's right and we're born missing the womb, which is to say that we're born into a state of nostalgia. It's as likely that I was somewhat miserable during those early adolescent years, as we all are, and I longed for someone else's past, longed for a childhood that wasn't mine. I probably longed for any childhood other than my own, now that I think about it, because at that age we think no one knows or understands or shares our misery. Time tells us that it wasn't misery and that all we were feeling was the solipsism of the very young. Time tells us all the ways we were wrong about our selves and the world.
Which is why we so often want to be children again, and why we can't be. What we really want is to go back to a time before knowledge, a time before the fall. You can't be nostalgic for what you have, only for what is irretrievable. Grass can rejuvenate. So can tulips. Us? Not so much.
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Political Animals
I'm somewhat unreasonably excited that the beagle won Westminster. I currently have a Brittany, but back in the day I had two beagles, so I'm a fan. The fact that this guy beat out not one but two (count them, two) poodles makes the triumph even sweeter, because it's essentially a victory of the sweet and sloppy over the frou-frou and precious. All of this makes me think of my petless childhood, and a story about it.
I spent ten years of my life begging for a pet. I was permitted a goldfish once, which of course died within two days, having been won at a carnival and therefore having been bred for early death. Then I had a hamster who escaped from his cage and...that's actually another story that I'll tell another time. Finally, when I was 14, something or someone gave, and I was allowed to get a cat.
We went to a barn and I chose a kitten. I named him Martini, after my father's favorite drink (I didn't know it, but at the same time I also gave myself a porn name that rocks: Martini Marwood). Things proceeded apace, until my father's heart problems were discovered. In those days, one had to sit at home for a couple of months and rest before a triple bypass, so my father found himself alone all day with the cat.
My father had never had a pet, and he was a fairly anal guy. He found himself following Martini around all day, trying to prevent shedding on the furniture and other suburban disasters. He decided that the cat was bad for his heart, and had to go. In these situations, we always had a family vote. There were four of us, two parents and two kids, so in the event of a tie vote the decision always went to the kids. I didn't make them up, but those were the rules.
The question on the floor was, "Should Martini go?" I entered the caucus believing we were headed for a tie that would be decided in my favor; I knew I was a "no" and my father a "yes," and I knew that my mother didn't like pets and that my sister did. What I didn't know was that, behind closed doors, my father gave my sister $20 to vote his way. In a crushing 3-1 defeat, Martini was shipped off to my aunt's house.
When I complained of vote-fixing, my father said, "It's good you learn this now. This is the way democracy works. Never forget it."
As I watch another Presidential election unfold, I spend more and more time remembering this lesson.
I spent ten years of my life begging for a pet. I was permitted a goldfish once, which of course died within two days, having been won at a carnival and therefore having been bred for early death. Then I had a hamster who escaped from his cage and...that's actually another story that I'll tell another time. Finally, when I was 14, something or someone gave, and I was allowed to get a cat.
We went to a barn and I chose a kitten. I named him Martini, after my father's favorite drink (I didn't know it, but at the same time I also gave myself a porn name that rocks: Martini Marwood). Things proceeded apace, until my father's heart problems were discovered. In those days, one had to sit at home for a couple of months and rest before a triple bypass, so my father found himself alone all day with the cat.
My father had never had a pet, and he was a fairly anal guy. He found himself following Martini around all day, trying to prevent shedding on the furniture and other suburban disasters. He decided that the cat was bad for his heart, and had to go. In these situations, we always had a family vote. There were four of us, two parents and two kids, so in the event of a tie vote the decision always went to the kids. I didn't make them up, but those were the rules.
The question on the floor was, "Should Martini go?" I entered the caucus believing we were headed for a tie that would be decided in my favor; I knew I was a "no" and my father a "yes," and I knew that my mother didn't like pets and that my sister did. What I didn't know was that, behind closed doors, my father gave my sister $20 to vote his way. In a crushing 3-1 defeat, Martini was shipped off to my aunt's house.
When I complained of vote-fixing, my father said, "It's good you learn this now. This is the way democracy works. Never forget it."
As I watch another Presidential election unfold, I spend more and more time remembering this lesson.
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