Subtext

Good news: Ion network is showing the Wonder Years.

Comment: in tonight's episode, Paul also has a love interest, and it is Carla, who has glasses, and is like the girl version of Paul. It occurred to me that in Rudy, the nerdy tutor also ends up with a nerdy woman with glasses. Two of my favorite productions, and both promoting some dating class system. Stay within your own. What a load of hokum.

When I Grow Up

This week I moved into my first condo. At work, I’m somebody’s boss. I have chronic lower back pain and when I’m sitting down my belly droops slightly over my belt. I pay my own bills. When I was young and talked about growing up, I’m sure I had no idea what I was talking about. Growing up was a way to talk about the time when I would no longer be the same. When I had moved out of the phase I was in. I may have talked about “when I grow up” but rarely about “when I’m old.” I’ve moved out of whatever phase that was, but I feel old much more than I feel grown up. Since I’ve lost youth, I suppose I must BE grown up, but I don’t think I’m A grown-up. This topic doesn’t seem to be working out well. Maybe I’ll try the Jewish theme and see if that gets me anywhere.
The most interesting thing about the previous post is that the author places himself on the side of the Jews. No matter how detached from any certain identity we might be, an attack on that piece really brings it back. Especially when it’s convenient and full of comic value. I haven’t really been Jewish for years, but if someone told me that my piece of trash plastic bag yarmulke fell off, well, fuck him and the nazi horse he rode in on. Nope, this one’s not working either. Let’s try another.
I need a hobby. I believe that both of my colleagues on this highly rated blog have one or more things that really drive them, that consume their free time and are fulfilling and productive. I don’t have that. What must it feel like to have something like that?
This is so sad, because I've had so many fantastic thoughts this last week, and now I'm just drizzling.

The Man Who Knew No Kafka

Earlier this week, as I stood on a street corner in Kew Gardens, a man said to me: "Hey, I think your yarmulke blew away." He pointed at a black plastic bag--a piece of trash.

It took me a full minute to accept what he'd said. Then, after imagining all the insults I could have hurled at him, I consoled myself by pitying the man. Prejudice hurts the prejudiced, I thought. Think of all he's missing out on. Think how sad it is that this man takes no pleasure from Kafka.

Then I thought, is there any pleasure in Kafka? He's one of my favorite authors--I've been reading him for over a decade and continue to value his insights and parables--but does he make me happy? I thought: Liking Kafka may require certain pathologies. Perhaps the anti-Semites are better off.

In pity, doubt, and confusion, my brain spun and half-strangled itself. A typically Jewish phenomenon, according to certain stereotypes. It was almost enough to make me tear this plastic bag off my head.

Whaling and Whining

I was talking to The Whale the other day, and there was a suggestion that we should choose a theme and try to each address that theme, to give the blog a more coherent feel. I don't have anything to say about Harry Potter, Hitler, or scanners, so perhaps I will start a new theme, and see how that goes.

We are each in our late 20s, or in my case, 30. Despite being the oldest of the bunch, I still find myself regularly thinking about my life in terms of how things will be "when I grow up." I don't yet feel fully an adult, and I think I probably won't until I either have a tenure track job (and hence know the city where I will be living for much of my adult life) or I decide to give up on academia and manage to find some other job that feels "serious" to me.

What about you two? Do you feel grown up? If not, is there something that you expect will make you feel that way?

Blog as Prayer

Perhaps God can read blogs, not minds. Maybe karma is now working the blog circuit. Just a month after I lamented the speed of scanning here, the world brought to my attention the answer. A coworker's coworker showed her, who showed me, a copy machine we have at the office that is connected to our hard drive system, so you can scan something straight from the copier into a special folder on my computer. It takes only as long as it would take to run the pages through the copier. Amazing. My life is so much improved now. I have to think of some other wishes to blog about, because I know the world is listening and yearning to fulfill them. Do I feel bad about wishing for scanning success in a blog, when there is war and poverty and hunger that needs blogging about? Yes, I do. How do I deal with that guilt? I don't. Just for the kibbitz, man.

The Big Bad

There comes a time in every man's life when he must despair of ever learning anything new about Adolf Hitler.

I thought I had reached that point a few years ago, but just this week I unearthed this gem: "[H]e liked whistling [...], especially the Walt Disney song 'Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf.' "

One of Hitler's nicknames for himself was Wolf--coincidence?

A powerful reminder that one's education is always a work-in-progress.

Laurie Berkner: The Devil Inside

"She's like the Beatles," my friend E. says. "Only better."

He's joking, of course, but he's also confessing: Laurie Berkner is the one "children's musician" he enjoys even when his two-year-old son is not around. Other parents I've spoken to have expressed similar sentiments; among fertile young Americans, Berkner seems to be a widespread guilty pleasure.

Having listened carefully and repeatedly to her albums over the last couple weeks myself (may my fiancee forgive me), I've come to understand both the parents' love of Berkner, and the discomfort that makes them joke about her.

On the one hand, she sings beautifully, her songs are catchy, and her lyrics often have a special meaning for adults. ("Doodlebugs," for example, is in part a shout-out to Seinfeld.)

On the other, she's singing about dinosaurs--she sings the alphabet song--can grownups listen to this stuff and maintain their dignity?

A possible solution to this conundrum struck me when I discovered, through the song "Telephone," that while Berkner may have a song in her tummy, she also has demons in her heart. Among her recurring themes are death, shame, alienation, and above all loneliness; and Berkner's countless imaginary/animal friends can't always dull the pain.

One song is pointedly titled "I Had a Friend": while two of these friends are obviously dead (Janis, Jimi), a third "dances alone" and the last "waves goodbye." "What Falls in the Fall" is a Kindertotenlied for the twenty-first century (although it was written in the twentieth). In "I'm a Little Snowflake" Berkner quietly "melt[s] away," and in "I'm Going to Catch You" death drives her from gluttony to hypochondria to a whole week's worth of failed escapes.

Then there's "Telephone," which I've already mentioned. She calls someone (a friend? an ex-husband? a dead relative?), but no one answers. She visits, but "nobody's there." The person shows up only in her dream, and here comes the tragic twist: instantly Berkner can't wait to be rid of this person. "Telephone" is an authentic loner's lament; when a connection with another person is finally established, it proves to be illusory or dissatisfying.

For me her saddest song is "Magic Box." Here she purports to celebrate her imagination as an effective defense against the wicked world, but the affirmation comes off as obviously, and perhaps deliberately, unconvincing. She declares "I can fly higher than everything," but I always hear "I can't fly higher than everything": singing one line but conveying its opposite, Berkner manages a uniquely Jewish expression of sadness.

Hailing her now as the Isaac Babel of children's songs, I can wear my Laurie Berkner T-shirt with my manhood intact.

(My friend S. suggested that "Pig on Her Head" reveals a bipolar personality, or perhaps a severe case of seasonal affective disorder [SAD]; I was sorry to learn that S. was not being serious.)

A Whale of a Home...

Mazel Tov to the Whale on his purchase. As a piece of advice, my wife, who prefers to be called "yoga pants," suggested that you never allow Mr. Howl and cream cheeze into the same room if you are concerned with preventing major structural damage.

I own my home

Yesterday I closed on my first home purchase. After several months navigating the twists and gullies of the buying process- warming to the idea of using all my money, and of commiting myself to a hefty monthly payment for the next thirty years, dealing with home repairs myself, dealing with realtors, having nightmares about what a good price is, or a good interest rate, or a good location, prioritizing needs (washer/dryer) and wants (central air) - in a stroke of good fortune I found everything I was looking for right where I was looking for it at the highest price I could afford, and my offer was accepted and yesterday I was handed the keys.
Clearly there has been time for the idea to sink in and for the excitement to build, but the feeling I had when it was finally mine surprised me. I've always moved rather unemotionally from one place to another. When I left the group house I lived in for four years, I was not sad at all, and never think back on that house with any particular emotion. I don't see to get attached in that way.
But now I own something that will be mine for as long as I want it. Any painting I do, any hooks I install, any improvements or repairs or additions I make, are totally up to me. I can make those decisions without wondering how it affects my security deposit or what will happen when I move. Of course there are plenty of potential worries that come with the purchase as well.
Nonetheless, the good feeling that came over me was a pleasant surprise.
I'll be packing up and moving over the next several weeks, and then buying furniture and decorating. And then all will be welcome to visit me in my own home.

More Matzah Please

Not the greatest jibjab, but a few nice lines, some pleasant moshing hassids, and the most matzah references to date.
http://www.jibjab.com/originals/originals/jibjab/movieid/71

Hills like lambs

Finally, some common ground. Pesach. The pascal lamb. Slaying of the first born. My favorite things about passover:

1. You don't have to go to services. It's sort of a compromise, since you can't eat until you do the seder, but you don't have to sit through the amidah, so it's a fair trade.

2. The food is fantastic. Hillel did make a mean sandwich. Gefilte are the best fish on earth. Matzah balls are so good delis serve them all year. And the rest of the week you can rock the fried matzah, and the matzah meal pancakes. Not that I keep passover.

3. Matzah matzah that's our cry, matzah matzah til we die.

4. Tonight we dip twice, when usually we don't dip at all.

5. It really shows the fortitude and survival instinct of our people. There's nothing that will stop us when we put our minds to something, stick together, and never give up. It's so inspiring. Just remember not to try it without having on your side an omniscient being who doesn't mind plaguing your enemies and producing miracles.

The best things about seders

As I prepare to attend a seder at Howl's brother's house (and as Howl may prepare to eat a pork-fried-pork sandwich on a Kaiser roll), I have prepared a list of my favorite aspects of passover:

1. Rabbi Hillel's sandwich

2. Chrain+Gefilte (pronounced "Gail-fight")

3. I like how people have their annual jokes that they save for the seder.

4. Matza's dramatic introduction into the Seder:
"This is the bread of affliction, which our ancestors ate in the land of Egypt.
Let all who are hungry come and eat.
Let all who are in need, come and celebrate Passover.
Today, we are here. Next year, in the land of Israel.
Today, we are slaves. Next year, we will be free."

5. The fantastic conclusion of the whole thing: "Next year in Jerusalem! Next year may all be free!"

back with Harry (part 3)

As my most loyal and attentive readers have already figured out, one of my goals in following Rowling's development as a writer is to raise broader questions about art, to nibble at the great "messy topics" that Sweatshirt, the Whale, and I enjoy discussing so much. (Usually these discussions go on past midnight; usually they occur while we munch through boxes of Men's Pocky.)

The question of the week is this: how does an artist outgrow mere entertainment, and learn to awaken profound feelings in her audience?

The Prisoner of Azkaban is the first emotionally resonant book in the Harry Potter series; it's the leap Woody Allen made from Love and Death to Annie Hall--how did Rowling accomplish it?

Necessary preconditions include a compelling plot (albeit far squeakier than that of The Chamber of Secrets), a likable cast of characters, healthy doses of sarcasm and slapstick, consistently dazzling wizardry, and then that same "unfailingly accessible" prose I commented on in my previous post. These qualities alone would have made for a worthy if boilerplate addition to the series; they don't create the book's emotional resonance, but they do facilitate it.

To the point, the emotional power of The Prisoner of Azkaban flows not from tricks or mysteries, but from the book's creative but recognizable portrait of grief.

From the second chapter, in which Harry inflates Aunt Marge after she insults his dead parents, to the final pages, when Harry shoots from his wand an animal representing his lost father, The Prisoner of Azkaban chronicles Harry's first serious attempt to understand and live with the death of his parents. Across the book a reader can follow Harry through all of Kübler-Ross's stages of grief: the scene with Aunt Marge shows anger, the dementors are of course depression, Harry's in denial when he believes that he's seen his father, bargaining is partly the reason Harry lets Peter Pettigrew live, and acceptance finally comes when Harry recognizes his Patronus as a stag and, the next day, when Dumbledore explains: "You father is alive in you... [I]n a way, you did see your father last night. ... You found him inside yourself."

This acceptance will prove fleeting, sadly, and in The Prisoner of Azkaban Rowling is already dropping hints that Harry's progression will not be wholly progressive. But to anyone who has mourned, the fragility of Harry's recovery cannot come as a shock. Kübler-Ross warns us that "stages" of grief are, in fact, indistinct and overlapping; most perniciously, as I have had to learn myself, they tend to recur long after you're supposed to have moved on.