Quodlibets

Breaking the Silence

But, not to say much.  I got nothing.  Including no job.  Not that I'm complaining, no.  I have made this bed, and I will resolutely sleep in it.

I'm back at square one.  Not the worst place to be.

Love Affair with the Beatles, Part 835

I'm reading another new Beatles book (Meet the Beatles, by Steven D. Stark), and I can't help but be overwhelmed by the number of new Beatles books.  There are at least two more on my wishlist, although some of those are about John.  This being, well, a big year for Lennonites; John's what-would-have-been 65th birthday was on Saturday (I'm almost 100% sure; recently, for sure, because a local radio station did an all-day Beatles/John fest in honor of it, and I think that was on Saturday), and of course, on December 8th, it's the 25th anniversary of his death.  Regardless, I can't get enough of the literature, which I'm sure you know, if you've been reading the blog for a long time.  If you know me IRL, you've maybe had to put up with it in person.  Almost worse, if you ask me.

Anyway, this new book seeks to explore the Beatles culturally.  The author isn't looking for who said what, and when.  He's not really exploring in depth how they formed, or their music.  Stark thinks that part of the Beatles appeal is contained in the signals they sent to young people; for instance, he thinks that women liked the Beatles so much because Beatlemania was the first time many young women tasted freedom.  He thinks that the women's lib movement was helped along by these young men.  He talks a lot (A LOT) about their appearance, and in some cases, he's clearly right.  The Beatles 'do was a big deal--long hair on men just wasn't okay--and in some ways, it may have contributed to the idea that boys and girls could be less rigidly stuck in their gender roles.  I don't know enough about homosexuality in England/America before, say, 1980, to know if the Beatles somehow influenced that community.  There is something to be said for the argument that in some ways, the Beatles were shaped by a gay aesthetic.  Brian Epstein, their manager, was gay, and I can't believe that he didn't know he was putting "the boys" into clothing that, well, looked more feminine than masculine.  If credible sources are to be believed, he was in love with John, and his adoration certainly shaped the way he dealt with all of the men. 

Anyway, it's all very interesting, but when I think of my mom and dad, 10 and 11 years old in 1964, I can't imagine that they loved the Beatles at first because they knocked down gender barriers, or because they were the harbingers of a new time.  Not a first, anyway.  See, it's hard to separate what the impact of their music was vs. the impact of their appearance.  It's hard for me to know if my mom liked the Beatles because they were so magically different in appearance and attitude, or if she just really liked the music.  Though, I can guess that it'd be even harder to separate the two issues in reference to my dad, who has always liked good music, but at 11 years old had certainly never seen anything like the Beatles. 

I simply can't imagine.  I can't imagine turning on Ed Sullivan and seeing these creatures, these long-haired boys in funny suits, playing rock music (and one ballad....).  The Beatles aren't revolutionary anymore, and it's hard for me to put the bands I like in cultural contexts.  There is nothing like the Beatles now.  Nothing like them exists and nothing like them ever will again.  I really do believe that.  The doors that began to slowly open with the advent of the Beatles are open now.  I've been able to walk through them the whole of my life.  All that screaming, all that Beatlemania, I don't think that I'll ever experience anything like it.  The exhilaration of the freedom, well, I have that.  I'm more free than my mother ever was, just because of the times we grew up in. 

If the Beatles helped bring that about, okay.  I understand their importance. 

For me, it's the harmonies.  I'm a sucker for the harmonies.

My scattered thoughts about "Goodnight Nobody"

So, I finished Goodnight Nobody by Jennifer Weiner.  I'm not sure quite what I think of it.  On one hand, it kept me reading, and I really enjoyed it.  On the other, I can't shake the feeling that it wasn't quite as good as I expected, or even as it should be.  I have to give the author credit for having a go at mystery; I can't imagine it's easy, as a genre, to write.  I certainly don't mind the fact that she didn't make this the straight chick/mommy lit she'd been writing before.  (Not like I begrudge other authors shifts in genre; I hated when Julie Garwood stopped writing the Scottish historicals and moved to suspense-romance, likewise with many, many other romance authors.  It seems the shift most often made is from historical to suspense.  From my favorite romance sub-genre to my least favorite.  Is it any wonder they're losing me?)  I like cozy mysteries a bit, and I would say that's what this was. 

And yet.  Somehow, the book didn't work for me.  In general, I don't love mommy lit, because it's obviously not speaking to me at all; given my abhorance of children, I can't imagine why it should be surprising that I don't particularly love reading about them.  I don't mind if the main character is a mommy, but I don't like when the  mommy part of her becomes the main focus of the book.  If that makes sense.  Anyway, Weiner's book was a lot about mommy angst, and trading career for children, and that just doesn't do it for me.  (At this point, S would say, "What do you want it to do, wash your clothes?)  I just had a hard time caring about the main character.  I wanted to slap her and force her to move back to New York--and get rid of her uncaring, assholish husband.  It seemed so evident that she didn't love him.  You know what else?  The flashbacks didn't really work for me.  The attraction between Kate (the protagonist) and Evan McKenna (her unrequited lust/love object from her life before) didn't work for me.  Evan's superficial attraction to a mean, vindictive, cheating model was never explained--I didn't understand it then, and later, when he reappeared, I didn't understand how he could eventually marry the model (who WAS cheating on him) and then simply say to Kate, "Oh, the marriage didn't work."

And Kate was okay with that!  I don't know.  I guess the truth is, the book didn't work for me, not at all.  I loved the first three, I really did.  Even the one before this, which was definitely mommy lit, I liked.  It was just a good book.  The point is, if it's well-written, I'll probably enjoy it.  I know Weiner is really proud of this book (gleaned by reading her blog) and I know she worked really hard at it.  I just can't like it.  It just wasn't good enough. 

A sidenote

There is something unquantifiably different about caffeine-free Diet Coke.  And not in a good way.  You gotta do what you gotta do, though.

Little Things

Last night, I found out what it was like to live like a prisoner in your own mind.  If that makes sense.  I started getting saws (vision obstructions) around 11:45.  I assumed it was a migraine, so I took some advils.  Some time later (not sure when), I stopped being able to express myself coherently.  I couldn't make a sentence come out of my mouth; I also couldn't remember words.  I wanted to tell S that "gobbledygook" was coming out of my mouth, but I could NOT remember that word.  I knew it started with a "g" and I think I even attempted to say it, at one point, but it wasn't right, and I knew it.  It was so frustrating to not be able to make myself understood--to know that what I wanted to say was within my reach but oddly removed from me.  I think it scared S; I know it scared me.  (I was also experiencing numbness in my right hand.)

It's surreal, to be stuck in your head, knowing what you want to say but not being able to pull up the word.  It's horrifying, in so many ways.  I can't imagine if I'd have been stuck in that place forever.  It must be spirit-crushing.  I like words so much, and not being able to use them correctly was killing me.  It was so strange; it ended quickly, though.  Five, maybe ten minutes and it was over.  I remembered "gobbledygook" and said it.  The numbness went away.  The headache was beat back by advil.  I woke up this morning and was fine, if a little nervous about if I could speak correctly.  I thought I might have to plan out everything that I was going to say, just in case I couldn't remember how to do it.  It was fine though, and I'm fine today.  Minor headache pain, like the bounceback I normally get after a migraine.  No real problems speaking or thinking.  Or singing, as I like to do in the car.  Or reading, even.

I'm fine.  It's a relief.  I talked to a doctor-friend, and he thinks it's a different type of migraine.  I have to cut back on caffeine (so long, regular diet coke) and red wine (no problem), as well as processed meat.  I should try to de-stress, since stress is a major cause of migraines.  I'm pretty sure that my recent work kerfluffle probably contributed to the episode last night.  Anyway, I just had the CT scan a month or two ago, and if I hadn't, the doctor would have advised me to get one.  But he thinks that as long as I've been looked at recently, it can be 99.9% explained by a migraine.

It was just.....scary.  But thank god. 

Julie et Julia

I just finished the slobbered-all-over debut book by Julie Powell.  If you don't know who she is and what she wrote, here is a two-sentence explanation:  Cooked 500-some recipes from Julia Child's first cookbook in a year.  Kept a blog about it.

And the book's about that interesting, too.  I was so unimpressed.  I'm not sure what I expected, but it was more than this, especially considering the amount of praise this woman is getting everywhere.  I've seen this book recommended by almost every major magazine I read, so I was happily looking forward to it.  And I loooove food, so the topic captured my heart instantly. 

I wasn't prepared to have such a tepid response to the book.  I kind of hate the author, for ruining what should have been such a good book.  I'm trying to think of how to put my objections into words.  First of all, I feel as if I hardly know the author, after reading an entire book about, well, her.  Second of all, if she was trying to make this a food memoir, or a book about food with lessons about life, she's done a terrible job of it.  I don't know her friends, I don't know her husband and I have no clue who her family is.  Mostly, I just know about how INSANE the Julie/Julia project made this woman, who I barely understand. 

Topics such as divorce, adultery and intimacy were mentioned, but never elaborated on.  The author repeatedly talks about the fact that her and husband haven't had sex in ages, but the resolution to this situation is explained away in what felt like two sentences.  One of the author's good friends obtains a divorce during the period described, and while the author has trouble grappling with the issues of the marriage breaking, and talks about that in great detail, later in the book the character's new relationship is mentioned with nary an explanation of how the author got to be so accepting, considering her earlier thoughts about the situation.

Frankly, the author comes off as a very self-centered person.  With a drinking problem, and a cleaning problem.  Every time the apartment/loft is described, it's described as squalor.  Cat litter in the bed.  Grease spattering the kitchen walls.  Butter smeared on the refrigerator.  When the author and her husband find maggots in the tray underneath their dish-drying tray, they're surprised!  I pretty much imagined trash on the floor--at one point she says the dirty dishes are piled in the sink and spilling onto the floor, there are so many--and rotting food under chairs and on tables.  This is supposed to be charming?  I think I'd be afraid to eat any food at her house.  And the drinking.  Every single time something goes wrong, or the author is stressed out, she has a drink.  A strong drink.  A vodka gimlet, to be exact.  I'm not saying it's wrong to drown your sorrows every once in a while, but every night?  All the time?  It's too much.

And I still don't understand her relationship to cooking, after the end of the book, save that it is frustrating to her that things don't go perfectly all the time.  I never, ever felt like she actually loved food; her love of food never came through in this book, which is sad.  I read a lot about food, and this would have to be one book that failed.  In trying to accomplish so much in such a short book, the author in truth accomplished nothing.  (In contrast to Ruth Reichl's three excellent books about food, Jeffery Steingarten's fantastic books, and myriad other books that tell a life story, through food.) 

Grrr.  This is starting to piss me off.  What a disappointment.

I'm afraid, so you should be too

I refuse to be scared into thinking that the Rove business, the Katrina fuck-up, the war in Iraq and any number of other questionable judgements made by this administration are not so bad.

See, the way I figure it, these people are fundamentally fearful people.  They're scared of anything that they don't understand, and frankly, that's a lot.  They're also afraid of anyone that doesn't agree with them, which makes it pretty hard to be the leader of a country where disagreement is a right.  I think that when things come to head (in a my-primary-advisor-"turdblossom"-did-something-very-illegal-and-incredibly-low sort of a way) these people are so AFRAID of losing power/money and yes, approval, that all they know how to do is scare us into submission.

It better not fucking work this time.  There hasn't been ONE major terrorism alert since just before that last election (hmmmm, interesting) and now when things are shitty and getting shittier, BLAM!  Terrorism alert.  Like Keith Olbermann said last night, is it really just a coincidence?  I think not.

I hate to say it, but Bush's administration is quickly becoming the Administration that cried "Terrorism" hoping to get what they want.  That's gonna be a problem, if there is, someday, a real threat.

Friday Random Ten (Free as a bird edition)

1. Tomorrow Never Knows -- The Beatles
2. Paperback Writer -- The Beatles
3. All Along the Watchtower (Live in Chicago) -- Dave Matthews Band
4. Central Reservation -- Beth Orton
5. Horsey -- Hem
6. This Is How It Goes -- Aimee Mann
7. Grey Blue Eyes -- Dave Matthews
8. Leif Erikson -- Interpol
9. Ants Marching (Live at Folsom Field) -- Dave Matthews Band
10. The Apologist -- REM

Thus, the hazards of a youthful indiscretion with the Dave Matthews Band are exposed.  I swear, my iPod is mean.  I listen to the damn thing on shuffle all the damn time, and it never behaves in this manner.  I'm telling you, the thing is snickering right now, knowing that it pulled out six songs by two bands. 

Boy, I look like a loser based on this random ten.

What I didn't anticipate

So, I went with my gut.  I went into (ex) work today and told my (ex) boss that it just wasn't working for me.  I don't have a back-up plan, I don't have another job, but I do have my sweet, sweet freedom from hysterical unhappiness.  I thought I might cry from nervousness and fear.  I thought that I couldn't possibly do this without having a panic attack. 

What I did not anticipate was that my (ex) boss would cry.  I wasn't mean, I swear!  I basically said, "It's not you, it's me."  Which is basically true.  I used two or three different analogies--puzzles, for one--and tried to explain instinct and gut feeling, and explain that it just wasn't going to feel right, no matter what.  I'm not sure exactly how it happened, but one second I was explaining my discomfort with the whole thing--"I don't want to waste your time and money..."--and the next I was apparently being convinced to stay.  Except that pretty much nothing could convince me to stay.  I think I kept saying the same things:  "It doesn't fit."  "I don't feel right."  "I'm uncomfortable working here." besides some deviations about how people hate change and I'm not prepared to work so closely with children.  (The library wanted to stick me ["only very occasionally, I promise you"] in a room with 15-20 kids playing with computers and DDR.  Hello?  I signed on for adult reference.)

I apologized profusely.  Extensively.  And yet.  This woman's eyes started getting red and teary, and I felt like I had to make her feel better about things so I started HEAPING praise on the library.  ("Your collection is fantastic."  "You're doing a great job changing things for the better."  "You're doing a great job getting the kids in the library.")  It's been pointed out to me that this sounds like a break-up; it's not you, it's me, and so on.  Maybe not far from the truth.  Regardless, I felt awful about doing this, while SO relieved on the inside. 

I just didn't anticipate such a response.  It was two days; how could anyone be that attached to an employee after two days? 

So.  Yeah.  I'm relieved, if a little nervous about the future.  It'll work out, though, because it has to.  This is better, I'm sure of it.

Photo Meme (just for fun)

Via Frog. 

Image Google the town you were born in:

The town you live in now:

Your name:

Your grandmother's name:

Your favorite food:

Your favorite drink:

Your favorite song:

Your favorite smell: