Wisdom of the Day

“If I had it my way, we’d all be eatin’ milky ways and grape slushies… total harmony. That’s why I’ve come to save the galaxy… the whole galaxy!!!!!!”

-Optimistic and rather ambitious homeless man on the corner of Boylston and Arlington this morning
(Thank you, Mark, for sending this my way).

I would personally amend that to cherry-coke slushies, but the sentiment is the same...

Opposites Day?

Something seems to have gone seriously wrong in Washington in the past few days. Liberals sounding like hard-line conservatives, and (perhaps even more disturbingly) Republicans sounding like they’ve actually heard of concepts like compassion towards society’s less fortunate. When it comes to the hotly debated topic of immigration reform, they're all going a little bit nuts. Maybe it’s just the spring air, or maybe they’re all playing a big joke on us: Surprise! It’s Opposites Day.

To demonstrate, let’s play a little game of “Guess Who Said That?”

Your choices:
- Dubya, our beloved Commander in Chief, or
- Sen. Hillary Clinton (normally my undisputed pick for the ’08 Presidential Campaign, though she’ll eventually lose that status if she keeps acting like this….)

Ok, here goes (no cheating by clicking the links before you've made your guess!):

A) "One thing we cannot lose sight of is that we're talking about human beings, decent human beings, that need to be treated with respect."

B) “A wall [along the US-Mexican Border] in certain areas would be appropriate.”

C) “Massive deportation of the people here is unrealistic. It’s just not going to work.”

Ready for this? Statements A & C – the two statements with which I agree whole-heartedly – are from our very own President. Statement B, about the wall? That’d be Hillary “what the heck is she thinking?” Clinton.

A wall, Hillary? Seriously?

You know something crazy is going on in Washington when I actually find myself agreeing with Bush on something.

Sleeping with the Enemy?

The other day I was reading an article in Time about the making of United 93, the new 9-11 movie about the passengers who tried to take over their hijacked plane, eventually causing it to crash in the fields of Pennsylvania and probably saving the lives of thousands at the plane’s real target on Pennsylvania Ave. (Looks fascinating and inspiring, by the way).

I was hit hard by a couple of photos they ran of the presumed hijackers on the plane. (The article was showing how the movie’s producers tried to cast people with similar looks and backgrounds to the real-life hijackers and heroes).

They were so young.

I don’t know why, but up until now, I’ve sort of always assumed that all the hijackers looked like Zacarias Moussaoui or Ramzi Yousef…big, bearded, a deranged look in their eye, obvious outsiders. Scary, imposing. In other words, clearly monsters.

They weren’t. Okay, sure, some of them do seem to have a bit of a deranged look in their eyes (at least in the FBI posters), but most of them look incredibly normal. The type of people I might pass every day and never take much notice of. They wore khakis and talked on cell phones. Some of them were frankly quite attractive. I might have flirted with them at a bar. I might have joked with them in class.

I realize my initial assumption about appearances was a little naïve, a little misguided, and probably more than a little racist. (Let’s be honest here about our own hidden prejudices). I realize that there is no logical reason for me to think that a man that looks like Moussaoui or Yousef is any more likely to commit atrocities than a man who looks like I might find him at my local watering hole. I know you don’t have to look like a monster to be one. But I thought it anyway. Did you?

Take a look at these pictures for second.



Doesn’t he look like he could be a lot of fun to hang out with? A big joker with lots of friends?



Or this one? Doesn’t he look like the type of guy you’d find in some trendy Central Square bar? Getting his MBA at Harvard, about to become some corporate big shot?



This is the one that really got me. Those eyes have been burning into me for days. Can he possibly be older than 18? Don’t you want to hug him, for a just a second, and promise him that life really does get better? That 18 is really a pretty shitty age, and that nothing is as bad as it seems? I know I do.

I’m not trying to humanize these guys or suggest for a second that they were anything but the murderers and terrorists they clearly were.

But I can’t help for wonder, just for a moment – were these men anything more than scared little boys, caught up in a bit of religious fervor and a course of events way, way bigger than them, lured in by the promise of a seat in heaven and a thousand virgins? Social outcasts who never learned to make friends, sucked in by an ideology that would make them for once in their lives feel important?

And if we can’t count on the next batch of terrorists (or, for that matter, the next batch of Columbine imitators) to be scary or ugly, to have huge dark beards and wear turbans, to have a look in their eye that gives away their murderous intentions, then how do we recognize them? How do we reach them before it’s too late?

Blogs are the New Black

Blogging, apparently, has become the thing to do. Like, this week. Okay, so they’ve supposedly been big for years, but I’ve never really been all that trendy. Last week, I broke down (and broke my wallet) and bought an iPod. This week, I’m tackling the blog. Baby steps, folks. Baby steps.

But seriously - blogs, suddenly, are popping up out of the woodwork, poking their little heads up in every facet of my life. Not that I’m complaining – the more ways I can find to fill up the some of the more mind-numbing hours of my work day, the better. I’m starting to feel like I’ve been invited to join a secret society. Did everyone always have a blog and I didn’t know it? Am I only just paying attention now, or are they really the trend-of-the-month?

I noted to a friend the other day that I think blogs are going to be our generation’s way of connecting writers together.

Whenever I picture my absolutely-perfect-I-won-the-lottery-money-is-no-object-I-get-to-do-whatever-the-hell-I-want life, it always looks a little like Hemingway’s description of the Parisian expat life in A Moveable Feast. Writing all day in cafes, random, lazy conversations and high-brow gossiping with other high-minded intellectuals, plenty of coffee, even more wine, summer drives with Fitzgerald and wild parties with Gertrude Stein. Don’t get me wrong – I’m no Hemingway (my proclivity for multi-claused sentences and frequent parentheticals and interjections being only one of the many, many giveaways). That’s where the lottery-winning part comes in….ol’ Hem may have had to sweat the money (but oh the romance of the life of the poor artist), yet he also seems to have been able to make his rent off his writing. I’m not going to count on that one just yet.

But to get back to my point – and, I swear, there is one. What I’ve always wanted is to be part of a community of writers – to get to spend my days writing and talking about writing (or at least ideas to write about) with other writers and thinkers. Hemingway had his circle of expats – Fitzgerald, Pound, Stein, Joyce. Romantic-era writers like Keats and Shelley corresponded prolifically through letters. Kerouac, Ginsberg, Cassady and other Beats all did their mad beat thing San Francisco. And our generation, it seems, has blogs.

Maybe some day, enterprising young English PhD students searching in vain for a half-way original dissertation topic will try to find knowledge – or at least a thesis – in the blogosphere. Maybe the post-post-modernists will embrace blogging as the newest way to reconstruct meaning (deconstruction being oh so passé). Maybe undergrads looking to write biographical- interpretations of the great literary works of this era will look to blog posts instead of letters and memoirs to find understanding.

And maybe all the fellow bloggers that seem to be appearing in my life these days are my community. If so, let the wine and coffee flow.

May You Run and Not Grow Weary

May you run and not grow weary.
Walk…and not faint.
Isaiah 40:31

(Sign posted on a Copley Square church before the finish line of the Boston Marathon)

I'm not much of a sports fan. About the only thing that will get me to a baseball game is the promise of massive beers and peanuts delivered to me at my seat and getting to sing a slightly slurred "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" during the 7 th inning stretch. And I'm certainly not much of a runner – I generally ascribe to the view that anyone who runs for any reason beyond being chased by a wild boar or something is a little loopy. (Extending that argument to its logical conclusion, anyone that does it for 26.2 miles is certifiable).

All of that noted, however, I have to say – watching the Boston Marathon yesterday was one of the most enjoyable outings – sporting or otherwise – that I've had in awhile. (At least among the outings that didn't include heavy flirtation or heavy drinking). Thousands of Bostonians lining the street to cheer on thousands of virtual strangers from all over the world is quite the sight, especially in a city with a reputation for unfriendliness towards "outsiders" (read: non-lifelong Bostonians) . Handmade signs, free kisses to runners, kids handing out glasses of waters, runners in crazy costumes, runners for a cause – be it personal, political, charity, or something else altogether. Many runners had their names printed on their jersey or written on their arms, prompting the cheering fans, me among them, to urge them on by name. "Way to go, Dave!" "Keep it up, Suzy Q." "Alright, Mark!" Each time I got to cheer a runner on by name, I felt as though I – in some teeny, tiny, miniscule way – was helping them to achieve their goal of finishing. I felt like I was a part of their effort. Call me mushy and sentimental, but it felt really, really nice to be a part of a community, if only for one afternoon.

There are, certainly, many more noteworthy and important things a person can do beyond running a marathon. On paper, I find the accomplishments and daily toiling of social workers, teachers, firefighters, and the myriads of others who give selflessly of their time and energy to be a lot more inspiring than someone who strapped up their shoes and pounded the pavement for an afternoon. On paper. Yet to watch so many people accomplishing personal – and perhaps lifelong – goals, goals I know they trained months for, goals I know must have seemed, at some points in the race, unachievable…to watch that unfold before you for hours is to be inspired.

I saw men and women in their sixties and seventies run by me at the 24 mile mark, showing few signs of fatigue. (And many more in their twenties, thirties, and beyond showing many signs of fatigue, but pushing forward anyway.) I saw a mother & son team – the back of his shirt reading "She's my hero" and pointing to her. I saw the now-famous Team Hoyt, the father pushing the son in his wheelchair for 26.2 miles to finish their 25th – that's right, 25th – Boston Marathon.

None of this inspired me to want to run. No, definitely not. If anything, watching the expressions of pure pain and exhaustion on the faces of the thousands of runners I saw yesterday only reinforced my notion that running is not the pursuit for me. But it did teach me a thing or two about determination. About the will to accomplish a goal, trumping every other physical and mental urge to give up, to lie down, to rest.

Yep, this is a certifiably cheesy post. No doubt about it. But this is one cheesy writer you can count as a fan of the Boston Marathon.

Jama Masjid

Two bombs went off during the evening prayers in one of the largest mosques in Delhi last Friday. This is not, perhaps, the most cheerful way to start off a new blog, but it's an event I've been thinking about a lot in the past few days.

I visited the Jama Masjid on my second full day in India. Still jet-lagged and weary from my 54 hours in transit, dragged along by a hired tour guide who answered "Yes, Ma'am" to every single question I asked, and entirely overwhelmed by my surroundings, I was more intimidated and frustrated by my trip to the mosque than anything else. It's a beautiful old mosque, sure, I wouldn't put it down as a highlight of my trip. Truth be told, there is little love lost between the Jama Masjid and I.

The Jama Masjid is located in the midst of a bustling, crowded marketplace in Old Delhi, the Muslim Quarter of the city. Close to the famous Red Fort, it is often added to tourist trips to the area as a prime example of Mughal-era mosques. I had already visited the Red Fort that day, and I was under the impression that my driver and tour guide was taking me back to the car. Instead, as we approached the parking lot, our cycle-rickshaw turned off in the opposite direction, straight into the teeming masses of people streaming through the market place streets, all seemingly intent on staring at me, shouting at me, and, of course, trying to sell something to me. Confused and on my guard - having been warned that if I gave one of these tour guides an inch he would have me exchanging all my money for a bag of worthless 'gems' before I could say namaste - I began to semi-politely question where we were headed. Having never heard of the Jama Masjid, I wasn't able to make much sense of his reply. I made certain he knew I wasn't interested in seeing any of his friend's carpet shops, and reluctantly decided to sit back for the ride and see where we were headed.

We stopped in front of the mosque - a large, imposing structure with a giant staircase leading up to the top - and I surmised that this was our destination. My tourguide led me to the top, where I was informed by the random Indian at the door that, while entrance to the mosque was free, it would cost me 200 rupees (approximately $5, the same price as a night's stay in a decent hostel) to bring my camera inside. I was a bit skeptical and put up a fight - the tourbook mentioned nothing of a 'camera fee,' and the man collecting the 'fee' wasn't exactly official-looking. My tourguide and the six men who were suddenly crowded around me (whenever there is a verbal altercation in India, you can be sure that at least five random men will join in -- especially when there's a white female involved!) all assured me that this was legit, and that if I didn't want to pay the fee, I could certainly leave my nice, fancy camera in the 'camera holding area' and go in without it.

Right.

After much haggling and arguing, the men admitted they were just trying to scam me, and let me in. Okay, right, maybe not. Actually, I complained timidly for a few minutes and finally just forked over the 200 rupees(which I can assure you is an astronomical price; it would be like paying $20 to get to see Boston's Trinity Church) sure I was being scammed but seeing no way of getting around it. It was only my second day in India; I was still getting my sea legs, after all.

I entered the mosque, a little disgruntled and a little grumpy. It was, as I've said, beautiful, with a wide open courtyard, intricate red detailing throughout, and large open windows that gave me a fantastic view over the insanities of the market place below. I had little appreciation for any of it, however, because a few minutes after I entered, I realized my watch was missing. Not only had they scammed me for 200 rupees, they had made off with my watch as well. (It's a classic trick, of course: get me distracted, crowd around me, and then slip off my watch while I'm not paying attention.)

My visit to the Jama Masjid was, as I've said, not a highlight of my trip. Yet all the same, it rips my heart out to hear of these bombings (a month or so ago, a series of bombs went off in Varanasi; last October in Delhi marketplaces) occurring in places I had walked, in a country I've come to think of as a second home. It's like they blew off bombs in my own backyard. I can think of nothing but the people I came to know -- most incredibly kind and generous, funny, open, friendly; some scheming and thieving, but clever bastards, none the less -- and wonder if they are safe. Yes, even the ones that made off with my watch.

When terrorism came to America in the form of planes crashing into the World Trade Center, it suddenly woke us all up. We called neighbors who had cousins who were visiting New York and maybe could have been in Manhattan at the time; we called friends who had family who lived somewhere on Long Island. We suddenly were all inter-connected. We suddenly were all part of a greater community. Even if we were Southern rednecks or Mid-Western soccer moms in our normal lives, we were all New Yorkers that day.

When the bombs go off in Baghdad (as they seem to do daily) or Tel Aviv (as they did today and likely will again some tomorrow hence), we give it barely a passing thought. Unless we happen to know someone visiting Israel that week, or have a family member in the service, these daily murders, these acts of hate, don't affect our day to day life in the slightest.

I don't know how we re-create the sense of global community we had after 9/11 after every bombing...or, if we even should. Most people and most governments aren't motivated to action until we are personally affected. I know I'm not. Yet short of sending every person to visit every country in the world, I don't know how we find that motivation for action.

I don't know how to make myself feel for the victims in Iraq or Israel or Uzbekistan or Darfur or wherever the latest crisis is as much as I felt for the victims of 9/11...or the victims in Delhi and Varanasi. When the bombs went off at the Jama Masjid on Friday, I was, for a moment, an Indian. I don't know how to make myself, for a moment, Israeli. I worry that until I learn - until we all learn - bombings like these are not going to end.

Shoe Shopping

I like to try on ideas the way I try on shoes. This one's sexy, but could I walk in it for miles? When and where will the blisters develop? This one's practical and sturdy, sure -- but is it really my style? This one is as comfortable as my favorite pair of sneakers. It's the easiest thing to throw on when I'm in a hurry...but that doesn't mean it's always the most appropriate for the occasion. I like to play with ideas, break them in, see where they take me. I can't tell how they'll fit until I've worn them in for awhile.

That's pretty much what this is blog is about. Writing down the ideas constantly running through my head, getting them down on paper, seeing what they mean and where they lead. No idea, in my mind, is too big or too small, too banal or too sacrosanct, to get a little critical examination. No cow too sacred to be milked. I like to question assumptions and pick apart trains of -- often faulty -- logic. Speak truth to power, or at least ask it a few pointed questions.

Lately I've been thinking a lot about immigration, gender roles in dating, Massachusetts' new health care plan, our definitions of 'sanity' and 'normal', the uses and abuses of casual sex, the isolating effects of iPods and cellphones, and whether stability is a good thing or a bad thing. I imagine those will all work themselves into future blog posts in one way or another.

I also like to write, and I like the idea of using the blog to get a little exercise. My dirty little secret: regardless of what it may say on my resume or paycheck, I really think of myself as a writer. I obsess over rhythm, pacing, word choice, flow; I'm incredibly critical when it comes to grammar. I can be more passionate about the process of writing than subject matter or the final product.

I've never had much luck with fiction, though, and while I spend most of my working life churning out bullshit in all its various forms-- intriguing, well-crafted, highly effective bullshit, to be sure, but bullshit none the less -- it isn't the sort of writing that really speaks to my soul. The market for the modern persuasive or contemplative essay may be limited at best these days, but luckily for me, Blogger seems to give out space for these new-fangled blog-things for free.

Writing is my own personal way of performing -- look at the cool tricks I can do with semi-colons! -- and I feel the constant need for the audience, or at least the illusion of one. Every journal I've ever tried to keep has failed miserably, yet I love typing long, prolific emails. Even if no one reads what I write, the fact that someone might is enough to get my fingers moving on the keyboard. Let's see if it works this time.