As we end February, two fairly recent passings noted, owing to brief, tenuous connections:
*John Fahey: When he played at Buffalo State, I was fortunate enough to co-host the college radio station's broadcast of the event. I say "fortunate," even though I had to scour the student union beforehand looking for him until I found him curled up in a doorway, playing away. Even though he began our intermission interview by declaring, in response to my dutiful if obvious question about the West Coast folk scene, that "there ain't no folk scene out there, man, everyone just kinda died." And then vanished for a good half-an-hour. But when he was up there spinning tunes off six metal strings, he was superb.
*The Continental Basketball Association: For two years, Worcester (Mass.) was home to a CBA franchise called the Bay State Bombardiers, and those two years coincided with my stint at the Blackstone Valley Tribune in nearby Whitinsville. I finagled the appropriate permissions and, over a few days, sought to observe most anything I could about the Bombs and the CBA: their venue, the dreary old Worcester Auditorium; their grim-but-game coach, former Celtic Dave Cowens; their too-perky-to -be-palatable cheerleading squad, the "Bombadears"; the apparent league-wide disdain for playing defense; and, most memorably, team mascot Captain PJ, a squat young man and self-professed radio show host, who would clad himself in bombardier outfit -- complete with goggles and scarf -- and, during time outs, run out onto the court to an organ accompaniment of "Wild Blue Yonder" and scurry with arms akimbo in ever-decreasing circles until he belly-flopped onto center court.
Feb. 23-25
Urgh. Post-relocation fatigue, deadline stress and head cold-related aches and pains make for generally phlegmatic weekend. But the homefront was enlivened by the presence of two male visitors: our inimitable canine neighbor, Curley, who has developed a severe catch-and-fetch addiction; and OD's longtime school chum Jacob, a living symbol of all that is (or can be) right about middle school-age boys -- and actually able to deal with a female dominated household.
Feb. 22
After three-and-a-half years, our office pulls up stakes and moves literally 'round the corner and down the street. My space is somewhat bigger, more interestingly configured, but I'll miss the proximity to the campus green.
Feb. 21
Recent Boston Globe article notes the cult of personality Vladimir Putin appears to be building in Russia, such that in Izborsk tourists can now visit "the place where Putin bought a cucumber."
Feb. 20
Viewing: "The War Room" -- Ironic yet fitting that D.A. Pennebaker would go from documenting the Woodstock generation's four days of self-realization in upstate New York to depicting its full embrace of the political system in the 1992 election. At the center of this, of course, are James Carville and George Stephanopolous, who depending on one's ideology are either fire and ice or Scylla and Charybdis. What's poignant is to realize, at the end when they've reached the pinnacle, how precipitous the drop. Highlights: the pre-debate frolicking, singing and mimicking (Mary Matalin has quite a bit of showmanship in her); Carville and Stephanopoulos trying to write Clinton's concession speech, and laughing uproariously.
Feb. 18
Finally, after a few weekends' worth of near-misses, I made it to The Burren for their Sunday afternoon session. Worth the wait.
Feb. 17
Shay, her long-tressed friend Tess and I head off to watch a thrilling BC-Providence hoop contest, won by the Eagles in hard-fought fashion. Definitely one of the more well-played games I've ever seen live, from high school to professional, with excellent defense on both sides (a little more so for BC) and some memorable competition between BC's Troy Bell and PC's John Linehan. Shay and Tess's night was made, meanwhile, when they appeared, in mid-groove, for a few seconds on the Jumbotron.
Feb. 16
Recent musical acquisition: (Mix) John Renbourn "Sir John Alotof"/John Renbourn Group "Live in America" -- I used to have excerpts from "Sir John" a long, long time ago, so getting it in entirety seemed a good idea, since it displays Renbourn's prowess in the folk-classical-jazz-Eastern idiom. His eponymous ensemble, especially with John Molineux in the mix, carries those ideas even further; the combo of guitar, Northumbrian pipes and tabla on "Fair Flower of Northumberland" is a perfect example.
Feb. 11
Viewing: "Run Lola Run" -- if not for the drugs and criminal activities, it could be a German athletic footwear commercial, all technosoundtrack and kicky visuals. But Franka Potente, the determined heroine, is superb to watch as she races through the city streets to rescue her hoodlum-wannabe boyfriend; with her red-dyed tresses, she almost resembles an Olympic torch in motion. The "Groundhog Day" reference is an obvious one, but "The Tin Drum" asides are quite clever.
Feb. 10
Book completed: "In the Country of the Young," by Lisa Carey -- a moving, contemporary-era ghost story that ties in about a century-and-a-half's worth of the Irish-American ethos. Once you get used to the rhythm, of the cutting back and forth between the individual and shared stories of the ghost child-woman Aisling and her surrogate brother/father-cum-lover Oisin, it's quite entertaining -- even if you know that, given the Irishness and the ghost-story quality, there's bound to be tragedy.
Feb. 9
Recent musical acquisitions:
*Lunasa, "Otherworld" -- gorgeous playing and well-conceived yet not overly elaborate arrangements. The duets and trios with flutes and/or whistles are, well, breathtaking.
*Balkan Voices Family Music/"Todor" mix -- a combination of a couple of CDs of popular Bulgarian performers, courtesy of my neighbors. Not sure if I have the names right, and I don't have any track details, but the former is pretty straightforward -- vocal duets and occasional trios, with the traditional gadulka, tambura, kaval, gaida and drum backing -- while the latter brings in electric guitar, bass, keyboards and drums. A contrast of styles I find very pleasing.
Feb. 8
The hard times of old England:
*Bernard Rayner, the "pigeon man" of Trafalgar Square, opts to give up his business instead of fight the London lord mayor's efforts to de-feather the area.
*Manchester United enters into a partnership with the New York Yankees, through which they will sell each other's team apparel and paraphernalia. Yes, I'm sure a Liverpool supporter visiting New York City would absolutely love to see a ManUtd. jersey on display in the Stadium, just like I'd be absolutely delighted at the sight of Yankee caps in the Old Trafford store.
Feb. 7
Okay, yes, I'll own up to it: I'm now 43. Pat me on the head, give me my slice of cake, and say no more.
Feb. 3
Viewing: "Small Time Crooks" -- hard for me to fully accept, but difficult to dismiss as well. Woody Allen's excursions into the realm of low-rent kitsch, a la "Broadway Danny Rose," sometimes veer dangerously close to socioeconomic ridicule. Yet the story and its theme -- something akin to profiting well but losing one's soul -- has a strangely irresistible quality, perhaps because of the idea that moral and spiritual corruption is worse than having a poorly-realized criminal nature.
Feb. 1
With pitchers and catchers preparing to converge on Florida shortly, some baseball-related items emerge from winter's dugout:
*Wall Street Journal columnist Joshua Harris Prager confirms longstanding rumors that the 1951 Giants had an elaborate sign-stealing system in place as they relentlessly bore down on the Dodgers in that epic pennant race. But Bobby Thomson torturously declares that he took no sign on that October day in the Polo Grounds: "I was always proud of that swing."
*But redemption of a sort is on the way: the debut of the New York-Penn League's Cyclones in June means that, finally, professional baseball will be played in Brooklyn again.
*More recent hysteria: Mitch "Wild Thing" Williams, who parlayed erratic control and messy hair into a veritable 15 minutes of fame, has actually been hired as a pitching coach by the minor league Atlantic City Surf. Asked at a press conference about the chances of him actually taking the mound, he replied, "Zero possibility, unless there was a bus wreck and all of (the pitchers) perish."
Jan. 31
Recent musical acquisition: Anne Briggs, "A Collection" -- one of the first singers in the British Isles folk revival I ever listened to, so this compilation is a great way, personally, to round out the circle. Most all of the songs are standards -- okay, chestnuts -- in folk circles, but it's worth remembering that Briggs helped put a lot of them into currency. And hearing her sing the likes of "The Recruited Collier" or "Lowlands" in that unearthly high, seemingly fragile voice is just a pleasure, period. Briggs was/is a fascinating character, as the very candid accompanying booklet makes clear: a sort of female Sonny Rollins, touched by something beyond our ken, but having to battle self-doubt and other personal demons in producing her art.
Jan. 30
Book completed: "Cloudsplitter," by Russell Banks -- occasionally engrossing, moving fictionalized (as Banks takes pains to point out in the introduction) account of John Brown as it might, might, have been told by his son, Owen. Two things anchor the book: First is the relationship Owen describes with his father, which he compares to Abraham and Isaac but comes to seem more like symbiosis -- John fills the emotional and spiritual hole within Owen, while Owen serves as enabler and conduit for John's vision. The second anchor is Owen's meditations -- and others' as filtered through Owen -- on race, which seem at once anachronistic and contemporary. Doesn't necessarily resolve anyone's feelings about John Brown, but it perhaps widens the lens at least a little.
Jan. 28
Prior to a largely forgettable Super Bowl, I take OD and friend to viewing of "Save the Last Dance" -- Julia Stiles and Sean Patrick Thomas are so likeable, especially in the obligatory "Pygmalion" scene, that one tends to overlook the film's inadequacies -- mainly the fact that it's got about four or five unexplored plot threads, notably a white father in a black neighborhood who plays jazz apparently every night (and, given his modest means, has an eye for interior decorating). But while the film embraces many of the familiar melodramatic devices, it avoids others: Stiles' Sarah, despite her vulnerability, is self-assured enough so that she doesn't set out to become popular or fit in at her new surroundings; rather, she takes to hip-hop almost as a kind of therapy. Fodder for another day's thought: Sarah takes on the trappings of another culture, yet she offers none of her own (does she have one?).
Jan. 27
*Day largely devoted to schlepping and sledding (with Shay and a quite reluctant new school chum), as LW works tirelessly and relentlessly to help OD familiarize herself with Belgium for participation in a Model United Nations program.
*Viewing: "Mystery Men" -- just goofy, good fun, especially the premise that there are degrees of super powers as well as of good and evil. The incidental or throwaway lines (such as the list of prospective superheroes, e.g., "There's White Flight and Black Menace -- they work together") often rival the intentionally overarch dialogue. Ben Stiller, meanwhile, is wonderful: For all his pent-up rage as "Mr. Furious," he is still essentially the in-over-his-head yutz he tends to portray in most all his movies.
Jan. 25
Almost everyone else is caught up in the pervasive Super Bowl vortex, so why not "D&Q"?
*Recent photo of NY Football Giants owner Wellington Mara shows him wearing, of all things, a SUNY-Albany baseball cap, which is rather significant to those of us with familial ties to said institution.
*That said, I guess I'm a bit conflicted as to which team I favor. The NYFG would seem to be an obvious choice, for geographical and numerous other reasons. Yet I recall exactly 30 years ago watching in alternating terror and delight as my dearly beloved Baltimore Colts battled Dallas, and an almost surrealistic ineptitude, to redeem themselves for the Great Failure of 1969. Now, of course, the Colts are in Indiana, and what is Baltimore's used to be Cleveland's. Aw heck, just give me a 20-17 game decided in the final seconds.
*Your team's made it to the Super Bowl. Bad enough that you're injured. But then the official injury report is released and you're the first entry: Greg Comella, FB (buttocks)
Jan. 24
A thrilling Attack of the Teenage Hormones episode this afternoon and evening. Almost enough to make one want to install a high school graduation countdown LCD clock. Almost.
Jan. 21
Finally, a proper snowstorm, untainted by sleet or freezing rain. Managed to squeeze in an hour or so's worth of sledding.
Jan. 20
Book completed: "Return of the Native," by Thomas Hardy -- felt compelled to read this, in wake of my Oct. 28 experience. Hadn't read Hardy in a long time -- in fact, haven't read a pre-20th century author in a while. Easy to take for granted "classic" books, and one could also smirk a little at the depiction of myriad chance meetings and overheard conversations amid a sprawling heath. But then you read passages like "In the captain's cottage she could suggest mansions she had never seen," or "There no dense partition of yawns and toilets divides humanity by night from humanity by day." The accumulation of misunderstandings, ill-fated coincidences and obliviousness, and the explosive climax these produce, is truly impressive.
Jan. 19
*Odd night, alternating between rain, sleet and snow, often in the space of mere minutes. After driving OD to her school dance, I headed for Newton North High School to see what I thought was a boys hoop game, and instead watched the Tiger girls' squad thoroughly dismantle Needham. Wasn't a disappointment, though; NNHS displayed some tenacious defense and barely relented even when the game was well in their hands.
With the game over, I hied myself over to Bradlee's, currently in its death throes. I'm hardly sentimental when it comes to major store franchises, but there was something strange, almost sad in a way, about walking among dismantled shelves and fixtures, some of them cordoned off by yellow "Do not enter" tape, or sorting through haphazardly arranged displays. Certainly don't remember such feelings about yard sales.
*Was I Ever That Young? Department: Walking across campus, I pass three young ladies lugging skiing equipment. I ask them which mountain they're heading to. Replies one, "I'm not sure, but it's in Canada somewhere."
Jan. 17
So the British House of Commons is debating legislation to ban hunting with dogs. Chief constables, however, are less than happy about having to add to their responsibilities, and have floated the idea of an independent licensing body to control and regulate hunting. Wonder if all this will mean songs like "Thornaby Woods" and "While Gameskeepers Lie Sleeping" will become popular again.
Jan. 16
Is it really 10 years since the Persian Gulf "War"? A nexus in many ways for post-Cold War America, at least in terms of illusions: e.g., a second Bush administration (the father, that is), a stable new world order and a quick-and-easy redemption for the military administration.
Jan. 12
Viewing: "Last Night" -- sad, sweet, funny Armageddon movie told in several occasionally intersecting stories, all dealing with the choices, priorities, relationships and values we might hold closest to us -- and the amenities we might, or might not observe -- in the face of impending doom. The most fully-realized of these threads is the one with Don McKellar -- who cannot bring himself to reconcile with his family -- and Sandra Oh, who pursues futile love until the very last.
Jan. 11
Friend and dancing colleague informs us at Red Herring Morris practice of rumored "killer app" that will help a user locate public bathrooms in a given, more-or-less urban area, and will even rate said facilities. Like analyzing the effectiveness and quality of the deodorant cakes in the urinals?
Jan. 10
Quite a week for quitting. Rick Pitino. Bill Parcells. And now Linda Chavez. Not me, thank you.
Jan. 6-7
*Lovely, powdered sugar-like snowfall prompts first sledding trip of the year (Shay and me). Nice, fast track, with slight water hazard at the bottom, and a little mogul to help you into it. Surprisingly, the medium-long plastic luge seems to be tolerating my abuse. While there, I'm introduced by a family friend to a friendly, outgoing little deaf Filipino boy named Chalin, who was discovered walking the streets of Manila a few years ago, and because no one knew for sure who or how old he was, was referred to as "Boy." Now, here he is, on a snowy hill thousands of miles away with his adopted family. Long roads we travel.
*We travel with two extra youths to take advantage of gift certificates and post-holiday sales, and within an hour are playing Teenager Daughter MallQuest -- which eventually expands to the full family version. But all ends happily with a surprisingly nimble game of "The Minister's Cat" on the car ride home.
*Viewing: "A Simple Twist of Fate" -- Or "Silas Marner" as told by James L. Brooks. OK, a bit of an exaggeration. Steve Martin's restraint is admirable, and his chemistry with the various interpreters of Matilda -- Alana Austin, in particular -- is believable and winning. Gabriel Byrne, meanwhile, has such a whipped-dog persona it's hard to completely loathe his character, which is the point, after all. Diverting for all the melodrama.
Jan. 5
One more leftover: Fascinating article in Boston Globe about young Chechnyan woman Angela Yakhyayeva who is helping to resurrect her region's folk music tradition by transposing it to violin -- a "forbidden" instrument, according to Chechen custom. One of those occasions when necessity, rather than whim, helps a folk tradition stay alive and evolve.
Jan. 4
Metaphorical stray pieces of tinsel and pine needles from the holidays:
*Standing on the check-out line in Building 19, I am confronted by the in-house TV system's showing of a Bob Hope commemorative video, including a skit with Old SkeeKnows as an eccentric inventor, Phyllis Diller as his battle-axe of a spouse, and Loni Anderson as his robot creation. Needless to say, the entendres hardly amounted to double.
*Just when you despair of pre-teen jadedness and cynicism, your 11-year-old leaves a note for Santa (with requisite milk and cookies, of course) reminding him to be sure and visit orphanages, hospitals and poor families.
*Viewings:
="City of Lost Children" -- Terry Gilliam, meet Roald Dahl. Murky, unsettling fantasy with any number of allusions to the way society exploits children. What grounds it is the rapport between unwitting, unlikely do-gooders Ron Perlman and Judith Vittet, in one of the better screen performances by a child in recent memory.
="Girl, Interrupted" -- less-than-satisfying adaptation of Susanna Kaysen's book, which had a knowing, rakish quality that seems diluted here. Kind of a young-adult version of "I Never Promised You a Rose Garden," with some good work by Angelina Jolie -- as the incorrigible-cum-mentor to a timorous Winona Ryder -- as well as Clea DuVall, whose perpetually determined facial expression seems all the more poignant as the film continues.
="The Next Best Thing" -- promising first half, which brings up some provocative questions about the nature and meaning of commonly accepted familial roles. The chemistry between Madonna and Rupert Everett -- who gently mocks, and rises above, the familiar latter-day gay-male stereotypes -- is highly enjoyable, and Malcolm Stumpf is one cute kid, full-stop. But sadly, the latter half of the movie opts for a "Kramer-vs-Kramer" atmosphere which lands flat.
11 Days of Home and Hearth
A truly satisfying Christmas-New Year's break, about equally restful and productive. It can be said that our present this year was a reorganized apartment, made necessary chiefly by the addition of a new computer (through in-laws' generosity) and a workstation/desk to house it. If our place is still overflowing with Stuff, at least it is contained somewhat more attractively.
So: Holiday Weekend #1 begins with trips to our much beloved Building 19 and features brief Bible readings to accompany our traditional Christmas Eve fare of Chinese food, "A Christmas Story" viewing and the "'Twas the Night Before Christmas." Breaking a trend of recent years, Christmas Day starts at 5:30 a.m., as LW's snuffly nose rouses her and, by accident, the girls. Clearly, the inevitable needed bowing to. But the pace and temperament was quite tolerable, actually, and by the end of the day YD was happily playing with her Lego Studios Webcam, displaying a concentration and single-mindedness (and quite some cleverness) that can be neither quantified or appreciated by educational systems, while OD contentedly made her bed with comfy new sheets. Surreal moment: Unwrapping presents while listening to soundtracks of a classic TV commercials (from Alka-Seltzer to Cracker Jacks) tape I purloined for Shay.
(Kudos to BC for their Aloha Bowl dispatching of Arizona State, although coach Tom O'Brien looked most ill-suited for Hawaiian shirt and lei combo while on duty.)
Leading up to Holiday Weekend #2, in between bouts of reorganization, we manage to wrangle a trade-in that results in our first proper digital camera -- which we put to good use during our day trip to visit Mom at her secluded, quite rustic retreat-conference center on the northwest edge of the Quabbin Reservoir. The girls and I also take in a BC-UBuffalo women's basketball game, which is as entertaining and enjoyable as any sporting event I've ever seen; the game has come a long way from the time I spent winter evenings chronicling the fates of Valley Tech, Northbridge et al for the Blackstone Valley Tribune.
Holiday Weekend #2 commences with a disappointingly dampish and weak Nor'easter (at least in our neck of the woods). After chipping away at the ice next day, I deposit the kids at their respective sleepovers, and the missus and I have the first childless New Year's Eve since the beginning of the Corazon Aquino era. We tuck into some shrimp and LW's excellent salmon steak and spicy string bean concoctions, but alas, I'm the only one who makes it to midnight, and barely at that -- although a barely coherent phone call from OD within seconds after the ball drops briefly jolts us from somnolence.
New Year's Day is my annual football indulgence, and the next day LW and I have one last idyll before resumption of the routine.
