Music for sort of old people)
Nick Hornby , who I adore, wrote a piece about Nelly Furtado. I read it in a music Granta issue, it might have come from The Believer and it is in The Nick Hornby Songbook. Whatever its roots, he talks about people dismissing pop music. He says ” I know too, believe me, that Cole Porter was “better’ than Madonna or Travis , that most pop songs are aimed cynically at a target audience three decades younger than i am, that in any case the golden age was thirty-five years ago and there has been very little of value since. It’s just that there’s this little song I heard on the radio, and I bought the CD, and now I have to hear it 10 or 15 times a day…” OK enough plagerizing. He was talking about Nelly Firtado. I am at the moment totally obsessed with Amy Winehouse . She is younger than either of my children yet I feel as if she is my find. I ran four miles listening to a rotation of Back to Black and Tears Dry on Their Own. I was so happy to be listening to her heavy accented voice. She has horns , I am married to a trumpet player so that is important and it is just what I want to hear. Hornby goes on to say something about knowing he should like opera or world music but…
People often look amused when I tell them what music I like to listen to. They give condescending looks to my tales of being the oldest person in the audience and of trying to find someone to go out with (the previously mentioned spouse hates most music I like. he is into JAZZ)
I still listen to music in the adolescent ways of we who grew up with records. It is interesting to me that Ipods let you do what singles did in my long ago teens; listen over and over until you know it the way you should know the Gettysberg address. Popular songs get internalized and recalled in a way nothing else does for me.
I am not sure how I discovered Amy Winehouse. It was before Back to Black came out. I may have read about her first. I listen to the radio some but not as often as I would like. I find myself reading about music and then going to have a listen. How weird is that? Sight to sound but it is the way I discovered her and the Perniece Brothers and Ivy. In any case I am seeing her in a month and cannot sit still thinking about it.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Leave a Comment
How did we miss that?
I am a constant and addicted reader. Also I am not a snob. Fortunatly this allows me to waste my time in grocery stores and the dentist reading People and the new overly large TV guide. (what is that about?) I also have enough time these days that I can get to the library and look at the New York Review of Books and the NAtion etc.,etc. (said the King). Susan Sontag died in 2005 and now with Annie Leibovitz’ new book we all get the word that the two were great friends. OK, I get that this is a private matter but what you are the great American intellectual and you produce great (again) pronouncements and discussions about the essence of existence isn’t being less then honest about something so basic deceptive. Sontag has written so much about being the outsider, and Death as a metaphor using AIDS that I feel cheated. If I had the energy I would reread some stuff but I feel like she has wasted my brain enough. Like politicians, intellectuals need to come clean to be effective. I forgive the trespasses if informed, but never if dribbled out
Filed under: Uncategorized | Leave a Comment
Departing the movies
I love to go to movies. Even with the simplicity and laziness of Netflix I would rather see a movie in a cinema(how grand). I love the downtown Boston Common theater because a) I don’t need to drive; b) stadium seating because I am short; c) snobbery of first run. All that excluded we went to see The Departed in a less fancy first-run.
I try to read about movies that I expect to see. About them but not the reviews. Reviews come after when they make sense. Ok “The Departed” was filmed here, I knew some people who did odds and ends types of jobs and I love cop/crime movies. I knew that it had great press and my other wanted to see it. It was great fun, I loved Leo and Mark Walberg but liked not loved the movie. My question is was the message about crime, men, or the fact that nothing in the East Coast US can function without a lot of cell phone use ? Even being too old I am not that much of a technophobe that I do not make good use of my cell. It just seemed as if the characters they were overly dependent on mobiles but also totally oblivious to the good twin/evil twin Leo/Matt combos using them aecretly in pockets and hallways. I liked this movie but I was so unaware of the extreme amount of violence. Whover wrote the New Yorker review (?Lake) really nailed my feelings. By the end it was absurd (folks were laughing). It felt very male and I wonder if that is why the level of violence has provoked so little discussion.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Leave a Comment
Anniversaries
Always a little late, all the 9/11 anniversary press as me thinking a lot about the World Trade Center and I feel oddly connected to them. In spite of my fervent desires to be a downtown New York type I definitely was not. I have stayed at a small European Marriot that was near the Battery tunnel. It was usually a place to stay while visiting Brooklyn. (The fact that Brooklyn has 3 million people, has had a large scale hotel ((the Marriott)) for only 10 or so years and has no other real hotels that are not at the airport is for another day. For an interesting Brooklyn hotel look google the Lefferts hotel, located across the street from my son.)
Back to the WTC. In fall 1979 we visited the top sometime after dayligh saving time ended. As we watched the sunset over Jersey I was struck by how high we were, how the light just disappeared behind the horizon and it immediately got very dark. My older sun was an infant, dancing as we held him along the windows. Even before 9/11 it was one of my most distinct memories of NY.
I also had a fancy dinner at Windows on the World and spent one other time stopping children from trying to throw things out or down.
My last memory is on Labor Day the Monday before we were driving back from DC and for some unknown reason took the Holland Tunnel on our way home. As I sat swearing in traffic Gs took the photo at the top across the river.
I diverge-here is why I am too old. I have been trying to find the time to figure out how to put up this photo. Now I am working on a machine that does not have my photos.
Hooray 9 days later I have had enough time to get that shot in. Each time I learn something that seems intuitive to people way younger than I, I feel like I have won something.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Leave a Comment
China
I have thought over and over again that my trip would be the push to start writing. However it still seems to hit me as very self involved to assume anybody would read me. China was such an amazing jolt to my thinking that it will be what i start with. The following are various emails that I sent back, reflection later. I have tried to clean up some odd spellings that were due to strange rickety computers in China. Where is all the shiny new stuff that it advertised here. Better editing is sure to follow. This to my family: Hello from Beijing- In spite of the fact that I have seen the sun only once since I got here this has been an amazing adventure. I wrote Gary some of the details of the forbidden city but I will send gabe another email. I took a tour to the wall which is about 90min ride from Beijing. It was a group tour (my first ever) and was of a standard style. Not the most known rip-off that exists but definitely a touristy thing. While I have seen Jonahs beautiful pictures of the Wall yesterday it was so foggy and misty that I could not see one thing. It is also the 1st weekend of China’s holdiays so it was packed. It reminded me of that Cherry Blossom time in DC. The most amazing thing was watching these hoardes of people walk ahead of me and see them climb into the mist. The relatively cloudy weather has kept (according to everyone) it relatively cool here and has made the city seem new in a way that it is not. I went by the Olympic Village construction site. It is huge and they have ripped down many many hutang which are the old Chinese quarters. I have been told they are moving everyone out to new apartments on the outskirts of Beijing. My tour was an interesting mix of people who chose it for a variety of reasons. Like a TV show we sort of separated into little groups of 4 or 6 (there were 20 people) Oddly enough Gabe there was a young woman from FOrt-Greene who is working in China for a year at Kraft foods. She is in another city near Shanghai and was visiting Beijing. My few days here gives me a great insight into how Jonah must have felt when he arrived, as well as a sense of how any immigrant must feel. It is easy to see why people speak their native tongue at home. I am leaving tonight on an overnight train to Xi’an where I will meet Jonah and Erica tomorrow (My Monday). I am going to walk to the Lama Temple now which is the biggest one out side of Tibet. The food has been great I have mostly eaten on the streets.My timing is all off and I periodically have real bouts of fear about logistics, (sort of like at home although magnified by the thought that I will be in a strange place, unable to communicate, and no one to guide me). It is hard work to travel by yourself. I write out a couple of sentences I think I might need before I go anywhere. They are pretty crude but it has worked so far. Gary if you are in Maine hello to Cindy and Joel. (At the great wall tourist stores there ARE t shirts that say my grandma went to the great wall and all I got was the t shirt. Love and good wishes. Hello to everyone, I am here in Xi’an waiting to meet up with Jonah. I am in a youth hostel that Jonah booked. Quite a difference from my digs in Beiijing which were quite opulent. Hotel with pool and bowling alley. My trip so far has been amazing and wonderful. In spite of the fact that I am overwhelmed by being by myself in a place where I am functionally illiterate I have managed to avoid catastrophe and get some good touring accomplished. The weather in Beijing was always overcast which was actually wonderful when I went to the Forbidden City.The mist obscured the thousands of cranes that are all over Beijing. Some of the most familiar sights are being renovated for the Olympics and are covered in green netting but it doesn’t matter. The amount of history that is so different from ours is overwhelming and the size and bustle of today is staggering. The traffic here is beyond belief. being a bad pedestrian at home have me my only chance at plunging into crossing. I will write more of a travelogue another time. I made it so far, My overnite train ride was on the brand new train that goes to Lasa. It was as nice as my hotel. Anyway more with China details soon, Be well, CArol Xi’an which I imagined to be a small city simply because I had never real hear of it it huge , prosperous and bustling. There is a fairly nice artistic feel to it and even there tourist junk has a nice feel to it. We walked around went to a lovely museum that had these ancint stone tablets that were a series of books, and some huge carved statues. We also saw a group of monks or sumo wrestlers with one white guy with them. Last night we walked to the Muslim quarter had some great food and were the only westerners out at 10:30 at night. One of the places bar b q ed the meet on bicycle spokes. A new industry you could create in AMerica perhaps. I am quite the intrepid traveller when I am in a group. On our second day here we met a nice Jewish boy from Cincinatti who was bailing on his teaching job in much the way Jonah has he told me his Mom would never do this.The hostel they booked IS testing my princessness. I realized besides sleeping in a tent I could not do a shower room. We got a triple with a bath for about $20/nite total. I treated Jonah and Erica to that and a dinner whixch was cheap but we got these juices that we neglected to notice were 3>30 a pop, they cost more than the food. This is a blast, I think you would hate some of it, but really love the exploring part of this. I hope this gets to you. I will email Gabe soon I have not yet figured out the apostrophe. I don’t think it is as hot here as you seem to be headed. People go quite quickly but consume tons of liquid on the street. Carts selling cold beverages are anywhere you turn. There are more kinds of vehicles here then I ever imagined existed. New cars, old cars, minivans and busses in a rainbow of colors and scooters and bikes pulling carts or going solo. Jeez. All of your gift ideas have run through my mind so I am glad they are something you might like. I will try. We saw the Terra Cotta Warriors yesterday. I would say with NO exception it is the most astounding sight I have ever seen. Besides being amazing on it’s own, totally staggering, the idea that people discovered it in 1974 when we thought we knew everything that existed is beyond imagining. i can’t believe I leave tomorrow. The news about the British planes is alittle unnerving.I am somewhat happy at the fact that there doesn’t seem to be much room for any kind of plotting in China. I will throw out my shampoo before I leave so that I can reenter the country. We have already had quite a travel adventure getting back to Beijing. Our flight from Chengdu, after 5 full days was moved up by about 20 minutes. We were at the airport and they announce it was delayed. At 7pm (one hour late) we boarded a very hot airline. They made an announcement (all announcements were first in Chinese and then in the most uninteeligible English I’ve encountered in my trip) that the air conditioning would kick in once we got started. WE sat, drove around and seemingly were in a take off line when another announcement came. After the Chinese part the people seemed really pissed but we sort of got that the plane needed some repair and we would wait. It was reaaly sticky and they were very slow to give out water. Then they started distributing dinner. All the while the Chinese were quite vocal about their annoyance. Soon after they distributed the food they let everyone off the plane, it was hot and pewople had to negotiate around their half eaten meal. Okay we take a bus to a different part of the terminal and the fun really starts. These people are furious, no one will tell them exactly waht is going on so what chance did we have. No personnel spoke English. It is about 8:30pm. At one point a really cute Chinese kid about 9 does some translating for me. We have already found two really wonderful English speakers, an English teacher from Beijing who was visiting Chengdu with a friend and a cute perky 20 something who was going to Indiana to get her masters . As we wait atound I thank the Chinese kid for doing such a great translation, told him he had great English and he says deadpan, ”I’m Canadian”. He was so funny. Meanwhile NO ONE knows anything. As one of our friends says the ”big potato” is not there and nobody canb do anything. Some people have connecting flights, some people want a lot of money we only want our luggage and to know what is happening. All the people in the airport work for the airport not the Airlines so they know nothing. At about 11 it seems we can go home and rebook tomorrow (will not work, we have no home), go to a hotel without our luggage (no way) or wait around for a new ticket and a hotel room maybe. A nice airport man who I nicely asked what was happening is sort of helpful when we see him but our friends, I think are using us, in the nicest way to get information because we are foreigners and they are nice to us. Periodically a roar goes up from the remaining passangers and they move to yell at some airport employee. A sort of cool amused young guy jokingly says something about the press. I don’t know if he called but about an hour later some either reporter or TV person comes with bright lights and interviree people. We try to fade into the background. Our friends help us negotiate turning in our tickets, getting new ones for 7am , picking up our luggage and getting to the somewhat seedy airport hotel, that seems to exist only for this purpose. The girl going to Indiana has a years worth of clothes and gifts for her friends, She has to negotiate some overweight fee. Anyway we get to the hotel, we are a sort of tight group of six. I share a room with the girl, (on the phone her mother tells her she is happy she is with someone old) We get a wakeup call at about 5:30 and take a very smooth flight (our airline as changed Yeah China Air) and get to Beijing. It was only about 13 hours later than our very original arrival time but it fell like a year. (We each got 300 kwai, about $37 for our trouble) Anyway we are here, in a really seedy hostel on a great market street with great food.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Leave a Comment
First
Too old is how I feel about doing this. A visit to China is what has propelled me.What I want to do is write of how this feels like the first adventure I have had in many many years. For reasons too boring I stepped off a plane in Beijing unable to read or speak the language. No one knew I was coming, no one would have known if I did not arrive. All journeys have begun.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Leave a Comment
Hello world!
Welcome to WordPress.com. This is your first post. Edit or delete it and start blogging!
Filed under: Uncategorized | 1 Comment
