Lady Heathen Soul

Who You Are and What You Do With It

2009-07-07T11:47:00.000-07:00

Here is why large family gatherings can be brutal: you meet a long-lost relative, a great aunt or your mother's cousin or something. She's dressed in a yellow dress with great big blue cabbage roses and wears a big rhinestone broach near her shoulder, and she tells you all about her days working for Western Electric and her trips to China and how she once met Mike Royko in a bar. And you think, "How did I go this far in life without knowing this person? She's great!" And she keeps talking to you through dinner and slowly, you get a new suspicion. She'll say something that kind of nags at you, and then she'll say something else that gives you a twinge. And then once more, she drops a phrase or an opinion into the conversation and it hits you: she's a racist. Or an anti-Semite or a homophobe or has some other nearly vestigal prejudice that makes you glad you don't ever have to see her again.

This is how I feel about my Aunt Irene Nemirovsky. She is only a relative in the sense that we are all part of the family of man. And, let's put this out right now: she died at Auschwitz, so any further criticism must be tempered by that fact. But I have just finished reading her highly-lauded Suite Francaise. When I first closed the back cover, I was stunned by this fragmentary novel of occupied France in 1941-2. Along with the book, my copy included letters written by her family and friends after her arrest in 1942, and these provided a nearly 360-degree perspective on the novel and the circumstances of its birth.

It's a complex picture. The characters in the novel are everything from true patriots to self-centered collaborators. The most compelling and sympathetic character is a young wife of a French prisoner who finds herself attracted to one of the German soldiers occupying her town (and her house). It's as if Nemirovsky is sending text messages from the center of the war to the future. Its about as real as mud on the boots of a soldier.

And Nemirovsky's story comes with its own dirty reality. Her family immigrated to France from Kiev after the Russian Revolution, knocked from their affluence and connections by the Bolsheviks. She never took French nationality, and converted to Catholicism in the late 1930s, after it was obvious that her Jewish ancestry was going to cause her problems in France. She never denied being Jewish, and she certainly had no reason to be sympathetic to Russians or Communists.

Still, her husband's letters to the German authorities after her arrest tried to argue that Nemirovsky had no love for the Jewish people, and in fact used many of her other writings to support this. Nemirovsky herself associated with right-wing newspapers and thinkers during her life.

The tangled nature of her stories, real and created, are both confusing and heartbreaking, but absolutely necessary. Poking through all of this, I can begin to see threads of thinking: how people can deny their ancestry in times and use it to their advantage during others. How a writer's works can be used to prove a wide range of points. But mostly, I am reminded, again, that prejudice of any kind, is, in the end, pointless. It's the rope that we pull that eventually tangles around our own feet.

Old Blogged Cross

2009-06-11T07:56:00.000-07:00

On a hill in Southern Illinois sits a massive cross. It is the kind of thing that even if you are standing in front of it you are not sure of what you are seeing. In fact, the 110-foot structure has been there 50 years. If you had visited it twenty-five years ago, it would have looked majestic, its white panels spreading out against the skies of the Shawnee National Forest.

Today, it is looking quite ragged. Many of the panels have been removed as part of an ongoing restoration project that has been hindered by lawsuits and bad feelings. I guess God's work on earth still needs too be carried out by flawed humans.

But the infighting that is marring Bald Knob Cross has not negatively colored my perception of it, because what I remember from my visit there in the late 1970s is how my parents lead the visit. I know now that I was brought up with respect for all religious symbols, and this has been one of the most valuable lessons I have learned from my parents.

We are not religious people -- we are not churchgoers and we keep our spirituality to ourselves. I cannot locate the source of this feeling on either of my parents' sides of the family, although I hear my paternal grandfather was invited to leave the seminary in Poland because he was an independent thinker.

But the origin is less important than the everyday practice, especially in a world where religious expression is a major point of contention. Again, I am lucky because I grew up in a rather diverse area, populated by many who were born in Asia. I am very used to seeing saris, sikh headwear and Buddhist meditation centers, all of which may or may not be a religious expression for any particular person.

However, no matter why or how something with religious origins is expressed, I believe it is important to respect it. The only religious expression I will step in to protest is that which harms another human being.

I am ever grateful and amazed by how we Americans express our multitude of spiritual beliefs. In driving around Chicago, I can see a mosque with minarets, billboards asking Jesus for forgiveness, or young ladies in not-quite-fashionable long skirts and high-collared blouses. We may not have universal heath care or wonderful public transit, but the United States is really a kind of paradise for religious expression.

The Road to Righteousness

2009-04-10T14:05:00.000-07:00

I saw a bumper sticker the other day that said, "You can't be both Catholic and Pro-Abortion."* Perhaps I am just itching for spring and ornery, but I almost got out of my own car and shook a finger at the bumper: "Oh YEAH?!? I'll show you!"

Let's assume the sticker meant "practicing" Catholic, which I am not. Therefore, I am not a living rebuke to its assertion. But for a few hours I considered going back to church just to prove that I can be any kind of Catholic I want to be.

My Catholicism, dormant as it may be, is something I still hold in reserve, like buying stock and holding it, or like keeping empty margarine containers in your garage workshop. Someday, it will come in handy.

That day, however, should not be the day I get challenged by the back of a minivan. And, also, I suspect the sticker's premise is that the church and many of its members would not recognize my Catholicism if paired with pro-choice sentiments, no matter how many holy days of obligation I showed up for.

But if I went to church, I would not go for accolades or for new friends or for potluck dinners. I would not go to be a part of a community of like-minded believers. I would go to be in a space dedicated to allowing me to talk to God, and for the chance to hear some interpretation of His mysteries, which I could take or leave. And right now, I can do these things in other places. A forest, for example, or in my garden.

Clearly, the bumper sticker's owner and I have different spiritual needs, and perhaps we should continue to stay out of each other's ways.

*Ten years ago, I would have also started arguing that I am actually "pro-choice," not "pro-abortion." But those linguistic battles are tiring. And anyway, if a woman decides she needs an abortion, then I can say that I am pro-abortion.

Pre, Present, Post

2009-04-07T10:08:00.000-07:00

Finally, I might be in the right place at the right time. All of this Twittering and Facebooking makes me feel like I am in the East Village in 1978, or San Francisco in 1968, or Paris in 1920. Perhaps I am actually in the middle of something wholly new that we will look back on with some fondness in 30 years. Or maybe we'll think it was all just silly. That's the gamble you take with history.

When the Internet came to my desktop in 1993-ish, I remember the sense of exhilaration I felt that I could communicate with like-minded people from around the world. Kids, listen here: we posted to text-based message boards that developed threads that looked like a letter-snakes were eating your screen. There were no pictures. There was no video. We did not know it then, but the interactivity was pathetic. And if we were talking about a musician, television show, or actor, the talent themselves never jumped into the conversation themselves.

I lurked and joined in on message sites for Mystery Science Theater 3000 and communicated with all types of fans, but the closest we got to talking with the writers and performers was when their publicity person posted an answer to a question (I remember you, Juliewa!).

This morning, I checked my Facebook account, which is my virtual locker, street corner, or stammtisch (choose your own metaphor) and then browsed my Tweets. Along with keeping in touch with friends old and new, these social media outlets have offered me some surprising connections. On Facebook, I am "friends" with Frank Conniff, one of MST3K's supremely talented players, and I am both following and being followed on Twitter by Chicago radio legend Steve Dahl. I wonder how long this online erasing of the boundaries between the talent and their followers will remain.

I feel like I am living a version all those stories I hear of people buying Iggy Pop a drink in some dive bar in the late 70s or writing a letter to Flannery O'Connor and actually receiving a handwritten response. And the walls are still up for many celebrities, some of whom likely use ghost-Twitterers or otherwise see all their social media obligations as the PR person's job.

All these venues are free for us users, but for how long? This is all fun -- for now. I have to resist the tendancy to take these things for granted, and begin imagining how I will describe this strange time in 2030.

Burning Desires, Part 2

2009-03-04T08:59:00.001-08:00

So I found a new supply of matches. Target is too tony to sell something so banal, but I did find a three-pack of 250 matches in the kitchen implements aisle at Wal-Mart. And then we went to Wisconsin for the weekend, where I "borrowed" a few boxes from the bar where we ate lunch. The trick: follow the smokers.

Nothing Like a Dame

2009-02-11T14:04:00.000-08:00

I have been reading Dame Rebecca West's Black Lamb and Grey Falcon for almost three months now. At this point, it's not just a book: it's a relationship. The thing is 1,200 pages long, so it's not that I am a slow reader. And I am reading a little bit almost every day. And in those days upon days, I have not only come to learn more about the former Yugoslavia, the book's theme, but I feel as if I have invited the author to stay with me.

Rebecca West published this book in 1941, at a time when she probably thought she had seen too much of history already. My tackling of the book is part of my studies of the world between the wars, as I attempt to create what can loosely be described as a foreign policy philosophy. Specifically, I feel the need to answer the question: When should the U.S. intervene in another country's affairs?

West has long since taken me off that track with her descriptions of churches and mosques, valleys and cities, and lunches of various types of cheese, bread, and brandy. She can go on about a Serbian monk or a Macedonian king for pages and pages. But the book also has a heart and a soul, if not an author I would like to spend much time with.

One of those lamented, lost "public intellectuals," West was an author and liberal thinker, espousing socialist and feminist views. Devistatingly learned, prolific, and able to cross literary genres, she also had a son with H.G. Wells. What she was not, I suspect, was a fool-sufferer of any stripe.

I could simplify things and tell you that I find West to be a bit of a snob. But that is not true. I am not sure I would want to have a beer with her (or, more likely, a sherry). I am sure she would find me tiresome and my education lacking. I could combat that by just shutting up and letting her talk.

Career Driven

2009-01-25T09:10:00.001-08:00

Yes, it's true: women are held to different standards than men. But thank God, for perhaps things, then, can actually get done.

So, what do you know about Ukraine? A so-called Russian satellite, its last starring role in U.S. news was during its Orange Revolution a few years ago. You may recall that one of its politicians carries on his pockmarked face what is likely signs of poisoning.

But then there's the beautiful Ukrainian, Yulia Tymoshenko, the country's Prime Minister. You perhaps have seen her severe crown of braids and well-tailored clothing...and sighed at the idea that a woman in power needs to be so calculatingly womanly.

Then I saw her on television after a meeting that would make anyone's day stressful: negotiating gas pipeline issues with Russian President Vladimir Putin. You know those meetings at work that you dread, that you think about with not only your head but your stomach acids for days before? The ones where you wonder what feminist pioneers were thinking anyway, subjecting you to years of mindless corporate gruntwork? Now, when I have those days, I will think of Yulia in her awesome black dress.

Yes, it is about how you look. And it's not for them: it's for you. You need to be groomed in workplace manners, you need to be prepared ("In what respect, Charlie?"), but in the end, the one thing you have control over during the toughest moments of your career is what you wore. And that can give you confidence, and in turn success, and, if you want it, power.

As for the braids, Tymoshenko has joked that they are the steering wheel she uses to drive the state. Whatever works, ladies.

Sara, Rick, and Lidia Walk into my Living Room

2009-01-13T08:47:00.000-08:00

We gave very little thought to digital television. Our TV is too old to receive a digital signal, and we don't have cable or satellite. We don't watch a lot of broadcast television, so we briefly considered not even having a set after the Great February Analog Drop-Off. We thought about just getting a monitor for the living room and setting up a wireless network so we could stream movies in two rooms...but then our heads started to hurt. And I watch WGN Morning News every day, and need my daily dose of snark from Robin, Larry, Paul and friends.

So we bought a converter. I have not staked out a position on the whole digital conversion issue. I am somewhere in between these three ideas: "One does not have a inalienable right to television," "the airwaves are a public domain and should be regulated in the public's interest," and "geez, let's upgrade something in this crumbling country!"

I really had no idea what would change when we plugged in the converter. I suspected nothing, really, as I thought all we were doing was preparing for the disappearance of something. I did not know we would gain these quirky "point" stations: 7.1, 9.2, 11.3,20.4. Now we have a constant broadcast feed of a local weathermap, a few more public television stations and fun infomercials for quick cookers, exercise contraptions, and Jesus.

My favorites are WTTW's artsy little sister, Create, which broadcasts only travel, cooking and home shows, and MHz Worldview, or televison for people who really want to know what's going on in Copenhagen this weekend.

Create features cooking and travel shows familiar to public television geeks. I am only a semi-fan of Rick Steves, as he really scared me about crime in Rome, quite unneccesarily. And Lidia Bastianich dresses up way too much to be truly cooking with all that flour.

I have small girl crush on Sara La Fountain, who is, strangely, Finnish and such a hottie. She narrates her programs in an adorable accent and cooks meat on balconies and in parks.

I do not mean to imply that the world exists for my amusement only. Actually, when I am sitting in front of the television, I still want to be absorbing information I can use later while I am being entertained. I'd rather "travel" to Stockholm than watch an aged Phyllis Lindstrom dance. I'd rather watch someone cook something than watch someone try to lose weight. And with my new converter box, I have found a cheap source of new ways to waste time!

Matches: Made in Heaven?

2008-12-22T13:44:00.000-08:00

Just about the only bad side of Illinois' public smoking ban is the fact that we are running out of matches. For about thirty years now I have not had to purchase matches (unless you count the extra long ones I had to buy to light my Our Lady of Guadalupe candle). I've taken for granted the easy availablilty of free matchbooks. Now, we are down to our last few. Thank you Country House, not only for your great hamburgers, but for giving out matches in little boxes rather than the fold-over books (they last longer).

But as pop culture archivist James Lileks has long noted, this is not the first great tragedy to befall the great free social giveaway of small fire and art.

(And no, I do not lament the passing of smoking. Filty habit. Most disgustingly, it gives you wrinkles).

Public Stories, Private Beliefs

2008-12-17T06:11:00.000-08:00

On the bus this morning, a passenger was relating details of the Christmas story to another passenger (who, I am broadly assuming based on his looks, was not Christian). Passenger #1 mentioned the special census, the Epiphany, the fact that the magi were not kings but astrologers - elements of the story familiar to any older child who happened to grow up Christian. Then he told Passenger #2 all of what he believed were problems with the Christmas story, as a way of explaning why he was not a Christian and therefore December 24 and 25 were not holy days to him.

I still at this point in time do not consider myself a Christian, although not because I think there are fallacies in the Christmas story. I have no idea what is true and what is not. Nor do I have any need to find out or to "prove" my position with "the facts." I do have beliefs about things, however, and these beliefs are ultimately what guide my faith. I simply do not at this time believe in the divinity of Christ, and therefore cannot call myself a Christian. I do know that there are those who share my belief but do still say they are Christians, and this is just fine with me.

I have a few other beliefs. I believe the Christmas story, no matter your faith, is a great one, with elements of law, sociology, astrology, history and politics. Something for everyone. I also believe that public transit is excellent for eavesdropping on conversations. Yesterday, for example, Passenger #1 was telling Passenger #2 about his office's computer vendor issues.

Up to Our Necks

2008-11-18T14:06:00.000-08:00

What's with the vampires? Kids these days love the blood-suckers, but really, they're nothing new. Anne Rice's Interview with the Vampire was kind of about mortality, kind of about New Orleans, kind of about how good bad can look. Now, we're all about Twilight, which adds to the vampire canon but is also about the first blush of teen lust. Once again, the vampire looks good. The mummy and the werewolf, I think, need some hair product and a better PR person.

But there is also a spiritual aspect connected with vampires. Anne Rice is now a devout Catholic, and is writing about how her beliefs have evolved since writing Interview, describing how she eventually "lost faith in atheism." (Thanks to Mary Jane for this interview in The Liguorian). Stephenie Meyer, the author of the Twilight series, is a Mormon.

Anything that gets us talking about the murky corners of faith is a good thing. Desire, immortality, immorality, and original and acquired sin are all topics for your vampire-related book discussion. It helps if it is a rainy day in a woodsy northern town or you are in a musty room in a humid, moss-drenched city. And if your vampire is hot.

Consider the Writer

2008-10-02T11:59:00.001-07:00

I wonder if writing his article about lobsters in any way contributed to David Foster Wallace's suicide? I don't mean to demean his tragic end with any uninformed speculation, but for someone who is depressed, small things can mean alot.

In his article "Consider the Lobster," Wallace wrote about how lobsters are boiled alive, and if they feel it, and if they scream in pain. When I was depressed, stuff like this could set me off on a few days of wretched rumination. Bad things happening to animals were especially tender areas (yeah, I don't like when bad things happen to kids, too, but depression also gets me started on topics like original sin, which doesn't help).

A few days of a mental stone like this rolling around in your mind's shoe wears you out. You're already tired when you're depressed, and therefore prone to illogical thinking. The reason you would consider the lobster in the first place is due to an extra sensitivity to stories and to the details that make a story and to the constraints that keep a good story from being a great one. Especially when it's yours -- your work, your life, your legacy.

I am so sorry DFW decided to end his life. But American literature is stronger because he was able to write what he was in the time he was here -- and with the illness he had. He need worry no longer about his stories, our suffering, and his legacy.

Lady Galician Soul?

2008-08-27T08:41:00.000-07:00

If you know more than a little about your family history, I'm jealous. Most of my history on both sides of the family has been forgotten, sometimes on purpose. I tell people I am Polish, and in Chicago, worldwide capitol of the Polish Diaspora, that suffices. But, as I increasingly apply my knowledge of history, even that can be questioned.

Both sides of my family came from an area on the European map that can now be described as southern Poland. However, because this country has been torn up over the centuries, my family records could be in Poland, Germany, Austria, Russia or Ukraine. And then when both grandparents arrived in America, they assimilated quickly, and expected their children to look only forward.

Being selfish, I am actually less concerned about the particulars of my family than knowing about where I am From. But history has played a geographic shell game with this information. It seems now that the best description I can apply to myself is Galician, a word used to describe an area of southern Poland while under Austrian rule. Of course, there is a Galician area of Spain, too, which has nothing to do with Poland but does muddy the waters even more.

I just finished A Short History of Tractors In Ukrainian, by Marina Lewycka which really isn't, but then again kind of is. The novel presents the idea that you might not have heroes in your family, but if they are Eastern European and survived the twentieth century, that was enough. Which seems to sum up my family's attitude towards their own story.

As for my story, I am still making that up as I go.

What It Is

2008-07-29T10:43:00.001-07:00

I have a hard time with labels, especially for the arts.

Dubstep, true crime, expressionism, fringe, documentary, trance, prairie style, bluegrass, romance, chamber, dada, ballet, easy listening, gothic, nonfiction, acid jazz, essay, collage, drum-n-bass, international style, contemporary, orchestral, drama, arte povera, ragtime, folk, neo-classical, rococo, Black Mountain, dancehall...

Absurdism? Yes.

Since I work in a library, labeling is important. After all, how else would people find things? And now that all information is floating around out there in the Internet ether, much time is being spent on ways to better locate what you want.

But really, it's all random, and my idea of a Mediterranean cookbook is not yours. The person in charge of the label maker is the one with all the power. Librarians and search engines both want to make it easy for me to find what I am looking for. But when do I ever know that for sure?

Sometimes the only thing that makes any sense is the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. And even then, only the first paragraph.

This is all a long way of saying that I intend to pay more attention to the labels on my posts...although it won't be easy for me (see above).

(My first attempt at labeling below was rejected because I included all of the second paragraph and that apparently was too much. So HA on your labeling, you lemmings!)

Embarrassment of Riches

2008-07-22T12:21:00.000-07:00

We recently bought a rug from our rug seller in Istanbul. He came to our house and sold us a rug that cost us, oh, thousands of dollars. Now, I can't tell anyone about it because the price embarrasses me. Also, the fact that I have a rug seller in Istanbul.

But wait! I'm only a lowly cruise ship passenger who bought a rug in port and the guy kept my name and called me when he was on business in the Midwest! And I don't have kids just so I can spend money on whatever I want! And it is beautiful!! And we wanted a rug! And it was still cheaper than the worst rug at Bloomingdales!!

Mostly, I am grateful for my shame. It means I am very bad at conspicuous consumption. Recently, I heard two people talking about how all their rich neighbors are gone on the weekends beacause they are at their summer homes. I could hear the eye-rolling in their voices. My in-laws have a summer home...but now you certainly won't know when I am going there (and why should I go anywhere when I have such a NICE RUG at home?)

Lake Gonaway

2008-06-10T11:37:00.000-07:00

If it was 30 years ago, I would be in Wisconsin Dells right now. This perennial family playground is where we went the week after I finished school for the year. It was perfect for everyone -- my dad and my uncles fished, I got to play mini golf and buy t-shirts, and my mom and my aunts could cook us dinner (she says with a post-feminist roll of the eyes). It was also about three hours from the Chicago area, which was a just-perfect amount of time in the car.

This week, though, we hear of a great tragedy in the Dells. Lake Delton is gone.

No one goes to the Dells for geology anymore, but if not for the geology, there would be no Dells. The glacial eroding of sandstone cliffs is what brought people there, and, as the family unit took to cars for vacation in the mid-20th century, Lake Delton became the Dells' resort area. It is a man-made lake, a damming of the Wisconsin River.

The dam has held. But recent torrential, unyielding rains tore away at an isthmus of sand that separated the lake from the river, and the lake drained in a matter of hours.

For me, this is heartbreaking. The Dells was my childhood Utopia. No work (or school), the family together, ice cream everywhere, rides that tickled your stomach. The colors were bright, the scenery was great, and there were waterslides. We had just-caught fish for dinner and made bonfires outside the cabin.

Is this on the scale of Hurricane Katrina's takedown of a major American city? Probably not. But it is a huge blow to the Wisconsin economy. It is also an engineering disaster, and perhaps, yet again, a reminder. Nature wins, people.

I Want a Clean-Shaven Man

2008-06-04T06:53:00.000-07:00

Guys, I may not be in the market for another partner/spouse, but I am still alive and not immune to the charms of the male species (my apologies for the purely hetero bent to this post). Or, at least I was, until y'all started wearing beards, faded t-shirts and thrift store pants.

Now, it must be acknowledged at this point that this is the male ideal I grew up with:

and wow, it still works for me today. So when I see men who look like this:

my heart sinks. Other parts of me fare just as badly. Men, I do not expect you to mow the lawn in your suits as it seems your forefathers did in the 1940s. I know we like to show our individualism through our clothes. I know shaving is a pain. But women have to do so much just to stay minimally attractive. Please meet us halfway. And for God sakes, comb your hair.

The Thing Called Loss

2008-05-14T08:55:00.000-07:00

There is no reason for me to be thinking of River Phoenix today, except that I had a dream about him last night. Maybe the reason, convoluted as this may seem, is that the release date of the fourth Indiana Jones movie is approaching and something seems to be missing. I always figured River would inherit the Indy role, as his tryout for it in The Last Crusade was spectacular. But fate intervened.

I spoke to someone recently who is an author escort on the day she took Chris Farley's brother around to Chicago media outlets to promote his book on the comedian, and maybe this, too, prompted the dream. As far as I know, no one this close to River has written a similar book. I think that's just fine. Silence is in keeping with the singluarity of River's presence on this earth. I know he was human and complex. I'd rather only his family and close friends know the details.

Sometimes I marvel at just how talented some people are. I was listening the other day to a live Rolling Stones album from the mid-1970s and was amazed at a version of Tumbling Dice that included both Keith's guitar and Billy Preston's organ, and I once again thanked God that these men met and were paid to play music. Once in a while, a David Bowie song will just shake me up with its genius -- the lyrics, the chords, the musical and literary influences he has harnessed. And then I think of River's performances in Running on Empty or The Thing Called Love and mourn for a career cut short and thank God that we have what we do from him. Every person's death diminishes me, especially those who touched me in some way. Today I am feeling that space where this actor was.

So what was my dream? It involved some sort of action movie set on a cruise ship. I was mostly watching it, but as the movie ended, I jumped in to shake River's hand and kiss him on the cheek, because I knew he would be gone soon.

Je Me Souviens Iran

2008-04-29T08:43:00.000-07:00

Finally saw Persepolis, which is not at all about religion (then again, with "polis" in the title, it wouldn't be). Marjane Satrapi's film version of her graphic novel is in some ways the other side of my story. A little girl in the late 1970s/early 1980s reacts to the uphevals in Iran. Except Satrapi did not just hear about these events in fourth grade. She lived them in Teheran. So let's talk about her story first, then I will briefly mention mine.

Little Marji watched as her country went from a dictatorship to war with Iraq to rule by Islamic revolutionaries. Two things seemed never to change: people getting executed and her family's loyalty to their country (rather than their country's politics). The idea of leaving Iran did not seem to be an option for her parents, although in the end they urged Marjane to move to France. Marjane's family was free-thinking and even included men who went to prison for their beliefs. Remaining in their country was not only an act of defiance but also a statement that they were as Iranian as those who demanded that women wear the veil and that martyrs die for the cause.

Marjane's bawdy grandmother chastized her for turning someone in to the police. Marjane argues that she had no choice. You always have a choice, her grandmother tells her. Even under opressive political situations, an individual's actions matter.

The movie was interesting to me because in 1980, when the Ayatollah Khomeini took power in Iran, my ten-year old self and my kiddie friends all were egged on to "hate" Iran and its leader. This was prompted, of course, by the hostage crisis, which was exhaustively (justifyably so) covered on American television. But Satrapi's work shows me what was going on in that despised country during this time. Little Marji, who was about my age, switches political beliefs hourly, and tries to get her friends to beat up on a kid with family connections to the Shah. I joined my classmates in making a pinata of the Ayatollah (we were involved in a study of Mexico). Unfortunately, it seems that the world is full of people whose political outlook has not progressed beyond that of a ten-year-old.

"Heroes"

2008-03-26T07:15:00.001-07:00

Two of my favorite men, together at last.

Thanks to marabou2005 (whoever you are..)

If It's A Clever Marketing Ploy, It Just Might Be Working

2008-03-12T09:21:00.000-07:00

Yikes. I might have, well, feelings for the Catholic Church. They've just updated the list of deadly sins, and I'm on board with most of them. Accumulating unnecessary wealth, pollution, human rights violations -- who runs the church, a bunch of socialist liberals?? And who do they think they are, bringing their theology into the modern world?

The only one I have a slight question on is genetic manipulation. Does this rule out any gene fix we discover that could end cancer? Or is that perched precariously on the famous slippery slope? I guess that's for Catholics to discuss, hopefully with other faiths.

Also, globalization -- good or bad? Good, if you're making more money than ever in a call center in India. Bad if your job used to be in a call center in Rapid City. But who is more worthy of that chance to make a living?

I think the answer on globalization is: it's here and that's that. How we deal with its effects? Perhaps the Catholic Church is offering some answers.

The International Museum of Me

2008-03-04T13:37:00.000-08:00

I am the executive director of a museum with a world-class collection of art. The Art Institute of Chicago's website lets you build your own collection. So for those of you who lack an art degree (or the scads of money that would let you boss those who do have art degrees around), you can now show off your taste and sophistication online.

My collection is heavy on modernism with some contemporary thrown in. Right now, many of the works I have chosen are not on display (presumably because the AIC is in the process of updating their 20th century galleries).

This sure is a lot easier than hanging and insuring all this stuff myself!

Less Nice, More F*#&K You

2008-02-12T11:16:00.000-08:00

Only current and former journalists may know or care that ubercapitalist Sam Zell now owns the Chicago Tribune. He's been making news lately not only because of the creativity/rapaciousness of the deal by which he acquired the plodding paper beastie, but also because of his, uh, unconventional corporate behavior. Like murmuring obscenities at a pesky photographer who asked one too many questions at a staff meeting. Zell has been keeping journo-bloggers panting from the exhastion of chronicling his many zany antics.

Well, to this I say it's fucking about time that we in corporate America (especially newspapers, for Christ's sake,) stop being such shitheads and start letting people be people, not workerbots. Swear a bit, tell a nasty joke, have a hot girl/boy/he-she on your desktop. Let a fish curry sandwich fester on your desk for three days. Don't think out everything you say before you say it. Dare to offend someone in the process of telling the truth.

Or, just take your meds, like a good girl.

Most Peculiar, Mama

2008-02-12T08:37:00.000-08:00

Sometimes, when I am bored, I try to come up with a hierarchy of Religious Figures on Earth. This usually ends with David Bowie somewhere near the top, but not at the top (for many reasons, one of which is the fact that I don't think he'd approve). George Harrison ends up somewhere there, too, as more of a sacred poet than prophet. I see Mick Jagger as Gabriel (he's the fallen one, right?) and Robert Plant as some sort of Methuselah tree-type thing growing in the California desert.

And then I feel I have to include John Lennon, although I am not historically a fan. We just watched The US vs John Lennon, which was very thought-provoking. First of all, did the goverment feel they really had to work that hard to discredit this guy? After all, the conservative right has taught us that all you have to do to make us suspicious of anyone or anything is play on our prejudices and fears. It's a lot easier than having J. Edgar work overtime.

Also, I really have more respect for John Lennon, the man and the artist. He seems like a smart, sweet, if naive, guy who had an eye and ear for the Next. And he could talk so intelligently off the top of his head! But we seem to have developed a strange blind spot about his relationship with Yoko Ono.

Soon to be released is a book of photographs by May Pang, who is described in the blurb I read as "the woman (Lennon) lived with while he was taking time off from Yoko Ono in the 1970s."

Taking time off? From your spouse? Can we do that?

If you change the world, I guess you can.

I Mythed That Day in School

2008-01-29T07:30:00.001-08:00

Travel does things to you, like spark an interest in Greek mythology that was never there before. I was always bored by stories of Greek gods, who seemed to be petty and spiteful and clearly made up by people who did not understand nature.

These characteristics can of course be seen today in the average person and presidential candidate. So gods, therefore, might have a hard time of it in a contemporary city. That's the premise of Gods Behaving Badly by Marie Phillips. Imagine that the "major" gods are all living together in a townhouse in London, conserving their dwindling powers and sniping at each other. Along come two mortals who get mixed up with Apollo et. al., and you get a quick primer on mythology and a cute story.

At first this book seemed too clever-clever for its own good. But Phillips managed to make marbly deities into flesh-and-blood characters, if that's possible. The mortals were quirky enough to hold me, too. The dialogue is astringent and often vulgar, and seems pitched quite right for millienia-worn supreme beings.

Artemis is the closest thing to a hero, here, with Apollo daring you to find him attractive. My only quibble now is that my fave god, Athena, is pretty two-dimensional, but Phillips did have a lot of them to deal with. Also, I think in the days of pagan past, one would probably favor three or four gods, much like Catholics have their favorite saints. Otherwise, how would you handle all these all-powerfuls competing for your attention?