On Hats

There has never been a time in my lifetime when it was necessary or fashionable to wear a hat on a daily basis. That is unless one is a male between the ages of 16-36, in which case one has no choice but to wear a baseball cap everywhere but in the shower. Or if you are some sort of Dungeons and Dragons nerd who finds it necessary to wear a top hat, because it gives you some sort of magical powers.  Still, those are just a few varieties of hat intended for a minority of human beings. Hats are really interesting, and sometimes I think it is a shame that we don't wear them anymore except to find shade or warmth. I suppose I prefer living in an age when I can go outside hatless without the neighbors thinking I've given up all respectability and decided to become a floozy, but it would be nice to wear a hat without it looking eccentric.

The other day I attended an event to honor one of our more heroic state representatives, and I was amused to see that in the short video tribute to her service this stately woman ALWAYS wore a hat. Not the same hat, mind you, but a different felt, feather, and studded confection to match her outfit. She looked like someone one had to take seriously (and probably shouldn't cuss in front of lest you wanted a slap across your saucy mouth). I could tell she was a force to behold even without her hats, but there is no doubt that her sartorial choices sealed the deal. She looked dignified without seeming imperious. Why don't more people go for this look?

Yesterday, while listening to that fucktard talk on his cell phone, I was temporarily distracted by an old man walking along the sidewalk wearing a blue woolen naval cap. You know, kind of like this:

It looked natural on him, and complemented his turtleneck and blazer ensemble perfectly. It got me to thinking, "Why that hat?" Is this guy a sailor by trade? Has he commanded a fleet, or at least set sail on the ocean blue? Has he hunted a great white beast that haunts his dreams, or sweltered under the heat of the noon-day sun as his ship languished in the doldrums? Has he cut an open course on a virgin sea, or found it true that the canvas can do miracles?

What does this guy know that the rest of us do not?

Another thought that occurred to me was that he might be wearing the hat in the unlikely event of a natural disaster, when society's rules become null and only an obvious leader can deliver us from certain doom. Imagine it: No electricity, no water, food must be rationed, the extreme couponers have barricaded themselves in their toilet paper and Tide filled basements, and no one can be trusted. But then you look up, and there's this man with captain's cap perched casually on his balding pate. Between him and the roving gang of listless 20-somethings cut off from their cellular plans, who are you going to trust. Yeah, the man with authority, that's who.

There is, now that I'm thinking about it, one type of hat that I want very much to fall out of favor, and that is the knit cap worn in summer. No matter how cool people think they look dressed this way, I've got no love for this look. The first type that comes to mind when I see this, is Skinny Pete from Breaking Bad. This guy is a useless tweaker, who may be loyal but you can't count on him to think. Why would anyone want to look like this character?

Skinny Pete has a point. I think he's made mine, too.

Ideas, Ideas!

Roz Chast gets it.

This afternoon I took a long walk up to a local cafe for a coffee and to get some reading done. The cafe is fairly large with many, many chairs and tables to sit at, but there were only three or four people in the place. No matter how small or large a room, most strangers tend to move as far apart from one another as possible, and it was my good fortune to find that the window seat was both the most secluded and quietest in the place.

Upon purchasing my reasonably priced and authentic macchiato (two shots of espresso, with a dollop of milk foam), I set myself up with a pad of paper and commenced to brainstorming blog ideas. It just seemed like the right thing to do at that moment, because the environment was so perfect for writing.  Within minutes, however, this ideal scene was interrupted by one of my fellow patrons, the dude who occupied the far corner of the room. Apparently, phone reception is none too strong in the back of the cafe, so he felt the need to move to the front of the room to take a call. And with that move, this nimrod moved to the top of my list of things to blog about.

It is no exaggeration to say that this guy decided that to take his phone call he needed to sit right next to me. Why, when there were 40 seats to chose from in the entire cafe? Perhaps he could have stepped into the other sparsely occupied, but large room where folks were engaged in conversation? Also, why couldn't he go outside? It was 60 degrees fahrenheit outside and sunny. Why the fuck did he need to settle down for a long and inane conversation right next to the only other person in the room? Thinking his actions crazy, I decided to let him know that he was introducing no small amount of irritation to the environment by turning myself toward him and overtly following what he was saying. I maintained an unwavering stare at him and tapped my pen on the table insistently hoping to attract his attention. Maybe all I had to do was gesture apologetically and insinuate gratitude if he would only go somewhere else. He did glance up at some point to see me giving him my full attention, but then he just turned his fat ass slightly to communicate that he was having a private conversation, thankyouverymuch. "Indeed," I thought, "this should be a private chat, Asshat, and I should not be privy to your fucking confab about the possibility that Apple might pay fucking dividends to their fucking stock holders, or that you might get an apartment in fucking Washington, D.C. this fucking summer."  I began to wonder, was this motherfucker raised by technologically dependent wolves?

Another thing I noticed was that espresso makes me cussy.

He did eventually can it and moved back to his seat, and I was able to return to my list. I was reminded of the advice recently posted at "Yeah, and Another Thing" that to find inspiration, one needed to get mad about something. How true! Because of this little trip to the coffee house, I may well have a dozen more blog posts to share. Write on!

Settling In

Two weeks into teaching and I think I'm starting to get my stride. This is the first weekend I've had to sit down and think about all the ways that I need to organize my life, and my GOD is there shit to get done. At this point in the morning I should probably put a higher premium on brushing my teeth, but I'm pretty comfortable in this chair, and Car Talk hasn't become so annoying as to send me out of the room...yet. (Those guys are good; I will not underestimate them.)

The Christmas decorations are down, but it has now been three weeks since I decided that I need to go out and buy some storage bins for them. Consequently, they are collecting dust in the corner of the living room, and when I glance over there the little wooden bear with a jaunty scarf around his neck seems to be giving me the stink eye. Once I get my teeth brushed and my hair dried, I really should take care of that business.

I've also got a fine pile of books to reckon with on my desk. Most just need to be put away, but I'm afraid that once I do that I'll forget all about them, and they'll never get read. Probably I'll leave them for another time.

Yesterday, I started following Courtney Stodden on Twitter and I couldn't be happier with this decision. Let me give you a taste of what this poetess/professional sexpot has to say:

http://cdn.videogum.com/files/2011/10/courtney_stodden.gif

"Provocatively poised out on my private sun-kissed patio in my plush bra & panties as I preciously paint a picture perfect... purrr..."

or

"Sweetly saturating my stimulated self beneath the shining sun as the starry sparkles on my stripped shape sublimely shimmer shades of sugar."

also

"Tenderly trembling my tantalizing tongue up - down & all around the sugarcoated candy-cane of Christmas! XOs"

and

"For GOD so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life." XOs"

Wait, what? Whatever...I decided to try my hand at Courtney's titillating take on twitter, and here is what I came up with:

 "I'm slithering swiftly past sexy and slipping spastically into something more sweatpants. Dang it! Sexy talk is hard!"

Here's the point: Courtney's good at this. I defy anyone of you to communicate entirely in sex-themed alliteration for any longer than it takes to string together a sentence. It may not be difficult from a grammatical standpoint, but it will wear you and anyone you are talking to out, either because none of it makes sense or because it is mind-boggling stupid behavior. YOU CAN'T DO IT! Courtney can, and that should tell you something (I'll leave what that thing is up to you).

Anyhoo...I need to prep for class on Tuesday. You know your parents were right in making you do your homework before you went out to play. It is so much nicer to have the job behind you rather than have to stop having fun in order to work. I'm not following your parents advice, because I'm not sure they have my best interests in mind, but I'll concede the philosophically salient underpinnings of their discipline. So today, I'm going to waste a whole mess of time and let the sense of duty wear me down such that I don't really enjoy my freedom. That's how my parents raised me and that is how I get things done. 

Pen Pals

Back in high school, I was one of those goody-goody types who enjoyed nothing more than getting together with other teens and thinking up ways to convince others to "Just Say NO!" The group I was in, Youth 2 Youth, was like Young Life, but for secular teetotalers, and we were invited into elementary schools to perform skits meant to make children believe that the cool kids didn't "get stupid." Now, to be fair to myself, I wasn't a dork and many of my co-abstainers were totally normal individuals who simply didn't get why anyone wanted the trouble that drug-use invariable brought upon a house. Most of us joined the group because it was good for our pre-college portfolio, ensured sanctioned absences from class, and generally put us in good favor with school authorities. When you are 15 and come from a stable home, these are the benefits that matter.

Part of the "fun" of Youth 2 Youth was the 4-day retreats designed to teach us how to be effective speakers and communicate compelling confidence. For some reason, they were all in Ohio. Anyway, I met some really cool people at these events, and in one case, I became deeply attached to a girl named Mindy. She and I knew instantly that we were soul-mates, an assumption based entirely on our mutual passion for Depeche Mode. It was our shared opinion that we were literally the most interesting people in Kent, Ohio that weekend, and when the retreat was over, we actually sobbed at the realization that we might never see each other again. All we had was the promise that we would write each other every day to maintain our close connection.

It is fascinating to think about how much emotion could erupt in such a short period of time. I can't speak for Mindy, but I believe that friendship was one of the most important of my life. Not long after the retreat, my family moved to Florida, and I was removed from the social world that I had taken for granted. I had to break up with a boyfriend and say goodbye to people with whom I assumed I'd always be friends. Because Mindy lived in New York, hers was the one friendship that did not change while everything else became unstable. During my junior year of high school, Mindy was my soul confidant and I poured all of my teen misery, enthusiasm, judgment, and wonder into the handwritten letters I sent her nearly every other day. Confirming the authenticity of our friendship, she always wrote back with as much passion, vulnerability, and humor as she received.

Eventually, Mindy and I parted ways. The letters became less frequent our senior year, largely because we both started dating boys with whom we became serious. The boyfriends replaced our friendship as the repository of all our feelings, and we both casually moved on. Often I missed her dearly, but by the time we went off to college, we just didn't keep up with each other at all. I think she went to Colgate.

Considering how little stock I put into archiving my own life, it may surprise many people to learn that I still have every letter Mindy ever wrote me packed up in a sweater-sized cardboard box in my closet. I haven't revisited that box since I packed it up before going off to college, but I'm glad I have it. I imagine myself thirty years from now returning to that friendship and reading those letters as a way of celebrating life.

So, with all of this in mind, I send a shout-out to my great friend Mindy Marranca with this song by the Katydids. Because she lived near Canada, she could tune into Much Music, and was forever introducing me to new stuff. This song has somehow remained especially hers:


"Lights Out" by the Katydids (not this acoustic version, but it's OK)

Love's Theme

The trend tearing up the facebooks right now asks one to post a youtube video for the song that was the #1 single on the day one was born. Sweet Pickles managed to turn the whole project on its head by picking the song (Toni Basil's "Mickey") that fit his ideal birth date, the veracity of which will not be questioned. Figuring he could not be outdone, I decided to go with my actual birthday to see what song was playing on the transistor radio where I was being born that cold day in February 1974. What a joy to discover that I couldn't have jokingly picked a better song to introduce my infant self to this mortal coil: you can go to wikipedia and type in "hot number 1 singles of [your birth year]" and scroll through the weeks to find your birth song. Let me know what it is in the comments section, would you?