The Oscars - All Is Lost

Ah, Hollywood on Oscars day. While I think this was a strong year for film, I'm almost boycotting the awards this year. Not boycotting exactly, but watching under duress. And that is because of the lack of this man. My Main Man. Our Man, Mr. Redford. 

I don't think acting is about losing a bunch of weight or pretty people making themselves look ugly or wearing a skirt when you're Jared Leto. I think actions speak louder than words. 

This was an epic snub to the most watchable man alive. That's all I have to say. Good night.

Sunday Scribbles - Untitled

my love is nimble

quick on its feet

for hide and go seek;

a child of science

shrinks down smiling

hides in cabinets

springs forth with soft laughter

to take up all the space in the room

solid

or melts to liquid, seeping into cracks

rises up gaseous

settles in a dew all around

takes on life again but

curls up in your lap to sleep and 

asks for nothing save the sound of us talking

requires no consistent shape

known only for the phosphorescent tail that trails behind it

unless otherwise noted, all poetry copyright Ryann Ferguson

Following Steve McCurry & The Last Ever Kodachrome Quest

Thirty-six frames and out. I've talked before about Steve McCurry being bequeathed the last ever roll of Kodachrome film.  I've been writing about contemporary art in Istanbul lately for a freelance job and so of course, this melancholy story is coming full circle for me. 

The prints from Steve McCurry's Kodachrome finale were recently on display at the Istanbul Modern. (Also on McCurry's website.) DeNiro, New York, India!

But most especially, NOW there is a new documentary about the experience, from National Geographic-- the organization that helped to make Steve McCurry famous when they put his Afghan Girl on the cover. Check it out, ya'll. Kodachrome may be dead, but the stories aren't.

Become You. The NPR version of You.

Pretty much all of my adult life, I've been looking to make my life circumstances align with my deeply-held idea about myself as an avid NPR listener. Only one other-- brief, beautiful-- time was I able to make it a real fabric of my day. That was when I was working my worst job to date: as studio assistant to a world-famous lighting designer in New York. 

For the months I had this part time gig (before she flipped out and called me incompetent for not reading her mind) I came to associate the morning pleasant lull of WNYC with the lighting designer being in a good mood. When she was travelling, I'd flip it on just for my own pleasure while I watered her ficus plants and cacti. Before that, in my childhood, I associated it with night driving and my father and laughing to Prairie Home Companion. Now, I equate it with the mental state I'm after. 

But Los Angeles. Oh, Los Angeles and my sunny Hollywood spot. My home now was made for NPR. Just today, my best friend Emily said, "Don't you love the NPR in LA? KCRW?" And I do! It's one of the few realities that live up to my fantasies of it. In my mind, I'd flip on an old radio to KCRW on misty Los Angeles mornings while I make coffee. I sit at my little kitchen table in my robe, taking my sweet time, and I laugh and am enlightened on all foreign policy and art issues I care about, but feel sometimes overwhelmed by, and I learn about all kinds of new things to hold my interest. The only difference between my fantasy and the reality is that I listen on my NPR iphone app. Sometimes I pick and choose stories and sometimes I flip to WNYC when I miss New York. But I am utterly happy when I do this. 

One of my favorites is The Moth. True Stories told live by artists and interesting people ranging from relative obscurity to relative and/or fading fame. Storytelling. Mmm. "Storytelling for everyday raconteurs." You go, Peabody judges. 

It's like a dream come true. They're all very real and basic and often simple and always poignant while revealing some mono no aware thing about living. Recently, I laughed in every room of my house while writer Walter Mosley told a wonderful and very real story about identifying language and its meaning. It is a delight. I cannot recommend enough. 

Also check out my old friend Suzanne Vega on Stage Fright. 

Sometimes, I lament that we have no BBC. But then I remember NPR and I am soothed again. 

Happy 100th Birthday, Rice University!

Today, I am wishing a wonderful Centennial Celebration to my beloved alma mater, Rice University. We are a small, strange, and lovely place. I hope we will always fight to keep it that way. We are a small, strange, and lovely group of people; filled with wild, brilliant, silly thoughts. 

I had a hard and lesson-filled four years there.  I remember the joy of winning the world series, jumping in Gillis's pool (no longer the president's house. They've filled the pool in now) and the more than one occasion I sat locked in my car out in the parking lot, staring up at the stadium and crying. They were an intense four years. Sometimes it just felt good to cry it out. In many ways, I think I made the absolute most of them. In other ways, I wish I'd worked a lot harder. 

But out of all my decisions, in my whole life, no decision (or the lead up to it) has had more impact on my life than choosing Rice. It is the fulcrum on which the everything else pivots: my career, my friends, the way I interact with the people I keep in my life. 

I haven't always agreed with the direction our current president has taken the school, but I insist that there exists an inherent Rice-ness at the soul of those swampy acres that no ambitious professional academic administrator could squash. Try all you like, but I think you'll never make Rice like Duke or Columbia or Harvard. And I'm glad for that fact. I always think of the West Wing: Let Bartlet Be Bartlet. 

Let Rice Be Rice. 

I wish I could be there to celebrate homecoming with everyone, but I am sending all my love and thanks to a place I love so dearly. Happy Birthday, Rice. Gurrrrl, you look good for 100. Go Owls. 

Positively Fourth Street, Always.

Fourth Street. Start on Avenue C. Losaida. Walk all the way from Avenue C to West 4th. Recalling every in and out, every short cut through a garden. Past my first apartment with no lock where I made my best friends, and Perbacco--  the best Italian restaurant in New York. Past the housing project where we watched that man look up at the sun and then die. Watching a group of friends help each other move a mattress. Remembering when my friends helped me carry my things west from 4th & B to 4th & 2nd, which burned down, but has now been rebuilt. 

Some things, I remember the old: the new bar, Dorian Gray, that once used to be the tribal jewelry store (no surprise that disappeared) and others, I only remember used to be something else. Some place else I never frequented. 

The same guys still work in the bodega. Belcourt looks exactly the same and I bet still serves amazing Bloody Marys, but it's called Caliope now. Past what was once Cuppa Cuppa, where a mean middle aged New York lady named Jenny eventually became my friend after about a year of me wearing her down with smiles when I bought my iced-coffee everyday. (Just proving every hardened New Yorker still wants a friend.) I wonder if the FAB center bought her out, or if she had to close anyhow. I hope she's happy and retired somewhere and not lonely. 

Past all the places along 4th and Washington Square Park where Steven and I dumped pieces of our set after VOTE! at Minetta Lane closed. We were so stealth. We didn't want to get arrested. We were high on margaritas. We had crowbars. It was one of the funnest nights ever. Who doesn't like being in league with someone? Being part of a low-stakes conspiracy? 

I'm in league with New York City. She's like my big sister who keeps my secrets from our parents. 

New York, in many ways,  is like that older sister. She taught you everything you know, She's cooler than you, She often pretends to be indifferent to you, or even annoyed by your presence, but actually, she loves you. And you love her. I may not always choose to live here in New York City, choose to live my life the way she does, but I'll always love her, conspire with her and look up to her best. 

A New Yorker is Someone Who Longs For New York

A lot has come and gone in New York since when I last lived here two years ago. H & H Bagels is gone. On the flip side, we have an Experimental Cocktail Club. And last week, we learned that Broadway/Times Square Main stay, Colony Music would close its doors. 

This disappearing act and others are all being documented by Jeremiah Moss on his blog, Jeremiah's Vanishing New York, aka the Book of Lamentations: A Bitterly Nostalgic Look at a City in the Process of Going Extinct. 

It is a melancholy blog that you can't help but feel achey scrolling through-- memory after memory of places lost to New York's escalating rents, corporate buy-outs, and fickle tastes. He says goodbye to all kinds of things I didn't even know we'd lost: the Les Desirs bakeries and the  Partners & Crime Mystery Bookshops. 

Justin Davidson of New York Magazine called Moss, "the defender of all the undistinguished hunks of masonry that lend the streets their rhythm and give people a place to live and earn a living: bodegas, curio stores, a metalworking shop in Soho, diners, and dingy bars."

He's expanded into an additional blog: Dreams of a Vanishing New York, where he posts his dreams and those of other New Yorkers. He started this side project after he noticed he'd be having dreams about the vanishing aspects of New York's character. 

Though, he's also quick to point out that it's not just what's going away, but what's replacing it. I don't know that I agree with him on the High Line, but I see his point. And cities built on tourism are kind of a common thread in my lifetime. 

I always think of the monologue in the wonderful You've Got Mail, on the night when Kathleen Kelly is closing her bookstore. 

People are always saying that change is a good thing. But all they're really saying is that something you didn't want to happen at all... has happened. My store is closing this week. I own a store, did I ever tell you that? It's a lovely store, and in a week it'll be something really depressing, like a Baby Gap. Soon, it'll be just a memory. In fact, someone, some foolish person, will probably think it's a tribute to this city, the way it keeps changing on you, the way you can never count on it, or something. I know because that's the sort of thing I'm always saying. But the truth is... I'm heartbroken. I feel as if a part of me has died, and my mother has died all over again, and no one can ever make it right. 

Which is all to say, I think this is indicative of an even bigger problem-- in our spheres of employment and occupation and our interests. A massive consolidation of value controlled by "the market." Cannibalizing the specialties to feed the consolidated giants. There's a lot we choose not to concern ourselves with. There's a lot of world out there, but we seem to be sticking to our comfort zones. Even I'm at Starbucks right now because I know what I'm going to get and they have free internet. But it depresses me. 

This is an American Soul question to me. (And a human soul question.) One we're not going to immediately get to the bottom of, for sure. But I think it's important for us to not breeze past it on the way to whatever we're going to do next. I think Jeremiah Ross's blog is that moment before movement. We have to at least sit with it for a while, roll it around in our thoughts and then proceed.  At least then we'll be able to say wherever we end up, it wasn't by accident, because we were too busy to pay attention. Wherever we end up, we'll be able to say we did it deliberately. 

“There is this sense of powerlessness as the city is being radically changed around them and the things they love about it are being taken away,” Mr. Moss said. “There’s this anxiety about being discarded. A lot of the dreams have to do with destruction and the fear of destruction, but there’s also a wish for destruction. I think underneath the anxiety, is the thought that if the thing you fear happens, then you don’t fear it anymore.” 

For Alyson & Dion, On Their Wedding

It was my great honor, this past Sunday, to stand under the chuppah with my best friends and say a few words-- some mine, some Don Paterson's-- about their great love and our shared experiences together over the last seven years. The two of them remain constant sources of inspiration to me to stay patient, to enjoy it all, and that loyalty to those you love really is its own reward. Here's what I said. It was a really beautiful day and I'm so grateful I could be a part of it. More from the wedding to come. 

For Aly & Dion

August 5, 2012

I spend a lot of time thinking about geography. So I'd like to say a little bit today about finding your way.  

There's a kind of emotional geography to these readings-- what you'll write and what you'll say-- in that, the spot on the map you're aiming for is the sentiment that is equally true of the bride and groom's relationship as it is of your personal feelings about them. That's why I'd like to start in New York City and end in Scotland, both old and new. 

New York is the kind of place where serendipity doesn't hide. It's right around every corner, on every subway platform, in every artistic partnership formed at a bar, in every answered craigslist ad. This is how we all came to be together today. Even though New York is on a grid system, it can still be remarkably easy to feel lost on occasion. It's the kind of place that serves as a proving ground that we are capable of making our way in the world alone....

But also that it is easier... and sweeter... when we go together. The way any number of people can see off the light of a single candle... and how that candle loses nothing by lighting others from its flame.  This is the best way I can think of describe both Aly and Dion. What they represent to me, to each of us here, and to each other. 

I'd like to quote my friend, the great Scottish poet (and rockstar!) Don Paterson: "And the true path was as lost to me as ever, when you cut in front and lit it as you ran. See how the true gift never leaves the giver; returned and redelivered."

For me (especially for me) and for each other, you have served as beacons-- lighting the path in front with your glowing, inimitable 'Aly&Dion-ness,' providing unparalleled comfort & relief, and signaling the way home. Which perhaps has never been a spot on the map at all-- never here nor there-- but which has always been together. 

You Have Got to Be Here - Last of London

Today is my last full day in the UK. I had a lovely chat and two cappuccinos this morning with the dear Helen MacInnes, who also helped me pack. And now, I'm doing thoselast odds and ends-- or bits and bobs--  under the sun, and occasional rain, here in London. 


There's a lot I'm going to miss. There's a lot I'm not going to miss, too. But mostly, when I look back on my time in London, I'll think of it as a place of near misses--- one that almost could have been perfect, but like most amazing things in life, slipped away.  One more of the beautiful ephemera. 


If you'll forgive a bit more Frank Ocean, "My friend said it wasn't so bad/ You can't miss what you ain't had/ Well, I can."


I'll miss the way the sun reflects off Regent's Canal. I'll miss the poetry of local places. And how you can have friends who live in converted gun factories.I'll miss the squares and the way so much of London feels like a heart-- with big arteries and little veins and how turning a corner can take you to a kind of London totally different from the previous street. I'll especially miss the smell of jasmine that floats through the air all over my neighborhood. 


There's the old saying the devil is the details. And this is certainly true. Especially of my time here, when so many things were nearly mine. When so much almost-but-not-quite worked out. But, of course, the saying derives from an earlier idiom, God is in the details. And this is even more especially true. 


My former boss and dear friend, Bob Hofmann, once did a really great impression of his old drama teacher-- in that very exaggerated drama teacher kind of way-- "YOU have got to BE HERE." About committing to the scene. We used to laugh and bring it up in all kinds of situations. But I have carried it with me everywhere I've ever gone. Even when you know you're not long for a particular place, you can't go wrong being present in that place every moment you have it. That act alone is as sweet as the jasmine I will miss so very much about this beautiful-- if rainy, and lonely-- city. 

On My Last Day in Scotland

On my last day in Scotland, I woke up not quite knowing where I was and then remembering I was in a place where so many of my happiest Scotland memories live: Zaza's flat on Howe Street. 
On my last day in Scotland, I drank Artisan Roast and told Sophie about my brother. 
On the way there, we saw this sign. And I literally had to stop, in the street, and laugh. For a while. 
On my last day in Scotland, for once, it wasn't windy. 


On my last day in Scotland, I sorted through some old clothes while Sophie played me the piano version of Song I Never Wrote For You. When she played it again, this time singing, I started to cry thinking about how much I would miss her, and my life here, and thinking about Fred, who I never met, but felt like I did because of Sophie and her music. 


On my last day in Scotland, there was some business as usual, as I prepare for jobs and work in New York. I paid some bills. I still had to write this blog. But mostly, I am trying to be in this place, one last time for now. Soak up the paintings of tragic queens in galleries and light through the arched museum windows, and my friends, who will always always be a high priority for me. No matter how my priorities change, I think it's safe to say that people always have and always will be my priority.


On my last day in Scotland, we'll have a dinner party at Anna's once more. We'll dance around the living room to Sam Cooke-- or maybe someone will even try to make me ceilidh. I hope not. But I hope that Torcuil winds me up and Taylor calls me Ryann. Ferguson. And Zeph calls me Small American. And we own it. I hope I cry some more and hug people a little too long and laugh too loudly. 


These years have been priceless. I can't believe they happened to me. 

Sorkin & Cynicism... and Sara McC

Today, I am celebrating the birth of someone I don't get emotional over enough. Her name is Sara McCleskey and on this blog, I refer to her often as McC. 


I have said before I think there are very few human relationships that are actually equal. One person is normally more invested than the other one. In my life, this over-invested person has normally been me. 


Even with my best friends, I always got the sense that I probably cared a little more than they did. I was, maybe a little too earnest. That's okay. I'm an alien and I don't mind giving a shit more than the average. But Sara McCleskey was probably my first genuine friendship of equality. Where I knew she would show up just as often and just as hard as I showed up. And I show up hard, people. For that, and for a couple of other things-- one I'm about to get to next-- I feel a gratitude I can actually only express to her in the form of odd humor and constant-- and I mean constant-- link-feeding to her facebook wall. 


Because it hurts your (my) earnest little heart to be understood so much. To have your weirdness appreciated. To be appreciated for the very the thing that the cool and snarky prevailing sentiment of today would mock you for. That's why I'm talking about Sara McCleskey in a post about Aaron Sorkin, his new show The Newsroom, and cynicism. (Well, that and because clearly, Sorkin also has an appreciation for the Ulster Scot last names beginning with Mc.) 


Critics (ugh, my least favorite people on the planet. Perhaps even more so than bankers, health insurance companies, mechanics and thugs) have almost universally panned the show. And there are some glaring faults, I admit. (All of which I think are hit on here.) But I also agree with the point made in that last paragraph that we've become so comfortable with cynicism that we can't even dream anymore. 


I loathe cynicism. Which is why I'll always love Sorkin, even when he's corny. Or perhaps especially when he's corny. I just call it earnest. Which is also why it was one of the greatest compliments of my life when Sara McC quoted the following as something she thought I could have written; something I stand for:


"To casually and sloppily take down, to ironize, to sneer comes very naturally to us, we can do it in our sleep, but to care, to try, to want, are harder. And to admit that you care or are trying or are wanting, well, forget it: Those will be impossible."

Cynicism is both the thing that occasionally makes me want to not get out of bed in the morning, and the thing that gets me out of bed so I can fight it. I'm not trying to piss anyone off. I just think we can be better to each other. That we can say "Yes, And" more often. Here's my ask for today: please, let's be better to each other, in the way we talk about things. On the internet, in person, everywhere. 


I haven't always made friends this way-- insisting that we be better to each other, insisting we don't ignore each other. But I like to think it pays off in the long run. It isn't a perfect process. But I think people are thankful in the long run when they can do it. Dan Rather agrees! I mean, can we talk about the fact that DAN RATHER is recapping the show for -- Queen of Snark, GAWKER?-- Surely this is a point for the good guys, right? Rather, like me, felt that the third episode was amazing. I agree with everything Dan Rather says. How can you not??


I've missed Sorkin's optimism on my television screen. I'm happy to have it back so I feel like I'm not the only out of fashion fool who wants us all to be better. Well, me and Sorkin and birthday girl Sara McCleskey-- my own personal talisman for optimism in the face of gloominess. 


(At least we haven't been murdered!)


PS- Newman is doing some of his best work here. Am I right??

Some Thoughts on Fathers and Daughters Today

Time again for my annual Father's Day Shout out. This year, it's a tale of three fathers. 


Twenty years ago my life changed forever when I worked up the courage to tell my own dad about how bad the situation had gotten with my mom. My dad was the first person to make me think that what I had to say was important-- even when it wasn't life or death. He never rushed me. He's never been bored or ever encouraged me to get to the point. He's talked me down from every ledge, through every problem of logic or of the heart. He's been so steadfastly on my team for whatever ridiculous goal I've ever had, even to this day, it scares me that in my life, I have at least one person I cannot lose. Because of this, he's the person I care most about making proud of me. 


Which is not say he's just a prop for my life. He's one of most talented, weird, cool people to ever live. In truth, I basically just hope he's as proud of me as I am of him. I  never used to think our personalities were the same, but the older I get, the more I'm seeing how similar at least our artistic temperaments are. 


Ten years ago, my life changed again when I lost another temperamental soul mate of mine, and a great glue of our family: my grandfather. I can't believe it's been ten years without him. The thought of it knocks the wind out me. I still recall so so vividly how far away, how lost at sea I felt when he died and I was in Japan. It still feels vert present, the memory of scribbling furiously my multi-multi page letter to him, when I knew the end was near. How the letter arrived just in time for Father's Day. How he was gone the next week. The traces of him are harder to find since I've moved to the UK, though I still run into him in thoughts that are not my own, but clearly the opinion of James A. Ferguson, just using me as a conduit. 


Seven years ago, I met another father who continues to blow me away. I know I focus a lot of my love on Aly, but I think it's important that I recognize the other half of one of my all-time favorite couples: Dion. In my own generation, he's the father I'm most inspired by. His daughter Hayley was born just in time for his 18th birthday. At at 18, this guy just went to it, putting his kid first in every way possible. I'm in awe of the way he talks to Hayley-- the way he strikes a balance between support and discipline-- (he allows no bargaining. It blew my mind) and what a wonderful young lady Hayley is turning out to be. It warms my heart that he was able to turn his devotion to supporting his daughter into amazing business skills, and then to get the eff out of Lehman Bros just in time, to start an amazing business with Aly, and (just like seeing my dad be able to realize his musical dreams makes me happy) finally make himself into the music artist he always wanted to be. You are truly, unequivocally, without a doubt one of the good guys, Dion. I feel blessed to know you. And comforted knowing you're gonna look after my friend Aly for the rest of your lives. I can't wait to celebrate with you both this August. And I'm celebrating with you and your song today. 


Keep being awesome out there fathers. And I will line up every year to gush. Shower. The. People. 

The Artist

Today was a little gem of a day. My pal Betsy treated me to lunch and a catch up session followed by a viewing of Michel Hazanavicius's silent film, The Artist. I was curious to see it for several reasons. It's the kind of old Hollywood adorable deal that has my name written all over it, but I wanted to know 1. Could my attention span really take a silent film? 2. Could they sustain whatever adorableness they might start across a proper feature length? 3. Was it really as good as all the reviews said?


The short answer to all three is Yes. It is delightful and lovely and fresh and offbeat. It's like a little package of peppermints. 


It's physicality for days, sparse but supremely witty dialogue cards, and dancing...oh, the dancing. There's even the most adorable dog bits, and everyone knows there's no love lost between me and the pups. 


French actor Jean Dujardin is like a cross between Errol Flynn, Fred Astaire & Rudy Valentino. And is one of the best examples I can think of to prove that you don't have to have perfect teeth to have an absolutely winning smile. 


His chemistry with Berenice Bejo makes even the audience blush-- and while she's great-- the movie belongs to Jean as George Valentin, the declining silent film star. Well, Jean and Uggie the pooch. Please see it. I'd consider it a personal favor. Happy Saturday!

Top 11 of '11 - Books

Saving the books category for last just feels right considering the place of honor they occupy in my life. Though, this is the first year that I'm including any non-fiction. I'm pretty proud of myself for expanding into non-fiction-- not that I don't read a lot of it-- I do. It's just that non-fiction never seems as good to me as fiction. For fairly obvious reasons. I'm not going to give myself too much credit though, because the only two that I read and loved that actually came out this year are humor books by some heroines of mine. (Okay and a shout out to someone we lost this year.) (Other amazing non-fiction I read this year, but didn't come out this year include AL Kennedy's On Bullfighting & Mary Karr's Lit.) But, without further ado, here are my top 11 books of the year. 


11. Arguably. Essays
RIP, Hitch. You will be missed. 


10. Swamplandia!
I tried to avoid Karen Russell's book and found that I could not. I'm the only one allowed to put exclamation marks in titles, right? Wrong. Honestly, the book is full of eccentricities and I'm not even sure how to describe it. Only that I think  you should read it. 


9. Bossypants
One of my favorite things about Tina Fey's book is that she reads it herself in the audio book version, so naturally, that's the version I got. Thanks, too, Tina for having this come out on my birthday. That was sweet of you.  I keep going back to how bad I feel for Brits who didn't get to grow up with Saturday Night Live. This just warmed my heart. Though Brits still won't be able to watch. Sigh. 




8. The Stranger's Child
Alan Hollinghurst taught me a thing or three about how to pace a historical telling that spans 60 years or so, all through interludes at English country houses. I don't know that I'll ever slow my pace to his speed, but it was nice reminder to slow the eff down. A great story, and a lovely portrait of the way time acts on us. Click here for more. 


7. The Art of Fielding
Chad Harbach's first novel is on just about everybody's top list and for good reason. Despite an over-arching sports metaphor, which normally I'd sort of loathe, I loved the book for its pith and precision. And I suppose if one must use a sports metaphor, at least he used baseball. 


6. Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns)
Mindy Kaling is the best. I'm putting her ahead of Tina Fey just because people are always comparing the two...sort of for no reason...isn't it possible for more than one woman to be extremely funny? In completely different ways? Her best friend rights and responsibilities is amazing. And I dedicate them to Emily Vi. 


5. 1Q84
Haruki Murakami, you outdo yourself again. How can you make the decline of humanity so appealing and humorous? I have such a soft-spot for Japanese writers. I love your play on the title, which as a Japanese speaker, I smiled immediately about. Ichi Kyuu Hachi Yon. Nine in Japanese is kyuu. The characters, the sense of place, it was perfect. (Long, but perfect.)


4. The Marriage Plot
This isn't Jeffrey Eugenides' best. And I still think he's kind of eye-roll inducingly pretentious (I  mean, people are always going on about my Franzy being a dick! Just listen to Eugenides!) but nevertheless, I was SO excited to read this. And I enjoyed every minute of it. I don't care how many times he says Leonard isn't DFW... the dude clearly is. For more, read this & this. 


3. There But For The
It was an honor to be given this book by the amazing Ali Smith herself the day after graduation. I loved the idea of a stranger locking himself in someone's spare room. The idea of strangers in general. How known any of us are to each other and to ourselves. And the characters are so expertly drawn, I jammed through this book like lightning. For more. 


2. The Pale King
I think it says something about a writer, namely, this one: David Foster Wallace, that his unfinished novel is better than most I've read. And obviously ambitious. A novel about the tedium of life (set in the IRS) that itself was not tedious? I wish he'd finished it. He hadn't quite succeeded or completed the task. But bless him for trying. For more. 


1. The Submission
Some called it a "rare and dangerous feat" and I agree. Quite simply, I was blown away by both the simplicities and honest complexities in Amy Waldman's book. I empathized with every character. I felt myself as a New Yorker in the central dilemma. And I don't think America or New York is anywhere near done dealing with 9/11, it memorial place in our city or our relationship with Islam. For more. 

America-bound Links

Tomorrow, I'm going to tell you about perhaps the worst film I've ever seen-- which I saw last night-- I'd vent now, but I don't like to put out too much negative energy on days when I travel, so instead, we'll have some links! 


This week, pretty much all of these are courtesy of the illustrious McC. 


- Who knew famous authors answered stock questionnaires sent by headstrong kids?
- The love, actually and hate, actually of Love, Actually. I died. 
- More instagram prints
- Graduate School Barbie. So. True.
- The science of sarcasm. Yeah, right. 
- The McCartneys in Scotland, 1969
- I heart Google Street View
- Low-tech high tech
- This has been done before, but this one is better. I love all the people in the room just continuing to type. Feck, I miss SNL living in Britain.


- Your favorite Kanye West Tweet embroidered!! (...!!!) This was maybe my favorite thing of 2011. When I order mine, I'm trying to decide between "Fur pillows...are hard...to actually sleep on," and "Do you know where to find marble conference tables? I'm looking to have a conference...not until I get the table though." Luckily, you can get a discount if you order three!! So I can get my third favorite: "Man, whatever happened to my antique fish tank?" This Christmas Camper is HAPPY. 


Off to fly! Edi to London City, Cab to Heathrow, Heathrow to the Ve-gas. 

This is how I feel...

...About being back in Edinburgh and back in my room! Hallelujah for the return of normalcy (or at least some semblance of it!) to my life. I might write in my comfy bed all weekend. Happy Friday, everyone! Here's a song. 

One Hand in the Air for the Big City

Every year, I feel a lot on this day. Every year, there's a lot I want to say. Thinking about my friends I lost that day. How most of the day, and even days later, I still didn't know they were gone. I was in Houston, which is where I'll be again next week. It just wasn't computing that day and I couldn't think of what to do. The only thing I could think was that I wanted to talk about art, so I went to Chipotle with my friend Jason Pallas, who was the person I liked talking about art with the best. I had no idea my friends were gone. 


I think about David Aoyama the most, every year on this day. My Buddhist practice has lulled a bit these last few years, but I always feel comfort knowing David was on flight 11 as it hit the first tower chanting Nam Myoho Renge Kyo-- all the way-- for those around him, and for us all. 


And when I start to tally up our mistakes since that day, ten years ago-- there's so many--  instead, I try to think about things like this. Kids singing. And kids singing in the invincible spirit of New York. It's actually my favorite thing about VOTE! Maybe even why I wrote it. Definitely why I wrote the title number. I'd allow a lot of criticisms of where I'm from, but our spirit isn't one of them.


When I start to get angry about why it took so long to rebuild anything down there, to fill those gaping wounds in my favorite-- the best-- city in the world, I try to remind myself that in the year since I've left, they've managed to build the section of the memorial I liked best: twin rectangular waterfalls that flow into the void of where the buildings used to stand. Reminding us what we lost. Reminding us to keep going. 

Margaret Mitchell: American Rebel

You leave the United States for ONE YEAR and you miss something like this! In commemoration of the 75th Anniversary of the greatest novel ever written, Georgia Public Broadcasting made this feature on the life of my dear, esteemed Margaret Munnerlin Mitchell Upshaw Marsh. Sigh. Who DVR'ed this? Help me!


Annoyingly, the site won't let me embed these videos, except the one "newsreel"y one below. But (aside from some not-very-well-written voice-over copy on them) they're pretty good and worth watching. Especially this one.


Oh, girl. Ever since I was about ten years old, I've just felt like I understood her. In fact, for several long tracts of my adolescent years, I was thought I might be the reincarnation of the GWTW author. (I was very precocious. Obviously.) "Very volatile. Emotionally and psychologically." Ha. 


If you're like me and must feed your obsession (McCleskey. Dena.) you can check out the press kit too. 

Good ideas! - And today is the last day!

I just think Snail Mail My Email is delightful! And sadly today is the last day! So hop to it! Send an email to snailmailmyemail@gmail.com and one of over 200 volunteers will hand write it out and mail it to your person...for free! I miss getting handwritten mail. (So it's not too late to send one to ME!) And just look at their gallery of mail already sent!

In a culture overrun with instant gratification and on-demand services, this project cultivates appreciation for the lost art of letter writing.

Word up to that. What a good idea. Here are some other good ideas, and things making me happy this Monday, my last full day in NYC.  

-Warren Buffet, Amen to this. 

- Cute blog from VOTE! cast member

- Interesting article about webseries

- A.L. Kennedy Podcast!

My Favorite Holiday

Even though there are a lot of holidays I don't care for so much, there is one that is my absolute favorite-- it's today! Father's Day! I'm all about celebrating them.


Father's Day always reminds me of those last days with my grandfather, when I sensed the end was near, and frantically wrote the longest letter I've ever written (which is saying something, since I tend to specialize in long letters) and mailed it from Japan. I still write him a letter every year around this time. I had a lot to say to him this year.

I don't normally get to spend Father's Day with my dad, but I am sending love from a far. And one of the coolest things about my dad is that he understands exactly why I can't stay, could never stay close to home. This Father's Day (and probably a few more) sponsored by Skype. 

My dad wrote me the above message in high school and it goes with me pretty much everywhere. 

Here, also, as requested by several people is the Steamboat Springs Band version of "Statesboro Blues." Featuring my dad on a smokin' steel guitar (I made him that lightning bolt) and on lead vocals. For a little white dude, Pops can sing the blues. Happy Father's Day-- to him and all the other dads out there who know what's up.