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Listening to Terry Gross interview Stephen Colbert on Fresh Air yesterday, there were chuckles aplenty. Yet I was stunned (and somewhat incredulous) to hear Colbert describe himself as a devout Catholic. Call me obtuse, but somehow I never would have associated wit, sarcasm, and ironic, deadpan humor with impassioned Catholicism. Who'd a-thunk it?
Later, I came across this hilarious list, thanks to McSweeney's (click the link to read entire list):
Popular Songs Renamed Along the Lines of the Cattlemen's Beef Board Ad Campaign "Beef, It's What's for Dinner." BY GEOFF SMITH.
* Back, It's What Baby Got
* The House, It's What's Burning Down
* Alles, It's What California's Über
* The Dust, It's What Another One Bites
* U, It's What I Would Die 4
* London, It's What's Calling
* Brooklyn, It's What There's No Sleep Till
* Fault, It's What's Nobody's but Mine
* Thang, It's What's Nothin' but a "G"
* Bigger, It's What Some Girls Are Than Others
* Behavior, It's What's Human
Listening to Wilco in the car this morning, I thought about my grandmother, whom we called Safta (Hebrew for grandma) and who passed away Wednesday. During her intimate memorial service Friday morning, the rabbi recited a series of prayers, to which we were to respond "Safta, I remember you." It was beautiful and heartfelt and a lovely way of promising to keep a much-loved one's memory alive.
2005, thus far, has been an utter tornado of travel and emotion. After my return flight from L.A. last week was accidentally canceled and the airline subsequently "misplaced" my luggage, I wearily returned to my normal life for barely two days before packing up the car for the six-hour drive over snow-covered mountain roads to Reno, where my parents decided my grandmother should rest.
Despite the sad circumstances, it was an absolutely wonderful visit with my family, including my aunt and cousins who flew in from New York. What a treat to see them (especially since I've been so down about forfeiting my plans to head east for a cousin's wedding in February). We shared warm stories about Safta over a couple of amazing meals accompanied by an awesome array of wines chosen by my cousin Arik, the sommelier. Mom and Grandma cooked, Dad mixed the cocktails and provided warm background music (Ray Charles, Sam Cooke, et al), Arik made sure the wines were properly chilled. (For brunch as well as dinner. We're Jews, after all.)
It was like the very best of Thanksgivings, only there was rokkotcrumpli (Hungarian layered potatoes) instead of turkey and music instead of football. We ate, we drank, we hugged, we shmoozed. And later, there was poker.
Most importantly, we laughed more than we cried. I returned home exhausted, but less saddened by Safta's loss than inspired by her life. 91 years is a long time to grace this planet and Safta lived her nine decades as the picture of strength, warmth, humility, good humor and love, as evidenced by the warm, loving assembly of her family this weekend. Rest in peace, Safta.
Whew! Just beginning to recover from the exhaustion that ensued this weekend, settling over me like dust on my neglected laptop. In this case, exhaustion is a positive thing, for it means I spent a weekend running around L.A. with my oldest friend, bonding with her two daughters, visiting her husband in the hospital and sharing some quality time with my sister and friends I love dearly.
On my first day in town, I visited Allan in the ICU and was overwhelmed by what I saw. I'd been "briefed" on his condition, but seeing him before my own eyes (and seeing what Michele had been dealing with all these weeks) bowled me over completely. Seeing someone you love in such a helpless state has to be the most humbling feeling on Earth. It just made me more awed by Michele's strength and the grace with which she's handled this ordeal.
During my short stay in town, Allan made some remarkable progress:
- He was taken off the ventilator and now breathes on his own
- He was moved from ICU to a private room
- His daughters were finally allowed to visit
Of course, little girls are highly susceptible to both harboring and transmitting bacteria, which means they were required to don gowns, gloves and masks for their visit with Daddy. We brought the gear home from the hospital the night before their visit so the girls could practice. Everything was enormous; there are no kid-sized protective gowns (which Michele tailored with scissors) or masks (which swallowed up entire kid faces). Regardless, four-year-old Sara was excited by the prospect of wearing "important" gear and two-year-old Emma is excited by pretty much whatever excites her big sister. (This works in reverse, as well. Were Sara to have poo-pooed the idea of suiting up, Emma would likely have stuck her tongue out in a show of solidaritous protest.)
I absolutely adored spending so much time with the bright and lovely Sara and her comedic counterpart, Emma. One morning, as Michele prepared breakfast for Sara downstairs, Emma wandered into Michele and Allan's bedroom, where I was getting dressed.
"Barney," she demanded, pointing at the TV. I leapt to my feet (as one is wont to do when ordered into action by a two-year-old who may or may not SCREAM BLOODY MURDER if one does not do her bidding) and started up the VCR.
Something I learned years earlier from watching with my young cousin, Jason: Barney is MESMERIZING. Emma sat on the edge of the bed, completely spellbound by the purple girly-beast. Once dressed, I took my place beside her and joined in her enthralled state. Emma eventually got up and waddled out of the room to locate her "didder" (toddler-speak for "sister").
So what did I do? I remained right where I was, eyes affixed to the TV as if it were perpetrating some Clockwork Orange mindfuck via the plum-colored behemoth. When the tape ended, I marched down to the living room, where I announced the apparent end of my sane years, proclaiming, "I have just watched a full 15 minutes of Barney WITHOUT A CHILD IN THE ROOM."
Please visit me at the Home for Thirtysomething Non-Moms Unprepared and Unequipped to Stave Off the Frightening Lure of the Barney.
Warning: I am surprisingly inarticulate today, having had ZERO caffeine since Friday, and that was just a few sips of green tea alongside some fantabulous sushi. (What, you didn't know lack of caffeine causes verbal impotence? Duh!)
Today's my father's birthday. He was born 62 years ago in what was then Palestine, which I find extremely interesting considering the country of his birth is now technically non-existent. I suppose some West Germans and Yugoslavians have that problem, too. Anyway, I'm glad Dad was born because if he weren't, I would not be here typing this and because of that, you'd be reading someone else's pointless ramblings while my domain name would likely go unused for all eternity.
Several people have asked me how I came up with "Ayelet Like It Is" and for that I must thank my friend Seth, to whom I confided many years ago that my secret career fantasy was to write a weekly syndicated column, a la Dave Barry, Joyce Maynard (whose column I loved as a teenager), Jack Smith, et al. Back then, Time Out New York featured a wonderful, often hilarious personal column, each week penned by a different author, each with a clever title culled from their own given name. For example, Brett Martin's column was called "My Favorite Martin." You get the picture. That column, by any one of the handful of writers they featured, was the first page I flipped to when Time Out appeared in my mailbox each week.
Anyway, Seth was the crafty cutie who came up with "Ayelet Like It Is" and encouraged me to find employment as a columnist for the sole purpose of putting his innovation to use. Well, in lieu of said employment (wouldn't it be, like, awesome if blog-writing could PAY?), I'm resigned to using Seth's creative moniker merely to provide this lil' blog a name. So thank you, Seth. Who knows what the hell I would have called this thing were it not for you?
VH-1 Classic makes me happy. Their new show, The Alternative, while merely an hour in length, is the best thing to come along since the sad demise of MTV's 120 Minutes. (Yes, I'm enormously easy to please... it's the "little things," folks.)
True, certain videos are questionable not only as "alternative" in genre but in terms of artistic merit. Some are head-scratchers. Some are laughable. For example, who remembers David Byrne's bizarre body-rocking and profuse sweating in Talking Heads' "Once in a Lifetime" video? Ouch.
This morning, it was all about Fishbone. Fishbone, whose hyperactive "Party at Ground Zero" was something of a good-time ska anthem in my high school days and whose concert I attended with some friends at the Roxy in L.A. sometime around 1990. A concert to which my friend Patrick wore a houndstooth blazer with faded jeans and scuffed "Duckie" shoes, all of which were still moderately en vogue at the turn of the decade (for a Fishbone concert, at least).
The guys in Fishbone (what were there, six of them?) rocked that little house and we had a great time shvitzing along with a few hundred other college-aged pseudo-delinquents. I'm not sure why or when the band officially called it quits, but I know their lead singer Angelo Moore ended up working with the likes of Jane's Addiction and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Not too shabby.
Anyway, to bring this completely irrelevant tale full-circle, I recently learned Fishbone will be playing here in town next week. The lamentable fact that almost NO recording artists of any interest to me come through this neglected region whilst on tour (though Wilco made an appearance not long ago) is almost enough to will my ticket-purchasing gene back into action. That, along with my strange curiosity to see how well Fishbone's frightfully energetic young members have aged and whether or not they can still excite a crowd with their exuberance.
Which brings me to another of my New Year's non-resolutions: MORE LIVE MUSIC, PLEASE. For me, that means making a road trip south to San Francisco or north to Portland or Seattle (if not hopping on a plane, hungrily bound for anywhere with a few decent concert venues and schedules). There's simply too much great music out there for a committed tune-o-phile like myself to be limited to the pleasure of listening solely via electronic format.
Happy new year, all! It was a relatively quiet one here, marked by a fantastically indulgent dinner, free-flowing red wine and a small group of wonderful friends laughing over music and poker chips at a spectacular A-frame house deep in the redwoods where llamas are the preferred pet and a wood-burning stove kept us toasty under a pitch-black, star-filled sky.
Resolutions? No, thanks. Like most, I see January 1 as something of a fresh start, but I've never been one to write down or even verbalize specific resolutions. I have focused on the follies and successes that cluttered 2004 and will now give myself many migraines as I attempt to learn from them.
At this time last year, I was preparing to leave my home city of New York for an uncertain future in some far-flung coastal town I'd only seen once but hoped I could love as much (albeit in very different ways). Now, after nearly a year here, I have moved beyond the disappointment of not getting into graduate school and have settled into a life that's surprisingly fulfilling. After months of white-knuckled frustration and a seemingly endless parade of what-the-fuck! moments, I find I'm (gasp!) happy here. Mind you, my life in this isolated enclave is so bloody far from what I imagined for myself, I sometimes wonder if it's all just one of those dreams that makes a David Lynch movie look like Sesame Street. But daggumit, I'm happy. I miss New York terribly and I will continue to do so until the day comes when I can make it my home again, but I've carved out a life here that lives up to standards I struggled (and failed, in certain respects) to achieve in New York.
Professionally, I'm in an excellent position as I enter my 10th year of earning a living as a writer (minus the frustrating months spent doing administrative jobs, forced to moonlight with intermittent writing gigs). I suppose a New Year's resolution, were I to have one, would be to continue not to take this good fortune for granted. This will be especially helpful to remember when ripping out my legendary curly locks over some looming deadline.
Personally, I struggle daily with the confusion and constant self-examination that comes with being a highly, sometimes dangerously introspective person. I doubt myself. I doubt those who love me. I doubt my choices and my path. Hell, I even doubt my brand of toothpaste. And yet being attentive to the persistence of these doubts means I can actively work to keep them from negatively affecting my relationships. That's a job in itself.
Physically, I'm in better shape than I've been as long as I can remember. So if I must squeeze out another resolution (which I won't), it would be to keep up the healthy lifestyle I've adopted here. It agrees with me. Which means I'll continue to push myself physically until running a marathon would be a walk in the park. Right now it'd be more like hurtling myself over a rock-strewn cliff, but hey, I'm working on it.
So, will I continue to bitch and moan about the myriad minor inconveniences that litter every waking moment of American life? Probably. Should I? Probably not. But despite our best intentions, we all do it and we'll all carry on doing it. Me writing someting like, "Golly, we should all be thankful for what we have and not take any glorious aspect of life for granted" would be sheer hypocrisy. And pure horseshit, at that.
But taking a moment out of my frequent whining to ponder the actual significance of whatever trifling matter lays the groundwork for my aggravation... that's where the real resolution lies. I promise to work on it, if you will.