Umbrellas on the Subway

It’s not that I can’t take sad movies, or even sad scenes in movies. What I can’t take, though, to take a phrase from A Christmas Story (aka, “The Shoot Your Eye Out Movie” in my family unit) is: “Sometimes, at the height of our revelries, when our joy is at it's zenith, when all is most right with the world, the most unthinkable disasters descend upon us.” [Thank you, IMDb].

THAT’s the kind of sadness, albeit applied to less comedic movies than the aforementioned Christmas flick, I can’t bear.

I find those situations, where people are guilelessly happy, when they’re on top of the world…and get slammed hard-Hard-HARD so painful, so awful, I can’t watch. Or I try not to, anyway.

A good example is from Brokeback Mountain – it’s the scene where Jack Twist is driving at breakneck speed from Texas to Wyoming because he’s received a post card from Ennis, a postcard telling Jack he’s getting a divorce. Jack can’t stop smiling, he’s singing “King of the Road,” he really FEELS like the king of the road on this particular trip northward because he believes (misunderstands) that finally, he and Ennis can have their “ little cow and calf operation,” finally have that “sweet life” that he desired so. When he arrives at Ennis’s place, it becomes clear that he’s wrong, that Ennis has no such plans, and he gets emotionally socked in the gut – it’s as if all the light exits his eyes.

When I get to that part in the movie anymore, I skip the DVD forward, I just can’t bear to feel-with-him through that scene.

I’d mentioned the 1961 B&W movie Goodbye Again in a recent post. There’s a scene in there that I can’t bear, either. I haven’t started skipping through that part yet, but at some point, I will.

The young Phillip (25 years old) is taking Paula (age 40) out to the finest restaurant in Paris – he’s celebrating because, though his boss and co-conspirator of a mother have “decided” that he should return to NY because of his relationship with an older woman, he instead executed a sort of declaration of independence so he can remain in Paris and be with Paula (because he really, really does love her). He takes Paula out on the dance floor after ordering caviar and a magnum of champagne and he is happy, happy. But Phillip doesn’t realize that his Paula sees her former lover across the room, a man she still hasn’t gotten out of her heart.

He dances on, oblivious that the former lover is gradually dancing toward them. With his back to the goings-on of the former lover, Phillip doesn’t see that the man reaches out and takes Paula’s hand and that, in that moment, Paula mentally and emotionally leaves him and returns to her former lover.

Paula makes an excuse to leave the dance floor and it’s only as he’s returning to their table at the restaurant that Phillip looks back, then swings for a double-take, stares hard at the former lover and drops his head downward. He knows that Paula has seen him because of her hurried request to return to the dinner table. He knows that he’s lost her.

OH!!!! I can’t bear that scene, I tear up every time I see it.

ER and I have a phrase for events like this…or at least, I do…it’s called “leaving your umbrella on the subway.” It comes from a time ER and I were in DC and it was so, so hot…and there’s just no heat like DC in the summer. I can’t take heat or sun even in moderate doses, and I was desperate enough for some relief that I bought an umbrella. Not just any old umbrella, but a thirty-dollar umbrella from the Discovery Channel store in Union Station. It was what was available; it was so hot, I probably would have paid 50 bucks for an umbrella.

I’d used it once, I think. We went to Crystal City from Union Station and only after I’d exited the subway and the cars took off did I realize that I’d left my umbrella on the subway.

I had the same what-a-great-day-what-a-wonderful-world happiness early in the day on February 18, 2001, having bought a NASCAR cake and really put on the dog in terms of "yay, it's the Daytona 500 day" snacks. Yes, I had that same sort of happiness on the day Dale Earnhardt died. And that alone might be why I can’t bear to watch people leave their umbrellas on the subway.

Ardeen

My niece Arden has been on the brain today. T-R-O-U-B-L-E is another way of spelling her name, not unlike her aunt was when she was a child. For this reason, I think I understand her better than even my sister does. Oh, if you don't believe she's trouble, take a look at this shot of her:
Right.

You've probably seen pix on my old blog of her and her sister, but one of the things I love about Arden is that, for a photographer, she's fabulous. She knows how to "work it" for a camera and also how to do so without going overboard. I could shoot her all day long and never get tired.

Bird, YankeeBeau and I will be joining Miss Arden, her sister and her mom and dad at the beach on the Outer Banks one month from today. (And ER thinks the only big deal about today is his birthday...no, it's the one-month countdown to a week at the beach!!!). I am taking a good friend with me, as ER didn't want to go to the beach with us. It will be a stellar, fun time, and one thing I'm looking forward to is that this year, not only does my sister want me to photograph the girls, I'm going to do the whole family this year (and we'll probably see those pix on our photo Christmas cards this year)...so it's more than worth lugging all of my REAL camera stuff to the OBX.

Oh, and the headline up there refers to a mistake someone made when Arden was born -- they got her name wrong and called her "Ardeen" (rhymes with Nadine) instead of Arden. ER and I still call her that, though usually not to her face (she has little recollection of those days just past her birth and would just give us the Arden-evil-eye if we called her that to her face).

I love my trouble with a capital T niece! Because I'm her trouble with a capital-T aunt.

Bienvenidos! Estados Unidos says Howdy (hope I got all that right)

I'm writing a post at the moment to make sure I don't go in and kill me a fax machine or something. Dang, one thing after the other today. I'll live. Sure beats where I used to be.

If it weren't for the fact that I got my hair cut this noon-hour, the day would be a write-off. It was a nice break in the day.

However, I listened to Lou Dobbs this morning, in his usual rant, and this occurred to me as the easiest solution to the immigration problem...what do you think? We do one of two things:

1. Make Mexico a protectorate of the United States like we do Puerto Rico; or

2. We turn Mexico into a new state, either called "Old Mexico," as everyone in Texas calls it, or we call it South Texas.

Then no one is illegal. We just make 'em part of the U.S. The border issue is solved. The national guard can go home. The fences and tunnels will be moot.

I grant you, it doesn't come out even to have 51 stars on the flag. But we could paste one on.

And all the "states" in Mexico become large "counties."

Anyone for this option?

Saturday on the Front Range

It’s a beautiful day in Boulder. There’s an art show of some sort downtown and it made for heavy traffic as I went west to find Hwy. 93. But the people all looked happy; kids in strollers, food booths, and people enjoying the sun. But I wasn’t stopping; I was on my way to the mountains, to Blackhawk, in fact.

This is the first time I’ve taken Hwy 93, which connects Boulder to the western edges of Arvada. It finally stops in Golden, right at the junction of Hwy. 6, about 18 miles south of UC Boulder. It doesn’t take long outside Boulder before you realize how close you are to the wide-open spaces, ranches and parking lots for trailheads.

I saw a small corral, populated by a lot of kids in cowboy hats; I think they were having a kiddie rodeo. Cows were grazing off to my right, in the green fields that form a sort of pretty foreground for the rocks that, at one time, heaved violently upward and became the flatirons. To my left, I could see the hazy outline of downtown Denver -- and even beyond that, eastward.

I saw a photographer setting-up a tripod next to an abandoned rock shanty of sorts – it was obvious she was going to use the shanty as foreground for the magnificent mountains jutting up about a half-mile west. I envied her; so far, I feel too insignificant and unable to adequately capture the mountains photographically. I think I have to understand them first.

That’s why I pay attention to the weather they make, how they look in the morning vs. how they look on the way home from work. I have to get to “know” these mountains because, since I’ve already declared that they are alive, I now have to know their “personalities.” It may take me a whole four seasons in their presence to understand them. And even then, I bet they will surprise me every now and then.

On south, a couple of miles north of Golden's city limits, developers are building. The houses seem so out of place in the midst of the rocks, the grazing pastures, the trees, few though they may be, budding. I can’t get over the style of homes that builders are building in the Denver-Boulder MSA, and these are no exception. All of the houses are at least two, and more often than not, three stories (and I’m not counting basements). The only rationale I can come up with is, aside from sheer habit, that it likely takes a two- or three-story home to offer potential buyers a mountain view.

My boss, who lives in Lafayette, just east of Boulder, says he has a lovely view of the mountains. But since I didn’t see them on the first floor of his home, it must be only upstairs that you can see the bare flatirons and the snowy peaks behind them…where Eldora, Winter Park and other ski areas are.

I turned right on Hwy. 6 and began the drive upward. The difference in elevation is about 3,000 feet from Boulder to Blackhawk and today, which is nearly 80 degrees on the flatlands, is 10 degrees colder at Blackhawk.

You go through three tunnels, punched through the mountains in the Clear Creek Canyon area, and the road basically follows the creek. In a number of places, you can see snowmelt, feeding the creek, and the creek is substantially fuller and wilder than when ER and I were in the same area about a month ago. Because of that, SUV's were all over the place, with people either loading or unloading their kayaks. Loads of people were just hiking, and there's one flat place where you can pull off that's right next to the creek. There, I saw families more so than the mountain athletes, and a boy was throwing rocks into the water.

I love the signs in Clear Creek Canyon along the road. Along with the expected “Watch for Falling Rocks” signs, are signs that say “Climb to Safety in Event of Flood.” First, the road that follows the creek is so windy that there’s no way you can watch for rocks; you just drive and hope that a rock won’t fall on you. Second, broken hip and knee surgeries aside, I bet I could climb like a crazy woman if caught in a flood there.

After the third tunnel (which have the appearance of being created during the WPA era – you know, there’s a certain look to WPA projects – drlobojo, you probably know if that’s the case), you come to a divide where you take Hwy. 119 to Blackhawk.

Blackhawk is just as it sounds, an Indian area, and also designated as a national Historic town, so a sign said. And of course, the center of interest in Blackhawk is Casino Heaven. Not just one, but many, many casinos and hotels. You’d think such a thing wouldn’t fit in with the mountains around them, but they seem to belong there. I went to Isle of Capri casino, spent a couple of hours there, and made the return trip, taking-in the opposite view of the one I had on the way up.

At Isle of Capri, I found a slot machine that was generous to me, over and over again. Bird can’t believe that I won’t just stick money I’ve won in my pocket and go home. My rule of thumb is a payout of $500 is the minimum for me to stick the money in my pocket and hightail out of there. You don’t want to make more than $600 on any one game, as you’ll have to fill our IRS forms.

But I enjoy the lights, the people, the sounds of the casino. Bird and ER don’t get the same kind of kick out of the casino environment that I do. And I don’t even know why I enjoy it. I just like going and winning enough to spend a good couple of hours hoping for a big one. No big one today, but I won enough money to play out for nearly two hours. Not bad.

I need to be getting a haircut or doing laundry and I’m doing neither. I so enjoy this little temporary spot where I’m living. I’m reading books that I’ve been intending to read, watching movies I love and making myself simple meals for one. I will be very glad, of course, when ER makes the decision to come, but in the meantime, I will continue enjoying living by myself for the first time in my life. Truly, it’s the first time.

There are so many things to take in here, it’s almost intimidating. How does one decide, among all the beautiful places, what one will do on a weekend? The good thing is, it’s not vacation, and I don’t have to hurry and take it all in as quickly as possible; I have the luxury of getting to know my mountains slowly…and that makes for a better relationship.

For years, the mountains here have talked to me. And I’m so happy to have the chance to answer them -- wherever they lead me.

Apollo 427

Dearest Apollo, you know I love you immensely. Fenway just had that dorky picture on my computer and I thought it was cute. I will put one of you on my blog today: There, isn't he cute, everyone. Backlit by the Christmas tree, in his Ho Ho Ho bandana. I love you, Apollo!

Not in a great mood today because I overslept by so much time, I actually woke up two hours after I was suppposed to be at work. I obviously sleep-walked and turned off my TWO alarm clocks this morning. My body has a mind of its own (which is really a funny statement, if you think about it). And if my body is tired, nothing in the world will wake me up. A sleep doctor in OK gave me medicine for what he called "Delayed Sleep Phase Disorder," and he said that my circadians were actually more like an adolescent's -- I like to think of it as my body operating on Hawaii's time zone. I don't like to take the medicine, and, in fact, I left it in OK because all it is is basically speed -- it's a drug they give to narcoleptics called Provigil and man,if you don't have insurance, you couldn't afford it, because the actual retail price of the danged drug is about $250 bucks for a month's supply. Still, I don't like it.

I now have three checkbooks as of yesterday, as well as three debit cards...one for my new Health Savings Account, which my EMPLOYER deposits enough money each year to cover the $2000 deductible so we have NO out of pocket costs for healthcare because, once we meet that deductible, everything is 100%. Having a plan like that for me is like taking my daddy to an all-you-can-eat buffet. They lose money on Daddy, they're gonna lose money on me. But how cool is that health plan?

I also now have a new checking account in Boulder and still the one in OK. Hooooly cow.

I had to go buy reading glasses last night. Old age beckons. I realized, once it got so bad I needed the glasses, that I've been reading with one eye for ages. I must had compensated. When I was trying to read last night, the right eye and the left eye weren't in sync...I'd see the lines in the book twice, one nearly on top of the other. I suspect that's more than just buying drug store glasses, so when I get the new insurance here, I'm off to the eye doctor.

So Apollo, I hope you like your picture. You are adorable in a much more regal way than your brother....Love, Dama

Regular Irregularity

I’ve had more than one person give me a little flack about not blogging regularly. I know that the best way to create an interactive blog is to make sure that you post something every day. The truth about the Boulder blog is this – the danged Ethernet cable in the place I’m staying is so short, I have to sit on a hard-backed chair at a table in order to access the Internet. I’ve been under that table trying to unhook the cable and install a longer one, but I can’t get the danged cable out of the box plugged into. So it’s that, plus the fact that work is busy, busy at the moment. I like this kind of busy, though. I show up at work and then look up and it’s time to go. The days go by very quickly!



The picture I post today is of my beloved Fenway – the picture was taken at Christmas, and you can probably see he’s behind a baby gate, locked in the hallway of my mom’s house. This is the picture that’s on my desk top right now, and every morning at work, his sweet, sad face (because he wasn’t getting to open presents with the rest of us) gives me a happy way to start the work day. I do looooove my grand-dogs.

One thing I’d like to do is disabuse you, if you’ve held such beliefs, that Boulder is some snobby place full of rich people. It’s not. Don’t let anyone tell you any differently, either. The people I’m around at work are, of course, absolutely wonderful people. But I interact with people in other places and it’s an awfully friendly environment.

Saturday, I did a little shopping, not leaving the Boulder MSA to go to some of the bigger shopping areas that are pretty new between here and Denver. I stayed right here. And the “mood” of Boulder on a Saturday is just very peaceful. No one is in a hurry, and that sense of having all the time in the world washed over me and I was so relaxed.

And even though I’ve spent a lot of time alone, I just haven’t been lonely at all. I’ve tried to explain to ER, who still tries to say I’ve “left him,” that I have plenty to do and plenty of resting still needed for me. I like my own company, too. I have books, I have DVDs, I have my therabands for my home PT and some free weights. I have all I need to entertain myself and what’s weird is, I spend hardly ANY money.

I do miss “home” and got a bit homesick on the anniversary of the OKC bombing, but, as I told ER, I feel like I am finally unwinding and resting from ten years of complete overwork. It might actually take awhile for the past ten years to be exorcised from me…not all of it, because there were some fine times in those ten years in the old work place. (I would like to add here that I miss Mike Morgan and the storm chasers; the weather people here are just nowhere NEAR the caliber in Oklahoma City).

But here, my boss man, who has been a friend and colleague for several years won’t allow me to over work. He and I have talked about how we’ve worked ourselves to death before in our lives. He told me the following: “Dr. ER, I promise, I’m going to spend a few minutes every day thinking of ways to make you a very happy woman.” Now, he’s referring to work, but I told him that I haven’t heard anything like that from a man in a long time! The motto here is “Work hard, but play hard.”

The whole crew is big on going to lunch in groups and these can last up to two hours – my boss “gets it” because those lunches are more than just lunch – work is getting done, morale is being lifted, people are interacting. It makes the work place and the people in it happy. Shoot, he took me out to lunch last Friday and we spent nearly two and a half hours just talking about governance in the western states. Since I love the study of governance, I was in hog heaven.

Changing topics rapidly, I have a movie to recommend. I just happened to come across it when at Target Saturday. It’s called “The Whole Wide World,” and stars hottie Vincent D’Onofrio and Renee Zellweger. Two people I love (who could NOT love Bridget Jones or Bobby on Law and Order: Criminal Intent). It takes place in the 1930’s in the Brownwood, Texas area. Surprise ending. And such a lump in my throat, I had a hard time swallowing. But you should hear Vincent D’Onofrio with a southern accent! It’s worth it just to hear that. The movie was released in 2003; I don't know how I missed it.

And another photo here, just to break up the text a bit. It's Ice-T, being a ho. Goofy cat .

I wonder if any of you can remember or have seen another movie – called “Goodbye Again,” starring Ingrid Bergman, Yves Montand and Anthony Perkins (who won Best Actor at Cannes in 1961 for his character in this movie). Wow, what a great flick. And a great story. It’s in black and white, filmed in France and it’s so obscure, you can’t even get it on DVD – I had to purchase the VHS after seeing it on AMC about a month ago. The story is perfect early 1960’s and it underscores again for me that I was born in the wrong time. I’d love to live back when everybody smoked and drank and we didn’t have so much worry about trying to live a long time. Now, in this flick, though, I can easily see what Anthony Perkins (also Norman Bates in “Psycho”) won best actor and I’m also glad that I’ve never seen “Psycho,” because this is the kind of role I want to remember him in.

I read something interesting about Perkins earlier this week and it’s that he was completely gay until his late 30’s when he met and dated Victoria Principal. And I thought to myself…well, yes, if anyone could make a gay man bisexual overnight, Victoria Principal could do it. Perkins’ wife at the time of his death was photographer Berry Berenson, and she was killed on September 11th, as she was on one of the planes that was crashed into the twin towers. Sad, sad.

So, here’s a nice, long post. I wish I could do it every day…if I finally win my battle with the Ethernet cable, I might be able to do so.

Repeat and Rerun

I keep getting e-mails from people regarding this post from my old blog, so I thought I'd republish it. Note that I'm doing so on a day when more people died in Iraq today than died in the Oklahoma City bombing. Those deaths are a mere footnote given today's media focus on the horrors of Virginia Tech. This bears reading again, though, I think.


Friday, June 09, 2006

An Open Letter to President Bush:

Dear Mr. President:In the immortal, if fictional, words of Dr. Benjamin Franklin “Hawkeye” Pierce, 4077th M*A*S*H, in a telegram sent to President Harry S. Truman (and copied to the Secretary General of the United Nations): “Who’s responsible?”

I think you know the answer to that question, and it’s just two words, if you’re being honest – the answer, should you care to utter it, is:“I am.”

Tell me if you plan to utter those words, as I want to book a skiing vacation waaaaaaay down under, if you get my drift.

It’s been a hell of a week for me, just thinking about life and people and war and politics and it’s given me food for thought. I accidentally caught the documentary “Bush’s Brain” on the Sundance channel last Sunday morning. All throughout, my stomach churned, but particularly the whisper campaigns about Senator John McCain’s adopted daughter (she happens to be a child of color) and Max Cleland are subjects requiring the penance of many.

Who’s responsible? You are.

Not Karl, not Karen, not any other suited youngster trying to be the perfect Alex P. Keaton in your campaigns -- YOU are responsible.

Our country is better than Abu Ghraib, better than what you forced Colin Powell to do at the U.N., better than the “sixteen words” and the close-to-assassination of Valerie Plaime. Who’s responsible? You are.

Our country is better than this war we’re in. I’ve been watching hour upon hour of M*A*S*H while at home lately and the later seasons, in particular, are so good at making sure that the viewers understand the horrors of war. I get it.

And Colonel Sherman T. Potter said to one young man in a very touching episode, “There’s probably been more stupidity completed in the name of manhood than for any other reason.” I think the good Colonel is right.

The Doctrine of pre-emption is one of those “stupidities” enacted in the name of manhood.

This morning, I read Newsweek. Cover to cover, something I rarely do.

Haditha.

The horror. The horror.

But of course, our Marines behaved as they did. Drugged, sensory-deprived. Hot, paranoid…are there no psychologists involved except for psy-ops in this nation’s military? Given the conditions, the behavior seen at Haditha is all but guaranteed.

The conditions we place our troops in right now in Iraq are indicative of man’s inhumanity to man. And there’s only one man who’s responsible -- you.

And even if you take the stage with a backdrop of repeated “buck stops here” messages, it won’t be enough. It's too late.

Too many kids are dead. Because you crossed the Rubicon; you crossed it when you used the word “crusade.”

You added insult to multiple injuries when you declared "mission accomplished," and you can't take it back.

So, so sad.

With all due sincerity and respect for the Office,
A disenchanted subject.

And a big hello to the Domestic Spying folks who pick this up and read it, too, feel free to leave comments.