May 2010
April 2010
“Abominations such as apartheid do not start with an entire population suddenly becoming inhumane. They start here. They start with generalizing unwanted characteristics across an entire segment of a population. They start with trying to solve a problem by asserting superior force over a population. They start with stripping people of rights and dignity - such as the right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty - that you yourself enjoy. Not because it is right, but because you can. And because somehow, you think this is going to solve a problem.”
—Desmond Tutu: Arizona: The Wrong Answer
“We live in New York, we work in New York. To be able to do those things, you have to be a superhero.”
—Vadim Ponorovsky, owner of Frites’N’Meats — a Manhattan hamburger truck, who asks customers to identify themselves with a superhero name. (WSJ.com)
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“It’s almost as if she was always lit from behind. If she wasn’t a movie star, the only other job she could have would be professional fairy.”
—Ryan Murphy on Julia Roberts
“I like it, at least he’s getting teens to want to have sex again, not like the fucking Jonas Brothers.”
—[redacted] on Justin Bieber
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I just chatted with my favorite family members: Elyssa (3) & Laura (2). I LOVE SKYPE!!
- My uncle: Elyssa, come eat your PB & J
- Elyssa (Age 3): Why don't we call it a PB & Lety?
- ** Lety is my aunt. She is married to Jay. Elyssa is used to hearing "Lety & Jay." Ding!
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“Oklahoma’s law goes further, mandating that a doctor or technician set up the monitor so the woman can see it and describe the heart, limbs and organs of the fetus. No exceptions are made for rape and incest victims. A second measure passed into law on Tuesday prevents women who have had a disabled baby from suing a doctor for withholding information about birth defects while the child was in the womb.”
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Strict Abortion Measures Enacted in Oklahoma
It seems like things everywhere have taken a really bad turn. I feel sick.
Always Go to the Funeral
Always Go to the Funeral by Deirdre Sullivan (NPR: “This I believe” series)
I believe in always going to the funeral. My father taught me that.
The first time he said it directly to me, I was 16 and trying to get out of going to calling hours for Miss Emerson, my old fifth grade math teacher. I did not want to go. My father was unequivocal. “Dee,” he said, “you’re going. Always go to the funeral. Do it for the family.”
So my dad waited outside while I went in. It was worse than I thought it would be: I was the only kid there. When the condolence line deposited me in front of Miss Emerson’s shell-shocked parents, I stammered out, “Sorry about all this,” and stalked away. But, for that deeply weird expression of sympathy delivered 20 years ago, Miss Emerson’s mother still remembers my name and always says hello with tearing eyes.
That was the first time I went un-chaperoned, but my parents had been taking us kids to funerals and calling hours as a matter of course for years. By the time I was 16, I had been to five or six funerals. I remember two things from the funeral circuit: bottomless dishes of free mints and my father saying on the ride home, “You can’t come in without going out, kids. Always go to the funeral.”
Sounds simple — when someone dies, get in your car and go to calling hours or the funeral. That, I can do. But I think a personal philosophy of going to funerals means more than that.
“Always go to the funeral” means that I have to do the right thing when I really, really don’t feel like it. I have to remind myself of it when I could make some small gesture, but I don’t really have to and I definitely don’t want to. I’m talking about those things that represent only inconvenience to me, but the world to the other guy. You know, the painfully under-attended birthday party. The hospital visit during happy hour. The Shiva call for one of my ex’s uncles. In my humdrum life, the daily battle hasn’t been good versus evil. It’s hardly so epic. Most days, my real battle is doing good versus doing nothing.
In going to funerals, I’ve come to believe that while I wait to make a grand heroic gesture, I should just stick to the small inconveniences that let me share in life’s inevitable, occasional calamity.
On a cold April night three years ago, my father died a quiet death from cancer. His funeral was on a Wednesday, middle of the workweek. I had been numb for days when, for some reason, during the funeral, I turned and looked back at the folks in the church. The memory of it still takes my breath away. The most human, powerful and humbling thing I’ve ever seen was a church at 3:00 on a Wednesday full of inconvenienced people who believe in going to the funeral.
