Yeah? I’ll give you irony…
I think that hipster culture is pretty much anything but ironic. In fact, in offering me something that is simply too tempting to resist mocking (I mean really, look at that fucking hipster) and sitting outside the gates of my building smoking American Spirits, talking as loud as they want to be earnest on their smart phones, picking at their “skinny jeans”, caressing their fixie bikes and staring longingly at the Queen Bee Hipster Bitch that runs the Buffalo Exchange downstairs from me, they are pretty much the least ironic thing going. I mean, by definition irony means the opposite of what is expected, or incongruous. These people are the most predictable humans I have ever seen. Their sense of style my be incongruous, but in saying that I am being euphemistic. I am aware that the Hipster Nation is really endeavoring to be sardonic, rather than ironic and that they would sardonically tell me that I am being pedantic. But they are so irritating that given the chance to get pedantic all over their asses, I would.
With all that said, let me explain (as if my proximity to the most heinous Buffalo Exchange ever did not already make this plainly obvious), I live in the middle of the SF Hipster universe. Yup. They are everywhere. Now, THAT is ironic.
Describe The World You Come From. Are you kidding?
The University of California asks the following of all of their potential Freshman:
Describe the world you come from — for example, your family, community or school — and tell us how your world has shaped your dreams and aspirations.
I have been spending a lot of time contemplating this directive over the past few months as a great many of my students are applying to the University of California’s various campuses. Well, actually, only three of the campuses are Hong Kong Approved [meaning they have enough name brand appeal]: Berkeley, UCLA and UCSD (go me!) But a lot of students are applying to those three.
And so here they sit, seventeen and strung out on college applications: “The World They Come From.” How best to approach such a task? Can you answer the question with a single answer? Can anyone definitively say, “I am From X” anymore? The students I work with are (generally) multinational, multilingual, transoceanic, multiracial people. Few of them could say they have lived in one place for their entire lives. Where are they from? Is it where they were born? Where they started school? Where they finished school? The country from which they received their [first] passport? The country their dad is from? The place their grandparents are from? How about where their mom is from? A very smart man once told me, it is always a question of scale. [I ♥ geographers.]
And that is only the first step.
I gotta say, I am truly envious of these kids in some ways. This topic is one I have dreams of writing a dissertation about. Seriously. I find it fascinating.
If dreams are like movies then memories are films about ghosts
truth no longer matters much to me
I prefer to value intoxicatingly interesting daysand so I let things slide without grace into their
self selected placeI have not enough time to waste space sorting
through all that is me.~ Jason Lyle Baucom
I distinctly remember, as a child, listening to my mom tell me stories about her life B.A. (yes, that would be Before Amanda) with rapt attention – along with myriad other sentiments… ranging from awe to embarrassment to bewilderment to pride. My interest did vary based on the subject matter I have to admit, but one thing that always stood out to me was hearing her say, “Ten years ago….” or “Twenty years ago…” And being blown away at the reality of powerful and meaningful memories of things from that long ago. The idea of having memories that far back just didn’t compute. I always hear that opening line in Sargent Pepper’s…
I still equate stories that begin “Twenty years ago…” with my mom, or perhaps Abe Lincoln and his “Four score and 7,” or at least people who have so much more life experience than I do. This is clearly ridiculous, but you know, old habits of mind… So of course, I am constantly surprised as I find myself recalling events and people and places and with vivid (if subjective) detail and then being hit over the head with the realization that what I am thinking about happened… TWENTY YEARS AGO.
I started high school 25 years ago – I still remember the illusion that it would be like a John Hughes film as if it were yesterday. 20 years ago my friend Willie was in Germany as the Wall was coming down and he brought a piece of it back to California for me. Just three years later Willie died. I graduated from UCSD 16 years ago and I can still see Dave Gutierrez (swoon) speaking to us and feeling the La Jolla wind on my face as I contemplated my upcoming forays in Europe. On August 9, it will be 14 years since Jerry Garcia died and I wish I had my photos here to share the Polo Fields memorial with everyone who does not understand how significant the community experience of the Grateful Dead was to those of us lucky enough to have a peek…
It has been nearly twelve years since Jason died.
This must sound morose… but I am not meaning it to be. These events… these singular moments that crystallize in our brains and combine to make up a lifetime sometimes seem so much more vivid in my mind. I remember so many other kinds of things as well: first kisses, first crushes, first humiliations, moments of startling clarity and moments of frightening confusion… Adventures and misadventures. Frankly, it’s awesome.
I spent nearly a year trading travel stories with a friend back in 2005 and was struck at the depth of memory. What stays with us. True, it is selective and subjective as hell… but that sure makes it a fabulous tapestry. Is it real? Is it true? Dreams are like movies, and memories are films about ghosts. And truth? Well, truth is as truth does. Perhaps Paul Simon was right when he ignored truth and said: “Faith is an island in the setting sun… But proof, yes… Proof is the bottom line for everyone.”
What’s your proof?
“We choose to go to the moon…”
Today is the day – the 40 year anniversary of that small step for Neil Armstrong… But was it a giant step for mankind? I often wonder what it would have been like to be seeing that Apollo mission live – (and to that end, this website is awesome recreating the Apollo 11 mission in real-time: http://www.wechoosethemoon.org/ – the photos, videos and audio are completely cool) – would I have been as impressed? More impressed? With which element of the experience? Or would I have been like John Updike’s Rabbit, “I don’t know, I know it’s happened, but I don’t feel anything yet.”
The anniversary of the moon landing has been a marketing boon in a waning economy and this is not too surprising considering the fact that, as A.O. Scott says in his brilliant piece in the New York Times, “it was at once a science project and a media spectacle.” And this tenuous connection between science and popular culture continues to fascinate me. My interest in science has always been a curious relationship. I find certain elements of it amazing and others tedious. I love experimentation and hypotheses and discoveries… I loathe manipulation and metonymy: “The Science” indicates this, “The Science” says that. Ever since Professor Randlett pointed out that habit of hiding behind “The Science” in the early stages of my graduate studies I have always smirked a bit to hear someone say, with self-satisfied authority, “Well, The Science has shown…”
A survey carried out by the Pew Research Center shows that there seems to be a growing disconnect between the public and science. This is hardly surprising, but the bizarre thing is that people still think scientists are super important, like respectable, but they don’t believe anything that the scientists are saying (although they seem to believe things that “The Science” tells them.) I imagine that would be super irritating as a scientist. I mean, to be rated as the third highest group (behind the military and teachers) as far as contributing to society, but then have significant scientific theories disregarded, like evolution and global warming seems like a frustrating intersection to be gridlocked in.
It likely comes down to the fact I keep running up against, which is that people believe what they want to believe. I actually know people who believe – for real – that the moon landing never took place. This is harder for me to swallow than the reality that people don’t believe in evolution or global warming… but not a whole lot. [Even Lloyd Christmas worked it out eventually...]
Perceptions of what is important in science are also changing. “As an example, ten years ago, 18% cited space exploration and the moon landing as the country’s top achievement of the 20th century. Today 12% see it as the greatest achievement of the past 50 years.” But looking at what “The Public” (there is that troublesome metonymy again) says about important contributions in the last fifty years and you will see the answer with the highest number of responses is “Nothing/I don’t know.” [I don't know? Are you fucking kidding? I admit, that I am still amazed is puzzling.]
So, on this day, amidst moon madness, recalling the last 40 years since that Apollo landing, I wonder about the hype. There is talk of returning to the moon by the year 2020. Good Ole #2, Buzz Aldrin said of walking on the moon, “I would never stoop to call kicking up dust on the moon a stunt, but it certainly wasn’t a pioneering effort that led to sustainment.” It seems like this could be money better spent, though I would love to have a go at a lunar escapade, so I understand the guys that want to have at it. And as we all know it all comes down to funding, so this will likely end up a partisan pissing contest in Washington. How Obama handles it will be interesting. Kennedy sure wowed ‘em back in 1961 speaking at Rice University.
There is something kind of awe-inspiring to think about the pace of progress which JFK reiterates in his speech, and to think that we are choosing to stymie that kind of scientific progress at the expense of religious zealotry or partisan politics is pretty lame. For what it is worth, we did it, and I think it is something to be celebrated. But the more pressing reality is that we need to celebrate and reward the pursuit of knowledge on a more regular basis… the normal everyday stuff that might just save our asses eventually – unless the Jetsons really do end up being our neighbors.
For now, looking towards Wednesday’s new moon in Hong Kong… I feel more akin to Jerry than NASA…
Standing on the moon
Where talk is cheap and vision true
Standing on the moon
But I would rather be with you
Somewhere in San Francisco
On a back porch in July
Just looking up to heaven
At this crescent in the sky
Irony or No?
I always loved how the spinner girls would get all feminazi about this song – like, “That’s RIGHT, the women ARE smarter…”
Somehow, I think the whole premise of the song was like, yeah, that’s right, the women are the smart ones, so don’t blame us guys for anything… we’re just along for the ride.
Either way… on a sunny day, like today, I look outside and remember shaking my booty with a cold beer and a big smile whenever the boys broke out this song, just like it was yesterday.
I still cannot believe this year will mark 14 years since Jerry said his final good bye.
A long, strange trip indeed.
It does take me back, and I cannot apologize for what is real…
Let me say, I am one of the first people to tell you I find emotional, nostalgic blogs (or any of that type of writing to be fair…) completely tedious, perhaps even gratuitous… So, you will have to forgive me certain indulgences as of late, which I will elaborate on more fully some other time…
There is just something I have to get off my chest… something I cannot stop thinking about… and yes, I have had a few drinks this evening… As Phil says, “I started out on Heineken, but I soon hit the harder stuff…” (Of course he also says, “I am going back to San Anselmo… I do believe I’ve had enough…” so you know he (and I ) are keeping it mostly together, because San Anselmo is the shit.) But I digress…
I was walking home this evening, in the bitter cold, [it is like 15°C... or 59°F, which now sounds not so bad... but here it is cold] listening to some very particular music… and I stopped at one point and closed my eyes and just listened. And I was positively transported.
There is an entire collection of music that I can listen to today and simply by closing my eyes and stopping for the briefest of moments I am taken back, seriously, I feel like I am somewhere else, totally in the moment…
Is this me, or is it the Kilkenny talking when I say that the chords… seriously, just the first three chords of Terrapin Station put me on stage left at Shoreline Amphitheater… When I hear Estimated Prophet I have to consciously hold my arms down… I Know You Rider makes me skip and spin (in private these days) and Standing on the Moon can, well, it can move me in ways I thought impossible. And there are more… soooo many more. Every song. A place. A smile. A memory. A crystalline minute in time.
I am going to have to take a Grateful Dead hiatus pretty soon because it s really proving disastrously retroactive, but god… to feel the way we would feel at those shows… I wish I was a talented enough writer to articulate the joy, the sheer pleasure of being at a show, with my friends who at that time were my family. For now I will have to rust that everybody has something like this in the recesses of their minds that they can draw upon and so you all know what I mean…
Right now I find myself inexplicably drawn to the people I shared that time with… and not for malevolent reasons. I am not looking to insert myself into their current lives or upset the balance of life in the ‘now,’ but just to remember, out loud, what we had for those brief shining moments. To make it real. To know it was real. I don’t want to change a thing. But man, I want to hold on for just a little bit more… We all need a miracle sometimes.
Because it was amazing and wonderful and magical and fabulous.
Here I am today.
Fucking Grateful.
Standing on the moon
I got no cobweb on my shoe
Standing on the moon
I’m feeling so alone and blue
I see the gulf of Mexico
As tiny as a tear
The coast of California
Must be somewhere over here – over here
Standing on the moon
I see the battle rage below
Standing on the moon
I see the soldiers come and go
There’s a metal flag beside me
Someone planted long ago
Old Glory standing stiffly
Crimson, white and indigo – indigo
I see all of Southeast Asia
I can see El Salvador
I hear the cries of children
And the other songs of war
It’s like a mighty melody
That rings down from the sky
Standing here upon the moon
I watch it all roll by – all roll by
Standing on the moon
With nothing else to do
A lovely view of heaven
But I’d rather be with you
Standing on the moon
I see a shadow on the sun
Standing on the moon
The stars go fading one by one
I hear a cry of victory
And another of defeat
A scrap of age old lullaby
Down some forgotten street
Standing on the moon
Where talk is cheap and vision true
Standing on the moon
But I would rather be with you
Somewhere in San Francisco
On a back porch in July
Just looking up to heaven
At this crescent in the sky
Standing on the moon
With nothing left to do
A lovely view of heaven
But I’d rather be with you – be with you
Band-Aids.
Sometimes we all need a Band-Aid.
I bought a bunch of very specific Band-Aid brand band aids when I was home this summer because I am not always happy with the selection of what people around me call ‘plasters.’ I just thought, well, you never know. The band-aids I like are the flexible cloth kind that are “skin” colored. My friend Anna and I had a long debate about the best type of band-aid because she completely disagreed with my choice. she had some valid reasons I guess… but I stuck with my original choice (heheh, ‘stuck’ with it.) I do not care for the sticky black yuck that seems to get around the edges of the plastic-y type, and I find they do not have the staying power I like. She said that the cloth ones smell bad. To which I countered that they do not if you maintain basic hygiene. It turned into a Coke or Pepsi argument, so I let it go… The main thing was that I wanted to have a good, quick fix of my liking should I need one.
But there are some times when the band aids we need don’t come in a box. I know that I endeavor to keep these kinds band-aids just as handy as my Band-Aid brand “Tough Strips,” though sometimes I misplace them and need to go looking. And when you really need a band aid for whatever is hurting you, it seems like you cannot always find them, so I decided to fill up my first aid kit. Here is what my band aid’s for life look like:
- Jamaica Blue Mountain Coffee with milk in a giant cup while I sit in the sun on my patio
- The Grateful Dead live @ Frost, May 6 & 7, 1989 (you can try this one here…)
- Two cats nestled up against me on the sofa
- Roberto’s #7 Combo, or #2 in a pinch
- The smell of the California Coast
- Talking to my parents or Anna
- Coloring in the lines
- Writing letters
- The beach
- Sunshine
- Yoga
Since these are not always available I figure it is good to have a couple other available varieties, in which case I still do recommend the flexi-strips by Band-Aid.
Because sometimes we all need a band-Aid.
The eyes are the windows to the soul? I don’t think so… it’s your iPod.
There are two things that I find to be the most evocative brain triggers: smell and music. Since I have waxed on and on about my smell fetish I figure now is the time to talk music.
I LOVE MUSIC.
I cannot recall a time in my life that is not punctuated by music and I am ever grateful for that. [I understand I even was quite a concert goer in utero... Thanks mom, I knew that was why I always had such love for the Fillmore...]
Now, since the advent of the digital music revolution it is like we have entered an entire new dimension. I took my entire music collection from home with me to Asia on my iPod (never mind that I fried it using dirty power on Koh Pha Ngan – prior to reverse loading the music onto my laptop… I still love you Thailand) and one 80gb iPod and a 16gb iPhone later [I swear that phone is the best relationship I have had in ten years...] I can safely say I understand why record stores are going under… not that I like it, I just get it. [If I were still in the States and had storage space I know I would still love whiling away the hours at Tower Records... well, except there is no more Tower, but you know what I mean.] The thing is we can take all of our music with us all the time. Listen to it with little interruption save for trivial tings like work and school.
All the time.
What joy!
And then this guy said, “Hey, lemme check out what you got on your iPod!”
“What? No, oh… okay. Wait, why?”
It was like someone I only sort of knew had asked to see my underwear or something. Is that appropriate iPod etiquette? [Okay, truth be told, I had, um... intimate knowledge of this individual, in fact quite near the time he popped the question... but that only underscores my point... I don't let just anyone cruise my tunes.]
What does our music say about us? Tons I would say. I mean, think about how much thought we put into a simple question like, ‘What’s your favorite song/band/artist?’ A lot goes into that answer. Do you go with a recent favorite? A classic? Something that you know your inquisitor has not heard so you illustrate your cutting edge-ness? Something totally cheesy to admit that you are either A) so cool you can afford cheese or B) simply cannot get enough of the Pina Colada Song? Whether or not you admit it, you are choosing your music as an extension of yourself. And when someone asks to see your iPod, they are asking to see deep into you. We judge people by their music, and if you think you don’t… you are a liar. I love how people look at me when I tell them that I saw every Grateful Dead show I could from 1989 through 1995. Oh, and yes I can sing all the words to ‘Damn it feels good to be a gangster’ backed right up by ‘I like to move it move it.’ [Bear in mind, my singing is hazardous to your health... ]
So, when people ask questions about our music collections we really are projecting a significant part of our persona.
Take for example activities like this:
1. Put your iPod/iTunes on shuffle.
2. For each question, press the next button to get your answer.
3. YOU MUST WRITE THAT SONG NAME DOWN NO MATTER HOW SILLY IT SOUNDS!!!
IF SOMEONE SAYS “IS THIS OKAY” YOU SAY?
I’m Gonna Be 500 Miles – The Proclaimers
WHAT WOULD BEST DESCRIBE YOUR PERSONALITY?
Call Me – Blondie
WHAT DO YOU LIKE IN A GUY/GIRL?
Changed Your Mind – Chris Isaak
HOW DO YOU FEEL TODAY?
Wickety Wack – Trackman
WHAT IS YOUR LIFE’S PURPOSE?
Angel of Harlem – U2
WHAT IS YOUR MOTTO?
Soul Vibrates – Plump DJs
WHAT DO YOUR FRIENDS THINK OF YOU?
No Sympathy – Peter Tosh
WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR PARENTS?
The Magnificent Seven – The Clash
WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT VERY OFTEN?
Too Lost in You – Sugababes
WHAT DO YOU WANT TO BE WHEN YOU GROW UP?
Poquita Fe – Flaco Jimenez
WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR BESTIE?
Dance Me – Telepopmusik
WHAT DO YOU THINK WHEN YOU SEE THE PERSON YOU LIKE?
Love is the Only Law – Ziggy Marley
WHAT DO YOUR PARENTS THINK OF YOU?
In the House – Los Mocosos
WHAT SONG WILL YOU DANCE TO AT YOUR WEDDING?
Be Good Johnny – Men at Work
WHAT WILL THEY PLAY AT YOUR FUNERAL?
The Passenger – Iggy Pop
WHAT IS YOUR HOBBY/INTEREST?
Can’t Get Enough of Your Love – Barry White
WHAT IS YOUR BIGGEST FEAR?
Give a Man a Home – Ben Harper
WHAT IS YOUR BIGGEST SECRET?
Troubled by the Way We Came Together – Natalie Imbruglia
Now, honestly, I followed the instructions, I only skipped unnamed and directly named songs as well as instrumental obviously. A couple of those answers were pretty good (I do not ever remember listening to Trackman on purpose, but sweet answer) and look at some of that stuff… what does that say about me?
Now consider this one, an activity that got more commentary than any other blog I ever did:
Step 1: Put your music player on shuffle
Step 2: Post the first line (unless the first line gives away the name of the song) from 25 songs that play
Sept 3: Strike through the songs as your friends correctly identify the song title and artist
Step 4: Looking them up on Google, etc. is CHEATING
Step 5: If you like the game, post your own!!
1. Well, high school, seemed like such a blur, I didn’t have much interest in sports or school elections…
2. You caught me in the middle dazed on the carpet, I was following the lines…
3. It’s poetry in motion, and when she turned her eyes to me…
4. Oh, you’ve got green eyes… Oh, you’ve got blue eyes…
5. Nowhere to go, but I’ll still be cruising, I live this life long long long time…
6. With so much drama in the l-b-c…
7. I watch you reading a book, I get to thinking our love’s a polished stone…
8. I wash my faith in dirty water, ’cause it gives my mind a little order…
9. We don’t own this place, though we act as if we did, it’s a loan from the children of our children’s kids…
10.Please please tell me now, please please tell me now…
I am stopping at 10 because I am sure you get the point (and feel free to guess the songs if you are up to the challenge.) The thing is, this really isn’t just about the music is it? Is it ever really just about the music?
Music changed my life. No that is not right. Music has shaped my life. Lately I have probably been thinking about it a bit more than usual, but it takes one chord… one word… in some cases just a smile… and there you are: back at Shorline, the Fillmore, Jack Murphy, the Greek, the Coliseum, Red Rocks, the Polo Fields, the Gorge, Sam Boyd, the Warfield, Coachella, the River, HJK, Cal Expo… wherever the music took you and who it took along with you.
As the guy [who played something UNmentionable when he had the chance to set the mood - let's just say her initials were C.D.] started scrolling though my playlists, he was like, “What is this???”
I knew right then, I had to go.
Look into my eyes all you want, but mind the iPod, eh?
Reminders.
Once upon a time there was a girl who thought that things should be a certain way. And she believed that because she thought they should be, that they would be. [We forgive this girl certain sillinesses because she was in her twenties...] This girl was sort of a late bloomer into the girlie ways of things but it was okay, by the time she hit her twenties she had a boyfriend, which seemed to be the point of all things at that juncture for some reason.
So, she was successful. Things were as they should be.
But then she got a little bit bored. A big transition was approaching: she was graduating from college and would be heading to Europe for a while, and then off to unknown, but certainly thrilling and impressive and amazing things, that should be. She decided to remedy this feeling of moderate angst by taking a road trip and seeing a Show, as she did. She would meet her friends and hang out and smile and dance and laugh, as you should. And there would also be this other rather interesting individual there who she had met at another Show long before… sleeping on the floor in a crowded hotel room in Northern California… was it the Ramada? Who knows, but she certainly remembered the boy on the floor.
After being deposited at a very specific entrance to the Show she met her friends and the boy was there. And it was nice. She believed this was now how it should be.
And so it was.
She graduated a month later, spent the summer playing in the Southern California surf and then headed home for a week before heading off off to the Mediterranean where obvious adventures awaited. While biding time in Northern California she turned 23 and went to see Peter Gabriel with the boy from the floor who made her smile and tickled her brain.
Then she went to Europe, because travel is what she wanted to do. More than anything: to travel and to take pictures. Many years later she would forget that this had always been what she wanted to do, but right then she knew, as you should.
While she was in Europe she listened to very specific music: and though now it seems too obvious a ploy to name the music as the boy, who is now a man, might read this story but let us anyways. The Grateful Dead; The Stereo MCs; Peter Gabriel. Over and over and over again.
When she came back from Europe she was very disoriented and amiss. She took this out on the boy who stood by her all the while. As he should have. She talked about all the things she would do one day. All places she would go. When she met his family, he told her later that they liked her a lot, but that they worried.
Why?
Because they think you want something you can’t have. Here.
What? No…
She couldn’t imagine that he wouldn’t be able to give her everything that she wanted. That was how she thought it should be. So that is how it would be. But she never really asked him. And then it happened: she decided that she had to do something else and she didn’t ask him and it made him angry and confused. As it would have, and of course, as it should have.
Twelve years later, she found him on an insidious internet social network and she dared to say: Is it you? She had looked for him before but it was now that she found him because it was now that she could, so she would. Yes. It. Is.
Now can we be friends?
He has made a beautiful life for himself… a beautiful family and a beautiful wife. He is happy and peaceful. And they talked and said what they should have said a long time ago. I am sorry. And she looked at his life with a bit of benevolent envy and so he gave her the gift of a lifetime:
He said: You are doing what you always said you wanted to do, remember?
And then she did.
And she smiled right where she was.
Amanda
