On Growing Up Finnish American in the '60s

On most weekends of my childhood my family would go to some sort of Finnish gathering. This could be a dinner with relatives or a ski trip or a barbecue or an extended family party. There were also functions held by the local Finnish Brotherhood Hall in my hometown of Berkeley. There were sometimes soft religious undertones to these, but as Finland is a Lutheran nation, there was nothing terribly overt. Maybe just a passing reference to god and a short prayer. Mostly there would be food and revelry and live accordion music and dancing. Wherever it was a point was being made for everyone to have a good time and forget whatever cares might be troubling them. The old and the young alike were treated with respect and dignity. Women were generally responsible for preparing meals and took on a greater share of the set up and cleaning, but this was in line with the times. I have never felt that my upbringing was especially sexist, certainly not relative to the rest of the world at the time. Women's voices were heard and respected.

I had a strong sense that everyone was happy. In fact that was rather the point of weekends. Finns are a notoriously hard working people. The proclivity to drunkenness usually manifests on weekends and often in the form of binges. Work gets done and quite efficiently thank you. The Finns of my parents' generation were enjoying the fruits of post war America. As a carpenter -- like seemingly every other Finnish American of our community -- my dad was benefitting enormously from the building boom. He always had work. The union was strong and he made enough that my mother didn't need to work yet we owned a home and two cars and my father was able to invest in and help build apartments in Lake Tahoe. The United States that I grew up in was a sharp contrast to the Finland where my dad was raised. His family was never poor but they did struggle and consumer goods were not readily available nor was the latest technology. So the Finns in the Bay Area of the late '40s '50s '60s and even into the '70s had cause for constant celebration. They were enjoying the American dream and homesickness was alleviated by the strong Finnish community around them. (Of course today Finland has the most respected education system in the world and was ranked by Newsweek magazine as the best overall country in the world to live in. Meanwhile in the US middle class homes usually require both parents to work and union power is fading and the economy...you get the picture. Times change.)

My father, Aimo Hourula*

It was a warm and happy and comfortable cocoon for me to grow up in. Besides my folks and big brother I had grandparents aunts uncles and cousins and family friends who were like relatives. There was no indoctrination, just an exposure to the culture of my forebearers. I had an amazing amount of freedom. Children were to be looked after and indulged and loved unconditionally. They were not -- however -- to be treated as square pegs to be jammed into holes round or otherwise. Today's children are often more programmed than raised, given an endless string of clubs teams organizations and groups to join. Their non school hours are so precisely scheduled that they even are assigned play dates. Many parents build their lives around their children sacrificing much of what made them unique before parenthood. In the Finnish community I grew up in parents made accommodations for their children and included them as part of their lives. Children were honored not deified. Unlike many children of today we did not feel we were the center of the universe just a valued part of it.

Of course this was no earthly paradise. Marital problems were not brought up beyond the tightest inner circle. Alcoholism and mental and emotional problems were closely held secrets. There were such strictures on mentioning them that even the sufferer was unable to admit it to themselves. Thus my poor old mom. She developed what was likely schizophrenia which coupled with alcoholism shattered her life in such a profound way that she could not even recognize anything was amiss. Paranoia gripped her like a vise.  I doubt that there were anything more than whispers when my father started turning up alone at social gatherings. Even as evidence came to light of my mother's serious issues there was probably never much but idle gossip. Finns of that generation had no mechanism to cope with such issues. My father himself was at a loss to help her or even himself. It was a situation that was not within his ability to grasp. Part of him simply died I think. I know part of me did. Eventually he met another woman and divorced my mom who lived on for another 28 very sad years. Undiagnosed and alone. The world I grew up was reluctant to acknowledge difficulties especially ones so exotic as my mom's. They were in a boat that was not to be rocked.

While liberal in most senses of the word Finnish Americans were troubled by protesters whether for Black equality or against the Vietnam war. They had such a good thing going they wanted no one suggesting anything was wrong anywhere for anybody.

I've made a point in my life not to idealize my youth, my culture, my family or anything else. Having a mother go mad will do that. But I do look back with great fondness at my childhood and the manner in which I was shaped and comforted by my Finnish identity. It is a powerful and useful and positive drug to have a strong sense of group and to participate in it fully. To work hard and achieve and give back and to enjoy. That's really what sticks out for me. People getting together and having fun. I had an uncle -- a younger brother of my dad's -- who I'll always remember with this impossibly large smile beaming from his handsome face. I'll also remember his powerful and frequently released laugh and his incomparable kindness to me. He built himself a big house in the suburbs and loved to host parties in it. Christmas Eve there was magic. Some of the great memories of my childhood are from holidays, get-togethers and bashes held there. I'd play with my cousins, eat a magnificent meal prepared by my aunt and feel an overwhelming sense of the world being a safe and wonderful place because it was not just the kids who were having a great time, but the adults too. Ya can't beat that.

If anyone reading this enjoyed it then it's dedicated to my late great big brother, Robert. If you didn't enjoy it then leave my brother out of it.

*Photo from my niece Matlena Hourula's website. You should totally check out her work.

We are Wonderful We are Contradictory

Every life is many days, day after day. We walk through ourselves, meeting robbers, ghosts, giants, old men, young men, wives, widows, brothers-in-love. But always meeting ourselves. -- James Joyce, Ulysses.

There's a certain glamor that can attach itself to stories recovering addicts and alcoholics tell about themselves. They create a narrative which makes them tragic romantic heroic figures with rich colorful pasts and inherit wisdom that normal people can't possibly understand. These self glorifying drunks and junkies use their diseases to imbue themselves with a glorious wisdom deserving reverence. These people are -- of course -- full of shit. What they have in bravado they lack in humility.

Humility is precious. A drop of it is worth pounds of gold. And lest you think I don't know what I'm talking about I'm talking about what I've been for much of the past decades. Wearing a checkered past like a badge of courage and honor. I crawled out of the pit of hell and now bestride sobriety like a colossus.

Humility is the recognition the understanding and the acceptance that we are part of a whole and while we're different we're no better than anyone else no matter what we do.

Of course a lot of us spend our whole lives smugly being different than everyone else. We are not normal not regular not ordinary we are fucking awesome and other people are just too dumb to now it. We have a special vision seeing what others cannot. Experiencing life more meaningfully. Sure we suffer for our self bestowed beatitudes. Addiction and mental quirks -- ranging from idiosyncrasies  to manic depression -- are some of the prices we pay for our heightened senses of awareness. Mere mortals can not possibly understand. How we suffer for our state of grace.

There are 12 step programs that can help wash away some of our self righteousness. But we can practices certain principles in all our affairs and still feel deep down that we are above it all. Deep down and above. Our wonderfully contradictory spiral into the depths of ourselves.

Life is a process. There is no finer aspiration than to pursue progress and not perfection. It's all we have really. Taking steps forward even if the winds of misfortune are blowing us backwards. There is much to be said for the person who gets up everyday and takes that shower and eats that breakfast and heads for that job and takes care of business and doesn't just rail and scream impotently at injustices small and large but does something. Keep on truckin' is not such a silly notion.

If you hang in there putting one foot before the other you'll surely be rewarded. Just being part of the world is a miracle. To experience love and friendship and art and beauty and nourishment and light and ideas...what gifts! By allowing ourselves to be part of it all we then can truly see that while we are all unique and special we are not of a superior quality no matter what we know and what we've experienced and what we've learned and who we've known. Cherishing who we are without deifying ourselves is an art best mastered in order to know true happiness.

It's all ridiculously easy and impossibly hard and wonderfully ambiguous and we are all fully capable and sorely lacking. We are the contradictions we seek in the world whether we're looking for them or not.

Thoughtless Commuters The Overweight and Compelling Sports Stories

Commute home on BART the other day I notice a guy standing next to me who looked to be about 90 years old. His cane barely keeps him from toppling over into a heap. No one was offering Methuselah a seat. The reasoning must have been that he's going to die pretty soon anyway so what's the point. Save the comfort of sitting for those young and healthy enough to enjoy it. I've seen pregnant women left to stand too. Why give a seat to someone who might be going into labor any minute? It would be that much harder to get her off the train and to the hospital from a sitting position. You could be a one-legged pregnant octogenarian and not be given a seat. Then again I see some people demand the seats by the door that are reserved for the old infirm and expecting. They've every right too. Recently however I saw a woman demand a seat from someone who looked younger than her. She was neither in a family way nor disabled. She was however fat. So because you're fat you can demand a seat? I'd have been like: "hell no I'm not giving up my seat to you just because you eat donuts by the box and drink coke by the liter." But that's me. I am not awash with sympathy for the obese especially when I see them coming out of ice cream shops or ordering a danish with their coffee. Should I have to make accommodations for smokers or drunks? I've been both and my message to addicts including those whose drug of choice is pastry: get some fucking help. There's plenty of it. I'm sorry you have an addiction I know what its like but this one's on you. No one gets clean or slender or off cigarettes unless they want to and no one is living in addiction for very long who doesn't know and hasn't thought about getting out.

It is our foibles and weaknesses and flaws and defects and mistakes and accidents that make us such compelling viewing. Perfection is boring. Give me stories of defeat and loss and tragedy and fatal error and you're giving me something to reflect on to learn from to be inspired by. My hero is Muhammad Ali. It would have been nice if he'd retired from boxing several losses before he did and never suffered from Parkinson's Syndrome but one has to admit that his story has taken on the shadings of Greek Tragedy as a consequence. Also that first loss to Frazier along with being exiled from boxing set Ali up for his greatest triumph -- reclaiming the heavyweight crown not once but twice. There was an other world quality to Ali's string of victories his beauty his poetry his politics. But ultimately he proved mortal.

I never much cared for Lance Armstrong. There was far too much perfection in his ceaseless winning. (Besides it was just riding a damn bicycle.) I sensed something amiss about him and was not at all surprised when it all come tumbling down and he was exposed as a lying cheat. Suddenly I was interested in him. Now instead of not giving a damn I actually could work some really strong animus. His story was far more interesting.

John Wooden was a much admired college basketball coach who racked up a string of national titles several earned by unbeaten teams. He and his team generally carried themselves with class and there was not a whiff of scandal around his UCLA programs. Yawn. Coaches and players can learn a lot from the late great Wizard of Westwood but what a snooze of a story.

In sports it is defeat that defines character. I have reveled in my favorite baseball team's (SF Giants) two World Series titles these past three seasons. But I am lucky to have suffered from so many near misses from the time I was a wee child through adulthood. Those crushing defeats merely strengthened my love for the team and made their first two titles of my lifetime so much sweeter.

Without agony ecstasy has little meaning. There are some who toss their team aside after bitter disappointment or an embarrassing pratfall. I've had two teams I love suffer shocking defeats recently. First of all you get used to it and can and should remind yourself that yes it is in fact only a game. (It is amazing for how many years I refused to accept that it was not just a game and would have an entire weekend ruined by a team's loss.) But also those losses make the wins meaningful and precious.

Sports are cruel if you measure success only in terms of championships. Locally the 49ers pro football team reached the conference title game last season and the Super Bowl this one. In both instances they lost and in excruciating fashion that brought out an endless cacophony of could haves should haves would haves. But goodness they had great seasons in both instances -- particularly given a long string of bad ones that preceded. It seemed impossible for locals to appreciate their accomplishments instead boo hooing the final loss. Perspective is everything and is often missing in the what have you done for me lately mindset of sports fans.

Okay my writing is spent for now. Can't think of a clever way to wrap this up so I reckon maybe I should just stop....

The Best Spam I've Ever Received and More Fun With IMDb User Comments

Subject Line:  ARE YOU DEAD OR ALIVE?.

The Letter: 

Dear: Customer,  How are you today? Mis Mary came to our Office this morning to Claim your fund, she stated that she is your younger Sister, she told us that you had a fatal Accident but unfortunately you survived but later gave up to ghost, she said that you instructed her to claim the ($750,000.00) Seven Hundred and Fifty Thousand dollars on your behalf before your death.  And here is her address she provided us to transfer the fund, Address: Spring Hollow Ct. Roswell, GA  30075. I will like to know and to confirm if you are the one that gave her the power of claim, if yes, kindly provide a letter of claim from a chief judge or from a reputable attorney in your country before we can release your Fund to her, if no, you are to quickly get back to me to avoid wrongful transfer so we will stop the release of your fund to the little lady who claimed to be your younger sister, okay.And she even say that she will pay for the dispensation international account opening fee of $105, so we are still searching if we can relaese the fund to her or not. 
So we can get her arrested because of the criminal act and it will soon be reported to the police authority. Use this  code as your subject when replying this mail to me (CODE SV01 AS YOUR SUBJECT) so that you can not make any misstake when getting back to me to arrest her.
Barrister Paul Edward

First of all the subject line is irresistible. My initial temptation was to send this reply. "Yes I am in fact dead. Fortunately some of us have internet access in the afterlife and having been a paragon of virtue my entire time as a mortal I am eternally online. Also the deceased who possess cyber privileges do not have to deal with ads when watching you tube clips. Indeed there are no ads anywhere on heavenly websites. Best of all the comments sections have been disabled so there is no temptation to read any rude racists off topic illiterate screeds that typically follow well-thought out essays or posts. So in terms of post mortality web experiences death can be a real treat.
"Anyway thank you ever so for your email. I did not have a sister named Mary or anything else. Not a real one. I did have an imaginary sister Jezebel. Let me tell you she was a caution and about as real as the money you purport to have more...."

Most spam is merely clutter but gems like these do come along and they are to be cherished.

Here's an adorable TV show review by and IMDd user for a very short lived reality series called The Catalina:

The Catalina is a show for younger people that like to party and have fun.It's not meant to be a completely serious show,it's a fun show that shows a family of workers! It's always fun to see that work can be fun but still getting things done.I think this show is very entertaining. I don't think people are getting it enough credit, get your heads out of your asses and just learn to have fun and enjoy life a little bit! Cast is pretty funny and Morgan cracks me up I have a good friend that is a lot like her I love it! This hotel looks awesome if I ever come visit South Beach i'm staying at the Catalina! I also like the diversity of the cast cool to see all different kinds of people coming together and learning new things from each other !

I think the author's advice that we get our "heads out of your asses and just learn to have fun and enjoy life a little bit!" is spot on. People who cannot enjoy the televised garbage that is reality programming clearly have managed to do the seemingly impossible and placed their heads into their anal passages and further are the type of individual incapable of enjoying life. Although if you can actually pull off that little trick with your head and buttocks you probably have conceived some pretty clever ways of enjoying life "a little bit!" The author celebrates the "diversity" of the cast. Usually when someone recognizes a TV show for diversity it means there's a token African American and someone who either looks or in fact is Latino. Judging from the show's poster that would be the case with Catalina. My daughters watched some of the Disney channel and Nickelodeon TV series when they were younger and the casts invariably included a Black kid who you'd swear was white if you just heard his or her voice.

Her review is not unusual. I see countless such defenses for bad shows and movies that are examples of the belief that the best defense is a good offense. The writers attack any would-be or actual critics of the show holding firm that this show or film is for fun so don't bring your high faultin' artsy attitudes about what's good and bad to this shlock. "Hey I know this candy is empty calories and will contribute to my obesity but it's not meant to be nutritious it's just for fun to eat so leave me alone!"

For classic films there are countless IMDB user comments like this: "will someone explain to me why this is supposed to be so good? I just don't get why this is considered a classic. Don't get me wrong I tried to like it but...." Explaining to someone why a film is great is a futile exercise. If the person is 12 years old then just suggest they revisit the film in 10 or 20 years. A lot of my favorite films are ones I didn't at all like when I was younger. Tastes change as a person ages.

I leave you with this final IMDb user comment on Hitchcock's Rear Window:

I think my 6 years old cousin could build up a better thriller than this. 
Yeah it's a good movie, I gave it a 8 out of 10, but seriously, is it really that good? Of course, the directing is very very good, the acting is good, the sound and the cinematography are great for the 50s, but what the *beep* was that plot? 
It's such an easy story, I don't even get chills, this movie could have been so much better. They're so many moments in that film that just made me say: wtf is that, how dumb is that, oh wow the police are already there, oh yeah of course he hid something in the plants while he could've just put it with the rest, and the ending, oh gosh just a big lol at the end, yeah he'll just take 30 seconds to walk from the door to the chair while letting his eyes open...) 
Maybe I build up myself too much, but when you have a 8,7 grade and you're the 29th best film on IMDB, you're suppose to be really better than that. 
This movie is supposed to be: mystery and thriller. I watched a romance and a comedy! 
I mean... I liked Hitchcock work as a filmaker in this movie, really really, but the screenplay just wasn't good enough. 
P.S. to the ones that'll call me a hater or a Twilight fan, I'm not lol, I really loved Psycho as a matter of fact, may be I thought I'd get the same excitement throughout the movie...

 I checked and this commenter considers Titanic the best movie ever. Whattaya gonna do?

I Hope You Find This Offensive

Ya know how people say: don't get me wrong. I'm the opposite. Please get me wrong. Totally wrong. Misinterpret what I say. Take it out of context. Develop a mistaken impression of me. And those words you took out of context? Twist them. See me as what I am not. Pervert your limited understanding of me. Assume the worst. Misconstrue to your hearts content. Fail to grasp my meaning. Mistake my sarcasm for heartfelt convictions.

Now that we've got that out of the way....

STOP IT!

For crying out loud stop offending people. Don't use the n word (nigger) the f word (fag). Don't use the q word (queer). Don't use the r word (retarded). Please do not make fun of people's weight -- no fat shaming. Sticks and stones may break bones but words will bloody well kill a person. This is what we need to be focused on as a society. Forget hunger poverty drug abuse domestic abuse crime gang activity incarceration rates. Never mind economic disparities. That's hard stuff. Here's what we should be worrying about: Lena Dunham got a tweet from comedian Lisa Lampanelli that had a picture of the two of them and the caption was: "Me with my nigga ... I love this beyotch!!" I know pretty awful isn't it? Well the worst part is that Dunham didn't immediately distance herself from the tweet and lambaste Lampanelli. It took FOUR DAYS for Dunham to say: "That's not a word I would EVER use. Its implications are beyond my comprehension. I was made supremely uncomfortable by it, perhaps I should have addressed it, but the fact is I've learned that Twitter debates breed more Twitter debates." And that -- of course -- simply was not good enough. An abject public apology in the middle of Times Square by Dunham and a subsequent public quartering of Lampanelli was called for. There were entire columns dedicated to taking Dunham to task for not beating Lamapanelli to death with a shovel. These are the defining issues of our generation. Making sure that we are very careful with what we say. African Americans don't need better schools or job programs they need offensive terms about them not being used by white women.

This freedom of speech business has gone on long enough.

We saw it at the Oscars last night too. People making jokes. A few on twitter called out host Seth MacFarlane for "fat shaming" humor and conflating gays with musicals. Homophobe! Fat people should not be subject to the ridicule of comics. Do you realize how difficult it is to say no to a donut? Or three? Obesity is no joke (it's actually a way of life in America). And let's not stereotype gay people for comic purposes. Or anyone else. Feelings might be hurt. Might. You never know. What if you make a joke or comment and someone is -- heaven forbid -- offended? What then?

From a blog post by the great Dick Cavett: I’ve never quite understood why this word — “offended” — is so horrifying. What doesn’t offend somebody? And who wants to see, read or write anything that is simon-pure in its inability to offend those dreaded “someones”? Anyone working in the media can tell you that there seems to be an always-ready-to-explode segment of the populace for whom offense is a fate worse than anything imaginable. You’d think offense is one of the most calamitous things that could happen to a human being; right up there with the loss of a limb, or just missing a parking space.

What is our obligation to the offendees? To help them limit their suffering by avoiding all offense? With what advice?

You could stay in the house, watch no TV, read nothing of any kind including potentially upsetting snail mail or e-mail, and you just might manage to glide through an offense-free day. No surly neighbor, no near-misses by unpunished, demented, sidewalk-riding cyclists, no cab driver letting other cabs in ahead of yours while distractedly nattering on his phone in no known language. Stay cocooned and you will risk no insults from rude waiters, no pain from gruff clerks, no snarls from any employees of United Airlines.

As you can tell I'm bloody sick and tired of people being defended from words. How about a defense from actions and deeds? That's where real damage can be done.

We want to live in a zoloft world where it's always sunny and everyone is careful about what they say and no offensive is taken or given and originality is sanitized before being presented for public consumption. Chew all the life out of it. Pablum for everyone!

I'm glad we no longer live in a USA where black people are routinely called or referred to as nigger or any of the other countless derogatory terms that were hurled about. I'm glad we're sensitive to the plight of all minorities and strive for equality in the workplace and in our culture. I embrace multi culturalism and ethnic diversity. I'm glad gay people can come out of the closet and people with disabilities are accommodated. I just wish

That

we

could

talk and joke and tweet and text and speechify and orate and chat and email without this constant nagging fear that we MAY be "offending" someone. Maybe. Cause ya know....

I hope you found this offensive and don't get me wrong. Unless you really want to.

"Everyone gets everything he wants. I wanted a mission, and for my sins, they gave me one. Brought it up to me like room service. It was a real choice mission, and when it was over, I never wanted another."

Writing sometimes comes out of anger or depression. Rarely from ennui. But sometimes....I made Apocalypse Now (1979) my President's Day celebration film. How about that.

People spend a lot of time numbing their lives. Television. You tube. Chores. Mundane everyday tasks.  It's not escapism but avoidance. At the beginning of Apocalypse Now Captain Willard (Martin Sheen) talks about the impossibility of being at home in the states after his first tour in Nam. "When I was here, I wanted to be there; when I was there, all I could think of was getting back into the jungle." Many war veterans have said the same thing. Because for all its horror war reminds a person that he is alive. They are wide awake to life and that awareness is like a drug. Imagine having that horrible acid trip that is war the whole time wanting to come down from it then once down wanting to drop another tab. Oh man.

It's no surprise that the film has the feel of an acid trip. From the opening shots of the helicopter The Doors singing "The End" and the jungle going up in flames through the journey up the river culminating with the insanity of Col. Kurtz it is a long very strange trip.

Yeah the helicopters. I've had a thing for helicopters every since high school when one poured tear gas down on me and thousands of others gathered on the Cal campus to protest the Viet Nam War. Seminal moment. These were not enemy choppers and I was not an armed combatant. From curious bystander to instant radical. The sound of those blades chopping through the air....Still. Today. 

There's a lot of helicopter action in Apocalypse Now. There are copters raining death from above on a Vietnamese village. The airborne cavalry. There's Robert Duvall extolling the smell of napalm in the morning. It's one of the many oft repeated lines from the film.  Like another Coppola masterpiece -- The Godfather (1972) -- Apocalypse Now is much remembered for its quotes and for its iconic characters. But these are just the ornaments of a kaleidoscopic and weighty epic. It is a heavy heavy movie sometimes feeling like an enthralling nightmare that won't end. It is humorless but beautiful. Despairing of humanity. At once an embrace of the warrior mentality and repudiation of it. Kurtz is hero villain victim. So are all soldiers. Instantly tragic figures caught up in a game played by politicians.

Ultimately Apocalypse Now is about madness and how it lives such a rich full life just beneath the human surface and is able to reign freely and easily where man make war. Kurtz was the model soldier who eventually fell into his own special abyss of insanity in which murder cloaked in battle made so much sense. Surely Duvall's Kilgore is a nut. Surfing through the war and playing Wagner.

Apocalypse Now is remarkably free of tension and there is little real contemplation of death. There is shock and mourning as Willard's crew meet their fates but these and other deaths are props in a story more heavy with the weight of group psychosis and savagery. It is no accident that Kurtz uses the word horror for this is a horror story. The beasts are men driven to acts that would be incomprehensible in other circumstances. But war...They are alternately manic and like zombies. Bouncing from one extreme emotional state in the next. Adrenalin coursing through their beings then suddenly abating replaced by overwhelming lethargy.

How does one go back to normal after living in among and as such madness? No wonder returning vets so often succumbed to drug addiction. It was the only way to replace the intense feeling of living not on but over the edge. The higher wire act. The craziness. The roller coaster without wheels.

Lunchtime Reverie and Thoughts on Sunset Blvd.

Lunchtime trip to Ferry Building to buy Valentine's Day gift.

Had  a seared sea bass sandwich as a reward for good deed.

Delicious.

Cane forlorn on the ground at trolley stop. How does one leave a cane behind?

Smattering of tourists. Not long before they'll be here in droves. Traveling in a drove not always recommended.

On the trolley back reading Joyce's Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man and listening to The Who. Nice.

Heading back to school/work pass a badly diabetic obese woman in a wheelchair. Then a a bearded old mendicant carrying two shopping bags. He reeks to high heaven and to low hell and parts in between.

Sun is out after a foggy morning. No rain to speak of here since New Year's. Depressingly dry.

San Francisco is prettier in the fog.

Class went well this morning. Had students present on an area of expertise. Heard about Japanese poetry, motorbikes, dogs, nursing, journalism, soup and how awful Hugo Chavez is. All but one of the Venezuelan students I've ever had -- who has ventured an opinion -- detests Chavez. Woman today was the second recently to say that she wished he was dead. Passionate.

Watched Sunset Blvd. (1950) last Saturday. It's in my top ten. Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson) reminds me more of my dear old mom in her latter days. The days when dementia was mixing in with schizophrenia and alcoholism for a spicy mix of eccentric insanity. She was a caution what with her cigarette holder and her 1940s lingo and odd phrasing and paranoid rants and cackling laugh. Was she perhaps channeling her own interpretation of Swanson's Desmond? Was that her? The Cal and Colombia educated housewife who was such a lovely woman and caring mother in moments of clarity. (But who's to say? Perhaps the clarity was when she was raging against hangover bugs planted by the mob or the government).  Watching the film I could taste the sickly sweet champagne that Desmond and mom would have served.

Sunset Blvd. is an amazing film for its infinity of layers. The possessed young man who is the unwitting lover confessor companion of a living relic. Unable to escape his own submission to her twisted will. And there lurks the man (Erich von Stroheim) who discovered bedded married and now caters to the faded and fading and utterly mad star. Oedipus meets Frankenstein meets Hemingway meets Lothario meeting Miss Havisham. Ready for your close up indeed as Bill Holden's Joe Gillis floats. Wasn't he always floating? Never really secure on the ground on his own two feet. Course cause no money. The repossession of the car withheld as his soul was taken. His pride.

Billy Wilder and Charles Brackett co write one of the greatest scripts ever and Wilder directed. It is an amazingly timeless film given its plot and setting. And say... who could have had the audacity to come up with that New Year's Eve scene? A band and no guests. The creepiness. The out and out sadness of what is less a seduction and more a rape. The audacity to create such an emotionally chilling scene and the brilliance to pull it off....Well that's cinema at its best.

So lucky.

Today's Commute Clocks in at Under an Hour Despite More Out of Service Escaltors

I'm on BART coming home and thinking about how amazing it is that I'm actually a functioning contributing member of society. I have so far avoided institutionalization. I maintain a job. Look presentable and bath daily. I can string together enough coherent sentences to pass as a teacher of English to students from throughout the world. There are no warrants out for my arrest and I have an impressive string of consecutive 24 hours without partaking of drugs or spirits. I am baffled by this and look around at my fellow commuters reckoning they surely must see me as a fraud. I can't possibly belong among these bankers and lawyers and secretaries and accountants and others who own large suburban homes and sprawling lawns and smiling spouses and children at some stage of development that will eventually end in Princeton class reunions. I am a relative pauper a bohemian a socialist troublemaker espousing free love. Surely they've sussed me out and are letting me ride at out of a sense of noblesse oblige. Maybe some day they'll turn me out and send me on my way to a rock pile a mad house or a cardboard box under an overpass. For now they pretend I'm one of them -- a regular guy. After all I sport a tweed jacket and a tie and recently dry cleaned slacks and three figure dress shoes. It is perhaps odd that I read an actual book rather than a kindle or the popular option of staring at my iPhone checking stock quotes (truth be told I don't know stock quotes from Marcel Proust quotes).

I got to BART via a trolley car wonderfully free of tourists. I'm so absorbed in my reading that I pay no mind to all but a few of my fellow travelers. There is one attractive lass who I soon notice is holding an edition of our school's text book. I've never seen her before so she is likely one of the newbies who had orientation today. I may well see her in a class of mine tomorrow and thus have a pang of regret that I spent so much as a second ogling her. The student teacher relationship can't be sullied by lascivious thoughts let alone actions. I hasten to make clear at this point that I do not look upon any member of the farer sex with impure thoughts as I am enjoying a blissfully happy marriage. But still men do have hormones and wandering eyes.....

Descending into the bowels of BART's Embarcadero Station I have to actually walk down to the main level as the escalator is out of service. BART escalators are as reliable a drunk's memory. On my journey home two of the three escalators I encounter will be on the fritz. I am an unabashed fan of escalators. Much as I like exercise I enjoy having my walking being done for me. I often marvel at people who are in such a hurry to get from here to there that they actually walk or even run up or down escalators. It bespeaks a kind of hurried lifestyle I find unnerving. Escalators whisper leisure luxury and ease. They spare knees ankles and thighs needless wear and tear. They are moving stairs for crying out loud. Beat that.

My wait for the trolley car departure had been less than a minute and my wait for the BART train is just at a minute. There will be a bus waiting when I get off BART and I'll have to make a dash to catch it. This combined good fortune means that I walk into my abode just 56 minutes after leaving work. Nice. The bus driver was just pulling away as I got to the vehicle. Many a driver will carry on and leave a frustrated soul behind in such circumstances. This driver is soft hearted and I express my gratitude. The bus ride is only a few minutes long -- not enough time to bother opening a book. At the stop near the Safeway there is the usual cadre of college students with groceries. They invariably manage to bump someone -- in this case me. College students have become increasingly awkward over the years as if some aspects of adolescence have become delayed. They swing backpacks bags and elbows with abandon. Sharing busses with them makes one practice patience and self defense.

The wife is late coming home so I get some work out of the way catch up on twitter and study a bit of Italian.  When she finally gets in we do not leap into one anothers arms but both beam broadly and get down to the serious and pleasurable business of hugs and kisses and how was your days.


Once greetings are complete I will enjoy a humble meal. Questions?

People Watching on Public Transportation and a Digression About Pretty Women

People who never ride public transportation are missing out.

What a trip -- pun intended.

Yesterday on BART. A nice quiet crack whore. Her skin looked like dried molasses. She had on flip flops with little plastic sunflowers on them. Her toes were like elongated raisins. She was meditative and oddly calm. Bony scraggly haired with a dirty dress/housecoat  that given her body mass looked like it was draped over a chair. She was a cleaner crack whore than one normally sees. She was probably somebody's mother and maybe a grandma to boot. Age is hard to determine with such people but I wanna say 40s. When I taught middle school I had a few students over the years whose mommas were crack whores. Other students had mommies and daddys who were lawyers and authors and such. Mixed bag.

There was a chubby 30ish white woman wearing a shirt that said "I Hecka Love Oakland." Except instead of the word love there was heart. A heart means love in case you didn't know. I wondered about anyone who would wear a shirt that said they "hecka" liked or loved or hearted anything. But especially Oakland. One would think that anyone afflicted with a fondness for Oakland would want to keep it a secret. Anyway she seemed happy in a dubious sort of unsentimental way. For some people happiness is a fall back feeling without any real feeling to it. Maybe she's a constitutional scholar or a bio chemist but she looked for all the world like someone not saddled with intellect.

There was a man sitting on a sideways seat talking to a friend who was sitting in the adjacent front ways seat. He wore clean work jeans with cuffs and boots giving himself the appearance of a working poet or a communist longshoreman. Especially given his dark bushy beard and dark bushy hair and dark bushy eyebrows. He was a serious and intent talker. He looked his nondescript friend in the eye as they spoke and his eyes were no more than a couple of feet from his companion. I don't know what they were talking about but it seemed damned important. An anarchist plot or publication of a new book or Israel. There was a real Israel/Palestine vibe. That must of been it.

I also couldn't help but notice the pretty woman on my car. She was totally obsessed with her iPhone. I know it's unusual in this day and age to find a young person who'll spare a minute for their poor neglected smart phone. She had beautiful long brown hair and was dressed smart/casual. But her efforts to wear make up without seeming to wear make up hadn't worked because she looked like someone wearing make up who was trying not to look like she was wearing make up.

When you're happily married and of a certain age all the pressure of noticing a pretty woman is gone. In single younger days you had to wonder if you should try to say something. If you don't it could be a missed opportunity that you'd regret onto your dying day and perhaps well beyond -- the kicking of yourself that you'd do. So you'd have to assess if this was someone you'd really like to get to know and by get to know. So okay maybe she seems shallow and uninteresting and you can safely say "thanks but no thanks" unless you're under the influence which is a whole different matter entirely. So you think this might "work." Is there an opening to say something? If so, what. That's always a killer. Okay I want to say something but what? It's got to be clever -- preferentially relevant to the moment. Once  in my 20s I was sitting at a table in the public library across from a gorgeous young thing who I'd exchanged a smile with. She seemed smart -- hello, in a library -- and natural and interesting and accessible. My brilliant idea was to write a clever note -- a speciality of mine. I composed a doozy. It demonstrated that I was funny and smart and had a way with words and no I don't remember a single letter of it. I was quite proud of it and was about to slide it across the table when Hercules sat down next to her and she greeted him with a kiss. I threw the fucking note away.

I observed these people and more although I swear to Vishnu that I was reading and listening to music the whole time. Veteran public transportation riders can do this. You're welcome.