When the rush-hour workers return, they break out and weave single-file heading to the gym or yoga class, streamline into bars, for their homes and the comforts of family, or the white noise of television. In the evenings, I wander through the outdoor markets and watch the strategic action of efficient workers. Movements are fraught, but always calculated and determined. I have been caught dangerously between the supermarket carts of shoppers armed with the threat of their wristwatches.

Freelance work, and writing particularly, can be a lonely occupation. Some have resorted to the creation of artificial offices where writers, designers, programmers and other freelancers can show up and labor. Forcing a schedule and forging the illusory bonds of co-work, they build their own cubicle walls and design an unencumbered space for production and the sense of belonging in a world they could just as successfully inhabit alone.

Friday, mid-morning, I paused to breathe and sip the last cup of coffee I would have, at least until 4 o’clock, when I would tire of my apartment. Any afternoon break would have already been extended or lost in a nap, and I would slip back into the degradation of participating in online social network sites, Microsoft Word macros and processing, or the flicker of an afternoon newsflash … the doldrums of my one-bedroom and white-screened laptop. In a trance, my fingers would begin to dance over the keys and my eyes scroll the distance of the seemingly endless page.

My thoughts then, were interrupted, penetrated by a new kind of passerby outside my window. Shuffling across the stark island of the rooftop next-door, there was an elderly man, wearing a robe and slippers. He had pushed through the heavy door of the access entrance and braced himself against the wind without a hat or gloves. His trek was solitary, along the ice-patched trail he walked and I had the brief sensation of human-contact, even the exposure to a commute.

His head was tilted downward, the plastered floor reflecting against his glasses. With a short, but quickening gait, he moved with purpose towards the edge, only briefly and narrowly distracted by darting pigeons from greater heights. When he reached the margins, he climbed up and stood up on the lip of the building, five stories up, and looked down at the concrete below. I felt sick, but did not know how to respond. If he jumped now, there was nothing I could do.

I thought about the failing economy and job loss, an eradicated pension, divorce, a battle with alcohol and depression, his family obligations, and an unyielding sense of loneliness in the city…all of his reasons not to go on living. Then, he pulled out something white from his pocket, which I knew, could only be a suicide note, enumerating each loss and his descent in quality of life.

The note waved wistfully from his hands. Since I was the only one watching, I desperately sought to think of a defense:

“It’s not worth it!” I would cry. “Don’t do it!”

I could dial 911. I reached for my phone, but knew it would only be too late.

What words could save him?

“Do you want to come over for coffee?”

“I know a really good psychotherapist on 7th and 10th!”

Resounding through the alley: “I understand! I work from home!”

I imagined his body, toppling slowly over the edge, free falling head-first, hitting the balconies, bending the frames of the aged wrought ironed fire escapes and finally collapsing into a tiny pile next to the children’s bikes and flower pots stacked below. The sound was dull and final. I would have to call the police and file a witness report. I would have to explain to the neighbors what I saw. The crowd would gather and I would never be able to forget this image, being left with lingering questions of my defeat.

It was then that I opened the window and leaned out, taking a deep breath, trying to quickly reduce my thoughts into a single expression. Before I could speak, he brought the white fabric closer to his face and held it with both hands against the wind, blew his nose, wiped his face firmly and cleanly, and returned the handkerchief to his pocket.

After glancing once more at the ground below, he looked back up at the sky. I think he may have smiled, or squinted his eyes against the sun. Then, he turned away from the edge and began to shuffle in retreat across the long, white rooftop. A quiet disappointment grew, when I realized the death of my fantasy—the fantasy, that on this day, my script would have had an impact. For a moment, he would have needed me to be exactly where I was.

I closed my windows and watched as he disappeared, behind the heavy door and into the building. I considered the importance of rush hour, of flailing ties and the comforts in holding a briefcase.

There was a car accident on the corner of 34^th Street and 31^st Avenue in late November. A block from my front door, three people were killed, their remains taken away, covered by white sheets, leaving behind small piles of shattered glass, bent plastic, and metal parts. The next morning, a news crew parked on the corner.

Outside their van, a reporter in tall black boots and a red pea-coat jacket  paced with a microphone. Make-up perfected, she looked hurried, frantic, trailed by a cameraman, as she sought a sound bite to confirm the tragedy. I passed them three times that day, and each time she asked me, affected, like an actress in real life, “Did you know the victims?” I would say no, scowling at the mercenary approach of the aging blond, her looks faded, her career, peaking at coverage of local fatalities. The wind blew her hair, and she pulled the strands from her mouth as she asked the same question to the man walking behind me. He shook his head.

It was cold the night I came home after the accident. I had missed the sound of the screeching cab as it broadsided the SUV, the screams of bystanders, the sirens, and the sinister chill of silence when it was over. By the time I passed the corner, the stop sign was surrounded with Latin prayer candles: each tall glass filled with bright wax, plastered with tawdry images of the Virgin Mary and Jesus, a halo rising behind his arms against the cross. Flowers were tied to the post with strings, festooned with ribbon and wreaths. Pictures of the victims were taped to the cold pole:

*A mother and her daughters pose against a tan background for a cheap photographer.

*A young couple waves from a second story window lined with flowerpots.

*A man holding a martini waves with his arms draped over the shoulders of two women.

Discerning the victims was impossible. I sought an indication of mortality, but in this instance, there was an inscrutable difference between life and death. The photographs told nothing of the tragedy. If there had been only one, the face of the victim, I suspect it would have given off that aura, the sense we have after knowing—the quiet sympathy that comes with death.

Love letters blanketed concrete surrounding the pole and swathed the metal between draping bouquets:

“Mi amor, te echo de menos. Pienso en ti siempre.”

“Te quiero con toda mi alma.”

“Cada día te quiero más que ayer y menos que mañana.”

For months, the shrine has accumulated bottles of lotion, a string of ivy and ribbon, small wrapped boxes full of gifts. Fresh flowers are delivered and strung on Sundays. Weathered photographs are replaced with new ones. Brighter candles succeed the others and collect at the base like Japanese prayer sticks. 

Notes and letters continue to be added as though the chronology of real time indicates some tangible presence, interactions contrived by absence:

“Feliz Navidad.”

“Feliz cumpleaños.”

One day, I noticed that the shrine began to breathe. Its shape personified, adorned by the trappings of human life: jewelry, hair ribbons, and necklaces dressed and decorated its expanding figure. Full cups of Dunkin’ Donuts coffee were brought to the foot of the post with a name written on the Styrofoam in a black Sharpie, “Para ____. Te quiero.”  The shrine flourished, as though the the metal stop sign would one day loosen from its concrete base, conjured to life by each item and sentiment, it would begin to sway and lumber off to work, holding a cup of coffee, its hands born by the stems of roses.

Today there was a rainstorm, and, in the gutter down the block, flowing towards the city drains, I found the carcasses of withered flowers. Later in the day, the ribbons from the post had come untied. The Dunkin’ Donuts coffee cups had been swept away by the street cleaners and many of the candles had tipped and fractured. I did not mind the shrine or its persistence. I did not mind this instant of quiet neglect. In the morning, it may come alive. I have watched it grow and die, a performance with the seasons.

I lost my last Ipod somewhere in the Lower East Side on Saturday night. Possibly under a bar stool at Shorty’s 32, maybe in the cab on my way to a party, or at the loft, where, I made my way through pea-coats and skinny jeans to the wine bar in the back, tossing my belongings under the coat rack along the way. I noticed it was missing later when I dumped the contents of my purse to dig for a last cigarette.

The sense of loss began to swell quietly. At first, it felt so common and easy to ignore. “I’ll find it later,” I tell myself. Suppression sounds like wine poured into a plastic cup, and I am summoned to the kitchen, where smokers are huddled around the window flicking wet palms of rolling paper and filters onto the street below. Loss can be consuming. At the window, I peer out over the city lights and pine, wondering how pitiful I have become, considering the sheer number of fallen.

“Doesn’t this mean anything to you?” I ask myself. “How could you be so reckless?”

So the Ipod is now… either in the pocket of a duplicitous hipster, the palms of my cabby’s teenager, or was found lying under the streetlights of Houston, now scavenged and sold. My Craigslist posting was as futile as a “Missed Connection:”

“Have you seen my Ipod? Attached to white headphones? It’s small and really cute and has an awesome playlist!?”

I never thought I was dependent, but merely complimented, by this attachment. With an Ipod, I run faster, I am stronger, more independent, original … detached. I imagine myself the character in the Ipod commercials, an anonymous black silhouette against a florescent green screen pop-and-locking, flipping waist length dreadlocks like Lenny Kravitz.

Without one, I despair…feeling the numbness of an amputee. My life: incomplete. I cannot concentrate, or run, or keep a schedule, or sleep at night. I regret that I am not trying hard enough protect this essential device, that holds, stores, and records… think of how many words are contained in that 1GB of memory? 

Maybe I should talk to someone.

When an Ipod breaks, I am reluctant to click, “Restore,” thinking, “No, surely, this will never work.” I try and sometimes it does work… usually not at all. But for a minute, there is hope. You can simply clear the memory, “Restore to Original Factory Settings,” to produce a clean slate, a clean start. Denying that the damage (from rain, or boots, or reckless disregard) has already been done. 

Everyone at Apple seems to know exactly what is wrong: “Haven’t you tried restoring it?” When you tell a friend it’s gone, they think they know exactly how you feel, “Dude, that totally sucks, I am sorry.” What you want to say is, “Really? Do you really know how I feel? Do you really know what this feels like?” But you can’t say that, because you kind of feel like an asshole that it hurts so much.

I used to drop the Pink Nano on the floor and it would begin to play. There are other tricks to make them last a little longer- flicking the on-and-off, holding buttons, shaking, banging… hurling. I have owned… (in chronological order) the Original White Nano, a Pink Nano, a 2G Silver Shuffle, a 1G Silver Shuffle, a gifted Red Nano, and my most recent loss… new last month…a 1G Green Shuffle.

Today I went (reluctantly) to Best Buy for my 3rd replacement this year. Now, I am holding the new “Vibrant Blue” 1G Shuffle that looks like something familiar… something I have held before…though I am not confident in its usage or my ability to keep it for very long. I did, however, buy insurance, optimistic that even if it is lost or broken sometime within the Apple Warranty period, I felt better investing in the worth and extension of its lifetime. 

“Insurance?” I ask my friend. “What do you think?”

“Well, I mean, knowing you… yes. I mean, nothing against you… but, yes… of course.”

A confession: I feel like I am progressing… as though this one really matters…like this will be the one that outlasts its own warranty. There was something promising about the investment in insurance, the hope in its endurance, or the knowledge that even when it breaks, I will have the illusion of my money’s worth. And when it is lost, at least I can say that I tried.

I first read DFW as a creative writing student at our lma mater, the University of Arizona. Last fall, I bought his essay collection, Consider The Lobster, which included a full-spread article covering John McCain’s campaign during the 2000 primaries. Originally conceived by Rolling Stone, Wallace was solicited as one of several respected and established writers to depict behind-the-scenes coverage of life on the primary campaign trail.

When McCain became the Republican nominee, I could not help but recall DFW’s earnest portrayal. His article, while capturing the nature of working as a member of the Press, also rewrites the character of McCain. Wallace’s McCain appealed to a wide readership. In his article, McCain was bold, outspoken, and vibrantly candid. His abundant charm and wit contributed to his enduring, uninhibited and honest relationships, including brazen antics, in dealing head-on with the press.

His personal accolades were also supported by his war story, now so popularized as to become folklore. Even as a non-supporting Democrat (reading the essay posthumously, 7 years after the primaries), I could not help but be moved by McCain’s history as a POW in Vietnam, where he refused to leave the prison camp without his fellow inmates. Wallace retells his story with credulity and seems to fervently believe in McCain’s claims of authenticity, unwilling to concede that he is “just a politician,” that he must… “be capable of devotion to something other, more, than his own self-interest.”

After supporting the surge in Iraq, McCain is infamous for the line, “I would rather lose the election, than lose a war.” Prior to his nomination, he was an icon of  patriotism and garnered reverence as a free-thinking, unbridled politician. Up until this point, his career has been marked by independence and bipartisanship, often invoking the criticism of his own party for his dissenting views on immigration, off-shore drilling, and abortion rights.

Shaping the politician is in no doubt, a political process unto itself. Watching the transformation of John McCain from a Senator into a presidential candidate illuminates the rigorous manufacture of the individual as a symbol in the political process.

Despite McCain’s seemingly best attempts, he has conformed to his parties’ agendas, including unabashed politicking, without much restraint, though he appears jaded and unmoved. His new persona is cagey and apprehensive, unwilling to discuss specifics, or speak openly about the same issues and questions that he once was able to vigilantly defend or criticize.

A week before the GOP convention, The Economist, titled their cover and featured article, “Bring Back the Real McCain” and in May, David Foster Wallace himself conceded in an interview with the Wall Street Journal that John McCain had changed since his nomination: “McCain himself has obviously changed; flipperoos and weaselings on Roe v. Wade, campaign finance, the toxicity of lobbyists, Iraq timetables, etc. are just some of what make him a less interesting, more depressing political figure now—for me, at least. It’s all understandable of course—he’s the GOP nominee now, not an insurgent maverick. Understandable, but depressing.”

After discovering that DFW hanged himself, it was difficult not to consider whether such a prolific writer left a suicide note, and be curious as to what it would have said. At the time of death, and especially suicide, it is impossible not to consider the culmination and meaning of one’s own life. In these final moments, where would your accomplishments reside?

Whenever a writer or any famed individual with a perceived amount of “success” is willing to end their life, it is difficult not to wonder, what happened… is it simply a case of depression? A haranguing sense of failure or fatigue? A sign of chronic melancholy and years absent antidote? Selfish indulgence? For one who has empirically “made-it,” what would it take to say, “enough?”

Wallace’s suicide in the middle of McCain’s campaign smacks of a tragic truth: despite any individual determination or ability, the sense of defeat may always be palpable. Perhaps it does not matter so much what you do, or say, or write, because, even with a level of prestige or influence, what does it mean to know, that your world may go on unchanged? Your obituary, as an epic-writer, may be D-list news after a financial institution fails. Your career that was once marked by maverick intent, may be corrupted, as you yourself become subsumed as a political symbol.

The fate of John McCain as a presidential candidate and political figure triggers the end of the individual, for it requires his incorporation and submission. His determination, idealistic departures, and heroic demonstrations become irrelevant where becoming a member of the moving or “progressive” elite, he becomes something else—someone else, eviscerating the individual character, nature, or disposition that  had created any signature dissent and momentum.

To become an influence, the individual must subscribe to something bigger, though this may also lead to the loss of the self. Perhaps a suicide itself is the ultimate declaration of individualism, or simply the discovery that “success” is an imposter in a world that demands capitulation.

I was raised in a Republican household, my father’s own history and career giving voice to the American Dream. Born in Janesville, Wisconsin, a town where most fantasy ended in a factory job at the GM plant, my father was the first of his family to attend college. He started his construction business that went bankrupt, but he pressed on, obtaining an MBA and eventually became the Vice President of a Fortune 500 Company. My relatives include members of the Steelworkers’ Union, ex-Navy Seals and entrepreneurs, each believing in the value of hard-work, perseverance, and the “pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps” mentality.

My father told me the other day that Obama supporters (and Democrats in general) undermine his own life story. In his view, if everyone worked as hard, they too could be comforted by the financial security that our democratic capitalist system affords.

I read a bumper sticker online this week that said, “Piss off a Liberal: Work Hard and Be Happy.” Immediately, I thought of my father (a wry smile appears on his face).

In my family, and under the auspices of my father’s protestant ethics, work means value, and value means profit, and that profit, yields worth. For my father, everyone has the opportunity to do well in this country, every individual has the advantages that living in this country affords, and anyone can find success and stability, if only they are willing to work. The converse of this argument, of course, is that if you do not have success and stability, you simply have not worked hard enough.

I cannot help but be kept awake at night by this election, particularly in light of the announcement of VP nominee, Sarah Palin. My mother, who has always been pro-life and Republican, has also been staunchly against “career women” types. Once she showed me an article about a group of mothers in L.A. who had formed a band and was furious that they would “abandon their children at home.” The feminist in me rebuked, and I asked her if she would have been offended if the band members were fathers: “It is a mother’s job,” she responded.

Since the Palin announcement, my mom sounds like a raving feminist and a liberal for the first time: “She’s just awesome…all that she has done.” And I am left sounding like the aged Republican housewife, “Do you really think she is ready? What about all of those kids?”

As a liberal (often feeling at odds with my own upbringing and past) this election feels particularly schismatic. It is becoming clear where exactly where my beliefs part, not only from my family, but also my roots in Middle America:

A Choice is Not Always Easy
I believe that women have a choice. But, it is…a choice…a choice that comes with complications and sacrifice. You choose whether you want to have a child or not. You choose whether or not you can afford to have 1 child or 10. You choose whether you want 2 children or 12 (ask Angelina). If you are lucky enough, you get to choose whether you want to work at all (though for most mothers, this is not a choice). Any honest mother who works will admit the difficulty of this choice, understanding that they sacrifice time with their families to work. Palin seems to deny this hardship and choice all together, seeming to breeze easily from beauty queen, to “hockey mom,” to PTA mom, to Mayor, and is now primed to become the next Vice President of the United States. She seems to deny any real hardship that working mothers face, and reinforces the Republican ideals that anyone can “have it all.” As a feminist, I cannot criticize her career, but her apparent recklessness and abject disregard for the reality that working mothers face.

Short rant #1: I have been reluctant to indulge the Palin (Spearsesque) baby drama, but I cannot help but be reminded of a conversation I recently had with my father who (not so subtly) blamed teenage pregnancy on the uneducated “black girls in the ghetto.” The GOP’S treatment of Palin’s daughter reminds us that teenage pregnancy for black girls is an “epidemic” and white-girl suburban pregnancy remains a “private family situation.”

Short rant #2: So maybe no one asked Bill Clinton about his ability to be a father and be Commander in Chief. And maybe it is true that no one asked Obama about whether his parenting would suffer if he were elected, but everyone would surely start questioning his integrity and judgment if he brought 5 kids and a pregnant teen into the white house (you know, because he’s black).

Reading the Constitution
I believe that the President should be of superior intelligence. The fact that he went to Harvard Law School should not be considered a threat, but a highly desired credential. Since when does “hands on” work preclude an intellectual understanding and since when does education preclude “real” experience? An attorney and law professor, who has actually read and understands the Constitution, who can articulate its nuances and credibly discuss its application, is not a blemish, no matter how much Republicans resent intellectualism. His sweeping acceptance internationally, his diverse cultural background, and willingness to engage diplomacy are not a slight of record. Do we really need to reinforce the stereotype that Americans are ignorant? Is hawkish militaristic rhetoric, cowboy hats and use of the word “dude” really conducive to national security?

*And no, living in Alaska does not qualify as “experience in foreign policy” because it is the closest state to Russia.

Living in Fear
As if using lies that spurred fear to cause a war were not enough, the Republican party continues its scare tactics in the movement of its people. They invoke the fear of God, the potential of Middle Eastern “savages,” the Axis of Evil, and threaten the loss of a Constitutional right to bear arms. In a not-so-ironic-twist they are using the fear of a worsening economy under Obama to galvanize swing voters (even though Clinton’s fiscal policy and economic record compared to that of the past 8 years is direct evidence to the contrary). The most abhorrent and base level human behavior on a micro and macro level arises out of fear. The Republican commitment to catering to this animal instinct (in addition to other acts of flagrant dehumanization) is further evidence of their ardent cynicism and shameless will to preserve their own machinery.

According to the GOP, Sarah Palin’s strength is Obama’s weakness. He is from a big city, she is from a rural town. He is Harvard educated. She has a Bachelor’s degree from the University of Idaho. She fishes and hunts. He eats arugula (according to his critics- he is so healthy! What an elitist snob!) This difference is the Republican advantage, and the argument goes like this: lofty intellectuals, impotent by design vs. get your hands dirty types who eat meat and understand “straight talk.” My entire family (veterans, businessmen, and ironworkers) all embody the morality of Midwestern family and work “ethics.” In this campaign, they can make a clear distinction between the character of John McCain and the character of Barack Obama. To them, the difference is tangible.

This election has created a larger personal rift (ironically in opposition to the promulgated goals of both parties), forcing us to personally attach ourselves to these ideals. How does your experience as a mother inform your choice? Are you voting for Obama simply because he is black? Would a true veteran not vote for McCain? As a “true” feminist, is it fair to call Sarah Palin’s ability into question?

This election has become personal the same way that politics in my own household have become personal. Despite my parents’ best attempts, I am not a Republican. I do not believe that every American is given the same opportunities for security and success. I do not believe that every person who “makes it” is a product of his or her ethics. I do not believe that the government should be able to spend on corporate bailouts and a war that is in violation of international law, all while invoking the fear of “big government” at home (“big government” being education, health care, and disability programs). I do not believe that intellectualism is pejorative. I do not believe that deregulation of the market is the answer to our social and economic problems (see Enron scandal and current mortgage crisis).

I can make peace with my own beliefs at-large, but when I challenge the notion of the American Dream, am I challenging my father? When I devalue the experience of a PTA member or scoff at a “hockey mom” am I belittling my mother’s work? As an academic in NY, am I not a “real” worker like my father, grandfather, and immigrant ancestors?

More, important, am I really making a choice in this invented cultural war between intellectualism and the “real world?”

In the same logic of the Republican campaign strategists, my father calls me cynical and mother thinks I “just don’t know.”

For this first time, I feel a very natural and divisive split from my parents, Republicanism, and what has seemed to be the vast majority of this country, at least in terms of the sprawling red states where urban (particularly bicoastal) living means isolation.

Being born in a country that you do not agree with is not so dissimilar from being born a dissenter in your own household. A friend said to me the other day, “I am starting to accept the fact that these yahoos might actually win the election. The hard part is accepting what that means about this country. I am going to have to completely recalibrate the way I feel… I need a new understanding of where it is that I live.”

This is a task I cannot so sanguinely complete, when my country… is also my home.

The South evokes the romantic: magnolias and Scarlet O’Hara, gulf shore sunsets, sugarcoated accents, and hushpuppies. Though from the North, it also remains mystifying, distant and remote, preserving a culture that appears to have settled like dust and history. Political corruption, Hurricane Katrina, and Jena-6 substantiate our fears as drive over the Appalachians, along highways, through the Bible Belt, past dirt roads and Baptist churches. We travel, over the Triborough Bridge, out of New York City, through New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and into Georgia with the certitude and comfort as we traverse for a higher cultural purpose (Tom Waits, Glitter & Doom, Atlanta).

We observe communities from the car windows (like a television screen): Confederate bumper stickers, kitschy lawn décor, truck stop strip-club signs, and pro-life billboards that flicker blood stained parts and fleshy fetuses. From our Fox Theater seats we were insulated again, separate, reminding ourselves that we are different, blue-blooded, defining ourselves by a temporary existence against the red curtain of the South.

On this trip, my boyfriend is meeting my extended family for the first time: my aunt (a chain-smoker, bleach blonde hair, legs much younger than her face), my uncle (Southern native with a golden beer belly, a master of the grill) and my two cousins aged 15 (recently discovered how to manipulate men with her breasts) and 19 (recently discovered beer pong and expressed interest in breast reduction surgery).

Our southbound road trip reminded my companion of his experiences hitchhiking: rest stops where women leave bathroom stalls in track marks and tears and Deliverance type scenes where drawling men loll, “Yoouuain’t from around heeere.”

He fears being recognized.

“Whatever… I look the same as you…we have the same nose.”

This is my version of comfort.

“People see it in my face, Kate. I’m a Jew.”

He asks me what my family will say when they find out.

“Nothing,” I answer. “Why would they care?”

Upon arrival, we are graciously offered the quaint comforts of a suburban home: a front porch with a swing, a sweeping pool, a sprightly Golden Retriever, and a pantry the size of my bathroom. My aunt and uncle’s Atlanta home is centered in a commuter belt that is becoming the residence of a growing number of minorities, against the will of their white neighbors. Throughout the weekend, we are informed of the developments: what “niggers” were moving in where.

We do not challenge their objection.

My family is made up of Midwestern Catholics and Lutherans who exhibit no remorse or shame in subtle or overt racism. While my parents curbed the use of racial epithets in our home, my extended family has never shied from the “N” word.

This is my family and not so distant past, however, the majority of my family and friends are from the Midwest, where racism sounds like this:

“Downtown has a lot of…low-income people.”

(Euphemisms)

Or

“Black people just commit more crimes. Look at the numbers.”

(Justifications)

I had introduced my boyfriend to my family several months ago and his Jewishness was treated jovially. My mom reiterated that she doesn’t care at all (making jokes that she doesn’t cook Kosher) and as he was leaving, my grandmother hugged him and said, “You’re all right…for a Jew.”

Everyone laughs.

“Grandma loved you,” my aunt told him, “She said you couldn’t get enough of that pork, that Heavenly Baked Ham.”

“So she just loved a Jew eating pork?”

Everyone laughs.

In the kitchen, my cousin’s boyfriend whispers to me, “Is he a Jew?”

“Yes.”

“But he was eating those hot dogs.”

“Well… he doesn’t practice.”

“Yeah, I knew he was Jewish, I could tell.”

As an English professor and a Marxist, my boyfriend has dedicated his career to exposing the political posturing behind governmental and religious orders. Teaching one of the most culturally diverse student bodies in the country, he speaks candidly about systems of oppression, the failures of the capitalist system, disenfranchisement, and the perpetuation of classism. He introduces theory, feverishly and passionately, believing that he is giving every student the tools to confront racism, social stratification, and injustice.

Unlike the professor’s discourse with susceptible 18 year olds, confronting a faceless constituency, or disparate academic peers, there is a new delicacy and sensitivity required in taking on your girlfriend’s family’s political and religious beliefs. We aren’t even married.

Someone mentions Obama.

My aunt is spurred: “I wouldn’t vote for a black man. Hell no- no way. Are you flippin’ crazy? You have no idea what I deal with…all those black bitches at work.”

She lights a cigarette.

“But…what does his candidacy have to do with the women you work with?”

“No way. Nope. Never. Never voting for a black man.”

She pauses seriously and taps the ashes from her cigarette, “You might think I’m stupid or ignorant, but that’s just the way it is. That’s what I know. And I would be caught dead before voting for some black.” 

My 15-year-old cousin adds, “You should see them try to read at school. It’s like, de-de –der…and I’m like, ok-aaaaaay… spit it out, ya’ll.”

For the first two days, we ignore our reactive instincts to confront my aunt when she cutely describes them as “Ni-gers” or when my cousin playfully denigrates the black kids in her school. When my aunt and uncle talk about how lazy and incompetent their black employees are, we sit quietly sipping from straws and talk about whether it is going to rain.

This proximity is uncomfortable. My family, my past, and my life are on display. So are his. We communicate in looks and whispers. I am angry that he thinks my family’s religious and political beliefs are relevant. He thinks he is selling out, avoiding harmful discord to float around a pool and drink Margaritas. We are caught between our families and our histories, our words and our beliefs, our politics and our relationships.

He thinks he is a hypocrite. I am defensive.

By Sunday at 3:00 a.m. we begin to fight.

We fight about the right to be racist and the right to teach it. We fight about whose responsibility it is to tell my young cousins that their racism is destructive. We fight about the difference between the Jewish, black, and indigent experience. We fight about privilege and education and whether people should be held accountable for their own prejudices. We fight about our own histories, whether our pasts are relevant, and whether they can be reconciled.

Hopelessly, we begin to gather our things to leave. It is 4:00 in the morning and we hear voices near the garage. I open the door to see my cousin and her friends sitting by the pool. When she sees me, she says in a loud whisper, “It’s okay! You can come out!”

“We had to hide the black kid in the bushes,” she laughs.

Just then, a tall black kid jumped over the picket fence and smiled at us, embarrassed and relieved.

They all huddle, giggling and I watch as she flirts with him, the same as she flirts with the battalion of white boys who come over to watch her dive and flit about in her rainbow of bikinis.

“I am beginning to learn that I am not who I think I am, but what I do,” a friend once told me.

As we travel north on I-95, tensions subside and we both agree that we hate highway food. We are collectively comforted that we live in a city where everyone despises the suburbs and makes regular use of the word “gentrification.” In the morning, I will wake up and read the New York Times and talk about grad school where I will write about the fetishism of the law and cultural constructions of self-identity. We will talk about politics and racism in America and the importance of the coming election. We will talk and talk…about theory…and practice…theory and practice…the difference between who we think we are and what we do.

My father is visiting New York for the weekend. I meet him at the Inter Continental hotel, an ostentatious hub for international businessmen. The doorman looked skeptical of my leopard print scarf, purple tank top, and shorts as I stepped into the lobby on 48^th and Lexington. Men and women in suits sit straight, prepped in leather chairs, propping laptops. A row of rounded backs and white hair face the bar at the West end, each right hand wrapped around a highball. The doorman takes me into an elevator that plays a galvanizing Bach and holds his head straight as we travel to the 13^th floor. Signaling my exit with his arm, he holds the door open to a hallway shamelessly adorned in gold trimmed tables, art frames, and candleholders; the carpet, a weave of gold flower vines and black… opulence unrefined.

This weekend, I am also house sitting for a friend two blocks from the hotel so we stopped to walk the dog before transferring my father’s bags from the hotel to my apartment in Queens.

My father: “Sure is a lot of garbage here.” I reigned the dog away from accumulated mounds of trash as we pass each apartment, bar, restaurant, and shop. Impressions of New York do not seem to deviate: it’s dirty and for most, the sheer amount of trash makes it inescapable in smell and as obstacle.

Unlike the residential neighborhood I grew up in near Seattle, the city streets of Minneapolis, or the suburban neighborhood of my father, where garbage is contained in  alleys, backyards, and two-car garages, NY trash can only accumulate in the open, whether in bags on the street, in gutters, sewers, cavernous subway stations, or the East River.

I tried to keep the dog from sniffing a homeless man as my father looked down and up, between the trash on the street and the people he tried to avoid, and then remarks, “There are a lot of people too.”

When we arrived at my apartment, I stepped into the kitchen. I tried to ignore the cockroach that slipped under the microwave. When I flicked on the lights, another came out from the sink, and another from under a soap dish. I grabbed the pile of coffee filters and started beating them out like a flame, yelling to my father from the bathroom, “Don’t come in here!”

“Are you changing?”

“Um…no…just…hold on…” I slammed another that fell into the silverware drawer and then stomped another out with my flip-flop. Truthfully, I usually thwart the cockroach affair with traps and exterminators, having only to clear out one or two a week…this way, I won’t see them when they aren’t there or imagine their sharp movements in my sleep. Of course, the first night my father is in the apartment, I come home to wage a full-on attack against at least 15.

Looking under the sink before my dad could enter the kitchen, I saw another crawl inside the trash. I quickly tied up the bag and ran, arm extended, to the chute at the end of the hall. It is a freeing act: tying up the knot at the end of a 10 pound bag, opening the door and pushing it through the 1′x 1′ hole. I hear it cartwheel against the metal siding. Sometimes the contents will thrash and spill. I think briefly of this release and wipe my hands, though unable to fully eradicate the residue of city living.

The cockroaches have hidden lives between the walls, a habitat that depends on the grime, proximity, and the density, allowing them to carry food and secrets from room to room, apartment to apartment, and building to building. When I returned, my father was peering out over the rows of windows, the lawn of my backyard: “All these people,” he said, “with no space.”

“I know,” I said, “and when you hear them, you know that they are there.” I open my windows to the quotidian air of discontent: nagging wives, the tension of work-a-day blue-collar men, children that protest their bedtime.

Disposition is irrelevant; it is the sheer numbers that have made New York a forum for displays of such personal desperation, frustration, or grief. Everything is too close: bodies and hands graze unintentionally on the subway, they see into bedrooms, and watch from peepholes. There is always someone close enough to invade your earshot, your olfactory senses, or slide into your seat.

Unlike the safety of suburban streets and the distance between homes, there is nothing to keep the garbage from mingling or spilling over, the same as there is no way to insulate against the soiled lives of others. “To air dirty laundry” is an apt metaphor, but also to be taken literally in the city, where the proximity makes the stains visible: undergarments and pants that hang from clotheslines; garbage, human waste, and decay cannot be concealed or contained, not unlike the muted altercations, where couples belie their contentment on the subway.

At breakfast the next morning, my father confirms, as we look out onto the street from a café: “I am starting to wish I could see my yard.” People are swarming in mass, cups of coffee spilling, strollers absorbing sidewalk bumps, traffic and sirens, the white noise of rush hour pervades.

My father considers his own verdant view and rooted garden, the steady stream of his private fountain and bird feeder, large potted plants, and the occasional raccoon that gets trapped behind the pool gates.

“Don’t you ever get sick of them?” he asks me.

“No,” I told him, considering the smells, the fears, the failures, the sweet smell of decay…the debris of humanity colliding, calling from the night window.

Each time someone passed, he repeated the same line. His volatility was noted by people on all corners of the block and most walked past quickly trying not to make eye contact or provoke further rage. His surges of anger, banging the receiver against the phone booth, crouching and wailing, and lunging at passersby, were punctuated by silence when he simply hung his head.

I watched from this narrow scope as he held the telephone in his hand and repeatedly slammed the receiver against the walled booth: “I am so mad…I am so mad! I could kill someone right now. I could KILL someone!” 

My curiosity was cut with fear and I am told by a handy local, “You know you shouldn’t do this alone. Pulling this shit could get you killed in other parts of New York.”

“I know,” I answered, “But we always leave too soon. I want to see what happens.”

As though this display were commonplace, I was too quick to assume he had gone mad. I noticed then, that the man in the phone booth looked showered, well-dressed, and pulled a suitcase. At some point he had been prepared…now loaded. If it were not for his rage, he would have gone unnoticed… completely functional (as we can only seemingly be). Something had happened. I ask what could make a man so angry:

“A woman…a woman could inspire that kind of rage,” said the local.

I watched incredulously considering the possibilities…an estranged wife… the arms of another man… a failed attempt to recover a lost love…a mercurial woman…the utter devastation of a definitive end.

You stupid, stupid man, I thought of the man in the phone booth…you had your belief in fated love. He had seen too many films, too many images to cause him hope, and now he has fallen prey to iconic scenes …relentless images belied by reality…now he is driven mad… left standing at the phone booth, waiting for answers …played the fool…he finds too late…that he was wrong… the guy does not always get the girl.

Perhaps he had been waiting at the phone booth for her to return his call. Now he stood panicked, alone and dejected, feverishly shaking his fist at the world, but unwilling to get back on the train. 

“But…he’s still crazy, right?” I asked, “Something IS wrong with him?” I waited for confirmation… I needed to know that this could not be any man.

THURSDAY (Manhattan)
J: I think New York is a good place for you…to be alone. You specifically. I always told you, but you never listened. I have been saying this since Tucson. 

SATURDAY (Queens)
V: Do you have proof of where you live? A bill or letter or something? Anything?
Me: No… I have my passport. My wallet was stolen…I don’t have a driver’s license. 
V: Do you live in the neighborhood? If you do, I can wait… but…you have to bring something back. You have to prove that you actually live here.

SUNDAY (Brooklyn)
T: Where are you from?
E: Where IS Katie from? Katie, where are you from? Not Seattle… you’re from Milwaukee. That’s where she spent her formative years…the Midwest. Then she lived in Tucson and Boston and Minnesota…but she’s Midwestern. Right Katie? (hug)

SATURDAY (Milwaukee)
T: I’m sorry I didn’t invite you to the wedding. You moved away and we weren’t close anymore…and I really regret that now. I guess…I don’t know, I didn’t think you would come. So… are you ever coming back?

SUNDAY (Brooklyn)
Me: Why don’t you like living with him?
T: It’s like he always wants to talk about his emotions and what’s going on in his life. 
Me: He needs a girlfriend
T: That’s just the problem… I mean… he has one… (kind of)… but he always wants to talk about her…it was pretty clear to the outside observer that it would never work…she would blow him off and then call and then he got excited, but now he just keeps talking about her…so I guess he needs someone else… and every morning now…he has to talk to me.

WEDNESDAY (Manhattan)
C: You cannot have a year long relationship in three-months- it doesn’t work. That’s your problem, you are just too intense. I have rules because…I think there are boundaries for a reason, like for one, no sex for at least three months
Me: What else?
C: Sleepovers 3 nights a week MAX
Me: And?
C: Wait at least a year before you meet the parents. 

MONDAY (San Diego)
S: You just need to be alone. I don’t know if you can…but you do. It might be hard at first, but then after like, 2 months…you won’t even care.

FRIDAY (Manhattan)
DR: This pain…I don’t think that…it’s anything…really. Have you had a lot of stress? Drinking more? Are you working a lot? I don’t think this is anything to worry about…and since you don’t have insurance, I don’t think we should do any tests. What I think is going on here is… psychosomatic. Really… I know you are in pain, but I think you are… just…going through a rough spot.

THURSDAY (Milwaukee)
Mom: You know what I do…I pray. I know you don’t like to hear that, but I do. And if I didn’t have that I would just shrivel up. I would… I would just die.

Dad: DON’T get a puppy. Dogs are just a proxy. Women get dogs and then they have babies and then, you know what they think? They think the dogs can just go eat shit. I think a baby would be good for you. You can stop thinking about yourself for a change. Try taking care of someone else. Or maybe try carrying around a teddy bear for a while.

MONDAY (Queens)
J: Maybe someday you will actually find someone you want to fight for… until then …alcohol is a cold, cold substitute. 

SATURDAY (Milwaukee)
T: I always used to complain when I was pregnant and people tell you that being pregnant is the easy part. They are right. I think now, being pregnant was really easy. It’s like…you have it… now try keeping it alive.

WEDNESDAY (Queens)
J: Fuck you. Be cold or love me. But bring brandy either way.

SUNDAY (Manhattan)
H: Stress can do funny things. I mean… look at my hives!

SUNDAY (Milwaukee)
M: Meet me in Philadelphia on Thursday. You said if I was ever a train away.
Me: My stomach is all fucked up. 
M: Come on. Just get a ticket. 
Me: Someone told me that Philly is like, New York’s fucked up cousin. 
M: Just come.
Me: Right.

SUNDAY (Queens)
J: Bring brandy only if you want to have a drink and laugh about this.
Me: I’m laughing right now.
J: Me too.
Me: Just kidding.
J: I’m not
Me: Me neither. So there.
J: So there.
]]> http://modernreverie.wordpress.com/2008/04/07/conversations/feed/ 1 salomai http://modernreverie.wordpress.com/2008/03/10/passengers/ http://modernreverie.wordpress.com/2008/03/10/passengers/#comments Mon, 10 Mar 2008 20:46:11 +0000 salomai http://modernreverie.wordpress.com/?p=27 ]]>

Last weekend: Housewarming party

Location: New Haven, (sigh) Yale Campus

Scene 1- (On the Road- The Passengers)

1) THE DRIVER (age 30, Woody Allenesque New York foodie, English professor, fiction writer, and…my neighbor)

2) SHOTGUN (age 32, ex-heroin junkie, charming rogue, and noble potter)

In common, THE DRIVER, SHOTGUN, and myself, are all predisposed to addictions and have spent our twenties railing against the absurdities and practicalities of the “real world.” Independently, we are driven to art, travel, writing, drugs, and escapism in many forms. My real life grievances continue to manifest in daily doses of brandy, a general aversion to finding what my dad deems a “real career,” and lately, a nagging hatred of Diablo Cody.

I live in New York because it affords me certain liberties like being perpetually unsettled, “just out of a relationship,” and a generally negative disposition notwithstanding my self-serving optimism. As a new resident to the city, I have learned that I am not alone and have thrived in the collective dysfunction and general displeasure I have found. Not incidentally, it occurs to me that there will be no housewarming in my near future (flashback to angry Italian and the illegal sublet).

Scene 2- (Housewarming)

I have never been invited to a “housewarming” party. The idea of homeownership grows more and more foreign as I settle into the city (lease agreements that linger into my 30’s). At the home of a curator of rare books at Yale, I didn’t expect to find myself back in a U of A frat house and the idea of housewarming did not naturally invoke images of hookahs and smoke-filled rooms or the morning after in a John Hughes film. However, I cannot say I was necessarily prepared for the level of maturity and togetherness this party presumed.

When we arrived there was a table with full, unopened bottles of whiskey, rum, and vodka (presented in trust). A bowl of ice is centered between rows of spotless wine glasses, brandy sifters, and water glasses. There was a centerpiece with candles and our host even considered a pitcher of water.

The room began to fill with thirtysomethings, fortysomethings, I couldn’t tell. Everything was serious. Conversations about after school sports and IRA’s and remodeling and promotions and retirement travel and the warming of houses. Someone brought a teal colander to match the teal teapot and the teal toaster and the teal dishtowels. The kitchen appliances matched the bathroom rugs and the lampshades and the couches and chairs. One woman brought cupcakes with alternating blue and green icing that she purposefully glazed to match the pattern of her dress.

There were moments that felt a bit like when I found out my best friend was (intentionally) pregnant (Me: “Really? You ….did…that…on purpose?”) While sipping my 5^th drink (in silent determination) I turned to see a 4 year old staring at me eye-level. “Oh…hey…uh…buddy.” I look around for help. Precocious curiosity was of the intensity I could not bear and so I handed him a cupcake. He peeled the foil wrapper and stuffed the fist-sized ball of cake in his mouth. He stood chewing, wrapper in hand, as I sat, tipping an empty glass (I spilled 4 times throughout the course of the evening). Holding our respective remnants, I tried to think of something to say. I started to wonder who I could relate to more… this short freckled person, making a mess of blue icing, or his father… the property owner.

Speaking with real adults is like listening to Wall-Street jargon on the subway. A woman described the multi-step process of making fresh hummus and my eyes glazed when she entered into phase 4 of sesame oil cumin mince. Later, an orthopedic surgeon, sprawling beside the well-nourished fire, a glass of red wine dangling between his fingers, explained to me how he performs a hip replacement: “So first you have to dislocate the hip…then we make an incision at the dorsal vertebrate….balllsocket ….prosthesis….thoracic….lumbar….suture…scapula…” (Me: ”Please shut up, please shut up, please shut up”), another rare moment where I have nothing to say. I stand up silently… I think he was still talking… boredom driving me like the shakes towards the kitchen table/makeshift wet bar and I splash Jack Daniels into a tall glass of ice cubes.

THE DRIVER asks if I am okay: “Are you having fun?”

Me: “Yeah! Totally. Who keeps putting on the Paul Simon record?”

My late twenties have left me floundering in adulthood, but it appeared that I was not alone. Throughout the evening, the passengers of our carpool find respite smoking on the porch, wondering how this party left us caught between generations.

At one of these outdoor cabals, Tucker, the landlord and father sneaks out to bum a cigarette. Clumsily, he asks, “Anyone spare an extra smoke?” He leans back, glancing past the window to ensure his wife and kids aren’t looking. Outside we hurl cuss words and dirty jokes. Everyone stumbles in laughing intoxicated by the nicotine and the illusion of rebellion.

Scene 3- (Quaint Neighborhoods in the Rearview)

In the morning THE DRIVER, SHOTGUN, and myself slam Orange-Strawberry AM Gatorade an effort towards recovery we fully understand. Speeding back to the city, vying against the traffic out of Connecticut, we spend the ride back to New York speaking openly of other (very different) times.

THE DRIVER began to relay his memory of calling 911 because SHOTGUN had OD’D on heroin: “He didn’t look any different, but when I tried to wake him up, he just started turning blue so I started smacking the shit out of him…flushed the dope right before the cops got there… Yeah…Narcan does just what you think it does… life-forcing gasps…except they don’t stab you with a needle through the heart.” The cops told him they would let SHOTGUN die if he didn’t hand over the drugs even though they flushed everything (except the bag in SHOTGUN’S pocket). All the charges were dropped when it came into evidence that the police tried to obstruct the ambulance.

Another time, THE DRIVER and SHOTGUN were so high they used a full month’s supply of food stamps on cartons of Ben & Jerry’s and boxes of Captain Crunch: “The best breakfast I ever had.”

I relish some of my decisions (hospitals and cops abound) and consider that perhaps…it was not so bad. For the weekend… caught between the blue icing and the teal colander…we speed back to the city and feel satisfied in the distance from a warmer house.

Me: Smiling, I settle back into a dead-bolted one bedroom.

Scene 4- (The Next Night- My Bed-Asleep)I had a dream that I chased an elementary school crush into a tree house. Regression is palpable…my subconscious, screaming from behind the branches, “Help! Help!”