WC: Ode to Carrying a Canvas Bag (or Two or More) to the Supermarket

Slate.com, one of my favorite online mags, has an interesting article about paper vs plastic, the answer of course being neither.

Here's a stat from the piece, which was written by Brendan I. Koerner:

And since discarded plastic bags don't break down for eons, they're free to wreak havoc on wildlife and ecosystems; there are, for example, 46,000 pieces of plastic floating in every square mile of ocean.

And don't forget that plastic bags are petroleum products. Yes, millions of people have been horribly injured or killed in the Middle East so that we can continue to pump out--and quickly discard--plastic bags.

I try not to ever take a bag, and after reading this piece, I'm going to try even harder.

DW: The Whole Foods Burqa Woman

Ok, I’ll make this fast.

Last year I saw this woman in a FULL black burqa at the Whole Foods store in my Montclair, New Jersey neighborhood. I had an extreme reaction that vacillated between outrage, fear, and empathy. My overwhelming sentiment was, “please get out of my neighborhood!” It is one thing to see women in burqas on CNN, but quite another to see them in the produce aisle. I was shocked at my response, because at the core of it was fear. I recently read “1,000 Splendid Suns” by the author of “The Kite Runner.” It was a devastating read, because it spoke very clearly about the mistreatment (abuse) of Muslim women in Afghanistan. I’ve also read several non-fiction books on this subject as well, and they don’t contradict each others’ perspective.

I know when I get plugged in like this that it has more to do with me and my stuff than Muslim women in burqas, so I’ve been ruminating on this a lot. Am I jealous of them because they have no shame in covering up their body? Am I enraged because the burqa is a symbol of the abuse and mistreatment of Muslim women? Not sure. As someone who has body issues, I was suspicious that I might envy the Whole Foods burqa woman because she had her culture’s permission to cover up completely without feeling weird. I have heard many Muslim women say that they feel “protected” by the burqa and I’m not so sure about that. That sounds like the Mormon “sister wives” who say on Oprah that being married to a man who has five other wives is a great thing. From what I’ve read, that is far from the truth.

What’s even more disturbing is how successful our government has been in vilifying the burqa and associating it with the specter of terrorism. I feel weird about my response to the burqa because it also feels so prejudiced and that’s not something I want to feel, let alone project out into the world. Today, it seems like more of a political statement than a lifestyle choice. I guess this is why France is adamant that children and teens cannot wear anything that speaks to religious affiliations (like yarmulkes and the hijab). I feel like I’m going in circles here, and just regurgitating a lot of unprocessed primal feelings. What I can tell you is that I’ve shared these feelings with other Montclair friends and people in my writer’s group and they said they felt the same way when they’ve seen burqa-clad women in Montclair.

Ok, I’m going to consider this: maybe the burqa symbolizes something very dark and scary for me, but not for everyone else. Maybe I should think of the Whole Foods burqa woman the same way I think of women who wear 6-inch stilettos.

They don’t scare me—I just don’t understand how they could be comfortable wearing something that would cause me a great deal of pain and discomfort.

WC: Thank You Andrea for Not Compromising

Andrea--Thanks for fighting the good fight. I have never understood why abandoning a section of our community counts as compromise. For me, it's selling out other people.

I guess there are political reasons to do so. Throughout U.S. history, progress has happened in fits and starts, and politics does require some very strange behavior. I love the saying that a camel is a horse designed by committee. It reminds me that the very nature of politics results in some bizarre results, and that's life.

But since you are the president of a club that represents our entire community, I think you are right to take the stand you are taking.

I know many gay/lesbian folk who consider transgendered and even bi people to be weights around our necks. I remember someone I know in San Diego--someone on the wall of fame at the gay center--saying, "Why can't they get their own movement?" I was very sad to hear that comment.

My late and wonderful friend Dennis Meiners once said that we will have achieved equality not when the most impressive gay person succeeds but when a mediocre gay person can be as successful as a mediocre straight person. Similarly, I believe that we will have only achieved equality when those of us who don't look and act like straight people can get our full rights.

You rock, Andrea!

WC: Not Jaded Yet--or Ever

I am 52 years old. I have been out of the closet for over 30 years. I have slept with not-quite-dozens of women. Being a lesbian is old hat to me. Yet it still thrills me to see a movie or TV show where women love each other, and even better, kiss and touch each other.

I guess that's one of the advantages of being in an oppressed minority--you don't ever get the opportunity to take things for granted. Maybe someday there will be so many depictions of lesbians in movies and on TV that they will be unremarkable. But, for me personally ever to become jaded about them, there would have to be thousands. No, hundreds of thousands. Millions?

Nah, I never could be jaded--I have too many years (decades!) of deprivation to make up for.

And you know what? There is nothing on earth more beautiful than two women kisssing.

(By the way, this was brought on by watching the reasonably good TV movie of Sarah Waters' Fingersmith.)

AV: Passing in the House

A bit o' background: In January I was honored to be elected President of a local Democratic Club. The San Diego Democratic Club is a LGBT club, whose primary mission is to elect LGBT and LGBT-friendly folks to office everywhere. In addition, we're frighteningly progressive, as you might imagine.

I'm not being just sappy when I say I was honored to be elected. The SDDC has been a strongly influential voice in local, regional, and state politics for over 30 years. At present, we number almost 500 members, among them several long-standing elected officials and many more who are seeking office.

The only problem? The monthly column I have to write for our newsletter. I swear, it's the most difficult part of the job for me, although it's getting easier. And doesn't it seem strange that I agreed to do this blog thing if that's how I feel about writing on a regular basis? Yeah, I thought so too.

But here's the column for November on a subject I think is important: the passage of (SPL)ENDA in the House.

---

As no doubt you’ve heard by now, the House passed HR 3685, otherwise known as the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, also known as ENDA. And, because this bill had been stripped of protections for transgender individuals (and any meaningful protections to LGB folks as well), this version of the bill has in recent days also become known as SPLENDA. You get it.

I suppose on the face of it, federal protections for LGB folks in the workplace is a good thing. We’ve been fighting for this protection for over a decade, right? In fact, as recently as the last couple of years, our side took one on the chin even for the arguably smaller pond of queer federal employees. Our good representatives couldn’t manage to provide protections for their own staff, fer goodness sakes.

So here we are at a grand day for the home team. Oh yeah, there’s that whole Senate vote thing and then the limbo under the veto pen of our Executive Officer. For now, though, let’s just pretend it’s all smooth sailing ahead, shall we?

And still I would be bitterly disappointed.

This bill doesn’t protect all of us and, in my opinion, does nothing to advance the general cause of equal rights for any of us. Especially for those of us who need it most: our transgender brothers and sisters, the gender non-conformists among us, and anyone who doesn’t fit someone else’s idea of what’s “okay.” You know … those of us who don’t, can’t, or won’t pass.

When it became known over six weeks ago that this bill was being rewritten to remove protection for transgender Americans in order to make it – get this – easier to vote for, there was an immediate outcry across the country and subsequent organizing on a grand scale. But, as we heard from Rep Frank and a certain national organization, the full bill didn’t have the votes and we’d have to go slowly. Or some such expedient nonsense. I’m sure that it’s much more complicated than – and at the same time exactly as simple as – that.

I am especially distressed, and angry, at HRC for their disingenuous actions over the last weeks, especially as Joe Solomonese, ED, pledged over a year ago to unequivocally support transgender rights at the federal level. Instead, the HRC waffled on the side of expediency in the face of overwhelming opposition from almost every other national LGBT organization on this issue.
Then, as some of you may have seen, they released a “field poll” the day before the vote which purported to have asked 500 “LGBT community members” about ENDA, returning a reported 70% support of the non-inclusive bill. They have not, as yet, released any details about the polling company, the selected participants, nor the margin of error. For me, I’m curious specifically about the “T” folk they talked to. I’ll bet you are too.

Adding further insult, they are also docking the official legislative scorecard of any politician who voted against the gutted ENDA on the grounds it was not inclusive enough. They’re treating our real friends as if they were right wing bigots. This is unsupportable.

Digression: At this point in my own administration, I feel obligated to reveal what has most certainly become painfully evident in these columns: I am an eternal idealist. Sometimes I think it’s a poor quality in politics. There.

Perhaps that will help to explain my disappointment and the fact that I would prefer no bill at all to this one. It is deeply flawed and smacks of unsupportable pandering. None of us get what we really want, least of all our family and friends who were summarily tossed off the ol’ freedom bus.

I can’t help but take this personally and not only because my family circle includes transgender individuals about whom I care deeply. Nope, it’s not so much that, although that’s certainly good enough reason.

No, it’s because the result of this legislative betrayal has cast me in the role of the enemy through none of my own doing.

As a simple not-so-exotic gender queer lesbian, I’m suspect in some circles of the transgender community; I’m a potential ignorant and well-meaning oppressor. I’m someone who, at first encounter, must be defended against – even just a little. I’m in a position where I feel I must say at the outset that I joined – along with all of you – a huge swell of support for an all-or-nothing push at the hill for an uncompromising inclusive bill. I feel as if I have to state my explicit and unconditional support of every person in our community to be all – and everything – they are right up front, before we get to the other small talk of introduction.

And I understand it. That’s part of what’s hard for me. We’ve all been there. Maybe it’s the hallway or the breakroom where a coworker asks what those multicolored rings are around our neck. Or maybe a question about the wedding band. Or the weekend. Maybe it’s the PTA. Or a City Council meeting. There’s a moment where we still wonder, “is it safe?”

Sometimes it’s not. And how desperately wrong is it when that question arises in our own midst; when the not-quite-so-safe place is in our meeting rooms, our clubs, the gathering places of our community? It shouldn’t even be a question, that safety.

This recent political maneuver supposedly will make “real” change possible. In the meanwhile, we are implicit in the overwhelming statement made that, again, equality isn’t really for everyone.

In this case, it’s only for us. Not for you. And really, it’s only for us if we can pass. Bravo.

I’d like to end this screed on a more uplifting note, though.
I want to give my thanks to everyone in our community that worked tirelessly to move support of a full and inclusive ENDA to the House. I am proud that the SDDC was one of the organizations that moved to sign the petition and to (most visibly in the person of our Legislative Advocate, Alex Sachs) stand up for true equality.

The swell of support across the country from hundreds of national, regional, and local organizations for an uncompromised and fully inclusive ENDA has been the spark of encouragement my inner idealist needs to keep moving forward. Organizations such as the NGLTF, NCLR, Al-Fatiha, Dignity USA, GLSEN, Pride @ Work, and the National Association of LGBT Centers (to name only a few) have demonstrated a phenomenal ability to organize and create real results. Impressive and inspiring to say the least.

Locally, FTMI, SDDC, The Center, Transgender Advocacy and Services Center, UCSD LGBT Resource Center, and many others immediately joined the nationwide chorus. My thanks to everyone who participated on behalf of those organizations, and to each of you who took the time to write a letter, pick up the phone, or to craft an email.

Our gracious thanks as well to Congresswoman Susan Davis, who again proved her dedication to equal rights and spoke eloquently on behalf of the fully inclusive bill prior to the vote. You can see her speech online at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KP0cKtmR1XU .

WC: Sweeney, Sweeney, Sweeeeeeeeeeny!

Okay, I'm doing the movie version of judging a book by its cover--I've decided that I'm going to like the movie of Sweeney Todd based on the stills.

Part of it is the lighting, which seems just right. and the attic room is creepy all by itself. Johnny Depp seems to me to have the right calibration of creepiness, pain, and sadness on his face. And I love the Bride of Frankenstein gray streak in his hair.

But what wins me over is something ineffable, that whole-greater-than-the-sum-of-its-parts that can happen when things fall in place the right way. Yes, it's a still, not the movie, and it may not correctly represent the actual film. Yes, I'd be better off with lower expectations. But I'm daring to be excited!

There was an earlier Sweeney whose still raised my expectations. I remember thinking when I saw this photo that if Brian Stokes-Mitchell and Christine Baranski were true to it, I was about to see a great Sweeney. And it was indeed great--in fact, it ties with the original for first place among my favorites.

The wonder of great plays/musicals is how many interpretations they can bear. The first Sweeney, with Len Cariou and Angela Lansbury, was the funniest I've seen, with the ratio of humor/darkness evolving over the course of the show so subtly that you almost didn't know what hit you.

The Stokes-Baranski Sweeney was perhaps the most human I've seen. He was a damaged, heart-broken man, and she truly loved him, treating him like any boyfriend with a weird hobby.

The Tim Burton-Johnny Depp Sweeney will no doubt be bloody, taking full advantage of all the color and texture that a movie can offer. I imagine it might lose some of emotional depth even as it gains in visual depth.

I just hope it's good. No, I hope it's great!

WC: The Thing About Hillary . . .

I wish I liked Hillary Clinton, but I don't. The idea of a female president is very attractive, and it would be nice to actually root for the female who might indeed make it to the White House. Again. On her own. Well, you know.

But I'm not rooting for her. I don't believe she ever acts from her heart. I suspect her brain may actually be a impressively large calculator.

This morning NPR had an interesting feature. A reporter tracked down real people mentioned in candidates' speeches to ask how they felt about being referred to--used?--in that way.

One of the stories was roughly as follows: Hillary and her entourage had stopped in some famous restaurant, and Hillary and the waitress had talked about the waitress's life. The waitress, a single mom, has worked two or three jobs at a time for most of her life, and she's tired.

At Hillary's next stop, the waitress was now part of Hillary's speech. "I just met this woman," said Hillary, in that grating voice of hers, and then she spoke of how single mothers like this waitress need help.

When NPR interviewed the waitress, she said she didn't mind that Hillary had used her life for a campaign speech. The reporter then asked the waitress if she thought that Hillary "got it" about the reality of the waitress's life. The waitress said no. She explained that Hillary and her group had gotten their meal for free and then had left without leaving a tip.

I suppose it's possible Hillary doesn't take care of such things and some lackey messed up. I suppose it's possible that Bill or Barak or Rudy or even Mother Teresa might have forgotten to leave a tip. But it still strikes me as an unfortunately revealing story.

HC: Ooh, I think I want this...

Do any of you know about the "Big Screen" video eyewear for an iPod? I just found it in my Brookstone catalogue...AND I WANT ONE.

Here's what the catalogue says, "Transform your video into a private, virtual 62" movie theatre, anytime, anywhere with Vuzix Video Eyewear. Plug the Video Eyewear into your DVD player, iPod, media player or game system to experience movies and games on the big screen--the virtual equivalent of a 62" display viewed at 9 ft. Two high-resolution VGA LCDs support 2D/3D viewing. Works with any video output device. Rechargeable battery lasts approx. 5 hours."

This thing looks like the glasses LeVar Burton wore on Star Trek...they're way cool, but I wonder how they'll work with my glasses? If I got these, and they worked at all, I'd have to rewatch every movie I love (no hardship there) and I'd never leave the house again. It would be like my dream, when I was a kid, of watching movies on my eyelids.

I've done a little research online but can't find any reviews of the product. In the catalogue it's $349.95, but I did find it cheaper somewhere online.

If I were a kid now, I would never leave the house. I'd be doing research all day, hunting down treasures on youtube.com, with various things plugged into my eyes and ears. I'd never meet my husband, and I'd never have my kids. Perhaps because I know what kind of an entertainment addict I could have been--or BE, if I get that fab new Video Eyewear--I do restrict my own kid's time on the computer and television and iPods, but I sometimes worry about the world.

I'm officially middle-aged, and looking back on the happier days of youth, when we played Monopoly and made deals to trade Ventnor and St. Charles for Park Place and a railroad, instead of sitting on a couch and killing things on an X-Box. I guess it's just a different form of play for kids, but I admit that I miss the old days sometimes...and I guess I'll happily drown my longing for the old days by sending away for my brand new Vuzix Video Eyewear. If I like 'em, I'll keep 'em. And you'll never see or hear from me again.

RS: My Cover Is Blown

I was on an airplane when it happened. My new job is about 75% travel, so my ass is adjusting steadily to the luxuriousness of airplane seats. My new job is also not particularly interested in my backside, so I get to travel coach. So much for luxuriousness. I'm a bit of a long-legged thing; and the good folks at Continental and American and, it turns out, Alaska Airlines don't seem particularly interested in my backside or my ganglier appendages. I doubt seriously they care that much about any of my appendages, but it was the ganglier ones causing me troubles.

I had been sitting on that plane for about 4 hours en route from Dallas, a monstrosity of an airport, to Seattle, a perfectly fine if forgettable little airport. I had a crick in my neck from my parent's dinosaur of a mattress that I had the pleasure of sleeping on the night before. My work took me near, well, 5 hours near, so I popped in for the weekend to leak a little gay into Booger County. Yes, I come from a place lovingly referred to as Booger County. Can't tell you the origins of our phlemtabulous nickname, don't know. The town just enjoyed its sesquicentennial. No doubt a whooping good time remembering the racism and in-breeding of generations past. Not that much to remember since both still go on. And that is not a nasty little exaggeration about my town. When I was in 7th grade, a girl I'll call Beth because that's her name got pregnant by her father. Okay, not so much your textbook in-breeding as incest, pedophilia, and rape but it qualifies. That's my town—slap the dog and shut my mouth—it's home sweet home.

Regardless, the town contains some of the most wonderful people I've ever met—there just aren't enough of them. I miss the people but never the place. I did enjoy surprising my family though. I was sitting at the table at the Red Lobster when my mother walked in. You don't get to cause that kind of delight very often in your life—and you add cheese biscuits to that and you got a little piece of paradise right there. Then my sister (whose birthday we were celebrating) walked in, and I got to experience causing some delight, albeit markedly muted compared to my mother's, again. My stepfather and I had arranged it because he is the only person in my family who can keep a secret. Mostly because he doesn't retain anything that he doesn't think is important and most of the crap we gossip about isn't. But it caused particular delight in him as well to surprise everyone. Hell, we were lousy with delight.

A day later, I was back on a plane, drifting in and out of fitful sleep, trying desperately not to drool on the lady next to me. She was reading a book on the process of reading. That seemed a bit redundant to me, but she was having a dickens of a time. That's dickens, small dick, not Dickens, big Dick. Actually, it was something about Proust and the Squid. Even the title bored me so I didn't care to retain it. Like father like son. My back was scoliosing with each passing mile; and while the numbness that had completely overtaken my ass was working its way up my southern exposure, it never quite made it to pain central along my L5. Each fidget to relieve and stretch my back sent thousands of little pricks of feeling into my substantial buttocks. I couldn't win; but then, who can feel the winner with any number of little pricks on your buttocks? Don't mean to be shallow or sizeist. . . but I am.

Upon descent, I decided to squeeze my altitude enlarged feet into my cute little shoes. It would have helped if I'd been a contortionist. I wasn't, so it happened. I heaved my foot toward my knee but Miss Fully Reclined in front of me combined with the Pack 'Em In Like Pigs at a Sale Barn Airlines' crawl space and my new favorite pair of skinny jeans (skinny compared to the Big and Bitter dungarees I'm used to) conspired to create physics of impossibility. Why it didn't occur to me that a harder yank on my foot would not alter said physics, I can't tell you. I wasn't thinking clearly because every chakra was in frickin misery. Surely, something had to give. Something did. The better part of the inseam of my favorite new skinny jeans. Fortunately, I've been running of late so the hairy cottage cheese of my inner thighs has diminished from a Costco sized tub to pint and a half mounds. What remained exploded into my lap like Pop Secret. I started a reconnaissance mission that I should sell to Homeland Security. I was simultaneously, though somewhat futiley, containing and stuffing like a bionic baker kneading over yeasted dough. I extended my pinkies to pull up the bottom of the rip to create a cover fold that I tucked up into that little arm pit-like part of my hip that usually enjoys a little attention but, apparently, not an accordion of denim.

I put those little, seldom used muscles to work; and they were gripping with everything in them as I hobbled like a pirate with a peg leg through the airport wrestling a coat, a heavy computer bag, and a suitcase that was about to bust like a dog tick. It was, from the ripple of stares that escorted me all the way to the rental car booth, quite a sight to behold. This morning I realized that I either overworked that little muscle in my crotch or I woke up with one leg suddenly shorter than the other. And I'm pissed. I loved those jeans.

DW: A Week in Provence

The more I think about it, the more I enjoyed the more rural part of our recent France vacation. Spending a week in Chateaurenard (15 minutes from St. Remy) was really very special. What made it special was not simply the beautiful landscape but the friends who joined us. The overall narrative was “The Four Seasons” meets “Two for the Road" with the soundtrack provided by Serge Gainsbourg, Juliette Greco, and Stephan Grapelli.

I would say the most memorable and truly fun part was getting lost with our friends Liz and Mike. Despite having directions, we couldn't find the house, and we drove back and forth for hours. Finally, Steve came to get us in this supermarket parking lot that would soon become an important landmark of sorts that we would refer to time and time again.

There were three couples, so we had three cars. Ours was always the one that made the wrong turn, and this was AFTER going around the roundabout at least three full times. The good thing about getting lost in Provence is that you always end up somewhere that’s beautiful, so it’s not like taking the wrong exit off of the New Jersey Turnpike. It’s also fun to see how other couples deal with each other under stress. There were a number of funny, mini-bickering episodes that would translate better in a full audio-visual presentation than in a blog, so I’ll reserve the details for another time. Suffice it to say that no partner relationship can be understood in earthly terms (not even my own), and that having a sense of humor is key to survival in any situation—be it work or play. This was especially important when we realized that we were in the wrong train station in Avignon 15 minutes before our train was to depart for Paris—form another train station in Avignon.

Despite our misguided sense of direction, we managed to go to Avignon, Aix-en-Provence, Arles, Nimes, Apt, Isle-sur-La Soruge, Gordes, and Rousillion. The most stunning piece of history was the Roman aqueduct at Pont-du-Gard. The best food was in St. Remy—a gorgeous butternut squash risotto. I had been dreaming of having mussels in garlic/wine sauce, which is a typical Provence type of dish. However, hardly any restaurants had them on the menu, and the only one that did was closed when we made a special trek back there. Ironically, it was the little neighborhood café in town that ended up having them and they were darn good. The house was really beautiful and had the loveliest grounds. We would gather outside on the patio most nights for a sumptuous pre-dinner sampling of bread, cheese, olives, wine, etc. The wine was the only bargain to be had. You could go to this C-Town type grocery store called “Ed” (the landmark as noted before) and pick-up a bottle of good wine for about 3-4 euros. The most divine condiment we purchased was this delicious onion jam that was a wonderful topping for my goat cheese and baguette sandwiches. I definitely want to try to make this, as it’s simply about caramelizing onions for hours until they turn amber and morph into a jam, with some help from balsamic vinegar and sugar.

Unfortunately I left the book “Snow” in our Avingon hotel, so I didn’t have that to read. Luckily, my friend Elaine brought a few books and I read the new one by the author of “The Kite Runner” and it was wonderful, but very difficult to read because of the way that women are treated in much of the Muslim world. I will save my commentary on this for my next posting, which I think I will title “My Inner Burqa.”

Amidst the rolling hills and lush evenings spent talking around the table, I had to deal with my half-sister’s untimely death. Because we didn’t have high-speed Internet service at the house (a mistake not to be made again), I had to write her eulogy on my Blackberry. Her son’s wife ended up reading it, which according to my niece, was well-received. I haven't even had time to fully process the loss as I hit the ground running with work 30 minutes after stepping off of the plane (that was last week).

Given my crnaky mood today, I’m surprised that I have been able to compose such a benign posting. Let's just say that I can’t stop thinking of the famous Sartre quote, “hell is other people.”

I think I’ll quit while I’m ahead.

WC: What If They Gave a Coup and Nobody Came?

Coup: A sudden appropriation of leadership or power; a takeover

The NY Times has been giving full coverage to General Musharraf’s imposition of military rule in Pakistan, as well they should. Pakistan is ostensibly democratic, and even the leaders of democracies must obey the law. Right?

How odd then that the Times has ignored National Security Presidential Directive/NSPD 51, also know as Homeland Security Presidential Directive/HSPD-20 (available for your reading pleasure at the White House website).

NSPD 51 covers the continuity of the federal government in the case of an emergency. Okay, that seems like a good idea in the post-9/11 world. We really do need some guidelines should, for instance, a nuke or two take out a chunk of the East Coast.

But, and these are serious buts:

• "Catastrophic Emergency" is defined as “any incident, regardless of location, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the U.S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government functions.”

Say, for example, our supply of oil was cut off. That would severely affect our economy, right? Or there was a huge earthquake on the West Coast―that would severely affect our population, right? So, this is not just for terrorist attacks or acts of war.

• Who gets to decide if it’s a “catastrophic emergency”? The President.

• What can the President then do, once he or she has decided that a catastrophic emergency has occurred? Well, pretty much anything he wants to. Like suspend elections. (Gosh, President Bush wouldn’t mess with elections, would he? That would be so unlike him.)

• Oh, and there are parts of NSPD-51―known as annexes―that are so classified that even a high-level, high-security congressman has been refused access. Who knows what they contain? Bush, Cheney, and Rice, I guess, plus whoever typed the damn things.

• What are the roles of Congress and the Supreme Court after this emergency? Well, the president might take the time to tell them that he’s taken over their powers.

What has Congress done about this so far? Well, kind of nothing.

The Supreme Court? The same.

At least there’s been a hue and cry in the press, right? Wrong. Like I said, the New York Times, the so-called "paper of record," hasn’t even covered the damn thing.

What can we do about it? Call or email your representatives. Tell them that NPSD-51 is unacceptable and that you insist they get off their damn butts and do something about it. And write the people at the Times and tell them that they should be ashamed of themselves!

Senator Clinton (New York)

Senator Shumer (New York)

New York Times email: nytnews@nytimes.com.

All senator's website urls follow the same pattern, by the way, so you can get to them easily:
http://PutYourSenatorsLastNameHere.senate.gov/

SS: The 90/10 Proofreader

So, I’m an editor and writer by trade, but I have one dirty secret that I might as well share with the world: I’m really not the best proofreader. While we’re at it, I’ll also confess that I’m a shit speller as well.

I get the impression that people assume that editors are automatically talented at proofreading, which is generally defined by most publications as reviewing a text for spelling and grammatical errors. I think this is assumed by people both in and outside the editorial world. If you know how to pitch a great story, write a great story, rewrite the great story to be more of a great story, it means you can also sit down with a ruler and a red pencil and line edit the story, right?

Not for me. I’m actually a really good editor, but in the sense of: I can find newsworthy, interesting stories when they are called for, I can rewrite your crap article to make it look like someone at “The New Yorker” penned it, I can imitate the tone and voice of a publication so successfully that I actually hear the “voice” speaking in my head and I can write a mission statement that would put any editor at Condé Nast to shame. I can also tell that you have talent even if you have just turned in something so horribly disorganized that I have to cut out key words and phrases with scissors and rearrange them by hand to figure out what you were trying to say.

If you ask me to desist from using a serial comma before an “and” construction, however, you will be spending much time using the Microsoft “Find and Replace” function while editing my article. The same goes for finding extra spaces between paragraphs and spotting subtle inconsistencies in font style.

I happen to be what is called a “big-picture thinker.” I’m not good with details. Or perhaps it’s that I can only see the details that appear relevant to me, and I happen to have a great intuition for finding the details that are the most relevant to the project at hand. My opinion is that big-picture thinkers are just as important as the detailed-oriented types in the media profession. Unfortunately, if you (God forbid!) make the mistake of not inserting a comma in the “right” place in a piece, you are automatically labeled as a “bad editor.”

But it’s really not the case. Quite honestly, most writers are human, and human beings tend to err. If I were to spend all my time torturing (it really is torture) myself over where to put commas, whether or not I have divined the “true” meaning or just the connotation of a word and if I have indeed inserted an adverb in a infinitive (did I even describe this correctly?) I wouldn’t be able to finish half of the truly excellent pieces I’ve written. Yes, I’m very big-picture.

I completely respect and admire proofreaders. Proofreading takes a marathon amount of mental stamina, and there is a lot of pressure on a proofreader’s head. I always felt sorry for the person who missed that major spelling gaffe on the cover of “Glamour” a few years back. Even proofreaders can have their “off” days -- imagine your “off” day being translated into one million glossies going out to every other household in the country!

And actually, through careful training and years of having to do it to stay employed, I’ve become what I would call a “90/10” proofreader: I catch 90 percent of the errors in any written piece and I don’t catch the other ten percent. I will do proofreading for some of my clients if it’s a small piece, such as a press release. I catch virtually all errors on press releases. But I couldn’t do anything much longer. I tend to get bored and fidgety, then sort of depressed and then downright despondent, the longer I go through the piece. I think my lackluster proofreading skills are really just a symptom of my inability to sit still for longer than five minutes.

In my view, if you want to be a professional proofreader, you really have to be a “100/100” proofreader. You need to be able to catch virtually all errors that come across your desk. I can’t do this. My brain does not function this way. And I’ve learned to accept this. I’ve also gotten to the point in my career where I can usually say no to most proofreading-only type projects.

It may seem silly for me to harp on my inability to be an incredible proofreader. But I work in a field obsessed with details. So the person who has the brain for details will invariably be perceived in a better light than a big-picture thinker. I’ve learned to work around it by maximizing my other editorial-related talents and letting someone else do the final proof. This way, nobody has to know my “little secret.”

But I might as well be honest about it. I’m not the world’s best proofreader, and I can live with that. I’m big-picture, and I belong in the editorial cesspool just as much as the detail-oriented person. Really, you need me: Who else is going to tell you that despite your correct use of a consistent tense in an article and your ability to abstain from using the colon or parentheses, it’s a disorganized piece of crap? And that you have no talent?

© Sarah Stanfield, November 3, 2007

AV: Aida, The Acorn Bandit

Today is Friday, my day for posting. I've chosen to post something by my wife, Aida Mancillas, an accomplished and award-winning public artist (and founding member of Public Address, an Arts and Advocacy group) here in San Diego.

Our lives changed in June of 2006, as you'll see in this post. For many reasons, not least the recent fires, I wanted to share with all of you the enormity of my pride and delight in sharing my life with her.

You can read more from her - and about her - at her own webiste: http://www.aidamancillas.com/. You can find more of her writing on her own blog: The Citizen Artist (the title of an essay she published in a book by the same name).

I know you'll enjoy her (almost) as much as I do.

Note: Last weekend we collected 199 acorns from an oak stranded in a swale under the train tracks in San Juan Capistrano. The jays in the backyard have already carried some of them away for planting in parts unknown.


The Acorn Bandit

I am an artist walking the cancer path. Every time I say that I feel a tightening in my chest, like I’m about to fall off the edge of a steep traverse. Cancer is not an illness; it’s an attitude toward life and living. I do the treatments, I get pictures of my brain taken regularly, generally taken while the technicians are injecting me with contrast dyes. I interact with technology that I have to stare down every single time I have an appointment for an MRI or chemotherapy. I wait in waiting rooms with my wife and sister, alongside people I don’t know but who are in pretty bad shape. Some of them are clearly not going to make it, but then, am I? I’m pretty sure I’m going to celebrate my 100th birthday. Centenarians run in my family. But life can throw you topsy-turvy on your head in an eye blink.

Last June 2006 I thought I had a sinus infection, a headache and a nosebleed. My wife Andrea took me to urgent care as per the suggestion of my primary care physician and her nurse. The next thing I knew some young doctor was leaning over me in a strange bed in a strange room telling me, “you’re not suffering from a sinus infection. You have a tumor in your brain. We think its bleeding into your head.” Right after that an elegant authoritative man—the surgeon of course-- came in. He had removed the tumor, telling me what would happen next. I don’t remember how I got to the hospital and in that recovery bed. I remember nothing of surgery, but somehow my loved ones and priest were around my bed with smiles and hearts open to me. Evidently I had been in surgery for hours. In the months ahead I won’t remember any of this except in little snapshots that flash up without intention on my part. That’s how it was for me. That’s how it is. No day is promised.

My response to this part of my life is to look for oak trees. When riding in the car I scan yards, shopping centers, parks, yards, and utility roads from a main road. I’ve met a neighbor who cleared away a pepper tree in her yard that had strangled the beautiful specimen oak in her yard. I left a note telling her how much I appreciated her work. She in turn invited me to dig up some seedlings from under the mother tree. It connected us to talk about her oak, her garden, and the loss of her beloved dog. Today the oak seedlings are thriving in containers in my back yard while I get them stronger and ready for permanent planting. The oaks and I seem inextricably linked. My daughter in law, Megan Williamson, knows about planting seeds, having worked for a commercial nursery outside Sacramento. When I gather acorns off the ground she instructs me to put them in water to see which ones float. Those won’t germinate. I look for the striations on the outside that mean the acorn has no moisture and is not viable.

More than the sunflowers that I grow for my upcoming grandbaby as his own yellow fort, the oaks mean that I will be here to celebrate my 100th birthday, the baby’s wedding, my son’s parenthood and grandparenthood, my parent’s 70th wedding anniversary, my sister’s grand motherhood.

All that I love about California is in these little oaks whose promise is a towering canopy where birds that we rarely see anymore can return. Who knows, maybe the moist roots will mean the return of the frogs that we saw all the time as children, all over San Diego.

It is a dry Santa Ana day, better than yesterday but still dry. Fire threatens if we are not careful with our cars and cigarettes. But fire is appropriate even if feared and unwelcome. It is the natural course of things here in southern California. The fire of the lasers and chemo has been burning away the cancer. It is a fearsome treatment and, as my priest says, a fearsome blessing.

My mother sent this after my surgery:
“I look high into the branches of the towering oak and know it grew well because it grew slowly. So may I grow toward my true destiny"

I look to see if friends and neighbors have acorns or seedlings that I can “liberate,” plant and restore to this micro canyon on which I live in urban San Diego, California. I do this to stay engaged in life at a time when so much around me is about illness, surgery, radiation, and sometimes death. I have long days when the members of the household go off to work and so it’s just me and the dog Sadie, a pit bull mutt whose chosen job is to watch me all day, lay down next to me when I rest, and pull me outside to the garden. It can get a little too easy to contemplate my mortality. Planning my next acorn raid gives me a sense of purpose and commits me to caring and nurturing life, not just my own.

Just recently I’ve gotten angry and snarled at death to “bring it on." I can say this because of the oaks for some strange reason.

Yes, it’s whistling in the dark but it’s also the kind of defiant energy that focuses me on the goal of LIVING, and engaging a creative life. So I’m making art again that is more intimate and personal than the larger, civic art works that I’ve been known for. The foundation of this work is the garden, the oaks and other natives, and the canyon whose name I just discovered. My little canyon has a name! It is North Arroyo Canyon. Somehow its having a name makes is even more important to restore it back to health. It somehow makes a difference to know it by its name—to make it healthy as I make myself healthy.

I’ve written before about the canyon, but until the cancer I had not put my full attention to the ecosystem except to note that there were no native plants in my little dead end canyon except two lonely toyons—one under a telephone pole and the other next to the Eucalyptus that sits in the middle of a sea of asphalt that is my driveway. Everything else in this little canyon is considered an “invasive exotic,” mainly eucalyptus, a few sad nopal cacti, jade plants, flowering apple ice plant which swallows everything, and a scattering of pepper trees and whatever Christmas trees that people have transplanted to their yards instead of composting them or sending them to the landfill at Miramar. When the winds and rains come they will topple like the eucalyptus. These orphaned Christmas trees have no deep roots to keep them in place when the weather turns nasty. I have already introduced deer grass, Cleveland sage, Pink Cat’s whiskers, Hummingbird bush, Cleveland sage, California poppy and other old friends, with many more to come.

Out of some unknowable and miraculous circumstances a couple of oaks survive in two of my neighbors’ yards. They are very old /California coast live oaks. They must be 100 years old because of their size and the time it takes for them to reach any kind of height. I’ve become deeply attached to the oaks, perhaps because of their links to my California heritage, perhaps because of their solidity and the incredibly deep taproot. I want to see myself in them. Perhaps it was the poem my mother sent me which was meant to bolster my spirits and remind me that the race doesn’t always go to the swift, and the oak grows well and strong because it grows slowly.

I used to be a multitasker—able to read, watch television, write a policy paper and answer my email all at the same time. Now I move slowly as I retrain the body, mind and spirit. With the aid of therapists, doctors, family and friends I am slowing down and savoring the jay that watches for me to emerge from the house, expecting the peanuts I throw out. I sit quietly with the dog Sadie. I watch a squirrel do acrobatics from the bird feeder. All this is gift to a woman who was given little chance to overcome the stage 4 glioblastoma.

I’m still here, just like the oak.

And I’m thriving just like the corn, the tomatoes, and the sunflowers.

Aida Mancillas, San Diego, CA

HC: Introducing the Dwights

Happy November! The year is zipping by, the big holidays are coming up. Lots of DVDs will be released. Although Introducing the Dwights received many favorable reviews, this indie from down under may have been under your movie-going radar. (There's no DVD release date yet.)

Originally called Clubland, as it is still known in its native Australia, this (dys)functional family drama/comedy stars the twice Oscar-nominated British actress Brenda Blethyn and a bunch of newcomers, all of whom are wonderful.

Blethyn plays Jean Dwight, an English, divorced mother living in Australia with her two just-out-of-their-teens sons. A promising comedian at one time—pictures of her in the 1970s with Benny Hill, Morecambe and Wise, and other headliners line the wall of her house—she still plugs away doing stand-up comedy, awaiting her big break. Both sons live at home, and Jeanie can’t help (s)mothering them. Younger son Tim’s moving van business was cofinanced by his mom. He’s also her chauffeur to gigs, and coprimary caregiver to his older brother, Mark, who was brain damaged at birth but, as reviewer Carina Chocano, LA Times, pointed out, “he’s wittier than Noel Coward on his third martini.”

Conflicts abound, with everyone wanting something and someone else being in the way—Jean wants to return to the glamorous, almost successful show biz life she was embarked upon before becoming a mom. Tim wants to move on with his life with his new girlfriend Jill. Mark wants to have the maximum amount of independence he can. Tim's new girlfriend Jill just doesn’t want to be steam-rolled by Jean. Nothing earthshaking here in terms of story, but the film has a huge heart, is frequently very funny, and has some realistically portrayed uncomfortable attempts at sex.

I mentioned good reviews, and there were many. In the interest of fair play, Jason Clark, Slant Magazine, says, “Shrieking like a banshee has unfortunately become Brenda Blethyn’s stock in trade ever since her remarkable breakout performance in Mike Leigh’s Secrets & Lies over 10 years ago. And now those who love to watch her boozily wobble in and out of rooms have ample opportunity to do so in this shrill, TV-lite Aussie picture that plays like a cinematic version of unstable menopause.” I can’t totally argue with Clark, especially because I do enjoy watching Blethyn “boozily wobble.” And she boozily wobbles better than anyone. (Closely followed by Michael Caine. Just watch them dancing together in Little Voice.) Yes, Brenda as Jean does a pretty good banshee impression as this overprotective, overbearing mother. The character is also an incredibly persistent dynamo of a woman. Not only does she do stand-up comedy in the evenings, she also works the early morning shift in a diner, and is a talent coach. There’s a lot to be said for Jean, who is desperately trying to hold her family together while plugging away with her no-longer topical stage act.

This film surprised me because in addition to caring about the middle-aged mother-of-two character (say! I’m a middle-aged mother-of-two too), I also really cared about and related to the Tim character and his girlfriend. They meet cute when he is hired to help Jill and her roommate move. He’s instantly smitten, and I think most of the audience is, too. Played by Emma Booth, Jill is pretty and awkward and real. She misconstrues much of what Tim is going through, and is convinced everything—from her too-small breasts to Tim’s nervousness around sex—is her fault. Tim is played by Khan Chittenden, who manages to be nerdy, sexy, downtrodden, and strong at the same time. It helps that the character is a nice guy, drawn to his outgoing new girlfriend but never wanting to hurt his mother.

I like movies that deal with the grays. No one is bad in Introducing the Dwights. No one means to hurt anyone. Everyone is trying to do their best. Jean frequently does the wrong thing, or lashes out, but her character is so well developed, and played by Blethyn, that it’s hard not to see her side. More than once will you cringe watching Jean unravelling and making a fool of herself. Blethyn never loses sight, however, of the hard working, devoted mom. She gave up so much to raise her sons. She works so hard at three jobs. Now her sons are grown up and no longer need her. That’s a lot for anybody to deal with. Blethyn’s strongest asset as an actor is helping us see the extraordinary in the ordinary everyday people she plays. In this film, she has great assistance from not only the supporting cast, but also the charming script by Keith Thompson, and the direction of Cherie Nowlan.

No buildings explode. No guns are shot. No countries are invaded. I’m not sure if there’s a special effect in the film. Introducing the Dwights is about flawed humans, just trying to get through the day. These may be the people who live next door that you've never gotten around to talking to.

Cliché alert: I laughed, I cried, I loved it.