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June 30 Driven (or Drivin', part 2)Yee-haw y’all! Greetings from the land of catfish, aggressive poultry, towns named Bald Knob and Possum Grape, and venerated establishments from B.J.’s Star-Studded Honky Tonk to Hogman’s Hog Pen! A. and I left Washington, DC (where the flooding had closed a lot of things we wanted to see, unfortunately) on Tuesday and arrived in Conway (halfway between Toad Suck and Pickles Gap!) at about 4:00 AM Wednesday, after a longlonglong drive that included all of the following:
All these combined to make the trip preternaturally enjoyable, of course—but the real highlight of the trip was the selection of radio stations in Virginia and Tennessee, which included at least four Christian self-help channels (handily located on both ends of the dial), one Christian rock/rap station (surreal, that), a few ultra-conservative talk stations (the unique national pride that Americans have is “what separates us from the animals in other countries”—you guys probably heard me scream), an 80s hair-band channel (had a wonderful time shrieking “WHOA-OH! LIIIIIIIVIN’ ON A PRAYER” ad nauseam along with Mr. Jon Bon Jovi’s eponymous quartet, though I drew an adamant line at Heart), and one unbelievably wonderful station out of Knoxville, whose three commentators slathered thick Southern accents over a completely serious, in-depth discussion of the virtues of Eastern Tennessee wildlife. Not only can you sell skins for good money ($180 for a single otter pelt, and otters are plentiful this year!), but if, like one commentator, your goal is “to eat [your] way across Eastern Tennessee,” you can enjoy otter, beaver, and even muskrat (“it’s a dark meat” that tastes better than otter and that’s also available as “marsh hare” in fancy restaurants up North). The discussion of gourmet fare then naturally progressed to frog legs, which can be acquired through frog-giggin’: Armed with an instrument resembling a stunted trident, you wade through swamps and ponds listening for a tell-tale “ribbit,” whereupon you gleefully spear your quarry—and, as with furry critters, you can skin your catch and fry it up right there in the swamp! I, for one, was profoundly grateful for The Sports Animal (99.1 FM Knoxville), whose (again, completely serious) program kept me laughing in wild and euphoric incredulity for about 20 minutes; oh, would that I had the sheer unadulterated genius to come up with something like it myself. So now I’m staying at my grandparents’ house in Little Rock, where the goal is to read and write me little brains out (those of you who just thought “THAT shouldn’t take long” are cordially invited to keep your clever witticisms to yourselves) until I head to Oakland for a month, where my cruel, CRUEL relatives will force me to stay in a cute and conveniently located house and drive a little red sports car before they drag me (kicking and screaming, mind you) up to Lake Tahoe for a few days. I’ll then return to Arkansas for about as long as I (and my family) can stand it; I should be back in Boston in mid-to-late August. (Those who want to fly down to Arkansas, experience some inimitable Southern culture, and drive back with me, consider yourselves invited!) I hope you’re all doing well, and that I’ll hear from you frequently during my self-imposed exile, S. Factoid Index:
June 25 Drivin', part 1Hey kids—Just wanted to let you all know that, after the sort of journey that makes for pretty good stories later (90 minutes of sleep the night before; constant rain--some of it heavier than I've ever driven in [and I'm from Arkansas!]; Connecticut traffic [no elaboration necessary]; ubiquitous New Jersey construction; highways and freeways that intersect and loop in patterns from Jackson Pollack's underwater basketweaving class [this was when, in response to Carri's call, I wailed "I hate Delaware!"]; inadvertently touring downtown [which I was supposed to have bypassed altogether last night] at 10 PM; navigating Dupont Circle as a newbie to DC, several degrees beyond exhausted after a 10-hour drive, in the rain that completely obscured road lines and refracted street lights into red, green, yellow, and white incomprehensibility [apologies to the (justifiably irritated) minivan driver, who let me know in NO uncertain terms that the red light was for me, not her]; cruising [again, accidentally] the George Washington Parkway [whose tree-lined lanes made for a lovely detour]), I made it to DC, safe, (relatively) sound, and in remarkably good spirits for someone who had been listening to an audiobook about Auschwitz. :-) June 24 Degeneration into respectabilityI’ve gotten some great responses to that last post (mostly via e-mail, as Stacer has been the sole public commenter [thanks, you!]), so I wanted to respond to the responses. (A benefit to insomnia: time to write! A drawback: significantly reduced coherence/eloquence, and lots of staring blearily off into the incipient sunrise…) (Here I must confess, with a touch of chagrin and irony, that the word “pimp” doesn’t actually bug me—the problems, for me, are related to the Larger Implications of its current popular use. As you’ll read.) The responses have been along several lines of thought—all, incidentally, about whether the word pimp’s degeneration into at least quasi-respectability is a good thing or not, and why (apologies in advance for grossly oversimplifying your messages, all). One camp feels that words like “pimp” and “suck” have, and will always have, a sexual connotation—and that the seemingly inexorable loss of that connotation indicates a lack of concern with things that society really should be concerned about. Another has pointed out that language is a fluid entity; words change not just connotation but entire meaning all the time, and this is neither good nor bad—it just is. Another feels that this and similar changes are potentially empowering (though the aesthetic effects are admittedly pretty horrid), especially for young women who have seized control of emotionally charged terms and are reconstructing formerly male-dominated relationships on their own terms. To all three camps: True dat. J To the First Campers: Dunno that I have anything to add—although my original post had more to do with the destructive rudeness and insecurity-as-arrogance that so bugs me, I also don’t like the overabundance of sex in entertainment written by people who have no idea that a few carefully chosen words or one searing glance can be much more effective than acres and acres of skin (the gift of subtlety is certainly a rare one). To the Second Campers: Yep, this occasionally curmudgeonly editor knows that language changes constantly—sometimes I like the changes (if I think they’re cute and/or demonstrate a certain verbal agility [according to largely undefined and probably arbitrary criteria]); sometimes I don’t (case in point: the use of “bitch” and “ho” as terms of “endearment”). (As T. said, “Thanks for NOTHING, Paris and Nicole!”) I’ve been exchanging e-mails with the Third Camper, and I want to write more here, but I really should try to get more than an hour and a half of sleep before I start an eight-hour drive later today (DC, here I come!). So I’m forced to post incompletely, and probably won’t be able to finish this for a few days. But then, some of you may think this is entirely long enough… June 20 PimpingI actually had something else to write about today—a Chicken Bus Epiphany, no less, which I feel somewhat obligated to write because of popular request/demand—but I hadn’t yet written it when a friend sent an e-mail that set me a-thinkin’. The e-mail was about a high-profile company’s use of the phrase “Pimp my <object>”; it had generated quite a bit of discussion, and some people were deeply offended at the term “pimp” and its connotation (or lack thereof—even more lamentable). So… I am, as usual, of two minds on this issue. (Meaning that I'm generally of two minds on ANY issue, not that this particular issue has arisen with sufficient frequency for me to have a “usual” way to think about it.) On one hand, the word “pimp” has entered the vernacular and no longer has quite the explicit sexual connotation it once did; it’s also a pretty colorful expression, one that perfectly captures the image this company (one that according to numerous recent articles is “in crisis”) wants to portray (young, hip, experienced but nonchalant [oh-so-“over-it”], impossibly cool). One could see it as a harmless, humorous expression that will be terribly dated in about five years.* But then there are people like me, who mourn with painful earnestness and bitten knuckles that same pervasive oh-so-“over-it”/in-your-face attitude amongst the Youth Of Today (also known as Generation Y, I think [which I escaped by the same year that makes me too young for Generation X]). I HATE that Bratz are the dolls of choice today (not that I think Barbie is any better—we seem to be trading one set of destructive stereotypes for another); I hate that everyone is so nonchalantly sophisticated these days; I hate that cynicism has become so entrenched in our culture that we instinctively look for the cloud behind every silver lining. I hate trying to navigate through a world where distrust and suspicion is the norm, where soul-fulfilling connections are scarce and genuineness is so unusual that it's described as “refreshing.” Ademas (a Spanish word I really like [and that’s unfortunately missing an accent over the second a]), I don't like that a word once so charged as “pimp” has become so common that nobody thinks about it anymore; we take it for granted that a “pimp” is someone we want to emulate rather than someone who exploits other people (or maybe someone we want to emulate because a pimp DOES exploit other people—oooo, the power, the raw sexuality—the POWER). Words have the ability to make tolerable things that shouldn't be; I think it was George Orwell who pointed out that something like the Communist International inspires less thought when it's called the Comintern. And then there are people who are also like me, who think that painfully earnest people should just shut up and get OVER themselves, already, and who realize that John Adams was bemoaning the deplorable state of the country’s youth back in the 1770s. But I tend to fit most frequently into category 2, sensitive soul-eyed spirit that I am (or want to be, because introverts are, like, DEEP, and nobody in this lamentably shallow world understands us—we like to corner the long-suffering market as much as we can, because we secretly envy all those socially skilled people who are having so much fun). Would love to read your forthcoming rant! Feel free to disagree with anything and everything I've said—I feel like there are a lot of sides to this issue that I've left unexplored. S. *Forthcoming bonus material/potential rant: Why I have a hard time with modern architecture and “aesthetics” (related to concept of things being so quickly dated). More forthcoming bonus material/rant anodyne: Why a lot of things, like modern architecture and “aesthetics,” that used to bug me don’t so much anymore (includes a Chicken Bus Epiphany!). June 14 Good Intentions Road, part deuxManaged to read a few books (finally!) while hitchhiking and chickenbusing across Zimbabwe, so the current list of completed books for 2006 is:
The on-deck circle (that is, books that will hopefully be read while I'm busy doing as much learnin' as I can in Arkansas and/or California) (p.s.: suggestions welcome):
*Book that inspired the Chicken Bus Epiphanies **Books that directly or indirectly help justify my existence, even if they didn't quite lead to a Chicken Bus Epiphany Lots of non-fiction this year—in fact, the only fiction even on the to-read list is The Wings of the Dove. There are reasons for that. Eventually I'll stop neglecting my 19th-century British and American authors and dive back into some Dickens, Gaskell, Eliot, James, and Wharton (again, suggestions welcome)… |
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