Black Ice

In today's New York Times, there's a story about a black Harlemite who is going to be teaching from Antarctica this fall. A guy called Dr. Stephen Pekar, a geologist at Queens College, recruited Shakira Brown, a 29-year-old science teacher, for the following reason:

“I’m tired of having a bunch of white people running around doing science,” said Dr. Pekar, who is white. “When it comes to Antarctica, it isn’t just the landscape that’s white.”

That's very true. When I was at McMurdo Station, station population was around 1,200—and yet there were only a small handful of black people, maybe less than 20 (or perhaps that's just how I remember it). Which leads to a funny story:

I was talking with a guy one day while working in Antarctica and he was trying to tell me a story about someone else, but I didn't know the guy he was talking about. He was telling me, oh, he's in the carp(enter) shop, he hangs out with so-and-so, he's about this tall, etc.

I'm trying to think who he was talking about and then I realize it. "Wait," I say. "You mean the black guy?" "Uh, yeah," my friend says. "Yeah, he's, um, he's African-American."

That seemed to me the height of absurdity. If we had been living on an island of four-foot-tall pygmies, would my friend have hesitated in describing the island's only pro basketball player as, "You know, that tall motherfucker"? I doubt it.

Some people have brown skin. So what? That's not usually the most easily identifiable characteristic about them—but it is when people with brown skin make up 1% of the population of wherever one's at.

But maybe my attitude on this results from growing up in the south, where it's no problem to say, Oh, yeah, the black/white guy. Also, African-American is often a misnomer: Not all black people come from Africa.

At any rate, I like this development and the story—diversity is always a good thing, and that'll be a treat this coming fall for Ms. Brown's students to see her working and teaching on the Ice.

Shotgun Stories

My friend Jeff Nichols' movie Shotgun Stories, which I saw last year at the Tribeca Film Festival, and which is being shown at the IFC Center in Manhattan starting on the 26th, just got a fantastic review in New York magazine. Read it here. I highly recommend the movie to anyone looking for a strong shot of Southern heat, violence, ennui and brotherly trouble. Congratulations, Jeff!

All Quiet on the Blogstern Front

I saw Joanna Newsom play with the Brooklyn Philharmonic at BAM. Lines like "In the trough of the waves, which are pawing like dogs, pitch we, pale-faced and grave, as I write in my log" jumped out at me; I had heard the words before but I had never heard the words before. I thought of the jump in complexity from Milk-Eyed Mender to Ys and how it echoed, in its unprecedentedness, the leap that Dylan made from The Freewheelin' to Blonde on Blonde and, in his only "V" song, "The ghost of electricity howls in the bones of her face, where these visions of Johanna have now taken my place." But then Joanna came back out, a vision in a short hot pink dress, and I heard evidence of her genius presaged: "There are some mornings when the sky looks like a road." Early on Dylan meditated on roads, too, singing in tribute to his idol, "I'm a-leaving' tomorrow, but I could leave today, somewhere down the road someday."

Joanna's come home but Dylan's on the road again. In Todd Haynes' fractured biopic I'm Not There, which I saw last Sunday, Dylan morphed as a small black boy jumping trains, living out of time, to a work shirt-clad Freedom Rider to a symbol-addled French dreamer to an arch embodiment of that high thin wild mercury sound to a broken family man to a man of god to a bespectacled, wily outlaw witnessing the sunset of that weird old America only to end up again, as he remains, on a train, winking and forever receding from view yet not ever disappearing. He's in whiteface at the ballpark this summer. He drives SUVs in black mirror shades. He sells ladies underwear just like he said he would. He wears bolo ties and can't keep from crying over Alicia Keys, who was born in Hell's Kitchen when he was living down the line. Woody, Dylan, Johanna, and Joanna, they "will be fine; but what was yours and mine appears to me a sandcastle that the gibbering wave takes."

File under fragments, Ice-related

Though not quite sastrugi*, the Jersey swamp's
wind-whipped, frozen hillocks on the way in
to work put me in mind of Antarctica,
and the cold-storage smoking-room's window,
through which I looked out onto the alien
Ross Ice Shelf, busted-up and jackknifed
like a California freeway after an earthquake,
and wondered, "Where in the holy fuck am I?"

* sastrugi = wavelike ridges of hard snow formed by the wind

Three weeks in the life

Forgive my long absence, Faithful Reader; In the past few weeks I have been really busy.

Two Tuesdays ago I saw Vampire Weekend play at the Bowery Ballroom, hands-down the best place to see a show in the city. They were great: It was the day of their self-titled album release, and during the show I had a smile plastered across my face the entire time. The drummer was like Stretch Armstrong mixed with Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem's drummer, with college-kid thrown in; the keyboardist spent large chunks of a couple songs goonily scratching at his face; the bass player shook and strutted as if he thought he were in a much cooler band than he actually is; and the lead singer was confident and guileless. The music (sort of Afro-pop or, in a much better term, "Upper West Side Soweto"—kudos to whoever coined that) was simple, weird, incredibly catchy and just a lot of fun. The woman I was with, whom I brought to the show without her knowing the band at all and who had been having kind of a bad day, couldn't deal with the very crowded crowd and went to the back of the room during the show—but she texted me during to say, "They are really good!"—They are that irresistible. They won't ever "save music," but they are a great band whose album, since I purchased it at the show that night for $10, I've been rationing so that I don't wear it out too quickly—an honor I reserve for only the albums I love best.

Next up: Joanna Newsom at BAM!

Linda's Tavern, Capitol Hill

All these black-and-white pictures of patrons
on the wall of Linda’s, a bar I’ve never been to
in a city I arrived in yesterday—

an arm-wrestling match between a guy and a girl;
lit cigarettes at the bar, clearly dating the photo;
a woman with fine red lips
and thin arched eyebrows, smiling
with her mouth open;
four band guys sitting at a table
with a sign saying
“drummer wanted”;
a bride and groom, come presumably back
on their wedding night
for a drink at the bar where they met;
a dead-drunk, slumped Santa Claus—

remind me
of the boxes of antique photos
in the Chelsea flea markets:
glossy-haired, stoic farmers;
women in black dresses right up to their chins;
grubby-faced kids now our grandfathers;
a forgotten-named dog, dead now eighty years—

for Linda’s will one day close
the photos taken down and stored away
until our tattoos our mustaches,
our self-consciously cocked hats our jokey outfits
our complicated hair our loves our lives
will be rifled through disinterestedly
by a Saturday shopper in search
of something for her bathroom.

R.I.P.

Normally in these pages I would not comment on goings-on within the world of celebrity, that glittering mirage ... but as I'm sure everyone by now knows, Heath Ledger, 28 and a fellow Brooklynite, was found dead of a sleeping pill overdose yesterday afternoon in a SoHo apartment.

My friend called and told me this around 5:30pm—and it really affected me. Perhaps because of his great talent, perhaps because he's my same age, perhaps because of this friend's recent dealings with him, he had become more real to me—though more likely the reason that it affected me so was because he died by his own hand (though unintentionally) as a result of drug use.

If, as Auden wrote, "poetry makes nothing happen," then a blog post must surely do less—but I feel I must say, no matter if it does any good, that if you think you have a problem, or know someone who does, try to get you or them some help. Trying to help someone else probably won't work, but you can try. If it's your own self, though, I know with total confidence that it can work. Just be careful out there—there's no coming back from where Heath Ledger, god rest his soul, has gone.

Nearly forty years ago

Nearly forty years ago, on April 3rd, 1968, in Memphis, Tennessee, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered a speech at the Mason Temple in support of the black sanitation workers then on strike in that city. The speech, which has since become known as his "I've Been to the Mountaintop" address, would turn out to be his last: Dr. King was killed at the Lorraine Motel the very next day. Anyone interested in listening to or reading this speech can find the audio and text here; I highly recommend it. It deals specifically with the problems in Memphis at the time, but it also grapples with the wider problems in America as well; Dr. King was an amazing speaker, and even now, listening to the speech, little chills, some strange emotional electricity, runs over my skin and through my body.

Toward the end of his speech, Dr. King relates how, in New York City in 1958, he was nearly killed by a mentally ill black woman who stabbed him while he was signing copies of his first book. He then touches on the fact that, on the way from Atlanta to Memphis that morning, his plane was delayed due to a bomb threat. And he seems to know what's coming, or to feel that his time on this earth might not be long—but he is at peace with that. He says:

Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn't matter with me now, because I've been to the mountaintop.

And I don't mind.

Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land!

I hope we get there someday. Which brings me back to the present: Earlier in Dr. King's last speech, he says something that is just as applicable today, in this very important election year, as it was forty years ago. He says:

Let us rise up tonight with a greater readiness. Let us stand with a greater determination. And let us move on in these powerful days, these days of challenge to make America what it ought to be. We have an opportunity to make America a better nation.

We do have an opportunity to make America a better nation; we can help make that change in the primary elections, when those of use who are affiliated with a political party can choose who we want to have represent us in the general election. And we can all—each and every one of us: white, black, Hispanic, Asian, Christian, Jewish, or any other of the unique colors, cultures, and religions that make America great—affect that change in November, when we can, at the polls, either make a choice for fear and xenophobia or, in concert with Dr. King, reject fear, embrace the world, help put a new, hopeful, and inclusive face on this great nation.

I encourage everyone who is not registered to vote to do so today, in honor of Dr. King and the ultimate sacrifice he made. Each state has its own rules and regulations, but the nonprofit, nonpartisan organization Declare Yourself can help facilitate the process. Go here and get registered now. Make Dr. King and his memory proud: Be an "extremist for peace," take on a mantle of "dangerous unselfishness," and let's do what we can to change the course of this country for the better both now, in November, and after. Dr. King would want it that way. As he said, in the last words of his last speech:

And so I'm happy, tonight.

I'm not worried about anything.

I'm not fearing any man!

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!

*If you want to help get others involved in this election year, send the link to this blog post to your family and friends. Here 'tis: http://hunterslaton.blogspot.com/2008/01/nearly-forty-full-years-ago.html

Anna Wise

This morning on NPR I heard one of the best, most moving things I've ever heard: The story—told in her own voice—of how this 96-year-old woman Anna Wise met and courted her husband, to whom she was married for 57 years. It's only two minutes long. Go here but don't read the story, which spoils it. You need to hear Anna Wise say it. Click the "Listen Now" link and dig it.

Also, I'm back from Seattle. More about that fine city TK.

He makes a good point

In light of Hillary's recent showing of emotion, I think we should all watch this clip of Ali G interviewing Newt Gingrich. Ali G makes some very good points.

And this, from The Onion's What Do You Think? section, way back in 2001. (I found this, by the way, by searching for "Onion menstruates legislation"—some words from the bit that I half-remembered.)

N.H. postmortem

I was talking to my dad last night at around 10:30pm, when it was looking like Hillary would—as she ended up doing—win New Hampshire. My dad remarked that, going into the primary, polls were showing Obama to have as much as a 13 percent lead over Hillary. So what happened to that lead?, my dad asked me. His theory was that Hillary, in her rare display of emotion and vulnerability the day before the primary, may have won the women back to her side. And, according to this NY Times article, my dad was half right, if not more—Hillary did win back the Democratic women of New Hampshire, though just how and why are not speculated upon.

David D. Kirkpatrick, with Megan Thee, writes in this Times piece:

Democratic women rallied around Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton in the New Hampshire primary Tuesday, according to statewide exit polls, confounding expectations and providing her margin of victory over Senator Barack Obama.

In contrast to polling results in the Iowa caucuses, half the women who voted in the Democratic primary gave her their support, the polls showed. Four in 10 voters said Mrs. Clinton was most qualified to be commander-in-chief, while 3 in 10 said the same of Mr. Obama.

Now, my question is: Was Hillary's display of emotion genuine? Or was it merely the last, best card she had to play? I dunno, and really we can't ever know; we can't ever truly know anyone's inner motivations and thoughts—oftentimes we only barely know our own. But what do the readers of this blog (both of them) think? Were they crocodile tears, or the real deal Holyfield?

Manganaro's

Hopping off the bus before
Port Authority, I look right to make sure
nothing’s coming—then I hit the avenue
running, up to meet one from the spring before,
with whom, on stoops, I had coffee and chocolate croissants.

That was a good spring. This January day
feels like spring: high fifties, fresh in the air.
Every year it seems
I write about the trees blooming
confusedly, their wood-brains believing
or wanting to believe it’s spring.

Up Ninth with a spring
in my step a sign
flashes red: Manganaro’s,
at which I’ve eaten—chicken parm subs the size
of footballs, and a story of two brothers
in a decades-long fight
over the red sign’s name. I, too, have a name,
but no brothers up here share it.
A little winter goes a long way
for this Southern boy.

Arrived at the park, I find the park’s been made
into not-a-park, rather a rink,
for the winter.
The buildings above, however,
with their white floodlights,
remain the same.
In the city and the buildings and the streets,
in the seasonally shifting park,
I seem to perceive an analogy
or a metaphor for me.

Hola amigos

It's been a long time since I rapped at ya—hope everything's still attached where it oughta be.

Item! Go Obama! New Hampshire's primary is tomorrow, and I hope against hope that Obama edges out Hillary—polls are showing them to be in a dead heat. It's not that I have anything (or much) against Hil, but after seeing Barack's speech following his win at the Iowa caucuses, I really feel that he is the man of the moment.

Item! Phosphorescent is a band on the GROW! I and a friend saw them open for White Magic in December. Even though I had never heard or heard of them until that night, they totally blew me away: They were like Wilco playing Spirtualized songs, just beautiful, chest-swelling, fractured, hopeful rock 'n' roll. They are playing Wednesday, February 27th at Union Hall in Brooklyn, and Friday, February 29th at Mercury Lounge in Manhattan; I have tix to the latter, and I highly recommend that others join me.

Item! I don't know why it's taken me so long, but I finally went—by myself, on a whim—to Fette Sau, the barbecue joint in Williamsburg, last night. The place opened last March, almost a year ago, but I stayed away until now. I think it had something to do with the place's very un-barbecue name, which means "fat pig" in German. Generally speaking, you do not want to visit a 'cue joint that's highfalutin enough to use another language in its name.

But the name is the only false note: The ambience, the music (Otis Redding and the like), the smell and, most importantly, the food and sauce, were spot-on. Yestereve I had the pulled pork and the burnt-end barbecue beans, with healthy chunks of both beef and pork involved in the latter. And man, I was in heaven. I brought a book I didn't even look at. The meat and the beans were spicy and smoky, done just right. The sauces, made in-house, were strong and had a real kick. There weren't any ridiculous fine-dining flourishes: just metal cafeteria trays covered with wax paper, whitebread rolls, wetnaps, and Mason jars. I tried to order a Diet Coke and they don't have it; they only have regular Coke. Now that's a barbecue joint I can respect, pretentious name or no. I highly recommend the place to barbecue-lovers and Southerners in the City.

Item! I watched Cool Hand Luke for the I dunno how many-ith time the other morning. Man, that is just such a great movie, one of my favorites. "Yeah, well, sometimes nothin' can be a real cool hand. " Anyone who hasn't yet had the privilege of seeing Paul Newman in what I think is his best role should run not walk to the DVD store or the Netflix queue post-haste.

That is all for now. I hope not to be gone so long, blog post-wise, in the future, though I am headed to Seattle on Friday for work. I can't wait to visit one of these "Star Bucks" I've been hearing about.

Here lies the cigarette. May he rest in peace.

Smoke-free college trend growing.

France faces end of coffee and cigarettes.

Smoking now permitted only in special room in Iowa.

The Path Sick Sorrow Took

When I went out
I'd been in twelve years. It was kind of quiet,
very much a whimper. I moved to San Francisco
and two nights after I went
to a place in North Beach called Vesuvius.
I just walked in on a cool afternoon and it was all
as I'd left it: the dark, scarred wood bar,
the familiar, not unpleasant gloom, the bottles arrayed against
the mirror. I went in and sat down
and ordered a scotch on the rocks.

It was amazing to me how easy it was.
The glass was sat before me
without comment or question.
I picked it up and hefted it, felt its weight
in my palm and then
took a deep drink.

The heavens did not crack open, the bar did not split,
I did not drop where I sat, struck down.
It was really rather anticlimactic.

I felt like the reformed thief
who once more takes up
his lockpick. I felt like when,
after having been in England for a year,
I drove again. The movements, the patterns
were all still there though rusty. They did not take very long
to warm up, to loosen, to work back in.
I'd uncovered a rut worn an age ago
through a field long since overgrown.
The path remained.

What happened after, where the path still led,
I don't have to tell you. The path still led
where it led. I may still be breathing
fighting fucking crying loving lying
but mostly I am dead.

Participate in Democracy

Go to Daily Candy (click here) and vote for Smart Fitzjerrell, the punky, sexy clothing line by Arkansas native and personal friend of mine Mary Kathryn Wells. If you don't, another Arkansas native might be elected our next president. And none of us want that to happen, do we?

Mixed tape v2.0

This is pretty fantastic.

It's just not the same, making mixed CDs instead of mixed tapes; the care and craftmanship involved are so much higher with a tape, so much more personal. You really had to sit with the songs, crouched over a boombox, hitting play and pause, cuing it all up just right. When you finished one—that you'd invariably made for a woman—you felt there was a bit of your own personal body and soul in that tape. And they make great documents, little solid items, the plasticky rattle, the handwritten songlist, the cut-and-pasted tape jackets, the old pictures.

File under jokey fragments, recent

1.

In retrospect,
my life was tits and whiskey.
I'd be lying if,
on this late-November night,
I said I didn't miss it a tit. I mean a bit.

2.

I need to write more about other windows.
I'm getting bored of my own stories:
Yes, Antarctica, dishwasher blah blah blah.

3.

I have sat imperiously, tie'd and jacketed,
in the lobbies of luxury hotels.
I have sipped coffee in Venice Beach hostels,
washed up from a firing.
I have mopped floors at the world's bottom
and fallen before bulls.
I'm 28. I should have spread things out more.

First feature

My first feature article for Meetings & Conventions has been published, just this month. Go here to read it. I'm quite proud of it; I hope you all out there in TV Land enjoy it.

Beachblogging

I'm sitting on the beach in Puerto Rico right now. Insane to bring your laptop to the beach, you say? Yeah, you're probably right—but the beach is only a few steps from my hotel, the El San Juan, so, y'know. The hotel is nice but for the pervasive, thumping techno soundtrack that is seemingly impossible to get away from: in the elevator, in the halls (which you can hear, faintly, the insistent bassline, at night in bed, in your room—no kidding), and even right here, right behind me on the beach. So maybe having a laptop out here, with a just-fine WiFi signal, isn't so strange. The waves are rolling in and the breeze is cool. There are a few scattered people in beach chairs nearby.

Puerto Rico has been great, if a bit odd. The city seems strangely empty—at least, Old San Juan, the 500-year-old downtown area, does. It's beautiful, though, the Creole (I think) architecture, all the pastel colors, the little lizards sunning themselves. I like a lizard, I've decided. They are cute little critters, how they are totally unmoving and then, bam, in a flash, they're off.

We've seen a lot of interesting hotels. The new La Concha, which is being renovated right now in time (they say, though I don't see how they will get it done in time) for a Sunday, Dec. 8th opening. The La Concha is an old hotel built in the Tropical Modernism style which has lain fallow for 10 years now—just went to seed. They're doing a ton of work on it, though, and it looks like it's going to be a beautiful hotel when it is finished.

That's all for now. Think I lost the signal.