The Redstar Perspective

UPDATE (10:55 p.m.): Apparently I’m not the only one quitting. HUD Secretary Alphonso Jackson is expected to resign tomorrow. Wahoo!!! Ok, now I’m done. Read on.

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It’s with some sadness and some relief that I write this post: I will not be blogging anymore at The Redstar Perspective. This has been a difficult decision, and I’m still unsure what it means. I may retire this site entirely, or I may resurrect it at an unknown point in the future. I’m still sorting out the details.

Here’s what led to this decision, somewhat in order of importance:

a) It’s time to write my dissertation. After meeting with two of my advisors recently, it’s clear I can finish this thing in the next 12 to 15 months and GRADUATE!!! Especially since the New Year, but generally speaking, blogging has become my primary activity, and an enormous time suck for me. Yes, my stats are SLOWLY growing, and, according to readers, my writing is improving. But, in addition to feeling like I’m losing my way re: the content of this blog (more on that in a minute), I also feel like I’m investing so much time and energy in this blog and not generating the returns I want to get. It’s not ok with me that my readership grows when I discuss the general election, because that’s not my preferred content focus. The hours I’ve been spending on posts about Obama v. Clinton, etc., is distracting me from really focusing on the writing I need to be doing NOW - that is, on issues of social justice, urban recovery and contentious politics in post-Katrina New Orleans. In other words, my dissertation.

b) I no longer feel comfortable blogging without anonymity in the ’sphere. Given where I’m at in my still-emerging career, I’m not ok with folks’ ability to track down my thoughts and opinions on-line.  I regret not blogging anonymously, and any blogging I do in the future will strive for greater anonymity. For someone with deeply personal intellectual interests, the current context of the Democratic primary and the empassioned and often heated on-line discussions of race, racism, gender, sexism and misogyny, privilege and prejudice have left me feeling that the web is an even less safe space to really grapple with these issues. In our splicing and dicing interpretative world, I know my thoughts and perspectives on the primary, on poverty, on my family, etc. are up for grabs for appropriation and re-interpretation. Nonetheless, I plan to remove some of the content from this site, but will leave the rest up for the history books.
c) The RP has run its course. This blog began in part because of my work in New Orleans, because my buddy Jake urged me to blog rather than send long e-mails to everyone I knew about what I was experiencing in the city beginning in January 2006. With this dissertation, my work in New Orleans and the Gulf Coast is coming to a close. This blog has grown from that original reporting, to cover topics of development, poverty, housing, inequality, activism, cities, and politics more broadly, but all of this has been mixed up with odes to my boyfriend, Grey’s Anatomy, and random (hopefully amusing) stories about my childhood and roots. Frankly, I’m not interested in writing a general interest blog that’s a mix of analysis and journaling. I need the latter for my mental health, but I’ll find another outlet. My priority is to examine urban inequality, especially as it impacts low-income women, households, and neighborhoods. This is what I want to be blogging about (and working on in my lifetime), and I know there’s a niche audience who wants more of this. I’ve got all kinds of ideas for blogging, but I need a new and fresh venue. That will come in time.

So there you have it. Just in time for what would have been the second annual RP History Month. I’m still figuring out how to keep my original New Orleans posts and select others on-line and available. I’ll probably make an announcement about that in the future.

If you’d like to stay in touch, please leave a note in comments. That will give me an e-mail address for you (remember, others can’t see it) if/when I launch another blog.

Thanks to all my readers and champions over the last two years, especially NYC Weboy, and other blogging allies such as Professor Zero, DonnaDarko, Pizza Diavola and Pocochina. It’s been fun, instructive, exhausting and mostly my pleasure. I have become a blogger. Look at me.

Until we meet again, I leave you with some highly recommended reading:

Please read this disturbing, enraging and graphic coverage of the brutal rape and assault of a woman and her kids in Dunbar Village in W. Palm Beach, FL, and how you can let the NAACP know where their legal, PR and activist resources really belong.

A pregnant man challenges people’s ideas about gender, sexuality, and reproductive rights. And shakes up the healthcare profession. (H/t Echidne.) Meanwhile, pregnancy discrimination complaints from women reach record levels.

A refreshing comments thread that asks bloggers to cool it re: their election coverage. Instead of all the collective hyperventilating, let’s all check out Insurgent American’s 35-Point Practical Guide for Action. (H/t Corrente.)

Read Brownfemipower’s WAM conference speech about centering feminist activism around questions of citizenship and the problems this creates for advocating for immigrant women. (How I missed this conference - held at MIT, the irony! - is beyond me.)

Be well, have fun, and stay safe.

I’m at a conference in New Orleans covering these themes, though the words “regional,” “social” and “smart” come before them, respectively.  (Me, I’m skeptical of regionalism and smart growth.)

It’s an interesting conference in that these themes don’t necessarily go hand in hand, and it’s effectively a community development conference that’s rather glitzy: held at the Sheraton on Canal St, with talks by Danny Glover and a panel beginning in a minute hosted by Tavis Smiley.  Last night the Mayor said a few words at the evening reception.

But it’s been interesting so far, as I hear from scholars, practitioners and wonks about trends in federal policy, the rising salience of poverty among voters, and municipal strategies for combatting poverty. I’ve been surprised at how much I enjoy it, given I usually can’t sit still during conf. presentations for more than 5 minutes.

I’ll be back over the weekend when this is all said and done with some longer, more interesting updates.  For now, I have to complain about one thing: WHY DOES THE MARRIOTT NOT ONLY CHARGE IT’S GUESTS A DAY RATE FOR INTERNET, BUT ALSO REQUIRE US TO USE A WIRE ATTACHED TO A MODEM?  I THOUGHT IT WAS 2008. 

Happy Friday.

PS: Life’s a lot more peaceful without the incessant virtual shouting of the blogosphere.

I am really sunburnt.  Even my fingers are sunburnt.  But not my eyes; I look like a raccoon from wearing shades all day in the hot San Antonio sun.  (Special thanks to the Obama supporter who lent me some sunblock, which I re-applied far too late in the day.)

But it was DAMN WORTH IT - Viva Clinton, who won Ohio, RI, and TEXAS tonight!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!:)

I am quoting Rep”>Rep. Delia Garcia (D-KS) in the title of this post, the first  Latina and youngest woman ever elected to the KS legislature.  She spoke briefly at Clinton’s victory party tonight in San Antonio - she’d traveled to the state to stump for HRC - to our crowd of majority Latino/a volunteers.  I’ve probably said this before, but I really think being a Red Sox fan (through ‘04 anyway) offers special training for the kind of close victory we experienced tonight in TX.  The enormous camraderie with fellow underdogs, the absolute elation in pulling ahead and coming to the brink, and the inability to truly relax until that ball is in Manciewixzcjghz’s glove and Foulke is in his arms.  D’oh!  Wrong image.

I have 2 pictures left on my disposable digital camera with me here in San Antonio, and I can’t wait to finish the roll and get the photos up on-line.  What an amazing 48 hours, and what a tremendous outcome.  At the heavily Latino precinct where I volunteered until 8:00 tonight, folks waited hours to participate in the evening caucuses, in part because the line to vote in the primary was so long.  A Latino dad drove up to the polling station in the late afternoon in his mini-van covered in Clinton signs, with his 2 daughters and wife.  He and his young teen girls sported similar Dallas Cowboys regalia, and the daughters held signs and cheered for Clinton while he shouted in English and Spanish into a bullhorn why passing drivers should support the Senator.  Eventually a cop came and told him to relocate - the bullhorn, unlike signs, requires further distance from the polling station - but it was a trip while it lasted.

When my fellow local volunteers finally arrived at Clinton’s victory party tonight, around 11 pm, they reported that the 3 precincts caucusing at our polling station awarded Clinton 21 delegates to Obama’s 2.  I heard multiple stories from other local caucuses where Obama didn’t even meet the threshold to receive any delegates, and Clinton took them all.  The crowd at the victory party erupted over and over and over tonight - when CNN exit polls showed 62% of TX Latinos supported Clinton, when Clinton first pulled ahead of Obama, when Ohio was called, when Clinton spoke in Ohio, whenever CNN showed that map of Texas and all the areas in the South that supported her (especially San Antonio), on and on and on and on.  So many reasons to celebrate.

Local and out-of-state volunteers alike kept talking about meeting up again in Pennsylvania.  I think it’s a must.  (Here’s hoping some of you all will join us!)  The nun I keep mentioning in these field posts told me she works with Mexican immigrants in Omaha, many of whom are undocumented and at risk for deportation.  She told us a particularly painful anecdote of a young mother getting deported and leaving 3 young American-born children behind, one not even a toddler.  This mom had come illegally to the country at age 2, and was now being sent back to Mexico, where she knew no one.  Sr. Ana really believes in Clinton because she thinks Clinton will deal humanely with the problems and complexities of immigration in this country.  I heard several times from others how much they similarly believe in Clinton.

Me, I trust no politicians, nor do I feel personally connected to any of them, as others over the last 48 hours have described feeling to Sen. Clinton, Pres. Clinton, and JFK, Jr. (of all people).  But damn! I was completely moved by the image of a woman on the big screen in that ballroom tonight, celebrating her win in Ohio and promising to keep fighting her way through this race.  Later in the bathroom a reporter who first apologized for not being impartial quoted her grandmother in saying to never count out a woman who is down, and the rest of us agreed enthusiastically. 

In the last 48 hours I’ve had the new pleasure to campaign in a Latino region, to work with straight women and men; lesbians, gay men and transgendered supporters; white, black, Latino and Asian volunteers; and campaign participants of all ages and abilities.  Honestly, it was f***ing awesome.  AND WE WON.

Cross-posted at The Hillary 1000.

See here for my recap of campaigning for Clinton in San Antonio.  I’m not sure what else might bring me to this city, but it sure was a treat tonight to spy a CNN reporter prepping outside the Alamo for what is surely the 8,999 story on why Clinton is a goner at any given moment.  Personally, I much prefer sociologist Manuel Castells cautioning me to “Remember the witches!” when I think about the significance of Sen. Clinton’s presidential campaign.

I arrived here last night; I depart on Wednesday.  Tomorrow is the TX primary/caucus chaos bonanza, where “vote early, vote often” is the mantra.  I am staying with a lovely Hispanic couple that is deeply religious and enthusiastically committed to Sen. Clinton.  I have a cab driver from Guinea that was the first of at least four people to ask me what happened that MA went for Clinton after Kennedy et al.’s endorsement.  Apparently, the Kennedy mystique and significance burns more brightly beyond the borders of Massachusetts.  Explaining to people that Ted’s opinion is not especially relevant and is rightly treated with suspicion by proper skeptical Massholes seems like an insufficient answer to the question.  Hell, I wish I knew why he, Kerry and Patrick found it necessary to go all out for Obama.

I phone banked, held a sign at an intersection, and assembled signs for the Clinton campaign all day. I tooled around with a retired grocery exec from Northern CA and a Latina nun from Nebraska.  I took in San Antonio’s Riverwalk but managed to find a much cooler spot for drinks and dinner a couple blocks away on Houston St.  (Probably the main drag of the old downtown - much more appealing than the Riverwalk for out of towners desiring some semblance of authenticity and history.)  The Alamo reminded me of Mt. Rushmore in that it was much smaller than I expected.  A plaque in front of it reprises some dying words from one of the Texas patriots.  At the risk of being inappropriately sardonic, may I say it seemed to me a foreshadow of nativism to come as it began with some complaint of being surrounded by Mexicans.   

During dinner I chatted with two entrepreneurs on either side of me at the bar - in town for a retail convention - about politics.  Both were gracious and interesting, with one a strong Clinton supporter from Northern Michigan, and the other a political agnostic and Republican from Orange County, CA.  Given I’ve worked for years with entrepreneurs, we were able to find common, cordial ground about the primary campaign and politics and policy more generally, without me having to lose any ideological ground.  I enjoyed it immensely.

After they departed, I was alone at the bar with three old white dudes, on who irony is long lost.  After eavesdropping on their conversation about McCain (if only he were Newt, they lamented), their own virility, and Vietnam, I was eventually enjoined by one of them in discussion.  Two were from Chicago, and the guy on the end expressed sympathy for Clinton that she couldn’t beat that “pipsqueak” who did nothing in the IL state senate but “sit in the back and smoke cigarettes.”  As he criticized her moves and strategy, I countered several times that I thought she’d done many of those things.  He loudly told me she hadn’t, and frequently cut me off with his own enthusiastic barstool quarterbacking.  When he got to the MSNBC debate, which he watched for “10 minutes,” and criticized her again for failing to make her case against Obama, I ironically noted that perhaps she had difficulty given she kept getting cut off when trying to deliver her message.  In all seriousness, he told me that wasn’t the case, and continued to harp on her. 

The conversation derailed further when one of his dinner companions told me Clinton was a lesbian, though improved immeasurably given this exchange:

Me: “of course, because all strong women are lesbians and man-hating.”

Buffoon closest to me: “Are you a lesbian?”

Buffoon farthest from me: “It’s ok though, because guys love lesbians.”

Me: “All lesbians?  I thought men liked only hot lesbians.  Or will any old dyke do?”

They were momentarily stymied, and shortly thereafter I took my exit.

I love dining alone at the bar!!  (Seriously, I do.)

I said to the M.A.S. on the last night of our L.A. vacation: “you’re the image, i’m the words.”  A metaphor for our relationship constructed of his photography work and my writing. 

He’s recently uploaded hundreds of his photos of New Orleans on Flickr - the majority of which were taken during joint visits to the region since January 2006.  His work is foremost a testament to the city, and is accompanied by a moving essay describing his love affair with it, including his mourning and desires for the place since Katrina hit in August ‘05.  He writes: (more…)

As in…

This vacation.  Walking, talking, eating, touring, reunions, great weather, and good company.  What more could I want? (You’re right, a little shopping)

The media.  If I have to read one more hyperbolic news report about HRC’s “stunning” reversal, blah blah blah, I might scream.  1 caucus does not a statistical sample make.  And go see Weboy and elsewhere re: the male liberal exuberance over Obama that also fuels much of the media reports…Go Hillary!  Good work, ladies of NH. 

Hillary’s win! Nice!

And now I’m checking out of our terrific oceanside hotel for several days in the San Gabriel mountains.  Then it’s off to a glam weekend in the Hollywood Hills.  Weboy is doing an excellent job over here; don’t you just LUV him?  This Boston girl sure does. 

My almost perfect breakfast with my man on the veranda of our oceanside Santa Monica hotel in sunny 60 degree weather (supported by heat lamps - love ‘em!) was marred by the media hype regarding Obama’s lead over Clinton in USA Today’s most recent poll (what do you want, on vacation it’s the nation’s newspaper or bust). Check out Weboy’s post below (maybe he’ll even provide the link for me here - ask and ye shall receive - ed.) and his final emphasis that HRC needs to distance herself from Bill to really charge ahead like many of us want and expected.

I am more saddened by this - hopefully temporary - turn of events than I anticipated. I don’t like Obama, and like my mother, I can’t articulate exactly why. It’s less about the man than the context of his rise - namely, his candidacy vis-a-vis our first serious female contender. This is how I see this race, removing the personalities of Obama and Clinton for the moment. If I was home, I’d take the time to link to the gender research supporting this perspective, but from this hotel lobby, my digital library is beyond my reach.

Clinton is 60; Obama is 46. She, like many women - especially of her generation - has had to wait for “her chance” to lead. She has had to follow on the heels of her husband, and, per our political process, has been able to lead in part because of the path he laid for his equally competent and sharp wife. But there is no question that she has come second, due to the general intersection of gender roles and life chances for men versus women. Now, her chance to lead the nation is seriously threatened by legitimate Clinton fatigue, and this noble if vacuous national desire for “change” that Weboy so clearly describes. Our ability to see her as an obvious choice for change is marred not only by some of her more centrist political stances, but by the sheer fact that she is indelibly linked to her husband’s past leadership. No male candidate - now, or ever, I bet - has to deal with that kind of gendered baggage. Including Obama, who as a light-skinned mixed-race male forty-something, can paint this eloquent picture of being not only unfettered by past personal political baggage, but can also use his race to paint himself as the only one who can unite our racially polarized country. Forgive me if I find his potential nomination less illuminating of this opportunity than if we nominated Jesse Jackson - the oft invoked other former black Presidential candidate (though there have been others), especially given Obama’s high support among people under the age of 35, some of whom are certainly, arguably believe a more racially equitable future is possible.

Then there is the issue of negative campaigning. A great deal of gender research reveals that women are penalized more heavily than men for acting aggressive or assertive; tests show that men and women alike sanction such behavior from women much more strongly. That Clinton is going negative against Obama can have significant costs for her that Edwards or Richardson would not face, that Obama would not face if/when he is negative towards Clinton. They simply do not face the same costs for adopting this particular strategy. According to the USA Today I have in front of me, Obama leads significantly among men, with almost 50% of their support. He is slightly ahead of Clinton among female supporters, in part because of the youth vote. Given the gendered risks of negative campaigning and baggage of campaigning in part on her husband’s record, Clinton’s road to the White House is uniquely difficult in a way that Obama and all the others (e.g., “high road” Huckabee, per Weboy) do not face.

Certainly, there is the reality of HRC’s strategic choices in her campaign, and that she would continue a perhaps-too-recent-for-many dynasty, but remember, we didn’t invoke dynastic fatigue when Dubya ran so soon after his father’s reign, even as it was so obvious we invaded Iraq to avenge his daddy somehow. Whatever people may believe about Clinton’s electability, or their personal feelings towards her, it is impossible to disentangle her gender from whatever outcomes we face in this primary.

And now I have to go walk on the beach with my boyfriend. Over to you, Weboy.

In flannel pj’s, recovering from a cold, pre-packing for vacation in L.A.  I leave tonight.  By prepacking I mean a) checking the weather for the 8 millionth time, b) making a list of what to pack, c) doing last minute laundry, and d) taking care of the essentials, like blogging and updating my iPod for the trip. 

I finally surrendered to the real reason behind my major fatigue this week - a head cold picked up somewhere on the Eastern Seaboard during my holiday travels.  I’ve had two consecutive nights of between 9 and 10 hours of sleep - sumptuous! - and sat on my couch til 4pm yesterday watching Waitress.  I was initially like, “eh,” but I keep thinking about it.  I doubt I’ll post a review; it was a bit too emphatically quirky for me, but there were definitely some sublime moments.  Probably a good rental.

Then last night, after a quick trip to the Wrentham outlets, where I experienced my first shoe mania in the 50% OFF EVERYTHING IN THE STORE AS WE CLOSE FOR REMODELING Cole Haan (seriously, a jacket and 2 pairs of shoes for $100), and a bowl of chicken soup at home, the M.A.S. and I had our requisite fight before we leave on vacation.  I say “requisite” because Bill Simmons, aka the Sports Guy, says this is one of the rules of relationships, that you’ll fight the night before you leave.  Ours involved mapping out our expectations of our trip to this former home of the M.A.S., after I told him I didn’t want him to lecture me on the history and significance of L.A. the entire time. Some bickering led to the mutual awareness that I am not into marching from monument to monument, and that a good trip for both of us involves wandering around neighborhoods and eating and drinking.  I think we’re going to have a fine old time. 

In my absence, NYC Weboy has once again graciously agreed to hold down the fort over here, cleaning out my spam folder and posting some original and cross-posted content for your reading pleasure.  Please show him the love you show me, and rest assured you’ll be more up to speed on current events in his stead than you normally are with me (New Orleans notwithstanding).  My life, home and blog are fortunate to have someone looking in on us in my absence. 

Be Good!!

I hear more about the “new” New Orleans these days (sadly, you can believe some of the hype, and not for the right reasons) than any “new” NY, but one need only satisfy one’s Law & Order addiction - as I’m doing as a side project to my PhD - to see how much NYC has changed over the years.  In keeping with the spirit of writing about not too much this week, this post is not a wonkish treatise about urban development and politics.  (I know, I know, you miss my lecturing ways.  Prof. Redstar will be back mid-January, after I shop my screenplay in L.A.  But I digress…)

I’m extemporizing here about my upcoming visit to NYC, which involves four nights of visiting friends in the outer boroughs.  And I’m not talking about the hipsterati in Brooklyn.  Nope, instead, with thirtysomething boyfriend in tow, I will be staying with friends and their families (collectively, three children under the age of five) in the Bronx and Queens.  Saturday night involves a trip downtown for a joint ABD status/birthday dinner with my best girlfriend from college and her husband.  And New Year’s Eve is still shaping up, but the likelihood of me blindly finding my way into a cab between 2 and 4 a.m. is about as high as one of the “lesser-known [presidential] candidates” debating on C-Span right now actually winning the election (someone take the remote away from the M.A.S.). 

Sure, I still have friends who live in Manhattan, and I’m still uncool enough that most of them live uptown (the married ones anyway…and I’ve never been cool enough to have less than a handful of friends living in Brooklyn), but really my NYC reality now is visiting my 22 year old cousin as she fashions her own version of my quarterlife adventures in the city.  Most of these friends are also out of town right now, on vacation with their young families, on mini-breaks with new flames, and just generally living their lives in the ways we know now, which mean that our paths cross less and less frequently, and generally only for special occasions such as reunions, weddings, etc.  My world is shrinking, and shifting. 

This post is not rueful, even if it is nostalgic.  This man of mine has a growing Flickr collection of us posed in front of extended family Christmas trees and dinner tables, at far-flung weddings, and in various leisurely settings.  Apparently, this is now my life.  And I’m wiser, and happier and fatter for it.  But what a kick, commuting from Boston’s own periphery of Brighton to the ‘hoods of Riverdale and Jackson Heights.  Places - mainly the latter - I’d consider living if I ever came back to NY.  A hope I still keep alive, even as I relax behind the wheel of my stepmom’s hand-me-down Pontiac, commuting between Newton and Quincy and Hanover and Connecticut in my own (re)new(ed) life in Red Sox Nation.  Who knew.

I’m off til mid-next week.  If I was more motivated, I’d organize a 2007 “Best of” collection of posts for your enjoyment; I’ve seen that around the web and wish I had done it.  Someone go through my archives for me, will ya?  But feel free to poke around here in my absence.  I can’t promise you’ll want any of the food in the cabinets, but there’s always some booze lying around.  Until I’m back on-line, I wish you all A Very Happy New Year - Be Safe and Have Fun!!

More or less cross-posted at NYC Weboy.

I’m headed out this afternoon for a quick trip to Baton Rouge.  I’ve been drifting around the blogosphere, and had hoped to organize my thoughts for a substantive post on race here, a topic that’s all the “rage” these days (pun intended), it seems, since Jena 6 raised public awareness of the enduring anti-black antipathy in this country.  (In a related moment of rare media activism, the press has filed a motion to open up the Jena 6 re-trial of Mychal Bell.  It’s worth noting that the Chicago Tribune has been relentless on coverage of this case; commendable, especially compared to some of their peers.  Check out the still video image of hot ticket Maxine Waters in action in a recent Congressional hearing re: Jena 6.)

However, my ideas are still churning, and so instead I leave you all with some links to the different conversations that have captured my attention.  In my absence, discuss:

First, activism among the young.  Alive?  Dead? Worthless? I think this inter-generational conversation is overly binary, and certainly bounded by class and race.  As you all know, all my post-Katrina recovery work is happening at the margins of serious global, regional and national activism regarding workers’ rights, immigrants’ rights, racial justice.  I’ve tried to raise this point in the past at Ezra and elsewhere, but it seems my experience with activists more likely to be found at the US Social Forum than on the mainstream political blogosphere is not that relevant to the other commenters.

Next, racism and the academy.  This is part of the larger conversation that’s been happening re: racism, nooses and the rising social conflict many of us perceive over racial inequity.  I could spend endless posts on this topic, bringing in the issues of class and gender, but I’d never make it to the airport.  This link is one of many that is a reminder to myself that I need to expend some emotional and intellectual effort on this topic.  In the meantime, another white academic takes the rest of us to task for our complicity in propping up racism; I almost feel irresponsible posting to this one link and no others (such as those from persons of color also calling us out), this topic is such a can of worms.  Let me say for now that there’s two issues for me here: a) the total isolated disfunction of the academy in which we talk to one another about issues such as inequality and race that have almost no relation to the way they play out for in “real people’s” lives (an academic phrase I loathe), and b) the aforementioned social conflict and racial antipathy that is the point of Rachel’s post.

Meanwhile, here’s just a brief glimpse of the impacts of racial inequality on the lives of women and kids, a topic I am digging into right now in the terrific and easy read Flat Broke With Children.  Anyone up for a blog book club?  After Flat Broke, we can get to this one on single mothers choosing to have children alone.  Jessica at Feministing takes issue with some of the letters in the author Louise Sloan’s Salon interview that criticize Sloan as selfish and putting her child at risk by her choices.  I personally like this one by spacekase:

The fact that the lifestyle “choice” championed in this interview is applicable to such a tiny, insignificant fraction of America as wealthy, single lesbians speaks volumes about its relevance. It’s a faux-cause; it is certainly admirable that she is so happy with her choice, but to attempt to link it to fundamental issues such as sexual identity or single motherhood sounds like narcissism to me. I think this is why books and polemics of this type are always doomed to fail. So a few right-wingers pooh pooh your choice — I don’t, and I still don’t really think you’re making some grand stand for womens’ rights.

Start talking about affordable daycare, living wages or the working class and I might think otherwise.

Sums up perfectly my cognitive dissonance over the obsession over women’s reproductive rights in the mainstream feminist blogosphere at the seeming expensive of a wider treatment of how cultural expectations of our role as caregivers clashes with the economic and cultural realities of women’s labor force participation, and how this clash plays out very differently according to race, ethnicity, class, etc. 

And with that, I’m out.  Back on-line Thursday.

H/t to Outside the Toybox for directing me to this sustainability quiz developed by American Public Media.  It allows me to estimate my consumption footprint compared to the appropriate productive acreage per human on the planet (about 4.5 acres; they explain what “productive acreage” means), and then calculates how many earths are needed if everyone lived like me.  Oh, and I get to design a personal avatar and a neighborhood avatar. 

So how many earths are needed if everyone else lived in a little, one-person apartment and drove a sh*tbox back and forth 5 miles to school and within a 3 mile radius for errands a few times per week?  And went shopping at least once a month and ate mostly dairy, grains and veggies?  9.6.  Welcome to the Redstar Solar System.

Turns out, I can blame the T - that’s right, the public Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority system - for my one-woman path of destruction.  What, you don’t expect me to actually ride that thing regularly, do you?  Sitting here at my PC I rarely shut off, I was flying way under the tree huggers’ radar; I live in a small place, alone, use hardly any electricity or heat comparatively (of course, I don’t pay for heat directly, so that’s probably the culprit there), and recycle A LOT.  3 acres, 1 acre, and 1 acre for my home, power and recycling habits, respectively.  Look at me! I’m a mere spec on the world’s surface.

Then the questions came about public and personal transportation usage.  Miles driven per month, mileage to the gallon, monthly miles ridden by bus or rail, and hours flown yearly, and in what class (why the latter matters I have NO idea).  Well, DAMN if I don’t take up 21 acres with my monthly first class to the Gulf Coast (thanks FF miles) and intermittent T riding ways.  I went from 1.7 earths to 6, just based on public transportation ridership alone.  Together, the MBTA and I will put this planet out of business in no time!!

My eating and shopping habits apparently gobble up 3 more planets, though a major flaw of the quiz is no available stats when I’m asked to compare myself to the average American shopper.  Well, do they mean the folks living in FEMA trailers in the Gulf Coast or the women in Lexus SUV’s in the Chestnut Hill mall parking lot?  Or apparently some combination of the two.  And who knew coffee is the second most traded commodity after oil, and also travels huge distances?   Our caffeine addiction is obviously the lesser known cousin to the American oil addiction.

I’m curious to see how you all fare.  According the comparables they offer at the end, most Americans (Dems, GOP, Green, male, female, etc.), are consuming over 99 planets with their power usage.  But when you break it down by state, and most likely only the public radio listeners/Cambridge-Berkeley-Austin radicals in each, you get much much smaller figures.  Compared to folks in MA, CA, and NY, I’m ravaging 3 to four times the number of planets. 

All without leaving my kitchen table. 

Or so politics is known.  And yes, I’m not looking my best at the moment.  But the cherry on top of this week’s political activity was sitting two rows behind Gov. Deval Patrick on the US Air shuttle home from Washington today.  If I hadn’t been so fried and thus buried in a People magazine, I might have noticed him before we disembarked.  Whatever, I’m so cool.  (and starry-eyed, apparently!)

 

Walking back to the Renaissance Arts Hotel just now, I was taken aback by a horde of funky, decked-out young women spilling down the street in various directions.  Turns out the hotel is the site for an upcoming Ryder Make-Up Labs training.  For more on why this run-in with the “most popular make-up artistry workshops in the nation…” is an ironic coincidence, click here.

And we’re live in New Orleans in 5!

If you missed this on Friday, check it out, because it’s warm and fuzzy and earned me a much loved call from my cousin Friday night;

This should make you laugh as I stumble my way through a weekend of dog-sitting;

This shows you how life (and dog-sitting) is immeasurably easier with good friends helping you along;

and though it’s less about where you live than who you live with, it definitely helps to know what you like.

When Prof. Zero (you should really read her remarkable blog) posted a favorite cities meme, I thought she put too many parameters around the cities we could nominate.  I was particularly put off by the size requirements, as I’ve come to learn in school how varied cities are in size and scope, not least because the boundaries between cities and suburbs, and urban vs. sub-urban life is rarely as clear as we pretend.  And bigger does not necc. equal more urban.

In response to protests, including mine, she offered up what she called a “self-tagging town meme,” to which I finally responded the other night with a stream-of-consciousness thread of my favorite cities, that included a heavy dose of random memories and specific characteristics that matter to me in cities.

One of the things I love about the M.A.S. is that he and I both look at cities critically and value urban life deeply - mainly, we crave the density, walkability, accessibility and diversity that many cities offer (what is with suburbs and the absolute absence of sidewalks, for instance???).  I believe that if we go through life together, we will be able to live in a variety of places, because I trust our ability to knowledgeably evaluate and recognize if places have the characteristics that we seek at a much deeper level than a schools/taxes/property values equation (though all of that goes into the mix).

Though I hope you’ll read the professor’s posts and my comments, in short, I gave a shout out to:

1) Hartford and economically struggling but ethnically vibrant old NE/MW towns everwhere;

2) Boston, ‘cuz that’s my hood;

3) Krakow, ‘cuz its collegiate, historic and amiable personality - not to mention Krupnik honey liquer - nurtured me through the very dark hours of visiting Auschwitz and Birkenau;

4) New Orleans (though this is more of a love-hate relationship);

and

5) Memphis.

Seattle, Minneapolis, Houston, Bismarck, ND and Vegas (”Adult Disneyland”) got shout outs too.  L.A., London, NYC (public transportation “nirvana”) and Dar are in my big city category.

Cities I could live w/o:

- Chattanooga, though I did find its train-station-sized-airport charming;

- Ft. Worth;

- St. Louis;

- Philly (”somebody else’s Boston”);

- Atlanta.

 

Of course, there’s no place like home, or my couch, at this moment, for that matter.

What are your favorite cities?  Bonus points for your stories.

Apparently, if you google “the shittiest year of your life”, my first blog post about Jamaica pops up third.

Awesome.

 

Where I am languishing now, at Gate D26 in the ATL airport, where I arrived with the lofty hope of boarding my Delta flight to Gulfport on time and without incident.  I even booked myself a 2 hour layover - as compared to my minimizing my transfer times in my down-to-a-science Boston-New Orleans trips - to account for any delays out of Logan.  Since I’ve been here, I’ve read two chapters of The Truly Disadvantaged, had some lunch, walked around, bought a ginger ale, checked my email, talked to the M.A.S., and now, finally, am blogging.  But still, no boarding, no flight, no arrival, no Gulfport. 

Over at NYC Weboy (ignore his posturing in the comments to the post below this one), I’ve expounded at length on avoiding the Philly airport, where timetables go to die.  Atlanta is no better, in fact, may be far worse.   In my few trips through here, it is typically complete chaos.  But I rarely connect through this place in my New England/Gulf Coast commuting life, whereas US Airways is constantly trying to throw Philly into the mix of the airports I regularly fly through.  One of the benefits of a freelance/student life is that I can structure my travel to avoid the busiest hours, and flying midday avoids both the crowds and provides me some internet-free solitude when I actually get some academic reading and writing done.  I knew my 1130 am flight out of Boston would likely happen without incident, and I was hoping a little ole flight to Gulfport might sneak through usual melee of overbooked flights and gates. 

Silly, silly me. 

I’m delayed an hour and counting, and fortunately have 100 pages to go in my book, and another one on standby (ha!) in my bag, along with an in-case-of-emergencies Elle magazine. 

There’s a toddler across the aisle from me, and he’s just starting to whimper now.  Awesome. 

 

Grumblypants.

Grumbly mcCrankypants.

Cranky mcGrumblepants.

Grumbly grumbly.

Grumble.

Grumble.

In high school, I had a lying, cheating deadbeat stalker of a boyfriend (is “deadbeat stalker” an oxymoron?). Other than that, and our very public, very adolescent, screaming fights, we were more or less inseparable for two+ years. One of the few good things about him was his middle child status, which primed him for easily responding to my only-child demands and quick irritability (”get me a tissue”; “i want to watch House of Style” “I don’t feel like it!” etc. etc.). Among the women in my family, this snappishness and short fuse is in abundance, and after that disastrous relationship, it was a long time before I ever felt comfortable enough again with someone to reveal this side of my personality.

Luckily for me, the M.A.S. and I are completely different in our emotional manifestations. Where I am easily outraged and aggravated, he is soothing and chill. Where he is petulant and morose, I am patient and sensible. Just now he visited me here in the computer lab with a smile and a kiss, a wonderful contrast to the whiny blogging I’d just finished moments before. Make today the second in a row where he’s had to make way for my frazzled irritation and temper.

In the course of last evening’s rush hour drive from Brighton to meet my dad and stepmom in Quincy for dinner, the M.A.S. and I were either stuck behind people driving 25 mph, or swerving to almost avoid being hit (3x). I’d hung up from a conference call 10 minutes prior to jumping in the car, and I was completely out of my mind when we arrived at Marina Bay, where I handed the M.A.S. the keys and drank 2 cosmos in no short order. I pictured myself vibrating like the characters in that old Comedy Central cartoon about the shrink (name??), and overall I felt like my cousin T.K. in one my favorite of her exasperated moments.

For those of you who don’t know my rad cousin, she has been going on 40 since she was 10, when she used to have a cup of tea and read the newspaper before school. She’s polished and professional and generous and kind and absolutely in charge, and admittedly, sh*t gets under her skin much less than it used to. Like this time:

It must have been ‘98 or ‘99, when we were both at our first jobs out of college, and hers brought her to NY on business, where I worked and lived. It was a Friday, and we’d planned to commute up to Boston together from the city, stopping over in CT to pick up my mom’s car so I could drive it the rest of the way to Boston (don’t ask me why this was the plan; it’s a classic convoluted strategy of my divorced-parent-life to appropriate their belongings for my own use). At 23, I was in full-throttle-love with NY and my upstart-career-gal life in it, and we were planning to take the Metro North from Grand Central, one of my favorite places in the city in all its classy bustle. For some reason, we agreed to take a ride from Canal Street (my office) uptown from my friend Gladys, a second-generation Chinese-American woman at my firm who is one of the most earnest, unpretentious people I’ve known. She loaded us into her two door car that was stuffed with boxes full of fliers promoting her Asian organization’s 2G’s new play. T.K., at just over 5feet, lucked out with the backseat, jammed in next to the boxes. We proceeded to snake our way uptown in Friday afternoon traffic, Gladys chattering cheerfully all the while.

When we finally arrived at Grand Central and unfolded ourselves from the car, we were immediately overwhelmed and almost run down by the hordes of seasoned commuters streaming about the place. I’m pretty good in crowds on my own, but my dodging and weaving strategy is essentially a solo effort. I was feeling particularly cheerful and at ease that afternoon with T.K.’s company in the city and the promise of a new romance awaiting me in Boston that night, and I was likely sauntering my way towards my train as realistically as possible on a commuter timetable.

Meanwhile, T.K. had about had it 2 minutes into the car where she was packed like a sardine without reprieve from Gladys’s pharmaceutical marketing nattering (our industry) and absent-minded, herky-jerky driving through traffic. Launching T.K. into the dense rush of Grand Central was almost too much for her to bear, and I’m surprised she didn’t melt away like the Wicked Witch of the West from the sheer sensory overload of it all. Instead, she did her best to fold up and disappear and avoid contact with any of the “unwashed public,” as she likes to call her former public transportation comrades. She even held it together when we squished into one of the mini-seats on the Metro North, the ones with no window or leg room that were added as profit-boosting afterthoughts and are not meant for anyone over 3 ft tall. We managed to enjoy ourselves in the sheer comedy of our two-woman show of Planes, Trains and Automobiles.

She finally cracked up two hours later in New Haven, where we grabbed some pizza before getting in the car for the two hour drive home. By now the memory is fuzzy, but it remains of T.K. dancing around in the pizza place, at her wits end, commanding me to get going so we could “get the hell out of dodge.” In my revisionist history of the moment, there is even some mock gun slinging.

I realize as I write this that this poorly recounted memory is likely only funny to me (and possibly T.K.). But re-capping it it has been exactly the therapy I’ve needed this afternoon to shake off the sheer frustration of the last couple days. Quite possibly the only other equivalently enjoyable memories would be of my dear American Type-A friend K trying to reasonably negotiate her way through the Tanzanian bureaucracy when she was in charge of communications for an NGO there. Most of our days together ended in hysterics over the endless run-arounds she got from the system and its employees in trying to publish and distribute a fundraising calendar. These hysterics usually resulted from me laughing out loud at her woes and her thankfully catching on that the situations were as ridiculous as they were enraging. “You see” became a favorite catchphrase between us, in fond memory of the way many Tanzanians began their explanations to her of why they hadn’t returned her call, paid their invoice, printed the calendar, etc. etc. etc.

You see, Redstar readers, it is not possible for me to do anymore work today, because I have been very irritated and unproductive from trying to do work earlier. And now, because I have taken all this time trying to work but doing no work, it is time for me to quit working/not working and begin my weekend! Please come back on Monday!

So apparently the rest stops on the NJ turnpike vary in their offerings - some have Starbucks and Popeye’s fried chicken. Others nothin’ but Burger King and some sad lookin’ hot dogs (e.g., Vince Lombardi). It helps to know in advance their line up along the highway, so as not to get screwed w/crappy Cinnabon coffee at 9pm on a Sunday night in traffic when you really need the ‘bucks caffeine jolt to carry you through the remaining 5 hours home to Boston.

We here at the M.A.S. seem to believe we’re holding on to our youth a little more tightly than it feels now on this Monday morning. We left Baltimore at 6pm last night and got home to Boston after 2am, only to have to unload 12 boxes from the car and then debate whether or not to leave the car in front of the hydrant rather than park in authorized but far-off and sketchy parking land at almost 3 am by now (We stayed in front of the hydrant, Brighton-style. No ticket this a.m. Nice!) Asleep by four, up at 11am by alarm to try to capture some semblance of a normal day.

I feel like I’ve been hit by a truck, and I’m definitely not fully awake even as I type. Yay coffee.

But it’s good to be home, after a busy busy week of consulting work mixed with non-stop visits to family and friends in the D.C. metro area. A half doz Maryland blue crabs at Obrycki’s before we got on the road last night and some great convos about past and present relationships got us through the long ride home. I know the M.A.S. is already gunning for a third round of mini-golf to try and steal the Championship title I’m still holding after round two last week in suburban VA, one of our few moments to ourselves (other than an impromptu field trip to HUD on Saturday night while we waited for friends to meet us in the city. But more on that urban planning geekiness later. Round 1 was in Sarasota in March with my dad and stepmom; I schooled them all.)

Thanks to Weboy and Sheelzebub (at Pandagon) for posting on topics near and dear to me, though I’ve definitely got a response to the former in the works when I finally bounce back here.

In the interim, if you had your own personal turnpike, who would you name your rest stops after? (One of the many fun highway games we played. Another: Redstar’s Presidential Campaign Platform! “No More Traffic.”)

Now this is what I call leading by example…