a Roxbury sunset

Tonight's sunset from the roof. See all the photos here.

E turns 30

Photos from E's 30th birthday party are here. We had a lovely weekend with E's brother and his wife.

Weekend run down:

- Friday we did a highly recommended pub crawl: River Gods -- Miracle of Science -- T.C.'s -- our roof deck. On the way, we picked up some random musician, who crashed at our place.

- Saturday, we hit Carson Beach before the party (yeah, Boston beaches!).

- Sunday we walked the whole city, and E accidentally ordered $80 worth of crabs at the Barking Crab. His response to the mistake? "If I knew I was going to order an $80 entree, I would have worn pants."

And now I'm about to pass out from exhaustion.

LoRox BBQ

This past Saturday, we had our first bbq / jazz concert of the season at Frederick Douglass Peace Garden. See all the photos here.

ESD#39: Robert Reich is my president

Boston is a small town--so small that I recognize certain strangers I see on a regular basis. Not exactly a stranger, but about weekly I walk by a young guy who was a guest speaker for my Transportation Policy class. I think he’s an aide in the Patrick Administration or something.

Every time I see him, I’m sort of overcome by a feeling of bitterness, because he’s just one of those guys. Those guys. He’s maybe 6’4” with broad shoulders and dark hair. He has a deep voice and is always impeccably dressed. And my bitter, bitter heart assumes that life has served him everything on a silver platter, because he just looks so damn presidential.

And as crazy as this sounds, I think this perspective affects my view of the current election (though I recognize that heart almost always trumps reason in people’s voting patterns). I believe that far more radical than electing a woman or a black man is electing someone who looks like Robert Reich (and, yes, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention his height). And the fact that Hillary Clinton dated Reich in college totally endears her to me. Of course, she did end up marrying the far more presidential looking man.

ESD#37: return of the tub-ohs!

It's 70 degrees in Boston right now. And that means...

RETURN OF THE TUB-OH CHAIRS!

E and I bought four of these things at IKEA, and after realizing they were the greatest invention of our time, bought four more.

Time to drag these mother-uckers up on the roof for the first impromptu roof deck party of the season.

Here's a collection of photos of the tub-ohs at their finest (a bbq / jazz concert from last year).

Hon, have you seen all of Anna's photos? There are some hilarious ones of the kids on the mic. I can't remember... what was the song they performed? Man, these photos are making me excited for the summer. I love my neighborhood so much.

ESD#36: what's in a name?

The border of Lower Roxbury, a Boston neighborhood of questionable existence, and which neither the South End nor Roxbury has completely claimed as its own.

E requested this post. Hopefully I'll do justice to what I assume he wanted me to say.

There was a shooting last night a couple blocks from our house. As usual, the Boston Globe and Boston Herald reported it differently.

The Globe reported that a black man was shot in Roxbury at a public housing development.

The Herald reported that a man (no mention of race) was "gunned down" in an "ambush" in the South End (no mention of the type of residence).

The cynical interpretation of this difference is quite simple. The Globe's readers, who are upper middle class, want to hear that violence is contained within the black community of Roxbury, a neighborhood where most readers would not consider moving to. The Herald, which is far more sensational, wants to report that violence occurs in a wealthy neighborhood; also, there's particular resentment of the South End considering a long history of racial strife and aggressive gentrification.

In all fairness, I don't know how the papers received their information or their policies on reporting victims' identities. But a likely scenario is that they received a Boston Police Department notice with the address in D4: South End/Roxbury, and they made their own choice of how to report it.

The question of whether our neighborhood is South End or Roxbury is a complicated one for many historical, social and political reasons. So I've decided to take inventory of various views. Here's the quick summary, with explanations to follow.

Where is 2 Lattimore Ct. (scene of the crime)? According to...

City of Boston, Dept. of Neighborhood Development: SOUTH END

City of Boston, Redevelopment Authority: SOUTH END (but... read below)

City of Boston, Housing Authority: ROXBURY (but... read below)

U.S. Post Office: unclear

Google Maps: SOUTH END

The People: mixed opinion

Further explanation...

Boston, DND: SOUTH END. The address falls under the DND South End profile and map. The historical context of this is that during urban renewal in the 1950s and 1960s, the State planned to put I-95 through Boston and prepared the way by clearing the majority of my neighborhood of houses and businesses. What was then known as "Lower Roxbury" was intended to be erased from the map. After years of aggressive community protest, the plan was canceled and what remains are some small clusters of single family row homes (where I live) and subsidized housing. With the urban renewal plan, the DND South End map's southern boundary was Melnea Cass Blvd., encompassing all of Lower Roxbury, because the latter would no longer exist. The DND hasn't updated the map since the plan was canceled.

BRA: SOUTH END. The census, a publication of the BRA, includes our neighborhood in the South End. However, The Roxbury Strategic Master Plan includes our neighborhood, with the historically accurate label of Lower Roxbury.

Boston Housing Authority: ROXBURY (kind of). The shooting occurred at Lenox / Camden, whose address, according to the BHA, is in Roxbury. However, their map shows it within the border of the South End.

U.S. Post Office: unclear. The address of the crime falls under 02118; about 90% of 02118 is unquestionably part of the South End. All of what once is / was called Lower Roxbury falls under 02118 except the small cluster of single family homes where I live. This is why I have to walk two miles to the post office in Mission Hill and why technically my address is "Roxbury Crossing", which is actually not a perceived neighborhood at all. The Roxbury Crossing zip code is Mission Hill plus a small group of homes behind Roxbury Community College. With the USPS zip code finder, searching for the address with "Boston" returns Boston, 02118; but searching with "Roxbury" returns Roxbury, 02118.

Google Maps: SOUTH END. The search returns "Boston". If you search for the address with Roxbury, it returns "Boston (near Roxbury)."

The People: divided. The most simplistic summary of opinions is that those who feel a historical connection to Lower Roxbury (very few) consider it as such. Those who are concerned with neighborhood perception related to real estate values prefer the South End label. This came to a head recently when some neighbors pushed for getting permit parking in our neighborhood, presumably knowing that the City would put up South End signs. We expected to hear more protest from the old school folks, but in the end, some of them liked the idea of having South End parking stickers, because parking in the South End is so difficult. In the end, we did get permit parking, and they do say South End.

And then there are people like E and I who are just trying not to be part of the problem, but because of our income level, are inevitably part of the problem.

Like I said, it's complicated.

Bus 23

Woah. Some kids from E's school documented the scariness which is bus 23. And the Boston Globe covered it. Good for them. I've certainly had some unsettling bus 23 moments (I ride it weekly). Once, some kids got into a yelling match with the bus driver; when she wouldn't let them on, they started chasing the bus and throwing rocks. Another time, all the passengers heard some frighteningly loud (and close) gun shots as we drove through Grove Hall. I generally feel safe, but I can't imagine being a teenager riding this bus every day.

I hope some other kids document riding the orange line after school hours. So many of E's kids won't do it, because fights are so common. Man, it's hard being a teenager in the city.

fun with photoshop!

I figured since I've been blogging for three weeks, I should spruce up the place a bit. How funny is this header photo? I love that Sam Endicott is singing directly into Mosley's tail.

The significance of the images is painfully obvious, but I'll spell it out anyway:

WU-TANG -- PERSONAL LIFE -- MUSIC -- BOSTON

The 4th image is the trickiest; it's from the "Make Way for Ducklings" sculpture in the Boston Common.

ESD#18: figure skating

You should listen to this while reading this post (Beirut's "Mount Wroclai (Idle Days)"):

I just returned from a walk in the Boston Common, where I observed an empty frog pond save one lone skater doing all sorts of fancy spin and jump moves--we're talkin' axels 'n shit. Viewing his otherwise unnoticed performance, I was overcome with sadness. Perhaps the fact that I was listening to Beirut* at the time contributed to my emotion. As the accordion swelled, I imagined how it feels to have a talent so unique yet so useless and rarely exhibited or appreciated.

Eh. Maybe he was some famous skater unrecognizable to me, since I haven't watched figure skating since the glory days of Brian Boitano (I thought he looked like Balki from Perfect Strangers, a very misguided childhood crush).


*Apropos to this post, my ipod categorizes Beirut as "Weddings and Funerals". How awesome is that?

ESD#16: high school musical

Because my office abuts the State House and Boston Common, I'm often distracted by loud rallies/parades/protests/performances on the Common or the State House steps. Post-Red Sox victory and Christmas were particularly busy times.

Today, it's High School Musical The Ice Tour! promoting their show on the Frog Pond. I've been listening to screaming children for the past hour.

I thought High School Musical was cute, especially the "Stick to the Status Quo" song. Not cute enough to see a second time. Certainly not cute enough to see the sequel. It kind of lacks the panache of classics from my childhood. You know, like, Camp Cucamonga?

Coincidentally, today I read that there's a recording of Sufjan Stevens performing an acoustic medley of High School Musical songs. I would kill for that recording (alright, so maybe I'm a bigger fan of HSM than I'm letting on!).

[Editor's note: Yeah. There's no Sufjan HSM recording. Sufjan's ironic, no? Well some guy who is even more ironic made a fake Myspace page with the most asinine mash-ups he could think of, including Sufjan/HSM. This was a really funny joke back in 2006. This is how behind I am with new music. I'm learning about 2006 hipster indie rock jokes in February 2008. Fail.]

Bust shots at Big Ben like we got time to kill

In these short essays, I reflect on how a lyric from the Wu-Tang Clan album "The W" speaks to my personal experience.

On writing, humor and race relations.

[Warning: this essay is too self-referential for my tastes and likely for yours. Bear with me.]

When I was young, my father often told me I was clever. According to my understanding of the word, my father thought my words and actions were cute and quaint, but not necessarily profound, innovative or insightful.

One day, upon observing that I was reading Steven Hawking's A Brief History of Time, my father commented, "Oh, yes. Hawking is quite the clever man." I then realized that the word clever has a different connotation in British English than in American English. All this time, my father's view of me was entirely different from what I had assumed.

In the American sense of the word, I would not call myself clever. Certainly, my storytelling abilities are lacking. I am by no means of Toastmaster caliber.* Given enough time and thought, however, I can piece together a mildly entertaining narrative, as I attempt to do in my essays.

I find it very difficult to write a reflective essay without some degree of humor. Perhaps I am mimicking the style of my favorite essay writers like Anne Lamott, Dave Sedaris and Jonathan Lethem. Upon deeper reflection, however, I simply do not believe my life experience is profound enough to offer serious insight into another's experience. Alternatively, anyone can relate to the idea that life is confusing, absurd and challenging, and shouldn't we all just have a good laugh about it?

Of course, this sentiment is shared by many writers. The New York Times' Deborah Solomon recently interviewed Ben Karlin, former producer of the Daily Show and editor of a new anthology of humorous essays, and struggled to elicit one answer from Karlin that was not sarcastic or self-deprecating. When she noted that her favorite essay in his book was the only unfunny one, he replied, "I worked a little bit with him to try to put some more jokes in."

There is underlying humor in my Wu-Tang Clan inspired essays, since, as a white woman, I am not the intended audience of the hip-hop ensemble. Further, I treat these songs with a certain level of sobriety, which is in sharp contrast to lyrics such as "in a room full of crackers, I might cut the cheese." This is similar to the sardonic style The New York Times often employs when writing about hip-hop.** By referring to the artists as "Mr. Cent" and "Mr. Game" The Times subtly judges hip-hop as beneath serious consideration. The formal writing style is intended to be ironic.

On the contrary, I write these essays with no intention of irony. I genuinely enjoy the Wu-Tang Clan and find much of their music thought-provoking. Thus, to avoid accusations of insincerity, at this point in the essay I'm going to loosen up my writing style. In fact, I'm going to use the word shit three times. Can't do that in The New York Times! Can't use contractions either, and I just used four!

Using hip-hop culture to humorously point out cultural differences is rarely done well. "Granny singing rap" has been beaten to death. "Chicks with gang signs" is blatantly ignorant. Dynamite Hack's cover of "Boys in the Hood" could be judged similarly. However, I argue that this folk version of the hip-hop classic aims to point out the absurdity of adult contemporary music and not hip-hop. "Boys in the Hood" shows that the only way to make lame, Jack Johnson style music tolerable is to add lyrics about guns and prostitutes. And when they sing "punk ass tripping in the dead of night" to the tune of "Blackbird"? That shit's just straight up funny parody.

Every good hipster loves Wu-Tang Clan. I recently observed some teenagers sitting outside their jeep blasting "M-E-T-H-O-D Man" and I self-righteously rolled my eyes. I then realized I had Wu-Tang's "8 Chambers" in my bag. But I'm not blasting that shit out of my jeep. I'm listening to it quietly with the windows rolled up, like Michael Bolton from "Office Space".

Unlike Michael Bolton, however, I hide my love of hip-hop, not out of fear, but out of a constant struggle to treat cultural differences and race relations in a way that's sensitive, honest and humble. And if I'm indeed being honest, I should throw guilty in there, too. In one of his "Ask a Black Dude" sketches from the Chappelle Show, Paul Mooney claims that if there's anything good about black culture, white people will steal it. "They don't let them have too much fun." Watching this sketch feels like a punch to the stomach.

This concept of stealing is present in any discussion of gentrification. Living in a fast changing neighborhood, I've seen a lot of what Mooney would call stealing. For example, my neighborhood is predominantly African-American and used to be full of jazz clubs. Currently, only three remain. Wally's has a long history of black ownership, but the patrons are predominantly white and come from outside the neighborhood. Bob the Chef's has been a pillar of the African-American community for years. A few years ago, the owner changed the name to Bob's Southern Bistro to appeal to a larger (read: wealthier) crowd. And now the owner sold it to someone outside the community who will reopen it as a martini bar named "Night Town" (which I will inevitably call "White Town"), targeting the growing population of students and young professionals (read: me). Slades is the only club whose patrons are predominantly African-American. I love Slades' food; I'm friends with the owners; and I'll occasionally drop by. But I can't help feel like I'm stealing when I do.

In the Chappelle Show episode with the Mooney sketch, two men walk onto the stage and tell Chappelle, "we're the white people coming to steal your show." In acting out Mooney's claim, Chappelle acknowledges the complexity associated with a show that focuses its humor on racial differences and appeals to both black and white audiences. As many have assumed, wrestling with this complexity surely contributed to Chappelle's decision to bow out of the show, despite being offered huge sums of money to continue.

* * *

Method Man often peppers his lyrics with humor. In "Protect Ya Neck (The Jump Off)", he offers one of his most clever lines: "Bust shots at Big Ben like we got time to kill." However, this brilliant lyric is weakened by the lyric that precedes it: "Now what clan you know with lines this ill?"

Here Method Man uses the same style I use when I try to tell a funny story. Usually, I precede and end the story in hyperbole, saying "the funniest thing happened to me today" and then afterward "I couldn't stop laughing" as though these qualifiers somehow increase the comic value of the tale.

By pointing out the illness of his line before he says it, Method Man may as well say, "Want to hear something funny?"


*This claim is ironic on many levels, as I believe this is one of the funniest sentences I have ever written.

**Searching The NY Times' archives for "Mr. Cent" and "sardonic" led me to this article. It's the perfect example of The Times' attitude towards hip-hop. Of course, this type of grammatical analysis is exactly what I did in this post, so I can't point the finger at The Times without pointing at myself. I love that the article's last line includes the phrase "the words were spelled right" and not "the words were spelled correctly." I wonder if this was intentional.

ESD#13: hate the haters

I am repeatedly irritated by a girl in one of my Urban Planning courses. During every class break, she incessantly talks to her friend, mostly relaying paltry anecdotes from her personal life (like what I'm doing here), complaining about a difficult professor or making fun of her classmates. Is it hypocritical to hate hate?

Usually when I hold this much contempt for someone, I invent tragic stories about his life so to excuse his behavior. In college, I discovered that all the stories I created for one girl were true, so it works sometimes!

I can attribute part of my irritation to the fact that I project onto her things I don't like about my program. She reminds me that the program isn't selective and allows for immature, disengaged students with poor analytical skills.

Last night, I deliberately sat next to her, so I could start up conversation and try to overcome my irritation. But I almost flew off the handle when she told her friend that she used to go to school in the "ghetto, but it's not ghetto anymore." She thought it would be "hilarious" to wear a shirt that says "I used to be ghetto, but I'm not anymore."

It's not hilarious. It's dumb and insensitive and so are you. The fact that you call that neighborhood ghetto shows that you have little understanding of the historical and cultural context for where you lived. If you were that disengaged from the community, why are you studying Urban Planning?

I wanted to be like Dave Chappelle in his wife swap sketch and throw her into a real "ghetto" ("g-g-g-g-get out of the car!").

Admittedly, I'm overly sensitive, because she was talking about my neighborhood. And I know that when you live in a tough neighborhood, you affectionately call it "the hood" or something similar. But there was little affection in her tone.

Apologies for the self-righteous rant.

ESD #5: political juxtapostion

I observed a nice moment of political juxtaposition today. A group of twenty or so teenagers holding McCain posters were posing for photos on the steps of the Massachusetts State House. Catercorner to them were their dirty hippie counterparts, holding signs saying "Bush performs economic masturbation," telling passers-by about the lies of status-quo politicians like McCain, Obama and Clinton, pleading that La Rouche was the only candidate willing to tell the truth.

I tried to gage the reaction of the McCain kids. Were they losing their innocence hearing about McCain's closed door agreements with corporate interests? Or were they laughing amongst themselves, saying, "those hippies will be bagging my purchases at Costco in a few years." It was hard to tell.

ESD #3: neighborhood kids

Last night, my husband walked in the door and said, "Some of the best conversations I have in this neighborhood are with the kids." Then he recalled this short bit of dialog:

My Husband: Hey, Chico*. How's it going?
Chico: Good. Who are you voting for on Tuesday?
My Husband: Obama. I read his auto-biography and really liked what he had to say.
Chico: OK. So where's Mosley**?

What I appreciate about this short conversation is that Chico cut to the chase--no need for polite chit chat or natural segues to a preferable subject. He simply wanted to know how my husband was voting. When he was satisfied with that answer, he moved on to his favorite topic of conversation: our dog.

* When I tell people about Chico, I feel compelled to note that this is his real name, and we don't call all Dominican boys in the neighborhood Chico. This is likely unnecessary, but indulge me here.

** Our dog.

In a room full of crackers, I might cut the cheese

In these short essays, I reflect on how a lyric from the Wu-Tang Clan album "The W" speaks to my personal experience.

On being the minority.

As compared with an African-American male who grew up in the Park Hill public housing complex in Shaolin Staten Island, my life could fairly be judged as privileged and sheltered. I was raised and educated in communities where the majority of people looked like me, talked like me, whose parents looked like my parents, whose house looked like my house. I have rarely been the minority--rarely felt like the "Other". In the few situations where I have been the minority, my status generally is derived from one of the following qualities:

I am a woman.
I am white.
I am politically liberal.

When faced with my minority status, I am often surprised by my instinctual response, which could be typified as anxious, unreasonable, absurd or a combination of the three. Allow me to be illustrate.

I am a woman. Due to the subjects I have studied, in academic settings I have often been one of few women. In high school, I was the only girl competing in math competitions; in college, I took male-dominated Economics classes; and now I study Urban Planning, a field predominantly consisting of men.

I recently started a new Urban Planning course, and on the first day of class, was one of the first students to arrive. As each new student walked into the room, I was surprised to note that every other student was male. I was further surprised by my reaction to this fact. With every new student, my anxiety increased--yet it was not a reasonable anxiety, like the burden of offering a female perspective on sociological discussions regarding urban life. On the contrary, I had a primal fear that perhaps these men might physically harm me. It is absurd, but I honestly considered the possibility that there is an unspoken rule between men that in a situation with only one woman, they could abuse her in secret. Fortunately, this anxiety was fleeting. Oddly, I never felt this anxiety when I traveled for work in rural Latin America. I was often the only woman in meetings in a warehouse of a farm surrounded by twenty or so bare-chested indigenous men. Feminists and cultural anthropologists would certainly offer words on my anxiety and the contrasting situations, but let us move on.

I am white. Currently living in a predominantly African-American neighborhood, I am often the minority. It is so common, that I am rarely aware of it; in fact, I am more aware of situations where there are no African-Americans (which, for the most part, is any time I leave my neighborhood). A recent night in Davis Square, Somerville, saw me repeatedly realize that the entire population of the bowling alley/pizza shop/subway was white. I worried that I might be perceived as participating in some sort of segregationist conspiracy. In hindsight, I see that I hold majority-related anxiety, as well.

Some friends and I were the only white people watching the Super Bowl in a bar down the street from my house. As Tom Petty performed the halftime show, my reaction was the same as the rest of the patrons: do white people really listen to this shit? I then realized, yes, white people do listen to this shit, and in fact, I am white, I own a Tom Petty album, and I know every word of the songs he is performing. At this moment, I started to sing. In the spirit of cultural understanding, I feigned enthusiasm so on-lookers might think, Oh, I guess they do like this.

I am politically liberal. I live in Boston, a politically charged town. Shared liberal values prevail, so much so that it is rarely rude to discuss politics with strangers. I often take this for granted, as I was reminded during a recent trip to my hometown in suburban Philadelphia, when I was asked "So, how does it feel being the only conservative in Taxachusetts?"

I naively thought that Urban Planning students would likewise be politically liberal; in fact, before I entered my program, I assumed that the majority of students would be liberal do-gooders like me who dream of cities full of mixed-use housing, eco-friendly transportation, bike and walking paths, independent retailers and strong community participation.

With the risk of oversimplifying, I have found that many Urban Planning students are technocrats more interested in unbridled economic growth and strong highway systems and less interested in equity issues related to the distribution of public goods. Further, as one professor expressed to me, many students are hostile to the history and analysis of planning theory and practice.

My naive assumption that I was part of the majority of liberally-minded students was shattered during an exchange with a fellow student in a recent class, summarized below.

Conservative Classmate: I don't want my tax dollars paying for public transit. I don't use it. Transportation isn't a right.
Me: That's the same reasoning used when taxpayers claim that education is not a right, so why should they pay for a school if they don't have kids? All schools should privatize and force parents to pay for their children's education.
Conservative Classmate: That's a good idea. Have you seen Boston Public Schools?
Me: [Blink, blink]
Me: Have you seen YOUR FACE?
Class: [erupting in laughter over my witty retort]

In fact, there was no retort, neither witty nor juvenile. I was stunned, and responded with what could best be described as a whimper.

Upon reflecting on my own minority status, I appreciate Method Man's "Redbull" lyric: "In a room full of crackers, I might cut the cheese." Here he describes a situation where he is the minority, and acts in a way that does not neatly fall into the categories of fight or flight.

Examining the lyric in its figurative sense, if Method Man were the only African-American in a room full of crackers, i.e., white people, he might react with flatulence. It is reasonable to judge this as a hostile action, i.e., fart as fight*, but I argue against this. First, because Method Man generally shows little hostility to any one group of people. His avid weed habit also contributes to his general affability. Second, considering the lyric in its literal sense, we perceive a "when life gives you lemons..." scenario. If offered a Wheat Thin, Method Man might spread some brie on it.

Considering both the figurative and literal interpretations together, we imagine Method Man at a ritzy cocktail party attended by no people of color, feeling mixed emotions. For the sake of illustration, let us consider a gathering with Fox executives to celebrate the sure success of his upcoming sitcom "Method and Red". He fears his sitcom is permeated with latent racism; he feels the outsider in a room with no people of shared race and background; he appreciates the smoky aftertaste of the gouda. Faced with a challenging situation, Method Man "lets one rip" while slicing the swiss.

In these two actions, I believe that Method Man has found a graceful balance of resignation, thoughtfulness, understanding and absurdity necessary for dealing with one's outsider status. I am unsure how to mimic this action in my own life. In a room full of neo-cons, I might increase welfare spending? It lacks the literary acumen of Method Man's lyric.


* With apologies to Dave Barry, I might suggest Fart as Fight as an excellent name for a band.