The Deer Hunter

On Memorial Day weekend, I watched “The Deer Hunter” for the first time. It took all weekend to finish the three-plus hours. When I first started watching it, I got through the first 45 minutes, and I was too depressed to continue - and at that point, no one had even gone to Vietnam. The thing is that I remember working class industrial life in the middle of the 20th century, and I don’t want to relive it, and I don’t romanticize it. And neither does the movie, really - but when your blue collar first-generation Americans are played by young Christopher Walken and young Robert DeNiro and young Meryl Streep there can’t not be a little bit of a romantic glow about the whole thing. 

Having started it, though, I wanted to finish, so I decided to watch it a little at a time throughout the weekend. This is a good way to watch a movie that you feel that you should watch but that is not particularly entertaining. “The Deer Hunter” is not really entertaining - but it’s pretty good and even beautiful in spots.  

For example, on the day after Steven and Angela’s wedding (the opening scene), the five friends go deer hunting together (the title is not an obscure 1970s metaphor). They drive through the western Pennsylvania mountains in a grimy old white Cadillac still festooned with “just married” pink streamers, winding through an otherwise pristine mountain road framed by rusted guardrails, and they stop to eat lunch beside a clear mountain lake. The landscape is completely unspoiled except for the paved road; and the contrast between the gorgeous mountain backdrop and the friends’ goofy horseplay and their makeshift picnic lunch of white bread and cold cuts is beautiful and real. 

I liked the characters’ names, too: Mikey and Steve and Nick and Linda and especially Angela and Stosh. If you grew up working class and Catholic in Philadelphia or Pittsburgh in the 1970s, your parents knew people named Angela and Stosh. Maybe your parents were Angela and Stosh. And although DeNiro and Streep and Walken are unrealistically glamorous for industrial western Pennsylvania, John Cazale as Stosh and Rutanya Alda (no relation) as Angela and George Dzundza as John and John Savage as Steven resemble the young adults I remember from that time - beautiful and imperfect and full of life. The actors were all wonderful. 

*****

One of my criticisms of “The Deer Hunter” is one that several contemporaneous critics apparently shared. These guys were just too old for Vietnam. Men aged 18 to 26 were subject to the draft during the Vietnam War, and “The Deer Hunter” doesn’t even try to depict its characters as younger than late 20s or early 30s. They are all grown men working in a steel mill. Christopher Walken, who was 35 when the movie was released, could possibly have passed for 26 in the right light, but none of the others looked a day younger than 32 or so. So they wouldn’t have been drafted. 

And it seems unlikely that grown, employed men would have volunteered - Steven especially, who marries the pregnant Angela and then ships out practically the next day. True, she’s pregnant by another man, but if you want to punish your fiancee for being unfaithful, it would seem that cancelling the wedding would be the prudent course of action. Marrying her and then going off to war seems like kind of a self-own. 

The timeline is also off. It’s supposed to begin in 1968. Would the men have remained in Vietnam for five years? Because “Midnight Train to Georgia” is clearly playing in the nightclub scene, and that song came out in 1973. Other than career military, I didn’t think that we kept men in Vietnam for more than a year at a time. On the other hand, Robert DeNiro’s Mikey would certainly not have made Staff Sergeant in just a year - and how did he get to be a Green Beret? And when he finally came home, why was he swanning around Clairton, Pennsylvania in his full uniform? Did he not own any other clothes? 

These are all little things, of course, but little things can make the difference between suspending disbelief and immersing yourself in the story, and sitting on your couch with your phone looking up details like when was “Midnight Train” released, and how long does it take to get from E-1 to E-5, and is there a Russian Orthodox church in Clairton, PA? (There is not - that scene was filmed in Ohio). There’s a lot that doesn’t make sense. There’s a lot that doesn’t add up. 

And there are bigger things, too. I expected a racist portrayal of the Vietnamese (the movie was made in 1978) but lots of military scholars have chimed in on the Russian roulette theme, with universal agreement that this never happened. The Viet Cong did plenty of other dreadful things to American prisoners so it’s not like there wasn’t ample material for a movie about the horrors of the war in Vietnam. And how on earth could Mikey return to Vietnam to rescue Nick, and then get out without a hair out of place AFTER the fall of Saigon? As Miss Eggy says, “The HELL?”

*****

All the racism and sexism and what-the-hell historical inaccuracy aside, I ended up enjoying “The Deer Hunter” as a beautifully acted relic of the middle of the American 20th century. I might even watch it again. But not right away. 

MDW 2025

It’s Saturday morning, Memorial Day weekend, and I haven’t even packed my pool bag yet. This is not like me, not like me at all. I’m not feeling summery. The vibe is off. 

And it’s not just the weather - but my gosh! I sat outside this morning, drinking my coffee and reading my book and enjoying the birdsong even though it was 55 degrees and I needed a hoodie and fuzzy socks and a blanket. I could have just stayed inside but it’s Memorial Day weekend and it was the first morning in weeks when I didn’t have to rush and I was determined to enjoy a leisurely half hour outside, even if it killed me. 

But I’m back inside now. It’s 10:08 and I need to come up with a plan. I think I’ll pack my pool bag. There’s almost no chance that I’ll actually get in the water today but I’m not ruling it out, either. I’m a member of the neighborhood’s small but hardy group of adult pool rats, and if the rest of the crew gets in that water, then I might have to do it too. 

*****

A few of us made our way to the pool yesterday afternoon, but only two adults actually got in the water - one of my fellow pool rats, and another person whom I don’t yet know. A new swim team dad, apparently - I overheard him talking to his little girl about how she’ll have to get in on Wednesday, the first day of practice, so she might as well get in today. And she did, and so he did too. The other person, a fellow summer lap swimmer, sat on the edge of that pool dangling his feet for so long that I thought he’d given up the idea of actually jumping into a pool full of ice water, but he did finally get in, and he didn’t even try to convince the rest of us that it’s fine once you get in because it so obviously was not. 

It’s warmer this morning, this being Sunday. I still wore a sweater and socks when I sat outside, but I didn’t need the blanket. I still don’t think I’ll get in the water today, but if the warming trend continues, I might swim tomorrow. 

*****

At some point during Memorial Day weekend, I try to watch a Memorial Day-appropriate movie. I’ve seen “Saving Private Ryan” about a dozen times. I also like “The Best Years of Our Lives.” “Platoon” and “Full Metal Jacket” are also good MDW movies.  But I wanted to watch something I hadn’t seen before, and until this weekend, I’d never seen “The Deer Hunter.” It’s quite good, though I couldn’t sit through the full 3-plus hours all at once. I ended up watching it in stages, 30 or so minutes at a time. I have a lot of questions about “The Deer Hunter,” and a lot of things to say about it. I’m going to write a post just about that movie. You’ll see it next week or a year from now. 

I also watched “Small Things Like These,” a movie adaptation of Claire Keegan’s brilliant novel. The movie is very very good (and how could it not be with a cast that includes Cillian Murphy and Emily Watson and Eileen Walsh and Clare Dunne), and the abrupt ending is exactly right. Knowing what we know about Eileen and her fear of outsider status for herself and her family, we can’t expect a happily ever after ending for Sarah, and it seems quite likely that Eileen will try to throw her out as soon as she discovers what Bill has done. But Bill takes that risk anyway - a small thing, trying to save just one girl when there are so many others in Sarah’s position - but most of us can only do small things. 

*****

It’s Monday now. I love the Monday of a three-day weekend. An extra day off is such a gift, even if it’s too cold to swim. I’m thinking about trying today, though - two more of my swimming friends did it yesterday, and I don’t want to wait until the water warms up because it’s not going to warm up anytime soon. But if I can’t steel myself to the water today, it will still have been a weekend of book shopping (Barnes and Noble with a Mothers’ Day gift card), movies, reading and writing outdoors, sushi, wine drinking with friends, and almost no Trump. And now it’s summer - and as always, I have no problems that summer cannot solve. 

The Graduate

Bear with me while I write about the crazy-ass Maryland weather once again. Notice that I didn't say just one more time because we all know that wouldn't be true.

It's May 21, a Wednesday morning, and we're on our way to the Xfinity Center at the University of Maryland for my son's graduation. He's graduating a little late but he stuck with it and got it done. He’s delighted, and we are delighted for him. 

But I was talking about the weather, wasn't I? It's cold and raining and it feels like November out here. Girls bought summer dresses for commencement day and it's cold enough for jeans and a sweater. At least they have gowns. 

I also graduated at the Xfinity Center, then known as the Comcast Center. It's Maryland's basketball venue and has all of the same rules and procedures as every other big sports arena. We're standing in the rain waiting to go through the magnetometers. It's 1053 now and the doors are to open at 11. Security personnel are walking through the lines of parents and friends loudly and emphatically reminding us that we can't have weapons or glass bottles or oversized umbrellas. Sir, Ma’am: We're just trying to stay dry out here. No one is smuggling contraband into the University of Maryland basketball arena. 

*****

Those doors opened promptly at 11 and we're inside now waiting for the ceremony to begin. Seating is unassigned so we got a front row on the mezzanine with a great view of the floor and the stage. I bought a crazy kukui nut necklace painted red and gold with Maryland terrapins and flag patterns as a souvenir for my son. I handed over my Visa card, and the student volunteer swiped it and handed it back with the necklace, and it didn’t occur to me until I sat back down that I didn’t get a receipt. I have no idea how much that kukui nut necklace cost, which makes it a good metaphor for my son’s entire college education. 

But whatever it cost, we were happy to pay. My husband and I grew up very working class. We had roofs over our heads and we didn’t go hungry but we didn’t have luxuries and we certainly didn’t grow up with any expectation of college or travel or any of the middle class experiences that our children have enjoyed. We look at our lives sometimes, and our children’s lives, and we’re amazed. Our house is small and simple, and we drive basic cars, and we have a fairly modest income - but our children played music and sports and have visited other countries. They drive their own cars and attend college. Sometimes we can’t believe we did all this. 

*****

It’s not about us, though, is it? My son graduated a bit late, a fact that bothers him and does not bother us at all. He graduated from high school in 2019 and started classes at our local community college that autumn. He’d been accepted at several private colleges, one of which wanted him to swim for their team; and at several universities in the Maryland system, including Towson and Salisbury but not including UMD, his top choice. He really wanted to go to Maryland and he decided that he’d rather go as a transfer student after community college than settle for another school. His first semester at MC was great, and then the pandemic shut everything down during his second semester, and he started to fall apart academically. Then he lost a very close friend to suicide, and began what will probably be a lifetime struggle with anxiety and depression. He talked about quitting school and I urged him to keep going, no matter how long it took, even if he took just one class at a time. “By the time I graduate, I’ll be 25,” he’d say. “You’ll be 25 anyway,” I’d say, “with or without your degree. You might as well be 25 with your degree.” 

He saw the wisdom in this - hard-won wisdom from a mother who “took a semester off” and didn’t finish college until age 47 - and he persevered. There were two semesters when he only took two classes, but then with summer classes and winter break classes, and a 19-credit final semester, he beat his own projection. He’ll be 24 next month, and now has a BA in Anthropology from the University of Maryland. We are very very proud of him. 

*****

Epilogue: About that kukui nut necklace. It cost $87. Eighty seven US dollars! Lesson learned - do not hand your credit card over to the adorable college kids running the pop-up trinket shop without asking the price of the trinket. 

Allergic

I don’t have a thing to write about today. It’s a very busy week, and there’s a ton going on in the world, and I’m doing things and reading things but I don’t have any idea what to say about any of it. But does this stop me? No, it does not. I write every day. This is a day, so I’m writing. 

I don’t really like to publish trash, of course, but when you write every day, there’s bound to be a certain quantity of bilge. There’s going to be some chaff amid the wheat. It’s part of the process. 

*****

Sometimes when I’m wandering through Barnes and Noble, as I did one day last week with my mom, I take photos of books that I want to read. Sometimes they’re books that I’ve never heard of, and other times they’re books that have been in the back of my mind for ages. So if nothing else, I’ll have plenty of books to write about. 

*****

It’s the weekend before Memorial Day. Last night (Friday) I was on my way to my 5:30 PM hair appointment when my phone’s emergency alarm started to sound. It had already started to rain and the thunder cracked just as the alarm started shrieking so I thought a tornado was about to hit. We don’t typically see tornadoes in Montgomery County, Maryland; but that’s the thing about Maryland weather - untypical is typical. There’s always some damn thing. 

The sky went from gray to darker gray to almost black in a matter of moments and the rain came down suddenly, heavily in an almost-blinding downpour. I was almost at the shopping center where the hair place is located so I wasn’t worried about driving. I sat in my car for a few minutes after I parked, just watching the rain come down and watching people waiting it out underneath awnings and overhangs. It was just about 5:30, time for my appointment, so I made a run for it a few feet across the parking lot and was soaked from head to toe when I walked in the door. But it was fine. The nice lady who owns the salon handed me some nice dry towels, and my hair was about to be washed and cut anyway.  The rain stopped almost as abruptly as it started. The sun was even out when I left, but it was that volatile, uncertain, mid-summer thunderstorm sunshine, and the rain started again as soon as I arrived home. I had no plans and nowhere I needed to be, and it was nice to have my soaking wet clothes as a perfect excuse to put on pajama pants and a t-shirt at 6:30 PM. 

*****

The last four weekends have been more work than work. So I had planned to rest a little bit this weekend. But my husband is building a crazy pergola thing in our backyard and he needed help yesterday so I spent Saturday holding up beams and picking up nuts and bolts and caddying tools. It could have been far worse because my husband fell off the ladder at one point, crashing into the table and chairs (luckily we were already planning to replace them) and tearing his shorts to shreds. Had the table and chairs not been right where they were, the day would have ended in the emergency room. But that man bounced right up and got back on that stupid ladder and kept going until we had the frame assembled and in place. He never even took a moment to change his shorts. I’m usually absolutely terrible at DIY projects but I was legitimately helpful with this project. But I’m out of the building trades now. It’s Sunday, and a beautiful day, and my plans do not include manual labor. 

*****

My husband kept going with the crazy pergola project on Sunday, but it was a solo effort. Both of the boys were away, and I was smart enough to stay away from the backyard. We did the hard part on Saturday anyway, so he didn’t really need my help. The part that required muscle is done. By the way, if you’re doing a job that requires muscle and I’m your first pick, then you probably need to re-evaluate some of your choices. That’s not the best match between skills and requirements, know what I mean? I guess desperate times call for desperate measures. 

I approached this whole build a pergola idea with considerable skepticism even before I got roped into serving as casual labor. Why do we need this, I thought? Is being outside not the whole point of being outside? But I’m coming around now. We also poured a new concrete patio a few weeks ago, to replace and expand the very small old one, and the pergola frame surrounding the pretty new furniture on the clean new patio creates a very welcoming effect, and it will be nice to have the roof for shade and shelter against light rain so that we can sit outside more often. The sides of the thing will remain open and it will be like having our own private park pavilion. 

*****

I’m on day 5 of a 6-day course of prednisone, after my own little emergency medical visit on Friday. I’d been outside on Thursday evening for a bit and I woke up on Friday morning with swollen, itchy eyes, a rash on my face, and generalized itching all over. When a Benadryl didn’t help and hydrocortisone cream didn’t help and the itching got worse, I went to urgent care so that I’d be in a medical setting in case I ended up in anaphylaxis. I’m much better now, though I still don’t know what caused it. I haven’t eaten anything, worn anything, or used any products, or done anything at all different from what I always do. The doctor said that I might have come into contact with something outdoors, or it might just be a random idiopathic occurrence. Let’s just hope that I’m not allergic to our backyard now that we’re making it nicer. 

Offsides

It's 730 PM on Thursday night. The Washington Capitals are playing against the Carolina Hurricanes in game 5 of the second round of the Stanley Cup playoffs, and it's do or die time. The Canes lead this series 3-1 so this is an elimination game for the Caps. The score is 1-0 in the first period, not in our favor. 

*****

It's never over until it's over. Just ask Lenny Kravitz. We just scored an ugly haphazard goal but it was good, and we'll take it. We have ourselves a game right now. 

*****

Well, that ugly goal was their only goal after a second goal was overturned on an offsides call. I’m not good at spotting an offsides goal at full speed but the replay on this one was pretty clear. The Carolina Hurricanes will play the winners of the Maple Leafs - Panthers series for the Conference championship and a chance at the Stanley Cup. And the Capitals will clean out their lockers and go home for the summer. 

It was the Capitals’ 50th anniversary season, and it would have been nice for it to end with another Stanley Cup or at least a longer playoff run. But I did get to watch Alex Ovechkin surpass Wayne Gretsky’s record to become the NHL’s all-time high scorer, and they played amazing hockey this year, and they made it past the first round for the first time since 2018. A winning season all around. Now I’m all in for Canada. As much as it would pain me to root for the Oilers or the Jets, I’ll take either of those teams over any of the remaining American teams. I’m hoping that the Maple Leafs will finally do it. Toronto hasn’t won a Stanley Cup since 1967, meaning that most Maple Leafs fans living today have either never seen their team win the championship, or they were too young to remember it. It’s their turn. Go Leafs. 

Sandwich

Oh my God it has been a long week. I love my mother but she is a full-time job, and I already have a full-time job. I’m up in the middle of the night checking on her, and hoping she’ll sleep past 8 in the morning to give me time to get ready for work. It’s like having a toddler again. And the TV! My gosh, I’m losing my mind with Lifetime channel stolen baby movies and Desperate Housewives reruns. And if I hear another TikTok video, I’m going to throw her phone in the nearest trashcan. I’m exhausted, and every bone in my body hurts. Still, I like having her here, and I’ll miss her when she goes home tomorrow. 

*****

It's Monday morning, and we're in the car on our way to take her home. Thankfully my husband was able to take the day off so I'm sitting in the backseat. I don't mind driving but I mind not driving even less. 

We had a cookout for Mother's Day. My mom and my husband's family don't spend much time together but they all get along. I was able to persuade my mom to sit outside with everyone, and she had a good time watching my niece and nephew run around and chatting with my mother in law. Despite my mother in law's dodgy English, the two of them always manage to understand each other. It was a lovely afternoon but exhausting. In a Venn diagram of the people at my house yesterday, I'd be in the middle where all of the circles overlap. That is an intense place to be. 

I thought about working for a bit later when we get back home but I don’t think I’ll have the energy. I've been on duty 24/7 for the last nine days, and I need a little break. Whatever people want or need this evening, they can get for themselves. The kitchen is closed for today, and maybe for the rest of the week. 

*****

It’s funny how when your kids move out of the house, you know that they’re out in the world taking all kinds of crazy risks and doing all kinds of crazy things at all hours of the day and night - but they’re out of the house, so you don’t see or hear them coming and going. When they’re not under my roof, I can pretend that they’re in for the evening by 11 and in bed by midnight. 

When they are home for the summer, however, I know when they go out and when they come home - or when they don’t. Let’s say we’re all cozy at home at 10 pm, and then one or the other of them checks his phone and jumps up abruptly and says that he’s “just going out for a quick hour or so.” It might very well be a quick hour or so. Or it might be a very late night, and I’ll lie awake worrying about car crashes and armed robberies and everything else from garden variety tomfoolery to straight-up disasters. And that is why, exhausted though I was on Monday night, I still couldn’t sleep until I heard the car in the driveway and then the door opening and then the kid who ran out the door at 10 coming in and going to bed at 1:30 AM. I mean, it’s nice to be able to tell everyone to feed themselves for a few days, but I sometimes miss the days when I didn’t have to wonder where my kids were at midnight. 

*****

My mother needs help and will need more as she gets older. My children are young adults and although they don’t need hands-on care or supervision, they’re also not quite independent. They’ll eventually be fully on their own, and then they’ll need help with their own children. And I’m looking forward to this. I’ve thought for a long time that taking care of other people is the most important thing in life. Now I think it might be the only thing in life. It’s good to be in the middle of all of this, and to be capable of managing it, even imperfectly. It’s good to be in the intersection of those Venn diagram circles. But that cooking embargo is still in effect, so my family will still need to feed themselves for the next few days. That’s why they call it the sandwich generation, right? 

Viva il Papa

My mom is watching news coverage of the papal conclave. So far, there have been four rounds of black smoke since the thing got underway yesterday. Rumor has it that we might get a Korean Pope. Or an African Pope. Or an American Pope (not Cardinal Dolan, I hope). We’ll see. 

*****

I was scoffing as I wrote that last part. I fully expected a non-European Pope (and it’s long past time) but I never ever expected an American. My whole hometown is claiming Pope Leo XIV (formerly Robert Cardinal Prevost) as their own, because he went to Villanova. My mom texted me the now-famous Villanova yearbook photo of young Robert Prevost, looking like the WJM mailroom boy who would have had a crush on Mary Richards. Her high school classmate’s much younger sister was his classmate at Villanova. Or so she says. Pretty soon, every Catholic in Philadelphia between the ages of 50 and 75 will find some Villanova association with the new Pontiff. Catholic New York and New Jersey and Boston and Providence and New Haven are all right now looking for their own Prevost connections. Meanwhile, every Catholic in Chicago is going to be insufferable for the entire term of this papacy. 

And good for them. As much as I’d have enjoyed seeing a Pope from the East Coast (again, not Dolan), Chicago seems like the most American place for an American Pope. New York and Boston and Philadelphia started as colonial settlements, remnants of the old world. Chicago grew out of American expansionism and exceptionalism. No other place could have produced Barack Obama and Oprah Winfrey and Hillary Clinton and the Second City and John Belushi and Bob Newhart, not to mention Jimmy McGill and Carmy Berzatto. No other place has the same American Century energy. Anything can happen in Chicago. 

*****

I have to admit that it’s very exciting to have an American Pope. And I am not the only person with Pope-mania. My mom has been sharing Prevost trivia for the past three days. We went to dinner last night and she reminded me a few times that she needed to be on the couch in front of the TV by 9 PM to watch an ABC News special about the new American Pope. My son sent me a video of then Bishop Prevost at the 2005 World Series (the Holy Father is a White Sox fan). Even my non-Catholic husband and friends are on this bandwagon. 

The whole country is on this bandwagon. The White Sox video has gone viral, and the White Sox organization is rubbing it in the Cubs’ faces. The yearbook photo is all over the internet, and the Pope’s brothers are all over the news. Donald Trump is out in these streets claiming that the College of Cardinals would never have chosen an American if he hadn’t been in the White House - never mind that they went out of their way to choose an American who is different from Trump in every way. Pope Leo XIV is the anti-Trump. 

*****

I’ve been at odds with the Church lately, mostly because I think that American Catholicism bears quite a bit of responsibility for Trumpism. But this Pope seems unafraid to confront MAGA. As a Cardinal, he even smacked JD Vance down on Twitter. And if the Swiss Guard is wise, they’ll keep JD out of the Vatican because that guy leaves a trail of destruction in his wake everywhere he goes. I’d travel with Tom Hanks sooner than be in the same room with JD. Meanwhile, right-wing Catholics (that should not be a thing but it is) online are apparently losing their minds about yet another “liberal” Pope. And if they keep calling this guy a woke socialist Friend of Francis, they might actually get me back into a pew on Sunday.  He's even a Wordle player. Viva il Papa. 

Circumlocution

Do you know about avoidance writing? Last week I started writing some dumb thing that will probably never see the light of day.  I had intended to finish the meeting minutes for our neighborhood association meeting, and then started writing something else because I’d rather do almost anything than write, revise, and proofread meeting minutes. 

That was last Sunday, a picture-perfect day. Now it’s Sunday again, and raining. We have had summery sunny weather for over a week, and now it’s going to rain for a few days but the warm temperatures look likely to continue for another week or so. Maybe we have seen the last of the cold. Between the sustained warmth and the rain, it’s wildly green outside, overgrown and almost tropical. This is what I like about Maryland. It’s crisp New England one day and lush Louisiana bayou the next. Maryland is like a box of chocolates.  You never know what you’re gonna get. Never a dull moment in the Free State, I tell you what. 

I did eventually finish those meeting minutes, slowly and reluctantly and with the worst possible attitude toward the whole endeavor. But I’m going to judge myself by results not attitude. The minutes are done, and they’re as good as they’re going to be. Never mind my sighing and muttering to myself like a surly teenager. 

*****

It’s going to be a busy week, work-wise and at home because my mom is here visiting. My son is also coming home this week and although I can’t wait to have him back at home, I’m a little shook at the idea of all his stuff arriving here and joining all of my mom’s stuff (she owns the largest suitcase I have ever seen, and she packs it full to bursting when she comes here, and then she wears the same three outfits on repeat all week and oh my gosh, who am I to talk). This house is small, and neatness is key in a small house, especially a house that contains a person as tightly wound as I am. But it’s good to have a few days of chaos, honestly. It forces me to go with the flow, which is something that I am not very good at. I like for things to be the way I think they’re supposed to be and for things to happen the way I think they’re supposed to happen. It’s good to have the occasional reminder that I can’t control everything. 

*****

I finished those dumb meeting minutes just in time for today, the first Tuesday of the month, which means it’s time for another monthly meeting. Now (in addition to a whole new set of meeting minutes, of course) I have to think about what else I want to put out on this blog, because I do appear to have a small but loyal reading public, and I can’t keep writing about the weather and household routines and my personal neuroses. Although who knows? Maybe that's why people show up here. 

Yesterday, I started writing about the book I’m reading now, which is Dickens’ Little Dorrit. I can already foresee what’s going to happen between young Amy Dorrit and Mr. Arthur Clennam, and I can guess the secret that Mrs. Clennam is keeping from her son, but I don’t yet know HOW all of this is going to shake out, and that’s what is so great about reading Dickens novels. This is going to be my year of Dickens. Little Dorrit is shaping up to be almost as good as David Copperfield; and reading Dickens will also give me something good to write about when I’m avoiding this month’s meeting minutes. 

Literature and lists

“Good luck to that MFer.” 

What does that mean? For which MFer is this well-wish intended? I had (and still have) the very same questions when I found this note written at the top of an old grocery list. The whole thing was in my handwriting so I know that it’s not Samuel L. Jackson’s grocery list. I just can’t remember writing it. 

*****

Meanwhile, two very unfortunate MFers share a cell in a Marseilles prison. It’s a hot August day, sometime in the middle of the 19th century. This is the opening scene of Charles Dickens’ Little Dorrit, which I just started for the first time. I know almost nothing about Little Dorrit, except that the main character, Amy Dorrit, is a young English woman raised in the Marshalsea, a debtors prison where her father is an inmate. Debtors' prisons feature very prominently in David Copperfield, one of my favorite books ever, and so I’m optimistic about this one. But these two prisoners in France are as yet a mystery to me. I don’t know why they’re in prison - for debt or some other offense - and I don’t know who they are and what connection they might have with the Dorrit family. But the first few pages are riveting, and I can’t wait to see what happens. 

*****

Back to the old grocery list with the cryptic headline. It was in an old handbag that I hadn’t used in some time. That bag just popped into my head one day, so I dug it out of my closet, and I liked it so much that I decided to use it again for a while. That’s the upside of having too many bags. I can always shop for a new one in my very own closet. 

It had been at least two years - maybe more - since the last time I carried this bag, making the grocery list at least that old. And try as I may, I really cannot recall having written it, and I also cannot recall which of possibly many MFers to whom I might have wished good luck - either sincerely or sarcastically. Whoever it was, I hope everything worked out for them. 

Homeland Security

I worked from home today after almost leaving my computer at work yesterday. In fact, I DID actually leave my computer at work yesterday. I breezed out the door at 6 PM, and was halfway to Gate 5 (which I would soon learn had been locked since 5, forcing me to turn around and walk to Gate 2, but that’s a story for another day) when it occurred to me that my bag seemed very light. It was light because I didn’t have it. At all. I had my purse, but I had left my work bag with my notebooks and papers and of course, my computer, on my desk. Thankfully, I was wearing my badge and was able to get back in the building to retrieve it. Thankfully, I realized that the bag was missing before I got home or worse yet before I woke up this morning ready to work only to find that I didn’t have a computer. 

It is not lost on me that I wrote a whole post last week mocking the “theft” of DHS Secretary Kristi Noem’s Saul Goodman go bag. Maybe I’m a little bit hypocritical for making fun of this woman when I am obviously just as careless with my belongings. Except my bag was on my desk in my locked office in a secure space on a Navy installation. And I just forgot it - I didn’t leave it on the floor in a restaurant. So Ms. Noem and I are not the same, and I stand by my initial take on the purse heist. And who - who, I ask you - could have predicted that an arrest would be made and that the person arrested would be an undocumented immigrant? 

This seems plausible, doesn’t it? An undocumented person puts on a face mask, walks into a very busy Capitol Hill restaurant filled with exactly the kind of people that an undocumented person would run a mile in tight shoes to avoid, attracts absolutely zero attention from a gaggle of Secret Service agents, sits RIGHT NEXT to the person the Secret Service agents are supposedly protecting, steals her $4,000 Gucci bag right out from under the chair THAT SHE’S SITTING IN, and then saunters out the door without a hair out of place? Sure. OK. It all makes sense. It all adds up. No holes in that story whatsoever.

And in the very unlikely event that this picaresque little tale is true, should Secretary Noem not resign immediately? Girl, you can’t secure your own belongings. How are you going to secure the gosh darn Homeland? 

All sales are final

Forewarned is forearmed: This is a ridiculous post and you probably don't want to spend the next ten minutes of your life reading it. If you decide (unwisely) to do so anyway, then please be aware that there are no returns and no exchanges. All sales are final. 

*****

Today is Easter. It’s a beautiful spring day - perfect, really. Sunny, warm, softly breezy - an every-window-in-the-house-open kind of day. I’m sitting next to one of those open windows now. The slight rustling of the trees, some birdsong, a very distant lawn mower, an Orioles game on TV in another room in our house - it sounds very spring-into-summery out there. 

I’m hosting dinner. We’ll have a lot of food, but I didn’t make much effort at presentation this time. I don’t have a lot of Easter-themed dishes or decor. We’ll be eating our ham and asparagus and macaroni and cheese and fruit salad from paper plates. I forgot to buy wine, so I hope that my sister-in-law brings a bottle. The whole thing is much more haphazard than my holiday dinners usually are. It can’t be helped. I’m hanging on by the proverbial thread so I consider it an accomplishment to be cooking and hosting dinner at all. 

*****

Why am I hanging on by a thread? Well, I’m glad you asked but you won’t be, lol. Actually, I couldn’t really tell you other than all of this (gesturing around wildly at everything) combined with the annual spring PTSD attack, which is worse than usual. I’m very tired. 

*****

OK, here’s one thing that’s getting to me. The old lady whose grocery shopping I’ve been doing for five years has been querulous and fussy lately, much more so than usual. Her house is in appalling shape - dirty and dilapidated outside and I can only imagine what it’s like inside. I’m very sorry for her but I’m also not a doctor and cannot cure a hoarder, which is what she is. I can see the stacks of newspapers through the windows, and the enclosed porch is a pit of despair. I used to leave her groceries by the front door, as she requested, and she would bring everything in. But she has been asking me lately to bring the items all the way in through the enclosed porch by the front door. She gives arcane and detailed and specific instructions for how she wants everything arranged - some things double-bagged, perishables separate, certain items closer to the door, be sure not to block the door even though she wants everything near the door and there’s very little room in that nightmare of a porch to put anything at all, etc., etc. 

The way this works is that I drop off the groceries, and she leaves a check. She will not use the internet and so I always have to call to get her list and then call to let her know when I’m dropping everything off. Last week, she placed the check inside a large Ziploc bag, and wrote me a very long note in felt-tip marker ON THE ZIPLOC BAG. And so of course, what I saw was a salutation, a few words and then three lengthy paragraphs of illegible smear, and then a few words about a blessed Easter, and her signature. 

It turns out that the letter was additional detailed instructions for how she wanted her groceries separated and organized and placed in front of and as near the door as possible but not blocking the door even though the “enclosed porch” is nothing more than a junkyard filled with piles of old household items and empty bottles and cans and so much other stuff that you can’t even see the “porch” part. It’s not even really safe to walk through this mess. But sure, tell me all about how we need to neatly organize the grocery delivery, after packaging the canned goods and cookies and yogurt like they’re Hermes bags. 

I couldn’t read the letter, as we have established, so I couldn’t follow any additional instructions that it might have contained. I did the best I could, and got out of there. My phone rang on Saturday morning. She was sorry, so sorry, so very very sorry to bother me and she’s absolutely not complaining but she can’t find the 70% isopropyl alcohol and she needs it and she wondered if I saw the note asking me to place it with the paper towels right near the door. I said that I was sorry about that, without saying a word about the illegible note, and promised that I’d stop by later and find the bottle of alcohol and place it near the door on top of the box where she could reach it. “The box,” she said, although there are literally dozens of boxes in that crazy porch, several of which are right near the door. I didn’t bother to ask her to clarify because she would have, at considerable length, so I just assumed (hoped) that when I arrived, it would be readily apparent which box she meant. 

But it wasn’t. There were several boxes near the door, any of which might have been the one that she described, but I couldn’t be sure, and she will not come to the door.  I found the alcohol and a few other items that I thought she might need, arranged everything as best I could, and I got out of there as quickly as I could. 

The phone rang again, at about 9:45 on Saturday evening. I was tempted to let it ring but she’s old and crazy and alone and maybe it was an emergency, so I picked up. “Can you help me to understand something?” she said. This is never a good faith question. The person who says “help me understand” already understands perfectly - they just want to complain or argue. They just want to start shit. And right now, I am in no way in the mood for anyone to start shit with me. Not that I ever would be, but right now? Just please do not. 

“Can you help me to understand something? I have been advocating for people with disabilities for my whole life (this was news to me - she has told me 20 different things about her prior occupations) and I always seem to be able to clearly express what they need, but I can’t make myself understood when I need something.” I started to ask her what she meant specifically, but she kept talking. The alcohol was placed just out of her reach. There was a jar of instant coffee placed with the alcohol, and she didn’t want it there. Something wasn't double-bagged. The container of pre-cut fresh fruit that she had asked for had leaked and made a mess. Everything was bad and wrong and terrible, and it was all my fault. I couldn’t even respond - partly because I was upset, and partly because she wasn’t even pausing for breath. And then the call just dropped and the line went dead. 

At that point, I was tempted to just go to bed and forget about the whole thing. But I called her back several times, with no answer. I might have worried that she’d fallen or had some other medical emergency, but earlier the same week (just three days earlier, actually) I had called her multiple times and just as I was about to call the police to do a welfare check on her, she had called me back, cool as a cucumber, saying that she’d been listening to a radio program and hadn’t been able to pick up. I wasn’t going through that again. So I called her on Sunday, just to see if she was OK, and it was as if the entire conversation hadn’t taken place. She was fine. Everything was fine. Later, I sent her a plate of food, for which she was very grateful. 

So again, she was fine - which is great - but I was not. I felt gaslit and ill-used and manipulated, and not for the first time. I call this woman every Wednesday night to get her grocery list, and when she doesn’t pick up, about ⅓ of the time, she later tells me that she saw my call coming in, but had been on another call, or listening to the radio, or something else more compellingly important than talking to the person who is literally keeping her alive. 

What was the point of all that? Am I going to stop helping her? No. But I have to complain to someone. Sorry it’s you. 

*****

It’s Friday now. The lady and I had a reasonably pleasant conversation on Wednesday. I mentioned the Ziploc bag, and suggested that she write her notes on paper from now on because I obviously missed her instructions and she was obviously upset about that. “No no no, I wasn’t upset,” she insisted. “I wasn’t criticizing! I wasn’t complaining!” Reader: She was upset. She did criticize. She did complain. But whatever. I did her dumb shopping and I bagged her dumb groceries the way she wants them, and I dropped them off in the den of disarray that she whimsically refers to as her front porch, and I picked up the check (which she had stuffed inside a disposable glove for reasons best known to herself) and I went on my merry way. 

*****

And Easter was perfect. I did get that bottle of wine (two, in fact!) and dinner was very very good, and everyone had a wonderful time. And I will be absolutely fine - despite crazy old ladies and anxiety attacks and mama drama and all of this (gesturing wildly at everything) - I will be absolutely fine. 

Purse heist

I literally cannot stop thinking about Kristi Noem’s purse. I know that there are far more important news stories than this one, but a story involving a handbag is always going to be my top headline, especially when it’s a story about a Cabinet Secretary’s handbag, and really especially when so many aspects of that story do not add up. The whole thing is suspect. The whole thing is off. 

First of all, let’s talk about where the Secretary placed her very expensive Gucci bag. No woman I know puts her handbag on the floor - anywhere, not even in her own house - let alone on the floor of a restaurant. That alone is enough to make me very suspicious, very suspicious indeed. Secondly, who carries three grand, her passport, and her medication out to dinner with her family? That’s a go bag, not a handbag. And the Secret Service! The woman has a Secret Service detail. I know that the Secret Service doesn’t hover over protectees when they’re out in public with their families, but should they not have noticed a dude sneaking up behind her and absconding with her bag? I think they should have, and I think they would have. There’s something very very off about this whole story. 

The thing that bothers me is that I’m not sure what’s going on. My theory is that they’re trying to build a case that DC is dangerous and crime-ridden, to justify a federal takeover of the city. Several people have suggested that it was a planned theft of her phone, orchestrated to prevent investigators from seeing her texts or Signal chats. I’m not sure why she’d care about that since the Justice Department is obviously not going to prosecute a Trump official for carelessness about information security. That train left the station with Signalgate. Another possibility is that she is just stupid and silly - but this isn’t a zero sum game. Any of a number of theories about this incident could be true, and she could also be just stupid and silly. 

Someone’s going to find that bag in a trash can somewhere. Secretary Noem’s makeup bag and her Vuitton wallet and whatever other random trinkets she was carrying will still be in the bag, but the passport, the cash, the IDs, the keys, and the phone will all be gone. And we’ll probably never find out what really happened, and who really took that bag, and why. 

Meanwhile, I wonder who paid for dinner. 

David Copperfield (spoilers left, right, and center)

I’ve read Dickens’ David Copperfield at least ten times, which means that now I’m reading it for at least the 11th time. I used to read it once a year, and reading Demon Copperhead, Barbara Kingsolver’s fan fiction interpretation of DC, made me want to read it again. And it’s just as good as it always is. PS - this post contains many many spoilers. But even if you read all the way through, and you haven’t read the book yet, you should because it’s great. 

I’ve read other Dickens novels too - Bleak House, and Hard Times, and Great Expectations. They're all great (especially Bleak House), but none have the hold on me that David Copperfield has. I’m going to read Little Dorrit, which I’ve never read, after I finish with David Copperfield. Dickens seems very relevant now. 

*****

Because of family turmoil of one kind and another, my life was abruptly and completely turned upside down several times during my childhood. Maybe I’ll write all about it someday, but not today. I wasn’t shipped off to a boarding school run by an abusive psychopath, and I wasn’t forced to make my own living in a strange city at age 10 or so, as David Copperfield was, so I’m not drawing any exact parallels between my life and his. But just like David, I knew what it was like to have the rug pulled out from beneath my feet, and to have no idea what would happen next nor any say in the matter, and to always feel unmoored and uncertain and insecure. It leaves a mark. 

It’s probably not that much of a spoiler to tell you that things turn out happily for David Copperfield, after many trials and tribulations. You also might already know that Dickens’ novels were originally published as serials in pulp magazines that apparently paid by the word. Dickens’ writing is beautiful and his work is a lot of fun to read, but economy doesn’t enter into the equation. If you prefer a spare and spartan prose style without a lot of unnecessary detail and embellishment - well first of all, what are you doing here; and secondly, Dickens might not be for you. Brace yourself also for the Victorian social mores. Dickens is rightly outraged at the grinding poverty of the working class in mid 19th century London, but he doesn’t question the hierarchy that places most people in positions of service in one way or another not to society itself but to its masters. He just wanted the people on the lower rungs to have a decent place to live and enough food to eat and enough money that they didn’t need to send their children out to work in factories. 

And of course, we have to talk about the women of David Copperfield. Dickens probably never questioned the patriarchy even once - but I still believe that he thought more highly of women than a lot of 21st century men whom I could name but won’t. 

David Copperfield’s society is one in which a fallen woman is literally better off dead. Although Dickens certainly doesn’t let the man or men involved in a woman’s downfall off the hook in terms of moral culpability, he also expects and accepts that a man who corrupts a young woman will eventually get on with his life. The young woman, however, is an outcast forever. Dickens, through his narrator David, obviously feels sorrow and compassion for such women, but doesn’t really seem to question why it’s necessary that they be separated from decent society. 

But Dickens didn’t make the rules of this society, he just wrote stories about it. And his female characters, good and bad, are as interesting and beautiful and human as the male characters. David’s aunt Betsey Trotwood is an independent woman of means and one of the strongest female characters in the literature of that time. Miss Betsey doesn’t care about pleasing men; in fact, she goes out of her way to avoid pleasing men or really interacting with them in any way, with the exception of her beloved nephew, her friend and charge Mr. Dick, and a few other trusted gentlemen. Miss Betsey lives by her own rules, and she demands and receives respect from others, men and women alike. Her nephew David, whom she renames Trotwood (after herself, of course) admires and loves Miss Betsey without reserve, not only because he is rightly grateful to her for giving him a home and an education and a rich and interesting life, but for her own sake. 

Agnes Wickfield, David’s childhood friend and eventual wife, is easily dismissed as a Victorian archetype - angelic, sweet, selfless, ladylike, accomplished in feminine pursuits, demure and deferential to her father and other men. David admires Agnes for her beauty and her other traditionally feminine virtues, but he and everyone around her also admire her for her strength, her courage, her intelligence, and her character. Agnes and David become acquainted at age 11 or so, and he recognizes Agnes’s brilliance quite early, noticing that her learning is quite equal to his own, even though she lacks formal schooling. Agnes sees and notices everything, and she is the moral heart and soul of the story.

The novel’s other female characters are also delightfully complex and nuanced and human.  Peggotty, David’s childhood nurse and lifelong friend, is love and steadfastness and selflessness personified, with a near-flawless eye for human goodness and evil (it is she who spots Mr. Murdstone for what he is the moment she sees him - on the other hand, she is taken in by Steerforth just like everyone else). David’s mother Clara and his first wife Dora are young and beautiful and a little silly and vain. But they recognize their own flaws - Dora is particularly self-aware and perceptive, especially at the end of her short life. Mrs. Steerforth is a cautionary tale about misguided love - she worships her son, making it impossible for her to truly love him, to his detriment and hers. And although we know that Mrs. Steerforth has spoiled her child, Dickens makes quite clear that the responsibility for his bad behavior and his eventual downfall is entirely his. The same applies to the vile Uriah Heep and the unfortunate Mrs. Heep.

It is also interesting that of the two women most hurt by Steerforth - Emily Peggotty and Rosa Dartle - Emily recovers and gets a second chance at a new life, and Rosa spends the rest of her life mired in grief and bitterness and anger - even though it is Emily who is “fallen” in the sexual sense, and Rosa who remained chaste. Rosa and Mrs. Steerforth would be outraged at Dickens or any writer who didn’t properly punish a girl like Emily - preferably by killing her off in some dreadful way but at the very least by making her live out the rest of her days as a pauper and outcast. All of this is to say that although Dickens wrote from the perspective of 19th century attitudes toward women, he obviously also loved and respected them.

*****

I’m right in the middle of the book now. David has finished his education and is about to begin his proctor’s training at Doctor’s Commons. He’s going to fall in love with the wrong woman and then the right woman. Uriah Heep will try to ruin Agnes’s life and he will almost succeed, but for the unlikely intervention of the unlikeliest of heroes, Mr. Micawber. The Murdstones will reappear, like black mold. Miss Betsey’s secret will be revealed. Mr. Dick will keep trying to get Charles I and his troubles out of his head. Steerforth will die at sea despite the heroic effort to save him by a man whose life he ruined. Most of the people who deserve a comeuppance will get it. A bunch of people who suffered unjustly will pick up and move to Australia, where they will prosper. And David and Agnes will finally live happily ever after.