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January 29, 2007Where’s the Fire, Taurus?It’s totally against your natureTO RUSH AROUND IN A FRENZIED WHIR so take a breather and lead down your path of least resistance, Slowpoke Road. Deep inside, you have a hunch things are going to turn out just how you want them to, and over here at Psychic Dispatch, we think you’re right. I used to keep (when I used to work) the above horoscope on my desk to remind myself that at whatever pace I needed to move, I was moving, and in the right direction. If Psychic Dispatch could tell me what this year holds for me, would I want to know? No, because uncertainty is uncomfortable and discomfort is fodder. Discomfort feeds the fire. No resolution this year to stop biting my nails—I’ll bite them plenty and have plenty of cause to. I welcome the angst. Bring it on. WHEN IN DOUBT, SHRED ITOK, first. It’s time to clear the decks and clean house. Time to put things in order, thin out the closets, find out what’s in those boxes never unpacked, go through all the papers, the torn scraps with faint jottings on them, the hasty notes on the back of the phone book—all the stuff people who work full time never get to and I thought I never would. What a joy it was to shred the irrelevant title paperwork for my Portland house! Page after page of legalese, subparagraphs, dotted lines and columns of figures—all gone! My tax returns from the 90’s, now in the recycling bin. What a release! I am passing my own Paperwork Reduction Act. Anything that generates paperwork, physical or electronic, even if it’s beneficial, will be studiously avoided. If I have to sign up for something, read anything about it, create an account, provide personal information, follow some damn procedure, receive e-mail notifications, keep track of it—I don’t care what it is, I don’t want it, I don’t even want to hear about it. My pledge, the law of my life, is to never push anyone else’s paperwork again, and to instantly put any new piece of paper I adjudge needful of keeping, in its place the first time I handle it. Sounds simple, but it’s revolutionary. My brain de-clutters as I write. THEY CALL THAT A REASON?I do want to preserve this bit of correspondence between myself and the City of Berkeley Building Permits and Inspections Dept.: Me: “I recently purchased a 4-unit apartment building and would like to change the letters identifying the units from Apartments A, B, C and D to Q, X, Y, Z. Why? Too boring, not my style…if possible, I would even like to officially name the apartments “Question Authority,” “X Marks the Spot,” “Y?” and “The Twilight Zone” (Q, X, Y, and Z for short).” Them: “Our office received your request to change the current address of Apartments A, B, C, and D to Apartments Q, X, Y, and Z. Your request is denied because the request does not conform to approved standards for house numbering.” Does not conform. I do not conform! That’s what it’s all about. Even in Berkeley. THE THOUGHT OF YOU IS A MENTAL ORGASMInto the shredder! That and other dreadful lines of awful high school “poetry” I cranked out every day, never getting any better at it, I feed into the blades in disgust. Journals raving and gushing about my first lover, forget it, they do not need to be preserved for literary history, even though that lover was my high school creative writing teacher Timothy White (not his real name). He was 23, I was barely 17—the scoundrel—though we did wait ‘til I graduated. Hey guess what: he liked my writing! Particularly the nonstop stream of love letters invoking the earthly garden of delights in store for him. He even told me there was nothing more he could teach me. He said, I’m just an English teacher; you’re the born writer. JAIL BAIT!I was absolutely astounded when he wouldn’t take me on a trip to New York, that my mother shrewdly observed, “He doesn’t want to cross state lines with you.” I had no idea my mother had any concept of any such motivation or subterfuge. BUSTED!One time he and I ran into my Latin teacher in a movie lobby. I was just excited—hey, Mrs. Latin! (for lack of a better made-up name). She of course was quietly outraged and he of course was busted. I’d been a pet of hers. She said hello to me but kept her eyes on him. Amo, amas, amat, Mrs. Latin! But nothing happened to him. I finally said goodbye to Timothy when he took a part-time real estate job and started introducing himself “Hi, Tim White,” with the two-handed handshake where you start with a regular handshake and then sandwich the guy’s hand with your other hand. We had always called him Timothy; no one called him Tim. That sounded an alarm in my head. ACTUALLY, I SIMPLY DIDN’T NEED HIM ANYMORE.We were together for 4-1/2 years, and by then I had grown up a bunch, graduated college and gotten a job and a 1-bedroom apartment at 1622 Pine St. at Smedley, a killer address only minutes away from the Grand Old Lady of Locust St. (the Academy of Music), for $135.00 a month (1977 dollars). I was also busy falling in love with the man who would be both the love of my youth and the heartbreak of my youth (hey there, old friend). He’s why I was so into Munch at the time, who was obsessed with a dentist’s wife he couldn’t have all to himself. “Sickness, insanity and death were the angels that surrounded my cradle and they have followed me throughout my life.” See what I mean? Enough of that! I’m not indulging in that crap anymore. Not to downplay the very passionate and daring Munch. BUT THANK YOU, FOREVER.I know what the function of Timothy was in my life, though. He was my first boyfriend, yes, he was educated and worldly, introduced me to a lot of outside-world things and had spirited me around in his orange Datsun 240Z, which he later traded for a silver 280. The universe put him in my path because I could write well enough—but it was he who taught me to read critically. For which I am still indebted; it may be the basis of why I am the writer I am today. He was my first mentor. Jack Kerouac was my second. Though I continued to write, I got distracted by earning a living, obsessing about love, getting away from my family, having nervous breakdowns, traveling, acquiring real estate, etc.—basically stumbling through life until it recently became crystal clear to me that I would never have the time I needed to dedicate myself to writing unless I stripped my life down to the essentials. For starters I kissed my house goodbye, then my job—and my series of columns documenting my tour of the US (and that tour itself) would not have otherwise come to be. So, I’m ambling my way down Slowpoke Rd. and I have a feeling things will turn out just as I want them to. DON’T JUST SIT THERE?Though I extol the virtue of not just sitting there, writing pretty much consists of sitting there. Not just sitting there; I am actually doing something, i.e., writing, but I do so parked on my butt. Perhaps that’s how it became the luscious padded cushion I enjoy today. That’s why if I have to sit there writing I like to do it on a train; at least while sitting there you’re also going somewhere. An immense portion of the work of this world is conducted by people who are sitting; in fact, Barbara Ehrenreich goes so far as to say that “school is training for sitting still.” CAFÉ LUNA, Sacramento and PresidioI write from the first of many new-to-me coffee shops that will host me and my PowerBook in the coming months, because I still need to engage myself with the world and so I will do my sitting with a latte in front of me. WHAT A LUXURY!I was able to attend a noon-hour talk by Ehrenreich at the Commonwealth Club, and she spoke of the freedom that writing allows you to “follow your curiosity—even if it doesn’t have any immediate output.” Writing is a lifelong dérive. In a sense, you can never stop writing, because you take everything you see, do, feel, read, know, discover to that task. FOLLOWING MY CURIOSITYThat’s why I’m meeting Jon Crow in Mexico next month. It’s all about experience. Found my flight on kayak.com, whose slogan is “Life is a trip.” Indeed, the long strange kind. I can’t stop moving now. Jon and I went to Mexico together in 1989 when I invited myself along on a trip he was making to learn Spanish in San Miguel Allende, and when he made arrangements to go back and suggested I meet him in Guadalajara and come with, I couldn’t resist another dose of Mexican magic. This will be my 4th visit there, but the first in 16 years. WHAT KIND OF TOWELS DO THEY HAVE ON THE MOON?My February Vanity Fair horoscope: A new moon at the end of my solar 9th house will fill me with that old restless yearning to explore what lies beyond the horizon…All Taureses adore seeing new places and having new experiences, but I love my creature comforts just as much. I’ll make it up to the moon—just as soon as I’m assured they’ve got nice towels up there. Or I’ll just take my own. God, how delicious, delirious, delightful, delovely. To not be working. Of course mom just reminded me on the phone, “Money doesn’t last forever.” It’s her “job” (as a mother) “to worry.” I said well find a better job. A more enjoyable one. WORK IS SUCH A BITCH!Barbara Ehrenreich spoke of the “ridiculous cultural expectation that you’re supposed to get up every morning and work…and that your work defines you, and is the measure of your worth as a human being.” Even if you love your work, there’s not a person on earth who is prepared, primed and ready, to get up at the same time every day and go through the routine of the work-day for xx hours, xx weeks, for xx years. That stuff has got to take its toll. I was on the verge of breakdown after ten straight years of that vicious misery-go-round. I felt I had no choice but to quit. Ten years is about my limit. In 1995, I had saved up $25,000 and quit the architectural firm I’d worked for in various capacities since 1983. I had a $28,000 mortgage on my Portland house at the time and my payment was something like $330.00 a month—for a 4-bedroom bungalow. The primary goal of this year was simply to not work. I went to the gym, wrote, read, went to matinees, museums, whatsoever I wanted, and about a year later when I had started to run out of money, my firm offered my job back to me at a substantial increase. I immediately rented my house out and left town. Some things, one simply cannot do. THANKS, ADOLF!I met a grande dame of American cinema the other night, by which I mean one great dame. I was familiar with noir leading lady Marsha Hunt’s pedigree as actress and activist, and as she autographed her picture in my program at the reception in her honor, opening the 5th Annual NOIR CITY Festival, now back at the Castro, I took the liberty of telling her, “I hope you don’t mind my saying this, but you are one hell of a broad!” She didn’t mind at all, she loved it. It was only after she was interviewed on stage by Eddie Muller, founder of the Film Noir Foundation and emcee of the Festival, that I found out she’s also one hell of a lady. I don’t know who young women look up to these days – Tyra Banks? Hillary Clinton? Oprah Winfrey? – but I nominate Ms. Hunt as the role model for the 21st century. She radiates class. At 89 she possesses a luminescent beauty, perhaps even more so than in the free ride of youth because her face now has a lifetime of character etched into it. Ms. Hunt reflected that there was one thing about Hitler that we had to be grateful for, and that was the influx of European talent into America during WWII. “Thanks, Adolf!” she exclaimed. “Thank you,” said Muller. “That’ll be in the New York Times Monday.” But it wasn’t. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/29/movies/29noir.html?th&emc=thIt was in The Ax Files Monday. THAT LIST THAT WAS BLACKMs. Hunt’s career as an actress with 52 films under her very stylish belt, ended when she was blacklisted after joining in a contingent of 30 or so entertainment professionals including Bogart and Bacall, Danny Kaye, John Huston and Ira Gershwin, which flew to Washington to protest the actions of HUAC in charging the Hollywood Ten with contempt. When she returned to Hollywood she, and dozens of others, had been named in Red Channels: The Report of Communist Influence in Radio and Television, issued by Counterattack: The Newsletter of Facts to Combat Communism, and pretty much lost her film career. In a 1997 interview, she said she’d been told at one point “the only way I might be able to work in films again would be to denounce that flight as a serious error that has been masterminded by Communists. I knew quite to the contrary, and of course I couldn’t say or swear to such nonsense.” After that, Ms. Hunt spent 25 years working with the United Nations. “And that’s whatever happened to Marsha Hunt,” she said onstage. Ms. Hunt has said of the witch hunt: “It was a terribly, terribly painful time. It was shameful. Well, it spread across the nation, as you know. It started with Hollywood, because that’s an easy way to get headlines, but it spread to the broadcast media, to education, to even religion, and for well over a decade this was no longer the land of the free, nor the home of the brave.” Be afraid, America, be very afraid. At the end of the program, I went over to where Ms. Hunt had been watching her 25-year-old self in “Kid Glove Killer,” and bid her adieu: “Like I said, one hell of a broad!” What a privilege to have met her. And that’s what NOIR CITY is all about, celebrating the amazing pool of talent—directors, writers, actors, cinematographers—that put these chronicles of danger, despair and desperation on the big screen. CASTRO, MY CASTRO, I HAVE MISSED YOU!Yes, NOIR CITY is back at the Castro, and has given the Castro back to me. It’s really the only appropriate venue for it. I still don’t know the details of the firing of longtime Castro programmer Anita Monga two years ago, or what her current relationship with the theater is, but she did do the programming for this Festival, and whatever the arrangement, NOIR’s two-year boycott of the Castro is over. That’s going to have to be good enough for me. NOTHING LIKE NOIR“It’s what I live for,” Eddie Muller told the Chronicle, and when I’m sitting in the dark watching those dark films from the 3rd row of the Castro, I know just what he means. I don’t remember any recent film that has made me gasp and exclaim, talk back to the characters and chew my nails like “99 River Street” did tonight—plus there’s a cigarette lighting scene between Evelyn Keyes and Brad Dexter so sexy it might as well have been sex. BLACK GOLDNoir was the golden age of cinema, in my book. And nothing self-conscious, look at me!, about these films, they just cranked out classics one after another, with great style, great stars, great stories, great dialogue, great photography and great atmosphere, even the B stuff. A great William Bowers line from “Cry Danger,” a film featuring 2nd-night guest Richard Erdman. He walks into a dilapidated trailer and comments, “Well the place looks lived in.” William Powell: “Yeah, but by what?” DOUBLE TROUBLEEveryone knows the classics, like “Double Indemnity,” containing this sparkling exchange between insurance salesman Fred McMurray and married femme fatale Barbara Stanwyck: Babs: Mr. Neff, why don’t you drop by tomorrow evening around 8:30, he’ll be in then. Fred: Who? Babs: My husband. You were anxious to talk to him weren’t you? Fred: Yeah I was, but I’m sort of getting over the idea if you know what I mean. Babs: There’s a speed limit in this state, Mr. Neff. 45 miles an hour. Fred: How fast was I going, officer? Babs: I’d say around 90. Fred: Suppose you get down off your motorcycle and give me a ticket? Babs: Suppose I let you off with a warning this time. Fred: Suppose it doesn’t take? Babs: Suppose I have to whack you over the knuckles. Fred: Suppose I bust out crying and put my head on your shoulder? Babs: Suppose you try putting it on my husband’s shoulder. Fred: That tears it. Great stuff, but the Festival showcases 12 films billed “RARITY!!! NEVER ON VHS OR DVD!” that you just won’t see elsewhere. Films like “Abandoned” (RARE AS THEY COME!!!), “I Love Trouble,” a new 35mm print, struck expressly for Noir City 5, “Pushover,” Kim Novak’s film debut, and two “RARE BEEFCAKE” Burt Lancaster titles, “I Walk Alone,” and “Kiss the Blood Off My Hands.” How can you resist a title like that (or Burt Beefcake)? And who knows, perhaps someone like Tab Hunter will just show up. There’s still plenty of time to check it out: http://www.thecastrotheatre.com/p-list.html http://www.filmnoirfoundation.org/ ELSEWHERE IN ENTERTAINMENTin the Guilty Pleasure category: Why couldn’t Michael Jackson have left well enough alone, and stopped messing with his face in the Thriller era? He at least looked like a human being, possessed good color, was actually an attractive guy and not a pinch-nosed bleached-out lawsuit-magnet freakshow. It’s only because I’m a film buff that I downloaded his video of “Bad” from I-Tunes (yeah right). The damn thing was directed by Martin Scorcese. Though someone on YouTube commented: “Gayest. Video. Ever.” – I disagree. Or, I don’t care. Kind of like what Chloë Sevigny said to Hilary Swank in “Boys Don’t Cry”—I don’t care what you are. Nor do I give a damn what manner of creature Michael is, he is just downright scorching in this thing. I’d have sex with his clothes. The studded hip belts alone are worth the price of admission. Fuck, I’ll take his pelvis over Elvis. And check out the challenge on his face as he does that come hither / I dare you thing with his middle finger—ouch. The dude is bad. Bad because he’s so damn good. Even the dorkier Jackson signature moves are presented With Authority, and he projects a true gang leader air of danger, make-up or not. He doesn’t care what you think he is either, he is quite simply the master of his domain! He’s tougher than the muscleman tough guys behind him. The furrows between his brows, the veins in his neck, his taunting demeanor, damn the guy was a hot, hot, hottie! I want to dance with that gang, I want to run with that pack, I am ready to rum-ble! West Side Story, move over. Who bad? You bad! THE ROOMThough Nicolas Cage was once in my “room” (the warehouse of people I would have sex with if I had the chance) I had to banish him because I could never have sex with someone (Nic) who has had sex with someone (Lisa Presley) who has had sex with Michael Jackson (assuming they did). Now I find I’d like to go back in time and forcibly drag the bad boy himself into the room! (Life is funny that way.) There might be a whip involved. WHO’S IN THE ROOM?My buddy Pete and I would say of someone: “Is he in the room?” “Is she in the room?” (kind of like Danielle’s and my man-meter at Burning Man: “Dinner or desert?”) It’s a crowded and diversely populated room, I must say. I guarantee you someone you know is in it. Maybe even you. (But if you’re not don’t go getting the wrong idea.) I’ll drop just one name. Diego Luna!! But perhaps I should remain chaste with the boy. I don’t want to get too close to the mystery. Nah, yes I do. Truly intriguing people can’t be solved like a crossword puzzle. In fact getting closer might land you farther away. So I hope Diego googles himself and reads this column. THE LISTRoss and Rachel on “Friends” had a similar “list” of I think five celebrities they had free passes for, but most people’s lists have no bearing on reality as to their likelihood to follow through on a genuine opportunity with, say, their gardener, or 12-year-old’s teacher. Most people’s lists are people they would like to have sex with; my list is of those I would have sex with, at the right time and place, given their consensual participation, because there would be nothing stopping me. I am free from conventional expectations of traditional relationships. I don’t need all that boyfriend / husband stuff; I’m happy on my own and don’t want all of anybody, because no one will ever have all of me. It’s not realistic; it’s not even possible. First off the fellow would have to get over my relationship with Jack Kerouac. It doesn’t preclude having profoundly intimate connections with people. I’ll just never tell someone, all or nothing at all; “something” is just fine with me. (Moral issues would be negotiated on a case-by-case basis.) CAN YOU FIND LOVE IN THE ROOM?Since the room and the list are hypothetical and there’s little chance I will actually run into Steve Carrell (I love him!) and find him amenable, I won’t confuse the issue with considerations of “love” and “in love” and the effects those conditions have on people’s behavior, because as Zoë Heller put it, “Being in love is a condition, isn’t it? It’s like being depressed. Or like being in a cult. You’re basically underwater—people can talk to you about life on dry land, but it doesn’t really mean anything…” And as Tom Robbins said, love is “the full trip…the grand tour: fall in love, visit both Heaven and Hell for the price of one.” The intent of the fantasy room is heavenly sex and not hellish love. But that’s why most people would not enact the fantasy—because intentions have nothing to do with what actually happens when separate energies combine on the material plane. Suddenly your free pass gets cancelled, and there’s hell—or heaven—to pay. But you don’t get to taste heaven without courting hell… Looks like my intention to post shorter pieces more often has once more failed, because after all, I live on Slowpoke Rd., where everything happens in the fullness of time.
The author will be appearing liveat the Castro, nightly throughFebruary 4th
------------------------------------------------------------ Don't bore me.
Would you like to see my room? copyright Alexandra Jones 2007 |
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