Inauguration Day

On Monday, I was sending out a text to a friend to wish them a happy Dr. King day. I linked in a video of U2 singing at President Obama's inauguration concert in 2009 when he first took office. The President invited Bono and the boys because they are great ... no really, the campaign had featured U2's music prominently. Naturally, U2 performed on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial "Pride, In the Name of Love," which commemorates Dr. King's legacy.

When Obama won and the inauguration was being planned, HBO announced that they would televise every moment of the momentous occasion of America's first black president being elected into office. And for this, HBO extended a temporary membership to cable subscribers so that subscribers everyone would have the  opportunity to follow the events of the days that surrounded the big event. I signed up immediately because I didn't want to miss any part of the celebration, and that U2 was performing made it even more enticing.

Re-watching the performance this week, I became so aware of my feelings about the 2016 election and my reaction to it. Watching Bono bound out child-like (or geeky teenager) excitement across the marble steps leading to the Lincoln Memorial, I remembered how optimistic I felt about the country at that time, the President, and the change that would come with his promise. In this shot, Bono sits on the stairs after the performance and looks ready for the possibility of it all. It was an amazing time for everything that Obama said that we needed to call on: hope, change, and the ability to make it happen. Yes, we can. Yes, we did. The first months of the presidency were tricky. The leftovers from the previous administration would seem to be the sledge hammer that would fall on hope and change, but it never did. For eight years, through times that moved in a pattern of up and down as all time does, possibility was never lost.

I have no interest in the Inauguration today. I don't want to listen to President Trump mumble through mesh ideas that aren't fundamentally American. I live next to the state that Mike Pence ran with intolerance and weak ideologies. Come live in Indiana, we have a balanced budget reads the billboards out to my mom's house on the border. No, that's all right. I would rather live in my broke-ass, broken down mess of state than move somewhere that allows for a business man to refuse to make a cake for a gay couple's wedding. In Bono's words, "I want to close my eyes and make it go away." It won't. But I am not so sure about how much of this sideshow that I can actually take. There will be no HBO for me this time around.

But I will not give up hope. I made a promise 8 years ago which was to say that I can. So, I will. And if we all will ourselves to move forward in grace and with hope, we can't lose. We just can't.

Haley Bennett

Vogue December 2016

Do you know her? I've been reading her name a lot lately, but I haven't seen her in "The Girl on the Train," "The Magnificent Seven," or "Rules Don't Apply." What I did see was this spectacular dress that she's wearing on  the pages of Vogue. I don't typically like the sheer dress/underwear look, but this Valentino number is truly magnificent. I love the up to the neck, sleeves to the fingers, and covering bib that gives the illusion that the dress is prudish. It isn't, of course. But it seems like it might be if the lace was replaced by some good old-fashioned cotton lawn. Maybe I like it because the red pops out from a dull background. It brightens the perspective. Although it was published in December, it came to me in January, after the lights, champagne, and general frolic of the holiday season. I reminds me to rage against the dull of shorter days colder light.

For Miss Haley, after having read the associated article, I have seen her on screen in "Music and Lyrics," which starred Drew Barrymore and Hugh Grant. I own a copy as I do most of Grant's work because he is adorable. In the movie, Grant is a wash-up teen idol who hasn't written a hit song for years until he meets Drew Barrymore. Together, they write a new song for a pop star, who is played by Bennett. It's a cute movie, and Bennett is believable as a, for the time, Britney Spears kind of personality. About two years ago, my nephew learned to play the song that she sings for the piano. A crush liked the song, so he played it. How adorable, right? Well the movie and Bennett were just that too.

Winter Blue

A few weeks ago, as we battled extreme cold in our building, a woman said to me, 'don't you hate winter?' Actually, I told her, having lived in Chicago for my whole life, I'm fairly used to plunging temperatures, piles of snow, and dark evenings. Sure, it's dipped back down to the single digits now, and the wind chill is pulling it even lower, but it has blended into the cycle of my life. And in times of uncertainty, knowing what to expect is a great comfort. Plus, when it is really cold outside, the sky is a spectacular shade of blue. Cold burns through clouds and finds for me the color of the Caribbean waters that I have swam in Puerto Rico's western beaches, which is the islands most beautiful encanto. I see that and find a great warmth in the sky, even as cold as it is.

The Lovings

Vogue November 2016

A pretty picture to begin the New Year. Always a fan of pattern play, I'm drawn to the interest that the red flower brings to make the look less blue. For 2017, instead of wearing pant suits to make a point, I say we all tuck a red flower into a headscarf to identify the movement for a brighter future than what is on hand for us this month for what is being served to us.

The actress, Ruth Negga, stars in the latest version of the story of Mildred Jeter and Richard Loving, who, as a bi-racial couple, were not allowed to marry in a 1950's State of Virginia. The couple was raised in a community where it was not unusual for a 'mixed race' couple to form, yet they were forced to move to Washington, D.C. to marry and live. At the suggestion of another, Mildred wrote to then U.S. Attorney General Robert Kennedy to expose the injustice of Virginia's law that kept her from living her life where it was meant to be lived out, in her home state with her family and friends. Kennedy got the letter, and the Lovings became quiet activists who turned a personal desire into a national concern.

Their story is not unfamiliar to me. In 1996, Timothy Hutton, Lela Rochon, and Ruby Dee stared in a version of it. I recorded it from a television showing, and I have shown it to students for years. The tape doesn't include the last fifteen minutes of the movie for an unknown or resolved reason, but students don't need to see the whole film to be pulled into discovering real events of the Civil Rights movement in our country. Since it is the story of two 'star crossed lovers,' it captures their attention and draws them into the bigger ideas of the movement.

I haven't seen the 2016 film, "Loving," that is in theaters now. I'm not so sure that I will see it in a theater. I love Lela Rochon's portrayal of Mildred. She plays the role simply and with the naivete of the bigger world that I would imagine a mountain girl would possess. Hutton is awfully cute, and the Australian actor who plays him in the newest version may physically resemble Loving more, but he and Rochon have a chemistry that makes even the hardest nosed boys in any of my classes swoon a little bit. It is a love story after all. And though they faced a huge state bully, which hasn't changed much in light of how Virginia voted in the election, continued to be a couple. It didn't break them; they broke it.

Alexander McQueen

Vogue September 2016

Last week, I attended a metaphor workshop at Poetry magazine library. One of the poems presented in the workshop ended with only the chimney remaining after the end of a passionate relationship. The house of it burned to the ground. When I saw this advertisement in the September issue of  Vogue, I immediately thought of the poem. It illustrates the exact sense of loss that the poet was trying to convey, including the isolated figure left behind in the fall-out. Although the poet was a man, the lonely, female figure standing next to chimney in this photograph works. 

But what is she wearing? McQueen, of course. It is a long gown from the look of it. And in black and white it is hard to sense the color; however, it looks dark. Shall I go as far as charred? It survived the flame, but it is scarred. I would like for it also to be deconstructed ... unfinished seams, hems, and an exposed zipper. It is the dress that one would wear when one is left behind in the ruin.

Shameless

Yes, I am late to the 'Shameless' party, Showtime's better American version of a British hit, which I am surprised about, for the fact that I'm just fine with the good ole U.S. of A's version of it ... English accents be damned! The actors are what makes this show impossible to stop to watching.

Admittedly, the show is absurd. Who lives like this? But there is enough about the truth in some of what is the unimaginable to be able to identify some characterization that I am not wholly unfamiliar with. A drunk Dad? Yeah, I know a little bit about that from the block ... maybe some from my own home. When Frank, the drunk Dad, opens up a can of Old Style, it's hard not to think about my own Father. Of course, mine didn't sit at a bar, pass out in the street, or sell his children's whatever to buy him another drink, drug, or the like. But when Frank rants with a beer in in his paw, I can hear my Dad in him. Frank is a drunk, but he isn't stupid. And he usually rants when he's down something wrong because it reminds him of what should be right, but isn't. My Dad would not rant as often, but he was happy to let you know what he thought about any thing in particular, and he was informed. It went through the Dad-filter, but it wasn't far off of a mark. William H. Macy plays Frank, and he's the best that I've seen him. His character is so disgusting, but he pulls a humanness out of the old boy to make him, possibly, likable. You don't want to like him, but it is hard to resist.

Fiona is another character that I understand coming from a family of four kids and being the eldest girl. I know what that means. Fiona has so much more responsibility than I would have ever had to take on given that she is the parent in the house; nonetheless, there is a charge that comes when one is the oldest girl. When Mom and Dad aren't around, it usually fell to me to take charge. And they complain that I'm bossy now. Umph! They would know what that was if they had been raised in my position.

My favorite character ... probably because I met her at church a couple of Christmas Eves ago, is Sheila, acted by Joan Cusack. Sheila is complicated. And each complication moves across her face effortlessly. She portrays the character as naive, quirky, and lost in a world that she wants to be in but doesn't understand. Plus, she is naughty. On Christmas Eve, our family goes downtown to eat under the tree, see Santa, and go to mass at the big church. Once, in the 'welcome your neighbor' part of the show, a woman turned to me and said, 'hi, my name is Joan.' She didn't have to tell me who she was as I knew the whole time that she was sitting next to me. I can't wait for the day that she's seated next to me again when I can say when she introduces herself, 'okay ... Sheila!' I should look up to see if she's won an Emmy for her role because she certainly deserves it. Maybe, I should mock up an Emmy just in case that she hasn't to present to her at mass. That would be a laugh.

I well into the fourth season now ... there may be 6 or 7 or 8, I'm not sure. And it has moved into some serious shit ... there's no other way of describing it. And I wonder if it's gone too far. But I will binge on. They are like family at the end of the day.