gilded era

my roommate, annie miller (the pretty lady in the middle of the picture below), threw herself a birthday for the big 3-0 last week... a 20's lawn party. it was beautiful. everyone was beautiful. in fact, i believe we would all have been a lot better looking in the 20's. and the hit of the night? a photo booth courtesy of janine sides. if you look this good, shouldn't it be captured on film?

totally radical

THIS is what I'm talking about. 

WWTFFD?

When you like American military history as much as I do, every day is Memorial Day, people. The American war du jour? The Revolutionary War. It all started with the John Adams HBO mini-series (pure awesome-ness). The family watched it over Christmas, pausing to discuss all the early politicking that got the upstart colonialists in a tussle with the most powerful army and navy of the world at the time. That’s when I realized how moderate I am. I found Bostonians to be a blood-thirsty mob of terrorists, and had I a vote in the Continental Congress in June 1775, I would’ve condemned the radical war-mongers from New England and urged more peacemaking with King George.

And my inner Tory goes further: I just might’ve shirked from allegiance to the patriots. When in 1776, the Brits decided it was business time and rolled into the New York Harbor with over 400 ships outfitted with tens of thousands of canons and carrying over 60,000 troops, I’m not sure I would’ve been brave enough to stand with George Washington and his band of 16,000 farmers and shop keepers.

And if the largest Armada ever assembled hadn’t done the trick, the New York battles would’ve broken my support. Washington lost – definitively – the first four out of five battles and the only reason the Continental Army wasn’t completely decimated is because fate stepped in and weather covered every retreat. Mother Nature was the MVP in Washington’s first five battles because Washington himself, as heretical as it is to say, made rookie mistakes. Big, awful mistakes. I guess that’s what happens when someone who had heretofore only managed a regiment takes on (it’s worth saying again) the most powerful army and navy in the world. Washington didn’t have one boat, for crying out loud. His soldiers didn’t have shoes!

Of course, history tells me my blood saving, peacemaking view is wrong. 1775 was the right time to jump into the great unknown -- armed with the right ideas and the right people if not all the correct battle accoutrements. Moderation isn’t always the safest, best course. Sometimes the times call for our indignation + action.

This new, aggressive thought draws my attention to the current front page. What would Adams have said about the GM bailout? Would Alexander Hamilton have gone apoplectic at the descent into national-security-threatening debt to China or is the bail-out, with all its risks, exactly the right solution? Would Benjamin Franklin have silently allowed our national press to founder, leaving us without a watchdog of government and human nature - a role so vital in a democracy that it rated a mention in the Constitution? It might be ok to be moderate with all the easy questions but for these hard ones... well... I'm thinking it's time to get radical. 

letter to the first lady

dear eve -- 

i've been thinking about you, there in the garden experiencing the same -- if perfect -- day over and over. i wonder if the apple was a premeditated scheme. were you happy to blame the serpent for the fantastic plan you cooked up to get out of the routine? i wonder -- and perhaps this is a bit graphic -- did you have a period? did you wonder exactly how that biological nuisance fit into the plan if you were to stay childlike and childless? did that monthly interruption of perfection give you the insight and courage to do what adam could not: see a life outside the garden? 

were you afraid? when you took a bite of that apple, did it occur to you that adam might let you go and that you would be yes -- as wise as the gods, but still childless and now all alone and cast out. did you rehearse a few ways to present the original ultimatum to adam? whatever you said, it worked. we single girls could take a lesson on convincing a man that comfort and ease don't trump the terrifying unknowns outside the perimeter if you've got a good companion. surely being the only woman put a check in your plus column.  

we're a grateful world that adam took the bait although your curse is with us today. see, despite the eons of time between your shot at mortality and mine, the nature of man (and woman) hasn't changed much. we women are still usually the first to get the itchin' to leave the garden. most every woman that's walked the earth since you, flesh of your flesh, has been cursed to replay your definitive scene in the garden. some of us a few times. only now that scary apple has been replaced with other symbols: a ball and chain, a baby rattle, a diamond ring. millions of pages have been written on how a woman can convince her adam to commit to a new life... did this genesis of relationship stories set the template?  and any tips for a girl without access to forbidden fruit and fielding a handful -- ok a world -- of other females that sometimes can distract even the good adams.

help a sista out,

k

jenna -- this one's for you

so you say you check in on my blog to see what i'm doing, jenna? that must be a disappointment for you. well, no more. welcome to your christmas miracle: a brand new blog post just for you...that says nothing at all. kinda like a toothless abominable snowman, ain't it? (still my favorite christmas movie of ALL time, that "rudolf the red nose reindeer.") and yes. the elf who wants to be a dentist is gay, just like the benevolent lion with wings that rules over the island of the misfit toys. now that island. THERE'S some blog material. i know that island. i might even live there. i wish mormon singles would incorporate some of the honesty those misfit toys oh so easily display. like the train that let's you know upfront he has square not round wheels on his caboose, or the bird who confesses those wings are just window dressing, he swims with the fish. how refreshing would that be? "i'm john, i might appear normal but i'm just looking for the next best thing and will only like you for 2 months tops." or "i'm suzy, well-adjusted on the outside, measuring you against my father on the inside." it would make more efficient dating, is all i'm saying.

but i digress.  merry christmas to you, jenna stott riggs, and also to the thousands of you that visit my blog daily for the frequent updates. and as a little treat, i leave you with this little gift o the season.

after school special

my cousin weston is a sophomore in high school. he got himself in a spot of trouble with a senior -- a good sized senior -- on account of the senior's girlfriend. apparently she was "talking to" weston. apparently "talking to" is a new category of relationship. it's the step after just crushing and before "going together." obviously this senior could not stand for such behavior and so his people scheduled a little conflict resolution with weston's people: after school, under the bleachers. weston missed the appointment. but weston couldn't run forever. the senior caught him when weston was out playing football with some of his fellows.  turns out that senior shouldn't have been so eager for a showdown. and i can tell you this story because some enterprising observer got the whole thing with their iphone and posted it on youtube. nothing's secret people. observe my boy weston -- the one in the blue shorts.

vote the bums out

so... you've seen the front pages, with all those downward trending arrows. all that red ink running down the front page would be our market, our economy, the future of our country. and while i've got a load of moral problems with digging out wall street after their reckless credit spree, it's clear the bail-out matters. stocks around the world rise and fall and banks fail or live to fight another day based on the word from the floor -- not the trading floor of the NYSE, mind you, but the floor of congress. and though our representative government can't pull it together to agree on a plan to salvage the wreck of our economy, they WERE able to agree on $630 billion budget bill yesterday. it was crafted in secret, voted on before anyone could read the 300 + pages and filled with at least $20 billion of pork for pet projects, and more for oil and auto industry subsidies... oh, and almost $500 billion --  a record-breaking outlay -- for the Pentagon for those twin regime-change projects in iraq and afghanistan. i get it. it's an election year and our congress people have to give back for the hefty campaign contributions they've received from big business, and defense, oil and auto give big in election years. but why aren't the little people getting together and teaching our representatives about fiscal responsibility by voting the bums right out of a job?  try balancing YOUR budget on the unemployment line, fella. 

i'm just saying.