A girl of eight, in coral jeans and boots, walks from one room to another. "Oh, here's that guy again!" she exclaims, pointing to thick paint and swirls.
Farther down the gallery, the straw-hatted man is a glimpse of blue and gold--too far away to confirm if that was a smile hovering around his lips.
1/18/2009
12/09/2008
demography
As I wait for the train, at that time that is both early in the morning and late at night, two young men who look like they should still have bedtimes sit down next to me. The one with a skateboard is white, his friend is Hispanic. Both have piercings that suggest awkward a bit more than they suggest hip.
"Did you see that one chick I made out with?" asks the boy who is white.
His friend shrugs.
"She was white, I think," says the first. He proceeds to list off the night's conquests by race: four white girls, two black girls, one Asian chick [at this point I begin to doubt his reliability], and, to top it off, a few Hispanic girls.
I remain in a quandary of mirth and horror. What astonishes, one top of everything else, is how accurately his demographics mimic the nation's.
"Did you see that one chick I made out with?" asks the boy who is white.
His friend shrugs.
"She was white, I think," says the first. He proceeds to list off the night's conquests by race: four white girls, two black girls, one Asian chick [at this point I begin to doubt his reliability], and, to top it off, a few Hispanic girls.
I remain in a quandary of mirth and horror. What astonishes, one top of everything else, is how accurately his demographics mimic the nation's.
12/06/2008
Revelation 19:16
Signing for packages at a certain New York publication, the delivery man points to my bare upper arm (the offices of the publication are excessively warm) and says I should get a tattoo there. I sigh and explain that I can never decide what to get.
"Get this," he says, lifting his shirt to reveal a life-sized handgun tattooed over his breastbone.
"Now how did you decide on that?" I ask.
"I was in a gang in L.A.," he tells me. "It was a long time ago."
The tattoo is slightly gray, as old tattoos go. He heads out to his next delivery. I turn back to my computer, editing a podcast about the legality of torture, a podcast about the science of loneliness.
"Get this," he says, lifting his shirt to reveal a life-sized handgun tattooed over his breastbone.
"Now how did you decide on that?" I ask.
"I was in a gang in L.A.," he tells me. "It was a long time ago."
The tattoo is slightly gray, as old tattoos go. He heads out to his next delivery. I turn back to my computer, editing a podcast about the legality of torture, a podcast about the science of loneliness.
11/22/2008
Epiphany
Fact: on any given day, at least sixty percent of the people at my local branch library will be in a bad mood.
Having braved the grumps of Epiphany to check out Gilead and The Art of Fiction (thanks Ms. Nosneb), I was disgruntled to discover that someone has, at least throughout the preface, penciled in an s in front of every he. I am an advocate of marking--in pencil--sections of interest, but this I cannot abide. It seems to me that any person reading The Art of Fiction should have the good sense to know that this exercise in silliness isn't really doing anything for the state of women other than distracting them with ugliness.
Having braved the grumps of Epiphany to check out Gilead and The Art of Fiction (thanks Ms. Nosneb), I was disgruntled to discover that someone has, at least throughout the preface, penciled in an s in front of every he. I am an advocate of marking--in pencil--sections of interest, but this I cannot abide. It seems to me that any person reading The Art of Fiction should have the good sense to know that this exercise in silliness isn't really doing anything for the state of women other than distracting them with ugliness.
11/19/2008
the short answer
This seems to be a week of channeling ire toward standardized testing. Perhaps it's just a reflex; this is the time of year where, if I was still teaching, the districts would bring out the benchmark tests--practice tests written in-house, which guaranteed two things: a badly written test that provided no helpful results, and a squandered week of school. After November benchmarking, it was time for December review and polishing. Rest up on winter break, because when you burst into the classrooms in January, it's time for the the six week sprint before state testing. In many ways, the approach mimicked the activities of a person hoping to be in shape for a Spring Break cruise: curse yourself for all those years of overeating and then employ all sorts of desperate tactics--starvation, colon cleanses, exercising in plastic--to make up for lost time. Don't worry--keep it up and I'm sure you'll look great next year.
Actually, this is a terrible metaphor. For more productive information, read this piece by someone who's graded standardized test essays for the last 14 years. I have some pity for him for doing this (it must be a mind-numbing task) but, hey, he's writing a book about it, so my jealousy balances that out.
Actually, this is a terrible metaphor. For more productive information, read this piece by someone who's graded standardized test essays for the last 14 years. I have some pity for him for doing this (it must be a mind-numbing task) but, hey, he's writing a book about it, so my jealousy balances that out.
11/16/2008
wonky wishes
I have sighed many times over Joan Acocella's writing--a sigh of desperate admiration. In a recent New Yorker article on the rise of overparenting, Acocella makes a succinct and astute observation:
Of course, like most selfish impulses, it's wildly illogical and will, at some point, come to a diseased and deadly fruition (known in Texas as shooting oneself in the foot). As Adrienne Rich observed:
Relatedly, the connections between George W. Bush and the testing companies were made years ago, but this remains an excellent article about the other economic wish that drove the development of No Child Left Behind. If there is one quality I will allow G.W.B., it is that he seems to know how to have fun. But I am befuddled by his cronyism: based on their inane curriculum and testing materials, the friends that made millions off NCLB appear to be the dullest of people.
No Child Left Behind: that sounds like the expression of a democratic wish. More likely, it was the product of an economic wish--that America not be left behind by India and China.If one has any doubt this truth, let me show you the latest language on the need for a successful education system--it is tinged with a fear of losing our accustomed world order. Battalions of foreign students breath down our necks. We must devour our math and science textbooks not because their content might help us unlock the beauty and power of scientific and mathematical theory, but because a country that can't add can't calculate tax breaks for U.S. corporations; a country that can't reason through science experiments won't own the means of energy production. In the new era of xenophobia, it's not that we can't imagine a world where resources are freely shared, but that we can imagine it all too well--we see that it means we might have to give things up.
Of course, like most selfish impulses, it's wildly illogical and will, at some point, come to a diseased and deadly fruition (known in Texas as shooting oneself in the foot). As Adrienne Rich observed:
Universal public education has two possible--and contradictory--missions. One is the development of a literate, articulate, and well-informed citizenry so that the democratic process can continue to evolve and the promise of radical equality can be brought closer to realization. The other is the perpetuation of a class system dividing an elite, nominally "gifted" few, tracked from an early age, from a very large underclass essentially to be written off as the alienated from language and science, from poetry and politics, from history and hope, an underclass to be funneled--whatever its dreams and hopes--toward low-wage temporary jobs. ...The results are devastating in terms of the betrayal of a generation of youth. The loss to the whole society is incalculable.Writing this in 1997, Rich was specifically referring to tracking, which has passed out of vogue in its most blatant forms. But regardless of this, we must remember that tracking was merely a symptom of a larger fear-plagued motivation--a motivation that remains just as viable in 2008 as it did during the Cold War.
Relatedly, the connections between George W. Bush and the testing companies were made years ago, but this remains an excellent article about the other economic wish that drove the development of No Child Left Behind. If there is one quality I will allow G.W.B., it is that he seems to know how to have fun. But I am befuddled by his cronyism: based on their inane curriculum and testing materials, the friends that made millions off NCLB appear to be the dullest of people.
11/13/2008
11/04/2008
the varied carols I hear
Times Square on November 4: it is perhaps one of the few times the Square is full of native New Yorkers. We are celebrating not the fall of a new year and soon-to-be broken resolutions, but something real, something hopeful, something that requires Walt Whitman and a few good yalps.
An NYFD firetruck attempts to navigate the throngs. Our eyes on the screen high above the vertex of Broadway and Seventh Avenue, we part slowly. The driver begins to tap on the horn, syncopating the blasts, and we join in: "O-ba-ma! Yes we can! O-ba-ma!" We wave as they crawl by. One fireman, suited up, arm on the windowframe, puffs on a cigar.
An NYFD firetruck attempts to navigate the throngs. Our eyes on the screen high above the vertex of Broadway and Seventh Avenue, we part slowly. The driver begins to tap on the horn, syncopating the blasts, and we join in: "O-ba-ma! Yes we can! O-ba-ma!" We wave as they crawl by. One fireman, suited up, arm on the windowframe, puffs on a cigar.
10/25/2008
10/21/2008
zip codes
Last year I tutored at a school in Brooklyn. You could see the Empire State building from the classroom, but life still seemed far removed from "the city"—although one student surely had studied the subway map more than once, he was shocked to learn that the East River flowed half a mile from his doorstep. "There's no water around here," he insisted.
Now I work within a few blocks of the familiar Empire spire, at a charter school in Chelsea. The sixth graders have made multi-page, multi-colored reports on their neighborhoods: Gramercy Park, the West Village, the Lower East Side; their projects are more developed than a number of high schoolers' I've seen. It's a magnet school for readers and writers. When they finish tests they pull out hardbound sketchbooks and begin doodling. Last week the seventh graders held a raucous impromptu debate on disposing of nuclear waste. (As precocious as they appear, I must say I am glad they aren't calling the shots on that piece of policy. Some of them hardly quibbled over the pitfalls of shooting plutonium into space—one trigger-happy girl had a disturbingly detailed plan to deposit it on the moon.)
When I introduce myself on my first day of work, a few classes break out in applause when I tell them I'm studying journalism at New York University. Many of them are members of the newspaper club, which is anxiously awaiting publication of its first issue. The newspaper's political writer, a bespectacled sixth grader, tells me it should hit the stands by Election Day. “Election Day?” asks the boy beside him, although a second later he knocks the palm of his hand on his forehead. “Oh yeah! Obama!” He raises his hand in the air, and his tablemates lift their hands in solidarity and simultaneously cry, "Obama!" The original instigator, a slight boy with cornrows, grabs my wrist and tries to push it in the air. Seeing as the city has forbidden public school teachers to promote candidates, I resist, but can't help telling him, "Obama wants you to do your homework."
They ask which publications I want to write for. I mumble something about the New Yorker, and they bob their heads in recognition. One girl raises her hand: "My friend's dad is the music critic at the New Yorker," she says.
"Sasha Frere-Jones?" I stammer. She nods. I ask if she ever read his pieces. Sometimes, she says.
Later in the day, a boy comes over and asks if I want to be a journalist or a teacher when I grow up. I tell him I used to be a teacher and now I’d like to write about teachers. I say nothing about my age or state of grown up-ness.
They may need some clarity on the nuclear issue, but at the very least, they are generous.
Now I work within a few blocks of the familiar Empire spire, at a charter school in Chelsea. The sixth graders have made multi-page, multi-colored reports on their neighborhoods: Gramercy Park, the West Village, the Lower East Side; their projects are more developed than a number of high schoolers' I've seen. It's a magnet school for readers and writers. When they finish tests they pull out hardbound sketchbooks and begin doodling. Last week the seventh graders held a raucous impromptu debate on disposing of nuclear waste. (As precocious as they appear, I must say I am glad they aren't calling the shots on that piece of policy. Some of them hardly quibbled over the pitfalls of shooting plutonium into space—one trigger-happy girl had a disturbingly detailed plan to deposit it on the moon.)
When I introduce myself on my first day of work, a few classes break out in applause when I tell them I'm studying journalism at New York University. Many of them are members of the newspaper club, which is anxiously awaiting publication of its first issue. The newspaper's political writer, a bespectacled sixth grader, tells me it should hit the stands by Election Day. “Election Day?” asks the boy beside him, although a second later he knocks the palm of his hand on his forehead. “Oh yeah! Obama!” He raises his hand in the air, and his tablemates lift their hands in solidarity and simultaneously cry, "Obama!" The original instigator, a slight boy with cornrows, grabs my wrist and tries to push it in the air. Seeing as the city has forbidden public school teachers to promote candidates, I resist, but can't help telling him, "Obama wants you to do your homework."
They ask which publications I want to write for. I mumble something about the New Yorker, and they bob their heads in recognition. One girl raises her hand: "My friend's dad is the music critic at the New Yorker," she says.
"Sasha Frere-Jones?" I stammer. She nods. I ask if she ever read his pieces. Sometimes, she says.
Later in the day, a boy comes over and asks if I want to be a journalist or a teacher when I grow up. I tell him I used to be a teacher and now I’d like to write about teachers. I say nothing about my age or state of grown up-ness.
They may need some clarity on the nuclear issue, but at the very least, they are generous.
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