Leesburg Essay 8

Alex

Felicie recently e-mailed an update on Alex’s condition, which I will generally reproduce here. Alex has had several more sessions of the chemo she started before Christmas. She has continued to feel better and has been able to start doing more. New Hampshire has had lots of snow this winter, and she's been cross-country skiing on the road through their woods. She bought snowshoes and has gone snowshoeing as well. She has stopped taking pain medication and says she feels great.

She had a CAT scan on March 10th. The results showed that the cancer remains stable (no spreading; no shrinkage). The chemo program she is on now has almost no side effects (just a little tiredness for a couple of days). She will continue on this chemo program for the time being, as long as she continues to feel good and the cancer is stable.

Campaign Notes

The press recently called out Hillary Clinton for comments during a speech in Ohio that appeared indirectly to disparage daughter Chelsea’s job at a hedge fund. The upshot of her comment was that under the current tax code, investment bankers can end up paying a lower percentage of their income in taxes than someone in a lower income bracket, which is discouraging to people who don’t make a lot of money. (Michelle Obama delivered a similar message, also in a speech in Ohio, advising young people not to go into corporate America but to become teachers and the like). I don’t have anything against investment bankers, and certainly even liberals can be investment bankers, but an interesting comparison is Chelsea’s career vs. those of Jenna and Barbara Bush, given the worship (maybe at last fading) of the Clintons by many Democrats. Jenna and Barbara are the ones who have chosen careers that are low paid and altruistic, while the presumably liberal Chelsea Clinton has gone into money.

Up to this point in the campaign I have been in the ABH (Anyone But Hillary) camp, although who could root against the woman who brought peace to Northern Ireland? I realize that ABH is dangerous, given my concerns about Obama’s economic populism, especially with regard to trade, his stated goal to pull out of Iraq as fast as possible (will he be sending a rep to Iraq’s government to assure them quietly that it’s just campaign rhetoric?), and the latest flap over his ties to the radical preacher. I will vote for John McCain (as George points out I’ve done this before), but my main goal is not to have the Clintons back in the White House (well, I voted for them—once—as well). Hillary fired some staff a couple of months back but it’s too bad the staff can’t fire the candidate. At least Obama said the right things during the Duke Lacrosse scandal (see below).

Economic Populism Reconsidered

After noting my concerns about economic populism, I’ll indulge in some of my own. I think it’s ridiculous when politicians pander to consumers who have spent their way into massive consumer debt, and when credit card companies get the blame for people unable to control themselves. Credit card companies, however, are shameless when it comes to working you over with fees and hidden costs. One month I sent in our credit card payment as usual, and, as far as I’m aware, for the first time ever, the check literally got lost in the mail. Concerned that it might have gone astray, I called the credit card company (Bank of America, BOA), sent out another payment, and put a stop payment on the AWOL check. Well, as it happens, a couple of weeks later my errant check arrived at BOA and they tried to cash it. Because there was a stop payment the check bounced and BOA charged me a $40 fee. At the time they received this errant check we owed them no money and the check was in a greater amount than the amount currently on the card.

At that time we used the card for everything, including groceries, because we got one percent cash back on all purchases, and so we probably generated all sorts of merchant fees for them. When I called and explained the circumstances (including the fact that their own rep told me to make sure to put a stop payment on the check), reminded them how much we use their card, and asked them to waive the fee, they refused, and not nicely either. I was, to put it mildly, annoyed. As a result I stopped using the card for our normal purchases and plan to cancel it in the near future.

I had a similar experience when I called BOA to obtain copies of back statements on our account as an aid in calculating foreign transactions over the course of a number of years. A class action lawsuit against credit card companies covers the period when we were in Berlin and had a lot of “foreign” transactions on our card; card holders can receive a small percentage refund for the total of all such transactions. BOA quoted me some ridiculous fee per statement (like $10 each per statement for 24 statements) for the copies and neglected to mention that the fee would be waived if my request was related to the legal settlement. The rep only volunteered this information reluctantly after I gasped and laughed and said that it was utterly ridiculous given that I was supporting my claim in a lawsuit against them. Our other credit card company—Citibank—had no such issues or fees and was very friendly.

On to the wine industry. I think the business about wine not being able to hold over for a day or so is propaganda designed to get you to drink more wine. I think some reds in particular actually improve after a day or so of being open (maybe the quite young and cheap ones), although there is clearly a point at which the quality declines markedly (maybe after around day two). I just finished a book called “Judgment of Paris” (George M. Taber) about the 1976 wine tasting at which California wines beat out comparable French wines and caused an international uproar. Although I’m more fond of the French than I was a couple of years ago, I’m still not unhappy to read about the French judges looking disconcerted when they confidently identified California wines as homegrown.

George and I caught a documentary recommended by a leftist colleague of his called “Who killed the Electric Car.” It is a mildly engaging tale about smog and politics in California, but glosses over a lot of the limitations of electric cars for consumers, such as their low mileage per charge (not so useful in long commutes from the suburbs to the city). In addition, the film includes no mention of the fact that mass use of electric cars will presumably shift emissions from areas with lots of cars to the areas around the power plants (still run on dirty fossil fuels until this issue is tackled as well); this seems a glaring omission to me. Electric cars may aid in fighting smog in cities but I’m not sure if they lower overall emissions. In contrast, George has been reading in Scientific American magazine about really innovative approaches to cutting emissions, such as collecting and using the heat absorbed by the blacktop on streets.

For more research on wine and electric cars (in addition to much use of the aforementioned credit cards), I would like to take a family vacation to California—to Monterey, in particular—to see the sea otters, but it’s just much too expensive to fly us all out there (don’t get me started on the subject of the airline industry). Instead we took a trip to New York City—staying each night in Ridgewood—for several days over spring break. Some of the highlights from the trip were the ferry trip to Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty, our long romp through Central Park culminating in a horse-drawn carriage ride, and a trip to the Children’s Museum of Manhattan, which currently features a floor of play areas related to Dora the Explorer to which Nora referred back longingly throughout the remainder of the trip.

A restaurant note from New York: George and I spent an afternoon in the city over Christmas and had lunch at this great place in Chinatown that serves vegetarian dim sum called (you guessed it) Vegetarian Dim Sum House. The website has a printable coupon for your convenience. Cheap, filling, fast, and very, very tasty.

At the end of July we are going to take a trip to Bar Harbor, Maine. I am really hoping that we will see some whales, unlike on our trip to Chincoteague when we saw not a single scrawny pony. If anyone has any pull with the whales, you could make a four-year old girl very happy and her mother very relieved.

Reviews

Four Stars

Probably the best movie we saw in the last couple of months was “The Queen,” starring Helen Mirren, who is almost indistinguishable from the real item in terms of appearance. I don’t know how accurate the script is—it concerns the royals in the aftermath of Princess Diana’s death—but to us it was well-presented insight into a baffling family (although George has always had this inexplicable affection for Charles).

Three Stars

“A History of Violence” stars Viggo Mortensen as a family man ostensibly protecting his home against mysterious attackers. It had a catchy premise and was well-acted, but we couldn’t work out anyone’s motives and found it ultimately hollow.
“Little Children,” starring Kate Winslet and Jennifer Connelly, received lots of good press, but unlike the movie “Crash,” which we both loved, there was a definite lack of connection among the various story threads.

Another movie that received a lot of laudatory press was “Pan’s Labyrinth,” which explores a young girl’s fantasy world in Franco’s Spain. George and I found it inventive but not brilliant. George figures that there are probably many parallels to life in Franco’s Spain, and many allusions to fables, but that only helps if you’re well-versed in life in Franco’s Spain or the symbolism of fables.

I suggested that George watch “A Cry in the Dark” with Meryl Streep, which is an ‘80s movie about Australian Seventh Day Adventists whose baby has disappeared and possibly been eaten by a dingo. The line from that movie that was mocked endlessly when it was in the theaters was “A dingo ate my baby!” For some reason the cadence seems wrong to me, however, and I find myself thinking “a baby ate my dingo!”

“Notes on a Scandal,” starring Cate Blanchett and Judi Dench, concerns the twisted relationship between two British school teachers. It’s worth watching for the lead actresses, who are unsurprisingly great.

Two Stars

“Last King of Scotland,” for which Forrest Whittaker received an Oscar (well deserved), tells the story of Idi Amin through the eyes of a Scottish doctor who becomes his physician. We were bothered throughout by the question of whether this doctor really could have been as naïve about Amin and his motives as he appeared to be while people dropped like flies around him.

“Hustle and Flow” concerns the ambitions of a pimp to move into the world of rap. The best thing about this movie is the theme song, which I believe created a stir at the Oscars that year when the singers came on stage dressed as hookers and pimps. All I know is, I went to bed that night singing the catchy “It’s Hard Out Here for a Pimp.”

Less than Stellar

“Music and Lyrics,” starring Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore, was so flat (ironically, given its subject matter) we stopped watching, packed it up in its envelope, and sent it back to Netflix.
George and I saw “The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring” in the theater, but he found it really boring and so we never saw the subsequent ones. This time I watched it on DVD for about twenty minutes, then decided that he was right and gave up. The most intriguing thing about it was that one of my favorite actors from the series “Lost” turns out to be a cast member (Dominic Managhan). This was not enough to sustain me for several hours. Maybe I’ll just try the books.

A Category All Its Own Because It’s French

“Cache” stars Juliette Binoche and Daniel Auteuil. It concerns a couple who are receiving bizarre and frightening notes and videotapes from an unknown source. The movie explores some incidents and persons from the husband’s past. There are references to injustices against Algerians and hints of some horrible childhood trauma. The problem is that, typical of an art film, everything is left very vague. There’s a point at which mundane and mumbling dialogue, lingering camera shots, and lack of human emotion or a satisfactory resolution become just those things, not a sophisticated approach to filmmaking.

And More

I read the book “Atonement” by Ian McEwan last Christmas and thought it was fabulous. I have been hesitant to see the movie because you never know what’s going to happen in the transition from book to movie. Three of my all-time favorite books, “The Bonfire of the Vanities” (Tom Wolfe), “A Prayer for Owen Meaney” (John Irving), and, to some extent, “A Thousand Acres” (Jane Smiley), were trashed in the film versions. Edith Wharton fared a little better: “Ethan Frome” was made into a 1992 TV movie with Liam Neeson and Patricia Arquette that was quite good, although another Wharton book, “The House of Mirth” with Gillian Anderson, which the critics seemed to like, didn’t do a lot for me. “An American Tragedy” (Theodore Dreiser) was made into a movie starring Elizabeth Taylor and Montgomery Cliff called “A Place in the Sun,” which I liked pretty well. Luckily, I read “The English Patient” (Michael Ondaatje) after I saw the movie; frankly, I wouldn’t have understood the convoluted flow of the book without having seen the film. (Sad note: The director of “The English Patient,” Anthony Minghella, died last month at a young age. In addition to this masterpiece, he also directed another favorite of mine, “The Talented Mr. Ripley.” It’s depressing to think of what else he might have had in the works.)

A book that I found to be a page-turner was “Until Proven Innocent: Political Correctness and the Shameful Injustices of the Duke Lacrosse Rape Case” (Stuart Taylor and KC Johnson). Most books about legal cases are mind-numbing to me, so its readability was a pleasant surprise. (Note to self: I still need to read a good, balanced book about the OJ Simpson case. Anyone have a recommendation?) It worries me that someday we may have to send our kids to college with these despicable race-, gender-, and class-obsessed faculty members. (I had a coffee cup recently from Starbuck’s that included a quote from Princeton professor Cornel West—not a very provocative quote in itself, but the name on the cup made me visibly recoil as though I’d touched something vile). George’s boss was recently researching the faculty and course offerings at the University of Hawaii only to find that the political science department—no, not the humanities department—was full of courses like “Feminist Theory,” “American Environmental Politics,” and “Gender, Justice, and Law.” Why would I spend upwards of $40,000 a year to send my kid to school to get a useless and hate-filled education? It especially worries me in the case of Alexander, who through no fault of his own was born a white male and thus is inherently a deeply flawed person.

I recently finished the book “A Beautiful Mind” (Sylvia Nasar) which explores the life of Nobel Prize-winning, schizophrenic mathematician John Nash. The book is just great and he must be a fascinating man to talk to if you speak his particular language (that would be math, I believe). The film version turns it into a love story, but the relationship between Nash and his wife seems to have been far less settled in reality.

Over Christmas I read “The Bird Artist” (Howard Norman), which I would describe as evocative unreality. It concerns the affairs of a small town and the murder of a lighthouse keeper early last century in Newfoundland. The book has stuck with me, although I was distracted by the silly names of the characters, like Botho and August. I would have been able to focus on the story much more had they been simply John and Mary. A lot of authors seem to try to add interest or a sense of cleverness to their stories by giving people bizarre names, but I think it’s a pretty annoying device, especially when the story holds its own.

My mother passed along to me a copy of a book by Joan Didion called “The Year of Magical Thinking,” which deals with the death of her husband as well as the serious illness of her only daughter. I had meant to read this when it came out, but it really hits home given the events of the past few years. I recommend it highly.

Alexander occasionally expresses interest in the Star Wars movies again; a couple of years ago he was obsessed with the newer movies (I, II, and III) and spent many hours drawing Darth Vader and Yoda and Anakin and playing with his lightsaber. When he spends time with boys from school he seems to go back to it a bit. In my own life, I’ve found that “Star Wars” is always applicable. For example, when things between the Giants and Patriots were down to the wire in Superbowl 42, I was bouncing around in our basement, almost unable to watch, (Muki thought I was a lunatic) and it came to me: “Use the Force, Luke” Another example: sometimes, just before I hear Nora call me through the monitor at night I think to myself: “I sense a great disturbance in the Force.” And then perhaps there’s Nora concerning Muki: “Can somebody get this big walking carpet out of my way?”

Cheryl was recently looking into the series of Indian stories written by my great grandmother, Ellen Miller Donaldson (you can find one here). We have a Native American ancestor, although I’ve forgotten who and when. When I first moved down to DC (twenty years ago this summer—is that possible?) I went to the archives/research library at the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) building downtime to do some research on an ancestor who fought in the Revolutionary War. I found Ellen Miller Donaldson’s supporting research from when she joined the DAR and I understand that this poor guy died of some disease like dysentery. Impossible to say how much fighting he did. My problem was that the DAR library was as depressing a place as any research library could be (and I love libraries)—full of dusty, barely functional microfiche readers. I had to abandon further research on the family because I couldn’t cope with the atmosphere. The DAR genealogy files have gone digital now and I can do research sitting quietly in my own home, but I first have to dig through my (dusty) papers and look up the soldier’s name. When I did the research at the library I could start with Ellen Miller Donaldson herself and work back.

It’s all about me, Me, ME!!!

I have finally gone back to a yoga studio, choosing one in Leesburg that focuses on “flow” or ashtanga yoga which is a much more athletic practice than I was used to in Arlington. The idea is to move more quickly from one pose to another. The room is heated to 90 degrees or so, which I found at first to be disturbing, but then realized that it helps to make it easier to get into the poses as your muscles warm up. I’ve never before been in a yoga class where they suggest you try to get into a handstand (“If handstand is in your practice, you could take it now”). Headstand is one thing, but handstand is in a completely different realm, and I am left sitting on the floor and laughing rather than relaxing in my inversion.

I have been visiting a 97-year-old hospice patient in a Leesburg nursing home. She has congestive heart failure and she worries about her short-term memory loss, but she plays a great game of Scrabble (we’re about even in terms of wins and losses). The weird thing is, the first time that I went to see her we got to talking about where we had lived before, and it turns out that she had been in Maplewood for years. It’s hard for me to grasp that she was about 55 and her sons had already graduated from Columbia High School by the time I was born—and I’m middle-aged. Yikes.

I have discovered a great way to keep up with sports this year. When I got my iPod last fall I subscribed to a number of podcasts that are supported by Apple’s iTunes. I really have enjoyed listening to ESPN’s Jeremy Green (son of former coach Dennis Green) commenting on pro football. I have also been listening to an ESPN series on men’s college basketball which has a slightly less engaging host but is still worth catching. I have been half-heartedly trying to follow the Georgetown men’s basketball team, as I did for a number of years back in the late ‘80s. The problem with college basketball is that it’s tough to get a handle on the universe given the countless teams and conferences, in contrast to football where there are only two conferences and 32 teams.

Child World

Nora has settled into school a bit and has even asked to invite a couple of kids from class to her and Alexander’s birthday party in early April. She’s now looking ahead to her long-term future and has informed us that when she grows up she wants to be a squid. Alexander, being the charming and ever-so-helpful older brother, feels the need to tell her that it’s not possible for her to grow up and become a squid. She believes that she can make this transformation merely by being encased in orange fabric.

Childen’s drawings tend to be as surrealistic as their future plans. Cheryl’s daughter Anneliese sent a really cute picture for my birthday of George holding a balloon. At least this drawing contained a balloon, which clearly links it to its subject (a birthday). My children often draw something completely unrelated to the occasion, like an army tank or a portrait of Mommy, and given the random subject matter the drawings might as well include a watch, melting, and a piece of bacon, crisp. If Alexander had his way, this is the way his new furniture would probably be painted. George is in the process of building and painting bookcases and cubbies for the kids’ rooms. Alexander naturally has elaborate plans for his. Nora is only interested in the addition of a chocolate fountain, like the one we visited at Georgia Brown’s restaurant on Thanksgiving.

We recently started giving Alexander an allowance of a dollar a week to get him used to handling money. The first week he wanted to use his money to buy something from a vending machine when I said I wouldn’t buy it. It took almost all his allowance and he didn’t do it again after that. He reacted similarly when he said he wanted to get a yearbook (which sounds to both me and George as a ridiculous item for a first grader) and we said that he’d have to use his money. Once George laid out for him how long it would take him to save up the twenty dollars, all of a sudden it wasn’t so important after all. I guess he’s getting the idea.

Final Note: Goodbye to Eliot Spitzer

How could anyone have self-destructed so quickly? It’s almost like a cry for help. I think Spitzer wanted to get caught, because he cannot possibly be so stupid to think that he couldn’t get caught. (George thinks it may have been a far more basic motivation.) I think Spitzer’s kind of like Giuliani, who seemed to morph a bit into the mob bosses and the like that he pursued with such determination. Perhaps he admired the chutzpah of the kinds of people he went after. I read a fascinating article in Vanity Fair about how quickly Spitzer managed to alienate almost everyone in Albany, so I guess he didn’t have much political capital left to spend.

I, like many other married women in America, informed George that under no circumstances would I stand up there next to him if he ever found himself giving a post-prostitute press conference, and that he would have to get the prostitute to do it. George hates this kind of all-men-are-potentially-guilty comment: he shot back that if it were to come out that I had become a high-priced call girl (well, at least he threw in “high-priced”) he wouldn’t stand up there next to me.