What weekends could be

This weekend was a good one.

It reminds me of what weekends can be. It reminds me of weekends from my first go-round at college in Denton.

M and I, along with two friends, went to tiny Winnsboro, Texas, a town with two main streets, and not many more traffic lights. There, we were able to enjoy wine at a small winery, have a delicious dinner at an Italian restaurant with a wood oven, and go to a small coffeehouse and see Ramblin' Jack Elliott himself. And we could have gone to another place in town to see more music after Ramblin' Jack's final set.

This is exactly what I want to see happen for Teenytown. And the only obstacle that I can see is money--ain't it always the case? Well, money and taste.

A good restaurant and a performance/exhibition space could make a huge difference. And I have to point out that our delicious dinner cost about half of what it would have cost at the mediocre Italian restaurant that's here in Teenytown, so the restaurant is not expensive at all. And it was beautifully appointed.

What I don't want: no more auto parts stores, no more dollar discount stores, no more metal buildings, no more antique malls, no more storage facilities.

What I want: life on the weekend that doesn't center on football, a good meal, a good glass of wine, a comfortable place to sit and talk.

Is that so much?

Calming down

Ike has passed us by. I bought ice, batteries, a couple of gallons of water, and we were ready to hunker down just in case.

Now I'm calming down. First Sarah Palin. Then the weather. I've got to calm my fears and myself. I've got to get in touch with my Big Mind and stop obsession over stuff I have no control over.

As Andrew Sullivan says, "Patience, steel, ... triumph." 'Nuff said.

Namaste.

Egghead intellectuals

As I despair over the level of discourse already evident in the first few days of the 2008 presidential campaign, I'm trying to figure out why intellecuals and ideas are so despised.

The arguments I heard from the Republicans were almost entirely binary--either you're for something or against it, entirely, all the way, no middle ground. Either you love guns in all their glory for everybody, or you hate them and don't want anyone, anywhere, at any time to ever even be near them. And so on. Let's just not mention abortion.

I have always considered myself a populist. I love teaching first-year writing classes where I get students to engage in ideas and surprise themselves by how they can look at an issue from many sides and have lots of smart things to say. I grew up in a working-class family, where for whatever reasons, I found myself to be a passionate reader, and then found myself at a friend's house where her family sat around the dinner table and talked about ideas! Without yelling! Even though they disagreed!! I was truly stunned by the possibility of such a thing. With that same friend, I met kids from other schools who didn't just read books, they talked about them. I loved it. I think I've always wanted to KNOW stuff, all kinds of stuff, and I'm jealous when others know stuff I don't. I want to know it, too.

So why do people hate intellectuals so much? Why is it that I find pleasure from ideas despite my background but others don't? Why do I like asking questions, and others don't? Why do I love to talktalktalk with others, and others see it as so much hot air? Is it something that is hard-wired into us? I have egghead wiring and others don't? I was raised in a church that did not encourage critical thinking, yet I still manage to think critically. Why don't others do that, too?

I'm really worried about the state of our nation. I've read enough history to know that our country has always included a majority of folks who don't value knowledge just for the sake of knowledge. And I know that American pragmatism fuels our collective need for practical solutions to practical problems. But the widespread passion for Sarah Palin makes me sad. I want to have someone in office who knows more than I do, is smarter than I am, is curious about issues, and can change his/her mind when confronted by compelling evidence. When I go to a church, I want there to be a minister who knows more about the Bible and the ways that particular church interprets it than I do but can also listen to my concerns and questions without telling me I'm going straight to hell on the express train. If I hire a plumber, I want him/her to know WAY more about how plumbing functions to make my life mess-free. Why wouldn't folks want a smart president?

I don't want someone just like me. For one thing, that's about the last job I want. And for another, Palin and McCain AREN'T just like us at all. They are both driven and ambitious--as are all politicians who are willing to run seriously for a major office. I want someone smarter than me who wants the job. I want someone who can listen and learn. I want someone who can appreciate the complexity of his/her job and the complexity of the people he/she seeks to serve as well as to lead.

It's going to be a long road to November.

Mean girls run for vice president

A while ago, I wrote about angry guys and tried to figure out what the female equivalent would be. Now I think I've got the beginnings of an answer: it's mean girls.

I still haven't been able to make myself watch the Tina Fey film "Mean Girls" because I remember vividly the mean girls I went to high school with, and even after lo these many years, they still get to me. They were always attractive and knew how to work teachers and boys alike so they always got what they wanted. They never got caught, things always worked out for them, and it drove the rest of us crazy. If we were ever insane enough to say something to some poor unsuspecting boy or to one of their adoring teachers, we were told we were just jealous, that we were being "ugly." A fellow "loser" friend said to me once after we'd been subjected to another demonstration of a mean girl's superiority at our expense, "Don't worry; she'll get her comeuppance some day." I said, "No, she won't."

Angry women don't get very far in our culture, but mean girls do just fine.

So I was trying to figure out why Sarah Palin terrifies me so much, and I realized she is one of those mean girls grown up. The nickname "Sarah Barracuda" says it all. I hope John McCain knows what he's gotten himself into because she ain't no Cindy. She can smile "real sweet" while she's saying things that cut her enemies off at the knees--or worse. She knows how to play it.

Don't turn your back on her, John.