Celebrating the Success of Others

So I could take the time here to complain about the many pains that have started to plague me on that long, slow march to the grave, but instead, I'll choose to be happy about my friend Clare's new book deal.

Clare has been writing Three Beautiful Things since May 2004. It's a really simple concept: recording three things each day that have given her pleasure.

What I like best about Clare's 3BT is that in the hands of a less capable writer, it could get really icky - all kittens and cupcakes.

But Clare's got the discerning eye of someone who's spent their life looking closely at and appreciating the natural world, which is full of bugs, muck, and other ickiness. She's able to see beauty where other people might not -- there was one a while back, I recall, about the slight feeling of relief you get after throwing up.

I don't remember how I found 3BT, but I do regard it as a sort of "when the student is ready, the teacher will appear" experience.

So her book -- 300 Beautiful Things -- has the potential to influence lots more people.

Either on the loo, or off.

Where Would I Live? Part Two: Kamms Corners

Now, I realize that I wrote Part One more than a year ago, but I'm still thinking about moving back, trust me....

When I was a kid, we lived off of Rocky River Drive in Kamms Corners. Until this afternoon - when a friend revealed to me that the new Kamms Farmers Market was a pickup point for City Fresh market bags - I'd never, ever seriously considered it as a place I might live as an adult. I mean, isn't that kind of sad, after all I've been through, moving back to the first home I remember?

Define sad, though.

The truth is, Kamms is on a decent transit line (the 75X), which would get me both downtown and to my parents' house. The Lorain Ave bus (the 22) could easily get me to the West Side Market, to my bank, and also downtown. Plus, I could easily walk to the Metroparks - something that you really can't do from very many neighborhoods in Cleveland.

Hmmm. Something to think about.

Bored

This BBC article on boredom reminded me of this quote from Jerry Mander's Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television:

I am a member of the pre-TV generation....and I can still remember what it felt like to come home every day. First, I'd go look in the refrigerator....Then, slowly becoming bored, I'd play with the dog for a bit. Here comes the boredom. Nothing to do.

Slowly, I'd slip into a kind of boredom that seemed awful....It was exceedingly unpleasant, so unpleasant that I would eventually decide to act -- to do something. I'd call a friend, I'd go outdoors. I'd go play ball. I'd read. I would do something.

Looking back, I view that time of boredom, of "nothing to do," as the pit out of which creative action springs.

New Favorite Restaurant

When in New York, you've got to go to Bamiyan Afghani Restaurant. Seriously. If you're planning a trip here, drop me a line and I'll go with you.

From the kadu (pumpkin turnovers with yogurt dip), to the Kabuli Palow with Lamb, to the traditional Afghan tea (brewed with rose petals and cardamom) - you can't go wrong.

And even in the off-chance that you do go wrong, the ambiance is totally worth it.

Breuer in the New York Times

The Breuer building was in the New York Times this morning:

New Focus on a Forlorn Cleveland Tower

Here's an excerpt:

County leaders and preservationists agree on the tower’s shortcomings. By modern standards, its layout and ceiling heights are cramped. Its mechanical systems, designed for a building twice its size, are outdated and overly large. Its porthole windows provide terrible insulation.

Some government officials have grown tired of pointing all this out.

“We represent the philistine position, those people who are too stupid to realize the architectural significance of this building,” David Lambert, assistant Cuyahoga County prosecutor, said dryly at a recent meeting of the Cleveland Planning Commission. [emphasis mine]

Yep - that about covers it.

Dinner With Nancy Pearl?

Nancy Pearl is having an essay contest - write about your first "book crush" and win a dinner with - guess who - her!

How does this sound?

Dear Nancy Pearl,
My first book crush was Harry Potter. In actual fact I stil love him very much. One day I hope to be a librarian just like you.

Your pal,

Christine Borne

Antioch College Closing

There's nothing like starting your day bleary-eyed with bad news from Mom:

Antioch College is Closing

According to the official message from Antioch president Steve Lawry, posted on SaveAntioch.org:

The University will begin to plan for the eventual
possible reopening of the College by 2012.

Which sounds a bit less hopeful than the press release on Antioch's site:

The Chancellor will establish a Design and Development Commission to determine the long-term future of the College with the intention of opening a re-developed undergraduate campus. An Academic Design Team will be appointed to design a new undergraduate curriculum reflecting the College’s strong traditions and values while meeting the needs of today’s students.

Had anyone else heard anything about this? Jim keeps up obsessively with Southwest Ohio news. And his mom - who lives within dead-cat-swinging distance from Yellow Springs - would've said something to us if she'd heard about it.

If I'd had any idea, I would've tried to help - but the handful of times I'd been to YS in the last few years (and I do try to go, every time we're down visiting Jim's family), it seemed to be doing as well as it ever had.

Yellow Springs is one of my most beloved places in the world. It's a unique little village with a fragile civic "ecosystem" - will any of it survive without Antioch? I mean, talk about potential instant ghost town.

I'm depressed.

The Pain in the Ass Factor, Cars, and Public Transport

So in doing a little leisurely googling of things like "i love public transportation" and "public transportation enthusiasts", I came across a Gristmill post that led me to this article that led me to this article:

The reason public transit does not make money is that the non-monetary costs of it are very high. You have to walk at each end, crowd in with unpleasant people, and wait (often in the heat or cold) for your chariot. Like many New Yorkers, I get very impatient at even very small delays, and I recently figured out why; a delay of a minute or two can be transformed into a delay of fifteen minutes or more when you factor in a missed train. Plus, on a systemic level, public transit's speed is inversely proportional to its convenience. The more stops and interconnections a system has, the easier it is to move from any given point A to point B; but the longer it will take you to get there. All these things mitigate against public transit. Since moving to Washington, I--a lifelong New Yorker and mass transit afficionado with an ideological and financial opposition to owning an automobile--have begun seriously considering the acquiring a car.

As long driving is more convenient and comfortable than taking a train, most people will prefer it even at a relatively high price premium. [emphasis mine]

Am I the only one who thinks the Pain in the Ass Factor of owning and maintaining a car far outweighs the Pain in the Ass Factor of waiting for trains?

Seriously - here's some of the fun stuff I remember from owning a car:

• stopping for gas;
• looking for parking;
• worrying about things like your car getting stolen, what that weird noise coming from your wheel well might be, or getting in a high-speed freeway accident (which I've been in - there's nothing like suddenly facing backwards on the freeway to make you hate driving);
  
• remembering to get the car serviced;
• dealing with the consequences when you don't remember to get the car serviced;
• sitting in waiting rooms of auto dealerships and service stations;
• getting road rage;
• being the recipient of someone else's road rage
• insurance

Think of all the time that crap takes up!

In contrast, here are some of the hardships of my pre- and post-car public transit life:

• walking to the train
• getting on the train
• riding the train while reading a book
• getting off the train
• walking to wherever I'm going
• not thinking about whether someone's going to steal the train while I'm not looking
• not thinking about whether I can get a better deal on train insurance from some other company
• not thinking about where I'm going to park the train
• not thinking about when the train needs to be serviced

Frankly, riding on crowded trains (which isn't actually that bad) with "unpleasant people" (who there really aren't that many of) outweighs the "comfort" of commuting by car, hands down. For me, at least.

Must...Watch...TV

We can't have universal health care, but by God, we won't have to miss old reruns of Hogan's Heroes:

At midnight on Feb. 17, 2009, the rabbit ears and the rooftop antennas that still guide television signals into nearly 1 of every 5 American homes will be rendered useless — unless they are tethered to a new device, including two versions unveiled yesterday, that the government will spend as much as $80 a household to help families buy....

To ensure that uninterrupted access to free, over-the-air television does not pose a financial hardship for viewers, a government agency ... will issue $40 gift cards to consumers who want to buy the converters so they are not left behind when television as we have always known it goes dark in early 2009. [emphasis mine]

Read more: Converters signal a new era for TVs

I remember first hearing about this back in my salad days on Lake Ave. As I recall, I shook my head and thought, people will never go for that. They won't go out and buy new equipment just to watch TV. There'll be a mass rejection of television.

Ahh, what I wouldn't give to step in my TARDIS and go back in time to thwonk myself in the head.

Such naivete.

Why Not Visit Cleveland?

Hmmm....what's this on my Washington Post? Why, I think I'll visit Pittsburgh. They say it's America's most livable city.

I bet it's a nice place.

Unlike Cleveland, which I never see advertised on my Washington Post.

The Theme of My Twenties

Now that I've celebrated the last birthday of my twenties (as my parents oh-so amusingly reminded me - like that doesn't make them even older), I feel compelled to reflect on my "fading youth."

Regret was probably the most common theme of my twenties. And I mean melancholic regret, the kind that paralyzes you, keeps you from doing what you want to do because "it's already too late."

Whether this developed as a response to an early overfondness of the work of Mr. Yeats, or as a vestige of my actual Irish ancestry, I don't know.

It doesn't really matter anymore, though, because I've come to appreciate how hilariously stupid it is to think that I can't embark on, say, a Grand Tour, because at age 29, it's too late.

I've also come to appreciate how to use Regret as a vehicle for personal growth.

Here's an old Cleveland-based regret of mine:

When I lived in Coventry, I did not do enough of the following:

1. walking down to Little Italy
2. spending time at Lakeview Cemetery
3. shopping at Zagara's
4. having breakfast at the Inn on Coventry
5. drinking at La Cave du Vin

That I didn't do these things is surprising to me, since I moved to Coventry because I wanted to live someplace where there were things I could walk to.

But I realize now that I didn't do more of this stuff because I had just started my first "real" job, and outside of my 40-hour workweek I felt exhausted and betrayed by the Universe for snookering me into such a meaningless existence.

So, instead of repeating this episode all over again, I'm taking advantage of what few walkable delights there are in my current neighborhood. My gratitude for them has even taken on a somewhat frantic overtone, as if they might disappear while I'm not looking (what's more likely, though, is that I'll disappear while they're not looking).

For those of you who are on the cusp, what theme dominated your last decade?