'It was all a dream'
Is the 'Call me Ishmael'
Of rap
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Thursday, February 19, 2009
The Best Little Gardener in Deep East Oakland
In the far southeast corner of Oakland, where white people aren't, an eleven year-old boy is wondering whether the bulbs are off to a good start, inspecting the cabbage for camouflaged worms and nervously urging the peas up their trellis. Worry is a hallmark of great gardening, and this kid's got it.
Three years ago I needed to scrap together more income, and Dylan, although he didn't know it yet, very much needed a garden at his school. (Laugh now at my supposition that starting an after-school gardening program at a public elementary would be a lucrative lark.)
It didn't take him long to become a gardener. The transition was well underway when we planted crocuses that first fall. He was inspecting the packaging--intense, as usual, while the other kids were wilding out, also as usual. Printed on the crocus package was a flower icon that read "MAR-APR," and he asked me to interpret this.
"March through April. That's when they'll bloom."
Dylan's eyes went wide. His fingers curled like talons grasping prey. His skinny limbs trembled. And he squealed as little ghetto boys are not supposed to squeal: "THAT'S WHEN THEY'LL BLOOM??" Affirmative. "Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!"
We had discussed the bulb concept as a class beforehand, but imagining these brown lumps creating fat purple flowers in a mere (he had a gardener's patience already) five months was just too much.
He quickly learned to identify seedlings. Pale gray-green V sprout? California poppy! And why is it special? Because...Because! Oh! Oh! (Talon hands.) BecauseitsthestateflowerofCalifornia!! He attacked stands of oxalis with rage, ignoring the little girls' pleas that the yellow flowers were pretty. It's a weed, he answered with unveiled disdain. Miss Emma, tell them.
He nodded, excited to tell me, and said he had been back over the summer. His fourth grade iteration included new big jeans and a fresh-clipped fade, but he was still kind of a loner and a bit weird. Certainly no other kid would play along when I wanted to talk in British accents. He developed an obsession with tomatillos (planted as a nod to the Mexican half of the class) even though he never quite understood what or why they were.
With Dylan as its stalwart, the garden program gained popularity. During one class I overheard a group of girls talking about how much they loved gardening. Dylan swished past them, busy with his trowel, and said, "I just come for the flowers."
Three years ago I needed to scrap together more income, and Dylan, although he didn't know it yet, very much needed a garden at his school. (Laugh now at my supposition that starting an after-school gardening program at a public elementary would be a lucrative lark.)
It didn't take him long to become a gardener. The transition was well underway when we planted crocuses that first fall. He was inspecting the packaging--intense, as usual, while the other kids were wilding out, also as usual. Printed on the crocus package was a flower icon that read "MAR-APR," and he asked me to interpret this.
"March through April. That's when they'll bloom."
Dylan's eyes went wide. His fingers curled like talons grasping prey. His skinny limbs trembled. And he squealed as little ghetto boys are not supposed to squeal: "THAT'S WHEN THEY'LL BLOOM??" Affirmative. "Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!"
We had discussed the bulb concept as a class beforehand, but imagining these brown lumps creating fat purple flowers in a mere (he had a gardener's patience already) five months was just too much.
He quickly learned to identify seedlings. Pale gray-green V sprout? California poppy! And why is it special? Because...Because! Oh! Oh! (Talon hands.) BecauseitsthestateflowerofCalifornia!! He attacked stands of oxalis with rage, ignoring the little girls' pleas that the yellow flowers were pretty. It's a weed, he answered with unveiled disdain. Miss Emma, tell them.
I knew from the start that Dylan was not, for lack of a more circumspect phrase, regular black. His pants were a little too tight and his hair was a little too long. When he came back for a second year of garden class, my only repeat recruit, he was mooning about orchids, which he said reminded him of Belize.
"Are you from Belize?"
He nodded, excited to tell me, and said he had been back over the summer. His fourth grade iteration included new big jeans and a fresh-clipped fade, but he was still kind of a loner and a bit weird. Certainly no other kid would play along when I wanted to talk in British accents. He developed an obsession with tomatillos (planted as a nod to the Mexican half of the class) even though he never quite understood what or why they were.
With Dylan as its stalwart, the garden program gained popularity. During one class I overheard a group of girls talking about how much they loved gardening. Dylan swished past them, busy with his trowel, and said, "I just come for the flowers."
That spring we planted tomatoes from seed. Each kid got to plant a four-inch pot with three seeds to take home. Ten kids in the class, plus the drop-ins who suckered the teacher into letting them plant their own pots too--probably sixty potential tomato plants were in those hopeful pots. Many were banished by parents who hated having their kids touch dirt. Some fell victim to kids' inevitable neglect. But one lucky seed was coddled and sprouted and fawned over and transplanted and in late summer it bore fruit to feed a large Belizian family.
The tomato experience planted a seed in Dylan as well. This year, our third, he began asking me for extra seeds and seedlings to take home and in my harried state I would pour a few seeds into his hand and move on to the next crying catastrophe. Only recently did I come to understand that he had created a vast menagerie of potted plants at home. I try to picture it, the mad scientist amid his many experiments. His mother explained that he had somehow obtained a cob of ornamental corn, painstakingly removed the kernels, and grown some cornstalks.
This fall the veteran fifth-grade Dylan showed the new crop of kids how to plant bulbs. (Two leftover bulbs were destined to join his menagerie.) He ripped open the package of paperwhites with glee, but was disturbed to find the roots already sprouting.
"Miss Emma, they think they're in the soil!" And that's when I knew the transition was complete. He knew what the bulbs were thinking.
This fall the veteran fifth-grade Dylan showed the new crop of kids how to plant bulbs. (Two leftover bulbs were destined to join his menagerie.) He ripped open the package of paperwhites with glee, but was disturbed to find the roots already sprouting.
"Miss Emma, they think they're in the soil!" And that's when I knew the transition was complete. He knew what the bulbs were thinking.
Driving away from the school one cold night, jean cuffs dripping, I saw Dylan riding home on the handlebars of his big brother's bike. Seeing him perched so precariously, my little horticultural genius, heading off into the dark of a neighborhood where the murder rate is high and the optimism rate is low, I decided to drop the hardened teacher thing. I thought, I'm just gonna love this kid. /
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Obama Doubt, Multipliers
I kind of love when people freak out about Obama. The cycles of rising hope and creeping doubt are as predictable as moon phases, and it's fun to watch columnists and pundits churn through another cranky round of PMS, knowing Obama will stay steady and not give a fuck.
A glance at NYT op-eds tells the tale. There's MoDowd making a point of roughing up the president, as she does periodically to prove her crush is not blinding. David Brooks' honeymoon is over--but then he cycles through the Obemotions so fast that no one cares anymore. Paul Krugman secretly resents Obama; read between the lines. (Is it because he's not the president's favorite bearded elfconomist?)
Doubts about Obama have a strong multiplier effect--which is what a stimulus plan is supposed to have. In addition to following the Obamalove tides, a recession-era amusement which I invite you to enjoy is watching Mike Pence (R-Ind.) and his frat brothers in both houses contorting into pretzels trying not to ratify Keynesian economic theory and still avoid blame for national ruin.
Pence cried about the stimulus plan last week, "It included wasteful government spending that has nothing to do with creating jobs!!!!" (My quadruple exclamation.)
Conservatives are into listing things in the stimulus plan that they think are ludicrous. From a CBS News column: "Shipyards get $100 million in handouts; $400 million is diverted to 'farm ownership loans.' [Yeah, whatever that means.] Another $200 million goes to computer centers at community colleges... NASA and the National Science Foundation receive $2.3 billion."
Now I'm not going to go into how farm-ownership, community colleges and science are sort of hate-proof. Because that really isn't the point.
The real point is, it's a stimulus plan. You spend money on stuff; that's how it works. But Republicans pull this disingenuous shit, like, Condoms! schools! art! (ew, art is grossest of all)--what does any of that have to do with creating jobs?
Government spending on any damn thing creates jobs. It's money going out into the economy, buying goods and services and so necessitating hiring.
The hirees then have income to spend, even if they earn that income testing condoms or, worse, educating children. And that money goes out into the economy => more demand for goods and services => more hiring, more income => yet more demand for goods and services, and so on. The alternative is to invite Depression II by allowing the downward spiral of decreased consumer spending and decreased income to continue unabated. And there you have the Clebilicious Pocket Keynes.
The problem for Republicans is that if they acknowledge government spending stimulates the economy in this way, they forsake everything they ever said about the crystal clear purity of the free market. (They also hate anything they can call 'entitlement.' Poor people act so fucking entitled.)
Their pretzely solution is to pretend tax cuts are a stimulus, because tax cuts get the Reagan stamp of approval. This fails on two counts. Republicans get caught acknowledging the concept of economic stimulus, and they also promote an inferior stimulus mechanism. Spending is what stimulates the economy; only a portion of tax cuts become spending, not the whole. When government spends directly, all of it (duh) becomes spending. It's like not believing in birth control but deciding to use some stupid contraceptive sponge just in case.
A glance at NYT op-eds tells the tale. There's MoDowd making a point of roughing up the president, as she does periodically to prove her crush is not blinding. David Brooks' honeymoon is over--but then he cycles through the Obemotions so fast that no one cares anymore. Paul Krugman secretly resents Obama; read between the lines. (Is it because he's not the president's favorite bearded elfconomist?)
Doubts about Obama have a strong multiplier effect--which is what a stimulus plan is supposed to have. In addition to following the Obamalove tides, a recession-era amusement which I invite you to enjoy is watching Mike Pence (R-Ind.) and his frat brothers in both houses contorting into pretzels trying not to ratify Keynesian economic theory and still avoid blame for national ruin.
Pence cried about the stimulus plan last week, "It included wasteful government spending that has nothing to do with creating jobs!!!!" (My quadruple exclamation.)
Conservatives are into listing things in the stimulus plan that they think are ludicrous. From a CBS News column: "Shipyards get $100 million in handouts; $400 million is diverted to 'farm ownership loans.' [Yeah, whatever that means.] Another $200 million goes to computer centers at community colleges... NASA and the National Science Foundation receive $2.3 billion."
Now I'm not going to go into how farm-ownership, community colleges and science are sort of hate-proof. Because that really isn't the point.
The real point is, it's a stimulus plan. You spend money on stuff; that's how it works. But Republicans pull this disingenuous shit, like, Condoms! schools! art! (ew, art is grossest of all)--what does any of that have to do with creating jobs?
Government spending on any damn thing creates jobs. It's money going out into the economy, buying goods and services and so necessitating hiring.
The hirees then have income to spend, even if they earn that income testing condoms or, worse, educating children. And that money goes out into the economy => more demand for goods and services => more hiring, more income => yet more demand for goods and services, and so on. The alternative is to invite Depression II by allowing the downward spiral of decreased consumer spending and decreased income to continue unabated. And there you have the Clebilicious Pocket Keynes.
The problem for Republicans is that if they acknowledge government spending stimulates the economy in this way, they forsake everything they ever said about the crystal clear purity of the free market. (They also hate anything they can call 'entitlement.' Poor people act so fucking entitled.)
Their pretzely solution is to pretend tax cuts are a stimulus, because tax cuts get the Reagan stamp of approval. This fails on two counts. Republicans get caught acknowledging the concept of economic stimulus, and they also promote an inferior stimulus mechanism. Spending is what stimulates the economy; only a portion of tax cuts become spending, not the whole. When government spends directly, all of it (duh) becomes spending. It's like not believing in birth control but deciding to use some stupid contraceptive sponge just in case.
And about that other downward spiral, in Obama confidence, I agree with Bob Herbert that Obama is underestimated all too often. I think his stock still has room to climb.
Monday, February 9, 2009
Deep Thought for Monday
In a half-conscious moment
I thought it was David Axelrod
Who created "The Wire"
I thought it was David Axelrod
Who created "The Wire"
Thursday, February 5, 2009
On Turning Thirty
Saturday I turn thirty, and my pose is 'not approaching it with dread'. That's my little contrarian streak showing, because you're supposed to approach it with dread.
Anyone over thirty will tell me I'm still young, and I buy that. If I can hope to live long, and if I value my older years rather than expecting diminishing returns from them, then I am indeed young at thirty. I feel pretty old to be young. Thirty years is a hell of a long time, just objectively. To get to live that long and still be technically young is a pretty neat trick. I know a few things by now, and I have some road ahead to apply them.
But when I turn fifty, I don't want to hear some bullshit about how I'm still young. I won't be--and what's wrong with that? What's wrong with being, in my thirties, at what Updike called "the midpoint," in full bloom rather than just a rosy bud full of potential? Most people seem to prefer bud status. Maybe it's scary to be smack in the middle of life. Easier to dream on what we might be in the future than admit the future has arrived. But unambiguous adulthood could be a good thing. No more school and throat-clearing. Now I play for keeps.
I started thinking of myself as 'about thirty' when I was twenty-eight and a half. That was my attempt to avoid surprise, one of three major factors behind Decade Dread. (Followed by fear of mortality and life dissatisfaction. This according to my research. My research was inferential, meaning I didn't look any stuff up; I just thought real hard.)
The Precor at Gold's thinks I've been thirty for quite some time. (And bless that Precor for being as forthright about these matters as humans wish we could be.) In the leadup, I have wanted to remind myself of both the youthful qualities I want to keep and the mature qualities I wish to own.
Anyone over thirty will tell me I'm still young, and I buy that. If I can hope to live long, and if I value my older years rather than expecting diminishing returns from them, then I am indeed young at thirty. I feel pretty old to be young. Thirty years is a hell of a long time, just objectively. To get to live that long and still be technically young is a pretty neat trick. I know a few things by now, and I have some road ahead to apply them.
But when I turn fifty, I don't want to hear some bullshit about how I'm still young. I won't be--and what's wrong with that? What's wrong with being, in my thirties, at what Updike called "the midpoint," in full bloom rather than just a rosy bud full of potential? Most people seem to prefer bud status. Maybe it's scary to be smack in the middle of life. Easier to dream on what we might be in the future than admit the future has arrived. But unambiguous adulthood could be a good thing. No more school and throat-clearing. Now I play for keeps.
I started thinking of myself as 'about thirty' when I was twenty-eight and a half. That was my attempt to avoid surprise, one of three major factors behind Decade Dread. (Followed by fear of mortality and life dissatisfaction. This according to my research. My research was inferential, meaning I didn't look any stuff up; I just thought real hard.)
The Precor at Gold's thinks I've been thirty for quite some time. (And bless that Precor for being as forthright about these matters as humans wish we could be.) In the leadup, I have wanted to remind myself of both the youthful qualities I want to keep and the mature qualities I wish to own.
Old enough and young enough. I thought surely the overlap could be positive, not just some nightmare of confluent wrinkles and pimples. So I have made myself hunker down hard on my big writing project. (Mature and serious.) And I made myself learn, in full, the dance to "Single Ladies." (Fun and flippant.) Apparently project creation and execution is my approach to life. And I know that about myself because, hey, I'm thirty.
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