Progressive Wednesday

National Poetry Month: “Jet”

As I entered manhood — I don’t mean puberty, I mean becoming an actual man — the poet Tony Hoagland was like a guide, the way Virgil served as Dante‘s guide through his masterpiece, The Inferno. I’d come across a poem here or there, and immediately, I’d photocopy the sucker and mail it to all my friends I consider brothers. I’d read his work out loud, alone in my apartment, trying, not to understand his words, but rather myself.

Tony Hoagland, like the previous poets we’ve highlighted this National Poetry Month (Ted Kooser, Mary Oliver, William Matthews, and Lucille Clifton), boasts an impressive “resume.” His third full-length book, What Narcissism Means to Me, was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Book number two received the James Laughlin Award. He’s also received two (count ‘em, two) grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Poetry Foundation’s 2005 Mark Twain Award.

To me, these “statistics” are fairly meaningless because I can’t imagine going through my twenties without his verse. But I don’t think Hoagland is a “guy poet.” I think he’s a humanist, shining a light — sometimes lovely, sometimes ugly — on American men and masculinity.

Below you’ll find one of my favorite poems from one of my favorite books, Donkey Gospel. If someone were to ask me what it means and how it feels to be a man, my one word answer is “Jet.” Enjoy.

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JET

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Sometimes I wish I were still out
on the back porch, drinking jet fuel
with the boys, getting louder and louder
as the empty cans drop out of our paws
like booster rockets falling back to Earth

and we soar up into the summer stars.
Summer. The big sky river rushes overhead,
bearing asteroids and mist, blind fish
and old space suits with skeletons inside.
On Earth, men celebrate their hairiness,

and it is good, a way of letting life
out of the box, uncapping the bottle
to let the effervescence gush
through the narrow, usually constricted neck.

And now the crickets plug in their appliances
in unison, and then the fireflies flash
dots and dashes in the grass, like punctuation
for the labyrinthine, untrue tales of sex
someone is telling in the dark, though

no one really hears. We gaze into the night
as if remembering the bright unbroken planet
we once came from,
to which we will never
be permitted to return.
We are amazed how hurt we are.
We would give anything for what we have.

Monday Morning Motherhood: Me Sans Mini-Van

In my previous columns, I've covered a number of issues and challenges that I and other parents face. With this column though, I'd like to talk about, well, me.

I had a plan, damn it. I like plans — stability, purpose, and more stability. Mine went a little something like this: a loving husband, three kids, a beautiful house, and a mini-van. I know, I know. Even I can't believe I dreamed of a mini-van. But that's what I had always planned.

So, I was engaged to man, and we were making wedding plans, we were making plans for our future. And then, the stick turned blue. When I first told him I was pregnant, he thought I was telling a joke with a stress-inducing punch line. After convincing him that in eight months another human would be popping out of me, the reaction was not what I'd expected: within a month, he was gone. He started living with another woman, moving on with his life. And I started living, alone and scared to death, with a child inside me. Morning sickness and weight gain were the least of my worries. How in hell was I supposed to give birth and raise a child all by myself? I'm the girl who once tried and succeeded in out-drinking a football player at a frat party. The girl that skipped 95% of her classes the first semester of college. Me and a kid? I’ve got two words for you: holy shit.

Well, as it turns out, I could do it. Still doing it now, too, though that's probably fairly obvious given the title of my column and the not-so-tall tales about my daughter. It ain't easy, my dear readers. Being the sole financial provider, the keeper of the Cheerios and Dora the Explorer yogurt, and the one who deals with all of the problems, all of the time, gets to be strenuous.

When she was an infant, there were times that the exhaustion would overwhelm me. Every bone in my body would scream for sleep, and there'd be no sleep in sight. There were times that her incessant crying would have me on the bathroom floor, bawling my eyes out, unsure of how I could ever survive this. I constantly second-guessed myself about what formula I fed her, what toys she played with, and if it was okay for me to get a sitter and take a night off.

Continue reading ‘Monday Morning Motherhood: Me Sans Mini-Van’

Rockin’ women, well, they rock.

Rock and roll ain’t noise pollution, and unfortunately, in our subtly and not-so-subtly misogynistic culture, women who rock are few and far between. But women who rock, rock. And since pleasure can be progressive, here are a trio of music videos for tunes belted out by the just-as-strong sex.

First up is “Fast as You Can” by Fiona Apple, a video directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, whose other creds include two modern classics: the films Boogie Nights and Magnolia.

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And here’s a cover of the pop-rocker “Your Daddy Don’t Know” by The New Pornographers, a mainly-Canadian outfit sometimes fronted by Neko Case. Case, for my cabbage, has some of the best pipes on the planet.

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Rounding our our triumvirate, give a click and check out the purest from of rock: punk. Below you’ll find the Breeders (fronted by sisters Kim and Kelly Deal) kicking the &$?! out of “Gigantic,” a song orginally recorded by Kim’s other band, the Pixies. Punk is only punk when it’s live, so enjoy.

Be a big brother

I’m a middle child (with middle child syndrome). Two sisters, one younger one older. It’s funny to think about my “big” sister protecting me in our youth, she’s half my size, but that’s exactly what she did. In fact, and this is totally true, when I was “roughed up” in a hockey game just recently, she started yelling, “Hey! That’s my brother!” Some brothers might have been embarrassed; I was a touched. Not because I thought she would jump over the boards and “drop the gloves,” but because she thought she would. The point is, she has been always been there for me, young and…well…older, willing to stand up for me when necessary, but more importantly, always setting a great example.

Unfortunately, so many kids grow up without a brother or sister to open doors, or show them how to open doors themselves. All too often these kids head down a road of destruction, and sometimes self-destruction. They need a mentor, a “big brother. Enter Big Brothers Big Sisters.

In their own words:

The Big Brothers Big Sisters mission is to help children reach their potential through professionally supported, one-to-one relationships with mentors that have a measurable impact on youth.

How effective is the program? According to an impact study of the BBBS program, children matched with “bigs” are:

• More confident in their schoolwork performance.
• Able to get along better with their families.
• 46% less likely to begin using illegal drugs.
• 27% less likely to begin using alcohol.
• 52% less likely to skip school.

Here’s the problem. The program is quite short on male volunteers. In the Erie county branch, female “bigs” are matched up with male “littles.” This is only acceptable up to age ten, for obvious reasons. There are waiting lists years long, and children are slipping through the cracks. The call has gone out from Lovie Smith and Tony Dungee for more male volunteers, and now it’s going out from Progressive Wednesday. If you’ve gt a few extra hours a week, sign up to volunteer in your neck of the woods. Instead of going outside to shoot some hoops by yourself, take a “little brother” with you. It’s the best thing you can do with your time.

Blood puppies.

Okay, I’ll admit — I’m trying to shock you a bit with that title. But this is a surprising bit o’ news. Check this sucker out from the Peach State:

The American Red Cross and DeKalb County Animal Services are teaming up so one good deed will lead to another.

People who give blood at any Red Cross blood drive in DeKalb can get a coupon good for a discount at upcoming pet adoption days sponsored by the animal shelter.

The coupon can cut up to half the cost off adopting an animal in need of adopting.

This is our kind of progressivism. One fantastic organization helping another, encouraging people to do two great things for the “price,” or lack thereof, of one. So why is this particular brand of goodness so important? Here are the facts, Jack:

• Every year in the United States, almost five million people are saved by blood transfusions.
• According to the ASPCA: “Five out of ten dogs in shelters and seven out of ten cats in shelters are destroyed simply because there is no one to adopt them.”
• Someone needs blood in the United States every two seconds.
• Between 5 and 9 million animals in shelters are euthanized each year.
• Approximately 20% of all patients entering hospitals require blood.

We’ll cover both subjects on Wednesdays, but in the mean time, if you’d like to help out the Red Cross, just click this sentence. And if you’d like to help out your local ASPCA, just click this sentence.

(And because we’re kinda fans of this organization too, if you’d like to help out Progressive Wednesday, just click this sentence.)

A pizza place practicing progressive environmentalism

We've asked you to do a lot of things for the environment: use compact fluorescent light bulbs, drive hybrid cars, purchase “green– energy, buy local organic food, recycle, use “green– credit cards. Heck, we even suggested that you change your bank for the environment. But this one tops them all: buy pizza.

That's if you live in Florida. More specifically, if you live in or visit Deerfield Beach, Ft. Lauderdale, Boca Raton, or Coral Springs. These are the current locations of Pizza Fusion, an all-organic, earth friendly pizza place, and model small business in southern Florida. Here's their goal, in their own words:

Pizza Fusion was founded in the best interest of the environment and the individual. By serving healthy, organic food with a commitment to the preservation of our fragile ecosystem, we hope to set an example for others to follow.

Here are some of the ways Pizza Fusion is “saving the Earth, one pizza at a time– :

• Their delivery vehicles are all hybrid cars. The Toyota Prius, to be exact.
• They purchase wind energy certificates to offset 100% of their energy use and have plans to soon be completely powered by solar energy.
• Their ingredients are all 100% organic, mostly grown within 60 miles of the restaurants, saving on fuel to get them there.
• All of their menus, napkins, and plates are printed on recycled paper.
• As a bonus they split energy savings with their employees resulting in 20% less energy used.
• Those employees are decked out in 100% organic cotton uniforms.
• They even use Sustainable Websites to host their website, which uses 100% wind energy for its web hosting
• For the kids, they host free classes every Saturday to teach them about increasingly popular organic food and other things they can do for the environment.

Not progressive enough? Chew on this organic info. They also offer health insurance to all employees working more than 20 hours a week and even have deals for their employees at local fitness centers. It's a healthy place to eat and work.

These progressive practices don't seem to be holding them down financially either. For you entrepreneurs, they are currently offering franchise opportunities, with plans to expand across the country. So if you're looking to start a business– ¦ Even if you're not, we could all stand to live our lives and run our businesses a little more like Pizza Fusion.

The TGIF Movie Review: Bobby

Let me begin this review with the ending of the film, a quotation from Robert F. Kennedy: “Surely, we can learn, at the least, to look around at those of us… and surely, we can begin to work a little harder to bind up the wounds among us and to become, in our hearts, brothers and countrymen once again.” This, it seems to me, is the message at the heart of Bobby, a fictional film written and directed deftly by Emilio Estevez.

The film focuses on one slice of time: June 4, 1968, the day of the 1968 Democratic primary in California, and the early morning of June 5, the day Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated in the Ambassador Hotel, the location of his campaign headquarters in that state. But the film isn’t a political history lesson. The film is a cultural history lesson, and a story about race, age, relationships, wars, and rivalries. This film is about hope gained and hope lost and how tragedy ripples, not like a pebble, but like a drop of blood in a pond.

Bobby, it must be said, is a star-studded movie. Harry Belafonte, Laurence Fishburne, Heather Graham, Anthony Hopkins, Helen Hunt, Joshua Jackson, Shia LaBeouf, Lindsay Lohan, William H. Macy, Demi Moore, Freddy Rodriguez, Martin Sheen, Christian Slater, Sharon Stone, and Elijah Wood all make significant appearances. This kind of cast helps Bobby succeed, because it emphasizes the importance of all kinds of Americans at the time of RFK’s life and death. (Plus, I never thought I’d say this, but even Ashton Kutcher is pretty good. How Estevez managed that is beyond me.)

Mixed in with the fresh footage is rarely seen footage of RFK and his hopeful vision for America, a vision, given the problems screeching on our front pages and nightly newscasts, that seems as timely now as it was then. RFK’s vision was for peace over war, environmental stewardship over pollution, civil rights over even subtle segregation.

Movies never make me cry. This one’s a rare exception. Why? Because, while the movie ends in tragedies we don’t see coming, Bobby isn’t a film about Robert Kennedy’s ghost, but rather about the potential of his angel today.