synch-ro-ni-zing

mom's jewels

(Click on the images to see the pins better.)

Mom was 40 years old when I was born. She was born in 1916. You can do the math.

She was of the generation of women who wore matching shoes and purses, and hats too, until the late ‘60s. Because she was a preacher’s wife, she dressed up every Sunday.

Fine jewels weren’t affordable or appropriate.

Costume jewelry was just right. Some of these pins belonged to my mom. Some I bought. Some were given to me.

This one was given to me by my sister Ginnie when she came back from Peru. I might have been 11 or 12 at the time.

Mom used to say:

“You get hungry for what you feed yourself.”

“Don’t let intellectualism take the place of God.”

“I always knew I had to marry a preacher and a redhead.”

“I try to be funny, but no one ever thinks I am.”

That last quote is a jewel I share with my mom, along with these pins.

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While Don was recuperating from shoulder surgery, we got hooked watching "24," the TV show that started in 2001 about the CIA operative Jack Bauer (Keifer Sutherland) and the counter-terrorist unit in LA. Now that we can queue TV shows on Netflix, four episodes on a DVD, we could watch interruption-free, one episode after another. The writing is quite good, and the acting is excellent.

We finished the third of the six completed seasons last week (the seventh season premieres January 2009). In a strangely oxymoronic way, the show displays politically progressive viewpoints, while in the context of the very structures Progressives would like to see changed or eliminated. The politics in it are complex, not black and white.

Each season became more intense, the violence more graphic and more personal. Sure, Jack Bauer is a great guy who only tortures someone because he needs to save a million Americans. But this past season (3) when he had to shoot a colleague in the head and deliver his body to the terrorist enemy (a former British MI-6 agent gone sour) to keep him from releasing a biological weapon that would kill millions of Americans, we decided to stop watching.

Two out of the five Oscar nominees for Best Picture this year were violent films, including the winner, “No Country for Old Men.” The other is “There Will Be Blood.” Today we decided to take “No Country” off our queue because it’s rated R for strong graphic violence. Everyone says it’s a great movie.

It’s sort of strange that we cover our children’s eyes to protect their developing minds from violent acts, but it becomes okay as adults to entertain ourselves with it. I know it's out there in the real world, but as my mom used to say, "you get hungry for what you feed yourself."

I dunno, I’m getting sick from feeding myself violence through the TV.

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addressing race

After Barack Obama's race speech, below on YouTube, people are talking about the race issue again. He acknowledges anger among Whites and among Blacks. Whether you want him to be President or not, to listen to a man who is a viable candidate for President of the United States who has relatives of practically every race, address the issue of race head on, is remarkable. He is the son of a White woman, apparently descended from slave owners, and a Kenyan father. His wife Michelle is descended from slaves and slave owners.

I am descended from slave owners. But my parents raised us to treat people of all races with utmost respect. Before I was born, my father was a poor Baptist preacher in the South who told the story of the Good Samaritan with the Good Samaritan as a Black person. You know the story. A man is robbed and left for dead, all the "good" people like priests walk by him, avoiding him lying there on the road. I suppose it was about the blood they weren't supposed to touch. Along came the Samaritan (Jesus' audience in this story, the Jews, hated Samaritans) who tended the man and paid for him to be nursed until he recovered. Ok, so my dad told the story from the pulpit with the Good Samaritan as a Black man, in a little rural church in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia. After the church service, the Elders came to him, saying, "Rev. Hart, we'd appreciate it if you'd please only preach the Bible."

In the 1990s I got a seven-year education in American race relations when I worked in a University office in which I was one of two White women. The rest of the staff (10 or so people) were either African American or Latino. I learned that my friend Sheree, a beautiful AA woman of 35, felt discriminated against every time she went to the mall and the staff stayed close by her and left White women alone. I learned that there was deep anger between African Americans and Latinos. I learned that some African Americans felt superior to Whites because they believed they would never degrade other humans through slavery. I learned that even after 140 years, Whites can't necessarily expect that African Americans are ready to "move on." I learned that I basically have nothing to say as a White person, about what an African American or Latino person might feel or should do.

This is the first 9-minute segment of Obama's speech two days ago. You can download segments 2-4 from the sidebar at YouTube.

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Happy St. Patrick's Day

I'm sorry I won't be going to Ireland for the University this summer. I was lucky to go the last three years.

Enjoy the green.

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road

associations:

road - - - - - - - - - residue

spring - - - - - - - knee-deep

human - - - - - - - exchange

today - - - - - - - - taste

speaking - - - - - concepts

escape - - - - - - - road

Listen to Jack Kerouac read from On the Road:

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Hitchcock

Rear Window: Unlike Jimmy Stewart, I wasn’t really spying on anything or anyone fun, just a brick exterior wall.

Check out Vanity Fair’s online photography portfolio recreating classic Hitchcock scenes with current movie stars, by photographer Art Streiber.

When you click on the photo in the portfolio, the original Hitchcock scene opens in a new window.

Charlize Theron as Margot (Grace Kelly’s role) in “Dial M for Murder.”

Scarlett Johansson and Javier Bardem spying on their neighbors in “Rear Window.”

Naomi Watts as the psychologically challenged “Marnie.” I just re-watched this. Sean Connery is great. Apparently Hitchcock was smitten with Tippi Hedren and wooed her, without success. After failing with her, he wouldn’t mention her name.

Keira Knightley and Jennifer Jason Leigh as “Rebecca” and Mrs. Danvers. My favorite Hitchcock.

Emile Hirsch and James McAvoy as “Strangers on a Train.” Eeww, this is a creepy, but good, movie. Robert Walker is forever a creep for me in movies after it, I can’t watch him in any other role and like him.

Renée Zellweger in Kim Novak’s role in “Vertigo.” This one doesn’t quite do it for me, the movie or the Zellweger shot. She looks old! Not that old is bad. She just looks old for the role. But I like how she really got into this, which you can see on the video making this portfolio.
Gwyneth Paltrow and Robert Downey Jr. in “To Catch a Thief.” I can kind of see Gwyneth as Grace, but the cliched choice for Cary would have been George Clooney I suppose.
Jodie Foster in Tippi Hedren’s role in “The Birds.” Hmm, I don’t know about this one either. Did you know Daphne Du Maurier, author of Rebecca the book, also wrote the story for “The Birds”? Talk about two geniusly creepy minds, Du Maurier and Hitchcock.
Seth Rogan in Cary Grant’s role in “North by Northwest.” Who is Seth Rogan? Although I love this movie, I always wondered why Cary Grant wore reddish brown shoes with a grey suit. Must be a ‘50s color scheme.
Marion Cotillard (recent Oscar winner for her portrayal of Edith Piaf in “La Vie en Rose”) in the shower scene in “Psycho.” I love this one, I think she looks pretty good screaming. But how do you replace Janet Leigh’s panicked face?

Here’s a video of the making of this cool project and here’s the background on making it, but I hope no one will ever remake these movies.

Um, I guess they already have:

“Dial M for Murder” became “A Perfect Murder” with Paltrow and Michael Douglas in 1998. It was pretty good actually.
“Rear Window” remade with Christopher Reeve and Daryl Hannah in 1998. Um, not so much.
“Rebecca” remade for TV. Didn’t see it, don’t know.
“Strangers on a Train” – Hey, a remake is in production this year!

“Psycho” – I didn’t see Gus Van Sant’s 1998 remake with Vince Vaughn and Anne Heche as the screamer.

Do you have a favorite Hitchcock movie? As you probably already know, he never won an Oscar for Best Director, although “Rebecca” won best picture in 1940.

“You thought I LOVED her!?”

By the way, I'm not quite getting why the illustrator shoved the movie poster over Joan Fontaine's head: