You said something... that I’ve never forgotten.
Thanksgiving was yesterday, as curious an American holiday as any other. We perpetuate this mysterious turkey-oriented family holiday without really knowing why, I say. I keep citing this statistic I heard on NPR that I heard: 96% of Americans will eat turkey on Thanksgiving day. "What is wrong with us?" I propose to people, "where are the vegetarians? Do they cave on Turkey Day? I bet at least 40% of that 96 don't even like turkey." My grandmother, of all people, tried to rationalize it to me. "Because the pilgrims killed a turkey on this day!" she actually attempted to justify. We got a laugh out of that one at our table, me, my mom and aunt BJ, witnesses to her earenst attempt to explain my intellectualized theory of mindless sheep-mentality behavior.
But you can't really complain about the whole getting-together-of-family thing, can you? Even if you hate your family or don't even really have many relatives nearby to eat with; you end up creating one out of friends or neighbors, don't you? There may not be any 'Giving of thanks' involved, but usually there's a moment where you do enjoy the romanticized notion of what it means to be thankful for what you do and do not have.
It was pretty bizarre, though, how drastically it seemed that my extended family T-Day seemed to perpetuate certain gendered stereotypes when it comes to the expectations and duties of men and women on holiday day. While my host and godmother aunt BJ was a-bustle in the kitchen with my mother and grandmother gabbing non-stop about the food, the timing, relatives, the house, the way things should be put out, etc., the men watched football and drank beer on BJ's massive sectional sofa next to the kitchen. I didn't know what to do. I don't pretend to feign interest anymore, about football to fit in. Everyone knows I'm gay but I'm not going to trash-talk football-watching or invest in the family gossip, either. So I milled. I ate a lot of shrimp cocktail and Tostito Scoops with a Southwestern cream cheese dip and mostly took it all in.
After the big meal was when it got even worse. The women continued to talk and clean, while the men took naps on the couch and generally looked like beached walruses in the living room. Again, where do I stand? I stand with my 5-year-old cousin Kelly in a closet and do whatever she tells me to. She leads me all over the house. I oblige her in her 'Follow me' game and do whatever she does, spins, stepping into BJ's giant jacuzi bathtub, crawling on all fours, rolling off the bed, etc. Then I suggested a piggy-back ride and that's where it started getting extra physical. I took her all over the multi-bedroom second floor on my back and we 'explored' opening every door. We closed ourselves into the coat closet downstairs and she crawled all over my shoulders and head for whatever reason, reading off coat label tags and ocassionaly making them fall to the ground, only to pick them up, stand back on my shoulders and hang them back up, "There" she'd mumble after grunting and heavy-breathing through an attempt to hang a coat back up. She never wanted any of the games we played to end. She insisted on playing Hide n' Seek after dinner but soon enough it was time to leave and she was whining and clutching to my leg. "I love you, Bill, don't leave" she protested. So cute.
I drove to Albany from Springfield at about 5 to make it to Mike's house before Jack's bedtime. It was totally worth it. My nephew is precious and I wish he weren't so shy, because I would like to hug him and kiss him ravenously but I think he doesn't really like it. He's surprisingly smart now, for not speaking in more than grunts and gestures. You ask him to bring you the fire truck puzzle piece and he does, you ask him for 'the bear' and he brings it to you, etc. I met Christa's gay brother Kenneth finally, and sure enough, he is cute but partnered, naturally. We watched "Blades of Glory," enjoyed it immensely, then some Ali G episodes while I had a couple bottles of classy beer.
On the way home I enjoyed "Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea" as much as I always do. PJ Harvey released it in 2000 and it is one of the records in my life that I can count on to distract me from my thoughts, to engage me from beginning to end, and to somehow make my spirit simultaneously be filled with optimism and dread in a beautifully complementary way.
She says this about "Stories": "I wanted everything to sound as beautiful as possible. Having experimented with some dreadful sounds on Is This Desire? and To Bring You My Love - where I was really looking for dark, unsettling, nauseous-making sounds - Stories From The City... was the reaction. I thought, No, I want absolute beauty. I want this album to sing and fly and be full of reverb and lush layers of melody. I want it to be my beautiful, sumptuous, lovely piece of work." The record has these beautiful moments of oscillation between soft and melodic songs of longing, desire for men she's in a fucked-up relationship with, appreciating rare moments of beauty and peace in a chaotic and often isolatingly brutal world, a world in general (perhaps humanity at large) and a specific world of New York City and Brooklyn. There are also cathartic releases in the form of balls-out rock jams like "Kamikaze," "This is Love" and "The Whores Hustle and the Huslters Whore." Her voice effortlessly goes from gentle and serene to anxious and angry in her most genius of moments. All along the way, of course, is some inspired guitar playing, incredible drum work and ominously beautiful piano tinkles, crashes and rumblings. I haven't listend to much else from her catalogue but I'm not sure I want to. "Stories" is like one of those records that means so much to me because it's so perfect and nobody can fuck with how great I think it is. And if I listened to her other records I would probably find myself forcing the listening and pleasure out of a sense of obligation. Then finding her previous and subsequent records not as satisfactory would imbue that dischord into my reverence for "Stories."
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