I KNOW NORMAN MAILER WAS KIND OF A DICK...

But I just love this letter.

To William F. Buckley, Jr.

January, 1966

Dear Bill,

I send you the enclosed not because I love National Review so much, for I don’t—it’s not so good as it ought to be, and often it’s tiresome, especially when one knows in advance what your trusted old line contributors are going to say—but as a personal mark of respect to you. Your letter was the best letter I ever read by an editor asking for funds. . . .

One request. Please keep my contribution in the secret crypts. It is not that I fear public opinion so much as ceaseless repetition. Repetition kills the soul and I would not wish to spend one hundred evenings in succession explaining to various outraged and somewhat stupid people in calm clear fashion my complex motives for giving a gift to a magazine for which I feel no affection and to an editor with whom on ninety of a hundred points I must rush to disagree. They would not understand that good writing is good writing, and occasionally carries the day.

Yours,

Norman

QUICKIE

A Virginia McCain hack on MSNBC just pronounce lambasted as Lamb Basted. As in,

"If you squeeze some of the cooking juices over the lamb, I'm sure you will be happy with the resulting deliciousness. Everyone loves their lamb basted!"

TOURIST

Yesterday I had a meeting in an office.

I've worked in offices. I had a friend in high school whose parents ran a tiny hot dog company out of Deerfield, IL. I worked there for awhile. There were five full-time employess:

M: My friend's Dad. He started the company after his family's kosher sausage company got bought by Sara Lee. Passionate about hot dogs.

B: My friend's Mom. Sweet-tempered, supportive, office manager and cheerleader.

R: Saleswoman. Her brother is a famous TV and movie producer. I remember her telling me a story about how she met Meg Ryan and she is so much prettier in person. I have since met the woman, and I can't say I agree. It seems like she showed her plastic surgeon a picture of Mr. Potato Head:

T: He was one of those Asperger's guys that, according to workplace comedies, seem to be a common feature of office culture. I'm glad he was there because now I can watch portrayals of his type and laugh knowingly. ("Spot On!" I can shout, while wiping my eyelids of their mirthful moisture.)

B: Receptionist of sorts. She was forever ordering office supplies. She was also single and a cancer survivor. I know this because the first time I met her she said, "Hi. I'm B. I'm single and a cancer survivor."

I was sort of a shipping clerk. Mostly I would stand in the back, taping labels to vacuum sealed frozen hot dogs. Freezer tape, if you don't know, smells uncannily of girl parts.

Point is, I've worked in an office. But the meeting I had yesterday was in a serious office. A corporate culture kind of office. The kind where a receptionist sits at a desk by the elevators and says things into a phone like, "Mr. So-and-So, Ilana is here to see you now." I was there for a Brainstorming session. A group of us sat in a corner on bouncy, kindergarten-colored furniture, the kind of furniture that was undoubtedly designed after a brainstorming meeting on "creativity maximization" . As we talked, someone wrote on an oversized Post-it Pad, periodically ripping off pages and hanging them on the wall.

It's not that I'm rock and roll. I'm really not. I live in South Brooklyn, after all. Brownstone and baby Brooklyn. The Brooklyn for corporate types who like trees. But something about being in that environment, on that furniture...it made me feel like this:

THE END OF SOME ERAS

Astroland, an amusement park next to the boardwalk in Coney Island, closed for good yesterday. My friend Vicki and I went down to Coney Island to give it a last look. It was sad. Look at how fun it was:


In other fin de siecle news, the musical Rent had it's last curtain call on Broadway last night. The original cast joined the final cast for a last rendition of Seasons of Love:




I guess it's time for some new eras. Any ideas?

JOYFUL NOISE

It's amazing how quiet real quiet sounds to ears trained on noise.

I am way out on Long Island. My non-celebrity boss lent me his house in the Hamptons while he hangs in Greece for three weeks. I am holing up here by myself for a few days to get some serious work done on the very many projects that I have lately been neglecting. They could use some attention, poor things. My projects are like the children of a drunk, absent Mom. "I promise I'll be better," I tell them. And they nod, listen. They want to believe.

Anyway, I arrived at the house at 6:45 or so and almost immediately hopped on my bike to make the twenty-minute ride to the grocery store. Why the urgency?

1. I hosted a really fun party last night, and I can't seem to bounce back from fun as quickly as I once could. I was in dire need of a cup of coffee and there is no coffee maker at the house. (Sad, right?)
2. I needed to buy some food for fridge. There is nowhere to eat in the Hamptons. Last week when I was here I wandered around the very swanky village of East Hampton looking for dinner. The place was brimming with upscale boutiques and completely bereft of eating establishments. The one restaurant I found had a $23 salad. I ended up seeing a movie and eating popcorn for dinner.
3. I missed my bike and wanted to ride it.

By the time I left the store it was dark. I have a bike light now, thankfully. That's a mistake you only make once! (Because my mother reads the blog I will not subject her to the scary image of me riding up a completely unlit country road with my cell phone on my handle bars to light the road ahead of me. Oh! I blew it! Sorry Mom! Um, if it's any comfort, I was wearing a helmet!)

I like to sing when I'm riding my bike through the city. A lot of people do. If you live in a big city and start listening for it, you'll hear a chorus of cyclists singing full voice as they ride. I don't know why I do it. There's an aspect of joyful outburst to it; there's also a desire to make myself louder and bigger due to my vulnerability among the noisy, burly cars.

Here in the country--and it really is the country--on the way back from the grocery store, I found myself once again bursting into song while steering Alberta (my bike). But the source of my need to sing was different than it is in town. It wasn't noise or brawn, but quiet that got me nervous. The quiet was everywhere, stubbornly pungent like tear gas, like the smell of garlic on hands.

I sang the whole way home. Showtunes, specifically:

Whenever I feel afraid
I hold my head erect
And whistle a happy tune
So no one will suspect I'm afraid

Darkness and loneliness and silence everywhere. The house was no better than the road had been. Immediately after closing the front door behind me, I ran around turning on lights, music, calling Gregory.

My apartment in Brooklyn is right on a highway. When we first saw the place we weren't sure we could handle the noise.

Maybe the need for noise is what separates townspeople from country folk.

I AM REALLY EXCITED FOR THIS MOVIE!!!

The Price of Success from beautifullosersfilm on Vimeo.

I WAS SO MUCH OLDER THEN, I'M YOUNGER THAN THAT NOW

I recently reconnected with a camp counselor on Facebook. He asked me how I was, and I wrote him a very long, emotional letter about how much he meant to me. Money quote:

I didn't know who I was when I met you, Marcus, I just knew that I wanted to be like you.

and:

When you imagine the motley crowd of misfits that are better off for having known you, please picture me among them.

His response? A sweet and casual thanks for saying that and glad I could help and seems like you're doing well which is good because I always liked you. Lovely, really, and perfectly appropriate. Far more appropriate than my epic diatribe about the past and youth and wisdom.

I don't know what I expected, something more melancholy, maybe, a kind of meditation on the magical time we shared. But this particular person has helped and inspired many many people in the course of his life, he probably gets letters like this all the time. He was undoubtedly more important to me than I was to him, which is the exact nature of the teacher-student (master-apprentice, counselor-camper, shrink-patient) relationship.

I have had a number of relationships with younger people, as a counselor or teacher, and more informally, as someone a bit older who has experienced things. A young comic comes to mind, my friend's aspiring filmmaker little brother as well. And I've listened to them, shared my experiences, hoped to be some sort of guide or resource. Thinking of these relationships now it seems that the joke is on them because, what the hell do I know about anything? I feel that I know less and less and less.

I asked Marcus about this in my letter, since I realized he was only 23 when I knew him, only seven years my senior, and he seemed to me like he knew everything. His response:

I was learning how to be grown up too and shared that to the best of my ability.

Teachers always say they learn as much from their students as they teach them, but maybe this means something different from what I thought it did. Maybe, in teaching, we make ourselves aware of what we know and what we have still to learn.

VEGAN LUNCH CHALLENGE

I recently had a conversation with a radical friend of mine. He's the type of guy who says things like, "It isn't a question of if we run out of water, Ilana, but when we run out of it." He took issue with the Green Movement, specifically with what he saw as a merger of environmentalism and consumerism, Green Chic. I argued that whatever someone's motivations for driving a Prius or using recycled paper products, it decreases our national footprint, a good thing for everyone. A government, civil or social, cannot hope to control the souls of its constituents. The best it can do is attempt to guide their actions, by doling out praise for those actions that are deemed good for society, (You have solar panels on your roof? Hoorah for you!) or punishment for those that are deemed bad (Litterer? Off with your head!).

My friend's argument was that there is a kind of back-patting that accompanies some of this visible environmental friendliness that does not translate to any actual net gain for the earth. Powering your home with wind power, for example, means little if you are jetting off to the Bahamas or to Europe or to Bora Bora four times a year. Still, I argued, better than nothing. Baby steps, said I.

Then I saw this little fact from the PBJ campaign:

Each time you have a plant-based lunch like a PB&J you'll reduce your carbon footprint by the equivalent of 2.5 pounds of carbon dioxide emissions over an average animal-based lunch like a hamburger, a tuna sandwich, grilled cheese, or chicken nuggets. For dinner you save 2.8 pounds and for breakfast 2.0 pounds of emissions.

Those 2.5 pounds of emissions at lunch are about forty percent of the greenhouse gas emissions you'd save driving around for the day in a hybrid instead of a standard sedan.

Now, I don't drive a Prius, I drive a bike, so I could easily be self-righteous about carbon emissions. But I can do more than my part, can't I? In fact, we will all have to do more than our share of habit shifting if we have any hope of effecting any actual change. We can't afford to rest on our meager laurels.

So I am pledging, here and now, to have a vegan lunch every weekday. I will do my very best to avoid all animal products, and in so doing, I hope to reduce my carbon footprint by 12.5 pounds a week. Wow. I will feel so good about myself after a few weeks, I might feel compelled to reward myself with a tropical vacation!

Just kidding.

Anyone else up for this challenge?

CLASS NOTES

I sent an update to the Class Notes section of my alumni newsletter, and they wouldn't publish it! This is an outrage! Especially considering the stuff they do publish. Like this little golden nugget (I have gone to the trouble of boldfacing the especially annoying bits):

"In Jan '07 I moved to Tel Aviv with the hopes of making new friends and establishing a new life for myself. Besides missing my family and friends in the US, my biggest fear was finding a job that would be even half as interesting and well paid as the one I had in Boston. To my surprise, within my 1st 2 weeks living in Israel I got a job offer that was not only as interesting but well paid. It's now been about 2.5 years that I've been with Sparta Systems as a sr acct exec to the European market as well as a regional sales mgr, managing a team of 5. At the same time, I'm finishing up my 1st year in an exec MBA prog part of Kellogg (NW) and Tel Aviv U. I have met amazing people here and have built a very strong network. I live a 10-minute walk from the beach (Mediterranean Sea) and am truly enjoying my life. In Aug, I'll be coming back to the US and will spend 2 weeks in Chicago (taking classes on campus in Kellogg). In addition to classes, Jim Smith MEd '01 will be flying in from Portland, OR, and we'll be going to a Cubs game with some of my classmates. After the 2 weeks, I'll head to Boston for a few days to see my family and friends before heading back to Tel Aviv. All in all, besides a bit of stress due to work and school and lots of business travel to Europe, I can't complain. Life is good."

Life may be good, anonymous classmate of mine, but it is also short. If you told me this story in person, I would nod, smile, and pass the time counting your blinks. Incidentally, did we know each other? I don't remember anyone from college.

Rather than cry myself to sleep (I'm doing that anyway, by the way, because it's hotter than stew in here), I thought...why wait to be published when you can publish yourself? (sad) So here's the update I sent my alumni newsletter. Enjoy!

I'm doing so awesome, it's pretty unbelievable. Career? Out of this world. Babies? I have six or seven babies and more husbands than I can even count. Seriously, it's killer being me. I live in Brooklyn, where I totally rock.

I just thought people should know what I've been up to.

NOT BAD

This is the view from the killer terrace that belongs to one of my clients who is never in town:



This is me reclining on one of the chaise lounges of said killer terrace while waiting for some guys to finish re-installing a bronze mirror:


I really should stop complaining about work.

MAKE ME A MATCH, FIND ME A FIND, CATCH ME A CATCH

In addition to my own celebrity, I work for an interior designer. A few weeks ago, he told me about a new client--single, straight, Harvard grad with an immaculate brownstone in the West Village. My response?

"Single you say? Brownstone? Do you think I could set him up with a friend of mine?"

I have always been a bit of a yenta (matchmaker, for those of you who are neither Jewish nor musical theater-educated). I love the idea of bringing people together, whether it is two people I love, two people I know, or a person I love with a person I have never met but who went to Harvard and is single and anyway what the hell else do you want? I can't seem to stop my match-mindedness, despite the fact that it has gotten me in trouble FOR YEARS. Because, let's be honest, most relationships fail. And if they fail and someone gets hurt, they blame not the tall, handsome, brownstone-owning former Lacrosse player, but the tall, dark, mettling Jewish girl shrugging sheepishly in the corner. In other words, me.

But I was in Chicago this weekend, playing poker with a bunch of my old camp friends. All of them are boys, many of them are single, and I just couldn't help my yenta wheels from churning. "Come to New York," I kept saying. "I have the perfect girl for you." Because the single women to single men ratio in NYC is totally off-kilter. My wonderful, single girlfriends are suffering a huge disadvantage here. Check out this map:
Chicago, as you can see, also has more single women to men. As my Chi-town girls know all too well.

So, what's a girl to do? Move to Los Angeles or Dallas or Denver? Just to find a single dude? Or suffer through the humiliation of an over-enthusiastic, old world-minded 30 year old jewess?

Up to you, girls.

AN OFFER THEY CAN REFUSE

I never thought I would be in a position to understand, first hand, the plight of Kay Corleone. You remember her from the Godfather, right? Diane Keaton. Outsider. Whose needs and desires are determined by this sinister collection of men. They loom. They whisper. They make plans.

I never suspected that I could identify personally with Kay, but that was before I came in contact with: THE CONDO BOARD.

I don't have a condo. I have a small rent stabilized one-bedroom in Brooklyn. When we asked the super, Carlos, about going on the roof, he shrugged. "Officially, you're not supposed to go up there. I tell people, just don't jump off!" Then he cracked up. This is the kind of management attitude I look for in a building.

My boss has a condo. Nothing can be done to the apartment--we couldn't put in a new bathroom, build a wall, nothing--without the board's approval. And for the last three months the Board has been holding my air conditioning proposal hostage.

"Looks good," the building manager said in March. "We just have to pass it to the architect and then the board will approve it."

That was the last I heard about it.

I call. "Oh hey, Ilana," she says. "No, I haven't heard anything." I picture a fat man with a wet cigar standing behind her, holding his fist and shaking his head. Beads of sweat form on her forehead.

Soon, she starts screening my calls. I have to call from other phones. I email in desperation. I consider CCing my boss. Because the AC is busted in the master bedroom and it's getting hotter and even though he's in LA he could descend at any time and oh! the humiliation! if he came to New York to find his bedroom hotter than Wisconsin in August, what kind of celebrity personal assistant would I be then? And what kind of wrath would I have to endure? No! I won't have it! I will yell! I will carry on! I mean, do you have to be a made guy to get anything done around here?

The building manager finally called me back last week. "Well the board met last night (Where? The Bada Bing? The pork store?) and they decided that your boss's Air Conditioner is not a priority."

Sigh.

THE TEARS THAT I CRIED FOR THAT WOMAN, THEY'RE GONNA FLOOD YOU BIG RIVER

In 2006 Greg and I took a road trip on two lane highways along the Mississippi. It was one of the most amazing trips I have ever taken in my life. We started in Davenport, IA, saw the green green earth of Iowa and Illinois ("It just seems like you could grow anything here!" said Greg). We got pulled over by a cop in Nauvoo, Illinois who undoubtedly took us for one of the millions of Mormon families that make pilgrimage to the tiny town, clogging the streets and cleaning out its candy supply. We went to Hannibal, Missouri, the boyhood home of Mark Twain, the whole town a kind of theme park dedicated to its famous literary son. We passed St. Louis, stayed in Cape Girardeau, MO where we were shocked to wake up in the Rush Limbaugh's hometown to discover a place that sold delicious multigrain muffins.

Now much of these river towns are underwater. They're a resilient bunch, though, the people who camp on the banks of that river. Are they like abused spouses? Sharing a house with a loving, committed partner with periodic outbursts of violent rage? Are we Americans who live near oceans or lakes or desert or mountains, are we the friend who, one day, over coffee, after yet another excuse (I fell down the stairs, the levees weren't tall enough, etc.), do we suddenly grab the wrist of our abused friend, do we look her deep in the eyes and say: "It doesn't have to be like this! You gotta get out of there! I will help you..." Does she free her wrist from our grasp, pat us on the shoulder and say, "But I love him. He's so wonderful so much of the time. You don't understand..."

HANGOVER EXCERCISE

Ever work out after a night of heavy drinking and find that the smell coming off you allows you to reconstruct moments of the previous evening that you may have forgotten? (Oh! Sniff Sniff Sweat-- I forgot about that chicken calzone!)

One time my boyfriend drank too much and threw up on a homeless person. The homeless person was totally disgusted. That's right. My boyfriend grossed out a homeless guy. It's one of the many of my partner's skills that I wasn't aware of during our early courtship. Also, he's stupidly good at the card game Spite and Malice. It's annoying.

THE PROBLEM OF OBSERVATION

I am, or have been, a dialogue writer. Plays, screenplays, teleplays, even standup comedy is dialogue, and is, as such, a first person enterprise. There is no floating observer, casually coming to conclusions about the characters. In a play the audience is the third person.

But now I am writing prose, and I am plagued by the question of intimacy in observation. Most of my favorite books are in 1st: Lolita (is there a more interesting troubled narrator than Humbert Humbert?) Invisible Man, Jonathan Lethem writes almost entirely in first person, Augie March, Roth's Zuckerman books. But there are beautiful third person books, too numerous to list, Cunningham comes to mind, and Moody, and of course, all the Russians and the French. Intimate tragic books that are filled with she and he rather than I: Of Human Bondage, Madame Bovary, The Scarlet Letter. First person seems funnier, more acerbic, more modern. More American. More ironic. Less beautiful. Dirtier.

But at what cost? To follow one character and neglect all others, it seems unfair!

It is not a negligible decision. It is the decision that defines an entire book.

Sigh. I fear the problem is that I am too in love with the little literary darlings I've created, that I want to have everything--first person voice, multiple character perspectives. Then I read this little passage in a book called Writings by Agnes Martin--an artist. (The set of four lithographs to the left are hers--Untitled 1998.)

Humility, the beautiful daughter
She cannot do either right or wrong
She does not do anything
All of her ways are empty
Infinitely light and delicate
She treads an even path
Sweet, smiling, uninterrupted, free

Sounds good doesn't it? Let the work, and not my ego make decisions for me.

In other news a friend of mine sent me this picture. Subject: Irony
Ilana's beloved replied, "They just take you out back to the range, and have you stand in a bucket?"

There. That was third person. What did you think?

BEEN WRITING

So I haven't been blogging much. But I'm getting complaints, which is nice. Since last I updated I have:

• Cleaned up excrement that belonged to a celebrity other than my boss.
• Traveled for ten days in the Basque Country with my Dad, sister and boyfriend without breaking up or becoming estranged from anyone.
• Spent a lot of time in Coney Island.

I am writing a novel (I know, right? Who the hell do I think I am?) that takes place partially in Coney Island. I was there when it was closed and took some cool pictures. Want to see? Thought you might:



Saddest place in the world, right?

I could start publishing excerpts of the novel...is that something you guys would be interested in? Post a comment and let me know.

I'M SORT OF UNCOMFORTABLE TALKING ABOUT THIS, BUT I NONETHELESS CANNOT SHUT UP ABOUT IT

For awhile I was writing about pregnancy. I wrote a couple stories, the play I am writing now has a pregnant person. Here's an excerpt from a play I wrote last year that I abandoned:

LIZZY
This is reality, mother! I am pregnant. With child. Knocked up. Corked. Embarazada.
JOAN
I don’t see why you insist on doing this to me. You have always had it in for me. Ever since you were a little girl.
HAROLD
(Incredulously)
Pregnant. Huh.
LIZZY
This has nothing to do with you. This is about me and what I want.
HAROLD
(HAROLD chuckles)
Well, Joannie? She’s certainly not a lesbian.
JOAN
Lesbians can have children Harold.
LIZZY
I am not a lesbian!
JOAN
It happens all the time.
HAROLD
Why do you know so much about lesbians?
JOAN
I don’t know so much. I know something, that’s all. About an alternative culture that I was perfectly ready to accept in my own daughter...
LIZZY
I am not a fucking lesbian!
JOAN
But now-- well, this is much worse than being gay. Did you hear me, Elizabeth? Much worse.
LIZZY
What about cancer? Would you have preferred that too?
HAROLD
I don’t know. I mean, not that I think being a lesbian is bad or anything...
LIZZY
Oh Jesus Christ.
HAROLD
But, I’m glad you like boys, Lizzy. I must say. That was a bit of a relief.
JOAN
Of course. Relief. I think that is the perfect word to describe the way that I am feeling right now. Relieved and relaxed.
LIZZY
Mom, calm down.
JOAN
Calm and serene and relieved. Right Harold? May I have a drink before I faint?

I seem to have gotten it out of my system, though. No one has been pregnant for awhile. Now I keep writing about race and racial tensions. One piece after another about it. I don't even realize I'm doing it until it's done. And the whole thing makes me uncomfortable.

Apparently, I'm not the only one.

AH, LOVE.

A quote from my boyfriend:

Don't give me the ass face just before I leave for work!

We're going to DC today. I need a break from the primary. One might think, "You're going to our nation's capital to escape the presidential nomination?" To which I would respond, "I never said I was very smart."

The last time I was in DC was in 8th grade. I remember that Josh Mintzer and I fought non-stop, until Josh got moved to another bus. I was good with the comebacks then. It was a defense mechanism I had to develop to counteract my underdeveloped fashion sense. If you go to school in nothing but a sweatshirt and a pair of red and white striped tights, you learn to hurl whatever tools you can get a hold of at the nasty hyenas that will undoubtedly greet you in homeroom.

I also remember that our tour guide in DC walked around with an open umbrella to make herself conspicuous, and got bleary eyed when describing the zoo's difficulties in getting the pandas to procreate. Apparently mama panda kept rolling over and squashing her babies in her sleep. This story was undoubtedly told to us to elicit our pathos, but we were thirteen. We thought it was hilarious. I remember the tour guide gesturing wildly about the tragedy, while I sat there on the bus with my friends, staring at the seat back in front of me, tears rolling down my cheeks, desperately suppressing the guffaw that was screaming from my belly, clamoring for release.

Anyway, we're going to see every museum. To walk hand in hand on the mall. It should be fun. I am sure I will have plenty to share when I get back, so stay tuned...

THIS IS ALL I CAN SAY TODAY. MY HEART IS DARK.

Enter the ICHC online Poker Cats Contest!

¡VIVA!

I loved this...keep an eye out for the lady in the laundromat towards the end of the video. It's a nice touch.