Out and Back

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This site will remain up for the next six months or so, as the migration isn't 100% complete yet, but in September the Typepad incarnation of Out and Back will go away!

Revolutionary spirits...

Now that I'm a crazed road warrior, I get most of my news from USA Today -- either the online version or the print edition left outside my hotel room door. This afternoon, while unwinding from a long day, I came across this interesting article. Rev. Gary Kowalski, a Unitarian Universalist minister, has written a fascinating-looking book called Revolutionary Spirit: The Enlightened Faiths of America's Founding Fathers. In the book, Kowalski takes on the obnoxious myth that our nation's founders were Christians and that our country was founded on (big air quotes here) "Christian values." From the article:

Instead, [Kowalski] depicts them as curious, strong-spirited, scientifically-minded men who were determined to keep religion out of government.

"I wanted to set the record straight," said Kowalski, 54, senior minister at the First Unitarian Universalist Society in Burlington, Vt. "I really felt that their legacy had been misappropriated by the religious right."

Before he could educate the public, Kowalski had to educate himself.

He first became interested in the early Americans' spiritual beliefs as an undergraduate at Harvard. In 2003, Kowalski could no longer tolerate what he saw as an influx of historical inaccuracy, and set about researching the true spiritual nature of the historical icons.

As an unwilling resident of South Carolina, which is rife with wingnuts who actually believe we're a Christian country, this article definitely piqued my interest. (If you think I'm lying about the wingnuts, here's some food for thought: the county where I live went for Huckabee in the Republican primary on January 19. Barf.) I'm looking forward to reading the book; I cannot tell you how many times I have read remarks on the editorial pages of the newspapers around here lamenting the fact that the "Christian" values our country was supposedly found upon have gone down the tubes. Good grief. When I finish Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion, I'm definitely picking up Kowalski's book.

I really heart NY

I worked in Connecticut for a couple of days this week. I flew into Newark, rented a car, and drove the 60 miles or so to Danbury, where my client was. Today I drove back so I could fly home. The sun was going down when I hit the Saw Mill Parkway, and by the time I got to the Bronx and began making my way towards the GWB and New Jersey, it was dark. I looked back over my shoulder at the lights of Manhattan as I crossed the bridge and said "Hi, New York!"

I was half-tempted, in my travel-crazed, sleep-deprived state, to blow off my flight home and just drive to Coney Island instead. I'll be working in Yonkers later this month... maybe I'll make it down then.

Gone too soon...

I got home from work this afternoon and checked out Perez Hilton (one of my guilty internet pleasures) and was very shocked to see the news that actor Heath Ledger had passed away. He was just 28 years old.

While I'll admit to enjoying the occasional supermarket tabloid and to checking out Perez Hilton regularly to chuckle at the latest celebrity gossip, I also profess a great love for movies and the actors and actresses that help bring them to life. And that love is sincere and reverent and, I think, transcends the baser instinct that drives me to read about Britney Spears' latest antics and shake my head in disbelief.

Like a lot of people, I first saw Heath Ledger in the movie 10 Things I Hate About You, a modern update of Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew. He played the Petruchio character (Patrick) opposite Julia Stiles' Katerina (Kat in the film.) It was a movie squarely aimed at teenagers, but it was more intelligent than most. I liked it so well that I actually bought a copy when it was released on video. It was funny, cute, and smart, and the two leads definitely left an impression on me. I still giggle at Patrick's impromptu serenade -- singing "You're Just Too Good To Be True (Can't Take My Eyes Off Of You)" to Kat from the bleachers during soccer practice.

Of course, most people (myself included) would argue that Ledger's greatest success came with his portrayal of Ennis Del Mar in Brokeback Mountain. It's still difficult for me to find adequate words to explain the emotional impact that movie had on me in general, let alone to describe how deeply I was moved by Ledger's performance (and that of his co-star, Jake Gyllenhaal.) All I can do is tell you to rent that movie and watch it -- of all the films Heath Ledger made, I think it's the one that shows most clearly what a powerful and gifted artist he was. It's hard to describe such talent in the past tense.   

Morning ramble

The posts here have been fewer and farther between, I know, but I had some time this morning and thought I would throw a few words up here to keep little Out and Back's bloggy heart beating. I'm writing this post from Christiansburg, VA. Hubby and I arrived on Saturday to hang with my brother, sister-in-law, and not quite six month old nephew for the weekend. We're heading back to SC this morning, but it has been a wonderful visit. My nephew is a very sunny little guy, quite even-tempered for a baby. My husband and I had fun holding, playing with, and reading to him at several points during the course of the weekend.

In other news, my husband will be finishing his PhD coursework this semester, after which he'll be able to dedicate himself full time to researching and writing his dissertation (he's already started work on it but I know he's looking forward to being able to give it more of his attention.) I got a promotion at work at the start of the year, too, which is exciting. More interesting projects and challenging clients are coming my way, and I'll be cross-training on a third product this year which I guess makes me a triple threat -- in any event, it makes me much more billable. We also might be leaving our little apartment in the upstate and moving to Charleston this summer, and we are both excited about that.

I'm still on the road quite a bit -- Texas this week, Kansas the week after, and upstate NY and Texas again in February (so far.) I've also got two local clients, which is a nice break from the norm. Imagine, commuting by car instead of by plane!

The culture of victim-blaming is alive and well

Stepping out from behind my semi-anonymous blogging persona for a moment, I was dismayed (but not altogether surprised) to read a report in one of the local papers about a sexual assault on the Clemson University campus. (My husband is a grad student at Clemson and we live nearby.)

The story reads, in part:

Clemson University police advised students Friday to walk in groups of threes and fours after sunset after a student reported that she was sexually assaulted by two men in a campus parking lot on Perimeter Road early Friday morning.

The student, 18, was exiting her car when one of the men grabbed her from behind and sexually attacked her in Parking lot R-1 about 1:30 a.m., Clemson Police Chief Johnson Link said. She said she was then forced to the ground and attacked by a second man, he said.

She had been waiting in the parking lot for campus escort assistance, Link said. The campus escort is a service offered through the university Police Department that provides an escort for students going across the campus at night.

The student notified Clemson educators several hours later, Link said.

Like a lot of newspapers, the online edition of the Greenville News has a "story chat" feature that allows readers to post their reactions, comments, and thoughts about the various articles, opinion pieces, etc. It makes for entertaining reading a lot of the time, but sometimes the comments that get left are just upsetting. In the case of this article, someone named sillyhunter posted the following (emphases mine):

This story has some questions................Why was this child out in a parking lot this late? Why wait to report a rape later the next morning.....Had enough time to decide if it was a rape or not?? And if she doesn't know about safety in this day and age maybe college is not for her. Sounds like she still needs to be under the watchful eye of a responsible adult. Maybe went to a frat party and had one drink to many and got just a little too loose and had party regrets the next morning??????It's always somebody else's fault never the victim. The difference between a stupid victim and smart person is that one is the victim.

I just about upchucked when I read that comment. I posted my own response (I use the handle "coneydog" when posting to the forums on the Greenville News website) and was heartened to see that someone else posted a response basically telling sillyhunter to shut up.

Yes, dear ones, the culture of victim blaming is alive and well in South Carolina. I guess I'm not surprised, considering how much misogyny still pervades society down here. Any locals who come across this post are probably going to tell me to go the fuck home, Yankee, but I'm not backing down on this one. Rape is an underreported crime, and despite the notoriety of the Duke lacrosse rape case (in which the charges were eventually dropped because the alleged victim kept changing her story and there was no physical evidence linking her to the three players she accused) the number of truly false reports of rape remains quite low. (One reference I found suggested as low as 2% of all reported rapes in the U.S. are false.) And for every rape that is reported, how many go unreported because the victim is ashamed, afraid, or forcibly silenced?

Ladies, it doesn't matter how much you had to drink, what you were wearing, how well you knew the guy, or what you may or may not have done with him in the past. If you didn't want to have sex with him and he went ahead and fucked you anyway, he raped you. It doesn't matter if you fought back or not or if you told him to stop or not, because silence does not equal consent. And to the young woman at Clemson, I hope they catch the pigs that did this to you. For every insensitive creep that calls you "loose" and accuses you of having "party regrets," there are many more of us who care about you and support you without ever having met you. Remember that.

A symbol of my faith

In the photo at left, I'm holding a necklace I acquired a few months ago. The symbol is a pentagram (the object itself is called a pentacle.)  Over the summer, I began a study of Wicca, an earth-based pagan religion sometimes referred to as witchcraft.  In all honesty, though, my study of Wicca has felt less like a study and more like an affirmation. The values and tenets of Wicca are 1,000% compatible with who I am.  Put another way, I think I was a Wiccan long before I started studying the Craft.

My newfound spiritual life has been a blessing, but it has also posed some problems. I can't be as "out" as I would like to be, for one thing. I live in an area that is heavily populated with conservative, evangelical Christians -- the kind that will tell you without batting an eye that you're going to burn for eternity in hell as soon as they find out you don't share their beliefs or haven't accepted Jesus as your personal savior. So wearing my pentacle openly is something I've only done a few times, mainly to test the reaction I get. My husband and I were in Anderson yesterday and the gal at the deli where we bought our lunch asked me about it.  To my pleasant surprise, she commented that she thought it was very pretty.  I wore it again to Wal-Mart today and got a few stares, but no one approached me or confronted me.  I still plan to be judicious about when I put it on.  I'm not ashamed of my faith and not afraid of a little confrontation, but given how "witches" were treated in the early days of this nation, I figure better safe than sorry.

So what does my five pointed star symbolize? Four of the five points correspond to the four elements -- earth, air, fire, and water -- and the fifth point to the spirit. The moon symbols on top of the star are meant to represent the three phases of the moon -- waxing, full, and waning -- which in turn correspond to the three incarnations of the goddess: maiden, mother, and crone. Contrary to popular misconception, the five-pointed star is not a satanic symbol. Pagans were using it long before the satanists got hold of it (and satanists typically invert it, with the topmost point pointing downward.) While I'm at it, I should also mention that Wiccans do not worship "the devil." As far as we're concerned, there is no such thing.  The devil is a wholly Christian invention, anyway.

My study continues... I'll pop my head out of the broom closet periodically to let you know how it's going.

The latest from Coney Island

I'm as late as can be on this bit of news and my favorite Brooklyn/Coney Island blogs have had much better coverage, but I would like to acknowledge that there have been some semi-positive developments in the Coney Island redevelopment saga recently:

On November 8, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg unveiled a new plan for Coney Island. Bloomberg announced that the city has plans to acquire all the land between KeySpan Park and the Cyclone (basically the existing amusement area), re-zone it, and lease it to a developer who will keep it as an amusement zone.  So your favorite megalomaniac and mine, Joe Sitt, is OUT (at least out of that section.)  That's the nice part.  Based on what I've read, Joey Coney will still have something to do with Coney Island since it sounds like the city might offer to swap parcels of land with him.

Bloomberg went on to unveil some more extensive plans for the neighborhood, including a section west of KeySpan that will be zoned for residential development.  So while the city won't entirely purge the residential element from the plan, I suppose the good news is that at least it's going to be in a better spot -- west of the amusements in an area that doesn't have a whole lot going on right now anyway.

I'll be curious to see how this all plays out -- I'm glad to see the amusement zone pried from Joe Sitt's control, but I still have my doubts about the city's redevelopment plans.  The Gowanus Lounge had a lot of excellent posts on the subject throughout the month of November; this one, in particular, was especially good.  Kinetic Carnival has some great posts, too, about the opposition that has sprung up in the face of the city's announcements.

The end result remains to be seen, but I do find the city's plan marginally more appealing than Sitt's and am hopeful that my favorite neighborhood will finally get the TLC it needs.

Montana

I spent a few days in Whitefish, Montana last week, not too far from Glacier National Park.  I was there for work, and as I wrote in an email to my brother, being there did me a lot of good.  I needed to remind myself what real mountains look like. The photo at left is the view from my room at Grouse Mountain Lodge.

It was cold and snowy but I didn't mind bundling up to venture out.  The people I met were friendly, and when they asked me where I was from I would say I lived in South Carolina but that I was from Seattle originally.  As soon as "Seattle" left my lips there was a smile or a nod of recognition, like we had an understanding.  I was suddenly less foreign.

The trip from South Carolina to Montana was a long haul... Greenville to Memphis to Minneapolis to Kalispell.  I was worried because I only had twenty minutes to make my connection in Memphis, but I made it without a hitch, only to discover in Minneapolis that my flight to Kalispell was delayed by two hours.  It was one of those maddening situations where the plane was there but the crew wasn't.  (They were stuck on a delayed flight from Canada.)  As soon as the gate agent announced that fact, a harried mother hollered out, "Just give me the keys, I'll fly the plane!"  One of her sons was a skateboarder, and as I walked past him on the moving walkway (I made several treks up and down the terminal in an effort to kill time) he noticed my sneakers (Etnies) and complimented me on them.  I guess Etnies are popular with skater boys, so I felt pretty cool.

Right: my tired Etnies. Haven't worn them since last winter, it's been nothing but flip-flops for me since April.

Odd Thanksgiving

For the first time in my life, I will be observing Thanksgiving by myself this year.  My husband is in Brazil at a conference and won't be home until Friday morning, and a rotten cold has pre-empted my planned trip to Virginia to spend the holiday with my brother, sister-in-law, and three-month-old nephew.  (I'd be in for all kinds of bad karma if I were to infect my cute little nephew or his parents with this icky cold virus!)

Fortunately, I am starting to feel a little less ill so I think I will enjoy a solitary holiday -- just me, the Macy's parade, and some sort of pumpkin-oriented confection if I have the energy to whip it up.  (I have the ingredients for both pie and muffins; we'll see how ambitious I get.)  I'm enjoying not traveling somewhere for a change, particularly considering that my job takes me all over the place and that I've already got a trip to Seattle planned for the winter holidays.  The local news channel has had a crawl going all day yesterday with the latest flight status and airport delays and it is wonderful, for once, not to be in the midst of all that.

When my husband arrived in Brazil on Sunday morning, we discovered that the wireless carrier that our wireless carrier partners with down there didn't have coverage in the town where my husband would be staying, so we agreed that we'd only call each other if there was a major emergency.  My husband discovered that the pousada where he is staying had a computer with internet access that he could use, though, so he's been emailing me updates on his activities.  Last night I got an email with "Boa noite" in the subject line ("goodnight" in Portuguese.)