06.30.08
Antiheroics
We just went to see Kung Fu Panda – yet another “hero finds himself” tale all wrapped up in a 3d animation box and a slapstick bow. This story features the self-doubting hero common in kids programs these days. He, like Barbie Mariposa, that Cow in Barnyard, and any number of soldier ants/insects in these animation vehicles, is a guy who just likes to party, have fun, live in his dreams. He has no faith in his abilities and has several glaring character flaws. Like the pothead male protagonist in Knocked Up, Po the Panda is unattractive, overweight, lacks self-control, is disrespectful and prone to inappropriate jokes.
That this loser could be a the hero of a story is questioned by everyone in the story but a cliche-lisping, senile old tortoise with a degenerative nerve disease. Here’s the problem I have with this genre of kids movie: the “good guys” are unlikeable: they are mean and quick to judge. They talk cruelly behind Po’s back, demonstrating the kind of cool-kid clique-ism that in the real world leads to bullying. I don’t understand why anyone would want to “belong” with assholes like them. But… Po is desperate to win their favour and of course, through “accepting himself” (i.e. his fatness/essential panda-ness), he can ignite a nuclear-strength blast of yellow light that will obliterate the enemy and win him fame and, more importantly, large-scale community acceptance.
This was as bad as the Ant Bully, in which a mean-spirited boy who beats on others because he is beat on ends up getting a taste of his own medicine and trying to save the very community he tried to destroy. This is the same as Annekin Skywalker, a sullen and miserable child whose temper tantrums lead to the mass slaughter of the Jedi – and to mass emulation on Hallowe’en. Mariposa pathetically begs all the characters to admit to loneliness and shyness too – she will never truly fit in until she wins big pretty sparkley wings for her troubles. Give me a hero – give me an unlikely one - clumsy one, a bookish one, a shy one, but give him something redeemable, something we as an audience can see that is more worth watching than the hero’s clumsiness. And give me a role model, someone who doesn’t just (like Tigress) do cool kung fu moves, but who lives a value too, who stands up to the cruel community.
On the other side of Kung Fu Panda – the Bad Guy is the real underdog. He was abandoned at the gate of the temple, brainwashed into thinking some scroll was the most important achievement for his lifetime, desperate to win the approval his adoptive father, and then when all was lost, exploded with rage. He was imprisoned under extreme conditions and for 20 years became more and more angry, plotting his escape. An escape which was worthy of an indiana jones story, or a video game – it was exciting, daring, and even admirable. He has no hope for redemption. He can only be destroyed. His story is tragic, more so because his heartfelt and deeply motivated struggle for achievement is thwarted by the out-of-shape, irreverent loser described above. He, like Po, has bound up his self-worth into his physical attributes, but inexplicably he cannot transform.
These issues did not appear to dawn on the children in the theatre, whose delighted laughter pealed out with every blow. They even clapped.
06.27.08
Beaujolais and Haydn
I don’t know if I mentioned that I foolishly signed up for a course on 18th century music for the summer. Riding high off my grade from the Reason course, I thought I’d take on a challenge and take a graduate level class on a subject I know virtually nothing about. Diving in head first, attempting to read scores and understand why some of this music is better than others = the professor assigns values to everything, “the best”, “second rate”, “dreadful” etc especially when speaking about productions of music. As a result I have learned that a very good ensemble can make very bad music sound good, and a poor ensemble can make very good music sound awful. But I still need someone to tell me whether the ensemble or the music is to be blamed for my dislike of a piece.
A couple weeks ago our class had a breakthrough and decided to drink and eat together. It’s a small group (6 students) and we’re awkward with each other and with the subject matter – sometimes we seem like children wearing our parent’s big clunky shoes and trying to walk. Well it seems we all traverse this music better with a drink in hand. Perhaps it connected us to the 18th century audience who would have had watery wine almost constantly.
We had a lovely Beaujolais on tuesday and it smoothed my nerves considerably for the presentation I had to give: on Joseph Haydn. I knew nothing about him before I started and now I’ve got a good grasp of the fellow and his music. What is more fascinating to me about him is the loving anecdotes, the warmth with which musicologists, connoisseurs and amateurs alike use when referring to him. He has been roundly well-liked since he began his career, and continues to be enjoyed *as a personality* even today. If only any of us could be remembered by history with such affection – and deserve it.
I will confess here however that I do not particularly like Haydn’s music, but I enjoy his humour/wit/caprice and enjoy the *ideas* behind his music, but when I sit down to listen for the most part, I find myself wanting something else. Perhaps I’m simply not listening to the Best.
06.13.08
Sunset in Ottawa – Dawn of new man
After the conference was over, I went to the art gallery with a colleague. The temporary exhibit there is titled “1930s – Dawn of New Man” and is really excellent. So excellent in fact I thought seriously about buying the catalogue of the exhibition. Maybe I can mail order it. Anyways, the National Gallery is a big place with concrete floors (very uncomfortable walking) and there is a lot to see. I can say with certainty that I did not see everything.
The Dawn of New Man is all about our self-concept as a species. Specifically, about the European and American self-concept during the 1930s and through the second world war. This can’t help but discuss eugenics, can’t help but display the Nazis, and can’t help but confuse us with still-effective images of human beauty and achievement. There are items to marvel at, pieces of twisted metal and powerful anti-propaganda artwork from the 1930s that seem to scream out that something is horribly wrong with Germany, something must be done. A series of photographs titled “portraits of victims” feature dignity, and we know what must have happened. The other side is that as we wander through the exhibit, if something is beautiful it must be a Nazi lie. If something squeezes our guts it must be truth, it must be activist. It must be real.
Really?
Well even now we cannot trust beauty. It is constructed of botox and chemicals. It veils age and experience, softens fine lines and reduces the signs of truth-telling. I’m not sure what to say.
Further in the gallery you can wander through many images of beauty. Pastoral landscapes (golden-age lies), portraits of the wealthy (Patron-sponsored self-promotion), and realistic moments of people at work (idealizing the proto-proletariat so they remain willingly oppressed)… After seeing the New Man it is hard to accept a marble statue of Empress Josephine without looking twice.
That is all for now, I must turn in and sleep for tomorrow early in the morning I call a cab and hop back on a plane, return home to my family and own bed and garden and happy little familiar life, a sunset-warmed portrait of post-millenial bliss.
06.12.08
On Apologies and Politics
We halted the conference to watch the Apology of the Canadian Government to the First Nations, Metis, and Inuit peoples of Canada whose histories and futures have been irrevocably damaged as a result of the Residential Schools System. The loss of culture, language and interpersonal abilities alone is so terrible. Then you add in the loss of children and of parents. This is cultural genocide that deserves more than an apology and deserves more than money.
For generations, neither the ruling party nor the official Opposition interrogated the practice of removing children from their home communities and subjecting them to education in the form of abuses. The death rates were not considered. The community impact was not considered to be meaningful because for generations First Nations communities were not seen as communities. There are enough descriptions of these horrors. We do not need to review them here. For the most part the apology was well scripted and humble, meaningful and repentant. Every speech ended on an upswing, on the hope for the future and for health and prosperity for all peoples of canada. Thank you Steven Harper for making your speech with the respect needed. Thank you Stephane Dion for apologizing for the Liberal governments’ involvement in residential schools. Thank you Jack Layton for calling the Residential Schools system Racist and for heartfelt down-home survivor anecdotes. Thank you all for not grandstanding. Oh, except Gilles Duceppe who couldn’t just leave it alone, couldn’t just accept the occasion as one for apologizing. Of course there’s always more that could be done but this was not the time and it was not appropriate to bring a further agenda to the discussion!
What more do I want to be done? Well, I want to see a special teaching scholarship in honour of residential school survivors available to First Nations students in education. We need more first nations educators. I want to see a remembrance day for the survivors of cultural genocide. We have a Holocaust Remembrance day and I can see a Residential School Survivor day too. I can see a bronze statue of three native children – one inuit, one metis, and one first nations, without smiles on their faces, standing as they did in those belying school portraits. I can see it in a modern form, too, traditional images in relief on their clothing and their hair swirling into sacred shapes. I can see honouring this survival. I can see this day as a vehicle for arts and cultural activities, as a celebration of the society that will not be put out, and as a reminder that the apology is just the beginning of healing. If we do not remember what happened, how can we prevent it from happening again?
06.10.08
Day of the Dead (Ottawa)
Zombified as a result of waking up every 2 hours all night long, of anxiety about not waking up keeping me up, of confusion about a new place and new experiences, and the great uncertainty of whether or not any of this is worth it, I lurched over to the shower closet and cleaned my sticky body. Then I dragged my corpse downstairs to the dining room where there were wee pastries and coffee, a selection of breads. Sadly this place has shite for yogurt (it’s that Yoplait Source thickened chemical milk with gelatin and pectin and sucralose and artificial everything – at 35 calories a container it isn’t even worth the energy it takes to lift the spoon to your mouth), and doesn’t serve a hot breakfast as I was hoping. Not that I should be upset: I don’t eat *usually* breakfast anyways! And the establishment is so affordable that I don’t have a need for vindication the way I would back home, all those “get my money’s worth” pieces come to mind.
However it is blessedly peaceful. As I sit drinking my coffee I am shocked at how utterly silent it is. it really is like living alone. I am aware of the ghosts in the walls, hear creaky footsteps and sometimes the sound of a television or water running, but not a soul to be seen. The only voice is the CBC, serene constancy of hypnotic voices describing unknown music with interest.
Did I mention it was 730am, EST? That’s -uh- 430am Pacific Time. Nope, not enough sleep.
I lurched down the street, backpack strapped on, in the general direction of the hall. It only took about 10 or 15 mins to get there, even highly distractable as I was.
The conference, well, there’s nothing to note other than the plethora of sweet snacks and foodstuffs available for half hours at 2 hour intervals.
After they replaced all my brain fluids with sugar syrup and coffee, they let me leave the conference. I wandered without direction all the way to the Museum of Nature where I paid 5$ to see a lot of dead things. Hundreds of dead (stuffed) birds behind glass, moose and buffalo, beavers and the bones of ancient monsters. Everything posed as you would find it in nature, only pouncing without skin, or eyeing prey with glass eyes. I find it impossibly ironic that the two ancient exhibits – the ice age and the dinosaurs, are both sponsored by Fossil Fuel companies! The most wonderful part of the exhibit was actually a whole set of portraits by F.H. Varley – probably mostly of now-dead people posed as they did in life.
He did something spectacular, or perhaps I’ve never noticed before, but oil paint is alive. It moves, it reflects, it pulls you in. Each stroke is like a moment of awareness, a glimmer of the person whose soul is revealed. These portraits are nothing in reproduction, but right there you feel like you are staring into the eyes of someone who actually lived, actually felt like that, actually looked across the room with that very look in his eyes. There’s one spectacular one of a little boy called “James” and something about that eternal gaze… I couldn’t stop staring. And wondering if he survived the wars (portrait painted in 1920).
For dinner, I had barely passable vietnamese noodle soup. Elgin street seems to have a bar every two doors, but I don’t feel like sitting alone in a tavern getting pub fare. So, I go for fast and cheap, and return home to knit.
06.09.08
My First Business Trip
Okay so it’s more of a conference, but still – it’s my first ever trip that work has sent me on – to OTTAWA (where I am right now). I just got off the plane and made it to my wee B&B which I will report on once I have an inkling of what this place is like. Its a creaky, 100+ yr old house with old fittings and small hot rooms, and is very very quiet… 9pm here and it feels like 1am because of the silence. When I let myself in, I felt the need to tip-toe around the place. So far, I like it. But then, I’m just glad to not be in the airplane anymore.
So, it’s hot and muggy. The airport smells like moist wood and sweat – reminiscent of a sauna without the cedar. I am sticky and intend to purchase some powder tomorrow soonest – seems like it would help.
Tomorrow the first of four days at the conference.
06.02.08
Weekend idyll
Take a few mental snapshots of this weekend while it’s still fresh:
Blueberry pancakes with maple syrup and scrambled eggs for breakfast on Saturday. Flecks of pepper dot the golden eggs. The small ones get cat-shaped pancakes with unintentionally grotesque blueberry grins.
Digging out the landscaping in front of the complex – the bigger one digs little holes for snapdragons while I mix manure and compost. We’re working together in the sun: synchronous bodies and purpose. No need to speak. We are equal and she is so proud of her hard work. The pile of small rocks pulled from the ground becomes bigger.
We go to Kits Point and they fly kites, hanging onto the stringspool for dear life. Above their wind-whipped hair, pink and rainbow-coloured kites dance in the sky. Swallows skim over the daisy-dotted grass like fighter planes. A mother duck stretches her neck, vigilant over her five younglings. The geese are lazy kings, ignoring us. Two huge bald eagles screech at us, flying past the kites and into the trees.
06.01.08
Linens
Last weekend the bigger one decided a picnic was in order. We picked out some nice fabric from the Giant Bag of Gingham (don’t ask) and I got to hemming.
Now we have small check yellow cloth napkins and big check yellow table cloth and tea towels. The tablecloth fits on our little ikea patio table as well to make a very cute (or kitchy) bistro set up.
