My Boston Monday

view from the room

We got a late start to our day in Boston. The hoards of fans had already amassed outside our Fenway Park-gazing window. Before coffee touched our lips, the stadium’s bleachers appeared half full. A man stood on the sidewalk hawking last-minute tickets, the only thing separating us from him, the Buckminster Hotel’s century-old glass windows. His cries were irritating as we tried to sleep in, but later, post-caffeine, they sounded endearing. Even my Yankees fans colleagues-turned-travel-partners felt excited.

As we left our hotel the electric air on Commonwealth Ave. smacked us in the face. The street had been closed and empty the night before in preparation for the city’s 117th Marathon, but today, the sidewalks were packed and bustling. The joyous atmosphere was palpable. Despite the unseasonably crisp air, this was shaping up to be the picture perfect Boston day.

As if by impeccable luck or happy coincidence, the minute after we walked out of our hotel, towards the T (the city’s metro), the race’s frontrunners whooshed past us. First, a photographer-laden truck rolled by, the crowd roaring; then the long-limbed ladies leading the pack zipped ahead. The spectators went wild, and so did we. We later found out we’d seen Kenyan Rita Jeptoo, the winner of the women’s race. At that time she had it clinched; a sign told us we were at the 1 Mile To Go mark. We lingered briefly in awe on the sidewalk, gazing upon the sweaty athletes as they momentarily rushed by us.





We descended into the subway headed against the stream of people emerging out of the Kenmore stop. We were seemingly headed in the wrong direction, but we had only one day to see Boston, and little time to spend cheering on the runners from the sidelines.

After a quick trip, we emerged from the green line at Park St, one stop north of Boylston. Unable to find the information booth we sought, we asked a couple cops where we could find it. They happily pointed us in the right direction. Because of the marathon, the city’s police officers patrolled the streets in full-force, scattered through the city and hard to miss, they all donned neon green vests.

A man dressed as a period puritan greeted us at the information booth, advising that a guided tour of the Freedom Trail began in an hour, but we scooped up our own map, set on exploring the trail on our own, and at our own pace.

At high noon the air remained chilly, the wind pierced through my North Face, but the sun reflected beautifully on the state’s gold-crowned Capitol Building, the first stop on the self-guided tour. We followed the 2.5 mile red path that snakes through the city’s streets and sidewalks, made either of red bricks or paint, marking 16 of the United States’ oldest and most historical sites. We marveled at The Boston Common, the nation’s first park, a perfectly manicured green lawn, once the site of duels, riots and many public hangings. We checked out King’s Chapel, laughed at one of the country’s oldest bookstores, now a Chipotle, and explored Faneuil Hall. We walked through the city’s Holocaust Memorial, a reminder of the evil of humanity, but also a lesson in resilience. We stood on the very stones on which the Boston Massacre occurred, not knowing, just two hours later another Boston massacre would take place just seven city blocks away.



Massachusetts State House


We built up quite the appetite after seeing the 11th site, so we headed to the town’s North End for a late lunch. Neptune Oyster on Salem St. was an easy decision, highly recommended by both The New York Times, and some friends. New England oysters and champagne launched our meal, followed by warm, buttery yet crunchy, lobster rolls. I indulged in and enjoyed every slurp, sip and bite. It was a perfect lunch, in the perfect warm and cozy Cape Cod-style bistro. Just as we finished scooping up the last of our crispy fries, my colleague called our attention to a small television screen above the restaurant’s bar. The screen’s graphic read “Explosion at Boston Marathon Finish Line.” “Wow,” we thought. We’d just stood in that very place last night, when we first arrived in Boston. But the longer we watched, the more it became clear to us, the patrons surrounding us, and the people presenting the news, that this wasn’t just an accidental explosion. We quickly realized we were in the midst of a terrorist attack. Suddenly those oysters and champagne didn’t sit so well.



Neptune Oyster


We had a decision to make: do we carry on the Freedom Trail, or resort back to our hotel? The only problem with retreating was that the site of the explosions lay halfway between where we were currently, and the Buckminster. We’d have to cross through that very area to return, and we figured the T would be closed for security purposes, at least temporarily. I supported sticking to our original plan. Taking cues from the many Israelis I know, I thought if we recoiled, they’d win. We still don’t know who “they” are, but that’s what terrorists, in any form, want. They want to disrupt our lives by instilling a paralyzing fear. My travel partners agreed, and we forged on, treading the red path. The irony of the trail’s name was not lost on us.

Our next stop wasn’t a historical site, but it might as well have been. Mike’s Pastry is a North End institution, home to the city’s most beloved cannoli. We scarfed down our crispy cream-filled desserts on the sidewalk.

By the time we reached Paul Revere’s house, text messages inundated my phone. Without prompt I sent a preemptive “I’m OK” text to my parents, who hadn’t yet heard the news. I tried to call, but cell service in the city had been cut-off, a preventative measure by law enforcement to stop any potential remotely detonated bombs. As I read about Revere’s many achievements, my colleague scanned the news on his phone. Law enforcement said to steer clear of any trash bins in the city, potential hiding places for bombs. We all quickly realized we’d been huddled around a garbage can. We immediately scrambled down the cobblestone street.

Next we explored the Old North Church, the legendary home of the “one if by land, two if by sea” lanterns. We hopped over the Charlestown Bridge to check out the USS Constitution, the world’s oldest commissioned warship. Of course, we couldn’t go on it. Security around historical sites, especially of military significance, had been amped up, and the tours of the boat, temporarily halted. Finally, we walked up to the Bunker Hill Monument, the site of the illustrious Battle of Bunker Hill, one of the American Revolution’s bloodiest. Its towering symbol of American patriotism reminded me of the Washington Monument.


USS Constitution

We strolled through the neighborhood’s beautiful stick style homes, and made our way back into the city. After picking up our rental car, we took a drive to Cambridge to explore Harvard. My phone finally had cell service, but my loved ones knew I was safe, since texts still beamed back and forth. The Harvard campus buzzed, but a sense of eeriness lingered in the air. We bought some collegiate gear, and headed back to Boston to pick up our bags at the Buckminster.

The city’s streets, at least those that remained open, were empty. Aside from ubiquitous police, it seemed most people heeded warnings to stay inside. After all, two more bombs were found, but dismantled by authorities. We navigated our way to the hotel, but Commonwealth Ave. remained closed. Now abandoned, and littered with the marathoners empty cups, signs, and trash, the air felt empty. Fenway Park sat bare in the distance. The once pulsing avenue lay still. Only the faint sounds of now omnipresent sirens rang in the distance. We gathered our belongings in silence and packed the car.



empty streets


We still had something to do in Boston, however. It was late, and our uneasy stomachs grumbled once again. In an elaborate plan to circumvent the closed streets, we guided our way back to the North End for dinner. The 87-year-old Regina’s Pizza at the corner of Thacher and Margin swarmed with customers, but we were quickly seated. As I bit in to a steaming hot slice, I gazed up at a TV on the wall. Almost two hundred injured. 10 amputations. Three dead.

As I grabbed my second slice, I drained out the sound of the news resonating from the walls, and focused instead on the beautifully vibrant chatter that surrounded me, remembering the roar of the crowd earlier, and the shivers those cheers sent down my spine.

Love Letters in Cyberspace: Pillow Talk or Public Chatter?

01001001001000000100110001101111011101100110010100100000010110010110111101110101
("I Love You" in binary computer code)




I eagerly awaited this past Monday. Not because in my PMS haze I longed for chocolate (which I did, obviously), or flowers, or any of cupid’s predictable presents. I was waiting for the biggest gift of all: public proclamations of love. I’m addicted to reading ridiculous rants, way-too-personal postings, and laughable love letters on social networking sites. I often frequent Lamebook for late-night laughter. But this past Monday, I knew I would hit the mother load: Valentine’s day - on Facebook. A veritable day of gushy gab manifested in the public domain. There were the predictable culprits, those who feel it necessary to send a love note on their lover’s wall, even though they live together or see each other daily. “Happy Valentine’s Day, my beautiful girlfriend” one post read. Chuckle. Then there were the inevitable lonely hearts, “Really wishing I had a boyfriend today,” someone said. Another grin. And of course, there was correspondence: the two-way Facebook convo between a couple for the whole world to see. Female: Happy V-day to the love of my life! Male: I love you baby! Female: I love you more, my beautiful, handsome man! Naturally, a laugh-out-loud situation ensued. But my chuckles soon turned cerebral: why is it that couples feel the need to proclaim their love in the contrived virtual universe? Is it not enough to say it to one’s face? Have the days of verbal communication vanished?


the parting of privacy

We live in an age where privacy is a mere memory, and what was once personal, is now public. And I’m not innocent! I have a Facebook, a Blog, a Twitter, a Website, Links, I’m all over the world wide web. Maybe I’m old school when it comes to articulations of amour, but shouldn’t that stuff be, you know, kept private?

In trying to understand what would cause someone to publicly post their feelings of love, especially correspondence with said love interest, I arrived at a few hypotheses (with help from some similarly private pals).

There’s always been a place in the public sphere for romantic rhetoric: think love songs of the 1980s, poetry readings in the 19th century, and Shakespeare. However, communiqués have mostly been between two people. Discovering love letters from the past evoked elements of voyeurism; a feeling of impeding on privacy. Kids of the future won't need to look far to find their parents’ precious declarations of devotion: they’re right there on their Facebook walls!



virtual performance

Perhaps these chatty cyber couples feel a need to constantly communicate. Or maybe, they didn’t quite say how they felt that morning before heading to work, and their partner left his/her cell phone at home, and can’t log in to her/his email or private messages on Facebook, so a wall posting is really the only way to send that love message. More likely, however, is a feeling of insecurity. People probably feel they are proving something to the rest of the world by openly communicating their love in the virtual public sphere. Maybe they feel others need to know how they feel about each other, or maybe they’re lacking something in person, or in their own lives, and feel that by declaring it on Facebook it will somehow be true or at least give the appearance of truth. This is true of virtual personalities in general. Many people have a Facebook persona completely different than who they are in person. There’s also an entrenched element of narcissism associated with these posts. Insofar as, do these public posters really think that anyone else even cares about their very personal and deeply intimate sentiments? If it’s not enough to tell the person you love, you love him or her in person, or in private personal correspondences, maybe something is missing. Why feel the need to proclaim a deep, intimate, true feeling in the most fake, artificial and contrived environment on earth? If you feel the constant need to publicly express your feelings in the virtual world, perhaps you’re lacking something authentic. Or, maybe you’re just an exhibitionist. Either way, to many of us who keep our private lives private, it appears as though you’re overcompensating. And just remember, that stuff never disappears. I’m not gonna lie, I’ve dabbled in searching through postings of previous love-interests' former love communiqués, and let’s just say, it ain’t pretty.

Time with Tony

(photo cred tumblr.com)

Foie gras and the future

204 pages into my latest literary undertaking and I’m feeling a bit stressed about it. I’ve spent significant time with Tony. As my most recent and lasting obsession, Anthony Bourdain, or Tony B. as I affectionately refer to him, has become a staple in my life. I discovered him last year, when my all-too-rare free time in the Salt City was spent salivating over The Travel Channel. Salivating because I mostly watched food shows, and as a grad student spent most of my time cooking only sweet potato fries (which I do pretty damn well, by the way) and tofu.

I felt a pretty strong connection with Tony the first time I watched him. You see, I never really spent much time casting my eyes on cable before I lived in 'Cuse, but my roommate insisted we splurge on it. Now, no disrespect to Syracuse or anything, but there’s really not much to do there. And even though I didn’t really ever have time to do anything anyway, my rare free hours were spent watching Tony with my pals Kate and Leigh over a meal we cooked up, drinking vino. That’s what got us through grad school.

I love Anthony Bourdain. I love his crassness, dry, wry wit and the fact that he was such a disaster in the 80s.

Condensation in California

It’s a rainy day in LA, a rare sight in the City of Angels, and a perfect day to watch a movie and read a book. After cooking up an impromptu brunch of fried eggs, homemade home fries, disgusting turkey bacon and toast, I sat down with my friend and watched Julie and Julia. It’s a cute movie about Julia Child’s rise to culinary success while simultaneously telling the story of Julie, a borough-bound call-center worker who writes a blog (!) about her adventure cooking 524 Child recipes in 365 days, raising her to fame. In my post-movie, post-brunch bliss I curled up by an open window and read some Tony to the sound of rain pounding the pavement.

I’m reading Kitchen Confidential, a Bourdain book, sort of a memoir about his own rise to food fame. In the preface, which is funny, written in 2000 before No Reservations, Bourdain writes almost incredulously about his success, which now, almost ten years later is at least ten-fold.

The chapter I just finished, “A Day in the Life,” gave me serious anxiety, as I bet was meant to with Tony's lengthy yet frenetic prose which push the reader through a day at Les Halles from the eyes of the chef. But what links Julie, Julia and Tony is not the French food, but their unrelenting goddamn hard work, and the risk-taking fervor with which they seem to approach life and work.

Tony hasn’t yet said how he got to Les Halles, and I’m not sure he will, but I’m sure it required blind-faith – jumping in full-force, and fearless. That’s what I admire so much about these three enormously successful people, and I think, I can almost guarantee that that is the recipe for success.

Goddamned hard work, uncompromising fearlessness and taking a chance. Julia Child worked for 8 years on something that may or may not have worked for her, Julie one year and Tony, almost twenty.

And in my current Bourdain-induced anxious twilight zone, I have renewed anticipation for what’s ahead in my own kitchen.

Twighlight and Tanless Sunning

(photo cred eonline.com)

Is the vampire trend going to bring back pale-chic?

To make myself feel better about my pasty peel, I often evoke the idea, or tale, that back in the day, say Victorian times, white, pale, pasty, skin was all the rage. I’ve done some research on the topic, and it seems the reason white flesh was considered the best, had to do with class. Those who spent time working the fields, outdoors, would become sun-kissed and tanned, a marker of being part of a lower class. Those who remained fair likely spent their days indoors, away from the sun’s harsh rays, probably sipping champagne and eating strawberries (okay, I’m totally picturing scenes from Marie Antoinette). Still, in some non-western cultures, a colorless casing is considered a marker of beauty. Men and women all over Southeast Asia don facemasks, gloves (pre-MJ death), and hold umbrellas to protect their peels from the sun. But somewhere along the line in our culture, milky-white complexions gave way to bronzed bods, and those of us who are melanin-challenged were sent on fruitless expeditions, eager to enhance our epidermises.

Tanning salons are too dangerous, spray-tans too fake, and it’s really, really, tough to find the right bronzer. Now, I’ve been lucky. While my white pelt gets no color from the sun, (freckles if I’m lucky) I discovered body bronzer not too long ago.

Trying to tan without sun and cream, however, is quite the process. It involves the very careful application of face and body-bronzer, learning to add natural “highlights” and can be very dangerous for some light colored-clothes.

I think, though, there might be a glimmer of hope for us ghostly gals. And his name, is Robert Pattinson. No ladies, he doesn’t dig anemic flesh, but the whole vampire fad invading all forms of media is propping up the pasties. Pale is the new tan, and it’s all thanks to vampires.

Sure some of our pasty pals are thirsty blood-sucking, night-thriving, socially-deviant murderers. But others are becoming sex symbols. Forget the spray-tan and photoshopped complexions, it’s all about having a naturally colorless rind. Gone are the days of cancer-causing oils and reflectors; let us stand together and embrace our whiteness. If Edward and that guy from that Anna Paquin show can be paxty (a morph between sexy and pasty), we can too.

But alas, I am in LA, the birthplace of bronzed beauties. I think I actually help other people get more tanned by reflecting sun from my flesh. While I have faith that fair is coming back full-force, I’ll wait a bit to totally expose my membrane. Until then, I’ll be body bronzing.

Whispers from the West

(On the way into LA...blurry, delusional, just like the last leg of the road trip)

Lingering in Los Angeles

The City of Angels is, apparently, the City of Dreams. Flocked to by thousands of hopeful whatevers year after year, this place is a repository of unachieved aspirations. Investment bankers go to Wall Street, wishing for wealth (and up until last year, usually made a buck or two). Techies, Taiwan. Fashionistas flock to France. But it’s the dreamers who come to lala land. Hollywood. Starlets searching for roles. Writers pray for a pair of executive eyelids to land on that script, the screenplay that will change it all, if only someone in a suit could see it. Paper stacks of pilots are piled in dumpsters and washed-up one-time actresses serve burgers in Burbank.

A cab driver put it pretty succinctly the other night. He said something like, “everyone comes here thinking they’re going to be a star…that’s why there are so many people in Los Angeles.” Maybe it’s a city of delusional, and deluded, daydreamers. But it’s place of escape from the banal bankers and uptight antics of the East coast (Toronto INCLUDED).

I think, in life, those of us who are dreamers, will have a tougher time. No automatic employment after education or test to take to make you a professional. But I think it’s more exciting this way. And apparently, so do a lot of folks out here.

There is something special about this city. Something contrived; something contradictory. The Hollywood sign, for example, is meager and almost dilapidated, but still, it can sort of take your breath away. Because it IS Hollywood. Los Angeles. The City of Angels. The City of Dreams.

Where I've been...

Not here. I know. But I have been getting around, I promise. My presence on this metaphysical phenomenon we call the web has just been relegated to other places.
Here, CURRENT,for example.

And here: YOU TUBE .

Here, too: EVEN BLOGGER.

Told you I've still been spinning webs.

But I'm back HERE, now. So keep your eyes peeled, and keep fashioning that culture of yours. Go on, do it.

Sex... It Sells.

The age-old advertising adage 'sex sells' is true - even in this recession. In tough times people have always turned to alcohol, but sex, it seems, is another vice untouched by the bad economy. According to people in the adult industry, sex will always sell, and this economic slow-down hasn’t had much of an effect on the industry. From strippers to prostitutes, women and men in the adult industry say the demand for their product (and services) is as strong as ever.