It’s New Years Eve. So much has been said about this decade that for lack of a better name is being called the post 9/11 decade. Remember Seattle’s public Millennium Celebrations that got cancelled because of a terrorist plot. Remember the sight gag on late night TV, Seattle’s New Year’s Celebration as a few guys in an empty room sitting on folding chairs. In the year 2000 my beautiful daughter was born, one of those auspicious millennium dragon babies. We bought a house in Seattle. And then the tech boom ended. And then we moved to New York. And then 9/11 happened the week after we discovered the sphere fountain in the World Trade Center Plaza was a good place to take our toddler. Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian Church Playgroup. And then we went to Nebraska to introduce my baby to her great-grandparents. And then there was the Anthrax scare so I didn’t send Christmas Cards from New York to let everyone know we we had moved. And then my baby could talk. Music for Aardvarks. And then my little girl went to preschool at the Dillon Center. STREB kid action with Fabio. Shi Chi Go San. And then my little girl went to pre-K in Manhattan. And then my little girl went to Kindergarten in Brooklyn. And then I spent two months on the jury for a murder trial. And then my little girl was in 1st grade. And then my little girl was in 2nd Grade. Shi Chi Go San. First Holy Communion. FIRST Lego League. Brownie Girl Scouts. And then my little girl was in 3rd grade. The Husband changed jobs four times in one year. The New Economy. AYSO Soccer. And now my little girl is in 4th grade. Barack Obama is the President of the United States. And now it is turning into 2010. We have a new hamster. Whoooosh!
Tag: Barack Obama
things to look forward to
We’re not yet up. I’ve just gotten to the point where I suddenly realize that the coffee I have consumed this morning is not enough and I must have food now. However, in the time since we woke up but didn’t get out of bed except to make coffee, we’ve bought tickets to see Barack Obama at the Hammerstien Ballroom on Tuesday October 20 and I have signed up to write a novel next month on the NaNoWriMo website.
Nobel Committee to America; Please Be On Your Best Behavior
The world is watching us and begging us to think of others. That is what the Nobel committee has said so effectively by giving the Nobel Peace Prize to President Barack Obama before he has even done anything.
I fear, that they fear, that we, the self-absorbed people of the United States of America (Congress, lobbyists, protesters, everyone) are going to continue to squabble like kids in the back seat of a car, screaming and crying over who got the biggest piece of candy (or healthcare or bank loans) while Daddy is trying to avoid a freeway accident and Mommy is trying to find the exit on the map of an unfamiliar city on the way to a very important family wedding where everyone is supposed to look pretty, act nice, and for God’s sake behave.
This is why Barack Obama is our President
During the campaign, Barack Obama reached out to Native People and was adopted in a traditional Crow ceremony by Hartford and Mary Black Eagle of Lodge Grass, Montana. They were introduced as grandparents to Malia and Sasha. Obama honored his Black Eagle family by having them brought to Washington DC and given prime seats to witness the Inauguration Ceremony.
His mother Dr. Stanley Ann Dunham Soetoro, would have been proud.
We’ve got the good pilot
I have been a weepy mess, tearing up several times a day, ever since Captain Chesley B. “Sully” Sullenberger ditched a US Airways jet safely in the Hudson River last Thursday. The cinema-cheesy symbolism went straight to my core and I am convinced that the United States of America is an airplane and Barack Obama is the cool, calm Carey Grant/Sidney Poitier/Jimmy Stewart type genius pilot who is going to save us all. Or not. Everything makes me tear up. Boats. Airplanes. People asking me what kind of coat I have because they need to buy a warm one before they leave for Washington, DC for the Inauguration. Twitters from friends who are on their way to DC or already in DC. Martin Luther King Day. Fresh snow. Civil Rights Movement veterans on CNN. My husband telling me Obama chose a Nobel prize winning physicist as his energy secretary. Listening to “This American Life”. Miley Cyrus in a grown-up red dress. Malia and Sasha Obama taking pictures of Miley Cyrus. My 8-year-old rolling her eyes because I am tearing up because I am watching both my kid and Malia Obama mouth the words to the Disney tween songs they both know by heart. Reading the Inauguration Parade lineup that includes both the Crow Nation of Montana and the Brooklyn Music and Arts Program. I’m just sitting here with my seatbelt on looking out the window at the water putting all my faith and hope in the pilot as my life flashes before my eyes and I pray for a safe landing: Ourfatherwhoartinheavenhallowedbethynamethykingdomcomethywillbedone-onearthaseitisinheavengiveusthisdayourdailybreadandforgiveusourtrespasses-asweforgivethosewhotrespassagainstusandleadusnotintotemptation-anddeliverusfromevil-AMEN
Happy Birthday to Me, I’m 29 again!
I’m too old to be on “So You Think You Can Dance”. The auditions are taking place at this very moment just blocks away from my Brooklyn apartment, at the Mark Morris Dance Studio. According to the official rules posted on line: contestants must be between the ages of 18 and 30.
So close in distance and so far in years.
We are big fans. My Kid loves the show and her favorite dancers always make it to the finals. She looks forward to being big enough to dance in sparkles and high heels. I look back on my former flexibility when doing the splits was just a part of my regular stretching routine. Now, without having “made a mistake” high school, I am old enough to be the mother of the younger aspiring professionals waiting in line to dance for their chance to be on TV. I’m more like the wierd old people with the thick torsos who sit behind the judging table and tell the young dancers what they are doing wrong.
Should I tell My Kid that I’m too old? She think’s I’m 29. She also thinks her teacher is 20.
She doesn’t know about the audition. Neither did I, until I just found out just now, via a fellow mommy’s twitter about the crazy long line right here in our ‘hood.
Should I tell My Kid I am the same age as her school principal, that my age is about the same as Michelle and Barack Obama. PRESIDENTS ARE REQUIRED TO BE OLD!
After the election last week, one of My Kid’s classmates spent the whole school day showing everyone she came in contact with a picture of Barack Obama clipped from a newspaper.
“He’s got grey hairs! Look! See right there! He’s got grey hair!”
Last summer back in my home town, we went to the popular ice cream stand that is a real scene for young families and college students. My daughter and her cousins came running through the crowd screaming at the top of their lungs.
“How old are you Aunt Kathie? How old are you Mom?”
“I’m 29.”
“No you’re not. How old are you really?”
“I’m 29.”
“No you’re not! UNCLE MARTIN IS 44 AND YOU’RE OLDER THAN HE IS!!!!!!!”
“I’M 29!”
“Why do you say you’re 29?”
“Because that’s what grown-ups say when they don’t want to tell people how old they are.”
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA
I am so happy, so relieved, so hopeful. I cried. I have never felt this way about a president. One of our own. Much is being made of the color of his skin and that is an inspiring first. But this is a president of my generation. Someone who was a child in the 1970’s and came of age in the 1980’s and married in the 1990’s Someone whose children, for better or worse, are influenced by the Disney Channel.
Early 2000s recession 2001–2003 22 months
The collapse of the dot-com bubble, the September 11th attacks, and accounting scandals contributed to a relatively mild contraction in the North American economy.
Early 1990s recession 1990–1991 23 months
Industrial production and manufacturing-trade sales decreased in early 1991.
Early 1980s recession 1980–1982 25 months
The Iranian Revolution sharply increased the price of oil around the world in 1979, causing the 1979 energy crisis. This was caused by the new regime in power in Iran, which exported oil at inconsistent intervals and at a lower volume, forcing prices to go up. Tight monetary policy in the United States to control inflation lead to another recession. The changes were made largely because of inflation that was carried over from the previous decade due to the 1973 oil crisis and the 1979 energy crisis.
1973 Oil Crisis 1973–1975 24 months
A quadrupling of oil prices by OPEC coupled with high government spending due to the Vietnam War lead to stagflation in the United States.
What Color is Barack Obama
I spend quite a while yesterday morning online researching Sarah Palin’s racism both overt and implied. So this evening on the subway when My Kid asked me what color Obama was…
I immediately started going through the Rolodex of my mind searching for facts I could tell her about his white mother from Kansas and his black father from Kenya and how the met in Hawaii and how some people get divorced. Also some foolish people with light skin like Sarah Palin decide not to like people who have dark skin like the Obama family, and say words like “those people” to mean they don’t want to even try to be friends. Even though they are grownups, they have not yet learned the lesson of “The Sneeches” by Dr. Seuss.
Stalling for time I asked; “What do you mean what color is Obama?”
She wanted to know if he was BLUE or RED!
I remembered an essay I once read by someone, who, attending a gay wedding and reception at a church in Seattle, wondered what carefully crafted words about love and relationships would be prepared for the child who was marveling at the weird thing he had seen. That strange thing the child had never seen before turned out to be a rotary dial telephone.
If you’re blogging about process and there’s not a performance involved you should shoot yourself
Tonight nothing is more important than electing Barack Obama president in November.
However,
My current task is to present a clown piece on September 11 (leaving plenty of time before November to work for Barack Obama.)
My head now is filled with the momentous Obama speech…
“In the words of scripture hold firmly to the hope that we confess” Don’t know what that means but it sounds pretty.”
And I’m thinking of using a Billie Holiday song….
So
Today has not been particularly productive.
There was a nice e-mail in the morning from Lorraine about playing and being on the same page.
My kid got up late and was cranky when she did.
I said “Hey it’s almost lunch time” and “Do you want to go to zoo?”
She cried.
She didn’t have any words so I assumed existential angst about the end of summer and start of the school year.
So I felt guilty.
We made scrambled eggs together using two pans, the regular one and her tiny single serving one.
Catsup.
We made art with a new set of stamps.
We played Junior Scrabble.
We went swimming at the Y (though we weren’t there earlier in the afternoon when Michael Phelps was!)
We hooked up with The Husband/Daddy
We went out for Thai food.
We were late getting home and missed part of Obama’s speech.
Tears during what I did see.
After the speech–It’s so shocking as the parent of an 8-year-old to see how much Malia Obama (just tuned 10 in July) has grown since he first declared in 2007. He started the campaign with two little girls and now he has only one little girl and one tween!
The CNN silence after the speech cameras finding shots of streamers hanging by a thread.