Random thoughts on the porch

I stayed at work late tonight to participate in some market research. Tegan corralled the kids and they went out to eat. When I got home about 6:30, T. and the kids were still gone, so I put my bag down and went back outside to sweep up the little, oval-shaped, orange leaves that our trees dump on the sidewalk, the driveway, the street curb. Sure, I know its a pointless waste of time right now, to sweep up leaves that will be dumped again in a few days and I'll do it again. But it was a good time, being outside in the autumn evening, alone with my thoughts and the dinnertime sounds of my street.

After I was done with that, Tegan and the kids were still gone. But I didn't feel like going back inside, so I sat down on the porch steps to let the sweat dry on my shirt and to watch the twilight deepen.

While sitting there doing nothing in particular, I had lots of random thoughts float in and out of my brain. Naturally, I didn't have a piece of paper or a tape recorder with me, so I didn't capture them as they came . . . something that I kind of always wish I could do in these kinds of circumstances. I am sitting there, wanting to remember all of these thoughts, but I don't want to go back in the house for paper or to get the laptop because I don't want to break the spell of sitting there. It's not like I was accomplishing anything, but I didn't want to systematize it by making it intentional . . . but at the same time, I was actively thinking about the fact that I wanted to remember it and KNEW that I wouldn't be able to achieve an accurate memory of my thoughts.

Anyway, what was I thinking? There are some of the things that I can remember:

1. While cars drove by or while kids on bikes pedaled by, I was wondering which was I should look--towards College or towards Spring? And should I settle on one direction or keep switching back and forth? And do I just look weird sitting here on the porch? Do people think I am peeking in their windows?
2. Man, I should get a decorative bench or something on the porch. The cement steps get hard after a while.
3. Why is my next-door-neighbor's flag not fluttering back and forth while mine (right above my head) whips around much more vigorously?
4. Why is it that every time I hear a car approach or see headlights, I involuntarily turn towards it, wondering if it is our station wagon? And how can I do this while looking nonchalant about it all?
5. How can I construct a post that takes advantage of the really excellent discussions between ESPN's Sports Guy and Chuck Klosterman? Would my regular readers want to read about that? I really identified with their observations that people today spend an inordinate amount of time talking about TV and movies (and I am SO guilty of that). And how about their critical views of bloggers that don't do anything but link to other people's work and then act like they have done something valuable . . . I don't do that, do I?
6. I really want to read some of Klosterman's books, but I can't because I have a library fine that needs to be paid and I can't find the book that is getting more expensive every day.
7. What would it be like if we rearranged the furniture in the house . . . moving the TV from the den into the front room. But I can't put the TV in front of the big windows, so maybe against the wall facing the windows? But then, won't people be able to see inside and watch our TV? Maybe I could put wooden blinds or something to create more privacy . . . I don't like those green curtains anyway. But if the TV goes in there, then do we move the computer out of that room and into the den? We could rearrange the den furniture so that the computer goes along that long wall that is the back of the garage. But I'd like to get rid of the computer desk we've got now, replacing it with a nice long desk or series of modular desks (something from Pottery Barn?) that can go alongside the entire wall, creating a place for the desktop computer and seating areas for the kids to do home work or draw . . . but then where do the couches in the room now go? And if we move the TV out of the den, we'll need to put something else else on the bookcases, right? I wonder if I can make an overhead sketch of the rooms and rearrange the furniture with little cardboard cutouts?
   
8. Oh, here comes the station wagon . . . remember to look nonchalant.
   

Home of the Braves

WARNING! This post focuses primarily on sports. If you have absolutely NO interest in this, drop out now. But if you do, you might miss valuable insights into my psyche . . . or not, who knows?

As of this moment, the Atlanta Braves are up 7 to 1 in the 6th inning. Baring a massive collapse (which might occur, you never know) the Brave will clinch their 14th division championship in a row--a continuous span of excellence not seen in professional sport of any sort.

Why mention this? Well, growing up in Georgia, I have always been a Braves fan. For most of that time, that meant being the fan of a crappy team. But since my sophomore year in college (1991, if you are keeping score) the Braves have never lost their division. While it is true that the team has only won 1 World Series during that time (1995) and lost four others (1991--the greatest World Series ever, 1992, 1996, and 1999) and haven't made it out of the first round of the playoffs in the last . . . oh, four tries (is that right?) . . . their success MUST be acknowledged.

Every year, about this time, ESPN runs an article celebrating the success of the Braves, lining up these statistics, comparing them to the flashy and championship Yankees while trying to acknowledge the undeniable success that the Braves have shown. This year's story is extremely long, but if you are a Braves fan, its worth reading.

As I said, my history with the Braves is a long one, steeped in childhood. About every year or so, my family would go to Atlanta, maybe on the way to Kentucky to visit grandparents, and we would stop to attend a Braves game at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium. During most of this time the Braves were not good or at best mediocre. The team wore powder blue uniforms and I lost AT LEAST three or four Braves caps over the years in Atlanta area restaurants after the games.

The one year of Little League success that I ever had, my team celebrated it's championship trophy by going to a Braves game in Atlanta. We sat in the picnic area and got our picture taken with Chief Noc-a-Homa. In today's world, the Chief is a terribly offensive thing, but it was a less polite, more brutal time in the 1980s. I remember the brief years of success in 1983 and 1984, when they won division titles. Dale Murphy--that Mormon sensation--won MVP awards. I have a good memory of listening to the radio broadcast as the Braves won 13 games in a row in my parents bedroom.

In the 1990s, when the Braves began their run of success, I was in awe of the team. I stayed up late suffering over endless one-run games. I suffered through the stressful, exciting, ultimately disappointing 1991 World Series loss to Minnesota. I was in Savannah with my sister the night the team won the World Series in 1995 (I didn't even WATCH that game. I was taking a ghost tour of the colonial squares in the dark of night.) I heard crowds in bars yell out faintly in the distance, either when David Justice hit the home run that was the only run of the game or when the final out was recorded.

I have pictures of some of the years in between, celebrations on campus during playoff wins. I'll scan those in when that scrapbook comes up in the rotation. Until then, well, this will serve as one of my few sports-related posts. You can all survive a few can't cha?

Yet another Omnimedia post

It's a busy blogging weekend both here and on the sister station.

Various stupid posts from yours truly are there, but don't miss Jack Thunder's latest post on important books that he's been reading.

Anyway, read here, read there, read everywhere.

Bob Dylan's new home? Omnimedia

The Martin Scorsese bio-doc No Direction Home is ready to be be released to television next week, I think. But before you watch that to see what all the fuss is about, check out the new Omnimedia post on all things Dylan.

West Side Story

I'm killing time, waiting for Battlestar Galactica to start and I run across West Side Story (the movie version) on TV.

I bought the VHS tape of this back in high school. While you might think of this as an odd purchase for a high school kid, it really makes sense in the larger scheme of who I was at the time.

First--the songs. Any honest person who appreciates American music has to admit that West Side Story is filled with some of the greatest American music created by an American composer. You can make jokes, as I certainly have over the years, that the movie is parody and funny. The idea of street tough gang members singing their operatic heads off, the cliched phrases, clothes, the knock-off Shakespearean plot . . . but the music, the lyrics, the complexities of "Tonight" where everyone is singing, preparing for a date or a rumble and everything else . . . all that transcends the hokey nature of the film. Some of Leonard Bernstein's best music ever.

Second--why I first loved the songs. This answer is deeply embedded in my love of band, martial music of that sort, and my (then) intense pleasure with Drum Corps. One of my first memories of Drum Corps International was hearing The Garfield Cadets (now known as the Cadets) perform a twelve-minute marching performance of their interpretation of West Side Story. The music was wonderful and stirring and the combined intricacy and chaotic precision that mark the Cadet's marching style made it an eye-opening experience. Remember that I had grown up wanting to be in band and seeing it presented in such a pure, intense form made a big impression on me.

Third--the actors in the movie. Rita Moreno was, to the younger me, always associated with Maria on The Electric Company. To see her as a sexy Latina in New York was always interesting. Natalie Wood was neither here nor there, but it was the presence of Russ Tamblyn (Riff) and Richard Beymer (Tony) that cemented my love of the film in 1989. For, you see, Tamblyn and Beymer were prominent members of my favorite TV phenomenon of my high school youth--the LOST of its day--Twin Peaks. Beymer played the deeply insane Benjamin Horne. Tamblyn played the clinically nuts Dr. Lawrence Jacoby. These dudes were weird, okay?

So, there are many reasons why, on a Friday night, I stopped to watch a good film based on a great set of music.

And now, you know as well.