The Hit List

Thanks very much to the Smart, Pretty and Awkward blog for first posting this link to 100 new classics from 1983 to 2008. How many have you read? I'm currently struggling to finish Love in the Time of Cholera.

Also, Smart Pretty and Awkward is one of my go-to blogs. I always learn something new and find tons of useful etiquette and fashion tips.

Take a look, it's in a book.

I don't remember exactly how I got linked to it, but I am a huge fan of the Better Living Through Beowulf blog. The author, Robin Bates, is a professor at St. Mary's College of Maryland and as far as I can tell the most well-read person alive. Not only does he demystify classic literature and poetry to make it more personal for everyday people, but he always picks his pieces based on current events, either global or personal. He writes a ton in every post, but none of it goes over your head. His blog really was the inspiration for this one (though he updates much more frequently).

I was catching up on some posts today, and read two pieces that really piqued my interest and curiosity, so much that I ended up reading a lot more about them than just what was supplied in the blog. The first was a very interesting post called The (Out Of Control) Passion of Mel Gibson. In it Bates almost plays a psychologist, interpreting Gibson's movies (and personal life) as a result his crazy Catholic upbringing. His observations about the male struggle for success through masochism are really thought-provoking.

The other post, Mama Grizzly vs. Real Grizzlies, offers a Goldilocks parody poem written by his father Scott Bates. I recently read another one about the oil spill that really touched my heart, so I went into G IS FOR A LITTLE GIRL WITH LONG GOLDEN HAIR very excited to see what came out. As it turns out, a really "scarily prescient" allusion to Sarah Palin's attitudes and policies. If you're an environmentalist, if you're creeped out by the Tea Party, or if you just love interesting poetry, you'll love this post.

I hope perusing Better Living Through Beowulf inspires more people to read and to explore literature to find out more about themselves. I know that I've become closer to my fiancée after reading Bates's thoughts on Citizen Kane, and I've been itching to pick up The Canterbury Tales to really go back and absorb the feminine power of the Wife of Bath.

Love, and stay interesting!

K

Sparkling Diamonds

If you haven't already heard of Marina and the Diamonds, the Welsh-Greek (I never use the word) singing sensation, you're about to. If you already are a Diamond disciple, high five.

Marina Diamandis has an amazing range that dips down into warbling guttural bellows and soars to falsetto boasts, an ear for hipness, and (most importantly) a lot to say. I have been impressed with every single song on her album The Family Jewels, but I will go in depth on a few tracks I especially love.

Oh No!
The first single I ever heard, and my introduction to Marina and her style. After getting linked to the video from Nylon, I pretty much watched it for a week, stopping only to eat and tear apart my closet searching for something resembling anything worn in the video. No luck.

Although the style and the attitude caught my attention first, what stayed with me were the lyrics and the themes of the song. As an utter romantic, I balked at first to "don't do love, don't do friends / I'm only after success." But after the first initial hump, I saw the song's other message: self-reliance. "I know exactly what I want and who I want to be...I'm now becoming my own self-fulfilled prophecy..." As a career girl down on my luck, this was inspiring. It was the get-up and go I needed to get me back on the job hunting train.

In actuality, Marina's songs on this album are chronicling her rise to stardom. She learns to deal with her insecurities about putting herself in the public light, she struggles to overcome what other people think of her ("OH MY GAWD, you look just like Shakira / No, no, you're Catherine Zeta / Actually, my name's Marina."), and she takes big risks not knowing whether the payoff will be worth it. Oh No! is about what happens when you realize you have to sell your soul to reach certain levels of fame, and the question of whether or not you will do it. Will we go all the way? This reminds me of a great Bollywood movie, Fashion, where an ambitious small-town girl does whatever it takes to become an internationally famous runway model. She gets everything she ever wanted, but also gets an abortion and wakes up in a strange bed with a black guy after a night of coke-addled hysteria. But I digress.

Honestly, the second verse and following bridge hit me the most:

One track mind, one track heart, if I fail, I'll fall apart

Maybe it is all a test, 'cause I feel like I'm the worst, so I always act like I'm the best

If you are not very careful, your possessions will possess you

TV taught me how to feel, now real life has no appeal

I feel like if I don't get a job and get something to work on, I really will fall apart. Without a focus, what do you do with your time?

Oh No! is great if you know how to live in moderation. If you have a direction, you can pursue it, but you can also decide to leave your integrity intact.

I Am Not A Robot
This song is a revelation, like many others on the album. While listening to it, you wake up and look at yourself differently. You are not a robot after all.

This song is about being detached from the rest of the world, about the way Marina would behave in relationships (The Sun, Feb. 5 2010). It's about bridging the impossible divide between an outward appearance and how you feel on the inside. "Better to be hated than loved for what you're not."

I generally believe that it's better to be yourself and alone than surrounded by people sharing in a lie. That's easy to say when you have friends, but as I take more and more time to do things that I actually like and that express my personality, I find I need the validation of my friends less and less. While Marina appeals to others to teach her "how to feel real" and to "turn her power on," you can really do it yourself. I like singing this to myself while looking in the mirror, and listening to what my reflection says.

Numb

Numb is about the end of Marina's journey: she's reached the Emerald City of fame, but has no emotional connections or friends. After devoting herself wholly to the pursuit of fame, she reaches her goal and realizes it's empty. In her search for the "golden light" she plunges herself farther and farther into the dark. "And I will wonder why / I get dark only to shine."

We all have situations like this: the great career that makes marriage impossible, the creative spark that alienates everyone around us. If these situations are focusing on relationships, it's because 1) I am very relationship-oriented and 2) this is another song about Marina's relationships. "I'm no good to anyone / 'Cause all I care about is being number one." She lost everyone in her skyrocket to fame, and now is shining and falling back down:

And I light up the sky

Stars that burn the brightest

Fall so fast and pass you by

Spark like empty lighters

Guilty Pleasures

I recently decided that I was going to do something that most women do way before they're my age: I decided to watch Sex And The City all the way through. I didn't invite my friends over for drinks and partying while we shared the experience, I chose to watch it alone. Maybe it's backwards, seeing the series after the two movies, but I think I've reached an age where I should stop caring whether people judge me or not.

For YEARS, I've known women who squeal, "I'm a Carrie!" or "I'm Samantha!" or any member of the quartet at the drop of a hat. What is it about these women that's so identifiable? If there was one thing I wish I could identify with them on, it would be their jobs - owning a PR firm, writing a successful column (when you can pay for an apartment with your writing, you're a success), dealing art, lawyering - not their sex lives. Anyone can have sex, you have to work hard to be professionally successful and financially independent. Maybe that's something that other women see too: we all have sex, even if we're too poor to afford fancy shoes.

There are also identifiable points about all these women that I think everyone can find within themselves: Samantha is outspoken in a way we all wish we were, Miranda is all kinds of intelligent, and Charlotte is an idealist and a really genuinely nice person. Yet they are still put into cookie-cutter stereotypes: the libertine, the career woman, the conservative. Maybe that's why there are no "I'm a Charlotte" t-shirts.

So what's so different about Carrie? She's average enough in her lifestyle that she can represent the viewer - she didn't start off the series wearing designer clothes and lavish jewelry, she eats greasy Chinese instead of gourmet cuisine, the first time we even see her we see her fingers smudging out a cigarette into a half-full ashtray, something distinctly un-glamorous and imperfect. She's smart but not a genius, romantic but not a sap, powerful but not overpowering. She is quintessentially average.

I do feel like I'm a Carrie, if I were to be one of them. I mix expensive pieces with flea-market finds, I take a lot of risks when it comes to my appearance, and I am generally a pretty creative person. I had flings, but I eventually settled down and found true love, and I do worry I'm going to be one of those boring married women. I totally identify, and part of that is what made me spend money on those ridiculous movies and 19 slots on my fiancées Netflix queue.

Fierce love to you all,

K

Stars, Banners, and Bombs.

It's almost over, but it's been a very good Independence Day for my family. I'm usually not a very outwardly patriotic person: I'm not one of those who wave American flags and proudly sing the national anthem. My relationship with the country is just a little too complicated to be that blatant.

However, you can't deny that there are huge advantages to living in the United States, and I enjoy those advantages, so it would be disrespectful of me to not take a moment and think about how glad I am to be living in America.

One thing I have an issue with is patriotic American songs. It's totally fine to write patriotic songs, but I find the usual stereotypical country-rock pseudo-ballads uninspiring. We've all heard stories of Jimmy and Suzie from Oklahoma or Nebraska, who lead simple lives and have big dreams that they may never see come to fruition, but who love their land and their family and their country like they love God. I've heard that story way too many times, but it seems to be enough for most other people.

My 4th of July traditions usually consist of two things: watching V for Vendetta and turning off whatever preprogrammed music comes with the local fireworks display (usually patriotic marches and "God Bless The USA") and playing the 1812 Overture while the fireworks go off. I only watch V on the 4th, because it's just enough time that I forget what happens and have to be reminded of the kind of integrity and patriotic love that goes into that story. Consequently, the 1812 has become this proud statement of strength and patriotism to me, as it was for the Russian people when it was written.

If I had stopped there, it would have been enough. But there's another song that describes my feelings about nationalism and identity even better: "Anthem" from the Broadway musical Chess. It concludes the first act of the show, and the new world chess champion from the Soviet Union is about to defect to England to be with the woman he loves. Since the world championship was between the USA and USSR, it was seen as a proxy for international politics rather than as a simple game, so the Russian's choice to defect immediately after winning causes a frenzy among reporters. They ask him if he will denounce his motherland, and he replies very simply:

No man, no madness, though their sad power may prevail

Can posses, conquer my country's heart - they rise to fail

She is eternal: long before nations' lines were drawn,

When no flags flew, when no armies stood, my land was born

And you ask me why I love her, through wars, death and despair

She is the constant, we who don't care

And you wonder, will I leave her, but how?

I cross over borders but I'm still there now!

How can I leave her? Where would I start?

Let man's petty nations tear themselves apart,

My land's only borders lie around my heart!

I am a believer in a school of thought called constructivism, which believes that no social construct can be taken as a given in any context. The idea of nationalism is interesting because the political borders of sovereign nations are constructed by the people that live in those countries. You can't see the border between countries, but they are enforced according to a social contract between two governments. So, like Tommy Körberg says in "Anthem," our home has endured ages before we fought wars, drew lines and "created" it. And it will be in our hearts wherever we go, as long as we believe in it. Take your sovereignty upon yourselves - your homeland is truly indestructible.

Rollin' on the River

It's summertime in Boise, ID, and everyone here has one thing on their minds: floating the river. My fiancee's dad (who works for the City of Boise) got paid to go float the river with a group of kids, and some friends have invited me to go rafting/floating with them sometime.

The only problem is, I do not currently own a swimsuit.

I have had terrible luck with swimsuits. I never have been a fan of the little triangle string bikinis that you find everywhere. My ideal swimsuit is something like the one supermodel Liu Wen wears in this short film:

Usually I'm a big fan of colors and prints - life is for living, you know, so why wear just one color? - but there is something to be said for a classy black swimsuit, especially one as tasteful and modern as this one. It should work for more than just getting in a pool, you could almost walk down the street with something like that on. Also, it's a great example of good cutouts in a swimsuit.

Unfortunately, I have yet to find such a provocative yet classy suit. The closest I came were this and this. I shall keep looking.

Love to you all, and a happy early 4th to my American friends!

K