Mumbling Madly

Feeling crummy with two enormous swollen lymph nodes and a sore throat. My ears threaten to slip into infection, my energy lapses into nothingness, I wear no underwear all day under my pajamas. My cat tiptoes across the lawn. My husband has taken to wearing a blue and white sweatband on his right forearm–just cuz he likes it. The floor needs vacuuming, the tomatoes are surprised by the sudden rain, our inside temperature reaches 66 degrees. No way am I turning on the heat in August, I think, and when I sit outside I realize it is warmer there then in the living room. We watch the Olympics all weekend long–the swimmers are glorious in HD. Josh makes pancakes for the first time from my father’s recipe. They are delicious, the blueberries spurting. I make cookies as an apology for a bunch of drama that happened at the theater on Friday. I feel bad. On Saturday I woke up too early after a night of fretting, stewing, and worrying about being disliked. I woke up to rain and realized I had to get on a boat and ride into Lake Union for a video shoot in an hour (how fancy does that sound?!) 9am and I am barely talking. I can’t believe I am standing at the water’s edge in a wonderful Bolivian skirt dressed like an immigrant with a light panel aimed at my face. Despite the beginning of a very swollen lymph node I have a wonderful Saturday morning on the water. It is dark and cloudy during the ‘immigrant’ shooting and sunny as soon as we switch into our Freedom Dancer clothes. I stand in front of a flapping American flag while my friends hum, “Coming to America” and the camera starts rolling. I eat mounds of Trader Joe’s chocolate cat cookies. I wear the sparkly pink hot pants that Abby bought for my birthday–God I would have loved those pants ten years ago at the height of my Origami Girl fame. I am reading an anthology of the Best Comics of 2007 and loving it. I have a box of performance art props in my office waiting to be played with again. I slow down…I slow down all weekend long.

Dancers for freedom at the “Coming to America” video shoot, (Joey, Joanna, Andrea)

Watched a devastating documentary last night about the El Salvador gang, “18,” last night on PBS. While I certainly don’t pretend to understand every nuance and detail about the gang culture it was a tough film to swallow. From watching one gang member breaking down while calling his mother who is living and working in the states (”I don’t care that you don’t send me money, just come and get me”) to watching a father of three try and leave the gang only to find a way to be lured back in (”I’m nothing but a worthless crackhead and only the gang will take care of me”). Most of these gang members are orphaned by parents who have left the country to find work or slain in the bloody 12 year civil war. All the incentives to quit (like jail–which the gangs run) can’t compete with the love and trust these young man have for their gang–the only family they’ve really had.

Despite feeling deep sadness for these young men it also put an interesting spin on the immigration issue. Many of these fellows started up their gangs in the states. When they were deported they brought the gang ideals back with them to their home country. A gang set up in south central LA is going to be very different then a gang set up in El Salvador. (Much, much scarier in my opinion after watching the documentary). It also made Josh very certain that we need to tighten up our borders, set up some real guidelines and follow real immigration rules. “Those are scary dudes that I don’t want in my country,” was Josh’s attitude. But I felt much more compassion for these men. Many of them seemed bright, hopeful, and motivated. If they came to this country and actually had opportunity would they actually change? Would they value our rules? And what about some many of these boys’ parents who come to this country to make some money?

The weirdest part of the documentary is at the end where they find and interview one of the mothers whose son was incarcerated at the end of the film. She is working in LA as a house cleaner. She left him seven years ago with his abusive older brother and never returned. The film shows her driving around in her Dodge pick up with her cleaning supplies talking about how important her work is. She obviously hasn’t seen the documentary footage because she seems lost and oblivious to her son’s reported angry behavior and recent murder charge (a newspaper article from her home town confirming his arrest is in her scrapbook). Perhaps it’s because this is the same boy who called his mother from El Salvador earlier in the film pleading with her to come and get him, his face twisted in grief, but this woman comes off as a buffoon. As much as I wanted to sympathize with her plight it’s apparent that she has been swept away in the relative comfort and complacency of California. Wow.

It’s hard not to draw parallels with the local gangs and the gang culture of El Salvador. While many of the values are the same: you take care of each other, you protect one another by any means necessary, punishment is an 18 second beating from your peers, if one homeboy goes down it is an honor to be chosen to take down a member of the rival gang, etc. there isn’t the same sense of despair in our country. In 2004, the rate of intentional homicides in El Salvador per 100,000 citizens was 41, with 60% of the homicides committed were gang-related. Compare that to our relatively low number of 5.7 murders per 100,000 persons in 2006 and you realize how ‘developed’ we really are. Despite these hard numbers, the similarities are classic: lack of education, parental involvement, money, all point towards boosting gang enrollment.

Right now as I speak there are sirens screaming by my house. I tell myself that it’s the fire station six blocks away–an epicenter for siren sounds. There has been considerable unrest in my neighborhood…I tell myself that it’s always rough in the summer. Sun pushes people to do stupid things they might not do in the rain. Watching this documentary gave me an inside look at the process, the route, the path it takes to join a gang. While it didn’t necessarily make me feel safer, it made me thankful that I live in the US, where education is given to everyone, gang activity is generally looked down upon (not lauded), and opportunity is still possible for even the hardest up.

I recently read a scathing review about my neighborhood on a local blog and it ruined my night. After thinking about it for a little while I posted the following (which I know is out of context but you can still get the gist): I found this post to be depressing, sad, frustrating, and largely unhelpful. (The blogger’s) heart is still ‘very much in the south valley?’ Really? How? By reminding me that the cops don’t come when called? That I can’t walk after dark by myself? Thanks…thanks I needed that. Look, once you leave Rainier Beach for the relative ’safety’ of another neighborhood I think you lose your right to criticize.

One of my students, a two-year-old, is accidentally locked in his mom’s mini-van with the windows rolled up. It is 80 degrees outside and probably twice that hot inside the car. It was his first day of class. His older sister is four and took Creative Movement with me. This is the studio in Madrona located along side the gorgeous Lake Washington. Half the joy of teaching at this studio is the view, the water lapping up against the concrete wall as I walk to the old boat house that’s been converted into a studio.

The van is parked facing the water and people are passing by and offering to help. The mother is frantically in control, her voice a thin tense line as she shouts at her son to press the unlock button. She desperately tries to coach him while waiting for her husband to bring keys to her vehicle. A small crowd gathers. The four-year-old sister spots me and runs up to the bench where I had innocently sat down to have some lunch–an ideal spot looking out over the water. I realize I need to take the other child off the mother’s hands and keep her calm in time of crisis. We sit side by side on the park bench, her feet dangling, someone has given her an apple. An old man dragging a plastic raft has stopped and suggested we call the police. It’s been 15 minutes since the accidental locking of the car. The little boy is now sweating. He’s holding a small stuffed animal, strapped firmly in his car seat, a look of blank wonder on his face. It is a game? Is he in trouble? He can’t push the lock down, his fingers are too weak.

A man in his forties, a young Madrona Mom, an adult student on her way to Open Ballet, this is just a small sampling of the small crowd. Some tap on the window at the little boy, others try and calm the mother, finally someone pulls out a cellphone and calls the police. “He’s sweating,” the dispatcher is told. A police car doesn’t come fast enough; another five minutes past by. The old man with the inflatable raft takes a sweatshirt and lines the passenger door with it. Then he expertly punches the window until the glass shatters with a resounding pop. The little boy inside the car screams and the mother dives in. She pulls him out of his car seat and runs, runs to the concrete wall that protects Lake Washington from the parking lot. She jumps in, with her clothes on, the water shallow reaching her waist. Her son is placed on the concrete lip and she begins splashing him with murky lake water to cool him off. People gather around with bottles of water, hands dip into the lake, voices are fast and firm. The little boy howls, his sister looks at me with big eyes. I had been sharing my almonds with her–nervous that she might have a nut allergy, (don’t all kids have one?) even though she claimed not to. “Why is he crying?” she asked. “Sometimes when you’re finally safe you can allow yourself to feel scared,” I explained. We had been engaged in several deep conversations about accidents, locking the car, the police, how strangers can help you in times of need. In her lap she held a second apple, “This one I’m saving for my brother.”

Beautiful Bald Bee is heading off to Iowa City…I’m gonna miss her (and her new husband behind her).

OK, so I’m a sucker for a deal. Such a sucker that I would break my self-imposed ‘no fast food restaurant’ ban in order to take advantage of the Friday Free Latte deal at McDonalds: From 11am-9pm on Friday you can stroll into the chain and receive a free small latte. Granted, there is zero advertising in the actual store, so you have to casually inquire, “Are you participating in the free latte promotion?” I guarantee you will get a blank look, because it will most likely be the employee’s second day and he hasn’t been informed about the give-away. However, after frantically checking with a pissed-off looking manager the free latte promo will be confirmed and the drink will be presented.

I learned about this promotion on the TV–probably the first time I was aware (consciously) of an advertisement influencing me to go out and but their product. If you watch standard television you’ve probably seen the ad campaign for McDonalds’ new line of espresso drinks. The latest one features two stuffy looking twenty-somethings sitting in overstuffed couches at a cafe, the perky sound of jazz in the background. One of them announces that Mcdonalds is serving espresso drinks and after a moments hesitation the two are thrilled, THRILLED. Suddenly, they realize they can cast off their dower appearances and really cut loose from the confines of the cafe scene. “I can start wearing heels again!” One of them cries.

I’m sorry, WHAT? I know the ad is trying to imply that folks who patronize, say, a Tully’s are nothing but dumpy, turtle-neck wearing, practical-shoe buying, snobs but when was the last time you saw a McDonalds patron wearing heels? Have you been in a McDonalds lately? Because Seattle breeds the exact type of clientèle the ad campaign is making fun of, the standard fast food patron in this city tends to, oh, lack teeth. Call it classist, but that’s just the way things are around here. Now that I think about it, I really should have put on a pair of heels and strolled in for my free latte–unfettered and unrestrained. As it was, I admittedly was wearing old birkenstocks. (Damn, maybe the stereotype is right).

While working for The Bucks I used to comment that it was a “McDonalds for rich people.” Coffee is cranked out, branding is shoved down throats, and superiority is felt by all. However, customer service is very important for the elite coffee chain and this is why the person ringing up your espresso tends to be a shade more cheerful then your average McDonalds teller. So, while you might have to pretend that you actually like jazz (as the McDonald commercial jokingly suggests) the benefit is that you get someone who is relatively polite taking your money. At McDonalds the poor fellow who procured my drink was enduring his second day midst the chaos of a busy lunch rush. He fumbled with the push buttons on the screen, couldn’t find the ‘iced’ button, forgot to ask what type of latte I wanted or what kind of milk. He looked about 16 and was obviously miserable as the snapping manager practically punched out the buttons on his register.

The verdict? Well, the complimentary McDonalds iced latte (which normally retails for $1.99) was terrible…completely and utterly horrible. The idea of McDonalds selling espresso at half the price is alluring–and a brilliant marketing idea. However, the quality just doesn’t match up. You know that stereotype? The snooty girls in the commercial who toss off their glasses with relief at no longer having to put on airs in the cafe? Well, those girls don’t exist. Like myself, those girls would take one sip of a McDonald’s latte and grimace. I AM one of those girls and I have to tell you: I almost bought into it. Not because I find espresso chains exhaustingly snobby but because I love espresso and wanted a bargain.

My McDonalds unfettered espresso experience was similar to buying a latte in Kansas City: the shit sucked. Pallid, melted, and tasteless, the drink paled in comparison to what you’d receive in even the dankest of cafes. Somewhere in Italy (home of the original espresso) a barista is crying. Call me a snob: I went home, brewed up two espresso shots in my fancy pants machine and tossed it into the watery semblance they called an iced espresso drink. Free is a very good price and I’m glad I didn’t pay a dime for that craptacular latte.