Way Overdue

Maggie has already posted a summary-in-pictures of our Thanksgiving weekend in South Jersey, but I'd like to spend the next few posts focusing on various parts. The first one is devoted to Plasticville.

One of my dad's great delights was setting up the trains he'd played with as a child (Lionel gage O), as well as the miniature town that went with them. 

Over the years, he acquired new buildings and eventually another antique train (American Flyer), as well as more track and things like switches (just like in real life!). 

Part of the point was to entertain children, starting with me as soon as I was old enough to operate the trains. This entailed wearing the conductor's hat and scarf, and pushing the dial on the control evenly and cautiously. 

When I was old enough, I was allowed to help him design the track layout and put together buildings. This fall, my dad's niece and nephew (Sandi and David) and their respective families got the process started. Upon our arrival, Maggie and I worked with my mom to get everything up and running.  The goal was to have Plasticville - the name of the miniature town - completely constructed by the time we left. 

I didn't think we could do it, but again, Sandi and David and families provided reinforcements. By late Saturday morning, this is what the town looked like:

Commercial/Industrial Zones

Close-up of homes and school

See if you can find the farm, the airport, the house under construction, the two signal towers, the custard stand, the trailer park . . . 

Oops

It's officially a month since I last posted - my bad.

I'll try to make up for my inactivity by catching up on all the great things that happened over Thanksgiving weekend, and all the nifty news of now. (I love alliteration.)

Panda update: she has a new bone, and she's gnawing away at it right now. Good times. 

I leave you with a five-minute musical that is exceedingly clever, well-executed, and socially conscious. Enjoy.

"Prop 8 - The Musical" starring Jack Black, John C. Reilly, and many more... by Jack Black

Memorial Scholarship

My mom and I are going to set up a memorial scholarship at my dad's high school. So far the idea is to gear it towards students who want to pursue careers in public and civil service (broadly defined). If anyone knows anything about setting up a scholarship fund or has ideas about what should go into the application, let me know. I'll keep you updated as we move forward on this. 

(Dad and I testing out my new webcam, circa 2003. The date is based on the size of my 'fro.)

Anecdotes

This weekend, I took the bus down to NYC to see friends and then the train to Princeton to see the new Triangle show. On the bus back to Boston, instead of reading, I spent the 4+ hours listening to my ipod, staring out the window, and thinking.  Naturally, I thought about my dad.

I remembered the day I got my "Yes!" letter from Princeton - it happened to be my dad's 51st birthday. Dad came home from work, and my mom told him to go see me in the office, where I was probably playing some computer game in celebration. As per our usual routine, he says, "Greetings, earth creature!" I say, "I got in to Princeton!" He says,

"Really!!??"

in a tone of voice that made it clear that he was genuinely surprised. He spent the next few minutes explaining himself: it's not that he thought I couldn't get in, he just thought I wouldn't get in. No offense meant, and I never took any from it. Dad knew not to take anything for granted.

I also thought about the parallel between my first day of college and a telephone conversation this past summer. I had moved in a week before the "first day" to go on a whitewater canoeing trip (freshman orientation/team-building type stuff). The day we got back from the trip was the first night of Rosh Hashanah, so I had to go right back home for services. My parents brought me back to campus the morning of the second day so we could attend services on campus and so I wouldn't miss any more orientation activities. This day, more than when my parents moved me in prior to the canoeing trip, provided that definitive moment when we "said goodbye," even though it would only be a matter of weeks until we saw each other again. 

The last thing my dad did was pull me aside - out of earshot for my mom - to tell me, "No matter what, you call your mother at least once a week. If you feel like going a month without talking to me, that's fine - but you call your mom."

This summer, after my mom had already (secretly) told me about dad's plan to have surgery, my dad formally asked me if I would come home. Normally it'd be a no-brainer, but my parents knew how stressed I was about generals, and at the time no one thought it'd be a serious thing. Still, I had already decided I would come home to take care of my dad for the first few days after the surgery. 

Once again, though, my dad wasn't taking anything for granted. He felt he had to apologize for taking me away from studying for generals, and justified his request this way: "I know you have a lot of studying to do, but I want you to come home at least the night before my surgery so you can be with your mom while I'm in the operating room. You can leave right after if you want, but I need you to sit with your mom at least for those few hours."

I don't know if he was just being chivalrous, or completely selfless, or if he simply didn't expect me to stay around and help him convalesce. But it felt just like that first day of college, and I hear him say "you call your mother" just about every day now. 

If anyone has any stories they'd like to share - especially ones I don't know - I'd love to hear them. 

Xkcd.com

Dad would have liked this one.

Generals Questions, finally

I promised a long time ago to post my generals questions. Before I do that, some info on the basic format:

1. We had to choose eight topics total. 
2. Six were meant to correspond to six broadly defined periods in music history (Medieval, Renaissance, Baroque, Classical, Romantic, 20th Century). 
3. Of the other two, one was supposed to be a theory/methods/historiography topic, and one was supposed to be a popular music/ethnomusicology topic. 
4. After choosing our eight topics, we were instructed to choose six on which we would be tested through a series of two-hour essays. 
5. Another topic would be turned into a syllabus for a graduate seminar, and the last topic would become a 10-minute oral presentation, to be given at orals (where the faculty question us "live" about our previous answers on the essays, our work on the syllabus, and an analytical portion of the test taken halfway through the summer).
   

Here are the questions I chose to answer for each topic, the titles of which follow the historical period designation.  (I've omitted the questions I chose not to answer, which tended to be the "harder" ones.)

Topic 1: Medieval: Trouveres

Long Essay: Is trouvere music modal? (You may interpret "modal" in the rhythmic as well as melodic sense.)

Short Essays: 1) Sources of trouvere music; 2) Major works of scholarship on trouveres

Topic 2: Renaissance: Cantus Firmus Masses in the 15th Century

Long Essay: Discuss connections among the complex of fifteenth-century masses based on L'homme arme. Do these masses support the claim that "emulation" and "competition" were operative concepts for composers in this period? How else might one characterize these composers' engagements with one another's works?

Topic 3: Baroque: The Italian Sonata

Long Essay: Discuss the European influence of Corelli as teacher and composer, until 1800.

(I have to include the question I didn't answer, just because it's so ridiculous: "Discuss the aesthetic issues involved in the repertory of early solo sonatas (e.g., Marini and Castello), including today's revival among performers (e.g., Manze)." I hadn't studied any of those people, and I still have no idea what "aesthetic issues" means.)

Topic 4: Classical: London in the 1790s

Long essay: Discuss the impact foreign performers, composers and impresarios had on musical life in London in the 1790s. In what ways did the situation in this decade differ from what it had been earlier in the century?

Topic 5: Methods/historiography: Historiography of French Musical Nationalism After 1793

Long Essay: "What is a [musical] nation?" (<-- This is actually how the question was written, quotation marks and brackets and all. It's an allusion to an important speech given on nationalism in 1882 by Ernst Renan.)

Short Essay: Wagner as Other

Topic 6: Rock: The British Invasion of the 1960s

Long Essay: The "British Invasion" is a term used to describe the overwhelming popularity of rock and roll groups from the United Kingdom in the 1960s United States. Groups such as teh Beatles, Rolling Stones, the Kinks and the Who were so much a part of everyday American cultural life that they became almost American in the eyes of their audiences. Why were the British Invasion groups so appealing to American audiences in the 1960s? How were the British Invasion groups themselves influenced by American popular genres (R&B, Motown, Rock) and vice veresa? In what ways did musicians and their music become icons of larger social, political, and cultural trends?

I created my graduate seminar syllabus on my Romantic topic, "The Piano Miniature. "

My oral presentation was on my 20th-century topic - and the main contender for a dissertation topic - "Patronage in Interwar France."

__________________________________________________________________

Good times, eh? 

A Sunday Walk

Panda saw a squirrel just before I shot this, so she was too occupied to mug for the camera. People keep saying she's gotten bigger, but I can't tell.

1%

There's always one, every year. 

We tricked this guy. You know - as in "trick-or-treat." At the time, he seemed a little stunned but none the worse for wear. He half-heartedly asked us for the candy back, and we kind of laughed and tried out one of our slogans: "We're putting the 'trick' back in 'trick-or-treat!'" and "You just got tricked!" 

Three houses later, we realized he was following us down the street. We asked him why he would do such a thing. He told us we should be ashamed of ourselves; that we were stealing candy from children; that we should get the f*** off his street. We defended ourselves, citing an apparent (and real) lack of children on the street; the fact that we are clearly young at heart, otherwise why would we be trick-or-treating?; and that he should stop following us. "It's a free country, I can follow you if I want!" he retorted. "If it's a free country, why can't we be on your street?" we asked, reasonable and calm as ever. 

He continued to follow us, to verbally abuse us, to threaten us. As he grew more belligerent, we grew more concerned, ultimately leading to the following scene. (See below for a transcript, since it's hard to understand everything.)

Weirdo: Go! Move!

Matt: We are. We're calling the police.

Weirdo: Call the police! Go ahead!

Louis: Hi, uh, there's someone following us, down the street.

[Unknown source: I think they're scared.]

Louis: Uh, what street . . . this is Willow.

Weirdo: You're stealing candy from little kids.

Louis: Somerville, sorry.

Weirdo: Move. Now. Move. Get your ass out of here. Get your ass out of here now. Move. All of you. Get outta here. You ruin the whole spirit of Halloween.

Weiiiiiiiiirddddddddddddddd!!!!!!!!

Election Day

Of all the incredibly important things to consider on election day, here's perhaps the most important, as seen on Somerville's sample ballot:

It says, "Shall the state representative from this district be instructed to vote in favor of amending the state Constitution to replace the state Legislature with 100 randomly selected adult residents of the Commonwealth, each serving a one-year term, to be called the Commonwealth Jury and to have all the legislative and other powers of the current Legislature?"

I hope we all vote an emphatic "YES" on this non-binding question. Then, I could be randomly selected to rule Massachusetts for a full year!!!!

Also, vote no on question 1 (abolishing the state income tax is reckless) and yes on questions 2 (decriminalizing marijuana doesn't mean legalizing it) and 3 (greyhound racing: probably not quite the economic pillar its proponents make it out to be).

Halloween!!!

As usual, I went trick-or-treating Friday night. The schtick is, I put a white sheet over my head (with two holes cut out for eyes), get down on my knees, and pretend to be 4 years old. I mumble, "trick-or-treat!" in my best Mickey Mouse voice. My legal guardian - played by my friend Matt for the last two years, and his girlfriend Madeleine this year - makes a big deal out of the whole thing. "This is his first Halloween. Ooh, he loves Kit Kats! What do you say to the nice lady?"

After I get candy, I stand up, throw the sheet over my head and say, "Thank you!" in my deepest Barry White voice. 99% of people love it. Here's a typical reaction:

Ahh, classic. After surprise, shock, and resignation comes joy and even satisfaction.





Can't wait until next year!!

Panda is here!!!

Panda is coming . . .

We have the crate . . .

We have a dog bed . . .

All we're missing is the dog!

Insert Huge Sigh of Relief Here

Generals, Written portion: done. Around 20 single-spaced pages, 12,000 words. I had 12 hours to demonstrate everything I learned this summer. Maybe tomorrow I'll post some of the topics so you can see how ridiculous musicology is.

Ahhhh!

This should read like a tall tale: My dad was such an excellent role model, even the same action could teach me both what to do and what not to do.

That didn't come out nearly as well as I had planned, but nevermind. Among friends and family, my dad's work ethic was well known - feared, even. He thought nothing of putting in an 80-hour work week, then bringing home more work for the weekend. By osmosis, I too learned the value of a strong work ethic, and I too became adept at pushing myself to work harder and accomplish more.

At the same time, I recoiled from the example my father set. No, he did not ignore his family responsibilities, and no, I never felt unloved or neglected. Rather, I saw the toll that stress from overwork took on my dad - on his health, on his happiness - and I vowed never to punish myself in the same way. Plan #1: Don't be a lawyer. Plan #2: Pick a career that I'll love, that gives me summers off, that lets me travel a great deal, and that gives me a flexible schedule.

Silly Louis.

After having picked that lifestyle as a response to my dad's, I used the very same self-imposed pressure I shunned to get me into a good grad program. And now, I'm feeling the crunch again - generals, teaching, dissertation prospectus, and FELLOWSHIP APPLICATIONS!!!!!!!! Apparently ambition and laziness do not coexist peacefully.

Still, I'll try to have the best of all worlds. This month will be ridiculous, but after October 8 (2nd day of generals testing) and October 13 (Fulbright due date), things will calm down. And I will once again appreciate that my dad taught me the value of relaxation - however unintentionally.

Maggie the Better Blogger

One of my dad's favorite expressions was, "You're a gentleman and a scholar, and there aren't many of us left." How right he was. Apparently, I was gentlemanly (emphasis on the manly) and clever enough to attract the attention of Maggie, who is much better at blogging than I am. But I'm learning! And that's what this is all about . . .

Getting Ahead of Myself

This blog constitutes the exploration of an idea that first found voice in the eulogy I wrote for my dad's funeral service. Before I get blogged down in the minutiae of everyday life, I'd like to publish the eulogy and officially set the groundwork for what's to come:

During the two weeks my dad spent in the hospital, my mom and I were blessed to have the support of so many people in so many ways. When we sat in the ICU waiting room, friends and family sat with us. When we prayed, whole churches and synagogues prayed with us. When we needed food, it arrived as manna from heaven, carried in the arms of neighbors. As my dad used to say, we now have more containers of food at our house than Carter has pills. This afternoon, we should approach that food as my dad would have: eat a lot, very quickly, and then wash all the dishes so my mom and I don’t have to.

On Saturday, just before my dad passed, my mom and I discussed the impact that this emotional, spiritual and edible support had had, not just on us, but on my dad’s care. Even if the doctors and nurses in the ICU – who deserve more praise, recognition and thanks than I know how to express – Even if they hadn’t had the chance to meet my dad before he came in for surgery, then surely they knew him by now. They may not have heard him speak, and some didn’t get to see his eyebrows dance across his forehead. But they came to know him through us, through our constant, zealous support and get-well vibes - and we believe that this experience translated into better, more emotionally-invested treatment. They knew he loved the Eagles, they knew he was a hard worker. They knew his sense of humor and his grace and his intelligence. They knew his style, from his super big glasses. And they knew his love for us, by the way he blew kisses at my mom and mouthed the words, “I love you.”

It’s amazing, all the things that those unfamiliar doctors and nurses could learn about him in two weeks. And yet, despite having a great relationship with my dad, there are many things about him that I do not know. What did he want to be when he was a kid? What was his favorite color? Who did he take to the senior prom? How did he decide my mom was the woman he wanted to be with for the rest of his life? Actually, my dad told me he never dated before he met my mom, but after seeing him in the hospital without his mustache, I can’t believe that.

We never talked about love, the birds and the bees, or any of that mushy stuff. Instead, when two characters in a movie leaned in for a climactic kiss, my dad would cover his eyes and yell, “Ewww!” or, later on, [in a fake accent] “Gimme little kiss.” Looking back on this apparent immaturity, I see it instead as a form of measured protection. My dad, more than anyone else I know, recognized the importance of childhood; he developed it into a timeless art. Don’t think for a second he ever shirked a responsibility: he loved to iron and work long hours, take leadership positions and serve his community. But he never abandoned the innocence, wonder, spontaneity and creativity I now imagine he had at age 10.

Dad sang to wake me up every morning, sang to change my diaper and potty train me, sang to my stuffed animals and sang to the dog. His love of music became my love of music. His playfulness, his wry, sometimes inscrutable and always corny humor became mine. His toys are now mine, and his delight in taking those toys out –with me, with his nieces and nephews, and especially with his great-nephews – is a legacy I can’t wait to carry on. Dad perfected the balance between childhood and adulthood, taking the best qualities of each age and transmitting them unsullied by the demands and distractions of everyday life. That balance, and the example he set, is his legacy, not just to me, but to us all.

There may be things I don’t know about my dad, at least superficially. But having identified one legacy, I feel confident that the coming years will bring further realizations. Just as his doctors and nurses did, I will continue to learn about my dad through all of you – through your words, your deeds, through your own ways of showing my dad’s quiet influence. There may be things I don’t know about my dad, but I do know that if I ever need to ask a question only he could answer, my dad’s greatest legacy will be that I only have to ask myself.

Louis is . . .

Apples

Beatles

Cooking

Dogs

Eagles (of Philadelphia)

France

Guitar

Humor

Interblags

Jacob

Kids

Life

Maggie (Musicology a far second)

Novelty

Obama

Panda/Paris/Panda in Paris! also, Piano

Questions

Recording

Scrabble

The Wire

Ubiquity

V for Vendetta

Woodstown

Xkcd.com

Yes

Zealotry

Favored Child

I'm an only child, but for the last 9 years there's been no doubt about who my dad's favorite was. And for good reason.

Justification

I always claimed I'd never keep a blog. The whole exercise seemed so self-centered: you expose your personal, "private" subjectivity to an audience that exists to gratify your desire to be a public figure, even if only anonymously. But (of course there had to be a "but") now I see the exercise differently; I understand the meaning of "self-centered" differently. That's because my dad passed away two weeks ago, at the ripe young age of 58. Now my subjectivity is not completely my own. Now my desire to air my private life publicly is a desire to keep my father's memory and spirit alive through myself. I don't deny that this exercise, too, is self-centered. I merely define the "self" differently than I did two weeks ago.

It remains to be seen how this will work out in practice. In the meantime, you'll forgive me for the conceit of assuming that everything I post is, however indirectly, an expression of what my dad taught me.

And what he continues to teach me, even as I struggle to figure things out on my own.