Pop Culture

Awkward Family Photos

As I sometimes reveal here, there is something universal about the awkwardness of family. About a week ago, two childhood friends launched a site to document as much. The results — in the vein of LOLCats and Stuff White People Like — are hilarious: The Choker: “This is what happens when your male role model is both a priest and a gym teacher.” ———————————————————————————————- My Two Dads: “You may use your calculator for this equation.” (Favorite comment: “I am very confused by this. Is the guy in the front right like a neighborhood computer guy who helps them out sometimes?”) ———————————————————————————————–

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10 Things I Hate About You, Travel Edition

The flight from Boston to Los Angeles takes six hours, during which there is a kind of caricature of intimacy that develops, at least in Coach. You might not even know the name of the guy sitting at your elbow, but still: You know his choice of reading material; what he drinks with his meal; the way his face, erased of its wakeful composure, slackens when he nods off after lunch. Every once in a while, your thighs touch, or you get a whiff of his cologne, and it’s all at once completely normal and yet weird: Here we are, two people randomly seated together. We begin the journey as strangers and then, hours later, we part knowing more details about each other than many of our casual acquaintances—even if we haven’t exchanged a single word. We’re not friends, exactly, but we’re something. Six hours is a long time to

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A Journey to ’25 Random Things’

Three weeks ago, William tagged me in a “25 Random Things About Me” chain letter. I’ve hung around with William a few times, but reading his list feels a lot like a peek at his diary: Here are his hopes, fears, and his profession of love for Twizzlers. I’m tagged again by Tim (“I’m a writer… but poetry is what I love to write the most”), then Kris (“I love Bailey, my Jack Russell cocker who puts her paws over her face when I scold her”), and red-headed Stephanie (“I am addicted to television.” And, comically, “This is not my natural hair color.”) I’m sensing that this thing is bigger than I might have thought. I do some research and discover the concept: Generate a list of 25 “things, facts, habits or goals” about yourself in the notes section of your Facebook profile and publish it there. Then, tap 25

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Refugee At Home

On Monday I had a small patch of skin cancer removed from the bridge of my nose. It sounds like a big deal, but it wasn’t. The procedure itself felt no worse than having an earlobe pierced: There was only a quick, surprising burn as the doctor applied a local anesthetic, but the actual procedure seemed to last no longer than a network station break. It was only the sound of cutting that got to me, the dull snip of flesh—the sound you might hear if your dinner companion chose to cut their meaty filet with a pair of cuticle scissors. That aside, it felt relaxing to be lying down in the middle of the day, under a warm blanket, a pillow tucked beneath my knees. I dozed off. When I awoke, I had a bandage on my face the size of a hamburger bun. I touched at it curiously,

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Wii Are Family

In college, I had a friend named Jane. She was the oldest daughter in a family of tennis players, and they all looked like her: tall and willowy, but strong as thoroughbreds, with defined muscles in their long arms and legs; permanently sunburned noses; and an effortless way of moving that was almost heartbreaking to watch. Even when Jane was just swinging her backpack over her shoulder as she sauntered out of class, she had a way of making it look like art. At her Long Island home, her family walked around in track suits and tennis shoes, without the irony that, for example, a track suit would have conveyed on my plump mother. Someone was always going out to play on the courts or coming in from just having played, toting bags and several racquets and fresh cans of balls that smelled excitingly of gassy rubber. They had kitchen

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Innocents At Home

It snowed the other morning north of Boston. It was the first, early snowfall of the season, if you take a very literal view of the term “snowfall,” because the flurries that fell didn’t amount to any real accumulation. They stuck tentatively to the ground, in clusters, like they were as surprised to be landing on the lawn as we were to see them. My 11-year-old woke and from her bedroom upstairs, and I heard a noise that sounded like she stepped on a puppy’s tail. She was squealing not about sledding or school closings, as you might expect. Instead, she hollered as she charged down the stairs, “Yippee! We’ve stopped global warming!” Her comment came without a hint of irony. How heartbreakingly innocent is that? She bounded into the kitchen and gave me a quick, happy hug. She might now be almost as tall as I am, but as

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I Can Haz Hoomin Hart-aik

Maybe it’s because the holidays put me in a melancholy mood. Maybe because I’m again staring down the barrel of six bleak months of winter. Whatever the cause, I can’t help but read lolcats these days without glimpsing the heartache of the human condition. In a piece a few weeks ago in Salon, Jay Dixit articulated it perfectly, when he wrote, “This is all funny stuff. But I submit that the true genius of lolcats lies in their tragedy.” Lolcats, if you don’t know, is a web site and internet phenomenon that combines a photo of a cat with a funny, idiosyncratic caption in broken English—a sort of dialect known as “lolspeak,” “kitteh,” or “kitty pidgin,” which parodies the poor grammar and spelling of Internet slang. The name “lolcat” is a compound of the phrase “LOL” and “cat.” It’s simple, it’s goofy, and it’s stuffed full of references and self-references.

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Sarah and Me: Junior High with Sarah Palin

On the surface, I should like her. Sarah Palin is 44, precisely my age. We were born three months apart. And like me, she’s a mom and works full-time. We should hang out, clink our highball glasses, and salute the kind of kismet that competent women often need to create real achievement. Except, in her case, the kismet catapulted her to the national stage and into history. In my case, it occasionally lands me a first-class upgrade. Sarah and I could talk about stuff that professional Moms our age talk about: The rush of being in charge; the need to wear seriously rimmed glasses, even if your eyes don’t require it; and techniques for gagging and hogtying that persistent little voice in the back of our heads that suggests our ambition comes at the obvious expense of our kids. But for some reason, I can’t warm up to her. And

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Morning Person

Like millions of people around the world who are following the Beijing Olympics, I’ve been watching a lot of TV this summer. Parked on my couch watching the events, it’s alternatively a new experience as well as a shot of nostalgia. Here, in 2008, I’m watching the summer games with my own kids. But I can’t help but recall a few decades ago, when I was the kid in the room, watching the events with my own parents, and Jim McKay in place of Bob Costas. My network’s broadcast schedule means that I’m getting to bed late most nights. At least, late for people who have trains to catch and clocks to punch. Because I work at home, I have a little more slack on this issue, and so, for the past week or two, the Olympics have helped me reconnect with the deliciousness that is sleeping in. But today

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