This is Mike and Paul. I met them a decade ago, when Oslo, the first really great coffee shop in Williamsburg, opened down on Roebling Avenue. By 9 am that joint was jumping—still is, even with the many artisanal-almond-milk-interplanetary-bean-drips that have opened in the years since. But at 7 am, we were often the only ones hunkered down over our coffees. Paul drank a latte, Mike drank a regular brew with one of those sugary cakes masquerading as a muffin, and I drank an Americano. On the days I’d woken up enough to apply lipstick before leaving the house, the men made a big show of buying my drink for me. “I love a blonde with red lips,” Paul would say with his irresistible grin. I’d bat my lashes. Continue Reading →
Archive | Country Matters
Virtual Grit: ‘Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk’
The reviews are in. Next to “Hulk,” “Billy’s Long Halftime Walk” may be Oscar-winning director Ang Lee’s worst-received film. Scoring a fifty-percent “fresh” rate on Rotten Tomatoes (not that such review aggregators matter, of course), the adaptation of Ben Fountain’s 2012 National Book Award-nominated novel has left such critics as RogerEbert.com’s Godfrey Cheshire cold. “Too obvious to be effective,” he has sneered, and others seem to agree. I am not one of them, but I also am in the minority of reviewers who have seen this account of an American soldier’s brief return from Iraq in the format that Lee had intended. Using a new film technology, he has captured an essence of the book that otherwise might never have translated to screen. Continue Reading →
The Way Forward Is With a Broken Heart
Last night I heard one of my favorite writers speak—he may be my favorite living writer—and I was so brokenhearted I could barely take it in. Afterward, I bought a new copy of his best book (I’d read the last copy to shreds), and made an ass of myself as he signed it. I forgive myself because I’d known this would happen. I’m balls out when it comes to meeting movie actors and rock stars, but on the rare occasions I’ve met the writers I cherish, I’ve presented as angsty, unbalanced, wild-eyed. I think it is because I was raised more by my favorite authors than by my parents. I learned to read at age 3, inhaled adult books by kindergarten, and relied on essays, novels, and memoirs for the models of decency and decorum, the communion and care-taking, that I received nowhere else. It’s no wonder I’ve always been a disaster when I’ve met my favorite authors. The degree to which I’ve cathected to them has made our dynamics hideously uneven.
The person I met last night was Edmund White, whose work I’ve loved since reading “The Beautiful Room Is Empty” in the university library while my peers fell upon each in beery, Gap-clad messes. (I hated college.) As he signed “The Farewell Symphony” for me, I welled up and recited the Joshua passage I’ve quoted here. I saw his eyes widen in sympathy and alarm but couldn’t reel myself in; any emotional pregnancy unmoors me completely right now. I know I am not alone in feeling this way, far from it. But I am ashamed to say I am not just mourning the demise of the United States of America. I also am mourning the death of hopes I’ve nursed for months and months. Continue Reading →