in every place

I ended up in the exurbs the other night, strange to be among immaculate lawns and corporate parks and long roads. One of my friends plays bass at a church out there and invited me to come out and hang with them, it's one of those groups for older young people which isn't called a singles group but could function as such.

I'm a little skittish around large groups of clean-cut people, I joke, but no one here seems to mind my black t-shirts and strange sense of humor. I'm so used to being around working-classers and underemployed liberal arts graduates that I go into a little bit of culture shock in a world where the girls are way more dressed up, and have accessories of affluence, really nice watches and whatnot, the cars in the parking lot make my beater with the broken fender look out of place, the guys are wearing things I never see in the city like the occasional chinos and topsiders and polos in pastel colors.

But everyone I talked to seemed very nice, and it was kind of refreshing to be somewhere full of people my age who aren't sporting any ironic affectation. You know you're sick of hipster accoutrements when you find a strange comfort in middle American normality. But it was the friendliness that got me, and the message that night wasn't intellectually vapid, so I might come back. If anything, meeting some nice girls and not running into anyone that seemed like future soulmate material made it easier. And I also talked to homie's roommate and we might be starting a band soon, since we like the same music and live near each other.

It's funny, we dress exactly alike, he says. And we do. Jeans and converse sneakers and t-shirts of bands we like. I'm way more girly than I once was, but I'm conscious of the lack of difference still. I drive home through the hot summer night listening to Nothing's Shocking and wonder how all the social anxiety I used to feel completely seemed to dissolve itself. There's still social situations that turn me into mush, but fewer and fewer do.

And yet last night I was driving home and feeling stupid for other things, for feeling things that are normal and human, of unrequition, of cynical sour grapes (it wouldn't work out anyway), of what-could-have-beens and it-was-never-meant-to-bes. The feelings of deep affection for my friends both male and female are probably more intense than some, but that's different than this. Absence maybe doesn't make the heart grow fonder, but it masks the inconvenience of seeing those day to day things that would render someone more human and less attractive, and sometimes it's worse to see them again and feel all of those emotions shuttered so carefully away bubble to the surface once more.  I could blame the hormones, and maybe that's all it is, but it's a terrible feeling.

rust belt chicanery

There was a discussion in a class I took last semester where the prof took issue with the writer of our book saying that a certain group is constantly looking back to and trying to recapture a golden age that existed in one form or another. I said that everyone does this, it's a universal human trait like creating or fighting or whatever, and of course I was wrong, because that's not what he believed. 

So we look back on our golden years, when there were jobs and whatnot, and there's talk of some renaissance in the form of taking ownership of our culture, but it doesn't ring true to me which is strange because all the stuff that's celebrated is stuff I kind of like, but I don't like the way it's being done, in part because I'm a bit cynical of bandwagons as a rule. 

So, rust belt chic.

It's a construct of underdogness,  a love of regional Midwest industrial culture by the young folks, a buzzword for this "creative class" that evidently has lots of money and no children and probably has some technocratic advertising gig, so uncool it's cool, which we've been recycling since Douglas Coupland codified the Gen-X irony and concepts like McJobs and Nutritional Slumming, but instead of being a wry look at the absurdity of modern life, it's become this kind of twee thing where it's way more shiny and perky and accentuate the positive than I'm comfortable with, and I think it's the preciousness of the approach that rankles me more than anything else. The quote about jaded anorexic vampires from cool cities like New York also somewhat rings false to me, because if anything we're not much of a blip on the radar anywhere else anyway, and we've got plenty of those types here that eat their own and relish being a big fish in a small pond.

But I think this is more some kind of escapism for people my age and demographic with some degree of disposable income looking for a new and in this case, a very affordable and available trend, capitalizing on the zeitgeist of kitsch, a low-budget conspicuous consumption that's not quite as weird as being a Bronie.  

Is it a proverbial going back to the womb? An escapist reaction to the current ennui?
  I told Randal I blame Wes Anderson in part, and maybe the whole Instagram aesthetic that infuses everything with this goldenrod tinge of retro, conjuring a comforting fuzzy memory that's some amalgam of childhood experiences that may or may not even be terribly Rust Belt per se but that were common collective memories of middle-class and blue-collar existence in the inner ring suburbs. 

Things like the houses our grandmas lived in, the afghans of cataract-fueled colors we were wrapped in as babies, tchotchkes made of seashells and matchbooks piled up in Dutch butter cookie tins celebrating Chuck and Di and exhorting you to Vote For This Guy back when cigarettes were more socially acceptable. Things that reminded us of a more innocent time when we were too young to be aware of the social problems around us like segregation and race riots and the Cold War, just the pop culture detritus of classic rock and Saturday morning cartoons and Star Wars, the graphics we remember as children, a selective approach to throwback clothing... vintage-style t-shirts yes, polyester muumuus and leisure suits not so much.

And then there's the comfort food we ate in the houses of our grandparents, in this area mostly of the Eastern European extraction, fuzzy VHS camcorder memories of going to weddings where there's polka bands, Catholic schools when they still had nuns, and hanging out at bowling alleys and corner watering holes where the decor hasn't changed in 30 years, the same . Ethnic identity was more of what your last name was than any long-held grudge from the Old World or any real sense of history except for maybe the street names in the hoods your grandparents once lived in before they hightailed it for post-war bungalows in the suburbs and on the outskirts.

Also, certain selective aspects of clothing from that era that mostly involve 50/50 poly cotton t-shirts with names of old bar league softball teams and trucking companies that no longer exist and quite possibly hair metal bands that may or may not be loved ironically. It's a very specific cultural memory for people who grew up on the West Side and then may or may not have majored in English lit at a state school, that conveniently forgets about the segregation, pollution, and other inconvenient truths of that time.

Is this maybe the northern equivalent to the southern nostalgia for the antebellum days? I wouldn't be the one to know, but it's a convenient revisionism that sentimentalizes and softens the edges, and maybe it's not so much wrong as something I just hope goes away sometime soon. 

no recess

So I'd thought about hitting up my high school reunion, in part because a former classmate and bandmate said he might be up for going and at least I'd have someone to sit with and reminisce about AP history videos of absurdity and weekends of driving around suburbia listening to the Misfits,debating the merits of various bands and ways of looking at the world, between him being all into Aleister Crowley and me being the token Jesushead and our other friend being all into some kind of Max Cavalera-back-to-the-primitive Star Wars pantheism, it was always entertaining, and no wonder that the band fell apart, but those were good times that fall that 9/11 happened and we were more abstractedly angry than anything coherent. As I've gotten older I feel like I know more what to be mad about but less of what to do.

So having transferred in after a traumatic freshman year elsewhere, I have no real emotional attachment either negative or positive to where my diploma came from. I never got really picked on, as the place was huge, I had no history, and fell enough in the middling crowd to not get messed with too much, I made some friends, other smart slacker geeks, who listened to the Dead Kennedys and Overkill and Slayer and loaned me books by Henry Rollins, who was more or less our patron saint. I didn't keep in touch with anyone really, because what would we talk about outside that framework. Some people went out and were successful and others ended up in jail, and part of me thought it'd be fun to go for kicks and giggles just to people-watch and observe because hey why not.

But it turns out that there are tickets, and said tickets, which include hors d'oeuvres but no booze, are about the price of seeing a good touring band come through Clevelandia, with no such guarantee of a good time, as it's at a yuppie wine bar and the people who I know are coming are people I either can't remember or never hung out with. I understand it costs something maybe to coordinate such a thing, but it also seems like a handy way to keep the riff-raff out. I'm curious enough about the world to put myself in awkward situations with a way out, but this doesn't seem to be worth the trouble.

best of the blotter: zebra-striped glitter, fake priests, and those damn kids

STRONGSVILLE

Sometime Strongsville police go beyond the call of duty to help a distraught resident.
Here's what happened at 3:20 a.m. May 4. Someone called 911 from Raccoon Trail, a report said. A dispatcher heard yelling before the call disconnected. Callbacks weren't answered. Police have to follow up on 911 hang-ups, so they went to the address, where they found an intoxicated woman who was upset that she couldn't find her purse.

She told officers a Royalton Road man had just dropped her off and she may have left it in his car.
So they went to the man's address and looked in the car to see if they could see it inside. Sure enough, there was a pink purse in there.
The woman confirmed it was hers and officers retrieved it. By 4 a.m., the woman and her pink purse were reunited, a report said.

SUSPICIOUS ACTIVITY, PEARL ROAD: Someone thought that four people standing outside of Wendy’s were trying to set a fire near the front doors after the restaurant was closed May 3.
Turns out it was just some employees of the restaurant smoking cigarettes and burning twigs. They were told “not to do this.”


LAKEWOOD

There's the beef
Lakewood police responded to the Rally’s on W. 117^th Street in Cleveland for a report of a tow truck driver who was threatened by a man who said he would shoot the driver if he didn’t buy him a burger at around 1:40 a.m. May 3. Police caught up with the man on Detroit Avenue and turned him over to the Cleveland Police Department.

Scary noises
A resident in the 1600 block of Phelps Avenue told police that a neighbor was making scary noises at around 7 p.m. May 1. The woman called back and said the neighbors making noise left.

ANIMAL AT LARGE, DOWD AVENUE: Police received word that a wild groundhog was charging at a group of people.
Officers could not find the groundhog.

COMPLAINT, RIDGEWOOD AVENUE: A group of children were playing football and, in the process, forcing traffic to stop when the ball went into the street multiple times.
A neighbor called the police, but the children stopped playing before officers could get there.
COMPLAINT, OLIVEWOOD AVENUE: After one apple too many, a woman called the police to report children throwing apples at her house May 5.
The children told the officer they were having an apple fight and a few of them may have gone over the fence.
DISTURBANCE, COHASSETT AVENUE: A man chased away a group of children who had been fighting in his front yard. He wanted officers to follow up on the matter.
When police arrived, the group had separated and no one was fighting.
COMPLAINT, HARLON AVENUE: Two children were shooting pigeons with BB guns May 4. Officers never found them.
COMPLAINT, HOPKINS AVENUE: Children were reportedly spraying passing vehicles with a hose May 4. As it happened, however, they were just spraying each other and a few cars got hit. Their mother took the hose away.



THEFT, GREAT NORTHERN: Workers at an accessories store inside Great Northern Mall told police May 4 a woman tried to steal $73 in merchandise. Among the items stolen were a scarf, a purse, several hair flowers and a zebra-striped glitter flask.

MAYFIELD

DISTURBANCE, EASTWOOD AVENUE: A boy, 16, was cited for unnecessary noise May 5 when he was playing a guitar too loud. Officers were unable to get the boy to answer the door due to the volume and had to contact the boy’s stepfather, who had to come home to let them in. This was the 12th time since 2008 somebody had complained about the boy and the volume level of his guitar.


 CHAGRIN

DRUG SWEEP, EAST WASHINGTON STREET: Working with three K-9 units from the Cuyahoga County Sheriff’s Department, village police checked more than 150 cars in the parking lot at Chagrin Falls High School shortly after 8:30 a.m. May 2, using the drug-sniffing dogs to detect the scent of any contraband. The dogs gave alerts on eight cars in the lot, although no drugs, alcohol or other evidence were found in those vehicles, an improvement from last year. Officials followed up with students whose cars were flagged, as well as those students’ parents.
DAMAGE TO PROPERTY, EAST WASHINGTON STREET: Later in the day after the sweep of the high school parking lot, at least two parents contacted police with complaints that the drug-sniffing dogs had scratched the finish of their children’s cars after they alerted on a potential scent. “The parents were advised that the cars in question were ‘hit’ on, out of 150-200 cars, by what may be the best drug dog the sheriff’s department has,” police said.

GENERAL ASSISTANCE, NOB HILL: After a woman called police May 5 to report that her mother took her credit card and would not give it back to her to use as she wants, police learned from the mother that the credit card in question actually belongs to her, and that she had given her daughter some funds the day before.

SUSPICIOUS, JACKSON: Police responded to a Jackson Street location upon report of a suspicious vehicle in the roadway at about 3:35 p.m. on March 30. Officers made contact with the occupant of the vehicle. The occupant was parked in the middle of the street looking at a sofa on the curb. They were advised to move on.

ELYRIA — Three men who identified themselves as priests were arrested after police said they found marijuana and weapons in one of the men’s home.

Lemroyal

At 5:15 p.m. Monday, police arrested and charged Anthony Williams, Jr., 38, for weapons under disability and an outstanding bench warrant and James Lemroyal, 48, for an outstanding bench warrant. James Utsey Jr., 28, was issued a citation for drug paraphernalia.
According to a police report, police were dispatched to apartments at 234 Brunswick Drive for several complaints from tenants of a marijuana smell in the building. Police said they found Williams, Lemroyal and Utsey in an apartment filled with a strong odor of marijuana.
Police said they found two ashtrays filled with ashes and marijuana roaches and a silver marijuana grinder in the apartment.

The three suspects refused to reveal their real names, only identifying themselves as priests.
Williams said his name was Priest Ish’ra’el, Lemroyal said he was Priest Lammalak and Utsey referred to himself as a Priest Ilataza. The men said it was against their religion to provide their real names and said the apartment belonged to the church.

Police also said they found three .40 caliber handguns, one Glock 22 and a .40 caliber semiautomatic handgun in the apartment. The men told police the handguns belonged to the church.
According to police, Williams has prior felony convictions for trafficking in drugs, domestic violence, felonious assault and weapons under disability. Williams and Lemroyal were taken to Lorain County Jail.

was I born to accomodate, I'm so good at playing dead

Universally, at every place I've worked, mostly in the world of customer service, the people who have always been the worst to deal with have almost always been women old enough to be my mother. And no, not all of you, there's a lot of you who are pretty awesome.

So I'm not sure why it is, if there's an assumption of privilege, of age in the sense that I'm young enough to be their kid and therefore can't be accepted as an adult of any kind, or just the kind of nastiness with which women with power treat others because they've read a lot of motivational books about getting what they want and getting ahead. The bosses who've given me the most trouble have been the women with an axe to grind, the suburban moms at the zoo were notorious for their nastiness, and the ones who want to get their masters' degrees so they can push paper and make life hard for everyone else

I've said it before, and I'll say it again, patriarchal society be damned, women have given me way more problems in life than men and have treated me far worse.

So today this lady comes up who doesn't get the special treatment she feels she deserves and seems to spout off her suburban credentials of children and pets nevermind that my compadre is married with children and people who are married with children trust me with their domains, children and pets. Obviously, we miscreants, not from the white-picket fence suburbs and not quite so tailored, are just being punkassed kids who are just being punkassed kids.

Having no luck with my homie, she turns to me and demands again claiming to be a nice person. Life experience has taught me that self-proclaimed nice people are usually anything but, and so I pretty much tell her that all I'm getting from her is not a lot of niceness and a lot of bullying. To which, on top of being too irresponsible for progeny, I've also got "issues" that she'd "love to help me deal with" but evidently I'm beyond help and so on and so forth.

Well. 

A few years ago, something like this might have made me cry, but years of taking verbal abuse from people with no recourse but to smile and say yes I understand while raging inside. At this point, my skin has thickened that I just kind of get mad, but it's impossible to feel hurt because it's obvious she's got way more issues than yours truly. Ironic that the worst people do deal with are the suburban women who want to become social workers and teachers yet have no empathy or understanding when they demand special privileges that could involve us landing in hot water. It doesn't surprise me any more, but it amazes me nonetheless.