Videofront is in my heart. Videofront forever.

I’ve been doing a lot of cleaning lately, sorting through boxes of things that never had a place. I’ve hit a load of stuff from the college years. I can’t bring myself to get rid of my SIM lists. They’re crumpled and I’m sure the contact information is all out of date, but I dread the day I’m replaying a story in my mind and can’t remember a name.

SIM was my major in college. It was pronounced like that, not “ess-eye-em”. The Studio for Interrelated Media was an idea of the 1960s. SIM students were the freaks of art school. Think about that. Take the weirdest artsy kid from every high school in New England, put them all together, and imagine how weird the freaks would have to be.

Most students in art school major in being painters or sculptors. SIM was about majoring in being an artist. We could work in any medium we wanted, and experimenting with new media was encouraged. Majoring in SIM was majoring in being part of a creative community. Students were responsible for producing out Thursday afternoon salon, when the entire department met to show work.

The students were extremely close-knit. We had no choice but to collaborate. There was an annual all-department photo. We had our own graduation ceremony, separate from the all-school graduation, where we’d get gifts with the SIM logo on it and someone would read “Pedagogy”, a poem written by department’s founder.

We wanted to think that it was a meritocracy, and sometimes we were. We spent just as much time talking about the thoughts behind our work as we spent working on it. We had few deadlines and even fewer guidelines. Some people flourished in the freedom, others couldn’t find their way. I defined a role for myself and rarely strayed from it.

My first year, I watched the older students setting up the galleries for the semester show. I wasn’t brave enough to put in work. Jenny (blonde Jenny, who had the awesome dog. It is in my nature to irrationally assume you know who I mean.) was struggling to get the 2-D exhibit in order, and I offered to type title labels for her.

I thought of this a few years later when I was a senior working on The Big Show 3: The Squirrel Show and I collared a bunch of sophomores. “You! Can you set up chairs?”

It’s like I have this spiel recognized. I even made a brochure entitled “So What The Hell Is SIM?” and distributed it to the freshmen. It was cult-lite, a not-unpleasant situation where everyone supports the force that keeps them together.

I have some regrets about my college years. Leaving home shook me in ways I didn’t expect, and I developed a huge case of the insecures, which I managed by putting up waist-high, razor-sharp picket fences. You could get close, but not TOO close. I didn’t know how to deal with creative failure. I didn’t trust myself to do good work. I was harmfully competitive. I shouldn’t have graduated. I wasn’t ready.

The friends I see most regularly don’t know me as a SIM student. They may know that I went to art school and that I had a weird open major situation, but they don’t know the SIM reputation. I was part of something that defined a large part of who I am, and I can’t explain it to anyone who wasn’t there.

On some levels it upsets me that my life seems to happen in independent chunks, rarely intersecting. Nobody knows all of me. I wish I had the kind of friend who could remember me in third grade, in eighth grade, in preschool. Sometimes I think it would be easier to know who I am if I had people who could remind me who I’ve been.

As I was writing this, I realized I’d forgotten all the words to “Pedagogy”. I feel like I’ve forgotten the Pledge of Allegiance. It’s an apt metaphor. Being part of that kind of community is like being a citizens of a tiny island nation. You share a common language and a common history, but the time comes when you have to leave the island. You keep in touch with people and you keep some traditions, but no one in the outside world understands your native language. Then sometimes, when life is what it is, you miss the people from the old country.

Television Notes

The Dyson company has a new vacuum cleaner, and they have the engineer in the commercial as they did for the previous model. He says something about the new design solving a problem that had "always bothered" him. This statement changes my mental image of him from "adorable nerd who just happened to invent a new vacuum" to "oh my god, what poor person has to live with him?"

Extremely Important

You might say life-changing, or possibly epic.

After years of being convinced I couldn't wear bangs, I finally bit the bullet. It turns out that the cowlick has gone down quite a bit since I was 14, and it IS possible for me to have bangs without looking all potato-faced.


That's me, trying to rock the Birkin look with a smoky eye and pale lip. La Plump lip balm in coconut, if you're curious.

I've had the cut for about two weeks, and I'm still in love. It behaves with a little bit of styling in the morning (just a blow dryer on the bangs). I feel hipper, more interesting, and - inexplicably - thinner. Funny how a little change can make such a difference, but I find my step is a little springier and I'm craving salads. I want to make my house warmer and more like Bob and Emily Hartley's. (That may have more to do with my current Bob Newhart Show obsession than the bangs. R.I.P. Suzanne Pleshette.)

Essay 1: The Inevitable Juno Backlash

First, SPOILER ALERT. I'm going to talk about the whole movie and will hold back nothing.

Second, despite the forthcoming rant, I thought it was a great film. Although there were moments the teenagers seemed a bit too wisecracking beyond their years (A character born in 1991 says "Thundercats Go!"? Does not compute.), I was glad to see such believable characters. And I swoon over the music, but I'd like to go on record saying that I've liked Kimya Dawson for some time now and owned more than one of her CDs even before I saw the movie. So there. There's my indie cred intact.

But there's something sticking in my craw...

In many ways this movie is the anti-choice movement's version of what should happen when there's an unwanted pregnancy. A lower-middle-class white teenager and her also-white male friend have sex without totally thinking it through. Pregnancy ensues. She decides she can't go through with an abortion after talking to a pro-life protester. She finds a nice rich white infertile couple who want to adopt, and she even insists that it should be a closed adoption because she just wants to get on with her life. (I think there may have been the words "forget" and "move on" in the actual film, but I wasn't taking notes.)

The adoptive couple has problems due to the husband feeling that not everyone needs to be a parent, but he leaves and is never heard from again. The wife is portrayed as bitchy and controlling, but once her husband and his self-interested goals are out of the picture and she has her adopted baby, she's nice and happy.

Yes, so the teenage girl carries to term, insists she doesn't even want to see the baby, and surrenders the child following a healthy cry with her baby-daddy-now-boyfriend. Because she realized she loved him all along, it's totally okay that they did it. The movie closes on Juno and her boyfriend sitting on his front steps, strumming guitars and singing an upbeat love song completely devoid of sexual tension.

It's hard to write this without sounding anti-adoption, but I worry the movie comes of as a lament for the good old days, when girls who were knocked up just gave their babies away and never spoke of the experience. The film's writer, Diablo Cody, self-identifies as pro-choice and a radical feminist, but I expect that her story will be twisted and used as an example of what every woman should do, and not as work of fiction about a situation that worked out for a handful people.

Juno is doing really well at the box office, and statistics give that at least one of the women who sees it will find herself unexpectedly pregnant. She may make the very difficult decision to surrender her baby for adoption, and my heart breaks for the moment she wishes it was as easy as it is in the movies.

Jump start!

New Years Eve I felt a little under the weather, but made it to Rachel's party anyway. (Technically 2007, but it counts.) Noah and I felt like chumps for leaving before midnight, but we were both sleepwalking through a cold. We saw Dick Clark stumble through cue cards and watched 2008 arrive on my couch, with a coffee table full of Chinese take-out. Then we fell asleep. Rager!

While I was at the party, I asked Maitland on my first friend-date of the year. She accepted!

Two minutes into the new year, I was two down. 364 to go.

Start at the very beginning. A very good place to start.

Background: In 2005 I embarked on a project to do One Hundred Things Before I Fell in Love For Good. Long story short, I had an awesome time and didn't finish the list. The adage about life happening while you're busy making other plans is true. Life got busy and interesting, and I wanted to move in with the guy before I finished the list. So there's "happily ever after", but it's annoying to feel like there's something unfinished to your "happily ever after".

But even in the fairy tales, something had to happen after "happily ever after". Sitting around staring into each others eyes gets tired after a while. There are bills to pay and dragons to slay and Wednesday nights when everything on TV is a repeat. I'd like to think that princesses remained true to themselves, that Snow White went to Tuesday Night Trivia with the dwarves, Belle kept reading, and Cinderella campaigned for the rights of domestic workers.

Hundred Things was fun, and it's a new year and I want to have fun. I want to keep doing things. There's no penalty if I don't finish this list, and any prize I'm dangling in front of myself is one I determine later. Some of them are really easy, because I don't want to set myself up for angst. It's just for fun.

1. Acquire any of the following: glass eye, taxidermied animal, human teeth
2. Alter that fantastic dress I bought at The Garment District and keep saying I'll shorten into a mini-dress
3. Ask my dentist if she recommends Trident for her patients who chew gum
4. Assemble something
5. At least try to keep a spending journal
6. Attend at least one yoga class
7 - 18. Attend twelve parties
19. Babysit (for free)
20. Beat Super Mario 3 on the Wii (suggested by Robert), no warp zones
21. Bring a re-usable glass to work so I'll stop using paper cups
22. Bring my lunch to work at least once
23-32. Buy 10 CDs
33. Buy a fire extinguisher
34. Buy a pair of pants that aren't black, brown, grey, or blue
35. Buy ridiculously girly/fancy/pretty/possibly expensive undergarments (suggested by Jill)
36. Cancel (sorta) my MySpace and Facebook accounts
37. Challenge John Serpico to an Iron Chef-style cook-off
38. Change my car's air filter by myself (suggested by Paul)
39. Change my e-mail and phone passwords
40. Change my mind
41. Change the curtains in my living room
42. Clean out my car
43. Convince people it is my birthday when it isn't (suggested by Craig)
44. Cook a whole fish
45. Crawl under something low (suggested by Craig)
46. Dance on a table/bar
47. Deliberately leave something in a library book (inspired by Perich)
48. Devote $100 to trying to quit biting my nails
49 - 61.Devote an entire afternoon to Feng-Shui'ing my apartment
50. Do one thing each month that was suggested after the list was posted
62. Do shots
63. Do some piece of artwork involving saints
64. Do the Hokey-Pokey (and turn myself around)
65. Draw a picture of a monster
66. Drink champagne
67. Drink nothing but water for a week (suggested by Dana)
68. Eat a hamburger at every meal for a whole week
69. Eat a sno-cone / shaved ice
70. Eat a whole steamed or boiled crab
71. Eat an extremely expensive meal
72. Eat every flavor of Live Savers at least once
73. Eat every Jelly Belly flavor at least once (Original line, not Bott's Beans)
74. Eat french fries only once a month (report it on the blog when I do)
75. Eat nothing but raw fruits and vegetables for a day
76. Eat something on a stick that isn't usually on a stick
77. Eat Spam
78. Eat steak & eggs for breakfast
79 - 90.Every month, find someone that I would like to know better and ask them on a friend date.
91 -110.Finish the collages I promised people during 100 Things
111. Fire a gun
112. Fly a kite
113. Get a massage
114. Get lost
115. Get my eyes checked
116. Get my retirement accounts into order and make changes as needed
117. Give away / throw out / sell 200 things I don't need
118. Give coffee another try
119. Give Rachel R. a massage (suggested by Rachel)
120. Give someone a well-thought-out gift for no reason (suggested by Michelle)
121. Go camping
122. Go on a weekend trip alone (inspired by Jill)
123. Go out for Dim Sum
124. Go to a make-up artist and learn how to use under-eye concealer
125. Go to a museum
126. Go to a yelp.com meet-up
127. Go to bed before midnight every night for one whole week
128. Go to Cabot's with people who appreciate ice cream and eat sundaes
129. Go to Dali
130. Go to Ikea
131. Go to the Brimfield Antiques Fair
132. Go to White Castle
133. Go vegetarian for a week
134. Have a picnic
135. Have a vase of zinnias in my house
136. Have dinner in the home of someone whose first language isn't English
137. Have more in my savings account on 12/31/08 than I did on 1/1/08
138. Have my old home videos transferred to DVD
139. Have something custom-made for me
140. Have something happen that is so unusual/remarkable that people ask “Was that on your list?”
141. Help someone move (moving in with me doesn't count)
142. Hire a professional for something I wouldn't usually hire a professional to do
143. Host a pot-luck
144. Host a salon evening
145. Introduce someone to a new food
146. Jump over something big (suggested by Craig)
147. Lather, rinse, repeat.
148. Laugh so hard something comes out of my nose or I start choking
149. Learn the middle names of as many friends as possible
150. Learn the time step (Jill promised!)
151. Learn to play poker
152. Learn to say "thank you" in 25 languages
153. Listen to French CDs to brush up on my vocabulary
154. Literally stop and smell the roses (suggested by Anna)
155. Make (non-career-specific) business cards
156. Make a complete and total fool of myself
157-168.Make a mix CD for the first 10 people who request one
169. Make a new friend (female)
170. Make a new friend (male)
171. Make a public service announcement
172. Make a really stupid mistake
173. Make a soufflé
174. Make an artists book
175. Make and share a creative valentine
176. Make cookies for the guys in the mailroom at work
177. Make dinner for someone(s) I don't usually cook for
178. Make fudge
179. Make out in the rain
180. Make pickles
181. Make someone a birthday cake
182. Make taco dip
183. Make the most amazing sandwich I have ever made
184. Meet one of my neighbors (1-minute walk or less from my front door)
185. Memorize all the states in alphabetical order
186. Memorize the US Presidents in chronological order
187. Offer a friend a bottle marked "poison", but isn't really poison (suggested by Craig)
188. Organize some sort of taste-test
189. Own a plant, try not to kill it
190. Participate on sundayscribblings.blogspot.com
191. Perform one night of old-fashioned, no-gimmicks improv
192. Pet a goat (suggested by Noah)
193. Pick my own something (apples, strawberries, etc.)
194. Play hopscotch
195. Play skee-ball and redeem the tickets, no matter how crappy my prize is
196. Play tag
197. Post one of my short stories on the internet
198. Put on a puppet show (suggested by Noah)
199. Put together a care package for a homeless person
200. Put up new smoke detectors
201-210.Read 10 works of fiction
211-220.Read 10 works of non-fiction
221. Read Bird by Bird
222. Read something suggested by a bookstore employee
223. Read the Bill of Rights
224. Read the Constitution
225. Read the Declaration of Independence
226. Read The Prophet (suggested by Michelle)
227. Read They Can't Find Anything Wrong!: 7 Keys to Understanding, Treating, and Healing Stress Illness
228. Read Ulyssees (suggested by Marc)
229. Re-arrange someone's lawn ornaments (suggested by Kat) or leave ornaments on someone's lawn
230. Re-read Les Miserables
231. Re-read The Wizard of Oz
232. Respond to one Spam e-mail
233. Ride a roller coaster
234. Roast a duck
235. Roll dice (or die) in a grocery store. Have an informal gathering and provide only the refreshments that can be found in the aisle that corresponds to the number rolled
236. See a live dance performance
237. See a live production of a musical, if only for the cheese factor
238. See Amelie
239. See every station in the Boston T system (inspired by Craig
240-251.See twelve movies in the theater
252. See Uncle Monsterface live
253. Send a question in to an advice columnist (suggested by Craig)
254. Send something edible
255. Set up a blind date
256. Shoot pool (suggested by Noah)
257. Sing really loud to the ocean
258. Sleep on a friend's couch/spare room
259. Slow dance
260. Sneeze while standing on one foot
261. Soak at Urban Oasis
262. Spend one afternoon with a new watercolor block and my paints and not stop until the block is all used up, no matter how frustrated I get
263. Stick my bare feet out the window of a moving car
264. Stick my tongue out at an authority figure
265. Take 100 pictures
266. Take a 1-week vacation and write daily trip reports
267. Take a class or workshop
268. Take a really good picture of my cat
269. Take at least one luxury bath per week (luxury = fancy product)
270. Take my nephew to New York for his 10th birthday
271. Take my nephews/nieces (if they're in town) to an IB Family Show
272. Talk to my hairdresser about bangs
273-284.Teach someone how to do something each month
285. Throw a handful of spare change into an empty schoolyard (suggested by Paul)
286. Touch a rat
287. Trade something
288-292.Try 5 new forms of exercise
293. Try Absinthe
294. Try to eat something for every letter of the alphabet in one week
295. Turn 31
296. Tye-dye something
297-301.Visit 5 states (other than Massachusetts and New Hampshire)
302. Vote
303. Walk home from work one day
304. Watch the sun rise
305. Watch the sun set
306. Wear mis-matched socks for a day and see if anyone notices
307. Wear my hair in Princess Leia buns for a day (suggested by Anna)
308. Weigh less on 12/31/08 than I did on 1/1/08
309. Whiten my teeth
310-361.Write a weekly 100-300 word essay on the topic of my choosing
362. Write a fan letter/e-mail
363. Write a letter of complaint to a company
364. Write a letter of compliment to a company
365. Write a letter to a politician (suggested by Paul)
366. Write my name on something that doesn't belong to me