I had forgotten it existed.  Completely.  Until last night, I probably hadn’t heard it for a decade-and-a-half.  But even though I hadn’t listened to it in ages, I found myself nodding my head and singing along to the chorus:

Hey Chel you know it’s kinda funny
Texas always seems so big
But you know you’re in the largest state in the Union
When you’re anchored down in Anchorage

In the singing along, I not only remembered “Anchorage,” I rediscovered it.  This is a song about old friends reconnecting and reflecting.  When I first heard this song in 1988, I was a thirteen-year-old dreaming of getting out and beyond (I didn’t know what that meant, exactly, but it meant something big) and an obsessive letter writer.  I think could imagine “Anchorage” as a correspondence I would be having one day, when I was all grown up.  Could it be I’m all grown up?  Well, weirdly, yes.

Rediscovering it, now, feels like a musical hug from the universe.

I took time out to write to my old friend
I walked across that burning bridge
I mailed my letter off to Dallas but her reply came from Anchorage, Alaska

She said, Hey girl it’s about time you wrote
It’s been over two years, my old friend
Take me back to the days of the foreign telegrams
And the all night rock and rolling
Hey Chel we was wild then

I’ve had so many moments of reconnection the past two years, thanks to the internets.  I’m no longer surprised when I get a Facebook invite out of the blue from someone I haven’t talked to in a decade.  Rather than feel surprised these days, I mostly just think it’s about time you wrote.

And there’s something reflective and shy in all of our reintroductions.  We’re almost always laughing at ourselves even as we’re seriously trying to make something of the words we send into each other’s orbits.

Leroy got a better job so we moved
Kevin lost a tooth, he’s started school
I’ve got a brand new eight month old baby girl
I sound like a housewife
Hey Chel, I think I’m a housewife

The bittersweetness of thinking about where we are and where we thought we would be.  (Or maybe where we thought everyone else thought we would be?)

Hey girl what’s it like to be in New York?
New York City, imagine that
…
Leroy says send a picture
Leroy says hello
Leroy says keep on rocking, girl
Keep on rocking

(Here I am, in New York City.  Did I know that would happen when I was thirteen?  Imagine that.)

I came home last night and played the song for E. I dreamed through the chorus, and I’ve been singing it all day.

Keep on rocking, friends.

I confess that I haven’t done a great deal of publication writing lately.  I’ve been awfully busy with client work. However, I’m always so pleased to be a part of a lot of very important feminist conversations!

On days when workers have the sense they’re making headway in their jobs, or when they receive support that helps them overcome obstacles, their emotions are most positive and their drive to succeed is at its peak. On days when they feel they are spinning their wheels or encountering roadblocks to meaningful accomplishment, their moods and motivation are lowest.

I find this a particularly insightful finding for both the non-profit sector and volunteer programming, where recognition and incentive are difficult to come by, anyway.  This kind of study reinforces the importance of creating highly functional non-profit organizations that allow people to get real and meaningful work done, as well as volunteer programs that actively manage volunteer expectations and give participants good tools.  Read the article here.

I’ll be taking this information to heart as I manage people and projects going forward.

Terribly Happy (Frygtelig lykkelig)

Fans of David Lynch, the Coen Brothers, Shirley Jackson stories, and noir-Westerns should definitely get out to see Terribly Happy, Denmark’s Oscar selection.  It’s all kinds of creepy, tense and funny – the kind of mystery that sparks a-ha(!) moments many hours and conversations after you’ve left the theatre.  The film has a lot to say about the suffocating conservatism/weirdness of small communities, who controls the power in them, and mental instability.  I need to see it again.  I want to see it again!  It’s terribly awesome. Also, if I ever got a cat, I would name it Mojn. [Looks like Terribly Happy is going to be remade in English - by the original director.  Let's hope this isn't another The Vanishing...]

Crazy Heart

Crazy Heart belongs to the category of indie films I call “Great Performances in Search of Good Films.”  Jeff Bridges gives a remarkable performance, one that makes the redemptive trajectory of the film almost seem meaningful and deserved.  There’s just not much movie here to help him out.  Maggie Gyllenhaal turns in a solid supporting performance, and nearly sells the romance central to the film, but the real surprise is Colin Farrell, who makes a surprisingly credible country singer.  Robert Duvall turns up, too, nearly stealing the show with his delightful few minutes on screen.  Oh, and I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that Crazy Heart makes the best use of a Waylon Jennings song I’ve seen yet in a film.  Waylon FTW!  (Heck, I guess I did like Crazy Heart all right.)

Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire

Precious is a good film.  It’s a powerful film.  It’s not an amazing film.  Without a doubt, the film was a tough job for its director, and Lee Daniels has done a commendable job of bringing the novel to screen and – most importantly – letting his actors act.  And the acting is truly marvelous – everyone turns in focused, strong, and engaging performances.  There’s been quite a backlash against Precious, and I think there’s an insightful and important dialogue to be had about the criticism of the film as exploitative and damaging.  Ishmael Reed’s recent NYT opt-ed makes a lot of compelling arguments about the film and its reception among white and black audiences.  I think so much of this kind of debate about Precious points to a much larger problem, though: there simply aren’t very many (positive) depictions of African American families on film – or any African American families, for that matter. We don’t see them, and when we do, they are overwhelmingly negative.  As a result, Precious ends up standing in for all films about African American families, and offers to many a pathological, destructive representation of that family life.  We need Precious to be just one of many films, and we need those films to provide many different representations of families. Instead, to Reed’s point, Precious (inadvertently, in my estimation) unfortunately ends up being a de facto representation of African American families that can serve to reinforce racist and classist ideas that many white people still have.  This is an important issue, and I don’t think we should shy away from talking about it.  I think the film is worth seeing, too, and not just to have this conversation, but also to appreciate the strength of its many merits.

And some super short takes from DVD land…

(500) Days of Summer: Joseph Gorden-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel are both excellent, and there’s a good bit to love about the first half of this film.  But by the time Gordon-Levitt’s character makes a phoneymoviebalony speech about the phoneyness of greeting cards and becomes a complete whiny jerk, the film has totally become 500 Days of Bummer.  Add to that some dumb voiceovers and an uneven tone, and you end with a perfectly meh film.  But it looks and sounds real pretty.

In the Loop: Saw this in the theatre several months ago, and have been looking forward to seeing it a second time on DVD.  It’s even better the second time around.  Razor sharp writing and directing, amazing acting, and Peter Capaldi slays. In the Loop will not improve your worldview, nor will it make you happy (it has serious serious serious bite) but it will make you laugh.

Extract: Welcome back, Mike Judge!  Extract is one very smart and low-key comedy full of great performances.  Judge has a particular knack for writing surprisingly complicated characters, and he brings his signature brand of loving satire back to Extract.  (Idiocracy was a total misfire, I think.)  Hooray for Kristen Wiig!  And, miracle of all miracles, Ben Affleck is simply great in this film (I find him loathesome across the board).  You know, I think that Mike Judge explores masculinity in some pretty interesting ways in his films and tv shows, and I think he deserves props for how intelligently he thinks about male characters.  Eat your heart out, Judd Apatow.

Angels & Demons: Well, of course I was going to see this film – it’s big budget genreschlock!  And just what do I have to say about it?  Well, it was better than The Da Vinci Code.  That’s something, right?