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Friday, May 30, 2003
Tired. Old. Fed up.
Each day brings more heat from the skies, more lies from our criminal government. There are no weapons of mass destruction, except those we used. The Iraqi museum wasn't looted nearly as much as reported. Jessica Lynch wasn't shot or stabbed, and appatrently never fired her gun at an enemy soldier. And the new tax cut will help stimulate the economy. Really, everything coming from the lips of our government officials is the equivalent of "Of course I'll respect you in the morning, and I promise not to come in your mouth." It's depressing. I want some truth, dammit.
The sun has started to blast here, and I swear it gets more difficult to deal with the heat every year. I think it's age settling in in a tangible way. That blows. Wasn't the gray hair and balding enough? Is gravity not a harsh enough mistress?
I feel bitchy, and you shouldn't have to hear that. Sorry. But I'm despairing right now, and it only looks to get worse, because the Democrats lined up for 2004 look like the biggest group of pussies they could find, and no one seems to want to make a stand about anything. And I'm still too young to run.
Marc@MarcMason.com
9:47 PM
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Friday, May 23, 2003
May 23, 2003
My mother thinks I’m a worrier for some reason.
Now, I have no idea why this is so. I keep my worrying on a pretty low-key scale, saving it mostly for when Rebecca is not feeling well, mainly because it’s sometimes hard to tell what is sickness and what is her need to be babied when she doesn’t feel well. So when my Mom went in Wednesday morning and had her chest cracked open and her pacemaker implanted, I wasn’t worried.
When no one had bothered to reach me more than 90 minutes after her surgery was supposed to be over, I wasn’t worried. I was pissed, but not worried. That’s just who I am: the soul of calm and placidity in the face of most things.
After finally hearing that her surgery went well and that she was resting comfortably, I wasn’t worried then either.
Really, most things in life that are out of your control are things you shouldn’t worry about. If Mom had decided to give it up while on the operating table, what was there that I could have done? Not a damned thing. Of course that would have been beyond horrible, but as far as worrying about it, that just wasn’t going to happen.
That isn’t to say that I’m without hypocrisy on this subject (see the stuff about Rebecca above), but I’ve spent a great deal of therapeutic time in letting go of the things I cannot change. So I am holding out hope that she’ll stop worrying a bit. She’s afraid to worry me, and I understand that on a basic level, but eventually, I have to be the one who gets the serious details about the bad shit instead of getting it filtered through Rebecca. I’m a grown up now, almost 33 years old. Serious. Responsible. And I’m trying very hard not to worry about that.
Marc@MarcMason.com
10:15 PM
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Friday, May 16, 2003
Dear God.
I wish I had something to say this week, or the time to say it, but I have neither. I'm currently working on another writing project that is requiring a great deal of energy, and that's mainly because I have an enormous level of enthusiasm for it. So I'm just popping by this week to thank the number of people who wrote and expressed their appreciation of last week's piece on the closing of Ed Debevic's. Thanks, everyone!
See you all next week!
10:56 PM
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Friday, May 09, 2003
Goodbye, Ed.
Tonight was a night full of rich nostalgia for me. In Thursday morning’s newspaper, there was a front page, below-the-fold article that announced the closing of one of my all-time favorite restaurants here in the city. “Ed Debevics” has been an institution here in the Valley Of The Sun far longer than I have, and even though there are many who have loved it more than me, I felt like I had join them in marking its passing from our landscape.
The story in the paper noted that Sunday would be its last day, so Bec and I decided to take a crack at getting down there tonight, knowing that the lines of sad diners were only going to get longer. Thank God we did. Tonight’s wait was 90 minutes when we got there, and people only continued to pour in from the parking lot. Now, Ed’s always had a decent wait, but this was ridiculous. On the other hand, there was no way in Hell that we weren’t going to stick around and say goodbye. Besides, waiting at Ed’s was always worth it.
ED’s was a 50s style diner with real style, unlike the wretched “5 and Diner” chain, a place where the help was always dancing on the countertops and was marvelously rude to the customers. Service wasn’t quite as big of a deal way back when, and so Ed’s made it perfectly acceptable to have a waitress plop down in your booth, chomp her gum, insult you, then steal a French fry. In other words: it was Heaven.
I remember the first time I went there, around fifteen years ago. My friend Chad has just finished playing a hockey game, and, not knowing we were going out to dinner afterward, he didn’t have a shirt to wear except the t-shirt he had worn under his pads. So Chad reeked and he reeked badly. Well, I had no idea what this place was about and was just along for the ride until our waitress came to the table and plopped down in our booth. She made some idle chit-chat, then suddenly began sniffling, finally sniffing louder until her nose alit on poor Chad. The girl recoiled in horror, drew back and said: “Damn, you stink!”
I knew right then and there that any place that allowed their employees to be that honest was a place I’d return to often.
Years later I took Rebecca in, and our waitress was talking with us when she suddenly ogled Bec’s lovely pair of 38s. “Wow,” our server said, “Nice rack!” I thought Rebecca was going to keel over in shock. It was that kind of place. It was always, always fun.
The article in the paper said that the few restaurants in the nationwide chain were being hurt by the proliferation of trendy hotspots that specialized in sushi and such. To that, I can only shake my head and wonder. How can we have, once again, let modern living wipe out something unique and full of joy and replace it with something dull and spare? Did we really need another excuse for abstract art and crystal fountains. Is there really no room for a place with color, life and cool signs like “You’re Leaving Ed’s And Going Back To Grim Reality” at the exit?
Over the years, I danced with the help to the sounds of “Car Wash”, “Shout”, and probably a song or two by Prince, sadly enough. But tonight, my heart tinged with sadness, I danced only in my seat, singing along to the classic songs being blared by the DJ, and tapping my toe along to the beats. And as we sat there while the building prepared to close for the night and head into its final two days, that DJ stopped the dance music and put on John Lennon’s “Imagine”, and that is exactly what I did. I imagined all the friends gone and forgotten who I had spent my time with there in that building, and I did a quiet dance for them all. For that moment, at least, I was able to ignore the grim reality.
11:34 PM
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Thursday, May 01, 2003
Well, I'm heading upstate to help my friend Brian give away some comic books, and will be gone for the whole weekend, so there's no new HN this week. Thanks for understanding, gang.
Oh, and speaking of comic books: I saw a screening of X-Men 2 tonight, and I can say without question that it is the best comic book film ever to reach film. Truly, a film that I've wanted to see since 1981, you know?
11:10 PM
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