In a not unusual occurrence these days, I reported a story (this one was for the Dallas Morning News) but ever-shrinking space in newspapers meant it never saw ink. Which is particularly ironic in regards to the back story on doing that story, which involved a weekend getaway with friends and my car broken down on a country road.

I went to see, Jen Yates, who writes the ever-brilliant Cake Wrecks blog. She was in town promoting her new book, which you should buy. It includes some old favorites but also lots of never-before-seen wrecks. Buy it through this website and I make a few pennies on the sale. Nothin' wrong with that. I don't shill what I don't genuinely love and I genuinely love the blog and the book.

So anyway, since I went to the book signing and wrote the story that never ran, I decided to air it here, along with an e-mail interview I did with Jen.

A Cake Wrecks book is icing on Jen Yates' cake

Nobody is more surprised than Jen Yates by the success of her Cake Wrecks blog.

It all started when her husband John signed them both up for a cake decorating class as Christmas present. “He thought it was one night, but it was 16 weeks,” said Yates, speaking before a standing room-crowd at Legacy Books in Plano on Saturday. “Sixteen weeks of togetherness,” she added with a grin.

In May 2008, a friend e-mailed Yates, who lives in Orlando, Fla., the first Cake Wreck photo (“…Under Neat that….”) A few hours later, Yates launched the blog she thought would entertain just family and friends. By July, she had hundreds of visitors daily. Within months, book publishers were contacting her. She turned them down. “I said, ‘You guys are really desperate.’”

Finally, though, she agreed. Now Cake Wrecks (Andrews McMeel Publishing, $12.99) is in book stores and the blog gets about 75,000 views and 50 submissions daily. Although, Yates says, “not all of them are carrot-jockey quality.” And that made her fans laugh.

Cake Wrecks fans know their Wrecks and most have a favorite.

“The Darth Vader baby shower cake,” said Rachael Hilst of Carrolton, who purchased two books for Yates to sign—one to keep and one for a friend.

“I like the misspellings,” said Jessa Waterman of Frisco, who wore a Cake Wrecks “I want sprinkles,” T-shirt.

Stephanie Ellis of Denton is partial to “mini hot dog riding a poo wave" because it was her submission, photographed at her local Kroger. That was a good week, she said. First her Wreck was accepted, then her boyfriend Kyle Bradbury—also at the event—proposed.

Though technical difficulties at Legacy killed her slide show, Yates wasn’t rattled. “I’m here, you’re here, there’s cake here, so we’ve got a party,” she said, and instead took questions from the crowd, proving to be as funny in person as on her blog.

She cited photo cakes as a trend on the wane. “I think people realized it’s a little odd eating someone’s face.” She reported that, “Some bakeries have told me they flat-out refuse to make cupcake cakes now.” She said she sometimes hears from moms who confess that they’re disappointed when their child’s birthday cake comes out perfect. And advising the betrothed couple on avoiding a wedding cake wreck, she said they should have it delivered early and, “Don’t have your Aunt Nancy give it a whirl.”

Before people lined up for autographs and some chocolate cake supplied by Bronwen Weber at Frosted Art Bakery, it was time for the cupcake contest—miniature “Wreckplicas” on cupcakes. From about 15 entries, Yates selected three finalists. The winner, chosen by audience applause, was “Push, Olivia Push,” the site’s first censored cake, complete with little fondant censorship bars. All finalists received carrot-jockey necklaces and the winner, professional baker Nicole Honsaker of Keller, also went home with a Cake Wrecks apron.

...

....OK, here's where things tail off in this story, 'cause it then went on to talk about Jen's husband falling horribly ill and being hospitalized in Dallas. It was pretty scary at first and they were stuck here while he got back on his feet. But all is well now and they were able to reschedule tour dates they'd canceled.

E-interview with Jen Yates

You’re hilarious--do you write all your own material?

Aw, thanks! Yep, everything with my name on it is all me. (I occasionally have my husband John or my sister-in-law Anne Marie guest post.)

Do you have an all-time favorite Wreck, and/or a favorite Wreck theme?

There are too many fabulous Wrecks to have just one favorite, but I especially love the misunderstandings (like the flash drive cake) and the Beyond Bizarre category. Trying to understand just why someone would put little plastic babies on icing carrots can hurt your brain, but it's also guaranteed to tickle your funny bone.

Do you think you're seen everything a Wreck can be or are you still sometimes surprised?

Every time I think I've seen the creepiest, ugliest, or most ridiculous cake imaginable, I get one even worse - or better, depending on your perspective. So yes, I still get surprised! That's part of the fun of writing Cake Wrecks; I never know what to expect in the inbox each morning.

Do you ever hear from the bakers whose Wrecks are featured?

Not very often, no. We've had a handful of bakers ask us to remove something they made - which we always do - but of those only two or three were particularly nasty about it. Most bakers seem to have a sense of humor about Cake Wrecks, and these days we actually get quite a few of them submitting their own cakes!

A friend (and passionate Cake Wrecks fan) wonders if your hostility towards cupcake cakes is due to some childhood birthday party trauma.

Hah! Well, if so then I've managed to repress it pretty well. ;) Besides, cupcake cakes are a relatively new creation, aren't they? Before I started Cake Wrecks I'd never even heard of them. No, my disdain for CCCs is easily explained: they're ugly, messy, and, you know, pure evil. Obviously.

(BTW, the same friend suggests that your next book should be Make Wrecks, a cookbook showing step-by-step instructions for reproducing the “more terrifying” cakes in your collection. )

Whoah there, I'm not so sure we should be encouraging the Wreckerators! Heh. Although, a lot of readers do recreate their favorite Wrecks, and send me the pictures. You can't ask for sweeter fan mail than that!

Labels: blogging, blogs, cake wrecks, dallas, jen yates, legacy books, naked mohawk baby carrot-jockeys, plano

I’ve never been to Mardi Gras in New Orleans and it sounds like hell to me. Crowds of drunken people who have thrown off inhibitions is not my idea of a good time, to understate the case.

But I went to my very first Mardi Gras parade on Sunday and it suffered the opposite problem. It was “family friendly.” And you know that can’t be good for Mardi Gras.

I’m guessing that family-friendly distinction is why, although much of Oak Cliff is considered the gayborhood, flamboyance was in very short supply. So was music. Not so much as a high school marching band. The Libertarian float had a pounding disco beat, but it came and went so fast. There was no dancing in the streets of Oak Cliff for this.

With all due respect to the monumental volunteer effort required for any community event, this parade bore no resemblance to the festive debauchery that is synonymous with Mardi Gras. It barely resembled a parade. The highlight for me was a float from a local sports bar, Alley Oops, which managed to misspell its name on its sign. How does such a thing happen?

I watched the parade with friends and we all did our very best to have fun, helped by high-octane margaritas. Here, along with some casual tipsy commentary, is a condensed two-and-a-half dull minutes of what actually took about 30 dull minutes to unfold. But for some reason, the very dullness of the whole thing makes me laugh. Maybe you had to be there, but the beaded cop just about does me in. And the Segways. God help us, the Segways...

What do we learn from this? Perhaps that, like Las Vegas, Mardi Gras is not meant to be family friendly.

Labels: dallas, mardi gras, video

Tom and I spent last night at the Hotel Palomar, here in Dallas, for a story. On the desk, along with a note pad, the hotel directory, and some snacks, was this poor fishy, trapped in a tiny vase--bored, restless, pleading for freedom with his little fish eyes. Sometimes he would look at the wall, sometimes he would look at the bed, sometimes he would float to the top of the water and with his little fish lips, silently beg for mercy.

We went to sleep, there he was. We woke up, there he was. Nothing to do, nowhere to go. We found it horribly depressing. We should have brought him home, bought him a decent-size tank and some friends.

Poor little fishy.

Labels: dallas, hotels, texas, travel, video

Labels: dallas, elections

Oh yeah--tomorrow night, I'll be at the AllGood Cafe to see a screening of Cotton Candy, a 1978 Ron Howard film about a battle of the bands that was filmed in Dallas. The bad guys band features my longtime buddy Mark Ridlen a k a DJMrRid and one of my first roommates in Dallas, John Painter. (Boy, did that living situation end badly...I try not to think about it.) I've never seen the movie but I've heard about it for years and tomorrow night should be a hoot and a holler.

That's John in the bottom photo, far right, and Mark next to him. That's a heapin' helpin' o hair you got there, Mark.



Read more about the movie here.

Labels: dallas, movies, pop culture

So, this cycling site linked to my feet slideshow and evidently, according to one commenter, I have "Morton's Toe." The things you learn online...I had no idea. I wonder if Morton is getting around OK without it.

I have an op-ed in today's paper. I have received two reader emails so far. One is a very nice note from a fellow who, it turns out, lives right down the street and designs needlepoints. The other is a racist rant from a fellow named Vance who fled my neighborhood in 1970 and sternly advises me to do the same. Yuck. One hates to admit people like him actually exist. Yuck, yuck, yuck.

I have lots of things to discuss here as soon as I have time ... but I have a busy day ahead and now must dash.

Labels: dallas, news

I'm in kind of a shitty mood this weekend for no reason I can pinpoint. Even an evening of Fred and Ginger movies last night didn't help dissipate my funk.

Then I read this story in my paper today, about a guy who is being told he can't park his new truck in his own driveway, and it just makes me want to go to Frisco and kick some suburban idiot ass. It makes me want to park my crappy old Honda on the streets of this gated community and leave it there. Or better yet, Tom's tired old Ford F-150, just to make the point. I suppose if you choose to live in a gated community with a homeowners association you are agreeing to abide by the rules ... but that doesn't make people suck any less.

Speaking of you are what you drive, I did enjoy Terry Box's column today, about driving a muscle car.

More buyouts coming at the Dallas Morning News. Wednesday is the deadline for decisions. Then the layoffs start again. Woe is us.

Labels: dallas, news, newspapers

Black and Blue is nominated for best cover/tribute band in the Dallas Observer Music Awards. Click here for a ballot.

I missed their gig at the Cavern last night but evidently, they rocked the jernt. Their ya-yas are definitely out.

Labels: black and blue, dallas, music, rolling stones

Sexually active male students in pink panties

And now, birthday weekend festivities begin. Next time you see me, I will have entered a new decade. Unless you see me tonight at the AllGood Cafe, for Black and Blue. Right, JWoiten?

Labels: blogging, blogs, dallas, google, google searches, music, nightlife cross dressers in saris

I'll take Scarlett Johansson's body, please.

Labels: dallas, news

My friends Chuck and Susan in fine disco form


According to the public radio show Marketplace (spinning off a Forbes Magazine article), while gay businesses in general are booming, gay bars are facing extinction. (Story here.)

This is a good thing because it means we find it less necessary to segregate ourselves according to sexual orientation. One person interviewed suggested—and he may be quite right—that the trend applies more to the coasts than to the rest of the nation, where the risks of hitting on the wrong same sex person may be a lot riskier. Hit on the wrong person in New York City and you’ll probably get a “no thanks,” or maybe a night of experimentation by someone who will claim to have been too drunk to remember the next day. Hit on the wrong person someplace like Wyoming and you may be beaten, tied to a fence and left to die. (You know what I mean.)

But I digress … my intent is to reminisce about gay bars in the 1970s, when I was a card-carrying, Halston perfume-wearing fag hag in four-inch heels and Qiana.

The disco movement may have been popularized by the breeders of Saturday Night Fever (a movie I adore), but it was launched by gay men. The first time I danced until dawn was at a disco called Galaxy 21, on 23rd St., near the Chelsea Hotel, which (like the rest of New York City) was a whole lot seedier then. Nancy Spungen had not yet died there; it was still the kind of place where that kind of thing happened.

I was in 11th grade. Galaxy 21 had three stories and that was the first time I’d ever heard Donna Summer faking an orgasm in “Love to Love You Baby.” After a night of dancing and drinking vodka tonics, I went with friends to breakfast at the Cosmos Coffee Shop, on 58th St. Then I dragged my friend Susan home with me to face my parents. We we were met by the stone-angry face of my father waiting for us at the kitchen table. Yikes. Yeah, I was in all kinds of trouble.

But a fag hag was born.

Our casual weeknight hangout was The Barefoot Boy, a dark, woody (no pun intended), cozy neighborhood bar in the East 30s where I learned to do the Hustle. This place was popular with older men looking for younger—chicken hawks, we called them. It’s also where I tried poppers (amyl nitrate) the first time. Yuck. Never liked it but people dancing by sometimes just stuck under the noses of other dancers for a snort.

Sometimes friends and I went to Ice Palace on 57th Street for their Sunday afternoon tea dances. I saw Ethel Merman sitting at the bar there once, surrounded by fluttery young men. That was when she had a disco album. Ice Palace had a “no open-toed shoes” policy which was designed to discourage women. We went anyway, in closed-toe shoes.

When Xenon opened, that became the hangout for my me and my friends. That wasn’t so much a gay bar as full-out glitzy disco—kind of the poor man’s Studio 54, where I went just once. I saw Robin Williams there. He gave my red pumps and vintage robin’s egg blue silk capri pants a good once over, then looked disappointed when he saw the rest of me.

Xenon was great over-the-top fun, with lots of smoke and flashing lights, a giant neon pinball machine, a spaceship that lowered from the ceiling…

Disco Sally, world’s oldest fag hag, a tiny little lady who I believe was an attorney, was often there, surrounded by an adoring gay entourage. I saw Eartha Kitt there once, dancing with a boa constrictor that was a regular (yes, the snake was regular); and Sylvester Stallone, who was surprisingly short; and Truman Capote, hat and all. And there was a guy, I forget what we called him, who spent every night doing interpretive dance alone.

When I moved to Dallas in the 1980s, my gay bar hangout was the Crews Inn on Fitzhugh, where my friend Stan (RIP) and I would get absolutely blotto on wicked strong happy hour drinks Friday nights. Yikes, I can still remember how quickly those hit, and I remember reeling out of there.

I went to the Village Station only once, as I recall. Same with the Roundup. I was new to Texas at that time and seeing people two-step was interesting in itself. Seeing guys two-step together was like entering a parallel universe. I recall feeling that women were not welcome at the Roundup.

I went to JRs once or twice, too, but by that time I was losing interest in bars in general and gay bars in particular because it was beginning to sink in for me that gay boys weren’t just looking for the right woman.

One of the attractions of gay bars for me at the time was that I could go and have fun and never get hit on, which I actually liked. Plus, I always had someone to dance with. (Old joke: Why did God make gay men? So fat chicks would have someone to dance with.) And gay men told me often how FABULOUS I was, especially when I wore Qiana and Halston perfume, which actually was a gift from a gay boy I knew in high school. I slept with this gay boy at one point--I suspect I was a last ditch effort for him. It wasn’t much fun for either of us…

If gay bars go the way of record stores, it will definitely be the end of an era. Not a bad thing. But they were great fun for me, back in the day.

Labels: 1970s, dallas, disco, memoir, new york city, nightlife

Dallas is accepting nominations for a new name for Industrial Boulevard. The DMN says:

There are Postal Service restrictions. Names can't be more than 14 characters, so "Down By The River I Shot My Baby Boulevard" is out. Apostrophes aren't permitted, so "What's That Smell Street" won't work. And it can't closely resemble an existing street name. "Turtle Creek Boulevard" is taken.

Want to nominate a name? Click here.

That’s the good writing du jour, IMO. Another fine line comes from Joyce Saenz Harris’ Taste section story about a book/cooking club whose motto, she says, “…might well be a chicken in every plot.” Cute. Too bad the paragraph started with the dreaded “Welcome to…”

In other election news, Oklahoma is accepting nominations for an official rock song. It already has an official state song (“”Oklahoma"), C&W song (“Faded Love”--not my guilty pleasure "You're The Reason God Made Oklahoma"), folk song (“Oklahoma Hills”) and waltz (“Oklahoma Wind.”)

Goodness gracious, who knew Oklahoma was so melodic?

Want to nominate an Oklahoma rocker? Click here.

So, Hillary pulled it out again. You want my theory about why Obama isn’t campaigning negative? He doesn’t have to because his supporters (I call them IOS---Insufferable Obama Supporters) do it for him. I hear many more Obama supporters going on about Hillary’s (and Bill’s) horns and tail than about Obama’s accomplishments. It's perfect--Obama can keep his halo and Hillary still gets smeared.

I would vote for Obama over McCain. No question. I like the guy--what I know of him. It’s his fan base for which I’ve developed a healthy loathing.

Labels: barak obama, dallas, dallas morning news, elections, hillary clinton, music, presidential election, writing

Here’s a WSJ interview with Jennifer Weiner about her book Certain Girls, in which she addresses Jane Smiley’s review, which I linked to earlier this week.

Weiner says, in part: “What shocked me was that she said I have to stop writing about nice Jewish characters. [In her review, Ms. Smiley wrote that Ms. Weiner "seems boxed in by her chosen genre" and should "address larger questions than the psychological ups and downs of her nice Jewish characters."]

I couldn't believe that made it past the copy desk. The idea you can tell a writer of a specific religion to stop writing about that religion is presumptuous. When an older writer tries to tell a younger writer through a review what kind of career she should be pursuing, it tends to speak to the reviewer's anxieties rather than the book itself…”

I didn’t interpret Smiley’s review as dissing anyone’s religion as much as suggesting Weiner look farther afield for her characters. Big difference. On the other hand, Smiley has written about horses and academia, which is the stuff of her life, so she should talk.

Speaking of chick stuff, Mary and I rented Private Benjamin last night and I am pleased and relieved to report that it held up. Sure, the fashions are 1980s as is some of the humor, but it’s still clever and thoughtful and fun. The cast includes Goldie Hawn, a few minutes of Albert Brooks, Eileen Brennan, Mary Kay Place, Armand Assante, Sam Wanamaker, Harry Dean Stanton…not too shabby. I love it.

More girltalk: A very kind blog reader sent me a link and asked my opinion of this article from The Atlantic, titled Marry Him!--the Case for Mr. Good Enough. It is an interesting argument for women to stop being so picky about their men and "settle" for someone who might be too short or too bald or too something or not something enough. I wasn't sure what to think of it--I had a knee-jerk negative reaction--and hemmed and hawed, but the woman who sent it managed to sum it up in one very neat sentence: I think what she says is to settle, I say is maturity. Yes, yes. Of course. That's exactly what I meant to say.

Deelish for Dallasites: The city elders plan to rename Industrial Boulevard to reflect the glamorous (very distant) future they plan for it. For you outtatowners, Industrial Boulevard is pretty much what it sounds like—a gritty stretch of auto businesses, titty bars, the county jail, bail bondsmen and, as happens to any area that abuts a dry district (that is, areas with no alcohol sales), a whole lot of liquor stores. (Read about it here.)

Among the names being floated:
Big D Boulevard (gak)
Dallas Delta (makes it sound romantic, don’t it?)
Kirk Parkway (presumably after former Mayor Ron Kirk)
Rio Vista (and what a vista the Trinity River offers!)
Stanley Marcus Boulevard (I’d rather see them name the planned Calatrava Bridge for him)
The Promenade (how grand!)

I say call it Beer Run Boulevard.

Speaking of Eileen Brennan, Tom and I watched most of the movie FM the other night. It was mildly entertaining--the hairdos alone gave us something to talk about--but we wondered which came first, FM or WKRP in Cincinatti? Anyone?

Finally, because my workout DVD shelf runneth over, and because reviewing DVDs helps keep me fit, I have decided to launch a second blog dedicated to reviews, called Suit Up and Show Up. I’ve posted a few old reviews and one new one up already and will keep up as best I can. Please check in from time to time if you’re interested, I’ve added it to my blogroll to the right.

Labels: books, dallas, exercise, fitness, fitness dvds, movies, news, writing

Not just the Bush library. W himself is moving to Dallas after he leaves office.

Labels: bush, dallas, news, president

The front page of today’s Dallas Morning News includes articles about new trails and a nature center along the Trinity River; about the raid on a polygamist ranch in West Texas; about the problems with privatization of Texas’ social services; about a debate over nets people who live on golf courses are erecting to catch errant balls before they do damage and, oh yes, a small wire story about Iraq.
So I’m wondering if the newspaper front page is even relevant anymore. Except for that wee international story and two state stories, how does this front page differ from the Metro section?

Newspapers are so confused these day.

The Metro section front page leads with the story I care about most—four teenagers were arrested as suspects in last month’s 26 car fires in Oak Cliff. Why is that not on the front page rather than the golf balls story? If people decide to live on golf courses, aren’t flying balls, um, par for the course? (Evidently, improvements in golf equipment allow bad golfers to hit balls farther and so the problem is growing. Poor, poor people on golf courses.)

I’m not sure why I’m expected to care so much about this that the story needs to be on the front page of my morning paper. Some people might suggest that it’s because the golf balls problem is in (wealthy) Plano whereas the car fires are in (depressed) Oak Cliff. That’s what some people might suggest. After all, aren’t crime and burning cars par for the course in Oak Cliff? Some people might think so.

Perhaps newspaper redesigns should be less about typeface than how the news is categorized. Perhaps we should have good news/bad news sections. Or rich man/poor man news. And sports, of course—although then we’d have to decide where today’s story about selling top-tier season tickets for the new Cowboys stadium should go. Is this sports or rich man news, since these seat licenses range between $16,000 and $150,000, with an additional $340 per ticket per game. (Woe is me, what is the world coming to?) It’s in the business section today, along with a story about how it’s getting harder to get loans for college. Interesting story and it's in the business sevtion …why?

Maybe we don’t even need to divide the newspaper into sections anymore, although that would make it hard to share in the morning.

An unrelated note: Writing in the New York Times, Nicholas Kristof cites evidence supporting my theory that sexism is more entrenched than racism.

Labels: dallas, dallas morning news, news, newspapers, racism, sexism

Black and Blue rocked the AllGood Café. Rocked it right.

Mike Snyder, who owns the AllGood, was tired and grumpy when Black and Blue arrived and told them to go on by 9 and get it over with so he could get the hell outta there. Nobody expected much of the evening.

We were all surprised by the full house. Black and Blue started cautiously but over the course of a two-hour set hit its groove. By Satisfaction, DJ Mr. Rid was dancing, cute girls were dancing, L7 couples from Addison were dancing (yes! that’s the target market!), white-man overbites were occurring, a stray drunken (or something) queen in mirror shades and stylish denim and black was dancing and annoying people. Black and Blue planned to cut their set down in deference to Mike’s exhaustion but ended up playing everything they had with one repeat (Rocks Off) before leaving the stage.

It's the Rolling Stones. What's not to like? No costumes, just the rock.

Mike was a lot less grumpy by the end—one might even say giddy. The band made a few hundred dollars off the door alone, with a $5 cover. (And Mike made his money in drinks, of course.)

Much smiling occurred at the end of the evening.

We all were, dare I say it?, satisfied. (Yikes. That’s really beneath me.)

Labels: dallas, music, nightlife, rolling stones

Tom's Rolling Stones tribute band, Black and Blue, makes its debut this Saturday night at the AllGood Cafe in Deep Ellum, during the Deep Ellum Arts Festival. I'll be there, will you?

Labels: dallas, fun shit, music, nightlife, rolling stones

Did we really need the Dallas Morning News to explain this to us?

The newspaper has been redesigned for our convenience. It is now narrower. Oh yeah, they saved a little money but honest, that is secondary to our comfort. What a relief! I had a terrible time hanging on to that big old newspaper. I practically strained things. Now, reading the newspaper is a snap!

Trouble for me is that narrower pages means narrower columns means shorter stories. I'm getting assignments for 250 and 500 word travel stories. Kill all the adjectives!

Labels: dallas, dallas morning news, newspapers, viral marketing

I’ve been beating the age horse to death but today's Dallas Morning News has an essay about the “Longevity Revolution” so one last little burst of griping. Ageism factors into Moos’ discussion. Always nice to know I’m on-trend in my kvetches. Click on the little graphic about life expectancy throughout the ages. In ancient Greece, life expectancy was 22 years. Man, they sure managed to accomplish a lot of art in a short time.

Anyhow, Moos writes: Six in 10 boomers in their 50s have told pollsters that they would like to switch careers someday and find jobs with a higher, social purpose. Many have set their sights on education, health care, the ministry and social services.

I was trying to switch careers to social work when I went back to school in 1999. Too bad I set my sights on a field that requires a post-graduate education because after I finished my BA, I realized I didn’t have the dough for grad school and when it comes to scholarship money at my age and station, pickings are very slim.

The last scholarship I applied for, the Jack Kent Cooke, required me to disclose not only all my assets, including retirement savings, but also to submit financial data from my parents. Nuts, right? I don’t know what to think about having to hit up dad for his data but the idea is, according to my adviser at UTD, my alma mater, which had to nominate me, if you’re not willing to drain your assets in pursuit of education, you don’t want it enough. Yeah, that’s fine when you’re 22. When you’re 50, it would only prove that you’re too stupid to educate.

In the end, after I’d filled out an extensive application—including six essays and all this financial data (and no, my father was not thrilled about supplying it), my adviser decided not to nominate me. I don’t know why, he didn’t say in his bland one paragraph notification though he hinted it was money. As in, I wasn't poor enough. But it was a blow. There just aren’t many opportunities out there for the likes of me. The JKC Foundation mission is “lifelong learning.” Yeah, my ass.

I might have had enough of chasing this particular dream. Remember when I posted this article about closing doors? It might be time for me to close this door and get on with my writing career, such as it is. I just don’t know how it’s going to support me into old age. AARP has scholarships for women and was overwhelmed with applications in 2007. Maybe I’ll try that next year. Maybe. Or maybe not.

Speaking of age...

Arbella Perkins Ewings, world’s third-oldest woman, whom I quoted a week or so ago, passed away nine days after her 114th birthday. Way to hang on for the ink, Ms. Ewings. And R.I.P.

Unrelated crime report: Somebody is setting cars afire in the Cliff. Yikes.

Labels: age, dallas, education, midlife, personal growth

Well, now that Mary has declared me funny in print, I will be contrary and write a morose blog instead. If you’re here for the first time looking for funny, then please come back tomorrow or go back to yesterday. There’s nothing for you here.

The topic du jour is suicide.

In the darkest days of my adolescence, I often indulged in the comfort of what the pros call “suicide ideation”—I thought about killing myself. On a pretty regular basis. It seemed like a pretty simple solution to all of it. Maybe I was a miserable teenage girl, maybe I was just a teenage girl. Dunno.

A couple of things people said kept me hanging on.

When I was about 13, Julie, a slightly older and equally melancholy friend, said that she thought the idea of “attempting” suicide was bullshit. “If you want to kill yourself, you don’t fail,” she said. We were on the hot back seat of the 104 bus, rumbling down Broadway. She stared straight ahead into her bleak future as she said it, and I knew she was right. I lived in a 12th floor apartment. If I really wanted to die, nothing stood in my way. Her words embarrassed me, forced me to acknowledge that as much as I found solace in the thought of dying, I clearly was not committed to the concept.

Many years later, I was hanging out in the Stromboli pizzeria on St. Mark’s Place, where my friend Steve worked. Steve was from a small town. “You know why I would never commit suicide?” he asked, leaning on the counter like a bartender. “There was a guy in my town who killed himself. It was terrible and all that, but after a while, everyone forgot. He probably wanted to make some kind of big point, but everyone just moved on.”

Yikes. That’s not an appealing thought, either.

Eventually, I memorized Dorothy Parker’s “Resume” and got on with my life. (Julie lives on, too. I think she’s a doctor or something.)

And as I got on with my life and moved past the bleak terrain of adolescence, I started understanding that the real problem with committing suicide is what it does to the people you leave behind. That is the immorality of suicide.

I’m on the topic because we just had a high-profile murder-suicide here in Dallas--a couple of movers in local politics.

I feel deep sympathy for the family and friends of the couple who decided their troubles were too much to bear. My heart breaks especially for their son, a senior in college, to whom they bade good-bye to in a phone call.

But because I did not know this couple, I feel free to indulge my anger towards them.

Perhaps more will be revealed over time, but according to newspaper reports, the Shaws were evidently driven to despair by life’s “turbulence,” according to a friend—much of it self inflicted. They had run up huge debts and Mrs. Shaw allegedly forged a letter from the Dallas County district attorney to avoid a debt and was facing a criminal trial. Mr. Shaw had prostate cancer, although friends said they thought treatment was working.

Yes, it sounds like they were having a rough time of it--I'm not being facetious when I say that. One of my favorite New Yorker cartoons is a guy standing in an hour glass that has the word "Life" written on it. Instead of grains of sand, bricks fall on this guy's head, one at a time. Bonk, bonk, bonk.

That's life.

Were the tribulations of the Shaws life really rough enough to justify what they just did to their son?

How self-absorbed. How cruel. How unnecessary, selfish, childish and cowardly.

In a way, I almost hope something really terrible in their lives comes to light, something that might somehow in some way justify this action, something that will let their son know that only the most dire circumstances would cause them to visit such a terrible tragedy on him. Debt? Unethical behavior? Hey, you were tough enough to do it, buck up and face the consequences.

When I was suicidal, I thought not committing suicide was cowardly. Now I understand that the reality is the opposite. (Except in the face of mortal illness. I have known people who have chosen suicide over an unavoidable and unbearable physical decline. I understand and respect that.)

I am also annoyed at James Ragland, who tried to be poignant about the Shaws but ended with a poem by Paul Laurence Dunbar about the faces slaves wore to please their masters while inside they were in agony.

Slaves? C’mon. As far as I can tell, the Shaws were slaves only to their own aspirations. There is, of course, tragedy to their story, but they are not victims. They made choices to the very end. The analogy insults Americans’ mutual history.

P.S. This afternoon, a woman threw her two sons off a highway overpass then jumped herself. They all lived.

P.P.S. Required reading for all people contemplating suicide: Tad Friend's New Yorker article, Jumpers, about people who jump from the Golden Gate bridge. Not all of them die. One of my all-time favorite magazine articles.

Labels: dallas, personal growth, psychology, suicide