Monday, June 1, 2009
UnAmerican Savings
I drove up to Buellton last week to buy a table saw, and took Robin's Pathfinder to haul it back. A few miles on the return trip, it broke down (or as Robin says, I broke it). It's a fried clutch. A cool $1,000 for a new one. I'd wince, except that repairing Robin's 1993 car reminds me how little, comparatively, I've spent on cars in my life. I added up the purchase prices since 1977: six cars, $21,000. My brother says in that period he's spent in the neighborhood of $200,000. That difference represents years of salary working just for a car. I'll take the years.
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Iowa Passage
Amy forwarded to me a plea for info from local columnist Starshine Rochelle, who was writing a piece on California marriage laws being less friendly to gays than Iowa's, except she had never been to Iowa and needed inside info. So I wrote this paragraph up in a few minutes and, since George has set the preening precedent for posting pieces he has both written and liked, I decided to follow suit. Besides, I'm on a memoir blogging roll.
I lived in Ames, Iowa for seven years. Home to Iowa State, it was one of two oases (along with Iowa City, a truly great college town) in the vast landscape of corn, soybeans, and agri-business. Still, it was a great place to raise a family--houses twice the size for a quarter of the price, no underclass or upperclass to speak of (since anyone who struck it rich moved immediately), and great, cheap pork chops. In my case, I also had a lot of guy friends to play basketball and poker. Plus, one could live in the small city full of trees and not realize it was Iowa until a trip into the vast surrounding flatness. I spent seven years surprising myself every time I took a drive.
Monday, May 25, 2009
Pressing History
I went to Boston.com for my regular dose of Red Sox news and found a piece of history, mine and my family's. Of course, finding it online also underscores the more general history, the digital age heralding the end of news on paper.
http://www.boston.com/business/articles/2009/05/23/feeling_pressed/
For me, this story of the end of days for pressmen recalls the beginning of days for my adult life. I worked at the Globe's pressroom from age 16 through college. My dad was there for 35 years. My three brothers all worked there, DJ for over 20 years. The guy in the Boston.com video (very well done, no? great accents!) who says he's the last of ten or twelve is my cousin, Bill McHugh, also featured in the article.
As the article conveys, the ink was inescapable, suspended in the air, coating the presses, the walls, the floor, the plate glass windows looking out on Morrisey Boulevard so that they seemed from outside to be tinted against the sun, but it was ink, in our hair, under our fingernails, up noses and ears, in our very pores. Even the locker room, the tiles in the showers were covered in ink. Some guys, my brother Brian among them, never got used to it. For the rest of us, it sucked, but it was just part of the uniqueness of the place.
The noise, too, was inescapable. The presses were each three stories tall and 30 yards long. The pressroom at the Globe had ten presses when I was there, and I think they since added one or two. When they were cranking out thousands of papers an hour for a Sunday paper run of 750,000, the drone was so loud we would have to yell into each other's ear to be heard. I remember lying in bed at 7 am and the roar still droning in my ears. Some guys wore ear plugs, and the Globe began testing our ears in my last years there, but, in fact, I know of no one who developed hearing problems. These thunderous machines simply defined the place, the atmosphere, the industrial rumble of the proletarian world faintly audible as white noise in the business and editorial offices.
The work itself was miserable, tedious, and, at my low-man status, exceedingly easy. Up the union ladder, the work got progressively more interesting and challenging, paper handler, apprentice, journeyman. Learning to be a journeyman pressman took years. As lowly "plate boys," our main job was to pick up the inky paper off the pressroom floor and bale it for recycling. It required about ten or fifteen minutes of actual work an hour, at most, but we had to hang around to clean up if a press "broke down," which meant lots of paper on the floor.
The hours weren't attractive either, at least for most folks, though I didn't mind the 10:30 pm to 4:00 or 5:00 or whenever the run was done in the morning. It felt special to be working while everyone else slept. But most of the work was weekends, especially Saturday nights printing the big Sunday paper. That was certainly a drag, and I dreaded getting THE CALL (I was a "sub" and so on call) to work a Saturday night.
The people were equally singular. Or I should say the organizational culture was singular. We were all guys, of course, in itself a mark of a blue collar. We were also over two hundred, from 16 to 65, probably two thirds of us Boston Irish (I was watching an Irish movie with DJ once, and when the credits rolled he quipped that they read like a Globe payroll report), lots of Italians, one black guy, and, as the video captures, lots of family groups. I hung out with guys like me, with fathers or uncles in the place, working our way through college, though some were lured by the money and security and became "regulars," lifers. I never saw any of them outside of work, but I liked a lot of them, and we had some fun. I remember one time, the only time I ever left for a lunch break, about 2:00am, four of us piled into someone's car. We still wore our inky clothes, so we brought newspapers to protect the seats and rugs. We drove into the combat zone, where the cops chased the hookers from corner to corner. Whoever was driving stopped where a couple of ladies were waving at us. One of them reached into the passenger seat window and grabbed Jay Geninino's crotch. We all howled with laughter when driving away, as the hapless hooker discovered that her hand was covered in ink. (Jay is the guy in the video talking about being devastated if the Globe closes. That is, I think it's the same guy.)
Though I couldn't wait to get out, though my dad wanted nothing more for me than something better than the Globe, the job clearly worked in my favor. The best was the summer between sophomore and junior years. I lived with friends in Brighton and would take the T to work at 7:30 on Saturday morning, work until 6:00 or 7:00 Sunday morning, making more money in that long day than my friends working five and six days a week at Ho Jo's or wherever. I spent the rest of my days that summer playing ball, exploring the city, and reading. It was a blast. That was the Globe for us. It enabled our lives.
When we were young and driving into the city to visit relatives, we'd pass right by the Globe on the Southeast Expressway. My dad would always say, "Bless yourselves, we're passing the Globe." I thought he was serious, and avidly made the sign of the cross. As a teenager working at the Globe, I was certain my dad had always been making fun of the Globe (and us) in the working man's spirit of "take this job and shove it." Now I'm pretty sure it was both.
http://www.boston.com/business/articles/2009/05/23/feeling_pressed/
For me, this story of the end of days for pressmen recalls the beginning of days for my adult life. I worked at the Globe's pressroom from age 16 through college. My dad was there for 35 years. My three brothers all worked there, DJ for over 20 years. The guy in the Boston.com video (very well done, no? great accents!) who says he's the last of ten or twelve is my cousin, Bill McHugh, also featured in the article.
As the article conveys, the ink was inescapable, suspended in the air, coating the presses, the walls, the floor, the plate glass windows looking out on Morrisey Boulevard so that they seemed from outside to be tinted against the sun, but it was ink, in our hair, under our fingernails, up noses and ears, in our very pores. Even the locker room, the tiles in the showers were covered in ink. Some guys, my brother Brian among them, never got used to it. For the rest of us, it sucked, but it was just part of the uniqueness of the place.
The noise, too, was inescapable. The presses were each three stories tall and 30 yards long. The pressroom at the Globe had ten presses when I was there, and I think they since added one or two. When they were cranking out thousands of papers an hour for a Sunday paper run of 750,000, the drone was so loud we would have to yell into each other's ear to be heard. I remember lying in bed at 7 am and the roar still droning in my ears. Some guys wore ear plugs, and the Globe began testing our ears in my last years there, but, in fact, I know of no one who developed hearing problems. These thunderous machines simply defined the place, the atmosphere, the industrial rumble of the proletarian world faintly audible as white noise in the business and editorial offices.
The work itself was miserable, tedious, and, at my low-man status, exceedingly easy. Up the union ladder, the work got progressively more interesting and challenging, paper handler, apprentice, journeyman. Learning to be a journeyman pressman took years. As lowly "plate boys," our main job was to pick up the inky paper off the pressroom floor and bale it for recycling. It required about ten or fifteen minutes of actual work an hour, at most, but we had to hang around to clean up if a press "broke down," which meant lots of paper on the floor.
The hours weren't attractive either, at least for most folks, though I didn't mind the 10:30 pm to 4:00 or 5:00 or whenever the run was done in the morning. It felt special to be working while everyone else slept. But most of the work was weekends, especially Saturday nights printing the big Sunday paper. That was certainly a drag, and I dreaded getting THE CALL (I was a "sub" and so on call) to work a Saturday night.
The people were equally singular. Or I should say the organizational culture was singular. We were all guys, of course, in itself a mark of a blue collar. We were also over two hundred, from 16 to 65, probably two thirds of us Boston Irish (I was watching an Irish movie with DJ once, and when the credits rolled he quipped that they read like a Globe payroll report), lots of Italians, one black guy, and, as the video captures, lots of family groups. I hung out with guys like me, with fathers or uncles in the place, working our way through college, though some were lured by the money and security and became "regulars," lifers. I never saw any of them outside of work, but I liked a lot of them, and we had some fun. I remember one time, the only time I ever left for a lunch break, about 2:00am, four of us piled into someone's car. We still wore our inky clothes, so we brought newspapers to protect the seats and rugs. We drove into the combat zone, where the cops chased the hookers from corner to corner. Whoever was driving stopped where a couple of ladies were waving at us. One of them reached into the passenger seat window and grabbed Jay Geninino's crotch. We all howled with laughter when driving away, as the hapless hooker discovered that her hand was covered in ink. (Jay is the guy in the video talking about being devastated if the Globe closes. That is, I think it's the same guy.)
Though I couldn't wait to get out, though my dad wanted nothing more for me than something better than the Globe, the job clearly worked in my favor. The best was the summer between sophomore and junior years. I lived with friends in Brighton and would take the T to work at 7:30 on Saturday morning, work until 6:00 or 7:00 Sunday morning, making more money in that long day than my friends working five and six days a week at Ho Jo's or wherever. I spent the rest of my days that summer playing ball, exploring the city, and reading. It was a blast. That was the Globe for us. It enabled our lives.
When we were young and driving into the city to visit relatives, we'd pass right by the Globe on the Southeast Expressway. My dad would always say, "Bless yourselves, we're passing the Globe." I thought he was serious, and avidly made the sign of the cross. As a teenager working at the Globe, I was certain my dad had always been making fun of the Globe (and us) in the working man's spirit of "take this job and shove it." Now I'm pretty sure it was both.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Fire Escape
The map of the Tea Fire shows our home (at the intersection of Stanwood Drive and Sycamore Canyon Road) surrounded. In every direction, the fire raged, flames up to two hundred feet, winds up to 70 mph.
The fire claimed 210 houses. Ours is less than 100 feet from the power lines in this photo. But it survived. I can stand in my driveway and see destroyed homes, hillsides scorched, burnt brush as close as across the street. But not a single leaf on our property was damaged.
We benefited from the firefighters' expertise and courage, from being low in the canyon so that the wind wasn't as bad, from the neighbors who cleared brush, and from pure luck.
That's not to say it's been fun. It hasn't. Still isn't. Robin has suffered, is suffering the brunt of it. She was working downtown, saw the fire in the hills, and rushed home. Good thing. If she hesitated a few minutes, she would never have made it through to pick up the cats and a few odd treasures. She was there for half an hour of Armageddon, the wind whipping embers through night sky above her, emergency vehicles in full siren mode, the cats freaked out, and her own flight instinct working in high gear.
I was teaching. I heard the phone buzz in silent mode a couple of times, but didn't answer it, keeping to my policy when teaching even though Robin had called me before she went home. Bad decision on my part. When class was over, I listened to the messages. In one, she said in a stern voice to call her immediately. In the second, which she later told me came after twenty attempts that all failed since so many were using the system, she screamed in panic and frustration: "PATRICK, PICK UP THE PHONE." I had to call several times before I could get through to her, just as she was leaving.
We met at George and Amy's house (though they were at--where else would they be?--a wine dinner). Hugs. Deep sighs. Relief. Safety. Though our ordeal had hardly begun, the worst was over, at least for us. I looked up at the hills and I could see the towering flames seven or eight miles away, advancing a hundred yards in thirty seconds.
We spent the night at Larry and Sue's, whose house, among the many offerings of help from our great friends, had the best situation for the cats. They gave us food and drink as we watched the fire coverage on tv and constantly checked Edhat for the latest local perspective. We went to bed that night with those images in our minds, not knowing whether anything we owned would survive.
I was optimistic. In fact, I said to Robin as we went to sleep that night that I was 75% sure our house would survive. She wasn't particularly reassured. She didn't sleep much and by 7AM was on the phone with the landlord, who had talked with "crazy Tom," a neighbor who stayed to fight the fire. That's how we learned that the house survived.
During a long walk on the Elwood bluffs and beach with my old friend Pete, the Golden Retriever, I decided I'd try to get to the house on bicycle. So I borrowed one from George, parked the car near the Five Points circle, and pedaled up toward Sycamore Canyon Road, which is closed to traffic between Five Points and our house due to a landslide a few years ago (ah, California), but normally passable on a bike. I approached the cop at the roadblock and asked if I could go up and see if my house was still there. He said, "Go for it."
Bicycling up Sycamore Canyon Road, I saw the fire-damaged hillsides on both sides, especially the west side up toward the Riviera, which was mostly toast. But dozens of houses saved, many with scorching all around. One man I met said he lost half his orchard, but not his house. "Fair trade," I said. He agreed.
Closer to our house, starting about fifty yards from our driveway, along Conejo Road and its side streets, folks were not so lucky as us.
We returned to our house on Sunday afternoon. Since then, we've been cleaning up the ash and suffering the poor air quality inside and outside the house, again Robin bearing the brunt of it since I'm apparently too insensitive to be be affected much. Plus the neighbor hood has been swarming with heavy vehicles, utility companies, refuse collection, public works, you name it. Chain saws fill the air. Helicopters still frequent overhead. No doubt the construction companies will soon follow in mass numbers. We'll be ground zero for months.
That's how we know we're lucky.
The fire claimed 210 houses. Ours is less than 100 feet from the power lines in this photo. But it survived. I can stand in my driveway and see destroyed homes, hillsides scorched, burnt brush as close as across the street. But not a single leaf on our property was damaged.
We benefited from the firefighters' expertise and courage, from being low in the canyon so that the wind wasn't as bad, from the neighbors who cleared brush, and from pure luck.
That's not to say it's been fun. It hasn't. Still isn't. Robin has suffered, is suffering the brunt of it. She was working downtown, saw the fire in the hills, and rushed home. Good thing. If she hesitated a few minutes, she would never have made it through to pick up the cats and a few odd treasures. She was there for half an hour of Armageddon, the wind whipping embers through night sky above her, emergency vehicles in full siren mode, the cats freaked out, and her own flight instinct working in high gear.
I was teaching. I heard the phone buzz in silent mode a couple of times, but didn't answer it, keeping to my policy when teaching even though Robin had called me before she went home. Bad decision on my part. When class was over, I listened to the messages. In one, she said in a stern voice to call her immediately. In the second, which she later told me came after twenty attempts that all failed since so many were using the system, she screamed in panic and frustration: "PATRICK, PICK UP THE PHONE." I had to call several times before I could get through to her, just as she was leaving.
We met at George and Amy's house (though they were at--where else would they be?--a wine dinner). Hugs. Deep sighs. Relief. Safety. Though our ordeal had hardly begun, the worst was over, at least for us. I looked up at the hills and I could see the towering flames seven or eight miles away, advancing a hundred yards in thirty seconds.
We spent the night at Larry and Sue's, whose house, among the many offerings of help from our great friends, had the best situation for the cats. They gave us food and drink as we watched the fire coverage on tv and constantly checked Edhat for the latest local perspective. We went to bed that night with those images in our minds, not knowing whether anything we owned would survive.
I was optimistic. In fact, I said to Robin as we went to sleep that night that I was 75% sure our house would survive. She wasn't particularly reassured. She didn't sleep much and by 7AM was on the phone with the landlord, who had talked with "crazy Tom," a neighbor who stayed to fight the fire. That's how we learned that the house survived.
I went to K-Mart to buy some underwear and toothbrushes and then on campus to work for a while. I got back about 2:00. Robin had spent the time mostly on the phone, seeking more information and reassuring family and friends that we were relatively, remarkably unscathed. She was overwhelmed by the emotional support, frazzled by the anxiety, and exhausted beyond her limits. It was all over her drawn face, her slowed speech, even her unsure movement. Somehow we managed to grab some borrowed t-shirts, the cats, and head over to the empty condo of Jim and Martha, who were back east for a death in the family. I put Robin to bed about 3:00 and, except for an hour or so in the evening, she slept until Saturday morning.
During a long walk on the Elwood bluffs and beach with my old friend Pete, the Golden Retriever, I decided I'd try to get to the house on bicycle. So I borrowed one from George, parked the car near the Five Points circle, and pedaled up toward Sycamore Canyon Road, which is closed to traffic between Five Points and our house due to a landslide a few years ago (ah, California), but normally passable on a bike. I approached the cop at the roadblock and asked if I could go up and see if my house was still there. He said, "Go for it."
Bicycling up Sycamore Canyon Road, I saw the fire-damaged hillsides on both sides, especially the west side up toward the Riviera, which was mostly toast. But dozens of houses saved, many with scorching all around. One man I met said he lost half his orchard, but not his house. "Fair trade," I said. He agreed.
Closer to our house, starting about fifty yards from our driveway, along Conejo Road and its side streets, folks were not so lucky as us.
We returned to our house on Sunday afternoon. Since then, we've been cleaning up the ash and suffering the poor air quality inside and outside the house, again Robin bearing the brunt of it since I'm apparently too insensitive to be be affected much. Plus the neighbor hood has been swarming with heavy vehicles, utility companies, refuse collection, public works, you name it. Chain saws fill the air. Helicopters still frequent overhead. No doubt the construction companies will soon follow in mass numbers. We'll be ground zero for months.
That's how we know we're lucky.
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Dolphins Blowing Air Rings
This video is of dolphins playing with rings they compose out of their own breath. It isn't known how they learn this, or if they're born with the ability. It's a lot like McQing, the talent among males in my family to demonstrate excellence in reasoning with or without possession of actual knowledge.
One, ahem, explanation involves "air-core vortex rings." With the tip of its dorsal fin when it is moving rapidly and turning, a dolphin creates invisible, spinning vortexes in the water. The higher velocity fluid around the core of the vortex is at a lower pressure than the fluid circulating farther away. Dolphins take advantage of this difference in pressure and inject air into the rings through their blow hole. The energy of the water vortex is enough to keep the bubbles from rising for a few seconds of play time.
But the main thing is that creating rings of air to play with is a lot more fun than simple transparency.
One, ahem, explanation involves "air-core vortex rings." With the tip of its dorsal fin when it is moving rapidly and turning, a dolphin creates invisible, spinning vortexes in the water. The higher velocity fluid around the core of the vortex is at a lower pressure than the fluid circulating farther away. Dolphins take advantage of this difference in pressure and inject air into the rings through their blow hole. The energy of the water vortex is enough to keep the bubbles from rising for a few seconds of play time.
But the main thing is that creating rings of air to play with is a lot more fun than simple transparency.
Monday, June 23, 2008
The Other Side of the Celtics' Victory
I'm a Celtic fan, but I live in Santa Barbara and have many friends who are Laker fans. I sympathize with them. They are uniformly disappointed, frustrated, even disgusted with the Lakers for the way they lost the finals. If I were a Laker fan, I'd feel the same, and I'd be particularly upset with the lack of team play.
Witness game four, the key to the series, in which the Lakers surrendered a 24 point lead, a "Collapse for the Ages" according to the LA Times headline. The Lakers dominated the Celtics in the first half, even though Kobe, the regular season MVP and by all accounts the most gifted player in the league, had missed all his shots save for three free throws. Some--Laker fans, members of the media, even Celtic fans--saw that scenario as a good thing for the Lakers: They were up big and Kobe hadn't even got going yet. But the Celtics had a different thought: Kobe would come out in the second half looking to get his.
The Lakers' predictability and Kobe's predictable selfishness keyed Boston's historic comeback. Knowing what was coming, Paul Pierce asked to guard Kobe, and he did a fantastic job of contesting Kobe's jump shots. In one particularly memorable play in the middle of the Celtics' big 21-3 run, Pierce blocked Kobe's shot, retrieved the carom, and ignited a Boston fast break.
Pierce's defense was just part of the overall team effort to stop Kobe. Pierce and Kobe both knew that, if Kobe drove past Pierce, the Celtics were all waiting to swarm Kobe, swallow him up, not allow a decent pass let alone a shot close to the basket. As it was the entire series, if Kobe were to get his, it would be through jump shots, which he kept jacking up over the taller Pierce. The rest of the Lakers stood around and watched as the Celtics took the third quarter, the game, and the Lakers' heart.
The next day, Jackson pointedly said that Bryant would be motivated by something Boston's Kevin Garnett said. When asked to elaborate, Jackson said, check the transcripts.
Garnett's words certainly struck a chord with the coach, and Kobe's play down the stretch in game five suggests that he also heard them and heeded them. He deferred to Gasol, even directing the ball away from himself to Gasol, since that is where the Celtics' defense was weakest.
The Lakers managed to win game five, but not convincingly. With Kobe out of the offense except to draw defenders away from the basket and give room for Gasol to operate, the Lakers looked and acted strange, out of character, desperate. Without a dynamic Kobe, the team was lost. Only the most die-hard Laker fans expected them to win even one game of the final two in Boston. A rout in game six was hardly surprising.
The problem isn't so much Kobe's need to be the star; the problem is that the Lakers are built around Kobe's need to be the star. It's one thing to make Kobe's unsurpassed talent the center of a team; it's another to make Kobe's narrative of greatness the center of the team. It's a Hollywood formula, eagerly embraced by the NBA and the media: Kobe's the hero on a quest to carry a team to a championship and everyone else is the supporting cast. This formula has informed the Lakers' organizational strategy for the last four or five years. Every organizational decision fits this overall formula.
In contrast to the Celtics' corny and profound but nonetheless appealing--and victorious--"ubuntu" ethos, "I am what I am because of who we all are," the Lakers are what they are because of who Kobe is. His scolding and scowling at his teammates and at his coach tell the tale of what "team" means to the Lakers. They don't have the opportunity to do things for the benefit of the team; they do things for the benefit of Kobe.
This depressing drama is, of course, not new to Lakers' fans, except that Kobe's selfishness was supposed to be a thing he'd outgrown in his transformation into a leader on and off the court, the heir to Michael Jordan's championship passion, demanding of his teammates only as much as he demanded of himself. The collapse in the second half of game four proved that to be all public relations, in the end a cruel fraud. The 2008 Lakers were about Kobe getting his. Or failing to get his.
The future holds some promise for Laker fans. Bynum will come back from injury to give the Lakers the toughness inside that they lacked in the finals. Bynum's presence also allows Gasol and Odom to play to their strengths, which are marvelous basketball skills (rather than vilified for their weakness, lack of physical strength). Vuyacic and Farmer will have more experience. Radmanovich will have more time on the bench. Kobe may even finally figure out how to lead a team.
If Kobe does mature, however, I still wouldn't root for him. Other petulant and selfish players who mature in the public eye are far more sympathetic. Paul Pierce's ghetto-to-Finals glory story, for example, includes overcoming genuine obstacles, like poverty and stab wounds and a career spent on the same bad team.
Kobe's story? On and off the court, he needs to overcome his sense of entitlement.
Rooting for Kobe is like rooting for the rich kid with all the tutors and advisers and insider legacy tracks, like rooting for corporate America, the Evil Empire, or George Steinbrenner.
I wouldn't want to be a Laker fan.
Witness game four, the key to the series, in which the Lakers surrendered a 24 point lead, a "Collapse for the Ages" according to the LA Times headline. The Lakers dominated the Celtics in the first half, even though Kobe, the regular season MVP and by all accounts the most gifted player in the league, had missed all his shots save for three free throws. Some--Laker fans, members of the media, even Celtic fans--saw that scenario as a good thing for the Lakers: They were up big and Kobe hadn't even got going yet. But the Celtics had a different thought: Kobe would come out in the second half looking to get his.
The Lakers' predictability and Kobe's predictable selfishness keyed Boston's historic comeback. Knowing what was coming, Paul Pierce asked to guard Kobe, and he did a fantastic job of contesting Kobe's jump shots. In one particularly memorable play in the middle of the Celtics' big 21-3 run, Pierce blocked Kobe's shot, retrieved the carom, and ignited a Boston fast break.
Pierce's defense was just part of the overall team effort to stop Kobe. Pierce and Kobe both knew that, if Kobe drove past Pierce, the Celtics were all waiting to swarm Kobe, swallow him up, not allow a decent pass let alone a shot close to the basket. As it was the entire series, if Kobe were to get his, it would be through jump shots, which he kept jacking up over the taller Pierce. The rest of the Lakers stood around and watched as the Celtics took the third quarter, the game, and the Lakers' heart.
The next day, Jackson pointedly said that Bryant would be motivated by something Boston's Kevin Garnett said. When asked to elaborate, Jackson said, check the transcripts.
If you've paid attention to them (the Lakers) all year, usually the first half is team ball, second half is usually Kobe takes over the games. They weren't nearly as aggressive as they were the first half. It just looks like they wanted to get the ball to Kobe and him sort of finish it off.... We were giving Kobe every look we've got in the book, from different matchups to trapping him, to a guy on the bottom. We were just making other guys make plays.
Garnett's words certainly struck a chord with the coach, and Kobe's play down the stretch in game five suggests that he also heard them and heeded them. He deferred to Gasol, even directing the ball away from himself to Gasol, since that is where the Celtics' defense was weakest.
The Lakers managed to win game five, but not convincingly. With Kobe out of the offense except to draw defenders away from the basket and give room for Gasol to operate, the Lakers looked and acted strange, out of character, desperate. Without a dynamic Kobe, the team was lost. Only the most die-hard Laker fans expected them to win even one game of the final two in Boston. A rout in game six was hardly surprising.
The problem isn't so much Kobe's need to be the star; the problem is that the Lakers are built around Kobe's need to be the star. It's one thing to make Kobe's unsurpassed talent the center of a team; it's another to make Kobe's narrative of greatness the center of the team. It's a Hollywood formula, eagerly embraced by the NBA and the media: Kobe's the hero on a quest to carry a team to a championship and everyone else is the supporting cast. This formula has informed the Lakers' organizational strategy for the last four or five years. Every organizational decision fits this overall formula.
In contrast to the Celtics' corny and profound but nonetheless appealing--and victorious--"ubuntu" ethos, "I am what I am because of who we all are," the Lakers are what they are because of who Kobe is. His scolding and scowling at his teammates and at his coach tell the tale of what "team" means to the Lakers. They don't have the opportunity to do things for the benefit of the team; they do things for the benefit of Kobe.
This depressing drama is, of course, not new to Lakers' fans, except that Kobe's selfishness was supposed to be a thing he'd outgrown in his transformation into a leader on and off the court, the heir to Michael Jordan's championship passion, demanding of his teammates only as much as he demanded of himself. The collapse in the second half of game four proved that to be all public relations, in the end a cruel fraud. The 2008 Lakers were about Kobe getting his. Or failing to get his.
The future holds some promise for Laker fans. Bynum will come back from injury to give the Lakers the toughness inside that they lacked in the finals. Bynum's presence also allows Gasol and Odom to play to their strengths, which are marvelous basketball skills (rather than vilified for their weakness, lack of physical strength). Vuyacic and Farmer will have more experience. Radmanovich will have more time on the bench. Kobe may even finally figure out how to lead a team.
If Kobe does mature, however, I still wouldn't root for him. Other petulant and selfish players who mature in the public eye are far more sympathetic. Paul Pierce's ghetto-to-Finals glory story, for example, includes overcoming genuine obstacles, like poverty and stab wounds and a career spent on the same bad team.
Kobe's story? On and off the court, he needs to overcome his sense of entitlement.
Rooting for Kobe is like rooting for the rich kid with all the tutors and advisers and insider legacy tracks, like rooting for corporate America, the Evil Empire, or George Steinbrenner.
I wouldn't want to be a Laker fan.
Saturday, June 21, 2008
Discovering Place
A friend gave us the “Best House Award” not really knowing what’s best about the house, because the best becomes apparent only while living here. It’s discovered; it’s the process of discovery. For example, the birds.
Robin gave me a great pair of binoculars and a whimsical book (first edition, she would have you know) by a local writer from the 1960s, Margaret Millar, who wrote about birding in Santa Barbara. It’s full of birding adventures, local color, prominently featuring the Natural History Museum, and perhaps too much whimsy for me; but I enjoyed it immensely because it inspired my bird watching. A new world has opened to me (or reopened).
This week’s hot weather, fortuitous because it arrived just when I’ve a got a break from teaching, has me sitting in the yard in the afternoon writing. For me, the writing process involves a lot of brooding with a pen and paper, which then gets cleaned up as I sit at the computer. I’ve been at the computer in the morning, but it’s too hot by afternoon, so I sit in the Adirondack chair in the yard under the oak tree and alternately write furiously and stare off into the sky. In short, I’ve given myself an excellent opportunity to watch birds. So I keep the binoculars close by and learn about what goes on around me in between Great Thoughts about Great Things.
Among the many birds I’ve learned to identify with the help of Whatbird.com and Google images (I’m still waiting for the bird identification book Kate’s getting me for my birthday) is the lesser goldfinch. I saw him one afternoon earlier this week, quite dapper in his breeding plumage—bright yellow coat and distinctive black cap. He impressed me with the way he hangs horizontally to the thinnest green branch or flower stem, bending it toward the flower or seed he wants. He especially liked the cosmos I planted, but also the grass gone to seed under the lemon tree.
The goldfinch came by again the next afternoon with a couple of paler companions, probably his mate and an offspring. They spent a few minutes flitting around the cosmos, then settled on the giant sunflower, which is still growing, not yet any flowers or seeds, and they proceeded to eat the leaves, peck away and eat them. Green stuff disappearing into their beaks. Big holes in the sunflower leaves. Birds eat greens? Who knew?
That evening sitting on the porch in one of the big Adirondack chairs, I identified the sound of the dark-eyed junco, a sparrow that wears a pronounced executioner’s hood, the only kind of sparrow I can distinguish, a feat of birding I accomplished the day before. So the little guy was foraging in the oak tree and would jump up to answer a call coming from across the canyon, his close call matching the distant one off to my left. The sound is like a circus whistle that starts out slow and vigorous, then gets faster and higher as it fades. Or maybe it’s like a high-speed high-pitched baby’s wail—waaaa-aaa-aa-aa-aa-a-a-a-a-a. Now I hear it all the time, distinct from all the other sounds. How cool. Do birders know all the sounds they hear in the back yard? How cool is that?
I’ve also identified a kestrel, a red-shouldered hawk, house finches galore, scrub jays, towhees California and spotted, a huge flock of cedar wax wings, and much more beyond the crows and pigeons. But rather than go too far down the nature boy path all at once, I’ll just reiterate that birding is part of the deeper pleasure of getting to know the place and its inhabitants. What’s better than discovering a great place, my great place, and its inhabitants?
As I said to Jenna yesterday, “It must be a great place if the worst thing about it is that the dishwasher leaves spots on the glasses.”
Robin gave me a great pair of binoculars and a whimsical book (first edition, she would have you know) by a local writer from the 1960s, Margaret Millar, who wrote about birding in Santa Barbara. It’s full of birding adventures, local color, prominently featuring the Natural History Museum, and perhaps too much whimsy for me; but I enjoyed it immensely because it inspired my bird watching. A new world has opened to me (or reopened).
This week’s hot weather, fortuitous because it arrived just when I’ve a got a break from teaching, has me sitting in the yard in the afternoon writing. For me, the writing process involves a lot of brooding with a pen and paper, which then gets cleaned up as I sit at the computer. I’ve been at the computer in the morning, but it’s too hot by afternoon, so I sit in the Adirondack chair in the yard under the oak tree and alternately write furiously and stare off into the sky. In short, I’ve given myself an excellent opportunity to watch birds. So I keep the binoculars close by and learn about what goes on around me in between Great Thoughts about Great Things.
Among the many birds I’ve learned to identify with the help of Whatbird.com and Google images (I’m still waiting for the bird identification book Kate’s getting me for my birthday) is the lesser goldfinch. I saw him one afternoon earlier this week, quite dapper in his breeding plumage—bright yellow coat and distinctive black cap. He impressed me with the way he hangs horizontally to the thinnest green branch or flower stem, bending it toward the flower or seed he wants. He especially liked the cosmos I planted, but also the grass gone to seed under the lemon tree.
The goldfinch came by again the next afternoon with a couple of paler companions, probably his mate and an offspring. They spent a few minutes flitting around the cosmos, then settled on the giant sunflower, which is still growing, not yet any flowers or seeds, and they proceeded to eat the leaves, peck away and eat them. Green stuff disappearing into their beaks. Big holes in the sunflower leaves. Birds eat greens? Who knew?
That evening sitting on the porch in one of the big Adirondack chairs, I identified the sound of the dark-eyed junco, a sparrow that wears a pronounced executioner’s hood, the only kind of sparrow I can distinguish, a feat of birding I accomplished the day before. So the little guy was foraging in the oak tree and would jump up to answer a call coming from across the canyon, his close call matching the distant one off to my left. The sound is like a circus whistle that starts out slow and vigorous, then gets faster and higher as it fades. Or maybe it’s like a high-speed high-pitched baby’s wail—waaaa-aaa-aa-aa-aa-a-a-a-a-a. Now I hear it all the time, distinct from all the other sounds. How cool. Do birders know all the sounds they hear in the back yard? How cool is that?
I’ve also identified a kestrel, a red-shouldered hawk, house finches galore, scrub jays, towhees California and spotted, a huge flock of cedar wax wings, and much more beyond the crows and pigeons. But rather than go too far down the nature boy path all at once, I’ll just reiterate that birding is part of the deeper pleasure of getting to know the place and its inhabitants. What’s better than discovering a great place, my great place, and its inhabitants?
As I said to Jenna yesterday, “It must be a great place if the worst thing about it is that the dishwasher leaves spots on the glasses.”
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