Kafka

I mentioned the Brooklyn Heights girls--the two I almost lived with? Well, one of them told me all about her intense curiosity in Kafka's letters, diaries, journals, etc., of course it goes without saying he was a fascinating, unusual, a neurotic. Según Freud, the illness of the neurotic is the illness of modern civilization.

Last night I went to flight attendant friend's holiday party in deep Queens. Deepest Queens, an area the look and feel of which makes it feel like it could be anywhere or anything. It's so abstract. Flight attendant friend and I met a few years ago on a flight from New York to my state of birth; I had a little shoulder-bag with me that I had stowed in one of the overhead bins. During those quiet moments before take-off, the flight attendants closing and inspecting the aforementioned bins, passengers settling in with a book, their anxieties, thoughts of wherever it is they have left and wherever it is they are to go, and the head flight attendant pulls out my shoulder-bag, a Colombian mochila, and, in a tone audible to the nearby fifteen or twenty passengers, says, with my bag held up, "Whose purse is this?" For once, my seatmate is a very attractive woman. What humiliation. Immediately with some awkwardness I stood up and claimed my bag, and told the flight attendant that "it's a shoulder-bag not a purse." Chuckling from the surrounding rows. "Looks like a purse to me!" she responded. Carly, my seatmate, doubled over in laughter. We struck up a conversation and discovered we were on our way to the same town, so I gave her a ride home from the airport. We've been friends ever since. She's a flight attendant with a major carrier, and the more of her friends I meet, the more I respect the carrier. The flight attendants are well-treated, a diverse and intelligent mix, multilingual, fun, and best of all, genuine. Be kind to your flight attendants, readers!

So last night I went to the fur-themed holiday party Carly threw at her apartment in Queens. Immense apartment, the only abode I've been that can hold a candle to Brooklyn's place in DC, so far, full of women and gay men dressed in fake fur of all kinds. Eventually I met a charming redhead who reminded me of another friend, also a redhead, a dancer, with similar facial features and a matching attitude. Incredible as it is, I was to discover the similarities between these two women run deeper: the two share the same first name. But the redhead of Carly's party came with a highly unusual maiden name: Kafka. It's a family legend Franz is a cousin once-or-twice-removed. Kafka comes from Phoenix, though she married a Brit, has a lovely baby daughter, and had been living in London until city life became too complicated. Before she married, first and last names were alliterative Ks. She shouldn't have ever changed it, I told her.

Kafka has appeared twice in my life in the last few weeks: what could it possibly mean?

I've been listening to Fela as I write, which reminds me: I finished Chimamanda Adichie's Americanah a few days ago. Ultimately I found the novel disappointing--thematically there are three distinct experiences Adichie explores, and the first and second are far and away the most interesting. As Adichie's protagonist reaches maturity, she loses depth--she becomes dull. The quality of the writing remains high, but the agony of it, the effort that went into it, all this changes--the texture, once beautifully and carefully sculpted, becomes smooth and indistinct. It seems as if Adichie ran out of steam at a certain point, and simply needed to finish the book, to put it behind her--this is understandable. I look forward to reading her next book, as I believe as a writer she does have the capacity to produce a masterpiece.

I've begun Wilkie Collins' Moonstone, which is a wonderful book and wonderful winter reading in particular, and has reminded me of the out-of-the-past idea of the "morally fallen," the disgraced woman (and occasionally man) of epochs long past. I was discussing Red Hook with my cousin, and I mentioned that I always think of Red Hook as the place where one should move after a disgraceful affair, a place to hide, to be alone, to reflect on the foreclosed life that might have been. She agreed, and knew someone who had done just so, only to become involved in another lurid affair, can you imagine?  The Moonstone proves to be delightful, as I knew it would. The edition I have is cumbersome and unwieldy, and this summer I found a pint-sized copy of Conrad's Lord Jim, so I may carry that around in my coat pocket when I'm unable to lug around a large tome.

My friend Grace is in Los Angeles this week photographing and drawing bulbous nudes with tattoos, her favorite subject. Grace is a favorite, and may be the reason I obtain the position with Sony Pictures. She shrieks, she screams, she exposes as much tattooed flesh as possible whenever possible. I can't wait for her to move back to New York. I don't understand why anyone moves to Los Angeles--sure the weather's great, but it can be cold, you have to drive everywhere which really means sitting in traffic for hours and hours and hours, and the air is awful.

Tonight I'll see The Daptone Soul Review (Sharon Jones and Charles Bradley) at the Apollo, and Philip Glass Saturday at BAM. I'm extremely excited: Sharon Jones is the Queen.

I hope to participate briefly in the Eric Garner protests outside City Hall later on today. It's been suggested police wear cameras, to prevent incidents like the death of Michael Brown, or at least provide irrefutable video evidence--well, with Eric Garner there was video evidence. If, as is the case with Eric Garner, a video can't convince a grand jury there is probable cause to charge a police officer, what's the point of cameras? I've said it before: a racist, trigger happy country produces a racist, trigger-happy police force. It doesn't matter if the officer in question has apologized, claims he never meant to harm Eric Garner, says he's sorry and prays for Eric and his family. Eric Garner was a father of six. Six children will grow up without a father, will have this injustice hanging over their heads the rest of their lives. What a shame.

We can talk about racism, but what we really need to do is talk about racists, because they're out there, and they're the reason we don't see indictments when it comes to the deaths of Michael Brown and Eric Garner. It's a tragedy and a disgrace. I hope this is a watershed moment, when the sensible people step away from those with the words of inequity on their lips, the racists with hate seeping out of their pores.

RIP Eric Garner. I, like the court jester of our time, am lost for words.