Monthly Archives: August 2012

Aug302012

So How’d Anne Do in Her 5K?

Following up on an earlier post, I’m pleased to report that my lovely Girlfriend Anne did very well last weekend in the JDRF Walk to Cure Diabetes. But looking back, I don’t think I made it clear exactly what this event was. It’s an annual charity event held at Salt Lake’s Liberty Park; two laps around the park’s perimeter added up to 5K. It’s not a race, and it’s not timed (although I did, in fact, time her — more on that in a sec). It’s basically a pleasant morning stroll (along with a couple thousand other folks and their children and dogs) followed by some carnival-type activities in the afternoon, all for the good cause of raising money to research juvenile diabetes. But 5K — roughly three miles — is a pretty good walk for someone who wasn’t especially active up until fairly recently, and Anne was genuinely nervous the night before, wondering if she’d be able to make it all the way around or if she’d become exhausted partway, or get leg cramps, or otherwise end up feeling humiliated by the whole thing. She needn’t have worried. As I said, she did great… in fact, she and her friend Kathy got annoyed at the slow pace of the herd shambling along the designated path and decided to cut over to an adjoining sidewalk so they could go at their own pace. They completed their laps, plus cut back through the middle of the park to reach the official finish line, in just over an hour, well ahead of most of the other walkers. Sadly, I can’t tell you precisely how much over an hour, because I messed up on my timekeeping duties and accidentally reset the stupid stopwatch partway through. Hey, I recently bought a new cellphone and I’m not familiar with the stopwatch function yet! Anyhow, the total I calculated at the end was one hour and five minutes; I’m guessing the actual time was probably more like 1:10 or maybe 1:15. Still, pretty good… and Anne wasn’t winded or sore and in fact seemed ready to go around again! I’m very proud of her.

She did well on the fundraising end of things as well, starting with a modest goal of $150 and ending with $180. I’d like to personally thank our friends and coworkers who donated, and point out that the JDRF will still accept funds in Anne’s name for up to eight weeks, so if you didn’t contribute and you’re thinking you’d like to, it’s not too late! Just go here and click the big orange “Donate to Anne” button at the top of the page. She and I both thank you in advance.

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Aug292012

Video of My Dad in Action

It’s been nearly a month since I promised to post videos of my dad’s burnouts at this year’s Wells Fun Run, and it’s going on six weeks since the event itself. To all my Loyal Readers who’ve been waiting on the edge of your seats for this — and that’s probably as many as two of you, I’m guessing — I apologize. Time flies, and it’s been especially fleet-winged this summer. The other day while I was taking my afternoon constitutional, I noticed the subtle difference in the air, that hard-to-describe quality when it’s still plenty hot outside, but the blast-furnace intensity of summer’s peak has faded and you just somehow know that a corner has been turned. The leaves aren’t changing yet, but the change is coming. Already. This summer’s shot to hell before I even realized it was summer.

You’ll have to forgive me. My mood always gets somewhat volatile this time of year, from just before Labor Day stretching on through Indian summer and into true fall (when Utah is blessed with a fall and doesn’t proceed directly into a foot of snow on the ground, which is how it’s gone the last few years). On the one hand, I love the changing weather and the golden light, the chance to slip into my leather jacket again, and the smell of woodsmoke and dried cornstalks. But I always get restless around this time of year, too, missing the certainty of long-abandoned back-to-school rhythms and knowing that, with the arrival of my birthday in September, another year of my allotted span is gone, another trip around the sun completed… another summer lost.

But we’re not here to lament over the inexorable march of time, are we? No, this entry is about celebrating my dad’s skill at an arcane competitive event.

Some of you may be wondering exactly what I’m talking about when I say “burnout.” Well, everyone knows what a burnout is, even if you don’t know it by that name, and many people — most people, probably — have done it at one point or another. You step on the gas a little too aggressively, your tires squeal and produce a little whiff of smoke, maybe you lay a patch of rubber on the asphalt, and then you’re off. For most people, a burnout is accidental and extremely transitory. In a burnout competition, however, the idea is to deliberately prolong the effect. Each driver is given 30 seconds to generate as much smoke as possible; whoever lays down the biggest smog bank and/or excites the crowd the most is the winner. Most people competing in these things will simply lock their brakes and stand there while their tires spin in one place. They might produce a lot of smoke this way, but it’s not really the most exciting thing to watch. The thing that makes my dad different and interesting — and ultimately successful at this — is that he knows how to keep the burn going while the car is moving. It’s trickier than it sounds. Most of the other drivers lose their smoke almost the instant they let their vehicles start rolling. But Dad has this knack… well, better you just see what I’m talking about. Here’s his first (and best run) from Wells this year:

You’ll notice the car tries to go sideways when Dad cranks on the power. Let me assure you, that’s normal, and it’s okay. A lot of the burnout drivers appear to be on the verge of losing control when they start to swing around like this, but Dad almost never does, which is part of the showmanship I mentioned in my earlier blog entry. I’m very rarely afraid that he’s in trouble when I see this.

Now, here’s his second run. The video isn’t as good, I’m afraid. The sun was down by that point and the light was nearly gone, so my video camera was having trouble holding focus. Also, the Nomad stalled just after Dad began his run. The engine was hot, you see, and big, high-compression, carbureted engines that are overheated are prone to a condition that you don’t see much in modern, fuel-injected cars, i.e., vapor lock. But the rules say you’ve got 30 seconds from the time the burn begins to generate smoke, so if he can the car going again…

In case you’re wondering, that really irritating squeaky noise in the background comes from a kid who had this big inflatable hammer thing with which he was beating his brother over the head. I was very close to taking it away from him.

Anyhow, because Dad was able to restart the car and resume his burnout, this run counted… and as you can see, it actually turned out pretty well, considering he lost so much time. Well enough that he won first place this year.

I know this is a silly event, and damn hard on the environment… but I love watching my dad do it, and I have to say again that I’m really proud of him. The crowd out in Wells knows that car, and they love it and him. There was a time when I didn’t have a lot of respect for my dad’s interests or abilities. What can I say, I was a real dumbass. Now I know better. Now I know it’s really cool to watch your old man when he’s in his element, doing his thing, and winning at it…

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Aug272012

Old Friends

Turning now from real-life heroes to fantasy heroes, yesterday the actor Mark Hamill — whom you may vaguely remember for a role he played in three somewhat obscure space-opera films made some 30 years ago — tweeted “It’s always great to catch up with a dear old friend!” as a caption for this photograph:

mark-hamill_rancor-2012
Presumably this was taken at the just-completed Star Wars Celebration VI convention in Orange County, California. It makes me happy.

That is all.

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Aug272012

Drive-By Blogging: Special Tranquility Base Edition

I thought I’d round up a few of the things I’ve been seeing about the late Neil Armstrong that have struck me as interesting or poignant.

First, I liked the sentiments expressed in the statement issued by his family:

While we mourn the loss of a very good man, we also celebrate his remarkable life and hope that it serves as an example to young people around the world to work hard to make their dreams come true, to be willing to explore and push the limits, and to selflessly serve a cause greater than themselves.

 

For those who may ask what they can do to honor Neil, we have a simple request. Honor his example of service, accomplishment and modesty, and the next time you walk outside on a clear night and see the moon smiling down at you, think of Neil Armstrong and give him a wink.

The last thought was immediately and predictably picked up by the cool kids with their Twitterings and turned into a trending hashtag: #WinkAtTheMoon. As these things ought, I suppose.

Next up, Armstrong’s fellow moonwalker, Buzz Aldrin, who sounds to me like he’s genuinely hurting right now:

I had truly hoped that on July 20th, 2019, Neil, Mike [Collins] and I would be standing together to commemorate the 50th Anniversary of our moon landing, as we also anticipated the continued expansion of humanity into space, that our small mission helped make possible. Regrettably, this is not to be. Neil will most certainly be there with us in spirit.

 

On behalf of the Aldrin family, we extend our deepest condolences to Carol and the entire Armstrong family. I will miss my friend Neil as I know our fellow citizens and people around world will miss this foremost aviation and space pioneer.

 

May he Rest in Peace, and may his vision for our human destiny in space be his legacy.

I can’t imagine what it would be like to have shared an experience like what Armstrong and Aldrin shared — being the first two human beings to walk on the moon — and then decades later to wake up one morning and have to face life without the other one. I don’t know if Buzz and Neil ever got together for barbecues, or even really spoke at all, but surely they must have had some kind of bond that’s now broken. How lost must Aldrin be feeling right now.

Actor, writer, Star Trek alum and Internet sensation Wil Wheaton said this:

I met Neil Armstrong once, at a dinner to honor Jimmy Doohan in the early 2000s.

 

He was not much taller than me, but he was a giant of a man. He was as kind as he was intimidating.

Phil Plait, the Bad Astronomer:

We have had our missteps since that one small step, and we can argue about the directions we are or should be taking. But given what we’ve done, and what we are capable of, I have the spark of hope that the future will look back at July 1969 and recognize it for what it was: the dawn of a new era. The end of homo sapiens terrestrialis and the birth of homo sapiens cosmos.

 

Neil Armstrong was the human who literally stood at that dividing line.

 

And I wonder… will there someday be a holiday in his honor? In my mind’s eye I can see people lining the streets, watching parades, talking about that day, smiling and laughing… and all the while, through a quartz window in the dome, the crescent Earth will be hanging in the black sky above them.

I really like that image, and the idea of a holiday in Armstrong’s honor. As I recall, I proposed something similar a few years ago.

The novelist Armistead Maupin, best known for the delightful Tales of the City series, posted a heartwarming anecdote on his Facebook page:

I met this nice man around a campfire last year in Santa Fe. As the moon rose in the sky, he talked, with extraordinary modesty, about landing on it. Later, when I introduced Chris to him as my husband, he smiled as if this were the most ordinary thing in the world. It occurred to me that there’s been more than one ‘giant leap for mankind’ since 1969.

Maupin is gay, if you didn’t know.

Speaking of Facebook, for all its annoying tics and general superficiality, it can provide opportunities for interesting encounters that we might not otherwise have. Here’s an exchange I had Saturday night with the lovely B-movie actress (and recent cancer survivor) Jewel Shepard:

Jewel: A moon walker has died. I met him once when I was in the 6th grade. He looked so ordinary, I thought to myself, this couldn’t have been a man who actually walked! on the moon. Later in life, I have come to realize there are many “ordinary” folks who have done extraordinary things. He was just one of my childhood I will never forget.

 

Me: Great thoughts, Jewel. I envy you for having the opportunity to meet him. I wish I had…

 

Jewel: @Jason yes, I was lucky — but what I learned most from that day and those that followed is this: There are a lot of folks who have achieved exactly what they wanted by following through on a dream. It’s when one doesn’t see past their current station in life is where the dream dies. If one has the desire and applies themselves in little ways towards that goal… a form of that goal does come true. That is what I took away from that day. I was in a foster home. I was alone… and yet, I thought I could just “make it” in movies. Okay, maybe not at the level I had dreamt — but I did and am doing stuff. What Mr. Armstrong allowed me to see for that moment in my life was a person can do something that is both magical and meaningful if one puts heart and thought and never takes their eye off the goal. Direction is what he taught me that day. After all the questions asked like, “Can you breathe on the moon” were answered, I was left with excitement in all things were possible no matter how improbable.

I can’t claim that Jewel Shepard and I are anything resembling actual friends, but we’ve talked in this fashion a couple of times. I like her. She’s a feisty, funny, smart, tough lady. And what she was saying about inspiration and dreams struck a chord for me, as that’s something that’s been on my mind lately. But that’s another blog entry.

Two more items… one is a real treat, a complete, hour-long interview Armstrong granted within the past couple of years (I’m not sure of the exact date, but it looks pretty recent) to an Australian trade group for CPAs, of all things. I haven’t had time to watch the complete thing yet, but in the first two segments, at least, Neil comes across as relaxed, friendly, self-confident but also self-effacing, and full of great stories. In short, a confirmation of everything everyone who ever met him has been saying about him the past couple days. If he had any reticence about being interviewed, it’s not on display here.

And finally, John Scalzi, as he so often does, wrote a blog entry I wish I could claim as my own, comparing the future we used to imagine would flow from Armstrong and Aldrin’s feat to the future we in fact ended up with:

We can still go back to the moon, of course. We can still go and build and stay and use the moon as our first stepping stone to other worlds. Anything is possible. But for me Armstrong’s death forever closes the door on a certain possible path the we could have taken, the one where that first small step and giant leap was not essentially taken in isolation, but was followed by another step and another leap, followed by another, and so on, one right after another, without pause and without interruption. Even when or if we return to the moon, we will never live in Neil Armstrong’s future.

 

I wonder how Armstrong himself felt about that. He lived down the road a piece from me; people I know had the honor of meeting him and described him, in so many words, as one of the best of men. Back here on Earth he did not seem to go out of his way to call attention to himself, and while he encouraged people to keep alive the spirit of exploration and service that he exemplified, it doesn’t seem that he spent a lot of time beating a drum in public. For all that, I read that when he was 80, he volunteered to be the commander of a mission to Mars, should anyone want him for the job. I would guess he wanted to live in Neil Armstrong’s future, too. I’m sorry for him he didn’t get to.

Amen, John.

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Aug272012

In Memoriam: Neil Armstrong

neil-armstrong_by-paul-calle

The word “hero” gets tossed around a lot these days, but it’s oftentimes not really deserved, in my opinion. That’s not to disparage anyone, or diminish whatever it is that they do. Rather, it’s the word that has been diminished in recent years, through overuse and misuse. One can do admirable things without being a hero. And there’s a lot more to being a hero than simply taking a particular job or wearing a particular uniform. In my mind, “hero” is a description that ought to be reserved for the truly exceptional, people who not only do great things but have a certain quality of character as well.

Just about every article and note of remembrance I’ve read about Neil Armstrong, who died Saturday at the age of 82, has described him as a hero. In his case, I’d say the word is entirely appropriate. Not just because he was arguably the most famous astronaut in the history of manned spaceflight… although I believe he most likely is. And also not just because he was an incredible pilot who saved two spacecraft during his astronaut career: first, the Gemini VIII capsule which tumbled out of control after a thruster malfunctioned, and then the lunar module that carried him and Buzz Aldrin to the Sea of Tranquility. (I don’t know if this is well known outside the space-nerd community, but the LM’s computer was overwhelmed with incoming data and kept shutting down, and was also trying to steer the craft toward a boulder field, so Armstrong took manual control and flew around until he spotted a safe landing site, finally bringing the LM down with only 30 seconds of fuel remaining.) His crewmates on those occasions both described him performing with an almost preternatural calm and grace under pressure. But those characteristics don’t make him a hero either; they just indicate he was very good at his job.

I don’t even think he was heroic for being the first human being in the history of our species to set foot on a planetary body other than the earth. Although that’s certainly a great deed, there wasn’t anything about Armstrong himself that led to him being that man. It could just as easily have been Aldrin who was selected to exit the LM first… or it could have been any of the other Apollo astronauts if the crew rotations and mission plans had gone differently. It very likely would have been Gus Grissom if the Apollo 1 fire hadn’t occurred.

What made Armstrong a true hero, in my book, was the way he responded to becoming that historic figure. His famous words about small steps and giants leaps — reportedly composed by Armstrong himself on the way to the moon, and not ahead of time by a professional speech writer or NASA PR flack — were not political or nationalistic or self-aggrandizing, as they easily could have been. Rather, he spoke on behalf of the entire human race, and beautifully so. And when he returned home, he displayed great humility and self-deprecation in his decision to stay out of the spotlight as much as possible. He could have used his position in the history books for personal advantage, parlaying his fame into political appointments or movie roles or high-paying endorsement deals. Or he could’ve simply become an insufferable braggart. To my knowledge, though, he never even tried to get so much as a free beer in a small-town tavern. Many people were puzzled and frustrated by his efforts to live under the radar, as he routinely turned down requests for interviews and personal appearances, and eventually even autographs. Personally, I admire him for it. I don’t read his reticence as reluctance to own the “first man on the moon” title, or as an urge to hide from the public. Rather, I think he was wise enough to understand that he was merely a human being, and that the historical Neil Armstrong, the one who will live on in legends and fuzzy black-and-white video recordings centuries after the actual man is forgotten, would be impossible to actually live up to. He receded from the public eye both for his own good and for ours, to save us from the disappointment of learning he wasn’t a superman or a demigod, but merely a guy from Ohio. A guy who couldn’t have become that legendary moonwalker without the assistance of thousands of others. I see his years of obscurity as another kind of selfless act, akin to the same selflessness he displayed at the moment he dropped off the LM’s ladder into the unknown powdery soil of our nearest cosmic neighbor. He was a hero precisely because he never tried to be a hero.

He was certainly a hero to me. I wish I’d had an opportunity to meet him. To shake his hand and maybe ask him how his crops were faring. (He spent his later years raising cattle and corn on a 300-acre ranch outside Cincinnati. Talk about coming back down to Earth.) And even though he wouldn’t have asked me to buy him a beer, I most certainly would have. The man did walk on the frackin’ moon, after all…

***
Image: a 1969 sketch by Paul Calle, courtesy of The Pictorial Arts.

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Aug232012

Raiders in IMAX

If you haven’t heard the news yet, the 1981 film classic that forever set a dress code for adventurers in the minds of the general public is coming back to the big screen — actually, to the biggest screens, i.e., IMAX theaters — starting September 7th, for one week only. As with other recent “event screenings” of the landmark motion pictures Jaws and Casablanca, this is basically a promotional stunt keyed around the upcoming drop of the complete Indiana Jones series on BluRay. But that’s okay… any excuse to experience one of my all-time favorites in the theater is fine by me. Here’s the poster for the re-release:

raiders-lost-ark_imax_poster

It looks like the work of Drew Struzan, whose signature style seems to have become the default for both the Indy movies and the Star Wars saga, but my understanding is that he didn’t actually paint this one. (Struzan retired from film-poster work following Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull in 2008, but I briefly thought he might have been lured back for this one-off project. Guess not.) Of course, I do have a quibble with the inclusion of “Indiana Jones and the” in the title. It’s unwieldy and unnecessary, as I’m pretty sure everybody knows this is an Indiana Jones movie. And I resent the fact that after 30 years of knowing it under one title, we’re now expected to start thinking of this flick by a different name. Um, no. Just as the original Star Wars will never be “A New Hope” for me, this movie is called Raiders of the Lost Ark. Period. Always was, always will be. Lucasian revisionism aside, though, this is a really nice poster. I especially like the reference to the warehouse scene in the upper right, and Indy silhouetted against the Egyptian sunset on the left, both of which are iconic cinematic images that, as far as I’m aware, have never been referenced in any previous advertising art. I wouldn’t mind having one of these in my collection, if anyone out there wants to get me a present. My birthday is coming up in only a couple of weeks, you know.

Incidentally, if you’re concerned that the title or anything else may have been changed within the film itself, rest easy. Senor Spielbergo himself assures us it ain’t so… and also says he won’t be doing any more tinkering with his old films because he “learned from the fans” following the E.T. debacle. Interestingly, he says that while he’s done with digital revisionism, he intends going forward to keep both versions of that film available for those who have a preference. If only his best friend could be convinced of the wisdom of that position…

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Aug172012

Friday Evening Videos: “Midnight Blue”

Tonight’s video selection isn’t particularly significant, and I have no particular memory or anecdote associated with it. I just like the song:

Lou Gramm was, of course, the lead singer for one of the biggest bands of the classic-rock era, Foreigner. But like so many leads from bands that peaked creatively in the late ’70s and early ’80s, including Steve Perry of Journey, Roger Hodgson of Supertramp, and especially Stevie Nicks of Fleetwood Mac, Gramm felt the need to go solo for a while in the late ’80s. He scored a couple of hits from two solo albums, of which this single — “Midnight Blue” — was the biggest, charting at number one on the Billboard charts for five weeks in the spring of 1987. As I said, I have no specific memory associated with it, but the melodic guitar and propulsive bassline always appealed to me on a purely sonic level, and hearing it now reminds me of a time and a general emotional background state.

For the record, I don’t recall ever seeing the video before this afternoon, so the imagery of a brooding, leather-jacketed young man in a long red convertible had nothing to do with me liking this tune. Any resemblance to my persona at the age I was when this song came out is purely coincidental…

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Aug172012

Moving Day

I’ll be honest, the primary reason I accepted the offer of my present job seven years ago this month was simply to get some steady work after an extended period of what’s euphemistically called “underemployment.” (This is a polite term for a truly evil state of slow, grinding torture in which you’re not quite a down-and-out bum — you are working, at least from time to time — but you’ve got no long-term security, no disposable income to speak of, and a dwindling sense of self-worth. Another word for this is “contracting.” It’s not a good fit for me.)

However, a second major factor in my decision was the location of my new employer’s offices, a 100-year-old, six-story building called the Commercial Club, which is situated on a quiet side street of downtown Salt Lake known as Exchange Place:

commercial-club-bldg
Exchange Place was the vision of a 19th century mining magnate, Samuel Newhouse, who wanted to establish a non-Mormon business district as a counterbalance to the LDS Church-dominated city center four blocks to the north. Described as a “little Wall Street,” Exchange was intended to be a rectangular complex anchored on its four corners by four identical office towers, all financed out of Newhouse’s own pockets. Only two of these, the twin 11-story Boston and Newhouse buildings — Salt Lake’s very first steel-framed skyscrapers — were actually constructed. Newhouse ran out of money before the other two could even break ground. But a number of ancillary buildings were completed, including the nearby Newhouse Hotel (sadly demolished in the 1980s, to be replaced by a parking lot), the Salt Lake Stock Exchange, and my home away from home for the past seven years, the Commercial Club.

Originally built as a recreational facility for the businessmen Newhouse envisioned working on Exchange Place, the Commercial Club at one time featured an indoor swimming pool; a vast, two-story banquet room; card-playing and smoking rooms for the gentlemen; and separate facilities for the ladies, primly located away from the men on their own private floor. And because Newhouse wanted the very cutting-edge in turn-of-the-century technology, the building even featured one of Salt Lake’s first mechanical elevators, which is still there and still operating — if rather creakily — today.

Of course, I didn’t know any of that when I started working there. But the atmosphere around Exchange Place was immediately and immensely appealing to me. Salt Lake isn’t like other cities I’ve visited; there’s little sense of urban life or identity here. People live out in the ‘burbs, the streets are virtually deserted after 5 or 6 PM, and most everything around downtown is relatively new and, frankly, kind of bland in appearance. But this little pocket of Salt Lake, this one block that’s bisected by Samuel Newhouse’s rebellious gentile* development, feels like a real city environment to me. It’s not quite a New York neighborhood, obviously, but it’s a place with the patina of age and the self-confidence that comes from long establishment, from rising and falling and rising again. I love the idea of a block that’s spirited enough for both thousand-dollar-an-hour attorneys and dive bars, trendy tapas restaurants and the Heavy Metal Shop.

And the Commercial Club itself fit my TV-inspired notions of what an urban, white-collar professional workplace ought to look like, with sleek modern fixtures co-mingling alongside antique decorative flourishes, just like the office sets of, say, Ally McBeal.

Admittedly, working there has had a few downsides. Multiple retrofittings have resulted in a somewhat confusing interior layout, and there have been the plumbing, heating, and insect problems common to any old building. You encounter strange smells in certain areas. That beautiful old art-deco elevator has occasionally gotten stuck between floors, sometimes with people inside (never me, fortunately). And Exchange Place can get kind of sketchy later in the evening, if you find yourself working late. (I’ve seen hookers around there after dark; there were reports of a sexual predator in the area for a while; and there was that big drug bust a few years ago when we learned the roast-chicken restaurant on the corner was a front for heroin dealers.) But generally speaking, I’ve been very comfortable in that old pile. Ancient places with colorful histories suit me.

Alas, the powers-that-be decided a while back that it’s time for a change. So starting Monday morning, I’ll be going to work in a new location… ironically enough, right smack in the middle of that Mormon city center that Samuel Newhouse was so determined to break away from. Preparations for moving 200-some employees and all their attendant stuff have been underway for some time, but it really got real last week as big orange plastic crates were delivered to each and every cubicle so we could pack up our personal effects. Most of us only made token efforts at that for the first couple days, because we needed things at hand so we could continue working. And of course everything on our agendas got put on hold following a power outage on Monday that was caused by an underground explosion. (The blast was reportedly strong enough that it lifted a couple of manhole covers several feet into the air.) But yesterday was zero hour… the moving company arrived in the afternoon, and chaos descended as people finally started dumping their belongings into those boxes. As one of my coworkers remarked to me, he felt like we were in The Empire Strikes Back during the “frantic evacuation from Hoth” scenes. Personally, I felt more like it was graduation day, a mix of bittersweet and difficult-to-articulate emotions brought on by the sense that some kind of era was closing.

As it happens, this job I thought I’d take just long enough to get back on my feet turned out to be a pretty damn good place to be. It’s lasted longer than any other job I’ve ever had, which means I’ve been working in that building for longer than any other. That’s got to generate some level of attachment, doesn’t it? Also, the Commercial Club has so much more personality than any other place in which I’ve ever worked, with the exception of the two movie theaters that will always be my favorite workplaces. Every other job on my resume’ has been in nondescript business-park type settings, and they’ve all blurred in my memory into a generically white-walled, gray-carpeted, cube-farm porridge. But the Commercial Club… ah, I’m going to miss that building. I’m going to miss the funky plaster cow-skull decorations that framed the painted blue-sky ceiling in the lobby. I’ll miss the “lava lounge” that overlooks the old two-story banquet room, which used to be a dance club back in the Awesome ’80s. I’ll miss the marble staircases with the worn-down troughs in their centers that turn so treacherous in wet weather, and the stories about a murdered prostitute who still roams the hallways at night, whispering to those who are stuck working until the wee hours. Hell, I’m even going to miss the gallows humor about cockroach crossings. I’m man enough to admit I had a bit of a lump in my throat as I walked out of there for the last time, out into a hot, dry Utah summer evening.

Our new environs will have the perk of being up high, with lots of natural sunlight and stunning views of the city around us. But a little research reveals that they were only built in 1986, too recently to have the kind of character and identity we’re walking away from. It’s been an era, all right. At least for me.

* Loyal Readers who aren’t from Utah may be confused by my use of the word “gentile” above. FYI, that’s what Mormons have traditionally called non-Mormons. Even Jews. Yes, it’s kind of weird. That’s Utah for you.

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Aug162012

35 Years Tonight

A lifetime ago. I was seven then. He was the age I am now, 42. And my mother was younger than I am now, as hard as that is to wrap my head around. The untimely, undignified, sadly unnecessary death of Elvis Presley, and Mom’s heartfelt, deeply wounded reaction to the news, remains one of the landmark moments in my developing awareness of the world around me, even after all this time.

And yet I’m not sure this anniversary has much relevance any more. Not the way it used to, even as recently as just a decade ago. Elvis still has legions of fans, and they still gather every year at his home in Memphis to hold vigil and pay tribute… but unlike, say, Marilyn Monroe, whose image remains as omnipresent as it ever was, if not moreso, it doesn’t seem to me like we see or hear much about the King of Rock and Roll anymore. I accepted some time ago that pop-cultural icons don’t endure the way we fans expect or desire them to — talking about the once universally beloved Star Wars these days seems to inevitably lead to an argument, and even the mighty Star Trek franchise has receded from the public consciousness, something I wouldn’t have thought possible during its heyday in the ’90s — but I am truly surprised that Elvis has lost his pre-eminence in the zeitgeist. It could be a failure of marketing — maybe the owners of Marilyn’s likeness push a lot harder? — but I suspect it’s something more organic. Possibly all those years of bad-taste fat-Elvis jokes and ridiculous impersonators have blotted out the cultural memories of who he really was, and why he once excited us. Maybe it’s something more ineffable. Whatever the reason, though, Marilyn’s image (if not her actual work or personality) resonates with younger folks whereas Elvis’ does not.

Or at least that’s how it seems to me. I could be completely wrong on this. I admit I’m not nearly as plugged into this stuff as I used to be, and the mass culture we all used to share has atomized to the point where it’s easy to miss out on things if you’re not following the right newsfeeds. Nevertheless, I have this nagging sense that Graceland may ultimately meet the same fate as the Roy Rogers Museum, which closed a few years ago because attendance had dwindled as Roy’s core fans aged out and passed on. I don’t entirely understand how something like that can happen, given how popular that man once was. Why does an artist like Frank Sinatra transcend the generations and continue more or less in perpetuity, but not someone else who was (arguably) more popular — or at least as popular — in his day? (Nothing against Sinatra, he’s just a good example of an artist who’s endured long after his contemporaries have been forgotten.)

Am I wrong about this? Either way, I’m thinking more and more that I should make the effort to take my mom on a pilgrimage to Memphis before too many more years pass…

elvis_young_performance

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