Historication: My Bucket List

When my friends and I get on the topic of family vacations, many of them wax poetic on their trips to the beach or Disneyland. Once it's my turn to chime in, I usually offer up something like, "I had a really good time when the power went out at Martin Van Buren's home in Kinderhook, New York," or, "Have I ever told you the one about how I got kicked out of the Rockefeller home for dropping rocks in the stairwell? GET IT? Rocks? Rockefeller?!" I usually then dissolve into a fit of giggles and my companions probably second-guess their judgment in befriending me.

My family's historically-slanted vacations brought me to more tours of historic homes, battlefields, cemeteries and villages than I could count. From Jamestown to Hyannis Port, I've traveled the east coast and beyond with my family, taking my fill of reenactors, historic markers and velvet-roped house tours.

Maybe to outsiders, my childhood seems a little bit warped. I had a penchant for those fluffy white colonial hats women in Williamsburg wore. (See G. Family albums for photographic evidence.) My American Girl doll Samantha and I wore matching outfits while visiting Biltmore, and my Princess Barbie dream bedroom was Alice Claypoole Gwynne Vanderbilt's oval seafront bedroom at the Breakers estate in Newport, RI. I also distinctly recall deriving serious joy from a hoop and stick in a motel parking lot.

Before my junior year of high school, my family took a trip to Gettysburg and Antietam that lives vividly in my mind today. After junior year, we hit up Emily Dickinson's home in Amherst where I took a photo of myself with a pizza box, which was a nerdy joke between my English teacher Mrs. Powell and I. Two years ago we spent my mom's birthday at the living history Pleasant Hill Shaker Village where some of the old Shaker family dwellings have been converted into individual hotel suites (with, I might add, the best TempurPedic cushy beds you'll ever sleep on).

I loved these vacations, even the ones where we spent significant time in the icy March Midwestern winds visiting ancestral grave sites. Maybe it’s the fall air or the political mood I’ve been in lately (you may have noticed that I’ve had politics and history on the brain), but I haven’t been able to stop considering all the little history vacation hot stops I’d love to make if I could get away right now. For your consideration, I’ve compiled a few below. Anywhere else I should keep in mind for future nerdy getaways?



The Mount: Edith Wharton’s Estate
I may or may not be a huge fan of The Age of Innocence. We’ll let that lie and just say that I’d love to visit Wharton’s home where she did a lot her writing. Even better is the fact she designed the home herself. How awesome is that? The Mount is facing foreclosure, however, so I hope that this spot makes it through these hard times. [http://www.edithwharton.org/]

Biltmore
Like I said, I’ve already visited the Biltmore estate while wearing this dress, but whatever. I wanna go again. This time, maybe without wearing that dress. This place is freaking awesome, and it was just a SUMMER HOME. A 175,000 sq. ft., 255-room SUMMER HOME with grounds designed by Frederick Law Olmsted. No biggie.[http://www.biltmore.com/]

Abraham Lincoln Presidential

Library and Museum
It is a travesty I live in Lincoln’s state and have not visited the Lincoln Museum in Springfield. This trip is on my short list because I think I should be able to make it down in a day. Of course, if I do go, I am absolutely positively visiting the Lincoln home and tomb. I will probably cry while I’m there cause that’s what I’ve been doing lately whenever anyone brings Lincoln up to me. (I’m talking to you, Obama!)
[http://www.alplm.org/home.html]

Hearst Castle
I have only been to California once, but if I can make it out there again and be anywhere near San Simeon, I’m going to Hearst Castle. One of my friends told me it’s like being in a haunted, abandoned, lonely place, and I think that sounds fantastic. I can also fantasize about Cary Grant swimming in the pool here. [http://www.hearstcastle.org/]










National Archives
Heaven is a place on earth, and it’s here in Washington, D.C. I really can’t explain it, but this place has been on my mind a lot lately. I’m itching to get back there and just soak in as much smelly, moldy paper as possible. [http://www.archives.org]

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I was there when we made history

I was lucky enough to receive tickets to go to Obama’s Election Night rally in Grant Park last night. The experience for me was surreal and overwhelmingly emotional. I felt lucky—not just to be at the front lines of this historic moment but also to be a part of a country like ours.

I spent the first part of the rally ecstatic, pumping my fist against my chest whenever Ohio’s results were pulled up on the Jumbotron and screaming, “THAT’S MY STATE!!” When CNN finally project Ohio for Obama, though, I felt quieter, calmer. It was as if I finally was allowing myself to believe that this could happen. I had made calls to my hometown in hopes to help Obama win, and while I got hung up on and sneered at a few times, I also talked with undecided voters who were truly concerned about our country and who seemed to lean Democratic by the time we finished talking, with Republicans who were voting for both a black man and a Democrat for the first time in their lives, and with other Democrats who were making calls themselves and who had voted in the early Ohio voting.

Here it was, Ohio’s electoral votes going to Obama, and I felt the pulse of the crowd against me and the rush of screams around me but I was floating outside of myself, completely peaceful.

By the time Obama’s rally was pumping celebratory music and playing a video montage that played on the emotions of a proud American, I was—like everybody else it seems—in tears. I replayed in my mind the last eight years of my life and all that has changed and imagined what changes will happen for me now—hopefully, for better this time.

But it was Obama’s speech, the full text of which is available here, which most resonated with me. In the last few months, I’ve been reading up a lot lately on Lincoln and feeling some strong emotions about our sixteenth president, so when Obama said the following, he truly touched me:

Let us resist the temptation to fall back on the same partisanship and pettiness and immaturity that has poisoned our politics for so long. Let us remember that it was a man from this state who first carried the banner of the Republican Party to the White House -- a party founded on the values of self-reliance, individual liberty, and national unity. Those are values we all share, and while the Democratic Party has won a great victory tonight, we do so with a measure of humility and determination to heal the divides that have held back our progress. As Lincoln said to a nation far more divided than ours, "We are not enemies, but friends…though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection." And to those Americans whose support I have yet to earn -- I may not have won your vote, but I hear your voices, I need your help, and I will be your President too.

Coming from such a conservative area, I know full well that there will be people who will never accept Barack Obama. That’s fine. But the important thing is that for those of us who believe in him, and those who might come to believe in him too, Obama represents a true shift away from that petty partisanship and negativity that has so sharply pitched liberal against conservative in the last eight years.

It would be disingenous of me if I didn’t mention that I wasn’t always such an Obama supporter, as evidenced even by this blog. But as the other candidates fell away and Obama’s policies took stronger form, I became one of his believers. Standing and cheering among his other supporters last night, I could begin to imagine a better America where our rights and freedoms are not stripped from us and we are given the freedom and benefits we deserve. I am so proud and just wanted to share.

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Halloween Update

When the Pygmalion Sarah Palin was unveiled back in August, I was still back in Denver, glowing happily from the Democratic National Convention. I couldn’t help but notice Palin’s side-swept brunette bangs and rimless eyeglasses, both of which I wear or own, and felt the call to Halloween action.

Of course, the Dressing Up as Sarah Palin for Halloween Express was bound to be one big trainwreck with just about everybody from Tickety-Tack Trannies to Joe Six Packs donning their own Palin get-ups for the evening.

So I decided to try something different, and this is what I came up with: Sarah Palin’s Forbidden Romance / Mr. Moose Whisks Sarah Palin Away. It involved a whole crapload of brown fleece, several trips to Jo-Ann Fabrics and at least one tantrum that involved foam and PVC pipe which we will not get into now.

Not exactly easy to maneuver in, but I had a fun time throughout the evening hanging out with friends at a few parties, taking photos with other bar-goers, and defending myself from crazy, crazy people who hate Sarah Palin so much they were willing to attack her Halloween doppelganger while screaming “I’M GOING TO KILL YOU.” To each is own, I guess.

Also see below for my #1 Halloween companion, Wall Street. :)

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Scary Female Voldemort With Fluffy Bow in Hair For Ohio's 2nd Congressional District?

Okay, prepare yourself for a Harry Potter reference. Remember how Voldemort becomes less and less human in his evil attempts at immortality? This, I’m pretty sure, is why Jean Schmidt looks the way she does.

I suppose that after you violate basic Congressional rules by calling Marine veteran and congressman John Murtha a “coward” on your first day in Congress, lie about gifts received from lobbyists, falsify your college education, tell voters you’ve been endorsed by politicians and organizations that haven’t endorsed you, plagiarize guest columns... TWICE, admit you weren’t aware of the financial crisis ‘until a few weeks ago’ and then air ridiculous commercials about the “success we’ve enjoyed” due to your leadership, and finally, wage a three-month assault on the fictitious Chinese drilling off the American coast that you've apparently imagined and then blame everyone (Republican John Boehner, democrats, then the media) for your lies, it becomes easier and easier to let yourself sour with age, baseless vitriolic attacks and senseless politics.

Of course, like the Cincinnati Enquirer reported back in 1984, this wonderful woman was calling young Republicans “young Hitlers” and booing Elizabeth Dole at the Republican National Convention, so I guess maybe she’s been this stupid all along.

Anyway, I proudly checked my ballot box for Victoria Wulsin. It’s hard to imagine that anyone continues to elect Schmidt into office, and I assume that those who do so just don’t realize how this woman is seriously embarrassing our district. I would beg Republicans and Independents who don’t know the issues at hand in the 2nd Congressional District of Ohio either do some research on the atrocious behavior of this woman or just skip voting for their representative altogether.

On a personal note, I might not be so angered were it not for the fact that I personally visited Schmidt’s office in Washington, D.C. back in 2006 to request her support in Congress to end genocide in Darfur. Upon arriving and waiting for quite a long time, I was handed off to an aide, not much older than me, who condescendingly suggested that it was so wonderful I was attempting to be so involved in politics, deflected my serious questions, questioned my own knowledge and then (!) tried to connect with me about my hometown by naming streets in it.

Totally insulting, but exactly what I would expect from Jean Schmidt’s office.

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Adorable Politics

You may have seen this before now, but it's just so cute I had to post it. These students at the Ron Clark Academy have been studying politics this year with mock debates and, well, raps apparently. Some parts are a little tough to understand so they lyrics are posted below.



Obama on the left
McCain on the right
We can talk politics all night
And you can vote however you like…

(McCain supporters)
McCain’s the best candidate
With Palin as his running mate
They’ll fight for gun rights, pro life,
The conservative right
Our future is bright
Better economy in site
And all the world will feel our military might

I want Obama
FORGET OBAMA,
Stick wit McCain you gone have some drama
MORE WAR IN IRAQ
Iran he will attack
CAN’T BRING OUR TROOPS BACK
We gotta vote Barack!

(Obama supporters)
But McCain and Bush are real close right
They vote alike and keep it tight
Obama’s new, he’s younger too
The Middle Class he will help you
He’ll bring a change, he’s got the brains
McCain and Bush are just the same
You are to blame, Iraq’s a shame
Four more years would be insane

Lower your Taxes - you know Obama Won’t
PROTECT THE LOWER CLASS - You know McCain won’t!
Have enough experience - you know that they don’t
STOP GLOBAL WARMING - you know that you won’t

I want Obama
FORGET OBAMA
Stick with McCain and you’re going to have some drama
We need it
HE’LL BRING IT
He’ll be it
YOU’LL SEE IT
We’ll do it
GET TO IT
Let’s move it
DO IT!

I’m talking big pipe lines, and low gas prices
Below $2.00 that would be nice

But to do it right we gotta start today
Finding renewable ways that are here to stay

Democratic left
Republican right
November 4th we decide
And you can vote however you like, I said
You can vote however you like, yeah

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Signs That This Election (Coupled With My Own Independent Historical Research) Has Mentally and Emotionally Exhausted Me

Last night I dreamt that Teddy Roosevelt, angry with me for apparently defaming the Republican party, was stalking about outside my house equipped with two black bears and one angry blonde mountain lion. What does it all meeeaaaan???

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What I Did With My Friday Evening.

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In defense of elementary school children everywhere...

I'm sure by now you may have seen the video where Sarah Palin answers an eight-year-old boy's question about what a vice president does. Palin does her best concerned look with knit brow and maternal smile, explaining that the veep "runs" the Senate and can "really get in there" to affect policy. The McCain camp has defended Palin, pointing out that she was explaining complicated civic issues to an eight-year-old. For the video of Chris Matthews putting a McCain spokeswoman Nancy Pfotenhauer through the ringer on this issue and Nancy jumping and bending backwards to defend her veep candidate, see below.



So who should be angry here, other than Chris Matthews? John McCain--because his running mate has a tough time stringing sentences together and has gotten mixed up before about what the vice president does? The American people--because it's insulting that a national political party would choose a vice presidential candidate not for her qualifications but for her yoobetchya charm as a last-minute effort to revive a floundering campaign? Dan Quayle—because he sees his great legacy of vice presidential flubbery challenged by this Alaskan maverick?

Nope. In fact, those who should be most angered are probably busy right now, playing tag at recess or practicing long division. Or perhaps they are learning Civics, and their teacher is having to waste lesson time reteaching what Sarah Palin got wrong about the duties of the vice president. It's the children of America who should be angry.

As I listened to Nancy Pfotenhauer argue over and over again that Palin's response should be taken in the context as an answer for a schoolchild, I was furious and wanted Chris Matthews to point out the obvious—that a second-grader could handle simple civics and grasp that the vice president doesn't run the Senate but instead serves as a tie-breaker when the Senate can't make up its mind; or the fact that if we all followed Palin's example, we'd oversimplify things so much for schoolchildren that they'd never gain a basic understanding of how our country runs or much else for that matter.

There are enough fairy tales in public education already. When in some history lesson Christopher Columbus was outted as the rapist and pillager he was, it was a little bit like losing Santa Claus. I thought back to my first lessons in Kindergarten, where in the week leading up to Columbus Day we read picture books about this international hero who brought gifts to America and back to Europe, who befriended the Native Americans and who looked dashingly handsome in the watercolor version of the story. With the truth exposed years later in another school room, I sighed and filed Columbus away in my "Believed That Once, But Never Again" mental dossier. To join him later would be Thomas Jefferson's indiscretions, Abraham Lincoln's theories on colonization, Japanese internment camps and John Edwards's fidelity, just to name a few.

I'm not advocating for a first grade lesson plan in smallbox blankets, but I also think that if we can tell children the truth and not insult their intelligence, we should do so. No vice presidential candidate who claims to be so dedicated to education should go in front of a nation and tell a child an oversimplified truth about American civics. So instead of condemning Palin for telling American children distortions, I will give her the benefit of the doubt that she didn't understand the issue herself.

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Things Currently Occupying My Brain, Preventing Me From Blogging

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Before you go see another quirky generational movie about being...

Tonight, college kids will pay their student ticket prices and pile into movie theatres across the country to see a movie that undoubtedly will speak to them, Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist.

I know because I was there in their shoes on this very night five years ago, paying $8.50 for a 10 o’clock showing of my generation’s movie, Lost in Translation.

I had landed as a freshman at Northwestern University only two weeks before opening night and I felt, as most college kids feel, like I had finally arrived. This was where I was meant to be—living in my totally awesome dorm with the coolest kids in a great-but-I’ll-knock-it-anyway college town, where I could finally eat fresh sushi and drink sake while musing about politics with other young liberals (hallelujah!) who shared both my opinion that God does not hate me for my lefty persuasions as well as my use of unnecessary superlatives like the aforementioned 'coolest' and 'totally awesome.'

But college also has this way of setting off a self-referential inner-monologue that you can’t shake. Walking through a gorgeous campus with your iPod soundtrack while leaves crackle underfoot doesn’t exactly help to curb your deluded sense of grandeur either. So you walk from class to class, high off Rousseau and that cute guy from Econ who was most definitely at least a sophomore, and you ponder your depth and your Friday night plans because that sophomore-dude is most definitely going to the party in Allison Hall.

It was in this mindset that I found myself on October 3, 2003, huddled around California rolls with new friends and waiting for our showing of Lost in Translation. I had broken up with my high school boyfriend the night before and was really looking for some solid ground, something I could identify with and find strength in. That turned out, I would discover at about 10:45 PM, to be Scarlett Johansson’s underwear.

Who was this girl who--while deeply pondering her life (like me! twinsies!)--wore headphones, stared aimlessly at citi-scapes and bounced around on a bed in Tokyo in her underwear? How cool was that? I made a mental note to find grandma panties like Scarlett’s and figure out how to make them so sexy. Underwear aside, I wasn’t in Tokyo, I wasn’t going to Yale and I was not planning on majoring in philosophy like Scarlett’s character, but her brooding self-examination spoke to me. It resonated with my inner-being, and this was my movie.

Actually, it was our movie, all of us. If you weren't on mine and Scarlett's side of the equation: What will I do with my life?, then you were on Bill Murray's: What have I done with my life? Many of us bought the soundtrack, some of us bought grandma panties (not nearly as sexy as hoped), and all of us talked feverishly about what had he said to her?? That whisper! It defined us all!

But then, four years later, we finally found out what he whispered: “I have to be leaving, but I won’t let that come between us, okay?”

And that was it.

After defining ourselves by our imaginings in that veiled mysterious whisper, relishing in the indelible innocence of their impossible, fleeting relationship, and coveting the quirkiness of Japanese culture and (by God!) karaoke parties, that was it.

Sure, I was let down in other ways, like Scarlett Johansson’s creepy, Pygmalionesque post on Woody Allen’s arm and Bill Murray’s disastrous divorce and the way the soundtrack kind of got old by the next summer. But this revelation was the final straw in severing me from the movie that I thought had defined me.

So a word of warning to you 18-year-olds or other self-seekers who might line up in the coming hours for this Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist movie and hope to find yourselves in the characters' doomed innocence or eccentric, impossibly cute behavior: Don’t hang your hopes on underwear or soundtracks and record the playlist yourself.

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