sisu

The look of love

Tuck and Sissy enjoying the good life back in the day. David Simpson photos.

The way we were. These two pics flew in over the transom the other day from our friend and former bro-in-law David, who's been digitizing fleeting images of our mutual salad days for the ages. "The look of love" was our theme song then — Who could resist Tuck's adorable sideburns, not to mention his manly strategic brilliance at the game of Risk? We weren't so bad ourselves with those big brown eyes, dazzling smile and long, silky mane — and this bit about the songstress whose "blue-eyed soul sound" is "seared in our memory" struck a chord as we googled Dusty Springfield this morning:

Dusty Springfield in concert, 1966.

Her song "The Look of Love", written for Dusty Springfield by Burt Bacharach and Hal David, was featured in the scene of Ursula Andress seducing Peter Sellers in the film Casino Royale. The song was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Song. The sudden changes of world pop music towards the experimentation of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, Summer of Love themes, and psychedelia left Springfield out of fashion.

Like the rest of our generational cohort, we had fallen at first for the Fab Four who fueled our adolescent fantasies of romantic love when they "turned left at Greenland" back in February of 1964, conjuring the furies of Beatlemania upon our shores. But our passion cooled as their style turned psychedelic, their "message" ever more vapid, "culminating" in the mind-numbingly naive and narcissistic "Imagine" (image and lyrics below). As our sis said in imail this morning:

The Beatles ended up being self-indulgent bores.

Imagine all the people
Living for today …

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace …

Which brings us to Evan Sayet's breathtakingly original take on "what happened" to the hearts and minds — and loyalties — of our generation in his provocatively titled "Bruce Springsteen: One-Hundred Percent Republican" at Big Hollywood, Andrew Breitbart's new group blog that premiered last week with a promise of changing the terms of the cultural conversation "to make Hollywood something we can believe in — again. In order to give millions of Americans hope." Sayet explains:

The “culture war” that we hear so much about is, to borrow Thomas Sowell’s phrase, a “conflict of visions.” Visions, Sowell explains, go deeper than mere policy – in fact they are the font of where we stand on the issues – and they are founded on some of the most basic and fundamental beliefs the individual holds about the nature of man and, in turn, the role and purpose of government, family, religion and all other influential forces that society has evolved. Sowell called the conflicting visions the “Constrained” and the “Unconstrained” and offered Jean Jacques Rousseau and Adam Smith as primary examples of the visions in conflict [as we are forever blogging here]. More contemporary examples are John Lennon and Bruce Springsteen, the former holding the “unconstrained” vision (which I call here the Neo-Liberal view), the latter the “constrained,” or, in my term, Conservative take. Just to be clear, yes, I’m saying that, while Springsteen the multimillionaire, rock star with the mansion in Beverly Hills may be a Liberal, Bruce Springsteen the poet is one-hundred percent Republican.

Sowell recognizes that, at its most basic level, this conflict of visions revolves around what one believes to be man’s innate nature. Is it, as the Neo-Liberal believes, that man is born good and then corrupted by the institutions of society or, do the Conservatives have it right and man is born with a dual and conflicting nature — capable of good and evil and everything in between — requiring cultural forces to help him tamp down the darker side and cultivate the good within?

Lennon’s iconic anthem “Imagine” could not be a better representation of the Neo-Liberal vision.

We're no Springsteen fan, of course, but Sayet's comment section is full of fans, some of them quite steamed at the suggestion that their hero could be anything but "a quintessential liberal." Sayet appears to have hit a nerve. Let's keep on hitting that nerve, and maybe something true will eventually get through.

Related thoughts on the cause-and-effect relationship between pop culture and the way we are now, from our August 2005 post "Elvis: The most effective American anti-Communist ever?" based upon a Glenn Reynolds essay apparently no longer available online.

My romance doesn't need a thing but food

"You never take pictures of my good side." Chelsea-by-the-Sea February 14, 1973.

Our hearts were young and gay thirty-five years ago to the day when Sissy (above left, ain't she sweet?) poured her heart into heart-shaped mini sandwiches for the guests who would stand witness at City Hall -- Mummy, Daddy, Norman and Catherine -- while Tuck (right) asked himself, even as he spit and polished, "Is it really appropriate to be cleaning your car on your wedding day?" Answer: You can never clean your car too often, 'specially if it's a 280 SL.

"It's absolutely perfect. You don't have to get dressed up, get into the car, face traffic . . ." Chelsea-by-the-Sea February 14, 2008.

St. Barts? Hong Kong? La Belle France? Singapore? Nairobi? Bangkok? Machu Picchu? Rio? Vatican City? We did it all in our salad days with style. Now'days homeside by the 'lectronic hearth with candles, JuJu's heirloom silver and Waterford crystal is where it's at.

Clue for 27 across: "They're full of dates." We love that red-herring kind of clue. In this case it sent us wild-goose chasing after tortes and palm trees before we realized the "era" of our ways.

It may have been Valentine's Day and our 35th anniversary, but the Wall Street Journal's weekly online crossword puzzle was still 24 hours away. The solution: Delve back into the archives to those weeks surrounding 9/11/01, when the puzzle was the last thing on our minds. Above, our solution this evening to the September 7, 2001 puzzle.

"I'll have some of that, please."

Baby Cakes loves our cooking . . .

Tuck: "Thanks for a nice time . . . Perfect guest list . . . Everything is absolutely perfect!" Baby: "Must have meat!"

So does Tuck, who was treated to a gourmet delight of filet mignon wrapped with bacon and grilled on the Jenn-Air, together with noodles mixed with a totally awesome new sauce (see below), pureed yams with coconut (similar to sweet potatoes but a bit earthier in taste), boiled asparagus with lemon juice and Pillsbury's bake-it-yourself "Crusty French Loaf."

Our totally adorable new Le Creuset Garlic Roaster from Williams-Sonoma poses with the inspiration for its design, garlic bulbs ready to roll. You remove loose parchment, cut off clove tops, pour a little olive oil over all and bake in the covered dish 40 minutes at 400°. Let 'em cool and then -- the best part! -- squeeze out the roasted goodness.

Our sauce for the noodles started with poaching a breast of chicken 20 minutes to be used for sandwiches later on. We reserved the poaching sauce -- white vermouth, low-fat chicken broth, water, sliced leeks and roasted garlic with chopped fresh rosemary and thyme and freshly ground pepper -- and added it to a roux of butter and flour, mixing in some half & half and grated parmesan before tossing with noodles. Mighty tasty.

"You used up all the glue on purpose!"

This 12" talking action figure of Darren McGavin as The Old Man with his prize Leg Lamp from "A Christmas Story" is ranked #29,856 in Amazon's Toys & Games section. The item is currently out of stock. Will McGavin's passing provide incentive for restocking?

"There has been a disturbance in the Force even more titanic than the recent expiration of Don Knotts," writes a bereft TigerHawk:

Darren McGavin, known to millions of us who "came of age" in the 1970s as "Kolchak the Night Stalker," has died at age 83 (scroll down for all kinds of pictures).

Damn, that makes me feel old.

Not you, old boot. The heart that loves is forever young. And not Darren McGavin, either. The beloved actor will live on for all generations as The Old Man -- Ralphie's bumbling, teddy-bear-gruff father -- in the timeless and eminently quotable "A Christmas Story." Trying to reconstitute the net-stockinged base of his shattered Leg Lamp, The Old Man spoke for all husbands who suspect their wives of nefarious motives:

You used up all the glue on purpose!

The Old Man is dead. Long live The Old Man!

Many ballerinas have risen to the challenge

Tiny's interpretation of Aurora -- the princess of Sleeping Beauty -- is uniquely her own, a dazzling blend of classically pure movement with minimalist post-kitchen staging, her kinetically challenging partner a day-glo superball.

"Since Brianza’s debut in 1890, many ballerinas have risen to the challenge of dancing the role of Aurora," notes the Eugene Ballet.

"Margot Fonteyn, Prima Ballerina of the Royal Ballet in England became an international star when she danced the opening night performance of Sleeping Beauty in the United States," according to Eugene Ballet.

Our magnificently contrarian Finnish-American grandmother, Julia Kock Loddy -- known in our childhood as Grammy and thereafter, once the great grandchildren started arriving, redubbed JuJu -- opened up unimagined windows of cultural magic to us kids long ago. She was the light fantastic in later years for the younger generations as well. The Exeter Academy boys didn't know what hit them. Looking back, we can only say Brava!  Margot Fonteyn, for example, was the name she suggested for our first Madame Alexander doll, an ethereal creature with saran hair dressed in pink satin and tulle with rhinestones and tiara. When it came to who should we be for Halloween, it was Princess Margaret and Peter Townsend. Grammy took our sister and ourselves uncountable times to the now-defunct Saxon Theater (?) in Boston to see "Lawrence of Arabia" in its first blush of full-screen glory.  She had read everything ever written by or about "Aurens" and adored Peter O'Toole.  We are reminded of the line in Cabaret:

She's clever, she's smart, she reads music. She doesn't smoke or drink gin (like I do).

September 8 was Grammy's birthday.  It would have been her 106th.  She did live to 92 but hated being stuck in an old-folks' home.  Her spirit had to soar. Like Aurora in "Sleeping Beauty."

Disputed treasure

After an untethered all-nighter in the wild at Goomp's last night, Tiny takes a day-long snooze upstairs in the studio -- with time out for a wakeful cookout-cum-shrimp vigil midday -- amongst family photos chronicling our own glorious youth.

"Museum treasure" read the double entendre frontpage, above-the-fold caption of the photo (behind Tiny, above left) of Miss Sissy in the day, way back when. "Disputed treasure" read the caption to the follow-up article inside, page 3 (photo right). We were working in the PR Department at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts then during its 1970 Centennial, and apparentlly the hoity-toity Brahmins who ran the place were not above a little manufactured controversy to draw attention to the blockbuster of the moment.  Some ancient object or other was allegedly stolen and later turned up buried somewhere on the Fenway, or something like that (don't remember the details but just the flavor of the moment). The Boston Globe photographer found the perfect photo op in the classic beauty of a pretty young thing on the Museum staff.

Update:  The 73rd Carnival of the Cats is open for business at Mind of Mog.

A proto-reality-TV shocker

Barbara Hale as Della Street, William Hopper as Paul Drake and William Talman as Hamilton Burger in opening credits of the first season (1957) of TV's classic Perry Mason.

"If you don't smoke, don't start.  If you do smoke, quit," said William Talman -- Hamilton Burger in the original "Perry Mason" TV series  -- in a proto-reality-TV shocker back in 1968.  It was the first-ever American Cancer Society anti-smoking testimonial by a celebrity dying of lung cancer. In those days it was almost unheard of to see a TV star doing an ad of any kind.  He had sold out. His career must be on the skids.  But Talman's testimonial was different, as ClassicTVAds.com explains:

When Bill Talman uttered those words, he was using morphine to ease the pain of lung cancer.  This former Perry Mason co-star asked the American Cancer Society if they would help him film this ad.  Please watch it. It was first broadcast after Mr. Talman died.

It's heartbreaking now to see the once dashing Peter Jennings of ABC's World News Tonight looking old and ashen, his signature suave-sounding voice now gravely -- in the Talman tradition telling viewers he has lung cancer.

The 66-year-old star journalist is expected to continue anchoring the news during the chemotherapy “to the extent he can do so comfortably,” ABC News president David Westin said.

“There will be good days and bad, which means some days I may be cranky and some days really cranky,” Jennings was quoted in US media as saying in his message to staff.

While Jennings's biased "anchoring" masquerading as "objective" news reporting rubbed us the wrong way and made him unwatchable in recent years, one can only empathize with his obvious suffering and brave effort to soldier on. He gave up smoking years ago, but as we know, giving it up doesn't protect you from tissue damage that may lead to the disease years down the road.

64 years ago today

Baby inspects roses from Goomp that arrived this morning.

"64 years ago they set forth in a snowstorm.  Love, Dad," says the card accompanying a lovely vase of pink roses -- garnished with eucalyptus sprigs, asparagus fern and baby's breath -- from Goomp. The occasion?  The anniversary of his romantic elopement with our mother when they were just a couple of college kids in love. They drove from Medford, MA to Manchester, NH and returned to their Tufts dormitory rooms the same evening. Their first night together as Mr. and Mrs. had to wait until the following weekend. The rest is history. Thanks, Goomp, for blessing us with your sentimental and enduring love for Mummy.

My romance doesn't need a thing but you

Tuck and Sissy say "I do" at Chelsea City Hall Wednesday, February 14, 1973, Mummy's birthday. Happy Thirty-second, sweetheart!

Notes from the snail blog (wedding album) of the occasion:

Justice of the Peace: Do you, Mary Loddy Jameson, promise to love, honor and obey?

MLJ:  I can't.

Love and honor?  No problem.  Obey?  No way. But we got away with a lot 'cause we were so cute and pretty in pink.

Mugged by reality?

"Ah! Li'l Greenie looks so stark over there in the muddy lot," writes a heartbroken Ann Althouse as she says goodbye to "The Little Car that Could" and gets behind the wheel of Silvio, the sleek, silver Audi TT Coupe (the 6-speed Quattro) that will take her where she's going from now on.

"I don't know if you've noticed, but I'm a political moderate. More than any ideology, I care about rational discourse," writes Ann Althouse:

In the year that I've been blogging, I've taken a lot of different positions, some left and some right. What I've noticed, over and over, is that the bloggers on the right link to you when they agree and ignore the disagreements, and the bloggers on the left link only for the things they disagree with, to denounce you with short posts saying you're evil/stupid/crazy, and don't even seem to notice all the times you've written posts that take their side. Why is this happening? I find it terribly, terribly sad.

We more than admire and respect this learned, thoughtful woman, whose recent posts about the air-bag-cushioned loss of her "L'il Greenie" VW -- who "gave his life for us" -- are sheer poetry.  Not to mention the grace of her writing and her artist's eye for heartstopping beauty in unexpected places like "a scrambled corner of my office desk." But "why is this happening?" caught us up short. It has been ever thus, at least in our experience.

Those of the right, who believe government ought to get out of the way and provide incentives for citizens to become proud, contributing members of society vs. those of the left, who know what's best for us and are into squeezing the money out of the productive citizens' pockets to perpetuate dependency -- humiliation, at bottom -- for the "little people." As for leftists' trashing of a lovely human being like Ann because she writes something they disagree with, we suspect that has to do with the left's current plight of waking up to find themselves on the wrong side of history.

Update:  Ann responds that she is "trying to reach out to the left and say: Behave better! Engage me! But I read [Sissy] as telling me that's hopeless."  Sounds about right.

Update II:  One year later, Ann's post is still alive and well and the talk of the blogosphere.

The ineffable pain of their loss

Christopher Reeve in his prime. That's how we will always think of him.

Our heart is breaking over the premature death of the courageous-beyond-measure Christopher Reeve. At the same time (that being said?), we are totally disgusted with the stem-cell harpies who are even now, before the body is cold, swooping down to use his death for their own political purposes. We saw a most offensive clip of Candidate Kerry speaking out the other day before Reeve's death, saying something to the effect of "I know Chris Reeve. He's a friend of mine." and then some inaccurate, Bush-bashing thing about the administration's trying to stop all stem-cell research.

Be silent. Remember the man. May he rest in peace, and may God bless all those who loved him are now suffering the ineffable pain of their loss.