Snakes and Gators

There's something about snakes that makes me jump. But I don't think I'm alone in that reaction. This spring I've seen more snakes than normal--including a New Jersey timber rattlesnake that I almost stepped on, and king snake as thick as my calf. And then there's the dolphins I saw while paddling off Tybee Island near Savannah, Georgia, and the alligators I watched in some South Carolina swamps. Ohio's wildlife proved to be the least dramatic and life-threatening: a small-mouth bass quite peeved to be hooked on a fishing line. Photos of these encounters (except the dolphins - they were too quick) can be viewed on the latest album I've uploaded to this site. Check out my Three States Wildlife Tour.
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Longest days

I saw a lightning bug as I biked home last night--my first such sighting since returning to the East a few months ago. A furious thunderstorm had just ceased pouring down rain, giving me a few minutes to pedal home and stay dry. These are the longest days of the year now. And that subtle shift of 1 or 2 minutes more light each day is still imperceptible even if the wonder of a wide-open summer hasn't changed since our ancestors invented myths to explain it.
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J-Jour

When I traveled through Europe six years ago, I naturally went to Normandy to see the beaches made famous by the D-Day invasion. I rented a stiff and uncomfortable bicycle in Bayeux, the town where I was staying at a wonderful hostel, and set off for the English Channel several miles away. My riding companion was an Australian guy I met at breakfast. And though he was 20 years older than me, he quickly left me in the dust. We covered 30 miles on a blustery late-September day, pedaling past the landing zones where the Americans, Canadians, British, and French soldiers came ashore. Flags of the Allies fluttered outside almost every building, while the beaches seemed eerily serene for monuments to such violent events.
But then I remembered that these beaches were only made battlefields by humans--and that by nature they are rhythmically calm places where water meets land. There had to be flags, and graves, and rusted tanks there to tell me that this platonic scene was once the site of a great battle. Without those reminders, I would have considered the beaches of Normandy to be a stirring place for a picnic.
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Going coastal

This year for Memorial Day weekend I'm heading south to Savannah, Georgia and the wedding of two good friends from my time in Edinburgh, Scotland. I have not seen Joslyn or Brian for several years, and I am delighted to be there this weekend when they get married. We will do a lot of catching up, and also guessing about the future. Which makes sense - because there's nothing like a wedding that is so much about the past and the future at the same time. Not only do I hope see old friends, kick back to some good southern hospitality, and tuck into tasty BBQ--but I also plan to venture to the coastline and do some low country kayaking and hiking. After all, that kind of stuff is job-related now.
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Backpacker wins an Ellie

For the 98% of the population that has no idea what a national magazine award is, or even that the magazine industry hosts an annual back-slap confab to reassure themselves that color/glossy print journalism still matters... well, it all happened on Tuesday night in New York City. And Backpacker, the small service-poetry magazine that I recently joined as an associate editor, won an award for best section - the front-of-the-book Basecamp section. Michelle Hamilton, now a senior associate editor at Runner's World, held this job before me, and she and the other editors who helmed Backpacker throughout 2005 did so much to earn this honor. And I hope that we can repeat the feat for next year.
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Red ripe tomatoes

This morning I walked over to the first of the summer's weekly farmer markets in downtown Emmaus. The parking lot of a local bank served as the site--sprouting dozens of tables and awnings to attract hundreds of produce shoppers, and the necessary kids and spastic dogs for the occasion. A farmer's market is rather natural in this part of Pennsylvania. One only has to drive (or bike) a mile in any direction from the town's squat stone city hall to encounter long wavy lines of split-rail fences and acres of pasture guarded by solid-looking silos. For the first time I'm living in a place that goes from city to rural and bypasses suburban. What a joy that is. I bought some tomatoes (violating a rule of mine to never eat tomatoes I don't grow - but they looked so delicious), kale, and soft Italian bread. Next week I'll buy my tomato seedlings there as I move into my new apartment and put in a small side garden.
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Far cry from adobe

I've settled on a new place to live in Emmaus, PA--a second floor apartment in a 'Queen Anne'-style house on the edge of the downtown business district. The house's towers, gables, and dormer windows are a world away from the angular adobe walls and jutting vigas that dominate architecture in Santa Fe. Plus, there's a lawn (with real grass) in the back just right for a tomato garden. My office is a 1/2 mile walk or ride away, and along the way I pass stores where I can buy Indian spices, fresh-made crab cakes, .22 ammo, and even get a tattoo.
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Hitting the culture nail on the head

Sometimes, and perhaps with greater frequency now, reporters at the New York Times catch a cultural phenomena at its birth. These are the articles you read not because you already know about the topic--but because they are utterly fresh and enticing. And I am not referring to those articles that attempt to cast a survey of your close friends as a massive cultural shift, like the September 20, 2005 article "Many Women at Elite Colleges Set Career Path to Motherhood," which, quite appropriately, got shredded.
But in an article dated April 27th, Styles reporter Warren St. John wrote about how MySpace.com profiles are becoming virtual shrines to people who have died tragically young. Okay, so most New York Times readers are probably vaguely aware of the Internet social community fad, and sites like MySpace.com-- even if it's from what their children tell them. And reporters have been trying too--the Times has run 86 articles in the last six months that mention Myspace.
But St. John's article, "Web Sites Set Up to Celebrate Life Recall Lives Lost," takes that extra step. He zooms in to examine 150 profiles of deceased people among the 70+ million that MySpace claims to have online. He highlights one website in particular that tracks these dynamic obituaries--http://www.mydeathspace.com/. A quick purview of that site enables you not only to anonymously visit the Internet "bedroom" of the deceased, but also see their friends and understand how they are reacting to their loss. It is microscopic, macabre, and universally fascinating. And I think it's good journalism.
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Harvard - it's in the name

A few weeks ago Gene Plotkin, a 27-year-old Wall Street trader and 2000 graduate of Harvard College was arrested by the FBI for allegedly running a global insider trader scheme based on tips from the printer proofs from Business Week magazine. And over the weekend, the Harvard Crimson reported that Kaavya Viswanathan, a Harvard sophomore whose new novel How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life netted her a $500,000 advance while she was still in high school, plagiarized several passages from previous teen angst books by Megan McCafferty, a former editor at Cosmopolitan and YM.
Duke University has received worse press coverage in recent weeks, but Harvard students and graduates aren't belting out the school's fight song in public, especially if these allegations turn out to be accurate. I don't believe there is anything particularly noxious about going to school in Cambridge, Mass. that encourages breaking the rules. Harvard is a college like any other. Students work hard or slack off, or alternate between a combination of the two. Students cheat, and they also get caught. Cheaters might be exposed at higher rates than other schools because Harvard professors use high-tech computer programs to catch plagiarized words and computer code. Most students cut corners to keep from falling behind. Those that cheat and succeed don't talk about it.
But more than having your roommate write your essay, or getting an early look at an exam, Harvard's main problem is the slow seep of entitlement that all students there absorb. Dining hall conversations are conducted through a warped prism that focuses all attention on this school and its importance in the world. Students learn that they are to be the best, first, and smartest in everything they do. At first most of this self-importance is imagined. But as the Harvard name and diploma works its magic, the bestowed authority becomes more real. It can also influence behavior. 'You are already the best,' the internal rationalizing goes. 'What you do to stay the best is not cheating, but your own cleverness.' Some people take this entitlement too far and blur the distinction between right and wrong or legal and illegal. It's easy to cheat when you consider yourself on a different level from everyone else.
But not all of this ego is cultivated inside Harvard Yard. Many people are quite willing to give Harvard extra attention, for both its triumphs and follies, which nourishes an already strong self-absorption. And as long as the rest of the world continues looking, Harvard students will continue to be seen--for both good and bad reasons.

Backpacker Isle

I'm learning that the archipelago of magazines resembles the Galapagos islands and its unique finches. Like those famous finches, magazines and their editors evolve in isolation to accomplish similar goals and overcome similar challenges. Darwin's birds have specially adapted beaks depending on the island they inhabit, while magazine editors develop tools to plan, edit, proof, and design that are specific to the attitude and needs of their home-publication. The balance of emphasis can be slightly different as editors weigh the importance of fact-checking, brainstorming, and even the internal sections within a magazine. In some places the difference is lingo. Printer proofs are all the same, but can be called "Blue Lines," "Proofs" or "Last Looks."
On the Galapagos, a finch who migrated to a new island would find an entirely different species with no connection to him. But in journalism, an editor who leaps to another magazine finds a world that's like a new map laid upon a something familiar. The destination is the same, but the routes and street names are different, and the new grid takes a little while to figure out. This is all becoming apparent to me as I start my new job at Backpacker and learn the environs of this new magazine island.
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Day Four: Home stretch

Today Jackie and I will drive from Akron, Ohio to Morristown, New Jersey--the final 450 miles of this road trip, and a journey between two homes for me. I grew up in the town of Hudson, a satellite suburb of Akron, and my parents now live in the Garden State greenburg of Morristown. My Subaru, which sports a "Learned Owl Book Shop" bumper sticker (the independent Hudson bookstore where I worked during high school), will bring its exotic New Mexico license plates to Soprano country. And this 2,000 mile trip out of the desert will end with a Passover seder of matzo ball soup and gefilte fish.
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Day Two: Arrived in Saint Louie

After two days, 1100 miles, and countless gallons of nearly $3 gas, I've arrived in Saint Louis. A few moments come to mind from my road trip thus far.
Just after merging onto I-4o East at Clines Corners, NM, I looked back and for a few minutes could see all the peaks in New Mexico that I had climbed or set foot upon, including Hermit's Peak, Santa Fe Baldy, and the snow-capped teeth of the Truchas ridge. I had never seen those mountains arrayed so splendidly, and I am glad that I looked back one last time.
In addition to a dozen CDs, my companion on this trip has been an MP3 version of the "9-11 Comission Report" -- read by a computer-generated female voice. Besides pronouncing the CIA as "seeya" and "NGO" as "ngoo" (not to mention the numerous and colorful Arabic names), this free MP3 version has been a great way to get into that report, which provides a terrific chronology on al Queda's decade-long and increasingly destructive war on the United States. I'm learning a lot of new things.
I am also remembering humidity. Cool mountain air was just a memory last night as I walked through Okalahoma City's "Bricktown," a warehouse district re-done as a trendy food and entertainment venue. A giant outdoor jumbotron showed the Red Sox playing in Fenway, and the moist night breezes felt oddly comforting to me, like an old familiar friend being re-introduced.
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Si, se puede

My last 'Santa Fe moment' might be my best one.
On Sunday afternoon I got caught up in a pro-immigration march in Santa Fe --a few thousand people coursing through downtown streets wearing white shirts and singing and chanting.
I originally thought the march was some sort of religious procession--it being Sunday, everyone dressed in white, and Santa Fe being a predominantly Catholic city. But then I saw the signs and banners, mostly in Spanish, with fiery pro-immigration slogans.
I was in the Plaza along with hundreds of bewildered tourists watching the boisterous marchers when an olive-skinned man standing next to me leaned over and asked, "What are they shouting?"
Huh? From a quick glance, I had taken him to be Hispanic, and was surprised by his request for me, an obvious Anglo, to translate the Spanish chants. But then I realized that he was an Indian from one of the pueblos (reservations) that surround Santa Fe. He didn't speak Spanish.
"I think they are saying 'Si, se puede,' " I told him. "It means 'Yes, we can.' "
The man nodded and thanked me, and then walked away with his friends past the famous portal where Indian artisans have been selling turquoise and silver jewelry for over 100 years.
I later did some research and learned that the slogan, "Si, se puede," has been borrowed by the immigrant rights community from Cesar Chavez's United Farm Worker (UFW) campaign from a few decades ago. Ironically, the UFW opposed illegal immigration, as incoming low-wage workers threatened the unionized jobs they were trying to protect.
Only in Santa Fe...
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Five boxes

That's what is sitting on the archive shelves in the basement of the Outside magazine offices. In those boxes are enough facts, hopefully accurate, to float a battleship. It's rare to see my two years of my life compartmentalized like that - but sometimes it's possible. Five years from now when those five boxes are carried away and destroyed, I wonder where I will be, and if their fate will ever cross my mind.
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Thinking about a move

I'm discovering that the logistical hurdles of moving across the country can obscure its real-life impact. These days I'm buried deep in a bullet-list dedicated to relocating to Pennsylvania--arranging a mover, finding enough boxes, deciding what to keep and what to give away, and planning final gatherings with my friends. But I need to think beyond my lists.
I'm realizing that the challenge of my new job and finding a place to live can block out the regret of what I 'm leaving behind. What is fresh eclipses what is familiar. And once you leave a place, you can't go back to the way it was before. Moving is like driving a brand-new car off the dealer's lot. That new car, like your old home, won't be the same the instant the tires hit the street. I learned this when I went back to Edinburgh, Scotland a few years ago. The ancient streets and stairways were still there, but my friends were not, and so the city seemed more foreign than I remembered it.
I don't know when I will return to Santa Fe, or what occasion it might be. But I should know that even though the mountains will still be here, along with my memories of climbing them, they won't feel as familiar as they do now.
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Reading Lincoln

The gist of Doris Kearns Goodwins' new history, Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln, is that our 16th president's success was not the result of lucky timing, his melancholic empathy, or an unhappy home life. Instead, she highlights Lincoln's persistent efforts to impress and eventually master all those men he needed to support his cause. For the most part these were men who were more famous, esteemed, and educated than Lincoln--but they never matched his political cleverness.
Lincoln was also ambitious--running (and losing) his first campaign for state legislature at the age of 23. In speeches he was concise, in appearance he was awkward, and in depressive moments he was remote, but in seeking support for his political ambitions, and those of his friends, Lincoln never lacked action and energy. In an age where self-promotional campaigning was unknown, Lincoln sought support through private channels and ensuring that his speeches were printed and circulated in newspapers and pamphlets. Goodwin, like other biographers, quotes his many letters to influential politicians and friends. Here is what he wrote to a potential supporter before his first congressional campaign in 1843. "Now if you should hear any one say that Lincoln don't want to go to Congress, tell him... ...he is mistaken."
History books tend to portray Lincoln as an inevitable 19th century political icon--the self-made, log cabin-born president. They neglect the fact that Lincoln was a political fighter--a ferocious party man who knew just which levers he had to pull to advance his chances for higher office. If Lincoln ran a political campaign in 2006, I think we would do well. He was just that smart about politics.
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Newark goes primetime

Finally, people are paying attention to Newark. NJ. Okay, so maybe only until the May 9th mayoral election. But I'm not complaining. Even the New York Times has devoted a blog to this big-top race between 20-year incumbent Sharpe James, and his baldy earnest challenger, Cory Booker. It's just too bad the media treats this city of 280,000 as the delinquent step-son to New York--a broken, corrupted city good for laughs when nothing funny is going down in Brooklyn.
Though everything about me begs the question--I've watched Newark closely since 1998 and know it better than any of the cities I've lived in. Here's what the media coverage of this race is missing:
First, Sharpe James is a former boxer. He plays with the press like a heavyweight toys with a bantam. And most reporters, with a few exceptions, gleefully submit to his pummeling. It's far easier to report a story about Sharpe James riding a bicycle down the 3rd floor hallways of City Hall to deliver his candidate petitions than to count the number of laws the city broke by siphoning Port Authority payments into capital projects like the downtown arena. I mean, the guy was wearing a straw hat and a tank top for christsakes! And since none of their readers actually care what happens to Newark, it makes for great entertainment. I mean, it's Newark afterall.
Cory Booker isn't that much different. Fresh off-the-plane reporters like to anoint Cory Booker as the incorruptible candidate and the city's next generation savior. The most excited are already counting down to the 2024 presidential primary when Booker would be a ripe 54 years old. He's Yale, Oxford ( Rhodes Scholar thankyouverymuch), Stanford and more earnest to accomplish good than Mister Rogers on Mother's Day.
Cory Booker started as a bright, young thing in Newark. In 1998 he knocked on thousands of doors to beat long-time Central Ward councilman George Branch--an old-style pol who never knew what hit him. I lived in Newark during the summer of 1998 and I remember passing newly-elected Councilman Booker several times on the sidewalk as he walked from his apartment in Brick Towers to City Hall. He smiled as he walked by.
Two years later I saw him again--and he had changed. "He's not in right now," his secretary told the line of Central Ward residents who waited outside his City Hall office hoping to see him. But he was in. I saw other guests, those with more "important" issues than shut-off water or broken traffic lights, enter through a secret side door to see Booker. He hadn't turned into a Sharpe James or copied the most repulsive habits of his fellow council members, but Cory Booker was no longer so bright and new. He got beat in 2002's mayoral election because he thought his shine was intact, and because Sharpe James bused in former Newark residents from South Carolina and Florida to vote.
The 2006 re-match is Booker's race to lose, and he knows it. He's more cautious than a Prudential employee at the corner of Broad and Market streets. Booker is smart enough to know that Sharpe James is throwing out phantom jabs and playing to the crowd. But James is just playing. If the mayor actually tries to seek re-election, Newark voters will resent being toyed with. Booker knows that James can't win the election, but that he can lose it by saying the wrong thing. Booker will continue playing the straight man in the race until it widens in his favor, or he gets really desperate.
Whenever someone asks me to explain what's the matter with Newark I start talking about toilets. I talk about specific toilets--the public restrooms located on the 3rd floor of Newark's city hall. The bathrooms for the council members and the mayor are immaculate, five-star affairs. I saw them when I was doing my interviews for my college thesis. But I also the saw public restrooms located less than sixty feet away. In there I found broken tiles, busted spigots, stalls drapped in caution tape like a crime scene, and urinals backed up all over the floor. Both facilities share the same plumbing, water source, and design plans--but one is for the people in power, and the other is for everyone else. Ever since I encountered this 'tale of two toilets, I've known that the symbol of Newark's failure to address its problems sits a dozen paces from the mayor's own gilded "throne."
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Going East

Yesterday I accepted a new job as an associate editor at Backpacker magazine--part of the Rodale group based in Emmaus, PA. Besides requiring me to change the title of this Web site (how does "Buckeye Bounced To The Keystone State" sound?) I will be moving back east in a few weeks time. I am looking forward to new challenges at Backpacker, and the chance to make new friends and acquaintances. In the past few days I've realized that there are a lot of little choices in everyday life--but only a few decisions that have the weight of years upon them.
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The Traveling Inferno

I was in transit this weekend. I was heading east across the country when thunderstorms over Chicago turned O'Hare airport into a pack of frustrated humanity worthy of the former "Hog Butcher for the World." I was trapped there for several hours as a participant/observer to this impacted chaos. They called it an "Air Traffic Control" delay--which I believe is the aviation equivalent to driving slowly when a downpour turns your windshield into a semi-opaque waterslide.
As I trekked through the concourses to find my departure gate, I noticed the curious transformation that occurred. The deeper I ventured into the airport, the more the architecture began to reflect the desperation of the stranded passengers.
I started beneath the gleaming glass and steel struts of the airport's newest terminal. I passed by Wolfgang Puck, Hudson News, Chile's and other denizens of the jet-set. Cyborg-like business travelers, electronic gear dangling from their earlobes, sipped coffees and beers with the confidence of frequently-delayed travelers. Plus, it's easier to be calm when you aren't paying for flights and meals. Here I glided along walkways under glowing fluorescent tubes.
But as I journeyed deeper into the airport, the wide corridors gave way to construction littered hallways, blind corners, and broken escalators draped in yellow tape. The information monitors announcing the arrivals and departures changed from crisp flat-screens to dinky RBG monitors dangling from the ceiling.
I left Wolfgang Puck behind, and found myself in the realm of Cinnabun, greasy pizza, and a forlorn Starbucks besieged by long lines of caffeine addicts. The air conditioning died out, leaving crowded hallways hot with unhappy people. Soon I noticed passengers splayed out on the floor like-war wounded waiting for the end to come.
From my quick study of the in-flight magazine map, I knew my gate was located at the far end of a long corridor. But when I reached the end of all paths--it wasn't there. Then I noticed the stairs going down. My gate was one of those basement departure zones--the cattle yards of airline travel. I saw people camped out on the stairs, their bags forming a hasty perimeter around their bodies.
I had little hope as I started my descent.
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Real genius

The weekend edition of the Wall Street Journal has a fun article describing how the chess team at Miami Dade Community College topped the best players from Harvard, Yale, and MIT to make the final four of the collegiate chess championships last December. Most of the community college's players hail from Cuba; a country, I learned, with a strong chess tradition. Miami Dade has done well in past competitions, but I believe this is the first time its Cuban chess superstars have been profiled in the national press.
The article described one player, Alberto Hernandez, as "a brawny 40-year-old security guard who studies English part time at Miami Dade." Hernandez arrived to the U.S. in a raft from Cuba in 1994. One of his opponents in the national competition was a 20-year biochemistry student at Harvard.
The article reminded me of a book--The Man Who Knew Infinity--about the 25-year-old Indian clerk named Ramanujan who was a self-taught mathematical prodigy. In 1913, Ramanujan sent an unsolicited letter containing several math proofs to G. H. Hardy, a prominent English mathematician. The undeniable genius of Ramanujan's equations impressed and puzzled Hardy, who arranged for the young Indian to come to England. Like a Good Will Hunting story authored by Evelyn Waugh, Hardy and Ramanujan worked together for five years, turning out incredible mathematical discoveries. But the young Indian felt isolated and homesick in England, and returned to India in 1919 where he died of tuberculosis a year later.
This story has always made me believe that the world's greatest celloist is not Yo-Yo Ma, but a child in Vietnam tending rice paddies who has never seen a cello. The best movie director is not Steven Spielberg, but an orphan living in the Rio's "City of God" who knows real anger and passion. The greatest writer on the planet is not sitting in a Starbucks with a laptop computer, but an East African boy herding bony cattle across the savannah whose only stories are the ones he dreams under the wide sky. Because of stories like Ramanujan and Miami Dade's chess players, I believe that there is much more genius in this world than there is time or luck to be discovered.
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