Maybe. I am definitely preparing to fake my way through class tomorrow by not really studying and doing this instead.

New York was awesome, but that may be because anything with F. is awesome. We went to the Frick gallery, which was… oh my goodness so unbelievable! We were looking at an Renaissance Adoration of the Magi and making fun of the angels on hovercrafts* and then I turned around, and there was Sir Thomas More. The Holbein portrait! (Although I don't suppose there is another one.) I am of two minds about More. On the one hand, I've seen A Man for All Seasons, but on the other, I like Richard III. I cautiously accept, therefore, the hypothesis that he was actually satirizing Henry VII and the Tudor Myth when he wrote his biography of Richard, but a)I don't know enough to know if this is a legitimate theory or not, and b)it does seem like a cop-out. I bought a postcard, though, which I now have on my wall.
*seriously. The background sky was full of these hovering cloud things with angels perched on them. It was very funny.

But it did make me wonder again what I'm doing here, being in New York. I love cities. I hail mostly from western suburbia, it is true, but whenever I spend time in a realy city, I love it. I like walking on treets, and watching people and looking at buildings, and feeling like I'm part of something. I LIKE being anonymous, sometimes. I knew this before I went to college, and yet I still ended up on an ugly campus roughly in the middle of nowhere. In high school, it was "in college, you'll be somewhere you want to be," and now it's, "in grad school, you'll go somewhere you really want to go." Which means that I'll probably end up at U Death Valley for grad school, with the proviso that, "when you get a job, it will be where you want to live." Ha.

The first rehearsal for the Monteverdi was tonight. It went pretty well, I guess. The coach only had baroque bows for the violins, which was too bad, as holding my bow out on the stick kind of makes my hand hurt. But she did say that she would bring the contact info for the head of that summer baroque program next time, and this is good.

David Brooks was his usual hideous self this morning.


April 30, 2006
Op-Ed Columnist
Lunch Period Poli Sci
By DAVID BROOKS
(My comments in plain text)

College is still probably a good idea, but everything you need to know about America you can learn in high school. For example, if you want to understand American class structure you'd be misled if you read Marx, but you'd understand it perfectly if you look around a high school cafeteria.

Of course, Marx does not purport to explain American class structure. Actually, he doesn't really purport to explain class structure in a socialogical way at all, but in an economic way.

The jocks sit here; the nerds sit there; the techies, drama types, skaters, kickers and gangstas sit there, there and there. What you see is not class in the 19th-century sense, but a wide array of lifestyle cliques, some richer, some poorer, but each regarding the others as vaguely pathetic and convinced of its moral superiority.

In other words: 'America is a classless society, because we all have equal opportunities to excel and succeed. Class is some outdated 19th c. notion that is utterly inapplicable to the modern United States.

Similarly, when it comes to politics, high school explains most everything you need to know. In 1976, Tom Wolfe wrote an essay for Commentary in which he noted that our political affiliations are shaped subrationally. He went on to observe that especially when we are young and forming our identities, we make sense of our lives by running little morality plays in our heads in which the main characters are Myself, the hero, and My Adolescent Opposite, the enemy.

"Forever after," Wolfe writes, "the most momentous national and international events are stuffed into the same turf. The most colossal antagonists and movements become merely stand-ins for My Adolescent Self and My Adolescent Opposite.

"If My Opposite, my natural enemy in adolescence, was the sort of person who seemed overly aggressive, brutish and in love with power, I identify him with the 'conservative' position. If My Opposite, my natural enemy in adolescence, seemed overly sensitive, soft, cerebral and incapable of action, I identify him with the 'liberal' position."

And so it goes. In every high school there are students who are culturally and intellectually superior but socially aggrieved. These high school culturati have wit and sophisticated musical tastes but find that all prestige goes to jocks, cheerleaders and preps who possess the emotional depth of a cocker spaniel. The nerds continue to believe that the self-reflective life is the only life worth living (despite all evidence to the contrary) while the cool, good-looking, vapid people look down upon them with easy disdain on those rare occasions they are compelled to acknowledge their existence.

If find it interesting that Brooks is coming out and saying that he supports "cool, good-looking, vapid" over self-reflection, culture, and wit. And… "culturati"? Yes, I know he's being ironic. But the irony is directed in a surprisingly candid way. You're better off having "the emotional depth of a cocker spaniel" than being an intellectual.

These sarcastic cultural types may grow up to be rich movie producers, but they will remember their adolescent opposites and become liberals. They may grow up to be rich lawyers but will decorate their homes with interesting fabrics from the oppressed Peruvian peasantry to differentiate themselves from their jock opposites.

In other words: the only reason I'm a liberal is because I was jealous of the cheerleaders at my high school. Oh, please, David Brooks!

In adulthood, the former high school nerds will savor the sort of scandals that befall their formerly athletic and currently corporate adolescent enemies — the Duke lacrosse scandal, the Enron scandal, the various problems that have plagued the frat boy Bush. In the lifelong struggle for moral superiority, problems that bedevil your adolescent opposites send pleasure-inducing dopamine surging through your brain.

Similarly, in every high school there are jocks, cheerleaders and regular kids who vaguely sense that their natural enemies are the brooding poets who go off to become English majors. These prom kings and queens may leave their adolescent godhood and go off to work as underpaid sales reps despite their coldly gracious spouses and effortlessly slender kids, but they will still remember their adolescent opposites and become conservatives. They will experience surges of orgiastic triumphalism when Sean Hannity eviscerates the scuffed-shoed intellectuals who have as much personal courage as a French chipmunk in retreat.

The attempt at bipartisanship is not convincing. While we nerds make enemies because of our jealous insecurity, the (manly) jocks and (all-American) "regular kids" just *know* that their "natural enemies" are those stuck-up, wimpy, effete proto-English majors. It's also pretty clear which side he's on when he makes the "regular kids" conservative and the (abnormal) nerdy ones liberals.

Because these personal traits are so pervasive and constant, Republican administrations tend to be staffed by people who are well-balanced but dull, while Democratic administrations tend to be staffed by people who are interesting but neurotic. Because these rivalries are so permanent, nobody has ever voted for a presidential candidate they wouldn't have had lunch with in high school.

If we follow Brook's own paradigm, Democratic administrations should be staffed by intelligent people, whereas Republican ones should be full of dumb jocks. (Oh wait…) But of course, what he means is "intellectual" and "non-intellectual," where intellectual is a bad trait.

The nerve is amazing: can he actually be saying that this administration is "balanced but dull"? Balanced? These guys? They're unbelievably neurotic! But oh, yes, those poor Republicans are just plodding along trying to keep the country on an even keel while the wild-eyed liberals try to screw everything up for the sake of their castles in the air. Oh, please! Why don't you make up a plausible bunch of lies for a change.

On the other hand, I can't help but apply the "well-balanced but dull" vs. "interesting but neurotic" line to history. Henries Bolingbroke and Tudor are wonderful model "conservatives," aren't they? Not so romantic as the Richards and Edwards, but good solid team players. Just what the country needs. I'm sure David Brooks is a Lancastrian.

The only real shift between school and adult politics is that the jocks realize they need conservative intellectuals, who are geeks who have decided their fellow intellectuals should never be allowed to run anything and have learned to speak slowly so the jocks will understand them. Meanwhile, the geeks have learned they need to find popular kids like F.D.R. to head their tickets because the American people will never send a former geek to the White House. (Bill Clinton was unique in that he was a member of every clique at once.)

The central message, though, is that we never escape our high school selves. Vote for Pedro

So, obviously, being a liberal geek, I'm not exactly an unbiased reader. But this just fits Brooks' line in so many ways. The important thing isn't education; it's character. The athletes and the ordinary, unintellectual, uninterested guy: those are the really good people, the ones who are mixing up solid American values with all sorts of complications and self-reflection. How can he get away with this? How can this be a country where it is not only acceptable but popular to denigrate learning and exalt stupidity to point of saying that stupidity is more desirble?

Now, to cheer myself up, I will do the Alphabet Meme:

Comment on this entry (er, if anyone reading this hasn't done this one already or wants to do it again!) and I will give you a letter. Write ten words beginning with that letter, and tell us what the word means to you and why.

I have the letter "n" from st_egfroth:



Nationalism. Sometimes I think that I could be a nationalist if only my nation were not what it is. But then, I do not like to identify with any kind of group, so this is not particularly logical.

Nemesis. I did not really have a nemesis until junior year of high school. She was a year older than my, achyvi's standpartner, and she hated me as much as I hated her. I had two nemeses senior year: my government teacher, and the girl who accused me of being only concerned with getting a high-powered, high-salary job because I didn't think a high school exit exam was a bad idea. I'd just like to point out that even then my prospective majors were history, literature, and music, and SHE was the one in the Business Club. In its proper sense of someone(thing) who hands out just punishment for presumption, however, I have always had nemeses. That Young Man from All State, for example, in high school orchestra circles. This does bring up the interesting question of "does one have to hate one's nemesis? Or would one just be impossibly goody-two-shoes if one didn't?"

Nebbish. I am afraid that I am one. The thing about a nebbish, I think, is that he (in this case, she) realizes his (in this case, her) own loser-ness. He (in this case…) knows how pathetic he is, and just accepts that. Do I accept how ineffectual I am? I think I do. I avoid confrontations, and just let the other side get away with it, and mutter to myself. I should be less inert.

Natty. Proper names should not count, perhaps, but Natty is my brother. He can consider this an official nag to get his Canadian citizenship befor her turns 18. It could be the way to save the entire family. Right, Natty? (If you know him, please IM him incessantly/spam his livejournal with this request!)

Negatives. I don't dislike double or even triple negatives at all. I have been accused of being a negative person, but I think this is because so many people are so positive and happy, and I like to play Devil's Advocate anyway. In AP French, I was fascinated by the chapter on all the different ways of making full or partial negation. I was very excited to finally learn the origins of the pleonastic "ne" in certain French subjunctive clauses this year.

Nails A duck walks into a conveniance store, goes up to the clerk, and asks, "Got any grapes?" "I'm sorry," the clerk replies, "we don't carry grapes." "Okay," says the duck, and he leaves. The next day, the duck comes back. "Got any grapes?" "I told you yesterday: we don't carry grapes." "Okay." The third day, the duck is back again: "Got any grapes?" This time, the clerk loses it. "I already told you: we DON't HAVE ANY GRAPES! And if you come in here asking for grapes one more time, I'm going to nail your little webbed feet to the floor!" The next day, the duck comes in and says, "Got any nails?" "I'm sorry," the clerk says, "we don't carry nails." "Okay, then," the duck replies. "Got any grapes?"
Il y a un canard qui entre dans un magasin. "Bonjour, monsieur," dit-il au propriètaire, "vendez-vous des raisins?" "Désolé," répond le propriètaire, "mais ici, les raisins ne se vendent pas." Le prochain jour le canard revient. "Bonjour, monsieur. Avez-vous des raisins?" "Non, désolé. On ne les vend pas." Le troisième jour, le canard est là encore: "bonjour, monsieur. Avez-vous des raisins?" et le propriètairs devient furieux. "Si tu y entres une fois de plus en demandant les raisins, je te clouerai les petites pattes grillagée au sol!" Le jour prochain, le canard retourne. "Bonjour, monsieur," il dit, "avez-vous des clous?" "Désolé," dit le propriètaire, "mais on n'y vend pas de clous." "Eh bien," dit le canard, "avez-vous des raisins?"
anas it in taberna tabernarioque dicit, "uvasne vendis?" "non hic venditur," respondet tabernarius. "bene." crastino, anas revenit: "uvasne habes?" "heri dixit: non vendo." "bene." cum die proxime eat anas et idem dicat, respondit tabernarius magnus cum ira: "NON HABEO uvas! quodsi uno tempore plus ibi venias, clavabo ungua ad tabulatum!" proxime die anas revenit: "clavane habes?" "non." "Bene. uvasne habes?"
(I'm afraid the Latin is rather bad, though.)

Needles I'm a sewer, and so I, as shocking as it may be, am able to thread a needle. I have always thought that the excuse of "Oh, I don't even know how to thread a needle" was an awfully poor euphumism for, "Oh, I'm a liberated woman who isn't going to submit herself to the dominion of the patriarchy by sewing." For one thing, it isn't a good excuse. Sure, threading a needle may not be incredibly easy, but it really doesn't have a lot to do with sewing itself. And please, it isn't that to thread a needle. It's hand-eye coordination that is completely independent of the actual act of sewing. Haven't you read any of those Victorian novels where Grandmother is always asking one of her grandsons to help her old eyes and thread her needle for her?

Nacre. I used to love to collect mussel shells on the beach because of the beautiful, shiny, mother-of-pearl insides. Now I've grown more picky: I only pick up the smoothed little pieces that have the nice color without the icky outside.

Nape is just a very good word. It's specific, but not technical. The odd thing is that is tends to be used in conjunction with "neck" even though it is sort of redundant to specify that nape "of someone's neck." It interstingly, can be also used as a verb, meaning, "to strike someone on the back of the neck."

Non-equal tempermant. Pianos are equally-tempered. We string players like to say that we have true pitch: we can distinguish between an b# and a c, for example. But really, what we do is what sounds good. It isn't based on absolute pitch or on te harmonic series, but on intervals. An f# is sharper in g minor than it is in B major, because in g minor, it's the leading tone. What we really should say we can distinguish is, say, an augmented 4th from a diminished 5th.

That was a lot harder to come up with than I thought it would be.