No Filler

Post-Tribune music critic Bob Kostanczuk wrote a feature on Gary rapper Freddie “Gangsta” Gibbs, whose music video of “The Ghetto” from his CD “Str8 Killa No Filla” includes various local scenes, such as Embassy Liquors and the Village shopping center. One line goes, “Fed my daily appetite for destruction, now I’m rebuilding.” Checking Freddie’s website, I found that you can hear both clean and dirty versions of his raps. Here’s a sample of the latter: “"Every rhyme that I spit, real shit, cuz it's just another day in my life. Niggas betta keep the vest, tech aimed at my testicles, they gonna be vegetables, they gonna respect the flow, til I'm gone!” Say what?

Checked the latest issue of “Vanity Fair” while at the library, which features a pictorial essay of World Cup soccer players naked except for jockey shorts designed to go with their country’s uniform. One article arguing that Norman Mailer’s misogyny prevented him from achieving literary greatness quotes him as saying Congresswoman Bella Abzug’s voice would boil fat off a New York City cab driver’s neck. An article on White House state dinners included 1985 photos of John Travolta dancing with Princess Di and President Reagan trying to cut in while his wife was slow-dancing with her lover alleged Frank Sinatra (see Kitty Kelley’s unauthorized biography of the former First Lady). Ulysses S. Grant held the nation’s first state dinner for Hawaiian King Kalakaua, destined to be stripped of power when white sugar planters forced him to sign the “Bayonet Constitution.” I checked out “The Audacity to Win” by Obama’s campaign manager David Plouffe, who writes in a pedestrian style but candidly about mistakes that occurred along the way to the nomination – such as not doing a background check into loose cannon Rev. Jeremiah Wright (on the eve of Obama’s declaration of candidacy in Springfield, IL, Rolling Stone magazine ran an embarrassingly strident interview with the pastor, who was cut from the program at the last minute), becoming complacent after the Iowa caucus victory, and not trying harder to knock Hillary out of the race in Texas.

Picked up Kurt Vonnegut’s “Fates Worse than Death,” a humorous collection from the 1980s that frequently refers to his turning into an old geezer. He skewers the Reagan administration and the corporate interests who so easily manipulated the President. Observing that novelist Nelson Algren supposedly gave feminist Simone de Beauvoir her first orgasm at a Lake Michigan cottage in Gary, IM, as documented by her biographer, Vonnegut quips that “the only first orgasm I ever gave anyone was myself.” His masterpiece “Slaughterhouse Five” was censored because a character says, “Get out of the road, mother fucker.” He claims the happiest he’s ever been was in Finland coming upon ripe, frozen blueberries in the permafrost and having them melt in his mouth. Vonnegut’s an environmentalist (at the rate we’re killing the planet, he predicts we’ll all eventually go belly up like guppies in a neglected fishbowl), a pacifist, and believes everyone needs an extended family. Prior to speaking in Vonnegut’s hometown of Indianapolis, John Updike prodded him for background information. Vonnegut told him that other Indy native sons included Dan Quayle, Steve McQueen, Charles Manson, and cult leader James Jones. Manson and Jones, of course, preyed on others’ need for an extended family. Vonnegut claims he can’t stand to read his own writings, unlike me, who enjoys rereading my reviews, magazines, and other publications.

Sunday I played board games (first time in two weeks) and then attended a birthday party at Brenden and Becky Bayer’s. I promised to send “Brothers in Arms” to a Vietnam Vet who is related to Becky and the father of a former student. Someone gave three year-old Rhiannon a musical potty chair, believe it or not. Grandparents Janet and Mike, old friends, were in from Vermont. Mike had on a Progressive Party t-shirt (the progs, party members are called) and might be a candidate for state auditor. I had tried to get him over to watch the Blackhawks-Flyers game the night before (my Flyers lost 6-5), but he begged off.

Monday: outside activities at Tom and Darcey Wade’s Memorial Day picnic, including croquet, got rained out, but Tom still grilled burgers, dogs, and brats. Wee got in several games of ping pong and Wits and Wagers, in which everyone answers a question, such as in what was the polio vaccine first available or what is the highest elevation of Mount Everest, and everyone writes down an answer and then can bet on any answer, including ones own. The hardest questions have to do with what percentage of Americans think this or that, such as that they are smarter than the average person their age. Home in time, despite holiday traffic, to catch the opening face-off of what three hours later resulted in another one-goal Flyer loss. They are playing great, but Blackhawk goalie Niemi was unconscious.

Tuesday: I had lunch at Country Lounge with Anne Balay, who asked me to read her book proposal, entitled “Steel Closets: Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual Steelworkers in Gary, Indiana.” She mentioned that Mary Margaret Fonow’s “Union Women: Forging Feminism in the United Steelworkers of America,” makes numerous references to my work on “Women of Steel.” Fonow is head of Women and Gender Studies at Arizona State, where old pals Ed and Gayle Escobar teach. Ed and I co-edited a book about Latinos in Northwest Indiana called “Forging a Community.” During its production he nicknamed me “Il Duce” because I was so relentless in getting him to stick to our deadlines. After we left Country Lounge our waitress ran out to my car with my left-over meat loaf. Driving back to IUN along Thirty-Fifth, we passed several black teenage guys whose hands appeared to be protecting their crotch. Maybe, like in the lyrics of local rapper Freddie Gibbs, they felt a need to protect their manhood.

Concerning my efforts to document the social history of Hobart, Fred McColly quipped: “When does the destruction of Hobart's reputation begin? I am up for that...it is a sordid little burg, entirely too smug for its own good...a reality check will annoy the boosters, but they are delusional anyway and need to be disabused of their illusions.” Love it. He mentioned passing the old Dixie dairy building and other abandoned houses and factories and wondered whether anyone has “inventoried the wreckage of Gary’s economic decline.” He added: “I know the changes at U.S. Steel, like the removal of the rolling mills because of the continuous caster have been well documented, but what about the mid-range of failed industry and commerce?” Good question. Speaking of Dixie Dairy, years ago I bowled against some of their employees, and when something good happened, they’d interlock eight fingers, keep their thumbs vertical, and say, “Udders Up!” Found out on Facebook that Fred’s daughter Sarah, like the old man also one of my best students, recently got married.