Catching Up

Minneapolis, MN to Saint Paul, MN

I get into Minneapolis/Saint Paul Airport yesterday afternoon and as Terrie arrives to greet me with Cherry my heart skips a beat when I catch a glimpse of her in the distance. Cherry I mean, not Terrie. Terrie is my mother; I love her but not the same way I love that car. I take it easy, especially around the sharp turns where the handling is archaic, and at the first convenient gas station we have a full inspection. Storage has been kind to her—no rust, no leaks, the light hint of dryer sheets and D-Con used to keep the mice out. She has the distinct and piercing combination of “new car smell” air freshener and transmission fluid. It seemed only yesterday I was forcing her through the Montana Rockies and learning what points are (you kind of need them to make the engine run) and that points failed after a few thousand miles. I notice a few minor problems: the high beam floor pedal sticks and the passenger side window regulator broke so I can’t roll the windows up all the way. The air conditioner isn’t running cold so it’s probably out of freon…all in all not bad for a forty year old car.

We stop about a mile from Terrie’s place at the site of the Interstate-35 West bridge collapse. It’s shocking when things like this occur and it’s particularly shocking when they occur so close to home. Floods, tornados, terrorist attacks, structural failures: they completely disrupt our routine and grab our attention because...I'm not sure why. It's just shocking. There are about 500 people along the Tenth Street Bridge that runs parallel to the collapse taking pictures and paying their respects. Although no one I know was hurt it's tragic that this sort of thing might happen at all. You can’t help but to feel a little vulnerable. I take my share of pictures and gawk at the wreckage. Like most Minnesotans I’ve driven that stretch of freeway countless times and now it lies crumbled and fallen in the hot afternoon sun. For a bunch of curiosity seekers the crowd is surprisingly reverent and quiet.

Terrie and I spend the afternoon reestablishing our host and guest routine. Usually when I visit another town I prefer to get a hotel but I’m doing this trip on the cheap (in the spirit of Route 66 I'm thinking cheap motels, greasy spoons, and gas station coffee) and I like the idea of staying with friends and family to save a few dollars where I can. I also tend to impose upon family when I go home for the holidays and often set aside three or four days to make sure I fully wear out my welcome. I always seem to forget that I can accomplish that mission in three or four hours. I absolutely love my family. In principle. The feeling is mutual.

I visit my dad and his wife Karen late in the afternoon. Dad retired Friday on the “rule of 90,” a trade union pension policy where age plus years of service totals 90 and you can collect a check. After thirty-two years as a heating and sheet metal worker he and Karen are packing up twenty years of household junk and moving to their northern Minnesota lake home to live out their days fishing with small-town locals (after fifteen years on the lake they’re still “the new folks”). Most of us know from experience that moving a house is a terribly stressful experience. It's useful to overlook some of the irritating aspects of the experience if you want to keep the peace. Dad and Karen don't really subscribe to this philosophy; instead they like to point out how goddamn annoying this or that or the other habit one of them has is to the other. A little loving nitpicking this is not. I did not make it up to see them this summer and I regret not making the time to get away. We’ve traveled and camped and summered outdoors since I was very young so not taking the boat out even once this summer makes me a little disappointed. As for selling the house, real estate has not treated him well. He bought a duplex in the 1980s and rented to a series of assisted housing eligible [welfare] tenants who tended to treat other people’s property like…well, other people’s property. After a decade of destroyed walls and carpets, windows and doors, he had enough and sold at a loss. Now they’re listing their current house in the newly-popularized “subprime” era of defaulted mortgages and declining property values. I offer my help in whatever way I can and wish them luck.

In the evening Terrie and I catch up over a few drinks and a light dinner at a little riverfront restaurant in Saint Anthony Falls, a historic district near her apartment. As we kick around philosophies about life and work and relationships a stacked skinny blond struts—no, bounces—by in a fitted flower skirt. Terrie’s eyes look like they're going to bug out of her head.

“You don’t think too highly of that delicious little number,” I remark.
“No, not at all!” she says.
“Why?” I ask. “She’s strutting and displaying what God gave her. She’s catching our attention, it’s interesting that when someone like her gets attention with her different look or behavior we go pro- or con-. You know, ‘What a sight and I don’t like it.’”
“Well, it’s not that I don’t like it. I like her skirt! But she reminds me of Paris Hilton,” she adds.
“And you don’t like Paris?” I clarify.
“God no, she’s a slut!”

That's interesting. I'd like to know more about what Paris is unlikable but it doesn't seem like the time or place to bring it up. Being a man may skew my perception of Paris and other Us Weekly celebrities, but I'll save that line of thinking for the long drive yet to come. Dinner is relatively brief since I have another appointment on my dance card. It's good to be home and catch up with everyone keeps me busy. It’s funny because if I weren’t busy catching up with people I’m not sure what I’d be doing with myself. Sitting around bored? I doubt it; at any rate I’m not sure.

After dinner I visit Tyson, an old friend from high school. Tyson and I attended an interdisciplinary arts high school together; we were the first graduating class at the new art school and lived in a dormitory together for a year. If the post-adolescent mystical self-discovery phase is something most of us outgrow we managed to get stunted. Tyson has introduced me to almost every significant idea in my adult life and I owe him a debt of gratitude. While my latest trip is about interest and emotional investment, he’s busy cruising the nostalgia expressway. He just got his hands on the latest KISS DVD anthology and invited several metal-friendly acquaintances over for an evening of wild raucous rock’n’roll excitement. Bad rock nostalgia is not my thing but I’m excited to meet some of the people he’s told me about. Stepping into his flat in Saint Paul’s Lowertown neighborhood I braced myself for the intense thrill of electrified macho metal energy.

“James come on in!” Tyson welcomes as I arrive. The place is full of metal guys and two girlfriends.
“Dude, your place is new right? How come you have cobwebs and dog hair everywhere?” one of his friends jokes.
“Seriously, was ‘The Elder’ 1980 or 1981?” another asks aloud, determined to the bottom of this burning metal trivia issue.
“You caught the tail end of festivities, bro,” I’m told by Mike, one of Tyson’s friends I’ve met once or twice at a local roller derby event. “Have a drink,” he gestures to the liquor on the counter.
“Do you guys have beer? Amstel Light maybe?”
“Only PBR, bro.”
“Oh. A Pabst is fine too,” I accept and take a seat.

The place feels lethargic and too bright, like being at the club at five in the morning when the house lights go up. Not a good look for me. We wind the evening down at a nearby anger rock dive bar, Station 4. Think CBGB meets Bloodsucking Freaks. Great spot for an ironic can of PBR and a Rollergirls post-bout party.

With a whiskey to steady my nerves I scan the room. Attitude permeates the place. The high art of lowbrow. Piercings and punk hair styles cry for attention (more accurately, demand attention and confront you for noticing) and get me thinking more generally about what attracts attention and how we value it: valence (the direction, that is: positive/negative, good/bad, right/wrong), intensity (how much positive or negative, good or bad), compatibility (a little bit good here and a little bit bad there), etc. The attention I get driving Cherry (I had five people ask me the year of my car today), or the attention we give to political debates, or the attention my friends and neighbors get when their issues call for my concern. Or is it that they demand my concern? Of all these things that come to my attention it’s fascinating that when the valence is positive (I like it) and someone is around to share in that liking, it validates my taste and reinforce our relational bond. I suspect that’s what having “something in common” is really all about: validation. Likewise when things that matter to me come to my attention and I feel differently those whose company I keep (different valence and high intensity) it tends to diminish those relational bonds. Maybe I feel we have less in common, or maybe I cannot trust that other person on matters of importance.

“What are you thinking about?” Tyson asks after I’ve spaced out staring at an underage couple making out.
“Nothing,” I lie. “How have you been?”
“Busy with work.”
“I know the feeling. Great party at your place.”
“Shaddap!” he intones in a bellow that calls out my sarcastic lie.
“Seriously. KISS is your thing and it’s nice to get out.”
“It’s funny, I wouldn’t spend time with most of these guys if they weren’t such die-hard KISS fans too.”
“Speaking of which, as the good host you should keep them entertained. It’s late, I’m going to have a soda and split,” I tell him.
“We should catch up before you take off,” he tells me. “And it’s ‘pop’ not ‘soda.’”
“Definitely. I’ll give you a call tomorrow.”

Driving out of Saint Paul I think about KISS fans flocking together. Compatibility and intensity about life’s little points of interest organize social bonds. While values are personal and subject to taste, it’s natural to have an opinion—a strong and emotionally charged opinion, or an emotional investment—about almost anything that crosses one’s path. Even if the thing crossing my path is inconsequential and irrelevant, if I notice it and I don’t like it, boy does that get my goat. I’m not a KISS fan, but I don’t have any reason to hate the band either. Emotionally I’m uninvested which probably makes me a little more adaptable when it comes to hanging out with a gaggle of music geeks. I can’t help but respect people with the capability to overlook petty differences of interest, to be unattached to the trivial, to just let the attention grabbers pass acknowledged but uncriticized. I’m reminded of the saying, “Intelligence is knowing what to look for. Wisdom is knowing what to overlook.”

Would that dad and Karen could do the same. Would that I could do the same. Would that we all could do the same.

Next stop: The State of a Fair