THING 1: LA DIA DE LOS MUERTOS.
For me, November started on the 9th at Tucson’s Día de los Muertos / All Souls procession — a mile-long walk of drums, candles, flowers, and memory. It’s a community ritual with roots in Mexico’s Day of the Dead traditions, where the living honor those who aren’t here anymore. I asked this woman if I could make her picture; she said yes, and as soon as my shutter clicked, she began to cry. Which made me cry. And together, we quietly wept for a brief moment. Without another word being said. Of course I didn’t know who she was thinking about, but I had my dad on my mind. My Da.
THING 2: THE UNCOOL: A MEMOIR.
SAVE OUR REPUBLIC! JOIN THE JOHN BIRCH SOCIETY! “The Birchers,” my mom rumbled—she was never one to squander an opportunity to teach—“watch out for the John Birch Society” she said. “One day they’ll take over. They’ll disguise themselves as Republicans and put all the teachers in jail.” This is Cameron Crowe, and he’s reading The Uncool, and it’s wild how fast it drops me back into the world that became Almost Famous. I’m eight chapters in, and just like the movie, Crowe’s mom in the memoir runs the house with a kind of fierce, loving, borderline-claustrophobic control. But in the book, she’s full of terrific aphorisms — and also a bit of a soothsayer. She certainly is close with her Birchers prediction; and early on, when she’s teaching in Japan before Crowe’s birth, she gets this overwhelming feeling that something terrible is coming. So strong, she moves out of the apartment she shares with another teacher. A few months later, a tsunami hits — killing a whole bunch of people, including the roomie who stayed in the apartment. And I haven’t even gotten to the part where Crowe meets David Bowie.
THING 3: MINX.
Looking for something to watch? I’m late to this one, but Minx hits a weird, sweet spot for me. It’s on Netflix, and it isn’t the amazingly-written, awards-season kind of show. Sometimes the ideas you care about only get heard when they hitch a ride on the vehicle people are actually paying attention to. Main character Joyce wants to publish a serious feminist magazine; the only way she gets it printed is by wrapping it around a stack of dick pics. Remember the guys who claimed they read Playboy “for the articles”? Funny thing is, the articles were great — and for someone like Joyce Carol Oates, Playboy probably offered the biggest circulation she’d ever get. That’s the grim honesty about building an audience, compromise, and how creativity travels in the real world. And yeah, I kinda feel Joyce’s pain — the one on Minx and the one behind the typewriter.
THING 4: THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION.
Minx doesn’t do it for ya? But you’re looking for something to watch, right? You probably know about the new Ken Burns doc. Maybe you’re already working your way through The American Revolution. If not, you should. I’m doing it, but slowly. And by “slowly,” I mean in 45-minute (or so) chunks—the maximum my brain can handle before it politely taps out. Not because Burns’s new documentary is boring. The opposite. It’s fabulous! It’s like being trapped in a classroom with the greatest history teacher who ever lived, hitting me with beautifully arranged facts until my mental buffer hits FULL. Turns out, that’s actually how the brain works: after about 40–45 minutes of dense information, we drift, not from boredom but from overload. So I watch it the way I’m supposed to eat rich food—small portions, savor everything, breathe between bites. Which means it’s probably going to take me a month to get through it all.
THING 5ive: THE TONE POETS.
I’m not an audiophile — my ear isn’t that good, and I’m certainly not about to start arguing about audio cables or turn tables or JBL vs. Klipsch (I’m a JBL dude) — but the Blue Note Tone Poet reissues are magical. Joe Harley and Kevin Gray are the wizards behind them (I had to look that up), and whatever they’re doing, it works. The fine folks at Blue Note just shipped me A Night at the Village Vanguard; I close my eyes, and for as long as I keep them closed I swear I’m in the Vanguard: small room, clinking glasses, Rollins’ horn right in front of me. I don’t know how they pull it off, but these records sound alive.
