It's Christmas Time in the City

Stroll with me through Boston's magical holiday lights! I recommend listening to "Father Christmas," a lovely song from the Narnia soundtrack, at the same time.


Two years ago, when I first moved to Boston, I posted holiday photos of the Boston Common, Boylston Street, and my then-hometown of Somerville. This year, I thought I'd post photos that are closer to my current home--the North End. They were all taken on my phone on a recent walk home, and I hardly had to go out of my way at all.

Fanueil Hall (as seen from Government Center Plaza)


Lambert's at Fanueil Hall


Seasonal Painting on Lambert's Windows


Entering Faneuil Hall Marketplace...and Catching a Glimpse of the Tree!


Getting Closer to the Tree...


The Fanueil Hall Tree


Going Past Fanueil Hall, toward the North End, and Looking Back at the Customs House & Fanueil Hall Tree


The Greenway on the Edge of the North End
The walkway gets lit up specially for the holidays, and this picture does not do it justice! Every time I walk through that area, I think to myself how wonderful it is that people will do something just because it's beautiful, and that these beautiful things can still brighten people's days, no matter how busy and stressed out they are.


Christopher Columbus Waterfront Park - right by the Harbor and the North End



North End Tree (by the Greenway and Hanover Street)


Hanover Street, the Main Street of the North End


Urban Italian Kitchen on Hanover Street


Modern Pastry Shop on Hanover Street


North Square - One of My Absolute Favorite Places in the North End


And while we're on the subject, New York is also a fantastic place to be around this time of year. I was recently at a conference there (Social Media for Pharmaceutical Companies) and got to see the famous Rockefeller Center tree and Fifth Avenue shops decorated for Christmas. If you're looking to change your soundtrack for your perusal of this blog post, I'd recommend this performance of "New York at Christmas" by the Radio City Rockettes (whom I saw in Boston last week--they were so fun!).


Rockefeller Center Tree


And This is Me, with the Tree, Wishing All of Thee a Merry Christmas from NYC!

The Sequel

What happens after one’s epic story has unfolded? It’s the part of the play when the curtain falls, the part of the movie when the credits roll, the page of the book that reads with finality, “THE END.” And we all know that sequels to such epic narratives fall flat. The story was complete and beautiful as it was, so why try to add to it?

But when it’s your own life, you have to go on living that sequel. And every subsequent sequel after that. I know this sounds melodramatic and self-aggrandizing, but to me, moving to Boston and making a life here for myself felt epic. Two years ago, I packed up an SUV that I’d had to pay the “underage” fee to rent after quitting a full-time job in the worst economy since the Depression to get a Master’s degree in publishing – a field which some would say is dying or at least uncertain and which everyone would say you don’t need a Master’s in. The rational side of me knew all this and wondered whether I was making a big mistake.

But the idealist in me, the optimist that is never quite silenced despite all the events and thoughts that make me cynical, dared to dream. I imagined throwing caution and planning to the wind just for once. I saw myself walking the streets of Boston with surety, with confidence, with grace, and preferably while wearing a nice montage of stylish outfits. I saw myself getting a job that actually inspires me, earning a Master’s, and moving into a chic little studio. I hoped for all this fervently...and it has all happened, even down to getting my own studio – a perfect place for just starting out in the world.

So what’s next? Now that the personal legend I worked to fulfill over the past two years has been reached, what now do I pursue? I think a psychologically healthy person would just be happy and rejoice for a few moments in their triumph. But the truth is that I’m not happy unless I’m accomplishing something, preferably something that seems impossible. Yet, at the same time, I’m really exhausted. Sometimes I can barely muster up the energy to do much after work besides watch TV, much less to set out on another epic adventure.

How long until I need a new Boston?

When I was debating whether or not to move out here, the song “Boston” by Augustana was my constant soundtrack [with my personal changes in bold]:

She said I think I'll go to Boston
I think I'll start a new life,
I think I'll start it over, where no one knows my name,
I'll get out of California [Minnesota], I'm tired of the weather,
I think I'll get a lover and fly him out to Spain
[I think I’ll get a Master’s and visit Jamaica Plain]
Oh yeah and I think I'll go to Boston,
I think that I'm just tired
I think I need a new town, to leave this all behind
I think I need a sunrise, I'm tired of the sunset,
I hear it's nice in the summer, some snow [ocean] would be nice

So what happens when people know her name in Boston? What happens when the sun that rose over Boston starts to set?

To clarify, I mean all of this metaphorically. I’m not planning on leaving Boston any time soon because I love my job and I fit in this town. But I need a new mountain to climb, a new challenge to tackle, a new story to enter into.

Maybe I should work to stop human trafficking or maybe I should run the Boston Marathon. Maybe I should write a book.

Or maybe I could find a way to be happy without being in pursuit of a goal. One of my New Year’s resolutions this year was to be more laidback. Actually, that’s the PG version of the resolution. The actual words I wrote in my journal were to “stop being such a bitch.” Now, mostly people laughed when I told them that because apparently I don’t come across as a bitch. And that’s better than the alternative, for sure. But I know my ambitious heart, and I know that I have within me the fire to stop at nothing to accomplish a goal. So apparently I thought the cure to this was to set a goal to be more spontaneous and more laidback. What stepping stones can I set for myself to try to enjoy life more and to take time to stop and smell the roses?

I don’t think I will come to any answers today. But I can at least tie the bow on a different item:

Operation: Defeat IKEA, Part 2
The thrilling conclusion to my epic battle against IKEA is that I hired movers and they disassembled and reassembled my bed. Like I said, thrilling. But they did say that this was the most complicated bed they’ve ever dealt with.

My Life in Review + Operation: Defeat IKEA, Part 1

Since it's been almost a year since I've written in this blog, here's a quick recap of the major events in my life: I graduated from Emerson and am officially a MASTER OF PUBLISHING AND WRITING. Oh yeah, you are all intimidated by that prestigious degree. I mean, on the scale of prestige, a J.D. gets the bronze medal, an M.D. gets the silver, and an M.A. in publishing is far and away the gold medalist.

Additionally, I got a full-time, non-temp job at Genzyme. I moved from the legal department to the fabulous CORPORATE COMMUNICATIONS department where I get to write articles and tweets and update the website, etc. In the blog post where I mentioned that I got the temp legal job, I just said I was working at "a biotech company" because I was somehow under the impression that someone at Genzyme was monitoring an RSS feed that would show them any time the word "Genzyme" was mentioned and that they would henceforth monitor my blog. This now sounds extremely paranoid and rather laughable to me. I'm pretty sure that as long as I don't stupidly post anything labeled "internal and confidential" to this blog, I can safely mention the name of the company where I work. :-) In any case, it's a great job and I'm thrilled to have a paid writing gig. Also, I think this job might actually save me from my addiction to school because it's interesting and challenging enough that I won't feel like I am shrivelling up intellectually and creatively without my classes. This is a good thing because I really don't have the time or money to go back to school for another degree right now, and I don't need one for my future career pursuits. But I might be singing another tune in a year or so.



The third piece of big news is that I'm moving to the North End next month! I found a lovely little studio and I'm thrilled to be living alone and closer to THE CITY. (Please note that the picture above is actually of me standing in a re-creation of Thoreau's cabin, which I visited with my parents when they came here for my graduation. My studio may be about the same size as Thoreau's house but is much sunnier. Like Thoreau, I can say that I moved there because "I wanted to live deliberately.") The new studio brings me to the other part of this blog post:

Operation: Defeat IKEA, Part 1

When I moved to Boston two years ago, I purchased the most fantastic IKEA daybed imaginable. It is part bed, part couch, part storage space. It's beautiful and practical and ideal for apartment life. In fact, I purchased it with this day in mind--the day when I would be able to move into my very own minuscule studio. It was a dream worth dreaming, and one that is finally going to be fulfilled.



However, now that the day has arrived, I have discovered a flaw in my plan. My IKEA bed, now fully assembled, won't fit through my bedroom door nor will it fit through my new studio's door. So I have to disassemble it. With normal furniture, that would be no big deal. But IKEA furniture is anything but normal; in fact, this bed--though perfect and beautiful and ideal when fully assembled--was likely designed by the minions of the anti-Christ (my apologies to Carina Bengs, who is the actual designer). When my friend Ann was helping me move out here, she also helped me assemble some of my IKEA furniture. She was assembling this daybed while I was assembling my dresser. She got to a point in the instructions where two people were necessary, but the picture did not show two of those cartoon IKEA people helping each other out, so of course she assumed she could do it herself. (We had to put blind faith in those IKEA instructions, mind you.) The largest piece of the bed came crashing down on her foot, ripping off her toenail and spewing her blood all over the bed and floor. So the bed has already scored a point against the human race, and now it's out to score another one. But I am determined that it will not.



I have figured out exactly which cheap IKEA screws need to be removed in order for the bed to be disassembled into four manageable pieces that will fit through a standard-sized door frame. One problem is that some of the screws are so cheap that they have been stripped; the bigger problem is that four screws are the dreaded lock-screw combination:



You screw one metal screw into a hollow metal screw, which locks it in place. I'm pretty sure you're never supposed to be able to unscrew them once they are assembled. However, this is the perfect bed and I will not give up without a fight and a (possibly fatal) attempt to use power tools to accomplish my goal. If I die trying to disassemble this bed, then this blog post can be my eulogy and it can also provide evidence for a conviction in court when the best lawyers from Lockhart/Gardner bring IKEA products to the stand. (I have become a huge fan of The Good Wife over the past few months, hence the somewhat forced reference to the law firm in the show, Lockhart/Gardner.)

I know it's dangerous to promise a future blog post, but my plan is to keep you updated on how my fight against this IKEA bed goes. And I also hope to write in this blog more regularly, now that I no longer have classes for four hours two nights a week, plus an endless stream of homework. We shall see how both of these endeavors turn out.

Comcast "Cares"

"Thank you for calling Comcast. Please make yourself comfortable. For nondescript jazz, please press 1. To hear reassuring lies like 'A customer service representative will be with you shortly,' press 2. For blaring heavy metal that you can hear in the next room if you decide to set the phone down in an effort to avoid wasting your life on hold, press 3." I would have chosen the third option this morning.

It all began with a monthly cable bill that was twice as high as normal. Of course, I figured that our fabulous promotional rates had run out, and I would just need to change my service plan to pay a more reasonable amount. Should have been simple, right? I was probably naive to think so. I tried to log in at Comcast's website and they told me that my account already had an email address linked to it and that I wasn't using the right one. So I figured that the email address was my old roommate's, since she was the one who'd originally opened the account.

Given that I had no time to wait on hold, I decided to follow the website's cheery suggestion to email them and receive a quick, helpful response within twenty-four hours. I received an incredibly understanding, comforting email with no real content. This is an actual direct quote:

I understand you would like to know why the total amount due is more than what it has been in the past and that you cannot log in to your online account using your non Comcast email address. I apologize for the confusion this high bill charges has caused you and I completely know the importance of having able to access your account online. Please do not worry; I am here to provide the necessary information about your bill and how you can get your user ID and password.

Oh, good. I feel so soothed. After I sent a follow-up email, Comcast finally gave me directions for how to solve my problem: I should close my current account to get rid of my old roommate's information and open a new one by clicking on a particular link and choosing new services. This sounded easy enough, so I decided to take care of it this morning as I was drinking my pre-work cup of coffee.

Big mistake.

The final step was a Live Chat in which the rep said that I couldn't possibly do what I was trying to do without calling Comcast. "I’m sorry; we cannot process your request at this time. Please call [phone number]." Since Comcast continually boasts that its email and Live Chat services are just as good as its phone services, I said something like, "I was following the directions in an email; please work with me to resolve this issue." The person—whom I was beginning to suspect to be a computer—pretty much repeated the exact sentence about not being able to process my order. It seems that email and Live Chat are just fancy ways for Comcast to avoid helping its customers.

Then I asked, "Why didn't the email just tell me to call instead of directing me to the Live Chat?" The rep started typing something and then changed his mind and typed something else, so I decided he must actually be a real person. He basically said he didn't know and repeated that I had to call the number. To which I responded: "Fine. Thanks for your 'help.'" I couldn't resist the sarcastic quotation marks, even though they are the most obnoxious thing in the world, and then of course I felt bad about it.

After all, it hasn't been that long since I've had a terrible customer service job; I know that he's just following some instructions in a manual and that part of his training was probably something like: "Don't innovate; don't use your problem-solving skills; just do exactly what the manual says." Because that's how big companies are. They treat their employees like idiots so that they can justify paying them diddly squat. So it's pretty sad that right after I'd decided this Live Chat rep was a real person, I treated him like he wasn't one.

At this point, I was already running late. I should have just postponed my call to Comcast. But I was frustrated and wanted to start out my day by solving this problem, not letting it drag on and on. So I called the customer service number and went through several rounds of "for [this problem], press 1." Then I got to the dreaded automated voice: "Thank you for calling Comcast. All available representatives are assisting other customers. Your estimated wait time is nine minutes." Okay, I thought, I can handle nine minutes. Don't ask me why I ever believe these automated voices.

So I started getting ready with the phone wedged in between my chin and my shoulder. The background music was so quiet that I could barely hear it when the phone was jammed against my ear, much less when I put it down momentarily to apply foundation or pull a shirt over my head. Putting on my makeup was the most amusing. I had my phone on my vanity, and I kept bending over to listen. If I didn't hear anything, I'd say, "Hello? Hello?" And of course, no one was there.

After at least forty minutes, as I was walking to the bus (a later one than I usually take), someone finally answered. I was out of breath from hurrying to the bus so when he asked me to describe the problem, I probably sounded like I was about to have a breakdown. I really wasn't; I had calmed down since the Live Chat incident. In fact, when he asked how I was doing, I nicely told him about my difficulties but assured him that I knew it wasn't his fault.

Anyways, he solved my problems beautifully. He actually seemed to want to answer my questions and find solutions. I'm getting the services I want at a reasonable rate, and I don't have to close my account and re-open it. (This would have involved paying for another installation, waiting around for four hours for the cable guy to come, and then having to deal with reconnecting my wireless adapter, which always causes an excessive amount of problems.) And best of all, the new services will begin immediately so I won't have to pay double for the month of July.

Though Comcast doesn’t care, at least one of its employees does.

The Boys from Little Mexico--A Review

Books like Steve Wilson's The Boys from Little Mexico (Beacon Press, June 2010) are exactly why I want to go into publishing. I've had a lifelong obsession with beautiful writing and compelling narratives, and more recently, I've developed a passion for works of art and literature that promote true understanding among people and groups who might not otherwise come into contact with each other. The Boys from Little Mexico is one of those rare gems of literary non-fiction that both exhibits excellent writing and opens the reader's eyes to the lives of fellow human beings.

Chronicling the season of an all-Hispanic high school soccer team, The Boys from Little Mexico is about so much more than sports. Perhaps most importantly, it is about the meaning of sports for the players and coaches we meet while reading it. Some of these boys knew that a soccer scholarship was their only shot at a four-year college education; others acknowledged that soccer gave them a reason not to drop out of high school. But on a more abstract level, soccer had the potential to give them a vision of success, a feeling of self-confidence, and a commitment to hard work. But, consequently, losses on the field sometimes seemed to portend weightier, life-altering losses.

Anyone who wishes to understand the nuanced and so very human elements behind immigration and education policies should read this book. Meet Octavio, who as a young teenager made the decision to make the dangerous trek across the Mexican/American border with no papers and go to school and play soccer in the U.S. Meet Carlos, who had to be taken from his birth mother when he was 5 years old and watch out for his younger siblings in three different foster homes before graduating from high school. Meet Coach Mike Flannigan, an Irish-American who continually seeks to understand his players better and help them succeed both on and off the field.

But even though this book deals with important, heavy issues, it doesn't feel like one of those books we all know we "should" read but don't really want to. On the contrary, the writing is quite engaging. On multiple occasions, I wasn't able to put the book down after I got off the subway so I kept reading it while walking to work! Even though I'm not really a sports fan, I was drawn into the fast-paced soccer games and even found myself holding my breath to find out if the ball would successfully make it between the goal posts. Steve Wilson manages to write these scenes in a way that soccer fans and neophytes alike will be able to visualize and experience the games much as they would if they were actually in the stands (and in the case of neophytes like me, we understand what's going on much better than we would if we were just watching a game). Similarly, Wilson's descriptions of political policies bear immediate relevancy to the lives of those in the story and, as such, manifest the complexities and importance of these issues while advancing the book's enthralling narrative. I highly recommend The Boys from Little Mexico to anyone who cares about education, immigration, sports, or just a really good story.

Why I moved to Boston, with a tasty dose of feminism, from ch. 12 of Jane Eyre

Anybody may blame me who likes, when I add further, that, now and then, when I took a walk by myself in the grounds; when I went down to the gates and looked through them along the road; or when, while Adele played with her nurse, and Mrs. Fairfax made jellies in the storeroom, I climbed the three staircases, raised the trap-door of the attic, and having reached the leads, looked out afar over sequestered field and hill, and along dim sky-line--that then I longed for a power of vision which might overpass that limit; which might reach the busy world, towns, regions full of life I had heard of but never seen--that then I desired more of practical experience than I possessed; more of intercourse with my kind, of acquaintance with variety of character, than was here within my reach. I valued what was good in Mrs. Fairfax, and what was good in Adele; but I believed in the existence of other and more vivid kinds of goodness, and what I believed in I wished to behold.

Who blames me? Many, no doubt; and I shall be called discontented. I could not help it: the restlessness was in my nature; it agitated me to pain sometimes. Then my sole relief was to walk along the corridor of the third storey, backwards and forwards, safe in the silence and solitude of the spot, and allow my mind's eye to dwell on whatever bright visions rose before it--and, certainly, they were many and glowing; to let my heart be heaved by the exultant movement, which, while it swelled it in trouble, expanded it with life; and, best of all, to open my inward ear to a tale that was never ended--a tale my imagination created, and narrated continuously; quickened with all of incident, life, fire, feeling, that I desired and had not in my actual existence.

It is in vain to say human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquillity: they must have action; and they will make it if they cannot find it. Millions are condemned to a stiller doom than mine, and millions are in silent revolt against their lot. Nobody knows how many rebellions besides political rebellions ferment in the masses of life which people earth. Women are supposed to be very calm generally: but women feel just as men feel; they need exercise for their faculties, and a field for their efforts, as much as their brothers do; they suffer from too rigid a restraint, too absolute a stagnation, precisely as men would suffer; and it is narrow-minded in their more privileged fellow-creatures to say that they ought to confine themselves to making puddings and knitting stockings, to playing on the piano and embroidering bags. It is thoughtless to condemn them, or laugh at them, if they seek to do more or learn more than custom has pronounced necessary for their sex.


Thanks, classiclit, for providing the text.

Literati

This was my end-of-semester reflection for my Book Editing class. The last paragraph is particularly amusing because it's just about the most pretentious thing anyone has ever written, yet I'm trying to use it to explain that editors aren't pretentious.

When I first signed up for the Book Editing class, I honestly didn’t know whether I wanted to be an editor or not, mostly because I promised myself when I came to Emerson that I would be open to the many and varied opportunities that exist in publishing. "Sure you may think you want to be an editor,” I told myself. “But everyone who goes into publishing thinks they want to be an editor because they don’t know what else is out there."

This attitude of openness was a good one to have at the beginning of my Emerson career. But at the end of my first year—after purposely seeking out publishing experiences outside of the editorial world—I am pretty confident in saying that I want to work in editorial. Yes, production, publicity, and marketing are all fun fields. And yes, I’m capable of understanding the financial and legal aspects of publishing. But nothing compares to the thrill of working with ideas, people, and words as an editor.

As an undergraduate, I majored in English literature and psychology. I remember saying that I thought I would love to work in counseling if I could only have intelligent, highly verbal clients. Of course, there is no field of psychology that would allow a therapist to have only these types of clients. But the author/editor relationship contains some of the elements I liked about psychology: discussing complex, intellectual, personal issues from multiple perspectives; building good rapport; and adapting one’s techniques depending on who is sitting on the other side of the desk. I really enjoy the challenge of understanding and working with all sorts of people, and the author/editor relationship provides many such opportunities.

I love working with ideas—and their mode of transportation, words—just as much as I love working with people. There is something invigorating about seeing the potential in a manuscript and knowing that you could be the fresh set of eyes that helps it reach that potential. The non-fiction ethnographic manuscript I worked with in this class has so much potential both as a literary work and as a book that might make some of its readers think differently about the world. Getting the chance to work with books like that would not only be fun; it would be meaningful.

Because I am much more focused on big ideas and themes, I would like to be an acquisitions and/or developmental editor. I would love to build my own lists, and I’d love to help polish every book on that list. When a young editor from Beacon Press came to our class and talked about starting her own list of graphic novels, I got really excited to think that she had been sitting in my position just a few years ago.

Speaking of Beacon Press, that is one of the ideal types of houses I would like to work for. I am much more attracted to small, independent houses because I think I’d get more opportunities to try different things. They usually need staff members to have broader job descriptions, and they aren’t so set in their ways that they can’t recognize fresh, innovative ideas. I also love that Beacon Press is mission-driven; I strongly desire to work for a house that publishes important, elegant books, especially non-fiction.

In addition to small presses like Beacon, I could also see myself working for a university press, particularly one that does quite a few books that cross over into trade. I like books that explore complex ideas, but I especially like books that can express these ideas in such a way that an educated, non-expert can understand and be moved by them. This allows the books to have more influence, and it also usually means that they avoided the “dry as dust” pitfall that so many academic books succumb to.

One final, semi-facetious note about working as an editor: I like that you get to be smart without being pretentious. There aren’t too many editors whose walls are ostentatiously covered with diplomas or who expect instant respect the minute they spout off their job titles. Nevertheless, most editors are well-read with a broad range of interests, have a fast learning curve, invent creative and innovative ways to solve problems, and balance technical precision with aesthetic sensibility. If that’s not intelligence, I don’t know what is.