Love and Lemmings

In modern America divorce is as much of an institution as marriage. The results--particularly the financial results for men--are calamitous. Today marriage is a lease, not a buy. Everyone is aware of this. Everyone acknowledges that marriage is a countdown to separation. Divorce surprises no one.

Yet what happens when you tell people you don’t believe in marriage? They react like you're some kind of curiosity from the future. Even if they aren't religious. Even if they are a group of divorcees. The fact that you aren't eager to become another predictable divorce statistic renders you an outcast.

Same thing with politics. You sit around a bar and listen to everyone list all the reasons why the political system doesn’t work, all the reasons the government is unfixable. Then when you say you don’t vote, outrage abounds! You are immediately treated with suspicion and disdain. How dare you not participate in this thing we all agree is irreparable!

It seems it is perfectly fine to skewer the sacred cows of marriage and voting, just as long as after you're done skewering you promise to line up with all the suckers. As long as you pledge not to change your behavior in light of the facts of marriage and politics, you are in the clear. The second you act on this knowledge, you are kicked out of the conversation. It's fine to complain, just as long as you promise not to do anything about it. This is the opposite of the advice people usually give you. 

 

So if you want people to take your advice on relationships, don't give them the best advice of all; avoid marriage. If you want people to take your disdain for politics seriously, don't reveal your non-voting record.

Why? Because MAN is a herd animal, and people want company on the Titanic.

One Angry Man

I “served” on a jury in the summer of 2007. It was just one day. The parties settled, so my service amounted to sitting in a room for several hours next to a bunch of other frustrated jurors-to-be. Naturally, I walked out of that courthouse with my bosom popping, as I always do after performing sacred civic duties.

Cut to a few months ago: I received a notice in the mail saying that if I haven’t served on a jury in the last six years, I am eligible to regress back into the jury pool.

I wrote back, giving my address at the time of service and the year in which I served (a little less than four years ago). In return I received a summons for jury duty. Apparently, my name, my address at the time of service, and my year of service wasn’t enough to help them narrow things down. Never count on a bureaucrat to connect any dots (or to even have a pen for the dot-connecting).

The juror website for my state offers no useful info. for contacting someone to explain any of this, because if it provided this function, people would use it to clear up the kinds of misunderstandings that lead to their being called to serve on juries when they aren’t actually eligible to serve on them. This is not an accident.

So I go to the Manhattan courthouse to explain this. I brought my new summons, along with my original summons from 2007, the jury questionnaire I filled out in 2007, and a paystub from 2007 showing my old address. This would be enough documentation to get a home mortgage loan, a lease on a pre-owned hovercraft, and an orphan from Darfur, so I figured it would be more than enough to verify that I sat in a jury room for one day in 2007.

When I showed the woman at the courthouse my paperwork, she acted like I’d handed her a used heroin needle. “No, you have to have your original certificate of service!” Evidently every document related to said service is irrelevant. I started to ask if she could just check with Queens (the county I served in), but she interjected with “We have no way of checking the records in Queens.”

Jury duty is spoken of as this sacred function, and in some cases, the decisions made by juries are a matter of life and death. Yet the databases of New York’s five boroughs lack the ability to communicate with each other about the folks performing this sacred duty. It seems Lady Justice is also blind to fax machines.

She gave me the number to call in Queens. I got someone on the line and gave my name, my old address, and the date on which I served. Within seconds, the woman in Queens was able to verify that I had served. I then asked how I could obtain a new certificate of service to satisfy the people in Manhattan. She said I could either go all the way out to the Queens courthouse (Jamaica, Queens, which is only slightly closer than Jamaica the island), or they could mail it to my old address. I told her I didn’t live there anymore. She said they could only mail it to the old address. I tried to ask if she could somehow communicate to Manhattan that Queens had a record of my service. She said my only option was to trek all the way out to the Queens courthouse to get a copy of the record. And of course, they don’t have evening hours. Why make things at all workable for the people who are employed and pay the taxes that keep courthouses operational in the first place?

So I go all the way out to the Jamaica Queens courthouse. It takes about an hour to get there. After going through security, I ask the guy where to go to obtain records. He sends me to a spot on the other side of the courthouse. When I get there, the signs I see give me a hunch that I’m in the wrong place. While on line I get on my cell and call the Queens helpline to make sure I’m in the right place. They tell me to go to the jury room for records. I head to the jury room. There are a handful of jurors-to-be sitting around (I’m guessing everyone was at lunch), but not a single official in sight. Literally not even one.

I walk back out and try to speak to a different security guy. He cuts me off and gives me another room number. I go upstairs to this new room; it’s marked as the room for jurors with questions. Not exactly what I was asking for, but at least we’re getting warmer.

In this room there was a woman leaning against the counter. She asked if she could help. As I started to explain why I was there, she cut me off, pointed to a bench and said, “Someone will be with you.” Before I could give any details, she just commanded me to sit…like I was a troubled dog on a troubled dog reality show. So I sat on this bench. NO ONE ELSE WAS WAITING. No one. Just me. There were probably 5 or 6 courthouse workers behind the desk chit-chatting (I learned that one of them was trying to lose weight). I sat there while the people behind the desk, who according to the signs, are there to answer questions, did nothing. They certainly weren’t answering any questions (except those related to their co-worker's diet strategy).

Finally a guy appears and offers to help. I explain my situation, and am again told to go to the jury room. I retreat back down the stairs and trudge back to the jury room. Once again, not a single official in sight. I started walking around in circles, thinking I must be missing something. After making a few laps around the mostly empty room, I find a little nook in the corner with an open door. I see two guys inside. I ask if they can get my records. One of them says YES HE CAN. DING! DING! DING!

Some obvious: Why weren’t there lots of signs identifying this as the records room? Why didn’t anyone on the phone or in person tell me to look for this room within the jury room? I can tell you its location wasn’t obvious.

The guy in this room was actually helpful, and I managed to get two copies of my certificate of service.

I went all the way back to the Manhattan courthouse (another hour-plus journey). I dealt with the same woman as before. I handed her my certificate. She adopted a nagging tone and lobbed this at me: “Come next August, you’ll be eligible again.”

Not: “Hey thanks for being patient with our embarrassingly outdated process.”

Not: “Hey thanks for being honest enough to comply.”

Not: “Hey thanks for paying the skyhigh taxes that allow me and my Kafka-villain colleagues to buy the paperwork we use to tapeworm your time.”

Nope, just another rap on the knuckles as I walked out the door. And we’re supposed to trust this system to make a sound judgment about whom to execute?

Random Acts of Randomness

You probably heard about that shooting that happened yesterday by the Empire State Building. I used to work just two blocks away from there, and less than a month ago, I had my farewell company lunch at the Heartland Brewery; the restaurant you saw on the news, the restaurant that had the gunfire right in front of it. Yep, not thirty days ago, I was eating lunch there. You’re probably thinking: “Wow, makes you think.”

Not really.

Yes, it could have been me. But it could have been me ANY day. It could be me today. A similar shooting could take place at the deli around the corner from my apartment. I’d be caught flat-footed, and would fill up with lead before I knew what was happening.

But getting back to yesterday’s shooting: The shooter had been out of work for what…a year, so hypothetically he could have stopped by during any of those days; not just yesterday. I walked by there quite frequently. Any day over the last year, I could have been there on a day when the shooter snapped. I could have been caught in the crossfire.

But what is always lost in the idiotic media coverage of these kinds of events is that that chance—the chance of encountering unpredictable violence-- exists every single day. Every time you interact with the world, worst case scenarios are all around you (and you can also get hurt at home of course). Every square inch of Earth has the potential for violence. Every square inch of Earth has already experienced violence. Every time you take a step forward, you are walking on someone’s grave. It wasn’t always concrete.

Every single day you are surrounded by disaster, and despite what the news might lead you to believe, extreme violence can happen anywhere at any time. Your parents weren’t totally crazy to plant that idea in your idea. Every subway car you ride probably has at least one person on the edge. Every mile of highway you drive down probably at least one person with a kettle of violence brewing inside him. And he already has a deadly weapon…his car.

But although violence can happen anywhere at any time, it rarely does. And the kind of chaotic violence that took place by the Empire State Building is such a low probability event that it isn’t worth thinking about. It doesn’t make sense to alter your life one bit to account for the possibility of ultra-low probability events. The only thing to “learn” from these events is that yes, you’re never completely safe anywhere, and when you see something that looks amiss, there is nothing wrong with crossing the street. It can pay to be paranoid.

Yes, in aggregate, some places are more violent than others, and yes, walking down the street at 3:00 AM is probably a bigger risk than doing it at 3:00 PM. But that is about all you can do to “avoid” violence; basic risk management.

So turn off the news and go on with your life like nothing happened. Be vigilant, but don’t lose sight of the cold, hard statistics, which favor your continued (mostly) safe existence. In other words, be a nerd with an edge (too bad those skinny jeans will make it nearly impossible to run away from the perpetrators).

Judging a bookstore by its brown paper cover

There is a 24-hour adult book store near my apartment. Hard to believe these places still exist. Between free Internet porn and online booksellers hocking paperbacks for 99 cents, I would have thought the adult book store would have gone the way of, well, every other kind of bookstore. I never would have guessed there were enough smut purists out there to allow adult book stores to afford Manhattan rents.

I have never popped into an adult book shop, but I would like to know if they have sections for Staff Recommendations. Hopefully not. It would be awkward enough browsing in an establishment called “Johnny’s Peepers Pages of Perversion,” without also discovering that the cashier’s vices involve butterscotch and squirrels.

I can just imagine the Staff Recommendation section…next to Who Moved My Lube? and The 17 Inch Sex Diet, there would be the stupid hand-written sign below the books:

“I really believed she was barely legal!” – Sam, Johnny Peeper’s Pages of Perversion Associate.

And even if I was intrigued enough by one of Sam’s recommendations to take a look at it, I’d still be afraid to buy the thing. There isn’t enough Purell in the world to get me to put my hands on a book that Sam the Shady Adult Bookstore Graveyard Shift Cashier might have already, ahem…flipped through.

ARE YOU TRYING TO DISGUST ME, MRS. ROBINSON?

When I was a child, I remember hearing repeatedly that Sophia Loren was "still the most beautiful woman in the world." At that time, Ms. Loren was in her mid-fifties. Even as a kid, I remember being infuriated by this statement. Clearly, a woman with both feet in menopause could not be Earth's finest female specimen.

Today when I hear this kind of mumbo jumbo I start ranting like Mussolini in a Red Bull commercial. Younger women should be ranting too; this statement is a grave insult to them. Seniority and experience have no place in the beauty world. Older women, even former bombshells, even former "most beautiful women in the world" are typically much, much, much less attractive than even average young women.

Young lasses, even homely ones, have the world on a leash, but they only hold that leash for a few fleeting years. Precious few of them understand this. And society's constant fibs about older women "still having it" certainly doesn't help, which is why younger women are even less likely to appreciate and leverage their powers...until it is too late.

And stop me if you've heard this outrageous claim: Tina Turner "still having great legs." What brand of aphrodesciac-laced crack are these commentators smoking? By the time I was old enough to know who Tina Turner was she already should have been confined to pant suits. Why were we all supposed to pretend not to notice that the ship had sailed on Tina's yams? Ms. Turner absolutely did not continue to have good legs any more than Joe DiMaggio continued to hit home runs. At least no one pretended that a rickety old Yankee Clipper could have stepped into the batter's box against Pedro Martinez. I would have rather had sex with Ike Turner.

Yes, the mid-fiftes Sophia Loren I saw as a child did look good for a woman her age, but that is the most that can be said. Almost any 20-year-old woman would have been far superior to this former bombshell. The only thing that ages like wine is wine.

It is true that once in a rare while a woman manages to remain beautiful long after you would expect her to (Marisa Tomei). And she does this how? Not by "growing into her looks." No...she remains beautiful by continuing to look more or less the way she did when she was young.

Let it be shouted from every rooftop: in her prime, Sophia Loren was the second most attractive woman ever captured on film. Luckily, we live in the age of YouTube and Google Images so that we can continue to enjoy her as she was then.

He's going the distance

Once a bachelor reaches a certain age, many women start to view him with suspicion. Because he has no broken marriages or engagements in his past, he is seen by many women as unstable. He hasn't demonstrated he can go all the way.

"I don't know about this guy, he's never been married. He's never even been engaged!"

So one of your must-haves for a potential husband is that he not be able to keep a marriage together? Basically what you're saying is: How can I expect this guy to succeed when he doesn't have a proven track record of failure?

Mixed signals, ladies. Mixed signals. Or maybe I'm just a hata because I'm not on my fourth bad marriage.

A star in nobody's sky

One of the comedians I started with, we'll call him King Charisma, has a booming star quality. This quality has been put to good use; King Charisma has been on television for several years.

Recently we saw each other for the first time in half a decade. He was back in NY, so we went out to reconquer some of his old haunts.

We visited two comedy clubs. When we stepped into the first one, King Charisma got the kind of welcome usually reserved for Santa Claus upon entering an orphanage. Everyone in this place hopped to their feet at the sight of him. Waitresses, hostesses, other comedians...even the manager (no one hates comedians more than managers) rushed to greet him. The greetings ranged from flirtation to awe to strange, older male sentimantality. Something for everyone.

I have known King for a long time, have seen him light up many rooms and have watched myriad people gaze up at him adoringly. But this display was beyond even what I was accustomed to. These people were reacting to King Charisma like he was James Bond. Not like he was Sean Connery; Sean Connery is a mere actor. I mean like James Bond the film character...the whole thing felt so exaggerated it seemed to be out of a summer blockbuster.

I was standing beside the King as this all happened. But instead of getting some of the run off from the starpower he was brandishing, at least three people looked at me, then turned back to King and said disdainfully, "What's with your friend?"

I wasn't doing anything wrong. I wasn't doing anything at all. I was just standing and observing.

We went to a second comedy club, one more drab and threadbare than the first. Somehow King Charisma managed to bring its deadened occupants to life. They didn't seem to notice me. At one point the bartender's wife popped in with a friend of hers. The bartender's wife remembered King Charisma and bopped over to bow to him. As soon as she and her friend noticed me, they kept the tradition alive by saying, "What's with your friend?"

I have heard this spiel many times from many people. Many nights I have listened to people who just met me make point blank comments about my evidently unfortunate presence. Many nights I have listened to people who don't know me share their theories about what must have happened in my life to turn me into such an unfortunate presence. I used to become incensed. Now I am starting to see it their way.

When I met King Charisma, he was in his late twenties, so I attributed his ability to inspire giddiness to his being a suave, seasoned guy with good looks. At that point I was in my late teens, so I figured this was standard fare. I did not grasp how much firepower he had or how uncommon he truly is. The guy is now in his forties, and still ignites that type of reaction. It occured to me that night that no matter what King does, he will always have a booming star quality. He will be the most charismatic bingo player in his nursing home.

Something I didn't understand when I met King Charisma but certainly understand now is that magnetism works both ways. I am the other side of the magnetism coin. I don't know why I didn't notice it sooner. No matter what I do in life or where I go, I will still be unequivocally repellant. There is something about me that is indefinably off-putting (or maybe it is perfectly definable). If this wasn't so, I wouldn't have spent my life answering queries about what is "with me."

My friend will always be a comet. As for me...well, the universe also needs wormholes.