Popular Sentiment

Return of the Finger!

It's not 100% yet, but my finger is back in typing condition. Hooray! Enjoy the fresh fresh fruits of my finger labor with my recent post on Cineplexus. It's a comp review of Spike Jonze's Where the Wild Things Are and the Coen Brothers' A Serious Man. Better late than never, right?

Right?!?

One Year Later: My Initial Reflections on Election Night

It's the anniversary of last year's huge election. I know a lot of people are frustrated about what's happening and what's not happening, but I hope these thoughts, written a year ago today, helps to put things in perspective a little bit.

An Evening in Grant Park with 500,000 Friends

Marissa Flaxbart

The stately older woman next to me sighed audibly and turned around to complain to my father and me. "What is that? Who are they talking to?" Fed up with something she called "American foolishness," she winced as Anderson Cooper talked electoral college with a hologram of Will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas.

We were staring at one of many jumbotrons in a sea of humanity near Grant Park. Chicagoans were out in the hundreds of thousands, all eyes on us as we stood downtown. The mood was one of cautious confidence but, as a group, we still had some butterflies. Sure, Obama was Chicago's candidate, but would our fellow Americans ("foolishly," the woman next to me might have observed) manage to ruin our celebration? Will.i.am wasn't going to be able to tell us which way Indiana or Florida was sending their electoral votes.

The early math pointed to an Obama victory as long as the West Coast went blue as predicted. As the pivotal poll-closing hour (10pm central) neared, CNN began a countdown that would ultimately announce our new president. We counted the seconds aloud as if it were New Year's Eve. 

And then, instead of a sigh of relief, we let out a collective scream. My father stood behind me and shouted, more excited than I've ever seen him. But the woman next to me remained silent. I caught her eye and she said to me through incredulous tears, "My grandfather could not vote." How bizarre to think that as recently as 1870 that the 15th amendment gave African Americans the right to vote for the first time. For many in the crowd, our collective ability to change our nation had suddenly become abundantly clear.

As we waited for President Elect Obama to take the stage, we watched McCain's concession speech together, we sang the national anthem together, we anxiously watched the stage (as shown on the jumbotron) for some signs of movement. Not long before our guest of honor took the stage, my father smiled brightly. By this time, he addressed everyone around us when he observed how lucky we were to live in Chicago.  It is not ironically that I invoke now first-lady Michelle Obama when I say that for the first time in a long while, I feel lucky to live in America.

Mouth? Quarantined!

I've been sick for the past week. At this point, I'm down to an icky, phlgemy cough and a dehydration problem, but last week was brutal. I consulted the internet to try and determine if I had a severe cold or the flu, only to discover that the line between cold and flu is dotted and constantly in motion, like marquee lights, only so very thin as to be nearly invisible.

I decided I probably had the flu. Despite the fact that I got a flu shot, or possibly because of it – I think I may have had a mild bug when I got the injection — flu seemed to be the best bet. My father was extremely concerned. If I had the flu, could I have the swine flu? If I had swine flu, what was stopping pneumonia from coming in and relieving me of my lung function? I needed to see the doctor. He was sure of it.

Yesterday, a week after the illness really hit me, I finally snagged a doctor's appointment by marching into the guy's office and saying the magic words: "I think I have the flu." I was instructed to wait a few minutes. Sure enough, less than 5 minutes later, I was taken into a private corridor and told that the doctor would see me, but that first I would need to put this on:


In the time it took me to say "thank you" and "I understand," I was asked several more times to put the mask on.

I felt kind of comfy in my mask, to be honest. I didn't have to worry about any strangers talking to me. I didn't have to cover my mouth when I coughed. It was kind of warm. I wore the mask for another 30 minutes or so before finally seeing the doctor. Much to my surprise, he was also wearing a mask. They were really serious! I was able to remove my mask long enough for him to check my ears (fluid filled), throat (red), and temperature (by this point it was back to normal), though I kept it on while he listened to my lungs. Was I coughing anything up? Yes, I said. What was I coughing up? I have no idea, I said. I haven't been looking at it.

The doctor's verdict was that I had "the flu or some flu-like virus." So, did he do a blood test? Did he put me on antibiotics? No. He told me to take Sudafed. Maybe some Mucinex ("it's safe, because it's basically nothing") but NOT NyQuil or Robitussin DM (the only thing I had been taking) because it interacts with one of my other meds. I was free to go, but not before making sure I hand-sanitized myself and put my mask back on. I actually asked about the latter point, as was told I should leave it on until I left the building.

I have been sick many times in my life, and I have been given a lot of different prescriptions, both over the counter and Rx only. This was the first time, however, that I was handed a mask to keep my germs in, or confronted by a similarly masked doctor. Keeping people healthy is important, perhaps doubly so in a doctor's office, but all this felt like a lot of dramatic quarantining for something that doesn't even warrant antibiotics. But hey, I'm no doctor. And now I have a lovely, high-quality, only-slightly-tainted new dusting mask.

Two Airports, Two Ads, Two Positions

Back from California, and I'm riding the sweet, sweet El Train, which I will be very fond of for the next few weeks as I recover from all the driving I did in LA.

I had a layover in Las Vegas. 3 hours. It was plenty of time to explore my terminal, which had, In addition to slot machines with no coin slots and advertisements directed at "Canadian Gamblers," one big sign suggesting that I spend some of my free time shooting guns at a nearby shooting gallery. There was an image of a white-toothed, young, blonde woman toting a semi-automatic rifle and grinning with Second Amendment pride, along with one of those human-shaped targets and a list of guns that were available for shooting. A long list. This whole collage struck me as patently bizarre. If I had any curiousity as to why I found it so strange, it was addressed the moment I sat down on this train and looked around. It's all about the culture.

Above my head at the moment is a banner ad - the kind that plaster every vehicle in the CTA's brigade. I've seen it before. It features pictures of little children, the theoretical victims of gun violence. Turn in a gun, it says, and you will be rewarded with a prepaid MasterCard. B.B. Guns are worth $10, and (regular, bullet) guns will get you $50. Assault weapons like the ones young women seem to enjoy shooting in Nevada? $100. 

I have an opinion on guns ("they are scary"), and I'm sure Vegas has gun haters, just as the Midwest has (many) gun lovers. But that's not the point of these musings. It's just so curious what a difference a couple thousand miles makes.

New Initiatives?

So here's the question: If I say I'm going to post every day, something, anything, every day, will that be commitment enough to actually do it? Throughout this week, I've had passing thoughts that would have made perfectly lovely blog posts here on PopSent.

I met Harriet Miers. She told me I had a pretty name.

I went to a graduation in Dallas where, in a class of almost 500, there was only 1 fat girl.

I played Rock Band for the first time.

I went to an alumni party for my university, where I found about 7 people I knew at all.

I saw a variety of advertisements, both wonderful and frustrating.

Okay, so some of these things are more remarkable than others; no matter. I frequently think in a sort of narrative style, composing my thoughts as if I were preparing them for mass review. Like so many things in life we rarely discuss, I have no idea whether or not this is normal.

Fingers crossed, I will try my best to make PopSent a nightly ritual.

Love,

Marissa