Row, Row, Row Your Boss April 30, 2007

After February’s office turnover, my Boss hired his wife. Boss Wife assists me in teacher recruitment. When I first got wind of this staff addition—four people work here, so wind travels fast—I started cruising Craigslist, hedging my employment bets. I couldn’t understand why you’d ever want to work alongside the person you go home to. I came up with a few examples, like Lost’s Evangeline Lilly and Dominic Monaghan, but they film in Hawaii, and I tend to think anyone can get along in Hawaii. It’s hard enough for me to date another writer let alone sit at adjoining typewriters. Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes didn’t end well. What if they ran a start up together?

I contemplated two scenarios. In the one, Boss and Boss Wife would fight all the time, take thinly veiled jabs at each other about missed carpool pick-ups and forgotten Fresh Direct deliveries. In the other, they would make-out. Who hasn’t worked in an office where people meet in the copy room? Only we don’t have a copy room. I pictured them giggling at any mention of fax. I pictured them team-loading a stapler. It doesn’t take two to load a stapler. That is not the expression.

Then the unexpected happened. I befriended Boss Wife. I really, really like her. There is neither cursing nor kissing in the office. She and Boss could double date with Josh and Amy Sutterer.

I am not one for boat analogies, but I’ll make one here. Boss is like a misbehaved (albeit precocious) toddler in a rowboat. He sees a hole in the bottom, but rather than plug it, he’s wiggling his finger around trying to make it bigger. Boss Wife is in the boat, too. She has a charming brightly colored pail. And ever so often, rather than slap his hand away from the hole, she empties out the leaking water. The boat is the office. The rest of us are in there too, sunning ourselves and snapping the occasional picture. Where are we rowing to? No one knows.

(I’m the redhead in the prow.)

I’ve Got One Poem in My Pocket, and the Other One is Hailing a Taxi Cab April 27, 2007

Happy New York City Poem in Your Pocket Day. I’m packing this. How about you?

Rosie O’Donald posted a 9/11 poem on her blog that’s quite moving. You can find it here.

Oh, and I have reason to believe my parents might be reading Trybecca, or at least Tuesday’s post. My father just sent me these:

A rocking chair. And a four poster bed. I noticed the jpeg “saved as” names. RockingChair1…that would imply a RockingChair2 and a RockingChair3, right? I guess a good photographer never settles for just one shot of the furniture.

I had such a fun time with my American’t Apparel post that I thought I’d invite readers to suggest other ill-fit for me to try-on. When you comment, include a link to the misguided article of clothing: boxy, buxom, drab, mesh, laced, pilled, bejeweled, shellaced…I’ll pick the three most questionable, try them on in-store, photograph myself and some unlucky friends, and report back. Be creative, but remember: clothing needs to be available in New York City. Please note that I will not model underwear. Anything else is fair lame!

Oh, and click here to vote for me:

Is That a Poem in Your Pocket or Are You Just Happy to See Me? April 26, 2007

This is my thesis.

I keep it on the toilet. Much like the tattoo on my shoulder blade, I forget it’s there until I happen to turn my head around or somebody points it out.

This past December, I graduated from NYU with my MFA in poetry. I learned that iamb is not a brand of dog food and that the world would be a better place with less “it rains in my soul” and “his eyes were pools of light.” I now get jokes where the punchline is “Jorie Graham awarded herself!” And if I were at a party and someone happened to bring out a plate of rotten fruit, I wouldn’t skip a beat before asking “Do I dare to eat a peach?

Since school ended, I’ve stopped writing poems. I only want to read them. I spent three and a half years with poetry. I dated poetry, I moved in with poetry (too soon?), and now I need to see other genres. Or to be alone. Although I think I’m falling hard for memoir.

But this Friday night is my Graduate Reading, and I’m excited. I get to hear my friends. I get to stand behind a podium and read three poems from my thesis and drink too much free NYU wine that probably goes by the name of Cheap Loon.

Here are the poems I’m going with. This first one is a villanelle. The repeated end words are ways to prepare Waffle House hash browns: battered, smothered, covered, diced, topped, chunked.

Waffle House

Your heart is a golden hash-brown smothered
In chili–no more chill feel of porcelain;
On my hand your hand, laminated, covered.

You had resigned yourself to a scattered
Place setting. Refused to accept that skin
Would ever again arrange you, but smothered,

Pain unplugged its hot plate. (Even diced
Intimacy regenerates.) You begin
To recollect the flesh: body covered

By another body, T-boned, topped,
Limbs pancaked–harder to remember when
Love’s last neon flickered, slept. You smothered

Hunger then, grit teeth and stomach, heart chunked
Solid as Formica, as ice, you’d been
Open so long then not–Oh! How I covered

You, shielded a blue flame battered
By an outer air. We sat down to dine
With scarred flatware–me, smothered
No longer in doubt. You, finally covered.

I’m a big fan of both Jane Kenyon and Anna Akmatova and how they give expression to the metaphoric moment in short lyric. It can be more of a challenge to condense something. A Kenyon or an Akmatova poem is like a suitcase packed with vacuum sealed space organizers– you can’t fathom how much they fit in there.

I wrote this “suitcase” poem after the death of my obstetrician, a close family friend and the first person to hold me after birth.

When You Who Delivered Me Died

My mother attended your funeral
alongside nurses in black dresses
while I made a tender list
of all the men who had ever touched me.

Part of my poetic growth has involved embracing pop culture in my work. I used to feel vaguely ashamed that I watch Surreal Life marathons or that I can tell Milli from Vanilli. Then I discovered poets like Denise Duhamel. She writes about Barbies. Like, I totally had permission to explore Nick and Jessica’s relationship in verse.

So the last poem I’ll read is a sonnet about the death of Steve Irwin. I like the interplay between formal structure and pop culture content. I was getting into Gerard Manly Hopkins when I wrote it, tinkering with sound. You can go to this site and click on the audio for Carrion Comfort to hear why I revere Hopkins. My poem includes an epigraph of an actual Irwin quote.

The Crocodile Hunter

Even if a big old alligator is chewing me up I want to go down and go, ‘Crikey!” just before I die. That would be the ultimate for me.”– Steve Irwin

The stingray stabbed your heart. You expected
claw and welter where instead a barbed spike.
At upturned tail’s puncture did erected
faith fall? You never could distinguish like
from love. Only shallows heard your toxic
call–what word went? Fatal stun and hover
not unlike the rest: old cardiac
adrenaline push, sense and water
same. Did you surface? When I read you pulled
the creature sword from chest, finally lept
from my holeless heart dread of a lulled
life–long mindful of aftermath I’ve kept
calm. Unassailable I’ve held at bay
some animal.

Friday is also New York City’s Poem in Your Pocket Day. Last year I carried this. Doty’s closing bit gets me every time. I know it by heart. It reminds me how we carry poems with us everyday without realizing.

Happy Administrative John McGrew Day April 25, 2007

In the midst of all this American Apparel hooplah my online purchases arrived in the office. Yes, I bought the $12 terry cloth tube dress. It was on sale. I typically proceed with caution when I see “terry cloth” and “tube” used to describe clothing, but it turned out towel-rific! This time I posed by the printer and recycled paper, in honor of Administrative Professionals Day.

I dig this dress. It makes me feel like Julie on “The Love Boat.” I would definitely wear this dress to a “Bachelor” rose ceremony.

As most of you know, I head up Human Resources for a small summer camp provider. My boss tosses dead goldfish out our 9th story window and leaves passive aggressive notes on my keyboard. This morning, he enthusiastically explained how a warm-water enema can reveal intestinal worms. I love it here.

But, because you aren’t a true New Yorker unless you hold multiple jobs, I supplement my low start-up salary by working nights at Gutenberg! The Musical! In my brief time at Concessions, I’ve shown Dustin Hoffman the bathroom and sold Steve Guttenberg bottled water. I’m glad I went to Grad School.

The winner of my Rue Will She Wash Her McClanahans? contest, John McGrew, was promised his picture on Trybecca.

I wanted John to choose a picture where he’s wearing American Apparel, but whatever. John is my old college friend and future roommate. I do not practice nepotism on Trybecca. It just so happens he was the only entrant to foresee Rue McClanahan’s fickleness. That is why he will never get tricked into being her sixth husband.

John’s a musician. He has a gig tonight at 8PM at Crash Mansion. Because it’s Administrative Professionals Day, and your boss will let you leave early, and the show is free, you should treat yourself to dinner on the Corporate card and come.

He’s so talented he can climb a tree with a trumpet! And look at the glare off that brass. I just know he’s going to do our dishes.

Download songs here.

A Pennywhistle for Your Thoughts April 24, 2007

Yesterday, over 3000 readers visited Trybecca as a result of Gawker’s Blogorrhea link to my American Apparel post—which, by the ironic way, featured an American Apparel ad alongside their teaser “American Apparel does dark things to women.”

One Gawker reader had this to say about my photograph:

Cap sleeves tread a fine line between “bicep-defining” and “Ren faire.” I tend to think Trybecca’s shirt is treading the wrong side of that line, but she rocks it regardless.

Strangers critiquing my wardrobe…I feel a little like a celebrity. Minus the crotch shots. Also, I had to look up Ren Faire. Turns out it’s slang for Renaissance Festival. There’s a pennywhistle gathering dust in my closet so maybe I can finally put it to use.

Most days I want to give up on the blogging. Then I realize it’s either blog or answer the phones at work. So I power forward.

I began Trybecca in January (at first I wrote “sired”—must be the Ren Faire shirt) and ever since, it’s been a slow crawl towards subscriptions. I don’t understand how blogs about spyware can secure thousands of readers a day. Spyware. I write about toilets and Steve Guttenberg. I’m doing everything I can!

And then, in the swoop of a high traffic hour, I’m the fastest growing blog on WordPress. American’t Apparel ranks in the top ten hottest posts. That’s out of 892,909 blogs. So I’m feeling pretty good, good enough to celebrate on my front stoop with three-buck chuck (the price went up), Mexican food, and friends.

Why am I doing this? Of course I want a weekly column or book contract. I want to get paid to lounge around in sushi-print silk pajamas. I want to lean out the window and berate Mr Softee for circling my neighborhood (Mr Loudee!) when I’m trying to write about Alec Baldwin’s parenting skills, because I  have a deadline and I  can’t come up with anything. Although if I could, it would involve Mr Baldwin phoning up his daughter to leave that message again, using this.

If you are one of the 3000 and returning, thank you. Introduce yourself. Let me know what you think, and yes, I do take requests.

The Apple Doesn’t Fall Far From The Uprooted Tree April 23, 2007

I’m from North Carolina but I don’t have much of an accent. My parents, however, do. Dogwalker David once likened my mother to Dustin Hoffman in Tootsie. When my mother calls, I can walk into the kitchen from the living room and leave the phone on the futon and still continue our conversation by yelling “uh-huh.” She’s that loud and continuous.

My parents say “perty,” as in: “that dress sure looks perty on you!” They affectionately refer to each other as “Mama” and “Daddy.” They drink sweet tea, hang holiday wreaths, and subscribe to the narrative school of no clear beginning or end. My friend Heather loves to recount the first time she met them. Heather was poised to take a bite of grilled chicken when my mother started describing the size of the tick she got from pruning crysthanemums, the tick that buried itself in her crotch and fed for days, the tick that my father removed on his hands and knees with a magnifying glass and tweasers—no easy feat given his poor eyesight and her bad back…

My parents have a digital camera and send me pictures from home. All the time. But these aren’t necessarily the pictures I would choose to send. For example, while I am particularly impressed by this action shot of me about to strike Jeffery with a hammer:

my parents would rather keep me up to date on flowers, birds, gift baskets, and the occasional albino squirrel. I grew up on a lake so there is plenty of photographic fodder.

Here’s a heron in our backyard:

And a fat unidentified bird:

A planter of red carnations:

How about a raffle basket:

Photographed from multiple angles:

Bored yet? Check out these bedroom shutters:

Ooh, this one’s good. This is the uprooted tree that fell on the “rough” during last weekend’s Noreaster:

But along with the tree came a series of damage holes that just, well, cluttered up my inbox:

My parents are awesome. They can’t understand how I’m too busy formatting this:

to ever consider taking this:

American’t Apparel April 20, 2007

Yesterday I went shopping at American Apparel. I’m a small girl but still I found that most of their clothes gave me ass shelf. Spandex is comfortable but maybe shouldn’t be a wardrobe staple. I bought a slate sheer ribbed shirred cap sleeve shirt (try saying that five times fast!) but couldn’t make up my mind about the yellow one (or canary or butter or whatever it’s called) so later that night at the theater, I went online with Garth to get a second opinion.

I was kind of horrified. Their models look really unpleasant. Like this young woman, whose fists are clenched in defiance of too little fabric. She’s thinking hard about something. She’s remembering those magic capsules from childhood– the ones you’d drop in water and watch magically expand–and hoping this shirt works the same way. Only it’s impossible to concentrate when your photographer is holding up a pantless plush Donald Duck to get you to pose.

“Yeah baby, yeah, that’s it. Show me angry.”

She was also made to wear a poor man’s version of the Hanes tee. Not a good fit, right?

At this point in the shoot, the photographer put down the Donald Duck toy and held up a picture of Kirsten Dunst.

“Ooh, yeah, give me bad posture, that’s it.”

I 100% support realistic representation of the female body. I drink too much beer and my thighs touch. Sometimes I jiggle my belly fat and make it talk in a cartoon voice. I love curves. However, I would think twice before ever leaving the house in this, unless I wanted to guarantee a seat on the train:

I can keep going.

This woman looks a little like a pissed-off Kristin Scott Thomas.

I would much rather wear what Kristin Scott Thomas wore in “The English Patient.” Even after a night stuck in an African sandstorm she managed to stay less wrinkled. Even in desert heat hiking to the Cave of Swimmers we never saw Katherine sporting a see-through jersey V-neck. There is such a thing as a too breathable top. Or dress. What is this?

If I see a shirt and it looks unflattering on a model, I probably won’t buy it. I’m not going to think “Hey, she’s gorgeous and doesn’t seem to care about the cut so I should purchase it too and not a wear a bra and try not to smile.” At least the models in Gap ads dance around. I’d much rather be at their wrap party.

But…I still like my new American Apparel slate sheer ribbed shirred cap sleeve shirt. Garth photographed me in it. I stretched it out for full effect.

I just ordered it in yellow!

Carpenter, Panderer April 19, 2007

I wish I could time a freakin’ celebrity on a freakin’ toilet but famous people aren’t seeing Gutenberg anymore. Even dead celebrities like Karen Carpenter can’t be bothered with showing up to will call. I mean, come on. Your ticket’s already been purchased. It’s just sitting there.

On second thought, I think Karen Carpenter died in a bathroom. That might make my blog in bad taste.

John Ritter purchased a ticket the week before but never claimed his, either. I’m starting to wonder if the Gutenberg box office (Joseph) is playing a joke on me. If an envelope appears with the name River Phoenix on it then I’ll know for sure.

So, as mentioned in my previous post, I’m looking to dole out advice.

This email isn’t signed so we’ll refer to its author as “Stuck in My Own Life.”

Dear Panderer,

I’m working in a job that i once loved. LOVED. I respected my boss and coworkers and really looked forward to work everyday. Now things have changed. Now i dread work and have no respect for my boss. What should i do? I really want to leave and get a new job but i don’t have a college education. Also i can’t afford to make less money than i am now and i have yet to find an entry level position that would pay what i am currently making.

I feel like I’m stuck in my own life.


Dear Stuck In My Own Life/Maybe My Friends M&J,

You don’t need a college education to get a better paying job. You just need a doctored resume. As a Director of Human Resources who takes her professional lead from Toby on The Office, I’ll let you in on a secret: most of us are too busy blogging or fun-mirroring our faces on I-Photo to do any background checking. If you say you went to Stanford, you went to Stanford. Also, hygene always trumps higher education. I don’t care how many times Laude or Cum appear on your CV or that you are proficient in Norse. If you have possum breath or too much Axe effect I will not hire you. Added tip: getting away with lying on paper is even easier if you are applying to work for organizations rooted in light and hope. I suggest environmental non-profits or Catholic charities.

What did you love about your boss and what changed? Did you stop sleeping together? You did capitalize LOVED. Maybe you should send this .

You didn’t tell me what you do but from your email it’s pretty obvious you work in a jammery.

Good luck,
Panderer

I think that went really well.

Need advice? Have an issue for me to glibly tackle? Write me at meredithbaxterbirny@gmail.com!

Johari April 18, 2007

I’ve been interviewing a lot of Psychology Teachers for summer camp, which has prompted me to make a Johari. Johari sounds like a Robin Williams movie about a magical boardgame and jungle animals. It’s not. It’s really a grid of mapped adjectives. Created by Joseph Luft and Harry Ingham in 1955, a Johari reveals discrepancies between how we view ourselves and how others view us.

I’ve picked six adjectives from the Johari list. These are the adjectives I feel best represent me. The next step is for you, my readers, to choose five or six adjectives that you feel best represent me. I prefer that only readers who actually know me participate. If you follow my blog and have never met me, but feel that my poignant and educated entries have touched and forever changed your life in incalculable ways, then by all means, Johari away. (You might want to select “conceited.”)

I don’t understand exactly how Johari works, but I’m hoping I’ll end up with a colorful grid I can print and hang in a .99 cent frame over my desk so that when my boss loses his cool and makes childish demands I can say “No” and point to Johari as evidence that I am right.

Click here to link to my Johari.

I’ll reveal the results next week.

Also, while we’re on the topic of psychology, I’ve always wanted my own advice column. For awhile I thought it might be called “Ann Panders” since a panderer is a go-between in sexual affairs, kind of like a pimp, and I could help couples iron out intimacy wrinkles. For money. Whoever pays me more gets the advice he or she wants. I’ve since decided this is stupid. (You might want to mark “wise” on my Johari.)

But I do still want an advice column, so if you’d like to write me and ask an anonymous question, I promise to offer you droll yet sensible guidance and feature it on my blog. You can write me at meredithbaxterbirny@gmail.com. I created this account just for my column.

Meredith Baxter Birny played the mother on Family Ties.

Elise gave such great advice.

Dear John Letter April 17, 2007

Dear John Mayer,

I don’t dislike you. There was even a time when “Why, Georgia” featured heavily on my mixes. But lately, I just can’t separate the song from the Simpson.

Did you have to date Jessica? Now I hear “Your Body Is a Wonderland” as a soundtrack to last week’s Australian Beach Getaway photo spread in US Weekly. When you sing “take all your big plans and break ‘em,” I guess the big plans you’re referring to are her call-in show for the hair extensions she designed with Ken Paves and “Look Up to the Sky,” the personal journal she intends to publish.

I know she’s hot. But John, so are you, and you could find somebody equally hot who hasn’t named an album “Sweet Kisses” or grown accustomed to celebrating her wedding anniversaries as MTV seasons. And do you know what kind of marital advice she’s dispensing to a scorned Spice Girl? Stick to him like glue. Jessica might sing “These Boots are Made For Walking” but she doesn’t mean it.

(Also, please don’t write a song called “Stick to Me Like Glue” on Continuum 2.)

I’m sorry that her Dessert beauty line rubs off onto you and your lips taste like banana split and your arms smell like cotton candy and your neck reeks of pepermint swirl. John, I know it’s exciting, but you look an unmarketable pall next to her.

And you were so cute seven years ago when you posed for this photo with my good friends Heather and Megan, who are not orange:

I would have bought this John Mayer a Miller Light and chilli cheese fries. We would have picked the chicken off of nachos and I would have giggled and said “Um, wait, is this tuna? I can’t tell the difference!” and you would have said “Good one!” and given me a high five.

Stop waiting for the world to change–you have to change back first.

Still your friend,

Becca