Five Journalistic Questions #7
Welcome back to Five Journalistic Questions, the bi-weekly non-newsletter newsletter in which I rant or rave on five topics (sometimes more, sometimes less), sometimes cohesive, more times random. Thank you for reading this far and a big thank you to everyone who has engaged, left a comment, and especially shared this writing with a friend…or talked shit about it at brunch– every word undoubtedly counts.
Who:
The coolest book I’ve come across, which I can’t stop talking about, and took two months to finish reading, was written by a writer, Fran Ross. The book is called Oreo and it’s a tale of a young Black and Jewish girl who is on a voyage to find (and exact revenge on) her father. The book had me at “revenge”. It’s so smart, funny, witty, and knowing. It's a bit challenging of a read because Ross writes in a nonlinear style and frequent breaks are needed to google the phrases written in Yiddish– yes, a Black woman wrote a book chocked full of Yiddish phrases! That brings me to my point: Fran Ross was the coolest. I first discovered her when she was mentioned in an essay nestled in the back of the sourcebook for the exhibition We Wanted a Revolution (Brooklyn Museum, 2017) written by Lisa Jones. I’m selfishly inspired every time I discover someone who is immensely brilliant but not a wunderkind. Here we have a brilliant Black, queer woman from West Philadelphia daring to write comedy and satire in the 1970s despite being repeatedly rebuffed and misunderstood. In addition to her day job, and sometimes freelance gig, as a proofreader at publishing house Simon & Schuster, she wrote for comedy magazines like Titters and women’s magazines like Essence and Ms. She left the New York literary scene in 1977 in an attempt to be a writer for Richard Pryor’s short-lived weekly variety show. I don’t want her lack of recognition and fame to be central to her story but I do feel it’s important to note that men, patriarchy (misogynoir specifically), colorism, and homophobia never move out of the fucking way. Allegedly [because Essence Magazine’s digital archives aren’t updated so I can’t read or link the article that was described as a scathing firsthand account of Ms. Ross’s experience that was written for the publication in 1979/80], not only could Richard Pryor not get out of his own way emotionally and psychologically, Paul Mooney (writer for comedy titans like Pryor and Eddie Murphy, equally famous amongst today’s moderately youthful for his “everybody wanna be a n*gga but nobody wants to be a n*gga” one-liner on the Chappelle Show) had sexist reservations about Black women comedy writers being in writers’ rooms at all. I wish I could say I was surprised but…nothing about men’s subterfuge and fuckery surprises me these days. Fuck ‘em. Oreo is a testament not only to the community Fran fostered in New York but also to the institutions she helped build and support when the literary establishment snubbed her brilliance. I implore you all to read the article in the Philadelphia Inquirer written by Cassie Owens and Scott Saul’s LA Review of Books article. They’re brilliant, heart-wrenching, inspiring, and enraging because I wish the world did better by Fran Ross and all Black women/femmes who are too brilliant to be understood forthwith and labeled. Oh, and don’t forget to read Oreo!
What:
I don’t, rather I can’t, do chores like a “normal” person. I blame it on a lack of focus that may or may not be attributed to ADHD [psychiatrist findings pending]. Silence doesn’t work because I’m bored to tears. I can’t listen to music or I’ll be in my kitchen until 3a doing my best Lorianne Gibson *boom kat* 8-counts as I did last night when I made the grave mistake of listening to Renaissance from the top. For my household duties, I need something that entertains and encourages focus. The only solution I’ve come to thus far that does not involve Adderall is podcasts.
Enter: Articles of Interest. It’s a spinoff of the 99% Invisible podcast and it is insanely good. I want to use this time, however, to talk about one specific subset of episodes entitled “American Ivy.” The show, hosted by Avery Trufelman, audits the origins and iterations of the American Ivy style– one of, if not the longest-running mainstay on the fashion trend landscape. From the stables of European aristocracy to the exclusive halls of academia, the smoky jazz clubs in the heart of the Village, to voter registration in Alabama farmland, and fighting for “idiosyncratic” style in Tokyo, “American Ivy” doles out a thorough history lesson about the ways American Ivy style was employed and manipulated to communicate different ideals, be it a signifier of wealth and conformity or an impetus for global change.
American Ivy has also helped me make sense of today’s style landscape. Fashion currently feels like a hodgepodge of flimsy trends that are raised and razed on a weekly basis. Articles of Interest compelled me to consider whether or not we’re enduring another Peacock Revolution–but in a fast fashion, ungendered way. We’ve been in a mosh pit of style mishmash before. Maybe this era of trendlessness isn’t novel at all.
As a proximate New Englander for nine years, having attended high school and college never more than five miles away from the hedge fund masquerading as an institution of higher learning better known as Harvard University, I must admit that I’ve developed a retrograde affinity for what we’ve collectively come to know as “basics”, “classics”, and “wardrobe fundamentals”. They’re cozy; they’re easy; they’re seemingly everlasting if you know how to shop and have a good tailor at the ready. I digress my tangent to say that after spending so much time in the land where foliage and pumpkin spice lattes go together real bad, my adult palate for wool, loafers, kerchiefs, and long-staple cotton button-down shirts stirred a feeling of nostalgia when listening to the broadcast. I temporarily longed to be in the municipality GQ once dubbed the “Worst Dressed City in America”. I couldn’t encourage you all enough to take a listen. I learned so much and it covered three nights of tedious chores!
(Seriously, though, Harvard’s endowment is nearly 12x the operating budget for the CITY of Boston. No wonder the schools could barely keep paper stocked!)
When:
I can’t be sure of the moment it happened. It may have been a weekday or a weekend but I just know that I was exposed. Maybe the influence occurred after rewatching Clueless for the umpteenth time and thinking Cher got it wrong in her rant about baggy jeans (...not the men who wear them, though). It could have also materialized as I looked through the ever-stylish press photos of Janet Jackson’s Velvet Rope era– my favorite era of hers. Maybe it materialized after I accidentally bought a pair of cargo pants a size too big, loving how the pants looked situated low on my hips, stretch marks al fresco for a change. The moment may have truly eventuated when I took it a step further and finally bought a pair of Levi jeans so baggy and so wide that Chloe Sevigny and Dem Franchize Boyz would both survey with pride. One thing’s for sure, though, baggy jeans are now embedded in my personality.
Baggy jeans: The most shapeless trend to come along since triple-XL tees are for the wearer with errands, informal events they’d rather not attend, and appointments but would rather not compromise comfort or style. It’s for those who would rather stay in than go out, a true seasonal depression staple if I do say so myself. Unencumbered by the gaze or opinions of others, the silhouette, or lack thereof, is freeing and perfect for a full day complete with multiple stops and meals. (Don’t act as if you’ve never had to unzip your pants on the subway for relief at least once.) Pant legs billowing in the breeze, when not getting stuck underneath shoes, the attitude is very “fuck these jeans”. The rips and microbes embedding themselves into the cotton fibers are nary a concern.
Baggy jeans are the twill of tasks and undertakings. The blue jeans of comfort and confidence and, though, bare midriffs make them synonymous with Erewhon lunch pickups in L.A, with the right mesh mock neck and leather overcoat, they can look just as seductive in autumn and wintertime New York. They’re for every season and reason, everybody and every body.
I’m always a bit skeptical about diving into trends without interrogating their motives and pursuits. I asked myself the priceless “is it genuinely stylish or is the wearer just skinny?” style question. Luckily, the answer is the former and I was free to expand my pant collection by one.
Where:
I have been newly reinvigorated by my reading schedule but I need to cut back on the number of books I buy and lie to myself about finishing. Like groceries, I think I look at purchasing books as a hobby as opposed to finishing them. I have dragged countless books across the threshold of this apartment, the previous batch looking at the next whilst rolling their eyes in unison, welcoming the newest collection of soon-to-be abandoned books into the fold. The routine got pretty old as my accommodations stopped having homes for all the books that failed to catch my attention by the close of the first chapter. Thus, I needed a solution, a structure, and a deadline all housed within a semi-reliable institution. (Don’t even attempt to borrow if the book you have a predilection for has recently hit the New York Times bestseller list or is currently in the promotional stage of becoming a Hulu Original™.) Behold, the public library— New York Public Library to be specific. For all of us who love the sensation of something “new”, the library is the perfect solution. Is the book new? No, but it’s new…to you. It’s a risk-averse way to dive into new literary styles and protect yourself from reading spec scripts disguised as novels– the worst ones. Aside from the fiscal responsibility of spending $0 to dive into other people’s business, dramas, and worlds, there is also a romanticism about libraries. For example, in Breakfast at Tiffany’s Holly Golightly and Paul Varjak spend way more time in the library than they ever do at Tiffany’s—instilling that bound books make for a better catalyst for amoré than diamonds. Beyond romance, there’s quaintness in walking the stacks, taking a respite in the reading rooms, hell, collecting a book from the holding desk (at the well-maintained libraries *cough*), admiring the regal and majestic neo-classical and mid-century architecture/decor in the process and recalling a bygone era when city officials believed that reading was, in fact, fundamental. (I’m looking at you Eric LeRoy Adams, aka The Promoter, aka Mr. Outside, aka Never in His Office. I understand that being the mayor of an economic epicenter like New York City is equivalent to being governor elsewhere but why the fuck are you in Qatar for the World Cup when eggs in Brooklyn cost $12.99?!)
Finally, I believe the library is as close as I’ll ever get to the rom-com-esque stranger popping out mid-aisle and a spontaneous meet-cute of engaging questions and piqued interests ensuing– even if it is just the 72-year-old librarian recommending a book to compliment the one I just picked up. Totally putting in the work for that $1.4 B, yes, with a B, endowment.
While I do love cracking the spine of a new book and having the smell of cellulose waft into my olfactory system and fill me with a sense of hope, why should I have to pay for those feelings when I live within a city that houses the nation’s largest library system?
A system with a *checks notes* $1.4B, yes, with a B, endowment.
Why:
You may or may not have noticed but my social media presence as of late has been increasingly calmer, subdued, and devoid of the typical wisecracks and quick-witted observations some followers of this hamster wheel are accustomed to— minus that one recent Gucci/Sunnei campaign “coincidence” and the Five Egg Quiche Scramble of January 2023. One part of this departure is because I’m saving my good thoughts, ideas, and remarks for this newsletter in an attempt to build a space separate from the timeline, separate from the algorithm, and separate from “content”. I needed to build a writing practice that’s personal and honest, about my likes and interests, in my words, sans the outside noise which began to feel like cellophane some days. The other factor is that…babes, I’m anxious…and a little bored. Speaking into what feels like a void half of the time and feeling disembodied from what the algorithm wants me to morph into…not what the good Tom intended when he became everyone’s friend on MySpace! I love my work as a writer and creator but there’s a tinge of social anxiety creeping in. Layer onto that being in a place of wanting something deeper and substantive that can survive beyond the likes. (I’m not doing that TikTok hip-shaking shit.) I want to use this year to discern what I want to give and take from social media and parasocial relationships. That’s not to say I’m leaving or cutting off the amazing community I’ve built but I am slowing the hamster wheel and being more intentional with the things I say and do online. The apps alone do not deserve my perceptive insights and brilliant comedic timing. It’s time for me to invest in myself and test my talents beyond the confines of social media to build the life and career (Sidenote: I can’t believe I actually have to work) I want for myself. This is my proclamation of such endeavors.
Partial divestment was a motivator that brought this “snoozeletter” into existence. I needed to have a respite, a place to get away from the algorithm, write some common sense and/or controversial thoughts about anything, and encourage readers to engage in a deep dive, a rabbit hole spiral, anything beyond mindless scrolling. That in turn charged me with the responsibility to read more, experience more, explore more, and attempt more in order to find fodder to discuss every other…week…month…whenever this damn thing publishes. I divagate. I hope you all are excited about the journey because I am. :)That’s all.
If you’re reading this sentence, thank you so much for reading another issue of Five Journalistic Questions! Please, feel free to discuss, or shit on it, over brunch or while in community with friends. As mentioned before, every word-of-mouth referral counts, and remember to tell a friend, to tell a friend, to tell their mom, to tell a friend! Tag me or leave a comment if you read. Ciao for now! ❤️
