tengo amigos yo?

I didn’t write again the other night because we lost power (therefore internet access) on account of the record heat and record electricity usage. It was not a city-wide blackout but I think just certain buildings in Almagro. We got it back later that day and it was good in that it forced me to go to sleep pretty early, which I needed. However, what I was going to write about was the fact that I’ve been surprised about making friends—and I left that deliberately without an adjective/modifier.

Many people came with friends from school and have already formed little groups. Others came because Buenos Aires is a lively, partying city and that’s the experience they’re bonding over. While I’m sureeeeee rationally of course that I’m not the only one, I’m feeling a bit out of place. There are people I like and people I want to get to know better – and, to be honest, plenty of people I don’t – but I’m impatient about the time it takes to really friends and wish I had even just one person immediately at my disposal. I also like three groups of people who haven’t really mixed socially very much yet, but am not really of any of the three groups yet. Sometimes, then, making plans is somewhat intimidating.

Most of all, seeing the way other friendships already are, I wish I had one person with whom I could especially bond and explore with, a go-to hangout sesh target. Usually that one person is all I want. In addition, I am anxious to make actual Argentine friends. Hopefully that will commerce soon.

In other news, I went to see the small carnaval parade downtown today with some of my new friends after a day of exploring on my own. I walked from Almagro up through Palermo Hollywood (shopping) and Palermo Soho (bars and cobblestone streets – gorgeous) to the botanical garden, then down to the Recoleta Cemetery, down Purreyedon and finally down Santa Fe. This is a gorgeous city. Pictures to come.

 

If I don’t write beforehand, Bariloche this weekend. Pictures most definitely to come. 

some thoughts on

Right now I’m sitting on our balcony that overlooks Avenida Corrientes. The sun is setting and it’s pretty beautiful. As in all times of day, though, it’s extremely busy! See?

Almagro y Yatay

 

I live in Almagro, a working class barrio in the west of the city. It’s south of Calle Rivadavía which, it’s generally accepted, divides the city into its richer and poorer barrios. As I said, Silvia walked me around Almagro a bit on our first day but today was the first day that I was able to contextualize better the character of Almagro.

 

Yesterday morning, we took a tour with an awesome and adorable (and Jewish!) guide named Gabi around Retiro, one of the nicest areas of the city. The palacios of rich portenos past – generally the landowners of European descent – are in Recoleta. Plaza San Martín is one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen, as was the monument to Carlos Pelligrini and surrounding French and Brazilian embassies. Plaza San Martín spills into Calle Florida, a touristy shopping district that is also very beautiful. That part of the city, of which I have TONS more to see, feels very European, historical, and beautiful.

 

Where I live is completely different. I’m now looking onto dirty buildings. As far as I can see are tons of apartment buildings crammed into a tiny space, with a few multi-story houses with clothes lines hanging everywhere. Instead of the glamour of Retiro, the flavor is much more South American. We have kioskos everywhere, places where you can buy perhaps a bottle of soda or a card to recharge your phone. The stores are generally very utilitarian; rather than sell clothes, they sell paint or cheap lunch or photocopies. I like that a lot.

 

I walked home today, about 30 blocks, from Recoleta/Barrio Norte to Almagro. In some respects, probably a bad idea. It was over 90 degrees F today and I’ve had a dehydration headache for the past few hours. But I appreciated seeing so many different faces of the city. I am sure that I will continue to write about this until the cows come home, as it’s an integral part of the porteno identity crisis, but this city really does balance two very distinct identities. Two blocks from a packed Starbucks and Plaza Lavalle is the Paraguayan consulate where long lines seek Argentine citizenship and a better life. Really fascinating.

 

As for some other thoughts:

1)      Argentine women have a reputation for being really gorgeous. However, I am certain that men are the fairer sex here. Almost all of the Argentine young men are insanely attractive. Seriously so. One big caveat: someone should tell many of these attractive young men that removing their mullets would make them even better looking.

 

2)      I have been resisting picking up an Argentine accent and using vos instead of tú. It’s pretty fun to say Calle Callao in an Argentine accent (cay-yay cay-yao in normal Spanish, cay-jay cay-jao in Argentina) and to say “vos sos de Boston, ¿no?” but I feel weird copping something that isn’t authentically mine (or, rather, so unauthentic as no Spanish is authentically mine…). On the other hand, I don’t need to call any more attention to the fact that I am a foreigner by using an grammatical form that pretty much doesn’t exist here, as I seem to be doing a fine enough job of that on my own. I think I will lose this battle in the end. I give you full license to mock me.

 

3)      Instead of drawing bus routes on maps like normal cities, bsas has the Guia T. The Guia T is like an Atlas in which you locate an address on a map and then look at the corresponding box on the corresponding page to find which buses go to that place. The exact location of the stop isn’t marked, nor is it at all easy to determine which direction a bus is heading without assistance. This is some Southern efficiency, if you ask me.

 

4)      I passed a tattoo parlor today called True Till Death. It was in a shopping center called el Centro Americano or something similar and its explanation on the sign outside, aka that it was a tatuaje, was (the only one) in English. I am visiting ASAP to ask if they named themselves for the Chain song but I am asking in SPANISH. I would have today but I got shy.

 

I will post again tonight because I have something else to say but don’t feel like doing it now. I was going to go out tonight but I have, as I mentioned, a major headache so maybe not. If that’s the case, I will definitely post again. 

he llegado

I am in Buenos Aires now. It's very hot and humid. (You should see my hair. Or maybe not.) The sun set very late. I keep having to remind myself that these things are not necessarily because I’m in bsas but because it’s summer here. Still, after the harrowing winter plaguing home it’s still kind of shocking to have sunlight after six and to be sweating while taking a shower. I frequently begin my thought process for a sentence in Spanish, which I’m taking as a sign of good things to come.

 

I was lucky enough to have serendipitously booked a ticket for the group flight, meaning I met a bunch of kids in the airport. I’m already seeing a North Cafeteria/South Cafeteria divide among the students, which is pretty crazy considering we don’t even really know each other’s names yet. Everyone is being righteously nice in that way that you could sit as anyone’s table in the dining hall during freshman orientation and ask the same six questions, more or less, that we’ve been asking each other now: What’s your name? Where are you from? Where do you go to school? Oh, do you know so-and-so? S/he goes there too. Where are you living in Buenos Aires? Oh, that’s kind of like how I live in ____.  I hope I don’t sound pessimistic or like I’m complaining. Actually, I’m quite grateful we have these topics to canvass and am genuinely interested for now.

 The flight was nothing worth writing about except that an Argentine man sat next to me and for the entire ride proceeded never to remove his headphones or speak to me. At first I thought it was because I was so unabashedly gringa but when I asked him for a pen to fill out a form he was equally short-winded and I concluded that it wasn’t me, it was him. My taxi driver, Juan, was the polar opposite and a hugeee sweetheart. I bumbled (so badly) through our conversation and kept having to say “lo siento” until it was repeated so I could understand. He was very very kind and we had many laughs, not just at my expense. I was a bit sorry to see him go when we arrived as Silvia’s apartment.

 

Silvia, my host mother, is great. Her building is beautiful and I have a great room and a bathroom all to myself. She showed me around the neighborhood, which is officially Caballito bordering on Almagro. It is very urban and busy but doesn’t really feel at all like any city that I know. My favorite part of our adventure was when she took me to the supermercado. She rarely goes but the American students, she says, always love the supermercado because they can buy peanut butter there. She thinks peanut butter is strange. She also thinks it’s strange that all Americans eat salad with every meal. I told her that I really like how Israelis eat salad for breakfast and we had a good laugh. She doesn’t cook much which is the only thing, so far, I find disappointing. Her hospitality and patience have been excellent and much appreciated, especially as I butcher her beautiful native tongue to answer her questions. And she, just like my mother, is a Jewish psychoanalyst so I am confident the apartment on Yatay will always feel perhaps too much like home.

 

We have an Argentine student living with us named Noelia. She is extremely skinny and has a tattoo. I initially found her extremely intimidating until I discover that she makes a face just like Danielle when she scrunches her face up in concentration. She told me that my Spanish is much better than the last student, Elena, and that she doesn’t want to practice English with me because she mispronounces things. And she set up my wireless network! Those things definitely put her in my good graces and made me stop being a tardo.

 

I was sorry not to explore more today but also very happy to unpack, get settled, and rest. Tomorrow begins orientation and I doubt it will slow down over the next week or so. But I have wireless and will be ever-accessible, so please tell me how you’re doing!

 

my generational debt? my priorities!

Last week I called attention to a couple of items that had been cut from the House stimulus package by the so-called “gang” of Senate moderates. The list included $5.8 billion for health prevention activity, $1 billion Head Start/Early Start programs, and $2 billion for increasing access to broadband internet. I’m not sure if they made it back into the final stimulus package – I am pretty sure they didn’t – but either way the point I want to make it still relevant: Our generation and our children will be paying for the stimulus package and forthcoming bank bailouts, which makes it all the more important that the bill has some degree of mid-to-long term sense. I appreciate that this will be an expensive enterprise – through probably not the $2.3 trillion plus debt members of the Republican caucus keep citing – and I think that’s a great reason to load it with more than just immediate forms of relief like the AMT fix or added unemployment benefits but also to take advantage of this opportunity and take a big step toward restoring America’s long term competitiveness.

My ideological convinction that investments should also balance longer-term priorities is all the more reason that it’s driving me crazy that Republicans, starting with Michelle Malkin, have been calling the stimulus package The Generational Theft Act of 2009. Think Progress catalogues some of the claim’s recent appearances:

Malkin’s views are apparently beginning to hold sway with Republicans in Congress. On January 29, Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) said of the proposed stimulus package, “This bill is a generational theft bill.” In a blog post yesterday for AmericaSpeakOn.org, a new conservative 501(c)4 group, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) used Malkin’s language as well:

The hundreds of billions of dollars Washington is borrowing to finance this pork-barrel monstrosity will come from our children and grandchildren.This is not “stimulus” – it’s generational theft.

Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), who has become a top critic of the recovery package in the Senate, also referred to it as “generational theft” on CBS’ Face The Nation.

WAIT. HOLD UP. The same Congressional Republicans complaining about a stimulus package that costs less than the Bush administration’s $2 trillion in tax cuts or the over $1 trillion spent in Iraq are just now talking about “generational theft?” These same folks who are gutting the sensible long-term priorities within the bill – that which they’ve described as “Democratic pet projects” – are complaining about the debt that they’re not inheriting? If this is my generational debt, a claim I could work with considering it's going to be my debt, that's a good reason for it not to be loaded with the same bad policies of the last eight years. 

I agree with Krugman’s assessment that this talk is “deranged.” (Krugman himself is advocating for an even bigger bill and thinks the administration is merely “kicking the can down the road.”) Ron Brownstein is on MtP is also ripping into this, asking what credibility Republicans have to claim the upper hand on fiscal stewardship. Watch it here.

As usual, Michael Connery at Future Majority beat me to the punch.

The facts of the matter are simple. We're facing the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, and the question on the minds of most economists isn't "how big will the deficits be," rather, it's "will the stimulus be big enough to plug the gaping holes in our economy." The economic recovery package isn't $800 billion in pork or wasteful spending, rather it is a stop-gap to save jobs, and a mid- to long-term investment in the future our citizens, our infrastructure, and our economy.

In its final form, the stimulus package will:

•   Modernize more than 75% of federal buildings and improve the energy efficiency of 2 million American homes, saving consumers and taxpayers billions on our energy bills. The plan will also double American renewable energy-generating capacity over three years.
  
•   Make the immediate investments necessary to ensure that within five years, all of America’s medical records are computerized, reducing medical errors and saving billions in health care costs.
  
• Equip thousands of schools, community colleges, and public universities with 21st century classrooms, labs, and libraries.
  
• Expand broadband across America, so that a small business in a rural town can connect and compete with their counterparts anywhere in the world.
  
• Enact the largest investment in America’s crumbling roads, bridges and transit systems since the creation of the national highway system.
  
• Invest in high risk-high reward science-based research and innovation, and bring it to market—to invent the technology the world uses, and prevent and cure deadly and costly diseases.
  

As Connery is noting, the stimulus package contains long-term provisions. Brownstein, again, reports in the NJ this weekend that Obama Focuses On Ends, Flexible On Means. What I am implying here is that these provisions are what a stimulus package that isn’t generational theft should look like, one that invests not only for the short-term (job creation vis a vis infrastructure projects) but in the long term (in sectors like weatherization and green building).

If anyone has called attention to this concept, it’s been Nick Kristof. In this On the Ground blog entry from two-ish weeks ago, Kristof began hammering the idea that the best part of the stimulus package were its investments in education. His column this weekend, too, address this is issue. As he notes, the bill invests $100 billion in education. When the Dept of Ed’s annual budget is merely $59 billion, this is obviously a really big deal. And to me, this suggests a stimulus package with some forward thinking. 

FINAL NOTE: Yes, I am in Argentina. I arrived this morning. But after a little suitcase mishap yesterday afternoon, I didn’t get a chance to finish this yesterday so it took first prioritiy. As for Argentina: I took a two hour nap and could probably fall asleep right now.  

getting ready!

I spent today mostly packing. It’s bringing out a side of me that I can’t help but find entertaining. I make lists then, when they get messy, I make new ones. It’s 3 AM and instead of sleeping – the sensible thing to do – I just made a new list of things to do tomorrow. Laundry, visa money, weighing my suitcase… things that demonstrate the neuroses radiating from me. It’s a good kind of fidgety, I think. I made probably a couple of hundred flashcards while marathon watching The Wire for too many episodes, simultaneously nearly completing my goals to finish Season 2 so I can leave it for Mom and to learn as many idioms as possible  that yo evito el sentido del no entender ni papa (to not understand a damn thing). In Spanish, to make a mountain into a molehill is to drown in a glass of water. I think that’s my favorite so far.

Yesterday was really pretty epic and I would be remiss not to share, even though I would rather just save face. I locked myself out of my house, climbed my roof to discover that winter screens meant I couldn’t open any windows, and read Mansfield Park while sprawled across the backseat of the Jeep in our garage until my Edmund Bertram, my mother, could rescue me. It got no less funny after that. Locking myself out of the house might even have been topped by my double-bagged groceries, the offer for which came with quite the wink. How much I felt like Fanny Price in that moment! (And how JA of me to form a sentence like that.)

I think I will be able to achieve my goal of only one suitcase !!!/knock wood/fingers crossed. Si occure, será macanudo.

t-1.75 (after sleep)

VERSE BROKE UP

Verse broke up. This band has been boring for at least two lps and two eps now. I originally said only one LP but I gave From Anger to Rage another listen to honor their end and decided to make it two. As someone aptly put it on the b9, "that one song they had was pretty sweet." Usually I really hate when hardcore kids complain about seeing bands too many times -- hardworking bands deserve respect -- but Verse was a tired band on so many levels. And since they manage to get onto every halfway decent east coast show, I couldn't just politely avoid them. I'll leave out some of my hard feelings about dudes in that band and just say I hope their future projects are as solid as Rebuild was.

The one thing I am legitimately bummed about is that Verse breaking up means the count of active hardcore bands I even just occasionally listen to drops to about three, give or take. The two that aren't Have Heart are west coast bands that almost never tour. Second, this means I'm really old. Verse are considered ancient for their six years of activity. I think that makes me ancient too.

To honor their and my oldness, I will recap my favorite Verse shows in order:

3. MONSTER SUMMER TOUR KICKOFF at the AS220 (7/12/07). Both of the summer's biggest tours happened to be in Providence for their first night -- Have Heart, Verse, DTN, Ceremony, Sinking Ships, Allegiance, Soul Control, and I Rise for a non-fest at Providence's tiny AS220. My favorite set at this show was hands down the Have Heart set because the police came, threatening to cut the mics because the show ran way late. Eventually they did but the kids just belted WATCH ME RISE and it didn't matter at all. Also, it was a perfect summer night. Often shows like that feel really long but this was just a lot of fun. Notable also because it was the first time I saw HxH headline over Verse aka the first time I realized how huge those dudes had gotten. I've been dying to find clips from this show, if anyone can help me out.

2. EDGE DAY 07 at Welfare. (10/21/2007). Again, lots of fun for reasons besides Verse (exhibit A: Sweet Pete doing Take the Risk with The Effort!!) but I have to say that their set was really fun to watch. (Sorry, I know better video exists but I didn't really look.) I was wiped at that point, especially because there had just been a string of mediocre bands, and I was camping out in the air conditioned spot by the sound tech where it's super quiet. Pat and I were singing the words just loudly enough for one another to hear, especially because our voices were echoing off of the sound booth. At such a huge, long show it was amazing to have a quiet moment with a band as quiet, relatively speaking, as Verse. Most of all, Sean Murphy's speeches were spot-on that night. I hadn't heard him speak that personally since he addressed his addiction in some much older WFTF sets I'd seen on video. (And a lot of his pretty trite commentary on politics, which generally makes me cringe.)

1. BEST DAY at the Wallingford Hungarian Club (1/5/04). The line-up still blows my mind: TFS in their pre-first breakup NC days, Our Turn, Verse, Have Heart, Look Alive / Learn shared set, and SOH. First time I saw Verse. The show was mostly youth crew bands. Although I was pretty into Turning Point and stay gold at the time, Verse's melodic style was still groundbreaking/awesome to me. The demo and Rebuild stand out to me as their best (aka before it was tired) work and, as this was one of their first shows at all, it's clear that they had no other option but those excellent jams. Another highlight: I brought notecards to the show from which to study.

Honorable mention: Verse at Fairfield U with TFS, Have Heart, Signs of Hope, and Fired Up (6/28/04). Mark and I ate ice cream in the hallway. One of my favorite shows ever. (I make embarassing appearances in the TFS and Have Heart videos from Scott at Bystander on youtube but nothing from Verse's set....)

Speaking of last shows, TFS last set rip is here. Many of my favorite faces present and an awesome shout out to Ferres before my favorite new TFS song, What We Know. Watching it made my day! Heads up: Rather than a continuous set, the folder contains MPGs of individual songs.

a week in review of sorts

I hope to make this, a weekly round-up of my favorite news and commentary, a regular feature to keep myself writing and thinking about politics at home while I'm away. If you're keeping score, anticipate Friday appearances. 

• McLatchy has a list of what the Senate cut from the stimulus package. I will be revisiting this but just as a preview: $5.8 billion Health Prevention Activity, $1 billion Head Start/Early Start, and $2 billion broadband. 
  
• Two great articles on SCOTUS this week, one piggybacking the other. First, Adam Litpak of The Times ponders “To Nudge, Shift or Shove the Supreme Court Left” which is summed up beautifully in Litpak’s closer: Mr. Obama’s first Supreme Court nomination will no doubt be an accomplished lawyer whose views are generally to the left of the ideological center. What remains to be seen is what sort of liberal — and what sort of liberalism — he intends to endorse.  Slate’s Dahlia Lithwick followed that article with a reasoned consideration (and rejection) of the progressive plea for a liberal lion on the Court. And by liberal lion, I would probably be better served to say a “liberal loudest animal you can think of.” (Cue justice brennannnnnn / dear justice letter now.) I am spotlighting these both because I particularly enjoyed reading them but also because Justice Ginsburg, the Court’s most liberal member, just underwent surgery for pancreatic cancer. It seems President Obama might have a Court nominee sooner than expected, cf Reuters.
  
• LOTS OF DRAMA in the upper echelons of the military/diplomatic world. First, Thomas Ricks scoops that it was Gen. Ray Odierna who pushed first for the troop surge. Second, Gen. Anthony Zinni flips a (very very public) shit because he was offered the post of Ambassador to Iraq, then lost it to Chris Hill without being told. Personally, I’m immensely pleased. Hill is a level-headed, results-oriented professional who I am thrilled to have in the service of our country. Most of all, I loved the long-form profile of Dick Holbrooke in the Week in Review. The best line: Many people have personal trainers; Mr. Holbrooke has a personal archivist. Awesome. All three are highly suggested reads.
• David Plouffe, beer pong champion? The Esquire's profile reveals few campaign secrets or insights on the surface but is still a mighty entertaining read. 
• OKAY Jonah Goldberg is a hack. I know. But I couldn’t help but agree with the sentiment behind his scathing indictment of Geithner and Daschle in the LA Times. Like the characters he mocks, I do believe that paying taxes is a patriotic duty and appreciate his righteous indignation. Speaking of hacks, Thomas Friedman on nation-building in Gaza stresses a point that I think is positively crucial: state capacity and effective institutions in the territories is essential for peace in the Middle East. (Or, for that matter, anywhere.)
• Finally, how did I miss that Kanye West, Lil Wayne, (9-mo. pregnant) M.I.A. and Jay-Z performed together tonight? Is this on youtube yet?

T-7 days for BSAS!

Blumenthal to challenge Lieberman?

Blumenthal has been kicking around CT for ages. Party leaders have beseeched him to run for governor too many times and he's always declined. He officially took himself out of the 2010 governor's race this week. (Dan Malloy, whose primary nod I supported in 2006, jumped in today. My love, however, is reserved for affable Secretary of State Susan Bysiewicz.)

In 2006, activists begged Blumenthal to run against Lieberman but he refused. Now his true ambition is coming out, courtesy of The Hill: Big surprise, he wants to run for the Senate. Serving as Senator, he said, “would be an honor, and it's always been a career goal." I don't have hard feelings about his decision not to run in '06 but I do think a stronger candidate than Lamont -- excepting the money factor and if perhaps if Lamont hadn't taken a poorly timed vacation -- really could have beaten Lieberman in that race.  Blumenthal will be an extremely formidable challenger against an already weak Lieberman. The wildcard is that I'm not solid that Lieberman will run again in 2012, especially with numbers as bad as his are now. And I also wonder if Chris Murphy will roll over and let Blumenthal, the state's most popular Democrat, take the primary. Murphy may be young but I think a lot of folks have eyes on him for a reason, not the least of which was his surprise (and considerable!) defeat of Nancy Johnson in '06. If not Murphy in 2012, expect him to be the favorite on Dodd's eventually open Senate seat. As I said, he's young.

David Brooks does it again

David Brooks frequently strikes gold in his columns, especially when he's mocking the set of people with whom I tend to identify. The pleasure I receive when reading his Lunch Period Poli Sci op-ed is endless, even though I've read it probably too many times. I was going to drop a blockquote in but it's just too good to hash like that.

Today's column, Ward Three Morality, just added to my love. For those who can appreciate what this means, Ward Three encompasses Tenleytown, Klingle, Cathedral Heights, Chevy Chase, Cleveland Park, Forest Hills, Foxhall, Friendship Heights, Glover Park, and Woodley Park. AKA these are the folks who patronize 2Amys and Politics and Prose, who embody the future I probably want one day. Knowing many of those folks, and self-mockingly considering myself an amateur of their ranks, I couldn't help but crack up at this hilariously on target dig: 

The good news for rich people is that people in this neighborhood are very nice and cerebral. On any given Saturday, half the people in Ward Three are arranging panel discussions for the other half to participate in. They live in modest homes with recently renovated kitchens and Nordic Track machines crammed into the kids’ play areas downstairs (for some reason, people in Ward Three are only interested in toning the muscles in the lower halves of their bodies).

I know that Brooks is being cheeky here but he is also imparting some serious shots at both sides. I'm not going to lie, it pleases me that these Ward Three folks are calling the shots now. Maybe I shouldn't feel so happy about that. Brooks is really right when he says Under their rule, the federal government is permitted to throw hundreds of billions of dollars around on a misguided bank bailout, but if a banker like John Thain spends $1,500 on a wastepaper basket then all hell breaks loose. (I am again reminded of Nietzsche. These drab upper middle class folks embody the bourgeois values Nietzsche loves to hate.) Like Brooks, I suspect this will be a prominent theme in economic crisis America and a continued criticism from the old right to the left. 

I similarly delight in his long-form Atlantic piece about high-acheivers in my generation, The Organization Kid. I think some of his insights are a bit off, and some clearly embody what I mock about Princeton and Penn, but much of the article is eerily true. I was thinking about it just yesterday when I was reading an American Scholar op-ed called The Disadvantages of Having an Elite Education. The beginning of the Scholar article, which is quite long, was both rather engrossing and also uncomfortably accurate.

It didn’t dawn on me that there might be a few holes in my education until I was about 35. I’d just bought a house, the pipes needed fixing, and the plumber was standing in my kitchen. There he was, a short, beefy guy with a goatee and a Red Sox cap and a thick Boston accent, and I suddenly learned that I didn’t have the slightest idea what to say to someone like him. So alien was his experience to me, so unguessable his values, so mysterious his very language, that I couldn’t succeed in engaging him in a few minutes of small talk before he got down to work. Fourteen years of higher education and a handful of Ivy League degrees, and there I was, stiff and stupid, struck dumb by my own dumbness. “Ivy retardation,” a friend of mine calls this. I could carry on conversations with people from other countries, in other languages, but I couldn’t talk to the man who was standing in my own house.

I experienced something very similar, to my complete dismay, when I was hanging out with a friend of a friend at a hardcore show. While I have some disagreements with both Brooks and Deresiewicz -- for instance, I know many people my age who are not econ majors heading for careers in investment banking -- there is much credence to their perspectives.