back at it: fam, italians, stuff

In all honesty, I really long for the days -- that brief three month span in the 05 summer to be exact -- where I had a mindless gig and was able to blog for 8 hours a day. I dont long for it in a "boy, I wish I wasn't writing for a living, rather answering phones and twiddling my thumbs" kinda way. But it was like a perfect storm. I was fresh off an incredibly fun internship in Orlando, back in the Strict crashing at my boys pad with tons of stories and a good 8-block hour of the day, every day, when I had nothing else better to do than indulge my daydreaming and voyeurism in the form of extra-ridiculously-long rambling blogs.

But this freelance thing is no job for the lazy. I'll say that. Much like when I was in school, there's never many instances where I can be doing nothing and feel all too comfortable with it. Back in the collegiate days, 2 or 3 hours in front of a television or surfing the web or CD shopping at Borders meant precious time wasted where I could be studying or drafting some paper, feel me. These days, its the same way. Either I should be finishing a project or pursuing a prject. Otherwise my transient NYC-Buff back-n-forth will continue much longer than my sanity and wits can suffer.

This is all getting at the point that, several times a day something random happens that I'd like to turn into a novel-blog and i always end up letting it pass. because when it comes time to sit in front of a computer and run off at the mouth, i always get this concerned feeling that I should be regurgitating about some person, album or issue i have to write about. it wasnt like this when I worked for the papers. You have allotted times during the day or after events to focus and bang out your piece and thats that.

ahhh...i'm rambling. anyways, as I always, I'm offering a guarded promise that you'll all most likely scoff at (which is perfectly reasonable); but i'm really gonna try to be more frequent on my blog. its only right. with all that said...here are just some random notes...

--- RIP to the blogs most loyal reader, my lil cousin Melonie. She used to be a teller at a relatively quiet bank where she had ample time to surf the web for music news and online shopping and, of course, to read her big cousin's blog. She's since quit that gig and took one for the fam, offering to be the primary day-carer (word?) for her lil nephew and my lil cousin, Zadok. Which is probably why she hasnt left an excoriating comment reprimanding me for the recent month-plus absence. Miss ya baby.

--- speaking of lil Zadok. He is the first male born into our extended family in close to 20 years. 20 YEARS!!! Ever since my lil bro Adam was born in 1985, we've had 20-plus year string of baby girls. Every uncle, aunt and cousin that have given birth to a new seed in the Thomas or Frazier line has given birth to a girl. This completely screw with the family dynamic, specifically considering my older cousins (Shaad, Jason and Ryan) are semi-AWOL. At most family gatherings its the uncles, the aunts and (unless my blood-brother (childhood friends I refer to as my brothers) roll thru) it's me, Adam and about 20 women. Which means they rule music, conversation, you get the picture. And it's cool. Female family members are also more likely to laugh at our jokes and humor us. And it's always cool to have an excuse to sing along to Jill Scott or Musiq and feel like a total schmazool. The larger point is that Zadok is being treated like somewhat of a family Messiah. It's a huge deal. The true benefits of his arrival will come when he is old enough to walk and talk and me and A-Eezy can begin grooming him into an obnoxious, ridiculous, caricature S.O.B. like every other Thomas Man. My twin cousin Halima will most likely not appreciate such a sinister plan, but after 20 years, can anyone blame us...just wait, I'll have using the word "nigga" before he's in pre-school. ha.

--- speaking of niggas. Charm School is a reproach. Noone on that show makes larger fools of themselves than two gut-bucket broads that happen to be blackies. I've documented here my reticence to indulge these shows, starting all the way back with Being Bobby Brown (which I sorely miss), specifically because of the concern that these idiots are being used by ignorant folk in non-urban America as cultural identifiers. These women and Flavor Flav are Susie from South Dakota's entree to black America, whereas I'm fairly certain that Screech is not the typical white dude. Some may feel that its overboard and condescending to believe that some hicks from Middle Americ or suburbia or segregated urban areas would be dumb enough to believe that most black women act like Larissa (though this actually might be closer to the case)...but everytime I watch the Sopranos I swear that it severely shapes my general view of Italiam-Americans. This might be an even bigger problem. Follow me here:

The easiest way to identify a black person is by the color/shade/hue of their skin (and our low credit scores, propensity toward crime and wide noses...kidding) I bring this up because, to see Larissa or B. Brown or Ying Yang Twins is most definitely stereotype-perpetuating, but you also see Tiger Woods, Obama, men in suits on the train and myriad other regular blacks throughout the day. The Tigers and Obamas can most definitely be passed off as the exception, but more and more, its becoming harder for an individual to validate thinking of Flav as a norm, but rather one member of a rather large underbelly. OK? (suspend an ultra-critical line of thinking and just roll with me here for the sake of my exorcizing this other, larger concern.)

But let's take Italians. It was just earlier this year that I learned that, typically, a last name that ends in a vowel is usually from some type of Italian American family line. Other than that, there is literally no physical identifier that I can personally ascribe to an Italian American. Arabs, yes. Asians, yes. Hispanics, yes (specifically Hispanic women over the age of 35, since they tend to resemble Anthony Hopkins). Jews, maybe. But Irish? No. Polish? No. Norwegian? No. Italian? No. Call me an idiot, but they look like very similar to every other euro-ethnicity to a large extent. So what happens? I start taking my cues (like a feeble minded rube, albeit) from either Hollywood or very extreme characteristics largely associated with Italian Americans. Is this grown man wearing a track suit to dinner thats tight enough around his crotch to his ball-bulge? He must be Italian. Is this white man/woman especially loud/crass/vulgar? Must be Italian. I'm sure I meet literally tons of Italian-Americans on a daily basis that act nothing like the Sopranos or the Italians in Spike Lee movies (Spike has a serious problem)...but unless, fopr some reason, I learn that they're Italian, you won't find me correlating their behavior with "being Italian". I wont meet a regular man at a grocery store who behaves like your average American and connect that with acting Italian. But if he's in the line and the cashier has to call for an item check and its making him late and he yells "OHHH! It's like waiting for paint to dry over here!" It's like "he must be Italian." Have you read this last paragraph? And I claim to be halfway enlightened. This is a HUGE problem.

I bring this up because I watch the Sopranos religiously. Often two to three times a week. It's one of my 4 or 5 favorite shows ever. Increasingly, tho (maybe over the past 3 to 4 seasons) I've always found the show to be just as comical as it is dramatic and the comedy often comes at the expense of the Italian characters who are often portrayed in such an ignorant fashion that its downright hilarious. "This," I ask myself, "is how THESE people get down?" I know, i know. I once read an editorial by an Italian American sports journalist up in arms about the way the NFL could bully a show like Playmakers off the air because of its negative depiction of pro football athletes, but the Italian American community wasnt able to effectively get the Sopranos thrown off the air for its constant perjorative depiction of Italians. Yes, the show is dramatizing a very small subset of Italians, but they're gripe is no different than the African American gripe that: When there are not enough aletrnate shows that reinforce positive aspects, then you get ignoramouses like me that cant help but basing generalities off these extreme cases.

Think about the Sopranos...has there ever been a truly positive character on that show? Any balance? HBO has given us The Wire (my favorite show ever), where blacks are criminals and corrupt politicians (even if the characters are three dimensional and realistic), with a few do-good cops here and there; Oz, with a bunch of nigger-inmates; and Def Comedy Jam, which, for all its opportunities, is a bojangling exhibition. Aside from that, there have been a few HBO films (like the latest joint with Latifah) and Def Poetry Jam (hackneyed and sickening, but at least its not disparaging) and thats it. Yet, I ride or die with that channel. Italians have been given The Sopranos and thats it. Just sayin...

Anyways, thank goodness we only have two more Soprano episodes left in the series. As soon as its over I'm gonna start my own personal rehibilitation effort