Pop Cesspool

THE SECRET HISTORY OF POP CESSPOOL, VOL. 13

My dad had a recipe for sardines that was intended to mask most of their smell while not totally diminishing their fishy pungency. He made the dish on intuition, like a hobo, with no official measurements. It went something like this:

• A can of the humble minnows (in plain water, not in oil or mustard)
• Some raw onion, diced
• Some vinegar
• A little salt
• And "more black pepper than you think you can stand."

That last bit of instruction was not to be ignored: After the first four ingredients were in the bowl, he'd forcefully shower the grayish mash with a significant dusting of pepper, to the point where the sneezy condiment was the only visible substance. Then he'd stir it all up and we'd eat it on saltine crackers.

It was totally a Depression-era snack, a way to turn very cheap protein into something zingy. He might've learned it in the Navy, or it might've been passed down through the coal miners and steel workers in the family. I've forgotten those details. Dad, for his part, saw it as a minor test of one's manhood: eat this ... it'll put hair on your chest. And he typically reserved it for times when we were all around the TV, watching sports on the weekend in the dead of winter.

We consumed it during Larry Holmes fights or while watching ABC's Saturday afternoon lineup, which began with professional bowling and ended with "Wide World of Sports." That show, hosted by Jim McKay, was the early booster for the Ironman triathlon, which seemed futuristic and mind-boggling back then.

The February 1982 version of the race was particularly dramatic: Julie Moss, a college student, was leading during the marathon portion. She was a newbie -- a total underdog -- and it was an inspiring moment. Dad, perhaps sensing the drama, made some sardines. We settled in with our fish and crackers to watch the final moments. Moss, looking tiny and vulnerable, was wavering. Her body was rebelling. She collapsed. She stood up again. Her pants were wet. Something dark was running down her leg. As she crawled to the finish, Kathleen McCartney passed her to win the women's division. Moss eventually finished, filthy and dazed. Her effort was a defining moment in sports history. In my house, we looked at each other. We looked down at the sardines. We didn't finish them.

I still make 'em a few times a year, though.

(read the complete and ongoing Secret History here)

THE SECRET HISTORY OF POP CESSPOOL, VOL. 12

I resisted buying a mobile phone for years, mostly because of the expense, and partly because my dad had worked for Ma Bell. Owning a cell seemed not only to be an extravagance, but also a betrayal of the land-line monopoly that had put food in my mouth all those years. But after the 9/11 attacks, I got a pay-per-use phone. And a few months before I became The Poppa, I added myself to the big-carrier plan that my wife had been using for awhile.

But throughout the late 1990s, before mobile-phone ownership was an inevitability, I harbored a deeper objection. I never read Into Thin Air, but one of the book's widely disseminated plot-points -- the final satellite call by Everest guide Rob Hall to his wife during that disastrous 1996 climb -- firmly affected my view of personal communications devices. Now, I've never trekked up a big mountain. And I've never been hopelessly lost in the wilderness. But I've also never been enamored with the idea of having the ability to call home and say, hey baby, I'm freezing my balls off and things don't look too good. In that kind of situation, if you have a phone, you're kinda obligated to use it, even though it's probably gonna be one of those conversations that is more "ironic and awful" than "dramatically sweet."

So, back in the day, anytime I borrowed somebody's celly for a long trip or whatever, I thought about Hall. And since I've owned my own, this has been my plan: If know I'm going to die, and I'm able to use my phone, I'll just send a text message to my entire address book:

LUV U ALL!

Everybody will think it's flippant and/or cavalier, but after awhile, they'll be appreciative that I even made the effort. (I reserve the right to revise this plan, depending on the context.)

It's possible that I'll send a second txt to close friends and family:

LUV U LOTS!

And Tha Mrs. will be all like "WTF?" And then I'll txt her:

BALLS FREEZING OFF. DOESN'T LOOK GOOD. LUV U MOST!!!!

And I'll be a legendary coward.

(read the complete and ongoing Secret History here) 

THE SECRET HISTORY OF POP CESSPOOL, VOL. 11

The restaurant's owners positioned the establishment as a relatively upscale eatery, so the bowtied busboys carried big oval trays, not bus pans. And the trays had to be hoisted to neck-level as we lugged them to the kitchen. Classy. The task required brute strength at times -- there might be 50 or 60 pounds of dirty dishes on a tray -- and the final stage of each tray-run was the trickiest part: Flatware and crockery teetering on the left shoulder. Right hand out to shove the big swinging door. Eyes open for cranky divorcée waitresses bringing steaks and lobsters in the other direction. Nod to the Puerto Rican dishwasher shrouded in steam. Don't slip, don't trip, don't give any lip.

But the kitchen also had loud music, and it wasn't just classic rock. On Saturday nights, in particular, the cooks would flip to the FM pop station's dance mix, the one broadcast live from a club near the airport or the fairgrounds or the riverfront. It was a mood changer, especially if the joint was busy. This was the winter of '87/'88, so the DJ would invariably play an extended mix of "Pump Up The Volume" by M.A.R.R.S. Suddenly everybody liked that "rap stuff." The divorcées would wiggle it just a little bit -- while still berating the cooks. The other wait-staff clique -- the flaming gays -- would lip-sync to the chorus. The cooks -- mostly Greek, mostly in their 20s and 30s -- would act like they didn't notice the song. But they probably went to that club when they weren't working.

I loved the brief infusion of proto-house, because I was desperate for a taste of urban bustle. While that 12" single spun on the radio, eating up 6 or 8 minutes of another grinding Saturday night, I could imagine that I wasn't trapped with half-satisfied people in a surf-and-turf restaurant near a corn field and a mini-mart and a rent-a-center and a stone quarry and a roller rink. This was a place of action, and maybe the world wouldn't be so goddamn boring forever.

(read the complete and ongoing Secret History here)

THE SECRET HISTORY OF POP CESSPOOL, VOL. 10

Penis envy might begin at a very early age, but it is certainly reaffirmed and amplified by that first elementary-school field trip to see The Nutcracker, especially if you -- and most of the other students in your 6th grade class -- have never beheld professional ballet in person. I suppose that in communities with more status and culture, such experiences happen earlier and more frequently, and so most young adolescents are long-inured to the idea that men in dance companies often have man-sized cocks. For my class, however, the show represented a paradigm shift.

I could wax poetic about the quiet, saucer-eyed reactions of the very Catholic girls in the class -- the slight head tilts, the scattered whispers during intermission, and so on. Was that a grin on the teacher's face? Was there an audible shuffle in the theater when the really-well-hung lead male strutted onstage? Did any of the other boys (certainly not me) nudge their female classmates to see if they were aware of the splendorous meat? Any answer would be hyperbole.

This much is true: The boys certainly noticed that cock. That shit was funny. The cock forced my young, aspirational brain to reconcile the highly cultural experience of seeing The Nutcracker in cosmopolitan downtown Allentown with the possibility that many of the females around me weren't experiencing anything intellectual at all. To be sure, they weren't necessarily quivering with lust -- "awe" might be a better term -- but they were affected, nonetheless, and this was immensely troubling.

(read the complete and ongoing Secret History here)

THE SECRET HISTORY OF POP CESSPOOL, VOL. 9

I can't possibly account for all of the deep psychological effects of "The Muppet Show," but the ballroom scenes were uniquely powerful. For sure, I laughed at some of the pairings (e.g. Waldorf and Statler together), the one-liners (particularly the less-nuanced puns) and the physical comedy (Miss Piggy's chops) -- but I may not have understood that adults don't really act like this when they go out. Now, I wasn't totally naive: If there's one thing the show communicated, in general, it was that *all* of adult life was ripe for parody. And as a kid, I loved this, because so much of adult life seemed over-complicated. So, yeah, I grasped that the ballroom scenes were basically an exaggeration. (And I didn't know anybody who went to ballrooms, anyway.) But, as with any 2nd or 3rd grader, much of grownup love & courtship was a mystery to me -- and I was also keenly aware that comedy contains much truth. So I'm positive that I took some cues and/or lessons from those Muppets and their terpsichorean gags. If I had to summarize my learnings, it would be thusly:

Don't be the frog who is thrown into the chandelier. Idle chatter should always lead to a punchline. Even monsters and scientists find partners. Snooty people can have grumpy marriages. Short guys sometimes get tall ladies. The old days have been compromised by hairy hippies. Don't overdress. Dancing does not necessarily equal happiness.

(read the complete and ongoing Secret History here)

THE SECRET HISTORY OF POP CESSPOOL, VOL. 8

My immediate neighborhood had a lot of old people and very few school-age children. There was me; my brother; a kid who would've been diagnosed with severe ADHD in today's world; and a boy with sketchy parents and a knack for petty crime. As a result, my brother and I spent a lot of time on our bikes, riding to other neighborhoods -- when we weren't jumping in and out of our above-ground pool like maniacs. The pool could be the loudest spot around, but it also could be the most inconspicuous. More on that in a minute.

Although there was a shortage of tykes, our block did have two households with high-school girls. They were social, but generally low-key; if they partied, it most often was elsewhere. (Probably because of all the old people in the vicinity. Some of those geezers had itchy trigger-fingers when it came to calling the police.) But occasionally, one girl's parents would throw a big bash. Once they hired a country/rock cover band. There almost always were people on Harleys. My family never attended. It's complicated.

Anyway, one party really sticks in my mind because it was obviously the girl's birthday, and the family rented a really loud jukebox. It wasn't a stodgy thing, either: If I remember correctly, it was the summer of '83, and that thing was stocked with Men At Work, the Greg Kihn Band, "Der Kommissar," Eddy Grant, "The Safety Dance" -- y'know, basically everything that was important to a pubescent, awkward, pause-tape-making,* Billboard-chart-watching nerd like me. (By 1984, I'd made the transition to weightier fare like Purple Rain, The Unforgettable Fire and, uh, 1984. Hip-hop, college rock and heavier metal were totally 1985.)

Anyway, I distinctly remember being relatively alone that evening. One parent was probably out with my brother. The other was probably doing something around the house. I was alone outside on the patio -- where I could be seen -- when I realized that this glorious cheese-pop onslaught was not coming from an FM station, but from some other, more selective source. Instead of crossing the lawn, saying hello, grabbing a soda and joining the party, I did the only sensible thing: I slipped into the pool, where I could sit with my head above the water but below the rim. Unseen, I mentally catalogued the hits until the sun started to go down. When it was darker, I climbed out and went inside.

(read the complete and ongoing Secret History here)

*pause tape: A cassette of songs made by listening to FM radio on a boombox and pressing "Record" whenever a prized tune is being broadcast. "Pause tape" nostalgia is particularly strong in hip-hop. But the technique also was ubiquitous in my white-and-suburban social circles during middle school.   

THE SECRET HISTORY OF POP CESSPOOL, VOL. 7

Deep in the caverns of my dorkitude resides Tom Swift Jr. I had no love for the Hardy Boys or any other serialized adventurers. If it didn't have spacecraft, airlocks, deadly rays or giant gadgets, it didn't exist to me. (I did occasionally make room for bowdlerized biographies of professional athletes.) I clung desperately to the Swift shelf at the local public library: a long stretch of volumes, generally with pale orange or yellowish spines, published between the mid-1950s and early 1970s, and bearing the name of author Victor Appleton II. Most of these titles ring a bell:

Tom Swift and His Flying Lab
Tom Swift and His Jetmarine
Tom Swift and His Rocket Ship
Tom Swift and His Giant Robot
Tom Swift and His Atomic Earth Blaster
Tom Swift and His Outpost In Space
Tom Swift and His Diving Seacopter
Tom Swift In The Caves Of Nuclear Fire
Tom Swift On The Phantom Satellite
Tom Swift and His Ultrasonic Cycloplane
Tom Swift and His Deep-Sea Hydrodome
Tom Swift In The Race To the Moon
Tom Swift and His Space Solartron
Tom Swift and His Electronic Retroscope
Tom Swift and His Spectromarine Selector
Tom Swift and The Cosmic Astronauts
Tom Swift and The Visitor From Planet X
Tom Swift and The Electronic Hydrolung
Tom Swift and His Triphibian Atomicar
Tom Swift and His Megascope Space Prober
Tom Swift and The Asteroid Pirates
Tom Swift and His Repelatron Skyway
Tom Swift and His Aquatomic Tracker
Tom Swift and His 3-D Telejector
Tom Swift and His Polar-Ray Dynasphere
Tom Swift and His Sonic Boom Trap
Tom Swift and His Subocean Geotron
Tom Swift and The Mystery Comet
Tom Swift and The Captive Planetoid
Tom Swift and His G-Force Inverter
Tom Swift and His Dyna-4 Capsule

And I was a TOTAL SNOB about it: Yeah, Star Wars is awesome, but I like to read books that are based on actual science. I bet I was particularly insufferable to the girls who got good grades in science class. They didn't see what all the Swiftian hype was about. To me, they were dense, ignorant. They didn't *love* science. It was just another class to them. They were girls. *I* was going to be a nuclear physicist.

The boys weren't so supportive, either. I vaguely remember wanting to re-enact one of the space-oriented books, on my basement couch, with some literate pals. I'd even drawn up an instrument panel on a piece of paper. I was going to be the pilot. They would be the staff. They politely refused. It was a moment of clarity.

(read the complete and ongoing Secret History here)

THE SECRET HISTORY OF POP CESSPOOL, VOL. 6

There's a small pocket of Delaware that encourages young, successful, single people to bludgeon their brain cells and livers with alcohol. My 1990s memories of the place are beyond fuzzy -- they're fractured and gray. This is for the best. I have a hunch that total recall would engender great waves of shame. One scene remains particularly vivid, though:

A typical beach condo, a couple of good friends, a bunch of their friends, and lots and lots of bottles. My friends are used to the routine. Their friends are downright invincible. I reach my fill before anybody else does. While everybody is still ingesting mass-quantities in the kitchen, I stumble into the living room to commandeer the stereo. A small pile of classic-rock CDs. Exile on Main Street. Sweet. Turn volume knob from like 4 ... to 7. Press play, it's "Rocks Off." Bean bag chair. Immediately, in my half-numb state, I'm not paying attention to Mick or Keith. Just Charlie Watts, that masterful, gentlemanly thump: Charlie Watts, man! Listen to that! I'm experiencing a sublime blend of exhilaration and paralysis. Song plays for a couple of minutes before anybody notices that really loud music is coming from the living room. People trickle in and out, concerned that I either need a beer, or need a buddy. Nah, man, just listen to Charlie Watts! The general response is like, "Are you sure you don't want another beer? Come and do Jager shots!" I pass out somewhere around "Tumblin' Dice."

(read the complete and ongoing Secret History here.)

THE SECRET HISTORY OF POP CESSPOOL, VOL. 5

When I was in 5th or 6th grade, one of the local dads decided that my elementary school needed a feeder team for its official Catholic league basketball squad, which was generally dominated by 7th and 8th graders. He rounded up players -- including yours truly -- and booked some practice time at a nearby public school's gymnasium. (My school didn't have a gym.) He botched one important thing, though: Our entry paperwork for the B-level league. Oops. We were left out.

This came as a tremendous relief to me, however. First off, I couldn't even make a layup. (Despite coming of age in the Dr. J/Larry Bird/Magic Johnson era, I didn't live in a basketball-oriented house.) But more importantly, I was very pale and somewhat pudgy. (I would only get fatter until about age 13, when things kinda evened-out for good.) The idea of practicing layups -- though humiliating -- was at least a familiar process; I'd already learned to hit a baseball, swim fearlessly and throw a football, so it was just another sports drill. But the pasty-and-round thing was a source of true anxiety. I was mortified by the thought of standing in front of hundreds of people in only a tank top and short-shorts. (The shirt-under-the-uniform thing, if I remember correctly, was made acceptable by Patrick Ewing a few years later.) Even Kurt Rambis, perhaps the dorkiest dude ever to play in the NBA, was kinda cut, y'know? I didn't even have armpit hair yet.   

THE SECRET HISTORY OF POP CESSPOOL, VOL. 4

In the broadest sense, I came close to "seeking comfort" in a prostitute, just once. It was the winter of '95/'96, and I had been in the D.C. area for less than a year. I slogged to the Black Cat on a wintry evening to see the New Bomb Turks. The small crowd included a large, unintentionally dangerous punker. At one point, his spiked leather jacket opened a shallow-but-painful gash in my thumb. Later, he inadvertently smashed my toe. I stumbled out into the street, after the show, to find that about 4 inches of snow had fallen. The streets were dead. My plan of catching a cab home to Alexandria looked futile (this was back before Metro started running its trains later). I had at least $30 in my pocket, believe it or not. I started walking toward downtown on 14th Street (which was still pretty bleak in those years), and I soon noticed that there were still two or three hookers strolling the sidewalks, aimlessly. I passed one; she acknowledged me with one of those are you OK sugarbear? kind of comments; I said, "I'm alright" with a grin. With my foot and thumb throbbing, I walked at least another block and realized, "maybe one of them know where to fetch a cab." I almost turned around and asked for a hooker's help; soon after, a driver in a ramshackle taxi spotted me and pulled over. He greeted me with a mixture of sympathy (it was cold out), gratefulness (I was a paying customer), and suspicion (what was I doing on 14th Street at 1 a.m.?).

THE SECRET HISTORY OF POP CESSPOOL, VOL. 3

It's quite possible that my first awareness of substance abuse came from "Curious George Goes To The Hospital," a book I received -- I think -- as compensation for the fact that my brother was born. I remember perusing it at a relative's house, not my own, perhaps while Mom & Dad parked me there so they could plus-one the family. It's all fuzzy evidence, but it adds up to some good context, right? (No, wait: I was only 2½ then. My exposure to the book might've happened much later, when my bro went in for some outpatient surgery.) Anyway, George's drug use amounts to this: Discovers ether. Huffs it. Trips balls. Passes out. (The scene has spawned a cottage industry of T-shirts targeted at stoner dudes.) As I grew into the section of boyhood that afforded me opportunities to consume illicit shit, I was a teetotaler. Miller Lites in the woods? Blah. Marijuana behind that unfinished house? No way. Some Skoal down by the creek? Barf. A nip of yer pop's whiskey? You're totally desperate, man. Most of those decisions can be traced back to Catholic guilt, which can be traced back to my youthful receptivity to the suggestions of allegedly upstanding adults. But I will say this: That image of George, passing out in a dark room? It's kinda bleak. I'll skip the ether, thank you very much.

THE SECRET HISTORY OF POP CESSPOOL, VOL. 2

In the original Pee-Wee Herman Show on HBO, there's a scene when the disembodied Jambi is given a pair of hands. He's extremely grateful, and he makes a comment along the lines of, there's something I've been wanting to do with these for a long time. It's one of the greatest jerk-off jokes in television history, but I can't remember what my initial reaction was in 1981, as a 10-year-old kid who watched that seminal episode any time I could. At that point in my life, I understood the concept of "playing with yourself," but the connotation of that phrase was "wasting time" -- and not "masturbating." But the gag is funny even if you don't know exactly what Jambi is implying, because he exuded an elemental salaciousness that was inherently comic. Within a few years, I had no doubt about what Jambi really meant. Ew, yo.

THE SECRET HISTORY OF POP CESSPOOL, VOL. 1

Y'know the scene in "First Blood Part II" when Rambo gets all-too-familiar with pig shit? It had a huge philosophical impact on me. I don't remember the exact details, but it appeared to involve tons of filth and slop and excrement. Here's where it kicks in, for me: Sometimes when I have to do something kinda nasty -- empty a vacuum cleaner, unclog a sink, scoop up animal feces, etc. -- I recall that scene. Now, my sympathies don't go out to Sly Stallone or the John Rambo character. The '80s are over. No, I think about the fact that there are people who have actually been submerged in shit, and I say to myself, "whatever I'm doing right now is not as bad as that."

Have a great weekend!