fraud. david rakoff. (163)

it never fails.  my last book of a year ends being the first book of the year.  but hey! it's only the 2nd day of the year and i got my first book in!

after reading love, dishonor, marry, die, cherish, perish, i decided to read the rest of rakoff's work and started with his collection of stories, fraud.  

i will have to say that right off the back, i fell in love with him and his allusions and imagery.  see:  "i tear my medicine cabinet a part like billie holiday and still only uncover one xanax." and this was in the second paragraph, i knew i would have some fun!  and i did! for the most part.  i have to admit that there were times that i got a little bored and rakoff got a little too debbie downer and snarky for me.

but lets share what i loved!

i loved the story of him at the kibbutz.  and i am glad he stuck up for himself at the chicken farm.  my ex-stepdad's uncle used to have chicken farm for eggs and the smell was disgusting!!! rakoff was right!  but that wasn't the point of his story.  i gave him an applause when after hearing the workers refer to him as she in hebrew, rakoff told them back in hebrew, "you're right . . . she doesn't like the chickens."  a great little classy middle finger!

also appreciated his little line, "i'm crazy about the food chain and love being on top of it."  

i found the story, "hidden people" about the hidden people of iceland really interesting.  primarily, because i now believe that björk, jonsi, so of course sigur rós, and of monsters and men are not icelandic people but rather hidden people!  i have seen björk and jónsi in concert and they are like little woodland fairies on stage.  it's almost like they reveal their hidden people selves up on stage. their music is enchanting and sounds otherworldly.  and check out their costumes:

i know hidden people dress like regular people only dated but still i think this is how they actually dress.  and i love all of the music but their something magical about them that i can never describe properly which i guess just adds to this theory.  it makes more sense that they are hidden people but their music is definitely out of this world.

i enjoyed his story, "extrordinary alien", because i do love canadians.  my favorite canadians include michael cera, alanis morissette, and robin scherbasky (though she isn't real).  and i just learned on wikipedia that kim cattrall, frank gehry (!!!), and ellen page are canadian!  way to go canada!

i absolutely loved "christmas freud"!!! what a clever idea for a barney's window.  a little odd but clever!  i also loved how they turned into actual sessions.  i wish christmas freud became a thing because let's face it, therapy sessions would be helpful during the drain of holiday season.  also i googled for an image of rakoff in his window but unfortunately didn't come across anything.

i really enjoyed the article about the teachers for austria, "we call it australia".  it made me consider going to another country to teach english, we'll see.  his story about tokyo also gave me an itch to travel.

the last story, "i used to bank here, but that was long, long ago" almost brought me to tears.  (i would have cried but i was on a greyhound from vegas, i was too tired to be that emotional).  it was a sad story considering rakoff's fate.  the story centers around him finding sperm he had stored because he was starting treatment for hodgkin's.  this hit close to home for me because as i get older and have yet to find someone to reproduce with, i might have to freeze my eggs and i never considered how expensive it will be.  hopefully it will not come to that.     

rakoff also discussed his treatment and the memories he had of his treatment.  he discussed how he glossed over the pain he felt which resulted his in his memories being eschewed.  i thought about that in terms of my grandma, i have been in denial about her being gone and i wonder what my memories will be of this time in the future.  everything now feels so far away but it has been two months since she first went into the hospital.  i worry one day that everything i have hidden away during this time will all come flooding out.  its okay if it does, because it needs to be realized but i am just not ready yet.

i hate to end on such a solemn note but its mirrors fraud so i guess its okay that it does.  but an enjoyable read, not something to digest all at once but to leave near a bed to occasionally pick up.

  

 

love, dishonor, marry, die, cherish, perish. david rakoff (150)

since i already read books based on celebrities emma roberts, and mindy kaling's instagram.  i decided to throw another celebrity into the mix, b.j. novak.

(quick digression:  i didn't think much of him on the office looks-wise until he got the glasses, than swoon!!)

b.j. novak posted this:  

so i decided to check out david rakoff's love, dishonor, marry, die, cherish, perish.  based on novak's pic and on the  fact that the cover was really cool.

quick addition, i have to give a shout out to my friend fabian for being in the know and beating novak to posting this.  i even liked fabian's photo but didn't think about checking it out until novak's post.  damn my pop culture media obeying brain!!!

here is fabian's post:  

since i based picking this book up based on b.j. novak's good looks and an interesting cover, i had no idea what this book was about.  i had never read anything by rakoff prior to this nor have i listened to this american life which he contributed to.  i also had no idea that rakoff passed away in august of 2012 due to cancer, and this book was published posthumously.  i had expected a normal size book and was shocked by how thin it was when i picked it up from the library.  but most surprising of all, was that the entire book is written in verse!  yes, verse!  its like dr. seuss for adults! and rakoff was a genius because he made it work with some impressive rhymes!

for example:

news-aperçus 

adolescence-phosphorescence

eyesore-mysore 

bon vivant-confidant

cantilever-fever 

(i could go on and on)

one of my favorite couplets was about the conservative blanche tilly who attacked clifford's gay comics:

"how i wish you would stop up that bile-spewing spigot,

you use when you speak, you rebarbative bigot."  

cruel and articulate!

but as my SAT scores will show you, vocabulary is not my forte, so the dictionary was out to help me with some of the words that rakoff used.

paresis:  slight or partial paralysis

frond:  large leaf

malfeasance:  wrong doing or misconduct 

aperçu:  a brief survey or sketch

bon vivant:  a person having cultivated, refined, and sociable tastes especially with respect to food and drink

(i really need to start a word-a-day program for myself.)

though love, dishonor, marry, die, cherish, perish is written in verse which has a lightheaded feel to it, rakoff's characters stories are quite heavy.  the novel opens with the story of a baby, margaret, born into pitiful conditions, as the midwife saw it, red haired and without a father (he was trampled by horses) and a mother without a family.  and the midwife was right, margaret ends up being raped by her mother's second husband.  luckily, she runs away to california and finds a better life.

margaret's tragic story was a lot to digest especially being the opening story.  but as the reader is introduced to other characters in the novel, suffering is just a fact of life.  mother, lost the glamour life of her youth when her father gambled it away.  clifford, an artist, gay and found freedom in san francisco, and sadly contracted and died from AIDS.  hannah, suffered from dementia and a cruel daughter-in-law.  and josh, who lost is family and ended up finding a picture that connects the all characters in the end, a six degrees of seperation. 

of all the stories in this novel, helen and nathan were the highlights for me.  

helen was clifford's cousin.  her mother was had quite the sharp tongue and would tease helen growing up, and the sarcasm, unfortunately went over helen's head.  but that ended up being the least of helen's problems though it was probably the source of her problems.  

helen's tale is a story told before, probably in amc's mad men (i haven't watched it), and sort of in billy wilder's the apartment (i actually imaged the office set up from this movie as i read).  boss has an affair with secretary.  helen's affair went on for about 5 years (i can't imagine that!) and ended with an abortion.  due to this, she got drunk and caused a scene at the holiday office party but fortunately was not fired (the affairs were quite commonplace so nothing worth being fired over.) but what i loved about helen was that though this occurred to her, she didn't play victim.  she still went to the holiday party every year, even wore her cocktail to work so to not have to go back and forth between home.  she knew people talked and in the end gave a big fuck you to her office tormentor.

nathan, i admired as well for giving his life tormentors a big fuck you too and on their wedding day.  he was caught in a love triangle between his best friend josh and josh's girlfriend, susan, and ended up the odd man when the other two married.  susan, being the bitch that she was, something her father also recognized, made sure nathan attended and gave a speech.  i really enjoyed nathan's speech, it was based on the fable about the tortoise that helped the scorpion get across the river.  in the fable, the scorpion ends up killing the tortoise and himself because it is his nature to stab.  it seemed an odd choice at first but he amazingly put it on content. 

he explained:

so what can we learn from their watery ends?

is there some lesson on how to be friends?

i think what it means is that central to living

a life that is good is a life that's forgiving.

we're creatures of contact, regardless of whether,

to kiss or to wound, we must still come together,

like in annie hall, we endure twists, bad torsions,

for food we don't like, in such tiny portions!

but, like hating a food but still asking for more,

it bears standing dry but so lonely on shore.

so we make ourselves open, while knowing full well

it's essentially saying, 'please come pierce my shell.'

love is does leave us open to pain but in the end it is worth it than being lonely.  (this coming from an old maid).  

however, nathan's speech did not end on this pleasant note but in the end, susan deserved the harsh speech.  and i love how in the end, susan's dad corrected nathan, letting him know that turtles swim not tortoises.

nathan's speech also demonstrated rakoff's cleverness.  another favorite passage of mine was clifford's mother talking about being trapped in the valley (san fernando valley for all you non-LA-ers).

"malibu's breezy.  hollywood's shady

but burbank? he might as well've brought us to hades!

i could yip when i think of the crime it,

was moving me out here was 'because of the climate."

the fan in her hand the scene's sole, languid motion,

"i once heard it said that there was an ocean

not terribly distrant from where we sit here,

but, i supoose that was just a bum steer.

escaping me now are the details specific,

but could it be named something like 'The Pacific'?"

i was in the valley when i read it.  and it was a hot day in october!  so the perfect setting for that passage.  plus i plan on stealing mother's little joke about the pacific!  

also aren't the illustrations great?  they were done by seth.  the ending illustration was especially cute:

an enjoyable read, i now plan on reading the rest of rakoff's works.

ps i saw on bj novak's instagram that the la times review was written all in verse.  here is a link.