Vail, Colorado.

(note: I have moved -- but my other blog site is down for maintenance (damn them) and I wanted to post. So I will copy and paste from here to there tomorrow.)

I’m not rich and famous. My annual income is not over a million dollars. I am not a trendy dresser. And I don’t own a mink coat. Since this is all true, it begs the question (Not, why do I think I am eligible to start a blog? That answer is obvious!): why the hell am I vacationing in Vail, Colorado.

‘Tis true. I am on vacation in Vail at this moment getting over my jet lag by working on my blog. (It just seems unreasonable to go to bed at 9:30 even if I did wake up at 8:30).

Some quick facts from an internet search on Vail:

“Aspen is where the celebrities go and Vail is the place where the people who own the celebrities go”

“In Vail, the municipality, the average single-family home price exceeds $1 million, and the average condo price is more than $500,000.”

Yes, so unfortunately it was not surprising when I entered the “diverse” Denver airport (diverse in the fact that there is a French restaurant, a Mexican restaurant, and McDonalds) (or, diverse in the fact that Latina women clean the restrooms) and then when I entered the “non-diverse” prop plane that took me to Vail/Eagle.

Let’s put it this way. I felt like a minority because I was Jewish. Thank G-d my Jewish father flew with me or else I would have been the metaphorical “one in a million” and that is not a tout of my ego. The only black man (who was also gay I might add, double whammy) was the flight attendant. (go figure). And together the passengers were wearing enough jewelry that I didn’t have to open the window and look out at sun to go blind.

So why does it make me mad? Shouldn’t I feel privileged to go where the elite go? I’m appreciative, I’ll put it that way. Vail is a beautiful. The scenery is postcard perfect without being a cliché – rocky territory painted with snow in all the right places. It is a mountain with great skiing conditions. It snowed 10 inches last week, five last night, and is supposed to snow tonight. Then next week it will be skiing in 40 degrees. How much better do conditions get? Plus, this is the first vacation with just my dad and I. That is exciting. I get to be the center of attention, while getting some QT in with daddy.

Yet, on the plane the men sitting next to me were all talking about how they smuggle Cubans into the U.S. Some have them sent to Mexico and then drive across the border. The no-fail method I heard, though, was to get them sent to Canada – “to make sure they aren’t counterfeit” (does that mean Canadians are more trustworthy than Mexicans?). This information was from one guy who “doesn’t smoke at all – (I’m a straight-edged devout man of G-d) – unless it’s a good Cohiba Siglo” and from another guy who in his “humidor at home has a Cohiba from Saddam Hussein’s collection”. (he also let his audience know he was “saving it for a very special occasion if we know what he meant”). Funny, how these are the crème de la crème of society.

While in Vail “the resort” I feel like I am in Epcot center. Every person who walks by me speaks a different language. It’s like I have the world at my fingertips.

And the ironic part is that the rest of the world is just like America. There are the foreigners who are building their fortune from the bottom up, which means these are the “workers” -- The front desk man was from Spain (but he did go to Valley Forge Military academy); the ski rental man from Argentina; and the Scandinavian ski shop cashier. Then, there are the “big pimpin” foreigners. (I wonder how they get their Cubans?)

So, its depressing and exhilarating to ski Vail. Seems wasteful to take advantage of nature in this way (by flaunting such excess) yet also wasteful to give up the skiing.

I will leave you with a question:
You are sitting on the top of one of the tallest buildings in NYC. You are with someone with whom you can speak your mind. You are bonding looking out upon the city. Down below you see the great lights, the amalgam of citizens, personalities, ideas, opinions. You see the immense of buildings. Perhaps you see a lesbian couple dancing in one of the windows. Or maybe you see a man opening the door of a limo for his date. You see times square – the advertising, the Mtv building, GameWorks (steven speilberg’s video arcade). You comment how far technology has come, how unbelievable it is.

My question: is what you see beauty or is what you see sadness?

I'VE MOVED

I've moved to a new blog. I saw it from an AIM link from a person on my buddy list (she'll remain nameless) although I believe Jen M. will know who I am talking about. Actually, yikes! truth is her old IM link to this blog site got me started on blogging.

YOU should thank her

just kidding

*I* should thank her

I found a Melissa-ism from my junior year of college. Actually Doug found it because he thought it was funny and wanted to cherish the memory forever. Now I can share it with my blog.

"I'm not a prostitute, so I might be biased...but I would never have sex with midgets."

Tonight we had an NLG presentation -- I got it together at the last minute. In case you didn't know (sarcasm very much intended because NO ONE really knows this) -- March 1st is Student Day Against the Death Penalty (says the NLG). So, I thought it would be pertinent if the NLG chapter did a presentation. I printed out 2 packets of 30 pages each on my precious printer with facts and statistics and a "how much do you know about the death penalty" quiz (haven't seen that one on quizilla have you?) AND we showed Dancer in the Dark. Yea, well, I guess no one else really agreed that the presentation was a good idea cause no one showed up.

Actually, that is a lie. I had 100% backing by the President -- Pete. He was there. And! the first person to be in the room was not even a "member" of the NLG but an amazing friend of mine (thank you Eva!). So yea, pete and eva and me watched the movie by ourselves.

Actually, that is another lie. About 1/4 way through the movie the homeless guy from the library comes in.

"Is this the presentation against the death penalty"

[Melissa looking totally confused] "ummm, yea." [Melissa's latent sense of spread the love] "wanna packet?" (c'mon no one else was taking them...)

"no thanks, i'm fine" (still fucking can't get rid of the packets. poor printer, how I waste you)

[homeless guy moves to back row with big pile of paper napkins that he will continuously spit/cough into throughout the movie].

Now...for those who have seen Dancer in the Dark it is a very powerful movie and it deserves some conversation at the end. Homeless guy agrees. He delights himself by telling us of his talents: "I come up with really good ideas, I can help you guys come up with them" and his secrets: "I have a huge hole in my head but I'm not crazy" (followed by "come up to me in the library, but don't tap me on the shoulder because that makes me paranoid")

The thing about it is though -- what is the craziest -- is that I actually enjoyed talking to him and he had some really good points -- etherial maybe and kinda tangential -- but like, i guess he frequents the library a lot and he is mad that there is gonna be renovation on the library because its only cosmetic ("for example, they are putting in bar stools for you guys to type in. Seems like law school will become a little lackadaisical and law school shouldn't it should be serious. It's almost as bad as moving the coffee shop indoors" -- which btw yes, we have a starbucks in our library now). Anyway, putting two and two together (two and two million different thoughts that is) -- Dancer in the Dark, to me at least, is about how fucked up the American system is -- how greedy a cop can be because he doesn't want to "let his wife know" that she can't spend as much...how two-faced and hypocritical our society is because in the court room scene the prosecutions whole case makes Selma (bjork's character) look bad when she has done nothing except (as eva put it) exhibited her naivete. Now, add that "two" to the fact that there is this homeless man who has "decided to be homeless" and is writing a manifesto on the housing system and how living on the "streets" makes teenages mean because they fundamentally need people to care about them and they need a "home" -- those "twos" together definitely make some strange kind of "four".

Yet, the whole time I was enlightened I had this bad look on my face like -- Oh my g-d, why is he talking to us, it is getting late, I am scared. But really when thinking about it -- I was scared because I didn't want to get into such a conversation because to take the plunge means I will take the plunge -- I will sit and talk for hours about how fucked up everything is. But isn't that exactly what this guy represents: a plunge-taker? How could I reject someone so authentic?

Maybe I am the crazy one finding wisdom in this guy who smells and has braids in his long beard. But he has exited the world so proficiently and isn't that what I have been complaining about all throughout law school? Don't I want to stop feeling bad about myself because of other's influences? Hasn't he isolated himself so that he nicely mocked me and my incredulous stare and turned it around and made him seem like the crazy guy?

The people we connect to are so few and far between. Even if its over a stare or a week or a year -- don't be afraid when it happens. It will be as natural as this tonight -- like when the homeless man came in, yea, it was sorta weird, but then Eva, Pete, and I kinda took it as normal (to a certain extent).

I think tonight deserves a smile. Here's looking at you kid.

law school prom pics:

http://photos.yahoo.com/alwayssneakers