Sometimes we outgrow the music we love when we're young and sometimes it stays with us our whole lives. Over the years I've lost my passion for, say, Duran Duran, even though I still love "New Moon On Monday" and "Come Undone" (I will never not like "Come Undone." It is moody and deep and totally surrenders to the sensuality underscoring the song.)

But the Carpenters, specifically Karen's voice, will always be with me. I get Richard's genius with musical arrangements, I do, but his approach to music is almost too methodical. It was always, always, Karen's lovely register and heartfelt (if sometimes understated) commitment to song I loved more than anything and still do.

Maybe it's because her health started to decline around the same time, but I've always thought their best years were 1969-1973, which are the years covered in their best-selling Singles album. It's not that their later records didn't sound good ( Horizon, for instance, is just gorgeous, but it's saturated in a sadness that was present in its initial release and not a lingering association with Karen's tragic death.)

The Carpenters are still loved by many these days and their sound remains wonderful, but I always wondered if album covers like the one for Close To You did more harm than good in helping them be more respected in the music business. It's totally adorable in a completely dorky way, but it might have been one of the reasons it was uncool to admit you liked them in the 70s:

This article explores the pains and perks of being a Carpenters fan. I can't wait for the writer's book on this subject to be released:

read here



Hannibal, Season 1



It kind of worries me that I enjoy the cooking scenes so much on Hannibal, Season 1. I know, of course, that he's not really cooking human organs, but the implication is still there. 

The food preparation on the show is as much a part of it as anything else and I can't believe how compelling this show has become for me. Great writing, atmospheric production and strong characters make me continue watching, though I've heard the ratings for the second season are down considerably.

I saw this article on BuzzFeed and found it quite fascinating since it explores all things food related on Hannibal in much depth! :

read here: Hannibal Food Secrets

#thisiswholesome is Honey Maid's hashtag for their wonderful new commercial that includes a gay couple raising a family. The above picture is taken from their response to the many homophobic comments viewers sent them in the aftermath. Though the positive responses were ten times the amount of the hateful ones, Honey Maid still wanted to acknowledge the haters. So all the comments were printed out and rolled into tight cylinders that were used to spell out the word "love"...what a terrific way to fight the hate!

I especially like the use of "wholesome" since it's the exact opposite of what most anti-gay people believe to be true about us. In all the debate about gay rights and marriage the one thing that's bothered me is this: if being gay itself is seen as horrible and sinful, does it really matter if we're born that way or not? Haters are still going to hate. Until we eradicate the unseemliness that some insist on infusing gays and lesbians with, we will never make progress in this hot button issue.

I'll never forget something I read in The Geek Shall Inherit The Earth by Alexandra Robbins. One lesbian teen nterviewed for the book said that straight people get the benefit of being seen as in love while gays are only associated with the bedroom. Many of us who are gay or lesbian want to fall in love just like anyone else, want to raise a family with that someone special and grow old with them. What could be more wholesome than that?

 I just reread this yesterday and loved it even more the second time. Adorable, sweet, funny and very well-written, Pitifully Ugly captures amazingly well all the insecurities, fears and frazzled nerves that come with trying to connect with someone you really like.

Robin Alexander's books are consistently pleasing and get what so much of lesfic does not: that true love, the kind that both pulls you in and lasts, is based on friendship first, romance second and physical intimacy last.

Some of my favorite passages that I highlighted in my Kindle*:


 "I fought the urge to cry when I realized I didn’t even want to date me."

"You always hear of people having epiphanies. One morning they wake up and have a moment of clarity. I thought I was having one of my own. I’d been so focused on having someone to share my life, that it made me kind of pathetic. //
Love me, love me, please pick me and complete my life.” I suddenly had a mental image of myself as a pooch in the pound barking and pawing at my cage door as prospective owners came looking."

 

"There’s no pretense, no smooth-sounding lines, just a woman honestly offering her heart and hoping that it will be taken by someone who’ll cherish it.”




*If you have a Kindle, you can go to kindle.amazon.com to keep track of all books and passages you have highlighted. Another neat feature I like (that remains anonymous, obviously) is that you can see what other people have highlighted on both the website and in your Kindle (if you have that feature turned on.) 

When I'm reading in my Kindle and see previously highlighted dialogue or inner monologue that are the same ones I have marked and complete strangers also have,  I feel an odd connection with them.

During the 50s and 60s there were two kinds of lesbian pulp fiction: the ones straight men wrote for other straight men purely for the titillation factor (often portraying the 'dangers' and 'ills' of being gay, as seen during a time very few people tried to understand gays and lesbians) and the ones closeted gay housewives looked to as survival literature (the only thing they had to cling to in a world that rarely discussed 'the love that dare not speak its name.')

Ann Bannon, whose five highly addictive and surprisingly well-written books are so much better than their covers and reputation would have you believe, went for the latter in a frank, sincere and often very touching manner.

As Patricia Highsmith wrote in her afterward to The Price Of Salt (written around the same time as Bannon's books): "Homosexuals male and female in American novels had had to pay for their deviation by cutting their wrists, drowning themselves in a swimming pool, or by switching to heterosexuality (so it was stated), or by collapsing (alone and miserable and shunned ) into a depression equal to hell."

Odd Girl Out and other novels like it may seem terribly out of date in our more enlightened 21st century, but, sadly, for many (especially those women who live in conservative towns or have no one to reach out to who would support their coming out) Ann Bannon's books still have a lot to say, not just about the chills and thrills of being a woman first realizing she likes other women, but about love in general.

Sentences such as these could apply to anyone who has ever been on the cusp of love and been terribly afraid: "And in self-defense Laura tried to build a wall of politeness between them, to admire Beth from far away. There was a vague, strange feeling in the younger that to get close to Beth was to worship her, and to worship her was to get hurt."

After Odd Girl Out, there is: I Am A Woman, Women In The Shadows, Journey To A Woman and Beebo Brinker (actually a prequel even though it was written last.) I bought all five separately through the Kindle store, but I love the idea of all of them coming together in one collection.

No matter what your orientation or beliefs, you may find all five books riveting, not only for their historical context in giving modern readers an idea of just how much has changed in the world of LGBT rights, but also because they do what any good book should: tell a compelling story with characters who jump right off the page. (Journey To A Woman, for instance, has a lot to say about finding yourself and making sure you don't mistake a past you still yearn for as the answer to all your problems.)

There is even, if you wait the series out and find yourself liking characters like Beth and Beebo, a happy ending of sorts...something almost unheard of for lesbians back then and, sometimes, even now.

I wish I could do these books the justice they deserve. Maybe, one day when I've had time to reread them, I can better capture how they can still speak to women decades later...