Forbidden Fruit

I wouldn’t see it that way. I pressed my palms to my ears, pivoted, and walked away whenever anyone wanted to discuss Women In Science. The NSF essay question about “promoting diversity” begged me to Google the stats on female physicists and mathematicians, but on principle, I refused. Instead, I delivered an argument for improved interdepartmental relationships, a need for diverse labs composed of scientists trained in different fields.

I believed that because our mothers burned their bras, there is no longer the need.

But enlightenment is not, as I had thought, an irreversible process and in the present culture war, our opponents are a frightening throwback to the 1950’s.

I expected that the Waxman report on abstinence-based education would reveal scientific inaccuracies, religious bias, and a notion girls have the responsibility to resist; guys cannot help themselves.

I did not expect the following:

One book in the “Choosing the Best” series presents a story about a knight who saves a princess from a dragon. The next time the dragon arrives, the princess advises the knight to kill the dragon with a noose, and the following time with poison, both of which work but leave the knight feeling “ashamed.” The knight eventually decides to marry a village maiden, but did so “only after making sure she knew nothing about nooses or poison.”

The curriculum concludes:

Moral of the story: Occasional suggestions and assistance may be alright, but too much of it will lessen a man’s confidence or even turn him away from his princess.

Choosing the Best, Inc., Choosing the Best Soul mate, 51 (2003). This book is the latest in the “Choosing the Best” series and was published since the most recent round of SPRANS grants; it was reviewed because the other Choosing the Best books were all among the most popular programs.

Please, the stereotype of a man with an ego that can be shattered with a few suggestions is ridiculous. I will patronize my little cousin and throw a game a Scrabble, but the idea that it’s necessary to do this for some future husband is – I mean, give that man a little credit.

sigh

I can’t bring myself to argue with the story of an apple to convince you that 2+2 is not 5.

I will continue to act like I live in a world that’s as I’d like it to be.

The Comforts of Home

I knew I was going to hate LA, and the professor’s e-mail describing the head of the department as a “fat sexist pig” made me certain I wasn’t going to do my graduate work there.

But when I met with the faculty, I realized it was the only place in the country with the research I wanted and I had no choice. I went walking through Westwood to try to convince myself that this silicone valley where the handicapped spaces are reserved those with collegian injections could become my intellectual mecca. I soon heard comforting words.

“Spare some change?”

Ah, the familiar. Like fickle weather and games at Fenway, interesting encounters with those who live on the street were a fundamental part of the Boston experience.

A suspecting man would shout: “White woman! I wouldn't sleep with a white woman if she was the last woman on earth!” Friends who were just sober enough to stumble home made out with bums in the street. And there was the time I met our Lord.

I was waiting for the bus at night. It was misting lightly and I was standing in the light of a mercury lamp. A man stepped onto the sidewalk.

“Got a light?”

“Um. . . no, sorry.”

“See that bar over there? They just kicked me out of that bar. I don’t even drink. . . you believe that? I don’t even drink and they kicked me out of that bar.”

Well, it is a classy place. Sometimes, I hear gun shots.

“You know, I’m Jesus Christ. They kicked Jesus Christ out of the bar -- that’s why I don’t drink. Jesus Christ does not drink.”

Right, no wine, just Camels.

“Jesus Christ needs a wife."

Shit.

"Do you think Jesus Christ needs a wife or a girlfriend?”

Retreat! Retreat!

The encounter prevented my trip across the Charles River that night. So, it's strange that I was glad to see that an A-list terminator was no better at dealing with poverty, the mentally ill, and disturbed veterans than the embezzlers and mobsters who ran the east.

A tripping prom queen, LA had a blemish it couldn't conceal.

Measure In Cats

“What is life? Life is the battle against sodium.”

Over 70% of the energy we consume is spent by ion pumps working against the passive diffusion of sodium into our cells; which, left unchecked, is lethal.


For those of us who are scientifically inclined, life is a war on our socially backward nature. We become fluent in Blind Date, in Simpsons, and in Friends; we wait to divulge our Star Trek obsession.

But we can’t always win and one November a broken heater and frozen pipes took my will to fight. I surrendered at the Dollar a Pound used clothing store. Someone’s blind great aunt surely had spent months crocheting the sweater I bought that day. It’s large, convex, and features a purple and blue pattern that would make your grandma's afghan cringe.

My friends measured the horror of the sweater in “cats", a scale based on the principle that while a cat per person in a household is fine, more than that quickly becomes. . . not. My purchase weighed in at four -- the equivalent of a cat in my arms, one on each shoulder, and one on my head.

But, I was completely defeated. I could see my breath in the house and in the interest of warmth and comfort, the sweater was layer number five: T-shirt, long-sleeve shirt, turquoise windbreaker, traffic-cop orange fleece, and IT.

With the advent of spring, my strength was restored. The sweater was banished to the bottom of my closet and I emerged once again capable of living within the societal norm.

On A Witch Hunt

Coming from the east coast, I take a “Guilty until proven innocent” approach to new acquaintances. There are too many wackos, nut jobs, and people in search of someone to doctor their emotional wounds for me to waste my time being nice to strangers.

To prove your innocence you must demonstrate that you operate under the same assumption of guilt that I do. Only those who know they cannot pass are delinquent in providing the test to others. By smiling politely when I don’t know you, you’re signing a confession.

But the west coast folks are chill.

They subscribe to the system of justice that let OJ walk. I have found myself in the land of the eternally cheerful. Who love everyone. Equal opportunity acquaintance collectors.
Here, my judgment seems unnecessarily cruel. So, I repealed my decisions on a few people my roommate liked. People I had already condemned.

I ended up in a car for twelve hours with a guy who couldn’t make a single decision on his own. Our trip began as follows:

Him: Should I bring CD’s?

Me: Sure.

How many should I bring?

However many – whatever you think is good driving music.

But should I just bring a few or the whole case?

Well – if you want to bring the whole case I certainly have room in the car.

But how many should I bring?

(sigh) Five.

Five? Are you sure? We’re going to be in the car for like -- 12 hours.


But maybe he should have asked my opinion more often. Later that trip:

I’m drifting off to sleep, he’s driving in the left lane on the 101.

Him: My God!

He signals, shifts to second, jerks the car over a lane, and quickly slows to 50. I’m fully awake, looking ahead to see the accident we just avoided becoming part of. Nothing.

Hooo. . . I was going 90 there for a second I just needed a TIME OUT.

So, I’ve started my own collection of people with whom I can freely criticize others. My people are not conventionally pleasant. My fellow judgers detest Ohio, shred my fashion decisions, openly express their hatred of Westwood, and create websites detailing the shortcomings of former friends. Cruel. . . but sane.

Didn't Get It

Something about being the person who is living your life leaves you oblivious to even the most evident messages.

And by you, I mean me.

Because when he invited himself to go up north with me for Thanksgiving, I didn’t get that that was weird.

But I was the only one.

Relaying the story to others, responses ranged from, “You know he wants to get with you,” to boisterous, nearly malicious laughter.

And the most telling reaction was from the roommate of a friend. A person who externalizes all internal dialog and whose internal dialog will not shut up. A person whose sentences all end with “. . . because I have a girlfriend.” A person so void of any notion of social normalcy that, the morning after, he’ll ask my friend if he heard their loud sex. And if my friend was deaf to his roommate’s expressions of carnal pleasure, the roommate will be sure that the following night, his lusty outcries are noticed. And this roommate, talking to me as if he were wearing pants over his boxer-briefs, sitting ankle on knee, forearm on thigh, confirmed that I was blind to what all others could see.

“Yeah – people have tried to pull that on me – I tell ‘um I’m driving to Arizona – they ask if the can come along. I’m like – 'no.' Gotta watch out for people like that – they’re weird.”

Clarity from the drunk on the corner who speaks in tongues.

Talk About the Weather

The wine snob takes a fine merlot, swirls, sniffs, swills, and remarks, “Fruity – high notes of cherry with an undertone of oak.”

The frat guy takes a gulp. “Hmm – Hell of a lot better than my Beast.”

I am similarly lost when Southern Californians comment on the weather.

Days perfect and rare in Boston to make top execs play hooky are cast aside with distain.

My first days here, I was constantly amazed by temperate climate. During that time, I contacted my department’s student affairs officer to ask if there were any meetings I needed to set up before term began.

In an overzealous effort to apologize for the “hellish heat”, his response included a detailed meteorological lesson on the Santa Ana winds. There was no mention of anything relevant to my question.

I am slowly learning how seasons, frigid mornings, unbearable warmth, and depressing grays can live in the range of 65-75 degrees, mostly sunny to partly cloudy. In a few months, I will become a connoisseur.

Joke's Over

According to a CNN exit poll, 7% of the country believes that intelligence is the most important quality in a president. Of those people, 91% voted for John Kerry.

Perfect ammunition for a “Bush is stupid” joke, but I’m not in the mood to laugh.

The Jon Stewart on Crossfire interview was the first indication. He wasn’t trying to be funny, or angry. He was desperate. The hosts didn’t understand: The Daily Show mocks the system, but they make a mockery of it.

Mom and Dad can’t have an intelligent discussion when little Sally keeps yelling, “Mommy your nose is too big,” and Billy is saying, “Daddy your teeth are ugly.”

But I may be giving America too much credit assuming that those fifty-two percent are unformed.

At the end of his election special, Jon Stewart held a stack of eleven cards in his hand, each listing a state that had voted on a gay marriage ban that night.

“Georgia – yep.
Montana – sure.
North Dakota – yep.”

He looked defeated.

“Oklahoma – of course.
Arkansas – why not.
Kentucky – absolutely.
Michigan – affirmative.”

He continued to toss the cards across his desk, the final few slid off onto the floor.

“Utah – yep.
Mississippi – yes.
Ohio – yep.
And lastly, Oregon – yes.”

The voters have spoken. And it’s not funny.

The Drive By

Mamma always warned me about those biochemists.

It was a Friday night and I was hanging out with a friend. The two of us were engrossed in a conversation about movies, sports, relationships or something equally benign.

“. . . amino acid. . .”

We turned.

“. . . and the REALLY interesting thing about it is that it’s a transcriptional regulatory co-factor that’s comprised entirely of beta sheets not a single alpha helix. The thing that I don’t understand though is that in the 157 position there’s a tryptophan. TRYPTOPHAN!! I mean tryptophan is huge and you would think that its removal would destroy the functionality of the protein. Tryptophan is the one with all of the overlapping pi orbitals and then you can draw all of the resonance structures. And it has a nitrogen atom; I think that the electron pair in the nitrogen atom, well whether you have an electron pair there depends on the pH of the solution. Anyway, I need to get back to work.”

The room was silent and the two of us were again alone.

We weren’t quite sure what happened, but we were left with full color handouts and notes were scrawled on the wall.

Drive by seminar.