Nealmeister

A Month Back (and Charlestown Shots)

While on the bus this morning, I thought of two things:
(1) it's been a month since I've been back blogging, and gosh, it does feel good, because the frustrated writer inside of me -- the frustrated, creative person inside of me -- really loves to do this;
(2) I forgot how great it feels to find a photographer that you like, because the frustrated photographer inside of me -- the frustrated, creative person inside of me -- really loves to be surprised by surprising interesting photographs.

 

What it means, I think, is that I need to write some more and I need to shoot photographs again.  And I need to write a note to a certain woman and her husband and child at the University of Utah, via Longmont, Colorado.  I need to _______.

[Photos via Alex Ward shot in Charlestown, Massachusetts]

Change is Inevitable II [In re: United States Gypsum Company]

I went to the 6pm Mass Young Adult Mass at Saint Mary's with my parents, and sat up near the front with my mom and my dad.  I really didn't say much to my parents.  I happened to bump into them on the way to church as I rushed down Main Street, and with our coat collars up and wool hats pulled down near our ears, I abashedly asked my dad up what he was going to do.  So we talked, and there was a lot of "I think, I feel, I'll figure" it out type of conversation going on.  Finally, we happened upon the great granite and brick structure that is Saint Mary's, and felt obliged to walk in.  When we got to the pew, my dad commented on my shirt: "Varitek" he said.  Then my mom asked, with Filipino accent and all: "oh, why, honey, you're not cantoring tonight?"  I kind of shrugged it off.  It was the Third Sunday in Ordinary Time, and the first reading, from Isaiah chapter 8, verse 23 or so. 

Anguish has taken wing, dispelled is darkness:
for there is no gloom where but now there was distress.
The people who walked in darkness
have seen a great light;
upon those who dwelt in the land of gloom
a light has shone.

I let the reading sink in my head and the thoughts process the matrix of my mind.

Now there comes a time when you really do begin to worry about your parents.  I don't know if it's part of the natural life cycle or what, but it seems like, in the midst of weddings and engagements and pregnancies, talk of the parents is the next in line hot topic among my friends and my junior associate co-workers; we're either tackling the fact that some day, our parents will get old and die, or we're avoiding the topic because we're too scared to confront the change and the love-anguish associated with the idea.  I always thought I'd be long off from thinking about my parents in that way, and luckily, I think that's a far ways away still.  But somewhere admidst the homily and the Nicene Creed during Mass, I started thinking about the United States Gypsum Plant at the end of Terminal Street in Charlestown.  I really couldn't comprehend that USG was going to idle a good portion of the Boston plant come the end of March; that all these employees, who watched me and my siblings grow up, were being W.A.R.N.'d under the Workers Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act; that, even though all of these people survived USG's Chapter 11 reorganization and crazy USG company picnics at Canobie Lake and even crazier times working just beneath the Tobin Bridge, in an instant, they were all suddenly being let down and let off.  I'm sure, for some, this was like the miracle in the works waiting to happen.  And I can assure you -- there will be many a commuter who will be happy when they don't have to drive over the Tobin Bridge through the steam from the USG Plant's steam stacks. But I, I felt like a piece of me -- even though I didn't work at USG (my sister, though, worked in the lab all through undergraduate and graduate school summers) -- was dying off.  And I felt like, suddenly, I was worried about what my dad was going to do.

I'll always remember when I got into Notre Dame.  It was my birthday in 1999, and since I had been feeling a bit nauseous at school, I dodged my friends after seventh period, called in sick to work, and just went home (I didn't know, at the time, that I ended up missing my own surprise 18th birthday party).   I came home to find a thin letter from the ND Admissions office.  And so, you know how the urban legend goes "if the letter's thin, there's no way you're in."  Well, I eventually mustered up the courage to open the letter.  The rest is pretty much history, but I did call my dad and hiked down to Terminal Street to the USG plant to show him the letter.  And in lockstep Rudy style, I put on a green hard hat and walked through the USG plant with my dad.  "Little Neal's going to Notre Dame" he'd announce proudly.  And of course, all of the familiar, tired faces at USG lit up a bit -- whether congratulatory or a bit bitter -- and extended manly hands to shake my soft  adolescent paw.  I remember the way the fine dust from crushed gypsum rock felt with every shake; it dried the hands and crusted in the same way thin layers of overly diluted plaster crusts on the surface of a spackling spade.  I recall the tears that were in my dad's eyes when he read the letter at the front entrance of the plant.  And I'll always remember the thought I had standing there under the bright, orangish lights inside the factory: "thank you, USG, for helping our family pull through.  And thank you, USG, for making sure I didn't end up throwing cement bags for the rest of my life."

As with any good post, I guess I don't know where this is heading.  But what I do know is this: with the USG Plant idling along the shores of the Mystic River, another piece of middle America, industrial America as we know it in Greater Boston, will move into askew memories of an (industrial) time that once was.  Another opportunity for some middle-class, blue-collar, working-class family to live on the hope of getting ahead -- much like the family I was born and raised from -- and subsist on at least a half decent living, will ride away on the waves of what is, to many, a vibrant and transforming economy.  And with that, I'm left to wonder what else is left for the working-class folks of Greater Boston to do.  I wonder, with pause, what my dad will do.

Change is Inevitable [In re: St. Catherine of Siena Parish, Charlestown]

I've been swallowing a pill that I knew was coming and have spent the past five years or so avoiding: St. Catherine's closing.  There are tons of pros, tons of cons, tons of opinions and tons of facts.  And I don't mean this post to really get into any real, in depth analysis of any of those things. 

What I wanted to get off my back, though, was that I'm hurting a bit over it.  Nothing to be worried about; no need for suicide watch.  But over the past week, I've been in a really pensive, deliberating, nostalgic mood.  To sum it up, it's been downright sucky. And it's all-in-all, a personal coming-to-accept-it experience.  It prompted dinner with Natalie, Carrie, Geoff and Amelia, but dissuaded me from attending any of those "info" meetings.  I can handle numbers and logistics, so when I need them, I'll turn to them, I thought.  The personal truth in this all is that St. Catherine's is home for me in a number of ways: coming of age experiences, believing in faith experiences, friends, family, love.  At the same time, I know that, but consolidating a worshipping spot into one church building, the whole community will benefit in the long run (the whole John-esque gathering/communion experience). 

What I'm experiencing, though, is what happens when you've stocked so much in the material place: you leave yourself open to being let down.  This isn't new, but as it relates to Charlestown, I think me, personally, I let this whole gentrification thing get wrapped up in the personal and the emotional and the nostalgia -- the wants, the needs, the feelings, the longings.  I think I knew it when the Boys' and Girls' Club did the whole Piece of Peace book back in the 90s. [Related link: 9 Lexington Street]  And now, Karl Rhaner and the wisdom and lessons from undergraduate catholic philo classes becomes useful again.  I'll use Nicole's Song [by Virginia Coalition] to get through the thinking, I guess.

So now I've been forced to give advice/
On a matter in which now I've become involved/
Should I stop my thoughts and close my eyes/
Play the lover's role in the beggar's disguise/
And beg God to give me/
Solomon's wisdom

In the midst of this, my brother Sean contributed a decent piece to the January 17, 2008 edition of the Charlestown Patriot-Bridge, which I'll just copy and paste here:

The Spirit of St. Catherine's
By Sean Boyle

To the people of the one-square mile that we know and love: In February, my church, Saint Catherine of Siena, will close.

When our ancestors emigrated from Ireland and other countries, they found it hard to be accepted. In storefronts, there were signs that read “No Irish need apply,” and riots broke out, one of which led to the burning of the Ursuline Convent in Charlestown. But our ancestors made Charlestown their home, street by street, house by house. This became our town, where we celebrated our culture, spoke our native tongue and created everlasting traditions. Charlestown was home to the second Catholic church in all of Massachusetts, Saint Mary’s. When our ancestors came here, the only thing they had that kept them going was their faith. It was the only thing in America that they could claim was theirs. As years went on, we built three vibrant Catholic parishes, we had a tight-knit community, traditions that would hopefully never end and our own unique culture in America and Boston.

But as 2008 arrived, I realized that traditions are disappearing, culture is being lost and that once tight-knit community is breaking and now forming a committed community made up of old and new residents. I am not old enough to remember the “old” Charlestown, but I hear stories about it all the time — stories of when the Bunker Hill Day Parade was the biggest day for Charlestown, with parties in every house and everyone filled with pride and happiness. Now, on the beloved parade days, I see fewer parties, fewer American flags waving in the crowd and streets that barely have any spectators. I hear stories of mothers, 400 deep, praying the rosary on Bunker Hill Street and marching against forced busing, marching for the love of their children and a cause that was worth fighting for in their eyes. I hear stories of the whole town watching Charlestown High’s football games, how Charlestown had the most pubs and sent the most people to World War II than any other one square-mile town in America. Other stories tell of looping, the Charlestown Rose, Ancient Orders of Hibernia, the Knights of Columbus, funeral marches with Irish women wailing, Saint Catherine’s “little Townies color guard,” mothers sitting on the stoop, CYO meets, stores and pubs that are gone, stories of the Bunker Hill Hillbillies and the Majestic Knights, tournaments and memorial services and, most of all, packed Masses.

When I was in eighth grade, I started an organization called FACES – Fill A Church Every Sunday. This was when Saint Catherine of Siena Parish was supposed to close (before it merged with Saint Mary’s). I was desperate and I wanted to save my parish, my church and my faith. I went from door to door in Charlestown; I got doors slammed in my face by people whom I knew, people who did not bother to answer and others that really did not care about church. I asked people to come to church and told them that my goal was to invite people to church and have them invite other people in order to fill a pew and, eventually, a church. I told them the Mass schedules at Saint Francis de Sales, Saint Mary’s and Saint Catherine of Siena. People used excuses such as: “I have a hockey game to go to,” “It is too far,” “I don’t have time,” “It is boring” and “I have to watch my television show.” My argument was all the hours of the Masses were spread over different hours of both Saturday and Sunday, so maybe you can make time. “Why can’t people spend an hour with God?” I thought to myself. I eventually gave up and lost hope. I was sad because this was a tradition that had been going on in the world for 2,000 years, a symbol of hope for our ancestors when they came here. This was our ancestors’ blood and sweat being thrown out the window.

I yearn for that old sense of community. I yearn for that tight-knit community, I yearn for those disappearing traditions, and I yearn for the culture we bestow upon ourselves. How can a shamrock be the town’s symbol when no one goes to church anymore? Do people forget what the shamrock symbolizes? Do people know why they’re wearing a Townie sweater with a big shamrock on it? Well, if you’ve forgotten what it symbolizes, here it is: Saint Patrick used the shamrock to show the Irish the sacred Trinity, three in one, one in three. The shamrock will be a tradition that will live on forever and a sacred symbol that represents Ireland and our faith.

To the People of Charlestown: WAKE UP! We are losing traditions and culture that we created and fought for. New traditions are being created, which I hope never die. But we must keep our old traditions going and teach them to future generations and future neighbors, because without the memory of the past, we are nothing. Traditions, such as passing a church or hearing an ambulance and then making the sign of the cross, hearing the church bells ring and not complaining or even simply going to church, are essential. These traditions are what make us who we are, a people who lived here for generations, a people who have just moved here, a people often misunderstood and put down, a people who fight for what they believe in, a people who have strong traditions and a historic past, a people who call themselves Townies and a people who live in a diverse, vibrant, urban and tight-knit community. We (old and new residents) know what it means to be from Charlestown. There is always a sense of pride and comfort in your heart. But we need to keep traditions going — keep the faith, keep the community and keep our culture, as well as share it.

As much as I do not want Saint Catherine’s to close, as much as I want to fight to keep it open, I know it is for the better. I am grateful for memories like Fr. Coyne’s Charlie Brown robes, midnight and six o’clock masses, CYO meets, shows and all the memories from Charlestown Catholic. I hope that I am able to raise my children in a town with never-ending traditions, with the people whom I knew when I was growing up and the new residents, and that sense of a tight-knit, diverse and unique community. I invite you all to attend mass at either St. Mary-Saint Catherine of Siena churches or Saint Francis de Sales Church. I invite you, Charlestown – both old and new residents, to keep the tradition of going to Mass alive. I invite you to keep other traditions alive and even though our neighborhood is changing before our eyes – to give new neighbors a warm welcome to “God’s country” and pass/share our traditions on to them.

I extend a warm welcome to the people of Charlestown to celebrate the last Mass of Saint Catherine of Siena Church on Feb. 10 at 11 a.m. (There will only be one mass for Saint Mary-Saint Catherine of Siena Parish on that Sunday). Join the people of Saint Catherine’s in tears, laughter and hopefulness, even if you are from a different church. I hope that through out the years the “spirit of Saint Catherine’s” will live on forever in this town. I also hope that more people keep the tradition of celebrating the Eucharist alive. Let us be united in Christ and united in Charlestown, and let us show our ancestors that we did not give up on the faith they once had.

Sean Boyle is a 16-years-old Charlestown native, and a  junior at Boston College High School.

So where does this leave us?  I'll quip from Meredith Grey's clichéd narration at the end of the season premiere of Grey's Anatomy:  Change.  We don't like it.  We fear it.  But we can't stop it from coming.  We either adapt to change or we get left behind. ... It hurts to grow.  Anyone who tells you it doesn't is lying.  But here is the truth: sometimes, the more things change, the more they stay the same.  Sometimes, change is good.  Sometimes, change is everything.

6AM, Day after Christmas

I woke up this morning, for the second time, literally feeling like I was in the band Ben Folds Five's song "Brick."  The song placates me after I've been wound up too tight for a while, and for some reason, between the plague and Christmas and a final push to the end of the 2007 at work, I was feeling just a little bit shitty.  Nothing that poses caution to mental health or anything, just a funk resting in between 'getting up on the wrong side of the bed' on one hand, and 'please, Gawd, why do I need to get out of bed today' on the other hand.  Of course, I did a good job putting up good face all day long today.  After my nice, long, run on the treadmill, though, I realized that I couldn't do any more work.  I just needed to chill.... at least for a little while.

While I was assembling a playlist on iTunes, I realized that there's some "moments" of undergraduate school that I particularly miss.  Let's place aside all of the nostalgia for Notre Dame for a moment and focus on a few life functions, like down time and finding new, awesome music, or heading to the Huddle just to hang out, get a diet mountain dew and some BK chicken tenders, and talk to whomever happened to be there (which, many a time, happened to be my roommate and the PE girls).  I feel like I'm missing that a little bit back in Charlestown.  I'll call it the Cheers effect, if you will, minus the alcohol.  Like, I'd go to the Huddle or make playlists and the like not so much to drink or to find caffeine, but to just hang out and be.  Exist.  And associate.  Without the expectation of generating business on the return side.

Anyway, this is totally turning into a bitch and rave.  I'll just stop now.

Currently on the playlist: Life in Mono, by Mono, from the Great Expectations Soundtrack [1998].

Moving, Lonergan, and Seventy-Five Days

An agent through which vital powers are exercised.

Fall is finally becoming fall in Boston, in November.  Crisp and cool, just the way November should be.  I always thought that this type of fall weather lends itself to the nostalgia that replays inside my mind and supports the frustrated writer that lingers inside of me.  That's what I thought about when I was walking up Walker Street after I got off the bus this evening.  I was thinking about how much I really love my street, and how cool but strikingly red the fireball glowed from the utility pole at the top of my street, and how much I really loved what I do--even though I bitch and complain about it at times.  It's that new slug of a slog that I have to fight out and figure out.  I could quit.  But I love the playing field.

Beneath that fireball, though, I bumped upon Todd and Meg's U-Haul.  Todd and Dan were in it, amid all of the Todd and Meg's life that was getting squeezed into a 17-foot U-Haul.  Now, I always get really funny with change, especially moving.  I play things off like I'll see someone tomorrow.  I try to keep things "normal."  I laugh a bit and [/MESSAGE CLIPPED/]

Re: emails from friends

The email message:

It's weird how reading your reply to George made me realize how I never hear you talk about Notre Dame that much anymore. Either corporate indentured servitude is stifling your nostalgia or I'm just not around you in a social setting that much anymore!

Nealmeister's response:

Oh, I do think about it a lot. I think about Notre Dame, and the ocean, and the woods in Maine, my parents and Sunday morning bruch, and that four of swords card from the tarrot card deck four years ago (or five summers ago). I think I'm just not around many people in a social setting anymore (unfortunately), and as such, all of the nostalgia gets kept to myself. The things that make me laugh with my friends, the things that I really love discussing, the things that I really love spending my time doing, there's really just not that time anymore. It's somewhat sad; those were all the things that made up my personality. But it's amazing how once you get to the real world, your "personality" no longer becomes relevant. Well, at least in the corporate world. It's all about cash. Nobody really much cares about what I think (or the brilliant things in life, for that matter, like the ways clouds form on the eve of a thunderstorm in the middle of the summer; or how beautiful the congregation sounds at church when they try to sing, even though they're somewhat out of key and sound somewhat shrill; or the sound of the tires to my corolla when I'm driving through the less congested roads around the Middlesex Fells), unless it has to do with a transaction. Which is hard. I'm sounding like a frustrated writer...

The reply back:

Damn, that was intense! Brilliant! I just had to check and see if you still had it in you. But I hope I didn't open a can of worms on you.

Thoughts from the blackberry

music: anna nalick/breathe

location: 93 bus stop, sullivan & bunker hill streets. 
weather: steady rain
previous discussion: w/Dave p*rkins, re: essex, rain, england and new englanders

The asian woman collecting empties out of trash.  No one thought about what happens to her when you fail to sort your deposit bottles out of the trash and into the recycling bins.  Random thought, yes.  And I know people get really annoyed with them digging through their trash.  But, think about it.  It is really as much about their livelihod as it is ours. 

That was the gross juxtaposition at the bus stop -- socially, culturally, socioeconomically. And I could not help but think: "dear God, neal, in light of doing this whole attorney thing, in doing this whole yuppie thing, in accomplishing something that I clealy am not completely cognizant of but yet let sweep me away, please, please don't let me become so jaded that I forget my roots.  And lose passion -- or is it compassion -- for people like the asian lady collecting cans."

music: john mayer/slow dancing in a burning room

Potpourri post: Decisions, Peter Lattman, the Devil Wears Prada, We are Called, Dictations like Meredith Grey, and AUSTIN or BUST!

I don't know how much more random my posts can get.  One thing is for certain: as the period of time between posts appears to grow, the content that I need to fit into each post grows.  Plus, right now, there's a lot going on and a lot on my mind.  For one, it's about time that spring seems to be gracing itself upon Bosto n (it was in the 50's today!), but then again, after all of the events that transpired today, I'm so ready to enjoy some sxsw...

So, drumroll please...

Peter Lattman & The Devil Wears Prada

I've been reading a lot of the Wall Street Journal Law Blog these days.  I guess that marks the official transition from being a Top-40, MTV loving junky [via Pink is the New Blog] to wearing pinstripe suits and reading the Wall Street Journal as I take the bus into work. 

Perhaps what it really means, though, is that I'm slowing transforming into the Young Urban Professional (i.e., a yuppie).  As a kid growing up in Charlestown, I constantly criticized (and mocked--with my friends from the B&G Club) the yuppies, but deep down inside, I secretly admired them.  Of course, as a 12-year old, the aspiration looked a lot greener than the reality.  Scratch that.  It's just fine, but whether first year attorney, first year surgical intern, first year teacher, or first year police officer, I'm realizing that every single career path I even vaguely considered (or on the flipside, desperately thought I wanted) just requires putting in the long hours, putting in more effort, putting in the blood sweat and tears.  It's just like hauling a** in school.  Heck, it's like Jesus being humbled, minus the whole crucifixion thing.  And all said and done--I'm a small fish again.

Peter Lattman and the Devil Wear Prada come into play here, in part, because last night, me, Jess, and her cousin watched DWP.  I know what you're thinking--it's a quintessential chick flick--but it kind of got me thinking: since I'm single, I should be doing more for work.  Like trying to learn more financial stuff.  Like anticipating everyone's moves.  Like adding 10 or 20 more hours to work (and not billing it out).  I'm young.  I should be able to handle it.  And maybe, as Peter Lattman reports, I can take appropriate charitable deductions for donating my used workslacks to the Boston's Long Island Shelter.

Of cou/MESSAGE CLIPPED/

In re: Hosea

I'm giving a short talk to my confirmation kids next weekend during their confirmation retreat.  I'm kind of stuck.  I don't know where to really go with the talk -- based off the theme "Jesus in My Life" -- because there's so much in it.  The thought itself happens to be rather loaded for me.  On one side, it addresses my angst, my willingness to give into temptation, my ability (ugh, my strength) to be bitter and cruel and judgmental and unforegiving.  So in that sense, Jesus is there in my life to try to battle all of those tendencies, to be a better person... 

At the same time, the question covers some of the most beautiful and brilliant experiences in my life.  Sometimes, that beauty has been revealed to me in rather tortured and tormented ways.  Often times, the brilliance would come forth from a eureka moment of sorts.  And then, resiliency.  It kind of grows out of my tendency, or preference perhaps, to recall certain things or events or thoughts in the nostalgic mindset that people like Hillary and Crystal and Ysmael have readily duxed "a Neal moment."  Each of these things, though, culminate in a Jesus moment of sorts, if we want to dumb the description down.  I can go on with stories.  Not happening now...

So as you can see,  I'm not quite so sure how to address it or convey it to these 15 and 16 year olds.  In abstract descriptors, I get carried away.  With the oscars in the background, I'm filled with ideas.  And with the music that I got to cant at Mass today, plenty an opportunity to draw a bit on the darker side.

... it's amazing how much can happen in a year.  or five. or ten.  And every time I listen to "Hosea" (Gregory Norbet, Mary David Callaghan, the Benedictine Society of Vermont), al/MESSAGE CLIPPED/

In re: Grey's Anatomy, post II

It's true.  I admit to all of the recent allegations against me lately: that watching Grey's Anatomy, and becoming a big fan, scratch that, lover, of the show emasculates me a little bit.  But I don't care.  I've been emasculated enough, to the point that it doesn't matter (I freely admit likely Britney Spears and Christina Aguliera.  You figure it out).  Yet another thing remains true: ever since I've been a young child, I've been attracted to two things--drama, and medicine. 

Drama has a special place in my heart because it became my own outlet.  I was the different kid in my neighborhood.  Neither a notably talented kid athletically, nor the whitest one on the block ethnically, I stuck out.  So, in the midst of boys playing hockey and basketball, I took great joy in being in plays and acting my role, singing in musicals and singing, in my head, of the great drama or poetry or short story dramas that I could compose. 

And then there's medicine.  I never expected that I would be an attorney.  Indeed, as a young child, I always dreamed about what it would be like, to feel like, to actually be wearing a white coat at Mass. General, stethoscope around the neck, chart in hand, scrubs on legs, and nike air sneakers on the feet.  I wanted to be a doctor, I swear.  I was enamored by them and I even faked sick to be near them.  Somewhere, along the way, I let the drama get the best of me (or maybe, I should say, the emotions) and found a way out.  Actually, saying "found a way out" is a bit gratuitous.  I gave up, in part because I didn't know what to want, and in part, because I was absolutely petrified that I would not be able to succeed.  In the midst of that, I found reasons to cop out.  Med School would cost a lot.  Insurance would cost a lot.  Blood freaks me out.  The pressure seemed unreal.  Med School would take forever.  The list continued on.  And I convinced myself that I really didn't want medicine at all.  I still convince myself today.  That doesn't mean, though, that I don't think about what my life would be like if I hadn't dropped out of organic chemistry and purposefully failed physics to block the path to Med School.  I still think about it.  That's what I'm admitting to you all right now.

So how does this relate to Grey's.  It's really quite simple, once I get past the gloss -- the Ellen Pompeo crush, and the "ha ha" rush that I get when the guys say that I'm transforming into a vagina because I'm tuning in to the ABC internet broadcast.  It's all about the living, vicariously through the drama, the hopes and dreams that I clung to as a child.  Dr. Neal Patrick Boyle, Jr., M.D., D.O., Ph.D.  It looked so good, writing it over and over as a 10-year-old at St. Catherine's Elementary School. 

It's just ironic that now, two posts that seemed like steadfast beacons in my life are now just rolled into a silly extra-curricular passion on ABC, Thursdays, 8 p.m. Eastern time.

And just think.  When I was 10, I didn't even know what an attorney did.

Linked: [Grey's Anatomy Insider]