5
Thursday, July 9, 2015
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com OPINION
E-mail RachEl at Rdawson@umich.Edu
RACHEL DAWSON
U
nlike
previous
pieces,
this week’s column isn’t
really about the physical
place of Ann
Arbor.
After
all, I’ve only
just
returned
from a few weeks absence. So,
sorry, no profile of the river, or
Pita Kabob, or WCBN or any of
my other favorite places that I
believe everyone should run to
this instant. This week’s column
is about the more abstract Ann
Arbor we take with us, for better
or for worse.
My charge is that a city lives
inside of its people too. That its
bounds are extended by the travails
of its goers in a structure not all that
different from the way the 25 books
you have checked out from the
school’s library extend the branch
to your basement desk, right next to
the beer pong table that hasn’t been
cleaned in a
few
weeks.
Ann
Arbor
was with me
this
week-
end because
it is a state
of mind now
intertwined
with my own;
Maize
and
Blue
walk
with me.
While
many of you
were watch-
ing women’s soccer for the first
time, I was glued to Wimbledon.
The tournament is magical to me.
Growing up, Roger Federer on a
Sunday morning in July was just
as good as Old Saint Nick crawling
down my chimney in December.
2008, anyone?
With
that
said,
this
past
weekend was only the first week
of play which means, interestingly
enough, that Wimbledon isn’t
scoring all that much Big Network
time. If you wanted to watch many
of the matches, you had to go to
the Tennis Network via your cable
or satellite.
Due to the lack of Big Corporate
Sponsors lined up at its door for
advertisement time, Tennis Net-
work’s commercial selections are
absolutely appalling, or at least
I think so. Much akin to 4 a.m.
infomercials, they’re headlined by
combo packs consisting of 10 disks
featuring 200 songs from the
Golden Age of country music and
blenders that have the power to
blend up a whole box of hammers
if need be. They usually contain
one to two washed up celebrities,
either retired or unemployed.
Most have the same overexcited
narrative male voice over that so
obviously doesn’t believe that this
is the greatest deal since The Chop
House accidentally printed a post-
er for all-you-can-eat filet mignon.
One in particular was the worst.
Brett Favre was modeling a back
brace called Copper Fit, which is
marketed toward those afflicted
by aching vertebrae. The com-
mercial starts with a shot of Favre,
the retired Packers and too many
other teams quarterback, loading
hay into a white four by four, you
know, because he does that.
Why is this all important again?
Because
I
wouldn’t
shut up after
I saw it. I
needed
to
analyze it. I
spoke at least
three essays
out loud to
the chagrin
of my sisters
and cousins
and
girl-
friend
dur-
ing a holiday
vacation.
“Sick consumerist ploy,” “Harsh
capitalist undertones achieved via
manipulative commercial rheto-
ric.” I used the words “juxtaposi-
tion” and “narrative framework”
in an academic sense at least five
and a half times, which is five and
a half times more than I would
ever like to.
I’m trying to say that I read that
commercial in my parent’s living
room on a lake under the lapis
lazuli dome of the crystal sky like
Ulysses in Hatcher’s Reference
room, pencil in hand, annotations
bookmarked, and it kind of scared
me, because I’m realizing I’m
changing. I’m no longer new to
school; so much of it has sunk in
and it’s starting to show.
Sometimes it feels like the
shrub of your brain is being tenu-
ously carved out by a Maize and
Blue figure holding electric trim-
How Jesus became the
Gingerbread Man
ELIJAH
SPARKMAN
mers. Then there’s you, mouth
agape, watching from your front
window in horror of your own
lack of control.
On the drive home Monday
morning, I listened to the new
Courtney Barnett record (which
everybody should go buy from
Wazoo tomorrow) and thought
a lot about the fabulous lyric
on her song “Pedestrian at
Best” which goes: “Give me all
your money and I’ll make some
origami, honey.”
My episode of intense critique
happened all over again. I had to
“unpack” (ugh, that word) the
song and discuss its cultural and
political context. What is she
really saying about monetary
value? What does her saying
what she said really say about
the tensions between value sys-
tems in society? What am I even
talking about?
Listen to the music. Just lean
back, watch the film. Here, have
a Cheeto.
Indeed, the whole venture of
leaving school and being around
things that aren’t your school
or your city can be tiring and
confusing. This is the reason
why I value one family member
of mine in a very particular way:
my youngest sister Sophia, age
nine. She is a very, very funny,
intelligent,
loveable
baby.
I
highly
recommend
everyone
engage the opinion of a child at
least once a week; they are more
creative than you.
I spent most of the holiday
weekend doing what my Grandpa
Sparkman would dub ‘recreating’
with my little sisters, their friends
and my family. This included
things like shooting pool, gam-
bling and playing euchre, ping
pong, football and a simple game
called Tiki Toss that my mother
became acquainted with on the
beaches of Vero.
The girls’ favorite thing to
do is a drawing game called
Telestrations. (Everyone should
go buy this from somewhere
that’s not the Walgreen’s on State
Street). The quick logistics: up to
eight people can play at once; each
player gets their own dry-erase
packet filled with eight blank
sheets; the game starts when
each player picks a card from the
middle deck with the name of
an object on it; each player must
then write the name of the object
on page one and then attempt to
draw the object on page two; each
player then passes the booklet to
the person on the left who must
guess what the object is; the cycle
is repeated until the booklet is full.
You can see how the game can
be entertaining and silly, objects
usually end up something far dif-
ferent than their original identity.
The card I drew was ‘Monas-
tery.’ I tried my very best to draw
Dostoyevsky’s Alyosha Karam-
azov and then passed the book,
hilariously enough, to my little
sister who, after I peeked to see,
wrote down, ‘A very Scary Jesus.’
After six little girls’ drawings it
made its way to my girlfriend on
the right of me. She guessed, ‘A
Gingerbread Man in a puddle,’
which I then had to draw.
And I’m sure there is much to
think about here, from plenty of
vantage points, but it was one of
the rare moments this weekend
when I didn’t. I just laughed
with all of my company and
drew a curvy ginger man with a
big old bite mark taken out of his
side, all the while stooped upon a
watery spot.
— Elijah Sparkman can be
reached at essp@umich.edu.
I highly recommend
everyone engage the
opinion of a child
at least once a week;
they are more creative
than you.
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