Unstructured, Unintentional Genius

Bettyville by George Hodgman
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Last week I was struck, in a negative way, by a piece of advice to writers that I stumbled upon on Twitter: "Storytelling trumps beautiful writing, every time" (Lisa Cron). I thought of a book like "Lolita," which is genuine art with a pretty cheesy and inauthentic "story." Even the great "Great Gatsby" has a pretty slim plot. So I totally rejected that advice... and then I read this memoir.

It's beautifully written. Still, you could start reading any random page and pick up right where you left off... no matter where you left off. Maybe my brain has been programmed by all the other writers who are following Ms. Cron's advice to reject memoirs. Reading this book, I would have appreciated more structure, unless the structure here is meant to mimic Betty's addled mind -- in which case, this is genius.


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Another Memorial Day With Gatsby

Every Memorial Day weekend, I find a sort of tender curiosity in trying to repeat the past.

This morning's rain in New Jersey made for perfect weather to hunker down and re-read "The Great Gatsby" to celebrate the start of another summer.

It's hard to fathom how a slight, 91-year-old book by F. Scott Fitzgerald never fails to renew my love for great writing and the power of imagination.

The book is still more vivid than any of the familiar video marathons that might have entertained me on another weekend -- James Bond on AMC, "Jaws" on IFC, the black-and-white war movies on TMC, or even tonight's "Roots" simulcast on A&E/Lifetime/History.

You'll never see a "great" Gatsby movie. Video can't capture the imagined sight of Gatsby holding out his trembling arm to the green light, or the grand artifice that Gatsby built to try to reconnect with Daisy.

It's not a plot-driven thriller, either, like "The Girl on the Train." I find it episodic, and dream-like. So I took exception to a tweet I saw this afternoon from Jon Winokur (@AdviceToWriters). He quoted this advice from Lisa Cron, an accomplished writing instructor: "Storytelling trumps beautiful writing, every time."

As Maureen Corrigan wrote recently in her own book about the benefits of re-reading Gatsby, "Anytime you try to explain to someone who hasn't read it what 'The Great Gatsby' is 'about,' the book fades into just another novel about love gone horribly wrong... Flailing around, you fall back on the truth: that maybe it's not so much the plot of 'Gatsby' that makes it great but the way it's told, that incredible language."

In literature, style matters. Otherwise, you can dismiss this book as about a guy who's been obsessed with a woman, now married to another -- and he's rich now and trying to win her back. I'm sure he's got a great Facebook and social media profile too, with plenty of party photos.

No, there's something uniquely American about this book... and something uniquely resonant about a tale that begins right as summer begins and ends right as summer ends.

Once, in driving my daughter home from college in Washington DC, I suggested that we listen to the book during the car ride. She loves "The Great Gatsby" as much as I do, and we thought we'd be able to hear the whole thing in one sitting.

But traffic was light, and things abruptly ended in the smouldering hotel suite at The Plaza. At that point, there was still the possibility Gatsby might end up with Daisy -- and my daughter was just as happy that the story ended right there.

"As far as I'm concerned, Gatsby never went for a swim before they closed up his pool," she said.

We laughed. While barreling up Route 95, we had just seen our share of real life passing by. But that's no matter. Listening to "The Great Gatsby," we both knew that America is still a land where happily ever after is still remotely possible.

A Beacon of Hope for Lesser People

Disrupted: My Misadventure in the Start-Up Bubble by Dan Lyons

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Looking for a scary read this Memorial Day weekend? Try “Disrupted: My Misadventure in the Start-Up Bubble” by Dan Lyons.

His memoir is far scarier than anything I’ve read recently by Stephen King – and it’s also funnier (thinking back to the author’s description of how a newsroom might react to Molly the teddy bear) than most anything I’ve read or seen recently, except for HBO’s “Silicon Valley.”

Wait. Lyons is a writer for “Silicon Valley,” and he was also one of my cultural folk heroes from the mid-1990s when he blogged as Fake Steve Jobs. So the “funny” part is understandable.

But why is this book scary?

Because good satire is always scary – and this is a tale of ageism, greed, abuse of power and double-talk. Because it raises important questions, yet again, about the stability and underpinnings of U.S. financial markets. And, finally, because there’s a scene with the author’s young son that chillingly portrays the impact of job loss on family life.

But what of all those young HubSpot workers – the real people (innocent bystanders?) seemingly caught in the middle of this tale?

I feel for them all. And I’m scared for them too.

In the end, Lyons is a solitary figure, fighting against time and seemingly always misunderstood. He winds up paranoid for his family’s safety and worried about his children’s future.

But the very fact that he’s fighting his battles with wit and insight gives me hope.

To steal a favorite closing line from “Mistress America,” a recent Greta Gerwig/Noah Baumbach movie: “Being a beacon of hope for lesser people is a lonely business.”

Namaste.


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Tonight Seems More Real

Here's an image of street musicians performing earlier this evening in Albuquerque, NM...

Last night, I was in New York, and this was the scene as described the "NY Business Journal": "Live performances by Demi Lovato, Wiz Khalifa and Snoop Dogg — in front of a capacity crowd at the South Street Seaport on Tuesday night — certainly helped Verizon-owned AOL stand out among the herd of tech companies in town showcasing their tech. The Tim Armstrong-led company also peppered its audience with its latest high-tech offerings and product launches."

Tonight seems more real.


Originally posted on my Instagram feed.

Read This Book: 'Never a Good Time'

"I came away with a much deeper and more profound appreciation for the only parents I knew. My only regret is that they never lived to hear me say that. There was never a good time."

Never A Good Time: A Memoir by Jack Hoey
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Do yourself a favor. Buy this book and read it before Mother's Day. When you get to the line in Chapter 14 that begins, "I thought about you every day of my life..." well...

My heart skipped a beat. And, full disclosure, I also enjoyed reading this short book because it was written by a former colleague who's an excellent writer. These stories are real, and it doesn't get any better than this, Jack.


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It's Complicated (My Relationship With Social Media)

Blame my cat for this.

It's not even 7 on a Saturday morning, but the cat woke me up and I couldn't get back to sleep, so I checked my phone...


On Facebook -- where, by mutual agreement of family members, I neither took nor posted a photo of our dinner the previous evening (although, for some reason, I checked in at the place on what's left of Foursquare... because, like Kilroy, I want to leave a mark that I was there) -- I was directed to a post by a very talented, social media-savvy colleague.

It pointed to a story about why the new "Ghostbusters" trailer is the most disliked movie trailer in YouTube history. And, by "disliked," it apparently means, a license to post misogynist comments about the all-female leads.

Because I read this story, any subsequent website I visited (thanks, Google) featured suggestions to click on stories posted on "ZergNet," an aggregator of stories such as: "9 TV Shows That Should Have Been Cancelled By Now," "The Real Reason Meg Ryan's Career Was Ruined" and "Daniel Craig's Harsh Words About The Kardashians." This is just a random sampling from this morning. There's much worse on the site, which seems to cater to Baby Boomers who like a cesspool of snark disguised as "celebrity news." I was rescued by a popup alert from Medium...


On Medium -- where I reposted my prior post from here (the one about the abandoned asylum... more later) -- I was intrigued by the headline, "F*** You, I Quit — Hiring Is Broken" -- a long read about a programmer's interview experience in the tech industry. It was a fascinating look into how bizarre the tech business has become, including mentions of the hiring process at aforementioned Google and over-my-head inside-baseball programming references. The author posted his Twitter handle...


On Twitter, I was alerted to an even more bizarre long read: this piece about Yelp Girl. The title explains it best: "The Revelations of Lady Murderface -- Talia Jane wasn’t any naive Millennial when she outed Yelp for its low pay and triggered raises. If you’d had her bizarre life, you might overshare, too." This made me think to check in at work...


On email, my company is currently involved in a labor dispute. The issues involved are important, complex and clouded by so many people having so many agendas that workers wound up caught in the middle. I see today that the striking unions have hired a former White House spokesperson who has launched a parody site where there are photos of six executives aligned like the Brady Bunch. They have been labeled the Greedy Bunch, and you can roll over each photo to view anonymous, sophomoric personal insults.

Seeking refuge, I turned to a place where people can only post if they create something, and it's usually filled with stunning photography, often accompanied by heartfelt or funny commentary...


On Instagram, I had recently posted photos of the abandoned asylum in my old hometown -- mostly because it evoked a deeply learned boyhood lesson about compassion, which I tried to capture here.

You almost always get likes on Instagram or simple expressions of encouragement, but this morning I noticed that someone I don't know had made this comment about my Totowa photo collage:

"I can tell you care about the place, so you should know that posting stuff like this is bound to bring the site negative attention. Vandals, thieves, and even security & police have access to anything you post publicly. That's why most of us never discuss the real names or locations of these places."

Point taken. And, I don't know, maybe I shouldn't have posted it. Too late now. In the meantime, just let me say this:

I do care. Very deeply. And, ultimately -- despite everything I've read this morning -- I have faith in goodness. I have faith in vandals and thieves, in the strikers, in the executives, in millennials and job-seekers, in entertainers and artists, and in all the people laughing and taking selfies and raucously singing "Happy Birthday" in the crowded and noisy restaurant last night.

It's complicated, but I have faith.

Found in NJ: Totowa's Abandoned Asylum

2022 UPDATE: Now totally demolished; a health care center is on the site today.

This is the North Jersey Development Center, a 188-acre compound of buildings, forever shrouded in mystery and permanently closed in 2014.

The property overlooks and abuts Echo Glen, a suburban development in Totowa where my parents bought their first and only house. A high fence, which was topped with barbed wire when I was a boy, separates the center from this neighborhood, which was built on top of swampland so that none of the cookie-cutter houses have basements.

According to asylumprojects.org, the Development Center opened in 1928, preceding Echo Glen's construction by 30 years. Originally known as the North Jersey Training School, the center served "625 mildly retarded females" in 1953 and included a 275-bed nursery, making it the only one in the state that housed children. The source here is a 1969 study published by the "New Jersey Association for Retarded Children."

One anonymous post on Google Books claims that many locals in the 1950s considered the center to be a school for promiscuous, wayward girls or an experimental asylum where a variety of psychology trials were staged.

By the 2010s, the facility housed nearly 400 adults, dwindling to 190 residents before being shuttered. Some residents were moved to the Hunterdon Developmental Center, which offers care for a wide variety of neuro-developmental disorders, including Down syndrome.

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When I was a boy, Totowa's Training School housed men, women and children in several dozen dormitory-style cottages. There were 35 buildings in all, including a school, chapel, healthcare facility, auditorium and swimming pool. 

I know this first-hand because I once attended a packed performance by Bozo the Clown at the auditorium there. Also, as an altar boy, I spent one summer assisting Fr. Lynch from nearby St. James parish as he celebrated Mass at the chapel.

Fr. Lynch was a tall man who rested his elbows on the pulpit and crossed one leg casually behind the other as he delivered his folksy sermons. He thought it might do me good to accompany him to the Training School every Sunday.

After folding himself into his compact car, Fr. Lynch would drive us down Minnesink Road and into the compound, past neat rows of cottages. Upon our arrival, the chapel was always packed with a well-dressed crowd of young residents and their families.

I was always intrigued by the congregation's responses during Mass. Prayers were loudly half-sung by the residents, who enthusiastically emphasized all the "thees" and "thous" in the Our Father and Hail Mary. At that point in Catholic Church history -- in the years following Vatican II -- there had been a concerted effort to encourage people to recite all prayers using "you" and "your."

"Why does everyone here pray the old way?" I asked Fr. Lynch.

"They pray the way they were taught," he replied. "It's comfortable and reassuring."

Today, decades later, at St. James itself, everyone prays the old-fashioned way, anyway.

I don't remember much about Fr. Lynch beyond that summer. He left St. James soon afterward, and the priesthood too. He married, according to one rumor. He died in Vietnam, according to another. In the pre-Internet era, there was no way of knowing for sure.

In the 1980s, the state changed the Training School's name to the more-PC "Development Center," but the name outside the main entrance has always stayed the same.

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Visiting my Mom the other day, I noticed that even the front entrance of the place is now enclosed behind a chain-link fence.

I stopped to take these photos -- and, in doing so, a couple of things occurred to me.

For one, everything in Totowa looks smaller than in my memory. It always does.

For another, I can't remember a single word of any one of Fr. Lynch's sermons, but I still, to this day, recall his kindness to everyone I saw him interact with that summer.

And finally, standing outside the locked gates, I heard no ghostly cheers for Bozo the Clown nor any echoing petition that Thy kingdom come or Thy will be done.

Instead, in 2016, the only sounds haunting this place can be traced to the traffic in the near distance, as everyone else speeds past on Route 80.

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A 2018 update to this post: "Totowa Under Attack."

Roosevelt Island, Google Style

Google has once again taken it upon Itself to make an automatic video of some time I spent taking photos.

And who am I to argue with my peripatetic search-engine friend?

So here's the short video, featuring photos I took on a beautiful late Saturday morning in New York. Nancy and I were walking past Tram Plaza at 60th Street and Second Avenue, when I suggested that we get a close up view of the intriguing, abandoned Smallpox Hospital (aka, The Ruin) we see on Roosevelt Island when we sometimes walk along the East River at Peter Detmold Park.

There was a tram approaching overhead, and we knew we'd be on the island in just minutes.

"I'm game," my wife said.

Yet another reason I love her.

PS- The Ruin has its own Instagram account and website.

Jersey Proud