Images of Spring

i am obsessed with this old man who walks with a mug of coffee in one hand and his princess of a chihuahua on a leash in the other each morning to the Glen Park BART station to get his morning paper. i had been wanting to take a picture of this flower for days and was lucky enough that the old man walked by just as i was taking the picture so you can see the little dog in the distance on the left. she raises her feet with each step and looks about nervously but is so devoted to him. it's beautiful. and he could get his paper delivered, but he doesn't. he takes her for a walk and gets his paper just to take in the morning scene, or so i imagine when i narrate his life as i walk behind him everyday.

this flower reminds me of this article by Nancy Kreiger called "Epidemiology and the web of causation: has anyone seen the spider?". It talks about old conceptions of disease causation as lacking an agent - African-Americans have higher rates of blood pressure but, she says, quoting Charlotte's Web, "where's the spider?" - as in - who is creating the social conditions that create this higher blood pressure? who is invested in and benefits from the structural racism that causes this higher blood pressure? surely, it is not just a matter of what she calls biomedical individualism, of people making poor food choices. so she proposes a model that looks a lot like the shape of this flower as a way of thinking about how problems have root causes that branch out and cause other problems, until finally you can't see from where a thing once came. it struck a chord in me many years ago when i first read it (thanks to my friend and mentor Lisa Moore at SF State) and reinforced my commitment to the upstream orientation of public health: rather than pulling people out of the river, let's go upstream and see who is pushing them in...

Spring inspirations from the world of pop culture

Quote of the day from today's NYT: Eric Landan, president of Rick's Cabaret International, which runs 10 strip clubs: "Our clubs are set up with the same decorations and customer service as any major steakhouse." His point was that strip clubs are not a big deal (true) and that they're where businessmen have long done their business (also true). What strikes me is the implicit parallel between strip clubs and steakhouses. It's almost like a set up for a feminist joke about women being treated like pieces of meat a' la The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist Vegetarian Critical Theory, by Carol J. Adams. I confess to never having read the book. We had it lying around my vegan all-girl punk house many years ago but the book's title seemed to say it all. The title, and all those all-girl punk songs we sang along to by Team Dresch and Sleater Kinney and Spitboy back in the day.

Speaking of girl power, I've been meaning to show this clip from the musical Wicked, which my roommate and I went to see in February. The song is called Defying Gravity and it's kind of reminiscent of all those riot girl songs of yesteryear. Here is a snapshot of the lyrics:
Something has changed within me
Something is not the same
I'm through with playing by the rules
Of someone else's game
Too late for second-guessing
Too late to go back to sleep
It's time to trust my instincts
Close my eyes: and leap!
It's time to try
Defying gravity
I think I'll try
Defying gravity
And you can't pull me down!

Also oddly moving (and, alternatively, hilarious) is Alicia Keys singing "New York" with Stephen Colbert rapping about his asthma and life in the upper-middle class!:

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Alicia Keys - Empire State of Mind (Part II) Broken Down
www.colbertnation.com

Faves films of late: The Runaways (serious lez action with Dakota Fanning as Cherie Currie and Kirsten Stewart as Joan Jett); The Hurt Locker (more serious fare - i don't often watch war movies but this one seemed to show the alienation and adrenaline rush that comes with living amongst so much danger and violence); Up in the Air (the moral: capitalist alienation-not love-will tear us apart unless we hold onto each other); The Princess and the Frog, (yes, it was refreshing seeing a working class, black princess in a Disney musical/cartoon/movie for once!!!)

Actual news (the passage of landmark health care reform! the web of disease causation! Tom Freiden's pyramid of public health interventions! the lifting of the federal ban on funding for syringe exchange! the U.S. finally, kind of standing up to Netanyahu on building in E. Jerusalem!) next time.