theparkerfamily.org

  • ballerina

    l5885028630_8698we saw “ballerina” tonight, a documentary by bertrand normand which uses five russian ballerinas at different stages of there careers to examine the life of a ballet dancer.

    i am pretty sure i was the only man there who dragged his wife along, and not the other way around.

    I fell on love with ballet in Russia, when I first saw a production at the Marinski — the theatre featured in the documentary — when I was in high school. in college, I was the resident light designer for the dance department for my last two years.

    and no, I’m not gay … thankyouverymuch.

    the film was beautiful, with stunning shots of st. petersburg mixed in with great behind the scenes footage of the dancers rehearsing and performing. I was in heaven.

    one of the opening scenes showed a class of first years at the prestigious Vaganova Academy, with their tiny builds and their incredibly petite features … which made me think:

    first, this could never have been filmed in the united states, because our seven year-old look like NFL linebackers by comparison.

    second, if baby sparklet is a girl, she has no future in ballet unless, well, she isn’t actually related to either the lady sparkler or myself. neither of us have any discernible coordination, nor could we be mistaken as petite, I’m the least flexible person on the planet, and my wife would have punched the artistic director in the nose after his first note on her performance.

    little sparklet can be pretty much anything she/he wants to be when when [it] grows up …

    … but not a ballet dancer.

    … and it kills me.

  • yup, we’re pregnant

    well, looks like we *are* pregnant … the lady sparkler went in for a blood test early this week, and it came back a big ol’ thumbs up!

    we’ve already told the future grandparents, but have managed to track down any of the aunts and uncles quite yet. it’s hard to get peoples attention without ruining the surprise.

    the Virginia parkers were in town this weekend (for my father’s birthday) so we got to tell them in person. the Houston spindlers got a phone call, but it turns out they already knew she was pregnant by the time they picked up.

    so, now begins the long wait … we’ve got 64 days until we reach the 12 week threshold where it becomes safe to blab about sparklet (temporary nickname for currently genderless future sparkler) publically.

    speaking of which, yes, we are going to find out the gender before hand, though TLS “feels” like it will be a girl. (and, no, I don’t know what that means either…)

    speaking of which, we just found out that the lady sparkler’s ob-gyn no longer delivers babies, so we have to come up with an artful way of getting our friends to recommend someone without letting on that we have an eminent need to act on their suggestion.

    two other things of note: we’ve started compiling a list of “must do’s” before the baby pops out… including redoing the closet in the second bedroom (which TLS has annexed as her own) and replace the death trap of an electric curcuit-breaker box our home inspector warned us about.

    we’ll probably be fine on furnature to start (sans crib, natch) and we are going to try and avoid getting a bigger car (though may need to invest in some kind of luggage rack considering we max out the trunk when travelling already).

    oh, and the lady sparkler keeps talking about painting, so that’s probably coming, too.

    second item of note: we’ve agreed on the fact that a last name like “Parker” needs to have a fairly conventional anglo first name to “match.” (for instance, Andrew Parker works … Enrique Parker does not.)

    with that already established, I’m thinking the name thing will actually be bearable, and maybe a little fun.

    last thought … we are legitimately super-excited about raising sparklet in the city. everythin within walking distance, the zoo, the limited space that win let us over-accumulate baby crap … everything.

    these are exciting times!

  • bad facebook meme week, part three: iphone psychologist

    in part three of “bad facebook meme” week, I’m supposed to shuffle my iPhone and use the first twenty song titles to answer the questions below:

    what do your friends think of you?
    imaginary (evanescense)

    what if someone says you’re okay?
    under the weather (kt tunstall)

    how would you describe yourself?
    buffalo (kathleen edwards)

    what do you like in a [wife]?
    stay (dave matthews band)

    how do you feel today?
    it’s the end of the world (REM)

    what is your life’s purpose?
    the mercy of the fallen (dar williams)

    what is your motto?
    lazy dreamer (liz phair)

    what do you think about often?
    city of blinding lights (U2)

    what is 2 + 2?
    chloe dancer (mother love bone)

    what do you think of your best friend?
    fuck and run (liz phair)

    what do you think of your love interest?
    who’s to say (vanessa carlton)

    what describes your life story?
    wish you were here (rasputina)

    what do you want to be when you grow up?
    crazy in love (beyonce)

    what [did] you dance to at your wedding?
    love me two times (the doors)

    what will they play at your funeral?
    hey, jupiter (tori amos)

    what is your hobby?
    hurt (johnny cash)

    what is your biggest fear?
    grey street (dave matthews band)

    what is your biggest secret?
    freakshow (muffy nixon)

    what do you think of your friends?
    pumpkin soup (kate nash)

    what will you post this as?
    in my head (anna nalick)

    some of these are disturbingly telling …

  • plant a billion lights

    timesq
    I’ve never seen my name in lights, but maybe this is the next best thing … this week, someone donated space on the billboards that surround times square to the plant a billion trees campaign.

    (that’s the nature conservancy’s tree planting effort in the brazillian rain forest that I raised money for last earth day — and helped launch as part of my day job.)

    I haven’t heard anything about who the donor was, or how they chose us, but it’s fantastic to see such an important cause get the recognition (imho) it so richly deserves.

  • bad facebook meme week, part two: firsts

    in part two of “bad facebook meme” week, a list of firsts … which should be interesting considering i basically don’t remember anything before seventh grade:

    Who was your FIRST prom date?
    Sarah Bierenbaum, and saw her in NYC last week.

    Do you still talk to your FIRST love?
    Christine Holt, and the last time I saw here was ~15 years ago in an outlet mall in Williamsburg.

    What was your FIRST alcoholic drink?
    Frozen Mudslide, at some bar in Richmond with Maya Larson.

    What was your FIRST job?
    Nick’s Pancake House, or Williamsburg Country Club … depends on what you count.

    What was your FIRST car?
    1978 Oldsmobile Delta 88. It was my grandmother’s car, and it was awesome.

    Who was the FIRST person to text you today?
    (Damn, i’m old.)

    Who is the FIRST person you thought of this morning?
    Tasha Spindler.

    Who was your FIRST grade teacher?
    Pretty sure it was Mrs. Sidebottom (don’t laugh) at Rawls Byrd Elementary School.

    Where did you go on your FIRST airplane ride?
    No clue. The first one I remember was to the Middle East, but there was certainly something before that.

    Who was your FIRST best friend?
    Tie between Mark Drew and Tim Bilbo.

    Where was your FIRST sleep over?
    First I remember was a church lock-in, but that was in High School. Did i mention i have a horrid memory?

    Whose wedding were you in the FIRST time?
    My brother’s … I was Best Man.

    What was the FIRST thing you did this morning?
    Wii Fit.

    What was the FIRST concert you ever went to?
    I hope to God it wasn’t New Kids on the Block, but I am pretty sure it was. The things one does to try and impress a girl … especially one that didn’t look at me the whole night.

    What was your FIRST foreign country you’ve been to?
    Bahamas (but have no real recollection). First I remember was a summer scholarship to Jordan and Syria.

    What was your FIRST movie you remember seeing?
    Black Cauldron. Damn scary movie when you are eight.

    When was your FIRST detention?
    Never had one, but it should have been when I slugged Justin Timpane in 8th grade.

    What was the FIRST state you lived in?
    Virginia. Then Maryland. Then DC, and that’s it. I’m not much for variety.

    Who was your FIRST roommate?
    I’ve blanked on the name (Josh?) but he dropped out after a 0.0 semester, and last I heard he was working at a deli in Williamsburg.

  • photos: snowfall in mount pleasant, d.c.

    Explore the Photo Set:
    photos: snowfall, washington, dc

  • bad facebook meme week, part one: twenty-five random things

    it’s bad facebook meme week here, so i’ll be posting not one, not two, but three of the worst facebook memes i could come up with. try not to read with any sharp objects lying around.

    I started writing this about a month ago, back when “25 Random Things” was still a meme on Facebook. Unfortunately, I’m no where near as interesting as I had originally thought, so it took forever to come up with a list that wasn’t tortuously dull to read through.

    1. I refuse on principle to have any regrets … you make the best decision you can with the information you have, and move on.
    2. When I wear a watch, I wear it on my “wrong” hand because that’s how my brother (left-handed) did/does it.
    3. In 5th grade, I won an award from Optimist International.
    4. I don’t remember anything that happened before seventh grade that isn’t a picture in a photo album.
    5. The first album I ever owned was The Police’s Synchronicity.
    6. I have the world’s worst taste in music (chick rock/chick pop) and place the blame squarely on my debbie gibson/shania twain-loving brother.
    7. I’ve been hit on by so many men that I’ve stopped counting, but I knew I was very, very straight ever since the first time I kissed Christine Holt in 9th grade (felt it in my knees).
    8. I named my future kids (three of them, all girls) back in high school and believe I still have a realistic shot of using the names.
    9. My 10th grade English teacher was awesome, and I often wonder what she’s up to.
    10. I can’t think of a single funny one-liner that I have said in the last two decades that wasn’t stolen from a movie.
    11. I was two classes away from being a Theatre major, but refused to take acting 101 and 102 on principle. I was a theatrical designer — did 35 light designs at nine different theaters before I graduated — and acting was “beneath” me.
    12. I’ve studied three different languages (Spanish, Arabic, Russian) for a total of twelve semesters, but sucked at all of them.
    13. If I could do College over again, I’d study Sociology.
    14. I occasionally worry that I will never reconcile my spirituality with the mess that is organized religion.
    15. I’m quite possibly the only person in the world to be turned on by women in colonial garb.
    16. I keep a list of every book I’ve read since 1997.
    17. I have incredible hair envy whenever I see a black man with short dreads (specifically Lenny Kravitz.)
    18. Up until five years ago, I had never been farther west than central Ohio.
    19. The most regularly trafficked part of my website exhibits paintings of Mary Magdalene through art history
    20. Even though i do it for a living, I hate technology, and refuse to buy the first generations of pretty much anything.
    21. I’m permanently concerned about being awkward in social situations, which (not surprisingly) usually makes me awkward in social situations.
    22. I’d give up every skill I have in my generalist (wide, not deep) skill set to be a virtuoso at any one thing, and it doesn’t matter a lick to me what that one thing would be.
    23. When I retire, I want to be a taxi cab driver in Washington, D.C.
    24. I don’t believe that Big Bird qualifies as a Muppet, and get angry when people make that argument … even though they are right.
    25. I have never been happier in my life than I am right now, and just about all of that is my wife’s fault.

  • well, here we go — a.k.a. the lady sparkler thinks she might be pregnant

    l5885028630_8698so, the lady sparkler thinks she might be pregnant. and while those words strike terror into my heart, it’s not for the reason you think.

    the last time she thought she was pregnant, I decided it would be a good idea to draft up some blog entries, with be idea that they’d be embargoed (ie. not published) until after the 12 week don’t-tell-a-soul period has passed.

    unfortunately, as I was jotting down my thoughts, I came to realize that something was wrong with our blog which cause unpublished drafts to be, well, published.

    and so, in the first week of January, maybe 50+ people who read the blog via RSS feeds (like, through google reader) got this message:

    “tasha thinks she might be pregnant …”

    so, when T.L.S. delivered the news today, after the obvious “yay!” response one would expect from me (closely followed by “let’s wait a few days to be sure”) my next thought was “how can I make sure I don’t embarrass myself again with another premature post.”

    the answer? low tech. I’m drafting this in notepad, and won’t upload anything ’til I’m ready for them to be published. I don’t that even I could screw that up.

    as an aside, thank you to all of you who either (a) didn’t make a big deal of my obvious mistake and pulled me aside quietly, or (b) just ignored the mistake because you knew I was just being a complete idiot. bless you all.

    so, if you are reading this, I guess that means sparklet’s due date is Nov 8th, based off Feb 2nd as the start of T.L.S.’ last period.

    (btw, sparklet is the insider name for the baby — it’s all we’ve got until there is at least a gender to work with.)

    oi! i just looked at the calendar saw a vision of the future: one day in junior high health class, sparklet will count back 38 weeks from his/her birthday and pick Feb14th as the likely conception day.

    even worse, sparklet will be totally grossed out, thinking mom and dad got tanked on Valentine’s Day and couldn’t control themselves … even though it’s been well documented that the only elixer of love we had on that day was ben’s chili bowl.

    btw, remind me to delete this post before sparklet can read … okay? I probably can’t afford the therapy bills this post would cause.

  • theatre: this beautiful city @ the vineyard

    l5885028630_8698a musical about evangelical Christians … and I loved it.

    at the offer of a very good friend (who’s taste in theater I trust without question) I saw this beautiful city at NYC’s the Vineyard.

    the show is a product of two outstanding city institutions, the vineyard (who brought you avenue q) and the civilians (known for investigative, collaborative theater), the musical is an even-handed look at the conflicts and interactions between believers and non-believers in and around the evangelical hotbed of Colorado Springs.

    why this show

    the first thing that popped to mind as i settled into my seat, was “i wonder what pitch meeting could possibly have lead them to this show…”

    seriously, we are in the middle of a partisanship-amplifying recession, which means people are buying fewer tickets, which means theaters tend to push commodities that they know will put butts in seats — decidedly not (a) brand new (b) fair-minded (c) musicals about (d) evangelical Christians, especially not in (e) left-leaning NYC.

    but, thank God they did (pun not-necessarily intended) because what came out of said pitch meeting is exactly what we as a civil society need to be seeing in times like these.

    production notes

    the foundation of a Civilians production is the way it is put together … the company sends the actors and production staff/directors out to a location, and they interview hundreds of people, on all sides of an issue.

    in this case, each word and every character in the show is a direct result of interviews with the people of Colorado Springs, which gives the production a view point and a legitimacy that just wouldn’t be possible otherwise.

    through the first act, the plot is based largely around the interviews themselves, with the characters explaining to unseen questioners what the migration of evangelicals to the small mountain town was like for all involved.

    everything you’d expect is here, from Christians seeking a homeland, to locals looking to retain the identity of their town, to outrage (on both sides) about lack of tolerance of from outside their parts of the community.

    the haggert controversy

    these real issues gave the company quite a plot to work with throughout, but the show got a heaping dose of drama when the head of Colorado Springs’ largest mega church (Ted Haggert of New Life Church) got himself embroiled in a sex and drugs scandal during the course of the interviews.

    such a dramatic change in the story arch could have over-amped the production, but it actually gave the second act a new prism through which to see the more general debate highlighted by the migration stories.

    even more surprisingly, the controversy added a level of depth and nuance to the evangelical characters (as the community affected) that could have been lost otherwise (as the people who tried to shift the balance of the city through migration).

    tolerance through exposure

    in the end, all the characters are real people with real issues. it’s often said that exposure (over the long term) breeds understanding, and the exposure I had from this beautiful city gave me a window into a world that is all too easily dismissed by hippie-progs on the right coast.

    maybe the most stunning experience for me in this vein was the song “take me there,” which is a spot on show of an evangelical youth service, in all its swirling-lighted, acoustic-guitar-playing, headset-microphone-yielding, rock-concert glory … I almost walked out born again myself.

    but, the more poignant exposure came from the characters relating their experiences, including one conversion experience that was a direct result of a drug-fueled lifestyle brought upon by a dysfunctional family. it’s easy to disregard someone’s politics, but harder to disregard their stories.

    I will forever remain intolerant of intolerance, but knowing some of the back stories involved makes it easier to embrace the person … a lesson that is core to this very production.

  • travel: new york, new york

    the jonas brothers, a musical about evangelical Christians, and an inter-city bus trip … oh, where to begin?

    well, work sent me up to new york city for a mobile marketing conference and, while i was only a day-long seminar, i had to go up the day before because the sessions started so early.

    needless-to-say, i don’t do 4 1/2 hour trips before arriving at 8am … so, i decided to get up there Wednesday, take the afternoon off to take in some somethings, and be fresh and ready for the next day.

    getting there

    now, funding is a little tight at the office … so i decided to be creative and take one of those fancy-pants DC/NYC buses i keep hearing about. you can only book online (which limits the demographic), there are electrical outlets at every seat, and most lines offer free wi-fi as well.

    i took the bolt bus (so can’t speak for the rest) but the whole experience was actually exactly as advertised. the bus was full, but not uncomfortable, filled with young urban metro-sexuals bouncing between the cities. i was easily the oldest (and least cool) person on the bus.

    and it cost $18. i can totally handle ignoring the “cool-lier than thou” crowd for an $18 ride to nyc.

    dead people who took pictures

    once i got settled into the hotel (on 44th, near times square) i realized that i was about three blocks away from the international center of photography which is *the* only museum i try to visit each time i’m in the city.

    the museum had a suite of exhibitions around fashion photography, including an entire floor dedicated to the work of 1920s and 30s Vanity Fair photo Edward Steichen, including many of his photos of America’s first star model (and a personal favorite) Marion Morehouse.

    there was also a small wing that featured some of Louisiana-native (and a personal favorite) Clarence John Laughlin, whose black and white work depicting the American south is stunning.

    so, that’s two bites at the “lucky” apple (three, if you count the museum being so close to my hotel) … it was a pretty good afternoon.

    my name is jonas

    after fawning all-over Ms. Morehouse and Mr. Laughlin, i headed towards union square to meet up with a great friend of mine for dinner, a musical about evangelical Christians, and drinks to follow.

    the show (this beautiful city) is worth its own blog post, but in between dinner and the show i had to kill an hour while i waited for the house to open. that’s when the Disney magic happened.

    i wandered out of the theater (the vineyard, on 15th) and around union square when i passed by the Virgin Megastore. there was a line out the door and around the block, which is a little odd for a Wednesday.

    i looked through the window and thought i saw three shaggy-haired, Jonas-brother looking kids. and then i looked at the line of twenty something girls. and then Jonasus. and the line, which (again) lacked anybody under the age 21. and then the Jonasi. and then a guy squirming in line who looked like a bouncer at an irish bar. and one squirrelly guy who looked like bobcat goldthwait from Scrooged.

    and then i was confused. these people were way too old to like the (disney channel product) jonas brothers. there were no elementary school kids. there were no 40-somethings who got dragged along by their children.

    they were all normal, even though there was probably more visual diversity in salt lake city than in that particular line …

    An hour later (as I was walking back from the strand, NYC’s best bookstore) everyone was gone and three NFL linebackers were blocking the entrance, but they were “kind” enough to leave the doors open to share their brand of saccharine-rock with the rest of the rest of the city.

    to be continued…

    seriously, though … this is turning into the world’s longest post, and I don’t want the musical about evangelical Christian to get short shrift.

    theater: this beautiful life @ the vineyard