On Shovels and Roots

Humphrey Bogart, "America's Most Dangerous Female Spy," and Benny Goodman walk into a bar...

We finally got some snow in the Elm City this past week, with about four inches arriving on Monday and Tuesday. Out came the shovels and snowblowers.

I like shoveling snow.

It’s an act that conjures nostalgia for my youth. I grew up just a few miles from my current home, and shoveling our front walk was one of my household duties every winter.

Shoveling this week also reminded me how my life has changed in recent years, especially since 2020. That summer, I moved from New York City back to New Haven after almost 20 years away.

Here, as a homeowner, I’m responsible for clearing the snow and ice from the sidewalk in front of my house so folks can safely pass by. And when I can, I help my older friends across the street clean up their strip of the sidewalk.

These seemingly mundane moments are actually instances of neighborhood bonding.

In my backyard, giving new meaning to “snowbird” on Tuesday afternoon. (Photo: Daniel Fleschner)

When I lived in Manhattan, I never had to shovel snow, of course.

I was a renter in a big apartment building. I had no kids, no spouse, and my job at NBC Sports was based 40 miles out of town. So I never really felt like a member of any particular community.

New Haven has offered a different kind of experience. But even though I have roots here, feeling included in the community has taken time to develop.

When I first moved back, the pandemic limited my opportunities to make new friends and connections. And I was working long hours (albeit from home) and spent extensive time in Japan and China for the Olympics.

But in September 2022, I was laid off at NBC, and a crucial part of my identity was suddenly stripped away.

Losing my job forced me to ask myself a series of hard questions: Who are you? What’s important to you? Where are you going?

The answers remain a work in progress. But I knew I wanted to do two things: revive my creative impulses and open myself to deeper community engagement.

So over these past six months, I’ve taken on a series of creative projects that have connected me to new people in different ways. I wouldn’t have had these experiences if I still worked at NBC.

Even this newsletter, which has given me permission to think of myself as a writer again, has opened unexpected doors.

One of those doors opened here in town last week, when something I wrote led to an invitation to a small dinner gathering. There, I bumped into a former schoolmate’s mother. I hadn’t seen her in close to 30 years, but I recognized her immediately and reintroduced myself.

“Oh, I certainly remember you,” she said. “You were the sportswriter. Are you still writing?”

I paused for a moment and smiled. “Yes,” I said. “I am still writing.”

And… still shoveling, too.

On to the list…

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The Best…

…Movie I Watched This Week

Brick (2005) — Directed by Rian Johnson
Available for rent on various streaming services

I can’t believe I waited so long to watch watch Brick, Rian Johnson’s 2005 neo-film noir set at a contemporary Southern California high school.

But listen here, friend — if I’d seen it when it first hit the screens, I woulda been jealous as a jilted beau, rueing every choice I’d ever made in my no-good, worthless existence.

The film is a true movie fan’s movie: a high-concept, low-budget homage to The Maltese Falcon (1941) and every murder-soaked cinematic potboiler that followed.

How many times as a kid did I watch Bogey tell Mary Astor, “Yes, angel. I’m gonna send you over” — fifteen times? Thirty? Fifty? See, mac, my screenwriting dreams were right in front of my face, looking me square in the eyes.

In my teen years, I watched dozens of noir classics, from Double Indemnity to The Killers to Touch of Evil and many more.

Hell, I’ve even got an aunt who was named for one of those pictures: Laura. The stuff was practically pumping through my veins. What kind of stuff? You know the kind, dreams and all that.

Clearly, Rian Johnson was watching those movies, too. And getting ideas.

So why did the gods plug him full of inspiration and not me? What made him bang out a script with fuzz-faced teens as the Johns and Janes? What compelled him to scrape together enough dough for production? What gave him the gumption to go out and make the damn thing?

Good for him. He wrote and directed a terrific movie.

Shame on me. I’m a patsy, a chump, the fall guy.

Now Johnson’s directing Star Wars and big movies for Netflix. Like I said, good for him.

And I’m here, sitting alone in the dark. Taunted by a blank sheet of paper in a two-bit Underwood, drained bottle of hooch by my side. But I’m not a kid anymore, see? I got no illusions left. I know I’m outta luck, outta hope, outta time. Dreams? Don’t talk to me about dreams.

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…Book I Read This Week

Code Name Blue Wren: The True Story of America’s Most Dangerous Female Spy — and the Sister She Betrayed (Hanover Square Press, 2023) — by Jim Popkin

Code Name Blue Wren tells the true story of an American woman named Ana Montes, who spied for Cuba while working as a U.S. intelligence official. It’s a page-turner, but not in the dramatic mold of a typical spy novel. (In fact, author Jim Popkin’s writing is quite straightforward and clear; it’s also very well sourced.)

No, this book is a page-turner for two reasons:

1. You cannot believe how often Montes gets promoted and receives awards during her lengthy career at the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, where she not only spied for Cuba but also downplayed the Cuban threat to top U.S. officials.

2. She did this while her sister, brother, and sister-in-law were all working for the FBI. If you think that made for some awkward and anxious Thanksgiving gatherings, you would be correct!

I won’t spoil what ultimately happens to Montes and where she is today. But this book is about more than just the outcome of her story anyway. It’s about what obsession compelled her to do; about inter-agency rivalry and dysfunction within the U.S. intelligence community; and about the damage Montes did to her country, her family, and herself.

Thanks to reader Susan L. for the recommendation.

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…Best Podcast I Sampled This Week

A History of Rock Music in 500 Songs

A History of Rock Music in 500 Songs has been around since way back in the fall of 2018 (pre-pandemic!), but I knew nothing about it until reader Matt W. recently mentioned it to me.

Writer-producer-host Andrew Hickey tells the story of rock history by producing, in chronological order, episodes for 500 different songs. (He starts all the way back in 1939, with a tune by the Benny Goodman Sextet.) Each episode is about an hour in length. So producing this is an almost unfathomably huge undertaking.

I’m a completist when it comes to podcasts and TV shows, but I know there’s no way I’ll listen to all 500 episodes in this series. Besides, Hickey has been at it for more than four years, and he’s only up to 163 songs so far. (He’s also writing a series of companion books; to date, two have been published.)

But it’s still fun to play one of these shows and find out the full history and context around a song. Hickey goes deep.

Can you find most of the information on these songs on Wikipedia? Probably. But while I think Hickey must be nuts for taking on this massive project, I support and applaud the effort.

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Here are links to some of my past essays, in case you missed any shows, movies or books:

TV Series:
Shrinking (2023)
Enlightened (2011-13)
Fleishman is in Trouble (2022)
Slow Horses (2022)

Movies/Documentaries/Comedy Specials:
Inherit the Wind (1960)
Marc Maron: From Bleak to Dark (2023)
The Elephant Whisperers (2022)
Fire of Love (2022)
Tár (2022)
Metallica: Some Kind of Monster (2004)
The Queen of Basketball (2021)
Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths (2022)

Books:
Killers of the Flower Moon by David Grann
Good for a Girl by Lauren Fleshman
It’s OK That You’re Not OK by Megan Devine
An Immense World by Ed Yong
The Boys by Ron Howard and Clint Howard
Folk Music: A Bob Dylan Biography in Seven Songs by Greil Marcus

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