Streep In Stilletto

I can envision taking Lauren Weisberger's novel out of the library on a slow day, one that might involve the leisure of trivial pursuit, but whatever the film adaptation leaves out, what it augments it augments so that getting beneath the surface of high couture isn't an issue for me. We do not need to see beneath the surface of Miranda Priestly, because Streep's minimalism says enough about the cost in and of itself that further exploration isn't necessary. Like Alexandre Dumas' dazzling marionettes, The Devil Wears Prada offers a material surface that becomes its own argument, and the pushback from Andrea's friends and family is obligatory, because the story has to acknowledge that the rarified atmosphere of high fashion is one that most mortals could not flourish in, not just those made obese and diabetic by high fructose corn syrup.

Yet we're all fascinated by pagentry and style, and why we are is interesting, even if it might have convoluted evolutionary triggers, our ability to distinguish color and pattern, to desire the perfect human figure even as we exploit and react to its varied entropic deformities. Meryl Streep does something virtually impossible in this film, or in real life, in that she embodies a perfect figure, that on a small scale is the epic equivalent of Grecian mythology-- not that Prada is a great film, or can stand with the classics, but it is great within the urban world it inhabits, one that makes Islamic fanaticism look like a biological nightmare by way of comparison, as if our species were losing its remarkable ability to conquer environments rather than evolving, as science fiction either suggests we shall or will fail, which sums up this vast genre in a nut shell, but is the basic truth behind it.

Is style an evolutionary adaptation? Andrea seems to reject it, on the surface, when it is time, she does not want to pay Miranda's price for ruthless perfection, but is that really what is going on with this movie, and why it was such a hit, strikes so many chords?

The fact that I don't need to read Weisberger's book isn't a reflection on her work; all serious writers have some version of it, like mine with selecting Alexandra Grilikhes over Bob Small, for instance, with her aesthetic vision more in tune with mine over Bob's working class post-beatnik brass knuckles, the two of them represent the basic division within the American literary presses. My thoughts here are only scratching the surface, goaded on by what Harvard modernist critics have written too, in their critical shorthand that my range does not quite match, though I can see where writing about Prada might assist me in making that leap. I did not expect that Weisberger's self-discovery, however Hollywood translated, would imprint on me in my environment to such a degree, the brutalism of a life style barren of any glamor whatsoever.

Crash Dump Curdle

I was surprised when Monica queried me voluntarily about Frank, during Brenda's international incident two weeks ago, surprised that she chose to speak to me on her own, at all, though I'd have to look up the date. If I do not write it down, either online, hard drive, or hard copy, I cannot remember the time frames about these things. I still dislike Monica, in the sense that white attendant reactionism to me, or paternalism, as with the-Susan-who-treats-Sherry-like-a-large-toddler, and that wasn't going to work with me, is about equal to the African dysfunctionalism in this system that has so scarred my psyche. If any of you read a future byline which indicates that I have been killed by one of these sterling paraprofessionals, don't be surprised; it happens, and all of Josie Byzek's efforts at chronicle collection, all of New Mobility's educational awareness pieces, do not change the fact that beneath the surface, attendant care can be as abusive as nursing home neglect.

I am not trying to rap Ebert for attempting to bridge the gap with his fans; if he gets a few to turn their civic conscience on, this is not a bad thing, but Roger got old and got sick, and I have been swimming in this cess pool since my sister Michelle's childhood. I remember her institutional environment, remember mine, and by default, my local disability center destroyed my life. I may salvage something, but it is too late for me to go back, absorb Hathaway's stress as Andrea, and climb back up, and even if, when I mail my missive, someone gets me a lawyer, and this lawyer comes up with a tactical approach that works, and Linda is politely retired, and Tom either institutes reforms or moves on, my compensation wouldn't amount to chicken feed, and that is the enormity of injustice.

It took me a  superhuman effort not to hurt myself back in 2000. I could not stand up for myself with EEOC intake personnel while I was decelerating and fighting it at the same time, even with a therapist, and this is the issue about time limits and the law. There is no other support system out there for me. Liberty is it, and they make me sick. My sister doesn't care. To her I am like Sherry, and to be treated like Sherry, and so I shield myself with contempt. My brother cares just enough not to be as callous as Stephanie, but when it comes to educating himself, and being aware, like the advocating author Rachel Simon, he chooses, like my sister, to stay blind, because they have children, and I am a terrifying burden.

Some people reading this may be moved, disabled or not, but do not know what to say or how to help, and I have already had my fill of Josie's compassionate pretensions that possibly cost me a happy memory of fun out on a date, with the anticipation of romance.  I would wipe out the ideology behind the simplicity of independent living as a phrase with my bare hands, if I could, and it would not change a thing.