The Snowflake Obsidian Story

I was walking up a packed stair case out of the Wall Street stop, when I heard a chink ... chink ... chink sound. We were all trudging out of the subway as usual. I would describe it as cattle moving in a herd. It pains me to say that because it sounds so cliche, but it's exactly accurate. The sound of something small falling down the stairs made my New York City public life instincts kick in. It's the kind of instincts that help you and other around you get through your day.

Someone just lost an earring, or their lip gloss, or the charm off a necklace. They're going to spin around and run against the crowd to catch it despite the odds of it being crushed in the stampede, kicked off the hilariously narrow platform, or the disapproval of the commuters. The sound was coming right at me. I kept an eye out for this thing. It would be better to find it, pick it up quickly and hand it to the owner, than deal with him or her running at me in a blind panic. No need for panic.

After three chinks it fell right at arms length in front of me. Without a break in my movement it was in my hand, a black polished stone. I looked up trying to find a person searching frantically. Everyone's heads were turned away from me. There was no way to know who lost it.

Walking up the stairs and out into the street I wondered about the value of this amorphous black polished stone. How did it get lost? Who (very recently) used to own it? Why? It didn't seem to come from a necklace. It stood alone. It was valued as an object and not an adornment.

In the office, I tried to identify the stone online. It was black with grey spots. Pretty simple to find: it was Snowflake Obsidian. I'm not one to believe in the healing power of crystals and stones, but I'm not completely ignorant to the fact that many people do, and there's a whole ideology behind it. I was curious. A quick Google search revealed 535,000 results. The experts agree: Snowflake Obsidian is a stone that brings balance.

Result number one, healingcrystals.com says,

A stone of purity, Snowflake Obsidian brings about a balance to body, mind and spirit. Snowflake Obsidian helps to keep centered and focused when any type of chaotic situation (office, commute, home, etc.) presents itself....Obsidian is often used for healing and releasing energy blockages, and has a tendency to work quickly to move truths to the surface to be resolved.

Maybe this was something a fellow subway rider used to stay centered during inevitably rough commutes - or the chaos of Wall Street. I hope they didn't really need it. It's mine now.

Some might say the stone wanted to find me and heal me of my stress. Some others might say it was a sign from a higher power; the stones don't really work, but it did inspire you look up the metaphysical properties and reflect on how it applies to your life. That's gotta be sign of something, right? Some might say it was all complete coincidence, and I should wash my hands - it is a subway rock after all.

I overthink everything. If I actively use the rock, maybe there will be a positive placebo effect on me. The only problem is my awareness of the possibility of a placebo effect would never allow me to experience the placebo effect. Stones can't actually heal anyone, right? God forbid I start believing in it, then I'll spend all my money on crystals. I just can't afford it.

Maybe I'll carry it around with me anyway, and attribute all the good things in my life to it. Then one tragic day I'll realize it's gone, have a moment of panic, but then realize everything is still fine.

The Blue Lobster

Browsing through articles on the internet, something just hit me like a ton of bricks. It was a story about a blue lobster caught off the coast of Plymouth, MA on Monday, August 8, 2016. Blue lobsters are a neat phenomenon, caused by an over production of protein. The lobster will likely be brought to an aquarium for observation.

What stunned me about the news was so much more personal and complicated than the lobster story itself. The memories that rushed back to me were from twenty five years ago. Strangely enough they involved my first experiences with unfairness, lying, shame, and my interests in strange trivia.

In 1991 I was four years old and my parents took me to Mystic Aquarium in Connecticut. There are only two things I can remember: it poured rain so hard my little shoes got soaking wet and shrank the next day, and I saw a blue lobster in a tank. My dad told me it was a very rare thing to see and I was really impressed by that. I had seen something truly amazing that day.

At this time I was also going to preschool, which I didn't enjoy very much. I didn't speak above a whisper and interacting with the kids was challenging for me. I never really liked the teachers either. Since it was summer, we all spent a lot of time playing outside in the playground in front of the school. Knowing me I probably didn't have any pressing play dates.

Sometimes the teachers had their older daughters or sons help out when they were on summer vacation. Those kids must have been between thirteen and sixteen, but they always seemed like adults to me. I don't remember anyone's names, but one of the teacher's teen daughters was helping that day and she was nice to me. Let's call her Jen and her mother Ms. Sandy.

All the teachers were sitting on the stairs leading up to the school, surveying the kids in the playground as they did. Jen was talking to me. I don't know who ignited the conversation but I remember telling her with excitement about my trip to the aquarium and seeing the blue lobster. I was so excited I almost broke from my whisper. Jen was excited too, she seemed engaged with my story. It felt great sharing my interests with someone else. Then we were interrupted. "Laura! Go to time out."

Ms. Sandy pointed across the playground to the picknick tables. Jen and I were both confused. There was a rule that the students weren't allowed to be on the stairs during recess. I was on the second or third step trying to talk with Jen; not horsing around. Jen protested, "But I wanted to hear more about Laura's trip to see the blue lobster!" It didn't matter. I broke a rule, I needed to be punished.

I was lead to the other end of the playground and told to sit at the picnick table and not speak to anyone. Not exactly a challenge for me. Ms. Sandy could have given me a warning; told me to get off the stairs. I definitely didn't notice what I was doing. I was four. I was also well aware of the rule, but more along the lines of "don't go on the stairs because you'll start acting like fool and fall down them." That's understandable. However, Ms. Sandy was trying to make a point. The concept of having rules in order to keep kids safe in this instance was twisted. It was about rules for rules sake. A "no tolerance policy." - a phrase that would become familiar to me in post-Columbine middle school. This day was one of the first times I wrestled with the idea of unfairness; the idea that a rule imposed on me could be flawed.

The other imposing feeling that washed over me was the shame. Shame that I maybe had done something wrong, and that other people would think I did something wrong by seeing me in time out. Another young teacher's aid - let's call her Ashley - came up to the table and asked me if I was sitting at the picknick table because I was in trouble. I shook my head "no" afraid she would ostracize me or punish me more if she knew the truth. It was the first time I lied to a teacher. Ashley sat with me in silence for a while, keeping me company, which was nice. Then she asked me if I just wanted to sit there by myself, and I nodded "yes." Ashley walked away.

Maybe ten minutes later everyone came rushing to the table for lunch. I sat dejected, with my coffee milk* questioning everything in my short life so far. It's the first time I get in trouble at school and it's over seemingly nothing - and while I'm trying to be social for once. I didn't feel guilt for getting in trouble, I felt shame at my situation and betrayal. I knew in my heart this was an over-reaction on Ms. Sandy's part, but I didn't know how to reconcile this quite yet.

Ashley comes over and confronts me gently. "Laura, I heard that you were in time out. Why did you lie to me?" I shrugged my shoulders. I lied out of shame, then the lie came back to haunt me. So many lessons learned on this day!

The issue was dropped, I was released from my time out due to lunch, and we all moved on with our lives. Ten years later the school would turn into a food pantry.

In the thirty minutes or so this all took place, I reflect back and see how it shaped me into who I am today. The "because I said so" mentality of authority figures does not sit well with me. I am a reasonable person who respects rules and assignments in general, but if someone asks me to do something that defies logic, or I have a better way to do it, I'm going to tell you. I don't suffer fools and I don't like people with blind power trips. Of course no one does, but I believe I have a stronger nose and less of a tolerance for people like that. I'm lucky it hasn't gotten me in more trouble in my life.

I can see now that the blue lobster represents my love of the strange, and my desire to share that knowledge with others. That has been with me longer than I ever thought. I do it in my artwork and this blog. If you have ever hung out with me, you know that I always have a weird story to interject. Either a fact I read about, or just an odd thing that happened to me - because odd things seem to always happen to me. Or maybe these things stick to me in a way it wouldn't stick with another person (e.g. I have this story about blue lobsters and my first "time out" at school, when someone else might not remember that happening to them at all). Lucky me.

But yes, lucky me. Though I shed some tears writing this - because feelings come back strong and unpredictably - I'm grateful that I can look back at a brush with powerlessness and unfairness, and see how I was becoming myself.


* In this Providence, RI preschool we always had a choice between three milks: regular, chocolate, and strawberry or coffee flavored milk.
**crude blue lobster illustrations by Laura Miner

The Grim Sleeper : Gripping South LA for a Reign of 25 years

We can be thankful that Lonnie Franklin is in prison for murder. On May 5, 2016 a jury found the so called "Grim Sleeper" guilty of the murders of ten women over the course of 14 years. This was relevant news to me since I was captivated by the HBO documentary Tales of the Grim Sleeper nearly a year before this conviction. At the outset of the film, directed by Nick Broomfield in 2014, we are made aware that the Grim Sleeper had been captured in 2010 and was awaiting the conclusion of his trial. The evidence was damning and he had little to prove innocence in court. But for over two decades Lonnie Franklin seemingly lived without fear of being caught for coldblooded serial murder.


Lonnie didn't hide, he just lived in a world where someone like him can rule the streets.    

At the start of the film, Broomfield enters Lonnie Franklin's South Los Angeles, CA neighborhood, and is treated with hostility by his former neighbors. They are in the mindset that Lonnie is innocent, that he was of good character, and it was all simply unbelievable. Maybe he was framed. Maybe it was lazy detective work. After spending more time in this neighborhood, and interviewing women - who did not have positive interactions with Lonnie - these same friends started requesting private interviews.

Still from Tales of the Grim Sleeper with one of Lonnie Franklin's friends and Nick Broomfield.

In these interviews friends would confess that they thought Lonnie was strange. He was kinky with women, he had his vices. He took photographs of women in precarious or violent positions. Lonnie had a gun. He wore it in his front pocket and showed it to people. It was the same gun the police would later identify as the murder weapon for seven out of the ten of his victims.

All of this was revealed and heavily padded with excuses and sheepish apologies. "I'm not proud of it." they would say. Lonnie's friends were well aware of his perversions, and they relished in it at the time. They swapped dirty photos, they shrugged and laughed when they saw hand cuffs in his car, and harbored the knowledge that Lonnie had a special van for putting women in bondage. But he was just "into women."

180 photos of women were found in Lonnie's house. Of the ten bodies found, all of the victims photos were in his collection.

When Lonnie asked some of these men to clean this van - on a fairly regular basis - no one thought twice when the rug had a dark substance in it. Then they convinced themselves it was oil, but looking back on it, it came up too easy to be oil. They can't quite picture it now. It could have been blood.

Later in the film other friends resurface to tell their tales, and they become more cavalier. Some of them are former crack addicts who admit they helped destroy evidence or even found women for him (who would most likely be his murder victims). These men did it for the crack he was supplying. It didn't matter that the car was filled with bloody clothes and God knows what else, these men needed to burn it to a crisp and get paid. It didn't matter that the woman they picked up was being tortured by Lonnie right in front of them, they needed to get high.

Forget about going to the cops. In this neighborhood the distrust for the police and the police's own disdain for this community helped facilitate a man like Lonnie. This was the perfect place to be a serial murderer. Women were being killed, and the cops weren't taking the time to investigate. These were crack addicts and prostitutes, or women who might fit the profile if you glance at the color of her skin and the street sign her body was found near.

The Grim Sleeper's ten identified victims

There are many survivors who were sexually assaulted and tortured. Women who tell the tale do not often have a section of the story where they report the crime to the police. At the time they were hooking and or high, and extremely vulnerable to arrest for their own crimes. All they could do was escape from his clutches, run for safety and learn their lesson never to sleep with him again. Lonnie knew this. That's why he got away with it for so long.

Near the end of the film, some of Lonnie's friends are laughing about him as they did at the very beginning. No longer are they hushed and concerned, ruminating over how someone they knew was very likely a serial murderer. Now they are quite sure he did it, and they gleefully approach Broomfield to share their anecdotes. All of their personal evidence has been compiled and outed among themselves.

Instead of laughing about how Lonnie would always be in his front yard chatting with the neighbors - truly painting an suburban ideal - they were laughing about how much Lonnie hated crackheads. They chuckled about how it was his first wife's fault that he hated crackheads, because she was one herself. They smiled about how he would openly tell them he was "cleaning up" the neighborhood. They all knew what it meant, and they were cool with it.

Lonnie was finally captured because his son Christopher was arrested. Lonnie had been arrested many times before for various crimes, but a new policy enforced by the LAPD to collect DNA from all arrested persons was only in existence since 2004. Lonnie narrowly escaped it after being convicted of a felony in 2003.

His son's DNA was a partial match to the DNA found on all of the bodies. Christopher could only be a relative of the Grime Sleeper. Besides, he was too young to have murdered the women who were killed in the 1980s. Lonnie Franklin's DNA was a perfect match.

Lonnie was sloppy. His DNA was all over the victims. The most vulnerable members of the community were too afraid to come forward. It was clear that the police didn't take it seriously anyway. Survivors that did come forward to the police went through the rigmarole of reporting, only to be filed away despite the multitude of evidence (descriptions of his appearance, the bright orange Pinto everyone knew he drove, bullets from the gun he consistently used, rape kits with his DNA). The key word here is consistent because Lonnie barely tried to hide, but it took 25 years for him to be stopped.

It's terrifying to think of the unreported crimes that occur in neighborhoods like this all of the country. Imagine a place the cops won't touch, the victims are doubly powerless, and a person like the Grim Sleeper will meet you in the middle. 
 

Suspiria: I Should Like This

I've been bad. I've been so so so bad by not making a post for February and March, as well as generally being neglectful of Consume + Consume in 2015 and early 2016. There were plenty of films I watched that were inspiring. Instead I just sat dumbfounded in front of my computer going ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ over pieces of art that should have gotten me writing.

I feel guilty about taking breaks in blogging and writing. I think about the people that do this as their job, who have to pump out words everyday; people who truly make writing their passion. I have to remind myself, that though I can write, and sometimes I have fun things to say, ultimately writing is not my true calling. Missing some time on my blog is disappointing, but I'm not ruining my life because of it. What is my true calling you ask? That's a story for another day...

Before I get to a real, actually thought-out post about Suspiria, (a film I have been recommend for years, and procrastinated in watching because...¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ) here is a list of some documentaries and films that I loved but couldn't muster a discussion over:

A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night
Electric Boogaloo: The Wild, Untold Story of Cannon Films
Nightcrawler
Making A Murderer

And now for our feature presentation: 
_____________________________________________________________________

I have many feelings about 70's Italian horror film Suspiria that are difficult to organize. There are two roads I've narrowed it down to, and those roads are pretty disparate.

One road is to praise the visual aspects of the film - as many do - posting film still after film still. It would ultimately be a dream-board of images I thought were cool; trying to impress others with my visual insight.

I'd convince readers to see the film so that they too can feast their eyes on the same colors and shapes. I would also go on about the use of Art Nouveau style that is repeatedly used in the set design.

The second road would be a complete dissection of the film's script, which I have nothing positive to say about. I would put on my EWW hat, (you can read that as "Eww, gross." or the popular YouTube series Everything Wrong With) and point out all of the many plot holes. What Suspiria has in visuals, it lacks in story line, plot, and sense.

What I can do to bond these two roads together is my theory that the project was conceived by a thirteen year-old girl. (The film was actually written by a then thirty seven year-old  Dario Argento, and twenty seven year-old Daria Nicolodi, but indulge me for a moment). 

On the one hand she doesn't have the know-how to make a coherent script, and her fantasies take precedence over reason. On the other hand her love for bright colors, newly found obsession with Art Nouveau, and her burgeoning dark side, make the film a perfect indulgence of horror and glamour.

If you don't believe that this is the work of a tween girl, read the IMDB plot summary of Suspiria,

A newcomer to a fancy ballet academy gradually comes to realize that the school is a front for something far more sinister and supernatural amidst a series of grisly murders. 

Joan Bennett of Dark Shadows fame keeping it elegant and supernatural as Madame Blanc.

It's got everything: ballet, Europe, a fancy school that's for students of indeterminate age (It's for  young people, like college or something. But I think I could go in a couple years when I'm fifteen because I'm so mature and good at dancing), Joan Bennett in one of her last film roles, grisly murder, a romantic mansion, witches, hot pink, a pool (!!), and one hot guy that you think might do something for the plot, but then does nothing for the plot.

The girls spend a lot of time looking pretty in pretty hallways, being drugged, and whispering. All of the actors in this international cast each spoke their native languages when delivering their lines. The entire film is dubbed over in English. Even the English speaking actors had their lines done over through ADR (additional dialogue replacement), thus leveling the playing filed and making everyone look sufficiently awkward when they speak. Knowing this fact makes ballet student, Sarah's whispering to Suzy (our main heroin) that much more hilarious, knowing that the actress was telling her secrets in Italian.

When you can't understand the person whispering to you, so you feign concern instead. 

Suspiria is an Art Nouveau explosion. In Madame Blanc's office, the illustrations of Aubrey Beardsley, leader of the Aesthetic movement, are framed on a partition. However, they do appear to be altered - possibly because of copyright issues. Below are comparisons of the movie stills with the original artwork.

#1

#2

#3

#4

All of the images have two subjects in their original versions, (even if one of them is just a disembodied head) but those in the background of Suspiria all only have one.

Beardsley's influence can be felt throughout the film. Especially in this above screen shot, the character named Olga even looks like she could be one of Beardsley's subjects. 

This aggressive black and white patterned wallpaper in Olga's apartment is reminiscent of Beardsley's exclusively black and white illustrations. It is also extremely 70's.

Scariest room in the movie?

Well...

Razor Wire Room might take the cake.

Ultimately Suspiria was delightful and inspiring. It reminded me of the colorful optimism of youthful creativity. The plot doesn't make any sense because it's a frame for frame remake of a young girl's bad dream, mixed with her aspirations, budding sexuality, and interior decorating sense.

12 Angry Viewers: Lost Gem of Mid-Ninties MTV

12 Angry Viewers wasn't the most popular show. I'm not sure any of my classmates in the 5th grade watched it, though we all watched MTV for sure. Wikipedia describes the premise:

"12 'Angry Viewers' were chosen. Through the course of a week they would watch several "brand new" videos and vote at the end of the episode which was the best. On Friday the best video out of the four chosen during the week was chosen and put into "heavy rotation" on the network." 

Maybe it wasn't that great and I'm inflating it, but unfortunately there isn't enough content online for me to re-live it. When Googling 12 Angry Viewers, one of the first things to come up is this hilarious article from a 1997 Philly newspaper advertising auditions for the show. Right off the bat, this journalist wins me with the line, "Say you have an addytood [sic]." Sick. I did have an attitude, and opinions about videos, thank you very much. Could not wait to watch!

I didn't know it yet, but I was viewing the most music video saturated programming of my lifetime. It's what I would consider a golden era for MTV. Many would disagree. It was a steep decline, and no one could see behind them. I also didn't know that I was in-taking a smaller percentage of music videos than previous generations of viewers. With shows like Cartoon Sushi and Liquid Television providing dark, violent and sexy cartoons pre-Adult Swim, I couldn't complain. MTV was a guide book for everything 20-somethings were into. This demographic in actually was starting to shy away from MTV and soon the programming would become less pseudo-adult and be more teen oriented.

If you lived through the early aughts of MTV and beyond, you know the hilariously low number of music videos they played during that era. It started with thoughts like, "MTV only plays videos if they're on TRL!" and devolved into "They cancelled TRL and now they only play Teen Mom and The Hills."

If you can imagine, the mid-nineties had their own critics about MTV's programming. Claiming even then that MTV was slipping on the video front. 12 Angry Viewers was one of several shows used to spoon feed videos to the masses, including MTV Live, Say What?, and Total Request. I suppose the executives agreed that the youths needed to watch things in scheduled show formats. Blocks of videos without a gimmick wouldn't keep their attention. I suppose this is true to a certain extent. I get the draw of watching a show. If it's a video block, maybe you change the channel when a video you don't like comes on. If the promise of a winner or an interview is ahead, then maybe you power through it.



The promo for 12 Angry Viewers is perfectly mid-90s. It has all the bells, whistles and flashing lights (literally) to get your attention. It's narrated by a Daria-voiced gen-xer, almost cooing over how satisfyingly cynical these Angry Viewers are. The visuals say, "We're taking the idea of throwing rotten tomatoes, and we're blowing it up!" It says, 'new futuristic fonts.' It says, 'negatives are negative.' It says 'extreme,' right before Xtreme! became a thing.

I have a couple solid memories from watching 12 Angry Viewers:

1. It was the first time I saw Portishead's Only You video. This nightmare-like underwater warehouse video was directed by Chris Cunningham, and it won during it's week on the show. This gloomy, jazzy song with strings, Theremin, and mixing and scratching was a revelation to me. Two years later I would finally purchase their self titled album, and Portishead would become one of my favorite bands. In the mean time I made sure to tune in to 12 Angry Viewers every day that week to see it. 

2. The Propellerheads History Repeating was great. It won. End of story.



3. There were Father's Day / Mother's Day episodes where parents watched videos with their college age kids (hilarity ensued - mom's didn't like Korn). One of the videos played was Zoot Suit Riot by the Cherry Poppin' Daddies, because "Daddies." 

4. Air's Sexy Boy was also a contender on the show. It didn't win or loose. It wasn't worth banning, but it wasn't worth Heavy Rotation either. However, this song sounded retro and French, so I loved it. 



5. Something else that was retro and French, is a music video panned for being too weird. I don't remember if it won or lost, AND I don't remember the artist. I haven't been able to find it anywhere. Maybe you can help me: The video is of two men preparing for a skydive. But the sequence goes forwards and backwards in a loop. They fly up into the plane, and then jump back out, etc. Inside the plane is a man who kind of looks like Nathaniel Hornblower, making waffles with badminton rackets, and mouthing to the lyrics (the only lyrics) sung by a breathy woman, "I love it." 

When I type this description into Google, I get nothing.

UPDATE UPDATE UPDATE!!!

This is it!! Gigantic thanks to Blogger user Hessell for answering my prayers.



12 Angry Viewers was a smart show because it purposefully played obscure and artful videos when this was going out of style. This may have been done for shock value, and to illicit strong reactions from the contestants, but at least it gave them a fighting chance on the airwaves.