A propensity for quoting rap and hip-hop songs and lyrics is not often found in mainstream news anchors, but Ari Melber is brilliantly bucking that trend on his ever-entertaining show ‘The Beat with Ari Melber’. In today’s political world, where the news is more depressing and dismal and hopeless with each passing day of non-indictments, Melber provides a healthy dose of humor along with intelligent and helpful analysis of political proceedings from a legal standpoint. He can loop an obscure deep-cut lyrical excerpt into a conversation on a deadly insurrection and somehow make it all work. Melber earns this Dazzler of the Day thanks largely to making political news something as necessary as it is entertaining. Check out his site here for all his current appearances.
A polarizing place since its inception (and many of the ensuing years since), the Amsterdam Mall, now called the Riverfront Center, was once the site of some of my childhood memories, and they were mostly happy ones. Now it’s mostly medical offices and a service center or two. I’d been meaning to revisit the space for a few years, and finally got around to stepping back inside its orange-carpeted glory yesterday, where I spent a few scant minutes before being escorted off the premises. But I’m jumping ahead…
Some of my earliest childhood memories took place at the Amsterdam Mall. I remember buying shoes at Buster Brown’s and lamenting when we would be dragged into Gabby’s for clothes. (Contrary to popular belief, I wasn’t born this way: once upon a time I despised shopping for clothes.) I remember when the mall expanded, dividing a downtown and a city that was already known for its Division Street. Mr. B’s Best, Smile-A-While and The Carl Co. all vied for the attention of shoppers. It seems strange to think that the place was once bustling, but on a Friday night in the 80’s there was no other place to be.
When I planned returning and taking a few pictures of what the mall had become, I anticipated a warm and nostalgic look back, backed by a few photos of what I assumed were some of the same plants that had been slowly growing skyward for over the last three decades. I remembered these same draceana and ficus. The idea that they had lasted all these years, that somehow they had been tended and cared for enough to survive gave me a sense of reassurance, a sliver of hope that maybe some things could be sustained, if not carefully cultivated, and given enough attention they could still be reaching for the sky. That’s the story I wanted to write, even if I found the mall in a sadder state. I did not expect to find it in such a sorry shambles.
I entered on the second floor, near the site of what was once Cinema 4, where I saw the first movies of my life, and the ones that formed those first memories: ‘Return of the Jedi’, ‘The Goonies’, ‘Gremlins’, ‘Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure’ ‘Batman’ and ‘Truth or Dare’.
Snapping a few photos of the empty expanse, I noticed first one, then multiple five-gallon plastic buckets, placed sporadically around to catch what I assumed were leaks. They littered the vast empty place, while in one corner a security guard sat with his head down, perhaps half-asleep, as no one bothered me as I took a few more pictures.
Waking down the stationary escalators, I passed the towering plants – the dracaena and ficus that I remembered, beside which stood a few stands of peace lilies. They held their dark evergreen leaves in arching form, a bit tattered but still alive, still deep green. I passed the large store-front where McCrory’s once stood, then the space where The Carl Co. extended its elegant footprint. Heading into the small part of what was once the original mall, the structure changed, and above me the light-filled atrium provided perfect habitat for a few more potted ficus trees which stretched to the top of the ceiling.
Along the rafters of this section I heard a rustling and looked up, where I caught a pair of squirrels running along the length of the place, skirting between electrical wires and the deteriorating walls. I snapped a few photos of the trees and got a bit of video of one of the squirrels, it being relatively rare to catch a squirrel indoors these days. At that point I heard a shout from the darkness of the mall, and saw the security guard making his way toward me.
He asked me what I was doing and I said I had grown up here and was taking pictures for a blog post I was going to write. “Which blog?” he asked gruffly.
“ALANILAGAN.com,” I said, stifling the ‘duh’ I wanted to add at the end, and fully expecting him not to have a clue what it was. Of course, he didn’t, so I’m not sure why he asked. What blog would it have been ok for?
He said that someone came in the mall last week and took pictures then “tore the place up online” and that’s why the owner doesn’t want any pictures being taken as it was private property except for the offices. I said I was planning on writing a story of my memories here, with some photos to accompany it, but I would no longer include the photos, and the story would have a very different ending now. He then escorted me unceremoniously out of the building. (Not even a hint of ceremony!)
Full disclosure that should come as no surprise to anyone: this was not the first time I was reprimanded for taking photos inside the Amsterdam Mall. Back in the 90’s, there was a period when I took pictures of everything and everyone, including our weekend romps at the mall. I actually have a photo somewhere of a puffy guy in a security outfit extending his hand toward me as he was telling me no pics were allowed in the mall. That was in the early 90’s. Maybe I should be reassured that some things haven’t changed.
As for this blog post, I originally wanted to write something sweet and nostalgic, and I had a few plant photos that actually made the place seem halfway inhabitable. However, since they didn’t want me to post any, you’ll have to make do with this description, and wonder at the safety and cleanliness of a place that houses medical offices and has squirrels running rogue through its hallways and a dozen buckets scattered throughout to catch the leaks. And I suppose I should be grateful for the new blog post idea, because given the abysmal state of things, I don’t even think artful lighting and clever angles could hide what a dump that place has become.
As for the current owner of the Riverfront Center, this one’s for you.
“Making tea is a ritual that stops the world from falling in on you.” ~ Jonathan Stroud
Tea has formed a literal and symbolic baseline for what has gone on at this website over the last twenty years. From its inception, this little corner of the internet was intended and designed to be a place of whimsical distraction, devoid of the ads and intrusions and comments that so often plague and ruin other sites. I’ve aimed to keep this as enjoyable as possible while being somewhat interesting to visit, with interesting twists and turns along the way. Of course, over the course of two decades, the overall undulations have been relatively smooth and unremarkable, and there is comfort in that.
When so much of the world has grown volatile and tense, I have striven to make this place somewhat consistent and comfortable – likening it to a living room that is largely quiet except when a gathering or company is coming – a place where one can sit down for a spell and enjoy a light read with a cup of tea or coffee or something stronger should you so desire. It’s a room that can be whatever you need or want – a room of requirement, perhaps, but with a lot less clutter, unless that makes you happy. It changes with the seasons, with the day, with the hour – it can start off cool and gray in the hours before dawn, when the couch or chair begs for use with a blanket and pillow. It can become brilliantly lit with sunlight streaming in the bay window, pouring through the fronds of a Norfolk Island pine and an ancient fern. It transforms into an afternoon refuge, the last of the days light fading while one sits quietly on the floor in meditative contemplation. It closes in a bit on itself at the approach of night, as one by one the lamps come on and gently warm the space, lending it the coziness and comfort we may crave in the evening.
And so I welcome you here, whenever you may need or want a moment of quiet, apart from the mayhem of social media and the madness of what our world has become. I’ll put on a fresh pot of tea…
“There is something in the nature of tea that leads us into a world of quiet contemplation of life.” ~ Lin Yutang
If you were going to make a splash of an entry into pop culture, there was no better place to do so than in the firmament of stars conjured in Madonna’s 1991 documentary ‘Truth or Dare’. and appearing in her enduring dance classic ‘Vogue’. That is precisely where most of the world got to meet dancer and choreographer Kevin Stea, the Dazzler of the Day. Without offense to any of the other dancers featured in ‘Truth or Dare’, Kevin definitely came off as one of the sweetest ones, ready with a smile or laugh, and largely staying away from the occasionally catty drama. That core of professionalism paved the way for a remarkably lasting career in a realm where careers flare brilliantly but extremely briefly. Check out Stea’s website here to catch what he’s been up to all these years after working with Madonna.
Fog brings conflicting memories to my mind. My earliest recollection of it stems from walking to McNulty Elementary School as a child, and taking a shortcut by cutting across a field. On certain fall mornings, the fog would be thick, and if we took the shortcut too soon we risked being engulfed in the middle of a field with no discernible landmarks for direction. A certain panic would sometimes set in when that happened, as much as the fog otherwise felt like a comfort. The group of kids with whom I walked didn’t always listen to me, and there were bound to be arguments about which direction we should take. That’s the memory of consternation, but the worry was mostly because it was affiliated with school.
The other memory I have is of a holiday excursion with my brother through the backroads of Galway, where we made a lunch-time stop at the Cock & Bull around Christmas tree season. It was, from what I now only dimly recall, a casual, flippant trip – unplanned and on the fly, which is much more my brother’s style than mine, and on this day it was one of those happy perspective-altering events that illuminates my fallacy in thinking there are definitive right and wrong ways to do everything.
In winter, I welcome a fog. It usually indicates kinder temperatures, and hints of spring.
With a Twitter feed that’s absolutely on-fire of late (and not in an embarrassing Santos sort of way), Ritchie Torres is precisely the kind of fighter our country needs right now in the House of Representatives. Representing the South Bronx, Torres has been a champion for his constituents, and anyone else who has been dealing with inequity. Witness his long list of accomplishments at his official government site here. Thanks to his no-nonsense way of addressing the awfulness that is the current GOP, he earns this Dazzler of the Day.
Lighting a cadre of candles to make a stand against the cold, pulling a fuzzy robe a little closer around my neck, and setting up a pot of tea, I conjure the spirit of hygge. This is how we embrace the winter rather than stave it off – the latter being an impossible mission, we might as well admit. The days go much easier when we bend with their general flow instead of fighting against them. I wish I’d understood that a few decades ago.
Here is a little song to echo the blanket of snow that covers the outside world right now.
It’s a muted song, for a muted morning, in a world of blankets. Before the work day begins, and before the sky has lightened and turned whatever shade of gray we will get for the morning, I putter quietly around the living room while the tea kettle warms. Hello, winter, the soul implores, begging for the response to be kind and, dare we wish for such a thing, warm.
Most days there is no answer, such as on this morning. Only quiet and silence and the muted sense that things are in a state of slumber. It’s better than when the answer is a storm, when the winter claps back with a scowl and a threat. Softness is welcome. Kindness appreciated. The lack of an answer is just an answer to another question. Winter winds its madness around the brain like cold hands around a cup of tea.
Risking my usual tendency to overshare, I am neither uncut nor much of a gem. I do think an argument can be powerfully made that I’m a raw and rough jewel, in dire need of faceting and polish, but I’m not a jeweler, and sadly I don’t know any or my jewelry collection wouldn’t be in such a shambles. My cologne cabinet, on the other hand, is pristine, and I’m putting out this Valentine’s Day request to add what may very well be the crowning jewel of it all: ‘Uncut Gem’.
According to the typically over-the-top verbiage of the Frederic Malle website, ‘Uncut Gem’ “…is an unapologetically manly scent, diamond-hard and absolutely fresh. Clear, spicy top notes of ginger, bergamot, mandarin, angelica root and nutmeg lead you to the sensual fire within: a leathery accord, vetiver, frankincense, generous amounts of amber, and a musk that vibrates with the skin. This is a scent that plays with the tired codes of masculinity while extracting their telluric force to create something beautiful and irresistible.”
Man, that’s a lot to take, and I can boil it down to this: the scent is wickedly gorgeous – the precise dose of freshness and brightness with a heart of warmth that makes it work just as well in winter as in summer. That’s no small feat, as most of my colognes fall in one or the other; only the best ones straddle all the seasons. I tried it on a test strip on a breezy and too-brief trip through Copley Square the last time I was in Boston, and it was exquisite. (I also tried the pair of new Tom Ford cherries and neither was impressive or worth their hefty price tag.)
When winter sets in, and the holiday decor has been shelved for another year, my comfort zone moves int the kitchen, where cooking provides not only sustenance and good things for the belly, but the heat from the stove and oven are a balm against the outer chill. With that in mind, I’ve been embarking on a few recipes by Padma Lakshmi, and thanks to their brilliance she is being named Dazzler of the Day. But as they once said in ‘Reading Rainbow’, you don’t have to take my word for it. Check out her website here, where the following encapsulation of her noteworthy accomplishments are described:
Padma Lakshmi is an Emmy-nominated producer, television host, food expert, and a New York Times best-selling author.
She is the creator, host, and executive producer of the critically acclaimed Hulu series Taste the Nation, currently in production for its second season. Taste the Nation is the recipient of a 2021 Critics Choice Real TV Award for Best Culinary Series, a 2021 Gotham Award nomination for Breakthrough Series, and 2022 Critics Choice Real TV Award for Best Show Host. In June 2022, Taste the Nation: Holiday Edition won a James Beard Foundation Award in the Visual Media – Long Form category.
Lakshmi also serves as host and executive producer of Bravo’s two-time Emmy-winning series Top Chef, now in its 20th season. Top Chef has been nominated for 42 Emmys, including her four-time nomination as Outstanding Host for A Reality-Competition Program. In 2022, she accepted two Critics Choice Real TV Awards for Best Culinary Show and Best Competition Series on behalf of Top Chef as well as an award for Best Show Host.
A scorching new photo-shoot/video-project from Madonna, featured in an overseas version of ‘Vanity Fair’ and their ‘Icon Issue’, is forming my new inspiration for this flailing winter. Check out the video excerpts below, which use selections like ‘Justify My Love‘, ‘Like A Prayer‘, ‘Isaac‘, and ‘The Power of Good-bye‘ – all of which work splendidly in this religiously-rich romp through iconic images. They make an instant match with Madonna, a woman once perfectly-described as Our Lady of Perpetual Provocation.
This looks like a promising entry to ‘The Celebration Tour’ era – a way of reminding everyone of Madonna’s iconic stature and enduring power (as if the ticket prices and sales weren’t enough) while leading into what might be an absolutely bonkers live show if she pulls it off right. If history is any indication, we have no reason to doubt her now. At every crossroads in her career, Madonna has managed to find salvation on the stage (witness the glory of ‘The Girlie Show’ following the ‘Sex’ firestorm, or ‘The Reinvention Tour’ after the ‘American Life‘ brouhaha).
What ‘The Celebration Tour’ may usher in is anyone’s guess – though if it’s anything like her brief Pride set this past summer, it will be bawdy, colorful, and aptly named. In other words, classic iconic Madonna, served up with an attitude and absolutely no regrets. (Check out my dream set-list for the new tour here, and come join the party!)
Sometimes I sip it, sometimes I spill it, but regardless of its outcome, the tea here is piping hot. That’s because I put it in the kettle and don’t take it off the stove until it whistles, all sputtering steam and screaming from painful heat. This is the way you get to the truth of the matter, the way you force it all out. Putting oneself on exhibition and show in a public website is treacherous business at best, especially when everyone is so ready with an opinion or critique. Dragging friends and family and former lovers into the storyline is risky too, even if their influence and import in my life is unquestioned. When tea gets spilled, it can be an awful mess – but a glorious one, steeped equally in history and histrionics.
My journey here hasn’t been all pretty poses and posies, as evidenced from these photos taken about two decades ago, in which I had a goatee for God’s sake. Mistakes have been made. Stumbles have been taken. Failure has become an art form. But so has living – and in a way this blog is a living and breathing work of its own art – a new form of expression in the time of social media. Sometimes messy, sometimes too emotional and personal, and sometimes just an utter disaster, all the foibles and fumbles of life’s imperfect zig-zagging have formed the backbone of its two-decade trajectory. Throughout it all, I’ve managed to document the days in regular fashion, treating this space as some sort of online diary, a repository of what has happened – the good, the bad, and the goatee-ugly.
Tea time has been held on the regular, and for a number of years I posted at least once a day for 364-days each year (we always went dark on 9/11). That sort of consistency takes discipline and effort, but this has been a labor of love, something I’d do for two or two million hits. In the end, it was more of an exercise in journal-like analysis – a place where I could seek out refuge or solace in words, in putting things down just to get them out of my head. To that end, it has and continues to serve a purpose in my life.
The beauty of it being a public place is that others have found something that resonates with them, and so my tea has become tea for at least two. Every once in a while I’ll hear from someone who wants to say hello and say that they too have felt what I expressed in a post or photograph. At those times, it feels like we have shared something, that we are not entirely alone.
It takes a singular sort of obsession to embark upon a search for self and then to do it for all the world to see for the last two decades, but such is the predicament in which I’ve placed myself since 2003. This year marks the 20th anniversary of my personal website, ALANILAGAN.com. The mundane happenings of a gay Filipino-American who got married to a police officer, worked through a career with the state of New York, and managed the shifting dynamics of a world increasingly besieged by atrocities has been as dull and unremarkable as it has been vital to providing the baseline of this website. Why have I done it for all these years? To leave a trail of breadcrumbs, I suppose, for anyone else looking for a way out, and maybe a way in.
Looking back over such a long period of time, I’m able to see the greater arcs of shifting perspectives and outlooks that comprises one’s online life. Comparing the 2013 Year in Review posts (here and here and here) with this past year’s reviews here and here, it’s startling to see how much has changed – and how much hasn’t.
Two decades of any website is an accomplishment, and given the typical shelf-life of a personal blog it’s an eternity. Keeping a small, loyal audience that has ebbed and flowed has proven an interesting exercise, and evolving in such a public forum while the social media world assembled itself and came into existence (then turned into a force greater than any of us could have imagined), is part of what keeps me doing this: it’s been a mainstay in an ever-changing online world.
This has been a search to find myself. A quest to find some meaning in a world that made less sense by the day. It’s been a journey to reach an understanding. I sought a better version of myself in all this HTML coding. I looked for me in all the poses and posies. I looked for me in the music that touched my soul, in the art that moved my heart, in the cadence and choice of words that I found to best express the person I needed to see – the person I needed to find.
When I think back to 2003, the world feels like a very different place. It was a time before social media as we know it. There was no FaceBook or Twitter or Instagram or Tik Tok. It was a time when blogs were taking off, and I rode that wave rather quietly and below the radar. Other sites seemed to burn as brightly as they did briefly, whereas I wanted to last. I wanted a little legacy. Today, that legacy is a website that’s been around for twenty years.
In many ways, I feel more lost than I did twenty years ago, but it makes more sense to be lost now – in the admission of that ignorance is the beginning of some kind of grace and understanding. A little closer to the truth, a little closer to the self. And so the work continues…
Officially, I opened the doors here in March of 2003, so the official celebration will be marked closer to that date. Until then, join me for a cup of hot tea…
Despite the fact that I walked circles around her and my nephew as we walked the entire Freedom Trail this summer, I knew that she wasn’t wrong. I was old, or at the very least, older – and I felt it. These days, it’s my eyesight that is deteriorating at the most rapid pace, requiring reading glasses of increasing strength in every room of the house, every drawer of the office, and every car in our garage. I’ve taken to wearing two pairs at once when my contacts aren’t in, and years of voguing have made the endless switching of spectacles just another choreographed hand-dance. The levity in that, and the opportunity for further accessorizing, doesn’t quite make up for the sadness I first felt when I noticed the advancing ocular degradation – because the first thing that became more difficult was one of my favorite things to do: reading. All the crystal-bejeweled eyeglass chains can’t make up for that.
My age group is going through such things – from blood-pressure medication to colonoscopies to gout – and it’s all a part of getting older. It hasn’t really bothered me, and I haven’t invested my existence with a dependence on physical appearance or youthful exuberance. In fact, it’s been more of a point of interest and study than worry, particularly as I’ve been diving deep into the archives of photos in anticipation of the 20th anniversary commemoration of this website.
The featured photo was taken almost twenty years ago, in Boston on a winter weekend, while the shot below was taken just a year or two ago on a similar winter day, but decades and miles apart. I don’t entirely mind the differences on the outside, because I’ve been working on the differences on the inside – but they’re worth noting, because as this site continues on its 20-year-and-counting journey, I’m starting to see the arcs and the long-range trajectories of life. Certain things sharpen, certain things decline, and certain things remain the same. The seeking and searching continue in earnest…
Hot on the heels of a self-titled debut solo album, Giuliano D’Orazio has actually been a mainstay on the Worcester, MA music scene for years. A self-described queer rock and roll artist, D’Orazio earns this crowning as Dazzler of the Day thanks to the ten glorious songs that collectively comprise the rollicking tour de force of ‘Giuliano’. I can’t remember the last time I was so moved and entranced by an entire album (my favorites include lead track ‘Boy Next Door’, ‘Holy Grail’, and the powerful ‘Don’t Pray for Me’, but every song here is worth repeat listens). Check out D’Orazio’s website here for more information and music.
My Mom was just lamenting the gray state this January has mostly provided – with none of the bright blue skies against sparkling snow that we sometimes get to make it bearably beautiful. On this morning, the snow continues – dropping blankets of white banked by a gray sky. A muted scene of beauty, silent and secret.
Tea and candles may seem like a small buffer against a raging snowstorm, but they make all the difference. In winter, it’s the little things that get us through, and there’s something quite cozy about riding out a storm safely ensconced on a couch with a book and a blanket.
We haven’t had that much snow this year, and the gardens are clamoring for some insulation from the heaving border of the thaw/freeze see-saw. For that reason alone, this snow is cause for celebration, even if it has been taking down tree limbs and causing other pesky events. This is nature’s way of pruning. It’s also a way to quiet and calm the world – telling us to slow down and take it all in, to pause and reflect and wonder.
