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ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS IS THE JAMES WEBB TELESCOPE

If there’s one gift that excites me most in my adult life (other than the latest VR headset, let’s be honest) it is the launch of the James Webb Telescope. Due to delays and unfit weather conditions, the launch date of the biggest telescope ever built has been pushed back to Christmas Eve. But with more inclement weather underway in French Guiana, it’s likely the launch will be pushed back another day, which would fall on Christmas Day.

Can you imagine it? The greatest technological marvel of this decade is about to be put into service to survey the stars and other solar systems in detail unprecedented. The Hubble Telescope gave us incredible imagery of the cosmos, but under the James Webb Telescope, equipped with a lens 2.75 times larger than that of the Hubble, it’s unfathomable to think what discoveries await. I cannot wait to see the first primary photos taken for comparison to the Hubble. It’s going to be, quite literally, awesome.

In this era of pandemic and seasonal pessimism, can anything act as a wayward Christmas star more so than a literal speck of light in the night sky, that of the James Webb telescope safely in orbit around the earth? Scientific marvels such as this (on the same playing field as widespread Covid vaccinations) give me hope for the future, one that gives us greater scope about our place in the universe.

All I want for Christmas, naturally, is a successful launch.

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O BATMAN OF BETHLEHAM

In trying to construct a Christmas Message for this Weekly Post-Ed, I drew a blank. In a previous draft, I wrote an essay about what I thought of the previous year, but like so much else attached to my life at present, it was dripping with seasonal pessimism and I couldn’t stand behind posting something like that. So, without an idea, I thought back to previous Christmases, parsing through what made them special for me, and I kept circling back on one particular memory.

When I was 7 or 8-years-old, I had it in my head that the best addition to the yearly Nativity play at my church was to include Batman as one of the Angels. Perhaps I was angry at the casting decision of the Director (Joseph always went to the eldest in the youth group, never to a pre-pubescent boy incapable of copulation, which was, like, totally unfair). I was grouped with two other girls cast as Angels. My costume was a white, a flittered garment tied together at the waist by a glittering cord of white. In my defense, a die-hard Batman fan costumed in a dress some months after donning the cape and cowl for Halloween would be rightly critical of this creative choice. Personally, I think Angels would dress less like Shepards, played by a trio of boys in similar garb, just slabbed in gray with woolen blankets draped over their shoulders.

And after rehearsal the night before the Christmas Eve service, I draped my costume over a hanger in disgust. A new creative direction was needed for the show.

I must have smuggled my Halloween costume under my baggy winter coat. While the Angels were busy pulling up white tights and (near) stainless robes with glitter tumbling off the dried gobs of glue along the shoulder pieces, I unfolded my Batman costume and was nearly dressed except for the fabric cowl and cape (Batman costumes have become increasingly movie-accurate over the years, to the chagrin of my 8-year-old self).

“Woah, what is this?” asked the Director passing by. “What do you have on?”

I smirked—clearly, he was blown away by my creative decision to alter the character of “Angel #3” to something much more modern, hip, cool, badass. “I’m Batman,” I said, proudly.

“Cool,” he said. “Take it off.”

You could hear my heart break. “What? Why?”

“Because Batman wasn’t present at the birth of Christ.”

“So?” I countered, a pretty useful argument I had employed at the time. Insert enough ‘So’s?’ into conversation and most people get tired of hearing it and let you win. At least, it worked with my parents.

“Robert, you’re an Angel. You’re going to dress like one. Does anyone want to help Robert get his costume on?”

On cue, Joseph, the eldest in the youth group playing the lead role, and totally undeserving (I was already soured by the politics of the theater at a young age), stepped in and held out the white tights I was to wear with the Angel costume. I must have given in because I did dress as Angel #3 for the play, but I wasn’t going down without a fight. If I was to be an Angel, then I would only appear as one.

I would not act as one.

Fast-forward to the miracle of Christ’s birth during the performance and you would have seen an Angel that, for reasons unknown, held onto an invisible cape, pretending to flap it around as though I were the Dark Knight in the Michael Keaton Batman movie.

“Why is Robert acting like Christ being crucified? Is that part of the show?” I heard an elderly man ask in the front row.

“I think it’s supposed to mean something,” whispered his wife.

The Director facepalmed when he heard this, unable to do a thing.

It’s a shame I didn’t have any lines that year (coincidence? I think not). I would have gladly given my line unto the baby boy doll draped in rags in the manger, our Jesus:

“I am vengeance, I am the night, I am Batman…of Bethlehem!”

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A MERRY LITTLE HAWKEYE CHRISTMAS

If you haven’t seen the new Hawkeye show on Disney+, please do! It was a festive and very Christmas take on a Marvel property. Sure, the Christmas element was crassly inserted (mostly in the form of Christmas songs accompanying all the skyline transition shots between changes in location), but the scenery of New York alight for the Christmas season eventually won me over. The show was fun and humorous in a way that was heartwarming for the holidays and I can’t say enough about checking it out.

Plus, as a bonus for the end-credits, an entire Broadway musical production of “I Can Do This All Day” is filmed in its complete glory.

The show is sure to become a holiday favorite going forward.

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A CHRISTMAS MESSAGE

At 32, things are seemingly worse than ever before. Not only is there a global pandemic seemingly without end, a cultural depression has led to the exultation of the highly successful and a feeling of deepest failure should one’s life never realize what it means to be valued by the grading systems of online platforms. It’s an age of unbounded loneliness, a lack of connection, and a crisis in wondering about the purpose of life.

On Christmas Eve, I often ask how a holiday glazed with the glitz and glamor of jingle bells and colored bulbs can possibly instill in us a feeling of home and warmth. The world seems, as it is, a place of disconnect and dissonance, a train passing by the station without intention of stopping. It sounds like good ol’ pessimism, but the older I get, the struggle to enjoy life is often beaten and battered by constantly being sold on the notion that I’m not enough (handsome, creative, productive, charming, witty, athletic). It becomes just as tiresome to fight as a constantly mutating virus.

So I ask: where is the joy in all of this?

The only answer I have is to remember why Christmas is meaningful. To me, Christmas can be about most anything (as any seasonal Hallmark movie can attest): the power of friendship, of family, of finding true love, of being rewarded for doing good. But while we lavish the fictional world as a place where good and righteousness wins out over the forces that prevents our happiness, we seldom receive the same satisfying conclusion to our life stories. And as the holidays hit, we want retribution—that our struggles weren’t in vein, that the holiday season means something, and to be rewarded on schedule, as the script was written.

Take it from me, I would love for life to unfold in this way, but it simply won’t for a majority of us. It’s been a long winter for the past few years even preceding the pandemic. Christmas time can be a very lonely, depressing holiday to those that have experienced loss and not found the means to fill the craters of their lives ever since. In my experience, you have two choices in the winter of our lives: to sink further into despair, or to choose (despite the pain) to seek joy despite it all.

Remedies aren’t without side effects. The notion of choosing differently sounds unfair or unreasonable, likely both, and that’s because it is. And yet, this choice is all we have in times of darkness. It’s easy to lay down, to let the circumstances of a torrential world do its damage. That’s always an option, but what’s the value in that? There is meaning getting back up again, because in the struggle of our lives, this decision to get up despite the odds is all we have left.

There is no paying audience cheering us on, or a narrator ready to set the story on its rightful course. There is only acting for our own story, to take truly be the protagonist we wish to be, despite how the story turns out.

So, this holiday season, I hope you seek joy, even if unattainable. The pursuit of something more has always yielded the most meaning in spite of the result (this website included), and I’ve found that choosing to see the better pieces of our lives is as magical as the notion that a man in red will deliver presents to good little girls and boys.

From me, truly, I hope you remember there is always a choice, not in how something turns out, but in our intentions for how we will carry on. I like being the main character of my life, and if I have a say in what I’ll do next, I’ll write that, too.

At least I get partial writing credit. I’ll gladly take it.

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Wishing everyone a good holiday. You’re not alone out there,

Down with a Sickness

I caught a cold this past weekend, which I don’t prefer, but there are also benefits to being sick that I’ve found. For an overthinker (such as Muah), having a head cold is a kind of performance enhancing drug. There’s less indecision because of the desperation to get something done and get to more rest.

[There are no survivors between being irritably sick and the pillow at the end of the day.]

Sports can be easier to play. For example, I play goalie in ice hockey and there’s a constant mental battle of not thinking versus “reading the play” (or recognizing patterns during play to make the best decision for being in position to make a save). When sober (not sick), sometimes the internal debate leads to pucks going in the net because you were too busy figuring out what you should be doing. When sick, all that thinking goes away because your thoughts follow this specific inner monologue: “I’m sick and this sucks. I’m sick and this sucks. I’m sick and…”

And there’s less thinking about what to do. In my experience, I play better like this.

However, if it’s somebody’s birthday weekend (such as Muah) and there were plans to leave town and celebrate, there’s no real benefit to being sick. I had to cancel plans and stay home to rest. Luckily, on this particular weekend, there were other things to celebrate.

Like this:

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Monster Hunter Rise Launch:

I can’t express how great it feels to play this game. Everything in this game feels so good: the gameplay, the world, the little nuanced charm and humor. To be more specific, this game feels like what a video game ought to feel like. You want to keep playing, the world is vibrant and engrossing, and there’s something to find on every quest. It’s a delight that’s made with such care and love.

I don’t write reviews of games. I just want people to play good stuff. I modeled my website after this game for a reason and that’s because I knew it was going to be special.

Great stuff Capcom.

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Mike Birbiglia’s Worldwide Pizza Party

I attended a virtual comedy show on Saturday night. It was hosted by Mike Birbiglia, one of my favorite comics, and featured guest appearances by Aisling Bea and Nish Kumar. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but the format was so charming and cozy that I wondered why comedy wasn’t delivered this way before. Being on a Zoom call, the show lacked the energy of a live performance (the sound of a mic and sound system, the collective mood and energy of the audience), but it was funny and fulfilling in a way that was both different and needed during a pandemic.

The show was called “The Worldwide Comedy Pizza Party”, and Mike’s entire act was devoted to bits about pizza. Truly. And it still played well! Mike began the show with some banter with the audience, which consisted of couples and singles perched on a couch or computer chair facing a webcam. He introduced his guest comedian host, Aisling Bea, who attempted to make a homemade pizza while the show went on. It was very much a “Late Night Talk Show” type of bit, but it was charming and funny all the same.

Mike’s style of delivering jokes through a virtual show is by flipping through notecards at a large corkboard. He recites the bit, which is still a work in progress, and depending on the levels laughter through the Zoom audience’s reduced mic volume, he moves on to the next joke.

Mike brought up that he’d like to perhaps film a comedy special as a virtual show. I think it works for how he was delivering his jokes; some worked, some did not, but he would always show the camera the title of the joke he just performed on his many notecards, which always made the crowd laugh from recognition. Obviously, you can’t show a large crowd at a club a handwritten notecard for a laugh, but it worked on a webcam setup.

Which, to me, was interesting because it showed how standup comedy can evolve depending on the medium.

The show was roughly an hour and half and worth the price of admission ($25). Perhaps the most cathartic part was the preshow and reading the Zoom chat. Everyone was happy to be there, happy to share where they were watching from (Sweden, Argentina, Toronto, Maryland, California, Michigan, etc) and what local pizza they had bought for the pizza party.

For me, who was sick and couldn’t watch this show with a friend, it was further proof that there are better things in this world if you look for them.

Plus, Mike Birbiglia is one of the big reasons this website exists at all. Mike writes about why he makes the things he does on his website:

“You’re doing it for the people who might feel better about something in their lives because of something you’re willing to admit about yours.”

After reading that, it was time to share.

Weekly Post-Ed #20