I won’t be surprised if you’ve never heard of Steve Piper. I hadn’t either, but here’s the point; Steve is a journeyman singer-songwriter I heard last month while traveling in Western Massachusetts, and in this life, when you’ve been around for a while, you begin to appreciate how much talent there is – in your neighborhood, in your city, maybe even in your own family. I’ve been saying this for a long time, but it hard registered last month when I heard Steve play one night in Stockbridge.
There is always some dissonance and disorientation when we return from an extended stay overseas. It’s not just the jet-lag. There’s a cultural acclimation that has to take place too. For two months we’ve been trying to live like locals in a foreign place. When we’re abroad everything feels new and interesting; the colors are vibrant and intense while back home they seem monochromatic. It takes time to adjust and, for me, time to find my Seattle voice.
Over the years we’ve learned to deal with re-entry by looking for local events – concerts, plays, exhibits, readings – that can help us recapture the feel of what’s new and interesting on our home turf, and I never feel truly at home until I’ve found something local to write about.
Professor Herma Hill Kay died at her home in San Francisco on June 10, 2017. She was a respected teacher, colleague, and personality at Boalt Hall, the University of California’s law school in Berkeley for 57 years. After obtaining her undergraduate degree (magna cum laude) in anthropology from Southern Methodist University she attended the University of Chicago law school, and after a year as the law clerk for Roger Traynor, legendary Chief Justice of the California Supreme Court, she began her tenure as a law school professor at Boalt. I never had a class with Professor Kay and can’t claim her as a friend, but we did have one funny encounter in Seattle years after I left California.
In Erica Jong’s 1973 novel, Fear of Flying, we were introduced to the “zipless fuck,” a sexual encounter involving two previously unacquainted persons with no emotional commitment.
In Grounded, a play by George Brant, a young woman in an Air Force flight suit tracks a terrorist on the ground 8000 miles away. She’s “flying” a missile-armed drone from her air-conditioned trailer in the Nevada desert. She is prosecuting America’s zipless war.
As an ex-Marine fighter pilot, I resist the conflation of jet pilot and drone operator. Real fighter pilots strap in, light the fire, pull G’s, land on aircraft carriers, and swap sea stories in the Ready Room. In Grounded, the unnamed pilot feels the same way. She’s a hard charging, adrenaline-fueled F-16 driver, but following maternity leave she finds herself assigned as a UAV (unmanned air vehicle) “pilot” in a windowless trailer in the Nevada desert. She is not happy with the assignment. She misses the excitement. She misses “the blue,” but war is changing and she has to deal with it.
His name begins with D. He’s a charismatic, pathological liar who thrives on the pursuit of beautiful women, ensnaring them with an inflated biography of great accomplishments. But, in the course of his pursuit he is forced, time and again, to revise his story as an aide and ally reveals (leaks?) his lies.
Recognizable? The story line may be, but you’ll be surprised to discover it’s not the story you think it is. It’s not today’s headline grabber. Instead it’s the story of Dorante, The Liar, in a 17th Century play by Corneille adapted and updated by David Ives and playing concurrently this month in New York and Seattle.
