12 Unrepentantly Happy Days of Christmas: "Christmas in Hollis" by Run-DMC

"It's Christmas time in Hollis, Queens. Mom's cookin' chicken and collard greens. Rice and stuffin', macaroni and cheese, and Santa puts gifts under Christmas trees": This is as much a part of my Christmas lyric vocabulary as "Faithful friends who are dear to us, gather near to us once more" or "Chestnuts roasting on an open fire." I'm still unsure whether this or "Walk This Way" (which established the black/white mashup that Anthrax/Public Enemy, Danger Mouse, and Girl Talk ran with) was more important to my junior high experience.

12 Unrepentantly Happy Days of Christmas: "My Favorite Things" by Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass

Ok, maybe not technically a Christmas song. BUT: 1) I'm about to visit the Trapp Family Lodge for Christmas for the third time, despite the fact that I haven't even seen The Sound of Music once and only have a vague understanding of who the Von Trapps were. But I know a few of one of their favorite things. 2) It's on Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass's Christmas album, and I know it more by Alpert's trumpet than by Julie Andrews's voice. 3) HAPPY. So happy.

12 Unrepentantly Happy Days of Christmas: "Mele Kalikimaka" by Bing Crosby

Since the early Nineties my family has watched National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation at least once during the holiday season, mostly to remind ourselves that, no matter how bad its gets, it can always get worse. But oh yeah, this is a happy Christmas list. How about some Bing Crosby, Hawaiian steel guitar, and Clark Griswold's Christmas fantasy?

12 Unrepentantly Happy Days of Christmas: "All I Want for Christmas Is You" by Mariah Carey

I totally ignored this song when it came out. I think it might have been because I was in the middle of a hardcore Dylan phase, and in a heated argument with my father about Dylan's singing voice he had the nerve to say, "Just look at Mariah Carey: better voice, and just as as good a songwriter as Dylan." It took me a long time to get over that one. She actually co-wrote most of her hits with Walter Afanasieff, aka Baby Love, the Russian-American producer who also co-wrote Celine Dion's "My Heart Will Go On." Th is song, co-written by Afanasieff, unlike the rest of Carey's catalog has steadily grown on me over the years. Or, as my friend Walker recently said, "I don't even care, I fucks with mid-90's Mariah all day."

12 Unrepentantly Happy Days of Christmas: "Sleigh Ride" by et al.

I have such a complicated relationship with this song. I can think of no holiday tune that's more thoroughly American, like an aural Norman Rockwell painting, with equal parts ebullience and vapidity that make it so easy to hum along to without worrying about any of the more grisly (birth of a tortured martyr), reverent (birth of a presumed savior), or more complicated elements (believing neither of these but still calling it Christmas) common to many songs of the season. My first memory of this song is hearing some muzak version on a used car commercial most years of my early childhood that sounded a lot like the Les Baxter version here, and getting that warm feeling that's so complicated to parse as an adult. In college I used to entertain my roommate Amanda by singing and dancing along to Debbie Gibson's version once a month or so throughout the year. It's still my favorite holiday standard, and I'll give any version a listen; two other favorites are the Squirrel Nut Zippers' and Los Straitjackets' versions. So of course I'm including all of them here.

12 Unrepentantly Happy Days of Christmas: "Tit for Tat (Ain't No Taking Back)" by James Brown

In discussions of the best single-artist Christmas album of all time, you could do a lot worse than James Brown's Funky Christmas, which is actually a distillation of three Christmas albums he recorded from 1966-1970. Brown actually rivals Sufjan Stevens in the wealth of really great Christmas songs he's recorded that are both seasonally appropriate and completely in his own personality. This is just one of many in that respect, but man, does it make me happy.

12 Unrepentantly Happy Days of Christmas: "A Charlie Brown Christmas" by Vince Guaraldi

Yes, the whole album. Every song - whether whimsical and jaunty, thoughtful and meditative, or just plain silly, is a shot of pure joy. As albums go, I can think of none that so crystallize the spirit of Christmas (whatever that is) than this one. I've grown weary of the actual TV special over the years, perhaps mostly because it can't seem to go more than two minutes without a commercial interruption (I should stop watching it on cbs.com), but the music has always been what moves this slice of mid-20th Century anti-commercial commercialism.

12 Unrepentantly Happy Days of Christmas: "Christmas in New Orleans" by Louis Armstrong

I've actually never been there during the Christmas season, but I've been enough in the warmer months to know what it means to miss New Orleans. And when I hear about "magnolia trees at night sparklin' bright" while "a barefoot choir in prayer fills the air, Mississippi fools gatherin' there," I know I'm one of those fools.

12 Unrepentantly Happy Days of Christmas: "Christmas Love" by Billy Idol

I'm a big fan of the Very Special Christmas franchise - have been since I shoplifted the first volume on cassette in 1987. What I think I love most about the songs gathered over its first three volumes (I lost interest after 1997) is how so many artists whose work I wasn't really into rose to the occasion to deliver original songs or reinventions of standards that felt - still feel - were/are Christmas to me. I designate this song by Billy Idol, which for all I know is an original, an honorary Very Special Christmas Song. Alas, I found it tacked on the end of a compilation titled Monster Ballads Xmas, with fourteen predictably glammed-up versions of predictably-selected popular favorites by Warrant, Dokken, Winger, et al that tend to run together. And then there's track 15. I love how Billy Idol somehow manages to channel Burl Ives, pulling us all around the fire and telling us it'll be alright while winking with mirth at the absurdity of the whole Christmas enterprise.

Get more Christmas Love (and Misery) here!

12 Happy Days Are Coming Soon!

Tomorrow, in fact. No, I can't promise that you'll wake up and the past month (hell, year!) will have just been an entire season of Dallas, but I am here to give you - and myself - a little respite. This Christmas season I just couldn't bear to put together another 12 days of miserable Christmas songs (plus, my mother-in-law made me promise I wouldn't), so I'm going in the opposite direction: 12 Unrepentantly Happy Days of Christmas Songs.

As per the past couple of years, I'll give you a song a day leading up to Christmas, starting tomorrow. You can use it. In the meantime, soak in the misery of last year and the year before, if only to escape the misery of this year.

Standing Rock Project: Oceti Sakowin and Sacred Stone camps and Kevin Gilbert(t) added

Today I added the two main camps and an important documentarian of Standing Rock to my sources for the project, under the tab above. So much to add, and I'm also reaching out to people and organizations I've met while there and haven't yet met. Much more to come!

Standing Rock, A Digital Oral History-in-Progress: Voices of Standing Rock

Many of you who know me, know that I spent some time with the water protectors at Standing Rock earlier this month. I've really struggled since returning home to contextualize the struggle and my own place within it, finally coming to this conclusion: I am a writer, and my primary function should to document. To that end, I'm developing what I'm tentatively calling a digital oral history. I'm not sure exactly how this will end up, but my general intention right now is to collect as many different voices as I can, and organize the voices contextually as I go. I'll be updating regularly, and will indicate recently added material. You can find the tab in the menu above, or click here. 

My first addition is Voices of Standing Rock, a project of the Iktče Wičháša Oyáte, or Common Man Collective, of Standing Rock. Their interviews are elucidating and personal, including both indigenous voices and the extended family of non-indigenous friends. They are a crowdfunded enterprise, so if you are looking for a good cause to donate to, you can do that here via YouCaring.

CAPS LOCK RANT: At people who voted for Donald Trump and now say, "It's only an election"

I HAVE A SNEAKING SUSPICION YOU WOULD ALSO SAY, "STOP CRYING. IT'S ONLY CANCER."

DON'T EVEN SAY THINGS ARE GOING TO GO ON AS USUAL. SO FAR, THE MAN YOU ELECTED HAS DESIGNATED A RAVING CLIMATE CHANGE CONTRARIAN TO HEAD THE ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY'S TRANSITION TEAM, MADE A WHITE SUPREMACIST HIS CHIEF STRATEGIST, AND MADE A FRINGE SENATOR WHO EVEN REAGAN SAW AS TOO RACIST TO BE HIS ATTORNEY GENERAL. IN A NUTSHELL, HE'S APPOINTING PEOPLE TO DESTROY THE INSTITUTIONS THEY HEAD. AND WE'RE JUST A WEEK OUT OF THE ELECTION.

AND STOP WITH THIS BULLSHIT ABOUT GOD BEING IN CONTROL AND SEEING MORE THAN WE DO. 1) THERE MOST LIKELY IS NO GOD. SORRY. 2) DONALD TRUMP WOULD AGREE WITH ME ON POINT #1, IF HE WERE TO ACTUALLY GIVE IT ANY THOUGHT BEYOND HOW IT WOULD GET YOU TO VOTE FOR HIM. 3) IF THERE WAS A GOD AND THAT GOD IMPOSED DONALD TRUMP ON OUR COUNTRY, THEN GOD HATES THE U.S.A.

THIS WAS NOT "JUST AN ELECTION," THOUGH IT MIGHT HAVE BEEN THE ONLY ELECTION IN WHICH YOU ACTUALLY VOTED. AND DON'T SAY YOU VOTED FOR OBAMA THE LAST ELECTION, OR TRUMP'S ELECTION IS NO WORSE THAN OBAMA'S. YOU JUST VOTED FOR THE LEAST QUALIFIED CANDIDATE OF OUR LIFETIME, IF NOT AMERICAN HISTORY. IF YOU THINK THAT'S A GOOD THING, I INVITE YOU TO HAVE THE PERSON IN SEAT 6C (OR WHATEVER SEAT, YOU CAN CHOOSE) NAVIGATE THE PLANE ON YOUR NEXT FLIGHT. IF YOU SEE OUR COUNTRY'S GOVERNMENT AS THAT PLANE AND YOU WANT IT TO CRASH, THEN YOU ARE THE PERSON IN SEAT 6C NAVIGATING THE PLANE.

I got nothing. But I promise I'll have something tomorrow.

So, a week has passed. It seems like much, much longer. I went to Standing Rock, and my country has a new president. I just finished writing a piece about my trip, and now I have to think on this new, ugly reality.

Ah, well. More Sneaky Feels starting tomorrow, and I promise you'll be reading about me and Standing Rock soon.

Let the real conversation begin.

Thanks to my colleague and teaching partner Nayma Qayum, I'll be discussing this recent piece from The Atlantic with my classes today as we begin our section on persuasive writing, with a focus shifted toward argumentation-as-understanding. Tomorrow I will vote, and the day after that I will be heading out to Standing Rock with Bill Housworth, an ardent Trump supporter who is also one of my oldest friends. We'll undoubtedly argue constantly and joyfully, as only people who understand each other as people can argue, when we're not too busy finding common ground in the mutual work we're doing and our shared heritage. It's going to be a very good week.

Sneaky Feels #16

The last Sneaky Feel of this week's residency is an intentional anti-climax. Enjoy our shared quotidian middle, friends.

Sneaky Feels #15

True story: I mostly dictated this one into my iPhone while driving down 9A one Thursday night (evidence below). Read it here!

Sneaky Feels #14

Day 3, and I'm gonna hit you hard with this one. We all get the feels, but what are you going to do?

Sneaky Feels #13

It's Day 2 of the Awst Press residency and here comes Sneaky Feel #13, in which Sylvia Plath and discomfort coexist in awkward liminal space (I know, big surprise).

Rave on, Sneaky Feelers!