PLACES: Pluto Is (kind of) Like My Junior High Experience

This Tuesday, I had the privilege of attending a lecture given by astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson at Vanderbilt. (…And by privilege, I mean I waited in 38-degree weather with about 200 other people for an hour. But it was worth it!)

In case that name means absolutely nothing to you (don’t be embarrassed – I didn’t know who he was either before this week), he’s the guy who officially demoted Pluto.

Ah, Pluto! My favorite little dwarf planet (it prefers “little people planet,” please). I remember the fateful day in 2006, the first day of 8^th grade for me – gotta love them awkward years – when dearest Pluto was stripped of its honors as the ninth planet in our solar system. I’ve always been small in stature myself and Pluto was that one planet with which I could connect. Apparently I wasn’t alone. Tyson himself wrote a novel entitled The Pluto Files: The Rise and Fall of America’s Favorite Planet.

Now, I’m not about to call the awkward junior high phase  “America’s Favorite School Years.” But I will admit that there are some striking similarities between this little person planet and my middle school experience.

Firstly, as Tyson pointed out in his very entertaining lecture, while Pluto’s demotion was mourned by all, “Pluto’s happier now!” “Pluto is now a big fish in a little pond,” Tyson stated.

I attended a small, Christian private school from 2^nd grade through 8^th grade. My graduating class was the largest in the school’s history: 28 people. Whoa there! Gettin’ crazy. I was the class artist, one of three musicians, and, well, everyone was the class brainiac (SRVCA was pretty nerdy back in my day).

I’m going to take a minute to brag here: the same year Pluto got kicked out of the solar system, I won 1^st prize in the 8^th grade science fair.  My project was about how fast different chocolates melted depending on their percentage of cocoa. True confession time: I did the entire project the night before. Take that, teachers! And I now hate science. (I’m an English major, dreading the physics lab Vanderbilt requires me to take next semester).

I was a big fish in a 28-person pond. Pluto was once 1 of 9 planets. Now it’s 1 of only 5 dwarf planets in our solar system!

Next, the majority of the time that the scientific world has known about Pluto’s existence, it was thought to be something it’s not. Discovered in 1930, Pluto was originally classified as another planet in our solar system. I’m not really a numbers person, but here’s how I got to that conclusion:

            2006 – 1930 = 76 years

            It’s been 6 years since 2006, so we’ve known about Pluto for 82 years.

            76 years of incorrect assumption / 82 years of known existence = 92% (majority)

For the majority of the time that the world has known about my existence, I was expected to be a math/science kid. Growing up, I dreamed of being an architectural engineer or a cardiovascular surgeon (Imagine my mom’s enthusiasm when I announced I wanted to be a writer and a musician!) Born in 1993, Emma was originally expected to continue with her trajectory of advanced mathematical and scientific thinking.

            I changed my mind in 8^th grade (just like Pluto!), so

            2007-1993 = 14 years

            It’s been 5 years since 2007, so I’ve been alive for 19 years.

            13 years of incorrect assumption/ 19 years of known existence = 74% (majority)

Thirdly, there is decreasing discussion of Pluto. Nobody really wants to talk about the little planet anymore. Teachers won’t tell their students about it in the same way they did back in the day because it is no longer a major point of the solar system. And for many Americans, it is undoubtedly still a sore subject (I can tell you first hand that there were numerous outbursts from frustrated Pluto-activist audience members on Tuesday).

Let’s be real: nobody really wants to dwell on the memories of junior high years. It was awkward. Voices got squeaky, people grew (or didn’t), the cool kids hung out at the mall, your mom had to drive you on “dates,” and, worst of all, dances were awful and weird.  There are those occasional moments in the rest of life when you reminisce on the horrors of middle school, which everyone who’s ever been 12 has inevitably encountered. But that’s it.

There is one final way that all of our junior high experiences are like Pluto. One of the most fascinating things that I have ever learned about space is that when you look out into space, you are literally looking into the past (yes, that inspirational scene in “The Lion King” is actually Simba’s dad talking to him from the past). This is because of the time that it takes light to travel; essentially, this conundrum means that we are looking at old light. While Pluto is not that far away from us, so its light we perceive in telescopes isn’t that old, it is still in the past.

And aren’t we all grateful that statement is also true of our middle school dances?

Oh yikes, buddy. 

Happy Thanksgiving!  

(Just in case you're still in the hell that is junior high, this is for you - ignore everything it says. Lies.)

PLACES: Hillsboro Village Is (kind of) Like Danville’s Long-Lost Twin

I simply don’t feel I’ve done Fido justice. Though I discussed it in my first “PLACES” post, there is so much more to say. Not just about one little restaurant, though. About all of Nashville. It’s a place far from my first home that now is my first home.

So for this week’s PLACES update, I’d love to introduce you to one of my favorite parts of Nashville: Hillsboro Village. To me, Hillsboro is the patch in the quilt of Nashy that feels most like my California small town of Danville. 

Bricks and centuries-old homes give each of these places a quaint, old-town charm. Don’t be fooled, though. Neither Hillsboro nor Danville is messing around. Cutesy doesn’t quite cover it; they boast some of the best high-end retail shops, boutiques, and award winning restaurants in their respective regions. Danville and Hillsboro are the perfect combination of class, culture, community, and couture.

 I’ve found very few streets I like as much as 21^st Avenue in Hillsboro and Hartz Avenue in Danville.  (These towns are twins, right?!) And though I’d love for everyone to get to experience both of these lovely towns, I know full well that travel is limited a devious evil called “budget”. To solve this problem, how about a little this-is-like-that to help you imagine what being in either town would be like! 

We’ll compare Hillsboro’s finest to Danville’s dandies with Twitter-like brevity

…and if there’s not really a match, well, I’ll have some other comparison for you.

Bookman Bookwoman is like Rakestraw after a tornado of dust, a flood of coffee, and a plague of old-people smell.

Sweet Cece’s is like Yogurt Shack with cooler topping dispensers, but not as cool toppings. #ironic #youneedaspoon,notaknife,alanis

  

Fire Finch is like Ella J.: stylish clothes, kind-of-a-splurge prices, and #cats?

Sam’s is kind of like That Bar: a decent scene with some good grub and the game on loud, but you’re more than likely to run into your boss, your friend’s mom, or a teacher. #yikes

  

McDougal’s is like…a hoarder’s paradise: if you look hard enough, you’ll find some decent fried chicken hiding between old license plates and newspapers. #help

The Belcourt is like The Vine. Both walk the fine line between artsy/cultured and pretentious, home to hipsters, documentary buffs, and businessmen alike.  #butstillpretentious

Side note: You should check out the Belcourt if:

-       You missed Sundance and want to feel cultured

-       You can name any Bon Iver song besides “Skinny Love” (even his cover song will count, guys)

-       You’re looking to be totally confused and bewildered by a film

Fido is like Sideboard on steroids, plus hipsters taking up all the booths, minus blankets for outside. #cmonguys #sharethelove

Jackson’s is like Pete’s Brass Rail: no one knows their namesake, but I’ve heard they’ve got some pretty good specialty beers. #iwouldntknow #imnot21yet

  

Pancake Pantry is like Valley Medlyn’s: if you’re local, you go there once a year. The portions are big, the servers are friendly, the lines are long, and the pancakes are great.

Provence is like La Boulange: France meets America in the most joyful of ways – coffee and pastries. (But unlike Provence, La Bou requires real people money.) #vandycard

In review,

Things Danville has that Hillsboro should get on board with:

-       A store for puppies and kitties! Like Molly’s Pup-Purr-ee!

-       A nice consignment shop. C’mon. We’re college kids, not millionaires. Posh, while it is nice to walk through your rows of way-too-expensive dresses and wish I had Taylor Swift’s closet, at the end of the day, you’re more of a window-shopping kind of place. Take a hint from Danville’s Savvy Shopaholic.

-       Sideboard's hot chocolate with graham crackers on the rim of the mug - yum!

Things Hillsboro nailed that Danville’s slackin’ in:

-       More than one coffee house! Sideboard is great, and I understand that Starbucks (*cough*cough* Char-bucks*) is nearby, but can we please get our act together and establish another hometown coffee shop that’s bigger than Sideboard? Dear Danville, consult Hot & Cold if you have any questions.

-       Jackson’s cookie dough egg rolls

But I guess even twins are different. I hope Danville and Hillsboro get to reunite someday. 

PLACES: Fido Is (kind of) Like Twitter Inception

I spent my Friday morning in a familiar place for an unusual reason: a business meeting.

Yep – for music! We’re really doin’ it, folks! But more on that another day.

My manager and I met with fellow marketing geek Ben Walls (glad to see we’re not alone in that category!) for coffee at Fido. Ah, Fido: A beloved Nashville hangout for record executives and exam-cramming students alike. You see, Fido has the two things that we’re all looking for in life: good coffee and free Wi-Fi.

But if you’re a Fido frequenter, you are well aware that the popularity of this place comes at a cost – if it gets too busy, they’ll turn off the Internet.

That’s right. 

The Internet itself! 

Ok, or maybe just their own Wi-Fi… You can’t really be sure. 

And the whole world disappears into the emptiness of that space where five bars of beautiful network used to be. 

Though this experience is briefly frustrating, it has brought to my attention a strange phenomenon: social networking continues without the Internet. I hear the chatter of aspiring musicians interviewing potential band members, the negotiations of food aficionados with restaurant entrepreneurs, and the excited giggles of newly-deemed bridesmaids with their queen bee; people connecting with one another in language that mimics tweets and status updates. Some I even overhear quoting tweets or showing each other their latest Instagram pictures. In my lifetime, as I was “born digital” as Mary Cross calls it, I have only ever thought of and heard the phrase “social networking” in reference to one of various online person-to-person connections. 

Not so! Social networking lives on in coffee shop chit-chat, post-church brunches, and after class “did-you-do-the-reading?-Me-neither” mingling. Nowadays it takes on a much briefer form than those occasions that I have heard called “networking opportunities.” Sure, that might be what we still name those Fido morning business meetings, but in truth, we are conversing through a series of Twitter-like expressions, the only way to keep one another’s attention.

"Today, the average human attention span lasts about 2 seconds," Ben informs Margot and me. 

"Well, at least we beat the goldfish!" I remark.

I cannot speak to Ben's source for this factoid, but this aspect of instant transmission of information goes beyond our cyber-selves. It penetrates our daily lives in even our face-to-face interactions. The cyber and the real are now intertwined.

I realize that Ben’s tidbit of info was shared with us in a verbal tweet: certainly fewer than 140 characters, poignant, and you can almost hear “#didyouknow” at the end of his statement.

So from this tweet-y conversation trend I cannot exclude myself.  If anything, this brief form of information sharing is magnified in the music marketing pool in which I find myself like a four-year-old learning to swim.

And if Fido is home to many of Nashville’s music business meetings, then Fido is home to the Twitter inception of the music world. 

Twitter inception is the strange existence of social networking, as it is online, within social networking, as it is in person. In case you are not familiar with Twitter inception, we’ll do some background investigating.

Ever since Al Gore (or whoever else would like to take credit) invented the Internet, our society has been lead-footing it up the steep road to “It’s a Small World.” Along the way, blogging and micro-blogging have gained important roles in not only the online persona (what I called the “cyber-self”) but also in the real world relationships of an individual.

Twitter in its infancy in 2006 was seen as a micro-blog outlet for those who had something brief to tell the rest of the world. Your friends could find out that you had a grilled cheese for lunch, were going to the Celine Dion concert, or had just finished reading The Kite Runner with only the click of a button.

We decided to cover up the human need to know better and be known better with the simplicity of knowing more. As our need to know more and know it now accumulated, we were no longer satisfied with just knowing about each other. We wanted to know about important people too. And celebrities found it charming that we commoners might be fascinated by their smallest musings. So Twitter became a marketing tool.  Tweets were no longer a way to tell the world the mundane mush of our lives that we wouldn’t otherwise verbalize, but breaking news from celebrity sources.

Now Twitter as a marketing tool strongly influences the music biz. If you don’t believe me, just ask SnoopDogg.  Musicians see value in being able to communicate to fans on a more personal level than going through a record label or management company. Unlike political revolution, where Twitter seems to be the key in one instance and not in another, the music industry as a whole has seen profit from the Twittersphere.

The heart of music industry communication is still largely face-to-face. And this is exactly where the “inception” part of “Twitter inception” comes in. In these real life Fido meetings, you’ve got to know your stuff – the latest project your contact has completed, the artists they work with, the sound they like, the last concert they saw, why they might want to keep up a business relationship with you, and more. So where do you find all of this? Twitter. Thus Twitter as a cyber entity becomes part of your conversation in the non-virtual world.

You’ve just been inception-ed (inceived?). By a little, blue, cartoon bird that carries whales when it’s not carrying your conversation.

  P.S. If you made it through even most of this post, pat yourself of the back for beating the odds. Your attention span lasted around 6 minutes. Congrats!