Fencing Bear at Prayer

No white person wants to be famous just among white people. Most of the things that white people do* are only interesting to other white people. Which means the only way that a white person can become famous is by impressing a lot of other white people. Which no self-respecting white person would ever want. QED, it is pointless to worry about being famous. In fact, it would be better not to be. Whew! I'm glad that I finally understand this now. Maybe now I can get back to work, secure in the thought that practically nobody understands what I am trying to do. And that I never really wanted to be famous in the first place. Also that it only makes me pathetic to be hanging around wishing that I were one of the popular kids. I'd rather still be a geek. So there. Now all I have to do is convince myself not to worry about getting a promotion--and I'm free! Okay, that's still a hard one. Perhaps there's something I'm still missing. *Like lib...

I'm finding it hard not to start this post with yet another apology, but there you go. Yesterday while I was making my breakfast--organic bananas, organic strawberries, all-natural (no corn syrup!) granola, organic milk from pasture-fed cows, organic herbal stress-relieving tea--I was suddenly struck by how white it all was. Unsurprising, you say? I am, after all, exactly the type of White Person Christian Lander's blog -turned- book is aimed at, both descriptively and in marketing terms: college-educated, upper-middle-class, wannabe artist-intellectual, urban dwelling. And, indeed, although I somehow missed the whole blog phenomenon last winter (too busy teaching the History of European Civilization, I suppose), I read the book as soon as I got back from Europe and could order a copy from my local, independently-owned bookstore . I even took the quiz at the back: "How White Are You?" Organic food (check), tea (check), yoga (check), gifted children (check-...