<\/p>\n
Published in McSweeney’s Internet Tendency<\/em>, September 2017.<\/p>\n \u2014 Hear that new one from the BSO?<\/p>\n \u2014 Shit, yeah, that Brahms? That one knocked me square on my ass. Even more so than the Shostakovich. Pardon me, the Grammy Award-winning<\/em> Shostakovich.<\/p>\n (They toast.)<\/em><\/p>\n \u2014 We should repeat.<\/p>\n \u2014 We should but we won\u2019t, because the Recording Academy hates Boston. Watch. Watch them give it to the frigging New York Phil, which is a fine orchestra if you like listening to a bunch of soulless prima donnas collect paychecks.<\/p>\n (They nod, drink.)<\/em><\/p>\n \u2014 Gotta respect Andris Nelsons.<\/p>\n \u2014 The kid can conduct his ass off, in the bravura tradition of Seiji Ozawa.<\/p>\n \u2014 Friend of mine down in Quincy just named his pit bull \u201cOzawa.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2014 Remember \u201902, when Ozawa did Beethoven\u2019s Seventh?<\/p>\n \u2014 Course I do.<\/p>\n \u2014 Course you do. We all do, because it was an indelible performance. An indelible performance that the New York Times<\/em> called \u201cplodding.\u201d Please. Please do me one favor, Mr. Big New York City Critic, please don\u2019t talk to me like I don\u2019t got two ears and a brain. Because I do, and also a heart, which Seiji touched with that masterful Seventh.<\/p>\n \u2014 They act like there\u2019s no culture north of the Triborough. Like guys like us don\u2019t know a sublimely realized Seventh when we hear one.<\/p>\n \u2014 Just don\u2019t talk shit about Seiji, all right? You come up here and you try to talk shit about Seiji \u2014 I don\u2019t care if you got a Pulitzer or a MacArthur or a Pulitzer and a MacArthur and an award from the frigging National Book Critics Circle \u2014 I\u2019ll lay you the fuck out.<\/p>\n \u2014 Figuratively speaking.<\/p>\n \u2014 Of course. This city once aspired to be the Athens of America. I\u2019m not about to disrespect that majestic civic aspiration by acting like a goddamned fucking barbarian.<\/p>\n –<\/p>\n \u2014 Other day I went over to the Museum of Science.<\/p>\n \u2014 How was it?<\/p>\n \u2014 Well it was the fucking Museum of Science, so how the fuck do you think it was? It was superlative. It was a testament to our region\u2019s proud tradition of rational inquiry.<\/p>\n (They toast.)<\/em><\/p>\n \u2014 Meanwhile, all you hear is, \u201cSilicon Valley this, Silicon Valley that\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n \u2014 Because they hate Boston, because they\u2019re jealous of Boston. And I\u2019m sorry, but making an app to call a cab isn\u2019t science. You know what is science? Life science is science.<\/p>\n (They nod, drink.)<\/em><\/p>\n \u2014 Gotta respect our biotechs.<\/p>\n \u2014 I swear to God, I get all these disgusting frigging fantasies about a bunch of these Silicon Valley guys coming up here and talking shit about our biotechs. Being like, \u201cOh yeah, Boston\u2019s got a nice little biotech scene.\u201d And I\u2019m like, \u201cLittle?\u201d And then I very figuratively lay them all out. I very figuratively beat them back to Cali using the gold Nobel medal awarded to Dr. H. Robert Horvitz.<\/p>\n \u2014 Friend of mine out in Walpole just got a Horvitz tattoo.<\/p>\n \u2014 Sick.<\/p>\n –<\/p>\n \u2014 So I\u2019m in the MFA last weekend, where I volunteer as a docent.<\/p>\n \u2014 A valuable service to an invaluable institution.<\/p>\n (They toast.)<\/em><\/p>\n \u2014 I\u2019m in Gallery 242, and this kid comes over, says, \u201cAre these are the only Rembrandts?\u201d<\/p>\n \u2014 And this kid is from where?<\/p>\n \u2014 From a state that wants so hard to be part of New England but is actually just part of New York, and it knows it, and so it\u2019s got all this twisted anti-Boston resentment.<\/p>\n \u2014 Friend of mine up in Lowell deals cards down in Connecticut. Says it\u2019s awful.<\/p>\n \u2014 What it is is anti-Boston.<\/p>\n (They nod, drink.)<\/em><\/p>\n \u2014 Kid asks for more Rembrandts. That\u2019s some true Connecticut bullshit.<\/p>\n \u2014 You want to see a hundred Rembrandts? Here. Here\u2019s a bus ticket. Enjoy Manhattan. P.S., it sucks. You want to see five Rembrandts, and really see them? Really engage with each canvas? Come to Boston.<\/p>\n \u2014 Because there\u2019s far, far less to see and do here, and so it\u2019s easier to concentrate.<\/p>\n \u2014 Exactly.<\/p>\n –<\/p>\n \u2014 Know where I haven\u2019t been in a wicked long time? Plimoth Plantation.<\/p>\n \u2014 I\u2019m there two, three times a month. It\u2019s a jewel.<\/p>\n (They toast.)<\/em><\/p>\n \u2014 You wonder why it\u2019s not constantly crammed with people coming in from all over to experience what life was like in the seventeenth century in a fledgling agricultural settlement on the outskirts of what would one day become Boston. \u2014 Could be the thing about people hating Boston.<\/p>\n \u2014 So it\u2019s guys in costumes speaking in an archaic vernacular and churning butter under a hot sun or whatever. Not flashy enough for you? Here. Here\u2019s a bus ticket. Go numb your brain in Times Square.<\/p>\n \u2014 The quiet of the place, its frank modesty, that\u2019s part of what makes it so moving. That, and its brave refusal to ignore the darker aspects of our history.<\/p>\n (They nod, drink.)<\/em><\/p>\n \u2014 Ever feel like some people, like non-Bostonians most especially, might be sleepwalking through something major? Like, not the shit we see, but the shit behind the shit?<\/p>\n \u2014 Like America\u2019s silent epidemic of depression? Its festering addiction to distraction? Like how some people mistake conspicuous consumption for meaningful experience? And how some others mistake hatred for virtue? Like how so many have lost contact with the communities that should help to sustain them and that they should help to sustain?<\/p>\n \u2014 Yeah, dude. Basically that. I worry that one day soon we\u2019re all going to find ourselves condemned to lives of isolation and sorrow, all trapped inside the same airless, boundless nightmare anti-community.<\/p>\n \u2014 Like Fairfield County, Connecticut?<\/p>\n \u2014 Exactly.<\/p>\n \u2014 If the whole world turns into one big Fairfield, that\u2019ll make us two guys from Connecticut.<\/p>\n \u2014 Two guys from Connecticut, just begging to get laid out. If Bostonians Loved Other Local Institutions the Way They Love Their Local Sports Franchises Published in McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, September 2017. \u2014 Hear that new one from the BSO? \u2014 Shit, yeah, that Brahms? That one knocked me square on my ass. Even more so than the Shostakovich. Pardon me, the Grammy Award-winning Shostakovich. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8422,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":35,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/236magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1124"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/236magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/236magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/236magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8422"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/236magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1124"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/236magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1124\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1216,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/236magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1124\/revisions\/1216"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/236magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1124"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n(They nod, drink.)<\/p>\n
\n <\/p>\nBrendan Hare (Fiction 2013) is a lifelong citizen of the commonwealth and a grateful alumnus of the fiction workshop.<\/h5>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"