dual personalities

That was the title of a recent post at Cup of Jo, one of those blogs that I regularly read…but which often makes me roll my eyes. The post, which focuses on a Michelle Obama quote, ends with the line: “Maybe…it’s time for quotes to make a comeback.”

It’s news to me that quotes had ever gone out of vogue such that they’d need to make a comeback. As far as I know, quotes have always been a thing–cavemen were probably scratching memorably pithy remarks into stone walls, you know? Certainly in the nineteenth century, it was typical to have notebooks in which one copied one’s favorite quotes and passages–they were called commonplace books. And I know my mother has always kept such notebooks around the house for as long as I’ve been paying attention. During my camp-counselor phase, I once decoupaged a notebook for a friend and inscribed EVERY PAGE with an inspiring quote. From what I understand, she used it for to-do lists for over a year.

Well I don’t think I need to convince readers of this blog (which features quotations in almost every post!) that quotes making a comeback is a pretty silly idea. So I will just leave you with a few of my favorites, which I found stored in various moleskine notebooks.

“That’s why I’m talking to you. You are one of the rare people who can separate your observation from your preconception. You see what is, where most people see what they expect.”
–John Steinbeck, from East of Eden

“They had reached, she felt, a sunny island where peace dwelt, sanity reigned, and the sun forever shone, the blessed island of good boots.”
–Virginia Woolf, from To the Lighthouse

“Woman represents all the poetry that the ordinary man is capable of appreciating.”
–George Moore, from “Some Parishioners”

Some quotes are wonderful because we relate to them, or they articulate something we recognize. Some quotes are appealing simply for their turn of phrase. (I’ve always loved “the blessed island of good boots.”) And in putting this post together, I realized that quote books are also like diaries–I recall when I wrote each line. I read East of Eden my senior year of high school and was kind of transformed–I don’t think I’d ever loved a book so much, or so wholesale. I read George Moore while studying abroad in Dublin, and his stories were such a balm in what was otherwise a very harsh environment.

And then there is always Ralph Waldo Emerson, whom I could quote pretty much at random from any essay and feel good about it. Can you read my cool-girl-handwriting, above? Apparently I noted that the “last paragraph [is] crucial,” so I’ve looked it up:

Every spirit builds itself a house; and beyond its house a world; and beyond its world, a heaven. Know then, that the world exists for you. For you is the phenomenon perfect. What we are, that only can we see. All that Adam had, all that Caesar could, you have and can do. Adam called his house, heaven and earth; Caesar called his house, Rome; you perhaps call yours, a cobler’s trade; a hundred acres of ploughed land; or a scholar’s garret. Yet line for line and point for point, your dominion is as great as theirs, though without fine names. Build, therefore, your own world. As fast as you conform your life to the pure idea in your mind, that will unfold its great proportions. A correspondent revolution in things will attend the influx of the spirit. So fast will disagreeable appearances, swine, spiders, snakes, pests, madhouses, prisons, enemies, vanish; they are temporary and shall be no more seen. The sordor and filths of nature, the sun shall dry up, and the wind exhale. As when the summer comes from the south; the snow-banks melt, and the face of the earth becomes green before it, so shall the advancing spirit create its ornaments along its path, and carry with it the beauty it visits, and the song which enchants it; it shall draw beautiful faces, warm hearts, wise discourse, and heroic acts, around its way, until evil is no more seen. The kingdom of man over nature, which cometh not with observation,–a dominion such as now is beyond his dream of God,–he shall enter without more wonder than the blind man feels who is gradually restored to perfect sight.

From Nature

So…what’s your favorite quote? 😉

I subscribe to a lot of magazines. I like to get things in the mail–and these days, magazines subscription are less than $10. The downside of this is that I read a lot of garbage. With the exception of the quarterly Magnolia Journal.

I find Chip and Joanna Gaines fascinating. They are so popular and yet so traditional. The subject of Buzzfeed hit-pieces, people love to act surprised when they find out Chip and Jo are Christians who attend a Texas megachurch. Of course, the reality is that what makes them so appealing is their Christian lifestyle.

Like their Target line, the magazine is full of soothing colors. It features stories about regular people, some who do extraordinary things. Recipes that regular people can cook. And the attitude is more look what you can do than the whiny problems and overly privileged homes in other shelter magazines. It is more comfort in your surroundings than treat yo self, if that makes sense.

The most recent issue talks about resolve and Joanna’s resolve throughout this year to pause and look up when she felt herself “disengaging” from what was going on around her. Of course, this mantra made me think of this song.

I think she is right when she writes, “I was wrong to blame time for so many years, to call it a thief for moving too fast. I’ve found the real thieves are distractions and our willingness to give into them, to allow our thoughts and energy to fuel their journey towards some lesser thing…This season, let’s look up and behold the beauty of here and now.”

These days, when it can sometimes feel like darkness is winning, I appreciate reminders that it is not, wherever I can find them.

This morning, I am flying back to Baltimore — both going home and leaving home! It was a wonderful long weekend in the Midwest during peak fall foliage. We did a lot of hanging out and catching up and even some adventuring around town. I am going to let my mother provide a fuller update tomorrow, so stay tuned. But I will leave you with this quote from Catharine Maria Sedgwick, which speaks to the feeling that home will always be where you grew up… especially when nature is putting on its best show.

“Home can never be transferred; never repeated in the experience of an individual. The place consecrated by parental love, by the innocence and sports of childhood, by the first acquaintance with nature; by the linking of the heart to the visible creation, is the only home. There there is a living and breathing spirit infused into nature: every familiar object has a history—the trees have tongues, and the very air is vocal. There the vesture of decay doth not close in and control the noble functions of the soul. It sees and hears and enjoys without the ministry of gross material substance.”

From Hope Leslie; or, Early Times in the Massachusetts

I’m afraid I’ve been shelling my days lately, and it’s only when I take a breather from the task at hand that I look around with amazement at the world — usually to remember it’s there at all. Amor Towles, who wrote the title sentiment, definitely falls into the latter category. Earlier this week I played hooky from work (shh, don’t tell) and drove down to Syracuse so that #1 son James and I could attend an author-event featuring Mr. Towles. The drive down went very smoothly: no dashboard lights threatened; the weather was clear and crisp, and the GPS spoke right on cue. James and I did a little shopping and then enjoyed dinner at a local watering hole, the name of which escapes me. I was having too much fun all evening to remember such details, and of course ALL of the photos I took were as blurry as this view of downtown Syracuse that I shot through a window on the second floor of the Crouse Hinds Theater.

Downtown was hopping for a Tuesday night, but we found the vast number of crows circling overhead decidedly disconcerting. Apparently, crows are a problem in a lot of northern New York cities (e.g., Rochester and Syracuse). Halloween or not, they were creepy and reminded us of The Birds.

Photo from an article on the crow problem. I no longer have the link.

Despite the overhead threat, we had a grand time. Amor Towles did not disappoint. The product of Yale, Stanford and over 20 years in international finance, he commands all the social graces and can tell a story with perfect comedic timing. What makes him stand apart, of course, is that he has something to say. He concentrated his comments on A Gentleman in Moscow, giving us a brief history of the Hotel Metropol, where the book takes place,

and putting the plot in its historical context. Much to the surprise of many in his very large audience of (mostly) wealthy, gray-haired-female-book-club-members, he told some hard truths about the Soviet’s brand of communism. To keep the mood light, he tempered those comments with hilarious stories. It was a truly delightful evening. By the time I got to my hotel (no way I was going to drive 2.5 hours home in the dark), I found that I was way too tired to grade as I had planned. I fell to sleep immediately and slept like a log. The return trip home was uneventful, and although it had put me even further behind than had last week’s out of town guest, it was well worth it! I mean, anyone who has a bookshelf like this in his study is my kind of guy (and I’m not referring to the figures’ nationality but to their presence there at all).

From a NYT article

I’m looking forward to Towles’s next book which is due out in another year or two. In the meantime, you can read this sweet story about how he came to own his great-great-grandfather’s hatbox.

The rest of the week passed in a mad rush and ended in a destructive wind storm, the likes of which I have never experienced. It poured rain all day and night on Halloween. Only a few intrepid children came to our door. The weather continued to deteriorate, and at about 4:00 am on Friday morning I awoke to the sound of rhythmic, repeated crashing. At first I imagined the cascading fall of neighborhood garbage bins but then I woke up enough to realize that it wasn’t garbage night, so they wouldn’t be out on the curb. I got up to investigate and found that the wind had blown BOTH of our back doors wide open and the outer one kept crashing against the wall of the house. Anything could have come in! Sometimes I’m glad I’m a light sleeper.

Have a safe weekend!

*Amor Towles, Rules of Civility