dual personalities

March 4, 2016

A woman at the sink

by chuckofish

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“My thoughts went round and round and it occurred to me that if I ever wrote a novel it would be of the ‘stream of consciousness’ type and deal with an hour in the life of a woman at the sink. I felt resentful and bitter towards Helena and Rocky and even towards Julian, though I had to admit that nobody had compelled me to wash these dishes or to tidy this kitchen. It was the fussy spinster in me, the Martha who could not comfortably sit and make conversation when she knew that yesterday’s unwashed dishes were still in the sink.”

―Barbara Pym, Excellent Women

It’s been a busy week and I am looking forward to  my weekend. How about you?

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March 3, 2016

“A chiz is a swiz or swindle as any fule kno.”*

by chuckofish

Today is the birthday of Ronald William Fordham Searle, CBE, RDI (March 3, 1920 – December 30, 2011) who was a British artist and illustrator, best remembered as the creator of St. Trinian’s School

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and for his collaboration with Geoffrey Willans on the Molesworth series.

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We were very fond of Ronald Searle growing up and my family always read aloud the Christmas chapter from How to Be Topp on Christmas Eve.

Searle grew up in Cambridge. At the age of 19 he gave up his art studies and joined the Royal Engineers at the start of WWII.  Searle was stationed in Singapore. After a month of fighting in Malaya, Singapore fell to the Japanese,  and he was taken prisoner. He spent the rest of the war as a prisoner, first in Changi Prison and then in the Kwai jungle, working on the Siam-Burma Death Railway. He contracted both beri-beri and malaria. He was liberated in late 1945 with the final defeat of the Japanese.

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I have a copy of his book Ronald Searle To the Kwai and Back, War Drawings 1939–1945, an amazing pictorial record of his war years, three of them in Japanese prisoner of war camps.

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In it he recorded the “grafitti of a condemned man, intending to leave a rough witness of his passing through, but who found himself–to the surprise and delight–among the reprieved.”

Immediately after the war, he served as a courtroom artist at the Nuremberg trials.

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Eichmann in court

Like many funny men, he had a very serious past.

So a birthday toast to Ronald Searle!

And another toast to George Kennedy who died last Sunday. Like Searle, he was  91 when he died and had a long, interesting life. A prolific actor of film and television, he won a best supporting Oscar for Cool Hand Luke (1967) and made several movies with John Wayne, including Cahill U.S. Marshall (1973), The Sons of Katie Elder (1965) and In Harm’s Way (1965). He also had memorable parts in Charade (1963), Bandolero! (1968) and The Dirty Dozen (1967).

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Quite a career. Any of these movies are worth watching. As for me, it might be time to watch The Sons of Katie Elder again.

*Molesworth, “Down with Skool!” (1953)

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March 2, 2016

Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us*

by chuckofish

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Daughter #1 is training again for another half marathon (her third!) which she will run next week in Washington D.C. Daughter #2 and I will be there to cheer her on. I could never actually run in a half marathon myself…indeed, I am doing my best not to complete a Snoopy-type triathlon.

But we are all running a race, aren’t we? Some say it’s a rat race. But I am not a rat, are you?

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I guess everything hinges on what you believe the prize to be, right?

(Discuss among yourselves.)

Here’s a little mid-week pep talk from George S. Patton, U.S. Army General and 1912 Olympian

Now if you are going to win any battle you have to do one thing. You have to make the mind run the body. Never let the body tell the mind what to do. The body will always give up. It is always tired morning, noon, and night. But the body is never tired if the mind is not tired. When you were younger the mind could make you dance all night, and the body was never tired…You’ve always got to make the mind take over and keep going.

We can always use a good mid-week pep talk.

Keep straining forward.

And from the Did-You-Know Department: The Last Race (2016) is in post-production. It stars Joseph Fiennes as Eric Liddell, who, you will recall, was the hero of Chariots of Fire (1981). This film was shot largely in China where Liddell is a hero. It deals with Liddell’s work as a missionary in China after his victorious turn at the 1924 Paris Olympics. Apparently the Chinese consider Liddell to be “China’s first gold medalist.” Good news indeed!

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*Hebrews 12:1

13 Comments
March 1, 2016

Lead me to the rock that is higher than I*

by chuckofish

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A new month, a new calendar page. The year is zooming by.

And March is going to be very busy, but I am not going to be overwhelmed by it.

We have fallen so much into the habit of being always busy that we know not how or when to break it off with firmness. Our business tags after us into the midst of our pleasures, and we are ill at ease beyond the reach of the telegraph and the daily newspaper.

–Henry Van Dyke, 1899

What would old Henry think of our iPhones and our personal computers? Zut alors!

I am trying to turn off the electronics an hour or two before I turn in at night. It seems like a good idea.

*Psalm 61:2

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February 29, 2016

Tell old pharoah

by chuckofish

Amaryllis

The Old Testament reading on Sunday was about God appearing to Moses in the form of a Burning Bush (Exodus 3:1-15). I suppose that was why we sang Go Down, Moses as our communion hymn. We gave it our best shot tried, but Episcopalians plus negro spirituals equals truly awkward. We just can’t swing it, literally.

We had a lovely, balmy weekend and I tried to get out and about, but was still recovering from my cough/cold/whatever. I re-organized a large cupboard filled with an assortment of dishes, serving pieces, silver, holiday decorations, cleaning supplies, ephemera, etcetera. This turned into quite a job as you can imagine, but I got it all sorted out, cleaned and put away. I actually threw away very little (typical).

Since officially giving up on Humboldt’s Gift, I perused several bookshelves at home and picked out several possible books to read. I settled on The Proper Bostonian by Cleveland Amory, which I had picked up some time ago at an estate sale. It proved to be very enjoyable  and full of information. Published in 1947, it “is as humorous and entertaining as anything that could be written about the Boston Brahmins–the Cabots, Lodges, Lowells, Adamses and others that make Boston a synonym for staidness and sobriety.” (Chicago Tribune) Now there’s a qualified recommendation for you! I am learning all about Boston’s First Families and the foibles of the “Proper Boston lady” and the “Proper Boston gentleman.”

This is particularly interesting to me as our maternal grandmother was a Sargent  after all and lived on Clarendon Street in Back Bay for years. She was, indeed, a “Proper Boston lady.”

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When our parents gave their third child the middle name ‘Sargent,’ our grandmother’s response was  not, “Oh, how nice,” but “Well, finally.”

Well, more on this later, because it is Monday and the bell tolleth for me. Have a good week!

P.S. I watched part of the Oscars–why? Why did they keep playing Que Sera Sera? It was a strange show. But I didn’t watch the whole thing. I went to bed. Give me some credit.

(The OM took the photo of the amaryllis.)

3 Comments
February 27, 2016

Picture in a Frame

by chuckofish

Winter finally arrived. We have had some interesting weather — ice, snow, rain,  then more ice, snow and rain, followed by cold, cold temps. Walking around is really quite a challenge. In the midst of all that and after years of procrastination, I was seized with the impulse to have a couple of pictures framed. So I did, and they turned out beautifully. I haven’t even fallen down yet (touch wood).

First, is a self-portrait that boy #2 painted in high school (I think), and which I’ve always loved because it really captures some elusive quality — and maybe it’s a little melancholy (and you know what a sucker I am for melancholy).

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As you can see, I have not hung it up yet. Nor am I capable of taking a photo that isn’t blurry or ill-lit. But you get the idea. Didn’t it turn out nicely?

The other picture I got framed is a watercolor of Dartmoor that I bought years ago in an antique shop in Okehampton, England. It’s not an antique — not even close, but I like it a lot. Once again, you have to use your imagination as my photographic skills  are on the weak side (to say the least) and the colors a tad washed out. Here it is leaning crookedly and blurrily against a chair in my family room.

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The prospect of spring’s arrival always makes me start planning home improvements. Certainly, new wall art is an easy way to improve a room. The portrait is going in the family room. I’m not sure about the watercolor. The green would go nicely in my downstairs bathroom, but that seems a bit of a waste. I’ll probably end up moving things around — spring improvements here we come!

Once I hang the pictures, I’m going to continue my big project, which is cleaning out  #1 son’s large bedroom closet so that I can use it to store family heirlooms that need more temperature control than the attic offers. It would also make an excellent linen closet. Onward and upward!

Enjoy your weekend!

 

 

3 Comments
February 26, 2016

Deep thoughts for Friday

by chuckofish

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Do you have plans for the weekend?

I will probably watch more episodes of The Rockford Files because I cannot get enough, it seems, of watching ol’ James Garner struggle in and out of that Firebird.

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He tries gamely to make his aging athlete’s body do what he wants it to do, but the camera frequently catches him limping after some bad guy or another.

Well, I guess I can relate to the aging PI.

Anyway, I thought I would choose a movie with an aging hero in it for my Friday movie pick, but it’s not so easy to think of one! If you google “Movies about old people” or some variation on that theme, you get a list of terrible movies like On Golden Pond (1981)–the worst!

So here are a few suggestions of movies I like that feature an aging hero/heroine(s)–but no wimps or sentimental stereotypes:

Grumpy Old Men (1993) with Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon–a classic.

GRUMPY OLD MEN, Jack Lemmon, Walter Matthau, 1993

Gran Torino (2008) with Clint Eastwood as a snarling old badass. Darn good.

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The Grey Fox (1982) with Richard Farnsworth in his first starring role at age 62–but good luck getting your hands on this one! I don’t think it has ever been released on DVD. Actually any movie with Richard Farnsworth would work in this category.

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Fried Green Tomatoes (1991) with Jessica Tandy as the amazing Ninny Threadgoode.

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Another along this line is Elizabeth Patterson as Miss Eunice Habersham in Intruder in the Dust (1949)–but then no one was better at writing old ladies than William Faulkner.

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True Grit (1969) with John Wayne as Rooster Cogburn or Rooster Cogburn (1975) with both Wayne and Katharine Hepburn–both playing aging badasses.

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Tom Horn (1980) with Steve McQueen in his last movie. This is a pretty sad one, because Steve was dying in real life and you can kind of tell. But it’s a good one, for sure.

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Here’s Steve with Richard Farnsworth and two lucky old ladies

Can you think of any others?

All of these oldsters make the forty-something Jim Rockford seem pretty young and with it in comparison. And me too.

Of course, if you prefer a more highbrow pursuit, you can read what Ralph Waldo Emerson had to say about Old Age here.

Have a good weekend!

3 Comments
February 25, 2016

Throwback Thursday–snow day edition

by chuckofish

K&S snow

Here is a snapshot of the dual personalities fifty years ago–circa 1965–in Forest Park. There’s not a lot of snow in evidence, but by today’s standards, it’s a snowpocalypse.

We had a snow day yesterday, in fact–all the schools were closed.

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A heavy, wet snow fell–we had about 4 inches in the morning–but it turned to slush very fast.

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I went out to shovel our front walk and it was like shoveling a slushie. But a lot of people lost their power when tree limbs fell on power lines and transformers blew. It was kind of a mess.

Since I am still recovering from my bad cold/cough/flu/whatever, I was glad to stay home and, except for my brief foray into the yard, take it easy.

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Sometimes there is nothing better than a Jim Rockford marathon.

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Nothing makes the present look better than a trip down memory lane into the 1970s when detectives talked on pay phones, everyone smoked,

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used styrofoam without guilt and drove cars that guzzled gas like nobody’s business.

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No offense, Jim. You were the greatest. Even though nothing ever worked out for you, even when you solved the crime and nabbed the bad guy.

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I mean, did you ever get paid? By anyone?

Have a good Thursday!

4 Comments
February 24, 2016

All my friends

by chuckofish

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If you cannot read all your books, at any rate…peer into them, let them fall open where they will, read from the first sentence that arrests the eye, set them back on the shelves with your own hands, arrange them on your own plan so that you at least know where they are. Let them be your friends; let them be your acquaintances.

–Winston Churchill (1874–1965)

This is going to be my next project, arranging my books “on my own plan.” I already sort of do this, but I could do a better job.

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All right, Winston, I accept your challenge.

5 Comments
February 23, 2016

In yo’ life

by chuckofish

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“You gwyne to have considerable trouble in yo’ life, en considerable joy. Sometimes you gwyne to git hurt, en sometimes you gwyne to git sick; but every time you’s gwyne to git well agin.”

–Mark Twain, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

While sick, I have cleaned up my DVR list and watched several movies that have been sitting there for a while. I watched The Adventures of Mark Twain (1944) starring Frederic March as our famous native son. It was entertaining but pretty white-washed. At least it did stress the fact that Twain was a hero for publishing President Grant’s war memoirs and giving him 70% of the profits. And there’s a good scene where he receives an honorary degree from Oxford.

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Onward and upward.

3 Comments