“You must know that there is nothing higher and stronger and more wholesome and good for life in the future than some good memory, especially a memory of childhood, of home. People talk to you a great deal about your education, but some good, sacred memory, preserved from childhood, is perhaps the best education.”
― Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov
While organizing a whole mess of some old photos, I found this great one of my dual personality when she was on a dig in Jordan back in the 1980s. I think it was when she was getting a master’s in archaeology at Mizzou, before she went on to Yale, but if I am wrong she can set us straight. She was always much less timid than I, more like our mother. Being in the desert with a camel (and without a hairdryer) would not have fazed her much.
Anyway, I spent my weekend per usual. I went to the book sale at the Unitarian Church, braving the Prius-filled parking lot in order to search through their treasure trove of books. Their thinking may be a little to the left of whoopee, but they are good readers.
I went to three estate sales and got a few more books and then I came home and worked in the yard for awhile. It was a beautiful day–the sun was shining, the sky was blue and the daffodils were poking up.
By Sunday, the temperature had plummeted, the wind was howling and it was sleeting, but I forged on to church nevertheless. I sat with my good friend Marty. It always amuses me to remember that her son was the coolest guy in school forty years ago and wouldn’t have known me from Doris Day, but it is proof positive that all things come to those who wait, if not in a semi-skewed fashion. It is the skewed part that is the point.
God does have a sense of humor and so should we.
Write deeply upon our minds, O Lord God, the lesson of thy holy Word, that only the pure in heart can see thee. Leave us not in the bondage of any sinful inclination. May we neither deceive ourselves with the thought that we have no sin, nor acquiesce idly in aught of which our conscience accuses us. Strengthen us by thy Holy Spirit to fight the good fight of faith, and grant that no day may pass without its victory; through Jesus Christ our Lord.
–C. J. Vaughan
Have a good Monday!
I finished The Spectator Bird by Wallace Stegner on MLK Day. I think I had tried to read this book several years ago, but had put it aside. Not in the mood. When I opened it up a few days ago, however, it immediately grabbed me and held my interest. Isn’t that funny how that works? I am that much older, I guess, and receptive, therefore, to this wonderful book about a retired literary agent who starts reading his journals from a trip he took with his wife to seek his roots in Denmark twenty years earlier. Although a spring chicken myself in my fifties, I have a lot of friends who are in their seventies and eighties, and what Stegner writes struck me as very true.
“What was it? Did I feel cheated? Did I look back and feel that I had given up my chance for what they call fulfillment? Did I count the mountain peaks of my life and find every one a knoll?”
Anyway, I liked it a lot and highly recommend it. Some of the things his hero gripes about back in 1973 seem like nothing to what we put up with now. They are the same things, of course. It won the National Book Award for fiction in 1977. It always surprises me when a book I like actually receives an award.
Wallace Stegner, you will recall, was an American novelist, short story writer and environmentalist. He won the Pulitzer Prize for Angle of Repose in 1972. He was an Eagle Scout.
I also recently read Cider With Rosie by the English poet Laurie Lee published in 1959. I read about it in The Outermost Dream, a collection of essays by William Maxwell, the wonderful New Yorker editor who also wrote some good fiction and had impeccable taste. Laurie Lee was unknown to me, but my dual personality tells me that he is quite well known in Britain and that his aforementioned memoir is dearly loved there.
Well, who knew? Thanks to William Maxwell, I found out. Laurence Edward Alan “Laurie” Lee, MBE (26 June 1914 – 13 May 1997) was an English poet, novelist, and screenwriter. And, by the way, his memoir of a bygone way of life really is wonderful.
What are you reading?
P.S. The paperwhite bulbs my brother sent for Christmas are growing–not blooming yet–but soon!
Mostly this weekend was a time for catching up. I had no social plans beyond a birthday lunch with my girlfriends and church on Sunday. We had a baptism and it was good to renounce Satan and all the spiritual forces of wickedness with my brethren. At the end of the service we sang the interminably long but deeply wonderful “St. Patrick’s Breastplate”. Verse 6 always brings tears to my eyes:
Christ be with me,
Christ within me,
Christ behind me,
Christ before me,
Christ beside me,
Christ to win me,
Christ to comfort and restore me,
Christ beneath me,
Christ above me,
Christ in quiet,
Christ in danger,
Christ in hearts of all that love me,
Christ in mouth of friend and stranger.
On the literary front, I finished In the Skin of a Lion by Michael Ondaatje, which daughter #2 had encouraged me to read. I enjoyed it, but it was the kind of book where you are always aware that you are reading “literary” fiction. Not really my cup of tea. Great literature does not hit you over the head with its worthiness. Furthermore, I have to say that while some of the characters are engaging, they are also anarchists/terrorists. So again, how can you really care what happens to them? In point of fact, I didn’t.
I watched two movies–one was a really good one: Oscar and Lucinda (1997), an Australian movie directed by Gillian Armstrong and based on the Booker Award-winning novel by Peter Carey. Boy, I really liked it.
Ralph Fiennes plays an Anglican priest in the mid-18th century who is an obsessive gambler. His reasons for gambling are pure and his Pascalian argument for his legitimate use of it as a Christian, completely righteous. He meets Cate Blanchett, who is a compulsive gambler, on the ship going to Melbourne and they become friends. Lucinda bets Oscar her entire inheritance that he cannot transport a glass church to the Outback safely. Oscar accepts her wager, and this leads “to the events that will change both their lives forever.”
I was so impressed with Ralph Fiennes who plays the innocent and devout minister without the least bit of irony or judgement. He is totally believable and likable. Cate Blanchett is as always intelligent and precise and believable. Both are so good as kindred spirits. Plus there are lots of fine actors in smaller roles. The production is beautiful. The music is by Thomas Newman.
Just a great movie! I will have to read the book now.
I also watched Company (2011)–a filmed version of the Broadway show which won the Tony for Best Musical back in 1971.
I was talking to someone at work awhile back and I said I hadn’t ever seen Company and the next thing I knew he had brought it in for me. He said I’d like it. Well, I finally got around to watching it and I did not like it. Stephen Sondheim’s negative take on marriage and relationships (and women in general) is very cynical and “sophisticated”.
Puff puff. But there is not one likable/relatable character in the bunch. The main character, played by one of my least favorite actors–Neil Patrick Harris–is a jerk. Poor Mr. Sondheim. I feel that he was writing from experience.
On the home front, I took down our outside Christmas lights. It was 60-degrees yesterday so it seemed like the smart thing to do. I was impressed with what a good job the boy did putting them up. I guess he isn’t an Eagle Scout for nothin’!
Golden Globe update: FYI June Squibb is from Vandalia, Illinois. You go, Flyover Girl!
And I thought Diane Keaton was lovely.
* “Ladies Who Lunch” by Stephen Sondheim
We had a snow day yesterday–so there was no going in to work–but there was plenty of work to be done at home.
Daughter #2 and I toiled with shovels to clear the long expanse of driveway which was covered with 10-12 inches of flyover snow. In 0-degree weather.
It was cold. Bundled up as we were with our Philmont gear and layers of clothing, it was still so cold.
But we worked on and cleared a trail.
And then we drank wine in front of the fire in the afternoon. And read books.
It was 5 o’clock somewhere.
* George R.R. Martin, A Game of Thrones
I have been all over the board (and map) recently with my reading choices. I read a good mystery by James Lee Burke, In the Electric Mist with Confederate Dead. I like the detective Dave Robicheaux and the author knows what he is writing about. The characters are not wooden and/or cardboard and the locale is detailed and real. A lot of bad things happen, however, and so I probably will not be in a hurry to read more, but if you like good, well-written mysteries, here you go.
From the low life in Louisiana I headed to lovely Botswana and the fourteenth entry in the #1 Ladies Detective series by Alexander McCall Smith. As I have said before, there is certainly not a lot to these novels. Nothing much happens and some of the characters are downright annoying, but when I am in the right mood, I don’t care. I like Precious Romotswe and her little white van. The author skillfully weaves a gentle tale of friendship and family. We are reminded that people are the same everywhere and the important things in life do not change. It is good to be reminded of this.
From there I moved on to the wonderful Marilynne Robinson and her engagingly titled book of essays When I Was a Child I Read Books. I can relate to that. I love everything Marilynne has ever published–and sadly that is not a whole lot–but she is one of those people who, if I ever met her and tried to have a conversation with her, I would feel like this:
She just knows so much and is so articulate. But she is on my page. She looks at history in context. She likes to give credit where it is due. She questions arrogant scientists. She is a Calvinist. I highly recommend her, if you are up to it.
Now I am back to the what-to-read-next question. What are you reading?
*Old Walt Whitman
One of the great things about traveling is discovering new used book stores. We went to four used book stores–one in Denver, two in Laramie and one in Boulder. And, of course, I bought some books!
They usually look like this one in Laramie. One of the small pleasures of life.
Another small pleasure? College/University bookstores!
Don’t you love used books?
*Betty Smith wrote that in A Tree Grows in Brooklyn.
Last week we were in Boca Grande, Florida, staying in a luxurious condo generously loaned to us by a good friend.
It was glorious.
Clearly I am an off-season person. One of the joys of the off-season in Florida is, of course, that there are so few people around. It is quiet and relatively peaceful. You have the beach almost to yourself and the pool is peaceful except for a few polite southern children who respect your space.
It is possible to live in the moment and really relax.
Our daughters, the over-worked TV exec and the on-a-budget graduate student, could let their hair down.
Daughter #2 sliced and diced for us while daughter #1 mixed perfect margaritas. Yummo.
All week I never logged on or in to anything. (Unlike this guy.)
To each his own.
I preferred to walk on the beach and collect seashells.
The weather, I might add, was perfect–never warmer than it was at home in our flyover state. And there was always that proverbial tropical breeze blowing. Plus, we spent hours cooling off in the pool which was surrounded by lovely Floridian flora.
Then we would go into town to eat lunch or have ice cream.
Then repeat.
Enjoy a lovely dinner.
Enjoy the sunset.
We got all dressed up once and went to the fabulous (and historic) Gasparilla Inn on our second-to-last night.
I read a lot of Nathaniel Hawthorne–my kind of beach reading! And we watched a lot of Designing Women, Season 2 which daughter #1 brought along, plus various movie favorites of the mindless variety, i.e. Viva Las Vegas, Ghostbusters II, and others too embarrassing to name.
Mix in endless mother/daughter chatter and you have a priceless vacay.
Nevertheless, it’s always nice to come home, isn’t it?
But I sure do miss my girls.
“Once upon a time in the dead of winter in the Dakota Territory, Theodore Roosevelt took off in a makeshift boat down the Little Missouri River in pursuit of a couple of thieves who had stolen his prized rowboat. After several days on the river, he caught up and got the draw on them with his trusty Winchester, at which point they surrendered. Then Roosevelt set off in a borrowed wagon to haul the thieves cross-country to justice. They headed across the snow-covered wastes of the Badlands to the railhead at Dickinson, and Roosevelt walked the whole way, the entire 40 miles. It was an astonishing feat, what might be called a defining moment in Roosevelt’s eventful life. But what makes it especially memorable is that during that time, he managed to read all of Anna Karenina. I often think of that when I hear people say they haven’t time to read.”
― David McCullough
They sure don’t make ’em like him anymore.
Feb. 3, 1859 “The writer must to some extent inspire himself. Most of his sentences may at first lie dead in his essay, but when all are arranged, some life and color will be reflected on them from the mature and successful lines; they will appear to pulsate with fresh life, and he will be enabled to eke out their slumbering sense, and make them worthy of the neighborhood.”
Feb. 20, 1859 “How much the writer lives and endures in coming before the public so often! A few years or books are with him equal to a long life of experience, suffering, etc. It is well if he does not become hardened. He learns how to bear contempt and to despise himself. He makes, as it were, post-mortem examination of himself before he is dead. Such is art.”
–H.D. Thoreau, A Writer’s Journal
I wonder what old Thoreau would have thought of blogging? I think it would have suited him, don’t you? A laptop in a little cabin in the woods.
dual personalities 