dual personalities

Tag: Weekend

May 19, 2016

Soldier, keep movin’ on*

by chuckofish

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All this rain and cool weather is doing great things for the iris and for our grass–is it ever green!

In other news, the OM and the boy and I are jetting off this afternoon to Pennsylvania where my niece will get hitched this Saturday. Daughters #1, 2 and 3 all have prior engagements (two graduations and another wedding) so they are not coming. C’est la vie.

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The wedding is in Meadville, the home of Allegheny College. William McKinley, you will recall, attended this college and Clarence Darrow and Ida Tarbell graduated from it. The wedding is taking place at the Unitarian-Universalist Church.

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Fun fact: The song “Bittersweet Motel” by the Vermont jam band, Phish, was inspired when keyboardist, Page McConnell, left a wedding in Meadville and drove down to the Pittsburgh Airport.

Halfway between Erie and Pittsburgh
You’re putting me through hell
On the highway to the Bittersweet Motel

When the only tool you have is a hammer
Everything looks like a nail
And your living at the Bittersweet Motel

Indeed, there is no quick and/or easy way to get there, so this will be an adventure in more ways than not. But I am up for an adventure this weekend…how about you?

Safe travels to all who are traveling. See you ’round campus, man!

*Toby Mac

3 Comments
May 16, 2016

“O Lord, how manifold are your works!” *

by chuckofish

Happy Pentecost! How was your weekend?

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We went to the last lacrosse game of the season on Friday after work and enjoyed sitting outside on a beautiful day, watching the game and the people around us. We never talked to the boy but the OM took a few pictures of him across the field with his giant lens.

On Saturday I went to several estate sales, including one in the lovely home of the brother of a former president of the U.S. His wife died a few months ago and I suppose he is down-sizing–you know, the kids took what they wanted and they were getting rid of the rest. The house was lovely and unpretentious, full of familiar things (books and LPs and monogrammed towels) and comfortable in an old school, slightly shabby way–just my style. They even had one of these–our family totem:

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(I didn’t buy his, because I have already given one to each of my children.) I did buy an old child’s chair, which had been chewed by a family dog, and a BCP.

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A good morning’s outing to be sure.

I finished Nightwoods by Charles Frazier and I highly recommend it. Good characters, tightly paced–well done. I am now reading Hope Leslie written by Catharine Maria Sedgwick in 1827, encouraged by daughter #2 who has read all of Sedgwick’s oeuvre for her dissertation. I am pleasantly surprised to report that Sedgwick is a regular Jane Austen, writing with a wry humor about “early times in Massachusetts.” Indeed the action takes place in the early seventeenth century and explores the “tumultuous relations between Puritans and Pequots.” I love this scene, described in a letter, where the fourteen-year old son pokes fun at an Anglican newcomer during a storm:

But Dame Grafton was beside herself. At one moment she fancied we should be the prey of the wild beast, and at the next, that she heard the alarm yell of the savages. Everell brought her, her prayer-book, and affecting a well-beseeming gravity, he begged her to look out the prayer for distressed women, in imminent danger of being scalped by North American Indians. The poor lady, distracted with terror, seized the book, and turned over leaf after leaf. Everell meanwhile affecting to aid her search. In vain I shook my head, reprovingly, at the boy–in vain I assured Mistress Grafton that I trusted we were in no danger; she was beyond the influence of reason; nothing allayed her fears, till chancing to catch a glance of Everell’s eye, she detected the lurking laughter, and rapping him soundly over the ears with her book, she left the room greatly enraged.

Now that is funny. “The prayer for distressed women, in imminent danger of being scalped by North American Indians.” I already like this Catherine Maria Sedgwick a lot.

The rest of the weekend was spent pleasantly puttering around, working in the yard, eating the donuts that my friend from Atlanta brought to me at work on Friday (he was in town for the air show)–note they are the “right” donuts–

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and going to a garden party in support of the Shakespeare Festival St. Louis.

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It was held at our friend’s 1867 house high up overlooking the mighty Mississippi…

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There was even a bassett hunt.

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Not bad for a stay-at-home introvert!

*Psalm 104

4 Comments
May 13, 2016

Weekend plans

by chuckofish

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We have had a rainy, stormy week, but the forecast for the weekend is good. I plan to take it easy and prepare for next weekend when I am going to my niece’s wedding in Pennsylvania.

“I’ll read my books and I’ll drink coffee and I’ll listen to music, and I’ll bolt the door.”

–J.D. Salinger, A Boy in France: Saturday Evening Post CCXVII, March 31, 1945

Sounds like a plan to me.

(The painting is by Thomas Hart Benton)

6 Comments
May 2, 2016

Stir up, O south, the boughs that bloom…”*

by chuckofish

…Till the beloved Master come…”

How was your weekend? Mine was quiet and restorative, but also a little sad, since I was thinking always of the weekend before when so many people were visiting. C’est la vie.

I finished E.L. Doctorow’s The March, which, again I say, is so good and wise and well-written.

I did a little yard work, but it was pretty wet and rainy. It is certainly looking lush in flyover land.

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I watched a few movies: Sands of Iwo Jima (1949), which I finally got my hands on…

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(This film recreates the famous raising of the flag on Iwo Jima scene, taken on Feb. 23, 1945, by photographer Joe Rosenthal. The three surviving flag raisers make a cameo appearance during this scene . Rene A. Gagnon, Ira H. Hayes and John H. Bradley are seen with John Wayne as he instructs them to hoist the flag (Wayne gives the folded flag to Gagnon). The flag used to recreate the incident is the actual flag that was raised on Mount Suribachi.)

and Learning to Drive (2014), a little film starring Ben Kingsley as a Sikh taxi driver/driving instructor and Patricia Clarkson as a book critic whose marriage is falling apart.

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Both supplied an entertaining diversion, but were not super great, if you know what I mean. Sands of Iwo Jima features John Wayne saying “Saddle Up!” continuously, so it wins as far as I’m concerned.

I went to church and was a reader–my passage was from Revelation 21 by John, the Revelator, so that was fun. The first lesson was from the book of Acts where Paul goes to Philippi in Macedonia and goes down to the river to pray and meets Lydia. All this made me want to watch O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000) which I did.

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It was a good choice. (And the last good movie George Clooney made.)

(This is how my mind works.)

*Gerald Near, Christ Has a Garden Walled Around

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April 18, 2016

With hearts aflame*

by chuckofish

It was a lovely flyover weekend with temperatures here near 80 degrees on Sunday.

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I worked hard outside on Saturday spreading mulch and my back hurt on Sunday so I slowed down some. I planted geraniums in pots.

FullSizeRenderThe boy came over on Saturday night because he was “batching  it”–we watched our all-time favorite episodes of Miami Vice:

“Out Where the Buses Don’t Run” (season 2, episode 3)

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with Bruce McGill as Hank Weldon

and “El Viejo” (season 3, episode 7)

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with Willie Nelson as Jake Pierson

They never disappoint. We are huge nerds, I know, but we amuse ourselves.

In church we sang one of my favorite hymns which always makes me cry.

And it did.

I leave you with the third verse:

The sure provisions of my God attend me all my days;

oh, may thy house be mine abode and all my work be praise.

There would I find a settled rest, while others go and come;

no more a stranger or a guest, but like a child at home.

(Isaac Watts)

Have a good week.

*Hymn #478, Jesus, our  mighty Lord, our strength in sadness

8 Comments
April 11, 2016

Consider the lilies of the field

by chuckofish

How was your weekend? Mine was pretty busy–at least for me. I went to a few estate sales, but didn’t find anything of note. I went to a funeral and I went to a fundraiser that daughter #3 had organized with the student government of the high school where she teaches. It was a benefit for the Greater St. Louis Honor Flight which sends WWII veterans to Washington to see the WWII memorial there. The boy was a “guardian” on one of these trips a few years ago. Anyway, we enjoyed the event and the movie about how the charity was started.

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Afterwards we went out for pizza and beer.

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When I got home I tried to watch Straw Dog (1949), the great Akira Kurosawa film about post-war Japan. A very young and handsome Toshiro Mifune plays a rookie detective who has lost his gun and is madly trying to find it. It is a great, great movie, but I fell asleep.

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Mea culpa. It had been a long day.

I re-read Ellen Foster by Kaye Gibbons. It was her first book and very good indeed.

On Sunday I did a lot of cleaning in my house, throwing away copious amounts of detritus. This always makes me happy.

Now it is Monday. Daughter #1 starts her new job. She no longer works for The Man, but for a start-up digital network, working with creative types who have man-buns.  You go, girl!

P.S. Don’t forget in all the hubbub of your daily life to take a moment and enjoy the scenery.

Vintage illustration by Mary Blair

Vintage illustration by Mary Blair

6 Comments
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?

3 Comments
February 15, 2016

Meet, right and our bounden duty

by chuckofish

Sunday was the first Sunday in Lent so we had the Great Litany at the beginning of our service–you know, that’s the one where we implore Christ to preserve us from evil and wickedness, from sin, from the crafts and assaults of the devil, and from everlasting damnation, etc, etc, etc.

We also switch to Rite I in our church so we go back to “and with thy spirit” and “we most heartily thank thee for that thou dost feed us, in these holy mysteries.” Of course, I am one of only a handful of people that probably enjoys this, but oh well, c’est la vie.

It snowed Sunday morning, so a lot of people stayed home, and I might have myself but for the fact that I was reading. It was a good reading too: Romans 10:8b–13

The word is near you, on your lips and in your heart (that is, the word of faith which we preach); 9 because, if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For man believes with his heart and so is justified, and he confesses with his lips and so is saved.11 The scripture says, “No one who believes in him will be put to shame.” 12 For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; the same Lord is Lord of all and bestows his riches upon all who call upon him. 13 For, “every one who calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved.”

After church, I had to go to the grocery store to pick up the cake for the baby shower I was co-hosting with Becky. The driving was worse than ever, but I got the cake and made it home. Then the OM drove me over to the baby shower and dropped me off with all my stuff. It was a fun party and the mama-to-be received a lot of presents.

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Daughter #1 sent her a present from NYC and it was a big hit.

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Ah, sunrise, sunset. And now it is Monday and I don’t have Presidents Day off. Hats off anyway to Washington and Lincoln, Rutherford B. Hayes

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and cousin Lyss

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et al. Huzzah.

3 Comments
February 8, 2016

“While life’s dark maze I tread”*

by chuckofish

Yesterday was the last Sunday in Epiphany. We are heading into Lent. Tomorrow we eat pancakes.

I had another confirmation class to go to on Sunday which meant another painful meeting with the eighth graders! We had a lesson in using a concordance. I thought this was kind of fun, but then I am such a nerd. We mentors were instructed to bring a bible with a concordance, so I hauled out my old NIV study bible from back in the day when I was in a small group. It made me realize how seldom I use it, now that one can find everything on the computer–and so fast!

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Anyway, I told my ‘mentee’ as we were leaving that when she was bored sometime she should play with the concordance. It really can be fun. You know, look up words and then follow up with the bible verses. Super fun and better than trolling your iPhone! She smiled and nodded enthusiastically, probably thinking, “OMG, how did I get stuck with this person?”

The weather this weekend was warm and springlike. I ran a lot of errands and even induced the OM to go to an estate sale on “The Hill”–an historically Italian-American neighborhood in south city which is terra incognita to me.

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The estate sale was run by the most reputable and high-end estate sale company and the pictures online looked like there was a lot of good stuff, so I wanted to check it out. We got lost of course, but we finally found it–right around the corner from St. Ambrose Church.

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The exhilaration of finding the place was unfortunately followed by the let down of most of the good stuff being already gone. C’est la vie. I did a little sleuthing and figured out that the house was owned by a retired Episcopal priest! Do I have a nose for finding Episcopalians or what? Even in the heart of Little Italy. I bought one of his bibles for $2. There were a bunch of old Vanderbilt yearbooks, which, had I been alone, I might have perused and even bought. I get a kick out of old yearbooks.

We had dinner out with the boy and daughter #3 and her parents on Saturday and we went to a Super Bowl party for oldsters, where we mostly watched the commercials. The PSA about the rampant problem with heroin starred a girl from our church!

Which I guess really brings home the message of heroin addiction and the girl next door. Sigh. I remember Tori (or maybe it was her sister) as a toddler going up to communion with her mother and saying in a loud voice, “Crackers? I want a cracker!” My older and more sophisticated daughters thought that was uproariously funny and for years afterwards would say, “Crackers? I want a cracker!” at inappropriate times.

And Peytie Pie won the Super Bowl!

Well, it’s Monday. Have a good one!

*Ray Palmer, 1830, “My Faith Looks Up to Thee”

3 Comments
February 1, 2016

In a mirror, dimly*

by chuckofish

12622510_536756126494538_6594554921321818546_oIn flyover news, the Anheuser-Busch Brewing Company announced last week that Mac, the first foal of 2016, was born at Warm Springs Ranch in Boonville, Mo., joining more than 160 other horses in the beer giant’s stable. Hello, Mac!

Over the weekend the OM and I attended the “Elegant Italian Dinner,” an annual fundraising event for the youth mission trip at church. It was, as usual, a jolly good time. What is it about heated up lasagna and a side salad in a dimly lit church hall that always hits the spot?

The next morning I got up and went to the 8 o’clock service at church so that we could go out to breakfast afterwards with the boy and daughter #3 at our favorite diner.

photo from yelp.com

photo from yelp.com

The OM had never been there, but he liked it, I guess, because he ate his slinger and then finished daughter #3’s waffle a la mode.

Anyway, the 8 o’clock service is a shorter service because there is no music (besides the Voluntary at the beginning and end of the service). It appeals to an older crowd and also to the golfers in the congregation. It is not really  my cup of tea. I also skipped the 155th Annual Meeting which followed.  I forgave myself.

I finished the mystery I was reading by the Danish author Jussi Adler-Olsen, The Keeper of Lost Causes. It is the first in the Department Q series about detective Carl Morck. I thought it was very good–character-driven and darkly humorous. I will definitely read more in this series.

I watched Red River (1948) and really enjoyed it. John Wayne and Montgomery Clift are really pretty great together. Clift never overplays his hand, never tries to upstage John Wayne, but is a real presence in every scene. He appears to be confident and at ease and not bad on horseback. I was impressed. Needless to say, this is no mean feat, because John Wayne is mythic in this part.

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*I Cor. 13: 12 (or “through a glass, darkly” KJV)

2 Comments