Things have been quiet around here for the last week or so. Traffic is light, Starbucks has been mostly empty, and there's a feeling that everybody must be out of town on vacation. It's very pleasant. Even the fireflies seem to be off napping somewhere.
Coinciding with that, we've had sort of a summer version of a polar vortex, with a storm front moving in and cooling things down, trailing ragged thunderclouds and pinkish-gold sunsets in its wake. It's amazing how charming a cold spell can be when it happens in the middle of July, dropping temperatures to the 70s, lowering humidity, and still allowing the sun to shine.
A little over a week ago, it was so humid that even at 8:30 at night, walking was like wading slowly through curtains of moisture. I much prefer that to walking through sleet and snow, but it does sap your energy if it goes on long enough. After a week of storm clouds wildly chasing sunshine, and vice versa, we're back to heat and humidity, though I understand we're in for another cooling spell in a day or so.
Among the charms of a summer evening's walk this week, I have spotted: toadstools, like something from a nursery rhyme, right on my street; a cardinal on a treetop silhouetted against the sky; two rabbits sitting together in a field; scampering chipmunks; porches edged with riotous flowers; and a complex sunset of mauve, pink, and orange. Tonight, big, fat cumulus clouds, tinged with apricot from the setting sun, seemed too lazy even to move, as if an artist had painted them on the backdrop of the sky and then went off on tea break, leaving them hanging.
If you looked at the image of July in one of those medieval books of hours, like the Très Riches Heures du Duc Berry, you would see what July looks like around here, minus the sheep and the castle. In fact, there is a street named Kastle near here, and there's a house not far away where (I'm not kidding) a sheep used to graze in the yard, so with a little imagination you can see some overlap. It's a pity the sheep is gone. I never saw it in the summer, but it would have made a lovely Très Rich Hours scene, Kentucky style, to go with all the cardinals, rabbits, hostas, and begonias of our suburban summer.
Tuesday, July 22, 2014
Tuesday, July 15, 2014
Shall We Gather at the River?
In my first year of graduate school, I tried to figure out the myths we currently live by in America, in the absence of a single religious tradition and the presence of multiculturalism. It was hard to identify one thing that most people hold as sacred until someone mentioned money. I guess I was reaching for something loftier, thinking that surely there was something grander we all subscribe to. I was slow to come to the realization, but you know, money explains a lot of things.
This unpleasant truth has slowly become clearer to me as I've watched the news over the last few years. It's not that there's anything wrong with making money, but when it becomes the highest value, with no other principles to check it, things get out of whack pretty quickly. Jung talked about the importance of balance in psychic health, of not having too much of one attitude or value to the detriment of others, and this is true at the collective level as well as the individual.
Some depth psychologists, like Thomas Singer, talk about the idea of "cultural complexes," recurring themes in the nation's psyche that play out in social life, politics, cultural trends, entertainment, and the media. Over time, it's possible to work through some of these complexes, as we grow conscious of them, through debate, compromise, lawmaking, and social change. It's a long process, and one that only works when all of the viewpoints on an issue, whether it's gun control, abortion, or affirmative action, are heard, considered, debated, and tested. Singer has said that it's usually a mistake to locate soul and "rightness" on only one side of an issue. Only deep engagement, passionate disagreement, consideration, argument, reconsideration, and compromise, over and over, for as long as it takes, can ever resolve things.
Interestingly, the cultural complex surrounding materialism in our society is the area in which Singer sees little engagement, meaning that we remain stuck in any issues touched by money--which, after all, covers a lot of territory. From tax reform to corporate regulation, from consumer protection to the role of money in political campaigns, from economic growth to health care, we run into stalemates time and again because the high value placed on the making of money clashes with so many of our other values.
Everybody knows the story of King Midas, who was gracious when one of Dionysus's satyrs fell asleep in his vineyard and was in turn granted anything he desired by Dionysus. When Midas asked for the power to turn anything he touched into gold, even Dionysus (not exactly a model of moderation) asked if he was sure that's what he wanted. Midas got his wish, which seemed like a great thing for the first half hour or so, until he killed his own child by the touch of his hand and found that even his food and drink turned into metal. It turned out there was a cure, which involved bathing in the river Pactolus, though Midas couldn't undo the damage he'd already done. It's assumed he emerged from the river considerably chastened.
Talk abut a tale for our time!
I read an article yesterday discussing the recent Pew Research Center finding that the number of Americans who think the United States is "exceptional" is dropping. This is true regardless of political party, and the trend is especially evident among those aged 18-29; only 15 percent of them think the United States stands above other nations. There is more than one way to look at these statistics, of course (exceptional in what way, exactly?), but Aaron Blake and Jaime Fuller of the Washington Post suggest that this finding is related to another trend, revealed by a recent Gallup poll. In 2013, Gallup found that Americans' satisfaction with the level of freedom in their lives has fallen 12 percentage points since 2006 (we're now in 36th place). Gallup explains the drop in terms of unhappiness with the economy, the government, and corruption. In other words, the New Normal.
Most of the people I know do live by other values besides money, and I believe we've always taken it for granted that our country stands for much more than power and greed. The question is, are we still justified in feeling that way? And if money is the root of so many of our current problems, what can we do about it?
I think a reasonable first step might be to get clear on the things that matter to us most. If we want to curb the influence of money and support other values in our culture, we can do it, but we have to have the will. Do we have that will? It's a big question. What else do we hold dear, and what else do we think makes life worth living? What do we want our country to stand for? Maybe the right place to start the conversation is with questions like these.
This unpleasant truth has slowly become clearer to me as I've watched the news over the last few years. It's not that there's anything wrong with making money, but when it becomes the highest value, with no other principles to check it, things get out of whack pretty quickly. Jung talked about the importance of balance in psychic health, of not having too much of one attitude or value to the detriment of others, and this is true at the collective level as well as the individual.
Some depth psychologists, like Thomas Singer, talk about the idea of "cultural complexes," recurring themes in the nation's psyche that play out in social life, politics, cultural trends, entertainment, and the media. Over time, it's possible to work through some of these complexes, as we grow conscious of them, through debate, compromise, lawmaking, and social change. It's a long process, and one that only works when all of the viewpoints on an issue, whether it's gun control, abortion, or affirmative action, are heard, considered, debated, and tested. Singer has said that it's usually a mistake to locate soul and "rightness" on only one side of an issue. Only deep engagement, passionate disagreement, consideration, argument, reconsideration, and compromise, over and over, for as long as it takes, can ever resolve things.
Interestingly, the cultural complex surrounding materialism in our society is the area in which Singer sees little engagement, meaning that we remain stuck in any issues touched by money--which, after all, covers a lot of territory. From tax reform to corporate regulation, from consumer protection to the role of money in political campaigns, from economic growth to health care, we run into stalemates time and again because the high value placed on the making of money clashes with so many of our other values.
Everybody knows the story of King Midas, who was gracious when one of Dionysus's satyrs fell asleep in his vineyard and was in turn granted anything he desired by Dionysus. When Midas asked for the power to turn anything he touched into gold, even Dionysus (not exactly a model of moderation) asked if he was sure that's what he wanted. Midas got his wish, which seemed like a great thing for the first half hour or so, until he killed his own child by the touch of his hand and found that even his food and drink turned into metal. It turned out there was a cure, which involved bathing in the river Pactolus, though Midas couldn't undo the damage he'd already done. It's assumed he emerged from the river considerably chastened.
Talk abut a tale for our time!
I read an article yesterday discussing the recent Pew Research Center finding that the number of Americans who think the United States is "exceptional" is dropping. This is true regardless of political party, and the trend is especially evident among those aged 18-29; only 15 percent of them think the United States stands above other nations. There is more than one way to look at these statistics, of course (exceptional in what way, exactly?), but Aaron Blake and Jaime Fuller of the Washington Post suggest that this finding is related to another trend, revealed by a recent Gallup poll. In 2013, Gallup found that Americans' satisfaction with the level of freedom in their lives has fallen 12 percentage points since 2006 (we're now in 36th place). Gallup explains the drop in terms of unhappiness with the economy, the government, and corruption. In other words, the New Normal.
Most of the people I know do live by other values besides money, and I believe we've always taken it for granted that our country stands for much more than power and greed. The question is, are we still justified in feeling that way? And if money is the root of so many of our current problems, what can we do about it?
I think a reasonable first step might be to get clear on the things that matter to us most. If we want to curb the influence of money and support other values in our culture, we can do it, but we have to have the will. Do we have that will? It's a big question. What else do we hold dear, and what else do we think makes life worth living? What do we want our country to stand for? Maybe the right place to start the conversation is with questions like these.
Tuesday, July 8, 2014
Wine for the Palate, Yarrow for the Heart
There's something in Vanessa Diffenbaugh's novel The Language of Flowers that makes me think of the movie Sideways. It may not seem that a teen-age orphan making her way in the world after years of foster care and a frustrated middle-aged oenophile should have much in common, but they do. There's the central role of grapes and vineyards in both stories, of course, but there's also a similarity of mythic themes.
At first glance, Sideways seems to be about one thing primarily, and that is romance. The film is replete with sensual images: wining and dining, epicurean picnics at sunset, flirting, and long drives through gorgeous fields of ripening grapes. Aphrodite's presence is so strong and beautifully rendered that it initially diverts attention from another, more patient figure in the story.
In keeping with Miles' tendency to devote himself to sybaritic pursuits while shying away from love, the movie seduces with soft-focus images of romantic dinners and voluptuous wines. Meanwhile, another goddess bides her time, making herself known only through subtle gestures. That's Demeter, notable mostly for her absence at first but coming into clear focus in the scene in which Maya asks Miles about his obsession with Pinot and in turn shares her feelings about the life cycle of the grape. No mere aficionado, Maya is the real deal. She not only loves to see things grow but is perceptive enough to understand that the key to Miles is bound up in his appreciation for a temperamental grape that needs a lot of nurturing to thrive. The subtle language of wine, shared by Miles and Maya, leads from sensual appreciation to something more deeply sustaining.
In The Language of Flowers, Victoria seems to have little going for her on her emancipation at age 18 from the group home in which she's been living. She shares Miles' penchant for acting out and has her own troubled and unhappy past. She, too, has a secret, sophisticated, and sensitive knowledge of a little-known subject, in her case the symbolism of flowers. Desperate to avoid living on the streets, she asks a florist for a job, revealing her innate gift for combining flowers not merely in beautiful arrangements but in a manner that speaks true. Unknown even to herself, Victoria is a healer, skilled at hearing what a giver wants to say to a recipient and knowing how to say it.
Like Miles, Victoria has betrayed and been betrayed and is afraid of intimacy. As her growing success as a flower arranger begins to open a new life for her, she, too, confronts the possibility of love. The not-easily-deflected interest of Grant, a farmer and purveyor she encounters in the flower market, simultaneously leads to a halting romance and a re-engagement with the traumatic past. Grant also speaks the rare language of flowers, which both intrigues and frightens Victoria but ultimately proves too difficult to ignore.
Nurturing takes many forms in this story. As in Sideways, Demeter is first absent, ineffectual, or deflected and then unmistakably central. Victoria begins to encounter one maternal figure after another, from her employer, to her roommate, to her employer's mother, a midwife and wise woman. Even Grant is a nurturing figure. Finally, and surprisingly, Victoria discovers that the imperfect mothering she received in the past, which had seemed so insufficient, was in fact perhaps enough. Grant leads her to a rapprochement with the woman who nearly adopted her years ago and whose teachings about the language of flowers proved to be a true mother's gift.
Flowers generally fall into the realm of Aphrodite, with their beauty and sensual appeal, but in this story they represent nurturing, care, true insight, and love. As in Sideways, a symbol with one meaning proves to have unsuspected dimensions, leading the way delicately from mistrust to trust and from insufficiency to abundance. Miles and Victoria play multiple roles, though the most prominent one for each is perhaps Persephone, at first sojourning in the Underworld and finally returning to life. Miles, Victoria, and the characters who surround them are examples of the way mythic themes surface in remarkably different contexts, all but unrecognizable sometimes but ever persistent.
Unlike some love stories, which seem too lightweight and inconsequential to be believed, both Sideways and The Language of Flowers have a gritty layer of reality. My guess is that this is because neither story stops with physical attraction but also acknowledges the importance of nurturing and understanding. Both stories are ultimately grounded in the earth.
At first glance, Sideways seems to be about one thing primarily, and that is romance. The film is replete with sensual images: wining and dining, epicurean picnics at sunset, flirting, and long drives through gorgeous fields of ripening grapes. Aphrodite's presence is so strong and beautifully rendered that it initially diverts attention from another, more patient figure in the story.
In keeping with Miles' tendency to devote himself to sybaritic pursuits while shying away from love, the movie seduces with soft-focus images of romantic dinners and voluptuous wines. Meanwhile, another goddess bides her time, making herself known only through subtle gestures. That's Demeter, notable mostly for her absence at first but coming into clear focus in the scene in which Maya asks Miles about his obsession with Pinot and in turn shares her feelings about the life cycle of the grape. No mere aficionado, Maya is the real deal. She not only loves to see things grow but is perceptive enough to understand that the key to Miles is bound up in his appreciation for a temperamental grape that needs a lot of nurturing to thrive. The subtle language of wine, shared by Miles and Maya, leads from sensual appreciation to something more deeply sustaining.
In The Language of Flowers, Victoria seems to have little going for her on her emancipation at age 18 from the group home in which she's been living. She shares Miles' penchant for acting out and has her own troubled and unhappy past. She, too, has a secret, sophisticated, and sensitive knowledge of a little-known subject, in her case the symbolism of flowers. Desperate to avoid living on the streets, she asks a florist for a job, revealing her innate gift for combining flowers not merely in beautiful arrangements but in a manner that speaks true. Unknown even to herself, Victoria is a healer, skilled at hearing what a giver wants to say to a recipient and knowing how to say it.
Like Miles, Victoria has betrayed and been betrayed and is afraid of intimacy. As her growing success as a flower arranger begins to open a new life for her, she, too, confronts the possibility of love. The not-easily-deflected interest of Grant, a farmer and purveyor she encounters in the flower market, simultaneously leads to a halting romance and a re-engagement with the traumatic past. Grant also speaks the rare language of flowers, which both intrigues and frightens Victoria but ultimately proves too difficult to ignore.
Nurturing takes many forms in this story. As in Sideways, Demeter is first absent, ineffectual, or deflected and then unmistakably central. Victoria begins to encounter one maternal figure after another, from her employer, to her roommate, to her employer's mother, a midwife and wise woman. Even Grant is a nurturing figure. Finally, and surprisingly, Victoria discovers that the imperfect mothering she received in the past, which had seemed so insufficient, was in fact perhaps enough. Grant leads her to a rapprochement with the woman who nearly adopted her years ago and whose teachings about the language of flowers proved to be a true mother's gift.
Flowers generally fall into the realm of Aphrodite, with their beauty and sensual appeal, but in this story they represent nurturing, care, true insight, and love. As in Sideways, a symbol with one meaning proves to have unsuspected dimensions, leading the way delicately from mistrust to trust and from insufficiency to abundance. Miles and Victoria play multiple roles, though the most prominent one for each is perhaps Persephone, at first sojourning in the Underworld and finally returning to life. Miles, Victoria, and the characters who surround them are examples of the way mythic themes surface in remarkably different contexts, all but unrecognizable sometimes but ever persistent.
Unlike some love stories, which seem too lightweight and inconsequential to be believed, both Sideways and The Language of Flowers have a gritty layer of reality. My guess is that this is because neither story stops with physical attraction but also acknowledges the importance of nurturing and understanding. Both stories are ultimately grounded in the earth.
Monday, June 30, 2014
Agree to Disagree
Is it good to "be consistent"? As far as ideology goes, maybe not. Being able to see things from another point of view may come in handy sometimes.
I'm thinking about this not only because of some research I came across but, more importantly, because of what I read in the news every day. A recent Pew Research Center study confirmed something that doesn't come as a shock to most of us: political polarization is a reality in the United States.
Many sociologists and political scientists have examined divisions among Americans in recent years--whether under the name of polarization, fragmentation, or culture war--and they have come to varying conclusions. Some of these researchers have found evidence for fragmentation along political, economic, or religious lines; others have concluded that the perception of a deeply divided country is greater than the reality. The findings often seem to depend on the way polarization is defined and measured.
The Pew study examined political affiliations and opinions on an array of questions. Essentially, the study found that significant numbers of Americans are now consistently liberal or consistently conservative in their views, that these consistent viewpoints align closely with Democratic or Republican party affiliation, and that members of both parties are increasingly likely to view the opposite party with deep disapproval. In fact, according to the study, 27 percent of Democrats and 36 percent of Republicans view the other party's policies as "so misguided that they threaten the nation's well-being." Ideological division has grown significantly over the last twenty years. (See "Political Polarization in the American Public," Pew Research Center for the People & the Press.)
In addition, Congress is more divided than it has been "since the end of Reconstruction," according to data compiled by political scientists Keith Poole and Howard Rosenthal. Analyzing roll call votes of senators and representatives, the researchers found that the ideological overlap formerly commonplace between Republicans and Democrats (as recently as the early 1970s) has evaporated. (See Drew DeSilver's article, "The Polarized Congress of Today Has Its Roots in the 1970s" on the Pew Research Center's website.)
While it's true that the public is more divided than it used to be, the majority of Americans, according to the Pew study, have mixed ideological views, still believe in compromise, and would like to see their politicians meet each other halfway to get things done. This is sometimes not apparent because the majority group tends to be less mobilized and vocal than those who are more polarized.
I'm thinking about this not only because of some research I came across but, more importantly, because of what I read in the news every day. A recent Pew Research Center study confirmed something that doesn't come as a shock to most of us: political polarization is a reality in the United States.
Many sociologists and political scientists have examined divisions among Americans in recent years--whether under the name of polarization, fragmentation, or culture war--and they have come to varying conclusions. Some of these researchers have found evidence for fragmentation along political, economic, or religious lines; others have concluded that the perception of a deeply divided country is greater than the reality. The findings often seem to depend on the way polarization is defined and measured.
The Pew study examined political affiliations and opinions on an array of questions. Essentially, the study found that significant numbers of Americans are now consistently liberal or consistently conservative in their views, that these consistent viewpoints align closely with Democratic or Republican party affiliation, and that members of both parties are increasingly likely to view the opposite party with deep disapproval. In fact, according to the study, 27 percent of Democrats and 36 percent of Republicans view the other party's policies as "so misguided that they threaten the nation's well-being." Ideological division has grown significantly over the last twenty years. (See "Political Polarization in the American Public," Pew Research Center for the People & the Press.)
In addition, Congress is more divided than it has been "since the end of Reconstruction," according to data compiled by political scientists Keith Poole and Howard Rosenthal. Analyzing roll call votes of senators and representatives, the researchers found that the ideological overlap formerly commonplace between Republicans and Democrats (as recently as the early 1970s) has evaporated. (See Drew DeSilver's article, "The Polarized Congress of Today Has Its Roots in the 1970s" on the Pew Research Center's website.)
While it's true that the public is more divided than it used to be, the majority of Americans, according to the Pew study, have mixed ideological views, still believe in compromise, and would like to see their politicians meet each other halfway to get things done. This is sometimes not apparent because the majority group tends to be less mobilized and vocal than those who are more polarized.
Jung's comment on ideologies, which he viewed as a "blight," comes to mind here. Could it be that the belief that we're in the right because of the reasonableness of our views and that others are all wrong because they refuse to agree is the biggest mistake we're making?
I used to wish myself away to a more liberal geographic location, where I might find more people who thought the way I did, but I think of it differently these days. I now believe that being surrounded by a variety of political views, including some that are very different from mine, has been a blessing in disguise. It's just harder to vilify people with opposing viewpoints when they're valued coworkers, friends, and acquaintances. When you like someone and understand their aspirations, joys, sorrows, and beliefs because their lives intersect with yours, it's easier to see where they're coming from. It seems likely in such a case that you'll discover the things you do agree on more easily.
Some people believe that harmony results from bringing people with a lot in common together, and that may be true. It's also possible that lack of friction is not always the highest goal. After doing some research on the Myers-Briggs test, I once concluded that having people with various personality types in a workplace is preferable to having a lot of people of a single type because including various perspectives makes the group smarter and more creative. It can be uncomfortable to live with differences, but in the long run, it may result in unexpected insights and new approaches to problems. That's if there's no unspoken belief that one way is inherently better.
Passionate partisanship is nothing new and certainly has precedent in the early years of our country. The Federalists and Anti-Federalists come to mind; the debate over the importance of a strong central government, states' rights, and civil liberties had strong, intelligent advocates on both sides. In the end, both sides got some of what they wanted, and most of us would agree that the addition of the Bill of Rights championed by the Anti-Federalists was a vitally important amendment to the Constitution. Our system of government was greatly improved by a disagreement that was eventually resolved by compromise.
Why aren't we doing the same thing now?
I used to wish myself away to a more liberal geographic location, where I might find more people who thought the way I did, but I think of it differently these days. I now believe that being surrounded by a variety of political views, including some that are very different from mine, has been a blessing in disguise. It's just harder to vilify people with opposing viewpoints when they're valued coworkers, friends, and acquaintances. When you like someone and understand their aspirations, joys, sorrows, and beliefs because their lives intersect with yours, it's easier to see where they're coming from. It seems likely in such a case that you'll discover the things you do agree on more easily.
Some people believe that harmony results from bringing people with a lot in common together, and that may be true. It's also possible that lack of friction is not always the highest goal. After doing some research on the Myers-Briggs test, I once concluded that having people with various personality types in a workplace is preferable to having a lot of people of a single type because including various perspectives makes the group smarter and more creative. It can be uncomfortable to live with differences, but in the long run, it may result in unexpected insights and new approaches to problems. That's if there's no unspoken belief that one way is inherently better.
Passionate partisanship is nothing new and certainly has precedent in the early years of our country. The Federalists and Anti-Federalists come to mind; the debate over the importance of a strong central government, states' rights, and civil liberties had strong, intelligent advocates on both sides. In the end, both sides got some of what they wanted, and most of us would agree that the addition of the Bill of Rights championed by the Anti-Federalists was a vitally important amendment to the Constitution. Our system of government was greatly improved by a disagreement that was eventually resolved by compromise.
Why aren't we doing the same thing now?
Tuesday, June 24, 2014
A Herm on the Road
Yesterday morning I drove to my hometown to accompany a family member to an appointment. The distance is not great in miles, but it has always seemed to me that mere miles don't reflect the real distance between here and there. While it's just down the road, my hometown has always felt a lifetime away. When matters called me there more frequently 15 or 20 years ago, I usually gave a big sigh of relief on the return journey once I hit the outskirts of Lexington, scene of my adult life. Now I wonder if even the psychological distance between here and there is as great as it always seemed.
I don't have the same kind of nostalgia for my hometown that a lot of people probably have for theirs. Some of the good memories I have are for places--like my grandmother's house--that are long gone. I used to have dreams in which I would somehow end up moving back into one of our childhood houses, and I usually felt trapped. I shouldn't be here, I'd be thinking. I'm an adult. I have my own life. More recently, when I dream of being there, I'm often on Main Street, passing the familiar shopfronts as if searching for something, feeling not exactly trapped but perhaps a bit frustrated.
One way I can tell I still have some of my old town with me is through my inner concept of "home." A lot of my ideas for what a neighborhood should feel like are based on my hometown experience of being able to walk just about everywhere, of spending time on tranquil front porches and in pleasant back yards, of being able to get an ice cream cone down the street and a library book a few blocks over. When I think of buying a house, I imagine a scenario that includes these possibilities. So, paradoxically, as much as I wanted to get away, some of my hometown experiences have had a positive, lasting impact.
Yesterday, on the way back here, I started thinking of the many memories I have just of the road I was on. I passed the little church where we once had an end of the year school picnic and water balloon fight, circa seventh grade. A little farther out is the electric co-op building where I attended a high school seminar that resulted in trips and a college scholarship. There's the drive-in where I saw movies with my family and napped in the back seat. Closer to the county line is the house that used to have a Chinese gong and a little Oriental museum, a bit of exotica on that country road that we always liked to look out for.
Then there's the little lane on the right that goes to Avon, where I went swimming with the other sixth-grade girls one summer, "Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In" blaring on the sound system, and jumped off the high dive for the first time. A few miles more, and there's the quick-mart where I once stopped with my Dad on the way back from Lexington. I don't remember what we stopped for, but I remember the occasion--a gray Saturday afternoon in November--because it so closely matched my mood. I was full of dread over having to find material to make a skirt in home-ec class, a prospect that overwhelmed me. (I wish that was the biggest problem currently facing me, but at the time it seemed a terrible ordeal.)
I've driven that road many times in a more businesslike frame of mind, but yesterday, perhaps because of some pictures of venerable local landmarks I saw while visiting, I was in a mood receptive to memories. As I passed the stately church with the classical facade about halfway between there and here, I thought for the first time in years of a short story I once attempted. It was all about that road, and that church (though I've never been inside it), and the journey from one place to another, short in distance but great in meaning. Something about the prospect of that church, with its Greek columns and its hilltop view, has always seemed to mark an invisible boundary between past and present. It's a herm, if you will: a milestone.
Maybe I'm now approaching a similar prospect, a place with a wider view. Maybe that's one of the benefits of staying with the journey long enough.
I don't have the same kind of nostalgia for my hometown that a lot of people probably have for theirs. Some of the good memories I have are for places--like my grandmother's house--that are long gone. I used to have dreams in which I would somehow end up moving back into one of our childhood houses, and I usually felt trapped. I shouldn't be here, I'd be thinking. I'm an adult. I have my own life. More recently, when I dream of being there, I'm often on Main Street, passing the familiar shopfronts as if searching for something, feeling not exactly trapped but perhaps a bit frustrated.
One way I can tell I still have some of my old town with me is through my inner concept of "home." A lot of my ideas for what a neighborhood should feel like are based on my hometown experience of being able to walk just about everywhere, of spending time on tranquil front porches and in pleasant back yards, of being able to get an ice cream cone down the street and a library book a few blocks over. When I think of buying a house, I imagine a scenario that includes these possibilities. So, paradoxically, as much as I wanted to get away, some of my hometown experiences have had a positive, lasting impact.
Yesterday, on the way back here, I started thinking of the many memories I have just of the road I was on. I passed the little church where we once had an end of the year school picnic and water balloon fight, circa seventh grade. A little farther out is the electric co-op building where I attended a high school seminar that resulted in trips and a college scholarship. There's the drive-in where I saw movies with my family and napped in the back seat. Closer to the county line is the house that used to have a Chinese gong and a little Oriental museum, a bit of exotica on that country road that we always liked to look out for.
Then there's the little lane on the right that goes to Avon, where I went swimming with the other sixth-grade girls one summer, "Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In" blaring on the sound system, and jumped off the high dive for the first time. A few miles more, and there's the quick-mart where I once stopped with my Dad on the way back from Lexington. I don't remember what we stopped for, but I remember the occasion--a gray Saturday afternoon in November--because it so closely matched my mood. I was full of dread over having to find material to make a skirt in home-ec class, a prospect that overwhelmed me. (I wish that was the biggest problem currently facing me, but at the time it seemed a terrible ordeal.)
I've driven that road many times in a more businesslike frame of mind, but yesterday, perhaps because of some pictures of venerable local landmarks I saw while visiting, I was in a mood receptive to memories. As I passed the stately church with the classical facade about halfway between there and here, I thought for the first time in years of a short story I once attempted. It was all about that road, and that church (though I've never been inside it), and the journey from one place to another, short in distance but great in meaning. Something about the prospect of that church, with its Greek columns and its hilltop view, has always seemed to mark an invisible boundary between past and present. It's a herm, if you will: a milestone.
Maybe I'm now approaching a similar prospect, a place with a wider view. Maybe that's one of the benefits of staying with the journey long enough.
Monday, June 16, 2014
Boundaries
In between dusting, making iced tea, and chopping vegetables for dinner, I've been thinking about old Robert Frost. To be precise, I've been thinking about his poem "Mending Wall." Did you ever study it in school? We came across it in the 5th grade, though what I gleaned from it then other than thinking the neighbor in it rather grouchy, I couldn't say.
Well, that was then. I'm now inclined to wonder what it was that set that rock-hauling neighbor's teeth on edge and made him insist on keeping the wall in good repair. You just know there's a story behind it; having had a few bad neighbors yourself, you may be more inclined than you were as a youngster to wonder about his side of the story. I know I am. The something-there-is-that-doesn't-love-a-wall narrator has apparently not lived in my building. If Frost had quoted me in that poem, I'd be saying not only "Good fences make good neighbors," but also "So does soundproofing."
As of today, I have new upstairs neighbors, it seems. I haven't seen them, but I'm going by all the noise, trudging back and forth, and voices I've heard in the hall. Last month, I heard maintenance cleaning the apartment after it was vacated by He-Who-Bangs-Around-Like-Thor (the previous tenant), and I was hoping for a quiet summer, but someone seems to have swooped in already. Over the last couple of summers, there was a two-month break between tenants when things were blissfully quiet. This year, the break has been cut short, but it was nice while it lasted.
June is not a common time for people to move in around here. Nor would I guess it to be common anywhere to start moving in at midnight on a Sunday night, but of course there's no accounting for taste. I don't know how much actual heaving of boxes and furniture took place, but I did hear a lot of footsteps up there right around then, just after I settled down peacefully with a book. Unfortunately, the previous tenant had a penchant for coming in and making a lot of noise as soon as I turned on my reading lamp at night, so last evening's unorthodox arrival already felt like deja vu.
I have several theories as to why that particular apartment has been so troublesome for the last several years, and most of them are tongue-in-cheek. Any one of them would make a great thriller or science fiction novella (and maybe I'll write it some time):
1.) A previous tenant had ill-gotten gains and hid it in the walls or floor. Word got out, but no one knows where it is; hence the use of saws, drills, and other equipment I've sometimes heard up there. Gold diggers.
2.) In that very apartment, an alien lost the wingnut needed to drive his spaceship and can't get back to Alpha Centauri without it (this is the reverse of Lost in Space; call it Trapped on Earth--Without a Paddle). The story of how this happened in the first place involves a wild party, a limbo session, and a spaceman who couldn't hold his bourbon. A succession of neighbors with humanoid features masks a desperate attempt to find the widget, which is smaller and thinner than a contact lens and can move of its own volition. Pod people.
3.) All the upstairs tenants are part of a psychology experiment to see how annoying they can be before the other neighbors within earshot move out. I agree, it would be hard to get this one past an ethics committee, so it would have to be run by a renegade psychologist untroubled by tenure considerations. At the end of the experiment, the psychologist ends up in prison, and the volunteers are forced to flee the country to avoid prosecution. Mad scientists.
4.) The tenants are part of a theft ring, which decided to establish its Bluegrass headquarters in the bucolic environs of a suburban apartment dwelling. No one would ever guess, right? All of the heavy noises and sounds of furniture moving are attempts to hide stolen -- what? Artwork? Gold bricks? Bicycles? Circus elephants? Criminals.
If this were a Douglas Adams or Neil Gaiman novel, the upstairs neighbors might actually be gods, passing mostly undetected as regular humans due to their shapeshifting abilities. The whole thing would end in a major gods-on-gods rumble or some sort of time travel cliffhanger. The trouble with that one is that none of my actual neighbors have had even a hint of mythic grandeur. I'm leaving this one off the list. So, not gods.
I think Mr. Frost's narrator dismisses his neighbor's insistence on mending the wall too naively. After all, healthy boundaries are important in life, as is consideration. The narrator seems to feel that even nature rises up against walls, toppling them in silent protest--whereas I am all in favor of them, within reason. They offer some protection against stray dogs, invasions of privacy, and accidents. A picturesque stone wall like the one in the poem seems eminently reasonable to me--it keeps modest order without being an eyesore. There's an art to stone fences, as well as personal boundaries, and I somehow doubt it's a spirit trying to break the wall in the poem. It could be moles, though.
Well, that was then. I'm now inclined to wonder what it was that set that rock-hauling neighbor's teeth on edge and made him insist on keeping the wall in good repair. You just know there's a story behind it; having had a few bad neighbors yourself, you may be more inclined than you were as a youngster to wonder about his side of the story. I know I am. The something-there-is-that-doesn't-love-a-wall narrator has apparently not lived in my building. If Frost had quoted me in that poem, I'd be saying not only "Good fences make good neighbors," but also "So does soundproofing."
As of today, I have new upstairs neighbors, it seems. I haven't seen them, but I'm going by all the noise, trudging back and forth, and voices I've heard in the hall. Last month, I heard maintenance cleaning the apartment after it was vacated by He-Who-Bangs-Around-Like-Thor (the previous tenant), and I was hoping for a quiet summer, but someone seems to have swooped in already. Over the last couple of summers, there was a two-month break between tenants when things were blissfully quiet. This year, the break has been cut short, but it was nice while it lasted.
June is not a common time for people to move in around here. Nor would I guess it to be common anywhere to start moving in at midnight on a Sunday night, but of course there's no accounting for taste. I don't know how much actual heaving of boxes and furniture took place, but I did hear a lot of footsteps up there right around then, just after I settled down peacefully with a book. Unfortunately, the previous tenant had a penchant for coming in and making a lot of noise as soon as I turned on my reading lamp at night, so last evening's unorthodox arrival already felt like deja vu.
I have several theories as to why that particular apartment has been so troublesome for the last several years, and most of them are tongue-in-cheek. Any one of them would make a great thriller or science fiction novella (and maybe I'll write it some time):
1.) A previous tenant had ill-gotten gains and hid it in the walls or floor. Word got out, but no one knows where it is; hence the use of saws, drills, and other equipment I've sometimes heard up there. Gold diggers.
2.) In that very apartment, an alien lost the wingnut needed to drive his spaceship and can't get back to Alpha Centauri without it (this is the reverse of Lost in Space; call it Trapped on Earth--Without a Paddle). The story of how this happened in the first place involves a wild party, a limbo session, and a spaceman who couldn't hold his bourbon. A succession of neighbors with humanoid features masks a desperate attempt to find the widget, which is smaller and thinner than a contact lens and can move of its own volition. Pod people.
3.) All the upstairs tenants are part of a psychology experiment to see how annoying they can be before the other neighbors within earshot move out. I agree, it would be hard to get this one past an ethics committee, so it would have to be run by a renegade psychologist untroubled by tenure considerations. At the end of the experiment, the psychologist ends up in prison, and the volunteers are forced to flee the country to avoid prosecution. Mad scientists.
4.) The tenants are part of a theft ring, which decided to establish its Bluegrass headquarters in the bucolic environs of a suburban apartment dwelling. No one would ever guess, right? All of the heavy noises and sounds of furniture moving are attempts to hide stolen -- what? Artwork? Gold bricks? Bicycles? Circus elephants? Criminals.
If this were a Douglas Adams or Neil Gaiman novel, the upstairs neighbors might actually be gods, passing mostly undetected as regular humans due to their shapeshifting abilities. The whole thing would end in a major gods-on-gods rumble or some sort of time travel cliffhanger. The trouble with that one is that none of my actual neighbors have had even a hint of mythic grandeur. I'm leaving this one off the list. So, not gods.
I think Mr. Frost's narrator dismisses his neighbor's insistence on mending the wall too naively. After all, healthy boundaries are important in life, as is consideration. The narrator seems to feel that even nature rises up against walls, toppling them in silent protest--whereas I am all in favor of them, within reason. They offer some protection against stray dogs, invasions of privacy, and accidents. A picturesque stone wall like the one in the poem seems eminently reasonable to me--it keeps modest order without being an eyesore. There's an art to stone fences, as well as personal boundaries, and I somehow doubt it's a spirit trying to break the wall in the poem. It could be moles, though.
Monday, June 9, 2014
Gone Fishing
Not really, but Wordplay is on a short break while I wrestle with revisions, labyrinths, cultural complexes, the myth of the rugged individualist, the potency of the myth of the rugged individualist, majority-minority demographic trends, the exact location of the Minotaur, Benjamin Franklin, the Knights of the Round Table, and the peer review process.
Saturday, May 31, 2014
Capturing a Book
Last week, I read two books recommended by readers of a magazine I subscribe to. This reminded me a little of my experiment two years ago, when I read lots of books from NPR's summer reading lists. I did something like that last summer, too, but blended recommendations from several sources. On the whole, I've decided that, despite coming across a few gems in these reading lists, I usually do better on my own when it comes to picking out books. I just know what I like.
I often find good titles when I'm looking for something else. I might be looking at books by an author I already know and notice something on the same shelf that calls out to me. Part of the fun of going to the library is the serendipity and the not really knowing what I'm going to walk out with. Sometimes, I'm in the mood for something in particular and walk out with a book within five minutes; other times, I know what I want but can't seem to find it.
When I went to the library the other day, I had a title in mind, but the library didn't have it, so I started browsing. I noticed several flyers on a display that someone in reader's advisory must have put together. They had titles like "If You Like Dan Brown . . ." or "If You Like Agatha Christie . . ." In my case, you almost have to be more specific: "If You Like Jane Smiley's Historical Novels But Not A Thousand Acres"; "If You Like Literary Adventures With Exotic Settings and Mythology"; or "If You Like Romances--With Humor--That Aren't Predictable," but to get something that close to the target, I'd have to write the list myself.
However, I flipped through several of the flyers and found some book descriptions that appealed. I started hunting and located a few of the books, including The Age of Desire, a novel about Edith Wharton, and Rules of Civility, a novel about upper-class New Yorkers in the 1930s. I almost picked the Wharton book, but something in the description made me think of Henry James's The Bostonians, and though this book may be nothing like that, I decided against it just in case it was. (This would be from my flyer, "If You Like Henry James and You Like Boston, but not The Bostonians.") Likewise, I might actually enjoy Rules of Civility, which is supposed to invoke a touch of F. Scott Fitzgerald, but my reverse snobbery kicked in just then and a novel about wealthy New Yorkers didn't appeal.
I perused three of the pamphlets and looked for at least 10 of the suggested titles before deciding that maybe the lists wouldn't work for me. I then tried the library's "New Books" shelf, but nothing grabbed me there either. This was turning into one of those contrary occasions when I didn't know exactly what I wanted, but I knew what I didn't want, and I wasn't finding what I wanted, but I didn't want to leave the library without a book.
I took one last look at the list called "If You Like The Night Circus" and saw a book called The Stockholm Octavo that I had somehow overlooked before. The description summarized a tale of love, intrigue, and a Tarot-like deck of divination cards set in 18th-century Sweden. What? How did I not see that before? I found it on the fiction shelf and was drawn to it right away because of the beautiful cover, which depicts the deck of cards, and the satisfying size--over 400 pages. I also noticed a blurb from an author I like on the back of the book, and that seemed promising.
The real test of a book, though, is to read the first few sentences. Then and there, you get the flavor of what the author is up to; a book that sounds fascinating in synopsis and is highly recommended is sometimes simply not your thing once you start reading, but this one began well: "Stockholm is called the Venice of the North, and with good reason. Travelers claim that it is just as complex, just as grand, and just as mysterious as its sister to the south."
OK, that's more like it! Right away, I'm intrigued because I've never thought of Stockholm as being like Venice at all. Throw in words like "complex" and "mysterious," and you've got my attention. A novel set in a northern city with the allure of an Italian one is probably going to be worth your while for the setting alone. And there's a seer! And a deck of mystical cards!
Why I ended up with the last book I considered, I don't know, but I walked out of the library happy. I'm about a fourth of the way through it, and somehow it's just what I had in mind, even though I didn't know what I had in mind when I walked into the library. Sometimes, you just know what you want when you see it.
I often find good titles when I'm looking for something else. I might be looking at books by an author I already know and notice something on the same shelf that calls out to me. Part of the fun of going to the library is the serendipity and the not really knowing what I'm going to walk out with. Sometimes, I'm in the mood for something in particular and walk out with a book within five minutes; other times, I know what I want but can't seem to find it.
When I went to the library the other day, I had a title in mind, but the library didn't have it, so I started browsing. I noticed several flyers on a display that someone in reader's advisory must have put together. They had titles like "If You Like Dan Brown . . ." or "If You Like Agatha Christie . . ." In my case, you almost have to be more specific: "If You Like Jane Smiley's Historical Novels But Not A Thousand Acres"; "If You Like Literary Adventures With Exotic Settings and Mythology"; or "If You Like Romances--With Humor--That Aren't Predictable," but to get something that close to the target, I'd have to write the list myself.
However, I flipped through several of the flyers and found some book descriptions that appealed. I started hunting and located a few of the books, including The Age of Desire, a novel about Edith Wharton, and Rules of Civility, a novel about upper-class New Yorkers in the 1930s. I almost picked the Wharton book, but something in the description made me think of Henry James's The Bostonians, and though this book may be nothing like that, I decided against it just in case it was. (This would be from my flyer, "If You Like Henry James and You Like Boston, but not The Bostonians.") Likewise, I might actually enjoy Rules of Civility, which is supposed to invoke a touch of F. Scott Fitzgerald, but my reverse snobbery kicked in just then and a novel about wealthy New Yorkers didn't appeal.
I perused three of the pamphlets and looked for at least 10 of the suggested titles before deciding that maybe the lists wouldn't work for me. I then tried the library's "New Books" shelf, but nothing grabbed me there either. This was turning into one of those contrary occasions when I didn't know exactly what I wanted, but I knew what I didn't want, and I wasn't finding what I wanted, but I didn't want to leave the library without a book.
I took one last look at the list called "If You Like The Night Circus" and saw a book called The Stockholm Octavo that I had somehow overlooked before. The description summarized a tale of love, intrigue, and a Tarot-like deck of divination cards set in 18th-century Sweden. What? How did I not see that before? I found it on the fiction shelf and was drawn to it right away because of the beautiful cover, which depicts the deck of cards, and the satisfying size--over 400 pages. I also noticed a blurb from an author I like on the back of the book, and that seemed promising.
The real test of a book, though, is to read the first few sentences. Then and there, you get the flavor of what the author is up to; a book that sounds fascinating in synopsis and is highly recommended is sometimes simply not your thing once you start reading, but this one began well: "Stockholm is called the Venice of the North, and with good reason. Travelers claim that it is just as complex, just as grand, and just as mysterious as its sister to the south."
OK, that's more like it! Right away, I'm intrigued because I've never thought of Stockholm as being like Venice at all. Throw in words like "complex" and "mysterious," and you've got my attention. A novel set in a northern city with the allure of an Italian one is probably going to be worth your while for the setting alone. And there's a seer! And a deck of mystical cards!
Why I ended up with the last book I considered, I don't know, but I walked out of the library happy. I'm about a fourth of the way through it, and somehow it's just what I had in mind, even though I didn't know what I had in mind when I walked into the library. Sometimes, you just know what you want when you see it.
Friday, May 23, 2014
Palace of the Looking Glass
This week, we had a special treat in the re-opening celebration for a local treasure, the Kentucky Theatre. The evening featured a free showing of South Pacific, free popcorn, free leis, and an appearance by Nick and Nina Clooney, who had their first date at the Kentucky years ago for a showing of (guess what!) South Pacific. The Kentucky has been around since 1922; you can tell it's of a distinguished age by its neoclassical facade and elegant architectural details, but it embodies the phrase "aging gracefully" to the fullest. Rarely will you see a more beautiful theater, or one that is more beloved, as evidenced by its most recent renovation.
Based on my extensive moviegoing history at the Kentucky, I developed an idea some years ago about the real meaning of the experience. This was even before I entered graduate school to study myths; I'd been thinking about mythology in our culture for a long before I went to school for it. It seemed to me that going to a movie had a ritual quality that was something like the feeling you get by going into a cathedral or some other great spiritual house. The sequence of events is perhaps in a different order, but the elements of enactment are similar.
I think the same dynamics come into play in most movie theaters, but perhaps the lofty elegance of a place like the Kentucky makes it more apparent that you're entering a special place, one set apart from the everyday world. You stop at the ticket booth and make your offering, which entitles you to enter. There's a series of liminal spaces, from the entrance under the marquee (where you're still outside but in shadow, already experiencing the imaginal lure of the movies calling out from the playbills and movie posters surrounding you), to the first lobby (in the case of the Kentucky, a spacious hall of mirrors, the better to remind you that what you're about to see is yourself reflected, or possibly a different reality altogether than you've imagined before, as in Cocteau's Orphée), to the inner lobby, behind a second set of doors, where the concessions stand reigns supreme.
Popcorn, Goobers, Raisinettes, Candy Bars . . . these humble but nostalgic foods that look so enticing inside the big glass case, where they sparkle like jewels, are the ritual accompaniment to the main attraction, topped off not with communion wine but possibly a Cherry Coke. Healthy eating is not really the idea; self-indulgence is somehow innocent in a movie theater, if not actually necessary, possibly to lower your guard. You thought you were coming for an evening's diversion, when in reality . . . who knows what might happen up there on that screen and inside your head? Instead of incense, the seductive, earthy aroma of roasted popcorn envelops you, and not just today's freshly popped offering, but all those other batches of months and years past, permeating the fixtures at a molecular level, smelling of carnival and mystery, magic and darkness, as a theater lobby should.
With refreshments in hand, you pass yet another threshold, the door to the inner sanctum, the auditorium itself. In the Kentucky, the large open space above your head, the stained glass, and the ornate architectural flourishes draw your eye up, as if toward heaven. You feel a little bit like Dante before he starts ascending. For many people, there is a distinct difference between a spiritual and a secular setting, but I think in this case, considering the imaginal and transformational potential of moviegoing, the distinction is somewhat blurred. You sit in the dark, suspend your disbelief as a series of images plays out on the screen like a dream, and are sometimes profoundly changed by what you see, shaken, inspired, exhilarated, saddened, enlarged. You have probably been entertained, but sometimes you've gotten a glimpse of something you weren't expecting, and it makes a difference.
When the movie's over and the lights come up and you retrace your steps to the outside world, it often takes a few seconds to adjust to being in the ordinary everyday once again. I remember attending a showing of A Touch of Evil one rainy summer night at the Kentucky and walking to my car afterwards through a town that seemed different from the one I had left a few hours earlier. I had somehow carried the noir mood out with me, and the familiar streets now looked like a scene from Orson Welles, as if God had somehow assumed the persona of the great director.
I lost the feeling by the time I got home, but it's worth remembering. Was it possibly an opening to realizing that the shadow world and the surface world are not as far apart as they seem? Don't good films often reveal that in one way or another? Isn't a movie theater a portal to the unknown, what the Celts called a thin place, but with good seats and popcorn? I think the answer to all of these questions is yes.
Based on my extensive moviegoing history at the Kentucky, I developed an idea some years ago about the real meaning of the experience. This was even before I entered graduate school to study myths; I'd been thinking about mythology in our culture for a long before I went to school for it. It seemed to me that going to a movie had a ritual quality that was something like the feeling you get by going into a cathedral or some other great spiritual house. The sequence of events is perhaps in a different order, but the elements of enactment are similar.
I think the same dynamics come into play in most movie theaters, but perhaps the lofty elegance of a place like the Kentucky makes it more apparent that you're entering a special place, one set apart from the everyday world. You stop at the ticket booth and make your offering, which entitles you to enter. There's a series of liminal spaces, from the entrance under the marquee (where you're still outside but in shadow, already experiencing the imaginal lure of the movies calling out from the playbills and movie posters surrounding you), to the first lobby (in the case of the Kentucky, a spacious hall of mirrors, the better to remind you that what you're about to see is yourself reflected, or possibly a different reality altogether than you've imagined before, as in Cocteau's Orphée), to the inner lobby, behind a second set of doors, where the concessions stand reigns supreme.
Popcorn, Goobers, Raisinettes, Candy Bars . . . these humble but nostalgic foods that look so enticing inside the big glass case, where they sparkle like jewels, are the ritual accompaniment to the main attraction, topped off not with communion wine but possibly a Cherry Coke. Healthy eating is not really the idea; self-indulgence is somehow innocent in a movie theater, if not actually necessary, possibly to lower your guard. You thought you were coming for an evening's diversion, when in reality . . . who knows what might happen up there on that screen and inside your head? Instead of incense, the seductive, earthy aroma of roasted popcorn envelops you, and not just today's freshly popped offering, but all those other batches of months and years past, permeating the fixtures at a molecular level, smelling of carnival and mystery, magic and darkness, as a theater lobby should.
With refreshments in hand, you pass yet another threshold, the door to the inner sanctum, the auditorium itself. In the Kentucky, the large open space above your head, the stained glass, and the ornate architectural flourishes draw your eye up, as if toward heaven. You feel a little bit like Dante before he starts ascending. For many people, there is a distinct difference between a spiritual and a secular setting, but I think in this case, considering the imaginal and transformational potential of moviegoing, the distinction is somewhat blurred. You sit in the dark, suspend your disbelief as a series of images plays out on the screen like a dream, and are sometimes profoundly changed by what you see, shaken, inspired, exhilarated, saddened, enlarged. You have probably been entertained, but sometimes you've gotten a glimpse of something you weren't expecting, and it makes a difference.
When the movie's over and the lights come up and you retrace your steps to the outside world, it often takes a few seconds to adjust to being in the ordinary everyday once again. I remember attending a showing of A Touch of Evil one rainy summer night at the Kentucky and walking to my car afterwards through a town that seemed different from the one I had left a few hours earlier. I had somehow carried the noir mood out with me, and the familiar streets now looked like a scene from Orson Welles, as if God had somehow assumed the persona of the great director.
I lost the feeling by the time I got home, but it's worth remembering. Was it possibly an opening to realizing that the shadow world and the surface world are not as far apart as they seem? Don't good films often reveal that in one way or another? Isn't a movie theater a portal to the unknown, what the Celts called a thin place, but with good seats and popcorn? I think the answer to all of these questions is yes.
Friday, May 16, 2014
The Sense of Place
Do different places express different archetypes? The question has interested me for several years, and I actually considered working on it for my dissertation. I think the answer is yes, but it's easy to fall into oversimplification when you try to identify what those archetypes are.
I'm especially intrigued by comparisons of urban environments. Is it possible to identify predominant archetypes in a city as expressed in its image, economy, physical environment, and the people it attracts? Can you characterize Seattle as being more like Hermes and San Francisco as being more like Aphrodite? Is Washington D.C. a city of Athena? Does Boston, with all its colleges, have more of a heady Apollo energy? Any city obviously has multiple faces, subcultures, nuances, and shadows, but predominant themes often seem present.
I've read books by people who have addressed these issues either as depth psychologists or from other perspectives, and they seem to agree that different places represent noticeably different aspirations and "personalities." I spent a lot of time a few years ago trying to identify the main archetypes of the place I live in, wanting to understand what it excelled in and what it lacked, especially in comparison to other places. When I first started thinking about it, I found this hard to do, probably because I'd been here so long and couldn't see things from the outside. Having been around a bit more since then (I traveled a lot in 2011), I have more of a basis for comparison now and can articulate what I know.
There's a calmness about Lexington, an orderliness that's in noticeable contrast to, say, Los Angeles, which is much more venturesome -- even chaotic. Part of it's a size difference, of course, but I think there's also a difference in underlying dynamics. Lexington is in many ways a settled place, centered on families, it seems to me, so that it has a feeling of Hestia, hearth, and home. L.A. and San Francisco (and many other places) are also much more hedonistic than Lexington. Hedonism, unless it's of a sedate variety, just doesn't seem to play well here.
I've found Lexington to be both comfortable and confining. I've always thought it was a probably a better place to raise a family than to live in as a single woman, and it all has to do with that homely quality. I've often felt out of my element here, as if standing out too much in any way was always going to be a problem. I felt that I might thrive in a more adventurous environment, a place with more variety not only in cultural and occupational opportunities but also in the people I would meet. I finally addressed this frustration when I commuted to graduate school out of state, an arrangement that let me stay in place but experience the stimulus of an entirely different environment.
My home and even my job were rife with Hestian qualities of order and caretaking; I needed an infusion of a different kind of energy, more Aphrodite, more Apollo, and more Hermes (for a feeling of movement and lightness).
I told a friend before I started at Pacifica that I hoped it would help me figure out either how to leave here or how to stay. During the three years I was commuting to Southern California, I was pretty much in the "leave" mode; the question was where, when, and how. But a funny thing happened somewhere along the way, because once released from three years of what was definitely a labor of love but gave me no free time, I was at leisure to rediscover my own town. Somehow, despite its drawbacks, Lexington suddenly seemed to offer more than I remembered.
I re-discovered the Gallery Hop; there seemed to be more places to have brunch on Saturdays; I had time to attend Woodsongs Old Time Radio Hour at the Kentucky Theatre (on the night I attended, I was having dinner in a nearby restaurant when it was announced that a European opera singer was in the house and would give a brief performance); a couple of weeks later, I saw a play by Samuel Beckett in the theatre of the same small restaurant. Lexington had perhaps changed and expanded a little, but what seemed really different was me. My graduate program, and what it took to see it through, had enlarged me, so that I felt more confident in my own skin, wherever I happened to be. Perhaps my vision had also become more acute so that I was now able to seek out those touches of Aphrodite and Apollo and Hermes wherever they happened to be.
Kentucky is, of course, very land-locked, so that the spirit of Uranus, the ocean, is not much felt here. I like the feeling of having land all around me; it's nice to able to move in any direction. But when I was in California, spending so much time between the mountains and the sea, I think I developed an expansiveness partly in response to the intellectual and social climate and partly in response to the physical environment. Looking up at the mountains and out over the ocean must have trained my eye, without my knowing it, to seek further and to see more. I think it's difficult to stay settled in your ways when you spend a lot of time next to the ocean, which presents such a challenge to ideas of solidity. I must have needed a little of that moisture, that fluidity, and that sense of things loosening up. And maybe the mountains raised my sights a little higher.
I miss the beauty of those California interludes, but I think in the end they did their job and became a part of me. Some sort of rebalancing took place that was partly to do with my studies and partly to do with the different energy I experienced on the West Coast. Never underestimate the power of place.
I'm especially intrigued by comparisons of urban environments. Is it possible to identify predominant archetypes in a city as expressed in its image, economy, physical environment, and the people it attracts? Can you characterize Seattle as being more like Hermes and San Francisco as being more like Aphrodite? Is Washington D.C. a city of Athena? Does Boston, with all its colleges, have more of a heady Apollo energy? Any city obviously has multiple faces, subcultures, nuances, and shadows, but predominant themes often seem present.
I've read books by people who have addressed these issues either as depth psychologists or from other perspectives, and they seem to agree that different places represent noticeably different aspirations and "personalities." I spent a lot of time a few years ago trying to identify the main archetypes of the place I live in, wanting to understand what it excelled in and what it lacked, especially in comparison to other places. When I first started thinking about it, I found this hard to do, probably because I'd been here so long and couldn't see things from the outside. Having been around a bit more since then (I traveled a lot in 2011), I have more of a basis for comparison now and can articulate what I know.
There's a calmness about Lexington, an orderliness that's in noticeable contrast to, say, Los Angeles, which is much more venturesome -- even chaotic. Part of it's a size difference, of course, but I think there's also a difference in underlying dynamics. Lexington is in many ways a settled place, centered on families, it seems to me, so that it has a feeling of Hestia, hearth, and home. L.A. and San Francisco (and many other places) are also much more hedonistic than Lexington. Hedonism, unless it's of a sedate variety, just doesn't seem to play well here.
I've found Lexington to be both comfortable and confining. I've always thought it was a probably a better place to raise a family than to live in as a single woman, and it all has to do with that homely quality. I've often felt out of my element here, as if standing out too much in any way was always going to be a problem. I felt that I might thrive in a more adventurous environment, a place with more variety not only in cultural and occupational opportunities but also in the people I would meet. I finally addressed this frustration when I commuted to graduate school out of state, an arrangement that let me stay in place but experience the stimulus of an entirely different environment.
My home and even my job were rife with Hestian qualities of order and caretaking; I needed an infusion of a different kind of energy, more Aphrodite, more Apollo, and more Hermes (for a feeling of movement and lightness).
I told a friend before I started at Pacifica that I hoped it would help me figure out either how to leave here or how to stay. During the three years I was commuting to Southern California, I was pretty much in the "leave" mode; the question was where, when, and how. But a funny thing happened somewhere along the way, because once released from three years of what was definitely a labor of love but gave me no free time, I was at leisure to rediscover my own town. Somehow, despite its drawbacks, Lexington suddenly seemed to offer more than I remembered.
I re-discovered the Gallery Hop; there seemed to be more places to have brunch on Saturdays; I had time to attend Woodsongs Old Time Radio Hour at the Kentucky Theatre (on the night I attended, I was having dinner in a nearby restaurant when it was announced that a European opera singer was in the house and would give a brief performance); a couple of weeks later, I saw a play by Samuel Beckett in the theatre of the same small restaurant. Lexington had perhaps changed and expanded a little, but what seemed really different was me. My graduate program, and what it took to see it through, had enlarged me, so that I felt more confident in my own skin, wherever I happened to be. Perhaps my vision had also become more acute so that I was now able to seek out those touches of Aphrodite and Apollo and Hermes wherever they happened to be.
Kentucky is, of course, very land-locked, so that the spirit of Uranus, the ocean, is not much felt here. I like the feeling of having land all around me; it's nice to able to move in any direction. But when I was in California, spending so much time between the mountains and the sea, I think I developed an expansiveness partly in response to the intellectual and social climate and partly in response to the physical environment. Looking up at the mountains and out over the ocean must have trained my eye, without my knowing it, to seek further and to see more. I think it's difficult to stay settled in your ways when you spend a lot of time next to the ocean, which presents such a challenge to ideas of solidity. I must have needed a little of that moisture, that fluidity, and that sense of things loosening up. And maybe the mountains raised my sights a little higher.
I miss the beauty of those California interludes, but I think in the end they did their job and became a part of me. Some sort of rebalancing took place that was partly to do with my studies and partly to do with the different energy I experienced on the West Coast. Never underestimate the power of place.
Thursday, May 8, 2014
Reading Trollope for Fun and Profit
I haven't figured out whether Anthony Trollope is a Low High Victorian or a High Low Victorian (and anyway, does it signify?), but whatever he is, he's entertaining. Last year I read the first of his Palliser novels, Can You Forgive Her?, a seriocomic tale of love, marriage, and politics in 19th-century Britain. The independently wealthy protagonist in that novel is urged by her cousin to marry the cousin's brother, an unscrupulous sort with designs on a seat in Parliament, while the man who really loves her tries to save her. Complications ensue, and despite the novel's length, it's lively from beginning to end.
I picked up the second Palliser novel, Phineas Finn, the other day and initially found it slow going. It concerns a young Irishman convinced by his friends to stand for a seat in Parliament, to the chagrin of his father, his law mentor, and even his landlady's shrewd husband, who all believe he should settle down to a legal career instead of throwing himself away as an MP (Trollope apparently thought very little of politicians). In the initial chapters we see Phineas thinking things over, deciding to stand for his district, and winning the seat. I wasn't bowled over by any of this, probably because several of the characters think so poorly of the enterprise that it's hard to get excited about Phineas's success. He seems to be in for a dull time of it.
Things only get lively when romantic feelings start to affect Phineas's decisions, and he begins to pursue the lovely but apparently unattainable Lady Laura Standish. Her n'er-do-well brother, Oswald, is in love with the charming and intelligent Violet Effingham, Lady Laura's great friend, who is smart enough to have turned him down three times by the end of Chapter 19. Trollope does not bring Lady Laura onstage until Chapter 4, and Violet appears a bit later. I'm trying to figure out his delay in bringing them out, as the story drags until the factors of love and attraction come into play. I'm still reading the novel, so I should probably hold off on an opinion, but it almost seems that, despite trying to write about politics, Trollope finds his interest in intimate relations between people more compelling.
As in Can You Forgive Her?, Phineas Finn's female characters are full of complicated and conflicting emotions; unable to satisfy their own political ambitions, they strive to find a scope for their abilities through the men in their lives. Despite the constricted roles society allots them, the women are fascinating, fully formed characters, making the best (or worst) of their chances within their own sphere. Phineas is shown to be quite in awe of Lady Laura, deferring to her suggestions over and against the advice of seasoned men like his own father. Yet Lady Laura, in choosing an advantageous match over romance, soon finds herself in a stifling marriage (the type of mistake narrowly avoided by Alice Vavasor in Can You Forgive Her?). While Trollope's heroines are likable and sympathetic, they are not all-wise and all-seeing; both his men and women make serious blunders that sometimes hurt others.
Lady Laura and Kate Vavasor (Alice's cousin) are maddeningly blind to the faults of beloved but unworthy brothers whose ambitions they promote at the expense of their own happiness and the happiness of their friends. Violet and Alice are both pressured to marry the brother of their closest friend even though doing so offers a good chance of misery for the prospective wife. Even Oswald seems more aware of his unworthiness to have Violet than his sister is, despite her affection for her friend. The political becomes personal as independent-minded women attempt to achieve ends they see as desirable through matrimonial alliances. Zeus and Hera, power and prestige, keep surging to the forefront, while Aphrodite continually tries to upstage them. It's entertaining but also a bit sad.
Phineas is an appealing character, inexperienced and a little brash but quick to learn. His good intentions often rub up against self interest, and their collision with his romantic inclinations drives the story. Can You Forgive Her? ended rather better than you might expect for several of the characters. In Phineas Finn, Lady Laura has already committed to a loveless marriage, Phineas has unwisely accrued a debt from a luckless friend, and others seem poised for either salvation or perdition. Trollope has painted his characters in such realistic colors that it's hard to predict how it all will end. I've already laughed out loud over some of his more wry observations. Like this one --
Violet: 'I abominate a humble man, but yet I love to perceive that a man acknowledges the superiority of my sex, and youth, and all that kind of thing.'
Lady Laura: 'You want to be flattered without plain flattery.'
Violet: 'Of course I do. A man who would tell me that I am pretty, unless he is over seventy, ought to be kicked out of the room. But a man who can't show me that he thinks me so without saying a word about it, is a lout.'
I've also observed that 19th century or 21st, Britain or America, politics, love, and ambition don't really seem to have changed much. If Trollope is to be believed.
I picked up the second Palliser novel, Phineas Finn, the other day and initially found it slow going. It concerns a young Irishman convinced by his friends to stand for a seat in Parliament, to the chagrin of his father, his law mentor, and even his landlady's shrewd husband, who all believe he should settle down to a legal career instead of throwing himself away as an MP (Trollope apparently thought very little of politicians). In the initial chapters we see Phineas thinking things over, deciding to stand for his district, and winning the seat. I wasn't bowled over by any of this, probably because several of the characters think so poorly of the enterprise that it's hard to get excited about Phineas's success. He seems to be in for a dull time of it.
Things only get lively when romantic feelings start to affect Phineas's decisions, and he begins to pursue the lovely but apparently unattainable Lady Laura Standish. Her n'er-do-well brother, Oswald, is in love with the charming and intelligent Violet Effingham, Lady Laura's great friend, who is smart enough to have turned him down three times by the end of Chapter 19. Trollope does not bring Lady Laura onstage until Chapter 4, and Violet appears a bit later. I'm trying to figure out his delay in bringing them out, as the story drags until the factors of love and attraction come into play. I'm still reading the novel, so I should probably hold off on an opinion, but it almost seems that, despite trying to write about politics, Trollope finds his interest in intimate relations between people more compelling.
As in Can You Forgive Her?, Phineas Finn's female characters are full of complicated and conflicting emotions; unable to satisfy their own political ambitions, they strive to find a scope for their abilities through the men in their lives. Despite the constricted roles society allots them, the women are fascinating, fully formed characters, making the best (or worst) of their chances within their own sphere. Phineas is shown to be quite in awe of Lady Laura, deferring to her suggestions over and against the advice of seasoned men like his own father. Yet Lady Laura, in choosing an advantageous match over romance, soon finds herself in a stifling marriage (the type of mistake narrowly avoided by Alice Vavasor in Can You Forgive Her?). While Trollope's heroines are likable and sympathetic, they are not all-wise and all-seeing; both his men and women make serious blunders that sometimes hurt others.
Lady Laura and Kate Vavasor (Alice's cousin) are maddeningly blind to the faults of beloved but unworthy brothers whose ambitions they promote at the expense of their own happiness and the happiness of their friends. Violet and Alice are both pressured to marry the brother of their closest friend even though doing so offers a good chance of misery for the prospective wife. Even Oswald seems more aware of his unworthiness to have Violet than his sister is, despite her affection for her friend. The political becomes personal as independent-minded women attempt to achieve ends they see as desirable through matrimonial alliances. Zeus and Hera, power and prestige, keep surging to the forefront, while Aphrodite continually tries to upstage them. It's entertaining but also a bit sad.
Phineas is an appealing character, inexperienced and a little brash but quick to learn. His good intentions often rub up against self interest, and their collision with his romantic inclinations drives the story. Can You Forgive Her? ended rather better than you might expect for several of the characters. In Phineas Finn, Lady Laura has already committed to a loveless marriage, Phineas has unwisely accrued a debt from a luckless friend, and others seem poised for either salvation or perdition. Trollope has painted his characters in such realistic colors that it's hard to predict how it all will end. I've already laughed out loud over some of his more wry observations. Like this one --
Violet: 'I abominate a humble man, but yet I love to perceive that a man acknowledges the superiority of my sex, and youth, and all that kind of thing.'
Lady Laura: 'You want to be flattered without plain flattery.'
Violet: 'Of course I do. A man who would tell me that I am pretty, unless he is over seventy, ought to be kicked out of the room. But a man who can't show me that he thinks me so without saying a word about it, is a lout.'
I've also observed that 19th century or 21st, Britain or America, politics, love, and ambition don't really seem to have changed much. If Trollope is to be believed.
Wednesday, April 30, 2014
The Thing That Keats Said
Last week, I came across Donna Tartt's novel The Goldfinch at the public library. A brief description of the plot on The New York Times bestseller list, along with the writer's reputation, reeled me in. The novel tells a fictional story about a real painting, Carel Fabritius's "The Goldfinch," a 17th-century Dutch masterpiece, whose actual home is in the Netherlands. In the novel, a bomb rocks New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art while the protagonist, 13-year-old Theo Decker, is visiting with his mother. Theo's mother dies in the attack, and in the confusion, he smuggles "The Goldfinch," which his mother adored, out of the museum.
Theo's impulsive act, undertaken while he's deeply in shock, becomes, along with his mother's death, the defining fact in his life. Unable to think of a way to return the painting without causing trouble, he keeps it, taking it out of hiding now and again to marvel at it secretly, though he's increasingly wracked by guilt and fear over his possession of it.
The interplay of opposites -- a cataclysmic act of violence, an object of rare and haunting beauty in its midst, a boy who is both innocent and guilty -- runs throughout the novel. Theo is a Hermes-like character, growing up to combine the qualities of a thief and dissembler with a rare sensitivity and passionate nature. In the midst of his self-destructiveness and suffering, he is aware of the moral dilemmas imposed by his situation and is somehow a better person than many of his actions suggest.
Since "The Goldfinch" is the central image of the novel, described repeatedly and in loving detail through Theo's eyes, it necessarily becomes an object of meditation for the reader. What is it about this little goldfinch, in addition to its purely monetary value, that sets such a complicated series of events in motion and affects Theo (and even his harum scarum friend and co-conspirator Boris) so deeply? It seems to be the recognition of a common destiny. The bird is chained to its perch, trapped and circumscribed by events, but it gazes directly and unflinchingly at the viewer in a manner that Theo comes to recognize as -- despite everything -- life-affirming. In the midst of somber circumstance, its spirit remains strong, its gaze sending a challenge to the viewer: I've embraced the eternal yes. Will you?
I'm reminded here, a bit incongruously, of the film Waking Ned Devine, a rollicking story rather removed in atmosphere from the rich solemnity of The Goldfinch (whose tone has much in common with the shadowy, gold-flecked interiors of the Dutch masters it celebrates). In Waking Ned Devine, there is a communal attempt to trick a lottery board into distributing winnings to the surviving friends of the actual winner, who has died. One senses in the scheme not meanness but rather a generosity in the spirit of the deceased Ned Devine himself. The trickery is good-natured and serves the greater good.
In the case of The Goldfinch, the painting is taken by a 13-year-old with the instincts of a thief but a certain purity of heart and is stolen in turn by his amoral but happy-go-lucky best friend, eventually falling into the hands of an international gang of criminals. The final resolution is a twist of fate beyond anything Theo could have imagined, with good and evil very much entangled. But did the purity of Theo's feelings for the painting somehow protect it just enough to tip the balance toward good? It seems this could be true, since the restoration of the painting then inspires Theo to rebuild his own life along more hopeful lines.
This story illustrates the way fate, personified here by the spirit of trickery, may move through the lives of people, sometimes with their knowledge and sometimes not, to achieve an end larger than all of them (though it may enlarge some of them in the process). The way this works, however, remains a mystery. Was it all accidental? Was some of it shaped by the desires of the characters at a level deeper than they could understand? Is truth beauty and beauty truth, as Keats said? You have to decide for yourself.
Theo's impulsive act, undertaken while he's deeply in shock, becomes, along with his mother's death, the defining fact in his life. Unable to think of a way to return the painting without causing trouble, he keeps it, taking it out of hiding now and again to marvel at it secretly, though he's increasingly wracked by guilt and fear over his possession of it.
The interplay of opposites -- a cataclysmic act of violence, an object of rare and haunting beauty in its midst, a boy who is both innocent and guilty -- runs throughout the novel. Theo is a Hermes-like character, growing up to combine the qualities of a thief and dissembler with a rare sensitivity and passionate nature. In the midst of his self-destructiveness and suffering, he is aware of the moral dilemmas imposed by his situation and is somehow a better person than many of his actions suggest.
Since "The Goldfinch" is the central image of the novel, described repeatedly and in loving detail through Theo's eyes, it necessarily becomes an object of meditation for the reader. What is it about this little goldfinch, in addition to its purely monetary value, that sets such a complicated series of events in motion and affects Theo (and even his harum scarum friend and co-conspirator Boris) so deeply? It seems to be the recognition of a common destiny. The bird is chained to its perch, trapped and circumscribed by events, but it gazes directly and unflinchingly at the viewer in a manner that Theo comes to recognize as -- despite everything -- life-affirming. In the midst of somber circumstance, its spirit remains strong, its gaze sending a challenge to the viewer: I've embraced the eternal yes. Will you?
I'm reminded here, a bit incongruously, of the film Waking Ned Devine, a rollicking story rather removed in atmosphere from the rich solemnity of The Goldfinch (whose tone has much in common with the shadowy, gold-flecked interiors of the Dutch masters it celebrates). In Waking Ned Devine, there is a communal attempt to trick a lottery board into distributing winnings to the surviving friends of the actual winner, who has died. One senses in the scheme not meanness but rather a generosity in the spirit of the deceased Ned Devine himself. The trickery is good-natured and serves the greater good.
In the case of The Goldfinch, the painting is taken by a 13-year-old with the instincts of a thief but a certain purity of heart and is stolen in turn by his amoral but happy-go-lucky best friend, eventually falling into the hands of an international gang of criminals. The final resolution is a twist of fate beyond anything Theo could have imagined, with good and evil very much entangled. But did the purity of Theo's feelings for the painting somehow protect it just enough to tip the balance toward good? It seems this could be true, since the restoration of the painting then inspires Theo to rebuild his own life along more hopeful lines.
This story illustrates the way fate, personified here by the spirit of trickery, may move through the lives of people, sometimes with their knowledge and sometimes not, to achieve an end larger than all of them (though it may enlarge some of them in the process). The way this works, however, remains a mystery. Was it all accidental? Was some of it shaped by the desires of the characters at a level deeper than they could understand? Is truth beauty and beauty truth, as Keats said? You have to decide for yourself.
Friday, April 25, 2014
Pre-Authorized But Unlocked
It's just my opinion, but I do think travel isn't what it used to be. As recently as three years ago, I still viewed travel as a great tonic, a way to not only clear the head and get a change of perspective but also to have fun. Now that I'm back from my trip to Chicago, I'll say this: I expect to one day start enjoying travel again, but that day has not yet arrived.
Actually, there was a little bit of silver lining to this trip. I was told at the airport security checkpoint in Louisville that the code on my boarding pass meant I had clearance and could go through a special line. In essence, this meant I didn't have to take off my shoes and hop around barefoot while pulling out items that need to go in bins by themselves. I had read about paying $100 or so to get this kind of treatment, but I certainly hadn't done that. It seemed such an anomaly that I asked the security officers how it happened. The answer seemed to be that sometimes you just get lucky. It reminded me of the feeling I used to have when I was a Silver Medallion flyer: the perks are modest, but any little bonus is enough to boost your spirits.
Once on the plane, I somehow managed to seat myself next to a UPS pilot, who was flying on business. Sitting next to a pilot will certainly make you feel safer, in case you happen to be having any jitters about the whole friendly sky experience. He told me about his career and all the places he'd been, and before I knew it, we were in Chicago. So far, so good. I had to get from Midway to the conference hotel via train, which isn't hard to do, except that the last bit involved finding my way from the Red Line station to the hotel on foot. I asked for directions, and I'm glad I got a second opinion, because following the first person's advice would probably have gotten me lost only two blocks from the hotel.
I didn't do any traveling within Chicago, except for walking to Millennium Park one afternoon and going to lunch at Downtown Dogs the next day; the conference kept me too busy. On Saturday, my last day, I decided to give myself more time than I thought I needed to get back to the airport. Despite having had a pretty easy time of it on the way up, I didn't want to be in a position of having to rush due to unexpected problems. It's good I took that attitude because the first thing that happened was that none of the machines in the Red Line station were making change, so I had to go back out, cross the street, and buy a bottle of water in a fast food store to get some dollar bills. One of the bills I was given felt a little strange, so to be on the safe side, I asked the cashier for another one. Sometimes those ticket machines are finicky.
Once I got my ticket and was on the train, someone told me that service on the Orange Line was out between Roosevelt and Halsted, which meant taking a bus between stations. That sounded like a headache. This person said he'd show me how it worked, but when we came out of the station, the bus he was getting on, which he said was going to Halsted, looked like an ordinary city bus. I could see Orange Line buses lined up behind it, so I walked over and got on one. Once I got to Midway, I printed my boarding pass and went through security, still under the magical protection of my pre-authorized status. I kept trying to find out more about why I had this status. I told one security officer that I'd had some strange experiences in past travels that made me question anything out of the ordinary; he just smiled. I told another officer that the ease of the whole thing was freaking me out; she said I should just be happy about it. She was probably right.
So, time to relax, get a sandwich, and read a little before the flight was called. Once on the plane, I rested all the way home, thankful when we arrived a few minutes early, since I still had to drive back to Lexington. I got to my car, unlocked the driver's side door, and uh, oh -- what's this? The rear door on the driver's side, which was definitely locked when I left it, was now most definitely unlocked. This is travel as I've come to know it; I suspected I wouldn't get home without at least one incident (not that it couldn't have been worse). I mentioned what happened to the person at the exit booth, who said she'd report it to the Louisville Police.
There's nothing about my modest little car that would suggest it has anything worth taking, and in case you were in doubt, a glance inside would show as much. Nothing was broken; the lock had not been forced. Once I got home, I was able to take a closer look and couldn't find anything else awry, but I followed up with airport security to let them know what happened. I had doubts that anything in the way of a police report would have been made on the basis of my mentioning it to the exit booth attendant, so I took it to a higher authority.
So, a trip, a return, a mystery, and thankfulness that I have nowhere else to go in the foreseeable future. This would seem a rather poor attitude if it didn't coincide with my budget, which makes it actually a convenient outlook to have at present. If you're wondering whether I, as a mythologist, make anything of the door incident, the answer is not really. I don't suspect Mercury in retrograde, or sunspots, or leprechauns but rather a more pedestrian explanation, which may even come to light via the airport's security cameras. You never know.
Actually, there was a little bit of silver lining to this trip. I was told at the airport security checkpoint in Louisville that the code on my boarding pass meant I had clearance and could go through a special line. In essence, this meant I didn't have to take off my shoes and hop around barefoot while pulling out items that need to go in bins by themselves. I had read about paying $100 or so to get this kind of treatment, but I certainly hadn't done that. It seemed such an anomaly that I asked the security officers how it happened. The answer seemed to be that sometimes you just get lucky. It reminded me of the feeling I used to have when I was a Silver Medallion flyer: the perks are modest, but any little bonus is enough to boost your spirits.
Once on the plane, I somehow managed to seat myself next to a UPS pilot, who was flying on business. Sitting next to a pilot will certainly make you feel safer, in case you happen to be having any jitters about the whole friendly sky experience. He told me about his career and all the places he'd been, and before I knew it, we were in Chicago. So far, so good. I had to get from Midway to the conference hotel via train, which isn't hard to do, except that the last bit involved finding my way from the Red Line station to the hotel on foot. I asked for directions, and I'm glad I got a second opinion, because following the first person's advice would probably have gotten me lost only two blocks from the hotel.
I didn't do any traveling within Chicago, except for walking to Millennium Park one afternoon and going to lunch at Downtown Dogs the next day; the conference kept me too busy. On Saturday, my last day, I decided to give myself more time than I thought I needed to get back to the airport. Despite having had a pretty easy time of it on the way up, I didn't want to be in a position of having to rush due to unexpected problems. It's good I took that attitude because the first thing that happened was that none of the machines in the Red Line station were making change, so I had to go back out, cross the street, and buy a bottle of water in a fast food store to get some dollar bills. One of the bills I was given felt a little strange, so to be on the safe side, I asked the cashier for another one. Sometimes those ticket machines are finicky.
Once I got my ticket and was on the train, someone told me that service on the Orange Line was out between Roosevelt and Halsted, which meant taking a bus between stations. That sounded like a headache. This person said he'd show me how it worked, but when we came out of the station, the bus he was getting on, which he said was going to Halsted, looked like an ordinary city bus. I could see Orange Line buses lined up behind it, so I walked over and got on one. Once I got to Midway, I printed my boarding pass and went through security, still under the magical protection of my pre-authorized status. I kept trying to find out more about why I had this status. I told one security officer that I'd had some strange experiences in past travels that made me question anything out of the ordinary; he just smiled. I told another officer that the ease of the whole thing was freaking me out; she said I should just be happy about it. She was probably right.
So, time to relax, get a sandwich, and read a little before the flight was called. Once on the plane, I rested all the way home, thankful when we arrived a few minutes early, since I still had to drive back to Lexington. I got to my car, unlocked the driver's side door, and uh, oh -- what's this? The rear door on the driver's side, which was definitely locked when I left it, was now most definitely unlocked. This is travel as I've come to know it; I suspected I wouldn't get home without at least one incident (not that it couldn't have been worse). I mentioned what happened to the person at the exit booth, who said she'd report it to the Louisville Police.
There's nothing about my modest little car that would suggest it has anything worth taking, and in case you were in doubt, a glance inside would show as much. Nothing was broken; the lock had not been forced. Once I got home, I was able to take a closer look and couldn't find anything else awry, but I followed up with airport security to let them know what happened. I had doubts that anything in the way of a police report would have been made on the basis of my mentioning it to the exit booth attendant, so I took it to a higher authority.
So, a trip, a return, a mystery, and thankfulness that I have nowhere else to go in the foreseeable future. This would seem a rather poor attitude if it didn't coincide with my budget, which makes it actually a convenient outlook to have at present. If you're wondering whether I, as a mythologist, make anything of the door incident, the answer is not really. I don't suspect Mercury in retrograde, or sunspots, or leprechauns but rather a more pedestrian explanation, which may even come to light via the airport's security cameras. You never know.
Thursday, April 17, 2014
Looking for Wisdom, I Encounter Jimi
I arrived in Chicago yesterday for a conference and have spent the last day and a half going up and down stairs between rooms, consulting a schedule book the size of Great Expectations, figuring out where the free food is, and processing a variety of ideas. This is my first time at this conference, and though I thought I'd been to some large conventions, this one is the biggest by far, at least judging by the staggering number of sessions.
By its nature, it's also more protean than some of the more discipline-focused conferences I've attended before. Popular culture is a natural home for a mythologist, but due to the tremendous variety of subjects included, it's broadly based, making it difficult to get your bearings. This actually supports what I said in my presentation today about the maze of knowledge and competing truths in the modern world. Traveling the halls here is a little like negotiating a maze. In one room, they're talking Tolkien; in the next room, they're discussing the Affordable Health Care Act; down the hall, it's feminist readings of fairy tales, punk rock culture, and fan fiction.
Planning one's strategy in advance may not result in smooth sailing, since cancellations can produce dropped sessions or alterations in panels you were considering. Not only is the gathering a maze, but it's a moving maze, seeming to reform itself as it goes along, like a starfish constantly shedding and growing new arms. Not only that, but I'd argue that there actually is no center to it except the one you impose yourself.
I've been surprised a couple of times, though I shouldn't have been, at reactions I've seen to what seemed to me fairly sensible questions and positions. One understands that people have a lot invested personally and academically in their ideas -- but still. From someone who was rather vehemently opposed to the idea of teaching information literacy across the curriculum to people on a panel who seemed uncomfortable about delving into politics in a discussion of Hollywood and propaganda, I've encountered some attitudes that were the opposite of what I'd expect.
Still, there are small epiphanies. A couple of sessions I've walked into that were second choices turned out to be excellent: one on special collections and one on the goals that shape educational planning in the United States. Sometimes accidents lead you to the right place. I left one session yesterday in a bit of a daze, disoriented by the direction the discussion had taken, and wandered into the exhibit hall, where academic publishers have their best books on display. What do you suppose I saw there, first thing? Nothing but a life of Jimi Hendrix, written by the man himself, bearing a cover photo of its subject wearing a sweet, slightly bemused expression.
I know it was an accident, but it was one that happened at just the right time. Girl, his expression seemed to say, the only thing that's wrong with you is being shut up in those rooms too long with all those smart-acting people. Get yourself outside and breathe a while. And don't pay too much mind to what goes on; take what you can and don't bother about the rest. When it's your turn to talk, get up there and say your piece. Then see if there's a free buffet around.
OK, that was me channeling Jimi, but maybe he would have said something like that. At any rate, a sweetly tricksterish quality somehow communicated itself to me from the cover of that book and activated my own inner rebel. Would you want to let Jimi Hendrix down? Me neither. Jimi, I said in my mind, I think I see your point.
Good, I imagine him saying. And I'm serious about that buffet. Get out there now and find something that'll keep body and soul together.
I'm not sure they have that, Jimi. These are academics, so it's probably more like crudites and cheese. With a side of condescension.
No kidding? Well, whatever they've got, pile it high.
By its nature, it's also more protean than some of the more discipline-focused conferences I've attended before. Popular culture is a natural home for a mythologist, but due to the tremendous variety of subjects included, it's broadly based, making it difficult to get your bearings. This actually supports what I said in my presentation today about the maze of knowledge and competing truths in the modern world. Traveling the halls here is a little like negotiating a maze. In one room, they're talking Tolkien; in the next room, they're discussing the Affordable Health Care Act; down the hall, it's feminist readings of fairy tales, punk rock culture, and fan fiction.
Planning one's strategy in advance may not result in smooth sailing, since cancellations can produce dropped sessions or alterations in panels you were considering. Not only is the gathering a maze, but it's a moving maze, seeming to reform itself as it goes along, like a starfish constantly shedding and growing new arms. Not only that, but I'd argue that there actually is no center to it except the one you impose yourself.
I've been surprised a couple of times, though I shouldn't have been, at reactions I've seen to what seemed to me fairly sensible questions and positions. One understands that people have a lot invested personally and academically in their ideas -- but still. From someone who was rather vehemently opposed to the idea of teaching information literacy across the curriculum to people on a panel who seemed uncomfortable about delving into politics in a discussion of Hollywood and propaganda, I've encountered some attitudes that were the opposite of what I'd expect.
Still, there are small epiphanies. A couple of sessions I've walked into that were second choices turned out to be excellent: one on special collections and one on the goals that shape educational planning in the United States. Sometimes accidents lead you to the right place. I left one session yesterday in a bit of a daze, disoriented by the direction the discussion had taken, and wandered into the exhibit hall, where academic publishers have their best books on display. What do you suppose I saw there, first thing? Nothing but a life of Jimi Hendrix, written by the man himself, bearing a cover photo of its subject wearing a sweet, slightly bemused expression.
I know it was an accident, but it was one that happened at just the right time. Girl, his expression seemed to say, the only thing that's wrong with you is being shut up in those rooms too long with all those smart-acting people. Get yourself outside and breathe a while. And don't pay too much mind to what goes on; take what you can and don't bother about the rest. When it's your turn to talk, get up there and say your piece. Then see if there's a free buffet around.
OK, that was me channeling Jimi, but maybe he would have said something like that. At any rate, a sweetly tricksterish quality somehow communicated itself to me from the cover of that book and activated my own inner rebel. Would you want to let Jimi Hendrix down? Me neither. Jimi, I said in my mind, I think I see your point.
Good, I imagine him saying. And I'm serious about that buffet. Get out there now and find something that'll keep body and soul together.
I'm not sure they have that, Jimi. These are academics, so it's probably more like crudites and cheese. With a side of condescension.
No kidding? Well, whatever they've got, pile it high.
Wednesday, April 9, 2014
When Basketball Was Postmodern
Well, March Madness is behind us, the NCAA tournament has come and gone, and spring rolls on. I'm sure you're wondering what postmodernism has to do with basketball and why people with degrees come up with such silly ideas anyway, but in this post I'm going to show you how it's done.
I was reminiscing about springs of years past and my freshman year in college in my last post, and I guess one thing leads to another. I'm now remembering my sophomore year, which was dominated by a long and snowy winter not unlike the one we've just had, only worse. The Eagles were singing "Hotel California," but we weren't having any of that dark desert highway business here. We got walloped by a late January storm and an accompanying deep snow that seemed to last for weeks. I had just gotten contact lenses and could hardly see for the glare; south campus resembled the Antarctic more than the Bluegrass. It was a year when spring could not have come too soon.
It was also the year our school won its fifth NCAA basketball title. I was a big basketball fan back then and still remember how disappointing it had been when Kentucky lost to North Carolina in the East Regional the year before. It's strange how vividly I remember that, but of course, it was a time of new experiences for me. The night we did win, in March of 1978, everyone poured out of the dorms in a spontaneous Dionysian outburst that involved yelling, dancing around, and jumping up and down and seemed to combine basketball frenzy with a sort of spring ecstasy. At one point, a random boy appeared next to us and lifted my roommate (who was not a small girl) off her feet and into the air. I still remember her expression, wavering between smiling and shocked. People were climbing the lamp posts, or trying to.
There was something akin to Botticelli's "Allegory of Spring," with its pagan energy, going on that night, though for sheer pandemonium the scene may have had more in common with Hieronymous Bosch. I didn't see any destructive acts, but there were some gravity-defying ones.
As it happened, I was taking a music appreciation course that semester (I think there may even have been a basketball player in the class). We had listened to things as varied as medieval chant, Henry VIII's "Pastime With Good Company," and Janis Joplin, but the most memorable recording was the one our instructor -- a good-natured sort who didn't seem to mind explaining polyphony to undergraduates -- played for us at the end of the year. We had been studying modern composers, and he played a piece and asked us to try to identify what it was. The dissonance and unsettled energy made me think of Stravinsky, and I was sure that's what it was. Our professor surprised us by explaining that it was a recording he had made of "you people" while standing outside his apartment the night UK won the tournament.
The sounds of celebration had resolved into a cacophony in which human voices and car horns and goodness knows what else were indistinguishable from the strings, horns, and percussion of an orchestra playing something postmodern and daringly experimental, with the spirit of "The Rite of Spring." You'd never have believed it, but it was terribly avant-garde.
I guess this says something about archetypal energy that manifests itself both naturally and in artistic productions; also something about how we are often a part of something without fully recognizing what it looks like from the outside. I'm grateful for that music instructor who had the wit to record what he heard, giving me, all these years later, an explanation as to why March is the perfect time for basketball tournaments. I've come to realize how often there's mythology inside the most ordinary things, something that never would have occurred to me that long-ago night, in my fish out of water days, united with my cohorts for a little while when basketball brought down the house.
I was reminiscing about springs of years past and my freshman year in college in my last post, and I guess one thing leads to another. I'm now remembering my sophomore year, which was dominated by a long and snowy winter not unlike the one we've just had, only worse. The Eagles were singing "Hotel California," but we weren't having any of that dark desert highway business here. We got walloped by a late January storm and an accompanying deep snow that seemed to last for weeks. I had just gotten contact lenses and could hardly see for the glare; south campus resembled the Antarctic more than the Bluegrass. It was a year when spring could not have come too soon.
It was also the year our school won its fifth NCAA basketball title. I was a big basketball fan back then and still remember how disappointing it had been when Kentucky lost to North Carolina in the East Regional the year before. It's strange how vividly I remember that, but of course, it was a time of new experiences for me. The night we did win, in March of 1978, everyone poured out of the dorms in a spontaneous Dionysian outburst that involved yelling, dancing around, and jumping up and down and seemed to combine basketball frenzy with a sort of spring ecstasy. At one point, a random boy appeared next to us and lifted my roommate (who was not a small girl) off her feet and into the air. I still remember her expression, wavering between smiling and shocked. People were climbing the lamp posts, or trying to.
There was something akin to Botticelli's "Allegory of Spring," with its pagan energy, going on that night, though for sheer pandemonium the scene may have had more in common with Hieronymous Bosch. I didn't see any destructive acts, but there were some gravity-defying ones.
As it happened, I was taking a music appreciation course that semester (I think there may even have been a basketball player in the class). We had listened to things as varied as medieval chant, Henry VIII's "Pastime With Good Company," and Janis Joplin, but the most memorable recording was the one our instructor -- a good-natured sort who didn't seem to mind explaining polyphony to undergraduates -- played for us at the end of the year. We had been studying modern composers, and he played a piece and asked us to try to identify what it was. The dissonance and unsettled energy made me think of Stravinsky, and I was sure that's what it was. Our professor surprised us by explaining that it was a recording he had made of "you people" while standing outside his apartment the night UK won the tournament.
The sounds of celebration had resolved into a cacophony in which human voices and car horns and goodness knows what else were indistinguishable from the strings, horns, and percussion of an orchestra playing something postmodern and daringly experimental, with the spirit of "The Rite of Spring." You'd never have believed it, but it was terribly avant-garde.
I guess this says something about archetypal energy that manifests itself both naturally and in artistic productions; also something about how we are often a part of something without fully recognizing what it looks like from the outside. I'm grateful for that music instructor who had the wit to record what he heard, giving me, all these years later, an explanation as to why March is the perfect time for basketball tournaments. I've come to realize how often there's mythology inside the most ordinary things, something that never would have occurred to me that long-ago night, in my fish out of water days, united with my cohorts for a little while when basketball brought down the house.
Monday, March 31, 2014
April, and Time
I've been focusing on a paper I'm writing on libraries as labyrinths, and it's taking a lot of my attention, so the blog is a little late in coming. I've been immersed in the life of Jorge Luis Borges for the last few days, and engrossing as it is, that hasn't stopped me from indulging in my other current preoccupation: keeping a weather eye out for new signs of spring.
Every time I go walking I see more patches of green on the lawns, more tiny flowers springing up; I saw my first daffodils of the season the other day near a coffeehouse I frequent. The buds are almost ready to burst on some of the trees, especially the redbuds, of which there are many in my neighborhood. I finally experienced that March day I was describing a couple of weeks ago, that prototypical day that's balmy and a little damp; it happened last Friday. It's still chilly at night, and though the temperatures have been variable, we are heading into a week of daytime highs in the 60s. Today was sunny and mild, and tomorrow should be the same.
If you want to see Kentucky at its prettiest, you couldn't do better than to arrive in April, though it's difficult to forecast the best time with precision, because many flowering trees seem to depend on warmth to bloom, and that never occurs predictably. Within a week or two, though, Lexington's streets should present a palette of various pink, violet, and white blossoms that will make the memory of winter grays seem a distant imagining.
I'm casting back in my own memory to figure out when the arrival of spring began to take on such significance. Not surprisingly, spring didn't really register when I was a kid in Florida, except to herald the arrival of Easter (the third best holiday in the pantheon). I don't remember having spring fever that much in junior high or high school, either; the chief thing back then was the beginning of summer. One day seemed much like another when I was in school, except for that electricity in the air that announced the approach of June.
The first time I ever fully appreciated how beautiful spring is in Kentucky was my first year in college. The campus has a variety of blooming trees, and though I must have been too engrossed in finals to notice it at first, I remember crossing Rose Street after my final exam in Western Literature From 1660 to the Present and suddenly becoming aware of a near wonderland of tulips and flowering trees. I was surprised that I had been too preoccupied to notice (though I must have had several term papers due in April and was also preparing to go home for the summer). At some point, while I was writing papers for Philosophy class, studying Spanish verbs, and thinking through my interpretation of Wordsworth's poem "Stepping Westward," the campus had transformed itself into a garden of great and delicate beauty. In succeeding years, I came to realize how fleeting that time of beauty is, and to look out for it.
Years of having to deal with ice and snow first thing in the morning before going to work did a great deal to destroy my enjoyment of winter, though I have to say I took those things in stride when I was in school and walked everywhere. One also falls into the habit of complaining, along with everyone else, about the short days and other pitfalls of the cold months. Beyond that, I have noticed in myself a keener awareness overall of the seasons, the holidays, and the rhythms that attach to different times of the year when time seems to move faster or slower. I don't know if this is something that comes with grower older or if it results simply from paying more attention.
The whole business of time has changed as I've gotten older. When I was young, I seemed to be living in an eternal now, probably because I didn't have much past to look back on. Now I'm more solidly situated as to past, present, and future, and of course the responsibilities of adult life require attention to such things as tax deadlines, the scheduling of appointments, and other duties that are time-dependent. I also live in a climate with distinct seasonal changes that constantly draw attention to the calendar. I'd actually like to go back to that eternal now of simply living in the moment, neither looking ahead, anticipating, or looking back, remembering. I wonder sometimes if living in more of a constant climate than the one I'm in would facilitate that, but I haven't had the opportunity to try it out.
Until I do, I guess I'll stick with looking forward to the redbuds and anticipating the azaleas. I don't know if it's Señor Borges or memories of life in Florida that have me thinking so much of sunshine and warm breezes . . . maybe it's both. But if I ever do relocate to a place in the sun, I may have to come back here for a couple of weeks out of the year, just for April. (Actually, summer is pretty nice here, too.)
Every time I go walking I see more patches of green on the lawns, more tiny flowers springing up; I saw my first daffodils of the season the other day near a coffeehouse I frequent. The buds are almost ready to burst on some of the trees, especially the redbuds, of which there are many in my neighborhood. I finally experienced that March day I was describing a couple of weeks ago, that prototypical day that's balmy and a little damp; it happened last Friday. It's still chilly at night, and though the temperatures have been variable, we are heading into a week of daytime highs in the 60s. Today was sunny and mild, and tomorrow should be the same.
If you want to see Kentucky at its prettiest, you couldn't do better than to arrive in April, though it's difficult to forecast the best time with precision, because many flowering trees seem to depend on warmth to bloom, and that never occurs predictably. Within a week or two, though, Lexington's streets should present a palette of various pink, violet, and white blossoms that will make the memory of winter grays seem a distant imagining.
I'm casting back in my own memory to figure out when the arrival of spring began to take on such significance. Not surprisingly, spring didn't really register when I was a kid in Florida, except to herald the arrival of Easter (the third best holiday in the pantheon). I don't remember having spring fever that much in junior high or high school, either; the chief thing back then was the beginning of summer. One day seemed much like another when I was in school, except for that electricity in the air that announced the approach of June.
The first time I ever fully appreciated how beautiful spring is in Kentucky was my first year in college. The campus has a variety of blooming trees, and though I must have been too engrossed in finals to notice it at first, I remember crossing Rose Street after my final exam in Western Literature From 1660 to the Present and suddenly becoming aware of a near wonderland of tulips and flowering trees. I was surprised that I had been too preoccupied to notice (though I must have had several term papers due in April and was also preparing to go home for the summer). At some point, while I was writing papers for Philosophy class, studying Spanish verbs, and thinking through my interpretation of Wordsworth's poem "Stepping Westward," the campus had transformed itself into a garden of great and delicate beauty. In succeeding years, I came to realize how fleeting that time of beauty is, and to look out for it.
Years of having to deal with ice and snow first thing in the morning before going to work did a great deal to destroy my enjoyment of winter, though I have to say I took those things in stride when I was in school and walked everywhere. One also falls into the habit of complaining, along with everyone else, about the short days and other pitfalls of the cold months. Beyond that, I have noticed in myself a keener awareness overall of the seasons, the holidays, and the rhythms that attach to different times of the year when time seems to move faster or slower. I don't know if this is something that comes with grower older or if it results simply from paying more attention.
The whole business of time has changed as I've gotten older. When I was young, I seemed to be living in an eternal now, probably because I didn't have much past to look back on. Now I'm more solidly situated as to past, present, and future, and of course the responsibilities of adult life require attention to such things as tax deadlines, the scheduling of appointments, and other duties that are time-dependent. I also live in a climate with distinct seasonal changes that constantly draw attention to the calendar. I'd actually like to go back to that eternal now of simply living in the moment, neither looking ahead, anticipating, or looking back, remembering. I wonder sometimes if living in more of a constant climate than the one I'm in would facilitate that, but I haven't had the opportunity to try it out.
Until I do, I guess I'll stick with looking forward to the redbuds and anticipating the azaleas. I don't know if it's Señor Borges or memories of life in Florida that have me thinking so much of sunshine and warm breezes . . . maybe it's both. But if I ever do relocate to a place in the sun, I may have to come back here for a couple of weeks out of the year, just for April. (Actually, summer is pretty nice here, too.)
Friday, March 21, 2014
Birth of Spring, Kentucky Style
Yesterday afternoon I took my camera when I went walking. I was looking for early signs of spring and wanted to document any I found. It was a bright, beautiful day, and I'd already noticed tufts of grass poking up in different places, so I knew there'd be other indications. It does seem to me that, like last year, spring is taking its sweet time about getting here. I can remember at least one instance (I'm not making it up) when spring was in full flower by April, weeping cherries, crabapples, and all. The forecast suggests that probably won't happen this year, but at least we're on the downhill side of March.
It felt so good to be out on a mild, sunny day that at first I was taking pictures of almost everything -- trees, flagpoles, buildings -- out of sheer good spirits. I saw a group of birds in a field and tried to photograph them, but they wouldn't sit still for it, so I had to give that up. On a residential street, I took pictures of clumps of new grass at the foot of a tree and the first flowers I've spotted this season, which turned out to be crocuses. Down the lane, I photographed branches almost ready to burst into bloom under a radiant blue sky. Seriously, I was
having thoughts about hopscotch; it was
an e.e. cummings, little lame balloonman sort of day.
This afternoon, I went for the same walk without my camera. It was a little warmer today, if breezier; more grass seems to have sprouted up over night, and I saw more crocuses. Someone was having a party on his back lawn, with croquet, a food table, and the works. A party for early spring! I haven't seen anyone playing outside since sometime last fall. It made me nostalgic for my grandmother's back yard, though that was really more of a June-July-August sort of thing.
Uh oh, I'm getting ahead of myself! It's not even April yet. We haven't even seen any redbuds, and we don't want to miss that. But a polar vortex will do that to you.
How's it looking in your neck of the woods?
Friday, March 14, 2014
Dryads and Fauns of March
I don't know what March is like where you live, but around here it's very changeable. I remember one year when spring seemed to start at the end of February, so that early March brought warm breezes and blossoms; another year (possibly the very next one) we had a winter storm warning and blizzard conditions in the middle of the month. Sometimes, you're wearing short sleeves on St. Patrick's Day, but that may not prevent you from seeing snow flurries when it's almost April.
Last year, it seemed to take spring a long time to get here. I'd go out for walks, and it would be bright and sunny but rather cold. March seemed to go on forever in a not-quite-winter-not-quite-spring limbo, with a few breaks here and there. It seemed to me that the buds and flowers were later than usual, though I might have imagined that.
In my mind, despite the knowledge that March is predictably unpredictable, there is an archetypal March day. I have actually experienced these, often enough that they have come to sum up the entire month for me, though I think such days are relatively few and even absent altogether sometimes (I don't remember one last year, for example). It's a day that, out of nowhere almost, is suddenly mild and even slightly balmy. Winter seems to have disappeared into nothingness. The air is still and a bit damp, and you can smell the earth. It may be sunny, or it may be cloudy, but the main thing is the returning warmth that you haven't felt for months. You may have heard birds all winter, but suddenly their singing is sweeter and more eloquent and cuts through the stillness like crystal.
So far, I haven't experienced a day quite like that this year. We began the month with a snowstorm that left things looking more like January than March, except that the quality of the sunlight, when I went walking the next day, was too mellow for winter. Earlier this week, we had temperatures in the low 70s on a day that had people driving around town with their car tops down, windows open, and radios turned up. It was undeniably a beautiful spring afternoon but more emphatic than the type of day I'm talking about, which appears without fanfare as more of a subtle awakening.
As a child in Florida, I learned about the four seasons as something that occurred elsewhere, though we pretended they applied to us, too, just to be good sports. We dutifully colored autumn leaves, as first-graders, with our thick Crayolas, imagined winter wonderland at Christmas (though we might be wearing shorts), and celebrated the return of spring with pastels and Easter eggs almost as enthusiastically as if we'd been snowed in. At that time, in the simple shorthand of seasonal images, a March day would have been signified by wind blowing an umbrella sideways.
In that, at least, today was typical. It was quite windy when I went out for my walk in the late afternoon; I took a light jacket. There was a hazy sort of sunshine that was neither here nor there. Although it was a mild day, it had more of an end of winter than beginning of spring feel to it; it lacked the raw earthiness that signals true change, and there was little, if any, greenery in evidence.
If I were to imagine a presiding deity for today, it would be a minor goddess somewhat like the image I saw in the mirror when I got home, with hair completely askew. I hadn't realized it was quite that windy, but my hair said otherwise. It looked like a coiffure a headbanger's stylist would spend hours trying to achieve with mousse and special combs; the lift was unbelievable. Yes, that might be the proper divinity for today, a sort of dryad with long, wild hair and streaming drapery who causes the wind to blow by shaking the branches of her favorite tree.
With any luck, she'll soon be superseded by the divinities of damp earth and still air, who announce their presence gently, with a scattering of tufted grass and daffodils, the loamy smell of dirt, and a lilting quality to the birdsong that turns their notes into something nearly liquid.
Last year, it seemed to take spring a long time to get here. I'd go out for walks, and it would be bright and sunny but rather cold. March seemed to go on forever in a not-quite-winter-not-quite-spring limbo, with a few breaks here and there. It seemed to me that the buds and flowers were later than usual, though I might have imagined that.
In my mind, despite the knowledge that March is predictably unpredictable, there is an archetypal March day. I have actually experienced these, often enough that they have come to sum up the entire month for me, though I think such days are relatively few and even absent altogether sometimes (I don't remember one last year, for example). It's a day that, out of nowhere almost, is suddenly mild and even slightly balmy. Winter seems to have disappeared into nothingness. The air is still and a bit damp, and you can smell the earth. It may be sunny, or it may be cloudy, but the main thing is the returning warmth that you haven't felt for months. You may have heard birds all winter, but suddenly their singing is sweeter and more eloquent and cuts through the stillness like crystal.
So far, I haven't experienced a day quite like that this year. We began the month with a snowstorm that left things looking more like January than March, except that the quality of the sunlight, when I went walking the next day, was too mellow for winter. Earlier this week, we had temperatures in the low 70s on a day that had people driving around town with their car tops down, windows open, and radios turned up. It was undeniably a beautiful spring afternoon but more emphatic than the type of day I'm talking about, which appears without fanfare as more of a subtle awakening.
As a child in Florida, I learned about the four seasons as something that occurred elsewhere, though we pretended they applied to us, too, just to be good sports. We dutifully colored autumn leaves, as first-graders, with our thick Crayolas, imagined winter wonderland at Christmas (though we might be wearing shorts), and celebrated the return of spring with pastels and Easter eggs almost as enthusiastically as if we'd been snowed in. At that time, in the simple shorthand of seasonal images, a March day would have been signified by wind blowing an umbrella sideways.
In that, at least, today was typical. It was quite windy when I went out for my walk in the late afternoon; I took a light jacket. There was a hazy sort of sunshine that was neither here nor there. Although it was a mild day, it had more of an end of winter than beginning of spring feel to it; it lacked the raw earthiness that signals true change, and there was little, if any, greenery in evidence.
If I were to imagine a presiding deity for today, it would be a minor goddess somewhat like the image I saw in the mirror when I got home, with hair completely askew. I hadn't realized it was quite that windy, but my hair said otherwise. It looked like a coiffure a headbanger's stylist would spend hours trying to achieve with mousse and special combs; the lift was unbelievable. Yes, that might be the proper divinity for today, a sort of dryad with long, wild hair and streaming drapery who causes the wind to blow by shaking the branches of her favorite tree.
With any luck, she'll soon be superseded by the divinities of damp earth and still air, who announce their presence gently, with a scattering of tufted grass and daffodils, the loamy smell of dirt, and a lilting quality to the birdsong that turns their notes into something nearly liquid.
Friday, March 7, 2014
Need Libraries? Ask Caesar.
This week I've been reading a book about the history of libraries. Even as a writer and librarian, there are a lot of things I didn't know, such as the difference between parchment and paper, the fact that philosopher David Hume was a librarian in Edinburgh, and the actual amount of destruction that took place in libraries when Henry VIII dissolved the monasteries in 1537 (apparently, some books were even sold as waste paper, according to Michael H. Harris, author of History of Libraries in the Western World).
In spite of the mind-numbing frequency with which priceless manuscripts and books have been lost through the ages to invasions, war, disaster, and neglect, the story of libraries is fascinating. Certainly they have been magical places for me, especially the ones I recall from childhood. I clearly remember my first visit to the elementary school library, a place that exuded the mystique of an inner sanctum, largely because of a rule that you had to be in the second grade before you could borrow books. I know some librarians might object to such a policy, but in my case, the effect of the prohibition was to make the library a place of fabulous allure. My first visit took on the character of an initiation: I couldn't have been more thrilled if that quiet second-floor room had contained the Holy Grail (and maybe it did).
Lately, libraries, like many other institutions, have fallen on tough times. I read last week about the difficulties the Los Angeles school district is having in keeping its school libraries open. Funding shortfalls have forced half the district's elementary and middle schools to do without librarians or library aides. Yesterday morning, I read an op-ed piece by the president of the Kentucky Association of School Librarians describing a plan to reduce the number of librarians in the local public high schools from two to one, a plan she believes will hurt students, greatly reducing their opportunities to get help with assignments, college applications, and other needs.
In hard times, granted, belt tightening is necessary, and even so, almost no one believes his/her own department or favorite cause should be subject to cuts. Still, there is something about the idea of reducing students' access to books (and librarians) that seems fundamentally wrong. Don't libraries and education go hand in hand?
I can't imagine my own childhood and youth without the libraries, both school and public, that I haunted like a hungry ghost. No trip to the inner sanctum to pick out my first library book, The Princess and the Woodcutter's Daughter? No one to help me learn how to use the Reader's Guide to Periodical Literature? No Nine Coaches Waiting or Pride and Prejudice, discovered for the first time by browsing in the library of my Catholic school? No mind-blowing journey into Of Human Bondage, a reading experience that helped me see there were other points of view besides the one in my catechism class?
I'm not privy to the amount of soul searching and agony required to hammer out a budget in either the Los Angeles or the Fayette County schools. I assume that only a massive amount of both could lead to a decision to cut library services. Frustration with the administrators and decision-makers in these particular cases may be misplaced, since the tale of how we arrived at such a pass is a long and tangled one that begins far from the halls of the schools or the offices of the school boards.
The real and terrible irony is that, here in the Information Age, with more need than ever for people to learn effective ways to find, evaluate, and use information, the processes by which they gain these skills are, in many cases, not supported. Information literacy is at the heart of critical thinking, crucial for effective citizenship as well as scholastic success. One sometimes gets the impression that, as far as some government officials are concerned, the less people know, the better, but I disagree. The basis for an open, democratic society is an informed citizenship. Besides that, future advances in technology, science, arts and letters, and business depend on an educated workforce with problem-solving abilities, a flair for innovative thinking, and a high degree of information savvy.
Mnemosyne, the goddess of memory, along with her daughters, the Muses, presides over the work of libraries. The accumulated knowledge of what has gone before, combined with the inspiration that gives birth to new ideas, allows societies to move ahead. In the history of libraries, we read of the loss of much that was worthy and beautiful, and of the ways in which the learning of the classical world was kept alive--though hanging by the barest thread at times--in the libraries of Byzantium, the studies of Arabic scholars, and the monasteries of the Middle Ages. Many civilizations, having attained a high degree of advancement, were undone not only by invaders but also by the loss of their culture.
This seems a dire fate to imagine for our society based on budget restrictions in education, which we all hope are temporary and subject to amelioration. But it's possible many of the great cultures of the past never imagined the fates that befell them, either. I'm optimistic that we, as Americans, can figure out ways to support schools, libraries, and literacy, even during an economic downturn, if we set our minds to it. I'm a little concerned about the political will to support such efforts, but on that point I hope to be proved wrong.
In spite of the mind-numbing frequency with which priceless manuscripts and books have been lost through the ages to invasions, war, disaster, and neglect, the story of libraries is fascinating. Certainly they have been magical places for me, especially the ones I recall from childhood. I clearly remember my first visit to the elementary school library, a place that exuded the mystique of an inner sanctum, largely because of a rule that you had to be in the second grade before you could borrow books. I know some librarians might object to such a policy, but in my case, the effect of the prohibition was to make the library a place of fabulous allure. My first visit took on the character of an initiation: I couldn't have been more thrilled if that quiet second-floor room had contained the Holy Grail (and maybe it did).
Lately, libraries, like many other institutions, have fallen on tough times. I read last week about the difficulties the Los Angeles school district is having in keeping its school libraries open. Funding shortfalls have forced half the district's elementary and middle schools to do without librarians or library aides. Yesterday morning, I read an op-ed piece by the president of the Kentucky Association of School Librarians describing a plan to reduce the number of librarians in the local public high schools from two to one, a plan she believes will hurt students, greatly reducing their opportunities to get help with assignments, college applications, and other needs.
In hard times, granted, belt tightening is necessary, and even so, almost no one believes his/her own department or favorite cause should be subject to cuts. Still, there is something about the idea of reducing students' access to books (and librarians) that seems fundamentally wrong. Don't libraries and education go hand in hand?
I can't imagine my own childhood and youth without the libraries, both school and public, that I haunted like a hungry ghost. No trip to the inner sanctum to pick out my first library book, The Princess and the Woodcutter's Daughter? No one to help me learn how to use the Reader's Guide to Periodical Literature? No Nine Coaches Waiting or Pride and Prejudice, discovered for the first time by browsing in the library of my Catholic school? No mind-blowing journey into Of Human Bondage, a reading experience that helped me see there were other points of view besides the one in my catechism class?
I'm not privy to the amount of soul searching and agony required to hammer out a budget in either the Los Angeles or the Fayette County schools. I assume that only a massive amount of both could lead to a decision to cut library services. Frustration with the administrators and decision-makers in these particular cases may be misplaced, since the tale of how we arrived at such a pass is a long and tangled one that begins far from the halls of the schools or the offices of the school boards.
The real and terrible irony is that, here in the Information Age, with more need than ever for people to learn effective ways to find, evaluate, and use information, the processes by which they gain these skills are, in many cases, not supported. Information literacy is at the heart of critical thinking, crucial for effective citizenship as well as scholastic success. One sometimes gets the impression that, as far as some government officials are concerned, the less people know, the better, but I disagree. The basis for an open, democratic society is an informed citizenship. Besides that, future advances in technology, science, arts and letters, and business depend on an educated workforce with problem-solving abilities, a flair for innovative thinking, and a high degree of information savvy.
Mnemosyne, the goddess of memory, along with her daughters, the Muses, presides over the work of libraries. The accumulated knowledge of what has gone before, combined with the inspiration that gives birth to new ideas, allows societies to move ahead. In the history of libraries, we read of the loss of much that was worthy and beautiful, and of the ways in which the learning of the classical world was kept alive--though hanging by the barest thread at times--in the libraries of Byzantium, the studies of Arabic scholars, and the monasteries of the Middle Ages. Many civilizations, having attained a high degree of advancement, were undone not only by invaders but also by the loss of their culture.
This seems a dire fate to imagine for our society based on budget restrictions in education, which we all hope are temporary and subject to amelioration. But it's possible many of the great cultures of the past never imagined the fates that befell them, either. I'm optimistic that we, as Americans, can figure out ways to support schools, libraries, and literacy, even during an economic downturn, if we set our minds to it. I'm a little concerned about the political will to support such efforts, but on that point I hope to be proved wrong.
Thursday, February 27, 2014
Demeter's in the Kitchen, and She Has a Blender
I seem to be preoccupied, in my recent Facebook postings, with food. I think there are several reasons for this. For one, it's winter, and most of us are in hibernation, especially with the kind of deep freeze we've had this year. You can't always hit the sidewalks for a carefree stroll in the sun (especially when they're covered with ice), but you can always put a casserole in or bake some bread.
In just the last month, I've written posts about baking bread and cinnamon rolls, cooking chicken stew with escarole, making marinara and Bechamel sauce for lasagna, fixing Spanish rice, baking chocolate Valentine's cookies, re-creating a ravioli and broccoli dish I had years ago in Somerville, Mass., and trying to figure out how my grandmother made cornbread. Unlike other things that might eat up your day, a well-prepared meal can rarely be considered a waste of time. My only regret is that my circle of college friends, whom I used to enjoy cooking with, is now too far-flung to make group dinners possible.
OK, so it's winter, but I believe there's more to my food-mindedness than that. In addition to my own birthday, both my mother's and my father's birthdays occur in midwinter, so I've naturally been thinking more about the two of them than usual. Inextricably tied up with memories of childhood are memories of foodways and family meals. How I regret not finding out how my mother made certain things, like pancakes and meatloaf! How I wish I could be in my grandmother's kitchen again, eating her fried chicken. How well I remember the taste of a grilled cheese sandwich and Campbell's Tomato Soup, a common childhood lunch. How much fun it would be to prank my dad on his birthday one more time by putting hot pepper in the Jello!
If I were to self-analyze, I'd say that many of my kitchen adventures represent self-mothering, an attempt to take care of myself through culinary means. Gridlock in Washington? That's OK, here's a blueberry smoothie. Emperor has no clothes? Never mind, have some stew. Yet another inane conversation overheard in Starbucks? Time to make biscuits. Snarky relative? There's a recipe for Chicken Piccata around here somewhere.
I can tell that it really is self-nurturing and not self-indulgence by the judiciousness with which I (usually) weigh what I'd like to have with what seems most nutritious. I grew up in the meat and potatoes era, but I've branched out: I'm always looking for new ways to fix vegetables, including some I'm not used to using. I think I shocked some old friends the other day when I announced I making the potato soup I've been making for 30 years with celery instead of leaving it out as I've always done. "But you hate celery!" I heard, almost immediately. It's true, I always did; but then I vacationed in New Orleans, where the food was so divine and sometimes had celery in it, and there was that yummy tuna dill sandwich they used to have at the library that included celery, and so . . . there I was at the grocery store on Tuesday, eyeing celery on sale for $.77 and wondering why the bunches had to be quite so big. (The soup experiment hasn't gone down yet, but I can't imagine it will use more than a couple of stalks, which could mean ants on logs in my near future.)
You may not believe it, but I also have less of a tendency toward snacking and unrestrained dessert foraging than I used to have. That's not to say I've dropped it altogether, but I'll give you an example. I heard about a new type of Ben & Jerry's ice cream yesterday that apparently includes two different flavors in a single pint along with a core of something delectable like raspberry jam or fudge. My most immediate thought was, "Wow, that's extreme!" instead of "I have to see if Kroger has it!" (I will have to see if Kroger has it, but it wasn't my very first thought. See what I mean?)
So I can't, at the moment, do anything about unemployment, political intransigence, ignorance, incivility, dishonesty, or the rampant failure of so many schools to teach information literacy, but I can at least try to feed myself, which is saying a lot in a world where way too many people still go to bed hungry. We could all use an infusion of Demeter, which is probably why I'm so preoccupied with her. When I think about my parents, I think they'd be pleased that I invested the money a couple of years ago in all the kitchen basics I'd never bothered with before. Fake it till you make it, I can hear them saying. Fake it till you make it. And by the way, your biscuits are better than they used to be.
In just the last month, I've written posts about baking bread and cinnamon rolls, cooking chicken stew with escarole, making marinara and Bechamel sauce for lasagna, fixing Spanish rice, baking chocolate Valentine's cookies, re-creating a ravioli and broccoli dish I had years ago in Somerville, Mass., and trying to figure out how my grandmother made cornbread. Unlike other things that might eat up your day, a well-prepared meal can rarely be considered a waste of time. My only regret is that my circle of college friends, whom I used to enjoy cooking with, is now too far-flung to make group dinners possible.
OK, so it's winter, but I believe there's more to my food-mindedness than that. In addition to my own birthday, both my mother's and my father's birthdays occur in midwinter, so I've naturally been thinking more about the two of them than usual. Inextricably tied up with memories of childhood are memories of foodways and family meals. How I regret not finding out how my mother made certain things, like pancakes and meatloaf! How I wish I could be in my grandmother's kitchen again, eating her fried chicken. How well I remember the taste of a grilled cheese sandwich and Campbell's Tomato Soup, a common childhood lunch. How much fun it would be to prank my dad on his birthday one more time by putting hot pepper in the Jello!
If I were to self-analyze, I'd say that many of my kitchen adventures represent self-mothering, an attempt to take care of myself through culinary means. Gridlock in Washington? That's OK, here's a blueberry smoothie. Emperor has no clothes? Never mind, have some stew. Yet another inane conversation overheard in Starbucks? Time to make biscuits. Snarky relative? There's a recipe for Chicken Piccata around here somewhere.
I can tell that it really is self-nurturing and not self-indulgence by the judiciousness with which I (usually) weigh what I'd like to have with what seems most nutritious. I grew up in the meat and potatoes era, but I've branched out: I'm always looking for new ways to fix vegetables, including some I'm not used to using. I think I shocked some old friends the other day when I announced I making the potato soup I've been making for 30 years with celery instead of leaving it out as I've always done. "But you hate celery!" I heard, almost immediately. It's true, I always did; but then I vacationed in New Orleans, where the food was so divine and sometimes had celery in it, and there was that yummy tuna dill sandwich they used to have at the library that included celery, and so . . . there I was at the grocery store on Tuesday, eyeing celery on sale for $.77 and wondering why the bunches had to be quite so big. (The soup experiment hasn't gone down yet, but I can't imagine it will use more than a couple of stalks, which could mean ants on logs in my near future.)
You may not believe it, but I also have less of a tendency toward snacking and unrestrained dessert foraging than I used to have. That's not to say I've dropped it altogether, but I'll give you an example. I heard about a new type of Ben & Jerry's ice cream yesterday that apparently includes two different flavors in a single pint along with a core of something delectable like raspberry jam or fudge. My most immediate thought was, "Wow, that's extreme!" instead of "I have to see if Kroger has it!" (I will have to see if Kroger has it, but it wasn't my very first thought. See what I mean?)
So I can't, at the moment, do anything about unemployment, political intransigence, ignorance, incivility, dishonesty, or the rampant failure of so many schools to teach information literacy, but I can at least try to feed myself, which is saying a lot in a world where way too many people still go to bed hungry. We could all use an infusion of Demeter, which is probably why I'm so preoccupied with her. When I think about my parents, I think they'd be pleased that I invested the money a couple of years ago in all the kitchen basics I'd never bothered with before. Fake it till you make it, I can hear them saying. Fake it till you make it. And by the way, your biscuits are better than they used to be.
Friday, February 21, 2014
In the Heartland, an Autumn Night
Sometimes it's hard to know what to write about when the time for doing the blog comes around. It's been an adventurous week. I've had home maintenance, a stuffy nose, a change of coffeehouse scenes, walks in the sun, and earlier this evening, a talk with two underemployed twenty-somethings who are just as frustrated with the economy as the rest of us. The perception about all the jobs going to the newly graduated? That's not really true, it seems. It's equal parts enlightening and sad to hear young people sound so disillusioned that early in their careers, though I remember being in a similar position once. Plus ça change.
So I was trying to decide on my topic and have been thinking about the events of the week. But having just had a long political discussion, my energy for current events is spent for now. You can only talk about the same thing for so long without getting bored, and I write the blog to have fun, after all.
What to do, what to do. Rather than write about anything tiresome, I find myself seeking a place of tranquillity. I know exactly where it is. I am thinking now about something that happened years ago, quite unexpectedly, at the end of what had been a very frustrating period, and it's there that I'll come to rest for the evening.
I was in a small midwestern town for a festival of world music. It was one of those events where you move around from place to place, hearing a Celtic band from the north of Spain in a church, a Cuban ensemble in a meadow, French cabaret in a theater, and an Afro-pop sensation in a bar. I was sitting in a small arts center somewhere off the main drag, having just been entertained by a flamenco performance (I can still see the dancer's flaming red dress and remember the drama of the singer's delivery). I took out my contacts between acts and had just put on some lipstick, who knows why, because we were all sitting in semidarkness. Reflex, I suppose.
There followed an Americana songwriter with whom I was not familiar at all. I had read the description of his music in the program, and he sounded interesting. When he took the stage, he did so with authority. During his opening banter, my anticipation was piqued even more. Something in his voice made you take notice.
His first number was a folk tune about love and betrayal, a grim traditional song, arranged by the artist, that I had never heard before. If you had been there, you would have seen my jaw drop and continue dropping until it hit the floor. Literally, I believe, my mouth was hanging open. My previous taste in music, while eclectic, had definitely tended toward the safer end of the pool. I had discovered a liking for the blues after a breakup with my first serious boyfriend years previously, but many blues songs seemed to deflect the harsh realities they revealed with humor. This was something else entirely, something so raw and honest it was almost painful to hear.
Song after song that night spoke of heartache, irretrievable loss, dreams that never came true, dangerous attractions, and loneliness. It sounds bleak, but strangely it wasn't. It was so human. Where you might have feared to wade into such waters with someone less capable, in this case you felt that you could go in there with him and come back out again and somehow be glad you had done it. I'm not going to get fancy with Aristotle on catharsis or anything because I'm not sure that's what it was. But talk about transformative! I could almost hear the people around me holding their breath. I have rarely, if ever, felt the same kind of hush take over a room. An unexpected thought came into my head: I seemed to sense angels hanging about. I now understand that something sacred actually was occurring, and that that was what I and no doubt everyone else was experiencing.
Amid all the seriousness, there were humorous songs (one of which might even have offended me fifteen minutes earlier), more banter, and a sense of direct connection between performer and audience. It was as if we were sitting around in someone's living room. The artist had blue eyes and a very direct gaze; if you happened to find it trained on you it was rather electrifying. I knew from past experience with this festival that the people around me were undoubtedly well-versed in not only the genre but the artist's entire repertoire, but it was all new to me. I couldn't believe I had never heard of him before. I guess the answer to that is that some things only come to you when you're able to hear them.
I read a review of the performance afterwards in which someone noted the rapt attention in the crowd that I had noticed, mentioning that a few silly people actually chose to leave early. I was one of the people who left, though as the performance was so truly remarkable, that may sound surprising. I did, however, have a plan to catch as many acts as possible during the festival, and at a certain juncture, listened to an internal imperative to get up and move. I slipped out and made my way to Main Street, thinking distractedly of the other acts I intended to hear and where I might find dinner. And so it was, fifteen minutes later, that I was standing in the middle of a crowded festival street, munching on something spicy, and realizing that whatever else the festival held in store, for me, at least, it had peaked. I was also wondering just what in the hell had happened in there, a question that has never been answered to my satisfaction.
As a mythologist, I can venture some good explanations, but as I said before, I'm not doing that. I sometimes think back to that night, though, and can feel myself once again in that room. I recall the sensation of thinking, wow, we're getting in pretty deep here, but somehow it only seems right. It was the experience of seeing sadness and pain turned into art that then had the power to change you. It was artistic honesty, not someone trying to sanitize messy things or make them seem better than they are. And yet, at the end of it, you felt more hopeful. I felt more hopeful. It was such a paradox, and so it remains. And I think about it still.
So I was trying to decide on my topic and have been thinking about the events of the week. But having just had a long political discussion, my energy for current events is spent for now. You can only talk about the same thing for so long without getting bored, and I write the blog to have fun, after all.
What to do, what to do. Rather than write about anything tiresome, I find myself seeking a place of tranquillity. I know exactly where it is. I am thinking now about something that happened years ago, quite unexpectedly, at the end of what had been a very frustrating period, and it's there that I'll come to rest for the evening.
I was in a small midwestern town for a festival of world music. It was one of those events where you move around from place to place, hearing a Celtic band from the north of Spain in a church, a Cuban ensemble in a meadow, French cabaret in a theater, and an Afro-pop sensation in a bar. I was sitting in a small arts center somewhere off the main drag, having just been entertained by a flamenco performance (I can still see the dancer's flaming red dress and remember the drama of the singer's delivery). I took out my contacts between acts and had just put on some lipstick, who knows why, because we were all sitting in semidarkness. Reflex, I suppose.
There followed an Americana songwriter with whom I was not familiar at all. I had read the description of his music in the program, and he sounded interesting. When he took the stage, he did so with authority. During his opening banter, my anticipation was piqued even more. Something in his voice made you take notice.
His first number was a folk tune about love and betrayal, a grim traditional song, arranged by the artist, that I had never heard before. If you had been there, you would have seen my jaw drop and continue dropping until it hit the floor. Literally, I believe, my mouth was hanging open. My previous taste in music, while eclectic, had definitely tended toward the safer end of the pool. I had discovered a liking for the blues after a breakup with my first serious boyfriend years previously, but many blues songs seemed to deflect the harsh realities they revealed with humor. This was something else entirely, something so raw and honest it was almost painful to hear.
Song after song that night spoke of heartache, irretrievable loss, dreams that never came true, dangerous attractions, and loneliness. It sounds bleak, but strangely it wasn't. It was so human. Where you might have feared to wade into such waters with someone less capable, in this case you felt that you could go in there with him and come back out again and somehow be glad you had done it. I'm not going to get fancy with Aristotle on catharsis or anything because I'm not sure that's what it was. But talk about transformative! I could almost hear the people around me holding their breath. I have rarely, if ever, felt the same kind of hush take over a room. An unexpected thought came into my head: I seemed to sense angels hanging about. I now understand that something sacred actually was occurring, and that that was what I and no doubt everyone else was experiencing.
Amid all the seriousness, there were humorous songs (one of which might even have offended me fifteen minutes earlier), more banter, and a sense of direct connection between performer and audience. It was as if we were sitting around in someone's living room. The artist had blue eyes and a very direct gaze; if you happened to find it trained on you it was rather electrifying. I knew from past experience with this festival that the people around me were undoubtedly well-versed in not only the genre but the artist's entire repertoire, but it was all new to me. I couldn't believe I had never heard of him before. I guess the answer to that is that some things only come to you when you're able to hear them.
I read a review of the performance afterwards in which someone noted the rapt attention in the crowd that I had noticed, mentioning that a few silly people actually chose to leave early. I was one of the people who left, though as the performance was so truly remarkable, that may sound surprising. I did, however, have a plan to catch as many acts as possible during the festival, and at a certain juncture, listened to an internal imperative to get up and move. I slipped out and made my way to Main Street, thinking distractedly of the other acts I intended to hear and where I might find dinner. And so it was, fifteen minutes later, that I was standing in the middle of a crowded festival street, munching on something spicy, and realizing that whatever else the festival held in store, for me, at least, it had peaked. I was also wondering just what in the hell had happened in there, a question that has never been answered to my satisfaction.
As a mythologist, I can venture some good explanations, but as I said before, I'm not doing that. I sometimes think back to that night, though, and can feel myself once again in that room. I recall the sensation of thinking, wow, we're getting in pretty deep here, but somehow it only seems right. It was the experience of seeing sadness and pain turned into art that then had the power to change you. It was artistic honesty, not someone trying to sanitize messy things or make them seem better than they are. And yet, at the end of it, you felt more hopeful. I felt more hopeful. It was such a paradox, and so it remains. And I think about it still.
Thursday, February 13, 2014
The Slippery Slopes of Sochi
"What are you going to do? Dice me, slice me, or peel me? There are so many choices!" --Jim Carrey, The Truman Show
It's wintertime in Kentucky, and this year we haven't had to travel to have a bit of the Olympic experience. In my back parking lot we've been plagued by black Avalanches with dark windows and fast-moving vehicles with unfriendly drivers in just the last week alone. When I'm not skating across a slippery lot to move my car, I'm pushing the recycling bin down an icy incline while hoping not to get brained, like the hockey coach who was recently hit by a puck, by something falling from the fire escape (I'm told it had a loose bolt a while back).
To give the Olympics their due, watching on TV is almost as hair-raising at times as real life. I've been a little less immersed in the Games this time than I sometimes am, and I'll tell you why. I usually enjoy the Olympics for the sportsmanship, the sheer athletic ability, and the sight of competitors coming from all over the world to participate. Pierre de Coubertin promoted the modern Olympics as a "festival of human unity," hoping to imbue them with some of the sacred purpose they originally served in ancient Greece. While one strains at times to detect qualities of brotherhood, sisterhood, and unity amid the commercialism and hype of today's Games, it's still there in the sincere efforts of athletes who push themselves to achieve more than they thought possible. It's there in the sight of competitors applauding others who have won honestly, appreciating their accomplishments in a sportsmanlike way. It's there in the human interest stories.
This year, though, I seem to detect even more politics than usual swirling about the Games. There's also a bit more showboating, many oddly dramatic costumes, mannerisms, and speeches, and a stilted quality to some of the commentary. Huh? Say what? All I want to do is enjoy athletic feats, not feel like I'm being asked to figure out what someone is trying to sell. I'm reminded of the scene in The Truman Show (in its own right a hilarious commentary on the blurring of real life, entertainment, and marketing) in which Truman's wife stops in the middle of a scripted conversation, looks at the camera, and pitches a particular brand of cocoa.
Is this the future of product placement? Is it mass hysteria? Something in the water? It's as much like watching Kabuki theatre or opera as it is an athletic competition, and the Olympics don't need that, in my opinion. The things skilled athletes can do on skies, sleds, boards, and skates don't need enhancement, which just gets in the way. The crux of the problem is that--to borrow John MacAloon's performance categories once again--there seems to be much less ritual and festival and much more spectacle and gamesmanship this time around. Just an impression on my part.
So my enjoyment has fallen off, and I've found my attention straying at times. I've even watched some of the competition with the sound turned down. When I can forget all the histrionics and distractions and become absorbed in the sheer mechanics of the athleticism, I'm still amazed at what people can do. The scenery is gorgeous and provides more than enough drama as a backdrop to all the action. I have to think the atmosphere of hyperreality surrounding the Games must be terribly trying to the competitors, who have enough to do to keep their concentration focused. Possibly they're used it.
The charm of the Winter Olympics lies in watching someone careen down an icy mountain at top speed, or twirl through the air and land gracefully on skates, without having to do it yourself. It's largely a vicarious thrill; I'm content to tune in from the relative safety of my couch. I've even been known to drink a mug of hot cocoa while watching, but it's usually not the brand someone else is selling. I like to reserve those decisions for myself.
It's wintertime in Kentucky, and this year we haven't had to travel to have a bit of the Olympic experience. In my back parking lot we've been plagued by black Avalanches with dark windows and fast-moving vehicles with unfriendly drivers in just the last week alone. When I'm not skating across a slippery lot to move my car, I'm pushing the recycling bin down an icy incline while hoping not to get brained, like the hockey coach who was recently hit by a puck, by something falling from the fire escape (I'm told it had a loose bolt a while back).
To give the Olympics their due, watching on TV is almost as hair-raising at times as real life. I've been a little less immersed in the Games this time than I sometimes am, and I'll tell you why. I usually enjoy the Olympics for the sportsmanship, the sheer athletic ability, and the sight of competitors coming from all over the world to participate. Pierre de Coubertin promoted the modern Olympics as a "festival of human unity," hoping to imbue them with some of the sacred purpose they originally served in ancient Greece. While one strains at times to detect qualities of brotherhood, sisterhood, and unity amid the commercialism and hype of today's Games, it's still there in the sincere efforts of athletes who push themselves to achieve more than they thought possible. It's there in the sight of competitors applauding others who have won honestly, appreciating their accomplishments in a sportsmanlike way. It's there in the human interest stories.
This year, though, I seem to detect even more politics than usual swirling about the Games. There's also a bit more showboating, many oddly dramatic costumes, mannerisms, and speeches, and a stilted quality to some of the commentary. Huh? Say what? All I want to do is enjoy athletic feats, not feel like I'm being asked to figure out what someone is trying to sell. I'm reminded of the scene in The Truman Show (in its own right a hilarious commentary on the blurring of real life, entertainment, and marketing) in which Truman's wife stops in the middle of a scripted conversation, looks at the camera, and pitches a particular brand of cocoa.
Is this the future of product placement? Is it mass hysteria? Something in the water? It's as much like watching Kabuki theatre or opera as it is an athletic competition, and the Olympics don't need that, in my opinion. The things skilled athletes can do on skies, sleds, boards, and skates don't need enhancement, which just gets in the way. The crux of the problem is that--to borrow John MacAloon's performance categories once again--there seems to be much less ritual and festival and much more spectacle and gamesmanship this time around. Just an impression on my part.
So my enjoyment has fallen off, and I've found my attention straying at times. I've even watched some of the competition with the sound turned down. When I can forget all the histrionics and distractions and become absorbed in the sheer mechanics of the athleticism, I'm still amazed at what people can do. The scenery is gorgeous and provides more than enough drama as a backdrop to all the action. I have to think the atmosphere of hyperreality surrounding the Games must be terribly trying to the competitors, who have enough to do to keep their concentration focused. Possibly they're used it.
The charm of the Winter Olympics lies in watching someone careen down an icy mountain at top speed, or twirl through the air and land gracefully on skates, without having to do it yourself. It's largely a vicarious thrill; I'm content to tune in from the relative safety of my couch. I've even been known to drink a mug of hot cocoa while watching, but it's usually not the brand someone else is selling. I like to reserve those decisions for myself.
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