A Sweet Unrest

Nothing Escapes The Rolling Sea

 

I know I said I couldn't read but I did read The Tempest.  And I watched a performance of it- this- and it was absolutely lovely to hear the language spoken aloud, and wonderful to see the masque.  And somehow Caliban seemed even more heartbreaking than when I'd read it.  And then I mined the marvels of iTunes University and found a lecture that was a bit rambly but still helpful to make the experience complete.

Except it didn't ever really feel complete because of course I had to do it all in mostly ten or fifteen minute increments stretched out over weeks but that's just the way it is and it feels very much like if I'm going to have any kind of inner life right now it's going to have to be snatched and stolen.  And I think it's going to be that way for quite some time.  If I wait for that great big fantasy block of free time to materialize, another ten years will go by without my getting around to any of the things I've always longed to read.

And it did feel good to be reading something challenging again.  I think I'd like to try one of the tragedies next- Macbeth, Hamlet, Lear, Othelo... any suggestions?

The song doesn't actually have anything to do with any of it really but it's the opening track of one of my favorite albums of the year.  In this one I particularly like the end and the way it builds and builds upon itself (like waves?  I ask you.) and somehow soars even as it fades.

Vetiver - Rolling Sea

The photos are from a lovely little nook in Golden Gate Park.

 

Tight Knit

Maybe I'm remembering this all wrong because I haven't seen it in at least ten years, but in the movie Like Water For Chocolate there is a scene where a carriage starts off down a dusty road and you see it leaving from behind, and out of the back unfurls an impossibly long blanket that the main character has knit out of her grief and sorrow.  It trails on forever in the dirt behind the speeding carriage.

It's a funny moment, and I get it.  I learned to knit many, many years ago when I was still very young and it was definitely not the cool thing to be doing like it maybe kind of is now in some DIY circles.  I learned at a time when I was a little bit lost, from someone who was incredibly good to me in so many ways, and I feel all of that love return to me each time I pick up my needles.  She gave me much more than the time and patience it took to instruct me (not a fast learner!).   Knitting suffuses my world with a sunny peace when I'm happy.   But more crucially, it steadies me through sorrow.  It's a way of enduring sadness, a place to put it, and when I come out on the other side I've made something hopefully pretty but in the very least useful.

So I knit a lot.  Thank goodness I now have children to foist it all upon!  I don't know what I'll do once they start refusing to wear and use all the things their crazy mama makes, but right now it's wonderful.  The baby can't protest, of course, and the elder... well, the elder continues to disarm me by actually asking me to make him things and seeming rather pleased when they are finished.  

Wending my way to what got me thinking about all this in the first place, I know it doesn't sound very rock n' roll but knitting is closely tied to listening for me because it gives my hands something to do while my head gets lost in lyrics and music and the gorgeousness of it all.  The past two weeks on the Contrast Podcast have been all about new music and I really enjoyed both 'casts (listen here and here).  I played a song by Phoenix but I flirted with the idea of submitting this one by Vetiver.  It's from their most recent album Tight Knit which I've grown attached to as it's full of lovely tunes and this one is catchy and infectious and has much more bounce to it than I somehow expect from them and it's very frequently on repeat over here, no matter what I'm doing.  

Vetiver - More Of This

Crease Your Party Dress

 

Everyone calls it amateur night, and maybe I am in fact an amateur, but I love New Year's Eve.  I can't find even one person willing to go out and dance the night away anymore but if I could find such a person, and a babysitter, I'd don my paper Happy New Year tiara and hit the streets in heartbeat.

A close second to a night of revelry is looking in all the shop windows this time of year.  I can't get enough of the party dresses.  And I especially like it when it's early, before the shops are open and the sidewalks are filled with people.  The contrast of all those festive clothes with the quiet, empty street gets me every time.

The best date I've ever had- so far- was on New Year's Eve.  It was a first date with someone I'd known kind of in passing for a while.  I was on the verge of poverty at the time but nonetheless I took my Christmas money, which ought to have gone to things like tuition and books, and bought a new dress.  And it was so worth it because the whole night was magic and lovely and the whole thing was magic and lovely and all these years later, I still have great memories and I still have the dress.  Buying a dress like that is an act of hope, and every once in a while things turn out even better than we could possibly hope for.  Isn't that what celebrating the New Year is about?

And so, even though those days are long gone now, I still get giddy when the nice dresses and the glitter and the confetti appear in the store windows again.  I want to go into the dressing rooms and egg everyone on a little bit, buy the dress, buy the dress.  And then go out and mess it up a little.

Happy New Year, and thank you so very much to everyone who read and commented this year.

Ella Fitzgerald - What Are You Doing New Year's Eve?

Tomorrow I'll Buy Myself A Dress

One of my other interests, besides books and music, is clothes. I never write about it here and I don't know why, because fashion and music absolutely go together. Fashion and poetry, I don't know- except weren't Lord Byron and Baudelaire known as dandies?

Anyway, over the past few years I've grown disenchanted with fashion magazines as they've focused more and more on celebrities and status bags and less on clothes. But when one door closes, a window opens somewhere else and for me that would be all the fashion blogs. And I think I like them even better than the magazines because it is so inspiring to see how real people with budgetary constraints and ordinary lives put themselves together. And I love that I can see how people from all over the world are doing this.

One of my favorite style blogs is Leah's. It's called Style for the Stay at Home Mom but it's really for anyone interested in nice clothes you can actually live in. Leah is a one-woman crusade against the Juicy tracksuit and the Ed Harvey t-shirt, but she also writes about art, books, poetry, music, and whatever else is on her mind. She's spirited, smart, funny and warm I always look forward to her posts. She was also very supportive of me when I first started blogging, a kindness I will never forget, and now she has tagged me for a Premio award, which is so, so sweet. Typepad and I are locking horns over how the little graphic can be displayed so hopefully I'll get that worked out. But the most lovely thing about it is that now my job is to talk about seven of my favorite blogs, so here we go:

I love Bookgirl's Nightstand- how could I not? Iliana reads and reviews lots and lots of books, takes pretty pictures, and makes amazing book art.

Copenhagen Cycle Chic is another favorite. Gorgeous happy people in great clothes riding bikes around one of my favorite cities in the world.

Lost In Your Inbox- I'm new to this blog but totally addicted. Marcy talks about music and life, not always in that order. She knows about so many bands, which is really impressive because she also has three children and seems to know where they are at all times too. She's definitely an inspiration.

All Eyes and Ears- Dane posts a picture and song to go with it. Gorgeous simplicity.

So Much Silence- Another great music blog. Kevin is into a really wide range of music and posts about bands like Frightened Rabbit and Calexico while still managing to keep tabs on Q-Tip's every move.

I write about him all the time, but I have to repeat it here: I love The Vinyl Villain. I also love his German musical twin, Dirk from Sexy Loser. Between the two of them, they must own every single recording from the last 30 years worth having. They both take requests too!

Pretending Life is Like A Song- It was there and then it was gone. Then I ran into Adam at the Contrast Podcast but still no blog. Now it's back and that makes me happy.

And finally, Melissa at Writing Forward is another favorite. More about that in my next post.

Mmm, that might be more that seven, but I hope it's OK. I think the best thing about this was that it inspired me to finally get my links list in order so thank you again Leah!!

Goodbye, Fake Steve

I've linked to this before but I thought I'd print it here. I've been crazy about a blog called The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs. A while back Forbes journalist Daniel Lyons started it up- he uses the persona of Apple's Steve Jobs to comment on business, politics, entertainment and modern life in general. And every once in a while he wrote a little poetry. At first no one knew who was actually writing the blog and then it came out. I find him really funny.

Well, this kind of thing can't go on forever and Fake Steve announced last week that he is walking away from the keyboard. In appreciation of all the enjoyment I've gotten from his blog, I'd like to share my favorite poem, Eric Schmidt's Serenity Prayer. For those who don't know, Eric Schmidt is the grown-up brought in to run Google when they wanted to go public (more here).

Eric Schmidt's Serenity Prayer

Dear Lord,
You have blessed me with many gifts
including a two hundred billion dollar market cap
and a search monopoly that gushes cash
like nothing in the history of the planet.
For these things, Lord,
and for allowing me to beautify the world
by splattering glorious text ads on every available surface,
I give you thanks and praise.
But now, Lord, your humble servant seeks your assistance.
My stock, though still widly overpriced, has dropped
by nearly one hundred dollars.
My followers, fully vested, grow restless,
and begin to seek a new promised land.
Though free delicious cuisine
from every corner of the globe
is available to them twenty-four hours a day,
like sweet manna from heaven,
still they hunger for more.
Though we offer haircuts and laundry
and saunas and massages
and a roller coaster and bumper cars and a skee ball arcade;
though each drone need work only four days
a week and may devote one-fifth of his or her time
to personal interests, such as designing time machines
and rocket ships that can fly to Mars
or just totally fucking off,
still, these spoiled, bratty, greedy little pricks
keep leaving for Facebook.
Damn them, Lord!
Smite them down!
Send a plague upon Zuckerberg!
Something that itches and burns!
But seriously.
Lord, I need your help.
Give me patience.
And kindness.
And courage.
Help me to put up with Larry's bullshit
and Sergey's smug, condescending tone.
Help me tolerate their Legos and jumbo jets and cockamamie ideas,
like this crazy campus that looks
so much like a friggin kindergarten
that you half expect to see Barney
leaping out from behind the bronze T-Rex
or riding on the replica of Burt Rutan's spaceship
or having his photo taken with Meng.
Dear Lord, how did I get here?
And how can I get out?
You know as well as I do
that I have no idea how to manage this place.
No one does.
You know that our
ridiculous profit margins
have masked our many mistakes
and inefficiencies. You know
this madness cannot go on forever.
You know what time bombs
lie buried in our income statement.
Lord, I come to you now
in most humble supplication
to ask this favor:
Let your servants succeed
at something other than search.
VaporPhone (tm), social networking,
desktop apps, herbal supplements --
frankly, Lord, I don't care.
Just make it happen.
Speak to me, Lord.
I'm listening.
I'm all ears.
Of course, if this be not your will,
I will accept your decision.
But I swear if that's the case
I am so friggin out of here
it's not even funny.
Seriously, Lord.
One year, tops.
Then I'm gone.
That is all.
Amen.

The original post is here.

Namaste', Fake Steve.

Meeting After Midnight Like We Do

This beautiful photo of Stockholm is by Diesmali.

Like everyone else I'm sure, I feel like there is never enough time. When I finally find a few minutes for myself, it's late. Or it's very early or it's the middle of the night. I never sleep all the way through anymore. There is always something to check. No matter how little sleep I've had, I wake up alert and ready to function now, not in a fog like I used to. That's a huge change- the completely unconscious, unending vigilance of motherhood.

But then sometimes when I'm up, it's nice. I have the house to myself and I can do whatever I want. Well, almost. Headphones and a flashlight and quiet movements and it works. I can see the city lights below from the front window and I love that. I think of the cover of Surf each time. It's a nice time to be up and doing things, writing or reading or listening. It's special and private and mine. It's important to me.

I start thinking about how hard that mouse had to work
night after night collecting all these things
while the people in the house were fast asleep
(From Workshop by Billy Collins)

It's hard to say which is more important, getting enough sleep or getting enough time. I guess it all depends on which need is most pressing at the moment.

When or where do you do your best thinking/reading/writing? How do you steal time?

Article

I really liked this article from today's NYT. I never tire of the story of Andrew Carnegie and his love of libraries.