March 4, 2013

I discover that my cable TV has channels which broadcast music, all kinds of music, even one called “Classical masterpieces.” Right now it’s “William Tell,” but before it was Lully and Rameau, and I was amazed and overjoyed.

Reading a book called Tolkien and the Great War. At one point a soldier’s letter is being censored, and suddenly, when my eyes were on that line,  my mother’s voice was in the room, clear and certain as life. She was recalling, as she did once to me long ago in the kitchen at Goodview, a letter she received from the censors in the other Great War. All the soldier’s handwriting was blacked out, and the censor had written, “Dear Marion, your boyfriend loves you, but he talks too much.” What boyfriend? Did she keep the letter– oh, the longing after lost music!

Mikado ended on a joyful note. No memories but good ones, though having evenings back for a while is a delight. Rushed to Cantaria rehearsal, to find it oddly depressed and ragged. I’m sure it was for lacking me. Convivial supper at Avenue M afterward.

Jamaica Kincaid on the radio spoke of a photo of her three year old self, and wondered, “Where is she?” I was driving to Biltmore from Arden when I heard this, and it was helpful, deeply helpful, throwing me back to the red headed kid in the dapple of the trees in a photo which is lost but which I remember. He knew who he was. He knew what he wanted. He saved me, as he must have in times past. I remember Jamaica Kincaid mostly for a rejection slip I got from The New Yorker for “Bonhanno’s Death,” which said, “We admired this very much, but we are afraid Jamaica Kincaid might want to submit something like this someday, and it is her territory.” Wish I’d kept and framed that. But, yesterday paid me back.