January 9, 2009
Full moon in the pale lavender of the east.
Wasted the morning (“I was sick,” I whine), but have been productive through the afternoon. Made a homemade dish for a potluck, a concession so rare I hope somebody remarks on it.
Drinks at the Usual last night after choir. I can home heroically tired, with the tiredness you have when you’re a boy and you’ve run all day, lying down under the quilt in delicious pain, almost whimpering on that edge between distress and comfort, feeling the warmth gather around me. The cats shored me up on all sides, as otherwise I might fall to ruin. Not one dream, not one movement until morning.
Monday, January 12, 2009
Thursday, January 8, 2009
January 7, 2009
Went to a Doctor Glasser in East Asheville about my lymphadema. My skepticism is deep and long standing on this issue, assuming that no one can help and those who say they can are after money, but he did make them feel better, even look better, and when I checked his suggestions, they were medically acceptable and backed up by at least as much testimony as appears on the Internet. It pleases me, actually, to be taking colloidal silver, as though I were after a slow cure for lycanthropy. A hundred bucks at the health food store gets me most of the drugs and apparatus he suggested. I remember, though, why I shy away from doctors of all sorts: the complicated self-obsession, the bottles and liquids and timetables, the time-consuming and mind-distracting regimens that compromise life on one side while (allegedly) prolonging it on the other. I would be taking 20 pills a day and spending two hours douching and mummifying my legs if I were to follow the doctor’s exact regimen. A middle path must be found.
Went to a Doctor Glasser in East Asheville about my lymphadema. My skepticism is deep and long standing on this issue, assuming that no one can help and those who say they can are after money, but he did make them feel better, even look better, and when I checked his suggestions, they were medically acceptable and backed up by at least as much testimony as appears on the Internet. It pleases me, actually, to be taking colloidal silver, as though I were after a slow cure for lycanthropy. A hundred bucks at the health food store gets me most of the drugs and apparatus he suggested. I remember, though, why I shy away from doctors of all sorts: the complicated self-obsession, the bottles and liquids and timetables, the time-consuming and mind-distracting regimens that compromise life on one side while (allegedly) prolonging it on the other. I would be taking 20 pills a day and spending two hours douching and mummifying my legs if I were to follow the doctor’s exact regimen. A middle path must be found.
January 6, 2009
Epiphany.
The Class of 1950 is semi-finalist in the Hidden River playwriting contest.
Spent a chunk of yesterday afternoon painting with Jason. Already he has the effect of slowing me down, making me concentrate of technique rather than the swiftest possible concretization of an idea, which is what my art has been basically about.
Reading Pound, The Cantos, page by page from first to last. I would say “rereading,” but I’m not sure I read it that way even when I was writing my dissertation on him, when I was, briefly, minimally, a recognized authority. I dived in then looking for passages to tingle my emotions or prove a point. I did not read systematically, as indeed the structure of the piece discourages system. Here is the impression I have so far: Pound was lonely for peers he could not find in 20th century– I was going to say “America,” but in 20th century anywhere–so he gathered around himself a gang of Malatestas and Sforzas and Cavalcantis to run with, gave them bantering nicknames and invented an argot for his chosen company, who could engage in war and choose stone for building with equal aplomb. He was not so much the little boy who never got picked for the team, but the little boy who couldn’t find a team to play with, nothing golden and bloody and eclectic enough for him. He stepped into history, and played with emperors.
Adam K came over after rehearsal, and we had tea, and talked about girlfriends and school and the theater, just as if we were characters in a novel. And a transformer blew somewhere, and the lights wavered. He is one whom most people must love on sight. We will see how he carries this blessing through the years.
Back in touch with John Bliss, from the apartment in Syracuse. He says he never imagined that I thought of him, but I did, not only for his beauty, but for his kindness, which I never repaid in anything like proper measure.
Epiphany.
The Class of 1950 is semi-finalist in the Hidden River playwriting contest.
Spent a chunk of yesterday afternoon painting with Jason. Already he has the effect of slowing me down, making me concentrate of technique rather than the swiftest possible concretization of an idea, which is what my art has been basically about.
Reading Pound, The Cantos, page by page from first to last. I would say “rereading,” but I’m not sure I read it that way even when I was writing my dissertation on him, when I was, briefly, minimally, a recognized authority. I dived in then looking for passages to tingle my emotions or prove a point. I did not read systematically, as indeed the structure of the piece discourages system. Here is the impression I have so far: Pound was lonely for peers he could not find in 20th century– I was going to say “America,” but in 20th century anywhere–so he gathered around himself a gang of Malatestas and Sforzas and Cavalcantis to run with, gave them bantering nicknames and invented an argot for his chosen company, who could engage in war and choose stone for building with equal aplomb. He was not so much the little boy who never got picked for the team, but the little boy who couldn’t find a team to play with, nothing golden and bloody and eclectic enough for him. He stepped into history, and played with emperors.
Adam K came over after rehearsal, and we had tea, and talked about girlfriends and school and the theater, just as if we were characters in a novel. And a transformer blew somewhere, and the lights wavered. He is one whom most people must love on sight. We will see how he carries this blessing through the years.
Back in touch with John Bliss, from the apartment in Syracuse. He says he never imagined that I thought of him, but I did, not only for his beauty, but for his kindness, which I never repaid in anything like proper measure.
January 5, 2009
An artist named Brendan Keough writes in his blog that he and his friends are “looking at nature through the eyes of David Brendan Hopes.”
Small crowd on the street in front of the Lakeshore Garden Apartments revealed itself to be parents (mostly fathers) waiting with their kids at the bus stop. It was sweet. I considered as how a parent in our day would no more have waited with us at a school bus stop (often, as in my case, several blocks away) than have flown to the moon.
An artist named Brendan Keough writes in his blog that he and his friends are “looking at nature through the eyes of David Brendan Hopes.”
Small crowd on the street in front of the Lakeshore Garden Apartments revealed itself to be parents (mostly fathers) waiting with their kids at the bus stop. It was sweet. I considered as how a parent in our day would no more have waited with us at a school bus stop (often, as in my case, several blocks away) than have flown to the moon.
Saturday, January 3, 2009
Savannah Farewell
January 3, 2009
Attrition to the “real world” left Amy and Bill and DJ and myself in Savannah. We wandered, shopped, drank, till, at my great importuning, we agreed to take the Dolphin Magic tour, which I remembered fondly from my last visit. Our first mate and contact with the sea was Beau, a personable young sea dog who exposed us to a remarkable expanse of his life in a remarkably short time. He described his time at boy-heaven summer camp in Brevard as “Lord of the Rings, with counselors.” We saw, in fact, teams of bottle-nosed dolphins out in the river, including a tiny one identified by Beau as likely the last baby of summer. The baby breached and dived so synchronously with its mother that they looked like one creature with two dorsal fins. When the dolphins first appeared, Beau cried out, “I’m still stoked every time they appear. I’ve got the greatest job in the world!” Beau is waiting for his captain’s license to appear from the Coast Guard, in which he once served. He presented our staying in the river instead of cruising out into the salt marshes as the result of encountering so much dolphin activity close in, though part of the reason was surely that one of the engines had conked out. Coming to shore, we drank, and I got very drunk indeed, and cannot say surely what else we did. Rose in the dark of the morning, cleaned the condo and glided through sleeping Savannah, home. The point where experiences become memories is always sad to me, though I am glad to have the memories. Goodbye Beau, goodbye Jersey Boy, goodbye Ambrosia at the first of morning, goodbye Pirates House, goodbye dark squares and the dim lights of mansions.
Liked the dolphins and the creche best. Liked just about everything. Vacationing in the same time zone has appreciable benefits. Ride home with DJ rich with conversation and silliness. Changes of travel plans and my reluctance to re-assess people who said “yes” with a particular price in mind leave me just under $500 in the hole. Will swallow it in the spirit of the New Year. Will tell anyone who asks where they can go which is not Ireland, "Savannah."
Attrition to the “real world” left Amy and Bill and DJ and myself in Savannah. We wandered, shopped, drank, till, at my great importuning, we agreed to take the Dolphin Magic tour, which I remembered fondly from my last visit. Our first mate and contact with the sea was Beau, a personable young sea dog who exposed us to a remarkable expanse of his life in a remarkably short time. He described his time at boy-heaven summer camp in Brevard as “Lord of the Rings, with counselors.” We saw, in fact, teams of bottle-nosed dolphins out in the river, including a tiny one identified by Beau as likely the last baby of summer. The baby breached and dived so synchronously with its mother that they looked like one creature with two dorsal fins. When the dolphins first appeared, Beau cried out, “I’m still stoked every time they appear. I’ve got the greatest job in the world!” Beau is waiting for his captain’s license to appear from the Coast Guard, in which he once served. He presented our staying in the river instead of cruising out into the salt marshes as the result of encountering so much dolphin activity close in, though part of the reason was surely that one of the engines had conked out. Coming to shore, we drank, and I got very drunk indeed, and cannot say surely what else we did. Rose in the dark of the morning, cleaned the condo and glided through sleeping Savannah, home. The point where experiences become memories is always sad to me, though I am glad to have the memories. Goodbye Beau, goodbye Jersey Boy, goodbye Ambrosia at the first of morning, goodbye Pirates House, goodbye dark squares and the dim lights of mansions.
Liked the dolphins and the creche best. Liked just about everything. Vacationing in the same time zone has appreciable benefits. Ride home with DJ rich with conversation and silliness. Changes of travel plans and my reluctance to re-assess people who said “yes” with a particular price in mind leave me just under $500 in the hole. Will swallow it in the spirit of the New Year. Will tell anyone who asks where they can go which is not Ireland, "Savannah."
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