October 11, 2010
Began looking the properties the real estate lady has been sending me. DJ and Iooked for three, found one, but the one was a gem, a sort of moss green gingerbread house back in the woods in Weaverville. The house may be ideal, but the property is not, quite. I wish I knew what I was looking for, or whether the whole enterprise is just the release of excess energy. DJ said “I can see you pottering around in a place like this.” I could, too, though it makes me seem rather more Hobbit-like than I would prefer.
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
Monday, October 11, 2010
October 10, 2010
10/10/10. If I waited a few hours it could be 10/10/10 at 10. Palestrina on the CD.
Took DJ to the see Asheville Lyric Opera’s The Magic Flute. The orchestra had some intonation problems, and the conductor didn’t seem completely comfortable, but the overall effect was thoroughly entertaining, and the piece settles deeper into its status as one of my perpetual favorites. The music is beyond flawless. The plot is ludicrous, of course, and this production’s approach made the funny spots truly funny, rather than just weird, which is what some settle for. The transcendent quality of the play comes from a vision which Mozart shares, in my experience, only with Shakespeare: that is the smiling conviction that the highest solemnities in the world and the most raucous earthiness are on exactly the same level, and each the road to joy. Those of us who are high and solemn are saved by conviction and solemnity. Those of us who are simple and kind are saved by kindness. Silliness from a pure heart is as good as heroism. Tamino is a hero and does everything right. Papageno is a appetite-driven lout who does everything wrong, and yet both get their hearts’ desires, and no one would contest the Papageno is the apple of Mozart’s eye. Papageno, after all, finds and rescues Pamina; he is unfallen Tristan, a hero who never beats his shield and shouts. Mozart mocks chivalry without dismissing it. It’s fine for them for whom it is right. Most of us can’t carry it off. Most of us are hungry, scratching Papagenos who forget the solemn vows we just made and wander about in a chaos of appetites, which we trust–correctly, it turns out-- to pure-heartedness to redeem. The slob next door is not necessarily any less sanctified than Galahad on his white stead. ALO was fortunate in having a Papageno who was personable, comic without exertion, an actor of great skill, and all the qualities mentioned above were asserted without being preached.
DJ and Bill and Amy and I had dinner before and drinks after the opera.
10/10/10. If I waited a few hours it could be 10/10/10 at 10. Palestrina on the CD.
Took DJ to the see Asheville Lyric Opera’s The Magic Flute. The orchestra had some intonation problems, and the conductor didn’t seem completely comfortable, but the overall effect was thoroughly entertaining, and the piece settles deeper into its status as one of my perpetual favorites. The music is beyond flawless. The plot is ludicrous, of course, and this production’s approach made the funny spots truly funny, rather than just weird, which is what some settle for. The transcendent quality of the play comes from a vision which Mozart shares, in my experience, only with Shakespeare: that is the smiling conviction that the highest solemnities in the world and the most raucous earthiness are on exactly the same level, and each the road to joy. Those of us who are high and solemn are saved by conviction and solemnity. Those of us who are simple and kind are saved by kindness. Silliness from a pure heart is as good as heroism. Tamino is a hero and does everything right. Papageno is a appetite-driven lout who does everything wrong, and yet both get their hearts’ desires, and no one would contest the Papageno is the apple of Mozart’s eye. Papageno, after all, finds and rescues Pamina; he is unfallen Tristan, a hero who never beats his shield and shouts. Mozart mocks chivalry without dismissing it. It’s fine for them for whom it is right. Most of us can’t carry it off. Most of us are hungry, scratching Papagenos who forget the solemn vows we just made and wander about in a chaos of appetites, which we trust–correctly, it turns out-- to pure-heartedness to redeem. The slob next door is not necessarily any less sanctified than Galahad on his white stead. ALO was fortunate in having a Papageno who was personable, comic without exertion, an actor of great skill, and all the qualities mentioned above were asserted without being preached.
DJ and Bill and Amy and I had dinner before and drinks after the opera.
October 9, 2010
Fuzzy stars before morning. Beautiful and healing dreams before waking, metamorphic. Some power (I don’t know whether I was the power, or the beneficiary of the power) was turning people into the gods they would be (or had been) and gods in to the people they would be when all the world was divine. We were clanking about trying on our new powers and splendors. When I woke I had a flawless feeling of well-being, and so many ideas for creation I haven’t enough hands to carry them out.
Roses–all of them–and honeysuckle join the more expectable low cloud of asters as autumn coolness warns everyone of final chances. Took the truck shopping and bought azaleas and bulbs. Dug mightily to get them all into the ground. The front yard flutters with pale butterflies. My spider has grown perceptibly.
Fuzzy stars before morning. Beautiful and healing dreams before waking, metamorphic. Some power (I don’t know whether I was the power, or the beneficiary of the power) was turning people into the gods they would be (or had been) and gods in to the people they would be when all the world was divine. We were clanking about trying on our new powers and splendors. When I woke I had a flawless feeling of well-being, and so many ideas for creation I haven’t enough hands to carry them out.
Roses–all of them–and honeysuckle join the more expectable low cloud of asters as autumn coolness warns everyone of final chances. Took the truck shopping and bought azaleas and bulbs. Dug mightily to get them all into the ground. The front yard flutters with pale butterflies. My spider has grown perceptibly.
Friday, October 8, 2010
October 7, 2010
Turbulent return. The flight from London seemed very long. I slept fitfully through it, and when I was not asleep the thoughts in my head were unquiet and disturbing. Very nearly the most disturbing thoughts I ever had. But I was sick and exhausted and uncomfortable, so maybe there was nothing to them. Delayed in Atlanta because Delta had not thought to secure a pilot, apparently. Came home to a new bathroom compliments of Matthew the Handyman. All green and cream as it was before, but without the cracks in everything, and the tiles seceding from the floor. He will appear in a few moments to tell me how much I owe. Went to choir rehearsal, and was glad I did, for there was something fresh and adventurous about it that reminded me why I joined in the first place. Discovered this morning that my computer had given up the ghost–or rather added some. Nothing would load, nothing would delete, nothing would respond. I tossed it with some vehemence into the trash and moved a laptop up to take its place, and it seems to be doing fine. So, this lordly morning I am fully home and caught up with myself, and Circe has acres to nap in where the fat computer tower used to be. A little stuffed panda bear sits on my desk lamp. It was lying on the cement path that leads to the Millennium Bridge, dropped or otherwise abandoned. He lived in my pocket fot a while, and now he lives here, plush against the plush back of the cat.
Turbulent return. The flight from London seemed very long. I slept fitfully through it, and when I was not asleep the thoughts in my head were unquiet and disturbing. Very nearly the most disturbing thoughts I ever had. But I was sick and exhausted and uncomfortable, so maybe there was nothing to them. Delayed in Atlanta because Delta had not thought to secure a pilot, apparently. Came home to a new bathroom compliments of Matthew the Handyman. All green and cream as it was before, but without the cracks in everything, and the tiles seceding from the floor. He will appear in a few moments to tell me how much I owe. Went to choir rehearsal, and was glad I did, for there was something fresh and adventurous about it that reminded me why I joined in the first place. Discovered this morning that my computer had given up the ghost–or rather added some. Nothing would load, nothing would delete, nothing would respond. I tossed it with some vehemence into the trash and moved a laptop up to take its place, and it seems to be doing fine. So, this lordly morning I am fully home and caught up with myself, and Circe has acres to nap in where the fat computer tower used to be. A little stuffed panda bear sits on my desk lamp. It was lying on the cement path that leads to the Millennium Bridge, dropped or otherwise abandoned. He lived in my pocket fot a while, and now he lives here, plush against the plush back of the cat.
Thursday, October 7, 2010
London Last
October 6, 2010
LGatwick. In my departure haze I gave the cabbie 70 pounds more than I meant to. Hope he can make use of that on his honeymoon in Las Vegas, The sickness turned out to be phlebitis, which I fought back with antibiotics, but which took Monday evening out of the schedule, and slowed down Tuesday. Monday night was the hateful miasma of fever delusions, Thought of Steven, sometimes in the midst of delusion, sometimes weith sweet clarity. Everything is lost, always, but somehow there is always something more. I did taxi to St. Paul’s and took the Millennium Bridge to the Tate. The Gauguin exhibit was sensational, and re-convinced me of his status as a major figure. Went to the play Lower Ninth at the Trafalgar Studio 2. It was the story of three men (one dead) on a New Orleans roof during the hurricane. It had dramatic occasion and great energy of language, and though it ended abruptly, as if somebody had suddenly called “time!” it was a good evening of theater. It’s hard to gather one’s thoughts in a space like this, but the basic thing to say is that I was not done with London. I had more to do, more to see. Since Dublin broke my heart, maybe this is the prime destination for a time. I have an hour before I have to appear at the gate. Maybe I’ll spend the last of my pounds.
LGatwick. In my departure haze I gave the cabbie 70 pounds more than I meant to. Hope he can make use of that on his honeymoon in Las Vegas, The sickness turned out to be phlebitis, which I fought back with antibiotics, but which took Monday evening out of the schedule, and slowed down Tuesday. Monday night was the hateful miasma of fever delusions, Thought of Steven, sometimes in the midst of delusion, sometimes weith sweet clarity. Everything is lost, always, but somehow there is always something more. I did taxi to St. Paul’s and took the Millennium Bridge to the Tate. The Gauguin exhibit was sensational, and re-convinced me of his status as a major figure. Went to the play Lower Ninth at the Trafalgar Studio 2. It was the story of three men (one dead) on a New Orleans roof during the hurricane. It had dramatic occasion and great energy of language, and though it ended abruptly, as if somebody had suddenly called “time!” it was a good evening of theater. It’s hard to gather one’s thoughts in a space like this, but the basic thing to say is that I was not done with London. I had more to do, more to see. Since Dublin broke my heart, maybe this is the prime destination for a time. I have an hour before I have to appear at the gate. Maybe I’ll spend the last of my pounds.
London 5
October 4, 2010
The west gleams peach and gold, deepened by blue-gray, the great round tower with the revolving purple band at the top stabbing through. It is early Monday evening, and I have arisen from a sleep that accompanied some kind of sickness, though I don’t know what. Flue-like symptoms, maybe flu. Arrived back in London in the midst of an underground strike, which didn’t affect me as I was walking anyway, but Kings Cross was apparently the epicenter of discontent.
Took the train yesterday To Cambridge. Steve can’t drive because of a series of DUIs, so I was picked up by his girlfriend Karen and driven out to Willingham. I assumed she was his mother, so I’m glad she introduced herself first. The back of the car, and indeed everything in their lives, smelled sharply of dogs, specifically three versions of a ratty terrier I forget the name of. Steve has two of them, with much too much personality, and a certain amount of time needed to be spent learning to keep them under the level of hysteria. Willingham is a quaint and scenic Fens town, the kind people put in TV shows, but the old town is surrounded by council housing, such as Steve’s, heavily subsidized by the government for people in various stages of ill luck. I did a riff on “Willingham”– reluctant pork, eager bacon, etc– which Steve didn’t seem to understand. Steve and I cooked an elaborate curry, and then headed out to the local in Willingham, the Black Bull. The Black Bull was joyful, friendly, and at the end of the evening four of us were left– the landlord, a man whose speech could barely be understood, Steve and I, the three Brits talked with surprising knowledge and interest about American comedians. Steve was broke, so I bought the drinks, which included samples of all five colors of Sambucco, which each taste mostly of anise, and are each a little more disgusting than the real thing.
What do I say of the visit? I came away feeling that my love for him is better informed and stronger for the weathering of contact with his actual situation. I looked at him watching TV, and I knew I have a friend for as long as circumstances allow. I had hoped for romance different from the kind that happened. It was romantic, but chaste and poor and sad. Steve cuddled me as he did his dogs, as a physical comfort, as a kind of living wall between himself and the darkness. Finally, one of us had nothing to give. It was all right. I might have gone to Willingham for the sake of both of us, but it turns out I went for his sake, and that is well. Any purpose is a purpose.
Steve is handsome and presentable and capable of suave conversation, and has an MBA, so it’s clear his present state of near-indigence is caused by something other than ability. He’s in the midst of a soul-quest, of which he speaks at length, but how can you tell someone the gods are speaking something other than he thinks they are? The book he is writing is fascinating to a friend, as it is autobiography and fills in the blanks of his conversation, but it has no commercial value–unless he were already a celebrity. He foresees a time, a few months off, when the money from selling that book puts his life back on track. I am powerless to say what I think, even though he asks me. And at then end of it, how do I know I’m right? Things may go exactly as he foresees.
He found the wishbone in the chicken, and we pulled it, and I won, but I did not get my wish. I’d be glad to relinquish it if I thought he got his.
Stopped between the hotel and the station to eat at a Greek restaurant. The tables were on the sidewalk, and I’ve become enough of a Brit not to be bothered by the mist of rain. A boy was singing at the next table, singing to the music of his headphones, loud and happy and oblivious. He was partially annoying and partially festive, and at last I decided that the festive won.
A bird sings on my balcony, a sweet small London bird singing in the gathering darkness.
The west gleams peach and gold, deepened by blue-gray, the great round tower with the revolving purple band at the top stabbing through. It is early Monday evening, and I have arisen from a sleep that accompanied some kind of sickness, though I don’t know what. Flue-like symptoms, maybe flu. Arrived back in London in the midst of an underground strike, which didn’t affect me as I was walking anyway, but Kings Cross was apparently the epicenter of discontent.
Took the train yesterday To Cambridge. Steve can’t drive because of a series of DUIs, so I was picked up by his girlfriend Karen and driven out to Willingham. I assumed she was his mother, so I’m glad she introduced herself first. The back of the car, and indeed everything in their lives, smelled sharply of dogs, specifically three versions of a ratty terrier I forget the name of. Steve has two of them, with much too much personality, and a certain amount of time needed to be spent learning to keep them under the level of hysteria. Willingham is a quaint and scenic Fens town, the kind people put in TV shows, but the old town is surrounded by council housing, such as Steve’s, heavily subsidized by the government for people in various stages of ill luck. I did a riff on “Willingham”– reluctant pork, eager bacon, etc– which Steve didn’t seem to understand. Steve and I cooked an elaborate curry, and then headed out to the local in Willingham, the Black Bull. The Black Bull was joyful, friendly, and at the end of the evening four of us were left– the landlord, a man whose speech could barely be understood, Steve and I, the three Brits talked with surprising knowledge and interest about American comedians. Steve was broke, so I bought the drinks, which included samples of all five colors of Sambucco, which each taste mostly of anise, and are each a little more disgusting than the real thing.
What do I say of the visit? I came away feeling that my love for him is better informed and stronger for the weathering of contact with his actual situation. I looked at him watching TV, and I knew I have a friend for as long as circumstances allow. I had hoped for romance different from the kind that happened. It was romantic, but chaste and poor and sad. Steve cuddled me as he did his dogs, as a physical comfort, as a kind of living wall between himself and the darkness. Finally, one of us had nothing to give. It was all right. I might have gone to Willingham for the sake of both of us, but it turns out I went for his sake, and that is well. Any purpose is a purpose.
Steve is handsome and presentable and capable of suave conversation, and has an MBA, so it’s clear his present state of near-indigence is caused by something other than ability. He’s in the midst of a soul-quest, of which he speaks at length, but how can you tell someone the gods are speaking something other than he thinks they are? The book he is writing is fascinating to a friend, as it is autobiography and fills in the blanks of his conversation, but it has no commercial value–unless he were already a celebrity. He foresees a time, a few months off, when the money from selling that book puts his life back on track. I am powerless to say what I think, even though he asks me. And at then end of it, how do I know I’m right? Things may go exactly as he foresees.
He found the wishbone in the chicken, and we pulled it, and I won, but I did not get my wish. I’d be glad to relinquish it if I thought he got his.
Stopped between the hotel and the station to eat at a Greek restaurant. The tables were on the sidewalk, and I’ve become enough of a Brit not to be bothered by the mist of rain. A boy was singing at the next table, singing to the music of his headphones, loud and happy and oblivious. He was partially annoying and partially festive, and at last I decided that the festive won.
A bird sings on my balcony, a sweet small London bird singing in the gathering darkness.
London 3, 4
October 3, 2010
Sunday morning. Skipped yesterday because I got home too drunk and wet and happy.
Strolled most of Saturday, to the National Gallery where I was stuck by painters I had never noticed before, and returned to old friends like The Shrimp Girl and Salisbury Cathedral from the Water Meadows. Sat a while in Trafalgar, realizing one could have a pretty full tour of London just sitting there. In the evening I went again to Covent Garden to see the Royal Ballet do Onegin. It was perplexing to me. By the end of Act II I was in to the story and the characters, but I must say that, though I love dance, classical narrative ballet has always struck me as superfluous. It’s about perfection of execution, and the execution was indeed perfect, but there must be something original and vital to be executed. In narrative ballets, good dancing is sadly coupled with very bad acting. I remembered from my days in The Nutcracker Ann’s admonitions to dress the stage and stay active and to stay in character, and I could not avoid seeing those things in Onegin. Is ballet acting deliberately bad–I mean, is it part of the form?–or is it that the dance takes so much effort they leave the rest to chance? I tried to push down the word “preposterous,” but it pretty much was. The Nutcracker is mostly fantastic, and for fantasy ballet works fine, but for anything that is supposed to be “real,” is just doesn’t. Unless your story is about swans or fairies, ballet is not your medium. The work dates from the 60's, but it seemed to have take nothing from a milieu within sixty years of its own time. I suppose that if one likes Eugene Onegin one might be interested in a dance version, but why, exactly? Without a great book shoring it up at every point, it is a very silly dance. Beautifully done, of course. Onegin was wildly handsome. Plus, I had a stupendous seat, At intermission, digging my ice cream out of its carton with one of those little spades they give you, I flipped a big dollop of chocolate onto a Japanese grandmother’s skirt. She was so polite she was going to pretend she didn’t see it happen.
Pouring rain when I left the opera house. Drank at the Freemason Arms, and thought of Jason. Drank at O’Neill’s on Long Acre, which was loud and merry, and where I met short dark Rick and tall red Bruce. I bought them a round of what they were drinking, and they bought me untold rounds of Sambucco, which I’d never had before. Bruce is an engineer and Rick was leaving for Japan in the morning, and had not yet packed. Bruce was a hugger, and soon I was being enveloped in drunk boy hugs and plied with Sambucco, and I was happy. Why does one leave one’s front door except for that? In the driving rain on Southampton, the Sambucco and the cider rose up in conflict, and I vomited lustily, but I was happy even while engaged in that. What did O’Neill’s have that the ballet did not, I wondered, seeing that one was a delight and the other had to be endured, considering what one had paid for the ticket? I suppose the answer is inspiration. On the stage nothing was new. In the bar, everything was.
Sunday morning. Skipped yesterday because I got home too drunk and wet and happy.
Strolled most of Saturday, to the National Gallery where I was stuck by painters I had never noticed before, and returned to old friends like The Shrimp Girl and Salisbury Cathedral from the Water Meadows. Sat a while in Trafalgar, realizing one could have a pretty full tour of London just sitting there. In the evening I went again to Covent Garden to see the Royal Ballet do Onegin. It was perplexing to me. By the end of Act II I was in to the story and the characters, but I must say that, though I love dance, classical narrative ballet has always struck me as superfluous. It’s about perfection of execution, and the execution was indeed perfect, but there must be something original and vital to be executed. In narrative ballets, good dancing is sadly coupled with very bad acting. I remembered from my days in The Nutcracker Ann’s admonitions to dress the stage and stay active and to stay in character, and I could not avoid seeing those things in Onegin. Is ballet acting deliberately bad–I mean, is it part of the form?–or is it that the dance takes so much effort they leave the rest to chance? I tried to push down the word “preposterous,” but it pretty much was. The Nutcracker is mostly fantastic, and for fantasy ballet works fine, but for anything that is supposed to be “real,” is just doesn’t. Unless your story is about swans or fairies, ballet is not your medium. The work dates from the 60's, but it seemed to have take nothing from a milieu within sixty years of its own time. I suppose that if one likes Eugene Onegin one might be interested in a dance version, but why, exactly? Without a great book shoring it up at every point, it is a very silly dance. Beautifully done, of course. Onegin was wildly handsome. Plus, I had a stupendous seat, At intermission, digging my ice cream out of its carton with one of those little spades they give you, I flipped a big dollop of chocolate onto a Japanese grandmother’s skirt. She was so polite she was going to pretend she didn’t see it happen.
Pouring rain when I left the opera house. Drank at the Freemason Arms, and thought of Jason. Drank at O’Neill’s on Long Acre, which was loud and merry, and where I met short dark Rick and tall red Bruce. I bought them a round of what they were drinking, and they bought me untold rounds of Sambucco, which I’d never had before. Bruce is an engineer and Rick was leaving for Japan in the morning, and had not yet packed. Bruce was a hugger, and soon I was being enveloped in drunk boy hugs and plied with Sambucco, and I was happy. Why does one leave one’s front door except for that? In the driving rain on Southampton, the Sambucco and the cider rose up in conflict, and I vomited lustily, but I was happy even while engaged in that. What did O’Neill’s have that the ballet did not, I wondered, seeing that one was a delight and the other had to be endured, considering what one had paid for the ticket? I suppose the answer is inspiration. On the stage nothing was new. In the bar, everything was.
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