July 30, 2011
Bitch of a drought continues. I can’t water enough to keep everything healthy, even with my oscillating miracle self-watering wand, that gives me so much stupid pleasure to watch, like a cat a clock pendulum. I thought I was doing the Peruvian chocolate mint a favor by uncovering it from its overhand of weeds, but it had vanished in the blaze two days later.
Still adjusting to the new spirit reigning within my spirit. It’s hard to recognize myself, hard to understand my responses to things in the light of what those responses had been for the previous forty years. I can’t even locate the old fury. It is as something one read of once in a book. This is 85% joy and relief. But it’s sad, too, as though some power within me were set aside, and I miss the strength of it even though it was self-consuming, futile, blasphemous.
T reveals going through something similar. I always think I’m blazing trails none other has walked. Or needed to.
The Masque of Light had a lifetime of exactly one day. It’s too elaborate for what everyone expected. I think it was beautiful, and would have been beautiful to see, but it joins its family on the ever-growing mound of wasted efforts.
Sunday, July 31, 2011
Saturday, July 30, 2011
July 29, 2011
Chatted with a Columbian woman who is part of the crew for Hunger Games. Zach was massaging her before me. I knew nothing about the production then, or I would have asked better questions. I tried to talk with her in Italian, mistaking her accent.
Finished The Masque of Lights to celebration the capital campaign at All Souls, part of which is dedicated to the preservation of the stained glass windows. It is a moving piece in my mind, but the gap between conception and the realities of production may be harsh. From time to time I am reminded of why I retreated from the production side of theater, to concentrate on the comparatively streamlined creation of scripts.
Chatted with a Columbian woman who is part of the crew for Hunger Games. Zach was massaging her before me. I knew nothing about the production then, or I would have asked better questions. I tried to talk with her in Italian, mistaking her accent.
Finished The Masque of Lights to celebration the capital campaign at All Souls, part of which is dedicated to the preservation of the stained glass windows. It is a moving piece in my mind, but the gap between conception and the realities of production may be harsh. From time to time I am reminded of why I retreated from the production side of theater, to concentrate on the comparatively streamlined creation of scripts.
Thursday, July 28, 2011
July 27, 2011
BG’s suggestions for Vance turned out to be good ones. Revision done, bloopers excised, historical anxieties eased.
Don Catrone is dead of pancreatic cancer. Of all my high school friends, he seemed to have his future the most surely determined. Did he become an opera star? I know he’s dead, but I know nothing else. Sad.
BG’s suggestions for Vance turned out to be good ones. Revision done, bloopers excised, historical anxieties eased.
Don Catrone is dead of pancreatic cancer. Of all my high school friends, he seemed to have his future the most surely determined. Did he become an opera star? I know he’s dead, but I know nothing else. Sad.
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
July 26, 2011
Addressed yesterday’s self-dissatisfied observations with a whirlwind of activity. Got online before dawn, and found an eager middle aged guy from Weaverville to clean out the gutters on both houses, stacking the debris neatly (I don’t know how he did it, actually) so that it can be shoveled as compost onto the flowers. Took my Cambridge receipts to UNCA for the money people to fuss over. Got a couple of estimates on my bit of painting. I took the one which was $180 less than the other (how can that be?) offered by a man with a German name who, nevertheless, speaks Spanish, and had his teenaged son along to translate. Both were fascinated by DJ’s fish. My cell phone was dead and because my provider’s store was no longer where I thought it would be, I bought a completely new system from a new provider– the rep who worked with me had one arm torn off below the elbow. This morning I feel at once fulfilled and superficial, having achieved much, but all of a daily chores variety. Did some writing on the windows masque, but got on to other things when I realized I was close to seeing the end.
Meeting with BG this afternoon concerning Vance. Came away with the perception that historians often misremember history.
Addressed yesterday’s self-dissatisfied observations with a whirlwind of activity. Got online before dawn, and found an eager middle aged guy from Weaverville to clean out the gutters on both houses, stacking the debris neatly (I don’t know how he did it, actually) so that it can be shoveled as compost onto the flowers. Took my Cambridge receipts to UNCA for the money people to fuss over. Got a couple of estimates on my bit of painting. I took the one which was $180 less than the other (how can that be?) offered by a man with a German name who, nevertheless, speaks Spanish, and had his teenaged son along to translate. Both were fascinated by DJ’s fish. My cell phone was dead and because my provider’s store was no longer where I thought it would be, I bought a completely new system from a new provider– the rep who worked with me had one arm torn off below the elbow. This morning I feel at once fulfilled and superficial, having achieved much, but all of a daily chores variety. Did some writing on the windows masque, but got on to other things when I realized I was close to seeing the end.
Meeting with BG this afternoon concerning Vance. Came away with the perception that historians often misremember history.
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
July 25, 2011
Mother’s birthday.
I realize I have a large dose of what women complain about in men, of what the perfectionist complains about in the more casual soul– which is that I simply do not see things in my own environment which I am not specifically looking at. There’s a crop of large weeds growing out of my roof gutters which I saw, of course, but never marked. That sort of thing does not happen in this neighborhood– and yet, I never recall seeing anyone on their roof cleaning their gutters. I delight in my garden because I see the flowers, which I love, and not that chaos of grass and weed that surrounds them, This all must be a tribulation to my neighbors, and proof of eccentricity which I would never credit in myself. My house looks like a big dorm room and not like the dwelling of an adult, and I don’t really know what to do about that, except throw everything away and buy new things that match. I replaced doors and windows years ago now, but never painted them. I simply don’t notice the bare wood, or rather like it if I do. I’m seeking a larger house and larger property (in a half-assed sort of way) and yet nobody looking at this place would suspect I have the ability (or the will) to take care even of what I have.
Mother’s birthday.
I realize I have a large dose of what women complain about in men, of what the perfectionist complains about in the more casual soul– which is that I simply do not see things in my own environment which I am not specifically looking at. There’s a crop of large weeds growing out of my roof gutters which I saw, of course, but never marked. That sort of thing does not happen in this neighborhood– and yet, I never recall seeing anyone on their roof cleaning their gutters. I delight in my garden because I see the flowers, which I love, and not that chaos of grass and weed that surrounds them, This all must be a tribulation to my neighbors, and proof of eccentricity which I would never credit in myself. My house looks like a big dorm room and not like the dwelling of an adult, and I don’t really know what to do about that, except throw everything away and buy new things that match. I replaced doors and windows years ago now, but never painted them. I simply don’t notice the bare wood, or rather like it if I do. I’m seeking a larger house and larger property (in a half-assed sort of way) and yet nobody looking at this place would suspect I have the ability (or the will) to take care even of what I have.
Monday, July 25, 2011
July 24, 2011
Friday night a second farewell to Michael and Amanda at Table, downtown. Wine and post-modern chocolates afterwards at the Grove Arcade. Late night Maria and Russell had us up to the apartment for homemade pizza, which, though I could not eat, seemed lovely.
Went in search of a typical American hamburger, found one at the Newbridge Diner, where I also discovered that they are doing the catering for the opening of Vance. I gather fragments and rumors of that event as one standing outside the city walls.
Friday night a second farewell to Michael and Amanda at Table, downtown. Wine and post-modern chocolates afterwards at the Grove Arcade. Late night Maria and Russell had us up to the apartment for homemade pizza, which, though I could not eat, seemed lovely.
Went in search of a typical American hamburger, found one at the Newbridge Diner, where I also discovered that they are doing the catering for the opening of Vance. I gather fragments and rumors of that event as one standing outside the city walls.
Saturday, July 23, 2011
July 22, 2011
Heat wave here still pleases me better than the bitter drizzle of London.
The downside is what a month did to my garden. It appears I’ve lost a holly, the magnolia, two yellow rhododendrons, two azaleas, the whole ginger plot, perhaps the white rhododendron, and who knows what else. R did a yeoman’s job of saving what he could, but the weather was so hot and dry there was no real hope but to be here and to water every day, a sad lesson, but one now learned. May yet save the magnolia and the azaleas. Time will tell. If the flowers were dying, the weeds were prospering, huge stands of them, the stands huge and the individuals in them. I tore into them this morning, clearing most of the slope of the front terrace, pouring sweat under the dry and upturned earth.
Out with the crowd last night to see the last Harry Potter movie. It was exciting. Then dinner at Avenue M, where we were greeted like old friends. Michael and Amanda leave today for Boise, so last night was sad, or would have been had I not poured the first four vodka martinis I ever had in my life down my gullet. I was unconscious for most of the dinner, and have no recollection of getting back into the house.
New tires for the Prius, a run for the truck to see if it survived the abandoned month. It did.
Heat wave here still pleases me better than the bitter drizzle of London.
The downside is what a month did to my garden. It appears I’ve lost a holly, the magnolia, two yellow rhododendrons, two azaleas, the whole ginger plot, perhaps the white rhododendron, and who knows what else. R did a yeoman’s job of saving what he could, but the weather was so hot and dry there was no real hope but to be here and to water every day, a sad lesson, but one now learned. May yet save the magnolia and the azaleas. Time will tell. If the flowers were dying, the weeds were prospering, huge stands of them, the stands huge and the individuals in them. I tore into them this morning, clearing most of the slope of the front terrace, pouring sweat under the dry and upturned earth.
Out with the crowd last night to see the last Harry Potter movie. It was exciting. Then dinner at Avenue M, where we were greeted like old friends. Michael and Amanda leave today for Boise, so last night was sad, or would have been had I not poured the first four vodka martinis I ever had in my life down my gullet. I was unconscious for most of the dinner, and have no recollection of getting back into the house.
New tires for the Prius, a run for the truck to see if it survived the abandoned month. It did.
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