This was a book I read for a short-lived English-teacher book club. Three of us agreed to read this virtually unknown book by Melville specifically because it was virtually unknown. Only two of us finished it, and it took me a long, long time (blame the book itself, the boat, and the wooing of the new woman).
It was written right after Melville finished Moby Dick, and was looking to go in a different direction. The historical notes say that he had, "exhausted his supply of experiences from his stint in the U.S. Navy." (How the hell they, or
anyone, knows that, I have no idea.)
Pierre is a privileged, rich kid living on his family's grand estate with his widowed mother. He is a great outdoorsman, has a great mind, dotes on his mother, and is engaged to be married to the local beauty, Lucy Tartan. But he longs to know his long-dead father better and wishes he had had a sister to grow up with.
And guess what happens? From out of nowhere Isabel, a long lost sister turns up with some stories about his father!
And guess what? Pierre is absolutely smitten with her! For real. He comes apart and unseams his life from top to bottom: he breaks the engagement to Lucy, abandons his mother, runs off with Isabel, pretends to be her husband and sets up house in the city. His family abandons him - his cousin pretends to not know Pierre when he arrives in the city seeking lodging, and his mother cuts him out of the will (and then she dies of heartbreak, leaving all of the family's riches to the cousin).
But guess who doesn't abandon him?
That's right, Lucy!
She sends him a letter that she loves him so much, and she has figured he is doing something secret, yet brave, and that because she loves him and his secret project so much she is going to move in with Pierre and Isabel and tend to him with "nun-like devotion."
I won't tell you how it ends, but be assured, you can live without knowing.
22 June 2007
8. Farewell to Manzanar by Jeanne Wakatsuki
This book was absolute crap. Total.
For some inexplicable reason this book is on the reading list for the 11th grade curriculum. It's a great book for 8th grade and would fit perfectly in that curriculum, especially in a Humanities class.
Set in California just as WW2 is starting for America, FtM is a memoir of Wakatsuki's experience in the largest of the American concentration camps. Her father is a fisherman who is accused of supplying oil to Japanese submarines - totally false charges. The family, along with thousands of other people of Japanese descent are ordered to be evacuated from the West Coast.
This book had the opportunity to be a rivetting memoir of a harrowing time for so many people. In fact, the conditions were so bad at one point that there were food riots at Manzanar. Wakatsuki gives this riot about three paragraphs, one of the them setting the context for the riot and the other two describing what went down.
Wakatsuki misses every chance she has to make us sympathetic to her plight, and makes Manazanar sound like sleepaway camp - and I'm not even exagerrating: at one point she complains that she hates her piano lessons, at another tells us she is so mad at her dad she is going to break her baton in half (her one, favorite hobby is baton twirling), and that she hates ballet classes because the teacher is too fat and awkward.
And she is overly fond of the phrase, "it's as if" which removes the meaning/gravity/merit of whatever she is describing that much further.
You could read it in less than two hours, but shouldn't.
It's especially disappointing that this book is in the 11th grade crriculum because putting it next to Huck Finn, Othello, or Salesman makes it look even weaker, yet I have to get up there and pretend it's worthy of deconstruction.
I did do a lot of context stuff with this book and we did discuss Executive Order 9066 (FDR), the apology (Reagan) and the reparations (Bush I). That helped a lot and gave the book some meaning.
Still, the whole experience of "teaching" this book left a bad taste in my brain.
For some inexplicable reason this book is on the reading list for the 11th grade curriculum. It's a great book for 8th grade and would fit perfectly in that curriculum, especially in a Humanities class.
Set in California just as WW2 is starting for America, FtM is a memoir of Wakatsuki's experience in the largest of the American concentration camps. Her father is a fisherman who is accused of supplying oil to Japanese submarines - totally false charges. The family, along with thousands of other people of Japanese descent are ordered to be evacuated from the West Coast.
This book had the opportunity to be a rivetting memoir of a harrowing time for so many people. In fact, the conditions were so bad at one point that there were food riots at Manzanar. Wakatsuki gives this riot about three paragraphs, one of the them setting the context for the riot and the other two describing what went down.
Wakatsuki misses every chance she has to make us sympathetic to her plight, and makes Manazanar sound like sleepaway camp - and I'm not even exagerrating: at one point she complains that she hates her piano lessons, at another tells us she is so mad at her dad she is going to break her baton in half (her one, favorite hobby is baton twirling), and that she hates ballet classes because the teacher is too fat and awkward.
And she is overly fond of the phrase, "it's as if" which removes the meaning/gravity/merit of whatever she is describing that much further.
You could read it in less than two hours, but shouldn't.
It's especially disappointing that this book is in the 11th grade crriculum because putting it next to Huck Finn, Othello, or Salesman makes it look even weaker, yet I have to get up there and pretend it's worthy of deconstruction.
I did do a lot of context stuff with this book and we did discuss Executive Order 9066 (FDR), the apology (Reagan) and the reparations (Bush I). That helped a lot and gave the book some meaning.
Still, the whole experience of "teaching" this book left a bad taste in my brain.
14 May 2007
7. Black Boy by Richard Wright
I read this book to teach it.
I did a crap job teaching it, but will do better next year.
My kids thought me writing "Bring Black Boy" as HW was funny. And they pretended that Black Boy was a superhero name, pronouncing the title of the book boldly, like the movie announcer guy.
Autobiography about Richard Wright growing up in the Jim Crow South. What a crappy life.
The language was amazing though; the guy can really write.
"(The essence of the irony of the plight of the Negro in America, to me, is that he is doomed to live in isolation while those who condemn him seek the basest goals of any people on the face of the earth. Perhaps it would be possible for the Negro to become reconciled to his plight if he could be made to believe that his sufferings were for some remote, high, sacrificial end; but sharing the culture that condemns him, and seeing that a lust for trash is what blinds the nation to his claims, is what sets storms to rolling in his soul.)"
and from the page before:
"Our too-young and too-new America, lusty because it is lonely, aggressive because it is afraid, insists upon seeing the world in terms of good and bad, the holy and evil, the high and low, the white and the black; our America is frightened of fact, of history, of process, of necessity."
Strongly recommended. And get the copy that has both parts, Part One: Southern Night and Part Two: The Horror and the Glory, the way Wright intended it to be published.
I did a crap job teaching it, but will do better next year.
My kids thought me writing "Bring Black Boy" as HW was funny. And they pretended that Black Boy was a superhero name, pronouncing the title of the book boldly, like the movie announcer guy.
Autobiography about Richard Wright growing up in the Jim Crow South. What a crappy life.
The language was amazing though; the guy can really write.
"(The essence of the irony of the plight of the Negro in America, to me, is that he is doomed to live in isolation while those who condemn him seek the basest goals of any people on the face of the earth. Perhaps it would be possible for the Negro to become reconciled to his plight if he could be made to believe that his sufferings were for some remote, high, sacrificial end; but sharing the culture that condemns him, and seeing that a lust for trash is what blinds the nation to his claims, is what sets storms to rolling in his soul.)"
and from the page before:
"Our too-young and too-new America, lusty because it is lonely, aggressive because it is afraid, insists upon seeing the world in terms of good and bad, the holy and evil, the high and low, the white and the black; our America is frightened of fact, of history, of process, of necessity."
Strongly recommended. And get the copy that has both parts, Part One: Southern Night and Part Two: The Horror and the Glory, the way Wright intended it to be published.
01 April 2007
Alive to all things and forgetting all.
POEMS ON THE NAMING OF PLACES
I
IT was an April morning: fresh and clear
The Rivulet, delighting in its strength,
Ran with a young man's speed; and yet the voice
Of waters which the winter had supplied
Was softened down into a vernal tone.
The spirit of enjoyment and desire,
And hopes and wishes, from all living things
Went circling, like a multitude of sounds.
The budding groves seemed eager to urge on
The steps of June; as if their various hues
Were only hindrances that stood between
Them and their object: but, meanwhile, prevailed
Such an entire contentment in the air
That every naked ash, and tardy tree
Yet leafless, showed as if the countenance
With which it looked on this delightful day
Were native to the summer.--Up the brook
I roamed in the confusion of my heart,
Alive to all things and forgetting all.
At length I to a sudden turning came
In this continuous glen, where down a rock
The Stream, so ardent in its course before,
Sent forth such sallies of glad sound, that all
Which I till then had heard, appeared the voice
Of common pleasure: beast and bird, the lamb,
The shepherd's dog, the linnet and the thrush
Vied with this waterfall, and made a song,
Which, while I listened, seemed like the wild growth
Or like some natural produce of the air,
That could not cease to be. Green leaves were here;
But 'twas the foliage of the rocks--the birch,
The yew, the holly, and the bright green thorn,
With hanging islands of resplendent furze:
And, on a summit, distant a short space,
By any who should look beyond the dell,
A single mountain-cottage might be seen.
I gazed and gazed, and to myself I said,
"Our thoughts at least are ours; and this wild nook,
My EMMA, I will dedicate to thee."
----Soon did the spot become my other home,
My dwelling, and my out-of-doors abode.
And, of the Shepherds who have seen me there,
To whom I sometimes in our idle talk
Have told this fancy, two or three, perhaps,
Years after we are gone and in our graves,
When they have cause to speak of this wild place,
May call it by the name of EMMA'S DELL.
William Wordsworth - 1800.
I
IT was an April morning: fresh and clear
The Rivulet, delighting in its strength,
Ran with a young man's speed; and yet the voice
Of waters which the winter had supplied
Was softened down into a vernal tone.
The spirit of enjoyment and desire,
And hopes and wishes, from all living things
Went circling, like a multitude of sounds.
The budding groves seemed eager to urge on
The steps of June; as if their various hues
Were only hindrances that stood between
Them and their object: but, meanwhile, prevailed
Such an entire contentment in the air
That every naked ash, and tardy tree
Yet leafless, showed as if the countenance
With which it looked on this delightful day
Were native to the summer.--Up the brook
I roamed in the confusion of my heart,
Alive to all things and forgetting all.
At length I to a sudden turning came
In this continuous glen, where down a rock
The Stream, so ardent in its course before,
Sent forth such sallies of glad sound, that all
Which I till then had heard, appeared the voice
Of common pleasure: beast and bird, the lamb,
The shepherd's dog, the linnet and the thrush
Vied with this waterfall, and made a song,
Which, while I listened, seemed like the wild growth
Or like some natural produce of the air,
That could not cease to be. Green leaves were here;
But 'twas the foliage of the rocks--the birch,
The yew, the holly, and the bright green thorn,
With hanging islands of resplendent furze:
And, on a summit, distant a short space,
By any who should look beyond the dell,
A single mountain-cottage might be seen.
I gazed and gazed, and to myself I said,
"Our thoughts at least are ours; and this wild nook,
My EMMA, I will dedicate to thee."
----Soon did the spot become my other home,
My dwelling, and my out-of-doors abode.
And, of the Shepherds who have seen me there,
To whom I sometimes in our idle talk
Have told this fancy, two or three, perhaps,
Years after we are gone and in our graves,
When they have cause to speak of this wild place,
May call it by the name of EMMA'S DELL.
William Wordsworth - 1800.
28 March 2007
housekeeping
My cousin is in the April issue of Coastal Living. Chris and Beth. Pg 178.
My brother KC is going to be in some British magazine owned by Conde Naste. Updates to follow.
Respect beer: an article today in the NY Times about a website dedicated to beers, the beer-making industry, and all other things beer. I figured there had to be a million of them out there, but this one seems alright. And since I mentioned that I keep a notebook for my beer tasting, I thought I'd pass this one along.
My brother KC is going to be in some British magazine owned by Conde Naste. Updates to follow.
Respect beer: an article today in the NY Times about a website dedicated to beers, the beer-making industry, and all other things beer. I figured there had to be a million of them out there, but this one seems alright. And since I mentioned that I keep a notebook for my beer tasting, I thought I'd pass this one along.
18 March 2007
How dull it is to pause...
Ulysses
Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron (1809–92)
IT little profits that an idle king,
By this still hearth, among these barren crags,
Match’d with an aged wife, I mete and dole
Unequal laws unto a savage race,
That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me.
I cannot rest from travel: I will drink
Life to the lees: all times I have enjoy’d
Greatly, have suffer’d greatly, both with those
That lov’d me, and alone; on shore, and when
Thro’ scudding drifts the rainy Hyades
Vex’d the dim sea. I am become a name;
For always roaming with a hungry heart
Much have I seen and known: cities of men
And manners, climates, councils, governments,
Myself not least, but honor’d of them all;
And drunk delight of battle with my peers,
Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.
I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro’
Gleams that untravell’d world, whose margin fades
For ever and for ever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnish’d, not to shine in use!
As tho’ to breathe were life. Life pil’d on life
Were all too little, and of one to me
Little remains: but every hour is sav’d
From that eternal silence, something more,
A bringer of new things; and vile it were
For some three suns to store and hoard myself,
And this gray spirit yearning in desire
To follow knowledge like a sinking star,
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.
This is my son, mine own Telemachus,
To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle—
Well-lov’d of me, discerning to fulfil
This labor, by slow prudence to make mild
A rugged people, and thro’ soft degrees
Subdue them to the useful and the good.
Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere
Of common duties, decent not to fail
In offices of tenderness, and pay
Meet adoration to my household gods,
When I am gone. He works his work, I mine.
There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail:
There gloom the dark broad seas. My mariners,
Souls’ that have toil’d, and wrought, and thought with me—
That ever with a frolic welcome took
The thunder and the sunshine, and oppos’d
Free hearts, free foreheads—you and I are old;
Old age hath yet his honor and his toil;
Death closes all; but something ere the end,
Some work of noble note, may yet be done,
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks:
The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep
Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,
’T is not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
Tho’ much is taken, much abides; and tho’
We are not now that strength which in old days
Mov’d earth and heaven, that which we are, we are:
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron (1809–92)
IT little profits that an idle king,
By this still hearth, among these barren crags,
Match’d with an aged wife, I mete and dole
Unequal laws unto a savage race,
That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me.
I cannot rest from travel: I will drink
Life to the lees: all times I have enjoy’d
Greatly, have suffer’d greatly, both with those
That lov’d me, and alone; on shore, and when
Thro’ scudding drifts the rainy Hyades
Vex’d the dim sea. I am become a name;
For always roaming with a hungry heart
Much have I seen and known: cities of men
And manners, climates, councils, governments,
Myself not least, but honor’d of them all;
And drunk delight of battle with my peers,
Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.
I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro’
Gleams that untravell’d world, whose margin fades
For ever and for ever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnish’d, not to shine in use!
As tho’ to breathe were life. Life pil’d on life
Were all too little, and of one to me
Little remains: but every hour is sav’d
From that eternal silence, something more,
A bringer of new things; and vile it were
For some three suns to store and hoard myself,
And this gray spirit yearning in desire
To follow knowledge like a sinking star,
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.
This is my son, mine own Telemachus,
To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle—
Well-lov’d of me, discerning to fulfil
This labor, by slow prudence to make mild
A rugged people, and thro’ soft degrees
Subdue them to the useful and the good.
Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere
Of common duties, decent not to fail
In offices of tenderness, and pay
Meet adoration to my household gods,
When I am gone. He works his work, I mine.
There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail:
There gloom the dark broad seas. My mariners,
Souls’ that have toil’d, and wrought, and thought with me—
That ever with a frolic welcome took
The thunder and the sunshine, and oppos’d
Free hearts, free foreheads—you and I are old;
Old age hath yet his honor and his toil;
Death closes all; but something ere the end,
Some work of noble note, may yet be done,
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks:
The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep
Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,
’T is not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
Tho’ much is taken, much abides; and tho’
We are not now that strength which in old days
Mov’d earth and heaven, that which we are, we are:
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
17 March 2007
Crumbolst
Long Island is iced over. Today Crumbolst and I went for a drive out east a bit (I wanted to buy some notebooks, but this was really just a front to hang out and go exploring) and saw some very cool stuff: we stopped in Port Jefferson - it's where the ferry goes to Bridgeport - and we walked the icy, snowy dock, and at the very end of the dock we saw a sailboat mast sticking out of the water! A boat had sunk at the dock! I have never seen anything like it. The boat was so deep underwater we couldn't even see it.
We also stopped at one of the small tiny beaches to throw rocks in the water and at iced over trees.
It was a good guy day.
We also stopped at one of the small tiny beaches to throw rocks in the water and at iced over trees.
It was a good guy day.
11 March 2007
Thermopylae by C.P. Cavafy
Honor to those who in the life they lead
define and guard a Thermopylae.
Never betraying what is right,
consistent and just in all they do
but showing pity also, and compassion;
generous when they're rich, and when they're poor,
still generous in small ways,
still helping as much as they can;
always speaking the truth,
yet without hating those who lie.
And even more honor is due to them
when they foresee (as many do foresee)
that Ephialtis will turn up in the end,
that the Medes will break through after all.
Written January 1901.
(from this site here)
define and guard a Thermopylae.
Never betraying what is right,
consistent and just in all they do
but showing pity also, and compassion;
generous when they're rich, and when they're poor,
still generous in small ways,
still helping as much as they can;
always speaking the truth,
yet without hating those who lie.
And even more honor is due to them
when they foresee (as many do foresee)
that Ephialtis will turn up in the end,
that the Medes will break through after all.
Written January 1901.
(from this site here)
03 March 2007
6. The Good Soldier by Ford Madox Ford
I have wanted to read some Ford since I found out he was BFF with Joseph Conrad. In fact, FMF wrote a book called Joseph Conrad and in it says that everything he wrote after meeting Conrad was written with the idea of reading it aloud to him.
What a great book! What Deft Mastery of Language.
The plot: a wealthy American couple permanently in Europe because the wife's heart condition will not allow her to travel. A British couple of the liesured, landed class. They meet up and spend the next 9 years worth of vacations and travels together.
Ashburnham, the Brit, is a soldier, has a regiment of some kind, and is a generous, benevolent landlord to his various farming tenants. And he has an eye for the ladies, but not in a predatory, lecherous way. He truly has a kind heart and wants to ease an other's suffering, whether it be an old farmer down on his luck, or a servant girl in the next train compartment. This being the Victorian Era, scandalous behavior is looked down upon. Any suggestion of outrageous behavior could be devastating to one's professional and social reputation. So any misbehavior is covered up with bribes, hush money, and favors. Ashburnham's wife, desperate to live the easy, socially respected life of a Landed Lady, does everything in her power to curb her husband's spending and his...indiscretions, of which there are not that many (for our day). To compound their problems he is a Protestant and she a Catholic.
Dowell, the narrator, is a Nice Guy, but I have to wonder if he is some kind of First Class Dimwit. He has a wife who is more than selfish. I feel bad for Dowell but to explain why would be to burn down the plot.
I strongly recommend this book for its use of language, and for the sheer joy of the exposition. It was delicious. The image comes to mind of an umpire brushing away the batter's box dirt from home plate after a high intensity play, each brush stroke clearing more of the dirt away, but requiring yet another and another and another swipe, until all the layers of dust and sand are swept away and the Whole is Revealed. Archeology. Quantam Mechanics.
I will definitely be looking for more FMF. And specifically to read what he wrote after 1898, when he met Conrad.
What a great book! What Deft Mastery of Language.
The plot: a wealthy American couple permanently in Europe because the wife's heart condition will not allow her to travel. A British couple of the liesured, landed class. They meet up and spend the next 9 years worth of vacations and travels together.
Ashburnham, the Brit, is a soldier, has a regiment of some kind, and is a generous, benevolent landlord to his various farming tenants. And he has an eye for the ladies, but not in a predatory, lecherous way. He truly has a kind heart and wants to ease an other's suffering, whether it be an old farmer down on his luck, or a servant girl in the next train compartment. This being the Victorian Era, scandalous behavior is looked down upon. Any suggestion of outrageous behavior could be devastating to one's professional and social reputation. So any misbehavior is covered up with bribes, hush money, and favors. Ashburnham's wife, desperate to live the easy, socially respected life of a Landed Lady, does everything in her power to curb her husband's spending and his...indiscretions, of which there are not that many (for our day). To compound their problems he is a Protestant and she a Catholic.
Dowell, the narrator, is a Nice Guy, but I have to wonder if he is some kind of First Class Dimwit. He has a wife who is more than selfish. I feel bad for Dowell but to explain why would be to burn down the plot.
I strongly recommend this book for its use of language, and for the sheer joy of the exposition. It was delicious. The image comes to mind of an umpire brushing away the batter's box dirt from home plate after a high intensity play, each brush stroke clearing more of the dirt away, but requiring yet another and another and another swipe, until all the layers of dust and sand are swept away and the Whole is Revealed. Archeology. Quantam Mechanics.
I will definitely be looking for more FMF. And specifically to read what he wrote after 1898, when he met Conrad.
"a compulsive diarist"
A few days ago I mentioned that I had been carrying around some notebooks with me when I got the Jeep stuck and then unstuck. I wanted to say a word about that here, which may be like one echo remarking on another. Or something.
I have always been keeping track of what I have been doing, logging my activities, in one form or another. My brothers and Mustapha (redundant) would know that I have a whole mess of calendars that I have kept since high school, jotting down a note about each day. Some days I was very verbose and even put down what I had for dinner, or who I hung out with and what we did. Other days simply get a simple "Islander game." Whether that means I went, watched it, or just that there was one, I have no idea.
When I got my old boat I started an online work/sailing log, and also kept a paper log that I thought I would give away with the boat. In that log were all the receipts, what I did, who I went with and what the weather was like. Much more information than the online version. When the boat was sold I kept that notebook and I'm glad I did as it had morphed into a personal document.
Lately I have been keeping about a half a dozen paper Moleskin notebooks on me at all times. I am still doing the calendar filling in, though I have a full page for each day. In addition to that I am tracking how each of my dollars is spent. The bank tracks a big part of that, true, but not where the cash I withdraw goes, and I'm telling you it's an eye-opener and has helped me achieve a measure of fiscal discipline I have never had (I have it planned so that by the end of the school year I will be completely debt free (private, personal, public), excepting my student loan (which I am ahead on)). I have a notebook for the boat. For beers I drink (so I can make good recommendations and recall what I liked and why. What's more annoying than having a breadth of choices and making a bad one, or repeating a bad one?). For the D&D. And for copying out cool Lit.
Maybe it's just my OCD, but I like being able to look up a date and have a pretty good recollection of what I did, no matter how long ago it was.
When I was buying the new boat, I showed the seller the online work journal for Persuasion. He followed a few links and remarked that I was a compulsive diarist. I always linked the sound of that and took it as a kind of compliment.
I have always been keeping track of what I have been doing, logging my activities, in one form or another. My brothers and Mustapha (redundant) would know that I have a whole mess of calendars that I have kept since high school, jotting down a note about each day. Some days I was very verbose and even put down what I had for dinner, or who I hung out with and what we did. Other days simply get a simple "Islander game." Whether that means I went, watched it, or just that there was one, I have no idea.
When I got my old boat I started an online work/sailing log, and also kept a paper log that I thought I would give away with the boat. In that log were all the receipts, what I did, who I went with and what the weather was like. Much more information than the online version. When the boat was sold I kept that notebook and I'm glad I did as it had morphed into a personal document.
Lately I have been keeping about a half a dozen paper Moleskin notebooks on me at all times. I am still doing the calendar filling in, though I have a full page for each day. In addition to that I am tracking how each of my dollars is spent. The bank tracks a big part of that, true, but not where the cash I withdraw goes, and I'm telling you it's an eye-opener and has helped me achieve a measure of fiscal discipline I have never had (I have it planned so that by the end of the school year I will be completely debt free (private, personal, public), excepting my student loan (which I am ahead on)). I have a notebook for the boat. For beers I drink (so I can make good recommendations and recall what I liked and why. What's more annoying than having a breadth of choices and making a bad one, or repeating a bad one?). For the D&D. And for copying out cool Lit.
Maybe it's just my OCD, but I like being able to look up a date and have a pretty good recollection of what I did, no matter how long ago it was.
When I was buying the new boat, I showed the seller the online work journal for Persuasion. He followed a few links and remarked that I was a compulsive diarist. I always linked the sound of that and took it as a kind of compliment.
20 February 2007
Lost by Carl Sandburg
DESOLATE and lone
All night long on the lake
Where fog trails and mist creeps,
The whistle of a boat
Calls and cries unendingly, 5
Like some lost child
In tears and trouble
Hunting the harbor’s breast
And the harbor’s eyes.
All night long on the lake
Where fog trails and mist creeps,
The whistle of a boat
Calls and cries unendingly, 5
Like some lost child
In tears and trouble
Hunting the harbor’s breast
And the harbor’s eyes.
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