March 2023

 7 March 2023  Tuesday 

Last night the Zoom summit with John and Phil.  Little over an hour.  Va finished watching Quiet on the Western Front.  What did the triumpvirate talk about?  Back pain, size of our grad school classrooms, retirement.  Can 

see John is trying to talk himself into doing it.  Admits he would miss the students and the captive audience.  Phil had lunch two days ago with John Miller and said John has long had Turette's Syndrome.  Had not known that.  Phil clearly quite lonely and still grieving.  He said he is going up to Cumberland at the end of this month for lunch with the classmates.  

Finished bolting up our four new kitchen chairs.   Smaller scale than the table set but nice looking and will do fine.   

Started My Cat Yugoslovia by Finnish writer Pajtim Statovci. Albanian immigrant at age 2 to Finland.  Delighted by it at once.  Magic realism, sort of.  So glad Andrei and I both like Eugenides' Middlesex.  Chee I tried but could not click with him.  To get his whole work you would have to start with the first novel, Edinburgh and then track his anxieties onward.  He writes well, for sure.  But somehow his sensitivity and confusions (trauma and after effects? ) interfere, undermine, dislocate his efforts to write what he thinks he wants to write.  

13 March Monday

Dined at M'Tucci's yesterday after Chatter.  Someone anonymously paid our tab.  Surprised at first and later baffled by how confused I felt about it.  

Nancy clarified it perfectly:  I think it is an offense to one's pride, sense of self sufficiency; putting myself there, it made me feel uncomfortable.

I think you are 'supposed" to think, "oh, how lovely" but I don't want to think/feel like someone else wants me to.

and,NO, not something I would do, will do...

—-

Exactly.  

Statovici really good.  Python and the cat.  And his mother's story.  When will it become his?  Immigration story worldwide as well as Finland.  Balkans.  Albania.  

Sleepy again today.  Clocks turned ahead.  facevisit with Dave yesterday.  They had Eliot's two birthday parties this past weekend, Emma's is next weekend.  

14  Tuesday  almost 6 pm  still sleepy and dopey all day.  Found two birthday cards for Lou at Wallys after long search.  George called from Charleston after messaging mixup.  Somehow Message keeps previous messages and if you're not careful when you go to send again it will send to the previous groupings.  

16  Thursday   Idalia.  Charging.  Lunch at Flying Star Juan Tabo.  Trying to save Entwell stories with Foreign Aid added.  Two google searches and finally got instruction I could understand and follow.  Weird.  

3600 Mackland back on the market.  Kim sent the info.  Forgot it had been offered two years ago at $519k.  Now asking $489k.  Big pink wall covering around the fireplace in the living room.  Gives it the look of a boudoir!!  Patio ceiling and beams stained dark——for some strange reason!!??  All the other woodwork in the house was sanded and varnished.  What is the acrylic word for varnished?  Sealer?  Basically all the hand crafted doors and redos have been ruined.  In fact the decorative door and frame that created the entrance hallway were removed altogether.  Wonder what she did with them?  Beautiful honey-toned wood with wax or matte varnish or sealer.  Now sanded to "lighten" so they look sort of scalped.  

Kim says there are no houses for sale these days.  She's going to offer us a chance to walk through it but I don't think we would want to.  We'll see.  

Finished My Cat Yugoslavia.  Statovici made his splash and hurray for him for doing so.  Many interesting moments and passages.  Like, of course, how freely he moves his tale around, oblivious of any creative writing dos and don'ts.  Can imagine how a workshop might have stymied him had he taken it on too soon, too much to heart.  Raw vision and all of that.  In the Finnish tongue too.  Fits any idea of queer one might have.  Gay theme running through but not enough to dilute or overshadow the immigration heartaches and astonishing sufferings.  

More important for me to stay on with Wolfe.  This diversion proves that, once again.  Will I look for more Statovici again?  Perhaps.  Not impossible.  

——

Dear Patsy and. Doug, First of all we are so sorry to hear about Edmund.  He was such a lovely dog and we know how very important he was in your household.  Losing a pet is not easy, I still find myself patting the bed to show that it's all right for someone to get up for the night and if I glimpse anything black  I get ready to pet. But it is easier if you want to travel and so we decided to remain petless for now.  

The big event here for us was the visit from Dave and his family.  I misunderstood that they were coming for "Christmas"since they couldn't come to Plymouth for that holiday this year and had set up a little tree and had miniature decorations ready for the kids to put on.When I realized I was wrong, I was glad that I had not ordered the 6 foot tree I had originally wanted and we made other plans. Dave and fam flew from Paris to LAX (A 5 MOVIE TRIP!!).  There they saw some friends before coming here  They got to the Grand Canyon for 3 days and then we met each other at the hotel La Fonda in Santa Fe for a fabulous dinner.  It was only triple the price of the lunch we had at Padilla's Mexican kitchen where we used to eat in the "old days".  It is still rated as having the best Mexican food in ABQ . The Inn at La Fonda is very historic for being at the end of the old Santa Fe trail and for being the place where Bob and I spent the first night of our honeymoon way back in 1969!! 

The big event of their visit was the presentation on my great Aunt Bama's career as a photographer by the photo archivist at the Abq Museum.  All 15 surviving members of the Milner family came and we all went out to lunch together at our favorite resto called the Range.  We got there around 4:00 so the place was pretty empty and they set us up at a very long table. We all had a marvelous time since some of us had not seen each other for over 20 years and many had never met Dave or his family.  At home the emphasis was on the March birthdays coming up.  Each child and their mom all born in that month told us about the elaborate plans they had for their big day. Emma and Eliot were born 3 years and 3 days apart and we are constantly amazed at how well they get along together and hope that lasts through adolescence...if only! 

 We are both doing fine and are trying to only eat one meal a day to lose a little wt.  I have lost 5 lbs!! Don't know about Bob.  I am anxious to lose weight very slowly since our good friend  Jessica lost 50 lbs before one of the 4 doctors she had seen diagnosed her with cancer.  She died a short while ago.

So now we are reading and watching TV.  My good friend Lou Ella usually takes me snorkling once a week and Bob takes the day off on Saturday while I am walking and lunching with my care giver Beckie. Now the house is empty and you should come and see us.  We like to stop over 1 night at an hotel in Atlanta, Delta'a hub, before coming here.  That means it is not such a long trip on the plane and we arrive much fresher .  We have a wonderful electric car and would love to show you all around under sunny skies with no snow or rain.

So please come.

un abrazo, 

Virginia and Bob      

——

Snow day for real.  inch or more on the firepit.  Should taper off by noon.  

Andrei told me about Daniel Mendelsohn.  Am just looking up about him.  What an astonishing career of brilliance and prizes.  Bald too.  Born in 1960.  Classics and languages and literature.  Mixed genre books and essays.  Should take a look.  Interview republished in Paris Review in 2014.

"But if I adopt the view of a professor rather than a critic, I think that Proust also marks a beginning. He opened the door to our interior world. Proust must be read, Proust must be taught, because Proust is good for the soul. He teaches us to read life as though it were a novel. It’s exactly that quote you mentioned—“Every reader is … a reader of himself.” In this sense, Proust, like Freud, has shaped our way of thinking. Thanks to him, we have become the critics of our own psyche.

After having read In Search of Lost Time, we realize that our existence has a common thread, recurrent themes, recurring characters—things that can be analyzed precisely the way they are analyzed in a text, by applying aesthetic and literary criteria to our every day lives. “What is the lesson you draw from your own existence?” This is the philosophy that Proust teaches us."

19 March Sunday  

deep into Greek series Blue Maestro.  The wife has just arrived.  We have seen that Fanis and Orestes killed the evil guy.  But who pulled the trigger?

Mendelsohn's ideas fit the show perfectly!!

“Desire is movement rather than place. But even more, the memory of that long and haphazard pursuit speaks of a certain kind of relation to the rest of the world: experience rejected in favor of remembrance, the center rejected in favor of the margin. A sense of the beautiful hovering just beyond your reach, to be reflected upon and considered. The reflection becomes, in its own way, another kind of possessing.”

— The Elusive Embrace: Desire and the Riddle of Identity by Daniel Mendelsohn

“This is the place where I decided to live, the place of paradox and hybrids. The place that, in the moment of choosing it, taught me that wherever I am is the wrong place for half of me.”

— The Elusive Embrace: Desire and the Riddle of Identity by Daniel Mendelsohn

“How do you know who you are? You are the one who loves by superimposing sameness over difference. This is the etymology of your desire.”

— The Elusive Embrace: Desire and the Riddle of Identity by Daniel Mendelsohn

——————

22 March   Swimming starts up again today.  

from Joe about his signing at Gibsons  —- 

So it was a nice evening. I was interviewed by Laura Knoy -- long story there -- and there were about 70 people in attendance. When I walked in I was astonished and pleased to see a bunch of PSU-ers. Paul, Ann, Pat, Kathy, Lynn Chong, Terry and Phil, Griffin (student), and do you remember Jen O'Donnell? She was very sweet. There were also a couple of other students who remembered me, but I didn't remember them. The whole evening had a nice vibe and I was touched, honestly. It's likely the last time I will ever give a public talk. We sold some books. The Steerforth crew was there...and they are very sweet. So that was it. But it was a nice aubade, I guess.

Herman Wouk was famous for the Caine Mutiny. He won the Pulitzer for it. This Youngblood Hawke captures all the feelings we had about authors, literature, NYC, movies, etc. You'd like it. It's incredibly readable. It's like taking a ride in a well made older vehicle.

Spring is slowly arriving here. I heard a loon today up in Maine. And Susan saw flowers poking out their heads. I've been fighting a cough and have to go on steroids again. So it goes, as Vonnegut used to say.

When are you returning to NH? How has it been out there? Hope you're enjoying it.

That's all I've got. Take care.

—-

now in Wolfe on 324 where he waxes about Place.  Wolfe's waxings and wanings feel so wonderful, familiar.  

Ben Lerner continues the motif in Topeka School—-language running through him, speech delivering him.  oops his character, p 25. 

Daniel Mendelsohn could say the same.  And Alexander Chee.  And Joe Monninger.  And Herman Wouk.  et al  

After dropping Chee I've decided to go back to him.  Not so Mendelsohn.  

What will happen with the book by a very young contemporary writer,

Michah Nemerever.  Great Nietzsche quote as epigraph: "I am no man, I am dynamite."  Perhaps I should be reading all of Nietzsche??  Have never done so.  So many great works missed.  

Note from Tommy Lee.  He and Ryan want to visit Joe later in the Spring.

We picked up prescriptions then Charged and drove to little Wallys for a walk and milk buy.  Realized, Willow did, after lunch, that the new edition of her book gets the title wrong!!! Yikes.  Adventure rather than Adventures.  Holy Cow how could I have muffed that?  

Great visit with the kids yesterday, or Tuesday. Eliot has seen two rats in his school yard around the piles of trash.  My dumb question.  Emma got lots of books for her birthday.  

Lao-tzu says: "All are clear, I alone am clouded," and expresses what I feel in advanced old age. Lao-tzu is the example of a man with superior insight who at the end of his life desires to return into his own being, into the eternal unknowable meaning.~CG Jung

When Lao-tzu says, “All are clear, I alone am clouded,” he is expressing what I now feel in advanced old age. Lao-tzu is the example of a man with superior insight who has seen and experienced worth and worthlessness, and who at the end of his life desires to return into his own being, into the eternal unknowable meaning. The archetype of the old man who has seen enough is eternally true. At every level of intelligence this type appears, and its lineaments are always the same, whether it be an old peasant or a great philosopher like Lao-tzu. This is old age and a limitation. Yet there is so much that fills me: plants, animals, clouds, day and night, and the eternal in man. The more uncertain I have felt about myself, the more there has grown up in me a feeling of kinship with all things. In fact it seems to me as if that alienation which so long separated me from the world has become transferred into my own inner world, and has revealed to me an unexpected unfamiliarity with myself.

on donsilver.net 

24  Friday  am  Willow snoozing in for a while.  Petie in the hospital with covid again.  Last fall had it.  

25 March  Saturday   First day off in a while.  Cold but sun is back.  Drive up to Double Eagle airport to see the western side of the volcanoes?  this morning or this afternoon?  Afternoon would put light on the crest and whole valley.  When will I ever drive down to Los Lunas?

First October booking came in last night.  Four nights? 

27 Monday  Cécile's birthday.  Dave says the macaron pillow got there ok.  

Mr Coffee stopped working.  Looked at various youtubes to fix.  Will buy a new one tomorrow.  The dark coffee on espresso grind has probably clogged the water tubes.  White vinegar?  but won't heat up at all.  Pressed both buttons and got a long beep.  Still not working.  Buy a new one at walmart tomorrow.  

Finished Chee's Edinburgh novel.  Starts in autobiography and ends in animist Korean mythology-symbolism with fast happy relationships ending tacked on for good measure.  Strange.  Labored.  He writes well, A+ writing student.  Perfected the opening novella.  Then profs and/or book agents said take it further into first novel and we'll publish it.  Or something.  Then some years later his conscience bothers him or his creative muses and he

collects his autobiographical essays and writes some more and buries deep within them his confession that in the novel he did not really say exactly what abusive thing happened to him.  So he tells us.  Out of context it doesn't seem that horrendous even as he explains it in proper terms about power and control.  In hindsight when placed within the carefully crafted prose of the novel pieces it makes a lot more sense:  if only he had put it in there in the first place.  Is it really about confessing trauma or adding to trauma?  Who can say.  

Do I want to read any of Hart Crane?  I've got Ben Lerner's Topeka novel to continue with.  And Web and Rock.  Stay with that.  Read it on kindle pad and see if it doesn't feel trendy enough.  

Va is playing piano, going through Claude's music.  

Lerner's book replays the ? 80s?  Bly's Iron John and mens groups.  only on page 29.

Dream last night of Nicholas showing me a manuscript, was it a course paper?  something he had written.  Aura cast from Chee's portrayal of life in college and teaching at a prep school?  

28  Tues   

Bought new Mr Coffee at Cotton Wally's.  Pablo called and is here now playing piano.  45?  character!  will he work out?  his son is disabled.  Pablo painted mural on the side of the 88 keys building.  

Finished Polish romance movie.  She stays with her husband after he is injured in Iceland.  Now an Argentine series about a Jewish woman having

an affair with a young Nazi at a resort.  

That movie had a happy ending.  Secreto bien guardado.  Wonder how it was reviewed in Argentina itself?  The evil witch figure we learn at the end is Italian!!! 

29 of March already!! wow.  time flying when weather is cold and snowy even here a mile high.  Swim day for V and Lou.  V and I are dyed in the wool romantics, these romantic movies get us every time.  What would we do without them?  Started the Irish Bloodlands at Anne's suggestion but not going to stay with it.  

More of Topeka School but downloaded White Girls and looked up to see who Hilton Als is.  Oh, I see.  His name for years.  Now I know a bit more.  

Fissure on my left thumb deeper than ever.  Wee pain.  Under thick coat of liquid bandaid.  

Wolfe on Mrs Jack's night at the theater skewers Broadway.  Still true.  Always has been I guess.  The true genius of Broadway.  Of New York.  

Now I wonder if I can't guess what Als's book will be like before I even start to read it.  

30 March Thursday  

Winds.  Charged at Walmart.  Chatted with ID.4 owner from San Antonio.  Pulling a camper.  Loves the car.  

Guys doing shop work between their two trucks from Arkansas.  Other guys selling own crafted blend of cologne in the parking lot.  Lunch on chili dogs from the Dog House.  Too much coffee yesterday, sleepless from about 5 to 7 am, least it felt like it.  Felt pretty low in the morning.  Chili dog and frito pie gave me heartburn, plus two mochis.  Strange day.  Idalya and her trainee Tawnia cleaned while we were out.  Piercing odor of Fabuloso all over the house now.  

Long report yesterday from Phil about his trip to Cumberland:  

Bill Stakem organizes lunches for LaSAlle 62 on the last Tuesday of months, so I drove up yesteday to attend one of thse lunchs at the country club and to look around C'land.

The lunch  included 8 folks: me and Bill and his wife, Paul Yockus and his wife,  The two wives attended Ursuline and I had never met them before.  Likewise, two other women: someone named Ann who I didn't much care for plus a nice small woman whose name, as I recall, was Jackie Martin.   Jackie said she had attended St. Mary's before Ursuline and when in elementary school had a crush on "Bobby Garlitz."  Last but not least was Ed Mullaney who was the only person who ordered booze: a martini. Mike Stevens and wife normally attend but were travelling.   What really surprised me is that other than health issues the conversation was nearly all about Bishop Walsh basketball.   In some way BW recruits players from all over the world: Ukraine, Ethiopia, Brazil, etc.  I was astonished to hear about this.  Apparently BW plays in two leagues: one is local and one is a nationwide league of top baskketball high schools from around the nation.   Apparently BW doesn't do well in either league, and  there was much discussion among the males about what should be done to improve the situation.   What also astounded me was how religiously Catholic everyone seemed.  I took religion seriously only for a while in the sixth grade, and these days refuse tto even celebrate Christmas, so it was like a trip to another planet for me.  

On health issues, all four males agreed that jogging days are over.  We all now walk,  although Bill also swims.   Paul is nearly deaf and has had knee surgeries.  But Cumberland is now a approaching a medical wasteland.  For serious surgeries, one apparently has to go to Piittsburgh.

  Paul was  also apparently very active in a tree planting program in C'land in the past.  Ed Mullaney is still quite  active in various organizations and is very sociable.  I call him "Mister Cumberland" because he's been so active in promoting the town in so many ways.

The only  woman I've kept in some occasional contact with over the years is Linda Weaver from St. Pat's and Girls Central.   Bill said that both Linda and her husband and are now "in a home" in Frostburg and apparently have lost a lot of their abilities.    I was sorry to hear this because I always liked  Linda.

Cumberland itself has both changed and stayed the same.   Some new things and businesses, but there is still a sad sense that  it will never again be like it was in the 1950s, although the city apparently has plans to put cars back on Baltimore Street, which didn't please the owners of City Lights, a very nice restaurant that will lose its ability to put tables out on "the street" in the summer.   I recommend this restaurant.  I had the best grilled salmon dinner I've ever had.  

One unnerving experience.   I've paid for the plaque on my future grave next to my parents.  When I visited their graves, there was my plaque on my future grave just waiting for me.  Also a bit depressing, I recognized only one name in all the nearby graves.   Cj'land, for me, is, as I said, another planet.  And the DC area is not exactly "home."   

———

Thinking last night of how alone we can feel, I can fell, no matter what is happening.  Wolfe's chapter itself a comforting reminder.  Got to thinking of Tóbin's book on Mann.  It has stayed more than I thought it would.  When I finished it I was skeptical.  But it has its power and somehow Phil talking about C'land had me thinking about it again.  Now looking at his novel on Henry James.  Greg loves to read and re-read All of James, just like people who read and re-read Proust.  I'm not up to reading James but I thought I might look at Tóbin's novel about James.  First chapter about his failure at writing for the theater seems perfect.  

31  March

Chris's home in Little Rock badly damaged by today's tornado.  Hit at 2:25 pm.  

generic note to Dennis and Phil — 

Cold and windy today, been that way most of March.  Not much sand so that's good.  Yesterday we had

chili dogs for lunch, Va's hair appointment got canceled.  

While we were charging the car in the walmart parking lot I realized how much hustle goes on.  Two guys with trucks with Arkansas plates set up some ad hoc shop and were cutting big pieces of metal.  Sauntering into

and out of the store.  Other guys were floating around.  Assumed they were doing drugs but later as I passed by their circle they said they had a custom designed cologne line, would I be interested?  Is that code??? 

Customers there were chatting about the various aromas they had tried and liked.  Cluster of five or six

people, all friendly and chill.  

Guy next to us also charging his car had a popup camper attached and a bike.  Doing a trip up to

Vancouver from San Antonio---biking, hiking, tanned and totally outdoorsy.  We were both smugly thanking VW for the two years of free charging.  

Day off tomorrow.  Plan to drive south for the first time, maybe only 40 miles.  Only small villages and one pueblo casino.  Nothing there but of more interest than Santa Fe north because there's too much there.  

Just got text message that nephew's house in Little Rock badly injured by tornado.  

Not much to say about your C'land foray.  Being on the winningest team drives catholicism.  How did the club look?  Same, in need of redo?  You think you'll go up every month for these lunches?  

You're all invited to come see us if any travel itches get  stronger.  Va's planning to have fairy lights put up on the patio so she can entertain out there.  No bugs makes the evenings pleasant.  

——

Thought I didn't like Tóbin.  Now I have three or four of his books stacked here.  Liking his slow pace.  He was born in '55, eleven years younger.  Maybe that is perfect.  For now.