Getting there by being there

It has been one of those summers where you get there by being there (if that makes any sense). My last 5 years seem to have been motivated by getting somewhere, and that somewhere four times out of five was New York. Well, now that I am here, I feel I am getting there -- There, that sense of being settled, of enjoying idleness, stillness if not quietude.

One of the renewed pleasures of this lifestyle is sitting on the balcony, drinking a cappuccino, and reading (wrestling with) the Sunday New York Times.

I couldn't resist smiling at this...

Snacks of the Great Scribblers

Sketchbook | Wendy MacNaughton | New York Times

Hope you are all enjoying a leisurely Sunday.

xo

bb

The Mirror

I keep having the same dream.
It seems to be forcing me to return
to the bittersweet site
of my grandfather's house,
where I was born on the table
Forty years ago.

Something always prevents me from entering.
I keep having this dream.

When I dream of the log walls
and dark pantry
I sense that it's only a dream.

Then the joy is clouded
for I know I'll wake up.

Sometimes something happens
and I stop dreaming
of the house
and the pines by the house of my childhood.

Then I grieve
and wait for the dream
that will make me a child again
and I'll be happy again, knowing
that all still lies ahead
and nothing is impossible.

from The Mirror, directed by Andrei Tarkovsky, written by Aleksandr Misharin and Andrei Tarkovsky

xo

BB

P.S. I'm on a quest. Perhaps I can plant its seed in your mind. Through Tarkovsky's films I've come to admire his father's poetry. But so far I haven't managed to find a book of Arseny Tarkovsky's poetry translated into English. If you're browsing in a used bookstore somewhere someday and see such a volume, do buy it for me.

P.P.S. My first experience of such a viral, vicarious quest was through a friend of mine, who asked me to keep an eye out for a frig magnet of a cow. Silly enough. But whenever I would see frig magnets for sale I would think of him and look for a magnet of a cow. His quest had become mine...

Super sad true love story

Every returning New Yorker asks the question: Is this still my city?

I have a ready answer, cloaked in obstinate despair: It is.

And if it's not, I will love it all the more. I will love it to the point where it becomes mine again.

*           *             *

We were walking hand in hand now along the vast grassy Sheep Meadow, which felt comfortable and familial, like a worn rumpus-room carpet or a badly made bed. Beyond it, on three sides, lay the constellation of once-tall buildings, the old ones mansard-topped and stoic, the new ones covered with blinking information.

*           *             *

Gray clouds bearing some kind of industrial remnant moved into the foreground; a yellow substance etched itself into the horizon, became the horizon, became the night. As the sky darkened, we found ourselves enclosed on three sides by the excess of our civilization, yet the ground beneath our feet was soft and green, and behind us lay a hill bearing trees as small as ponies. We walked in silence...

*           *             *

It was time to leave. We headed south, and when the trees ran out the park handed us over to the city. We surrendered to a skyscraper with a green mansard roof and two stark chimneys. New York exploded all around us, people hawking, buying, demanding, streaming. The city's density caught me unprepared, and I reeled from its imposition, its alcoholic fumes, its hubris, its loud, dying wealth....

-- from Super sad true love story: a novel, by Gary Shteyngart

One-liners (2)

Life is beautiful

but the world is hell.

-- Harold Pinter, quoted by his wife Antonia Fraser in her memoir "Must you go?"

One-liners (1) or Manifesto

i
have decided
to be happy
because it
makes me
happy

bb

{I was inspired by this post by Jane.}

Nine words

Man 

is 

hungry 

for 

beauty. 

There 

is 

a 

void.

~ Oscar Wilde

To the New Year

To the New Year*

With what stillness at last
you appear in the valley
your first sunlight reaching down
to touch the tips of a few
high leaves that do not stir
as though they had not noticed
and did not know you at all
then the voice of a dove calls
from far away in itself
to the hush of the morning

so this is the sound of you
here and now whether or not
anyone hears it this is
where we have come with our age
our knowledge such as it is
and our hopes such as they are
invisible before us
untouched and still possible

from Present Company by W.S. Merwin

* I was inspired to read this collection after hearing an interview with William Merwin on National Public Radio. You can hear it here:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=98326584

Jealosy?

Jealousy is defined as defined as being afraid that someone else will take away what you already have. That's not it. Envy? That's defined as wanting what someone else has. Getting warmer. Envy seems to me to suggest wanting the very thing someone else has: I want it rather than you, kind of thing. No, that's not it, but what about my wanting it as well? That wish I was there too kind of feeling. That's it. Have a great time darlings!

xoxo

BB