blog as notebook

I'm taken with this Emily Dickinson definition of art I just stumbled across, in a wonderful little Slate photo essay on Joseph Cornell.

"Nature is a Haunted House - but Art - a House that tries to be haunted."

I like the idea that so much of what I do is hanging around, trying to haunt my house over and over again.

thank you soma

for playing Jerry Jeff Walker.

Pack up all your dishes.
Make note of all good wishes.
Say goodbye to the landlord for me.
That son of a bitch has always bored me.

If I can just get offa this L.A. Freeway without getting killed or caught.

cosmo's moon

Once when I was little I pitched an embarassing fit at the idea of renting Moonstruck, because I wanted something more "age appropriate." But my parents rented it anyway and after much stomping and huffing and slamming of doors, I crept down the stairs and watched the whole thing from the bottom step, peering around the living room wall. I'm sure my parents knew, even though I tried to be secretive.

Now I only want to be as tough as Loretta. I want to sit around drinking strong coffee and eating cannoli and little almond cookies with my mamma. To wear black all the time like a Sicilian grandmother. To exaggerate and turn over tables and compare everyone to feral animals. This is how it goes.

cnn headlines are often absurd

The demise of Encore has forced me to Starbucks where holiday music tinkles and the creepy men who are always here stare at me yet again. The next time the weak-chinned guy stares at me I'm going to tell him to put his eyes back in his head. You think I'm a nice person who is kidding about this, but I'm not.

Thanksgiving worked out! Way too much food, declamations, and Sailor Jerry, but fun was had by all.

I'm creeped out right now about this.

And I'm feeing as though there are an awful lot of stories in the news today about zoo animals. Is that what we turn to in the face of hundreds of deaths in Sadr City?

Hope never seems to stick around.

idle days

Has it seriously been a week? Here's the deal: A says I should be preparing for wintering in, hauling firewood and digging up the tubers and stirring the large pots of preserves. That the mind slowing down and the body speeding up is the natural course of events. I agree and that's been my life this week. Therefore no posts, only Gillian Welch and Dave Rawlings and the way they alternately coddle and throttle their guitars. Only surrender to the sound.

Weekend, Weekend

Turns out herding MFAs really does get them out onto the dance floor. What with the rain tents and lights and the serious rock of Steven!, the MFA band, it was quite the time. Would that the rest of the weekend had been as work productive as that was fun productive. V and I have been ridiculous with our chit chatting instead of working (too fun!). I love it when she says things like "befitting her station."

This weekend's distraction was brought to you by The Queen. Beautifully done. It made sense when I saw that the director, Stephen Frears, had made Dirty Pretty Things, which I loved. Even though I'm not going to England this winter, I'm immersing myself in its culture (reading England, England now). This movie made me think about how having a female monarch presiding over the fall of the Empire might have contributed to the monarchy retaining what power it has; the film's illumination of the Rosie the Riveter aspects of the Queen's personality helped me understand the "progressive" element of her postion, which I think I'm generationally and culturally removed from. I've also been wondering what will happen to the institution in the coming male reigns. Which will happen soon, I suppose -- an odd thought.

I would much rather rake leaves and run on a treadmill than read right now. My brain is a floating balloon. But look at me avoid The Wizard of Oz which is playing out there in the living room and focus. Yes, look at me go.

"it's all right to feel things, though the feelings may be strange"

I wonder to what extent (my language is so inflected by teaching comp) my life as it is now could fit into the narratives of "Free to Be You and Me."

Tonight the MFA band (including dear housemate o' mine) is playing a party and I am obliged to go and cheer for them. I'm actually excited about it, though I've been feeling pretty anti-party lately. I need to practice guitar so I can some day appear with them.

All the leaves have dried up in the last week and the trees are shedding rapidly. It's as though Bloomington said, oh yeah, it's November, better get barren. Except that it's been very warm. The temperature in my house is so much cooler that I keep feeling tricked when I open the door.

I met our non-regular (subbing on days off) mailman today. I always love meeting the mailman because of my dad, and also because it's nice to know the face of the person who stops by your house every day. He was super nice, as is the regular carrier. I want to make them baked goods. Can't forget to leave the holiday card out this year.

Some hopeful news on the IR front regarding solicitations. Keeping fingers crossed.

"Let us take a turn about the room"

Is it a seminar foul when the professor has the flu but asks the students to have the class anyway? What if it's an election night and the students would like to watch the results come in?

V and I ate sesame chicken and broccoli and cabbage whipped up on the spot by me and watched the Midterm Midtacular. I was teased by multiple parties for my grimacing and fidgety involvement in the election results, but there is a long tradition of this, from Mary and my marathon Katrina coverage sessions to the Buffy crowd event mentioned over in Stoveland. It was a little bit like the feeling of following the last football game I watched. Familiar, old and exciting. Even if the stakes were ever so much higher. Perhaps I needed to think of it that way so I wouldn't be so sad if the results went badly.

V just wrote this beautiful line: "its wings as grey as timber beat upon the bulb."

I want to write all about Stove's visit, but she did it all. Suffice it to say, all parties including Barnaby are sad that she is gone. And a little worried that too much gossip was had. But mostly feeling the aftermath of her presence that made everything glow a little bit brighter in this dim November.

life starts again today

The Big Presentation is done, rawther well I think, and even though I went on for far too long and couldn't answer all the questions posed, I always feel that the fact that there -are- questions posed is a sign of engagement. Also, faced with concerns about just who is thinking about author intentionality anyway these days, I feel I acquitted myself well as a writer. I'm no fan of interpreting a work with an author's bio. in my back pocket, but when you're a writer, it's hard to argue that the author doesn't matter. I'm trying to figure out whether the author-function is the same as the implied author. It's all knotty terminology.

Anyway. It's chilly and my feet are freezing and I was happy to wake up from a dream of a plane doing barrel-rolls over the Great Marvels of the Western World (Leaning Tower of Pisa, Acrpolis, etc.) and not have to worry about a presentation or reading 25 stories. I bathed and read 10 and practiced guitar and thought fond thoughts of visitors from out of state. Really, it's almost cheerful.