Hmmm

"I'm not only a trouble maker, I'm a troubled soul."

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          

                                                     Garry Kasparov, former World Chess Champion

You Can Never Have too Many

This reminds me of Thomas Jefferson's 1815 quote to John Adams:

         "I cannot live without books." 

                  This is my idea of Heaven!

God Bless Us, Everyone

Kai<

oJ lo>gov sa<rx ejge>neto kai< ejskh>nwsen ejn hJmi~n kai< ejqeasa>meqa th<n do>xan aujtou~ do>xan wJv monogenou~v para< patro>v plh>rhv ca>ritov kai< ajlhqei>av

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, glory as a unique, only one of his kind Son, sent from the Father, full of  grace and truth.

John 1:14

Before

"What are you doing"

I asked her one night. She said,

"Making room for you."

The Irony

To whom it may concern:

Saturday night after a long day of shopping our favorite second hand stores, we settled in for the night to unpack two large bags of books we'd bought. While doing that, something happened, something simply spectacular, something I've wanted to do for a very long time, something I've dreamed about for decades but never, or very rarely, experienced, and never like this night. We managed a scene right out of John Denver's Poems, Prayers, and Promises, where, after talking quietly from the heart about the things most important to us, and passing the pipe around as it were, when I got to it, I opened a used copy of some collected poems of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and began to survey its contents.

For whatever reason, I began at the back and began sampling here and there as I moved forward. As I was moved, I began reading aloud to her. What a magical moment: sitting with my best friend and lover, in a dimly lit room, sharing thoughts, dreams, and then poems from this newly purchased volume. Such a state eventually lead us to quoting favorite lines from memory where we could, and searching for others online when memory gave way to the ravages of time. 

After surveying a few pages, I came across his poem entitled Haunted Houses. Upon reading it, I realized that, like second hand houses, anything we purchase used, including books - maybe especially books - comes with a history, a past, ghosts if you dare. Some second hand items are significant, like valuable antiques, others simply carry the impressions, scars, and spirits of previous owners. This irony was not lost on either of us as I read Longfellow's beautiful argument, so lucidly laid out in Haunted Houses, from a used book. It was such a mystical experience all by itself that I have to share a significant stanza with you. It runs thus:

"We have no title-deeds to house or lands,

Owners and occupants of earlier dates

From graves forgotten stretch their dusty hands,

And hold in mortmain still their old estates."

What a perfect experience: sitting in a used house, built and inhabited since the early 60's, reading from a previously owned book of poems, immersed, or should I say, accompanied by, not only the spectral spirits of earlier generations of readers and dwellers, but also in the authorial presence of Longfellow himself (Anyone unfamiliar with this author/reader union needs to read Walt Whitman who makes it a habit to address future generations of readers as being present with them. Longfellow, while not as explicit, does the same thing by addressing topics such as time passage, aging, and the impermanence of life and reality). We both independently expressed feeling the ghosts of this simple volume. If I might be so bold, I'd say that we ALL enjoyed a beautiful evening singing chants from Longfellow and others.

If you can, get into the habit of buying second hand goods when you can, and you too can encounter these same multi-generational spirits on a regular basis. Please don't think this is just for books, houses, furniture, pictures, and sundry housewares can have the same effect. All one needs is something durable with a past.  I can't think of anything more spine tinglingly flattering than being honored to contribute to the life of a piece of furniture, a garment, or a book, a place, carrying on it's history, adding to its legacy. There's also something comfortably right about it. So join in and add your emotional footprint, your energy signature, to the life of the tangible.

Until next time,

Contemplate the mysteries, and remember to breathe.

(Favorite Poems of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. 1947. Henry Seidel Canby, ed. Doubleday & Company, Inc. Garden City, New York. pp.276,7)

Never Judge a Book by Its Cover?

To whom it may concern:

Ted Bishop, a professor at the University of Alberta, wrote a book chronicling a motorcycle trip he made from Edmonton to Austin Texas (and back again - Just like a Hobbit - well if Hobbits rode motorcycles). While in Austin he did research on James Joyce's Ulysses. Among other things which he observed, what struck him most was the fact that the notes and questions left by previous owners in the various margins of the editions available to him (and apparently, the University of Texas at Austin has quite the collection of this work) varied greatly depending on the cover of the book and the various prefaces and introductions. He claims, as you'll see below, that all that preceded the text in a given edition of Ulysses colored the reader's expectations, and therefore his marginal remnants. 

Now, loving books myself, I've judged many a book by its binding, cover, paper (quality, thickness, AND color), age, and too many intangibles to mention. However, when I read this paragraph congealed from Bishop's careful research, I was astonished at it's truth.

"Seeing all these different editions together I was beginning to get a sense of how the physical book would change your reading of the text. I don't know the term yet, but what I was doing was reading the "paratext," the elements surrounding the text - cover art, blurbs, prefaces, introductions - all of those "thresholds," as the French critic Gerard Genette calls them, that we must cross before encountering the text itself. There is no such thing as a pure text; we always reach it through the paratext , and though we may try to ignore it, it shapes our reading. Who said, "Don't kjudge a book by its cover"? We always do. (Riding With Rilke: Reflections on Motorcycles and Books. Ted Bishop. 2006. W. W. Norton & Company. New York. p. 119).

Because of this paragraph alone, I now consciously attempt to begin reading a book at the first line of chapter 1 regardless of what precedes it. Of course, I must still see the cover, must still evaluate (at least when purchasing a copy) the quality of the paper if I expect it to last, and the myriad of other things related to the pure physicality of the volume itself. Thus, in many ways I don't always succeed. After all, we all know that often an author's best argument is in his prologue. So not being swayed by paratext material is hard under the best of conditions. Nevertheless, I thought I'd share this one caveat about reading which might have otherwise gone unobserved by readers like myself.

Until next time,

Contemplate the mysteries, and remember to breathe (and skip the paratext material!).

Life

There's an adage in aviation which goes like this: "Air speed is life, and altitude is life insurance." In the day to day world, we are often treated to cliches like: "Time is money." However, ask any child, any lover, any artist, any philosopher, or any person dying from a terminal illness, and you'll hear a fundamentally and radically different song, usually accompanied with vehemence and ferocity: Time is NOT money,

Time is life!

I wrote a poem about this once, but in keeping with today's image, I'll save you the time. 

Until next time,

Contemplate the mysteries, and remember to breathe.

Maybe

It seems I'm as calm and as at peace as I've been in years. No decades: no nervous coughing, no habitually unnecessary clearing the throat, no annoying sniffing, no wiggling, no wringing the hands, no tapping or drumming the fingers. 

Maybe it's the nightly mixed drink I've begun to enjoy. 

Maybe it's the prospect of knowing that my major issues have come to a head - after all, they can only end one way or another - I can't see how they can continue unresolved, for better or for worse, much longer. Certainly not forever.

Maybe it's knowing I'm free to live my life as I want, on my terms, outside the box which was depressingly too small for my vision, for the first time in my life. 

Maybe my body took leave of its senses and has fundamentally changed on it's own. 

Maybe it's just I'm too stressed to feel nervous any more? 

Maybe I'm where I was always meant to be, doing what I was made to do, enjoying life for its own sake, without expectation or requirement, in harmony with bigger, unseen plans. 

Maybe all the stars have magically aligned for the first time in my belabored existence. 

Maybe I no longer care, and I'm at peace simply because of the way things are.

Maybe it's being with the love of my life, safe, secure, cuddled in her embrace every night.

Just Maybe.

Maybe it's all these things. 

Maybe it's nothing at all. 

Maybe . . .  

Truth be told, I honestly don't know. But maybe, a thousand to one shot maybe, I really don't care.

But somehow I think I do.

Regardless, maybe I'm just happy to be happy for a change.

Maybe one day I'll know.

Maybe I won't.

Maybe it doesn't matter.

Maybe.

Invisibility

To whom it may concern:

I was watching the 1977 cartoon version of Tolkien's The Hobbit last night. While it is silly in so many ways, something stood out which made me question the plausibility of the concept of invisibility. No. I don't think it's really possible. No. I don't want it to be possible either. Given that it's a fictitious concept, maybe I'm thinking about it too much. However, I, and many writers throughout the ages,  have thought about it a lot, and this movie only re-opened the mental quandry again. 

The concept comes up early and often in man's literary history. In my experience, the earliest I've encountered the theme of invisibility was in Plato's The Republic where he discusses the ring of Gyges. Similar to Tolkien's ring of power, this ring, when worn a certain way, renders the wearer invisible. In like manner, H. G. Wells's The Invisible Man, could be characterized as a modern re-telling of the same episode. Here he wages the same argument and yields the same basic answers (While Wells answers clearly the question of what one would do while invisible if he knew he couldn't be caught, he doesn't wrestle the same way Socrates does about ethics. He implies a lot, but doesn't quite tackle, to my satisfaction, the issues Socrates raises). 

All that said, my basic problem is this: when one is in an invisible state, by means of a ring or other device, what actually is invisible? It's been too long since I read about Gyges or the invisible man in Wells. In Plato, Gyges was not, but in Wells, the invisible person might have to be naked. Does anyone remember specifically? I bring this exact point up because it is at this very point that my metaphysically addicted brain becomes over active. 

Let me expand on my question by allusion to The Hobbit. In this version of the movie, Bilbo wears the ring, waves sting (his small sword) around, and it appears, tho it's not stated as such, that the sword was still visible. I really don't care whether it was or not, my question remains, or at least shifts to: what is the basis of invisibility of inanimate objects? Obviously, Bilbo's clothes were invisible, and if you follow where I'm going, what else would be? I'd always assumed his sword or other carried objects were. However, what becomes of objects or people with whom he comes in contact? I.e. what about if he's riding a pony, carrying a basket, a back pack, or throws something which had previously been in his grasp and presumed invisible? Does it suddenly appear? Does the pony, etc vanish when he wears the ring? This is a problem to me because if it's anything he comes into contact with which becomes invisible, wouldn't the entire world (Universe?) by extension also become invisible because his feet are on the ground?

More recently, Harry Potter is also entrusted with an invisibility cloak by someone. As you'll remember, everything which is covered by it is rendered invisible. Of course, this only raises more questions than it answers to me, because, like the problems stated above, and very kin to the paradox of what container can hold a liquid which can consume anything?; why isn't Potter's invisibility cloak, well . . . invisible too? Or have we passed into the problem of the set of all sets? Maybe I'm digressing. 

Seems sort of self defeating to me. Silly I know, but I'm curious. Maybe I've just thought too much about it. Thankfully, it's never affected my enjoyment of stories where such devices grant the user invisibility. As a matter of fact, I can't imagine a good fantasy tale without at least someone going invisible part of the time. It's kind of like Sci-fi without some time travel. It just seems right, even tho in reality, it seems puzzling and problematic. Ah, well, maybe I need something else to think about.

Until next time,

Contemplate the mysteries (*puts on magic ring*) and remember to breathe

*disappears* 

Mind and Matter

I have at least one more post about books in the works. Can you tell I'm obsessed with them? However, after my last two, I thought you might need a break. Also, truth be told, I didn't write much (ahem . . . any) this weekend. So, I decided to post this nugget of wisdom on the left from one of my former professors instead.

It's reminiscent of one of my favorite adages:

"If you cannot make an appointment or accept an invitation, simply tell the person 'no'. A friend won't demand an explanation, and an enemy won't believe the one you offer."

Until next time,

Contemplate the mysteries, and remember to breathe.