save the words! /  by mrm

I just realized what I need to be doing with my life. I need to create a preserve. A place for words, for the abused words of the world, where they have meadows to frolic in and shade to lie in and plenty of hills to roam and hide behind, far from the prying eyes of this world, this cruel world that maltreats them so. Kristin and I were discussing our empathy for "random" and "literally," respectively, and that was when I realized what I should do. I need to create the equivalent of the San Diego Wild Animal Park for words. 

Join me. Donate now.

cauliflower cake /  by mrm

Who even knew there was such a thing? I love my home. Kristin made this for dinner tonight, and it was scrumptious. And so fluffy! And it held its texture so well, just look!

Am I the luckiest girl on the block? It's arguable.

grasses /  by mrm

I don't have a lot to say to flatter my hometown, but I do enjoy the train ride from San Francisco (really, from Richmond) up to Sacramento, along the bay and through the marshlands. 

The marsh grasses are unreal. I have seen the colors in all seasons. This being fall, there are tall and short grasses in colors ranging from lime and sage green to cranberry, burgundy, and lilac, and matte silver, and lion's mane gold. And pampas grass with creamy, feathery tufts that wave in the breeze. (This is all just before Fairfield, if you're heading northeast.) All set off by pools and slow, winding streams, slate blue. I'm not making this stuff up. Fairfield itself, of course, a terror of a town. Telephone wires and concrete block buildings and housing developments. Gas stations and storage units. But those fields, marshes, somehow unsung.

satisfaction /  by mrm

"Early on the first day of summer, I found myself sitting in the middle of an impossibly green pasture, resting. 'The longest day of the year' is what I would jot down in my notebook in bed late that night, followed by 'literally,' which was then struck out and replaced with 'figuratively.' What can I say? I was tired."

           – Michael Pollan, The Omnivore's Dilemma

I'm always pleased when someone tips their hat to one of my pet hates. Thanks, Michael Pollan.

biscuits /  by mrm

"Overcome by these perspectives Murphy fell forward on his face on the grass, beside those biscuits of which it could be said as truly as the stars, that one differed from another, but of which he could not partake in their fullness until he had learnt not to prefer any one to any other."

                – Murphy, Samuel Beckett

sight /  by mrm

Last night I finished reading Jose Saramago's Seeing, the sequel to Blindness. While I loved the latter,  Seeing left me feeling like I'd been punched in the gut, then kicked in the face. Even so, there's this:
He walked through the garden and stopped for a moment to study the statue of the woman with the empty jar, They left me here, she seemed to be saying, and now all I'm good for is staring into this grubby water, there was a time when the stone I'm made from was white, when a fountain flowed day and night from this jar, they never told me where all the water came from, I was just here to tip up the jar, but now not a drop falls from it, and no one has come to tell me why it stopped.

tonight /  by mrm

it's warm and there's an almost-full moon and a cloudless sky. It's so gorgeous I want to roll out my sleeping bag and fall asleep there, straight under the sky, even on the concrete of my backyard, the moon in my eye. I won't, though. I'm not all I should be.

the present moment /  by mrm

"Who are you? Why do you walk down the street? Where tonight will you sleep, and then, tomorrow? Oh, how it whirls and surges – floats me afresh! I start after them. People drive this way and that. The white light sputter and pours. Plate-glass windows. Carnations; chrysanthemums. Ivy in dark gardens. Milk carts at the door. Wherever I go, mysterious figures, I see you, turning the corner, mothers and sons; you, you, you. I hasten, I follow. This, I fancy, must be the sea. Gray is the landscape; dim as ashes; the water murmurs and moves. If I fall on my knees, if I go through the ritual, the ancient antics, it's you, unknown figures, you I adore; if I open my arms, it's you I embrace, you I draw to me – adorable world!"
             – Virginia Woolf, "An Unwritten Novel"

episodes like this /  by mrm

"What can one make of episodes like this, unforseen, unplanned, out of character? Are they just holes, holes in the heart, into which one steps and falls and then goes on falling?"
– J.M. Coetzee, Elizabeth Costello

overturning prop 8 /  by mrm

I remember when they legalized gay marriage in San Francisco. I remember the joy. I remember having a job interview near City Hall, and arriving early, on I think the 16th of February. Not even the first day of the weddings. And I remember the line still stretched around the block. I remember standing in the rain, and watching the couples emerge, some carrying signs, "Together for 30 years, and finally married." I remember wishing I was a reverend so that I could help. I remember how much I liked the phrase "spouses for life." I remember the brides in matching dresses, the couples in sneakers and jeans, in every color and style of clothing, I remember the laughing, I remember applauding for every single pair of newlyweds walking down the stairs of City Hall, under my umbrella, crying and smiling and standing and watching them and feeling it so much.

And this is not the final victory, but it's a start.

no dodos /  by mrm

Today, at the Maira Kalman exhibition at the Jewish Contemporary Museum. This wasn't there, but a lot of great things were.

My favorite things, though, were her books. (Of course, says housemate Davis. I'm so g*&d#@$^ predictable.) I intend to acquire some soon. Hopefully the ones about Max. They are whimsical, rhyming, and (need I add) beautifully illustrated.

moving pictures /  by mrm

I saw three films at the Silent Film Festival last weekend, and I kind of wish I could do that all the time. To sit in the theater while the music responds to the screen. Those old images. The way people moved. The intensity of it all. 

Movies don't usually allow me to empty myself. Somehow, imagining the dialogue as their lips move, hearing only in my head the few sentences that flash by on title cards, transports me in a way that films so rarely do. I suppose it shouldn't be surprising. It's closer to reading than watching a talkie is. And why text has such a direct line to my mind and heart I don't suppose I'll ever know. I primarily experience the world through words, and that's been true for a long, long time now.