The world is tied to a simple text
The last time my birthday fell on Yom Kippur, I was twenty-seven years old; the time before that, nineteen. This time I am thirty-eight years old. I can't think of a character my age this year, but ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
spatch has reminded me that he was my age when we married. That counts.
My erev birthday was observed with my niece and candles and pre-fast pizza and my mother handing me a small square package wrapped in shiny blue paper with strict instructions not to open until the morning. I was afraid the City of Somerville would give me an alarm clock with a repeat of yesterday's sleep-shattering jackhammers right outside our driveway, but the rain must have kept them off: I woke on my own time and my husband sang to me and now I have a CD of the 2018 original cast recording of the NYTF's Fiddler on the Roof/פֿידלער אויפֿן דאַך, which seems very suitable. The plan is to visit museums during the day and meet my parents for break-fast after sunset. Every year is its own.
There was music in this valley, but not of birdsong and falling streams as in Tabitha's valley. Here the music was of the waves breaking along the shore, the sea wind rustling in the silver leaves of the olive trees, and a strange wild haunting melody that was like nothing Tabitha had heard before. Had she ever heard a harp played she would have been reminded of that, yet it was not harp music. It was lament and triumph in one. It was a wild desire to be gone and the sorrow of parting. It was an Autumnal song. It was weeping and laughter. It was darkness and light and being born.
"What is it?" she whispered. "Andrew, what is it?"
"It is the Minstrel Swan [. . .] Don't you know your signs of the Zodiac?" asked Andrew, smiling.
"Yes, I do. There are twelve of them, one for each month. There are starry people and starry beasts and starry fish, and one who's both a man and a beast, and one who's a beast and a fish, but no starry birds. I've always thought that's wrong. Why should the birds have no star to watch over them? I've always believed someone made a mistake in calling the Autumn sign the Scales. September 23rd till October 23rd. That's the time of the year when the great winds come in from the sea like beating wings. Parson Redfern has a picture of the Scales, and they look just like a great winged bird flying through the sky. I believe the Autumn star is a bird. And he's the greatest of all the star creatures."
"You're right," said Andrew. "He's the greatest of them all, and he is called the Minstrel."
—Elizabeth Goudge, The Valley of Song (1951)
spatch has reminded me that he was my age when we married. That counts.My erev birthday was observed with my niece and candles and pre-fast pizza and my mother handing me a small square package wrapped in shiny blue paper with strict instructions not to open until the morning. I was afraid the City of Somerville would give me an alarm clock with a repeat of yesterday's sleep-shattering jackhammers right outside our driveway, but the rain must have kept them off: I woke on my own time and my husband sang to me and now I have a CD of the 2018 original cast recording of the NYTF's Fiddler on the Roof/פֿידלער אויפֿן דאַך, which seems very suitable. The plan is to visit museums during the day and meet my parents for break-fast after sunset. Every year is its own.
There was music in this valley, but not of birdsong and falling streams as in Tabitha's valley. Here the music was of the waves breaking along the shore, the sea wind rustling in the silver leaves of the olive trees, and a strange wild haunting melody that was like nothing Tabitha had heard before. Had she ever heard a harp played she would have been reminded of that, yet it was not harp music. It was lament and triumph in one. It was a wild desire to be gone and the sorrow of parting. It was an Autumnal song. It was weeping and laughter. It was darkness and light and being born.
"What is it?" she whispered. "Andrew, what is it?"
"It is the Minstrel Swan [. . .] Don't you know your signs of the Zodiac?" asked Andrew, smiling.
"Yes, I do. There are twelve of them, one for each month. There are starry people and starry beasts and starry fish, and one who's both a man and a beast, and one who's a beast and a fish, but no starry birds. I've always thought that's wrong. Why should the birds have no star to watch over them? I've always believed someone made a mistake in calling the Autumn sign the Scales. September 23rd till October 23rd. That's the time of the year when the great winds come in from the sea like beating wings. Parson Redfern has a picture of the Scales, and they look just like a great winged bird flying through the sky. I believe the Autumn star is a bird. And he's the greatest of all the star creatures."
"You're right," said Andrew. "He's the greatest of them all, and he is called the Minstrel."
—Elizabeth Goudge, The Valley of Song (1951)
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Thank you!
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Thank you! It was!
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Thank you! That is a nice blessing.
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I wonder what picture of Libra looks like giant winged bird...or maybe it's just the layout of the stars themselves.
Happy birthday!
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Thank you!
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Right? I think I'm considering it canonical. I always associated autumn with wild birds and wild winds anyway, and I love that Goudge adds the sea.
I wonder what picture of Libra looks like giant winged bird...or maybe it's just the layout of the stars themselves.
I think she must mean the constellation—I can imagine a bird in flight, its wings streaming. If you want scales, you have to invent the pans yourself, anyway.
Happy birthday!
Thank you!
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Thank you! There has been a lot of off-Broadway klezmer, and singing.
(Your icon is just a lovely image.)
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P.
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Thank you!
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Nine
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Thank you!
I re-read the book this fall and I thought Goudge was right.
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And then there was Chinese food and watching Child and their friends declaim from an American Girl catalogue, which actually beat the looping repetitions of 'Grizabella the Glamour Cat.'
I am glad we got to share this year and there is nothing to do for the next one but keep eating people, so pass the capers.
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Mazel tov! I'm so glad. It's got . . . some rum . . . in it . . .
And then there was Chinese food and watching Child and their friends declaim from an American Girl catalogue, which actually beat the looping repetitions of 'Grizabella the Glamour Cat.'
That's like found theater. I approve.
I am glad we got to share this year and there is nothing to do for the next one but keep eating people, so pass the capers.
Amen. Dill's good, too.
*hugs*
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Thank you! It was, actually, really nice.
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Thank you!