I am experiencing adjustment difficulties. Shockingly, it was extremely relaxing to spend a weekend in a house where I could step outside without having to listen for the absence of footsteps on the shared stairwell and then don gloves and disinfect my way through three different doors and where it was possible to find stretches of land and water sufficiently depopulated that I didn't need a mask screaming up all my sensory issues every second I was outside. I slept better on Cape Cod. Acres better. Just not long enough. I know by definition there is no escape from a pandemic unless one happens to live in Antarctica or one of the countries that treated the oubreak of a virulently mortal disease like a humanitarian crisis rather than a personal inconvenience, but apparently the mere ability to take a walk without a significant escalation of physical and mental stress makes a real difference. Also I had the sea. Now I have a dry street full of people who crowd the sidewalks and only about half wear their masks because isn't the pandemic over? Isn't that why everything is reopening? Isn't the economy so important? Is an island micronation too much to ask for?
On the bright side, for the first time in months, I have new books: Scott R. Jones' Shout Kill Revel Repeat (2019), Annemarie Schwarzenbach's Lyric Novella (1933), and Cees Nooteboom's Monk's Eye (2016). I started the last this evening and am so far enjoying it very much. You may see why.
Have some links.
1. As previously mentioned but not directly linked, the Criterion Channel has made a valuable portion of its collection free to view without subscription: Black Lives.
2. On words from the outside and the inside: Anthony Mordechai Tzvi Russell, "Translating Black Lives Matter into Yiddish."
3. I was struck by many things in this recent interview with Jon Stewart, but especially this line: "The police are, in some respects, a border patrol, and they patrol the border between the two Americas."
4. Courtesy of![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
osprey_archer: I had never before heard of Edith Maude Eaton, the pioneering Chinese-Canadian/American author who wrote under the pen name Sui Sin Far. I am going to try to get hold of her collection Mrs. Spring Fragrance (1912). That edition looks as though it contains her autobiographical essay "Leaves from the mental portfolio of an Eurasian" (1890), too.
5. Courtesy ofmoon_custafer: the ultimate list of utterly insane old money names. I have serious difficulty believing I didn't receive spam from some of these people in the mid-2000's. Lucretia Le Bourgeois must have been trolling.
I would like not to be so tired all the time. I would like to be writing. I would like my job not to wipe me out mentally for the entire day. I would like a lot of things I suspect are impossible. At least I had the sea.
On the bright side, for the first time in months, I have new books: Scott R. Jones' Shout Kill Revel Repeat (2019), Annemarie Schwarzenbach's Lyric Novella (1933), and Cees Nooteboom's Monk's Eye (2016). I started the last this evening and am so far enjoying it very much. You may see why.
Have some links.
1. As previously mentioned but not directly linked, the Criterion Channel has made a valuable portion of its collection free to view without subscription: Black Lives.
2. On words from the outside and the inside: Anthony Mordechai Tzvi Russell, "Translating Black Lives Matter into Yiddish."
3. I was struck by many things in this recent interview with Jon Stewart, but especially this line: "The police are, in some respects, a border patrol, and they patrol the border between the two Americas."
4. Courtesy of
osprey_archer: I had never before heard of Edith Maude Eaton, the pioneering Chinese-Canadian/American author who wrote under the pen name Sui Sin Far. I am going to try to get hold of her collection Mrs. Spring Fragrance (1912). That edition looks as though it contains her autobiographical essay "Leaves from the mental portfolio of an Eurasian" (1890), too. 5. Courtesy of
moon_custafer: the ultimate list of utterly insane old money names. I have serious difficulty believing I didn't receive spam from some of these people in the mid-2000's. Lucretia Le Bourgeois must have been trolling.I would like not to be so tired all the time. I would like to be writing. I would like my job not to wipe me out mentally for the entire day. I would like a lot of things I suspect are impossible. At least I had the sea.
