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If you'd go to Mother Carey
I really think there are few things I find as beautiful as the sea. The last two days were rain and heat and lots of late-night conversations, but I stuck around an extra night and so we spent a couple of hours this afternoon at Beavertail, lying on the dry rocks between their sun-warmth and the sea wind, watching cormorants through a field glass and being much less scientifically amused by the probably-college students in the next cove over, who alternated between swimming and diving in the high tide and engaging in subtle mating rituals like losing parts of their bathing suits and smashing slices of watermelon into one another's faces. It was the first time I have been to the sea all summer; I wasn't equipped for swimming, but I climbed down to where the waves were breaking in over the ledges, rolled up my corduroys and found a long strand of seagrass wound around my ankle for my pains. I can't remember the last time I folded my arms beneath my head and closed my eyes against the sun for so long, everything was drained to a drowned blue when I opened them. Small red ants kept trying to colonize my jacket, which had nothing more interesting in the pockets than some old cough drop wrappers. I took a couple of photographs of ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
greygirlbeast and humglum which hopefully they will not hold against me. At one point I tried reading another chapter of Patrick O'Brian's The Surgeon's Mate (1980) with my hat sort of propped to the side for shade, but I hope it is no discourtesy to Stephen Maturin that I was too distracted by actual ocean. (I finished it on the drive back to Providence. I like this series. And the Harvard Book Store is remaindering their copies, so this is the edition with the intelligencer pin-up cover.) There were tall clouds billowing over the water and gulls with their slate-white wings poised on the thermals like sailors' carvings. My hair is still in wind-knots and I can't tell if I've sunburned. It was very, very lovely.
Today is also the centenary of Mervyn Peake. At this point it would be apropos to quote Prunesquallor saying something festive and absurd, but I'm actually on the commuter rail back from Providence; the Amtrak train we ran to make—and I got a ticket for—turned out to be late, then later, then indefinitely delayed in New Haven. We shall see how this works out. The screaming baby in the seat in front of me is definitely not a plus.
. . . I am now home, which is much appreciated. Oh, my God, the screaming baby. If it doesn't grow up to sing Wagner at the Sydney Opera House, it'll be a waste of lungs. I missed a call on my cellphone because I couldn't hear the ring over the baby. In any case, having access once more to my books:
And all the while the progress of the seasons, those great tides, enveloped and stained with their passing colours, chilled or warmed with their varying exhalations, the tracts of Gormenghast. And so, as Fuchsia wanders across her room in search of a lost book, the South Spinneys below her window are misty with a green hesitation, and a few days later the sharp green fires have broken out along the iron boughs.
Mervyn Peake, Gormenghast (1950). May we still be hunting that book in a hundred years.
greygirlbeast and humglum which hopefully they will not hold against me. At one point I tried reading another chapter of Patrick O'Brian's The Surgeon's Mate (1980) with my hat sort of propped to the side for shade, but I hope it is no discourtesy to Stephen Maturin that I was too distracted by actual ocean. (I finished it on the drive back to Providence. I like this series. And the Harvard Book Store is remaindering their copies, so this is the edition with the intelligencer pin-up cover.) There were tall clouds billowing over the water and gulls with their slate-white wings poised on the thermals like sailors' carvings. My hair is still in wind-knots and I can't tell if I've sunburned. It was very, very lovely.Today is also the centenary of Mervyn Peake. At this point it would be apropos to quote Prunesquallor saying something festive and absurd, but I'm actually on the commuter rail back from Providence; the Amtrak train we ran to make—and I got a ticket for—turned out to be late, then later, then indefinitely delayed in New Haven. We shall see how this works out. The screaming baby in the seat in front of me is definitely not a plus.
. . . I am now home, which is much appreciated. Oh, my God, the screaming baby. If it doesn't grow up to sing Wagner at the Sydney Opera House, it'll be a waste of lungs. I missed a call on my cellphone because I couldn't hear the ring over the baby. In any case, having access once more to my books:
And all the while the progress of the seasons, those great tides, enveloped and stained with their passing colours, chilled or warmed with their varying exhalations, the tracts of Gormenghast. And so, as Fuchsia wanders across her room in search of a lost book, the South Spinneys below her window are misty with a green hesitation, and a few days later the sharp green fires have broken out along the iron boughs.
Mervyn Peake, Gormenghast (1950). May we still be hunting that book in a hundred years.
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All praises to Peake.
Nine
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Thank you. I ran across it while looking for another scene and it seemed correct.
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I shall check it out . . .
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDY6bWT5oTM
"Agriculture Canada's definitely gonna come lookin' for us."
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I had the good fortune to spend this afternoon swimming in the river with
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Nice. I don't care as much about rivers or lakes as the sea, but I can appreciate them.
Thank you!
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I'm sorry for the screaming baby and the obnoxiousness of the Amtrak train's fail. I hope Amtrak at least weren't patting themselves on the back at the same time--a few weeks back when I was trying to get into NYC for my bookclub meeting the train I wanted was cancellt, and the electonic message board at the station was alternating between "[my chosen train] is cancelled" and "MetroNorth Service: Good". I was not pleased.
I'm glad you're safely home, and I hope you're not sunburnt.
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Shockingly, no. I never used to; then I was on medication which made me almost literally allergic to the sun, hence the broad-brimmed hat that shows up in so many photographs of me outside; now it seems I'm no longer flammable, but I still like the hat.
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You're welcome. (You should bring back photographs.)
You can keep the baby (perhaps it will turn into a pig).
I should have thought of that.
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misty with a green hesitation
Beautiful.
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It made me very happy, and something like at home.