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Sunday, October 23rd, 2011
(from Chapter 3 of Our lady of the dark flowers)
From the four points of the compass they came, the strikers on their way to Alto de San Antonio in their long, dusty caravans. The village was boiling over with excitement. As you looked into the chaos of the crowds streaming through the village's streets, you could see signs bearing the names of salitreras, La Gloria, San Pedro, Palmira, Argentina, San Pablo, Cataluña, Santa Clara, La Perla, Santa Ana, Esmeralda, San AgustÃn, Santa LucÃa, Hanssa, San Lorenzo, others that we hadn't even heard of. And that's not all -- covered with dirt from their heads to their feet,the strikers came singing, shouting, not only the oficinas in San Antonio's district, but from every district in the Pampa del Tamarugal. The influx of people showed no signs of letting up. The strike had spread across the pampa like a duststorm -- "Good dust, the dust of righteousness, my brothers" crowed Domingo Dominguez, walking among the crowd. To the bird's eye, there were more than five thousand of us, pushing together into the streets of the village, bringing our power to the strike. Men of every race and nationality, groups which had clashed in bitter fratricidal wars, were coming together now under the sun, under a single standard -- that of the proletariate.
posted afternoon of October 23rd, 2011: Respond
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Saturday, October 22nd, 2011
I feel like I give short shrift here at READIN to quick, intense reads, like it is mostly the books that take me a long time to read that I am moved to write about. (This is not always true, Costaguana was a pretty quick read -- but anyways.) Three books that I've devoured recently and found most satisfying, nourishing meals.
- Feeding on Dreams by Ariel Dorfman.
His memoir on revolution and repression in Chile and principally on the paths of exile and seeking a home (and seeking a voice) that his life has followed in the decades of the dictatorship and the decades since.
- Golden Boy, Emerald Girl by Yiyun Li.
Short stories about life in China and as an immigrant. Fascinating sense of dread and pointlessness. You can read the title story in the New Yorker.
- In the sea there are crocodiles by Fabio Geda and translated from Italian by Howard Curtis.
Telling the emigrant story of Enaiatollah Akbari, his journey in his tenth through fifteenth years from Afghanistan to Italy by way of Pakistan, Iran, Turkey and Greece. Akbari's encounters -- friends and strangers who help him survive and make his way to his home in Italy, soldiers and thugs and police who make his way more difficult, the family that ultimately decides to foster him and help him seek asylum -- are gripping, moving, haunting stuff.
 (It is not until after mentioning these three in the same breath that I realize they share (very loosely) a common theme of homeland and exile. Not sure what to make of this...)
posted evening of October 22nd, 2011: 1 response
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More from Shorpy: a breathtaking view of the Toledo, OH waterfront in 1909. Here is a snip of it, click through for the whole (huge) picture.
 ...And, we're off to Occupy Wall Street today.
posted morning of October 22nd, 2011: Respond
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Wednesday, October 19th, 2011
 Mountain Station is opening Friday's Songwriter Showcase at Studio 12 in Montclair. Come on time at 8 if you want to hear our music! -- We're doing two short sets, the first at 8 and the second later on after some of the featured acts have their sets. We'll be playing a couple of our old favorites and a couple of brand-new songs. Hope to see you there.
posted evening of October 19th, 2011: Respond
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Tuesday, October 18th, 2011
 So for about 3 years now I've had the vague notion that I would really like to take a two-week vacation from work, travel to Mexico or some other Latin American country and enroll in an intensive Spanish language program. Unfortunately the artisan who fashioned me and put me here on Earth did not see fit to give me any capability of making plans; so it has remained a vague, unrealized notion. Every quality has its antithesis, every vacuum has its corresponding completeness; and Ellen is a very good planner. So thanks to her persistence it looks like we have a plan, a palpable plan, for the three of us to travel to southern Mexico late next summer and study Spanish as a family, at the Instituto Cultural Oaxaca. I can't wait!
posted evening of October 18th, 2011: Respond
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Sunday, October 16th, 2011
Sylvia and I carved a Jack O'Lantern this afternoon.
posted evening of October 16th, 2011: 3 responses
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Saturday, October 15th, 2011
Sylvia got a lovely birthday present from my parents, a bunch of merch from Moomin Shop, in Finland. A "Little My" nightgown, a mug with a likeness of Moominmamma, copies of "The Book About Moomin, Mymble, and Little My" in both English and Finnish --  Sylvia and I spent a little while watching this (beautiful) 2009 production of "Kuinkas Sitten Kävikään?" and reading along...
posted evening of October 15th, 2011: Respond
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Bob and Janis are coming over this afternoon to play some tunes -- I'm eagerly anticipating my first jam using the custom shoulder rest I carved this morning. Ever since I got this  fiddle I have been thinking that a wooden block shoulder rest would work better than the contraption the maker provided, to attach a standard violin shoulder rest. Fate forced my hand a few weeks ago by ordaining that I should lose the said contraption... (come to think of it, I've been playing with no shoulder rest for a few weeks, and have been making some interesting music that way too... Mountain Station recorded a fun take on Odds & Ends last week.) Turns out I was right! It's extremely comfortable to hold the violin with this extension. I've been listening to some old (well not that old I guess but from like last year) Mountain Station tracks lately and enjoying our sound. And it is just getting better -- our new "St. James Infirmary" is a different, more organized and complex song than our first recording of it.
 Also -- bought a pickup for the fiddle, I decided to get a saxophone pickup that will clip onto the bell. This will help with amplification when we play at Studio 12 in Montclair next Friday.
posted morning of October 15th, 2011: 1 response
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Friday, October 14th, 2011
Laura's wishing Peter would just
Give up this pretension, would just
Break this patterned silence
Where he builds his lonesome castle. Now she
Cries out in the morning when she
Wakes and finds him missing. Wishes
He'd reach out and touch her, wants
To hold him in his grief -- she wants to
Have back these long years that
she's been waiting for his voice. Peter's
Walking in the garden, where he
Knows the paths are laid,
Planted crocus in the springtime, planted
Hostas in the shade, wanders
Down the road to town, but nothing's
Open Sunday morning, now he
Rubs his eyes and wonders if he'll
ever find his home.
Expectation conquers knowledge and the
Evidence of senses; what I
see and hear and feel
I'll never grasp if I decline;
For all I wish and want and hope I'll never
Stand beside my grave, I'm seeing
Gauzy patterns traced out
On the page of wounded time.
She gets up, groggy, runs the water,
Steaming up the mirror, she hears
Peter downstairs in the kitchen,
hopes he's making coffee,
Laura's tired out, she didn't sleep well,
Combs her hair and squints and in the
Mirror she can see the look of
anguish on her face.
She's downstairs with a cup of coffee,
Looking quizzically at Peter,
Peter's solemn face that just
can't seem to meet her gaze.
A question's in the air and they both know it, but the
heavy silence keeps their lips held tight; keeps
Heavy thoughts drawn back to yesterday.
posted evening of October 14th, 2011: 3 responses
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Thursday, October 13th, 2011
int main() {
printf("Goodbye, Ritchie\n");
return 0;
}
posted evening of October 13th, 2011: Respond
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