Memories....

Reading my favorite author [Jose Saramago] on my favorite ocean. The Pacific one.
Happy Saturday to you all!
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Splash du Jour: Friday

Have a great Friday!
******

Answer - by Sarah

When it comes to books and music those who know me well know that my tastes and preferences are hard to pin down to any one sort of genre. In other words, I read and listen to a diverse and wide range of authors and musicians. I love a lot of divergent topics and sounds. And styles.
Tonight, as I sit here at Starbucks -- a short word about music.
Do you ever wonder what might be your favourite song ever?
if someone asked you, would you be ready with an… answer?
As I said, I have such an expansive appreciation of music -- I love so many different styles, from AC/DC, Tool & Mettallica --> Rascal Flatts & Vince Gill --> Dvorak & Brahms --> Eva Cassidy --> B.B. King & Eric Clapton --> JOHN MAYER & COLLECTIVE SOUL [upper-case intentional] --> David Gilmour / Roger Waters… according to what mood I'm in I probably can be found at any given time listening to one or another of these kinds of artists. In fact, there is only one genre of music I particularly dislike altogether, but I'd rather not name it here because I don't want to alienate a couple of my friends, who happen to dig it.
At any rate, one artist whom I especially love is Sarah McLachlan.
I have even met her, on several occasions, all of which have confirmed her to be not only a great composer / singer / musician, but also a lovely person.
The point of this blog tonight is to say that if someone were to ask me what my absolute favourite song is -- truthfully I would probably have to go with Comfortably Numb by Pink Floyd, but after that, it would be this one, called Answer.
I love everything about it, even its silences. I love the lyrics, the cellos [or whatever they are] the way she plays the piano -- and to those type of ultimate questions we ask of ourselves or are asked by others, this song seems to me to beautifully represent the essence of the ultimate... answer.

Splash du Jour: Thursday

Constellation

There were dots on her shoulder, more than this
I cannot say. In that moment I closed my eyes
and leaned into her
constellation.

Any scientist will tell you that no one has ever escaped
such a journey. Gravitational forces are too great
and at that speed you are
light.

In that moment, time itself reconsiders, and yet
cannot do anything about its current direction.
Everything you have ever wanted to do, you are
doing.

© Ciprianowords, Inc. 2009

Have a great Thursday!
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A Week At The Airport

Recently I read a terrific little book.
Alain de Botton's A Week at the Airport.
It was my seventh venture into the world of de Botton -- and as always, a wonderful, thoughtful, humorous, and rewarding time.
In this, his most recent book, the Swiss-born, London-living author is commissioned by BAA [they own London's Heathrow Airport] to spend a week as writer-in-residence. Like Tom Hanks in Terminal he is there ALL THE TIME, except in this case, the vagrant brandishes an all-expense-paid voucher for everything, including lavish meals in The Concorde Room and his sleeping quarters in the attached hotel.
Furnished with a desk in the very middle of all the action [see photo below] Alain was given free-access to everything Heathrow! In his inimitably witty and incisive way, he proceeds to illuminate all aspects of airport life, modestly sprinkling his wealth of incidental knowledge as he goes. And as you turn the pages, you are met with the brilliant accompanying photographs of Richard Baker. Oh, what a beautiful book.

I think my favourite part was when the author visits the in-house book store.
After his bracketed note that none of his own titles are on the shelves he goes on to discuss what is, in fact, there. Ironically, TERROR seems to be a predominant genre! You've got to admit, airport bookstores are indeed reaching out to a different clientele than your local antiquarian bookseller. The author strikes up a convo with store manager Manishankar:
"I explained…that I was looking for the sort of books in which a genial voice expresses emotions that the reader has long felt, but never before really understood; those that convey the secret, everyday things that society at large prefers to leave unsaid; those that make one feel somehow less alone and strange."
As I read this, I nearly spewed coffee through my nose!
Because I had to realize that these are exactly the kind of books that de Botton himself writes!
Then this: Manishankar wondered if I might like a magazine instead.
In my opinion, de Botton could be assigned the topic of "Sewer Effluent in the Middle Ages" and produce a book along those lines which would thoroughly engage the reader.
So -- just think of what he does with this airport!

It is definitely a worthwhile read! I highly recommend that you find yourself a copy of this thing, and while you're at it, pick up some other works by this author.
You will not be disappointed.
In an interview, when asked what he does all day, Alain replied “Sit at home, at the top of the house, and think about stuff."
Any reader will be thankful that de Botton does not stay up there, but climbs down from the attic…. and writes.
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Splash du Jour: Wednesday

The world of the living contains enough marvels and mysteries as it is -- marvels and mysteries acting upon our emotions and intelligence in ways so inexplicable that it would almost justify the conception of life as an enchanted state. No, I am too firm in my consciousness of the marvellous to be ever fascinated by the mere supernatural, which (take it any way you like) is but a manufactured article, the fabrication of minds insensitive to the intimate delicacies of our relation to the dead and to the living, in their countless multitudes; a desecration of our tenderest memories; an outrage on our dignity. Whatever my native modesty may be it will never condescend so low as to seek help for my imagination within those vain imaginings common to all ages and that in themselves are enough to fill all lovers of mankind with unutterable sadness.
-- Joseph Conrad --

Have a great Wednesday!
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Splash du Jour: Tuesday

Talk about leaving your toddler with the wrong bedtime story!

Have a great Tuesday, y'all!
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Splash du Jour: Monday

To be clear: an ideology is a belief system with an inadequate basis in reality; a religion is a belief system with no basis in reality whatever. Religious belief is without reason and without dignity, and its record is near-universally dreadful. It is straightforward -- and never mind, for now, about plagues and famines: if God existed, and if he cared for humankind, he would never have given us religion.
-- Martin Amis, The Second Plane --

Have a great Monday!
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"...blue of the outer air."

For reasons too lengthy to go into here, it would be fair to say that the horrific events of 9/11 were instrumental in changing [altering forever] some of my deepest felt beliefs about existence itself.
It shifted not only my worldview, but also my other-world view!
No, not shifted. --> Displaced.
Exactly ten years ago [to the minute, actually] Flight 11 slammed into the North Tower and the stunned world assumed it to be [merely] a terrible aviation disaster. But seventeen minutes later, the second plane -- ach, it's too sad to talk about.

Whenever I come across a passage in fiction that mentions the World Trade Center… I pause, and remember. This happened a while ago as I was reading Martin Amis's [1984] novel Money, and the protagonist/narrator said:
I turned, taking the sun full in the face. Up here with the high windows, Manhattan was hidden and you saw only the twin shafts of the World Trade Center, two gold lighters against the strong and pressing blue of the outer air. I shook my head. The mote in my eye, that dead spot where no light lives, wiggled its black finger at me.

Those buildings no longer stand -- and thousands are dead, largely due to a certifiably insane belief in prophetic words.
So, far be it from me to add Martin Amis to some list of….. prophets.
But the last line of that excerpt does have a coincidentally prescient nature to it.
It serves, however, along with the photo I posted above -- to remind me, and remind me profoundly -- that I do not believe in prophecy. Or prophets.
I once believed in both, and now I am ashamed of that fact.

Currently I am reading yet another book by Martin Amis. It's called The Second Plane and it's a collection of essays and short stories about the events of Sept.11, 2001. It's such a well-written, deeply sobering book.
Will that day, ten years ago, ever make sense to anyone?
No.
Mainly because what caused it never will, either.
In the Foreword to The Second Plane, Amis writes:
I was once asked: "Are you an Islamophobe?" And the answer is no. What I am is an Islamismophobe, or better say an anti-Islamist, because a phobia is an irrational fear, and it is not irrational to fear something that says it wants to kill you. The more general enemy, of course, is extremism. What has extremism ever done for anyone? Where are its gifts to humanity? Where are its works?
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Splash du Jour: Friday

Objectively good places to work rarely end up being so; in their faultlessness, quiet and well-equipped studies have a habit of rendering the fear of failure overwhelming. Original thoughts are like shy animals. We sometimes have to look the other way -- towards a busy street or terminal -- before they run out of their burrows.
-- Alain de Botton, on writing his most recent book AT the airport. --

Have a great Friday!
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Splash du Jour: Thursday

I consider books to be good for our health, and also our spirits, and they help us to become poets or scientists, to understand the stars or else to discover them deep within the aspirations of certain characters, those who sometimes, on certain evenings, escape from the pages and walk among us humans, perhaps the most human of us all.
-- Jose Saramago --

Have a great Thursday!
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Nirvana...

Theologically speaking, is it incorrect to suspect you have entered "nirvana" simply by picking up a wonderful six-pack of Moosehead beer and an awesome pizza from Angelo's down the street?
Let's see -- nirvana, by definition, is the state of being free from suffering. In Hindu philosophy, it's the union with the Supreme being through moksha. The Buddha described it as the perfect peace of the state of mind that is free from craving, anger, and other afflicting states.
Hmmm... I'm craving another slice, and another beer.
So maybe it's not quite nirvana I'm experiencing?
All I know is that as I eat and drink this stuff, I do feel as though I am communing with some sort of deity, by way of pepperoni and mozzarella.
Hey, we all have our own paths to god!
Just thought I'd drop by and let you all know that I cannot imagine a greater sense of fulfillment, no matter how many incarnations I've had to go through to be right here tonight.
With my pizza and beer.
[Cipriano, isn't Bookpuddle supposed to be about "books" at least once in a while?]
True enough, O Faithful Reader!
But now and again I do like to touch upon the topic of Serendipitous Enlightenment.
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Splash du Jour: Wednesday

Here's exactly how I feel this morning.
But noooooooo -- I have to go to work!

Have a great Wednesday!
******

Splash du Jour: Tuesday

The world today doesn't make sense, so why should I paint pictures that do?
-- Pablo Picasso --

Have a great Tuesday!
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The Friendly Squirrel

There are few things I love better than a good long weekend. And today was a beauty of a nice Sunday!
I have tomorrow off! Yayyyyy!
My day began with a severely artery clogging late breakfast at Smoke's Poutinerie followed by inordinate amounts of Starbuckian coffee and book reading. Some of you may not even know what "poutine" is, so, a word may be in order.
Poutine... umm -- it has mysterious French-Canadian origins and is a relatively new invention in the genre of Food That Will Most Likely Kill You Tomorrow.
Let's see. Basically, it's a pile of french fries drenched in gravy and cheese curds, and if you are at an up-scale poutinerie [like Smoke's] -- well, they beef it up in like a dozen or so different ways. Adding stuff to it.
A typical "grace" at Smoke's is something like, "Father forgive me, for I know not what I eat!" Then you dig in.
Te absolvo!
For the severely uninitiated, I've provided a visual --> HERE.
So after this escapade in haute cuisine, as I said, followed by gallons of coffee, I was wallowing in a sea of gastronomic guilt. Walking through the open-air Market I figured I'd offset my sins by purchasing some organically grown produce.
I bought a bag of peaches, a large onion, and some broccoli.
On my way home I stopped by my favorite little courtyard, set my bags down and resumed the reading of my book.
A few pages into chapter 57 I heard a scampering, rustling sound behind me.
A squirrel was literally hopping along the back of the bench where I sat. So I turned around, and we had a little chat...



The Friendly Squirrel persisted in nuzzling around me, and honestly, the thing was so dreadfully cute that I thought I would break off a chunk of broccoli stalk to see what he [or she?] would do with it...



It was readily apparent that this squirrel is not a vegan. I could so relate!
We had so much in common in that moment! So, realizing the onion was not an option, I reached into one of the bags and bit off a piece of organically-grown peach. The Friendly Squirrel took it straight from my fingers...



Things were getting progressively cuter by the moment. I gave The Friendly Squirrel some more... and it tied right into that, with a vigor reminiscent of how I had earlier attacked my poutine!



All in all, a wonderful day in my urban life.... filled with all the wonders of city living.
Readily available levels of cholesterol AND wildlife! What more does a guy need?
Little did I know as I set out today that it would end so serendipitously.
I made a new friend!
For further squirrel-related observations, click --> HERE.
******

Splash du Jour: Friday

We feel quite truly that our wisdom begins where that of the author ends, and we would like to have him give us answers, while all he can do is give us desires. And these desires he can arouse in us only by making us contemplate the supreme beauty which the last effort of his art has permitted him to reach. But by… a law which perhaps signifies that we can receive the truth from nobody, and that we must create it ourselves, that which is the end of their wisdom appears to us as but the beginning of ours.
-- Marcel Proust --

Have a great Friday!
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Splash du Jour: Thursday

A biography of any literary person ought to deal at length with what he read and when, for in some sense, we are what we read.
-- Joseph Epstein --

Have a great Thursday!
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Splash du Jour: Wednesday

The invention of writing, which occurred independently in distant parts of the world at many times, even occasionally in the modern era, must rank among mankind's highest intellectual achievements. Without writing, human culture as we know it today is inconceivable.
-- O. Tzeng and W. Wang --

Have a great Wednesday!
******

Splash du Jour: Tuesday

Have a great Tuesday!

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My Scar: A Reverie

There are certain things you never forget.
Like your first beer.
Your first cigarette.
The first time you had…… never mind.
Yesterday was the complete opposite of the day before. It was damn COLD out.
The day before, I was tanning with my legs up on the balcony railing. Yesterday, though, I only ventured out there a few times. And each time I wondered….. is summer really over?
Anyhoo -- at one point I heard a racket of voices down below in the park across the street. A father [presumably] was piloting a bike-riding kid along the paved pathway, and I quickly got the impression that the youngster was about to go solo.
There is a lovely clump of trees along that path, and just as father and son entered into it I heard the elder human being yell, "You're doing it, you're doing it" and a much younger voice in reply -- "I am. I'm doing it. I'm doing it."
The trees hid my view at that point, but I knew what was happening. But for those trees, I was voyeuristically witnessing history as it applied to one small, young life.
That kid was riding a bike for the first time.
I went back into my apartment before I ever saw either of them again.
But it made me recall a similar event in my own life, albeit a bit more tragic than this kid experienced.
A hundred or so years ago, my father was likewise guiding me up and down our driveway -- training wheels off for the first time ever. Then he let me go, yelling much the same thing as this father was, yesterday.
However, instead of an affirmative answer from myself, I went careening like a headless chicken into a rolled up spool of barbwire. My dad, believing at the time that he had a normal son and all, felt there was no reason I should go wobbling directly into this area of mayhem. But I did. Who could have known that his procrastination in installing that rolled up fence would involve so much bloodshed?
I gashed my leg open so bad the blood was exiting it horizontally.
I bear the scar to this day, just below my left knee.

In the summer I wear shorts at work. On my lunch break today, I took my work boots off and put on my flip flops. As I leaned down, I saw the scar, and thought of that kid yesterday.
Even though the trees hid him -- oh, how successful he sounded. So unlike me.
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Splash du Jour: Monday

Learning to read begins the first time an infant is held and read a story. How often this happens, or fails to happen, in the first five years of childhood turns out to be one of the best predictors of later reading. -- Children who have never heard a story read to them, who never hear words that rhyme, who never imagine fighting with dragons or marrying a prince, have the odds overwhelmingly against them.
-- Maryanne Wolf, Proust and the Squid --

Have a great Monday!
******

Saturday Snapshot

My cat, Jack. Always on the prowl for something!
Cheers!
-- Cip
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Splash du Jour: Friday

She would have liked to sit upon a rock and listen to words, not of any man, but detached, mysterious, poetic words that she alone would interpret through some sense inherited from sleep.
-- Patrick White, Voss --

Have a great Friday!
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Splash du Jour: Thursday

Early photo of me on a lunch break (circa 1989).

Have a great Thursday!
******

About Prayer and Stuff...

On the way to Starbucks today I saw this sign on a church lawn. I made my friend stop the car and I snapped the photo.
I thought I'd like to discuss my ideas about the thought process that might have gone into such a public advertisement.
[You have too much time on your hands, Cipriano!]
I know. I'm on vacation. So here I go…
Firstly, what I have to say is not some sort of blanket criticism of the sign. I have nothing against anyone that would drive by and think it the most profound statement they ever saw. Especially since a decade ago I would have been that person. My ideas, d'apres mon experience [as the French might put it] have definitely morphed, no doubt about that. I have nothing against faith, per se. But I do feel the urge to address some of the fridge-magnet mentality of what is being suggested here. Mostly I would pose questions.
Prayer does not change God.
Why should anyone do it, then?
Well -- because the practice of doing it will change you, we are told.
Change a person…. how?
If I asked the pastor of this church, he or she might say that it gives the person hope. It provides a sense that the situation they or someone else is facing may be altered by an intervention from on high.
Or not.
But the "or not" part is what confuses me, nowadays.
The first part of the sign's statement takes any intervening force directly off the hook. It seems that the important part of the transaction is the "hope" part. It makes me wonder if a similar effect might not be achieved by simply talking to a good friend about what one faces from day to day, vis a vis, living life. Hearing someone say, "I wish you well" or "I'll be thinking of you," etc.
Granted, such a privilege may not be afforded a person that is drowning in the Atlantic, surrounded by circling shark fins. In that situation, I too would surely call out to... something to help me. The thing is [and I know it's the glass-half-empty outlook, but] ultimately, I've come to believe that my real hope on that day would lie somewhere among only two or three real tangible scenarios:
1) How hungry those sharks are.
2) How fast can I grow gills.
3) Is there a boat passing by?

Again, I am not trying to belittle what we call "belief" or "trust" in God -- but doesn't experience sort of show us that no matter how hard we pray [or not] life is going to happen to us, regardless? Some things good, some things bad? Pretty much all the time? When it comes our time to say goodbye to it all, won't the particulars of our demise, whether peaceful or tragic, be more dependent on mitigating circumstances than on either prayer or divine intervention in response to those prayers?
Never mind death, but if we are in financial crisis -- is this the time to pray [and hope]… or is it a time to quit being stupid with your money?

So essentially, the sign on the lawn tells us we will be rewarded if we hope.
And I believe there is a measure of truth in that.
But where the sign most crucially errs is in suggesting that a) prayer has everything to do with the attainment of that hope, and b) that the change will [ipso facto] be positive or beneficial.

I would like to suggest that prayer, at best, can have a placebo effect.
Are placebos, necessarily, a bad thing? No.
But what needs to be understood is that their effectiveness is an exception to the rule. Medically speaking, placebos have been known to be a source of healing for some people because of some sort of connection between hope and health. There are cases where it is evident that through hope alone, the body itself can be cheated of its own legitimate ailments. But what if our hospitals adopted this procedure as a first [or only] course of action? It would be absurd. Placebos are nothing better than a last resort, a last ditch effort.
So what is it about the sign that bothers me?
Well, not a whole lot, really. In fact, I believe there is a lot of truth to it. For one thing, I completely believe the first part of it is truer than true. I would probably attend a church that had a sign out front that said ONLY that part.
What bothers me is the subtle nature of the negative possibilities of the second part of the sign.
Just as in medicine not all placebos are effective, neither in prayer are all hopes beneficial, in their effect. "Answers" are not only an exception to the rule, but [I maintain] they are also a manifestation of what would have happened anyway! The boost that any "answer" may have received from hope is, at best, negligible. And always questionable. Beyond this, I believe that a lot of people are actually damaged by prayer and/or the "hope" that it engenders. After faithfully living in expectation of a result that never comes, no amount of telling someone that all along it was meant to change their personality and not the circumstances, will assuage their disappointment and grief.
In the Bible, Jesus said, "Ask and it shall be given to you…" [Matt.7:7]
This sign seems to be revising that to become, "Ask, and it may possibly be considered, but most likely, not." The important thing being how much hope you've gained.
My only soapbox here is to suggest that there are other, more rational ways to live, and have hope. A god who is entitled to answer prayer[s] in several diametrically opposite ways and yet retain ascribed attributes of omnipotence and omniscience, is to me, at the very least -- self-negating.
Saying God "did" something is not very different from retrospectively saying "What happened happened."

Below is an image taken from my balcony this morning. If you click on it, you will see it in all its glory. It was a gorgeous sunrise.
It strikes me that there was a time when an entire civilization worshipped that glow to the east, as god. That very sun. The same one, even. Think about that. An exploding ball of hydrogen and helium. They addressed all of their hopes to it, in prayer.
Did "it" answer their prayers? I'm thinking not.
It certainly didn't do much for King Tut who died as a teenager, either murdered by a blow to the head or poisoned -- the jury is still out on that one, but it is pretty much affirmed that his death was accidental.
Just makes me wonder is all.
Out front of some pyramid, I envision a big sign in the sand...
Prayer does not change The Sun but it changes the one who prays.














To further investigate this issue, click --> HERE.
Cheers!
-- Cip
******

Splash du Jour: Wednesday

The greatest of faults, I should say, is to be conscious of none.

-- Thomas Carlyle --

Have a great Wednesday!
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Splash du Jour: Tuesday

What we, or at any rate what I, refer to confidently as memory -- meaning a moment, a scene, a fact that has been subjected to a fixative and thereby rescued from oblivion -- is really a form of storytelling that goes on continually in the mind and often changes with the telling. Too many conflicting emotional interests are involved for life ever to be wholly acceptable, and possibly it is the work of the storyteller to rearrange things so that they conform to this end. In any case, in talking about the past we lie with every breath we take.
-- William Maxwell --

Have a great Tuesday!
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Vacation: Day 1

Well, the first day of my second vacation of the year is going swimmingly.
Not that I've done any swimming -- but I mean, smoothly, satisfactorily.
What have I done?
NOTHING!
Just as planned!
My friend is visiting me for the next few days and so today the extent of our accomplishments was to walk down to the open air Market and buy some fresh produce, which we've already cooked and eaten.
Next, a lot of sitting around, chilling out on the balcony.
Click on the above image for an enlarged view of where I live.
Why would I go elsewhere for a vacation? It's beautiful HERE!

And, on a sad note -- this morning Jack Layton passed away after a prolonged battle with cancer. This is why the flag is at half-mast on Parliament Hill. This photo was taken again, from my balcony.
For those who may not know, Jack Layton was leader of the Opposition in Parliament. I myself am not a Laytonite, per se, but still, I was so impressed with the almost unheard-of and unprecedented [and definitely unpredicted] strides that he made in the spring 2011 Federal Election. He took The New Democratic Party to new heights in that election. Regardless of how one feels about the ideas and policies of Jack Layton, I think that his voice will be sadly missed in Canadian politics.
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Splash du Jour: Monday

It doesn't matter how beautiful the guess is, or how smart the guesser is, or how famous the guesser is; if the experiment disagrees with the guess, then the guess is wrong. That's all there is to it.
-- physicist Richard Feynman --

Have a great Monday!
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Where Has He Been?

Dear Friends, please forgive me for not blogging much lately. I would not blame any of you for not even reading this current blog here, I am so inconsistent. And not only this, but I don't visit your own blogs nearly as much as I want to.
Thing is, the emergency lobotomy I received a while ago -- it didn't go as well as predicted.
Doctor says I should be ship-shape soon, though.
Amazingly, during my convalescence I have been doing some reading -- through the gauze over my eyes, as it were.

Falling Man, by Don DeLillo. What a fabulous book, maybe the best thing I have read this year. A story of how the events of September 11th, 2001 affect the lives of several New York residents. Five puddles©.
Going After Cacciato, by Tim O'Brien. A squad of American soldiers in Vietnam -- and how they end up in Paris. Or not. An artfully constructed narrative that at times lost me due to its dual possibilities -- as in, I found it difficult to differentiate between the use of realism and hallucination. [Confusion may have been caused by my recent brain operation though…]. Three puddles©.
Eclipse, by John Banville. My first reading of Banville, but not my last. A compelling first-person narrative about a washed-up actor returning to his childhood home to try and find himself. He learns a lot from the current inhabitants, some of them ghosts, others, still very much alive. Five puddles©.
Currently I am reading a wonderful book called Loving Frank, by Nancy Horan.
I have always had an interest in Frank Lloyd Wright, the famous American architect. This is a fictionalized account of his love affair with Mamah Borthwick Cheney and it is wonderfully written. Truly engaging. I'm dying to get back to it, even now. For a long while I have wanted to make a trip out to the remote wilds of Bear Run, Pennsylvania for a tour of one of Wright's most well-known buildings, the house known as Fallingwater.
Happy reading to y'all!
I'm on vacation again….. starting right now…. Yayyyyyyy!
[Oww! I shouldn't yell like that…. not until I'm fully healed….]


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Splash du Jour: Friday

I had jumped off the edge, and then, at the very last moment, something reached out and caught me in midair. That something is what I define as love. It is the one thing that can stop a man from falling, powerful enough to negate the laws of gravity.
-- Paul Auster, Moon Palace --
Have a great Friday!
******

Splash du Jour: Thursday

Have a great Thursday!
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Splash du Jour: Wednesday

Happiness was different in childhood. It was so much more than a matter simply of accumulation, of taking things - new experiences, new emotions - and applying them like so many polished tiles to what would someday be the marvellously finished pavilion of the self.
-- John Banville, The Sea --


Have a great Wednesday!
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Splash du Jour: Tuesday

Reading was my escape and my comfort, my consolation, my stimulant of choice: reading for the pure pleasure of it, for the beautiful stillness that surrounds you when you hear an author's words reverberating in your head.
-- Paul Auster, The Brooklyn Follies --

Have a great Tuesday!
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Splash du Jour: Monday

There are some themes, some subjects, too large for adult fiction; they can only be dealt with adequately in a children's book.
-- Philip Pullman --

Have a great Monday!
******

Rascal Sleepin'

This is my niece's cat Rascal... in full window repose.

Ahhh, just looking at him makes me want to lie down on the couch!
Happy weekend to y'all!
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Splash du Jour: Friday

Have a great Friday!

******

The Silent "K"

When I arrived at work this morning there was a note on the door saying I had just missed a delivery from a courier company. I work all alone at a satellite building [no, we don't make things that go into outer space] but what I mean is, my warehouse is one of several in our company. So I called my supervisor at headquarters on the radio to advise him of the circumstances and he said he'd call to reschedule the delivery of the items. But he needed the reference number on the ticket. It was a long number and began with a few letters. I proceeded to rifle them off but he was like "Wait. Wait. Give me the letters slowly."
I figured I'd give him corresponding words to make sure we got it right over the radio, and was soon to find out how retarded I am when it comes to all that Alpha-Bravo-Charlie stuff.
Because, the very first letter was an "N" and I said, "N, as in…. knuckle!"
We both realized the state of my IQ at the same time and started laughing… I was so discombobulated that I could not do it for any of the other letters.
I just said them v-e-r-y s-l-o-w-l-y.
Only now, as I sit here having coffee and doing some research do I find out that the official Phonetically-Approved representative word I should have used is, of course... Knovember.
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Splash du Jour: Thursday

Life is oblivion erupting, for a brief moment, into non-oblivion in order so that oblivion may proclaim: 'I am.' The assumption being, of course, that living things are aware enough to make such a proclamation. Let us suppose that they are. Let us suppose that they are, to a degree, self-aware. This makes for the possibility of life recognizing itself, yes, but not as oblivion, only as life. In order for life to recognize itself as a fleeting pulse of oblivion, self-awareness must be refined into pure awareness, which is observation unimpaired by either ego or preconceptions.
-- Barbara Gowdy, The Romantic --

Have a great Thursday!
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Splash du Jour: Wednesday

A good piece of fiction, in my view, does not offer solutions. Good stories deal with our moral struggles, our uncertainties, our dreams, our blunders, our contradictions, our endless quest for understanding. Good stories do not resolve the mysteries of the human spirit but rather describe and expand upon those mysteries.
-- Tim O'Brien --

Have a great Wednesday!
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Splash du Jour: Tuesday

How strange it is. We have these deep terrible lingering fears about ourselves and the people we love. Yet we walk around, talk to people, eat and drink. We manage to function. The feelings are deep and real. Shouldn't they paralyze us? How is it we can survive them, at least for a little while? We drive a car, we teach a class. How is it no one sees how deeply afraid we were, last night, this morning? Is it something we all hide from each other, by mutual consent? Or do we share the same secret without knowing it? Wear the same disguise?
-- Don DeLillo --

Have a great Tuesday!
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Splash du Jour: Monday

The weird thing is, I HAVE had dreams like this!
Have a great Monday!
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Splash du Jour: Friday

Wildflower

Nowadays, no walking is needed.
Plastic numbers will send tame ones
Around the globe at a click. Try it.
Think of someone in need, first.

Potted, wrapped, still dripping with dew.
Carded and be-ribboned, only idiots
And madmen sidestep such efficiency
Or walk somewhere.

I thought all of this before yesterday,
When… on a hillside I knelt as though
The world were a cathedral. And knew
That I can only enjoy this, by staying.

-- © Ciprianowords, Inc. 2008 --

Have a great Friday!
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Splash du Jour: Thursday

We are all imprisoned by the dictionary. We choose out of that vast, paper-walled prison our convicts, the little black printed words, when in truth we need fresh sounds to utter, new enfranchised noises which would produce a new effect.
-- Mervyn Peake, The Gormenghast Trilogy, Book#1 --

Have a great Thursday!
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Splash du Jour: Wednesday

Have a great Wednesday!
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Splash du Jour: Tuesday

To be truthful, some writers stop you dead in your tracks by making you see your own work in the most unflattering light. Each of us will meet a different harbinger of personal failure, some innocent genius chosen by us for reasons having to do with what we see as our own inadequacies. The only remedy to this I have found is to read a writer whose work is entirely different from another, though not necessarily more like your own—a difference that will remind you of how many rooms there are in the house of art.
-- Francine Prose, Reading Like a Writer --

Have a great Tuesday!
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What I've Been Up To...

Well friends, my holiday is over. It was a wonderful two weeks of fun and frivolity on the west coast of this awesome country of mine. Tomorrow begins a stint back at the ol' salt mines! However, in three weeks or so I have another week off, so….. all is not lost, regarding this summer.
As you can see in the above moment-in-time, I read even when I am floating around on the Pacific Ocean. That's me in the final stages of a terrific book, The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver.

I thoroughly enjoyed it, to the extent that it makes me interested in other books by this author. This one follows the adventures of an American missionary family as they find themselves in the Belgian Congo, [early '60's] trying to foist the Word of God on the people there. To put it mildly -- things do not exactly go favourably for their evangelistic efforts. Kingsolver tells the story in such a unique style, each chapter alternating between five narrators, [the mother and the four daughters]. Interestingly enough, the main reason they are all in Africa in the first place [the father, who is divinely "called" to be there] is not allowed a stint as narrator. According to the account of the rest of his family, he is one of the most mule-headed religionists I have ever heard of, in fiction or in real life. It is agonizing to read of his stubbornness. It is impossible to summarize such an epic, sweeping story -- but I'll let the words of two of the daughters approach a summation:
You can't just sashay into the jungle aiming to change it all over to the Christian style, without expecting the jungle to change you right back.
-- Rachel
There is not justice in this world. Father, forgive me wherever you are, but this world has brought one vile abomination after another down on the heads of the gentle, and I'll not live to see the meek inherit anything. What there is in this world. I think, is a tendency for human errors to level themselves like water throughout their sphere of influence. That's pretty much the whole of what I can say, looking back.
-- Leah
This is a book I would highly recommend to my Bookpuddle friends.

It is a rare thing for me to give up on a book, but I did so with the book that I picked up after the Kingsolver one. I actually regretted taking it along with me on my midnight flight home -- because I found that no matter how hard I tried, I just could not get into it.
And I had nothing else with me!
What Maisie Knew, by Henry James.
Rarely has a book resonated with me less than this one. It's right up there now in my list of Books That Blew©… alongside things like The Tin Drum by Gunter Grass, and similar ilk.
It's supposed to be the story of a young girl that is tossed about by conflicting parties in a really convoluted divorce case. I found that my devotion of a hundred pages of reading was very unrewarded. I had to put the book down and admit defeat. There was a profusion of characters that lost me.
I'm not a stranger to older novels [this one being published prior to the year 1900] but James kept using terminology that eluded me… things like the repeated use of "my companion" when I found it difficult to know who in the world he was referring to… and I mean, I recently read Thomas Hardy's The Trumpet-Major [published a decade or so before this book] and I found it excellent. So……….. not a keeper, this one.
Currently I am immersed in an outrageously good book by Francine Prose, called Goldengrove.
Don't you just love it when you stumble onto a book that draws you in?
I just wish I had taken this piece of "prose" with me on my airplane ride.
So, this is what I have been up to, lately.
Holidaying.
Reading.
Being severely lazy.
I hope I have not lost too many of my dear devoted readers by my absence from Bookpuddle blogging.
My wish for those of you who still check in here from time to time is that you enjoy the rest of this summer, reading, reading, and…. reading!
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