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Time. To. Slow. Down.

Yesterday I woke up and would have sworn that every cell in my body ached. If I could have stayed in bed I would have, but my mind was already swirling with anxieties, my usually somewhat hidden insecurities jabbing away at my tender flesh.

I would have told you that I had done nothing to warrant this bodily revolt, but I knew that I would simply have been deceiving myself. The truth is I had been exhausted on Sunday, so exhausted I could barely stand and had to leave a reception early before I collapsed. Even then, I only allowed myself 2 hours before pushing myself further, pushing myself until I had to stop, and starting up again the moment I had the slightest charge in my energy stores.

It seems I am the queen of unrealistic self-expectation. For some reason this second round of unpacking has been harder than the first. Then, I was so happy just to be here that I gave myself space. Now, I've been here a month, and I inadvertently let my evil doppelganger out of her box, the little voice that says "why aren't you all unpacked yet?", "why haven't you weeded all the flower beds", "why haven't you trimmed the shrubbery", "why haven't", "why haven't", "why haven't….." The problem with that voice is that it looks for all the failures, and refuses to see all the successes. I know perfectly well that there is no rush. No one expects more, or cares, and even if they did, it would be their problem, not mine. But I've spent nearly 60 years letting that voice butt-in and have her way. Perhaps it is time to stop.

Yesterday, really for the first time since moving in, I sat down and wrote my morning pages. I wrote again this morning. I had to give myself permission to write first, rather than unpack, work in the garden, or take my walk. If I do all those things first, I will never write, and if I never write out my thoughts, I let my guard down. If I lose touch with my thoughts I let those little worms of insecurity rise up to the surface where they have no business living. In retrospect it seems I do this every summer, try to cram everything into the early morning, and then end up struggling all the more. But this summer the stress of the move, even of a good move to a place that feels so strongly my place, has amped up my tendency toward self-criticism.

In a couple of weeks I'll be embarking upon my 60th year on this earth. This is not something I want to carry into my 60s. It is time to let the things I think and say and believe, the words I tell everyone else, sink into the deepest darkest recesses of my own heart. It is time to hammer the last nail into that coffin and seal up that little voice the screams "not good enough" once and for all. I don't have to have a perfect house, or a perfect garden, if I am tired and forget to run the dishwasher the world will not end. I am allowed to fail, to be tired, to be wrong, to make mistakes

I am still tired today. But I will not push myself. The new bookshelves arrived, but if I don't have energy to carry them up the stairs today, so be it. There will always be another day. And if there is not another day, if today is the last day, bookshelves will be the least of it.

Yesterday, I wrote my morning pages, and I let Tikka drag me out for a walk. It was a longer walk than I felt like taking, but I felt better for it. Afterward, as I stood in the shower, I was struck by the combination of color shown above. Such a simple thing, a bathroom wall, a door, a towel, fog on the shower door. But it changed my perspective. I thought how lovely it was. I didn't pick the wall color, it was here before me. The towel may not really match, but I didn't think about that, didn't berate myself because I still haven't gone out and purchased a towel bar on which to hang the towel. Instead I thought how lovely it looked draped over the door, how happy that momentary observation made me.

And I rested. Later, I realized that the colors in my bathroom are the colors in my new glasses. As I sit here right now I see the same colors in the walls of my office, in the shadow of light passing through a sheet of glass and a watercolor on vellum, in the colors of the clouds on this rainy morning. These are the moments that count, not the stories we tell ourselves so that we feel more successful, or accomplished, or whatever. We are already accomplished; we are already perfect. Perhaps that is another myth we tell ourselves when we think we are striving for perfection. What if it is our striving that actually makes us imperfect? What if we only see our perfect selves in those quiet moments when we touch someone else's hand, when we watch the bird in the tree, when we listen with our hearts and our minds, when we just allow ourselves to be?

June 22, 2017
In the Garden

I thought I would share a few photos from my garden:

I feel incredibly fortunate to have found a house I love surrounded by a garden filled with the kinds of plants I love. Most of this garden has nothing to do with my efforts.

The West side of the house in the early morning, when the hydrangeas still shine and the daylilies have not yet awoken. In the afternoon the daylilies dominate and the hydrangeas slip into the background.

I have started working in the garden, mostly in the early morning and evening, when the heat does not offend my sensibilities, or trigger my tendencies to get headaches. Most of my efforts fall into the category of scut work: weeding, pruning, deadheading. It can be enjoyable in its own slow meditative way, but perhaps only in the small doses I allow myself. The garden will be here, and I will catch up.

The ferns I had originally planted next to the front door were moved; they needed more sun. I was aware of this when I planted them but hoped for the best anyway. They are happier now.

When I planted the small towers next to the ferns I was initially disappointed. I figured I would be replacing the plants within days, but they have settled in nicely. Perhaps it is all too much greenery, and flowers would have been better, but it is late June already, and it is possible that there is some disconnect between what is currently available in nurseries and what I am willing to plant. The hedges need pruning as well, which requires another trip to the store for the requisite tool. I've lived all this time and never needed to trim a hedge.

There is always something new to be discovered, one might as well take time to enjoy the process.

June 17, 2017
Quick Post on Thursday Morning

There was a lull in the unpacking. I was behind on several fronts and my outside life intervened, demanding that I pay attention to obligations too long abandoned.

Then, Tuesday, I experienced another fit of profound unsettledness and the shifting and opening of boxes, with the attendant piles of paper and general chaos resumed. Although it was really only a brief side-line from the main activity center, the last three boxes were unpacked on the morning room, and I was able to bring in a small table and the two extra dining chairs that don't fit around my table without the leaves. The two chairs are actually too big for the small outdoor table that currently resides in that space, but I have the table, and as the major kitchen appliances have issues and a kitchen remodel is vaguely scheduled for the next year or so, it works for now.

In fact, aside from inability to deal with unpacked things, I am rather amazed at my ability to be patient with what is not done. In the old house, "not right" was a burden, here it is just a meh. The difference seems to be that this house simply feels like home to me and the old house didn't, although it took me a long time to articulate that feeling. This house is my sanctuary and home, even unpacked and unsettled.

But back to unpacking…

My main push on Tuesday was to find the printer and start getting the office together. I'd been struggling with shelving issues in my office, (the Billy bookcases were a failure) trying to balance my need for bookshelves on a budget now with my dream of a future library. I eventually realized the two commercial kitchen-style steel wire shelving units sitting unused in the garage would fit in my office space. Even if they are too deep, at 18 inches, I already own them, and hence no additional cost is incurred. Then I realized I had another, 14" deep unit in the basement that would work upstairs, and so the unpacking of the office began.

I got the smaller unit upstairs and assembled on Tuesday, and got my printer, tv, and some books in place. The plan was to spend the rest of the week disassembling the garage units and reassembling them upstairs, but I had a couple of the contractors here for another task and they helped, working far faster and more efficiently than I could have. They even carried my desk upstairs. Much as the sunroom was lovely, it was unpractical in the late afternoon and evening, as there was too much glare on my screen. The room is great for reading, and needlework, and chatting with friends, but no so much as an office.

So most of Wednesday was spent shifting boxes of books, unpacking, sorting and shelving. I will have to buy at least two more units, and for those I will buy the 14 inch shelves, which will be worthwhile even if, at some point, should my dreams of a library become reality, they need to be replaced with wider 18" utility shelves when they move back to the basement or garage.

In the meantime there is more unpacking ahead. My plan was that I would have philosophy, religion, classics, and literature, along with a few other small categories in my office. History, biography, and science have been relegated to the basement to wait for that dream library. At the moment it appears that I may have extra space on the shelves, although it is too early to determine how much extra space, or which books will be allowed to migrate up into the land of light.

June 15, 2017
A Perfect Start to the Morning

Somehow, in the midst of unpacking, and rearranging a few cabinets in my kitchen and pantry so that they were more efficient to work with, I got distracted and obsessed.

As a result, the house is filled was filled with the aroma of freshly baked bread this morning.

I hadn't really planned on baking. I hadn't baked for quite some time, but there is something about the new house that makes me want to play. Or maybe I just wanted to avoid the annoying problem of what I'm going to do with my books between now and the time that custom bookcases can be made. It is proving to be a more complex problem than I had originally anticipated.

And so it came to pass, that when I was looking up Béatrice Peltre's recipe for radish greens soup, I got distracted by the recipe for quinoa and oat bread rolls. I ended up spending too much time searching for the ingredients for the rolls, but now think the results were worth the effort. Of course it would all have been easier if I had basic gluten-free baking supplies in my pantry, or I had given myself more time for planning. But I wanted to make bread, and I didn't really want to wait, by which point the inspiration would surely have fled.

I enjoyed the first roll with my breakfast, sitting outside on the deck, enjoying the cool morning air, a cup of coffee, and a tender crisp warm roll with my eggs. A perfect moment. The roll lived up to all my expectations, crisp outer crust, tender interior filled with air pockets, wonderfully complex bread flavor, and gluten- and dairy-free to boot. I'm taking the rest of the rolls to a luncheon today, but I will surely be making them again.

June 8, 2017
Accounting for Books

In my imagination, May, especially early in the month, during that transitional period before moving into the new house, was going to be a period filled with open expanses of time: time for engaging with books, for reading and writing, for sharing those things that moved me in one direction or another. Alas it was not to be. There was a necessary period of post-packing naps, but otherwise my time was often too full with obligation, and although there were moments of blessed solitude, freedom of time seemed illusory, always hoped for but just slightly beyond reach.

It is not that there was no time for reading, plenty of reading occurred in the first half of the month, but there was no time for reflection, and as the month went on, that reading became more insubstantial and less likely to induce frustration at my inability to write out or talk out my thoughts on what I was reading.

Haruki Murakami's Men Without Women arrived just as packing was winding down, and I was so eager to get started I plunged in at the first opportunity after closing on the old house. I was not disappointed, although I did struggle with the first story and wondered if this would be the first Murakami I did not love. But each subsequent story drew me in, and although each story was separate and completely different from its predecessors, the progression of the stories seemed to build layers of insight, creating something that was simultaneously disconnected and unified. As usual, the characters and stories were complex, quirky, and profound and I wished I had spent more time and thought with the book, wished I had been able to explore my reactions more fully. I may well be reading it again soon.

I also wish I had been able to explore the multiple levels of interconnectedness, lies, and self-delusion in Domenico Starnone's Ties, a novel that is raw, often painful, but also insightful on many levels. It is not the easiest read, primarily due to the rampant emotions, deceit, and the slow dissolution of the walls the characters have built around themselves and between themselves as the family unravels. The book begins and ends in fury and it could be easy to read on that level alone, taking sides and blaming, but there is much more to this book. The beginning reminds me of Elena Ferrante's Days of Abandonment, but Vanda remains trapped in her fury, and this book is far more complicated, examining the story from the perspectives of all the family members, weaving a complex fabric of the many ways we layer and entwine ourselves without really understanding the consequences.   I was so upset after reading it I thought I would never want to go back to it, but now wonder if perhaps I have left it unfinished, and need to return and wrest with my thoughts more deeply.

Partly due to this frustration over being able to work out my reactions to the above books, in my head and on paper, my further reading leaned more toward works suited to my transitional mind-set, insubstantial reading which was entertaining and often captivating, but which did not leave me yearning for my pen. Memoirs and personal reflections figured highly, including Betty Halbreich's I'll Drink to That, which I found charming and, at times, touching. Yes, the book is about clothes and style and the women who buy clothes, but really that was only a small part. It was the perfect book for those first days after moving out of my old house, light but not completely insubstantial. I followed this with Stephen King's On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, which is more a memoir than a book about how to write. King is nothing if not a good storyteller, and the story of his life and how he came to be the writer he has become is entertaining and fascinating.

Then I read An Economist Gets Lunch by Tyler Cowen, which I suppose is technically not a memoir, but then I'm not really sure what it is. It is not a book about food, and yet it doesn't escape food, or Cowen's personal experiences with food, although it is not so much about preparing food. It is also a book about economics, but economics mixed with personal annectdotes, and food history, and politics and a little mishmash of this an that. The title actually describes the book well. It is a book about an economist who gets lunch, and the explorations, mental and physical that arise from two simple precepts: that one must get lunch, and that the author makes his living by thinking about things, The book is an exploration that arises from those two principles. I personally loved it, economics, history, idiosyncracies, and all, but I recognize that it is most definitely not a book for everyone and many will find it boring, tedious, and/or unfocused.

The last memoir, read just before I moved in to my hew house was Susan Hermann Loomis's On Rue Tatin, the story of finding and renovating her family's home in France, with recipes. I have enjoyed Loomis's cookbooks, and I enjoyed the story of finding her crumbling old house and making it her own. It made me yearn for my own house, which is not as old, probably not as charming, and in far better shape. In the end though, I am a person who likes stories, and I connected with this book. Loomis is very good at describing the tastes and smells of France, of exploring the sights, the interactions, the rubbing together of cultures and expectations. It was a lovely, and yes, escapist, read; a story revolving around people, time, place and the bonds that are formed.

The two more significant books that I read during this period, Tyler Cowen's The Complacent Class and Lior Lev Sercarz's The Spice Companion, will influence my thoughts for some time to come. I don't always agree with Tyler Cowen's analyes, and I don't have to agree with an author to love a book, but he has made me think, and reconsider some closely held shiboleths. The resulting insights will continue to influence my thoughts and my choices and I think the book is well worth reading.    The Spice Companion is not so much a book to cook from, although the author does offer menus for spice blends and ideas on how to use spices, but an inspiring look at spice and flavor and the way flavors work together, or against each other.  Reading the book has already had an impact on the way I cook and think about cooking even though I haven't picked it up since moving into the house and filing it on the shelf.



On a lighter note, I listened to Michael Connelly's The Lincoln Lawyer while I took my morning walks during my period of transition and, as always I enjoyed it immensely. I have not read the series in order, but that really hasn't hurt my enjoyment of the books at all. I also found Ilia Delio's Care for the Earth: A Franciscan Spirituality of the Earth to be very light reading, although I believe my EFM classmates found it more inspiring and more difficult than I did.   I would say it was clearly written, and my main objection to it was that it mostly consisted of stringing together ideas from other books, books I had already read and found more insightful. I suppose then that, in my case, the author was preaching to the choir, but it is probably a good introduction to the idea that caring for the earth is both a moral and a spiritual or religious responsibility and in helping the reader articulate a theological response to environmentalism.

I'm hoping to be more focused in June, but it may be simply wishful thinking. Either I'll pull myself together or I'll abandon book posts all together.

June 3, 2017
Three Things Thursday

A minor set back or two this morning, and I need a tiny break, a few deep breaths. No boxes will be unpacked today.

1. This is the view from my desk, where I am perching on the edge of the chair, a chair I am sharing with Moisés, who is still adapting to the fact that his world has been completely transformed while he was away. I am perching on the end, because if I scoot further back, said cat will bite my backside. I'll dump him out later, but for now, I am willing to concede a little space.

It is a nice, hidden place to be this morning, even though this is not the permanent location of my desk. But it is a good temporary space, and a good place for settling in. I can see glimmers of cars, of people walking or running by, but I remain hidden. This sun room is a room I will spend much time in. My needlework chair is already here, and there will be a sofa, and hopefully many hours creatively spent with either thread or a good book.

2. Homemade breakfast in my own dining room.

Sometimes things just come together in the most wonderful ways. A couple of eggs and a slice of ham were joined by a tablespoon of gremolata (sans anchovy), a third of an avocado, and a couple of slivered peppadew peppers, all remnants from the previous evening's dinner party,combined to make a delicious breakfast. The added seasoning was the memories of fellowship evoked by those bright and cheerful flavors.

3. Late afternoon light looking in to the sewing room. Yet unpacked but full of promise.

June 1, 2017
One Week Later

One week since move in day. I'm still in my new house (no surprise) and I'm even more in love with the place although I am also far more familiar with its peccadillos. Well, we all have peccadillos. I have mine, as I enter my 60th year on this planet, and this house, which is 90 this year, has its as well. Let us celebrate peccadillos. Much as we may like shiny new things, it is our eccentricities which make us what we are.

Move in day went swimmingly. All the boxes were color-coded, although the furniture was not. This was a good thing, as I am still trying to get the tape residue off a chrome table that the movers stuck tape on when I moved here from New York 5 years ago. At the same time, some things ended up not where I originally intended. This too is good and bad.   As to the color coded chart, (and yes, every box had matching color coded tape), I own up to being a nerd, an organized nerd who likes color. Ignore the "Thanksgivings/Petitions", I borrowed the white board from the church. At the same time, both thanksgivings and petitions are oddly pertinent to the process of moving, so perhaps it was a serendipitous choice after all.

I am not unpacked; I am however partially unpacked. The living room and dining room are more or less set, furniture wise, although there are boxes of decorative "objects" (pretend to affect a snooty French pronunciation here) still to be unpacked. The master bedroom is more set, in that both large and small items are in place, but within the drawers anarchy may be brewing.

The kitchen is more than half unpacked, but has also been re-arranged twice. I am about to embark on the third rearrangement of the kitchen. Whether this is necessary, or it is a way to avoid scrubbing the stove and oven (which is desperately in need of scrubbing) is yet to be determined. I am having friends for dinner tonight, and whether I cook on a newly cleaned stove, bite my lips and cook anyway, or order out, is yet to be revealed.

There have been joys and frustrations and an untold number of trips to Home Depot and Bed Bath and Beyond. Among the joys is my evolving spice rack. A friend sent a house-warming gift consisting of a set of 5 spice blends and a copy of The Spice Companion from La Boite NY. As it happened the box of spices and their nifty little magnetic boxes arrived just as I was wondering what to do about spice storage. In the previous house the spices were in a shallow drawer, which was not my favorite choice as I tend to like spices in easy sight. In this house I have fewer drawers, but one empty piece of wall.  I went in for a long-overdue haircut shortly after the spice collection arrived and saw these photos of downtown Knoxville. An idea was born.

The lower photo will move up and the spice modules will continue to grow around the photos.  I ordered empty spice sets from Food 52, which I filled with the remnants of my intentionally dwindling spice collection, and the collection will continue to grow as needed, eventually occupying much of this wall. Apparently I like spice and color. Also apparent is that I am inclined to spend too much time fretting about the details and not enough time getting the boxes opened.   It will all happen in its own good time, and I shall continue to putter, more so than in my last move, as there is no one hurrying me along.

(A view of dining room joy. the tiny square hanging in the window may prove to be the new curtain fabric, not that you can tell anything in this photo.)

Admittedly there have also been moments when I have wondered what the heck I am doing and if I am even cut out for this. Friday I returned home tired and hungry after running around, fulfilling goodness knows what errands. It was late, around about 8 PM. I had just come from Home Depot and I wanted dinner. I knew I had some nice ground lamb in the fridge, and an eggplant, and I wanted nothing more than to grill a lamb burger and make some kind of spicy eggplant puree to accompany said burger. It seemed so easy.

Then I realized that the grill was on the deck, conveniently positioned next to the gas outlet, but was not connected. Why had I not noticed that? I couldn't get the cap off the gas line in order to hook up the grill. It appeared to be rusted in place. In my limited experience with gas lines (we did not have one in NY) the connections had plastic caps, but not this one. As I mentioned it was late and I was tired and hungry. I didn't feel like rustling through the box of tools George left me, and which I have still managed to avoid organizing. I wasn't sure I even had the right kind of wrench, and I definitely did not want to go back to Home Depot. I ended up making a lamb and eggplant saute, which was perfectly good although not what I wanted. Worst of all, tired and frustrated as I was, I simply doubted myself and the wisdom of my choices. How could I manage a house if I couldn't even connect a grill to the gas line?

As it happens the grill is still not connected. I either: 1) Don't have the right kind of wrenches to do the job (possible); 2) Don't know what I am doing (more than likely); 3) Have the right idea but don't have the strength to move the rusted cover (also a strong possibility), 4) Am fully capable and have the right tools but am afraid of the gas line (you have that right); or 5) Am generally in over my head. I'm opting for the latter, but I still have resources. I can work a drill or a table saw, even though I may prefer not to, but I really don't want to figure out the gas connection. Luckily I can afford to call for help.

Of course that means that if I can't count on using the grill, I have to clean the stove.

May 30, 2017
Counting Down

Yesterday Tikka and I drove down to Atlanta and back. We went to Ikea for some Billy bookcases, and since move-in day isn't until Monday I thought I could at least get one or two bookcases assembled in advance. I will need more, but they can be delivered at a later date. This week both the drive to Atlanta (slightly over 3 hours each way) and putting together the bookcases are necessary distractions.

I'm in need of distractions right now. I'm tired of going to an empty house. I love seeing each new improvement, watching it evolve, but I'm also frustrated that all I have been able to do is sit and watch. I need to put something together, to feel the sense of accomplishment of doing something, even something small like putting together a bookcase.

I knew that this week would be the hardest week: the third week between houses, the week after my two short trips, to Chicago and Dallas, the week before move-in. I don't think I'd really realized that I'd be quite as much at loose ends, quite as emotional, quite as ready to just crawl in bed and pull the covers over my head hoping that I'd wake up and find myself all moved in. It's not that I have nothing to do, just that I'm just having trouble pulling myself together enough to focus. I struggle with decisions. I want to burst into tears. They aren't necessarily tears of sadness, and they certainly aren't tears of joy either, although I can't say that I am that far from either one of those emotions. Perhaps it is all just anticipation and frustration and a feeling of being unmoored. Two weeks was a vacation, now in the third week I just want to be home.

The work is winding down at the house, or is the term finishing up? The contractors will be done tomorrow, except for a few things that haven't arrived yet, but for the most part they are small things. Life and work can go on without them. The washer and dryer were probably installed in the new laundry room yesterday while I was driving. The countertop might arrive tomorrow, or it might arrive next week. I don't have confirmation on that yet, but I'll manage either way.

Today I have to get those Billy bookcases out of my car and upstairs. Then I can start assembly. The rugs also come home today. Once the rugs are in perhaps I can set up the loom, perhaps I'll find other small tasks to keep me occupied. Monday can't come soon enough.

May 18, 2017
Two Concerts in Chicago

The weekend before last I was in Chicago. That first day, the day I arrived 2 1/2 hours later than planned due to flight delays, the day I missed an appointment, the day after I had closed on the old house and was still exhausted from moving out, I went to two concerts. In fact I was running so late that I almost didn't make the first concert, and I was so tired I wondered if there was any sense in it, but I had bought the ticket, and it wasn't cheap, so I went.

I was glad I did.

Friday afternoon I attended the Chicago Symphony. Ricardo Muti was conducting the Brahms symphonies, and I was in town for the first two. I perhaps feared a stodgy performance of Brahms, a gentle dusting off of the standard repertoire, and I feared that I would doze off. My fears were unfounded. The first symphony opened with a strong sense of controlled drama. I felt the second movement could have strayed a little further into lyrical territory, but that may be due to my own emotional yearnings more than any understanding of Brahms. The rest of the piece came together beautifully with a thunderous and convincing release of restrained turbulence in the finale, like a distant thunderstorm approaching only to be cast aside just before its climactic arrival with a sudden break in the clouds and the arrival of a sudden burst of sunshine in the form of a horn solo.

The second symphony was also incredible, with an almost a pastoral undercurrent in the opening movement. That Brahmsian restraint was still present, but it felt more lightly held here. Again the second movement did not quite live up to my expectations. It is, to my mind, a slow, ruminative work, deeply imbued with melancholy, yet never quite surrendering. In this performance the movement felt rushed, as if the conductor had no time for meditative melancholy, or as if going to slowly would flirt too closely with a loss of control, I'm not sure which. There was a palpable sense of "hurry up" present in the performance which did not serve the work well. I felt the conductor and the musicians, the music itself, felt at odds. Yet all came together again in the allegretto, as if Muti's instincts and the music were more at peace, and the orchestra pulled off that balance between emotional release and intellectual control that marks Brahms's works, that flirtation with the pastoral without ever quite giving in.

In the evening I was back at Symphony Hall for a jazz concert. I found this concert more difficult. I wanted to go, and I enjoyed the concert overall, but there were times when I was also confused and even bored. It brought to the forefront my struggles with Jazz; the way my expectations and my enjoyment don't always align, as if there is something I just don't understand, some frame of reference I am missing. Every time I am bored with a concert, I think perhaps jazz is not my thing, but then, just as I am ready to say "never again", I am captivated by something new. I wonder this is simply because I have not listened enough, or if it is something deeper. Basically, the jazz concert reminded me that I really haven't quite figured out what I like or even why I like what I like.

The first part of the concert featured Regina Carter playing music honoring the late Ella Fitzgerald. I felt that Carter successfully translated the theme of Ella's swing into something that suited them both, capturing both a sense of Fitzgerald while at the same time honoring Carter's own talents and interests. I did enjoy most of the music, and I liked the way she started with a reference, and a hit of swingtime but took it in different directions. Yet I also felt occasionally bored, and my mind would wander off, wondering if I was missing some key element. There were moments that were heartbreakingly beautiful, and other times when I felt that the performance stayed in too long in a fairly narrow stylistic range, perhaps popular, but at times mind-numbing. I yearned for greater dynamism and a bit more of the wonderful harmonic invention of which Carter is quite capable, but which did not seem present that night. Or perhaps it was just me. My neighbors, long time subscribers, seemed perfectly content. Anyway, by the time I figured this out, it was time for intermission and I was happy to stretch my legs.

The second half of the program was more to my taste and made me sit up and take notice. Perhaps I just had better reference points, perhaps I am just more attracted to the edgier world of the SF Jazz Collecive. Although I am familiar with both Ella Fitzgerald, and the work of Miles Davis, perhaps Davis is closer to my heart. Perhaps also I am attracted to the way the members of the SF Jazz collective were willing to transform Davis's music, I treasured the riffs and the references. Both my neighbor, the long-time subscriber, and I were chortling under our breath and rocking our seats during Sean Jones transformation of "So What" and I loved the playfulness of their take on "Feel the Groove". Woolf's vibraphone playing was shimmeringly beautiful, but my favorite piece was Miguel Zenon's rearrangement of Nardis with the incredible acuity and audacity of the high-velocity four-horn front line and Zenon's incredible solos. The piece I least understood was David Sanchez's original work "Canto". It was gentle and melodic and quite beautiful in places, but I was also bored and felt it lacked tension. Or perhaps I was just tired. The concert started at 8 Central Standard time, 9 by my east-coast body's time, and perhaps exhaustion simply played a role.

Two wonderful concerts, and they were exciting and soothing the way only music can be. I missed a concert in Knoxville that weekend, but I think I got the better deal.

May 17, 2017
Promise

Wednesday there was some excitement at the (new) house:

A painting was delivered. I was very excited. Although it had nothing to do with the work that is being done in the house, or the reason I have not yet moved in, I was happy to be able to get the painting up before the furniture, and very happy to see it on the wall.

(the artist discussing his work)

Later in the day, I began to question myself. It was the anniversary of George's death, a date I know well, and I even, perhaps stupidly, used as the alarm code on the old house. At that time, when I put in that alarm, it was perhaps the only number that mattered, the date of loss, of untethering. Not so much anymore. But I had forgotten. I wouldn't have thought about it at all except for a series of family emails commemorating the loss. I wondered if perhaps there was something wrong with me that I did not remember, did not hold that date close, did not feel pain or loss. For me that time is past, but it is also important to gather around to support each other in our individual paths and struggles.

Intellectually I can say it is an interesting coincidence, that this painting in this house, this expression of future movement, should be installed on this date. George would have found it humorous. But George is gone and I am here, and, although he is always with me, life is about moving forward and letting go, even of love. In fact love itself is a kind of letting go, of not holding on too closely. You know, of course, that we don't love people less because life moves on without them. Love is like that. It makes us more ourselves than we ever knew we could be, but it also gives us strength and resilience, at least if we let it, so that we can overcome great wounds, even when that wound entails the ripping away of a part of ourselves. There is no life without relationship, just as there is no life without suffering, and to thrive we must share in both. To convince ourselves otherwise is to live in denial, which, is perhaps, not to fully live at all.

For me, at least, it was better to hang a painting.

The past makes us who we are. The people we have loved, and who have loved us, are our personal saints. They are woven into the fabric of ourselves. But we are not our pasts. It is the future that beckons, and the future is what we have been made for.

May 12, 2017