'Cole was still full of the diet question.  He now lives chiefly on rhubarb tops--they have such a "foody" taste, his son thinks.  "Dear me! Poor fellow!" Whistler told him, "it sounds as if once long, long ago he had really eaten, and still has a dim memory of what food is!"  "And spinach," Cole added, "it's fine. We eat it raw.  It's wonderful, ( Read more... )

“The beginning of all journeys is separation. You’ve got to leave somewhere to go somewhere else. It is also the first step towards freedom: You ignore the voice of Pharaoh inside that mocks you, saying, “Who are you to begin such a journey?” You just get up and walk out.”

-- Lubavitcher Rebbe (2007)

The Jewish spring  festival of Passover is ( Read more... )

The scene:  A Florida beach, where Delia, Brother & I are discussing where the Family should eat tonight

Brother:  When you make a choice for a group, you can't worry; you just say, "Fuck'em if they don't like it!"
Me:  Yes! Yes! I have this theory, 'Some people just lack the "Fuck it!" gene!'  Though me . . . I mostly have it, but sometimes I don ( Read more... )

In family condo in Florida (Sanibel Island).  Dad on the phone with local computer tech help that is clearly of the irritating variety. When he gets off, I express my sympathy.  He seizes a teaching moment:

Q1:  How many people are below average?

A1:  One half.

Q2:  How many are made in God's image?

A2:  O.....K.....I think it is only fair to ( Read more... )

Tonight, my cousins Paul & Debra Saltzman Hill came up from lower Manhattan, where they've been living without power since the storm; Paul, an architect, has been organizing their building to make sure everyone has water and support - including getting people to carry water up to folks on the 12th floor (no elevators!), checking on the elderly, etc ( Read more... )

'It was Thomas Edison, I think, who famously said, after failing for the hundredth time to invent a working light bulb: “I haven’t failed, I’ve just found a hundred ways not to do it.” That is a really good principle for artists.'
-- Howard Gayton,
in his interview with Brian Froud & Wendy Froud on collaboration, Part 2,
read the entire wonderful ( Read more... )

“There is luxury in self-reproach.
When we blame ourselves,
we feel no one else has a right to blame us.”

- Oscar Wilde

Ah, Oscar!  Right on the money, as always.

I do get so cross at some peoples' pre-emptive apologetic strikes, and have been wondering why that sort of apology bothers me so much . . . . I think it is their assumption (however ( Read more... )

‎"Stories are always really, really hard. I think it's totally rational for a writer, no matter how much experience he has, to go right down in confidence to almost zero when you sit down to write something. Wy not? Your last piece is never going to write your next one for you."
-- John McPhee: 
The Art of Nonfiction No. 3
The Paris Review
Spring 2010

"I do not want actors and actresses to understand my plays.  This is not necessary.  If they will only pronounce the correct sounds, I can guarantee the results."
-- George Bernard Shaw
I'm not sure I agree with that - hell, I'm not even sure GBS did - but I sure love the line.  Gearing up for more "illuminated" audiobooks, control freak that I am, I ( Read more... )

Nipped over to see if handworn was still in the game so I can ask him about rugs,* to discover that he has been posting extremely fine quotes almost every day for awhile, among them this from Evelyn Waugh:

"Anyone could write a novel given six weeks, pen, paper and no telephone or wife."

Clearly, Mr. Waugh meant to type "and the internet" but got distracted.

( Read more... )