Christmas is not a time or a season but a state of mind.
Calvin Coolidge
I've been having lots of lasts lately. Last teaching, last classes, last exams, last time in the IES Center... so it almost seems like I should be at an end. But I'm not. Because this isn't the last time I will walk down Kartnerstrasse, isn't last opera I will see, isn't the ( Read more... )

Events in the past may be roughly divided into those which probably never happened and those which do not matter.
William Ralph IngeIt's the end of the semester, so of course things have been going at an insane pace. Which would be completely normal if I was at school, but somehow it seems sacreligious here in Vienna. But I just finished two out ( Read more... )

Freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the right to do what we ought.
Pope John Paul IIOur trip to Prague and Krakow started off rather interestingly. The interesting event was namely me waking up 15 minutes past the time our train left. I woke up, called Bethany, yelled “I’msorryI’msorryI’msorry!” into the phone about twenty ( Read more... )

The best mirror is an old friend.
George Herbert Yes, I realize I have not posted in years. Well, certain other people have not either, so there. You know who you are, because you're probably not reading this ( Read more... )

The last week has been... I don't know, rather typical? Except, well, to call any part of my life in Vienna "typical" just seems to take it for granted. And it was certainly not typical of the life I usually live - most notably because I saw two more operas. Barber of Seville and Magic Flute, both of which I enjoyed much more than Faust, and both ( Read more... )

A good gauge of spiritual health is to write down the three things you most want. If they in any way differ, you are in trouble.
RumiSome entirely random thoughts that are coming into my head as I sit here at 4:21 PM Vienna time, sweltering in the very beautiful and historical but entirely non-ventilated Palais Corbelli, aka the IES Center ( Read more... )

Traveling is a brutality. It forces you to trust strangers and to lose sight of all that familiar comfort of home and friends. You are constantly off balance. Nothing is yours except the essential things - air, sleep, dreams, the sea, the sky - all things tending towards the eternal or what we imagine of it.
Cesare PaveseWhen I try to describe the ( Read more... )