Now Playing: Tenth Avenue North, "Satisfy."

Pictures from last week are here

  We had a wonderful time in Colorado skiing. I really wasn't sure how I would manage learning to ski, but Mr. W spent all morning on the first day teaching me on an easy slope. Every time I fell down, I had the consolation of looking up at a spectacular panorama of mountains on the other side of the valley. That first day we skiied at Ski Cooper, a small resort about three hours northwest of the Springs.

The drive to that resort was absolutely gorgeous. It had just snowed on Sunday, so we drove through a white world, up into the mountains. At the top of a pass we encountered a thick fog bank. As we came down from the pass, the fog lifted far away, low, giving us a glimpse of the feet of the distant mountains, burning gold as the sun rose with white fields of snow before them.

In the afternoon the drive back was equally spectacular. A brief afternoon storm had blown up, and the mountains that had been gold and white in the morning were now white and silver, shining like new steel against dark clouds. Then, out in the valley, we were driving through fields of snow with the mountains stretching away for miles and miles to the north, long white and blue ranges. I have never seen anything that so perfectly embodied the awesome terrifying purity of the Creator.

We skiied at a larger resort, Monarch, on Tuesday and Thursday. As the week went on the fresh powder became icy, but I also increased in confidence so that by the end of the week I was actually having fun. On Thursday Missy and I flew down the mountain together for our last run of the week.

The car decided to break down on Wednesday, so we took Wednesday off and visited the Garden of the Gods in the afternoon. The contrast between the arid red rocks and the silver-and-white majesty of Pike's Peak to the west was striking. It was a warm day, so the park was full of people--especially rock climbers scaling the nearly sheer faces of the largest outcrops. Pigeons flew in and out of honeycombed holes in the rock.

We drove back to Oklahoma on Friday through a snowstorm. Though I had planned to return to Stillwater on Saturday, I ended up spending an extra day with the Ws because a two-foot-high drift at the end of their subdivision was keeping the whole neighborhood snowed in. It really was a totally wonderful time, though. The unexpected, completely undeserved blessing of the whole trip kept me rejoicing every moment in the spectacular goodness of God.

Now Playing: Tenth Avenue North, "Times."

Just back from a glorious spring break trip to Colorado with the Ws, and I have a couple of books to review.

First of all, The Penderwicks, by Jeanne Birdsall. Missy recommended it; it's a light, easy read, a children's book. The subtitle of the book is "A Summer Tale of Four Sisters, Two Rabbits, and a Very Interesting Boy," and that sums it up neatly. Birdsall has a simple, engaging style. Her characters are charming, and over the course of the story each character undergoes some sort of transformation--no teenage angst; the pathos of the characters' mistakes is gentle, not overdone. Parts of the book are absolutely hilarious and reminded me delightfully of books I read when I was in elementary school.

When I came back, I finished Annie Dillard's Tickets for a Prayer Wheel. Dillard is a contemporary American author known for Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, a book of essays. Tickets was her first book and is a collection of her poetry. Dillard's style is distinctive as she combines stark images from nature with vivid pictures from human life (perhaps her personal experience). She seems to be a Christian of the same variety as Madeleine L'Engle, which, from my perspective as a Christian, enriches her writing. The title poem of the book, the last poem, was my favorite. No matter what her religious convictions, Dillard stands in awe of a mysterious Creator God, and her title poem beautifully but austerely captures God's Otherness. 

Now Playing: Felix Mendelssohn, "Violin Concerto in E Minor".

Story: Last Wednesday night in our college Bible study, I requested prayer for graduate school decisions, specifically that I would hear back from Harvard and Indiana in the near future since those were two of the places I really wanted to go. (At that point I had been accepted at Michigan and Iowa.)

When Stephen and I came home from Bible study, my father met us with a huge grin at the door. "E--, Indiana rang while you were away! You've been accepted!"

Yes, it does really happen that way sometimes. Who knew our God was so good? I forget!

Now Playing: Edward Elgar, "The Lark Ascending."

Today was a Custard the Dragon day: "Custard kept crying for his nice safe cage...."

I just finished Green Dolphin Street, by Elizabeth Goudge. Published in 1944, the novel is set in Victorian Europe and New Zealand and follows two sisters and their childhood friend. In some ways the premise of the book follows an inversion of the classic love triangle, two sisters being in love with the same boy. However, Goudge's lush writing style elevates the simple plot far above the stereotype of the "Victorian" novel.

The power of Green Dolphin Street lies in Goudge's genius for marrying the physical landscape of her world to the spiritual and emotional states of her characters. Throughout the book dazzling descriptions of the tiny Norman island where the characters grow up and of New Zealand, where two of the characters eventually live, reflect the deeper spiritual truths with which the characters struggle. External and internal landscapes respond to one another so beautifully that the most staggering portions of the book involve both photographic real scenery and spiritual truth.

One reason why the book resonated so deeply with me was the skill with which Goudge depicted each character's journey toward God. She creates three categories of person: the Savior, the Comforter, and the Creator. Each of her characters fits one of these categories, and for each character salvation only comes through his or her particular situation. Each character must confront his/her strengths and weaknesses in the midst of events that on the surface appear to be mundane but that trigger tremendous spiritual conflict.

Though for some people Goudge's attitude toward "spirituality" might appear to be too general, references throughout the novel to the Book of Ruth and the Psalms direct the reader to the true source of salvation. Her subjectivity is only the subjectivity necessary to honor each character's individuality--salvation comes from the same source for all, but it fits itself to the needs of the specific personality at hand.

So I'll finish with a quote from the book, one of the passages I loved best, in which Marguerite finds her salvation.

"… and with her that belief she thought she had lost, that certainty that one’s life is a complete, rounded, timeless thing rooted in eternity, that what we once had is ours forever, that what we will have is already present with us, that at no time in our lives are we ever anything but immeasurably and inconceivably rich and blessed." (275)

It's March, and the wind is blowing lots of

WHITE RABBITS

around outside.

Now Playing: Psalm 130.

Anyone ever tried ginger milk tea? Thanks to our pastor's wife I was privileged to enjoy the experience this afternoon while on the phone with Nicole. Some of the strangest good stuff I've ever tried. Asian food, real Asian food, surprises my American tastebuds whenever they encounter it, and ginger milk tea was no exception. It's a powder, non-dairy creamer, sugar (spelled "suger" in the English translation on the back of the packet), and ginger, stirred into hot water. And the result is--spicy, to say the least.

Yesterday I finished the last book in Lawhead's Song of Albion trilogy, The Endless Knot. The book picks up flawlessly where the second book left off, with celebration and rejoicing. However, the latter half of the book grows rapidly darker until it reaches its bizarre conclusion. I must say that after reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, I should be more comfortable with narration unfolding from a "dead" character's point of view, but every time it weirds me out (pardon the colloquialism).

If you're going to read the book, beware--plot points may be given away. In one sense, the end of the book beautifully mirrors and consummates its beginning, as the main character recognizes that his death mirrors that of Christ, recreating the world, elevating it to a higher, purer existence.

However, my main reaction to the main character's death and subsequent "resurrection" was one of bewilderment. How can a mere human being replicate the sacrifice of Christ? How can a human's death bring about the recreation of two worlds in a way that mirrors Revelation 21-22? Lawhead seems to want his readers to draw these conclusions, but I almost feel that such conclusions are presumptuous. Certainly let us have Christ figures in literature, but put them in their proper place, please, ultimately as sinful humans.

I know that as a Christian I probably ought to appreciate Lawhead's conclusion more than I do, and I know that many of you will probably disagree with me. Though Lawhead tells a good story, I can't help wishing he had ended it differently. For me these books are fun but not great literature--to which they have no pretensions anyway.

Wanted to reply to the comment on the last post: The intense, complete devotion to a spouse portrayed in A Severe Mercy definitely could be overwhelming. I suppose it wasn't to me since I was too busy thinking about the other themes in the book. (And thus, perhaps, looking at one tree instead of the forest.)

Towards the end of the book, Vanauken does acknowledge that such total devotion was spiritually perilous to himself and his wife. Looking back on his life with her, he realizes that at some point, in some way God would have had to come first, and he calls himself "pagan" for focusing so completely on his wife.

And on a more cheerful note, I found that phone this morning!

Now Playing: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.

Today I had the misfortune to lose my phone, so if any of you try to ring or text me, that's why I'm not responding. I'm pretty sure our neighbor's dog ate it because I lost it while taking her for a walk. I was so pleased with myself for thinking to take it along in case someone from Michigan rang, and I held it in my hand in the pocket most of the way--until I wasn't holding it anymore, I suppose. My theory is that the dog jumped up and ate it, but who knows now. Frustrating.

On Sunday evening I finished reading A Severe Mercy by Sheldon Vanauken. Really one of the best books I've read in awhile. When I told the W girls I was reading it, they gave me wide-eyed looks as though I had told them I was planning to battle a dragon, but honestly I'm not sure why.

The book is well written, with beautiful descriptions and records of conversations between highly literate and intelligent people. It includes letters by C.S. Lewis, which, of course, automatically makes it wonderful. (ahem) The story follows a young couple through their conversion to Christianity and subsequent tragedy and its aftermath.

Perhaps the book is so precious to me because I read it at a point of deep discouragement and frustration with my sinfulness and circumstances. One of its themes is the "ongoing act of creation" in which God is engaging, which a Calvinist would call God's sovereignty. Yet I find thinking of it with Vanauken's term more helpful. "Creation" carries with it all the connotations of purposefulness, beauty, and authority without the theological maelstrom that sometimes accompanies "predestination". God is creating the world now as an author in the midst of writing a story creates the story, though God's creation is perfect on first draft. Every event, even the smallest, carries significance because it is part of this artistic act of God's creation as it unfolds through time.

In addition to this beautiful way of thinking of God's sovereignty, the book also deals with the interwoven themes of Heaven, joy, love, and eternity. In any situation this would be encouraging, but reading about the way in which someone else applied these truths to their own life rekindled my own hope in these truths. Heaven is a certainty not a distant vague daydream but an actual destination to which each day brings me slightly closer.

And that certainty is one filled with the glorious light of Christ's presence. Though Vanauken never describes being enthralled with Christ's love himself, he portrays his wife's complete surrender to Christ. He and I stand in much the same position--a place of longing for Christ's presence without fully realizing complete surrender or a satisfying sense of Christ's love.

Although I can understand why the book would be overwhelming--it portrays tragic emotional/spiritual crises--it gives a clear-eyed, honest approach to the relationship between sorrow and the majestic Savior.

Now Playing: One of Stephen's piano pieces.

Last night I finished Moo by Jane Smiley. This book was a graduation gift, so I was compelled to read it at some point. For those of you with strong sensibilities, beware--the language and subject matter extend past the Chaucerian in bawdiness.

Moo is a satire of academic life, set in a midwestern town at a large state university. Thanks to that setting, one point of humor arose from the outset since aspects of the novel's setting mirror the setting in which I have grown up. (To make a not-so-subtle parallel, one of the buildings on the novel's campus is named Stillwater Hall). Unfortunately, satire has never been a favorite genre of mine, so my reading of this book was biased from the outset.

More humorous at times were the parodies of the academic writing style and of interdepartmental arguments. I don't often laugh out loud over books, and this book is definitely not one to provoke that kind of mirth, but occasionally the parallels were just too strong, and I had to smile.

Smiley's sense of the poignant is also strong in the book, though, and such moments were what made the book valuable. Her telling observations about her characters reflected to me the emptiness of a lifestyle without Christ, even as she parodied the complacent self-righteous Christianity that some academics seem to assume to be the definition of faith. She strips the masks from her characters' motives, revealing pure animal desires as well as the emptiness the characters find as they follow those desires. Lives full of sad humor seem to be the fate of midwestern humanity, at least according to Smiley, though she ends on a triumphant note--a marriage, of course.

All-in-all, this is not a book I would necessarily recommend to anyone. Having said that, its humor and poignancy made for several thought-provoking moments. And now I'm (supposedly) ready for academia! Hooray.

Now Playing: Beethoven, Symphony No. 7, "Poco Sostenuto--Vivace."

Not that anyone misses this particularly, but thought I'd post a wee something up here. There might possibly be some photos around [ somewhere ], too.

Since I theoretically have so much time to read these days, I may post a few short reviews of books. The first happens to be a pair of books, The Paradise Wars and The Silver Hand, Books I and II of the Song of Albion trilogy by Stephen Lawhead.

Both books are set in a quasi-Celtic Britain, the premise of the plot being that a pair of Oxford students are whisked away to Albion thanks to a sort of space-time discontinuum. What follows is set almost exclusively in the Celticized world of Albion, in which characters from Celtic legend predominate.

The plot moves swiftly and intensely through a story that grows increasingly dark from the first book to the second. Since Lawhead is a Christian author, the imagery in the story is unmistakable as a salvific figure arises from the most unlikely corner. The moments of triumph shine vividly against the extremely dark acts of evil with which the hero and his tiny contingent of followers must contend.

Overall, the plot is a simple, classic struggle between very good and very evil. Very good appears to be weak and outnumbered; very evil is--well, very evil. From a human perspective, though, such a plot often mirrors our experience on this earth, so books that follow that experience can be a refreshing reminder of the inevitable triumph our world will have in Christ.

The third book in the trilogy, The Endless Knot, is sitting next to my laptop, waiting its turn.

Now Playing: Sufjan Stevens, "Seven Swans", "The Dress Looks Nice On You."

This morning my mother took our cat, Annie, to be declawed. Here is the offending creature herself. She may look innocent, but she has become more and more nasty, scratching ankles/arms of people she decides she doesn't like. This evening I came home from work and discovered her sprawled in a corner of the study behind the sofa, still heavily anesthetized, with blue booties on her paws. She looks pathetic.

Since it's been just barely above freezing, the streets have become a mess of slush. I drove to the gym this morning, the car waffling slightly, and then to work later. Work was slow today.

As soon as I got home, I had to turn around and leave again to meet my Korean student, H, at the FRC. She had invited me to meet her family today, so when I arrived at the FRC, I found she and her husband waiting for me with their minivan. They live in one of the new blocks of married student housing buildings--brand new apartments. Culture shock number one, of course, was that I forgot to take my shoes off at the door and had to be prompted by my hosts.

H introduced me to her husband and her three children. She had prepared a delicious meal for us: sweet potato noodles with vegetables and a big dish of white noodles with shrimp, broccoli, and peppers round the edge. It really was delicious. We sat round the table and carried on a sort of conversation. When I asked them what their favorite Korean food was, they told me that it was kimchi. "Would you like to try some now?" the daughter asked. H immediately went to the fridge and brought out a bowl of the stuff--pickled fermented cabbage soaked in chili. It looked something like this:

  

(Thanks to the wonderful Wikipedia). Slimy at first and then just spicy. They laughed at my attempt to use chopsticks and were thoughtful enough to provide a wee fork, though obviously it would've been much, much easier to use chopsticks to eat the sticky noodles. Actually, despite the awkward silences, it was a pleasant time. They were friendly, we laughed at our attempts to communicate, and in the end I learned about them and their culture. After an hour, H and her husband drove me back to my car, and I went home.

At home I sat in the study and read a letter from Laura--almost as hilarious as listening to her talk. Completely hyper. My father was working on papers, so I sat and talked to him.

We all ate tea together, an unusual occurrence that happens about twice a week. After tea, we watched a Foyle's War episode, III.1. Laura rang in the middle of it, so we chatted with her for a bit. Family worship after. I just barely remembered to rescue my wash from the dryer. 

White rabbit, by the way!

Now Playing: This sermon by Pastor D.

 An awesome treatment of Christ's power to change his people. I listened to this yesterday morning and was very much in need of the grace it communicates: that Christ sees us as we are now, knows us completely, but doesn't turn away from us. Instead, he not only foresees our transformation into holy human beings but is himself the agent of that transformation. There's tremendous ground for hope and peace in that truth.

Now Playing: Rascal Flatts, "Life Is A Highway."

So this poor blog has been suffering sadly from neglect. And I'm so cross-eyed with tiredness that I'm not sure this post is going to remedy anything, but o well, here goes.

Today: had the best intentions of going to the gym. Really. But it didn't happen. Ate breakfast instead and ran errands before work. I went to Staples to print off J.D.'s beautiful posters for CRF, then to Wal-Mart, then to the bank, then to the Student Union to have said posters stamped by the authorities.

Then to work. Hooray. Really I don't mind my job that much. Today Pastor and Mrs P came in for lunch, and I got to wait on them. Yesterday Mr and Mrs F came in, so this was my week for serving people I know. That's the best part.

It was warm enough today that we propped open the side door of the restaurant to let in the south breeze, until a curl of wind whipping up the alley spewed leaves and dust onto the floor. I cleaned and was out by three o'clock.

I sat on the garden wall and ate a bagel in the sunshine. Drank one of the Korean aloe vera juices that we're selling now at Crepe Myrtle. Not a fan of pulp in beverages, but I liked the sweet, white-grapey flavor. Warm sun on my face, arms, and bare feet was absolutely wonderful, though the strong southwest wind was chilly. It roared in the bare oak trees and flung dead leaves skyward.

Then a shower, then a fifteen-minute nap--stretched out flat, surrounded by afternoon sunshine filling the room, intensified by the yellow walls, at the heart of warmth, fresh air coming through an open window.

I slept intensely for about five minutes. When I woke, I went downstairs and started to make tea. I attempted to make the chicken casserole that Laura had made that night for all of us girls and Stephen. Unfortunately, my mother was in the shower, so I wasn't able to ask her how much chicken to use. Laura had just said "chicken" in her version of the recipe, so I used everything in the refrigerator--over three pounds! As a result, I used up the chicken my mother had intended to use for tea on Sabbath evening, and the casserole was watery since the broth baked out of the chicken and added far more liquid than was necessary. Instead of creaminess, we had soup.

We actually had a good meal, only the second one we've eaten all together all week. I teased my mother about not eating the potato skins, and we laughed at Annie, who was frantically trying to kill a twist tie. After tea, I went to the high school girls' Bible study at seven o'clock. Ellie was already there and helped me set up chairs in Pastor's office before everyone else arrived.

Everyone came tonight. We can barely fit around the table in the office--a tight, laughing circle. Sat around and joked before Anna started to read tonight's chapter of On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness. The girls ate popcorn and cookies, courtesy Paige. Anna led the Bible study tonight on risk and serving others. The girls eagerly go down rabbit trails. Whenever Ruth says, "Well..." and squints at you through her glasses, you know you're in for a time of it. :o)


At home, said good-night to my parents and went up to bed. The wind roars outside still, jangling the Es' wind chimes. I've been reading Middlemarch, enjoying in particular Fred's and Rosemary's interactions. Their first "argument", about grammar, made me laugh a lot--sounded rather like another very familiar brother/sister pair.

Now Playing: The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers soundtrack, Track 11, "The Leave Taking."

Some photos from the last two weeks are here.

With my father's help I finally finished the redecorating project! We had to saw about ten inches off a piece of cork board, but in the end it makes a wonderful bulletin board for photos and Tara's artwork.

Roommate visit! Rachel came back for almost a whole week. We spent a few days in Stillwater, watched Stephen play an amazing game of basketball in Oklahoma City, and went to Tulsa to visit friends. In the course of four days, Rachel managed to see everyone on her list, and I got to tag along for most of it. A little bit sad since Alisha and Stephen are both leaving for graduate school, but at least I got to see them before they left. And I finally managed to catch up with Holly and Kevin, not to mention being part of a long-anticipated reunion of the Salt And Vinegar Club.

Saturday we spent with Philip and Alyson. We visited The Oak Tree, a used bookshop in Tulsa on 15th St. It's one of the best bookshops I know. I love going in there, though some of the books are rather pricey. The proprietors keep on hand a collection of beautiful volumes, first editions, pristine copies, etc. Nicole and Tara joined us there, so we had a reunion in the literature section. When we all checked out, the wizened old man with the huge beard at the front desk managed to talk knowledgeably to Nicole about Virginia Woolf, to Alyson and me about C.S. Lewis, and to Philip about Jack Kerouac.

On Sunday, Rachel and I went to our respective churches, and I ate lunch with Amanda, Tara, Nicole, Matt, and co. Rachel and I got to spend some time with Nicole in the afternoon before making our way to Matt's house for "burger night". As a character on Creature Comforts said, we weren't lost, only "temporarily misplaced." But we managed to find it eventually....

Monday was a weird day, mostly made up of phone calls to people. Rachel and I went to campus, visited Woodward Park, and ate lunch with Crystal and Tara. We ended up spending all afternoon together, chatting. After dinner, Amanda came over, and we played games and talked. That evening, Rachel, Crystal, Gavin and I met up at Gavin's apartment for our Club reunion. Crystal showed us her progress on her senior project, and Rachel and Gavin talked economics and sci fi.

Yesterday, Rachel and I both spent time with Alisha. I helped her pack her room, ate lunch with Holly and Kevin, and spent all afternoon chilling with Rachel at C.H.O.C.S. before we went to eat tea with Avis and Amy. Back at Tara's house, the three of us hung out until Philip and Alyson came over after RUF. Then we settled down and watched The Prestige, Philip's first time.

This morning, I drove Rachel to the airport at about seven o'clock to catch her half eight flight. The moon hung very thin just above a rust-colored sunrise. It was hard to say good-bye. We had had a lovely few days together. We actually spent quite a bit of time together--long stretches of hours in the car, in the coffee shop, at my house, at Tara's house, reading, talking, playing Scrabble, looking at books of photos.

I went back to Tara's house and napped until Tara got up at about nine o'clock. She made banana pancakes for breakfast, and we ate them Boxcar Children-style with butter and brown sugar. Alisha stopped by to say good-bye at about half ten, and when she left, I left as well.

Now Playing: A Dr. Who episode, which my family is watching intently on the computer behind me. I must say that "watching" the episode doesn't make it any clearer than hearing a garbled synopsis of said episode.

 

One last fun time with the lot of us (and Stephen) before spring term begins. A Laura-and-Rachel special for tea and Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban afterward.

Yesterday evening Elizabeth, Sarah, and I went to see Avatar. Someone in a conversation I'd overheard in the restaurant a couple of weeks ago had said that it was the best film she'd ever seen, her favorite film ever, so on and so forth. Someone else, an Air Force member, had said that he'd enjoyed it purely for the artwork. And my esteemed brother had said that he would refuse to see it simply because of all the hype.

So, primed with these various opinions, I went into the cinema, donned the ridiculous 3D glasses, and attempted to enjoy the film while maintaining an objective distance.

Today when I got on Google News, one of the top entertainment stories happened to be a blurb about how Conservative bloggers are expending their venom against Avatar's rabidly Liberal agenda. To me the agenda wasn't so much offensive as simply annoying from an artistic point of view. Surely the cliches about the U.S. military being the villain, the earth being our mother, and natives always knowing best could have been more complicated, if only for the sake of the story.

Setting all that aside, I have to agree that the artwork of the film was stunning. I have never seen such a lush world, in such color, pulsing with life and light. If a concatenation of artists, geeks, and ethnologists can create a world like that, what must the Creator God's world be? Looking at the world in January, I see snow on black ground, bare trees, and a grey sky. The world is full of barrenness and death, cold, hostility. This is the world I believe has been created by the good, true, beautiful God?

"Now we see in a mirror darkly, then face-to-face." A mirror--a negative. Reading Annie Dillard, I was reminded of the via negativa, the way to know God through what is not God, through contrast. Living in a world under the curse, we see a negative of the goodness of God. It resembles God's goodness in its extravagant beauty and magnificence, but it also is the antithesis of that goodness as it experiences death and decay.

The most awesome part is that God has promised to remake the world, "I saw the new Jerusalem descending from heaven as a bride adorned for her husband." And that he has promised to save us for this new creation, no matter how hard we kick and scream and fight. I rage against his mercy; I hate his salvation; I rebel against the fact that he is sovereign and holy. At least, that's what my life says. Yet, though my life contradicts it, he has saved me and is preparing me for that revelation of his goodness and beauty in a recreation of our universe.

In the film a key phrase is "I see you," which becomes a tag for seeing someone--understanding them, knowing who they are, what they are thinking and feeling at the deepest level. Far beyond the glorious richness of a restored creation, a world free from death, is the promise in the Beatitudes: "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." "They shall see him face-to-face, and his name shall be on their foreheads." "Now we see in a mirror dimly, then face-to-face."

I can't comprehend what it will be like to see God. How does a human see infinite holiness, truth, and goodness? In the person of Christ--and perhaps also in his work, in the new creation. A physical manifestation of the attributes of God. Like Aslan's country in C.S. Lewis, a world that unfurls eternally new beauties, peeling the skins away.

Pure speculation, of course. For now the most important thing to remember is that this is not home: "looking for a city whose builder and maker is God."

I apologize for the inconvenience, but from now on you'll be asked to log in if you comment. Someone decided to post adverts for boots on here--not objectionable but annoying. Whatever.

I have been regaled with excellent prose for the last few days: Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, for a mystic, Romantic voice, and now Dorothy Sayers, Gaudy Night, for something completely different.

“Isn’t the writing of good prose an emotional excitement?”

“Yes, of course it is. At least, when you get the thing dead right and know it’s dead right, there’s no excitement like it. It’s marvellous. It makes you feel like God on the Seventh Day—for a bit, anyhow.”

“…. You expend the trouble and you don’t make any mistake—and then you experience the ecstasy. But if there’s any subject in which you’re content with the second-rate, then it isn’t really your subject.”

“You’re dead right,” said Harriet, after a pause. “If one’s genuinely interested one knows how to be patient, and let time pass, as Queen Elizabeth said. Perhaps that’s the meaning of the phrase about genius being eternal patience…. If you truly want a thing, you don’t snatch; if you snatch, you don’t really want it. Do you suppose that, if you find yourself taking pains about a thing, it’s a proof of its importance to you?”

“…. One always makes surface errors, of course. But a fundamental error is a sure sign of not caring….”

~

“… there are a few rare people, I believe, who don’t look on themselves as jobs but as fellow-creatures.”

“.... The worst of being a job… is the devastating effect is has on one’s character. I’m very sorry for the person who is somebody else’s job; he (or she, of course) ends by devouring or being devoured, either of which is bad for one….”

“But you say you don’t despise those who make some other person their job?”

“Far from despising them,” said Miss de Vine, “I think they are dangerous.”

                       Dorothy Sayers, Gaudy Night

Now Playing: Dvorak on Laura's computer.

Our white Christmas! Annalee, Mary, Laura, and Lillian.

More photos here.

Now Playing: More Fearings!

Pictures from yesterday here.