Father’s Day
“My grandpa whistled for me.”
Things I learned on my summer vacation
“Meat Detour Ahead.”
New directions in movie rentals
Any pot in a storm?
Charles Van Doren (1926–2019)
Here’s another way to think of Charles Van Doren: as a deeply thoughtful student of the sorrows and possibilities of human life.
Frozen heads
Nailheads.
Sanford Sylvan (1953–2019)
Elaine knew him when she was a teenager, and heard him sing many times. The two of us heard him in a Boston Shakespeare Company production of Mother Courage, directed by Peter Sellars. It was our third date, January 24, 1984. Linda Hunt played Mother Courage. I’ll never forget it.
What better place to be
Driving home from a concert on a rural route partly covered in ice and snow, what better place to be than behind a snow plow?
Resolution 2019
Reposted, with the year changed, from January 1, 2018.
“The” four
People can be slotted into “the” four or five or six anything, one slot per person, only if you’re looking to attract eyeballs on the Internets.
Embarrassment: mild, fleeting
And as I left the store, twelve-pack of Little Sumpin’ Sumpin’ in hand, I found myself walking past a little old Amish man.
“How to talk like a Samaritan”
It’s a warm evening, isn’t it? What train are you going to get? What’s your name? Do you need any help? Are you okay?
From Diary of a Lost Girl
“Just a little more love and no one would be lost in this world!”
Pareidolia
A bit of an egg-roll wrapper.
“The repeated refrains of nature”
Rachel Carson: “There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature — the assurance that dawn comes after night, and spring after the winter.”
Things I learned on my summer vacation
How is it that Elaine is able to accomplish all she does? “No traffic!” And more.
How to help
How to help people affected by Hurricane Florence: The New York Times has suggestions.
Falltime
One way to know you’re now in your sixties: at a yearly physical, the first question from both nurse and doctor is “Have you fallen in the last year?”
Gym, yikes
The New York Times reprts: “How You Felt About Gym Class May Impact Your Exercise Habits Today.”
“What are they doing to us?”
“We’re being kicked around by crazy people”: Martha Dobie (Miriam Hopkins) in These Three (dir. William Wyler, 1936).
Recently updated
More to a story of small-town life.
Who cans?
“Someday we’re going to ask a younger person where the canning supplies are and they’ll have no idea what we’re talking about.”
Small town, car, screen
One way to know you’re living in a small town.
Salzberg’s Theory of Pizza
“It is better to have pizza you don’t want than to want pizza you don’t have.”
One last cleaning
Our dentist is retiring at the age of ninety.
“How did that happen?”
Hannah Gadsby, in Nanette (dir. Jon Olb and Madeleine Parry, 2018), recounting her mother’s explanation of what she regretted in raising her children.
Putting the wagon before the horse
An Amish tow truck?
“What are we here for?”
Sonny Rollins: “We got a short life, and what are we here for? To eat ice cream and have fun with girls? No.”
Permission
“I can’t believe anyone is taking this seriously.”
Emma González for Congress
She addressed a rally for gun control and called B.S.
“Prayers and condolences,” again
A student at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Parkland, Florida, responding to a presidential tweet offering “prayers and condolences.”