checking it twice

 

Dear Reader,

Look at this thing I found!  The Stinging Fly!  It sounds like it was made for us!  I ordered a year's worth.  It seems to me to be the kind of thing you might want to give to a friend.  

For your young folks, I hope you will read them this book, The Magic Pudding.  It's all about a koala named Bunyip Bluegum- I am sure that you and anyone you know, will love it, at any age.  This is not a gift that would require money, this reading to your loved ones (see link above), it is a gift of your time.  If you live far away, maybe you could buy a copy and mail it.... 

This year's handmade gift from us will be Sriracha sauce- we wish you a spicy year!

seasonal glums

 

Frosty's traumatic impermanent permadeath*

Dear Ones,

Does the end of the year bring a glumming?  A heightened awareness of temporal fragility?  For me, it does; in spades.  For one thing, I am always sorry to see a year go by, even if it was a dud of a year;  I just do not like feeling that there is less and less of anything, especially time.  By time I don't mean time, though; I mean chocolate chip cookies, walks at the beach, floats on the river, cups of coffee in the morning.  I mean that I am sad when I think of how few car rides might be left; how few pies are left to make.  Moon rises.  Knitted sweaters.  French films.

Running along parallel to this discomfiting remainder, are the repetitive 'traditions' of the holidays.  The sticky sameness of our un-adaptive and drear 'traditions.'  I think, and I look forward to your thoughts on this, that our holiday celebrations are closer to a form of mass hypnotic psychosis than an expression of kind togetherness.  

Between these two ominous ghosts, Loss and Ennui (not to mention Ennui's twin, Excess), what, in these last weeks, could be salvaged or savored?  Let's mull that over with spices and orange rind, while we listen to the song for today.

*Yes, I do think watching children's cartoons like Frosty without any contextualization by a qualified adult could have a lot to do with the way I feel about this 'joyous' season!  And, in the spirit of the ghost of Excess, here's another.

in the wet

 

in the stars, in the cards

 

Dear Days Remaining in the Year,

I have a song for you, for today.  Aselestine.  

If there were more time, I'd write to tell you how I am feeling, but the days left are so few, it feels silly to bother.  I am trying to write this mountain of greeting cards, and there is nothing really to say about all this darkness and hate.  For years I have been thinking we will get to a place, a place in the future, where we will look back and say, Whoo boy!  What a terrible time that was!  It's so great to be here and think back on that time; like a fading nightmare.  A place you leave and it just gets smaller and smaller in your rear view mirror.  But thinking on the future feels indulgent and foolish.

There is one thing, I guess, that feels worth the saying:  I am sorry for the times I hurt you.

no doubt

 

Jack Stauffacher

Dear Letters,

I think I may have mentioned this book before; may have entreated you to read it already.  I know I gave one of you a copy of it.  I still hope you will take a look at the conceptually fascinating Alphabetical Diaries.

It's not just that it doesn't fit into our expectations of narrative; it defies all this continual page turning.  I was startled mightily by it, because when I am tearing up and painting over and gluing down the shreds and fragments of my own journals, I think that my silly words are a narrow little existence; I think that no one felt like this, no one one filled 100, 500, 1000 pages with their aching self doubt and their limitless self loathing.  But that would not be true, it seems, from reading Sheila Heti's Alphabetical Diaries.  

It felt so good to me to know that someone else wanted to try to contain themselves, to try to improve, to reform, to rehabilitate.

Here, for today, an ABC song about singers, When Smokey Sings.  The thing I like best about this song, is the little musical reference to ABC's really big song, Be Near Me.  Of, course, I also love that 'she threw back the ring.' 

cranberries

 

Dear Season of Sauce,

Your song for today!  Spread it on liberally!  More cranberries!

Oooh.

 

Dear What Can the Matter Be,

I have a book I feel you should read- only, it is devastating.  I don't use that word much to describe books and tales, but it is warranted, here.  I could tell you more, but you know, it might be nicer for you to be enchanted in your own way; plus-what, I am now very busy acquiring all the other Rachel Cusk books, so I don't really have the time to sit and chat!

PS  Okay, that might not be enough to convince you, alright; even after all these books, all this time, you still don't quite believe that I wouldn't send you someplace you shouldn't be; okay:  here is another description:  This book sees you.  Yes, you.  And you, and me.

PPS  Okay, you want a taste, okay: no, you won't get it from me!  You must go and forge your own beautiful, specific relationship with these 255 pages!  And anyway, why not just judge it by its beautiful cover?

PPPS  Okay, one more thing: it all happens in a day, just as our beloved Mrs Dalloway.  And if that isn't enough?!  The endorsement, the recognition, the cover, the similarity?  Well, you just cannot be satisfied today, I guess.