ON POETRY BATTLES, RUMMAGING IN THE DUST FOR A LITTLE SPARKLE, AND LIGHTS GOING OFF IN THE BRAIN
Thursday July 8 2021
Dear Sarah,
I mentioned The Pillow Book in my letter of last week, which, perhaps simply by the power of suggestion, I’ve been reading at bedtime, keeping it just next to my own pillow. Today I was telling M about The Pillow Book and how peaceful it is to read and fall asleep to, and I was thinking about how strange the concept of the year 1000 feels. Among other things, the book is full of fascinating observations of fashion and clothing in Japan, the ways to wear garments and the color combinations that are right and best to represent different seasons and stations of power. The year 1000 sounds so far in the past but to read The Pillow Book (in a contemporary English translation, of course) it all seems less different and distant than you might imagine. (One distinction: there seemed to be a lot of poetry battles — sending people messages in the form of partial poems for them to start or complete based on their knowledge of poetry — which, now that I write it out, seems again not so different from today; not quite like Twitter but essentially a way by which people could demonstrate their knowledge and cleverness to each other in a somewhat public forum, since people would sometimes compose their messages or replies among their friends or colleagues and avidly wait together for the return of a response. Social media in a more truly social context!)
I was reading a bit on Wikipedia about Sei Shōnagon, and then I wanted to read more about the Empress Teishi whom Sei served, and I had a laugh with M because when I opened the Empress’s Wikipedia page I genuinely expected to see a photograph of her there, even though she was from the year 1000! You couldn’t get a photo of anyone (not even an empress) until the 1800s (and retroactive photographs aren’t really a thing; can’t we just dig one up somewhere??). The availability of information on the internet makes much seem somehow timeless, out of time, and for me, using the internet so often goes hand-in-hand with seeing photography that I expected a photo of anyone and everyone. If you wanted to capture someone’s visage in the year 1000, you would need to draw it or paint it or make an etching or a woodblock print. No precise likenesses! It seems that the earliest photograph to include people dates to 1838, View of the Boulevard du Temple, a daguerreotype image made by — surprise! — Louis Daguerre. (Fun fact: apparently Daguerre is also the inventor of the diorama, something I wouldn’t have thought to consider an invention, but if at one point it didn’t exist and then it did… there you are! It also sounds like the original “diorama theatre” might be a bit different from what we would call a diorama today.)
Photography: the art, application, and practice of creating durable images by recording light, either electronically by means of an image sensor, or chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film. The idea of durable images and the recording of light can keep my mind occupied for a while! The history of photography and advances like the camera obscura and the pinhole camera that were precursors to photography as we know it today (and as we’ve known it in the last century-plus) are good reminders that some advances take shape over hundreds of years, people building on processes over time, picking up where others left off… which makes me think of Beth Pickens and Speck Syndrome. It can be a comfort to think of oneself as being part of the long-term unfolding flow instead of thinking one has to change the world in a distinct and visible way, today (and tomorrow, and the next day — so many days, so much potential pressure one can put upon oneself!).
It was such a treat to see you last weekend! (M laughed at me later to see how we spent some of our in-person time together peering into our respective laptop screens, firing off the last bits of our Friday letters to each other!) The four-day weekend put me back in a refreshed mood, centering me away from screens big and small. I always feel better about life when I look at my phone less, yet it can be hard to remember that that’s the case — the phone addresses some immediate desire for visual and mental stimulation, like how it’s so easy to eat snacks when you’re really hungry and you can hardly imagine having to prepare something before you expire right there on the kitchen floor, inches from the stove and countertop where you might prepare the full meal you’re hankering after. Phone time for me often involves circling around and staring into my email, effectively looking for someone to demand time from me. Less phone time, more pencil time! After a long weekend off I felt more inclined to put pencil to paper, felt tickly creative thoughts come creeping back into my brain. A relief! I was feeling bone-dry for a bit there, rummaging in the dust for any little sparkle that might catch and hold my attention.
You mentioned a couple of weeks ago thinking about my days more as units of time (was a it a good day) rather than units of progress (what did I accomplish) — and this makes even better sense to me as I copy it out now by hand. A lot of days lately I feel pleased simply to have made it through — like I am running a gauntlet! — but this frame is not a sustainable one. I’m waking in the morning and feeling like the day is something to be tackled as a whole, instead of thinking of it as a series of minutes and hours that will unfold as they do, some predictably, some unpredictably. As ever — maybe instead of things being hard, they could be easy. A river instead of a gauntlet!
I am waiting with bated breath to see if your letter will reveal whether or not you’ve eaten the fabled Cugino’s in GL, and if so, how you liked it! If any pizza can live up to the hype, it just might be Cugino’s. Best enjoyed with a glass of house chianti or other affordable red! I hope you and yours are having a delightful week, and I can’t wait to hear what you’ve been up to!
Until soon!
Yours,
Eva
P.S. I wonder about your dad’s angry response to the article you sent (a mention also from a couple of weeks ago). What was the article? What was the response? Was he angry at the article or angry at you for sending the article? :thinking face: Now I’m adding a time-and-energy-intensive request for a response to the original thing that initially took your time and energy! Respond if you will, or I’ll save it and ask you in person at some future moment that hopefully won’t be too far in the distance!
P.P.S. I sprung upon myself the idea of a mid-year period without drinking, which I have labeled and compellingly marketed to myself as DRY 21, starting the Tuesday after the 4th of July holiday and continuing until we go on vacation to Connecticut… it sounded like a good idea on a fresh post-holiday Tuesday morning, though on Thursday night I’m somewhat regretting my rash decision! But there will still be plenty of summer left for beverages in late July and onward!
July 9, 2021
Dear Eva,
It is Friday evening, and we are en route from Grand Ledge to a hotel near the Detroit Airport where we will stay to lighten the blow of our 7 AM flight tomorrow. This letter writing marks the first moment since my drive back from your house last week that I feel I have had a minute to really take a breath and reflect. I will savor this hour of looking back over the week, even if it comes in a packed car with an 8 year old deejay.
My first reflection – working remotely from a vacation-like setting is less like actual vacation and more like a bizarre purgatory, where you can see vacation out in the distance through a glass window in your office. When will I learn my lesson? I spent Tuesday through Thursday this week huddled on a rocking chair in my inlaws’ office while the kids went to movies, splashed around in the hot tub (cold tub), and played Battleship. I am remote work veteran, way too experienced to be this naïve about the allure of “working anywhere.” Guess what, Sarah? Working anywhere is still just working, and with the added stress of not having the comforts of your usual space and routine while you do it.
Remote work purgatory aside, it has been a nice week since we last spoke. Please tell M that he was wrong about our Saturday night movie pick; Bill went with My Neighbor Totoro, a quiet and lovely animated Japanese movie from the 1980s, which might be the antithesis of Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. On the Fourth of July, B and I successfully biked 25 miles to and from our holiday BBQ. Above all, it was a really good chance for the two of us to catch up after nearly 48 hours apart when I went to Minnesota. It is fascinating how interwoven two lives can become, to the point where it feels a bit funny to be apart for even such a short time. I imagine you can relate to this.
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S, just now in the car out of the blue, “Why did the days go by so fast at Grandma and Grandpa’s house?” It seems pretty clear the kids felt like the week was pure vacation, and I am very glad and also very anxious to join them in that mental state. Today was my first official day of PTO, and we spent the day at the Yankee Springs camp site. Other than the array of Trump flags we saw soaring around the lake, it was a beautiful day full of summery fun. I can still feel the lights going out in the workspace of my mind (and in fact, I need at least one to remain on through Sunday when I have to present at a board meeting), but I am starting to enter the tranquil otherworld of full vacation. It is pleasing to know I will have next week’s letter to document Full Vacation Sarah!
Completely switching gears, I wanted to mention the smallest of experiences I had one recent Saturday on my weekly Whole Foods run. I was leaving with a trunk full of overpriced groceries, and I noticed a man playing guitar in the parking lot holding a sign saying he needed money to help his family avoid eviction. I pulled over, found a $10 bill tucked away in my phone holder, and jumped out of the car to hand him the money. None of this is notable, except for the way it made me feel when he smiled and sincerely thanked me. I was overwhelmed with good feelings, to the point that it made me deeply uncomfortable. Did I give him the money for him, or for my own self-satisfaction? I have read before about the science behind altruism as a catalyst for happiness, but I am not sure I have ever had such a palpable and nearly shameful experience of it. I am still stewing on what to take away from this–including in connection with working in nonprofits that rely upon this vanity to subsist.
I am feeling more lights going off in my brain as I write this letter, which I take as an encouraging sign. I am ready to give this brain a proper week-long rest!
I am enjoying the ability to mentally visualize your evening tonight, now that I have seen your home with my own two eyes! (Incidentally, I have decided for sure that I do not have aphantasia.) I hope you have a relaxing weekend ahead, full of tasty margaritas and Star Trek Next Generation!
Until soon, my friend,
Sarah
P.S. I am breaking our unwritten rule of not editing a letter after reading yours, but I want to end the suspense to say that we DID in fact make it to Cugino’s this week! Or rather, Cugino’s made it way to me after B’s parents picked it up and brought it back to their house in the country. It was, indeed, quite delicious, and I can see why you have a hankering for it on your trips to Mich. Even the gluten-free options received a bit of light praise among our tough crowd!