"People sometimes act as though owning books you haven't read constitutes a charade or pretense, but for me, there's a lovely mystery and pregnancy about a book that hasn't given itself over to you yet—sometimes I'm the most inspired by imagining what the contents of an unread book might be."
It seems to me one of the "x-ray machines" of a political party's soul is to see how, when in power, they apportion legislative districts. The Republicans in control of the Ohio have gotten hilariously creative in drawing districts and this, to me, is a sign of corruption. It's a graphic - literally - display of the dearth of fairness and common sense versus their own self-interest. Ridiculous gerrymandering is the last refuge of a political scoundrel and like pornography you know it when you see it.
"...to lose physical sight, it is thought, is to gain second sight. One door closes and another, greater one, opens. Homer’s blindness, many believe, is a kind of spiritual channel, a shortcut to the gifts of memory and of prophecy."- from novel "Open City"
"O God who wished Blessed Margaret be blind from birth so that the eyes of her soul enlightened by your grace, might more clearly see the value of spiritual realities..."- from novena prayer to Blessed Margaret of Castello.
My brother-in-law discovered that he could create a musical communion in the bar from his I-phone, by sending a virtual request to the I-tunes jukebox to play any song he chose, without ever getting up from the booth. No one would know who requested the song. He selected Andrea Bocelli singing Ave Maria.
From the very first notes, the other patrons of the bar were alarmed. The bartender went to the jukebox to see what was playing. Another patron went with him, and together they tried to override the song. But it couldn't be done. The bartender tried to comfort his customer saying, "Well, it's sort of a pretty song."
To which the patron replied, "I'm going to throw up."
This is one of those very rare cases where technology thrills me: you could potentially request an I-jukebox song from your I-phone, without ever even entering the bar. If you want the pool-hall patrons to spend the evening listening to Gregorian Chant, sit in your car, and request (for a small fee) all the songs you desire, from your phone.
High school jeer/cheer that will apparently forever be lodged in my head went:"Go Back! Go Back! Go back to the woods! Your coach is a farmer and your team is no good!"Alternative renderings include:
"Retreat! Retreat! Retreat to the pines. Your coach is a rancher and your team is not exceptional."Dylan has some much better ones:
Unto the woods convey yourselves with haste; for, as your coach is adept at nothing save tillage of the soil, your team, O hapless foe, is of truly mean estate.and...
No laurel of victory shall come your way, O wretched contestants of the gridiron! It would seem that your athletic director is incapable of anything but making the earth yield produce in abundance; therefore, O team, return with all due haste to the rural atmosphere; indeed, go back to the bucolic spot which gave you sustenance.
Let no foreigner who has attached himself to the Lord say, ‘The Lord will surely exclude me from his people.’ Let no eunuch say, ‘And I, I am a dried-up tree.’ Foreigners who have attached themselves to the Lord to serve him and to love his name and be his servants – all who observe the sabbath, not profaning it, and cling to my covenant – these I will bring to my holy mountain.
- Isaiah 56
"His reverie took him out of the everyday, away from the blankets and the bag of urine. It was the late thirties again, and he was back in Cambridge, breathing the damp air of the fens, enjoying the tranquility of his youthful scholarship."Ah how I love that phrase: "the tranquility of his youthful scholarship". How high the stakes seemed, holding to my coveted if meaningless goal of graduating "cum laude", the fruit of having acquired a 3.5 on a 4.0 scale over the years. And how true it was that the scholarship was played out in a tranquil fashion on those long evenings at King Library. I would wander over to the periodicals after studying and feed on some of the vitality of those wondrous, eclectic magazines. Oh how the ache of learning was slaked in those days!
Let us now pause to contemplate the person of Jesus during His earthly life. In His humanity He had experienced our joys. He has manifestly known, appreciated, and celebrated a whole range of human joys, those simple daily joys within the reach of everyone. The depth of His interior life did not blunt His concrete attitude or His sensitivity. He admires the birds of heaven, the lilies of the field. He immediately grasps God’s attitude towards creation at the dawn of history. He willingly extols the joy of the sower and the harvester, the joy of the man who finds a hidden treasure, the joy of the shepherd who recovers his sheep or of the woman who finds her lost coin, the joy of those invited to the feast, the joy of a marriage celebration, the joy of the father who embraces his son returning from a prodigal life, and the joy of the woman who has just brought her child into the world.It's perhaps of interest that Paul VI wrote that in 1975, when he was in old age and after Humane Vitae's poor reception, when he was said to be downhearted and discouraged. Later he writes:
Here below this joy will always include to a certain extent the painful trial of a woman in travail and a certain apparent abandonment, like that of the orphan: tears and lamentation, while the world parades its gloating satisfaction. But the disciples’ sadness, which is according to God and not according to the world, will be promptly changed into a spiritual joy that no one will be able to take away from them.
I remember the buying of my "Anatomy of Melancholy" (that I have never read, nor ever mean to—I dare not risk the sweetness of the title); two big beautiful volumes, with a paper label on the back of each, they stood imperious on the shelves.
