The joy of having tried

We are already quite good at creating many things we want in our lives, but have we achieved the diversity of friends and associates that we want? I don’t think so. What stands in our way? There is nothing wrong with comfort and contentment. In fact, I am a fan of both. There is a…

How relevant intent?

Labor is blossoming or dancing where The body is not bruised to pleasure soul, Nor beauty born out of its own despair, Nor blear-eyed wisdom out of midnight oil. O chestnut-tree, great-rooted blossomer, Are you the leaf, the blossom or the bole? O body swayed to music, O brightening glance, How can we know the…

We can see his junk

The revolutionary eats and sleeps the revolution, the grand cleansing moment when a new order will triumph, and then, once it has happened, he finds himself wandering among corpses and ruins. — Siri Hustvedt, Living, Thinking, Looking These past weeks, particularly this week, news in the US has been directed toward unrest in Baltimore and…

That spirited work

Grief, after all, is desire for the dead or for what’s been lost and can never come again. Grief is longing. This was stasis without fulfillment. This was the world stopped, meaning extinguished. – Siri Hustvedt, Living, Thinking, Looking More than a dozen years ago, Paul and I were in a serious train wreck with…

Community can happen

Desire is the engine of life, the yearning that goads us forward with stops along the way, but it has no destination, no final stop, except death. – Siri Hustvedt, Living, Thinking, Looking This week I am writing with Martha, Rose, Gail, David, and Julio in mind. My weekend was filled with them, filled before they…

Written in the air of a room

Every book is for someone. The act of writing may be solitary, but it is always a reach toward another person – a single person – since every book is read alone. The writer does not know for whom she writes. The reader’s face is invisible, and yet, every sentence inscribed on a page represents…

Ideas that are big enough

My essays are a form of mind travel, of walking toward answers with an acute awareness that I will never come to the end of the road. I use my own experiences the way I use the experiences of others – as insights to further an idea. – Siri Hustvedt, Living, Thinking, Looking, 2014 This…

Paddle like hell

X-Ray technicians Yard conductors Yard hostlers Yard loader operators Yeast makers Yellow pages space salespersons Yoga instructors Yoga teachers Youth program directors Youth services librarians Youth workers Zoning engineers Zookeepers Zoologists and wildlife biologists Zoologists Zoology professors S. Department of Labor, Occupational Outlook Handbook At the end of day, there is still work to be…

Hard work for a common goal

Dance artists Dance costume designers Dance directors Dance masters Dancers and choreographers Database administration manager Database administrators Database coordinator Database developers Database management system specialist Database security administrator Data operations director Data processing equipment repairers Data processing managers Data processing systems analyst Daycare aides Day care attendants Daycare providers Day care workers DBMS specialist Deboners…