Several months ago, I got Rhett Miller's The Interpreter: Live at Largo. It's an album of him covering a bunch of songs that probably are particular favorites of his. The recording is live, so you get a bit of concert banter introducing some of the songs. I have no idea what Largo is/was, but based on the banter, it sounds like this sort of performance was typical: established musicians performing covers.
What I find interesting about it, apart from Rhett's gorgeous, lovely voice, is the songs that he chose. I had no idea, until I listened to it, that he's a Bowie fan. (Recently, he wrote a piece in Salon in which he explains to his children why Bowie's Hunky Dory is a great album: Trust me on this: David Bowie's "Hunky Dory") The Bowie song he covers is "The Bewlay Brothers" and, having never heard it before, I assumed it was a Dan Bejar song. Rhett also performs songs written by Tom Petty, Elliott Smith, Elvis Costello, The Pixies, The Ramones, Roddy Frame, The Beatles, Dylan, and Robyn Hitchcock.
I will forever be grateful to Rhett Miller for this album because it introduced me to the song "California Stars." This is a song that was on Mermaid Avenue, a collaboration (of sorts) among Wilco, Billy Bragg, and Woody Guthrie. Apparently, Guthrie left behind many lyrics without music and Wilco and Bragg put them to music. "California Stars" is simply beautiful and, even though I am a mild fan of Wilco and I loved Billy Bragg's Talking With the Taxman About Poetry, I probably wouldn't ever have heard it if it weren't for Rhett Miller. Thank you, Rhett!
I was surprised to hear him say, in his intro to "Waterloo Sunset," that it was "the greatest song ever written by a human being." It is a great song, but I wouldn't call it the greatest song ever written.
This got me wondering what song I would call the greatest song. This is really such an impossible and pointless exercise that I must try it. Here is a list of contenders, in no particular order:
- "Every Line of a Long Moment"
- "God Only Knows"
- "Caribbean Wind"
- "Thunder Road" (I do love a big gesture.)
- "The Whole of the Moon"
- "Care of Cell 44"
- "A Fond Farewell"
- "Wild Horses" (I prefer the version by The Flying Burrito Brothers.)
- "Walk Away Renee"
- "The Bleeding Heart Show"
- "Freeze the Saints"
- "Thousands Are Sailing"
I attended a pen show in Apex, NC earlier this month. It was a bit of a letdown because I had built it up so much in my mind. I have a tendency to do this. When I'm enthusiastic about something (and, especially when there isn't much that I'm enthusiastic about at the time, like now), I tend to obsess about it and put so much weight on it that it can never live up to my expectations. It might sound strange to feel that way about a pen show, but live and let live, already!
One of the reasons that I was a bit disappointed was because there wasn't much there for someone who knows little about antique pens. Most of the displays/vendors were antique pen collectors/dealers and, although I have always found antique pen collectors to be more than willing to explain things to me, I was hoping for a few more opportunities to see new pens. I particularly wanted to see the new Parker Ingenuity line, which uses "Parker 5th technology." They're not fountain pens. They're not ballpoints. They're not roller ball pens. I'm intrigued.
Anyway, I did find a few things that I am enjoying using these days. I bought a pen from a company called TWSBI.
I hadn't heard of them before, but the pen writes very nicely and looks great. It has a broad nib, which may become my new favorite nib size. I have always gone with the fine or extra-fine nib on my fountain pens, but I'm really enjoying the way this broad nib writes. I also got several new inks, which is always delightful. The J. Herbin 1670 Anniversary ink is a beautiful shade of red.
I also now have a bottle of J. Herbin ink in Rose Cyclamen, which is a lovely shade of pinky-purple. It's the ink I am currently using most.
One of the more interesting shades I have is Pelikan's Edelstein ink in Jade.
I've never had a bottled green ink before, although I've had many items in the shade of bottle green. This, however, is not bottle green. It's a lighter green with some gray or ashy tones to it. It's kind of liberating. It's a nice color and I'm impressed by the quality of colors in the Edelstein line.
Perhaps the best part of the whole pen show weekend, though, was discovering Office Supplies & More in Chapel Hill. What a treasure this place is! So many pens!!! So many notebooks!!! It is exactly the kind of store I could spend a lot of time and money in. Why aren't there more of them?
Yesterday, I despaired for the future my country. Although it was what I had expected, I was very sad that Scott Walker won his recall fight and will be the Governor of Wisconsin for the remainder of his term. People voted for him in spite of his questionable (to put it mildly) testimony to Congress and in spite of (perhaps because of?) his vicious attacks on the rights of public employees. I despaired for the future of all of us who are not among the very wealthy, all of us who need our jobs not just for the pay, but also for the health insurance. And I was amazed at the utter lack of imagination among so many of the voters of Wisconsin.
"Why a lack of imagination?" you may ask. Because it shows a serious lack of imagination to vote to keep someone who, as soon as he had the power, immediately stripped away the rights that had been won through hard experience, the rights that were, in fact, protecting the rights of ALL of Wisconsin's workers, regardless of whether they belonged to unions. Do the people who voted for Walker really believe that their jobs are safe as long as he is in office? Do they really think that he won't want to take away other workers' rights? Do they actually believe that their lives will be better now?
The truth is that workers with rights are what keep our economy going. Walker talks a lot about how good for Wisconsin's economy his policies are, but where will Wisconsin's economy be in, say, 5 years? Our national economy relies on consumers, primarily middle-class consumers, with disposable income. How many of those consumers will be left after a few more years of Scott Walker? Now that public employees can no longer bargain collectively and he's made it so hard for their unions to work for them, we're going to see their pay and benefits dropping, which will mean they will have significantly less disposable income. There will be, to quote a famous Republican, a "trickle-down effect" throughout the economy of Wisconsin. Stores will close. Companies will downsize. The few manufacturers who remain will relocate their businesses. People will lose jobs.
Yesterday, I imagined similar scenarios playing out in other states over the next few years, with similar outcomes. I saw short-sighted voters all over the country electing people who would take away collective bargaining rights, would cut funding to schools, would cut the few remaining public programs that help those in need, and would increase tax breaks for corporations and wealthy individuals. The social-class divisions that exist today are nothing compared to what we could be living in just a few years from now.
And why would people vote for the politicians who would enact such harmful policies? I suspect that much of it boils down to the attitude of, "If I don't have a union representing me, why should you? If I don't have good health insurance, why should you? If the people in my profession can't bargain collectively, why should anyone else have that right?" But maybe that's just cynicism on my part. I confess that I am feeling exceptionally cynical right now.
I find it amazing, although I probably shouldn't, that so many people are absolutely convinced of things in spite of evidence to the contrary. Let me give you an example -- people all over the US have expressed the belief that our public schools are failing and are in crisis. They say that the evidence in support of this belief is that students in the US do not score at the top of the heap on international tests. They continue to say that our country is in danger because our students aren't number one in the world on these tests and they say that our students are performing worse now than in the past.
They continue to believe this even though the data from the National Center for Education Statistics show that our scores on international tests have never been at the top, and in spite of the fact that our scores have improved each time our students have been tested. Let me state that again: our scores get better each time our students are tested. Our students are performing better on international tests now than they have ever performed.
Here's another statistic: the number of Americans with some college education has increased from 10% in 1940 to 56% today. Again, we aren't number one in the world in terms of college degrees obtained. But this hasn't hurt our GDP. It is still well above China and Japan, the next closest countries.
So, I'm appalled that so many people still argue that our schools are failing and that these failing schools will hurt our economy and make us less competitive. Where is the data?
I'm particularly struck by this when I think about the assumptions of people like Columbus when they set off to explore. Columbus and his backers were certain they would find lots of gold when they landed. Some European explorers were so certain they would find gold that they forced the natives to work in mines that failed, over and over again. And what about the US invasion of Iraq, which American leaders said was necessary because the Iraqi government had weapons of mass destruction and American lives were at risk? Where was the evidence of that? Plenty of people at the time expressed doubts, but more people wanted to listen to those saying we had to invade. Tragic.
I guess it's not news that people can be misled, quite easily, when someone speaks with authority. It's depressing, though, that humans haven't learned to demand evidence.
I spent a wonderful afternoon last Sunday, sitting on my porch in my new rocking chair, reading and listening to the birds. It was so quiet on my street and the weather was perfect -- not too hot and not too cold, with a light breeze. I really love hearing birds singing. It's another of my sonic thrills.
Sounds are a very important part of my life. It's not surprising, then, that I have become a huge fan of audiobooks in the past ten years. I like listening to books because I can do other things while I listen to them (multitasking is my whole life, it seems) and because I get to hear good books while relaxing. However, not just any audiobook will do. I find that I can really only listen to fiction. I prefer to read nonfiction. I also find that certain narrators are absolutely unlistenable to me. I have some very specific preferences.
- In general, I prefer women narrators. However, their voices cannot be too high and I really prefer that they not have upper-class English accents. Unless, of course, we're talking about Rosamund Pike.
- Regarding male narrators, I prefer voices that show some energy. I can't stand Dick Hill as a narrator. Does it get any more stagnant than his narration? Not possible. Oh, and who calls himself "Dick"?????
- If I'm listening to a novel that takes place in Scotland or Ireland or England, the narrator's accent should be Scottish or Irish or English. Why does Samuel Gillies or Joe Dunlop or Michael Page narrate books by Ian Rankin, which take place in Scotland? I prefer James MacPherson when I'm listening to Rankin. And I'm so grateful for Gerard Doyle, who narrates Adrian McKinty's books, which take place in Northern Ireland. I feel like I'm there when I listen to him.
There are certain words that I love strictly because of how they sound. These are usually words that start with an 'm' or a 'p'. If both of those letters are in the word, it's probably one of my favorite words. For example, I like the words:
- pimento
- pipit
- pippin (to be fair, I also like this word because of Scottie Pippen)
- mercurial
- madcap
- maharaja
- mineral
- memento mori
- prism
Also, my favorite town name is Mineral Point. It's a town in Wisconsin. I visited it once and didn't find it particularly charming, but I love the way it sounds. Mineral Point. It's a beautiful name.
I am an advocate against going paperless. Not that I don't love technology; on the contrary, I am a gadget fiend. But I also love actual paper, print, and writing by hand. I have used iBooks for some reading, but I still prefer holding an actual book in my hands, turning the pages, flipping around, and reading in bed without worrying about breaking a device. I also like magazines. Again, it's about holding the magazine in my hands, flipping pages, and not worrying about breaking anything.
Perhaps one of the things I love most about books and magazines is browsing in a book store. Sadly, there aren't any bookstores that are less than an hour's drive from my house, but I'm willing to put in the driving time. Even more sadly, driving an hour only gets me to a Barnes & Noble. To get to a really good bookstore, it's a much further drive. I can, however, get to a pretty good pen store in about an hour.
I collect fountain pens. This may seem pretentious, but allow me to explain. I've always loved writing, both the physical act of writing and the intellectual pursuit of writing. The things I've loved about the physical act of writing have been finding new and interesting writing instruments and using them on different kinds of paper. My father mostly used fountain pens when I was a child. He thought he was state-of-the-art because he used cartridges. I never really thought about fountain pens, myself, until one day when I was in a drug store when I was about 19 years old. I came across the Varsity, a disposable fountain pen by Pilot. I bought it and loved it. I loved the way the ink flowed out of the pen and how the nib looked as I wrote.
Unfortunately, at that time I couldn't afford any high-quality fountain pens. And, since I was going into teaching, it was many more years before I could afford to buy one of my own. Eventually, though, I got a Waterman Hemisphere and a Parker Sonnet. These were my first 2 real (non-disposable) fountain pens. I went on to buy many more and I now have a nice little collection. My current favorite is my Pelikan Souveran 215, although I still use my Hemisphere very regularly. I don't have any antique fountain pens, which is what the "real" collectors love, but I'm quite happy with my pens.
Of course, as soon as I got my own fountain pens, I had to look into inks. This is where things got really interesting. I started by getting a bottle of ink from Levenger, Cobalt Blue. Then, of course, I had to get some cartridges, since most of my pens take cartridges as well as bottled ink. When surfing the internet, I came across Private Reserve Ink, which has a great selection of ink colors. My favorite of theirs is DC Supershow Blue. But my favorite ink company is, without question, Noodler's Ink.
Noodler's has a fantastic selection of colors, and it also has some truly inspired names for them. Currently, I have Dragon Napalm (a bright orangey red, kind of like mercurochrome), Baystate Blue, Navajo Turquoise, Concord Bream (a pale, grayish lilac), and Polar Blue. Next, I plan to get Nikita (a bright red), Eel Cactus (magenta), and Bad Blue Heron.
Last week, I visited family and friends in the greater Chicago area. Already, I am imagining that I can hear those who live in the actual city of Chicago groaning. People who live in Chicago proper sometimes have attitude about those who live in the suburbs. OK, so I was raised in the suburbs. What's the big deal? Anyway, while there, I ventured into Chicago, itself, in order to visit the Art Institute. I have several favorites there, such as Beata Beatrix by Rossetti, and The Old Guitarist by Picasso. But my favorite gallery within the Art Institute has always been the Paperweight Gallery. You can imagine my disappointment, then, when I entered the gallery only to find that many of the paperweights were not on display. Later, I learned that the Art Institute was considering getting rid of them.
[Insert melodramatic scream of "Nooooooooooooo!" while on knees and shaking fists at sky.]
The collection of paperweights at the Art Institute is one of the best in the world. When I lived in the Midwest, I was fortunate to be near two of the best paperweight collections -- the collection at the Art Institute of Chicago and the Bergstrom-Mahler Museum in Neenah, Wisconsin. I can't explain what I find so beautiful about glass paperweights, except to say that I've always liked very small things. Within the beautiful millefiori antique paperweights are very small "canes" and there are often letters or dates to be found on them. I could spend hours looking at collections of antique paperweights because there is so much to see within these little worlds. This is what attracted me to Hello Kitty and Little Twin Stars when I was 10 years old. Everything was so tiny! Of course, now the Sanrio company makes normally-sized things with Hello Kitty on them, too many things, in fact. And, it's very hard to find anything with Little Twin Stars. But, I digress.
Oddly, I do not enjoy the Thorne Miniature Rooms Gallery, which is quite near the Paperweight Gallery. I find the miniature rooms to be stifling. I really don't enjoy entire rooms of antique decor, whether miniature or full sized. I like individual pieces of antique furnishings, but not entire rooms. So, a gallery of 68 miniature rooms of antique decor overwhelms me.
The depleted paperweight display was not my only disappointment on my visit to Chicago. I also saw one of the most hideous things I've ever seen. On Michigan Avenue, there is a monstrously large, full-color statue of Marilyn Monroe, Forever Marilyn by Seward Johnson. It's been there for almost a year and it's the ugliest piece of public art in the world. OK, that might be an overstatement, but come on! I'm a big fan of public art and I also love pop culture, but this statue is just an eyesore.
Throughout Chicago, you can find public art by Picasso, Oldenburg, Chagall, Miro, Dubuffet, and Calder, among many others. The architecture in Chicago is also breathtaking, with buildings designed by Henry Hobson Richardson, Louis Sullivan, Frank Lloyd Wright, and Mies van der Rohe, among many others. In this setting, the statue of Marilyn Monroe is just an insult. I'm just grateful that it isn't going to be a permanent installation. It's supposed to leave sometime soon.
