1) So yesterday one of the best things happened of the entire month. It is so exceedingly rare for family to get to Boston, but yesteday my sister’s niece and her husband suddenly appeared! They were visiting a friend newly moved to Boston, and the four of us spent a fantastic at the MFA gorging on first lunch and then art.
1a) I wish more family would make their way to New England . . .
2) At the other end of the spectrum, I am going to have to have a Difficult Conversation with someone (no, it’s not you, calm down! :-) ) and have been cogitating how best to handle it. I put out an appeal for Divine Guidance this morning, and I got it in the last chapter of a book I don’t turn to daily on my devotional rack: A Book of Courtesy: The Art of Living With Yourself and Others, by Sister Mary Mercedes, O.P. “Never make another person appear ridiculous or injure his feelings,” she wrote in the very last chapter. I feel more comfortable being able to approach this conversation with this guideline.
3) The theme of Etiquetteer’s Repeal Day party at the Gibson House this year was their celebrity cousin Edith Russell, who married Sir Lyon Playfair and became a London political hostess. How wonderful to happen upon her portrait by Sargent at the MFA yesterday.
