Thursday Midday, April 4

1) Back in the 1980s I read both The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged for my father, and I hope I never have to read them again. I say this in spite of Ayn Rand’s beautiful descriptive prose, which is often swamped by her dogma*. This morning, reading this article about Guns Down America grading American banks on their dealings with the gun industry reminded me of the lesson of Ellsworth Toohy in the former novel. He advised whichever young architect it was who wasn’t Howard Roark just to get out there and create one’s own structure. About one third through the novel this little nothing architectural group started making statements about issues in the public eye. By the end of the novel that little upstart group was the dominant force in the industry. And that’s just what Guns Down America is doing.

2) The horoscope indicated that this is a day for diplomacy, and it certainly is.

3) Remembering my first trip to Versailles in 2008: my initial disappointment seeing the front of the palace clogged with tour buses and scaffolding, the special exhibition of Jeff Koons sculptures all over the place, the crowds, the beauty, lunch in the old boathouse, bicycling around the canal. How can that have been ten years ago?!

*Her opening of The Fountainhead describing naked Howard Roark diving from a rocky cliff and swimming across a lake . . . I don’t remember the words, but I remember the impact they had on a closeted twentysomething. Twwwwaaaaaannnnnnngggg!

Thursday Morning, April 4

1) Yesterday my wonderful sister supervised the move-out of my things from our parents’ home; their journey to Boston has begun, and I had better be ready!

1a) How fortunate that I’m now able to give away furniture that has been given to me over the last 35 years. The cedar chest from a redecorating tenant at ye Vyndyme in college, the pine nightstand someone left behind in the foyer on Beacon Street, the beautiful cherry coffee table from ye Hyrtwood from a redecorating friend - these and my pine bookcases are all being received gladly by my upstairs neighbors, who are themselves moving.

2) Yoga last night at the home of friends. I really needed that.

3) They taught me that if you open the Bible at the middle it’ll automatically come to Psalms. Surprise! Mother’s Lamsa Bible opens to Job 17, and how’s this for a morning wakeup call, verse 4: “For thou hast hid their heart from understanding; therefore they shall exalt themselves in their deception.”

Tuesday Evening, April 2

1) I must direct you all to read my dear friend Paul Fallon’s blog post “First Kiss Girl/First Kiss Boy.” It’s just wonderful.

2) To be honest, I have just had it. Really, all I want to do is sleep. But, in the words of the late Boris Lermontov, “That great pleasure must be denied me.”

3) ONE reason I’ve just had it is (surprise!) my beautiful new yPhone. Today I actually dropped it (the new middle-class nightmare) and permanently nicked the leather cover! Since then, the blasted thing will give off ringtones and alert tones no matter how many times I mute it. And I want a silent phone. I’m damned if it’ll be my phone going off during a meeting or a concert or something . . .argh!

Morning, April Fools Day, 2019 - Words

1) The word that came out of my dream last night was concatenation: “a group of things linked together or occurring together in a way that produces a particular result or effect.”

2) Reading the NYT on an early bus this morning, I was delighted to read about the name of the new imperial era in Japan, “reiwa,” It is “a term with multiple meanings, including ‘order and peace,’ ‘auspicious harmony’ and ‘joyful harmony,’ according to scholars quoted in the local news media.” The Japanese are all excited about it. Imagine if we Americans could get as excited about something poetic.

3) One of the word games I play with myself every once in awhile involves finding substitute verbs for “to be” and “to have.” ‘Cause let’s face it, “am,” “is,” and “have” are three of the most overused words we use.

Return to Lake Charles, Day Five: The Last Night

1) Tonight is my last night in the home of my parents. The place feels adrift with furniture out of place, things scattered on the floor, uncertainty in the air.

2) But at this point I'm so weary I will just have to be comfortable with missing something.

3) After next week (or whenever my own things are shipped out), nothing that remains here will be special any longer. They will be items without history for strangers to make their own.

4) Everything is packed as well as I can pack it - and if that isn't good enough for the movers, then I had better be prepared for heartbreak. Visions of smashed crystal and broken furniture dance in my head.

5) Should have been blogging yesterday and today, but so very much to do, so many people to see and talk to, and so much trash to take out . . . my head didn’t have the space.

6) Tomorrow morning we have to put out the trash, go out to breakfast, finish my packing, visit the cemetery one last time, and then go to the airport.

7) And then I begin the third phase of my life. The first phase ended when I completed my education and joined the workforce full time. The second phase ended now. What will the last third of my life be like? What will I make of it?

Return to Lake Charles, Day Two

Foreword: Before I begin, it must be generally understood that Mother saved everything. And while I have always encouraged that, this experience is already challenging my beliefs and making me realize how much attention my things will receive after my death.

1) Laura had a very long day yesterday, and I had a night of no sleep. I decided to get the day going about 5:30 AM - very much like Mamma, actually. She told me once she just didn’t see the point in lying around in bed if you were awake.

2) Chicory coffee and devotional in the living room. I am keeping Mother’s Bible, now bound with wide bands of clear tape and full of her pencilled marginalia. Rather than use bibliomancy, I went to a page that had been bookmarked: Proverbs 9. And verse 13 stood out to me in a way that it would not have stood out to Mother: “He who denies things falsely feeds on winds and pursues fowl of the air; for he has forsaken the way to his vineyard and the paths of his labor, to journey in the wilderness wihtout water; in the places that are trodden he travels thirsty and gains nothing.”

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3) I turned to the first page, and was surprised to see an autograph: “With God’s richest blessing. Geo. M. Lamsa Aug 1971.” My goodness, it’s the Lamsa Bible! Then August, 1971, must have been the first of our weeklong summer retreats at Unity, when I remember well that we heard George Lamsa speak and heard about his life story. I spent the rest of devotional researching ye Intyrnytte for more information about him and this controversial translation.

3a) You know the entire trip is going to be like this. An object, most likely a familiar one, will reveal something unexpected that will start a chain of memories.

4) And in fact, the entire morning was like that. Laura and I decided to start with the guest room closet. What remained inside was mostly boxes from Gramma and Uncle Bill’s house, but what came to us first was all Mother’s boxes of vacation materials. My goodness! We threw away SO many tourist brochures from all over the world, from Hawaii to Copenhagen. Postcards were saved for a friend of Laura’s. Laura kept most of the photos. Coins (Mother loved to bring back examples of local currency) were collected together.

4a) Mother saved everything, including posters from my unhappy campaigns for student council in junior high school. Laura said she found them in the attic, and one has to wonder why Mother would have brought them over here from Orchid Street. I certainly didn’t ask her to preserve them.

5) My brother-in-law showed up earlier than expected with a piece of furniture that’s coming to Boston, and he joined us for a time before getting active with lawn care. I had a bottle of top-notch bourbon for him as a thank-you gift.

6) Back in the guest room, I had two “Oh my GOD!” moments (I no longer remember in what order). In one box I found a long necktie box with a small ring box inside, and I knew instantly that these were the boxes that Daddy has used to surprise Mother with an egagement ring Christmas Eve, 1954 - and thereby announce their engagement to his family.

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7) At the top of the closet I saw a large box marked FRAGILE and I was pretty sure what it was. And I was right: it was my Mad Hatter hat that Mother made for me out of papier maché - her greatest achievement! But ALSO in the box was something I thought had been lost forever: a Mexican tin shrine to hang on the wall that I had been given in the late 1970s from cousin Delphine’s things.

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7a) Even better than those things, a small white jewelry box yielded a cherished memento I thought, too, was lost forever. Along with my wisdom teeth and a glass suncatcher rested a green-tinted ivory snuff bottle. That little bottle was given to me by Miss Emma, a very elderly lady to whom I was very devoted in my early teens. Miss Emma, the strongest pillar of cultural Lake Charles and a friend and neighbor of Gramma, she gave me that little bottle the day she moved to the nursing home in Texas. I was the only one who came to say goodbye when they drove off in the ambulance, and I remember flopping down in a big armchair and crying the rest of the morning. And now this memento is restored to me.

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8) We found a WWI photo of Grampa Dimmick neither of us had seen before. No wonder Granny knew she’d marry him as soon as she saw him walking up the walk at the home of whoever it was she was visiting in Opelousas.

9) Laura and I broke for lunch at Big Daddy’s - the Doyle’s of Holly Hill - and I am here to report that they didnt have club soda or ginger ale because, as the waitress said, “We aren’t that fancy.” But they fed me some good gumbo! Thank goodness I didn’t order an Aperol spritz . . . :-)

10) After dropping off about six boxes of books in a couple places, we divided to conquer for the afternoon. Laura wrapped up crystal, and I started boxing up papers from the morning search that will come to Boston with me. So many wonderful photographs, and so much else! The engraving plates from their wedding invitation, their high school graduation invitation and programs, a lot and a lot.

10a) I know you are all saying “Robert, just torch it all!” And you know I just cannot do that, but I am not taking everything, and I am proud of the amount of stuff that is getting tossed out.

10b) But OH . . . there is so much. I have almost every one of Mother’s date books from 2014 back to at least 1971, and probably longer. These aren’t just her appointments, but a guide to what everyone in the family, friends, and church was up to, including obituary clippings, wedding announcements, and sometimes recipes. What am I going to do? If there was a Museum of the Middle Class, these would be the cornerstone documents.

11) Tony expressed interest in early dinner, and we headed off to a new place, Rikenjames, on Ryan Street, that was quite good. We were obviously beating the Friday rush! Beer and catfish for Tony, beer and steak for me.

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12) I was dropped back at home while Laura and Tony went to meet local friends. And I was able to discover a box of Mother’s college things. This included not only her diploma and three of four athletic association passes, but also a small box of everything related to Rush her freshman year - including cocktail napkins from the various functions! At last, proof that Mother’s lifelong love of napkins and making sure everyone had one began before marriage! :-) But even more fun, she’d saved all the nametags.

13) I’m gonna have to pick up my pace tomorrow, which will also include seeing Mother’s friends.

Thursday Afternoon, March 21 - En Route

1) The Economist. Fascinating as usual.

2) Late lunch at my beloved DFW Pappadeaux, Terminal A, responding to work email, researching summer vacation, and remembering that today is National Common Courtesy Day.

3) Caterwauling Baby started caterwauling on the way OUT. Good.

Tuesday Night, March 19

1) For a rarity, I left the office just before 7 PM, and in a good mood.

2) Writer’s block sometimes tastes like bourbon.

3) And for a little night music, the famous 1955 recording of my beloved sextette from Lucia di Lammermoor with Maria Callas and conducted by Herbert von Karajan - which they repeated! I have often called this a “grand machine” and the zenith of the 19th century.

Thoughts on the Admissions Bribery Scandal

1) One of Mother’s many, many sayings was “Honesty is the best policy.”

2) Quotable Quote: “Perhaps it wouldn’t sting so much . . . if we didn’t bill college as the foremost experience for young people, one that sets the tone for their entire lives.” — Rainesford Stauffer in the NYT

2a) Because let’s face it, since World War II, college has acquired the perception that it’s a required rite of passage, especially for the uppermost tax brackets. But is it, really?

2b) Reading about Olivia Jade Giannulli last night, the daughter of actress Lori Loughlin, a 19-year-old social media influencer with her own brand, first I was angry to read her being quoted saying “I don’t really care about school, as you guys all know.” And then I thought, “But of course college is the only path for the wealthy, even if they aren’t very intelligent.” And it made me think that it’s high time to legitimize the roles of debutantes (and dandies, for gender equity) in society again: idle rich young people who can be confined (I choose the word carefully) to the party circuit where they won’t bother anyone but the staff. They need an option that seems legit to keep them away from colleges where they aren’t doing anyone any good.

2c) I mean good heavens, during the Great Depression, all those screwball comedies were about the insanely wealthy doing insane things. Katharine Hepburn in Bringing Up Baby, Carole Lombard in just about anything.

2c.1) The dark side of that, of course, is Marsha Hunt’s doomed “prom trotter” in my beloved These Glamor Girls of 1939, whose only purpose in life is to date college men and go to college parties - until she’s so obviously older and more false than everyone else that she becomes the punch line.

3) This is the sort of scandal that helped start the French Revolution. Twenty-five years ago when I was actively reading Claude Manceron’s enormous five-volume Age of the French Revolution in paperback, I remember the bit about the bankruptcy of the de Guéméné family. That revealed to rest of the France just how decadent and extravagant the nobility was.