Monday, September 27, 2010
A change of pace
Every time I consider writing here lately, I turn away and do something more literal instead. Go off and paint or draw outside. Make soup. Lug wood. Write in my journal with a fountain pen. Move stacks of books around in the book room. Move stacks of paintings around in the painting room. Invite a friend over. Toss toy mice around with the cat. Real life is particularly sweet at this moment and I think, yes, I will continue to post here from time to time, but after nearly five years I find myself winding down and so will keep posts shorter and simpler than in the past. In fact, much more like what I began doing in the first place, before I apparently tried to write my life story. There are so many good book blogs now, discussing so many great books old and new (and don't get me started on the art blogs), we could do nothing but read and try to keep caught up, all day long. And miss what's happening away from the small glowing screen.
So in the spirit of my more streamlined posts of the future, as I imagine them, a new favorite quote from what I thought was a cookery book when I began reading it, but what turned out to be about everything, as all good books are, Honey from a Weed: Fasting and Feasting in Tuscany, Catalonia, the Cyclades, and Apulia by Patience Gray (Harper 1987):
"...I was reading the landscape and its flora with as much attention as one gives to an absorbing book." (p.189)
That speaks to me as a painter, walker, gardener, reader, and I could go on and on - this book has wonderful sections on foraging, antiquarian booksellers, fishermen, anarchy, sculpture, and oh, glorious food - but perhaps it's enough just to mention these things, and move on.
So in the spirit of my more streamlined posts of the future, as I imagine them, a new favorite quote from what I thought was a cookery book when I began reading it, but what turned out to be about everything, as all good books are, Honey from a Weed: Fasting and Feasting in Tuscany, Catalonia, the Cyclades, and Apulia by Patience Gray (Harper 1987):
"...I was reading the landscape and its flora with as much attention as one gives to an absorbing book." (p.189)
That speaks to me as a painter, walker, gardener, reader, and I could go on and on - this book has wonderful sections on foraging, antiquarian booksellers, fishermen, anarchy, sculpture, and oh, glorious food - but perhaps it's enough just to mention these things, and move on.
