Monday, October 2
anyway let's see if i can whip up a something here about my life more quickly, and get to bed sometime decent.
recent days have been characterized by a resurgence of Interest (translates to interestedness?) in, mostly, Things. specifically, in an intellectual vein. beginning not with ModEpic (TolsJoyCiamarquez?) last wednesday, tho that was okay, but more so immediately afterwards, having dinner with hannah and hearing about her anthro woes and doing some more theory talk, trying to remember things from the culture concept. (also, we excavated a frozen glowing wooly mammoth from the 2nd mile, and made an apple crisp by heavily doctoring a recipe from her chef this summer, at the ranch in montana.)
i stayed up late - must have been that night - re(re)ading my (undergraduate) (thesis), in prep. for the rousseau jungles exhibit, resavoring the savory salience (hey, remember this?) what i mean is i really like that paper; i loved writing it, and i think the ideas in it are swell. i note that maybe the most interesting of the things i was doing though were not so much art history as history and theory that happen to do with an artist. which is maybe the point.
though there was the night i stayed up reading about free jazz and temporarily convincing myself i ought to get a lot of alice coltrane and pharoah sanders records. or something.
can i say something coherent about thursday? i remember thinking "gee, what a lovely day this has been, and i haven't even seen the mountain goats yet..." chief of the lovelies was happening on the national portrait gallery and perusing the collection, mostly the 19th century stuff (including a whole series of matthew brady studio cartes de visite) whilst listening to bill frisell's album of american portraits, have a little faith. some moments, regarding wistfully heroic antebellum shakers and reformers - john brown, wm lloyd garrison, henry clay - and hearing the unbearably poignant titular hiatt cover, nearly induce tears, the conmingled swells of glinting admiration, all-too-human pathos, hopeful self-recognition, historic irony; nostalgic complicated patriotism.
another point: i acquired four (4) books while i was in d.c., and no cds. i bought the rousseau exh. catalog, which i'm quite curious to read the essays in. (i approved of the theoretical slant of the walltext in the exhibit itself, though there wasn't much of it; i didn't get the audioguide, though i did watch the abbreviated, kevin-kline-narrated accompanying doc. the bookstore had several other recent rousseau monographs, which either postdated my thesis or otherwise eluded me. i want to know if anybody has unwittingly duplicated my interpretive and art historical detective work or vice versa.)
later on, i picked up baker's the mezzanine and a grapes of wrath at a used book store (the latter largely because of its brilliant lime green cover), and sarah pawned off a copy of in cold blood on me. so lots to look forward to, as if i wasn't about to embark on another ulyssey - besides which i'd be corked to read some antebellum history or maybe even merleau-ponty(?) (anyway, i think the larger message is that there's no decent record shopping in d.c.)
other capital interludes (no more need be mentioned about the weekend's concertgoing) included watching the curse of the were-rabbit (and, nearly as exciting, renting it), playing srcabble with src and "hi hi cherry-o!" with ella, a pre-kol nidre walk in the woods with jedd, and sallying forth with heidi(+)rob to ye rennaissance fest. bagpipes, archery, jousting, glassblowing, a midsummer night's dream, henry viii betwixt wives, flower garland circlets and drinking horns worn at the hip, and all manner of food on sticks and/or deep-fried (not the soup though, that was in bowls made of bread.) eh, what do you want? jolly goode fun. n.b. if you're a good rock climber, you could effectively get free admission by winning $25 (-$8 to try = $17 ticket price) for climbing the castle tower (involves a considerable overhang.)
ok, lemme go get my laundry now and venture out into the world.
oh p.s. on the bus back sunday nite i listened to robyn and paris and come and get it (not called rachel but it could be) - guess what kind of mood i was in! - and thought about the lyrics rather more concertedly than i'd done, and i shall have some things to say about that at some point.
you could have found out i might have been the girl of your dreams