Intersecting at Stoppard

Tom Stoppard died this week. I've been in awe of his work since I was an undergraduate, maybe even before I actually ever read his work, simply from the sheer audacity of the premise of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. The more I knew, the more there was to love. Later, he fed my theory that writers who come to a language late as foreigners (like Conrad, Rushdie, Nabokov, Brodsky, Stoppard) write so precisely, because they have some additional intuitive insight into language. Much later, I learned of his deep connections to India as it played out in Arcadia and Indian Ink.  (In the linked article here, I was charmed to see a reference to Hermione Lee a much beloved professor and the president of my college at Oxford.)

And it turns out that theater is life. 

In a literal sense. 

In a letter to the Times of London, in response to Stoppard's obituary, Michael Baum, a Professor emeritus of surgery, wrote: "In 1993 my wife and I went to see the first production of Arcadia by Tom Stoppard and in the interval I experienced a Damascene conversion. As a clinical scientist I was trying to understand the enigma of the behaviour of breast cancer, the assumption being that it grew in a linear trajectory spitting off metastases on its way. In the first act of Arcadia, Thomasina asks her tutor, Septimus: "If there is an equation for a curve like a bell, there must be an equation for one like a bluebell, and if a bluebell, why not a rose?" With that Stoppard explains chaos theory, which better explains the behaviour of breast cancer. At the point of diagnosis, the cancer must have already scattered cancer cells into the circulation that nest latent in distant organs. The consequence of that hypothesis was the birth of adjuvant systemic chemotherapy and rapidly we saw a striking fall of the curve that illustrated patients' survival. Stoppard never learnt how many lives he saved by writing Arcadia."

[As it turns out, I wrote a letter to the editor myself this week trying to reach David Shulman. I actually met David in the late 1990s at Hebrew University in Jerusalem. I was with a group of people at IAS and heard someone say "Tamil Pessalama?" (Shall we speak Tamil?). I turned around expecting to see a Tamil person (the intonation and accent were so perfect), but here was this genial white guy. David is a genius (a MacArthur Genius even!) and works on poets I revere. But more recently and importantly, he's been a lifeline for me with his tireless work and compassionate voice for Palestine. I wrote a note thanking him and sent it to him at his university email address, but it was deemed undeliverable. So I then sent it to the letters editor at NYRB where he has written most recently with an earnest request to forward it... and they must have! Because this morning, I received a lovely email from David that brought tears to my eyes. (I wonder how much of my letter writing is due to reading The Correspondent!)]

Pic: Michael Baum's Letter in The Times. All the deaths since mom's seem extra poignant--Andrea Gibson, Robert Redford, Diane Keaton, Alice Wong, Dharmendra, Jimmy Cliff--I'm seeing them all through her connections to them too.

some noes

I would have been miserable as a lawyer. I had to do lawyer-like things today in my role as a CASA and also in my role as a Title IX advisor on campus, and while they were necessary things, I felt quite unhappy doing them. It reminded me a bit of what our realtor JS said. He used to be a cop and said he liked being a realtor because when he was a cop, 90% of his interactions with people were negative and as a realtor, it was the inverse. 

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I had a good time at the thrift store (I found some great copies of some fairly recent books) but somehow managed to forget the one thing I actually went in there for... an old lampshade I plan to use as a collar for our Christmas tree.

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Speaking of which, no--our tree isn't up. I took Thanksgiving down just this past weekend, and I like a little palate cleanser... all the better to savor Christmas decorations. (Also, the kids won't be here until mid December, which is when the tree will come up from the basement. Hallelujah.)

Pic: I kind of did decorate for Thanksgiving! (And didn't do *anything* for Halloween.)

beyond thankful

Today is At's Boss Day.  

And it made her so happy to hear that Big A's favorite photo from Thanksgiving was this one of At on the sofa with the puppies, because it is so reminiscent of that whole genre of paintings from the 19th century, where women are reclining luxuriously on sofas while reading with pets--except this one is updated for the 21st century by At reading on her phone.

I mean... it's nice, I suppose, to be compared to a fancy lady in a painting... But also, while Big A's love was never in question, he used to brag a lot about "my boy" and found At's transition tough, so this compliment meant a lot to At.

And a shoutout to whatever art appreciation course Big A took in college. Some of it may come from his artist grandparents and mom, but his art references frequently have me looking stuff up.
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ALSO, THANK YOU FOR READING!! It's going to take me a minute to get through the comments...

in the aftermath the answer is yes

It is hard to look at me

for I am your museum

and also your miracle

to reflect your starlight  

so my heart stays home

embarrassed by sadness

I rise and fall on wings that

may be pages and they may

take me away to forgetting

I can see the road right here

how it gets there--connects

--without touching a thing 

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Pic: The aftermath of yesterday's winter storm.

time zones

another day rolls over 

into tomorrow

I wake, roll over in bed 

reach for my phone

                                            wondering if my mother 

                                             texted me in the night--

                                             it happens a lot as we're

                                             in different time zones 

                                             

then the screen flickers    

my brain reboots

and the past three months

come charging back

                                             and I... remember why 

                                             she doesn't text

                                             and why she can't call

                                             still most days 

I will catch myself 

"saving things" 

for our nightly chats 

although she died 

                                            nearly three months ago...

                                            but when I listen  

                                            to her old voicemails

                                            her voice starlit

gathering warmth and love

I wonder what if 

what if

what if

the past is just another kind 

of time zone

__________________

Pic: Nu's pic of me, Max, and Huck napping. I guess I'm happy when I'm asleep? I love how Max sticks his tongue out when he's happy. (The plates of half-eaten food everywhere are Nu's thing while they're home on Thanksgiving break.)

ruh-roh! I have a broken toe

I mean I knew, but now it's official. I have a broken toe. 

Except now it's being taken seriously and I have an appointment with a podiatrist and a boot. The boot is cumbersome, but it compresses the top of my foot and that feels so good. It would have been seriously helpful if I had gotten it two weeks ago when my foot was all swollen, puffy, and about thrice as painful. Well, now I know better.  

The nurse practitioner has prescribed me some pain medications to pick up at the pharmacy. I didn't tell her I did not even take OTC pain meds all this while.

I'm usually pretty wimpy with discomfort and pain. But at this point, the physical pain seems merely a distant echo of the psychic pain. 

Pic: My photo of the x-ray. My foot looks so weird!

field notes

I wear echoes

ragged through the city

when we talk

I talk only of childhood

I dream we dig

as if we know this earth 

and can't say why 

I wait to be turned back

they're all saying 

that leaving is necessary

they don't know 

I will never say goodbye 

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Pic: Red Cedar yesterday with Big A. At the start of our walk, it was tough getting my taped-up right foot into my sneaker. That made A say we should go to Urgent Care instead of on a walk, but I really needed a walk for my wellbeing. If my foot's broken, it has already been broken for over ten days, so what would another day matter anyway?

post Friendsgiving post

While I was puttering around, putting things away after dinner, I found these three (At, Huck, and Max) all cozied up...

At told me she's moving to Chicago at the end of year. 

"At the end of the year," so there's some time, I thought. Before realizing that it's already the end of November. 

I'm happy for her as she's outgrown Lansing. And she was supposed to move to Seattle this year before all the tragedies happened. And Chicago is much closer. But it will mean that our impromptu trips and hangs are numbered.

Nu who was napping elsewhere when I took this pic watched the Lilith Fair documentary with me. I watched it earlier this month and LOVED IT SO MUCH. I laughed, I cried, I goosebumped up, I texted people about it, I was inspired... When I say something is feminist, this is what I want it to mean--not merely that it's women-centered, but that it is anti-patriarchal. That it is about people who support each other, that they offer opportunities to groups who are typically shut out, that they make childcare and family healthcare available, that they listen to critique (for instance, that black women artists are underrepresented) without getting defensive and work to fix it, that there is confidence being in such a space that racists and homophobes are unwelcome. 

Nu and I were looking at each other all starry-eyed, wishing we could go to one...

T for Thanksgiving!

I like how our additional table (build a longer table is my guiding motto), turns our seating into a T for Thanksgiving!

(Although I want to call it Friendsgiving or Thanksloving or something else entirely to avoid celebrating colonial narrative... even as I acknowledge the aspect of gratitude... anyway...)

somehow...

we're doing Friendsgiving at our place...

Friends are coming over armed with support and food and we'll have some international students too...

But that doesn't mean I don't feel the need to prep our standard menu. It has actually proved to be a good distraction.

The family menu has been fixed for... IDK... the last ten or so years? But this year, I added icons to remind myself of what could be bought/prepped before the day, and it has been a life-changer!

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Pic: The kitchen is crowded and cluttered in the lead up the big feast and I'm kinda... happy?

scary (probably toxic)

Now that a winter storm is approaching, I am regretting my choices to mope my way through the four days in Puerto Rico with no trips to the beach or the old city... Could I not even have opened the balcony door and spent a few hours soaking in the sun?

Why the heck was I so determined to be as miserable as possible?

Also, why do I keep listening to my mom's old voicemails. My sister asked me if I found it comforting or sad... And it hits differently at different times...

Possibly the worst thing I'm doing to myself is lurking on my mom's sibling group chat. I got added for updates when my mom was in the hospital, and people have forgotten I'm in there. Now when her four remaining sibs are making plans and carrying on about their lives without her, I feel so bad/sad/mad... I should just leave, but feel like that's another connection I'll lose.

Pic: The island-flavored picture I took of Puerto Rico IN THE AIRPORT.

among my more mundane considerations

One of the weirder things I've caught myself thinking is that now that I have my my mom's picture on the altar in addition to Scout's picture, my Baldwin votary, and all the Hindu, Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Pagan, and other spiritual paraphernalia I have going on...

no one else better die because 

I have no more room on the altar.

the lay of the land

like another woman
but for a very different reason

I tell you to lie back and think of England

you should go to sleep

I really have to go to sleep 
I have an early morning class, I have an early morning meeting, I have to wake up super early

so leave me be 
and just go to sleep
lie back think of England

that'll be terrifically bland 

and boring enough to be soporific 

think of Charles, I say. Think of Queen Elizabeth, think of Queen Elizabeth's purse

empty friend

try not to touch

this narrow secret

where turning informer

I learn the limits

of contagious history

the cold, lucid account

that decides if you

are calling for someone 

or just... crying  for them 

_____________________

Pic: Max and Huck eye the treat jar and contemplate ringing the bell for service.