I have finished reading 'Spare', by Prince Harry the Irrelevant. It is an interesting, revelatory fast read and if you have nothing else to do, I recommend you read it.
Tuesday, February 28, 2023
Spare
Free Speech and all that Jazz
For me, it is a given that people have an inherent right to free speech and you have an equal right to be offended. Being offended is usually just a whine, an annoying, meaningless whine.
I have spent many days and weeks in Facebook jail because someone is offended by my comments. Henceforth, most of my writing will be on this blog. You will be able to comment. I will be able to tell you to fuck off. So let's get to it: How about those fucking Repugs?
Wednesday, November 24, 2021
Essays After Eighty
I am reading this little book I bought weeks ago. It is not at all threatening, even though the cover is of a very wrinkled old man, Donald Hall. In the first pages, we read of how he sits in his chair before the window, a barrier protecting him from the New Hampshire Winter, blowing cold and snowy on the other side.
When you get old you need to find books like this one, one that speaks of old age as the mind-numbing unraveling of a productive life. I find parallels here and some comfort. He is not Dylan Thomas, raging against the dying of the light. He bears witness to himself.
A quote:
“IT IS SENSIBLE of me to be aware that I will die one of these days. I will not pass away. Every day millions of people pass away—in obituaries, death notices, cards of consolation, e-mails to the corpse’s friends—but people don’t die. Sometimes they rest in peace, quit this world, go the way of all flesh, depart, give up the ghost, breathe a last breath, join their dear ones in heaven, meet their Maker, ascend to a better place, succumb surrounded by family, return to the Lord, go home, cross over, or leave this world. Whatever the fatuous phrase, death usually happens peacefully (asleep) or after a courageous struggle (cancer). Sometimes women lose their husbands. (Where the hell did I put him?) Some expressions are less common in print: push up the daisies, kick the bucket, croak, buy the farm, cash out. All euphemisms conceal how we gasp and choke turning blue.”
― Essays After Eighty
Tuesday, November 23, 2021
The politics of fiction | Elif Shafak
Elif uses storytelling to convey her truth and ideas. Her books always serve a moral purpose.
If trees could speak | Elif Shafak
One of my favorite TED presenters, very knowledgeable and well-spoken.
Writing Naked: An Interview with Donald Hall
I am now seventy-six, not as old as Donald here. Donald is dead now, passed in 2018. I feel a kinship with declining old age. There are many videos on YT about him. He was poet laureate of the United States in 2006.
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