musings

Three Disconnected Thoughts

/ J. Thorp / 2 Comments

Every so often on my commute I surf the FM airwaves to hear what “the kids” are listening to. Not my kids, mind you — I brought them up right on The White Stripes and Ella Fitzgerald and Johnny Cash and stuff — but their classmates and friends. I discovered two things: 1) nothing worthwhile is going on above 100 on the dial (unless you get nostalgic for high school; then there’s Jack FM*) and 2) the five most requested songs in the Twin Cities (as compiled by KDWB) are brainless, heartless, soulless, and painfully repetitive. It’s like a free day in junior-high Phys Ed class, as scored by R2D2. Beeps and bleeps. Twits and tweets. A steady bass thud and random screeching. Whining and bravado. Cat-calls and wolf-whistles. Turns out I’d rather listen to death metal. Anyone can wear excess makeup and questionable clothing, jump around on stage, and not sing. But at least the metalheads play instruments and break stuff.

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Ever walk down the street and spot someone coming toward you whom you can’t quite place…and as she gets closer, her face breaks into the sweetest smile, and her eyes gleam, and you’re a bit embarrassed because you must have met her, but you just can’t remember…so you smile a little, sheepishly, and now she’s grinning, and gives a little wave, and you start to raise your hand in greeting, almost close enough to speak…and then you realize there’s someone walking about 15 feet directly behind you, and you don’t know this girl at all?

No? Okay, yeah, me neither…

—-

I did a little Easter shopping this evening at St. George Catholic Books and Gifts in Blaine. Wonderful selection of all things Catholic — like many such stores, it used to be in a tiny little space, but it has since expanded significantly. Nevertheless, every time I go in there, they have boxes of new stock on the floor and seem to be reorganizing; every shelf is chock-a-block with books, icons, statues, and keepsakes; the walls are lined with paintings and crucifixes…clearly they have everything, if they could just remember where they put it! I love the store, and always spend more than I intend. It occurred to me today that St. George’s is very like the local hardware: everything is organized just well enough that I feel comfortable browsing myself, and everything is in just enough disarray that by the time I find what I’m looking for, I’ve picked up at least two other items, as well. Savvy storekeepers?

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* Ever re-listen to the songs we were singing along to back then? Eesh. I had no idea.

Life Stinks: An Early Spring Poem

/ J. Thorp / 5 Comments

Blogger’s Note: It’s a rare thing that I post twice in one day, but this has been percolating in my head for a few days now. Then earlier today, my friend at the Tales from the Domestic Church blog posted on Facebook that the spring air outside her office smelled “delicious.” We’re along way from flowers here, and though I appreciate the early (or earthy) signs of spring as much as anybody, decay doesn’t smell delicious. It smells like BRAAAAAINS!

Decease and Persist
Grey clouds spit chill drizzle on blackening snow;
Bare trees creak and clatter in scattering breeze.
Last leaves of past autumn tear, tumble, and blow —
And something undead stirs below.

The preening of songbirds begins in this cold.
Spring cleaning takes root in the richness of rot.
Aroma of flesh-fertile humus and mold —
Wet corpse-fed worm-fodder of old.

A fragrance of vagrants, impure and unclean;
Stiff leavings of winter now soften and spoil.
It rises but slowly, it’s smelt before seen;
The reek gives new meaning to green.

From ’neath this foul blackness we watch it arise;
Once-dead fingers scrabble from shadowy grave.
The zombie Earth lurches, blinks dirt from its eyes —
And stretches pale limbs toward the skies.

As swiftly the drifts turn to droplets and drown
What passes for life beneath Winter’s hard thumb,
With mindless persistence and sunblinded frown —
The dead rises up from the ground!

The Second Third, Week 18: Sleep

/ J. Thorp / Leave a comment

Yale has a tradition called Feb Club — as I recall, every night of the shortest month of the year (and the long denouement of winter) someone hosted a party somewhere in the general vicinity of Yale, and everyone was invited. 28 parties in 28 days. Intensity in ten cities (or at least three: New Haven, New York, and Boston). Or so I was told.

See, I never did the whole Feb Club thing. Why? Wasn’t much of a partier, not enough disposable income, and to be honest, I need my sleep. I also only ever pulled one all-nighter in my entire academic career.* I lived by the creed that it was always better to be half-studied and well-rested than the opposite.

People always say eight hours is ideal, but I don’t know anyone who gets more than six or seven hours a night on a regular basis. I also don’t know any adult who sleeps soundly through the night. (I’d pay for a couple hours of the drooling unconsciousness of my children!)

I also know certain people who thrive on less than eight hours. But not me. Eight hours is perfect. Four to five hours can work for a night or so if I’ve got something to pull me through the next day: an exciting road trip, hunting, that sort of thing. But after six or seven hours — my typical amount — waking is like swimming through molasses. I’m dead tired all day. And that’s most days.

I could attempt to train my body to do more with less, but I don’t want to. As I recall, the Feb Club slogan used to be, “You can sleep when you’re dead.” I was never less interested in accelerating the process. In my Second Third, I want to get to bed earlier. And sleep just a little past sun-up. Because those stolen minutes are the best.

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*It was the last anthropology paper I ever wrote, as a senior, for a professor I’d had for two or three other classes. I didn’t have a topic until the night before. He gave me a B-, not because it wasn’t well written or accurate, but because I apparently regurgitated a lecture from one of his classes two years earlier.

Dostoevsky, or Three Things to Love About The Brothers Karamazov

/ J. Thorp / 2 Comments

Blogger’s Note: Three long summers (and three even longer winters) ago, I agreed to my friend Jacqui’s challenge to read 15 Classics in 15 Weeks. I have since read 10 of 15, this being my tenth from the list. The last one, Homer’s The Odyssey took 11 months, not because it was overly long or monotonous, but because it required a level of mental engagement I couldn’t always give it. The same is true for this one, which has taken me more than a year…

I literally just finished The Brothers Karamazov and logged into this blog with a tear in my eye. It has not managed to displace Steinbeck’s East of Eden as perhaps my favorite book ever (thus far) — but I imagine it will prove to be a 936-page seed that will germinate, slowly grow, and bear fruit years from now. It will stick with me, I have no doubt. Without further ado, Three Things to Love about The Brothers Karamazov:

  • Absurd As Us. Many, and perhaps most, of the characters seem absurd, even over-the-top. Chances are you’ve never been in a town such as this, with people such as these. You know no one like the Karamazov clan or their diverse friends and lovers — and yet, each rings true, and we recognize ourselves, our friends, and our families in the peculiarities we find here.
  • Fatherhood and Brotherhood. What does it mean to be a father? A brother? A friend? What would you endure for fools who share your surname, whom you can abuse but no one else can touch — what loyalties do we bear to our fathers, sons, and brothers? Though you might guess that this is a theme from the title, these ideas emerge slowly and subtly from the plot, since the Karamazov men’s family ties are, uh, looser than most…
  • Religion and Culture. Dostoevsky does not shy away from religion and philosophy, permitting his characters to speak at length (and in character, so not always clearly) about the existence of God, morality, humanity, science, psychology, justice, the state, and more. I was struck by how a book written circa 1880 could have so much to say about our world in 2011.

You might ask, would I recommend it? I might reply: in general, or to you, specifically? I don’t know how to answer, so for now, I will say that I enjoyed it very much, and that it rewards persistence. It is a great book.

I have another, contemporary novel to knock out before I proceed, but it should be a quicker read. Next on this long-running (and long-overdue) challenge will be a book not on my original list of 15, but one recommended by my good friend Fr. Tyler at Prairie Father: Brideshead Revisited. Fr. Tyler, incidentally, recently wrote this wonderful review of Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment.

The Second Third, Week 17: Ashes

/ J. Thorp / 2 Comments

There is a paragraph from this year’s Holiday Letter that has returned to me again and again in the past few months:

“Ever wonder how God can know everything that will happen, even though we have free will and make our own decisions? St. Augustine talks about God as existing outside of time: He existed before time in any meaningful sense, so He can see all of time—past, present, and future—in an instant. But I think of life as a high sledding hill with God at the top, giving us a push. It’s left to us to steer, but like any good father, He knows our tendencies to close our eyes or overcorrect better than we do, and so He can see every curve we’ll negotiate, every bump that will bounce us airborne, every tree we’ll hit. He sees the trajectories of other sledders and knows their tendencies, as well—knows whose paths we’ll cross, for good or for ill, and when we’ll be blindsided by love. He alone has the long view, the Big Picture. We must persist with less—a glimpse of heaven through the treetops as we slip away, faster, faster…”

This seems particularly appropriate this Ash Wednesday, when we dwell a moment or two on the ephemeral nature of this life and this world: We are dust, and unto dust we shall return. In these Second Third posts, I’ve already written about being grateful for what we have and finding the sense to know when enough is enough. But today, the focus is on something a little different: In my Second Third, I hope to detach even from the “stuff” we choose to keep. I hope to turn my eyes toward heaven instead of where I am now, staring at the ground, watching my step. I hope to quit worrying about who’s in control of the sled, and enjoy the sting of snow on my cheeks, the gleam of stars passing overhead, the laughter of those I love weaving through the trees beside me, the white moon and the lonely miles. I hope to live, not hastily or extravagantly, but thoroughly — so that when I reach my third Third I have nothing left but joy to spend on anyone. Including you.

A man can dream, can’t he?