Things Our Heroine Needs to Remember...

just one in a looooooong series.

Be not angry that you cannot make others as you wish them to be, since you cannot make yourself as you wish to be.

-- Thomas a Kempis

Percy as Poem

I've been feasting on the archives at Korrectiv when I should be working.

He caught TB in med school,
bending over the corpses
of bums who died in the street.

He was sent away to rest,
surrender to the only cure:
rest, no exercise, sleep.

And so he read: Nietzsche,
Proust, and his favorite,
“the melancholy Dane.”

Happiness was despair,
he learned, even in America:
smug faces in the checkout lines,
a nation that believed
in bigger cars, more pills,
better bombs.

He thought about his ancestors,
their Delta plain and seas
of cotton, men who were
merely stoics at the end…

One day, he checked himself
out, drove across the country
to New Mexico.

He walked outside, night
after night, his heart
turning to a painful stone.

He saw the darkness between
the distant stars, faint light
at best.

But what if the sky
was only a book, open
to another, more careful
reading?

Out there, in the desert,
anything was possible,
even God.
~~~~~~~~
– William Miller
Literary Review, Winter
2004, Vol. 47 Issue 2, p. 103-4

Of Soren and Socrates

I miss my finger puppet...

The majority of men in every generation, even those who, as it is described, devote themselves to thinking (dons and the like), live and die under the impression that life is simply a matter of understanding more and more, and if it were granted to them to live longer, that life would continue to be one long continuous growth in understanding. How many of them ever experience the maturity of discovering that there comes a critical moment where everything is reversed, after which the point becomes to understand more and more that there is something which cannot be understood. That is Socratic ignorance, and that is what the philosophy of our times requires as a corrective…It is quite literally true that the law is: increasing profundity is understanding more and more that one cannot understand. And there once again comes in “being like a child,” but raised to the second power.

— Soren Kierkegaard

Things I Need Reminding Of - Part I

To live in the past and future is easy. To live in the present is like threading a needle.

- Walker Percy, Lancelot

Humility

"Sometimes I lie awake at night and ask, 'Where did I go wrong?' Then a voice says to me 'This is going to take more than one night.'" -- Charles M. Schultz

Our Heroine Has A Contrite Heart

Out Heroine has been exerting entirely too much control over her life lately, and so it comes as no surprise to her that the results are so unsatisfactory & underwhelming. Y'all, William Cowper knew what ailed me back in 1779:

A Contrite Heart

THE Lord will happiness divine

On contrite hearts bestow;

Then tell me, gracious God, is mine

A contrite heart or no?


I hear, but seem to hear in vain,

Insensible as steel;

If aught is felt, ‘tis only pain

To find I cannot feel.



I sometimes think myself inclined

To love thee, if I could;

But often feel another mind,

Averse to all that’s good.



My best desires are faint and few,

I fain would strive for more:

But when I cry, “My strength renew,”

Seem weaker than before.



Thy saints are comforted, I know,

And love thy house of prayer;

I therefore go where others go,

But find no comfort there.



O make this heart rejoice or ache;

Decide this doubt for me;

And if it be not broken, break,

And heal it if it be.

Awwww, C'Mon

C'mon guys -- if I lose Mad Men so soon after LOST, I will have to see a grief counselor:

The Emmy-winning show is the subject of a bloody battle between creator and executive producer Matthew Weiner and network honchos at AMC. The show has yet to be renewed for a fifth season, and the sides are far apart on a deal. Money is the issue, Deadline and The Daily report, but it has nothing to do with Weiner's contract; the two sides were close to agreeing on a two year, $30 million deal for the mind behind the acclaimed period drama. Instead, the struggle involves budgeting in other areas, namely advertising and even actors.

Read the whole horrible thing. Best case, we have to wait til 2012.

Happy Birthday, RMK!

Happy Birthday to RMK, the best brother and friend a Heroine could ever hope for. I hope that we live to be 100 together, and that God gives me ample opportunities to rescue metaphorical CHiPS helmets for you.

Children of the same family, the same blood, with the same first associations and habits, have some means of enjoyment in their power, which no subsequent connections can supply...

~Jane Austen, Mansfield Park, 1814

Future Plans with Die Suesseste

I can't wait til the day I can read this to Die Suesseste:

The Skin Horse had lived longer in the nursery than any of the others. He was so old that his brown coat was bald in patches and showed the seams underneath, and most of the hairs in his tail had been pulled out to string bead necklaces. He was wise, for he had seen a long succession of mechanical toys arrive to boast and swagger, and by-and-by break their mainsprings and pass away, and he knew that they were only toys, and would never turn into anything else. For nursery magic is very strange and wonderful, and only those playthings that are old and wise and experienced like the Skin Horse understand all about it.

"What is REAL?" asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. "Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?"

"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."

"Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit.

"Sometimes," said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt."

"Does it happen all at once, like being wound up," he asked, "or bit by bit?"

"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you
can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."

"I suppose you are real?" said the Rabbit. And then he wished he had not said it, for he thought the Skin Horse might be sensitive.

But the Skin Horse only smiled.

The Velveteen Rabbit

Tuesday Poetry Shot: Pushkin

From Alexsandr Pushkin, one of the most romantic poems of all time. Our Heroine is a sucker for men with broken hearts.

I loved you.
Even now I may confess,
Some embers of my love their fire retain,
But do not let it cause you much distress,
I do not want to sadden you again.
Hopeless and tongue-tied, yet I loved you dearly
With pangs the jealous and the timid know;
So tenderly I loved you, so sincerely,
I pray God grant another love you so.

When I read this in high-school, I was so moved by it that I memorized it (and a few other romantic tearjerkers).

Years later, visiting Russia, I discovered that our guide had also loved and memorized this poem (albeit, in Russian), and so we recited it together (her in Russian, me in English), each to the other. That someone else should feel sorry for Pushkin, and the anguish he felt that wrung this poem out of him, and that these two people should meet by chance and recognize eachother as kindred spirits, was just so cool.

It remains one of my favorite memories of that trip.

Die Suesseste

The most important thing that happened while this blog was on hiatus:


Our Heroine joyfully welcomed a fresh character into the panoply of people she loves: Die Suesseste.

Dear Die Suesseste,

One day when Our Heroine is old and gray (but hopefully still kicking around the place) you can read the archives of this blog and realize that auntie was just as eccentric as Mommy and Daddy told you she was. She loves you very very much and for always.

Love,
Godmother Auntie

Nuns of the Perpetual Adoration

Calm, sad, secure; behind high convent walls,
These watch the sacred lamp, these watch and pray:
And it is one with them when evening falls,
And one with them the cold return of day.

These heed not time; their nights and days they make
Into a long, returning rosary,
Whereon their lives are threaded for Christ’s sake;
Meekness and vigilance and chastity.

A vowed patrol, in silent companies,
Life-long they keep before the living Christ.
In the dim church, their prayers and penances
Are fragrant incense to the Sacrificed.

Outside, the world is wild and passionate;
Man’s weary laughter and his sick despair
Entreat at their impenetrable gate:
They heed no voices in their dream of prayer.

They saw the glory of the world displayed;
They saw the bitter of it, and the sweet;
They knew the roses of the world should fade,
And be trod under by the hurrying feet.

Therefore they rather put away desire,
And crossed their hands and came to sanctuary
And veiled their heads and put on coarse attire:
Because their comeliness was vanity.

And there they rest; they have serene insight
Of the illuminating dawn to be:
Mary’s sweet Star dispels for them the night,
The proper darkness of humanity.

Calm, sad, secure; with faces worn and mild:
Surely their choice of vigil is the best?
Yea! for our roses fade, the world is wild;
But there, beside the altar, there, is rest.

Ernest Dawson

Job Hunting

Look at them, Smithers. Goldbrickers.. Layabouts.. Slug-a-beds! Little do they realise their days of suckling at my teat are numbered.

Monty Burns

I'm sorry it's been so quiet around here, but there's a good explanation: I'm job hunting. I've been job hunting for a while, but I've haven't mentioned it here because, boring, obviously. But I have really kicked it into overdrive lately, because the unicorn made of dollar bills that the Administration promised still hasn't arrived.

As I'm sure you all know, finding a job is a job. So posting will be much lighter until I find something, that unic$rn arrives, or I read about something really amazing.

However: Mr. Anonymous, I read your District 9 comment, am chewing on it, and will address your concerns forthwith.

Carry on.

Stop The Presses!

Earlier this summer, at a suburban Marshall's, I spotted a pair of pewter gladiator flats with oodles of adjustable buckles (Our Heroine loves buckles) with which I fell in love, but which - in a rare instance of maturity and self-denial - I decided I couldn't afford, and so put back on the shelf.

Almost immediately I regretted my decision, but it was a few days before I could go back for the shoes, and when I did, ALAS! they were gone. I was not stoic about my loss, and for the last six weeks I have done nothing but wail and gnash my teeth over them. My friends have grown quite tired of it, I suspect.

But tonight there are glad shoe tidings! I was driving around suburbia with Mum, who spotted a Marshall's and suggested we go in and see if my gladiator sandals were available. They weren't, but I found a pair of shoes that I am happy to rebound with: Etienne Aigner, multi-colored patent leather, TWO sets of buckles(!), an ankle strap, and best of all, a high, thick heel. Voila!
I can't wait to wear them with textured tights in the fall, and did I mention they only cost me $19?

Marshall's can sometimes be a trial for the spirit, but if you're diligent and persevere, other times something wonderful happens.

Sisters of the Polyester Pantsuit

Remember when I said that Episcopalians make Catholics feel better about our troubles? Well, here are a couple of our troubles:

Oh dear. The bongos say it all. But if you really need to read more, click here. Our Heroine thinks that Vatican visitation may be just the thing.

You mustn't get the wrong idea. Our Heroine loves nuns, and she loves "nun-gazing" (more so now I've been reading The Crescat). So as an antidote to the bongos, I give you this image a dear, sweet sister:

Image via The Crescat

If it weren't for the coffee, I'd have no identifiable personality whatsoever

A cup of coffee
Victor-Gabriel Gilbert

Up so early, my lovelies, and I'm not sure why. Day is still cool, and I watched the sun come up with the most delicious cup of coffee I've had in recent memory, all steamy and toasted.

I like how the lady in Gilbert's picture is holding her cup so daintily, her wee pinky extended. Even all by herself in the scullery, she's still a girl through and through.

Me? I am holding my cardboard cup in one big Irish paw and cussing the peasant ancestors that deprived me of glorious slim digits.

Side note: I want that apron.

Title Credit: David Letterman

O Sad Pompeii!

Today in AD 79, poor Pompeii was destroyed.

The Destruction of Pompeii in 79 AD
Karl Pavlovich Bryullov

From Pliny the Younger's letter to Tacitus:

[snip] They tied pillows on top of their heads as protection against the shower of rock. It was daylight now elsewhere in the world, but there the darkness was darker and thicker than any night. But they had torches and other lights. They decided to go down to the shore, to see from close up if anything was possible by sea. But it remained as rough and uncooperative as before.

Resting in the shade of a sail he (Pliny the Elder) drank once or twice from the cold water he had asked for. Then came an smell of sulfur, announcing the flames, and the flames themselves, sending others into flight but reviving him. Supported by two small slaves he stood up, and immediately collapsed. As I understand it, his breathing was obstructed by the dust-laden air, and his innards, which were never strong and often blocked or upset, simply shut down. When daylight came again 2 days after he died, his body was found untouched, unharmed, in the clothing that he had had on. He looked more asleep than dead.[snip]

Our Lady of Pompeii, pray for them!

Your Daily LOL, Brought To You By The Episcopalians

As Mark Shea always says, God invented the Episcopal Church to help Catholics feel better about our troubles. That's why I love the Midwest Conservative Journal, where Chris Johnson documents the slow, painful death of that denomination with hilarious acuity.

Anyhow, someone alerted Mr. Johnson to this comment by an Episcopalian dad elsewhere in the blogosphere (emphasis added):

I raised my daughter in the Episcopal Church so she would learn the traditions of our ancestors, not so she would become a believing Christian.

LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLz and a thousand more LOLz!!! I laughed so hard I cried, I really did. Someone typed that with their serious face on, can you believe it?

As Chris Johnson says, definitely tee-shirt material.

My First Sci-Fi Debate: Nerds Have The Most Fun

Tuesday, August 18, 2009, was a historic day here at Our Heroine's Parasol Emporium & Petticoat Junction, for on that day I received my best comment to date. The comment was in response to my angry screed against District 9, in which I complained that the plot has more holes than a yard of Battenburg lace, and then I enumerated the ones that chafed the most. However, later that day a reader responded in disagreement: he felt that the content of those holes had been more than implied by the writer/director. Here's what he said [needless to say, but, SPOILER ALERT]:

...First off, the ship was described as "in distress", which could mean any number of electrical or mechanical problems could have existed, and, when MNU cut into the ship, the lights were off and it was in a very large amount of disrepair.

Just because the engines are operational, does not mean that the life support and computer systems are online...

[you asked:] "Why did the aliens come here? Why were they all sick upon arrival? Who (and where) are their leaders?"

Again, this is where life support systems come into play. For arguments sake, lets say the ship was damaged by a meteorite storm (highly likely due to the ship's large size) Some of the compartments may have been torn open into the void of space, killing a good deal of the aliens, specifically the leader caste. Christopher is likely the sole surviving member of the crew, and therefore plotted a course to the nearest liveable planet (Earth)

While they coast, the Prawns multiply causing their living conditions to deteriorate.

The reason they left their planet in the first place could be any number of things (civil war, colonization, exploration)

Although the aliens are unwelcome, we cannot help them repair their ship and leave, for the sole reason that they are the working caste, not the thinking caste. Its pointed out twice in the movie that these prawns aren't noted for their intelligence, and are very gullible when it comes to the humans telling them to do things. Also, MNU is holding them there for experimentation and weaponry purposes.

As far as weapons go, i cant disagree with you there, but I can offer speculations as to why they did not revolt;

Without leadership the revolution would be doomed anyway.

The strict curfews and deadly force imposed by MNU prevented the aliens from even attempting a revolt.

And finally, they've been there for 28 years. There must have been multiple revolts that were immediately crushed by military force.

The Prawn derailing of trains can be summed up by the media using anything they can to blow it out of proportion, like the 911 craze where everything was suspected terrorist activity.

I thoroughly enjoyed District 9 and think it's plot held together very well. Apart from a few "wtf?" moments (grav-gunning a pig... really?), I thought the plot was really concrete.

LOLZ! Our Heroine forgot about the pig that got grav-gunned. For that alone I would have loved this comment. But beyond that, I've never had a commenter go to such lengths to understand and respond to anything I've written, and I was really pleased, even though I can't agree with him (but wish I could).

Here's what I wrote in response:

I grant you that things COULD HAVE gone down the way you describe, but they could have gone down in other ways as well, and my problem with the movie is that it didn't give me enough information, (whether that was deliberate or not I don't know) and left to my own devices, I drew totally different conclusions about the Prawns than you did.

For example, for a ship that was allegedly in distress, (maybe damaged by meteors) w/o life support or computer systems, it took off without any issues! And it had to have systems and life support if Christopher was planning on navigating it to his home planet and surviving the trip! (Or at least that's what I assumed based on what I saw)

And if the Prawns left their planet because something bad had happened there, Chris was real confident about being able to find help once he got back. BUT, if they were coming to colonize Earth, that's an act of war (making District 9 a POW camp).

In regards to your point that the media blew Prawn destructiveness out of proportion, I saw no evidence for that, and in fact the "scientist" in the "documentary" explains that their destructiveness appeared to be cultural/biological. I agree that it's possible it was all a big media frenzy; but I wasn't shown enough for that conclusion, and, in fact, to me the movie's evidence pointed to the contrary.

You describe a coherent narrative for the Prawns, and if the movie had provided some audio/visual evidence for what you describe, I would definitely have felt differently about it. But what it seemed to me was that the writer/director could not come up with a narrative that explained the ship (first being in distress and then working fine), the arrival of the Prawns, how they all ended up in District 9, Chris's intelligence, and the Prawn arsenal coherently, so he just left it vague and blurry and called it "art."

My final point: your post did a better job than he did!

His comment really did do a better job than the movie, and I would have liked it so much more if I'd seen in it what he did. But more than that, this comment made Our Heroine the happiest nerd on Tuesday, so...thank you, Matt!

Happy Birthday, HP!

Today is HP Lovecraft's birthday. He was born on this day in 1890.

Don't know who HP Lovecraft is? Well, he invented this guy:
out of the brilliant but disturbed inner sanctum of his own head.
(click on image for more details about The Great Dreaded One)