My life for the past several days has been set to the soundtrack of the film Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait, which was composed and performed by the Scottish post-rock band Mogwai. It is minimalist and entirely instrumental, with a lot of building on and repetition of theme. It is also the first album in a long time that has completely consumed me. I seriously mean it when I say that I have been listening to it multiple times in a row - all last night while I was sleeping, all of my return journey from the Philly area this evening, etc.
That film was the first that Matt Doll showed to us in Italy. As I was driving just now, I was trying to pull together some thoughts that would be conclusive for this, the last post of this blog. Once again, though, I realize that a thought I put into my travel writing piece is true - even though I want there to be a neat finish, a length of string measured and cut by Lachesis and Atropos, it is not like that. The segmentation of my life is artificial, only valuable for reference; this search, la ricerca, continues on, continues to change and to change me. There are great gains and small gains, and some are lasting. The same with losses. The impact of them changes with time and with place, but they build together into a person all the same. What gives any person the right, ever, to cast off his label of "stranger"? Implicit in that is the question "When are we not home?"
This is also the joy of circumstance.
03 July 2009
27 June 2009
Thoughts on Georgia from Tennessee
I am currently writing from Chattanooga, Tennessee, where they like excess letters. For the last week my youngest brother, Jason, and I have been crisscrossing back and forth across Georgia, setting up curriculum material for a textbook bid that Classical Academic Press (the company at which my brother interns) is pitching to the Georgia public school system.
You might remember that in my travel writing piece I speak about how it is impossible to actually know a place if you simply pass through it. Living in Italy for four months after visiting for two weeks before has shown me this, poignantly. I do not deny, however, that one can form ideas and opinions about a place even from just a flash by the window, ideas and opinions that have truth. It may not be truth about the actual place…but that’s a tangled mess of reasoning that I will let you figure out.
It is with this in mind that I am writing some of my own thoughts about the place that has been Georgia to me. It is such an extreme shift from Italy; I lived there in one place for four months, while for one week I have been moving all over the state, seeing most areas at 65 mph, never staying in one place for more than 12 hours. Orvieto had time to grow and fill out in my mind, while my understanding of Georgia is thin and flat, and scattered. Orvieto is as grounded and contextualized as the tufa cliff on which it sits, while Georgia is untethered, free to drift off, out of mind.
It’s certainly an experience, driving across it. Multiple times. Some places have been pretty amazing looking, actually, like the Currier and Ives looking farmhouse we passed today, or some of the plantations we see from the road. There is a sort of nostalgic aesthetic to rural or agricultural America that I’ve missed out on for the past four months. And while the accents still grate on my ears, the people have for the most part been very friendly.
After a lovely stop in Richmond to have lunch with Erin McRae and her hospitable family, Jason and I took another break in our drive down at South of the Border in South Carolina. Culture shock. After growing somewhat accustomed to an environment in which materials have meaning and significance and are used in a very conscious way, this display was a disgusting waste. Billboards starting 103 miles away proclaimed this polymer-coated shrine to the cheap and transitory. I hope no one ever takes it seriously. It is sad to me that a place could have so little that is real about it.
The first (American) fast food that I’ve had since leaving for Italy entered my body Sunday evening. It apparently wreaked havoc, because I felt like shite the next morning. Thankfully, Subway seems to be a safe alternative. We walked into a Walmart superstore at one point, and it was overwhelming for me. I was reminded once more of the excess when we ate lunch at a Chinese restaurant two days ago. The amount of pork lo mein on my plate was astounding; I barely made a dent in it, and both Jason and I had enough left over for dinner that night. I am serious when I say that a ten-inch diameter plate had a five-inch high pile of food on it. Why?
This carried through to our pizza experience here. First of all, don’t trust any Georgian’s opinion of good pizza. It is wrong. They just don’t know! Our pizza was equally excessive, and not that great tasting. There is so much sugar or salt in everything.
It is interesting to me that this comfort with glut is so prevalent in a place with so much poverty. Excess and superfluity are the last things that most of these people should have, let alone want. We drove through some areas where the town was an intersection with stained trailers grouped around, while an abandoned freight train rusted on the track nearby. Other towns had clean brick laid all around, while manicured gardens and carefully spaced trees lined the double streets. Sometimes these sorts of places were right next to each other. Half of the schools we visited were enormous, clean, and had every facility imaginable. The other half were broken down and had the air of depression around them. One was located in the middle of a neighborhood in which some blocks looked like they were lifted right out of Liberia—huts, dirt paths, dogs, sweating shirtless people.
Another thing you can’t help but notice down here is the profusion of churches. Mostly Baptist, of course, but also Methodist and Church of God. Each small town has to have 3 or 4, it seems, ranging from one room whitewashed buildings with a steeple plunked on top to megachurches. I’ve seen two Presbyterian churches and one Catholic church. In Italy, the numbers were completely opposite. Christianity feels completely different here; we haven’t visited any churches so it may not be entirely fair to make this claim (but remember, this is my Georgia), but in large part it seems to be the type of Christianity I’m working to get away from. There are the obvious aspects of evangelicalism that I don’t think I need to reiterate, but something in particular that seems foreign to me is the strong tie of faith in Christ to faith in America. It is not uncommon to see a church’s sign read “This Sunday a.m.: Patriotic Service,” or to see a billboard with “Jesus Saves: Vote” painted on.
Crazy rims are hugely popular here, even on the crappiest cars. What’s the crappiest car you can think of? Someone in Georgia has it, with dubs. Someone also has a nice, perfectly normal (banal?) car with them, like a Honda Accord. Like, say, the one we saw parked outside of Walmart.
Speaking of cars, the roads around Atlanta are awful. And stopping for gas around there means broken pumps and annoying, ugly hookers. But many of the highways cutting through rural areas are quite nice, flat and wide with a high speed limit, lined on either side by wild forest 150 feet tall and as thick and straight as a hedge. There is something very peaceful about humming along down an open highway in early evening. Until an enormous SUV riding jacked up over monster truck tires bears down on your tail.
In spite of all of this (Georgia), Jason and I have managed to have a decent time. I would have liked to see Savannah because I hear that it might have changed my impressions, but maybe I can stop there some other time. It will be lovely to be back home, though. Once again I find myself saying this.
Perfectus vero cui mundus totus exsilium est.
You might remember that in my travel writing piece I speak about how it is impossible to actually know a place if you simply pass through it. Living in Italy for four months after visiting for two weeks before has shown me this, poignantly. I do not deny, however, that one can form ideas and opinions about a place even from just a flash by the window, ideas and opinions that have truth. It may not be truth about the actual place…but that’s a tangled mess of reasoning that I will let you figure out.
It is with this in mind that I am writing some of my own thoughts about the place that has been Georgia to me. It is such an extreme shift from Italy; I lived there in one place for four months, while for one week I have been moving all over the state, seeing most areas at 65 mph, never staying in one place for more than 12 hours. Orvieto had time to grow and fill out in my mind, while my understanding of Georgia is thin and flat, and scattered. Orvieto is as grounded and contextualized as the tufa cliff on which it sits, while Georgia is untethered, free to drift off, out of mind.
It’s certainly an experience, driving across it. Multiple times. Some places have been pretty amazing looking, actually, like the Currier and Ives looking farmhouse we passed today, or some of the plantations we see from the road. There is a sort of nostalgic aesthetic to rural or agricultural America that I’ve missed out on for the past four months. And while the accents still grate on my ears, the people have for the most part been very friendly.
After a lovely stop in Richmond to have lunch with Erin McRae and her hospitable family, Jason and I took another break in our drive down at South of the Border in South Carolina. Culture shock. After growing somewhat accustomed to an environment in which materials have meaning and significance and are used in a very conscious way, this display was a disgusting waste. Billboards starting 103 miles away proclaimed this polymer-coated shrine to the cheap and transitory. I hope no one ever takes it seriously. It is sad to me that a place could have so little that is real about it.
The first (American) fast food that I’ve had since leaving for Italy entered my body Sunday evening. It apparently wreaked havoc, because I felt like shite the next morning. Thankfully, Subway seems to be a safe alternative. We walked into a Walmart superstore at one point, and it was overwhelming for me. I was reminded once more of the excess when we ate lunch at a Chinese restaurant two days ago. The amount of pork lo mein on my plate was astounding; I barely made a dent in it, and both Jason and I had enough left over for dinner that night. I am serious when I say that a ten-inch diameter plate had a five-inch high pile of food on it. Why?
This carried through to our pizza experience here. First of all, don’t trust any Georgian’s opinion of good pizza. It is wrong. They just don’t know! Our pizza was equally excessive, and not that great tasting. There is so much sugar or salt in everything.
It is interesting to me that this comfort with glut is so prevalent in a place with so much poverty. Excess and superfluity are the last things that most of these people should have, let alone want. We drove through some areas where the town was an intersection with stained trailers grouped around, while an abandoned freight train rusted on the track nearby. Other towns had clean brick laid all around, while manicured gardens and carefully spaced trees lined the double streets. Sometimes these sorts of places were right next to each other. Half of the schools we visited were enormous, clean, and had every facility imaginable. The other half were broken down and had the air of depression around them. One was located in the middle of a neighborhood in which some blocks looked like they were lifted right out of Liberia—huts, dirt paths, dogs, sweating shirtless people.
Another thing you can’t help but notice down here is the profusion of churches. Mostly Baptist, of course, but also Methodist and Church of God. Each small town has to have 3 or 4, it seems, ranging from one room whitewashed buildings with a steeple plunked on top to megachurches. I’ve seen two Presbyterian churches and one Catholic church. In Italy, the numbers were completely opposite. Christianity feels completely different here; we haven’t visited any churches so it may not be entirely fair to make this claim (but remember, this is my Georgia), but in large part it seems to be the type of Christianity I’m working to get away from. There are the obvious aspects of evangelicalism that I don’t think I need to reiterate, but something in particular that seems foreign to me is the strong tie of faith in Christ to faith in America. It is not uncommon to see a church’s sign read “This Sunday a.m.: Patriotic Service,” or to see a billboard with “Jesus Saves: Vote” painted on.
Crazy rims are hugely popular here, even on the crappiest cars. What’s the crappiest car you can think of? Someone in Georgia has it, with dubs. Someone also has a nice, perfectly normal (banal?) car with them, like a Honda Accord. Like, say, the one we saw parked outside of Walmart.
Speaking of cars, the roads around Atlanta are awful. And stopping for gas around there means broken pumps and annoying, ugly hookers. But many of the highways cutting through rural areas are quite nice, flat and wide with a high speed limit, lined on either side by wild forest 150 feet tall and as thick and straight as a hedge. There is something very peaceful about humming along down an open highway in early evening. Until an enormous SUV riding jacked up over monster truck tires bears down on your tail.
In spite of all of this (Georgia), Jason and I have managed to have a decent time. I would have liked to see Savannah because I hear that it might have changed my impressions, but maybe I can stop there some other time. It will be lovely to be back home, though. Once again I find myself saying this.
Perfectus vero cui mundus totus exsilium est.
21 June 2009
Extension
Well. I have been back for five days now, and it's been sort of strange. Everything here is as before, and it frightened me a little at how easily I slipped back into a state of comfort with my surroundings. Not that I thought four months would completely erase over a decade of familiarity with one place. Still, I was hoping that there would be a somewhat foreign aura around everything. I will need to work at making it that way.
There have been plenty of adjustments, though. For instance, when I first got back I kept slamming things: doors, toilet seats, etc. And all the door handles in my house felt like they were about to fall off. I soon realized that I had grown accustomed to pushing around ancient, heavy wooden doors and cranking down on their handles. Things have less weight here, whatever that means. Also, why on earth is there so much carpet everywhere?
Food is kind of a major thing, as I'm sure you can imagine. Tomatoes taste like water, and everything has way too many ingredients. I looked at the ingredients list on a box of purchased Atlanta Bread Co. sweet rolls, and it's absurdly long...because of all the preserving chemicals. And why does color need to be added? (I would take a photo of it, if that didn't mean flipping it upside down and smooshing the sweet rolls) I was going to have a Yoplait yogurt last night, like I normally do when I'm hungry right before bed, but then I noticed that it contains high fructose corn syrup. Nevermind. I don't want to sound like some sort of radical organic activist, because I don't think I am (and I'm sure this sounds pretty tame to a lot of you); it's just that none of this makes sense to me anymore. How about we just make bread and sweet rolls the way they've been for thousands of years? Why does guacomole need to be processed and in a plastic bag?
So my dad and I are making something for dinner tonight.
But here's the big thing, why I'm not closing this blog off just yet. I expect the culture shock to continue, and maybe even get worse, over the next week, and...I want to write about it. While this page may have been helpful for some of you in following what I was doing, it has been extremely helpful for me in understanding what I was doing. I'm not normally one to journal, but I've discovered it's importance. But back to the point:
Jason (my 17 year old brother) and I are taking a road trip to Georgia.
He's been doing computer animation and graphic stuff since he was 12, starting with open source programs. This summer he landed a paid design internship at a local school curriculum press that is run by my old headmaster. Apparently, Georgia is conservative enough that the press, which comes from a Christian background, is able to make a bid for some Latin and other language texts to go onto the Georgia public schools curriculum list. But the catch is that anyone making a bid needs to do so with a physical representative in 13 locations over the course of next week. It wasn't cost-effective to send one of their secretaries, so they hired Jason and I for this job. Fortune falling from the sky!
Of all the places I'd imagined I could be going right after I got home (not many, really...um, Harrisburg? Hershey? Camp Hill? that's about all I expected), the Deep South certainly was not one of those! Now, we'll be pretty busy going from place to place to set up a book table and sit at it, so I don't expect it'll be a journey worthy of Faulkner. But it will be strange right after living in Italy. Now do you understand why I expect my culture shock to increase? I mean, what will I wear?
This week has been great, though. I love being back with my family, in my own (horrificly messy) room, and being able to slowly reconnect with friends. I went to Brian and Jolie's adoption party for Anna on Tuesday night, our family went to Mangia Qui in Harrisburg for a really great dinner Thursday evening, and Allison and Juliana Coleman had a welcome back to H-burg/graduation party last night; it was really nice to know that there were going to be things to do when I got back. Not having constant activity will be something I need to slowly get used to. The Orvietani thought their town to be sleepy and dull, but that's because they aren't in suburban Central PA.
So...all this to say, keep reading to see how I adjust. Will I once again settle into American routine and custom with a gentle sigh, or will I continue to feel weirded out every time I see Xanthum Gum on a label? At any rate, I know that the immediate future holds a lot of exposure to grits and twang.
There have been plenty of adjustments, though. For instance, when I first got back I kept slamming things: doors, toilet seats, etc. And all the door handles in my house felt like they were about to fall off. I soon realized that I had grown accustomed to pushing around ancient, heavy wooden doors and cranking down on their handles. Things have less weight here, whatever that means. Also, why on earth is there so much carpet everywhere?
Food is kind of a major thing, as I'm sure you can imagine. Tomatoes taste like water, and everything has way too many ingredients. I looked at the ingredients list on a box of purchased Atlanta Bread Co. sweet rolls, and it's absurdly long...because of all the preserving chemicals. And why does color need to be added? (I would take a photo of it, if that didn't mean flipping it upside down and smooshing the sweet rolls) I was going to have a Yoplait yogurt last night, like I normally do when I'm hungry right before bed, but then I noticed that it contains high fructose corn syrup. Nevermind. I don't want to sound like some sort of radical organic activist, because I don't think I am (and I'm sure this sounds pretty tame to a lot of you); it's just that none of this makes sense to me anymore. How about we just make bread and sweet rolls the way they've been for thousands of years? Why does guacomole need to be processed and in a plastic bag?
So my dad and I are making something for dinner tonight.
But here's the big thing, why I'm not closing this blog off just yet. I expect the culture shock to continue, and maybe even get worse, over the next week, and...I want to write about it. While this page may have been helpful for some of you in following what I was doing, it has been extremely helpful for me in understanding what I was doing. I'm not normally one to journal, but I've discovered it's importance. But back to the point:
Jason (my 17 year old brother) and I are taking a road trip to Georgia.
He's been doing computer animation and graphic stuff since he was 12, starting with open source programs. This summer he landed a paid design internship at a local school curriculum press that is run by my old headmaster. Apparently, Georgia is conservative enough that the press, which comes from a Christian background, is able to make a bid for some Latin and other language texts to go onto the Georgia public schools curriculum list. But the catch is that anyone making a bid needs to do so with a physical representative in 13 locations over the course of next week. It wasn't cost-effective to send one of their secretaries, so they hired Jason and I for this job. Fortune falling from the sky!
Of all the places I'd imagined I could be going right after I got home (not many, really...um, Harrisburg? Hershey? Camp Hill? that's about all I expected), the Deep South certainly was not one of those! Now, we'll be pretty busy going from place to place to set up a book table and sit at it, so I don't expect it'll be a journey worthy of Faulkner. But it will be strange right after living in Italy. Now do you understand why I expect my culture shock to increase? I mean, what will I wear?
This week has been great, though. I love being back with my family, in my own (horrificly messy) room, and being able to slowly reconnect with friends. I went to Brian and Jolie's adoption party for Anna on Tuesday night, our family went to Mangia Qui in Harrisburg for a really great dinner Thursday evening, and Allison and Juliana Coleman had a welcome back to H-burg/graduation party last night; it was really nice to know that there were going to be things to do when I got back. Not having constant activity will be something I need to slowly get used to. The Orvietani thought their town to be sleepy and dull, but that's because they aren't in suburban Central PA.
So...all this to say, keep reading to see how I adjust. Will I once again settle into American routine and custom with a gentle sigh, or will I continue to feel weirded out every time I see Xanthum Gum on a label? At any rate, I know that the immediate future holds a lot of exposure to grits and twang.
16 June 2009
Notes From An Aeroplane
It is strange for me to realize just now that my two primary modes of transportation, plane and train, allow only a lateral view of the landscape. There is no possibility of seeing what is coming ahead before you get there, unless it is looking down during the holding pattern before the final descent, or when the track curves around a stream or some farmer’s small, dusty plot. Observation can only happen at the moment of experience – no foreshadowing of what the future holds, no isolation and dissection of the past. And then you arrive at your destination. I don’t know if this is expressly a metaphor that carries deeply in any way, but I think there might be something to it.
I’m so glad they took the pains to tell us on our in-flight map screen that we flew right over Kuujjuick! Wow!
There are a good number of things to which I am thankful to be returning – cheeseburgers from the grill, that sort of thing. What I am not anticipating with a light heart is the rampant consumerism of American culture. Stepping foot on this plane was like entering a small America again; immediately, screens flicked on and it was announced that there would be a cinematic smorgasbord spread in front of us. Just from my seat I could see several people actively flipping through channels, changing from movie to movie. It’s surprising to me that the foreign, slow, soundtrackless film Gomorrah was played at all. But good thing there were seven other options for those without the attention span for that (and this was just in economy seating!). The couple sitting to my right asked several times if there was any cran-apple juice on board – the apple, orange, and tomato juices, not to mention the several sodas and water, were just not good enough. My four months of reduced options and a context of appreciation for the fresh and the handmade have made me healthy, fit, in more ways than the simple matter of physique. I pray that I will successfully fight the urge to accept the glut of manufacture and unlimited choice that so defines the American context I am about to reenter.
I am exhausted; two hours of sleep the night before, a 5 am wake-up call, a long and arduous path through security (but none of my bags were overweight! Wonder of wonders!) and then a nine-hour flight – and sleeping on planes is difficult enough, but the daytime flight just further complicated things. A two-hour layover in Dulles, a short flight to Philly, and then into the arms of my beloved, waiting family.
I’ve used this time to listen to the Arvo Part and Philip Glass recordings Matt gave me. Perfect for introspection.
Saying goodbye just now was a bitter joy. All good things come to an end, and this is good because the temporal has value; a significant aspect of love would be lost without separation. Part of, maybe even inherent to this is the implied promise of reunion.
Flying over Pennsylvania around dusk is a special thing. The earth lies in a layered cloth, corduroy furrows in one part, the metallic sheen of water in another. All through it are the twisting, organic strings of roads and waterways, filled and dry. When you look out toward the fading haze of the horizon, the yellow patches of cultivation among the interstices of blue green forest begin to mirror the sky above it; eventually the illusion is complete, and they are no longer pieces of earth but clouds floating (even above the actual clouds). This is hard to explain, the non-horizon line that is only able to be seen in the air. This, and how time seems to stand still because nothing moves around you.
And now I am home.
I’m so glad they took the pains to tell us on our in-flight map screen that we flew right over Kuujjuick! Wow!
There are a good number of things to which I am thankful to be returning – cheeseburgers from the grill, that sort of thing. What I am not anticipating with a light heart is the rampant consumerism of American culture. Stepping foot on this plane was like entering a small America again; immediately, screens flicked on and it was announced that there would be a cinematic smorgasbord spread in front of us. Just from my seat I could see several people actively flipping through channels, changing from movie to movie. It’s surprising to me that the foreign, slow, soundtrackless film Gomorrah was played at all. But good thing there were seven other options for those without the attention span for that (and this was just in economy seating!). The couple sitting to my right asked several times if there was any cran-apple juice on board – the apple, orange, and tomato juices, not to mention the several sodas and water, were just not good enough. My four months of reduced options and a context of appreciation for the fresh and the handmade have made me healthy, fit, in more ways than the simple matter of physique. I pray that I will successfully fight the urge to accept the glut of manufacture and unlimited choice that so defines the American context I am about to reenter.
I am exhausted; two hours of sleep the night before, a 5 am wake-up call, a long and arduous path through security (but none of my bags were overweight! Wonder of wonders!) and then a nine-hour flight – and sleeping on planes is difficult enough, but the daytime flight just further complicated things. A two-hour layover in Dulles, a short flight to Philly, and then into the arms of my beloved, waiting family.
I’ve used this time to listen to the Arvo Part and Philip Glass recordings Matt gave me. Perfect for introspection.
Saying goodbye just now was a bitter joy. All good things come to an end, and this is good because the temporal has value; a significant aspect of love would be lost without separation. Part of, maybe even inherent to this is the implied promise of reunion.
Flying over Pennsylvania around dusk is a special thing. The earth lies in a layered cloth, corduroy furrows in one part, the metallic sheen of water in another. All through it are the twisting, organic strings of roads and waterways, filled and dry. When you look out toward the fading haze of the horizon, the yellow patches of cultivation among the interstices of blue green forest begin to mirror the sky above it; eventually the illusion is complete, and they are no longer pieces of earth but clouds floating (even above the actual clouds). This is hard to explain, the non-horizon line that is only able to be seen in the air. This, and how time seems to stand still because nothing moves around you.
And now I am home.
13 June 2009
ave maria, gratia plena, dominus tecum
Tonight we celebrate Bruce Herman's paintings of Mary, which have been permanently installed here in Monastero di San Paolo. I've been really busy with singing rehearsals, helping to rig lighting, etc. Tonight it comes to an end with one spectacular show.
Today I revisited the Duomo a number of times. After walking past the cathedral pretty much every day, I was surprised to find that today, for some reason, it seemed larger. Maybe it was because of the large white clouds behind it providing a sense of depth to its background. Maybe because it is the largest thing looming on the horizon of my vision in these last days, a metaphor for where I now live and am about to leave. I went inside it, looked once more at the San Brizio chapel with the Luca Signorelli paintings, paused before the icon of the Miracle of Bolsena. Tomorrow I will be attending mass there, in celebration of Corpus Christi, the holiday remembering the Miracle of Bolsena in which the blood of Christ dripped out of the communion cup onto the cloth beneath it. This is Orvieto's biggest day. Our last day.
And suddenly I am torn. fortis autem jam cui omne solum patria est. perfectus vero cui mundus totus exsilium est.
I want to leave and return to what I have always known. I want to stay in this place I am only just learning. Both are changing.
I don't know how to end this post. Likely the next thing here will be posted from home, something written on the plane perhaps. But this too probably won't be a conclusion. Like I said in my last post - this is a series of interludes.
Today I revisited the Duomo a number of times. After walking past the cathedral pretty much every day, I was surprised to find that today, for some reason, it seemed larger. Maybe it was because of the large white clouds behind it providing a sense of depth to its background. Maybe because it is the largest thing looming on the horizon of my vision in these last days, a metaphor for where I now live and am about to leave. I went inside it, looked once more at the San Brizio chapel with the Luca Signorelli paintings, paused before the icon of the Miracle of Bolsena. Tomorrow I will be attending mass there, in celebration of Corpus Christi, the holiday remembering the Miracle of Bolsena in which the blood of Christ dripped out of the communion cup onto the cloth beneath it. This is Orvieto's biggest day. Our last day.
And suddenly I am torn. fortis autem jam cui omne solum patria est. perfectus vero cui mundus totus exsilium est.
I want to leave and return to what I have always known. I want to stay in this place I am only just learning. Both are changing.
I don't know how to end this post. Likely the next thing here will be posted from home, something written on the plane perhaps. But this too probably won't be a conclusion. Like I said in my last post - this is a series of interludes.
11 June 2009
A Series of Interludes (Orvieto)
Yesterday evening we sang and danced a short piece (from the larger ensemble we'll be performing on Saturday) at the library as part of a reading and discussion with the Italian author Susanna Tamaro. It is so wonderful to be singing like this again! Today we had our last class with Scott (he talked to us about matters of faith and poetry and art and where/how they intersect), and Jake and I rigged up part of the lighting for Saturday. We built an apparatus to suspend two bright spots inside the well in the courtyard so that they can send a beam shooting up at a dramatic moment. We'll test that tonight.
Here is the travel writing independent piece I wrote for this class. I apologize for the poor formatting that Blogspot forces upon me...well, you. It's titled A Series of Interludes (Orvieto).
I will not try to tell you what Orvieto is. This will save you heartache and me misery.
What gives any person the right to cast off his label of “stranger”? How long do you need to stay in a place, how well do you need to know it before that identity can be relinquished? I have a sense that people who have lived here their entire lives—and their fathers and mothers before them—have not noticed things apparent to me, the stranger. There is a time in between arriving brand new and leaving a veteran in which the eye stays fresh, a time when some familiarity with a place brings a little knowledge that has not yet been tainted by numbing comfort; I have tried to remain on this plateau of unjaded understanding, with its steep drops at either end that mirror the carved crag on which the city is built.
But I am beginning to see that time and familiarity may have little to do with each other, and maybe are not important at all, anywhere.
∼
When you travel to Orvieto, first travel to millions of years ago—to a volcanic landscape bubbling and heaving as creation takes form around it, as it settles and cools and becomes richly fertile. The soil is remarkable for what it gives to the vegetation, and the indigenous Vitis vinifera grapevines have given the inhabitants of this area their foundation from the earliest recorded moments. Actually, the foundation is what lies beneath the soil, the rock that breaks through the thin skin of cultivated earth at points to form large, exposed outcroppings. This volcanic stone is called tufa, and it too is a provider. Etruscans discovered the potentials of this stone as they discovered the fortified safety of Velzna’s insular mesa; the igneous rock is light and porous, like a combination of sandstone and pumice, and is soft and easy to cut when first excavated. With exposure to air, however, it hardens and increases in strength, while still retaining its lightness. While it proves drafty and absorbs moisture in the winter, in the summer it is cool.
In this city, with its emphasis (born out of necessity and maintained out of pride) on local resources, all of the buildings employ tufa in some way. Orvieto is built on top of tufa and out of tufa; the ancient stone born of fire and gas provides our first step into the city’s history, the first hint at its nature.
The final step is the same; the tufa cliffs are further fortified with tufa blocks in many parts. The grass seeds lodge in the pores and grow and moss softens the edges, and there are sections where natural cliff and made wall meld together and are once again the same after centuries of separation.
∼
When I arrived, my Orvieto was brand new. Now it is close to four months old, and is still being constructed, sometimes reconstructed. On a map there is a whole town with solid form, but what does the cartographer know? Orvieto is laid out with a walk around the circumference, main guidelines on an axis, a few lines twisting out from the center. It is an unfinished web; my eyes and feet work with my mind as tandem spinnerets. Yesterday I walked down a new alley and a new strand was spun; Orvieto grew.
∼
The German couple next to me stares from paper to the tops of buildings, wondering where is Point B. Perhaps if I spoke their language I could tell them how to reach it; instead, I ask myself from where did Point B come? What is it that has caused this city to be, given it its impetus and identity? Surrounding me is coherence, even if an incomprehensible coherence; this city is named, and so it is a thing, it exists. Orvieto. But where, and when? In which stratum of this layered place is the buried kernel of distinctiveness to be found, the small but significant seed that determines all that sprouts above it? I begin to see that it is not one thing, but that each of the strata makes a facet, all of which twist and reflect and meet along many points.
Everyone flocks to the Duomo, the cathedral built hundreds of years ago in a splendor that is now rare, and still was rare then. For these spectacle-seekers, this is Orvieto, one building (and maybe the funicolare to get there). For the old man in the hat shop, this corner of the corso is Orvieto, and he tries to share it with the crowd that is intent on finding “Duomo Orvieto,” for a profit. For the students, school is Orvieto, and they feel the dread of exams; this is relieved when they sit on the curb and do shots, having become citizens of “Caffe Cavour Orvieto.” For the woman pushing the stroller, her baby is Orvieto.
This is a haunted place, and it is governed by ghosts. Layered specters of its history fill in the cracks, move the streets, and give promptings for what will come. All around I see palimpsests. Nothing has an age because there is no point in thinking like that. The function of this building is to create art students who may or may not impact the next age; broken plaster on the wall that has been crumbling for fifty years exposes the tufa stone blocks that comprise the building’s structure. The Etruscans sat above this one block before it was a block, when it was earth and unnamed and created millennia before any man was. It was soft and secret and remained that way until recently, when it was named “block,” and “Orvieto,” and solidified.
And the building next to it tells a story that we also call Orvieto, along with the four-star hotel and the Etruscan tomb, mottled like the door against which I am leaning. Also the bread I can smell, and the tall cyprus trees and new grass in the gated garden, and this road sign brought from many miles away has also become Orvieto.
Perhaps, for a time, I too have become one of these facets called “Orvieto.”
∼
Sweaters and scarves become light cardigans, which become sundresses and linen shirts, the top three buttons undone. With this change of seasons comes an exponentially increasing number of foreigners. Brits, Japanese, Swiss, Swedish, French, Germans, Canadians, and loud Americans surface for an instant and then disappear. They usually make no visible mark, certainly not individually. But each of these invisible marks gives life to this place, and grouped together change the surface of Orvieto as insolently as raindrops carving canyons in a flash flood.
You cannot tell foreigners from locals by what they actually are, in many cases. The giveaway is those things with which they surround themselves—clothing, cameras. This is consistently true, of course, only at the most superficial degree: observation from a distance. Their identity is constructed from things which are not them. The French generally wear loose and soft looking fabric, and Germans have a penchant for earth-toned cargo pants or shorts, paired with sandals. Sandals and socks, likely. Americans wear baseball hats and hiking pants, the sand-colored transforming kind that zip-off to create shorts, and hiking boots. Decrease the physical distance between cultures, and the distinctions become more subtle, but this remains: identity is constructed directly around the person, not from what he actually is.
And it is, naturally, the same with the locals. They are not foreigners in this place, simply through the accident that they were born here.
This is why you must never merely pass through an area unless your intent is to distinguish nothing and learn nothing.
∼
The open-air market in Piazza del Popolo is an exemplification of a foreign thing being part of Orvieto, so much a part of it that if it disappeared, something of the city’s nature would be lost. And another paradox: all that is here in this market exudes impermanence, and I know that by evening there will be no trace that such a thing ever happened. Necessities and treasures, food and utensils and clothing purchased will have dispersed throughout the town, placed in cupboards or on windowsills.
If one expands his view to look over the centuries, the amount of time that the market exists in Orvieto—a few hours twice a week—is so brief that it may as well not exist. But I see the old woman trundling her rolling grocery bag along. The bag makes a rumbling of plastic wheels on stones and cracks between them, a sound that crescendoes and decrescendoes in a rhythm that matches the rise and fall of limping legs. They have been walking to this piazza for this market for close to a century, I am sure. Will you tell her the market does not exist? She spends her week benefiting from it—it nourishes her and her family, gives them life and sometimes excitement, sustains them through their lives. Man cannot live on bread alone, but she spends much of her time selecting bread, regardless. Other time is devoted to thinking of this market, planning for it—the market is not only in her physical world (a world growing less real), but, crucially, it is a central location in the world of her mind. This is the same for many, if not most, Orvietani. So for centuries, likely millennia, the market has been a permanent fixture in Orvieto, beginning when it was Velzna. This temporary collection of physical objects and foreigners is perhaps the last thing you would assign to the realm of metaphysics or whatever you want to call it, but what the market is most is an idea. The idea is important.
∼
I want there to be a conclusion, but other than leaving this place and recommencing in another, there is none. I will continue to imagine that time and familiarity interact, fighting each other and dancing together (depending on something inane like my mood or the weather), but it will be somewhere else. Orvieto is no developed story, consistently and smoothly moving through rising action, climax, dénouement, final page. It can be introduced; from there it must be observed in pieces, separated artificially into interludes, pauses in something that does not stop or end.
Orvieto began as the rest of the world: without form and void, unnamed. With the first unknown inhabitants it received its first lost name, followed by a series of other names in other tongues. It is foreseeable that this progression will circle back on itself until there are no longer inhabitants and Orvieto becomes again an unnamed formless void. There is no place without people.
What gives any person the right, ever, to cast off his label of “stranger”?
Here is the travel writing independent piece I wrote for this class. I apologize for the poor formatting that Blogspot forces upon me...well, you. It's titled A Series of Interludes (Orvieto).
I will not try to tell you what Orvieto is. This will save you heartache and me misery.
What gives any person the right to cast off his label of “stranger”? How long do you need to stay in a place, how well do you need to know it before that identity can be relinquished? I have a sense that people who have lived here their entire lives—and their fathers and mothers before them—have not noticed things apparent to me, the stranger. There is a time in between arriving brand new and leaving a veteran in which the eye stays fresh, a time when some familiarity with a place brings a little knowledge that has not yet been tainted by numbing comfort; I have tried to remain on this plateau of unjaded understanding, with its steep drops at either end that mirror the carved crag on which the city is built.
But I am beginning to see that time and familiarity may have little to do with each other, and maybe are not important at all, anywhere.
∼
When you travel to Orvieto, first travel to millions of years ago—to a volcanic landscape bubbling and heaving as creation takes form around it, as it settles and cools and becomes richly fertile. The soil is remarkable for what it gives to the vegetation, and the indigenous Vitis vinifera grapevines have given the inhabitants of this area their foundation from the earliest recorded moments. Actually, the foundation is what lies beneath the soil, the rock that breaks through the thin skin of cultivated earth at points to form large, exposed outcroppings. This volcanic stone is called tufa, and it too is a provider. Etruscans discovered the potentials of this stone as they discovered the fortified safety of Velzna’s insular mesa; the igneous rock is light and porous, like a combination of sandstone and pumice, and is soft and easy to cut when first excavated. With exposure to air, however, it hardens and increases in strength, while still retaining its lightness. While it proves drafty and absorbs moisture in the winter, in the summer it is cool.
In this city, with its emphasis (born out of necessity and maintained out of pride) on local resources, all of the buildings employ tufa in some way. Orvieto is built on top of tufa and out of tufa; the ancient stone born of fire and gas provides our first step into the city’s history, the first hint at its nature.
The final step is the same; the tufa cliffs are further fortified with tufa blocks in many parts. The grass seeds lodge in the pores and grow and moss softens the edges, and there are sections where natural cliff and made wall meld together and are once again the same after centuries of separation.
∼
When I arrived, my Orvieto was brand new. Now it is close to four months old, and is still being constructed, sometimes reconstructed. On a map there is a whole town with solid form, but what does the cartographer know? Orvieto is laid out with a walk around the circumference, main guidelines on an axis, a few lines twisting out from the center. It is an unfinished web; my eyes and feet work with my mind as tandem spinnerets. Yesterday I walked down a new alley and a new strand was spun; Orvieto grew.
∼
The German couple next to me stares from paper to the tops of buildings, wondering where is Point B. Perhaps if I spoke their language I could tell them how to reach it; instead, I ask myself from where did Point B come? What is it that has caused this city to be, given it its impetus and identity? Surrounding me is coherence, even if an incomprehensible coherence; this city is named, and so it is a thing, it exists. Orvieto. But where, and when? In which stratum of this layered place is the buried kernel of distinctiveness to be found, the small but significant seed that determines all that sprouts above it? I begin to see that it is not one thing, but that each of the strata makes a facet, all of which twist and reflect and meet along many points.
Everyone flocks to the Duomo, the cathedral built hundreds of years ago in a splendor that is now rare, and still was rare then. For these spectacle-seekers, this is Orvieto, one building (and maybe the funicolare to get there). For the old man in the hat shop, this corner of the corso is Orvieto, and he tries to share it with the crowd that is intent on finding “Duomo Orvieto,” for a profit. For the students, school is Orvieto, and they feel the dread of exams; this is relieved when they sit on the curb and do shots, having become citizens of “Caffe Cavour Orvieto.” For the woman pushing the stroller, her baby is Orvieto.
This is a haunted place, and it is governed by ghosts. Layered specters of its history fill in the cracks, move the streets, and give promptings for what will come. All around I see palimpsests. Nothing has an age because there is no point in thinking like that. The function of this building is to create art students who may or may not impact the next age; broken plaster on the wall that has been crumbling for fifty years exposes the tufa stone blocks that comprise the building’s structure. The Etruscans sat above this one block before it was a block, when it was earth and unnamed and created millennia before any man was. It was soft and secret and remained that way until recently, when it was named “block,” and “Orvieto,” and solidified.
And the building next to it tells a story that we also call Orvieto, along with the four-star hotel and the Etruscan tomb, mottled like the door against which I am leaning. Also the bread I can smell, and the tall cyprus trees and new grass in the gated garden, and this road sign brought from many miles away has also become Orvieto.
Perhaps, for a time, I too have become one of these facets called “Orvieto.”
∼
Sweaters and scarves become light cardigans, which become sundresses and linen shirts, the top three buttons undone. With this change of seasons comes an exponentially increasing number of foreigners. Brits, Japanese, Swiss, Swedish, French, Germans, Canadians, and loud Americans surface for an instant and then disappear. They usually make no visible mark, certainly not individually. But each of these invisible marks gives life to this place, and grouped together change the surface of Orvieto as insolently as raindrops carving canyons in a flash flood.
You cannot tell foreigners from locals by what they actually are, in many cases. The giveaway is those things with which they surround themselves—clothing, cameras. This is consistently true, of course, only at the most superficial degree: observation from a distance. Their identity is constructed from things which are not them. The French generally wear loose and soft looking fabric, and Germans have a penchant for earth-toned cargo pants or shorts, paired with sandals. Sandals and socks, likely. Americans wear baseball hats and hiking pants, the sand-colored transforming kind that zip-off to create shorts, and hiking boots. Decrease the physical distance between cultures, and the distinctions become more subtle, but this remains: identity is constructed directly around the person, not from what he actually is.
And it is, naturally, the same with the locals. They are not foreigners in this place, simply through the accident that they were born here.
This is why you must never merely pass through an area unless your intent is to distinguish nothing and learn nothing.
∼
The open-air market in Piazza del Popolo is an exemplification of a foreign thing being part of Orvieto, so much a part of it that if it disappeared, something of the city’s nature would be lost. And another paradox: all that is here in this market exudes impermanence, and I know that by evening there will be no trace that such a thing ever happened. Necessities and treasures, food and utensils and clothing purchased will have dispersed throughout the town, placed in cupboards or on windowsills.
If one expands his view to look over the centuries, the amount of time that the market exists in Orvieto—a few hours twice a week—is so brief that it may as well not exist. But I see the old woman trundling her rolling grocery bag along. The bag makes a rumbling of plastic wheels on stones and cracks between them, a sound that crescendoes and decrescendoes in a rhythm that matches the rise and fall of limping legs. They have been walking to this piazza for this market for close to a century, I am sure. Will you tell her the market does not exist? She spends her week benefiting from it—it nourishes her and her family, gives them life and sometimes excitement, sustains them through their lives. Man cannot live on bread alone, but she spends much of her time selecting bread, regardless. Other time is devoted to thinking of this market, planning for it—the market is not only in her physical world (a world growing less real), but, crucially, it is a central location in the world of her mind. This is the same for many, if not most, Orvietani. So for centuries, likely millennia, the market has been a permanent fixture in Orvieto, beginning when it was Velzna. This temporary collection of physical objects and foreigners is perhaps the last thing you would assign to the realm of metaphysics or whatever you want to call it, but what the market is most is an idea. The idea is important.
∼
I want there to be a conclusion, but other than leaving this place and recommencing in another, there is none. I will continue to imagine that time and familiarity interact, fighting each other and dancing together (depending on something inane like my mood or the weather), but it will be somewhere else. Orvieto is no developed story, consistently and smoothly moving through rising action, climax, dénouement, final page. It can be introduced; from there it must be observed in pieces, separated artificially into interludes, pauses in something that does not stop or end.
Orvieto began as the rest of the world: without form and void, unnamed. With the first unknown inhabitants it received its first lost name, followed by a series of other names in other tongues. It is foreseeable that this progression will circle back on itself until there are no longer inhabitants and Orvieto becomes again an unnamed formless void. There is no place without people.
What gives any person the right, ever, to cast off his label of “stranger”?
09 June 2009
Mundus Totus Exsilium Est
delicatus ille est adhuc cui patria dulcis est
fortis autem jam cui omne solum patria est
perfectus vero cui mundus totus exsilium est
He is delicate to whom his native land is sweet.
He is already strong to whom every land is his fatherland.
He is perfect to whom the world is as a place of exile.
— Hugh of Saint Victor, 12th cent.
I received the above quote from Bruce Herman today at a meeting during which he explained a bit about the paintings which will be installed for his show on the 13th. I think it is a perfect summary of the emotion and state of being that I am gradually putting on as my time in Italy moves toward its end. In addition, it is a good saying for life in general, especially the time of life I currently inhabit in which there is much that is necessarily transient.
I left off the last post in anticipation of the meal we were about to have at the Doll’s apartment, a flight of stairs and a few steps down the hall from our own living quarters. The meal matched my expectations; I was angry with myself for having eaten even those few fennel seed biscuits I’d had over an aperitivo with Riel right before, because I ought to have starved myself that entire day! We were first treated to a delicious lentil soup topped with goat cheese, accompanied by soft (salted!) bread from Rome. The main course was a bit of an experiment for Matt: a bowl of rice formed the substrate for baked sausages and a delicious pesto gravy of sorts. My mouth waters still as I think about it. Salad with a light vinaigrette were on the side, and we finished the time with Sharona’s apple crisp and vanilla ice cream – a lovely taste of home.
But we’ve done more than eat. Sunday was our last mass at San Giovenale, the millennium-old worship space that feels as sanctified and ancient as you would imagine it to be. In my writing class we are finishing the final drafts of our pieces; I will likely post mine Thursday. Sunday evening we had the first ever Monastery San Paolo Show of Talents, at which I read the poem I’d written here (Scott Cairns had graciously helped me make some revisions that brought it to a point at which I am comfortable with it). Following dinner was a reading of both the Italian and English translations of a poet who was a contemporary of Dante, at which both Scott Cairns and a visiting professor from Wheaton, Brett Foster, each read a poem of his own.
I’ve also been commissioned to videotape parts of rehearsals for the events surrounding the installment of Bruce’s paintings, and I believe I will be helping with lighting for that as well. This is a full-fledged show, with original music and interpretive dance in response to the paintings. Singers and dancers from New York have come in, as well as Paul and the choreographer Karin Coonrod. Of course I wish I could be actually singing, but the parts are only for women; still, I am doing all I can to assist, which has been fantastic. [EDIT: I just found out that I will be singing after all, apparently they need a tenor 1 for something! I'm not quite sure yet in what capacity I'll be singing, but I'm really psyched about it! This made my night.] And busy. Here is a look at my schedule (in addition to class from 9-12 Wednesday and Thursday mornings):
Wednesday
2:00 – Light crew meeting
6:00 – Readings by a famous Italian author
9:15 – Concert at the Duomo
10:15 – Attend the tail end of light rehearsal
Thursday
6:30 – Reception for Stone Carving and Travel Writing classes (presentation of work)
8:30 – Open house at the Doll’s apartment
Friday
11:00am – Artist panel discussion
5:30 – Presentation by Claudia Koll
7:30 – Group dinner at Charlie’s
9:00 – Performance at Teatro di Mancinelli
Saturday
3:00 – Exit room inspection
5:00 – Procession of the Women (an Orvietano festival)
9:00 – Opening of Bruce Herman’s installation
Yesterday was a good day. Around four, Bruce and I went to Montenucci’s for crudini and to talk about art and learn more about each other. He is very knowledgeable, especially experientially, but is at the same time completely humble and accommodating towards a zealous, excited, and naïve young art student like myself. I thoroughly enjoy every chance I get to speak with him, and I hope that that will not end after I leave this place.
Before dinner that same night, a group of us gathered at Caffe Cavour to drink spumante and see Hilary Meakin off. Her teaching job ended today, and so she’s now in Rome and flying back to England tomorrow morning. I really enjoyed all of our interactions here, and I hope that I will see her again in the future.
Dinner was a delicious salad with a desert of watermelon! After, some of us went to Charlie’s. I tried a beer made by Trappist monks that was served to me in a gold-rimmed goblet. It was pretty good.
Not too much going on today. This afternoon Matt gave a demonstration on how to hand make a book for drawing or painting in, which I think I will do this summer. I’ve always rather liked the idea of creating a book…there are a few possible themes I have in mind. But for now, I think I will spend the remainder of my time doing the final polishing on my travel writing piece.
perfectus vero cui mundus totus exsilium est
fortis autem jam cui omne solum patria est
perfectus vero cui mundus totus exsilium est
He is delicate to whom his native land is sweet.
He is already strong to whom every land is his fatherland.
He is perfect to whom the world is as a place of exile.
— Hugh of Saint Victor, 12th cent.
I received the above quote from Bruce Herman today at a meeting during which he explained a bit about the paintings which will be installed for his show on the 13th. I think it is a perfect summary of the emotion and state of being that I am gradually putting on as my time in Italy moves toward its end. In addition, it is a good saying for life in general, especially the time of life I currently inhabit in which there is much that is necessarily transient.
I left off the last post in anticipation of the meal we were about to have at the Doll’s apartment, a flight of stairs and a few steps down the hall from our own living quarters. The meal matched my expectations; I was angry with myself for having eaten even those few fennel seed biscuits I’d had over an aperitivo with Riel right before, because I ought to have starved myself that entire day! We were first treated to a delicious lentil soup topped with goat cheese, accompanied by soft (salted!) bread from Rome. The main course was a bit of an experiment for Matt: a bowl of rice formed the substrate for baked sausages and a delicious pesto gravy of sorts. My mouth waters still as I think about it. Salad with a light vinaigrette were on the side, and we finished the time with Sharona’s apple crisp and vanilla ice cream – a lovely taste of home.
But we’ve done more than eat. Sunday was our last mass at San Giovenale, the millennium-old worship space that feels as sanctified and ancient as you would imagine it to be. In my writing class we are finishing the final drafts of our pieces; I will likely post mine Thursday. Sunday evening we had the first ever Monastery San Paolo Show of Talents, at which I read the poem I’d written here (Scott Cairns had graciously helped me make some revisions that brought it to a point at which I am comfortable with it). Following dinner was a reading of both the Italian and English translations of a poet who was a contemporary of Dante, at which both Scott Cairns and a visiting professor from Wheaton, Brett Foster, each read a poem of his own.
I’ve also been commissioned to videotape parts of rehearsals for the events surrounding the installment of Bruce’s paintings, and I believe I will be helping with lighting for that as well. This is a full-fledged show, with original music and interpretive dance in response to the paintings. Singers and dancers from New York have come in, as well as Paul and the choreographer Karin Coonrod. Of course I wish I could be actually singing, but the parts are only for women; still, I am doing all I can to assist, which has been fantastic. [EDIT: I just found out that I will be singing after all, apparently they need a tenor 1 for something! I'm not quite sure yet in what capacity I'll be singing, but I'm really psyched about it! This made my night.] And busy. Here is a look at my schedule (in addition to class from 9-12 Wednesday and Thursday mornings):
Wednesday
2:00 – Light crew meeting
6:00 – Readings by a famous Italian author
9:15 – Concert at the Duomo
10:15 – Attend the tail end of light rehearsal
Thursday
6:30 – Reception for Stone Carving and Travel Writing classes (presentation of work)
8:30 – Open house at the Doll’s apartment
Friday
11:00am – Artist panel discussion
5:30 – Presentation by Claudia Koll
7:30 – Group dinner at Charlie’s
9:00 – Performance at Teatro di Mancinelli
Saturday
3:00 – Exit room inspection
5:00 – Procession of the Women (an Orvietano festival)
9:00 – Opening of Bruce Herman’s installation
Yesterday was a good day. Around four, Bruce and I went to Montenucci’s for crudini and to talk about art and learn more about each other. He is very knowledgeable, especially experientially, but is at the same time completely humble and accommodating towards a zealous, excited, and naïve young art student like myself. I thoroughly enjoy every chance I get to speak with him, and I hope that that will not end after I leave this place.
Before dinner that same night, a group of us gathered at Caffe Cavour to drink spumante and see Hilary Meakin off. Her teaching job ended today, and so she’s now in Rome and flying back to England tomorrow morning. I really enjoyed all of our interactions here, and I hope that I will see her again in the future.
Dinner was a delicious salad with a desert of watermelon! After, some of us went to Charlie’s. I tried a beer made by Trappist monks that was served to me in a gold-rimmed goblet. It was pretty good.
Not too much going on today. This afternoon Matt gave a demonstration on how to hand make a book for drawing or painting in, which I think I will do this summer. I’ve always rather liked the idea of creating a book…there are a few possible themes I have in mind. But for now, I think I will spend the remainder of my time doing the final polishing on my travel writing piece.
perfectus vero cui mundus totus exsilium est
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