Being Transformed

Death Comes to Pemberley

2012-01-27T17:17:00.000-08:00

In a letter from Lady Catherine is this funny line.
I actually laughed out loud:

" I shall convey your news to Mr. Collins since it cannot long be concealed. As a clergyman, he will wish to send you his usual depressing words of comfort, and I shall enclose his letter with mine but will place an embargo on its length. " ( p. 151)

Spring Friday in January!

2012-01-27T15:10:00.000-08:00

Daffodils on our walk today. Really. It is still January.

Quote that my students heard, discussed, copied in their journals , and then wrote about it:

"The essential disciplines of emerging leaders provide them with an ability to see beyond the constraints of present circumstances to the possiblities of the future. They stir up in them a hunger to see what is in terms of what ought to be. They provoke in them a passion to live life beyond the limits imposed by the tyranny of the urgent."

by Tristan Gylberd

Habits matter.
Work matters.

The tyranny of the urgent presses in even on 14 - 18 year olds. (My students' ages.) Living beyond that is where the balance is. Like today's walk at the end of a busy week. Needed for thinking time with my husband. Laundry needed to be folded but ....... the tyranny of the urgent. The busyness of a home.

How about you? What are your habits of discipline?

Lectio Divina. Drink from it.

You find the time to do what you are called to do. You have to have Lectio Divina to do that.

Thank you , Tristan!

The Sun is out....all day!

2012-01-25T13:38:00.000-08:00

Everyone is out and about.

The sun is out.

All day.

Warm.

“If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world”
- Thorin to Bilbo Baggins

Checked OFF

2012-01-23T18:36:00.000-08:00

I finally got my Fall Semester grades done tonight for my English high school class. One of the best classes I've had with 11 students. They love to talk, connect big ideas, and are reading The Odyssey now. I will not
correct the names , even the title! So they are looking for Honda vans and loved what the word means: odyssey. " So that is why Honda named the van Odyssey!"

Update to the TO DO list

2012-01-23T14:57:00.000-08:00

Suits .... the groom of the June wedding just picked out suits to buy.

Not long and the two weddings will become one.

To Do list gets shorter then longer!

Checking off TO DO lists

2012-01-23T12:46:00.000-08:00

I have many lists now with two weddings: March and June. Even the groom's side has much to do like the DRESSES I wear plus everyone else in the family is in the weddings! The dress I had for March is the right color for June so I've been looking for another. One is here to be tried on! YEAH! A major "check off" the list today: the ring bearer knows where to get his tux. Well, his mom does. ( my nephew is 8 ) Thankfully, our 3rd son ( June wedding ) had coupons for $40.00 off each tux that our 2nd son ( March wedding ) is now using. They had to be used by the end of this month. So Saturday was spent moving 2nd son into his new apt., Emma had Musical Theater practice and I monitored backstage, and 3rd son was calling me as he looked for suits for his wedding. The contract for the March wedding tuxes got done too. Busy rainy day.

IF you are confused, you have now stepped into my mind.

IN this busy time: Emma is in a Musical Theater production in 2 weeks, going to a Bridal Shower this coming weekend and teaching my English class which is starting with The Odyssey. But I've escaped to Pemberley! I don't usually like sequels by a different author , especially those with Jane Austen. BUT P.D. James has risen up to the role because of her excellent writing. I knew she would.

Here is a quote referring to when Elizabeth gets news of Lydia's elopement at Lambton Inn in a letter. Mr. Darcy arrives and quickly leaves. We know the story which ends up turning Elizabeth's heart to Mr. Darcy.
He becomes her knight in shining armor as he rights this wrong that Mr. Wickham has done to the Bennet family. As James writes she tells the story of Pride and Prejudice as each character thinks back upon events.

Here her writer's salute to Austen:

"If this were fiction, could even the most brilliant novelist contrive to make credible so short a period in which pride had been subdued and prejudice overcome?"

Death Comes to Pemberley by P.D. James

2012-01-19T12:56:00.000-08:00

I read P.D. James' Time to Be Earnest years ago when it came out. I saw it on the library shelf which meant it grabbed me. Have you ever had THAT happen with a book.
It is her memoir that she didn't want to write, even at 77. I wanted to have tea with this British author afterwards. Her voice had been a conversation and I listened. I didn't have tea with her but what a good and living book does is make you feel like you did! There is an excellent talk at the very end she gave to the Jane Austen Society in England on EMMA as a Detective Story! Here in her latest book which she apologizes to Jane Austen for continuing onward into the lives of those in Pride and Prejudice.

Death Comes To Pemberley begins in the Prologue with :

"It was generally agreed by the female residents of Meryton that Mr. and Mrs. Bennet of Longbourn had been fortunate in the disposal in marriage of four of their five daughters."

Emma and I are sharing the library book. She's ahead and said today: " OH, you have that?" I've just begun.

Don't you love a good book on the bedstand?!!

Gratitude

2012-01-16T16:20:00.000-08:00

I am almost done with this book. My Commonplace Book, which I just call my journal,is fully of quotes of Pat Conroy's authors that helped make him a writer.

For Ann Voskamp:

" I am numb with gratitude."

"When Dickey is writing at his best, it is like listening to God singing in cantos and fragments about the hard dreaming required for the creation of the world."

For Laura Barkat:

"When I read James Dickey , I was transported into that ecstatic country where poetry and poetry alone can take you, and shake you with the cutting edge of beauty and hammerlock of its language."

" I want a novel so poetic that I do not have to have poetry anthologies of poetry to satisfy that itch for music, for perfection, and economy of phrasing, for exactness of tone."

For Nancy:

"In habit lies safety."

" Books are living things and their task lies in their vows of silence."

Other authors covered by Conroy: Margaret Mitchell's GONE WITH THE WIND ( his mother read it to him at age 5) , The New York Book Shop in Atlanta where he read and read, Thomas Wolfe, Charles Dicken's Christmas Carol to Gullah speaking kids on Daufuskie Island and tonight I will read the last chapter:
The City.

End of the Week almost: Friday

2012-01-13T07:43:00.001-08:00

I want to give praise as it says in Psalm 24:
"Lift up your heads, open the gate . Let the King of Glory come in...."

Yesterday , my DAY was full from the start to finish.

The praise : In the morning, a cell phone text came: " You don't have to come today."

You know how the soul is lifted when weight is upon it and then released! My day was like that. This text was God's answer to my morning prayer: "Lord , help me today as I do the things YOU have in my day. Arrange each step. " It made all the difference.

I was running in the car from one thing to the next:
from teaching to celebrating my fellow teacher's birthday to running with meals to others ( Another text later from my son that his wife was home sick from school: she is a 7th grade teacher) to running Emma to her Musical Theater practice and back. I had enough food to bring to my sick daughter-in-law from the other meal. One commitment also was in my day but lifted out with that text.

"Order my steps........arrange my day, Lord."

My literature class started studying Psalms yesterday. I didn't know that MY pastor is also preaching on Psalms this January. Psalm 24 started this past Sunday and sermon/ his notes are here. He wrote an excellent book that is a complied devotion of his writings for the PCA's 40 Days of Prayer:

My class read Psalm 24: the first Psalm of the Week ( Sunday ) read and recited in the homes of the Israelites from 539 B.C. on . Jesus would have said this every Sunday. Memorized it easily that way. We had dictation to learn more of the use of commas and semi-colons alongside The Elements of Style by Strunk and White. ( only one student got the dictaton perfect!)

Illustrator: Maira Kalman

Then Emma started singing:" This is the song we sing at church! " ( Worship Director composed it)

" Lift up your heads , open the gate, let the King of Glory come in ...."

I awoke in the middle of the night singing it.
Doing that all today. Reminds me of Beth's blog.

Midweek

2012-01-11T17:14:00.000-08:00

Part 1.

In the midst of a rainy day that would have been a blizzard if it had been colder, I thought about time.
Don't you have a day's list of "things to be done" press upon you but the day becomes what the Lord has . A listening ear on the phone twice today. Meeting an old student to give her a recommendation for NC School of the Arts. Writing some letters. In the car , I listened to Susan Macaulay as I took Emma to piano and to choir practice and to biology. Susan said " look for a half an hour at least a few times a week to read and ponder the Word." A good reminder. She understands life. Busy life.
Her voice brought a peacefulness to my soul. That is what happened when God called me to homeschool. He used her writing to do the same. I seem settled and calmer and life seems balanced after listening to her English voice.

Listen to her free.

Part 2:

My students had fun writing their own verses like Billy Collins' Aristotle. You can listen here.
Try it yourself.
The Beginning..... the Middle.....The End.
Then you will never forget Aristotle ( Poetics) gave stories that structure! Seems simple but then the beginning of oral stories to written is a fascinating history. Of course, Billy Collins makes my students say : Let's write!

Stunning Beauty

2012-01-07T14:45:00.000-08:00

I have seen Rembrandt in major museums but not so many portraits ~ 50~ in one exhibit. His "oeuvre" ( they used the French at the museum ....work) is mesmerizing to stare at. The lace, the wrinkles, the hair, the cloaks, the pink and flesh colors in the faces with the noses even shining a bit, standing behind docents to catch more information ~~ I liked just looking myself and seeing the portraits. The most famous were two of his self-portraits:

Lucretia

( photo below is not mine but a similar one on my phone)

I did find a glass cased full of copper etchings of Rembrandt's in the free part of the museum.
I would love to be going to the Morgan Library in NYC
for their exhibit of Rembrandt's world.

How about this: went later in the afternoon to another museum to see an exhibit on "Genghis Kahn" ~~ my.
Good and we will be studying him in March.

How about this: ended with one gallery in a Gallery Crawl that a friend had a few paintings being exhibited. Fun to talk to artists , here are a couple you will like:

Shannon Newby

I Pledge | Shannon Newby | cut book, encaustic on wood

12 x 12 x 3" | 2009

( lots of book art)

Phaedra Taylor

Bound and Waiting | Phaedra Taylor

encaustic, paper, string, oil paint on wood | 12 x 16" | 2011

Hannah Costner

and my friend Anna who loves color and Van Gogh and Rilke and the Lord.........


To Rilke

I was energized coming home after all of that!
Today I am taking down the Christmas tree (Ephiphany is over) AND reading this book which is very, very good...... a blog to come:

Tomorrow : Rembrandt

2012-01-05T17:10:00.000-08:00

Heading out on a day trip to Raleigh to see "Rembrandt in America" tomorrow.

Gladys Taber on Christmas

2012-01-02T07:39:00.000-08:00

"I think most mothers get tired during the Christmas rush. I do. There is always a low moment when I fervently wish it were just over and I could SIT DOWN. I wish it were August. And nothing at all going on.
And yet, when the children say, "Thank you for a wonderful Christmas, best we ever had," and one child whispers, "this was just all I wanted - how did you know?" and one child curls up to read the book you have chosen so carefully, and one says, "we never had such a Christmas," suddenly then all the tiredness ebbs away, and a pure happiness floods in.
For in spite of the tinsel and wrappings and struggle over presents, we still have an idea, after all, that Christmas means giving some special joy, an unusual joy to someone. And that compensates for the commercialism which sometimes seems to threaten to engulf Christmas entirely."

( written in 1955)

First Week of 2012

2012-01-02T07:26:00.000-08:00

It has a nice ring to it this New Year Number: 2012.

"The Year of Weddings" in our house: two this next 6 months.

I started reading through some of Michael Dirda's books. This one was already copyrighted to 2012 when I opened it last night:

I haven't seen the new Sherlock Holmes movie yet.
Some of my kids have. We did see The Adventures of Tintin and if your kids grew up on those comic books, it is very worth seeing so they can relived the stories. My sons got the books out that we had collected and started rereading them! Also saw Midnight in Paris: very Woody Allen. I would love to see it again to catch more of the wit and innuendos. We've already seen Season 2 of Downtown Abbey and know the ending BUT rewatching it on Masterpiece Theater.

College son still here. He starts back later than most being at a school in the NC mts. We think they save on heating bills although today is the first cold during the holidays.

Epiphany ahead.

Last Day of 2011

2011-12-31T11:52:00.000-08:00

Warm outside.
Sunny.
Carolina blue sky.

I finished the very British Wodehouse book: Right Ho, Jeeves. There were many words to ask my husband!
He is almost like a walking dictionary but a few stumped him. Skijoring; buckedness ( in looking this word up , the lines in the book came up on Google! Must be a Wodehouse word); others and of course:
What ho and Right ho!

Quiet evening ahead after a few weeks of preparations
and travel.

How about you?

last Friday in 2011

2011-12-30T15:50:00.000-08:00

We are back in town from Atlanta , well, the outskirt
of that southern city. Back from Grandma's new house.

I read while two of my children, Grandma and my husband played Scrabble for the last two nights.
I always keep a Commonplace Book. Nancy has a
blog on keeping one. I always put the date and what I am doing and the weather! Maybe my grands will love that part of reading it when it is passed down.

The Week After Christmas

2011-12-27T07:17:00.000-08:00

Celebrations.
Christ's birth.
Food.
Son's Christmas Eve birthday.
Food.
Engagements.
Food.
Family gatherings.
Food.
Delicious.

Best quote in Steve Job's biography:

"I always thought of myself as a humanities person as a kid, but I liked electronics," he said, " Then I read something that one of my heroes , Edwin Land of Polaroid, said about the importance of people who could stand at the intersection of the humanities and sciences, and I decided that is what I wanted to do."

This Week

2011-12-20T11:39:00.000-08:00

Upper: Evan and Brandie
Lower: Brad and Kara

This week is full of joy for the next year will be the Year of Weddings: Brad is getting married in March.Evan proposed friday night. My nephew proposed Saturday. There's a run on weddings!
Praising God!

We are settling into games , movies, books , and food!
How about you?

Facebook or Blog

2011-12-14T17:39:00.000-08:00

The tree is up!
We watched in the background "Little Women"
while eating pizza and salad and putting the ornaments on the tree.

The Christmas Tree at the MET in NYC with the nativity scene surrounding the bottom.

The Thirteen Days of Christmas

2011-12-13T10:31:00.000-08:00

I have this book on my Christmas shelf that I must have ordered last year. It is delightful.

" St. Stephen's Day was the only day of the year on which all the boys in the town were up well before seven. It was still dark when the streets rang with their shrill hopeful whistling for snow. A snowball fight was the best of all St. Stephen's Day battles...."

Romance, a wealthy man woes his love with the Twelve Days of Christmas , all set to the Twelve Days of Christmas. I won't tell you about how he got 3 French hens or 3 turtledoves! Maybe it is in your library. I highly recommend it. You will chuckle.

Advent Poem

2011-12-11T14:27:00.001-08:00

By one of my favorite living poets:

"The Whip of Advent" by Tristan Gylberd

The pitch of thestall was glorious

Though the straw wasdusty and old

Though it blew bitterand cold

The wind sang with orchestral beauty

The night wasmysteriously gleaming

Though the earth wasfallen, forlorn

For under the eavesof splendor

A child-The Child-wasborn

Oxen Sheep and doves

Crowded roundNativity's scene

Though the worldstill failed to grasp

T’was here that peacehad been

Cast out into a cave

When no room wasfound for Him

His coming was ascourge

That cleansed arobber's den

While the Temple'sbecome a cattle stall

Where beasts and suchare sold

The Child's turnedManger into Temple

And changed the baseto gold

Tis the paradox ofthe ages:

Worldly wisdom willne're relent

To notice signs ofvisitation

Nor the cords of thewhip of Advent

The Lord sparkles the morning

2011-12-09T07:53:00.001-08:00

I am walking around a m a z e d.
Glitter is in the air.
Angels.
I think of these lines from Richard Wilbur's poem

'Love Calls Us to the Things of This World' which comes from St. Augustine :

Outside the open window

The morning air is all awash with angels.

I have been praying for 2 who have cancer every morning since diagnoses earlier this Fall. Now from writing a letter to one on Tuesday , getting a call last night: they know each other. One sells eyeglasses and the other works for an eye doctor. WHO would have known? I didn't. They didn't until my letter this week to say " I am praying for you."

No kidding God moment!
His beauty.
His amazing love.
Pouring in.

You know when you happen upon something on the internet

2011-12-06T12:16:00.001-08:00

You look up an image and you find a very beautiful blog. Here's where I ended up from the Morgan Library in NYC to Bibliodyssey:

Books~~Illustrations~~Science~~History~~Visual Materia Obscura~~Eclectic Bookart

Baby Songbook

The Royal Anjou Bible

"By any definition, it is one of the supreme Bibles of the gothic period"
[Christopher de Hamel*, Cambridge]

The Vallard Atlas

North America, East Coast

It amazing that you get as much done as you do.......quote by a former student to me right now!

Preparation

2011-12-05T10:54:00.001-08:00

Only a few decorations are up in our house.
Preparation also means finishing. You have to end
something to start something!
Class tomorrow will be the last one at my house. Winding up Rasselas of the dictionary author: Samuel Johnson. H. E. Marshall has a lovely narrative of this author in English Literature for Boys and Girls which we have been reading out loud. Or look at this lovely Google Book with illustrations.
Midterm is on Thursday. Charlotte Mason style.

From Samuel Johnson's Dictionary: 1755

Chrístmas. n.s. [from Christ and mass.] The day on which the nativity of our blessed Saviour is celebrated, by the particular service of the church.

Séraphim. n.s. [This is properly the plural of seraph, and therefore cannot have s added; yet, in compliance with our language, seraphims is sometimes written.] Angels of one of the heavenly orders.
To thee cherubim and seraphim continually do cry. Com. Pr.
Then flew one of the seraphims unto me, having a live coal in his hand. Is. vi. 6.
Of seraphim another row. Milton.

To Loll. v.a. To put out: used of the tongue exerted.
All authors to their own defects are blind;
Hadst thou but, Janus-like, a face behind,
To see the people, when splay mouths they make,
To mark their fingers pointed at thy back,
Their tongues loll’d out a foot. Dryden’s Persius.
By Strymon’s freezing streams he sat alone,
Trees bent their heads to hear him sing his wrongs,
Fierce tygers couch’d around, and loll’d their fawning tongues. Dryden’s Virgil.
By the wolf were laid the martial twins;
Intrepid on her swelling dugs they hung,
The foster-dam loll’d out her fawning tongue. Dryden.

Remembering this line from Hamlet this Advent:

First Saturday...

2011-12-03T06:41:00.001-08:00

The week was full.
Full of students and projects.Wonderful ones on engineering in Antiquity. Emma did a replica of the Temple of Dundur which is at the MET which we saw in September. Caesar Augustus had it built on the Nile. The heiroglyphics picture a Pharoah with Augustus' face! She built the temple which is the building with columns.

Christmas Concert on Thursday night! Aren't live voices better than a recording?!!

We ordered the bridesmaid dress for Emma yesterday. March wedding for her policeman brother.

Saturday. I love Saturdays. Last week seemed like everyday from Weds. to Sunday was Saturday.
Almost done with the leftovers.

Virtual Eric Whitacre

2011-12-01T05:20:00.001-08:00

Lux Aurunque

Hemming

2011-11-30T11:35:00.001-08:00

I've had Emma's long black skirt
since early October when Dec. 1st
Concert date seems miles to go.
It does feel like Robert Frost's
"Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy
Evening."

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep....

The promise is to hem this skirt so she can sing
tomorrow night. All pinned up. Ready for my needle
and thread. Quite a lovely concert with this song by
Eric Whitacre: Lux Arumque ( Light and Gold)

Books for this Advent

2011-11-28T10:14:00.001-08:00

Advent arrived right as Thanksgiving Dinner ushered family back to their place in the world.
Place meaning apartment or college dorm room in our case with our sons.
Second son is planning his wedding for early March. That seemed to be here so quickly
from his engagement last Christmas. NOW to look on my shelf to start a Christmas
Devotion and Christmas Stories. Postings soon.

Any suggestions?

Dorcas gathered her old brown cloak firmly about her, as though the balmy southwest wind were a savage northeaster, and peered out from the recesses of her brown beaver bonnet like an owl from the shelter of a hollow tree. Nevertheless there was the hint of a smile upon her usually grim mouth. For though she did not admit it, she was enjoying this expedition in search of the erring Polly. The sharp tang of the seaweed lying in shining coils on the sand below her was delightful. The sparkle of the sea in the sunshine raised her spirits. Turning to look at the little town, she found she had forgotten how pretty it was with its steep cobbled streets climbing the hill, its old red roofs all higgledy-piggledy and the plumes of smoke from the chimneys azure in the clear air. (p. 28)

When you have computer problems...

2011-11-26T11:09:00.001-08:00

You have to CALL upon a husband, several children who actually are grown: 22, 19, and 14,

and you have to take it to the store to get a new card so this computer can get to the Internet.

All done today. I'm thankful to each.

Otherwise, all is well. My sister's birthday celebration on
Sunday in Durham at Duke Chapel for worship, lovely French restaurant for lunch , and seeing The Rockette's Christmas Show.

Then the house has filled up with sons, a daughter-in-law, girlfriends and friends to eat, talk, eat, and talk!

The weather outside is mild.

What was your best recipe on your Thanksgiving table?

Over in England

2011-11-17T17:06:00.001-08:00

"Recording is as important to me

as the actual making." Ann at Journaling the Journal writes as she prepares for an

Arts and Crafts Exhibition in Whichford, England to raise money to restore windows for St. Michaels Church:

A good luncheon can evidently be obtained at The Norman Knight, opposite the Village Green, and Whichford Pottery is well-worth visiting. We're raising money to restore the windows in the Church; there is stained glass dating back to medieval times, and the village itself existed long before the de Mohuns were granted land here by William the Conqueror in 1086.

I hear a sigh.

Mine is echoing in yours.

Ann Patchett opens Parnassus Books in Nashville

2011-11-16T19:25:00.001-08:00

"Ms. Patchett said that she is counting on her store to drive home a sharp, tough-love message to book lovers: buy books at independent stores, or the stores will go away."

Read about it at the NY Times and on NPR.

I loved TRUTH AND BEAUTY: A Friendship.

Ann wrote Bel Canto.

Her newest book: State of Wonder.

Need a road trip.

Back to Dictation

2011-11-15T15:39:00.001-08:00

It is such a good tool for learning vocabulary, spelling,and punctuation. Dictation.
Great time today thinking about where commas go,
how to spell "sententious,"and what is a bromide!
All in a dictation lesson.

We are using the "parvum opus" of Strunk and White: The Elements of Style.
We are also loving " Eats,Shoots & Leaves." There are picture books that are priceless byLynnTruss that even my high school students loved. Laughed. When a writing ends in laughter, it reminds me of
Billy Collin's poetry.

I found an old English author in a Parent's
Review: Edwin Abbot. There are lots of
Google books online. Logic and a training
to examine a word and its uses are learned.
Then there is remembering what they read.
Good teaching on both sites. Good books
on writing.

Time

2011-11-14T09:23:00.001-08:00

We had a long weekend just
over the Appalachians to Knoxville
to see our 3rd son Evan.
He's job hunting and taking online
post-grad classes. CPA ahead for him.
It was fun. Very fun to thrift store
shop: Van Gogh print and a drafting
desk that I wish I had!
Lovely drive and Autumn still had
her gay scarf on with gold and reds!

Today is Monday. You know Monday is
the start to the week after the Sabbath.
How's your week starting?
Here the weather has a warmth to it
which brought shorts out for my daughter!

Energy Bars

2011-11-09T09:44:00.000-08:00

I have two batches of
River Cottage's :
Honey and Peanut Butter
Booster Bars
cooling .
Easy. I used the Flax -Peanut
Butter ( you can add flax which
I did add what I had in the house)
from Trader Joe's.

I love the River Cottagecookbooks
from Dorset, England.
It was started in a 17th
century farmhouse in Dorset:
River Cottage.

Bison?

2011-11-08T16:24:00.000-08:00

I loved to be inspired.
I am listening to a new
sound: Bison.

Group is from VA.
Playing at IAM next
Friday night in NYC.

Not closeby.
Great words.
Biblical.
Celtic, folk, classical.
Makes me smile.
Clap my hands.
Thinking some sons would
like the sound.
Thinking how beautiful
is music.
It's different.
Sounds a bit European.
Not American.
Definitely not what's on
mainline radio these days.
Doesn't that say alot for
just listening to them tonight!

Jane Eyre.....or Janet

2011-11-07T18:36:00.000-08:00

Mr. Rochester called Jane
"Janet." We had a most
lovely brunch and skyping
a friend in Austria for our
Book Club on Saturday.
See my friend's post
on Janet.

Such a rich and lengthy
discussion that we only
got half of the book covered!

Do reread it.
You will marvel at Bronte's
insight and rich language.

Quotes for my Commonplace Book

2011-11-03T20:06:00.000-07:00

From Miss Charlotte Bronte's
book: Jane Eyre

Mr. Rochester to Jane:

" You never felt jealousy, did you,
Miss Eyre -- your soul sleeps , shock
its yet to be given which shall waken
it. -- You will come some day to a
craggy pass of the channel , where
the whole of life's stream will be
broken up into whirl and tumult,
foam and noise; either you will
be dashed into atoms on crag points,
or lifted up and borne on by some
master wave into a calmer current--
as I am now."

" You want to read the tablet of one's
heart."

" We know that God is everywhere;
but certainly we feel His presence most
when His works are on the grandest
scale spread before us: and it is in
the unclouded night sky ,where His
worlds wheel their silent course,
that we read clearest His
infinitude,
His omnipotence,
His omnipresence.
I had risen to my knees to pray for
Mr. Rochester."

November!

2011-11-01T13:17:00.000-07:00

Crept in to my life so fast
today.
Did it to you?

I liked writing October.
November brings in the
holidays and then we turn
into another year older!

I'm reading Jane Eyre again
for our Book Club on Saturday.
I am struck so deeply by her
language and humanity of the
characters. She read and read
as a child at home in their
library. She caught down deep
language. She caught attention
to syntax and vocabulary.
And she caught what love looks
like within Jane.

Wendell speaks

2011-10-28T13:37:00.000-07:00

ON Civil Disobedience.
October 20, 2o11 in Cambridge, Mass.
This reminds me of A Christian
Manifesto by Francis Schaeffer.
( must read in high school)

I got a few of his earlier poetry
books out of the library.
First editions .
Small and tight.
I love such poetry books.

WE had already read this Richard Wilbur poem

2011-10-26T10:06:00.000-07:00

So amazing the timing!
Wilbur is our poet of the
semester.

A Barred Owl

The warping night air having brought the boom

Of an owl’s voice into her darkened room,

We tell the wakened child that all she heard

Was an odd question from a forest bird,

Asking of us, if rightly listened to,

“Who cooks for you?” and then “Who cooks for you?”

Words, which can make our terrors bravely clear,

Can also thus domesticate a fear,

And send a small child back to sleep at night

Not listening for the sound of stealthy flight

Or dreaming of some small thing in a claw

Borne up to some dark branch and eaten raw.

Yesterday, I told my Elementary poetry
students about WHAT happened,
they left my house WHOOOING....
up my driveway on alert to hear
a WHO COOKS FOR YOU back!

That owl was hungry

2011-10-24T18:10:00.000-07:00

Our day with the OWL in our
yard this afternoon.

The OWL who sat on a branch
outside our back porch.

The OWL who had a mockingbird
mock him, swoop at him, and
chatter so much that HE was
danger!

The OWL who flew to our front
roof over the front porch. We
sat in Gordan's bedroom and
watched him get something
dead out of the gutter!

The OWL who then flew
to the magnolia tree and
stared at us. YOU know they
stare right at you.

The OWL who then had a
squirrel from his beak.

Back home 3 hours later,
he is sitting on a branch
of the Bradford pears at
the top of the driveway.

Emma hears a shriek.
The OWL is in the squirrel
nest up a pine tree. I yelled
up at him how BAD he was.
Third squirrel in 24 hours
in his beak.

Many FIRSTS to record!

( photos and a video were
taken! Stay tuned.)

FIRSTS

2011-10-24T09:55:00.000-07:00

I always think of this now:
Book of Firsts.
I made one in a blank journal.
Nancy writes a good blog
on The Calendar of First.

It is a capital plan for the children to keep a calendar––the first oak-leaf, the first tadpole, the first cowslip, the first catkin, the first ripe blackberries, where seen, and when.
( Charlotte Mason)

It builds a habit.
Attention.
Observation.
Recording in a book.

Yesterday , my neighbors
and husband all said this as
we sat on their back porch:

"THIS is the first time we've seen
that."

An owl swooped from the trees
to the top of my green roof
with an animal in it's mouth.
A squirrel.
He held it down.
We could hear the animal.
Then he flew to a branch in my
front yard. By this time, we
had binoculars.

This morning the crows were
cawing and cawing. It was such
a raucous that I looked outside.
They were chasing a hawk.
He just sat there on a branch too.

Well, our Squirrel Nutkin got more
than his tail off and I made sure
our cat Oreo was inside!

New Tim Keller Book: Nov. 1

2011-10-18T18:12:00.000-07:00

White on white with this book cover!
Excitement.
Tim and Kathy Keller write the book
from their lectures and his sermons
on the subject : Marriage.
Watch a short , fun video of the
two here.

November 1st.

For my students and children

2011-10-17T07:49:00.000-07:00

Farmer Sitting by the Fireside Reading....Van Gogh

“Deeply engaged reading leads to perceptual awakening, stimulation of the core of the intuitive and experiential . . . What reading and writing can teach us is a deeper empathy that leads us to desire the best for others who are entirely different from us, and to long to communicate with them.”

- Makoto Fujimura, “Refractions #26: The Epistle of Van Gogh

The Letter T

2011-10-12T10:19:00.000-07:00

I recently saw this illuminated
letter "T:
at MoBia's KJV's 400th Anniv.
Exhibit. It is small but glorious.

All the letters were beside the
larger canvas which Makoto
did for each of the Four Gospels.
Each Gospel had it's own wall.
He then illuminated each chapter.
Here is Chapter 1 of Matthew:

My Matthew 1 chapter head initial letter (each initial letter was specifically designed for each chapter) Here you can see the names in Matthew's genealogy listed inside the "T." The shape of the "T" always reminds me of the cross of Jesus.

Makoto Fujimura

The beginning of another week and a book

2011-10-10T10:04:00.001-07:00

Monday is a stay at home
day. I get ready for three
busy days, then friday is
a stay at home day.
Book Ends.

I finished Donald Miller's
To Own a Dragon: Reflections
of Growing Up without a Father.
over the weekend in a few days.
He wrote Blue Like Jazz and
seems to have a knack for putting
jazz into his writing. I never
thought I needed to read this book.
One of my sons loved Miller's books
but we didn't get this one because
he has a dad. Me: divorce. So reading
this book brought to light a few
things to help me go deeper into that
wound. I recommend it to anyone
who has absence in their life. Absence
of any kind, not just a dad. It also is
one of the best books on manhood!

I found this short interview and wonder
if Miller has done this:

Miller: I’m working on a book called A Map of Eden, which is a biography of a performance artist who, with his art, brings to life social justice issues and calls people to action. Thomas Nelson will publish that.

Are you wondering at the title?
It is in the second chapter:

" I didn't start reading till in college,
but I knew about fairies and dragons
and trolls from hearing about them
at reading time when the librarian
at my elementary school crossed her
long legs and sat silently until we
sat silently. Then she'd wrap her lips
around the simple words of a children's
book, holding her palm against the
crease of the page , turning the book
towards us to display the watercolor
pictures ~~~ a small troll in a big coat
who lived under a bridge, his eyes ever
alert for travelers on the bridge. There
was a book of a boy riding a dragon
through the clouds, smoke and fire...
and I remember wondering what it would
be like to own a dragon.....

I bring this up because in writing some
thoughts about a father, or not having
a father, I feel as though I am writing
a book about a dragon or a troll under
a bridge. For me a father is nothing more
than a character in a fairy tale."

Julia's Yarn

2011-10-07T12:27:00.000-07:00

Maybe you saw this if you
knit and read Getting
Stitched on the Farm.
It is another sign of the
times: Kristin Nicholas' Julia
yarn( named after her daughter)
is being discontinued.
Read here and order halfprice
for her scrumptious colors
from her sheep!

photos from Getting Stitched
on the Farm~~

Apple's head

2011-10-06T19:03:00.000-07:00

I am reading the NY Times
tonight about Steve Job.
Very interesting

He put much stock in the notion of “taste,” a word he used frequently. It was a sensibility that shone in products that looked like works of art and delighted users. Great products, he said, were a triumph of taste, of “trying to expose yourself to the best things humans have done and then trying to bring those things into what you are doing.”

and this about consumers
which is what I think (I am
so technically ignorant!)

When asked what market research went into the iPad, Mr. Jobs replied: “None. It’s not the consumers’ job to know what they want.”

Kuyper

2011-10-05T18:06:00.000-07:00

"Thinking itself is a spiritual activity"

Abraham Kuyper

Busy, busy writing

2011-10-03T12:16:00.000-07:00

My Students are writing stories.

Richard Wilbur, poet the siblings
are learning this semester, writes about
his daughter writing. My daughter
is writing. He reads it HERE.
I might have to read it
with my students. Several
metaphors and imagery and
that last line~!!

THE WRITER

In her room at the prow of the house

Where light breaks, and the windows are tossed with linden,

My daughter is writing a story.

I pause in the stairwell, hearing

From her shut door a commotion of typewriter-keys

Like a chain hauled over a gunwale.

Young as she is, the stuff

Of her life is a great cargo, and some of it heavy:

I wish her a lucky passage.

But now it is she who pauses,

As if to reject my thought and its easy figure.

A stillness greatens, in which

The whole house seems to be thinking,

And then she is at it again with a bunched clamor

Of strokes, and again is silent.

I remember the dazed starling

Which was trapped in that very room, two years ago;

How we stole in, lifted a sash

And retreated, not to affright it;

And how for a helpless hour, through the crack of the door,

We watched the sleek, wild, dark

And iridescent creature

Batter against the brilliance, drop like a glove

To the hard floor, or the desk-top,

And wait then, humped and bloody,

For the wits to try it again; and how our spirits

Rose when, suddenly sure,

It lifted off from a chair-back,

Beating a smooth course for the right window

And clearing the sill of the world.

It is always a matter, my darling,

Of life or death, as I had forgotten. I wish

What I wished you before, but harder.

Today demands a poem

2011-09-30T06:45:00.000-07:00

I may write one as the air
of Autumn arrived , sun
brings goodness on its
rays, and the skies make your
head rise up!

Until that poem appears in
my journal from my pen,
I think about Richard
Wilbur's poem that says
the morning is awash with
angels.

Abraham and the Three Angels

by Marc Chagall

I found Luci Shaw writing
for Flourish Magazine which
also has a Wendell Berry-ness
to it. Here is a Rilke poem found
there . Must write some letters!~
( see that line , keep that Lost ART
going gals)

Lord: it is time. The Summer was so immense.
Lay your shadow on the sundials,
and let loose the wind in the fields.

Bid the last fruits to be full,
give them another two more southerly days,
press them to ripeness, and chase
the last sweetness into the heavy wine.

Whoever has no house now will not build one anymore.
Whoever is along now will remain so for a long time,
will stay up, read, write long letters,
and wander the avenues, up and down,
restlessly, while the leaves are blowing.

Autumn Garden, Van Gogh

hum....

2011-09-28T17:52:00.000-07:00

I am looking
at the Yarn Stores for
the NY Yarn Crawl this
weekend. I am not there
or going there BUT
I can pick up needles
and yarn and next trip
go here:

Brooklyn General Store

Great video with this song.
It made me smile tonight!
Don't you want to sit in
and take a seat.

Song

born to hum

once in the spring of my 24th year
i had nothing to say.
with a dangling promise and
a terrible past
i threw all the words away.

we were born to hum.

you were the last in my 24th year
to make a demand of my voice.
i tickled your ear and
i laughed in your face and
i gave you my choice.

we were born to hum.

it's a gradual running,
a kind of release
that's settled on my face.
once in awhile i complain to myself,
nothing gets done!
nothing's in place!

but i would rather hum.
i would rather hum.

© 2003 Erin McKeown

Second Edition Preface

2011-09-28T12:31:00.000-07:00

Charlotte Bronte did not write
a Preface to the first edition of
JANE EYRE. She did to the second.
She gives acknowledgements and
remarks in the Second Editon's
Preface , giving this at the end to
whom she dedicated the work:

Finally, I have alluded to Mr. Thackeray, because to him- if he will accept the tribute of a total stranger- I have dedicated this second edition of Jane Eyre. CURRER BELL.

I am starting reread Jane Eyre for
the 3rd time in my life. It's the next
Book Club in October!
I remember hearing Susan
Schaeffer Macaulay speak on Reading
and Literature with an admonition
to read Jane Eyre every decade!
I've missed a few but the first time
holds a great story . More on that to
come!

Dedication Pages

2011-09-27T15:01:00.000-07:00

"This is no furniture for the scholar's library, but a book for the winter evening schoolroom when the tasks are over and the hour for bed draws near; and honest Alan, who was a grim old fire-eater in his day, has in his new avatar no more desperate purpose than to steal some young gentleman's attention from his Ovid, carry him awhile into the Highlands and the last century, and pack him to bed with some engaging images to mingle with his dreams."

Robert Louis Stevenson, Dedication Page to Kidnapped

Ovid ~~ have you read any of this Roman poet?

Plus that is ONE sentence! It's what great writers do.

Thomas Merton for Monday Gratitude

2011-09-26T08:10:00.000-07:00

God, who, in His mercy, completes the hidden and mysterious work of creation in us by enlightening our minds and hearts, by awakening in us the awareness that we are words spoken in His One Word and that Creator Spiritus dwells in us, and we in him.

Thomas Merton

Me tagged?

2011-09-24T17:29:00.000-07:00

I was tagged by Nancy
on her blog for something
called MEME:

A meme is "an idea, behaviour or style that spreads from person to person within a culture.
An Internet meme is a concept that spreads through the internet.

So here goes:

1. One homeschooling book you have enjoyed -
For the Children's Sake began my journey
and I have reread Essex Cholmondley : The Story of
Charlotte Mason.

2. One resource you wouldn't be without -

our local library

3. One resource you wish you had never bought -

Saxon Math. Actually I never bought
it . It was passed to me and didn't work well
with my son who loves math. He told me
how it didn't work for him and he loved
math.

4. One resource you enjoyed last year -

the internet
Charlotte Mason Archives

5. One resource you will be using next year -

Blogs and books.
My students will do a private blog as a class.
Also doing The Brooklyn Sketchbook Project.

6. One resource you would like to buy -

Travel.
Museums . Rembrandt coming 3 hours
away soon to NC!
Theater.
Concerts.

7. One resource you wish existed -

I agree with Nancy on this one :

Non-profit ChildLightUSA Developing New Mason Curriculum

8. One homeschool catalog you enjoy reading -

I love reading book catalogues , Image
Journal , and online blogs, etc... ( Kindling Muse, Books and Culture, the Curator)
even twitters!

9. One homeschool website you use regularly -

Grantian Florilegium
Ambleside Online
Childlight USA
Book of Centuries

10. Tagged:

Amber Benton
Beth Pinckney
Melissa Smith

Back from the Big Apple

2011-09-21T13:18:00.001-07:00

Back from a long weekend to New York City with my sister and daughter . We visited my nephew who lives in Brooklyn now. Residency. Long hours in the hospital. We , on the other hand, learned how to get into the city on the subway to go to the MET, Morgan Library, MoBia ( to see The Four Gospels of Makoto Fujimura) " How to Suceed in Business " with Daniel Radcliffe ( yes, he can sing and dance quite nicely!) and NY food. Upon returning I'm reading " Clara and Mr. Tiffany" by
Susan Vreeland: the turn of the century story of his stained glass windows. I had seen several
at the MET and now the story comes alive! Clara was a letter writer besides being an artist of color and beauty.

"What saved Clara Driscoll from obscurity is not any Tiffany Studios catalog, but her passion for writing letters."

IN a library stack

2011-09-13T16:57:00.000-07:00

Listening to this tonight. Julie Andrews and her
daughter reading and talking! I wish I had a
young one to put to sleep listening! Fun poems
even some written by them.
Listen to Julie Andrews lovely articulation
( My Fair Lady) and accent!

Came home also with an old copy of
David McCord's poems. Illustrations
are whimsical and delightful.

Just looking at ART

2011-09-13T12:59:00.000-07:00

Doing Picture Study with
high school students is
extraordinary. They described
many paintings of The Garden
of Eden. Training the eyes to see
and the mind to think:

Thomas Cole: The Garden of Eden.... 1828

"We recognise that the power of appreciating art and of producing to some extent an interpretation of what one sees is as universal as intelligence, imagination, nay, speech, the power of producing words. But there must be knowledge and, in the first place, not the technical knowledge of how to produce, but some reverent knowledge of what has been produced...children learn, not merely to see a picture but to look at it, taking in every detail. " ( Charlotte Mason)

All in a day

2011-09-12T18:11:00.001-07:00

Upstairs bathroom being
updated. White tub and floor
now. Red walls with a new
cabinet of cherry wood. It
reminds me of the dining room
set we had growing up. Deep
and rich wood.

So that is going on while life
goes around it.

Life will take Emma and I to
NYC this weekend. Yes.
Going up with my sister to
see : On Eagle's Wings.

Needing a poem to sink into

2011-09-09T09:24:00.000-07:00

For Autumn.

I had one line from
Emily ~~ Dickinson
this past summer that
sunk in : A Something
IN a summer day ~~
became a meditation to
look upon the Lord's doings
in my life, in my prayer life,
in TIME of the daily.

Looking for this for
Autumn as the air cools
and the bird chirp and
the soul is lifted to joy.

The work begins

2011-09-07T07:42:00.000-07:00

Charlotte Mason said to set
a student in a large room
and set before them a feast.

Yesterday was that as we began
this year's Humanities class:
Antiquity.

I am very thankful for the day
which was filled with students
who love to come to the feast!
The day was punctuated with
many timely intersections of
people in the path SO I would
know "He is with me."One was
seeing Lysa Terkeurst at Barnes
and Noble as Ann Voskamp was
flying in for her webcast.
You can listen again today.
Ann talked about turning worry
into wonder."I WONDER what
God will do as my greatest fears
flood my mind and heart."

"Always be on the lookout for the presence of wonder."
— E.B. White

Rest on LABOR DAY

2011-09-05T15:01:00.000-07:00

Glad to have a rest on this
rainy Labor Day. My high
school Antiquities Class starts
tomorrow. Charlotte Mason said
Education is a Life. It is an
Atmosphere..... and the start of
Education is a Discipline. The
work of reading and thinking
begins.

They have been reading
their choice of anyTolkien books
this summer. I'm sure JRRT would
be thrilled to see his fantasy myths
start off a year in Ancient Literature.

I hope to post a writing exercise
after we do it that I did with
Lauren Winner at her writing
workshop a few years ago. Time
does fly ~~we will be looking
at that from John Milton:
On Time as God created Time on Earth
in Creation.

Nadine Rippelmeyer

Kicking off the School Year

2011-09-02T17:09:00.000-07:00

I should have taken photos.
Alas ~~ that has been my life:
forgetting the camera.

Last night 11 students gathered
round my kitchen table , taco
salad, ice cream sundaes :
to read The Comedy of Errors.
We only got to Act. 3.
We'll finish up this week in
class. Onward to a great year!
I feel so blessed : new students,
their moms and a great energy
of the Spirit for these high
schoolers!

Best line in the play so far
for me that struck me with
delight:

Here comes the almanac of my true date.
Act 1, scene 2

Do you know what that means?
( I have one of those , if you didn't
know THAT about me!)

Midweek

2011-08-31T18:45:00.000-07:00

Great start to Beth's biology
class today. Emma came home
with so much to tell from her
first day . Delighted!
AND she is the only girl.
Sort of like her life with four
older brothers. Emma even said
Beth taught how Charlotte Mason
teaches with living books,
narration, etc.. so it will be a good
year in high school science.
Very lacking in my memory of
my high school experience.
I never feel in love with it but I know
I would if I were in Beth's class!
I'll read the books this year ~~
they are good ones. Thanks Beth.

For CM fans, check out
CM blog carnival with many links
from Amy who is headed to Peru
soon. Amy made me laugh alot
at the Childlight Conference so I've
tucked her in my heart for prayer.

Makes me think of this beautiful
quote from In this House of Brede
by Rumer Godden:

" We have you tucked in out sleeves,"
Dame Perpetua had written to the expectant
mother. 'In our sleeve.' and it was true.
Every nun had her personal post , a continual
stream of letters went out - 'lifelines' , many
people called them: each anchored in the
strength of prayer."

Wanderlust and joy

2011-08-29T10:36:00.000-07:00

“Modern life is moving faster than the speed of thought--or thoughtfulness.” Rebecca Solnit

Walking this morning with Emma to slow down
the speed of life. Modern life presses in , doesn't it.
I press in prayers , even so short,
at this time; feeling there's joy that even might
surprise me but I might miss it if I'm going too
fast. Lewis' "Surprised by JOY" were those
beginnings of joy in his life aesthetically
and spiritually ( which you know he did alot of
walking):

1. the memory of a memory: "As I stood beside
a flowering currant bush on a summer day ther
suddenly arose in me without warning , and as
if from a depth not of years but of centuries,
the memory of that earlier morning at the Old
House when my brother had brought his toy
garden into the nursery. It is difficult to
find words strong enough for the sensation
which came over me: Milton's "enormous
bliss" of Eden... gives somewhere near it.

2.through Squirrel Nutkin: enamoured of a
season . The idea of Autumn. ... It was some-
thing quite different than ordinary life and
even from ordinary pleasure: something,
as they would say, "in another dimension."

3. through Poetry: I was lifted into huge
regions of northern sky: Longfellow's
Saga of King Olaf.

August TEA

2011-08-26T12:16:00.001-07:00

I'm listening to HEM
from NYC as I get ready
for a Summer TEA here in the
morning. NYC: a place which
should be bracing for the
hurricaine winds. I have a
nephew in Brooklyn who is
doing his residency.
This will be as fascinating
as my policeman son's stories!
He did a drug bust one night
this past week! He was surprised
the 20 year old confessed to growing
and selling that plant!

As the winds come by, we will
be having TEA in the morning
to kick off the year English Style.
Charlotte Mason would be pleased.
Many will share Impressions from
the Childlight Conference this past
June.

Dreaming

2011-08-25T07:53:00.001-07:00

The Island Illustration by Ernest H. Shepard from the book When We Were Very Young by A.A Milne

Two REALLY good cookbooks

2011-08-24T08:41:00.000-07:00

Heidi's blog: 101 Cookbooks

Wasn't it just lovely this morning!

2011-08-23T14:54:00.001-07:00

Starfish by Winslow Homer.........missing the sandy edge

It was SO cool this morning
as Summer comes to an end.
School is beginning here in the
South. Not really in our home.
The boys have left to start a
new year. My daughter-in-law
begins a new grade teaching
English/ history : 7th grade.
Graduate school almost done
for her and for another son.
The youngest of five is in
HIGH SCHOOL. I can see the
end of the road!

Today we had breakfast at
The Flying Biscuit with two
young moms I've seen from high
school to college to marriage to
motherhood. One said " Emma,
get ahead and make your Senior
year " a Gap Year" . You'll get
to do the things that you want
to do and explore to see if you are
good at it ." Good advice for the
last one at home.

Jane Austen and FB?!

2011-08-18T14:15:00.001-07:00

Got to this part this afternoon: " "Love and
Freindship, the most famous of her
adolescent satires (" as fast as she could
write and quicker than she could spell"
Virginia Woolf remarked about them) ......

" After having been deprived during
the course of 3 weeks of a real friend.....
imagine my transports at beholding one,
most truly worthy of theName... ...
instantly unfolded to each other the
most inward secrets of our Hearts."

One can imagine the fun that Austen
would have made of Facebook, or
MySpace, or Twitter, with their
comparable illusion
of instantaneous intimacy."

** yes, Austen did spell Friend wrong, thus the
comment by Virginia!

Saving Snail Mail

2011-08-18T06:10:00.000-07:00

Happened upon from
looking up Scriptura,
a Paper store via an
old Victoria magazine,
to this blog called
Saving Snail Mail.

Communication has
many tools. So the letter
now is not like Jane Austen's
or C.S. Lewis' which nowadays
can be to converse online.
BUT it can be.

What about handwriting?
Read my friend's blog.

Abundance

2011-08-17T09:31:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a total junk mail day.

Just back from the mailbox:
3 letters , Victoria magazine,
Netflix movie, and a returned
letter that I put the
wrong zip code ON!! I put mine.
What was I thinking!

Wish it was as easy as the above
letter!

The lost art of letter writing
is flourishing today.
Think I will have a cup of tea
and read!

Handmade journals

2011-08-17T07:17:00.000-07:00

Always beautiful to
made by hands:

You can find the link from this blog.

I bought a small stack of 3 at Anthropologie
last night. " Journals are my one weakness."
(Larkrise to Candleford ~~ Dorcas)

Wishing I lived closer

2011-08-16T09:24:00.000-07:00

To go to this shop
in London:

LOOK to see the journals made out of old books.

Handmade metal teacup that is so pretty!

Quote from a student

2011-08-15T05:43:00.000-07:00

Once you start working with your hands… it just doesn’t leave your fingertips.

2011-08-12T09:40:00.000-07:00

Last
year's
view
to
the
ocean.

Take
a
look!

The weekend is here.
"The Help" just came out.
Great read last year at the
beach!

The King's Speech

2011-08-11T19:07:00.000-07:00

A podcast with the screen-writer
of this excellent film about how
Colin Firth learned to stutter.

Blog Transcript: David Seidler

Well, I worked with him a great deal; or, I think he worked on me a great deal. Anyway, he said, "Look, you're writing from your own experience; this is your story, as well as Birdie's." And, of course, he was quite correct. So we worked together a great deal during the pre-production rehearsal period. We had three weeks, which is extraordinary for a film. That's almost as long as you get for a Broadway or West End play. They only rehearse for four weeks, so it's really amazing. And it's great that we had it. And Colin questioned me very thoroughly: first, working from the out towards the in. He was asking me how it felt, physically: which muscles, how did the chest feel, where did the shoulders go, what's happening in your stomach, what happens to the column of air, the way the jaw juts forward and locks? All of these things: he wanted exactly as much muscle memory as I could convey to him. And then, he started questioning me about the internals: the sense of frustration, the sense of loneliness, the inner silence because you can't speak. He really delved into it very, very deeply. And then, of course, everyone said, "Well, I wonder if Seidler really knows what he's talking about." So, they got all the very top British speech therapists to come in, and they said, "Yeah, actually, he does know what he's-- yeah, he's been there. That's the way it is."

Ordinary People and books

2011-08-11T07:31:00.000-07:00

It is those who do the
labor around us who
perhaps have the greatest
influence. Read Iain
Murray: co-founder of
Banner of Truth Publishing,
being interviewed in Table Talk.

TT: Who are some of the people you have learned from the most in your ministry?

IM: I owe a great debt to many people. In my university years, there was no one who impressed me more as a Christian than Sarah Cochrane, a Salvation Army woman, who washed the floors in our college and had to live with a drunken husband. Among my greatest helpers were older men who led me to good books: F.J. Hobbs (a tailor) and S.M. Houghton (a schoolmaster). Later on, my generation had the privilege of knowing John Murray (who spent much of his life at Westminster Seminary, Philadelphia) and Martyn Lloyd-Jones. They were humble, godly leaders.

We never know how our lives will touch others. For example, how few of the names of mothers are known to the world, but how different Christian history would have been had their hidden ministry not been exercised. And what Christian man can say how much he owes to his wife? For all Christians, the words are true: “Let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up” (Gal. 6:9).

Second Beach READ

2011-08-10T05:39:00.000-07:00

Jacob Wrestling with the Angel by Eugène DELACROIX (1798-1863)
My friend Jeannette was reading this
book about this painting by Delacroix
while we were at a recent conference.

Finished it up in the beach house not
on the beach last week. Library book.
It didn't need wind and sand.
The author is in search for the meaning
of the painting and writes this
as a memoir. Great painting to
study as in Picture Study.

HOT

2011-08-08T19:59:00.000-07:00

Dreaming of cool air.
Aren't you?!!!

N.D. Wilson writes in
Notes from a Tilt-A-Whirl:

"Summer --sun-cure the world.

Here Spring grows and greens
and warms , spreading life,
wrapping us in her arms,
until suddenly we realize that she's
not a girl anymore. She's a woman.

A woman named Summer.

The world is still greening while the
students leave this town. ....The
students leave the full joy of
spring's summer transition to the
locals.

It's quieter that way, and we listen
to the leaves grow and the wheat
combing the wind's belly.

Spring is spiritual. Resurrection
always is. Summer brings the fruit
of that resurrection."

Summer reading: at the beach last
week!

to the coast

2011-07-28T19:24:00.000-07:00

Going to the beach.

Be back in August!

I'll be doing what the girl
in the painting is doing.

John Stott

2011-07-28T05:45:00.000-07:00

A great man of the faith
passed away yesterday:
John Stott.
April 27, 1921 - July 27, 2011

He leaves a legacy for us.

One of my favorite books he
wrote was on Birdwatching.

I had read his most recent book and I
think his last after hip surgery a year
ago. It is one to reread.

Good article written 7 years ago that
Tim Keller has on his twitter:

There's been a lot of twaddle written recently about the supposed opposition between faith and reason. To read Stott is to see someone practicing "thoughtful allegiance" to scripture. For him, Christianity means probing the mysteries of Christ. He is always exploring paradoxes.

The Post Office

2011-07-27T13:03:00.000-07:00

Have you
ever laughed
in the P0st
Office at
another
conversation?
Well, today
an older man

was buying stamps for his sister:
" I send her stamps because she will spend that dollar
I use to send her for her birthday. She can't hold on to
one dollar. She called me once to ask me for money and
I told her to go over to that gambling place and ask for
her money back!"

Then as I was getting my stamps, another lady was
telling the same PO worker her woes! My PO worker said
that guy could be a psychiatrist!

As we walked out,
Emma said " Just like in Candleford!"

What a painting does

2011-07-26T20:02:00.000-07:00

CM on Picture Study:

“We cannot measure the influence that one artist or another has on the child’s sense of beauty, upon his power of seeing, as in a picture, the common sight of life..."

Monet Painting in His Garden
at Argenteuil
1873

Galileo by Mitch Stokes

2011-07-26T19:16:00.000-07:00

Mitch Stokes always starts his books well. He starts
with a story. For Galileo, it is that he is known by
his first name. Italians gave one honor this way.
Galileo's last name is just like his first: Galilei.
Did you know he was a doctor?
Did you know monks taught him?
He lived in a historic time of invention, poets,
artists in Florence. I thought he only discovered
the telescope but he did so much more. He
discovers the pendulum clock, calculates the
geometry of Dante's Inferno, is visited by John
Milton.( so was there a connection between Paradise
Lost and a Copernicusor Aristotelian universe?
That is something to think upon that we don't
know)

This is an excellent book for high school readers
upward. Good for biography, mathematician,
scientist, man of faith. One man gives his talents
to what he is called to:
" He would apply mathematics to the real world and
replace the wordy fumblings of philosophers
with true knowledge."

Lots of patterns at PURLS

2011-07-25T18:42:00.000-07:00

Store is in Soho,NYC
and the online blog
is in your home. Times
have changed , haven't they!
Great ideas for
handwork for your kids
and for you:

The Purl Bee
makes linen towels.
Look into the site for
knitting, crochet and
sewing projects.

Planning

2011-07-25T11:17:00.000-07:00

Clifton Suspension Bridge over Avon Gorge , North Somerset, England
Notice nothing holds it but the two points on land.

Planning School for 2010-2012.
Sometimes it feels like that bridge!

Just give me Living Books for all subjects,
including math!

Principles on which to select School-Books

I venture to propose one or two principles in the matter of school-books, and shall leave the far more difficult part, the application of those principles, to the reader. For example, I think we owe it to children to let them dig their knowledge, of whatever subject, for themselves out of the fit book; and this is for two reasons: What a child digs for is his own possession; what is poured into his ear, like the idle song of a pleasant singer, floats out as lightly as it came in, and is rarely assimilated. I do not mean to say that the lecture and the oral lesson are without their uses; but these uses are, to give impulse and to order knowledge; and not to convey knowledge, or to afford us that part of our education which comes of fit knowledge, fitly given.

Again, as I have already said, ideas must reach us directly from the mind of the thinker, and it is chiefly by means of the books they have written that we get into touch with the best minds. (page 177)

Volume 3: School Education. Chapter 16 (XVI)

"As I have said, knowledge, that is, roughly, ideas clothed upon with facts, is
the proper pabulum for mind. This food a child requires in large quantities and
in great variety. The wide syllabus I have in view is intended in every point to
meet some particular demand of the mind."
Charlotte Mason: A Philosophy of Education

Free Keller sermon

2011-07-22T06:48:00.000-07:00

Preaching Hell in a Tolerant Age

Understanding Sin

Timothy Keller

( have to download it and read it)

Strong Word

2011-07-21T07:07:00.000-07:00

Dunamis

strength power, ability

inherent power, power residing in a thing by virtue of its nature, or which a person or thing exerts and puts forth
power for performing miracles
moral power and excellence of soul
the power and influence which belong to riches and wealth
power and resources arising from numbers
power consisting in or resting upon armies, forces, host

Back from the Library

2011-07-20T11:52:00.000-07:00

I have been waiting for a few of these
to come on my HOLDS ~~ smiling!

Poetry lines that sink in to prayers

2011-07-19T08:20:00.000-07:00

Song of the Angels, William Adolphe Bouguereau

I find myself praying some
lines of poems. The metaphors
go deep. Deep calls to deep.

Rilke's whole poem :

Ah, as we prayed for human help: angels soundlessly,

with single strides, climbed over

our prostrate hearts

And then thinking upon
the morning:

" The morning air is all awash
with angels."

I quote them in conversations
so if you talk to me anytime soon,
a line from the poems may come out.

"High Subjects"

2011-07-18T06:35:00.000-07:00

Emily Dickinson wrote this poem of
High Subjects:

We never know how high we are
Till we are asked to rise
And then if we are true to plan
Our statures touch the skies—

The Heroism we recite
Would be a normal thing
Did not ourselves the Cubits warp
For fear to be a King—

Richard Wilbur, Poet Laureate in 1987,
has this to say about his best poem, Lying. He explains
this poem here and it is an echo of Milton's Paradise
Lost. 4 minutes into the mind of a poet :

What I’m sure of is that a high subject, unless perhaps one is writing a hymn, should not be approached with remorseless nobility, and this poem has its comic elements, as many of mine do. Comedy is serious; it is the voice of balance; and its presence in a serious poem is a test and earnest of its earnestness.

Lying

by Richard Wilbur
( Read here by the poet)

To claim, at a dead party, to have spotted a grackle,
When in fact you haven’t of late, can do no harm.
Your reputation for saying things of interest
Will not be marred, if you hasten to other topics,
Nor will the delicate web of human trust
Be ruptured by that airy fabrication.
Later, however, talking with toxic zest
Of golf, or taxes, or the rest of it
Where the beaked ladle plies the chuckling ice,
You may enjoy a chill of severance, hearing
Above your head the shrug of unreal wings.
Not that the world is tiresome in itself:
We know what boredom is: it is a dull
Impatience or a fierce velleity,
A champing wish, stalled by our lassitude
To make or do. In the strict sense, of course,
We invent nothing, merely bearing witness
To what each morning brings again to light:
Gold crosses, cornices, astonishment
Of panes, the turbine-vent which natural law
Spins on the grill-end of the diner’s roof,
Then grass and grackles or, at the end of town
In sheen-swept pastureland, the horse’s neck
Clothed with its usual thunder, and the stones
Beginning now to tug their shadows in
And track the air with glitter. All these things
Are there before us; there before we look
Or fail to look; there to be seen or not
By us, as by the bee’s twelve thousand eyes,
According to our means and purposes.
So too with strangeness not to be ignored,
Total eclipse or snow upon the rose,
And so with that more rare conception, nothing.
What is it, after all, but something missed?
It is the water of a dried-up well
Gone to assail the cliffs of Labrador.
There is what galled the arch-negator, sprung
From Hell to probe with intellectual sight
The cells and heavens of a given world
Which he could take but as another prison:
Small wonder that, pretending not to be,
He drifted through the bar-like boles of Eden
In a black mist low creeping, dragging down
And darkening with moody self-absorption
What, when he left it, lifted and, if seen
From the sun’s vantage, seethed with vaulting hues.
Closer to making than the deftest fraud
Is seeing how the catbird’s tail was made
To counterpoise, on the mock-orange spray,
Its light, up-tilted spine; or, lighter still,
How the shucked tunic of an onion, brushed
To one side on a backlit chopping-board
And rocked by trifling currents, prints and prints
Its bright, ribbed shadow like a flapping sail.
Odd that a thing is most itself when likened:
The eye mists over, basil hints of clove,
The river glazes toward the dam and spills
To the drubbed rocks below its crashing cullet,
And in the barnyard near the sawdust-pile
Some great thing is tormented. Either it is
A tarp torn loose and in the groaning wind
Now puffed, now flattened, or a hip-shot beast
Which tries again, and once again, to rise.
What, though for pain there is no other word,
Finds pleasure in the cruellest simile?
It is something in us like the catbird’s song
From neighbor bushes in the grey of morning
That, harsh or sweet, and of its own accord,
Proclaims its many kin. It is a chant
Of the first springs, and it is tributary
To the great lies told with the eyes half-shut
That have the truth in view: the tale of Chiron
Who, with sage head, wild heart, and planted hoof
Instructed brute Achilles in the lyre,
Or of the garden where we first mislaid
Simplicity of wish and will, forgetting
Out of what cognate splendor all things came
To take their scattering names; and nonetheless
That matter of a baggage-train surprised
By a few Gascons in the Pyrenees—
Which having worked three centuries and more
In the dark caves of France, poured out at last
The blood of Roland, who to Charles his king
And to the dove that hatched the dovetailed world
Was faithful unto death, and shamed the Devil.

Living Poet: Richard Wilbur

2011-07-18T06:01:00.000-07:00

How could I miss such a
good poet?! I sat in a workshop
last week hearing about this
wonderful wordsmith!
Delight.

Here is Dana Goia with a bio
of Richard Wilbur.
He was friends with Robert
Frost. Aha..... doesn't that make
you want to hear their conversations!

Poetry is always to be read out loud.
Listen to the poet in this very
dear poem: A Wedding Toast.

About his wife as she is a reader
and a rereader: The Reader.
You as readers will know the truth
of living books and what they do
to enchant.

About waking up and it will make
you smile: Love Calls Us to the Things
of This World.
Melissa , this is for you!

The title "Love Calls Us to the Things of This World' is taken from St. Augustine. "Plato, St. Teresa, and the rest of us in our degree," says Wilbur, "have known that it is painful to return to the cave, to the earth, to the quotidian; Augustine says it is love that brings us back."

Love Calls Us to the Things of This World
Richard Wilbur

The eyes open to a cry of pulleys,

And spirited from sleep, the astounded soul

Hangs for a moment bodiless and simple

As false dawn.

Outside the open window

The morning air is all awash with angels.

Some are in bed-sheets, some are in blouses,

Some are in smocks: but truly there they are.

Now they are rising together in calm swells

Of halcyon feeling, filling whatever they wear

With the deep joy of their impersonal breathing;

Now they are flying in place, conveying

The terrible speed of their omnipresence, moving

And staying like white water; and now of a sudden

They swoon down into so rapt a quiet

That nobody seems to be there.

The soul shrinks

From all that it is about to remember,

From the punctual rape of every blessèd day,

And cries,

“Oh, let there be nothing on earth but laundry,

Nothing but rosy hands in the rising steam

And clear dances done in the sight of heaven.”

Yet, as the sun acknowledges

With a warm look the world’s hunks and colors,

The soul descends once more in bitter love

To accept the waking body, saying now

In a changed voice as the man yawns and rises,

“Bring them down from their ruddy gallows;

Let there be clean linen for the backs of thieves;

Let lovers go fresh and sweet to be undone,

And the heaviest nuns walk in a pure floating

Of dark habits,

keeping their difficult balance.”

Catching up on blogs

2011-07-16T18:15:00.000-07:00

Do read Lanier's Books
for her summer reading
list!

Charlotte Mason warned wisely and famously against ‘twaddle’, and I consider it my duty, as writer and bookseller, never to misguide anyone along that line. But permit me to highlight a few volumes and authors which, if not particularly freighted with great moral themes and deathless prose, will at the least prove gentle companions for a slower, lazier time of year. Perfect for reading in a hammock, or tucked in a cool windowseat…

Getting Ready for the Sabbath

2011-07-16T18:02:00.000-07:00

Back from out of town
this week . We drove over
the mountains into cool
weather. As we got closer
to home ~~ everything looked
comforting. Home.

Rest. Praise tomorrow!

Emma turns 14 tomorrow.
Celebration.

Artist Retreat .....

2011-07-07T09:53:00.000-07:00

I read poetry, even out loud.
I found this wonderful prayerful
poem in Uncollected Poems:
Ranier Marie Rilke. I imagine
Fra Angelico's angels doing this:

Ah, as we prayed for human help: angels soundlessly, with single strides, climbed over our prostrate hearts.

Two artists show in galleries:
Barbi:

Imagining Spring

Linda:

Another friend paints and plays the cello
and LOVES Rilke. She is the glue for me
with the others. They know each other
from Chapel Hill ~~ we gave each other words
to encourage and inspire. Words from
our distant lives that intersected up
on the lake.

Much needed timelessness.

Now heading up to Jan Karon's Blowing Rock
for our 33rd anniversary tomorrow!

Summer settles in

2011-07-05T07:00:00.000-07:00

Makoto Fujimura spoke of
"being generative" at Enounters
in March in NYC. So an invitation
came from a new friend who I roomed
with to come for an Artist Retreat up
at the lake.

Heading out with Van Gogh's Letters,
handwork, a new journal and pens and
stationary, and food ! Overnight with
sisters who create. Ideas begetting ideas.

from the library

2011-07-02T11:58:00.001-07:00

The cover stood out from the library shelf.
Isn't it beautiful! Isn't the title!
I don't have an Italian grandmother,
but I wanted to learn from them.
Sit in their kitchens. Hear their voices.
Taste the food!
I opened it upon getting
home from Sat. Farmer's Mkt
and Sat. errands.
There on the first page was a quote from
Laurie Colwin. Her cookbooks are wonderful
to read. I felt like I opened it to a friend speaking.
Jessica Theroux writes so beautiful of simple
generational cultural traditions that are
handed down by those in the kitchen to the table.
Recipes. Cooking. Read the
beginning here.

A cookbook to simmer with!

Finished Island of the World last night.
One of the best books I've read in a very long time.
One I will read again ~~ that means 839 pages.

" Christ, he had learned, always drew his followers
into deep waters, even, at certain points, to the brink
of literal drowning, for this immersion was the
beginning of wisdom. It pulled the soul from the
mere horizontal perspective into the vertical,
the cosmic one, which is so much higher than
it is broad. "

Watching two painters

2011-06-29T11:35:00.000-07:00

Son Gordan.
Daughter Emma.
Stripped wallpaper
and a border.
Painting together to
get the job done.
Cream Brulee.
Brick Red.

Living room is a
mess with all the books,
furniture moved out
of the back hall which
goes to the washer-dryer
and bathroom.
Order coming.
"Color coming!"

Photos coming.