talk of that another day

[nnozomi]

Daily life: I’ve spent the last few days commuting among late 19th-century Tatar Russia, early 20th-century Shinjuku Botanical Garden, and the insides of 21st-century pneumatic cylinders, with occasional excursions to educational policy and applied ethics. My work life is weird sometimes.

Music: Among MDZS/CQL characters, I don’t like Lan Wangji half so much as his brother, but I keep running into lyrics that seem designed for him—“Once upon a time I drank a little wine, was as happy as could be. Now I’m just like a cat on a hot tin roof, baby what do you think you’re doing to me…” not to mention “Dearest, how can this be so? You were dead, you know…”.

Books: I've been rereading my favorite WWII diary collections (maybe I'll post in more detail later); some early quotations from Edith Oakley, a highly educated secretary in Glasgow.

The air raid last night would seem to have been on a bigger scale than previous ones. I said to Mother at once, "Don't you want a shelter now?" She said "Damn a shelter!" But 15 minutes later she changed her mind--without any pressure at all--and seemed quite disposed to do something.

...The Zoo faces our office windows and Mr. Mitchell says that in an invasion the lions will be shot straight away. My mind is torn in two. It is hard lines on the lions, but I am sure I don't want them loose in this area.

...Absent-mindedness and poor memory seem rife. All the morning Mr. Mitchell has been asking me questions, the answers to which would normally have been quite well-known to him. Mr. Mitchell and I both find the same thing, that the strained atmosphere has upset our sense of time. An hour seems like a day, and a day like a week. The month of August seems to have lasted for decades.

Chinese: I've made myself a very analog practice tool using sample sentences from the Chinese Grammar Wiki (three thousand-odd sentences, hanzi/pinyin/English, a great resource), and I'm having fun with it although possibly not getting very far. Still using Liu Chang as listening practice, and amused by his occasional habit of breaking into English to win an argument with his best friend: "Today is not my birthday! Today is your birthday!"

Writing: Progress slow but steady. I'm about to bring on stage a minor but significant character who has only appeared as an offstage nemesis so far, and I'm afraid I might end up liking him too much.

Photos: Pansies doing their best creeping thyme impression; also some very early flowering plums, some pseudo-pussywillows which I think will grow up to be magnolia blossoms, and a house where I'm not sure anyone actually lives, but they sure do garden.




Be safe and well.

Comments

[clevermanka]

Your WWII diary selections remind me of P.L. Travers's I Go by Sea, I Go by Land which I read many times when I was a child. I still have my copy...

I'm afraid I might end up liking him too much
Those pesky side characters!

I always love your photographs, but this collection is wonderful. I especially like the bottom row. Those last two are gorgeous. I love love love that building in the last one.

[nnozomi]

I'll look into getting hold of the P.L. Travers book! That sounds like fun. I have something of an obsession with WWII-era diaries, as may have become clear. (You might should look into the autobiography of Shirley Williams (a British politician and the daughter of the writer Vera Brittain), who was in fact sent to America as a child during the war...).

and thanks so much for your kind words, I love taking these weird photos in particular. Japanese cities tend to have so many boring buildings that finding the interesting ones always feels like a triumph.

[trobadora]

Thank you for sharing those quotations! This sounds fascinating.

And your photos are gorgeous as ever. ♥

[nnozomi]

I love these books; the editor did a good job of selecting people who were both genuinely ordinary (I mean, no one who would appear in a history book, list of celebrities, etc.) and genuinely interesting.

and thanks　♡