October 31, Mine and Yours

Angela writes:

It is raining and I contemplate with surprise how little of the Sandy storm made itself present for us here. Strange acting of calamity: for those in the middle of it, the world comes to a stop; for others, maybe not very far away, the same span of time is marked by some inconvenience.


Yesterday we walked along the trail and I got some breathtaking pictures of the sky above the county, without knowing clearly what those same clouds had brought with them somewhere else. Amazing what a little machine like the iPhone can grasp of the grandeur of such phenomena. Or is it that, to such grandeur, our means of intervention are secondary?

All that can be said at the sight of these pictures is, that I was there to witness it. Very little know-how went into the seizing of these cloud formations, except for my being prepared. If such renderings were ever to be properly printed, and presented in a public space, they could, I suppose, be called art. And yet the only artistry at work was that of natural elements at play.













Not long ago we had the visit of my cousin and her two children, grown up inquirers of all things worthy of inquiry. The topics addressed during their stay were numerous, yet the one which kept us awake overnight, believe it or not, was the question of art, and of who can call themselves an artist. Tudor, our lovely nephew, among many other things a dandy if one is yet to have survived the turn of the past centuries, wants to know. Not least because his sister Oana is an artist, who, like all such respectable fellows, bypasses the potential riches promised by lucrative endeavors like her brother's. Her brother, generous in turn, is ready to accept that an artist is one who makes art, even if they take a loss. For the sake of the argument, I contradict, and maintain that an artist can only call themselves such if they bring their work out in the open, to the public. By public of course I do not mean the immediate family, neither one's well intentioned friends and acquaintances, but rather people one does not know.

It is difficult for Tudor to accept that one who plays their bongos (his example) in the solitude of their home is not an artist in my definition. I say, they are not artists, but rather they play bongos. Just as I am not a painter, but rather somebody who sometimes paints. And so long as I will not expose a meaningful body of works, I will simply be one who spends some of her time in such a fashion.

From there, not surprisingly, at least not for me, we went on to speak about love and loss. Yes, this is how far the question of one's coming out with the fruit of their artistic expression took us. A question of definition again. Can love call itself such, if it is not built on the fear of the loss of the beloved? I ask. One condition too difficult to accept without putting up a vigorous struggle. And just like in the case of art, an unjust prerequisite. Why should anybody need the accord, or recognition, of anybody else than oneself, in order to keep doing what they enjoy, and which they cheerfully and freely may call art? For themselves alone to take or leave, for themselves to appreciate.
Likewise in love, the lover should be free to say, I love because I feel like it right now, and I will stop loving when this object will stop giving me what I expect.

Meanwhile, according to my position, neither is for me to take or leave. In art it would make such an occupation deserving of the name hobby. In love the take it or leave it rule makes the relationship a partnership of sorts. There is, of course, nothing wrong with that. I am tempted to say, that is, mostly and maybe rightfully, the form relationships take nowadays. As for love, where the one who loves is concerned with the needs and wants of the beloved, well, for better or for worse, such relationships are on the wane. Who would want to live one's life hanging on the affections of another than oneself?

Is this not what happens, when we take our art, whatever that may be, to strangers, and ask them what they think of it? It is a difficult place to be in, and in a world where self- sufficiency is the name of the most sought after condition, to depend on another's judgement, or passion, or compassion for that matter, is strictly unacceptable.

No wonder that a young and sensitive person may, sometimes, over such matters, loose sleep.

October 19, Sugar Molecule

Angela writes:

Ottawa under heavy rain and fast winds is not much to look at. We could not even get out of the car to go and eat somewhere afterwards. I had had to fast before the test, which took almost three hours. That is because one needs to wait for that sugar molecule, as they call it, to come out of the metal syringe, itself encased in a metal box, all of which are handled with gloves, and travel deep into the body of the testee. This it will eventually light up from the inside.

The lung doctor called me yesterday to let me know that the pet scan shows an area of mild activity, not characteristic of cancer, probably an inflammation of sorts. The results are non-specific again, or inconclusive. I have two options: either wait for another three months and get another cat scan of the lung, and again every three months after, for two years; or have the surgeon go in and remove this formation, with the risk, of course, that upon biopsy the extirpation prove to have been unnecessary. In spite of all the expensive, so-called non-invasive imaging techniques, the scalpel remains the most trustworthy instrument.

Since I was given a choice, I chose to wait.

Some of my friends or colleagues, with whom I communicate from time to time, give me an idea of how they imagine convalescence. Since the university professor’s most important complaint is to have not enough time to read and write, to do research as it is referred to, because of teaching and other administrative duties, a character on sick leave, or, even better, on disability, such one like myself, would certainly take advantage of all the time freed up by the disease in order to, while taking pills, read and write. And, in case that person, on account of some debilitating condition, were unable to write, they would certainly at least read voraciously all those excellent books they were not able to get into while doing the work required by their salaried condition.

To this question I have to again answer in the negative. No, I do not read. The fact that I lay, apparently still, propped on a pillow, on my couch, does not mean that I am comfortable. Indeed, as the traveling sugar molecule would tell you, if it could speak, the condition of the opium eater that I have become is one of double discomfort: a fire burning within the body, especially along the spine, which takes not kindly the loss of one of its member vertebrae; and a film of ice coating the outer envelope of this burning body, the skin. If for Scheherazade it was not difficult to answer the riddle of the one who walks dressed and undressed at the same time, by wrapping herself in a fishing net, for me the answer appears less easy to grasp.

Between reading books, after fifty years of book reading, and reading music, as I now do, as a beginner, there lies a difference that in fact allows me to take pleasure in the second and reject the first. Reading music is at this point the recognition of a direction, and a rhythm for the hands. For the moment it is all about the hands, and the manner in which, without grasping anything whatsoever, they bring about some lovely and ephemeral formation of sound. No real meaning beyond that deciphering, if not the correspondence between sound and a small, well-defined gesture. The reading of books, now an old if not respectably competent endeavor, is much more about finding the sought-after meaning. Why this, why that, and how it came to be. All the awe at the deciphering of signs, which makes reading so enjoyable in the beginning, now lost. The attention we must bestow upon such an occupation, much more purposeful than the one we apply to hitting the right note.

I am not, of course, against reading, and if I were, it would take longer than this to justify. Yet for those who consider it to be the most desirable of the minor, low energy actions to fill the day of the proverbial patient, I suggest that the fictional nature of all reading can only offer false, self serving answers. The pleasures of fiction can easily hide the struggle at hand. While the clearly imperfect exercise of one’s hands, in painting and music for instance, gives the full measure of the body’s mood.

October 9, Giving Thanks for Bartok

Angela writes:


I would like to wish you a very happy thanksgiving week. This is a marvelous holiday to which I used to pay little attention when I was younger. It did not belong to my childhood and I did not fully understand it, mainly because when one is young, one thinks less of what one has, or has been given, than of what one is poised to expect and receive. This is not only true of the young, it is also true of the university setting of which, for so long, I have been a part.

It is wondrous to be, as I am right now, the object of the attentions of those who are around you and notice the manner in which they achieve such presence. I am certainly wary of judging those overwhelmed by their work, if not by life. I have been there, where there was no time for those far away. Not to speak about those left on the sidelines. I had a job to do, and no matter how hard I tried, I never got it quite right. Or so it seemed. That is how mother university (or is it a father?) trains her offspring.

On the other hand, people who have other occupations than the academic seem to have an easier time. With the understandable exception of the illness-fobic, and there are a few I came to uncover. Yet all are saved by the retired, and I take that in the wide sense of the word. Oh, the retired! Those who have given up ambition! Where would we be without them, who fortunately have time to take care of the ill, the busy and the stressed out?

You may remember that I was apprehensive about going to Montreal. Fortunately, the first day I had there, Heidi spent a whole afternoon with me. Not because she did not have more pressing things to do. She came to see me and alluded right away to the physiotherapist who wanted me to practice the computer keyboard, no matter what words or numbers would cross my mind and come under my fingers. What a narrow use of my precious energy, she mused. For her, who, among other talents, including writing, is an accomplished musician, a keyboard is a piano keyboard first. We went to the music store to look up pianos. And at the end of another couple of hours, we came up with a choice.

While waiting for my keyboard here in Springbrook, I started looking into some of the rudiments of this trade. My long distance teacher sent right away a whole cahier with music exercises put together by the Hungarian composer Bela Bartok for his son. Of course these exercises contain a lot of motifs which used to fill my childhood's everyday musical landscape.

Now the keyboard is here, looking out over the turning foliage and the everyday more barren trees. And I have to say, the effort it takes to work those keys is very different than what it takes to write on a keypad. I have the sensation of touching something original, I would venture to say from before writing, even if I never thought of the writing keyboard as the approximate replacement of a more authentic one, which would by now be lost. But there is this visceral pleasure contained in the pushing of a key and that resulting sound, hopefully the right one, which should come out and greet you with what feels like encouragement. Not to speak about the effects of a series of sounds, which, in the right order and with due exercise, may begin to make sense. When I am not practicing, I listen to a recording of this music, while doing my painting. There is ever less time left for me in one day. And since I only have a few hours of active energy to begin with, i do not quite know how to give myself to these tasks, one more pleasurable than the other. I am afraid the first casualty of the true keyboard, you might have noticed, was the computer.

That is how, for this thanksgiving, I had to give thanks for all the friendship which has accompanied us for the last year. Soon it will be a year since Colin wrote a long letter to my family doctor, asking not only for the appropriate pain medication, but for a serious investigation of the pain in my back. What else can I wish for, if not to grasp the one thing to be thankful for, even as life put us through her blind, cruel workings.