writing between the cracks

Yesterday, I discovered I have completed a short story, a month after the birth. How did this happen I ask myself, amidst the chaos of bottles, nappies, mess and snatches of sleep? It happened because like food and water, words are my sustenance.

Of course I would love to have the headspace to luxuriate in my thoughts and have them flow with the happy and relaxed vigour of a bubbling brook chortling through the world. I wouldn't mind my old happy routine either, an hour and a coffee and the world was mine.

Yet, aside from these things, the words come anyway, rich and intoxicating, as if surfacing in stolen moments, they have more potency. At the moment, less time means less mental constipation. It is either write it now or forget it. And if it is forgotten, a better moment is gathered the next time the pen hits the paper. My short story may not be structurally sound or have the greatest nuggets of meaning, but it means that I am writing between the cracks of time, when the hours re-order themselves and I continue.

Foreskin's Lament

Recently, since having a child, I have been confronted in so many ways. The most confronting was a healthcare professional suggesting that my child have his foreskin removed as to possibly prevent a problem later on. Boy, did I rail. Why did God put that piece of skin there in the first place if to only have it removed? If it is a religious choice that is one thing, but if one isn't religious, why bother?

Today in the newspaper glossies there was a double paged article on the issue, the type that can induce anxiety. The pros for foreskin removal, the cons. I have to agree with the cons. Especially when the Dr against quoted it is a violation of human rights, a choice a man can make later on if it is an issue, that the small percentage risk of disfigurement or death, for cosmetic reasons only is abominable.

It made me think of this book, Foreskin's Lament by Shalom Auslander. It isn't a great book, but some of it sparkles, particularly around his own childhood. Suddenly, my memories of this book come into sharper focus. Auslander writes of his own struggle whether to initiate his son into a tradition he doesn't believe in or to let his son be what God made him ( one and the same for an Orthodox Jewish person, not if agnostic).

Auslander's book of short stories Beware God however is excellent, witty and hilariously black.However, my mind keeps leaning back through time to Foreskin's Lament. Who would think a little piece of skin could cause so much upheaval...

Nimrod Bracelet

I love this bracelet from Mark Sanfilippo Jewellery It reminds me of all the fabulous art deco buildings in Sydney, the chevrons and letters so very 1929. It has been ages since I have been into the CBD, firstly the swine flu kept me away from crowds, and then my belly did. I live so close, but it may as well be a country away.

If a character wore this bracelet would she turn into Daisy from the Great Gatsby? Or is it more a seductive handcuff, the type Mrs.Houdini would wear for her husband's delight? Or is something that Virginia Woolf would peer at through a rain covered window and think too flashy and more Nancy Cunard than for herself? Or maybe the metal encrusted bauble that one of Colette's society ladies wear while popping mauve macaroons in rose coloured chocolate ala Cheri....

I wonder, I shall just have to go and try it on.

Back

I have taken up my pen and have written for the first time in months. Lovely wicked rotten handwriting, unpalatable content, but words a - streaming, baby in one arm, pen in the other. Sometimes it is a veritable gush...

Have also christened my fingers with some Herbin ink, am yet to try it, but have sent it to my inkophile Jedi Master to try first. Above Blue Myotis and Lierre Sauvage, that is Forget me not blue and Wild ivy...

can't wait to see what writing they deliver

Parrot and Olivier

Squawk!

Have been nibbling on the pages of Peter Carey's new novel, it is delicious.

Entrancing language

Two seductive first person narratives - a French aristocrat and a Dartmoor scamp

Descriptions divine, flashes of brilliance, breath taking and only up to page 50!

Kazuno Kohara

Yesterday, this lovely little book found its way to my house. The European idea of a season of festive cold has always been delightful to me, it is almost as if it is not possible to have a Christmas or festive season without the cold. Christmas always seems elsewhere. A few years ago I had Christmas in Prague and realised that I missed the hot pudding and swelter, so for me Christmas is always somewhere in between, like a mythical place, like Avalon.

However, I do love things that celebrate the change of seasons.

The paper cuts in this book are so full of sparkling joy, the ink of blue going from grey to dark across the page, as a little boy and his dog have adventures with a lithesome sprite, Jack Frost himself. The pictures often zoom in like a close up of the action, which has commedia dell'arte touches.

Raymond Briggs' The Snowman also came home with me, so the other hemisphere is lingering large. It is delightful too, albeit sad, when the little boy finds his Snowman melted, like the Russian folk talk of the Snow child. At least with Jack Frost there is reassurance that the planet turns, that time passes, that the little boy will see Jack Frost next year. At 4 am in the morning, baby in one arm, bottle in the other, it too reminds me that the snow bleary glare of my eyes will pass too.

The House at Via Manno

One thing about spending so much time in the hospital, is having the reset button clicked for life. Just the sky seems bluer and the old Victorian houses lining our street even more full of character. The gardenias in our garden have sprouted. When I was heading to the hospital, there was only one. The perfume is intense. A sandwich I ate today had tomatoes that sung with a zing. Milk tastes like cream. The kindness of neighbours is startling and raw. Reading words on the written page tend to pump with their own blood. Even from trashy magazines, the images dazzling and strange.

When I got home from hospital to settle myself I started reading this book. A page before shut eye at all the strange hours. Something normalising. Reading before bed a long habit.

My son has a Nonno. He makes us tomato salsa which I haven't been able to eat for nine months. Now it is like manna. My son's Nonno's family has a lot of crazies in it, some leak out from time to time. This book was a little comfort. Making me think of my own grandmothers, hopefully watching out over us, from their starry canopy.

'But what do we really know about other people?’

In this magical, jewel-like novel, a young Sardinian woman explores the life of her Nonna — her romantic, beautiful, and somewhat crazy grandmother. Nonna is an unforgettable character whose life spans much of the twentieth century. A dreamer with fierce loyalties and unbridled passions, we follow her search for perfect love to an ending both surprising and profound. Along the way, against the stunning Sardinian landscape of cities, marinas and mountains, we meet the members of her large family, and the mysterious Veteran, the man of her dreams — each one drawn with warmth, humour and deep insight.

Milena Agus writes of family loves and secrets, of sexuality, of music, and of the harsh realities of war and migration in twentieth-century Europe in a powerful, compelling, and yet whimsical voice.

A bestseller in Europe, The House in Via Manno introduces Milena Agus to English-speaking readers in this sparkling translation by Brigid Maher.