Cats asleep and happy as I opened another can of tuna ... and did not put it down on the floor. I think there are cat magnets in tuna. They aren't like dogs, (my cats at least), who are generally on the watch for anything falling from human hands. When gravity pulls the tidbit down, dogs are generally right underneath to receive and gulpingly consume, ready for the next. Cats, on the other hand, are waiting to be convinced, interestedly lingering nearby. But when tuna get on the plate on the floor, a smooth, and quite gravitational forces impels them to get right to it. They don't break stride, regard the tuna progentitor with gratitude, or inhale the food. (Allright, I have seen some cats do this, mine don't.)
Embroiled in a bit of an emotional storm this week. This has slowed but not stopped me. I have not made a lot of organizational progress, but I haven't spent the week eating, sleeping, or spending money I don't have, so that seems like a plus.
I had to give up on Skippy Dies. Call me old. Call me feminist. Tell me you don't want to fuck me and that I don't have a sense of humor, but I am pretty tired of boys-in-boarding-school books. Especially ones that feel like Lucky Jim at the beginnning, if they are not, indeed Lucky Jim. I don't need to read about another disaffected, lost boyman in his 20s about to cheat on his honest but not exciting girlfriend who rescued him for loneliness and thorough jerkhood, soon to have her heartbroken. I do not fault the book for being caddish and derivative, because it boring. (Although not badly written.) And I am really quite tired of sex-crazed teenage boys on drugs. Not interesting at all.
So, I picked up Elegy for Iris again, and although it is sad, it is quite the opposite side of the coin.
Upon seeing Piero della Francesca's The Resurrection,
" ... the picture is not only supremely satsifying but also electrifying. It inspires awe. We ate our spaghetti that day with a sense of high achievement, for who can see a great picture or read a great book without taking some of the credit for it himself..."
I find Bayley's musings on marriage quite comforting and sweet and a different language of what draws people, or drew them together.
"Iris seemed to be in a reverie, too. I took her hand and it pressed mine. What was she thinking? I had no idea, any more than I had in the case of Kafka, and I knew very well there was no way to find out. But this realisation reassured me deeply: it made me happy as the hypothetical woes of Kafka had made me feel sad. Such ignorance, such solitude! They suddenly seemed the very best of love and marriage. We were together because we were comforted and reassured by the solitariness each saw and was aware of in the other."
And later:
"So married life began. And the joys of solitude. No contradiction was involved. The one went perfectly with the other. To feel oneself held and cherished and accompanied, and yet to be alone. To be closely and physically entwined, and yet feel solitude's friendly presence, as warm and undesolating as contiguity itself."
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