09 II 2003 - 19:21 - vos nuntiate bona

Tereza, maybe? The jury's still out on that one... I'll assume you've had some of these but would suggest filling in the holes: Odyssey, Iliad, Aeneid, Metamorphoses, Juvenal's Satires, Horace, Catullus. I will get back to you about translations although Lattimore and Fagles are good for the Greek (and I believe Lattimore just came out with an Aeneid), while Mandelbaum's Aeneid is at least accesible.

One of my favorite percussionists has a tumor in the middle of his brain. I found this out yesterday, and with that news in mind, Rostropovich's interpretation of Shostakovich 8 was breathtaking. I don't understand how the reviewer could have hated such a glorious piece, but to start with such material and to form it in a Rostropovich gives the piece a terrible majesty, a force capable of inflicting a killing blow to the unwary.

Which perhaps was not the best mood to put myself in, but from when have I paid attention to what's good for me?

A lot of the time, really. I try to tell myself that this focus on what's happening in my life, to me, damn it, is mostly because I can't do anything about anyone's tumor, real or metaphorical. He's going to go through a twelve-hour surgery and there's nothing I can do that will help -- not throw myself under the knife in his place, not wave a wand and make it better, and all I can do is to wish him well, and doesn't that feel frighteningly empty after a while? Powerless is the word of the day...

which is a funny word to take, you know, because I went and spent two hours learning to drive. I will make a good driver out of myself yet. With luck, that is. If I'm not lucky, then we'll see what happens. Maybe I'll move somewhere small that offers a relatively good standard of living for a relatively low cost (good-bye, San Francisco), a good public transportation system, and learn the many ways in which not having a car can be a problem sometimes. It'll be fun.

I go now either to write or to do homework -- probably to do homework, for I feel disgustingly empty. And you know what? I don't think you're dreary at all. And even if you are, sometimes I wish for dreary...

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