gloved

James Bradley writes so beautifully. The best thing I did today was read this post and the related essays of his that he's linked to, at his blog City of Tongues. I think you would appreciate them. I had not seen any of these essays before, despite having valued his novels since Wrack and having very much enjoyed his occasional blogging since he began to do it.

I have been thinking a little bit recently about the problems that are usually present, in my observation at least, in memoir-ish writing about episodes or experiences of inner disruption, and I guess I'd thought these problems were here to stay, partly because of the modalities of autobiographical writing that appear to be available to practitioners of the form working now. But I am inclined to revise that opinion now. James has written about it all with such clarity and care, and with a truly wonderful capacity to move between active if dispassionate reflection and gently allowing his narrative to be carried by the form of the experiences he describes. I had spent some time in the middle of the night before minutely reading and re-reading Virginia Woolf's 1925 essay 'The Patron and the Crocus' and thinking about what she says a writer needs to know, and do, to produce good writing - to know for whom one is writing - and James's essays resonate with Woolf's and also, in their purposefulness, demonstrate the truth of her claim.  

I took a shower earlier in the evening. I was indulging my wonderful hobby of washing my hair extremely well, and I was singing along with a new record that I'm hugely enjoying, by a woman who I've been acquainted with for many years and who I feel very connected to, and who seems as though she may be able with this record, quite different in kind to her previous work, to make the breakthrough to a more mainstream kind of success; lucky mainstream, if that happens, she's more than it deserves, but when artists work so hard and give up so much for their creative work nothing is better than seeing the strain disappear from their faces when they finally earn some money. So I hope it works out for her. And as I said I was singing along. And I stopped thinking about the feelings and ideas lifting and blooming in the music and I began to think about myself. I thought, I have had a really shit couple of years. Emotionally, in terms of identity, in imagining my future, it's been a walk on perpetually and unpredictably shifting sands. And I want this to stop. So OK, one of Lenny's adorable little friends did say to me in the park last week, oh your hair is all grey already, but snide remarks from shitty little seven year olds aside, you know, I feel pretty able at this juncture in my life. When I don't have to walk on the shifting sands any more, I will be able to put the energy and the mind and the determination to work in much better and more satisfying ways. And this is what I thought, listening to someone else's creative work; I thought about myself and whether I can make a life for myself where I too will be able to stretch myself in those ways. You know, I think I can. I will have to get through the weekend first, however.

All right. Well, some pictures from today.

just thought I should give my bike some love, I know I mention it quite a lot but I don't give it many chances to just show itself to the world, as it is, without me sitting on it or falling off it

  

Could not help myself

Did not purchase

Dinner was Lentil Crisps, which are a sort of cross between poppadums and polystyrene packing fill, with silken tofu, vegan pesto and sauerkraut. And a G&T. I ate too much today. In seperate incidents, two different people at work gave me Cherry Ripes. I have been quite appreciatively reading this book called Anzac Memories, by Alistair Thomson. The awful-sounding name is interesting - the book is literally a study of how three Melbourne men constructed their recollections of their First World War, the stories they told others and themselves, the intersections of their memories with narratives circulating in the public domain. It's such an interesting project but it also has the quality of an academic book that has compensated for its innate adventurousness with a lot of very plodding laying-out of the assumptions. It's a little sad that a book about the plasticity of memory should itself be so stiff.

My white woolen jumper suddenly exhibited all these little holes - I found six. If it's moths it's a weird and disturbing new kind of moth that can do all this damage with speed and stealth. The jumper has been worn and washed at least weekly since April. Then yesterday I got it off the drying rack and all these punctures. I darned it.

The darns are visible but not overly so I hope. I don't like throwing clothes out unless its absolutely necessary. This jumper is very plain and simple - I got it from Uniqlo four years ago for $30 - but I really like it

Vinnie is horrible, this is his arse