If you are unfamiliar with both, it is easy to conflate Tom Jones, the book, with Tom Jones, the singer. Even easier if you have seen Tom Jones, the movie. The sexual adulation for the man, in his prime, might seem to echo the debauched lewdness in the film.
I have lost track of why I share this wisdom with you. You may have it for free, with no lesson attached. If you wish.
Free, except that you’re obliged to goggle* the three varieties of TJ on your own.
At 250, Jane Austen is so fresh to those of us who are her fans we read her with baited breath.
As if we hadn’t met Mr. Darcy before.
Mr. Darcy and all the women, the Emmas, Catherines, and Elizabeth Bennets whom, in fact, I’ve met so often. If you like Austen, you have met them all as well.
On December 16th, let’s raise our book jackets to Ms. Austen.
Enjoying a late lunch with my friend T. is a long conversation, catching up.
Miss Nellie’s lost us to India / Times Square where the menu is long and on a screen. By long, I mean extensive and, let’s face it, enticing. Miss Nellie’s is catty corner from India etc.
It’s menu is predictably smash burger and salads.
It is truly serviceable but not exotic, and we preferred the wilder choice.
We each chose an item from the vegetarian selections.
My recently avid reading (or listening) truly expands my knowledge of all sorts of things. I allow one thing to lead to another.
For instance, I never knew of Celia Paul but ran her down after a mention in a book I was indulging in.
Wish, I could credit it, but off hand want to say it was one of Patti Smith’s memoirs.
I just finished Stay With Me, so I know that’s where I gleaned this tidbit of information. In context, I mentioned this in a discussion of violence in children’s stories. That was apropos Peter & The Wolf, which has some grisly bits.
I want to defend that violence as not being random. It is a wolf’s nature to eat birds.
Back to the tidbit lost in my explanation and defense of the fairytale: Stay With Me had an incidental sidetrack of its own.
Nigerian folk tales are easily as quesy as the German or Russian brand.
I followed a few of these down their own rabbit holes. Stories Nigerians tell their children can also seem too blunt.
D. has this effect on door men around town. That’s how we wound up at the Speak a few months ago.
On Friday, after we attended a Works & Process production of Peter & The Wolf, we got an invitation to come inside. The man at the door of the Neue Galleries tells us that it’s free from 5 to 8pm. We have 40 minutes and I want to see the Klimt.
All I know of Klimt’s work I learned in Lady in Gold. Anne Marie O’Connor’s book was on the reading list J. had shared with me.
The Neue has not just Klimts but also Bauhaus furnishings. There is an unexpected Klimt clock.
On our way out, the man who had greeted us, tells us that the restaurant, too, is excellent. He is awaiting a hot chocolate to top off his evening.
We’ll have to return after the holidays, I’m guessing.
The streets are lit by trees that are wrapped in neon, and by decorations. The city is festive.
Staying in the moment is akin to not buying trouble.
Living in the now.
Being mindful.
Finding myself in once familiar locales, it’s in.the present. It also conjures the past.
I am not buying trouble!
I am mindful and I am grateful.
All The Best