Category Archives: Recalling

Journaling

Lately, my favorites have been those that specialize in Japanese paper goods; there are so many adorable, and useful, little amusements to discover. I recommend starting out in midtown, at Kinokuniya USA, a giant bookstore whose basement level is almost entirely devoted to notebooks, pens, and letter-writing sets. You can then trek to the East Village, to niconeco zakkaya, a cute-as-a-button spot that specializes in journals, sticker books, rubber stamps, and washi tape.

The New Yorker Daily                     By Rachel Syme

There are many platforms for the many disciplines of self-expression.

Journaling is a way to get control of your life or at least chronicle its natural disarray. Generally, the journal is used to report to oneself on oneself.

In my books, it’s separate from the  blog posts I share with others. [There is an intended pun in there.] My writing is often a chronicle of my life, but the one I post is more organized than it would be in a journal.

Here, I try to make some order of it all. My posts, whether poems or opinions, intend to make a point.

My preferred “journal” is Samsung Notes. I type, therefore, I can read what I wrote. In my long hand, yesterday’s entry would remain a mystery; well, not just yesterday’s but most days’.

Nonetheless, I am attracted to the paperback book journals Rachel Syme describes and recommends.

I remember this taste

I don’t know if it was the exotic setting or the plangency to a Swedish film, but these wild strawberries in a restaurant in Italy were fresher and sweeter than anything I had ever tasted.

Redolent of the forest from which they were picked, they had a taste unlike an ordinary strawberry or any fruit I ever ate. Then or since.

Rich, fragrant, tiny, and perky, wild strawberries were a once in my lifetime experience.

They remain a strong, much favored sensory memory.

Found objects

If you were going to open up a shop, what would you sell?

In my youth, I knew a pair of artists whose work was informed by found objects.

They scoured the streets near their Lower East Side apartment for cloth and discarded spindles and leftover thread. Cardboard and milk cartons were turned into artwork.

Recycling the leavings of their industrial neighbors was an artful endeavor in and of itself.

Objets

If you were going to open up a shop, what would you sell?

Once upon a.., I planned on opening a little store with my friend Helen. We thought it would be cool to sell crafts.

Stock media photo of a Rollei Rolleiflex

I had been taking pictures with my Rollei Rolleiflex, which I wanted to include in our inventory.

The storefront we had in mind was deliberately tiny.

MLK

Who is your favorite historical figure?

It’s not really history if you’ve lived it but I greatly admire Martin Luther King, Jr.

He always maintained a harmonious dignity and respectful rhetoric.

He was a true peace maker.

He paid dearly for his efforts on behalf of equality and social justice.

Given our current civil status, I can only hope that his martyrdom was not in vain.