Odd bedfellows
The library shelves nonfiction about cannibalism next to books on etiquette
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Good fortune
While moving, I found an old fortune cookie fortune:
Now is a good time for serenity: a book and a good friend.
That is sound advice.
In case you’re interested, the lottery numbers on the back are 16-17-20-26-30-43.
I bought a ticket with those numbers. The drawing is after my deadline for posting. I might let you know if I win.
Surprised by joy
I’m chipper these days and I don’t know why. I should be bowed down by the weight of putting the house in order, unpacking boxes and transferring books. But most days, I am ebullient.
Why is that? Good sleep? Only some nights.
Good food? Always. One of the best thing about being home is controlling what I buy and cook and eat. No more wondering what hidden ingredients were tripping up my keto diet.
Maybe the secret is collagen. I’ve started taking some daily. It’s often recommended for older people. Our skin and joints lose collagen as we age.
Then, here I am at home with my husband. That counts for a lot.
Whatever it is, I feel so alive and spongy with ideas.
Here. I’ll share some of them with you.
Dewey Decimal system
I came across a strange juxtaposition of books at the Central branch of the Multnomah County Library. It’s at the transition from call no. 394, cultural customs, to 395, etiquette or manners. 394.9 is indeed the place for books on cannibalism.
LibraryThing, a nifty app that keeps track of your books and compares your library with others’, if you care, has a breakdown of the Dewey numbers for all its members’ books. It also explains the classifications.
The Dewey Decimal Classification, named after Melvil Dewey, the librarian who developed it, dates from 1876.
It separates knowledge into 10 divisions:
000 Generalities (now including computer science)
100 Philosophy and psychology
200 Religion
300 Social sciences
400 Language
500 Natural sciences and mathematics
600 Technology (applied sciences)
700 The arts
800 Literature and rhetoric
900 Geography, history, biography
I remember in the 1970s, as computer science became a discipline, Dewey had to scramble to find a place for those books. That new place was 000-006. 007-009 are still unassigned, according to Wikipedia.
Dewey or Library of Congress?
Most public libraries use the Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC), but academic libraries favor the Library of Congress (LC) system.
LC has 21 categories based on letters of the alphabet, excluding I, O, X, Y and Z.
Only a few of the letters are mnemonic, like G for geography and M for music. The others are random: K for law, R for medicine, N for fine arts.
It’s a useful system but relatively expensive to implement, so public libraries will probably be sticking with DDC.
I asked my sister, who has retired from a long career in the library at University College Cork in Ireland, which system they employ. She pointed out that Ireland has no Library of Congress, so they use Dewey.
Weigela
This is the weigela in our backyard. It’s blooming furiously now, but it had a few fallow years after an overzealous gardener cut it too far back.
Strange that many folks pronounce weigela as why-GEE-li-a, adding an extra syllable. Do you say poin-SET-a, or poin-SET-ti-a, for the word “poinsettia”?
Whatever. Hummingbirds love our weigela.
Cornflakes
I awoke on a recent morning, as I often do, with an image in my mind. It was of a bowl of cornflakes, with milk.
I’m not eating carbs just now, trying to adhere to a keto diet. But cornflakes seem immensely appealing today.
Nothing else taste like them, does it? The dry texture, the corny taste, the cold milk, incipient sogginess.
I remember a Kellogg’s print ad from many decades ago, in which a psychologist (he’s on the couch with a bowl; the box is on the floor) explains that the reason we like cornflakes in the morning is “conquerable resistance.” Having something we can overcome makes it easier to get out there and take on the day’s challenges.
I have never in my life eaten cold cereal for breakfast. In the frozen north where I spent my early years, breakfast cereal was hot, cream of wheat or oatmeal. Cold cereal was a bedtime snack.
We called all dry cereal Kix, whether it was the breakfast cereal of that name or not.
Even in those long-gone days, we didn’t have sugary cereal. My mom the nurse didn’t think that was healthy. We all know she was right. Moms usually are.
Not all spring greenery is green
These trees are red maples, Acer rubra. The leaves look red when backlit by the sun, but up close they are just green maple leaves.
Dipping in
I’m inaugurating a new way of reading as one more way to tackle the vast mountain of books I love and admire and want to read—when I have time. Which I never do.
But what if I dip into the center of a book? Open it at random and suck out some ideas?
I did that recently with The Healer Within. I read about the Remembering Breath, and it sparked an essay that started with breathing and ended up with a hole in the ground.
Last week I dipped into The Old Ways by Robert Macfarlane. I had just come across it while unpacking. I wrote about it last week, and here was the book.
Dipping in, I found his description of a mountain in Western Tibet, Kailash, the source of four mighty rivers: the Ganges, the Brahmaputra, the Indus and the Sutlej.
That description is all I can take in—it’s the middle of a sleepless night. The narrative continues, but I am consumed by the image of Buddhist pilgrims circumnavigating this Tibetan peak “clockwise.” Do Buddhists even have clocks with circular faces?
Try it again
This dip and sip method probably won’t work with fiction. But maybe it would. I haven’t tried it.
My coffers are full. I can only take in so much more new information.
And old information gets lost. While trolling through my photos, I came across two small quilts that I had made only a few years ago. I had totally forgotten about them. It took me awhile even to remember who I made them for.
One was for the adult daughter of a caregiver at Rose Schnitzer Manor who has cerebral palsy and uses a wheelchair. Her mother said she likes elephants.
The other was a wheelchair cover for a friend who has multiple sclerosis.
One more thing about the Macfarlane book. The index is arranged by topics. It’s so appealing to check out “artefacts & artworks” or to find “watercolours by Ravilious” and “gold lumulae.” I can’t wait to tackle this book. Yet, I have to wait, because I’m involved with a number of other books as well.
Book web
Sticky with ideas, Too many to eat. Leave the mummified bodies For another feast. Just glean what you can Let the rest lie fallow You will revisit Some time When it’s time. When you’re ready, The book will be there.
House phone
When I was in assisted living, I was provided a landline and a four-digit extension. But it was so inconvenient to try to pick up in time that I seldom answered it. I gave my cell phone number to everyone I could think of.
Phone story
The phone rings it head off, but It’s on the other side of the room. It might just as well be on Jupiter. I’ll never make it before it stops. I’ll never make the touch-tone of life, either. How strange that I can write by voice, Sparing my fidgety fingers. But I have to give up on dictation— Because it can’t hear my words, Over and over, it refuses To understand what I say. I might as well be on Jupiter. Weave me a phone metaphor, Like the curlicue cord you used To twist around your fingers Till all the spring was straightened. My life is a dial tone Waiting to connect My life is a metaphor Waiting to dial.
Coffee followup
I introduced you to the Tōv, the Egyptian coffeeshop on Hawthorne Boulevard in Portland, last week. I drank a life-changing pour-over and a sturdy cortado there, but I didn’t realize till later that I could have ordered Egyptian coffee.
It came, thick, strong, unsweetened, redolent of cardamon, in a tiny long-handled brass pot to pour into a waiting cup.
Mediterranean countries have similar brews: Greek coffee (not to Turks!) Turkish coffee (not to Greeks!), Egyptian, Arabic, Bosnian.
The basis of all of them is finely ground coffee boiled in a long-handled pot. Sometimes sweetened. Usually spiced with cardamom.
It’s hard to find Mediterranean coffee in Portland, so being able to order it anytime in a coffeehouse is a treat. Even if it does cost $9. That includes a piece of basboosa, a syrup-soaked Mideastern pastry of semolina and coconut that would cost $3.50 by itself. It was worth breaking keto for.
The roaster
Tōv’s beans are roasted in Northeast Portland by Cosmopolis. The founder of Cosmopolis Coffee, Conor Carrigan, has ties to fine Colombian coffee. His great-uncle Rafael Parga Cortés introduced coffee to farmers in Tolima, a region in the Colombian Andes.
Cosmopolis buys coffee from small farmers and cooperatives in that region, including the Jorge Rojas bean that I fell in love with at Tōv.
I wrote a poem in that coffee house.
Unpacking
Hawthorne is brilliant with sunlight and breeze. Not many dogs, and mellowness reigns. Turkish design, and a pour-over coffee “For here,” brings a drink in a mismatched mug. Moving is tiring, but in a good way. We put out boxes of things that don’t work. Free for the neighbors, our decluttered clutter. Free is a good price. Who will take that stuffed skunk? Books are a conundrum. I have too many, And one of the bookcases won’t fit in my space. Keep me! No, keep me! Books whine, and they wheedle. How can I part was such excellent words? Substack overflows with good and bad writing. Everyone thinks they have something to say. Well, yes, we all matter. The issue is choice. What way will you read? Paper or pixels? I like paper, so sue me. With beautiful type. Covers designed by an artist of note. Maps of the wilderness, how can you not read? Try leaving a library without a new book.
Check out
I ran into a trio of retrievers a few days ago. Princess Buttercup is 13, but the other two are just a few years old. Leo is in the center. Rogue, at right, is a therapy dog. He visits hospitals and nursing homes and loves to be petted. These dogs were almost as friendly as their owners.
Take time for yourself
Having a day of rest every week is essential to our well-being. If only it were easy to kick back and relax.
Sabbath, again
[Written in a fog of memory] The day is never as quiet As I planned the night before— Quiet categories of time, Much reading, a calm walk, Time to meditate. But the computer Won’t cooperate. Email disappears, and an app Just, just, just Won’t work. Time is eaten by the crossword, Making dinner, Listless conversations— People matter most, of course, But sometimes they are insipid— My pen leaks; I have to refill it. I planned to knit, Write a poem, Sit in my recliner. Instead, I dithered and supped. It’s all good, really. I’m sleepy as I write this, My leg jerks, jolting me awake. My back hurts a little, too. Yet I keep it up. The poem gets written, I keep nodding off. The leg jerks me awake. I have a martini with three olives.
—30— Housekeeping If you enjoyed this post, hit the ♡ to let me know. If you have any thoughts about it, please leave a comment (click on the thought bubble at the top of this item). If you think others would like it, hit re-stack (the interlocking arrows at the top of this item) or share.
I too have a growing mountain to be read of recently purchased books. Back and forth between kindle, book, and substack and of course the weekly local paper for a community I feel less and less involved in these days. It's really nice the weather's warming up now and I can retreat to the lawn swing, lay my head back, and soak up some sun.