Coffee and Courtesy

Life is not so short but that there is always time for courtesy.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

For years we have been hearing about the decline of civility - in schools, offices, even our government. That good manners are vanishing due to (take your pick) increased reliance on technology, poor parenting, cable TV, or Facebook. And I must admit that I do see evidence of this everywhere, much to my dismay.

Winter à la Sarasota

I have written before about our looong Floridian summers. About how we try so hard to live the outdoor life, faced with a seemingly endless parade of photo-opportunity days that give the lie to what is really a swamp-like climate. But the truth is that we spend all summer hiding out indoors in a sort of hibernating state. We go about our daily lives, moving sluggishly from air-conditioned homes to cars with matching temperatures and tinted windows - into shops, offices, malls and all manner of buildings with piped-in icy air where we take shelter from the invisible onslaught. Even then, the heat and humidity leave us damp before we can get from car to building. The only difference between night and day here is that the sun disappears. The temperature and humidity levels hardly change - it’s impossible to sleep without the air turned really low. Forget about cracking a window.

Sailing Alone From Song to Song

I was going wherever I happened to go,
giving myself over to whatever I met,
-Su Tung-P'o

How easy he has made it for me to enter here,
to sit down in a corner;
cross my legs like his, and listen.
-Billy Collins

One evening, in the manner of Su Tung-P'o, I followed the path of composer Missy Mazzoli to New Amsterdam Records, where a new CD of her music was on offer.  From there I spotted a trio called janus, with a first CD just out.  The trio intrigued me because of its instrumentation:  flute, viola, and harp.

January Blue

The first day of 2011 found Wide Open Spaces in downtown Philadelphia in the immediate aftermath of the Mummer's New Year's Day parade. As we parked the car, we watched a few straggler Mummers making their way back home, still in full make-up and costume. We left the garage and exited onto Broad Street and into the largest sea of crushed beer cans I have ever seen in my life. It was impossible to take a step without landing on a can - Coors Light seemed to be the beverage of choice for the New Year's Day revelers.

A Voice Made for Radio

A mother and her middle-aged son were reunited yesterday, after many years of estrangement. A mother myself, my heart went out to Julia Williams as she sat on the set of the "Today Show" this morning. Seated beside her was her only child, 53 year old Ted Williams. Although her son had just been catapulted into the limelight and was clearly thrilled and overwhelmed by turns, this mother was holding onto what was obviously a hard-earned habit of skepticism. She told him not to hang around with the wrong people and not to disappoint her. After all, just last week he was a homeless man holding a cardboard sign.

Slouching Toward Lachenmann: Björk’s Abyss

What Weill said in the twenties held true again:  "Once musicians obtained everything they had imagined in their most daring dreams, they started again from scratch.”
—Alex Ross

It was like heaven itself had opened up to me and shown me not a vision of the future at all, but better than that, the beginning of the road to the future.  I had come into the world at the end of an old, complex, overweighted style groaning with European modernist baggage, and history offered me a chance to step onto the ground floor of a bold new enterprise.  I didn't even try to resist.
—Kyle Gann

Alex Ross, that indispensable source for all things musical, reported that Björk once said, “Minimalism is my abyss!”  This came to me as something of a shock, as Björk had narrated a series for the BBC on that very thing.

Another New Year's Day with the Mummers

Every New Year’s Day, thousands of Philadelphians, mostly men, don elaborate costumes of sequins, spangles, and feathers. They carry banjos, saxophones, and double-basses to march in one of the most unusual events in the world - Philadelphia’s Mummers Parade.

In Search of a Silent Night

© Sans façon.  By kind permission of Sans façon.

The holiday season is upon us, in case the endless Jingle Bell Rock loop at Starbucks hasn’t given it away.

-Jon Stewart

A few chocolates, a glass of mulled wine and a CD by the The Sixteen playing quietly.  Sublime.

-Friko

Here today we are doing something special, we are stopping and appreciating the space between things, the unintentional sounds that make up our world.

-Dave Hilliard, Cage Against the Machine

Last year, in her post “Do You Hear What I Hear?”, Wide Open Spaces remarked on the auditory invasion of Christmas music at this time of year:

It’s not that I don’t enjoy Christmas music; I do have a nice collection of CDs that I bring up from storage this time of year.  I just don’t understand the need to have it invade all my listening hours.  Last year one radio station started playing Christmas music on November 1st –in effect, they devoted 17% of their annual product to these tunes. (And need I mention that these tunes are associated with a religious holiday that not all people celebrate?)

As she noted, while there is some decent holiday music out there, “not everything is listenable.  For every Bing Crosby or “O Holy Night”, there is Alvin and the Chipmunks or “I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas.”  Blech.”

In Search of Lost Cookies Redux

And suddenly the memory appeared.  That taste was the taste of the little piece of madeleine which on Sunday mornings at Combray . . . my aunt Léonie would give me after dipping it in her infusion of tea . . .

-Marcel Proust

'Tis the season of the cookie.  With visions of Mom and Grandma baking Christmas cookies dancing in my head, I put out a call for family reminiscences and got this reply:  “No doubt you will make mention of Mrs. Schweer's cookies.”

Christmas Cake

My husband only asks for one Christmas gift every year without fail - a Christmas Cake baked by me. This tradition started when we came to America, the land that does not know Christmas Cake. Until then, I could stroll into any food store in South Africa (even at the last minute) and buy a perfect Christmas Cake – non-baker that I am. Or, we could go to our mothers’ homes where my husband could get his home-baked fix. But that first Christmas in America, I just could not find the cake. You see, in this country, “Christmas Cake” is plain old fruitcake. Once I figured out that that was what I should be asking for, I was surprised to find that not only was it hard to find a good fruitcake in America (or at least in Florida) the cake was much maligned here – so much so, that there’s actually a Fruitcake Toss festival held in Colorado every year: