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Something about John Coltrane
Feb. 11th, 2007 10:53 pmLast week, as a combination birthday/anniversary gift and exercise in overcoming inertia (and therefore also somewhat depression), I cleaned the middle room. I gathered up the rug and futon cover and pillows and throws and pillow covers and mat covers and took them all to the laundromat. Two of the large pillows have perhaps never been washed. I came home and removed all the furniture and dusted and swept and mopped. I put it all back in place. The room was glowing again, or maybe it was just the orange of the futon brightened by the layers of dust and dog hair removed. But now I can enjoy sitting there and not feeling grossed out.
It is the brightest sunspot of the apartment and next to a radiator and therefore good for naps. I have pleasant memories of warm and intense nights spent there. But I love sitting and lounging there because the room is also our library, and I can sit and stare at the rows of books and have the same feeling of calm and longing and curiosity that I have when browsing through bookstores and libraries. I am constantly called to read and I have all the patience and attention in the world to do it, I don't get distracted by sleep or tv or snacks or internet.
Tonight I settled down to finish working on a budget, to perhaps do some paper journaling. I pulled out John Coltane's Lush Life, an album I'd been thinking of after listening yesterday to his A Love Supreme. After finishing doodling and brainstorming with the calculator and feeling satisfied with my plan, my eyes wandered over to the shelf which has started to accumuluate a textbook collection. I have many of mine from college, but these are all recent acquisitions, mostly literature collections I find used on online for cheap because new editions are now being required for students. I am drawn to them for several reasons: I like collections, the idea of collections and what brings stories togethers and the essays included with the primary sources, I like to think about how I would teach literature and writing in the future, I like the concept of textbooks, even with their inadequacies. I pulled down a Norton collection of short stories and was surprised to see an Amy Bloom story included. I started to flip to it, but got stopped by the sudden need to read James Baldwin's "Sonny's Blues". I read it years ago, but have been wanting to revisit for craft reasons and paused because I felt a bit ashamed at the cliche of reading it while Coltrane blew on his horn about being like someone in love. But I did it anyway.
The story moved me as much as before, but for different reasons and I couldn't even stick with my examination of the language and structure, I was just too drawn in to the movement of it, I didn't want to pick it apart at all. When it was done, I put down the book and pulled the dog close to my chest and curled up on the pillows. I could feel my eyelids getting heavy and wondered if sleep might be a bad idea at this time of night, but the warmth of the radiator and pillows and fur, from my inside -- the fuzz that comes after I absorb a moving piece of creative work -- and in the air from the music, and for a moment I actually thought, this is the most amazing moment of my life. I don't want to move, I can't move, I don't want to move, I want to stay in this place.
Of course, I fell asleep seconds later. I woke up to silence, the record over. How long was it? What time...day is it? Who am I again? All the disjointedness of unexpected nap, feeling awake and sleepy and unrested and calm. I stand up and I'm shaken, I am still not myself, but I don't know who this other person is yet. It's like I am blurred and nearsighted and far away. I am the character in some other story, stuck in the spine as the book was shut on me while I was out of the scene, a mere subplot (what if I'm only the subplot in someone else's story? ), and I can't find my way back to the action.
Of course, I'm back together seconds later. I look at the clock, and figure I can't have been asleep more than 10, 15 minutes tops. I am silly and sleepy and its Sunday night. But I go into the next room and the candle is out. There is no draft, no breeze. The wick is fine, it did not drown in wax. I look at it, and think, I was right. Someone was here and passed through me first, on the way out.
It is the brightest sunspot of the apartment and next to a radiator and therefore good for naps. I have pleasant memories of warm and intense nights spent there. But I love sitting and lounging there because the room is also our library, and I can sit and stare at the rows of books and have the same feeling of calm and longing and curiosity that I have when browsing through bookstores and libraries. I am constantly called to read and I have all the patience and attention in the world to do it, I don't get distracted by sleep or tv or snacks or internet.
Tonight I settled down to finish working on a budget, to perhaps do some paper journaling. I pulled out John Coltane's Lush Life, an album I'd been thinking of after listening yesterday to his A Love Supreme. After finishing doodling and brainstorming with the calculator and feeling satisfied with my plan, my eyes wandered over to the shelf which has started to accumuluate a textbook collection. I have many of mine from college, but these are all recent acquisitions, mostly literature collections I find used on online for cheap because new editions are now being required for students. I am drawn to them for several reasons: I like collections, the idea of collections and what brings stories togethers and the essays included with the primary sources, I like to think about how I would teach literature and writing in the future, I like the concept of textbooks, even with their inadequacies. I pulled down a Norton collection of short stories and was surprised to see an Amy Bloom story included. I started to flip to it, but got stopped by the sudden need to read James Baldwin's "Sonny's Blues". I read it years ago, but have been wanting to revisit for craft reasons and paused because I felt a bit ashamed at the cliche of reading it while Coltrane blew on his horn about being like someone in love. But I did it anyway.
The story moved me as much as before, but for different reasons and I couldn't even stick with my examination of the language and structure, I was just too drawn in to the movement of it, I didn't want to pick it apart at all. When it was done, I put down the book and pulled the dog close to my chest and curled up on the pillows. I could feel my eyelids getting heavy and wondered if sleep might be a bad idea at this time of night, but the warmth of the radiator and pillows and fur, from my inside -- the fuzz that comes after I absorb a moving piece of creative work -- and in the air from the music, and for a moment I actually thought, this is the most amazing moment of my life. I don't want to move, I can't move, I don't want to move, I want to stay in this place.
Of course, I fell asleep seconds later. I woke up to silence, the record over. How long was it? What time...day is it? Who am I again? All the disjointedness of unexpected nap, feeling awake and sleepy and unrested and calm. I stand up and I'm shaken, I am still not myself, but I don't know who this other person is yet. It's like I am blurred and nearsighted and far away. I am the character in some other story, stuck in the spine as the book was shut on me while I was out of the scene, a mere subplot (what if I'm only the subplot in someone else's story? ), and I can't find my way back to the action.
Of course, I'm back together seconds later. I look at the clock, and figure I can't have been asleep more than 10, 15 minutes tops. I am silly and sleepy and its Sunday night. But I go into the next room and the candle is out. There is no draft, no breeze. The wick is fine, it did not drown in wax. I look at it, and think, I was right. Someone was here and passed through me first, on the way out.
