The Fourth of July has always been my favorite holiday, since I was a little kid in a small town with a parade and relay races and fireworks over the beach at night. The fireworks exploded so loud I called them thundercrackers. One year the folks out on the barge bungled the order and shot [...]
Here’s a review I wrote of Mona Simpson’s new novel, My Hollywood, for The Comment Factory.
Collected Road Thoughts: -words without translation — examples include the German weltschmerz and the Korean word for a certain kind of stress -societies that cannot be taught mathematics because of their lack of a number system and also the wonder of a new human (baby) applying their learned numbers to real-world things, like pieces of [...]
“A 481. Awareness of the manifold possibilities open to me in the future; new hope…” And also a Penfield mood organ. Or maybe just some of this crazy water: Masaru Emoto’s water crystal experiments consist of exposing water in glasses to different words, picture or music, and then freezing and examining the aesthetics of the [...]
Driving up to Petaluma, I passed an 18-wheeler hauling the broken-down rides from the county fair, which ended a few days prior. I half expect to see little Pete and Artie tussle with some waves, but it’s still only July. Phew!
For as long as I had been driving highway 101 to or from Los Angeles I’ve been tempted to stop here: Initially, my desire kindled when I saw the magical words “Hearst Castle” for the same exit as the Madonna Inn. But upon passing that hot pink sign visions of Greek Revival and Gothic dining [...]
Here’s an excerpt from Joan Didion’s essay “In the Islands”, from her collection The White Album, a great summer read, as is most of her collected nonfiction, in that several pieces are short enough to read at the beach and the breadth of content allows for the itinerant mind of summertime. ¡Disfruta!
The following letter was sent to the editor Pascal Covici by John Steinbeck, along with a box containing the manuscript of East of Eden: Dear Pat, You came upon me carving some kind of little figure out of wood and you said, “Why don’t you make something for me?” I asked you what you wanted, [...]
On the last day of the sixth grade I spent the afternoon with a group of girls, among us some very popular members of our class. We decided to ditch out on the myriad pool parties held in celebration of our newfangled freedom and to indulge in the expensive ($5!) summer treat of moviegoing. We [...]