tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6169112009982140882024-03-05T17:15:23.451-05:00HAVING AN EMPTY MINDEmma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.comBlogger23125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-59724506592234409652013-04-12T15:29:00.001-04:002013-05-20T21:59:58.029-04:00Noticed: This Blog<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
By me, after almost a month. Anyway, beloved audience, I'm switching myself over to tumblr because the post editor stresses me out slightly less to look at. So please find yourselves over at<br />
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<a href="http://havinganemptymind.tumblr.com/"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="color: red;">havinganemptymind.tumblr.com</span></span></a><br />
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See you there.</div>
Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-88863545285043471542013-03-14T20:05:00.001-04:002013-03-14T20:08:47.183-04:00Eastward Inwestments<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
One of my most dedicated and attuned readers has brought to my
attention the Development of Eastern Poland initiative, and its cheeky
ad campaign that seems to be going very sluggishly viral:<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/uURx1oDIKj8?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">The disappointed therapist, the largest and most brilliant jewel in this crown of suave insinuation and guilt.</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfydrj0H5TcHSkH6NBKxXoMrObnGMAU9r6SwOxLtm5YmZ0VsfYf2m-KqF-HTSeV3ye1cKz4Om4-DYbA9OHppLgQCZRaJrhpcIg7He4IOxdKhdBml2sQ_wDUWu1RFNPJD6UXAQNVwWelvPc/s1600/Dlaczego_zainwestowales_5891569.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfydrj0H5TcHSkH6NBKxXoMrObnGMAU9r6SwOxLtm5YmZ0VsfYf2m-KqF-HTSeV3ye1cKz4Om4-DYbA9OHppLgQCZRaJrhpcIg7He4IOxdKhdBml2sQ_wDUWu1RFNPJD6UXAQNVwWelvPc/s400/Dlaczego_zainwestowales_5891569.jpg" width="282" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The angry Polish father-in-law who wonders why you didn't invest in Eastern Poland.</td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOYsnUxjez5ifbDY-EmiNCRQHY7eGBjWwKI3-YBtjdtCIzR4wjrrwLa3vilxjpXioqzmrqWUgiJEHGK9pvqw_Y8p1bjOwwAiTWJ6fTF0mQ_-F69NT1vmBf1C6fnW4Tfyjz67lI2Cr4suFu/s1600/35415223.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="256" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOYsnUxjez5ifbDY-EmiNCRQHY7eGBjWwKI3-YBtjdtCIzR4wjrrwLa3vilxjpXioqzmrqWUgiJEHGK9pvqw_Y8p1bjOwwAiTWJ6fTF0mQ_-F69NT1vmBf1C6fnW4Tfyjz67lI2Cr4suFu/s320/35415223.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I think I've reached as far as I can into this meme, but you can see a lot more <a href="http://www.somethingawful.com/d/photoshop-phriday/invest-eastern-poland.php">here</a>, and download the original ad materials <a href="http://whyeasternpoland.eu/aktualnosci/materialy-promocyjne">here</a>.</td></tr>
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Basically,
there's a program (in <a href="http://www.polskawschodnia.gov.pl/">Polish</a>, <a href="http://www.polskawschodnia.gov.pl/english/Strony/Introduction.aspx">English</a>)
to increase investment in eastern Poland. Poland received funding from the European Regional Development Fund to spruce up five of its easternmost voivodeships. (Or
voi(e)vod(e)ship, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voivodeship">according to Wikipedia</a>. There are sixteen Polish voivodeships. I had to memorize them when I
was learning Polish, because there are a certain number of facts you
have to learn about Poland in order to justify your having attempted to learn the
language. I was initially planning on doing a post explaining exactly what a voivodeship is, because I believed that since <i>voivode</i> originally referred to a warlord, and since Bram Stoker's Dracula identifies himself as being descended from one, there could be an interesting story there. I'm still looking.) What this means, among other things, is more funding for universities, increasing Internet access, improvements to roads and the creation of bicycle routes, and this glossy advertising campaign to attract investors and tourists. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish-Lithuanian_Commonwealth">Several previous campaigns</a> that
have brought attention to the region have gone <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partitions_of_Poland">unappreciated</a>, if <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Front_%28World_War_II%29">not underreported</a>, but this one seems to have caught on. <br />
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What's interesting to me is that the organizers of the initiative and people responding to it seem to be absolutely in agreement that eastern Poland today is pretty much without attributes, with a minor difference in perspective; the first insists that this makes it ideal for development from without while the second wonders, who thinks about eastern Poland? Where is it? Is it different from the rest of Poland? Meanwhile, your therapist, your father-in-law, your son, your <a href="http://i.somethingawful.com/u/garbageday/2013/phriday/poland/jazzyhattrick_01.jpg">Polish Tupac</a> roll their eyes as their exasperation becomes unbearable. This is not true, of course, even beyond any discussion of murderous histories, national confusion, glumness and mushrooms that may or may not be on the tip of my tongue. But it is an easier way to make a 30-second commercial. It seems like a commonplace of coverage of the campaign that the average investor would need to do some moral reckoning to come to terms with becoming financially involved in the region--that by becoming involved in it today they would be accepting the aspects of its history that remain unacceptable. As much as I do favor reasoning based on consuming guilt regarding situations that may or may not ever actually come to be, I would like even more to see a campaign that addressed this reticence in an intelligent and open way.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8EdsgEap0135ZQ2lGIxg6A8wwf6FzBFYc9Wei4trOC4lhzf3cuxgUlHphq-aKjMDc7KyPHB-Hd6_0xXnMe5A7Rj-PIqqE2IhgQ0lElCv10u-wbURYHv4rKZNYAo169u9IqSuImy49meZ8/s1600/wschodnia+polska+Stalin.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8EdsgEap0135ZQ2lGIxg6A8wwf6FzBFYc9Wei4trOC4lhzf3cuxgUlHphq-aKjMDc7KyPHB-Hd6_0xXnMe5A7Rj-PIqqE2IhgQ0lElCv10u-wbURYHv4rKZNYAo169u9IqSuImy49meZ8/s400/wschodnia+polska+Stalin.jpg" width="286" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Invest!</td></tr>
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Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-81495760635783059722013-02-28T15:18:00.000-05:002013-02-28T15:29:00.759-05:00Agreeable Nonsense<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
It's still February. For some this may be a simple fact, or it may be something which requires a more complex strategy of coming-to-grips. So I offer you this, a rhetorical tic that has become my only answer to so much, as daily life begins to resemble nothing so much as the deep and merciless but also inconsequential slush piles which are my constant companion.<br />
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Throw yourself into the sea. Have you considered it? When life on land can do nothing but disappoint, demand a constant shaking up of expectations, consider the freshness of a new medium of living. You may die, yes, but you may die if you persist on land. You may yet live, if you begin with the sea.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIRAMlPRzfCxsrlRXZ3BclUAFZlnUzH9xqNomrNIhn98emKCI9W82o24NNigTpv6cPAK3C1ml39R6wrmslPQoveJl_JIWs0XtMY5lWHHZGsqOkEEGEQFVXv-FYVKi9Pu70A8yg0xz6aAdR/s1600/P1000381.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIRAMlPRzfCxsrlRXZ3BclUAFZlnUzH9xqNomrNIhn98emKCI9W82o24NNigTpv6cPAK3C1ml39R6wrmslPQoveJl_JIWs0XtMY5lWHHZGsqOkEEGEQFVXv-FYVKi9Pu70A8yg0xz6aAdR/s320/P1000381.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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And it has to be the sea. The sea is better than the ocean because it is more susceptible to myth. With so many stories that begin with someone throwing themselves into the sea, the end involves some sort of productive interaction with an exotic fish whose attributes remain partially mysterious throughout. It is also less accessible to most of my readers, therefore making the journey required to reach it more worthwhile. By the time you reach the sea, you'll most likely have a comprehensive understanding of the stress that led you to consider throwing yourself into it. It may also be warmer in there.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgg2oQUout-u28jWw06SBEp8mnlHYeyDKH_0DuD_SUBiEuZmrshxQfQfWQxgL2KPo6gOUG-5RzEpqFsOdFjOkJNRhzOz4va4Rmf0be_uMkhqEQc7Lz6PH0-ZAN9sTM23aqWmnEuKKKTQWUJ/s1600/775155.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgg2oQUout-u28jWw06SBEp8mnlHYeyDKH_0DuD_SUBiEuZmrshxQfQfWQxgL2KPo6gOUG-5RzEpqFsOdFjOkJNRhzOz4va4Rmf0be_uMkhqEQc7Lz6PH0-ZAN9sTM23aqWmnEuKKKTQWUJ/s320/775155.jpg" width="212" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This is what I am actually talking about.</td></tr>
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But if you decide to take my advice, please walk, or bicycle, or take a boat to the sea. Nothing more efficient than a train, please. This isn't the Internet. This is real life.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm2bPPLyCZHbkuVohhUwpotpZFQ5cpFI_dMVxPHi-LtdiM7jRqaxVAdJPlSqX8Mwr4oFFcISNS2ztLLMf2P3K-cQeYl9ef4Wj5h2_SpRLZz3V1Y_0pZJpeWs0Uyog_D6QduPCaoofLZHiY/s1600/P1000383.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm2bPPLyCZHbkuVohhUwpotpZFQ5cpFI_dMVxPHi-LtdiM7jRqaxVAdJPlSqX8Mwr4oFFcISNS2ztLLMf2P3K-cQeYl9ef4Wj5h2_SpRLZz3V1Y_0pZJpeWs0Uyog_D6QduPCaoofLZHiY/s400/P1000383.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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This is my only suggestion.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgk5sMXIARcG7WgWL_2D8Bb-OlgKwJXL6EfA58kbrL2mCypyLCE81wJPMQoAw3LGJ9WZ39Jwcjft4MBl4_SPgLtJv3IJSjVbbzSKMEKZlH7yVRXYq9epzUfLd0vgj-gVskhaBcoav6lWiM6/s1600/P1000382.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgk5sMXIARcG7WgWL_2D8Bb-OlgKwJXL6EfA58kbrL2mCypyLCE81wJPMQoAw3LGJ9WZ39Jwcjft4MBl4_SPgLtJv3IJSjVbbzSKMEKZlH7yVRXYq9epzUfLd0vgj-gVskhaBcoav6lWiM6/s640/P1000382.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-69564269889608264402013-02-14T22:49:00.002-05:002013-02-16T12:20:40.438-05:00Helpful Holiday Suggestions on the Suggestive HolidayWhere I am, there's about an hour left of Valentine's Day. If you're short on romantic ideas, consider having a picnic inside. Bread, cheese, salads non-standard (such as potato, pasta or cucumber) or the normal kind, or just a large steak on a blanket. Play nature sounds. If you're feeling rich, serve sushi next. Play ocean sounds. This is my dream.<br />
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Or, for the Slavists, Orthodox Christians, Catholics, Indo-Europeanists and, perhaps, Slavs in your life, celebrate instead the Feast of Saints Cyril and Methodius, who Christianized the Slavs and created Old Church Slavonic, and are, apparently, the co-patron saints of Europe, as of 33 years ago. This is neither my dream nor my reality.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhD_xZTla7jpDi8kcTHG2lSw2WHeLnXVigZ0sWt1TibhsUQzjeR8GgVSPD6WOD61qEW5EOsqiKUxjvpCfjtmWvpiCPSd_pikBp3EOGcrhH4vwwN53KC3c90XsPCbRrPhCnFPQgQ-36WPXhL/s1600/2_14_cyril_methodius2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhD_xZTla7jpDi8kcTHG2lSw2WHeLnXVigZ0sWt1TibhsUQzjeR8GgVSPD6WOD61qEW5EOsqiKUxjvpCfjtmWvpiCPSd_pikBp3EOGcrhH4vwwN53KC3c90XsPCbRrPhCnFPQgQ-36WPXhL/s320/2_14_cyril_methodius2.jpg" width="304" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Happy Valentine's Day.</td></tr>
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Incidentally, the first image you get when you Google-Image-search "Cyril and Methodius cookie" is the same as when you simply search "Cyril and Methodius." It seems like the kind of minor religious/historical event that might come with a pastry of a distinctive shape. This is closest to my reality. (My reality at the present moment involves half a cheesecake brownie.)<br />
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<3><!--3--><!--3--><!--3--></3>Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-54715582404704945232013-02-13T01:40:00.000-05:002013-02-16T12:19:47.620-05:00This Post Has Not Earned A TitleI spent tonight writing a post that I've somehow been writing for months, but cannot finish. Since I've started I've had to change the opening anecdote several times, and the most relevant of the links has expired. But you'll love it even in its bedraggled present state, I promise. <br />
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In the ever-fewer minutes I have until I'm not lucid enough to think of words I will make use of the ones I can lay my hands on to say that it took me over a day to find out that the Pope resigned. For some reason this was the moment when I ceased to be my regular, relatively unconnected self and an almost imperceptibly different self, one who thinks she should maybe have a Facebook again. The next threshold is the one between this self, who is terrified of Facebook and its ilk on a very visceral level but realizes it is useful in a lot of ways, and the one who isn't that worried about it.<br />
I'm not sure what to think. I'm tempted to say that I wish I had well-considered reasons for the present state of affairs that drew equally on an abstract ideological perspective and the demands of living a healthy, beautiful, productive but still very driven-by-practicality daily life, you know, just in case, but I don't actually wish that. I think what I actually wish is that I had a very specific, eloquent glint in my eye, preferably my left eye, and when I looked at someone they would just see that glint and know, <i>that's it. That's why she doesn't have a Facebook.</i><br />
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Or not, either one is fine. This isn't a great post. So here are three pictures from my healthy, beautiful, productive, still-more-glittering-adjectives daily life, just for you:<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgX5-SwMDitiR4UZFTZiwm9Gz6SGTQDnNUO2XDe4egKIsgJcuQ3jr2PyECrp1W42duReLEwr42c-RaUnlBc_m3ABVYQEBkjRID1gbpB_i7lDyPsDm2R0fI7h5RU25GP_8nBNyUYHcl402wr/s1600/IMG_0309.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgX5-SwMDitiR4UZFTZiwm9Gz6SGTQDnNUO2XDe4egKIsgJcuQ3jr2PyECrp1W42duReLEwr42c-RaUnlBc_m3ABVYQEBkjRID1gbpB_i7lDyPsDm2R0fI7h5RU25GP_8nBNyUYHcl402wr/s640/IMG_0309.jpg" width="478" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Some poems I like, and a stack of books from when I was proving to someone that Slovenian exists.</td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCEngFxLyLKO3b0dr6XYCDJPXKDGLPuDLpVHIeYuJf8pIekjvZQezWdXUU2eqAdsGqPmRavc_uPPqSGRmTa7pop7oL-CxCoHk0oDxuBcxYEUhX5L2muJTCDt29pqxomgMxWxmj-K5m0Oof/s1600/P1000004.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCEngFxLyLKO3b0dr6XYCDJPXKDGLPuDLpVHIeYuJf8pIekjvZQezWdXUU2eqAdsGqPmRavc_uPPqSGRmTa7pop7oL-CxCoHk0oDxuBcxYEUhX5L2muJTCDt29pqxomgMxWxmj-K5m0Oof/s400/P1000004.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This brick I somehow acquired and dressed up as myself on the last day of my Intensive Polish program. (This was several years ago. I do not look like this brick any more.)</td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgbGw8lbeXBFThWWPGKg4-14nS-rPU7HDTjOzP1Zz6q8qQ17PbZPVrtDY0WKr6EwWLtCdYiu3eZoH2ivKRMYthiRrfFHLc39_ZyeZ788mCsuOmP0YNWXdILqy_Q_HXMyj69cWCnGzg70C9/s1600/IMG_0306.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgbGw8lbeXBFThWWPGKg4-14nS-rPU7HDTjOzP1Zz6q8qQ17PbZPVrtDY0WKr6EwWLtCdYiu3eZoH2ivKRMYthiRrfFHLc39_ZyeZ788mCsuOmP0YNWXdILqy_Q_HXMyj69cWCnGzg70C9/s640/IMG_0306.jpg" width="476" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Most of an unusually attractive breakfast I once ate.</td></tr>
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<br />Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-82315034554691928522013-02-08T17:07:00.002-05:002013-02-08T19:35:18.632-05:00Cold Month of LoveFebruary seems to me like a month that doesn't demand a ton of you
emotionally. It is muddy, in a spiritual sense. However, today is <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pre%C5%A1eren_Day">Prešeren Day, the Slovenian Cultural Holiday</a>! Spiritual mud and all, the imperative to celebrate love is constantly reinforced. Let's submit. <br />
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My college-student status at my bank is expiring, which reminds me
that about four years ago at this time I was opening a new bank account that would be relatively easy to access in Slovenia, where I would be visiting <a href="http://mapooka.blogspot.com/">Marisa</a>. Most of the pictures you see below were taken by her steady hand. It was a fun trip:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglgKY_ibLEK3SzTJyVgrbMfvgntztfWGwNmdqy2u_3D9KdmdH4HtovsCV6sJ1MCvmqZWv-UY_9dQO9VZWbg7TqiI7ZK5QnM007YHZXsxmEsZ-mHjwQPlNiEI0ZcFTOx5t4RYS_2T1-RCAs/s1600/2976_865596655223_416877_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglgKY_ibLEK3SzTJyVgrbMfvgntztfWGwNmdqy2u_3D9KdmdH4HtovsCV6sJ1MCvmqZWv-UY_9dQO9VZWbg7TqiI7ZK5QnM007YHZXsxmEsZ-mHjwQPlNiEI0ZcFTOx5t4RYS_2T1-RCAs/s400/2976_865596655223_416877_n.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Fun. This hostel was full of impudent French teens.</td></tr>
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Slovenia is the kind of place that lurks in the back of your (my) mind--it could exist, and you could think about it, but what is there to think?<br />
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Here are some suggestions:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavoj_%C5%BDi%C5%BEek" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8NQcTrMP8QARuvHro34rEUzN37n6L3A3k9wujBzFM2Zweaimo2bVRR63TCYQBDkhppabWh9LS3nMiA_qvKOQS-Spx6onT5dMfTsOd-c1Ihy_JR02uH7a-dchzBAFjETyJiw5mTOXB9mTx/s320/zizek-stalin.jpg" title="" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavoj_%C5%BDi%C5%BEek">Somehow, this is the most famous thing about Slovenia.</a></td></tr>
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2. Slovenia is different from Slovakia, but they are nearby, relatively speaking. Slovenia is probably closer to Slovakia than you are.<br />
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3. Slovenia is next to Italy, which is somewhat confusing but also very convenient, in certain circumstances.<br />
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4. There are <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julian_Alps">Alps</a>. You may ski there.<br />
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Shortly before I left I looked at a map that told me that Slovenia lay slightly south of the line between places in Europe whose average winter temperatures are below zero, and those whose are above. I was extremely encouraged by this.<br />
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Prešeren Day, the Slovenian Cultural Holiday falls on the anniversary of the death of the poet <a href="http://www.forvo.com/word/france_pre%C5%A1eren/#sl">France Prešeren</a>, national poet of Slovenia (as far as I can tell, there are no other contenders for this honor). He was born in 1800 in what is today Slovenia, and had a lackluster and overall unsuccessful career as a lawyer, but did manage to open his own law firm in 1846, three years before his death.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaAhqE1ZzxPTlU8L-yU9MJr5ZQnHqW_95O2h_iokCgnd1qvMtRNCQSZER5jwqjp2IrAQx7U3qceewAYThZtZdJIeaE-OCGTGeO_0dOm02oRSVNBZTuDa53Ji7G8w5xRkrOjy74-Z59bOks/s1600/france2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="317" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaAhqE1ZzxPTlU8L-yU9MJr5ZQnHqW_95O2h_iokCgnd1qvMtRNCQSZER5jwqjp2IrAQx7U3qceewAYThZtZdJIeaE-OCGTGeO_0dOm02oRSVNBZTuDa53Ji7G8w5xRkrOjy74-Z59bOks/s320/france2.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Both of these portraits are approximations. He avoided having his portrait done his entire life, to the day of his death (today). </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrGFaq5pweQeqlek5oth8Xkv3WH9EVMQioH8R9dTkJE-EZ_N8ipRR-1az8pKAv2ntblAiJd65pjKNzQDeeTDdx6jyjrTizp2_KSYHyE64UO1Z3-FDt0gB4XrIFpDmkIdQ8So6OCMdN8oWc/s1600/Pres%CC%8Cern-Goldenstein.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrGFaq5pweQeqlek5oth8Xkv3WH9EVMQioH8R9dTkJE-EZ_N8ipRR-1az8pKAv2ntblAiJd65pjKNzQDeeTDdx6jyjrTizp2_KSYHyE64UO1Z3-FDt0gB4XrIFpDmkIdQ8So6OCMdN8oWc/s320/Pres%CC%8Cern-Goldenstein.jpg" width="212" /></a></div>
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He was kind of a mess. But he had a job to do (Romantic poet), and he did it well. He networked with <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karel_Hynek_M%C3%A1cha">other Romantic poets</a>. He produced a national epic. And, he remained in unconsummated, unrequited love for almost two decades, despite a marriage to someone else and several affairs.<br />
164 years ago today, he confessed that he had always loved the woman he had first fallen in love with, Julija Primic. She, in turn, seems to have done pretty well at the job of poet's muse.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgi2lNALt_JtULqZWH9rCejeiy4MO1sb-taOXBSQjdLkBQU-KWNFy-IeT2z0DR9uIt3KVeuFXhQNdymsAJSoj7_ZnjIgfKv6ldgG6g-DW8glRXiFTNc4qq_tzS9HOGY1pwC2FKetJoOnJZf/s1600/julija-primic.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgi2lNALt_JtULqZWH9rCejeiy4MO1sb-taOXBSQjdLkBQU-KWNFy-IeT2z0DR9uIt3KVeuFXhQNdymsAJSoj7_ZnjIgfKv6ldgG6g-DW8glRXiFTNc4qq_tzS9HOGY1pwC2FKetJoOnJZf/s320/julija-primic.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ms. Primic.</td></tr>
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<span itemscope="" itemtype="http://schema.org/CreativeWork">This is a rendition of her, located on a wall on the main square in Ljubljana. Its gaze is directed toward the statue that sits in the center of the square, of the man she wasn't in love with.</span></div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVrss73slfDmdFypqc4yXrZh4br4FtrkQomUf5l4CPmWUht1Ue_IcisqSAmbINvbaafo75zE8j0BDbS90ytE3v_v8zysCtEy81RmptfKQQY5xTFVj8bfb6lxt0i8TyHFmMoMHjuilWpGfY/s1600/2976_865596720093_4704577_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVrss73slfDmdFypqc4yXrZh4br4FtrkQomUf5l4CPmWUht1Ue_IcisqSAmbINvbaafo75zE8j0BDbS90ytE3v_v8zysCtEy81RmptfKQQY5xTFVj8bfb6lxt0i8TyHFmMoMHjuilWpGfY/s640/2976_865596720093_4704577_n.jpg" width="480" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Watch out for an upcoming post about the realities of Carnival, as shown at the bottom of the frame.</td></tr>
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<span itemscope="" itemtype="http://schema.org/CreativeWork"> </span><i><span itemscope="" itemtype="http://schema.org/CreativeWork"><br /></span></i></div>
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<i><span itemscope="" itemtype="http://schema.org/CreativeWork"> Let my poem, like a shrine, contain - your name;<br />In my heart shall ever proudly reign - your name;<br />Let my countrymen hear echoes, east and west,<br />Of the music in that joyous strain - your name;<br />On this shrine shall nations henceforth read your fame;<br />Here it stays to glow and glow again - your name.<br />When both you and I have crossed in Charon's boat,<br />Even then the glory will remain - your name.<br />More than Cynthia, Laura, Delia and Corrina,<br />Time will ever hallow my refrain - your name.
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Which seems true, since I am blogging about her. Maybe this is consolation enough.<br />
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So today, raise a glass of pretty good beer to a pretty good Romantic poet from a small, pleasant country. And, enjoy!Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-21686752768758148562013-02-05T06:30:00.000-05:002013-02-05T13:24:57.573-05:00Things In My Life That Nest Spring is coming, kind of, with everything preparing to replicate itself. My house is full of objects that strive to remind me of this.<br />
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgl-nRMxHEkRIoptq5VmZrbLU_4gzJDBTMQxKHd1RsVLNZobPliomXudne8GTxN26jlKZQfOqP_aKaDrMhHnf1XaC2aLHILj-zL_l2Fz-JNmVEsP_O9ICwKZwUW0OG0a22pLda_wa5NpTcu/s1600/IMG_0289.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="478" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgl-nRMxHEkRIoptq5VmZrbLU_4gzJDBTMQxKHd1RsVLNZobPliomXudne8GTxN26jlKZQfOqP_aKaDrMhHnf1XaC2aLHILj-zL_l2Fz-JNmVEsP_O9ICwKZwUW0OG0a22pLda_wa5NpTcu/s640/IMG_0289.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Regular (czarist? Stay with me) nesting dolls.</td></tr>
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When I was first studying Russian, a man named Sasha would very occasionally come sing songs with our class. Apparently, he attempted to come many times, but almost never succeeded. In my memory this is because it was constantly snowing, because it snowed more in the past, and also Russia. I think he lived in Windsor, which was the actual reason.<br />
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The two things I remember him saying were that he had come to understand while living with a group of Yakuts that music that begins slowly and eventually accelerates to a frenzy was a universal human phenomenon. He hypothesized that this was because it mimicked the human heart in its response to the world. The other thing was about matryoshki--that the traditional ones had seven parts, like the optimal Slavic family. This was supported by the fact that the Russian word for "family," семья (sem'ya), contains the word for "seven," семь (sem'). (Actually, I think he said that it was originally composed of the words семь и я, "seven and I," which to my mind makes eight, but in any case mine has only six, making it unambiguously deficient.)<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAkLlTtLWW1XrUmvPs1UBNgZCdOwPZzWJUU7d6InMCCgqACM3YYjBW4rUQpJ_4SYwu3p0w8CpSewFycByx0y9yKkuNTjAFRSy2LEp5AnBMtIzff-Qrxl0DePqvD1bDguz8FxaTq-UnnIuo/s1600/IMG_0290.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="478" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAkLlTtLWW1XrUmvPs1UBNgZCdOwPZzWJUU7d6InMCCgqACM3YYjBW4rUQpJ_4SYwu3p0w8CpSewFycByx0y9yKkuNTjAFRSy2LEp5AnBMtIzff-Qrxl0DePqvD1bDguz8FxaTq-UnnIuo/s640/IMG_0290.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Soviet-leader nesting dolls.</td></tr>
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Fact Time: Like the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_guitar">seven-string guitar</a>, the matryoshka is a product of the late 19th century that has managed to seem eternal. It was inspired by a similar style of nesting doll from Japan, and its creation was funded by an industrialist who was also a patron of folk-art-for-folk-art's-sake. <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3d/First_matryoshka_museum_doll_open.jpg">This is the first one.</a> The original design was heaving influenced by the tradition of icon painting, and many of the early dolls were painted by people trained in that tradition. Because of this the dolls had a style that was identifiably Russian, but cheerily without context or religious implication.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAA-ckTMbWrx3YaoxQSSgVB6aVzS6RJj19H1NlfpNZA3-9l_tYW1owp1PHdJCo-hw417nffFJB41WOMA1cyd3YO5Mh6YNd7XSbS9gA2Q3_5wRa7XT2fNogZHq2w9H9_43wY8zlFMUsqiOB/s1600/vladimir-mother.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAA-ckTMbWrx3YaoxQSSgVB6aVzS6RJj19H1NlfpNZA3-9l_tYW1owp1PHdJCo-hw417nffFJB41WOMA1cyd3YO5Mh6YNd7XSbS9gA2Q3_5wRa7XT2fNogZHq2w9H9_43wY8zlFMUsqiOB/s320/vladimir-mother.jpg" width="200" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7qICLOGAMwokyBTEZlsFIITkAeSZQewx1A2oj61QSSZMt55vggT3Vtect4P_5tjZQ66hZaed48GxoQ5sE3W9MGlJ5LlOqAyWfip0YP75AxkgJCImRdXUFY2XYVdeftQJkFoXdNvkcsNTY/s1600/RUSSIA+-+matryoshka.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="211" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7qICLOGAMwokyBTEZlsFIITkAeSZQewx1A2oj61QSSZMt55vggT3Vtect4P_5tjZQ66hZaed48GxoQ5sE3W9MGlJ5LlOqAyWfip0YP75AxkgJCImRdXUFY2XYVdeftQJkFoXdNvkcsNTY/s320/RUSSIA+-+matryoshka.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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With enough effort, you can find almost every idetifiable non-matryoshka cultural object that has come about since then represented in matryoshka form. It has become its own medium as a kitsch signifier, but its association with Eastern Europe persists.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzdAwu0njDnUmWELYT_MnF79k9Wlnmo8XYeJKZGuXLam8CaWrPI-9y1RlCnVHFssoN5FmqyK9bzVJ6Z0kMuf1h_w-DgH4_pbDjDbs8Mo5p3o77xX2OsqvpYjE0HtLnCq5qFW7YY6t9T8a9/s1600/styd.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzdAwu0njDnUmWELYT_MnF79k9Wlnmo8XYeJKZGuXLam8CaWrPI-9y1RlCnVHFssoN5FmqyK9bzVJ6Z0kMuf1h_w-DgH4_pbDjDbs8Mo5p3o77xX2OsqvpYjE0HtLnCq5qFW7YY6t9T8a9/s640/styd.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">In Prague.</td></tr>
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And overall this is not so far off from my newest thing that nests, this floral nesting hammer.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_DnocHUBsji3G9QH-tGbkFHFXWVJtvJNaV1rWjnmzViDIcwo62uNi53Fu4vVw5oHWbxIOXncEJHo2oNALEGR8MaWeFuvhvd47CWXRLUbSpQoN3cI7F8e0YFO05Ud1n3HHR7ScZvhCqx5o/s1600/Photo+on+2013-02-05+at+04.18.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_DnocHUBsji3G9QH-tGbkFHFXWVJtvJNaV1rWjnmzViDIcwo62uNi53Fu4vVw5oHWbxIOXncEJHo2oNALEGR8MaWeFuvhvd47CWXRLUbSpQoN3cI7F8e0YFO05Ud1n3HHR7ScZvhCqx5o/s640/Photo+on+2013-02-05+at+04.18.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Spring is coming. Remind yourself what flowers are.</td></tr>
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These are its daughter-features:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8_99TZwnqeoHweIq8rYRmdEAVvWfM3wkQ7BpDHmwOjHLi_t1u-07nm2R_-h3KPSKvNerSuNNCy3jlsrl59tfHQPScdK-ABnb2eRlE3tTbGUzvWMlyftVAl3yGAt9V_gv7sZzFP7rzBuhn/s1600/Photo+on+2013-02-05+at+04.27.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8_99TZwnqeoHweIq8rYRmdEAVvWfM3wkQ7BpDHmwOjHLi_t1u-07nm2R_-h3KPSKvNerSuNNCy3jlsrl59tfHQPScdK-ABnb2eRlE3tTbGUzvWMlyftVAl3yGAt9V_gv7sZzFP7rzBuhn/s640/Photo+on+2013-02-05+at+04.27.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The fork is unrelated. It did not come from the hammer.</td></tr>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3m-TwroRSLDBBlHhUx0OiKWuRgreGKmKPxSMwMACm8ubVJsvmiDNpfDQDx16xe3L5QVMGbhj_YIj8OsUKa51TbIV51J_AE1LDLa0lDAAEGDfe9sRSCTuM-jOxuhbDi7bLeGGieQvJ5Je-/s1600/Photo+on+2013-02-05+at+04.27+%232.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3m-TwroRSLDBBlHhUx0OiKWuRgreGKmKPxSMwMACm8ubVJsvmiDNpfDQDx16xe3L5QVMGbhj_YIj8OsUKa51TbIV51J_AE1LDLa0lDAAEGDfe9sRSCTuM-jOxuhbDi7bLeGGieQvJ5Je-/s640/Photo+on+2013-02-05+at+04.27+%232.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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And, for years undiscovered, until now: <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEho8hd1Beu0GXwc07mQSKErJAdvwjR08DrLkecp-qv840fk7zaD_Wn3uc_Dtg3X9G98F1GjvFaGru-lTGn3R8hB4g3hOIPoYPc6Effwpc_c23X5zsvYMvzSzxGKUWei242RwegHnLM805pO/s1600/Photo+on+2013-02-05+at+04.28.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEho8hd1Beu0GXwc07mQSKErJAdvwjR08DrLkecp-qv840fk7zaD_Wn3uc_Dtg3X9G98F1GjvFaGru-lTGn3R8hB4g3hOIPoYPc6Effwpc_c23X5zsvYMvzSzxGKUWei242RwegHnLM805pO/s640/Photo+on+2013-02-05+at+04.28.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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Appropriately, I was given this by a Russian man who I rescued from a snowstorm. He did not need rescuing, but he was grateful nonetheless. I kept it in my coat pocket for the rest of the day, which struck me as a handy thing to do, but when it fell out more than one person expressed dismay that it was not a more impressive tool for self-defense; for example, a disguise for pepper spray. It is a hammer, I pointed out. Yes, but what if you filled it with acid? That could be really effective.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikeiihcUvFTRxva6DRC0YGidaVriYENLctvxBWFR3p9SmHCBHrPtvfzv-aFHnZ83b3cZc-9nnwryCfFY5HrkI9X4kXmiR1WfW97E-R9Fyhu79Rk02m0LaoxFBgXFeZOgbI9BEFycmIsgix/s1600/IMG_0250.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikeiihcUvFTRxva6DRC0YGidaVriYENLctvxBWFR3p9SmHCBHrPtvfzv-aFHnZ83b3cZc-9nnwryCfFY5HrkI9X4kXmiR1WfW97E-R9Fyhu79Rk02m0LaoxFBgXFeZOgbI9BEFycmIsgix/s400/IMG_0250.jpg" width="298" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">One can hide inside the other, in case of danger.</td></tr>
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<br />Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-62970679483938104722013-02-05T06:11:00.000-05:002013-02-05T06:13:29.756-05:00One Empty Mind, One Regular MindI am very fortunate to be featured this week on <a href="http://inbedwithamywilson.blogspot.com/">In Bed With Amy Wilson</a>, the blog by a lady of the same name where she shares thoughts, insight and enthusiasm for the music she loves. Go check out a blog by a person who knows how blogging works (and so much more)!Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-50048170985564204172013-02-01T16:10:00.000-05:002013-02-01T16:10:47.487-05:00Watch for My Upcoming Play Where I'm Just Sitting In Front of A ComputerMARISA: <br />
i want adulthood to be cocktails and then ali having babies<br />and everyone having money<br /><br />
EMMA: <br />
I appreciate this vision<br />I have a nice drink<br />you have a nice drink<br />Ali has a nice family<br />we pour her a glass of juice<br />
<br />MARISA: <br />
and the babies are playing with money<br />
<br />EMMA: <br />
it is very nice juice, it came in a glass bottle<br />you have a gift for thisEmma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-29415560829751761322013-01-25T14:58:00.002-05:002013-01-25T14:59:03.988-05:00A Handsome And Shapely Woman<br />
I want to learn trapeze. (I want to learn how to write a sentence about a trapeze: I want to learn to trapeze? I want to learn the trapeze? I want to learn how to use a trapeze? Look this up, somebody else?) But I'll be sure to use a network.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0-bIUKvd7zC4XdqvPCHC9WPbz5yp9NsbKFd4bjVDE7Z7g9eCLxyiOz5DWh5C-38IZlchfwWvRIyAd1zZMMc07RKCkVv1W5yYd7ha7Y9Rwxg7CsrVPUkZkIUkaDl2Ti9qrmEPC3fTljOGW/s1600/112630430.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0-bIUKvd7zC4XdqvPCHC9WPbz5yp9NsbKFd4bjVDE7Z7g9eCLxyiOz5DWh5C-38IZlchfwWvRIyAd1zZMMc07RKCkVv1W5yYd7ha7Y9Rwxg7CsrVPUkZkIUkaDl2Ti9qrmEPC3fTljOGW/s1600/112630430.jpg" /></a></div>
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<br />Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-71440087212443406532013-01-25T00:52:00.002-05:002013-01-25T00:58:36.099-05:00The Post About Olavi VirtaI just finished reading Anne Applebaum's <i>Between East and West</i>, which is an account of a trip she took through Eastern Europe, from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea, in the late 1980s. Travelogues appeal to me, although maybe less acutely than they do to <a href="http://mapooka.blogspot.com/">Marisa, who could tell you about some great ones</a>. Mostly I was looking for an informally-written book about Eastern Europe that avoids getting bogged down in either historically-justified horror and despair or an unrelenting rush of quirkiness. This one seemed to settle on mild bewilderment and disgust, which seems like a well-tempered combination of the two but wasn't especially compelling to read. I tend to be easily charmed by an author with an elaborately constructed personal mythology, which was not this book's shortcoming. Anyway, this post is about Olavi Virta.<br />
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Look at this man. Look into his eyes.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlWwqOCJjNq1k4jMDFGgeGfGy6uw3F2aeggDrlRd71dOJizT8dShQNmM96YGTgAyY0sfeygt1hmQo8hHYqRBTSANddOeyeJAb9vyyCaOlRLr2ej-2dMFcwjH23dkqa_r1d38-EG9IncjQ-/s1600/Olavi+Virta.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlWwqOCJjNq1k4jMDFGgeGfGy6uw3F2aeggDrlRd71dOJizT8dShQNmM96YGTgAyY0sfeygt1hmQo8hHYqRBTSANddOeyeJAb9vyyCaOlRLr2ej-2dMFcwjH23dkqa_r1d38-EG9IncjQ-/s400/Olavi+Virta.jpg" width="332" /></a></div>
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This is the real king of the Finnish tango, according to a website called "Virtual Finland." (So far, all of my experiences of Finland have been virtual. A friend of mine who visited told me that everyone seemed to have their own lake. I would probably love actual Finland, because I love fish, being in saunas, and being near, but never in, Russia.) This is Olavi Virta.<br />
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He was arrested for whatever a DUI is called in Finland in 1962 (rattijuopumus, according to Wikipedia), and alcohol played a major part in his overall undoing, which I think is what this drawing is trying to convey:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2k3XhetB7mU9faOCehk8v00UvKNDPAGvnt5anCdg45_svZ3SqklJyeEh_8Gp_gcGGv62pKSvXUuXNEo3J27Z-0vRk4223m4cziGbupo2h2tJcsfIePA7u9IornwJeO3fIltY9TZfx2a-5/s1600/olavi_virta_by_osmatard4njrhm.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2k3XhetB7mU9faOCehk8v00UvKNDPAGvnt5anCdg45_svZ3SqklJyeEh_8Gp_gcGGv62pKSvXUuXNEo3J27Z-0vRk4223m4cziGbupo2h2tJcsfIePA7u9IornwJeO3fIltY9TZfx2a-5/s320/olavi_virta_by_osmatard4njrhm.jpg" width="218" /></a></div>
Actually, this seems to be roughly the life-narrative of most of the stars of the Finnish tango I have read about so far.<br />
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The head of the gramophone library of the Finnish Broadcasting Company quotes Dr. Pirjo Kukkonen as saying that "tango lyrics reflect 'the personality, mentality, and identity of the Finnish people in the same way as folk poetry does.'" Looking at tango as a genre makes me more frustrated than usual with the currency the idea of premature nostalgia seems to have at the moment, but maybe now it's happening at a volume and rate that makes it seem more obvious and worthy of analysis. Can't we use the word 'melancholy' in more self-diagnoses?<br />
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Olavi Virta says, whatever you want. <br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVU5lVkxOJyCHWeT8qwSvO5OB6gWpwhcZHbFIHRoQTSfhlrweIvPVZFSZTRnoyqevZt2g7EJj8lI3SeL-Nk1tpOd48TRj520H_gHH1iPp708Rjyy6F4Hw1H8Lrlj74Sy1ZvXEs7NBxGGpn/s1600/olavi-virta.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVU5lVkxOJyCHWeT8qwSvO5OB6gWpwhcZHbFIHRoQTSfhlrweIvPVZFSZTRnoyqevZt2g7EJj8lI3SeL-Nk1tpOd48TRj520H_gHH1iPp708Rjyy6F4Hw1H8Lrlj74Sy1ZvXEs7NBxGGpn/s320/olavi-virta.jpg" width="251" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Believe it.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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Tango lyrics deal with roughly the same set of themes across
all sorts of cultural and genre boundaries: longing (longing for
home, longing for a woman, longing for woman-as-metaphor for everything
else), sadness, nature, one's mother. The same is true, I guess, for
folk poetry, but in that case often the particulars of the situation
(the specific details of the setting, the characters, the plot, if we're
talking about epic or narrative poetry) take over from the overall
feeling. In this respect tango is more efficient; it is all feeling,
and if all this feeling is expressed in your own language then it is
difficult to deny its power, even when held at a distance.<br />
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One phenomena I hope to discover in the course of my life is tangos written by unusually articulate fourteen-year-old girls. I think they would (will) be magnificent. When I know wealthy people I will do my best to convince them to create a scholarship for promising twelve-year-olds to manufacture it for me, if necessary.<br />
Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-71599087935934573322013-01-19T19:39:00.002-05:002013-01-20T00:31:18.735-05:00Two Fact-Clusters to Haunt You Over Sunday Brunch (Invite Me)1. "Foible" is a word so heavy with the suggestion of being of Yiddish origin, and yet it is not.*<br />
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(It is from Latin-via-French (originally from the word for "to weep") and is related to "feeble" in an interesting way I will now relate. It was used around the 17th c. to refer to the top third of a fencing blade, which is the weak part, and extended metaphorically around the second half of that same century to describe a personal weakness. Its meaning has softened slightly since then, depending on where you draw the line between a weakness and a personality trait. The same cannot be said for "feeble," which is still a mean thing to say about someone.)<br />
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My mother did warn me in stern tones today over Saturday brunch (let's make it a marathon, yes?) about trusting the Internet too much, so I am also accepting donations of the OED, or very smart people who fit on a bookshelf.<br />
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2. And, here's a tune from the original king of the Finnish tango, Olavi Virta, about whom more later (hereafter to be abbreviated AWML). Its title translates into English, I'm told, as "Why I Am Sad."<br />
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*"Foible" in Yiddish is "di shvakhkeyt."Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-12490360614621896732013-01-16T03:00:00.000-05:002013-01-20T01:03:34.084-05:00Beauty Pageants of HistoryA man asked me to explain this picture:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1Q-xCztlxGTzcdC_RvPIv_ywaA9fDPozgjaK9CWOACt4934Rfjcz428xsxKGMKU4eNVEBjdUGecy05UgxgqzYecehkOXOVsT4lNmNl_rUfGW00IYQJVPOMuB7V8I-HFl7o2E7zF1yawYI/s1600/1623.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1Q-xCztlxGTzcdC_RvPIv_ywaA9fDPozgjaK9CWOACt4934Rfjcz428xsxKGMKU4eNVEBjdUGecy05UgxgqzYecehkOXOVsT4lNmNl_rUfGW00IYQJVPOMuB7V8I-HFl7o2E7zF1yawYI/s640/1623.jpg" width="428" /></a></div>
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In any way I saw fit. So I will.</div>
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This was taken during the May 1989 All-Union Beauty Contest, put on by the All-Union Directory for the Organization of Mass Spectacles, an <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1990/02/06/movies/review-television-soviet-bathing-beauties-on-parade.html?n=Top%2fReference%2fTimes%20Topics%2fSubjects%2fT%2fTelevision">"all-male perestroika-inspired cooperative"</a> that was actually privately owned, commonly known as "Venets," or Crown. 35 finalists were given three weeks of intensive training to make them ready for presentation as potentially the most beautiful (unmarried, childless) women of the Soviet Union. The final event of the contest was originally to be held on International Women's Day, March 8, but there were problems. <br />
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There had been earlier beauty pageants in the USSR, beginning with one in Vilnius in March of the previous year, and <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AthCsDNv928">the existence of uncategorized beautiful women</a> preceded all of these. None of them seem particularly Soviet in intention, and Lenin's averted gaze seems to suggest he knows it too. The New York Times, among others, noted that the bathing suits worn by some of the contestants were remarkably revealing. The women pictured in the set of black-and-white photographs that has made its way around the Internet are beautiful, without necessarily being comprehensively presentable, against the grain of so many a pageant participant. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjG-AA_rALze-Mfs9OuQCAA4mMdNQ_fxD4Dz9mDz5gkSYvknGuijbX9NqjXBZ-PpBDiIFHh6cberhPKNSkHfxcB6fp-wV8N4iWXKLGyz36Bp05GZpZTbVfQveQ9QwI3OTM1vbaVCxqbRIT3/s1600/1133.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="273" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjG-AA_rALze-Mfs9OuQCAA4mMdNQ_fxD4Dz9mDz5gkSYvknGuijbX9NqjXBZ-PpBDiIFHh6cberhPKNSkHfxcB6fp-wV8N4iWXKLGyz36Bp05GZpZTbVfQveQ9QwI3OTM1vbaVCxqbRIT3/s400/1133.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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The pictures are also beautiful, I think, perhaps to the point of being a little misleading; a search for the same event on Russian news websites brings up photos of the same in the garish color that seems to be very much of its time, that is, shortly before my birth.<br />
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Even now, or now-ish, though, the idea of a beauty pageant in Russia seems to inevitably inspire skepticism, <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/08/10/russian-prison-inmates-ho_n_255774.html">across venues</a>, in a way that seems incongruous to me with the myth/sporadic truth of the beautiful Russian lady. She is made beautiful by not being in Russia, I guess, where she can only be ridiculous.<br />
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Along marginally similar lines, since <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/11/world/upheaval-in-the-east-lenin-statue-in-mothballs.html">the unpleasantness twenty or so years ago</a>, you find Lenin in the strangest places.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitHHe5UierWrCEygcwtqg5OeKWCa4GBw9fVLMNVsRbJHU9Ev7SqJoBDImkKZyuvyTPg0ekaOEHHYLW1WlfuuKPxPnmEiz26QLezFcMGha849smHm0ezSV0SVMUU49nBegrQYgAT5BGO1HE/s320/lenin.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="266" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.stuff.co.nz//201621">Lenin in the ice.</a></td></tr>
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I'm not sure he was ever beautiful, but as a subject of kitschy sculpture he seems accustomed to being ridiculous.<br />
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My favorite beauty pageant of history, or 20th-century East European history, though, is the one in <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wtfL_-DTDMc">Firemen's Ball</a>. This is how it's done, as I shall explain another post in the near future.<br />
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I'll leave you with this, a passably relevant link between U2's decadent, melancholic Euro-irony phase of the early nineties and its compulsive world-half-awareness/neo-Christian phase of the later, for some reason:<br />
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Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-88064996662387806082013-01-06T18:08:00.002-05:002013-01-06T18:08:19.120-05:00Victory Interlude<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYetyOYsvatbHPmm5lLQ7x6JGA-P5iqCC0na88endZTBGNCYyay2w0yWgNQpDrW-5Hl7Ptp9KcXOuJDqoj6U2NG2Ya-iT6-Dju5eLstmAIvRfxjji9EbCC_HJZ8uSX8ak8JTQbiJpB_Ars/s1600/Photo+on+2013-01-06+at+18.05.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYetyOYsvatbHPmm5lLQ7x6JGA-P5iqCC0na88endZTBGNCYyay2w0yWgNQpDrW-5Hl7Ptp9KcXOuJDqoj6U2NG2Ya-iT6-Dju5eLstmAIvRfxjji9EbCC_HJZ8uSX8ak8JTQbiJpB_Ars/s400/Photo+on+2013-01-06+at+18.05.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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Today I achieved one of my minor goals for the year/the rest of my life, which was to learn how to peel a clementine with one hand (specifically my right hand, which is neither my dominant hand nor my primary driving hand, because I worry about scurvy on the road) while leaving the peel intact.Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-58198931192098788292013-01-05T16:11:00.000-05:002013-01-05T21:10:49.975-05:00Feverish and/or ProblematicA week back I started reading Borges, which is a thing I have never really done, except when I read "The Quixote of Pierre Menard" between seven and twelve times for an Aesthetics class. (On the last day of class, we discussed how ugly the statue outside the window was, and had always been, with the full force of our collective correctness.)<br />
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Why did I do this? Because I love Argentina. No, this is not true. I know almost nothing about Argentina, and also I have never seen "Evita." Because I dance tango without knowing very much about Argentina, without having feelings about it.<br />
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Explaining tango to people who do not dance tango, and so probably do not think about tango, is a risky endeavor. Case in point: since I started dancing tango I have received as gifts three "tango shawls" from friends and relatives. I had no idea that such a thing exists, or is even possible, and even now, as the owner of three tango shawls (one fuzzy white, which can be converted into a cowl by opening it at either end and has for some reason a thick line of fringe on the inside, one a thin strip of pink, purple and green knitted frills, and one in what I imagine is a classic red), I could not give you an account of their definitive characteristics. After a lot of talking and Google Image-searching, though, I determined that what is roughly supposed to happen is that I am supposed to lean back over my partner's right arm and let my body form an appealing arc, as the fringe of my shawl and, optionally, the last half-inch of my hair trails on the slightly dingy black-and-white tiles of the dance floor, before snapping back and continuing on to form new and different appealing arcs.<br />
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Sometimes the attempt proceeds along more comprehensible lines. A man with a gorgeous and well-maintained bookshelf recommended to me that I read Borges' essay on the history of the tango, which seemed extremely reasonable. My understanding of the man (Borges, with the many bookshelves, not the man, with his one or two) remained somewhat unearthly, which is more a result of my prodigious non-knowledge than any quality of his. I know he was a librarian in Argentina's national library, I know he was into Old English. I know sometimes I would sit on the floor in the Undergraduate Library and read his advice to young poets, and it would give me great feelings. I know he was blind. I know he is dead. But without excessive knowledge I was also able to understand him as someone who was probably able to explain something about Argentina to me. Most of what I know about Argentina I have learned through the tango, and what this has left me with besides a diminished certainty in my ability to move my own body is for the most part a collection of unfamiliar words, and a little bit more about music. <br />
<br />
So I'm not really sure what I was expecting. I think I expected him to be something more like Nabokov, sort of playing with national and linguistic allegiance through recourse to pure proficiency, a little more sublime in the case of Borges, and personal ambiguity--Nabokov's insane accent to Borges' vague evocation of Tiresias. What I actually found when I started reading from parts of "On Argentina," which understandably is a collection of his writings having to do with Argentina, was something I was more familiar with than I had expected. This was not fiction and it had nothing to do with endless libraries and books that sort of write themselves. This was nonfiction, written by a man with a sense of himself, and a sense of the place he lived and cared for, and felt that his primary responsibility as a writer was to present this place to the world beyond its borders. The pieces were all short, and all clustered around the same set of goals; he was trying to define the Argentine national character. At one point he defines the Argentine national character as caring not at all about national characters, or existence as a nation at all, but instead being defined completely by personal relationships. Two separate times he proves this with the example of a crime show where a police agent befriends a criminal in order to turn him into the police, which would be reacted to with rage by his typical Argentinian.<br />
<br />
I'm not sure if any of this indicates a contradiction, but I feel like it does. Or maybe I'm just impressed by someone who can believe so deeply and comprehensively in both universal and particular truths, and believes that they can strengthen each other. I was expecting something as unearthly as the stories themselves,
instead I found a man engaged in the same problems of every person who
attempted to live the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b1KukR-M_qU">20th century</a>, slaving away at the same
categories that are beginning to seem insane to me. <br />
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Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-39124444246874838362012-11-15T23:57:00.002-05:002012-11-15T23:57:29.793-05:00Three Times the CharmingI still don't believe there has ever been a better title for a blog than this.Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-36446033976317417182010-10-16T23:26:00.001-04:002010-10-16T23:28:17.909-04:00THANK YOU, LIFE<a href="http://classifieds.grossepointenews.com/Letters-7384.112112_Dog_park_benefits_entire_community.html">DOG PARK BENEFITS ENTIRE COMMUNITY</a>Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-90496003167158937072010-06-02T13:21:00.012-04:002010-06-05T14:18:36.752-04:00Many Dogs I Hope Someday To Meet<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1T9NrozgUfsdInnTssxv3Fgx8nCVFFLVyrVJQIVG3I-GEdFFZ8RztI3J5eV3zVJCEbUG6ENvbA2c43GishNnA5xuB7-1rHzRXb1OKF1B6_tQyEUUsm5MlOEj0Xl4t4l4cZ4V0QyZH1Urw/s1600/Eddie.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 166px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1T9NrozgUfsdInnTssxv3Fgx8nCVFFLVyrVJQIVG3I-GEdFFZ8RztI3J5eV3zVJCEbUG6ENvbA2c43GishNnA5xuB7-1rHzRXb1OKF1B6_tQyEUUsm5MlOEj0Xl4t4l4cZ4V0QyZH1Urw/s200/Eddie.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5478228464617201554" border="0" /></a><br />Once abandoned, now loved, these mutts for the Mutt March, June 6, when I will be in Pittsburgh.<br /><br />Marisa and I had lunch at Janet's today, but this is not true. We had breakfast at Janet's, or brunch at Janet's, but I said 'lunch' because Janet's is actually called 'Janet's Lunch.' Also, I am reluctant to call meals that occur before noon 'brunch,' because brunch seems like the kind of thing that happens when you wake up after noon and thus have to give up on all other meal titles because old people are already mad at you for sleeping while the sun is up. A lot of old people are mad at you.<br /><br />And we saw the above, advertised on a poster, along with ESL lessons, custom dressmaking, and something else that may have involved boats. So I thought maybe there could also be a parade for people who had been jilted, but then had found love, along the same lines. Marisa didn't bother to criticize this. They could also have a mascot named Eddie.<br /><br />But Eddie, this Eddie, he is the face of the Grosse Pointes. Because they are a dog town, or five dog towns making their increasingly meandering way along the coast of Lake St. Clair, which is probably a dog lake. (Once the Grosse Pointe News gets its archive business in order, I will provide you with a super-apt link to a letter to the editor from a doctor residing within our fair borders who claims that dogs are inherently superior to cats, because while a cat will simply eat you if you accidentally die in your house without feeding it to a degree adequate to the situation, a dog, realizing that its dead owner possesses some relationship to its live owner, will guard your body until other, live humans inevitably arrive. I can't remember whether or not she proposed restrictions on cat ownership, but I'm pretty sure she did, since this letter was in response to some article detailing legislation against public airing of dogs. I know she didn't comment on how a dog would treat a guest if one happened to die in your house and you didn't notice, but I wish she had. This is one reason why Grosse Pointe is a dog town, and so charming in its pointless hostility.)*<br /><br />And really, me owning a dog exists in another universe, equally remote from the one where I could have written that kind of letter.* Dogs are adorable. I love to say hello to them. One of the most charming qualities of dogs in general is their readiness to say hello, while a cat must be manipulated for years for this to occur.* I may well own a dog someday if I have children who want one and I don't bother to fight them on it, because really, why? I'm sure children are so hard to deal with I wouldn't even notice, or something. And then, in this universe, I will be old, and not only will I have made a coherent series of life decisions and reached a hair-state that works well for me and does not necessitate constantly tricking myself into thinking I am working toward another, more exalted hair-state, I will also probably be the kind of person who gets up really early to accomplish things, and so I can have the special parent-bond with the dog whereby I feed the dog and walk it at times when other people don't want to be awake or don't want to walk a dog, because I assume I will have shiftless and lazy children, which is fine by me. So there's that. But I also assume my children will be unreservedly affectionate toward animals, so they can handle that part, while I am a sleeplessly vigilant mother, which is what I fear must happen. I fear.<br /><br />And then, because originally when I was thinking about this I was walking on the Diag trying to remember to go do the thing I was going to do, which I forgot to do, which was pick up the newly most trustworthy translation of <span style="font-style: italic;">The Death of Ivan Ilyich</span>* from the UGLi, and I saw a woman sitting on the ground with her legs stretched out in front of her, holding a camera, looking very serious. And I saw three young girls in baggy jean shorts and running shoes standing in front of her, on the rise of grass in front of the flagpole, right hands on their chests, singing 'The Star-Spangled Banner' in high and tuneful voices. Their mother made them start again, just as they made her start again with the camera. Neither group was satisfied. Here's another universe I can't really understand, although when I think about it, I would totally have done this as a child, because I liked doing things and having people know about them.* Then their father, maybe, walked up with a plastic bag full of food, and I could see inside there were four packages of everything inside. It could have also just been a man with a bag of well-organized food, yes.<br /><br />Then I got closer to the UGLi and I saw a family, a mother father and daughter, all holding hands. Actually I heard them first, talking about how a couple they all knew acted awkward when they were together in public, and at the time I was thinking about how I could finally think about every portion of my life I remotely cared about in some sort of objective way since I don't even care to think of this month as anything but formless. I was kind of dismayed at them, being happy, recognizing the unhappiness of others, or wrongly identifying something different, and maybe better or just more private, as unhappiness. Here's a universe I really could never understand.<br /><br />Anyway, I'm moving to Pittsburgh on Friday, which is terrifying because my duffel of choice is walled up in the attic, which is a phrase I am tired of using more than once in a conversation. My house has seven finches in it, and I was supposed to find places for five of them to live that are not this house, but so far I have not. As my mother has told probably every person she has talked to today excluding the waitress at the restaurant we went to this evening, I finally registered for my summer class today. I also learned how to say 'lightbulb' and 'sailboat,' and at one point this afternoon I could also say, "What sort of house is this?" in a convincingly colloquial manner. I'm going to forget everything I own.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />*This will come up all the time in the conversation I plan on one day having with Jeffrey Eugenides.<br /><br />*As you will soon see, charming reader, this universe is separated from the one I currently work through chiefly by time. Soon, I will had gone crazy.<br /><br />*It's like when you walk into a room of people and begin frantically deducing what their specific requirements with regards to facial expression, habitual level of anxiety, academic, athletic, professional, artistic achievements or lack of any of the above, comfort with eye contact, propensity to tangential speech, amount of attention paid to clothing and personal grooming, and attitude toward the room that you are both occupying itself might be for a person they would be willing to put forth effort toward communicating with, and then you realize that they're down with whatever, and you just can't handle it. That's what it's like with dogs, and sometimes toddlers.<br /><br />*Time, guys.<br /><br />*Though I know it is at least correct-ish, I wish I could just write Ilich because it's awkward to decide what to do with the 'y' and I have a time enough as it is trying to figure out what to say when I'm saying something that people know I know about, and really when saying anything at all, so I wish that the transliteration community could just do this thing for me.<br /><br />*I keep trying to figure out what it is I dislike about the internet while running into things I like, more and more, because I love having every bit of information ever available to me, minus a lot. It's like that the only mercy available to all humans is our inability to hold every aspect of our lives in mind at once, maybe, but then half broken-down. That's probably something like what it is. I know there is no leader- asterisk for this one, but it's like the hidden track on a CD at the end of the secretly long last track for people who refuse to stop listening, or forget, or figure it out.Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-91512787925845406932010-05-21T02:14:00.004-04:002010-05-21T02:31:59.400-04:00And Frustratingly General Statements Regarding the PresentMarisa and I are awake, which is true without being remarkable, but tomorrow we are going to Ohio. We are going as much to Ohio as you can go without accidentally overshooting and going to, for example, Kentucky, which is another trip for other times, including but not limited to the past. Marisa is writing a blog post, and I am writing a Wikipedia article about a Bohemian noble family that was important until 1634, when the last one died. So, read Marisa's blog, and have needlessly picky questions about the past, kind readers. This is the sort of space we can fill in your lives at this moment.Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-59511439917207189692010-05-13T11:11:00.000-04:002010-05-13T11:24:05.830-04:00This Is TrueThe fact that I am wearing contacts, and so can see, is making me feel as if I've already accomplished something today. As if, even now, I am accomplishing something.<br /><br /><br />P.S. I have longer things to say. In time.Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-57662784593311291962010-05-04T14:54:00.000-04:002010-05-04T14:59:33.025-04:00WantedFor this summer, some sort of dress-option which, while seeming completely ordinary in any context I choose to inhabit, obscures all flesh which indicates to any significant degree any information regarding one's genetic inheritance or personal behavioral inclinations. Forearms are fine, even including wrists, due to the extremely low concentration of Romantic poets in Ann Arbor, based on close observation and collection of data. This has been inspired by a woman I just saw wearing a dress over some short drawstring pants with sandals. She's getting there, but there's a long way to go.<br /><br /><br />Also, beyond comfort, serendipity, and new love, reading Greek produces the best general feeling I can think of, especially since only one of those three is readily available.Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-58546293253929267702010-02-02T02:49:00.000-05:002010-02-03T01:13:31.908-05:00The Extremely Wide Ocean, The Summer!<span style="font-family: verdana;"></span><span style="font-family: verdana;">I'm being distracted from these mountains of Greek by thinking about going to Poland, which prompted me to actually print out the forms which will allow me to do so, which is a positive step, so this straying from Greek is not an entirely bad thing, or at least not until I realize that I am wrong in this respect.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">So, I'm going to Poland! And I will get on a boat and be afraid of the ocean and the ocean will be consistently terrifying, yet beautiful! At this point in my thought process I get caught up in wondering what I will read during this interminable nautical process. I imagine it wouldn't be a great idea to go with my usual method of making this decision, which is taking everything. I keep imagining the horror of finding out that I've taken a library book aboard, and it gets recalled three days out in the internetless seas, but I don't know this, and then I find myself in Kraków with a book and thousands upon thousands of dollars in fines. Exaggeration is essential here. It's been suggested that I take myself through the entire Odyssey, because it is a sea book, except for the land parts, and a journey book, claro, and a large part of me is drawn to this idea of only having this one book (and the dictionary, its helper book) and slowly coming to know all its corners as I head past Iceland, or something like that, trying not to become fixated on the idea of icebergs. And then I go <span style="font-style: italic;">mad</span>. So among the less stressful plans I am struggling to solidify my conception of the future in order to make, is this one. Suggestions are welcome, either for books to read or how to choose the kind of books that would suit the situation. Because the ocean is extremely wide, and the summer is allegedly approaching.</span>Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-616911200998214088.post-47002143187360908412010-01-31T20:50:00.000-05:002010-01-31T20:51:01.205-05:00This should be a pub!Welcome back to the Empty Mind!Emma Claire Foleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06281519067528511708noreply@blogger.com2