You were expecting fairy houses? Look elsewhere. For her MFA thesis, Amanda Kelly has been miniaturizing hoards. Spinning wee vases on a tiny pottery wheel, carving bevels with tiny woodworking tools, painting minuscule, perfect letters with a two-haired brush. With surgical focus, she creates little worlds that render chaos safe. You can […]
I think of French influence in St. Louis the way I think of the Romans’ influence in Britain: Other than naming, most of that culture has disappeared. St. Louis certainly “brands” with the ubiquitous fleurs-de-lis, and the landmark statue of Louis IX, sculpted by a German-American artist, at the top of Art […]
William of Ockham never met Esther Perel. After days of mainlining her latest podcasts on Where Should We Begin, I realize the medieval monk was wrong. Nothing is simple. Using a razor to cut away what feels irrelevant can set you up for a lifetime of confusion. Granted, Perel is an Olympic-caliber psychotherapist, […]
“Walking-around knowledge” is an odd phrase. Do you use it? I do not know where I first heard it, though I suspect it was in my childhood or army service because it feels like an older construction my elders would have used. The presumption was that seeing and hearing things firsthand—to […]
Released five years after the surrender of imperial Japan in World War Two, but at least two decades before Americans would start loathing Japan’s prowess in mass-producing fuel-efficient compact cars, Rashomon had the immediate disadvantage of provoking xenophobic reactions. Even in the early nineties, as a college student attempting to bond with […]
For one romantic night away, two days of cleaning, prep, and angst? This neurosis is not like me. Someone else staying in our home was never a big deal. But then came lockdown, and an easy domestic chaos that never ended. Our recent trips have been separate and brief, no dogsitter needed. Now, […]
I am sick of skimming. The news brings one battle, betrayal, or death after another, washing over me without really registering. So when my eye lands on an opaque, terse announcement that a New York gallery owner was killed in Rio de Janeiro, I read every word. Determined to go deep for a change, […]
Stanley Crawford has died at eighty-six. Stan published eleven books of fiction and nonfiction, including the wonderful novella Log of the SS the Mrs. Unguentine, and the memoir A Garlic Testament: Seasons on a Small New Mexico Farm. RoseMary, his wife, passed away almost exactly three years ago. Together they owned […]
Andy Warhol once said he loved Coca-Cola because regardless of who bought a bottle, it remained the same product for everyone. “A Coke is a Coke and no amount of money can get you a better Coke than the one the bum on the corner is drinking. All the Cokes are […]
I hear that Marcel Proust’s hero is plummeted into the past after eating a wafer whose French name sounds like my cousin Madeline, the wife of an Italian butcher in Jerseyville, Illinois. It is going to be music, not cookies, for my plunges into the past. I recently listened to Richard […]
