I am the proud owner of a very lovely copy of a children's book, A.A. Milne's When We Were Very Young. It was $3.95, which made me pleased as punch. I bought it at a secondhand bookstore in Amherst along with Joan Didion's Miami, perhaps in an attempt to leverage the childishness of the first book with the loftiness of the latter. I am mentioning this, anyway, because I took a picture of it at my desk, and feel like showing both the book and my desk to you, because it is 1.40 in the afternoon, I've finished my lunch, I'm ill and very free.
At the very corner of the picture sits the book, a green hardcover with gold embossing, primed to take its spot as a coffee table book. You may be able to spot a small portion of this big underwear shaped purse I use to carry my Chapstick and digital camera in. I love it, its blue and yellow and covered with cupcakes, and so appeals entirely to my juvenile cartoonish self. In the silver photo frame is a picture of Juliet and a sleepy looking me at the airport Coffee Bean the day she missed her plane. You may also e-spy a silver heart shaped picture holder that is holding no pictures and the top of my big vitamin bottle, from which I consume copious amounts of tablets like candy. The plastic bottle with the blue cap is my favourite American bottled water (next to Dasani!) from WalMart that cost something like $2.64 for 12 bottles (all hail Sam Walton! and big money hungry conglomerates!). Strewn across the desk are my 4 Pj Harvey cds which in chronological order are : To Bring You My Love, 4 Track Demos, Is This Desire and Stories From The City, Stories From The Sea. I took them out while I was listening to Mirah & Cat Power, whose cds I was downloading into my iPod, because they seem to draw heavily on Pj Harvey's music, which I've totally forgotten to put in my iPod too. I have 2 Sufjan Stevens cds hidden under there somewhere as well. Behind the cds sit a pile of magazines like The Economist, Lucky and Vogue and something called A Box Of Stars that I bought in Utah. The Doritos are there for me to stuff my face with as and when I feel like. These are the messy contents of a small part of my life, and they sit on my desk today.
I think a lot of my life is lived secondhand - I procure photo books, prints, pieces of art, novels and poetry in an an attempt to force a connection with a world I otherwise shy away from. I don't do much to segue from this sort of life. Last night, I looked through the first few pictures of another remarkable book I bought in Amherst - David Hilliard's recently released photograph book. I didn't go past the first few pages because I was absorbed by the initial images and the heavy thoughts that weighed on me as I tried to make sense of their meaning and significance. I was moved just looking at them, I don't really know why - something about their rich narrative quality and the palpability of detachment and connection he tries to make evident in his photos. The book is made almost entirely of triptychs, panoramic photographs segmented into three parts that a person could spend hours poring over. I feel like buying it for a lot of birthdays, its really stunning and I know I sound stupid talking about it, but I really loved it. It kind of struck me the way Dan Eldon's book struck me so many years ago. Do pick up both if you haven't already, or, you know, come over to my house and I'll show it to you.
Also, I'm going to Italy/Greece in about a month. So the the travelling begins again.
I can see a lot of life in you
I can see a lot of bright in you
And I think the dress looks nice on you
I can see a lot of life in you
<3 Sufjan
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