For as long as I remember myself, there is one thing I hated in Greeks: their constant moaning and evading of their responsibilities. Greeks are unhappy, and they think it is not their fault. Most often it is the government (that they vote for), the 'others', the neighbors, the people who tax-evade, the Americans (everyone's favourite vilain).
But crucially it is never their fault.
But if it is not your fault then you cannot do anything about it.
Atenistas think differently. Perhaps bad things are our fault, not because we did them, but because we are not doing anything to change them. Let's do that then!
In a country with non-existent state presence, citizen's groups are long overdue. The only ones who can do something are sensitive, educated, concerned citizens.
I wouldn't necessarily post two videos in a row but this song is phenomenal. And in the process it shows a couple of things about the world:
1. Mark Ronson is great. Version was not a one-hit wonder and Ronson is not a one-trick pony. This song is different, deep, pop and in short perfect.
2. Boy George has an amazing voice. We knew that already of course, not least because of another comeback attempt 2-4 years ago in the Antony & the Johnsons album, in their song 'for today I am a boy'.
3. Comebacks are amazing. Boy George has been exiled and neglected from the mainstream UK scene in the recent years. Perhaps because of his drug problems, perhaps because he seems to people to be a fat, odd-looking relic of the '80's. But this song, that has made him relevant, beloved and Radio 1-playable again, may haver put him on the map.
Like Travolta and Tarantino, comeback stories are even more glorious than success stories, perhaps because they are the ultimate success stories. Like a rise-and-fall-and-rise-again Scorcese movie, comeback stories show people that success is worth nothing when you lose it. Unless you manage to win it again.
This might be a useful message to X factor people.
Pet shop boys ironically urged audiences to do west in their 1993 cover of the village people. I remember arguing with my boyfriend then on whether the song was ironic or not. I didn't agree too much with that boyfriend anyway. But I digress.
Lat night I went into a little shop to buy some beers. Next to me was a poor woman wanting to buy a sprite. She gave the man in the till a pound. He said it cost 2.50. She thought there was an offer. He went and brought her what was on offer instead: a 7up. As she was waiting there in shame, holding up the queue, I thought of going to give her 2 pounds. Then I thought that would be insulting and I didn't do it.
I was sad thinking about this woman. These days, we are all so used to social inequality that it seems trivial to us, it seems almost normal. I am not sure on how this van be changed. I go through phases of caring and not caring. I go through phases where seeing people sleeping in the cold roads, in the rain seems fine to me. And then something happens and I stop and think.
It is really not normal, this inequality. No matter how self-absorbed we are, no matter how engrossed we all are in our own problems, it is important to remember every once and a while, that it is not fucking normal. It is shit. I don't know what we can do, I don't know if charity or ethical living or eco shit work in any way. I just think it's important to remember that it is not normal.
Madonna is the queen of reinvention, or so people say. That's why she is so successful.
Sometimes she is a dirty 'virgin' with a 'boy toy' belt. Then she becomes a live pin up in Dick Tracy. Then she is an unstoppable nymphomaniac, circa 'satisfy my love' and the Steve Meisel book. Then a siren/japanese geisha. Then a cowgirl. Then a disco queen. Then a rapper. And so on and so forth.
Lady Gaga follows big 'M' footsteps, having reinvented her style (copying Madonna relentlessly in the process) more times than one can count with one and only album (The Fame and the Fame monster are one album. Really.)
Every year around my birthday, I think about reinvention. Is reinvention the mother of rejuvenation, in other words do people keep themselves young when they reinvent their style?
I don't know.
I guess I should reinvent myself but I am too bored. My self works fine for me, for the time being, I guess.
Until one year I wake up and feel this deep need to renew myself and become some sort of aerobic queen or something else equally preposterous. Till then, let's have cocktails and celebrate our old and boring selves!!
Sitting in the empty house, listening to the rain on the windows. Doing nothing. At least nothing that other people would consider important. I'm calling the bank, the doctor and the tax people to change my address. I am trying to get a new car insurance. I am dyeing my hair darker. I am enjoying the silence in the house, the slowness. No more lost months in the calendar. September went to November almost directly it seems, I never managed to see the October picture.
But fastness will be no more. Slowness, silence and calm is the way to go. I am sure I will not follow my own advice, but if anyone wants to hold me accountable, here is the proof.
Life doesn't move me - just like a movie It doesn't move me Life doesn't move me (Tricky, Bury the evidence)
Sometimes i feel like Tricky: my life goes by and I don't feel it. Good things happen, people come and spend time with me, I talk to friends but i am not 100% there. i live life, i perceive life in a superficial manner: I hear my friends problems and i feel them (sort of), i give advice, i am relatively connected, but not with all my heart, half my mind resides elsewhere. Half my mind travels to stuff i need to do for tomorrow, work that needs done, what i'll cook for dinner etc...
I never thought I lacked empathy, I always thought that I can leave my things aside and just listen to my friends. But this is not even about empathy, this half-hearted involvement with life does not only happen when i listen to people's problems. It happens also with nice things, i am hanging out with a friend and I am not all there. Half my mind is elsewhere.
But where, you will ask, where is a better place to be than in a pub having a drink with people you love/like and make you feel well? I guess in my head, being in work-mode seems to be a better place. But this cannot be true. It's not that I prefer this - i just cannot help it. But this is what I want to, what I have to change. Work and stress and stupid stuff is not something that can dictate my life to such an extent. When I was young(er) I thought that people chose to be stressed. Now that i find myself not being able to help it, I think it is even more important to at least try to.
My life is more important than this. The love I have for people is more profound than this.
Life needs to move me - not like a movie. Life needs to move me. Not like movie.
This morning I stumbled upon this video from the bbc. It shows Greek 'militant shoppers' pleading with super market managers to lower their prices so that they can do their shopping. In the second part of the video, a driver refuses to pay the tolls and asks (calmly and politely) for the person who works there to get his vehicle number and have the company to sue him, if they so wish.
Various things came to mind when seeing this.
Firstly, needless to say that no greek media, to my knowledge, has discussed this phenomenon. But this is nothing new, that Greek media are corrupt and cheap.
Secondly, it makes me think that there is another way in that stupid country, there must be another way. Ever since the 'austerity measures' came to play, Greeks have done what they know best: they complain with no end, they become passive aggressive to people that are innocent, they moan, and ultimately they do nothing. They keep buying what they bought (especially for their children) and then say they have no money.
I am not sure Greeks can do civil disobedience very well, they are too hot-headed for that. But these people in the video proved me wrong. And I am sure I am not alone. In two old posts, one from me and one from youkali, we discuss what it means to be political and/or an activist in this day and age. It is important to remember that we are not sheep. It is important to remember that, if we live in a western country and are writing/reading this blog, we most probably are well-educated, fairly well off members of society. This, at once, makes us fairly privileged and at this day and age, one cannot take privileges lightly, one has to earn them.
And then tell me: what is the sluttiest thing about it?
a) Beyonce chewing gum b) The transparent bra c) The plastic guns (a classic phallic symbol...) d) A certain ass movement e) The lyrics (and their implications)
If you're reading this blog then you must know I have an affinity to freaks. I love Antony and the Johnsons and his starfish, i love Björk and Pagan Poetry and I adore, I adore anything by Tim Burton. Apart from his movies, i also love Oyster boy and the pin cushion queen. But most of all I adore staring girl, who found an unlikely friend in Florence and the Machine's song 'girl with one eye'.
Long live the freaks...
She told me not to step on the cracks I told her not to fuss and relax Well, her pretty little face stopped me in my tracks But now she sleeps with one eye open That's the price she paid
I took a knife and cut out her eye I took it home and watched it wither and die Well, she's lucky that I didn't slip her a smile That's why she sleeps with one eye open That's the price she paid
I said, hey, girl with one eye Get your filthy fingers out of my pie I said, hey, girl with one eye I'll cut your little heart out cause you made me cry
I slipped my hand under her skirt I said don't worry, it's not gonna hurt Oh, my reputation's kinda clouded with dirt That's why you sleep with one eye open That's the price you paid
I said, hey, girl with one eye Get your filthy fingers out of my pie I said, hey, girl with one eye I'll cut your little heart out cause you made me cry
You made me cry You made me cry You made me cry
I said, hey, girl with one eye Get your filthy fingers out of my pie I said, hey, girl with one eye Get your filthy fingers out my pie
I said, hey, girl with one eye Get your filthy fingers out of my pie I said, hey, girl with one eye I'll cut your little heart out cause you made me cry
When you are trying to finish something do not take big breaks: they fuck up your concentration and you end up dancing in your office instead of writing things that need written.
But, on a different note, isn't this a cool song to dance to?
I wake up in the middle of the night and I have these lucid thoughts. Every night almost, I wake up for some reason and then i start thinking of something: an idea for work, an idea about the blog or just an idea. I think about it in amazing clarity and in amazing simplicity. All the lack of concentration that I have during the day, all the toing and froing of my mind, gives its place to the clear lucidity of the night. I think of beautiful sentences and I want to get up, turn on the computer and write them down but I never do. I am always too tired, too certain that I will remember them in the morning. But, sadly, I never do.
Until some years ago, if someone told me that I would be writing a post on preparing for the winter on the 4th of August, I would laugh. But this is not some years ago, and i am not laughing.
The skin is still dark and shiny but it's getting white fast. The feet are dry and the legs need cream all the time. The eyelids are shiny and the hair is light. But the dresses that needlessly travelled back with me will not be worn. The excessive collection of flip flops will be used only for the shower. The sunscreens will expire and smell funny. The ankle bracelets will live in a box. The coral toe nail polish will be forgotten (how silly it looks on the white skin).
But it's not death, it's hibernation. Until the next summer, where i will be frantically looking for my summer gear, my sarongs and my cheap plastic earrings.
Summer, the season of democracy, where plastic jewellery looks good.
Like the old song by StereoNova that i love so much, i am back and celebrating starting over, for one more time. Every year, coming back from holiday, i feel new, I feel that nothing phases me, i feel that i can deal with everything. Even belfast's grey sky.
But this year it's different, I have things i always wanted, i have happiness. And even if goodbyes are always hard, and even if nothing is perfect, i am happy.
Looking at my itunes library, I am amazed that my most recent playlist is called ‘2008 forgotten’. It’s almost surreal, not only it is two years old, it also contains tracks that I have forgotten. There was a time where all I could think of was playlists, I was making them all day, I was choosing them carefully and I was constantly dedicating them to people. Now, I make none. When I want to listen to music, I hastily search for stuff that I listen to without any care. But what to do, time flies and times change.
I never wanted to be busy; I thought I would always be free. That’s why I did a PhD, that’s why I became an academic. I always wanted not to conform to social norms, not to go to work 9 to 5. I always wanted to listen to cool music and read literature. And now? Now, I have no time. Not because I actually don’t have time, but just because I do so many things (badly and hastily) at the same time, that I actually don’t have any real time. I jump from one thing to the next without finishing anything, without really caring, just running.
Things need to change. I don’t want to be this person anymore. And I am sure I don’t have to be this person, I am sure I can do something else.
I think I need to go back to playlists and literature. And perhaps the summer is the ideal time for all this.
A lot of things finish today, Lost being one of them. But this post will not discuss this topic - yet.
This post is about saying goodbye to things that were both good and bad. English has a great word for the emotion that such situations give you: bittersweet.
Today I am saying goodbye to my flat of the last three and something years. And it feels utterly bittersweet.
This was the first flat that I got with my own money, it was the place of my independence. Although it didn't seem like that all the time, this flat was for my new beginning, in a new city, in a new (first, albeit initially part-time) job. I came here with no friends three years ago and the beginning was tough. Loneliness, lots of TV and general frustration. Then things went up and down and life went on. The sense of temporary reigned and I thought I was about to leave this city any day.
But then last year, almost this time, things changed. New life. Not always great, challenging at times, but new and exciting nonetheless.
And this year more changes. New house. My house. My own house. Never had this feeling before. I never wanted to be adult and conventional. But I guess resistance was futile. Now I am the ultimate 'young professional' with a big mortgage and new wooden floors. And I don't feel conventional. I just feel different. The same but different.
I never write political posts but today I will make an exception. Labour lost, Gordon Brown resigned and Cameron turned the Torries into government with a 'historic' coalition with Lib Dems. This whole thing makes me sick. I have never seen a more opportunistic, insincere individuals as those two in government today. How can you work with someone that you called the bast joke you ever heard? I mean, David Cameron has called Nick Clegg a joke. And now he says he is the next best thing since sliced bread. I mean, come off it.
I understand that Labour had to go. I think it had to be punished, if for no other reason than for the war against Iraq. And although this was Blair's thing, it is the same party after all, and it had to be punished. But the Torries are not the answer. People who want to give tax cuts as incentives for people to get married, are not the answer. As JK Rowling said, this reminds us why we don't want to vote Torries.
But in a way, I think Nick Clegg is worst. Nobody knew this man a month ago, then he goes on TV, does a 'good' debate (which, for what it's worth I thought was simplistic and crap), gets hyped up like no other, LOSES seats for his party and in the end becomes the 'key-holder' for this whole election. He spent 5 days talking to the Torries AND holding secret talks with Labour, and then, like any slutty girl who double-times her poor boyfriend with the new handsome boy in class, chooses the new handsome boy in class. Who is also rich. And has gone to an expensive private school. And looks like an egg-head.
The only tragic figure in this whole story after all is Gordon Brown. The most uncharismatic man in the history of politics, but alas a sincere man, a man of principle who lost simply because he was not Blair (or Cameron with his pregnant wife, or Clegg with his 'charisma'-whatever). It pains me to see his stepping down statement, but it also makes me happy. It makes me happy that these people exist, that they go into politics and that they win, sometimes, even for a tiny amount of time, they win and they try.
Always in my life i have been torn between my love for simplicity and my love for beautiful things.
My mother loves beautiful things, our house is full of them. Although I have grown my own taste for them, I have always felt a bit overwhelmed by them. Why do we need all these useless expensive things? This feeling was also matched with a dismay against my mother's own profession: decorator. A decorator, I used to think when I was younger, why on earth would anyone want to devote their life in putting things in a house and choosing curtains?
And then growing up, it hit me: decorators do not make beautiful houses, they make happy people. And things are not expensive and useless, they are just small reminders of places we have been to, artists we like, unique artefacts that we have found, in short our entire lives.
The reason I am thinking of these things and I decided to write this post is because I went to a lovely house on Friday night, a house full of things of beauty and rarity. But because the people that have it are nice people, and have chosen these things because they like them and because they make them happy, the whole thing did not look contrived and pretentious, it just seemed simply great: a beautiful house, with beautiful things made by beautiful people.
It is the person then, it is the person that defines the thing, not the thing that defines the person. Nouveau riche people have made a much bigger disservice to beauty than they think...
I am a huge Lost addict, that is not news. I have written something about this series before, here and here but I haven't done any serious Lost fans theorizing. As the ingenious series is approaching an end in 23rd of May however, and discussions on the net increase in number, complexity and literary credibility, I had an idea myself. As I am a fairly mainstream person, the column I am mostly following is Doc Jensen in EW, whose latest ideas had me thinking.
One of the most prominent literary references of Lost is that of Alice in Wonderland. As in Alice, my other two favourite tales for children, Miyazaki's Spirited away and Michael Ende's Neverending story also deal with a very important theme that is becoming increasingly relevant in Lost: keeping one's identity through memory, through remembering oneself. To cut a long story short, Alice, Chihiro and Bastian in the three respective pieces get lost/stranded in a magical/imaginary world and can only return to their own world, the real world if they manage to not forget who they really are in these magical worlds. In Lost, our heroes are stranded on this magical island and now with the sideways world they have these split lives. The only way they can come to their own world, the only way they can reconnect with their other halves -in this case their other half selves (Plato's Symposium anyone?) is through anamnesis, as Doc Jensen rightly points out in his column in another ingenious Platonic reference. Plato is clearly a major inspiration for the Lost creators (cf. the quite literal scene with the cave in 'Recon' of this season).
So, to cut the extensive name-dropping and to wrap things up: perhaps the answer to the question' what is Lost really about', I could provide my own spin on things. Lost is about being true to oneself, to one's true character and values and this connection, this memory of oneself is the only thing that can set us people really free, not just from the magical island as in Lost, but in life in general. And since it all makes sense so beautifully, read this again in my earlier post from this month where I reconnect with my roots.
No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be; Am an attendant lord, one that will do To swell a progress, start a scene or two, Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool, Deferential, glad to be of use, Politic, cautious, and meticulous; Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse; At times, indeed, almost ridiculous— Almost, at times, the Fool.
I grow old … I grow old … I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.
The familiar: we always love more what we know best.
There is a deep, meaningful comfort and happiness when we are with people we know well, in places we know. When this happens to me, I feel that I am in some deep state of togetherness with my oldest deepest self. The older parts of me, the ones that are deeper, they are the ones that come out when I am with my parents, my family, my cousins. One professor of theatre once compared the characters and the plays oS Shakespeare to onions that have many layers. The comparison is not too new, I know, but i think it's also valid for people in general. We are born and in the beginning there is only the core of our character: nature. Then we grow up and we form our outer layers: nurture. The core always needs to be accessible though, always. And this is when familiarity comes into play: when you are with your family, with the people that know you best, in the places that you were playing as a child, you cannot escape from that core. You cannot pretend you're all layers. The stubborn child that you were once upon a time comes out again, and that's such a relief. No filtering, no nothing, just you and your core.
That's one of the reasons I love being home - it reminds me of who is me.
Not the me who teaches and tries to write papers. Not the me who goes to nice dinners with colleagues. Not the me who shops posh clothes. Not the me who is a sensible, fake-lefty, essentially capitalist adult.
But the me I've left behind in Greece, the child who runs barefoot in the sand eating easter cookies. And my mothers eyes always give me that knowing smile, when she recognises that child every time I go home... And I am happy because I know that she is still here, that child, underneath all these layers, she is still here, safe, in Greece.
I have always adored covers - i don't know why... Perhaps because they give a new, a second chance to songs, perhaps because they remind us that there are many ways to see things, there are many ways to listen to a song. Often people think that good covers are reinventions of bad/mediocre/unknown songs. The cover that I have over here however is so NOT that... 30 seconds to Mars (indie American band that i didn't know but are fronted by Requiem for a Dream hottie Jared Leto) are covering Lady gaga's bad romance. And it's amazing. Stripped from the exuberant campness and theatricality of gaga, bad romance remerges as an epic, melodic ode to lost love, grief, despair and bad romance.
Enjoy... even without the classic roar 'ga ga ou la la'...
When I first sew this young man in Jonathan Ross's show -I think he was probably wearing the same suit- I was immediately convinced by my preconceptions that I will definitely hate his music as much as I disliked his attitude. To be a bit more specific: my first thoughts were that he is an alcoholic, or at least a drug addict, or a Portsmouth football fan, or Pete Doherty's second cousin, he writes cheap hip-hop music, wants to be famous, wears a suit because he is on a Friday night show in BBC and most likely I will never recall his name or his music. When he opened his mouth, two things happened: 1. My mouth dropped, I could not match the voice with the image and 2. I felt he could be the male version of Amy Winehouse. Although I haven't heard anything else form his work, this song stayed with me easily.
I am pretty sure that every single blogger in the universe has written a post on not wanting / not being able to write a post. I am not so sure this is an interesting topic for others to read but we all keep writing it anyway. Perhaps it makes us feel less guilty - for not having posted anything for a long time (like it does for me ) or perhaps it makes us stop seeing the previous post that has haunted our blogs for as long as our block has gone on. And also it buys us a bit of time, to think of something more, something new and interesting and posting it swiftly after our non-post.
So I will start thinking later tonight and I am sure I will come up with something really to cool very very soon.
I went to see lady gaga live in Belfast last week and i've been trying to write something about it for a while. The truth is I am not sure how i feel about lady g anymore, so I don't know what to write about her.
On the one hand she is clearly different from other popstars: she can play the piano (amazingly even), she can sing like a jazz singer, she is sexually liberated |(like only one other popstar-madonna), she writes her own songs, songs that are about her relationship with her alcoholic father. In the show she proclaimed herself as the queen of the freaks, the little monsters, her fans that she says she loves so much. She said repeatedly that she knows how to feel the odd one out, or feel like an idiot even, and she likes for her little monsters to feel at home with her, in the monster ball.
Now this is highly commendable, especially in a time and age where appearances is the one thing where people care about the most. To have a popstar, a member of the cultural elite of our times tell people that it doesn't matter how they look like is something.
On the other hand, there is no other way to put it: gaga is a shallow popstar. She has rilke tattooed on her arm, and dresses as if she comes directly from a fashion museum, but she is shallow. She writes and produces overwhelmingly shallow pop songs, with pop lyrics. The only thing that saves her is that her shallow lyrics are very sexual, something that is fairly oddball for a female song-writer.
And then it is her show: a weird mixture of theatricality, over the top-ness, wardrobe malfunctions (or not) combined with out of place personal confessions (about her alcoholic father for example and about how she loves us, the little monsters). Such combinations make the show look more mismatched than eclectic and make gaga look more schizophrenic and undecided than brilliant.
Prisons are for movie directors, what lollipops are for children: they cannot get enough of them. And just when you think you've seen enough of prison dramas and there no other new thing you could possibly want to see, Un prophéte appears and sets a whole new ball game all together.
Let me be entirely clear about something: I loved the movie. And funnily enough I didn't expect that at all. For once, it is a French movie and I don't get along very well with French movies, I find them slow, long, pretentious and tedious. But this one so was not all of these. I think the best way to describe the movie was that it was crystal. Some movies have this quality, of being so clearly good that you don't have to think about them, you don't have to qualify your answer, you don't have to excuse the mishaps, you don't have to half-cringe some moments when you watch them. You just sit there and enjoy them from the beginning till the end, and just simply like everything about them. I think the last movie I felt so clearly about was oldboy. And un prophéte is way up there with the cunning Korean.
Perhaps it was the script: the rise of a nobody in the microcosm of the French prison, Malik's relationship with Cesar: so complex and deep, the clear analogy between the anthropology of the prison and French society, the haunting relationship between Malik and Reyeb.
Perhaps it was the acting: The glorious newcomer Tahar Rakim as Malik, with his piercing eyes, Niels Arestrup as the arrogant and fooling Cesar and everybody in the supporting cast.
Perhaps it was the cinematography, the grittiness of the prisons, the bluntness of the blood, the sharpness of the Northern sun. Or the innovative techniques of freeze frames, the combination of cinema verité with magic realism and the colours of the movie.
The success of the prophet is found in the combination of all of the above to tell a seemingly banal story (petty criminal enters the prison as a frightened nobody and exits it as a crime lord) with an unexpected breath of fresh air.
If it doesn't win the foreign language film Oscar, I will eat my hat.
**** Update: awesome album! Fresh, exciting, dark but not solipsistic, modern yet a classic. As always.
Massive attack are releasing their new album, Heligoland, tomorrow. In anticipation of this, the guardian has a small retrospective on their work, their collaborations and their most inspirational moments. Reading it made me realise that some things are really classic despite seeming too era-specific. Let me explain: sometimes it seem that the notion of timelessness that is often associated with classic things is also in turn associated with something that when you see it (hear it, read it etc) it does not reveal the era that it came from. Ancient Greek tragedies for examples are archetypical stories, that when stripped from their era-particular characteristics, they can function perfectly in any space and time. You can direct Medea set in the 21st century and the backbone of the story (revenge and jealousy- the beast that lies in us all) can still work.
I think however that for something to become eventually a classic it needs to be exceptionally modern (almost ahead of its time) at the same time. Medea would have never been a classic if it hadn't been so modern when it was written. Hamlet would have never become a classic if it hadn't shattered the norms of theatre, with the introduction of the ultimate anti-hero, the reluctant prince, when it was first written. There is no way something will become a classic if it is not also painfully new and modern.
Massive attack's music is, for me, the ultimate '90's music. Unfinished sympathy is often labelled the song of the decade (like Paranoid android is the song of the '00's) and the band itself had been the pioneers of the quintessential '90's movement, trip-hop. In that sense, when you listen to blue lines or protection, some songs might sound dated and essentially yesterday-ish. But I think, this is what makes Massive attack's music so classic, it is a product of its time and yet it was ahead of its time. It defined and decade and can therefore classically represent this decade forever.
What I was really hanging around for, I was trying to feel some kind of a good-by. I mean I've left schools and places I didn't even know I was leaving them. I hate that. I don't care if it's a sad good-by or a bad good-by, but when I leave a place I like to know I'm leaving it. If you don't, you feel even worse. ~J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye, Chapter 1
Anyone who knows me, knows that I adore 'the catcher in the rye'. I read it when I was 15ish and Holden has been my friend ever since. For some time, obsessively he was my best friend, I kept reading the book again and again, thinking that i would find something new each time i read it. The funny thing is that I did, I found new things all the time: a sentence that i had missed, a detail that made the story better, a line by Holden that was better, more intense than the previous one. I never read another book by JD Salinger, i am not sure why. Probably I was scared i wasn't going to like it as much and i would feel bad about catcher in the rye as well. Or because I thought that what on earth can ever be better than Holden Caulfield?
I remember being intrigued at the mystery of JD Salinger, his self-imposed seclusion, his aversion to the press, his life outside the limelight. And now that he died, all I can think of is that he will not have to hide anymore.
I don't even know what I was running for - I guess I just felt like it. ~J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye, Chapter 1
I have no time to write - I am too busy letting my life pass me by - but I couldn't stand seeing my pathetic new year post for so long.
When i return from hibernation I will write about all the things i am thinking about: the new movies i saw (nine and the road - each of them imperfect in a different way), the books i am (not reading), the gigs i missed (bonobo) and the ones i am looking forward to (go gaga for gaga), the weather that is changing, my white hair that is multiplying, my diet that is not working, the beneficial results of spa (galgorm rocks) and other tales from the new year. Ah yes, and the lists of 'bests of 2009' that I never wrote. Perhaps because the only thing i wanted to put in is the film 'Let the right one in' and the old, reread and beloved book by Σώτη Τριανταφύλλου, 'Σάββατο βράδυ στην άκρη της πόλης' that makes my insides warm just by thinking about it. Perhaps not because it's so perfect but because it is familiar. Familiarity though, and other deep and thoughtful topics are not for now, not for a Monday morning at work with a long list of things to do, the longest in a long time.
What is that we want from the new year, any new year?
Change, I guess, and something better than the last one...
Sometimes I think of the years passed and I confuse one with the other: my last birthday with the one 5 years ago, last christmas with the one of 2005 and so on and so forth. So, if there is one wish I have for the new year is to remember it more. I want to do things that are interesting and distinctive enough to remember. And possibly worthy enough to write in this poor blog, that I have neglected so much over the last few months.
In any case, happy new year people, whatever 'happy' means...
P.s. I hope to write a 'best of 2009' post soon... But this means i have to stop being lazy. Oh well....
