paisleypiper's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- odds and ends of tuckered me I took an impromptu break this evening from my studies� Quinn and I went over to her son and daughter-in-law�s house for dinner. We had a great evening � some red wine, some perfectly cooked fish, a nice salad with pears, a pear tart, and then (more importantly) conversation and plans. They are embarking on a kitchen remodeling project and were seeking our thoughts. Each of us, individually, has endless thoughts about house-stuff, and each of us really likes to tackle the logistical problems of design and function. So it was an evening of measuring tapes, pictures and samples. And I really liked talking about something that will be concrete and tangible one day. Something that in eight months, I will be able to see and feel. The rest of my weekend I spent in the abstract, reading Poststructuralism: A Very Short Introduction by Catherine Belsey. It was short, especially for something like postructuralism, yet did not over-simplify the idea by driving it toward a tidy summary. She left some things undefined, some things a mystery and brought clarity to other things. And I am working on a poem about my family�s life during the Vietnam War. Although, I am altering it a bit because the string of facts just wouldn�t happen in a poem. But through this process of setting up and trying to find the best route in to three defying scenes, I learned quite a bit about my parents. All my life I have heard about how in love they were (and still are, after all these years). They each get teary when they think of the other and feel badly for ending their relationship 28 years ago. I used to hate this because it stirred up a child�s desire for parents to get back together. I consider my family to be a casualty of the war. My father was drafted while his wife was pregnant and while he was enrolled full-time as a student at the university. The head of the draft board was a prosecutor and my prominent attorney grandmother took a case defending a kid with some marijuana in his glove box that made the prosecutor look ridiculous and overly-punitive. Their young hippie plan was to finish college (my father was an engineering student) and then to move to Africa. My father�s main dream being to work to build bridges across the great rivers. They wanted to have a lot of children and work on the bridge and road issues of rural parts of Africa. My father has not been able to make peace with having to fight in a war he did not believe in. For me this poem is my parent�s story, something I never thought I would write. Something that didn�t seem healthy to write � but it is absolutely demanding to be written. Last weekend I spent a day at a table with a bunch of young girl college students. For one moment, I would just like to indulge myself in a change in my typical language pattern. OK, way to be stupid, Mrs. Bush. I have been reading quite a bit lately in the New York Times about the canceled poetry symposium that was to be held February 12 at the White House. Mrs. Bush canceled it, apprantly, after learning that some of the poets hoped to sue the event to protest American military action. The New York Times quoted the first lady�s press secretary as saying ��while Mrs. Bush respects and believes in the right of all Americans to express their opinions,� Ms. Rodriguez said today, �she, too, has opinions, and believes that it would be inappropriate to turn what is intended to be a literary event into a political forum.�� Wow. I know that I do not even need to begin pointing out all that is problematic about this statement. But in response, the poets organized and developed a campaign and web site. There are over 5,000 poets with anti-war poems on the web site. I just can�t get over that literary events are not supposed to be political�. 12:37 a.m. - 2003-02-10 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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