"It was imprudent of us, in the first place, to become authors. We could have become something regular, but we managed not to.
We were lucky, but we were also determined." Roy Blount Jr

"I don’t change the facts to enhance the drama. I think of it the other way round, the drama has got to fit the facts,
and it’s your job as a writer to find the shape in real life."
Hilary Mantel

Saturday, January 26, 2008

Humming & Hymning

Strange Saturday. Good strange.

Slept late. In the a.m. listened to the radio--Boston's WBUR
cause NHPR was concluding the winter beg-a-thon (and giving away Super Bowl tix). We're paid up members, so leave us alone, already.

During WWDTM I tried to interest the girls in the big giant red ball I bought for them at great expence yesterday. When I first brought it home they were very interested but today they preferred napping to ball-chasing.

Giving up, I next baked a batch of oatmeal/cranberry/chocolate chip cookies for tomorrow's Annual Meeting at our parish. The Vestry is resonsible for goodies and I'm Mrs. Senior Warden--the Chap took care of his contribution all on his own but I'm adding a little something sweet to the mix.

While baking, I listened to Knopfler's amazing Kill to Get Crimson.

I also trimmed up a pair of ivy topiaries, which were sadly misshapen through neglect. A heart-shaped one grew from cuttings I took on the Isle of Man many years ago--I think in the front garden of my friend's house. The cone-shaped one came from cuttings from an acestral churchyard in Suffolk. I then washed the leaves of the other heart-shaped one made from ivy I snipped at Versailles, growing round Marie Antoinette's little summerhouse.

About 2 o'clock I sat down to practice the mandolin. Instead of going through my lesson book, I grabbed a (very dusty) old Hymnal--not the revised, current Hymnal, but the version we used back in the days when I sang in the junior choir.

I went through it hunting up all the favourite hymns, especially ones familiar from my youth that aren't usually sung in our parish. And I played them. I stuck a marker in the place of each one. There are 600 hymns in that Hymnal, not counting the chants and service music, like the Gloria.

Four hours later--yes, really--when I stopped, my fingertips were raw and the Hymnal looked like this.



I used a lot of markers. They sort of blend together in the picture.


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