Dear friends and family,
Laury and I are reaching the last days of our collaboration on Measure for Measure; we had a hiatus of three months after my fall on July 23rd, and she has gently pushed me to work, always willing to come to me and work for as long or short a time as I am able. We just completed the acknowledgments, and today we may select the 8 or 9 photos for the book. There are a few holes to fill here and there before we send it to our supportive general editor, Jim Lake. There are many Focus editions ahead of ours, so they are not in a hurry for this play.
Another almost finished bit of work is an essay I wrote for Shakespeare Survey. The editorial staff will complete the necessary formatting changes—for which I am grateful.
So my only unfinished job is responding to the editorial staff's comments (which I have not received yet) for the essay I wrote for Shakespeare Quarterly; I hope i will receive this editorial work-over soon and that I can respond to it. But there is nothing I can do to speed up their process.
The larger work on the website hamletworks.org will be my major work for as long as I am able to do it. I originally chose such tasks (in the 1980s) because I could pick up and put down the work to blend with the many demands of teaching in a community college (till 1999). Now this pace works well for my condition.
I did want to write about what happened yesterday: Sonia's salmon patties (delicious), Rabbi Lee's visit (he loved my apple compote), the damage to my foot when a freezer container fell about 5 feet on it (scary and painful: I move too fast, even now), the continuing pleasure I get from the evolving scene outside my windows (now that the dogwood has lost its leaves I can see the brilliant red of the maple beyond it), and more. But there is tomorrow for recording daily activities and thoughts.
Love to all,
Bernice
Friday, November 12, 2010
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Drowsy dahlias
Click on image to enlarge; click on back arrow to return to blog.Hello all,
Each seasonal change has its own personality. For most life besides modern humans, autumn is one of preserving resources, preparing for days with less warmth and light, and practicing various forms of resting and sleeping in preparation for a future rejuvenation. For the past two days I have dug up and boxed my dahlias so they can survive a winter considered harsh and killing for these lovely tropical flowers whose ancestors never evolved to accommodate such weather. Just a few days ago the blog featured some pictures of my unsuspecting plants but two mild frosts withered and blackened the dahlia leaves and stalks and brought the proud flowers to the ground. Pictured is one of the three boxes of dahlia tubers partially filled. I carefully spade under a tuber clump, pull the whole clump up by the stalks that are then cut off. I remove the clods of earth and examine each clump. Some individual tubers have succumbed to attacks by worms or beetle larva and any of these pests must be removed along with unhealthy tubers. I do not want to provide a winter home and feast for any free loaders. The tubers are gently placed on a bed of peat moss (as pictured) and finally covered with more moss. The covered boxes spend the winter in the garage where the temperatures are more moderate than outside.
Gathering the dahlia tubers provided a lovely time for meditation and for thinking about the evolution of plant life. The first plants appeared hundreds of millions years ago and lived in a tropical environment where winter never imposed itself. Over time, some plant life gradually evolved to live in temperate zones and had to contend with less ideal conditions in which some form of dormancy was necessary for survival. A big revolution came with the appearance of deciduous plants that shed their leaves to contend with winter conditions. Some plants like the forsythia need a couple of hard frosts to set their growth for the spring. This prevents a premature flowering which could be induced my some mild Indian summer days. So, as I tucked in the last of the dahlia tubers I thought of how human preferences and interventions have greatly altered the “natural” boundaries of plant life.
Bernice and I met when we were 14 on December 17, 1947 (it is Bernice who remembers the date) but I was just days from my 15th birthday on December 25. The details of that grand meeting will have to await another telling but, as we realized later, we may have met a year earlier. The reason that I am writing of this is that Bernice mentioned in the prior blog that I have always enjoyed writing and now that I have acquired the blog bug I am reluctant to give up the pleasure. In the spring of 1946 I was in 8th grade and Bernice was in 7th grade, both in Buffalo schools. There was an Americanism contest held throughout all Buffalo grammar and high schools with the top prizes being an overnight trip to Washington, DC. I wrote on James Madison, the fourth US president and one of the influential founding fathers. Bernice wrote something more general. I won for my school and for my district but not citywide for all 8th grades. Bernice won all the way (she has always been a better writer) and went to Washington. There is 13-year-old Bernice, third from the left with the great hair, along with other winners and chaperones in front of Buffalo’s Hotel Statler and about to embark for Washington. This picture appeared in the Buffalo Evening News.
Good night everyone,
Merwin
Wednesday, November 10, 2010
No stopping Merwin
Dear Friends and family,
Many of you have written with appreciation for Merwin’s posts, which he has enjoyed writing. He’s not stopping; I am sure you will hear from both of us.
News yesterday of the death of my dear friend and colleague Ken Rothwell. I know that he was approaching, if not having already reached, 90, and had lived a full and rich life in so many ways. This past year alone he edited King Lear for Focus Publications.
We connected in 1976, when the Northeast Modern Language Association was meeting at UVM in his hometown, Burlington, VT., and where he was already a full professor. I had proposed to NEMLA a panel on Shakespeare on film, a new field then, and asked him to participate because he was one of the first to write on the topic. He agreed, and he hosted a gathering at his lovely home there, joined as always by his fascinating wife, Lyn (one of the first nurse practitioners in the state if not in the country). I proposed to him the idea of the Shakespeare on Film Newsletter, and he leaped at the idea. We put out our 1st issue in Dec. 1976 and gave out free copies and gathered subscriptions at the Dec. meeting of the Modern Language Association. We jointly edited the newsletter until 1993, when it merged with the Shakespeare Bulletin, a performance journal. Ken and I shared platforms in many countries, when we each gave papers in the discipline. His valuable publications are too numerous to mention: I constantly refer to his filmography of Shakespearean films and his history of Shakespearean films. So much more to say about Ken: he was a gentleman and a scholar, an athlete, a loving father to four children, each very different from the others. A tall, imposing figure, he always kept his zest for life, for scholarship, for friends and family. His work will go on.
Why a blog: I have the feeling that if I write, I can capture my days, which otherwise would slip away, un-noted and unnoticed. And how many more will there be? Got to hang on to all of them.
Yesterday was a heavy-duty day for me. My cheerful aide Sonia was here, and she put me through all my paces: a walk around the block without a cane, the exercise regimen left by Bill (many require someone to work with me, resisting my movements), the stationary bicycle, and of course kitchen work. We made apple tart again, but I let it bake too long, so it is more like apple sauce. It is delicious, though. Sonia, who does not cook or bake, is full of wonder at my readiness to improvise. We added lemon juice to the 12 or so apples (cut up with skin left on), dried prunes and frozen strawberries. We also prepared Sami’s roasted cauliflower: as she wrote, “addictive”! I couldn't stop nibbling. Next week we'll get another cauliflower from Rothkamp Farm and make Sandy's version, with onion, potato and more spices (but not too many).
Later in the day, realizing that the zucchini I had gotten at the farm needed to be cooked, I peeled and sliced them and gave them the same treatment. Also good, but not quite as delicious because they lack the firmness of cauliflower.
Today dear Kathryn came for lunch, and I presented all these dishes: cauliflower, zucchini, and apple compote (we'll call it). I eat too much! I enjoyed her lively company. She woke me up sufficiently to get me here to the blog.
A demain!
Love,
Bernice
Many of you have written with appreciation for Merwin’s posts, which he has enjoyed writing. He’s not stopping; I am sure you will hear from both of us.
News yesterday of the death of my dear friend and colleague Ken Rothwell. I know that he was approaching, if not having already reached, 90, and had lived a full and rich life in so many ways. This past year alone he edited King Lear for Focus Publications.
We connected in 1976, when the Northeast Modern Language Association was meeting at UVM in his hometown, Burlington, VT., and where he was already a full professor. I had proposed to NEMLA a panel on Shakespeare on film, a new field then, and asked him to participate because he was one of the first to write on the topic. He agreed, and he hosted a gathering at his lovely home there, joined as always by his fascinating wife, Lyn (one of the first nurse practitioners in the state if not in the country). I proposed to him the idea of the Shakespeare on Film Newsletter, and he leaped at the idea. We put out our 1st issue in Dec. 1976 and gave out free copies and gathered subscriptions at the Dec. meeting of the Modern Language Association. We jointly edited the newsletter until 1993, when it merged with the Shakespeare Bulletin, a performance journal. Ken and I shared platforms in many countries, when we each gave papers in the discipline. His valuable publications are too numerous to mention: I constantly refer to his filmography of Shakespearean films and his history of Shakespearean films. So much more to say about Ken: he was a gentleman and a scholar, an athlete, a loving father to four children, each very different from the others. A tall, imposing figure, he always kept his zest for life, for scholarship, for friends and family. His work will go on.
Why a blog: I have the feeling that if I write, I can capture my days, which otherwise would slip away, un-noted and unnoticed. And how many more will there be? Got to hang on to all of them.
Yesterday was a heavy-duty day for me. My cheerful aide Sonia was here, and she put me through all my paces: a walk around the block without a cane, the exercise regimen left by Bill (many require someone to work with me, resisting my movements), the stationary bicycle, and of course kitchen work. We made apple tart again, but I let it bake too long, so it is more like apple sauce. It is delicious, though. Sonia, who does not cook or bake, is full of wonder at my readiness to improvise. We added lemon juice to the 12 or so apples (cut up with skin left on), dried prunes and frozen strawberries. We also prepared Sami’s roasted cauliflower: as she wrote, “addictive”! I couldn't stop nibbling. Next week we'll get another cauliflower from Rothkamp Farm and make Sandy's version, with onion, potato and more spices (but not too many).
Later in the day, realizing that the zucchini I had gotten at the farm needed to be cooked, I peeled and sliced them and gave them the same treatment. Also good, but not quite as delicious because they lack the firmness of cauliflower.
Today dear Kathryn came for lunch, and I presented all these dishes: cauliflower, zucchini, and apple compote (we'll call it). I eat too much! I enjoyed her lively company. She woke me up sufficiently to get me here to the blog.
A demain!
Love,
Bernice
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
Dear friends and family,
Two wonderful responses came in for cauliflower recipes. Just in time. They are very similar except the one from Sandy specifically mentions many spices from which to choose while the one from Sami just mentions spices to taste. Sonia, my aide, a retired nurse, will help me prepare this dish. Sonia comes to us twice a week courtesy of our long-term care insurance. Basically, both recipes call for small pieces, with olive oil or walnut oil (Sami) or canola oil (Sandy: never olive oil!), baked till brown. Sandy also adds onion and potato pieces. Today, I start with Sami’s recipe, using cumin as the spice, one of my favorites. Before Rothkamp Farm closes, I will get another cauliflower and try Sandy's. Actually, the one I put together myself is very similar, except I stewed it rather than baking it: onion, mushroom, small pieces of potato, turmeric, and finally a scrambled egg once it was done. 1/4 of a caulifower made 4 meals! three for me and one for Merwin. I can eat the same thing every day.
This is the first week that I am completely without helpers from Visiting Nurses of NYC. All of them were wonderful: Dimary, my 3x a week aide; Ronnie, the nurse; and Bill, the physical therapist. I am grateful to all of them; I hate losing them as part of my life. Bill was the last one to go—and he gave me a kiss and told me I could contact him any time if I had questions or concerns. He lives close by, but I doubt I will bother him. Sonia is a great help with the exercises, most of which require another person.
It's a beautiful sunny day here today, and Sonia and I will go for a walk first thing. It's chilly but invigorating. Breakthrough today: I got the NYT on our driveway; it's tricky because it's a hill, ut I did it.
Love to all,
Bernice
Two wonderful responses came in for cauliflower recipes. Just in time. They are very similar except the one from Sandy specifically mentions many spices from which to choose while the one from Sami just mentions spices to taste. Sonia, my aide, a retired nurse, will help me prepare this dish. Sonia comes to us twice a week courtesy of our long-term care insurance. Basically, both recipes call for small pieces, with olive oil or walnut oil (Sami) or canola oil (Sandy: never olive oil!), baked till brown. Sandy also adds onion and potato pieces. Today, I start with Sami’s recipe, using cumin as the spice, one of my favorites. Before Rothkamp Farm closes, I will get another cauliflower and try Sandy's. Actually, the one I put together myself is very similar, except I stewed it rather than baking it: onion, mushroom, small pieces of potato, turmeric, and finally a scrambled egg once it was done. 1/4 of a caulifower made 4 meals! three for me and one for Merwin. I can eat the same thing every day.
This is the first week that I am completely without helpers from Visiting Nurses of NYC. All of them were wonderful: Dimary, my 3x a week aide; Ronnie, the nurse; and Bill, the physical therapist. I am grateful to all of them; I hate losing them as part of my life. Bill was the last one to go—and he gave me a kiss and told me I could contact him any time if I had questions or concerns. He lives close by, but I doubt I will bother him. Sonia is a great help with the exercises, most of which require another person.
It's a beautiful sunny day here today, and Sonia and I will go for a walk first thing. It's chilly but invigorating. Breakthrough today: I got the NYT on our driveway; it's tricky because it's a hill, ut I did it.
Love to all,
Bernice
Monday, November 8, 2010
Bernice is back
Hello everyone,
I am back! Merwin has been urging me to resume my blog, but he has been so good at it that I have hesitated to get on board. Thanks to Harvey, I now have a setup that allows me to keep my legs raised, and I can sit on my recliner while typing. I think I will ask Merwin if we can take turns. Since we heard from a dear friend yesterday who was happy to learn that I was on the road to recovery, Merwin has felt that he should perhaps be more forthright about my situation. I believe that I have recovered as fully as I ever will from the brain surgery (but hoping for improved memory as time goes on) and the back surgery (but hoping for good pain management). But the chronic condition remains. Now I am back to square one, dealing with the cancer. There is no cure. All I can hope for is good days, like this one. There is no pain from the disease, just fatigue and itching and some other inconvenient side effects, like needing to keep my legs elevated. I hope to be on another drug trial as soon as I can travel into NYC easily, and I think that could be soon, since our trip to Mt. Sinai as few weeks ago went very well. A new drug might relieve some symptoms.
Whatever my physical condition, I almost always have a smile on my face—as I do now while chatting with you, looking out my windows at the still vibrant leaves. I am looking forward to going back to our little studio in NYC, perhaps walking around the block to one of my favorite restaurants, Szechuan Gourmet (or more likely getting take-out), looking out the window at Bryant Park and watching the ice skaters. I know I have to conserve energy. An hour is about my limit for an outing. Someone will have to drive us to NYC. I am thinking about how this apartment, empty since I left Mt. Sinai in early Sept., will get cleaned before we come. Such things dance in my head—along with recipes for dishes featuring cauliflower, of all things. We bought a big, beautiful one at Rothcamps Farm, a half mile from our house. The farm stand will close the day before Thanksgiving, and the best vegetable they have are these gorgeous, huge pure white heads. Does anyone have a good recipe? I made a curry, enough for four people, with about 1/6 of the head. Help!
My Shakespeare work is a great joy to me. Today I am sending, via email, an essay on a Hamlet production to Shakespeare Studies. It was accepted over a year ago, but they had no room for it until this coming issue (they publish only once a year). The editor gave me a chance to look it over again and make changes. Merwin and Toby made suggestions, and I noticed a few sentences that could be clearer. Then there is my work on our website hamletworks.org, and of course wrapping up Measure for Measure, with my dear friend Laury. It’s a great life.
Love to all, Bernice
I am back! Merwin has been urging me to resume my blog, but he has been so good at it that I have hesitated to get on board. Thanks to Harvey, I now have a setup that allows me to keep my legs raised, and I can sit on my recliner while typing. I think I will ask Merwin if we can take turns. Since we heard from a dear friend yesterday who was happy to learn that I was on the road to recovery, Merwin has felt that he should perhaps be more forthright about my situation. I believe that I have recovered as fully as I ever will from the brain surgery (but hoping for improved memory as time goes on) and the back surgery (but hoping for good pain management). But the chronic condition remains. Now I am back to square one, dealing with the cancer. There is no cure. All I can hope for is good days, like this one. There is no pain from the disease, just fatigue and itching and some other inconvenient side effects, like needing to keep my legs elevated. I hope to be on another drug trial as soon as I can travel into NYC easily, and I think that could be soon, since our trip to Mt. Sinai as few weeks ago went very well. A new drug might relieve some symptoms.
Whatever my physical condition, I almost always have a smile on my face—as I do now while chatting with you, looking out my windows at the still vibrant leaves. I am looking forward to going back to our little studio in NYC, perhaps walking around the block to one of my favorite restaurants, Szechuan Gourmet (or more likely getting take-out), looking out the window at Bryant Park and watching the ice skaters. I know I have to conserve energy. An hour is about my limit for an outing. Someone will have to drive us to NYC. I am thinking about how this apartment, empty since I left Mt. Sinai in early Sept., will get cleaned before we come. Such things dance in my head—along with recipes for dishes featuring cauliflower, of all things. We bought a big, beautiful one at Rothcamps Farm, a half mile from our house. The farm stand will close the day before Thanksgiving, and the best vegetable they have are these gorgeous, huge pure white heads. Does anyone have a good recipe? I made a curry, enough for four people, with about 1/6 of the head. Help!
My Shakespeare work is a great joy to me. Today I am sending, via email, an essay on a Hamlet production to Shakespeare Studies. It was accepted over a year ago, but they had no room for it until this coming issue (they publish only once a year). The editor gave me a chance to look it over again and make changes. Merwin and Toby made suggestions, and I noticed a few sentences that could be clearer. Then there is my work on our website hamletworks.org, and of course wrapping up Measure for Measure, with my dear friend Laury. It’s a great life.
Love to all, Bernice
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
Writing Group Night
Click image to enlarge; click back arrow to return to blog.
Good evening all,
I want everyone to see how Bernice is managing to work for hours at her computer every day between time devoted to her exercises, short walks, and the normal sustaining activities. She is in her bedroom and is seated in her recliner with her legs elevated. Getting her legs raised is all-important for when she tries to work at her big desktop computer it is fatigue/pain in her legs that frustratingly shortens her sessions there. The recliner has a side lever that raises and lowers the leg rest. We were lucky to get this modest-sized recliner and it was with the help of son Arthur just after Bernice's fall in March which broke her pelvis. Arthur and Debbie picked up the recliner at that time and it is serving splendidly now. Son Harvey is responsible for his mom's dandy new laptop which is resting on a convenient lap rest that has a beanbag-like bottom and a flat top surface to support the computer. Next to her is her multi-shelf cabinet that holds all her current working papers as well as her phone and whatever. I must tell you that Bernice complains that my unskilled photography distorts and enlarges her feet so I am confident that all of you can overlook these shortcomings.
While I am keying this in I am in my downstairs study and Bernice is with her writing group upstairs in her study, I have written before about this group who have been together some 30 years to read their writings to each other and receive thoughtful and helpful criticism. These gatherings are private and never attended by outsiders. When the reading session is over we will all sit down for a dinner made up of interesting and always tasty contributions from the group............. It is now post-dinner and i am mellowed from good food and dessert. A spinach pie, salad, couscous with beans, crusty breads, and pumpkin-cheese pie and cookies. The guests have departed after helping with much of the cleanup and it is time for me to windup.
I have decided to say nothing of the election. After all, what could I say? Could I repeat the observation that many of the very people who have ranted against the health care bill and been taken in by masterful media ranters, are often the very ones who will benefit. They are either not aware that we are the only industrialized country lacking universal health care and we had 50 million citizens with no health insurance at all. Would i have the temerity to remind these folks that it was Bush who entered office with a surplus, got us into two terribly expensive wars in terms of our treasure of wealth and human life, who oversaw the economic crash and left office with a monstrous deficit the right has whined about? No, better to skip these issues and go quietly. I might consider commenting on those against any climate legislation who insist that global warming is a sham or wonder about the qualifications of new legislators who might have to deal with education issues but do not believe in evolution. No, i see that it is fruitless to make any election comments at all except to say that if there is some entity somewhere at all concerned with our welfare, I do hope she will lessen our discomfort.
A better night to all,
Merwin
Monday, November 1, 2010
Before the First Frost
Click to enlarge image; click the back arrow to return to the blog.
Good early evening all,
The weather forecast is for our first frost of the season but that is a little uncertain. When it does occur there is a drastic alteration in some of the plant life. I ran out with my new camera to capture our own local scene before the decisive event. The pink dahlias will suffer, wilt, and blacken. My patch of dahlias have produced a continuing blaze of colorful blossoms since the spring. These plants are native to the deep south and would not survive here without loving help. Sometime this month I will repeat my annual ritual to preserve their beauty for another season. I dig up the tubers, discard the leaves and spent flowers, and put each tuber to sleep in a covering of peat moss in a cardboard box. The boxes are put in the garage where there is never a full freeze. In the spring just after Mother's day I will pull the tubers briefly into the daylight and then bury them in the garden for another satisfying season. Some years ago I had dahlias in a variety of colors but I have observed my own mini-evolutionary event. Each spring some of the tubers do not survive the overwintering. Among the survivors I select the largest with the most numerous little shoots and divide these. This selection pressure has now resulted in the survival of almost exclusive pink dahlias you see pictured here. The next picture shows one of my chrysanthemums, a bit bedraggled from recent wind and rain but doing its best to satisfy me. The photo also illustrates my limited camera skills as I have no idea why some images are blurry and others wonderfully sharp. In the final photo of the trio, the young dogwood is displaying its scarlet statement which it assumed after its initial russet. Bernice is pleasured by this foliage which she can see while sitting in her recliner in her bedroom. This is its final color change and this is the color that will briefly adorn our grounds until our fallen leaves are gathered for recycling.
Today Bernice and I went to our Waldbaum supermarket for a big shop. This was another step towards normalization for Bernice. Bernice took her wheelie and it proved to be an indispensable accompaniment for she could use it to move about, stand and examine goods, and to sit on it for occasional rests. It also represented a welcome change to have Bernice give me shopping directions instead of from one of her lists. While we were in the shopping center we decided to get something to bring home for lunch and ended up at the bagel store buying chopped whitefish on a seeded bagel for each of us. Today's bagels have grown so oversized, unlike the sensible bagels of our youth, that we could only eat a half each. The outing really tired Bernice and reduced her energy to complete planned literary tasks.
In the morning Bill the PT person came for his penultimate visit and, always pushing Bernice to the next level, suggested taking their walk sans cane. Bernice, at first flabbergasted at the suggestion, complied and was very pleased when she was able to walk unaided around the block. Bill says that her best exercise is walking but advises that she should use the cane where there may be other people or the terrain is uneven.
The progress Bernice is making in the physical realm is heartening and this is largely a recovery from her terrible fall and the subsequent brain surgery but increasingly she must contend with the symptoms of her underlying blood condition. That is another battle to be won.
A good night to all,
Merwin
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