Book Review: The Name of the Wind

This past week I finally read a book that has been on the shelves since 2007. The author, Patrick Rothfuss, graduated from the University of Wisconsin at Stevens Point, which I was also fortunate enough to attend for a time. My sister told me that he had been working hard on a fantasy book for years, but that he also wrote good articles for the university paper-- which I could confirm, having read some of them. While I survived about a decade without regular reading, a feat about as foolhardy and dangerous as ten days without food or sleep, the name of Rothfuss and his published work have been steadily nudging away at the back of my mind. 

Screenshot from the author's website, here

The Name of the Wind follows a nonlinear plot, but it begins by sitting you down in an inn at night to listen to an old storyteller, Cob, tell four or five men part of a heroic legend of their world. The third-person omniscient narrator gives you a number of hints about secrets hidden by the innkeeper, Kote, and draws your attention to "a silence of three parts" surrounding him and his inn, the Waystone.

"The most obvious part was a hollow, echoing quiet, made by things that were lacking. If there had been a wind it would have sighed through the trees, set the inn's sign creaking on its hooks, and brushed the silence down the road like trailing autumn leaves. If there had been a crowd, even a handful of men inside the inn, they would have filled the silence with conversation and laughter... of course, there was no music. ... Inside the Waystone a pair of men huddled at one corner of the bar. They drank with quiet determination, avoiding serious discussions of troubling news. In doing this they added a small, sullen silence to the larger, hollow one. It made an alloy of sorts, a counterpoint. The third silence was not an easy thing to notice. If you listened for an hour, you might begin to feel it in the wooden floor underfoot and in the rough, splintering barrels behind the bar. It was in the weight of the black stone hearth that held the heat of a long dead fire. It was in the slow back and forth of a white linen cloth rubbing along the grain of the bar. And it was in the hands of the man who stood there... The Waystone was his, just as the third silence was his. It was deep and wide as autumn's ending. It was heavy as a great river-smooth stone. It was the patient, cut-flower sound of a man who is waiting to die."

After a few chapters in and around the Waystone, the story shifts away to a traveling scribe named Chronicler, who is robbed of his horse, shirt, and purse by a band of mercenaries. We are not left to wonder long about how his story will connect with Kote's. We learn both that Chronicler is an important man, and that Kote is willing to tell him the true story behind his own legend, provided he sit down immediately and record it over the span of three days. Kote admits that his true name is Kvothe, and begins his tale in a childhood of learning while traveling with his parents and their troupe of highly talented performers. The tale soon turns incredibly dark, but Kvothe describes how he managed to survive and to study at the University through many misadventures.

At the climax of the story-within-the-story, Kvothe finds himself "calling the name of the wind" inadvertently, causing injury and trouble and nearly getting himself expelled from the University, but at the same time, his talent is finally recognized by an elusive professor who decides at long last to teach him. At about the same time, Kvothe finds a secret way into the Archives he has longed to use for years, but was banned from early on due to a malicious trick. 

At the climax of the present-day story, one of the mercenaries from the beginning appears at the Waystone and, apparently possessed by a demon, attacks the people within. One of the townspeople dies and another is the hero who incapacitates the mercenary. Kvothe's attempt to use magic against the mercenary proves useless. 

In the conclusion, once the commotion is over, Kvothe retires for the night, while his assistant and student Bant confronts Chronicler to demand that over the next two days, he must guide Kvothe to reflect on his past heroism and triumph, and not let Kvothe dwell on failures. Bant says that we all constantly tell ourselves a story about who we are that makes us who we are, and that Kvothe has begun to believe he is no more than a weary innkeeper. Bant wants to have the old Kvothe back. 

* * *

One of the things that stood out to me most in this story was that, for the most part, there is not a lot of explanation or exposition up front. You are not quite thrust into the middle of action or climax, but rather into what feels like the calm before a storm, and then fortuitously you can pick up clues about where you are and what might be going on through Kvothe's life story and the intervals back at the Waystone Inn. 

Thanks to this narrative structure, you get hints about the world, its cultures, and religion, but the urgency of the plot is carried by Kvothe and his drive to survive and get into the University; to learn, among other things, why his parents were killed and who the enemies of their murderers are. The strongest and most foundational pieces of the story concern Kvothe's happy memories of his parents and mentor, his practice and mastery of the lute that connects him with his father, and his unpredictable relationship with the mysterious Denna. On the other hand, his antagonistic interactions with a young nobleman named Ambrose produce a number of circumstances that drive him along his path, and in telling the story, Kvothe always comments that he was a fool to underestimate the trouble Ambrose would cause him. This makes for some uncomfortable suspense and dread. 

It is a slow burn of a story, and although Kvothe as a character is remarkably intelligent and clever, nothing is made easy for him. This can be frustrating, but it also makes for quite a payoff when Kvothe does succeed. 

I would have liked a little more background about the world and for Kvothe to have discovered something more significant at the end of the story about his parents' killers. Before the end of the story, I would have liked to know what it meant for the characters that the mercenary came to the inn, instead of keeping it vague and mysterious. 

The sequel, The Wise Man's Fear, was published in 2011. I will most definitely read it. I hope that since it is now 2018, the third (and final) installment in the series will be arriving soon. 

Overall Score: 7.5/10

Being Real, When You're Depressed

I'm living with depression. I had it for a long time several years ago-- it lasted about a year. This time it's been on and off (feeling like it's mostly on) for about two years. During this time, I've been saving up my paid time off-- in anticipation of a special business trip, but it was canceled in January. Feeling very much at the end of my rope, I decided to take a whole five days off to recharge.

I envisioned a blissful week full of nothing to do, at the end of which I would be bouncing back to work refreshed and re-motivated. I envisioned spending all those days just reading, eating well, walking, and exercising. These activities tend to get cut when I am busy or stressed, and they tend to be the ones I most think about at night when reflecting on the day.

As it turned out, I did some of them. Though not healthy, I did bake one of my favorite cakes, an orange-lemon and white chocolate loaf cake. I did a little walking. I even walked my way into a Petco to look at the animals. Just seeing animals brings a little warmth to my heart, a smile to my face. 

On the sitting quietly side of things, I actually finished one written application I have been agonizing over for months, and then wrote and sent in another application for a weekend job. I think it will be good for me to get out and work around people. I hope I am fortunate enough to get this job.

I read one and a half books: No Time to Spare, collected blog essays by the late Ursula K. Le Guin, and A Monk's Guide to a Clean House and Mind, by Shoukei Matsumoto. Le Guin's book is full of witty and wry observations on a range of subjects, including her tuxedoed pet cat, Pard. While I cannot agree with everything she wrote, the reading was most enjoyable. Especially this: "Fantastic literature, like all the verbal arts, must satisfy the intellectual as well as the aesthetic faculty. Fantasy, odd as it sounds to say so, is a perfectly rational undertaking. As for the charge of escapism, what does escape mean? Escape from real life, responsibility, order, duty, piety, is what the charge implies. But nobody, except the most criminally irresponsible or pitifully incompetent, escapes to jail. The direction of escape is toward freedom. So what is "escapism" an accusation of?"

A Monk's Guide is interesting both as a modern account of aspects of Buddhist monastic life, and as a commentary on the spiritual and cultural significance of cleaning and cleanliness in Japan. Strikingly, Matsumoto says, "If you ever have the chance, observe how monks clean their temple grounds. ... Cleaning is carried out not because there is dirt, but because it's an ascetic practice to cultivate the mind." Cleaning is "a way to eliminate gloom in the mind but, even if you work really hard at sweeping and mopping, it won't really make you feel refreshed if you do it at night. ... Cleaning should be done in the morning. Do it as your very first activity of the day."

Other than that, there were a couple of successful sales in my online shop, which means that my home is becoming freer of things I can't use anymore. I made sure to practice my cello every day, and  now bowing is starting to make more sense. That is a small marvel. 

I went to church on Ash Wednesday and received the familiar mark on the forehead with the words "Repent and believe in the gospel." (Usually it has been "Remember man, that thou art dust, and to dust thou shalt return," but the change made me notice and think about the words.)

All in all, then, it was not an unproductive vacation, but I noticed a few days into it that I was not  actually relaxing. I just could not allow myself to relax while there were important things to do, things I would be hard-pressed to find time for once I went back to work. This realization turned into its own mini-catastrophe, and then the anxiety spiraled out of control and I couldn't sleep at all one night. It was dispiriting. It is dispiriting, as I have not managed to reset my body clock, or to make the extra effort to be ahead of a deadline that falls in a few days. 

And yet here I am. Night has fallen. Work starts with the dawn, ready or not. But I am readier than I was. This week didn't make time stop, and it didn't change me into someone with boundless energy and zest for life. But it was right to take this time. I absolutely recommend it if you are in a similar position. 

The reason is simple. If you are dealing with depression (and/or anxiety) every day, the energy you are expending is considerable. It exhausts mind and body. Taking time off with no strings attached (if you can manage it) is a really important thing to do for yourself, to send your conscious and subconscious mind the message that it's okay. You don't have to choose between frantic scurrying and quitting altogether. Even if you kind of fail at relaxing according to your own high standards, give yourself the gift of the opportunity. And give yourself the permission to give and receive that gift again and again. 

Yes, I also mean "fail" again and again. But look at it this way: you are never going to fail 100%. Whatever percentage of time you achieve relaxation, or another goal, that time is priceless and indestructible. Keep it in your heart and let it help you. It will teach you something you need to know about yourself. It will shine like a hopeful little candle, giving you enough light to light another. 

I wish you courage and peace. 

Life in a Volatile Cauldron

One of the only reasons we humans survive as a species is surely that we are so diverse. I am not talking only about race and gender and obvious physical traits like height and weight and ability or disability. The strength of our diversity truly lies in the different skills, aptitudes, interests, and values we have-- and the pursuits that we value. Art! Science! Government! Business! Learning! Teaching! Storytelling! Composing! Playing! Praying! Likewise, it lies in the ways we devise to achieve our goals.

I think it is the constant balance and counterbalance that has prevented the evil within us from finally overpowering the world from one sector or another. 

Yet so many are crying out with hatred, bitterness, white-knuckled paranoia, despair for the future, and what is far, far worse: a despair of the humanity of great swaths of people. I say this as someone who absolutely cannot abide what has taken power in the U.S.A. It's all too easy to despair of those who don't see the horror and danger that I see.

But I must not. It would be a path of voluntary self-blinding. I have to believe that the millions and millions of people who disagree with me are also human, with their own stories of pain and struggle, their own noble aspirations, and even kindness in their hearts. 

All of us deserve our life, liberty, pursuit of happiness, and dignity. 

How did we come to this? And how, from this mad whirling carousel balanced on the head of a pin on the edge of a skyscraper, can we descend safely to live in peace and respect?

I suspect that what most of us really, really want is simply that. Life in peace, with dignity.

A star in our hand

Going home

There's a time when the angry daylight buzz,
The sharp tick of fingers on keyboards,
Hundreds of echoing pavement steps,
Stalling, starting motors, honks,
Shouts, alerts, staccato heartbeats,
Falsetto laughter
Fade, fade, disappear in shadows and lights.

Not a silent night, no, a night alive
And filled with gentle sounds
Of washing up, or television laughter,
A pair of bundled walkers on the sidewalk,
Convoys of trucks far away,
Laden with products and presents.
Here the air fills noses with welcome, like
Roasted garlic and warm bread and chocolate chip cookies,
Drifting quietly beside the smell of clean laundry,
The cold honest scent of the earth,
A delicate wisp of perfume.

Listen longer, hear other sounds:
Harsh sounds, hurt sounds, crying, silence.
Look longer where the light is cold
In lonely rooms below, above, where the man,
The woman, the child takes up fist or bottle,
Shoots a slicing onslaught with abandon,
Or perhaps sits all alone,
Fighting alone.
See her at the darkened window,
Motionless panic, silent and frantic and drowning.
See him huddled against the brick,
Eyes down, only ragged arms,
Just these two arms against destruction
And so much hate.

A child will see and a child will hear.
I can help. Can't you help?
Through long years still a hummingbird heart
Feels the golden flame in every face,
The mark of God, dignity,
Aches for anyone outside the glow
Of a warm home with comfortable occupants
In comfortable silence and comfortable arguments
That end sometimes with every gut sore from laughter,
A sleepy peace in every woolly head
Brushing teeth, happy to dream.

Reflected fire in the dim sky fades.
Now let all drink oblivion.
Carry love and triumph, hope and fear
Alike, alike
Into mist-wreathed holloways, beaches, and prairies,
Search time-forgotten paths behind the windows
Of the soul to find the lost word,
The lost song,
Lost sight
Until the search is spent
And fire is born again
Another day.

First Winter's Night

At dusk in November, the first winter’s night   

Crept into the pale blue air.        

When the north wind spilled its rich, deep dyes,

The light in the skies drew my eyes to the glass

And I witnessed the last sun of autumn pass.

The moment had gone. With a breath I returned

To the labor that fills each day,

To work that required four thousand breaths more

Before I opened my door and had done.                             

Too tired to wash, too tired to clean, but I let

Habit pull me through the routines.

Something outside seemed to push on the walls,

Pressed the air heavy and dim on my brow,

And too soon I slept by the lamp at the window,

The only sound three ticking clocks.

All unaware, stillness changed to a feast

When they came light on feet shod in blue, gold, and white,

With a piper’s reel and the scent of the night.

They lit every candle and toasted the flames

With a rich draught of dark honeyed mead.

Scattering crumbs of spice-cake and pie,

With a whirl and a twirl they leaped laughing by,

And the caper carried them under the sky

Once again, to dance on the paths of the moon.

But I heard the pipe and I caught the perfume,

Recalled dancing myself in the light of the moon

Long ago, and the moment of memory pierced

Like an arrow, and fiercely I felt the hot gladness

And sorrow roll down.

I leapt up and opened the door to the night

And burning there in the ink-dark sky

Met the bright eyes of all of the ancient world’s stories

Sharp-cut and clear beyond two evergreens,

My sentinels bristling stoic and tall.

In new awe of them all

I drank deep of the air, tonight a cold stream,

Clean and alive with the heartsongs of trees.

Then blowing a kiss to the moon, I

Reached up to the stars to offer a bow

In respect, and I joined the invisible crowd

In their dance on this first winter’s night. 

"All you need is love and a puppy..."

Pupper photo here because I miss Lily, too.

These past 11 days have been a jolt, an education, and a catalyst for me. How many things we do for ourselves every day when we have the free use of our bodies! It is likewise astonishing how all these little things add up their time throughout the day. I would not have believed it was possible for me to work essentially two full-time jobs at once. In all honesty, it is not sustainable. Nevertheless, being able to do it for the short term leads me to reassess the way I've been organizing my time at home. 

Thanksgiving will soon be here. On many past celebrations of the day, I have probably mentioned being thankful for my family. I am now learning a new depth of gratitude for the strong and loving people in my family, whom I took for granted for so many years, like air or daylight. While in various ways the world seems to grow dark and cold, the trust and faithfulness of familial love still feed the flames of hope.  With the mission at hand, I am thankful each day for the work my aunt and sister did to rebuild this battered nest and give its bird a chance to heal his wings. Thankful that he is indeed healing and growing stronger, that he is still with us. Thank God for giving us enough grace to bear the trials. 

I miss something very much. I am rediscovering the feel of writing and the pull of its potential. The cello is becoming a friend, a door to a landscape of happy toil: part exploring and mapping, and part building. Soft encouragement still radiates out of a loaf of homemade bread. There are goals I want to pursue again. And behind it all, with the companionship of a dusky shadow, is the Something I find myself missing. I am not, and I am, content.

Zzz?

Floating
I think
So tired
I am

Perhaps
we are all
on loan from
hospital

Dazed and
beeping and
machines
sighing for us

It really might
all end
in
diapers

Till then
is the time
we have to
live

The Professor

I am old, my body heavy
The weight of decades
Pulls me earthward;
Solid bones like mountain ridges,
Stiff muscles like an ancient ox.

Once was a time
I gave no thought
To waking or sleeping.
The point was the work,
My life was the work.

Incidental, everything else
Clothes– incidental
Food– incidental
Car– holds together
Haircut? My hat's all I need.

The shining quest, the fire,
Which I with dogged steady steps pursued,
Was knowledge: A treasure
To be both won and shared,
Spread to the furthest corners.

Who is man and whence comes he?
Ancient peoples, alive as we think ourselves to be,
Worshiped, warred, wed, and worked.
The pieces of their lives remain and
They themselves remain, so we should see.

The years that fell with dust
Upon their kitchen tools
Never choked the fires
Burning from their hearts. And so
I chose my place beside their hearths.

Years have not been so kind to me.
They press upon my lungs
To keep the stale air in
So that my very blood
Circulates confusion in my brain

Betrayed by blood, now water
Mutinies to jump the sinking ship;
Brigand keen to forge a blazing trail,
It burns my body as it goes,
Making purple limbs stiff as wooden boards.

Now blood, then dust.
My groaning body mountain
Will fall and turn to dust,
And will the fire below
Burn strong throughout the night?

November - William Cullen Bryant

Yet one smile more, departing, distant sun!
One mellow smile through the soft vapoury air,
Ere, o'er the frozen earth, the loud winds run,
Or snows are sifted o'er the meadows bare.
One smile on the brown hills and naked trees,
And the dark rocks whose summer wreaths are cast,
And the blue gentian-flower, that, in the breeze,
Nods lonely, of her beauteous race the last.
Yet a few sunny days, in which the bee
Shall murmur by the hedge that skirts the way,
The cricket chirp upon the russet-lea,
And man delight to linger in the ray.
Yet one rich smile, and we will try to bear
The piercing winter frost, and winds, and darkened air.

William Cullen Bryant

A keen and poetic observation

Old Sketches

Wandering

What Will Be

Spent

We have probably all wrung out a washcloth or a dish towel. We've squeezed and twisted, watched the water drip out, and hung the cloth to dry with a feeling of satisfaction. Right now, these days, I am the cloth. I feel completely wrung out. 

The truth is, I have mostly done this to myself. Squeezed and twisted as much as I possibly could until there was not even a drop left of energy or time. And beyond that I've kept pushing, thinking optimistically that this state can't go on indefinitely; it will get easier; life will look brighter in the morning maybe, or on the weekend.

It feels like being swept underwater and crushed beneath the relentless tide of routine demands, with added weight crashing over you from extraordinary circumstances and current events, as you struggle to right yourself, to find direction and air.

Still, here at my desk, breath follows breath. I am here. There is work to do. 

Writing holds a natural magic. In putting pen to paper, and even in typing letters on a screen, writing easily generates life and light. In particular, I have found that making a diary entry– this kind of confessional writing– tends to herald a change. A new chapter, maybe ten or twenty pages from here. The point is, once you form your woes into words, they lose some of their power. 

Finding a voice again

Welcome back! It has been four years since the last time I attempted to update this blog. To be honest, I am not sure that I will write often: it seems in my small corner of the world that people do not keep blogs anymore unless they are published bakers or full-time political commentators, and I am neither. 

Things have happened over the intervening silent years, however, which have served to confuse and scatter my thoughts. Not knowing what to think anymore is a state closely related to not knowing who one is anymore. At least, I have found this to be so. It has always been in writing that I have found the most clarity, and today I will begin an attempt to find my voice again on this blog. 

A Leaf of Thought
Thus Adam gave names to all the cattle, and all that flies in the air, and all the wild beasts; and still Adam had no mate of his own kind. Gen. 2:20

It struck me today that much of the division we see in the world is sustained by language. In a sense, what is language but classification– that is, division and demarcation? On this topic, the broad field of hermeneutics (the interpretation of meaning) yields the fruit of many theories and questions, but without becoming too technical, I would merely observe that as human beings, we seem to love dividing the world, beginning with language. 

The words we use regarding gender, for example, are becoming slowly but increasingly fraught. Notwithstanding the two-spirited as understood by indigenous American people, the humble terms "man" and "woman" have generally served people well in the past. Today it is a point of real consternation among some that we use only these words, as if they impoverish us as people, or as if there is something wrong with them intrinsically. 

I think there is something to be said for allowing that most people do not neatly conform to a narrow prescription of masculinity or femininity, and acknowledging the many unique understandings we humans have about our own identities. Surely, though, this is a matter of common sense, and "man" and "woman" are coming under fire unjustly, for failing at a job they were never intended to perform?

In other words, it is perhaps naïve to suppose that our language will achieve better representation (or ultimately, justice or happiness) for humankind by crafting and enforcing the use of new words to describe unique understandings of gender identity. In doing so, are we not using our first tool, language, to divide, when there is a much simpler remedy for our trouble? Might we not build some unity and peace among ourselves, instead, by agreeing first that human beings generally come as male or female, with some exceptions, and second that individuals are free to interpret for themselves how to be male or female? I wonder why we create more and more boxes for ourselves.

The United States is sometimes disparaged as a land ruled by individualism, to the detriment of the community or the group. Without a doubt, the sacred character of the individual is still honored here, at least in theory. Yet I think that ironically, we can be misguided and misled to use words that not only harm our community as fellow members of a nation, but also dishonor our individuality through their reductive generalization. The problem is that none of our words can be specific enough to truly capture a phenomenon as explosively, defiantly unique as a human being. 

As an afterthought, I will add the observation that language achieves beauty when it is both very specific (dividing) and very broad (inviting), as in poetry. But that is all, because I intended to paint only a leaf of thought here, and not a branch or the whole tree.

Carrying on

Have a cup of tea and relax! How is your Lent going? Have you had to rethink your Lenten sacrifices or practices? How about staying cheerful in spite of them, and engaging people in a friendly manner?

For me, Lent is going fairly well and Lent-ishly this year. I find I can do very well without either YouTube or Facebook. I think I saw a meme on Facebook once that showed a box of cigarettes with the Facebook logo, captioned: "Social Cigarettes." I suppose it is. I was certainly at the point where, when anxiety kicked in, off I would go to Facebook to 'calm down.' But I don't need to be up on everybody's business all the time, after all. As for YouTube, "Aw, this three-minute video is a well-deserved brain break!" too often had been turning into, "What, have I really watched so many videos already?!" So, so long to both of them until Easter.

Unfortunately, I don't anticipate having any time to make pysanky this year. Still, I have lots of photos of ones I made in 2011. That was a great winter/spring for crafts. Imagine getting off of work at 4:30 pm! I did not sufficiently appreciate the early hours I had then. (Well, to be honest, I did some days but not others, so given a chance to return to those days, I would make sure I appreciated them all!)

However, all is not lost. To give my artistic inclinations more tools and training, and to force myself to leave the confines of my home office and be with real people, I enrolled in an oil study class. Actually, by the time I thought of it, the session had already been going for three weeks, but the teachers are friendly and flexible, and so I was able to join anyway. I never painted with oils before, or learned how, so it was a little daunting at first to walk into a classroom full of students at various levels, seemingly all working on the finishing touches to very respectable oil paintings. (Since then, I've been getting there on time and sitting by the other beginning students.) Anyway, it has since become one of the things I look forward to most each week.

That's all for now. Busy day ahead with Aqua Zumba at the end of it!

Getting warmed up

Happy Valentine's Day! It's very interesting that it falls right at the start of Lent. Of course, it was bound to happen; any late 16th-century kindergartener could have deduced that February 14, 2013 would be the day after Ash Wednesday of the same year.

All the same, don't you feel something a little jarring? Whether it's Valentine's Day or St. Patrick's Day, perhaps you have a sense of something being off, when the day in question falls in Lent. How do I deal with that?, you might ask yourself. Will I celebrate it with flowers and chocolate or green beer, or will I look wistfully on as the unchurched continue appropriating the celebrations for themselves?

The answer, I think, is already given to us. As Chesterton observed, there is no other such great contradictory religion as Catholicism. Here we have two very (seemingly) contradictory events: Valentine's Day, no longer an official feast day, it is true, but still a day very much rooted in Catholic heritage and one or two saintly people named Valentine– a holiday on which love is supposed to reign supreme, and people give themselves leave (or feel obligated) to show their affection in extraordinary ways– and Lent, a period of mortification, prayer, and giving. In fact, on closer inspection, they are very well suited for each other. For what is love without sacrifice? And what is sacrifice without love?

If you are perplexed about the former question, look no further than the superficial traditions and guilt-trips our culture has tacked onto Valentine's Day. The latter question is less accessible, precisely because this culture has divorced sacrifice from love, and when it uses 'sacrifice' at all, it means things like "paying more taxes so we can spend more money on every level... for the kids" or soldiers who "sacrifice for this country" without any further elucidation.

Love and sacrifice. They go together. Put aside time today to do something that will add warmth to your Lent.

Ash Wednesday

Remember, man, that thou art dust,

and to dust thou shalt return.

How is your fast going? Father Z asked the same question, and from the comments it looks like a lot of people are going at it with great intensity! 

Remember not to be like John Dashwood, though.

John Dashwood: In such cases, I would rather do too much than too little.

Whereupon his wife replies: There's no telling what they expect. The question is what can you afford?

And so, in a matter of minutes, John is persuaded not to offer his poor relations any monetary assistance whatsoever.

In an alternate universe where John Dashwood was Catholic, I can see him being similarly persuaded for the sake of one thing or another to make no alteration to his Ash Wednesday meals, either. Such is the power of selfishness and a feeble will!

All of this (self indulgence) is behind us now. You and I enter the desert of Lent and endeavor to put our better selves back in control of the body and its hundreds of cravings and demands. This is not only for the sake of self improvement (for which we should always be striving), but more importantly so that we can become Christ to the world and make it a more beautiful place.

We are temples of the Holy Spirit, and such temples are not the work of one day, even a very pious day, of fasting and abstinence, supported by prayer, and showing its harvest in almsgiving. Every sacrifice helps, though. 

I am convinced that one of the best small sacrifices one can offer during this time is the sacrifice of cheerfulness. Yes! It's natural to be cheerful at Easter, but it's easy to give ourselves a pass during Lent. After all, we need to grit our teeth in order to tighten our belts, don't we? 

No, we don't. Especially now, when all the world seems swathed in despair and every road looks like a dead end, it is a great thing, however small, to persevere in being cheerful with everyone we meet.

A word in your ear. If anyone would like to make me a Schwarzwälder Kirschtorte for Easter, I accept!

Tu es Petrus

Everyone by now should be aware that Pope Benedict XVI is abdicating the See of Peter effective February 28th, 2013.

What he must have been suffering in contemplating this move! I understand in some small way how it feels to go day after day fully fatigued, but how much more our Pope! To have so many cares on his shoulders, to be exhausted, and yet to feel keenly the duty he owes Our Lord and His Church... "Tu es Petrus." These words must have echoed back to him as he prayed for light and guidance.

In the end, he received an answer. I have full faith that the Pope knows what he is about, and his abdication, followed by the succession of a new Bishop of Rome, is for the best.

I hope dear Papa Ben may soon return to his beloved Germany, and be blessed with a quiet life of prayer and contemplation, secure in the knowledge that he has done the Lord's will, and that the Holy Spirit will continue to guide the Church.

This is Novus Latium. It is fitting, therefore, to repost the following video, which is in Latin.

I'm sure I am not the only one who is very sorry to lose this wonderful, humble Servant of the Servants of God. You might wish you could give him a hug; I certainly do. Well, we can send him many spiritual hugs through prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, to which we will be reapplying ourselves in earnest anyway when Lent starts on Wednesday. It would probably be a good idea to offer our prayers and sacrifices this Lent in a special way for the Holy Father, the Church, the conclave, and the next successor of Peter.

Conquering frivolity

Frivolity. American society is saturated and sick with it. For those of us who observe this with dismay, it seems there is little we can do to remedy it. The serious are always mocked by the frivolous, though not always without some justification. We will have long to wait, indeed, if we hope to see the benefit of our good example working in others– at those times when we are able to show a good example, that is, instead of being distracted or succumbing to the expedience of anti-social behavior to carry us through another weary day.

Distraction has stealthily become the sole attraction of survival, I think, for many Americans. For us, the routines of life, the things we spend the most time doing, and the places where we spend most of our time, have long since failed to inspire. In our jaded eyes, merited or not they take on the appearance of prisons, and every escape is welcome.

With few exceptions, it is difficult to find any place without distraction. Homes are filled with a constant inflow of all the noise, imagery, and information that computers, tablets, TVs, and radios provide. Even the gym has its tasteless pop music rolling while an array of flashing TV screens command unwary eyes. Advertising is as vile as it is ubiquitous. It is sometimes difficult to understand how any sensible person would subject himself to wasting 30 or 60 minutes watching a program, punctuated by commercials, which is in itself blatantly promoting some poorly thought-out attitude or lifestyle under a watery veneer of what passes for drama, humor, or romance. Noise in the car and in the shops, promotions on packaging, bags, and receipts, and everything in gaudier color, more distasteful lettering, and more obnoxious voice and appearance in order to be noticed above the rest of the din. Above all, let there be no simplicity, no rational thought.

Of course, we all say we're seeking peace, even if we do not use quite those words. Everyone is "just so busy," he could simply collapse with relief on the weekends if he had not even more demands on his time then than during the week. Still we long to get away from it all, think longingly of an extended vacation, mean to try yoga, mean to implement some new dietary advice, mean to "get organized" so that we can figure out how to extract any remaining drops of sanity to spend on the supposed improvement of our lives.

It would be grave folly to believe this way of life could be sustained, but I fear the great mass of people leading it cannot think past their immediate circle of primary distractions... money and bills, work, fuel, and social networking, to name a few. In fact we have joined that "mass of men [leading] lives of quiet desperation" so eloquently described by Thoreau.

Thoreau also wrote that he wanted "to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life..." Neither do any of us!

I will not attempt an exhausting amalgamation of the many self-help books and articles available as my own unique and branded path to fix everything wrong with the world. I may simply observe that without the essentials of a deliberate life, all advice is in vain. And what are the essentials of a deliberate life? Here are five.

1. Stillness and Quiet

We must demand some period of quiet reflection every day, even if it is only 10 minutes.

2. Prayer

Every day.

3. Reading

For pity's sake, turn away from the screen, put down the glossy magazine, and read a good, old, honest-to-goodness work of literature that will give your mind some meat. Be warned, however, that the consistency of meat is quite different from mashed peas.

4. Human Interaction

Meet people's eyes. Talk– and listen. Sometimes dare to imagine yourself as playing a supporting role in someone else's life. A community of bellyaching, belligerent, budding celebrities is no community at all.

5. The Outdoors

If you can't remember the last time you went outside for anything other than driving somewhere or catching a train, put the devices to sleep and go see what's out there. For all our admiration of the natural and organic, we may sometimes forget that people were made to live on this planet, breathe its fresh air, and feel its earth (or snow) underfoot.

"You are a very fine person, Mr. Baggins, and I am very fond of you; but you are only quite a little fellow in a wide world after all!” “Thank goodness!” said Bilbo laughing, and handed him the tobacco-jar.

Breaking through

It was one of those days. The morning went well, but the afternoon tanked; I couldn't get a thing done. My whole being was desperate for distraction, and anything would do. Later on, I found out that my average word count per day last month was unusually low. I'm at the point where that sort of information is only fueling a temptation to give up, rather than work even longer hours than I already do. The problem is that my long working day is not as productive as it should be, because I am depressed about low word count yields for my files, and feel like the whole thing is pointless because I always seem to be merely digging myself out of word count deficits. Of course, it's a vicious cycle. I have to pull out of it somehow.