Blogging a little later this morning. Eileen and I try to do a weekly “check-in.” This is a vestigial ghost of the old “family meeting” we used to have with our children. It gives Eileen a chance to bring up stuff without having me overreact which I often do when I’m not prepared emotionally to deal with the pressures of adult decision making. Maybe it’s a good thing I’m now in therapy, eh?

Anyway, we go over the upcoming week. This week we also paid bills together which worked surprising well with Eileen at the check ledger recording and me at the computer paying stuff. She’s balancing the check book right now. Since she usually balances the checkbook having her write in amounts helps because her handwriting is much clearer than mine.

I am making some progress in my Greek studies.

I am beginning the fifth little section based on The Clouds by Aristophanes, section 5D. I have figured out that the text is designed that you first read and learn to understand the new Greek passage and then gradually do the grammar for it. I also do the background reading suggested in the companion volume, An Introduction to Classical Athenian Culture.

Recently, Eileen mentioned to her mother that I was studying Greek. She spontaneously responded, “Why?!” I think this is a logical response. Not sure I even know the answer. But I do enjoy it.

I missed my trio rehearsal yesterday. Both string players are temporarily having physical problems that prohibit them playing music. Yikes!

I did manage a treadmill session yesterday. Just what the doctor ordered.

I spent some time trying to plan at church. Unfortunately I spent a good deal of the time I had allotted for planning simply sorting music. But I did get a couple of Sundays done. I skipped rehearsing organ, but cannot do that two days in a row. So I better get over there today.

I have been working slowly on two Copland two-piano pieces, Danzon Cubano

and El Salón México. 

When I texted Rhonda that I had found her scores, she responded that I better get practicing on them. I like that.

My copy of The Poetry of Derek Walcott 1948-2013 arrived in the mail yesterday. It’s in excellent shape. It’s a large book which is a bit daunting but I will probably eventually read the whole thing.

Review: ‘Sixty’ Recounts a 61st Year, Complete With Humor, Rue and Hemorrhoid – The New York Times

Speaking of books, this looks good to me.

My first appointment with Curtis Birky went well. He seems educated, articulate, and intelligent. I spent most of the time answering questions he asked me. Questions like what three words would you use to describe your mother? (“minister’s wife, highly socialized, and quick to blame herself” the last mentioned because it is something I also do). For my Dad, I answered “Intellectual in a non-intellectual environment, life long journey towards liberalism, and typical male lack of intimacy tools with other males”)

Birky got me thinking about my family of origin again. I felt like we connected pretty well. He DID recognize Ed Friedman and was impressed that my brother Mark and I attended a weekend of Friedman presenting his ideas together. He gave me some tools developed by Aaron Beck to do some basic anxiety and depression self eval. It’s my homework for our next visit in two weeks to fill them out.

I also met with Jen and Rhonda yesterday. Jen and I had a good meeting (as usual). She told me that she thought my post gospel improv Sunday was a good thing. I had wondered because the congregation laughed after it. She said she thought the laugh more of an acknowledgment of it than finding it silly.

I told her that Calvin Hampton’s priest occasionally substituted an organ improv for the entire homily.

We agreed that we weren’t there yet, but I suggested maybe after we get the new organ.

I had a ball playing duets with Rhonda.

She brought a lovely 4 hand version of Haydn’s first symphony. We played entirely through it. She even allowed me to do some of the repeats (I like repeats….. Pablo Casals said that Bach repeats were important). Thank you, Rhonda!

I have been admiring the design of the Greek text I am working from. They use a passage from Aristophanes very cleverly to introduce verb tense. In the first section, the main character of the play, The Clouds, says that yesterday he was sleepless. The notes in my independent study guide asked what tense must the verb be after “yesterday.” Then two sections later, he has the same character ask his son if he will love him tomorrow. So of course the verb the son uses will be in the future tense. Then the son tells the father that he WAS listening, he IS listening, and he WILL listen to him.

Someone was on their toes when they found this section to introduce tenses and also be simple enough to be in a relatively early chapter in the text. Cool beans.

Eileen was going through her old Facelessbook messages recently and found one from 2014 that she had missed. Steve Frayer has messaged her. He was in her fifth grade math/science class at st. Damian’s in 1981. Recently he had found a book she had given him which she had inscribed to him. He remembered her fondly and wondered what had happened to her since then. He also remembered taking music classes from me and the fact that I had a harpsichord in the classroom. But Eileen was the star in his eyes for sure. He is now married (to another guy) and serving (somehow openly) in two Detroit parishes as the musician. Eileen and I quickly “friended” him.

He’s on the right. I love shit like this.

Memorial in Alabama Will Honor Victims of Lynching – The New York Times

Stevenson is doing good work. High time to make our shameful past more visible.

Why ‘The Nightly Show With Larry Wilmore’ will be missed – LA Times

 Larry Wilmore Talks Nightly Show Cancellation, Making White People Uncomfortable | Vanity Fair

This morning I see Dr. Birky for the first time at 10 AM. It’s around 7:30 AM right now and I have done my usual cleaning of the kitchen, making coffee, Greek study and a bit of Shakespeare read out loud.  I am preparing for my first meeting with this guy more than I did for the one with Lynne Wright. Ms. Wright asked me for the birth years of my children and wife. I thought a genogram would easily show this info. I remembered doing an extensive 6 generation one back when I was taking a course in family systems for church workers. Lo and behold I found it. I will take it with me but not necessarily show it to Dr. Birky unless he’s interested.

Looking over my notes for the family system course reminds me that I have done a lot of work on myself over the years. I think of my many songs that I have written in the folk rock style and suspect strongly that they represent some sort of therapeutic activity. Probably more therapeutic than anything else since despite the feelings of my friend Jonathon Fegel I’m pretty sure they have no commercial potential. Artistic? Another question but one that doesn’t interest me that much at this stage.

What does interest me is they have helped me cope over the years, even grow a bit. In addition to this I realize that I have been driven to seek ways to improve myself, my personality, and my behavior over and over. I could easily make a list of my strengths, weaknesses, flaws, and attributes I am proud of.

I see it as self obsession and self improvement, a bit of pathology and also attempts at self awareness. As I think about what I’m going to talk to Dr. Birky about I’m trying to come with an outcome that these kinds of dudes look for. “What will it look like at the end of therapy if we can achieve your goals?” The best I can do here is to hazard that I might be more self aware of my own growing edges. But we’ll see what I say to Dr. Birky. I need to stop because I have several tasks to perform before I leave for my day.

Dr. Curtis Birky phoned me yesterday and we set up an appointment for tomorrow at 10 AM. So far this dude looks good to me as a possible therapist. I like that the paperwork for incoming patients is available on his website as documents I can fill out online and then print up.

We had a nice chat on the phone. He asked me some screening questions (seeking addiction help? abusive relationships help? will legal authorities be seeking access to our therapy? no in all cases). He asked me to describe briefly why I was seeking therapy and laughed when I concluded this description with the idea that I was interested “in finding out what kind of crazy I am.”

I’m listening to Bjork’s Medulla album on headphones as I write this blog. I am, of course, doing this because I have been reading about Alex Ross’s visit with her while she was making this album in 2004. Reading this essay will give me an excuse to check out some of her music and the music of other Icelandic musicians/composers Ross talks about. So far this album on the headphones is fun. It sounds like typical Bjork to me. I do like her work. It interests me that she composed the vocals on Sibelius but then hired a copyist to make clean copies for the singers. This is mostly a vocal album.

Today, I will start planning the fall church season in earnest. I am planning on working at church to do this. Yesterday I met with Laurie and she sounded quite good on the Dvorak Biblical song she is singing. Her work with a private teacher is obvious and I think she sounds quite good. Good enough for me to offer to meet with her more often and go through some lieder for the fun of it.

Let’s Get Intimate. Big Music Doesn’t Need Huge Halls. – The New York Times

I missed this when it was published at the beginning of August. Bookmarked to read.

For Music, Smaller Is Better – The New York Times letter to the editor

An architect’s response, also which led me to the original article.

When Police Are Poor Role Models for One Another – The New York Times

A look by an ex-cop.

President Obama’s Emotional Spotify Playlist Is a Hit – The New York Times

I noticed this playlist on Spotify and played it for awhile. Eileen was sure that it hadn’t been actually done by the President. This says it was. How cool is that?

God, Realigned: The Era of Reformation – The New York Times

This looks like a book I would like to peruse.

Jules Feiffer Noir: Union-Busting, Communism, Jews and Hollywood – The New York Times

I didn’t know Feiffer was writing a trilogy. This is the just released volume two.

Jesmyn Ward’s Anthology of Race Builds on the Legacy of James Baldwin – The New York Times

This is definitely a book I want to read. I am a fan of James Baldwin.

I had a nice surprise after church yesterday.  The man pictured above, Doug McQueen, came up to me and began telling me how much he liked the way I did the service. I asked if he was an organist and he said he was. I found out later (looking on Facebeek) that he retired after forty years of service at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Peoria Illinois.

He gave me detailed compliments on much of the service. He liked the prelude and postlude and the way I accompanied the hymns. He was also the first organist I have met lately who  recognized the name Martin Pasi. Mr. McQueen said that he had played the Cassavant at Hope and commented that with all the organs hope has (2 in Dimnent, the new Cassavant and the Walker in Huw’s studio) Hope was turning into an organ mecca. I hadn’t thought of it like that. It was refreshing to hear it actually.

I am thinking of checking out the organ practice room situation at the new Hope College Music Building. I haven’t been through it yet. I am seriously considering going on my knees and asking Huw if I could practice there while my organ is out of commission. Rhonda has already offered Hope Church. It would be good to have a few spots up my sleeve. Many times organ practice rooms are empty at colleges I have attended.

Mr. McQueen didn’t mention it, but after the gospel yesterday (link to readings), I improvised a dissonant illustration of the divisiveness in the gospel story. After the last chord with Jen in the pulpit and ready to preach, the congregation laughed. I figured they were laughing at the music. Eileen said they might have been laughing at the fact that Jen had bumped the mic right at the end of music. At any rate, it got their attention and Jen moved smoothly into her homily.

I came home and looked for a recording on YouTube. I remember hearing Lang Lang and a young student play a Schubert piano buy roche diazepam online duet at the Proms a few years ago. I wanted to hear it again and think about printing it up and having available for duets.

Here is the two part video of their performance.

I do like this quite a bit. I printed it out and from her response to an email, Rhonda sounds interested.

Since I have scheduled my soprano soloist to sing a Biblical Song by Dvorak on Sunday, I have asked her to bring her viola and play a little arrangement of the famous Largo from his New World Symphony. My organ arrangement in is Db so I dug around and found one online. IMSLP has an arrangement for violin and piano but it’s not public domain in the US, so I landed on a nice clean arrangement for recorder and piano in G major (link to pdf).

I am meeting with Laurie (the singer/viola player) today at 5 PM. I have until then to put this arrangement in Finale. I will probably transpose it to D major and put the recorder part in the viola clef. I was trying to avoid work on Mondays but I enjoy messing with Finale.

Facing the music: David Sawer | Music | The Guardian

I like this interview mostly because most if not all of the music Sawer mentions is embedded into it. cool. I will probably play some of them later.

Join the Army and Choose Whichever God You Like – The New York Times

Sarah Vowell once again on the pages of the NYT!

 Understanding Hillary: The Clinton America sees isn’t the Clinton colleagues know. Why are they so different?

This article by Ezra Klein helped me quite a bit. I am of course planning on voting for Clinton but not without misgivings. Klein provides insight into her warts and all. I think her ability to listen is a valuable attribute as well as her experience in governing. I didn’t watch the actual interview which is linked.

The Best Wireless Routers of 2016 | PCMag.com

This went by on my facelessbook feed. I bookmarked it to think about.

I got up earlier this morning but I’m still running late on blogging. Eileen and I made a grocery trip yesterday with one important goal to replace the propane tank on our grill. Unfortunately, while attempting to hook up the new tank I dropped the dang thing on my hand. The damage was not as bad as it could have been. I have no bruises this morning but two of my fingers immediately became uncomfortable yesterday and they are sore this morning. Good grief. It’s not as if I don’t have enough obstacles between myself and my need to improve as a musician.

Ironically I had just purchased work gloves for just this sort of task but had neglected to don them. sheesh.

I finished Ross’s essay on Schubert this morning. I find Ross very inspiring. He combines a erudite informed understanding with a thoroughly contemporary point of view. I like both things about him. The next essay seems to be about Bjork. Cool.

When I read about someone like Schubert I inevitably find myself drawn to the piano to play through some of their work. Yesterday and this morning I spent time with the first movement of Schubert’s last piano sonata, the one in Bb major. Nice stuff.

Ross points out how pertinent Schubert is to many composers living now. He quotes a Ligeti lecture on Schubert. I didn’t check the footnote, but remembered that Ross attended some lectures by Ligeti. I doubt if they are published.

Enough. Time to get ready for work.

I’m Latino. I’m Hispanic. And they’re different, so I drew a comic to explain. – Vox

I found this helpful. Latino refers to geography (Latin America… people from Spain are not Latino, people from Portugal are). Hispanic refers to Spanish language speakers (People from Spain are Hispanic, people from Portugal are not…. they speak Portuguese.)

Glenn Yarbrough, Folk Singer With the Limeliters, Dies at 86 – The New York Times

Another fascinating obit. I like the part where Yarbrough realizes that his audience was rich boring people and also that he kept being drawn to sailing around the world.

Eileen and I did the Farmers Market this morning. We bought corn, cukes, trout, tomatoes, peaches, and melon. We are certainly eating good these days. I’m not exactly losing weight, but at least my BP is still passable (consistently under 130/100).It was unbearably hot two nights ago, but last night was not as bad. We are still resisting window air conditioners at this point.

Choir season is coming up and I need to get going on it. I’m planning on buying one of Helen Kemp’s books if it still in print. I’m want to add it to the weekly  use of the  songbook we use now, Sing Legato. The choir knows most of these by heart so that shouldn’t be too hard.

Eileen likes Canons, Songs and Blessings more.  I agree that it has better music. But Where in the World: Folksong Warmups from Many Lands has more directed exercises toward vocal development. I want to decided and order multiple copies of one of them today.

We will  probably begin rehearsing on Sept 7 so we can sing on Sept 11 – the Kick off Sunday). But I’m not too worried about it. The parameters of trying to do more one rehearsal wonders to offset the expected lowering of consistent attendance makes it simpler. The possibilities are fewer. If I’m wrong in predicting this I can always adjust music to make it more interesting, I guess.

Yesterday was pretty warm here in Holland all day. I went to the church and rehearsed piano and organ for a few hours. The church wasn’t any cooler than home. Eileen walked downtown for sidewalk sales in the rain.

I found myself carefully playing some of the more difficult variations of the Goldberg Variations at church yesterday on the piano. Then I rehearsed a couple of Philip Glass etudes. At the organ I worked over the psalm for Sunday. Then I rehearsed the postlude. I have scheduled an excerpt of Andrew Clarke’s rather lengthy piece for organ and brass on “How Firm a Foundation.” He composed it so that it can be done on organ alone. It’s very sectional. Originally I had thought that the closing toccata would be a bit much in such a short time. But I’m planning on it and have been working on it.

I also continue to systematically read Bach’s organ works. I have finished reading the Orgelbuchlein and am reading through the volume of the Leipzig chorales (at least I think that’s the volume). Yesterday I read the entire ornamented chorale prelude on Komm Heileger Geist.

This is extremely cool. Bach’s original autograph scrolls while the perform plays it.

This morning after my continual battle with Greek past tense, I returned to reading Alex Ross’s Listen to This. I left off at Chapter 7 which is on Schubert. It of course inspired my weak little pea brain to sit down and play some Schubert at the piano. I do enjoy his music very much. Rhonda and I have been playing some of his four hand music. This is lots of fun!

I listened to the August 12th podcast of FAIR this morning as I cleaned the kitchen and made coffee. Donna Murch was interviewed. Here’s a link to her latest pertinent article.

Paying for Punishment | Boston Review

I haven’t read it yet but was very impressed with her in the podcast.

Letters to the Editor on Think Tanks and Corporate America – The New York Times

The first letter is by Harvey Cox. Wow. He’s still alive.

I learned yesterday that it might not be a good idea for 64 year old Jupe to move eight 50 pound bags of quick concrete left over from setting the new fence posts. I also did a lot of other messing around like sweeping the area in front of the garage, moving left over chain link fence and posts. By the time I had done all of this and other chores I was hot, sweaty, and tired.

I did notice some pain in my left hand during my weekly rehearsal with my cellist. Ah well.

I learned something from my grandson and his piano teacher recently.

I asked him if his teacher insisted on using Czerny’s somewhat eccentric fingerings. He said yes so i decided that I should do that as well. This doesn’t sound as crazy as it is. On the second page of Czerny’s opus 337, Czerny introduces his chromatic scale fingerings.

I admit that I use a very simplistic chromatic scale fingering which mostly three fingers, the ones we number 1,2,3. My Dad showed me this fingering.

I don’t remember studying it with anyone. Just practicing it. Czerny employs all fingers. After mastering the first page of opus 337, it will be a tall order for me to relearn (or learn in the first place) Czerny’s fingerings for the chromatic scale but I’m determined to do this.

Yesterday I was playing through volume IV of Bartok’s Mikrokosmos. I had another insight. My whole history of musicianship has been one of halfassed emergency adaptations for imminent public performances. I have spent a lot of my musical life ignoring fingerings in pieces and reading them as easily as possible. Yesterday I decided i would work through some Bartok’s Mikrokosmos pieces and force myself to exactly use his fingerings.

I do use fingerings in editions of pieces I play. But I consider them suggestions and that’s probably good for literature. But I think I could learn something from using Czerny’s and Bartok’s fingerings.

It reminds me of pounding away each day on learning Classical Greek. No end in sight, but enjoying the process itself.

Despite being exhausted and hot, I made bruschetta and pesto yesterday. I noticed that the Roma tomatoes Eileen bought for me arrived from the grocery store on the ripe side. I resolved to make bruschetta, but let it go for a while. Then I asked Eileen to pick up some basil for me on Wednesday. It was starting to wilt already yesterday. So I kicked in and made the food. There was enough basil to make pesto. Yum. Eileen bought chicken and is planning to use some of this stuff when she grills the chicken. We do eat good.

Eileen has been helping with proof reading the church bulletin. Yesterday at my weekly meeting with Jen I said I wish I had three more Eileens to look over the bulletin each week. Jen said she thought that was a sweet idea. And then she paused realizing that she might be condoning a sort of polygamy which I hastened to say was not what I was thinking.

However, later I was pondering that it would be lovely to have three more people who listen to me and help me like Eileen does. You know, friends.

I’m not complaining too strongly here. After all, I had the benefit of having my brother visit this past week and we had  many good chats. And yesterday morning I had a very pleasant time playing piano duets with  my colleague, Rhonda (Thank you again for a lovely time, Rhonda!) I value these relationships as they stand.

I keep sleeping in a bit. I think my body is still trying to adjust to California time. This morning I was showering when Eileen got up. I hadn’t even washed dishes yet. She got up early in order to go exercise this morning. That’s where she’s at right now.

She emailed a complaint letter to Lowes yesterday. They had told us that the final installation of the fence would now be mid September. This is two months after when they originally told us they could do it. The workers showed up to install it Monday but the company had sent the wrong parts. This was causing the delay. The workers went away Monday and left a huge pile of trash in front of our garage.

As I was going over to say hi to Mom, the workers pulled in to the driveway and told me they were going to finish installing the fence. Apparently the company had expedited getting the correct parts. It looks like Eileen’s complaint might possibly have had something to do with that. At any rate, our fence is now complete.

In this last pic, you can see an unfortunate bow caused by the tree roots. I say unfortunate but actually like a bit of irregularity like this.

I mentioned to the workers that the area where they had stacked a bunch of stuff from the old fence needed to be swept because of the possibility of nails left from the debris. They were unimpressed and didn’t do it. I plan to do this before pulling my car in.

Jen and I met with the people from St. Peter’s Montague yesterday. I tried to be helpful, but I’m not sure I was. I think it would be fun to connect to another Episcopalian parish, especially one that does a variety of  music and decent liturgy. St. Peter’s may be like that. But I wasn’t left with the impression they would actually use me a resource person despite telling the priest about St. James Press, IMSLP.org and playing snippets of the Widor Toccata for them. They seemed like good people but the priest is not on Facebooger.  I just sent a friend request to their pianist. We’ll see if i can actually connect with them whatever happens with the organ.

How Media Distorted Syrian Ceasefire’s Breakdown | FAIR

A thoughtful examination of the usual distortion of corporate media. Good reading.

Yusuf to Play Shows in New York on ‘A Cat’s Attic’ Tour – The New York Times

This was on my google news feed this morning. This makes me happy because I got the impression that he not only quit performing in public after renewing a commitment to Islam, but had given up music. Cool.

Blogging later in the day again. I slept in a bit. Eileen has left again. I’m writing at about 9:30 AM. She has gone to the Farmers Market and then plans to go blueberry picking. It’s a good thing she chose today to go, because the farm where she plans to pick has notified people that today is the last day for this sort of picking. She has been talking about this ever since getting back from the Hatch cabin where she and other family members picked huckleberries.

I am listening to Bartok’s Concerto for Orchestra. I checked with my record collection to find out what recording I have been listening to for years. It turns out it’s the Herbert Von Karajan one.

It’s on Spotify and Youtube.

It’s funny how you get used to a recording of a work. It’s almost as if a composition slowly changes into or adds attributes of a “sonic sculpture.”

Incidentally, I recently read a foosebooger post by my old friend, Jonathon Fegel, where he used the phrase, “sonic sculpture.” It made me smile. I’m pretty sure he got this phrase from our discussions years ago when we saw more of each other.

I was recently looking for Garry Trudeau’s prescient take on the Donald published over a decade ago. I was browsing at the library, discovering that Trudeau was not shelved with the other “comics.’ Then I spotted some beautiful books on the shelf.  

Mark happened to be nearby. I asked him if he recognized the author, Lynd Ward. Neither he nor I did. I checked out the library copy of the books because of their beauty and the fact that they were edited by Art Spiegelman.

It turns out the two volumes are Ward’s collected opus of six wordless graphic novels. All of the pictures are wood cuts. Wow. Wonderful stuff.

Mark was so impressed with the books he ordered some very low priced used copies. They are cool.

Mark is going to get on the road in about an hour or so. In the meantime we have been relaxing and chatting. Eileen took off to meet some of her family for a field trip to Michilinda the collection of “cottages” that her family was caretaker for for many years.

Mark and I were talking this morning and I discovered he didn’t know about an upcoming movie based on the works and story of Vincent Van Gogh.

Here are a couple more videos that we looked at this morning.

I think we agreed that this looked pretty cool.

Mark did get paid yesterday. Apparently Jen had asked a parishioner to hand deliver the check and they had failed do so. We picked it up while we were out yesterday.

I put off finishing this blog until Mark left. It sure was fun having him around!

Mark is hanging around a couple days after subbing at Grace. It was fun to work with him yesterday. He is such a good priest when it seems that good leaders are getting rarer and rarer. Of course, I’m biased.

We have been chatting this morning so the blog is coming out a bit later today. We are waiting for the fence people to come and start work on our new fence. All four cars (Mark’s included) have been moved out of the driveway so they can pull their equipment in.

I’m hoping that I can get started on planning for the fall soon. I have some challenges coming up such as not having an organ for a while while we prep for our new organ installation. Not sure when the old organ will go away. There are plans to refurbish the back of the church to prep for it. When this happens, the old organ will be in the way and have to go. I’m meeting with some people from a church who might want it on Wed at 1 PM.

Another challenge is several people in my choir (which seems to be getting smaller and smaller)  announced that this year they will be missing more choir. This is challenging. My solution will be to choose material that can be done with less rehearsal. This precludes much stuff that I would probably otherwise choose to do if I had a bit more commitment. At the same time, I have been pondering how to communicate to my members what I expect of them if they plan to meet me half way (attendance is one of those things, obviously).

I’m a bit disappointed that no one bothered to make sure Mark got paid yesterday for his services. Yikes! He told me that not getting paid wasn’t just about me and musicians. I guess he’s right. I just emailed Jen and asked her about this.

Books for me to read seem to keep on coming. This book was mentioned by Jeffrey Toobin in yesterday’s NYT (which i am still working my way through). He said it is the closest thing he knows to a perfect book: “It combines exhaustive reporting, elegant prose and narrative genius to remind us that class, as well as race, is at the heart of the American experience.” I’m in. My library has a copy on the shelf which I plan to check out. It’s for sale for a penny on Amazon. Cool.

When Blood Pressure Is Political – The New York Times

Allostasis? Who knew? Bookmarked to talk to my shrink about when I explain why I’m seeking therapy.

I had a phone call from the wedding soloist yesterday around 10:30 AM. She was on her way from Ann Arbor but wasn’t sure if she would make our noon appointment. I told her to call me when she arrived and I would meet her at the church. Eileen was busy getting ready to go to the annual Hatch Family reunion. She cooked a big piece of pork to take with her. I didn’t accompany her because of the wedding. As is usual these days, the wedding was weird. No singing, of course, even though the one Bible reading was one that mentioned singing. The minister preached. As I said yesterday I was the only pastoral staff person there. The janitor came in about an hour beforehand and wondered where everyone was. He was responsible for the sound system. Fortunately my soloist did not ask for a mike. By 5 PM, the place was full. No programs. After the reading of the one Bible passage the poor dude said, “the Word of the Lord.” Dead silence. The bride walked in to the soloist singing the song embedded in yesterday’s blog. We had to lower it three or four steps to fit her voice, despite my request that she tell me what key she wanted it in (“I sing it just like the YouTube”). At one point, I think she got lost. At any rate I wasn’t with her for several measures toward the end of the song. But she came through like a trooper. I got paid. When I got home Mark was already here. I hadn’t thought much about feeding him beyond thinking that there might be some leftover pork for him after Eileen got home. There was. We shot the shit for a while over martinis. I do enjoy his company (Hi Mark!). I’m still recovering from a different time zone and slept in until 6:30 this morning.

Shostakovich mentions in his memoirs that it is Bernstein which he prefers as American conductor of his works. Having said that I couldn’t find this reference this morning so maybe I read it somewhere else. At any rate, I enjoy this recording immensely and listened to it last night.

Once again I am blogging a bit late. I am waiting for a phone call from the soloist for today’s wedding. She and I were supposed to meet at noon but apparently she is on her way from Ann Arbor and didn’t think she would be here in time.  I told her to phone me when she was in town and ready to practice.

There is no bulletin for today’s wedding. They may have printed up something themselves,  but our office did not do one as far as i can tell. I think I may be the only person from Grace’s staff involved in this wedding. Weird. I dreamed about it last night. Someone from the wedding was handing me sheet music and wasn’t sure where they wanted the piece performed in the wedding.

I’m not too worried about this wedding. The solo is a goofy pop song.

I was rehearsing it in my dreams last night. It’s very easy. When they hand me pop music I don’t worry very much about it. In my dream I was playing it on guitar.

I think I’m going to quit because it’s a little after noon and I’m expecting to be called over to the church soon.

We are expecting a shipment of fence materials this morning. I got up early, showered, did the dishes, made coffee, and then moved the cars out of the driveway. They won’t start working on the fence until next week.

Eileen and I both are still tired from our California marathon.

I ordered a real copy of Derek Walcott’s poetry book above this morning. I was able to buy it used for around $10. His poetry continues to impress me. I own one volume and would like to have the above collection in my library to read.

It’s looking like Trump may have finally stepped over some sort of line with his current behavior.

I only wish that the election was closer so that his current waning support would cost him the presidency. While the fact that there are so many people who would vote for him is terrifying to me, more terrifying is the idea that he would be leader of this country.

On the other hand, Clinton looks more unattractive to me everyday. Trump is definitely being outdanced but I am feeling less and less confident that the Democrats will not continue to hurt the country if elected (drones, privacy issues, campaign finance). Ah well. All governments are jerks. But I still feel that it’s responsible to exercise my franchise and will vote for Clinton.

At the Ontario airport in Corona I wandered into the airport bookshop looking for a magazine to read on the flight. I had brought two magazines with me on the flight there and it had been convenient to have a magazine to read in the cramped quarters. With a magazine in hand I wouldn’t be entirely dependent on my devices and the few books I had brought along for diversion. I quickly discovered that magazines were boring and extremely expensive. Than I spied a paperback copy of Viet Than Nguyen’s novel, The Sympathizer.

This book was on my list of books I intended to read. So I bought a copy and read in it on the way back home.

Viet Thanh Nguyen was born in Vietnam in 1971. His family migrated to the US in 1975 fleeing from Saigon as it was taken over by the North Vietnamese. His novel digs back into the history of Vietnam and the USA. I’m about 100 pages in. I think he is an amazing writer. He has insights that are extremely pertinent for a country still waging wars in other parts of the globe.

Plus it’s a good read. The main character is a communist spy embedded in the South Vietnamese refugee population. It was interesting to me that Nguyen’s main character ended up in L.A. after spending time in barracks at Camp Pendleton. Nguyen, himself, lives and teaches in L.A. Perusing his wikipedia article I found that he briefly attended University of California Riverside. These places are places I recognize. My son was a Marine at Pendleton and I believe he attended U of C Riverside for a while.

I had forgotten that The Sympathizer won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2016. Nguyen has written a nonfiction companion volume,  Nothing Ever Dies: Vietnam and the Memory of War. His wikipedia article quotes Nguyen’s website: calling it  “the critical bookend to a creative project whose fictional bookend was The Sympathizer”

Vietnam looms large in my life. Not only did I live through the terrible time we were at war there (and have to deal with the possibility of being drafted into the armed services to fight there), but I have known many people from Vietnam including people like the people in The Sympathizer. I am tempted at this point to add Nothing Ever Dies to my list of books to read.

My copy of this book was on the kitchen table when we arrived last night having arrived in the mail while I was in California. McNeil, the author, died last month. I read his obit and decided it might be interesting to read some of his work.

Last night I listened carefully to the first three movements of Shostakovich’s Fifth Symphony.

I am reading his memoirs. I was amazed at how beautiful I found this music. Shostakovich’s life was one of turmoil and continual fear and impending disaster. He walked a fine line of artistic integrity and personal survival in Stalin’s Russia. I recently read a fictionalization of some of the events in his life (The Noise of Time by Julian Barnes). It captures a lot of this fear in the image of Shostakovich waiting by an elevator in the building he lived.

He has his bags packed and is waiting there to prevent the secret service from crashing into his apartment and taking him by force. This does not happen, although Shostakovich did face questioning including an intimidating phone call from Stalin in which he declined to represent Russia in America. 

He did end up coming to America. Unlike many people in Russia and Europe escaping terrible lives, he seems to have hated America. He loved his country but knew it well.

Anyway, I only mention all this to underline the miracle of how I hear his music not only dealing emotionally with a troubled life and country but also containing much that is beautiful and redemptive to my ears.

I embed this recording largely because it has the 2 piano score for the listener to follow. I was surprised to find that I was able to download the complete score and follow it on Scribd on my tablet.

It was random that I found it (googled). Scribd seems to be a paid subscription service for ebooks and audiobooks. Surprisingly they seem to have music scores as well. I am using a three free items offer to look at the score of Shostakovich’s symphony. The monthly rate is $8.99. This gives you access to 3 books and 1 audiobook each month. But also apparently unlimited access to their sheet music collection.

Very stupidly they don’t seem to provide a definite list of what they have. Dumb. Without knowing exactly which scores they make available I have little interest in subscribing.

Our annual California Jenkins visit is coming to an end. Eileen and I get on a plane this morning to go back home.

Whenever we visit California, I have lots of odd associations going through my brain. It’s hard not to think of Raymond Carver.

And just now between listening to Shostakovich this morning and an insistent ringing telephone (the old fashioned ring) I feel like I’m in the movie Barton Fink.

Anyway it’s been a good visit, but I am definitely looking forward to getting home.

Our time in California is drawing to a close. It has been good to see the fam and have some time off. It’s been good to have wifi and a piano to practice on.

I feel a debt of gratitude to Nicholas’s piano teacher. Czerny’s Opus 337 was sitting on the piano when we arrived. There was a little  note to Nicholas from his teacher to do each section 20 times. She was merely repeating Czerny’s instructions.

I waited until everyone was out of the house yesterday and then followed the instructions of Czerny and Nicholas’s piano teacher. Reading in Nicholas’s edition reveals that Czerny was himself a piano teacher of some note and taught 10-12 hours a day if we are to believe the notes in the book.

I found this work online and put it on my tablet. It seems to be something I would like to add to my piano technique rehearsal. Cool. I asked Nicholas if his teacher insists on Czerny’s fingerings which strike me as a bit odd. He said she did. Good enough for me. I also asked him if he had done any of the sections 20 times yet. Nope. I told him when I was his age I didn’t see the sense in the Hanon exercises my piano teacher assigned me. Why do them? I could already pretty much sight read them which is what I did in my weekly lesson. It wasn’t until much later that I began to get more serious about learning to play the piano. Nicholas seems to have tucked a good bit of technique under his belt at this point, certainly more than anything I had before David, his dad, was born.

I finished LeGuin’s little book of poetry I purchased at Farenheit 451 bookstore. It was fun. It reminded me of the verse that sometimes occurs in her novels.

Speaking of poetry, I neglected to mention how fitting Derek Walcott’s Collected Poems were to read sitting by the ocean. He is a poet of craft and uses his Caribbean childhood as a continue wellspring of inspiration.

My sunburn is still itching. It affected my sleep but it wasn’t as bad as it was the first time it went nuts.

I’m blogging a bit later this morning. California is three hours later than Holland Michigan anyway so this is even later than the time lag. I slept in this morning until 6 AM local time. Usually when I get up here in California no one else is awake. This morning someone (Nicholas it turns out) was taking a shower in the bathroom by where we are sleeping. He has choir camp today and tomorrow.

Today is my daughter-in-law’s birthday. She asked  me if I would go with her to Starbucks this morning for coffee for her birthday. So that’s what we ended up doing. David joined us and one of her sisters and nieces stopped by while we were there to wish her a Happy Birthday!

It was good to have a Sunday off yesterday. I do think just being physically out of town helps. We took the kids for our annual bookstore trip where we give them money to buy books. That’s always fun. Eileen and I managed to restrain from buying anything. Then we went to Five Guys for a grandparent/grandkid lunch. Good times.

I am getting some reading and study in. There is a decent piano here so I have been doing some practicing. This morning I emailed the music for this Sunday to this office. My brother is coming to substitute for my boss on Sunday. This will be fun.  He and I haven’t been able to do too much church together over the years since he has been ordained so this will be a treat.

I picked out a prelude which can be done on manuals: David Johnson’s setting of the opening hymn: “How wondrous and great,” tune: Lyons. I have a soft spot in my heart for Johnson. He always writes clearly and with excellent craft. He is dead now, of course. But I do use his material from time to time. I’m planning on an improvised postlude on the closing hymn: “Give Me Oil in My Lamp.”

My nephew, Trevor Jenkins, messaged me on Facebooger yesterday. This was a surprise. At first I wasn’t sure he was a real person. But after a few comments, it became obvious that it was really him. I probably have met him. He is the son of my late cousin, Alan. He’s 33 now and still seems to be adjusting to life. I do like connecting with family.

On the outskirts of LA, there is an obscure little museum about printing. David somehow ran across this and organized an expedition for us yesterday.

It was a fascinating collection of printing presses some of which are apparently historical.

This was our tour guide. I believe his name was Richard Small. He was funny and informative and continually quizzed my grand kids about things such as “Did they know where pasta originated…. the same place as printing?” Not Italy (their guess) but China!

This press was a replica of a replica of the Gutenberg press. After a bit Mr. Small walked us over to another building where he handed us over to two more docents who were equally entertaining and informative. One got the impression of stumbling into a meeting of older men in a guild (which is in fact what they are).

The last docent demonstrated this Heidelberg printing press. It was satisfying to watch and listen to him, since it was obvious how much he adored this machine. He talked about its precision. If you put one period on a page and ran the same sheet through several times you would only see that period since the machine was so precise. He also pointed out that in order to create a speeding up and slowing down that was necessary in the process two of the rollers were made of very dense material, one weighing more than a tone. Imagine, he said, that this roller had to be brought quickly to a stop and then started again. Then he took a nickel and put it on its edge on a part of the machine. While this huge machine ran, the nickle remained on its edge. Very cool.

Toward the end of the tour, everyone was invited to write down their name to be printed up by the linotype machine. I put mine all in lower case but to no avail.

We were given the actual metal type face made with our name on it to keep (note the foot of your reporter above).

On the way to the museum, my sun burn began to itch incredibly. My son, David, was kind enough to stop and allow me to buy some aloe gel. This helped.

I had been dumb enough to neglect to put on sunblock when I swam in the ocean a few days ago. After we got home, the itch began again with a vengeance. I googled it and found that this had a name: Hell’s Itch.

It was no joke. I was in the shower for a long time cooling it off. The aloe gel didn’t help. My googling revealed that the skin was healing itself and the only effective relief would come from showers and application of A & D ointment. My daughter-in-law, Cynthia, brought me some on purchased on her way home from work. That did help. Boy do i feel stupid.

It’s still uncomfortable but much much better.

At the Front in a Scarred Falluja – The New York Times

I think the use of “first person” in this article is weird. Maybe it’s supposed to be a feature but in my interface it was simply in the line up of news stories. The article starts with the word, “I.”