Salter

“In the end, writing is like a prison, an island from which you will never be released but which is a kind of paradise: the solitude, the thoughts, the incredible joy of putting into words the essence of what you for the moment understand and with your whole heart want to believe.”

via Counterpoint Press

I didn’t mean to write about him, even think about him. —He was a hero of mine until I came to realize some things: what I really liked was the prose. Some of it just breathtaking. It was not about the plot or the story. And he died too late to circumvent the last novel. I don’t know if the prose came to life further into All That Is, I turned away before I could say one way or another. And he personally failed me. (I always take my writers personally.) — But I happened across “Why I Write” in Lit Hub and so I came to be here once more. So there’s the quote and there’s the photo, of a much younger Salter than the one we buried. Indeed. It is for the moment what you understand, and believe.

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It’s just that sort of day…the type wherein the mind bolts from containment. Too much, too much, too much… So, herein, methinks whatsoever I choose will work. Or not. But of no matter. For what is a “matter” anyway?

Isn’t it odd and fun how a word loses all meaning and sense when it is said repeatedly?

Today is brought to you by yesterday and tomorrow has no significance. Yet the same thing will occur, over and over.

posted by Amazing World

Lines for Posterity:

Happy Birthday, Raymond Chandler July 23, 2013 | by Sadie Stein

“Tall, aren’t you?” she said.

“I didn’t mean to be.”

Her eyes rounded. She was puzzled. She was thinking. I could see, even on that short acquaintance, that thinking was always going to be a bother to her.

—Raymond Chandler, The Big Sleep

And then: The Viking god, Odin, had two ravens, Hugin (thought) and Munin (memory), which flew around the world every day and reported back to Odin every night about what they saw. I have a friend who is certain that all of the creatures, birds, dogs, wolves, all, are taking note of what we do and say. They then report back to Heaven (God, et.al.) who then takes that in to account for our personal record. Heavenly spies, I guess.

“But knowledge does not protect one. Life is contemptuous of knowledge; it forces it to sit in the anterooms, to wait outside. Passion, energy, lies: these are what life admires.”― James Salter, Light Years

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The Japanese understood the connection between horses and women, females. They knew, understood, painted them together, in a certain light. That is how you capture, and keep.

I wish you love, and redemption. Then you might make it okay. Redemption is Forgiveness earned.