Peter’s Home
Yaaaay.
And we went out to dinner and, you know, talked. That thing we don’t do because we’re together all the time, and furthermore we lead kind of un-discussion-worthy lives. I mean, I know I run around a lot–let’s not call it caroming–doing stuff, but none of it is the cure-for-cancer, breaking-the-land-speed-record, discovering-a-new-breed-of-earwig type of thing. You can tart stuff up for a blog, it’s harder with a husband, someone who’s, you know, looking at you while you do your nut. So we fill in crosswords when we go out to dinner–I’ve told you this–so we don’t have to ruin the mood by making conversation. Tonight we acted like normal people going out to dinner. We talked. Peter’s trip seems to have been a great success. I was probably most worried that–during the extra day he took before the con began, to get himself on American time–he and my old friend, who’d never met before, would loathe each other on sight and I’d have to spend the rest of my life never mentioning either’s name to the other*, which was going to be difficult. But they seem to have got on fine. (Especially Peter and the Dog, whom Peter says they have trained to frisk and frolic and suck up charmingly–the way dogs can do and people can’t–and make guests feel welcome.) And Peter had several of his con people tell him how much they liked my books, and apparently one bloke praised me for daring to tackle writing about ‘a troubled teenage boy.’ Snork! It never occurred to me he was troubled. Jake’s just a little stressed out. That’s basically how I managed to get inside his skin: I know about stressed out. . . .
Anyway, for some reason I’m shattered. ** So I’m going to take THE BLUE CASTLE and go to bed. A strangely psychic friend has just sent it to me. I know the Anne books of course and I know of Emily but I’ve never read her, but I’m going to have to, after the number of people who’ve mentioned her on Pollyanna’s booklist, and why. But I’d never heard of Blue Castle till several of you posted it and I thought, okay, really have to try that one. But I hadn’t got any farther. I certainly hadn’t written to my strangely psychic friend about it.
So instead of going on and on in my standard fashion I thought I’d post one of my favourite photos of Peter, in honour of the day’s events. This is from several years ago, taken at Wisley, which is the big Royal Horticultural Society garden about an hour away from here, in Surrey. When we were commuting up and down to London several times a month we used to stop at Wisley pretty frequently, for lunch, and a schmooze through the garden.*** Not so often in later years. This was one midsummer when I’d dragged Peter there to look at the roses. Peter tacks through a field of roses at a speed of knots. I was there with my camera and, having got so far, was not going to be shifted quickly. Peter disappeared. I found him: thus. Sorry about the tilt in the horizon, but I was so afraid he’d move before I took the photo. He said later that he was plotting. Oh, of course. It’s a posture I too might take under pressure of story. Not in a rose garden however.
* * *
* Maybe they did loathe each other. And the one thing they agreed on was that they couldn’t tell me, because it would mean I would have to spend the rest of my life never mentioning, etc .
** The repossession of a husband is an exhausting event. Is jet lag contagious?
*** And a schmooze through the shop. They have a terrific shop full of Tasteful Gifty Things that you actually like, plus a perfectly enormous wall of gardening books. I head for the rose shelves first, of course, am tragedified when there isn’t anything I want and transcendent when there is. It’s a problem when you’ve been doing/reading something for a while: you actually learn stuff, and you then inevitably get fussy about the quality of new info. It’s almost a champagne occasion any more when there’s a new rose book worthy of its space in my life.
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Welcome home, Peter! Glad to hear things went well!
And that really is a great picture. He fits perfectly on that bench. :D
That bench was probably made for him.
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Welcome home, and as we say in Greece, kalos ton dehtikate (which means that we hope you were well to welcome him and glad to have him – Greeks have appropriate wishes for each occasion).
It is lovely to have a topic of conversation with a loved one, isn’t it. Because I mean, obviously, you like talking to him, and it’s a pleasure to do so, if you hae something to say… That sounds incoherent I know.
Love the photo. It manages to be eccentric Englishman, deep thinker, knight-errant resting and medieval tomb-like in position. Fabulous!
That’s a great picture. Welcome home, Peter!
The Blue Castle is fun. if you’re interested in weirdness, read The Blue Castle and then go look for The Ladies of Missalonghi, by Colleen McCullough. It’s almost a parody, although McCullough swears she didn’t plagiarise. In your enormous (nonexistent) swathes of free time.
In your enormous (nonexistent) swathes of free time.
****** I’ll do that, then. :)
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If you like the Blue Castle, which is one of my favourite Montgomery books, you might try also, the Tangled Web or Magic for Marigold or Jane of Lantern Hill. One of the things I love about Montgomery is the quietly subversive pokes she makes at the little human hypocrisies she sees in her world. And the interesting solutions to things that her heroines come up with. I always thought I’d like to see the Blue Castle done as a stage play. Valancy’s family would be a hoot to play on stage.
Let us know how you like it. And if you do, I really urge you to check out the Tangled Web.
Have you ever been inclined to write for the stage?
By the way, glad to hear Peter’s home safe and sound. My other half was to go on a business trip too this weekend but we had an eventful few days because he’s ended up in the hospital instead. Bleh. But he’ll get his treatment and then, come home. That photo of him on the bench is great!
Oh, and lastly, so jealous and pleased for you that you’ve (found)/made/eked out time for horses!
A
Ended up in HOSPITAL??! He’s okay?!?
. . . The stage, no. But I have two-thirds of a screenplay written, which I suspect I will eventually heave a heavy sigh over and turn into a novel. It has what I think are several such FILMIC scenes, but I haven’t the intestinal fortitude to do the shopping around Hollywood thing.
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Thanks for asking. He’s okay. Just needs his gall bladder out. Gallstones travelled where they shouldn’t and so he’s all a lovely shade of yellow (that was my clue to go the hospital and NOT the airport) ;) Blockage stones were removed today and the bladder will be taken out tomorrow. Thankfully, he has something wrong but he’s not very sick, if you get what I mean. Speaking as a spouse and also a doctor, might the universe arrange it that I can just work as a doctor NOT on my own dear ones please!!! I much prefer being the professional and not the worried relative. This way is too stressful.
And I thought my life was busy enough before… ha! anyways, it does comfort me to see that i’m not the only one wishing for 48 hours to the day as well. I am constantly amazed when I read about the various things that take up your time and imagine how many others there are that you don’t blog about… glad to hear I’m not the only one with a slightly out of control life!
…. speaking of stage, I wasn’t thinking of Hollywood but rather a live theatre production. Think Harold Pinter rather than Stephen Spielberg. Hollywood’s rather scary anddifficult. See what they’ve done to other great works of fantasy…
speaking of stage, I wasn’t thinking of Hollywood but rather a live theatre production.
********** ?? Yes, I know. And I said, no, I hadn’t, but I’d written part of a screenplay.
I’m not the only one with a slightly out of control life!
********* My guess is that more of us feel that way than *don’t*.
re: stage – no, screenplay yes
…er, sorry , my reading comprehension has gone downhill since the husband was hospitalized. He’s thankfully home now so hopefully, things will look up.
Courage and all amounts of intestinal fortitude to you on encountering 2 sets of galleys!
btw, the butterscotch recipe looks GREAT. I’ll have to try it.
(it gets added to the ever-growing list of things I want to try… a not insignificant part of that list comes from this blog – books, recipes, stuff to do…)
A
I’m glad he made it home okay. I can attest to the fact that he was a huge success at the conference, as I was the one who had the privilege of taking him back to the airport yesterday. I was worried that his flight would be delayed after we got horrible storms on the way home.
Oh heavens! You’re Genevieve! Yes, I’ve heard about you! Now, are you the one that gave the really interesting paper about the economics of EVA?
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I am the same one who gave that paper.
Will you post it somewhere? Can you send me a link?
That is a fantastic photo!
I’m glad Peter’s home safely, and I promise not to mention how late you were answering comments while he was away…. ;-)
Oh, and I hope you enjoy ‘The Blue Castle’ it’s a lovely comfort read,(although my favourite L M Montgomery is ‘Jane of Lantern Hill’…)
And strangely psychic friends who send you books are a very good thing to have.
Gak. I’ve never heard of Jane either.
I promise not to mention how late you were answering comments while he was away
******* BETTER HADN’T. Remember I hold the secret of the delete key!! :)
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**Gak. I’ve never heard of Jane either….**
Oh Jane is a lovely book, I’d definitely recommend it. (I’ve always been sorry that she didn’t write a sequel, but maybe it’s better that she didn’t, because if the sequel hadn’t lived up to the original that might have spoiled the magic of it… *ponders*)
I haven’t commented on your blog in a while (a few months?) because, frankly, I feel a bit to unfamiliar with the topics you usually post about to feel like I can add something that sounds relatively pertinent. If you take up sailing, or develop a desperate need to understand the history of tourism, Canadian politics, or Nova Scotia history, I’ll be chatting up a storm. However, I was one of those people touting LMM’s Emily books and especially The Blue Castle, and I’m so curious to hear what you think about TBC.
I’m trying to play it cool, though, because these kind of “did-you-like?” situations are often awkward, like when your songwriter friend plays you a new song and you have to just sit there and listen and half-smile and nod your head and agonize, the whole time, over what your *reaction* is supposed to be (and is it about you???). Or when you love, love, love this particular scene in an episode of Firefly and you’re trying to hold in your laughter in case the friends you are showing it to just don’t get it, or in case your laughter distracts them from the charm of the scene, or… well, you know. I’m trying to be *casual* here, eh? So, uh, are you liking it . . . so far?
Yes, and I’m busy hiding under the bed at the amount of excited gleeful ‘do you like it’?s I’m getting! Yes! I like it! I like the awful, awful, awful family–it’s so extreme it becomes parody but it’s very GOOD parody. And I like her name–Valancy.
I sailed in a previous life–I doubt I’m going to wedge it back into this one but I said that about piano lessons. . . .
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Yay! I’m sure you’ll sleep better now that he’s home. The Husband gets sent off on paint business now and again, and the nighttime strange outside noises always seem worse when he isn’t in the house.
Shattered maybe just because he’s home safe and you can stop worrying? Post-return relief letdown or something like that. Worrying is hard work. *Sends hugs and chocolate*
That’s a great picture. The Author At Work.
I’m sure Peter and your old friend got along just fine. They both like you, so obviously they have a lot in common. :)
Shattered maybe just because he’s home safe and you can stop worrying? Post-return relief letdown or something like that. Worrying is hard work.
********* Yes, I think that’s exactly right! ***PHEW . . . COLLAPSE.***
That’s a great picture. The Author At Work.
I’m sure Peter and your old friend got along just fine. They both like you, so obviously they have a lot in common. :)
******* Not necessarily the RIGHT things. I’m CRABBY, remember. :)
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I have yet to pick up Blue Castle. I’ve heard that The Ladies of Missalonghi by Someone Whose Name I’ve Just Forgotten and Don’t Want to Look Up is either a) a parody or b) a plagiarism of it, so I’ll have to read them together for comparison’s sake.
You must read Emily. She’s better than Anne.
You must read Emily. She’s better than Anne.
** Yes, several of you have said this over on Pollyanna, which is why I have to. I liked the first Anne, but after that . . . it was kind of just a standard heroine of a standard romance. I have the same feeling about Little Women etc.
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One of the things about the Emily trilogy is that in it, LMM creates her most realistic male character ever. Most of her men are merely rewards for the heroines, with no real personality of their own. Dean Priest, though, is real, flawed, with a steely intellect and a creepy fascination for the young Emily.
Dean Priest is one of the reasons I came to appreciate LMM as a person/author. He’s proof positive (there’s other proof, but for people who need definitive examples) that LMM was more than a writer of sweet stories – she had this astute, brilliant talent, and it seems like she spent much of her author’s career suppressing or disguising it.
Can you tell if I didn’t go the historian/landscape architect route, I would’ve been an LMM scholar? :P
Most of her men are merely rewards for the heroines, with no real personality of their own
*** Bingo.*** The reason I am mostly bored to tears by so-called chick lit.
Here is where a favourable exposure to a book in childhood/adolescence makes us able to forgive some author’s shortcomings but not others. Because I liked LMM’s work as a young’un, when I came to analyze their faults, I learned more about her as a person, and decided to accept her authorial blindnesses, because her other characters are so winning, or have transformative stories (e.g. Marilla), or compelling relationships (e.g. between families – and what makes a family – and friendships, etc.).
I didn’t have the best experience of Kipling, for instance, and so can never forgive him for his othering and sensationalism, despite the fact that he was a product of his time. It’s odd, b/c I know you were influenced by him and I love your writing, but that short story where the Hindu girl in love with the soldier has her hands cut off was the end for me.
Interesting. That story is still giving me nightmares thirty years later. But give him his due–he was *against* what he was presenting there!
The Blue Castle? You haven’t read it before? I hope you like it. It’s one of my favorite LM Montgomery books. My sister and I have long and hopeless arguments about the pronunciation of the heroine’s name.
Yay for Peter being back!
I’m saying VALancy. What do you say?
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I say ValANCY, but my sister agrees with you. My personal opinion is that any name that sounds like a window treatment must be pronounced differently.
I know what you mean, but I call the window/bed thing VAY-lence. Valancy is VALancy.
Ah, I see. Well that makes sense. As I said, my sister and I will never stop (mock) arguing over it.
THE BLUE CASTLE is one of my favorite books ever! Enjoy it!
It does take it out of you, repossessing a husband. Mine worked out of town for three years before he retired and came home every other weekend, so I can vouch for it. Of course that put us in your recent dinner situation, actually talking in a restaurant if we went out, which we never do now because we’re in the same house all the time, doing the usual stuff. I’m glad Peter got home safely (and hopefully on time, which has been a big problem for air travelers here).
My husband would also gravitate to the bench in a rose garden. Or any garden. If the sun didn’t put him to sleep (ahem) he would spend his time wondering how much longer I would be . . .
Diane in MN (can’t tell if the software is having name issues tonight)
It’s very frustrating that here, gardening, is something that Peter actually DOES, and he STILL gets through a garden–I don’t even say a ROSE garden–1,000,000 times faster than I do.
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‘The Blue Castle”! I haven’t read that for years – just checked the bookshelf and I do own a copy, so I may revisit it myself. I remember loving it as a kid.
There was big scandal a couple of years ago, where Colleen McCullough, well-respected Australian author was accused of plagarising ‘The Blue Castle’ in her book ‘The ladies of Missalonghi’. Aparently, they are quite similiar, but McCullough vehemently denied the plagarism, although she had read TBC as a child, but had forgotten it. Subconcious at work, perhaps.
Mind you, I’ve gone off McCullough recently. She came out in defence of the men of Pitcairn Island, recently tried for years of sexual abuse of female children. It’s not a ‘social custom’ I can readily overlook.
Susan in Melbourne
She came out in defence of the men of Pitcairn Island
******** Good gods. No, that won’t do. I read a fair amount about it and I don’t buy the local custom thing either. It’s abuse of power–as usual. In a tiny society it’s easy for absolute power to corrupt absolutely.
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I think a rose garden seems a very nice place for that kind of posture. I bet it is good for working out things other than plotting. (If I find a bench and it actually stops raining at some point I might try it).
And my favourite word of the day: tragedified.
Thank you for spending the time on this blog. I look forward to reading it each morning.
That’s a fantastic picture. :) My father does this in museums, he never reads labels and whizzes through them so quickly that it’s possible he arrives back at the beginning of the gallery before we started. But rather than finding a bench as above, he stands around and huffles impatiently at us when we finally emerge.
Glad he made it back safe and sound!
The Blue Castle!!? Oh, I’m SO glad you’re reading that! It’s my absolute favorite of all her books (and I’m sure I won’t be the first person to say that on here), and I have read them all rather exhaustively. I hope you’ll enjoy it.
And you really must read the Emily series. But you know that. I’ll stop being redundant now. :)
Nah. If I don’t mention Emily in the next six months or so, nag me. :)
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Oh I hope you like The Blue Castle– I think it’s lovely. Let us know please!
oh my, i just love that book! do hope you enjoy it – looking forward to hearing what you thought about it.
all of my bookclub and i are patheticly huge fans. glad to have come across your blog!
Thank you! :)
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>>I’ll be looking forward to the NICE PRESENT he brings back for me. Surely there must be suitable shopping opportunities in Bloomington. Jewellery is good.<<
We’re on tenterhooks…what nice prezzie did Peter bring back for you?
Oh, lovely!
And I just had to make a shout of joy over _The Blue Castle_. I can’t wait to hear what you think of it. It’s one of the books I reach for when _Jane Eyre_ is more than I have time to read and yet need something special..
“He said later that he was plotting. Oh, of course. It’s a posture I too might take under pressure of story.”
Love the pose – very….heraldic. Perhaps it was that sort of storyline being developed? Very glad Peter is safely back home, anyway, after a good trip.
I like Wisley’s Long Border in summer (though I tell myself that our somewhat liberal scattering of weeds between the intentional plants is far more wildlife-friendly than their immaculate setting). That’s the line I’m sticking too, anyway. :)
heraldic.
******** LOL! Yes! This hadn’t occurred to me!
I like Wisley’s Long Border in summer (though I tell myself that our somewhat liberal scattering of weeds between the intentional plants is far more wildlife-friendly than their immaculate setting). That’s the line I’m sticking too, anyway. :)
********* I look at their long border and **quail.**
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“I look at their long border and **quail.**”
Yes, I do too. Then I tell myself very firmly that if I had that much time and money I could achieve a similar effect and I walk up the hill and console myself with the demonstration kitchen gardens – they’re less overwhelming. :)
The first gardening book I read when becoming a garden person (as opposed to an ‘Oh look, flowers’ person) was ‘The Small Garden’ by C E Lucas-Phillips. I can still remember my stupefaction at one of his phrases, to the effect that ‘of course, a varied herbaceous border cannot be achieved with less than 10 feet in depth. My own ‘small garden’ at that time was a vast 20 x 50 feet! The rest of the book is very good though.
******** The repossession of a husband is an exhausting event.
It’s all that worrying about him and those fridge doors… only when you stop worrying does the strain that’s been galloping after you like an express train manage to catch you up and run you over. I hope you have some time to relax and unwind and catch up with each other over the next couple of days.
And congrats to Peter on his success. Hurrah!!
This reminds me of one of Peter’s favourite quotes. I can’t remember where it comes from–I’ll ask Peter tomorrow (at a more civilised hour). But it’s talking about suitable plants for this and that area of your garden and how your garden should be laid out, and declares grandly: ‘no garden, however small, should ever be without at least two acres of woodland.’
” ‘no garden, however small, should ever be without at least two acres of woodland.’”
Well of course I agree with whoever it was (sounds a bit Lucas-Phillips-ish to me) – but what I’d like to know is who is going to give me the two acres of adjacent woodland – and how will my neighbours feel about it! And we would immediately install a tree-top walk, modelled on the new Kew one (http://www.bbc.co.uk/london/nature/kew/), of course. :)
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Yes, me too, all of that. Except I haven’t seen the Kew walk yet. Read about it.
Two main reasons I like L M Montgomery are her sense of humour and her ironical observation of character and behaviour – all those side characters and people who are only mentioned come alive and give an impression of a comunity. Here’s an example (that’s somewhat decently short – I could quote pages) of what I like:
“I think the baby should be called after one of our missionairies. It’s a shame that we have three foreign missionairies in the connection and and not one of them has a namesake – even if they are only fourth cousins. I suggest we call her Harriet after the oldest one.”
“But” said Aunt Anne, “that would be slighting Ellen and Louise.”
“Well” said Young Grandmother haughtily – Young Grandmother was haughty because nobody had suggested naming the baby after HER – “call her the whole three names, Harriet Ellen Louise Lesley. Then no fourth cousin need feel slighted.”
The suggestion seemed to find favour. Lorraine caught her breath anxiously and looked at Uncle Klon. But rescue came from another quarter.
“Have you ever” said Old Grandmother with a wicked chuckle, “thought what the initials spell?”
They hadn’t. They did. Nothing more was said about missionairies.
(From “Magic for Marigold”)
The enjoyable and fun parts make the books that I otherwise am not so fond of – like, I must confess, “A Tangled Web” and “Magic for Marigold” – well worth reading. Also I must confess: I like Anne!