Patty Griffin songs - sweet and sad and true

You might not have heard of Patty Griffin, but you probably know the singers who've sung her songs, who admire her as a singer and a songwriter. The Dixie Chicks, Jessica Simpson, Linda Ronstadt, Martina McBride. One of her songs even appeared in a mainstream Hollywood film - "We Were Soldiers," performed by Mary Chapin Carpenter.

I found Patty Griffin's own version of "Dear Old Friend" a while ago, and it set off a flood of thoughts and emotions. It's a song to listen to if you've ever lost a friend to illness, war, graduation and moving away. Though the last stanza sounds hopeful - "how will we smile ever again / i'm asking you sincerely, my dear old friend / the moon on the hill says we probably will" - it's a wistful sort of hope, even fleeting. It's very much like the final scene in "Once Upon A Time in the West," when Jill asks Harmonica to come back again. He has a look in his eyes that says he's already miles away, and when he says, "Someday," you know that "someday" will never come to pass.

"Dear Old Friend" by Patty Griffin (13 Ways to Live)

how will we smile ever again
i'm asking you sincerely, my dear old friend
what do you say, is there a way
my dear old friend

how will we smile ever again
i'm asking you sincerely, my dear old friend
the moon on the hill says we probably will
my dear old friend

Jessica Simpson's album A Public Affair is mostly upbeat. You can tell she's moved on from her divorce, her grief; all determined to have a grand time. But one song stands out in its spare yet breathtaking rendition, and it's the closest reference to the recent events in her life. Though I didn't care much for the other songs on the album - or any of her earlier music, for that matter - I thought she nailed this one. Beautifully.

"Let Him Fly" by Patty Griffin (performed by Jessica Simpson in A Public Affair)

Ain't no talkin to this man
Ain't no pretty other side
Ain't no way to understand the stupid words of pride
It would take an acrobat, and I already tried all that so
I'm gonna let him fly

And there ain't no talkin to this man
He's been tryin to tell me so
It took awhile to understand the beauty of just letting go
Cause it would take an acrobat, I already tried all that
I'm gonna let him fly
I'm gonna let him fly
I'm gonna let him fly

The Children of Hurin

It's been ages since I last wrote anything about The Lord of the Rings. I even thought about closing my "Lord of the Rings Fanfare" category. The films came and went, and so did the extended-edition DVDs. Most of us found that there was life after the final easter egg was discovered on the final DVD. We moved on.

But now, I expect we're going to make a U-turn and head back to Middle-Earth. A new story, and maybe another movie? For here comes a new stand-alone book from the Tolkien household. Begun by J.R.R. Tolkien and finished by his son, Christopher, who spent nearly three decades poring over his father's notes and drafts to produce The Children of Hurin. I read bits of the tragic tale from The Silmarillion and The Unfinished Tales and I look forward to having the story fleshed out into a full-length novel.

Some have been saying the book has much potential for a film - battle scenes, a major twist, tragic characters. I'm all for it, as long as they bring back the original LOTR film team.

More information on the book, to be released April 17 - can be found here.

Quirky couples

It's been a while since I highlighted any movie trailers, so I watched about eight in a row yesterday and found two that made me laugh. They're both about rather unusual pairings - just observe the facial expressions, the dressing, the personal obsession with revenge and dogs. Animals are pretty symbolic in both movies - dog, shark, eagle.

Eagle vs. Shark, a film from New Zealand, showcases the stranger of the two couples. Sure Jarrod and Lily are peculiar and awkward, but they're also highly watchable and endearing. Lily's shy, and Jarrod's like a boy trapped in a man's body with a fringe so short it takes even more years off him.

The title of Year of the Dog made me think of Chinese New Year. Ideally, it should've opened last year instead of this year. Anyway, it seems like typical Hollywood romantic-comedy-fare, but from what I've read, the film explores singlehood and depression and animal welfare issues. Even if it fails to accomplish this, it has John C. Reilly! And Peter Sarsgaard just glows in the trailer. He's never been known for romantic roles, but he cleaned up very well for this film, and it certainly helps that he still sounds mellow and mysterious, very John-Malkovich-like. Incidentally, he played John Malkovich's son in The Man in the Iron Mask, the young musketeer who Leonardo DiCaprio - as King Louis - had off-ed so that he could lay claim to Sarsgaard's fiancee.

The dogs look great, and the eagle and shark costumes? Spectacular.

Looking for Autumn

I miss the seasons. Before I went away to college, I used to imagine what it'd be like to ride a sled, to have a white Christmas, to watch trees morph from bare to bounteous, to see those same trees lose their leaves half a year later. Many people have favorites, but I've always found it hard to choose one. Every season fills me with different emotions and varied beauty (which reminds me of Gerard Manley Hopkins's poem "Pied Beauty" - see below), and I relish the change the seasons bring and represent.

Still, if I had to think of one that affected me most, I'd choose fall. Autumn arrives during my birthday month, and its palette holds some of the richest, grandest colors - red, gold, orange, yellow. Of the seasons, fall is the one that brings to mind the passing of time, the memory of what is lost, the thought of what will die. I don't necessarily enjoy these thoughts but having them stirs other thoughts of the good things that I have and that do take place.

When I read this article, I thought of two things - how much I miss autumn, and whether I could have accomplished what the writer did. I liked that he had to find the spot where the photo was taken. I've felt that before, that hunger for an answer, a piece of knowledge, a name or word. But I never had the kind of contacts the writer does and many of my own quests fell by the wayside! So it was with a sharp, vicarious pleasure that I read about his hunt for autumn.

"Pied Beauty" by Gerard Manley Hopkins

Glory be to God for dappled things -
For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches' wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced - fold, fallow, and plough;
And all trades, their gear and tackle and trim.
All things counter, original, spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
Praise Him.

Fly away home

I've never flown a kite before, but I liked watching people fly them. When I lived right by Bedok Reservoir, I often took walks there and sometimes stopped to admire several avid kite fliers, their arms deftly maneuvering the kites like soaring puppets. They reminded me of the one red balloon that, as a child, I lost hold of one Saturday afternoon. I'd stared hard at it then - just as I stared at the kites - watching it drift farther into the sky, thinking that it was heading straight for the land of lost balloons, where they bobbed eternally and held balloon parties for newcomers.

It's been ten years since I went to the reservoir, and I wonder if they still fly kites there. And listening to Rosie Thomas's "Kite Song" brought back all those images. The gentle bobbing of balloons; the sharp, graceful swerves of kites as they traverse the sky. Of course I learned eventually that balloons fall back to earth and sag into forlorn swatches of rubber, but kites...a kite may fall, lie low for some time, and then the wind will find it again and pull it skyward for a new journey.

"Kite Song" by Rosie Thomas

Oh, tie me to the end of a kite
So I can go on, I can go on with my life
Every marigold I pass below will be my guiding light
I just want to go away from here

Oh, tie me ever tightly by your side
So I may go with you wherever you reside
And anytime the road looks dimmer
I will be your guiding light
I just want to go away with you
I just want to go away with you

Love stories

There are sweet love stories like these and moving tributes by authors like Calvin Trillin.

Then I read something like this, which isn't just about abiding love but also the horror of war on soldiers and their families, and I can't help but feel horrified: first at my reaction to the photographs, and then at the war that begets such awful scars - emotional, physical, psychological.

I crawl back to my copy of About Alice, where Calvin Trillin writes about never ceasing in his attempts to impress Alice.

But I never stopped trying to match that evening - not just trying to entertain her but trying to impress her. Decades later - after we had been married for more than thirty-five years, after our girls were grown - I still wanted to impress her. I still knew that if I ever disappointed her in some fundamental way - if I ever caused her to conclude that, after all was said and done, she should have said no when, at the end of that desperate comedy routine, I asked her if we could have dinner sometime - I would have been devastated.

No wonder someone once wrote, "But will he love me like Calvin loves Alice?"

Trillin's writing is comforting, more than capable of moving my withering soul. But as I read a line Alice quotes - "To live fully is to live with an awareness of the rumble of terror that underlies everything" (Ernest Becker) - I think of the times when terror does more than rumble, and how one struggles to keep living, to say nothing of living fully.

List of 3s

Luckily for dimsumdolly, I managed to renew my domain name even though it expired several days ago, otherwise I wouldn't be able to respond to her tag.

But yes, it's been four years since I started this blog, and perhaps there should be more fanfare about it, but I've been insanely busy with teaching and editing. I'm counting down to the two-week break that begins the last week of March. Perhaps I'll finally be able to reply to emails that have been lying around for a couple of months, read more books (though I did read three novels during the Chinese New Year break; snacking at obscure relatives' homes be damned, I want my reading time), finish unpacking, buy more furniture to store whatever hasn't been unpacked, maybe get to a few more milongas and yoga classes.

For now, I'd better take care of this list.

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3 things that scare me:
Losing any one of my senses
Violence
Being scared

3 people who make me laugh:
Zach Braff as Dr. J.D.
John C. McGinley as Dr. Perry Cox
Calvin Trillin from "The New Yorker"

3 things I love:
The sea
Books
Unicorns (of the fierce and terrible beauty types)

3 things I hate:
Lizard/bird shit
Cat meows in the middle of the night
Arrogant people

3 things I don’t understand:
Why people change
Why bad movies get distribution
How we could possibly be the only living beings in the universe

3 things on my desk:
A mini Totoro
A bottle of ink called "Galileo Manuscript Brown"
A pair of bookends in the shape of "The Gates of Argonath"

3 things I’m doing right now:
Watching the anime, Deathnote
Putting away the latest editorial project I've completed
Staring dismally at the pile of essays I have to grade

3 things I want to do before I die:
Travel to all the places on a list that I've made
Attend an Ennio Morricone live performance (though I gather he may er...go before I go)
Live in Italy again, even if it's just for a few months

3 things I can do:
Hum a Jewish lullaby
Live alone and not feel lonely (most of the time)
Fold paper hearts

3 things you should listen to:
Your conscience
National Public Radio
Ennio Morricone's score for Once Upon A Time in the West

3 things you should never listen to:
Politicians
Bigots
Empty flattery

3 things I’d like to learn:
How to do a handstand
How to write a villanelle
More Italian

3 favorite foods:
Kueh Pie Tee
Edamame
Rocket salad with prosciutto and parmesan cheese

3 beverages I drink regularly:
Water
Bandung
Iced peach tea

3 TV shows/Books I watched/read as a kid:
Charlie Brown
Heavenly Sword and Dragon Saber
She-ra

3 people I have to tag:
a l, vantan, yann
(if any of them still read this blog)