Hello, David!

It is a measure of the welcomeness and singularity of your newsy email that I wish to respond immediately – “…and I have taken a long sheet of paper to show my gratitude“. Casual correspondence represents what in this era might qualify as a lost art – though I have no way of knowing who or how many preserve this form of literary intimacy. What I do know is that two of my favoured authors – Tennessee Williams and Jane Austen – considered it wasn’t beneath them. I refer for example to a book you may have read; namely, “Tennessee Williams’ Letters to Donald Windham, 1940 – 1965”. The book was recommended to me a hundred years ago by a fine fellow I met in Cape Cod. The letters – which as you might expect of Williams are perfect gems – capture places on both Cape Cod and Key West which while perhaps not immediately recognizable certainly succeed to enliven reminiscences!

“Foner’s coverage of the Selective Service Act passed in May 1917, is brief. He simply states that due to the passage of the Act the number of men in the army went from 120,000 to 5 million. He also informs readers that the Act resulted in about 24 million men enlisting. However, the bigger picture in all this is what Foner speaks in great detail about. Foner wrote that the war seemed to bring about the being of a ‘new nationalist state’ in the country. Federal government agencies seemed to be controlling everything from- food margins and transportation to fuel. Food was rationalized because many sought to believe that food will help win the war. If they kept their soldiers full, they would surely have enough strength to win the war. Everyone in the country was focused on doing what they could to help the U.S. win the war. Nevertheless, the biggest difference between the Selective Service Act of 1917 and other previously written acts was that a substitute could no longer be hired to fight in a man’s place, the man himself would now have to enlist.“

Certainly from the first time I melted to a frozen martini while reading a Jane Austen novel (or at least the same six paragraphs over and over), sitting in my large green leather chair, watching the logs ablaze in the Vermont casting reflected over the polished reclaimed pinewood floors – since then at least – the American songbook has been a stock complement to what was then my evening euphoria. The only thing that improved the transport was my little French bulldog Monroe curled upon the nearby couch, no doubt blissful after a tireless day at the law office greeting clients and deliverymen. In the early days I may have punctuated the intoxicating drama by trimming the mahogany side table with smoked oysters, squares of sharp cheddar cheese and whole wheat wafers. There may have been as well a cigarette and crystal ashtray!

Unwittingly this morning I initiated what later evolved into a manic culinary project. I have an undying interest in seaside dwelling. Aroused perhaps by the clear blue sky above Sarasota Bay I amused myself during breakfast today by revisiting Villa Luna, the mountain-top home in Porto Rafael, Sardegna where we stayed a number of years ago. Though access to the property is precipitous the reward is a spectacular view of the Mediterranean. The remoteness of the venue invites reflection and planning.

The truth about wintering in Florida is that, as grand as it is – and I mean that, seriously – one is inevitably drawn back to home territory for what I suppose can safely be called emotional and spiritual rejuvenation. I won’t say the yearning for the homestead is instantaneous; but certainly within a six-month period the capitulation is not uncommon – l’m saying not altogether frequently but by any standard at least regularly. One forgets what may have provoked the urgency to leave home in the first place.

There’s a difference betwixt saving it for the funeral and living the rest of your life like a firecracker. There has to be somewhere in between. Unfortunately the philosophic business of the “via media” or the popular dietary prescription of plant-based foods are not the complete answer either. Indeed the more compelling yet disturbing truth is that unlike fathomless youthful ambition there really isn’t any workable answer. In the result the only practical solution between these competing options is to undertake the immediate determination to capture what arises from the past, what distinguishes the present and what motivates the future. That seems the surest way to cover all the angles while avoiding the mistake of any one. While my happiest conviction is the present there are details from the past that survive to entertain me. I’m obviously less certain about the future but my innate rationality would no doubt have propelled me to say so at any age.

Palm trees by the pool make a unique sound in the mellow afternoon wind. It’s more of a wash and less of a whisper such as through the tall pines in Muskoka at the rocky edge of Grand Island where the mahogany launch lay moored in the copper-coloured boathouse. The pine needles finely cut the wind like the strings of a violin. The palm ferns on Longboat Key sway with the sea. The tossing ferns critically interrupt the penetrating sunlight. The dark shade triggers a tumult of blaze and midnight scattered with points of light. I move to another chaise longue to escape the conflict and restore my dreamy immersion. The orb of white contrasts the layers of azure and green.

“I went to the woods because I wished 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, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practice resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and be able to give a true account of it in my next excursion.“

Henry David Thoreau, “Walden; or Life in the Woods“

Okay, this is a hard one! So much to say! The account of New Year’s Day is of necessity aligned with an account of New Year’s Eve – the one insinuates the other, affording a sense of recovery both emotional and social and sometimes physical and spiritual. So many things have transpired since 5:00 PM yesterday afternoon – New Year’s Eve – when Diana greeted us at her front door radiant in a midnight blue gown remarkably without competing jewellery, welcoming us to her’s and Ziggy’s cocktail party.

We’re on the outer lip of the seasonal festivities. The week between December 24th and December 31st is first-rate. Though we do nothing traditional on either Christmas Eve or New Year’s Eve the entire period is diverting and signal. Nobody can deny the universal absorption in colour and congeniality that overtakes us all. Last night I lingered at the window mesmerized by the shimmering tiny white lights in the swaying fronds of the palm trees by the pool. The prospect of entering the year 2020 is a touch of heaven! The New Year affords the gusto of novelty.