Deep in her soul, however, she was waiting for something to happen. Like a sailor in distress, she would gaze out over the solitude of her life with desperate eyes, seeking some white sail in the mists of the far-off horizon. She did not know what this chance event would be, what wind would drive…
After a semester of grading, more grading and endless office hours, only one more 8 a.m. class stands between me and freedom (or, as I refer to it in my mind, time to write my dissertation). An even more comforting thought is that this is probably the last time I'll ever teach this course--especially at…
I learned this, at least, by my experiment; that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours. -Henry David Thoreau (On Walden Pond)When people find out that my car of choice is a…
But there is great dignity in allowing oneself to keep clear about what is good, and it is what I think of when I hear the term "good taste." Whether things were ever simpler than they are now, or better if they were, we can't know. We do know that people have always found ways…
It's hard to believe, but my European archival adventure is quickly coming to an end. In a way, it seems like much more than 5 weeks have gone by. I don't know if that's because so many of my days started to blend together thanks to the whirl and click of microfiche (a surreal experience…
With postwar guilt, he decried bratwurst, sauerbraten, and Konigsberger Klopse as dishes verging on poison. They were the Hitler of foods. Instead, he looked to our own Greek diet--our eggplant aswim in tomato sauce, our cucumber dressings and fish egg-spreads, our pilafi, raisins and figs--as potential curatives, as live-giving, artery-cleansing, skin-smoothing wonder drugs...They didn't call…
There is a silence where hath been no sound. -Thomas Hood ("Silence") I know I've written about pizza before, but, frankly, when all is said and done, it's something worth revisiting again and again. Pizza is just one of those irresistible comfort foods: you put whatever you're in the mood for on top of a…
Dining with Dostoevsky 