Comments for family matters!

Comment on Bad news from Brian? by Tom Collins

Tom Collins — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 13:55:37 +0000

You are a riot, George. Sometimes I think you are a rock, a cabbage, a viral infection — the way you insuslt and scold –and the next moment, some runic treasure from a lost life with a tongue so silvered you could catch the moon with it! At any rate, as long as I have something to read, you shall have it — if I have to paste it together with spit and walk it to Kremlin-Bicêtre myself! love–btw

Comment on The BAIRD FARM (X) by Tom Collins

Tom Collins — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 10:15:01 +0000

It’ll take a while to get used to the hole in what was expectation of the next installment! The Japanese are spot on in their obsession with 49 as a very unlucky number! Perhaps that’s why we were sent to planet earth! Why Jack Benny was so inspired to keep at 49 until the curse wore off! I feel as though I know Janet, and I’m anything but indifferent to her. Thanks so much, Brian, for contributing these family matters to “Family matters.” “Two out of three” is a great batting average. Of course I understand, accept, and embrace the multiple meanings of “farewells.” I’m grateful you let this be the first venue of a great piece of writing!

Comment on The BAIRD FARM (IX) by Tom Collins

Tom Collins — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 04:12:55 +0000

I’m more and more convinced you have to be in a special place to write like this. Each installment explodes with life and lingo. Nothing can be more personal, and private, than the Baird Farm, and yet reading about these family affairs puts them in a special place for us. Like the womb mandala in the novel I’m reading: filled with deities that gradually segue to familiar figures of one’s past and present. Or the cubby-holes or niches along the upper edge of those early 60s paintings by Jasper Johns. We spend our lives aiming at targets, then we are set free for the niches.

Comment on The BAIRD FARM (VIII) by Tom Collins

Tom Collins — Sat, 26 Jun 2010 17:02:58 +0000

More bigeminal conversation! These people, Brian, are as alive during the time it takes to read your posts as any living people I know. You must be in a strange place to be able to work such magic. Midwestern magic. That’s my proposal for a subtitle to this, when it’s published in book form. A mauve handerchief! Too bad you left that behind! Hihi. There is a beautiful piece of calligraphy in Sylvie Etient’s office now. You would be surprised at the translation your friend proposes to her visitors. I’ll say once again that I can’t wait to hear more about the Bairds. Right smack dab in the middle of this summer heat we’re having (nothing in comparison to the Midwest, of course), you made me nostalgic for “Silent Night”! Encore maestro!

But truly, what a special singular place you must be when you sit down to write these things. If it were a comic book, all of those sentences would be in bubbles, and they would ALL rise up off the page and float away into the ears of everyone who remembers that kind of bellowing. The (W)ALL effect.

Comment on “A good year” with Russell Crowe and Marion Cotillard, directed by Ridley Scott by Jo

Jo — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 13:04:32 +0000

I was really glad to read what you had to say. I do think this movie has been generally underappreciated. When I first saw it I must admit to somewhat of a problem with Max as he is in the beginning, but that was personal for me because I was married for 12 years to a man who reminded me rather strongly of him and who, alas, did not have an epiphany like Max did and go to live gloriously at a vineyard in Provence. But I have seen it several times now and each time I’ve found myself more sympathetic with Max until now I’ve grown quite fond of the bloke and his transformation has become a delight. Now, instead of disliking him at the beginning, I merely wait with an amused tenderness for him to get his head screwed on straight and sit back and enjoy the process of it. And the Max at the end of the movie is someone I would be delighted to live with…especially in such a place.
Jo in Pittsburgh

Comment on “A good year” with Russell Crowe and Marion Cotillard, directed by Ridley Scott by Ro

Ro — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 11:40:17 +0000

Thanks for this analysis, which sums up a lot of what I like about this movie and had never quite managed to put my finger on.
It’s a totally delightful feel-good experience and a sad indictment of critics that they wanted something different at the time from Scott and Crowe and failed to appreciate its souffle charm.

Comment on The BAIRD FARM (VII) by Tom Collins

Tom Collins — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 03:32:41 +0000

Another great post to read out on the Baird farm. I just came across an ad for a book by Stella Gibbons called “Cold Comfort Farm.” Guess who I thought of then?
I had some work to do in order to fully “enjoy” this evocation. “The conversation became bigeminal.” Anybody know what bigeminal means? I didn’t. And I can say this morning that it has to be one of the most beautiful words in the language. No doubt Dick, Mona and Mary Ellen know it, but would be surprised to see it used here. It means “the state of having a pulse characterized by two beats close together with a pause following each pair of beats.”
That’s my title for part VII. It’s a beautiful piece of work. And it made me laugh. We all know about this kind of concentrated energy pulsating all around the table, with eating and talking vying for first place. How many meals there must have been in all our lives when we felt this bigeminy!

My question in this “reply”: do you have to be a writer like Brian to engage in this kind of work or play? No doubt there’s work here: it doesn’t just come out like that. The rhythm isn’t natural. But it’s such a great gift that I still wonder why people don’t think more often of trying out their hand, just for the fun of it!

My parting shot. I far prefer bigeminal to bisexual. Among other things, because of the pause between the beats. A thousand thankyous to Brian for taking care of my poor heart!

Comment on No Country for Old Men - revisited by Tom Collins

Tom Collins — Sat, 12 Jun 2010 14:10:30 +0000

This work on the figure is essential.

Comment on What the melancholy spirit gives to humans by Tom Collins

Tom Collins — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 07:11:28 +0000

SEND YOUR COMMENT AGAIN, please. Unfortunately, I was still too sleepy when I moved to approve it, and it got marked as spam. I pray God you’ll get this message and put that comment back up. It was about a memory of the metal art work at the Luxor. It was a precious piece for this blog, and I hate myself for being so ham-fisted!

Comment on The BAIRD FARM (V) by Tom Collins

Tom Collins — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 06:59:52 +0000

Now I know what it was like waiting for an installment to be published, by Alexandre Dumas or Eigi Yoshikawa or Siegfried Kracauer. I wait for the next episode of the Baird Farm. And it’s great to know that it’s on its way. That you won’t be let down, barring death, illness, or some major distraction that in Brian’s case is unlikely. I’m sure people, up until recently, had this kind of relationship to comic strips. And for a while, to comicbooks. Just waiting, and saying “I can’t wait”!

Cousin Janet is amazing. She can wait. And she’s a real girl. I get that; I see what that means. Something I share with my friend: encounters and long moments (instants and years) spent with real girls. That explains a lot.

You have to know how to wait. And when to pounce. Then how to revert to waiting mode. This can be tiresome on paper, but a lot of fun, retrospectively, in “real life.” It must have been fun for cousin Janet to lead her people on like that, and introduce a wedge between them and her cousin Brian, just for laughs. Having them on, as the English say. Before having to deal with the moment of truth. Thanks again for this great post, and above all, for the format.