Another brief appellation

Which is a better name, Donut or Kozy? I can see points in each one’s favor. Donut is 25% longer than Kozy. However, Donut has the advantage of being a noun and, what’s more, indicating what the business sells. Neither one would be considered the traditional spelling of the word in the dictionary, but Donut may actually be in the dictionary. Kozy’s hand-sprayed look is more charming.

What’s your vote?

Where the fish are

They adorn a women’s restroom (now closed for the winter) at White Rock Lake. The men’s bathroom has similar embellishments.

There’s a steep hill on the south end of the lake where pedaling doesn’t really do any good, so I like to stand up on the pedals and pretend I am a human sail, slowing the descent of my bike. The sidewalk is narrow along this stretch and curves onto a narrow bridge at the bottom, so I only do this if there isn’t much traffic. It’s breathtaking and fun.

Today, though, as I was unfurling myself and swooping down the hill, something went wrong and I almost lost control of my bike. I hunched down against the handlebars and the seat, braked, and swerved a few times to regain my balance. I wanted to avoid two things: plunging headlong onto the asphalt and hitting an oncoming cyclist. Amazingly, I regained control by the time we passed. What a wonderful vehicle a bicycle is. It’s so much more stable than you think. And I always love finding out that my body knows what to do in these situations.

The oncoming cyclist smiled in a concerned way as he passed me and asked if I was OK. I laughed and said something about how it had been a close call, and I continued on, seated. This was a better scenario (for his sake) than if I had died and the poor guy had had to witness that, but it was a worse scenario (for my sake) than if there had been no one to witness the whole sailing disaster at all.

I had another scene of public humiliation last week as I was walking home from work at dusk and singing “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year” in full voice. Not just the normal melody part, but the dramatic cadenzas at the end of my high school choir’s arrangement of this song, where you repeat “It’s the most wonderful time” three times, and one of the times the syllable “der” is a step higher than usual, adding a fascinating touch of variety and excitement. I thought I had hit the pitches pretty accurately and was feeling pleased with myself when I heard a shuffling noise to my left, just a bit behind me, and realized a person was standing in their front yard with their dog. I suppose I could have said, “Oh, hi!” but instead I continued singing, a little more quietly, making up more words, until I got out of earshot. This seemed to be the most nonchalant course of action.

I think these humbling occasions are very good for us. I think that not taking oneself too seriously serves one well in life. And it is also good for society in general when we admit our foolishness to each other. It helps us all feel better.

The Secret Agent

Conrad appears to have gotten some criticism for the “sordid surroundings” and “moral squalor” of this tale. Yet when I discussed it with some friends, we all admitted that we had an impression of comedy and even absurdity, not horror. Sure, the plot is scary and tragic, but he treats it in such a way that you are never really scared, just kind of incredulous, and scornful of all the characters.

I know I have read at least one article or review of this book that said it was an illuminating read in connection with September 11. But the mood of the book seemed incompatible with that type of terror.

The book is quite different from Heart of Darkness or Lord Jim. I read those a long time ago, but I don’t remember much humor in those books. I loved Heart of Darkness as an angst-ridden adolescent. I sought out Lord Jim as an angst-ridden college student. The Secret Agent, however, is laugh-out-loud funny at some points, and impossible to ever really take seriously.

However strange this book was, Conrad is a consummate artist, and we were all impressed by his brilliant decisions about when to disclose what, what to disclose at all, and what to have take place offstage. The book was finely crafted.

I am generally more gullible than suspicious as a reader, and I grew in compassion for the characters, who were initially presented with quite a bit of irony and amusement. My friends who read the book did not seem so moved. I found things to admire about most of the characters. Seeing Conrad deal so thoughtfully with a domestic relationship was interesting for me, since I was only previously familiar with his nautical settings. There was a melodramatic scene with gas lamps and a grotesque cabdriver that I enjoyed very much and everyone else seemed to think was dumb.

Mystery fish

Here’s a place I’ve never had the chance to show anyone before. I pass by it fairly often myself.

Bald cypress

It was a lovely day for a bike ride, 60 and sunny. This picture’s a little blurry, but I like it because it captures the interesting colors of the day.

Sometimes, usually at the darker times of the day, the lake is a fascinating iridescent color than I can only describe as the color of magnetic tape or shiny black garbage bags. It is so lovely that I feel bad not having a different way to describe it. It’s mostly a dark, dark blue, but it shows off different brilliant hues with light and movement.

Today the wind was strong, displaying a muddy brown in the shadows of the waves and a slate blue elsewhere. Also you can see that the bald cypresses, White Rock Lake’s signature trees (you can see their attractive cone shape across the lake, where they’re planted at regular intervals from each other, give or take a tree here and there) are turning color. They don’t really lose their leaves, but they start looking like they’ve been scorched in a forest fire. I am very fond of them.

It was a beautiful day, but I think I like the weird times better, the times just around dawn, or on a foggy morning, or in the evening at sunset.

The Fellowship of the Ring

This is at least the fourth time I’ve read this book. It’s nice to go back after a few years and still be charmed and delighted. A lot of people think of strange creatures and battles when they think of Tolkien, but what I was impressed by this time was the human subtlety among the characters.

He turned to Strider. “Where have you been, my friend? Why weren’t you at the feast? The Lady Arwen was there.”
Strider looked down at Bilbo gravely. “I know,” he said. “But often I must put mirth aside. Elladan and Elrohir have returned out of the Wild unlooked-for, and they had tidings that I wished to hear at once.”
“Well, my dear fellow,” said Bilbo, “now you’ve heard the news, can’t you spare me a moment? I want your help in something urgent. Elrond says this song of mine is to be finished before the end of the evening, and I am stuck. Let’s go off into a corner and polish it up!”
Strider smiled. “Come then!” he said. “Let me hear it!”

“I want your help in something urgent” seems incongruous at first look. One might judge Bilbo for being insensitive or completely out of touch. This happens often with the hobbits’ speech.

“Strider looked down at Bilbo gravely.”

Much has already been made of the unacknowledged work of Strider and the Rangers to protect an obscure country full of ignorant people. This is a huge, beautiful theme of the books. But there’s more going on here than just Strider graciously overlooking the errors of a bumbling, sheltered, homely hobbit who has been thrust into the world-changing activities of ancient and noble people.

With Tolkien, not all that is being thought is not being spoken. The hobbits know more than they let on, and they have virtues of their own. Here Bilbo is being funny, lightening Strider’s load, and Strider gets the joke. There’s a deeper understanding between people who have learned to trust each other’s character over time.

I think playing with all kinds of levels of seriousness like this, all at once, is great writing.