Mea Culpa

For all intentions of being a prolific writer and profound thinker, I must admit to being merely...vainglorious?  For all wishes held in one hand of recording anecdotes and musings of a childhood witnessed, I have the shit of the mundane, the normal and the usual piling up in the other.  Tough to type with both hands full.  Mea culpa.

And for all of my professed love of Italian cars, I must admit to my daily driving betrayal:  a 1963 Mercedes Benz 220SEb.

Plush leather, real wood, just the right dollops of chrome. Brutish but crisp mechanicals.  Imagine--fuel injection in 1963!  A beauty, with the heft and grace that you might expect of a Teuton goddess.  There are cars and then there are automobiles... and this was an automobile nonpareil.

I've recently sold it after a long ownership.  My unforgiving anima.  Mea culpa.

I kept some personal memorabilia in a little leather pouch in the glove compartment, which I removed before selling the car.  It took some time and coaxing from a 18 year old single malt before I was willing to open the pouch and review the contents.  Included is a Laguoile knife, the 1950's leather key fob from my grandfather's Cadillac and a gold amulet brought back from La Finistere some moons ago.  Then there is the old newspaper photograph of Ry Cooder and son motorcycling through the streets of Havana, Cuba taken from Wim Wender's film "The Buena Vista Social Club".  I've written on the bottom "Vocatus Atque, Non Vocatus Deux Aderit", which if you've seen this movie and you've seen Ibrahim Ferrer's face at the conclusion of the Carnegie Hall concert in New York City, you might know my inspiration.  Beautiful.

And in my own handwriting:  snippets of poetry; some of my own, some from Raymond Carver and this from Wallace Stevens:

"Keep quiet in the heart, O wild bitch.  O mind

Gone wild, be what he tells you to be:  Puella.

Write pax across the window pane.  And then

Be still.  The summarium in excelsis begins...

Flame, sound, fury composed... Hear what he

says,

The dauntless master, as he starts the human tale.

A momentary pause.  Here is a photograph of myself on a boat in Elfin Cove, Alaska on a particularly beautiful day many summers ago.  The spectacular landscape behind me contrasted sharply with the barrenness I felt inside of myself on that very day, almost at that very moment when that photograph was taken.  Indeed I wanted that picture taken at that moment to never forget that I had just joined Eve in the Garden.  That I too had taken a bite of that forbidden fruit of the knowledge of good and evil, and of the power of life and death.  As wide open as the sky and the Gulf of Alaska were, so crushing was the weight of this fall from grace.  Mea culpa.

This old wound has never really left me.  But it continues to heal me.

Again I hold my breath.   Amidst the last few bits and scraps in that leather pouch is an old love letter from a previous life.  Beautiful musings from a beautiful and intelligent woman.  Another pause as I simply say "thank you" at once anonymous and eponymous.  Can I confidently say this?!  She and I may or may not have deserved more that we were willing to give to each other at the time.

Well... Mea culpa.

This leather pouch and the old Mercedes seemed to be the appropriate receptacle for these items--the ark and its sanctum sanctorum, by my own imaginings. I shall miss this  ark.  And the pouch and most of its contents will be tucked away carefully someplace else now.  Nonetheless, I'm grateful to allow these objects, these memories, these emotions and thoughts flight, that the sacred becomes the profane, and that the profane becomes sacred.  As is above, so is below.

To see a World in a Grain of Sand

And a Heaven in a Wild Flower

Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand

And Eternity in an hour.

William Blake, Auguries of Innocence

Invoke the ephemera, Maestro Herbie and company!

Brilliant!

Back in the day, this was racing!

And also, there was some pretty fine filming, editing and storytelling back in that day too.  Go here for the BBC's story of the 1958 running of the Coupe des Alpes.  Top Gear owes its chops to films like this!

I wanna ride that route on my Italian bicycle someday!

That French Car

The Citroen DS is pretty well known in car circles as being one of the most amazing cars to have ever been produced.  Its safety features were far ahead of its time, its comfort was and still is unparalleled, and its road manners are sublime even by today's standards.

When it was first unveiled in the 1950's, it was widely panned both by both critics and the car-buying public .  People just didn't know what to make of it.  Attitudes and perceptions changed quickly however, and the car very quickly became one of the best selling automobiles in history.

Just as the DS prognosticated future trends, an unfamiliar word gracing our own vocabulary today suggests the future:  sustainability.

The idea of sustainability is being applied to our eating habits, our healthcare programs and our economy. This is a good thing,  as it offers a bright spot of hope and opportunity to the dark clouds otherwise looming on our collective economic horizons.  Despite early resistance and criticisms, I think if we give it a chance... sustainability might offer us a smooth ride in surprising comfort.

With thanks to the goddess!

Heffalumps and Woosils

There's been a strange flu going round these past weeks in the city, and it found its way to our home.  We've spent a fair amount of time cozying up here with the requisite amounts of chicken noodle soup, orange juice and Winnie the Pooh videos.

The original videos from the late 60's and early 70's are the ones to watch.   They tell A A Milne's story of Christopher Robin and friends with amazing creativity, veracity and musical whimsy.

And then there's this whole other very real drama going on about the economy, bailouts, stimulus packages, people in high places not paying taxes, etc etc.  Oh bother.  

Better safeguard your hunny!

'Nuff Said

Magic and Loss

Pictured at left is a 1938 Alfa Romeo 8C 2800.  This was the scrumptiously styled saloon car based on the fantastically successful Vittorio Jano designed track car.  These cars were pretty magical at their time of introduction, resplendent with the latest in innovation and styling, just a half step away from their race track brethren.  Even the exhaust manifold was art, sculpted with delicate fins so as to help keep the exhaust temperatures cool.  Such a car is not possible today.

And now these cars, of which only a few survive, are either museum pieces or a billionaire's bauble, tucked away in atmospherically controlled garages and far away from the thronging crowds and excitement of yesteryear's race course.  There's a bit of loss there, methinks.

And so it goes with our lives.  I see it with my child, that she has started out with such unabashed enthusiasm and delight in the magnificent and the mundane.  She loves her dollies to bits just as much as she loves unravelling the toilet paper roll.  She says "noshanks" to pieces of broccoli as enthusiastically as she slurps butter off of her toast.  She does not walk, but runs excitedly everywhere.

And I know that she will progress, grow and continue to experience the many delights as well as a few of the heartbreaks of a lifetime. Friends will come and go, success and failure visiting regularly and hope and faith will have to be constantly nurtured amidst growing older and hopefully wiser.  Slowly, a life of active track time will turn towards the stillness and quietude of the museum.

Guess I'd better get out of my own museum, back onto the track and back to oiling her wheels and greasing her enthusiasm for her own next few go-rounds anyways.

Its a good life, always filled with a bit of magic and loss.  Thanks Lou Reed, for the words and inspiration here.

Snow: good for kids, bad for Italian cars.

At less than three feet tall, my little girl loves to let herself fall into the snow outside.  Hasn't quite grasped the idea of snow angels yet.

And with less than 6 inches of ground clearance, my Italian car is just not getting out into the rutty roads created by the big snowfall.  Haven't seen anyone else's out either.  Imagine that. 

'The labyrinth blows, but I choose it'.*

Happy New Year!

After a few good rounds of the sun salutations, a good Yoga session always ends with the Savasana pose. Lying flat on your back, arms and legs outstretched, breathe deeply and feel blood flow into all of those unknown spaces in your body for just a few minutes. I call it 'naptime' pose, but really it is more than simple napping--it is wakeful resting to build awareness of and appreciation for your body's internal processes.

And in this moment of post holiday revelry and transition into a new year, I wish us all a good Savasana. It is moments like this to savour, to rest for a minute and to let ourselves catch up before we plow ahead into the day to day routine of another year.

No matter the journey behind us, we've still got much ahead. The labyrinth unyieldingly beckons.

The Mille Miglia was the most famous of all Italian road races and the thousand mile route varied from year to year, despite always starting in Brescia and including a run through Rome. Pointing the way for the drivers were little red signs, such as the one pictured above.

I wish all of us a good Savasana and a heaping helping of little red signs to point the way in 2009.

*quote from John Green's Looking for Alaska, a recommended favorite read from 2008.

Dreaming up Holiday Spirits

Snow is falling lightly and all is quiet in the city. My wife and child are sleeping peacefully.  

I treasure these moments, these people dearly and I wish for them this dream of dance.

As the rich overtones in the Pas de Deux bring exceptional warmth and clarity to the movement of dancers on stage, so too might the holiday spirits bring warmth and clarity to the preciousness of our interactions with friends and family.  As an old aquaintance suggests repeatedly: life is short!

God rest ye merry gentlemen and women!  And let your own dream of dance begin....

The Cut-Away View

The university thesis paper I never wrote but wanted to have written was a metaphorical examination of Ronald Reagan's political doings at that time--the Iran/Contra scandal and the beginnings of deregulation at the highest levels of the economy and government.  The metaphor symbolic of Reagan was to have been a very successful married man, carrying on multiple affairs, enjoying plenty of high-end consumption and rough trade relations. Thematic inspiration for my observations and final analysis was provided by Chrissie Hynde and the Pretenders and her song, Time the Avenger.

Tough for me to get the big ideas down on paper, let alone wrapping them around my flighty head in those halcyon days...and I was too damn busy making a mess of my own quasi-conjugal relations.

Neither the hard driving beat of Chrissie's song never left me, nor did my critical eye towards political and economic events.  But I did leave the enthusiasm for British cars behind then, and have since embraced their Italian brethren.

Pat Braden's book The Alfa Romeo Owner's Bible has been a great resource along the way. He begins his book with an eloquent and honest warning about the very real dangers of auto-

mobile repair and restoration--in short, that great bodily harm might occur to the unwary, the negligent or the incompetent.

Pat's Bible is the one I'll turn to when I'm explaining politics and economics to my daughter.  If these constructs are the engines of our society which propel us forward into the future, then it is to her benefit to remain aware and mindful of their power.  The political economy machine, just like a Ferrari 12 cylinder,  can be a unwieldy beast at the best of times. 

Or it can be a completely unforgiving Ponzi scheme at the worst of times.  Impassive acceptance is no longer appropriate--vigilance and accountability are.  Time the Avenger is still knocking, and not just on Ronnie's door anymore.  For the sake of all of us who haven't heard it [the knocking] yet, cue the 8 count drum solo, Chrissie!

More good food for thought here from Joseph Stiglitz in the current Vanity Fair.

Or here from Michael Lewis, author of Liar's Poker.

And here's one more interesting perspective.  Better to know than not know!

It is indeed right and salutary that we have the annual reminder of "Light amidst the Darkness" at this time.  I wish that you, dear reader, and I carry it forward together for ourselves and our children.  Peace.

Transparency

Raymond Carver has always been a favorite.  Here is "Happiness":

So early it's still almost dark out.

I'm near the window with coffee,

and the usual early morning stuff

that passes for thought.

When I see the boy and his friend

walking up the road

to deliver the newspaper.

They wear caps and sweaters,

and one boy has a bag over his shoulder.

They are so happy

they aren't saying anything, these boys.

I think if they could, they would take

each other's arm.

It's early in the morning,

and they are doing this thing together.

They come on, slowly.

The sky is taking on light,

though the moon still hangs pale over the water.

Such beauty that for a minute

death and ambition, even love,

doesn't enter into this.

Happiness.  It comes on

unexpectedly.  And goes beyond, really,

any early morning talk about it.

The truth is that happiness does come richly and unexpectedly.  And it does go beyond, really, any drivel I might post about it here. Thank you dear reader, thank you to my family, thank you Mr. Carver and thank you house of Bertone.

At Least It Was a Bugatti

Some days the rubber just does not hit  the road and all the long days of work and blood and sweat and tears are just gone. Comfort is somewhere to be found in that I guess.

Learning to parent is learning to fail with grace.  Despite best efforts of patience, calm and consistency, the under-slept and overwrought side of myself occasionally comes out and wants to decide the moment with my child.  I forget that it is a team effort--that two of us are learning together about life, growing up and becoming independent of each other.

Such moments thankfully are few and far between.  And thankfully they don't seem to linger too much in memory or imagination for either of us.

In the Garden of Wonder and Delight

The aquarium is a favorite place for all of us. 

Colorful tropical fishes, monstrously big ugly fishes, jellyfish, belugas, dolphins and more...I happily suspend my land limited imagination and enrapture myself to Captain Nemo's world while my daughter typically runs around and squeals in delight, no matter if she is visiting the mighty beluga or the gift shop.

In dreams, water is often considered to represent the mythical, the magical, the unknown.  

In waking, the aquarium is a wonderful place to be affronted by mythos, by magic and by unknowingness.  

There I'm happy to be humbled, not only by the diversity of life on the blue planet but also by the paucity of my own imagination for it.

"To be no part of any body, is to be nothing."

Reaching Backwards and Forwards

My child sleeps peacefully and I whisper to her the concluding words from Mark Doty's exquisite poem "On Broadway":

In the same way Ezekiel turned back to the benevolent stranger.

  'I will write a poem for you tomorrow,'

he said.  'The poem I will write will go like this:  

  Our ancestors are replenishing the jewel of love  for us.'

It is me who remembers into the past of grandmothers and grandfathers to accept this gift for her and simultaneously I postulate far into the future of adolescence to give it to her when she can consciously know and appreciate it. For all of my backwards and forwards reaching, she effortlessly embodies this jewel of love right here and right now.

Driving late at night at high RPMs with everything adjusted and tuned just right, the valve train on my car's engine sings to me the song of Aurelio Lampredi, Vittorio Jano, Edoardo Weber, Nuccio Bertone, Marcel Ghandini and a whole host of others who collectively have contributed to the immediate pleasure at hand.  It is a beautiful thing.

My child sleeping peacefully tonight is a beautiful thing.

Little more action, little less conversation!

 

Who needs Italian cars when you can dance like this?!

O Souverain, o juge, o père

I'm a believer in the Taoist notion of "right mindfulness", i.e. check up from the neck up, think before speaking, get behind your words, live intentionally, let actions speak for themselves, it's not the size of the tool it's how you use it, WWJD, yes we can, etc etc....

And if I cannot get together the right mindfulness, I at least hope to be good, to be kind and to be just.  I hope that I might set an example for my o-so-quickly growing daughter, if not myself.

And then, if I can't even muster up the basics of goodness, kindness and justice, then I'll follow the dictum:  Fake it 'til you make it.  In other words, act like I've got it together until I actually do have got it together, and I'll give it all I got anyways, because really I'm never going to have that time again and if I don't give 'er (to borrow from my Canadian friends' vocabulary) I'm just going to be spinning around in the confusion.

I find that parenting sometimes requires me to fake it till I make it.  So many new and unexpected twists and turns of delight and mystery occurring that I don't fully comprehend, nor can I direct the outcome. This is a good thing, despite the feeling that not all my tires are on the ground at all times.

The Maestro, Fangio provides the example here.  With grace, eloquence and a measured strength behind the wheel, he maintained control and composure even in the midst of some pretty turbulent moments during his Formula 1 racing career.

I hope that I too might keep it on the track with such attributes for the many successes and failures I am sure to share with my child in the years to come.  Thank you Fangio for the example, and thank you my daughter for the opportunity.

Asinine Obfuscations & Obstreperous Assertions

'Amazing' is generally used as a term of approval, e.g "Amazing Alfa, dude!" whereas 'danger' is used as an acknowledgment of the possibility of injury, pain or loss.  Long long ago, the dictionary revealed these definitions after I penned this:

Where I was to write I love you

I wrote

Amazing!  Danger!

instead.

It was no mistake.

Not much has changed after all these years.

The Dancing Frog!

Given moments like this,  I just want to be able to look at my child in the eye and let her know I did the best I could at any given time and made the best choices I possibly could.  True dat.

Defining Moments and Italian Cars

Day before yesterday's musings went to saints and heroes, opportunity and empathy, knowing and not knowing.

Today's attentions went to an unhappy little girl running a high fever, not wanting to get much further from the embrace or lap of a parental unit. Whew!  Makes for a long day.

Whereas the previous days' thoughts have been within the realm of chance, tomorrow's attention and intention will be given to the embrace of choice.  Tomorrow will be all about the choice to make alongside my fellow compatriots south of the border.  Gonna be a big day.  

Really though, it is going to be just another day and just another choice. 

Much more powerful than simply casting one vote is continuing engagement with the body politic, dancing with it at whatever level possible, and working towards the change [in the words of M. Ghandi] that you or I want to be. And at this point in our national, indeed our global history, there is no greater chance to speak and act truth to that power.

Is any given moment otherwise defined ?

An oft repeated description of Italian Cars is that they are a "participatory event".  You don't get the thrill or enjoyment of one just by passively sitting in the driver's seat.  The car does demand a fair bit of attention to keep it maintained and road ready.   You get wet if you don't tend to the rubbers around the windshield and doors.  You get a dead battery or worse if you ignore the warning signs.  And due to the high revving nature of the engine and infamous temperament of the transmission, driving it to the far reaches to which it is aptly capable requires a bit of finesse and engagement that you wouldn't give otherwise, say... to a Buick.

Catch my drift here?

Beginning the beguile

All Saints Day today and I'm trying to think of a few saints of our time.

Dag Hammarskjold at one time supposedly said something about few saints and heroes being available in this modern world due to the lack of opportunity, conviction and empathy.  He might be right.

What's a saint or a hero to do?

The discussion of saints and heroes aside, I will continue giving my love and attention to my wife and child,  I'll continue indulging my guilty pleasure of Italian engineering and design and I'll endeavor to make this blog a more interesting read.  As the title suggests, these postings are going to revolve around the not disparate themes of child rearing, Italian car ownership and a few things in between.  God bless the narrative deficient disordered brain!

My wife suggests I too often have spoken empty platitudes...maybe this will give me a chance to hang them out to dry once and for all.

She's not especially keen for the Italian cars either.

Having not knowing how I was to begin this blog,  I have begun it nonetheless.   And so I am, as much as my restless nature will allow, content for one more cloudy night.