GoldenThistle of Simmer

Nowhere near enough sleep last night. With some difficulty, I had finally fallen asleep, and slept for about an hour before the Sparrowhawk started screaming in his sleep. I awoke like a shot. "Are you all right?" I inquired. He replied in a dignified manner, "Yes, I'm fine," and promptly went back to sleep. Unfortunately, I couldn't do the same. Eventually I went downstairs to watch midnight Olympics reruns and noodle around on the internet, until I decided to do something slightly more productive. Then I ripped through most of Old in Art School, by Nell Painter. This memoir was passed on to me by Deb, who received it from a friend. It's not an easy read. The author is somewhat obnoxious as a narrative voice, although by the end of the book, I felt that in real life, she would probably be a valuable and interesting friend. She is also a historian and writer, her most well-known book being The History of White People. On her retirement as a professor at Princeton, she decided to get an MFA in painting, and proceeded to do so at age 71, showing tremendous determination and creativity. I'm always saddened by the fact that apparently I can still be disillusioned, and once again I was saddened and disillusioned by an unsparing description of what it takes to acquire credentials for a career as what Painter calls "An Artist." It's all about the usual suspects--fashion, bad philosophy, privilege, and knowing the right people. There's a teeny little bit about craft and technique, but nothing at all about truth, beauty, or historical context. Any possible application to a career in writing will be left to the imagination of the reader.

Another lesson learned came from the subplot of her efforts to care for her father, a widower going blind in his 90s in California. I've read/heard so many stories now in which a loved one is clearly experiencing dementia for as much as ten years before the exasperated caregiver catches on. Sometimes they never do. They go on believing that the aging person is behaving badly, being mean, selfish, or rude without ever realizing that it's not a character flaw but a form of brain damage. I have no solution to this, however. Most of us seem unable to grasp the situation until it's too late.

At any rate, I struggled through this tale of grit and woe (with illustrations) until it started to get light outside. It's dark for such a long time, and then the light comes so fast. It's hard for me to force myself back to bed then, because it's just so exciting when the world begins to glimmer back into being. I want to stay and see what happens--maybe this day will be completely different! (As I said--constantly surprised by disillusion!) But by then I was feeling pretty awful with sleep deprivation, so I slept for another three hours. Still not enough. I accomplished a phone call with Queenie and a walk, and watching the jumping portion of the 3-day equestrian event. That was about it. Now I'm trying to stay awake until it's dark enough to hurl myself at the fickle feet of Morpheus again.