Sunday Papers Time.

While I haven't done much in my visual journals and I'm a few Sunday papers behind, I have been BUSY this month creating a lot of art, which is always fine by me. More on that later. Here's one project.

But on to Sunday Papers:
Whenever my friends and I get together for lunch, especially if it's been a while, we begin to make an agenda of catch-up items. We don't want to miss any news and views!  Or, if we meet often, we're likely to bring with us our latest clippings - physical or virtual - to share. Let's just say, in either case, we rarely if ever lack for conversational topics. Call this my Did You See opportunity I'd like to share with you over lunch. Are you going to have wine? Let's split dessert.

1

When women pass 50, in some ways, their lives get better,” Ms. Fonda said. “It’s like: Who cares? What do we have to lose to not be brave? 

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/26/arts/jane-fonda-and-lily-tomlin-together-again-in-grace-and-frankie.html?_r=0

OK, I admit it. I'm over 50.

2

illustration by Jessica Fortner

" 'We travel for romance, we travel for architecture, and we travel to be lost,' the writer Ray Bradbury said in a 1990 interview...'There's nothing better than to walk around Paris and not know where in hell  you are,' "

Stephanie Rosenblum states in her essay, "You can't go wrong." Not only in Paris, she says, but in any city "if one hopes to have the kind of chance encounters that make a vacation more than a game of hopscotch around landmarks."  I am such a proponent of this concept that I enjoy solo wandering, hopping the Metro toward any direction, perhaps doing some research first as to things I might find in out-of-the way neighborhoods. I like to get off at any stop (I've done my crappy or dangerous neighborhood homework first) and stroll aimlessly around, perhaps looking for something in a photo I saw or just discovering. When I can, I do the same in any unfamiliar city. Paris is perfect for this: fairly compact, easy to hop on a Metro, something to sketch or photo on almost any street. Okay, I admit I keep my iPad or map in my bag in case I get hopelessly lost (which is, in my opinion, hard to do in Paris, but easy in lots of other places) or need to refresh my sense of direction. And I do this venturing out in the daytime. I will always remember the first glimpse of the Eiffel Tower I had as I wandered about on my first trip there. I was somewhat disoriented at the time, not worried about it, but aware I wasn't sure of my location. Literally,, as I turned the corner, there it was, a total surprise, the top half peeking over the buildings. A moment of unexpected glee I will always remember.

3

"We live in a culture so preoccupied with happiness...that we forget grief is not something merely to get over, something over which we "achieve closure," but a human undertaking, a slow, sticky process of allowing our love to take another, more remote, shape."  Meghan O'Rourke. 

From NYT Book Review, another memoir on love and loss and grief. There have been several lately. Any of us who have had a painful loss, even as a friend or family member helping the coping process, gravitate toward these memoirs, whether or not the loss is fresh. The process of grief is such a large part of life. I think this will be on my read list. 

The Light of the World, A Memoir by Elizabeth Alexander.  Book review written by Megan O'Rourke, author of The Long Goodbye.