Strange Currencies
New podcast with Christian Wiman, world travel on the NE Regional, & postcard-art
Podcastery
This week, I posted Episode 566 of The Virtual Memories Show, feat. poet Christian Wiman as we celebrate his amazing new book, ZERO AT THE BONE: Fifty Entries Against Despair (FSG), a fusion of essay, poem, memoir and anthology that explores how the act of writing a poem is a gesture of faith. We talk about the varieties of despair and joy, the question of whether the world is chaos or has order, and whether the relationship between art and life is a tension or an actual antipathy. We also get into the urgency of mortality and the rare cancer that almost killed Christian on three separate occasions, the notion of having a calling and the difference between given and earned callings, who we’re really trying to reach when we write a poem, whether Philip Larkin’s Aubade is a poem of pure despair, how literature has taken the place of sacred texts, and what he’s learned from teaching at Yale Divinity School. We also discuss The Void & how to tune it out, his thoughts on faith and Christ and how the incarnation of God in Jesus sacralizes the physical world, where poetry began for him, whether joy is passed down epigenetically like trauma (allegedly) is, what it’s like having a Ninja Blender for a brain, coming around on poets in translation like Yehuda Amichai, the meaning of existence, and a lot more (I mean, if you can have a lot more after the meaning of existence). Give it a listen! And go read Zero At The Bone!
This week, I posted Episode 565 of The Virtual Memories Show, feat. writer & editor Danny Fingeroth as we celebrate his new biography, JACK RUBY: The Many Faces of Oswald’s Assassin (Chicago Review Press), following the 60th anniversary of the assassinations of JFK & Lee Harvey Oswald. Danny & I talk about what drew him to Ruby’s story, how many JFK conspiracy rabbit-holes he had to avoid, the challenges of separating Ruby’s life from myth & speculation, and how the bio began as a graphic novel before its prose incarnation. We get into the people he would have loved to interview for this book, what Ruby’s siblings & their kids went through in the aftermath of Jack’s moment of infamy, the circus of Ruby’s murder trial, and the danger of treating Ruby’s life like a sitcom. We also discuss Danny’s dizzying résumé, including his 20-year run as a writer & editor at Marvel Comics, discovering himself as a biographer with Stan Lee: A Marvelous Life, the complexity of the (working) relationships of Lee, Jack Kirby & Steve Ditko, and more. Give it a listen! And go read Jack Ruby: The Many Faces of Oswald’s Assassin
Recent episodes: Matt Bors • Phillip Lopate • Leslie Stein • Josh Bayer • Adam Sisman • Lisa Morton
Strange Currencies
Yesterday was one of my yo-yo trips to FDA in Silver Spring, MD. I haven’t done one of these in a long time. Getting there & back from NJ meant
Up at ~3:30am
0:45 drive to Newark Penn Station
2:50 Amtrak NE Regional to BWI
0:40 Lyft to FDA
Negotiate negotiate negotiate 9:30am-4:30pm
0:40 Lyft to BWI
2:40 Amtrak to Newark Penn
0:45 drive home
In the door at 9:00pm
All told, ~8:20 of travel time, not incl. waiting rooms, train platforms, etc. A glamorous life, I know.
On the evening train, I walked to the cafe car to get a snack & some water. After I made my order, I noticed some crazy-bright bills in the tip tray behind the plexiglass. I asked the counterman what country they were from, and he put them on the counter to show me: “This one’s Barbados, and this one’s Costa Rica!”
While I reveled in the vivid inks and art, he took out his wallet, and fanned a stack of exotic currency. It was all so beautiful, an array of colors and images and scripts and denominations from across the world. I asked him if I could take a picture of it all, and he laid it out on the counter.
He smiled and said, “The funny thing is, I’ve never been to any of these places. But I just got my passport, so now I need to get some time off!”
I put some ugly-ol’ American dollars in the tip tray, and wished him safe travels.
Art
Another week where I didn’t really draw anything, so this morning I decided to draw a postcard out of a photo of Frederic Tuten that I saw on IG last night. I’ll send it to him as a belated 87th birthday present, even though the knit cap looks like he has a bowl haircut. After I scanned it, I added a little watercolor for the hat & scarf, but meh. You should go to the Flickr album of most of the art I’ve made & find something you like.
Until Next Time
Thanks for reading this far! I’ll be back on Sunday with links, books, & workout craziness, and Wednesday with a new episode, maybe some art, & who knows maybe a little profundity or something.
I light candles in a daze since I found God,
—Gil Roth
Virtual Memories
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(I deactivated my Twitter acct., so don’t look for me there)