Let Me Lend You The Rhodora

“I’m writing this sitting in the kitchen sink.”

That’s the opening line of Cassandra’s journal (or as it is better known: the novel, I Capture the Castle, by Dodie Smith). I just finished reading that book. As I lie here procrastinating the preparation of my dinner and listening to Luciano Pavarotti, that quote floated into my mind. I love it because a kitchen sink is such a mundane thing, but when there is someone sitting in it, writing, it becomes irresistibly quirky and interesting.

The contrast between the kitchen sink image and the live recording of Pavarotti is creating quite a fascinating confusion of artistic expression in my head. On the one hand, there’s the off-beat, poetry-reading Cassandra writing in the sink and on the other is one of the most beautiful operatic voices belting out an Italian aria. I imagine Cassandra with her tatty clothes and alternative perspectives, living in a dank, broken-down castle and somehow it’s just as beautiful as the image of Pavarotti singing to an elegantly dressed crowd in a stunningly preserved 18^th century concert hall. I love that about art.

Listening to Luciano’s live performance reminded me of a time I attended a free concert at the music school in Siena. It was free because all of the performers were students, but of course they were all brilliant because you can’t get into that school unless you’re good! The room was magnificent; the kind I would imagine they held grand balls in during the 18^th & 19^th centuries. The walls were white with ornate cornices and golden gilding. I soaked them in as the exquisite violin and piano filled my ears… you know when you just feel beauty? There’s nothing else like it. You forget to take breaths and just allow everything you see and hear to absorb into your senses; hoping that you will be able to take in enough to remember it forever.

I think beauty is something that human beings need to survive. True beauty. Something that makes you marvel. Without it we forget that life is worth living. I’m sure you can all think back to a moment when you saw a gorgeous skyline, talked to a kind soul or heard a moving piece of music. Didn’t you feel… alive? I strongly encourage purposeful pursuit of beautiful things. It’s good for you! If you can’t think of anything like that right now, let me lend you a poem that always does it for me when I need a hit of beauty…

THE RHODORA

By Ralph Waldo Emerson

In May, when sea-winds pierced our solitudes,

I found a fresh Rhodora in the Woods,

Spreading its leafless blooms in a damp nook,

To please the desert and the sluggish brook,

The purple petals, fallen in the pool,

Made the black water with their beauty gay;

Here might the red-bird come his plumes to cool,

And court the flower that cheapens his array.

Rhodora! if the sages ask thee why

This charm is wasted on the earth and sky,

Tell them, dear, that if eyes were made for seeing,

Then Beauty is its own excuse of being

Why thou wert there, O rival of the rose!

I never thought to ask, I never knew:

But, in my simple ignorance, suppose

The self-same Power that brought me there brought you.

The Man Who Smelled Like Peanuts

I read somewhere that many of Charles Dickens’ peripheral characters were inspired by the odd people he observed on his train travels. Here in England I often think about that when I’m riding the trains and imagine the people around me as characters in a novel. It’s not too hard to do either because trains are always full of eccentric and obnoxious people just begging to be satirised.

At the moment I’m living in South Shields… a small town twenty minutes from Newcastle (the ‘cool’ city of the north). There really isn’t anything very remarkable about South Shields in the winter. It’s cold, bleak and everything closes early. However, it is a coastal town and I’m assured that it’s quite a charming little place in the summer. I can’t say I’m convinced that summers here are a worthwhile affair, but for these guys 24 degrees Celsius is a really big deal, so I smile and nod (I know… I’m an Australian-summer snob).

Apart from all that, the people here are the highlight. They have musical accents that I sometimes can’t understand and they are all SO NICE! From what I can see the north of England is one of the most amicable parts of the world. People are friendly, helpful and open. I love that. It makes my dinky accommodation and unfulfilling job almost worth it.

South Shields is linked to Newcastle by the Metro (Newcastle’s version of the tube). It’s an attempt at modernisation that would have me convinced if it weren’t for the fact that it only runs until about 11:30pm (even on weekends) and the carriages always smell like urine. No I’m not exaggerating; every carriage, every day, smells like urine. I’m not sure what’s going on there…

Anyway, one day last week a different smell wafted through my carriage. A 60-something-year-old gentleman decided to sit himself next to me with his newspaper and his flat cap. As he did, I smelled peanuts. It took me a couple of seconds to realise that (a) there were no actual peanuts in sight; and (b) there truly was a man sitting next to me who smelled like them. I mean REALLY smelled like them. In fact, that day, there may have actually been a giant peanut riding the Metro disguised as a Geordie.

What’s a Geordie? An inhabitant of Newcastle. They’ve all got nicknames up here depending on where they’re from or which politically incorrect category of social hierarchy they fit into.

I don’t know why the peanut man made such an impression on me but for some bizarre reason, he will pop up in my memory whenever I think of Newcastle! I guess maybe I felt a bit like Charles Dickens might have; sniffing this man and deciding to write him into a story as the eccentric do-gooder who baffles his beneficiaries with nonsensical one-liners (while emitting various legume-family odours). And for the first time since I got here, I felt like I was really living in England.

Thanks Dickens…