A friend gave his public recital at a music conservatory today. He sang his heart out from what I hear. I want him to know that his friends praise him and support him, that we love him and know that he will do great things with what he has learned. Triumph matters occasionally, it is something which my friend has worked hard to achieve. I am sure there were folks there happy for him but I am also aware of the envy that exists. We do not escape the reality of sin. Let those who envy simmer in their dark juices. Let the rest praise God for human gifts. All my best to you Aloha Kitty. We are waving even from a distant coast...

To be buried in something so glorious...beauty seeks to replicate itself.

A lovely day to visit the museum.

Still one of the more frightening films released. After seeing a midnight showing on April, Friday the 13th, I wondered what sort of people would go to this kind of film. Curiously, there were a fair amount of folks at a little art house theatre in the city. A mixture of young and some older. I suspected a fair number of folks had yet to see the film and if they had, they had not seen the film in on a large screen. Cunningham's classic still offers a few scares but mostly, it is a whodunit thriller which gradully brings about the kind of suspense that one does not always see with the thrill-ride horror so common in films these days. Friday the 13th is not a rollercoaster ride but something a bit disturbing. At times, even a bit subtle.

It is always a matter of perspective.

At twilight, sometimes known as the gloaming, it is quiet. There is little sound and the city is peaceful. I can hear a bit of traffic in the distance and sometimes, a fire truck sirens by. But most of the time, atop this hill, I enjoy the cool evening before it darkens completely.

Happy Easter. Christ is risen.

Virginia Woolf considered having Clarissa Dalloway kill herself in the original version of Mrs. Dalloway (1925). Eventually, she changed her mind and did otherwise. After the turn of the century, Ian McEwan would publish what would seem like an homage, Saturday, which many reviewers did not connect immediately to Mrs. Dalloway. Is it because people are not familiar with the novel? Perhaps it is because Mrs. Dalloway remains fodder for English majors at the undergraduate level while people from other disciplines can graduate from universities without having read this work from the modernist period. If we seek any evidence for the failed imagination in society today, we need only regard television as the most damning source. The repetitive and mind-numbing programming has left viewers scurrying for cable networks which offer more demanding viewers a wider array of programming. Is television better because people speak quickly in laughably unbelievable patterns of dialogue? I would like to believe that people are genuinely that witty. If such places exist, I'd like to know where they are.

On Good Friday, I noted the various ways in which communities throughout the world celebrated this holy time. Whether they participated in re-enactments or sat awaiting the beginning of liturgy, I found the photographs a reminder that Christianity is a global community. Believers come together for worship...