Pensée du jour

Truman Capote:

The good thing about masturbation

is that you don't have to dress up for it.

Pensée du jour

A quote from a friend of mine, proof that there is beauty everywhere:
". . . watching the coastal skyline transform from azure to pink and fiery orange to dusty violet and charcoal."

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Thank you, precious!

Happy Fourth!

In celebration of our Independence, why not read the following American masterpieces, ones that have stood the test of time. Masterworks that helped to make this country incomparably American, for the words and phrases inside these classic, classic books are testament to the creativity, boundless imagination and inspiration of those writers who once quenched America's thirst for beauty through their transcendent (my favorite word!) writing styles. American English—not England's English—is the miracle of ALL languages—according to the provocative Joyce Carol Oates. Where else could one find the sheer audaciousness of this sentence? other than from the pen of one of this nation's greatest prose stylists, Truman Capote: [To be in love:] ". . . you feel as though pepper has been sprinkled on your heart, as though tiny fish are swimming in your veins. . ."

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1. Willa Cather's exquisite evocation of early America, My Ántonia (1918)

". . . not a country at all but the material out of which countries are made."

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2. Truman Capote's shimmering, sexy, nearly-tropical-in-heat début novel, Other Voices, Other Rooms (1948)

"I am me."

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3. Carson McCullers' first novel, The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter (1940)

". . . how can the dead be truly dead when they still live in the souls of those who are left behind?"

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4. Ernest Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises (1926)

"You're not a moron. You're only a case of arrested development."

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5. Sinclair Lewis' Main Street (1920)

"I think perhaps we want a more conscious life. We're tired of drudging and sleeping. . . of always deferring hope till the next generation. We're tired of hearing politicians and priests and cautious reformers. . . coax us, 'Be calm! Be patient! Wait! We have the plans for a Utopia already made; just wiser than you.' For ten thousand years they've said that. We want our Utopia now—and we're going to try our hands at it."

Weather report

Oscar Wilde:

Whenever people talk to me about the weather, I always feel quite certain that they mean something else.

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At the moment: effervescent, sublime, transcendent weather cloaks Chicago.

Why is my wish, always and forever: If only it would last. If only. If only.

Relief

After a string of ninety plus-degree days, a calm, cool oasis mists Chicago, at least temporarily.

Thais, for obvious reason, came to mind as I roamed the desert city.

Porn, courtesy of Cooper's Mom

Gloria Vanderbilt, aka CNN's Cooper Anderson's controversial heiress mother, has written an erotic new novel, Obsession, that seems to have been inspired by the world of pornography—that secret, forbidden, voyeuristic guilty pleasure every one lusts about. . . Ms. Vanderbilt, in the ripe old age of 85, has no qualms, it seems to me, on what certain camps may think or say of her latest creation. I read the first two chapters last night, and I must say that she knows her porn: perhaps too, too well for a woman nearing ninety. But who are we to judge?

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Speaking of sex: that ultimate seventies symbol of sultriness, wavy blond hair, and, yes, sex, Farrah Fawcett, had just passed away, literally in the last hour or so. She is best remembered for her flawless, sun-kissed body immortalized in a best-selling pin-up; her Charlie's Angels stint, which seemed almost like soft porn back in the day; and, of course, her stormy love affair with boy-next-door Ryan O'Neal, which spanned nearly three decades. Ms. Fawcett was the epitome of easy, effortless, never-the-girl-next-door, laid back California style that was all the rage during her glory years in the '70s. It seems to me that no one looked more sexier, or desirable, or luscious in a pair of blue jeans and T-shirt than Ms. Fawcett did. She was 62.