Links
Archives
Sunday, December 19, 2004
|
SNAPSHOTS FROM HOME:
A Regular University Diaries Feature LUMINARIA Last night, UD joined about twenty fellow Garrett Parkers on a cold clear night and went caroling door to door. In her red-gloved hand she held a flashlight from Sharper Image which burned blue. For an eerie and elegant effect, everyone in town had lined the street in front of their house with luminaria, stenciled paper bags inside of which had been placed an inch or two of sand and a lit votive. The evening’s air of wholesome bonhomie stirred up the angry ghosts of Ambrose Bierce and Evelyn Waugh, who, along with many other writers, lodge quietly within UD but can be roused on these sorts of occasions. Throughout the greeting of neighbors and the exchange of good wishes and the choruses of We Wish You a Merry she heard them grumbling. She heard the many cutting and witty things they said and she laughed with them as they shed their dark radiance on the luminaria. Yes, yes, of course… And yet, and yet, and yet (to quote once again a favorite locution of one of UD’s college professors, Erich Heller), in the midst of their rancor she heard as well the voice of John Cheever, who understood the setting better than those other two, and had an affection for it. UD decided to go with Cheever. |