Islands

We left the house at 6:00am yesterday for our journey to Bear Island, Maine. If we were crows, I suppose it would have been an hour's journey, (though this is just a wild guess and Dick could probably tell me the exact amount of time, but he's asleep).At around 11:00am we arrived at the island, which I feel I ought to capitalize. The Island.

There are almost 3000 (!) islands off the coast of Maine. I had no idea that the number was so high until a moment ago, when I googled it. I knew there were alot, but not this many. 95% of these islands are privately owned.

The idea of owning an island is beyond me. Yet, I remember having fantasies about just such a proposition years before I moved here. I had come to Maine to camp for a few weeks via plane, and while waiting to leave, I noticed that there was a glass display of real estate ads, all for islands, not houses, nor acreage but whole islands for sale, and most of them cost less than the price of a modest house in the suburbs of New York.

At the time, I lived in a tiny house on Long Island (not the one in Maine). For the price of that house, I could have owned my own private realm. I would have no money left over to build a house or buy a boat, but a person can dream, can't they?

I didn't buy an island but I did move to Maine. Unfortunately, I moved up here totally broke and didn't buy property until the prices were driven almost as high as they ever have been (such has been my luck in all matters financial).

But this is not what I meant to write.

I wanted to write about the kind of light (and darkness) that exists on an island. I am pausing here, trying to find the right words, and they are not coming to me. I am terribly tired, but I would venture to guess that this is not why I am at a loss for words. I am not enough of wordsmith, by any means, to convey the quality of the light off the coast of Maine.

Every time I have left the mainland, within five minutes I become awe struck. The water reflects the sky and even when the skies are dark with rain clouds, the sense of spaciousness grows as one gets further from the shore. The boat may be noisy, but the sound of gulls and terns overpowers the sound of the motor (or maybe only to my ears).

Yesterday morning was gray and foreboding, but the gray was tinged with purple, so similar in color to the shakes on the sides of most of the islands' buildings. One realizes, too, just how many shades of gray there are. The rocks, the sky, the dead trees (oh, they are beautiful, those mangled behemoths), the new and old houses, the storm petrels. . .all gray, magnificent gray.

We got lucky, and heavy humidity and fog did not turn to storms. The sun came out brilliantly, quite surprisingly, and the sky was filled with the kind of cumulous clouds that I've always thought of as islands in the sky. Totally perfect. Islands below and above.

And then Bear Island, the Island, small enough to see water on all sides, but large enough to hold a small forest and quite a bit of mystery.

What can I say? I coveted. I still do. There was the "big house", where the family has lived for over one hundred summers. And there was the "kitchen house", which not only held a kitchen but an indoor dining room big enough for thirty people (or more) and still feel intimate. The screened dining room faced the sun setting over the water and held a view of not only the other islands, but the coast of Maine, far enough away as to obscure what I knew was there - the "city" of Belfast, where I used to live (and now have very mixed feelings about). I could not see the new nail salons and the big orange sign of the new Family Dollar Store. Ah, poor Belfast. If one strays from its still beautiful side streets and two lower shopping streets on the water, one could be in Anywhere, USA.

As this evening has turned to night, I realize that the darkness on the island was so much deeper. Here, in my tiny rural village, we have street lights. No, it isn't New York. I can see the stars at night and at some point, around 9:00pm, the sound of cars pretty much ceases. But it is never truly pitch black. It never becomes truly quiet either, for there's always some hum of a motor to be heard, whether it's the cooler in the General Store or one of the trucks my neighbor has in his front yard. In my own house, something is usually making some sort of sound. It may be the sump pump or the well water pump. We've stopped using our furnace (for good, I think), but there's a propane heater and a refrigerator and if one is really sensitive to these things, the sound of the electricity. Yes, it makes a sound. Another thing Dick could explain, but I won't wake him up to say "Hey Dick, why do we unplug the washing machine?"

Bear Island runs what little electricity they use from solar panels (or something - I didn't ask for details). At night, the darkness seems deepened by the quiet. And oh how I long for that kind of quiet. It is like the quiet after a huge snow storm. It envelops me and makes me feel comforted and snug as a bug. I am surprised when I find that many people are afraid of this kind of darkness and quiet.

So many homes, most of them, I'd say, have neither quiet nor darkness. The TV is always on, or the radio, or someone is listening (sort of) to music. The phone is always ringing. When I was in Princeton, I noticed that about a third of the folks on the street were talking into the air, for they had bluetooth devices in their ears. There is no place you can not be reached by others or assaulted with sound.

On the Maine Islands, you're lucky to get any kind of phone service. The mail arrives by boat, every day during the summer (at least on the few islands that were serviced by the boat we came in on) and twice a week during the winter. For those who do have cell phones, they have great excuses for not being able to talk; "I'm on an island." It sounds so dramatic, as if they were cast away and stranded, and not living leisurely and by choice in this wondrous setting.

I have been bewitched by other Maine Islands: notably Swan's and Little Cranberry Islands. As a teenager, I spent a day sitting in the woods of Deer Island, Canada, reading H.P.Lovecraft under the enormous pines. I never wanted to leave.

The same summer I read Lovecraft, I joined a bunch of other kids to rough it on an interior island on Moosehead Lake. We didn't figure out properly how much food we needed and were out by the end of day two, so three of us got in a canoe and started paddling in what we thought was the right direction of the store. Moosehead Lake is big. None of knew how to read the map of the waters or use a compass (skills we should have had, of course). To make matters worse, a storm blew up out of nowhere, lightning and all, and we wound up nearly killing ourselves trying to make it up onto the shore of another typically stoney Maine Island. I am not lying when I tell you there was an old sign that read "Welcome to Devil's Island". Sopping wet and freezing, we crawled our way over the rocks and found a row of burnt out summer cottages fronting a deep woods. We figured we'd sleep in one of them until the morning came, assess the canoe's damage in the morning, and pray someone would come along. Or something. We hadn't a clue.

Before we made it to the cottages, a woman ran out of the woods. She was quite old. She said she had been watching us, and feared that we would not make it to shore. She led us through a dark path to a large house deep in the woods. There were two other old women who lived with her. And then there was this - the ground floor of the house was filled with glass canisters of cookies and sweets. On every surface we saw, there they were. It was insane. We were kids of 15 suddenly thrown into a real life Hansel and Gretal house. The women were thrilled to see us. They went off island once a month for groceries and spoke very little. We were like little children to them. The boy who was with us was of particular interest to them. He had dark skin and dark hair and had the audacity to announce he was Jewish. I have no idea why he did, but one of those woman, I kid you not, parted his dark hair to look for horns. Oh, we were babes in the wilderness!

I remember falling asleep, scared that I had been poisoned, and scared that I would be bitten by bedbugs, for I was sleeping on a bed filled with straw, something I'd only read about in books or seen in museums. In the middle of the night, I had to pee, and went to the outhouse. There was a chainsaw on the floor, with something oozy looking dripping off of it. My imagination ran away with me. I truly thought one of compatriots had been killed very quietly while I was sleeping and certain I was going to be unwittingly fed him or her for a meal the next day.

The next day turned out to be bright and beautiful. Our canoe was ruined. The women told us that we could stay and that Moosehead Lake had a coast guard of sorts, since it was so big, and that after a large storm they generally would come by to check on things. Eventually.

Even though none of us had been cut up and stewed and the women were less terrifying in the light of day, none of us wanted to stay too long. We were grateful when the boat turned up in the late afternoon. They were looking for us. They had checked on the friends we left behind first, who were terrified we had been killed in the storm. They took us all back to the shore. We were admonished for our ignorance and warned against ever trying such a thing again without knowing the basics of compass reading and preparation. It didn't matter. We were all from the city and now that we were out of danger, we all agreed that this would make the best story of the summer once we got home.

And that was certainly true, for here I am, thirty years later, telling this story.

Back then, I was somewhat scared of the darkness and quiet of islands, though I also felt deeply attracted to them. Tonight, it is raining heavily, thunder is cracking and lightning is lighting up the dark night sky. But it isn't so wild or so daunting here on the mainland. We will not be stranded. Tomorrow, my driveway may have some new ruts, but that is all.

I meant to speak of the nature of the light on the islands, but I fell back in time, and remembered some of what brought me to this place called Maine. It is not the place I knew as a child, but it is still is, out there on most of those 3000 islands. Yes, now people have satellite dishes, internet service and cell phones, but they can always say "Service is bad out here" and go about their business, picking blueberries and gazing out at the water, living in a world of enormous light and darkness.

If I lived out there, I'd have a gray cell phone. A osprey might come swooping down and mistakenly carry it away in its talons, thinking it was one very cold mouse.

Ah.

Photo note: This is not the water off the coast of Maine. I have no idea where it is. It was on the Web, and the description was in a language I did not recognize, which is intriguing in of itself. I looked for a good picture of any of the 3000 Maine islands, and gave up. They all looked too much like picture postcards, or were ads for multi-million dollar homes. I toyed with the idea of putting up a square of purplish gray, but this photo will do. For what, I am not sure.

Nausea

I mentioned in an earlier post that I had been to Marshall's and they had a pretty good selection of deals on perfume in opened boxes. My nose got all confused and I wound up buying Azzaro Pure Cedrat instead of Christian Lacroix's Tumulte, which was a mistake. It makes sense, since they're both cedar smells. But one is cloying and the other (I hear) is not. I will be near that Marshall's in three days. I hope they still have that box of Tumulte.

INTERJECTION: I discovered that the word Cedrat does not mean cedar. There is no translation in English. It is a bit lemon, a citron, and most definately not cedar. No wonder I thought it smelled wrong!

I'm wearing Aura Cacia "Root" at this moment and I'm not liking it much. I have a craving for the scent of wood shavings. I had it on my fingers that day I sneaked a few sniffs from those opened boxes at Marshall's but figured it was the Pure Cedrat (pure cedar, no?)

There's something almost disgusting about this Aura Cacia oil. It's not subtle. But what does it smell of, exactly? This is one of those times where a scent is making me nauseous, literally, and because of that, I can't really say anything about it except it's making me ill. In fact, I am going to go scrub it off right now. I'll be right back.

I used the Caldrea Italian Cypress Pear liquid soap to wash away the oil. It was probably a poor choice, considering it has such a strong woody smell itself. I do feel nauseated.

This has been a nauseating week in a number of ways. I began my phlebotomy course on Monday. On Tuesday, I drew blood for the first time. We looked at the vials of blood after they were centrifuged.

Then I came home and ate steak. I sat and relaxed before I did the dishes and felt rather squeamish about the platter the steak had been on. It was coated with coagulated blood and fat that had turned solid, as fat does when it's cool. It looked too much like the blood in the vials. It's interesting how I wasn't bothered at all by drawing blood out of a person's vein, analyzing the vials of blood or talking about some objectively horrific subjects involving severed limbs and the like. The dirty platter was the thing that made me queasy.

I used to be squeamish. Then I became a body piercer and a tattoo artist and discovered that I wasn't at all. But a funny thing happened along the way. I started to become over-sensitive to the smallest accidents that occurred to people that I care for. If a friend had a bad scrape from, say, falling off a bicycle, I would feel a shiver go through me. I would feel almost faint at the sight of a small cut on my boyfriend. I can not look at these little wounds on those I like. This has now extended to myself. I cut myself with a knife a few months ago while doing dishes. It was not a big cut. I didn't need any stitches. I thought I was going to faint.

I've tried to understand why I changed because it's a bit disturbing. What I figure is that since I put my feelings on hold completely while "working", they're coming out at other times, when it's not important. But the reason it's disturbing to me is that it is important, for if I needed to help a friend (or myself) I might wind up passing out instead of actually doing something.

Ugh. The smell of the lingering Root and Cypress Pear is not a good smell. I can't get it out of my nose. I ate an apple, which usually helps settle my stomach. I think I'll go rub my hands liberally with Booth's Honey and Almond Body Butter and see if that helps mask the smell I don't like. It usually does the trick. Let's hope so. I really feel sick.

Note: That Booth's product really works. It's a bargain, too, at six bucks. It's a bit waxy and greasy, but it has a warmness that is nice. The smell is not quite right, as far as "accuracy" goes. But it does seem to just about always work to neutralize a scent that's bothering me. I do have very dry hands, and so, even though I generally don't like feeling greasy, I like this product. Now, I know I said I wasn't going to write "reviews", but this sure sounds like one. Please don't hold it against me.

And lastly, if you were thinking I was going to be writing about Sartre's "Nausea", I'm sorry you've been disappointed. However, I can steer you to an article entitled "Sartre and Camus: Nausea and Existentialist Humor", which I started to read and found decidedly unfunny, but I'm not an academic. If you read it, let me know how it turns out.

The horse named Degeneration pulls into the lead

When I was looking for an image of a horse drawn carriage with the horses rearing up, I found this Currier and Ives print. Nothing like the bucolic scenes of a perfect Christmas time here. I had no idea that Currier and Ives indulged in such bigotry (click on the picture to see it in detail to get a full impact). Here is a link to a scholarly site about the "dirty secret" of Currier and Ives, along with plenty of images, and this disclaimer at the top:
Disclaimer:
"Be aware that the words, descriptions, and images from Currier & Ives Darktown Comics series are considered racially offensive by today's standards."

In the horse drawn carriage of my imagination I'm sitting in, we suddenly come to a huge crevasse in the earth. If the driver didn't pull back on the reins hard enough, we would plummet to our deaths. He does, and the horse rears up, whinnying. It is all so very classic. Just like in a movie. I've never seen this in real llife.

No matter. It is a mental picture of the feeling I'm having that this blog is quickly degenerating into a place where I come to unload my crapola.

Slang break:
crap·o·la (kr-pl)
n. Vulgar Slang
Rubbish; nonsense.
[crap + -ola (probably modeled on trade names like Shinola, a brand of shoe polish).]

This is not what I wanted to happen, but it's an easy chasm for me to fall into. Thus, I am pulling on the reins, for I don't want that horse named "Degeneration" to win this race (or to fall to its death, along with its passengers, which includes this blogger and perhaps a reader or two).

As a respite from my crankiness, I offer you the following: In spite of the snow on the ground, spring is evidencing itself in the sound of birds. I heard the distinctive call of the Red-winged Blackbird a few days ago. DIck reports that he saw a few Robins across the road from us.

I saw some greenish grass in my back yard for the first time in at least five months.

And that is the end of my post. You get a beautiful Japanese wookblock print,"Camellia in Snow and Sparrows" by Utagawa Hiroshige, as a bonus for this post that started with such distasteful imagery.

Human Existence

This is the name of a perfume.

I quote from Thierry Mugler's website:
"How can something so ugly become so beautiful?
Why do we all need some dirtiness to find addiction and love?
The everyday struggle in perfumery.

To emulate the absurd blend, the duo of perfumers has selected a natural malt absolute containing notes reminiscent of cheese. They added a laboratory-created reconstruction of civet, and some cumin for acridness."

Why do we all need some dirtiness to find addiction and love?

Let's take a look at this sentence: . . . "we all need". . .
Who is this "we" that Thierry Mugler is speaking to? I suppose one could make the argument that anyone who shells out 700 bucks for a box of weird fragrances might fit the description of someone in the throes of an addiction. But mostly, I think it's just rich people who will buy this. Though I can imagine stealing to obtain the money to buy the Comfret. . .but I won't. I promise. I don't do that.

Yet.

I really want that box.

Okay. . .let's look at the sentence again: "Why do we all need some dirtiness. . ."
So, um, you're assuming we all need dirtiness. What is dirtiness? I read somewhere that this "Human Existence" is redolent of a woman who is unkempt. The cheese is the scent of the inside of a young girl's navel. And as a former body piercer, I will attest to the fact that even the loveliest, sweet smelling, well dressed young woman's navel does not smell "nice". It is an acquired taste, one that I never acquired.

And this unkempt woman, what does she really smell of? I will say the unspoken words: pussy and cum. Isn't that what we're talking about here? The real smell of sex. The two scents that come together to make life, thus, human existence.

Is human existence inherently ugly and sex inherently dirty? Are we scent obsessed because of some basic existential disgust for our bodies. . .these dying things that they are, with all their awful needs and excrements. I can feel my mouth curling and my nostrils flaring while I'm writing this.

I have, at times, felt this way. The horror of the body. The days when I don't want to take off my clothes and bathe, for I don't want to see this body, naked, raw, and imperfect.

So, why would I want to buy this in a bottle? Curiosity. Lots of it. I'd like to know what they think this horrible life smells like.

Odd footnote: I wanted to find a Rubens painting for this post. Obviously, I did; "Rape of the Sabine Women". And where did I find the image, just by chance? On a discussion about this:

March 07, 2007 05:31am
Article from: Agence France-Presse
"(Rome) A CONTROVERSIAL ad by fashion designers Dolce and Gabbana suggesting gang rape has been banned from Italian publications. . ."

Come to your own conclusions. . .

It's all subjective

Yesterday I read Chandler Burr's Top Ten List of Perfumes. Now, Chandler Burr has written two fine books about scent and is the fragrance reviewer for the New York Times, so I'm not going to dis anything he thinks. He knows forty zillion times more about this subject than I'll ever know and has sniffed thousands of scents. I love his writing and he's solid on the science of the whole biz.

But, when I read this, "God knows Nos 19 and 22 can be tough to appreciate immediately", I was rather taken aback. I adore adore adore (and on and on until the word is meaningless) Chanel No. 19. I still remember the first time I sniffed it. Hard to appreciate? Why? What's hard about it? Someone please tell me.

The first time I smelled No. 19 I was at B. Altman's on 34th St. and 5th Avenue in New York. This dates me, as the store closed on December 1, 1989.

I loved Altman's. There was something totally wrong with the store by the time I was shopping there as an adult. One could sense it was doomed. Unlike Macy's, which was perpetually packed, Altman's was quiet. It had few customers and quite a small stock. It felt personal shopping there even though it was a big store, for the service was always lovely without being nagging. I always felt very young in that store. Everyone who worked and shopped there was "of a certain age". What age is that, exactly? I think I might be beyond it now!

Again, I am getting off topic. There are two topics. One: Chanel No. 19. Two. Altman's. I suppose the third is Chandler Burr's estimation of No. 19 as being somewhat difficult, but I'll drop that one. I won't fight with a professional!

I bought all my perfume at Altman's. I could have gone to Saks or Henri Bendel. At the time I'm talking about, Barney's was still a men's clothing store only. I suppose I could have gone to Macy's, for that matter. They had a huge cosmetics department. I forget there was also Lord & Taylor, but if I get into why I loathe that store, this post will be endless (but if you want to know, leave a comment!) On second thought, I'll tell the story some time, with or without coaxing. It's pretty crazy.

So: Chanel No. 19. The one perfume that I have always loved above all others and judged every other perfume on. Why do I love it so? I do not know. The first time I sniffed it, I fell in love. Can you explain what love is? Love at first sight, at first sniff, at first hearing or first taste?

We can deconstruct all we want. We can find the little pieces that point to what we love: "He had such piercing blue eyes." But many people have piercing blue eyes. "I love the taste of honey." But I bet you wouldn't eat dog food with honey, would you? "I love the beat. Yes, it's the beat." So? "It's that first rush of bergamot, followed by. . ." Nah, I'm not buying it. Love is subjective. Once we objectify it, it's no longer love. It's just analysis.

I'm not saying it's random. It's not. But I'm saying that the factors that go into "what we love" are so complex as to defy deconstruction. Oooh, I don't want to deconstruct! How pre-modern of me! I don't.

Let love be a mystery. I love Chanel No. 19 and I don't want to know why. It makes me feel happy. Isn't that enough?

Note: Photograph of B. Altman's can be found here, along with an essay about it's architecture and the hey-day of 5th Avenue department stores.

What to wear while duck is cooking

I had a shower and was without scent. The house is filled with the smell of duck; greasy, deep and gamey. I'm not going out and I'll be spending a good deal of time in the kitchen later. . .

. . .hmmm. What scent goes with the smell of duck? I'm sure Chandler Burr would tell me exactly what scent to wear, since he hosts scent dinners.

It would be lovely to ring him up and ask him, but a.) it's Easter Sunday and I'm sure he's got a pretty full day, and b.) He doesn't know me from a hole in the wall (what the hell does that expression mean, anyway?).

I got sidetracked trying to track down the origins of the above expression. I couldn't find it readily. The scent of cooking duck pulled me back to my original task. . .oh, my brain is constantly thinking parenthetically, tangentially. . .why can't I get it into line?!

Since I had just posted about Passage D'enfer, I did think of that. It is Easter Sunday, after all. I don't particularly associate Easter with those candy chicks (Peeps?), chocolate bunnies or colored eggs. Besides, there's a couple of feet of snow outside. Not exactly a Spring-like day here.

I never got that about Easter, anyway. Isn't that all about the Pagan celebration of Spring? Isn't this a celebration of the resurrection of Christ? Goodness, the whole week leading up the this day is one that should be somber, in my humble opinion. Now I've got an image of Jesus on the cross whilst children with baskets filled with plastic grass search for eggs frolic beneath him. Very strange little vignette in my mind.

Oh, the Duck. Decision: Serge Luten's Chypre Rouge. I've only worn it once, liked it instantly, and remembered it being somewhat dark without being depressing. Yes, depressing. Smokiness comes to mind - a scent I love, but at this time of the year, I'm sick of. I use a woodstove (yes, people still do) in my house and I smell burning wood all day (note to readers: locust bark or wood on the grill makes food even yummier than mesquite.)

Chypre Rouge is not smoky. It's sweeter than I remember it. When wet, I smelled curry quite strongly and felt sad when that dissipated. Curry scents, of course, go beautifully with duck. I'm planning on making curried duck with the leftover tomorrow, in fact.

Still, though the curry is now gone, it is a fine scent with the duck. I wish it was darker. I noticed the patchouli and thought: "Wait: I loathe patchouli!" Guess I've been wrong about that for a long time. I can smell it and it does not bother me.

Once, when I was the boss of a small clothing boutique, I asked a girl to scrub off her Patchouli. No matter how much she washed, I could still smell it, and I sent her home. I got a bad reputation for that. Another time, I was having breakfast in a small diner and the waitress was wearing patchouli. I had to leave. I felt like I might throw up.

Well, Serge Lutens, whatever company is supplying you with the bio-identical patchouli does a grand job. Unfortunately (or fortunately 'cause I can't afford it) the scent is just not bowling me over. It's beautiful, for sure. . .wait. . .I better stop analyzing it or else I might convince myself I need it. . .

It's too sweet. No, it's not. It's perfect. No, it's just okay. I like it. Shut up. It goes with the duck. Do I detect a hint of wine in it? Ah, perhaps my mind is playing olfactory tricks on me again.

Now I have to cut up onions and potatoes. I wonder how it will "go" with that.

Note: The painting is Jean-Baptiste Oudry's Still Life with Hare, Duck, Loaf of Bread, Cheese and Flasks of Wine (1742). This painting is the smell of roasting duck.

And again I waffle: this scent bothers me in an some way. I'm thinking "it smells like a very good perfume". That's an odd statement, but it's true. It seems almost generic. I think it reminds me of my grandmother's bedroom. That's what is bothering me. It smells like the inside of her heavy (and i mean heavy!) black lamb coat but without the mothballs. Yes, I'm waiting for the mothball smell to kick in! I am! I can picture her shoes now. Where the hell did she get those shoes? Was there a store in Brooklyn that sold 19th century shoes? Her shoes were heavy. I am trying to conjure up something, anything, light about her and I can not. It is a sign of the times in which she lived. A true depression-era woman. She carried a valise, not a suitcase. He handbag must have weighed twenty pounds. She always carried a tin of Pond's cold cream, a compact with pressed powder and bobby pins.

Okay. This is the hallmark of a great perfume. I could go on for hours about my grandmother, her house, her coats, her bags and the only slightly post-Victorian person that she was.

I have thought of something light: One picture of her. Alone. Smiling. Wearing the clothes of a flapper. I wonder what times she had then!

And now back to reality: I must go cut up potatoes and onions!

And how is this bad?

I was looking for a positive quote about being a dilettante and stumbled upon this (dabbler being a synonym for dilettante).

“If you look at history you'll find that no state has been so plagued by its rulers as when power has fallen into the hands of some dabbler in philosophy or literary addict.”
-Desiderius Erasmus


Personally, I'd be quite happy if we had rulers (read: politicians) who were literate. It'd be a damn sight better than ones who seem not to have finished 12th grade English or spend their free time shooting birds and friends. . .

If you know something about Erasmus and would like to explain the context, please leave a comment.