half eaten books

I met the new year surrounded by old friends, having ended 2018 surrounded by slightly less old college friends. But perhaps more on that later: the new year is often a time to reflect. In my case, I am reflecting on the books I have started in my life but not finished. From the bottom:

First: I don't think I will finish this book. Prisoner's of Love has been treacherous, I just can't get into it. I give up. I do.
2nd: The Geographer Drank His Globe Away does not have the same ring to it in English as it does in Russian. My mother gave me this book; I am #blessed with a mother who's book recommendations tend to fall in line with my literary tastes, I guess this is no accident (side note: that is my least favorite hashtag that I see all the time). So I know I should give it another try, in spite of my borderline illiteracy in Russian (I'm exaggerating but still)
3rd: Has anyone ever actually finished this book? Not only is Infinite Jest difficult to carry around, it is also the most depressing thing I have ever read. In some ways like the Bell Jar but longer, without the southern romanticism of The Sound and The Fury to take the edge off, or the Irish romanticism and nationalism of Joyce's Ulysses (see, those books I somehow managed to read!) Because reading it is so mundane, and is lasts forever. Absurd as well, sure, but mostly it feels like waiting in line for your groceries behind someone talking about tennis. We'll see. Not a priority.
4th: The White Tiger is a book I picked up while in Maine at a second hand book shop with Sorrel. It is the first book I ever didn't finish, senior year of high school, because it was a school book and I didn't finish it in time before graduating. Not only do I want to finish it because it has stuck in my head all of these years, and I hold a true curiosity of how it ends, but also perhaps finishing it will allow me to stop this pattern of not finishing books. Except for that bottom one. Nope.
5th: Notes from the Underground. It's really good, the bit of it I have read I've truly enjoyed - though being a classic I guess this is a given. Plus Matt was asking me about it a month or so ago, so I'll have someone to discuss it with once I'm done in addition to my parents. Bonus.

I also have A Young Doctor's Notebook and Twelve Chairs on my list for Russian ones, and Howards End (EM Forster) in English.

any other good reads I should get to this year?

Truth and Beauty

At the very end of my shift on the 31st, a code was called that resulted in three restraints. That was how I exited 2015.

They say your year will go the way you entered it. I entered it with warmth. I was surrounded by people I've known since I was ten. I called my family in Arizona. I messaged those who I wanted to carry with me from 2015 into 2016.

My first conversation of the year was
Eloosha, with a smug look: Huh, doesn't feel very different.
Me, insistent on magic: almost like New Years is an artificial time construct, you jerk.

traditions carried for generations: Oranges or clementines. Champagne. A table laden with food. Ирония судьбы (The Irony of Fate) playing in the background. Saying goodbye to the Old Year before saying hello to the New. Family. A New Years tree. Sparklers and fireworks. Snegurochka and Ded Moroz. Gifts. Love.

First Day of the Year, discussing bunnies as secret illigal pets during college
"I only ever saw two bunnies at Yale, one was named Truth and the other Beauty, and one of them almost certainly overdosed on cocaine" (which one though, is unknown)

I woke up the next morning and knit for a little bit before falling asleep and waking up with everyone else: all of us soon transitioned to one bed, a lump and warmth and promises to try to stay horizontal for as long as possible. Liza said "my new years resolution is to keep my heart over my head for as long as possible". Eloosha said "I think with my hands". I tucked those away.
Wasting time to the fullest with cuddling and music and late brunch. 
The next morning I woke not in my own bed yet again, and read Autobiography of a Corpse (Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky translated by Joanne Turnbull, 1920's) while surrounded by sleeping beauties.

I made it back to my apartment eventually, only to go back to the same company for a conversation that lasted hours, a midnight visitation and trying to breathe and be brave.

2015

2015 was holding my breath. I lived so much this year.

Time passed with a moon dipped in venom, so many friends visiting - Adrienne, Hannah, Will, Sorrel, a Bernie rally attended. I smoked my first cigar and felt sick - stuck with the habit of holding the smoke in my lungs. I got hit by a car while biking, and had too much to think anything of it. I went to a lecture on John Weiners at Harvard at Kelsey's urging, hundreds of miles away in Columbus, Ohio. I got sick. I spent a few days in NH with my coworkers and three dogs. I got told that I was looking exceedingly bird-like. My flatmates and I threw a party and named it "Crunksgiving". I climbed Mt. Lincoln and Lafayette with my father.

each of those is a story, a vignette.  maybe I'll have time to tell them this year.

I read a few books - Cat's Cradle in a burst of "oh! reading in English, I've forgotten!". On Adrian's advice (and my parents as well)  How to Win Friends and Influence People. When I felt lonely with R, I would read his favorite book; 100 Years of Solitude - it went by quick, so did he, the irony not lost on me. House of Leaves, which I had gifted myself for my birthday. Matt then lent me City of Glass. A project started by Hannah and Sorrel led me to read chunks of A Short History of Wine, I Drink Therefore I am; A Philosopher's Guide to Wine, and A History of the World in Six Glasses.

I'm ready to breath out.

wrap up

I was just watching stand-up on youtube with people, but have a hard time getting into it. The go-to explanation is that I'm too pc to laugh, but a lot of it was pretty inoffensive. Just boring. Or sad. Many jokes come from sorrow.
But I'm not a lost cause -- A few of the patients said about me "that one has a sense of humor".
I'll take it.

Welcome in the new year. Here is what happened in the last one (listing off for myself so I can start afresh?):

The next generation was in the second iteration of the Harms play from 2008. I talked to Eloosha, half asleep, after that, and to a half-awake Valya the next morning. Dew-covered thread connect sleeping moment to sleeping moment, new faces on an altered stage.

I went to the Goya exhibit with Max M. There was this beautiful print The Blind Guitarist and some paintings on ivory that had a really interesting effect.

bits of James Bond. The Manchurian Candidate (1962, USA, Frankenheimer); Print the Legend (2011, USA); Footnote (2011, Israel, Cedar); Mazerunner (2014, USA, Ball).

photo by Miriam E

spelling

I've just given both my brothers haircuts. I've spent time with family and seen friend (Annutik is going to India! She just came back from Australia. Everyone else seems to be staying on this continent for the next few months). I'm leaving for NYC tomorrow morning until classes start up again.

My sort of New Years Resolution:

I've attempted to make New Years resolutions before - twice. However, neither of those years ended with me doing the intended split. Mama says Russian's don't make resolutions, and I have a conspiratorial theory that it's a habit brought to culture by capitalist gyms trying to sell memberships (everyone who goes to gyms regularly hates this time of year).
But in spite of my mother, and myself, I've decided that there is something I should work on. Spelling. And what better place to make sure I do this but here? I'm not sure how I've managed all these years - read so many books, written so many papers - without absorbing the proper way to order letters. Most people seem to make adjustments without conscious effort. It's at the point where it looks like I'm making errors in my grammar and pronunciation, particularly in Russian, but in English too. Sure, it's embarrassing. But mostly I want to improve my spelling because I'm vain (vane, vein) and I got two really great compliments on my speech this year. Amanda consistently tells me I speak and write poetically (in English). Kostya told me that sometimes he thinks I'm quoting classical literature, and then realizes that I'm just talking (in Russian). If spelling is blockading my ability to bring poetry to the page, then I should work on it. Right? Of course, I have yet to figure out how I'm going to do this...

Новый Год в Москве

You can practically taste the translation in some parts. It's at the bottom again.

Oh! and before I forget: another thing that American's associate with Russia is "babushka". However, it does not, as many think, mean headscarf. It means grandmother. Though if you search "babushka" in wiki, it says "A Western term for a woman's headscarf tied below the chin in the Eastern European manner." so I guess if you use it with that definition in English it's acceptable.

31: В семь утра слышно как дворники чистят лед и притоптанный снег. Чуть раньше, подметают тот, который еще не прилип.

Настал вечер. Позвонила Симе с который я не виделась восемь лет; тогда мы провели месяц в одной палатка в Карелии. Она, добрая, пригласила встречать Новый Год вмести с ее однокурсниками (с мехмата). Мне Санька тоже предложил отметит Новый Год, но в анти-кафе с экономистами я не пошла. Решила, что математики мне более знакомый народ.

Шел снег, взрывался салют; эхо на весь город. Проходила мимо женщин в шикарных шубах, которые стояли и смотрели, как их мужья расчищают машины. Некоторые еще ругались, за то что дверь не достаточно быстро открывают. В метро на меня посматривал какой-та мальчик, но претворялся что этого не делал; метро как метро.

У Сими было хорошо; она героически приготовила очень много еды, и мы ее убедили взяться за гитару. Дружно, слегка фальшиво, напевали песне (ну, когда могла, подпевала, у меня конечно странный репертуар). Сыграли в игру со стихами; человек выбирает не слишком известный стих, и говорит из него две строчки. А каждый игрок должны придумать еще две правдоподобные строчки, и сдают свою версию тому кто загадал. После этого зачитывают все версии, включая оригинала (и версию которую сочинил тот кто загадал). Все голосуют, стараются угадать, какая версия оригинал. Мне даже один раз удалось обманут большинство (после орфографической поправки), что конечно для меня удивительно (и приятно), хотя то что я придумала достаточно тупое:

Что же вас сгубило,
Бросило сюда,
Что же вас сгубило,
Бросила судьба

Оригинал:
Что же вас сгубило,
Бросило сюда,
Где не так уж мило,
Где - сковорода?

1: Новый год мы встретили на кухне, с телевизором. Шампанское, а в скоре после этого кофе; романтично. Ближе к восьми мы пошли гулять, было безумно красиво; снег с машин еще никто не очистил, небо светлое от облаков. Проводили большинство народа в метро, и пошли в Битцевский Лесопарк, там два озера, и санитарии, красивый. Переходя дорогу, узнали что в пол девятого, на Новый Год , ходят пустые автобусы.

В 10 мы легли спать, потом в 16 проснулись, что с джетлагом мне не помогло. Убрались, и я поехала обратно на Ленинский Проспект. В метро, на меня тырился какой-то дядя, старался обратить на себя внимание; метро, как метро.

2: Днем болела, вечером решила что хватит и пошла на каток с Симой и ее друзьями. По очереди терпеливо меня учили кататься, не смотря на то что они меня не знают. Каток это хорошее место познакомиться с Русской попсой. 

This is from the second time we went, same people though.

31: Seven in the morning you can hear the yardmen (city workers) cleaning away the ice and compacted-from-being-stepped-on snow. A bit earlier, they sweep away that which has not yet stuck to the ground.
Evening came. I called Sima who I had not seen in eight years: then we had shared a tent for a month in Karelia. She, being kind, invited me to meet the New Year with her course mates (math section of MGU). My cousin San'ka had also invited me to mark the New Year, but I did not and up going to an anti-cafe with economists. I decided that mathematicians are a more familiar crowd.
It was snowing, fireworks were exploding; the entire city echoed. I passed women in luxurious fur coats, who stood and watched as their husbands cleared the snow from the car. Some of them also made a fuss about the car door not being opened quickly enough. In the metro, some boy was glancing at me and pretending that he wasn't; a metro, like any metro.  

It was really nice at Sima's; she had heroically cooked a ton of food, and we convinced her to play the guitar. Together, slightly off key, we sang (well, I sang when I could; my repertoire is rather strange). We play a game with poetry: a person takes a poem that is not too famous (preferably abab rhyme scheme, this part is easier in Russian) and give the players the first two lines. After that each player has to come up with his own continuation. Then all the versions (that of the players, that of the person who presented the first two lines, and the original four) are read out load. The player’s vote as to which one they think is the original. I miraculously managed to trick the majority (after my spelling was edited) and of course for me this is amazing (and pleasant) though what I came up with was rather obtuse.  My version is about being abandoned by fate, the original is about frying a fish.

We met the New Year in the kitchen, with the T.V. Champagne, and soon after coffee; romantic. Around eight we went for a walk; it was incredibly beautiful; no one had cleaned the snow off of the cars; the sky was light from the clouds. We walked most of the group to the metro, and then went to the Bitevskii Forestpark; there are two lakes, and a sanitarium, which is pretty. When we crossed the street, we found out that at 8:30, on New Year’s, run empty buses.

At 10am we went to bed, and then at 4pm we woke up, which didn’t help me with my jetlag. We cleaned up, and I went back to Leninskiy Prospekt (it's a big street where I was staying). In the metro, some man was staring at me, trying to get my attention; a metro, like any metro.

2: I was sick during the day, but then in the evening decided that enough is enough and joined Sima and her friends at the ice rink. They took turns teaching me how to skate, despite the fact that they don’t know me. The skating rink is a good place to acquaint oneself with Russian pop-music.

Happy 2011!

This is our New Years tree.
It is crowned with a Rat-Angel, that we got on the Chinese year of the Rat.
Дед Мороз gave me a moleskin notebook :P

There is some history before this (pagan, tzar, Germany, ect), but overall: how Russians ended up with a New Year's Tree:
It was a Christmas tree, like any other, for the orthodox Christians. Then in 1917, the revolution happened and all religious holidays were forbidden.
Communists, yeah. But people need a winter festival of lights. So New Years became popular.
(and now i give up on re-wording it myself)
"However, following the article “Let’s Organize a Nice Fir-Tree for Children for the New Year!” by Pavel Postyshev, published in the major Soviet newspaper Pravda in the end of 1935, fir-trees and New Year festivities returned to people’s homes on December 31, 1935. Yet, it was not until 1949 that January 1 became an official day-off."
from here

and Ded Moroz (Дед Мороз, or 'Grandpa Frost') and his granddaughter Snegurochka (Снегурочка, or Snow Maiden) give out presents, which magically appear at the stroke of midnight.