The Writer's Life: The Writer's Life 8/31

Friday, August 31, 2018

The Writer's Life 8/31 - Beyond

Deacdes, channel 2-2 through my TV antenna, runs The Best of Ed Sullivan Monday through Friday from ten to eleven PM. I check in when whatever show or movie I'm watching is in commercial. Much of it is comprised of musical artists. Most of the performances are good but exactly what one would expect. Occasionally it soars, such as Peggy Lee singing with the Righteous Brothers, a pairing I had no idea had ever occurred. Recently, a singer with whom I was unfamiliar, whose name I've forgotten, sang the Italian standard Al Di La, which was captioned at the bottom of the screen. Why isn't it one word? I wondered, having always assumed it was a woman's name. Curious, I googled it. The phrase actually translates to "beyond." The song is about the transformative power of love, not a specific person, which should have been obvious to me every time Connie Francis' soaring version came up on one of car CD's. My ignorance would surprise none of my family elders, almost all of whom are deceased. I always wanted to be what they referred to as "'merighan." Still do, but I appreciate Italian-American culture more than I ever have. At one time I shunned it, as if it were inferior. Just one of the many examples of the dumb know-it-all I once was. At least I hope I no longer am.

And this certainly looks like it's from beyond, recently caught and released off the shore of Maine:

Business at the floating book shop was much better in the extreme heat than it was today in the breezy cool. I sold only one book, but it was the kind of sale that made the session worthwhile despite the paltry return. When I asked a gentleman browser if he were looking for something in particular, he replied, in a heavy accent I assume was Russian, "Byron." I didn't have anything by Lord B, but I had a hunch he might be interested in another volume, an English translation of selected poems by Osip Mandelstam, a Polish Jew born in Warsaw in 1891 when it was part of the Russian Empire, who also wrote essays, one of which was critical of archfiend Joseph Stalin, who imprisoned the poet twice. Mandelstam died in a camp in Siberia in 1938 at 47. The potential customer's eyes spread as I showed him the book. "Where did you get this?" he said, thrilled. I told him people gave me books all the time and I had no idea what they would be. I laughed when, after he paid, he banged the hardcover copy against the rail of the scaffold to shake dust from it. Thank you, sir.