Print, Risk

You may have heard something recently about reading the printed word. You've likely heard that in addition to reading the printed word, many have taken a pledge to do so. This pledge, the baby of east side bride and cevd, means we are committed to reading books and newspapers and magazines and subway signs and words that are printed.

This all sounds very pleasant--coffeehouses! the smell of ink!--but I would like to remind us all that pledges are rarely made without a bit of underlying risk. In this case, make no mistake, we undertake a great deal of it. To say nothing of stepping silently around the characters who spend time at libraries, we must reckon with smudgy, soft ink on our hands, paper cuts, early-evening cherry pie cravings when nothing else will do, men at bars who ask--or do not ask--with cocked eyebrow, what we're reading. We risk missing our train stop or leaving a half-finished paperback in the back of a cab. We risk heading in bleary-eyed, achy, having a poem knock the wind out of us as we cross the street. We risk daydreaming, staring at strangers whose toes remind us of Seymour's, glimpsing the dust of other worlds. We risk walking into another land and coming back changed, or not ever quite returning at all. It is a brave choice, to make a pledge. And if we're going to Read the Printed Word, it seems important to face the facts.

A list with a Lauren in its pocket: I face risk with lists. At least for the time being, books I've finished in 2010 will appear at the right-hand side of this blog. This is not to say I'll list everything I read in print, for that would be a bit unwieldy. I'm leaving out research and professional livres, for example, and t-shirts and street signs and newspapers and magazines and plaques and calling cards. Mostly, you'll see fiction and livres for littles and collections of poetry, and only those read from cover to cover. Will re-reads be included? Of course. Categories may or may not appear. I'm prepared for all sorts of possibilities.

What, dear reader, have you got going, printed word-wise?
What have you risked recently by burying your nose in its depths?

Twirl, Roll

Spotted at the Museum of Childhood in Edinburgh, phenakistascope disks, which started the aforementioned obsession with moving pictures and scopes and tropes of all sorts. Also, a bag of clay marbles. I would like to have one of these to roll between my fingers while I think. (Cat-eye marbles give me the creeps.)

Thaumatrope, Valenthyme

One last swap post, and then I promise to be through.



From marvelous Lily, I received sweet-smelling, fresh valenthyme and valenrosemary from her very own garden (!) along with a heady bar of lemon geranium valensoap from Saipua. These were packaged alongside the most perfecty card of all time (one for me to pass on, no less!), stamped and wondering: "Will Ewe Be Mine?" All told, an herbaceous, sweet-smelling valentine, one that allowed me to glimpse warmer weather, to sit at my desk in cold New York and stand in a desert garden, running my fingers through bundles of herbs. Many thanks, Lily.



To Amanda at Bird for Bread, I packed up a set of thaumatrope cards. I've been a little obsessed with these toys since visiting the Museum of Childhood in Edinburgh, and it seemed about time to track some down and spread them about. In the vein of magical toys, a tiny fortune-telling fish headed Amanda's way as well, along with a big batch of hand-cut felt hearts ("Take heart, Valentine"). You can see more at Bird for Bread.



Thanks again, all. xoxo

Flight Map, With Fowl

Jamie is one of my favorite blog girls. She cuts paper and thinks in maps and lives in a desert scape of branches and motorcycles and furry friends and nowls. Her designs are unique and her photos beautiful. And when she wrote last week during the swap, saying "You know flight path diagrams?!" and explained how she pictured "all those little packages like a flight diagram," and said that she would MAKE ONE for FIRST MILK, for the SWAP, I had to grab something heavy so as not to float away.

You can see the results of her lovely, detail-oriented designer's heart above. Valentine-carrying fowl, delivering love from one blogger to another to another to another all week. (Click to make it big and fabulous.)

Over and over again, I am amazed by the far reach of the Internet. I am amazed that something tiny like my wanting to live in a world where Valentine's Day doesn't suck results in so many pairs of hands packing up a bit of tangible love to send across the distance, nurturing community by post. In Jamie making a collective diagram of our tenuous, strong web. Thanks to each of you for helping me live in a world where Valentine's Day doesn't suck. And thanks to Jamie for having the sorts of eyes that see it so perfectly, render it in such clear terms.

Around the Internets, a few posts from swap participants, if you're interested in such things. I'll add to the list as time allows and as swap posts appear this week. For peeking, Peonies and Polaroids (sent, received); Life According to Celia (sent, received); A Desert Fete; Heart of Light; Privilege; The Avid Reader's Musings; kidchamp.net (sent, received); BigBANG Studio; Heart of Light; Dog-Eared; Bird for Bread (sent, received); A Girl's World; With Honey, Please; Hat and Feathers; Spirographs and Flying Fish; The Bee and the Bobbin; The Domestic Empress; Doux; That Cardboard Box (sent, received); Poppycock and Sunshine; bigger, better, best; first milk.

Feathers, Hearts

Many thanks to each of you for your kind birfday comments this week. It ended up being a lovely one, all told. One full of very large marshmallows and a snowstorm and a narwhal and an accordion and red balloons for days.

Swap valentines are winging their way across the world. I can hear them fluttering, like heart-eyed nowls. I'm already hearing reports of some received and torn into and delighted in. This is good news. For those of you who participated, many thanks for doing so. I'll post a swappy round-up next week.

Finally. I cut out a lot of felt hearts around Valentine's Day. It's just something I do. Here are some for you, dear reader. Pretend they're in a little envelope slid beneath your door. xo

In Which Snowmen Gather

I left my desk several times today, donning layers of grey and stepping into slush past my ankles en route to one park or another. By dusk, snow creatures stood every five, every twenty, every four feet, snow arms in snow pockets, grand, swooping hats pieced from discarded saucer sleds and broken branches. Once the hands that might theoretically have formed them had been dragged home, been scolded for going mittenless, it was as though each snowman had simply gathered his bearings and risen up from the snow sometime around two-thirty, brushing himself off, as snowmen do, and findng a satisfying vantage point for himself not too near the others. Perhaps where to wait and wonder after his pipe. No one much was around but the village of silent snowmen and a few overtired, pelted littles. And chatty, annoying lovers with too-bright camera flashes blinding self-made snowmen's button eyes.

Birfdays, Tea

Today is my birfday.
I'm going to wear a dab of perfume and have a tea party just with me.
Maybe I will buy some pink lilies.
Maybe someone will bring me a balloon.

A big red one.

On Staying

Snow being dense and thick and covering of the place I was to go this weekend, I did not go. Sometimes it is worrisome to go, dear reader, even when one's bag is already packed. Particularly over many bridges on a bus in thick, silent snow. Nobody wants to die on a bus is what I am saying. Sometimes it is important to stay.

When staying, it is sometimes important to wear one's pajamas the whole weekend through. (Long coats and tall boots cover pajamas. Hats cloak oily curls.) When everyone already thinks one is out of town, one can do as one pleases. Taking to one's bed with scissors and glue and red felt, for example. Taking to bed with good coffee and Cary Grant and a good, thick book. Searching drugstores for brown polish and holding three polishes in one's hand like jewels, deliberating. In painting one's toenails a downy, minky brown--the brown lavender would be if lavender had thought to be brown. In standing on a pier until the cold winter wind blows tears out your eyes. Sometimes it is important to stay, to hide. To consider What Is to Come.

And when the people call and the people say "WhereareyouWhatareyoudoingWhenwillyoubedone," sometimes it is important to say, "I'm not telling. I'm not telling you or anybody." And then to go back to bed.

Hoard, Keep: Laundry Pegs

For holding things up or together, for wrapping twine around, a bouquet of wooden laundry pegs, received from a friend last week. Sometimes friends just know these things.

Swappers, please postmark by tomorrow. Let's get all that love out there!

Happy weekend, all.

Wednesday Words: Cardboard, Window

Dialogue from Away We Go. Because some things take time. Some things take even more time than we think maybe they should take.

V: Burt, are we fuck-ups?
B: No. What do you mean?
V: I mean we’re 34,
B: I’m 33.
V: And we don’t even have this basic stuff figured out.
B: Basic like how?
V: Basic. Like how to live.
B: We’re not fuck-ups.
V: We have a cardboard window.
B: We’re not fuck-ups.
V: (Whispered) I think we might be fuck-ups.
B: (Whispered) We’re not fuck-ups.

Poet, Pus

Granted, I’m off today. I keep a good neurotic’s calendar, and it’s three years, to the day, since Seymour killed himself. Did I ever tell you what happened when I went down to Florida to bring back the body? I wept like a slob on the plane for five solid hours. Carefully adjusting my veil from time to time so that no one across the aisle could see me—I had a seat to myself, thank God. About five minutes before the plane landed, I became aware of people talking in the seat behind me. A woman was saying, with all of Back Bay Boston and most of Harvard Square in her voice, "...and the next morning, mind you, they took a pint of pus out of that lovely young body of hers." That’s all I remember hearing, but when I got off the plane a few minutes later and the Bereaved Widow came toward me all in Bergdorf Goodman black, I had the Wrong Expression on my face. I was grinning. Which is exactly the way I feel today, for no really good reason. Against my better judgment, I feel certain that somewhere very near here--the first house down the road, maybe--there’s a good poet dying, but also somewhere very near here somebody’s having a hilarious pint of pus taken from her lovely young body, and I can’t be running back and forth forever between grief and high delight.

J.D. Salinger, Zooey

Swap, Cont'd

Swappers should have received a swaplet this weekend. If you haven't received one, please shoot me an e-mail straightaway. I've received many kind e-mails from folks putting their packages together, and I'm glad you're all so excited. Happy hearting to you, to you.

Swap, FAQ

Hi, all. I've got a couple more spots in the swap, and will update yesterday's post when they've been filled. UPDATE: ALL SLOTS HAVE BEEN FILLED. Based on some e-mails I've been receiving, though, I thought I'd include a little Valentine's Day Swap FAQ.

Q: I am not even crafty. I hate crafts. Crafts make me want to throw up. What about ME?!
A: The swap is not about crafting unless you would like it to be. Some people will craft. Others will not. Swappers can buy OR make their presents, with the exception of the valentine's card itself. If the thought of making a valentine makes you nauseous down to your toes, I hope you'll come up with a clever alternative.

Q: What? I have to make valentines for 25 people? Are you out of your mind?
A: Swappers only need to put together one valentine. That is all. One is not very many.

Q: Valentine's day is an *sshole. Why are you even doing this?
A: Ah! I'm so glad you asked! For me, the swap is less about Valentine's Day than it is about community and fun mail, for fun mail and community make me glad. Valentine's Day is a good, midwinter excuse for fun mail. Also, I am somewhat fond of paper hearts.

Q: You say I have to send you my blog domain. I don't have a blog. Can I still play?
A: I'm afraid this particular swap is for folks with blogs. If you don't maintain a blog, I hope you'll make (or not make, if crafting displeases you) a clever valentine (or unvalentine, if you'd rather) for somebody or something you love. I hope you'll cover it in hearts and stand in line at the Post Office humming a pleasant hum.

Wear Your Heart on Your Swap

UPDATE: WE'RE ALL FULL. MANY THANKS FOR RESPONDING!

Hello, dear reader. With the end of January nigh, it's high time for me to announce the second first milk Valentine's Day blog swappity swap swap. It is fun! It is heartful! It is like receiving a valentine from your bestest third-grade crush. Only better, because you won't have to wonder what "I think you're sweat [sic]" really means.

The swap works thusly: You e-mail me, and I e-mail you a swaplet. You send a small box of goodies, outlined below, to said swaplet and receive a package of goodies from a swaplet. Voila! The swap is complete.

Details:

1) Same rules as last year. Each Valentine's Day box should contain three items: a valentine, a small gift, and a little something (something little, lovely--a red pencil, a box of sweets). Presents and little somethings can be bought or crafted, but valentine cards themselves should be hand-made. Getting all gluey is just too fun, you see.

2) To sign up, e-mail me (firstmilkmaid@gmail.com) with your name, mailing address, and bloggity blog blog name/domain by this Friday, January 29th, and indicate whether you're willing to ship internationally. I'll contact you with your swappity person soon thereafter.

3) Please postmark all packages by Saturday, February 6th so they have a full week to make their way in the world. Ok? Ok.

4) I'd like to keep this on the small side of things, so will cut it off at 25 swappers or so.

For inspiration, a few posts on last year's swapped goodies around the Interwebs: here, here, here, here, here and here. Huzzah!

Count, Tack

Bought at the flea market this weekend, a set of numbered, barbed 1948 tacks that "keep track of screens, storm windows, drawers, lockers, etc." Among other features, they are "rustproof. . . with raised figures that remain visible even after painting." For counting things up and nailing them down. For meditations on precision, worth.

I like the old copy, the font and the dust.