Genji
A Branch of Plum
“ ‘We live in a degenerate age,’ said Genji.” According to the book, everything, perfumes and calligraphy in particular but also fabrics, were better in the past. And this is the 10th century. How often have people thought they weren’t living in a degenerate age?
I’m at my new favorite Peet’s again, the one at 8th Street and Brannan, and just finished the first volume of Genji. Besides the superior chairs, decor in general, and clientele, what sets the cafe apart is the music they play. I wouldn’t say it’s the finest jazz, but it is quite good jazz, and far better than the more common hits from the ‘60s.
New Herbs
Just when you think the “romantic” complications at Rokujo (Genji’s primary residence) couldn’t get any more convoluted, they do. One of Genji’s brothers, the former Emperor, is ill and withdrawing to a religious life as he prepares for death, and the best way he can think of to protect his favorite daughter (who is very young but even more immature) is to marry her off to Genji -- who isn’t even particularly interested in her. At the age of 40 (or 39) he is now saddled with a child bride to look after.
The poor man would rather spend his nights with Murasaki, but he’s concerned about hurting the feelings of the former Emperor. And his new wife, who is only known as “the Third Princess,” is revealing herself to be something of a twit.
This reminds me of what I imagine the sad reality of the Islamic martyrs’ Seventy Virgin reward would actually be like.
But fear not. Genji is still Genji and is now chasing after one of his new wife’s kins women, a woman he has a romantic past with. The lesson being, I suppose, when your romantic relationships get too complicated, chase after someone else.
“The world has an unpleasant way of gossiping about people in high places. How, everyone asked, was Murasaki responding to it all? Some lessening of Genji’s affection seemed inevitable, and some loss of place and prestige. When it became clear beyond denying that his affection had if anything increased, there were those who said that he really ought to be nicer to the princess. Finally it became clear that the two ladies were getting on very well together, and the world had to look elsewhere for its gossip.”
After describing, in considerable detail, the presents and display of two spectacular events in a row organized first by Murasaki and then by Akikonomu (the Empress for whom Genji acts as guardian, without hitting on her for once) we get this, “...We have all read romances which list every gift and offering at such affairs, but I am afraid that they rather bore me; nor am I able to provide a complete guest list.”
After praising the short chapters, this “New Herbs” chapter is endless and even divided into two parts. And lots of things are even happening, births and deaths as well as the usual romance. Genji’s daughter has now given the crown prince a son. And after learning of this, the daughter’s grandfather -- the Akashi Lady’s funny father -- has broken entirely with the world and gone off into the mountains to pray and die.
Leaving the “world” behind is something much talked about in this book. Genji wants to do it but keeps getting pulled back in. (Godfather 3 reference) The Former Emperor, the father of the Third Princess, is doing this, but the Akashi Lady’s father is the most extreme. This would seem to be a consequence of the Buddhist influence on Japan at this time. It isn’t that different from the Christian emphasis on the Next Life, and seems to be ignored in general about as much.
Everyday impressionism
I set down the book and pensively turned my gaze to the street outside the Market Street Peet's. I was enjoying the vagueness of seeing the street with my reading glasses on. And then it occurred to me that I could go even more impressionist by simply taking off my glasses entirely. Better. Semi-translucent blotches of color.
I can spot the crazies walking past even when they are just blotches of color due to the way they move.
Windows
I had to print out some documents this morning so I fired up my Windows machine. Before I could do any work it had to complete the installation of the “April” OS update. Since this is late July, I can only hope they mean April 2018. This process took forever. Having some previous experience with this nonsense, I did other things while waiting. I did my daily exercises. I shaved. I brushed my teeth and changed my clothes. I washed out the compost toter. I swept all the carpets and tile surfaces in the building. I changed my clothes again. I addressed the envelopes for the HOA mailing I was going to print out.
How is it, one wonders, Google can update the Chrome OS without my being aware of it and Microsoft can’t? Maybe Microsoft just doesn’t care? When the process was finally complete, Cortana seemed to be gone. I feel bad about this. I never once engaged Cortana. I could have said “Hi.” Unfortunately, all the questions I thought to address to Cortana included profanity, which seemed even ruder than ignoring her. “Why does the software for displaying files and folders on my computer seem NOT to be part of the fucking OS but some slow add-on? Why do I have to force an update of the list of files it shows me when I’ve just opened the list (when trying to select a file to enclose with an email for example)? Are you people all high or just stupid?”
Link to Table of Contents
Genji
Something I’m really enjoying about this book is the short length of many of the chapters. They can be as short as a page or two. Almost like prose haiku. Genji is continuing to be an overly attentive guardian to Tamakazura. He is her music instructor now. I’ve learned to trust Murasaki S., but I do wonder what she’s about here. Tamakazura’s father has discovered another daughter by-blow (the Omi Lady) and brought her to his house, where she has become a source of amusement to everyone. Tamakazura and her ally within Genji’s household, we are told, now appreciate the wisdom of her not going directly to her father, but this seems a bit contrived as the two young women would seem to be nothing alike. And of course then her half brothers wouldn’t be falling in love with her -- not clear to me if they have actually seen or conversed with her.
Genji’s day-to-day life as a Chancellor and older person longing for a life of retirement seems quite similar to his younger days except that now he maintains a compound full of past, present, and possibly future paramours. He is currently living with two daughters of men he knows and associates with, and I don’t think either of them are aware of this, I know Tamakazura’s father doesn’t know. Not sure about Murasaki’s father. (Yes he does. This comes out later when Tamakazura is mated off with the husband of another of his daughters.)
This would be a fascinating book to read with a feminist book club... though I would be a little concerned for my own safety.
A few words about the binding of this edition of the book. The cloth cover is quite lovely, the spine is covered in purple cloth -- wisteria purple being Murasaki’s color and the meaning of the name. The majority of the cover looks like handmade paper or very subtle marbling and there’s a leafy symbol in gold at the top right of the front cover. Haven’t been able to determine what it means as yet, but it is quite handsome.
All in all a very good looking book. The work is divided into two volumes which fit into a hard case which I haven’t looked at as yet.
Days later: I just noticed that the Knopf borzoi is embossed into the back of the cover. Lovely touch.
The Royal Outing
The Omi lady is yet another character who could have been written by Jane Austen. She has some Mary Bennett about her and perhaps a little Mrs Elton as well. If someone were to do a version of Genji set at a much later date, she could be the half-American daughter who doesn’t get Japanese customs. And Lydia Bennett! This only struck me at the end of The Cyress Pillar, but it’s probably the most apt. I retract the other suggestions and will go with Lydia.
As appalling as some of the gender relations are here, when you remember this is the 10th century it’s an amazingly civil society. A European equivalent would probably be even more appalling.
Purple Trousers
Besides the brevity of these chapters, the other remarkable thing about them is that almost nothing is happening. Mostly a series of interviews with poetry, where either Tamakazura or Murasaki are concealed behind screens or in another room and communicating through one of their women. I’ve started to imagine additional chapters in which the young lady is tipsy and flatulent. And her poems are rude limericks.
Bastille Day
Aside from our not having a single toter to help with carting around our equipment and the bags of trash, this event went quite smoothly. Most of the day was on the boring side. The turnout seemed better this year, I suspect because of the World Cup, with all the French expats feeling more French than usual. (See also notes on the following day.)
The entertainment started at 4:00pm -- maybe earlier than last year -- and was mostly cover bands. The last group was the best. They played popular music from the 1960s sung in French. I always hope for “French” music I haven’t heard before but always get the usual hits from the ‘60s but in French. The musicians were older guys, but the two singers were young women dressed in what I would describe as Carnaby Street fashions. They looked quite smart; and sang well.
Since we are so much aware of our bad luck, I have to mention an instance of quite striking good luck. Recology provided us with four, six yard dumpsters for the event. This would give us one dumpster for each trash stream plus a spare if we ran out of room for something -- or we could have made one a dedicated cardboard dumpster. Except that when we (not me personally) arrived, one of the dumpsters already contained a bunch of trash and a wheelchair. “We” sorted everything else, but left the wheelchair.
At the end of the day we locked up the dumpsters so people don’t steal even more of the recycling and, more importantly, don’t contaminate what we’ve sorted. These dumpsters are quite battered, so if was hard to get even one of the two possible locking points to work for the three dumpsters we had used. But, finally we got them locked up and turned to the dumpster we had left empty except for the wheelchair. This one was so mangled we could do nothing with it. We so lucked out.
AIDS Walk 2018
(I think my 3rd AIDS Walk)
Walking down my hill on the way to breakfast and then work, I saw a mass of people blocking Powell Street opposite the Sir Francis Drake Hotel and heard, for the second day in a row, the strains of Le Marseillais. And that was how I learned the French had won the World Cup.
AIDS Walk has always been a mess and last year it was a disaster. I had to stay over an extra two hours past the end of my shift just to get things in order so we could finally leave. But I complained and made a bunch of suggestions and, surprise, I was listened to. This year was almost easy.
There were still a half dozen or more trash boxes provided by a lubricant company on the field, but they were mostly backstage or on the periphery. Scores of these satanic objects were collected early on and tossed into recycling -- I had been harping about these boxes for the previous 24 hours.
The problem with these boxes are that they are not part of our three stream system. People throw everything into them. And sometimes they aren’t even lined, so you can’t even pull out a bag of trash and sort it. You have to cart around the entire box full of mixed trash.
With these boxes mostly off the field, there were also fewer places for people to throw trash that we had to then sort. This is actually a good thing. When I arrived at 1pm, there was no pile of trash bags at the dumpsters and no one was sorting there. Last year at that point there was already a hopelessly large pile of bags, as volunteers were pulling anything close to a full bag and bringing it to the dumpsters to be sorted. This year, more of our people were sorting on the field and the volunteers were only hauling bags we had pulled and that didn’t need further sorting. The usual system. Yes, it works here too... surprise!
And the post walk entertainment this year was better. As I was walking up to the event, at Sharon Meadow in Golden Gate Park, I suddenly remembered just how awful the entertainment has been in the past. Usually it’s people who are famous (or wealthy) for something else who also have a cover band in their spare time. Last year, maybe, the lead singer really couldn’t carry a tune. But this year the final acts were people known for their participation on RuPaul’s Drag Race. I didn’t know them, but some were spectacularly good, and they could all carry a tune. For the first time I felt bad for the entertainers because so many walkers don’t hang around for the show. In the past this has been a sign of good taste and self-preservation. Plus the wind was getting fierce.
The main drama of the day had to do with someone hiding the keys to a rental truck in a place that was impossible to get to without having the keys. I had nothing to do with this debacle, so I just ignored it. I was cajoled into driving said truck, once the keys had been expensively retrieved, back to U-haul. I was supposed to put a couple gallons of gas into it before returning the truck, but, for the life of me, I could not get the pump to work. It’s probably been over a decade since I’ve bought gas, but you wouldn’t think the process would have changed so much. I still have no idea what I was doing wrong.
A new paint finish
The other day I was running around trying to feel a new paint finish. I’ve been a big fan of the semi-gloss finish, for both inside and outside, because it both looks good and stays clean longer/is easier to clean. I still think this is true, especially outside.
I’ve come around to the satin or eggshell finish for inside, as it does look better and is still better than flat for keeping clean. Benjamin Moore, in the latest issue of Dwell, is advertising a new line of paints with a matte finish they claim feels like soft leather. I was intrigued enough to look up some of their stores near where I was, in hopes of getting my hands on a finish sample.
While I did an excellent job of spreading the word about this new “Century” line of their paints, I had no luck feeling the feel. Upon a little further online research I discovered that this line of paint is, as they say, but didn’t in the ad I saw, “for the trade.” I now have a list of fancy paint stores that do carry it and I still plan to get my fingertips on a sample, but this product is probably not in my future. And for so many reasons. First, I’m not sure they would even sell to me, not being in the trade. Second, they don’t offer any shades of white. They only offer seventy some colors -- very nice ones, I will say -- but nothing even close to white. And third, my current schedule for repainting my apartment -- whether it needs it or not -- is for nine years in the future. Since I’ve been changing my mind about my next paint color every year (or month) for some time now, my second reason may not hold up, but I really do anticipate painting the walls and ceiling to match my largest piece of “furniture,” a large storage assembly in bright white melamine. Now I’m imagining myself being thrown out of the “to the trade” paint boutique for admitting this. As soon as the words “white melamine” leave my mouth, security is summoned and I hear, “I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to leave now. White melamine indeed.” *Spits carefully into an understated vase sitting on the counter.*
Anyway, thinking about my nine year plan reminded me of Ari, my next door neighbor when I first moved to SF. His lover visited SF regularly but didn’t live here, so Ari was frequently at loose ends at night. One of his favorite ways to pass the night was repainting his kitchen. Noisily. I would sometimes get up in the middle of the night and go over to inquire if possibly a bear had broken into the building and to see if he needed a bandaid or a tourniquet. We would then talk for hours as he painted -- driving me nuts as he was a sloppy painter who did not do the prep. (There’s a reason my paint still looks fresh after twenty years.) My nine year plan (it was a ten year plan before I made some small changes and touch-ups last year) would have made him laugh. Given ten years he would probably have spontaneously painted a dozen times and quite possibly retextured or gutted and plastered. (Retexturing is what I would like to do, but it’s really too much work for how little of my walls you can actually see.)
I wish I could recall exactly when Ari died. I think it was right around ten years after I met him, so about ten years after he became Ari Ash, as this was a name he invented for himself. It was the AIDS version of tuberculosis, curiously, that took him. He wouldn’t have lasted a week on the Magic Mountain -- he would have gotten bored and run off to reinvent himself someplace more interesting. “Taking stock” was not his thing. He was more of a Peeperkorn character.
Not a day goes by...
The other day I was at the Bank Cafe and then went ‘round the corner for lunch at my favorite Vietnamese sandwich place. On the way back to the Bank Cafe, it occurred to me that I had not run into a strikingly crazy person all day.
I managed to get one of the nice chairs facing out onto the busy intersection of Post and Kearny. Some time later, looking up from Genji, I noticed an odd looking person, barefoot, standing in profile right in front of me on the sidewalk. While I watched, he unfastened his pants, gave his genitals a good inspection, re-fastened his pants and then strolled across Post Street against the light.
Link to Table of Contents
The limits of practice
When I lived in Noe Valley in the late 1980s there was a guy who decided to make some money playing guitar in public or semi-public places (laundromats and taquerias). The only problem was that he was terrible. I moved out of the neighborhood but ran into him again several years later when I was doing an errand in the valley. To my surprise, he had gotten quite good, after years of steady practice.
I thought of him just now as I passed, for the 2nd time today, and in a 2nd location, the street balladeer for the Union Square/Financial District Interzone. He’s been playing and singing for years and has not seemed to improve at all. He makes me miss our street saxophonist who was so good he was pulled in to play at art galleries for their "1st Thursday" events (I remember him playing on the fire escape of one above Grant street) . The only problem, as was finally revealed, was that he was wanted for murder back East. Him I gave tips.
Back to The Tale of the Horn-dog Pervert Genji
Since I have most of a month before I should return to TMM on my other blog, I’m resuming The Tale of Genji. While the previous, abridged version I was reading ended where it seemed like Genji was about to change his ways, this, not surprisingly, hasn’t happened. His complicated love life continues as before.
Here's the edition I'm reading now:
The Tale of Genji
by Murasaki Shikibu Translated by Edward Seidensticker
Alfred A. Knopf, 1978
The Morning Glory
I just ran into something interesting, Genji is currently courting Princess Asagao who has resigned her position of high priestess of Kamo, and she is refusing to even see him. He sends her a morning glory with “sad, frostbitten little blooms” to indicate how badly she is treating him. The footnote says, “Asagao means ‘morning glory’ in modern Japanese. The name derives from this chapter....” Was this work as influential as Shakespeare in Japan? How well is it known today? Time for a visit to Wiki.
I had forgotten that Fugitsubo is the name both of his mother and his great love, and the mother of his secret son, who is now Emperor. Though I should say, one of his great loves. It sounds like reading Genji, for the average Japanese speaker, is a bit like reading Beowulf. Most people require a translation. But my comparison with Shakespeare may be apt. Though the book is probably better known to the average Japanese reader now than it was in the past because there are more and better translations.
The Maiden
There is a long quote in which Genji is defending, to his son’s maternal grandmother (I had forgotten this son existed), his decision to not promote the boy to a higher rank but to send him to university instead. He is to gain, “a good, solid fund of knowledge. It is when there is a fund of Chinese learning that the Japanese spirit is respected by the world...” I do not know enough about the Heian era in Japan to know if this represents a Confucian preference for merit over simple preference based on birth. But what’s interesting is the footnote the follows “Japanese spirit” that informs us that this was the first appearance of the phrase “Yamato-damashii” in Japanese literature.
Genji has moved. His new residence has separate quarters, and gardens, for Murasaki (his main “wife” or child concubine); the Akashi Lady (the mother of his daughter who is now being raised by Murasaki); the daughter of one of his dead lovers who is, I believe, a consort of the new Emperor and I thought the new Empress, but I could be wrong about that (yes, she is); and finally another lady from his past referred to as the Lady of the Orange Blossoms. His current love interest, who is stonewalling him, lives elsewhere. And he’s now Chancellor to the new Emperor, who has just become aware that Genji is actually his father. Genji only suspects that the Emperor has discovered this and the Emperor doesn’t know that Genji suspects he knows. If only there had been TV soap operas in Murasaki’s (the author) time.
The Jeweled Chaplet
And now he’s discovered the grown (twenty year old) daughter of another of his great loves. His lovers have a disconcerting habit of dying young. And now she, too, has joined his menagerie in the wing under the care of the Lady of the Orange Blossoms, along with his son. The son who is in love with his cousin whose father is Genji’s great friend and rival... and who is also the father of this new girl. Only this girl and Genji's son are not blood kin.
It is remarkable how wittily Murasaki (the author) pulls all this off. One does want to see the places and especially the clothes described in such loving detail. Though what one really longs for is to smell these male paragons. Having read this far, I’m thinking that “shining” Genji is a confused translation as what Murasaki raves about is how good both Genji and his rival smell. I’m thinking the Japanese for “shining” might better be translated as something like, the “delightfully fragrant” Genji. (There’s no chance this is actually true, but it should be true.)
Murasaki never mentions the women smelling good.
The First Warbler
This may be the chapter that best captures the otherness of this time in Japanese history. As part of the New Year’s celebrations, Genji makes the rounds of his ladies. Visiting them each in turn, even the ones at his now secondary residence, and we get something of a review of the relationships. Granted, there are at least two daughters of former loves who have a different status, this is all quite odd and the fact that he decides to spend the night with the Akashi Lady -- who has not seen her young daughter living on the same grounds for years now -- only adds to the oddness. Murasaki (the character) is not pleased either.
I am puzzled by the lack of any mention of male staff at these residences. Perhaps this is a side of things Murasaki (the author) is simply unfamiliar with. But you would think there must be some security, at least, around the Chancellor. And that plot complications would be bound to arise.
In this little collection of women around Genji are two very young ones who are daughters of former loves of Genji who have died, as so often happens with the women around him, starting with his own mother. He is in the position of guardian for them both, and for the one he has assisted in making her Empress. But he has also hit on both of them and is being particularly difficult with the other one, Tamakazura, while at the same time managing the courting of her by many others including one of his princely brothers. (Her own half-brothers are also courting her as that relationship is being concealed by Genji.)
Independence Day
Last week I worked the 4th of July Festival at the Berkeley Marina. I don’t know how many years I’ve worked this event, but it must be close to ten. It’s a nice setting for an afternoon in the sun by the bay. Though I do spend my time in a parking lot.
Getting there takes a train and a bus and about an hour and a half -- getting home takes over two hours, in part because you have to walk a long way because roads are closed leading to the marina.
The long parking lot is divided in half, lengthwise with a long line of food vendor tents on one side, an open area for lines, an area of tables, then a landscaped berm and the waters and boats of the marina proper to the north. Just beyond the west end of the parking lot is another parking lot given over to a pony ride, various other kids rides, and our supply area which for Berkeley events includes parked garbage trucks instead of dumpsters. The (union) city crews haul the bags we pull, and the piles of cardboard the vendors leave, back to the proper truck... we hope.
At first, back ten or whatever years, we would monitor the eco-stations when it got busy, which meant standing in the sun for hours pointing to the right container and then fishing out all the things people threw in the wrong one regardless. I still did a little of that this time, along with some “education” for people interested in the process -- there are always a few weirdos at these events -- but mostly we keep in motion, sorting and, when necessary pulling bags and leaving them on the ground for the city crew to haul away. But a large percentage of my time is taken up finding and sorting the bags of trash the vendors are hiding.
I thought I was keeping ahead of things yesterday, except for the vendor at the far east end of the line who wouldn’t give up their can for me to sort until the end. If I could have gotten my hands on it sooner, I would have cleared out all the (mostly plastic) landfill items, as I could see that it was mostly landfill. But no. When the woman running the booth finally let me have it, they had just added the good compost that they were tossing at the end of the day. It took me forever to separate a couple gallons of noodles and rice from all that plastic. So my mood was not the highest as I started my long hike to the first bus, only to learn then that the expected wait was half an hour.
At least I got a shuttle bus ride up my hill when I got back to SF, as they had taken the cable cars out of service. And I still have no idea why my cell phone decided to take the day off, leaving me unable to clock-in and out.
I kind of lost my train of thought there, what I started out to talk about was my memories of celebrating Independence Day. The first celebrations were so of that time. My parents, especially my father, being serious golfers, we belonged to a country club, Owl Creek, in a suburb to the east of Louisville. The club sponsored it’s own little firework display on the golf course. We would gather on blankets and towels on the grass on a hot and humid Kentucky evening, and watch a modest, but very close, display of pyrotechnics, while our parents drank and the mosquitoes drained our blood.
I have no Independence Day recollections from Colorado, which is curious, and possibly a comment on the bleak state of my parents marriage at that time. In SoCal, I remember our first 4th because we spent it trying to recover our dog, who had bolted. After that, I recall us driving into the hills where you could see a half dozen or more distinct firework displays happening at various beaches, and even over the landlocked semi-cities of the LA basin. LA is really more like the Balkans than it’s like an actual “city.”
This train of thought may have started with the little ponies in Berkeley yesterday. I couldn’t help recalling Freckles, my horse for a summer in Prescott, Arizona. Now that was an Independence Day to remember. First we had to ride the horses into town from our camp up in the mountains. It was the longest ride I can recall us taking, since we mostly just rode around up in the mountains. Then we rode in the local parade, with Freckles proving very popular with his bucking and prancing about. I’m sure Rick must have stood on his saddle and guided Prince with voice commands, but I don’t actually remember that in the parade -- probably because I was trying to keep Freckles under control. Then we stopped at A&W for junk food... the thought of taking horses to a drive-through was just too good to resist. And finally we had to ride all the way back home, in the rain, because the 4th of July is also the traditional start of the Arizona monsoon.
That’s a day I would like to see again on video.
After that, 1968, I don’t recall another Independence Day until 1976, two days after I arrived in San Francisco. I rode the 22 Fillmore bus to SF’s Marina Green and spent the day enjoying the sun (a freakish notion for a refugee from Summer in Phoenix) and playing volleyball. The weather was perfect until the sun went down and the fog rolled in. By the time it was dark enough for fireworks, the fog was heavy and low. All you could see was a vague glow of color in the sky. I loved it.
Since then, they’ve moved the SF fireworks further away from the Golden Gate, with mixed results. Some years you can see the fireworks and some years you can’t. I’ve watched them from the roof of Fox Plaza (29 floors up) and from the northern slope of Russian Hill, where we sat of the sidewalk steps and enjoyed whatever we could see between the buildings on either side. And now, for the past ten or so years, I’ve been at Berkeley.
At first I would stay to the end, shutting down our stations and cleaning up after. There was one year I stayed just to actually watch the fireworks, which are launched off the old Berkeley Pier. it’s a perfectly fine firework display, though not as grand as SF’s. But I’ve learned that if I stay even for the fireworks it takes even longer to get home, and if I stay to clean up I will be riding one of the late night buses back home. Better to bug out early. The only fireworks I actually see now are the private (illegal) ones I see out the windows of the bus or train as we pass through the Oakland battlefield. Last night there were two fires in Oakland, though I didn't hear if they were firework related.
Next up on my work calendar: Bastille Day!
