Journal of a Sabbatical

September 30, 1999

hell

Today's Starting Pitcher: Bryce Florie

Today's Reading: Danube by Claudio Magris

Twice this week I've heard talk shows on NPR about hell. Apparently the Pope has issued some kind of statement about the Catholic teaching on hell: that it is a state of mind, a separation from God. That's what I was taught as a child, so I don't quite understand what all the fuss is. I don't ever remember a single teacher telling us that hell was an actual physical place eternally burning. I do remember being told that hell is the absence of God. This isn't new news.

I started out to write some kind of essay on the pop culture images of hell, mistaken folk myths about what Catholics believe, busting the stereotypes of Catholic education (we do learn science, including evolution - it's true I had to get a note from my mother to buy a copy of Teilhard de Chardin's The Divine Milieu when I was in high school but it is kind of a difficult book if you haven't had a lot of theology, paleontology, and philosophy already) today, but it seems both pointless and well beyond my talents. So that's all on hell.

Since when is Bryce Florie a starter? I guess I'm not on top of all things Red Sox. In fact I really didn't even know Florie was on the team until he pitched really well in middle relief shortly after I got home from my trip. I called up Nancy and asked "who on earth is Bryce Florie?" I guess Jimy with one M wants to give the bullpen some work so they'll be sharp for the playoffs, 'cause Wakefield came in fairly early and Florie wasn't doing badly.

Tiny flying insects with kind of squared off moth like wings have invaded my office. A glance through my brand new copy of National Audubon Society Field Guide to New England, which I bought to replace the copy that was stolen along with my binoculars, scope, tripod and my National Geographic bird book, reveals no clue as to their identity. I hope they're not something I should be worried about.

WBUR has been doing a promo all day for their local noontime news show, Here and Now, which is having a bit about Lowell Celebrates Kerouac on today's show. When I checked the web site, I was mildly disappointed that the blurb didn't mention Paul Marion. Paul's been working on a forthcoming collection of Kerouac's early writings for ages now and it's supposed to come out in November. He read some very early Kerouac from the archives to a bunch of us at Andover Bookstore several months ago.

When the heavily promoted bit came on though, it was in fact Paul Marion reading from Atop an Underwood, the collection that he's been editing. He's going to be reading more early Kerouac at the Whistler House Museum of Art on Saturday afternoon as part of Lowell Celebrates Kerouac.

I noticed that my poem in the Andover Anthology is finally up at The Bridge Review. Mark Schorr claimed he would notify me when the second issue finally went live, but somehow I never got the message. Oh well. Ned's Dante poem (to which I wrote a response an age ago) is in this issue too.