About Me

I like books. Old books, especially. With wonderful covers and yellowed pages and dusty spines that stain my sleeves. 

I like French stuff. Especially French writers and thinkers and artists. And French books. Old French books. I have been trying to get my PhD in French literature for a little too long now. Nineteenth century. A man by the name of Vigny.

I like Poets. Capital "P." The more tortured the better. French, German, British, American... I love them all. A bit too much sometimes, maybe. I teach them. Writing. I teach writing. About tortured Poets. Chatterton, Baudelaire, Poe, Rimbaud, Plath, Sexton... Jim Morrison. I love tragedy. And compassion. I like words.

Words

Be careful of words,
even the miraculous ones.
For the miraculous ones we do our best,
sometimes they swarm like insects
and leave not a sting but a kiss.
They can be good as fingers.
They can be trusty as the rock
you stick your bottom on.
But they can be both daisies and bruises.

Yet I am in love with words.
They are doves falling out of the ceiling.
They are six holy oranges sitting in my lap.
They are the trees, the legs of summer,
and the sun, its passionate face.

Yet often they fail me.
I have so much I want to say,
so many stories, images, proverbs, etc.
But the words aren’t good enough,
the wrong ones kiss me.
Sometimes I fly like an eagle
but with the wings of a wren.

But I try to take care
and be gentle to them.
Words and eggs must be handled with care.
Once broken they are impossible
things to repair.

-Anne Sexton (1928-1974)

I like paper. Old paper, especially. With musty smells and simple designs and an incomparable feel that transports me. Ephemera. I persistently pore over ephemera. And dream about it.

I like letters. The Letter People on PBS. My favorite childhood show. Letters forming words forming ideas forming worlds. I love letters. I love lettering letters. And ornamenting them. And packaging them. And stamping them. And receiving them. 

I like design. I'm teaching myself some stuff. Researching sites. Forming ideas. Forming preferences. Learning about design through designers I like and the incessant influx of designs that designers post daily. Hourly. Minutely. Infectious inspiration. Contagion. I want to take classes. Education. Education makes my world go round. I need the eggs.

The last lines of Woody Allen’s benchmark film Annie Hall (1977):

I thought of that old joke, y’know, the, this… this guy goes to a psychiatrist and says, “Doc, uh, my brother’s crazy; he thinks he’s a chicken.” And, uh, the doctor says, “Well, why don’t you turn him in?” The guy says, “I would, but I need the eggs.” Well, I guess that’s pretty much now how I feel about relationships; y’know, they’re totally irrational, and crazy, and absurd, and… but, uh, I guess we keep goin’ through it because, uh, most of us… need the eggs.

-Woody Allen as Alvy Singer

I also like cheese. A lot.

Oh, and P.S.: My name is Lesley.