My Quarantine



Monument at Pere LaChaise, Paris



In the last ten days, I've not left the house except to go to the hospital. Bill took me to the ER after witnessing one too many of my violent coughing spells. I received a tentative diagnosis of Whooping Cough, or as it now known, pertussis. Pertussis is apparently extremely contagious, so I've been quarantined until the antibiotics render me noncontagious.

For most of the time I've been sequestered, as I'm pretty weak, I've been occupying myself by sorting and organizing my collections of antique engravings, postcards and vintage "orphan" photographs. I've never really thought of myself as a collector of anything. Yet, somehow, over time, I seem to have amassed groups of things I like, and decided I couldn't live without. Thankfully, the largest of these groups of things are two-dimensional! (That is, if you don't count useful stuff, like furniture.) All of these groups of things (which will be henceforth known as "collections") were started when I was still a child. My brothers and I grew up going to auctions with our parents. For a fraction of our allowance we could buy an ugly, mint-green table, a china-head doll, a (slightly scorched) pair of wooden shoes, or even a box lot of old pictures.

So anyway, I've been immersed in images from, and of the past. Yesterday, as I was staring vaguely out the window at the little birdies pecking at seeds in the snow, coughing into a handkerchief pressed to my lips, I realized I reminded myself of a Victorian consumptive confined to a sanatorium! Here I am, wandering listlessly from room to room, handkerchief clutched in my palm, settling now and then at the table in the library to put my pictures into albums. And I've been quarantined for an illness I thought had been confined to another time. Quarantined! God! That is SO century before last!



Here is a tour of some of my favorite haunts from over the last week. If you would like to join me in my personal Wayback Machine, we'll begin in the rarefied air of plate engravings:



Resignation





The Dog's Ambition





Madame Pompadour

Jealousy

Chapel of the Virgin, St. Sulpice

Monument of the Bouchee Family, Pere Lachaise

Calais, France (not Maine)



German Engraving from late 1700s



London Stone

In Part II of our tour, we'll visit the odd, amusing and sometimes slightly sinister highlights from my "Orphan Photographs" collection:

Hair Proud (The first in my collection)



Hello? Really Can't Talk Right Now





Little Kid Tries to Capture Shapeshifting Doggie




Little Kid Tries to Capture Shapeshifting Doggie (detail)




FiFi Demands a Solo Portrait



Jed Is Just Like a Son to Us



I Control Dollie With the Sinister Power of My Mind




Zombie Coed




Discovered At Their Evil Games




 Two Old Witches With Their Familiars Are Confronted By Foul Soul-Sucking Entity




 Banished! Begone, You Foul Soul-Sucking Entity!




Shreveport, Louisiana c. 1920s




Mad Killer Dolls Come Alive At Night 



Jump In! The Water's Fine.



Manic Monkey Grabs Self & Lampshade

 

Sacre Coeur

It's a weird thing, getting older. I'm really not all that comfortable with it. Not having had children, I didn't have the natural progression into being looked to as The Adult. In my head I'm still in my 20s, but my body is changing in ways that don't make sense to my self-image. My parents are aging, and now I worry about them in the same way they must have been concerned for me when I was out sowing my wild oats. Instead of thinking about what else I might enjoy doing for a living, I'm wondering how I'll ever be able to retire. There are so many things I want to do, and I feel as if time is running out. I do not like this one little bit.

I had a dream the other night that left me feeling a deep gratitude for the relationship I have with my parents mixed with a profound sadness that our time together is finite. For days now, the words "Sacre Coeur" have been floating in and out of my thoughts.




Sacre Coeur, from the long steps leading up to it.



Sacre Coeur

Dad and I are on a mid level platform looking up the hill to Sacre Coeur in Paris. I’m explaining to him all about the levels of the city and trying to get him to see and feel the beauty of the city I love so much. We are making our way up the hill through neighborhoods of artists and regular Parisians toward the church. I am worried about the pain in Dad’s legs. I don’t want him to be in pain but I hope he can make the climb. He’s worried too about his knees, but seems to be doing just fine. We stop at a platform/overlook and look back on the lower part of Paris. I point out landmarks to him while we rest. I am anxious that we make it to the top so he can experience the magnificence of Sacre Coeur, but am also just so happy to be here with him. We are sharing our heritage. We both turn to look up at the church at the same time. I know we are getting closer because I can see only the top of the dome.



The view from Sacre Coeur looking across Paris.



Without even spending much time analyzing this dream, I am struck by the central image of Sacre Coeur, Sacred Heart. The church isn't one of my favorite places in Paris, it's not even in the top 25. I adore the neighborhood, though, which is still peopled with artists and writers. Because of this, it seems such an obvious, bash-over-the-head message to myself that I need to focus on what's really, really at the heart of the sacred for me. I need to focus on what's important, and not waste energy lamenting the signs of my own mortality.

What is most sacred to me? Love is.