The 1922 poem referenced here is the one by Robert Frost "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening," one of the most referenced poems in literary history but not even Frost's most famous (Road Not Taken arguably, I often get the 2 mixed up to be honest).
Something about winter (the long nights, heated homes, and unappealing thought of going outside, maybe) always puts me in the mood to read books, or "stop by books" if I'm trying to be literary like Frost (what a literary first name, by the way, Robert was born to be an artist/writer). The snow outside falling making it a quiet evening (if you don't count the incessant car alarm that went off down the street) and curling up with a book on the couch without worries of work, the stock market, or the future. Just myself and the book in front me, which happened to be "The Year of Magical Thinking" by the late great Joan Didion, who tragically passed away earlier this year along with a bunch of famous people like Sidney Poitier, Bob Saget, and Barbara White. Yea January's been quite a rough month. Fittingly, The Year of Magical Thinking is about Joan coping with her husband's sudden and shocking death, finding herself alone without her longtime partner whom she confided in and shared her literary talents with. I now understand the feeling of having a partner whom I can confide everything in and share interests; the book itself was one MJ bought but I found interesting and started to read after seeing it in her pile.
Back to reading, though, there's something just comforting about sitting in a quiet place to read. I didn't realize this aesthetic pleasure before, likely because it seems nerdy and I was so insecure about myself I didn't want to add another piccadilly others could tease me for, but the setting of where one reads is important too. In college I sat one glorious afternoon outside in the engineering quad at the University of Illinois as the sun rose and set reading an entire book cover to cover (it was a Percy Jackson page-turner, so no great feat) but I got exposed to the idea of reading settings by visiting Powell's Bookstore in Portland with MJ, one of the highlights of our journeys together. Maybe post-pandemic plans need to include traveling the country visiting different bookstores (call it Stopping by Bookstores on a Snowy Evening). There are bookstores apparently that have cats guarding the books against mice and bugs like Amelia at the Spiral Bookcase in Philadelphia. Really a lost aesthetic, reading in America. It'd be nice if everyone reverted to healthy brain activities of reading and educating oneself or just reading for fun, but we've went a different way of Iphones in everyone's laps, not books. And shorter attention spans.
Alas, the time for preaching is over, for I have promises to keep, and pages of Joan Didion's book to go before I sleep.
Fantasize on,
Robert Yan
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