The Line

All This Weight: Sarah Borges

I think I share TMAO’s negative correlation between blogging and struggles at school. Posts are fomenting– at last count twelve topics in the Draft folder, and I’ve been tagged for the Passion Quilt besides (thank you, Linda…)

And I can’t write any of it right now because I’m so backed up on grading essays. Let the truth ring.

While I get my life in order, enjoy this. On its home album, Trailer Park, Beth Orton couples trip hop and Appalachian-type folk with mixed, but admirably brave results.

First, thanks for all the thought-provoking comments on my previous post, due in vast majority to Dy/Dan’s deeply generous link, and resulting in what is my writing’s first (and no doubt only) translation into Swedish (actually, it’s Norwegian– see comment below. Ed.) Life is good. I am taking time to sift through it all and let it percolate, and will be writing a response in the next few days.

Setting all unintentionally controversial talk of tech aside, the post title is not an oblique reference to myself but the song featured here. Josh Ritter is my new boyfriend. Er, new favorite singer/songwriter/poet. He’s going to remind you of Dylan, perhaps, including the scruffy beard. Today, he’s reminding me of why I teach English in the first place. Enjoy.

I’ve got a Muslim student in the hospital right now. When I went to visit him I thought he looked a little lost among the tinsel and stockings hanging in the Pediatrics ward. I think this time of year brings it out in folks; anyone who’s outside of mainstream culture, for whatever reason, seems to feel it tenfold around Christmas.

My husband is a Presbyterian minister and I am a cradle Catholic, so you can imagine that I have investment in the essence of the Christian holidays. But I can’t forget that are multiple perspectives in the world– on religion, on materalism, on family. I guess I have in my life just too many beautiful Middle Eastern kids, beloved Jewish relations, brave single parents…

So I am put in mind of this song that I love. Neil Finn, previously of Crowded House, is a longtime favorite, and the album this song is from is a work of art. If you like it, try to find an mp3 of the studio version– it’s even better.

Enjoy the blog’s first Youtube rip, and your holidays– whatever those happen to be.