Log24

The following meditations were inspired by an ad today in the online New York Times obituaries section–

“Been somewhere interesting? Tell us about it for a chance to win a trip for 2 to Paris.”

Country song, quoted here Dec. 17, 2003–

“Give faith a fighting chance.”

Malcolm Lowry, Under the Volcano–

“I sit now in a little room off the bar at four-thirty in the morning drinking ochas and then mescal and writing this on some Bella Vista notepaper I filched the other night…. But this is worst of all, to feel your soul dying. I wonder if it is because to-night my soul has really died that I feel at the moment something like peace. Or is it because right through hell there is a path, as Blake well knew, and though I may not take it, sometimes lately in dreams I have been able to see it? …And this is how I sometimes think of myself, as a great explorer who has discovered some extraordinary land from which he can never return to give his knowledge to the world: but the name of this land is hell. It is not Mexico of course but in the heart.”

From an obituary of mathematician Gian-Carlo Rota linked to here on April 18, the anniversary of Rota’s death:

Gian-Carlo Rota

From a novel, Psychoshop, quoted here in an entry on the Pope’s birthday, “The Gates of Hell” —

His manner was all charm and grace; pure cafe society….

He purred a chuckle. “My place. If you want to come, I’ll show you.”

“Love to. The Luogo Nero? The Black Place?”

“That’s what the locals call it. It’s really Buoco Nero, the Black Hole.”

“Like the Black Hole of Calcutta?”

“No. Black Hole as in astronomy. Corpse of a dead star, but also channel between this universe and its next-door neighbor.”

“Here? In Rome?”

“Sure. They drift around in space until they run out of gas and come to a stop. This number happened to park here.”