Museum Memories, Act 1

I posit that a strong correlation exists between digital camera ownership and picture-taking of massive volume. The key concept being that publishing every shot is never in the picture.

Dancing Maenad, detail
 (Met Museum, New York)

Since laying my hands on one of these infernal machines, I've taken to photography as if there were no tomorrow. My subjects de préférence are museum/gallery displays and architecture (including archaeological ruins). 

I take it as given that snapshots are to objects of breathtaking beauty as potato chips are to snacking¹. So my routine after the plain vanilla, straight-on shot, comprises looking down from above (interior shot), the underside, and from the right and/or left (this is usually an impeded view). In these days of cheap imitation, context is everything. I may snap a group of objects as evidence of relative size. A single item of interest may require a floor-to-ceiling dimensional spotlighting. The more the merrier encapsulates my overall theme.

The Three Graces. Roman
copy of a Greek original.
(Met Museum, New York)

Years of pictorial self-struggle have at last borne fruit. I've finally come to accept a person or two in my composition. Not only do they lend veracity, they act as living yard sticks (metre sticks in Canada).

To say nothing of the dogged² detail shots. My favourites are bits of drapery and the details that you wouldn't expect to see in a book. The type of thing you'd only see in, well, a museum.

Have you ever been to New York's Metropolitan Museum³? It's chock full of antiquities from around the world. If you've been, close your eyes and imagine the view into the Greek Galleries' classical statuary with your back to that huge chunk of fluted column behind you. Whatever you see, I've probably snapped it.

Lapith and Centaur, still at it.
(British Museum)

Perhaps the British Museum's Duveen Gallery is more your cup of tea. Been there? Then close those eyes. Yup, I've likely a snapshot of that too. Need convincing? I've spent so much time in the gallery's heady air staring at the Marbles⁴, that at one point, one appeared to quicken. If you've seen the dark grey copies in New York City's Onassis Cultural Center, you've only glimpsed a faint shadow. Without the marble, at best, they're dead meat. Sorry NYC.

I live within commuting distance of a city with a museum that's the pride and joy of many, or so I assume. Yet I find myself blasé. I rarely visit. I admit it: I'm spoilt rotten. Given the big picture (there's a finite quantity of quality antiquities), I'm disgracefully so. 

Nevertheless, I'm unrepentant. If I can't spend an afternoon in the company of ancient statuary, jewellery, grave-goods et al, I'll take photographs in museums that live up to their name. Then I'll do my utmost to relive those moments.

It's an expensive fix, but apart from travel (I do so wish), what's the alternative? 

* * *

Notes

¹ One is never enough. 

²  Apologies to Jerome K Jerome.

amazon.com

³ When visiting New York City, the Met is not to be missed. My favourites are the Greek and Roman Galleries, not just for their sculpture, but for their pottery, furniture and wall painting. I also enjoy the Egyptian and the Medieval galleries.

If you're planning a visit to NYC, why not take a look at these:

If you love museums, one day is never enough. The Metropolitan Museum of Art Guide is a great way to help you to prioritize and spend your time wisely. 

It also makes a great souvenir. And better still, is an enticement to planning your next trip!

amazon.com

If painting is more your style, you should love, 100 Best Paintings in New York by Deanna MacDonald and Geoffrey Smith. This handy guide will aid you in locating the best of the best. Take in the Frick Collection, the Guggenheim, the Met, MOMA, or wherever takes your fancy.

Apart from being a wonderful souvenir, this is another volume that will spur you into preparing your next visit to NYC.

⁴ Who wouldn't want a book on the Parthenon Marbles? Not anyone I'd want to rub shoulders with. Let's see now:

amazon.ca

The Parthenon (part of the Wonders of the World series) by Mary Beard is a gem of a book. Along with a short history, there are two "if you visit" sections -- the building (in Athens) and the Marbles (in London). A must for both the armchair and the airplane traveller.

I dare you to read it and then not be desperate to visit both Athens and London!

amazon.ca

The Parthenon Sculptures (aka The Parthenon Sculptures in the British Museum) by Ian Jenkins, Senior Curator in the British Museum's Department of Greek and Roman Antiquities, is primarily a coffee table tome. If you're looking for pictures, this is the one!

amazon.com

The Parthenon and Its Sculptures by John Boardman, is a great book filled with detailed historical information about the building and the carvings. I found my copy at the British Museum on display in the main bookshop.

The book you want if you're after both pictures and history.

amazon.ca

The Parthenon Marbles: The Case for Reunification is Christopher Hitchens' impassioned plea for their return to home. I bought the last edition on Berlin's Museum Island and enjoyed his arguments. I've been to Athens. It's expensive to get there and not an easy place for a retiringly polite Canadian. None of the marbles were on display at the new museum, despite having been crated up and moved months before. Nor would they available for many months to come. If I'd wanted to see copies, I'd have skipped the Athens subway and taken the bus to New York City. Self-centred, I know, but for now I'm with London on this one.

* * *

Books mentioned

• The Metropolitan Museum of Art Guide
• 100 Best Paintings in New York
• The Parthenon
• The Parthenon Sculptures (aka The Parthenon Sculptures in the British Museum)
• The Parthenon and Its Sculptures
• The Parthenon Marbles: The Case for Reunification

What! Blue and yellow don't make green?

Ever wondered why the Bible's Mary is so partial to deep blue robes or the reason the Dutch were once so enamoured of sober black, despite their lavish still lifes and intricate landscapes?

My Canadian copy's title & cover,
 Colour: Travels Through the 
Paintbox. Courtesy amazon.co.uk

"Full of forgotten facts and beguiling anecdotes ... it would be hard to confront a painting ever again without seeing in it a kind of coded map of the world." (Telegraph) 

Ever since I read Victoria Finlay's Colour: A Natural History of the Palette a few years ago, I've looked at colouring in a new light. Ditto for pearls and stones -- precious and semi-precious -- after Jewels: A Secret History. I think Colour is by far the better book, with its low-down on the most famous pigments used throughout the ages. For example, Finlay visits the fabled home of Ultramarine -- a colour so valuable, few, other than Mary herself, deserve to wear it in Renaissance master paintings.

Courtesy: Amazon.ca

Finlay travelled far and wide seeking out evidence of the fascinating world that existed prior to the introduction of chemical pigments and dyes. Australia's ochres were no pedestrian dirt, but a spectacular variety of colours. Simple and more complex blacks -- great pigments, terrible dyes. Other soils -- our Burnt Umbers and Siennas. 

Terre Verte -- the earth colour under all those wonderful pink Renaissance skin tones. I once asked an art teacher about the practice of Terre Verte underpainting -- what an earful -- all those necessary glazes on top. Not a method employed by artists today.

And not so yummy Mummy Brown's gruesome key ingredient --  exactly what the name says -- ground-up corpses. A once popular white -- once based on highly toxic lead. Vermilion, so ubiquitous in Japan -- another toxic tint. Bizarre yellows from India and Cambodia as well as a poisonous green that caused a mysterious death-by-wallpaper. Plus orange, and blue jeans' indigo plant. An over the top violet we know as Royal Purple -- the reason for ancient Tyre's humongous shell middens -- and the sunny secret to its dye. Mass-murder of the shellfish kind.

* * *

Needless to say, the most toxic ancient pigments are now only available by permit. It wouldn't do to have museums restoring their treasures with the modern chemical variety. And, despite the strides in safety provided by modern pigments, check out those expensive jars in art supply stores. Many still aren't safe to use without taking precautions.

Check out The Phrontistery for some unusual colour terms, from aeneous (a bronze), to glaucous (a green), to zinnober (another green).

More green, not an easy colour for Kermit:

* * *

Courtesy amazon.com.

Bitten by the colour-bug? A Perfect Red: Empire, Espionage and the Quest for the Color of Desire is another fascinating tale. Each new fashion season tempts us with a "new black", but did you realize that red is the "old black"? Although there were a variety of red dyes, the Aztecs' cochineal stood out in brightness and colour-fastness. From a source the Spanish did their utmost to keep concealed, it was affordable only to the rich.

"Europeans tried to crack the enigma of cochineal. Did it come from a worm, a berry, a seed? ... all joined the chase ... a chase that lasted more than three centuries." (From back cover.)

* * *

Courtesy amazon.com.

For the true die-hard, Michael Wilcox's colour-theory Blue and Yellow Don't Make Green is a treat. Of course, they sometimes do -- but it all depends upon which blue and which yellow. After going through its colour charts and other detailed technical information, should you find yourself backsliding, just remember the "green and yeller" of Pete Seeger's Henry my Son. That should give you pause.

"Where have you been all the day, Henry my son? 

Where have you been all the day, my currant bun?

In the woods, dear mother. In the woods, dear mother.

Mother be quick, I got to be sick and lay me down to die.

. . .

What color was those eels, Henry my boy?

What color was those eels, my pride and joy?

Green and yeller. Green and yeller.

Mother be quick, I got to be sick and lay me down to die.

. . ." (lyricsvip.com)

A wonderful album. Looks like something out of
the  '70s, doesn't  it? Courtesy amazon.com.

I still have my 1975 double album, Pete Seeger and Arlo Guthrie Together in Concert, where I first heard Henry my Son. The misery of "green and yeller" have been with me ever since.

* * *

Books mentioned

• Colour: A Natural History of the Palette
• Jewels: A Secret History
• A Perfect Red: Empire, Espionage and the Quest for the Color of Desire
• Blue and Yellow Don't Make Green

The Joy of Snow, or Winter Wonderland Blues

They say the British are always complaining about the weather. But with no Brits in sight, these days, all I seem to hear is winter whingeing. I'm even doing it myself.

I spent four years on the West Coast in a suburb of Victoria, British Columbia. It's a place that, in Canadian terms, never gets very hot or very cold. The roses in our front garden lasted until December and Christmas dinner included parsley from our garden. The first spring flowers appeared in February and snow was something that came in on peoples' cars from places such as Duncan.

And I loved the tall trees -- I keep waiting for re-runs of Twin Peaks, just to get another glimpse of them. Most of all, I don't think I'll ever forget being able to see the Olympic Range of mountains from my living room window.

Whoops, not the Olympic Range, but a range of Olympians. Detail of the Gods vs the Titans
 on the Pergamon Altar in Berlin. These kids sure had no respect for the older generation.

Several months ago, I came across a beautiful large paperback entitled Rainforest: Ancient Realm of the Pacific Northwest at my favourite second-hand bookshop in Montreal. Although there is some text, it's primarily a collection of  nature photographs taken in and along the West Coast, from BC to California. Page after page of moss-covered giants, mountain streams snaking through mossy forests, mist-enclosed mountains, and ice-and-snow encrusted vegetation -- you get the picture. Amazingly, although the introduction is by David Suzuki, there is only one smallish image of devastated, broken forest.

Any Group of Seven collection would show far worse deforestation. Take, for example, Joan Murray's Northern Lights: Masterpieces of Tom Thomson and the Group of Seven. If a painting's title includes the word "Algoma", you can be certain the trees will be some variety of blackened stump. Nevertheless, Murray's book is eye-catching, with full page photos of both the artists' best and lesser-known works, from the early years up to the late '30s. Flip through it, and you'll understand why Tom Thomson found painting summer landscapes too boringly blah, too green.

I also love pictures of snow. I've spent hours in front of  Lawren Harris' white landscapes marvelling at the variety of colours he used to render his snow just right -- blues, pinks and yellows, among others. What I hate is the snow experience. The chill, the damp, the shovelling, and the way Downtown Montreal's sidewalks resemble single-file forest trails long after the snow has ceased falling. Not to forget the ice. I especially loathe the ice. Fall on slippery pavement a few times and you'll understand why.

My family recently welcomed me home after a "warmer weather" holiday in the US. Three days in New York spent at the Met and its neighbour to the north, the Guggenheim, with a side-trip to the New York Public Library, and over a week in the Boston suburb of Cambridge. After leaving Quebec's snow it was great to be in an almost snow-free New York. As for Boston, I often went out without my gloves. Nevertheless, it was still cold outside, so I was forced to seek the indoor pleasures of museums, libraries and bookshops.

I always love going to the Met, and again it didn't disappoint. The highlights of this visit were American Landscapes (gigantic!); Haremhab, The General Who Became King (for those with an interest in ancient Egypt or Tutankhamen); Thinking Outside the Box: European Cabinets, Caskets, and Boxes from the Permanent Collection (1500-1900) (exquisite); The Roman mosaic from Lod, Israel (beautiful); and of course the "new" Greek and Roman Galleries (spellbinding).

Roman silver at the Met. Not quite the Warren Cup, although the shop
does have its diminutive British Museum guide in the bookstore.

When I visit a museum or art gallery, I usually pop into the bookstore first. Just to see what's there, mind you. That way I'll have an idea as to the exhibitions with guides or catalogues. The down side is that I end up with a heavy bag of books while I tour the building. Now, before I left on my trip, it came to me that I may have taken a risk importing a small British Museum guide a few years ago. It covered the focal piece of a special exhibition I had just seen, located in a room with warning signs at the entry. In fact, I remember most of the guide justifying the museum's recent acquisition of this disturbing masterpiece of the Roman silversmith. What had come to me was the idea that Canada Customs might not agree.

Of one thing I was sure -- the book would never be allowed into the US. But here it was at the Met. The slim volume, an unexpurgated twin to my home copy, was barely noticeable on the bookshelf. (Un-) expurgated: Are you like me in always completing the thought with " 'Olsen's Standard Book of British Birds' -- The one without the gannet"?)

I departed the Met bookstore with nothing more than the books I absolutely could not do without. The idea of lugging them to Boston and then home to Canada was a big incentive. I'm now the proud owner of the following lovelies:

• Simon Jenkin's England's Thousand Best Houses (I've been on the look-out ever since I acquired the Best Churches version) -- highly discounted too, 
• The Gothic Enterprise: A Guide to Understanding the Medieval Cathedral. I hope it's as good as Universe of  Stone: A Biography of Chartres Cathedral, an amazing book bought last year at the Met. How the Gothic cathedrals were built -- the fact behind the fiction of such novels as The Pillars of the Earth. Alas, I paid the full price,
• How to Read World History in Art: From the Code of Hammurabi to September 11. With its glossy paper, this is not your standard paperback. Why I of all people need a book to show me famous artworks along with a description of the related historical events, I don't know. All I can say is that I imagined my children consulting it (as if!). Heavy and at full price, I still bought it. Take that as a recommendation,
• Land of Lost Gods: The Search for Classical Greece. The grownup version of the tales I read as a child -- Schleimann at Troy, Elgin and the Marbles, but primarily the smaller-scale, but still spectacular feats and acquisitions, such as collecting for Louis XIV, recording the appearance of the Parthenon, and the stories of Pergamon and Ephesus, the cities with the great libraries that succeeded Alexandria's. I have a feeling I may be rereading Mary Beard's excellent The Parthenon, with its two "If you visit" sections -- Athens (the building) and London (the Marbles),
• The Horses of St Mark's: The Story of Triumph in Byzantium, Paris and Venice. Plundered from Constantinople by the Venetians, removed to Paris by Napoleon, this book promises to reveal their origin, sculptor, and explain why they were cast in copper, not bronze. A paperback, my British Abacus edition is filled with black and white illustrations, but no colour plates. It looks like a compelling read, especially at the discounted price of US $6.98 (Cdn $23 retail). I'm sure I'll be following up this read with Piazza San Marco (ie, St Mark's Square), part of the Wonders of the World series -- along with Mary Beard's The Parthenon.

Next day, I was off to the Guggenheim, whose shop was small and less inviting than most of its ilk, perhaps due to after-Christmas sales and the recent closing of its special exhibition, Chaos and Classicism: Art in France, Italy, and Germany, 1918–1936. No book section! While the top two floors were closed, not everything from the exhibition had been removed. Fortunately, rather than starting at the bottom, as the numbering of the remaining exhibition pieces suggested, I followed my guide book's advice and chose to walk down, rather than up. Another great tip from the The Mini Rough Guide to New York City. I enjoy Frank Lloyd Wright's work, so I'd recommend a visit even if the building were empty -- the artworks were the icing on the cake.

My third and final day in New York was spent at the main branch of the New York Public Library, the Stephen A Schwartzman Building. Given the hype at the beginning of the 2 pm tour, I was expecting a near repeat of my visit to London's British Library late last century. We had a brief view of the stacks -- a small, far away peep into virtual darkness -- and tempted with "Here's our fabulous map room, too bad it's shut today" and "People come from all over to do genealogical research; the room's down that hall". However, what we did get was a detailed explanation of how to fill out a book request.

Nor was there anything resembling the British Library's Treasury Room, where you can view a copy of the Magna Carta (have you read 1215: The year of Magna Carta? It's a small gem of a book.) and the Lindisfarne Gospels (the sacking of Lindisfarne Abbey is considered the beginning of the Viking age).

While waiting  for the Library's building tour, I took the tour of  the special exhibition on the main floor, Three Faiths: Judaism, Christianity, Islam. If you are like me and love to see old books, this was the place to be, especially since it was all free -- unlike the museums, this place has no entrance fees.

Centuries-old Torahs, Bibles and Qur'ans. One volume of Gutenberg's Bible. An early American Puritan prayer book, with the prayers in a form quite different from that of the King James Version. Although Tyndale, Wycliffe and Caxton, among others, were represented, I was surprised there was no Geneva Bible, a favourite of the Pilgrims until they became The Authorities in the New World. When our guide mentioned that the King James Bible was based primarily on earlier English-language texts, especially Coverdale's, I made a mental note to speak to her before leaving.

My plan was to recommend Adam Nicolson's fascinating God's Secretaries, an amazing story of teamwork among the highly-educated. It's a great read, and if that's not enough, you can try Wide as the Waters: The Story of the English Bible and the Revolution it Inspired. Should you want to know more about Gutenberg and his financially ruinous quest for perfection, take a gander at The Gutenberg Revolution: How Printing Changed World History. All three books tell the story of people who were ahead of their time. As for the tour guide, she hadn't read Nicholson's book, And she wasn't interested.

One thing the New York Public Library had over the British Library was a shop. Although its book section is small, it's full of great books. I picked up the softcover British Library catalogue to Three Faiths, entitled Sacred: Exhibition Catalogue. Although some of the exhibits are different, the focus is the same. I managed to control myself and left David Crystal's newest tome, Begat: The King James Bible and the English Language, for later. Also available was his By Hook or By Crook: A Journey in Search of English, which I really enjoyed when I read it last year. If you think he's enthusiastic when you read his books, you should hear him talk. Close your eyes and you can imagine him jumping up and down and waving his arms with excitement.

I left NYC just in the nick of time. Thirty minutes after my 7:30 pm departure for Boston, new travel was to be suspended in anticipation of The Snowstorm. On arrival at Boston's South Station by 11:30, I had yet to see a single flake, but next morning in Cambridge the windowsills had about four inches of snow. Despite the horrors of the white stuff I managed to trek the ten minutes' walk to Harvard Square, to me, the beginning of the bookstore pilgrimage trail. It was on a later trip to the Coop that I would scoop up Simon Armitage's The Odyssey. It was Armitage's reading of an excerpt on BBC4's Gods and Monsters: Homer's Odyssey (aka In Search of Odysseus) that had begun my own odyssey in search for the book.

My idea of a nice piece of turf. The
garden at Longfellow House a few months
 ago. It's just you and the bunnies when
 the house is closed to visitors.

A few days later, I braved the vagaries of the T's Green Line trams to visit the Museum of Fine Arts. I was obliged to leave (why do museums always close so early?) before I could enter the new Art of the Americas Wing. I'd recommend the special exhibitions I saw, but most closed a few days after I saw them. There was however Millet and Rural France. Located in a hallway, the exhibition showcases several small works by Millet in media other than oil. Two black and white studies for The Gleaners, a riverbank scene with a sky with the colours "of a Japanese woodblock print", a miniature landscape at dusk, a patch of dandelions evocative of the Group of Seven -- but with detail more evocative of Durer's 1503 patch of turf -- they're all wonderful.

Taking advantage of the MFA's "return free within 10 days" offer, I made another foray to see the new Art of the Americas Wing. A bathroom search led me to Fresh Ink: Ten Takes on Chinese Tradition. Before I was robbed of all my new, expensive calligraphy gear by security guards at Japan's Kansai Airport a few years ago, I used to search out all the Chinese watercolours I could find. Now I tend to avoid them, but I decided to take a quick walk through Fresh Ink anyway. I wish I had seen the exhibition on my first visit, so that I could have seen it twice. It was breath-taking. Not only were they contemporary works incredible, ancient works that gave the artists their inspiration were on display too. I walked through the exhibition twice and spent a fair amount of time just gawping. If you visit and they have still run out of exhibition guides, you now know who picked up the last wrapped catalogue. Due to a computer glitch, only the two display copies (both highly pawed) remained upon my departure.

I think my Fresh Ink catalogue will go wonderfully with my Jane English Tao Te Ching. Her black and white photographs are a wonderful translation of the landscapes some of the exhibition's artists evoke. It's no surprise that the 1997 edition commemorates 25 years in print.

French tableware from the second half of the 18th century in the Sèvres Ceramics Museum.
The ugliest china I have ever seen on display anywhere. Pink wood grain -- tacky, tacky, tacky.

I made one commuter rail trip from Boston. Salem's Peabody-Essex Museum website promised old ships' logs and journals from the city's heyday as an international shipping port along with period luxury goods imported from Japan and Chinese export china (ie, porcelain). I love old maps and books and china. It was a sad day for me when Toronto's Gardiner Museum was demolished. I found solace in a visit to Paris suburb Sèvres' Ceramics Museum (Musée national de Céramique) -- the third largest in the world. If you examine the photo of the building on wikipedia, you'll notice two white columns flanking the main entrance. They're actually gigantic Chinese vases. The new Gardiner later made some restitution by hosting Made in China: Export Porcelain (1500-1800) in 2007. According to the introduction, a subsidy from the sponsor had been necessary to publish the catalogue. It's sumptuous.

Although the Salem exhibition had neither the breadth or width of the Gardiner's it was still worth the trip. Apart from the porcelain, there were paintings showing details of the trade; from the ordering, to production, to shipping. Interspersed between the display cases are floor to ceiling pieces of antique wallpaper depicting Chinese pottery production. Lovely landscapes with miners and potters. Beautiful and instructive.

Berlin's Museum Island. Not just empty
 words -- it takes a bridge to get there.

Considering that European customers had only written contact with the Westerners who placed the orders and that this was done in minimal contact areas of China where neither the potters nor the decorators had any knowledge or contact with the West. it's amazing anybody can appreciate and understand the designs on the early pieces. I love early Meissen pieces too -- the first European porcelain looks almost, but not quite like the Chinese. It's wonderful, Chinese products, then Chinese artisans producing with more or less successful Western-style designs, European attempts at mimicking the Chinese, European designs that try to look like the Chinese European-ish designs. It gets better when you see what the Japanese made of all this. When they entered the trade, they put their own spin on the Chinese designs. Not to forget the Arab market. For only some Chinese export ware was destined for Europe.

By the way, Meissen china is still being produced. When I was in Berlin a few years ago, I managed to tear myself away from Museum Island for a walk along tony Unter den Linden. Looking into the window of a shop, I saw teacup and saucer sets running at about 400 euros. I didn't bother going inside to get a better idea of the price range, it's always been an expensive product.

Arrival by boat at Drottningholm. No welcoming party?

My favourite piece at the Peabody-Essex Museum was a huge bowl (think giant punchbowl) with a lid and platter. It was commissioned as a gift to Swedish royalty and its design is meant to be viewed from the front. It depicts Drottningholm Palace and its Chinese Pavilion. There are tiny Europeans on a wooden dock and a Swedish flag fluttering in the wind. It really needs a magnifying glass to appreciate it fully. Although the main palace, where official functions are held, such as receiving new ambassadors, is in Stockholm, Drottningholm is the residence of the royal family. The mundane way to visit is to take Stockholm's subway and then a bus. I took the romantic way by boat. It's not fast, but the scenery is worth it. I travelled in early May and I almost believed I was in Algonquin Park's interior.

Drottningholm's Chinese Pavilion in May.

The Chinese Pavilion was built to be used, not simply a pretty toy to be shown to admirers, and the love put into it's furnishing shows. As I was leaving, I saw a group of Chinese visitors. They were in stitches. I'm not sure whether they said so in so many words (it may have been on the descriptive card), but the decorative Chinese calligraphy panel they were viewing was just that -- decorative. The Chinese characters were pure nonsense.

Somehow I made it out of the Peabody-Essex without visiting the book section of the bookstore. Probably something to do that when I was accosted by a guard on the second floor and told the museum was "closing in ten minutes" as if I had been crouched behind some display case rather than in plain sight in an empty gallery. I had been on my way to the cloakroom, sorry "coatroom", when I noticed the shop was open and none of the staff was telling customers to get a move-on.

One of the Met's small Chinese vases. 
Late 17th-early  18th century in a bright 
sang de boeuf red.  Not for vegetarians.
 Note the photographer's
 skillful use of museum-glare lighting.

So I decided to join them. Picked up two beautiful little Chinese vases (solid colour with white interior) at half price. If I were to photograph them an place the picture amongst my pictures of the original variety at the Met, you wouldn't notice the difference. Turns out they go wonderfully with the vase I bought this summer at the same shop. Although I kept searching for books, I couldn't find any. I came upon the bookshop on the way to fetching my coat but was (1) worried it was so late the coat check person had given up and gone home or (2) not brazen enough to walk in and be the last customer. You choose, both are equally probable, and each is 100% correct.

By now you're probably thinking that Salem might actually be worth visiting outside the Halloween season, but what's all this have to do with the winter and the weather? Lots.

I arrived at North Station, as instructed my the MBTA's handy trip planner (only two trip suggestions at a time, and leaving earlier doesn't mean arriving earlier, so it takes forever to obtain and print out a feasible selection). After I settled the confusion about the 125 Rockport train -- according to my trip planner Rockport-bound train was to leave at 1:20 and this 125 still had TBA for a platform upon my arrival -- I only had about 45 minutes to wait. Isn't selective reading wonderful? If I had read what came before the Rockport and 125 I would have learnt on my own that the 1:20 pm train and train #125 were were separated by an hour. And, no, I would not consider the fact that the train listed on the line above 125 was something like 346 and the one below something like 459 to be a dead give-away. Never underestimate the power of wishful thinking.

So what does one do in an almost empty train station with 40-odd minutes to wait? Before pulling out a book, that is. Visit the local ice cream stand, of course. The one at North Station is like a trip back to the '70s. The product names, the artwork, everything screams nostalgia. Unfortunately, the prices are strictly 2011 Boston. I enjoyed my selection -- a smoothie with lemon sorbet and raspberries and sparkling water. However, when I attended ConU (the newly merged Sir George Williams and Loyola Universities, now known to outsiders as Concordia), we had a smoothie counter in the cafeteria. A straw remains upright without the lid in a real smoothie. That said, beggars can't  be choosers in a train station and most stations would have provided less enjoyment -- visual and alimentary -- for US $5.25.

When I returned home to Canada, I calmed the nostalgia bug by watching one of my husband's favourite DVDs -- the 2009 Woodstock: 3 Days of Peace and Music. I remember seeing the original movie when it came out. Luckily for me, Quebec has had some of the laxest film censorship around. It was rated 13 Years, and I looked older than my age. I've never been able to fly to London without thinking of Arlo Guthrie singing Coming into Los Angeles, even though I've never taken the polar route.

My traveller's luck held out for the return trip. Salem's commuter rail platform is reached from the street by descending a set of stairs, walking past the stops for the even more infrequent buses to Boston and other places, walking along the train platform and ascending a more substantial set of stairs to what could be broadly described as an enclosure. That is, if you accept having a roof and three walls as a definition. I would have needed to descend the stairs and stand in the open air to determine whether "shelter" could be included in this definition.

It sure was tough negotiating a way off
 the Boston-bound train. Some of the passengers
 were real monsters. Detail from the Pergamon Altar.

With the sun having set a good while before, it sure was cold. The guy who kept walking back and forth clapping his hands and making other "gee, I'm cold" gestures for the next almost-hour sure made it hard to forget. I say "almost-hour" because it took a few minutes to get through all those people walking out of the station. As I froze, it became more and more apparent that those people had just alighted from the Rockport-to-Boston train. My train. In hindsight, I should have wasted more time generating and printing return schedules.

Now if you want to hear about really nasty weather, I could talk about the high 22, low 24 Celsius weather we had the other day, back home in Quebec.

Instead, I'll just sign off with the thought of a July afternoon in Granada. It was 39 degrees Celsius. Every time I sat there would be some local fanning herself who would turn to me and say "Que calor!". I horrified one by telling her that, after factoring in the humidity or wind chill, we could reach 39 degrees in the summer and 39 below in the winter, back at home. It's been less the two centuries since they shut down the headquarters of the Spanish Inquisition in nearby Cordoba, so it ought to take a great deal to horrify an Andalusian.

For those whose only familiarity with the Spanish Inquisition is from Monty Python sketches, I would recommend Reston's thought-provoking Dogs of God:  Columbus, the Inquisition and the Defeat of the Moors rounded out by the bittersweet The Ornament of the World: How Muslims, Jews and Christians Created a Culture of Tolerance in Medieval Spain. If you're not in the mood for nonfiction, Guy Gavriel Kay's The Lions of Al-Rassan may give you a taste for the real thing. It's where I started.

So quit complaining about the weather -- it's always going to be too hot or too cold. Take your advice from the Monty Python crew and Always Look on the Bright Side of Life.

Books mentioned

• Rainforest: Ancient Realm of the Pacific Northwest 
• Northern Lights: Masterpieces of Tom Thomson and the Group of Seven
• The Warren Cup
• England's Thousand Best Houses
• England's Thousand Best Churches
• The Gothic Enterprise: A Guide to Understanding the Medieval Cathedral
• Universe of  Stone: A Biography of Chartres Cathedral
• The Pillars of the Earth
• How to Read World History in Art: From the Code of Hammurabi to September 11
• Land of Lost Gods: The Search for Classical Greece
• The Parthenon
• The Horses of St Mark's: The Story of Triumph in Byzantium, Paris and Venice
• The Mini Rough Guide to New York City
• 1215: The year of Magna Carta
• God's Secretaries
• Wide as the Waters: The Story of the English Bible and the Revolution it Inspired
• The Gutenberg Revolution: How Printing Changed World History
• Sacred: Exhibition Catalogue
• Begat: The King James Bible and the English Language
• By Hook or By Crook: A Journey in Search of English
• The Odyssey (aka Homer's Odyssey)
• Fresh Ink: Ten Takes on Chinese Tradition
• Tao Te Ching (Jane English, photographer)
• Made in China: Export Porcelain (1500-1800)
• Dogs of God:  Columbus, the Inquisition and the Defeat of the Moors
• The Ornament of the World: How Muslims, Jews and Christians Created a Culture of Tolerance in Medieval Spain
• The Lions of Al-Rassan