09 December 2013

Rejoice with me



She called her neighbors and said, “Rejoice with me, for what was lost has been found!”
(a parable from Jesus, in the Gospels)

As I wrote my thesis I had enormous stacks of books from multiple libraries, piled, spread, tucked, and scattered around my study. At the end of summer, some of these had been renewed over and over for months. Thinking I was “mostly done,”and feeling guilty that someone else might want access to some of them, I returned most of the stack to Wheaton’s Buswell Library. A few short weeks later, about a month into the fall semester, I checked a few of them out again, whilst checking references and following up some lingering questions.

Some time later I needed to check something in Christoph Wolff’s The World of the Bach Cantatas. But for some reason I could not lay my hand on it. A week later, following some serious searching and pawing through and re-organizing, I still could not find it. I began to feel alarmed. I conducted several searches through both vehicles, I went through all the bags in the house. I went to coffee shops to see if I had left it behind somewhere.

Beyond alarm, I was now beginning to wonder how I was going to afford to replace this book. I borrowed the book from another library. Finally I talked to the circulation librarian at Buswell. She kindly offered to put out an APB at the library, “just in case.” Of course, this proved fruitless. Equally kindly, she suggested we talk “after the holidays” about what this was going to mean.

So, I was technically at liberty but preparing to plead guilty, and waiting for my sentencing.

Yesterday, preparing to listen to the St. Olaf Christmas Festival online, my Karen suggested I drag out the speakers from my church office to use in the family room. They were easy enough to find, in a box, under my desk, tucked away with photos and other things I hope to put back in a professional office one day.

And what to my wondering eyes? There, in this open-topped box, in a hard to reach place, which had been left alone for about a year, was Christoph Wolff’s The World of the Bach Cantatas. How in the world did it get there? It could not just fall in. Everything under my desk is waiting for my next job; there is nothing from my current writing or teaching down there; indeed, I can barely pull my chair up to sit at the desk. Obviously someone (and it would have to be me) put the book here. I have absolutely no idea.

But that just adds to the wonder, the delight, the adventure of tearing a house upside down, and then being surprised long after giving up hope. So I invite you to “rejoice with me, for what was lost has been found!”

I can’t wait to put this into my librarian’s hands and celebrate with her!

31 October 2013

Neologisms


I have handed in a draft of my thesis, and can now turn my hand again to other adventurous ideas. Reflections coming out of the thesis proper will show up at my other blog. But the adventure of writing? Well, I guess that belongs here.

Or more specifically, today, the adventure of words. I’ve written a passel of words over the past 6 months. Too many for a thesis, actually. I’m sure my next adventure there, before it gets approved, will be the process of editing down.

One fun aspect of typing, editing, proof-reading, and otherwise being buried in words, is the joy of unexpected ideas that pop up through typos. Or in some cases, just through over-thinking things.

So, here’s a short list of neologisms – words that ought to be:

Threatise: a document proposing, justifying, and explaining the ways and means of intimidation (physical or emotional). See The Prince by Machiavelli.

Comcluding: when your Comcast contract runs out; or, if you close your Comcast contract early.

Oboeligatto: well, what would you call  the melody played by a double reed instrument  accompanying a different tune? (see BWV 5/4, or read my thesis when it comes out)
 

Bilbliography: the list of resources consulted for an article, chapter, or book about a beloved hobbit.

  JRRT's drawing, taken from Wikipedia via Google images

Quirkly: adv., in a rapid but unsual manner; or, in an unusually rapid manner.

There’s another that only great exercise of self-control, and the fear of the PC police keeps me from posting. But that raises a whole other question about the adventures of the recesses of the human mind.