Footnotes to a Conversation, September 4, 2023

“And all at once, summer collapsed into fall.” – Oscar Wilde

Diary of a Tuscan Bookshop

Alba Donati opened a bookstore in a very small Italian village – and then came Covid and the bookstore only stayed open thanks to book-lovers and local residents. Diary of a Tuscan Bookshop: A Memoir is a patchwork quilt of thoughts about books, community, and family. Donati is a poet so don’t expect linear timelines and stories. On the other hand, you can look forward to a renewed love of books and an inward look at what we value most in life.

“A bookshop is a school – a window looking out on a world that we only think we know. But to really understand the world we have to read, because those who write are always inspired by something that doesn’t quite fit the mold. And when things don’t add up, authors must face the paradox of life and venture into the darkness of the human mind – become at one with that darkness, even – there is no other way.”

Doing Things Differently

How much stuff do we really need? Can we design our world differently to consume fewer resources and less energy? For example, the stove takes up a substantial amount of room in my galley kitchen; however, what I use the most is a single ring. What if we did away with stoves and replaced them with a couple of induction hobs that we unhooked from the wall when needed? [Lloyd Alter]

A Surrealist Tree

“To be surrealist is to banish the notion of déjà vu and seek out the not yet seen.” - Magritte

“‘I am trying at the moment to discover what it is about a tree that belongs to it specifically but which would run counter to our perceptions of a tree,’ wrote Rene Magritte to his friend and fellow Surrealist Andre Breton. Once the Belgian found a solution, the tree-as-giant-leaf became a lifelong motif.” [The Book of the Tree: Trees in Art]

You can see an image of La Recherche de l’Absolu, the tree as a giant leaf, on Arthur, a digital museum.

Eat More Fruit & Veg

Here are some excellent tips for including more fruit and vegetables in your diet. Trying new vegetables sounds like fun, but the idea that really caught my attention was to revisit vegetables you think you dislike, perhaps in a different format. I will try to get brave and eat some celery. [Wicked Leeks]

Footnotes to a Conversation is a weekly Monday feature covering an assortment of topics that I’ve come across in the preceding week – books, art, travel, food, and whatever else strikes my fancy. I also post occasional articles on other dates, including frequent book reviews and travel tales.

If you share my love of nature, check out EcoFriendly West, an online publication encouraging environmental initiatives in Western Canada, and Nature Companion, a free nature app for Canada’s four western provinces.