Go to the Limits of Your Longing

The Inner Voice, Auguste Rodin

God speaks to each of us as he makes us,
then walks with us silently out of the night.

These are the words we dimly hear:

You, sent out beyond your recall,
go to the limits of your longing.
Embody me.

From the Book of Hours I, 59

Daily Thoughts 1/31/2011 (Power Why Some People Have It, WEDC)

Ōta Nampo (大田南畝,1749-1823) was a late Edo period Japanese poet and fiction writer.

Daily Thoughts 1/31/2011

Talked to the Women's Enterprise Development Center in Yonkers about setting up a presentation in February.  I rather like their programs.  I also spent some time weeding in the storage area.

I am also looking at ereader equipment, apps, and ebooks which would part of an ebooks loan.

Today is a quiet, steady day. I put the book, Marshall McLuhan : you know nothing of my work! by Douglas Coupland on hold.  It was in the January 9, 2011 New York Times Book Review.  Our budget is slim these days, so there is not much to order.

I also checked out Power Why Some People Have It-- And Others Don't by Jeffrey Pfeffer.  It is an attention getting title. It is about organizational politics.


Web Bits

Library Posters http://www.flickr.com/photos/philbradley/sets/72157625923493122/

The One Who Is Coming

Fruit Garden in Pontoise, by Paul Cézanne

Why not think of God as the one who is coming, who is moving toward us from all eternity, the Future One, culminating fruit of the tree whose leaves we are? What stops you from projecting his birth on times to come and living your life as a painful and beautiful day in the history of an immense pregnancy? Do you not see how all that is happening is ever again a new beginning? And could it not be His Beginning, for to commence is ever in itself a beautiful thing. If he is to be fulfillment, then all that is lesser must precede him, so that he can fashion himself from out of the greatest abundance. Must he not be last, in order to include everything within himself? And what meaning would be ours, if he, for whom we yearn, had already existed?

Rome, December 23, 1903

Letters to a Young Poet

Cowboy Angels by Paul McAuley

Cowboy Angels by Paul McAuley.




Cowboy Angels by Paul McAuley combines the genre of alternate history with thriller writing. The Real is an America where Alan Turing created the theories which led to gates to alternate histories called Turing gates. There are some wonderfully dry thoughts on Schrodinger's Cat in association with the Turing gates.



This is Paul McAuley's best book. I like the main character Adam Stone, an orphan who is recruited into the CIA to change the course of different alternate histories preventing fascism, communism, and rebuillding where there is nuclear war. The descriptions of the visits to alternate America's are wonderful.



Paul McAuley successfully creates a sense of different Americas. There are descriptions of the art of The American Bund where for a short time the "Dear Leader" created monumental art, or the space where an atom bomb fell devastating areas of Manhattan.



I also like that the story starts in the past in 1983 when Carter is elected in the Real. This makes it feel like both a historical novel and an alternate history novel. The novel touches on so many different styles of writing.

Adam Stone is a very hardcore character. He shoots, interrogates, suffers beatings, and keeps on going. He is after a secret plot to change the alternate histories timeline. His actions are extreme, violent, and polemical. This may turn some people off, but I found it interesting.

Most of the technology is todays technology. The money is similar, the guns are similar, the art and culture are different. The differences are often philosophical. Adam Stone describing his past actions as an agent of the "Real" is describing a form of imperialism which can be hard to stomach. He kills for his countries beliefs.

The novel hinges on many philosophical and political ideals. Is it right to create one America under many skies? Is it manifest destiny to push your will in different worlds?

This is a fantastic story. It is full of constant surprises, strongly opposed ideals, and constant tension. It does not end they way you might expect it would. This book will create strong opinions for and against the story.

Alone

Adam, Auguste Rodin

No. Of my heart I will make a tower
and stand on its very edge,
where nothing else exists—just once again pain
and what cannot be said, and once again world.

Once again in all that vastness
now dark, now light again, the single thing I am,
one final face confronting
what can never be appeased.

That ultimate face, enduring as stone,
at one with its gravity,
drawn by distances that could dissolve it
into some promise of the sacred.

New Poems

LOOKING THROUGH SOME PHOTOGRAPHS I FOUND INSIDE A DRAWER

I was taken by a photograph of you.

SATURDAY IS FOR CLEANUP

Sem grandes post hj

Acho que já magoei muita gente, acho que já perdi a amizade de alguns. Eu reconheci que errei, que fui chata, e tal, mas pedi perdão, agora não posso obrigar ninguém a me perdoar.
Realmente não to boa com esse história, espero não magoar mais ninguém, realmente estou triste como nunca imaginei que estaria, .
Sei-lá estou bem por alguma coisa, e ruim por outras, espero que tudo isso se resolva, ou que pelo menos pare de martelar na minha cabeça.
Estou irritada por gostar de alguém que me quer como amiga, estou irritada por magoar amigos, estou irritada com algumas coisas de família.
Este post é para que eu possa desabafar, dizer o que eu to sentindo, pois alguém uma vez me disse que escrever  melhora, então pois bem aqui estou eu.

Obs; não precisa comentar dizendo que vai ficar tudo bem, quando sei que não vai ficar, ou que está tudo bem quando não está.

Responsabilidad

"Soy responsable de lo que veo.

Elijo los sentimientos que experimento y decido

el objetivo que quiero alcanzar.

Y todo lo que parece sucederme yo mismo lo he pedido,

y se me concede tal como lo pedí"

Daily Thoughts 1/29/2011 (Ebooks, Book Applications)

Teodor Axentowicz (1859–1938), Reading, 1899, Pastel on Paper.

Daily Thoughts 1/29/2011 

There are piles of snow everywhere outside.  I had to dig my car out.  Anyways, back to books.  I have been reading http://www.teleread.com   The site has a section on libraries in the top menu bars.  I am gathering more ideas about how important ebooks are to libraries.  I also read some of No Shelf Required which is about digital content in the library setting. http://www.libraries.wright.edu/noshelfrequired/

What perturbs me sometimes when I read about ebooks is the almost total lack of conversation about digital music.  There are far fewer services for digital music in libraries than bookstores.  I have wondered when the amount of digital music available to libraries will increase.  I see an increase in book applications, but very little movement towards enhanced ebooks with music.  This would be a tremendous combination.  Books on musicians with digital music would be a very good idea.

There are other ideas which have come up.  How would you lend a book application in a library setting.  Libraries already have tremendous problems with lending computer programs.  Book applications are basically computer programs.  I think it would have to become more device focused.  You might want to lend an Ipad with a set of applications on it.  Eventually there will be tablets affordable enough for this. It is something which librarians should be thinking about.  I would like to be able to lend Ipads with book applications on them.  We already have laptops that are used inside our library.

You Come and Go

Rilke by a Window, by Gerolf Van de Perre

You come and go. The doors swing closed
ever more gently, almost without a shudder.
Of all who move through the quiet houses,
you are the quietest.

We become so accustomed to you,
we no longer look up
when your shadow falls over the book we are reading
and makes it glow.

From The Book of Hours I, 45

Estou triste.

Estou triste Hoje,pois acho que magoei uma amiga, sabe não queria que ela ficasse triste comigo, amo muito ela, mais que uma irmã.
Estou triste, pois estou com saudade dele, (segunda chega logo Pow).Triste porque minha encomenda não chega,triste de ver minhas amigas triste, triste de ver a falta de respeito aleio.Triste de ver que alguns amigos estão distantes,Triste com tanta coisa.
Mas creio que tudo vai se ajeitar aos poucos, tudo vai tomando seu caminho.
Peço desculpa a quem eu fui chata, chereta, entrometida.
Luana me perdoa . Minha best, minha mais que irmã, eu te amo minha parenta da lua crescente, maggot forever.
Te amo muitão.

Daily Thoughts 1/28/2011 (Ebooks)

Painting of Russian writer Evgeny Chirikov by Ivan Kulikov, 1904.

Daily Thoughts 1/28/2011

I finished reading Cowboy Angels by Paul McAuley this morning.  I would call it an alternate earth thriller.

I checked the displays this morning.  I also spent some time planning for the website for Twitter and the survey on the website.  I am reading more on ebooks to get better grasp of what I will say in the grant we are working on.

I have been thinking on recent reasons I have run into for ebooks in libraries.  Some of the things which come to mind are:

• Transmedia literacy the ability to handle information across a variety of different devices.
• The digital divide does not just apply to computers, it also applies to other electronic devices.
• There is a need for greater information literacy.
• Libraries are not prepared for enhanced ebooks or book applications.
• The Ipad is more than just an ebook platform it has many other functions.
• Children need to be shown ebooks early to prepare them for the digital future.
• Libraries are just starting to build ebook collections. It will take time to match their book collections.
• Libraries need to be renewed so they can be ready for a digital future and not be perceived as obsolete.

Web Bits

DBW Library-Publisher Panel Makes the Case for Ebook Lending
http://www.libraryjournal.com/lj/home/888975-264/dbw_library-publisher_panel_makes_the.html.csp

Ebooks and Immediate Gratification from Overdrive's Library Blog
http://overdriveblogs.com/library/2011/01/24/ebooks-and-immediate-gratification/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+OverdrivesDigitalLibraryBlog+(OverDrive's+Digital+Library+Blog)&utm_content=Google+Reader

Am I Not the Whole?

Rodin, 1902, by Edward Steichen

God, are you then the All? And I the separated one
who tumbles and rages?
Am I not the whole? Am I not all things
when I weep, and you the single one, who hears it?

From The Book of Hours II, 3

WHITE OUT

É TRISTE

É triste dizer "oi"

Quando a vontade é dizer " te amo!"

É triste dizer que te esqueci,

Quando na verdade você está cada vez mais em meus pensamentos.

É triste querer-te,

Quando não dá pra tê-lo.

É triste ter o máximo de esperança,

Quando não há o mínimo de possibilidade.

É triste te ver e não poder te tocar,

É muito triste te amar!!

Autor: Desconhecido

Que falta.

Como é triste, muito triste não te ver, sinto tanto a sua falta, eu preciso de você do meu lado, preciso de seu carinho, de seu jeito.

Perceber que você está tão longe, e pode estar com outra, me deixa tão irritada, com ciúmes, fico sem chão só de pensar.
Me diga quando você volta? me diga quando você vai trazer minha inspiração?, me diga que não a ama, que não a deseja, mais que realmente está balançado por mim.Queria ouvir tantas coisas sairem de seus lábios, tantos sentimentos sendo mostrado no seu olhar.
Sonho em te encontrar, e um dia e poder olhar em seus olhos, e saber que o que eu sinto é real, e você também sente o mesmo.
Eu sei que você sente quando penso em você, que você sabe que preciso de você do meu lado, que sinto sua falta como nunca senti na minha vida, espero que você sinta minha falta.
Não me resta opção, esse sentimento cresce a cada dia, não posso esconde-lo, aprisiona-lo; prefiro que você saiba que eu , sim eu Realmente sinto algo por você, algo que ninguém é capaz de sentir como eu.
Você é tão especial, tão diferente de todos, não é só isso, você é único, um em um milhão.

Daily Thoughts 01/27/2011 (Web Content, Cowboy Angels)

The Artist's Father, Reading "L'Événement," 1866, Paul Cezanne

Daily Thoughts 01/27/2011

On the way to work, I read some more of Cowboy Angels by Paul McAuley.  Some of the alternate Americas are very interesting. 

I got to work a little late because of the snow today.  I spent some time working on a grant for ereaders.  I still have quite a bit to do.  I have been looking at the Sony Reader Program for devices and ebooks.  http://ebookstore.sony.com/library-program/  I also spent some time on the Overdrive site looking at compatible devices for the ebooks which we get from them.

I also took a few minutes to look at the new library survey which we have.  We are going to look at it a little more.  It needs some work. http://www.mountvernonpubliclibrary.org/node/111

I put the Web Content Strategists Bible by Richard Sheffield and The Content Management Bible by Bob Boiko on hold through interlibrary loan.  No libraries in our system currently have them.

On the way home, I read some more of Cowboy Angels by Paul McAuley.  It has gotten even better, there is now a twist in the turing gates.  The main character adds an element of time travel to the ability to travel to alternate histories.  This makes the reading captivating.