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At what point did girls in my generation begin to talk, almost exclusively, like Shoshanna from Girls? Even if you don’t watch the show, you know what I’m talking about. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, imagine you’re about to giggle. Now keep your voice at that same falsetto pitch and start speaking, eschewing all declarative statements while your tone lilts upward at the end of every phrase, a never-ending question punctuated with “like” and “so” and “so, like,” .

This is what I am currently being subjected to as I hurtle through the air in a half-empty Southwest aircraft on my way back to Baltimore. Unfortunately, the girls so,like-ing in the row ahead of me aren’t nearly as brilliant and hilarious as Zosia Mamet’s satirical Shoshanna.

By no means do I mean to exempt myself from this epidemic. I have been known to lapse into similar aurally grating rhythmic and tonal patterns, and if you observe me doing it in the future, you have my permission to publicly chastise. I realize that changes over time in dialect and speech patterns are natural and unavoidable, but if this is the path in which we’re headed I want no part in it.

I also realize that I am too young to be complaining about the transgressions of today’s youth. I submit that “crotchety” is a state of mind and has nothing to do with one’s age.

Let’s end on an uplifting note. Things are great. I am doing what I’ve always wanted to do, and I’m getting paid to do it. I can make my own schedule. I get at least eight or nine hours of sleep every night, and sometimes--nay, often--more. I have the best friends and family ever. I get to come home to an awesome guy and two cats with unnervingly canine personalities.

Spring is finally starting to peek through the freak winter storms of the past week, and with spring comes long jogs, fastidious house-cleaning, and lemon bars.

#Girls #ZosiaMamet #lemonbars


When it rains, indeed. In the past two days I have acquired over two hundred pages of music, all to be performed in the next two weeks. My daily schedule: practice, read, eat, [think about] work[ing] out, play with the cats, do some housework, repeat ad infinitum. I lead quite a charmed life.

#music #practice #cats


Is there anything more heart-meltingly, gut-wrenchingly, makes-your-soul-churn-so-violently-it’s-like-you-have-soul-indigestion beautiful than the second movement of the Brahms D minor piano concerto? Sure, there are probably lots of things (or at least a few things, for example the third movement of the Brahms B-flat piano concerto) that rival it, and maybe others will be inclined to disagree (all you Brahms haters can check your hating at the door, thanks), and maybe in the near or distant future I’ll change my tune (take the appropriate amount of time here to snort/scoff/roll your eyes at my pun and get frustrated by the ubiquity of my parenthetical remarks), but for now the Op. 15 Adagio is just getting me all kinds of hot and bothered.

I was practicing the Brahms this morning and then, because I am a masochist, decided to treat myself to my teacher’s recording of it with Szell and Cleveland and I damn near had a psychotic episode where I felt awe/ecstasy/joy/envy/despair/hopelessness/bewilderment/wonder/love/respite all at the same time and all in the span of the three and a half minutes it took for the orchestra and soloist to present the first 26 bars.

The sun is streaming through the trees and speckling the living room furniture with patches of gold, a visual personification of the warmth and intimacy that permeates the music. Like petting a dog. Like drinking hot cocoa. While wrapped in a Snuggie.

The Adagio is my own secret hideaway, my Terabithia, a sanctuary from the world on the other side of these windows, the world that comes flooding back in once the music stops, a world of political sparring, dishonesty, worry, discontent.

Before I wax too maudlin about this exquisite work of the gods (if you thought this was bad, your stomach for all things maudlin could use some strengthening; a few doses of Wuthering Heights should cure you if it doesn’t kill you) I’ll excuse myself now from this ode to Brahms and go make lunch.

Is there anything more saliva-inducing, hearty-but-light, ready-in-minutes-so-you-can-get-on-with-the-music-worship than lemon-garlic-butter-parmesan pasta?

#Brahms #Fleisher #Szell #pasta

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