From the Ridiculous (my hair) to the Sublime (a great book)

 

Monday – July 2, 2012 – From the Ridiculous (my hair) to the Sublime (a great book)

It’s wonderful waking up to the gentle hum of air conditioning.  When I went outside at 7 to pick up the newspaper, I discovered that is was actually quite pleasant outside.  For a few seconds, I was lured into the optimistic belief that the scorching heat and frizz-inducing humidity levels are coming to an end.  The weather report says otherwise.  Seriously, I need help.  My hair looks like the nest of a bird with attention deficit disorder.  (The photo is too scary to post.)  I’m tempted to cut it all off.  Or maybe I’ll ask my friend Ola how to wrap a scarf around my head to cover this mess.  I am so envious of my smooth-haired friends who never have to deal with this problem. 

During our days of no power, while I was trying to keep very quiet and still, I finished reading a wonderful book, The Hare with AmberEyes, by Edmund de Waal.  It’s a fascinating, beautifully written work of non-fiction.  An artist himself, de Waal sets out to trace the history of a family collection of netsuke (Japanese miniatures) and discovers the story of how the Ephrussi family, from a small town in the Russian Empire, became one of the wealthiest banking families in Europe in the mid-1800s.  The setting moves from Odessa to Paris, Vienna, Tokyo, the U.S. and the U.K. over a period of 200 years.  The author describes the family’s opulent lives against a background of ingrained anti-Semitism in Parisian and Viennese society in the 19^th century and early 20^th century, before the family fortune is destroyed and they face heart-breaking personal tragedy with the rise of National Socialism in the 1930s.  It’s one of the best books I’ve read in a long time.