A catalog of the stuff in my apartment
I have recently come to the conclusion that turtlenecks suit me. Maybe that’s because I have a thin neck and the fabric supplies an illusion of bulk. Or maybe it’s that, when worn with my glasses and habitually severe expression, a turtleneck seems to complete what should perhaps be my signature look: a visual homage […]
Anybody know what this thing is supposed to be? My husband, Frank, and I got it shortly after moving to the Boston area. Having installed our new dining table, we figured we should adorn the surface with a vase or bowl or something. So we went to HomeGoods and came back with this . . […]
Shouldn’t Michelangelo’s David be circumcised? After all, the biblical king depicted in the statue was pretty famously Jewish—a hero of the faith, in fact, ranking up there with Moses and whoever invented bagels. Yet Michelangelo sculpted a Gentile foreskin for his David. It’s almost as though we can’t trust 16th-century European Christians to represent those […]
Ever since the coronavirus pandemic put us all on lockdown starting in the middle of March, I have occupied the oxymoronic position of shut-in travel writer. I’m paid to be an advocate, witness, and resource for exploring the world, yet I can’t leave my home. On an ineffectiveness scale of 0 to Susan Collins, I […]
Pablo Picasso’s 1934 painting Deux personnages (La Lecture) depicts two young women reading, sexily. The figure on the left is the painter’s lover and muse at the time, Marie-Thérèse Walter, whom he had met when she was 17 and he was 45 and married to somebody else. The other personnage in the picture is one of Marie-Thérèse’s […]
Indirect Objects 