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These early entries are a bit tentative. I am still experimenting. Hopefully I'll remember what it takes to build a decent campfire and its light will then be a strong enough beacon to attract and then reward an audience - moths to a flame, so to speak, but without the conflagrant consequences.
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It's too wet and blustery here in SYD to light our fire this evening, as much as our mood may crave the bleak atmosphere. So, our meagre clan squeezes into my study, shoulders rubbing unknown shoulders, knees pressed against unaccustomed knees.
We are insulated from the autumn air by straining bookcases on all four walls, though a large window in one wall looks out on a bushy front yard and a quiet and darkening suburb. The wine - Domain "Black Tongue" Shiraz (2011) - is a particularly good one and, thanks to the ethereal nature of the Campfire, it will last us until late into the night, no matter how many glasses or cups are quaffed by those here present.
Although the folk who sit at the Campfire are all impeccably polite, as each one enters I see their eyes roam judgementally over my library. There is not one among us who does not judge others by the books on their shelves - I would not have it any other way. As for people who have no books in their house, I refuse to believe that they exist except as characters in a Stephen King short story.
Years ago I was invited to the house of a colleague who lived in the mountains. She was a fair bohemian and always smelled of roses, so of course I had a crush on her. Everything about her house, right down to the rugs and cushions on her lounge, seemed to be from my dreams of an ideal home. And when I saw her bookcases I was entirely unnerved, because they so closely mirrored mine that I was convinced I had met a soul-mate. Ah, the power of books. Of course, like all mountain spirits, she has since vanished among the eucalypts.
I was bemoaning to a neighbour the decline in mailed correspondence - no-one writes letters any more - and that fact that I have to buy some of my books on-line, just to keep our lovely postman employed. That's the kind of considerate person I am. Proof of this sits on the shelves before you this evening. My most recent book purchase: five volumes from the immense Everman's Library, Pocket Poets subsection.
Haiku, Sonnets, Zen Poems, Villanelles and Solitude. My poetry shelves are so full, as you see, these newcomers must perch precariously. However, they are close at hand and are such pleasant editions that I find myself reaching for one at various times when I should be more seriously employed. Lovely!
But now, I fear that I may be over-running my allotted wordage. After all, as well as a seeming inability to write letters, folk have also lost the ability to read more than a couple of paragraphs. Apparently there is even an internet correspondence application that actually restricts people to a limited amount of characters, so that their writing is no more than a couple of lines long. God help us if that is true! Soon everyone will be communicating like that; world leaders may address issues of Great Significance in tiny twittering non-sentences, thereby signalling, not statesman-like leadership, but the end of civilisation as we know it!
Anyway, I should stop now in case I overburden my reader(s). If you've had the fortitude to reached this far, do say so in a comment.
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