[WITI No. 64] Intro to Montaigne cont'd - parental quirks, grateful for good health,
Hola, frends, it’s me, George. Thanks for reading. We might have met online or IRL. Welcome to my weekly exercise, where I ask What Is The Information? Here I usually write about what I’m reading or what audiobook I’m listening to and how to turn that into wisdom I can pass along to my kids. I also write about tax debt here, if that’s how you found me. Sometimes, I share interesting bits from the internet too.
Welcome!
One bit of housekeeping, in the coming weeks, I plan to purge this list and move to a different newsletter provider. The list I’m maintaining is overflowing with fake subscriptions. If we’ve spoken, you’re safe. If not, leave a comment or drop me a line.
The above is still happening…
+++
I’m still listening to How to Live or A Life of Montaigne by Sarah Bakewell. Montaigne has been on my reading list forever and this is a great introduction. Bakewell starts each chapter with an answer to the main theme of Montaigne’s essays, How to live?
Chapter Three: How to live? Be Born. Montaigne won the life lottery of his time by surviving his older siblings - he was the third born but his older siblings didn’t survive. So as the eldest male child, his father invested in him. Montaigne’s father had Michel wet-nursed in the village surrounding the chateau, so his mother didn’t have have an opportunity to connect with her son. Their differences would later grow to conflict when Montaigne’s father died and he took over the estate. The other curiosity is that Montaigne’s father forced Michel to learn Latin. It was the language of the educated and it was forbidden to speak any other language to the young “Micheau.” Both mother and father, and household servants learned to communicate solely in Latin with the young Montaigne.
I can’t imagine having my own child being away from me for nearly two years. I savored the few hours of nightly sleep in the hospital room when our children were born but that was just 3 days and I definitely knew where my kid was. I suppose the older Montaigne could visit his son but it’s unusual by today’s standards in the West. I’m not sure what people do elsewhere. I’m certain this arrangement would not work for me. There are too many firsts I would miss as a parent - first steps and words, the inklings of your child’s personality. No trade for me.
As for the Latin experiment, this is interesting. It’s one of the techniques for becoming fluent in a language. Michel Montaigne master Latin and receives the associated accolades. Today’s Latin is probably English but mastery of English while speaking other languages is a superpower. I’m encouraging my children to explore it with my overt plans to send to them to Germany for university.
Chapter Two: How to live? Pay attention. Montaigne establishes a new type of writing where he flits from one topic to another, in what would later be described as a stream of consciousness. He paid close attention to what he did and what he thought, that it was not unusual for different versions of Montaigne (younger or older) to appear within the same essay. This accounting of his thoughts is a practical version of inscription at the temple of Apollo at Delphi; Know thyself. Bakewell declares Montaigne to have achieved some level of awareness that Buddhist masters take lifetimes to obtain.
Chapter Four: How to live? Read a lot, forget most of what you read and be slow witted. Why is Sarah Bakewell directing Montaigne’s advice so pointedly at me? Montaigne treated books as acquaintances, reading Plutarch was like “meeting a real person across the centuries” He had a modest 1,000 book library some of which he acquired from his best friend. I think I have found my French spirit animal.
+++
Word of the Week: Baize
Can’t remember where I encountered it. It’s a word you’ll use once in your life and to show off how worldly (or nerdy) you really are. I think the context was some sort of negotiation where the tables were covered with this material.
Find of the Week
I showed this photo to my daughter who thought it was some kind of strange food. What an interesting image for something so ordinary, something nearly all of us have in our homes.
Skokie, IL Covid, the 3rd Wave but a different health challenge
Last Friday, I got a phone call from a number I nearly recognized. It was a local number from our area. The high school was calling to report our daughter tested positive for Covid-19. I had to pick her up immediately.
I figured it would be hard to avoid the Omicron wave. We had several vectors - 3 children at school, my wife’s bowling league. Thankfully, her symptoms were mild sore throat for 2 days - that’s it.
I, however, had a small Shingles outbreak. It’s no fun. I have a rash on the right side of my torso with some patches on my stomach, chest, hip and back. It’s itchy, warm and painful. The pain alternates from dull and nearly forgettable, to sharp and notable. There’s no real remedy, like a dummy, I waited a week to get a diagnosis - the prescribed medicine is most effective 48 hours after diagnosis. So I’m enduring for another couple weeks. Wish me luck.
You never appreciate your good health till it’s gone…
Got some pithy how to live tips? What life experiment do you blame your parents for? Hate my writing?
Think someone might else might like this…
That’s all I got…till next week.
-George