Saturday night – Lincoln in the bardo

Just back from endicott.   Nice to be home. It’s jsut about zero out and walking into a cold house.. brrrrrr.. the oild keeps the place from freezing, but it’s nice now that we have a fire bruning again. I took advantage of the cold stove.. one of the ferw times it’s ever cold in the winter to replace the stell baffles in the stove with new 1/2 plate baffles I had made at queen city stell. So far so good. 

DIane drove the whole way home from endicott. we listed to podcasts most of the way. The last hour we listened to ‘live from here’ the replacement for prairie home companion.  Cant say I’m a fan yet.. but tonights show was interesting. The main attraction for me was a dramatic reading from George Saunders book’ Lincoln in the Bardo’. from the excerpt  we heard.. it’s an interesting telling of the inner thoughts of Abraham Lincoln following the death of his 11 year old son willie. Willie died of typhoid about one year into the civil war. ..  The Saunders story  is based on a true story of Lincoln going down to visit .. even hold..his son in the crypt where his body was interred..  The story is told from the vantage of ghosts who settle into Lincoln’s body and feel what he’s feeling and hear his thoughts. 

 

“My poor boy, he was too good for this earth,” the president says at the time. “God has called him home.” Newspapers report that a grief-stricken Lincoln returned to the crypt several times alone to hold his boy’s body.

ATHe reading on the radio show was amazing. Lincolns thoguths wander from his own grief, the the grief of all the fathers.. and mothers.. who’s sons were being lost in the civil war.. . He feels responsible.. it was very powerful. I just bought the book online .   I’ll let you know how it is..

for now.. time for sleep

nite all. nite sam

-me

 

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