Knirps Umbrella, Juggernaut and Buzkashi

 The Knirps Umbrella, Edwin and Juggernaut:

My memoir of the day features the Knirps Umbrella from my days as a Law student.  In the year above me, there was a bloke named Edward who represented the epitome of the conservative nature of the general perception of what a barrister should be.  One of my best friends ( chiefly because she had the room next to mine at Chamberlain) had aggressive social ambitions.  She discovered that Edward's hone address was a 'stately home's in the country.  He dressed very smartly and was top in his class.  As a first year student, he won the top prize for being the best in his year.  (I won the same prize a year later.)  As part of his turnout, he always carried a leather case, a sterling fountain pen, and this unique folding umbrella made by Knirps.

My friend was so impressed that, thinking he had to be connected to the aristocracy, she promptly captured him as her boyfriend.  I gently mocked all the pretensions by calling him Edwin.  At the same time, I coveted a Knirps umbrella as it was the most alien, cool shape I ever had seen.  As you can see, apart from the convenience of being a folding umbrella that could be stasged in a bag or briefcase, it was rectangular rather than round.

When I next took the train to London to shop, I bought a Knirps umbrella of my own.  I believe they sold them at Harrods.  It was exorbitantly priced,  but those were the days when a University education cost next to nothing before the next Tory government applied American profit based standards to everything, so I had a bit of  pocket money for frivolous expenses.

The virtues of the Knirps, like Edward, proved to be an illusion in terms of its visual promise.  It had an extremely complicated folding system and had to be dried thoroughly after any use or it is essentially would be ruined.  It was a nightmare in practical terms.  Yes, it looked fabulous when it was folded into its slim rectangular case, but I first began to carry another 'real' umbrella for actual use while dangling the Knirps units strap simply as an accessory to the 'well-dressed law student' and it looked fabulous with my Jaeger suits and Bally boots.  (Those were my pre-punk days.)

Edward proved to be an illusion as well at least in terms of the fanciful aristocratic character my friend had perceived.  I stopped mocking him and stopped calling him Edwin when she discovered he was the son of the housekeeper at the stately home and instantly terminated the relationship.  He was brilliant.  That was no illusion, but that was not as important to her as finding a lawyer to marry as her personal stairway to social advancement.   I felt sorry for him after that, but I daresay he did well for himself on his own merits and possibly even has ascended to the judicial branch of the House of Lords.  God only knows what became of the Knirps.  

A little postscript to all of this: My friend did marry 'well' to the point where her daughter ultimately was able to represent the rich girl in an episode of a rather horrible British reality series called 'Poor Little Rich Girls'.  As for fashionable 'well-dressed students' at my University, another friend and I were chosen to act in a film called 'Juggernaut' after we responded to a call for 'well-dressed students' on the University announcement boards.  The students who showed up for the 'cattle call' at the docks were ALL students from the Law Faculty.  

We had no lines.   We portrayed friends or relations of the first class passengers waving them off on their ill-fated voyage in the freezing rain.  (No Knirps allowed.  It had to be portrayed as a merry event and we had to hold and then release balloons into the sky.)  There were at  least two dozen takes of this minor scene before they let us go.  We spent most of the day on it, with a short break for lunch that was supplied as a small portion of soup in a plastic cup.  We were paid five quid each for our services.  (I recall we had to sign a rather substantial contract at the start of the day, which certainly cost them as much in paper as the actual pay they doled out )

The end of this tale is that Amelia and I both caught severe colds front long exposure to the cold and rain and spent more than five pounds on cold remedies.  As for our acting performances, we were featured live on television that evening on the local news, which made us the talk of the town for 24 hours, bug the entire scene was cut from the cinema version of the film.  If you can find a version on tape,  you can see me in my favourite Jaeger suit waving blithely to some random person on deck.

Although I portray this adventure as a grim proletarian tale, Omar Sharif was Amelia's mother's tenant at her flat in Paris, so we were able to demand admittance to him, and he ordered a very good tea for us.  He was handsome and very charming, although I sensed he entertained us a little reluctantly. Her mum was declared one of the seven most beautiful women in the world by Vogue.  Safia Tarzi held the world record for the highest ascension in a hot air balloon, and was killed a few years later when her balloon exploded in the skya few miles from Paris.  Another amaxing woman and influence in my life.  I will devote more to her later.  Meanwhile, with refernce to Omar Sharif, she complained often and bitterly that he and his friends had broken some valuable porcelain pieces while in resepidence at the flat at the Avenue Henri-Martin.  I seem to recall he played cards a lot, had a passion for bridge perhaps.

This is a photograph of Safia Tarzi I found online.  She had quite a connection with Vogue back in the day.  She was Afghani royalty, and the family fled with immense riches when the monarchy was abolished.  She was married very young to a doctor and they lived in Paris.  Amelia was the only child of that union.  The couple divorced almost immediatel snd Safia never remarried, although she created a very toxic situation by stealing one of Amelia’s boyfriends and creating a rather long relationship with the guy, who was at least a decade younger than she was.  

Safia was daring, intelligent and creative.  She was an afdent feminist at a time when women, despite their support of the banner of women’s rights, held back personally.  Safia was rich enough not to care, having jettisoned the husband who might have held her to a more traditional role.  She drove a black and white Corniche with her matching balloon to meets across Europe.  She designed and modelled her own unique creations.  She bragged about being the only woman allowed to play the very physically demanding Afghani game known as Buzkashi that is similar to polo.  It originally featured an enemy’s head instead of a ball, but that was changed to an animal’s head by the time she saddled her horse to play on an otherwise male team.

Cicely Edmunds and Agatha Christie, a Rose Garden and Murder

 'Ordeal by Innocence': sciatica and other effects of stenosis and scoliosis are so severe now that I am not functional physically, and will not even attempt to sleep in a bad tonight.   Last night was like being tortured on the rack.  I cannot recline in the recliner but the pain is least severe when I sit.  So back to nights in a chair.  My poor cats will be very upset, but hope  this horrible regression will be brief.

(Caveat: these posts really are notes to myself, which is how my novels always were formed, and how my paintings come into being as well.  I do not wait to publish.  Everything is a work in progress.  I give social media a little window into my thoughts and ideas, and if this provokes any interest or dialogue,  that is fantastic.  For me, these posts are part of an ongoing conversation with Life, with memories,  and opinions of art, music, books, film and television... and of course, people whether they shine brightly only in memory now, having died, or whether they still are here to engage with me on some level.  I do not require agreement with my views.  I welcome any dialogue, and any opinion of my work.  It is a constant struggle now, mainly because of the exhausting influence of pain, but I will not allow myself to put off my ambitions again.  Too much time has been stolen by recovery from surgical procedures, cancer and all those treatments and effects.  People may think that being confined to a chair would represent the best opportunity to write or paint,  but levels of pain do dominate choices.  For the month of November, however,  I signed up for a project that simply counts words.  They may be 90% rubbish and 10% usable.  The percentages may be even less in my favour, but what I promised to myself was production daily of 500 words, and so far, even though I think I may not ht ave logged on the site, I have exceeded the 'bare bones' skeletal requirement.

I read all of Agatha Christie's books when I was possibly 8 or 9, at the same time I first read Thackeray and Mary Renault, and every classic I could find.  My parents did not consider Agatha Christie as deserving, but I thought she was brilliant.  At that age, I missed some of the sexual and social elements in all the 'adult' books I read, but still engaged thoroughly.  I read 'Ordeal by Innocence' on a visit to Berkeley to see Cicely Edmunds,  who played in the San Francisco Symphony and had a gorgeous little house that bordered the Rose Garden.  A good read sitting outside at a perfectly magical venue.  Is it any wonder this is fixed in my memory?  I recall the warm breeze, the scent of hundreds of roses,  the gentle buzz of bees as they made their journey from flower to flower, and being completely enthralled by the book I was reading.  I did not want to put it down, even for a good lunch.  En passant,  I realise now that Cicely Edmunds was one of many amazing role models from my childhood.  She had shaped her own career and life perfectly.  The location on a hill next to the Rose Garden, as well as the little house filled with carefully chosen collections of art works, exquisite furniture, rugs, and little unique items were conducive to every positive current in the river of life.  She had earned the lifelong respect of other musicians,  and although the job was demanding and even exacting, she enjoyed it and embraced every musical challenge with zest.  She was a member of the Symphony when Seiji Ozawa became its conductor.  The appearance of that handsome innovative Japanese star in the world of classical music was very exciting for her.  She shared that sense of excitement with us.  He was charismatic and unique, and although I would have been aware of him as a listener of classical music, a more profound sense of him and his influence was provided by Cicely.

Back to Agatha Christie:

In recent years, I have become a little jaundiced about Agatha Christie simply because her work has been done to death in film and television, and when a new production is released, my immediate response is a sigh of almost annoyance.  Yet here I am, watching the ever-wonderful Bill Nighy in this 2018 mini-series, acknowledging that there is a valid reason why people continue to engage with the work of Agatha Christie.  They are not simply puzzler 'who-done-its'.  This version certainly is worth watching.

Postscript: Bill Nighy of course has given us many stellar performances, but one of my personal favourites is his role in 'Love Actually', a film that is on my annual Christmas Cinema de Condé programme, along with the Christmas episode of the fantastic Australian series,  'Mother and Son'.

Best Memories of La Jolla

As children in La Jolla, we had an incredible number of amazing shops and markets.  Some were upscale like Jergensens but others offered unique ethnic foods at a time when most other places did not have such a variety.  One of my favourite places was called C&M, where I became addicted to their Artichoke Frittatas.  I have travelled throughout ItalIa, have frequented Italian groceries in other countries and cities, from San Francisco, to New York, to London.  I never found a frittata to match theirs.

Many thanks to a Facebook group for old La Jollans called ‘La Jolla Homegrown’.

The Flowering of a Garden of Sociopaths

 I now have a great deal of personal experience here.  It was not an area of expertise I would have chosen, and as the sociopaths were individuals I actually loved or cared about deeply, the interactions have proved to be very painful.  For a sociopath is incapable of empathy or even of perceiving other human beings as equals.  Certainly they will satisfy their own needs and desires without ever giving others a second thought.  The ones I have known were considered to be ‘gifted’ as children and this gave them a sense of entitlement and somehow deserving more than ordinary people.

After beginning these notes, I found that some one recently shared an article from the New York Times purporting to have written by a psychiatrist who is a sociopath about her failuress as a wife and mother.  To me, the entire premise of disclosure for any purpose other than notoriety is bogus.  A sociopath never is sorry, nor interested in making amends.  What does interest them is manipulation of the audience.

To return to the past, and the chrysalis of the sociopaths I have known, I really believe that the gifted programme was pivotal in setting the format for their prceptions of Self.

I was one of those ‘gifted’ students as well, and I was arrogant and careless with the feelings of others to some extent when I was young.  I was bullied and mocked a little for being different and for being two to three years younger than every one else in my classes.  I could have become embittered and sadistic if I had obsessed upon that too much.  I could have taken any opportunity for revenge, I suppose, and made people feel misearable, helpless and small.  I could have embraced all of the old ‘Seven Deadly Sins’ and had a rather evil existence.  The fact is that I awakened one day and recognised that I really did not like to hurt other people, but this was not the critical realisation.

My epiphany was based on my own need to heal myself from the damage caused by trauma and old wounds.  The only way to do that wascby understanding why the people who had hurt me had done so.  What motivated them?  I had to learn how to put myself in the skin of another human being to solve the question.  Once I understood what motivated the action that hurt me badly, I could move on.  In many cases, I found that the system of victimisation or sadistic behaviour was not really personal or specific to me.  In some cases, it was caused by insecurity, as so often is the case when a child bullies another.  It can be part of the herd mentality or simply protective colouring.  Go along with the crowd and join in the taunting or teasing because you do not want to be a target yourself.  That is kind of normal really.  

We were resented at school by many who otherwise might have become friends because we were culled from the group and placed in exclusive very small groups based on I.Q.  When my daughter went to school, I was very happy that this awful practice had been discontinued.

Part of education is socialisation.  I skipped three grades to graduate at the age of 15.  There was nothing normal about that, and I think part of the reason I hated school so much was because my age and the lack of continuity with a single year group alienated me from almost every one.

What was less forgiveqble than the responses of my peers was the attitude of the teachers towards me.  I was treated with kid gloves.  My teachers generally behaved as though my intelligence intimidated them.  I challenged them constantly by inventing sources and creating quotes in languages I had invented.  I wrote an entire poem in Medieval French for my French class.  I inserted fake ‘memoirs’ into my essays for History classes.  Why did no one take me to task?  Why did no one slap me down for my nonsense?  The only things I needed from education were socialisation and discipline.  I was given neither.  Almost everything I ever learned was from books that I read.  One can read books at home.

I desperately wanted some kind of real friendship and acceptance.  The closest I came to that was by creating the Motley Crew, an acting company that was formed to convince my mother that we were not children having fun, which she would have not allowed, but young artists who were pursuing a serious academic aim.   As my own classmates were three years older than I, I cast my sights on my sibling’s class, as they were closer to my age.  We wrote a play after asking each potential member what character he or she wished to play.  It was kind of a wonderful concept.  It is really a pity that two members of our group became sociopaths and I therefore really no longer have any genuine connection with either.  Another who probably was my best friend has died of cancer.

The only girlfriends I had, with one notable exception in Vivienne, hit on me, and not having either experience or encouragement in dealing with affection or infatuation from members of my own gender, their advances soured our friendship.  One of those friends later committed suicide.  I lost contact with the other girl who was from Germany, and I do regret that.  

I only gradually recognised the sociopaths in my life.  One really does not want to believe they exist in everyday situations.  Hannibal Lector is not the neighbour who lives down the road ordinarily, although I did discover that a man who killed his girlfriend, then cooked her head in a pot and ate it had been a neighbour of mine in the East Village in Manhattan.   

More later.  My hand is cramping badly now.  It truly amazes me that the sociopaths I know, rather than showing compassion for me as a disabled woman, had the scent of blood in their nostrils, and a mentality of ‘survival of the fittest’.  In their view, I deserve nothing because they are so much stronger physically and more mobile.  They are not more intelligent by any means, and that could be another reason they want to bring me down, because I actually am an equal, and they refuse to acknowledge that.  God forbid there are people who remind them they are not as unique and soecial,as they think.  King and Queen of their Dung Heaps is how I look at it.  Oh yes, they are richer than I and always will be, and some of those assets have been stolen from me.  One of them told me in so many words that as I owned ‘no assets of significant value’, I should surrender control of my share to her borderline criminal partner.  The other one expected me to roll over, allowing him to act as Trustee of any assets I ultimately acquired... and why should I do that?  If he had been honest, I might have considered that option, but past friendship only counts for so much , and discovering significent theft and pilfering by this one, not to mention the fact that I will fight to the death if need be for the rights of my daughter, marks the end of that road.  No, I will not involve the police.  I will do it my own way.

I do not think sociopaths are born.  I do not think they become sociopaths at the age of 12, like Jewish children who acquired the mantle of adulthood at that age.  I think the descent is gradual, and somehow the choices they make and often, the benefits reaped by manipulative, greedy, and dishonest actions, encourage their sociopathic tendencies.

I always try to be courteous, and I have a tendency to allow people their fantasies, as long as they do not harm me or ohers.  I believe that this response of mine may have led these sociopaths to believe that I do not know the difference between fantasy and reality.  In fact, I am and always have been almost painfully conscious of reality.  I have an excellent memory as well.  I still am hurt profoundly by the knowledge that a close family member and a close childhood friend whom I even once considered my sweetheart only perceive me as a ‘mark’.

A Tale of Life and Death, the character of Julian

Julian muses: 

She is the kind of woman that makes one feel like royalty, or even the son of a god.  She is a woman who took my breath away with her audacity, her intelligence, her sense of honour and above all, her presence.  Not the most classically beautiful woman in the world perhaps, but there was an inner light that dazzled and sometimes blinded me.  You may think me a fool, but I was not the only man to kneel willingly at her feet, nor the only one to offer my life to her.

In this day and age, when every one has turned away from the old values, when religion is the topic of vulgar jests and matrimony has become meaningless except for financial benefits, a matter that no longer is blessed with the potential of children much of the time... perhaps you will find the concept of unconditional love and obedience absurd.  Hanging from a cross, I had time for reflection and I am not a man who is gullible or ignorant.  After the first hour, I begged to be allowed to kiss her exquisite feet and to pledge my allegiance to her.

Now you may create your own sordid scenario based on a mistaken notion that my acts were driven by a desire for sexual gratification, that she was Mistress, not of the souls of men and women, but of drama.  I expect you did not pay close attention to the very first thing I said to you:  She is the kind of woman that makes one feel like royalty or even the son of a god.

You probably thought she fed upon her own power and loved the idea that SHE was royalty (which she was by heritage actually) or that divine blood and authority ran in HER veins.  I do know that she thought we all had a birthright that could raise us far above our current social status, far beyond any considerations of money, career or whatever else defines us in the eyes of society.  And THAT was her power, her gift to all who came to her for help.

Much has been written about dominance and submission... once taboo, it has become common currency in the bedroom and the boardroom.  What she offered was far beyond all of the vulgar commerce or partner agreements.  Beneath her whip, I was reborn.

Characters of Antoine and Julie

For the novel, portraits of a couple too common in reality to ignore.  

Antoine: Do you really need that fan and second light on when you're in the bathroom?'

Julie: Let's see... i'm in there about 2 minutes.  But I guess... why don't you just follow me about and instruct me on how to become a total asshole?

Julie:  The latest thing is to start every complaint with 'Note:'  Does he EVER listen to himself?

Abusive behaviour is corrosive.  It is eating away at my soul day by day.  I try to ignore his absurdities and his contempt, because I know it really is directed towards himself.  I seldom have known any one who hates himself so much and cannot deal with it in a slightly more positive fashion. He is a real 'kick the dog' personality and the sad part of it is that, as a successful salesman, he was able to conceal this aspect of his personality from me entirely until it was too late.  I met him at the wrong age, the wrong time and the wrong circumstances.  The fact that God decided to allow this man to plant the seed of life in my womb changed everything.  From that point onwards, my life was devoted to my daughter and what I felt would be best for her.  I remembered the nightmare of growing up in a broken home, of having my Mum remarry and the constant power struggle between her and her new 'family unit' and my real father, who spent the last decade of his life living alone in a sad little hotel so that he could stay close to us.

I do not understand how women kill their abusers frankly.  It elevates them to a position they do not deserve.  I would not go to prison for any man or woman. Would you be willing to go to prison for killing a mosquito or cockroach?  Why then would you be willing to ruin your future for an abusive man or woman?

It makes one think of Lou Reed’s album ‘Berlin’.

‘Caroline says as she gets up off the floor,

You can hit me all you want to,

But I don’t love you anymore...

But she’s not afraid to die.’

More about this pair later in the context of an estate item.

Sappho and Freddy Mercury

There is a part of me that would like to chuck all of the following into the nearest bin, along with all of my romantic ideals, aka illusions, and perhaps take a thunderbolt from Aphrodite's kinsman and hurl it down onto the heads of all of those who have deceived me, insulted my intelligence and humilitated me since my mother died.  Most of these individuals are people I should have been able to trust and certainly once were loved by me.  To know first of all that some one closely related by blood asked me for my medical records, not because of any concern for my good health and survival, but to see what the chances would be of me dying of cancer so I would be out of the picture still is difficult to process.

The general consensus appears to have been that having once been (for a brief time) a bit of a wild child, I never grew into adulthood, never actually became an individual who was eligible for anything good in life.  

Aside:  Never, never judge an individual by his or her childhood or even adolescence.  People who do not have parental or social guidance especially can spiral down quickly.  If you are a neglectful or irresponsible parent and your child does need help, emotional support or guidance and you fail to give it, count yourself lucky indeed if that child does not commit suicide.  It amazes me how any one can be egocentric where parenthood is concerned.  There are parents who look at a child and simply see a reflection of themselves, and where reality differs, they round off the edges and blur the outline.  They see what they want to see.  The child is an extension of their egos, and anything that goes wrong is shoved beneath a psychic carpet to rot.

That happened to me.  I actually nearly died because no one listened to me when I complained about severe pain and when it dragged on and on without any resolution, I did become desperate and despairing.  I was barely 21 years old, and I saw no future because I knew something was terribly wrong and no one was addressing it with any sort of logic.  Small towns, however prosperous and sophisticated they may appear, are still small towns, and the networks of gossips include members of the medical profession, sad to say.  I think society has changed a little in this respect and being young does not mean that your voice cannot be heard now.  In those days, however, it did, especially when a parent and other self-appointed experts spoke more loudly.  

All of this ended only when I moved out of the geographical area, and instantly went to a good gynecologist who hurried me onto an operating table and whisked out my very dangerous ovary.  That close call redefined my psyche.  I lost any faith in the future.  I saw how easily a disease or illness or even an act of violence could terminate any life plan.  And I admit that after that, I became very insouciant where planning of any sort of financial security or programme for old age was concerned.  I honestly never believed I would survive long enough to reap any rewards, so I lived for the day basically.  I did not squander my life, but when I had a job, I never put money aside for my old age.  I admit that freely, and I have spoken to my daughter many times of my foolishness.  There is an expression a very dear friend of mine used to use:  'We are cut from the same cloth, you and I', he often would tell me.  The fact that he was one of the most brilliant, well read individuals I ever knew made that declaration a positive one.  I would not have wished to have been a literary or theatre critic as he was, and I knew in my heart of hearts he always envied writers of fiction and wished he could have had what he perceived as the 'courage' to create fiction, but all of that aside, being cut from the same cloth as John Gross would be a source of pride.

The only reason to mention this expression is to say that my daughter is NOT cut from the same cloth where money and planning are concerned.  She is a very responsible and forward-looking individual, some one who never tried to borrow money off her family, who never abused the love of family members for her own gain, some one who really is a bit of a role model for me in many ways.  In point of fact, she may not be a role model, but what she is for me is my compass that constantly points to the honest and decent option in any situation.  Going back to the start of all of this, I tried NOT to shape my child into a duplicate of myself.  It is natural in a way to want our children to find joy in the aspects of life that give us joy, but I really really tried to allow her to become whatever she wished.

Whatever influence my mother had on her unfortunately never resulted in any validation for my daughter, and that breaks my heart a little.  My grandfather was an artist, and in our family, artists were placed as being closer to God than any mere ordinary creature.  He was not successful in making a name for himself.  He had little success in supporting a family of seven children.  It was my grandmother who held down two jobs to do that, working as both a teacher and as a nurse... but it is my grandfather who is the subject of ancestor worship.

Of the seven children, my mother was the first to have a child, and I was that child.  Indeed, my grandfather's mother (my great grandmother) was the epitome of a social snob and declared that it was indecent to have seven children, especially if one could not support them financially.  She therefore recognised only the eldest two, according to my mother.  My mother happened to be the second child.   (My mother told me this again and again, and yet just now, I realised that my great-grandmother had THREE children, not two.  So was this simply another false fact in the Book of M to lend her greater stature or legitimacy or something?). It is a true fact, however, that I really was the only grandchild to have known my great grandmother, simply because I was the first one in my generation to have been produced. Once upon a time, there was a photograph (black and white no doubt with those wonderful deckled edges that photographs and fine writing paper used to have) of me as an infant seated upon her very prim and proper lap.

This great grandmother never liked the fact that her son had declared himself an artist.  Art was something one did as a genteel hobby, but was far too bohemian to be embraced as a career.  Her other son became a Minister and a missionary minister to boot, but that is one of the traditional callings.  Ideally, the eldest son would have farmed the land, but they lost all of their land in a period of great economic depression.  My mother would tell me of the land they once held that had become valuable decades later in the very heart of various cities.  I am not certain what happened to the original farm.  She never spoke of that.

These ramblings are not for public consumption at this point in time.  I am simply trying to kickstart my writing again.  The past year and nine months have been the worst in my life.  It is ironic that I recognised this would be the case in a rather prophetic manner.  I anticipated my mother's demise as ushering in the absolute nadir of my existence, and it did.  I was diagnosed with Stage 3 breast cancer a few months before my mother died, and that was very horrible, and terrifying and painful and everything else.  The thought of BECOMING my mother physically after watching her degenerate after her breast cancer from a slender beautiful young woman to some one who was overweight and misshapen with an arm swollen to twice its size by lymphedema was a constant source of fear once I reached adulthood.  One has fears like this, but I have to admit, I never really thought it would come to pass... and then it did.  I lost the same breast she lost.  It was both better and worse for me, because I am left-handed and it was my left breast and the lymph nodes in my left arm that were taken.  She was right-handed, so her primary arm was not affected.

Undying Aphrodite of the shimmering throne/chair, daughter of Zeus, weaver of wiles, I beg you not to overpower/subdue/bring low my heart/soul with anguish and distress, dear Lady/Mistress.  Come here if ever before you heard my voice from afar, and hearken/pay attention to me, leaving the golden house of your father above,  the noble sparrows  beneath the yoke, to quickly lead or bring down to the dark earth.  Close and compact, feathers and wings moving fast descending through the middle of the heavens in a whorl or spin.  Arrive suddenly/with speed, blessed fortunate one with your smiling face aid ask:  for what again do you suffer, do you call me yet again, do you want exceedingly, yet again ask why do you suffer with your frenzied raving spirit/mind/heart?  who do you want me to persuade (ask the divinity  Πείθω) yet again into your love or affection?  Who wrongs you, Sappho?  For even if she flies, she soon shall follow and if she rejects gifts, shall lead/carry/bring them soon in return, and if she does not love, shall love soon, however unwilling.  I pray you now to break me free/loose me from thought/care/anxiety, and accomplish my desire.. and be my ally.  

Let us discuss Aphrodite specifically in the context of Sappho.

First of all, Aphrodite is not the patroness of marriage in the traditional sense.  She is the power of lust and illicit love.  She herself has been made victim to this power.

She was born near Cyprus (in other words, native to Sappho's land) from the severed genitals of Uranus, a sky god.  When Chronos castrated his father Ouranos with his sickle (a curved tool/weapon that symbolises the crescent moon, and thus Chronos, god of time, is associated with the cycles of that heavenly body), and threw the genitals into the sea, Aphrodite (foam born) emerged from the foam.  This is the version of her birth that is given by Hesiod.  In other versions, she is perceived as the result of the union of Zeus with Dione (a Titan).   In the latter, then, she would be, as the Orphics used to declaim:  'I am a child of Earth (mud) and starry heaven, but my nature is of heaven alone.'  Despite everything you say, there are associations with the ancient Cybele and the mystery religions where it is only through castration that a god emerges. 

She probably was the heir to the traditions of Inanna/Ishtar and the Phoenicians who called her Astarte.  Nonetheless, as that is not relevant to you, her name associations of 'Aphrodite Pontia' (of the deep seas) and 'Aphrodite Euploia (of the fair voyage), and her name Cypris ('of Cyprus') all surround her like the sparrows in the Ode.

Whether the word conjures sparrows or winged phalli or simply a torrent of words, it is part of this supplication or invocation to the great goddess.

Now to the affairs of the Goddess.  Married (against her will in some cases) to Hephaistos, the greatest smith in all of the worlds and a cripple to boot, but having affairs with Ares, Hermes and Dionysus himself, there is of course the famous tale of how Hephaistos created a golden net and trapped the goddess in the act of intercourse with Ares.

The result of her union with Adonis or Dionysus was Priapus.  Priapus of course is the most potent tiller of soil, the very power of fertility with his enormous phallus and association with gardening.  Here again though I see the association with older cults.

Other children of Aphrodite allegedly include Eros, Harmonia, and the mortals Aeneas and Eryx.

She is linked to the term 'mixis' which means 'mingling' and has obvious associations, but associated both with peace and with strife, as Freya herself in later times.

Described by Hesiod as 'quick of glance', 'foam-born', 'smile-loving', 'golden Aphrodite', and by Homer as 'smiling' and 'golden'.  So Sappho's description of Aphrodite responding with a smile is very classical.

I am going to take the bull by the horns here, because her association with my beloved Adonis is very clear.  She fell in love with the beautiful boy, locked him in a chest, and delivered him to the care of Persephone.  The lady of Hades then fell in love with him of course, and would not return the precious cargo to Aphrodite.  Zeus intervened and made the usual dictate where these consorts or lovers of the Great Goddess are concerned: Adonis, as a god of vegetation should spend four months in the Underworld, four months with Aphrodite, and four months of blessed solitude each year.  Thus we have here again the fate of Dumuzi who was punished by Inanna for not having mourned her disappearance into the Land of the Great Below to confront her dark sister, Ereshkigal, but simply held orgies and sat upon HER throne in the Land of the Surface, by taking her place seasonally in the Underworld to perform the role of Ereshkigal's dead consort each year for a season.

So, against YOUR desires,  let us explore the conception and life of Adonis. 

He has many different tales, because his cult obviously was adopted by the Greeks.  For the Greeks:  it all began when his grandmother Cenchreis, boasted that her own daughter Myrrha was more beautiful than the goddess Aphrodite.  This sort of boasting always leads to disaster.  The goddess punished her by causing the girl to fall in love with her own father.  In some versions, the father was Theias, king of Syria, but in others, he was Cinyras, king of Cyprus.  he was the son of an incestuous union between Theias, a king of Syria and Myrrha  or Smyrna, his own daughter.  She is defamed by the accusation that it was she, the child, who 'tricked' her father into having sex with her.  This sort of trickery definitely is one of the powers of Aphrodite incidentally.  The child of this union was Adonis.  The father was so disgusted by the event that he wanted to murder his own daughter, but she pled for her life and was transformed into the Myrrh Tree.  Myrrh incidentally is the symbol of death and is used even now in incense and in embalmings.  Adonis was spirited away by the smitten Aphrodite, hidden in a chest, became the object of a jealous dispute between Aphrodite and Persephone, and Zeus pronounced his doom.  He actually was killed by a boar, either an accident or agent of a jealous god/goddess, Artemis or Ares.   Aphrodite then transformed him into a violet flower.  They still hold the annual rites of mourning for Adonis in some parts of the Arab world as well as Iran under other names, but originally it was a festival known as the Adonis.  It involves the planting and nurturing of fast-growing grass that then is pulled out by its roots and thrown into moving water (usually a river).  In Lebanon, the river actually turns purple during a season and this was considered the result of casting the dead god into the water.

Symbols of Aphrodite include a band or girdle she wears across her chest (an ancient me that holds her powers of desire and seduction), a sceptre (another ancient me), a dove or other bird, including the goose, a wreath of myrtle, a looking glass (mirror), and often she actually rides a swan or goose.

I think the following about yoking the chariot is significant.  She is obliged to leave her father's house, and perform an act that gives her one of her powers.  The yoking of the chariot and invocation to the sparrow or sparrow to carry the chariot down to earth is not accidental.

She cannot perform this task from her comfortable throne or chair.  Moreover, she cannot fly down from heaven to earth.  She needs the sparrows and the chariot and the descent is quite dramatic and powerful.  As I wrote previously, it is like a tornado with a specific destination, arriving suddenly to Sappho.

9¤ρµα ατος Ð chariot. Ùπασδεύξαισα aor.part. nom.sg.fem. of Ùπο-ζεύγν¯υµι yoke under, put under the yoke. καλός ή όν good, noble; beautiful. «γον = Ãγον 3.pl.impf. of ¥γω lead, carry, bring. 10çκύς ε‹α çκύ quick, swift. στρουθός Ð sparrow. περί is also used in Aeolic for Øπέρ above. γ©ς = γÁς gen.sg. γή ¹ earth. µέλας µέλαινα µέλαν black, dark. 11πυκνός ή όν close, thick, compact; fast, strong; πυκνά adv. δ¯ινέω whorl, spin; Aeolic δίννηµι; δίννεντες pres.part. nom.pl.masc. πτερόν τό feather; in pl. wings. çράνω = οÙρανοà, gen.sg. of οÙρανός Ð heaven. α„θήρ έρος Ð ether, heaven; air. 12διά through. µεσ(σ)ός ή όν (in the) middle.

Furthermore, she may have a smiling face, but Aphrodite has a dark history, as dark as that of Demeter and quite similar.  Adonis, whom she loved, was held captive in a chest.  Persephone and Aphrodite become rivals for his love.  Zeus dictates the old solution of dividing the year into seasons for him to go to one and the other and then have a few months alone.  (The chest is similar to Plutarch's telling of the myth of Osiris.  According to Plutarch, it is a sort of Cinderella glass slipper tale.  Set creates a glorious chest and offers it as a gift to the one who fits inside it.  Only Osiris fits in the chest.  Set locks it and throws it into the river.  It floats to Byblos where it lands, and a tree grows round it.  Isis searches the world for him and in some versions, actually became a nurse to the queen's child.  She liberates the chest or coffin and carries it back to Egypt.  Set cuts him into pieces and all the pieces are thrown randomly hither and thither.  The penis is eaten by a fish.  Isis must make a new one through magic so she can become pregnant by her dead husband in order to bring forth Horus.)

Undying Aphrodite of the shimmering throne/chair, daughter of Zeus, weaver of wiles, I beg you not to overpower/subdue/bring low my heart/soul with anguish and distress, dear Lady/Mistress.  Come here if ever before you heard my voice from afar, and hearken/pay attention to me, leaving the golden house of your father above,  the noble sparrows  beneath the yoke, to quickly lead or bring down to the dark earth.  Close and compact, feathers and wings moving fast descending through the middle of the heavens in a whorl or spin.  Arrive suddenly/with speed, blessed fortunate one with your smiling face aid ask:  for what again do you suffer, do you call me yet again, do you want exceedingly, yet again ask why do you suffer with your frenzied raving spirit/mind/heart?  who do you want me to persuade (ask the divinity  Πείθω) yet again into your love or affection?  Who wrongs you, Sappho?  For even if she flies, she soon shall follow and if she rejects gifts, shall lead/carry/bring them soon in return, and if she does not love, shall love soon, however unwilling.  I pray you now to break me free/loose me from thought/care/anxiety, and accomplish my desire.. and be my ally.

Sappho was a poet but she was first and foremost during HER life, a performer.  Thus, every piece that now is read originally was performed by her for an audience.  She sang, evidently, and although many people have attempted to perform her work, too much information is missing to make any of this more than wishful fantasy.  Nonetheless, I believe it is vital to identify the audience.

They would be very familiar with the Goddess Aphrodite, and she would be a day-to-day part of their ordinary lives.  There would be temples where sacrifices would occur after doves or birds or whatever was being offered were purchased in a market or whatever.  It does not matter whether Sappho was religious or not.  Aphrodite would be woven into the tapestry of her life and the lives of her audience in the same way going to Mass, having a cross in the house, and other old Catholic traditions would be part and parcel of the life of any Italian during the Middle Ages or until people actually were able to rebel against the Church.  

Apart from this, an Invocation to the Goddess at the beginning of any performance would be an auspicious act, like making the sign of a Cross.  'Bless and smile upon this little song of mine'

So she sets the stage:  The first part identifies the Goddess, and probably would have been accompanied by some action on the part of dancers or musicians.  No one really knows, but it is not impossible that props would be involved as well. 

Next, there is actual drama in the form of the descent of Aphrodite, the swirling or thick spin of the sparrows, the movement of the chariot.  Whether this was accomplished simply by a drum beating out an increasingly fast rhythm in conjunction with the poetry or whether it was accompanied by dance or whatever... we do not know, but I feel that this drama is an essential part of the Ode.  it is not static.  It is not simply a recitation of Aphrodite's aspects and powers.  It brings her down to the audience with words and associated actions (even if only in the mind of the audience).

Now we come to the gist of the Ode.  It becomes very personal.  It is a dialogue between Sappho and Aphrodite ostensibly, but in fact a vehicle through which she can express the whole business of love, of desire and torment, of the nature of seduction.  Sappho demands reciprocity of affection.  She enlists the very power of the Goddess Aphrodite to persuade this mortal to respond to her, even if unwilling, to 'bring gifts'.  I think this refers to love and sex, not actual items like flowers or fine cloth or whatever lovers gave to one another.  What is interesting here, however, is that she is not asking for happiness or joy.  She is asking to be freed from her torment and anxiety.  She needs the object of her desire to submit to her, and the implication for me is that, once this is accomplished, she will move on to some one or some other desire.

I do not know what more you expect from me, to be honest.  Again, one cannot ignore the audience.  She is singing in order to involve them in her own feelings, her torment, her quest for conquest/love/lust.  There is an undertone in the entire Ode, despite the 'smiling face' reference to Aphrodite, that Sappho never will achieve any real enduring happiness.  Her quest is ongoing and infinite.  'Once again', 'again' and so on.  Her definition of passion is ephemeral in nature, much like that of the Goddess herself, who fell in love more than once.  She does not ask that Aphrodite give her the love of some one who will be devoted to her for the rest of her life, with whom she can share love on a stable basis.  She is the female equivalent of a rake, a Don Giovanni.  If she had a Leporello, he probably could have counted her conquests.  

The life of Don Giovanni held no enduring happiness or joy.  He had courage, and he had the overwhelming need to conquer women, one by one, but he did not have any emotional attachment really to any of them.  I see very much the same in Sappho. This, however, is a fundamental theme in music and poetry through the ages.  Most poems and songs do not speak of a placid, joyful existence shared with another.  They speak of torment and longing, the desire to seduce the object of desire.  What happens afterwards often is irrelevant.  It is the thrill of the chase, and the excited, enhanced emotional rollercoaster associated with 'falling in love' and trying to achieve that moment of union that would constitute victory.

The next part of this essay is to compare Sappho with Freddy Mercury from Queen.  This would be anathema to any classicist, but I find it an interesting comparison, especially with respect to 'Somebody to Love'.

Here are the Lyrics:

Can anybody find me somebody to love?

Ooh, each morning I get up I die a little
Can barely stand on my feet
(Take a look at yourself in the mirror and cry)
Take a look in the mirror and cry
Lord what you're doing to me (Yeah, yeah)
I have spent all my years in believing you
But I just can't get no relief, Lord

Then the Chorus: 

Somebody 
Ooh, somebody 
Can anybody find me somebody to love?
Yeah

I work hard (He works hard) every day of my life
I work 'til I ache my bones
At the end (At the end of the day)
I take home my hard-earned pay all on my own (Goes home, goes home on his own)
I get down (Down) on my knees (Knees)
And I start to pray (Praise the Lord)
'Til the tears run down from my eyes, Lord

Chorus once again, then:

(He works hard) everyday (Everyday)
I tryand I try and I try
But everybody wants to put me down
They say I'm goin' crazy
They say I got a lot of water in my brain
No, I got no common sense
(He's got) I got nobody left to believe
No, no, no, no

Chorus again, then: 

Got no feel, I got no rhythm
I just keep losing my beat (You just keep losing and losing)
I'm okay, I'm alright (He's alright, he's alright)
I ain't gonna face no defeat (Yeah, yeah)
I just gotta get out of this prison cell
(One day) Someday I'm gonna be free, Lord

Find me somebody to love (repeatedly, now)
Somebody (Somebody)
Somebody (Somebody)
Somebody (Find me)
(Somebody find me somebody to love)
Can anybody find me
Somebody to
Love?

Sappho cares nothing about the identity of the object of desire.  She is consumed by the pursuit.  Freddy has lost the motivation, the faith in the pursuit itself.  Sappho asks Aphrodite, goddess of love and passion, to bring her the object of her desire.  Freddy asks 'any one' to bring him some one he can love.  

So is it the thrill of the chase?  Is it the very interaction with Love and Life itself?  Do we die when we no longer care?  When we no longer can summon the energy to look for love?  To have faith?  In some one, in something?