There's a great bit in the first chapter of 'Underworld' where Gleason, Sinatra, and Toots Shor are in the stands for the famous '51 'shot heard round the world' game. Gleason, getting progressively drunker while J. Edgar Hoover looks on from mere rows away, does his business all over Sinatra's shoes: “Jackie utters an aquatic bark, it is loud and crude, the hoarse call of a mammal in distress. Then the surge of flannel matter. He seems to be vomiting someone’s taupe pajamas."
And a bit later, Gleason says: "Hey. Don't think you're the first friend I ever puked on. I puked on better men than you. Consider yourself honored."
"The goal in Japan is not to reduce loved ones to a fine powdery dust but to hold on to a few of their most significant bones. These are essential to the second stage of the ceremony: after the cremation (which is viewed through a round window in the crematory door), mourners are led by the priest to the bone-picking room, where they pluck the surviving fragments from the ashes with pairs of unusually long wooden chopsticks." -- A similar ritual is depicted in the Apple series, Drops of God (French production, not the earlier Japanese manga series). Have you seen it?
Thank you for this amazing piece, when we took our last "family" trip it was to visit an Army buddy of my father who lived in the Boston area and I could have happily stayed at the Central Burying Ground reading tombstone epitaphs for the entire trip. The last paragraph of this post made me think of John-John and I've shed the first tear of the new year, I don't like to cry but will Thank you anyway, this piece made me feel so much. 💙
There's a great bit in the first chapter of 'Underworld' where Gleason, Sinatra, and Toots Shor are in the stands for the famous '51 'shot heard round the world' game. Gleason, getting progressively drunker while J. Edgar Hoover looks on from mere rows away, does his business all over Sinatra's shoes: “Jackie utters an aquatic bark, it is loud and crude, the hoarse call of a mammal in distress. Then the surge of flannel matter. He seems to be vomiting someone’s taupe pajamas."
And a bit later, Gleason says: "Hey. Don't think you're the first friend I ever puked on. I puked on better men than you. Consider yourself honored."
Damn. Busted. Love that Underworld opener.
"The goal in Japan is not to reduce loved ones to a fine powdery dust but to hold on to a few of their most significant bones. These are essential to the second stage of the ceremony: after the cremation (which is viewed through a round window in the crematory door), mourners are led by the priest to the bone-picking room, where they pluck the surviving fragments from the ashes with pairs of unusually long wooden chopsticks." -- A similar ritual is depicted in the Apple series, Drops of God (French production, not the earlier Japanese manga series). Have you seen it?
I’ll have a look for it...
Thank you for this amazing piece, when we took our last "family" trip it was to visit an Army buddy of my father who lived in the Boston area and I could have happily stayed at the Central Burying Ground reading tombstone epitaphs for the entire trip. The last paragraph of this post made me think of John-John and I've shed the first tear of the new year, I don't like to cry but will Thank you anyway, this piece made me feel so much. 💙
Wonderfully hallucinatory travel through time and idea. Thank-you.
Extraordinary...and only one day into Dry January.
So enjoyable!Happy New Year.