The Tennis Practice Wall at Volunteer Park; The Condition of the Working Class in England; Benny Goodman at Carnegie Hall, 1938
I still haven’t settled on a title for this weekly summary of current obsessions; nor to be honest, do my weekly preoccupations often qualify as full-blown “obsessions.” But, in copying the New Yorker’s weekly “Take Three” column, where a different New Yorker staff writer sums up three things they’re currently into, I’m starting to think it’s a surprisingly accurate way to chronicle one’s life.
I’m still sick from the stink of anti-Semitism that’s closing in right now, and which commandeered my thoughts in last week’s installment, but my head did get caught up in some revitalizing stuff this week.
#4
1) Hitting at the Volunteer Park tennis court practice wall.
I was breaking a salubrious sweat within five minutes of volleying against the DIY, wood slat wall affixed (years ago?) to the fence at this secluded city tennis court. I was gleefully sore the next day knowing I’d gotten a gratifying work out slide-stepping between my forehand and backhand, leaning into swatting the ball with a grunt as if I were my favorite WTA star (and this week’s sub-obsession) Aryna Sabalenka. Speaking of, I finished up by practicing my serve, smashing the balls with abandon, hitting some obvious Wimbledon aces.
I biked over to the courts Friday afternoon (singing “Sabalenka Friday” as I went) and again on Wednesday morning, (singing “Sabalenka Morning”); I would have gone Monday morning too if it hadn’t been raining.
2) Friedrich Engels’ The Condition of the Working Class in England.
Engels’ materialist poetry is everything I want from a Charles Dickens novel without the labyrinthine plots; he writes with literary flair: “The streets uneven, fallen into ruts; masses of refuse, offal, and sickening filth lie among standing pools in all directions; the atmosphere is poisoned by the effluvia, and laden and darkened by the smoke of a dozen tall factory chimneys.”
He’s also a thorough reporter, documenting his tale of two cities—the wealthy and the poor living side by side as a revealing function of industrial capitalism—with columns of stats and excerpts from government reports.
I’m only a third of the way through this urban prole manifesto, but so far, it’s all sumptuous and serious prose: “The more elegant commercial and residential quarters hide the grimy working-men’s dwellings; they suffice to conceal from the eyes of the wealthy men and women the misery and grime which form the complement of their wealth.”
3) Benny Goodman’s 1938 concert at Carnegie Hall
Benny Goodman on Klezmer-induced clarinet motifs. Gene Krupa on horse-hoove drum rolls. And Jess Stacy on sly piano.
My old dad turned me onto this moody yet rowdy live set of big band swing when I was a teenager. I’ve lovingly returned to it on occasion, but this time, its pop shapes, Mahler-esque arrangements, slight blues bent, and Gotham city beats have me cheering along with the sold out crowd.