Librarian: Angel

This isn't a particularly Happy Halloweeny post except for that it happened to me on Halloween and I'm trying to be better about timeliness around here and anyways, haven't you had enough Halloween yet for one year? No? Well then: a trick or treat for luck lovers.

The mailman today brought this large flat envelope to our house, with my name carefully written across the front, with a stamp from the San Francisco Public Library as the return address. I of course assumed the worst: that somehow I'd forgotten to return some wildly valuable book and they'd sent my overdue bill in this envelope, so large it required over a dollar in postage to send. Happily, this was not the case, and rather carefully wrapped up inside was the book present I received from Elana as an early birthday gift three weeks ago, still with gift tag and wrapping paper in tact.



I realized at once that I'd slipped the little Russian children's book into my library book for safekeeping the day I received it and then upon my last visit to SFPL, unknowingly returned them both to the depository. If my life were a dramatic movie, there would be a close up of me dropping it onto the conveyor belt at the entrance (San Francisco is so fancy like that) only to realize the next day that the treasure had been lost forever. Antics would ensue to get it back. In real life, I had just this week begun to wonder where exactly I'd put that little book and some lovely person at the library happened to be looking over me all along.


Since I can't thank this lovely man or lady personally, I'd like to state for the record that this person has something really good coming to them. Twenty dollars found on the sidewalk or two desserts or SOMEthing. Hear that universe? What a nice thing to do for a total stranger.

Motherland

Back a couple years ago, when my life was still exciting, I lived in the great red land of yore: the Russia. And I still have plenty of little tokens around that serve well to reminisce of my time there. Colorful, kitshcy and somber, the design that I found during my time in St. Petersburg continues to shade the things I cherish: striped shirts, leather shoes, floral wallpaper, canisters.

Flipping through the dense new issue of Readymade, I came across some things in their holiday gift guide from a funny website devoted to peddling traditional russian garb. One of the magazine's featured designers, Christine Schmidt of Yellow Owl Workshop in SF, cited two things from the internet store on her own wish list: a pair of wool boots and a telnyashka, a striped wool shirt worn by men in the navy. I brought such a shirt home for John upon my return and he still wears it.

In a funny coincidence, my friend Mary Wegmann sent me some socks recently, which I happen to be wearing today and they have the same seemingly haphazard color combination that I used to find so interesting in Russian handicrafts, specifically knit ones. Here is the note that accompanied my socks:




I brought her socks from Russia which were also knit by ladies on the side of the road, imperfect and chunky. My new ones are the same way. And here are some swatches; note the play between hot pink and ochre beneath burgundy stripes.




Anyway, this time of year I always seem to develop a hankering for more nordic, soviet, woolen components in my wardrobe. The consistency is really pretty nice. It means I don't have to worry about "updating" too often. And apparently I'm still sort of in as my grandma would say...