You were one of my first readers, over at the old blog. I think I was the one who brought you into the nation of Munuvia.

• • •

Triticale is gone. He had the most amazing mind when it came to wordplay; he was the one who suggested—back when I was still doing "household hints"—that I could replace the category "Attila in an Apron" with "Apronics."

He called me "Attila the Honey," natch.

Just damn.

Please pray for Tom E. Arnold. His family will be holding Shi'va on the 19th and 20th of this month in Illinois, and there will be a celebration of his life this coming spring.

• • •

Thank you, Tom. Vaya con Dios, my friend.

Via Sean.

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You were one of my heroes. I'm glad you died with a chocolate bar and a bottle of high-quality whiskey by your bed. And I'm glad you and Helen lasted 45 years. Wow!

• • • • •

What a life-affirming, fabulous woman. The triumph and tragedy of her life is that she became the face of lesbianism among Canadians and the literati. Though this probably helped fortify a lot of young women who needed someone to look up to, I think it unfairly limited the market for her books, which were largely carried in feminist/GLBT bookstores, but not always available at mainstream venues. And that's a shame: they were wonderful. They deserved to be read by everyone.

There was a lot more to Jane Rule's characters than the fact that some of 'em were gay.

I know most people's favorite Rule novel is Desert of the Heart. It was indeed a magnificent read, and it was later loosely adapted for the film Desert Hearts, which I saw with a boyfriend in the early 1980s (he didn't mind, of course; he developed a crush on one of the actresses, so seeing her in a lesbian sex scene was AOK—men are so cute).

But there are others: I liked Inland Passage, and (especially) Memory Board. The most amazing Jane Rule book of all is undoubtedly Contract with the World. I could read it over and over again. I may just do that, this month, as a tribute to Our Jane. (Um. Not this Jane. I mean, "Our Other Jane.")

And I see that not all of her books are widely available. If someone wants to make some money in the English-speaking world, they might want to re-issue Rule's stunning body of fiction. (All of it, including This Is Not For You. The fact that a book is not easy reading—or tremendously accessible to straights—does not make it less worthy of reprinting.)

• • • • •

You did well, Ms. Rule. If I can die as half the woman you were, I'll be very, very happy.

I'll be praying for you; I'm sure you and G-d made your own arrangements years ago, and I'm confident I'll see you on the other side of the veil. You, Auden, Yeats and I can have some laughs. You bring the cigarettes; I'll bring the cigars. You bring the whiskey; I'll bring the gin.

(Photo courtesy of the Globe and Mail piece linked above.)

Hat tip to David Linden for penetrating my influenza fog/usual MSM blackout.

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You meant more to me than you could ever have known. I read A Wrinkle in Time so many times in my attic bedroom (on nights both stormy and not), I've got passages of it memorized.

(Readers, here's the book's Wikipedia entry. But do not be self-destructive: read it before you go there. And get this book in hard cover, for crying out loud! You can thank me later. No one reads this thing only one time.)

You, Madeleine, were a better diarist than Anais Nin, a better allegorist than C.S. Lewis or J.R.R. Tolkien. You were the best writer of books for children and adolescents ever, bar none. (And I say this as a fan of J.K. Rowling, whose lapidary achievements still can't achieve the breadth and scope your career encompassed.)

And you made it possible for all kinds of imperfect and skeptical people to contemplate the notion that they could, after all, be Christians. "With," as you put it in one of your published journals, "all kinds of doubts." And you made it okay—cool, even—to have a scientist mom. That saved my psychic bacon during the tough years of being a teenager—which, in my particular case, persisted into my 20s (some will say 40s—but they are being unkind).

Even your creative failures were fascinating, and well worth reading.

You made magic. And moral ambiguity. Again, and again, and again.

Ms. L'Engle's official site is here. I've never looked for her before on the web. I'm so glad she's there, but the image on the front page made me choke up, so I haven't explored there yet. How many people have the love of science she had, and yet the same level of faith? Very few.

MORE Wheaton College rawks. They have extensive collections on Sayers, and on a few of the Inklings, and on L'Engle, too? The mind boggles. What a freakin' brain trust they must have over there.

AND YET MORE Nurse Theology had plenty to say to me when we were comparing notes about the various L'Engle books, great and not-so.

The good nurse is always taken aback when I quote her, verbatim, from conversations we had in the 1980s. And yet, she said all those things, and has such a way with words . . . I can't help it. (Even when it got back to me that she'd said "I like Joy. But I can't see how anyone can stand to be around her for more than ten minutes." That perspective was very necessary for me at the time. And simply adorable.)

Ms. Fine Theology on Madeleine L'Engle: "Why won't she give Zachary Gray a break?"

I looked at her when she said that, and I think my jaw sort of floated for a second. Because, of course, I had taken Zachary to be a character of his own. I felt that he was flouting L'Engle's wishes—rather than vice versa.

Of course, that brings up the whole Calvanism/predestination debate, and I'm not sure I have time for that.

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Bob Petersen is dead. He changed my life, and the lives of too many others for me to possibly count.

He was an example of how someone could endure unbearable hardship and yet soldier on.

He made hot rods respectable, and gave hunting a cachet it might not otherwise have had out here on the West Coast, in the 1970s—when Hunting magazine (Petersen's Hunting) was founded.

I worked for his staff on Hunting as a copyeditor, and after his company was sold I was Assistant Managing Editor on some of the Outdoor Division one-shots. Later, I moved to Automotive, and spent some time on-staff at Hot Rod Bikes, Custom Classic Trucks, and the Automotive newsstand publications.

Finally, I landed for a year at Sports Afield, which Pete had bought just to keep it from folding. It was a noble effort, though he eventually let it die when 9/11 worsened the recession that was starting anyway in 2001.

Pray for his wife; she's endured tragedy in her life, and needs our best thoughts and wishes.

Thank you, Mr. Petersen. The company you founded did a lot for me, and I'm grateful. I got to taste the prosperity print media used to represent, right before it started to die—or to transmute into something else.

I hope they have many classic cars in heaven—heavily customized, and in cherry condition.

UPDATE: We're losing our shootists: David Arnold, and Jeff Cooper, and Bob Petersen. And the one whose death hurts almost as much as Dave's: Gary Sitton, whom I used to copy-edit at Hunting. The amazing guy whose writing was utterly magical. (And I stole that word from him, by the way: he once wrote in a column that Ernest Hemingway had been both "a magical writer, and a fairly sorry human being." If Gary was in any way a "sorry" human being, he saved most of his wrath for himself.)

Aw, fuck. I'm not good at death. I'm just not.

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You will be missed.

As I'm sure you've heard, her family is suggesting that donations be sent to the Lung Cancer Alliance, which fights to increase the investment in research to prevent/cure lung cancer, along with battling the idea that lung cancer victims should somehow be stagmatized.

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I was so young when you occupied the White House. But I do know that I thought you were amazingly bland. Very boring.

And in retrospect I see that the country needed that blandness. Desperately.

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You changed everything.

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And thanks for the cool cartoons.

(CNN's story.)

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Thanks for undoing some of the damage inflicted by my beloved Bloomsbury Group.

Thanks for inspiring Reagan and Thatcher.

And, thanks . . . for all the fish.

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If I die someday as a quarter of the woman you were, I'll be content.

I didn't agree with every word that came out of your mouth, but you were the real deal—and when I felt you stated things too strongly, I knew it came from passion, not personal vanity.

Stefania has more.

Sorry I'm late. Ciao, Bella.

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. . . to be angry when people die?

Death makes me positively livid at times. Am I the only person other than Edna St. Vincent Millay to have this reaction?

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. . . to Viola Elder.

What isn't said is that she was able to handle with grace the death of one son after his drug problem killed him. As I understand it, there's nothing tougher for a parent than to bury a child. I interviewed her once; she and her husband sat in front of me at the Liberty Film Festival last October, so I introduced myself and spoke with her briefly.

What a woman. What a blessing she was.

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I found out a few nights ago that Larry Elder's mother died last Friday.

She was a sweet, good-hearted woman, and the entire country will mourn for her. We all knew her from her appearances on Larry's show; some call her "America's Mother." Larry, of course, called her "the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court."

It made me angry, of course: that's always my first reaction to loss of this kind.

But what she did while she was here was truly amazing. An inspirational gal.

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But the happy kind: when people die in their nineties (and sometimes eighties; perhaps even seventies) it's easier for most of us to let go.

There was weeping, and it was certainly an emotional time for the children and grandchildren of my great-aunt. But it was easier for the great-grandkids and cousins to bear death under such circumstances—after someone has lived a rich, full life.

The great-great granddaughter was too young to comment on the matter, but I'm given to understand that she wanted to be fed and changed after the service. Perhaps there's a message in that.

I was told my great-aunt is having the best times of her life these days, and once more envied the faith that makes such assertions possible. Let's just say I see through the glass very, very darkly and hope one day to glimpse the reality face-to-face.

Goodbye, RoseMary Goodwin.

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I've been checking my e-mail every five minutes, hoping someone would send me a cheap distraction. A note. A link. A joke. Something to keep me from feeling what I feel tonight. I'm just empty inside.

I suspect plummeting blood sugar is part of what I'm coping with, along with anxieties about this new gig I might or might not get at the end of the month—and a glimmer of hope that I might be able to keep the good client, ditch the bad one, and get the staff position I'm hoping for, which would get the husband and me back into the benefits game. Sponsored health insurance, of course, would a big plus for us right now. And we could also use some kind of steady income: there should never be two freelancers in the same family.

But that was just the beginning of my emotional tailspin: annoying projects—seemingly without end—for my nonprofit volunteer work, the fun symbolism of getting together with Attila the Hub to cash in one of our last few assets . . . and then hearing about Roger Borden's death last night. (I called him Matt Carnation, here. He loved that post, and sent the link to a lot of his friends and relatives.)

He's in his early fifties—was, I suppose, dammit—and succumbed to a liver cancer he told me he'd probably beat. I believed him, because 1) I'm stupid, and 2) my friends aren't alllowed to die. Not that I've heard of anyone who survived liver cancer, but this was going to be the time. I was sure of it.

I'm in a state of rage right now: rage at Roger for dying, rage at myself for not keeping in closer touch, rage at cancer for taking the young, and rage at God for giving us this gift of life, only to snatch it away. I want to shake my fist at the sky and yell out, "what's the freakin' point?"

All of which is irrational, of course, so I start over again, and find that I have an inexplicable fury at myself for being such a child, for being unable to accept that life ends. And fury at my pathetic attitude that I don't really have to grow up until one or both of my parents die. Fury at all the procrastinating I do, at the chances I take of leaving this earth with my dreams unfulfilled. Whatever those were. (I've forgotten. Well, maybe I haven't.)

At least I had some warning the last time someone died on me, though that was a particularly rough one, because the person involved had a stroke, and worked hard to get his life back to normal. He'd just about succeeded when they found the . . . cancer. (See? I almost swore. And I can't, because Dave always thought I was a lady. His mistake, but one wants to be respectful.)

I've been trying to think of solutions. I've considered the option of not getting close to anyone who's older than I am, but 1) it's too late in the day for that, and 2) even people who are younger than I am can die: there's no guarantee at any age.

Then, brainstorming-style, I consider not getting close to anyone. But that doesn't entirely solve my problem, because I'd still die someday. And if all my human affiliations magically vanished, I'd simply die lonely (though perhaps it would make my final years seem a lot longer than they really were).

For a couple of years, I've been trying to operate with a sense of how finite life is, and how precious. I'm even being polite with my parents, whenever feasible, because theoretically they might die someday. And even when it comes to the young and/or tough—people I presume will outlive me—my time with them is still finite, because I'm mortal, too. Kinda.

But I don't much like it. Not for me. Not for anyone with class and verve. Roger was a funny guy, and he didn't get many breaks. At least, it didn't seem that way from where I was sitting. I've known several people in my twelve-step group who buried their children, and I admired most of them for being able to speak of it without crying. I admired Roger because he almost always cried when he mentioned his son.

Roger was special. He did work in our program that will live on for many years. He's a guy who made a difference.

Edna got it right:

I am not resigned to the shutting away of loving hearts in the hard ground.

So it is, and so it will be, for so it has been, time out of mind:

Into the darkness they go, the wise and the lovely. Crowned

With lilies and with laurel they go; but I am not resigned.


Lovers and thinkers, into the earth with you.

Be one with the dull, the indiscriminate dust.

A fragment of what you felt, of what you knew,

A formula, a phrase remains—but the best is lost.

The answers quick and keen, the honest look, the laughter, the love,
They are gone. They have gone to feed the roses. Elegant and curled
Is the blossom. Fragrant is the blossom. I know. But I do not approve.
More precious was the light in your eyes than all the roses in the world.

Down, down, down into the darkness of the grave
Gently they go, the beautiful, the tender, the kind;
Quietly they go, the intelligent, the witty, the brave.
I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned.

Roger: "For me? Well, as long as you turn it into something productive at some point." I'm pretty sure that would be his take.

So I will try. I'm not promising. Not quite yet.

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1 The only thing in life that is certain (beyond death and taxes) is the here and now. Tomorrow is a bright, shiny promise, and most of us will live to see it, and it will become the here and now. Thankfully. So tell those special people that you love them when you have the chance. Remind them that they're important to you, and that you value having them in your life. And it's OK to rage, and to even feel childish for doing so. It may not be particularly rational. But it is the human thing to do. And you are human, yes? Let me leave you with two thoughts: I appreciate you. I enjoy your writing, and wish I had even a measure of your skill. And a thought, stolen from a master of the written word: "End? No, the journey doesn't end here. Death is just another path, one that we all must take. The grey rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and all turns to silver glass, and then you see it." "What? Gandalf? See what?" "White shores, and beyond, a far green country under a swift sunrise." At least I hope so.

Posted by: I R A Darth Aggie at March 15, 2006 05:55 AM (1hM1d)

2 Sorry for your loss...I have no words to lessen your pain. Thanks for all the good you do for all of us! You are making the world a little bit better for all of us! Hoping all will go well with all your plans in progress.

Posted by: Darrell at March 15, 2006 11:37 AM (i8Wby)

3 Thanks, guys. You're sweet. All will be well at some point. I just kind of thought people would be amused at the sheer childishness of it: "Roger died, and it's all about me!

Posted by: Attila Girl at March 15, 2006 03:38 PM (s96U4)

4 My condoleences to you. Your words are heartfelt and I admire the character behind them. As for a desired cheap distraction, I'll share an old med school joke which I hope doesn't offend too many. The time came for a guy and his gal to get physical so off they went into the woods. The guy removed his shoes and socks revealing deformed toes and nails. Girl: Uhmm, whats that? Guy: Tolio Girl: Tolio? Do you mean polio? Guy: No, Tolio! Next, the guy removed his pants revealing dry, scaly patches on his legs. Girl: Uhmm, whats that? Guy: Kneesles. Girl: Kneesals? Do you mean Measles? Guy: No, Kneesles! Finally, the guy removes his underwear. Girl: OOO, I know! Small cox! The end. All the best to you.

Posted by: Dalsan at March 15, 2006 04:14 PM (8gN76)

5 Um. How many, um . . . how many did he have?

Posted by: Attila Girl at March 15, 2006 04:18 PM (s96U4)

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To me, you'll always be the feisty lady in The Poseidan Advanture, but I'll go back and see the movies you made as the Blonde Bombshell. Every single one of them.

WaPo has a nice bio here.

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