Speaking of public relations, there is a a BBC documentary called The Century of Self that starts with Edward Bernays and the development of the Public Relations industry which makes one very much question why we believe anything that we hear on TV–or the internet. That said, it’s the little summing up that I find interesting because it’s always the important details that are left out about how I got from here to there (did you walk? Take a cab? Wait for the bus?)
It’s like reading a short story. Joan Didion said something about short stories. It was something like that the reason she didn’t write short stories, is because she didn’t believe in that epiphany the protagonist has in a short story. She says that it doesn’t happen that way in real life. Life is not just one way–something happens– and we are forever another way.
Further, I love the odd reminiscences we have on our lives. Things can get so condenscend and thick with just a phrase. One of my favorite is from a woman I knew in London who worked in a shop and once apropos of nothing, she looked down at me (she was very tall) and in her ponderous rhythmic voice. Her black sunglasses reflecting the track lighting:
She had been a model, before there were Models she would generally arrive late, and seemingly a little tipsy after lunch. But that was London. Everyone is a little tipsy in London after lunch.
Back to Marsia Hozer. She also is quoted as saying one of the most brilliant things I’ve heard in a very long time.
“Don’t think too much. Keep your mind quiet and if something pops into your mind just do it.”
Which is how this got written. I really do love this apartment.
**All photos from David Patrick Columbia’s New York Social Diary.
