Claudia, Autore presso Keep Calm and Drink Coffee

SPOONS

May 27, 2023 | WHO CARES

The magical world of spoons was the title of the exhibition in Vigevano that I missed.

I was able to retrieve the images here but I would like to chat about spoons with you.

First of all, I admit that I have stopped using spoons since I do not put sugar in my coffee, although in doing so I violate the rules of bon ton that requires that the spoon is always served.

Not only that: I’m also wrong because I don’t follow the advice of experts who say that espresso should be stirred anyway.

Do you use a spoon?

Do you have a favorite spoon?

There are some really fancy spoons actually, here for example the New Wave by Villeroy & Boch

or the Alessi set, again we are outside of the Etiquette though, which requires that the spoons be equal to each other

And had you ever seen Lavazza’s ESpoon?

There is even a “cream-saving” spoon.

Then if the cream is matched with this choc… spoon, isn’t the result sublime?

What spoon do you use?

Among the spoons we have I prefer the white and yellow checked ones, which are not elegant, but are very nice.

Would you believe it if I told you that I managed to lose two of them?

Who loses them, who drops them … Salvador Dalì made the spoons symbol of his research on the oneiric.

Have you ever woken up during a dream and felt the desire to memorize the images in your head the instant they vanished?

Salvador Dalì used to fall asleep after lunch in his armchair with a spoon in his hand, knowing that when his sleep was deep, his fingers would drop the spoon, and expecting that the thud of the spoon would wake him abruptly allowing him to remember.

Undoubtedly he gave us dream works, if you will allow me this pun.

Incidentally, spoons are also a symbol of good luck: the tradition of giving silver spoons to new babies still continues.

This custom comes from the Middle Ages: when newborns of noble families received a silver spoon as a gift as proof of wealth from birth.

Born with a silver spoon in one’s mouth.

What did yours look like?

I didn’t get any silver spoons, but I consider myself equally lucky, and I can always fill my empty spoon with a nice dose of Nutella, can’t I? 🙂

Have a good coffee then, perhaps inspired by Liz’s elegance to stir it, what do you say?

FAME D’ARIA – HUNGER FOR AIR

May 20, 2023 | BOOKS

Fame d’aria – Hunger for air is the latest book by Daniele Mencarelli published by Mondadori.

Daniele Mencarelli has needed no introduction for a while now.

Fame d’aria – Hunger for air appealed to me because of the structure, the writing and the way in which in real time the reader gets the full load of the eighteen years of life with Jacopo.

Jacopo is not the main character; Jacopo is Peter’s son, Pete is a man.

I say just a man because that is what I thought as I got to know him one line after another.

Pete is not a superhero, he is not a champion, he is not even an example. Peter is simply a person, a human being, as are all those who try to behave in the right way against the waves of the storm that is life: an incessant and continuous lashing that hits inexorably.

Also for this reading I thank Monica, and then I also say thank you to Luciana for pointing me to the meeting with the writer organized by The Pleasure of Telling.

In this way I was able to listen directly to Daniele Mencarelli’s words and find out how his need to tell this story came about.

About six years ago he met a Peter and began to put the pieces together, details that seem to have no importance until the accumulation becomes an element that turns into writing, thinking about how to translate a memory “saved with a name” as if it were a document that has the power to illuminate the path to which to give life.

The immersion inside a life that was not his own was brutal for Daniele Mencarelli; no frieze was allowed to hide the disfigurement that always had to prevail.

In this book the author shifted to the third person while always keeping the present tense because he likes to give the impression that the events happen as they are read because he feels they are less distant.

I must say that the goal was fully achieved because even me as a reader felt literally inside the story.

The novel has an antecedent: in 2000 while going for a beer, Peter meets Bianca. They recognize each other and it is love at first sight.

In 2023 Pietro is a 50-year-old man and his car breaks down in Molise, with him there isn’t Bianca, there is his son Jacopo who is 18 years old and unfortunately has very low-functioning autism.

The village where they stop to look for a mechanic: Sant’Anna del Sannio does not exist in reality although it resembles many places that each of us can identify.

Pete and Jacopo are headed to Puglia where Bianca is waiting for them to celebrate their 20th wedding anniversary.

The unexpected lasts three days and revolves around three characters: Oliviero the mechanic, Agata the bar owner, and Gaia. Thanks to her, we enter the father’s inner world and discover everything that families like theirs lack.

Basic seed: the scene as a moment of unveiling the human exactly as I was telling you about the Peter who I discovered while reading.

Daniele Mencarelli was born as a poet, poetry is able to name things, it captures the depth with respect to the scene. Narrative, on the other hand, is architecture of scenes that then takes the form of plot and psychological arc of the characters.

In fact, poetry should not be “strict poetic language,” but should live within the elements of the novel form.

Literature is a gesture that is meant to bear witness.

These words of Daniele Mencarelli find a particular embodiment in the book Fame d’aria – Hunger for air , I think.

But what struck me most was to learn about the author’s personal “hunger for air.”

Over-inked pages that give a sense of claustrophobia.

From this “hunger for air” literally comes the need to open up vertical spaces in the horizontal narrative.

The need to perceive much presence of white, that is, need to break the sentence and go to the head as if it were a need for air.

Reasoning as a poet in certain moments of the human you arrive with a broken speech. In the highest places of the human one arrives only with lyric.

A personal hunger for air.

How about you? When do you feel your hunger for air?

THE BOOKBINDER OF LOST STORIES

May 13, 2023 | BOOKS

The Bookbinder of Lost Stories is the book I read, again thanks to Monica.

Speaking of friendship, Sas Bellas Mariposas and Mamaglia are skilled fan of the author: Cristina Caboni, so maybe they would like to tell us something about her.

In the meantime I would like to chat more about how I especially liked the parts that describe the binding process in the early 19th century.

Nowadays how long does it take to create a book?
There are several 24-hour delivery options on the web.

And each time we find ourselves with the usual question: have we gained or lost?

Recently with my husband we have been looking for someone who was still in a profession related to the traditions of the past, but here in the area unfortunately we do not have old style jobs anymore.

It is very sad to be aware that the precious chain of passing on knowledge and teaching patience and time needed to acquire skills has been interrupted.

By interrupting the oral tradition, we will deprive ourselves of the privilege of being able to know stories because there will be no one left to tell them.

So I would very much like to take up the concept of “binding” lost stories to unite them and to keep them living with us.

I spent a lot of time listening to one of my grandmothers telling about her childhood in a peasant family, talking to me about a seemingly distant era, about an essential lifestyle, about objects that we will never use.

My other grandmother, had less life to live but equally her tales remain indelible to me, as well as the memory her rice-fields worker knees.

My great-grandfather, on the other hand, was a carter, and his traveling for work gave him the opportunity to meet and to marry my great-grandmother: German, in spite of the saying “wife and oxen in your own country …” jokes aside, theirs was a rather unconventional marriage considering historical period and social conditions.

But tell me please! I would love to “listen to you.”

If you have a craft to tell, if you want a story not to be lost, if you wish to pass on a tale, a thought, a concept, a proverb, an experience or even just a comment, I will be grateful and add it to the lost stories to be bound.

CAT AT THE MET

May 6, 2023 | FASHION, MUSIC

Cat at the Met is the description that came to mind when I saw these images

on the instant I smiled but then I wondered what prompted Jared Leto to dress up as a cat.

This is the Met Gala: an event created to raise funds for the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute that over the years has become such a prestigious and coveted event not only in the fashion world that tickets, for those not included on the invitation list, are astronomically priced.

Nevertheless, the Met Gala has a strict rule: no cell phones and consequently no sharing on social media.

This perhaps contributes to the idea of exclusivity that Anna Wintour has built over the years making it an event that some refer to as “the Oscars of fashion.”

As a Meryl fan I inevitably associate Miranda Priestly, by the way did you see that Andy was actually appearing in the video? 🙂

So back to the cat: Jared Leto was not the only one who wanted to follow the dress code of this edition by paying homage to Choupette, aka Karl Lagerfeld’s cat.

In fact, the Met Gala 2023 was also dedicated to Karl Lagerfeld as a preview of the Costume Institute’s exhibition A line of beauty: at the Metropolitan Museum from May 5 to July 16.

Undoubtedly dressing up as a cat has made even we in our own small way are talking about it, but beyond that, do you find it a brilliant or irreverent idea?

Do you think this participation added a valuable contribution, or the risk of slipping into style fall?

Can we see it as a touch of irony or can it be a missed opportunity to give a message?

In general I think we all have a great need for levity, certainly we also have to learn from cats.

In the meantime we should maybe convince Jared Leto to be less tea guy 🙂 what do you think?

And maybe even less Cat at the Met.

Joking aside, now that he has felinely got our attention, we expect great things from the new Thirty seconds to Mars album due out on May 8, especially after the statements he made in an interview: listening to Italian 80s music during the filming of the movie House of Gucci in which Jared played Paolo Gucci, left an important imprint of inspiration because it was able to reach the heart.

How can you blame him?

COACHELLA

Apr 29, 2023 | FASHION, MUSIC

Before I even understood what Coachella was I tried to figure out how to pronounce this curious name.

The correct diction comes from the Hispanic language because Coachella is the name of the valley where this music festival was first held: in Indio, California, at Empire Polo Events.

Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival was born in 1999 on the occasion of the 30th “birthday” of the quintessential music festival.

No need to specify the name, right? Just the date is enough: 1969.

Actually, the Coachella festival is conceived precisely on the failure of Woodstock 1999, so catastrophic that it was called the day the 90s died …

Coachella was the need to restart from art.

And from this restart, the numbers year after year have multiplied, until it has become a musical and very fashionable event.

Coachella is music, but Coachella is also outfits: I collected some photos from the web.

What do you think?

Would you feel inspired by the music enough to indulge in your look?

Have you ever attended any kind of dress code or otherwise themed event?

Undisputed queen of the just concluded edition was Zendaya who also surprisingly sang. together with Labrinth All for us from Euphoria.

She is so universal and versatile that it becomes really hard to find suitable adjectives.

From the white camisole under dress for Coachella, to the maison blanche E-1027, built by Eileen Gray in Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, as her own testimonial for Le Capucines.

Music always as an important thread.

I don’t know about you but when I listen to Urge Overkill Girl you’ll be a woman soon I can’t help but think of a totally iconic scene … in the radio frame shall we catch a quote from it? We will talk about it again 🙂