7/15/44 [New York.] You have to enjoy the weather always. Walking home from Sixty-First Street on Second Avenue, eleven beautiful black blocks. (The moon is not, the lights are, you are, your feet with the spring in them, this is youth, now!) You inhale the soft cool night, you gaze on the lighted bar doorways fondly. Your shoes, for once, are comfortable. Your head is filled with a number of things… with the youth’s grudging appreciation of the splendid night, and with the consciousness of health, future, potency. Breathe deep! Your lungs are still functioning perfectly, your thighs do not shake too much, your calves are resilient, your toes eager. Every muscle is obedient (taut for an instant, then couchantly relaxed), every dream will come true.
— Patricia Highsmith, “Patricia Highsmith: Her Diaries and Notebooks: 1941-1995.″ Anna von Planta (Editor). (Liveright, November 16, 2021)— Patricia Highsmith, Her Diaries and Notebooks: 1941-1995
Photo: Mike Kononov via unsplash
very alive
Brings to mind your sprints across town to catch the train or make it to the office, firing on every cylinder. 😉
Exactly what resonated with me!
Miss those posts….💕
Awwww….I wish I could say I miss those moments. Hmmmmmm.
I miss the color and energy, the keen human insights that always permeated those posts, pal, but I am also very happy that you have a markedly *different* morning walk to share with us these days.☺️
Oh, so me too Lori. Hard to imagine going back!
Wow! I remember those days!
Me too!
Tenacious fervor, unbridled ambition, these are my thoughts. Must be the driven 24 year old in my home this week, naive determination to a certain extent.
Yes Lisa. That’s it!
Reblogged this on It Is What It Is and commented:
The city that never sleeps … “7/15/44 [New York.] You have to enjoy the weather always.” – Patricia Highsmith, “Patricia Highsmith: Her Diaries and Notebooks: 1941-1995.″ Anna von Planta (Editor). (Liveright, November 16, 2021)— Patricia Highsmith, Her Diaries and Notebooks: 1941-1995.
So antithetical to the ‘head down, fast clip, insular bubble’ within which most New Yorkers navigate…far better to take a look up I think…
That it is Mimi….
How wonderful to remember that feeling! I’m in favor of pretending it is so, and maybe it’ll become more “real” at least now and then.
So me too Valerie!
At 23, Patricia Highsmith, was intoxicated with life! Everything she encountered, felt or noticed was, as if she was in midst of the Sweet, Innocent, Fire of a 1st Love…she was embracing Herself (inwardly and outwardly) – so fully immersed…In Her Youth…she grasped the Knowledge “That Each Breath Is A Gift’ The Filter of Her Eyes, on Full Throttle!!! with such unlimited potential Patricia Highsmith, passage so Vibrant!!!../// and have you thought that perhaps you’ve walked on some of the same sidewalks in NYC or in Texas (Born), as she did? She attended, Barnard…
Ha. I do wonder if I walked the same sidewalks. Cool thought!
Ha, I’m sure the cool thought stems from having two older brother and older sisters, a younger sister as well…I observed them, learned from them, wanted to be like them in some regards…the oldest of the sisters had her first crush on the youngest of the brother’s best friend…she would come unglued when Al P. came over…if this teenage boy ate dinner at the house she wanted to wash his dinner plate & silverware, then set them aside in the cupboard…he liked to sit in a chair in the living-room (not the couch) after the brother and Al would leave to go do high school boy activities -she would line us younger sisters up…with her instructions -no one IS Allowed to sit in the chair Al P. sat in!!! except of course, She could…on about day 3 of the off limited chair one of us would test the water and sit in the chair…she would have a melt down…oh the drama of her first crush…when she was old enough to start dating -we became very stealthy in spying on when the date would pick her up and spy out the windows when she was dropped off…most of the time they came in and this provided lots of fodder for future teasing… she dated one guy the summer before college she lived at home…he drove a Corvette Stingray and he had an Aussie accent..I would run outside much to her embarrassment, say his name and ask him to speak, Ha, ha…I have a thing for voices…She eventually marriage a man with dual American/Canadian Citizenship…they later divorced and she married one of her High School boyfriends…btw my hubby has a sister with the same name of my sister and they both married a man with the same first name! that they dated in High School…So you can perhaps ascertain I have lots of situations to draw upon when I write…
Dual citizens. Wow!
His dad started some type of manufacturing company in a tawny community just outside of our hometown…the former brother in law stayed in USA for awhile since they had a son (who was 9 or 10 by then) he eventually returned to Alberta…he was very artistic…he made his living as a Truck Driver….He is still of working age…lost track of him about 10 years ago. Very common, Canadian last name…I think his dad sold the business when he was in his 70’s and moved back to Canada too…
Interesting!