A diary entry:
Coming home from the OLLI at AU before the spring semester starts (will be teaching The Poldark Novels [the first four] in Context) in DC in the middle of the day: I looked out my car window and saw all of the Potomac as far as I could see frozen over. I recalled 1978 or so when Jim and I lived at the top of Manhattan and would walk along the Hudson River -- that year we saw huge ice floes in the river, but the river itself was not frozen solid.
My time among these OLLI people was good; I was cheered to see a suggestion of a future course in Fielding's Tom Jones for a whole semester was looked upon very favorably by those I mentioned it too.
The delightful 1997 BBC Tom Jones -- Tom, Sophia playing the harpischord so pleasurably while Square Western glowers at them...
With a wonderful ironic narrator at the cross-roads, lots of voice-over narration ..
I'm now home with my cat, sitting by a radiator thinking to myself how my beloved never said goodbye to me because he couldn't bear to, the last days he was conscious he did not try to comfort me because he knew there was no comfort for this loss of his companionship. He trusted he left me enough money; if I could stay rational, I would survive.
These are four remarkable videos by Stephen Frye; and ought to be watched regularly: everything he says is true, good, helps one do good work, but to enact them fully requires great courage and strong nerves:
https://humanism.org.uk/thatshumanism/
Miss Drake