my mother used to have a birthday around this time of the year and, chance being a fine thing, i woke up around three and found this little thought in proust ...
"When we have passed a certain age, the soul of the child that we once were and the souls of the dead from whom we sprang come and shower upon us their riches and their spells, asking to be allowed to contribute to the new emotions which we feel and in which, erasing their former image, we recast them in an original creation. Thus my whole past from my earliest years, and, beyond these, the past of my parents and relations, blended with my impure love for Albertine the tender charm of an affection at once filial and maternal. We have to give hospitality at a certain stage in our lives, to all our relatives who have journeyed so far and gathered round us."... so then it seemed appropriate to celebrate both proust and sylvia and, as it were, the crossing of their paths in the night ...
