Ague and goiters and boils, oh my.

One thing I knew about walking pneumonia:

• You can sing it to the tune of “Waltzing Mathilda.” Similarly, “diverticulitis” scans beautifully to “Gary, Indiana” from The Music Man.

Two things I didn’t know about walking pneumonia:

• It is not merely a vernacular reference to an undefined group of diseases; it is in fact a generally accepted name for a specific atypical pneumococcal virus.
• I have it.

Which gives me medically-sanctioned and spousally-enforced time to rest, recover and ponder other things, like: what about all those other folksy disease names? The ones from Chaucer through Shakespeare and well into Wodehouse, a vast array with which I am casually acquainted but not intimately familiar? “Chilblains,” said the husband, and I replied, “Frostbite… maybe? Hmmm.”

Quick post from the home front

*whispering* The Hub is on the last few pages of Ysabel, the latest from Guy Gavriel Kay. The protagonist in this one is a fifteen-year-old boy, and for the first hundred pages or so, I was thinking,”Beautifully written, of course, but a bit too coming-of-ageish for my taste.”

But then he got me, as he always does, and while I wasn’t dissolved in tears,* I wasn’t disappointed. And the last few pages made me say out loud,”Oh, you clever bastard.”

So I’m watching Brian to see how he reacts as he finishes. I can’t wait to hear what he thinks.

*as I was after A Song for Arbonne, The Lions of Al-Rassan, and Lord of Emperors

… still going on about Jane Eyre.

She is immune to coercion. Not immune to passion or pity or the call of duty, but instinctively resistant and thoughtfully opposed to the imposition of external ideas onto her own judgment. She examines systems of thought and accepts those parts that seem right to her. In a world of “legless angels,” she refuses to deny either her humanity or her spirit. Examples that I love:

• As a child, she is terribly embarrassed by her unjust punishment at the hands of Mr. Brocklehurst, but she never concedes or apologizes. She is not a liar; she has told the unpleasant truth more times than her aunt can bear and will not retract it.
• As a governess, she has not the slightest thought of leaving her post when her charge is revealed to be the illegitimate child of a courtesan. Her only concern is for Adele’s feelings; Jane knows well what it is to be unwanted and Mr. Rochester’s denial of his probable paternity irritates her (inasmuch as she ever really becomes angry with him).
• She holds fast to the idea of a union based on love or none at all, a relatively new idea at the time, and an almost unbelievable position for a woman of no means, whose only real chance of financial and social security is marriage.
• She respects St. John’s ideas of service before self, but rejects his plans for her. It is my opinion that she sees the fundamental hypocrisy of his “sacrifice.” True, he loves and has denied himself the love of a beautiful young woman, but he tells Jane candidly that in the long run, he knows he could never be happy with Rosamund. His spiritual ambition would eat away at his conscience and his pride. If St. John is sincere in his self-knowledge, then what does he truly sacrifice? He is following his deepest desires while urging Jane to forgo her own.

More later on Jane. More, in fact, than anyone may really want to read…

… celebrating Jane Eyre.

For so many reasons, this book has become the closest thing to an inspirational text I have. My first copy, purloined 23 years ago from a ninth-grade English class set, is worn to the point of dissolution. I keep it, but no longer read from it – a newer copy does actual duty. That first, cheap, crumbling paperback has gone with me all over the world.

I told a friend that someday I would get all emo and post the actual quote that has been the touchstone of my interior life; here it is.

Jane has learned that Rochester is already married; divorce laws prevent him from leaving his mad wife; she must decide whether to live with him as his mistress or leave him forever. I do not share her religious beliefs or social mores, but I believe completely in her sincerity. After an interview in which he uses every tactic of desperate love to make her stay, she retires to her room. Alone. To think.

“Who in the world cares for YOU? or who will be injured by what you do?”

Still indomitable was the reply–”I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself. I will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man. I will hold to the principles received by me when I was sane, and not mad–as I am now. Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth?”

As someone who “under stress may fall prey to various forms of immediate gratification,” I go back again and again to Jane’s struggle and resolve. Right isn’t easy. But it’s worth it in the end.