So, I am working my way through 1881. He has committed to being a full time painter, but like his work in ministry, he starts from zero and builds up. His obstinate non-conformity still causes him problems, but he is somewhat reconciled to his family (living at home with them in Etten for a time) and is out of the coal country, so often he sounds quite happy.
I wish all people had what I am gradually beginning to acquire: the power to read a book in a short time without difficulty, and to keep a strong impression of it. In reading books, as in looking at paintings, one must admire what is beautiful with assurance - without doubt, without hesitation...I am busy rearranging all my books; I have read too much not to work on systematically to get at least an idea of modern literature. Sometimes I am so sorry that I do not know more about history, especially modern history. Well, being sorry and giving up doesn't help us on; the only thing to do is to push forward. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Etten, early August 1881
He has fallen in love, but she does not return his feelings, being still hung up on an old love. Being Vincent, he loves anyway. That man does not seem to have a "just relax" bone in his body.
So I remain calm and confident through all this, and it influences my work, which attracts me more than ever just because I feel I shall succeed. Not that I shall become anything extra-ordinary, but “ordinary”; and by ordinary I mean that my work will be sound and reasonable, and will have a right to exist, and will serve some purpose.
I think that nothing awakens us to the reality of life so much as true love. And whoever is truly conscious of the reality of life, is he on the wrong road? I think not. But to what shall I compare that peculiar feeling, that peculiar discovery of love? For indeed when a man falls seriously in love, it is the discovery of a new hemisphere. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Etten, 7 November 1881
If ever you fall in love, do so without reservation, or rather, if you should fall in love simply give no thought to any reservation.
Moreover, when you do fall in love, you will not `feel certain' of success beforehand. You will be `un âme en peine' [a lost soul] and yet you will smile.
Whoever feels so `sure of his ground' that he rashly imagines `she is mine', even before he has waged the soul's battle of love, even before, I say, he has become suspended between life and death on the high seas, in the midst of storm and tempest - there is one who knows little of what a woman's heart is, and that will be bought home to him by a real woman in a very special way. When I was younger, one half of me once fancied that I was in love, and with the other half I really was. The result was many years of humiliation. Let me not have been humiliated in vain. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Etten, 10-11 November 1881
He really is determined in his love.
The clergymen call us sinners, conceived and born in sin. Bah! What confounded nonsense that is. Is it a sin to love, to feel the need for love, not to be able to live without love? I consider a life without love a sinful and immoral state. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Etten, c. 21 December 1881
1881 ended with an argument between himself and his father and Vincent leaving the family home in Etten, possibly this time for good. He is devoting himself to drawing, but he got a paint box from a cousin (?) for Christmas, so he is enjoying exploring that.
This set of blog entries is taking quite a while, but I am very much enjoying spending the time with Vincent. More as I continue. If I keep up with a year at a go, there will likely be about 10 more Vincent entries, interspersed with other things. Enjoy :)
Note: The letters can be found in their entirety at http://www.webexhibits.org/vangogh/
Friday, December 21, 2012
Response to poly questions part 2
(continued from previous post)
3. Be happy ALONE.
This reminds me of the film "Cool Runnings". When one of the bob sledders asks John Candy's character Yes, that’about what it feels like to win a gold medal (or something along those lines), Candy replies, "If you're not enough without it, you'll never be enough with it." I continue to work on being enough just by myself (there are in fact times that I wonder if I will ever be alone - reference my chaotic life in the previous question). I do think that I'm pretty ok on this one. I am daily more comfortable inside my skin.
4. Communicate. Honestly.
I have to work on this one. I don't like conflict and I don't like saying things that will (or could) upset the person that I am with, so I repress. THIS needs work for me.
5. Know what you want. Here’s another list of questions for ya. (Hint: Rules 1 to 4 come in real handy before you get to this one.) Aargh! These are challenging!
- What would your ideal polyamorous relationship look like? I don't know that my ideal poly relationship looks that much different than my ideal monogamous relationship. I just want to love and be loved. I don't want to be told that I can't love or I oughtn't. I need to know that somewhere I'm most important, but I don't have to be most important all of the time, and sometimes I want to be left alone.
- What joys do you think polyamory will bring to your life? People to love freely.
- What challenges do you think you will face? Do you think you’re equipped to handle those challenges? This part worries me. People don't follow the rules. Emotions are messy, and there is so much, not just potential, but likelihood for drama that I almost don't want to think about poly. I handle drama pretty well, but I also will step back if someone is a more demanding partner, so it is easy for me to feel shunted aside. This is where I think that poly is maybe not for me.
- Do the benefits you want match up with the kind of room do you have in your world for multiple partners? There's the rub. For the next few years, I just don't have room in my life for multiple partners. I have to get my kids graduated from high school and then maybe, but not until then. Hell, until then I don't even know if I have room in my life for a single partner.
- Do the benefits you want match up with what you have to give in return in terms of time, energy, availability, etc.? See response above
- What do you think an incoming partner might want from you? How might she or he feel about your situation? Working on this one
- If you have an existing partner, do your values, desires and abilities match up well? Are you looking for the same or compatible sorts of polyamory? Working on this one
- Are you open to a range of options within the range of polyamorous arrangements, or is your interest very specific? If it’s specific, why? What do you hope to gain from that particular form? I am pretty open, I think. I certainly don't have a particular attachment to a single form or arrangement that I know of.
linked from http://sexgeek.wordpress.com/2007/06/10/10-realistic-rules-for-good-non-monogamous-relationships/
When Vincent reads my mind
So, there was a moment in the July 1880 letter where it felt as though Vincent had reached into my head and pulled chunks of my brain out into the light for all to see. Not a fun experience necessarily, but certainly provoking:
A caged bird in spring knows perfectly well that there is some way in which he should be able to serve. He is well aware that there is something to be done, but he is unable to do it. What is it? He cannot quite remember, but then he gets a vague inkling and he says to himself, “The others are building their nests and hatching their young and bringing them up,” and then he bangs his head against the bars of the cage. But the cage does not give way and the bird is maddened by pain. “What a idler,” says another bird passing by - what an idler. Yet the prisoner lives and does not die. There are no outward signs of what is going on inside him; he is doing well, he is quite cheerful in the sunshine.
I want to just leave this quote alone and say, "Ok, there it is."...maybe for now I will.
A caged bird in spring knows perfectly well that there is some way in which he should be able to serve. He is well aware that there is something to be done, but he is unable to do it. What is it? He cannot quite remember, but then he gets a vague inkling and he says to himself, “The others are building their nests and hatching their young and bringing them up,” and then he bangs his head against the bars of the cage. But the cage does not give way and the bird is maddened by pain. “What a idler,” says another bird passing by - what an idler. Yet the prisoner lives and does not die. There are no outward signs of what is going on inside him; he is doing well, he is quite cheerful in the sunshine.
But then the season of the great migration arrives, an attack of melancholy. He has everything he needs, say the children who tend him in his cage - but he looks out, at the heavy thundery sky, and in his heart of hearts he rebels against his fate. I am caged, I am caged and you say I need nothing, you idiots! I have everything I need, indeed! Oh! please give me the freedom to be a bird like other birds!
I want to just leave this quote alone and say, "Ok, there it is."...maybe for now I will.
Thursday, December 20, 2012
Vincent, Part Three
Still working my way through his letters to his brother Theo, which are published in their entirety here: http://www.webexhibits.org/vangogh/ This post begins in January of 1879.
For the early part of the year he is working as an evangelist in the Borinage, a coal mining are in (I think) Belgium. His descriptions of the mines & miners & the world they inhabit are masterful. His artists eye combines with a ready sympathy that manages not to be cloying or pitying at all. He respects the miners even while he is a bit appalled at their condition.
His depression (or whatever his mental condition is) Is likely made worse by what he sees while working as an evangelist in this area. He cannot help but imagine, empathize, and despair (this is purely my interpretation, btw) - When I saw you again and walked with you, I had a feeling I used to have more often than I do now, namely that life is something good and precious which one should value, and I felt more cheerful and alive than I have been feeling for a long time, because in spite of myself my life has gradually become less precious, much less important and more a matter of indifference to me, or so it seemed. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Cuesmes, mid August 1879
Same letter...I like that he acknowledges how he is feeling, but is choosing to try and make it better - So instead of giving in to despair I chose active melancholy, in so far as I was capable of activity, in other words I chose the kind of melancholy that hopes, that strives and that seeks, in preference to the melancholy that despairs numbly and in distress.
So, I read along,1879 and much of 1880 pass pretty quickly because there is some sort of estrangement between him and the rest of his family. He doesn't write at all from August of 1879 to July of 1880. The July letter contains in large part his attempts to explain his non-conformity and seeming inability to be the person his family wants him to be. This letter sears, cuts, in its honesty. I don't even know where to begin to paste sections. If you like, you can pause here and follow this link to read the entire thing: http://www.webexhibits.org/vangogh/letter/8/133.htm Go ahead, I won't stop you. Read the entire thing and absorb it. It's worth your time. I'll still be here when you come back.
At this point, I have made it through to January of 1881. Good changes are happening (or at least changes that he seems positive about). He has left the coal country and found a drawing school in Brussels. With his characteristic fervor, he is throwing himself into drawing the way that he threw himself into his studies for the ministry. 1881 looks to be chock full of letters, so that must mean that he feels better during this year (at least I hope so). Another entry will follow in a day or so. Meanwhile, I think I am going to commit large parts of the letter of July 1880 to memory.
For the early part of the year he is working as an evangelist in the Borinage, a coal mining are in (I think) Belgium. His descriptions of the mines & miners & the world they inhabit are masterful. His artists eye combines with a ready sympathy that manages not to be cloying or pitying at all. He respects the miners even while he is a bit appalled at their condition.
His depression (or whatever his mental condition is) Is likely made worse by what he sees while working as an evangelist in this area. He cannot help but imagine, empathize, and despair (this is purely my interpretation, btw) - When I saw you again and walked with you, I had a feeling I used to have more often than I do now, namely that life is something good and precious which one should value, and I felt more cheerful and alive than I have been feeling for a long time, because in spite of myself my life has gradually become less precious, much less important and more a matter of indifference to me, or so it seemed. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Cuesmes, mid August 1879
Same letter...I like that he acknowledges how he is feeling, but is choosing to try and make it better - So instead of giving in to despair I chose active melancholy, in so far as I was capable of activity, in other words I chose the kind of melancholy that hopes, that strives and that seeks, in preference to the melancholy that despairs numbly and in distress.
So, I read along,1879 and much of 1880 pass pretty quickly because there is some sort of estrangement between him and the rest of his family. He doesn't write at all from August of 1879 to July of 1880. The July letter contains in large part his attempts to explain his non-conformity and seeming inability to be the person his family wants him to be. This letter sears, cuts, in its honesty. I don't even know where to begin to paste sections. If you like, you can pause here and follow this link to read the entire thing: http://www.webexhibits.org/vangogh/letter/8/133.htm Go ahead, I won't stop you. Read the entire thing and absorb it. It's worth your time. I'll still be here when you come back.
At this point, I have made it through to January of 1881. Good changes are happening (or at least changes that he seems positive about). He has left the coal country and found a drawing school in Brussels. With his characteristic fervor, he is throwing himself into drawing the way that he threw himself into his studies for the ministry. 1881 looks to be chock full of letters, so that must mean that he feels better during this year (at least I hope so). Another entry will follow in a day or so. Meanwhile, I think I am going to commit large parts of the letter of July 1880 to memory.
Laughter and Tears
Facebook status update: "Just finished watching all 3 episodes of the 2005 BBC "Casanova" starring Peter O'Toole & David Tennant.
Curse you, Russell Davies.
That is all."
Curse you, Russell Davies.
That is all."
Monday, December 17, 2012
Vincent, part two
Ok, so I am working my way through http://www.webexhibits.org/vangogh/ and reading each of the letters in the exhibit. I left off in January of 1878, so here I go again, posting good quotes from the next section of my reading :)
Is not life given us to become richer in spirit, even though the outward appearance may suffer?...I would feel more attraction for, and would rather come into contact with, one who was ugly or old or poor or in some way unhappy, but who, through experience and sorrow, had gained a mind and a soul. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Amsterdam, 9 January 1878
It must be good to die in the knowledge that one has done some truthful work and to know that, as a result, one will live on in the memory of at least a few and leave a good example for those who come after. A work that is good may not last forever, but the thought expressed by it will, and the work itself will surely survive for a very long time, and those who come later can do no more than follow in the footsteps of such predecessors and copy their example.- Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Amsterdam, 3 March 1878
I like all of this next letter. He talks about struggles and melancholy and the importance of working through those challenges, of striving. Then, he says this - It is good to love as many things as one can, for therein lies true strength, and those who loves much, do much and accomplish much, and whatever is done with love is done well...Love is the best and the noblest thing in the human heart, especially when it is tested by life as gold is tested by fire. Happy is he who has loved much, and is sure of himself, and although he may have wavered and doubted, he has kept that divine spark alive and returned to what was in the beginning and ever shall be. If only one keeps loving faithfully what is truly worth loving and does not squander one's love on trivial and insignificant and meaningless things then one will gradually obtain more light and grow stronger...The need is for nothing less than the infinite and the miraculous, and a man does well to be satisfied with nothing less, and not to feel easy until he has gained it...So let us go forward quietly, each on his own path, forever making for the light, `sursum corda' [lift up your hearts], and in the knowledge that we are as others are and that others are as we are and that it is right to love one another in the best possible way, believing all things, hoping for all things and enduring all things, and never failing. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Amsterdam, 3 April 1878
I had to resist pasting almost the entire letter. In his letter the next month, he could be talking about today.
At times it is good to see such simple things when one sees so many people who for different reasons have strayed from all that is natural and so have lost their real and inner life, and when one also sees so many who live in misery and horror - for in the evening and at night one sees all kinds of black figures wandering about, men as well as women, in whom the terror of the night is personified, and whose misery one must class among the things that have no name in any language. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Amsterdam, May 1878
There are some places here, thank God one finds them everywhere, where one feels more at home than anywhere else, where one gets a peculiar pristine feeling like that of homesickness, in which bitter melancholy plays some part; but yet its stimulation strengthens and cheers the mind, and gives us, we do not know how or why, new strength and ardour for our work...How rich art is, if one can only remember what one has seen, one is never empty of thoughts or truly lonely, never alone.- Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Laeken, 15 November 1878
Tonight's sitting only got me through 1878. His emotional struggles seem to be getting the better of him. He desperately wants to preach, but cannot cope with the studying required to get a theological position. It leads him increasingly into depression, and his parents are deeply concerned for his well-being. They try to help, but he doesn't always take it.
More next time, when I go into 1879.
Is not life given us to become richer in spirit, even though the outward appearance may suffer?...I would feel more attraction for, and would rather come into contact with, one who was ugly or old or poor or in some way unhappy, but who, through experience and sorrow, had gained a mind and a soul. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Amsterdam, 9 January 1878
It must be good to die in the knowledge that one has done some truthful work and to know that, as a result, one will live on in the memory of at least a few and leave a good example for those who come after. A work that is good may not last forever, but the thought expressed by it will, and the work itself will surely survive for a very long time, and those who come later can do no more than follow in the footsteps of such predecessors and copy their example.- Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Amsterdam, 3 March 1878
I like all of this next letter. He talks about struggles and melancholy and the importance of working through those challenges, of striving. Then, he says this - It is good to love as many things as one can, for therein lies true strength, and those who loves much, do much and accomplish much, and whatever is done with love is done well...Love is the best and the noblest thing in the human heart, especially when it is tested by life as gold is tested by fire. Happy is he who has loved much, and is sure of himself, and although he may have wavered and doubted, he has kept that divine spark alive and returned to what was in the beginning and ever shall be. If only one keeps loving faithfully what is truly worth loving and does not squander one's love on trivial and insignificant and meaningless things then one will gradually obtain more light and grow stronger...The need is for nothing less than the infinite and the miraculous, and a man does well to be satisfied with nothing less, and not to feel easy until he has gained it...So let us go forward quietly, each on his own path, forever making for the light, `sursum corda' [lift up your hearts], and in the knowledge that we are as others are and that others are as we are and that it is right to love one another in the best possible way, believing all things, hoping for all things and enduring all things, and never failing. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Amsterdam, 3 April 1878
I had to resist pasting almost the entire letter. In his letter the next month, he could be talking about today.
At times it is good to see such simple things when one sees so many people who for different reasons have strayed from all that is natural and so have lost their real and inner life, and when one also sees so many who live in misery and horror - for in the evening and at night one sees all kinds of black figures wandering about, men as well as women, in whom the terror of the night is personified, and whose misery one must class among the things that have no name in any language. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Amsterdam, May 1878
There are some places here, thank God one finds them everywhere, where one feels more at home than anywhere else, where one gets a peculiar pristine feeling like that of homesickness, in which bitter melancholy plays some part; but yet its stimulation strengthens and cheers the mind, and gives us, we do not know how or why, new strength and ardour for our work...How rich art is, if one can only remember what one has seen, one is never empty of thoughts or truly lonely, never alone.- Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Laeken, 15 November 1878
Tonight's sitting only got me through 1878. His emotional struggles seem to be getting the better of him. He desperately wants to preach, but cannot cope with the studying required to get a theological position. It leads him increasingly into depression, and his parents are deeply concerned for his well-being. They try to help, but he doesn't always take it.
More next time, when I go into 1879.
Sunday, December 16, 2012
Cave of Forgotten Dreams
Horses, lions, cave bears, rhinos, wolves, bison, aurochs,
ibex racing joyously up out of the earth - birthwaters
Stop and be silent – listen to the silence of the cave –
hear the heartbeat of the earth and maybe even your own
Flute made from vulture radius – soft reedy windy sound
–pentatonic scale
Buried by landslide 20,000 years ago – paintings date from
up to 32,000 years ago
Crooked finger man, six feet tall – making red palm prints
Dreaming of lions (no teeth or claws)
Layers on layers with 5,000 years between
Tracks and bones laying as they fell – calcite dripping
glacially slowly over everything
Cave bear
The arch over the river
Worship and celebrate
Cave as cathedral – there in the womb of the earth – child
footprint next to wolf print – what is the story it tells?
Fresh charcoal with calcite growing over it like
a frosted window pane
Vincent, part one
So, I found a web exhibition of all of Vincent Van Gogh's letters to his brother Theo & I have immersed myself in them. There follows quotes from various letters that I appreciated:
Do go on doing a lot of walking and keep up your love of nature, for that is the right way to understand art better and better. Painters understand nature and love her and teach us to see. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, London, January 1874
He that sincerely loves nature, finds pleasure everywhere - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, London, 30 April 1874
Don't regret that your life is too easy, mine is rather easy too; I think that life is pretty long and that the time will arrive soon enough in which “another shall gird thee and carry thee where thou wouldst not.” - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, London, 6 March 1875
He talks about the paintings that he is looking at in museums, and I find myself wondering how it would be to see art as he does. At one point in the January 1874 letter he tells Theo to simply appreciate, that people don't do this enough...something to work on for me? Possibly.
Another thought: The contrast between his letters and what family members say about him is striking
Letter from Vincent van Gogh to His Parents, Ramsgate, 14-17 April 1876 I just loved the imagery throughout this letter, especially his use of color.
Honestly, I have had some happy hours here, yet I don't have plain and complete confidence in this happiness, in this peace. The one may be the result of the other. Man rarely declares that he is satisfied; as soon as he finds that that it goes too well, the sooner he thinks that it will not go well enough. But this is in parenthesis; we must not talk about it, but continue quietly on our way. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Ramsgate, 6-8 May 1876
Let us bear love one unto another that God may augment and strengthen our love, and gather love around us, and if there should be no human being that you can love enough, love the town in which you dwell, as you do, too - don't I love Paris and London, though I am a child of the pine woods and of the beach at Ramsgate? - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Isleworth, 1 September 1876
Last night, after I had been at the office till one o'clock, I made a detour to the Grote Kerk [Great Church]; then, I went along the canal and past by the old gate, I finally arrived at the Nieuwe Kerk [New Church], then I returned home. It had snowed, a deep silence reigned over everything; I saw here and there little bright lights in the windows and, in the snow, the black silhouette of a night watchman. It was high tide, and beside the snow the canals and ships looked very dark. It was charming around the two churches. The sky, grey and foggy, only let the moonlight filter through. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Dordrecht, 28 February 1877
Here, the dark days before Christmas are as a long procession at the end of which shines such a light, the feast of the Nativity: the friendly lighthouse behind the rocks, when the water comes crashing against them on a dark night. This feast of Christmas has always been for us a bright spot, and may it always remain so.Here, the dark days before Christmas are as a long procession at the end of which shines such a light, the feast of the Nativity: the friendly lighthouse behind the rocks, when the water comes crashing against them on a dark night. This feast of Christmas has always been for us a bright spot, and may it always remain so. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Amsterdam, 19 November 1877
OK, I have made it to January of 1878. He's just 24 and still buried in studying to be a pastor. I don't know if he will manage to pass algebra. I will pause here and come back later. Just in case, here is the link to the entire exhibit: http://www.webexhibits.org/vangogh/
Do go on doing a lot of walking and keep up your love of nature, for that is the right way to understand art better and better. Painters understand nature and love her and teach us to see. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, London, January 1874
He that sincerely loves nature, finds pleasure everywhere - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, London, 30 April 1874
Don't regret that your life is too easy, mine is rather easy too; I think that life is pretty long and that the time will arrive soon enough in which “another shall gird thee and carry thee where thou wouldst not.” - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, London, 6 March 1875
He talks about the paintings that he is looking at in museums, and I find myself wondering how it would be to see art as he does. At one point in the January 1874 letter he tells Theo to simply appreciate, that people don't do this enough...something to work on for me? Possibly.
Another thought: The contrast between his letters and what family members say about him is striking
Letter from Vincent van Gogh to His Parents, Ramsgate, 14-17 April 1876 I just loved the imagery throughout this letter, especially his use of color.
Honestly, I have had some happy hours here, yet I don't have plain and complete confidence in this happiness, in this peace. The one may be the result of the other. Man rarely declares that he is satisfied; as soon as he finds that that it goes too well, the sooner he thinks that it will not go well enough. But this is in parenthesis; we must not talk about it, but continue quietly on our way. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Ramsgate, 6-8 May 1876
Let us bear love one unto another that God may augment and strengthen our love, and gather love around us, and if there should be no human being that you can love enough, love the town in which you dwell, as you do, too - don't I love Paris and London, though I am a child of the pine woods and of the beach at Ramsgate? - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Isleworth, 1 September 1876
Last night, after I had been at the office till one o'clock, I made a detour to the Grote Kerk [Great Church]; then, I went along the canal and past by the old gate, I finally arrived at the Nieuwe Kerk [New Church], then I returned home. It had snowed, a deep silence reigned over everything; I saw here and there little bright lights in the windows and, in the snow, the black silhouette of a night watchman. It was high tide, and beside the snow the canals and ships looked very dark. It was charming around the two churches. The sky, grey and foggy, only let the moonlight filter through. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Dordrecht, 28 February 1877
Here, the dark days before Christmas are as a long procession at the end of which shines such a light, the feast of the Nativity: the friendly lighthouse behind the rocks, when the water comes crashing against them on a dark night. This feast of Christmas has always been for us a bright spot, and may it always remain so.Here, the dark days before Christmas are as a long procession at the end of which shines such a light, the feast of the Nativity: the friendly lighthouse behind the rocks, when the water comes crashing against them on a dark night. This feast of Christmas has always been for us a bright spot, and may it always remain so. - Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, Amsterdam, 19 November 1877
OK, I have made it to January of 1878. He's just 24 and still buried in studying to be a pastor. I don't know if he will manage to pass algebra. I will pause here and come back later. Just in case, here is the link to the entire exhibit: http://www.webexhibits.org/vangogh/
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