upsidedown-ness

Just back from talking on Gaston Bachelard and Joseph Cornell in Dallas -- great Bachelard conference at the Dallas Institute, such interesting talks and people... and imagine seeing To Kill a Mockingbird as a play (!). Who wouldn't miss Gregory Peck, but that heartrending line to the young girl Scout: "Stand up... your father is passing by" still leaps out at you... Great delights of cuisine at the Arts Center, in a southern place, Screen Door (crayfish dip!) and a Japanese place with amazing immense shrimp..
And I finally got to Fort Worth to those grand museums, the Kimbell, with the Caravaggio exhibit, and the Modern Museum with its lovely pool. Fully worth the trip, before the long way to Sydney, a city I really love.
Of course, I had the celebrated Sydney rock oysters, small and intense, and larger ones from Tasmania, and had an allday ferry pass from Circular Quay, hung out on every ferry deck and went on everywhich passage, as far as I could go, to Manly and past Cockatoo Island, and Paramatta (only there we had to take a bus, because of the tides) and in between, went to the Rocks to explore, at Fine Wine and Foods on Argyle Street, a 3 course delight for lunch at 19 Australian dollars, and outside at the Orient Hotel in the sun. Everywhere, the great white wines, and Cooper beer on draft. How I love Sydney -- the incredibly extensive Fish Market and the Deep Fried Mud Crab at the Golden Century! what to say, wish it were nearer. I went to Pinter's No Man's Landin the Opera House, and the Australian museum, mostly to read about the aborigines, now called indigenous persons, because of the Torres Strait people. Days of repentance and reconciliation and still going on -- in Adelaide, where I went to speak in honour of Hazel Rowley, on biography and obsession, I was taken to the memorial at what was Colebrook House to the indigenous families from whom the children were removed: the Lost Generations, as also happened in England. Sobering beyond belief, the whole trip.
And I still feel upside down...