So, I was shopping at the Harlem Trader Joe’s on Tuesday, and they were playing a reggae mix in the place. Then this one came on. I don’t mind having this one stuck in my head nonstop. See, I had a roommate way back in Texas, who was a huge Bob Marley fan. We listened to a bunch of reggae music together, hanging out and playing video games.
Blog
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Short Story Review: “Keuka Lake” by Joseph O’Neill
(The short story “Keuka Lake” by Joseph O’Neill appeared in the March 3rd, 2025 issue of The New Yorker.)
Photograph by Annie Collinge for The New Yorker
I don’t know if you know this, but grief is a really popular theme for short stories. (That and bad relationships with parents, but that’s a story for another day.) Grief lends itself easily to the dramatic, and is also individualistic, and it can also be shocking as to what emotions and memories it will bring up. Everyone grieves differently, and maybe I was a little flippant at the start of this, because maybe my past grief still makes me uncomfortable. Parts of “Keuka Lake” tapped on my past grief, but in the end Joseph O’Neill’s story meandered, leaving an unsteady feeling to the work.
The story starts off with a banger of a first paragraph, letting us know that Nadia, the protagonist, has been involved with someone from a teenager to the day she became a widower at fifty-four. Her husband was killed in a car crash near a town in the Finger Lakes, and Nadia never knew why her husband was driving up there. And then the story just flutters about. We follow Nadia to a visit to her sister on Montreal, and then an early return to the States, where she gets a speeding ticket. She then looks up a former boyfriend, who is a lawyer, to take care of the ticket, and though she never sees the lawyer, Nadia engages his secretary to look into the reasons why her husband was in the Finger Lakes.
I say that the story “meanders” and “flutters” because the story never feels like it takes anyone seriously. The tone that is taken towards everyone that isn’t Nadia is condescending and rather dismissive. I understand that Nadia is lost without her husband, and she isn’t sure how to react or behave normally, as everything has a level of annoyance to her. But at the end of the story, I can’t say conclusively that Nadia learned anything. There is no catharsis, or release, or even a realization of anything. I believe the last section of the story was to provide that, but it felt too random and disjointed, though I understood that Keuka Lake is near the town where Nadia’s husband was killed, and I guess we are all the fish in our grief.
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Random Pictures
Busy day, and trouble finding a topic, so how about the last five pictures off my phone.
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Site Redesign… Eventually
I have been thinking about this for awhile now; I need to redesign the site here. It feels like I need to update some stuff, maybe make it look a little better. To be honest, I have never found a layout that works for me, in all the years that I have tried creating a blog site. Even going back to 1999, and my first Blogger page. Building a page and site and all of this has never produced a site that I was comfortable with.
I know the first question one needs to ask themselves when they start building out their site, is what is the purpose? What is the point? Well, I want to place that I can write daily.
Okay, mission accomplished.
But… I must say that the reason just about all of you come to this site, talking like 75% of you, is to read the reviews I write. So, that would lead me to believe that I should play up the review stuff, and not do too much of the “personal blog stuff.”
I don’t know… I never feel comfortable with building this thing. Makes me feel a little selfconscious, and also rather clueless to technology.
You know… I’m just going to copy Fox Reviews Rock layout. It’s simple, effective, and rocks. It’s a cooI site and I like what they do.
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ODDS and ENDS: Right on Time, Sweaters, and Well Said
(Line up to the mind cemetery…)
So, we have had a good old fashion winter up here in New York City. It’s cold all the time, been snowing regularly, and again it’s been very cold. Now, this week hasn’t been the coldest week this winter, as we did have a couple of days in the single digits in January, but in the 20’s with wind, that’s rather chilly, too. And with the temp being so low, it happened in our house; all three of us on Wednesday said the same thing – “I’m ready for Spring.” Looking at the calendar, I see that it’s late February, which means we are right on time for the declaration for the seasons to change. Honestly, you could set a watch by it. Same time every winter, we say the same thing – “I’m ready for the seasons to change.”
Though the downside of wanting the seasons to change is that the clock has started ticking for the time I have left with my sweaters. The cardigans, pullovers, jumpers, fisherman’s, and Irish sweaters; I do love them all. I will even through in sweatshirts, as I received a few for Christmas, and they are awesome. Sure, there is still a lot of cold weather to get through, and even chilly nights in Spring. But the clock is ticking.
