hrj

Just a very brief note today, because I've been out seeing Art in the Chicago Art Institute, and taking an architecture cruise around the waterways of Chicago (somehow I never thought of Chicago as being a "river city"), and I'm about to go out to see a show (which will probably supply the fodder for tomorrow's review post).

I was born in 1958. And that means that today I am 58 years old. And that means that I have lived through the same number of years as had passed between 1900 and the time of my birth. For purely arbitrary reasons, I tend to consider 1900 as the cut-off between "modern times" and "historic times". 1900 was roughly around when my grandparents were born. I suppose, by that metric, the date of my birth might be "historic times" for people being born today. (I know a lot of people who have a much more recent cut-off for "historic times", though.)

I certainly feel like I've lived through changes that are equivalent to those that happened in the first half of the 20th century. The experiences and expectations and normalities of the era I was born into must seem utterly fictional to kids today.

Heh. "Kids today." I have a lawn, but it's ok if you play on it. That's what lawns are for.

I'd like to give a public thank you to the folks who took up my birthday request to go forth and say nice things about my books in public. It was just exactly what I wanted.