All Souls' Day

After the all-important Halloween on Monday, and the, for some, even more important Ognissanto (All Saints' Day) yesterday, how about a brief tribute to today's lesser-known holiday, All Souls' Day. If Halloween is the day the dead are permitted to walk the earth, and Ognissanto is the day we celebrate all the saints in heaven, All Souls' Day is the day to reflect upon and remember those we have personally lost, and (if you're Catholic) pray for their speedy passage through Purgatory and onto Paradise.

William Adolphe Bouguereau

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Faith's Vase

The 29th comes around faster and faster every month! Five months have absolutely flown by!

Last month I wrote about finding my great-great-grandmother's wedding ring, and how I didn't know it yet, but that ring would subtly steer the course of my life (if you believe in that kind of thing). I also promised that in this post I would explain how a 150-year-old band of gold could have such mystical powers, but I lied. I can't do that yet. I have to tell a little more of the back story first.

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On Being a Woman, by Dorothy Parker

On Being a Woman

"Why is it, when I am in Rome,
I'd give an eye to be at home,
But when on native earth I be,
My soul is sick for Italy?

And why with you, my love, my lord,
Am I spectacularly bored,
Yet do you up and leave me-- then
I scream to have you back again?"


Dorothy Parker (1893-1967)


This woman just got it. Perennially unlucky in love, she made light of her disappointment, never taking herself too seriously, and made us all laugh along with her. Short, sweet, with clever rhymes and immaculate meter, her poems are unmistakable, tripping of the tongue with a delightful cadence. Dorothy was sarcastic, witty and cynical to the extreme, but with such a charming touch of wistfulness and playfulness, you can't help but love her. And I can't imagine there's a woman alive who couldn't identify with her.

Here is one of my favorites:

"Oh, life is a glorious cycle of song,
A medley of extemporanea;
And love is a thing that can never go wrong;
And I am Marie of Romania."


Or how about this one?

"Four be the things I am wiser to know:
Idleness, sorrow, a friend, and a foe.
Four be the things I'd been better without:
Love, curiosity, freckles, and doubt.
Three be the things I shall never attain:
Envy, content, and sufficient champagne.
Three be the things I shall have till I die:
Laughter and hope and a sock in the eye."


When asked at the Algonquin Round Table to discuss Horticulture, she declared:
"You can lead a whore-to-culture, but you can't make her think."


Lastly, I present the very first Dorothy quote I ever heard. When I was growing up, our fantastic next door neighbor loved to quote it. I never knew who had said it until a close friend introduced me to the inimitable Ms. Parker. I advise you memorize it; it'll make you the hit of any party:

"I love a martini,
but two at the most:
with three I'm under the table,
with four I'm under my host."

 All quotations by Dorothy Parker

Photo Sources: 1, 2,

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