The Sunday Salon

In some ways, I always feel sad about Sundays. I always feel as though something good has come to an end! It’s been a busy couple of weeks here, with a good friend from college coming to visit last weekend, up from Virginia. We explored some parts of Philly, including the Independence Seaport Museum at Penn’s Landing (which is literally a stone’s throw away from my apartment). The best parts of the museum are the cruiser Olympia and the submarine Becuna. The museum is one of the lesser-known attractions of Philadelphia, but I thought it was pretty interesting (and I’m not really into maritime history!). Sadly, my friend had a personal emergency and had to go back home, but it was good to play catch-up again after four years of not seeing each other.

This weekend has been pretty much one long veg-out session; I’ve been watching a marathon on DVD of Downton Abbey, an Upstairs Downstairs-esque Masterpiece Theatre series about one family and its servants in a large country estate in 1912 (it opens with the sinking of the Titanic, on which the heir to the estate has perished). Like Upstairs Downstairs, it’s a lot like a soap opera, but absolutely riveting. Maggie Smith plays a dowager countess with a very sharp tongue.

Recently I’ve been obsessing over something I can’t control, and so the best thing for me in those moments is to throw myself into work, which is what I have been doing. It’s worked for the most part, but as soon as I’m not busy, I start obsessing again! I don’t talk much about my personal or work life here, but certain things have been slightly difficult for me recently, and I’ve been searching for things to take my mind off all that. What hasn’t helped is that I recently finished reading a novel called Alas, Poor Lady (Rachel Ferguson), the desperately sad story of a late-Victorian spinster and what happens to her—not the best reading choice in my current mood! But I think re-reading an old favorite has compensated for it.

Yesterday I began re-reading Jane Eyre; the last time I did so was at least in high school! I keep forgetting how good it is! My mom and I are planning on going to see the new film adaptation at the Ritz tomorrow night, so I thought a re-read was very much in order. It’s amazing how a book like that is still highly readable, 170 years after it was published. And, I think, deep down every woman dreams of having that ‘Reader, I married him” moment herself!

I went to Borders during my lunch break on Thursday to use up the rest of a gift card, and bought the movie tie-in version of Jane Eyre (one can never own too many copies! In my 650-square-foot apartment alone there are six. Obsessed, much?). I normally despise movie tie-ins with a passion unrivaled, but I actually like the cover of this one. While I was at Borders, I was saddened by all the “everything must go” signs behind the counter…