On Trivial (and Not So Trivial) Things

We went to a dinner tonight, a thank you dinner at Ingleside Winery, deep in the farming heart of King George Co, a fund-raising thank-you for a new parish hall. It was a little bit unaccustomed: we don't normally do this sort of thing, but thought it would be fun, an almost-date. It turned out to be a rollicking good time: we sat with an older couple who had been parishioners for over 40 years, who were natives of the area, and the gentleman's maternal grandfather had been sent through Ellis Island from Calabria . . . and the other, a couple of roughly our age from Puerto Rico. The lawyer gentleman was telling his family history and his wife dared us to guess how much a thousand acres plus a big house had cost in 1905, when the immigrant-doctor had bought it after seeing it on the Potomac, and about fell of her chair when I guessed the right amount ($2,000). She said I was the first person ever to get it right! How funny.
And then . . . Oh, the architect for the hall had travelled down from DC and gave a brief speech, and after he quoted Ruskin, I said, I MUST SPEAK WITH THIS MAN. So the older lady gave me a verbal shove (which I always need) and I did, and IT WAS AMAZING. If I had had any moxie at all, I would have asked him to stop by our house on his way home, because it's been YEARS since I've heard anyone mention Ruskin!
Is that from the Seven Lamps??!! i asked, I'm sure over -eager, and "Why, yes! I didn't expect anyone to catch the reference! . . ."
and we talked of such things, and of the necessity of religion, and he critiqued Christopher  Alexander, of Pattern Language, as being overly mathematical and overanalysing the natural human activity of architecture and community-planning. (sorry, Mr Ben!!!) It was glorious, and it made me late for my babysitter YET AGAIN.
OH, I miss it! I miss Ruskin and Pater and Pieper and I MISS IT. I have things to say, world, about Truth and Beauty and Goodness and yes even architecture!!!!
and i find, now, I have no heart for the frivolous thing: read Ruskin. hairbrushes to follow.