Work, Violin and Sybaritic Fragrances

It was the last day of the new week, and as two colleagues were missing in the little team I am in, it was quiet. I congregated at the lunch table again, which was at least more sociable. There was an amusing and edifying exchange when two colleagues pretended to greet each other extremely rudely, and a third colleague took it seriously. He said in a dignified (but not obnoxious) way that perhaps they should 'express their respect for each other in other terms,' like a school teacher. I was grinning broadly at the whole dialogue, while secretly worried that the fact I wasn't shocked at the play-rudeness earlier indicated that I was made of a less fine fibre than the third colleague.

Later in the day I had a grand inspiration of ordering my teammates to be 'king for a week' of the team. Otherwise I fear I will never loosen the reins of power enough for them to see the whole spectrum of tasks that the full team does, and for example tasks of mine which someone else will need to do if I am ever absent for more than a day. My brother, the present king, has already shown a few simplifications that can save time in the way these tasks are done... Underlining the idea that if there is a slow and stupid way to do something, I will invariably bite down on it like a dog bites down on a bone, then latch onto it and keep trying to chew through until it is pried loose from my jaws. (Not the best simile.)

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I am reading Matthew Arnold's Culture and Anarchy hastily so that I can stop wallowing through it day after day. But there was a passage that evinced signs of 'empathy' and 'physically experiencing the world outside one's library' that, to be honest, was so shocking that I haven't fully recovered from my dumbfoundedness yet. Thankfully there's lots of condescending nonsense mixed in after that, to re-ground me in familiar reality.

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I recorded myself playing the violin during the weekend, with my desktop computer. Partly the recording technology is at fault, maybe. But the tone was rustic, though not so unsophisticated when I managed to get in the swing of things. Although I've moved past a few quirks left over from my infant years learning the instrument, I definitely need to have a listener point out faults that are glaringly evident to an audience. Rather than beg my uncle (because he has suffered through violin pedagogy enough, I imagine) to give me a crash course, I wrote an email to the music school this evening, asking to join a group lesson before the summer school holidays. That said, I really hope that lessons, with the self-consciousness due to public playing and analytical thinking, as well as the mechanical approach of being drilled, won't ruin the enjoyment I've been getting out of the violin practice.  — E.g. out of Kreutzer études, even when (or, especially if?) I find out I've been playing them in the wrong key after minutes of intense squeaking.

But I am continuing my private practice schedule, not as religiously when it comes to reading up on technique, admittedly. It includes more listening to violin recordings. I doubt it's solid reasoning, but I've been listening to Yehudi Menuhin recordings particularly because I presume he has fewer quirks that I would be likely to badly imitate. It's easy to put a lot of 'colour' in to one's intonation, for example, but difficult to take it back out again; and I'm anxious enough for correctness and for cold perfection to want to know how to keep it restrained.

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I am becoming irritated at the continuing winter. But during the weekend I went on a luxury shopping trip that cheered me up. I still consider Kadewe as a locus of seamy decadence; and feel out of place in it because I am such a Before in any 'makeover' scenario.

But I came back with a French scented berry candle (it smells like roses rather than berries, I think, and it catapults me forward into June despite the dim February light and draughts) and perfume samples, as well as a pale green moringa scent I'm not entirely sure about. The candles and perfumes are like having spring and summer flowers in one's room.

A Boring Girly Paragraph That No One Is Forced To Read:
I decided to celebrate some of this false spring at work today. I sprayed some perfume on my sweatshirt at arm's length this morning, gingerly because I've had terrible mistakes with over-dousing. Also, I wore the first lipstick I ever bought for myself at work. It is almost invisible, and I want to use it before it expires. I am glad that make-up isn't de rigueur in Germany as it was in Canada. But I want to learn the lesson not to care about make-up either way, and wearing it in the first place and seeing that it is not a big deal (except insofar as it is an enormous pain in the neck to use it refinedly) should be helpful. That said, my lipstick barely helps with this training of character; it is tasteful and subtle, both optically and weight-wise. ('A colour that won't scare you when you look in the mirror,' as the make-up counter saleslady endearingly put it, after I explained that I have rarely worn make-up.) Lastly, as honesty compels me to admit, the lipstick has a rather fake raspberry fragrance that reminds me of candy; wearing it is far more enjoyable for that reason than it ought to be for a grown woman.