Jewish Relief Agency: A Miesian Out of the Box Concept

This video brings a lump to my throat.
I am so honored that I know some of the folks responsible for this amazing food-relief agency in Philly.
And I know that if ever we needed the help, we could get it from JRA.

 

Just tonight I was looking at a book entitled 50 Bauhaus Icons You Should Know.  Not too impressed, but I always thought that Mies van der Rohe coined the concept of thinking out of the box.  Didn't think my memory was shot yet, but I found little online to back myself up.  Not that I'm wrong.  And isn't he also credited with "form follows function"?  Yet the wiki entry gives credit to Louis Sullivan.  Must be my 40 year old brain talking.

JRA calls their video Beyond the Box, and I'm good with that.

But the founders of the agency are out-of-the-box thinkers, whether they're interested in the Bauhaus or not.

On Purging, Winona Ryder and J.D. Salinger

Many years ago I was terribly impressed upon reading about Winona Ryder's habit of collecting old copies of Catcher in the Rye that I decided I wanted to do the same.  Of course I loved Holden Caulfield just as much as the next gal, but I never thought of the Winona's very clever idea of collecting them.  Since I always had great respect for her work and style, this seemed like a great idea.  Not that I didn't trust my memory, but of course I did my online research about this topic, and indeed she spoke a few years ago about how many of her old interviews referenced J.D. Salinger.  My desire to collect them, though, ended up growing to a few other titles, as I grew to love Salinger dearly the more I read him.  In the mid '00s when Stango and I lived in New Haven, the city where I birthed Concealed Light and the Wolfman, I would envision myself in the 1950s waiting on the train platform in New Haven, as was detailed in a different seminal Salinger book Franny and Zooey.  Girl can dream.

Then reality struck:  it wasn't so easy in the mid 90s to simply pick up used editions of Catcher in the Rye anywhere in the northeast.  Sure I had the time as a single working woman, but visits to bookstores in Cambridge, Providence and New York City were all quickly visits in vain.  Ithaca?  Maybe.  Toronto, Burlington and the Berkshires were better scouting sites.

I write all of this because while Concealed Light was away at camp in July I managed to purge out lots of unneeded items from clothing to toys to books.  I believe at least 10 bags of stuff were donated.  Probably will regret one or two of them, but in keeping with Miesian minimalism of less is more to which I strive, I was happy to see it all go.

But not my Salingers.

They stay.

my 2 paperbacks and a hard copy of Catcher in The Rye

Funny thing about the original reader of this book I purchased in a used book store probably in the Berkshires is that I knew David Barash!  Nice guy.  I think I told him once that I had his high school copy.

  

Do I care that there is fraying on the binding?

From my hardcopy of Catcher in the Rye:  not a first edition but I imagine this was published for a book club or library edition.  Still a pretty good find for minimal money:  I could not afford to spend more than $15

So, the hardback isn't in great condition.  I don't care!

Worthy reads in their own right.   Did Wes Anderson study the Glass family and contemporize them in his various films?  

My Salinger collection as a whole.  I know, this is a modest collection.  We're not talking to Sotheby's, people!