Arias I'm Stuck On

September 18, 2025

None of these are particularly deep cuts, and the ones I would like to write about aren’t particularly great pieces of music. And for an audience that doesn’t know opera, the “dying cat” singing would be a turnoff. So, here’s some I think I could show off that wouldn’t be offensive to someone without an opera palate.

La Bohème: "Che gelida manina"

Moods: Love at first sight, desperate curiosity of the other

Mimi’s candle has gone out and she’s out of matches. She asks her neighbor, Rodolfo, to light it. She loses her key and they both search for it on the floor. They live in a very poor building and a draft blows both their candles out.

A man like Rodolfo needs to use some slight dishonesty and gamesmanship to win a woman like Mimi. He finds the key and slips it in his pocket, then declares there’s no use searching in the dark. He uses the opportunity to introduce himself to her. The aria begins.

He introduces himself. A lot of words here to say he’s a broke writer. The shocking confession begins at 2:35 and climaxes perfectly at 3:45:

l'anima ho milionaria.
Talor dal mio forziere
ruban tutti i gioielli
due ladri: gli occhi belli.
V'entrar con voi pur ora
ed i miei sogni usati
e i bei sogni miei
tosto son dileguati.
Ma il furto non m'accora,
poiché vi ha preso stanza
la dolce speranza!

I’m a millionaire in spirit.
But sometimes my strong?box
is robbed of all its jewels
by two thieves: a pair of pretty eyes.
They came in now with you
and all my lovely dreams,
my dreams of the past,
were soon stolen away.
But the theft doesn't upset me,
since the empty place was filled
with hope.

Now the supplicant Rodolfo is on his knees, literally begging Mimi to find out who she is. Ramón Vargas delivers this role better than any other filmed performance I’m aware of. His vulnerable pleading is what does it for me. Who hasn’t been enamored by a stranger, just wishing you could just get on your knees and ask “Who are you?” Rodolfo gets to.

L’Elisir d’Amore: “Una furtiva lagrima”

Libretto

Moods: Triumph, requited love

Nemorino is a peasant and a fool hopelessly in love with Adina, a landowner. He gets swindled by a traveling “doctor” into buying a love potion which is actually wine. It doesn’t work. He enlists in the army and uses the bonus to purchase even more.

There’s a party and the women are all over him, as the entire village found out before our couple that Nemorino’s uncle has died and he just inherited a fortune. Now, he’s drunk and is convinced the potion has worked. He notices a tear on Adina’s cheek and takes this as evidence of her jealousy. Actually, she found out the poor idiot spent his entire recruitment bonus on her. The aria begins.

Le Nozze di Figaro: “Porgi, Amor”

Moods: please God bring him or her back

Mozart. Not much to say here. Just sad and whiny. Stream the full thing wherever you’d like, the linked video isn’t complete but I think you must see what’s happening on the stage.

Serse: “Ombra mai fu”

Moods: Security in another

Baroque, Handel. He’s singing to a shade tree. Written for castrato, nowadays commonly sung by mezzo-soprano. Really nice with a body high.

Norfolk and Western Railway

September 7, 2025

I saw your boy at the switchyard. Frailer than usual. He was watching the Pullman trains go by. Think he wanted to hop a freighter, but I don’t think he’s nimble enough to catch a ladder. He’ll slip and lose his legs.

Reckon he knows that and we’ll see him in Ms. Jones’ class. He’ll be too shy to read his book report, just like the last five grades. But she’ll give him a pass again.

Remedia Amoris

September 1, 2025

I have been stir-crazy, and combined with travel stress I haven’t been completely stable. Lovesickness and mild erotomania have possessed me.

I went looking for a cure. I found Remedia Amoris, a didactic poem by Ovid written circa 2 AD. Ovid presents himself as a physician curing you of the disease known as love. It is the follow-up to the Ars Amatoria, which is about how to find and keep love. Both works are for men and women.

Here's his advice:

• Get busy. Work for the courts, join the army, or take up farming.
• Do not use sorcery.
• Tally up the betrayals and grievances. Ovid tells us his lover had ugly arms.
• Exaggerate or twist benign (or even good) qualities into bad ones. Ovid’s example: if she’s a little heavy, now you must believe she’s fat.
• Get her into situations where her bad qualities show. Examples: If she has bad teeth, make her smile. If she has a bad voice, make her sing.
• Catch her in the morning before she has the chance to do her makeup. Ovid: catch her “disarmed”.
• Get a second lover. Your energies will be split between the two.
• Don’t be alone.
• Don’t meet her. Don’t meet her family nor her servants. Move if you must.
• Don’t hate her. It enrages Heaven and the man that hates, loves.
• Burn your letters.
• Throw out her portrait.
• Move out of the place that you shared.
• Avoid romantic poetry.
• Don’t drink. Wine inspires lust. If you must drink, drink so much that you can’t think.

Uber driver

August 28, 2025

I took an uber from the train station. He was a Mexican dude, throwing "foo"s and "ese"s all over the place. He asked me what I do and I thought of a way to explain concisely my very convoluted situation of dropping out, giving away all my stuff, and working on boats. All I said is I'm changing careers for the money. He clocked that I looked Latino and asked me about that. He told me about how us Mexicans have always been here before the United States, then in the very same breath, completely seriously, suggested that I join ICE for the $50,000 bonus!

The conversation went to ways of making quick money. The usual stuff like hitting the oil rig, Alaskan crab fishing, and drug trafficking. He did ten years in prison for smuggling heroin over the border. I asked him how many times he got away with it. Ten. This guy wasn't stupid. He was a historian, once, and has some legit corporate job now. I told him I couldn't be a cop and he kept pressing me on that, how good the benefits are, the whole pitch. Same thing with the Army. His brother's in. "Ay, that foo's about to retire."

He didn't seem to understand having a conscience when making money. Or maybe he thought I was like him when he heard what I was up to, someone who will do anything for a dollar no matter the stigma, risk, or pain. With how much I've blown up my life for some quick boat money, I guess I am a bit like him.