Dear Marion,

Your letter about Mahler's Sixth Symphony, for which I thank you, 
is once more a poignant reminder of my esthetic limitations,
adopted as I have my father's protective mantra "Das hat mit
mir nichts zu tun." My interpretation of esthetic limitations
is a quasi biological one: that we assimilate the sounds and
images to the degree to which we are exposed to them; they
modify our souls or neurons, - as you prefer, - and that it is
principally lack of exposure which prevents us from learning
new imagery, new music, and - for that matter, new languages.
Mea culpa! It's my fault that I have not listened enough to
enough Mahler. My idolence has now created a gulf, especially
between the experiences of Nathaniel, who has been a Mahler
enthusiast for many years, and myself who keeps listening,
over and over again, to Bach sonatas and partitas. When I ask
myself, hidebound sinner that I am, whether at 81 it's too
late to change, I realize, to my embarrassment and shame,
that I don't really want to.

Playing with my computer: that's how I've kept myself busy,
installing a second video-capture card, reprogramming the 
machine to access both /dev/video0 and /dev/video1, nailing
three additional surveillance cameras like bird boxes, onto
two trees and onto the fascia of the porch roof. A fourth
camera sits next to my mother's prized "Rosenthaler" porcelain
lamp for an image of the living room, entrance hall, dining
room and kitchen. You'll see, appended to this letter.

The next status hearing in the Nantucket case in two weeks
and two days has been preoccupying my thoughts as I plot
strategy and tactics. The Nantucket plumbing authorities
promised to file their report on my defective plumbing by
the middle or end of this week. The Court has allowed them
until June 10. My friend Cynthia Behrman has been much taken
with the legal drama, and as is my habit, I've exploited my
correspondence (and my correspondent) with extensive
disquisitions on the subject, which I invite you to read
if your mood so directs. The URL's are
http://home.earthlink.net/~ej1meyer/2011/d110528.00
http://home.earthlink.net/~ej1meyer/2011/d110529.00
http://home.earthlink.net/~ej1meyer/2011/d110530.00
http://home.earthlink.net/~ej1meyer/2011/d110530.01
also a recent letter from Caner Centinkaya may interest you:
http://home.earthlink.net/~ej1meyer/2011/d110530.02

I've abstained from working on Chapter 46, for lack of time,
preoccupied as I have been with legal ruminations and
surveillance toys. I must still bury about 14 feet of cable,
late this afternoon when the air has cooled but the dew has
not yet condensed on the grass. Tomorrow or the next day
I must begin mowing the lawn, in anticipation of our departure
for Belmont on June 7th. I plan to begin packing with Margaret
on the morning of Sunday, June 5th.

Your impending encounter with the hematologist has been much
on my mind. In its context I am again impressed by the circumstance
that unnamed and undefined illness remains very much integral to
life. It's only the presumption to identify, name, prevent and 
"cure' it, which makes disease a harbinger of suffering and death.
Try not to let the physicians infect you with their diseases.
(I hope my comments don't seem too absurd to you.) My modest and
apologetic suggestion that there might be circumstances where it
would be helpful to the doctor and to you, for your physician to
discuss your "case" with me, arises from my own experience as a
physician, in that I have frequently found it very helpful, given
the akwwardness and imperfection of communication to talk also with
"a member of the family." How presumptuous of me!

Please telephone or e-mail me after the event.

Jochen