How long pray will you abuse my patience, a quote from the Roman orator and lawyer Cicero’s first oration against Cataline. The actual quote translates more or less as How long pray will you take advantage of my patience? A quote that is in many ways similar to Mrs. Dorothy Parker‘s famous, “What fresh Hell is this”? A quip, it is said, that she uttered when her doorbell rang. Probably during cocktail hour, and if history is correct the writers of the Algonquin Roundtablemade cocktail hour last all day. And night. “What Fresh Hell is This” is a feeling that arises for me when my partner’s phone rings and it is his ex-wife. Such things do not usually grate on me but for dramatic effect does so at ungodly times, such as during intimate moments. Or at 9 am. A time when I sleep soundly. Mrs Parker, I know how ya feel I say as I reach for a dirty martini (in my imagination) because hey, 9 am is too early for that particular cocktail, but not too early for a Bloody Mary perhaps? Does the rate of alcoholism rise when we are in relationships? I must search the Internet today for that particular factoid. For relationship advice however we must not turn to our Roman orator Cicero, because of him, we do know that he married and divorced Publilia all in the same year, 46 BC.
How long pray will you abuse my patience?
05 Saturday May 2012
Posted in just beautiful things
AS a writer one may plagiarise sometimes, from oneself of course. As follows is an updated version of an earlier rant.
a great description of that feeling when the phone rings or the door bells klangs at an unGodly hour. I reach for the gun I don’t have and crawl out of bed in case it is someone I have to talk to and try not to be too surly