Privilege Blog

A Small Favor, Or, Saturday Morning at 8:54am

I have a small favor to ask.

Many will remember my father, Professor C. from his posts here on the blog. (You can find them by searching on “Professor C.” in the side search bar.)

Professor C. spent a few days in the hospital this week. What we might call a heart “event.” Difficult to call it an attack, nothing so pronounced. But hospitals can be unpleasant, so we are all happy he’s home and on the mend. Perhaps none so happy as he himself. The food was dreadful.

Here’s the favor. By now you know my family of origin weren’t big on displays of unfettered feeling. But we did and do believe in civility, and the support of community. So if you’ve a moment, if you wouldn’t mind, I would deeply appreciate any comments today in the way of an articulated wave to my papa. I suppose it’s a warm formality that I’m thinking of.

Also, no need to worry about me, I am fine, and if I am wished well my culture will cause me to feel that I am asking for unwarranted attention. Sounds silly, but there you have it. All of us have our families of origins, maybe we’ve all grown up quite differently, but I imagine we share Get Well Soon.

Also waving.

Thank you in advance.

I hope winter is heading out everywhere it needs to be gone, and starting to show its face where appropriate. I also hope, as always, that you have a good weekend.

84 Responses

  1. Professor C – So sorry to hear that you have had to be in the hospital and hope that you will feel better soon. Take care.

  2. Best wishes for a swift return to health, Professor C. Hospital stays are miserable, I’m glad to hear you are home!

  3. Dear Professor C,
    Warmest wishes to you for a swift convalescence and a return to the activities that make you happiest! Here’s a toast to home cooking, too!

  4. Dear Professor C,
    Wishing you a speedy recovery! Glad you are home. It is always so nice to be back in your own bed. Take care.

  5. Hi to Lisa’s very brilliant and can I add, handsome, father. Wishing you a speedy recovery, and welcome back home.

  6. Dear Professor C:
    Greetings from Vancouver Canada. Please accept my best wishes for a full recovery.
    Sincerely,
    JDL

  7. From a reader in the very west of Wales! Glad you are well enough to be at home. Hospital food is just as bad here!

  8. Dear Professor C:

    From a reader who much enjoyed your articles on this blog, best wishes for a speedy recovery and no more hospital food!

  9. Another hello from Vancouver. Glad to hear you are out of the hospital and safely back at home. Hope you will feel better soon!
    Suz from Vancouver

  10. Best wishes for a complete recovery to Professor C. from Croatia !
    Staying in a hospital would be unpleasant even for a healthy people!
    Take care,
    Dottoressa

  11. I hope you’re able to get outside and enjoy this lovely weather we’re having in beautiful Northern California, some healthy food, naps in the sunlight, a walk perhaps, and of course a glass of lovely red wine. Be very good to yourself.

  12. Best wishes for a speedy recovery from the beautiful state of Idaho. ( this from a UCB grad who grew up in the Bay Area).

  13. Professor C: glad you are on the mend. Mending goes so well in sunshine – get some sunshine today & continue to feel better. xoxo

  14. Professor C., best wishes for your recovery and your continued good health from a soon-to-be Ph.D. <3

  15. It is great to hear that you have escaped from the hospital Professor C, and are safely ensconced at home. Best wishes for a speedy recovery.

  16. Dear Professor C,
    Greetings from Uppsala, Sweden. Wishing you a swift full recovery, and a lovely summer to enjoy.

  17. Hello, Professor C,

    Greetings from the Washington, DC area. Be kind to yourself. Recovery takes time but you will soon feel better and more like your normal self, or even better than before! Revel in home cooked meals and the comfort of your own bed.

    Very best wishes!

  18. Dear Professor C, I wish you a speedy return to top-notch health and home cooking, warmest regards from Cambridge, UK.

  19. Howdy Prof C
    Nothing but nothing worse than bad grub.
    Awful glad you got sprung.
    Stay out of those dang hospitals and have yourself a special treat today.
    Warmest Regards from Deep East Texas.

  20. Hello Professor C.

    Warmest wishes for your quick return to good health, and if you have been to Taiwan, you know just how warm that can be! Take good care of yourself, and know that the influence of your teaching and personality is needed and felt all over the world.

    Very sincerely, Jim

  21. Wishing you a quick recovery Prof. C. (The above is very selfish. I loved your posts on James and hope we might see a few more).

  22. Professor C, sorry to hear you were in the hospital this week but happy to hear you are home and on the mend! Hope you have something great for dinner to wipe out the memory of hospital food.

  23. Sending a “get well soon!” from the southwest, and a congratulations on no longer having to have your toast steamed and your vegetables desiccated and your proteins vulcanized by the hospital!

  24. Hospital food is the worst! Glad to hear you’re on your way to recovery, Professor C.

  25. Hi Prof C, I just spent 24 hours with my own Prof C, my dear old dad of 87; widowed 3 years ago and livibg indepentendly for the first time ever. He is just back from a visit to NYC to celebrate a 90 year old friend’s birthday and his next trip is to the Venice Biennale where two former pupils are the curators this year. He is an inspiration to his family and friends. And I am sure you are his twin on the West Coast! Lots of love from Ireland.

  26. Professor C, I’m sending you warm wishes from Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. So glad you are home from the hospital — hope you feel better soon.

  27. Wishing you a speedy and full recovery. Be sure to get the best diagnostic advise possible… Nobody likes to be unwell and getting better depends greatly on medical expertise. As you know, experts are not all equal. All the best, Susan

  28. Well, Professor C, if all these good wishes don’t perk you up and bring a smile to your (handsome) face, then all I can say is that you have imbibed a little too much of the Swift koolaid!

    But as your friend of some fifty-plus years, I will add my own heartfelt wishes for your speedy return to the land of the well-fed and well-engaged with life, and with many good thoughts as well to your beloved Brigitte (Gitta), who I am sure is giving you the best of care – and the best of reasons to wake up every morning with a smile on your face!

    Here’s to many more good mornings –

    All love,
    Vicky (as was)

  29. To Professor C. wishing you all the best from the East Bay! Hoping you have a terrific meal on this glorious Saturday!

  30. Prof C.

    Glad you’re out of that dreadful place!
    Hope you’re feeling better soon.

  31. Professor C – I am wishing you every wellness. I’m also quite sure that your family is taking excellent care of you and ensuring that you’re getting some much tastier food than that which you’ve endured for the last few days :-) Best, Kristin

  32. Waving hello Professor C. from the Mountain West. It’s a beautiful spring day here in Salt Lake City, Utah. I hope you are enjoying the same kind of day as well. Glad you are home where you are comfortable and the food is good. Green and red jello are good incentives to stay away from the hospital. Good health and best wishes. Amelia

  33. Professor C, welcome home! We have MISSED you around here! Thankful, though, that Lisa has dedicated a file exclusively for your essays, a file I visit and revisit frequently. Indeed, this morning I enjoyed “A Passage to India” all over again as though it were the first time, a time-lapse point you made much better than I in the essay itself.

    While they’ve captured you under house arrest [in a bed/in a chair/on a chaise], please do consider your next topic for our consideration. As I said, we have missed you!

    Sending buckets of Yankee-inappropriate, Deep South-gushing HUGS, and even wild extravagant LOVE, your fan from Amelia Island, Florida.

  34. Much love, light and prayer for a speedy recovery from Sydney, Australia, Professor C.

    I may have used too many commas in that sentence. Apologies.

    SSG xxx

  35. Dear Prof C, sending you very best wishes for speedy recovery. Hospitals, although necessary, are a very tough place to find yourself in. Just brought my 90 year old mum home from hospital this a.m and she has had the first restful sleep in 2 weeks. We spent the evening planning her first breakfast for tomorrow. Portez-vous bien et beaucoups de joies dans les jours a venir. Saluts de Montreal Canada! Kirin

  36. Dear Professor C,

    Hoping your recovery is swift and uneventful. Congratulations on making good on your escape from the hospital :-)

    Regards from Michigan,
    Kris

  37. Happy Sunday to you, Professor C! I hope your weekend has been bright, relaxing, beautiful, and filled with good food! I’m so glad that you have that hospital stay behind you! Take care and enjoy yourself, your people, and any dogs who happen to be around.

    Wishing you all health and happiness from an unseasonably cool, breezy, lovely spring in Alabama,
    Mandy

  38. Wishing you a speedy recovery, Professor C. Waving from Ottawa, Canada where we are just removing our winter boots and soaking up some spring sunshine. Now that you are home, may you do the same. Well, except for the winter boots part. Ha.

  39. Dear Professor C,
    So glad you are resting comfortably at home. From one former heart patient to another (I had a procedure done last July), I wish you a full and quick recovery. Perhaps you can take the time to read or reread a cherished book or take gentle walks with friends and family. As Mr. Spock used to say on Star Trek, “Live long and prosper.”
    Regards from Concord, MA,
    Karen

  40. Professor C I am wishing you all the best health (and good food at home) from Guelph, Ontario. I’m so sorry to hear you had to have a trip to the hospital. I hope you recover fully, and soon.
    My own dear father is in hospital in Atlanta and he also said the food is dreadful.
    Cheers to you Professor xox

  41. Best Wishes for a speedy recovery, Professor C!Your daughter’s musings have entertained, educated and challenged me over the years. I am thankful to have found her on the internet. Hope you can return to your activities soon!

  42. Professor C., it is heartening to hear of your return home and your escape from hospital food – my father once shared his profound relief on just such an occasion and his almost palpable pleasure made a great impression on me. All best wishes for speedy recovery to you!

  43. Dear Professor C – so glad you are back home & getting better . I have just spent quite some time reading your literature/film posts and so also hope your recovery leads to more posts of the same calibre !

  44. Slàinte mhòr agus a h-uile beannachd duibh, sir. I hope to have the pleasure of encountering you here again one day.

  45. Dear Professor C,

    Knowing a little bit about your wonderful daughter, Lisa, and what a clever writer she is, leads me to believe that she was raised by parents that not only valued education, but wit and integrity, as well. I, too, value higher education and come from a family of witty educators of the utmost integrity.

    I wish you the best of health and many more well and splendid days with your family.

    Best regards,
    Valerie H.

  46. Dear Professor C,

    Best wishes for a speedy recovery. I owe you a little thanks as I recently watched The Age of Innocence, prompted by reading your review, then adding it to a list and finally seeing it. My enjoyment was enhanced by your insights.

    I hope you are feeling fully yourself as soon as possible.

    Wendy N

  47. Dear Professor C,

    I have enjoyed your daughter’s blog for a long time. I see where she got her talent and insight. Wishing you a speedy recovery!

    Susana

  48. Professor C.,
    I send you healing thoughts after your recent hospital stay. I have been reading Emily Wilson’s translation of The Odyssey and getting lost in the beauty of the language. Find one of your favorite books and try to do the same. It is a lovely distraction.

    Donatella (aka DB)

  49. Dear Professor C,
    Sending hugs from London (actually Barbados, where I’m on holiday). Wishing you speedy healing. I’ll bet our hospital food is equally, if not more, dreadful than yours. Best wishes.

  50. no man is an island your daughter has reached out for love and connectedness and support for you – what a wonderful gift from a wonderful daughter

  51. Dear Professor C.,

    I send you thoughts of comfort and healing on this lovely (finally!) spring day. I join all the many readers who share a concern for your welfare, and, in fact, the welfare of your family. There is a connection, in literature and other things, that ties us.

    Your friend,
    Mary Jane

  52. Best wishes for prompt and complete healing from Southern California.

    Warm regards,
    jill

  53. Dear Professor C,

    I thoroughly enjoyed your autobiography. Yes, I actually read and enjoyed it.

    Now I’m sending you get well wishes. I’m sure you will be well taken care of. So here’s to a speedy and complete recovery.

  54. Dear Professor C

    Sending best wishes from Melbourne Australia for your recovery. Family, home and good food the simple pleasures are simply the best
    Mary

  55. Dear Professor C,

    Warm wishes from a rather cold but almost snow free New Brunswick, Canada. May you have a swift return to good health.

  56. Dear Professor C.,

    A big wave and warmest wishes from sunny Western Australia. We do hope you get well soon! :)

    Jess

  57. I echo everyone’s comments. Hospitals are no fun.
    Waving from SaltSpring Island BC.
    Ali

  58. Professor Carnochan. I hope you are on the mend and putting your time in the hospital well into your rear view mirror. By the way, I’ve read your memoir and enjoyed it.

  59. Professor C. Here’s a hope that you are on the mend. It’s so wonderful that you are home, that alone will speed recovery. Take care of yourself and be well.

  60. Dear BC,
    Please do get well soon and quickly get back to all the fun and good things you’re always busy doing.
    Mary Kay

  61. HOME and ON THE MEND, such sweet words. A big wave and a silly grin and tap dance to help you recover, heh. We are all pulling for you here, Professor C. Mel from Vancouver.

  62. Dear Professoer C,
    hospital food is terrible everywhere in the world. I Wonder why that is. Can they really save any considerable amount of money by serving poor food? Or is it just part of the general lack of consideration for the individual patient?
    Anyway, now that you are back to your own bed and home cooking, I am sure you will recover quickly.
    All the best from Germany

  63. I wish the good Professor a swift and uncomplicated recovery. I am a subscriber to this blog because of him. I went looking for articles on Tristram Shandy and my Saturdays (this week — Monday. Great weather at last pulled me outdoors all weekend) have been better ever since.

  64. I missed this over the weekend, but know that you’re thought of fondly and wished a speedy recovery!

  65. Professor C,

    Sending you warm wishes for a speedy recovery.
    Glad you are home and on the mend!

    Best,
    Janet
    Park City Utah

  66. Sorry I missed the call but glad to hear Professor C is on the mend and out of hospital. I’ve enjoyed his “discussions” on the blog tremendously, so when he feels better, and should he be so inclined…we’re probably due for another!

    Mary

  67. Dear Professor C,

    You are in my thoughts. Please get well,

    Holly
    New Smryna Beach, FL

  68. Dear Professor C,

    I hope you are feeling much better and comfortable at home today. I have very much enjoyed your guest posts in the past, especially about Edith Wharton (one of my absolute favorite writers – of great novels as well as satisfyingly spooky ghost stories) and would love to read more from you in the future. Or perhaps hear what you are reading now. I haven’t opened my copy of Ursula LeGuin’s Lavinia yet (not new, but new to me), though I have high hopes.

    Take good care of yourself, be happy and well.

    Very best,

    MMJ

  69. Sending a bouquet of exuberant tulips to brighten your day, Professor. Best wishes from Vancouver, BC.

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