Good-Bye (For Now) to All That

I've neglected this blog since last April mostly because I learned then that I will be heading to Ann Arbor in September on a Knight-Wallace Journalism fellowship, which will give me eight months to begin work on a second book--a project bearing little resemblance to Moby-Duck, at least so far as subject matter goes. (No more seafaring for me. I've had my seaward peep, and now will be trying to peep both eastward and into the past. More on this later--much later.)

The last few months I've been preoccupied with the logistics of leaving New York. The date of the move swiftly approaches. An Ann Arbor lease has been signed. A truck big as a boat has been reserved. Many boxes have been packed. We've built a ziggurat out of them in the living room. We've been trying to reassure M. & B. about the move by describing the delights awaiting them in their new home. We're in a transition, in other words, and my preoccupations are not the same ones that preoccupied me when I created this blog. They're still fatherly and bookish, but not as watery as they once were.

There are a few items that have collected in my file of things to post about. I'll try to get to them before September 1. Thereafter, the terms of the Knight-Wallace Fellowship (an eight-month sabbatical for journalists) wisely prohibit publication of any sort, including blogging.