January in Review

Boy, am I running behind. Blame it on February being a short month....

First of all, I "re-listened" to Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. If you don't already know what a genius Jim Dale is, then I'm not sure I have anything else to say to you!

New Year's Day, my husband allowed me to be a complete slug, and I sat in a chair by the stove with a mug of cider and a cat and ripped through Stieg Larsson's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. I thought it was great. Nothing groundbreaking, I don't suppose, but it's what thrillers used to be back when James Patterson was still writing his own books. It's a good, solid story, carefully built with interesting characters, and I was hooked from the beginning, which is saying something, since Larsson launches the story with some corporate espionage/fraud. (Sorry, that's just me, but I need bodies - missing jewels, industrial spies, and military plots don't cut it.) It was a pleasure to read; not a literary novel, perhaps, but a strong story told well. I'm saddened to learn Larsson only left us with three before his untimely death.

Seems it was a month of good stories, or started that way. I moved on to Hannah Tinti's The Good Thief after that. I'm a little concerned that it's being billed as historical, because the historical details were hazy and sketchy enough that even someone with a decent grasp of early American history and material culture would have had a hard time placing the story definitively. But that's because it's a story! An orphan who lost his hand, a stranger with questionable motives, giants, dwarves, brawls - this has it all. Reading Tinti's debut tale was like sitting around the fire, listening to a storyteller spin a yarn with odd characters, larger-than-life adventure, and spellbinding twists and turns. It might say everything about this novel to say that I kept picturing it in my mind as a terrific project for Tim Burton....

After that I picked up Bottomless Belly Button, the graphic novel by Dash Shaw. This was my first graphic novel, or at least my first graphic novel that was more about "novel" and less about "graphic." It was a good choice, because although I've not exactly been converted to a graphic novel fanatic, it was an introduction to the subtleties that the medium can convey. In the right hands, I can see that it's a beautiful blending of books and film - delicate emotions and nebulous events that don't always translate well in either format (your book would be too wordy and your movie would have no plot) are dealt with so well here. It's actually the opposite of a story in some ways, more like little glimpses of how a family deals with the end of a story, and at the end, I realized it could only have been done justice as a graphic novel. Which is, I suppose, as it should be.

At this point, I took a brief break from my "best of 2008" lists to catch up with Linda Fairstein's Alexandra Cooper series in Killer Heat. What can I say? Linda Fairstein. If you've read one, you've read them all, and if you've read them all, odds are they've stewed into a composite novel in your head. Body, investigation, turbulent relationship with Mike Chapman, danger in isolated historic New York spot, and a last-minute rescue and resolution. Acceptable way to kill a little time, and her newest release, Lethal Legacy, takes place in the New York Public Library, so I had to get caught up for that!

Olive Kitteridge, Elizabeth Strout's latest, was another "best of" title that I picked up, and I'm glad I did. "Gentle" might be a good word for the story, but not for the character. Olive is brusque, loving, cold, passionate - she's just a human, a normal person, who if treated as a survey topic would probably have an even smattering of responses in the love, like, dislike, and hate columns. She's us - average people who have good days and bad, who occasionally does something right, occasionally does something mean, and as often as not does one or the other completely unwittingly. All of that averages out to the human experience, and Strout's work is almost like a series of short stories, many NOT from Olive's point of view, that are strung together to give us a picture of who she is at some of her best and worst moments. It's almost as if a camera crew followed her around for her whole life, collecting bits and pieces that were edited together by someone with a well-balanced sense of things. You like Olive Kitteridge, not because she's likeable, but because she's very human, and we can all identify with her fits of generosity and viciousness.

After that literary pause, I took a complete turn off the beaten path and picked up Daniel Everett's Don't Sleep, There are Snakes: Life and Language in the Amazonian Jungle. I liked it, I think, although in some ways there are two works here - an anthropological one and a linguistic one, and they might have been better served by actually being two books. I fell into the anthropological track, and I felt jolted about quite a bit when late in the work the writing shifted to a more technical linguistic discussion, but regardless, the Piedans are people worth getting to know. They are truly unlike any other group of people I've ever read or heard of - they don't import knowledge, they have a remarkably simple language, and they seem to be so unconcerned with the distant past that their language doesn't even allow for a discussion of it. Everett raises a philosophical question - are we who we are because of our language or is our language what it is because of who we are? A "chicken or egg" question, one that leads you to wonder if a culture doesn't have war because their language wouldn't allow for the expression of it or if their language doesn't allow for the expression of war because they've never had one. Fascinating, but ultimately, not quite fulfilling. Perhaps I just need to go find a linguist to quiz at length to satisfy my curiosity....

It's Electric!

Karmically, we were due for a power outage. The remnants of Hurricane Ike whipped through here last year, and our power barely blipped. Especially "barely" in light of the fact that lots of Ohioans didn't have power for a week or more. Several ice storms and heavy snows this winter put the lights out in some places, but again, not even a dimming of the lights over here. So, when the heavy winds came through this week, it was kind of our turn.

Unfortunately, it is, of course, not the kind of turn you want - not like being next in line for an amusement ride. The power went out sometime after we went to bed Wednesday night, and naturally, this meant that I had a web conference scheduled for Thursday afternoon. Hooray for the community room at Panera! I ruthlessly (okay, not really) kicked a bunch of people studying some cardiology stuff out, recharged my cellphone and gabbed away with no problems, aside from the occasional advertisement for Panera because I was getting timed out and having to go back to their main page to get logged in again.

Then I spent the afternoon expending enough energy and money that I felt certain the power would come on again. (You know that old rule: if you want something to happen, make it as inconvenient as possible, and it will. Need 5 seconds at a stoplight to find your lip balm in your purse? Guaranteed green lights all the way to work.) Anyway, I remembered that our uninitiated gas grill had a burner on the side, so I lugged home a propane tank ($50). After work, we unearthed the grill in the barn, drug it around to the back deck, and fired it up. Fortunately, I'd made a pot of chili this week. Then, I found a paint bucket and an old five-gallon bucket, so we managed to pull enough water up out of the cistern to rinse dishes and flush the toilet. We also unpacked all of the freezer and refrigerator into a big Rubbermaid tub and iced it down. A positive there - we got the fridge cleaned out!

After a candlelight dinner (chili and a Mistletoe-scented Yankee Candle Co. candle aren't, perhaps, the most palatable of scent combinations) and a run out for ice and some hot cocoa, we headed up to bed. The cats filled in the little nooks and crannies around us like chinking between logs. I wore the work light on my head, so Andrew could read to me, and then I rolled up in a little ball and slept like a log. An occasionally chilly log, but a log nonetheless.

As I was paddling around in my thoughts while waiting for sleep, I was thinking about Fannie Flagg's character, Aunt Elner. You just have to love Aunt Elner, and one of my favorite things about her is her intense appreciation, an appreciation that only an old farm wife could have, for electricity. Thomas Edison is one of her favorite people, and every year, on his birthday, she turns on all the appliances in her house at the same time to celebrate. I thought to myself that I might just have to do that next year.

So, we woke up to power this morning. The electricity not only was cooperative enough to come back on, but considerate enough to do it enough before we woke up, allowing the water heater to generate hot water for showers. While Andrew showered and fed cats, I cleaned out the pellet stove and fired it up, and then he made breakfast while I showered. It's already almost 55 degrees in here, and after I settled on the couch with the heated mattress pad and a quilt, I remembered Thomas Edison, and thought I'd just see when his birthday was so I could be prepared. According to Wikipedia, it's February 11 - the day before our electricity went off. Perhaps he was peeved by our lack of appreciation. I've made a mental note to do better next year....

Minutiae

I think it's the smallness of winter that is draining. Everything about winter is so incremental and miserly; the thermometer (and thermostat) degrees that we were so generous with in August - 87, 91, what's the difference? - are now guarded so carefully, watched over and discussed. Rain falls and soaks, a deluge, but snow accumulates. And accumulates. And accumulates.

Then, it all goes away so slowly. A summer thunderstorm wets the earth and by the next day, it's hard to know one passed, but snow lingers. It's like the negative of a photograph. Instead of dark shadows, the hollows and ditch lines have white streaks and traces that hang on for weeks. And the dripping is interminably. Snow leaves as slowly as it came, one drop from the eaves after another.

At the same time, this smallness is what is fascinating, so delicate and precious. Tiny sand-like grains fall and fall and fall until they pile up inches thick! The cumulative effects of individual flakes is amazing and beautiful, and individually, they seem to be swept away so quickly.

I remember my first big snow. The winter of 1977, I had just turned three, and I had an impressive collection of miniature jelly jars, likely from a gift basket, that had been handed off to me as toys. In memory, it seems as if I spent hours going outside, scooping snow into a jar, and bringing it back into the house. No matter how tightly I screwed the lid on or how close I stayed to the door, within moments, I had a little jar full of water. I was entranced, over and over, by the science that reversed another science. It's hard not to be in awe of a world that produces miracles in a jelly jar.

December in Review

I don't know how I managed to read so much with all the holiday obligations. I can only ascribe my success to online shopping and minimal decorating. And sheer laziness.

A friend recommended This Republic of Suffering: Death and the American Civil War, saying it was the best academic work of the year, and she may be right. In an age where making your name as an intellectual seems to involve creating obscure and/or incredulous spins on the staples of history, Drew Gilpin Faust comes up with a really smart and obvious discussion AND a really accessible doorway for readers: death. The work is structured simply, each chapter devoted to different aspects of dealing with death on such a spectacular and national scale, and the reader learns about the process of dying, killing, burying, numbering, etc. It's not a "pick a side" approach, and Faust uses numerous examples from primary resources on both sides of the conflict. I honestly just wish it had been longer, because she presented a number of topics that I would have welcomed tangents with interesting tidbits. I got another Drew Gilpin Faust book for Christmas, Mothers of Invention: Women of the Slaveholding South in the American Civil War, and I'm hoping it's as good.

After Into the Wild, I decided I really should read Into Thin Air, Jon Krakauer's account of the disastrous 1996 climbing season on Mount Everest. It was just as enjoyable as his other work, but with a personal story to tell, he didn't spend as much time delving into background material and logistics as he usually does, which is where I learn the most. In short, I wish there'd been more history on the attempts to climb Everest, more details on Sherpa culture, and more discussion of the logistics involved in making a climb possible. However, in all fairness, I have to acknowledge that wasn't the story he set out to tell.

A friend loaned us The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane, a glorious story by Kate DiCamillo. As one of us was coming down with bronchitis and the other was recovering, I spent a rainy December Saturday on the living room futon reading it aloud. Edward Tulane is an elegant, but exceedingly pompous, china rabbit. He thinks very highly of himself, but devotes little of his cold china heart to thinking of others, until he is lost and separated from the little girl who adores him. Through a string of adventures, in the typical fashion of children's classics, Edward Tulane learns that love is not just about being loved, but also loving. My only wish was to know more about the lives that Edward passed through after he moved on, but I suppose that's also part of love - parting and perhaps never knowing the fate of someone you cared for or someone who cared for you.

I had a hard time polishing off Tasha Alexander's And Only to Deceive, but perhaps that's because I love Deanna Raybourn and her Lady Julia Grey series accomplishes everything Alexander attempts to do, only better. Victorian lady seeks solution to mysterious death of husband, etc., but Alexander's heroine was a bit stiff and self-righteous. The character postures too much, and the right had all the markings of a first novel that hasn't been scrubbed down - bits of it felt like writing workshop exercises. Meh....

Catherine O'Flynn's What Was Lost was a different story - a great first novel that won a Costa award. Still, I fear she may suffer from being stuffed into a genre cubbyhole, because it's not really a true mystery in some sense. Regardless, her writing was wonderful, her characters were colorful without being too quirky, and she created a fairly successful atmosphere and setting as well. I enjoyed the sarcastic and snippy tone of her writing - would compare it to Kate Atkinson actually. I'll be on the lookout for her next effort.

I can't say enough good things about The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society (Mary Ann Barrows and Annie Shaffer) or enough bad things about the title - it's quirky, but just too darn cumbersome! The book was wonderful, one of those books that I keep picking up and putting down because some subconscious part of my mind wants to prevent me from gobbling the whole thing up. It's all the good things the reviews say - warm, friendly, funny, touching and just perfect. Most of all, it's a book for people who truly love books, who understand how books can lift and inspire and serve as lights in dark places. With such a gloomy outlook in the world these days, I was so happy to read about goodness, friendship, survival and all the things that really matter. I can only hope that there will be sequels and other adventures for this motley cast of folks brought together by their love of books.

And finally, in a little afterthought, I picked up one of my mother's books that I've been toting around for 20 years but never read - A Bit of Christmas Whimsy by David Edman. It's nice, a little O'Henry-ish, what with the city setting, the "common" people, etc., and although the twist ending isn't much of a twist in today's world, it was a nice story about how things tend to work themselves out, regardless of our mucking about in them. Just what you'd expect of a little holiday novella, but I'm glad it's stuck with me through various moves and book weeds.

And now, off to finish a January book!

Warmth Returneth!

Heat arrived in our house for New Year's, after having taken its leave around Christmas, and if the old adage of my surrogate grandmother that what you do on New Year's day, you'll do all year holds true, I'm in for a good time. Personally, I think this was meant to discourage post-holiday/pre-return to school squabbling in children and excessive drinking in adults. (Who wants to spend the whole year arguing over a supply of AA batteries or hungover?) Anyway, I hope she was right! I spent the morning fussing over the stove (and she was right, because that's normally how I seem to spend a good bit of my year), but I spent the afternoon wrapped in a quilt, toasting my feet in front of a sturdy little flame, reading quietly and steadily through a really good novel. So, here's to doing all year what you did on New Year's day!

Sock Paws

Do other people do odd things when they're by themselves? I sometimes wonder what strange things would show up if I were on camera during the day when I'm alone. Do other people dance while waiting for their bread to toast? Do other people walk up and down the stairs repeatedly while eating a banana? Do other people add sound effects to dishing up lunch?

I only ask this because it's very cold in our house today. (Day two with no heat. I don't want to talk about it.) Cold is just one of those things that you deal with in a patchy fashion - there's not normally a real plan to prevent being cold, so the end effect is usually something very uncoordinated. For instance, this morning, I realized that I was in green and blue plaid pants and a red, green and white plaid shirt with pink fuzzy slippers. That, in and of itself, is a bit odd although perhaps acceptable, but I also had mismatched brown trouser socks on my hands with my sleeves tucked into the cuffs. I will also confess that I didn't want the trouble of retucking them, so I just ate a few crackers out of the box with my sock paws. Reading was a bit tricky, until I figured out how to turn the pages with my bookmark. Clearly, one of the primary functions of society is to prevent exactly this sort of thing, but it's equally clear that inventiveness only happens when one is free from concern about what other people think. Is it just me, or is all of life contradictory? And even more important, is everyone as strange when left alone?

No Sleep Till ...?

I'm attempting to break a napping addiction. Between my medication, anxiety, the weather, the holidays, etc., I've become a nap junkie. In fact, I'm not sure that "nap" even covers it any longer. "Nap" is too polite a word for sleeping all night and then another four hours plus during the day.

It started off innocently enough - just take a little rest in the morning after a rough night of sleep. And the next thing I know, I'm going back to bed, sleeping until 10:30, working, taking another nap later in the day that's only as short as it is because Andrew comes home, working in the evening to catch up, staying up late because I can't sleep, and then starting the whole thing over again the next day. The insomnia at night has been useful. I read, I work, I wander around the house, but even when I do sleep at night, the next day I'm still exhausted.

So, operating on the theory that sleep begets more sleep, I'm attempting to break the habit. No caffeine after 8:00, and less of it during the day. A sleeping pill every night for one week to reestablish sleep patterns. Warm milk before bed, and bed at the same time every night. I've even gone so far as to create a success chart for myself and offer bribes for making it through January and February without sleeping. It's early days, so I'm still in that hopeful stage of withdrawal, the "this is going to be a breeze" stage. I feel like a Civil War soldier: I'll have this problem whipped and be home in time for dinner!

The reality, however, is that it's a little like not having electricity. You know how that goes when the power is out, and you think, "Well, I'll just fold this laundry, light a candle and make myself a mug of tea. Oh. Right. I can't boil water." or "It's a little cold in here. I'll get a blanket, put on a sweatshirt and turn on the space heater." I keep making these little plans for my day, doing this, then that, then taking a nap, then.... Oh. *sigh*