Flocking Together

I was proctoring an all essay final on Monday when the silence was broken by honking geese somewhere in the distance.

I also heard the migration from inside while grading at night on Nov. 28 or 29th.

Out in the field in mid-November (probably the 11th) we kept hearing birds just over the tree tops.  I finally realized that it was a large flock very high in the sky.  My best guess is cranes, as they were definitely not geese.

Driving to New Mexico on Nov. 23, I encountered many lone raptors.  If it weren't such a preposterous suggestion, I would say that three of them were falcons.  Which would increase my lifetime wild falcons sightings by 300 percent.

As I was walking to work on Thursday, Dec. 1 a flock of canada geese flew low over the houses and there was a flash of white in their midst.  A snow goose among the canadas.

No, I don't know what that means.  Perhaps the one I saw last Dec. found some friends?

Wearing my heron on my sleeve and an owl around my neck

I really don't like doves.  Mourning doves, in fact, are probably my least favorite bird, and somehow it irks me that their ridiculous coo-ing bird-brained-ness is the symbol for peace.  I love hawks, but I'm already reminding Aster and Dianthus, "There are no winners in war," every time they pull out the army men.  I'm no hawk.

Several times this year I've thought about blogging about bird symbols, but have gotten mentally caught up with the dove/hawk thing, to which I've started to respond, "Well, I'm a heron."  Which is a pretty meaningless statement because being a heron on policy issues makes no sense.  But herons, great blue herons in particular, have resonated with me for twenty years.  I see them as good omens or spirit guides or just something personally special (Wow-- it appears I wrote the same thing 8 years ago).

I've been wanting to blog about the election, but I am still too angry.  I've been wearing one of my two owl necklaces daily to remind me of the wisdom of choosing my words well.  And I've been losing sleep composing this blog post.  As I finally sit to write it, I find that I still can't.

I'll just say what I told one of my classes on November 9.  "There are people in our community who are fearful following the results of the election.  I sincerely hope their fears are unfounded.  Whoever you voted or didn't vote for (because statistically, it 's likely you didn't vote), it is all of our job to make sure those fears don't have a basis.  If you live by Christian values, now is the time to demonstrate them."

Which gets us to the heron on my sleeve in the title.  By "heron on my sleeve" I meant "heart on my sleeve," because it is a little too easy to see how I feel about things (except that I always smile, so some people can't tell, so I have to pre-announce to one of my colleagues when I am cranky) and by "heart on my sleeve" I also meant "safety pin on my chest".  I've been wearing a safety pin prominently each day.  Safety pins are a signal that I am a safe space, that people can talk to me regardless of gender, religion, sexual orientation, race, size, and that I will get involved should someone be harassed for who they are.  In yet another way that our country is divided, my social media feed is largely "post-safety pin" including some circles safety pin wearers are being mocked for doing so little, and the students on my campus are largely oblivious that the movement exits.

But I'm wearing my safety pin with pride.  I've been in contact with my congressman. I will register as a Muslim if it comes to that.  I urge you to join me.  True, it's a symbolic gesture.  But so are lots of things.  And little symbolic gestures can add up.

 Like votes.

Herons are lovely and graceful.  And then they are move and they are gangly and clumsy and awkwardly proportioned.  And then they are flying and they are funny looking and inefficient, but they are flying.  They are still and hard to disturb and nearly inactive.  And then they are fast and sharp.

For Grandma and Kathleen

I cried a lot last week as the Cubs won the World Series.  Joy, yes, but also real sadness that my grandparents weren't alive to see this. And gladness that my parents were.  And concerns about the end times it foretold. (I jest.  I think.)

I will cry tonight as the election results come in-- however they do.

But as I've prepared my white linen outfit-- the closest I have to a white pantsuit, I've been very sentimental-- like I get about the Cubs, but angrier-- as I realize all of the sexism and misogyny wrapped up in so many things.  I'm pissed off about middle age and old women being invisible and apologize that I am just now recognizing the extent of this.

Yet Grandma, Mom, Kathleen, Jane, Darna, . . . you were never invisible to me.  Thank you that I've always had amazing strong women in my life (and thank you Dad for always appreciating that).  I pressed my linen pants and curled my hair this morning Kathleen; I know how you always hated Chelsea's; and Grandma I appreciate how you think that I should be wearing whatever is comfortable to vote and not worrying what Kathleen would think.  So I'm representing a long (but sadly not that long) line of suffragettes as I wear white to vote.  And Mom, the red shoes and the pterodactyl necklace are my Big Orange Splot you always taught me to have.

I took my sons when I actually voted on Friday.  We discussed the merits of Hillary Clinton and Gary Johnson  and the next day Gary Johnson was batting with the bases loaded in one of Aster's convoluted World Series play-by-play stories, perhaps with some college volleyball mixed in.  I love this.  There is so much disconcerting about the world they are growing up in, but my sons are growing up in a world in which female scientists are the norm, where the Cubs and Royals have recently won the World Series, and where women and libertarians are on the ballot for President.

Grandma and Kathleen,  I am excited to witness it for you.

Pumpkin and Jedi

Yep, they are growing up.
Past years can be accessed starting here.

Bird Bingo in the Midst of a Glowing Season

Sun rise and sun sets have been phenomenal recently, and the trees in my town are just beginning to turn.  Despite plenty of turmoil around, I feel I'm in the midst of a long glowing season.

Aster and Texas Glowing in the Morning Light
BioBlitz 2016

BioBlitz was a lovely glow-y weekend in the middle of this.  We camped, ate well, taught people about invasive species and may have met our tribe (more on that someday), and, very importantly we saw birds: egrets, cormorants, vultures, herons, kingfishers, three types of woodpeckers, and osprey (which is more than the total of the last two BioBlitzes combined).  The boys played Bird Bingo twice. some bird trivia game once and we were on the winning team for BioBlitz jeopardy, where my knowledge or the state vegetable of Oklahoma (watermelon) and bird pop culture ("Just like Stevie Nicks, this bird goes ooh-ooh-ooh") came in handy.

Watch the birds and keep glowing.

Judging books by their covers (again)

A long ago conversation with Amateur Reader and my sister-in-law still has me thinking about how I select books (I was attempting to link to the conversation on Wuthering Expectations here, but I am now recalling that this was an actual conversation, mulled over coffee and good food, so I'm only finding distantly related posts, like the one AR wrote about plot twists in Jane Eyre, which would probably be relevant for readers of Okay For Now except at the time of that blog post, AR hadn't yet read Jane Eyre and I couldn't remember it).

At the library in particular, I judge books by their covers.

I picked up Saving CeeCee Honeycut by Beth Hoffman because it had a hummingbird on the cover and kept it because something on the jacket suggested it was about Savannah, and it has been my Savannah summer.  If the universe is signaling to me through my book choices, it is reminding me of the very fine line there is between quirky crazy and mentally ill and that the family members can be easily scarred by both.  Despite that somber message, and a having a strong anti-discrimination pro-confident woman position, the book is mostly a light coming of age story of an adolescent girl escaping her parents and thriving among the rich women in Savannah.  M, MiL, GK and many others would enjoy it, particularly if travelling to Savannah, but its no glorious caper of a Mary Kay Andrews chick book.

I picked up The Dancing Pancake by Eileen Spinelli because dancing pancakes fits in right there with magical food, a common motif among things I read,  and I was feeling guilty that I had never noticed Eileen Spinelli as I was checking out Jake and Lily by Jerry Spinelli, her husband.  I was in the children's and young adult (shelved together at the local library) novels looking in the S for Okay for Now when Spinelli jumped out at me.  Jake and Lily was great.  One thing that J. Spinelli does very well is recognize that we are all the bad guy in our youth and his very likable characters make some very unkind (if normal) friendship moves.  Jake and Lily is no Stargirl, but it is pretty fabulous.  The Dancing Pancake was in verse, of sorts, and also lots of fun.  I would have no reason to compare it to Jake and Lily were Eileen and Jerry not married, so I am not going to do so now.

I picked up The Artisan's Wife by Judith Miller from the new books because I was going to mock it based on the silly cover.  But from the cover I also learned that the heroine is abandoned in Weston, West Virginia.  And since one fourth of my nuclear family was born in Weston, West Virginia (population 4,110), somehow the book was calling to me.  The Artisan's Wife is historical Christian feminist romance of some sub-genre I have never before encountered.  A very large portion of the book is devoted to work and the running of a tile works.  Another large chunk takes place at the mental hospital (an imposing building in Weston, known now (for haunted house tours) and allegedly in the 1870s according to the book as the Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum) [message from universe about mental illness duly noted], and the last chunk is dealing with family and prayers.  The book is good and the writing solid enough to stand up on its own merits, but as the romance is entirely without tension, I have no idea what this book would be or who would read it if it wasn't niche marketed.  [Note: there are two copies of this book among the new books at our small local library.  Either somebody is reading these books or some librarian thinks some readers are reading these books].

While looking for something else this morning, I ran back across Having It and Eating It by Sabine Durant, which I read sometime in the last year or two because Durant is now shelved where Katie Fforde used to be.  It's one of the chick lit books focusing on the messiness of relationships (I'd probably place Wife-22, The After Wife, and Bridgett Jones in this category) and, while everything is neatly resolved, it left me feeling a bit deflated.  I guess sometimes I do want plain happy marriages.

I would not have read Behind the Throne by K.B. Wagers based on the cover because someone chose a really mundane quote for the back cover and Behind the Throne is described as beginning "an action-packed new series with a heroine as rebellious as HAN SOLO, as savvy as LEIA, and as skilled as REY." (emphasis not mine).  However it is good, really good, and I have my next in the series pre-ordered from Amazon. Whether or not K.B.'s sister is a dear friend (and she is), I would be recommending Behind the Throne for anyone with a passing interest in action sci-fi (the Star Wars assessment is not that far off, but seems very unlikely to prompt me to read a book) or feminist dystopias.

What are you reading?

Plant Images from Central Kansas, July 2016
They are as unrelated to these books as Desmanthus is to H.Clinton

Not to be outdone by G.H.W. Bush

As a private citizen, I will be exercising my right to vote in a few weeks and I intend to vote for Hillary Clinton for President of the United States.

Illinois Bundle Flower in Kansas

I know you are shocked.

[I've been waking up trembling recently following dreams that I am personally responsible for DT.  I'm pretty sure a blog post from a known ecologist and educator isn't going to change a lot of minds; but George, Barbara and I are doing what we can. (From my home computer long after I should have gone to bed, in my case.)]

Losing My Sense of Humor: A Rant Followed by a Book Recommendation

I am becoming a humorless crank.

I have long maintained that my ability to find humor in things, be they sleepless nights with infants or toothpick's lodged in my husband's foot (or both), is perhaps my greatest talent.

Which means that for a lot of the summer (and it is still summer in my mind, and I've been mulling this post since late July) I have been both humorless and talentless.

But there has been so much this summer that is not funny.

It is not funny when the opening night skit of vacation Bible school features two college-aged women being completely useless on a rainforest expedition (one reading a fashion magazine and one shrieking at imagined snakes) and the narrator repeating, three times, versions of the line, "Aren't we glad we got out of there [time travelling was involved] before the professor started his boring lecture about plants again."  I'm sure if I brought it up with the youth director, he would have pointed out that one of the men in the skit was also useless and it was all in good fun . . . and he would have probably been thinking that I just supported the idea that botany professors were boring pedants.  But every kid there saw young women only being useless and heard, three times, joking or not, that learning about plants is boring and listening to professors is something to be avoided.

(Oh, speaking of not funny and church things-- do not, in my presence, sing any song with a repeated verse then motions of "thumbs up, elbows out, knees together, feet out, butt out, tongue out, head up.  Hopefully you will also stop the spread of singing like this in any situation, whether or not I am there.  I know the point behind these silly church songs is not, "Let's make fun of the way that people with cerebral palsy move,"  BUT, wait, let's look.  We just put kids into the classic "elbow flag" and possibly drooling stance of someone with cerebral palsy and now we are going to encourage them to laugh at each other because . .  people in this stance should be laughed at?  it is hilarious that some people can't control their limbs?
Oh, but it is not about my son?  You weren't making fun of the way he walks?  He looks normal when he walks anyway?
So you want kids to be able to learn that physical differences are mockable when nobody they know is being made fun of?
Or perhaps I am just being overly sensitive and nobody associates that posture and spastic movements with anything negative?  Umm. Well.  Uh, there is enough not funny in politics without me further going there.)

And lots of the not funny lasted all summer.

I cringed, (and did sorta laugh, I'll admit), when I was heard claimed that Hillary Clinton is responsible for her husband's actions while Donald Trump needs to be forgiven for his womanizing past because all Christians have sinned and we are not to judge.

I smiled about the coverage of the Democratic convention when, "the candidate's spouse looked fetching in a blue pantsuit, but doesn't have the upper arms of the current first lady," until I noticed how concerned I was about his health and what that might do for her presidency.  I never considered the health of Barbara, Hillary, Liddy, Laura, Tipper, Theresa, Cindy, Michelle, Ann, or Melania as part of their husband's candidacy, and hate having a double standard.

I laughed a lot at Ghostbusters, but found the surrounding hoop-la remarkably unfunny.

My whole family watched a great deal of the Olympics, so I could kind of laugh at headlines like, "Phelps Ties for Silver Ledecky sets new world record" and mutter my thanks to Andy Murray for alerting his interviewer that he is not the first person to win more than one Olympic tennis gold, ["I think Venus and Serena have won about four each."]

I cheered for the Mister when he corrected one of Aster's doctors when the doctor suggested (humorously??) that the Mister probably thought the doctor was r-word.  I cheered for my mother-in-law when she asked if there were any good looking boys in Dianthus's class, after he had been asked if there were any good looking girls, but couldn't help myself and went ahead and asked if there were any interesting intelligent classmates.

I guess I really thought that I was one of the feminists who could laugh at feminism. And maybe I still am. Except, it turns out, I am one of those feminists who not only upholds the radical notion that women are people, but also that they should be treated like, and spoken about, as if they are people.  I'm one of those radical educators (and dare I say Christians) who thinks that both words and actions matter. And there has a lot for me to be cranky about.

Strangely, I was in one of these there-is-nothing-funny-about-this moods when I opened, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian by Sherman Alexi, which starts out with a kid being born with excess fluid on the brain.  Oh, the hilarity of hydrocephalus. And there's nothing funny about reservation schools or alcoholics or poverty or abandoning one's people in order to pursue hope or or racism or funeral after funeral on the rez.  Yet somehow there is, because coupled with Ellen Forney's drawings, Alexi's words are funny.  Very funny.  And the situation is so NOT FUNNY.  And it is true and sad and really uncomfortable to be laughing at. Like lots of life.  Reading it helped me regain my talent*.

I hope you are surrounded by things that are joyously funny, like Dianthus and Aster claiming to swim like Le Ducky, but if you only have a enough to offer a little smirk, I hope you take that smirk and cherish it, for an interesting fate awaits you.

"Reader you must know that an interesting fate (sometimes involving rats, sometimes not) awaits almost everyone, mouse or man, who does not conform,"
The Tale of Despereaux by Kate DiCamillo pg. 25

*But I'm still somewhat humorless and cranky, so I wouldn't test it.

Bird Books Deliberate and Accidental

I picked up The Aviary by Kathleen O'Dell because it was clearly a bird book, and this year young adult bird books have transported me to many interesting places I wouldn't otherwise go (see, for instance Nightbird, Mockingbird and All the Bright Places).  Based on cover alone, The Aviary is not my sort of book.  Neo-gothic creepiness is not my thing.  But it wasn't that creepy (or Gothic) and I was amusedly transported.  And there were lots of birds.  So it falls into the "definitely recommended for me during bird year" category, along with the, "someone else should read this but I don't know who".  Ask if it might be you.


Okay for Now, by Gary D. Schmidt, by contrast, is unreservedly recommended, and I didn't even know it had birds in it until I got it home from the library.  Schmidt's Wednesday Wars was fabulous, part of the series of YA books that convinced me that I need to read more well-written children's books (rather than poorly written adult books) and I need to read more Shakespeare so that I can understand the likes of The Wednesday Wars and The Dairy Queen.  Okay for Now is a follow-up to The Wednesday Wars, and I was not going to like it as much because 1) the main character of Okay for Now is a jerk in The Wednesday Wars (and much as I believe Amateur Reader when he suggests that shouldn't matter, it does for me) and 2) It is about Jane Eyre.


Somehow, though, Okay for Now has everything going for it. Unexpected birds for one!  Each chapter is named after a bird from an Audubon painting.  It would seem like Schmidt is trying to do too much-- coordinate every chapter with emotions visible in a bird painting, re-tell Jane Eyre, update readers on perspective drawing, preparations for the moon landing and the Yankees, and arouse our sympathies for alcoholics and their families, Vietnam vets, and middle school teachers while telling a story from the perspective of a 13 year-old jerk.  It so worked for me.  I want to go read Jane Eyre just so I can fully get Okay for Now.

"That afternoon, after our Cokes, I drew that Snowy Heron
like I was John James Audubon himself.  Except, my heron,
he was strutting out into the world like that hunter would
never, never come"  OfN, pg. 204.
Image by Audobon, Plate CCXLII

It left me a little heartbroken.  Not because I want to live in poverty in small town New York in 1968-- other books transport me to worlds where I want to stay-- this, clearly did not, but because I was reminded how much a difference teachers can make and I wonder if I'm fulfilling my potential for as many students as I could.  And because this had already been written and I could never write anything that good.  The thought is silly, but I'm left with a little achy despair when I read fabulous things.  In any case, Mom and MiL, GK and other great teachers should read Wednesday Wars and Okay for Now, and I'd love to hear the perspective of a Jane Eyre fan (L, AR?).

And who is going to read Jane Eyre with me now?

Times, they are a changing

Last Wednesday morning (Aug. 24) the Mississippi Kites were circling the park in a great furor, as if drumming up support for the migration south.  Wednesday afternoon there were only two around the park and I figured the main flock had flown the town, as it were.

Thursday morning they were lined up in some nearby trees in bigger groups, and I've seen them congregating anti-socially-- in a long drawn out line on a power line, every day since*.

Aug. 17, 2016  Grades 2 and 0.

They have not left yet, at least they have not all left yet, but it seems obvious they are thinking about it.   Change is in the air.

Actually, ragweed is in the air, and we are all suffering from it.  And we are, more or less, all suffering from our change back to full routine with no naps.  But school started Aug. 17 for the boys and Aug. 22 for me.  Images of  last year and the year before (grades 0 and -2) and the year before that, should you want to see that they are growing up.  Somewhere around there's a picture of my new red shoes for 2013, which I still consider my new red shoes.

*ETA: Wed. Aug. 31 there were 60 of them lined up in one block at 7:45 this morning.  5 on one tree, 1 in another tree and the remaining 54 spaces about a meter apart on the power line.  Six more were one the lines on the next block.  This is not where you'll find Mississippi kites mid-summer.

Yes, my eyes were open when I took the photo,
33rd grade?  My 11th year of full time teaching.

Because nothing says "end of summer" like paying attention
to one's toenails for the first time since March.

It's a Family Tradition

Dianthus believes in family tradition.  If we did something last year, we'd better well do it again.

So, for the third year in a row we went camping and too a self timer of us in front of the tent.

July 31, 2016

For the fifth year our of the last seven, we took the boys over Trail Ridge Road and marveled at the animals (elk, mule deer, marmots, and pikas)

For the second year in a row, we ate baked Alaska to celebrate the anniversary of the birth of Dianthus (he is now SEVEN).

SEVEN!

July 2015

For the first time, we rode the train to a Colorado Rockies game.  It rained, the sun came out, the Rockies won and much junk was eaten by Aster, Dianthus and their cousins.  Expect complaints if is doesn't happen exactly that way again.

Rocky Mountain National Park, from
Trail Ridge Road.  August 7, 2016

Circumference Divided By Diameter 2016

The [My Family] Pie Workshop happened!

Three of my cousins and I baked pies last weekend!

That's a peach between the Pi and the 2016

First suggested in 2000, when my parents were in China and I baked pies at my grandparents for a larger family Thanksgiving gathering, the [My Family] Pie Workshop had reached mythical someday status.  We agreed we were going to bake pies together . . . someday.

And then last Saturday we did.

We baked two buttermilk and two peach pies, whipped cream, made several bad math puns and laughed a lot.  All (pies, puns, and company) was excellent.

The technique will remain a secret*, but I present here the

Summer 2016 Lucky** Pie Crust Recipe

1/2 C unsalted butter (8 oz., 1 stick)

Members of [My Family]

1 spoonful Crisco
1 1/4 C flour
3 Tbs. cornmeal
1/4 tsp. salt
3-7 Tbs. ice cold water


*Ha!  Keep cold.  Freeze the butter.  Squish-knead the butter into the flour.  Chill as a disk. Chill before rolling.  These are not actual secrets.
You can read them in many books, including those that I use: The Gourmet Cookbook, Martha Stewart's Pies and Tarts (the 1980s version), The Pie and Pastry Bible, The Sweet Life, and Betty Crocker.  The Buttermilk filling was based on Martha Stewart and the peach from the Gourmet Cookbook.


**Somehow I've had better luck with pie crusts this summer than I have in years.  While this is probably attributable to the fact that I have made more pies this summer than I have in years, or maybe that I've watched a great deal of The Great British Baking Show, I think that it may be the addition of cornmeal (and sometimes a teaspoon of powdered sugar) and I am not about to mess with these ratios that work.

Chick Lit and Another Bird Book

Savannah

I gave my mother Mary Kay Andrew's Savannah Blues and Savannah Breeze, both "beach books" with a healthy dose of Southern charm as preparation for our trip to the beach near Savannah.  Like Andrew's other novels (of which Save the Date is probably my favorite among the five or so I've read) both Savannah novels follow flawed female protagonists through wacky adventures and some of them fall in love.

As we were recently discussing them (I was reading Katie Fforde's Love Letters at the time), Mom kept comparing them to (or confusing them with) some other fun, if formulaic, chick lit beach read, (Mary Simses' Irresistible Blueberry Bakeshop and Cafe, which I haven't read) which made me laugh because all of the women in these kind of books are quirky bakers/caterers/florists/decorators/gardeners, not just in these three novels.

But I came to a stunned revelation after talking to her and looking at my MiL's collection of books.

Some people do not read these kinds of books.

Okay, that is not actually surprising.  More accurately, I was surprised to realize that some people who both read novels and would really enjoy such books, do not know that a whole category of them exists.

Beach in South Carolina.
No, we did not sit around reading on the beach, but I suggest
many good books should you ever find yourself in a
position to sit on a beach reading.

I'm not sure of the true category title- someone in the industry should help me out here.  It's the intersection of "Beach Books" (anything plot driven and easy to read), "Chick Lit" (written for women), romance, and contemporary comedy.  These are not bodice rippers.  The women have jobs, brains, confidence issues, money woes, and sometimes disappointing sex.  They are not Oprah Books.  Dysfunctional families are rarely redeemed.  They are not the sagas of the glitterari of Daniel Steele and Jackie Collins (compared here 5 years ago).  These books are smart, if light, and I really really like them.

I view the authors as women who fully get Jane Austen, Nora Ephron (particularly When Harry Met Sally) and Tina Fey.

So, Jennifer Crusie, Katie Fforde, Mary Kay Andrews are smack in the middle of this genre and I have enjoyed many of each of their books.  What are your favorites?

As a side note, I was contemplating how to write about these books when I realized that "chick" is a bird term.  I can write about all the chick books I want this year!

Speaking of bird books (and pies*)-- I recently read Alice Hoffman's Nightbird.  It is hard for me to be objective about a book that is so many things I enjoy: well written YA, magical, about people who bake, about people who garden, and about birds.  Suffice it to say that I recommend the book for those of you also into magical food books that contain gardens and birds.

*Okay, I wasn't exactly speaking of pie, but I seem to have quite a bit recently.

More Baking Magic

Five layers of coconut pecan deliciousness (an Italian Cream Cake) for a FIVE year old Aster.

And more buttermilk pie.  Because it is the summer of buttermilk pie.

Apology to Three Elizabeths, Third Try

I have not read Eat, Pray, Love,  About this I have been foolishly proud,  And I should apologize.

I must first apologize to Elizabeth Gilbert. Somehow I've been okay with mocking Elizabeth Gilbert for some time.  I absolutely could not stomach the premise of Eat, Pray, Love (and honestly, when described as a memoir of a woman getting over a bad divorce by eating her way through Italy until she finds herself by falling in love with a Brazilian in Bali, it does sound repulsively entitled and simplistic).  But I should have learned long ago that people are more than a plot synopsis, and in this case, not only was the book recommended by one of my best friends, but I've also had ample evidence that Elizabeth Gilbert was more than Eat, Pray, Love.  Among other things, she wrote one of my favorite adult novels of the last few years (Signature of All Things, which I discussed here) and I found her political commentary spot on.  Yet I was smugly not a fan,

I should have noticed some cognitive dissonance when I discussed Signature with my sister-in-law.  When I mentioned that Signature was great in spite of the author, SiL asked if she'd given up her perfect life on the farm.  Once I realized that SiL was talking about Barbara Kingsolver and was still annoyed with Barbara Kingsolver seemed to be enjoying preserving food, I became defensive.  Barbara Kingsolver (Animal Dreams, The Lacuna, The Bean Trees . . . among my very favorite authors) was so different than Elizabeth Gilbert ("just run away and meet the right new man and everything will be okay!"). But SiL had actually read Animal, Vegetable, Miracle and Pigs in Heaven while I was basing my disdain on what?  The fact that the book sold well?

Which brings us to Elizabeth Hagan.  Rev, Hagan (a.k.a Pastor Elizabeth) was an interim preacher at my church in Oklahoma.  I always thought that she was great for our church, but I was unsure if I liked her, perhaps because I was unsure if she liked me.  I'm older than she is, but in the context of the church we fell into the same small demographic group. We were the only two young (humor me), blonde (humor both of us), smiley, professional women in the congregation, and we may have been uncharacteristically stiff with each other,

After Elizabeth moved on from our church, we became Facebook friends and I started following her blog and her writing.  She's great!  I'm ashamed that that surprised me.  As I was recommending her thoughts on something recently (why Mother's Day and Independence Day shouldn't be celebrated as church holidays), it occurred to me that I may have missed out on a deeper friendship because of petty envy.  As if there isn't always room for more thoughtful smiling women in the world. [Rev, Hagan has a newborn and is working on a new book, so probably will never read this, but if she does: Elizabeth, I'm sorry I that I was surprised to find your writing so good and I'm sorry if my insecurities prevented us from becoming better friends,]

So as part of some compensatory act, penance for judging women harshly for being able to fun things that I'm not (in other words, for doing just what I wrote against doing here), I paid extra close attention to Elizabeth Hagan's recent book suggestions and checked out Elizabeth Gilbert's Committed: A Skeptic Makes Peace with Marriage (keep humoring me, somehow this makes sense in my mind).

Committed is wonderful (more on that in a moment).  Which made me think that I should apologize to the aforementioned Elizabeths and also to my best friend E, who not only stood in line to get me a signed copy of Signature of All Things, but who also told me, years ago, that I would enjoy Eat, Pray, Love.  E, I'm sorry I didn't listen to you the first time.  You know me quite well and I should know that.

About Committed:  For about a week and a half, I spoke to anyone who would listen (mostly The Mister and My Mother) about Committed.  It is the most thoughtful discussion of marriage I have encountered, and fun reading as well.  Like Anne Lamott's Operating Instructions, I think everyone should read it, but like Operating Instructions, I have no idea to whom I would recommend it.  A happily married woman has no place giving a book about a happily [if reluctantly] married woman to a single or less-than-happily married friend, and the recently engages probably don't want to hear it, just like the recently pregnant don't want to about the the struggles of having a newborn and actual parents of newborns are too sleep deprived to read Operating Instructions and recognize it for the humorous masterpiece it is.

Eleven years two hours and six miles from
the point of public commitment. 

Withing a period of two weeks, I read both Anne Lamott's Some Assembly Required: A Journey of My Son't First Son and Committed,  Both authors have a core subject and both take some rather lengthy tangents (Lamott considerably more so).  In each case, I wondered, "Does anyone really want to read about your travels in the middle of a book about . . . ?" and in both cases, the writing is so good that my answer is "Yes!"  Yes, I wanted to know about Lamott's insecurities and weird trip to India and Gilbert's bad times in Cambodia*, just because they are so skillful with words.  I hope someday to be so skillful.  I need to practice.  Thanks for putting up with my practice.

And, as far as personally committed goes, The Mister and I recently celebrated our eleventh anniversary (steel and fashion jewelry!) by attending a wedding and going shopping together for spatulas.  As you can see from the image, we even color coordinated.  This fact was shockingly much commented upon.

*Okay, not only does Liz (we are suddenly on a first-name basis) have great skill with words and fun taste in subject matter, she is the sister of Catherine Gilbert Murdock, author of the fabulous Dairy Queen YA novel.  I would be embarrassed by how much that raises E. Gilbert in my esteem, if I didn't think it happened the other way more often.

Apology to Three Elizabeths

I have not read Eat, Pray, Love.  About this I have been foolishly proud.  And I should apologize.

I must first apologize to Elizabeth Gilbert.  Somehow I've been okay with mocking Elizabeth Gilbert for some time.  Based on premise, I absolutely could not stomach Eat, Pray, Love (and honestly, if you say that the book is a memoir of a woman getting over a bad divorce by eating her way through Italy until she finds herself and falls in love with a Brazilian man in Bali, it does sound repulsively entitled and simplistic).  But I've long known that Elizabeth Gilbert is not all Eat, Pray, Love.  Among other things, she wrote one of my favorite novels of the last few years (Signature of All Things, which I discuss here) and I've read some of her political commentary and find her spot on.  Yet somehow, I was smugly not a fan.

I should have noticed some sort of cognitive dissonance when I discussed Signature with my sister-in-law.  When I mentioned that Signature was great in spite of the author, and SiL asked if she'd given up her perfect life on a farm or not.  Once I realized that SiL was talking about Barbara Kingsolver and was still annoyed with Barbara Kingsolver because Kingsolver seemed to enjoy preserving food, I became defensive; Barbara Kingsolver (Animal Dreams, The Lacuna, The Bean Trees . . . among my very favorite authors) is so different than Elizabeth Gilbert ("just run away and, meet the new right man and everything will be okay!"). But SiL had actually read Animal, Vegetable, Miracle and Pigs in Heaven so was basing her opinion on something.  I'm not sure where mine came from.

Which brings us to Elizabeth Hagan. Rev. Hagan (a.k.a. pastor Elizabeth) was an interim preacher at my church in Oklahoma.  I always thought she was great for our church, but I was unsure if I liked her, perhaps because I was unsure if she liked me.  I'm older than she is, but in the context of the church we fell into the same (small) demographic group.  We were the only two young (humor me), blonde (humor both of us), smiley, professional women in the congregation, and we may have been uncharacteristically stiff with each other.

After Elizabeth moved on from our church, we became facebook friends, and I have started following her blog and her writing. She's great!  As I was recommending her thoughts on something recently (why Mother's Day and Independence Day shouldn't be celebrated as church holidays), it occurred to me that I may have missed out on a deeper friendship because of petty envy.  As if there isn't always more room for thoughtful smiley women in the world. [Rev. Hagan has a newborn and is working on a new book, so probably will never read this, but if she does: Elizabeth, I'm sorry that I was surprised to find your writing so good and if my insecurities prevented us from becoming better friends.]  

So, assuming she would never have any knowledge of it, I recently checked out Elizabeth Gilbert's Committed: A Skeptic Makes Peace with Marriage because Elizabeth Hagan recommended it, as a sort of compensatory act.

Committed is wonderful (more on that in a moment).  Which made me think that I should apologize to the aforementioned Elizabeths, and also to my best friend E, who not only stood in line to get me to a signed copy of Signature, but who also told me, years ago, that I would enjoy Eat, Pray, Love.  E, I'm sorry I didn't listen to you the first time.  You know me quite well and I should know that.

About Committed: For about a week and a half, I spoke to anyone who would listen (mostly the Mister and my Mother) about Committed.  It is the most thoughtful discussion of marriage I have encountered, and fun reading as well.  Like Anne Lamott's Operating Instructions, I think everyone should read it, but like Operating Instructions, I have no idea to whom I would recommend it (a happily married woman has no place giving a book about a happily [if very reluctantly] married woman to a single or unhappily married friend and the recently engaged probably don't want to hear it, just like the recently pregnant don't want to know about the struggles of having a newborn and parents of a newborns are too sleep deprived to get just how funny Operating Instructions is).

Eleven years, two hours and 6 miles from
the official point of  public commitment

Within the period of two weeks, I read both Anne Lamott's Some Assembly Required: A Journey of My Son's First Son and Committed.  Both authors have a core subject, and both take some rather lengthy tangents (Lamott considerably more so).  In each case, I wondered, "Does anyone really want to read about your travels in the middle of a book about . . . " and in both cases, the writing is so good that the answer is, "Yes!"  Yes, I wanted to know about Lamott's insecurities and weird trip to India and Gilbert's bad times in Cambodia, just because they are so skillful with words.  I hope to someday be like that.  I need to practice. Thanks for putting up with my practice,

And, as for a personally committed, the Mister and I recently celebrated our eleventh anniversary (steel and fashion jewelry!) by attending a wedding and going shopping together for spatulas.  As you can see from the image, we even color coordinated. It was shockingly much commented upon.

But There Are No Chiggers On A Dream Trip

Despite being best buddies, Aster and Dianthus have the sibling habit of caring way too much about what is befalling the other.  Good things are sweeter if one can gloat that the other didn't get it.  Bad things are worse if the punishment is not shared, whether deserved or not. Unequal distribution leads to an uproar, even if one or the other doesn't particularly like whatever is being shared.

In other words, they are human.

I bring this up for two reasons.  The first is that I have an aunt who thinks that my brother and I didn't bicker in the back seat.  I don't know what evidence she used to conclude that, but I certainly don't want to mislead anyone about Aster and Dianthus.  I'll be clear-- Aster and Dianthus have abundant charms, and they can be really annoying individuals.

Secondly, I have witnessed this behavior too much in adults recently.  When hearing about things other people are doing: taking maternity leave; going on a long honeymoon, competing in long distance races; there have been responses of, "well, I didn't get any paid leave," or "knees don't really hold up after 50" not so much as a point of discussion but with an implied attitude of, "I didn't get to do that, nobody else should either."  Although it is just as unseemly when adults do it as when my kids declare that it is no fair the other gets to carry the towel bag (really), I've caught myself coveting when I read of friends taking a year or two to live in Mexico, or overlanding from Alaska to Patagonia, thinking, "Well, I couldn't up and leave for two years," as if that should have stopped them (read their blogs Slobe Family Adventure and When Sparks Fly, and for discussion of how to do it yourself, see The Practical Overlander).

So from the first day of driving in the rain across Arkansas, when I thought, "Wow, we are doing it again.  We are living the dream," I've wanted to write about the recent journey with my family.  And I keep getting stopped by the voices in my head telling me about all of the problems in the world and all of the problems faced by my friends.  There's a vague background chorus chanting, "Must be nice."

And the truth is, it is nice.  It is nice to have the Mister who wants to eat around the world with me. It is nice to have a job where I don't work in the summer.  It is nice to have the means to travel. It is nice to have great parents and in-laws who want to meet us in interesting places so they can hang with their grandkids.  It is nice to be able-bodied.  And I know full-well that having this combination is not the norm and will not last forever.  And my not appreciating it will in no way solve the problems of my friends or the world, nor will a lack of appreciation extend my window of opportunity.  So I'd better get over any hesitation and enjoy it while I have it.

So, we took a four-thousand-plus mile road trip (it is not as far to Hilton Head, South Carolina, as it is to Vancouver British Columbia, where we drove last year).  We saw, did, and ate lots.

One stop on our journey was a professional conference at which I was presenting.*  Strangely (for an academic conference), there was an option to camp and, also strange for an academic conference, one could sign kids up for a nature and art camp when one registered; which is how this whole trip came to be ("while we are going to Kentucky for the conference, we might as well go to West Virginia to see our old neighborhood.  While we are there, we might as well attend the folk festival.  Oh, there is time between conference and folk festival? well, we might as well go to the beach . . .).

When we arrived on Sunday night, late, having taken a wrong turn and driven the windy roads of southeast Kentucky twice, we weren't sure exactly what our reception would be.  A super-nice woman was willing to re-open the registration table, only to tell us that the road to the campground was impassably muddy, but if we would pull out our camping gear, she'd send somebody to shuttle us there. We were tired, cranky, swarmed by gnats and unloading our minivan in the mud

to pick out the camping essentials to be dropped off who knows where across a creek.  I commented to the Mister, while wondering how far I was going to have to slog in the mud in order to give my professional talk, "Yeah, camping with the family at a conference.  May go on the list among the craziest things I've done.  You'd think I'd know better."

Someday they will legitimately be able to say, "When I was young
we would go on vacation and there wasn't even a t.v.  So we played
barefoot in the creek all day.

And then it became magical.  The frogs were so loud they kept us up at night.  The freshly cut hay and the mountain magnolias left life smelling fresh and vaguely sweet.  If one stayed up late enough, the stars and the lightning bugs were amazing.  Dianthus and Aster bonded with the four other children in the kids' camp, and for four days they were inseparable, racing to establish their own table in the dining hall, helping each other on hikes, and playing barefoot in the creek for hours.

Little kids in big spaces

It was every bit as idyllic as it sounds.

Same spot: enlarged to show texture of trees

I know enough of the craft of storytelling to know that readers don't want uninterrupted sweetness.  But our trip overall, and our time at Pine Mountain in particular, was truly lovely, and nothing would be gained by sullying those memories.  Which is why I'll leave the discussion of the constant scratching of giant swollen chigger bites on both boys' genitalia off of this post.

*For the record, my severely budget constrained institution did not pay for any travel and I am never compensated for my time while attending summer conferences.

Home from (and in) Exotic Places

Upon their return to Colorado from a two week East Coast excursion (meeting us in Hilton Head towards the beginning) my mother told me what a great trip they had, and how it had almost felt like visiting a different country, with all the different, foods, accents, and environments.

Southeastern Kentucky.  So not Western Oklahoma.

It sounded silly when she said it, and I would have laughed, had I not just commented, two days before, when we arrived in Kansas City, in a hot haze over 100 degrees with a furnace blasting south wind and bad traffic, that it felt like home.  It wasn't just that the Mister was not alone in his Royals cap and Jayhawk shirt, it was that until then, from the first lunch in Fort Smith, it felt like we were somewhere else, someplace exotic, someplace vaguely foreign.  Grits and green tomato country covered by lots and lots of trees.*

South Carolina Swamp.  Also not Western Oklahoma.

Wandering around the town in West Virginia where I lived for four years didn't feel like a homecoming (except when seeing friends) and I kept muttering, "We used to live here? It's so green.  And so steep and so not like the places I live."  But I did live there.

When I returned to Western Oklahoma there was a similar sense of confusion, "Really?  This is where I live?" (and I never lived in Kansas City, which felt so home-like).  But my cat was here, and our house with its problems and lots of lots of zucchini and yep, I was back where I belong.

Central Kansas in May.  Not Western Oklahoma as well.

It's hard to explain the diversity of the US to people outside of it.  Its hard for me to fathom and I've driven huge swaths of it.  It's a pretty incredible place in so many ways.  So here is my annual celebration of the diversity of this country, and the greatness that can be found across it.  Happy Birthday US of A! With all of you're flaws, you are my home, and for that I am glad.

The Captains say, "Happy Birthday USA!"

*Anyone who complains that driving the interstate across Kansas is the most boring driving around hasn't driven the interstate across Georgia, flanked by plantation pines and nothing else for hundreds of miles.

2015 Americana Cheese photo here and 2014 here.