Reading and Retrospective

First, Reading.
Those of you who have been reading here for a while may remember that I always post a list of books read in each year. Although I have lower than usual confidence in my record-keeping for the wild and crazy 2011, here's the list (and please forgive me for not properly formatting titles):

At Home: A Brief History of Private Life by Bill Bryson
Adam and Eve a novel by Sena Jeter Naslund
A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson
Blood Almanac poems by Sandy Longhorn
Threshold poems by Jennifer Richter
Rookery poems by Traci Brimhall
The First Four Books poems by Louise Gluck
Gilead a novel by Marilynne Robinson
Housekeeping a novel by Marilynne Robinson
The Forgotten Garden a novel by Kate Morton
Wuthering Heights a novel by Emily Bronte
A Room with a View a novel by E.M. Forster
Pearl of China a novel by Anchee Min
Rebecca a novel by Daphne duMaurier
The House at Riverton a novel by Kate Morton
Sacred Hearts a novel by Sarah Dunant
A Gate at the Stair a novel by Lorrie Moore
Private Life a novel by Jane Smiley
Queen Bee Moms and King Pin Dads by Rosalind Wiseman
Heart's West: True Stories of Mail-Order Brides on the Frontier by Chris Enss
The Beekeeper's Apprentice a novel by Laurie King
Today's Special Dish poems by Nina Lindsay
A Reliable Wife a novel by Robert Goolrick
The Price of Privilege by Madeline Levine
WAIT poems by Alison Stine
The Everything Tween Book by Linda Sonna
Selected Poems by H.D.
Colosseum poems by Katie Ford
When Will There Be Good News? a novel by Kate Atkinson
The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields

up next:

No Eden poems by Sally Rosen Kindred, and
Death Comes to Pemberley a novel by P.D. James

And now, Retrospective.
Reader, Both Fires is almost three years old. My how time flies.

In those three years of my life as mother, we've gone from little ones, to big-ish ones; from the bird theater to exclamations of "Epic fail!" and "Whatever." (Oh, how I detest 'whatever.').

In those three years of my life as writer, we've gone from the fledgling poet just trying to connect to the world of poetry a bit, to the still-fledgling poet who is now sending out her work on a regular basis and sometimes even getting acceptances; from the mom who felt guilty taking time off to write, to the writer who knows her children will be better and stronger because she pursues her own creative life without apology.

In those three years of my life as person, we've gone from the teeny tiny woman (who, I'm glad to tell you, doesn't live here anymore) to a gal who, yes, has a chronic illness but who now has the right meds and a clearer diagnosis, and who can see her illness more as a sculpting life force than an invisible box.

I've enjoyed writing here, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart for reading.

Starting tomorrow, I invite you to join me at the stanza, where the story of mother, of writer, of person, poet and pilgrim, will continue. I hope to see you there.

Reader, I wish you peace, joy, and everything wonderful in 2012 and beyond.

Hometown: Blank (and P.S. a give-away)

1st edition cover

"In the loveliest town of all, where the houses were white and high and the elm trees were green and higher than the houses, where the front yards were wide and pleasant and the back yards were bushy and worth finding out about, where the streets sloped down to the stream and the stream flowed quietly under the bridge, where the lawns ended in orchards and the orchards ended in fields and the fields ended in pastures and the pastures climbed the hill and disappeared over the top toward the wonderful wide sky, in this loveliest of all towns, Stuart stopped to get a drink of Sasparilla."

This passage from E.B. White's Stuart Little always takes me back to the town I was born in, the town where I began my growing up, the town that, in some ways, still feels like my hometown. Here, I was known, I was my mom's and dad's daughter, I was the middle sister sandwiched by two boys. With the other kids, we ran around the neighborhood in a pack. We went sledding on Davie's hill and walked our way lost in the woods. It was just like Ames Crossing, the loveliest of all towns in Stuart Little, except that the orchards gave way, westward, to dunes and we drank Faygo Rock'n'Rye or Vernor's instead of Sasparilla.

But then there is the town where we lived amidst field after field after field. Where the noon whistle reminded us of lunch time and the six o'clock whistle told us it was time to go home before our parents got cross. This was the town with the old fashioned wooden water tower that darkened to silhouette against the evening sky going down toward dusk. And this was the town where my BFF and I would sit on the swings at night at the little town beach, drinking diet cherry 7-up and wondering where life would take us. The town that had a town drunk called Sundown, where you could walk across M-66 by waving your hand at the traffic to stop, and it would even though there was no stoplight. This is the town where my BFF's grandpa was the Village President once, and then her dad was, and now her sister is. In this town I graduated from high school and tried to graft myself on to the history of farming families, many of whom are still living and working there today.

And then there was New York City, that amalgam of thousands of small towns held together by the stitching of cross-streets onto Broadway, the Asian grocer where I got my coffee "light," the trembling of the 1/9 below the streets, the barely-there restaurants where you could get black beans and scrambled eggs and pressed Cuban bread for $4, thank God. Because that was all you had till you got your sliver of a paycheck the next week, and you needed a full belly to get through your finals.

Next came the Township, strung between the dark blue bay and the every-color brilliance of the lake. We swam at the drop off, walked to the fruit stand for sweet corn in the afternoons sun-soaked and happy. In the evenings we reached up to touch the stars that looked so close, we saw ourselves in the sparkling wash of the Milky Way, we walked through tunnels of fireflies. Then played euchre late into the night; always sit the way the bathtub runs if you want to win (ancient family secret). This is where we brought our first loves, our first real loves, the people we joined ourselves to in marriage. This is where we brought our babies home to meet their grandparents. This is where we go home to now.

Next there was the biggest small town in the world: Saint Paul. There everyone is Catholic, and everyone grew up there, and we lived in John and Millie's house even though John and Millie had died long ago. This is where my babies were born, where my dearest friendships took root and grew as rich and tall as the trees in the boulevards. This is where I learned to expect flood, to take shelter away from the basement's rattling windows, to huddle together and keep the fire burning strong during winter's long residence.

Now we are here in this little peninsula town. We have put down shallow roots in its here-and-there streets that are a patchwork of House Beautiful and houses slouching down to their dotage. We find our way to the best dry-cleaners, the semi-secret produce market, the library quiet and nourishing as the womb. We sleep with our windows open, hear the song of crickets and the Caltrain going through downtown. We walk through our days hemmed in by mountains: to the east, the blonde foothills curled like so many hips and thighs under the sun; to the west, the blue-dark Santa Cruz with its mantle of cloud bank off the ocean. Here we have landed: taken by surprise, but together. Our life unfolds day by day as if we have always been here. This is where those babies are growing up, at least for now.

Which is my hometown? I've been wondering lately. My field for 'hometown' on Facebook has always been blank. I have never known for sure, and still don't, what makes a town a hometown. If, as Joan Didion says, "a place belongs to those who claim it hardest," then the Township is mine all mine (don't worry, I promise to share!). But still, I hesitate to say it's my hometown -- there are families who have been there generations; it's their hometown. Sometimes I think my hometown is wherever I am right now: so, here on the peninsula; except when I'm visiting Mom and Dad at the lake; and then, near Ely, Minnesota, on vacation -- that week, the northwoods is home.

What's your hometown? How did you decide? Is it the place you were born and grew up? Is it the place you've been longest? Is it the place you raised your children, had the best library, or your favorite orchard of all time?

I would love to know how you, Reader, define hometown for yourself. Or if you're not sure, then something about your hometown or several of your hometowns. Anyone who comments will be put in a drawing for a copy of Today's Special Dish by Nina Lindsay, a hometown poet: born and raised and still working in Oakland; a poet who uses characters and scenes from her hometown to make her art.

Wherever you are today, I hope you feel at home. Happy Friday.

PS. I forgot to say I will draw the winner next Friday 10/28/2011! And also, if you're kinda shy like me and would rather "comment" via e-mail, you'll still go in the drawing.

Smoke Signals

Reader, I thought I'd better send up a few smoke signals in case you thought the fires had gone out in South-of-the-River.  No, we are still puffing along.  It's just that we've been living in the realm of The Bare Minimum this week as three-fifths of us have had a virus.  I am one of the -fifths.

One nice thing about having a chronic illness is you really have to listen to your body.  When I was healthy, I could power my way through most coughs, colds, and other such maladies.  Now, thanks to the cocktail of immunosuppressants that manages my arthritis symptoms, I have few defenses against the germ-of-the-week.  My body reacts to illness by refusing to do anything but sleep.

Well, I exaggerate a little. I did a few things other than sleep this week, but just a very few.  It's really very freeing to experience (again, for the, like, 50th time) the realization that it doesn't register with the Universe, not even one little bit, if I am Behind on Everything.  Ah, freedom!

Today, all -fifths were back in school and I managed to sit at my writing desk for a couple of hours and survey the scene.  I tried a few warm-ups and writing prompts to get the poem-making machine back into action.  I wouldn't call it serious drafting, but I showed up.  I also took a look at submissions.  I am not anywhere near my goal for the year.  So I paged through the poems that feel ready-ish and set aside five to send out.

Tonight all five-fifths of us will have our usual Friday night homemade pizza and Greek salad, and then head over to the high school for the boys' basketball game.  Even though we probably will not last past half-time, it will be like old times for me.  Even though I will not know any of the boys on the team, I will know every boy on the team: the smart, shy one who didn't grow into himself until sophomore year; the ladies man throwing out looks to the student section; the small but determined guard; the big guy in the middle who has been through more than he lets on; the guy at the end of the bench in a button-down and a knee brace, out for the season.  The coach; the coach's wife who fed the whole team a spaghetti dinner last night.  The smell of popcorn, the pep band, all the adolescent dramas unfolding, barely noticed by the non-adolescents.  The assistant principal standing at the door of the gym, looking serious.  It's not the 80s anymore, so I won't be wearing my blue eyeliner and my big bangs, but it will definitely feel like Friday night.

I guess there could be a basketball poem in my future.

Happy Friday to you, Reader.  I hope your Friday night feels like Friday night to you, too.

September Eleventh: Words and Numbers

I've never liked the way we (the media, politicians, news reporters, our society in general) have shortened the events of September 11, 2001 into two numbers:  9/11.  To me, speaking the words September eleventh makes us slow down just enough to remember and honor for a moment; saying nine-eleven is just too quick to give the people whose lives were lost or forever changed that day their due.

And yet, there are some striking numbers from that day nine years ago.  Here is a list from New York Magazine.

Remember to hug all your dear ones today, and to say a little prayer for peace and other miracles.

Saying Goodbye to the Bird Theater

I have always loved listening to the way young children figure out their world and the mysteries of language and vocabulary.  You know: the words they make up for things according to their own logic, or close substitutes based on something mis-heard.  And then there are the questions they ask as they try to figure out this great big, secret-coded world.

When my own children started talking and saying the darndest things, I would write things down on scraps of paper.  In my more organized moments, I'd drop them into a file in the filing cabinet.  Most days, I'd just shove the scrap into a book or a drawer.  Some of my happiest moments lately are when I come across a forgotten scrap of paper that says something like:  The Bean says "Glory to God in the highest, and pizza to his people on earth!"  Or, AJ wants to know: "When are they gonna put President Obama on the dollar bill with curlers in his hair?"  Or, Sister sez, pointing to her babies, "This is Baby, and this is Nother Baby, and this is Carrie.  I have too many that I can't take care of them!"

Just yesterday, Sister said, "Mom we need more seeds in the bird theater."  She meant bird feeder of course, and I didn't have the heart to correct her.  I just know the days of little-kid-isms are numbered.  Soon The Bean will stop saying weakened for weekend, and AJ's mouth will finally be able to pronounce Rs.  Someone, probably one of her know-it-all big brothers, will tell Sister:  "It's bird feeder, not bird theater," and that bubble, too, will be burst.

Meanwhile, I am remembering all my favorite baby words, sayings, and questions, like:

The Bean's word for disappear:  lostappear.  And he way he said St. Francis of A See Saw (instead of Assisi).

AJ's words for helicopter and lasagna: hebba-cobba and kazanya.  And the way he thought the word for airplane was Dada! for the first three years of his life (in his defense, Husband was traveling a lot in those days).

Then there's Sister who called airplanes Tokyo! for the daily 3:00 flight to Tokyo that went over our old house.  And her endearing words for strawberry (dawbobo), accidentally (axlee-dentlee) and tomorrow (nexterday).

Like the Bean's explanation of what happened after the dinosaurs became extinct, including his crude understanding of evolution:  "Roads began to be built.  Monkeys turned into people."

Like the time I read Psalm 147 to AJ:  O sing to the Lord giving thanks; sing psalms to our god with the harp.  He covers the heavens with clouds; he prepares the rain for the earth, making mountains sprout with grass.  And AJ said, "Aha!  So that's who popped up all our grass -- it was God!  Wait a minute, how can just a stone statue pop up all the grass?"

Like the way Sister still says, "Can I company you?" when she wants to go somewhere with someone.

And who was it?  I can't remember now.  One of them had just been watching Sesame Street, and I asked:  "What number did the Count talk about today?"  And whoever-it-was said, "The Count wasn't on today.  He's on vacation.  But one of his disciples was there to do the number of the day."

Children become so very competent so very quickly.  They learn to read and listen and pronounce, and they figure out the world.  They learn to say strawberry, and understand that the Count doesn't have disciples per se.  Then they stop saying things like:  "Can we have dee-dogs for lunch?" (hotdogs), and "Mom, do dinosaurs have a penis?  Well, do they at least have a glitter box?"(I think this one had to do with figuring out how dinos went to the bathroom -- litter box?), and "Hey, I was talking and you inberated me!" (interrupted).  Soon, they will be grunting at me, and I'll be lucky to get the three syllables that every parent hates: what-ev-er.

In the mean time, I am not going to correct anyone's mispronounciations, or verbal mix-ups, or even smile at the questions that show how puzzling this world still is to them sometimes.  I'm going to enjoy every one of them.

Long live the bird theater.


(P.S. I would love to hear other people's memories of what their kids used to say, or maybe still do say.  Share them in the comments if you like).

Remembering Emilie / Books Read in 2009

This is my friend, Emilie, and her boy, Ben. I am thinking of Emilie a lot this week as the anniversary of her death approaches on Christmas Eve. Emilie was a daughter, sister, wife and mother to two boys (both under age two at the time of her death). She was a writer, a voracious reader, a spiritual pilgrim, and a wonderful friend.

Emilie had a tradition of listing on her blog all the books she had read in a given year. I looked forward to it as a resource for ideas of what to read next. Last year, she didn't complete her list; she was too busy dying well, with courage and grace that amazed us all. I am borrowing her tradition as a small way to remember her, and to keep one of her great loves -- books -- alive in the world.

You can read Emilie's story here.

Books Read in 2009

The Other by David Guterson
In The Unlikely Event of a Water Landing: A Geography of Grief by Christopher Noel
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
The Book of Genesis, Robert Alter trans.
The Book of Exodus, Robert Alter trans.
100 Poems from the Chinese, Kenneth Rexroth ed.
Sappho (Poems), Robert Montgomery trans.
A History of God by Karen Armstrong
The Christian Book of the Dead by Margarete Van den Brink and Hans Stolp
The Shack by Wm. Paul Young
The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo by Steig Larsson
The Dead** by James Joyce
The White Album by Joan Didion from We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order To Live, her collected non-fiction
The Big House by George Howe Colt
Cost by Roxana Robinson
In the Beginning: Creation Myths From Around the World by Virginia Hamilton
Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts
The Alchemy of Illness by Kat Duff
Begin Again: Collected Poems by Grace Paley
Lady Macbeth: A Novel by Susan Fraser King
New England White by Stephen Carter
Possession: A Romance by A.S. Byatt
The Pope's Daughter by Caroline P. Murphy
Complete Poems by Anne Sexton
A Wedding in December by Anita Shreve
We Were In Auschwitz by 6643 (Janusz Nel Siedlecki), 75817 (Krystyn Olszewski) and 119198 (Tadeusz Borowski)
Between Silk and Cyanide: A Codemaker's War 1941-1945 by Leo Marks
The Friday Night Knitting Club by Kate Jacobs
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Anne Barrows
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
The Subtle Knife by Philip Pullman (from the His Dark Materials Trilogy)
The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million by Daniel Mendelsohn
Milk and Tides poems by Margaret Hasse
The End of Suffering by Scott Cairns
New Tracks, Night Falling poems by Jeanne Murray Walker
Recovered Body poems by Scott Cairns
Second Glance by Jody Picoult
Traveling Mercies by Anne Lamott
Ordering the Storm: How To Put Together a Book of Poems, Susan Grimm, ed.
The Florist's Daughter by Patricia Hampl
Lighting At Dinner poems by Jim Moore
The Book of Ruth from the Old Testament
Beowulf, from Medeival Myths edited by Norma Lorre Goodrich
El Cid, from Medeival Myths edited by Norma Lorre Goodrich
The Meaning of Everything by Simon Winchester
Songs Without Words by Anne Packer
Migration: New and Selected Poems* by W.S. Merwin (partial reading)
The Story of English* by Robert McCrum, William Cran, and Robert MacNeil (partial reading)
A Romantic Education by Patricia Hampl
King Lear by Wm. Shakespeare

*partial read
**novella

I am only listing books here, not short stories, articles, and the rest, but I just have to mention the short story A Tiny Feast by Chris Adrian because it was so very good. You can read it here.

Please share a few of your favorite books of 2009 in the comments if you like. Happy reading, everyone!

Remembering

Since eight years ago today, I have yet to make it through a September 11th without leaking tears on and off all day; without hearing certain voices and sounds and, especially, silences; without seeing certain images in my mind's eye; without remembering the raw fear, and horror, and utter grief; without still trying to puzzle out, How could that have happened? Why would that have happened?

I was one of the luckiest ones that day: across the country, without any family in the disaster areas. I had a few close friends in New York City, and I had my fond memories of my graduate school days there, but I was not in a position to have my life collapse before my eyes, like so many did that day.

And still, I remember sitting on the couch with my twelve-day old Bean, watching the morning news. Hearing the anchor break in to say a small, private plane had crashed into one of the World Trade Center Towers. Watching the video a few minutes later and thinking, That wasn't a small, private plane.

Watching live coverage a few minutes later. Seeing the dark shadow come through the sky. I remember my brain stopping -- briefly understanding on some subconscious level -- and then starting again. Then saying "Oh my God, there's another one."

I remember a sudden jerky split in the TV picture with an aerial view of a maze-like structure. "What's that?" Husband asked. "It's the Pentagon," I said. With a gash in its side, a black plume of smoke rising up.

I remember listening to the audio of a voicemail from a passenger on one of the planes. It was a message to his wife. He said, "It doesn't look good." He said, "I want you to do good, be happy." He said, "I hope I see you" but if not, "See you when you get here." As if he was already partly in that known-yet-unknown There, that eternal place where souls reside.

And then the bewilderment, the inability to comprehend that explosion of dust, and bricks, and paper, and lives -- the towers falling down.

I remember the eerie, silent skies above my house near the airport, which were usually so full of the distant rumbles and roars of jets overhead. And starting a few days later, the regular patrols of fighter jets that were The Bean's and my only company on our morning walks.

I remember trying to get through to my dear friend, LC, all day, all week, all the next week; hoping and praying that she and her husband were okay. I remember finally getting through to her office in late September, time standing still while I waited to hear the words, "We're all okay," the wash of weak-kneed relief when I heard those words in her sweet voice. I remember the joy and tears we shared over the phone lines that were finally, blessedly open again.

I remember waiting to hear the stories of amazing rescues, of people pulled - alive! - from the rubble hours, one day, two days after the attacks. I remember finally accepting that, with one or two exceptions, there were to be no such stories.

And I remember lying down in bed next to Husband that night, thinking of all the people in New York and Washington and across the country, who were lying down so utterly alone.

Sometimes I try to figure out why this still feels so raw, even to someone like me who, after all is said and done, really lost nothing on that day -- except a bit more of my innocence. But I have learned over the years to let feelings flow. If you need to remember, then remember.

I am remembering today.

And I am asking you to remember, too: Remember to tell your dearest ones how precious they are to you, and to say a little prayer for peace and other miracles.