January Reading List

Only six books read this month, but they were more lengthy than usual.

River Horse by William Least Heat-Moon also known as the book that took me twenty years to read. I first became acquainted with this author in the mid-1980's when I read and fell in love with his first book, Blue Highways. My appreciation of his writing extended with his second book, PrairyErth. So when River Horse came out in the late 1990's, I had to have it. HD bought it for my birthday and I eagerly opened it only to be stopped by specifications and a diagram of a boat. I tried a couple more times over the years, but could never get into the book.

I learned long ago that some books aren't meant to be read until I am supposed to read them. This time I had no problem getting past the description of the C-Dory and into the fascinating story of Heat-Moon's journey across America made almost exclusively by water. My pleasure in reading this book was tripled when it required, for me, the addition of a dictionary, to look up the words I did not know, and an atlas, to follow the waterways he took. My favorite book this month. My theory about why I was able to get past the boat descriptions now is that in the intervening years my eldest son began building boats. I think his enthusiasm for the processes rubbed off.

This Tender Land by William Kent Krueger is another of his stand alone books. About four orphans making their way the best they can during the depression years, it is a heart-warming journey of survival, friendship and the struggles to simply survive during those hard times.

The Guest Book by Sarah Blake is the story of a privileged American family over three generations beginning in the 1930's.

Just Before Dawn by my younger brother, Les Lynam is the fourth in his Time Will Tell series and the one I was least looking forward to. I knew it would be about the dark decades after nuclear war had destroyed much of the world's population and changed the weather in the rest of the world. Constant winter in the United States resulted in deaths from cold and starvation. Governments collapsed, warring factions took over. Not my preferred genre. But I was pleasantly surprised. Lynam has given us characters we really like and cheer for, wonderful descriptions and dialogue.
This series is for young adults, but his characters have aged, therefore he has introduced some sex and violence which I think adds to the continuing drama. As he said, "Who the bleep is Ariel and WHAT, exactly, is a D-Walker?" I really look forward to the fifth and final installment.

The Last Widow is #9 in Karin Slaughter's Will Trent series. These are quick reads for me because I just can't put them down! For me, she is the female equivalent of John Sandford.

The Last Kingdom is the first book of Bernard Cornwell's series of the same name. I used to read a lot of books set in the times of early British Isles, but got away from them the last thirty years. I came to this book via one of my daily jig saw puzzles. It was a picture of Bamburgh Castle in Northumberland on  the Northeast coast of England. There is an option on the puzzle to click for more information which I did. One of the items that came up was Cornwell's book, which I decided to add to my reading list. I have enjoyed the writing and the story as well as going back to that era. There are twelve books in this series. I haven't decided yet whether I am going to read more.

Love's Paradise

I haven't given up hope of identifying the "mystery picture" we found in Mom's closet after she died. But I may have another idea where/how to search for it.
Yesterday I got curious about another picture I have of hers. It took a little while but I was finally able to locate information including the title about.......

                                                  ....... Love's Paradise

I found it advertised on ebay as a 1925 Art Deco print by artist, illustrator R. Atkinson Fox. It is exactly like the one hanging on my wall with the exception of a slightly different, but still original, frame.
In the lower left corner is "Copyright 1925, Borin, Chicago". In the right corner: "Fox-Urgelles". The asking price is $225.00, although I found several other sites with prices from $79.00 to $310.00. And no, the one I have is not for sale. I believe it was a wedding gift to my parents and I hope it stays in the family. My eldest granddaughter has already said she would like to have it.

Robert Atkinson Fox, a Canadian who began as a portraitist, was also noted for his bucolic paintings. From the early 1900's to the 1930's, he was a prolific commercial illustrator commissioned by major calendar and art print companies. And this is what has given me the idea of looking for my mystery painting under illustrators rather than artists. Maybe I'll get lucky.

As Luck Would Have It

Sometime around the end of November, the first of December, I began hearing a noise I described as a little squeal when the furnace started up. I mentioned it to Hubby Dearest, but he could hear nothing. (Which was not unusual, I often hear sounds he doesn't.)

"Maybe if I ignore it, it will go away," I thought. (Although I had been raised by a wise woman who never let the source of a strange noise go uninvestigated.)  Instead it got steadily worse. Finally I decided I was going to phone the heating and a/c business that had been advertising 'free funace check ups during the month of December' to have ours serviced. As luck would have it, by the time I phoned them the 'free' had changed to $30.00. Still, it was not a bad deal. It was the last day of December. Our 'new' furnace was exactly ten years old. I gave them my name and address ending with "we are located in a mobile home park". That is when the receptionist said, "Oh, we don't work on mobile home furnaces."

The following Monday I called a local heating and a/c business. To save time I lead off with the question, "Do you service mobile home furnaces?" "Oh yes." and when I gave her the name of our park she said she knew where we were located, that they had made several calls here. As luck would have it, they could be here the next morning when temperatures were in the 40's and being without heat for awhile wasn't too bad.

The tech arrived right on time and went to work, first taking off the furnace door and listening to the noise. As he worked I mentioned that the furnace was ten years old on the 31st. As luck would have it, he said, "It's going to be that extra week that gets you. Parts are only warranted for the first ten years". He quickly identified the squealy culprit as the inducer motor and left to see if they had one in stock. As luck would have it, they did. He efficiently installed it and then checked over the other parts of the equipment, discovering a large piece of foam against the blower motor. Placed to act as noise insulation, it had come unglued. "You should notice a big difference in your air circulation now," he advised. I thought there had been a change in the force of air for a long time, so another bit of good luck - and a reminder to place a service call every year or two, even if there wasn't a noticeable problem.

I wondered aloud if there was the possibility the motor might still be under warranty depending upon when the company we bought the furnace from had sent in the paper work. The serviceman said they could look up the serial number online and find out.

We received the invoice two days later. I was almost afraid to look at the total bill. The first line item was for labor, the last for tax. In between, as luck would have it: "1 Inducer Motor ---- Under Warranty - No Charge ---"

The Flashlight Skate

Late in the evening the lights dim
mellow music wafts, it is announced
all the Sadies line up waiting a turn
as the boys begin circling the rink

The steadies pair up, skate away
single guys skate by eyeing who
has the flashlight power now
I watch him circle past available

Finally my turn flashlight in hand
waiting until he is close enough
aiming the light for his face
so there can be no mistake

He slows, waiting as I skate to him
tentative smiles arms around waists
my hand on his tooled belt leather
jolted by the frisson passing through me

A Wandering Mind

When my mind wanders, I begin to wonder. First, why it goes where it goes and then, what made it go there? First thing this morning it wandered to the memory of a holiday dinner in December, 1972. I had invited my boss and wife and her mother. I remember nothing about what I served. I do remember that we had a nice evening and that my boss' mother-in-law was an interesting and lovely woman. I know I was introduced to her by her full name, but I was taught that you don't refer to your elders by their first names unless/until you are invited to do so by them. So I always thought of her as Mrs. ?? Try as I might, I could not remember her last name. Ah, but with the long arms and many fingers of the internet, I was sure I could find it.

I began with the name of my boss' wife, Willie (her name was Willis Ann, but she was always known as Willie) and where she lived after they retired and moved from Des Moines. Her name came up immediately along with a link to her obituary which gave me her parents' names. Weatherholt. Mrs. Weatherholt. I never would have remembered that. Willie was ninety-nine when she died. The above photo of her looks very much like the way I remember her mother looking.

Willis Ann was also a very interesting and lovely woman. She and I shared the love of books and reading. She was ever so intelligent and gracious. I learned much about the lives of her, my boss and their children during the years I worked for him, most of which I had forgotten - like that Willie had been a reporter for the Saint Louis Globe-Democrat and had worked for the US State Department 'paraphrasing' secret messages during WWII. It was in DC where she met her husband Tom who was directing wartime public relations for the American Red Cross. Thirty years later, when I worked for him, Tom still felt remorse that his flat feet had kept him from enlisting in the army for active duty.

Once I located Mrs. Weatherholt's name, I also read her obituary (wandering/wondering mind). In addition to the usual facts, Willie and Tom's youngest daughter had penned a loving memory of her Grandmother Oma which I thoroughly enjoyed reading.

An even more vivid memory stands out about that Christmas holiday dinner forty-seven years ago --
My dinner party was winding down when the telephone rang. There was no beep, leave a message then nor caller ID. When the phone rang, you answered it. It was my Mom delivering some heart breaking news - my little niece, Jennifer Lynn, had died. She was only three days old, born on December 13 and dead on the 16th. (Thirty-one years later my Mom would die on that same date.)
Our family was devastated. My brother and his wife had already gone through so much to have a child. We were all so happy when she was born. I don't even have a picture of her. The only time I saw her was in her little casket. I don't even have a photo of her gravestone - something I will rectify when we decorate for Memorial Day in May.

I honestly don't know which memory came first this morning. Was I thinking about the dinner and Mrs. W. or was I thinking about Jennifer? Those two memories are forever linked in my mind.

My older brother Ron called me yesterday to let me know how he was doing after his quadruple stent procedure last week. I already knew he was home and recuperating because after waiting two days to hear something, I called his eldest living daughter, Lorrie Anne. It happened to be her's and twin Andrew's birthdays. It is quite possibly thinking about them, how old they are now - born a little over a year after Jennifer's birth and death - that had me thinking about the night of December 16, 1972 and the dinner party interrupted by the telephone.