July 2024 Reading List

 First of all - how did July go by so fast?! Next - eight books read this month - all of them good.

The Truth About The Devlins is Lisa Scottoline's latest offering. It is about a family all of whom are successful lawyers except one. I have always liked this author's books. This one was especially satisfying.

The Watchmaker's Hand is #16 in Jeffery Deaver's Lincoln Rhyme series. An old nemesis is back to taunt the team. These books hardly ever end the way you think they will.   

A Calamity of Souls is the newest book by David Baldacci, one of my favorite authors. This book is set in 1968 in southern Virginia. With some parallels to Harper Lee's To Kill A Mockingbird, it is a harrowing story about a white lawyer defending a black man accused of murder. If you've forgotten what the 60's were like, this excellent read will take you right back there.

Peter Nichols is a new author for me. Granite Harbor, about a serial killer in a small town in coastal Maine, is a well written, satisfactory mystery if you like trying to figure out whodunits.

Switchboard Soldiers by Jennifer Chiaverini is another of her novels based on facts. I love history and I really like learning about the roles women played during the times of war. 

An Unfinished Love Story by Doris Kearns Goodwin is about the political roles she and her husband played in Washington in the 1960's. Kearns is one of my favorite people and authors. This memoir brought back so many memories of those years - JFK, LBJ, Vietnam, Kent State, the Democratic convention in Chicago, protests, the threat of nuclear war.... - turbulent times during my formative years.

What Happens in Paradise and Troubles in Paradise are the last two books in the Paradise trilogy by Elin Hilderbrand. I wrote last month, after reading the first in the series, of how I was reminded of my own experience on St. John and the other US Virgin Islands. And these two books did somewhat the same except that I was more caught up in the story lines than memories. At the end of the last book a category five hurricane decimates much of the islands. It was based on the real hurricanes, Irma and then Maria, both cat 5's, that struck in 2017.

I have enjoyed Hilderbrand's books in her Nantucket series, but I liked this trilogy more. I will read her newest, Swan Song, which, as the title suggests is her last in the Nantucket series.

My son Douglas and his wife Shelly visit St. John as often as they can. After the hurricanes, he went to help rebuild as much as possible in the limited time he had there. This photo of him was taken after they had cleared debris and began construction. 

Her Tools AKA My Tools

Were you a woman in your 30's during the 1970's? Did you identify as a feminist? Part of the Women's Liberation Movement? Did you, like me, buy yourself a pink tool kit? 

The quality of the tools was mediocre, but it felt like a statement: "I have my own tools. I'm capable of fixing things myself. I am an independent woman."

Over the years the case broke and the tools were either lost or broken and discarded. A few days ago I found something that would work to replace a broken clip on the cover of our large oscillating table fan. I was having trouble getting it fastened so HD came to help. I said, "We need a pair of needle nose pliers", bent to open the bottom cupboard drawer and pulled out my pink pliers. Fan fixed. And the memory of my pink tool case surfaced.

Just like my mother and grandmother, I keep a few tools handy in the kitchen - screwdrivers, pliers, vise grips, scissors, etc. The ball peen hammer was my mother's. I still remember which cupboard drawer she kept it in. The pliers may, or may not, be grandma's. When she died the only thing my mom really wanted of her's were her pliers. I also remember just where grandma kept them.

They both had the same rule: "If you use my tools, put them back where you found them." Obviously I have the same rule. Which is why, when I couldn't find my orange handled screwdriver this morning, I asked Bud what he had done with it. He didn't remember having it, but I found it on his workbench in the garage.

"I don't care if you use my tools - just put them back where you found them." 

Once You Learn These Words

 

You Begin
Margaret Atwood

You begin this way:
this is your hand,
this is your eye,
that is a fish, blue and flat
on the paper, almost
the shape of an eye.
This is your mouth, this is an O
or a moon, whichever
you like. This is yellow.

Outside the window
is the rain, green
because it is summer, and beyond that
the trees and then the world,
which is round and has only
the colors of these nine crayons.

This is the world, which is fuller
and more difficult to learn than I have said.
You are right to smudge it that way
with the red and then
the orange: the world burns.

Once you have learned these words
you will learn that there are more
words than you can ever learn.
The word hand floats above your hand
like a small cloud over a lake.
The word hand anchors
your hand to this table,
your hand is a warm stone
I hold between two words.

This is your hand, these are my hands, this is the world,
which is round but not flat and has more colors
than we can see.

It begins, it has an end,
this is what you will
come back to, this is your hand.

  

Was It Princess Moonbeam or Shining Star?

The following Mary Oliver poem I discovered this morning really triggered some childhood memories of when Betty and I used to play cowboys and Indians. We were usually cowboys, well, cowgirls I guess, but once in awhile we were Indians. That was when we made camp in the grove of locust trees up at the other place. I've been trying to remember my Indian name. Those two guesses in the above title probably come close.

But now that I know I do have some Native American ancestors (blog post April 27, 2024, "Meet My Native American 7x Great-Grandfather) I have been trying to find a translation for the one woman mentioned by name - Waikusanin. I even tried the Delaware/Lenape Talking Dictionary and got no translation. But I did find this Lenape name: "Weenjipahkihelexkwe" which means "Touching Leaves Woman".  I can't pronounce the Lenape name, but I'm going to pretend that Touching Leaves was my great-great-aunt - just as Aunt Leaf  was the one Mary Oliver imagined. Here is her beautiful poem:

Aunt Leaf  by Mary Oliver

Needing one, I invented her -
the great-great-aunt dark as hickory
called Shining-Leaf, or Drifting-Cloud
or The-Beauty-of-the-Night.

Dear aunt, I'd call into the leaves,
and she'd rise up, like an old log in a pool,
and whisper in a language only the two of us knew
the word that meant follow,

and we'd travel
cheerful as birds
out of the dusty town and into the trees
where she would change us both into something quicker -
two foxes with black feet,
two snakes green as ribbons,
two shimmering fish - and all day we'd travel.

At day's end she'd leave me back at my own door
with the rest of my family,
who were kind, but solid as wood
and rarely wandered. While she,
old twist of feathers and birch bark,
would walk in circles wide as rain and then
float back

scattering the rags of twilight
on fluttering moth wings;

or she'd slouch from the barn like a gray opossum;

or she'd hang in the milky moonlight
burning like a medallion,

this bone dream, this friend I had to have,
this old woman made out of leaves.

 

I never knew any of my great-great aunts well enough to imagine one of them being the aunt of this poem.

But I can certainly imagine my dear Aunt Leona (Dad's sister) and me having the kind of day described in Oliver's poem. 💚

What Is It About Brioche?

I limit my trips to Walmart, keeping a running list until there are things on it that I need and I have to go. And when I do, I almost always check the sale racks of baked goods. I don't always buy something, but I look. This week I came home with Sour Cream Donuts, Lemon Sliced Loaf Cake, a small bag of three Macadamia Nut cookies and a loaf of Vanilla Brioche. I guess my sweet tooth was acting up. 

I debated about the brioche. It looked so good - "Oh why not?"

And vanilla brioche? Well that almost melts in your mouth when you say it, doesn't it?

It has been quite awhile since I last bought any brioche. I forget that it really doesn't taste like I think it will. I'm probably  attaching a romantic French connotation to the word and imagining, in my mind, sitting in the sun outside a Parisian café drinking café au lait and eating brioche.

This morning I tried toasting a slice. It was some better. Brioche has "high egg and butter content which gives it a rich and tender crumb".

Next time I'll buy the Croissants. I know I like them, especially filled with chicken salad.

Hm-m, my son-in-law bakes a lot of different kinds of bread. I wonder if he's ever made brioche?

Do Your Ears Hang Low?

Ever since I started wearing glasses when I was twelve years old, I've known that my ears were lopsided. The right one is lower than the left one. For some reason I really noticed the difference after my shower this morning while I was doing my hair. Not only is the right ear lower, it sticks out slightly more - and I had never noticed that before. The song 'Do Your Ears Hang Low'? popped into my head. I knew all the words to the first verse, but not if I remembered them from my childhood or from when my children were little.

I was surprised to find that the song dates from 1838, probably written by George Washington Dixon. There are some vulgar versions of the song including one that was popular among the soldiers in WWI. These are the  five stanzas of the children's novelty song. 

Do your ears hang low?
Do they wobble to and fro?
Can you tie 'em in a knot?
Can you tie 'em in a bow?
Can you throw 'em o'er your shoulder
Like a continental soldier?
Do your ears hang low?

Do your ears stand high?
Do they reach up to the sky?
Do they droop when they are wet?
Do they stiffen when they're dry?
Can you wave them at your neighbor
With an element of flavor?
Do your ears stand high?

Do your ears flip-flop?
Can you use them as a mop?
Are they stringy at the bottom?
Are they curly at the top?
Can you use them for a swatter?
Can you use them for a blotter?
Do your ears flip-flop?

Do your ears stick out?
Can you waggle them about?
Can you flap them up and down
As you fly around the town?
Can you shut them up for sure
When you hear an awful bore?
Do your ears stick out?

Do your ears give snacks?
Are they all filled up with wax?
Do you eat it in the morning
Do you eat it in the bath?
Do you eat it with a scone
Or do you eat it on its own?
Do your ears give snacks?

I remember Mom once telling me that after checking the fingers and toes on each of us after we were born that she looked to see if our ears stood out like Dad's did. None of her four children had inherited Dad's protruding ears. 

A few years ago I read an article that said the first born daughter takes after her father. I do have Dad's large ears and nose and more of his temperment.

This is a photo of him when he was around 12 years old.

Be

 

I believe, before FB changed so many things, that in my profile Intro there were more than the few things that show up there now. 

I don't remember what the prompt was, but my one word response was 'Be'. As in: exist. 

I found and bought this reminder in 2003 at the Portland Saturday Market. The seller/carver told me it was a rock he found in the Columbia River.

In 1970 an unassuming little novella written by Richard Bach was published. It was about a seagull who was more concerned about learning how to perfect his flying than in scavenging for food like all the others in the flock.

It was an allegorical tale of reflection, freedom and self-realization. By the end of 1972 the book was #1 on the best seller list having sold over a million copies. 

In 1973, I had my own copy.

That same year the movie came out along with the soundtrack album by Neil Diamond.

I've used the lyrics "Lonely Looking Sky" from the album along with some of my photos in a previous blog post.

It's funny that I have never used the words to "Be" before, especially since it is one of my all time favorites.

Be 

Lost
On a painted sky
Where the clouds are hung
For the poet's eye
You may find him
If you may find him

There
On a distant shore
By the wings of dreams
Through an open door
You may know him
If you may

Be
As a page that aches for words
Which speaks on a theme that's timeless
While the Sun God will make for your day
Sing
As a song in search of a voice that is silent
And the one God will make for your way

And we dance
To a whispered voice
Overheard by the sould
Undertook by the heart
And you may know it
If you may know it

While the sand
Would become the stone
Which begat the spark
Turned to living bone
Holy, holy
Sanctus, sanctus

Be
As a page that aches for word
Which speaks on a theme that is timeless
While the Sun God will make for your day
Sing
As a song in search of a voice that is silent
And the one God will make for your day

I'm not even sure I still have the book - if I do it is in one of boxes out in the garage.

But I do still have my JLS pin. 💙