First and 30

What I'm Reading

2011-11-15T07:36:00.002-05:00

Note to self: There’s no such thing as “light” reading about working mothers.

So, after Jezebel did this piece, I decided to buy the book. If you know me, you know that this means nothing. My list of books to buy (a word document I tried to fix and upload at one point, but got too busy) sits at about 300 right now. I have eight books on my dresser waiting to be read. I’m in the middle of two books right now, and there are three other ‘unopened’ books hanging out on my Kindle, waiting for my attention. I have a book problem.

(I really don’t have a problem, and if I do it’s the fact that my brother-in-law gave me Game of Thrones and the Hunger Games early this year, and reading those 8 books threw off my schedule. I give him full credit for the backlog this year. Next year will be different.)

So I bought this because I’m reading a nonfiction book about a German pastor I learned about via the Kindle Daily deal (damn you Kindle Daily Deal!) and it is so. damn. dry. I want to finish it, but I go through these long phases where I just don’t care about his siblings, the family holiday celebrations, or the letters to grandma. I need frequent breaks.

Hubby and I went to Chicago for the funeral and I knew I didn’t want to read Holocaust-themed nonfiction, so I picked up I Don’t Know How She Does It and settled in to the trip.

Note to readers: What follows is not a review. It’s a personal, visceral, profanity-laden rant about my feelings after reading the book. If you’re looking for in-depth analysis, you’ll have to catch me on another day. Also, spoilers.

So this book made me want to open up a vein. I went into it expecting something like “Bridget Jones becomes a mom,” and I got something more like 9 to 5, except the bad guys kind of win. Apparently the only way to succeed at a parenting is to give up your high-stress high-profile career and live on your less ambitious husband’s salary. Also, single women that don’t want children should have them anyway, because the main character felt ‘awe’ when her children were born. That doesn’t make any damn sense.

I’m in a labyrinth here. The book tries desperately to paint a picture of the unfairness of judging the main character’s choices in parenting. I don’t actually want to judge her parenting choices. Thing is, every person in her life judges her parenting choices, AND SHE LETS THEM. She’s a well-paid, high-powered hedge fund manager with no backbone. Ultimately, she decides that everyone in her life that made her feel small, from the misogynists to overcompensating moms to her heinous in-laws, are somehow right. If all of these characters are right and she is wrong, then why isn’t a single one of them likable? I stayed up all night after reading this book, trying to figure out if my decision to TRY to get pregnant was going to destroy any hope of a career. I know that she’s a fictional character; I know she has more money than I do, and I know that she worked in a field with a LOT more men. Yet I found myself troubled and anxious about this book because it seemed to say that, no matter your gifts and talents, there’s only ONE WAY TO BE A MOTHER, and that way is all-consuming.

I’m not a mother (yet), but I’m obsessed with the mechanics of working motherhood. I’m less interested in the opt-out/opt-in debate, because it is presented as an argument for rich people. It’s never, “do I want to stay home?”, it’s always “am I squandering my intelligence/pedigree/greatness on kiddie time?” The real-life SAHMs I know don’t present their problems or choices in this way. A lot of them stay home because they don’t demand pay that would exceed day care. That’s an issue I can understand.

The thing is, even if I was rich, I’d still want to work. I’d want my children to see me working. I’d want to them to understand that coming home after accomplishing something is important. I think that ambition gets a bad rap in our society, and I want my kids to appreciate and nurture their ambitions. If, heaven forbid, one of my kids ends up in an abusive or otherwise nonfunctioning relationship, I’d want him or her to realize that economic independence is the way out. That’s easier to do if he or she grows up in a situation where economic independence is the norm for both spouses.

I can’t be appeased by a tacked-on ending about securing funding for a “lady business.” The ending almost makes it worse. She can only use her skills for a dollhouse factory. Because she’s a MOTHER. She can’t fight back against the environment in her office. She has to leave. Because she’s a MOTHER. It's the only option. How fucking depressing is that?

So who was he to you?

2011-11-07T12:06:00.001-05:00

We’re sitting in Detroit, New York, DC, Philly, across Georgia, Ohio, everywhere. We’ve woken early to a missed call from the wee hours of the morning. We’re girding ourselves against the news. We’re calling back, spines stiff and cutting to the chase: “Who died?” We are absorbing the news, changing diapers, making breakfast, dusting forgotten shelves. The key for us is to keep moving. Keep moving and stay on the phone. We’re drinking coffee, we’re shredding junk mail, and we’re calling each other, over and over again. We’ve put on the music of our respective youths. In Georgia, you can hear the Dells. In DC, it’s Boyz II Men. Music, and ringtones. We have to keep calling each other. We have to tell each other stories. We have to wonder about funeral arrangements. We have to bicker and snap at each other, get briefly frustrated, hang up, and call back in a few hours. We have to guess how other family members are dealing. We have to call them after we decide how they feel… They don’t get the opportunity to disabuse us of our perceptions. We don’t actually say much, or we say everything. The silence and the noise, it’s all the same. It’s family. It’s the women of my family building a weathered, heavy chain against the grief. We don’t cry. Much. Not as long as we keep moving.

My cousin says, “All my life we’ve been searching for him.” I agree. Some years, we heard from him every week. Some years we didn’t even have a phone number for him. He was complicated. We are all complicated. My husband says, “Who is he exactly?” He cannot wrap his brain around my huge, huge, family. I say, “One of my grandmother’s brothers.” My grandmother had 10 siblings. His parents are close to my grandmother’s age. His grandparents passed years ago. He didn’t know their siblings, and they didn’t have all that many anyway. I say, “My uncle.” He stops himself from correcting me. He’s finally realized that in a family our size, we tend to simplify. Everyone older is an uncle or aunt. Everyone your age is a cousin. Even if they’re not. Everyone is family. Even if you don’t know how. My husband doesn’t know who this uncle is to me. He can’t recall if I’ve ever mentioned him. I don’t talk about my childhood much. It’s loaded for me, and I try not to dwell on things I can’t change. And there are so many aunts and uncles, so many cousins. I tell stories right before I take him to see someone. I tell stories right after someone dies.

He was a nice, nice man. One of my mother’s favorite uncles. I can tell, because he is complicated. I have inherited her love of complicated people. It is a narrow sliver of a counterculture streak, I suppose. For us, not so much. It’s never a radical act to love your family. He lived in Chicago, which was very cool. Detroit with a better reputation. We could trade barbs about our basketball teams. I grew up with the Bad Boys. He tolerated my armchair enthusiasm. He was a former athlete with a different perspective. I was a kid with a loud mouth.

He grew up in Detroit too. A very different Detroit from my own. It didn’t matter, much. Just as we are all family, our family is all Detroit. Very few of us move away. To my young brain, this made him an exception.

He would talk honestly about anything in his life. I didn’t get sent to the backyard to play in Chicago. I got a seat at the table, and he talked to me like an adult. I didn’t understand all of it. I don’t remember all of it. I know he wanted to help me avoid his mistakes. And I know his mistakes looked a lot like my father’s.

The dead father thing hangs between me and my family. Lots of silence, lots of assumptions about my feelings. We don’t talk about the thing. It’s a big reason I ran east after college. It’s a big reason I ran inside myself before I could leave for college. I want to wear it a certain way. In the Midwest I don’t get to do that, so I don’t stay for very long.

That’s not the fairest of assessments, but that is how it feels and therefore I don’t care.

My uncle didn’t care about how I wore it, or how I was supposed to be seen. (I didn’t even have words for that at the time.) He would just talk to me about the choices he made, especially the choices that overlapped with my father’s. He’d be very, very honest. He had some regrets. Most of the time, he was perfectly capable of surviving himself. My father did not survive himself. As a kid, I needed that juxtaposition. Needed to know that dad’s way wasn’t the only way. I needed to believe that with strength you can rise above. My uncle gave me that.

I haven’t seen him in years. An invitation to my wedding was returned by the post office. I would occasionally wonder about him, and about his kids. I assumed I’d hear from him, or about him. So many aunts and uncles, so many cousins. I didn’t hear anything until Saturday.

Eventually I have to stop calling and I have to stop answering the phone. I have to stare into space and hold my dog and sit still. It’s important to practice sitting still without crying. There’s an art to it. Someone will need me soon, or I will need someone else. This will all go better if we keep the emotional dreck at bay. We’re not an emotionally expressive group, as a whole. We don’t carry tissues. We carry bricks and build walls. We yo-yo each other, pushing away and then holding close. Fortifying ourselves with and against each other all at once. My husband looks at all of this and sees a lot of crazy. I look at my half-cleaned half-arranged house, I hear my music, I see myself clutching my phone, and I see my great-grandmother in her kitchen. I see my grandmother on her couch the day my father died. I see my mother in Georgia listening to the Dells. I see all their sisters and daughters too.

At my wedding, a woman is making a brief speech about marriage. She is poised and funny and full of life. My husband leans over and says, “Who is she?” I say, “She’s an auntie, related to my grandfather.” He says, “What’s her name?” I don’t know it. “How do you know she’s related to your grandfather?” he says. It’s the nose. And the charm.

With grandma’s family, it’s the stiff spine. It’s the refusal to limit mothering to your own children (or children at all). It’s the busy hands in times of tragedy. It’s the chip dip and peach cobbler and whisper fights. It’s a huge damn porch on Beniteau. It’s the tears that come eventually.

No matter how far away, it’s still family.

Read this

2011-08-26T08:41:00.002-04:00

Hey, I'm working on a post for today, and hopefully I finish before Irene does a face punch to my fair city. In the meantime, read this awesome post from the Good Men Project.

What I’m Reading

2011-08-24T15:49:00.000-04:00

How Starbucks Saved My Life: A Son of Privilege Learns to Live Like Everyone Else
By Michael Gates Gill

1. If your office has a community bookshelf, use it as an opportunity to read something you wouldn’t normally read. I found one of my favorite books that way.
2. Keep your expectations low.

Full disclosure: I don’t care for Starbucks coffee. It tastes like they burned the beans. Also I don’t go for fancy whippacinolatta stuff, so it’s not a business that really appeals to me.

I am a speed-reader. I can’t always stop myself from blowing through books and articles (especially if the language is fairly basic), and sometimes I think I lose something. I often read books over again, so I can kick back and enjoy the way that writers play with language. I don’t need to read this one again.

Michael Gates Gill grew up rich and a child of the rich, went to an Ivy League university, used his secret-society connections to land a high-powered, high-paying advertising job, meet loads of famous people, moved whenever his company told him to, and then he got old. Then he got fired. Then his consulting business dried up. Then he knocked up a woman he met at a gym. Then his wife left him. Then he discovered he had a (minor) brain tumor that causing him to lose his hearing.

Did you get all of that? I know it’s kind of involved. This is an autobiography, and there’s little motivation to skimp on details when you’re writing an autobiography. (unless you were President.) That’s why a book about working at Starbucks also includes a story about tea with the Queen. And one about meeting Frank Sinatra. And one about running with bulls in Pamplona because he wants to impress Hemingway. And one about how his dad’s archenemy is the guy that wrote The Secret Life of Walter Mitty.

Still with me?

This book is bad. It’s not terrible (though the never-ending BJs to Starbucks are pretty ridic. And he can’t write dialogue to save his life, every character, regardless of age, ethnicity or educational background, sounds exactly like him, and nobody ever uses contractions), but it’s bad. I hate to say this, because Michael Gates Gill clearly needs a hug. He’s a very emotional man, and he has some legitimate regrets about the way he lived his life (Even though he did what he was raised to do. We are all screwed in some way), and he’s working really hard to repair that damage. It’s just…the man is fighting so hard for perspective and making so little progress and I kinda want to shake him. Also I don't care about his famous people encounters, and they seem really out of place in the narrative.

He’s sitting in Starbucks at the end of his rope (and in a very expensive suit), when a woman jokingly asks him if he wants a job. He says yes, without thinking. She says, “are you sure you can work for me?” and then he tells us about how much he loved his black nanny and how lonely she was when he left. Since his prospective boss is also black, this is relevant. Because this is how many black people he knows.(did I mention he lives in NYC?)

So he stumbles horribly through the interview and gets hired to work a month later. He’s not hired to work in the Starbucks he was sitting in, and this is a problem because he’s one of those people that only goes so far north and so far east or something (I don’t know New York, but I am familiar with this sort because they’re all over the Detroit suburbs). So this causes a panic, and he has to learn to ride the bus. MGG is always learning things.

He learned to clean the bathroom, and work the cash register, and talk to customers, and speak to his coworkers with respect, and carry trash bags and he’s the happiest he’s been in his life. He also realized that in his past life he’d purposely destroyed the career of woman much like his boss because she didn’t look like him. And he’s very sorry.

And I’m very irritated. It’s not that I don’t sympathize with the guy. I mean, I don’t sympathize A LOT, but I do sympathize. I just…he revels in his new life like it’s a hobby. I never read Eat, Pray, Love because I thought it would be like this. Except this is full-time.

So I recommend skipping this one, but if my review is a bit too vague, just read these lyrics instead.

Definitely NOT progress

2011-08-22T20:24:00.000-04:00

“If women want to vote and shit, they need to do this kind of stuff. I feel the same way about girls asking out boys and women opening their own doors. If chivalry is dead, it’s women who killed it.” – comment on my husband’s Facebook status on this morning.

Every once in a while I read or hear something that sets my teeth on edge. I’ve done a lot of work to avoid the obvious traps, for good reason. Living where I live, and knowing who I know, I have come to expect that my friends will disagree with me, as we represent a wide swath of experience. If I’m too amped up on the obvious triggers, it makes it difficult for me to give the benefit of the doubt to the people I love, and that is a path that leads to screaming. It’s better to try and focus your energy on things that matter and not wrap your head in knots over hyperbolic, deranged, intellectual midgets. That suck.

Comments like the one above though… they just fill me rage. It starts with my husband (and I’m not sparing him in this) posting this:

It is 2011, yet in my office when a mouse is found in a trap all that can be heard is, "We need a boy to take care of this." #notprogress

This is obnoxious on several levels. Here are a few:
1. My husband doesn’t even use Twitter
2. The women in his office shouldn’t be obligated to present “progress,” as he sees it, every moment of their goddamn lives.
3. The incident in question involved a 4-year-old that stepped on a live rat in a glue trap. The situation was a gross nasty mess that a lot of “boys” would’ve balked at, and the kid just wanted her shoe back. (Hubby didn’t balk, because he prides himself on being a burly Eagle-Scout fixer type. They were right to seek him out, though it was an expensive solution overall.)
4. The shit show comment listed above.

The person who posted it is a friend. We have drastically diverging views, but I like to think that we can respect each other’s opinions even as we disagree. I generally treasure my friendship with him, as it is one of the many things in life that reminds me that there are real, kind, thinking people in the midst of this screaming match of ideas. I’m not trying to make him into a strawman. I want to say that, and also say up front that I’m trying to present my view as calmly as possible.

“If women want to vote and shit, they need to do this kind of stuff.” The Nineteenth Amendment was ratified 91 years ago. How is it that men still think that my rights as a citizen exist at the whim of their perceptions? I’m not talking about governmental leaders here. I’ve heard everyday men from all walks of life utter similar phrases without a moment’s doubt. They feel comfortable saying such things because they still have the lion’s share of the power in this country. The steady (but damn slow in some cases) progress that women have made is edging ever closer to something resembling equality of opportunity, and statements like this ring out ever louder in the present day. It betrays a sense of resentment on the part of modern men who’ve never enjoyed the privilege of being the “head of household” of yesteryear. (Clearly this is an exaggeration, as these structures still exist in my country and others, but bear with me here.) Even taking this into account, this statement is fucking stupid. There’s still all manner of privilege to spare for them, including the rather pervasive cultural language that equates women with “bad” and men with “locked in an endless battle not to be women.” Also, we’ve used all manner of fiery hoops to disenfranchise voters in this country, but the “release the live rat from the toddler’s flip-flop test” would likely result in next to no one getting a vote.

“I feel the same way about girls asking out boys and women opening their own doors.” Fine. Whatever. A lot of us uppity voting women already do that shit. If men don’t ask out women they like, and treat them kindly on dates (the door-opening thing, thought it was supposed to make a woman feel special? Didn’t realize it was some gendered requirement that we sacrificed with the vote, and I’m betting I’m not alone in being confused by that.), I’m sure there will be some consequences, but they’re not really my problem or my responsibility.

“If chivalry is dead, it’s women who killed it.” This part actually made me laugh.

Dictionary definition of chivalry
• The medieval knightly system with its religious, moral, and social code
• Knights, noblemen, and horsemen collectively
• The combination of qualities expected of an ideal knight, esp. courage, honor, courtesy, justice, and a readiness to help the weak
• Courteous behavior, esp. that of a man toward women

First and 30’s definition of chivalry
• A bunch of awkward and forced gestures that generally make me feel like the man I’m around thinks my arms and legs don’t work.

Chivalry (fourth bullet first list) is dead. We’re not a particularly courteous society a good chunk of the time. Blame the internet, blame the ever-shifting definition of community and failure on some fronts to enforce basic social norms, blame whatever you want. The end result is that we live in a world with less kindness than it should have (note that I didn’t say less kindness than it used to have. That’s how you know your blogger is black, people. I’m not fucking nostalgic for the “bad old days”). This is something that makes me both sad and tired. All people should be courteous to other people because it makes life easier and more pleasant. If it can only happen because of gendered assumptions, then we’re all fucked. Fuck dictionary chivalry, long live (un)common decency.

Chivalry (second list) is not dead, and I can attest to it, as it’s forced on me on a daily basis by random men that I’m usually not even paying attention to, and they take umbrage when I’m not interested. I’m totally sorry for opening my own door guys. I’m pretty sure I didn’t notice you holding open that other door because I was balancing my checkbook in my head, or drafting a meeting agenda in my head, or generally living my life, in my head and because you, as a stranger, are somewhat inconsequential to me. If I noticed, I would’ve thanked you, but now you’re acting as if my failure to register your existence is akin to murder, and I really just want you out of my face. Feel free to be mad about it though. That sounds like a good use of your energy. Fuck First and 30’s definition of chivalry, with absolutely no caveats.

My fundamental beef with both comments (my husband’s and my friend’s) is that everyone involved in this situation is an imperfect person that made imperfect choices. My husband’s coworkers heavily gendered their request, and that is problematic. I know what they meant (someone helpful, and not squeamish), and I know why they worded it that way (a lot of men really enjoy being “needed” in this way), but it’s still problematic because my stomach is in knots and I’m at like, 1300 words here. I shouldn’t have to defend their choices… but I feel like not defending these choices means not standing up for women. And if we’re going to denigrated together, then we need to hold shields together too. My husband put on his superhero cape (cuz that’s how he rolls), but then called them on the carpet because of the way they asked for help. Except…half of his damn identity is predicated on being the guy you go to for help. Just be happy about it, for fuck’s sake. Then my friend uses this conversation as a platform for his (unreasonable) belief that women should choose between their equal rights as citizens and their rights to ask for assistance in the interdependent society that we all participate in. That’s a fool’s choice.

In short, it’s 2011, and I’m still explaining to men that demanding that all women that “vote and shit” live up to their individual perceptions is sexist as hell. Definitely #notprogress.

Dreaming

2010-01-31T09:19:00.000-05:00

Last night I had this sweet dream about going out for ice tea. I was sitting on a patio, surrounded by people from past that I've had conflicts with and everyone was fat and reconciliatory, and we laughed and rebuilt bridges and I showed them my house down the street. It was big and old and in the middle of a renovation and the porch could fit 40 people on it. I hung white Christmas lights on it and threw a party and danced hugged people and had a wonderful night. I went to find hubby to tell him about it, but he was nowhere. I went through 30 rooms before I found him asleep on a couch by a window. When I woke him up, he wrapped his arms around me, and we sat on the couch and looked out at a blue spruce and we talked for hours and fell asleep again. We woke up with the sun in our faces and we took our crazy dog for a walk and we told each other jokes and drank some more ice tea. I woke up feeling fantastic... to an empty bed, because hubby's in the hospital getting a round of chemo. I walked my crazy dog in the snow and cold and trudged back in to my house to make a cup of tea and warm up.

And now I can't decide if I feel good or bad.

What I'm reading

2010-01-31T09:03:00.000-05:00

I finished Fragile Things by Neil Gaiman, shortly after this book, and it was a welcome change. Gaiman's short stories range from the terrifying to the simply strange, and when he doesn't tell me the big secret, I'm fairly confident that I don't want all the answers. I realize that there's been some brouhaha over his profile in the New Yorker, but I don't agree with the outrage, and every time I read one of his books, I'm just grateful for good imaginative narratives in this world.

Next book (I've already started it, and I'm loving it): Looking for Calvin and Hobbes: The Unconventional Story of Bill Watterson and His Revolutionary Comic Strip.

Status report

2010-01-31T08:41:00.000-05:00

So hubby had a bad setback that landed him back in the hospital. (I referenced it here) He caught an infection in his blood from his catheter, and his blood counts were so low that he started bleeding in his eyes and experienced some vision loss. We've been to three specialists, and no one is sure how permanent this vision loss is going to me. So many maybes... Hubby went into a full-blown panic for a while, which terrified me. He doesn't panic, and I don't know how to deal with his panic. He's so solid and strong, even when he's not, and I just didn't know what to do.

We've taken some real financial hits throughout this, and our taxes provided the nasty surprise that hubby forgot to change his tax withholdings and the feds are going to be the latest vampires at the door. I'm trying not to go around the bend, and I'm not really winning at that, and I've been full of frustration and despair and other things that I can't name. Then I talked to an old friend from high school. She's been reading my posts on facebook and she decided that she wanted to do something to show her support of my family, even though we haven't seen each other in 12 years or so. So she's going to run a half-marathon to raise money for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. I'm completely flabbergasted. I'm so touched that she's putting forth this kind of effort (she's never even met hubby) for someone she knew in high school. I think this is a testament to the idea that our words, our pain... it has power... Even when it's half-expressed and ill-conceived ideas. I'm glad I can still reach people... and that there are people in the world that care enough to run 13 miles because I hurt.

Please help Send Amanda to the Bayshore Marathon.

Donate if you can.

What I'm reading (maybe it's me)

2010-01-31T08:23:00.000-05:00

So I've finished The Heretic's Daughter by Kathleen Kent. The book follows a 10-year-old girl and her family in an early American settlement. Her family is implicated in charges of witchcraft (and spreading the plague) and several members are tried in Salem. The author is a descendant of one of her characters, so clearly she has some attachment to her work.

That being said, she covers three years in about 300 pages, (100 pages per year, roughly) and most of it is about fried beaver tails and skirt hems and sewing lessons. When she wasn't covering the exacting minutiae of life in 1690, she's was alluding to some deep secret of the father of the family relating to his life back in England. The icing of the piece is the bloated, bloated, bloated writing.

Now, maybe it's me, but I shouldn't have to sit through 300 pages of skirt hems and harvest time just to get to a trial that's barely mentioned and then another 7 pages where the narrator discovers the detail of her father's secret and then declines to share it with us. It doesn't seem fair to bore the living shit out of me and then refuse to deliver. I know that there are people who dig this stuff, they prefer to read fictionalized history because they suspect that real histories are too dry. If this is the best example of that genre, I'll make sure to avoid it in the future.

I feel cheated by this. There was no story in this story, and the one secret that I was actually interested in is still left unexplained. This is Kent's first book, and I'm trying to look at it more kindly in that light (forgiving endless unnecessary metaphors and the like), but I don't think I'll ever pick up another book by this author. Now, if you click the link at the top of the post, you'll see that the amazon reviewers seem to vehemently disagree with me. So, maybe it's me.

It's not, this book sucked.

So sweet.

2010-01-25T08:30:00.000-05:00

AFC Championship: Colts vs. Jets celebration - More The Indianapolis Star Galleries

The 2009-2010 book list

2010-01-20T11:13:00.000-05:00

Okay, sorry this took so long. I'm really feeling the limitations of my blogger skills right now. The titles in italics are books I already own (I've already read the first 3, and I'm in the middle of number 4). Through the year, these are the books that I'll be covering in my semi-regular "What I'm reading" posts. (Possibly some extras too.) Give a holler if you have any other suggestions. I'll update on the hubby later in the day, or later in the week.

1. Ta-Nehisi Coates The Beautiful Struggle
2. Moveable Feast, Hemingway
3. Push by Sapphire
4. Kathleen Kent The Heretic’s Daughter
5. Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein
6. The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle
7. Word War Z: An Oral history of the zombie wars by Max Brooks
8. Looking for Calvin and Hobbes by Nevin Martell
9. Fragile Things by Neil Gaiman
10. Dream City by Harry Jaffe and Tom Sherwood
11. The Puttermesser Papers by Cynthia Ozick
12. Eyal Press Absolute Convictions
13. Robert Leleux Beautiful Boy
14. Uglies by Scott Westefeld
15. Blindness by Jose Saramago
16. Grand New Party by Ross Douthat and Reihan Salam
17. The Billionaire’s Vinegar by Benjamin Wallace
18. Toy Monster: The Big Bad World of mattel
19. Look at Me by Jennifer Egan
20. Quiverfull by Kathryn Joyce
21. Erasure by Percival Everett
22. Super in the City by Daphne Uviller
23. Voluntary Madness by Norah Vincent
24. Gimme Shelter by Mary Elizabeth Williams
25. Dating Jesus by Susan Campbell
26. Escape by Caroyln Jessup
27. A Grand Army of Black Men by Edwin S. Redkey
28. American Slavery, American Freedom by Edmund Morgan
29. The Secret History by Donna Tartt
30. American Odyssey by Robert Conot
31. A Nation Under Our Feet by Stephen Hahn
32. The Purity Myth by Jessica Valenti
33. The rage of a Privileged Class by Ellis Cose
34. the social theory of practices by Stephen turner
35. When She Was White: The True Story of a Family Divided by Race by Judith Stone
36. Bad Boys by Ann Ferguson
37. Garfield minus Garfield
38. Washington, D.C. Protests: Scenes from Home Rule to the Civil Rights Movement By Mark S. Greek
39. American Colonies by Alan Taylor
40. The Radicalism of the American Revolution by Gordon Wood
41. Battle Cry of Freedom by James McPherson
42. Nature’s Metropolis by William Cronon
43. Ida: A Sword Among Lions: Ida B. Wells and the Campaign Against Lynching by Paula J. Giddings
44. The End of Influence: What Happens When Other Countries Have the Money by Brad DeLong and Stephen Cohen
45. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon
46. Weevils In The Wheat: Interviews With Virginia Ex-slaves
47. Lauren Sandler's Righteous: Dispatches from the Evangelical Youth Movement
48. The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver
49. The Yiddish Policeman’s Union by Michael Chabon
50. The Mysteries of Pittsburgh by Michael Chabon
51. Confederate Emancipation by Bruce Levine

Why this pisses me off....

2010-01-08T01:35:00.000-05:00

I got two facebook emails today on the same subject. Here they are:

This was in my inbox and thought I'd pass it on...not sure in teh least how it is supposed to spread cancer awareness but I have gotten the idea it is annoying some of hte guys and who can resist that? *evil laugh*

"Some fun is going on... Just write the colour of ur bra in your status nothing else and send it on to only girls no men. It will spread the wings of cancer awareness. It will be fun to see how long it takes b4 the men will wonder why all the girls have colour in their statuses!"

and...

Something fun is going around! Update your status with the color of your bra, nothing else in the message, just the color. Then send this to all the gals on your friend list, but none of the guys. Let's see how far this goes to spread cancer awareness and how long it takes before the guys start wondering about the color updates!

I wrote this status update as a response:

Dear friends: if knowing the color of my underwear helped heal cancer, my husband wouldn't be lying in a hospital bed in the fucking emergency room right now. Feel free to spread all the bullshit forwards you want, but leave me the fuck out of it.

So here's a brief list of my issues with this message, mostly for the benefit of people who sent it to me, and then saw my status update:

1. Secret memes don't raise awareness of anything. It's a game, which is nice for people who remain untouched by this illness, but why send it to me? I don't PLAY cancer games. I live with cancer. I know that you know the difference.

2. If the only way to raise awareness about a serious health issue is to titillate friends and acquaintances with talk of your underwear, then there's something wrong with your friends and acquaintances, or there's something wrong with you. Using your tits to sell concern about cancer is crass, base, and is the sort of behavior that makes you complicit in your own objectification. Even if you don't consider yourself a feminist, you know that I DO. So again, why send this to me?

It didn't help that I was getting these emails while I'm trying to communicate with John's oncologist while in the ER. (He was admitted tonight, apparently he's got a nasty unidentifiable infection and he needs [another] series of blood transfusions.) I have ignored the other stupid facebook cancer meme, with the stupid heart shapes in the fucking status updates, but this one...is just fucking appalling.

What I'm reading

2010-01-07T11:18:00.000-05:00

I’ve read two books and two Sandman volumes since Christmas. I’d like to comment on Sandman as a larger work when I’ve finished the whole series. Neil Gaiman is such an elegant and nuanced writer (and a pretty good blogger), that I don’t want to comment on what’s going on in his work until I get to see the whole picture. I love comic book ‘volumes.’ I don’t have the time to track individual comics (I have a hard enough time remembering which volume I’m due to read next if I wait too long), and the volumes are as meaty as a novella, and a great way to spend an afternoon for me. Sandman is a particular favorite, because my husband and I read them at about the same pace, (he’s a slower reader of other things) and we can share them and discuss them…usually at least. So, Sandman is great (and please, please, Neil Gaiman, write some more novels) but it’s not what I’m going to talk about today.

On to the books. I read The Beautiful Struggle by Ta-Nehisi Coates, my favorite blogger. There’s not much I can say about this book without dissolving into fangirl gushing, so I’ll just say that I consider it required reading for everyone.

The other book I read (and the whole point of this post, finally, in the third paragraph, because I've become really undisciplined in my writing) was The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver. This book was an anomaly for me for a few reasons. First, I compile a list throughout the year of books I want to read or sound interesting, and I try to pursue books on that list first (comic books not included, I go through too fast), this book was not on that list. Second, I’d convinced myself that Barbara Kingsolver was a romance novelist, and I don’t read romance novels (though, in the spirit of this blogger, I may reconsider). So, I heard Kingsolver speak about her new book on NPR, and I decided to check her out. My office has a small table devoted to book sharing, so I picked up The Poisonwood Bible.

The book details the life of a family (mother, father, and 4 daughters) that decides to travel to the Congo for a missionary post in 1959. The book covers the transition of Congo into Zaire, as well as the (mostly hamfisted) attempts of the missionary father to convert members of their small village to Christianity. Each chapter of the book is narrated by a different female member of the family (we never hear the father from his own perspective) and spans several decades.

At the core, this is a book about the failure of will and the futility of arrogance. The Price family moves to the Congo with hopefulness and surety. They’re confident that they have everything on their side: the right god, the right morals, the proper lessons. Rev. Price even travels with seedlings, since he intends to teach the villagers the proper way to harvest the proper food. The longer they stay, the more apparent it is that they have nothing to offer the villagers or themselves. For all they’re surety, they are completely unprepared. Each family member responds to this in a different way and as a result of different incidents. Eventually the Congo consumes them (in one case, literally) and they are forever changed.

The book had a profound effect on me. Aside from the careful examination of white privilege and its pitfalls (and it WAS careful, more careful than I was expecting), the theme of how life changes you more than you can change lives was powerful for me. I feel that I’ve been teetering on the edge of some sort of emotional growth spurt for months now. I seem to be becoming someone…more. I’ve not given my consent to these changes, and I don’t quite know what they are, but the fact remains that I’m being consumed by the raft of shit that has hit my family in recent months, and that some of these changes will be permanent. One of them seems to be a newfound lack of faith in the power of my will to change my world. That change rattles at the foundations of who I am and how I see myself, and I don’t really know what to do with it. It’s an arrogance that has kept me warm and safe for as long as I’ve felt warm and safe. But the fact remains that those seeds won’t grow in the soil that I’m in, and I somehow have to redefine what’s proper for me in this new context.

When I get a chance, I'll publish the book list, and I'll track how many I get through.

It's late... and I can't sleep...

2010-01-05T22:50:00.000-05:00

My grandfather took a fall right before Christmas. He landed on his glasses case, and that managed to break two ribs and puncture a lung. They kept him for a few days, put a tube in his chest, and tried to regulate his blood pressure and blood sugar (I inherited those problems from him). They failed to regulate those things and released him anyway. He went back for a follow-up today. His lung has deflated 20% and his wounds aren't healing. They readmitted him for observation.

After years of struggle, I'm finally in a financial and professional position to be back home when they need me, and I can't leave. God help me, this life is so long...

And another thing...

2009-12-31T13:10:00.000-05:00

I'm certainly making up for lost time today...

I hate that my husband has this thing sticking out of his chest.

I can't explain how horrifying it is to see him walking around with tubes sticking out of his chest. The chemo goes in them. they pull blood from them (which is icky and disturbing and makes me ill to even think about, much less witness). Occasionally they require 'flushing.'

Argh. Fuck cancer

Another end-of-year list

2009-12-31T11:41:00.000-05:00

In an attempt to release some of this negative energy, here is a list (in no particular order) of things that piss me off.

1. Burkitt’s Lymphoma . Seriously, fuck you. My husband is one of 10 Americans in his age group with this disease right now. 10. Yes, he will be cured. Yes we will come through this 'stronger,' but we were already strong enough so fuck you cancer.

2. The phrase "you will come through this stronger." FUCK THAT.

3. Resting the starters in the middle of the 3rd quarter when you have a lead and it's a home game AND the other team needs to win to potentially play you in the playoffs. Fuck you Jim Caldwell.

4. Crash and Amelie. They just piss me off.

5. People that ask questions that they don't want to know the answers to.

6. People that ask questions they already know the answers to.

7. People that congregate in doorways, the tops of escalators or stairs, and anywhere else that impedes other people. I don't care if you're on vacation, stop being so fucking thoughtless.

8. The San Diego Chargers.

9. My insurance companies. Both of them. All you do is take my money and make my life harder. Fuck you.

10. Anyone who gets righteous about any of the following:
a. not owning a television
b. not drinking caffeine
c. not watching sports
d. not believing in God
e. not eating meat
f. not smoking
Memo to the world: The things you DON'T do, for whatever reason, don't make you special. The things you jump into in this life matter. The things you retreat from are largely personal, and the rest of us don't give a shit how unique you feel for discarding them.

11. Nurses who wear perfume on the cancer ward. Way to introduce a group of nauseous people to your whorish scent and selfish disposition. You're TOTALLY in the right line of work.

12. People that start shit with you and are then surprised when you fight back. If you don't want a fight, then don't fuck with me. It's not complicated, and there are plenty of people in the world who are willing to be doormats for a bully. I'm not your girl. Ass.

13. Those fucking Swiffer commercials that imply that women have romantic relationships with their cleaning implements. (cuz apparently only women clean) That's just so fucking off that I don't even know how to respond. If you looked at our society through the lens of our commercials, would it be even remotely familiar?

14. People that think Obama is Jesus incarnate. He's not.

15. People that think Obama betrayed progressives. You don't listen well.

16. People that think Obama wasn't born here. You're fucking paranoid, and likely a complete fucking racist.

17. People that think Obama is a socialist. You're fucking stupid.

18. UPDATE. I hate that I got an email from these guys because an 11-year-old is pregnant and too scared to finger her abuser. The state won't fund the termination of her pregnancy without a police report. I hate this ugly scary world.
There, now I feel a little better.

I am, in fact, an angry girl

2009-12-31T10:50:00.000-05:00

I know it’s been a long time since I’ve posted. Most of the stuff that’s going on in our lives revolves around people I won’t reference here. It’s not fair to invite certain people into this public forum without their permission, and I don’t want them reading this, so I’ve mostly been quiet.

Too quiet it seems. I’m sensing a few themes in my life right now. One is that everyone else seems just as hypersensitive to things as I am, so I find myself wishing I’d held my tongue, even (especially) when I don’t mean any harm. The other thing I’m finding is that more than a few people think that I’m closed off. There are lots of people fighting to offer me a hand in the things that I’ve been going through, and they think that I’m not open to receiving help, or letting my guard down. They’re right, of course, but people seem to be taking it personally.

I am private (ironic to say this in a blog post, I know). I am guarded, even with people I love. I don’t share easily, I don’t open up easily. These are things that are hard for me. I’ve been hurt before, too many times to count. Even when I tear down my own walls and just express what I’m feeling, I typically don’t like what I get back. It’s a hard, cruel world out there, and turtles have shells for a reason. I like my shell. It suits me. I’m comfortable there. There’s room for my husband, my dog, the occasional friend, and not much else. It doesn’t mean I don’t love all of these people (and I acknowledge that this is a nice problem to have), it just means that I can’t lay myself bare for them or anyone else. Not without significant emotional turmoil. I don’t have the luxury of having that kind of turmoil right now. My job is to be a pillar to my husband and my home. I need to hold them up. I can be a fucking mess later. I can work on my relationships later. Right now everything in my life is on hold. This is an expensive choice I’m making here, I realize that. I’m going to lose people. I’m going to hurt some feelings. There are people who aren’t going to understand. I don’t see another way though. I can’t talk too much about how I feel right now, or what I’m going through, because I just keep feeling it. It’s brand new every time I say something to someone. Doing that feels like skinning myself raw just so people know I trust them. I can’t afford to be that kind of mess. My family can’t afford that kind of mess.

So here’s the status update for all concerned parties:

1. Life is shit right now. We’re skating on the razor’s edge financially (a tree fell in the backyard, across three yards, and crushed a neighbor’s car. Insurance refused to pay to haul it away. Don’t know if they paid for the cars, but I had to dip into my retirement to get the tree out of there, as it was in a precarious position and could have caused more damage.
2. Hubby’s treatment is progressing, and we’ve had no real nasty surprises, but being poisoned once every few weeks is wearing on his mood, and it’s a fight to get him to check in to the hospital anymore.
3. I am just completely drained. If it’s not the tree or the cancer, it’s the job (which I have very little investment in right now, given the circumstances) or illnesses in my family. I feel like I’m being pulled apart. I can’t be anywhere I want to be for any amount of time that’s worthwhile, and even if I could, I can’t marshal the focus to be a worthwhile addition to any of these circumstances.
4. Christmas was fine, if you like that sort of thing, and I generally don’t.
5. I’m getting sick. This is a natural response to all this stress, I know. However, my husband can’t get (another) infection, so I’m banished to sleeping in my tv room until I’m better. So even when he comes home (tonight), I’m isolated. It’s really fucking lonely, and the loneliness is compounded by the fact that I can’t reach out to anyone on my own fucking terms because I’m not doing enough weeping and wailing.

What's a girl to do?

2009-11-17T00:05:00.000-05:00

Today was an interesting and sucky day. Mostly sucky. Completely sucky. It all finally hit, as I was sitting with a newly pregnant friend.... the life that I've lost. The babies that will never surprise me. The world I used to inhabit. It's all broken glass on the floor.

I want my life back. I'll never have it....

It wasn't easy to blog.

What i'm reading

2009-10-31T12:22:00.000-04:00

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz

Okay, people have been raving about this book for some time. I'm was wary of reading it because of something I like to call the Amelie Effect. When that movie came out, everyone and their mother was over the moon about it. "So clever," "So inventive," "You should see it!" So I did. Snooze.

So I've been wary of this kind of hype ever since. The Pulitzer Prize piqued my interest, so I gave it a go.

The book follows a family of Dominicans living in both Santo Domingo and New York. The book is full of Spanish phrases, science fiction references, and Dominican history. This book is like music. I felt like some of it just went gliding through my brain. I can't remember being so charmed by a book that was so sad. I'm still thinking about what the mongoose means. I highly recommend it.

Week 8 Football

2009-10-31T11:36:00.000-04:00

8-5 last week. I'm not getting any better at this.

Texans over Bills

Ravens over Broncos

Bears over Browns

Cowboys over Seahawks

Rams over Lions

Colts over 49ers

Jets over Miami

Giants over Eagles (westbrook is going to be missed this week, I think)

Chargers over Raiders

Titans over Jags

Packers over Vikings

Cardinals over Panthers

Saints over Falcons

Let's see if I can crack the 8-5 record.

On blessings

2009-10-26T22:09:00.000-04:00

I ended a previous post about the stress of the past few days with a statement about how we are blessed. Let me elaborate.

My favorite high school teacher (who would NOT appreciate my potty mouth on this blog) was once run over by a bus. He was in a great deal of pain, he drifted in and out of consciousness, and at one point he came too and told his wife he was hungry. She offered him the apple from her purse, the only food she had in the midst of the emergency room anxiety. He told me that eating that apple was the most enjoyable feeling of his life, and that nothing that he's ever eaten has tasted as good as that apple on the edge of his life.

I think that story is beautiful, but until now, I've never understood it (which was a blessing, may you never 'understand' it either). In the midst of the most painful situation of our lives, I've seen such kindness from every facet of our lives, I don't have words. My hubby's coworkers donated six weeks of leave to help him through chemo, friends have shown up with food and done grocery shopping and research and even loaned us a vacation house so we could hang out before all the madness started. Our church has been a constant source of support (one our ministers calls John about once a week. For a congregation our size, I think that's amazing.) I've cried on many shoulders, held many hands (including the feisty grandma of the bride last weekend) and have found myself propped up by dozens of hands (and not in a creepy Labyrinth way). For every sharp pain to my guy that cancer has delivered, I've had a basket of apples to choose from. That basket seems to be bottomless.

That's why I say we're blessed.

What I don't talk about when you ask me how I am

2009-10-24T22:00:00.000-04:00

I don't know if this dance is the same for every cancer spouse (I don't know if cancer spouse is even the right phrase. I think I made it up. If I stole it, I apologize to whoever), so I'm really only speaking for me. It goes like this:

Person X: How are you? Really?
Me: (Insert random platitude here)
Person X: I'm here for you if you need me. Please know that.
Me: Thank you so much. That means a lot to me.
Person X: (Insert cancer anecdote here)
Me: (Insert new platitude)
Person X: (Tell a story about how I need to take care of myself in order to better take care of hubby)
Me: (nod sagely)
Person X: (give me a story about why hubby means so much to him or her. No bullshit here, he's deeply and profoundly loved, and quite worthy of it all.)
Me: (Insert new bullshit platitude)
(hugging)

Here's what I think when all of this is going on:
How are you, they say, and my mind just buzzes and buzzes and buzzes about money, and how I have to work, and how I wish I could walk the dog normally, and how could one take-home medication be 5k, and how could insurance refuse it, and why the fuck can't I get a swine flu shot, and jesus where is my testing kit for my diabetes because I can't remember if I've taken a fucking pill this week and I can't fuck up my blood sugar on top of everything else and fuck fuck fuck?

I'm here for you, they say, and I think, take this bullshit cliche, don't make me talk about how I feel, about the death of the life I knew, about what babymaking means for us now, about what anything means for us now... take my cliche, swallow it like I mean it. I can't start and not stop. You can't volunteer and not take me over for a lifetime. I'm stuck. I need to talk about this forever or not at all. I need both. I need you to hear me all day everyday or never again. take the cliche. It's your unsticking. Don't be stuck with me. I can't get you out, and it's not fair to keep you here, even though I need you. I need you desperately, because I'm a bundle of need. Run. Run. Run away. Don't run. Save me. Nevermind. Run. I'm going to stop listening now, because you're about to make me cry, and when I start, I can't stop...

That's about how it goes.

The last 8 days

2009-10-21T22:59:00.000-04:00

The post is bleak, so here's a puppy picture to brighten it up.

So hubby started chemo last Tuesday. There was a four-day hospital stay, two spinal taps, some (possibly excessive) steroid injections, a wedding, and some serious crabbiness. The first bout was rough... and it's slowly getting rougher. He's already lost 20lbs (He's a big guy, so it's not so bad) and his eyebrows are falling out. This is all going so fast...

Here are some fun (or odd) facts about chemo:
1. your can sweat it out of your pores for up to 48 hours
2. during chemo, you should courtesy flush (it's not just the pores!)
3. when they inject chemo into your spinal fluid, you get nasty migraines that only go away when you lie flat....for 12 hours at a time.
4. If you're still sweating out the chemo, caregivers should wear gloves when changing your bed linens

I remember the part of my life where none of this would have occurred to me.... it was a nice part.

I went to football practice tonight! It was so nice to see the ladies, and one of my fellow blocking backs told me about her kid's chemo (he was 2 at the time, and it was 14 months...) and offered me all the help and support I needed. I watched them run plays for awhile, played with their kids, and all had a good night.

I feel like crap. I feel exhausted. We're so unlucky.

But we're really, really blessed.

Week 7 Football

2009-10-21T12:31:00.000-04:00

So I missed my picks last week. (The wedding was worth it, so I’m not complaining.) That’s probably for the best, as we’re entering the wild part of the season, and I can’t really figure out what each team really brings to the table. For instance: Is Denver really that good? I wouldn’t have said so before last weekend. How vulnerable is the Giants D? I know Brees can pack a wollop, but they did next to nothing out there against him. What is this Bengals team? How did the Titans go from zero to suck in one season? And, seriously Eagles? What the fuck?

I think so far this season there are a few reliable teams:

1. My Colts, reliably awesome
2. The Pats, but there’s some defensive issues that will come into play the next time they have a real opponent
3. Atlanta. How about that young QB?
4. The Chargers, reliably mediocre, and soon to be overhyped
5. Brown, reliably sucky
6. The Bills, also sucky
7. Ditto the Rams (see more about the Rams below)
8. Looks like the Bucs are going on this list too. I confess I don’t know much about them (I have an NFC blindside, I confess)
9. Oakland. That QB sucks. I’m sorry; they need to back to the drawing board. Poor guy has all the necessary components, but he can’t put them together to save his damn life.

Before I get to my picks for the coming week, I want to say something about the hubbub around Rush Limbaugh as a possible minority owner for the crappy, crappy, Rams. Let me preface this statement by saying that I find the man’s viewpoints deplorable, and I thought that his statements about McNabb were both appalling, and completely within my expectations for him. All that aside:

1. Journalists have an obligation to thoroughly research their information. WIKIPEDIA doesn’t cut it as a primary source. Of all the hideous things the man has said, why must you go the fiction route, CNN? That reporter should be fired.
2. With all due respect to Jim Irsay (a fine man who represents a fine football team) and Roger Goodell, this is still America. Being a race-baiting bigot doesn’t preclude you from being an entrepreneur. Racism is not illegal. It’s wrong. Those are two different issues with two different consequences. There are certainly players that wouldn’t want to play for Rush. I don’t blame them. That would be a problem. I think he would have been a bit of a liability for the Rams brand, but probably not more so than their record. That would be a problem. However, this could have been a teaching moment for Limbaugh. I don’t see anything so scary about black people (being one of them) that we can’t put Limbaugh in their proximity and push some real change. Certainly not the conservative black millionaires that the NFL kicks out. At this point, we’ve made Limbaugh and underdog, which unfortunately means that his microphone is, for the moment a megaphone. Bad move fellow liberals.

My picks:
Chargers over Chiefs, though I couldn’t tell you why

Packers over Browns

49ers over Texans…in a squeaker

Colts over Rams (Go Horse!)
Steelers over Vikings, because I finally found someone I hate more than Ben Roethlisberger

Pats over Bucs

Jets over Raiders

Panthers over Bills. The Bills give me indigestion

Bears over Bengals in a shocking game

I’m gonna say Falcons over Cowboys… I may regret it but I think so.

Saints annihilate the Dolphins

Giants, playing angry, kill the Cards

If the Eagles don’t beat the ‘skins, then they aren’t the team I thought they were.

OOH! I'm going to visit my team at practice tonight! I can't wait. More about that later.

What I'm Reading

2009-10-21T11:51:00.000-04:00

You Suck: A Love Story by Christopher Moore

Christopher Moore is best known for the book Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal. I haven’t read that yet, so I don’t have much to say about it (I think I’m reading that after my next book) other than this: the topic doesn’t strike me as a stretch for this author, and I’m betting it’s pretty good.

This book is a sequel to Bloodsucking Fiends, and follows the adventures of vampires set loose on San Francisco. I loved Fiends, it really captured the best of Moore’s skills, creating lovingly-created wacky subcultures that find themselves interconnected through loneliness and necessity (the book contains one of the funniest marriage proposals I’ve ever read).

That being said, there’s a passage in the book about how sleeping vampires don’t wake up during the day, and how a mortal considers dressing his vampire girlfriend up in a cheerleader outfit and sexually assaulting her. The book doesn’t treat the idea as assault (though that’s what it is), and our meek little beta male seems to think better of it.

And then, it pops up in You Suck. Except now, it’s actually happened, and the two characters discuss this egregious breach of trust as if it were a social faux pas. So now I hate the book. There were some interesting elements, it overlaps with another Moore book I enjoy, and I finished (because I rarely put a book down forever), but rape is not okay. It’s not something that happens because an awkward young man that’s new to relationships doesn’t know the score. It’s something that happens because of fucking rapists. I don’t understand why that’s so fucking confusing for people, and I’m fresh out of understanding on the topic. So, thumbs down, and a break from Christopher Moore for the moment.

Other favorites by this author: Bloodsucking Fiends

What I’m reading next: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz. I want to see what all the fuss is about.