The Sunday Salon: Bookish Birthday Gifts and a Gift from Me to You

For a period of years in the mid 1960’s, my cousin Cora gave me one of Laura Ingalls Wilder's “Little House” books for my birthday every year. The gift was especially meaningful since Cora was the cousin I most admired - she was about 15 years older than I, and she had gone to college, something no one else in the family had done. I knew next to nothing about college, except that my parents regularly alluded to the fact that I would someday attend as well. Because I loved school, and college was School with a Capitol S, I looked forward to going with eager anticipation. Cora was the only one in the family who gave me books as gifts, and in my mind this conferred a special connection between us. We were both readers, and that set us apart from the rest of the family.

Of course I loved reading the Little House books, and would re-read the year’s book several times before my birthday rolled around again. There was no question of “jumping ahead” in the series and taking out the next one from the library. For that entire year I lived with whatever adventures the Ingalls' family were undertaking as I waited for the next installment to arrive in early March. 

Books were my preferred friends and companions in those days. I was a quiet only child, growing up in a suburban Catholic neighborhood, surrounded my families of five, six, seven, children. Although I enjoyed playing with other children, I was happiest curled up somewhere with a book. I felt connected to the characters in books the way I didn’t always feel connected to the living, breathing children in my neighborhood or classroom. That’s the wonderful thing about books - they connect us to people and experiences and worlds we might never otherwise consider. They invite us to question and explore, they give solace and support.

At least they always have for me.

I still have all those Little House books, the hardcover editions, on a special shelf downstairs. My son wasn’t particularly interested in them, which isn’t surprising. He loved mysteries and ghost stories and, later, satire and Star Trek. I kept his favorite books from infancy through childhood, and parcel them out to my grandson at appropriate times. I don’t have any illusions that my grandson will care about Laura and Mary Ingalls either, so I suspect those books will stay with me until someone packs up my final effects.

People rarely buy me books anymore, which I completely understand. Even though books are my favorite gift (aside from jewelry) how would anyone know what I’ve read and what I haven’t? My mother often gives me Barnes and Noble gift cards which are a fine substitute, and I judiciously hoard them to use on titles I know I want to maintain in my permanent library. 

One of the most meaningful bookish gifts I ever received was from my husband, many years ago. We were in our early 30’s at the time, he was working long, hard hours and I was finishing up my college (I did go, but in fits and spurts over a period of 10 years). The book was The Collected Poems of Sylvia Plath; this purchase was touching evidence that despite his busyness and preoccupation with his own work, he had paid attention to my interests of the time. 

I’ve kept that book as well, even though I never read the poems anymore.

All this to say, tomorrow is my birthday, and there are a couple of books I’m coveting for myself this year. One is A Spool of Blue Thread, Anne Tyler’s latest (and she says her Last) novel. The other is Kristin Hannah’s The Nightingale, which many people have said moved them to tears. I am thinking of starting my own birthday book buying tradition, taking myself to the bookstore tomorrow and purchasing a gift from me to me. 

I’m also inviting you to my bookish birthday celebration and giving away one copy of my own book, Life In General. Enter to win by leaving a comment here - tell me about your favorite bookish gift, or simply say “I’m in.” A winner will be chosen by random drawing on Sunday, March 15.

And whatever you’re reading this Sunday, may it connect you with satisfying thoughts, ideas, and emotions. 

Wish List

Amazon has a very cool feature they call a “Wish List.” It’s a place to digitally file items you wish for, and though mine is usually filled with books, occasionally something out of the ordinary will creep onto it. (Right now, the odd item is a camera that takes instant photos, because sometimes it’s just nice to hold  a paper photo in your hand - instantly.) If and/or when people might be shopping for a gift for you, perhaps because it’s your birthday in few days (hint), they can go to your Wish List, find and item, and presto chango with one quick click it’s on its way to your door.

My Amazon Wish List is fairly sparse in comparison to many others. That’s because I’m not much interested in things you can buy from Amazon. Remember, it wasn’t all that long ago that I spent a lot of time, and effort (emotionally and physically) dispensing with the kinds of things that are so easy to obtain from places like Amazon and it’s equivalents. 

No, it’s not stuff I wish for these days. Most of my wishes during this long dreary winter would fall into the "turning back the clock" category, something no one has yet manage to make possible. So on this Thursday, a few days before I slip into the last year of my fiftieth decade, here in completely random order, is my real Wish List...

~To be walking hand in hand with my grandfather, our dog trotting faithfully at his heels, tramping around in the woods behind the first house I remember, carrying my tiny Remington cap gun rifle and “hunting” for rabbits. 

~To be riding my purple sting ray bike with the white banana seat and the multi-colored handlebar streamers down the middle of the street, gossiping gaily with my friends Lisa, Jenny, and Jill.

~To have one more conversation with my Dad, a conversation in which I could tell him for sure that I loved him, appreciated him, was sorry if I had ever disappointed him, and that I once and for all understood and forgave him.

~To have a garage big enough to hold every car my husband every loved - from the 1971 black Mach One Mustang, the 1979 Bandit Trans Am, right on through to the 1998 Red WS6 Trans Am - all in pristine condition and ready to drive at a moment’s notice.

~To duplicate in real time a snapshot I found the other day, taken on a sunny Easter morning in the early 1980’s, where I am sitting between my parents on the porch of Western Golf and Country Club, watching my four-year old son in his navy blue Easter suit run around the greens hunting for chocolate eggs.

~To wander through the Victoria Gardens in Niagara Falls, holding hands with my husband on the morning after our wedding, and feel like the luckiest 20 year old girl in the world.

~To come driving down our old street and see Brian’s Grand Prix parked in the driveway and know he was home safe and sound, sitting happily at his computer blasting digital enemies with machine guns in the latest version of Wolfenstein or Duke Nukem.

~To accompany Choralation singing Captain My Captain at State Solo and Ensemble and not have them go flat in the acapella section.

~To spend a winter in our house in Naples. No, I’m going to be greedy, it’s my wish list after all. To spend forever in our house in Naples. 

~To see my little Magic - who has become cranky enough in his old age to be banned from the groomer and thus is subject to my ineffectual chopping and shearing - once more time beautifully groomed and bathed as only my friend Tami can do.

~To take my mom shopping at Hudson’s (not Macy’s or even Marshall Fields, which my Detroit friends will understand) and have Maurice Salad for lunch. 

I’m sure most of you could put a similar wish list together in a matter of moments, like I just did with this one. It’s often the little things that stand out in our memories, that recall entire eras of our lives, that tug at our heartstrings and make us yearn. 

It makes me wonder, of course - what is happening in my life right now that might be on a similar list in 15 or 20 years, when I’m on the brink of 70 or 80 or maybe even 90 years of age? What will I long for in those years? The minor aches, pains, and infirmities my 50’s have ushered in, the gray hairs, the lines around the eyes, the wobbles in the neck (and I do feel bad about my neck, Nora Ephron), those might be extremely appealing as reckoned against changes yet to come. The days that are now sometimes just a little too empty, a little too lonely, may seem full by comparison to unforseen days in the future.

“You can’t wish back time,” my mother has said with a sigh, and I suspect she is recalling her own personal wish list when she says it. You can’t, it’s true. But maybe wishing for the things that were once so precious in your past can help you find what’s precious in the here and now, even if that seems at first look to be “precious little."

With that thought in mind, here is my Present List...

~Having coffee each morning in the sitting nook of our beautiful bedroom, the sun streaming in casting shadow rays across the vaulted ceiling

~A little dark haired boy watching a video of me reading him a story, saying “Pretty cool!” in response.

~Simply knowing said little dark haired boy is in the world, happy, healthy, smart, funny, and exceedingly cute.

~Playing What A Wonderful World with Classical Bells, in full ensemble effect, getting all the nuances and harmonies just right and in perfect synch.

~Taking the ’98 Red TA out for Sunday drives in the summer, wandering hand in hand with my husband through car shows or small towns we happen to find, feeling like the luckiest almost-60 year old in the world.

~Eating home made chicken noodle soup my 88-year old mother still makes for me whenever I’m not feeling well.

These are my gifts for these present days. 

Come to think of it, I really couldn’t wish for more.

How about you? What’s on your wish list?

Write On Wednesday: Desperate Distractions

I’ll be honest - I nearly cried when I looked out my window this morning.

Snow fell in wet, white sheets, and the sky was gunmetal gray. Skeletal tree branches rattled in the wind, and the chickadees clung desperately to the feeder as it swayed dizzily back and forth.

It wasn’t going to be a good day.

This winter has seemed plagued to me, with illness and unrest, bitter cold and gray skies. I’ve been sick again this week, some odd combination of maladies that appeared out of nowhere.

The winter of my malcontent, I’m calling it. 

So far, 2015, I am not impressed.

I had great plans for the day too - nothing scheduled outside of the house, so I was going to catch up on writing, make headway on publicity for an event involving both my handbell ensemble and the community theater I volunteer with, and maybe even do the taxes (or at least gather the paperwork - yes, I’m one of those tax procrastinators.)

But my energy and ambition fell with a wet thud, just like those snowflakes that were piling up on the porch. 

 Most successful writers will say it’s necessary to put yourself in inspiration’s path: show up at the page every day, don’t wait for inspiration to come find find you. 

One of my favorite writers, Dani Shapiro, whose book Still Writing sits on my desk, talks about the pattern she has for her writing life. “Three pages every day, five days a week,” she maintains. But then she goes on to note that if you “do the math,” this means she could write a novel length manuscript in half a year. 

“I have never written a novel length manuscript in half a year,” she admits. “In fact, two years would be fast for me."

So what happens? As author William Styron put it - “the fleas of life” get in the way. Shapiro agrees. “The dog has a vet appointment; the school play is at noon; it’s flu season, a snow day, who knew there were so many long weekends? The roof springs a leak; the neighbor’s house is under construction; a friend calls in a crisis. Life doesn’t pause to make room for our precious writing time. Life stops for nothing and we make accommodations."

There is an incredible amount of willpower necessary to write, especially when writing isn’t your “bread and butter.” Distractions abound - not only the alluring call of the internet, but homelier distractions as well. Like the bed sheets that should be changed, the towels that needed washing. There is always tea to be made, maybe it would help settle my queasy stomach - or if not that, some toast, dry but still something after all. While the tea brews, perhaps just a few more pages in that new novel I just started. Maybe I’ll finish the chapter before the tea cools, and then go back upstairs to write. By then it’s time to take the dogs outside, which means another pass with the shovel so their short legs don’t become encumbered with icy snowballs.

Ah yes, you know the drill, I can see you nodding your heads guiltily out there. After a while, it all becomes a little desperate, doesn’t it? Sort of like the way we feel when we open the window and see another snowstorm, another gray sky, hear the thunk and scrape of the snow blade as it passes down the street for the 10th time today.

Perseverance. I managed to put myself into the chair, open the page, start to write. Time slips by, you get lost in whatever world you’re creating. For the writer - and I suspect for the musician, the painter, the cook, the seamstress - it’s all part of the same battle. Put yourself where ideas and inspiration will find you. 

And hope it doesn’t get sidetracked by distractions of its own on the way.

The Sunday Salon: Second Chances

I’ve never been one of those readers who will “solider on” with a book to the bitter end even if I don’t care for it. I’ve always felt the searing truth of the saying: “So many books, so little time.” Most of my books come from the library where I have a habit of dashing in, plucking a sackful of books off the new release shelf, taking a quick pass through the stacks to see if there’s anything I might have missed or if an old favorite might be calling my name, and then making off with them like a bandit. (Sometimes, I still feel like the entire concept of libraries is too good to be true - I mean, they really let me come in and just take a dozen books home with me?) 

I admit, it’s harder to set aside a book I’ve bought and paid for than one I’ve borrowed from the library, so I’ve learned to be very selective in the books I purchase because I know I’ll feel a stronger compulsion to finish them. 

On Monday,  I started reading a library novel by a new-to-me author, Sally Beauman. I had finished In This House of Brede early Monday morning, and gave myself the entire day to let it “digest” before starting something else. I found it’s necessary to do that after reading a book that was particularly entrancing, and I was definitely deeply immersed in Godden’s 1960’s novel about a contemplative monastery of nuns.

Although I gave myself the day (and a busy day it was) to release Brede from my mind, I still struggled with The Visitors during my regular evening reading time, and also well into the hour I give myself for reading each morning. The early stages of the novel were set in Egypt, circa 1920, and recounted a good bit of detail about Egyptian archeological expeditions. It’s well written and researched, but not an area of particular interest to me. I was contemplating giving up on it. With the same library haul that yielded The Visitors, I had also brought home a number of quite interesting novels, as well as a memoir I was eager to read. 

But then, I hit the second section of the book, almost 200 pages into a 450 page novel. Suddenly we were back in England, near Cambridge. Our main character was dealing with a very interesting, complex new person in her life. We were meeting her father for the first time, and learning what an absolute dolt he was. The author was filling in the back story of this young girl who had lost her beloved mother, and was on a psychological search for a family of her own, just as the English archeologists were searching for royal tombs in the Egyptian desert.

Suddenly, I was hooked. I can’t put the book down. I’ve been carrying it around the house every since, and read a few more pages whenever I have a few moments to spare.

I’ve had this experience a few times before - almost ready to set a book aside, I decide to read on a little more, when suddenly the author pulls a rabbit out the hat and lures me completely in. Naturally I have to wonder if some of the other books I’ve put aside unfinished might have fulfilled their initial promise if given a second chance. Reading teaches us so much, in so many ways.  Of course there is a life lesson to be learned here as well: second chances sometimes pay off. 

Now, back to The Visitors..I can’t wait to see what happens next.

How about you? Have you ever been tempted to give up reading a book only to find yourself completely sucked in within the next chapter?

Making Strides

We just got home from a walk outdoors, our first in many weeks thanks to the frigid cold and icy streets we’ve had for the past two months. This morning, even though the temperature is only in the teens, the sun shines brightly and (almost!) warmly. There is no wind, the streets are dry, both dogs have a definite spring in their step. It felt good to suck in that fresh air after so many days inside the house. 

We have some friends who are leaving today for a month long sojourn in southern Florida, quite near the city where we once had a vacation home. Winter has been extra hard since we sold that house in 2012. Although we were never able to spend entire winters there, I realize now that even spending a few days there every month made a huge different in our ability to withstand the rigors of a Michigan winter. 

Even so, I’ve often thought that were I able to spend a signifiant length of time in Florida (or any warmer clime) I would choose the months of January and February. By the time March arrives, I feel as if I’ve survived the worst, as if I will make it to spring. 

When March comes, I am hopeful. 

Perhaps it’s because March is my birth month, so I feel anticipatory (yes, even at my age).  The calendar says spring arrives this month, although I have seen many a nasty snowstorm come in on March 21. Still there is something in the air in March, a perceptible lengthing of daylight, a definite intensity to the sun that lifts my winter weary spirit.

With those changes come a sense of wanderlust for me, and this year I really feel it. I’ve become aware of a stirring in my own heart lately, something nudging me to fling wide the door and set out, take big strides, see new things. I’ve never been one who craves travel, unlike many of my friends. I’ve always been happiest and home, and most especially so in these past couple of years as we’ve moved and been settling into our condo. Just last year I wrote these words in the Home Life section of Life In General: “I love being home. I enjoy my own company, my own space, and my own time to practice all the homey things I like to do. Sometimes I think I am dangerously close to crossing the line between homebody and hermit. I am so enamored of this house and this place that I must have a really good reason to leave."

I still love my home, still love being in it and doing all those “homey things.” But I’ve noticed a tiny rustling in my spirit, a little bit of longing when I see those commercials for the Viking River Cruises, and slight tug at the heartstrings when I hear the roar of a jet engine overhead. I thought I was immune to that desire. But maybe not.

Maybe my feelings are changing.

The other day I was talking with a young friend who is staying home with her three children after working in a professional career, one she studied long and hard to achieve. “Colleagues keep asking me when I’m coming back to work, but I really don’t want to go back to work. Maybe I should?” she questioned. “But I just don’t, and I’m not sure I ever will."

During the time she’s been home, she’s uncovered an immense creative talent in painting, sewing, and crafting - a talent she never explored or even knew existed until a few years, after a life spent in science and medical field. But this creative work is feeding her soul right now in a way she obviously needs. 

“One thing I’ve learned,” I told her, in a rare moment of motherly type wisdom, “is that the needs and desires for our lives can change drastically during the course of a lifetime. What interests and nourishes us when we’re 25 may be totally different at 35. It’s happened to me, it will happen to you, too.” 

It’s true, the desire for change comes to all of us - even to me, one of the most change resistant people on the planet. It may not occur in the fashion we Michigander’s use to talk about the weather (if you don’t like it, wait five minutes and it will change), but it comes in it’s own way and time. A little over a year ago, I would have said I didn’t care if I ever traveled anywhere, would have insisted that traveling was way overrated, that I was perfectly happy just staying home forever and always.

And yet. That blue sky, that open road. The rolling hills of southern England. The lapping waves of the Gulf of Mexico. The sidewalk cafes of Paris. They are whispering in my ear - come, see.

Ironically, these feelings come at a time when we are less able to travel than ever simply because of our situation. My mother’s health is not good, and she depends on me for so much right now. We have the dogs to consider, our fur babies who have never been left with anyone but my mom who is finding it increasingly challenging to care for them. These were the things I once used to justify my unwillingness to travel, to explain why I never planned trips longer than four or five days. Now it feels more like being held back, when I really want to loosen the reins of my existence. And this is a situation that is unlikely to change for the foreseeable future.

The need for change, the desire for change - it comes to us whether we want it or not. Sometimes it creeps up quietly and settles in a remote corner of the heart. Sometimes it rushes in like the March wind. In 2013, I wrote: “There are times when the need for change become palpable, when the yearning for something fresh and new insistently clamors for attention and cannot be ignored."

As I open the door to March and to the promise of “something fresh and new” in the natural world, I want to open myself to these new feelings, notice this change of heart and find ways to satisfy these urges within the set of limitations I have. 

When the need for change begins to clamor, it does no good to ignore it.