Reflections on 28 Deaths

Twenty children, six adults, one mother and one son. Dead in Connecticut.

My heart is heavy. Twenty-eight deaths by gunshot in one day. We spasm through a communal grief, fear for the safety of every child, desire to have a giant rubber eraser for time. Can't we erase back to a point where other choices could be made? How far back would we have to go?

We don't see the dozens of other deaths by gunshot that occur each day singly and in isolation. Twenty-eight deaths by gun happen every day in America. It's quite common. We are not outraged. We do not spasm. It is not news. The grief, though, the grief flows out in waves of pain from pierced bodies.

I've had my griefs, my losses. Enough to know that grief does not kill you and it does not particularly make you stronger, but it does alter you. If you're lucky, it stretches the heart unbearably till it can hold the love that you can no longer physically express. And you end up with a more expansive understanding for those who suffer (including yourself). If you're not lucky, grief can seize up your emotional innards like hard water choking off the openings in a shower head. I've had it happen both ways. It hurts both ways.

I am not in shock from the shootings in Connecticut. I am horrified, but not surprised by this lone gunman with his weapons of mass destruction. His life was a surfeit of guns. When you go crazy, you grab what's handy. It might be a credit card. It might be a knife. It might be language. If you are surrounded by guns, you grab guns. It's no surprise. I don't know why death comes as such a surprise. It is our one truly universal experience. Maybe if we acknowledged this truth more we would kill less. It's a paradox.

I am calm about my own death. I know I will go into the ground and eventually rejoin the processes of my planet--erosion, remodeling, creation, destruction. I know that any impact I have must be in the here and now. I can't waste my time. I have come out of the earth, my body made of water, carbon, calcium, iron, and many other earth elements. It makes sense that as I rise up as an entity I then subside back into the arms of the mother planet. I am comforted.

Although I have just posited a soul-less death, I feel like our national obsession with guns is an illness of the soul, the sacred psyche. These young men who kill so spectacularly are so desirous of acknowledgement of some kind, desirous of comfort, of meaning. My heart goes out to them as much as to grieving loved ones of the dead. Many of us have felt the way those young men feel, but we either (1) did not have access to a huge amount of ammunition and ready guns or (2) had resources, had relationships, and, in my case, had a few treasured gifts like the ability to express in words and an indomitable sense of humor. We are them. They are us.

The song that keeps repeating in my mind is "Where Have All the Flowers Gone." It's meant to mourn the loss of young men in war but seems entirely apt to describe the loss of children in an armed nation. Where have all the flowers gone, long time passing? Where have all the flowers gone, long time ago? Where have all the flowers gone? Gone to graveyards, every one. When will we ever learn? When will we ever learn?"

Winnie-the-Pooh, by A.A. Milne

Disney's Pooh

Mild, gentle, genuine, funny. The Winnie-the-Pooh stories are wonderful. Somehow I feel that not much is going on and then find that much has. Winnie-the-Pooh and his friends roam through the hundred-acre woods exploring their world and their friendships. If there's a child inside you, give A.A. Milne's classics another read. If there's a child beside you, these stories are essential.

I read a compilation of the Pooh stories called A World of Winnie-the-Pooh, which contained all of the stories on my Eager Reader's list--and added in some poetry. It also included the original illustrations by E.H. Shepard, which are much more evocative and whimsical than the heavily delineated Disney versions with which we are over-familiar. (E. H. Shepard was an illustrator for Punch, which Milne wrote for.) However, this volume was over-sized and ran to more than 200 pages. It was heavy to hold and the line lengths were too long for the type size. I never felt comfortable while reading it. Loved the content. Hated the packaging.

E.H. Shepard's Pooh

It is impressive that these little characters--stuffed animals come to life--maintain their dignity and personhood through a range of adventures and problems. Their character flaws are accepted in a friendly way, mocked a little bit, but not seen as any barrier to affection. For example, Rabbit likes to organize. The friends go to him when they need organization. And then politely ignore him.

Pooh is presented as "the bear of very little brain," and is thought stupid by himself and the others (except for human boy Christopher Robin). Pooh's smart solutions to the jams he and his pals get in are considered cause for wonder. And they are all amazed that with such a small brain (or not brain at all), Pooh comes up with relevant poetry for every occasion. I can see how children, who are so often dismissed by older siblings and adults, would relate wonderfully to Pooh, who makes big mistakes with absolutely no malice aforethought. He maintains his integrity. Maybe little kids can also.

The stories are saturated with the loving kindness that Milne must have felt for his son (Christopher Robin Milne). He enters into the world of childhood with a light touch and an understanding of the seriousness of slight things and the slightness of serious things. The dialogue is plain old funny--through it each character is fully revealed. Eeyore: "It's snowing still... And freezing. However," he said brightening up a little, "we haven't had an earthquake lately."

I don't remember reading the Pooh books as a child. Somehow, though, they wafted into my consciousness. I knew about them long before I read them. I believe that I saw cartoons of them (probably the Disney movies) before I read the books. I remember very little of what I did read as a child. I don't have memories of being tucked into bed with a story. We did go to the library a lot and I knew that my oldest sister and my mom always brought home books and read them. I knew that Dad and Grandma read the newspaper every day.

Cabin in ice storm

The first real book I remember was a chapter book that I liked so much I checked it out over and over again--but I can't remember the title. It was a juvenile mystery about a group of middle-school-aged children (and adult chaperones) who got trapped in a cabin during an ice storm. And, of course, a criminal was on the loose. The ice storm gave a surreal survivalist feel to the book and the criminal put the children in just enough jeopardy for the reader to be thrilled without being terrified. If anyone knows the title of this book, let me know. I checked it out over and over again from the children's department at the Middletown Public Library in the mid to late 1960s.

I'm struggling to make this post longer, but there isn't that much to say about Winnie-the-Pooh. It is so straightforward and unaffected...no need to dig deeper than what it presents. Get it. Read it. Laugh with it, cry with it. Practice the forgiveness and acceptance it portrays. Enjoy.

You Can't Hug Gift Wrap

Low-money, High-meaning

I struggle with gift-giving every year, and as the years go by, I do less and less of it. We all have so much stuff. More just adds to the clutter. All of that clutter comes right out of the earth and then leaves huge carbon and garbage footprints behind. And, do all of those gifts really make you feel happier? If they do, that's great. But if you want to spice up your regular gift-giving or replace it all together, here are some wacky ideas you might want to try.

I developed many of these ideas for my sister's family, with whom I celebrate Hanukkah, which I celebrate better than I spell. I'll give suggestions for adapting these ideas for non-Jews. My sister's family is strung across the United States, so these ideas also focus on how to share experiences via social networks and technologies. However, these, too are adaptable, for low-tech folks. Please post a comment on this post if you try one of these ideas. Let me know how it went.

Please note: Get someone to create a Facebook page for your family's holiday activities if you try any of my suggestions. You'll need a place where you can post and view photos from each other and comment on the activities you choose to do.

Remember, I've already said "wacky." If you are looking for dignity, go somewhere else! Here we go...

Phone Chain. Organize a phone chain by alphabetical order of first names (or age, or location, whatever) for sharing something specific, like something you love about the callee. The first person calls the second person and tells him or her what makes him or her great, the second person calls the third, and so on. At the end, scramble up the names for another round of calls. Scramble the names for every night of Hanukkah (or 12 Nights of Christmas?), using topics like a favorite memory, things that made you jealous, if that person were a tree what kind would he or she be...be creative. Post or Tweet comments to each other if you want.

Sharing a meal. Pick one night of Hanukkah (or other holiday date, like Christmas Eve). Make sure that everyone in your group is eating the exact same food at the exact same time that day no matter what the time zone. Post photos of yourself eating for everyone else to see. Anything from Big Macs to fruit cake would be acceptable, as long as you are all together.

Holiday Collage. Have everyone take a photo of lighting the Menorah (can’t spell this very well either) or doing some other holiday ritual, like hanging a stocking on the mantle. Post the photos for each other. See if someone in your family has the talent to convert the photos into a family collage.

Give a Gift to a Stranger Day. Give something away--a dozen cookies, a pair of gloves, a snow globe--use your imagination--to a stranger. Just tell them it is "Give a Gift to a Stranger Day" to celebrate the holidays. How did it turn out? Any surprises? Share comments on Facebook, Twitter, or by email. (Or tell the next person on your  nightly phone chain about it!)

Random Acts of Kindness Day. This is a variation of giving a gift to a stranger. For a whole day you'll have to keep your radar out for ways to be kind. Have everyone keep track of and share the experience. How much good will can you generate as a family?

Remember When... Have each person write down a few Hanukkah (or Christmas, or Dewali, or Ramadan, or...) memories to make a little booklet. I bet someone in your family can use a graphics program to put a polish on the final product. And surely someone knows how to scan old photos into the mix.

Unity Feast Un-united. This idea is purely for the wackiness of it all. It makes no sense. I love it. Each family member is assigned to make one dish for the feast. But, since you can't be together, you'll only get to eat the one dish you fix. (You can snack later.) Like, one person does latkes, but that’s all that person gets to eat. Other people have dessert or a salad, but that’s all they get to eat. And so on. Eat this meal on the same night. You could try Skyping together as you eat. Post photos.

Wackiness Against the Machines. Call a vending service person to complain that your money won't fit into the money slot. Make the technician pull the fact out of you that you are trying to buy a diet coke with Hanukkah gelt (chocolate money wrapped in gold foil). Share your experiences. I know this is a bit mean, but humor can be ugly. Please don't call a service technician out of bed at midnight on Christmas Eve when there is a blizzard just to do this. Or, OK, go ahead.

Wackiness Against the Machines (a kinder version). Stand at a vending machine till someone comes along and then try to get the Hanukkah gelt to go in the slot and complain about it to the person waiting for you to finish. It's up to you what tack to take--puzzled, angry, surprised. I guess you could try fake (children's) toy money, but that could get you arrested. As usual, chocolate is always a good fallback position.

Three-Way. Get your mind out of the bedroom, I'm talking about phone calls. Do a three-way Skype (or other videophone technology) and try to sing a song together (something a little more complex than the Dreidel song--I recommend the Hallelujah Chorus). I suspect that some laughter might ensue therefrom.

Skype With Puppets. I've just recently had my first Jetsonesque videophone experience and I keep thinking of bizarre things to do. So, make sock puppets, or brown paper bag puppets, or just draw lips with a red pen on your thumb and forefinger. (No, you do not have permission to go to Pinterest for instructions. Use Google like regular people.) At the Skype time, have the puppets talk to each other on camera. I don't know what will happen.

Fright Makeup. Likewise, you have my permission to apply fright makeup before Skyping with your parents, no matter how old you or they are.

Do Good With Money (Real, not Chocolate).  Pick a particular charity and see how many donations your family can generate in a single day using your various networks—email, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Google, phone, knocking on doors, begging at bus stations. Have people donate in honor of a departed loved one or a famous hero like Rosa Parks or Harvey Milk. May I recommend Outreach International (outreach-international.org/) if you don’t have a charity in mind? This is actually a socially responsible suggestion--how did it sneak in here?

Chocolate Money Attack. Go out on purpose to put Hanukkah gelt into Salvation Army bellringers’ buckets. You decide whether to sneak it in or do it for all to see. Share your experiences. Have a handful of (real) coins or a five-dollar bill ready to sooth any bristled feelings and provide plausible deniability. "Oh, that's right, I keep the real money in my other pocket!" Remember, they're not called "army" for nothing'.

Be extravagant. Do a nightly Skype call to discuss anything you’ve been doing. You can even Skype together as you light your Menorahs every night, or as you open a window on your advent calendar.

Rewrite. Change the words of a popular holiday tune or verse to describe your family. For my family, we'd have to find rhymes for outrageous, talkative, and loyal (of course, royal). You are only limited by your personal tolerance for weirdness.

SIDEBAR: THE SOLSTICE

The winter solstice occurs on December 21 or 22. Every year. It's not something to believe in, like a religious faith. It's an event that happens and has happened every year of your life. The darkness is over! The sunshine is returning! This is my favorite event of the winter. Go druid. Affix leaves to your gonads and run around on a hillside. Just have a party. Turn on every light in your house. Put on suntan lotion on spec.

To me, the solstice is also a reminder of the strange coincidence that allows life to exist on earth--if the earth tilted a little more or a little less, or if it orbited a little closer or a little farther from its star, we wouldn't be here. We wouldn't be here to marvel at ourselves, to tremble with outrage, to cry with sorrow, to feel like the most important thing in the whole universe, to gawk, to wonder, to love. We wouldn't be here to be wacky and then recognize our own wackiness, and then laugh uproariously, and then to reflect on it. I'm glad we're here on our little blue marble in space.

SIDEBAR: KINDNESS ECONOMY

Kindness is one of the few things you can give away that actually enriches you--and as you spend kindness, the amount of kindness in the world actually increases. It's not like spending money with its scarcity--if I have more someone else has less. And you count kindness to any living thing or to our planet itself as kindness. I invite you to join me in promoting the giving of kindness. Here's one way to work it.

1. Consciously plan to do one nice thing for someone, do it, and say to yourself, “This kindness is my gift to [recipient’s name here].” The target of the kindness is not the recipient--the recipient is your loved one for whom you normally buy a commercial gift.

2. Then, write down what you did and send it to the recipient you chose. His or her heart will be warmed with the thought that kindness is increasing and that you have good values!

3. Your kindness doesn’t need to be a deprivation or a sacrifice. It doesn’t have to entail great planning or expense. And it doesn’t have to cost anything at all.

Your kindness won’t clutter up or pollute our Earth. I guarantee that it will be just exactly the right style, size and color. It will be a gift of your heart that warms the hearts of others. If you plan to give a gift for the holidays this year, make it a gift from the kindness economy.

SIDEBAR: TOURIST DESTINATION LANDFILL

Yes, you can arrange tours of your local landfill for your family, usually by contacting the solid waste authority in your area or the owner of the landfill if it is private. One year I toured the Franklin County Landfill--the largest artificial structure in the state of Ohio. It is acres and acres of garbage...and not garbagy garbage like banana peels and apple cores and chicken bones. Most of the garbage is stuff, just stuff, or stuff that stuff was sold in, stuff that might have been gifts. And much of it is in perfectly good condition. I saw whole buildings dumped into the landfill, not even chunked up much. I saw a huge amount of recyclables. That's what I saw. Ask what I smelled! Ask about the flock of sea gulls that have adapted to living at the landfill because of the good eats. Next, ask what I didn't see--the thousands or millions of cubic yards of buried garbage.

The landfill was fascinating. Turns out, it's not the giant compost pile we are led to believe, in which garbage will gradually biodegrade into mulch. It's more like a series of gigantic Ziploc bags--pockets of garbage hermetically sealed in plastic. The whole landfill is lined with nonporous clay and other materials that ensure that no leakage occurs. In a poem, I refer to the landfill as a huge pile of MREs (the military's "meals-ready-to-eat" bags of food) for future generations. (Future generations refers to your own children and grandchildren--yes, those kids right there.)

OK, so I ranted. But you'll be glad you went if you go.

Sample Chapters from Joy's Novel

Here are two chapters from my strange novel called Long Arm of Not the Law. The novel ranges across time and space and has many strands--maybe too many. I'm not editing yet, though. I'm just trying to get material out of my head and on to the screen. In the book, these two chapters will be separated from each other. You meet the chapter's main personality in the first one and then later revisit her. Remember that this book is set up as a series of vignettes more than as a traditional narrative. Enjoy.


CONTRABAND
          All was dark but for a single candle flame. The light mainly served to emphasize the darkness. Sounds gave shape to it, set it in motion.
          A rustling, a muffled cry: “Ouch!”
          A rustling, a whisper: “Hush up.”
          The sounds, the words, and now your ears can see the shapes in the dark, though the dark has not lifted. And the skin can see also, see shapes by subtle changes in pressure and the waft of the faintest breath. The dark has people in it.
          A whisper: “Mama, how long we been here?”
          A whisper: “Jonah, count the marks.”
          And Jonah feels with his fingers the marks he has made each time the upstairs woman brought food. Two marks. His stomach tells him that it is almost time for the third.
          A whisper: “I count two, Mama. And we ought to get victuals soon now. That‘s three.”
          The space smelled of sweat, earth, fresh-dug potatoes, human waste. The woman who brought food also replaced the slops bucket.
          A whisper: “Can’t be much longer before we leave, Jonah.”
          A whisper: “The lord knows, Mama.”

          Later, which is how they measured time, you could hear footsteps and the rusty cellar doors screeched open. Light flooded the dug out room, revealing at last to the eyes the room’s inhabitants. Four people rose to their feet, a teen-age girl, skinny as a seedling, trembling like a leaf; a man with an ageless face but grizzled hair whom the girl hid behind; a young man who had not yet grown into his height; and a woman, also ageless, who held a sleeping child in her arms. This was Mama. She stood in front of the others. She was their speaker. She had served in the house, in the main house, and knew how to talk to white people.
          Two white people came into the room instead of just the woman. A man carried an armload of clothes and a lantern. The woman carried a bucket of water in one hand and a bucket of what looked like stew in the other. No one spoke until the doors clanged closed.
          The white woman spoke to the black woman. “Tonight is your night. The arrangements are made.” She set the buckets on a stack of firewood. “Eat up. We’ll tell you what to do while you eat.” The white woman took some clothing off of the man’s pile. “Make sure each of you gets some warm clothing.”
          The four inhabitants of the cellar gathered around the buckets, taking turns dipping individual spoons into the stew and sharing a tin cup dipped over and over again into the water bucket. Behind them, their hosts began shifting a pile of potatoes. It was embarrassing to have these white people serving them food and emptying their slops and now laboring over the potatoes. Only Mama was brave enough to talk to them. She was spooning stew into the little one. They took turns running their fingers around the inside of the bucket, then licking off the stew they gathered in this way. Food was a hope in this underworld, this underworld of escape. They would eat every single drop.

          This word, escape, and the name of the place to which they fled, freedom, thrilled through them, tingled, generated just enough allure to overcome fear. Now they got down to work with the whites--another novelty--and got the potatoes moved, and at the bottom of the wall there were two boards wedged against the wall with rocks. The white man and Jonah pushed the rocks aside and let the boards fall. Now they could all see it--a tunnel.

          “It’s tight,” the white woman said. “But keep going. Keep going and you will be all right. You’ll come out in a corn field.”
          The escapees watched the woman’s face, drew her words deep inside.
          “You should see a string of white diapers hanging on the clothesline. If you don’t see the diapers, come back here.” She spoke directly to Mama. “You must see the diapers.”
          Mama nodded and said, “No diapers, come back here.”
          “Right. Walk as fast as you can to the clothesline and go into the barn.” She looked down at her hands. “That’s all I know. Just go into the barn.”
          Mama nodded again. “Go into the barn. Yes.”

          The white woman said, “Gather up a wrap and get going.” She helped Mama into a hooded cape. “Go with god. We will pray for your safe journey.”

          “Thank you, ma’am. You have been kind to us and you didn’t have to be.”

          “Yes, I did.”

          And thus did four people and one child escaping slavery move under the town of Maple Hills and into the night. Mrs. Buttersby’s husband had already replaced the boards. She stooped and started shifting the potatoes back to where they had been.

LIBERATION SHE’LL BE
          Mama Libby looked around her home and lowered her chin in a satisfied nod. The floor was swept. The cooking things were washed and stowed on hand-hewn oak shelves, firelight throwing the pocked bottoms of cast iron skillets into high relief on the wall by the hearth. It was all clean, but the smell of bacon and toasted bread had not been scrubbed from the room along with the soot and particulates that were the flotsam and jetsam of her rural neighborhood. The families who lived in this row of a dozen frame-built houses were workers--farmhands, drivers, mill workers, cleaners, street sweepers. Her own elderly father was a blacksmith, with Jonah 'prenticing. How different it was now for the fruits of his labors--coins and bills and good will--to come home from work with him instead of being usurped by white people who claimed to own not just the fruits of his labors but him also. He had been a piece of equipment subject to depreciation and resale like any other.
          And the equipment was not invented yet to describe the equipment Mama had been in the white people’s wealth machine (vacuum cleaner, wash machine, sewing machine, dishwasher, Formula 409). And, oh yes, brood mare. Two of Mama’s children had been taken away, sold away from her for good cash money, one to South Carolina and the other in Mississippi, she thought, but she didn’t really know. She still carried the hope that someday maybe they could be together--someday right here in THIS world, right here in Battle Creek, Michigan, not on some shimmery-vague heavenly shore. She wanted to see them while they still had bodies to hug, hair to braid, hands to hold, laughter to share. She wanted to see their earthly selves and make sure they knew they were still a part of her. She sighed and took one more swipe at the dishpan with the hem of her apron.
          As it often did, the sight of her own clean kitchen called out memories of other kitchens, other rooms. She remembered the clay-lined fireplace of her quarters (not home) on the white people’s property, remembered making the rice allotment stretch by cooking in the hulls of the peas she had cleaned for her owner’s dinner and adding in new greens from dandelions her father picked on his way home from the forge.
         She remembered the vaulted plantation house kitchen with its immense brick fireplace, about as much floor space in the fireplace as in her slave quarters and the brick ovens and the water pumped right into the sink basin hewn from solid granite. She remembered rows of wooden buckets, rows of hams hanging from meat hooks, salt-skinned and solid, stacks of plates--everyday stoneware, company china, special event Limoge, and the worn wooden plates reserved for her and the other enslaveds.
          And frequently, she thought of that dug out room with the one candle, smelling of slops and stew, perspiration, potatoes, and earth. The room of the shapes in the dark, the squeaking cellar doors, the narrow tunnel. She thought of the woman who brought food, who thought about the cold wind, who opened herself to the dangerous labor of furthering freedom.
          Mama had renamed herself when she arrived in Battle Creek, into freedom. She introduced herself as Libby now and people thought it stood for Elizabeth, but really it stood for Liberation. And she gave her last name now as Shelby, which stood to her for “she’ll be.” Liberation she’ll be.” It brought a giggle into her throat to say it, a gorgeous feeling of sheer life, full life. Libby Shelby. She had always been called Maddy before freedom, a corruption of the word maid, not the name Madelaine.
          Libby was working now as a teacher. She had taught herself to read by scheduling the cleaning of the nursery during the tutor’s visit. When the room cleared out, Libby would reverently touch the cloth reader, trace the half-erased letters on the slate. Learning to read was Libby’s first radical act, the first heavy door she dragged open for herself. She couldn’t get enough and started to sneak books and newspapers out from the main house--which would have demoted her to field work if she were caught--or to the auction block. Reading was how Libby learned about freedom--not the elusive, reached-only-by-death freedom of the songs and scriptures she knew, but real freedom in a a real place in real time. She started to dream, to have words for her dreams, to have words for her anger and her pain. By the light from a tallow candle, she taught her father to read, and her daughter--the only one of her children left to her--and to Jonah, who became part of their family. Now she was teaching her daughter’s child in the frame schoolhouse in town with the pot-bellied stove that gulped coal and the chalkboard of slate that stretched the whole length of the room.
          They were four generations in that dugout basement room, four generations united in the goal to be free. They were all Shelbys now, Pa, Mara, Jonah, and baby Truth, named after Battle Creek’s famous resident Sojourner Truth.
          Libby had backtracked as best she could to trace the path her family had taken to freedom. Every year on the anniversary of her escape, she trekked south a bit, through Michigan and into Ohio, to find the places and people who had helped her family escape. She had made it as far south as Lancaster, Ohio, but there the trail went cold. No one could tell her about that woman in the earthen basement or the clothesline of bleached diapers glowing in the night, or the horse and wagon that had waited in the barn that carried them onward to where they could be free. And she was scared to go closer to the Ohio river. The South had long arms for escapees. She would not go to the river.
　
　
　

Church of the Dog, by Kaya McLaren

          My friend found Church of the Dog at the Herbert Wescoat Memorial (McArthur, Ohio) library book sale. She was charmed and amused by the title, as we have joked (not with great originality) about god being dog spelled backwards. We also go to church together and we both love (fiercely and delightedly) our dogs. She has a powerful golden retriever named Bailey and I have my nimble multibreed Marigold. So, Church of the Dog intrigued us on several levels before we even opened the book or read the kudos on the back cover. At 25 cents, how could we resist this book? My friend made the purchase.
          In a few weeks, she brought the book to me. She was consternated by it and offered it to me. I thought, oh no, is it all about sex or something? Then, I thought, it must be something else, because sex would probably not consternate this particular friend. So I took it and started in on it. My first impressions were not good. The book is based in an alternate spirituality that borders on witchcraft, but in a beautiful, nature-oriented way. The heroine travels in her dreams to meet other dreamers and sometimes meet with deceased people who were released to this dreamland world upon death. She reads auras and with special giftedness can manage auras--her own, those of others, and even large scale auras such as that surrounding a high school just after a Columbine-type shooting. (She and other “dreamers” dream-travel there like a team of psychic first responders.) This is not a type of spirituality I enjoy reading about.
 
          But, my friend wanted my impressions, so I struggled on. I had the book with me when I went to Denver on business at the end of October (2012). In the hotel room it was read or die of bad TV. I felt myself begin to submerge into the book, to accept instead of fight its premises and I started to enjoy the story and all of its fey qualities.
          At base, Church of the Dog is about transformation, about dealing with the painful blows life can sometimes inflict, about moving through and beyond, incorporating. The heroine is a traveler, a wanderer. She becomes (lets herself become) entangled with a family of farmers in Washington state or Oregon (can’t remember) that consists of an elderly married couple and the grandson they raised. Their son and daughter-in-law had been killed when the grandson was eight years old. The grandson survived the accident, shielded by the body of his dead mother.

          The trauma of the accident left the remaining family frozen in fear, guilt, pain. The deus ex machina heroine gradually thaws out this family, beginning with grandma, then grandpa, and finally with the grandson, now in his late 20s. She uses auras, saunas, hot springs, spiritual artifacts from many faith traditions and especially dancing as her tools. The dancing is especially wonderful and is a wonderful metaphor for the need for each of them to begin to dance the dance of life again. The descriptions of the dancing are rhythmic, lyrical, literally moving as well as figuratively. The old couple is reawakened in their love for each other as well as in their awareness of their grandson’s unfinishedness, frozenness. He has much business to attend to (the business of living) and needs to be freed to do it.

          That’s the basic story. I will not be giving spoilers. I recommend Church of the Dog as a little piece of beauty in our world, a book about benevolence and healing. Even if you don’t buy into the new age spirituality, the transformations of the characters are powerful, moving, and engaging. I felt pain with them and the tears of whatever it is when you untie a tough knot, untangle a necklace, release a tight fist. The tears come from the pain released when the blockage eases. It’s the shake of earth when the tectonic plates slip past a snag or the tsunami raises from a great movement under the sea.
         If you cannot step outside your own belief system for a little while to enjoy this book, I feel for you. I’ve had that problem with books--some of the ones on this very blog. And many, many times I have stepped inside the beliefs of Christianity to enjoy a book from within that perspective. Diving in the pond of another way of viewing the world is why I read in the first place. But sometimes I just can’t do it. Like, I’m not sure I could dive into the pond of totalitarianism to enjoy Mein Kampf, for example; or swim with hatred theologists. We all have our limits. So, if you can make it happen, enjoy Church of the Dog with me. I am warmer inside and more forgiving for having read it.

Airport Rant

Here's a blow-by-blow of my latest air travel torment at Denver International Airport, pictured above.


DENVER AIRPORT: BAD MAMMAL

Blogger on a plane--looks
just like me, too

How many blog entries have been written while sitting on an airport runway trapped inside a plane that is going NOWHERE. It is the ultimate rant topic--time to kill (or, time being murdered), external locus of control (powerlessness), anxiety (how long will my ride wait at my destination point), hunger, thirst, and unappeasable bladder pressure.

And, I have sort of gone commando by opening this laptop and typing away against explicit instruction to not use electronical devices. At least if they drag me off the plane I’ll be OFF THE PLANE. I was going to write a literary blog as soon as we got in the air and received permission to compute. I was going to use my time productively and for the betterment of humanity.

Instead, I have devolved into rant mode, acidic and snarky. My natural tendency to lead the opposition has been triggered. Why do we not revolt? Why do 100 paying customers sit here like calves stuck in the castrating chute or like passive droolers waiting to be instructed. (“Close mouth now.”) What we lack, I think, is leadership, for someone (not me, please) to stand up and speak out and ask the most fundamental question of human existence--”why can’t we at least go to the bathroom?!?” I can hear the ensuing chorus of yeahs, amens, and gotta-go-pees peppering the dry recycling air.

The de-icing process--I think we need to put a few of
these into Denver Airport's Christmas stocking

I’m stuck on a runway in Denver. I have now been on the plane for over two hours. Although it was well documented that snow was coming, (we started talking about it at our conference yesterday morning) the airport was apparently not ready to de-ice the number of planes it had scheduled to take off. Our plane has been number five in line for de-icing for nearly an hour. Meanwhile, the weather system we could have flown out of is socking us in like the lid on a Tupperware bowl.

We’re already on the red-eye flight back to Columbus, Ohio, where we still face a two-hour drive home to Vinton County. My eyes will be dead, not red, by then. And I am already exhausted from attending a three-day conference that crammed my head so full with ideas and issues that I’m at a loss right now to make sense of it all.  I hope this intervening ordeal does not drive out the previous few days of experience in the same way that a concussion blanks out the most recent events before the injury.

Battlestar Galactica pilot and various ships in the blowing up process. Were any humans still on board?

Now we see planes being removed from the runway and dragged back to the gates. The last plane that shambled by was completely dark, like all occupants had expired. United in death on United Airlines. It reminds me of a sci-fi episode in which a spaceship thought to be both empty and in enemy hands was blown up with nuclear bombs--and right before the explosion, something appeared in the window--was it a face? Was it a human face or an alien face? The bomber pilot was haunted for many episodes with the ghosts or non-ghosts of his actions. Anyway, that’s what my wandering thoughts bring up when the “dark plane” goes by. Do we know who is/was in there? Does TSA have a plan for this? “Passengers die of boredom and dry sinus passages while de-icers sit idle in the tarmac.” “Pilots depressurize rebellious passengers demanding to take off or get off.” “Shroud of ennui offs trapped passengers.” “Even carry on bags desiccated on ‘death flight’.” “Carry-on carrion: Angry passenger empties overhead bins killing all.” We are news at eleven just waiting to happen, man.


Oh, now an iphone user reports that we are under a winter weather advisory. Power to the people. I love that about cell phones and the internet.

Oh, now the pilot has announced that we have been on the plane too long and are going back to the terminal. We are exceeding the 3-hour limit for pickling passengers. But, didn’t they know an hour ago that we would? Who compensates me for my time? Will they give me a rebate? Will they give me a free ticket for another flight? Will they give me a gift certificate for the food court? 

A squirrel plans ahead for winter;
squirrels are good at being mammals

It’s just horrid. I am looking for someone to be really angry at and there’s just no one. The pilot is as much a victim as me. Right now I am leaning toward blaming the airport for not planning ahead for sufficient de-icing equipment. And I blame those who let us even leave the gate when they could have predicted that we would not reach takeoff. I do not blame any supernatural entity for making it snow. It’s our job as mammals to cope with extremes of weather. I just wish the airport had been a better mammal.

Perry Mason: The Case of the Vagabond Virgin

Raymond Burr as Perry Mason, 1957 - 1966. Yes,
he's in black-and-white; color not yet invented.

          All of your old friends are here (if you are over 50 or so): Perry Mason, Della Street, Paul Drake, Hamilton Burger, and Lieutenant Tragg. We know them well from the television show Perry Mason that ran from 1957 to 1966. It was a favorite of my mom's and if she watched it, I probably did, too. (Yes, I first watched Star Trek with my mom, who was attracted to Captain Kirk.) Mason, the defense attorney, used every nuance of law, every scrap of a right or privilege, every possible interpretation of statute. The 1948 book The Case of the Vagabond Virgin, by Erle Stanley Gardner, has it all--familiar characters and savvy law--along with a juicy murder to solve.

Hamilton Burger, prosecutor; Lt. Tragg police
detective; Della Street, legal secretary; Perry
Mason, defense attorney; and Paul Drake, private
investigator (left to right)

          Vagabond Virgin at last satisfies my desire for a literate mystery that follows the classic rules thereof. Nothing is wasted in this book. Almost every detail--from appearance, clothing, casual utterances, make and model of car, everything--has a direct bearing upon the plot, upon the resolution of the murder mystery. It all becomes a big Bucky ball of causality and inference.

           The Perry Mason books are pot-boilers--somewhat gritty, delving into the seamier neighborhoods, and quite frank about sexuality. This one was urban with forays into the countryside. There is wry wit that often leads to a realization. And the characters are sharply drawn. I knew what each character looked like (not just the ones I knew from TV) and appreciated their personalities. The pace was fast, snappy. I had to keep my brain on or I missed things. It was clear that Gardner was an attorney and that he scoured statutes and case law to build his intricate plots. Mason is a bit on the shifty side...some of his projects border on illegal/unethical practice. But Mason's facility with the law keeps him in the clear every time.

Warren William as Perry Mason in a 1935 film

          In Vagabond Virgin, a businessman is accused of killing his partner. A hitch-hiking young woman is the alibi--or is she? The titular heroine engages in self-exploitation for money, playing the innocent virgin with drivers that pick her up. Her virginal story is so woebegone that the drivers press money (rather than their attentions) upon her.The partner's ex-wife and a mysterious reporter also figure into things. The final resolution of the plot occurs when Mason actually engages in meta-cognition (thinking about how you think) and realizes that he has accepted a batch of assumptions without checking their validity. He rethinks the case from its origins and comes up with a solution that leads to an amazing bit of courtroom drama. The criminals definitely get their comeuppance (also a standard of classic mystery).

         It's fun to be the reader sitting on Mason's shoulder throughout this book, seeing the inside of his maneuverings, getting the inside dope that the police and suspects do not have. The Mason team (Della, Paul, and even Gertie at the switchboard) work smoothly and efficiently, questioning Mason, but generally doing exactly as he directs. He doesn't always disclose all to them, not like he does to his reader.

Erle Stanley Gardner, 1889 - 1970. He worked with a
a group in California that sought to overturn convictions
that came about through inept legal representation.

          Erle Stanley Gardner is a masterful storyteller with a confident and unapologetic world view. Mason does not anguish when he bends the rules. The sexual escapades of the characters (not Mason!) are accepted as is--more faulted for their execution than for their morality. This is refreshing--I'm a bit tired of characters agonizing and self-excoriating, and regretting and seeing both sides of question. (I'm tired of doing it myself!) Mason's certainty and willingness to just move forward with the ends justifying the means keep the books about him cerebral and satisfying--just like a mystery novel (which is NOT real life) should be! Mason is not damaged or changed. He operates as a sort of matrix through which the plot operates and resolves, but is not used up--he's the catalyst, not a reactant.

1940s cover--the book is a
bit risque

          Some of the Perry Mason movies are pretty good. I saw one recently that starred Warren William as Mason and was made in 1935. It had a 1920s New York-type setting (lots of action in high-rises and lots of cabs). William's Mason was quite droll and a bit decadent, which is a bit truer to the books than perhaps the TV series is. Although I am still filtering the TV series through my child-self memories--"adult" content may have gone right over my head. I do remember one episode where someone said "cherche la femme" to Mason. I didn't know what it meant, but I remember Mason's face being tired and melancholy when the line was said.

          If I had more Mason mysteries, I would certainly read them. The Case of the Vagabond Virgin was a delightful diversion from reality and took me into another world. I think that's the true goal of a murder mystery. It's a genre about right and wrong, innocent and guilty, wit versus stupidity. The good and the smart triumph. It's not reality--but it's OK to take a break now and then. I recommend Perry Mason in all of its forms--book, radio, and TV.

Monster and Self-Defense by Jonathan Kellerman

Why Did I Read These?
These two Kellerman mystery novels came to my house with a batch of books from friends who were moving. These beloved friends had so many wonderful books from throughout their long lives--on poetry, religion, civil rights, inspiration, literature (got a wonderful shelf of Dickens), art, music. Somehow, two modern paperbacks by Kellerman ended up in the mix of musty-yellowed pages, crumbling bindings, and venerated authors. I haven't discovered yet why the anomalous novels were part of the collection, but because they stood out as such oddities, I of course decided to read them first. I am going to contend in this blog post that Jonathan Kellerman is not venerated.

Airport Books
Neither Monster (1999) nor Self-Defense (1995) is about an airport. Both are, however, New York Times best sellers according to red stripes across the covers. It is further noted on the covers that each book is "An Alex Delaware Novel." Each book is about 500 pages long. Airport books. People getting on airplanes want neither slender volumes nor future doorstops...the book must last just long enough, but not too long. That's about 500 pages.

Padded Books
Now, I have been on many airplanes where I needed more padding, but not in my reading material. Both of these books seemed artificially long to me, like the text had been cut apart and irrelevant detail added in for length--maybe not even by the original author. The padding was distracting and slowed these books way down, killed the tension. Every single character, no matter how minor, was described in detail--face, makeup, hair, clothing, skin, hands, mannerisms, size, smell. And so were locations--trees, street names, directions to places, type of building, color of building, condition of lawn, parking of the car. The long driving sequences were burdened with detail that was just detail. Perhaps the driving directions were supposed to give a sense of reality or authenticity, but I think if you don't live in Los Angeles (the setting for both books) you don't really care and if you do live in Los Angeles, you just need a few hints, not a map. I could trace on an L.A. street map every single location. It was too much.

Meanwhile, back in the mystery...what, we are in the middle of a mystery? I thought we were in a travel book. And that's the real criticism, that the wordiness and padding removed me from the plot for such long periods of time that I had to flip backward in the book to find out what was going on! And, you know my rules for classic mystery--no detail should be extraneous. If something is mentioned, it should have direct relevance to either theme or plot and preferably both. (Thank you, Dorothy L. Sayers.)

Series Cystitis
Yes, here comes another one of my modern-mystery pet peeves. Because this book is part of an ongoing series, we endured strange digressions that would only be relevant to someone who had read the previous book or books. I guess that ensures continuity for regular readers. But regular readers would get subtle hints. Surely these whacks over the head are as annoying to regulars as they are to first time readers. These backflashes (not flashbacks) were yet another impediment to getting this book going, getting it to work, getting it to do its job as a mystery and a "good read." Itch-itch. Cystitis.

Dr. Sherlock Freud
Alex Delaware is a psychologist who consults for the police. He pairs up with a detective who is GAY, it is noted several times (I think only as yet another backflash and so we women readers don't get too attached.) Milo's gayness is really irrelevant to his character as a friend and police detective, as it should be. Alex is aggressively heterosexual as we know from his fade-to-black encounters with his cute wife. (So we women can fantasize about him.) Really, the wife is totally irrelevant to this book--I bet she's part of the series cystitis, from a previous book or two back, needing to be updated.

Alex (female) Kingston as Dr. Who's River Song--
"Love a tomb!"

For the whole book Monster, I thought first-person narrator Alex Delaware was a woman. This impression comes from the murderous level of detail about furnishings and fashion, which are much more typical of a romance than a mystery; and from the ambiguity of the name itself. It's so trendy to have masculine-named heroines these days. Delaware's thought process are not earth-shattering, neither is his therapy. He flunks the Sherlock and Freud tests!

In Self-Defense, there is a long sequence of hypnosis and age-regression that was pretty miraculous. Delaware age-regressed the client to particular days and times of day. It was presented as a mundane therapeutic process. Maybe it is in California. It helped move the plot along.

Multi-Murders
These books would have been well-plotted if the extraneous material had been removed. Individual scenes were quite tense and spooky and the settings were creepy. Much of Monster was set in a mental hospital for the criminally insane. I still feel claustrophobic thinking about it. Self-Defense was less atmospheric until the action moved to an old estate that had formerly been a nudist and then an artist colony. You could almost smell the dead bodies under the turf.

You are getting very sleepy...

Monster involved some ritualistic deaths that ended up tying together many loose ends about a brutal murder from decades before. The killer was locked up in the asylum. The trail was a mass of red herrings leading, as in both books, all over southern California. The outcome was a bit pedestrian (no, it wasn't the butler, but  it was pretty predictable), but satisfying.

Self-Defense introduced a young woman who was having bad dreams. Milo brought her to Delaware for treatment. She and Milo had connected during a trial of a brutal mass murderer. The mass murdered was only in the book to justify the heroine's bad dreams (and maybe to bring in some gruesome shock-scenes). From clues in her dreams, a whole series of murders is disclosed. The ending is obscure. I never did get the title's significance.

Victimized and victim women were prominent in each book. Many men were killed also, but never with as much detail and fear. Milo and Delaware were the ones who kept their heads and restored women to wellness. Both books featured multiple deaths--at least five main deaths each and many others mentioned. This seems totally unrealistic to me and, pardon the phrase, overkill (!). 

No one ever really smiled when using the
microfiche machine--it was a pain in the hiney.

Pace of Change
These books are from 15-20 years ago and boy do they show it. They come across as modern, except for the hilarity of their technology. Pay phones. Answering machines. Microfiche. Researching at the library. So quaint. I leave it to you to ponder whether these mysteries would even be possible in today's age of instantly transmitted photography, rapid information retrieval, and inter-connectedness.



Conclusion
I struggled through these books, but I don't recommend them, even for airports. Stick with John Gresham or Pat Cornwell. Maybe I'm just not easily amused, said Queen Victoria. Like my first experiences with Chinese food, my first experiences with mysteries were of the best and everything else is a bit of a comedown. We soldier on.

Reflections on...Yard-saling

Blogger is reporting from Middletown, Ohio, home of pater familias Bob Dickerson, at the conclusion of Day 2 of yard-salin’.
          I am hot, sticky, sale-shocked, eating nothing but sugar and carbs, and stupefied with water weight gain. My ankles are not looking dainty right now in the brand new shoes I bought at the yard sale next door for $3.00—Naturalizers with a nice low heel and ankle straps that are hiding under rolls of bloated tissue. "Next door" is the Middletown Senior Center, which is also having a yard sale today—some venders out on the lawn; and in the cafeteria/multi-purpose room, donated items sorted into categories—very tidy. 

          Yes, my dad (who is pretty sharp--selectively) is never slack about piggy-backing on the marketing of others—the balloons and colorful signs for the senior center also guided buyers (buyers-beware) into his ample front yard. Under the beautiful old oak by the street we spread our merchandise on large tables, loosely grouped by category (books, housewares, toys, clothing, etc.) and by source (my sister Kathy, my dad’s friend Melanie, and his neighbor Charlotte).

We had this very Vera Bradley
bag for sale--and it was
priced too high to sell

        I threw my stuff in with Dad’s stuff and didn’t worry about making money. I live to serve (ha-ha-ha) and helped out wherever necessary. The other stuff-providers, though, had certain prices they wanted for certain items and we had lots of counter-pricing going on—Dad and I were pretty much always ready to deal (Will you take $5 for this? Yes). We definitely had too many captains and not enough sailors, and even though I was there to be a sailor, well, nobody thinks I’m shy, so my opinion was often added to the pricing puree.
          The crowd at Dad’s sale differed greatly from sales in my hometown of McArthur, Ohio. In McArthur, the people are poorer, are sometimes desperate, and are often looking for low-priced necessities, not novelties or kitsch. The Middletown crowd was made up of a lot of seniors (because of the neighboring sale) and the people were pretty well off.

Typical house in Dad's neighborhood; he,
however, lives in a Cape Cod.

          Dad lives in a moderate house in a blue collar, aging area, but his street is ringed by higher-cost housing—and they came out to support the seniors (and thus Dad). It was odd to be around so many well-off people, I’m so used to the low-income people of my town. We are different in both dress and conversation. The most significant commonality was love for children and grandchildren. In both towns, people are happy to talk about children and want to buy nice things for them. They look over children’s items with critical eyes.

         Because so many different people brought stuff, we had an interesting sale—not overloaded with children’s clothing or sports equipment or any other category. Well, OK, we had too many purses, probably. And they were overpriced and the women selling them would not bargain or cut the price. I assume these purses will be leftover unsold.

          I spent lots of time getting into and out of a lawn chair (moved gradually across the yard throughout the day—to follow the shade) and a fair amount of time just chatting up the customers. Each one has a story to tell.   
          One thirty-something woman pulled up on the other side of the fence next to the driveway in a van. She got out and asked us if we wanted a walker. Dad jumped right on it and started to talk price. (Resale of lightly used medical equipment usually leads to a tidy profit.) But the woman insisted that she was giving us the walker, she wanted to give it away. Her mother had died two years ago this weekend and she was just now able to face the medical aids left over from her mom’s illness. She would be glad for Dad to make some money off of it and for it to go to people who needed it.
          We all quieted while she told us the story of her grief, and handled with respect the walker that she pulled out of the back of the van and handed over the fence. Over the fence came a portable toilet. Over the fence came two different bath benches. Over the fence came an elevated toiled seat. Over the fence came a long-handled shoe horn and sock-helper stick. Over the fence came an anti-bedsore mattress (with air pump).

         The woman’s van was crammed with stuff. She cried. Each of us had at least a quivering lip if not a tear. Turns out we were helping her with a significant event in her grieving. She and we were all sacred for a moment, right across the fence, under the oak, next door to the senior center, on Central, in Middletown, on a summer afternoon, in August.
          Sacred.

          At our most human.
         That’s yard-salin’.

Sidebar: Bob Dickerson’s Rules of the Yard Sale  My dad worked in the shoe business for several years and even though he didn’t like it very well (you had to have more loyalty to and spend more time with the store than your family), he has a natural bent toward retail. He has many sensible rules for his sales (he says, however, that no rule can't be broken). Here are some of his guidelines.
        Make some money even if you cannot make the money you want. You won’t get rich with a yard sale, but you might get some mad money to play with.
        Keep stuff off the ground as much as possible. People are not in the habit of looking down. Borrow some tables if you need to, or stretch a board across some chairs. Whatever. Dad has many tables that have detachable legs so he can store them flat.

         Fit your tables to your tarps (for sales longer than one day). Dad lays down the tall items on a table, sticks other stuff under the tables, and then throws on a tarp that fits right over that set of tables—clamp, clamp, clamp, and you’re closed.

        Open early--at least be ready at the designated start time. And, decide how you want to handle “early birds”—those people who come the night before a sale or show up at 7:00 a.m. for your sale that you advertised to start at 9:00. Dad doesn’t worry about fairness or justice—he’ll sell to any early bird who wants to shop.

        Have shade or canopies—anything that encourages people to linger a bit is good. Dad doesn’t usually sell food, but on a cool day I think an urn of coffee would not go amiss. It takes a long time to drink a cup of coffee.

        Mark prices on every item or keep all the items in a group at the same price.

        Keep prices divisible by $0.25 or $1.00; this way, you save tons of time making change—and you only need to get quarters from the bank.

        Be ready to make change. Have at least $10 in quarters, fifty one-dollar bills and 10 five-dollar bills. (Remember, you’ll get this money back out at the end.)

        Greet each customer with a smile. Have bags available for their stuff. Circulate. Tell the customer something about the item he or she is handling.

        Keep it tidy. Kathy and I spent a lot of time straightening tables, filling in gaps.

        Only put out clean merchandise. No one will buy filthy items and they bring down the whole sale. If you want to sell them, put a low price on them. Salt-stained boots? They will sell at $1.00 but not at $5.00.

         Fix broken things, if it is not too expensive. Dad recently painted the handlebars of two tricycles he bought for $5, turning $5 items into $15 items.

        Have various sizes of batteries and an electrical outlet (or plugged-in extension cord) so customers can see if things work.

        Don’t keep everything you don’t sell. Drop it off at a Salvation Army, Goodwill, AmVets, the Red Door Thrift Store, or any number of other charitable organizations.

        Don’t hold things for people unless they pay in advance. You should always stay free to sell what you have.

        Make your sale visible—put some large, sexy items out by the street. Don’t hide your light (or merchandise) under a bushel, folks. Balloons are a great attention-getter on your signs and at your site.

        Coffee mugs, golf clubs, crutches, dolls, winter clothes at summer sales—hard to sell.

        Clean stuffed animals, tools, medical equipment (except crutches), furniture, jewelry—easy to sell. However, just about anything will sell if you price it right (low).

        Have the courage to be generous. Dad often gives away toys to kids, or throws in a free item here and there. As my dad testifies, generosity almost always returns to the giver.

Space Cadet, by Robert A. Heinlein

Acting Ensign Wesley Crusher could never
escape his goody-two-shoes reputation on
Star Trek: NexGen

No, there is no irony in the title of this book--Heinlein wrote his book Space Cadet long before "space cadet" became synonymous with "airhead." And, really, I wonder if this book wasn't the inspiration for the most noteworthy of space cadets--acting Ensign Wesley--Wesley Crusher from Star Trek: Next Generation. The main character Matt Dodson shares only a certain earnestness and respect for authority with Wesley. Unlike Wesley, he is not that great at science and math (but is a natural as a pilot), hangs out with people mainly his own age, and he travels without his mother.

Space Cadet, written in the late 1940s, is the tale of teenager Matt's training for the Space Patrol--a peace-keeping force created to prevent the use of nuclear weapons on Earth and its neighboring planetary bodies. The story follows him from newbie to independent young officer. With his friend Tex, Matt goes through many agonizing tests in a boot-camp setting, during which many applicants are winnowed out. These tests include a ride through the too-many-G-forces/too-little-G-forces gizmo (Matt withstands 7 Gs and passes the test); personality challenges (there's a faked tragedy for the applicants to respond to); academic tests; and even ethical tests.

The 1948 cover--see below
for other covers with
other goals

Matt and Tex pass the tests and move on to a training ship and further study. Eventually, they move out into space as junior officers attached to a working ship. Eventually, they move into increasingly dramatic settings and adventures--especially when they crash land on Venus. On Venus, you see the impact that the training has had on these young men--the resources they have to draw on, the principles they follow. (And, of course, there is a counter-example, a cadet who washed out of the program early and scorns its values.)

But, the charm of this book is not particularly in its plotting. It's in the details. It's in the pace. Once again (see my blog entry on Rocketship Galileo), Heinlein pulls me right into the world of the book. Although nothing dramatic happened for pages on end, Heinlein created enough hooks on Matt for the reader to feel attached, to slide into Matt's spacesuit with him (that sounds kinky), to face the challenges, wonder at the new systems and knowledge, hope for success, fear failure. 

Slide rule--yet another wet dream
of science in the 1950s and 1960s--looks
like a tool for WASPs only

Heinlein is adept at drawing enough details into the picture to make it real without overdrawing or over-explaining. He gives enough for your imagination to complete the environment but does not worry if what I picture is not exactly what he meant. I was amazed, because I was hooked into this obsolete boy's adventure  novel right away. I struggled with moving through weightlessness and with magnetic boots and with trying hard not to need to use the airsick bags. I fretted over "astrogation" and the mathematics it required (and the slide rule!). I worried over my fitness for such an elite corps. (see the video at <iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/MiRlJSttQuc" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> for a tutorial on weightlessness, which makes it look embarrassingly easy.)

Young Matt is a great character--fun, but not dangerous; flawed, but not a loser. I was most interested in what happened to him during his Earth-leave, when he visited his home in Des Moines for the first time after entering the Patrol. What he found was a total disconnect. He found that his family could not understand anything he talked about and that it was all too complicated to explain. It was not discussed in the book, but I saw it as a critical moment for Matt--when his life in the Patrol became more real to him than his life on Earth.

This beautiful photo of Venus uses
color to indicate the concentration of
various chemicals in the atmosphere

The Venus part of the book was charming in its antiquated vision of Venus. For now, scientists do not believe that any life can exist on Venus--not only is the atmosphere thick with poisons, but the air pressure is so great that it exerts a dramatic crushing force. The surface is barren. If life might be there, we would have a hard time detecting it--our apparatus would need to be so thick to avoid being crushed that any delicate maneuvering would be difficult.




For more information, go to  http://library.thinkquest.org/18652/venus.html.

Matt and Tex, however, find a tropical dangerland with swamps and creepy critters and alien intelligence. This is their lab for putting into practice all of their training--their training in values and self-control as much as in any particular subject. They find that as a group they have more intelligence that any of them individually.

So, another thumbs-up for Heinlein. I don't think I've been to Venus with Matt, but I do feel like I went to some other world that was mistakenly called that. I have a feeling of movement, of time, of growing up. That's cool. And, that's good, because I have three or four more Heinlein books to read from my Easy Reader children's literature list.

Me and Space: Evolved Lemur

This is the tech-guy cover
from the 1980s or so, I'd
guess

I was a child in the 1960s (I turned 10 the year the moon landing took place in 1969), so maybe it's not a surprise that I have so much interest in space and space travel and the interaction of humans with unearthly conditions (such as weightlessness) and with others unlike themselves (such as Republicans). How do we solve the problems? Are there human characteristics that truly define us as a species? One of the most defining characteristics of humans is the sense of wonder, the tendency to gawk and to explore that which puzzles and amazes us. What lies beyond the horizon? What lies beyond the end point of the solar wind? But does this define just some of us? Is hide-boundedness another trait of humans--the desire for stasis and certainty?

See, these are issues that my submergence in the genre of science fiction have awoken in me. Because I did (and still do) submerge. My inner self resonates with the themes and imagery of sci-fi. It is abiding, and I know that because it has abided. There are episodes of Star Trek I have seen dozens of times, but I am still somehow intrigued. One of these is an episode of NexGen in which the crew started to devolve because the inactive content of their DNA was triggered by a virus. Troi was turning into a fish. Riker became a Neanderthal. Even scarier, Worf turned into a Neanderthal Klingon. But most touching was Captain Picard devolving into a lemur, acutely aware of sounds and sights, ever fearful. Could his humanness reach through the genetic programming to rescue the ship?

This is the soft-focus warm and fuzzy cover, probably
from the 1990s. Makes science fiction safe for kids--
although this is a distinctly adolescent book--not
for children.

I have seen Godzilla in the original. I have seen Hitler's hand creeping across the gangway of a submarine. I have made first contact with species so radically different that communication was nearly impossible (Republicans again!). I've been on so many different planets and spaceships that I cannot count them. What has this done to me? First, I know that it leads me to see humans as a species like any other on Earth, subject to the same survival pressures as any other. We are not divine. We are not the chosen ones. We are not on top. Second, it has increased my likelihood to see events from many points of view, to see that there are as many priorities as there are people. It has led me to attempt to lead with peace, not hostility.

There. That's my space manifesto. I am most touched by the Voyager space probes, which have now reached the endpoint of the solar wind, the outer edge of our solar system. And yet they travel on. They continue to gather information and will even after they can no longer communicate it to us. The Voyager probes mirror the journey we are all on--we are curious and communicating beings and we will keep looking...for what? For whatever comes.

So, weird, dweeb, nerd, geek? I'll accept the title of "evolved lemur," thank you very much.