Appalachia Project: Icy Sparks, 1998

Icy Sparks, by Gwyn Hyman Rubio

I have lots of critiques of this book, but generally I like it very much. I especially appreciated the main character's reference points in the flora and fauna of Appalachia. Her wanderings in the woodlands of northeastern Kentucky were similar to my own rovings in Vinton County, Ohio.

Icy Sparks was an Oprah Book Club book, meaning that it fits into a particular style: Excruciating suffering followed by unrealistic triumph. The endings dignify the suffering and make it meaningful. These books match Oprah's own life story of abuse and poverty, which she, through drive and talent, turned into an outstanding triumph. But Oprah doesn't credit herself with being extraordinary. Her story is not the norm. It seems like a comforting myth, that strong women will always prevail for the common good and suffering turns into benevolence. Hideous abuse survivor turns into crusader for justice. Schizophrenic woman makes inspirational bookmarks and is fulfilled. Call me a cynic, but a cloying rose-scented mist floats over this group of books. Suffering is the key. Suffering is only meaningful if it ends up doing good.

In Icy Sparks, the heroine and first-person narrator (named Icy Sparks) has Tourette's syndrome, a neurological disorder that causes physical and verbal tics. A Tourette's patient may have an urgent need to stick out her arm, distort her face, or say a curse word. The syndrome is related to obsessive-compulsive disorder; and symptoms may be worsened by stress.

Rubio's book is set in Kentucky at the between about 1955 and 1962 (Kennedy is elected as part of the plot, but the book ends before his assassination.) Rural Kentucky has more in common with the previous century than the one it's in. The area seems more prosperous than the region Johnson sought to fix up in the 1960s, but jobs were hard to come by, the coal industry was up and down, and coal dust coated the towns.

I imagine Icy's eyes to be this color.

Icy's mother died in childbirth, so she is raised by her grandparents, who she calls Matanni and Patanni, terms which are completely undefined. I have looked them up and they refer to places in Thailand and Pakistan, but have no use as grandparent names. I quickly got used to them and they sounded normal. They don't seem to indicate any non-western ancestry for Icy. She is pale and blond and has golden eyes...nothing that would indicate India or Thailand.


As she nears puberty, Icy starts to have compulsions to twitch, curse, twist, and pop out her eyes like a frog. She controls these as best she can, saving up all of the urges until she can be private and alone. Then she lets fly the pent up impulses, twirling and twitching and cussing until she has used them all up. She sees herself as having an entirely evil self to go along with her nice self and has a terror that the people she loves wouldn't love her if they knew.

Icy uses the image of the pokeweed plant to describe herself to herself. You can eat the stems and leaves of pokeweed--they are perfectly fine. But the berries and roots are deadly poison. She seems to be like the pokeweed, part poison, part good.

Rubio does a great job of portraying Icy's process of developing an understanding of what is wrong with her...she does not have a name for it and sees it as a flaw in her character rather than as a medical condition. Icy struggles to stay in touch with her good self, to make sure that both selves have expression.

In the hospital, Icy puts puzzles together, like she
tries to put herself together.

Of course, Tourette's doesn't easily stay hidden. Icy becomes more and more of an outcast and is seen as a major behavior problem at school. Her principal, in compassion, sends Icy to a mental hospital. The mental hospital is grim and gray. Icy's description of the food made me want to gag. And the other patients are a hodge-podge--cerebral palsy, OCD, brain damage of various kinds. Although the other patients are described with gruesome detail, their suffering is somewhat glossed over; they are presented sort of as other oddities that populate the world of abnormal children as opportunities for good-deed-doing. It's all Icy's story.

Icy's experiences in the hospital are weird. Although she has very little actual treatment, she gets miraculously better and is released. This seems like a complete denial of what happened in those sorts of settings. Icy's rebellions and actings-out are tolerated rather than brutally suppressed. She is on no regular medicines. Everyone is wonderful and the Nurse Ratchet character is satisfyingly banished.

More stuff happens. Icy deals with loss and with a peculiar religious conversion that seems like a lengthy non sequitur in the context of the book. The religious material is certainly interesting and vividly presented. It seems that the extremes of religious expression give Icy an outlet for her urges and compulsions. She begins singing with several different choirs, and singing helps. When she sings, the urges go away. The roots and berries are no longer poisonous; she is all good.

There is a Harry-Potteresque epilogue that cheapens this book. "See, I became a useful person who helps others in a wonderful way, so that means all my suffering was OK." Again, my inner cynic was triggered. And, in terms of literature, we already knew that with the last sentence of the last chapter. It's like the author didn't trust her readers and didn't trust her own writing. Please razor blade out the epilogue before you begin reading.

Here's the ending of the last chapter, when Icy is singing at big concert--the real best place for the book to end.

"At that moment, a handwritten sign shot up like a crown above the heads of the crowd. Dressed in red, white, and blue, Miss Emily was tilting on top of the bench like an unfurled, massive flag, propped up by the sturdy shoulders of Darrel Lute. WELCOME TO THE WORLD, the sign read. Right then and there, I believed in my future. In front of the whole of Ginseng, beneath the mountain of cloth, my heart was finally beating bright red and strong for all to see."

What doubts can you have after that?

Trying Twitching

I have been experimenting with twitching. I have some familiarity with it from have restless leg syndrome. When I'm trying to sleep, my legs need to twitch. They probably do during the day, too, but I'm moving around enough to ease the need. I take medication for it. What if twitching gives me a tiny measure of the relief that Icy felt?

So far, I feel that an occasional twitch is useful and releases tension. However, I hope that my practice with twitching doesn't turn habitual. I'm already unusual enough without adding that.

Singing

Like Icy, I am never more relaxed and at ease than when I am singing. I soothe myself with singing all the time, or with whistling. Music is in me. And, I stick with music. I find that I will listen to the same band for months, the same set of songs. I'm processing that music over and over. I don't know why. I like all types of music. I'm on a Rolling Stones jag(ger) right now...have been listening to them for more than a year and can't get...no satisfaction, of course.

I feel most spiritually right when I am singing. I feel aligned. It's not a matter of good self/bad self, like it is with Icy. But when I'm singing, other stuff drops away. It's cool.

Appalachia Project: What Is Appalachia?

For the purposes of my reading project, I am using the political definition of Appalachia as formulated by the Appalachian Regional Commission, the ARC (www.arc.gov) (see below). The county I live in, Vinton County, Ohio, is in red, distressed. The classications are based on economy, population, education levels, employment opportunities, and other factors.

I am not an expert on Appalachia. This blog post presents my own private conceptualization of the region.




Geologically, the Appalachian mountain ranges stretch in a broad curve from eastern Arkansas through western New York and into eastern Canada. And, if you take plate tectionics into account, they extend into northern Ireland and Scotland. You can see from the map to the right how North America and Eurasia were neighbors earlier in Earth history. The tectonic idea is cool when you realize how many people from those areas moved so far only to settle in the same mountains. Thanks to author Sharyn McCrumb for introducing me to this idea.



A cabin at Niches, McArthur, Ohio,
 where I reconnected to Appalachia.

My personal definition of Appalachia has evolved to include emotional, genetic, and economic factors, in addition to geology. I was the one in my family who was called back, called to return. I began by camping in this region and ended up by moving in permanently. It just felt like home. My ancestors were fully established in southeast Ohio by about 1840--and I mean on both sides of my great-grandparents' families. Their gravestones are gradually disintegrating within about 40 miles of my house.


THIS land is my land. Can ya' hear me?

To me, Appalachia is poor, slow to embrace change, suspicious of authority (in the schools and government), and slow to trust outsiders. It is also beautiful, resourceful, generous, funny, and rich in family and history. People feel tied to the land in a different way than in more urbanized areas. I feel tied to the land in a way I never imagined. When I sing "This Land Is My Land," I really mean this land, right here, right under my feet. "This land" is not an abstraction to me anymore. Some things about Appalachia drive me crazy. Some things make me cry. Some things fill me with gladness and Joy (myself).

Tourists don't usually see
the slum side of Jamaica.

Conceptual Models
Third world model. I often view Appalachia, and particularly the place where I live, as a third world country. We are largely dependent on extractive industries (timber, coal, natural gas) that we sell wholesale. Our raw materials are made into products and sold retail and the profits do not return proportionately to our region. Further, people keep trying to tell us that tourism is the salvation of our economy. But tourism is low-paying for the boots on the ground. Again, the real money often leaves the community. And, it is still other-centered, not a development of us for us. Like many third world countries, there might be a prosperous looking tourist "strip" masking neighborhoods of great poverty.

Matriarchal model. The key unit of community in Appalachia is the extended family, often overseen by a matriarch and supported by female breadwinners (at a lower rate of pay than male breadwinners). Men come and go out of this system, sometimes providing only sperm. People socialize within the family and do not build relationships outside it. Part of this stems from historic isolation of families (see density model below). An interesting part of a federal jobs program I have been working with is that the workers have been forming non-family community relationships. I think the results from this may be more revolutionary than the income generated by the jobs. The matriarchy is a key strength of Appalachia, but it can also deaden opportunity and stifle new ideas.

Poverty model. The characteristics often listed for Appalachia continguate with poverty characteristics. The problems of Appalachia are the problems of poverty, but spread out, diluted over many hundreds of square miles. We are hard to reach. The health and education issues are the same. Teen pregnancy, alcohol and drug abuse, and epidemic tobacco use are prevalent. That's why I'm an anti-poverty crusader as well as an Appalachia booster.

Density model. As mentioned above, we are spread thin. Vinton County, Ohio, is the most sparsely populated county in the state, in terms of people per square mile. This makes service delivery and transportation to services difficult and expensive. It also allows for privacy in a gruesome sense--no close neighbors to look out for methamphetamine labs, abused or hungry children or spouses, living standards. No gossip, in other words, which is amusing because in town (the tiny town of McArthur, population about 1,000) there are NO secrets. Everybody knows everything. I sometimes try to imagine what would happen if my county were simply closed. Move out all the people. Let it all go fallow. It's so empty anyway. It's just an idea I toy with. And, it demonstrates the parallel between the current treatment of Appalachian people and the historic treatment of native Americans. Move them off their land and disappear them into society as a whole. Get hands on land.

From ARC website:
ARC's mission is to be a strategic partner and advocate for sustainable community and economic development in Appalachia.
The Appalachian Regional Commission (ARC) is a regional economic development agency that represents a partnership of federal, state, and local government. Established by an act of Congress in 1965, ARC is composed of the governors of the 13 Appalachian states and a federal co-chair, who is appointed by the president. Local participation is provided through multi-county local development districts.
ARC funds projects that address the four goals identified in the Commission's strategic plan:

1. Increase job opportunities and per capita income in Appalachia to reach parity with the nation.
2. Strengthen the capacity of the people of Appalachia to compete in the global economy.
3. Develop and improve Appalachia's infrastructure to make the Region economically competitive.
4. Build the Appalachian Development Highway System to reduce Appalachia's isolation.

The Appalachian Region, as defined in ARC's authorizing legislation, is a 205,000-square-mile region that follows the spine of the Appalachian Mountains from southern New York to northern Mississippi. It includes all of West Virginia and parts of 12 other states: Alabama, Georgia, Kentucky, Maryland, Mississippi, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia. Forty-two percent of the Region's population is rural, compared with 20 percent of the national population.

The Region's economy, once highly dependent on mining, forestry, agriculture, chemical industries, and heavy industry, has become more diversified in recent times, and now includes a variety of manufacturing and service industries. In 1965, one in three Appalachians lived in poverty. Over the 2007–2011 period, the Region's poverty rate was 16.1 percent. The number of Appalachian counties considered economically distressed was 223 in 1965; in fiscal year 2014 that number is 93.

These gains have transformed the Region from one of widespread poverty to one of economic contrasts: some communities have successfully diversified their economies, while others still require basic infrastructure such as roads and water and sewer systems. The contrasts are not surprising in light of the Region's size and diversity. The Region includes 420 counties in 13 states. It extends more than 1,000 miles, from southern New York to northeastern Mississippi, and is home to more than 25 million people.