Book Review: The Leftovers by Tom Perrotta

The Leftovers by Tom Perrotta
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

“Just a sec,” I told my two-year-old. “I need to get my book.”

“What book?” he asked.

“My book,” I said, showing him the cover.

“No one is wearing those shoes,” he said.

I confirmed that the shoes were empty.

“That book is about shoes, and no one is wearing those shoes,” he concluded.

None of this really has anything to do with Tom Perrotta’s story. I just like any excuse to share my kids’ cuteness.

As far as the story goes, I can say I enjoyed it, but I wasn’t blown away. The idea was awesome: the Rapture (or Rapture-like event) and the confusion and despair of those left behind. I loved that Perrotta left ambiguous just what had happened. Throughout the book, Perrotta presents what might be an explanation—only “good” people were taken, only “bad” people were taken, people were taken whom others had wished away or whom others had forgotten about or begun taking for granted. But as soon as one of these ideas came up, evidence to the contrary appeared. In the end, what happened or the reasons it happened are irrelevant to those remaining: life goes on, and they just have to figure out for themselves what that means.

This event (at one point referred to as a “harvest,” which I find satisfyingly unsettling) opens up the chance for a variety of fresh starts, and I enjoyed reading about the ways in which so many people started over or attempted to stay the course as though nothing had happened. The result is both tragic and hopeful. I particularly enjoyed how the cultish Guilty Remnant evolved throughout the book. I probably ought not to have been surprised about the direction that took, but I was, and I’m glad that I was. I imagine it must have been a lot of fun for Perrotta to play around with all of the possibilities.

While I enjoyed the book, it never really coalesced into something phenomenal. Not that every book has to (or even could) be phenomenal, I’d just kind of hoped for something a little…I don’t know…more. It’s kind of how I’ve felt about all of Tom Perrotta’s books, now that I think about it.

I am glad it wasn’t about shoes, though.

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Dandelions and Dog Poo: Exercising With Children

With the longer days and warmer temperatures, my thoughts have turned to getting into a regular exercise routine. I’m trying to keep it realistic since most of my time is spent with my children and there’s a limited amount of exercise I can reasonably do with a two-year-old and a seven-year-old in tow.

There is a rail trail in our town, though, and I was thinking I might be able to put the toddler in the jogging stroller and my daughter on her training-wheels bike and do at least a little bit of running a couple of times a week. And since Dimity McDowell and Sarah Bowen Shea (authors of Train Like a Mother) state the miles run while pushing a jogging stroller count double, that means I could easily get my weekly mileage up to nearly 20 miles with just three runs a week (or up to 6 miles with just one run a week, since I’m trying to be reasonable with my goals here).

Today was our proof-of-concept run. Er…walk.

My son insisted on riding his walking bike so we left the jogging stroller at home. After 10 minutes on the trail, we’d gone about 20 feet and my son had fallen about 12 times (two of which were actually unintentional). We finally stashed the walking bike in the trunk, and he and I walked hand-in-hand, pausing every few steps to throw things in the water-filled ditch to the side of the trail or smell the weeds or collect dandelions for his “bouquet,” all the while trying to keep up with my daughter who was pedaling away on her bike. The highlight was when my son ignored my cries of warning and picked up a piece of dog poo he thought was a rock.

Successfully revising my expectations rather dramatically on the fly, I was feeling great about getting out and walking with the kids for a half-hour today. Until, that is, I mapped our walk and discovered that it took us 30 minutes to walk 0.78 miles.

Not a bad toddler pace, I guess, but I probably didn’t need to struggle into my sports bra for that.

It was, however, a good trial run. If I can get my son to sit in his jogging stroller next time, I’m confident I can get a little closer to my standard 10-minute-mile pace. And perhaps we’ll even be able avoid needing to use quite as much hand-sanitizer as we used today.

Biking Home From Church: A Springtime Olfactory Journey

Decaying leaves.

Lilacs.

Honeysuckle.

Cow manure.

Cut grass.

Wild onions.

Charcoal smoke.

Fecund earthiness of the wetlands.

Car exhaust.

Warming asphalt.

Mild sewage smell from the water treatment facility.

Pine needles.

Congealed petroleum in the garage.

Pretzel sticks in the kids’ bike trailer.

Fishy, stale bicycle tire air.

Book Review: A Gesture Life by Chang-rae Lee

A Gesture Life by Chang-rae Lee
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I almost love this book, but a few things keep me from it.

First, though, I’ll tell you why I love it. I love the way the story unfolds. Chang-rae Lee takes his time revealing the story. It comes out in bits and pieces from the first-person perspective of Doc Hata, just as a person would generally reflect on his own life. A scene comes to mind, then something else jumps in and we follow that thread for a bit, then back to the original scene, which is now colored by the tangent. I luxuriated in the language and found myself hypnotized by the writing. I closed the last page and looked at the clock and did a double-take: it was 2am. I love when a book transports me like that.

One of the little pebbles in my shoe along the journey of this book is a time issue. I had (and still have) a lot of trouble figuring out how old Sunny is at the end of the book. Doc Hata says at one point that he hadn’t seen her in nearly 13 years and that now she would be twenty-two. Except that we know he saw her when she was 18. Maybe he meant that he hadn’t really seen her since she was 9, before the rift between them began to widen? Maybe he meant she was thirty-two? This would make more sense given that he mentions a few wrinkles and grey hairs, which are more common in the over-thirty set than the twenty-two-year-olds I’ve known. Maybe this is just an editing snafu, but man does it rankle me.

The other part that keeps me from loving this book is the despair of it. Doc Hata is a man who has lived a number of identities, all shaped by and for the culture around him. He’s Korean and works to become Japanese. He’s Japanese and works to become an American. He’s a medic and becomes a doctor (at least in the eyes of the people in his town). He’s a chameleon, which is, I think, why it’s so hard for anyone to get close to him. How can they know who it is they’re dealing with? How can they put their trust in someone whose identity is so slippery?

Then there’s Hata’s sense that, because he’s around when tragedy strikes those around him, he somehow attracts tragedy (cum hoc, ergo propter hoc). He sees himself as the opposite of a lucky rabbit’s foot, and he convinces himself that those around him would be better off without him. He seems to feel as though he’s unintentionally deceived them into believing that he’s helping them through their misfortunes when they wouldn’t have had any misfortunes at all if he’d kept his distance.

While it’s illogical, it’s not unrealistic that Hata believes this. On the contrary, his world-view and his view of himself are all the more tragic because they’re totally realistic, and all the more unsettling because of the personal connection I feel to these beliefs. I can relate to Hata’s search for a place and an identity, and I can relate to his attempts to make some order out of the causes and effects in his life. I’ve not experienced anything to the degree that Hata has, but as a life-long nomad, I’ve done my share of trying to fit in and trying to discover who I am in relation to the wheres and whos of my current stop, wherever and whenever that might be.

This was a beautifully written gut-punch of a story, but I couldn’t love it because it carried the much-too-real aroma of the despair and futility that lurks just beneath the surface. Acknowledging that despair by loving this story seems too dangerous; I prefer to keep my distance from it.

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Children’s Book Review: Let’s Join In by Shirley Hughes

Let’s Join In by Shirley Hughes
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I learned of Shirley Hughes from Jim Trelease’s The Read-Aloud Handbook. We just picked up this one and another of her books from the library this morning.

Let’s Join In is an adorable book. It’s a collection of four short stories for the preschool set, “Hiding,” “Giving,” “Chatting,” and “Bouncing.” The illustrations are detailed, kinetic, and fun, and the stories capture the spirit of young childhood well. I love the feeling of togetherness and love that’s evident between the big sister and the baby. The stories convey a sense of understanding and empathy with the joys and trials of both the children who enjoy the stories and the grown-ups who read them aloud. The picture that accompanies the text, “When Mom is busy, she says that there are just too many chatterboxes around,” could have been of me and my kids during dinner prep.

This is one my two-year-old asked me to read again as soon as I closed the back cover. (Actually, I’m not sure if this is a positive or a negative.)

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Book Review: MWF Seeking BFF: My Yearlong Search For A New Best Friend by Rachel Bertsche

MWF Seeking BFF: My Yearlong Search For A New Best Friend by Rachel Bertsche
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I gave this book to page 53 because a random person (random meaning I don’t know him) on Goodreads said he gives books 50 pages to engage him. If they haven’t drawn him in after 50 pages, he moves on to another book. I’m fine with taking advice from random people when it suits me.

So, there’s my caveat: I only read three chapters of this book. I read the reasoning for the year-long weekly friend-date challenge and recaps of the first seven friend-dates, and already I feel overwhelmed trying to keep track of names and impressions and why someone who already has lots of friends is seeking a “BFF” from a pool of people she doesn’t know rather than from the people with whom she’s already friends. I am not someone who is energized by casual interaction in a public setting, but even knowing this, I was surprised at just how worn out I got just reading about how often the author went out with people (on top of being around people all day at work). Actually doing it would be like Hell to me. Not the innermost circle, one of the more outer circles (maybe the fourth?), but in the neighborhood, for sure.

Add to that the fact that I don’t think I have much in common with the author aside from the desire to be a writer and a recent relocation to an unfamiliar city (except that she went to college in her unfamiliar city whereas I didn’t set foot in mine until we drove up in our rental car with the kids and the cats and my Vitamix in back). She’s seeking to recreate a BFF experience from her childhood, a BFF experience she can access via phone calls and visits back to her home city, if she chooses to. I don’t have that kind of measuring stick (as I mentioned in my review of Claire Dederer’s Poser: My Life in Twenty-three Yoga Poses).

I do appreciate that she leaves open the possibility that she might not “need” a new best friend, that she’s actually happy and fine just the way she is and only thinks she needs a best friend because she’s comparing her present life to her past and to the lives of people on her favorite tv shows. While I would like to establish a stronger social circle in my newest home town, I’m mostly satisfied with my homebody existence. Despite Bertsche’s arguments that it’s impossible, I do actually consider my husband my best friend. The trouble we have is that we have so little time without the children that we rarely can have an uninterrupted conversation. When we do, we’re great buddies and chief confidantes for one another. We mostly need friends here so we have a safety net in case we need help and so we can get referrals for good babysitters. Oh, and the neighbors wandering about with chainsaws after that freak October snow storm were surprisingly helpful.

Perhaps the book gets just awesome after Chapter 3, but I’ve got A Gesture Life to pick up from the library’s hold shelf, and I’d much rather sink my teeth into some good fiction right now.

And frankly, even if the way to find a best friend is to go on one friend date a week for a year, it’s just not worth it to me; I would go batty (battier) well before the 52nd date.

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Book Review: Poser: My Life in Twenty-three Yoga Poses by Claire Dederer

Poser: My Life in Twenty-three Yoga Poses by Claire Dederer
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I almost stopped reading this book about 50 pages in. I was enjoying Dederer’s writing, with all of its pithy GenX-ness, but I found her perspective very critical. She seemed to have concluded, since she felt pressured by her peer group to practice attachment parenting and it didn’t work for her, that anyone who practiced attachment parenting was doing it because of social pressure. Attachment parenting devotees were some kind of Stepford Wives, blindly following the dictates of the masses. She ignored the idea that maybe attachment parenting works for some people and it didn’t work for her. And she described What to Expect When You’re Expecting as a left-wing book. I don’t know many of my peers who would describe any book that doesn’t list non-reclining positions for pushing as a left-wing book. We all hated that book. We gravitated towards Ina May Gaskin and Sheila Kitzinger and Penny Simkin and Henci Goer. Had we been less ecologically and free-speech inclined, we would have burned What to Expect When You’re Expecting.

Basically, I took Dederer’s judgements personally, which is kind of ridiculous. I mean, she doesn’t know me. We gave birth to our first children five years and nearly 1000 miles from one another. We’re part of the same generation, but just barely.

Knowing this, I soldiered on through the rest of the book, and I’m glad I did because this book is all about personal growth. I felt a kinship to Dederer as she moved from being guarded and judgmental to being more open and accepting of other ways of raising children and even other ways of living. Although I was on the other side of the fence (e.g., my first child refused a binky so I became militantly opposed to them by my second child), I recognized her journey from traumatic birth experience through anxious early motherhood through gradual comfort with her chosen path separate from what her peers were doing.

Although Dederer places a lot of value on staying in one’s hometown, this is a particular downside to staying put, at least from my perspective. I have never had a hometown. I moved every three years as a child. As a grown-up, the longest I’ve lived in any one place is six years. Until I joined Facebook, I didn’t even know what my elementary school friends thought of different parenting practices, much less what they thought of me for being a weirdo mommy. It is in some ways liberating to be a nomad, to lose touch with my past and trick myself into believing that because it’s not underfoot, it’s not always with me.

But by the end of the book I found myself jealous of Dederer. She finds the secret for her, which is to move away for a couple of years and then come “home”. I like this idea, but without a “home,” this is simply not an option for me. My whole life has been “away.” Even if I moved to where my dad is or where my mom is, I wouldn’t have a network of lifelong friends to tap into because the friends of my childhood are scattered across the country. I’m equally at home everywhere, and I’m equally a stranger everywhere. Dederer’s voluntary exodus from and then voluntary return to her home just highlighted for me how much I don’t have a home. It kind of pissed me off. I wanted a place to go home to, goshdarnit!

Even as it pissed me off, though, I delighted in watching Dederer’s journey. I could relate to the growth-through-yoga that she experienced. Many of her fears and realizations seemed very familiar to me. I especially appreciated her chapter about handstand. I first attempted handstand in yoga teacher training. There an Iyengar teacher described me as “beyond clumsy” in handstand. It was a caution to another student about me in front of me: “Be careful,” he said, “she’s beyond clumsy.” Meaning, “Watch it because she’s likely to fall on you while you’re trying to assist her.” I know it’s silly, but this teacher’s words have echoed in my mind at practically every yoga practice I’ve done since. I’ve gradually allowed it to become background noise rather than letting it take center stage, but I sure as heck haven’t tried handstand since then. (Well, once during a workshop, but I embarrassingly dissolved into tears, and I haven’t tried since then.)

As a clumsy, non-svelt yoga practitioner whose limited flexibility has been hard-won, I liked reading about yoga from the perspective of someone who isn’t a former gymnast or ballet dancer. Someone who doesn’t “float” from uttanasana into chaturanga. Someone with hips.

Some reviewers have complained that the links between Dederer’s personal reflections and the poses for each chapter are rather tenuous. I agree to a point. Some chapters did seem to be “yoga pose” + “everything else,” most notably the child’s pose chapters in which she recalled episodes from her childhood. But the chapters with the more forced connection between pose and narrative were the minority. For the most part, I found the link between yoga and her stories to be pretty close.

The part I loved best was watching Dederer accept her reality in a less judgmental way. Rather than comparing herself to everyone else and/or throwing out what she’d built and trying to start over again as her mother had, Dederer took what she had and made it something that worked better for her. I find this inspirational. Even if it does involve having a hometown and a greater skill at making friends than I have.

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Nonalcoholic Yumminess

I recently discovered my new favorite refreshing beverage, and I thought I’d share it with you all.

I accidentally made a still life!

Here’s my disclaimer up front: I do not like sweet drinks. Sodas? Yuck. Cocktails that call for simple syrup? Eww. So this drink really hit the spot. If you are someone who loves sugary drinks, bless your soul, but this isn’t the drink for you. It’s not bitter or sour or anything, but it’s definitely not sweet.

If you’re not familiar with Angostura bitters, while it technically contains alcohol, it’s available in grocery stores (even in Utah). Like vanilla extract, you use it in quantities so small that the effect is essentially non-alcoholic.

An interesting tidbit: My maternal grandmother was once featured in her local small-town Ohio newspaper for her award-winning recipe for marinated short ribs, the marinade for which features Angostura bitters. Those marinated short ribs remain in my memory as a major comfort food from my youth, along with twice-baked potatoes and hamburger stroganoff (which my family also called “hamburg stroganoff.”)

Okay, you’re probably thirsty after reading all of that, so here’s the recipe for my yummy, nonalcoholic beverage:

Ingredients:

Ice cubes

2-3 dashes Angostura bitters

A squeeze of lime juice (2/8 fresh lime, or a splash of bottled lime juice, unsweetened)

Carbonated water/seltzer to top up

Fill a tall-ish glass with ice (5-6 cubes). Add 2-3 dashes Angostura bitters. Squeeze 2- 1/8 sections of lime into the glass, rub the rim with a lime wedge, and drop the sections into the glass. Top up with carbonated water/seltzer. Enjoy and repeat as many times as you’d like!

Sisyphus and Housecleaning

There aren’t many splurges in which I engage, at least not many that involve spending money. One thing I do allow myself is a monthly visit from housecleaning professionals to deep-clean my home and those spots that I rarely clean at all (like the insides of the light fixtures).

Usually I take the kids to the library on cleaning day so that I have the pleasure of opening up the door when we arrive home and knowing that, for a few minutes at least, there’s nothing that needs to be cleaned. The cleaners visited yesterday. It was too soon to go to the library, so we stayed at home while they worked and tried to stay out of their way by doing our homeschooling out in the sunroom instead of in the dining room where we usually do lessons.

The smell of probably-toxic cleansers hung in the air as the housecleaners called out their goodbyes and let themselves out. The sound of the door latching was followed not a minute later by the sound of one of the cats yarking on the basement rug. While my attention was occupied cleaning that up, my son saw his chance.

The kitchen, crayon.

The dining room, dry erase marker.

The toy room, dry erase crayon.

The bedroom, crayon.

The office, washable crayon.

Between the kids, the cats, and my own messy cooking style (while making dinner that night I dropped a big glob of mashed potatoes on the kitchen floor that I’d just finished dowsing with the cooking water from the collard greens. I think I may have already mentioned my “exploding squash” adventure, so you can see that this is a pattern of behavior for me), I wonder if it’s really worth the money to have professionals clean my house. Housework is always a Sisyphean endeavor, but at least I don’t have to hand over a check if I’m the one doing the work.

Book Review: Turn of Mind by Alice LaPlante

Turn of Mind by Alice LaPlante
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I’m impressed that LaPlante wrote the entire book from Jennifer White’s fractured perspective and this book wasn’t more tedious to read. It’s an interesting concept and fairly expertly executed. The effect most of the time was somewhere between reading the “Benjy” section of The Sound and the Fury and watching Memento. I found that I couldn’t stop reading in the middle of one of the sections because I would lose my place. So I would just sit down and power through to the end of the section. Most of the time, once I got there, I was so engrossed in the story that I just powered through to the end of the next section.

The narrator was not a likable person. Pitiable? Yes. Likable? While I felt sorry for her, my prevailing feeling was a sort of grim satisfaction: she was now reaping what she’d sown. I was skeptical of how many of her thoughts were spent on her family when she’d until very recently done little more than build her career. Until her illness, it didn’t seem as though Jennifer spent much time thinking of her children at all. I was surprised at just how devoted her children were to her after she’d spent their entire lives absent and not at all sure she even loved them. But I suppose LaPlante addresses this by explaining that the nature of Jennifer’s illness opens things up, allows her to poke at uncomfortable places in her memory. It’s as though her penance for living an unexamined life is to be trapped inside the memories of that life.

And the ending. Well, I won’t say anything about the ending except that it was a bit disappointing. Throughout the book, I could see the flame of the firework rising into the sky. I read with anticipation: When it exploded, it was going to be good. But then it got to the top of its arc, shot off a small fountain of purple sparks, and then faded into the night’s sky.

But then, I’m rarely satisfied with endings.

I enjoyed this book. It’s a unique perspective and LaPlante pulls it off well. So don’t let my complaints about the ending and the main character put you off of it.

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