One for the Books

Between work and kids and various biennial political events and writing and such, you might be surprised to hear that I found time to read in 2019. For sure, many busy people read via the miracle of audiobooks. I've heard people extol the virtues of whiling away rush hour, kids' piano lessons, and road trips by being read to. Every time I buy a book, Amazon offers to read it to me. Even the kids' school libraries have audio books.

This does not work for me.

"Look, doc, I don't care if  you actually

recommend our toothpaste. We already

got 4 dentists to recommend it. We need

someone to not recommend it so it can

be 4 out of 5. Otherwise, it sounds fake!"

Humorist Dave Barry once said that everybody thinks they are an above-average driver. I think I am definitely an above-average driver--if you pick the sample extremely carefully, the way toothpaste companies pick dentists who recommend their toothpaste.

I've only been in a couple of wrecks, but that is a result of me over-compensating by being overly cautious. I can definitely enjoy a good audio book in the car, as long as someone else is driving. I tried using them on our first family road trips, and I would get absorbed in the story and suddenly, the chapter would end and I'd have no idea what state we were in. So it is either music or silence for me on the road, and my reading happens via physical books (I know, so quaint) or on my Kindle, which does limit the number of books I can get through in a year.

Nevertheless, according to my Amazon order history, in 2019 I bought the following books:

• The Realm Below: The Rise of Tanipestis, by Susan Rooke. I was so excited to be asked to review this book. Susan has the most vivid, wicked imagination and this is no ordinary supernatural tale. 
• Educated, by Tara Westover: Good enough that I recommended it to my mother, who had (of course; she lives on the library website) already heard of it and put it on her ebook request list. We both loved this autobiography of a young woman raised in a prepper compound who finds her way out into the wide world and acquires an Oxford education. Families are weird.
• Doing it Over, Staying for Good, and Making it Right, by Catherine Bybee: A fun series of sassy chick lit novels set in the Pacific Northwest. Every once in a while, I get in the mood, read a few of these types of books, and then move on. 
• Shrill, by Lindy West: I really enjoyed this book of essays. She has a strong voice and is a strong advocate for women and for basically not being a jerk to people. She's also funny and smart as hell. 
• Rebecca, by Daphne DuMaurier: Eleanor chose this for her book club in English. For their book club report, they had to write, act in, film, and produce a movie trailer. Eleanor played the crazy person. If you've read it, you know who that is. I don't.
• A River in Darkness, by Masaji Ishikawa: I saw this one on Amazon and was intrigued. It's an autobiographical account of a Japanese-born man whose mother and step-father emigrated to North Korea, the hardships he experienced (Japanese immigrants were despised), and his ultimate escape and return to Japan. You will never look at weeds the same way again.
• The Girl with Seven Names, by Hyeonseo Lee: Another autobiography of a North Korean defector. She came from a different social class, so it offered a much different perspective.
• AP World History Prep Plus: It is entirely possible Eleanor actually opened this once or twice, but I didn't have the heart to ask.
• Finis, by Angelique Jamail. Angelique was our guest at the Austin Poetry Society meeting in March. This novella is an imaginative fantasy novel about a world in which people manifest animal traits. 
• Holes by Louis Sachar: Both Bruce and Eleanor read this book in 5th grade, but this is the first time the school asked me to buy it. Unfortunately, there was not enough supernaturalness, female characters or K-pop to hold Betty's interest.
• Macbeth (No Fear Shakespeare): This is wrong, dammit. You are SUPPOSED to fear Shakespeare. Not the witches, the Elizabethan English. This is what we scared teenagers with before the real world made Lady Macbeth cute. (For Eleanor's English class.)
• Loving Day, by Mat Johnson: I read Pym last year and loved it...Johnson has a unique vision and some of the most original characters in fiction. The narrator is a biracial man who was raised black by his black mom but unfortunately takes 100% after his lily white Irish dad in looks and has a Jewish daughter who identifies as black. It's a funny and profound look at how we identify ourselves and others. 
• A Thousand Splendid Suns, by Khaled Hosseini: Beautifully, vividly written and just plain brutal to read. By about half way through, I was plowing through it determined to finish, telling Hosseini, "YOU OWE ME A HAPPY ENDING, DAMMIT!" If abandoning your goat to return to the war-torn city where your family was blown up so you can rebuild an orphanage qualifies as a happy ending, then maybe, I guess? 
• Suzuki Music School: Viola Books 4-5: As it turns out, Bruce hates the viola and considers these books horrible trash books for a horrible trash instrument that only nerds like his sister who are to be pitied would ever want to play. Books are in pristine, never opened condition.
• Men We Reaped, by Jesmyn Ward: Despite the title sounding like a horror novel, Eleanor says it was a really interesting memoir of a young woman's harrowing childhood in Louisiana, so maybe a horror memoir? I haven't read it.
• Born a Crime, by Trevor Noah: When Jon Stewart left the Daily Show, I was like, "NO! No one will ever replace him! I can't even watch this non-Jon-ness!" But then Noah grew on me and I love how the show has evolved. His account of his youth in South Africa was both funny and interesting.
• Sweet Pipes Recorder Method, Volumes 1-2: I decided this summer to learn to play the Cheater's Clari-Flute. The fun and feel of the clarinet and the range of the flute, without the hassle of bleeding gums, finger callouses, or reeds, FTW! As a bonus, the learning songs make the house sound like a year-round Ren Faire...anyone want a turkey leg?
• The Proactive Professional, by Chrissy Scivicque: Staff recommended this as something I might want to give to staff, so I read it, and I did. It has not, in any way, made me more proactive. Or professional. 
• Lesson Book 1: Piano Adventures, by Nancy Faber: Oh, what an adventure it was! The chords, the suspense of wondering if the left and right hands would play the same song... (Bruce needed a second copy for my house.)
• Tipton Poetry Journal, #41: The fun thing about poetry journals is that it's a lot like getting your high school yearbook...you immediately look at your own entry first to make sure you don't look like a goober with a typo or something, and then you go straight to the table of contents and see who all you know and read their stuff so you can see what they've been up to.
• Isaac's Storm, by Erik Larson: My mother, who is a voracious reader, read this true account of the Galveston hurricane of 1900 when it came out in the 90's, but I hadn't heard of it until one of our staff recommended it to me. It was amazing to me how little government agency politics have changed in the last 120 years. It was also a gripping read; I read the part about the actual landfall of the hurricane twice, just to savor the writing and the vicarious experience of a major hurricane making landfall.
• First Book of Practical Studies for the Tuba, by Nilo Hovey: Is the tuba ever, truly, practical? (Purchased for Betty, of course)
• The Bookshop on the Corner by Jenny Colgan: One of my poet friends posted about this British romance novel on Goodreads so I gave it a try. It's a romance novel, so plausibility and plot are not going to be strong points, but I dug the whole Scottish highlands setting. Kilts!
• In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote: Because high school these days is so hard core that the kids read true crime accounts of vicious murders in English class. (Eleanor enjoyed it.)
• One Hundred Recorder Pieces, Volume 1, by David Stilp: What happens when you get tired of playing Renaissance Faire classics like "The Sailor Likes His Bottle-o!" and "Holla-hi, Holla-ho" but aren't quite sure your pets' eardrums are ready to learn the notes above high E? You get a nice book of recorder pieces to play around with, that's what.
• Who am I? Who are We?, by Christa Pandey. I love reading books by people I know and respect...it is a good way to really understand someone you already know in a deeper way. In this book of poems, Christa grapples with that uneasy question of what we as individuals and communities have become in these polarizing times.
• The K-Pop Dictionary: 500 Essential Korean Slang Words and Phrases Every K-Pop Fan Must Know, by Woosung Kang: A (pop)cultural tour-de-force, providing glimpses into the slang of K-pop and K-drama stars, so that Korea-boos like my daughter Betty (whose Christmas present this was) can work tragically mispronounced Korean phrases into middle school conversation. (Apologies in advance, native Korean speakers.)
• Crazy Rich Asians, China Rich Girlfriend, and Rich People Problems, by Kevin Kwan: Eleanor gave me the first book in paperback format for Christmas. It was awesome fun, as I'd heard it would be. Scheming relatives, preposterous wealth, and an author who doesn't take his characters too seriously--all resulted in me reading a book a day. Also, I'm a sucker for humorous footnotes. 
• The Beautiful Ones by Prince: Bruce (a Prince fan) gave me this biography/autobiography/ collection of random found things for Christmas. It is not, in any sense, a normal biography, which is entirely appropriate. It included copies of song lyrics scrawled on the backs of envelopes, annotated photo albums, and Prince's handwritten notes for his autobiography. It was almost like rummaging through his nightstand. 
• Solos for Young Violists, Volume 4, by Barbara Barber: A gripping page turner, full of bold dissonance and stratospheric, demon-dog summoning flights. Not that I am the one reading it.

So, statistically, I guess I bought a whole bunch of books but only actually read 21 books...24 if you include the recorder books. Of those, half were written by persons of color and 55% were written by women. 52% were fiction, 38% were non-fiction/biography/autobiography, and two were poetry. Only 30% of the authors were not American-born.

Bob says that the worst book of 2019 was absolutely, without doubt, The First Book of Practical Studies for the Tuba. He does not recommend.

The Teens

Perhaps they're like a bronco ride: lots of ups and downs, brief moments of airborne ecstasy followed by planting face down in the dirt and dodging skull shattering kicks. Perhaps they're like a kaleidoscope: the more you try to hold still and stop time, the faster the change happens and the patterns shift, beautiful but utterly impermanent. Or maybe they're like one of those sped up art videos: it looks like random paint splashes, odd lines and lumps, and you're waiting and waiting for it all to come together, and it's so satisfying when it does. 

No, not these teens.

Although that paragraph describes their experience with junior high/high school pretty well, too.

These teens: 2010-2019.

My experience with the last 10 years has been a little bit of "all of the above." Let's take a quick stroll through the decade, shall we?

Molly in 2010: high energy, high maintenance, too-smart-for-anybody's good, prissy, sassy labradoodle we adopted around this time. In her early years, she was fond of trying to eat the contents of Bruce's diaper.

2010: At the beginning of the decade, we had just moved back to Austin. I took a new job definitely outside of my comfort zone. I hadn't written more than half a dozen poems in the preceding decade and had never published any of them. The kids were toddlers.

Lesson learned: I hate sitting in my cubicle alone writing things on the computer all day. 

Betty and Bruce decorate the tree in 2011. We had to decorate trees at work the year before and we went with a "recycled" theme and I folded 200 origami cranes out of colorful sticky notes. Once you've folded 200 cranes, you do NOT just throw them away. Some became mobiles. Some found their way into my personal Christmas ornament stash. 

2011: Ugh. Can we fast forward? No? Sigh. The sitting in the cube alone all day was making me nuts. The ex and I separated. I remember a colleague telling me how surprised she was to hear that, as she had been a barely functional basket case during her divorce, and I was holding it together so well. Inwardly, I laugh-cried at that, because I was absolutely a barely functional basket case. To the point where, any time I come across someone I met during the 2011-2012 time period, my first reaction is to want to apologize profusely and promise them I got better. Oh, and 2011 was when I got the original knee injury that led to me being almost unable to walk, that led to the gait issues, that led to the foot problem, that led to the 2019 hospital visit. Thanks, 2011. 

Lessons learned: Ignoring pain is a bad idea. There is a fine line between being authentic and over-sharing. (Actually it may not be that fine of a line.)

Pericles in 2012. He was my best buddy. He slept in the crook of my arm every night and kept me company in his quiet way.

2012: See 2011. The blessings of the 2011-2012 period were good friends who listened to my drama  and frequently treated me to meals and drinks to break up the monotony of ramen and my $10-a-day budget. I had started attending the Austin Poetry Society critique group in 2011, and finally became a real member in 2012. A poem about Pericles was one of my first wins and first published poems. Another of my poems was illustrated and placed on an Austin bus. I began writing short stories. I switched jobs to try my hand at project management.

Lessons learned: Poetry people are the best people. Good friends can get you through anything. Being authentic means putting your words and your work out there and taking risks. 

Bruce and I, Bandera Volcano in New Mexico. If you look closely, you can see I'm trying to hide my cane. By this point, my knee was so bad I had to heave myself to a standing position and could barely walk. Because I am stubborn, this did not stop me from walking up this volcano in 108 degree heat. 

2013: The new job was probably one of the highlights of my professional career, in the sense that it really played to my strengths in a very unique way. I succeeded not so much with crackerjack organizational skills (I don't have those) but through using my intuitive skills to anticipate needs, read people and situations, and sense what was important. My buddy Pericles crossed the rainbow bridge at the ripe old age of 18, and, a few months later, I adopted Daisy. On the plus side, my mother took us to New Mexico on the first of many family vacations. Another plus was winning the Stand Up for Safe Families haiku contest and reading my poem and sharing my story as a survivor of child abuse to an audience of hundreds on Lady Bird Lake.

Lessons learned: I hate full-time project management with undying passion, even more than sitting alone in a cubicle writing things. Just because you can  do something, doesn't mean it will make you happy. I consistently underestimate the amount of water to bring on a hike.

Bruce and I on the top of Crystal Mountain in Arkansas. Bruce stuck to my side the entire hike, worried about me, as I stubbornly heaved myself up the mountain with my walking sticks. There is a theme emerging...a theme that would one day contribute to the college education fund of my podiatrist.

2014: Another new job. This one, it turns out, I actually enjoyed AND did well at, simultaneously. Who knew? More poems published. I won the Austin Poetry Society top contest for the first time. My first baby moved on to junior high. Thanks to the excruciatingly painful miracle of Airrosti, I was slowly regaining my ability to walk with something approaching normality. I got tired of my own drama and made the conscious decision to stop thinking and talking about drama.

Lesson learned: Gratitude--seriously, after the physical problems of 2011-2013, I would have these moments of "Wow--I just got out of the car without pain...I couldn't do that last year. What a blessing!" Or, "Hey! I just stood up! Like normal people do! How awesome!" I still have those moments, actually. 

Robert Pinsky & me signing autographs at the Houston Museum of Fine Arts in 2015. He had judged my poem as a semi-finalist in the artlines2 contest and all of the finalists & semi-finalists were lined up to sign the anthology. Okay, most people asked for my autograph while waiting to talk to Pinsky...I had the benefit of great seating. They had forgotten to print a name tent for me and so the only empty spot was at the end of the table, next to him. It was an amazing experience to hear so many people telling him which of his poems they loved and what his words meant to them. 

2015: More poetry. More success at work. I learned to loom knit and made 42 practice coasters for people at work (sorry--I hope the lumps don't make your coffee spill) and then hats and scarves for the kids, some of which may still exist in a parallel dimension somewhere. I volunteered with the Poetry Caravan and was recognized with the group at the Austin City Hall. After our Colorado vacation, we adopted Bob Cat.

Lesson learned: Writing is about connection, a way for people who may never meet to know each other deeply. Some of the most rewarding readings I did were for the Poetry Caravan when I did not read any of my own work, but shared poems by authors I loved so that me and the audience were having a conversation through poetry.

Betty, Eleanor & Bruce enjoy Fancy Coffee while using our shipboard credit on our Alaskan cruise. The first several days we were frugal, and then on the next-to-last day, I realized we had $200 in credit and it was lattes for everyone!

2016: My mother bought a house in Round Rock and we moved in together. I started working with Kim, a gifted masseuse and wise woman whose insights have been such an enormous blessing in my life. I finally got a poem accepted in the Texas Poetry Calendar and another poem published in the San Antonio newspaper. And, late in the year, Betty talked me into telling her the story that would become "The Golden Feather"--the novel I never thought I could write.

Lessons learned: Stay open to intuition and wonder. I actually CAN write a novel. 

Me & Eleanor before 8th grade 'prom.' Yep, my eldest child started high school in 2017.

2017: I spent the year preparing for organizational changes at work and revising (and re-revising and re-re-revising) "The Golden Feather." Slowly, it became a Real Book devoid of silly typos, characters whose names changed spelling constantly, and gaping plot holes. It acquired illustrations and a fabulous, truly unique cover (thanks, Steve Jackson!). I was especially proud of the two poems included in the Dos Gatos publication "Weaving the Terrain." As I became happier and more confident, I was writing not just emo/depressing poems but more outward looking poems. I joined the Austin Poetry Society board and began editing the anthology.

Lessons learned: Your poetry is a lot more interesting when you lose the angst.

Betty opens the box containing the proof copy of "The Golden Feather" in 2018.

2018: Talk about roller coasters! I mentioned "organizational changes" at work...in the 5-year period of 2014-2019, I had 10 different supervisors, 5 offices and 5 phone numbers. My department lost 3 functions and gained a new one. I promise you, change fatigue is real. Then, mid-year, the book finally came out. Hurray! While I was still planning how to celebrate, we went to Maine on vacation. I had been concerned about the swelling and pain in my foot, but instinctively knew that if I went to the doctor, the vacation would be cancelled. So, we went on walks, climbed stairs (endless stairs), wandered around Quebec City on foot, and I refused to give up or even acknowledge pain. Consequently, the second half of 2018 was spent in a cast or boot. (If you've ever wanted to up your stress game, try interviewing for a job in a cast, on a knee cart, after you've chipped your front tooth flipping said knee scooter on a sidewalk crack, so that you roll in the room scraped up and looking like you've been in a bar fight. I was like, "They are NEVER going to hire me." But they did.) As soon as I got out of the boot, I celebrated by accompanying Eleanor to Chicago with the orchestra and hiking all over Chicago on what turned out to be a poorly made custom orthotic, which led to...

Lessons learned: Ignoring pain is a bad idea (see 2011). Good friends (and family) can get you through anything (see 2012). On the other side of change fatigue lies resilience.

Betty & I at her 5th grade graduation in 2019. Yep, ALL of my babies are out of elementary school. 

2019: ...an exciting stay at the local hospital for a bone infection resulting in the amputation of the tip of my toe. I self-published my first collection of poetry that Eleanor illustrated. I finally put together a poetry workshop I'd been thinking about for a couple of years and it was a success...through word-of-mouth, I was invited to deliver it at three different festivals in 2019-2020. I finished off the year having a blast talking to people and selling books with Eleanor at the Heights Artisan Market in Houston.  

Lessons learned: I can design and put together a book by myself. I have a bigger, more supportive network than I thought. It's okay to ask for help when I need it. Cute shoes are overrated. Gratitude (see 2014).

So--yes. Ups and downs, a veritable tornado of change (changenado?), and tremendous growth and transformation--personally, professionally and as a writer. These were the Turbulent Teens, for sure.