Serious November reading

We are nearly halfway through November and the impeachment hearings have begun. That's pretty serious by any measure. As befits the seriousness of this month, I have been reading serious books, four so far.

First I read a novel published in the 1930s, Of Lena Geyer by Marcia Davenport. I was inspired to read it after reading Willa Cather's The Song of the Lark a few months ago -- someone in some comment section somewhere mentioned it as being similar. Marcia Davenport was the daughter of famed opera singer Alma Gluck, and her book is based on the life of another famed (back then) opera singer, Olive Fremstad, as was The Song of the Lark. Fiction, yes, but serious old-fashioned fiction.

After that I read LaRose by Louise Erdrich, because my book group had read The Round House, which is actually the second book in a semi-trilogy (LaRose is the third -- I read the first book, The Plague of Doves, earlier). Again, fiction, but very serious fiction, all three about crime and punishment on an Indian reservation, with interesting things to say about the intertwined history of Indians and whites, different ways of dealing with crime, etc. All three books are sad, but I found LaRose to be truly depressing, not redemptive, didn't want to finish it, didn't really believe in its happy-ish ending. The Round House was the best book of the three.

Then it was time for a presidential biography -- #15 James Buchanan, thought by many to have been our worst president ever (present president excepted). I read the short bio by Jean H. Baker, in the American Presidents series. To my astonishment I found it utterly gripping. I finished it in a day. Here is a quote I took the time to copy out, from the last pages of the biography:

"He was that most dangerous of chief executives, a stubborn, mistaken ideologue whose principles held no room for compromise. His experience in government had only rendered him too self-confident to consider other views. In his betrayal of the national trust, Buchanan came closer to committing treason than any other president in American history."

Baker wrote that in 2004 (or before), long before we'd even dreamed of Trump as president. Dubya would have been president at the time. Was she thinking about his failings when she wrote this? It doesn't sound like it's about him. But so much of it sounds like Trump -- not the "experience in government" part, nor the "principles" part, but otherwise. God.

And then I read H is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald, a book I'd been wanting to read ever since it was published (in 2014/2015). Oddly, I found it a little disappointing. It wasn't quite the book I was expecting, or it didn't hit me right or something. The book is a memoir of how she dealt with her grief when her father died by getting a goshawk to train. Macdonald has described her book as also being part "shadow biography" of T. H. White, who also wrote a book about training a goshawk, and it was that part of it that made me sad -- White had such a sad life. On the other hand, the part about Macdonald's own grief didn't really move me, although I did understand what she was going through. She was about 37 when her father died, I was 28 when mine did, and like her, I fell apart. Looking back, I don't know why I grieved so hard. I wasn't very close to my father, though I admired him greatly. But his death was just devastating for me. A year after he was gone I wanted to kill myself. Drugs rescued me, just as they rescued Macdonald. I am not a fan of antidepressants, but they can work miracles with major depression. Anyway, this is a book I might have to think about some more.

Now I'm re-reading Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh, the book group's next choice, which is in its own way quite a serious book too, and after that I will read The Crucible by Henry Miller, because I'm supposed to read a "classic play" for the Classics Challenge, and THEN I will start reading Moby Dick, my choice of "very long classic." I was first going to read The Golden Bowl by Henry James for that category, but Jill Lepore's article about Herman Melville in The New Yorker steered me in that direction instead. As a teenager, I used to try to read Moby Dick off and on. Our public library had a large old illustrated hardback. I would check it out, return it, check it out again a few months later. I never got beyond the first few chapters. Later I found out that my future high school sweetheart, Greg Chediak, was doing the same thing at the same time. Such an odd thing to have in common. I wonder if he ever read it all the way through. I am finally going to do that soon.

Not much else to report. The Halloween candy is gone except for a few pieces that only Kid A likes, but Kid B won't let him have (dog in the manger). I did not steal a single piece of candy this year (the boys did give me some hated Almond Joys). Another item: the twins had their first band concert last night, which I thoroughly enjoyed. They have such a wonderful teacher! The 6th grade band played so much better than the 5th grade band last year, and the 7th/8th grade band was amazing. An excellent musical experience. And oh, how I missed Rocket Boy.

Other than that, I have been working my way very slowly through some cleaning projects -- made some good progress on the twins' room, and now am trying to face this mess in the living room. (Note that I am blogging right now, not cleaning.) My book group comes here next week (to discuss Brideshead), so I must deal with this by then. Wish me luck. One step at a time is usually a successful strategy for me, but this disaster looks like it will all fall apart if I pluck something off the top.

On the plus side, it's 59 degrees outside and our latest snow is melting. Hold that happy thought.

Snowy Halloween

Well, it is November 1st, the sun is shining, and I am in a pretty good mood. I always kind of dread November -- October is so much fun (usually) and it's hard to let that go -- but when November arrives it's never as bad as I thought it would be. Nice to have a break from the excess. Nice to focus on serious stuff. Speaking of serious stuff, I have already turned in my ballot for the November 5th election. I'm really wondering how that's going to turn out -- there's a chance that the Boulder City Council will flip back to "build, baby, build," which I would be sorry to see.

I'm hoping November isn't as snowy as October was, because the snow and cold have been overwhelming recently. HOWEVER, I'd take snow and cold over fire and smoke any day. I've been obsessing over the California fires this past week or so, and every time I go out to shovel or do anything that's affected by the snow and ice and below-freezing temps I remind myself that it's better than fire. And smoke! When I talked to Rocket Boy the other night, he asked whether the smoke from the fires had made it to Colorado yet, but I sure haven't smelled any. He asked about the quality of the sunsets (which would indicate the amount of particulates in the air) and I reminded him that our high was 8 the other day and except for shoveling, I have been spending most of my time indoors. I certainly have not been going out to look at sunsets!

While indoors, I have been spending a lot of time reading, as always. In my last post I showed a picture of seven spooky books I'd gotten from the library -- as of today, I have read four of them and nixed the other three. No point reading something that doesn't thrill you. My favorite, though, was one of the better books I've read so far this year (I'm up to 100, and counting). It was The Remains of an Altar by Phil Rickman, book 8 in a so-far 15-book series, and I am now planning to go back and read all the others. This will be a challenge, since our library only has a few of them, and I can't spend a lot of money on frivolous things right now, not having a job and all that. But I suspect they're the type of book that I won't want to read a dozen of right in a row -- better to space them out. And anyway, it's November, so I have to read serious books. Biographies, general non-fiction, classics -- that sort of thing. Not supernatural mysteries, a type of genre fiction I only learned about this year.

Yesterday was of course Halloween, and I really wondered how much celebrating the twins and I were going to do. We had gotten three pumpkins the week before -- at the grocery store, which made me feel terribly guilty. The local farms need the money they make off their pumpkin patches, but this year with all the snow, we just didn't feel like trekking out to one, not even Munson's which is quite close. So we had our pumpkins, but they weren't carved. I had bought several bags of candy (varieties I don't like) while the twins were on their Outdoor Ed trip, and stashed them in the garage. I'd asked the twins over and over what they wanted to be for Halloween, but got very muted, uninterested responses. Finally, on Halloween afternoon we carved the pumpkins (I scooped the guts out and each of us carved one face) and the kids got into their costumes. Kid B decided he would be a wizard one more time. We have really gotten our money's worth out of that costume, and amazingly, it still fit him (just a little shorter than in years past). Kid A decided to be a "blue-haired purple-shirted eye-knifer," whatever that is, but at least it was easy to assemble. I had bought him some blue hair dye for "Crazy Hair Day" at middle school (which is actually today), so that worked for Halloween too.

They took some time getting ready, taking off their costumes in order to put sweatshirts on underneath and all that sort of thing -- because it was COLD. Even when they were ready, they hung around, handing out candy to the first few trick-or-treaters, getting their courage up. This was their first year going out on their own, because I had to stay behind and hand out the candy (usually Rocket Boy does that). That means they probably didn't say thank you to any of the people who gave them candy, because I always have to yell, "Say thank you!" Oh well. They finally set out and did Dartmouth, 36th, and 35th -- and then ran home to tell me all about it and use the bathroom and warm up. Then they went out again and did 32nd Street, after which Kid A came home for good, saying he had enough candy (this was about 7:15). I worried about Kid B trick-or-treating by himself, all alone in a wizard costume, but we have a very safe neighborhood, brimming with kids, and of course he came home safely at about 7:45, with an enormous bag of treats.

So now it is November, and we have an ungodly amount of candy in the house, but so far I have stayed out of it. That is, I've eaten two small Almond Joys, but those were formally given to me by the twins, because they don't like almonds or coconut. I have not put my hands into any of the bowls and poked around (the middle bowl is the leftovers of what we handed out). Unlike previous years, I'm letting them eat all they want, in the hope that it will be gone quickly. This morning they had candy for breakfast (and a glass of milk each). They have to learn some self-regulation at some point, so this is an experiment to see if they can do it at all. If they can't, at least the candy will be gone quickly.