"Salvage the Bones" is only Jesmyn Ward's second novel and it is stunning. Not only is the story compelling in a tough way but the descriptions are sometimes so true that you read them over a couple of times just to set the picture in your mind. This is not an easy book to read, it doesn't have a smooth, lyrical cadence. It is choppy, at times abrupt, intense and hard-edged. In the beginning, the reader has to work at liking it, or at least accepting it and continuing on. There were passages that I couldn't read, specifically about dog fights, that were too gruesome even for me. But those are balanced by beauty and honesty: "Skeetah stands in the sun, the only boy in the yellow clearing who braves the light with the dogs. He ignores us, looks past us off into the woods, still as China at his side, who ignores us and looks off as well, standing, never sitting. I wonder if he has trained her to do this, to stand at his side, to not dirty even her haunches with sitting so that they gleam. China is white as the sand that will become a pearl, Skeetah as black as an oyster, but they stand as one before these boys who do not know what it means to love a dog the way the Skeetah does."
The story takes place in a small, poor hamlet in Louisiana ten days before Hurricane Katrina destroys the place. The narrator is a young teenage girl, Esch, who lives with her father and three brothers in a life ringed by poverty and hardship. She is a girl surrounded by men, trying to navigate a world that is in many ways a dead-end. One of the central characters is a white pit bull named China and as the book opens she is whelping her first litter of puppies. China is a strong metaphor for everything this family is desparate for: safety, comfort, hope and a future.
The family ties are mercurial, as family ties often are: tight and strong when forced but loose and careless when anger and resentment, fear and hunger show up at the table. The community this family lives in revolves around survival, dog fights and razor sharp teenage sullenness. The upcoming storm is at first barely heard, just a shadow in the background, no one but the father paying any attention to its potential. As it approaches and as it becomes apparent that it will be a Category 5 hurricane, its awful presence grows. The wind picks up, the kids try to board up the windows of their shack of a house, they scavenge for food to last a few days. When Katrina finally arrives, they huddle upstairs, trying to wait it out. "The sun will not show. It must be out there, over the furious hurricane beating itself against the coastline like China at the tin door of the shed when she wants to get out. But here we are caught in the hour where the sun is hidden beyond the trees but hasn't escaped over the horizon, when it is coming and going, when light comes from everywhere and nowhere, when everything is gray."
The last section of the book, as the water rises through the house, upstairs, forcing them to crawl to the attic and then break through to the roof, is mesmerizing and frightening: "Light floods the flooded attic, close as a coffin. Randall grabs Junior, who swings around and clings to his back, his small hands tight as clothespins, and Randall climbs out and into the hungry maw of the storm. It is terrible. It is the flailing wind that lashes like an extension cord used as a beating belt. It is the rain, which stings like stones...."
Again, this is a very, very good book. Tough, gritty, unrelenting and beautiful, it deserves to be read. This honest portrayal of poverty and violence, family and survival is one you will not forget. I personally cannot wait for Jesmyn Ward's next book.
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"A Drop of the Hard Stuff" was written by Lawrence Block, who published his first novel in 1958. Why I haven't read him before is beyond me. He has written more than 50 books, novels, short stories, non-fiction, you name it. Again, this book made someones "Best Crime Fiction of 2011" and thus made its way to my library list.
I really liked this book, not because of the crime but because of the characters and the writing. The protagonist is Matt Scudder, a retired cop, an alcoholic who goes to at least one AA meeting a day and is just short of his one year sobriety mark. The other main character is AA itself. Now, I am not a stranger to the world of alcoholics and meetings and the Twelve Step program. But I have never gotten such an amazing, up-close, real depiction of the meetings and the process as I have in this book. Not in any sort of preachy way, just in a matter-of-fact, this is how we do it, kind of way. The meetings and the 12 steps are very important to Matt Scudder and several other characters and they become important to us, the reader as well.
The novel takes place in Manhattan and Block obviously knows his city. Descriptions of bars, liquor stores, hotels, streets are all finely tuned but gritty at the same time. "I was tired and was all set to hail a cab until I remembered that it was the heart of the rush hour, and the traffic would be impossible. I didn't want to sit in an unmoving taxi while the lights changed and changed again, but neither was I ready to face the sardine-can crush of the rush-hour subway." It reads simply yet gets the job done.
From the beginning of the book, there is an air of sadness about it. The plot is simple but the thought process of Scudder is not. Everything is colored with his quest for sobriety. He sees everything, everyone through the haze of fear that he will take a drink. We really feel his desperation to be sober but we also feel the power alcohol has over him. "One day at a time" was never made more real to me than in this novel, probably because Scudder talks about it more than most alcoholics I personally know.
Eventually pieces fit together and he figures out the mystery of the "random" murder and two other seemingly unconnected killings. The nice thing about the ending is that unlike most cop/detective/crime novels, it is not a pat ending. Nothing really gets resolved but it doesn't seem to matter. We have been part of Matt Scudder's life (as fictional as it is) for a short while and if we have paid attention, we are a little wiser about the struggles of addiction. Plus we got a good story at the same time.
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It has been a week since I wrote anything here and I am rather miffed about that fact. I will do better this week, promise.
This is so Facebook stuff, but much of what I write is: my very good and oldest (I met him when I was 18) friend Flip (John to his other friends) was in Dallas this week. He normally lives in Hawaii. I suggested that he call my daughter and at least hook up for a drink or a quick dinner. He made the call and Jenn, being the cook that she is, said why bother going out, come over here and I will cook for you. He did, she did, and they had a great time.
Flip is one of the few guys I went out with in my youth that I didn't sleep with, a fact that I don't give up lightly but I just did. (If anyone reading this blog has had better thoughts of me than that, well, sorry. It was the 60's after all.) We have remained very, very good friends for all these years. Currently we talk on the phone at least once a week. Flip leads a much more "cutting edge" and active life than I do, but he lets that slide and still loves me. And I love him. There are some people that you just love. If they called and said "I need you" it would mean dropping everything and jumping on the next plane to be there. I know Flip would do that for me and he knows I would do that for him.
I think my kids have met him maybe three or four times in their lives, the last being at least 20 years ago. But that Jenn and her girlfriend had Flip over for dinner after all these years makes me so happy! It's all family. It's all about the connection, the love, the support, the care. My connection with Flip goes back years. He helped me through some tough times and I have helped him through the same. In essence, we grew up together. He used to come over to my house in Torrance, CA on Sunday afternoons and vault over the back fence to have a scotch with my Dad. He didn't really care if I was there or not, he liked hanging out with my Dad.
I have great stories about me and Flip, and some I will share here in the future. Suffice it to say that I am happy he is in my life and now in my daughter's as well. We all (me, Jenn, Gabe, their respective mates) need to go to Hawaii and let him show us his native state.
That's it for tonight. Might have a book review tomorrow. If nothing else I have some stories about the inn in Healdsburg to pass on. All good. It's all good.
Thanks again for all of you who are reading along with me and for your patience in waiting for the next episode. I will do better at getting pen to paper (or fingers to keys) in the coming days.
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Sometime in the past year I wrote a blog review of this book by Michael Lewis but I can't find it now. Maybe I just imagined I wrote it. I know I didn't read it, but I did listen to it while driving across the country from Texas to California, or the other way, west to east. Can't keep all those journeys straight.
But I digress. The book "Moneyball" is as much about the science of baseball statistics and how different statistics can (and possibly should) affect which players a team buys as it is about baseball itself. Lewis presents the statistical theory created by a guy named Bill Jones and gives the reader a lot of analytic information about various baseball statistics. It is a different way of picking a team. Instead of picking the players with the most hits, for example, a team owner might pick a guy who had the most walks because that will, statistically, mean more runs.
The movie zooms in on the first general manager to use this theory, Billy Beane of the Oakland Athletics. Without a big enough budget to compete with teams like the New York Yankees, Beane knew he had to find some way to buy good players for cheap money, which meant players no one else really wanted. With the help of an economic graduate, Beane begins to see how sabermetrics (the name given to this specialized analysis) could help him get those players and turn the team into a winning dynamo. While it worked, it didn't work well enough in the beginning to get the Oakland A's to the world championship, but other teams have used this approach and had great success.
All the above is just a short summary of the mathematical theme behind this story. The movie does give an overview of how this differs from the classical approach to hiring baseball players, but the movie is really about the A's and Billy Beane and ultimately, about baseball. With a great deal of stock footage we get the back story on the A's and the story of their incredible turn-around in the 2002 season, going from one of the most losing teams to setting a record later in the season for the most consecutive wins: 20 in a row! It's a good story about baseball and how sometimes, even in a sport as deeply steeped in tradition as baseball is, someone has to come along and shake things up.
Brad Pitt is good as Billy Beane. He isn't suppose to be pretty and he isn't. (But still, quite nice to look at.) Beane has weak people skills but razor sharp baseball intuition and an incredible knowledge base about the sport. Pitt plays him well, not making him warm and cute but driven and still vulnerable. I could have done with less chewing tobacco and less spitting in the cup, but that's a minor quibble. When you read the book, you have no idea how they can turn it into a movie because there is little action, just a lot of talk about action. The movie skips the talk (for the most part) and gives us the baseball action. It has a good supporting cast, although the family bits certainly aren't necessary. For a movie that just focuses on one team in a small part of one season, it is not slow, it doesn't lag and it has some real-life sport suspense as well. Check it out, now on DVD. It's a very nice way to spend a couple of hours, especially now, in off-season.
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Yes, I know I haven't written in a week but I have been thinking about writing so perhaps that will count. Or not. Cold, yes. It was 23 degrees this morning, I kid you not, as I drove to work. No, I don't have a temp gauge in my car, the economy models do not have such a thing, but a bank I pass on the way to Calistoga enlightens me on the temperature each morning. At 7:16 it was 23. That's cold. I can't wait to see what it will be tomorrow because it's supposed to be even colder tonight. Even Cooper is pretending (I hope) that he has a sore foot so he doesn't have to go outside except to pee quickly then hobble back inside.
What else? Got two excellent old movies from the library last week. "The Apartment" which is pretty much a perfect movie, Jack Lemmon, the incredibly cute Shirley McLaine, Fred McMurray as an asshole and a great supporting cast. One of Billy Wilder's best, totally entertaining and even today it holds up. Makes me want to rent a few of his other films, which I will. Also got "Sorry, Wrong Number" with the young (and therefore handsome) Burt Lancaster and the creepy Barbara Stanwyck in another black and white flick. Totally cheesy overacting by Stanwyck and Lancaster, but oddly suspenseful. The last scene is classic.
Gifts: my most excellent friend Tom gave me a Kindle Fire this week, completely unexpected and most appreciated. Tom received one for xmas as a gift and loves it and I am now loving mine. It's a remarkable little machine, small and light and ever so versatile. I haven't even begun to crack the surface on what it can do but I am enjoying exploring the capabilities it has. Already I have downloaded several free books and some apps. Gosh, I almost feel like a 21st century person!
Kids: I spent a couple of hours on Sunday with Ben and Stacey and Sam and Henry. It's odd but when I hang out at their house it feels like I have come home. The boys are totally cute, Sam fluctuates from being totally out of control (for a minute or two) to being completely adorable and the perfect little boy. Henry at three months (almost) is starting to smile and make cooing noises, especially at his parents and will be a charmer like his big brother. Ben is starting to smile too and often coos, especially when watching football and drinking a beer. Stacey has moved beyond the cooing stage and just shakes her head a lot at all the males in the room. It was a lovely couple of hours on a Sunday afternoon.
Alrighty, you are up to date. I haven't mentioned the rodent problem here at my apartment and won't go into detail but let's just say that I have no problem inflicting great bodily harm and intense pain on these creatures, no matter what PETA says.
More in the next few days.
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Again, this is a book I got out of the library on a recommendation from someones "Best Reads of 2011." I had never heard of it before, and the author's name begs some sort of cultural dichotomy.
This is a good book, albeit written in an odd format. The main character, whose name we don't know, is a large-animal veterinarian and the "call" refers to just that, the call he gets about an animal in need. The structure of the book is almost like a play, or a screenplay: in capital letters and bold type the author tells us what is coming. There are statements such as THE CALL: and then we know who called and why. ACTION: what the vet did with and for the animal. RESULT: obviously, the outcome of the vet visit, whether the animal lives or dies or gives birth. Along the way we meet the people who own the animals as well and their stories are as important as the vet's care of the animals. WHAT THE WIFE SAYS: again, obvious but usually in response to what he said or what the kids said or did or just a general observation about their lives together. There are other categories as well: WHAT THE WIFE MADE FOR DINNER, WHAT THE KIDS SAID, etc.
The story is set in rural Vermont, and the turning point is an almost fatal hunting accident that brings the family into clear focus as they try to make sense of this terrible event. The story expands from here and is basically about people looking for meaning in a world that seems to make little sense, but they don't give up the search. While they are trying to make sense of things and holding out hope that the accident won't prove fatal, many other odd things happen: strangers show up at their house who end up not being strangers, there might be a spaceship hovering above the vet's house, the vet might have some weird disease that he is supposed to get checked and on and on. These things aren't distractions. Instead they lend reality to the characters because this is exactly how real life is: jumbled, confusing and complicated. This book has a strange cadence, perhaps because of the structure, but the characters, especially the vet, become more and more real as the story opens up. It's a short book and a quick read but you end up liking everyone and you want them to be good and healthy and happy. There are bits of brilliance in the writing, the everyday made beautiful: We stood in bright sunshine right outside the door, slipping on the melting ice dirty and matted with Newfoundland hair from where the dogs sometimes sat and kept watch, looking down our driveway and out over our field to the pond. ... The snow wasn't soft, but more like gritty crystals that stayed in Jen's hair as she lay, still laughing, on the snow. Sunlight came through the branches of the apple tree and the children, breathless, lay back on the snow beside Jen and let the sun hit their faces."
Check it out of the library, let me know what you think.
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The arrival of a new year should always make one stop for a few moments and take stock of one's life. Or maybe it's just tradition that we do so. 2011 was a tough year for many. You all know my employment and housing woes, but those were temporary (although sometimes it seemed otherwise) and not life threatening. Others had much more serious concerns: health, home foreclosures, death of friends and relatives. The turbulent political climate everywhere in the world didn't help, either. Whether it was the economy, the environment, human rights, public protests, war, famine, poverty, there were so many sad, unsettled and tragic moments this past year that we are all lucky to be amoung those still standing.
The beginning of a new year is like being given a clean slate. Nothing personal is written on it yet and each of us therefore has the opportunity to try and make this new year our own. We cannot control destiny, of course, but we can control our approach to the future and how we individually deal with what is thrown at us. Some people make resolutions. Some people pick one word to tack on the wall as a guiding force. That word could be anything: love, propsperity, house, peace, new car, family, health, baby, education, the list is endless.
I haven't figured out a plan for 2012 yet. But I have realized this: 2011, as difficult as it was, certainly wasn't dull! And it was educational in many ways, at least for me. I learned so much about myself (for example, that I really liked flush toilets!) and about my small world. I learned to accept the kindness and generousity of friends and family without feeling that I had to always reciprocate. I learned which people were willing to listen to my frustration about my situation and which were uncomfortable doing so, and I accepted that.
There is no way I would have gotten through 2011 without my friends and especially my family. My two kids each gave me a place to live for several months, which I know was an imposition at times, but I loved being part of their everyday worlds for a while. Friends helped me find part-time jobs, or paid me under the table for a few months so I could still collect unemployment benefits and thus afford health insurance. Those friends also helped me find places to live short-term and a couple of them encouraged me to stop worrying and just settle down for six months and see how that felt.
Bottom line, I want to thank all those folks who were on my side last year. Without you all, I wouldn't be as happy as I am now with my simplified life, my part-time jobs, my pared down way of living.
It's odd but I am happier right now than I have been in quite some time. A big part of that is my decision to stop worrying about "what's to come" and live in the present moment. Yes, I am eating up some of my savings but that's what it is there for, to help me through tough times. Yes, I still only have part-time jobs but they are mostly paying my way. I have a very small place to live that I can afford and it is in a fine neighborhood. In the big picture of the world, I am totally safe, secure and healthy. In the small snapshot of my tiny world, I am safe, healthy and the insecurities that I harbor are of my own making. It's not a bad way to start a new year. Let's look forward to 2012 being full of good adventures!
