AliBlog

123, 5, 3 meme

I've been tagged by David for this book meme. Just before reading his post, I'd been lying on the couch, Zanna sleeping on my belly, reading An Ordinary Spy by Joseph Weisberg. Spy novels are rare for me, but I was drawn to this one by the claim that portions of the text are redacted by the CIA's Central Review Board. I'm still not sure if that claim's legit or a part of the fiction but it drew me in nonetheless. And the story took over from there, consuming me for a few days as good stories often do.

My instructions are to open the nearest book to page 123, skip past the first five sentences, then give you the next three sentences. Here they are:

Bobby didn't understand the joke - it seemed to hinge on some sort of cultural reference that was lost on him - but he laughed appreciatively. It felt like a time to give TRACER exactly what he was looking for, not ask him to explain ____ culture. Back at the Station, he looked up TRACER's friend who had played the joke.

Nothing too revealing there unless you want to see it as a metaphor for the culture of blogging. We could - and some of us do - create inside jokes about blogging all day long. Or we could continue to spread this self-reflective memes over and over again in a way that non-bloggers would never understand. Yes, we could do that - and we will. I don't usually tag for memes, but this one is easy, and even those who've already done it can do it again with a different book. I'm tagging the last five commenters:

• Mich
• Sarah
• Rachel
• Lumpyhead's mom
• Kristy

Pick up the nearest book, turn to page 123, skip the first five sentences on that page, then type the next three sentences. (Non-bloggers are welcome, as always, to play along in the comments.)

Listen.

I've learned a lot from Kurt Vonnegut and Kilgore Trout. One of them was a real earthling man who wrote make-believe stories and the other was a make-believe, futuristic man who wrote make-believe stories within the real earthling man's make-believe stories.

Hooray for make-believe stories!

Hooray for creative earthling minds!

The earthling man, Kurt Vonnegut, died just one earthling day ago, which - come to think of it - means the make-believe man died yesterday too. Somehow through their books, they both taught me the kinds of things you can't learn by reading books.

Hooray for books!

Hooray for learning!

I laughed my way through my first Vonnegut book when I was eighteen years old. I read it in 1991 in a square room on the fourth floor of an all-female dormitory in Athens, Ohio. I am speaking of my alma-mater, Ohio University, where WWII POW and survivor (along with Vonnegut) of the Slaughter-House Compound Gifford Doxsee now teaches history. I don't know Doxsee but I want to mention him here because he was, at least at one point in time, a member of Vonnegut's karass. And maybe by mentioning him I become, by extension, part of that same karass. Actually, I'm fooling myself. And you too. As Vonnegut's own Hoosiers example illustrates, my relationship here is something more of a granfaloon.

(Look. Right now I'm wondering why granfaloon has a full, referenced entry at wikipedia and karass does not. Clearly, the concept of karass - a collective group of individuals working together and moving time forward together to meet God's will - is more important than the false conditions of the same word, a granfaloon. But I've learned there, at the wikipedia site, which anyone can edit as everyone knows, that granfaloon as a psychological technique existed before Vonegut's use of the word. And yet. And yet hierarchically, Vonnegut's definition of the word comes before the definition of the psychological technique in the wikipedia listing. That's interesting.

(Hey. You can't believe everything you read online. You know that, right? My doctor told me that. Vonnegut, by the way, didn't read things online. Beau says he loathed computers, which is too bad. He would have written a compelling blog.)

I can't remember which of his books I read after Deadeye Dick. But I've read them all. I've read them and read them and read them until the scenes and characters and themes from each began to swim and somersault and twist together in my mind.

Since that day my mind has been systematically processing every Kurt Vonegut-related reference into a single book. I don't know its title. What should we call it? I need a title for that one make-believe Vonnegut book that exists only in my creative earthling mind.

Naming things is hard. Babies. Books. Bands. A name puts a stop to one phase of a thing's creation. It defines a thing indefinitely. The name of a book, especially, is such a permanent thing. Bands break up and reunite and split into solo careers. Babies grow up and take nicknames and married names and professional names. Book titles always stay the same.

Vonnegut liked books. He thought it would be a shame if his grandchildren grew up without experiencing books. Again, we could blame the Internet. But there's nothing to blame. His grandchildren will always have books. And so will their grandchildren always have books. They will be green and hard-covered and stacked up the walls.

Vonnegut was not a religious man. He was a humanist, but he understood that the choice not to have faith was an option most often exercised by members of a privileged class. He felt lucky to have that option. In many other ways, he did not feel lucky. He warned us that the history and politics and societal trends in this country were not on the luckiest of streaks. We are rolling the dice with the current administration. I imagine that's what he would have said if he were asked to resort to this trite little metaphor I've gone and created here.

Despite (or maybe because of) his not being a religious man, nor a particularly patriotic man, Vonnegut had a strong sense of the need for community. This is a clear theme throughout his books. I don't get much of a kick out of politics myself, but I do get a kick out of religion. The part of my faith that I subscribe most strongly to is the social justice part, which clearly has a foundation in the human need for community.

Am I getting any closer to claiming Vonnegut as part of my karass? Probably not.

Ordinarily, I mark the passing of time in years. At night I mark the passing of time in minutes. In this earthling year 2007 I turned 34 and Vonnegut would have turned 85. He would have written out the word eighty-five instead of the number 85. Trained in AP style, I type the number 85. Vonnegut, himself was trained as a PR hack like me and didn't start writing novels until after he spent quite a few years in the PR business. This is nice to know. Even PR-hacks like me can still have hope.

Hooray for hope!

Vonnegut despised semi-colons. I don't have much use for them either. I tend to edit them out of the articles I've been tasked to improve. I do have a foundness for em-dashes, though. Upon a quick inspection of a few of his books, I would guess that Vonnegut found little use for em-dashes. Me - I tend to over-use them.

Hooray for em-dashes! 

Vonnegut said, "Tellers of stories with ink on paper, not that they matter anymore, have been either swoopers or bashers. Swoopers write a story quickly, higgledy-piggledy, crinkum-crankum, any which way. Then they go over it again painstakingly, fixing everything that is just plain awful or doesn't work. Bashers go one sentence at a time, getting it exactly right before they go on to the next one. When they're done they're done.

"I am a basher," he said, which surprised me. He said all of this, by the way, in Timequake, which he wrote with Kilgore Trout in 1996 when he (Vonnegut, not Trout) was 74. It was his last novel but not his last book.

Typically, I am a swooper. I tend to bash more when telling stories for work and swoop more when telling stories for this blog, which is also surprising. In this post, however, I have been bashing. (Strike that. It is now many, many earthing minutes later, and I am still swooping. I can't help myself.) 

The minutes of time that I'm marking here are getting away from me. I've intended all along to end this post with Vonnegut's three favorite quotes and to post-script it with the title of that all-encompassing, make-believe Vonnegut book I've been trying to name. I'll tell you right now that I came up with the title for that book in my own creative earthling mind somewhere in the middle of writing this post.

First, here are the quotes:

"How the hell did I do that?" - Ted Adler

"Who is it they say I am?" - Jesus

"We are here to help each other get through this thing, whatever it is." - Kurt Vonnegut Jr. (his son)

Hooray for Vonnegut!       

(That was it. The title of the make-believe Vonnegut book in my creative earthling mind is Hooray for Vonnegut! Did you recognize it?)

(Okay, sorry. One final self-referential plug. After this I'll be done. If you have any interest in reading the last post I wrote as a tribute to a dead author in the style of said dead author, you should go here.)

Some Good Stuff from Some Good Magazines

The little magazine I edit sometimes wins a little award or two. But these. These nominees are big. I want to read them all - but can't. Let's divide and conquer on the list. Scroll past the magazine nominees by circulation to get to the article nominees. Pick a story, read it and make a note in the comments if it's any good (or not).

I read Alice off the Page because I recognized the author's name. I think I saw him speak at OU once but I can't be sure. (Is he the guy that writes about food?) Anyway, it looks like the New Yorker is only publishing excerpts from the full article, which is a shame. I think I would like the article and Alice too if I could read the full piece about her.

I also read Is Bill Cunningham a Great American, because it was published in a regional Ohio magazine. If nothing else, it shows how blogging and other forms of online writing are influencing feature writing and other forms of print editorials. I don't know if the author Kathy  Wilson has a blog, but she should. She put herself in the middle of a profile piece, and that takes guts. The kind of guts you see in a blog - but typically not the kind of guts you see in regional magazines. And it works. Cunningham comes across as somehow likable and completely unlikeable at the same time, though I'm still not sure why Wilson likes him - or if she truly even does. I don't know him - but I know enough now to know that I wouldn't like Cunningham's radio show. Not for a minute. I also think he probably didn't like the feature when he read it. I wonder if he knew he was being interviewed by a liberal.

She Asked for It

Sarah's asking for opinions on two books: Life of Pi and Reading Lolita in Tehran. I'm having trouble posting my comment over there. I think I hit a word limit. So here's my response.

I like what Margalit says in her comment about Reading Lolita. And I'm not well-read in the two areas she mentions - the classics or non-fiction lit by Muslim women. While reading it, I felt that I would enjoy the book more if I had read more of the classics. It's really not a book about reading groups or even about books, though. It's a book about the Islamic revolution in Iran and the effects of the revolution on thinking women from many different backgrounds. Nafisi merely examines that period of time in her life and her friends' lives through the lens of classic literature. If you're going to read it, don't get hung up on remembering names of the characters or the books under discussion. I kept slowing myself down trying to remember all that before moving on to the next chapter. Don't. You'll get reintroduced to the books and the women again and again with plenty of detail, so you get to know them all very well eventually - without having to try too hard.

I think you know that I loved Life of Pi. I wrote about it here. My mom thought it was so-so. My friend Melinda led a book group at church that read it, and I think half of the folks in that group didn't even like it enough to finish it. And you have to finish it. The end is essential. Overall, I'd say you will like it if you're ambivalent about religion - if you're interested in and fascinated in the beliefs and myths of different faiths but have as many questions about faith as you do answers. If you are dogmatic about having faith or absolute about not having faith, or if you don't like to think about the effects of faith on our lives, then you probably won't be as interested. You also have to be prepared to spend some time on a boat. With a wild animal.

Another Dreaded Book Meme

More than anything, this little game has encouraged me to start keeping track of what I'm reading again. I've tried on and off to keep a reading log but always loose track after a few months and then regret it when I can't recall the titles of books I want to recommend or re-read or discuss later. Anyhow, Sarah put me up to this.

1. One book that changed your life. Can a book change your life? I'm not so sure. At the risk of sounding preachy, I'll re-mention the book that made me proud to call myself a Christian again: Reimagining Christianity by Alan Jones. As I've said elsewhere, you'll like it if you've been tempted to dismiss Christianity as a judgmental, patriarchal Western religion but - like me - have longed to see it as a mystical, metaphorical and compassionate process. 
2. One book that you’ve read more than once. Who was it that said an important trait of a critical reader is the ability to re-discover - and like - a book you disliked the first time around, and - alternatively - admit dislike for a book you've read with less enthusiasm the second time around? Was that just a literature prof I knew or some more well-known theorist? Anyway, The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck is my example of the former. Hated it in high school. Loved it in college. An example of the latter? How about an embarrassing one: Yesterday I Saw the Son: Poems by Ally Sheedy.
3. One book you’d want on a deserted island. Oh gosh. This one kills me every time. I think I'd most want a current anthology of post-modern spiritual essays. I've read and liked The Best American Spiritual Writing of 2004 and 2005. Assuming I won't leave for the island until next year, I'll take the 2006 version of that series along.
4. One book that made you laugh. Do you do this: read excerpts of the book you're absorbed in to your husband and expect him to laugh as well? Never works. Most recently? Don't Let's Go To the Dogs Tonight by  Alexandra Fuller. The best memoirs find comedy in the darkest of upbringings.
5. One book that made you cry. Most recently, Left to Tell by Immaculee Ilibagiza. I often cry while reading, but this one made me blubber.
6. One book you wish you’d written. The Life of Pi by Yann Martel. You love it or hate it. I loved it. The exposition, the timing, the details, the mysteries and - especially - the lingering questions.
7. One book you wish had never been written. Baby Wise by Gary Ezzo. I'm still deprogramming myself from reading that drivel nearly four years ago. Don't touch it.
8. One book you’re currently reading. Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi. I've been picking this up and putting it back down for more than a year. I re-read the first chapter at least five times before I plowed ahead and fell in love with the characters. The jacket and introductory chapter are misleading. You think it's going to focus solely on this group of women and their journey together, but it's truly and singularly Nafisi's memoir, which details the many ways her life has been touched by books - and by the people she's shared them with (including that core group of women but many others as well).
9. One book you’ve been meaning to read. Speaking of Sin by Barbara Brown Taylor. Two reasons. 1) I recently read and loved her memoir Leaving Church, and 2) I've written before about the hollowness of religious terms and the absence of true meaning in the way that so many of us talk robotically about our faith. Brown Taylor is one of those rare theologians who can move beyond those cliches and take us far deeper into the depths and mysteries of the words that many of us have chosen to describe our faith.
10. Tag people. Y'all know my standard tagging rules. Play along with me in the comments by picking one or two of the questions & posting your responses there. I will do one real tag this time too, since I recently started reading this farming and family blog written by an old high school friend who I suspect is also an avid reader. I'm not sure if he's reading this post, but if he is, maybe he'll play along on his blog.

It's All Local

Only local has been redefined. It's worth skimming past the NSync example to get to the meat of this article. The theory? Increases in consumer choices will be the death of the mega-hit (h/t Joe Levi).

In other words? Years ago, you liked what your neighbor liked but not necessarily what your cousin in Topeka liked. Then, communication technologies improved and enough people around the world liked enough of the same things to turn certain singers and TV shows and books and media outlets into worldwide hits. Now, technology has improved enough to offer (almost) everyone exactly what they want no matter where they're located. So your location doesn't limit your interests, and The Marketing Machine has less control over your interests. As a result, you decide what to listen to, watch and read based on what you like - without the limitations of geography or fashion.

Example? We like iMesh, and we've been downloading folk, country and bluegrass music like fiends. What do you like that you'd be less likely to enjoy if local media outlets were your only resources?

Blogging Advice from Usability Guru

Now even Jakob Nielsen's telling us how to blog. I do trust his status as a usability guru, but its hard to listen to Web design recommendations from someone whose site still looks like it was created in 1996. Too bad he's always right. Here's his list of the top 10 usability issues for blogs. I'm definitely failing at 5, 7, 8 and 10 - and occasionally failing at 3, 4 and 9.

For now I'm picking just one to fix - Classic Hits are Buried. This weekend, I'll plan to work on a list of classics, or favorite posts from AliBlog. Cast your vote now in the comments section and let me know which of my old posts you'd like to see on the list.

New Reading List from TIME

Check out TIME magazine's top 100 English-language novels from 1923 to the present. I've read a paltry 16, if you count the one that I listened to on tape (Animal Farm). There are two that I tried to read but couldn't finish (both the Bellow books I'm ashamed to admit, though I'll try again soon, because I think I wasn't in the mood at the time). And many on this list are also on my current 'to read' list. Right now, I'm reading Atonement.

How many have you read? Which do you hope to read soon? Who do you think is missing from the list? I was disappointed not to see anything from John Irving.

Lost at Sea

This weekend I was adrift on a life raft with my new friend Pi Patel and his pet tiger for 227 days. I hung on to the story to the very end, Pi fighting off the elements and me fighting off sleep so I could read on and on and on. And I will be dreaming about that boat and its inhabitants and their adventures for months to come.

I always start out thinking these stories of isolation will be slow. Boring. Empty. Alone.

Remember that Fed Ex movie with Tom Hanks and the volleyball on the island? I thought it would be torture to watch. An hour of him alone on an island with no one to talk to? Sure, he can act, but how could he possibly hold my interest? Turns out, the part on the island was the only part of the movie that held my interest. I never wanted him to leave that island.

And I never wanted Pi to leave his boat. I learned so much with Pi on that boat. I learned about human nature, animal instincts, aquatic life, extreme weather, true faith and so much more. I didn't want him to leave the boat, but paradoxically, I kept reading - in part - because I wanted to see him leave the boat.

And do you know where he is now? He's still on the boat. That's not a spoiler. It's a metaphor. Pi Patel is on the boat in the same way that Ken Kesey and his band of Merry Pranksters are still on the bus - eternally. He's there now with his three-toed sloth and his degree in divinity. He's there with his mother, father and brother. He's there with his many inclusive and contradictory views on life and how to live it. He'll be there forever in my dreams.

Typo of the Day

Duuuuude. They said reefer. That's funny.

Biblical Grrrrl Power

I tried reading All the Women of the Bible by Edith Deen but I was turned off by her thin, literal readings of the book's strong female characters - like this one:

After she had partaken of the forbidden fruit, she also gave it to Adam, and he too ate it, thus sharing in her guilt. In this act we have an excellent example of woman's impulsiveness and man's inclination to follow wherever she leads, even into sin.
...
Afterward, when Eve told God that "The serpent begged me, and I did eat," she displayed the natural tendency of women to blame, not herself for her wrongdoings, but those around her.

Tell me that doesn't make your blood boil: Eve, the archetypal woman depicted as weak, impulsive and dishonest. Worse, it's age-old, patriarchal interpretations like this one that will continue to turn people away from the true depth of the stories in the Bible.

By contrast, listen to some of the wonderful things Naomi Harris Rosenblatt says about Eve in her insightful new book, After The Apple:

It is Eve who forces open the gates of Eden so that all of us may benefit from the vast, perilous realm of human potential that lies beyond the confines of the Garden. It is her daring choice that unlocks the sexual knowledge essential to the creation of life.
...
Eve is the one who chooses knowledge over immortality ... [and] the narrative implies the trade-off of immortality for knowledge and experience is complete. When Adam and Eve become mortal, they become fully human. Death confers a sense of urgency to life; the fact of death tells us that whatever we do is important, that we must not procrastinate.
...
Eve is a trailblazer ... The women in the Bible are part of a long line of Eve's female descendants who use their powers as women to work everyday miracles in a patriarchal world.

In her re-telling of the story, Rosenblatt gives us the freedom to be proud - instead of ashamed - of Eve. She challenges us to re-examine the tired, old interpretations we've seen again and again about the mythical women in the Bible.

Now, instead of seeing Eve as weak and impulsive, I can see her as brave and introspective. I can view her actions as deliberate. I can see that perhaps the act of eating the apple was a rejection of her life in paradise and the result of her desire to transcend the limitations of the garden. And I can relate.

Don't you think that maybe under his robes even God was cheering Eve on? That maybe He was proud of her even as He doled out His punishment - like a strict father teaching his teenage daughter a lesson yet still respecting the decisions she's made.

And that's only the first chapter! I can't wait to read on, and to discover the hidden strengths of Sarah, Delilah, Abigail, Jezebel and the many other brave women living their lives outside the garden.

Bringing Up Robey

This is why I subscribe to the ParentCenter newsletter:

There'll be a time when the children's bodies are off limits to me — when I will have to do all my fond gazing while they're asleep because even the presence of my eyes on them will feel about as welcome and comfortable as a hair shirt. I think that's my biggest worry about the kids becoming teenagers: Not so much the smoking of something or other in a Dunkin Donuts employee bathroom or the various breathless gropings of underclothes, but this — this potential loss of access to the people I love most in the whole world.

It's an excerpt from this week's Bringing Up Ben & Birdie column by Catherine Newman. She usually makes me laugh, sometimes makes me cry and always makes me nod my head in understanding.

It's a sacrifice, but I put up with piles and piles of unheeded parenting advice and unneeded product advertisements clogging my inbox just so to be notified about her weekly journals. And it's worth it.

And as much as I enjoy reading her thoughts, I love hearing what her kids are saying even more. I am just fascinated with the way children express themselves.

Here she chronicles her family's sense of humor, wherein her son Ben says, "The thing that's so weird about Target? I feel like I want things I don't even want." and her two-year-old daugther says, "I a big girl! I go to fingergarden."

And here she describes her preschooler's crush on his friend Ava: "How was school today?" you ask Ben, and he says, "Good. Ava and I hugged ourselves down to the ground, and then we hugged ourselves back up."

Robey's classmates hug like this too. They're so loveable, these kids. And their hugs are so sincere. Robey will be playing and playing and playing, then just stop what he's doing mid hammer swing or mid block tower or even mid Elmo dance, and run over to hug me. For no reason. I'm just sitting there on the couch reading my book and he scurries over with hugs and love pats for free. And then he'll do it again five minutes later. And I'm squeezing back everytime - taking in as much of him while I still have access, because I know I'll never get enough.

Reading Suggestions?

I'm looking for book group suggestions. The group meets weekly at our church and is composed primarily of progressive-thinking Christians. I am - by far - the youngest person in the group. The last two books we read were God's Politics and Gilead, so we're looking for another change of pace but still something with a spiritual theme. Here's my list of options so far:

• The Eyes of the Heart by Frederick Buechner
• The Life of Pi by Yann Martel
• In the Beauty of the Lilies by John Updike
• The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
• Innocent Darkness by Edward Sheehan

If you have any better suggestions or if you've read any of the above, leave a comment or send a note. Thanks!

They Will be Missed

They were young, mostly. And productive. And living full lives. They were citizens of the world from Australia, Poland, Nigeria, France and many other countries - not just the UK. They will be missed by their families, their friends, and even by the many strangers they would have encountered if their own lives had not been cut short so violently and abruptly.

In reading these brief bios, I just can't get over the average age of the victims. So many of them were single and starting new jobs. I know this is an over-generalization, but most of the stories I remember reading about the victims of 9/11 were stories of middle-aged professionals who left behind spouses and children and years on the job.

In these bios from London, however, I'm struck by how many had not yet married or raised children or spent years dedicating themselves to a single field, and somehow that saddens me even more than the sure grief of losing a spouse, a father or a mother - because they never had the chance to be any of those things. And the true loss of that potential is heartbreaking. 

Also, I'm wondering - is there a site like this that provides similar information for victims of terrorism around the world? Because I'd hate to forget that there are young, productive people dying in Iraq and Israel and Afghanistan too, and in so many other regions around the world where terror is still a constant, daily threat at levels we can't begin to imagine.

(hat tip: ambivablog)

Baby Bliss

College roomie Amy Buringrud wrote the current feature over at Motherhood Magazine's online edition, a lovely little essay that describes what she was least expecting from motherhood: complete and utter bliss.

Right now, while postpartum depression and the baby blues (both very real conditions to which I can attest) are hot media items, it's nice to be reminded about the joys of parenthood:

... I find myself admiring my baby’s profile in the middle of the night. And then there’s the fact that I’m not usually a spontaneous dancer, but now I waltz around the house with her in my arms to just about any song on the radio, the theme songs to sitcoms, and the next-door punk band’s riotous practice sessions. On top of all this, I sing ridiculous, made-up songs at totally inappropriate times (like when there’s someone else in the room).

Don't let her fool you, though - I remember impromptu dancing and singing from her on more than one occasion in our little dorm room in O'Bleness Hall. Of course, now it's blissful, baby-inspired dancing instead of wacky, drink-inspired dancing. And what a difference it is.

In the Beginning

Go read about the voice of the Internet that started it all.  I'm only half way through this article but fascinated with it in many ways. I never visited, but it sounds like Suck.com was the precursor to personal writing for the Web, anonymous ranting online and even this innovative use of hyperlinking that makes the Internet what it is today.

This was in 1995, which isn't that long ago, yet everything was so different. I was using a Mac at the time in the university's computer lab but hadn't yet written my first e-mail or even surfed the Web. Can you imagine how much things will change in the next 10 years - I can't.

(Hat tip: Writing for the Web)

Second Time Around

I'm looking forward to re-reading Marilynne Robinson's Gilead over the next few weeks with my book group. This time through, I'll be reading with an eye towards imagery and an ear towards the rhythms of the narrator's words.

On my first reading of this tidy little story, I read quickly, focusing on the action - what little there is - and on the theme of forgiveness. This time, I plan to slow down and look for the larger symbolic themes conveyed through the narrator's father and grandfather.

The notes I made for this reading are pasted below.

Themes to consider while reading:

• The gifts and influences of our fathers (and other father figures).
• The significance of beauty in everyday life.
• The presence of healing and grace in the midst of sickness and concern.
• The symbolic importance of the narrator’s father and grandfather.

Questions to ask while reading:

• What counts as genuine prophecy? Genuine vision? Genuine faith?
• What can we learn from our children that we cannot learn from our fathers?
• What statements – if any – is Robinson making about Protestantism today?

And now my questions for you - what books have you enjoyed re-reading lately and what did you notice the second time around?

Unpolished Apples

Writing in Brain, Child Magazine, Jody Mace explains why - sometimes - it's hard to be frustrated with your child's shortcomings. If you've ever snacked before dinner, relied too heavily on technology or slept in too late -- and then disciplined your child for these same behaviors -- you'll relate to her essay The Apple and the Tree. Here's an excerpt:

When I discipline my kids, sometimes I feel like I'm just going through the motions. Can I really expect them to overcome things that I can't? Am I just playing at the role of the grown-up when inside I want to binge on pudding, abuse the Internet, stay in bed until ten a.m.? Is there no hope for them? Or with my training and instruction, no matter how forced it feels to me, might they defeat their demons early in life? I don't know, but I do the responsible thing and correct them when I should, even if I'm really just as bad as they are.

I was rarely disciplined as a child, and - for the most part - I seem to be emulating my mother's casual, easy-going parenting style. In our home, we do try to enforce some structure throughout the day, but I realized early on that you can't expect a toddler to have more of a routine than you do.

Like Mace, I see that most of Robey's bad habits are my own. Lately, I've been eating fig newtons everyday between breakfast and lunch. Sometimes, I demand more attention than I deserve. Always, I find at least a few last-minute activities to push my bedtime an hour or so later than I had intended.

When we try to eradicate these behaviors in our children, are we really doing it for their benefit, or are we trying to save them from the unrefined pieces of ourselves that we see in them?

For Mace it's a matter of polishing and acceptance -- polishing those weaknesses when we can and accepting the others, both in ourselves and in our children, which sounds like a good theory to me.

Around here, our apples aren't over-shined, but they're not bruised and battered either. For the most part, we take them as they are right off the tree.

No Tiny Pleasures Here

After starting -- then putting down -- Bill Bryson's The Lost Continent: Travels in Small-Town America this past fall, I've finally picked it back up and read the last few chapters.

One of my favorite parts is his dead-on description of the money-eating machines in Las Vegas. Bryson starts out with $10 worth of quarters, plays for awhile, then gets $10 more. Before giving up, he decides to go in for one last bucket of change.

... I went and got another $10 worth of quarters, and started feeding them in. I won some and lost some. I was beginning to realize that there was a certain pattern to it: for every four quarters I put in, I would on average get three back, sometimes in a bunch, sometimes in dribbles. My right arm began to ache a little. It was boring really, pulling the handle over and over, watching the wheels spin and thunk, thunk, thunk, spin and thunk, thunk, thunk. With my last quarter I won $3 worth of quarters, and was mildly disappointed because I had been hoping to go for dinner and now here I had a mittful of quarters again. So I dutifully fed the quarters into the machine and won some more money. This really was getting tiresome. Finally, after about thirty minutes I got rid of the last quarter and was able to go and look for a restaurant.

On the way out my attention was caught by a machine making a lot of noise. A woman had just won $600. For ninety seconds the machine just poured out money, a waterfall of silver ... I felt sorry for her. It was going to take her all night to get rid of that kind of money.

For those of you who enjoy Vegas, don't take offense. No city, town or state is safe from Bryson's biting acerbity. Here's what he has to say about Ohio:

In the morning I awoke early and experienced that sinking sensation that overcomes you when you first open your eyes and realize that instead of a normal day ahead of you, with its scatterings of simple gratifications, you are going to have a day without even the tiniest of pleasures; you are going to drive across Ohio.

Ouch. And if you think that's bad, you should read what he has to say about his own home state of Iowa.

It's a funny read, but not nearly as enjoyable as my favorite Bryson book, A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail. This buddy adventure story offers as many laughs as Hunter S. Thompson's Las Vegas buddy adventure, minus the drugs, drink, fast cars and wild women. (Thunk, thunk, thunk, spin and thunk, thunk, thunk). And yet, somehow, Bryson's walk in the woods is just as intriguing (and at times just as maddening) as Thompson's descent into the depths of Vegas.

Lessons in Filmmaking and Writing

"All writing is presumptuous. You're presuming that you know something that someone wants to hear."
~John Sayles

I've been enjoying the book John Sayles: Interviews, edited by Diane Carson, on many levels -- as a writer, an interviewer and a fan.

Since I came to Sayles fandom very late in the game -- after renting Men with Guns on a lark a few years ago -- this book is providing at least as much insight into the genius and diversity of my favorite director as I've gained from watching his early movies.

Plus, many of the interviews, which span from 1981 to 1998, recall an earlier era in the history of celebrity journalism when the Q&A wasn't the dominate form of reporting. Instead, reporters spent more time fleshing out their stories with observations, research and other telling details -- some more expertly than others.

A quick read of the ledes in this book can give you an easy comparison of good and bad writing. Take the following examples.

The first is from a 1983 feature in the Philadelphia Inquirer by Rick Lyman titled "Sayles Talk."

The air is very rarefied here. You need collateral to take a breath.

The sound of fine china meeting silverware tinkles delicately in the lightly scented air while tuxedoed waiters move in watchful glide patterns around the cloth-draped tables. The rich smell of coffee fills the dining room while tall windows framed by scrupulously tended plants offer a sumptuous view of a private waterfall.

In stalks the genius ...

...his brown corduroys, well-worn, stop just above a pair of ragged tennis shoes. His shirt, also light brown ... is most definitely not button-down. In fact, there are not buttons at all, just shiny snaps, in the urban-cowboy motif. His hair, pulled back behind his ears, sprays out at the nape of his neck like the bristles of a broom that has seen too many seasons.

The second is from a 1985 feature in the Buffalo News by Robert Seidenberg titled, simply, "John Sayles."

In the movie world, John Sayles is a maverick.

He writes dozens of horror and sci-fi genre flicks, finances and makes his own deeply personal films and writes prize-winning fiction. Rather than coasting down the Hollywood mainstream, he chooses to duck in and out of less-traveled roads, leaving a distinct imprint on all that he touches.

And Sayles has not only forged new territory -- and helped pave the potholed sidestreets of American independent filmmaking for those who follow. He has, by most standards, attained success.

Now I know my writing can be heavy handed at times, but that first excerpt is a textbook example in the over use of modifiers. I even removed three paragraphs of additional scene setting from the center of that excerpt without losing my point. The second excerpt tells us more with half as many words AND introduces the main subject five paragraphs sooner.

The first author is trying -- quite hard -- to make a comparison between the standard characteristics of the rich and successful and the humility of Sayles. And we get it ... but we don't get much about Sayles and his films until we're 300 words into the article.

But now I think this post is becoming awfully presumptuous itself. Just because the technical nuances of good copy writing fascinate me, it's presumptuous to assume anyone else cares enough to read a long blog post on the subject ... especially when you started out thinking you were going to learn something about John Sayles.

So, I'll conclude with two more telling excerpts that will give you a better sense of who he is. Beyond that, watch the movies. Read the book. Or read any of Sayles' own books. It's all good stuff, I promise.

... The common thread in Sayles' films is an abiding generosity of spirit and an eagerness to explore the human experience.

That's from a 1987 Asbury Park Press article by Eleanor O'Sullivan and it sums up succinctly why Sayles is my favorite movie man.

The next is a quick Q&A excerpt from The Seidenberg article mentioned above, which illustrates the absolute simplicity of what makes Sayles tick.

Q: Does The Brother then signal any sort of change of direction for your filmmaking, away from more personal stories like Seacaucus Seven and Liana?

A: Not at all. It's just that I thought up this idea and wanted to make a movie out of it and I did ...

Ahhhh ... if only it were that easy for the rest of us!

Rock on, ThPM

These people sound so cool. If I lived in the Pacific Norhwest, I would so want to paint bathrooms, bake cakes, drink beer and worship God with them. Their cultivator Rachelle has a great blog that says (among other things) all our prophets are rock stars.

All About Books Survey

New blogfriend amba had this survey on her blog yesterday & invited others to play along. My responses are below.

1.) You're stuck inside Fahrenheit 451. Which book do you want to be? This question's asking what book I'd sign on to memorize for The Cause. My answer is Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver - with a short explanation: I'm unduly influenced by a two-year addiction to books-on-tape that I developed during my commuter days. I love Kingsolver's sing-song voice, so I'll volunteer to listen to her reading of this book over and over until I've memorized every lyrical sentence with the same inflections.

2.) Have you ever had a crush on a fictional character? Most recently, Homer in John Updike's The Cider House Rules

3.) The last book you bought was...? For my mother-in-law's birthday on Friday, I purchased Gilead by Marilynne Robinson. (As an aside, you know you live in a small town when you inquire about a recent Pulitzer-prize-winning novel at the local mall's only book store and the clerk looks at you as if you're crazy for assuming it would be in stock.)

4.) The last book you read was...?
Reimagining Christianity by Alan Jones

6.) Five books you would take to a desert island... When Jeromy and I departed for our three-month road trip around the U.S. ten years ago, I packed three milk crates full of books that elbowed out important space in the Trooper, which should have been reserved for more camping gear. I won't make the same mistake when I pack for The Desert Island. So I'll be practical and optimistic, taking books I'll need and a few others I've been waiting to read for years:

• The John McPhee Reader
• Traveling Mercies by Anne Lamott
• The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
• Mystics and Zen Masters by Thomas Merton
• SAS Survival Handbook (that's SAS as in special forces, not software, shoes or planes)

7.) Who are you passing this stick on to and why? Tiffer, so we can hear what she's reading on her Palm lately. She and all my other blogless friends are invited to answer one or more (or all) of the questions in the comments section of this post.

Language Confusion

Have you heard about Globish -- the 1500 words you should know to better communicate with international colleagues? This article explains it well, but good luck finding the actual list at the Globish Web site, which doesn't appear to be written in English OR Globish but rather French. I'm confused.

For a site that is designed to ease language confusion, check out Confusing Words. You'll learn the difference between rough and ruff; peruse and scan; and further and farther. Strangely, the word man is listed as the fifth most confusing word. Apparently it gets confused with male and masculine.

Now I'm confused again. Man ought not be more confusing than nought and naught.

Here's What You're Supposed to Do with a Blog

Thought I'd try going the traditional route and provide a sampling of the sites I visit throughout the day today.

Something from the Parent Center to grab your attention: Turns out men who do more housework have better sex lives. Pay attention, guys. Do the dishes, clean the tub and vacuum the floor ... and you might get some.

Andrew Sullivan on the controversy surrounding Terri Schiavo's life/death: "What we have lost today is the prudence and moderation of old moral teaching."

Googling lots of terms for an article on genomic research: haplotype, multifactorial diseases and the expectation-maximum algorithm. Then I found this great little glossary for genetic terms.

Later, I ended up in wikipedia browsing common religious references that could take lifetimes to ponder: Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes, Halakha.

And, finally, I was sad to hear that yet another favorite writer - Saul Bellow - has died. He doesn't fit into Michelle's cowboy poet category, but his writing contained a true "human understanding and subtle analysis of contemporary culture." That's according to the Nobel Prize committee in 1976. I tend to agree.

Our Most Pressing Water Issues

Southwest Hydrology, the trade magazine I helped launch while in Tucson, has a great new Web site. The magazine's story is one of two people (Hi Betsy! Hi Howard!) seeing a need for a communication vehicle and taking it solely upon themselves to envision, plan and publish a magazine that drew in large numbers of advertisers, subscribers and editorial contributors from the very first issue.

They teamed up with SAHRA and the University of Aizona a few years later, and the content keeps getting stronger. You can check out past issues here or subscribe for free here.

Long Live the Good Doctor

I've spent the last twelve hours, with a sick toddler attached to my hip, digging through boxes in the basement, trying to find the research paper I wrote on Hunter S. Thompson in 1995 for an Advanced Magazine Editing course at Ohio University. But our demented system of sorting and filing and stacking and stowing shit in that nether region of this house leaves much to be desired.

Instead, I'm holding an essay on The Gina Kolata NY Times scandal (written long before we'd ever heard of Jayson Blair), an annotated bibliography on nonverbal communication, and a long, dry paper on the balanced scorecard method of integrated management. Useless, all of it. Boring, useless academic crap in this time of mourning that requires sharp insight, vivid memories and imaginative scratchings on bar-room napkins.

To make matters worse, all of my books are still stowed away in boxes too. Since we've yet to build book shelves, we still have dozens and dozens of boxes filled with books, stacked to the ceiling, and all of my favorite HST writings, which I'd like to revisit tonight, are buried somewhere deep, deep within the heap.

Damn you, Hunter S. Thompson for putting a gun to your head and pulling the trigger at a time when I can't even find the pieces of you that I most admire. Why can't I just go to the book shelf and pull out dog-eared copies of my favorite HST books, along with a few unauthorized biographies and some personal papers that summarize the madness and vigor and unrest of your life and writings, your contribution to the craft of reporting, and your influence on my own twisted education?

Instead, I'm stuck here in my cold, wet basement, surrounded by tattered boxes and theoretical masters' theses on empty, pointless topics. It's all garbage that hardly seems worth saving at this point. Who's going to die next and leave me without the proper filing system to write a salient and proper send-off? Ken Kesey? Spalding Gray? The Brown Buffalo? Oh shit - they're all dead too and I've already lost my chance.

Here's what I have after a deep, mad dive into the basement of doom: only a pile of reviews written by my peers after I presented my theories on how to edit challenging writers for that J-school course -- with HST as my example. So I'll leave you with their comments, which summarize something, I think ... something about young, adventure-starved writerly types who dream of road trips to Vegas, bylines in Rolling Stone and Tetradactyls in flight:

Fear and Loathing has been on my reading list for years ... now I'm putting it at the top of my priority summer reading list. I like the concept of Gonzo journalism, blending fact and fiction to get to the heart of things. I think I need to do more drugs. - Lynn

I haven't read any HST STILL, even though he was first recommended to me when I was 13 or 14. But he continues to pervade my life and seems to be a very power-full, energy-full person. He's on my list of books to take with me to Europe now .. I've always feared reading him to tell the truth, because I've secretely been afraid that I'd find him too male and too drug-oriented. In any case, I guess it's finally time for me to get around to him. - Mary

The easy thing to do with a writer like Hunter Thompson is study his quirks, laugh or gasp a bit and be done with it. You, however, did something much more subtle, trying to understand why other professionals put up with him. What does he have that's worth the trouble? The answer is in the writing, and I think you gave us a flavor of his thinking and prose. But more than that, you gave us a deeper appreciation of what editing is. It's putting up with some real crap sometimes, and that's worth thinking about. Terrific presentation. It was funny, well-supported with examples and very subtle. - Professor Westfall.

I still think you should have gone up there and said, "In the strong tradition of HST, let's screw the presentation and go get some peoyte!" I wish we all could get away with what Hunter does. - Anonymous

An absolute extremist, Thompson approached his writing the same way he did his life -- driving himself straight into the storm of it with the windows down, the radio blaring and the accelerator glued to the floor. Thank God he took us all along for the ride.

p.s. Thanks to Gabe for the title of this post. I'll pay you back this weekend in peyote and mezcal.

p.p.s. In case it needs explaining, this post was written in true Gonzo spirit with an intentionally singular point of view and just a few liberties taken in the description of events.

The First Contact Experience

This article from Outside magazine, describing adventure trips that take high-paying travelers into the jungles of Papua New Guinea to observe primitive peoples in their natural environment, is one of the most disturbing things I've ever read.

Paying an experienced tracker to lead you into the natural habitats of elepahants, tigers and cheetahs is one thing. But this. This is shameful and indecent. It's tacky and embarassing. And it's just plain wrong. 

But is it for real? That's a question Michael Behar, the author and one of the adventure tourists in the group, poses early in the article. Honestly, though, does it really matter? Especially when we all know from countless world history classes that:

From Columbus to Captain Cook, the clash of modern and primitive has almost always led to disaster for native people, in the form of warfare, colonization, disease, and economic exploitation.

While many of our predecessors have approached past "encounters" with noble ideals -- trumpeting Civilization and Christianity -- the end result, more often than not, is a fight for property and natural resources.

Is it any better that these modern, amateur anthropologists have no agenda in mind? What draws them to the jungle is, at best, a craving for adventure and, at worst, a need to tell The Best Vacation Story Ever at next Thursday's happy hour.

The justification for the endeavor, from the guide Woolford, is laughable:

The way Woolford sees it, the scholarly elite, once the gatekeepers of discovery, are having to make room for any adventure seeker who can pay for the experience. To him, the First Contact expedition is a means to further democratize the process.

Democratize the process of discovery? In what way is he contributing to that process? And how democratic is it really if said adventure seeker is paying thousands and thousands of dollars to "participate" in the process?

Behar makes it a point to describe how much love and affection Woolford has for the region, but he also details Woolford's strong drive to please his deep-pocketed clients. Yet Woolford sees no conflict of interest.

Woolford, my dear, the whole idea is a conflict of interest.

More on the Tsunami

While the press have stayed primarily focused on the dollars and cents and on the shock value of the Tsunami, it seems that some of the details about what's happening in the aftermath have been lost. Below are excerpts from a public briefing earlier this month, given by USAID Administrator Andrew S. Natsios, who had recently returned from the region.

First, a poignant description of the long-term psychological effects  of the disaster:

... we are dealing with a population that has been severely traumatized. Many of the people have lost most of their extended families, their neighborhoods, all their friends, schools that the children would go to, all their businesses, livelihoods, jobs are all lost. And so people are going into shock -- some of them -- psychologically. And you can't see it from a distance, but when you talk to them you realize that they're not entirely aware of what's happening to them; their psychological state is such.

And we are beginning to, through the NGOs and working with the ministries of health, to prepare counseling that will allow some of the families, particularly the children, to deal with what they've been through because they will -- most of them will never finish dealing with these memories their entire lives and we need to understand that it's not just what you see, but what is behind the tragedy in people's minds and memories that count as well.

It's refreshing to learn that Natsios sees those counseling efforts as the top priority in this stage of relief. The second and third priorities, he says, are to get businesses back up and running and to continue providing shelter. 

On a positive note, he reminds us that the the United States' role in providing assistance is to support the local governments, many of whom already have disaster plans in place:

These are all democratically elected governments. They have competent ministries. They can do this. They have their own disaster management agencies in existence in three of the four countries. And so our job is to support them. We need to make sure we are sensitive to the fact these are sovereign governments. We are not going in there to take anything over, we're simply helping them in doing the work they're doing.

You get good news straight from the source when you take the time to read these types of briefings, but who has time to read transcripts and watch C-SPAN all day. Plus, it always frustrates me (even as one who conducts interviews for a living and is guilty of the same crime) to read the questions from the press at the end, and to see that the themes for their stories were decided long before they entered the briefing. Even the answers they're looking for are planned out in their heads long before they ask the questions.

Richland County's Drug Wars

Small-town newspapers catch a lot of slack for poor reporting, conservative editorials and out-of-date news. Last week, however, the Mansfield News Journal ran a touching and well-reported series on drug use in Richland County, with honest coverage and moving profiles. I especially like that it focused on the people and the treatment issues more so than the law enforcement concerns. Some of these articles should be required reading for teens in the area and for parents of teens. In fact, if you have a teen, read it with them and discuss it. If you are a teen and you want to discuss it, talk to your parents. Or talk to your teachers. Or send me an e-mail.

Poker ... I hardly know her

Okay, all you gamblers, gamers and Celebrity Poker fans. What are the top "tells" when reading fellow players? According to a survey (pdf) of professional and amateur players conducted by Harrah's, the No. 1 tell is a demeanor of nervousness or excitement.

Amateurs might take a few hints from the pros who rank tells in this order of importance:

1. Nervousness/excitement
2. General mannerisms
3. Betting patterns
4. Talking/verbal expressions
5. Eyes/eye movement
6. Body language/body movement

Amateurs, however, rank tells as follows:

1. Body language/body movement
2. Hand shaking/movement
3. Nervousness/excitement
4. General mannerisms
5. Eyes/eye movement
6. Betting patterns

Other differences between professionals and amateurs?

• Amateur players like jackpot games almost twice as much as professionals.
• Professionals are more likely to play for the money instead of recreation, hobby or fun.
• Professionals are twice as likely to be self-taught poker players vs. amateurs who have primarily been taught by a family member or friend.

In the same document (pdf) from Harrah's, you'll learn that casino gambling is a popular pastime for more than a quarter of U.S. adults. In fact, more than 53.4 million Americans (26% of those 21 or older) gambled at a casino in 2003.

I was also surprised to see that the differences between casino gamblers and non-gamblers are fairly minor. Here are a few revealing differences, though:

• Casino gamblers are more politically active and tend to be more connected to community groups, particularly volunteer, fraternal, union and political groups, while non-gamblers are more active in religious groups.
• Casino gamblers and non-gamblers are both more likely to volunteer for religious and education groups than any other types of organizations, however.
• Gamblers are more likely than non-gamblers to have a variety of common investments.
• Casino gamblers like to travel in style and are more likely than non-gamblers to book upscale accommodations when they vacation and more likely to schedule a wide range of vacation experiences.