Friday, September 30, 2005
miss rumphius
One of my favorite picture books of all time is Miss Rumphius. It tells the story of a woman whose father tells her that, before she dies, she must do something to make the world more beautiful.
For the past three days, my daughter has been at home with a horrible ear infection. Yesterday, an elderly couple from the church called to ask if they could stop by to visit her. I told Lily that they were coming over, and that the woman was the person I would choose to be my Nana if I could. I told Lily that they remind me of Miss Rumphius.
A few hours later, they arrived with a Barnes and Noble bag. The husband sat on the couch next to Lily and read to her from a copy of Lilly's Purple Plastic Purse that they had picked out as a get well gift. Lily curled her legs under her nightgown and read some of the words as he pointed them out. He paused, and asked her questions about the pictures as he read.
It seems so simple - stopping by for a few minutes to bring a book and read to a sick child. It's not the sort of grand gesture that wins humanitarian awards and recongition. But in my entire life, I don't think I have ever seem anyone do something so beautiful.
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Tuesday, September 27, 2005
soundtrack
For those of you interested in the marriage of cinematography and soundtrack, Cameron Crowe has written a very good essay.
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Monday, September 26, 2005
little shop of stories
Things I've been enjoying this month::
Cotton Candy
The beautiful people behind Jakes Ice Cream have opened a combination children's bookstore and old fashioned ice cream parlor called Little Shop of Stories. Words can not express my love. It is perfect.
Picture books have always been one of my very favorite things. We have recently discovered three very good ones.
Skippyjon Jones is about a Siamese Kitten that wants to be a Chihuahua, and it will probably end up being Lily's favorite book. She even wants a Shippyjon Jones birthday party.
Random House has published a relatively cheap (just over ten bucks in hardback) anthology of the beautiful Little Golden Books illustrated by Eloise Wilkins. I remember these from my childhood.
My favorite book as a child was the story of a little boy who made friends with the monster that lived in his closet. (Good Night Orange Monster). A few years ago, I worked in a bookstore with a man that had a rare book finding business on the side, and I had him get me a copy. Just last week, I discovered a new book called Leonardo The Terrible Monster. It is not quite as good as Orange Monster, but it is pretty darn close.
Finally, this is my new favorite shirt. For the men out there - it would make a nice gift for the reading woman in your life.
Cotton Candy
The beautiful people behind Jakes Ice Cream have opened a combination children's bookstore and old fashioned ice cream parlor called Little Shop of Stories. Words can not express my love. It is perfect.
Picture books have always been one of my very favorite things. We have recently discovered three very good ones.
Skippyjon Jones is about a Siamese Kitten that wants to be a Chihuahua, and it will probably end up being Lily's favorite book. She even wants a Shippyjon Jones birthday party.
Random House has published a relatively cheap (just over ten bucks in hardback) anthology of the beautiful Little Golden Books illustrated by Eloise Wilkins. I remember these from my childhood.
My favorite book as a child was the story of a little boy who made friends with the monster that lived in his closet. (Good Night Orange Monster). A few years ago, I worked in a bookstore with a man that had a rare book finding business on the side, and I had him get me a copy. Just last week, I discovered a new book called Leonardo The Terrible Monster. It is not quite as good as Orange Monster, but it is pretty darn close.
Finally, this is my new favorite shirt. For the men out there - it would make a nice gift for the reading woman in your life.
Labels: save as draft
Friday, September 23, 2005
music for changing leaves
I've been snarky about the movie Elizabethtown because it strikes me as a Garden State rip-off, and I was not terribly fond of Garden State. But perhaps I am just being judgmental.
In any event, despite my lukewarm reaction to the film itself, the soundtrack to Garden State was one of my favorite things to listen to last fall. The nice people behind Elizabethtown have put together a similarly autumnal mix of music and are streaming the whole thing free online. I've been listening for two days.
(Disclaimer for the moms of kids old enough to repeat the f-word - track five has bad language, you might want to turn it down when you get there.)
In any event, despite my lukewarm reaction to the film itself, the soundtrack to Garden State was one of my favorite things to listen to last fall. The nice people behind Elizabethtown have put together a similarly autumnal mix of music and are streaming the whole thing free online. I've been listening for two days.
(Disclaimer for the moms of kids old enough to repeat the f-word - track five has bad language, you might want to turn it down when you get there.)
Labels: save as draft
Tuesday, September 20, 2005
speed
Everyone called my grandfather by the name Speed, which was a joke that went over my head as a child. He and my grandmother lived in a two bedroom, one bath house in Gulfport, Florida. It had windows that cranked open and no air conditioning. The unpaved alley behind their house was lined with broken bits of shell. My grandfather had dug a garden in the yard, planting seeds in the power-soft grey sand as if it was dirt, as if he still lived in Kentucky.
As a child, it never seemed as incongruous as it was - my grandfather's vegetable garden planted next to a tropical banana tree. I did not like vegetables, but I admired the bananas and asked for them. He always refused to get one down, and stopped me the one time I tried to knock them by throwing grapefruit like Gilligan would have done. They were up too high, he said and I sensed something like contempt in his voice - a disapproval of the fruit growing wild near the telephone lines. He silently walked the rows in his garden, barefoot and shirtless, like a chief. He harvested fat purple eggplants, thin green onions, sweet corn, and sturdy beans that my grandmother paid me to snap the ends off of. I sat on the concrete steps with a metal colander in my lap and longed for dusk or lightning, anything that might crack the shimmering surface of the heat.
Each year, we visited for a week in the summer and three days over Thanksgiving. In November, we carried wrapped Christmas gifts with us. Each year, we bought my grandfather the same gifts: the latest western by Louis Lamour. a box of ribbon candy that looked magical but tasted like medicine, and a carton of discount brand cigarettes. My grandfather drank beer and smoked cigarettes, two things that were not allowed in my house. Once, he offered me a taste of the forbidden drink and I lifted up the plastic cup and allowed a tiny sip of the lukewarm liquid to slide past my clenched teeth. It reminded me of feeling trapped, of sweat and urine and my grandfather's ashtrays. No matter how many times I have tried to drink beer since then, no matter how ice cold or imported the bottle has been, I've never been able to force myself to consume more than a few swallows.
In the evenings, my grandfather sat in a fake leather recliner and watched baseball games on a small television set. Every now and then, he would let me climb onto his lap and he would sketch small pictures with a ball point pen on a legal pad. He drew wild-eyed men, hairless and bare-chested, clutching lizards and snakes in their hands. He gave them vowel-laden, Cherokee names and told me that he knew these creatures when he was a boy. He'd give me the drawings as a gift, and later, my parents would take them from me and remove them from the room so that I could sleep as they reassured me that his stories were make-believe. Sometimes, my grandfather would sing a song for my brother and I, inserting our names in his rhyme: A-my Miller ain't no good, chop her up for kindlin' wood. I always understood that he meant it affectionately, but it still made me walk backwards when I left the room.
My grandfather had been a house painter. As a younger man, he had taken the leftover cans of paint home and used them to paint pictures. He stacked the portraits in the garage, because the combination of colors gave them a slightly nauseating effect. Skin held a discomforting undertone of the Pepto-Bismo pink that was a popular house color in 1950's Florida. The blue contained a hint of neon. His art was painted with the colors of signs and shops, not people. When he died, nobody could bring themselves to keep the pictures.
I remember my grandfather shirtless, skin tanned deep to the color of dark red clay. I picture him outside, watering his vegetables that grew because he knew to add fish heads to the foreign earth. I see him sitting in the fluorescent kitchen light, playing cards at night. I remember his black vinyl chair - the end table at the arm that held a used ashtray and cup, and the space beneath that held a book of crossword puzzles and paperback westerns. Cowboys and Indians.
As a child, it never seemed as incongruous as it was - my grandfather's vegetable garden planted next to a tropical banana tree. I did not like vegetables, but I admired the bananas and asked for them. He always refused to get one down, and stopped me the one time I tried to knock them by throwing grapefruit like Gilligan would have done. They were up too high, he said and I sensed something like contempt in his voice - a disapproval of the fruit growing wild near the telephone lines. He silently walked the rows in his garden, barefoot and shirtless, like a chief. He harvested fat purple eggplants, thin green onions, sweet corn, and sturdy beans that my grandmother paid me to snap the ends off of. I sat on the concrete steps with a metal colander in my lap and longed for dusk or lightning, anything that might crack the shimmering surface of the heat.
Each year, we visited for a week in the summer and three days over Thanksgiving. In November, we carried wrapped Christmas gifts with us. Each year, we bought my grandfather the same gifts: the latest western by Louis Lamour. a box of ribbon candy that looked magical but tasted like medicine, and a carton of discount brand cigarettes. My grandfather drank beer and smoked cigarettes, two things that were not allowed in my house. Once, he offered me a taste of the forbidden drink and I lifted up the plastic cup and allowed a tiny sip of the lukewarm liquid to slide past my clenched teeth. It reminded me of feeling trapped, of sweat and urine and my grandfather's ashtrays. No matter how many times I have tried to drink beer since then, no matter how ice cold or imported the bottle has been, I've never been able to force myself to consume more than a few swallows.
In the evenings, my grandfather sat in a fake leather recliner and watched baseball games on a small television set. Every now and then, he would let me climb onto his lap and he would sketch small pictures with a ball point pen on a legal pad. He drew wild-eyed men, hairless and bare-chested, clutching lizards and snakes in their hands. He gave them vowel-laden, Cherokee names and told me that he knew these creatures when he was a boy. He'd give me the drawings as a gift, and later, my parents would take them from me and remove them from the room so that I could sleep as they reassured me that his stories were make-believe. Sometimes, my grandfather would sing a song for my brother and I, inserting our names in his rhyme: A-my Miller ain't no good, chop her up for kindlin' wood. I always understood that he meant it affectionately, but it still made me walk backwards when I left the room.
My grandfather had been a house painter. As a younger man, he had taken the leftover cans of paint home and used them to paint pictures. He stacked the portraits in the garage, because the combination of colors gave them a slightly nauseating effect. Skin held a discomforting undertone of the Pepto-Bismo pink that was a popular house color in 1950's Florida. The blue contained a hint of neon. His art was painted with the colors of signs and shops, not people. When he died, nobody could bring themselves to keep the pictures.
I remember my grandfather shirtless, skin tanned deep to the color of dark red clay. I picture him outside, watering his vegetables that grew because he knew to add fish heads to the foreign earth. I see him sitting in the fluorescent kitchen light, playing cards at night. I remember his black vinyl chair - the end table at the arm that held a used ashtray and cup, and the space beneath that held a book of crossword puzzles and paperback westerns. Cowboys and Indians.
Labels: save as draft
Monday, September 19, 2005
still here
i've just been thinking. i'll be ready to post the thoughts soon.
Labels: save as draft
Wednesday, September 07, 2005
perfectamundo
Bee Season
Not sure about Richard Gere, but I'm feeling Juliette Binoche and the little girl.
Not sure about Richard Gere, but I'm feeling Juliette Binoche and the little girl.
Labels: save as draft
code red
Around lunchtime yesterday, there was a loud noise in the hallway next to my classroom. Outside my window, hundreds of students began running into the parking lot.
My students are freshman and they were scared. A couple of them immediately got under their desks. My first thought was that there had been a shooting. I taped paper to cover the window in the door, and we waited.
After about ten minutes, administrators had moved the students back into the school. We dismissed to lunch.
Later, I found out what had happened: A group of boys from a rival school had jumped the fence and come into school as students moved from first lunch to class. They had baseball bats. They attacked a boy.
My husband and parents hear this story and I reassure them that I am okay. I tell them that my classroom door locks automatically, that I have large windows that everyone could climb through if they needed to get out of the building. Then, when I am alone, I think about the reality of the situation and I can't help feeling like the world has gone crazy. I was quietly taping paper over my window yesterday so that, if there was a gunman, he could not see inside the room to fire at a student. I taped up the paper knowing that violence was a very real possibility. Later, I actually thought that I was grateful the boys only brought in bats, because if they had wanted to kill someone, they could have brought guns.
It seems like the situation with gangs is getting worse. I know that many of you pray for schools, and even for my school specifically. Please pray for safety. Please pray specifically for my boys. Please pray for wisdom for the administrators, and for the resource officers.
My students are freshman and they were scared. A couple of them immediately got under their desks. My first thought was that there had been a shooting. I taped paper to cover the window in the door, and we waited.
After about ten minutes, administrators had moved the students back into the school. We dismissed to lunch.
Later, I found out what had happened: A group of boys from a rival school had jumped the fence and come into school as students moved from first lunch to class. They had baseball bats. They attacked a boy.
My husband and parents hear this story and I reassure them that I am okay. I tell them that my classroom door locks automatically, that I have large windows that everyone could climb through if they needed to get out of the building. Then, when I am alone, I think about the reality of the situation and I can't help feeling like the world has gone crazy. I was quietly taping paper over my window yesterday so that, if there was a gunman, he could not see inside the room to fire at a student. I taped up the paper knowing that violence was a very real possibility. Later, I actually thought that I was grateful the boys only brought in bats, because if they had wanted to kill someone, they could have brought guns.
It seems like the situation with gangs is getting worse. I know that many of you pray for schools, and even for my school specifically. Please pray for safety. Please pray specifically for my boys. Please pray for wisdom for the administrators, and for the resource officers.
Labels: save as draft
Tuesday, September 06, 2005
shame
"My friend Tanner, she says you know me and Jesus - we're of the same heart.
The only thing that keeps us distant is that I keep fuckin up."
from the song, "Shame on You", by the Indigo Girls
Often, on Sunday mornings, my husband visits the churches that support our coffee house ministry. In site of his travels, we decided that I would continue to attend our home church with the kids. As a child, I travelled from church to church with my father, and I have serious doubts about how good of a decision that was. Now, I teach a toddler Sunday school class, and the kids are invested in their church. The only bad thing about this arrangement is that I do not enjoy getting the kids dressed, fed, and ready for church all by myself. We are usually running late, and it stresses me out.
I was in a bad mood two weeks ago. Chip was in Conyers, and I was alone with the kids. We were just barely going to make it on time, but when I got in the car, it was running on empty. I was annoyed. I would have to stop on the way to church and get gas. This would probably make us late. It also meant that I'd be buying gas in my own neighborhood, where most of the people are poor and everything costs more.
I pulled into the gas station and noticed a woman standing next to the pump. I almost cursed out loud. Shit. I only managed to restrain myself because it was Sunday, and my kids were in the car, and I did not want to have to explain why Mommy said a bad word.
The woman at the pump was wild-eyed and bedraggled. She had no car. I braced myself for the inevitable; I was sure that she was going to ask me for money.
I resent the panhandlers that descend at gas station pumps. It feels calculated, extortion-like - the awkward silence as I wait for the car to fill with gas, the pump tallying the evidence that yes, I actually do have money. I am suspicious of the men that walk up and ask for money when they are so close to the convenience store's contraband: cigarettes, beer, lottery tickets. I silently wished that the management of the store would send this woman waiting at the pump away. I stuffed the cash I was carrying in my pocket to give her when she asked and locked the car doors.
I started to pump the gas, stared at the numeric display, and waited.
Although she was standing in the lane next to me, she did not approach or say a word. Curious, I turned to look at her. Her hair was unbrushed and pulled away from her face. She was wearing a tight, gold colored, party dress that hit her bare legs mid-thigh. It had thin straps. The back of the dress was unzipped all the way down to her waist, and a wide stretch of her skin was visible, crossed with darkened scratches and scars. She held something (a purse?) clutched tightly to her chest.
I realized that she was a hooker.
She was not at the gas station waiting to ask for money; she was waiting on a man.
She noticed me looking at her and I half-smiled. "Are you going to Waffle House?", she asked. It was such an odd question, it took me a moment to even begin compose an answer. I was prepared to give her money, but Waffle House? She must have sensed my confusion, so she explained. "I need a ride to church. Are you going to the Waffle House? My church is next to the Waffle House."
I shook my head. "I'm going the other way," I answered.
What I told her was the truth. I was already halfway down Washington Road, and my church is in the opposite direction of the church next to the Waffle House. She just nodded and shifted her gaze away from me, back towards the street. Waiting. Resigned that who she was waiting for is not going to show up, but waiting anyway. Just in case. As she turned, I realized that the brown thing she held against her was not a purse - it was a Bible.
But I was late, and my kids were in the car, and I know the rule about not giving or accepting rides from strangers. I drove away.
The only thing that keeps us distant is that I keep fuckin up."
from the song, "Shame on You", by the Indigo Girls
Often, on Sunday mornings, my husband visits the churches that support our coffee house ministry. In site of his travels, we decided that I would continue to attend our home church with the kids. As a child, I travelled from church to church with my father, and I have serious doubts about how good of a decision that was. Now, I teach a toddler Sunday school class, and the kids are invested in their church. The only bad thing about this arrangement is that I do not enjoy getting the kids dressed, fed, and ready for church all by myself. We are usually running late, and it stresses me out.
I was in a bad mood two weeks ago. Chip was in Conyers, and I was alone with the kids. We were just barely going to make it on time, but when I got in the car, it was running on empty. I was annoyed. I would have to stop on the way to church and get gas. This would probably make us late. It also meant that I'd be buying gas in my own neighborhood, where most of the people are poor and everything costs more.
I pulled into the gas station and noticed a woman standing next to the pump. I almost cursed out loud. Shit. I only managed to restrain myself because it was Sunday, and my kids were in the car, and I did not want to have to explain why Mommy said a bad word.
The woman at the pump was wild-eyed and bedraggled. She had no car. I braced myself for the inevitable; I was sure that she was going to ask me for money.
I resent the panhandlers that descend at gas station pumps. It feels calculated, extortion-like - the awkward silence as I wait for the car to fill with gas, the pump tallying the evidence that yes, I actually do have money. I am suspicious of the men that walk up and ask for money when they are so close to the convenience store's contraband: cigarettes, beer, lottery tickets. I silently wished that the management of the store would send this woman waiting at the pump away. I stuffed the cash I was carrying in my pocket to give her when she asked and locked the car doors.
I started to pump the gas, stared at the numeric display, and waited.
Although she was standing in the lane next to me, she did not approach or say a word. Curious, I turned to look at her. Her hair was unbrushed and pulled away from her face. She was wearing a tight, gold colored, party dress that hit her bare legs mid-thigh. It had thin straps. The back of the dress was unzipped all the way down to her waist, and a wide stretch of her skin was visible, crossed with darkened scratches and scars. She held something (a purse?) clutched tightly to her chest.
I realized that she was a hooker.
She was not at the gas station waiting to ask for money; she was waiting on a man.
She noticed me looking at her and I half-smiled. "Are you going to Waffle House?", she asked. It was such an odd question, it took me a moment to even begin compose an answer. I was prepared to give her money, but Waffle House? She must have sensed my confusion, so she explained. "I need a ride to church. Are you going to the Waffle House? My church is next to the Waffle House."
I shook my head. "I'm going the other way," I answered.
What I told her was the truth. I was already halfway down Washington Road, and my church is in the opposite direction of the church next to the Waffle House. She just nodded and shifted her gaze away from me, back towards the street. Waiting. Resigned that who she was waiting for is not going to show up, but waiting anyway. Just in case. As she turned, I realized that the brown thing she held against her was not a purse - it was a Bible.
But I was late, and my kids were in the car, and I know the rule about not giving or accepting rides from strangers. I drove away.
Labels: save as draft
