Hello Monday, and hello new week – I guess. This is the first week I’ll be putting in a full five days in the past three weeks and I can already feel that it’s gonna be a doozy. The week before last, as you already know, I was out of the office for a few days attending my college reunion (plus one extra day in Richmond getting sworn into the Virginia Bar), and then last week, we spent the early part of the week still in New York – adding a few days onto our trip so that we could build in a little time with family, particularly with my brother and sister-in-law who were visiting from Colorado, and with my grandmother who recently had a stroke (but is miraculously much better). The middle part of the week was full of travel, then I was running around and Steve was on a business trip on Thursday and Friday. All that’s to say – we spent this weekend trying to be as low-key as possible, but I still don’t feel recovered and ready to jump back in the rat race. Anywho. Happy Father’s Day to the dads! After all the travel and craziness of the past few weeks, Steve wanted a laid-back, relaxed weekend, so that’s what he got. The only activity on the calendar for the weekend was Peanut’s camp orientation on Saturday afternoon. Steve took her and they had a great time; I stayed home to officiate naptime and do some work. On Sunday, we let Steve sleep in as long as he wanted; when he came downstairs the kids greeted him with sand art plaques they had made in camp last week, and I greeted him with “beer snob” glasses and fun new coasters. He was pleased with all of his gifts! We spent the morning relaxing at home as it got hotter and hotter outside – I did more work while the kiddos napped – and then Nugget woke up and wanted to go to the pool, which is open for the season, yahoo! Peanut was still sacked out and Steve was in the middle of a game with friends, so Nugget and I snuck off for some water fun and we had the best time. I’ll be clinging to those memories of splashing with my little dude as I plod through the week, I’m sure.
Reading. Not much to report this week. I wasn’t able to finish my re-read of The Turner House before book club (thanks, travel!) but still could partake in the discussion since I remembered it well from when I read it a couple of years ago. And then it was back to Scenes of Clerical Life. I’m nearly done now, after putting in quality time with the last of the three novellas on Sunday evening after the kiddos finally fell asleep. Not sure what I’ll read next. I am finding my bookish thoughts being pulled in all sorts of directions these days. I do have a library book out with a hard deadline, so maybe that.
Watching. Nothing noteworthy to report here. We’re between shows at the moment, so we’re just meandering through re-runs of old favorites Parks and Recreation and The Crown and trying to stay decently up-to-date on Rock the Park. But nothing jumps to mind as being especially interesting or new to share.
Listening. Lots of podcasts. I took a break from listening to much of anything on our travels, since the kids aren’t really podcast fans. But now that we’re back, I’m almost caught up on Those Park Guys Podcast and I’m staying pretty updated on my book podcasts, too. My brother told me about a podcast called Dirtbag Diaries that sounds great, so I may check that out (as if my Audible account wasn’t neglected enough as it is).
Blogging. More Ithaca for you this week! On Wednesday I have mini-recaps of three hikes from Reunion weekend comin’ atcha, and on Friday, Part II of the Reunion recap itself, since the first part was getting so absurdly long I had to break it up. Yay, Cornell!
Loving. Sibling time! I’m still on a high from seeing my brother and sis-in-law last week. Living so far apart is hard, and any time we get to spend together is such a special treat. My heart felt like it was going to explode watching them with their niece and nephew – they love those kids so much, and I know they would give anything to see them more. We had the best time sailing and hiking together on Monday and Tuesday, and then on Tuesday night Danielle and I stayed up until 2:00 a.m. (who even am I?) sipping wine and talking. We are lucky enough to see a fair amount of my parents even though they are seven hours away – they make a huge effort to visit as much as they can – but Dan and Danielle have lives in Colorado, and we have lives in Virginia, that we can’t just take breaks from the way those lucky retired folks can. So we make the most of the time we do have together.
Asking. What are you reading this week?
The Untelling, by Tayari Jones – While I wait (and wait, and wait) for my library hold to come in on An American Marriage, Jones’ new release, I picked up The Untelling from her backlist. The Untelling is the story of Aria, a young woman whose family was torn apart when her father and baby sister died in a car accident when Aria was a young girl. Aria, her mother and her sister survived the accident. Now in her twenties and working as a literacy instructor, Aria believes she has put the past behind her and found a way to uneasily coexist with her remaining family members. But when she discovers that she may be pregnant, wheels are set in motion that will eventually bring a reckoning for everyone. Well – The Untelling was beautifully written, but left me a bit cold. It may be library deadline reading, which is never a great way to read. But I felt that the plot was a bit contrived – the only way to have a book was to have Aria make a long string of terrible and illogical decisions, and it began to feel farfetched. I mean, no one makes that many insane choices.
Second Class Citizen, by Buchi Emecheta – I’ve been trying to read more classic African writers, and I’d never read anything by Emecheta – plus this immigrant narrative looked really interesting. The story focuses on Adah, a resourceful young Nigerian woman who is driven by a dream to live in England. Adah will do anything to make her dream come true – even marry a gigantic jerk. She does make it to England and, of course, finds that the immigrant life is much harder than she expected. Adah is strong and could probably have thrived even in the very foreign London of the 1960s, had she a partner who was deserving of her. But her husband Francis is a cruel and lazy man, who insists on Adah single-handedly supporting the family even as she has baby after baby. Spoiler alert, and warning: don’t read this if you need a tidy ending. By the end of the story I was very invested in Adah getting away from Francis and becoming her own woman, and the end was singularly unsatisfying.
Sailing Alone Around The Room: Collected Poems, by Billy Collins – I’ve been reading this collection in snatches (on my phone) for a couple of months now, and meh. I didn’t really like it. Some of the poems were quite lovely and thoughtful, but a lot more were just Collins drinking orange juice, listening to records and thinking about naked ladies. I know that he has quite the fan base and was the poet laureate of the United States, but Collins just didn’t do it for me. I like my poetry touched with the sublime, and this collection was just too mundane for my taste. I have heard that it’s not his best, and that there are better examples of Collins’ writing out there. Maybe at some point I will seek one out, but I don’t see that happening soon. I’m more content to wander hedgerows with Betjeman or charge through Camelot with Tennyson.
The Last Watchman of Old Cairo, by Michael David Lukas – Finally, four books in, I hit on a May read that I just loved. This was totally expected, because I adored Lukas’ first novel, The Oracle of Stamboul, but I’d have been crushed if The Last Watchman of Old Cairo was disappointing. Happily for me, it was even better than its predecessor. Lukas can spin a tale, no doubt, and he does so here – following three sets of characters through three time periods – Ali al Raqb, the first watchman of the Ben Ezra synagogue in Old Cairo in 1300 AD; two sisters from Cambridge who travel to Cairo to save priceless documents that are being looted from the synagogue’s geniza in 1875; and Yusuf al Raqb, the son of the last watchman of the synagogue, who has just passed away and left his son with a mysterious scrap of paper and a lot of grieving to reconcile. I loved every second of this gorgeous story and have been telling everyone I meet to go read it immediately. So I will tell you: GO READ IT. IMMEDIATELY.
Sing, Unburied, Sing, by Jesmyn Ward – I’d been waiting months to get the latest from Ward; the library holds list was a mile long. (I live in a city of readers, which I love, even if it does mean that I sometimes have to wait for the anticipated new release.) Ward tells the story of Jojo, a young boy on the cusp of manhood; Leonie, Jojo’s tormented mother; and Richie, a ghost. When Leonie learns that Jojo’s father is about to be released from prison, she packs up Jojo and his sister and drives with a friend up to collect him. Perspectives switch back and forth between Jojo and Leonie, and eventually Richie, in a sad and spellbinding story. So – this was not a comfortable reading experience, especially the Richie parts. My aunt picked it up after she asked me what I was reading and I told her and she texted me a few chapters in: “Is it this depressing the whole time?” The answer is yes, but it’s also beautiful.
To Die But Once (Maisie Dobbs #14), by Jacqueline Winspear – World War II has officially begun, but when the latest installment in the Maisie Dobbs series opens, London is in the throes of “the Bore War” – the early days, before the Blitz, when most of England just baked in the sun and stewed with apprehension, wondering when something (anything!) would happen. (Eventually, something does: the Dunkirk evacuation, which catches a few of the characters up in it.) Maisie and Billy are investigating the disappearance of a neighbor’s son who was apprenticed to a painting company working with untested flame-retardant paint in a top secret location. Meanwhile, Maisie is working on formally adopting her orphaned refugee, Anna, and trying to be present for Billy and Priscilla as they worry about their sons, who are old enough to go to war. The Maisie novels keep getting better, and I tore through this one as usual.
Brensham Village (Brensham Trilogy #2), by John Moore – The second installment in the Brensham Trilogy (of lightly fictionalized memoirs about the market town where Moore grew up and the constellation of villages and hamlets that surrounded it) was a dream to read. I loved Portrait of Elmbury, and Brensham Village was, if anything, even better. The book opens with Moore and his three friends (“the young varmints”) discovering Brensham Hill, which rises above its namesake village about four miles outside of Elmbury (where Moore lives). There is a folly on top of the hill, complete with hermit, and there are “lolloping” hares and a mad Lord (who was one of my favorites amongst Moore’s cast of delightful characters). Having conquered Brensham Hill, Moore looks down over the thatched rooftops of the village and dreams of being part of the life there – and as a young man, he fulfills that dream by joining the cricket team and being informally adopted as one of Brensham’s own. He trades jokes with the landlords of the Adam and Eve and the Horse Narrow pubs; plays darts and scampers over the outlying areas in search of insects with his old Latin teacher, Mr Chorlton (a beloved character from Portrait of Elmbury), mourns with the villagers when a freak frost destroys their fruit crops, and shudders at the shady Syndicate that is quietly buying up land around the village. Brensham isn’t a real place – it’s an amalgamation of villages around Tewkesbury – but in Moore’s hands, it breathes and teems with life.
Rocket Men: The Daring Odyssey of Apollo 8 and the Astronauts Who Made Man’s First Journey to the Moon, by Robert Kurson – There are a few books that I just can’t resist, and “dad books” about the golden age of space travel are in that category. In Rocket Men, Kurson covers Apollo 8 with aplomb. I thought I knew pretty much what there was to be known about Apollo 8 after reading Lost Moon (which was retitled Apollo 13 after the movie came out) but there was a lot more to tell, it seems. Kurson digs up every interesting, funny, hair-raising or disgusting anecdote he can find (and I kept stopping Steve in whatever he was doing so I could read them aloud). My favorite was definitely the anecdote about Bill Anders flipping the bird at a Soviet flight while stationed in Iceland, and the Soviets’ months-delayed response. This was a lot of fun, and I enjoyed every minute. (It would also make a great Father’s Day gift for the nonfiction-inclined dads out there.)
covered in flour 