I am in the middle of these books.

I am reading Great House for my book group. I'm about halfway through it, and so far I am finding it rather brilliant. Each new chapter brings you up short, because it is in the voice of a character you haven't met before, but whom you will discover to be linked to the threads of the other chapters/characters in some unexpected way.

I am also reading this book about Mary Frances Kennedy Fisher's several years spent in Dijon, back in the late 20s and early 30s. Her style is desultory and devil-may-care, and she apparently ate and drank like a wolf and a fish, respectively. And I can respect that. The historian gave me this book for my birthday. This may be the closest I get to living in France sometime. I hate to be pessimistic, but there you are. However, I think I can say without a trace of pessimism that this is the closest I will get to living in France in the late 20s and early 30s, and for that fact, I want to express my gratitude to this book and its giver.

I am also reading this book, another birthday book. Actually, I have only read the preface to this book. I am afraid that this book is going to make me cry.

I am also reading this book, given to me by my mom and dad for my birthday. I love its author. She is a true original.

I am also reading this very interesting account of several family journeys to the places on the American map (lower 48) that seem to have the least human habitation, as evidenced by a nighttime aerial map, which shows where there is artificial light. The places include a stretch of the St. John river in Maine, central Pennsylvania, southeast Oregon, and part of the Gila Wilderness in New Mexico. It is very interesting, as I too have a fascination with what is vast and empty.

This is a lot of books to be reading at one time. I am finding, though, that picking up nonfiction, particularly, a little at a time means I end up finishing more books than if I insist that I plow right through. I also have some books waiting in the wings, such as A Gate at the Stairs by Lorrie Moore, and Kraken by China Mieville, and some things I am supposed to read and watch, such as Andre Agassi's memoir Open and The Pianist, and the last season of Saving Grace and the first season of The Sarah Connor Chronicles, which I would very much like to do. I would, however, like to find an uninterrupted, oh, month, to do that reading and watching. A month in another dimension. Can't we, in this modern era, come up with the Uninterrupted Month Dimension?

recollected.

My so-called TV life.

What's that?--you want to know what I watch, week to week, on television? I thought so. Well, I am happy to oblige.

I feel like I'm maybe the only person in the world who still watches TV, as opposed to watching television shows via the internet, and likes it. This makes me feel a little like an old person, but the habit of regular TV watching can be explained: I believe it is due (a) to having come of age when watching TV was your only option, as there was no interweb, and (b) to liking the rhythm of a week being paced, in part, by the show that's on each night, if there is one. (I can feel your horror radiating all the way over here, through the tubes and onto my screen, because of how much TV you surmise I must watch. Well, horror away. I do watch that much TV. And I like it.)

So this means that, if the world is good, there's a show on most nights of the week that I like to watch. This is especially important for week nights. The world is most in balance if I can get through my working day on a Monday, for instance, and there's an episode of The Closer awaiting me at its appointed hour. That episode redeems whatever drudgery or difficulty or simply the long hours of the day that preceded it. On Tuesday, The Good Wife; on Wednesday, Modern Family; and on Thursday, the glory that is the NBC lineup, but especially Parks & Recreation. And 30 Rock.

Well, I have just named the television shows that are my mainstays at the moment. Like every other thinking person, I am awaiting the new season of Mad Men. I have several little DVD things lined up, because I either didn't have HBO, or I wasn't able to finish the series in real time (The Wire/In Treatment and Saving Grace, respectively). And I am about to go into mourning because The Closer is winding up its current stint, which will lead us inexorably into its very last episodes ever.

This summer, I started to watch Criminal Minds with my daughter, who is a huge fan of the show. I myself love a police procedural, and I came to appreciate the show. I am looking forward to the new season, which I will have to DVR so I can watch it later, as it is up against Modern Family, and the historian and I watch that one together. The DVR is hooked up to the downstairs TV. Currently, running son is residing in the downstairs lair, so it's possible that there may be a whole slew of Criminal Minds for me to watch sometime, when I don't feel I will be intruding on the whole lair-ness happening down there. Who can say.

I would like to have a bunch of new awesome shows to watch. I wish I had started Breaking Bad when it started. Ditto Men of a Certain Age and other stuff, like House. I guess. I guess I should have watched Downton Abbey, so maybe I'll try to catch up on the first season before new episodes start.

But I need to get this whole project organized. The television routine is part of what keeps everything else in its proper place, and I need that, the people. I need it, or everything else, and I, will feel crazy. Or maybe I might have to, what? do something else, like something productive. Write, or read.

But I don't want to get ahead of myself. I will be checking out a few things in the new season. And if you have something you think I should watch, something that's still broadcasting in the real world, in real time--on television, and not on my DVR--please let me know. I will consider it an act of generosity, and a kindness, which I shall never forget.

(thanks to Amelia, who pointed out this post on every day I write the book)

The good news is,

And lo, there was pie.

Archival research, the people.

I know of no one, and I mean no one, who is better at it than my husband, known to you as The Historian, whose book is now a real thing, printed on paper and bound in cloth, with a dust jacket and dedications, historical photographs and captions, fat chapter titles, footnotes galore, and an index that his co-author did himself.

Did I mention the archival research? This meant looking at microfilms of newspapers and minutes, then searching newspapers online, not to mention looking at all manner of other dusty documents with their relevant secrets well hidden. It meant trips to Special Collections and the LDS Church History library. It meant reading more socialist writing than you can shake a stick at.

It required patience and diligence and persistence and invention. It is the completion of a many years' long task, and it tells a story that almost no one knows about.

And it is a damn book, the people, and that--that is something to celebrate.

Find out more about it here. And the authors will be at the Book Festival on Oct. 22 (more information here).

Cooking & cleaning.

Well, mostly cooking. With a little laundry and dish-washing on the side.

In the cooking department, though, in a grand flourish, commensurate with the great wealth of fruits and vegetables at the market of late, I:

• roasted some squashes, some just on the verge of being not quite good anymore, along with some garlic, onions, and peppers;
• steamed some yellow beans;
• roasted some green beans with olive oil and garlic;
• made some corn salad;
• made some caprese salad;
• made a quinoa salad with some beautiful Rancho Gordo beans, and various herbs, greens, etc.;
• and roasted some potatoes, to eat as they are in their olive-oil-and-garlicked state, or with leftover harissa.

And what did I learn from this cooking extravaganza? Some things:

• you need a vat of olive oil when you start a cooking extravaganza.
• having already-made food in your refrigerator, the result of a cooking extravaganza? A truly excellent state of affairs.
• we buy a lot of food at the farmer's market, and it takes a detailed logistical plan to eat it all.

For instance, I have a giant bag of basil in my refrigerator right now. (Me, to farmer: Is that whole bag for sale, for real? Lady Farmer: The Pesto Bag? Yep. Man Farmer: We call that "the pesto bag," because that's about how much we use when we make pesto. Me: Gimme that.) I'm going to make pesto out of it. But I need to get on that right away, and after my cooking extravaganza, I might not have quite enough olive oil up in here.

I would also very much like to make, or at least have, a pie--and I have got the peaches, blackberries, and blueberries to do something pretty spectacular in neighborhood of pie. But I need to make pie crust, and you know--logistics. What I mean by this is, I wish there were already a pie crust made. But what with having extravaganza'd around in my kitchen for hours, my desire to make a pie crust is kind of diminished, from my formerly ambitious state. Can't have everything, I guess. Although, having now whined for awhile about this, I feel strangely in the mood to actually make a pie crust. Check back for further information on this very important topic!

(I should add to the "cleaning" portion of this post that I also cleaned out some sad greens and herbs and a handful of leftovers and whatnot from the refrigerator. So now the fruits of my cooking extravaganza labors fit in there. Barely.)

Three songs.

Yesterday, my son and I ran to breakfast (at Virg's, radagast, in case you're reading--it was dang good, so thanks for the recommendation!). Whilst driving there, we were listening to The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner, the last studio album of Ben Folds Five. The last controversial studio album of Ben Folds Five. Anyway. It has a great two-song sequence, beginning with "Army,"

which contains, near the end, these lines:

"and my ex-wives all despise me
try to put it all behind me
but my redneck past is nipping at my heels"

a song which is followed immediately by "Your Redneck Past":

which begins with these sharp lyrics:

"choose from any number of magazines
who do you want to be?
billy idol or kool moe dee?

if you're afraid they might discover your redneck past
there are a hundred ways to cover your redneck past"

(My son and I agree that those first three lines are some of the best beginning lines of any song, ever--"Billy Idol or Kool Moe Dee?" Ridiculous.) But all of this talk of rednecks reminded me of another song, called "My Redneck Friend," by Jackson Browne, from the album For Everyman, which I loved when I was in high school:

All of which made me think of how many ways we weave the connections between the things we loved in the past--I listened to this Jackson Browne countless times when I was young--and the newer things we encounter. Also, is there a thing about rednecks in popular music? Is redneckery the guilty secret of rock? Something to think about.

Here's a little sequence I have been mentally connecting:

Rolling Stones - Paint It Black by SamFisher037

I'd be interested in hearing about your little three-song chains, the connections you make between your past and present through song.

Dear Bruiser,

Today, in the mail, I found the following:




I once believed--when I thought about it, which was not, truthfully, very often--that you could not read. But who knows? You're now getting mail, addressed to you. With some news for you, Bruiser!

I'm sorry to say, though, that the news is a little presumptuous. In this newsletter, there's a coupon:

I don't know what "senior" means in Dog, but around here, when we hear "senior," we demur. We protest. We flat out deny. I am speaking of myself here, obviously.

And when we were out walking today, I thought, how can they say "senior"? to Bruiser? Because you were cantering and prancing and, in fact, took me for a little drag when a small, yappy dog behind a wooden fence had a thing or two to say. It was impressive, B, I just want you to know I felt your vigor--was, in fact, moved by it--and I thought, I don't know if a so-called senior dog would have that kind of gumption.

I say, let the people keep their labels to themselves. Labels cannot contain you. (I am speaking of myself here, obviously.)

love,

htms

Crying at the movies: a memoir.

Last night, after my birthday movie, I came home to find myself tagged in this post on my son's wall:

"It turns out the lady was your mom." I will pause so that you may reflect.

Well, I do have a long and storied career as a movie cryer. Here are a few movies I have sobbed like a motherless child at:

• The Way We Were
• Terms of Endearment
• Stepmom
• The Notebook
• Marley & Me
• Titanic, obv.
• uh, every single Harry Potter movie, probably. More on this later.

I have also cried like crazy at indie movies, such as:

• Summer Hours
• Friends with Money
• Whalerider
• Into the West
• Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
• Things You Can Tell By Looking At Her
• Blue Valentine
• Bright Star
• The Fall

and probably a whole bunch more that I may or may not care to mention. The Sex and the City movie, for instance, after Mr. Big stands Carrie up, sort of, at their wedding and she looks so miserable. Or, like, parts of Superbad, which the relevant youngest son pointed out to me wasn't remotely poignant to him. Or Into the Wild, with director Sean Penn pulling the cry-now strings like mad.

My kids like to say that I cried at a Rugrats movie, and maybe at a Pokemon movie. I don't know. I'd like to see their evidence--we all know from about a billion Law & Orders that eyewitness accounts are notoriously unreliable. But I will not deny that if a movie tugs at my heartstrings, I am generally happy to oblige, although sometimes if movies are trying to work me, I resist. I'm not that easy. Okay, I am. But sometimes the weep machinery is just too much, and in those circumstances, I stay dry-eyed.

Usually, though, I cry. And I don't particularly care. So what? Why bother to think of sports? I used to cry a lot about life-y things, and sometimes I still do. But these days, I just don't like it--it makes me feel bad, and my eyes get puffy, and it's all just too tragic. At a movie, though: crying at a movie lets you release feelings that need to be released (see: catharsis), but mostly in a limited, self-contained way. I don't usually cry too much (except for at Marley & Me, and Stepmom, and Terms of Endearment--I wept so much in those movies I had to take to my bed afterward to recover. And if one of them comes on on cable--forgetaboutit.), but frankly, it feels a little bit cleansing.

Anyway. In July, a bunch of people, including my daughters and me, went to see the most recent Harry Potter, I pretty much full-on sobbed when (seriously? you haven't seen/read it yet? what is wrong with you? spoiler alert) Snape died. After the movie ended, my daughter with the wicked wit said, "Are you okay?"

Yep. Just fine. Now leave me alone, I'm fishing for my Kleenex.

Today

was my birthday, so I

• acknowledged to myself that I am old(er) with a small but private and very limitedly miserable sulk, then
• opened birthday presents from the historian,
• wept over a sweet note from my oldest friend and a sweet note from my dad, after which I
• ate a birthday custard,
• took a quick birthday trip to Target (what. That's totally a thing.), and
• took a birthday trip to work that lasted a lot of hours, where I
• had a birthday interview with a student candidate for the editor of the literary/arts mag, then
• received a phone call wherein my grandson sang me "Happy Birthday," whereupon I
• spent a birthday hour in the Student Writing Center, whence I gave birthday help to a student, after which I
• fretted over a birthday lesson plan and a birthday grammar & style activity, and then
• taught, after the birthday fretting, a great birthday grammar & style class! I then
• ate my birthday sandwich and birthday potato chips, and drank my birthday Dr. Pepper, with my friend, while concurrently
• doing my birthday office hours online; then I
• went home before having a
• birthday taco and watching a
• birthday movie with the historian.

In conclusion, birthday birthday birthday! BIRTHDAY, oh yeah.

As Monday abolishes the weekend.

This weekend we saw Our Idiot Brother, which was charming and delightful. We enjoyed it very much. We bought peaches and tomatoes and onions and eggs and bread and beans and squash and grapes at the market. I ate a lot of watermelon. I just can't get enough watermelon. We also bought the most beautiful berry threesome: a basket each of blueberries, raspberries and strawberries. We went down to Utah Valley for a family gathering. I finished my Swedish thriller. I read a manuscript for the press I'm on the editorial board of (nice prepositional ending, eh?). Took Bruiser for several walks. Commented on the initial posts in my online classes. Watched two episodes of the old Adult Swim show Home Movies (streaming now on Netflix, highly recommended). Talked with running son, who jumped back into Utah life this past Thursday, surprising me in my office with a bag of Lays Classic Potato Chips. Read the New York Times sitting at the table under the cherry tree. Listened to a big cracking thunder and lightning storm last night.

Today, I have been in my office interviewing editorial candidates for Folio. And while I confess I wish the unstructured, wander-where-you-will qualities of summer, which often eluded me during the actual time I was off work, would last a bit longer, it's been kind of nice to listen to these potential editors talk about their ideas, their plans, their enthusiasms. The show-up-on-time qualities of fall are pretty good, too.

The last day of summer, technically: an FAQ.

Q: How's that prep coming?

A: Oh, swell, thanks for asking.

Q: Seriously.

A: None of your business.

Q: What'd you do today, the last day before school meetings start tomorrow morning?

A: Would you like that in a paragraph, or a bulleted list?

Q: Bulleted list, please.

A: Excellent choice:

• picked up one grandson from his house at 9 a.m.
• picked up other grandson from his house at 9:25 a.m.
• drove directly to Target, where we purchased 2 varieties of Spiderman (Arctic Attack Spiderman and Spider Sense Spiderman), various snacks including Kung Fu Panda Fruit Roll Ups, and a pair of shoes for me (I really needed them!).
• drove home, where we engaged in long bouts of Spiderman play, interspersed with discussions in which we parsed the various features of the two Spidermen.
• had Happy Meals for lunch. Bruiser finished off the last chicken nugget neatly, when it was left unattended and, one can safely assume, therefore unwanted. Except by a dog.
• watched Iron Giant. Our viewing was enhanced by a video chat with an auntie in Scotland, and discussions about whether the giant was a good guy or a bad guy.
• resumed Spiderman play.
• built a Spiderman garage with blocks.
• took Bruiser for a very short walk.
• had a snack.
• had a little rest with some Wonder Pets to amuse and inspire us.

Why, what'd you do?

Q: How on earth will you be ready when classes start on Wednesday? Don't you have long meetings tomorrow?

A: What's a long meeting and a laptop for?

Weekend stats.

Peaches: 16, from two vendors.

Nectarines: 3 exorbitantly priced ones, from our fruit guy, who has a very high opinion of his fruit in general, and his nectarines in specific.

Movies: 1, unless you count watching A Few Good Men on AMC for the zillionth time, in which case: 2. Wait! also significant portions of The Misfits on TCM, because it was Montgomery Clift day, which we watched while laying around this afternoon and also reading portions of a Swedish mystery novel.

Pants purchased on sale at the Gap: 4 pair, cute if I do say so myself.

Successful technology challenge sorted: new charger for my Macbook Pro, which was (I bet you can guess this:) failing to charge.

Dollars spent to sort technology challenge: 0. That is "zero." That's because of the brilliant Apple Store Genius, Tomasi, who figured out, I guess, that my charger was still warrantied, or something? Anyway, Tomasi was awesome. Tomasi is a solutions provider.

Syllabi finished, worked on, or started: 0. That is also "zero." I have no further comment to make on this point.

Fantastic culinary adventures: 1. I made harissa, to go with roasted potatoes omg it was aMAzing. It was for my poetry group.

Birthday girls who ate pancakes with us: 2. At Dee's! --a brief panegyric on Dee's: unpretentious; full of cheerful folk but still with a table to be had, without any waiting whatsoever; with the best hash browns I've had in quite some time, and, judging from the several bits I stole from one birthday girl's chocolate chip pancakes, with an excellent chocolate chip pancake.

Rating, on a scale of 1-10, with 1 being "hideous" and 10 being "stellar," of the weekend overall, thus far: pretty much perfect.

Dear Movie Studios of America,

It was certainly our own fault that we chose One Day as our Friday night movie option. However, having now viewed this film, we have the following constructive criticisms to make, in the spirit of better movies for everyone:

1. You should hire somebody who can tell you how to make a movie better, because pretty much any fool could have told you what you should have done to make One Day a better movie.

2. No amount of bad haircuts, Doc Martens, and wire-rimmed glasses will make Anne Hathaway the "plain" girl. Also, sorry and no offense, but Anne Hathaway's accent sucked. Shoulda hired a British actress.

Sincerely,

htms.

Let us review.

I think it is healthy, salutary, to pause at the end of something to assess what one has accomplished. What one has learned, if you will. And it is in this spirit of self-assessment that I offer firstly a consideration of what I thought I might accomplish this summer; secondly an enumeration of what I did indeed accomplish this summer; and thirdly, a reflection upon what the two data sets, compared, might reveal.

Firstly. I said I would make movies, write poems, revise a couple of manuscripts. I said I would "Gather my wits and be the happy genius of my house" and that I would lay "hands upon a will, a desire to start again, an urge from which I will not be diverted." I also had ancillary plans to organize and order my house.

SECONDLY. What follows is a detailed but not complete listing of my accomplishments since I turned in my grades in May:

1. I organized the footage for exactly one video, as yet incomplete.
2. I did a radical and far-reaching inventory of my poems, both manuscripts, to better understand what my poetic project is and what my poetic means are.
3. I did a revision of one of my manuscripts, but that was before item 2 above. So I don't know what I think of this revision. Also, the version of this manuscript that prompted the revision--it had had, to a very recent point, seemed to have absolutely no traction--no one was interested in it. Yesterday, I heard from a competition--this no-traction ms was a finalist. God. This possibly leads one to wonder what revision even means.
4. I traveled hither and yon, here and there, far and wide. L.A., NoCal, Idaho, the wilds of Nevada.
5. I spent lots of time with my daughter who has since departed for Louisiana. I did not anticipate that she would spend quite a bit of time here this summer, as she moved out of her apartment in anticipation of the big move. We also took two of my grandsons (her nephews) to Idaho in advance of their parents' arrival.
6. I saw a fair number of trashy movies, and some of them twice. One of them three times.
7. I read a pile of police procedurals and some other books, even some good ones.
8. We got a new roof.
9. I have not yet lain hands upon a will, a desire to start again, an urge from which I will not be diverted. At least not consistently.
10. I recently wrecked our car.
11. I have written no new poems. None. Whatsoever.

finally....

I have found the recurrent cycling in and out of my house of my youngest two children to be more of an emotional event than I would have predicted. Or maybe that's not true. Maybe I really expected it, but it has still hit me hard. I miss them, and I know that missing them is no tragedy, rather a necessary step that comes before whatever's next. Still.

Even so, one of the great pleasures for me--and one of the most meaningful--was to have spent that time with my daughter. I did not expect it, but I will remember this summer as the summer my daughter left, and before she did, she lived here, we talked every day, we ate together, we watched endless episodes of Criminal Minds because it is her current favorite show. I loved that. I am still watching it, because it makes me feel connected to her.

I am still finding my way back to writing--the act of writing. My friend Renaissance Girl says that everything, for a writer, is writing--walking out in the green world, thinking about things, mourning them. And I think she is right. I would like, though, to be back at making the things. This last week, I have been collecting notes for a couple new poems. I think they are poems. I'm going to try to make them into poems. We'll see.

The lack of blog in the last several months--the paucity of posts, certainly, but also a failure of delight in making them--is indicative of something, and I want to see if I can do something about it.

One day--the day after I had finally articulated my own depletion to myself--I said, aloud, to myself whilst walking the dog, Just be happy. Why not just be happy? And this sort of seemed like an answer. For awhile, anyway. I just want to assert my words, my little words, into the world. Just let them have their say, let them work their way to the surface, let them become these statements, poems, whatever. I want to keep trying.

No art.

Tomorrow morning, my daughter is leaving.

She had to find a home for her bunny.

This summer we've had colts in the back field.

We had a party to see her off.

And on the Sabbath day,

I made jam, because it was apricot day at the market yesterday. It might be apricot day again next week, but you can never tell, really, so it's good to seize the day.

I like to use citrus instead of commercial pectin. It makes the fruit taste more like itself, and also like sunshine. I am not kidding.

It's half a lug of apricots, about 2 c. of sugar, juice of 2 oranges and 3 lemons. Bubbling away.

Sharpies were made to label jam jars. True story.

So this is about 2 half pints and 10 little quarter pint jars. I might give one to you if I really like you.

After the jamming--which will continue into tomorrow after I buy more lids and rings and probably more jars--I had plenty of apricots left to make a blackberry apricot galette. The blackberries were because yesterday, it was also blackberry day at the market.

Magical household.

My washing machine did heal itself. Apparently, it just needed a little break from its job, much like the rest of us do. Shortly after I posted yesterday, and after I had tentatively switched a few breakers on and off like I knew what I was doing, which I patently did not, the washing machine drained itself and went into the rinse-and-spin cycles. Like the champ that it is.

Now, if my household would just

• vacuum its own rugs,
• clean out its own refrigerator,
• hang up its own clothes,
• sort its own excess,
• clear the kitchen table of its mail and books and whatnot, and
• do the thinking for me about my poetic project, so that I can
• revise my manuscript into the winner I know it can be,

then I would

• solve the debt ceiling crisis.

I don't think that's too much to ask.

Mundane update.

Today, a day mostly at home, I washed clothes until I (apparently) broke my washing machine; washed dishes; made bread; made dinner; contemplated my own poetic project as well as my poetic means until I felt a little dizzy; walked the Bruiser; felt just fine.

A day mostly at home is pretty swell. But I wish my washing machine would spontaneously heal itself.

After a long walk, we arrive at the water's edge.