Lucius, Rylant, and Pushing to the Edge

I hate to sound like a broken record, but what can I say? Sometimes the programming on NPR just nails it. And on all these drives between Indiana and Michigan that radio is my companion. Today I heard some All Things Considered and Ted Radio Hour that was spot on. Just when I thought I'd listened to my most interesting story of the day, something else would follow keeping me awake as I headed south.

First up, All Things Considered had a quick interview of the two singers in the band Lucius. They had  their NPR debut early this year with a Tiny Desk Concert.

Ummm...I think I just heard all of my new favorite songs. Especially that first one. Killing it!

On that same episode, I heard from Cynthia Rylant, author of such greats as When I Was Young in the Mountains and The Relatives Came among many others (one of my top 5 of children's book writers). She has a new book of poetry out illustrated by Marla Frazee. It's titled God Got a Dog. According to the interview, Ms. Cynthia has been known to sit down and write an entire book of poetry in one day. I'll have what she's having, right?

And then the TED Radio Hour had this episode on right after I heard from Lucius and Rylant titled "To the Edge"in which 4 adventurers describe what it is that pushes them to dream up and conquer dangerous and thrilling feats. I heard from a polar explorer, a spelunker, a long-distance rower, and a tight-roper walker. The interview of long-distance rower Roz Savage was what really resonated with me. Savage is the first woman to row solo across the Atlantic Ocean (and then the Pacific and Indian...what?). She left her job as an investment banker and started her rowing adventures at the age of 34 when she sat down and wrote two obituaries: the one she'd like to have and the one she'd probably have if she kept on the same path she was on. What would happen if we all sat down and tried that exercise?

Here's to a great week ahead!

Happy Friday!

Greetings, weekend. Where have you been all my Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday? It was a long one, folks, this past week. But we're here. Hope abounds! 

What I'm Reading:

The Chosen by Chaim Potok, 1967

Required high school reading at a former employer, I pulled The Chosen out from the dark underbelly of my bookshelf (you never know what you'll find back there). This digging and rummaging happened the other night in a fitful craving for adult fiction. One long chapter in and so far so good. I don't know much yet, but that chapter and the book jacket point to a friendship story starring Bobby Malter and Danny Saunders, an Orthodox and a Hasidic Jew, set in Brooklyn in the 1940s. Like many, I'm vulnerable to coming of age stories (A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, anyone?) so I have high expectations.

     I may or may not be fascinated with Toronto's Mayor Rob Ford...can't seem to tear my eyes away
     from this not just because of his rap sheet but because he won't resign.

What I'm Viewing:

     With all the energy it takes to run a marathon, maybe I should consider applying it somewhere
     else?! Boiling 20 eggs, perhaps?

     Check out this fascinating map of worldwide births and deaths (found on Cup of Jo).

     I've been barreling through season after season of Mad Men several years behind the curve
     which tends to be the way of the MC TV world.

What I'm Loving:

     Hasn't it been lovely this November, bright and bold and beautiful?

     Michigan State basketball is upon us! Go Green, right? Headed to my first game tomorrow night.
     But IU, the old alma mater, is on the calendar, too. Tickets arrived in the mail for a game this
     December. Reunion with the college roommate in a few short weeks!

     There are some neat exhibits on the docket of a few Indianapolis museums including Matisse at 
     the IMA and Leonardo the well-preserved duckbill dinosaur is on his way to the Children's
     Museum.

     Emily Dickinson loved to bake!

the White Hurricane

100 years ago today a storm swept through the Great Lakes, a storm out of some epic poem, a "White Hurricane" as they called it. They say the winds roared at 95 mph and the waves grew to 35 feet tall. They say ships were paralyzed in the whiteout conditions with frozen navigation tools.

Over 250 people died during the course of the White Hurricane. 12 ships sank and many more were destroyed or stranded. 4 ships were never found. NEVER FOUND. 100 years later. Still lost.

I love the Great Lakes. I love those wide, deep, cold Great Lakes. I love that freshwater and their slow, strong march to the Atlantic through the Saint Lawrence. And I love their shores, the dunes, the cherry trees, the aching cracks of the shelf ice in winter.

But lying in bed at night thinking of those lost ships at the bottom of a lake is what truly keeps my fascination alive.  It's the idea that a thing so big could slip away, could disappear under the water line, and leave not a sound behind. Where once was a ship, a moment later, silence. It isn't those ships in particular. It isn't really ships at all. It's more about that before and after. Something lonely about those Native Americans and those voyageurs in their canoes and those moose. Have you ever seen a moose? So big and lanky and intimidating, but when he slips back into the trees, through the foliage, it takes only a moment to return to silence and then it is as if he was never there. It leaves you wondering as to what is lurking just through the trees. A ship sitting below you; you have no idea. A woman could have stood on the shore where you now stand 150 years ago or yesterday, but there's nothing left to tell you. A moment passes, and then, silence. A sobering reminder of your size and place in the scope of all this.

Isle Royale Light from our honeymoon

Pie by Sarah Weeks, 2011

In my mind, pie season is upon us. A few years back, I spent Thanksgiving at my relatives' home in western Massachusetts. They have the best kind of holiday home with soo many friends coming and going. I've always admired open door policies like that. Anyway, one of their very closest friends baked a pecan pie. Though I was full to the brim with my aunt's killer mashed potatoes, I knew I could make room for a bite or two of pie. Okay, maybe a whole piece...or two...who knows? I very well could have had 3. That was the best darn pie I have ever had! It turns out it was a fairly simple recipe from the back of a Karo Syrup bottle (it doesn't take much to please me) so I've been able to bake it since though it isn't quite as good. Maybe it was the setting, the crowd that really made that pie. Or the crust? I digress.

So though I know some of you may think the summer is pie season with all of those lovely fruit pies ripe for the picking, November and December will always be pie season in my heart. And what more delicious way to kick off this time of year than  a quick reading of Sarah Weeks' middle grade chapter book Pie?

Pie is nominated for a Young Hoosier Book Award this year so I feel like every which way I turn one of my kids at school has their nose in this book. Not to be outdone, I brought a copy home this weekend and had a little look see.

Alice's Aunt Polly can bake a mean pie. From classics like apple pie and meringues to the more obscure chess and concord grape, Aunt Polly can bake them all. She's won many national awards for her delectable deserts. Hailing from Ipswitch, Pennsylvania circa 1955, Polly takes no compensation for her masterpieces. She gives them all away for free. So when Polly passes away suddenly, Ipswitch is thrown in a tizzy wondering how they'll survive without her baked goods and who will take her place as the next Ipswitch queen of pies. Unfortunately for the townspeople, Polly wrote in her will that her crust recipe would be left to her grumpy cat Lardo and Lardo would be left to Alice. Alice is busy missing her Aunt Polly when Lardo goes missing, and she must put the pieces together to figure out who has catnapped the recipe holder.

Kids should read Pie. Wouldn't you know many young readers love a good mystery? And Pie balances mystery with a sweet story about friendship and family. Alice and her mom have a tumultuous relationship and are able to work it out through the course of the story. That is refreshing. I find a lot of middle grade books either with solid and reliable mothers or absent mothers but not a lot in between. I appreciate the realistic quality of that relationship in Pie. Though there are some serious themes (death and loss and mother quarrels), the book maintains an overall light quality with funny scenes like a school principal bench pressing weights or a possible suspect throwing a stolen pie out the window of the local inn. Finally, the book is riddled with pie recipes including that lemon chess pie which a friend of mine made (it is divine!). And is it just me or is there something deeply satisfying about reading recipes?

I think I like pie more than cake. What can I say? See below:

Proposed brother/sister road trip: Russia's M10

Just thought you should know....

Anne Lamott has a new book (remember her from the honeymoon?)! I saw it when I picked up the copy of Dallas 1963 I ordered from the bookstore around the corner. Stiches was tempting sitting there on the checkout counter looking all green and hopeful, but buying 2 hardcover books in one trip to the bookstore is buying one too many. Until next time, Anne!

Also, Dave and I saw 12 Years a Slave. Whew. If you've heard anything about it, you've likely heard this movie is strong and powerful and very difficult to watch. Do not expect a relaxing trip to the theatre. And don't buy popcorn and candy and the likes. The brutality of 12 Years a Slave does not lend itself to movie snacks. All of that said, I encourage you to see it as it supposedly is one of the most accurate depictions of slavery to come out of the film industry. I recommend it in the same way I would recommend Schindler's List.

And finally, I stumbled on this FASCINATING piece from the New York Times on the 430-mile road that connects St. Petersburg and Moscow, the M10, that is. The article describes the severe neglect of the road and the plight of the towns and villages out there standing along it. We're talking out in the hinterlands here. Villages are being reclaimed by the wilderness! There has been a resurgence of child marriages along the M10 as laws for schooling the young have changed or been done away with. And there was a 70 MILE TRAFFIC JAM during a blizzard last year. The article reads:

    After a snowstorm in November, about 10,000 vehicles got stuck in a traffic jam that 

    extended more than 70 miles, trapping some drivers for three days in subzero 

    temperatures.

What?! That is some wild west business happening out there. The article gives political explanations as to why the M10 has experienced such neglect and the implications of this downward spiral.

Read on, my friends! And happy November!