flashback...

For those of you who have been blog readers a long time, you may remember that I used to write on separation of church/state issues when I lived in Kentucky.  Oddly, that was good training for an article I wrote last week...and it came out on Saturday.  Here's a CBC opinion piece on why I think there is no such thing as a "secular prayer" and why I think it shouldn't happen at city council or at the Manitoba legislature.  Turns out that the Canadian Supreme Court thinks that too!

Like a prayer: Rethinking traditions at city council

In other news...our radishes are coming up, little bitty green things, in our raised garden beds.  Both boys had the sniffles so we spent a lot of the weekend playing close to home.  This playing alternated with small boys throwing cranky tantrums.  We also attempted a trip to Fort Whyte for their Earth Day festivities.  It was gorgeous weather, very crowded, and a bit hard to maneuver with two hungry, cranky and sniffley guys.  We did see pigs, chicken, rabbits, bison, an owl and a snake, lots of geese and other birds and lots of touchable wildlife taxidermy (which I found gross, but the boys loved).

The most interesting part of the visit, for me, was the Pioneer Sod House.  here's a link to some photos.  I had never been inside a sod house--I believe I have seen some collapsed ones out on highways as we drove someplace, but this was a real live example.  We have a great kid's book:
The New Land: A First Year on the Prairie

That helps us explain to the boys what the first European settlers on the prairie experienced when they came here...and it has a sod house in it.  What a rush it was to see light dawn for both three year olds as we went into a real (very small) sod house.  We all wondered what it would be like to spend winter in one.  Very close quarters!

I also recently came across some Manitoba legal codes from the 1870s that said which belongings could not be confiscated in case of bankruptcy.  Luckily, a spinning wheel and weaving loom were stipulated as among the essential items that could not be taken.  Whew.

Of course they were absolutely necessary to keep the family warm and clothed, but also?  for mental health reasons....

OK, that's enough prairie talk for today!  Have a good one. :)

what I've been up to...

The last few days have been a whirlwind.  The professor has a very busy term, teaching two upper level classes, so he needed to do work on the weekend.  Didi (my mom) came from the US to visit and play with twins.  One of the twins has a whopper of a cold, which means it is likely only a matter of time until the second one gets it, or the grown-ups get it.  Oh, and nobody ever sleeps through the night, have I said that before?! :)

Meanwhile, my essay, Building Jewish Identity -- for preschoolers, came out.  Suddenly, I had people I did not know (at preschool pick up, of course! where else do I go?) telling me that they were reading my work.  This was a surprise.  To be honest...a lot of the time, I write something, and I never hear a thing afterwards!  Sometimes there are negative comments, but this was totally different.  It was positive. 

Then, Maclean's magazine published a truly game-changing piece about racism in Winnipeg.  The author of that article quoted me, based on this essay I wrote for the CBC back in November.  More than anything, I am so glad that people "heard" what was being said in that important article--and I see lots of discussion about racism in the media here, in emails people send, --and who knows, maybe out on the street.  (I haven't been out much, what with the twin preschoolers, the cold virus, the lack of sleep, etc.)

The most interesting thing about all this is that I haven't been especially worried or afraid.  Back when we lived in Kentucky, if I wrote a piece with anything political, controversial, or religious in it...I often heard about it. I received hate mail, or weird phone calls.  It was really disconcerting and scary sometimes.  It did not stop me from writing or wanting to make positive change, but it did make me wonder if it was safe, if it was worth it, and whether I should keep writing. Who knows, maybe I am just too busy to worry here, but luckily, lately, the positive feedback has outweighed anything else.

Recently, I've felt like it is worth it to keep doing this writing thing.  At the same time, I've been working on a new knitting design.  This has been fortunate, because when somebody wakes me up every 2-3 hours, I find it much harder to formulate any kind of argument or point...hence the delay in posting here...but knit?  heck yeah.  I can still knit.

Even if I didn't design, this always has benefits.  People in Winnipeg will always need woollies. :)  
 

A book and its cover

I took my time reading One Man's Meat... E. B. White's essays are engrossing. In fact, if I had to describe this experience, I might call it "chewy." That is, when you really have to chew your food, think it over, and get back to it later. Sometimes I had to ponder the historical context of his words, think on his perspectives in context, and appreciate his reflections on war and history in an age when media was NOT omnipresent the way it is today.

Some of the essays were incredibly straightforward and relevant today. Written 70 years ago, the points they make about our automobile society, the changes in regional language from one state to another (New York to Maine, in White's case) or even his insanely stressful "to do" list, called "Memorandum" are all still relevant. His clear competence as a professional--both as a writer and his adaptation to life on a farm were all well-worth reflecting on because he combined two things I often think are well-suited to one another. (The professor keeps steering us towards buying houses "in town" because he thinks I'd acquire an awful lot of sheep, llamas, goats, etc. in a hurry if I had a house in the country. My imagined garden and orchard would also be enormous. It's enough to scare a person into buying houses near lots of bus routes, I suspect.)

White's essay, "Memorandum" reminded me of my most scattered, stressed-out "to do" list and how much there is always left to get done at the end. I read that one before bed and you can bet I didn't sleep much afterwards!

I also felt stimulated by this book in a way that I haven't been lately. I admit that I've lately been guilty of reading lightweight British mysteries and other novels that pass the time without too much thought required. In part, I figured I was giving myself a brain break while my body works overtime. In part, I was just being lazy during a time when I do have plenty of time to read..and think. Reading these essays required me to do research as I went along, reading more about E.B. White, his life, his family members and his times.

I was reminded, this past summer, by the heavyweight books that our resident student took on as her leisure time reading. I too read depressing/intellectual/inspiring/well-written/classics (etc) for fun when I was 20, and she did too. Recently when I spoke to her on the phone, I heard from her that her favorite book of the summer was The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera.

Really? I asked her. Did you buy that here or bring it with you from home? Or did you borrow it from our shelves?

Oh, she said, I borrowed it....

and I laughed, because the copy she'd read was perfect for a knitter. I'd read it so many times (at about her age) that the spine was perfectly cracked, the book lay flat, and any knitter could read it slowly, while knitting, over and over again. It was also one of my favorites at that time of life. These days, I don't push myself as often to read books about big ideas, and I should.

Reflecting on these essays made me ponder a few things.
1) Some writers are lifelong companions. Charlotte's Web was one of my favorite books as a kid. My mother studied that book in her children's literature class in college. My father cried as he read it to me, and I've read it over and over. I'm still distraught that I seem to have misplaced my mother's copy of The Elements of Style. In any case, I bought another, as it is a reference book I can't teach writing without...and well, you get my point.

2) While I write lots of different things, I think at heart I am most fond of the essay. The problem with this is that being an essayist is no longer so profitable. I think the closest I come to getting to write essays all the time is on the blog--and I don't earn anything here. I've thought over that one long and hard and have yet to find good solutions to that. I'm hoping that some day I'll make the big time with an essay I sell, but so far, at $100 or less for most of the ones I sell, I'll have to stick to other kinds of writing to make my way in the world.

3) I am still very fond of books. That is, actual books rather than electronic ones. I don't have an e-reader of any kind and have debated long and hard over whether I need one. The gadgetry of it is tempting but they are quite pricey for someone who reads as much as I do. Usually, I conclude it's safer NOT to have one when I spill tea at breakfast while reading, or when I notice one of the dogs sidling up and licking a book on the coffee table. Neither would be ideal for an e-reader, I'd imagine.

However, it would also keep me from learning about the history of the actual book in my hands. (Check out the photos to see these details) My copy of One Man's Meat was purchased in 1963 for the Owensboro, Kentucky High School Library. I found this book to be fairly sophisticated, so while I am sure that somebody enjoyed it while it spent 35 years there, I was surprised to see it spent so long in a high school library! I might have read it in high school but I'm not sure what I would have gotten out of it at that time...

It was discarded in November of 1998 (a few months after the professor and I got married). It next turned up at a Bowling Green, Kentucky public library book sale sometime between 2003 and 2009, since I must have bought it sometime in there. I suspect I bought it sometime in the range of 2007-2009 but hadn't yet gotten to reading it. I moved it to Canada with me...and finally enjoyed its well-cracked spine and soft paper over the past few months.

That's just a few thoughts on this wonderful essay collection. I'm sure I'll think back on it over and over again over the coming months or years. I may have to read it again. If I teach a writing class where it's relevant, I might have to use one of these essays--each one is a gem from which I (and my students) could learn a great deal.

If you're a reader and you like essays, do check it out. It's well worth it!