Fan Mail from Your Favorite Flounder-er

Hey, guess what! Significant Objects just posted a story I wrote about this sweet Japanese fan.  As I've mentioned before, I have been fascinated with Josh Glenn and Rob Walker's project which seeks to show how our emotional entanglement with an object increases that object's value. All that makes sense, of course. But the beauty of the Significant Objects project is that they've devised a method to measure that increased value using the auctions on E-Bay.

So, here's the deal...swing by and read the story, then click the link that takes you to the ebay auction for it..and bid, bid, bid! You may win ... and if you do, you gain three things: the sweet little fan, a copy of my story to have and to hold, and the warm feelings of contributing to a very worthy cause, Girls Write Now.

And I'd love to hear what you think of the story, too.

True Confections & NPR

Off to the side is a brilliant red and white Follower Badge belonging to Katharine Weber.  It is the image of her book cover (on the left)  of her latest novel, True Confections, which was published  January 5th, 2010... and has already garnered a very tasty review from NPR  Her blog, Staircase Writing, is one of my fav go-tos on my bloggy-bloggy list, so there is no excuse for me not trumpeting her pub date earlier. But do visit her blog for candy-lore, "staircase moments" and book-tour reports. And I'm sure you'll be tempted as I am to snag her book, too. It looks delectable. Like chocolate.

Significant Objects Volume 3

Significant Objects is doing it again, yep, yep,  Volume Three, proceeds to benefit the organization Girls Write Now. A great line-up of writers, too, for a worthy cause...including Charles Baxter (yes, the Charles Baxter) whose story is already up. So excuse me, I'm on my way to bid on the meteoric paperweight he so brilliantly created out of whole cloth.

Writing Lysacek Style

Watching the Olympics these past nights, suffering from Olympic Narcolepsy all the next day...man, it starts late here on the West Coast and then goes later.  Doesn't make sense, since we're  pretty much in the same time zone as Vancouver, but there you have it.  Media playing yank-the time-zones.

Still, it's worth the sleep deprivation, as long as you're not one of my co-workers, who have to bear the brunt of my Olympic-sized crankiness the next day.

The Men's Figure Skating Shoot Out at the Pacific Coliseumn...omg...Lysacek! * What a stunningly beautiful five-minute eternity on ice. The perfect flow of energy, grace, power, control. Nothing broke my attention on his flawless execution; I wasn't caught up in how high he leaped or how many times he spun. I was enthralled, enraptured, transported to those moments of lost-to-the-world concentration. It hit me then: we want this same sort of focused, breathless attention from our readers; we want them  to be so caught up in our world that they are not aware of how high we leap or how many sentences it takes to construct the scene and setting; we don't want them to see any clunky transitions or biffed landings.  We just want them there, an engaged witness to the story.

So I went out to the woodshed and began revising. Again.

But I work with hope in my heart and a somewhat clearer vision of the way forward: ditch the un-essentials, streamline,  streamline, streamline and weave in about eight triple axels.



* Because NBC controls all video coming out of the Olympics, this link takes you to YouTube of Lysacek's 2009 Championship Free Skate. Pretty amazing stuff, but his performance at the Olympics was even more so.

Napa Valley Writers Conference - Summer 2010

And speaking about the Napa Writers Conference ...  it looks like another bang-up summer of writing and workshops for what I (personally) consider the Best Little Writing Conference in the West.

Okay, so yes, I'm involved (Fiction Director this year), but I was a workshop participant for two years and loved it just as much then. This summer, check it out: Ron Carlson,  Lan Samantha Chang, Curtis Sittenfeld and Michael Byers as fiction faculty; C.D. Wright, Arthur Sze, Brenda Hillman and Major Johnson as poetry faculty.  Spending the last week of July in one of the most beautiful valleys in California, working with fabulous writers...really, what's not to like?

Rolling admissions worked well last year, so we're doing it again, which means we'll be accepting applications beginning March 1st  (in one week -yowzers! -- better get my eyeballs oiled and tuned up.) Scholarship deadline is April 1st....so, writers, grab your keyboards; send me some apps!

Some photos from last year, courtesy of participant Charlene Kwon:

Some plein-air workshopping with ZZ Packer's group

  After the workshopping and writing, come the readings.

Gathering for wine and conversation before the Robert Boswell and Jane Hirschfield reading at Rubicon Winery (previously known as the Niebaum-Coppola Winery).

Ron Carlson - "The Signal"

Speaking of Ron Carlson (previous post, down at the bottom), I was so impressed with his latest novel, "The Signal." (Of course, I am an RC fan, so not soooo much of a surprise there.) Still. The man can write.

(Although dedicated to local indie bookstores, I've included the link to Amazon above, simply for the excellent Washington Post review posted there. Read that, then log off and order/pick up the book at your LIB. )

The Washington Post reviewer, Ron Charles, notes that Carlson "writes like Hemingway without the misogyny and self-parody." Amen. It is one of the Carlson's qualities that I most admire (aside from his prose, that is). He writes both men and women characters with full respect for their humanity, rather than privileging one over the other, or parroting the cultural baggage of being male in this society. His stories that involve parenting are gems for revealing the depth of emotion and reality of being an engaged father.

Carlson's prose has a poetically tensile strength that is at times simply amazing; it defies description and must be read to be truly appreciated.  In "The Signal," he brings all the skills he's honed from crafting short stories, cutting out all the fluff usually acceptable in the form, so that it reads almost like a novella and yet.. it isn't quite. The prose is absolutely complelling; once I dip my eyeballs in the pool, I have to be yanked out by some obligation standing in front of face and shouting, "Hey, Mom, hey, Mom, hey, over here!" or the smoke alarm wailing because I've left the toast in the toaster way too long or the teakettle boiling to the point of a flamed and red bottom. And few authors can write the mountains the way he has in story after story, in "Five Skies", the previous novel, and now "The Signal."

And, even more fun, Carlson is one of the faculty this summer at the Napa Valley Writers Conference, the Best Little Writing Conference in the West, imho. So, folks, get your keyboards running: applications open March 1st and as Fiction Director this year, I'm waiting for your submission, yes, I am!

Objects of Significance, Objects that Signify

The Significant Objects Project rocks on. They're now at the end of the second round (the last object is up, folks, time to start bidding) the proceeds of which benefit 826 National, the writing program that Dave Eggers and crew began in SF and now has gone, umm, national. Sig. Obj. has now raised over $2,000 by  e-baying various thingamabobs, doohickeys and tchotchkes after they've been value-enhanced by a pertinent albeit invented history.  Rob Walker chats more about the project here at More Intelligent Life.

This past week, Sig Obj has been dedicated to objects collected by Underwater New York, which...well, to get the whole story you'll have to go there, but suffice it to say, these evocative objects have another whole layer of meaning sloughing off them; they've been underwater before being salvaged by the intrepid band of New Yorkers dedicated to seeing what is under their water. (hell yeah, they're brave! or... foolhardy?)  Yep, hop on over there, it'll all become clearer. But -- remember: come back!

So the Sig Obj project is looking at how a story enhances an object. It's fascinating that once we've engaged with an object, once we've attached value, symbolism, meaning to a thing, that thing becomes precious to us, even though it itself hasn't (usually) changed one iota and is probably, on the grand scheme of things, inherently worthless. Although Jamie Madigan's blog is about gamers and why they do what they do, this particular post considers the assigned vs absolute values of objects and he quotes some very interesting research about what happens when objects carry an emotional charge. Go there for the research...come back here to find out what the hell I think I'm talking about.

Okay, a story making objects valuable, we got that. But it got me thinking about the role of objects in fiction; how they carry meaning for the story. Not just symbolically, though that can happen. I'm thinking more like the inventory that Ron Carlson talks about: the stuff that arrives at the start of the first draft, the objects, attitudes, names, weather, etc., and how these things both define the story and can be used later in the draft to keep the story moving along. But the idea is that these specifics bring significance to the story, they give it life. To me it is the reverse of story granting significance to things; it's things granting significance to the story.

Professions that Require Large Shoes

Anyone up for a new curious list (as described in previous post) ?
Let's roll!
Professions that Require Large Shoes:

Father
Carpenter
Carpenter's son

Winter trapper
Shepards
Mythical Characters with a seven-league stride


More suggestions needed!

Lucia Galloway: "Venus and Other Losses"

Great news! My friend and fellow-Antiochian Lucia Galloway's new book of poems, "Venus and Other Losses," has just been published by Plan View Press. I don't have copy to quote from yet, though I will soon. I've always admired her poetry; she has a great feel for formal structures, using them to her advantage, all the while messing around with them in most delicious ways.

I do have a link to a recently posted poem of hers, Seasonal, that will give you a taste of the delights to be found in her work. And if you go to her webapage, Lucia Galloway, you'll find other poems on her Portfolio page as well as links to other published work.

But wait, wait, update! Lucia generously sent me this poem, found on page 32 from "Venus and Other Losses," to post for you all.  Enjoy!

Poem without the Piano

Even if you’re expecting

just notes—

in tunes and rills

chords and counterpoint—

you may get minnows silvered

darting in little schools

or sumo wrestlers panting

groaning with the contest.

You may get Chinese acrobats

stacked up in pyramids

or paddle balls

or yo-yos

whirligigs

Pick-up-Stix

painted turtles

crawling from fissures

between the keys. Things

whose happening

takes shape in spaces

between the sounds.

~ Lucia Galloway

Breakfast for Dessert, anyone?

You know those mad, rushed, over-the-top days when breakfast-for-dinner is the best thing going?

Well, today I had dessert-for-breakfast. That's the sort of day it's been. You'd think things would have calmed down a bit at work, now that we're into the second week of the semester. But no.  Students are still duking it out for classes, and in my office, no less.

So I had my dessert first today, just in case. And besides which, a home-made eclair will get you though times of Big Trouble better than anything I know. Thanks, Gran'mom Marilyn!

Breakfast is the handiest, most satisfying meal there is and it never hurts to have two or three of them in a day. Guess lots of people had that urge when the forecasters called for a few feet of snow last week in the mid-Atlantic states. See the results: Snowpocalypse

Or as one commenter from Philadelphia said, when observing that stores sell out of bread, milk and eggs before a storm,"Why do people in Philly feel the need to make French Toast whenever it snows?"

As one who grew up in very Upstate New York (Potsdam and Buffalo), two feet of snow, well, it's snow, but I doubt we would have had a snow day. Of course, we were prepped for it with snow tires, winter woolies (down and fleece these days) and our pantry was kept topped up. No one rushed anywhere in the winter.  Unless they were on skis.  And then when we came in from a bit of cross-country or other snow-play, ahh, the  aromas of warm maple syrup and hot chocolate. And French toast. Fast, simple, hot.

So maybe it's an atavistic thing.

Diagram A

Two weeks ago,  my dentist (yes, he's mine, he's too good to share ;-} ) drilled out a huge hunk of disintegrating silver amalgam from a lower front molar in preparation for yet another manufactured tooth. I think that gets me down to just a crooked little picket fence of bottom teeth, and maybe about 4 others, that are original issue from the gum up. All the other teeth are gold crowns or porcelain caps cemented onto some mighty stubborn roots, although most of those have been gutted by root canals. (see diagram A). By the time I'm done, my genetically worthless teeth will have become the best part of me, sturdy and hale, while the rest of me falls apart. 

I began my life terrified of dentists. In the fourth grade, whenever my mom told me I had an appointment after school, I'd run away from home. Not so far that my father couldn't find me by driving around the block a few times and ordering me into the car when he spotted me hiding behind a tree. My panicked escape was understandable. At the time, Novocaine was just beginning to make its way into the profession and our dentist didn't believe in using it. Yes, way back in the mists of time.  And there was so much work to be done; Dr Hart had a long list of cavities to tackle.  Dr Hart, my mom would say, flicking an inch-long ash off her Chesterfield, I'm not sure he has one.

Perhaps Dr Hart wasn't comfortable about being able to administer the proper amount to children, or maybe I was just too wiggly for him to get a good purchase on me with a needle in one hand. Anyway, the body memory stayed with me for a very long time, even after I went to many (hundreds, it seems like) other dentists and Novocaine became an essential of the procedure. All my adult life I've avoided making appointments, missed them, reset them. When I did get into the chair, I made sure I was numbed to my eyebrows. 

Today, I got the double-crown glued on (without Novocaine, too -- no drilling!) and I feel ready for another 50,000 miles. I bless the advances of the dental profession and the excellent technique and skills of my dentist.  But it's only the first installment, And so, bit by bit, the re-build begins. 

Wordless Wednesday: Windows and Doors

Curious Lists: Unlikely Ice Cream Flavors

One book acquired over the holiday, "Curious Lists," is basically a bunch of suggested Lists to make, in any way you'd like. So, yeah, its mostly blank ... but what great lists!

For instance: Knots Used for Sailing or Declarations of a Furious Chef or True Things About Cats or Hiccup Cures or Unlikely Ice Cream Flavors. These can be taken seriously or whimsically, depending on mood or any surrounding mayhem you might find yourself in.

Kinda reminds me of the "Pillow Book," the Japanese book written around the year 1000 by a Sei Shonagon.  Part of its charm are the lists the author included, though this current book is more, uhh, interactive. (God, that word is becoming, like, poison.)

So I thought I'd throw one of those lists out there and see what folks come up with. Post any suggestions in comments and remember, fictional or literal suggestions equally acceptable (just not overly scatological or un-family friendly; those can go on your personal list you keep in your car's glovebox for the times you need to convince an officer of the law that you're more wacky than drunk and should simply be delivered home into the waiting arms of your patient but worried spouse).

So how about the last one mentioned:

Unlikely Ice Cream Flavors 

1) Aloe Vera

2) Spaceship Exhaust

3) Copper Shavings

4) Fairy Dust

5) Belly Button

Send me more!

Good News from the Publication Fairy

More good news for the New Year (and beyond) from our buddy Paul Lisicky:

1) SmokeLong Weekly chose his story, "Palo Alto," as their kick-off publication piece.
SmokeLong Weekly—"Palo Alto" by Paul Lisicky—January 4, 2010

BUT, even better! his novel, The Burning Man, will come out in Spring 2011! Yahoo!!!! Major, major congrats! If you want, you can wish him your own congratulations at his blogpost.

Feckless Frazzled Furlough Friday

First working Friday of the year and it's a Furlough Friday. Fah! It all seems rather feckless to me--a half-assed, ineffectual band-aid to a problem that requires systemic change and some big-picture thinkers up in Sacramento. Fancy that! But I'm not even going to attempt to crack that nut today. Don't want to ruin a perfectly fine Friday with frazzled and fried brain cells and a bad, sizzling attitude. 

What I want to do is get beyond the fecklessness, go past the fulminating and even facetiousness and develop something more .... fortuitous, forthright, fulfilling, maybe even frothy. I've decided they'll be Fiction Fridays. Instead of going to the office, I'll go out to the my little garden-shed-turned-into-studio and crank out some scenes on the novella. What the hey. Maybe by the end of the Economic Downturn, I'll have the dang thing finished. 

Wordless Wednesday

I took the two pix above at work on the last Wednesday before the end of the semester, and the one below on the first Wednesday we came back (today).

Wandering the Interschnitzel

Being home for ten days gave me with plenty of time to wander the grassy plains of the Interschnitzel. When I should have been working on my novella, yes... but. Sometimes you gotta take a break.  And the weather was too rubbishy (rain. cold. more rain.) for a comfortable meandering, humming actual walk.
Anyway, thought I would share some of my discoveries.

Miss Buckle...love her photos and sensibilities.

Staircase Writing... the blog of a bonafide follower of my blog, not kith or kin!  A nice take-off from stairway wit (as opposed to the elevator pitch), that includes lots of tidbits about candy. All due to research for her  novel "True Confections." May we all be blessed with such sweet research.

ohfortheloveofblog ... love reading Molly's blog, lots of spirit, lots of compassion, lots of sass. And she's got a good reading list. Plus, she makes some stunningly yummy-looking food.

That's it for now, folks. Back to work tomorrow, in the vacant, echoing halls of academia, in Darwin Hall, to be exact, where evolution is not so much a theory as an under-funded concept.

To the Persistent, Go the Rewards

Good news for the new year! My friend and grad-school compadre, Cecilia Ward Jones, had her essay, Art of Perseverance, published in the latest Poets and Writers (Jan/Feb 2010). Three cheers, hip-hip-hooray and a thousand kudos!

The link, unfortunately, will not take you to her excellent essay, just the listing on the P and W website noting that it's available in the print edition.  But I think most of you are already subscribers,  a few of you can come by the house and read my copy (in the back room by the computer, kids), and as for the rest of you, there's the library, or lingering at the newstand or loitering at your fav indie bookstore. Just don't get arrested and try to blame it on me.

You could also buy it.

Cecilia's essay addresses that age-old conundrum: why we write, and particularly why we write when, even after years of fighting our own doubts, working against everyone's expectations (she has some personal doozies to tell you about), and slaving away in isolation, improving story by story through sheer finger-sweat, brain abuse and neglect of human relationships, there are such meager crumbs of recognition, i.e. publication. Like, usually, none.  As her (putative) friend said, and I quote from the essay: "' but that's like a hobby, right? Your writing. Since you don't publish.'

"Okay, everyone, in unison: GRRRRRRRRRRR! 

Cecilia wonders, "I'm not published, ergo I'm not a writer?" which leads her to that question in the back of so many of our minds:  If I'm not getting published, then why do I do it? 

The irony is not lost on Cecilia, no siree bob, that her published essay is about her not being published. 

Struggling with that same question, a bloggin' buddy, Kathleen O'Hanlon posted this on her blog Southern California is My Desk :

" It is my pleasure and my burden to get to spend time inside my head everyday, to the detriment of exercise, professional development, home-cooked meals, going to movies with friends. This is what I do for better and worse. And most days it feels like this is what I'm supposed to be doing. Don't know why. Don't know if I ever will know why. But there it is." 

It's similar to Cecilia's conclusion: "a normal person probably would have gone on to other things, but I continue to write. Stubborn? Maybe. But it's what I do. I write. I get up every morning, sit in front of my computer and work away."

Cecilia and Kathleen have nailed it: we don't know why, but we do; we write. For better or worse, we write. In sickness and in health. In rain, snow, sleet, dark of night and bright of day, under blue moons and during monsoons. We write, ergo we are writers. So there.  

So Many Books, So Little Time

yes, yes, absolutely, you're right: lame-o blogger, haven't posted in weeks. Though, between the end of the semester and the whole holiday thing, those were some pretty intense weeks. Lots of things went by the wayside: correspondence (email, FB, LinkedIn, and otherwise), tidyness around the house and office, excessive attention to grooming, etc. Don't get me wrong, I took showers - almost everyday, in fact. Just wasn't rat-tailing the bangs or buffing up the nails. Course I don't do either of those things anyway, so that didn't save me so much time. Let's just say that I kept myself presentable, just not dolled up.

So the blogging suffered. But my family is happy and I'm still employed; what more can you want? Time, of course... mostly for various writing projects. Which is another reason the blogging is on the back burner. This week off  has been an opportunity to woodshed, as the jazz-cats say, out in my garden-shack studio. Helps that it's been raining, too. Easy to stay inside.  It's been raining in my novella, too, come to think of it.

The library project is on hold for now. In an attempt to meet their slashed budget, the Sonoma County Libraries are closed all this week. I know they have little choice, but these are sad times.

On the upside, I've been able to indulge in some fabulous reading: The Elegance of the Hedgehog, by Muriel Barbery (translated from the French), a book that had been recommended to me several times. And with damn good reason. This is some book. I haven't finished quite yet, but almost; I'm at that point where I'm slowing down, so it lasts just a teeny bit longer.  I'm completely impressed with the author's ability to mess around with philosophical ideas and yet keep a compelling tale going. Not only that, but there's been few words I had to look up in the dictionary, like incunabulum. I  love it!  The French can be like that, though. I highly recommend it; has anyone else read it yet?

This is Barbery's second novel but the first to be published here. Her first novel, Gourmet Rhapsody, has subsequently been published on this side of the pond and it's next on my list.

Some of the rest of the list:
The Help by Kathryn Stockett...I want to see what the fuss is about.
Lacuna, by Barbara Kingsolver, 'nuff said.
A Gate at the Stairs, by Lorrie Moore, ditto
Too Much Happiness, by Alice Munro, ditto, ditto.
The Art of Subtext, by Charles Baxter as suggested by Cliff Garstang on his blog Perpetual Folly, a blog to check out if you're of the writing clan.

Prep, The Man of My Dreams and American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld. One of the faculty at Napa Writers Conference this summer; I like to be prepared. It's that Inner Scout thing.
Long for This World, and Coast of Good Intentions, by Michael Byers, for the same reason.

Woman's World, by Graham Rawle, a novel written using text (words, phrases) entirely cut out from women's magazines. This is an Xmas gift from my bookseller daughter--she knows her stuff.

Well, that's a good start. Here's some links, if you're interested in other good book lists.

KList...by Kathleen O'Hanlon
S.Krishna's Books  authors from South Asia and a whole bunch of places not America; includes book reviews and reading challenges. A great place to be introduced to unfamiliar authors.

With that, I think it's time to pack 2009 away and get ready for 2010.

Significant Mention

So today, Significant Objects commented on my comments about them and posted a link to my blog and the story I had created from one of their SO's. How cool is that?  Yep, just about that cool.

No matter, here's the link...you might have to "read more" to find me. Then cruise around and check out their current project, Significant Objects 2, which is raising funds for 826 National, which I realize now, duh, is 826 Valencia gone national.

And then, writer-ettes, find an object of significance and write its story.

Significant Sauce

Sooo ...apropos the previous post about Significant Objects and their usefulness as writing prompts, here's the narrative I wrote using the pictured object as a prompt, which was originally posted here.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * 

She brought it back from Kansas City, because he loved bar-b-que so much. A token of gratitude for being so agreeable about her mandatory sales managers conference scheduled on the weekend of their third anniversary.

"Doesn't hold enough sauce to cover a chicken wing," he growled. He stood up, grabbed his beer, went to watch the news, leaving the jar, barely three inches high and the dour color of baked beans, on the kitchen table where he'd unwrapped it.

Soon, however, he didn't have enough scruples to come home every night or hide the emails or even pretend he was looking for work anymore.

She left for good after coming home early from a horrendous day at work to hear a voicemail from the third girlfriend in as many years, accusing her of being the "other woman," of wrecking his happiness, of holding him back. He was nowhere to be found, maybe out buying more beer, maybe just out. With sudden swift arcs of her arms, she swept everything off the kitchen table, reveling in the clatter and crash of the breakfast plates, coffee cups, empty beer mugs, catalogs, cutlery, a jelly-jar of pens, the chipped cow-shaped butter dish his mother had given them for a wedding gift.

Only the miniscule bar-b-que jar survived, dancing around in the middle of the table, the top off and rolling, the brush-bristles stuck to its underside describing wacky circles. She grabbed it, put the top back on and placed it in the exact middle of the empty table. She stuck this message to it: "This holds just enough sauce to coat your teeny-tiny heart as I roast it over the spluttering flames of your entrails on a spit made from the long bones of your legs."

He boxed the jar up and mailed it to her at her sister's house, a scrawled note rubberbanded around it. "This will hold all the money you'll ever get out of me."

She folded an SASE envelope in half and rolled it around the bristles, stuffing it all back into the jar, and mailed it back: "One check for half your gross worth in the enclosed envelope? Good enough for me. Never seeing you again? Priceless!"

He returned it: "You'll see me, alright - in court."

When the new keys to their old house arrived, she put them in the Bar-B-Que jar, tucked upright around those bristles that had never seen any sauce.

A few months later, she put the hefty check from the sale of the 3BR/2BA, vault ceils, hrdwd floors, gd neighborhood (and nicely appreciated) house into her new bank account.

At least that's the way she'd tell the story at our Single and Sassy meetings.

Lazy Blogger & the Significance in Objects

Yes, it's been weeks, almost a month, something like that, since I've dropped by my own blog. I've become that bane of the bloggerdom, an irregular correspondent. Some of that was due to having a good time: a short trip with friends to the mountains (close to Donner Summit, well before the snow flew), and after that, a longer, more solitary visit to Wellspring (in Philo, CA) for a writer's retreat.

And then some of it's due to the pile-up of work: registration for the Spring 2010 semester started last week and it's been a wang-dang doozie from the get-go. In between was the Thanksgiving holiday, with folks hanging out here, food prep and a day or two of recovery, and so there you have it.

Meanwhile I've been playing around with S.O. (Significant Objects, honey, not Significant Other, this is a family-friendly blog). Significant Objects, as noted in previous post, is a coalition of folks who ran an experiment in the value of desire, as I interpret it.

These folks decided to discover if increasing the significance of an object would increase that object's desirability, as measured by an increase in price on eBay. The set-up was to purchase tchotchkes on eBay for a song or a song-and-a-half, then ask writers to provide a narrative that created and illuminated significance for that particular object. They then reposted the object on eBay, accompanied by the narrative and kicked back to see what happened.

Boy, did it happen. They've completed one such project of 100 objects and you can see the results at the website, as well as checking out the objects, stories, charts and figures.  It definitely shows the power of narrative.

I, of course (you did, too, I bet), thought right away what cool writing prompts these objects would make for a malingering writer, looking for a jump start. But that's the gist of another post.

6. Sebastopol Library

On one of the first serious rain days of the season a few weeks ago (yes, sorry, it's been that long), I left work and drove out to visit the library in the unique, quirky little town of Sebastopol, a good half-an-hour away. So let's say it's 40, 45 minutes from my home in Petaluma, depending on traffic (isn't all life in the Bay Area dependent on traffic?).  It had been raining all weekend, but that Monday it was wrapping up-more than a drizzle, not quite a shower.

Sebastopol Library
7140 Bodega Ave
Sebastopol, CA 95472
Visit time: Monday evening, 5:30 - 6:30 pm

Ratings

Architecture/Atmosphere: 3

Seating: 3

Books: 4

Librarians: 4

Two books checked out:
Salt by Mark Kurplansky.
A fascinating look through history at a basic element so necessary for life. Once upon a time, one could pay their bills with salt. And be paid with salt. Thick going in spots, but compelling.
Why I Write The Secret Lives of Authors by Philip Oltermann.....another example of the importance of punctuation. I thought the author was going to tell me why he writes about the secret lives of authors, because, as we well know, writers are equal parts nosy, tight-lipped and show-offs, confident that folks desperately want to hear about why the hell he spent hours in a cramped garret churning out text-docs about the hidden lives of other authors. But the book is far more than that.

The library is just up a small hill from the city center, on one of the main arteries of town, the one that goes right out to the coast, another 45 minutes or so down the road. It's one of those brick-clad buildings from the 70's (1976 to be exact) but with a whole bunch of style. The clean angles and spare lines have a pleasing balance of weight and shape. Anchored on one corner, of course, by a large, very red, apple, the icon of Sebastopol, once the Apple Capitol of Sonoma County.  Although the orchards have dwindled and the last apple processing plant closed shop several years ago, it's still the Apple Capital, at least in the hearts and minds of the populace. They still have the festivals and parades and a million apple icons around town to prove it.

But back to the library.

The entrance is somewhat disguised; walking up the terraced steps past a water garden is an act of faith, but it leads us to a lobby whose door is set back, not quite seen from the street. The lobby is actually a wide hallway, with another entrance on the opposite side; to my left is the Community Room, to the right, two entrances into the library. The hallway is pretty much all brick. In the wall between the two library doors is a long narrow window, shoulder height, resembling  a theater box office window somewhat, only much much longer, that gives a glimpse into the circulation desk area. We can see, through this wide slot, the clutch of library techs assisting patrons, and the patrons themselves on their way in or out.

Okay, so the pictures are kinda blurry, but if you squint your eyes....and maybe stand on your head, it'll start to make sense. I kinda like the ghost-patron in the second photo.

The Community room is hosting a very lively art show of masks, puppets and costuming; a fitting exhibit for pre-Halloween.

After shaking off the dribs and drabs of the drizzle, I spend some time at the art exhibit and then cross the hall to enter the library, dropping several books on the return counter. The place is packed: all study tables are occupied, many are shared, and all computer terminals are in use. Once again, a very large  square with cubby-nooks running along two edges, yet on this rainy day, it feels more cozy than oppressive or crowded.

At one table, a chess game is in progress, at another, math tutoring.  One young girl makes the circuit from the children's area near the front (below, outfitted with two reading couches), to her mom, working at the computers a few aisles away.

I admire the supreme patience of the reference desk librarian who responds to several people trying to get  their uniquely individual laptops to access the inter-schnitzel.  I wander a bit, investigating the shelves.  The collection seems very robust in non-fiction; self-development, crafts and gardening in particular.  It feels like an accurate reflection of the town, known for its self-reliant, back-to-the-land, do-it-your-selfers. Before I leave, I grab a shot of some books, these biographies below; there is something soothing about these full shelves, rich in the lore of poets.

Sonoma County Libraries to close for ten days

I better hurry up with my library reviews, look what's happening!

article one

article two

Another sign of the damn times.

Here I am, bumbling along, confident that libraries will always be there - until they are not, that is. I'm still not used to them being closed on Sundays and that happened years ago. (Maybe even a decade ago. Hush!) I'm thinking of the school children without a place to study or do research, of the moms who rely on the library as an inexpensive educational and recreational resource and just plain quiet time. Holy moley!

I understand that the library administration had to make some tough decisions; I see the same tough decisions being made on campus where I work. But I worry about a society that hesitates to fully fund schools and libraries and parks, that when they are needed most, they are least available.

October 31st came around again.

Halloween is a one heck of a big deal here. And on a Saturday night, with good weather and an almost-full moon, it's an even bigger deal than usual.  600 + pieces of candy (one per trickster) handed out from our house in an hour and a half; you gotta love it.

Well, actually, we no longer love it; we have become the Scrooges, the Grinches of Halloween. We went to the movies, deputizing my sister and niece to do the Halloween Duty, leaving them to sit on the bottom steps in front of our house, dropping candy one by one into the bags and hats and hands of vampires, ballerinas, princesses, skeletons, pirates, a family of jelly-fish, a Haz Mat container bubbling over and one kid decked out as a kitty-litter box.  Or so they gleefully reported to us.

Our neighbor told me they had about 1400 ghouls & goblins come by. But then they have a tunnel created out of pvc pipe, covered in black plastic sheeting with spooky music, flashing lights and low-hanging cobwebs  inside.  It's a big draw. Up the street, a fella has life-sized mannequins of practically every Disney  movie character that he sets out on his lawn. He's got music too, and dry-ice fog. The crowd gets so thick in front of his house, he sets out traffic cones to keep people out of the street traffic.  Two blocks over, D Street has even more elaborate sets and houses.

Our one piece of Halloween decoration? A string of pumpkin lights I found in the basement.

Walking back from the movies, it was kinda neat to see the families and groups of kids and teens roaming the streets, the houses decked to the nines, lights still flashing in haunted houses and the spooky tunnel next door. Even at 9 p.m., some houses still had lines of trick-or-treaters, though they were short lines.

Neat enough that we'll invite my niece and sister up again next year. And we'll leave them with more candy.

Another Three-Book Review

I have not kept up with much, have I? The 13 Libraries in 13 Weeks is so obviously becoming 13 Libraries Sometime by the End of the Year.  There are reasons for this. But yes, I have visited another library and will post that review next. First, though, I thought I'd catch up on some of my reading. These three books were checked out of two different libraries and remain books I'm excited about.

The Married Man by Edmund White. In three words: gorgeous, gorgeous prose. The sort of writing you slurp up, way past bedtime, with sentences you want to study to find out how the heck he does it and descriptions you want to roll around in like a cat in catnip.  The story is no slouch either. It pulses along on several continents, delineating intricate relationships among several men - some lovers, some not - and rolling to a complex, revelatory ending. I'll be reading more Edmund White, double-dog guarantee.

Counting Sheep by Paul Martin. Okay, this book just plain scared the bejesus out of me. The dangers of sleep deprivation are real and Martin reveals them all: the brain that falls apart, the body that breaks down, the accidents, the social consequences of drowzy ineptitude. It all seemed so familiar. So instead of trying to squeeze another hour of work on the computer (usually completely unproductive, anyway), I've been snoozing, cat-napping, dreaming, lolling around, catching zzz's, trying to offset the sleep debt that I've been living with (if you could call it that) for decades. Many decades -- more decades than I'd like to admit publicly. Begin with bad genes, add nervous habits and early-onset caffeine consumption, become a teen-ager, go to grad school, have kids, fit in a couple of jobs, well, I was pretty doomed.   What is the drug of choice for moms with kids (especially infants)? Sleep. Hours of sleep. Weeks of sleep. Months of sleep. I would have mainlined sleep if I could when the kids were tiny. And the craving only got stronger with time. Now I've been scared straight: I've got a sleep journal going; I've invested in actual jammies, not just those t-shirts and sweats no longer fit for daytime use; I'm taking NAPS!   I'm developing an eye for the good nap spots, too, much to the dismay of my employer.

The Niagara River by Kay Ryan. I've been a fan of Ryan's terse, lyrical, wry, playful, mind-twisting verse for a very long time. Not quite as long as I've been sleep-deprived, but close enough.  One reviewer noted, and I completely agree, that she is "immaculately off-kilter." She's unique; I can't think of another poet that I'd say she resembled.  But others of you out there, other poets in particular, might be able to point to someone.  So, let me know. And just because, here's one of the poems from this book.

Thanks, Kay.


Pitcher
A pitcher molds
the air in it, dividing
from the air beyond
the air it holds. And
should the pitcher
vanish, something
would take a minute
to escape, a gradually
diminishing integrity,
a thinning pitcherful
of pitcher shape.

Objects of Significance

From Mark Doty, I discovered this site that is a complete treasure-trove for anyone fascinated by the objects we collect and shed on a routine basis.  It's also a trove of writing prompts, for those of us looking for a nudge or two. Or a reminder of the ways in which objects can enhance, develop or even be the story.

Significant Objects

Blackberry Love

No, not the PDA, the real deal, the prickery, stickery, luscious berries... a link to a piece published in Newsbytes at SSU:

Blackberryness

When Damp Begs to Drop Out

We were kept on hold all day yesterday,
(swear it's going to rain any darn second now),
the air thick and lugubrious, dense with potential.

By mid-afternoon, the world had gone silent,
no chittering, twittering, or chipping,
no trills or calls of songbirds.

The tribe of Canada geese, fifty strong,
had plumped down on the lawn,
all facing southwest, bills tucked under wings.

Around four pm, a herd of ravens, had to have been thirty or more,
came galloping across the sky, wheeling and calling, landing on the roof opposite us, slipping over the far edge to hunker under the wide eaves.

The damp in the air begged to drop out.

Then, well after dark, the first hesitant patters of rain, a tickling along the roof. Plinkety plonk plinkety on the tin spark-cover of the
chimney pipe, the tympany of rain.

In the wee-est hours of the night, the storm strolled into the county, commanding all airspace, pummeling trees, filling up creek beds and ditches. Attention!

This morning, the rain rustles and rushes, swatted by wind-gusts against the window. Wind wrestles the taller trees, messes about with the smaller ones, nothing is still.

The birds and animals will sleep the day away in nooks and hollows, under eaves and logs, tucked amongst the fat leaves of the canna lilies.

Only humans will walk about, with clutched umbrellas, impervious foot-gear, tightly sealed coats, blown half-sideways and soaking wet.

Soooo.

The Insurance Industry says the Health-Care Bills in Congress will increase the costs of health care for everyone.

Guess we'll really need the public option* now.

*Or as I like to think of it, an extension of Medicare to help those who can't pay the current (outrageous, imho) health insurance premiums.

We expect rain

okay, so I didn't get to a library this weekend. I shoulda, woulda, coulda, all that. But the air was heavy and thick, the sky a paltry grey. I opted for being close to the house and battening down the hatches: putting the hammock and umbrellas up into the rafters of the garage, deadheading the sunflowers, refilling the bird feeders, swapping out the curtains (an easier task than putting up storm windows, but the same idea). The first significant storm of the winter is predicted to hit Monday evening/Tuesday morning, the tail end, the left-overs you could say, of a typhoon out in the Pacific and I felt a scurrying need to be ready for it.

So in lieu of a review, I'll post this poem from Kay Ryan's book "The Niagara River."

Expectations

We expect rain
to animate this
creek: these rocks
to harbor gurgles,
these pebbles to
creep downstream
a little, those leaves
to circle in the
eddy, the stain
and gloss of wet.
The bed is ready
but no rain yet.

Choices, Change & Opting for Options

Okay, I just have to get this off my chest. Then I'll get back to books and libraries.

All these folks having raging fits about the public option provision in the health-care reform bills, like it was some sort off bogeyman hiding under the bed gonna jump out and EAT them...jeepers creepers criminey crow! I don't see them having fits about being forced to take Social Security Retirement Benefits, or Medicare. Aren't these public options? Aren't they stabilizing forces, ensuring coverage and care for all of us in our senior years?

The sheer irrationality of their un-discourse lets us know these critics speak and act from fear. As a therapist-buddy once said, if it doesn't make sense, it's gotta be emotionally-based.

As far as I'm concerned, the "public option" can really be considered an extension of Medicare benefits to those people who either can't afford the current (outrageous) rates or who've been denied coverage due to pre-existing conditions (like pregnancy, allergies, asthma, or just plain being alive) or who've been kicked off plans because they were just too sick for the companies to cover (though I thought that was the point of health-insurance: you pay a little bit every month so you don't have to pay the whopping fees when you were sick or injured-silly me) or any of the other myriad of excuses to take your money and run.

A public option is just that: an option. You don't have to take it. If you're happy with your insurance, like I am with Kaiser, guess what? You don't have to take it!!!! Yipppeee! In a truly functioning capitalist society, there are plenty of choices. In fact, freedom is all about choices, but don't get me started on that or we'll be here until the cows come home and bogeymen are passed out, drooling, behind the curtains.

Of course, the insurance companies are terrified of the pubic option crouching there in the corners, behind the curtains, under the bed just aching to snatch them; it could be the monster that makes them fly right. For a change.

5. Guerneville Library

Early in the afternoon, on one of the hottest days of the summer, Cheryl, my intrepid library-review companion, and I start the 45-minute drive to Guerneville. Soon we are out of Petaluma and in rolling country, with hayfields, cow pastures, flocks of sheep on either side of the road. A quick dog-leg jog through the quaint town of Sebastopol and we’re out in West County proper. Here the stunning heat is moderated somewhat as we pass through stands of redwoods, bay, oak. Still the AC stays on; a hand on the window confirms that it’s mighty f’ing hot outside, pretty close to a hundred, I'm guessing. (It was.)

We’re heading for the Vacation Wonderland side of Sonoma County, where the Russian River meanders the last few miles to the ocean, and cabins, vacation rentals, and party bars sprout up like mushrooms in a manure patch.  Following 116, we cross the river on a green-painted steel-girder bridge, make a fast left and suddenly we’re smack-dab in downtown Guerneville, probably the largest town out here, certainly the one with the most chi-chi stores.  A quick right turn at the main intersection and in a trice, we’re  upon the library just up the road and across from the fire station. 

Guerneville Library
14107 Armstrong Woods Rd,

Guerneville, CA 95446

Visit time: 2-3 pm, Saturday afternoon.

Books checked out:

Counting Sheep, the Science of Sleep, Paul Martin 

The Naked Brain, Richard Restak, M.D. (continuing a theme)

like you'd understand, anyway, Jim Shepard  (all lower case!) (accck!) 

Ratings

Architecture/atmosphere: 4

Seating: 3

Books: 3 (taking into account its size)

Librarians: 4

Overall:  14

This may be the smallest full-time library in the Sonoma County Library system, but it is no slouch. An appealing structure, clad in a dark green and brown replicating the hues of the surrounding redwoods, it looks to be composed of triangles and circles, with a sharply peaked  roofline and several very large, round, clerestory windows. Below are two views from the parking lot, and below that, the view of the front entrance from the road.

Entering the lobby, the Maggie Boynton Forum room is directly in front of us, with an introduction to Auyervedic Medicine by Dr. Erika Crotta already well underway. Behind the announcement boards, the vaulted ceilings in the library can just be seen. We turn right into the library entrance; I note a counter-stand sign by the drop-off counter that  reminds patrons to wipe items off before returning them, apt testament to the heavy-duty rainy season here. This is flood-central for Sonoma County; Guerneville and its neighbor down-river, Cazadero, record the highest rainfall totals per storm and per year in the county.

Constructed in 1980 and opened in 1981, the library was designed for 18,000 volumes, though dollars to donuts, I’ll bet there are more than that now. With central vaulted ceilings, open beams and plenty of high clerestory light, it feels more spacious than 6,237 sq. ft. would seem to be. For all its compactness, though, this library covers all the bases - fiction, non-fiction (in almost equal numbers, seems to me, which makes my little fictioneer heart go pit-a-pat), periodical shelves, computers for internet and catalog use, three sturdy work tables with sturdy chairs, a row of reading chairs, a distinct children’s area. It’s very quiet, for anything anyone says at one end can be easily heard at the other. With about 10 patrons (men, moms, pre-teens, kids) looking for books, reading at the tables, surfing the interwebs, it feels full and lively.

The librarian is very helpful and kind, but reluctant to approve interior shots. I can see why; virtually no shot except straight up would exclude people. I dearly want to grab a photo of the stained-glass circular window placed high in the apex of one wall, a balanced design of colored rectangles by Robert Moore that reminds me of Frank Lloyd Wright, but I refrain.

All in all, a most pleasant experience. For its size, I found the collection quite adequate, with something of interest in every century of Dewey’s decimals and plenty of heavy hitters in the fiction. Here, though, the benefits of the SC Library system stand revealed. If a book isn’t on the shelf here, it is bound to be in some other library in the system. Put in a request and the item will arrive in a matter of days, as long as there aren’t previous requests for it. And if it isn’t in our system, there is a reciprocal agreement with Mendocino Library system. Pretty difficult to stump the system. Though some do try.

I check out my three books, a book on the brain (again!), one on sleep (there are times when it feels like I’m allergic to sleep) and the third, a collection of short stories by Jim Shepard (haven't read much of his work). My companion, pleased with her selection on textiles and color, and I, happy with my three volumes, walk back into the heat of the afternoon, slide into my car blessed with AC, and proceed down-river to a mutual friend’s open-house-warming party. (Though some might wish for a house-cooling party). This is the sort of the afternoon to linger by the river, mulling on the reason for ripples and the direction of currents, as the rest of the county bakes on.