How We Live Now: Scenes from the Pandemic | Bill Hayes

 

I had no idea that Bill Hayes was working on another scenes of New York book that would focus on the March-April Covid-19 lockdown of 2020. If I'd known, I may have experienced fewer angsty days of my own, knowing that Bill was going to somehow make it all right!

It’s a little like losing your life while still being alive, this experience.

How We Live Now is presented in a very similar way to Insomniac City from three years ago. A lovely hardback edition, with black and white photographs scattered throughout. Photographs, or more precisely portraits, that Bill takes of strangers as he is out walking around New York (with their permission). You can see some of them here. The photographs are usually accompanied by a vignette - whether it's what was happening on that particular day or a little personal story about his meeting and conversation with the stranger in question.

Behind me a small line had formed....A family was looking for books for their kids to read. I felt like I was in a metaphorical breadline - a breadline for feeding the brain and the soul.

Insomniac City was a love letter to New York and to his recently deceased partner, Oliver Sacks. How We Live Now continues this theme. Losing Oliver is obviously still a painful memory for Bill, but three years later, his stories are fond reminiscences rather than emotional outpourings. While his love for New York continues unabated, despite the changes that lockdown brought.

When you look out & see the empty streets & sidewalks & shuttered shops, a friend tells me, see it as solidarity - everyone doing their best to keep themselves & everyone else healthy....Even so, I can’t deny how sad & disorientating the absence of life in these once busy streets seems.

It's only a small volume. A slim slice of life as we are living it now, by someone who has a tender eye for detail, for the unusual and the routine. Hayes is a thoughtful man who reflects on how is feeling throughout this time as well as documenting the impact on some of those around him.

In the enforced solitude and silence, you can sometimes hear yourself replaying moments in your life, things said or not said, done or not done, love expressed or not expressed, all the gratitude you’ve ever received, all the gratitude you’ve ever felt.

He captured some of the feelings and moods that I also experienced during our Sydney lockdown. The moments of anxiety as well as the odd moments of peace - being able to listen to an individual bird sing, watching a skateboarder roll down an empty street from his apartment window...

Because I’ve worked at home for years now, the mandate to stay home and work from home is, I imagine, a little easier for someone like me. I’m also a loner and an introvert (except when it comes to strangers), which helps too.

Even so, there are times when I feel spooked - not scared but spooked.

However, what I found most endearing or comforting as I read How We Live Now, was the sense of solidarity that we are all in this together, and the reminder to live our lives now. Our collective here and now may not be the one we planned for or expected, but this is what we have right now. 

Because what IS is what matters most. What was will only make you blue in New York.

This is our life. We are living it. And that's all we have ever been able to do - to live in the world we are in.

Wishing that things were 'normal' or talking about when things go back to 'normal', will only lead us to despair. This is our normal now. We're living it. Whatever happens afterwards, will be different to what went before. This experience will change us all, in big ways and in small. We don't know what or how yet, but change is one of the few things guaranteed in life. Covid-19 has simply been a real in-your-face reminder that this is so. If we fight against it, we can become bitter and disappointed. However, if we accept it, and let go of our desire to control everything (one of the hardest lessons I've certainly had to learn as an adult) we can learn to roll with the punches and find some grace in just being, here, now.

And like Hayes, I am curious to see what's on the other side. 

I am climbing the walls here. But I also know I am among the most fortunate: I have a roof over my head, food in my fridge, and my health to be thankful for. So, if this is how we have to live - with masks and gloves and almost no human contact for several more months - then so be it, this is how we have to live. I just want to see what's on the other side of this f***ing mountain.

My Previous Plague/Pandemic Reads:

• The Plague | Albert Camus
• How We Live Now | Bill Hayes (non-fiction Covid-19)
• The Stand | Stephen King
• Moloka'i | Alan Brennert (Leprosy)
• All Fall Down | Sally Nicholls (The Black Death) YA
• Hamnet | Maggie O'Farrell (The Plague)
• Oryx and Crake | Margaret Atwood
• Year of Wonders | Geraldine Brooks (Great Plague of London)
• The Pull of the Stars | Emma Donoghue (Spanish Flu)
• A Journal of the Plague Year | Daniel Defoe (Great Plague of London)
• Intimations | Zadie Smith (non-fiction Covid-19)

My Current Plague Reads:

• A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century | Barbara Tuchman (non-fiction The Black Death)
• How We Live Now | Bill Hayes

Up Next:

• Pale Horse, Pale Rider | Katherine Anne Porter (Spanish Flu)
• The Decameron Project: 29 Stories from the Pandemic | The New York Times (Covid-19)

Only Happiness Here | Gabrielle Carey #AWW

 

Gabrielle Carey, with this book about Elizabeth von Armin, had the honour of being the very first author event by zoom, that I participated in during this Covid year. Also in attendance was Lisa from ANZLitLovers, who had alerted me to the event in the first place. It was lovely to be able to wave hello to someone I knew before proceedings started proper. For a thorough account of the author talk, please read Lisa's post here.

I had not read Only Happiness Here prior to the event, but it was high on my list for AusReading Month possibilities. By the end of the discussion, though, with Jessica White, it had moved up to be next on the pile! As had my desire to read Elizabeth and Her German Garden. 

Only Happiness Here refers to the sign that Elizabeth von Armin had over the door of her Swiss chalet. As Carey states in her book, Elizabeth may have been one of the 'earliest proponents of positive psychology.' It was this approach to happiness that attracted Carey. Enough so for her to reread all twenty-one of von Armin's books before embarking on a trip to the British Library to read her letters and diaries as well.

This is very firmly in the camp of biblio-memoir or bio-memoir. Carey is very much a part of the story, as she rereads the books and interprets what she finds there. It is also her personal search for happiness and peace of mind, as she delves into von Armin's life, looking for clues or signs on how to be happy. 

My quest was about how to understand Elizabeth's temperament and her way of seeing things, how she maintained such buoyancy, such apparent relish of daily living.

She eventually hits upon nine Principles of Happiness According to Elizabeth von Armin - freedom, privacy, detachment, nature & gardens, physical exercise, a kindred spirit, sunlight, leisure and finally, creativity. 

Carey developed each principle into a chapter or section that interspersed von Armin's writing with known facts about her life. Of which, there are not as many as a biographer would usually like. This was all part of von Armin's desire to remain very private, and happy. Towards the end of her life, she burned a large number of her 'notes and diaries in what she referred to as "the holocaust"'. Which, naturally, leads the rest of us to surmising stuff about how she felt and thought via the actions and words of her characters. 

So the first fact many of you may not know about Elizabeth is that she was born in Australia. In the prestigious suburb of Kirribilli in Sydney, to be precise, on the 31st August, 1866. She was christened Mary Annette Beauchamp, and known as May by her family and friends. Her home for the first three years of her life was most likely Beulah House (converted into an apartment block in 1908 and now only remembered by the name of nearby Beulah St and wharf). I've said it before, but Australians are hopeless at commemorating the birth places and homes of our well-known authors.

Her father, Henry Heron Beauchamp, came from an artistic, well-to-do family in London. He emigrated to Australia in 1850 to set up a business as a shipping merchant. His business thrived and in 1855 he married Elizabeth Weiss Lassetter (known as Louey). All six of the Beauchamp children were born in Sydney.

One of Henry's brothers, Arthur, moved with his young family to New Zealand in 1869. His son Harold is the father of Katherine Mansfield, making May and Katherine first cousins once removed. Katherine's last letter, before her untimely death, was to her cousin May.

In 1870, Henry and his Lassetter brother-in-law, decided to move their families back to the Continent. Enjoying three years in Switzerland together, before settling in London.

As May got older, she kept her Australian heritage very quiet. Any odd accent or 'twang' that people noticed in her voice, she would put down to 'Irish connections'.

Being a 'colonial' in class-conscious England was not much fun and could often be a hindrance to making one's way into good society. Curiously, this slur of the 'convict stain' still loomed large in the imagination of many of the Brits that I got to know in the year I lived in London (1991). I imagine that the 'good-natured' ribbing I received was a watered down version of attitudes a hundred years prior.

Carey wonders if May's 'awareness of her Australianness (was) just another one of Elizabeth's deep secrets?'

She married Count Henning August von Armin-Schlagenthin on the 6th February, 1891, effectively becoming a Prussian Countess overnight. She had three daughters in quick succession - Eva (1891), Elisabeth (1893) and Beatrix (1894), after which, the Count was apparently banished from her bedroom...until 1899 when Felicitas was born, then Henning-Bernd in 1902.

At the beginning of 1898, she sent her first manuscript, Elizabeth and Her German Garden, off to the publishers. It was published in September of that year under the pen-name, Elizabeth. After an initial celebratory remark in her diary, the following days were scrawled angrily with 'rows with H'. May never provided any detail about these rows, which leaves the reader to look for clues in her novels.

If happiness was something she often enjoyed privately, depression was also something she believed should be borne individually....Elizabeth believed that sharing misery only increased the gloom and risked infecting others. 

We know some of the basic facts about the less happy times in Elizabeth's life - the Count's arrest for embezzlement, the death of Felicitas as a teenager, her fear of ageing, the loss of their family home in Pomerania and Henning's sudden death in 1910 - but not how May felt about them. Once again, the only clues are in her books when her characters go through similar experiences.

Despite times of depression and sadness, May continued to find joy and solace in nature, especially gardens and appreciating beauty.

The rest of her books where published with the tag 'by the author of Elizabeth and Her German Garden' causing a lifetime of supposition and speculation in literary circles, although her friends, like E. M. Forster, H. G. Wells and Bertrand Russell, were well aware of her writing.

I finished Carey's book with a very strong desire to get to know May better. I will try to source her two more recent biographies, but in the meantime, I will start at the beginning of EvA's oeuvre with Elizabeth and Her German Garden, which will have the happy coincidence of counting for an #AusReadingMonth title as well as the #NovNov challenge.

Did Carey also find happiness in the end?

Like the rest of us, and like May, the answer is yes and no.

The trick, it seems, is to focus on the happy.

Not long after, the lockdown was announced and during the weeks of working from home, I took to having lunch under the frangipani tree. Oftentimes, following my salad and cheese and seeded bread, I stretched out on the picnic blanket, and as the world turned in turmoil, I lay in the dappled sunlight pretending I was Elizabeth von Armin.

Facts:

• The International Society Devoted to Scholarship on Elizabeth von Armin has some amazing articles and essays, including the one that led me to them, Family Life on Kirribilli Point in the 1860's: The Enigma of Elizabeth's Birthplace (Jennifer Walker, posted October 27. 2019). This piece includes a copy of G W Peacock's Government House ca 1850, which when blown up to expose the background, we can clearly see Beulah House and its gardens.
• There is a 1958 biography by one of her daughters, Elizabeth of the German Garden.
• Another in 1986 by Karen Usborne, Elizabeth the Author of Elizabeth and Her German Garden.
• And again in 2013 with Jennifer Walker's, Elizabeth of the German Garden - A Literary Journey.

Elizabeth von Arnim Monument in Buk, Poland

#AusReadingMonth2020

Moving Among Strangers by Gabrielle Carey

Writing regularly blog posts seems to be something quite beyond right now. But thanks to Karen @Booker Talk I've be revisiting some of my older posts to find fresh inspiration. This post about the rather silent author, Randolph Stow, was originally published on the 29th August 2015.

I've been thinking about Gabrielle Carey a lot, over the past 24 hrs, after learning that she has a new book coming out in October with University of Queensland Press about Elizabeth von Armin called Only Happiness Here. 

Her website explains that von Armin has been one of her literary passions for quite some time, and like me, Carey is amazed that this Australian born writer (along with her cousin, Katherine Mansfield) is so little known and appreciated here. 

New Zealander's have done a much better job of being loud and proud about Mansfield. Admittedly, von Armin only lived in Australia for the first three years of her life (whereas Mansfield grew up in NZ before moving permanently to Europe). But given our tendency to claim famous folk with far less tenuous links than that, it's curious that we have been so silent on our relationship with von Armin.

I want to know more about the friendship and authorial support that existed between von Armin and Mansfield and how they influenced each other. And I'm keen to find out why Carey is so fascinated by von Armin. Weaving together the biography of an author with her own personal reflections was one of the things I really enjoyed about her Randolph Stow book. 

It has stayed with me for five years now. 

Given how many books pass through my hands each year, for one to stick in my memory so clearly, says something about the strength of the story within, as well as it's ability to get under my skin.

So I give you a slightly revised and updated look at my 2015 post for Moving Among Strangers.

Today I had the pleasure of attending the Honouring Randolph Stow event at the NSW Library.

The Honouring series is the brainchild of my friend Julia Tsalis, the Program Manager at the NSW Writers Centre. 

On their website she says:

Sometimes we forget about the great when revelling in the new. In its annual Honouring Australian Writers series, the NSW Writers’ Centre pays tribute to writers who have made an important contribution to our literary culture.  

In 2015 we turn to the West Australian writer Randolph Stow. Perhaps best known for The Merry-Go-Round in the Sea and To The Islands, which won the Miles Franklin Award, Australian Literary Society Gold Medal and the Melbourne Book Fair Award in 1958. He was also awarded the ALS Gold Medal for his poetry in 1957 and won the Patrick White Award in 1979.  

A writer fond of silence, known for the metaphysical and existential qualities of his writing but also a master at evoking the Australian landscape, Randolph Stow embodied contradictions. Geordie Williamson, says of him in The Burning Library, ‘In him, as in no other non-indigenous writer in our literature, landscape and mindscape are one.’  

Honouring: Randolph Stow brings together Gabrielle Carey, author of Moving Among Strangers a memoir about her family’s connection to Stow, Suzanne Falkiner whose biography will be released in 2016, Richard Tipping a poet and producer of a documentary on Stow, and West Australian author Alice Nelson (The Last Sky) whose career has been inspired by him.

In preparation for the event, I read Gabrielle Carey's Moving Among Strangers: Randolph Stow and My Family.

Carey's award winning book is a curious, but very pleasing mix of family memoir and grief journal as well as a homage to little known Australian author and poet, Randolph 'Mick' Stow.

I say little known, because when I told family, friends and colleagues (yes, even colleagues!) where I was going today. Only a couple of them had heard of Stow.

My relationship with Stow is not much better. I've only read one of his books and that was his children's story about Midnite, the not-so-bright bushranger and his talking cat. The talking cat put me off too much to ever really enjoy it properly though!

But, like Carey, I do seem to have this fascination for Australia's long lost, forgotten authors.

I'm curious about why we, as a nation, do not seem to celebrate, embrace or cherish our award winning, highly acclaimed authors.

Their childhood homes do not become museums.

No "so and so was born here" plaques pop up on suburban streets and rarely do they have university or school wings named after them. They're lucky to have a street named in their honour!

Carey echoes my concerns in her book when she reminds us that:

Other countries seem to be able to preserve significant writers' houses - why are there so few in Australia?

However, after the Honouring Randolph Stow event today, I wonder if part of this lack of recognition starts with the authors themselves.

All four panelists spoke of Stow's famous silence.

Suzanne called it his "authorial invisibility". 

Richard told us how Stow had said, "writers are writers because they're not talkers." 

And Alice quoted poet Louise Gluck's "eloquent deliberate silence" to describe Stow's personality.

Meanwhile Carey's tender memoir is an endless parade of Stow's reticence and quietness which she sums up towards the end by saying,

Stow's silence doesn't appear to have been an unfriendly one. His temperament and philosophical bent both point towards a faith in silence and deep doubt about language.

 

This is not someone searching for the limelight or to have his name forever blazoned across the skies. His story writing and poetry were personal, they were part of his search for home. Home, for Stow, was not one house or place either.

Maybe we don't need to make a fuss about his childhood home or where he went to school, except of course, there is no denying, that it is these things, these places of our childhoods that shape us is so many ways, consciously and unconsciously.

Stow himself also said (in reference to Joseph Conrad) that "I think one does need to know a great deal - well, a certain amount, anyway, about an author's life...and not only what he chooses to have known."
(my highlight).

So, what have I learnt about Stow in the past week?

He could speak and read about five languages, he was fascinated by the Batavia wreck (so much so that he taught himself to read Old Dutch so he could research the source materials), he loved to read Conrad and Joyce and he 'wrote' his books in his head whilst walking and only physically wrote them down once he had it complete in his head. Sadly, he had two such books in his head when he died. 

Stow also had an incredibly mellifluous voice (not unlike Princes Charles but with an Australian undertone) that we heard thanks to the resurrecting of Richard Tipping's interview with Stow from the 1988 film A Country of Islands. More than preserving old homes and the placing of plaques, we need to ensure that archival films and interviews like this are conserved for future reference. The 8 minute excerpt we heard today was one of the highlights of a stimulating afternoon.

I look forward to reading one of Stow's adult novels (now republished by Text Publishing) or seeing one on the big screen soon. I also highly recommend Carey's memoir for those who love their family memoirs and author biographies entwined in a happy embrace.

• The 2020 Honouring Event will be for Katherine Susannah Prichard on the 22nd August.
• Carey also has a biography about Ivan Southall called Falling Out of Love With Ivan Southall that sounds intriguing.

Ten Doors Down | Robert Tickner #Memoir

I recently attended an author talk featuring Robert Tickner talking about the story of his adoption. Ten Doors Down is the book of this story.

You may recall Tickner's name. He was an ALP politician during the Hawke and Keating era and the Minister for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs throughout the first half of the 90's. During this time, he was also going through the emotionally fraught experience of searching for his birth parents.

Early on, Tickner makes clear that he is one of the fortunate ones. He was adopted by two loving, generous parents. He had an idyllic childhood growing up in Forster, NSW. And his subsequent experiences in searching for and finding his birth family were mostly successful and positive.

His birth mother had a less happy time though. She grieved her whole life for the child she gave up. Even though she found love and happiness in marriage, she decided not to have any more children as she couldn't bear the thought of losing another child.

After the initial joy of rediscovering her son, she suffered terribly from knowing that she had spent most of her adult life living ten doors down from Tickner's adopted grandmother. A grandmother that Tickner visited nearly every school holidays. Knowing retrospectively that her son had been so close all this time was hard to absorb.

Ten Doors Down is a touching memoir and if you get a chance to listen to Tickner talk with Richard Fidler in Conversations, I would highly recommend it.

Till Apples Grow on an Orange Tree by Cassandra Pybus

From chaste kisses to lost innocence; from the bohemian world of sixties Sydney to the counterculture in San Francisco; from radical feminism to disillusion, Cassandra Pybus opens the door on her own remarkable life and transforms it into a mirror which reflects ourselves. Her candid and passionate journey through personal memory and history offers a meditation on place, on politics, and on the pain of disappointment and betrayal, interwoven with an unexpectedly heart-warming love story.

 A few years ago I spotted this little gem on the shelves of a second-hand bookshop. It was almost AusReadingMonth and I thought that it would be the perfect slim read to fill out my schedule. For reasons I can no longer remember, I didn't fit it into my schedule that year. Or subsequent years...until 2019.

It was a prompt from within the Griffith Review 63 (that I'm currently reading) that brought Till Apples Grow on an Orange Tree to the top of my TBR.
Cassandra Pybus wrote a memoir piece for the Griffith Review titled Every Path Tells: Traversing the Landscape of Memory. I thoroughly enjoyed her writing and quickly realised that reading one of her books might help my Tasmanian box in the AusReadingMonth Bingo card.

Every Path Tells was an essay about the power of story telling, walking as meditation and the capacity of nature to soothe the soul. In Pybus' case, the natural environment was Tasmania, Lower Snug in particular, the home of her family and full of happy childhood memories.
However, at the start of the essay she finds herself, in her thirties, in Sydney, realising 'the simple proposition that my life was unfolding without my willing it.'

A trip back to Tasmania changed everything.

Suspended beneath Australia like a heart-shaped pendant of sapphire, emerald and tourmaline, Tasmania is where the world peters out in a succession of rugged peninsulas that ultimately crumble into the vast expanse of the Southern Ocean. Peering through the small window as the plane descended across the jagged Freycinet Peninsula into the tiny Hobart airport, I felt an inexplicable surge of pure satisfaction. It was as if Constantine Cavafy spoke directly to me: 'Arriving there is what you are destined for'.

Her descriptions of her walks are just lovely. I could almost smell the forests and feel the imprinted paths through them. I wanted to follow the desire lines to see where they might lead me too.

For Pybus, they led her home. To a strong sense of family and belonging, and to a second chance of love. For me, I gained a greater desire to see Tasmania for myself, to read more of Pybus' works and her bibliography has now added Heather Rose's Bruny and Robert MacFarlane's Understory to my wish list.

I confess that I knew next to nothing about Pybus. Reading about her interest in nature, feminism and history made me wonder how on earth this had happened. Surely with these common interests, I should have bumped into her writing somewhere before in the past 20 years.

For whatever reason, though, this was my first excursion into her writing and opinion.

Till Apples Grow on an Orange Tree was a memoir told via unconnected essays-as-memory. In one of the early essays I recognised elements from the her Griffith Review piece that had been reworked. I'm fascinated by this process. As a journal writer from way back, the reworking of an old idea that has had to time to be re-evaluated with maturity, new knowledge, experience and perspective is something I have played with at various times in my writing life. I'm sure I will have more to say about this process when I get to the end of Helen Garner's, Yellow Notebooks though!

A curiosity was discovering that Pybus and Garner had been friends, or at least friendly. But no longer. She delicately revealed that there is no more possibility of a friendship. I will now be searching for C or P references in Garner's notebook!

Pybus' essays started in the 1960's with her high school years, her best friend, Chloe, their uni years, messy love affairs and Chloe's eventual and tragically dramatic suicide. She explored her parents back stories with sensitivity and love.

I responded to her discussions about not belonging and transitory migration. I also moved around a number of times as a child, and struggled to find a place to belong as an adult. Pybus discovered that she could reinvent herself over and over again as the past does not hold you. Whereas I found, that you could run from your past as often as you like, and try to reinvent yourself any number of ways, but the past would always come back. It may not hold you, but it will haunt you until you face it squarely head on. And accept it and yourself.

Pybus' second chance at love also resonated with my own story. Maybe one day I will have the resources to reflect on my own love story, to give it a writerly meaning and context. It's an idea that itches and scratches at me occasionally, but I have many reservations. Like Pybus I believe that we all tell stories to give shape to our lives, but not every story needs to be made public!

I thoroughly enjoyed her history pieces about Tasmania. Lower Snug, Bruny Island and the  Indigenous history of this area.

We cannot remake the past, but surely the promise remains that we can remake the future, if only we can find it in ourselves to acknowledge the injustice of the past - from which we have benefited - and make some recompense.

Her pieces on Port Arthur and the Chinese in Tasmania felt less convincing though. A bit too meandering, and at times they felt like a writer in search of a story, any story.

Reflections on the Vietnam war protests from someone who actually participated in them will always be interesting for those of us too young to really remember this time.

A few of her pieces were obviously early thoughts about a topic that later became books - White Rajah: A Dynastic Intrigue (after spending time in Sarawak with her her husband's work) - The Woman who Walked to Russia: A writer's search for a lost legend (or a travelogue through the Canadian wilds). This piece also considered the pros and cons of solo travel; sometime I have also had plenty of opportunity to ponder.

I thoroughly enjoyed my time in Pybus' hands and will happily read more by her in the future, especially if it's about Tasmania. Her connection to the home of her early years, shines through with an authenticity and heart that makes these pieces rise up above the rest.

Facts:

• Pybus won the Colin Roderick Award in 1993 for Gross Moral Turpitude.

Three Women by Lisa Taddeo

Three Women by Lisa Taddeo is one of those books of the moment, and one that I have actually managed to read during it's moment! And I can see why so much buzz has attached itself to this book.

It's about sex, desire and what it means to be a woman, told from the perspective of three women that Taddeo has spent years and years getting to know. Years and years of trawling through diaries, text messages and legal documents. Years and years of interviews with the three women and their family, friends and colleagues.

It's an extraordinary, personal and universal journey.

One can recognise aspects of one's younger self in each of the women - their thinking, their actions, the external forces that have influenced them. Fortunately most of us (I think) are spared the traumatic episodes that have come to define the lives of the women in this book. Most women I know have had icky episodes in their lives, but another group of women, live with much larger, darker secrets. This is a book about those women.

'And there but for the grace of god go I' was a common refrain that ran through my mind as I read this book. My family has used this phrase all my life, so much so, that we now abbreviate it to a simple 'there but' and the rest of us then automatically, silently, finish the phrase in our heads.

These women were on the other side of this phrase.

Most young women just want to be loved for who they are, messy bits and all. Getting a boyfriend can become such a huge part of our teen years. This desire can often lead to bad choices being made. These young women just want to be accepted, they want to belong. Like boys of the same age, they often want to break out from their parent's world. They want to experiment, have fun and dabble with bad boys, good boys, girls, whoever will show them some love and affection and desire. They want to find their power, even as they can have it taken away by others or as they give it away not realising what it is that they have. The trouble is the trouble that can happen to girls during this phase is often devastating. The double standard still exist and these girls bear the brunt of social scorn, ridicule and censure.

After almost binge reading the first half, I had to put this book aside for awhile. I was starting to feel impatient and annoyed - at the women in the book, at the world we live in, at men who take advantage, at foolish young girls who make bad choices, at families who don't take better care of their teenagers.

A couple of weeks later, I jumped in again. Once again I was utterly absorbed by Taddeo's amazing story-telling  - but there was also a part of me that was repulsed. The roller coaster ride of compulsive empathy followed by pulling away with annoyance was quite exhausting. Exhilarating and exhausting.

So what did I learn?
Or what did I get out of this all-consuming reading experience?

Firstly, that it is possible to find a book utterly engaging, authentic, intricate, insightful, thoughtful, supportive and non-judgemental, yet aggravating at the same time.

Secondly, that it's possible to describe a book as narrative non-fiction at its finest and utterly pointless at the same time. I say pointless, not because I think these women and their desires are pointless, but because I'm not quite sure what Taddeo was hoping to do with the book.

Thirdly, what you get out of this book, will depend on which lens you view it through. A feminist lens will leave you feeling enraged. A diversity lens will leave you feeling disappointed. A psychoanalytical lens will appreciate Lisa's ability to get her three women to reveal so many intimate details about their lives, but I'm not sure anyone of these women could be considered archetypes. A Marxist lens will see class and social inequalities confirmed by the different desires that drive these women.

Finally, I learnt that the beginning, middle and the end of a book can produce very different reader responses, in just the one reader! It was exhausting at times, at other times I empathised and recognised certain universal thoughts and beliefs and at others I wanted to shake them all until I could make them see sense, take control of their lives and stand up for themselves.

I also wondered if the one thing these three women had in common were parents, who despite loving their children, were somehow absent or guilty of not paying close enough attention. Whether it was alcohol, mental illness or emotional distance. As Taddeo says is her Prologue,

how much of what I thought I wanted from a lover came from what I needed from my own mother. Because it's women, in many of the stories I've heard, who have a greater hold over other women than men have.

This is not another book that blames women for the problems of other women. It's rawer than that. And more encompassing. It's life;

the beast of it, the glory and brutality. [The] blood and bone and love and pain. Birth and death. Everything at once.

Three Women was my latest book group choice. It generated lots of discussion, although no-one was prepared to be the first to talk about her desires! And maybe that's why Taddeo wrote this book - as a way to provoke a group of women into talking about desire, love and sex.

Mirka & Georges: A Culinary Affair by Lesley Harding & Kendrah Morgan

Mirka & Georges: A Culinary Affair is a beautiful book and hard to define. Is it an art book? Is it a biography? Or is it a recipe book? I guess the subtitle that Harding & Morgan chose gives us a clue to their intentions - that food is the central idea around which the book hinges.

Food, not just because of it's ability to sustain and fill an empty stomach, but the social aspect of food, preparing, sharing, bringing family and friends around a table to eat together, to talk, laugh and philosophise!

Upon arrival in Melbourne in 1951, the Mora's couldn't find a proper cup of coffee or a restaurant that stayed open past 8.30pm. However, it didn't take them long to search out pockets of like-minded people and small European wholesalers as they gathered them into their new home and studio on Collins St.

Mirka's iconic artwork also features throughout the book. Lovely full page spreads of her work as well as collages wrapped around each of the recipes included in the book. I had planned on cooking a couple of the recipes for Paris in July - Blanquette de Veau or Truite Aux Amandes appealed in particular as being good winter dishes, but a hectic work schedule and a nasty head cold has got in the way of my good intentions this year.

However, Mirka and Georges is not just about the art and the food. Harding and Morgan have written an engaging, personal account of both Mirka and Georges' childhoods in France, their subsequent meeting and marriage after WWII and eventual emigration to Australia.

The early pages of the book are littered with childhood photos as the threat of WWII loomed. Mirka's family were arrested and detained in the 1942 Velodrome d'Hiver round up, but managed to escape transportation thanks to a letter claiming they were 'indispensable to the war effort.' Friends then procured false papers and a safe house for them.

Georges was a German of Polish descent born in Leipzig. His parents were wealthy modern art collectors, however after witnessing the book burning in Berlin in 1933, his parents encouraged him to leave for Paris. During the war he was interned briefly as an 'enemy alien' before joining a Jewish unit in the French Foreign Legion posted to North Africa. Later he joined the Jewish humanitarian group Euvre de Secours aux Enfants that helped Jewish orphans whose parents had disappeared throughout the war.

They were a passionate, creative and gregarious couple. Their wartime experiences made them embrace the opportunities of peacetime with open arms. Living life deeply, passionately, artistically. Seeking freedom and fun and doing it all with a great deal of European flair and finesse.

They soon found their niche in Melbourne as friendships with Sunday and John Reed, Charles Blackman, Joy Hester and Arthur Boyd blossomed.

We follow the Mora's various ventures into cafes, restaurants and exhibitions as their young family grows up. The book follows them all the way to the break up of Mirka and Georges around 1970.

I knew very little about the Mora's lives before this book but what I found between the pages of this lovely book, has only intrigued me more. I only wish I'd ever had the chance to eat in one of their restaurants!

Book 16 of 20 Books of Summer Winter
Sydney 15℃
Dublin 18℃

All Happy Families: A Memoir by Herve Le Tellier

All Happy Families wasn't the memoir I was hoping it would be. Le Tellier is upfront from the beginning, letting us know that he doesn't feel love for his parents. I was therefore expecting a heartfelt exploration into all the whys and wherefores of his troubled childhood. Instead, we simply got a recital of the family tree with some anecdotes about things that were said and done.

Don't get me wrong, Herve's family was pretty ghastly. His mother would now be diagnosed with a pretty major personality disorder and his step father with codependency. His biological father obviously spent the rest of his just being grateful that he got out. Herve had lots of very good reasons to distance himself from the family of his birth as soon as he could, but the problem was, he also kept us, the reader, at a distance.

Memoirs, these days, are expected to provide various psychological insights as well as catharsis for the author. One of the very best that I've read in recent times is, Nadja Spiegleman's I'm Supposed to Protect You From All This. Le Tellier's book has obviously been cathartic for him, but I didn't feel like I got to know him at all. His lack of curiosity about why his mother and other family members acted the way they did was, well, curious. This complete detachment was no doubt his survival technique, but I wanted him to draw this bow too and show us how he had embraced his life away from the parental home. How does one go on to develop empathy, caring kindness and healthy relationships when one has a childhood lacking in all of the above?

Le Tellier does state at the end that he doesn't 'know what it might mean to anyone other than me. But by putting into words to my story, I've understood that sometimes a child's only choice is to escape.'

I guess what I was hoping for was some insights into the lingering after effects of such an upbringing (there are always lingering after effects). The decisive breaks away from his childhood experience as well as the personal realisations that he must have made throughout his adult life would have been fascinating to read. Perhaps this is just the first step for Le Tellier in this process or maybe he's simply not as introspective as I am!

I also chose to read this book now thanks to Paris in July. Casual mentions of some antique furniture and a country house with references to French history and pop culture were interesting, but the place of origin was ultimately less significant than the family of origin.

Favourite or Forget: Knowing a less extreme version of Le Tellier's mother, made this book interesting, with my own personal insights coming from Le Tellier's example.

Facts:

• Translated in 2019 by Adriana Hunter a British translator of over 60 French novels.

Book 13 of 20 Books of Summer Winter
Sydney 24℃
Dublin 20℃

Becoming by Michelle Obama

Becoming ended up being an epic read for me, simply because I put the book down when I was half way through it in the New Year, when we were away and busy with family and summer and stuff, and then I forgot to pick it up again.

Other new, shiny books caught my eye and it kept sliding down the pile of half read books by my bed.

A few nights of waking up in the middle of the night and not being able to get back to sleep though, has cured that problem.

I find it too hard to read my fiction books at that time of the night, but the heavier non-fiction titles don't work either. An easy to read memoir is the thing that does the trick.

And a memoir that is full of the such hope, dignity and grace is the perfect antidote for the 3am blues.

I'm not sure I can add anything new to all the other rave reviews I've read for this book where Michelle Obama walks us through her childhood, her school years, her career, meeting Barack, having a family and moving to the White House. All I can add perhaps, is a perspective from the other side of the world.

There may be nuances particular to the American dream in Michelle's story that those from elsewhere may not fully appreciate, but I could appreciate the message about the importance of education to change lives. However, as Michelle realises too, it's not just a good education that gets you there.

In our modern Western world, a large majority of children have access to a good education. But not every child has the advantage of a strong, supportive, loving family or an inspiring teacher that can change the course of their lives, or a minister or neighbour who mentors them towards a better way. Good education, especially in the early years is vital, but so too are these connections, these people who boost, push, motivate, encourage and manage to say just the right thing at the right time to make a difference. People who open just one door, or people who do that one thing that makes your life easier for just that one magic moment. Then having the right personality to be able to make the most of those moments is the final blessing.

Michelle Obama was fortunate enough to have most of those things work in her favour. But it's her gratitude and her ability to give back, or to pay her good fortune forward, that makes her shine with grace and dignity.

Gratitude, grace and dignity are sadly lacking in much of world politics at the moment. Arrogance and bullying tactics have been mistaken for gravitas.

It is a curious thing watching all our Western democracies floundering on a bed of teenage petulance, seemingly in a race with each other to the bottom of human decency and kindness. I sometimes wonder if we are watching the death throes of the democratic process as we know it. The Obama White House may be the last decent government anywhere in the world for a long time to come. Living under the political systems currently in China, Russia, North Korea or Iran are not enviable or desirable in any way shape or form either. It could be easy to despair.

I have to remind myself of inspirational leaders like Jacinda Ardern in New Zealand or Justin Trudeau in Canada to know that it is still possible for kindness and inclusivity to be the guiding philosophy of a government and its leader.

Becoming reminds us that there are people in leadership positions who care, and care deeply. That small changes can lead to bigger changes. That individuals can make a difference. And that kindness and generosity will always be more admired than the alternative.

Michelle Obama's book is charming, genuine and heart-warming. The perfect antidote for the 3am blues.

8/20 Books of Winter Summer
Sydney 20℃
Dublin 20℃

Motherhood by Sheila Heti

When I was in my twenties and thirties, my friends and I spent a lot of time discussing and dissecting each others dreams (#lifebeforesocialmedia)! We read books, kept dream journals and wondered about the significance of what happened in our heads in the middle of the night. We were searching for meaning and trying to make sense of our emerging lives. We were confused and bemused by adulting (not a term back then) and looking for answers anywhere and everywhere. Mostly we simply found more questions and more angst. It's a weird time that feels like forever; thankfully it's not.

As the years have gone by, those levels of turmoil, doubt and self-reflection have eased up (#hallelujah)! At some point most of us discover a place of relative calm and peace. Our search for meaning and purpose finds something to latch onto and we've worked out what's important and what's not. Everyone gets there at different times, in different ways, but I do believe that we all have the ability to get there eventually. 

Reading Shelia Heti's Motherhood brought all those days and nights of angst and yearning rushing back. I finished it last night and for the first time in a very long time, I had a dream that felt significant and that I still remembered upon waking. 

It was a tsunami dream. A double tsunami. It felt like I'd had this dream before and was replaying an old tape. 

I was standing on an isthmus with a lots of others. We could see the waves coming, getting more intense and more overwhelming with each surge. Everyone knew what was happening, yet so many people chose to stay low on the beach as I raced up to the pinnacle of the isthmus. Others were playing a russian roulette, trying to see, get the best photos, before racing up just in time. People were being swept away in front of my eyes because they had stayed on the beach too long. I looked behind me which is when I realised I was on an isthmus, with more water behind me, but no tsunami.

The dream suddenly reset, I relived the race up the beach to the top of the hill and looked behind me to see a second wave of tsunamis coming up the beach behind me as well. Water began to swirl around my feet. Flotsam and jetsam floated by; it felt dangerous and scary, but I was on high ground and could go no further and trusted it would have to be enough. 

Suddenly (as often happens in dreams) we were rebuilding part of the house that had been destroyed by the tsunamis. The owners, a young couple, proudly showed me the work done on the new en suite - I admired the new toilet, shower and hand basin and congratulated them on getting it back to normal so quickly. In the living room, a miniature cow was being held by one of the couple, they passed it to me. It had been washed up by the tsunami. It was soft and shivery from fear. I cuddled it gently to my chest, cradling its udder in my left hand, and felt myself calm down and re-centre as it nuzzled me.

As my friends used to say, my dreams were about as subtle as a sledgehammer! Water represents emotions and tsunami's are obviously an overwhelming amount of emotions. Houses are our minds and the rooms represent the various sections of our minds. Bathrooms represent cleansing and expressing emotions. Cows are a feminine symbol of fertility, motherhood (see the link here), creativity, beauty and wisdom. The left side is also feminine representing creativity and nurturing.

Given that I've been feeling overwhelmed by emotions this year, have just come to the end of my 'official school step-mothering duties' with B18 finishing his final exams last week and feeling frustrated for quite some time at the disappearing of my creative space, this dream is a pretty clear message.

If I'd read Motherhood in my twenties and thirties, I'm sure this book would have felt so personal and so pertinent, it would have been painful. As it was, I remembered some of those feelings and thoughts, but they felt like a dream. A little unreal and far away and intangible. There was also a huge sense of relief to see how far I had moved on from that time of angst. I'm not surprised I had a powerful dream experience at the end of it.

Motherhood is billed as a novel but reads like a private journal. Heti's protagonist is probably as petulant, self indulgent and tormented as I was at times at that age. She dabbles in coins, tarot, dreams and psychics to find meaning and symbolism in her life. 

As someone who chose, deliberately and consciously, at a young age not to bring children of my own into this world, many of her to-ing's and fro-ing's were familiar, although, I'm fairly sure that I didn't torture myself over it quite as much as Heti's protagonist did. I always said that if my 50 or 60 year old self regretted the decision that my 20, 30 and 40 year old self made, then that 50 or 60 year old self would just have to put up with it. So far, no regrets.

Perhaps 18 years of early childhood teaching and a decade of step-mothering was enough of a foray into the world of nurturing?

There were lots of provocations within Heti's story worth discussing, including various feminist assumptions and ideals, societal and cultural expectations, creativity, choice, non-choice and freedom. But one of the comments that really landed for me was around the protagonists experience with depression and the change she felt when the drugs finally kicked in. 

Yet I fear I don't have the right to speak anymore, given the drugs. I can't pretend I have come to any answer, or any great wisdom. I think the drugs are the reason I am feeling less bad, not something I realised....Am I disappointed? A little bit, yes. I wanted my own magic to get rid of the pain....What kind of story is it when a person goes down, down, down and down - but instead of breaking through and seeing the truth and ascending, they go down, then take the drugs, and then they go up?

As someone who didn't go down the road of drugs for the very reasons that Heti hinted at, I sometimes wonder if I extended my pain unnecessarily for longer than I needed to. Yet at the same time, I feel a weird sense of achievement and a fierce independence and strength from having worked out how to go up and stay up all by myself.

There is no right or wrong way to get through this life; there is only your way.

This has ended up being a very personal post; Motherhood is that kind of book. It will elicit strong feelings and personal responses. We all make choices and non-choices; we all make decisions and non-decisions and occasionally we have our ability to choose taken away from us. Yet there are choices and decisions to be made even within that space.

Motherhood would be a courageous book club choice leading to a robust, revealing and emotional discussion.

Canadian Giller Prize shortlist 2018

The Complete Maus by Art Spiegelman

This is one graphic novel that really packs a punch.

The Complete Maus by Art Spiegelman is one man's journey to understand what happened to his father during WWII. It's obvious from the opening pages that what happened to Vladek during the war had a huge impact on everything that came after. His marriages, his relationship with his son, Art, as well as having deep, abiding influences over Art's life to this day.

Art began his cartoon in 1980. It was serialised in Raw, an avant-garde comic magazine published by Art and his wife, Françoise Mouly, until 1991. The comic reflects conversations that Art began having with his father in 1978 about his war experiences. The story moves between these events and the modern day, where we see Art & Vladek's troubled relationship play our during their meetings.

There is a lot of sadness and unhappiness in this story.

Near the beginning of this story (in a story within the story) we learn that a teenage Art had spent some time in a mental health facility. Art's mother then committed suicide when he was twenty. 

Vladek and Anja were married before the war and had a young son, Richieu, who died during the war. Vladek and Anja survived the Polish ghetto as well as their time in Auschwitz and Birkenau, before eventually moving to Sweden (where Art was born in 1948) and then in 1951 emigrating to the States. 

Spiegelman uses animals as a kind of metaphor throughout.

The Jews are mice, the Germans cats, the Polish are depicted as pigs (which created a controversial reaction when the book was translated into Polish in 2001) and the Americans are dogs. In a humorous meta-fiction moment in the story, Art and his wife are discussing how he should draw her as she is French. Should she be a frog? Françoise suggests a bunny rabbit, until they agree that since she converted to Judaism she should also be a mouse. I suspect there are whole websites, papers and articles dedicated to unpacking the meaning behind all of this, but I'm too tired to search them out right now! However, I did read that Art once said that using animals "allowed me to approach otherwise unsayable things." (MetaMaus: A Look Inside a Modern Classic, Maus)

The Complete Maus contains two parts. 

Part I: My Father Bleeds History was first published in 1986, four years after Vladek's death. This part ended with Art walking away angrily from his father after learning that Vladek had destroyed all Anja's diaries and letters after her death when 'one time I had a very bad day'.

Art finds it hard to forgive his father for this act of destruction. 

Part II: And Here My Troubles Began shows Art struggling to come to terms with his newfound fame thanks to the publication of Part I. He has a young family and is obviously still trying to manage his own depressive episodes. 

Both Art and his father suffered from versions of survivor guilt, with Art not only living with his own memories but the stories of his parent's memories as well. The ghost memory of his brother, Richieu haunts him as well. Part II is dedicated to him, along with Art's own children, Nadja and Dashiell. (I read Nadja's memoir I'm Supposed to Protect You From All This a couple of years ago - it was one of the best memoirs I've read in a long time.)

This Pulitzer Prize winning book is not an easy read or a comfortable one, but if you only ever read one graphic novel in your lifetime, make it this one.
It's emotionally rich and complex.
The simple drawings convey so much emotion by the end, that I defy anyone to be left unmoved by the final page of the book. But it's Vladek's words that are at the heart of this story. Despite their complicated relationship, Art allows his father's words to stand. He bears witness to Vladek's story in an attempt to find meaning in something that is beyond understanding.

Smile & Sisters by Raina Telgemeier

Smile and Sisters have been two very popular books at work with 11-14 year old girls. Now I see why. Raina Telgemeier has created two very personal, engaging stories from two significant events in her pre-teen years. Smile details her rather horrific orthodontic work, while Sisters not only features her relationship with her younger sister, but explores a period of time in her early teen years when their parents marriage was on the rocks.

Most of us have a ghastly orthodontist story from our childhood, but not many readers would be able to take on Telgemeier's lengthy, painful and traumatic experiences in the dental chair. Via her and artwork, Telgemeier shows us the ordinariness of teen life as well as the individual self-consciousness that infects most teens anywhere in the world. She explores image, belonging (I was so glad when she finally moved on from that first group of friends - they were awful) and embracing who you are.

It was a surprisingly touching coming of age story with bucket loads of courage and perseverance.

Sisters wasn't quite as success to my mind. Here Telgemeier explores why her relationship with her sister may have been strained throughout their younger years. It felt believable and authentic, but also a little like she was stretching to find another book.

We've all had those challenging relationships with siblings at different times, when two very different personalities constantly rub up against each in daily family life. Sometimes things improve when you're no longer living together under the one roof; sometimes things don't.

But the thing that can bring you together is shared fear and shared adversity - when you think your parents may be about to split up.

In this case, Raina gave her sister a draft of this story several years prior to publication for approval. She also allowed Amara a chance to share insights into her side of the story.

I'm not normally a big fan of graphic novels, but these two books were easy to read and I really liked the colourful artwork. The simple designs were capable of conveying quite a lot of emotion.

Smile was the winner of the Eisner Award for Best Publication for a Teen Audience in 2011 and a finalist for the Children’s Choice Book Award.

Sisters won the Eisner Award for Best Writer/Artist in 2015.

Books 15 & 16 of my #20BooksofSummer (winter) challenge - drop-in titles
25℃ in Sydney
16℃ in Northern Ireland
I read these books during the July #reversereadathon

For Audrey With Love: Audrey Hepburn and Givenchy by Philip Hopman

Over the years I have developed a rather strong love and admiration for both famous Hepburn's. Katharine for her fierce independence and uncompromising approach to life and love...as well as her wonderful, eclectic movie choices. And Audrey for her style, her big heart and her amazing cast of leading men!

Therefore For Audrey With Love was always going to attract my attention.

Philip Hopman is a Dutch author/illustrator who briefly studied fashion design before switching to illustration. His colourful pen and ink drawings capture Audrey's style and elegance perfectly.

The first few pages are a little difficult to follow as the narrative runs two parallel stories until Audrey and Givenchy meet for the first time. The language is a bit stilted and dare I say, inane. The translation was done by Ann de Clercq-Foley, so not sure if the problem lies with her or with the original.

However, it's the drawings that make this picture book so appealing. They're fun and oozing panache. It's a visual feast of fashion rather than a strict factual story; a loving tribute rather than a faithful biography; a pictorial version of fictionalised fiction.

One of the curious spreads was the one above, where the top row depicts other famous women who also enjoyed wearing Givenchy designs, but the bottom row shows Audrey experimenting with other styles, "but everything she tried was stupid".
Stupid?

I'm not sure if Audrey ever had the need or the opportunity to wear a Dorothy outfit, or Marilyn's revealing white dress or even Maria's convent dress from The Sound of Music. Audrey's My Fair Lady costume was a costume and it suited the purposes of the movie, so I wouldn't call it stupid either. It was an odd choice of word that sucked some of the intended humour out of the drawings.

The gorgeous double page spread showing off Audrey's Breakfast at Tiffany's outfit is stunning, but sideways!

Whereas the Funny Face sequence was a celebration of diversity and normal, everyday style with normal, everyday people. 

The friendship between the Audrey and Givenchy was something I didn't know much about...which caused me to google it...as you do!

From UK Vogue 2011:

Givenchy first met his iconic muse, Audrey Hepburn, in 1953, in a romantic twist of fate that rivals any of her films. He had in fact been expecting Katharine as the Mademoiselle Hepburn he was to dress for the forthcoming picture Sabrina. Audrey is said to have arrived in a tied-up T-shirt, tight trousers, sandals and a gondolier's hat on the day that sparked the beginning of a 40-year friendship. 

Givenchy went on to design the actress' personal ensembles, as well as those made famous by her in timeless films such as Funny Face, Sabrina, and of course Breakfast
at Tiffany's."The little black dress is the hardest thing to realise," he told the Independent in an interview in 2010, "because you must keep it simple." In the words of Hepburn,
Givenchy to her was more than a couturier, and indeed she to him far more than a muse. Theirs was a relationship not only of professional advantages, as they propelled one another into the royalty of their respective worlds, but one of deep and long-lasting affection, that would continue for more than forty years.

Wikipedia had this to say about their collaboration:

In addition to Sabrina, Givenchy designed her costumes for Love in the Afternoon (1957), Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961), Funny Face (1957), Charade(1963), Paris When It Sizzles (1964) and How to Steal a Million (1966), as well as clothed her off screen.  

According to Moseley, fashion plays an unusually central role in many of Hepburn's films, stating that "the costume is not tied to the character, functioning 'silently' in the mise-en-scène, but as 'fashion' becomes an attraction in the aesthetic in its own right". Hepburn herself stated that Givenchy "gave me a look, a kind, a silhouette. He has always been the best and he stayed the best. Because he kept the spare style that I love. What is more beautiful than a simple sheath made an extraordinary way in a special fabric, and just two earrings?"  

She also became the face of Givenchy's first perfume, L'Interdit, in 1957. 

In addition to her partnership with Givenchy, Hepburn was credited with boosting the sales of Burberry trench coats when she wore one in Breakfast at Tiffany's, and was associated with Italian footwear brand Tod's.

I was unable to find an image source for the above photograph - it was all over the interweb - but a lovely tribute to their friendship was in the Harper Bazaar earlier this year and it featured this photo as well.

For Audrey With Love is a lovely picture book about fashion and friendship. But it is Audrey's classic beauty, style and grace that shines from every page.

#ParisinJuly Week 3 update @Thyme For Tea

Calypso by David Sedaris

This was my very first David Sedaris book.

I know! Where have I been & what on earth have I been doing?

I've been meaning to read him for years and years, but it was the opening line in Calypso that hooked me,

Though there's an industry built on telling you otherwise, there are few real joys to middle age. The only perk I can see is that, with luck, you'll acquire a guest room.

As someone who enjoyed having a guest room throughout my (single) twenties & thirties but lost it when I married with kids - in my middle years - I knew exactly what Sedaris meant about the joys of having a guest room. I'm now past the middle years (it would be nice to think I will reach 100 yrs of age, but highly unlikely given my family history) and I'm still waiting to rediscover the guest room (the kids will move out one day won't they?)

Like Sedaris, I speak in jest, mostly! Mr Books & I are very aware that our time with kids living at home is coming to an end. It is a bittersweet period. You want to enjoy this last phase of the family all living together, but at the same time we can drive each crazy with differing expectations and opinions about cleanliness, how long a shower should last & where to leave the car keys!

Sedaris' writing felt so relatable and relevant that after you finish chuckling about his story, you start thinking about your own!

Sedaris grew up with five sibling ("Six kids! people would say. "How do your poor folks manage?")
I was one of four ("Four girls!" people would say. "How does your poor dad manage?")

I'm not sure how it is in small families, but in large ones relationships tend to shift over time. You might be best friends with one brother or sister, then two years later it might be someone else. Then it's likely to change again, and again after that. It doesn't mean that you've fallen out with the person you used to be closest to but that you've merged into someone else's lane, or had him or her merge into yours. Trios form, then morph into quartets before splitting into teams of two. The beauty of it is that it's always changing.

Yup.

A fitbit obsession led Sedaris onto a 60 000 step regime - me? I will walk an extra km just to hatch an egg in pokemon go! Sad but true.

The stuff David talks about is personal, which caused this reader to reflect on many of her own personal beliefs and feelings.

One afternoon we scattered my mother's ashes in the surf behind the house....My mother died in 1991, yet reaching into the bag, touching her remains, essentially throwing her away, was devastating, even after all this time.

This is a topic much on our minds at the moment. I always thought I wanted to have my ashes scattered in the ocean, off a cliff or in a garden. But in the past ten years or so, I've witnessed so many people - the survivors of loss - really, really struggle to scatter the ashes of their beloved. It's too hard. So they don't. Instead ashes end up in cupboards or under beds and those who would like to have someone where to go to mourn their loss are left with nothing - no grave, no plaque, no memorial, no special beach, mountain or tree. Sedaris' story confirmed for me that I want my ashes buried, preferably within a couple of weeks of my death, under a rose bush or tree, with a plaque. I don't want to make this time even harder than it may already be for those that I leave behind.

From what I have read, this is the most personal that Sedaris has been in his writing. I enjoyed his stories about family and ageing, but then he started down the road of commentary and anecdotes. I didn't find them funny. The story about what people in other countries call out of cars at bad drivers was laugh out loud funny, but the rest left me with a bad taste in my mouth.

Many of his jokes and tricks seemed rather mean and occasionally cruel. Like his comment about pulling a guess 'out of my ass in order to get a rise out of someone' - someone who had just told him that her mother had cancer. I was also annoyed by his American abroad approach to politics - proud to be ignorant of all things not American. Certainly not someone I would want to sit next to at a dinner party!

So sadly, I think this will be my one and only Sedaris. The annoying bits out-weighed the interesting or amusing.

Book 10 of #20booksofsummer (winter) drop-in title
Sydney 18℃
Northern Ireland 24℃