July reading notes: variety is the spice of life

In July, I read a nice mix of fiction and nonfiction.  I really enjoyed the three novels I read, which were from three completely different areas - contemporary adult, young adult historical fiction and children's classic.  Variety is good!  I was very interested in the content of the two nonfiction works that I read.  One did not satisfy, but the other was fantastic and inspiring.  A great month of reading overall.


The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin

This is the heartwarming and engrossing summer novel I had been hoping to read.  According to the author's website, this novel is "is a love letter to the world of books—and booksellers—that changes our lives by giving us the stories that open our hearts and enlighten our minds."

I can't help but like a plot that takes place largely in and around a bookstore.  This story does have some tragedy and sadness in it, too.  Its main characters are quirky and loveable.  The novel is full of literary references; some I got and others I didn't.  Now I have a list of short stories and books to add to my TBR list.

The Path to Purpose: How Young People Find Their Calling in Life
by William Damon

I wanted to like this book, and I do agree with with the theme.  According to his website, the author is "one of the world’s leading scholars in human development."  He writes a lot about why young people need to have purpose and what happens if they don't, and he gives examples of young people who have found purpose.  However, the material is not presented in an interesting or compelling way.  I think most people who work with children understand the WHY, but want more of the HOW.  Only at the end of the book does the author give some specifics as to how we can help young people find their purpose.  There are other books that do a much better job.  Off the top of my head, I would suggest Project-Based Homeschooling: Mentoring Self-Directed Learners by Lori Pickert.  That book, which I recommend to all parents/teachers and not just homeschoolers, explains how we can observe, recognize and encourage children's interests and passions.  That's one of the best ways to help them find their purpose, in my opinion.  

From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E.L. Konigsburg.  Beloved children's author E.L. Konigsburg died last year at the age of eighty-three.  Konigsburg won two Newberry medals, as well as many other honors during her distinguished writing career.   

This novel, one of her Newberry winners, was the selection for our mother-daughter book club last month.  It was great to revisit this title, which I never read as a child but read many years ago as a children's bookseller.  It was even better to share that experience with my eleven year old daughter.  We both thoroughly enjoyed this classic story with its mix of mystery, adventure and coming-of-age elements.

 

Uprising by Margaret Peterson Haddix

My sister Ann recommended this book to me, which she heard about from her local independent bookstore.  See the author's website here.  This is young adult historical fiction, written about the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in 1911.  The story focuses on three young women whose paths cross - two are immigrants who work at the factory and the third is a privileged high-society girl.  The book excellently portrays the immigrants' struggles, the horrible and exploitative working conditions of the time, and the solidarity of the immigrants and workers.  It's a sad story dealing with the tragedy of the fire and the loss of so many lives but does offer hope in the end.  It's also an entertaining and informative history lesson that gives voice to those who lost their lives and the struggle for humane working conditions. 

The Urban Bestiary: Encountering the Everyday Wild by Lyanda Lynn Haupt.  I'm kind of in love with this book.  The author is a nature writer who lives in Seattle.  She observes the wildlife in her own yard and surrounding neighborhood, and then expands into the background, history and science of the various animals that live among us in urban and suburban settings.  Mixed in with that, Haupt delves into mythology, philosophy and practical advice for observing, appreciating and/or dealing with the creatures in our midst.  Although my children and I have done various nature observation projects in the past, I have not done much lately.  This book has really inspired me to: closely observe the animals that visit my yard and neighborhood, take more nature walks/hikes, and start a nature notebook or journal.  I'll definitely be referring to and rereading parts of this book.  Highly recommended!    

*****

P.S.  Currently I'm reading:

Enrique's Journey:  The True Story of a Boy Determined to Reunite with His Mother (Adapted for Young People) by Sonia Nazario - This book is a required summer read for my sons' high school.

Hold On to Your Kids:  Why Parents Need to Matter More than Peers by Gordon Neufeld, Ph.D., and Gabor Mate, M.D. - I read this book several years ago and am revisiting it.

Let it go or set them free

When I finished my thirty day blog challenge on July 22nd, I planned to keep up the momentum by blogging two more times that week and three times the following week.  I even penciled in target dates on my calendar.  Yet here we are almost two weeks later, and I'm just returning to my blog.  Today I feel ready.  I have the time and energy; I have something to say.  My idea of keeping up the momentum and continuing without a break did not work, so I let it go.  There was a neighborhood event; there was a scary situation with our foster cats; there were sleepless nights; there was laundry and preparing for a trip; and there was a wonderful trip to visit my sister and her family in Minnesota.  When it came down to it, blogging was not a priority.  Let it go.  Long before the ubiquitous hit song from Frozen, "let it go" was a useful mantra for me.  Although, I admit that I sometimes now sing it to myself to the tune of that song.  It makes me think of another song, "If You Love Somebody Set Them Free" by Sting.  The refrain "set them free" is also a useful mantra, and I can sing that one too!  There are ideas and things and situations and maybe even people that we need to let go or set free.  Even stories sometimes need to be set free. 

As a writer, I keep lists or drafts of stories I want to tell.  Some of these stories, I have held on to very tightly.  It's possible to hoard a story, I think.  When it came time to write my blog posts, I wondered if I should share certain stories.  Was it the perfect time to tell that story?  Would I be able to tell the story in the perfect way?  Again, with the perfect.  If I let this story go, if I set that story free...if I share it, will there be more stories to tell?  I was falling into the common trap of thinking in terms of scarcity rather than abundance.  There will always be more stories to tell, and it felt so good to share my stories and set them free.

While I may have been a bit of a hoarder with my stories, I am not at all a hoarder when it comes to things.  Minimalism works for me, but my one weakness is books.  I can be too reluctant to part with them.  Not that it's a bad thing to collect books, but I feel I need to be just as aware of my tendency to hold on to books as to any other item.  Books, like other possessions, need to be taken care of and stored so they take up both physical and mental space.  And could certain books be enhancing or blessing someone's life rather than sitting static on our shelves?  Many times, the answer is yes.  I have gotten better about letting them go.  Recently, I weeded out many children's reference books that either my children had outgrown or that we had never used.  When a friend was collecting books for a local literacy agency, I was able to grab a stack of children's books off the shelves without any second thoughts at all.  I will still hold on to the books that hold a special place in our family's hearts and memories, but I've made progress in setting many books free.

It's also wonderful to set free and let go of ideas that hail from How Things Should Be.  You know what I'm talking about, right?  The "we've always done things this way" or "that's the way we did it when I was a kid" or "that's the best/proper/logical/easiest way."  Don't get me wrong - I love tradition.  One of my favorite things as a parent is to share with my children the traditions that I grew up with as a child - whether those are seasonal or religious or holiday traditions.  What I'm talking about when I talk about How Things Should Be is when we hold on to ideas that are no longer working or no longer make sense or don't need to be applied unilaterally.  These are generally not ideas that other people impose upon me, but rather ideas that I impose upon myself.  An example is my now-abandoned idea that my children and I must read a book before we can watch any movie based upon said book.  As a voracious reader and book lover, I held onto this one for quite a while.  I still think it's not a bad idea, but I let it go as a general principle.  This mistaken principle is once again linked to idea of scarcity over abundance.  The scarcity thought is:  "If we watch the movie first, then we will never read the book."  Not true at all.  Case in point:  my younger two children watched all of the Harry Potter movies before they read the books.  And then they both read all of the books - voraciously.  I really enjoy Murdoch Mysteries, a Canadian television series.  Since the show is not available in the U.S. until well after it airs in Canada, there is a lot of time to wait in between seasons.  I'm planning to read the books on which the series is based, so that I can get more of the stories and characters until the next season is available.  

Letting go of ideas about How Things Should Be leads to abundance rather than scarcity.  In the sixteen years that I have been a parent and in the seven years that I have home-schooled, I have let go of many principles related to How Things Should Be.  Our family life has benefited greatly from adjusting to changing situations and letting go when it makes sense.  The decision to "let it go" or "set them free" has helped me live a more authentic life.  Change is always present, and I imagine I'll continue to say (or sing) my mantras for the rest of my life.  

  

On putting yourself out there, vulnerability & connection

In my very first post on this blog, I mentioned some of the reasons I procrastinated for so long on getting my blog started.  There was a good deal of perfectionism involved.  Directly linked to perfectionism is fear.  Recently, I've been talking, reading and thinking quite a bit about the fear of "putting yourself out there."  When I wrote my post about parenting as an introvert, I visited Susan Cain's website to get appropriate links for attribution in my post.  The first thing that popped up was a blog post entitled "How to Overcome the Fear of 'Putting Yourself Out There.'"  A bit of synchronicity there. 


The "Creative Process" list and graphic pictured above can describe both how the creator feels during the process of creating and also how she feels during the process of sharing what she has created.  Sometimes I go through those feelings as I'm writing a post.  And I also may revisit those feelings when I share what I have written - through Facebook or an e-mail message - and hope for some feedback.  Or at least some indication that a few people are reading what I write.  I have put myself out there, and - yes - I still feel vulnerable while I try to be brave about sharing my written words.  Maybe they think what I write is crap.  Maybe what I write *is* crap.  Although I know it's never a good idea to assume what is going on in another person's mind.  And then...some people "like" a post or comment or send an e-mail or mention in a conversation that they've read a certain post.  Others remain silent.  Sometimes the people who are silent are people who I thought would be interested or supportive.  And I can't assume they're not, but I wonder.  


As a result - putting myself out there has helped me develop more empathy, both for those who put themselves out there and for those who hold back.  People put themselves out there in so many different sorts of ways - initiating a group or activity, teaching or sharing skills, changing the dynamics in an organization, standing up for what they believe in, showing artwork, sharing feelings, etc.  I've been delighted by the connection I've felt to other people who have commented on or talked to me about what I've written.  Writing my blog has connected me with friends (old and new), relatives, neighbors and acquaintances.  Writing my blog has helped me be more empathetic and responsive to those who put themselves out there in their own way.  And there's empathy for people who are silent, too.  I don't know the reason for their silence.  And I try to put into practice something I've recently learned from my lovely cousin-friend Lori.  It's a practice called "just like me."  In her example - if a speeding driver irritates her, she thinks, "That person is driving too fast.  Just like me.  Sometimes I drive too fast."  In my case, since I've been thinking why certain people don't respond to my writing.  They're just like me.  Sometimes I don't respond or hold back.  Or they might be just like me in other ways.  They might just be really, really busy or sick or tired or sad or struggling with any number of issues.  If I think of them being "just like me," then I can be more empathetic.  Whether that means making more of an effort to respond to and acknowledge someone's hard work or passion or purpose or interest or initiative or joy.  Or whether that means acknowledging someone's sadness or grief or difficulty or anxiety or struggle.  Either way, it's about seeing other people.  And not holding back in seeing them where they are.  This has all been said much better by others.  I highly recommend Brene Brown's books and TED talks; you can find out more about them on her website.  I just re-watched both of her TED talks, The Power of Vulnerability and Listening to Shame, and was so inspired.


I have felt vulnerable in the process of sharing my writing.  And I have also felt a great deal of connection and purpose and joy.  It has been an amazing experience.  Thanks to all who have read any of my posts and therefore supported me through my thirty day blog challenge!      

This baby

 

This baby is my son

My first-born child

He came into my life

When I was so very new

To being a mother

His dad and I were full of joy

Then two weeks old

A routine check-up turned into

Too many doctors listening

With stethoscopes

For too long

Sent off immediately

Hospital, heart center

Cardiologist, echo-cardiogram

Congenital heart defect

Open heart surgery – today, soon

A blur of information

Explanations we can’t comprehend

Total anomalous pulmonary venous connection

Sign this, consent to that

Baptism before surgery

For our first baby

Tears.  Tears.  Tears.

Hours and hours of waiting

Anxiously with family

Updates from the nurse

A surgeon who operates

On such a tiny heart

A hero who fixes this baby’s

Fragile little heart

Sitting in a room

With a breast pump

Pumping and whirring

Saving my milk for him

Days and days of recovery

Of tubes and beeping and fear

From PICU to NICU

We must learn a different way

To be new parents

CPR lessons, tiny doses

Of heart medications

Caring for all those scars

 

And yet, so soon…this baby

Grew fast and big and strong

No complications – from baby

To toddler to preschooler to boy

Obsessed with fire trucks

And constructions vehicles

Busy and active and

Exasperating at times

He went to the hospital other times

There were stitches

Multiple times

Naughty and nice.  Silly and kind.

A big brother

A boyhood, a normal boyhood

For this baby

Now this baby is 16 years old

You can see the scar on his chest

Sometimes people ask

He is tall and lean and muscular 

He likes to play basketball, soccer,

Football, lift weights

Play video games

Study hard

He drives (when we let him)

He is still silly and kind

A normal young person,

He sometimes makes good choices,

Or sometimes gets in trouble

And he is a miracle to us

He continues to

Surprise and bless us

Everyday

 

I find this hard to write about.  Still.  I don’t know how to express it exactly.  I have written about it in narrative form, in a more linear way.  But when I sat down to write it recently, it came out like this.  I am eternally grateful to all the medical staff that guided and assisted us through our son’s surgery and recovery.    

Although this experience was very traumatic at the time, I have always been mindful of how temporary it was.  Our son’s heart defect was completely repaired, and he has no long term effects or limitations.  We do not know what it is like to parent a child with long-term health challenges.

Raspberry time

In Confessions of a Lazy Gardener, I mentioned the abundance of raspberry bushes gone wild in our yard.  All of the raspberries are ripening, and it's time to pick them.  It's hard to keep up with the picking. although not with the eating.  In honor of the lovely raspberry and in the interest of getting to bed early tonight, here are two quickly composed poems.  You will perhaps sense that I am a bit overwhelmed with the picking and a bit too tired to worry about the quality of my poems.

*****

Raspberry haiku
Lots of raspberries
Ripe, juicy and delicious
Picking and eating

Raspberry limerick
Many raspberries ready to pick
How to get them all?  That is the trick.
    Morning, night or noon
    Still more to pick soon
Yet to eat them is yummy, not ick.

  

Fostering feline friends

Our first group of foster cats

Two of the four kittens in our first foster group

A few years ago, a co-worker told me about how she fostered cats and kittens for the Wisconsin Humane Society.  I had never heard about fostering animals before, so I did a little research.  The WHS uses volunteers to foster dogs, cats and small animals.  Animals need to be fostered for various reasons.  Usually animals go into foster care because of growth, behavior or medical reasons.

We didn't have any family pets at the time.  I thought that fostering would be a good way to learn about caring for animals and an interesting family project.  We had been pet-sitting for friends' pets (dogs, cats, guinea pigs, rats).  We enjoyed that because it gave us the opportunity to spend time with a variety of animals.  All three of my kids were being home-schooled at the time, and so fostering would also be part of our education as both a learning experience and a service project.  I mentioned the idea to my kids.  There was no turning back after that!  I filled out the online application and attended the required Foster Orientation and Cat Behavior Seminar.  We got our first foster group at the beginning of 2012, as a New Year's present.  It was a group of four kitten siblings that were about three-months old.  They needed to be fostered for growth and because of an upper respiratory infection.  

We brought the two male and two female kitties home and set them up in an extra bedroom.  They were so much fun, and we got into our daily routine of feeding, medicine and playtime.  Lots of playtime!  The kids got to know the kitties' personalities and named them Sweetsie, Stinker, Swirl and Tiger.  Over the course of the few weeks we had them, we took them in for a couple of vet check-ups at the WHS.  Eventually the time came that the four kittens were healthy and ready to go out for adoption.  I will admit - it was very hard to say good-bye.  There were tears on our part.  But we knew that we had taken good care of the cats and helped them get better.  We looked for them to be posted on the WHS website and were excited to see that all four of them got adopted within a day of being posted.  It cheered us up to know that our first fosters were adopted so quickly and that we'd be called to foster again soon.   

Buddy Skojko and Angel

Angel with my daughter

And we were called within a few weeks to foster two more kittens.  These two just needed to be with us for a couple of weeks so that they could grow big enough to be neutered or spayed and then put up for adoption.  The kids named the sister Angel and the brother Buddy Skojko.  Again, we were sad to say goodbye.  Again, the kittens were adopted quickly.  However, my daughter started lobbying for adopting from a future foster group. That leads me to our next foster group.  This time a mama cat with her two babies.  These kitties were younger than any we'd had before - only about 20 days old.

Little Buddy Jay

Little Buttercup

 

Buddy Jay and Buttercup, as well as their mom Crystal, stayed with us for quite a while.  The babies were tiny and needed to stay with their mom and nurse and grow.  They also both had eye infections for which we had to administer medication regularly.  We grew really close to this little group, and we made the decision that we were definitely going to adopt Buddy Jay and Buttercup.  We considered adopting Crystal as well, but she started to not want to be with the kitties as they got older.  The WHS recommended that we just adopt the kittens.  So they found their forever home with us and have now been with us for two and half years.  

We didn't foster for several months after that, as we wanted to focus on our new pets.  We also had trips and other events that kept us away from home.  In addition, we had rearranged the bedrooms and no longer had an extra one that could be devoted just to kitties.  But in the beginning of 2013, we decided we were ready again.  Over the course of 2013, we fostered four individual cats.  Two were adult cats that we fostered for socialization.  Two were kittens that we fostered for growth.  We were able to figure out a way to keep them separate from our resident cats, which is a requirement for fostering.  After these four, we had another period of time when we couldn't foster for various reasons. 

Charlotte

Jughead (we did not name him!)

Charlie

Leo

Nala

At the beginning of this summer, we took in another adult cat.  She was a sweetheart who we named Nala.  I had mentioned to the WHS that my daughter was really hoping to foster a group of kittens again.  And they obliged!  The day after we returned Nala to go out for adoption, they called us about taking a mama cat and her five kittens.

Mama & five nursing kittens

Five kittens in a pile

When we picked them up, they were only twelve days old.  They are the youngest kittens we have fostered.  We've had them for a few weeks now, and it's been so fun to watch them grow.  From the first day when they barely wobbled out of the crate and spent all of their time either nursing or sleeping.  To the active kittens they are now - running and chasing and wrestling and eating.

Fostering cats and kittens has been a wonderful experience for our family.  Including our current group, we have fostered twenty cats.  We'll probably take a break after this boisterous group, but I'm sure we'll continue to foster when we can.  There is work involved, of course, depending on the age of the cats or kittens and whether or not they are on medication or need additional special care.  Lots of cats or kittens means lots of feeding and lots of litter-scooping.  And sometimes even wiping little kitty bottoms.  (The WHS provides all necessary food and medicine.)  Fostering certainly has been an educational experience.  We've learned a lot about kittens and cats and about the functioning of the WHS and the roles of the different people who work there.  Fostering has also been a good service project.  Taking care of animals and helping them get ready to be adopted by their forever home is a great feeling.  Fostering has been a lesson in compassion and care-giving.  And a lot of fun!     

*****

P.S.  If you're interested in fostering animals for the Wisconsin Humane Society, you can find more information here. 

P.P.S  My daughter insisted that I include photos of all the cats we have fostered.  (I could not find a photo of Crystal, but I have the rest.)  I haven't taken time to learn about layout in Blogger, so pardon the inelegant arrangement of the photos in this post.

Our house doesn't always look like this

A plaque almost exactly like the one pictured above hung for many years in the basement of my childhood home.  My younger sister and I even memorized the saying and enjoyed reciting it repeatedly.  We grew up in a family with seven children.  With nine people living in a modest-sized house, things were always a bit busy and chaotic.  At the same time my parents were generous hosts, and always welcomed friends and relatives into our home.  People were always welcomed to come, relax and converse just as the plaque says.

I was thinking about this plaque lately and wishing I had one hanging inside the front door.  We've had a steady stream of visitors lately, many to come and see our five foster kittens and their mama.  As our friends enter the house, I always seem to mention something about "well, the house is sort of a mess."  Sometimes that's true.  And sometimes it's not, but I feel obligated to mutter something about its less than perfect state.  I don't think I actually worry about what people are going to think, but I seem to find safety in making an excuse for the current state of my house.  The truth is that I do clean my house on a somewhat regular schedule.  I do major cleanings when we are going to host book club or a meeting or a family event.  Despite my inclination to minimalism, we have a fair bit of stuff.  As people enter our house, one of the first rooms they see is our project room.  Since I have been homeschooling two or three of my children for the past seven years, our project room gets a lot of use and has a lot going on.  As it should be.  Just to be clear - I never, ever think that any of my friends are judging the state of my house.  I know that they aren't.  It's just my perfectionism that makes me say something.

My excuses about my house not being in tip-top shape remind me of a blog post that I read a few months ago.  I had followed a link from Facebook to read it.  The gist of the post was the author saying that if people expected her to spend hours cleaning her house before they visited, then she really didn't want to be friends with those people.  And she also didn't want her friends to feel they needed to do a major cleaning before she came over either.  I read it and thought it was nice.  The main point, to me, was let's cut each other some slack and not judge each other if we don't keep our homes in tip-top shape.  What was interesting was that people got all crazy in the comments.  It actually devolved into name-calling.  Yes, a lot of people agreed with the author and liked how she expressed the idea.  But a bunch of other people read into it - that she was saying it was okay to be a slob, or that it was okay to let your children be slobs and not teach them how to take care of their things and help with household tasks.  Which was not what the author said at all.  Then there were those who criticized the post because the author paired the post with a photograph of a living room that was not really messy at all.  I admit the thought crossed my mind - the photo looked more like a page out of a Pottery Barn catalog than like a messy room.  The furniture looked new and clean, the hardwood floors looked new or newly-refinished, the painted walls and woodwork looked perfect, and there were beautiful window treatments on the clean windows.  Contrast this with furniture that is well-worn or scattered with pet hair, hardwood floors that are old and worn or scratched, walls and woodwork in need of a fresh coat of paint, and mini-blinds (that don't work properly) on finger-printed windows.  What was "messy" about the room in the photo?  As I recall - a few scattered books, toys and games and maybe a blanket or a backpack on the floor.

It's all relative, though.  Some of us live in newer homes, others in older homes.  Some in big houses, others in small ones.  Some families spend a lot of time in their homes, other less so.  Some families have larger incomes, others have smaller.  Some people choose to spend resources on home decor, others choose to travel or use their resources elsewhere.  Someone's messy house might be another family's dream.  Thus one comment - "holy first world problems."  But of course the author of the blog post wasn't trying to address all those issues.  You'd need to write a whole book to cover that anyway.  What she was talking about was relationships and supporting each other rather than judging each other.

Which is why I need to drop my little "excuse this mess" bit when friends come over.  And instead remember the humor, playfulness and warm welcome expressed in the plaque:

Come in, sit down, relax, converse.  Our house doesn't always look like this.  Sometimes it's even worse.