As the lights went down in the theater I grinned at the irony of finally having some time alone with my husband and choosing to see a movie, an activity that disallows conversation. But, really it was just perfect. When we talk we talk about the kids mostly anyway and the movie allowed us to quietly be adults for a couple hours before returning home to the cookies that were baked in our absence.
More tidbits:
* I recommend “The Savages.” This was a great movie and really hit home for me in a number of ways.
* I just learned I am related (on my mother’s side) to this guy. This is the coolest news I have had in quite a while.
*Teething, especially molars, is a bitch.
* I have been debating getting rid of the junky, ugly, plastic, horrible, broken, not-enough-storage-my-mom-got-it-at-a-yard-sale-after-I-told-her-not-to play kitchen for something nicer, sturdier, wooden…but they are expensive and it is hard to justify. I think I may do this instead.
*Willa Cather’s protagonist is “An-tone-NEE-a” not “An-TOE-nee-a” like I always thought.
*It is snowing here: L is at the library, A is sleeping, I am eating aforementioned cookies and all is right with the world.
The tops of two buildings. (picture quality wonky: click to enlarge for clarity)
It is gray and overcast. Snow is falling on the mountains. My work is done for the day, errands are run. I am comfortably ensconced in sweatpants and am about to make a cup of earl gray tea. It is curling-up-with-a-book weather for sure. But. But, I have a one year old with a runny nose demanding attention and a three (“and a half!”) year old bored out of her mind since coming home from preschool…So, no reading until late tonight. After the online class is checked and dealt with. After dishes are done. After teeth are brushed and face is washed because I might just fall asleep with a book in my hands. After. After the long day when A. B. Yehoshua’s The Liberated Bride is funny and interesting but not enough to make me stay up much past 10.
Still, I have managed to get a lot of reading and quite a bit of reviewing done lately. I can’t remember all the recent books (if I recall them that will be another post) and not because they were bad but because I am so tired all the time. Weary, I think, which is much more literary anyway.
So, here are some recent reviews (both non-fiction) with a promise of more soon.
The Anatomist by Bill Hayes
I’m Looking Through You by Jennifer Finley Boylan
So my last Dotmoms post is up today. It may in fact be the last Dotmoms post ever. I have enjoyed writing for the site these past few years. It was nice to have a place (that wasn’t here) to blog about motherhood. I only wish I had had more time to write about A. I would like to continue writing about parenting somewhere. I really don’t want this space to be mostly about my kids so I am not sure what I am going to do. Perhaps I will put something together myself (something bookish and different? But, what hasn’t been mined already on the internet?)
I sort of knew Dotmoms was on the way out. Posts were published less and less frequently and readers were barely commenting any more. There are lots of excellent parenting sites out there these days that similarly share personal stories so I wonder if the Dotmoms readers (and writers) moved on to greener pastures.
Anyway, hope you will go over and read my latest and last and I would love to hear what you think.
Sometimes the littlest things about this city make me smile. Like this brightly painted auto mechanics shop. The winter sky seems nicely painted, too, doesn’t it? What is the sky like where you are?
One day, when I was in high school, I came upon a girl I knew in the park, sitting under a tree. She was intently focused on a book, Maira Kalman’s Hey, Willy See the Pyramids. I had never heard of Maira Kalman but right away loved her kooky drawings. The girl under the tree was, ahem, frying (as we used to say) on acid and surely saw more than I in the book but I found a lot to enjoy as well. And, then I forgot about the book for a couple decades.
A year or so ago while checking out kids books at a used bookstore I found a Kalman book and happily paid the two bucks to take it home. And then I found another, Oh-La-La: Max in Love. This book has become a favorite of L and mine. I have a great time giving all the characters accents and funny voices and L loves the story of the dog-poet, Max, who wanders around Paris in search of love. The illustrations are excellent as well; vivid and surreal. Whenever we are at the bookstore or the library we look for more of Kalman’s children’s books to bring home.
Recently I got a hardback copy of Kalman’s latest grown-up book, The Principles of Uncertainty. It is a memoir of sorts, illustrated and with photographs, too. It is weird and sortof sad and very very interesting. I am reviewing it so don’t want to write too much here except to say, if you are in search of something quirky and thoughtful, colorful and strange, check this book out. Kalman has a way of elevating the ordinary into art and this book makes me want to start collecting all kinds of things like staplers and silk scarves, bird feathers and buttons.
I am at Dotmoms today.
Can you think of anything I forgot?
Also a new review up at Bookreporter.
Tell me if this seems weird: someone wants to have a party for one of your kids’ birthdays. They will host, provide food, bake the cake et cetera. But, they want you to send the invitations (and the implications is, limit the guest list).
And, does this seem even weirder: after a few days they are miffed they have not received their own (emailed) invitation.
Do you think I should require them to RSVP?
I am updating this to add that they did, actually, just RSVP to their own party.
enjoying my break….be back soon.