Scenes & Thoughts From Life & Lit

"Can we play ball?"

 

This is what spring looks like. 

 

At least, it is what the month of March so often looks like here in northern Michigan, as the calendar announces spring in the midst of continued snow and ice. 

 

But a thaw brings its own troubles. Frozen mud ruts are jarring, but a slithery mud wallow can be much more difficult to navigate. And do we want the 70-degree temperatures in March that family in Minnesota and Illinois had recently? I should say not! Heaven forbid the “darling buds of May” be tempted to open any earlier and risk a killing frost!

Future Mudbath Here

Meanwhile, living in a book –

 

Published in 1859, the action of George Eliot's Adam Bede takes place in 1799 against the backdrop of the Napoleonic Wars, but world-historic events are not the author’s concern. We are told the time only because the narrator insists that “all this happened, you must remember, nearly sixty years ago,” and so, she says, we should not be surprised that Adam exhibits a touch of peasant superstition along with his keen intelligence or that “Hetty’s sphere of comparison was not large.” The novel's world is a circumscribed rural world of a bygone past but also includes the inner, infinitely complex worlds of the people who lived there in that time.

 

Reading Eliot's classic novel in the 21^st century, it is difficult to view it, as many did in 1859, as the “vile outpourings of a lewd woman’s mind.” Seduction, pregnancy, and infanticide do occur in the story, but hardly in “lewd” language. Of the seduction, we see only kisses and an arm around a waist, while the infant is more abandoned than murdered—criminal, yes, but neither violently nor without feeling—and between the seduction and the abandonment, the terrified flight of a young woman never before on her own in the world has her pregnancy named to us by the author only, circumspectly, as her “hidden dread.” There are no graphic scenes or language.

Winter continues.
Seasonal road season is not here yet.

Shocking readers was not George Eliot’s aim. Rather, she encouraged the enlargement of sympathy for our fellow creatures.

 

The story takes place at the turn of a century over 300 years ago. We see the faces of George Eliot’s characters as their own friends and families see them, and at the same time we feel the beating of their hearts as if those hearts were our own. Hopes, illusions, doubts and all the rest of the changing weather that passes through their souls we experience along with them as, along with what we see, there is what the author allows us to feel, which is more than we might for our own neighbors and friends whose hearts are hidden from us. As the omniscient narrator tells a story so universal that it might have taken place at any time in human history, we are introduced not only to people as they appear to each other but also to the inner lives of each. We see clearly the querulous, jealous mother-love of Lisbeth Bede, the near-worship of young Seth for his brother Adam, Adam’s hard and unforgiving judgment of those who lack his devotion to work, Hetty’s inability to feel sympathy for anyone’s feelings other than her own, and Dinah’s gentle saintliness that asks nothing for herself—and if Lisbeth and Seth and Adam, Hetty and Dinah were our neighbors we might stop with what we see and judge them by a single standard, much as does the voluble Mrs. Poyser, with her rock-ribbed sense that her view of things was the only right view. But granted access to their inner doubts, fears, and hopes, we share (if we are sympathetic readers) in the author’s sympathy for them all.

Weak sun trying its best to shine --

A friend and I were texting one recent morning about writers able to move readers to such sympathy. As I have long said of Betty Smith’s A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, you might be unable, in real life, to tolerate sitting next to one of her characters on a long bus ride, but thanks to her insights into that character’s experiences and the marks it has left on the soul, a reader understands the why behind, for example, someone’s maddening anger or overwrought sensibility. By contrast, no subtlety or great knowledge of hearts is required to create a fictional hero or villain, only the willingness to play God and divide the human race into the saved and the damned. “An author needs a vision of human nature and unusual writing skill to produce characters that truly reflect reality,” my friend noted. 

Vision, skill—I would add that it takes generosity of spirit on the part of the writer, a largeness of soul. And a reader willing to open her own heart and mind to the vision of such a writer cannot help but feel increased sympathy for mankind in general.

 

How can it be that I never read this novel before? To think that I might have missed it entirely! It will be part of my mission as a bookseller to urge its reading to others, though I realize that not all readers will find it as compelling as I did because Adam Bede presents a couple of possible stumbling blocks for 21^st-century readers. 

First, there is the dialect. Repetition and context aid in translation, however, and a reader quickly realizes that ‘mun’ stands for ‘must,’ ‘war’ for ‘were,’ and ‘nor’ for ‘than.’ Also, the dialect is stronger in some characters’ speech than in others and occurs not at all in the exposition, so screw up your courage and dive in!

 

A more general stumbling block for many would be the novel’s opening pace. The story begins slowly and builds slowly. We see country people at their work and at their worship, the author in no hurry to cut to the action, her paragraphs long and dense with description. While impatience on the part of a reader will be ill rewarded, I can promise that once things begin to happen there are plenty of sudden scene changes and increasing drama.

Ice moving out of Omena Bay at last!

With eyes on the forecast –

 

I’m back in my bookshop today, for the first time since—was it really Thursday, March 12? Almost two weeks ago?! That’s what the double whammy of a couple feet of snow plus a debilitating cold will do to the most determined and intrepid bookseller. But she is back among the living, friends, and happy to be here for you once more.

Somewhere in the future will be more blue skies.

Without the blue snow!

And now? Will I take spring break next week along with everyone else in Northport, the public school and our hardworking friends at New Bohemian Café? Is there a road trip in my near future? Or will I stay put and be a destination for someone else? Much depends on the weather, my friends, as is so often the case in our extraliterary lives, but I am here this week, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, for sure, March 25-27, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., so stop by if the spirit moves you. 

And someday soon Sunny will be rolling in clover!

Michigan Winter-Spring

Wednesday there was ice. Freezing rain, sleet, call it what you will, it wore no body armor, nor did it carry lethal weapons! It was but a reminder to slow down and exercise caution. And after all, it is March in Michigan. By bedtime and the next morning, ground that had been briefly bare was again covered with snow. The bad news is that we have a blizzard warning for Sunday; however, the good news is that Thursday dawned clear and sunny, and the snowy, ice-covered world sparkled. Better than diamonds! No mining necessary! Ephemeral beauty is the best kind, isn’t it? “Everything is temporary!”

Yes, everything is temporary, grief is the price of love, and death is the price of life. 

    “It’s the bargain we made. No, we didn’t make it.” 

    “Someone else signed us up.”

True, I’m glad they did. I wouldn't have wanted to miss it. Because in this often sorrowful world, there is also joy. The world—life—is everything all at once, though our tiny minds can only focus on a small sliver at a time. 

Here’s some good news: Bonnie Jo Campbell has a new book coming out in October and has more or less promised to make another visit to Northport.

Here’s more good news: I have Fleda Brown’s new book of poems in stock NOW! It’s what you need, I assure you. I know I do.

        I am over the hump of the buying demographic.

I can drive my old car off the ends of the earth for all

anyone cares. The young are removing me from their

sight as if they were the first humans, inventing fire.

- Fleda Brown, “This Week,” in The End of the Clockwork Universe

The young cannot remember being old, as we old ones remember (so well!) being young. It doesn’t matter. The astonishing thing is how young the old can still feel—when glances meet, hands touch, the sun shines, winter aconites bloom, and a breeze lifts a thin lock of grey hair as if it were a girl’s raven-black bangs.

The other evening I thought I would read George Elliot’s The Mill on the Floss but somehow couldn’t open the book and picked up instead Michael Zadoorian’s The Leisure Seeker, a road trip story featuring an old woman and an old man, she with cancer and he with dementia. Does that sound depressing? It isn’t. There are moments of aching sweetness throughout the book, humor, suspense, and a tone of resolute determination that runs through the wife’s narration.

When does the last road trip come? How often do people know at the time that it’s their last ? 

My travels may be more modest from now on, but they are not over. My memory is not gone, either, and I am still making new, happy memories. Occasionally happiness feels selfish and self-indulgent, given all the tragedy in today’s world, but more often I feel that it is part of gratitude, an acknowledgement of the abundant gifts I have received, and I have many reasons to be grateful for my life, here in its eighth decade.

And do I want another spring? Am I impatient for its arrival? Oh, my friends, does a bear shit in the woods, and is the pope Catholic?!

P.S. Beautiful end to the sunny day here. 

I Never Trust an East Wind

Strange sky on Sunday morning

The weather forecast for Sunday morning was for a couple hours of rain or snow, but the east wind was a monkey wrench thrown in that prediction. No way we would have rain, with air as cold as it was, the little no-name creek frozen to silence again except for the miniature waterfall section. Sunrise had no warmth to it, either. Were those grey clouds in the north moving our way? No, they seemed at a standstill, sun and wind pouring between two completely different sets of clouds. But then, an east wind always makes for strange weather.

 

Now it’s spring break. – Not for me, but for many. Northport School is closed. New Bohemian Café is closed all week, too, as are Fischer’s Happy Hour Tavern, 9 Bean Rows, and heaven knows how many other purveyors of food and coffee, so those of us staying behind in Leelanau will have to be resourceful to get through the remainder of March. Don’t we always, though? One way or another….

 

Several people have asked if I found it worthwhile to have the bookstore open all winter. Since it wasn’t my first bookstore winter, I knew what to expect, and that did not involve crowds of book buyers carrying out piles of treasures! A few bibliophiles now and then were grateful, however, to find the shop open, and several large inventory intakes kept me busy pricing and shelving and rearranging whole subject areas, which means I’ll be well stocked when “the season” arrives.

Young people on left, classics on right

Older children's books, YA, and school readers

Then, too, I’ve been keeping my weeks and days short: Wed.-Sat., 11-3. It only makes sense. Projects at home, not to mention work and play with Sunny Juliet (mostly play), are more important than looking out at empty downtown streets until 5 p.m.

Now, though, Northport is moving toward establishing a “social district,” which is apparently (and I didn’t know this before) a term for official sanction to take alcoholic beverages from restaurants and bars out onto the sidewalk and into the parks. I haven’t taken a position pro or con on the plan and won’t be taking one, as younger generations are driving now. They’re putting in a lot of time and energy, and it’s their turn, while my business and I are Old School and will never be anything different, so I’ll just watch and report from the sidelines. 

And a week from now it will be time for me to post my “Books Read” for the month of March. Will I finish that very philosophical nonfiction book in time to include it, or will I continue to be pulled off-task by one novel after another, currently The Piano Tuner, by Daniel Mason. And will the piano tuner ever reach Burma? I’m beginning to wonder, and the only way to find out is to keep reading. (Juleen, I know you've already read the book, but don't tell me what happens!) Sunny Juliet had a bath this morning, so we will be spending the day indoors, and I should have time for quite a bit of reading, letting that strange east wind do what and as it will.

What a clean dog girl!

Closing note about one of those projects at home: A metal frame table with wood surface has been my “desk” in the office but in a few weeks will be put into service as a seedling nursery, and I’ll move desk work to the actual desk. The table, covered with Con-Tact paper in the past, seemed ready and willing to give up that covering, so with putty knife and fingers I started stripping it down. 

Looking a little shabby

Stripping it down....

Then the table’s identity suddenly came clear to me: It was the table from the houseboat! David’s homemade houseboat, moored for years on the Leland River, just upstream from the Riverside Inn. I got out photos, and yes, there it was. 

The same table

Houseboat and rowing skiff on the Leland River

So now even those discolored rings revealed on the surface are dear to me. Recover it? Paint it? don't think so. Like Harlan and Anna Hubbard, continuing their "shantyboat life" on the banks of the Ohio in their new house, I will keep my past close going into the future, whatever the future brings.

Just Little Bits, No One Big Story

It’s Monday evening. After a celebratory shared birthday dinner at our house on Friday, a Saturday full of work and noise and hubbub, and a happy, exhausted Sunday of R&R, we treated ourselves to a day trip today, a drive to nearby Traverse City. We lunched at our favorite Chinese buffet restaurant, where my fortune cookie yielded up this gem: “Sing and rejoice. Fortune is smiling on you.” Isn't that wonderful? Wouldn't that make you smile from ear to ear?

There was snow in the air on and off all day.

Now tomorrow, Tuesday, is the first day of March. It’s also the first day of autumn in Australia (where it is already today rather than tomorrow), while in the United Kingdom, Denmark and Ireland, it’s the first day of spring. Those countries all do as the Romans--that is, they change seasons according to the Roman calendar--while we in the U.S. steer by the stars, changing at solstices and equinoxes. I only know this because I have a new friend in Australia, and I’m still finding the information quite mind-boggling.

And now Kathy writes to me that March 1st is also the Feast of St. David, as observed in Wales. Question: If I tell the household David about St. David’s Day, will I have to prepare a whole feast, or can we get by with a mess o’ leeks and a pot of daffodils?