WHERE HAS ALL THE FREE TIME GONE? LONG TIME PASSING, ETC.

Where did November go? It’s well into December now, and to end-of-semester tests, grades, workshops, working with my after-school kids, and trying to have clean underwear, has been added holiday shopping for distant children and other relatives. Next comes wrapping, packing and mailing.

Reading continues, always, but there is scant time for journaling about it. I finished Spectacular Happiness over T’giving in Massachusetts, am almost finished with Killing the Buddha, have read a Marcia Muller Sharon McCone mystery, The Dangerous Hour, and am now reading a book called Welcome to Lizard Motel, by Barbara Feinberg. This book is subtitled: Children, Stories, and the Mystery of Making Things Up, and I want to read it aloud to the world. Seldom do I find nonfiction this compelling – it’s an exploration about the place of stories in children’s lives, told in the form of a memoir.

In the previous post I talked a bit about Spectacular Happiness, written by Peter D. Kramer. This is the guy who wrote Listening to Prozac, and other nonfiction books on psychology. His first novel is more introspective and psychological than much fiction, and now I see why. Robbie (see her comment on previous post, in which I first discussed this book) wants me to go easy on the anarchy, as she must work in the insurance industry. An industry which itself comes in for some criticism in the book. The blowing up of monstrous beach houses built where no houses should ever be is perhaps a fantasy many of us entertain. It is not really the main theme of the book. It’s a long strange convoluted tale of love and parenting, as well as one man’s relationship to his Place. I loved this novel, though I will admit it got too slow and introspective from time to time.

P.S. on Dec. 7 - Well, perhaps it's not entirely a fantasy after all. Take a look at this article from the AOL News.  Ecoterrorism? just across the Chesapeake.  Again, houses being built where no house should ever be.  Nature preserves should be respected, nature itself should get a hell of a lot more respect than it does.  Do I condone this kind of thing?  My jury may still be out, to tell you the horrible truth.  I have already admitted it's a fantasy of mine.  So far, one I have never acted upon.