But You Did Not Come Back

This small memoir - almost a booklet - stood on my shelf for a few weeks after I received it. The first day, I had scanned the opening page, but then I closed it and set it down.

It was too important to rush through, and I had a busy couple of weeks ahead of me, so this morning I picked it up again.

Marceline Loridan-Ivens hadn't "self-identified" as a Jew, but that didn't matter: she was deported with her father to Auschwitz-Birkenau as a young girl. All the familiar unspeakable horrors unfolded there, and from the first line, my eyes were hesitant to move down the page. I always have the feeling, when reading books like this or when watching movies about the Holocaust, that I'd rather not hear it all again but that I owe it to Germany's victims. And Russia's, and China's, and Uganda's, and Yugoslavia's. Syria's. The world's. My discomfort, my revulsion and my tears, are the very least of the tributes I can offer.

Marceline's father on the men's side managed, somehow, to pass a letter to her on the women's side. The letter contained, Marceline knows (she is sure), his urgent message of hope for their future life, and an exhortation to her, to survive.

But she has no memory of the words. She has no memory of where she lost the letter, or anything that it said.

Seventy years have passed since Marceline left Auschwitz, then left Bergen-Belsen, and marched through Czechoslovakia to a repatriation camp. She rejoined what remained of her family, and has carried Auschwitz-Birkenau with her, through all the mess and tragedy, up until 2016.

She lives in Paris. She sees the hatred that still burns against the Jews throughout the world. After decades of work as a documentary film-maker, she sees the failure of any system, of any nation, to establish either unity or peace.

Nearing the end of her life, she has written this memoir as if it's an ultimatum to us, to humans. All the terrifying events of her time in the camp, her time afterward - if there can be an afterward - and what she sees happening now...all these things unfold in bare, stark prose over only 99 pages.

I didn't cry a single tear during those 99 pages. It was all just too horrible, too full of despair, too unthinkable.

On page 100, there is a single sentence. That sentence, written so recently the ink is barely dry, caved me on myself and made me weep. I won't tell you why.

Read "But You Did Not Come Back".

At the Water's Edge

Today I finished "At the Water's Edge". Sara Gruen, the author, also wrote "Water for Elephants", which I read not too long ago.

In this novel, set in early 1945, the main character is an American woman visiting Scotland with her husband and his best friend. Back in Philadelphia, they are socialites with more money than direction or purpose, and their trip to Scotland in the middle of World War II is more of a frolic than anything else.

They are after a sighting -- and hopefully photographic proof -- of the Loch Ness monster. This fact, coupled with their truly awe-inspiring rudeness toward everyday, working-class people, alienates the sympathy of the local populace with surprising speed.

Mild hijinks ensue and our heroine, frequently abandoned at the inn while the men go adventuring for days at a time, winds up interested in, attracted to, and understanding of the hardworking locals.

I have to admit, here, that I didn't feel captivated by this book. The conflicts seemed overly contrived, and because the villain spent so much time off-stage, I didn't feel very invested in or concerned about the threat to our heroine. I never really believed she was in any danger -- certainly none that a bit of stiff upper lip couldn't prevent.

With all its faults I preferred "Water for Elephants" to this one. Still - I'm glad I read it and it was a nice way to pass a few hours over the last week or so.

Up next -- Kazuo Ishiguro does it again!

The Forever Girl, with one big huge spoiler.

Erudite Mondays at Half Soled Boots

Volume 13 Number 2

The Forever Girl

by Alexander McCall Smith

I really wanted to love this book.

In the end, I'm not even sure I like it.

This is the first Alexander McCall Smith book I have read (he of the "No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency") so I don't know how it compares, but I was favourably impressed by his style. It has a certain distance from the reader...I didn't feel as if I was walking in their shoes, or sitting in their living rooms: I felt I was hovering over their houses, detached from the characters, their situations, and even from the passage of time. Sometimes you want to be right in the thick of the narrative, feeling what the characters feel, and sometimes you want to experience the story with a little more elegance.

It started out so well. The author announces, right on the first page, that the novel is about unrequited love. He claims to be exploring this idea that there is no "one person" to whom we are bound, and with whom, if we can only find them, we will have a complete life - will be a whole person.

90% of the novel works to support this premise. The characters circle each other in a decades-long dance of attraction and repulsion, while we await further developments. Time flies in this book: one turns a page, and find that years have passed. Over the course of the novel, the reader comes to believe that He does not love Her - this has the undeniable ring of truth and the undeniable proof of events, dialogue, even body language. All the choices the male character makes are away from the girl who loves him.

Just as one is thinking "well, that's the meaning of 'unrequited'", a curve ball arrives. Suddenly, literally on the last two or three pages of the book, the author does a complete 180, and has his annoying leading man (up until now the wishy-washiest of noncommittal losers) suddenly declare undying and forever love for the woman who has waited all this time for him to realize her existence.

What the heck?

In one fell swoop (or "foul sweep", as I see on the internet constantly), all the credibility disappears. The author's whole point, everything he has been working towards, the evidence of the reader's own experience, is chucked out in order to provide a pat happy ending.

The events of the story, the characters themselves, just don't support this conclusion. I'm left wondering whether the author had originally intended a very different ending than the one he actually wrote. Nine times out of ten, life just doesn't turn out like that: the letter doesn't get delivered in time, the prince finds someone else who fits the glass slipper, and young starry-eyed women, formerly models of constancy, get tired of waiting on balconies for their clueless, idealized lovers, and marry the grocer just so they can get on with it.

I expect this novel will do well on the shelves of local drugstores, so people can pick up a copy while they are getting sunscreen and flip flops on their way to the beach. It's just the kind of thing people like to read to distract themselves momentarily while working on their base tan, or waiting in the middle school parking lot. I know this kind of book sells well, but in my opinion the ending undermined both the novel's premise, and the reader's investment in the characters. With the Disneyfied conclusion, the whole thing became forgettable.

Reread? No.
Recommend to Others? No.
Bookplate? No.
0/3

Book Book

Well, well. It HAS been a while since I reviewed a book!

I've got two how-to's for you today. Let's tidy The Butler Speaks out of the way first, shall we?

This is a neat little book, comprising everything you need to know to make your life more serene and classy. Charles McPherson, butler to some very posh people in his day, has put a career's worth of tips and tricks into this one volume - you get to find out exactly what you're meant to do with that weird shaped fork, the correct way to clean a fridge (you're probably thinking, as I did, "There's an incorrect way?"), and just what your next party needs in order to be the event of the season. (Some very good ideas here, specifically - mostly along the lines of FOR GOD'S SAKE DON'T FUSS.)

At first glance I like it quite a lot, but I'm not sure that this book is a success, overall. It's got loads of useful information, sure, but much of it would only apply to a certain class of folks. (Hint: not our kind of class, at all: unless you're the type who makes seven figures, always sits in the back seat of your car[s], and lives far, far closer to the Atlantic than the Pacific.) He means well, but the tone is a little superior for me. It's meant to be, of course -- I'm sure others would find him perfectly amiable. I'm not the target audience for this book, though he tries to insist that his edicts are universally applicable.

HalfSoled Boots' Book Rating System:
Reread? Parts, maybe: I like his instructions for making a bed.
Give To Others? Not really.
Bookplate? No.
1/3

Oddly enough, and I never thought I'd say this: Martha Stewart does a little better in the "fix up your life" game than Charles does. Her Living the Good Long Life is more conversable, more practical and down-to-earth: altogether a more realistic collection of advice, especially for your everyday, average type of person. In this book, she is aiming at bettering the daily lives of the elderly. Of course, in her comprehensive career she has addressed herself to almost every age group: baby, child, young adult, middle-aged power earners. It's only natural that, she herself having reached her 70s, she would turn her laser beam gaze on senior citizens.

Lots of good stuff, though - small practical things like "never put anything on stairs, ever", and "if you see a wrinkle, put cream on it", along with more serious items of advice like "get a colonoscopy" and "your home is not a shrine to your children". I am not 70 (soon, though), but I found a couple of interesting tips and tricks in this book, and I use them now. (For instance I'm putting cream on my wrinkles, though I'm not sure it's helping.)

My only complaint about this book is that there is sometimes a faint whiff of taking care of business - as if this was the only demographic which had, until now, not felt the benefit of Martha's caring, if slightly obsessive, eye. It feels a little like tidying up loose ends.

I'll be hanging on to this one, though, because I like the honest and practical approach to aging. I like the idea that there are specific and concrete things that elders can do, and that we can do for our elders, to make the last decades of life more pleasant and comfortable.

Reread: Yes.
Give to Others: Likely.
Bookplate: Sure.
3/3

Nigellissima!

Everybody knows I love Nigella Lawson. I have her new book, Nigellissima, her tribute to Italian food. It's a great book - lots of flexible options and "inspired by"-type dishes.

I haven't read it quite cover to cover, but nearly. I sat on the sofa the other night with a huge glass of Shiraz, flipping through the recipes, and wishing I could make her macaroni and cheese without having to get up and walk into the kitchen. The book, like all her other ones, makes me feel languid and decadent.

Nigella's books are usually hefty, filled to the brim with delicious recipes and chatty notes. Nigellissima, however, is uncharacteristically slender and understated. Much like Nigella herself, if the internet is to be believed. I'm hoping she doesn't go whittling herself even further - she looks great, of course, but I don't trust thin cooks. The thing I've always loved about her was her sublime unconcern with her weight, and her perfect - neither defiant nor apologetic - acceptance of her luscious figure. "Bosomy and bottomy", to use her words. If her next book is a volume of slenderizing recipes involving things like flax and steamed skinless chicken breasts, she will get a strongly-worded letter from me.

I've made two dinners from this book so far. One was a finger-licking, chin-dribbling feast of "chicken under a brick" - or 'bricken', as I'm calling it. This was unbelievably, smoothly, voluptuously delicious (my fingers just typed "volumptuously" twice, and I liked it both times). It's a whole chicken, spatchchocked (cut through the backbone and laid flat on a baking sheet), marinated in various spices and unguents (I have a small jar of preserved, salted lemons that really came into its own here), and then roasted hot and fast under a foil-wrapped brick. Shockingly good: the only thing I had to complain about is that the damn brick put paid to the Bakelite handle on my saute pan, which I unthinkingly used to lift the whole shebang out of the oven. It was just a few pounds too much, I guess, although my husband pointed out that now, at least, the pan fits into the dishwasher a lot better.

The second meal was a true feast. It was a whole leg of lamb, deboned, butterflied, and dressed with balsamic vinegar, olive oil, slivered garlic, sea salt, bay and rosemary (my addition). It, too, had a hot, fast roast (425 for about a half hour) and a fair bit of resting time. The only problem with THIS meal was that I didn't have enough people around my table to do justice to a whole leg of lamb. Mmm, delicious.

My favourite thing about the book is the way Nigella does NOT use a bunch of chi chi Italian names for the dishes. She uses good old English, which keeps the confusion to a minimum.

The low-down:
- LOTS of meat dishes in this book.
- And a LOT of seafood. Yerch. I am allergic to shellfish and I will end up cruising right on by huge sections
- Delicious-looking desserts
- Nigella's comfy, confidential food-writing turns up in spades and makes the whole thing worthwhile. 

My score - 4 out of 5. And to be fair I'm only deducting a star because a) there is way too much shellfish, which is less Nigella's problem than Italy's problem; and b) Nigella has gone a bit diet-ey.

Mangia!

"This shooow goes ever on and on..."

I went to see "The Hobbit". And I nearly fell out of my seat.

From boredom.

And irritation.

THE GOOD:

• THE DWARVES. I liked everything about them. Good casting, good dialogue, good costumes, good jokes. And that "to find our old forgotten gold" song was a great fireside moment. 
• BILBO. The perfect mix of deference and humour, reluctance and courage. Well acted and well-cast...but then I love Martin Freeman in anything. (Dent Arthur Dent) And... 
• RICHARD ARMITAGE. I could watch him get a filling done, that's how interesting he is to me. Although it's a little disconcerting finding myself physically attracted to Thorin Oakenshield, who I've always loathed. 
• THE KNITTING. Oh, the knitting. The dwarves are covered in the stuff, and it's all dreamy and so very, very copyable. 

THE BAD: Where to begin? Where, oh where, oh where to begin. All right, let's begin with:

• GALADRIEL. I love Cate Blanchet, but Galadriel's stupid faux-sonorous voice, with that ridiculous habit of unnecessary telepathy, has got to stop. In that one scene, where she paces around Elrond's council chamber like a restless spirit, she is WEARING LIFTS. Seriously. They have jacked up her shoes by a good two inches, presumably to give her a more ethereal, Elven look. It's the stupidest thing I've ever seen, except for that laughable, noodley hair of hers. 
• THE PLOT PACE. Seriously? 9 hours (total) for a 260 page book? I was checking my watch. During The Hobbit, a movie I've been looking forward to seeing since 2009. WHILE WATCHING RICHARD ARMITAGE WEARING FURS LIKE A SHORTER, SEXIER CONAN, I was checking my watch. That's how much this stupid movie drags.
• All the EXTRA CRAP they stuck in from the Appendices, just to give it more run-time so they could release three, three-hour movies instead of one three-hour movie OR, okay, if you insist, two two-hour movies. It's a CASH GRAB and I hate cash grabs.

So are you getting that I hated The Hobbit: An Unexpectedly Boring Ordeal?

Twelfth Night

Today is Epiphany, the last day of Christmas, the day commemorating the visit of the Magi. I usually take my tree down on January 2, but this year I was enjoying it so much I left it up. So today's the day it comes down, and winter begins where Christmas left off.

Mum and I went shopping on December 29, which last year I vowed I wouldn't do. It wasn't too bad - not as bad as last year when it wiped out all my Christmas spirit. However, it was pretty depressing. By Boxing Day, it seems, everyone has moved on. I often hear people say, in passing, "I'm SO glad Christmas is over."

Of course, it isn't over until today, January 6, Epiphany.

The problem is, naturally, that Christmas is primarily a commercial holiday. So after 4.30 on December 24, all the spending is over until the New Year's Eve appy/liquor store wave hits.

I realised this year that, as a mother, I don't really feel like it's Christmas - I certainly don't get a Christmas "break" or "holiday", as such - until the evening of December 25th. When everyone stands up from the feast I made, and my husband goes into the kitchen to wash the dishes while I waddle into the living room to fall somnolent on the couch, then I can actually be "off". The kids play with their new toys, or read their books; no one's hungry (no one will be hungry for some time); and all the buying, cooking, baking and decorating is as done as it needs to be.

The last few years it has seemed a little unfair that I am running like a madwoman the entire four weeks leading up to Dinner, but I've changed my perspective: now I think it's perfectly wonderful to have the real Christmas season - all twelve days of it - to do what I like with. I knit, read, do a 1000-piece art puzzle (this year, "The Intercepted Love Letter"), eat leftovers, drink lots of coffee and cider, sleep at odd hours, and gaze in delight at my beautiful tree.

So every year I'll quietly enjoy Christmas, celebrating it all the way from December 25 to January 6, until Business ("Business?!?! Mankind is their Business!!!!") comes up with some way to commercialise Twelfth Night, or starts a "Three Gifts on Epiphany" ad campaign. In the meantime, let's keep lighting our Christmas candles and brewing our New Year Wassail and enjoying the last few chocolates in the box.

Because despite the insane presence of Valentine's paraphernalia in stores, TONIGHT is the last night of Christmas!

Exercise a high degree of caution

I wasn't going to even comment on the Sandy Hooks thing. It's all a bit much for a nice peaceful, artsy, family-oriented Canadian blog.

But I've gotten a bit upset about it.

And something has just occurred to me.

I think the Canadian government should post a travel advisory about visiting the US, similar to the ones they use for countries like Mexico, Bahrain, and Lebanon. It should read something like this:


There is no nationwide advisory in effect for the United States. However, you should exercise a high degree of caution due to the threat of unpredictable terrorist attacks in public spaces. Be aware that there is anti-Canadian sentiment in places, especially northern regions close to the Canada/US border. Be aware that there are 90 guns for every 100 people in the US.

Or maybe this -- just to keep it simple:

Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada advises against non-essential travel to the United States due to heightened tensions and crime.

Then again, it's probably not necessary - aside from the occasional shooting of a Canadian customs officer, gun-toting Americans seem to stick to murdering their own people rather than ours. If you're a Canadian, just don't go to any movie theatres. Or malls. Or elementary schools. You know - the usual spots where bullets fly.


ACTUAL QUOTES I'VE SEEN ONLINE SINCE THE SANDY HOOKS ELEMENTARY SCHOOL MASSACRE:

1) We (the US) should remove all gun regulations so everybody can have them, not just criminals. [Adam Lanza wasn't a criminal. He was an Everybody. So was James Eagan Holmes. Bet you any money, the next psycho who opens fire at a group of moviegoers or innocent little kids will be, too.]
2) One well-placed firearm at Sandy Hook could have prevented the entire slaughter. [Unless, y'know, the well-placed-firearm carrier was down the hall at the time. But hey - more guns in schools is a great idea! Then the kids can be caught in cross-fire as well as just regular fire. That's what they need - MORE bullets to dodge. A bunch of kindergartners at the O.K. fucking Corral.]
3) Guns don't kill people, people kill people. [Yup, they do. With guns.] You can kill somebody with a ball-point pen, too - why not make THOSE illegal? [You're right. You might find it hard to kill 26 women and children in 10 minutes with a ball-point pen, though. Maybe you could get them to stand really still?]


American culture is violent and it glorifies violence*. The weird thing is how shocked we still are when violence happens.
*CAUTION: link to disturbing, mainstream images

So in six months' time, when some Everybody, regular Joe, I-don't-understand-it-he-always-seemed-so-normal American gets tired of the Canadians taking over the CostCo parking lot in Bellingham and brings his Bushmaster assault rifle, or his Gluck handgun, or whatever, and opens fire on Punjabi Canadians who are trying to buy milk (THOSE BASTARDS HOW DARE THEY), I for one won't be surprised.

Maybe we should all rethink our Nexus card renewals, and use our purchasing dollars to boost the economy in our own, gentle, country.

O Canada. Thank you for everything.

'Hop's' Epic Fail

It's Good Friday. You want some family time, and it's a long weekend, and those hot cross buns are sitting kind of heavy, so you think "I know what I'll do! I'll rent Hop." After all, it's a cute little family Easter movie to watch with the kiddies while you pop Mini Eggs and marshmallow bunnies, right?

NO.

Why?

Here's why.

There's the poor little wandering Easter Bunny, just looking for a place to stay for the night. See the gates behind him?

Yes, that's right: he thought he'd try the Playboy Mansion - after all, the guidebook says "home of sexy bunnies", and he is - to use his own words - "incredibly sexy". He has a little conversation over the intercom with Hugh Hefner about whether or not he qualifies.

"They wouldn't understand anyway," says my husband in response to my ranting in the kitchen afterwards. And will the preschool/school-age target audience for this movie know what "Playboy" is? Of course not. This is one of those adult-themed jokes that children's entertainers seem to think obligatory these days. It's like a snide little wink over the tops of the kids' heads.

But when my eight year old sees some idiot's bunny-with-bowtie mudflaps on the back of their pickup in the Thrifty Foods parking lot, she is going to think to herself, "Oh, that's from Hop!" And she will give a little smile and think about candy and laughs and good times.

That's called "branding", and it's one of the hottest marketing concepts of our time. We've all heard about the study involving preschoolers, where they recognise the golden arches. (Actually, our kids have a lot more imprinting than just McDonald's - this is worth a quick read.)

Playboy is just as recognisable a brand as any other. It's one of the original pioneers - if you can call it that - in an industry that is now worth 12 billion dollars a year in the US alone.

And hell - we're advertising to kids already, right? Give them a few years and they won't be kids anymore - they'll be adults: fully integrated consumers...might as well start prepping them now to contribute to that 12 billion dollars a year. Know how much income tax that generates?

And we haven't even talked about the gender issues yet. You can buy t-shirts for little girls that say "Future Porn Star" - you can buy thongs for little girls. And then there are the men's jeans whose care tags read "Give it to your woman: It's her job".

I thought we had come a long way, but I might be wrong. The pendulum seems to be swinging back, and my daughters are growing up in an age where they will learn their place as sex objects, no matter what I do about it.

Last night I had a dream that I was at a party where I was the only one who didn't want to eat the tarantula cheesecake. Huge black tarantulas, with red bits on their legs, crushed up and mixed with the sugar, the eggs, the cream cheese, and the melted chocolate. Horrifying, disgusting, unpalatable, sinister, and probably harmful - in a deliciously sweet and silky dessert.

Because that way, it goes down pretty easily.

Arresting the Decay of Language, Cont'd

All right, listen.

There are two ways to say the word "the". You can say "thUH" (short E: phonetically spelled thĕ [the underlining of th indicates it's the "voiced" th, as in "they" - as opposed to the "voiceless" th, as in "throw"]), or you can say "th-EE" (long E: phonetically spelled thē).

Generally speaking, when "the" precedes a word beginning with a consonant (or hard) sound, you would use the short "the", as in this phrase:

The dog ran past the car.


"Thĕ dog ran past thĕ car".

But if "the" precedes a word beginning with a vowel (or soft) sound, you would use the long "the", as in this phrase:

The owl hunted the otter. 


"Thē owl hunted thē otter."

What you'll find, in these troublous times, is that people use only one version of "the" - the one with the short vowel sound "thUH". But if you use a short "the" right before a word that begins with a vowel (osprey, end, abstract), the sounds run together and you end up with a phrase like "the udder" sounding more like "thuhuhdder". Well, obviously that doesn't work: there has to be some kind of delineation between the two vowel sounds.

Enter the glottal stop: Ɂ .

Do you know what a glottal stop is? It's a tiny halt you make in your throat, during speaking, to cut off the flow of air for a split second. It sounds weird, but try saying "thEE udder", and then try saying "thUH udder" and you'll see what I mean...you have to do a glottal stop whether you've heard of it or not. You'd write it "thĕ Ɂ ŭdder".

Well, glottal stops are all very well - nice and technical, and all, but why use them if you don't have to? Why not just use the correct pronunciation of "the"?

Good question.


Thē ĕnd.

If nobody tells you, how can you know?

Dear People of the English-Speaking World:

The word is "normality".

Think about "formal", which is an adjective. Now make it into a noun....did you say to yourself, "formalcy"? No, you did not.

There is no such word as "normalcy". You may have used it yourself, and now you're saying "What? Of course there is!" But don't feel badly; you couldn't have known. It's everywhere - like "impact" used as a verb, as in "Your hydro bill won't really be impacted by that." [im-PAC-ted...yuck]  When, really, if you're not talking about a wisdom tooth or a bowel, don't say "impacted".

You could say "These changes won't really have an impact on your hydro bill."

Is "normalcy" in the dictionary? Sure. So is "LOL", and you won't catch etymologists and grammarians using that, either.

So please practice this: "The English language has to regain some semblance of normality."

You are a person with free will - of course you are. And if you decide to say "The English language has to regain some semblance of normalcy," nobody will arrest you. You just won't have my blessing, that's all.

And really, who cares about that?

Carry on.

Shannon

Quantificating

Only ten more days until my mood rises with our Lord. Can't wait.

In the meantime, I made the mistake of watching this new TLC show called "Extreme Couponing". Has anyone seen this? After watching for about forty seconds I wanted to climb in a hot bath and open a vein.

Here's my problem. Well, here are my problems, I should say.

Parsimony
Word for the week: parsimony. The quality or state of being stingy. Adj: parsimonious. There will always be people who will do anything to save a dime, and on the flip side there will be people who would rather spend ALL their dimes than sacrifice a pleasure or preference. Of everything in this very opinionated post, this is the most subjective and potentially offensive part, so I'd like to note that this is my personal feeling in response to this particular show - and to assure you that though I disparage the extreme couponers, it doesn't necessarily follow that I can't appreciate the value of thrift and good management.

But.

The cheapskates on this show are unbelievable. The amount of time they'll expend, the sheer number of hours involved in collecting and sorting hundreds of coupons, memorising store policies, dividing their purchases into two or more carts so that everything is grouped to maximise savings, according to double or triple-couponing, the mental energies directed to this whole exercise....and all so that they don't have to PAY FOR THEIR FOOD. It seems so dreary, so miserly, so small-minded. It's all so narrow and pinching - the complete opposite of words like largesse, generosity, good-naturedness, open-handedness.

I don't have any idea what their other expenses are, naturally, but I don't imagine those people are taking public transit, turning off lights, installing solar panels, or disconnecting their cable TV service. I'm willing to bet that most of their money-saving initiatives are directed at their food - the nourishment of their bodies, the fuel that keeps them alive, the single biggest factor in the health of humans. Which brings me to...

Food Value
90% of what I see bought on this show is packaged food. Aside from the odd trip to Meats or Dairy, these people are spending hours cruising up and down the centre aisles of the grocery store - and doesn't everyone know by now, hasn't everyone heard this truism: that the FOOD is found on the outside four walls? Bread, dairy products, meat, fruit and vegetables. You can live your entire life - longer AND better - on just those, never having seen a Frito Lay or bought a can of Campbell's. How many coupons are published to help you save money on fresh produce? Hardly any. Why? Because those are actually worth your money. They can be difficult and costly to grow, maintain and transport, and their nutritional value is both potent and fragile. So far, I haven't seen a single head of broccoli or bunch of carrots on this show. And people, let me tell you something I'm sure you already know: what prepared packages of food have to offer you, you don't need.

Obsessive Behaviour
Well. This one's kind of obvious. Reality TV thrives on obsessive behaviour, but there's something extra depressing about a person who spends weeks clipping bits of paper, spends five hours pushing a cart around choosing what the coupon marketers want them to choose, burns holes in the checkout screen with their eyes in case the coupon doesn't get entered properly, and then crows triumphantly when their bill is reduced by 90%. Great job! You've taken home a bunch of crap and preservatives to cram into your family's mouth for the next several years. Every time you eat some of it you can congratulate yourself that you didn't pay for it. The only thing better than butylated hydroxytoluene is FREE butylated hydroxytoluene.

What draws these people to extreme couponing is not need (I don't imagine TLC is going to be featuring truly poverty-stricken people on this show - from what I've seen the families are more likely to be covered in bling and loading their free groceries into huge shiny SUVs), it's the gloat-factor - the feeling that they've put one over on the Man, got something for nothing, And THAT'S the obsessive part. "Extreme Couponing" is a shiny, tidied version of two other TLC shows - "My Strange Addiction" and "Hoarding-Buried Alive". For the hoarding bit, read on.

Stockpiling

In order to save the most money, you need to be able to buy in quantity. Nobody really needs to have ten boxes of Frosted Flakes at once, so you have to store what you don't use right away. Do I want to have a garage stacked floor to rafters with non-perishable food, which is mostly processed and packaged trash, preservatives, and chemicals? What does it add to my life - the knowledge that if I have the urge for chips and ranch dip, it's right there for me? Or maybe the thought that if World War III breaks out, I won't have to loot the Piggly Wiggly, but will be able to fend off all my neighbours with a shotgun while cramming one of my 250 free packs of Twinkies? I don't need that. Neither, I would argue, does anyone.

*   *   *

Probably some readers will think I'm crazy and sit there telling their laptops in a loud voice how wrong I am. Straighten me out in the comments - go ahead and give me a blast! I'm sure I'm overlooking something important - like perspective. And on that note, I'd like to point out, through clenched teeth, that there is no such word as "cuepon". Of the many abominations perpetrated against the English language, that mispronunciation is among the most irritating.

Okay, and now just let me check......hang on, give me a second.....Yep, I think I've probably offended everybody. I can click 'Post' now.

------------------------------------------
By the way, a point of interest - in Canada, we don't have double and triple couponing. Every coupon I've ever seen has, in the fine print, "one coupon per customer per product". So "Extreme Couponing - Canadian Edition" would be an awfully short-lived experiment, wherein we watch Doug Mackenzie save $2.50 on a single package of back bacon and get 50% off select garden hoses when he buys one at regular price. There might be a mail-in rebate, but I wouldn't count on it.

Save Yourselves

Remember when I reviewed "Casino Royale" and I thought it was pretty much the worst movie ever? Well guess what! I found a worse one!

2012.



Even the name is making me feel queasy. Two years from now, when I spend 365 days feeling unaccountably nauseated and having nightmares, it'll be because of my unconscious, associative memory of this movie.

It's like someone in an editing booth cut the climactic 25 minutes from each of the following disaster movies and taped them together to form a three-hour gauntlet of painful, funny-in-a-bad-way action footage:

- Crimson Tide/Red October/every-submarine-movie-ever-produced ("Someone has got to swim down to where something is jamming the hydraulics! There's not enough oxygen for him to get back! It's a suicide mission!")
- Independence Day ("The White House looks like a little toy with that gigantic ship overtop of it! Oh God, no! There goes the last bastion of freedom and intelligence in the known world!")
- Titanic ("The night is so black, and the sea is so deep! One brave man has the courage to stand facing the o'ermastering ocean, seconds before he perishes as the enormous liner sinks with frightening suddeness beneath the darkness of the waves!")
- Armageddon ("We are on a tiny little planet floating in the vastness of space, at the mercy of ominous planetary alignments and unexpectedly large asteroids! Er, I mean, solar flares! Now don't you feel vulnerable? Good!")
- The Day After Tomorrow ("See how it looks when Mother Nature decides to drown all the humans in snow? or rain? And doesn't the USA look scary with all its prominent buildings and monuments gunnel-deep in precipitation!" Also in this category, "Two-second glimpses of major world landmarks and cultural icons toppling/being engulfed in flames/sinking beneath waves/rolling over screaming populace, or silly Catholics who are sitting there praying as the dome of St Peter's Basilica does a slow pastry-pin manoeuvre through the Piazza San Pietro."
- Volcano ("All that plate-tectonic stuff the geologists have been saying about the San Andreas fault finally turns out to be true! And look at the size of that gee-dee crack down Santa Monica Boulevard!")

But luckily (pick any of the above movies for an example), the YEW-nited States of aMERica has HEEroes! Remember that terrible line from Independence Day (I think), where a Royal Air Force fighter pilot turns to his copilot and says in a posh, relieved accent, "Thank God the Americans are doing SOMETHING, wot?" Record numbers of people died from acute embarrassment in cinemas all over the world.

Spare yourself the agony of wasting three hours of your life which you'll never, ever get back. I hardly ever wish I had never seen a movie - usually there is some redeeming quality, no matter how tiny, to make it worth the watch. I'm sorry to say that even the presence of Chiwetel Ejiofor (y'know - the black guy from Serenity and Kinky Boots?) couldn't save it for me. Also, I usually like John Cusack, but if he's going to keep selling out for huge blockbuster Bay-and-Bruckheimer-style action flicks instead of using his powers for.............

And while looking for links to flesh out that last sentence, I stumbled upon his (apparent) twitter feed, which makes me think I should dedicate the rest of this post to a plea for public funding to set up classrooms in Hollywood production lots so that actors can have access to basic literacy training.

Now I need to go wash my eyes by watching "Everybody's Fine". I'm depressed already, why not have a good wallow-and-cry?

Over and out.

Get (Ab)used to it.

I've had a lot of mail and comments about my last post. It's been amazing...thank you so much for that.

I had an email exchange with someone yesterday, prompted by "Carborundum", and it led me to think more deeply about children's experience in traditional school. Normally I wouldn't carry on about any subject two days in a row, but in this case there really is more to say.

Often (like, very often), when people confront me about socialisation, they say things like “kids have to know how to deal with bullies...if they are never exposed to bullying and negative situations like that, they won’t be used to it.”

I always wonder whether they are even hearing themselves. “Getting used to bullies”, translated, is “suffer through it, and learn to avoid them”. What kind of society do we have, when we willingly and daily expose our children to damage, just so that they get used to being exposed to damage?

Because it serves no other end – once school is over, the need to tolerate bullies is obsolete. If it comes up in the workplace, it’s called “harassment” and it’s illegal. On the street from a stranger, it’s called “assault” and it’s illegal. In your home from your partner it’s called “domestic violence” and....it’s illegal.

Scenario:
A 6-year-old girl comes home from Grade One in tears. Mean boy is bothering her. Next morning, she has a stomach ache. Mom says, "You can't just stay home - you've got to learn to deal with it." A month later, girl is throwing up every morning and crying all the way to school. Mom says "I told her to ignore him - he's only doing it for attention. [Laughing] I told her it's the way boys show they like you. Anyway I talked to her teacher: she's going to try to put them into different groups." Two years later, the girl is 8. The boy is still in her class. He hasn't changed, but she doesn't complain about him much anymore. She has started odd behaviours, though: mostly playing her girl friends off against one another, and pushing some of the younger kids around.

Scenario:
A 7-year-old boy with a life-threatening anaphylactic peanut allergy is on the playground at lunch. A group of older boys approach, hands in pockets. They pull their hands out and begin to throw pebbles at him, yelling at him that what they are throwing are peanuts. "You're gonna die!!" The boy's friend, panicked, tries to block the 'peanuts' with his body, crying to his friend "RUN!" The principal, when notified, advises that he avoid those boys in future. Later that year, there is a girl who has never liked the boy. Her parents think "peanut-free" infringes on their child's rights. They send peanut butter to school with her. She walks down the hallway outside his classroom after lunch, with her PB-smeared fingers trailing along the wall.

Five years and many incidents later, the parents decide to homeschool the child for his own safety. Now he's 13 years old. It has been 18 months since he was removed from that school. He still remembers, with an edge of panic, that day with the pebbles.

Scenario:
Mr HalfSoledBoots and I are walking downtown in Victoria. We are on a crosswalk when an SUV nearly hits us. It passes so close that Mr HSB reaches out and slaps his hand, hard, on the back window. The SUV screeches to a halt. Five young men pour out of it. One of them, huge and staring, shoves my husband into a parking meter while roaring a stream of profanity. He rears back, fists clenched, and spits into my husband's face. His friends pull him away and they take off.

A cyclist walks up to us, leading his bike. "I saw the whole thing," he says. "Next time try not to get in their way."

No. He says "I've called the police. I'll be your witness."

The young man is charged with assault. We identify him in a photo lineup. He goes before a judge.

Scenario:
My friend, aged 25. Married to a bully. A year or so after the wedding, he starts to push her around. Nothing major at first. (The punching comes later.) She tells me about it. What is my response?
"Ignore him."
"I guess he must really like you."
"He's just trying to get a reaction."
"Don't give him the satisfaction."
"Stay out of his way."
"Try not to be alone with him."

No.

What makes school the exception? Why don't the rules apply there, too? We tell toddlers to respect others, not to snatch, not to yell, not to hit, not to make mean faces. Adults are expected to know that. But in a school? ignore them. Next year they'll move to middle school. Try to stay near the teacher. They're just trying to get a rise out of you. Don't go out of sight of the playground monitor. Stay together.

As a parent who has chosen alternative education, the burden of proof is on me. People want evidence, constantly, that homeschool is effective. I have to prove that my kids are just as good at math as their mainstream peers. I have to prove that they can speak articulately, print neatly, make eye contact, and are getting at least 20 minutes of exercise per day. I am expected to be proud and relieved (and the worst part is I am proud and relieved) when someone gives me a surprised compliment: "Oh my goodness! Your kids are so well-behaved!" Or once, at a party, after several minutes spent quizzing her (I was not present): "Your little girl already knows all her colours...good job."

I want the burden of proof to be on the mainstream for a change. I want proof that children in their system are well socialised. I'd like schools to have to prove that their environment is loving, supportive, intolerant of violence and hatred. And that the people coming out of it are articulate, polite, egalitarian, responsible, thoughtful, erudite, and well-rounded.

I want the public system to prove, using real, valuable benchmarks, and real, concrete, personal examples, that it is worthy of being given your children for 30 hours a week.

I suspect I'll be waiting a while.

Carborundum

I was at a party tonight. It was a craft thing. I was sitting next to a woman who, when she heard that I homeschool, had this to say.

Challengingly: "Oh, so you don't send them to real school."

Well, no.

"How old are they?"

Eight and five.

"Oh, five, so she's not in school then."

Yes, she's in Kindergarten, we homeschool.

Dismissively: "Kindergarten! Hmph. Homeschool kindergarten. So you don't send her to real school, like."

Pause...No, we do kindergarten at home.

"I don't know what you'd do for kindergarten at home."

Well, you'd be surprised. The ministry likes it, anyway.

"I don't approve, as you can see. [I'm thinking, of kindergarten? of the ministry?] I'm an old schoolteacher from way back. [Oh. Of homeschool.] And here's why. It's the socialisation, you see. Those children, those home children, when they go to real school they don't know how to behave. Ask any teacher, they'll tell you those children who are kept at home..."they don't know how to play", they'll say, when they go to real school."

Feeling my face turn red as my needle-felting increases in speed and ferocity.


I didn't make a verbal response. There were so many things to choose from. I could have gone with any of these.

1. I'm interested in your definition of socialisation. Do you mean that my children will not be aware of the proper pecking order among a barely-supervised and potentially harmful gang of 30 children, all the same age? Because Thank God.

2. When you say "don't know how to play", I'm wondering whether you mean that a child who is put in a concrete box to do worksheets for six hours a day, and periodically released to run among 75 or 100 other 6-9 year olds on large, plastic, specially-built gym structures...that this child knows how to play? And that my child, whose time is largely her own and is expected to fill it with reading, games, puzzles, outside explorations, conversations with her family and friends of various ages - and yes, TV - doesn't know how to......what? have fun? Get all the way across the monkeybars? Or, do you mean that she doesn't know how to manage the dynamic of love-hate friendship politics, rule following, and peer aggression on the playground? See item 1.

3. Homeschooled or not, my children are obviously far better socialised than you are, since neither of them would dream of saying something so rude to a total stranger at a party.

4. Get back, bitch.

But I said nothing because I realised something she didn't: that I was at a Christmas party, in someone else's house, making a felted angel and polite conversation with people who weren't sure of my first name. So I smiled at someone else, willed the angry flush away, and took the high road.

I had plenty of time to think about this exchange during the couple of hours I was there. I didn't have much to say...I was in a new place with a new group of people, after all. I wasn't there to be a loudmouth, to defend my family choices, or to proselytise for alternative education. It certainly wouldn't be me who made the hostess feel awkward and uncomfortable by holding a hostile and defensive conversation at her Christmas party.

I thought about my own experience at school. I remembered how often I dodged into the K-1 cloakroom or the girls' bathroom, or the dark and deserted equipment room, to avoid someone mean, whose voice I could hear coming down the hall. I remembered days of boredom and repetition. I remembered certain years, certain grades when I didn't think I'd make it out alive, and others marked by happy friendships....well, friendships I remember as being happy.

I went through the system, and I came out of it okay. I'd say, though, that I got educated despite school, rather than because of it.

Not that it didn't teach me a few things. It taught me to fear the disapproval of others. It taught me that if a perceived authority figure questions my choices, I probably made a serious mistake. It taught me all kinds of interesting things about how wrong I look, how unacceptable I am physically, and that my role as a female is largely concerned with escaping the notice of predators. The list of things I learned that I am no good at.....well, let's just say it's long.

A lot of my life afterwards has been about recovery. Many of the choices I make now, as a parent, are about protecting my children from that early harm which I feel left permanent marks on me. My choices for their education are a reflection of my philosophy, and all the things I've learned and taught in the last 30 years.

I sat there tonight, quietly listening to bits of other conversations, and doing my felted angel craft. I started with two pipe cleaners, the same as everyone else, and hunted through the shared bag of coloured wool to make the body and robe of my angel.

The only one with purple butterfly wings.

The only one with black hair.

The only one with brown skin.

The only one that was completely different.

Lily Chin's Knitting Tips and Tricks

Review Month at HalfSoledBoots

Volume 10, Number 4

Knitting Tips & Tricks

by Lily Chin

This book has me at a bit of a standstill. I don't want to need it but, gallingly, I think I might.

Let me explain.

Lily Chin seems like an interesting character. She's quite keen to impart her knowledge to those of us so unfortunate as to not be able to take one of her 'popular', 'instant-sellout' tips and techniques classes. I raised an eyebrow at her assertion that many of the tips are not common knowledge, but "have become more popular, I'm sure, as a result of the classes that I have taught almost every month since 1994. Word gets around. Thus, some things may be familiar to you..."

That slightly patronising little gem is on the second page of text. The first page looks like this.


I have such a hate-on for this trend - outsize fonts in mid-page.

But then, just as I had defiantly decided there wouldn't be anything truly necessary in the book (I'm reactive, what can I say), she came out with two really useful bits of information. One was a little page on knitting with ribbon yarn, which has been the stuff of my nightmares for some time now. I've got a Clapotis in the works, using ribbon yarn, and it's frustrating me so much I'm afraid I'll go off in an apoplexy. Lily advises me to sew the yarn ends together with needle and thread...not to weave in the ends...and it's so obvious I can't believe I didn't see it before. She also advises me to set up my yarn ball on a knitting needle axis, so it behaves like toilet paper. Huge reduction in twisting.

The second useful thing was her explanation of combination knitting, and exactly WHY, when I knit stockinette using the continental method, my purl rows are almost always a little looser. It's a matter of yarn path, it turns out, and it's fixable. I'm going to try combination knitting in the new year and see if I can't retrain myself.

I haven't read the whole thing, and I'm sure that I'll find a lot more techniques to improve my knitting skills. I don't ever have to reread the first two pages, after all, so they won't be a long-term issue. I'm actually looking forward to reading the rest of it, and finding out what else I didn't know I didn't know.

Overall I like this book, and it will live on my shelf despite its off-putting, annoying-fonted first pages. I give Chin credit for the knowledge she has amassed, but, as a final note, I do take humorous issue with the following. I can think of so many adjectives to describe this piece of advice, including "incongruous", "laughable", "amateur", and "outrageous".


And to that an extreme "WTF?!"

It's not perfect, but it'll be useful. It's small - a good knitting-bag size. It comes from one of the most respected designers (and Vogue-appointed Master Knitters) in the textile world, and most knitters will need what's in this book, one way or another.

Lily Chin's Knitting Tips & Tricks gets:
Reread: Yep
Given to Others: Probably
Book plate: Why not.

2.5/3
A Note: Lily has also published "Crochet Tips & Tricks". If I were a crocheter, I would actually buy that book just on the strength of this one. Bound to be good stuff in there.

If On A Winter's Night...

If On A Winter's Night
by Sting

This CD is a thing of delicate beauty. There are no synth-laden pop riffs or 'guest vocalists'...if you're looking for anything like The Police or the typical Sting offerings of his solo career, you'll be disappointed.

If you've heard "Songs From the Labyrinth" you'll have a better idea what to expect from "If On A Winters Night". Sting, in his maturity, seems lately to have been drawn to ancient music: consider also that this recording, like "Labyrinth", was released on Deutsche Grammaphon, a classical label.

The music itself is flawless. It has a keen sound quality - particularly on the pieces with stripped-down instrumentation - and the arrangements are careful.

If you are interested at all in Sting as a person, the liner notes will prove invaluable. There are six closely-printed pages written by Sting: musings on his agnosticism, his childhood memories of winter, the seasonal cycle as it affects humans. It's interesting and introspective.

I would classify this CD not as "Christmas", as I've seen it described, but as "solstice". It reminds me a little of the New Age/Pagan CDs that comprise my favourite winter listening.

I love If On A Winter's Night. It is full of lovely winter songs, beautifully interpreted by a first-class musician.

Listen Here.

They're in here.

Spoiler Warning: this is a heavy review of an emotionally huge movie.

I went to a movie the other day. I had high hopes for it, and was certainly prepared to have a good time.

I didn't have a good time, though.

I got punched in the gut. Where The Wild Things Are put a whammy on me.

It got released on my birthday, and I thought we might take the kids to it after dinner. I checked parent previews and got the idea it wouldn't be appropriate - I asked a friend and she said this:
Where the Wild Things Are is a dark and disturbing movie. I wished I hadn't seen it...the movie should carry a warning label: for people with happy carefree perfect childhoods only...I am still disturbed, four days later.

I was interested. And I thought, I pretty much had a happy carefree childhood, I should be golden.

Wrong.

Because I am a human...because I was a child, and have come full-circle to parenthood, Wild Things was a sucker punch.

The Maurice Sendak book, which of course everyone has read, is a terse and symbolic story of a child's defiance, punishment, and capitulation. During his punishment (sent to his room), a jungle grows up around him and he sets sail across an ocean, in a private boat. He arrives at a strange land full of strange creatures: Wild Things. They threaten to eat him, but he tames them with magic, and they crown him king.

There are several pages, in the middle of the book, with no words on them. Max's adventure is barely narrated at all - and his emotions are only named in one tiny line - "Max was lonely and wanted to be where someone loved him best of all." Aside from that line, the reader is left to infer what she will about what's going on in Max's head.

The movie is, on the surface, significantly different from the book. (Which - okay, the book has, what, 8 pages? and the movie takes nearly two hours, so you'd expect some fleshing-out.) In reality, though, it is not different at all. Every event, every extra character, every change made by the writers, seems perfectly natural to the original text.

Max's journey to the place where the wild things are is, like in the book, a turning inward. The place where the wild things are is a manifestation of his internal landscape as, in fact, the wild things themselves are manifestations of Max, his family members, his habits, his fears, his longings. Their characters are not static - they keep shifting as power dynamics change, as Max's will first unites, then divides them. The wild things are often children - they submit to his kingship, relieved to have an authority figure again.

This theme surfaces again and again throughout the movie, as characters admit their need for "a king". They need guidance, they want someone to look after them and make everything all right. (It's significant that Max, in his real life, doesn't live with his father - the reason is never made clear. We don't know whether the father is dead, or just gone.)

For a while Max becomes that authority they need (while at the same time, one of the wild things has become Max's father figure), but soon the wild things discover, as Max once did, that nobody has enough power to make everything all right.

Parents and children, and the hurt they inflict on one another, is a huge theme in this movie. There is one scene that cut me right to the bone. Judith, a wild thing who has always been more or less skeptical about this upstart king, has a jeering match with Max. No words are said, but she and Max just mock and roar more and more loudly at each other, him imitating her with a look of contempt on his face. She is in a trench, looking up at him (the only way he would be taller than she is), and after she screams at him for the last time she cries out, before he has a chance to answer her, "YOU CAN'T DO THAT BACK TO ME!"

He stops, taken aback.

"YOU CAN'T BE UPSET!" she yells. "We can be upset but you can't get upset! You're the king! If we say 'I'll eat you up', you have to say [gently] 'oh no! what'll I do! don't eat me!'"

Max stares at her. You can see the realisation of what he's done - the same thing that has been done to him - on his face. Then he turns around and walks away.

It is gut-wrenching.

I am a parent who has anger problems. Thank God I am not a hitter, but sometimes things escalate. I push, they push back, and then - well, I am ashamed to say that I, too, have imitated my daughter's words or voice, which she has used to me out of hurt and impotent anger. I have turned it around on her and have wounded her, deliberately, by using my position of power to subdue her, demean her.

It seemed harmless at the time. It seemed like a way to show her how it made me feel when she said that - how it felt to have someone talk to you that way. But what she needed from me...what she always needs from me...is for me to be the parent, the adult, the mother - the one in control. It's a paradox, because she's trying to hurt me...but she doesn't want to succeed.

When I saw Max and Judith behaving like parent and child, I sobbed. I felt such a conviction of guilt for the few - thankfully - times in our lives when I have done this to my own child. I had heard those exact words from her. "You can't get upset! You shouldn't imitate me!" And once, heartbreakingly, "I'm just a child Mummy!" Watching this movie, I remembered what I had forgotten. I knew it as a child, knew it right at the core of my soul. I remembered that fear I felt when I pushed her, hoping against hope that she would react with love and not anger. That she would reach out instead of lashing out.

It's not too much to say that Where the Wild Things Are changed my life. It absolutely wounded me. It reached out of the screen, tore me out of my Now, and shoved me back into my Then. It reminded me what it was like to be powerless, to trust out of necessity. It reminded me what it was like to burn with rage and helplessness, to lash out in pain, needing to smash and destroy. And it reminded me what it was like to want, so badly, to be treated with gentleness, to be treasured above all else - even just to be given the gift of my mother's gaze. Without anger, without distraction.

If you had told me a week ago that a movie could make me feel this way, could double me over in pain, make me run home to my children, make me change the way I am with them, I'd have laughed out loud. A movie, though, is just a vehicle for a voice. The message can be a teeny little folded up thing that flies inside you disguised as laughter, disguised as fantasy, imagination, nonsense.....and then when you've lowered your defenses, taken it in and given it a place to Be, it unfolds itself. You look at it differently. It's a part of you. You understand what you've really been seeing.

That moment of comprehension can be devastating.

I don't know whether you, in particular, should go see it, or not. I will say that it's the best movie I've seen in probably a decade. I'll also say that I'm buying the soundtrack, and I'm buying the DVD, and then the special edition DVD, and then the ten-year anniversary director's cut DVD box set, and then....you get the idea.

A lot of people don't like this movie. It's painful - no doubt about it. And a lot of people probably don't understand this movie - you should have heard some of the people in the theatre. They were mystified, and slightly resentful. "That wasn't in the book!" But, for my part, I came away changed - and for the better. As I said to my sister, "Run, don't walk."


Photo from IMdb, used totally without the permission of WarnerBros.