Some Busy December Therapy

It's snowing! Yay! Except, now the driveway needs to be shoveled and I remember that I don't have four-wheel drive and have to go down a steep, windy hill in order to get to town and my main occupation as a mother of four is to drive little people around.  So....snow.  Yay.  

Seth can't be bothered with warm things like pants and coats.  It would cover up the awesome Nike Elite socks he is so proud of and he might not be able to "air shoot" a basketball in restricting pants.  Must have baggy basketball shorts on for that, even if there is almost six inches of snow outside now.  Oh, to be in 7th grade.

I have done absolutely nothing this week.  As I type, I am sitting at my broken iMac (Henry broke the commuter...surprise, surprise) in my winter nightshirt and slippers.  I know this is because I have my busiest weekend ever coming up, not to mention the week following that includes our anniversary, Daniel's first birthday, the arrival of my sister for the holidays, the 4-H club Christmas party, and all of the presents to organize and wrap.  This weekend, I have to bring gluten-free offerings to the ward Christmas party, play the piano at the party, make program copies for the Sunday music fireside (this program has taken me hours and hours to make as I have never done anything on Pages and it was not nearly as intuitive as Steve Jobs thought it was), have our primary program (I am no longer YW president.  I kept intending to write a long-winded post about how that ended and now I am in the primary presidency and ward choir director but it has never happened so....I am in the primary presidency and ward choir director!) bring homemade lunchables for primary activity/sharing time following program, have a short choir practice following church to run through music with new accompanist, flute player and violin before the evening performance.  Bring cookies for fireside refreshments.  Play for string ensemble.  Sing a solo.  When my brain is full of these kinds of to-dos, I almost shut-down in the days before hand.  I think it's a coping mechanism because I am not one of those people who thrives on being busy.  I can get it all done but not without some major meditation in advance.

Messy house.  Pajamas.  In real time:)

It just....fell over. Onto the floor.  While Henry was playing Angry Birds. 

Daniel is kind of walking.  He initiates walking all day long but still hasn't mastered it as a mode of transportation.  He has figured out stairs, both going up and coming down on his belly, feet first, so there really isn't anywhere he can't go.  This means there are lots and lots of messes everywhere now, instead of just downstairs.

I am not going to be on Facebook for two weeks.  It is my cooling off period because after all of the election posting, from BOTH sides, which I suffered through (everyone has a right to their opinion, after all) even though all of the "You're wrong!" tied me up in knots, now I am being tortured by posts featuring both those intending to wear pants because a woman has yet to pray in general conference and those who can't imagine anyone could ever feel unequal in a pretty dress.  Can I just say that I wish I were a man right now?  Not because they have the priesthood and not because they get to pray all the live long day in general conference but because women are crazy.  And kind of mean.  I really wish I could just stay home this Sunday and not have to wear or not wear pants but it's the primary program and fireside.  I'm a victim!

Seth and Sam had a piano duet recital last Saturday.  I am a vocal advocate of piano recitals.  In my opinion, they are the games to practice and the tests to homework.  It's a means to measure progress under pressure.  Huge fan!  But, I am not a huge fan of overlong recitals.  The boys' piano teacher has participated in a few area-wide piano recitals lately and while I can understand the theory behind it (combining all of the students from seven different teachers.  You get a larger audience, a wider variety of music and ability) I don't think any non-professional or very good semi-professional production needs an intermission.  It was an hour and a half long.  An hour and a half...in a concert hall....with Daniel and Henry.  Hell!  And this was as long as Seth and Sam's number was.  It was too easy for both of them and so it actually got messier the more they played it because they kept going too fast.  Duets are a challenge!  Anyways, as I obviously have no backbone when it comes to speaking with the piano teacher, this may go as another unreported grievance.  Although, I may say this one out loud because it's not against her personally.  Maybe.

So much other stuff to say but I'll stop here.  Life's good.  Expensive....but good.  I'll post again soon.  This was very therapeutic.

Book Review #46 - The Language of Flowers

I realize no book can do all things but I also think a book can do more than one thing. The Language of Flowers is a beautiful book. With its imagery and description of beautiful flowers, not to mention the inclusion of every noted flower's victorian definition, it's easy to believe in the power of roses,jonquils and even thistles. It's easy to enjoy this story about a broken, abandoned girl who communicates with flowers and begins to discover her own worth and strength by using her talents to help others. Most of me wanted to believe in all of the blossoming magic.

But, I didn't. Maybe that's unfair.

Victoria is a victim of abandonment, never knowing who her biological parents were or why they left her to the care of the government but her journey through foster families reveals the sometime ugly realities of the system. At times starved, emotionally manipulated, and continually rejected by family after family, Victoria seems a textbook case of someone suffering from attachment disorder. When she is finally placed in the care of a loving woman who wants her and suffers through all of Victoria's attempts of sabotage, her future seems to finally have the possibility of a happy ending. From the very beginning of the story, however, we know something didn't work out. The novel uncovers the unhappy story, chapter by chapter, weaving between her newly independent adult life and the flashbacks through her childhood, mostly during her time with a woman named Elizabeth who teaches her about flowers and wine grapes and life.

There is enough realism in the narration that the unrealistic parts of the book distracted me. Who are these secondary characters in Victoria's life that seem too good to be true? Is it possible that someone with as severe emotional problems as Victoria can really function at a job? Or have a relationship with a man? I'm not implying that the author made it easy for Victoria. On the contrary, the author repeatedly highlighted Victoria's difficulty in each of these life developments. Some of the details her moments of despair made my stomach church with sympathy and pain. What was missing was the difficulty of the other characters. Weren't they outraged by her behavior? Weren't they turned off by her appearance, her deception, her almost feral behavior around food? I want to believe that there are people who are blessed with patience in abundance and who are ambassadors to help rehabilitate these poor, love-starved souls and I do believe that they exist. I just want to know about them too. I was disappointed by getting a little bit of Elizabeth's story and motives but never really getting to know her. I never understood her connection to Victoria, a connection that was vital to believing the story.

Ultimately, I think the author became a bit too focused on sharing the language of flowers and left out some critical development to the more interesting human story. I just wanted...more.

Book Review #45 - The Time Keeper

I struggle with the kinds of books whose objective is to moralize a topic or instruct. Non-fiction sorts such as Self-help, parenting, dieting and how-tos are the obvious sources of trouble but Mitch Albom's type of fiction fits in this category too. This type of book, which promises a better life for me if I only read and agree, always seem more attractive until I am sitting down with the book open in my hands and then I am either bored or bothered.

I have thought a lot about it and have concluded that the reason for my prejudice is I don't want a book to think for me (how's that for circular logic?) I think my favorite hobby, even more beloved than reading, is thinking. I love to think. I am perfectly happy to sit in a quiet car or room and ponder. I think that's why I love fiction and literature so much is because while the author may be moralizing or instructing, I have to do my part...thinking...in order to figure it out.

Mitch Albom doesn't seem to trust me enough to let me do that. I haven't read much of his work but after finishing The Time Keeper, I felt cajoled into thinking what HE wanted me to think. Time is precious! Moments matter! Um...yeah. I sort of already thought that.

But, then I got kind of confused. Because he used a fable to make his point, I got lost at times in which was more important. Was it better to not pay attention to time? Or did paying attention to time make life more precious because time is finite? I may be thinking too hard about it.

Then, when all the preaching was said and done, I disagrees with him. I do not believe man is the inventor of keeping time. My own beliefs state that God separated the light from the darkness and called His work a day. I also disagree with the idea that that man must die in order to enjoy memories or moments as if the finite quality of earth time is a superior experience over eternity. That just does not make sense.

I'm probably over thinking it all. See, if you give it all away, then someone like me will try to ruin things by adding to or digging deeper to the already generously donated thoughts.

A nice idea of a book though.

Book Review #44 - Sweet Tooth

Love, then a bit of a disgust, then interest, then disappointment, then admiration. That was my emotions running the gauntlet while reading this book.
Honestly, there isn't an overall opinion from me about this book. Parts of it are really brilliant. Lots of parts. So...I guess I'm saying it's mostly brilliant except for the parts that aren't and those were rather horrible except now that I'm finished, I wonder if they were purposely horrible. Or something like that.

This is not your typical spy book. From its uncomfortable title (at least for me it is) to its female protagonist, none of Sweet Tooth seemed to fit the successful formula that is often used when writing about lies, espionage, The Cold War or the British secret service. I mean, the mission "Sweet Tooth" is about the government finding authors who hopefully have a right of center slant about the whole capitalism vs. communism ideology and then secretly funding them so that they can hopefully write a book that persuades the masses. Duh-duh-dum. What? You didn't gasp?

O.K. So there wasn't a lot of life and death on the line here but there was a lot of interesting human drama. From its look at the world from a woman's perspective in 1970 to the realization that Big Brother could be just about everywhere, McEwan manages to salvage what I feared was becoming a sappy and poorly done woman's take on spying with some fantastic McEwan-ing at the end. It was different. I liked it. Quite a bit.