Truthing (Golden State by Ben H. Winters)

I started to use "Lying 2.0" as part of my post title because I thought "truthing" was not a word; however, possibly it is a rare word used in the Late Middle English period. Some would say that "truthing" is rarely used now as well. But, I digress. Or, do I? The story of Golden State by Ben H. Winters revolves around telling the truth and any digression from the truth (telling a lie) is a punishable crime. The picture below pairs water with the book as the setting is California, the golden state, and, until recently, a state in drought.
 

This dystopian novel (a favorite genre of mine as my daughter, who read it with me, accurately claims) feels like a modern day twist on Fahrenheit 451. Just as Fahrenheit 451 foresaw big screen televisions, reality shows, and bluetooth earbuds ("seashells" I think Bradbury called them), I have to wonder if Winters is foreseeing a time where our desire to know the truth based on webcams and instant replay, etc., actually imprisons us in some false notion of truth.

Discussion groups will have no problem finding points to discuss especially centered around "What is truth?" I have to confess while reading this book I went to coffee with a dear friend and we forgot to take a picture. What an amazing thought that two people would go to coffee and not take a picture! This little sentence crossed my mind: "Did we truly meet up for coffee if we did not record the occasion in a photo?" The whole thought is laughable, and yet...

I'm tending to give books a ratings "range" these days, and the range for this one is 3-4 stars. Four stars because I do like dystopian novels, and this one does have a story, even a mystery to solve. (I didn't see the answer coming, but then I never do.) Three stars because the story flounders at the end; however, I think Winters has a sequel planned (otherwise, the ending stinks, and I am left wondering what happens to some particular characters I grew fond of).

💕💕💕 Not really a family friendly book, but great ideas in here for adults to discuss with the younger generation.

Spiritual formation -- I'm wondering if a practice that might lend itself to discovery would be to go for a certain period of time without taking any "selfies". To remember something by way of art or conversation. Or, to compare pictures taken, art drawn, memories and discuss how each member of a family sees and perceives an event or even "coffee time."

Moving On (Miller's Valley by Anne Quindlen)

Nothing like walking through reviews of a book and realizing that I am going to be one of the few who rate it with 3 stars. Three stars: I liked it. It was fine. There's the issue, isn't it? We don't like to receive a 'C' grade, an average grade. We don't like to be "fine" or "nice." I can't really label the book as "nice" as once again this summer I've just finished a sad book (with somewhat of a "happy" ending, I guess). I am desperate to move on to something witty and humorous and happy. However, I didn't choose this book (it was a book discussion group choice for the month of July-August), and moving on from sad books is not why I chose the title "Moving On" for this post.

The people of Miller's Valley must move out and move on because their town is going to be covered in water; it will be a "drowned town". This is not a plot spoiler as we learn this immediately in the novel.

Still, I could have chosen a variety of themes to focus on from Quindlen's novel: eminent domain, 1960s and Vietnam (or any war era sending back soldiers into civilian life), family relationships, friendship, pro-life/pro-choice/sex, growing up / growing old, loneliness, identity and home.

All those themes touch my life in one way or the other, but I keep coming back to what it means to "move on." When does moving on help us grow and thrive, and when is moving on equivalent to cutting ourselves off from what matters and/or simply running away? When does someone else's moving on become something we have to deal with, get through, and get over?

If a reader is willing to look into that theme running throughout Miller's Valley and throughout the lives of its characters, then she or he will have lots to think about in this "quiet" book (a number of reviewers who rated this book three stars were wishing they had paid attention to the "quiet" label -- this means the story may move a bit slower than one would like).

The book is an excellent choice for discussion, but I'm not purchasing the book for my own shelves.

💕💕💕💕 One of the most important actions we can take with our children (and with ourselves) is to help them build up friendships that will last a lifetime. Some childhood friendships will fall by the wayside -- oh! what a great analogy I've fallen into! Some friendships will fall on footpaths where the busy birds of this life will eat them up. If the friendships seem like good ones, pick up the seeds and move them to a place where they can be nurtured. Some friendships fall  among the rocks. Make sure that not all of your children's friendships and your own friendships stay in the rock or acquaintance region. Some friendships will fall among the weeds. Those are the tough calls to make when it comes to friendships. To have friendships among the good soil, those are friendships that last a lifetime and in rain and shine, help us to thrive and grow. Too often I've either moved on from friendship to friendship or planted friendships everywhere without making sure that I have deep friendships.

--------------Matthew, Mark, Luke, and Acts in the New Testament all write of "shaking the dust off of   [one's] feet." Words for moving on. My comments here address whether we read those stories in light of the reality that God is Love (see my ongoing blog post about this in this link here.  ) or if we read it as if God were made in our own image and if we shake off dust, then we either hate you or can't stand you or feel something other than God love for you. What if we look at "shaking of the dust" as moving on and moving past so that we can thrive and grow, so that we are not continually dragged down into the taking any number of unhelpful actions: being someone's rescuer and getting in the way of the Holy Spirit; becoming morose and stuck in the past; getting angry and becoming depressed about the past, unable to hear the goodness to which God is inviting us...

What if "shaking off the dust", "moving on", means we are invited to move away from bitterness, wrath, malice, evil words -- to put them off, to shake them off -- and to put on, move toward kindness compassion, and forgiveness? It may mean that moving on and away from someone or something is healing for our souls...and may lead to healing for theirs as well.

What if "shaking off the dust" means a moving on which is also helpful to the person or people from whom we are moving on or moving past? If the person can not hear and feel our love, can not hear and feel that the kingdom of God has come near to them, do we trust God in perfect love to send someone else? Just because we need to shake the dust off of our feet does not mean that God has abandoned the people. Truly, if these actions of shaking off the dust in protest as a testimony does not change any minds, if after time and time again, a person chooses to walk away from the freedom offered in Jesus, in God, in Love with a capital 'L', then the person gets to have what he or she wants and that is a life outside of the kingdom of God. That is sad, but the judgment does not come from us. Shaking dust off of our feet does not make us superior. It is merely an action done in love directed by God who is Love because we who are moving on are not the ones to carry the message of love there. We need to discontinue reading the words of Jesus as though he is saying them with hate and instead read them as a parent who deeply loves his children. "And you, Capernum, [think, dear children, about this] will this get you to heaven? No, you will go down to Hades [Sheol, a place of darkness, a place of death, a place where nothing grows or thrives; this is not what I want for you; change your mind, dear children, for I love you with an unfailing love].

**********I continue to think on this topic of moving on, shaking the dust off my feet. This question comes to mind. When do I move on and when do I stay put? It might have to do with what leads me toward  God and which leads me away from God. It probably has a lot to do with what is most helpful for both the one who is not listening and to me as well. Which "moving on" "shaking the dust off" move me toward God and away from anything that puts me in the place only God can hold or takes me away from anything I idolize? Which "moving on" or "shaking the dust off" takes me farther away from God's invitation to me (think of Jonah and Ninevah)? 

Sleuthing (The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley)

In my pursuit of some light reading, I discovered I do not possess my own copy of To Kill a Mockingbird. I intend (barely and briefly) to compare Scout, the protagonist of TKAM (as it was known by my students) with Flavia, the protagonist of The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie (TSATBOTP -- goodness, even with initials, the title is still long). I went to take a picture of the two books together and that's when I realized that I did not own TKAM (my children, take note, my birthday is coming).

From the title of this blog post -- "Sleuthing" -- and the picture of the dead bird, you can deduce ("arrive at by reasoning, reach a logical conclusion") that this is a mystery, not my normal genre to read. However, several friends rated this book highly (4 stars) on Goodreads, and I longed for something light-hearted to read.

Eh, dead bodies but no blood and guts, just lots of talk of poisons...lots. No deep philosophical discussions but lots of multi-syllable words...lots. I like multi-syllable words even when they are written as coming out of the mouth of a precocious eleven year old. The thoughts and conversations of Flavia can be funny. It is meant to be "over the top" (hyperbole, exaggeration). It has to be when the author names the characters Ophelia (Feely), Daphne (Daffy), Flavia, Antigone, Dogger, etc.

Therefore, if the book is meant to be jolly good fun (even with dead people, poisons, kidnapping, etc.), readers shouldn't expect reality in the story. Yet, at the bottom of this custard pie (part of the story), there is some sweet (or not-so-sweet) reality in the form of how the murders happen and in the kidnapping. All's well that ends well so have no fear there. I like the relationship between Inspector Hewitt and Flavia, but I confess to being annoyed by the family relationships.

One, why are mothers generally dead and fathers cold and distant (or vice versa)? Can one not have an adventuresome life with a live mother and father who care for and love you? Maybe not. I finished two memoirs this summer Calypso and Hillbilly Elegy (reviews in the links) and one author has a dead mother and father who was cold and distant in younger years and warm and loving in later years, and one author has a drug addict mother, and a father who left the family.

Two, Flavia's siblings. Flavia's talk of poisoning her sisters and how they treat each other is flat-out painful for me to read. Not because it sparks painful thoughts of my own relationships with siblings but because I have such good relationships with my siblings and whenever I have seen painful relationships, the situation has not been funny. I know, I must remember this is exaggeration for the sake of fun. Keep that in mind and you'll be fine...if you like long words and long explanations of how poisons and crime work. Nothing gory, and the explanations are well done. Also, Flavia is not perfect in her sleuthing, just as Scout in To Kill a Mockingbird is not perfect. Scout is a believable character. Author Harper Lee catches the right temperament, the right expression for a smart, intelligent young girl written in a style where the character is looking back. Then again, To Kill a Mockingbird is meant to be realistic...a lot.

I'm conflicted. I can't give the book 4 stars like my friends and many reviewers, but I can't give it 2 stars like some other reviewers who hesitated going against popular opinion that Flavia and her sleuthing are as good as...the sweetness at the bottom of the pie. I liked the book. I started the book one day and finished it the next. Not a perfect solution for my desire for light-hearted reading, but a fair choice. 3 stars. Go into it as something over-the-top and laugh at the names of the characters.

💕💕💕💕 Sibling love. That has to be my topic for this section of my blog post. How to get it. Some of it may take time, but surely parents helping children to love one another has to be one facet of sibling love. I confess I did my whole ambitious, not present, time of parenting which I regret. Now, I pray, God of the past, present, and future, will redeem the years the locust have eaten (all biblical references)...that God who is outside of time will redeem ("compensate for the bad aspects") of those years.

-------------It took me a moment to think what could go into this spiritual transformation section, and then it came to me: Being Present. Scout's dad Atticus (one of the most beloved characters in literature) is a lawyer and busy. When he reads his newspaper, he concentrates on reading his newspaper, still there is a sense that he is attentive to his children. Flavia's dad Colonel de Luce (in Italian, luce has to do with light, but in late Middle English, it's a pike fish!)...laughing out loud here...her dad is a cold fish and not attentive to his children even with their mother dead. To practice being present to people, I stop what I'm doing; I look with my eyes; I keep my mouth closed and listen with my ears; I'm thankful for the person. Being present while alone, for example, eating: I enjoy looking at the food; I taste and savor each bite; I'm thankful for food. 

To Read or Not to Read (Shelf Life ed.Gary Paulsen and Vinegar Girl by Anne Tyler)

I don't have to read every book I start. This was an important decision I made last week. See the stack of books below.

These are just a few of the books I intend to read! At the time I took this picture, I forgot there was one in my purse.

(Yes, the purse looks like it could be replaced, but that's a blog piece for another day: not filling our waste or dump sites.) My actual decision not to read a book came while reading these two books:

I finished Shelf Life; I returned Vinegar Girl to the library. Both of these books have something in common. In Shelf Life, editor Gary Paulsen asked prominent authors to write short stories  which included the mention of a book. This was done to promote and benefit ProLiteracy Worldwide. Vinegar Girl by Anne Tyler is the third book of Random House's "Hogarth Shakespeare" project where a novelist updates a story from Shakespeare.

I picked up Shelf Life from work and I almost did not finish it as the stories at the beginning did not interest me. Sure, they mention a famous book (or two) in each story, but the stories came across like the results of a writing assignment rather than what would naturally come from the author. However, some of the students at the school where I work had this book as required reading so I pushed on and I liked the stories at the end. Also, the last section "About the Contributors" fascinated me.

Vinegar Girl written by well-known author Anne Tyler was supposed to be my "light-hearted" read after reading through a series of depressing books. It was okay, but I kept thinking the original Shakespearean play The Taming of the Shrew was a lot better. This isn't just me insisting on the original Shakespeare. I like his stories retold in modern language. I just kept thinking: "Wait, she's changing up the actual story." In the middle, I decided that I could stop reading. Just because I had started reading the book did not mean I had to finish it. Not only did I have all those other books I wanted to read (see first picture), but these books came in two days later (and The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley looks like it might be the light-hearted read I have been looking for.)

💕💕💕💕 About 70% of the people who look at my blog do so on a mobile device and I now realize the website post does not always come out well on a mobile so I'm working to fix that. I still have not figured out how to add the translation widget to the mobile format, but I'm playing with how to divide up the sections such as this one that connects the reading to family life and the one below connecting to spiritual transformation.

I don't actually have the answer to the question I'm raising in this section. How do we get our children and students to enjoy some of the best literature of the ages when testing on anything kills most of the joy?

-------------As for spiritual transformation and reading, I have not, I believe, mentioned reading scriptures which surely would be included in any spiritual transformation plan. Again, testing destroys a whole lot of joy. While reading Old Testament scriptures and New Testament scriptures will help any reader because of the vast number of biblical references and allusions made in books, reading of the bible can make a transformative difference. And, while some readers may gasp at the word "can", reading the bible knowing that God loves you, the reader, and delights in you, makes a difference between reading it  and being transformed and thinking that God is out to get you and not being transformed. Also, skillful readers know to picture in their minds what they are reading. See the second book review You Gotta Be the Book in this blog post "Five Books..." to read a discussion of how important it is to picture what we are reading, yet so often that information is not offered to those reading the bible.  

Retiring and Transitioning (Next by Vanderbloemen and Bird)

The short version of how I came to be reading this book: I thoroughly disliked hearing the statement: "All pastors are interim pastors." Wait! Don't stop reading because I used the word "pastor." I promise that this post will apply to all, not just pastors.

I still don't like the statement as used by authors Vanderbloemen and Bird. While I have dear friends who are wonderful interim pastors, I think the use of it in the book carries with it a negative feeling even if the authors do not intend to write in that way.

In this case, why do I give the book three stars which means I like the book? I would go so far as to say, for pastors and churches the rating is 4-5 stars and a necessary book to read. As someone not on an elder board and not a pastor, I appreciated the ideas in the book to know how to help a community of faith and a workplace community. I appreciated being challenged to think about how we all need to build bridges for others.

For the first two communities mentioned above, I like to think of leaders moving on in the best of circumstances as a time of commencement. They are about to begin a new part of their journey in life and how can the leaders bless their community and how can the community bless them. In the worst case situations, dealing with grief within a community is needful. For good or for ill, being prepared from the moment a leader takes up his or her position is the great idea conveyed by this book. The authors do go into every nitty gritty detail (money, loss of momentum, etc.) As one reviewer put it, for a book about pastoring, it seems like the the authors deem a good succession as one with continued tithing and continued growth. I have to wonder about some of the examples in the book: what happened to love God and love others.

The takeaway for me in this book is how does anyone: a parent, a woman or man, a employer, a leader, and, yes, a pastor, leave a legacy, not of wealth but of that which she or he has contributed to the world just being who they are and what they have been doing on this journey? Our unique identity can not be passed on, nor should we want it to be, but people are going to continue on without us. How can we make those transitions as smooth as possible for them?

Vanderbloemen and Bird's last chapters are some of the best. On page 171-172 of the next-to-the-last chapter, they bring in the work of William Bridges, an authority on change and transition "[who] helps us understand the emotional side of those transitions. He argues that the single biggest reason organizational changes fail is that no one has thought about endings or planned to manage their impact on people. His argument is that changes don't do you in. Rather transitions do you in.

"He explains the way the concepts differ. Change is situational....new location...retirement...reorganization...a shift...Transition is psychological. It is a process people go through as they internalize and come to terms with the details of the new situation the change brings about."

I have just participated in seeing a community carry out V&B's suggestions well: The pastor and his family verbalized a personal goodbye, the community had opportunities to say goodbye and to honor the pastor and his family. The grief of the community was and is being recognized. The pastor and family was gifted and blessed.

I wanted to include the beautiful words spoken during these celebrations and services but it would make the post too long so if you know me personally and would like me to get those to you, I will. If I don't know you, but you ask in the comment section, I will start putting those in my replies in the comment section.

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I've mentioned in this section before the need to know who would take care of your children if something were to happen to you. My children are grown so now my concern about what comes next is not to leave them with too many of my possessions to go through and try to get rid of or find places for. Also, as I think about my job, how can I make it easier for the person who one day will follow me? And, those who follow behind me will have their own contributions to make, but how can I leave my little section of the path clear so that they can more easily extend the path and travel farther than I could go?

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HUMILITY -- oh, does preparing for one's successor take humility. To practice little habits daily so that when that day comes, we can do so with grace and love and peace -- this, this is following Christ.
My indirect ways of practicing humility have been in choosing to get in the slow line at grocer's stores and letting people with less groceries than I to go ahead of me. Humility. Why is my time so much more than other people's time? Read the book Leadership and Self-Deception (link to the review here). When we take action which lacks humility, we want to make the others as people not like us, people who deserved whatever action we took.

Another little indirect step toward humility I took yesterday involved the dish soap. Yes, the dish soap. I tend to leave it out on the counter. My spouse loves tidiness. He mentioned that he is always putting it away. Please note that he did not say it to "put me in my place". It's not a slippery slope toward slavery if I choose to put the dish soap away as an indirect way to practice humility. This may not be a good practice for someone with an abusive spouse. I'm a creative messy person and my spouse likes some order. I'm not ready for a hoarding reality show, and he's not ready for psychological care; we're just different and  I'm confident in myself and my abilities; therefore, for me, putting away the dish soap is a practice I thought I would try. You can figure out your own small step of practicing humility.  

Siblings (Calypso by David Sedaris)

I know, I know; the word "siblings" may have an 'ing' in it, but it is not a gerund. Nonetheless, it fits too well for me to get hemmed in by details like grammatical rules. In my family, we could make a gerund of it: "I think she just siblinged you!" And, my siblings would instantly understand.

Did you know that calypso can mean "a type of West Indian song whose words are often invented as the song is sung" which actually fits Sedaris's books -- they come about as his song of life is sung. However, Calypso comes from the name of his cat, not the name he gave his cat, but the name his neighbors gave the cat who had a secret life apart from its life with Sedaris (for fans of etymology, Sedaris has some fairly intelligent neighbors as the original Greek means "she that conceals; to cover, conceal").

I did not actually intend the picture to go with concealment. I was going for a West Indian feel, all part of image management; I can't just post a picture of the cover, can I?

Let me return to siblings. This is my family. No, not literally my family, but it could be my family except, thankfully, my mother is still with us. Therefore, it is difficult to criticize anything that comes so close to home. Also, it's a memoir and even my students knew (or if they didn't, they really would have benefited from figuring this out), I do not like to downgrade anyone's writings when the stories come from the heart. Don't immediately assume I hated the book (family, you know).

But, it is a type of memoir, even in essay form, and I'm not a fan of memoirs. (Thus, my three star rating.) I usually don't finish reading them. I finished reading this because I couldn't stop reading it. Reviewers who read Sedaris say that this is his most introspective, darkest humor...and not to start with this book as an introduction to Sedaris. Too late for that advice. He is funny...and, yes, back to family. His family reminds me of my family.

Yet, the turtle. I can't get over the turtle incident. That is not like my family. And, the incident with his sister. I want to be mad at him about that. I want to think that none of my siblings would ever do that to another one. I discussed it with one of my sisters. When is "tough love" truly love and when is it a euphemism for "downright mean"?

I've bookmarked page 91 a conversation between Sedaris and his partner Hugh:

Sedaris writes, "It's not that our father waited till this late in the game to win our hearts. It's that he's succeeding." Sedaris then starts complaining to Hugh: "'But he didn't used to be this nice and agreeable.'

'Well, he is now,' he [Hugh] said. 'What can't you let people change?'"

Sedaris comments: "This is akin to another of his often asked questions: 'Why do you choose to remember the negative rather than the positive?'

'I don't,' I [Sedaris] insist, thinking, I will never forget your giving me such a hard time over this.

Honestly, though, does choice even come into it? Is it my fault that the good times fade to nothing while the bad ones burn forever bright? Memory aside, the negative just makes for a better story..." Sedaris concludes.

So, either confession is good for Sedaris's soul or all the negative stuff makes for a better story or both. I could have done without any essays on bodily functions, but, again, sigh, family. I could do without the bodily discussions in my own family, except when my sisters get going during a sibling reunion and they crack me up. Sometimes it's funny until it's not, and there are parts of this book (for some, the whole book) that are not going to be funny. There are plenty of 4-5 star reviews for this book (and that's how I ended up choosing it from Book of the Month Club). This is for those who want to read a review with a lower amount of stars.

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This is my "raising children" section, and whether one would normally pick up this book to read or not, it really has some family stories to get a parent thinking. If you only read books on your "acceptable" list, books that probably say what you think anyway, then you're not going to be challenged to think through your parental practices. This book can give you a chance to think through how you feel about tough love, how you feel about people changing, how you feel about life now and life in the future. It's somewhat like being immersed in one's own culture, one can't see where your culture misses the mark, but go to another culture, and you see with different eyes. Still, there are parts that will gross out some readers (me included). I would like to say that we raised our children not to be gross, but...family.
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On a more serious note, spiritual transformation. I have to wonder, without casting stones because I have to practice how to avoid this as well, whether or not the incident with Sedaris's sister had anything at all to do with image management. Was it tough love or was Sedaris concerned about what his sister would do in front of all those people if he let her in? I'm not sure I know of any adults who are totally oblivious when it comes to their images. How people see us matters a lot to us. Before I went through a spiritual formation institute (this one at Renovaré), I had never heard of a practice to learn indirectly how to push back against image management when it truly mattered. One practice is not to go back and fix an email or a media post when the reason to fix it would be to fix one's image. If autocorrect really messed up something, then, yes, by all means, editing is called for; however, there are times when what we need to practice is to practice truly being kind not just our image of being kind.

Lamenting (Hillbilly Elegy by J.D. Vance)

The diversity of my spring/summer reading selections boggles my mind.

The book Hillbilly Elegy by J.D. Vance was thrown into the mix by my library book discussion group. Most of the time when the group chooses a memoir, I don't make it to the end. Vance's book broke that pattern. That doesn't mean I'm giving it five stars (I've vacillated between 3 and 4 stars), but I did finish it within three days of reading and parts of his story resonated with me.

An elegy is a lament, and I'm not so sure this book is a lament as much as it is a cry for help. Reviewers disagree about the value of the book and, as usual, the ratings depend on how they take the book personally.

Connections for me revolved around whether conclusions Vance made could happen in my community and, if I had a similar background with a different result, what made my life different from Vance's?

On page 56, Vance comments on students and college that applied to my life, and I wasn't born or raised anywhere near Appalachia. "To move up was to move on. That required going to college. And yet there was no sense that failing to achieve higher education would bring shame or any other consequences. The message wasn't explicit; teachers didn't tell us that we were too stupid or poor to make it. Nevertheless, it was all around us, like the air we breathed: No one in our families had gone to college..."(56). Not a single counselor or teacher talked to me about getting into college. I did all the work myself (and very poorly). I was an intelligent person who read a lot, but never knew how to study to get good grades. Thankfully, I had access to a community college and it was there that grades began to matter to me. I didn't think about "moving up"; I thought about having that college degree and proving that I had worth.

This memoir (one reviewer questioned calling it a memoir when the author is thirty-one!) is a must read for Christ-followers who care about making a difference. On page 96, Vance discusses: "Many of the sermons I heard spent as much time criticizing other Christians as anything else...My new faith had put me on the lookout for heretics. Good friends who interpreted parts of the Bible differently were bad influencers...All of this talk about Christians who weren't Christian enough, secularists indoctrinating our youth, art exhibits insulting our faith, and persecution by the elites made the world a scary and foreign place" (97).

Vance's thoughts on Marine Corps boot camp, I believe, hold a key to some solutions: "Marine Corps boot camp, with its barrage of challenges big and small, began to teach me I had underestimated myself", and this -- "...I had never felt empowered--never believed that I had the ability and the responsibility to care for those I loved" (163, 167). The Corps taught him how to compare banks and shop for loans (175). Just as with college preparation, no one at school taught lower middle class students like myself how to do finances. Vance states: "I'm not saying ability doesn't matter. It certainly helps. But there's something powerful about realizing that you've undersold yourself--that somehow your mind confused lack of effort for inability. This is why, whenever, people ask me what I'd most like to change about the white working class, I say, 'The feeling that our choices don't matter" (177). There's no reason to put forth effort if one thinks effort does not change the circumstances.

This may be the difference between the community and family of Vance and my family. My family background may be one of times of poverty, but they were (and some still are) farmers. Farmers know that they may not be able to control the weather, but they can control tilling the soil, putting seed in the ground, and tending to crops and farm animals. One's effort makes a difference.

I'm a bit surprised that I don't want to buy the book as it does have statements I'd like to remember: "I don't believe in epiphanies. I don't believe in transformative moments, as transformation is harder than a moment. I've seen far too many people awash in a genuine desire to change only to lose their mettle when they realized just how difficult change actually is" (173). Vance writes: "We're more socially isolated than ever, and we pass that isolation down to our children. Our religion has changed--built around churches heavy on emotional rhetoric but light on the kind of social support necessary to enable poor kids to do well" (4). Thought-provoking.

I almost titled my blog post: "Politicking" as the book was later used to explain election results. The emails Vance cites on pages 192-193, I have seen and had discussions with relatively upscale family members and their friends who believed fake news and conspiracy theories. One's culture lives on no matter how little or how much money one earns. Also, reviewers have castigated Vance's book saying they believe it is his way to begin a run for public office. Is a person more noble who doesn't plan to go into public office but just seemingly "falls" into it? I ended up liking Vance and his wife and the decisions they make. This book is definitely a great discussion group book choice.

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Too often when parents and others start discussing "consequences", the topic is tied to consequences for one's naughty actions. What about consequences of perseverance and practicing and taking risks and failing yet trying again? Researcher Carol Dweck's work in growth mindset is excellent for learning how to teach children the "power of believing that you can improve".

Dweck's work wasn't around when I was raising my children; however, we did believe that our efforts could change circumstances. We may not have farmed, but we did garden.

What can you and I continue to do to help others know that they can persevere, practice, take risks and fail yet try again?

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See above. I don't know that I believe all transformation is harder than a moment, but I do believe transformation comes with daily moments. As Dallas Willard often said or wrote, and I paraphrase him, "indirectly doing practices which enable us to do that which we have not been able to do by our own direct effort." Vance could not in one direct moment overcome his cultural belief that his efforts did not have an impact on consequences yet the Corps taught him moment by moment he could keep his room clean, keep his hair cut, iron his uniforms, run not only a mile continuously but, in the end, three miles continuously, fail and be able to try again.

As Dallas wrote in The Great Omission: "Grace is not opposed to effort, it is opposed to earning. Earning is an attitude. Grace, you know, does not just have to do with forgiveness of sins alone" (61).  

This Isn't the God I Grew Up With Pt.1 (Joyful Journey Listening to Immanuel)

"This Isn't the God I Grew Up With" has been a title in my draft posts for awhile. When I read Joyful Journey Listening to Immanuel (by E. James Wilder, Anna Lang, John Loppnow, and Sungshim Loppnow), I knew I wanted to pair the title with the book review. However, as I wrote, I discovered the thoughts behind the title were too many for one post coupled with a book review. Therefore, I'll start with a short review (so I can copy onto Goodreads easily), and then follow up with how the God (god?) I grew up with would have compromised the practice of Immanuel journaling.

Joyful Journey is a fantastic personal growth / transformational book. My only complaint was the cost for such a slim book but then I found out I could have bought it for a better price directly from Life Model Works (see also the JoyStartsHere website). Life Model Works joins brain science with spiritual life and scripture. This particular book walks the reader through improving awareness that God is with us, God is good, and God is willing to help us. The fourth chapter guides the readers through what to do with the disconnect that comes through trauma and intense emotions. The steps in journaling start in chapter five although I was introduced first to the journaling aspect of Joyful Journey. One more general comment: the authors address both fears within the Christian community ("Are you sure this is scriptural?") and the connections to what we are learning about the brain. Essentially we have a Creator who designed our brains for connection -- "neurologists are even identifying that there is a region in our prefrontal cortex in charge of how we conduct ourselves that is nourished and developed best in this environment of loving relationships. Through these connections we actually become our true selves as God originally intended. We are able to have meaningful relationships and develop our brains and minds for success and abundance through loving connections" (11).

Chapter Six develops Immanuel journaling within community and with community, the practice of "shalom check". Shalom check can help guide the journaler in knowing if this is "the right relationship, at the right time, in the right place, at the right strength and in the right amount" to share with people (52). Also, I find it a good check for knowing those same qualities of God's peace, shalom, for myself and my actions, my journaling. The authors' checklist for shalom include:

Do I feel peacefully calm? (This topic "fits" together correctly now.) 
Am I sensing God's loving presence? (Underlining mine.)
Am I confident that nothing can take me away from God's love? 
Am I portraying my weakness accurately? 
Am I still sensing God's interactive presence in my painful memory? 
Have my joy, peace, and hope increased? 
Has my desire to love and serve others increased? (54).

This checklist would have invalidated the view of God which I grew up with. As I walk through Immanuel journaling, thankfulness fits in with most views of God. Sometimes that thankfulness is more along the lines of "Thank you for not squashing me like a bug today" than along the lines of "Thank you for the the beauty surrounding me" but gratitude is usually a given. The authors do make the connection between gratitude and the control center of the brain on the right hand side (34-45); however, if gratitude is impossible at the moment because our relational circuits (RCs) are off (covered in chapter four), then starting with what God sees in our body and what God hears from us, and stating to ourselves that God is with us (Immanuel), God wants to be with us, is a first step to restoring relational circuits.

Here is where I would have hit a roadblock with the god I grew up with. God did NOT want to be with me when I was a bad girl, an angry child (or adult). The god I grew up with stopped listening to me if I started to whine or complain. Basically, the god I grew up with resembled either Zeus (capricious and wrathful) or Santa Claus ("He knows if you've been bad or good, so be good for goodness sake!" -- Or you're going to get coal in your Christmas stocking) or  George Burns (Oh, God! 1977 movie with Burns portraying God as an old man who expects actor John Denver to deliver God's message to the human race that they have everything they need and so the human race needs to get on with life).

Those gods are not going to be interested in me hearing the words: My dear child...my beloved...I delight in you...

If those gods saw me, they're going to throttle me; if they hear what I'm thinking, I'm going to get punished and sent to my room for sure. God gives his beloved sleep; therefore, if I don't sleep, I must have done something wrong. Even worse, as this happened to be the conversation among childhood friends this past week (No, I did not bring it up!), one dear friend had been told that God sent her illnesses because she must have done something bad. I wish this were an uncommon thought; however, another writer/teacher was told the same thing when his daughter was born with a defect that took her life at a young age.

Now I know and trust that God who sees me and hears me, loves me and understands me, wants to be with me, wants to do something about what I am going through. It may not be what I think I want in the moment, and I've lived long enough now to know that when I think I am right, I'm not always right (see below in the heart section).

Interestingly, I did an exercise this past week of drawing with my non-dominant hand my earliest thoughts of God. Surprisingly, the pictures were not the same as my pictures of God that I learned as I grew up! My earliest pictures were of a smiling Jesus with arms stretched out or of a picture on my best friend's wall. Two children crossing a bridge with God protecting them which as I write this, I realize that it actually must have been a guardian angel; however, that was my picture of God: protecting me and opening up arms to me.

Now I know and trust that when Jesus says to his disciples: "If you have seen me, you have seen the Father (God)" that is to be my picture of God. The 1 Corinthians 13 passage so often recited at weddings is a picture of God. Those attributes are the attributes of God. Anything less is not God.

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I so regret as I raised my children that I raised them in the way I was taught, not by my mother necessarily, but by some well-meaning women, who might have said, "God is love" but their version of love was fairly strict. An example that stands out in my mind is children do not get out of bed or out of the playpen just because they are crying. I'm fine with an overtired child crying for a brief time because when he or she is overtired, then no amount of attention is going to stop the crying. In fact, the attention may just keep the child from getting the sleep needed. But, if mom is trying to be perfect to please God, you can imagine what that mother's children will go through. I thought I was so right just as the women who taught me thought they were so right. I wonder now how many children have a picture of a Santa Claus god who "sees them when they're sleeping; he knows when you're awake; he knows if you've been good or bad, so be good for goodness sake!"

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As a spiritual formational practice, place your bible in front of you opened to 1 Corinthians 13. As you journal, picture God loving you, being patient with and kind to you, not dishonoring you, not easily angered with you. Yes, God does not delight in evil, but you can admit your weaknesses, and God, whether you are at the place of admitting all or not in that place yet, God protects you, teaches you how to trust, how to hope, how to persevere. Where it looks like God has not protected you or your loved ones, God will be with you in that trauma and suffering. I know that this can cause people to either not believe in God or to hate God, but I've never gone that direction because 1) I've had too many times of experiencing the unseeable God who calls me "beloved child" "delightful one" even when, especially when, I fail,  and 2) I can not figure out how we could have a perfectly good world without God making everyone a robot type of person with no choices.

Surviving (Small Country by Gaël Faye)

Small Country by Gaël Faye is a difficult novel to read, not because of the prose, which is outstandingly beautiful, but because of the horrors within it, which are tragically ugly. Why in the world would I recommend the book to anyone? Let me answer that with a conversation in the book itself as the main character Gabriel asks Madame Economopoulos if she has read all the books lining the shelves on her walls.

"Have you read all those books?" I asked her.

"Yes, I've even read some of them many times over. They're the great loves of my life. They make me laugh and weep and question and reflect on things. They allow me to escape from myself. They've changed me, they've made me a different person."

"A book can change us?"

"Of course a book can change you. It can even change your life. It's like falling in love. And you never know when such an encounter might happen. You should beware of books, they're sleeping genies." (140)

There wasn't much laughing or escaping from myself in this book. Weeping, questioning, reflecting -- there were plenty of those times. I'm trying to think of how to explain those times without giving away moments in the book, moments so real and detailed that the story feels more autobiographical than fiction. A character named Donatien brings up God, but rather than asking where God is, he puts the blame on humankind. The question to reflect upon becomes how can one help? Do we allow two small countries to annihilate each other along with all the powerless ones trying to survive? Rwanda and Burundi are extremely small. It took me three times and a final Internet search to find them on my world map.

Follow the boy's first finger out horizontally and just a tad bit up, and you can see two tiny pieces as if they are small puzzle pieces of Tanzania. They also both touch the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Uganda sits above Rwanda. If you want to feel where prejudice can ultimately take you when it tears apart an entire country or two, this is it.

If you're willing to face the challenge of reading the book, you will have excellent writing to read. Kudos to both the author Faye and the translator (in my case, Sarah Ardizzove translated it into English). On Goodreads, reviewer Liberty Hardy had the best recommendation I've read for diving into this book: "Don't forget, books that break your heart also strengthen your soul."  It is one of those books that can be read quickly but sit long on your mind and heart.

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I don't have the answers for how we keep our children from being overwhelmed by tragedy, keep them from being inured to violence because they may see so much of it in media, and keep them from being without compassion. I'm not sure if I lived in that tension between all those poorly or well. I was surprised as 2011 came to a close by how many of my students (living in the West) grew bored with 9/11 stories. Yet some of the most vocal became caring medical professionals. Perhaps the expression of boredom was a way for a teenager to keep fear away. Feel free to comment on how to address this with children, students, teenagers, adults. Again, my apologies for making you wait before seeing your comment appear, but if it is on topic (and not trying to sell anyone something), I will add it to the blog.

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In the formation of spirit, a human navigates a variety of streams. Six that I am familiar with as a Christ-follower are as follows: 1) Incarnational -- practicing life every day living as Jesus would live my life if Jesus were me 2) Holiness or wholeness or virtuous -- practicing life aiming for good and thriving 3) Spirit-filled -- practicing life living and loving with passion and joy 4) Word-centered -- practicing life with a life-giving message (and when necessary using words, as St. Francis supposedly said) 5) Contemplative -- practicing a life of prayer 6) Compassionate -- practicing a life of compassion. All of these prepare my mind, body, heart, soul for both tragedy and joy. For more on the Six Streams, use this link here.

Companioning (Summer Hours at the Robbers Library by Sue Halpern...sic, as in "spelling is correct")

This book was not on any of my "to read" lists. I was wandering through the local library waiting for my granddaughter to pick out her books, and I saw this book in the NEW BOOK section. Look at this cover! How can a bookophile bypass such an offering? And, a  logophile, also.  So much so that I looked up the etymology of bookophile and logophile. At this point, if I have almost lost you, skip down to the picture! Bookophile is a recent addition to the English language. However, the word that means "lover of books" bibliophile is on record as early as 1820. If I have not lost you, logophile means "lover of words" as does lexophile; however, the latter is used mostly with people who love words in puzzles and the like. It has been at least three weeks since I have reviewed any books (although I have finished six books), and I needed to prime the brain to go into reviewing mode. Maybe I'm not such a lover of writing. What would that word be?

Awesome cover, isn't it? I have ten bookmarks in my library copy so I definitely enjoyed the book. I'm going with a rating between a three and a four. See how I rate in this post. Halpern's novel is entertaining, and I had it read within three days. Some readers think it ends abruptly, too pat (simple, glib, unconvincing) which took me back to my days of teaching denouement -- a tying up of all the loose ends into a conclusion -- a definition which is rather interesting considering I was taught the actual word means "unravelling" as in all the problems are unravelled and life settles (for good or for evil or in the case of great novels, ambiguously). I am truly digressing into words today!

One reviewer quit reading after the first chapter, which is not the first chapter but rather titled "The Marriage Story Part I". He or she called it "chic lit" and stated that starting out a book with college sex did not portend an auspicious read. (My apologies for the big words today; I'm only half way through my coffee; will that work as an excuse?) Skip that part if it would annoy you; Halpern does not actually continue in that vein.

Sliding up the scale from three stars to four, if you give an English teacher or a group discussion leader a book with talking points in it, she's going to like the book. Strewn throughout this book are quotes from poets and authors! Swoon!

There is a story. You might have been wondering. Homeschooled (wait, "Unschooled") girl Sunny steals a dictionary and gets community service time at, yes, you guessed it, the library, where she meets older single woman Kit, yes, the one involved in the marriage story, part 1, but she's not married now (and part of the draw of the story is wondering why she is not married). One also wonders what is going on with Sunny's parents, Willow and Steve.

My connections to the book -- Sunny and her parents do not eat anything with a face which leads Kit to contemplate a bible verse she learned in her college "Bible as Literature" class (Genesis, not Song of Solomon) about humans having dominion over animals. This talking point sent me off on a search of the Hebrew word radah. This is an excellent discussion of four Hebrew words used in Genesis. Rather than Sunny thinking the bible verse is a bad idea as in the book, the real Hebrew word would support her family's desire to protect and take care of animals. Also, in a connection to me,  my eating protocol at the moment is such that I'm not too keen to eat anything with a face...except maybe a fish...but that's a different blog.

Sunny and Kit have a discussion about silence and mindfulness which Sunny relates to because her parents went to a meditation retreat. Then, the two have the homeschool/unschool discussion throughout the book. Sunny states at one point about her ability to get along with younger children: "[It goes with] the whole homeschool / no-school territory. Older kids and younger kids are always tossed together. No one really makes a distinction. When you're little, you idolize the older kids, and when you're older, the little kids idolize you, and you get used to entertaining them" (71).

How about the question of reading the ending of the book first? See, if you're not a book reader, you're thinking, "Who cares?" but this is the type of question which raises voices in a book discussion group.

Another talking point: Characters change (103). Do they? Do the character traits of people change in real life?

Lest you think this is strictly a chick lit book, Halpern delves into the life and thoughts of her male character and his relationships with a group of four older men (thus, one of the aspects of my "Companioning" portion of my blog title). As much as I do not like the current wave of books where each character gets his or her own chapter, Halpern does a great job of transitioning between the characters.

Death and dying. Yup, got some death and dying in here. Got some religion, but church folks tend to get the negative aspects of the book. Maybe homeschoolers/un-schoolers get negative treatment as well, but Willow and Steve are not religious homeschoolers. No..., but I can't explain why without including plot spoilers. As a homeschooling parent who tried the John Holt unschooling, which is harder than using already written curriculum when done correctly, and a private school teacher and a public educator (not all at the same time), I'll just write that there are oddities and lawbreakers in every avenue of education.

I'll close with going back to the words and books. Halpern does include where Robbers Library comes from. It takes a long while for a short little explanation which has nothing to do with the story but satisfies those of us who kept flinching because we thought an apostrophe had been left out. After all, Sunny did steal a dictionary, but it has nothing to do with her. That's not a plot spoiler, folks. That's for all the readers who need to know that Robbers Library is not a typo or grammatical error. As for the books part -- the library -- some reviewers thought these situations would never happen at a real library. Pay attention to the reviews of the small town librarians. These activities could happen at all the small town libraries I have ever been in and used. We know our librarians. They are our people.

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For the children/grandchildren part of my blog: Libraries! Go to them! Often! My children had a library card as soon as they could write their name, between four and five years old.

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For the spiritual formation part of my blog: Check out that link about radah. You may not give up eating anything with a face, but what is one action you could take to protect the world we live in?
Next month is Plastic Free July . Give it a try. I have for several years now, and I've reached the point where it has become habit to avoid using single use plastic or, if possible, not use plastic at all. 

Maddening (Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by David Grann)

If you know me personally and you're wondering how I came to be reading a non-fiction book like this (it's not my normal "go-to" genre), I was wondering the same thing myself. I came home from vacation, opened up my email, and read that I had this book waiting for me at the library for pick up. I thought: "Did I order this? I know we've been watching Quantico, but I don't think I ordered a book on the FBI!" Then, I realized it was a discussion book for the next library book discussion group meeting.

I know "maddening" is not a gerund which I generally use in my book review blog titles, but the book's story (not the book itself) is infuriating. The story involves one of the worst racial tragedies in the US, and it's not even in American History textbooks. If I were still teaching, I would definitely choose this book as one for my high schoolers to read.

The author David Grann stated in an interview with PBS News Hour that he started writing the book as a "Who did it?" but it became a "Who didn't do it?!" One reviewer mentions that there are a lot of people involved. There are! I feel Grann did a good job of keeping it clear. Pictures helped. Although pictures of the "devil himself" made me even more disgusted with him as he is so smug, so sure that he is going to get away with everything. If it sounds like fiction, it does read like a movie or television series. Apparently the story did make it onto film, but I'll bet that a new movie or tv series comes out of this.

Hopefully, if that happens, those who make it will stick to the story. The greed and travesty is unreal as it is, but the goodness of those who helped and tried to help is equally amazing.

Embedded in all of this is also the early beginnings of the FBI which adds to the story. Ratings wise, I'm saying 4 stars only because I save 5 stars for books I buy full price. IF I were teaching this, I would buy it and it would be bought for all my students. In that respect, it is a 5 star book.  I recommend the book.

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My family moved from a very diverse area to a not-so-diverse area. Thankfully, we have much diversity in our friends and family. I have never regretted teaching my children to love people of all ethnicities. I can't really say "teaching" as we just lived out being friends with all manner of people. I could  have done a better job with the homeless.

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A story like this cries out for practices of social justice. Unfortunately (or perhaps with good reason), anyone under 18 is not allowed to help out at our homeless shelters and places where meals are served. (Before anyone gets upset, the children might know each other from school and they don't want the homeless children being embarrassed by being fed by a fellow student.) As adults, we have many options. My mind today was in the direction of spiritual formation in children so I did a search on "social justice practices and children". I ran across this quote that resonated with me:

People should talk to us with the same kind tone that they talk to other children.

 (Beeru, ragpicker, 14, member of child workers union, India)

Wow. Lots of great ideas can be found, but how about starting with how we talk with one another? If you're a person of influence in a church, then I have some really great ideas. How about living in the poorer neighborhoods or setting a family up in a home next to church members and getting that family financial guidance, marital guidance, childrearing guidance? I've seen it done.

Surviving (The Legacy Series: Legacy, Prodigy, Champion by Marie Lu)

The first book in this series, Legacy, is not shown here because it was my daughter's book. She thought I stole borrowed it from her when I reviewed it last week. (See that review here.) However, I did not take the book home with me; thus, I only have these last two in the series which I checked out from the library. Notice the books are from the Teen section, and know also that the books have nothing to do with London -- that's just my morning coffee cup. The series takes place in the United States (and I realized this morning that I do not have a US coffee cup -- hint to family and friends).

Why did Lu (or her publishers) title this series the Legacy series? Really, the first book mainly involves the prodigy character(s). But, can you imagine a series titled the Prodigy series? It sounds a bit elitist, which the prodigy character, June, is. We can consider Day as the anti-prodigy character who is a prodigy that didn't make the cut but survives anyway (not a plot spoiler).

This series ranks ahead of the average teen series because of what Lu brings to the table of literature. Sure, it's typical teen fare: parents dead, lots of violence and fighting to survive, love interests (will she go with _______ or with ________ when you know all along that she's meant to be with ____).

However, though it irks me to have dead good adults in teen fiction, I do think the legacy that June and Day have involves parents and siblings who strive for good, in fact, gave their lives up fighting evil. Lu also employs symbolism and allusion, trademarks of good literature. Take the names of the main characters: June and Day -- season and time of the most light, at least in the northern hemisphere where this story takes place. Then, the kiss in Prodigy is so strong of an allusion, if you don't see it, you have some missing pieces in your literary background. I would rate Prodigy  as the strongest of the three books with a 4 star rating.

As for Champion, the last in the series, one can not just stop at Prodigy! I surmise my issue with Champion is that it moves beyond my originally agreeing with a Commonsense review stating that Legacy was for readers 12 and up. I will say, though, that when Lu brings in the theme of who we become, what shapes us, then she leads us into a story much more than the average teen fiction.

"How had he slowly twisted into the Elector who created such a dark nation? What path had he chosen to follow?" (Champion 263).

We know the legacy of three characters and the choices they make along the way which lead them into the people they become. We also see the choices of a few other characters and what led to their rise or fall. In this respect, I like the story. I'm still giving it 3 stars, but who doesn't finish a series?! Three stars won't stop someone from finishing to see what the end holds. And, to Lu's credit, she does go for a more complex ending. I do intend to read more of her novels.

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Writing stories. The deeper aspects of the Legacy series are what elevates this series: the choices that characters make, who they are and who they become. Too often, I saw students from first grade to high school think their normal everyday lives were not as exciting as the latest action movie they happened to watch. I made it my goal to encourage them to see that their daily lives had value in story form. A couple of weeks ago I gave my granddaughters a file of their dad's art work and written work. One of their favorite pieces was a story that he wrote about his dad, their grandpa. The story was loved by Grandpa as well. It's unusual for someone not to want to be a hero (or perhaps "heroic" would be a better word), but heroes don't happen overnight. Small daily actions grow heroes. Daily life, daily choices matter. June and Day, the characters in these books, have flaws, make mistakes. Sometimes our mistakes provide comic relief in our stories and sometimes they provide transparency and reality, but our mistakes need not hold us back from becoming people who in the midst of surviving also grow and thrive in goodness.

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I'm into these practices on listening since a friend sent me nine "DO NOTs of an Active Listener" from a 2014 blog of Janice Taylor's. I wish I could figure out how to turn them into DOs except, basically, the DO part of each one is "Just listen." 😌

4. DO NOT interrupt; do not cut the speaker [your child, your student, your friend, your ___?] off mid-sentence. Allow him/her to finish the thought. Just listen.
5. DO NOT plan your responses as the speaker is speaking. Just listen.
6. DO NOT give advice unless specifically asked for it. Just listen. 

Certainly this book series is an opportunity to think about social justice as well. How one goes about social justice is a good topic of discussion or of listening: to God, to others, before judging, jumping to conclusions and finding oneself more of a hindrance than a help.

The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood and Altared by Claire and Eli

The Handmaid's Tale -- Let's just get the caveat out of the way. There's sex in this book. Not just sex but distorted, destructive sex. So, why did I read this book? Well, I didn't know this about the book when I started. However, I had seen this title around for many years. It came out in 1986, and I, for some odd reason, thought it had to do with geishas. Yet, this April I was on vacation, and my daughter had the book on her bookshelves. She said that it was a dystopian novel (and she knows I read dystopian novels). Specifically, it's a dystopian satire. The quote by Jonathan Swift's A Modest Proposal gives us one clue that this is the case. An interview with Margaret Atwood led me to read the book. In the interview, Atwood said that none of the horrors in this book have been dreamed up. While they have not happened in one place at one time, they have happened or are happening somewhere in the world. Here from an article in 2012, Atwood comments:

"I made a rule for myself: I would not include anything that human beings had not already done in some other place or time, or for which the technology did not already exist. I did not wish to be accused of dark, twisted inventions, or of misrepresenting the human potential for deplorable behaviour. The group-activated hangings, the tearing apart of human beings, the clothing specific to castes and classes, the forced childbearing and the appropriation of the results, the children stolen by regimes and placed for upbringing with high-ranking officials, the forbidding of literacy, the denial of property rights: all had precedents, and many were to be found not in other cultures and religions, but within western society, and within the "Christian" tradition, itself. (I enclose "Christian" in quotation marks, since I believe that much of the church's behaviour and doctrine during its two-millennia-long existence as a social and political organisation would have been abhorrent to the person after whom it is named.)

"The Handmaid's Tale has often been called a 'feminist dystopia', but that term is not strictly accurate. In a feminist dystopia pure and simple, all of the men would have greater rights than all of the women. It would be two-layered in structure: top layer men, bottom layer women. But Gilead is the usual kind of dictatorship: shaped like a pyramid, with the powerful of both sexes at the apex, the men generally outranking the women at the same level; then descending levels of power and status with men and women in each, all the way down to the bottom, where the unmarried men must serve in the ranks before being awarded an Econowife." For the full article go here. 

Please note: The situations in this book are happening or have happened! Secondly, Atwood places the word "Christian" in quotation marks because she thinks what has been done in Christ's name would have been abhorrent to Christ. There are Christ-followers in this book who die for trying to prevent the activities in this society. Thirdly, while feminists have embraced this book, for readers to miss the satire against repressive regimes is to limit the impact of the story. 

Here I get to whether satire has the same value visually in a televised show. I say no. Atwood's introduction in the book includes a quote from A Modest Proposal, and I include here the start of Swift's proposal: 

"I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London, that a young healthy child well nursed is at a year old a most delicious, nourishing, and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee or a ragout."

Swift continues on with how to the poor Irish. Can you imagine (or maybe you can; I think it would be horrible) watching a show of someone eating a one-year-old child? 

For me, turning The Handmaid's Tale into a commercial, entertaining commodity strips the book of all of its power, all that the satire was fighting against. This is even more true given that the series is continuing to stray from the original story. 

As I turn to the other book, a book written by two Christ-followers, Altared, the question must arise in some minds: why would I couple this non-fiction book with Atwood's? I do so because Claire and Eli (no last names on purpose) offer, in the words of one reviewer: "A much needed wake-up call -- a plea for a paradigm shift in the way we think of love, marriage, and ourselves as followers of Jesus." 

Also, this comment "real love has little do with looking for Mr. or Ms. Right" hits at the core theme of this book. The body of Christ, as seen in our church institutions, has bought into the culture's view of love, or I might say, Dean Martin's view: "You got to get yourself somebody because you're nobody until somebody loves you" and Dean is definitely talking about lower case 's' here. Yes, this includes the church who makes singles feel less than they are because they are not one half of a couple. Instead of a top priority of getting to the altar (hence the title Altared), Claire and Eli invite the reader to make love for God and love for one's neighbor the greatest priority. 

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Books, banned books: what do you let your children read? A large number of books that I have taught in my classes were banned at one time or another: Uncle Tom's Cabin, Huckleberry Finn, Animal Farm, Brave New World...I propose (not a modest proposal and not a satirical one) that if you son or daughter wants to read a book that you let them and also do the following: 

1) Read the book at the same time as your child is reading it. For some offspring, nothing says "uncool" like mom or dad reading a book he or she wants to read. 

2) Read the book and discuss, as in let your son or daughter do the talking and be a listener. What kind of questions could you ask? "What did you appreciate about the book?" "Why do you think people want to read this book?" "What do you wish I would understand or get about this story?" 

Finally, in this section, as a former literature teacher, I would like to add that not all books you've been told are "bad" are actually bad. Two brief illustrations. A colleague and I were pulled into the principal's office for teaching A Tale of Two Cities because "it was about rape". For the life of us, we could not figure out what we were being called on the carpet for. Finally, we reminded each other that the peasant woman probably was raped, but this was Dickens, for heaven's sake, no graphic details at all. Then, come to find out, a commentary at the back of the particular book we were reading said the entire book was about the "rape of women through all ages". I think the commentator missed the point of the book; however, that being said, the story itself did not include any rape scenes. Then, one of my all time favorite books was brought into question. Brave New World. A story way ahead of its time when Huxley wrote it. A highly moral story. A story were readers are told that everyone is encouraged to have sex with everyone but the only "graphic" illustration of this is when Lenina drops her zippicamiknicks on the floor, and my students were as disgusted by this as John was horrified. Interestingly, many of the same parents complaining about the book had high schoolers who had already seen (and perhaps had laughed with them) when Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds run into each other in the nude in The Proposal. A critique of this movie is not my point; the fact that my students had seen much more nudity on the screen than is in Brave New World is my point. 

With no apologies for making this blog post even longer, I include a paragraph from an article"Brave New World (is Here!) From a New York Post 2012 article:

If Orwell’s “1984” is a cautionary tale about what we in the capitalist West largely avoided, Aldous Huxley’s “Brave New World” is largely about what we got — a consumerist, post-God happyland in which people readily stave off aging, jet away on exotic vacations and procreate via test tubes. They have access to “Feelies” similar to IMAX 3-D movies, no-strings-attached sex, anti-anxiety pills and abortion on demand. They also venerate a dead high-tech genius, saying “Ford help him” in honor of Henry Ford just as today we practically murmur “In Jobs We Trust.”

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Spiritual practice -- listening -- 3 ideas from a blog by Janice Taylor, 2014, quoted in a Salem Alliance Church 2018 Conference flyer: 

1. DO NOT allow your brain to race ahead of your lips! We speak at about 100 to 150 words per minute, but we think at 250 to 500. Just listen. 

2. DO NOT anticipate what will be said. Just listen. 

3. DO NOT be distracted by the people or things around you. Keep your eyes focused on the speaker. Just listen. 

Becoming -- a Three Book Review

I grew up thinking I was not creative. My parents didn't put this idea in my head. I simply felt I never came up with any new thoughts. This belief came to full fruition in my junior year of college. Our first activity in my Foundations of Education class was to think of as many ideas as possible using a pair of eyeglasses. Um, look through them; start a fire... When the class as a whole listed the ideas possible, I realized where I had missed the possibilities. The one idea that remains, of the many my classmates had, is to use them for an ant corral*. How effective of an ant corral that would be doesn't matter. What matters is I suddenly saw that I could learn how to be creative! I just needed to see connections beyond my normal parameters for a given object or subject. This is a long introduction to say that I am exercising my creativity by combining these three books for review: Legend by Marie Lu, The Crossroads of Should and Must by Elle Luna, and Becoming Dallas Willard by Gary Moon. They happen to be the first three books I read during my school break.

I give Legend by Marie Lu three stars. I like it. It's a good beach read, library read, vacation read. I liked it enough to seek out the other two books in the series once I returned home. I read somewhere (and, of course, now I can't find it) that Lu was intrigued with the idea of the poor criminal meeting up with the good person such as in Les Misérables. In this story, the criminal has the better morals of the two; however, I think not only Les Misérables but other stories have influenced Lu, all to the good. (Without being too much of a plot spoiler the ending matches the ending of The Tale of Two Cities with a bit of a twist...or maybe not such a twist...since I could also say that it matches a bible story.) Lu comes to the table of the past and updates the stories, freshens them up. Legend is a well-written, easy to read story of a dystopian future. It annoys me that the good adults in YA fiction are always dead or will die (an exception to this standard practice might be The 100; however, since I've only seen the television series and have not read the books, I'll have to check with the granddaughter to confirm that adults do live in that series). A Commonsense review noted that this book could be read at 12+. I agree with that. If you are in the + range as I am but you have enjoyed reading The Hunger Games series or the Divergent series, then you will probably enjoy this series as well.

I give The Crossroads of Should and Must by Elle Luna four stars. I have bought my own copy so that I can write in it. The "shoulds" have driven much of my life. Oldest child, what can I say more? Yet, pairing up "should" and "must" as opposites stretches my thinking about these two words. They are both modals. I used to describe modals as words your mom uses: "You should clean up your room." "You must clean up your room." "Would you please clean up your room!" Modals also express "ability or possibility" but somehow I never caught on to that. I focused on the "permission and obligation" part of the modal definition. Basically, "should" is born out of duty, someone's idea of correctness, our own or someone else's criticism. "Must" as used in this book involves what we love, what drives us, what wakes us up in the morning eager to get on with the day -- with the caveat that what drives us needs to help us thrive, not kill us. Alcoholics must have a drink, but that's not what is going to help them thrive and grow. I did tell my daughter, "Hmmm, I must read, but I don't think I can get paid doing that." She had some ideas of how readers get paid. Previewing books, a reader's dream job, yes? Yet, I get to choose what I read at the moment. I'm not sure how much I would enjoy being forced to read something. The Crossroads of Should and Must is a gift book, an inspirational book, an artsy book. The price is right for me and I want to play around with the questions and thoughts in the book. 

Finally, I arrive at the book I pre-ordered so that it arrived on the first day out in the public and arrived in time for me to read it while flying out of my home state. I easily give Becoming Dallas Willard by Gary Moon five stars, and not just because I've sat under Dallas's teaching (and Gary's, too, come to think of it) or know some of the people that helped Gary make this book be the best it could be. I read the book every page from title page to endnotes in four days, and I will read this book again and again. It won't be sitting on a shelf looking pretty. Why would I re-read a biography? I first "met" Dallas in 2003 when he was a keynote speaker at a teacher's convention. About the same time, one of my sisters gave me his Divine Conspiracy  to read (I had a tough time getting past page 80 that first time of reading). Ten years later in 2013, I sat close enough to hear and see his interactions with people as he gave some of the last lectures of his life. In other words, I met him at a time when who he was seemed unachievable to me: incredibly kind and gentle at the same time that he was incredibly brilliant and humorous. This story Becoming Dallas Willard illustrates so well how the Dallas who closed out this life in 2013 was not the same Dallas who entered it in 1935.

He grew up in more challenging circumstances than many American readers; however, like many of us, he was a normal teen capable of activities that indicated his brain was not fully developed (read, foolish, dumb, stupid, thoughtless). There's nothing wrong with being a super good, moral, kind teenager, but I was not, and it's helpful to see that someone I respect and admire became that better person. He also sat under some of the same church teaching that I did and came to realize how it fell short of the fuller trusting real relationship one could have with Jesus, who "will walk right up to you", and that the kingdom of God and invisible things are real (131-132). Dallas failed in some of the same ways I have failed as a parent. To learn from someone who has struggled with my same struggles encourages my soul. Because spiritual practices were so much a part of Dallas's life, the book is a veritable source of spiritual practices in life narratives. Even the section of Dallas's years as a philosophy professor, which some reviewers have not enjoyed, I appreciated. How does the transformed life look during the hours of employment?

What does the transformed life look like when one comes out from under all the "shoulds" we or our culture places upon us? What does the transformed life look like when light and goodness shine forth? That's the connecting thread between these three books. Dallas Willard became who he was/is because his "must" was a vibrant relationship with Jesus, knowing that the kingdom of God is real and living in light of that eternal truth. He practiced in indirect ways actions that enabled the love of Jesus, the goodness, the kindness, the intelligence, the beauty and art of a life with Jesus to naturally flow out when it was directly needed.  Fictional characters June and Day become better characters as the light overcomes the darkness, good overcomes evil. (Granted there's a bit more violence in the Legend series than might be desired, but without characters who practice goodness, there would be no story. Violence would not overcome violence.)

Who are we becoming? People who live stunted lives because the "shoulds" keep us boxed up in fear? Or, people, who because of fear or anger live violent, ruined lives (this will come more into play in the second and third books of the Legend series)? Or people, as today's Sacred Space describes and a person that I saw in Dallas Willard -- a person who "reach(es) the fresh and challenging possibilities that God wish me (us) to realise"?

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This is my section of the blog for "been there, wish I had not done that" or "been there, I'm so glad I did". As mentioned above, I failed in the same way that Dallas did in certain areas of parenting. Believing church instruction of "spare the rod, spoil the child" has to count as one of my failures. Along with believing some teaching about a child being willful when he or she cries. More than likely, it is an overtired, over-stimulated child, a hungry child, a wet or hurting child. I'm thankful there is so much more research out now than there was when I was raising a child. Sure, there are ways to spoil a child, but I have a feeling that it has more to do with giving a child an overabundance of material goods rather than giving a child an abundance of hugs, presence, partnership in doing chores, direction and guidance in learning to live in an overactive world.

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"What most often stops me achieving freedom is my tendency to be caught up in fears and exceptions about what I 'ought' or 'should' be. My usual automatic responses tie me down and inhibit me from exploring new areas of growth. I ask and pray for a greater sense of inner freedom and that I might reach the fresh and challenging possibilities that God wishes me to realise" (Sacred Space, Monday, April 23, 2018).

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* This morning as I sat on my back porch, I noticed that a lead line had corralled an ant. Actually one ant was corralled inside the loop and another ant was corralled outside the loop. I thought ants could crawl up surfaces so I was surprised that neither one tried to crawl over."