February 2024 Reading

Another month has gone by.  I read seven books in February.

Audio first:  I am continuing to listen to Dorothy Sayers mysteries (have I mentioned that I love getting audiobooks from the library?).  Clouds of Witness was fun to listen to.  I have read it many times before, so I enjoy seeing how the story is put together.

 

I read three nonfiction books this month.  The first was Elliot Page’s memoir Pageboy.  I really wanted to like this book.  As a person who loves a trans person, I absolutely applaud Page’s courage and his successful navigation of his transition.  The prose pained me.  I’m glad I read it.  More stories like his need to filter into our collective consciousness so that we learn, as a society, to let people be themselves, whoever that turns out to be.  Your mileage may vary.  Verdict:  good story, bad writing.

 

Speaking of writing, I enjoyed Conversations on Writing by Ursula K. Le Guin with David Naimon.  The interviews are amusing, smart, and thought-provoking.  It’s clear that the two of them had some chemistry.  It felt kind of like eavesdropping on the cool kids.

 

Principles of Movement was written by Brent Anderson, the founder of Polestar Pilates, where I did my Pilates education.  The book, as one would expect from the title, distills the founding principles he uses to conceptualize what we do in Pilates and in movement in general.  While it is perhaps most useful for movement professionals, there is a fair amount that can benefit the general reader who wants to know more about how to move well.

 

On to fiction.  My church book group is reading The Inquisitor’s Tale by Adam Gidwitz.  I’m going to miss the next few weeks of discussion and I really wanted to know how it ended, so I finished it.  It’s a Newberry Honor book with lovely illustrations by Hatem Aly.  I am not sure that there is a book more up my alley.  It’s set in the medieval period, narrated by various different folks in turn, and has a saintly dog in it.  Three children, all outsiders in their own ways, meet up and overcome all kinds of obstacles, including a farting dragon.  It’s funny and deep and wise.  Read it.

 

Finally, I polished off the last two of Gail Carriger’s Custard Protocol novels, Competence and Reticence.  Totally satisfying reads.  I have no complaints.  Go read them.

 

February total:  7

Spring total to date:  26

Year to date total:  26

February 2024 Flash Lit 10 (last one!) - Home

Home

 

Sometimes a place

speaks to my heart and

I know it’s a home-place.

The piece of sky

that is Tahoe

nestled in its piney

mountains is one.

The crazy press

of ideas and humans

and backpacks, the

smell of incense and sweat,

the white campus buildings

of Berkeley is another.

They are places

that stick,

that nourish,

that call me back

to them and to myself.

February 2024 Flash Lit 10 (Second Version) - Home

Jamie flicked her ponytail back over her shoulder and touched the bat to the far side of the plate like the big kids did.  Aluminum on rubber made a hollow clunk.  She remembered Daddy’s instructions:  bend your knees, elbow back, choke up on the bat, watch the ball.

The pitcher was staring at the infield dirt.  She was taller than Jamie, maybe closer to 8 than 7, with curls spilling out from under her cap.  “Lucy!” the other coach called.  “Pay attention!”

 

The bright yellow sun of the softball arced toward Jamie.  She swung, missed, and heard the sad thump of the ball into the catcher’s mitt.  “Strike one,” said the umpire.

 

Jamie narrowed her eyes.  The second pitch went wide.  She got a piece of the third one, popping it up over the head of the bewildered catcher.  The outfielders fidgeted.  Jamie heard somebody’s little brother in the bleachers demand an Otter Pop.

 

On the next pitch, she connected.  The ball sprang back straight at the pitcher and through her legs.  Jamie ran.  Jenny’s dad, the first base coach, sent her on to second as the other team’s shortstop overthrew the first base player.  That girl was still running after the ball when Jamie rounded second.

 

Jamie heard the ball thunk into the dirt somewhere behind her as she got close to Daddy and the girl of third base, who was blowing a bubble with her gum.  “Go, Jamie!” Daddy yelled.  “Go home!”

 

Gasping for breath, Jamie pounded the dust of the baseline with her sneakers.  The shortstop, having given up on the idea that any of her teammates could catch, pursued her.  Somewhere Jamie found enough energy to propel herself to the house-shaped plate ahead of her.

 

Everyone cheered for her and Daddy picked her up and whirled her around.  “Home run!”

 

Jamie liked coming home.

February 2024 Flash Lit 10 (first go) - Home

Home

 

The Mole knew

the smell of it,

the comfortable shape

of his chair,

and the caress

of air shaped by

his walls.

He was happy to

venture far

along the river’s chuckle.

He loved Ratty

and his cozy fire,

but from time to time

he had to obey

the heavy magnet

in his heart

and come home.

February 2024 Flash Lit 9 (last go) - Space

Space

 

Distances between stars

stretch light years.

Between hearts,

it varies from

the twinkling of an eye

to the depth of the abyss.

By nature,

space is nothing.

The background,

the negative,

the pause.

But without it:

no perspective.

Stars and books and

bodies and rubber bands

and teaspoons and

cats a jumbling whirl

of nonsense.

It is space

that makes meaning.

February 2024 Flash Lit 9 (2) - Space

Space

 

Jill clenched her teeth.  Her thighs were screaming at her to move.  She snuck her eyes open and saw that there were three minutes to go.  That was fucking forever.

 

“Now keep focusing on the breath,” Sage said.  “Feel it going deep into your body and then flowing out again.”

 

Of course the yoga teacher was named Sage, Jill thought.  She named Sage’s imaginary siblings Basil, Rosemary, Thyme.  They probably grew up with cats named Parsley and Oregano.

 

“In and out.”  Sage’s voice was much closer now.  she had moved silently between the knotted students and Jill smelled her, incense-like and spicy, behind her.  Such a cliché, like the cotton balloon pants and the tie-dyed baby t-shirt with the screen printed Sanskrit OM on it.

 

“Keep breathing.  Let your thoughts drift by like clouds.  We want to create space in our minds like the space between the inhale and the exhale.

 

It was so annoying, this insistence on floating when Jill was so stubbornly stuck to the ground.  On a damn sticky mat, too.

 

“Think of it like a remote control.”

 

Sage probably didn’t even own a TV.  She probably watched the chives grow for fun.  Chive could be another sibling.

 

“We use the breath to open a gap between stimulus and response, like pressing pause.”

 

Jill, knees calling desperately for help, wanted to hit fast-forward.  Why the fuck did she keep coming to this fucking class?

 

“Two more breaths.  Breathe in peace and let all your anxiety out with the exhalation.  Breathe in peace and this time breathe peace back out into the world.  Namaste.”

 

Jill’s legs trembled as she straightened them.  Ominous popping sounds came from her spine as she struggled to her feet and rolled her mat.

 

“Good job today!” Sage said, cheerily patting Jill’s shoulder.

 

Jill smiled.

February 2024 Flash Lit 9 (first try) - Space

Space

 

I visited my mom

after my dad died.

The countertop in his bathroom

stretched empty,

clear of pill bottles

and shaving cream

and four identical bottles

of lotion.

Mom had taken a bunch

of his shirts

to the thrift shop,

leaving gaps along

the closet bar.

The hospital bed

was gone

and so was the low

hum of the oxygen.

But in the corner,

square and sharp,

the box of ashes

sat in my dad’s chair,

still in his space.

February 2024 Flash Lit 8 (version 2) - End

End

 

It’s almost as hard

to conceive of the end

as it is the beginning.

I always wonder

what went before

and what happened after.

Nothingness

breaks my system—

witness the struggle

to meditate and empty

my attic mind.

And even if the thoughts

become nothing,

there is still the attic,

empty, swept of everything

but dancing dust

and sunlight.

That’s not nothing.

So maybe one thing

can end, like

the last of a spool

of thread, but

all things?

Even that thread

is merely put

to use, holding

the fabric together.

No, there is no end.

February 2024 Flash Lit 8 (first) - End

End

 

the

Land

Backward

in (before or)

after

ever

happily

lived

they

and

February 2024 Flash Lit 7 (last time) - Shift

Shift

 

That first time

the baby slept through

until five—

I thought there was something

wrong—

was there still breath

in that little body?

I had learned

the night shift,

they rhythmic pacing

from room to room,

patting and soothing.

I knew the light

from the street lamp

through the blinds,

where the floor groaned,

and the particular weight

of the baby’s cry

in my bones.

And now?

Now the baby

stayed nestled.

I slept, too, but

warily,

adjusting to this first

of many

growing shifts.

February 2024 Flash Lit 7 (second gear) - Shift

University Avenue in Berkeley slopes gently upward from the bay to the campus.  There are roughly ten million stoplights from where it leaves Interstate 80 until it ends at Oxford Street.  A long time ago, I was learning to drive a manual transmission car.  The freeway had been no problem because there was no stopping, starting, or changing gears.  Then Rick, my boyfriend at the time, and I arrived in Berkeley.

“Clutch!” Rick said.

 

There was yet another grinding sound and the baby blue 1968 VW Beetle stalled.  Again.

 

I pressed the brake to stop the backward drift of the car.  If this were a dance, I had no left feet.  The clutch made no sense at all.

 

“OK.  Start again,” Rick said, pushing his blond hair back out of his eyes.

 

For him, I would do it.  I was eighteen and in love.

 

The car rumbled back to life and I made it through the intersection when the light turned green.  I managed the shift into second gear and the light ahead went yellow and red.  I panicked and slammed both brake and clutch, but the engine did not stall.

 

Until the light turned green.

 

The cars behind me, headed for class or the Indian grocery or the bookstore or wherever, sometimes honked, sometimes drove around me with stares of disgust.  I crossed San Pablo, which felt like a miracle, only to stall at the next two stoplights.

 

Every grind of gears, every stall made the tears gather in my eyes.  I wasn’t getting any better.

 

When I almost rolled backward into some unsuspecting Volvo (probably automatic), stalled for the zillionth time, I gave up.  I pulled the parking brake, threw open the door, walked around to the passenger side, and told Rick, “You drive this fucking car.”

February 2024 Flash Lit 7 (first try) - Shift

Shift

 

An inch a year

and in a few million years,

you get an ocean

or maybe a mountain range

depending on the push or pull.

Tectonics require patience:

time and rocks blink slowly.

Do not confuse this

epic slowness

with inactivity.

Beneath the surface,

the rocks boil.

February 2024 Flash Lit 6 (second alternate version) - Alternate

Alternate

 

Dark then light

then dark again.

Cold to hot

and back.

What goes up,

well, you know.

And you also know

about the ins and outs.

 

Some will say

there is an alternative

to love, but there isn’t really.

Sometimes clouds

obscure it

or the beat of rain

drowns it beat,

but…

 

it is the constant

at the heart

of everything. 

February 2024 Flash Lit 6 (Alternate Version) - Alternate

 

Alternate

“But that means she never gets any jam!” Mary cried, outraged.  “Mama, that’s cheating!”

 

Julie sighed inwardly, but answered gently, “Yes, it is a kind of cheating.”

 

“Then I don’t want to be a queen,” Mary declared.

 

“You’ll have to settle for President, then,” Julie said, setting Through the Looking Glass and its alternating days of jam aside.

 

“Do Presidents get to wear sparkles and crowns?”

 

“Sparkles yes, if they want, but no crowns.”  Julie badly wanted to lie about the crowns because she would really like bedtime to be peaceful for once.  Some snide friend of Matt’s had asked her one time if she thought she was wasting her college degree staying home with Mary.  Clearly that woman in her spotless tailored suit had never had to debate this particular five-year-old, because it was like the Socratic method and the Inquisition at the same time.  Julie needed every bit of rhetoric and philosophy she’d ever learned.

 

Mary had been sleepier than Julie thought.  She curled around her favorite stuffed rabbit, flushed and angelic and deeply asleep.

 

Julie straightened the covers and patted the book on the nightstand.  When she stood up, she caught sight of herself in the mirror, a splotch of red paint on her cheekbone and another on her shirt.  They looked like hearts.

 

It was good to know she was loved, even in Looking-Glass World.

February 2024 Flash Lit 6 (first take) - Alternate

Alternate

 

It sounds fancier

than other,

but to be the alternate

is still to be

outside,

not quite part of the group,

not a peer,

not called upon

for a verdict

except in dire need.

Still, peering

remains required.

Even an alternate

has to watch.

But, being other,

can watch the watchers

as well,

think of alternatives

to how things are now.

February 2024 Flash Lit 5 (third time) - Delete

Delete

 

Would you do it?

Spotless mind yourself,

like in the movie?

Erase that person

from your cells?

I couldn’t.

It would have to

delete the growth, too,

the things I learned

by crying

and hurting

and struggling.

The only sunshine

I can bear

is the kind I fought

to see.

February 2024 Flash Lit 5 (second version) - Delete

Delete

Harry typed:  Roses are red

 

No.  Trite.  Delete delete delete.

 

He tried again:  your eyes are like.  But what were they like?  Like, you know, eyes.  With small curved hairs around them to keep particles out and an adjustable hole in the middle to let in the right amount of light.  And filled with kind of squishy stuff.  No.  Delete delete delete.

 

When I look at you, I want… Absolutely not going there.  Harry blushed.  Delete delete delete.

 

It went on like that for hours, the ebb and flow of words on his screen.  Finally, exhausted, Harry hit enter.

 

Which is why, when the red rose was delivered to Laura on Valentine’s Day, all the card said was:  Love, Harry.

February 2024 Flash Lit 5 (first stab) - Delete

Delete

The old way was messier.

Even if I chose

a simple slash

through the wrong word.

I could crosshatch

or scribble over

or use a big black marker.

The whole sheet of paper

could be torn out,

crumpled, thrown violently

in the direction of the trash.

If I wanted,

I could even burn it,

an offering of rejected words

to the writing gods.

 

Backspacing

is less satisfying.

The delete key, for all

its innocuous tapping,

a more final erasure.

February 2024 Flash Lit 4 (last go) - Escape

Escape

It was stupid,

the argument—

aren’t they all?—

about ironing.

But

also about power

and iron control

and the urgent pressing

growth toward something,

somewhere

bigger than

my childhood home.

I fled, tearful, fifteen,

from my mother.

Out under the sky

I could breathe and rage.

Even there, I couldn’t

escape for long.

I went back

and smoothed the wrinkles

from as much as possible.

February 2024 Flash Lit 4 (second try) - Escape

Mr. Johnson stood behind the long counter with the sink in it.  The whiteboards behind him were covered in formulas and molecular diagrams in which Teresa had not the slightest interest.  The fifty five minute class period of chemistry might as well be fifty five to life in prison, as far as she was concerned.

Someone had told her that the architect who had drawn the plans for her high school had gone on to a career designing prisons.  Teresa believed it.  Whoever it had been liked cinder blocks a lot and windows not at all.  She wanted out.

 

Her eyes drifted across the periodic table on the wall, along the lab counters on the sides of the room, glimpsed an unfortunate double-bonded oxygen atom on the edge of some compound on the board, and came to rest on Mr. Johnson’s bicep.

 

Teresa had never really looked at Mr. Johnson before.  He was, like thirty, which was old.  But the bicep curved out nicely from the sleeve of his polo shirt.  His skin was dark brown and very smooth.

 

Some suck-up asked Mr. Johnson a question and he turned to answer, presenting his back to Teresa’s side of the class.  Other parts of Mr. Johnson also curved nicely.

 

Teresa escaped form chemistry into an appreciation of anatomy.

February 2024 Flash Lit 4 (first one) - Escape

Escape

I was choosing tomatoes

when it happened.

The grocery cart squeaked

when I bumped it, one

wheel out of true.

All through produce

the song crawled after,

and down the aisle

of rainbow sports drinks.

It infected the man

with three day’s growth of beard

and a safety vest.

He hummed and selected

fruit punch.

In pasta and sauce,

the grandma with twins

caught herself singing.

That damn earworm

followed me into the car

and I heard, over and over:

if you like piña coladas…

There was no escape.

February 2024 Flash Lit 3 (3) - Insert

Insert

Say whatever nasties

you want about fjällbo

and kallax and billy,

the impenetrability

of their assembly instructions,

the swearing and smashing

of thumbs.

You still get a bookcase

at the end

to hold all the stories.

And it’s still easier

to build a whole

Ikea family than

a real one, where

inserting part A

into slot B

is just the beginning

and a few screws

are always loose.