Cats, comics, Christopher Tolkien, corner kicks, Charon’s cosmology, comfort, carrots, and connections

Katherine, who is nine, is working on a comic strip these days, about a girl named Mimi and her large family, including a number of cats. She is reading other books for fun (such as Eva Ibbotson’s Which Witch?), but for research as she writes her strip she is enjoying Cats, a Dorling Kindersley “pockets” book, and Drawing Comics is Easy! (Except When It’s Hard), written by a seven-year-old named Alexa Kitchen. Visit Ms. Kitchen’s website to see her cool book and art:

http://www.alexakitchen.com/

And did you know there are breeds of cat called “Egyptian Mau,” and “Turkish Van,” among many other exotic sounding beauties? If you’re not fortunate enough to have a book small enough to carry in your pocket, all about cats, try this website to see what they look like: http://www.cfainc.org/breeds.html

The cats who live in Katherine’s comic strip have names to go with their origins, such as “Hathshepsut” the Egyptian Mau.

Gregory, who will be 14 soon, is reading David Beckham’s Soccer Skills as he begins practicing with Macon United for the upcoming season. Gregory admires how Beckham has repeatedly come back from adversity during his career. Last spring Gregory played midfield and also took most of the “set pieces” for his soccer team in Albany, and fellow midfielder Beckham is masterful at these.

When he is undertaking something or trying to master a skill, Gregory likes to find out what people who excel in the same area have to say about their experiences. As any autodidact will tell you, experts are great resources.

At the library recently, Gregory chose The Children of Hurin, a novel set before The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkein, edited by his son, Christopher Tolkein. On the way home from practice tonight, he said it was a good story, but that the “old language” takes some getting used to.

We also discussed how some of his favorite fantasy books, like the Harry Potter and Eragon series, and The Bartimaeus Trilogy http://www.bartimaeustrilogy.com/, have made it hard for him to find other books to read, because he loves those so much and finds the stories so compelling that other things pale in comparison.

On Sunday, I shared several poems by the new U.S. Poet Laureate, Charles Simic, with the family. Simic’s work is thought provoking and often darkly humorous, and his style, says outgoing P.L. Donald Hall, makes him “a poet of great individuality.” (Concord Monitor 8/3/07).

See the Concord Monitor article for more on Simic: http://www.concordmonitor.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070803/REPOSITORY/708030319&SearchID=7328966059358

and check out “Charon’s Cosmology,” Simic’s poem about the beleaguered ferryman of the underworld, here:

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=171685

I’ve recently finished reading Farewell to Fairacre, one of the many books about a perfectly lovely English village by Miss Read, aka Dora Jesse Saint. Mrs. Saint is the same age as my grandmother (94) and I find her books to be the ultimate in “comfort” reading. Have you ever read a book and felt, when you looked up, surprised that you were still in the room, and not in the place you are reading about? Hemingway said that is the hallmark of a good book — that it is truer than reality.

The Fairacre books make me feel that way, and they are a great armchair vacation not only into the English countryside, but into a pleasantly “simpler” time. Saint doesn’t candy coat the past — people are people, but there are fewer cars and less technology. You’ll want a cup of tea and if possible, a cat to curl up with.

I also recently finished Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver. It’s a thought provoking book, exploring what Speaking of Faith ‘s host calls “The Ethics of Eating.” http://speakingoffaith.publicradio.org/programs/ethicsofeating/index.shtml

Kingsolver describes her family’s year of eating mostly food they grew or raised, augmented by local foods. They made a few exceptions — one thing that resonated with me, because I can identify with needing to have an emergency stash of macaroni and cheese (Katherine is rather partial to Annie’s and Trader Joe’s), and I certainly couldn’t live without coffee, nor would my family wish to live with me if I did.

Why eat local? Kingsolver is motivated by the desire to support the local agricultural community, to reduce her family’s carbon footprint by purchasing things that weren’t shipped long distances out of season, and to connect with traditional seasonal eating patterns. She points out that it is only since the post WWII era that out of season produce and packaged foods became the standard fare in America, much to the detriment of our health.

Like proponents of Slow Food http://www.slowfood.com/, Kingsolver honors the sense of closeness to the earth and one’s fellow diners, as well as the sheer pleasure, of eating lovingly grown and prepared local food. As a scientist and a farmer, she appreciates the opportunity to preserve heritage varieties of fruits, vegetables and livestock. As a progressive thinker, Kingsolver points out the environmental and human costs of our choices. She is also a delightful writer, wry and honest and just plain entertaining.

Kingsolver’s husband and daughter contribute informative sidebars on nutrition, environmental and ethical issues, and recipes. I’m hoping to try their “disappearing zucchini orzo” with some of our own garden bounty soon. Additional food for thought if you’re pondering the issues in Animal Vegetable, Miracle is an op-ed in The New York Times on August 6, found here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/06/opinion/06mcwilliams.html

Steve is reading Linked: How Everything is Connected to Everything Else and What it Means by Albert-Laszlo Barabasi. It’s a book about the science of networks, recommended to him by a fellow life learning dad and colleague. Barabasi is a physics professor and he explains the theory, mathematics, history, and human dynamics behind the networks that link, well, everything. He’s done a lot of work on the structure of the World Wide Web.

Steve is interested in the way computer science and human nature come together online, so this book is fascinating for him. Based on his enjoyment of Linked, I think it will be on my nightstand when he finishes.

I’ve stayed up ridiculously late working on this first post and on the “presentation” of bookconscious. There are so many more books to share; it’s easy to lose track of time when reading or writing about reading. As reporter and author Jim Bishop once wrote, “Books, I found, had the power to make time stand still, retreat, or fly into the future.” (Simpson’s Contemporary Quotations) If only blogs did, too.

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