Home

Home again, Home again, clippity-clop. At three or so this morning we finally pulled into our driveway. Both girls were asleep and Martin and I were close to delirium.

There are several pieces of good news.

One. No mice, and no mice droppings. (Upon return after last trip, Martin found three corpses in varying states of decomposition).

Two. A really lovely letter from my college writing mentor about my book.

Three. A beautiful, sunny, throw-open-the-windows day today.

Four. We were not blown up by creepy unibomber look-alike on last flight from Midway-Chicago.

I don't think I am an overly paranoid person. Granted, we had cajoled two children through an endless web of airport check-in and security, and soothed them through two flights already.

So we were finally boarding our last plane from Chicago-Midway to home. We were grateful though apprehensive of the late hour and the state of two over-tired children. At least Southwest is the airline with a heart, and they still do the morally correct thing and let families with small children (often on the brink of insanity) board early.

But this flight had holdovers from the plane's last destination. We tripped onto the plane, loaded with computer-, diaper-, snack- bags, wild-eyed one year old and bleary five-year old. There is a camaraderie between all preboarders (heavily pregnant women and loaded-down parents), and we enjoyed the glow as we walked past the shiny-bald flight attendant and onto the plane.

But then, slouching into his seat, encased in the hood of his University of California-Berkeley sweatshirt, a chap in large glasses in the front row gave me pause. I was not judging merely based on appearances. But as I passed with Elspeth on my hip, he let forth a great HISSSSSSS. Indeed, he hissed as Merry passed. Another sweet-cheeked little boy followed us. The hooded man put out his index finger and curled it as if to say FORWARD. And as this sweet little boy passed, he again HISSSSSSed.

It was a full flight. This hissing man was sitting in the front row, primo-seat with lots of leg room, but the two seats beside him were among the last to be filled. I don't think he hissed at all people who passed him, only children, but I can't be sure. One thing was clear: he was sending crazy vibes.

After take-off, this man disappeared into the bathroom and stayed there for a long, long time. Sitting in my seat, breastfeeding Elspeth for the umpteenth time and drinking yet another CranApple juice, I imagined the hisser bent over the bathroom sink, concocting a wildly clever bomb. Or perhaps he would burst out of the bathroom past the bald flight attendant and make a bee-line for my children, yelling incoherent threats.

I planned what I would do if these things were to happen. There comes a time in every exhausted mother's life where she imagines crazy things and then plans what crazy things she will do in response. Martin sipped club soda and wrestled the Sudoku puzzle beside me. He was unconcerned though he did admit the hisser had an uncanny resemblance (only beard lacking) to the unibomber. People are strange, he said, and flipped to the next in-flight magazine puzzle.

Of course he was right. The hisser did not do more than hiss. And I am glad, because my plans for making a great scene in case of emergency were vague at best. Yes, people are odd. And I am included.

Our home airport, when we arrived, was cavernous and echoed in the odd way airports do after midnight. Olympic-Opening-Theme music boomed over the loudspeakers as I carried a sleeping five-year old though the wide deserted terminal. Two men mopped the floor of the food court. Magazines and merchandise stared out at us through the metal teeth of their after-hour grates.

And then, much much later, Martin and I plunged into the cool darkness of the eastern night and drove through the bare-bone forested highways toward home.

Bed never feels so good as after a long absence. We had a wonderful, dream-like vacation in the west, and we hope we carried the spirit of that wide-open place home with us. Home. Our pillows were deep and our own house friendly in the early morning darkness. We had not been blown up, we had not fallen asleep on the way home, and our children were quiet and in their own beds. Thanks be.

Flagstaff. Groovy.

Missoula, Montana. Say it. Do you see that faraway, dreamy look that steals over our faces? It is the same look you see on the visages of people remembering their first true love, first tender steak, first grilled portabello.

Missoula, destination of hippies, drifters, students, Subaru-drivers, skiers, dog-lovers, bong-users. Martin and I arrived there long, long ago, before children. We fell in love with the Mission Mountains and the vegan Indian food and the way Missoula was like a big hand, opening to ideas and art and searchers. We loved the mountains and the hippies that drove SUVs and the bakeries and breweries. We mostly loved being new adults, far away from our pasts, in the midst of exciting people who wanted to hike and chat and fill growlers full of beer.

Missoula, as I said, is many worlds away now. But we remembered it with a bemused longing when we arrived in Flagstaff, Arizona. Flag, as the locals say, is overlooked by the stunning San Francisco peaks. The train clatters by with regularity. Today I saw a man in dreadlocks driving a vintage car accompanied by a shaggy dog panting into the wind from the seat beside him. Women on bicycles wear imported Indian blouses. You can walk to organic food, Indian food, Thai food, you name it--and have a cup of coffee at every corner. Whiffs of incense curl around young men with disheveled hair with their laptops and unwashed shirts and Birkenstocks.

Ah, I thought, as a dreadlocked woman in Indian headscarf checked us out of the organic foods market, it all fits so well. The sunshine, the mountains, the extreme sport shops, everyone in sandals drinking designer coffee. This is our kind of place.

Did I mention that Sedona, with its stunning red rocks and sylvan hikes, is only forty-five minutes away?

Of course, like Missoula, Flagstaff is practically unaffordable. Everyone and her dog wants to live there. And I'm happy to be going home tomorrow to PA. Yeah, Arizona is something out of our early-morning dreams, tinged with the smell of good coffee and drifts of sunlight over our pillows. But we'd miss the hills, and the gray winter that makes us scream for spring, and the mellow summers, and deciduous trees. And as I told Martin, wouldn't we get tired of being around so much total coolness ALL the time?

I want to tell you more about Arizona. I want to show you pictures. And I will. But for now, plan a trip to Flagstaff. When you get here, strap on your sandals. Find some good sushi, and drink some good dark coffee. Send me a postcard.

Gorge Yourself on Trollope and Thin Mints

+




= PURE BLISS


At first I was outraged when Martin told me he had bought girl scout cookies--BUT NO THIN MINTS. For me, the girl scouts and thin mints are synonymous. What did he mean, samoas? How could you buy a box from the girl scouts and not buy thin mints? I seethed impatiently as Martin explained. Coconut? Chocolate? I felt increasingly optimistic. They'd be crunchy, of course--I pictured Swedish biscuits. My wrath subsided to a warm bed of cocoa-coated embers.

"Bring home the samoas!" I commanded haughtily.

Later that same day, uniformed girl scouts smiled responsibly at me from the box as I ripped it open and pulled out the plastic tray. Right-ho. I'd not eaten much that day, maybe a pbj and an apple, and I was hungry. It was "secret-nibbly" time: I give the girls a healthy snack like apple slices while I slink around in the shadows, clandestinely shoving dark chocolate into my mouth.

So. Samoas, here we go. The cookies were chewy rings of coconut-stuff with ribbons of chocolate on top.

At first I was disappointed. Having expected an exquisite crunch, my palate encountered a rather waxy, plastic texture instead. But by the second, and the third, I was willing to overlook mere trifles. By dinner I had devoured many, many samoas.

After the girls were tucked in bed, I settled down with a the last half of BBC Trollope-based He Knew He Was Right and a cup of tea. And did I mention--the last half of the samoas. I was, in a reckless, collegiate-like way, determined to consume the rest of the box. I chomped along strongly for a while. The cookies sustained me most of the way through the melodramatic shlock of this Trollope gem.

My tea cup was cold. It was late. But then, there were more cookies, and there were bonus features. The biography on Anthony Trollope proved highly entertaining-- far more interesting, in fact, than the movie itself. What a gem of an old Victorian Trollope was!

I love the way Anthony Trollope wrote, (pocket watch before him), precisely 3000 words per 3 hours, before work, every day. He was beaten constantly as a student and endured a miserable family, but he overcame this Dickinsonian beginning by hard work. He married a good, well-scheduled Victorian woman who tirelessly produced tasty dinners for him every evening and transcribed all his scribbles. Old Trollope also entertained a secret passion for a bold American woman, and so was a bit of a bastardi for all his straight-laced, Victorian ways. But let's not forget that he left many, many, many, many books behind, and even better, instituted the red postal box that is now a standard feature in every proper English town.

What better combination than a cup of tea, a box of scout cookies, and Trollope? But I couldn't finish all the samoas. Too much of a good thing was making me queasy. Like prolific Trollope, like too many girl scout cookies, some things are just better in moderation.

Opa! For a hilarious take on samoas and culture, check out (click on npr) Marc Acito's commentary on npr.

Sources: Photo of Trollope: www.wikipedia.com______G.S. Cookies: http://www.girlscouts.org/program/gs_cookies/cookie_history/

Trollope? In Arizona?

No, no Trollope in AZ. But I published this one in absence, since I will be sans Internet tonight.

xoxoxxo

Rotten Bananas Butte: Merry's Banana Boy

Rotten Bananas Butte is not located, as it sounds, in a Richard Scary town. Oh, no, you can visit Rotten Bananas Butte on the Navajo Reservation here in Arizona, by Chimney and Castle Buttes.

Merry was so delighted by Rotten Bananas Butte that she began illustrating a story right on the spot. On hotel stationary, you can follow the sordid story of Banana Boy. Or you can just ask Merry to tell you:

"One day two little girls were baking a banana. They put it into the oven, and the biggest little girl said, "Oh, I think it's done."
[Merry breaks in: Originally, she says, this story isn't really true. The banana dies in the oven, right here. He doesn't really run away.]
But then the banana jumped out of the oven and said, You can't catch me! He began to run away, and came upon a river."

From here, the story sounds strikingly familiar. Banana Boy meets a fox, so wily and charming that he convinces the banana to climb upon his twitching nose; and then Banana Boy is devoured poste haste. But Merry is again quick to remind you that Banana Boy doesn't really get gobbled up by the fox but perishes at the beginning of the story, in the oven. "Bananas don't run away," she points out. "They just lie there."

Tomorrow we'll see the Grand Canyon. More later. The sun is strong, I just devoured a rich chocolate pudding, and I feel like sleeping.
_____________________________________________________________________________________

I've been standing on the corner in Winslow, Arizona. Such a fine sight to see.
It's a girl, my Lord, in a flat bed Ford. . .or Martin rocking with Don Henley.

Where to next?

Arizona, Day 1

Yesterday, as we juggled piles of luggage, two carseats, and huge crowds of people seeking a spring break, I began writing in my head. There were four pairs of shoes to remove at the long line in security (yes, a one-year old must have her shoes x-rayed now), and a bit of a pause as a woman with white gloves inspected my purse.

--Ah, she said, pulling out a bottle of hand-sanitizer. Yes, you have to have a baggy.

--A baggy?

--Yes. Do you want to go back out and get a baggy?

I gawked at the long security line. Elspeth, perched on my hip, kicked her sock feet.

--Well, I'll just throw this out then, said the woman. Next time, don't forget your baggy!

Standing in my sock feet, I felt as though I were in kindergarten. Take off your shoes; don't forget your baggy.

The plane from PA to Chicago was packed. We arrived in snowy, cold Chicago late and ran through the airport. As we panted at the gate, a very sleepy Merry burst into tears.

The flight from Chicago to Pheonix was jammed with people, and most of those people seemed to be having a much better time than we were. Behind us sat two young women, one of whom was about to be married and was quite voluble. Seating about the plane was a positive gaggle of bridesmaids who joined said bride in the aisle for drinks and stimulating conversation.

Holding a writhing, screaming Elspeth, I listened to the uninterrupted--and I do mean, no-breath--conversation behind me. The wedding women sounded as if they had memorized sitcom scripts, and the bride held court, regaling her b.maids with endless and varied information about parties and drinking and old boyfriends while sipping beer (ordered from the very attentive bald flight attendant).

Merry slept in a hump on the arm of my seat; Elspeth breastfed and then screamed almost constantly propped up on the other. Both girls were crusted over with evidence of messy colds. Add to this that I had almost completely lost my voice and could barely order a drink or say thank you for peanuts. Yes, I felt rather like an alien with four antennae in that plane full of chatter and beer and shiny, sparkly bridesmaids. Please let this flight end.

And unfortunately the women lowered their voices conspiratorially any time they got to any juicy tidbit that might have compensated for the endless potato-starchy-prattle that they subjected the rest of us to. The best line I heard was delivered by the bride who said, "So guess what my grandmother served at Thanksgiving. Okay. She served stuffing, but she sliced it. Have you ever heard of slicing stuffing? Omigod."

I could tell you about the many endless things we did after our flight landed--I could tell you how Merry and Elspeth and I wandered up and down dirty white flights of stairs in the parking garage--but I will end with this beautiful picture: both girls asleep at the hotel and Martin and I scarfing down a sandwich over the sink in the bathroom before dropping into bed ourselves.

And today, the west pulled at our spirits as we opened ourselves gladly to the expanse of the brilliant sky.

We ran down narrow trails in the Little Painted Desert, where our shadows were far away and tall. If we jumped high enough, would we ever come down? Would our shadows rise and stripe canyons, buttes, mesas until we met the sun?

The sun is strong, and the land is wide and the roads long and straight. Buttes rise up around us; cacti grow like trees; first, second and third mesa glow in the setting sun.

What is it about the west that makes you feel as if you could give away all you own, buy a beat-up old pickup, and disappear into the warm expanse? Reinvention. The idea gets into your blood, and suddenly anything seems possible. The sky, the land, everything is so wide and startling that you feel as if you are flying, even when you are standing small and firm on the ground.

Pictures tomorrow.

Goin West, Yee Ha!

Well, we're takin these headcolds and gittin outta town.

Fact is, I sure shouldn't be wastin my time writin right now, seein as I have me a buncha packin. Sure fired up about it, though. Yippe kiyeh!

Heat! Sun! Open blue skies! Make sure to bring along your sunglasses. Music to my ears.

We are truly boarding a plane this afternoon and skimming our way through the clouds accompanied by the wails of our sinused-plugged children. We're headed for Arizona, where we plan to see my sister and her lovely family down at the Hopi Reservation, where the land expands for miles and miles, orange and brown and beautiful. Where the skies are so deep they make you dizzy. We also plan to take in the scenery at Sadona, the Grand Canyon. . .Oh, the West is the Best!

-Well, to all those of you who have been sweating like skinny wax tapers in the inferno this week, have a lovely break.

I know I plan to. More from. . .ARIZONA later. Wa-hoo!

The Sowness of Sows, the Goodness of Things

Error Detected! Caution: Exit now, or next week, you will:

Nurse an iron head cold that falls upon you like an armor-clad elephant.
Your family will also catch said head colds.
Your children's eyes will crust over with viral conjunctivitis.
You will receive disappointing news.
Your 1-year old will fall down the stairs, belly-flop fully clothed into your shower, suck the coating off an ibuprofen from a childproof bottle.
Your husband will be insanely busy and thus absent.
You will wear pajamas all week.
You will fall hopelessly behind in all housework.

What would you like to do?
1. Run away
2. Endure the week
3. Hibernate (recommended)
4. Check yourself into institution

I choose-----number two! Big surprise!

And yet, even when weeks go as they do sometimes, and even when--every time I glance in the mirror I see an unkempt, messy face looking back at me--even when things are "not ideal," a week is better lived than not. Near the end of winter, hibernation often feels like it would have been a great idea. What better option than to curl up and cover yourself over with leaves like a perennial mulched and waiting for spring?

Tonight found me first singing harmony with Dora the Explorer's mailbox as I folded clothes with one hand and held runny baby Elspeth with the other. I managed to shout Spanish commands at a gate on the TV along with Merry who has resided in high state on the couch for the last week or so. Later I scooped up macaroni and cheese while singing Chicago's If You Leave Me Now. Merry held her milk glass in the air. "Cheers!" she said. "Cheers to getting out of the house tomorrow!" Elspeth, puffy red eyes and all, did her best to toast with her orange plastic sippy cup. So, no, it hasn't been a week of culture and sophistication. It has been a week of dirty tissues, sticky faces, and unpleasant snufflings and snorts during the night. But the week is almost over.

But hibernation? No. I wouldn't have missed the lovely occasional brightnessess in a week of homebound sickness. Strong coffee, for instance. Lots of strong coffee, which is now, beyond a shadow of a doubt, good for you. Hurrah! Like dark chocolate, another wonderful thing that is good for me!

Sickness equals good reading times with the girls. Merry is reading #95 of the Boxcar Children series, which is truly an abomination. Outfits are catalogued in great detail ("Violet was wearing a flour sack paired cunningly with an umbrella as a hat. . .), as are meal choices ("Benny ordered a grilled fishhead on rye with ketchup and fried rat tongue"). But it is nice to snuggle beside her in bed and read.

Elspeth has slept a great deal, and when she is awake she just wants to snuggle.

And I am inherently worthwhile, even in my pyjamas.

Reading Saint Francis and the Sow reminds me of this. I do not feel like a sow, though I do suckle Elspeth regularly. However, if Saint Francis found beauty and spirituality in a sow, I think my chances are pretty good overall.
_____________________________
image from www.wikipedia.org
______________________________
Saint Francis and the Sow
Galway Kinnell

The bud
stands for all things,
even for those things that don't flower,
for everything flowers, from within, of self-blessing;
though sometimes it is necessary
to reteach a thing its loveliness,
to put a hand on its brow
of the flower
and retell it in words and in touch
it is lovely
until it flowers again from within, of self-blessing;
as Saint Francis
put his hand on the creased forehead
of the sow, and told her in words and in touch
blessing of earth on the sow, and the sow
began remembering all down her thick length,
from the earthen snout all the way
through the fodder and slops to the spiritual curl of the tail,
from the hard spininess spiked out from the spine
down through the great broken heart
to the sheer blue milken dreaminess spurting and shuddering
from the fourteen teats into the fourteen mouths sucking and
blowing beneath them:
the long, perfect loveliness of the sow.

--read and enjoyed from A Child's Anthology of Poetry, Edited by Elizabeth Hauge Sword, 1995

February Makes Me Quetch; Oh, for the Open-Tide!

Translation:
Febuary makes me groan; oh, for the young springtime!

Open-tide literally is translated as "early spring, the time when buds open" (Sperling 105).

Isn't that lovely?

But take care, while tripping giddily through such springtime finery, not to pluck and devour the pissabed!

That's sheer fadoodle! Or, sheer nonsense! (Good guesses, M & kjr.)

--Source of poplollies: Poplollies & Bellibones / A Celebration of Lost Words by Susan Kelz Sperling, Konecky & Konecky 1981*

GUESS: What does PISSABED mean? Guess below; answers in tomorrow's daily Poplolly.

*Click on S. Kelz, above, for source for picture and NPR interview.
Source of "redbud" picture: Autumnridgenursery.com

Hot Cuppa, Wot?

STRIP JACK NAKED. This was the name of the card game our British neighbor in Dhaka taught my sister and me, aged six and eight. In the afternoon, Heather and I would run through the sweet smell of frangipani trees, squeeze through the hedge, and visit the old British granny-lady. She fed us biscuits and taught us how to cross-stitch, and if the first title of the card-game was too racy, we could always call it BEAT THE OLD LADY TO BED if we preferred.

Later in Kenya we had another lovely British neighbor who was soft and smelled wonderful and called us "Lovey."

So maybe it's these two exquisite ladies that put the anglophile in me, or maybe it's tea, or maybe it's the BBC.

Tea! Tea cozies! John Cleese! Spot of milk or slice of lemon! Wedgewood! Hyacinth Bucket! Marmite! Judi Dench! Egg cups! Wellies! Wot?

If any of these things make your heart beat faster, you might be a bit of an anglophile yourself.

One glance at my Netflix queue reveals a striking similarity in all the vicarious lives I indulge through TV or film. Hmmm. All set in U.K. For some intense weeks I lived with Judi Dench (or maybe I WAS Judi Dench?) as I took in the entire series, including the bonus, of As Time Goes By. The music for this sitcom is atrocious, but the script writing is clever. Also, I enjoyed looking at Dame J.D.'s tea mugs, her smart London townhouse, and the richly furnished country estate (complete with eccentric locals). As I sat comatose in front of the TV, I was actually touring London on foot; I suddenly loved runny poached eggs; everything I said was witty and well-pronounced as I poured from a tray with an endless supply of duty-free liquors from Heathrow airport.

If Henry James and T.S. Eliot could switch nationalities, why can't I? If they could, just on whim, began writing colour, centre, theatre, and wot-ho, why can't I?

Actually, I do not want to trade in passports. Though American tourists are generally embarrassing in foreign countries (super LOUD), the charm of living vicariously in a hay-topped cottage (with hollyhocks in the front yard) without any of the reality is too great a temptation.

I am ashamed at the sheer commercial nature of the following. Nonetheless, here are some of my favorite anglophile pleasures:


BISCUITS: Marie biscuits, for their crisp texture and perfect tea-dipping properties; digestive biscuits of any kind, especially if they're coated in chocolate.

CANDY: Smarties, rattling happily in a cardboard tube. Cadbury's bars in golden wrappers.

CLOTHES: Knee socks (with shorts); wildly clashing patterns worn together

*See all sources for pictures listed below.

TEA: A six cup teapot, warmed with a swirl of boiling water. Twinings English Breakfast is the tastiest tea (beyond actual East African tea) I can locate in America. Do not overbrew to a soup. Nor do you want a weak cuppa that pales hideously at the first drop of milk. And use a tea cozy so the pot lasts, and lasts, and lasts, through all the courses of your tea. Cozies are extremely hard to find; in fact, an import store, a trip overseas, or your own sewing machine may be your only affordable options. And of course, use a cup and saucer unless you're busy or on the run. And then a beaker is okay.

Scones, yes. Clotted cream, Devonshire, absolootely. A dollop of marmalade.

Best BBC TV SERIES:
Jeeves and Wooster, Monarch of the Glen (Scottish), Ballykissangel (Irish), As Time Goes By, Father Ted (Irish--in small doses), Waiting for God, Keeping Up Appearances, Fawlty Towers, Yes Prime Minister

Best BBC DRAMAS:
Of course, Pride & Prejudice, North and South (rivals P & P), Wives and Daughters
*
Pretty-Good BBC DRAMAS: Daniel Deronda, The Way We Live Now (David Suchet goes nasty for this leading role)--these are both based on Anthony Trollope Novels

Not-so-hot BBC DRAMAS: He Knew He Was Right (acting is good but as title suggests, not worth three-four hours).

BRITISH THINGS I HATE: Marmite, Vegemite, poached eggs, kippers for breakfast

BEST MYSTERY SERIES: Poirot (charming voice and narcissistic but polite manner); Cadfield (a monk-detective in Middle Ages--top marks for writing); Midsomer Murders are at first promising but the sheer number of murders is ridiculous

BRITISH THINGS I NEVER USE BUT WISH I DID: A slotted toast tray; egg cups; heated radiator covers in the bathroom for damp towels

Here I listed Music, Plays, and Movies, but that was just a waste of space. The answers are obvious. U2, Oscar Wilde, and just about anything BBC.

BRITISH FIXTURES I WISH AMERICA WOULD ADOPT: Real pubs, warm beer, the BBC, red post boxes, the metro to everywhere, Heathrow Airport, teatime, British Airways, Margaret Thatcher

BOOKS: Too many to mention. My favorite still has to be Austen, and my biggest surprise would be when I actually fell asleep reading Barchester Towers by Anthony Trollope. I rather thought I was going to love it.


CHILDREN: If you have children and are just a teeny bit of an anglophile yourself, I would strongly recommend The Naughty Little Sister series; Shirley Hughes' Alfie books and charming illustrations (click on 'Hughes' above for website); Kipper the Dog DVDS. All of these celebrate story and character without imposing didactic morals on children. Thank goodness.

And for the very young: Helen Oxenbury's "Pippo" stories. Elspeth (1) loves the bold pictures, the simple story, and the charm of the characters. I love how English it all is.

Cheerio, and toodle-pip!

***Sources for pictures (in order): www.bbcamerica.com; www.englishteastore.com; www.amazon.com; www.egglamania.org; www.wikipedia.org; www.liverpoolmuseums.org; amazon.com; www.ratherjolly.com

Don't be Thrunch and Spuddle; Thrip and Squiddle

Translation:
Don't be angry and make a mountain out of a molehill; snap your fingers and waste time with an idle chat.

(or: Let down your hair, man.)

Fancy fadoodle? Me, too.

--Source of poplollies: Poplollies & Bellibones / A Celebration of Lost Words by Susan Kelz Sperling, Konecky & Konecky 1981*

GUESS: What does FADOODLE mean? Guess below; answers in tomorrow's Poplolly.

*Click on S. Kelz, above, for source for picture and NPR interview.

Miss Vanderbilt--Ahem--There's a Dog Paw in My Pudding

**see photo source below I wonder how many wives could resist rising up in unholy protest if husbands suddenly took to wrapping their heads up in wire and head rags, greasing their faces, tying up their own chins, putting on oiled mittens for the night.--Vanderbilt 513

Amy Vanderbilt is a good read. If you've run out of Jane Austen, consider a nightcap--settle into a good chapter of New Complete Book of Etiquette / The Guide to Gracious Living.

Ms. Vanderbilt is side-splitting (not generally an acceptable mannerism) for several reasons:

1. She often writes tongue-in-cheek (but only in private; tongues should not reside in cheeks in the public domain).

2. This historical edition of Etiquette, this interminable commentary on correctness, all 706 pages (excluding the index), is an archaic catalog of the many graces our modern society blithely deposited in a waste can. And this is hilarious, because I am me and you are you. We only remember manners like Amy's in some past great aunt or in the blue flickers of a British sitcom.

3. The minutia is astounding and worth remark. Jane Austen, yes, but here the minutia is broken down in instructional chapters. My manners have slipped, yes, but just how many disappeared? For example, I can choose from a list of topics, from pages 212-220, read, and master The Social Pleasantries:

"Gifts of Love" * A Guide to Tactful Conversation *
When to Use a First Name * If You Cannot Remember Names *
Personal Questions--What Are They? * Dangerous Topics of Conversation * How to Parry Direct Questions * That Word "Lady" * How about "Miss!"?

And so on. I wish I could delight you with the entire list.

And egad! I certainly encourage good manners. Suddenly, as when you look at your dirty house in spring sunlight, I have viewed our table manners and shuddered. "When we come back from vacation," I warned at dinner tonight, "We are lodging a frontal attack!"

I talk with my mouth full, keep my knife in my right hand at all times, and point with my silverware. I am up and down from the table like a wind-up toy. Martin leaves his napkin on the table for the duration, sprinkles crumbs like Hansel, and occasionally brings along reading material (not for group edification, mind you). Merry eats many no-no things with her fingers and groans about soup for the third time in a week. And Elspeth is our crowning glory. She kicks up her feet into her food, which resides temptingly on the bare tabletop. She casts all things to the ground while grunting and smiling. She stuffs vegetables into the unreachable crevices of her highchair.

Every woman should change for dinner, if only into a clean house dress. Dinner is the high point of the day, the forerunner--it is to be hoped--of a free evening. Every little girl should be clean and in fresh clothes, even if they are just clean pajamas and bathrobe for nursery supper, every night, so that the idea of changing for dinner is inculcated at the earliest possible time. . .[she goes on]. . .Fresh grooming for evening is one of the criteria of gentility. --Vanderbilt 183

Scene: Evening. Mother and children lying exhausted on couch. Husband Martin sets the table and cooks dinner. Wife requests a cup of tea but receives none. Dinner is ready. The lovely family enters grandly (no bagpipes) for this "forerunner of a free evening:" Elspeth is still in pajamas from the morning. Merry is stained by tomato soup (did we brush her hair this morning?) and her face is crusty. And I, that paragon of gentility, have already showered and am clad in my biggest, softest, smelliest red bathrobe. Hair freshly brushed? No. Make-up? Heck, no. Heels? Try slippers.

All right, we do all have head colds. But Amy Vanderbilt would point out that is no excuse.

And last night, I gave myself a sharp wake-up call when I tossed a cooked carrot across the table, head of to foot of, mind you.

My great aunt would have di-ed. Actually, it is probably a good thing she has, because our table manners have become worthy of a Berenstein Bear's Book, a TV reality show, a PBS special.

In fact, Fred Rogers surfaced earlier this week as Merry critiqued our table manners and then systematically listed new rules for a new, gentler family dinner.

One, one, one! One, we need to start putting bibs on Elspeth.

Two, we need to start putting napkins on the table.

[Merry goes on--skips four, and continues--]

and seven [two fingers thrust into air]--We need to start behaving at other people's houses,

and number eight, we need to start turning lights on,

and the last one, we need to start picking up Elspeth's food that she throws on the floor.

Then she paused to survey our shocked faces, since we had all suddenly grown pig snouts and were snuffling in main dishes like the parents in Spirited Away. Undisturbed (she had seen it before), she concluded, "The person who wrote Mr. Rogers is very talentive."

Gentle people are often acutely embarrassed by the table manners of those with whom they find themselves eating. A carefully bred wife may suffer much inner torture because her husband--always when manner seem very important--forgetfully leaves his spoon in his cup or absent-mindedly licks his fingers. --Vanderbilt 229

I think I can conduct myself with adequate propriety. My mother certainly pressed upon us all the importance of the placement of the knife, the proper usage of napkins, appropriate dinner time conversation (no bodily details, no fights, no descriptions of illnesses.) And so on. She even let me know what to do when a "foreign matter" entered my mouth, such as a disgusting piece of gristle or fat or bug (and we had those occasionally on our produce growing up in Kenya). But I forgot this one night on a date with Martin as I audibly expectorated a piece of sushi, back onto the artful arrangement of lettuce and beet shreds on my plate. I love sushi. But my taste buds told me something was amiss with this one. Martin, let me tell you, was utterly horrified. Really. In retrospect, I feel I should have brushed up on foreign matter, or foreign bodies as Miss Vanderbilt terms them:

Foreign bodies accidentally taken into the mouth with food--gravel, fish, stones, bird shot--are removed with thumb and forefinger. . .If a gnat gets into a beverage or some other unappetizing creature turns up in or on a diner's food, he fishes it out, unobserved. . .or leaves the drink or dish untouched, depending on the degree of odiousness of the intruder. A gnat or a tiny inchworm on lettuce shouldn't bother anyone, but most fastidious people draw the line at a fly or worse. --Vanderbilt 232

This leaves me in pleasant reflection as I imagine what "or worse" could be. A rat. A human finger. A chicken head. Teeth.

But I am clearly missing the point. Besides, the list above does not constitute polite conversation, in any company.

Forgive me.

GUESS BELOW IN 'COMMENTS': WHAT YEAR WAS THIS EDITION OF VANDERBILT'S NEW COMPLETE BOOK OF ETIQUETTE PUBLISHED? AND DON'T CHEAT. IT'S NOT GOOD MANNERS.

**For more on Amy Vanderbilt, and for the source of her photograph, go to: http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9074800/Amy-Vanderbilt (photo: 1956, Brown Brothers).

Slow Down, Read a Book, Chew a Gnat, Post a Comment

Don't miss JL's new book review (see below) on Seth Vikram's book.

And don't forget to share a comment, above--
Guess the date on Miss Vanderbilt's advice on gnats.

AND below--
Slowing Down. . .In our busy world, what slows YOU down?

CONTRIBUTOR REVIEW: A SUITABLE BOY BY VIKRAM SETH

A Suitable Boy

by Vikram Seth
Harper Perennial Modern Classics, Reissued October 2005


Seth was, pre-Boy, perhaps best known for his novel Golden Gates, written entirely in sonnets. A Suitable Boy is quite different, though suffused with poetry, both in the rhymes one family spontaneously generates at the slightest provocation, and in the rhythm and elegance of Seth’s prose. However, this book is most like a Victorian novel in genre. It is HUGE. It has lots of pages. It has nearly as many characters and subplots, complications, major and minor life devastations, and an ending both as final and as inconclusive as anything George Eliot ever produced.

It is set in 1950’s India around the time of Partition. This is not a historical moment that I’m especially familiar with, and I think a bit of prior knowledge would have helped my comprehension of the larger story. The ostensible main plot, however, is fairly universal: Lata, the young heroine, has a devoted mother who is busily trying to marry her off to a suitable boy. Unfortunately, Lata meets and instantly falls in love with an extremely unsuitable boy—for starters, he’s Muslim and she’s Hindu. Enter a couple of other suitors AND everybody’s families AND dashes of religion and politics and other romances of the mostly unsuitable variety, and you’ve got a really long novel. Also a very good one.

Lata is a woman at the cusp of many things, the modern era being but one of them. So, for her, the choice of husband (inasmuch as it is her choice, which brings up another set of issues in the novel) carries a vast weight of symbolism. Will she choose the vulgar but traditional and up-and-coming shoe salesman her mother promotes? Or maintain a balance between tradition and individualism by marrying the witty and educated Hindu poet whom her mother doesn’t like but cannot forbid? Or will she go the truly modern route and marry her Muslim student for love? And by the end, which does the reader, seduced into the mindset(s) of the book’s world, want her to choose, and why?

If you do read this one, please do let me know your thoughts on it. Especially on the ending. You can email me at thelonglets@hotmail.com.


--Reviewed by Jordana who holds and juggles two MAs, two children (one unborn), one biohusband, and many good ideas. Jordana teaches English at a high school in coastal Virginia. See her blogsite carpematrem.wordpress.com.