READ ALL ABOUT IT
Since 2012, I’ve been writing about books. And the act of reading. And the importance of story and narrative. But, mostly, the underlying theme of all I write is how taking a moment to stop and digest some longform text — instead of scrolling, instead of watching a video, instead of multitasking — can be one of the most grounding things we can do for ourselves. Here’s the one-stop online home for all this writing.
You can read more about me and my work by moseying over here. Want to peruse periodic “essay drops” — excerpts from my work-in-progress essay collection about Homesickness? Here ya go.
Home, Where My Thought's Escaping
Does one need to leave home in order to truly understand what that word means to him or her?
With migration inching its way to “top headline” status in news media around the world, the notion of “home” bubbles into my mind repeatedly. I don’t mean just “immigration,” because one can merely mention that word to someone (particularly an American) and know that a forceful stream of opinion will begin to gush forward. Yes, “migration” is in the news because of debate about immigration to America and Western Europe, but migration also refers to refugees, a general spirit of “multi-culturalism” (when you’re married to someone of a different nationality, you’ve obviously got to choose someplace to live and make roots), the globalization of the world’s economy and where multinational companies are sending their employees, and simple but gradual population shifts. The Wittengenstein Centre for Demography and Global Human Capital recently released an interactive map showing major migration pathways from 1990 to 2010. Take a look because it is fascinating: The Global Flow of People
It's Like This... On Anne Enright and What Are You Like?
1961 brought something amazing into the lives of every young girl who has ever attended a slumber party. The advent of games such as “Truth or Dare” and “Light as a Feather, Stiff as a Board”? A guide to prank calling? No, sorry, what I’m talking about here is Disney’s smash hit The Parent Trap (in Technicolor), starring Hayley Mills as twins separated at birth: snooty Sharon McKendrick from Boston and freewheeling Californian Susan Evers. The underlying romantic story, which essentially declares “opposites attract,” brings the girls’ long-estranged mother and father back together in an all-too-perfect fashion. The film, marketed as a comedy full of high jinks, was nominated for two Academy Awards, netted $25,000 at the box office, and provided a springboard for three television sequels, a theatrical re-release in 1968, a popular remake more than 35 years later, and the remarkable ability for “Let’s Get Together, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah” to get stuck in every viewer’s head. This is compelling stuff, and I have seen this movie at least ten times, mostly at sleepovers.
Shake It: A Break from Regularly Scheduled Programming
Last night, my husband and I and our two kids huddled around a laptop watching old videos. One of my favorites? A front-toothless version of my now-10-year-old daughter singing “Summertime” from Porgy and Bess. Summertime, and the livin’ is easy… School has been out for a week, we’ve had some uncharacteristic 70-degree days, and the 10:30 pm light is making bedtime later and later. Summer: It always shakes things up a bit. So, I will too. (Shake things up, that is. Much like how Debbie Gibson sang “Shake Your Love” in 1987. Oh, to have a video of me singing that.)
It's Not You, It's Me
I love my son so much. Obviously. And I really love the earnest way he expresses bewilderment over some of his contemporaries’ preferences. Although he just turned 9, an age where “toys” sort of lose favor, it’s actually been several years since he’s enjoyed a toy: A fanatical obsession with Thomas the Tank Engine would have been the last one. He’d rather be outside with a ball or composing meticulous lists and charts—ranging from alphabetizing his school’s entire student body to transcribing World Cup rankings. So a year or two ago, when a few of his friends were into Skylanders (I don’t know what they are either. Little figurines, I guess, with elaborate backstories to go with them?), he just wasn’t sure how to engage with these pals. I picked him up from school one day and he said, “I don’t get it. All they do is…” And then he proceeded to demonstrate with lots of hand motions and puppetry how his friends would manipulate these figurines to battle and do cool stunts. Similarly, he tried the Lego after-school program for a few terms and just couldn’t get into it. (Just goes to show how kids will repeatedly surprise their parents; six years ago, I would have absolutely pinned him as a future “Lego Kid.” Guess not!) Simply put, he likes what he likes—some things you just can’t force. The great thing, though, is that he takes great care in picking out birthday presents suitable for these friends and truly desires to get these guys what they want even when he doesn’t have the foggiest idea what they actually “do” with them.
A Real Education: On Tan Twan Eng's The Garden of Evening Mists & What We Read in School
I’m about to sound either really clueless or really curious.
Here’s a sampling of some of the questions I asked myself as I read The Garden of Evening Mists by Tan Twan Eng. Why is everyone referring to Malaya, and not Malaysia? Pearl Harbor was not Japan’s “official entrance” into World War II? Why is there a South African living in Cameron Highlands? And the Boer War: What was that again? Perhaps I should be a little embarrassed to admit my ignorance about the Eastern World despite, I think, being reasonably informed about general global history and geography. But my reading of Tan’s lushly and quietly beautiful novel about the Japanese Occupation and its lasting effects on protagonist Yun Ling took me constantly to Google; the result of my reading was not just another wonderful story embedded in my heart, but also a small step forward in understanding a greater world.
Just the Facts
“Good fiction creates empathy. A novel takes you somewhere and asks you to look through the eyes of another person, to live another life.” – Barbara Kingsolver
Barbara Kingsolver is one of my tried-and-true, go-to authors. From the first time I picked up a copy of The Bean Trees in the 1950s-bowling-alley-turned-Barnes-and-Noble in downtown Bellevue, I knew I would like it. Originally, it was the cover art and fluorescent orange spine that made me pick up the book, but after I bought it and actually read it, I knew I was under the spell of this author. Although the eccentricity of a blind babysitter named Edna Poppy and a shop called Jesus is Lord Used Tires stood out to this 17-year-old, what I really enjoyed was Kingsolver’s ability to show me other sides to issues and situations that I didn’t know much about, such as underground railroads for immigrants and rural Appalachian towns. It was all very eye opening, yet in a quirky-character-driven sort of way. But as much as I love to read Barbara Kingsolver, I’d also argue that her novels sometimes lean toward the pedantic and heavy-handed side; she may write sympathetic characters for both sides of an issue, but at times, they turn into caricatures of themselves.
The Better Way
As soon as we have our first experiences with the stage—waiting to go on for a piano recital or a nerve-wracking regional spelling bee—we learn the backstage rule of thumb that teachers and other official adults-in-charge have screeched for years: If you can see people in the audience, they can see you too. With little children, however, keeping away from the glow of those footlights is a tricky proposition; they all want to see, and although they may not be aware of it, their main goal is often to be seen themselves. As for the adults in the audience? Although they may be glad that their children are obeying, it is that lone excited child waving frantically to Mom and Dad whom they’ll all remember. And for those children too meek or too compliant to make their faces known? Well, the audience won’t see what they’re doing until they come on at the appointed time, in the appointed fashion.
Motherly Love
I have an awkward admission to make: I read what are fondly known as Mommy Blogs. I’m embarrassed that I actually spend precious downtime reading these often narcissistic and sentimental odes to a Pottery Barn catalog version of life so I won’t even stoop to the level of sharing the ones that I skim—even if just once a month—because many of them embody so much navel gazing and consumerism. Let’s just chalk it up to the thirty-something-mother version of watching Saved by the Bell reruns after school. (Don’t deny it unless you’re going to admit to watching Charles in Charge instead.) Why don’t I like these online chronicles of motherhood? Let me count the ways: They commodify children. (Can you imagine having tens of thousands of people looking at your child’s mug every day?) They often take a sarcastic and demeaning tone. (Listen, I completely understand the trials of preparing meals for picky toddlers, but pulling out the big sarcasm and provocative-language guns and essentially poking fun at your offspring in a very public forum to generate sympathetic and commiserating laughs is just juvenile—and I can be a very sarcastic person. #soblessed) And lastly, these online snippets of “real life” are often viewed by their authors as tools to catapult to their fifteen minutes of fame. (Just hop on over to the Huffington Post and read the posts by mothers who are faux angry for this, that, and another reason and then watch all these posts go viral.) In short, many seem to me to be one-dimensional “soft” versions of what mothering truly encompasses; many mommy blogs present an ambience or a general feeling. So why, then, do I still read them? These blogs give me a peek into what makes my American contemporaries tick, sometimes they provide a good chuckle when I see how stylized every facet of bloggers’ children’s lives can be (even in attempts to “keep it real”), but often, it’s just fluff entertainment.
Lost in Translation
Sometimes as I’m browsing in an Irish bookstore, or perhaps as I’m eyeing what other people on the DART are reading, I wonder if an “all-American” title, such as To Kill a Mockingbird, Go Tell It on the Mountain, or The Grapes of Wrath, translates well; do these books affect non-Americans the way they do Americans? It’s a one-half-simplistic, and one-half-sensible sentiment. Simplistic: Is the “American experience” really so incomprehensible? (No, because global media make sure it’s plastered over every continent.) Sensible: I’d argue that you can’t really feel intertwined with a particular culture if you haven’t spent a substantial bit of time there. (Eating at Letzte Bratwurst vor Amerika/“Last Hotdog until America” in Sagres, Portugal does not count toward familiarizing oneself with America.)
To Otto
“And most important, it was our duty to give love to those who needed our affection.” — Grace Roby, in Empire Falls, by Richard Russo
I’m a little embarrassed to admit that I have been, on rare occasions, enthralled by the Duggar family. [ed note: This was written in 2014!] If you’re not American—or if you avoid People and US Weekly—the Duggars are an extremely religious family comprised of 19 children. One of the family’s mottos is J.O.Y., the acronyms standing for the order in which they believe respect should be bestowed: Jesus, Others, and (finally) Yourself. It’s an interesting concept, one that can be taken too far, particularly in a rigid and patriarchical environment. But wipe out the religious overtones, and it’s probably an attitude that most people—especially parents—embody. And subconsciously or not, we do it often: Full car and one child has to ride up front (air bags turned off, of course!)? I’d rather put one of my own in the hot seat than someone else’s child.
The Economics of Moving
There’s an economic principle called Pareto Efficiency that essentially states that you cannot add to one individual’s set of resources without taking away from another’s set of resources. I’m not an economist; although I studied enough economics in college to qualify for a minor, I’m really a humanities person, so leave it to me to think about how this principle applies in emotional, rather than financial, scenarios. As a result, I’ve seen each place I’ve lived—a collection of different environments—as experiences meant to be kept separate. I’ve always seen it this way: If I pour my energies into life in Dublin, all the previously exerted energies in New York, for instance, drizzle down some sort of drain, as if they’re needed elsewhere.
Say What?
When we visited the National Museum of Scotland in October, we ventured into the “rocks and minerals” wing, usually a favorite spot for my daughter. However, this time, it was my son who seemed to have a strong reaction to the amethyst geodes and orbicular granodiorite. A few feet away from him and my husband, I heard the latter gasp, “What did you say?” It turns out that my son had, rather loudly, announced the display they were looking at: Folded Schist. I’ll let you try to imagine what my husband thought his dear offspring had exclaimed in a museum.
Premises
Have you seen the Portlandia sketch “The Dream of the 90s is Alive in Portland (aka Portland: The Place Where Young People Go to Retire)”? You know, “Remember the 90s? …people were talking about getting piercings and tribal tattoos and people were talking about saving the planet and forming bands. When they encouraged you to be weird…It was an amazing time where people would go to the Jim Rose Sideshow Circus and watch someone hang something from their…” I’ll end there. Cue the stilt-walkers and ironic clowns on unicycles and organic paper-makers and hipsters who work “a couple hours a week at a coffee shop”…
Quiet and Careful
Here’s what I noticed within two months of moving to Dublin: People here are considerably less angsty than Americans about anything identity related. Although I’m asserting this as an outsider, when you come from a place that necessitates pigeon-holing its citizens—for political reasons, mostly—less emphasis on categorizing sings to me. America: the land of Buzzfeed quizzes that don’t even make any sense! (What Country Should You Live In?/Which U.S. President Are You?/Which Super Power Should You Actually Have?) Ireland: the place where everything is “just grand”!
Alone With My Books?
Does loneliness look the same in Las Vegas as it does in New York?
Donna Tartt’s The Goldfinch: The book left me simultaneously heartbroken and somehow optimistic for a happily ever after—but as far as settings go, her subtle sense of the ticks and tocks of a place, a region providing the backdrop for a culture and for a society, is one of the best I’ve read.
Neither Here nor There
Dublin Review of Books
An exploration of Irish author Roddy Doyle’s work, in-group communication styles, and now-ubiquitous emojis.
Stories for Social Change in ‘Flight Behavior’ and ‘The Line
The Curator
An exploration of personal storytelling using Barbara Kingsolver’s novel Flight Behavior as a framing device.
Read Here or at CuratorMagazine.com
Ambiance: Where Details are Everything,
The Curator
The importance of setting — and when to generalize and when to particularize, using my experience in an international book club and its selection of the novel The Yacoubian Building (Alaa Al Aswany) as a starting point.
Read Here or at CuratorMagazine.com
The Sense of Redemption
The Curator
How important is “redemption” in a novel — or a life? An exploration of redemption and The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes.
Read Here or at CuratorMagazine.com
And Then Came Sebastian Barry
The Curator
Can language – our lives – instead of an actual event, stir up as much emotion in one’s soul? Is it the plot, or is it the words? My encounter with Annie Dunne by Sebastian Barry.
Read Here or at CuratorMagazine.com
