Prologue (3-5): Imprinting the Land

In Annie Dillard's Prologue to An American Childhood, she writes about what the land is and what it once was, tracing its genealogy back through the ages, where only woodpeckers and the occasional "gang of empty-headed turkeys" came through the quiet forests of Pennsylvania (4). She seems to take meaning for her own life from the land she inhabits, writing that "when [all] else has gone from [her] brain," including the faces of her family, "what will be left [...] is topology: the dreaming memory of land as it lay this way and that" (3). How does land touch us so--make us feel grounded, concrete, real? How is it, when we touch the earth, it reaches down inside us, grabbing onto some oft forgotten core? And how is it that despite all the changes the land sees, it still remains the same underneath the frantic rat race of life?

Dillard's passage inspired me to revisit the land with my own brood. Maybe something would leave an imprint. At the suggestion of Sydney's physical therapist, the uphill hike around Cress Creek gave direction to desire.

When we arrive, I close my eyes, blinking at the bright sun that glints against interpretive signs along the trail--signs imprinted with discoveries about the faulted land near my native Rexburg. Cress Creek tells the story of the land along the South Fork of the Snake River in Eastern Idaho. Cottonwood trees, some housing eagles' nests, surround the Snake, their leaves shaking with bright yellows and oranges in the late fall wind. Cattails rest in the low marsh. Along the trail, we learn that Indians used the land for food, trappers for pelts, and later settlers for homes and farmland that now expands across areas neighboring the Cottonwoods. At each subsequent age, the land has served a new need, but part of it always remains unchanged.

An old stagecoach trail intersects the same vision as distant, dormant volcanoes, volcanoes that once rained ash across the landscape. That same ash now composes a large portion of the rock along Cress Creek. Tuff, with its various fragments of fused detritus, tells a story entirely its own. Earlier than the Indians but sometime after volcanic eruptions, the creek comes running down the mountain. Sagebrush, Bitterbrush, Utah and Rocky Mountain Junipers arise from a seemingly dead environment to feed deer and other mountain animals. Watercress grows in the creek water, warmed by geothermal heat, and moose arrive to feed.

In the present, my kids run from post to post, searching for tracks, doo-doo, what Liam calls, "Blue's Clues" --anything that might denote an animal roamed across the same dirt. They identify some excrement along the trail as coyote scat, and I don't have the heart to tell them that it most likely came from a species of domestic dog: "Watch out; I think I just heard a coyote in the brush!" They scream and scatter.

My kids would have given their snacks, shoes, siblings to have glimpsed live animal inhabitants, an eagle, rabbit, lizard--anything. Wrong day? Wrong time? Should we have hiked with those trappers of old in order to make that stable and unchanging connection we're so eager to feel with the land? Like my children, I too long to visit some earlier time and place, be transported to experience June rhododendrons in early settled Pennsylvania, where Annie writes, "tall men and women lay exhausted in their cabins, sleeping in the sweetness, worn out from planting corn" (5). I have planted corn; I have slept, exhausted in my bed--but I would give something spectacular to smell those June flowers. We look to the land for comfort, but sometimes what we're searching for isn't there. The eagle passed at a different time of day. The flowers on Cress Creek faded in late summer. If the routines of my life don't organically intersect with settlers, summer, sweetness, I can close my eyes, wait nine months, two years, a half an hour--and suddenly the world is a new place with new possibilities. This is my latest discovery.

Wait for it. We close our eyes, and the world turns around again.

I've seen it happen over and over lately. Each day brings brilliant new surprises. Everything on the land changes for Dillard, from one space of time to the next. Yet across all those passages of time, there are connections, just as Dillard connects the spaces of time during her childhood into one vivid and amazing tapestry, a tapestry as brilliant as each of our own lives. One minute I'm tickling my kids before bed, the next I'm researching scholarly articles, shaking off single guys at LDS dances, responding to student grievances, planting corn. If only I could take a step back and view the marvelous pattern of it all--the landscape not of Cress Creek in the 1800s, 1925, or Pennsylvania in the 50's, but the landscape of my own life. It is the landscape, the topology, that gives meaning and purpose, guidance and direction to our lives. The tapestry, the topology, the hill's curves and juts, the winding river, the cattails in the low marsh, the "land as it lay this way and that."

Next week--Prologue (7-9): Play Me Some Soul Music

A Year of Annie Dillard :)

Book club, my house, this past Friday on Annie Dillard's An American Childhood--and not one soul showed their face. (You know who you are!) In truth, their absence was a gift. Spurred by a recent breakup, I started reading. Within 15 minutes, reading drove me to writing. The non-arrival of my book club members was divine intervention of a sort. I woke up through the pages of Dillard's text... Oh, my voice called out through the pages, it's "You again!" (12).

For me, Dillard's book is about rediscovering how to live a vibrant life through the unblinking eyes of childhood. She notes, "Everywhere, things snagged me. The visible world turned me curious to books; the books propelled me reeling back to the world" (160). Dillard (and recent life experiences) have "propelled me reeling back to the world," despite Doctorate classes, managerial work, and single motherhood with three young kids--or perhaps because of those things, I've been given a second look at life.

In my reawakening, I began wondering: What if I read a few pages of Dillard each week and then acted on what I read, much like the once fascinating descriptions of rocks drove me to geology and camp-outs in Southern Utah? If Annie was playing guitar, I would pick up the dusty Acoustic from the basement and pluck out "Fearless Heart," like my favorite missionary companion used to play before bed. Then, I would write about it. I would find a way to push past the fenced boarders of my life--graduate school, packed lunches, TGL Reports--and remember what it felt like to live. This I've determined to do.

Annie examines life. She examines it even as she lives it. She awakens and reawakens to find herself on different areas of the globe, under a different set of constellations, and she muses about connections between all those different spaces in time. I'm trying to do the same. Where was I last year, the year before? Stumbling? I do not stumble tonight. Tonight I write under a dark grey roof, Orion on the east horizon, Gemini bordering his arm, and Taurus above, with his red eye, Aldebaran, gazing down. His beauty marks me, and I transcend Annie's pages. What more will I yet discover in this world?

Prologue: Let Reading Go to Your Head

In 1955, when Dillard was ten years of age, her father left on a river trip that would take him from their home in Pittsburgh, down the Mississippi to New Orleans--a place he hoped would revitalize his predictable life with rough, hot, jazz (6-7). What prompted the trip? The book, Life on the Mississippi. I hate to open those pages lest I find myself on a river trip as well. Dillard's father quit his job, packed his boat, and left home with a whistle on his lips. Though he only made it as far as Louisville, Frank Doak and his daughter, Annie, teach us something in the story: Don't live a life of regret. Dillard's every word beckons readers to reawaken, reexamine, reinvest, and remember what it means to live.

Let reading go to your head. Imagine, invent, fantasize--then act. Try it, and I'll try it along with you.

Next week--Prologue (3-5): Imprinting the Land

Wrestling the Unmaker

Anyone who has ever spent a holiday in my presence knows how highly I consider food. Food--a basic necessity that sustains life but often offers more than just physical nourishment. It can, at times, feed our emotional needs. Food, like a good book, can be comforting. Today, for instance, over a bowl of yellow thai curry with potatoes, carrots and chicken, I remembered single days, working on a Master's thesis and enjoying the tenacious connection I had with my roommate, Kaydee. At a Vietnamese restaurant in Logan, Utah (a restaurant that no longer exists), we often discussed life, the future, and trivial bits, like what Pink was wearing in her latest video. Today, with a mouth full of rice paper, crunchy cucumber, shrimp and peanut sauce, I felt those bygone days reach down and swipe my face like a brush (Dillard, "New Name" posting).

So, there you have it. The sensory act of eating can traverse whole canyons in our lives--and food plays the part of bridge. When my former marriage counselor/current grief (relief?) counselor reiterates, "You are the most important person to you, so you need to take time for yourself!" I think, "Fine. Let's eat!" Seriously, though, I understand that I need to do something each day, and perhaps multiple times in that day, to rejuvenate my soul. Am I shallow if gardening and constructing something from the harvest does that for me? It's an act of creation, one where we get to fulfill our status of designers and architects, battling types of destruction that persist in the undoing all around us. I remember a book teaching the same principle (though not with food) years ago. In it, Orson Scott Card's prophet, Taleswapper, relates:

"War is the Unmaker's ally, because it tears down everything it touches [...] fire, murder, crime, cupidity, and concupiscence break apart the fragile bonds that make human beings into nations, cities, families, friends, and souls."

[...]

"Sposing I believe you," said Alvin. "Sposing there's such a thing as the Unmaker. There ain't a blame thing I can do."

A slow smile crept over Taleswapper's face. He tipped himself to one side, to free up his hand, which slowly reached down to the ground and picked up the little bug basket where it lay in the grass. "Does that look like a blamed thing?"

"That's just a bunch of grass."

"It was a bunch of grass," said Taleswapper. "And if you tore it up it'd be a bunch of grass again. But now, right now, it's something more than that."

"A little bug basket is all."

"Something that you made."

"Well, it's a sure thing grass don't grow that way."

"And when you made it, you beat back the Unmaker."

"Not by much," said Alvin.

"No," said Taleswapper. "But by the making of one bug basket. By that much, you beat him back." (128-29)

Alvin does with grass what I do with food. He creates. How do we contend with destruction in our lives? How do we wrestle those Unmakers who would tear down all we've built? We continue to create in whatever manner we can.

Therefore, I offer two dishes for your consider-ation, made with my own hands, with as many base materials as I could muster. The first I'm including because honestly, it took me the better part of a day to fashion into being. The taste, though earthy and hearty and satisfying, didn't last that long--so I have to show something else for my efforts: Mozzarella Pizza Bombs. Homemade dough, homemade tomato sauce, buffalo mozzarella, fresh garden basil, and hot oil to fry the delectable combination.

Every once and a while, the food that comforts is not heavy. Think of those times when your body craves water--something pure, something cleansing, refreshing. This was my latest experience with the neighbor's garden salsa. They hauled me into their home for dinner, after babysitting my three rug rats--and I'm so glad they did. I was still thinking about the nachos and salted cucumbers hours later, and since then, I determined to make my own salsa--no recipe.

Fresh, plump, sweet, garden tomatoes, garlic, cilantro, green peppers, onions and lime, salt and pepper. Heaven on a plate and beauty in your mouth. Wholesome, I could feel it beating back that Unmaker--at least until next mealtime. :)

Works Cited

Card, Orson Scott. Seventh Son. New York: TOR, 1987.

The EMP

Seventeen years ago this month, I listened to an ordained patriarch tell me about my life. Ever since that day (due to allusions of tumultuous times) I thought I would live through some horrendous last-days episode--you know, the ones you play out in your mind where bombs explode in open fields and you have to travel cross-country to colonize with other survivors, filtering your own drinking water, growing gardens and hunting to remain alive. For some reason, I always imagined myself as a widow, but with some older, protective son and a brood of children, battling through the physical trials and hardships of a telestial world together. In my dream-vision, I felt strong.

The feeling subsided as I began my own family in earnest. Why would I want to believe anything could harm them? I focused on the typical Christian goals: get married, have children, support your husband, nurture your family, serve--yet somewhere in the middle of all this, I lost a portion of my strength. Perhaps I just misplaced it. Then, nearly two years ago, my parents began re-implanting the final days' scenarios through talk of a church series aptly entitled, The Great and Terrible. Though the series delivered somewhere in the middle, only to take a nosedive near the end, one element intrigued us all: the EMP.

EMP stands for electromagnetic pulse, and in Chris Stewart's end-of-days drama, it takes out every kind of electric energy as well as cell phones and car batteries. Set off by a nuclear warhead detonated in the upper atmosphere, the EMP brings man back to the Dark Ages. Chaos rules from Washington D.C. to California. As power-hungry political players make grabs at the government of an already devastated nation, the average American is left to simply survive. Engrossed by the series, I told Duane we needed to bulk up and get tough, to be able to pick up one of our kids (as Johnny Depp once mentioned in an interview) and run for a mile while hauling them. Imagining highways full of abandoned vehicles and city streets taken over by gangs, I started running again--just around the block. I began lifting weights and reinvesting in the mile. At the urging of both parents and family, I stored more food, filling cupboards and the garage with powdered milk, soup and pudding mixes, flour, sugar, dried beans and peanut butter. We ordered dried fruit and dehydrated eggs for Christmas, along with flashlights that required no batteries, hand-operated wheat mills, propane burners, and water purifiers.

What I never realized in all of this planning was that the EMP I so feverishly anticipated was of quite a different caliber than the one described in Stewart's book series, and in some ways, more impacting. The EMP hinted at in my future was already living in my house. I had been sleeping next to it for years. I'd even been adapting my cooking to feed its peculiar appetite. How could I have been so stupid?! It had been giving off little warning signals--a ticking, a soft beeping--for the past seven years, like some type of active bomb... Finally, it exploded.

Now, instead of imagining missiles and tsunamis, I wonder how many of the battles and wars of the last days we will fight in our own neighborhoods and in our own homes. How many of us will lose friends, husbands, sons, daughters, parents, siblings in that struggle? And why do people like I wait for some catastrophic, physical event to occur, although the disintegration of society is well underway all around us? Still, one correlation between intimate EMPs and public--even global--natural disasters that cannot be denied is the inborn compulsion to survive, to heal, and to live again. When disaster strikes, and you raise your head out of the pounding surf, if you find the boon of friendly faces when you look about you, you take hold of those hands, you pull yourself up, and you begin again. If I've learned anything in the past couple months, it is to hold firmly. Hold onto friendly hands; hold to the things you know to be true--those things that remain throughout and even after the storm.

Works Cited

Stewart, Chris. The Second Sun. Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2007.

Confession of a Humpback Mother

I live on a strict budget. It's true. I never spend more than I make, and I always pay off credit cards completely when the bill arrives. However, one simple website tempts me... and on several occasions, I've punched in the card numbers without knowing exactly how I would pay the bill. Lately, dear readers, due to circumstances I'm sure you're already aware of, I've been forced to come to grips with overcoming my pinpoint shopping addiction. And the first step is, of course, confession.

I am a Gymboreeoholic. Holding one of their coupons burns a hole in the coupon folder. Seeing a 60%-off sale message in my in-box quickens the pulse just a bit. Please, don't judge. Just give me this slight obsession without ridicule. Let me hang onto this cherished fault without seeking an intervention--yet. If confession is the first step, I'm not yet ready for what follows. And if I'm honest with my confession, I know I'm already planning a desperate look of what's new in the fall lineup when Gymbucks come due this Thursday. I know once I allow myself to click the link directing me to their front door, I've already caved, despite whatever justifications I tell myself: kids are always growing; the weather's always changing. Jeans get holes. Perhaps there is some truth to those reasonings, but if I'm really going to get help, I have to recognize that part of the hold Gymboree has is comfort.

When I slice open a freshly-mailed Gymboree box, crack open the carefully and individually packaged skirts, gymmies, sweaters, jeans, T-shirts, I feel comforted. At times, we all buy things we think will bring us peace, and how harmful can cotton really be? Ah... a knit jumper. Soft, striped leggings. Corduroy pants. They make me feel safe, like a favorite blankie, even if I can't wear the clothes myself anymore. Wrapping my kids in comfort, comforts me. Is this wrong? Is this perceived notion of safety and security misguided?

At the end of a long work day, once the family is wrapped in fleece or cotton contentment, I pull out another purchased luxury and I snuggle with the kids, in bed, to read it. Paper might not feel soft against your cheek; however, cut and printed with ink, it can also succor aching hearts. So here's my secondary, possibly not necessary, confession. Around two weeks ago, in a mangled and confused state of grief (while Duane had the kids), I visited Barnes and Noble and spent $100. Woah, I know--that might not be much to some of you, but to this mother on a budget, I had to suppress the numbers on the receipt to enjoy the simple satisfaction of the books. Ah... the books.

I like keeping shelves full of books in every room, including my kids' rooms. Just having them standing guard in my own personal library reminds me of something I once read in school:

We come to feel that the books we own are the books we know, as if possession were, in libraries as in courts, nine-tenths of the law; that to glance at the spines of the books we call ours [...] allows us to say, "All this is mine," as if their presence alone fills us with their wisdom, without our actually having to labour through their contents. (Manguel 245)

At times that physical ownership, the books on the shelf, the library, can make you feel empowered with knowledge or at least the promise of knowledge. And with that promise comes the hope that you can make it through today, tomorrow, and the months and years yet to come.

So, can money buy happiness or can books and clothes provide comfort, identity, direction? Is the promise of their support and sympathy misguided? I hope not entirely. They are certainly not the end-all answer to our grief, but perhaps they can give us a moment of peace to figure things out. Case in point: last night, half piled on top of each other, we read a section from The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Animals of the World (one of the Barnes and Noble purchases) on martens and weasels, nocturnal animals that hole up in hollow trees during the day and eat everything from berries and nuts to any meat they can catch, including both squirrels and frogs. According to author Tom Jackson, "They kill their prey with their long, curved claws and sharp teeth" (158). How can a ravenous and wild marten be comforting? Let me explain.

Sydney's new morning ritual--watching "Champions of the Wild" on Animal Planet--inspired the encyclopedia purchase. She wants to know where these animals live, what they eat, how they sleep, and where they fit into her world. Sydney is a child who doesn't bat an eye when lions bound on the rumps of antelope, biting and clawing their prey into submissiveness, nor when leopards tug their leaden dinners up neighboring trees, entrails exposed. I suppose she's seen plenty of pain at home, and I've come to realize that the animal world is less a horror and more a comfort, when you have the right perspective. Not all fathers stay with their children. Like humpback whales, many mothers in the animal kingdom raise their offspring alone. Others, like meercats, rely on the community. And weasels emerge at night to rip apart inattentive frogs. It's not a pretty sight, but that's life.

None of us want to sleep next to a weasel, yet there's comfort in knowing you're not the only absent- minded frog or lone humpback whale or any other number of bizarrely behaving animals in the world. You might be pathetic, but you're not alone. Ironically, when you've felt the rawness of life brush past you in your inner sanctum, there's comfort in seeing the crude and unedited as a real and natural part of life on Earth.

So, next time life claws you ragged, my latest suggestion is: pull on some soft gymmies, plump up the pillows, and snuggle down with a good book--one that doesn't sugarcoat the natural scenes of life. You don't have to spend a fortune, but sometimes even monetary purchases can provide consolation and insight.

Works Cited

Jackson, Tom. The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Animals of the World: A Guide to 840 Amphibians, Reptiles and Mammals from Every Continent. China: Fall River Press, 2009.

Manguel, Alberto. A History of Reading. New York: Penguin Putnam, 1996.