The Florist's Daughter by Patricia Hampl

The Florist’s Daughter by Patricia Hampl is a deep exploration of two extremely influential individuals on the author’s life: her mother and her father, though much more emphasis seems to me to be on the mother. There's an intended irony, I think, in the author's title, the florist's daughter. Hampl has always considered herself "his girl," and throughout the book, Hampl shows us the benign relationship she has with her mom... at least until later in the book. The memoir could be considered a comparative analysis of Leo the Lion and Stan the Gentleman, interwoven with a final reconciliation of perception versus a broader reality that the narrator, as daughter, missed, and naturally - we aren't often granted a more objective stance from which to view our parents. The narrator’s position is, notably, bedside next to her dying mother, and throughout the book we are returned here, in the final days of this era; though we might go away from the bed for pages and pages to explore the past, we always return to the bedside.

Throughout the text, Hampl establishes parallels between her parents and the landscape. Her mother is the downtown store; her father is the greenhouse. Her mother is urban, her father is rural. Her mother is sophisticated/from up the hill; her father is wild/from down the hill. There’s uptown and there’s the greenhouse. There’s local and there’s travel. The landscape and geography of St. Paul and its surroundings serves as the perfect vehicle for Hampl to navigate the ways in which she finds herself relating—or not relating—to her parents. As Hampl explores the world of her childhood and her parents’ upbringing, the florist’s daughter gradually realizes that she is not just the florist’s daughter. With distance and experience, the depth of her mother within her surfaces along with an understanding of Leo the Lion. This revelation to the reader and the narrator, too, comes late in the memoir, when Hampl writes this single sentence paragraph: “And I’d thought I was his girl” (page 201).

There’s much to praise in Hampl’s rendering of her parents. Using key phrases and descriptions of her parents, she is able to establish and carry their personae throughout the memoir, reminding the reader who these people are. I am impressed by Hampl’s exhaustive descriptions and explanations of her parents. A perfect example is on page 52, when describing her father’s relationship to St. Paul:

“But the attention my father demanded was a world away from the note-taking watchfulness of my mother in the corners of charity balls. She was tracking. He was filled with wonder. St. Paul provided all the beauty a person needed—St. Paul and an occasional trip into the glory of the Minnesota lake country. Leo the Lion plotted guided trips to Ireland that he argued were a waste of time and money. The Thoreau of St. Paul, he said Europe could wait, he hadn’t seen all of Minnesota yet.”

This beautifully rendered sentence out the mouth of a lesser writer might have read: “My father loved St. Paul and didn’t care to go anywhere else, even though my mother tried to arrange trips to Europe.”

Lately I have been picking up on a writer’s use of key repetitions and their effectiveness. Even in this paragraph, I can grab “note-taking,” “charity balls,” and “Leo the Lion,” three prominent characteristics that Hampl has affiliated with her mother. This seems extremely useful to me in building a character across many pages of a book. They are unique details about a person that help us to understand who she is, and repeating them reminds us of these qualities.

Hampl is also a master of sequence and timing. The reader discovers truths about the narrator as they happen—we experience her naïveté in the florist’s shop with the navy man and the epiphany of the “almost rape” late in the book, not to mention her awakening to the relationship she has with her mother. It seems that as the scenes unfold, the narrator gradually comes to a clearer understanding of her mother, as if by sitting bedside in the hospital with her, she has turned on a slow defrost against a severely frozen windshield. By the end of the book, the windshield has been made clear so as to navigate the way from here forward.

Full Body Burden - Growing Up in the Nuclear Shadow of Rocky Flats

I recently finished Kristen Iversen's book, Full Body Burden: Growing Up in the Nuclear Shadow of Rocky Flats, an important and terrifying account of the dangers that lurk in the secrets of our personal and national lives.  It is especially important and worrisome as the Denver area experiences such dramatic flooding, stirring up buried plutonium deposits.

Kristen Iversen accomplishes what Michelle Herman called the “stealth memoir” at the River Teeth conference this spring. Iversen’s personal and family history is woven closely with the history of Rocky Flats in such a way that both story lines magnify each other. Any time that Kristen described Rocky Flats in terms of ground, water, and air contamination, history, health, etc., I immediately felt the weight of this information on Iversen’s family and storyline. And any time Kristen described her family’s activities, relationships, and experiences, the same weight of Rocky Flats pressed down on those scenes.

I’m certain that’s no accident. There are no scenes where I found myself wondering why she shared this information. Everything is critical to the unfolding of the story and contributes to the larger narrative about Rocky Flats. The power in this kind of paired narrative (personal memoir plus literary journalism/reportage) is that each works as a lens in a pair of 3-D glasses. You can see through one by itself, and you can see through the other by itself, but looking through both lenses makes the story pop off of the page. I would have had a much more challenging time digesting the information about Rocky Flats in all its heavy political history, health records, employee names, corporate lingo, and scientific data, but because Iversen has included her own family story, she gives her audience a tangible, accessible handle to grip while we navigate all of that information.

On the other hand, Kristen’s personal narrative (alcoholic father, boyfriend’s death, marriage and divorce and so on) is a plenty compelling tale on its own, but each and every scene she chose is quite literally in the shadow of Rocky Flats. It is a good example of a writer knowing exactly what she needs to hang onto in order to keep the reader going – her primary thread that runs through the narrative is always and importantly Rocky Flats.

It reminds me of what Cheryl Strayed said about Wild, she began every chapter “on the trail,” which seems to me to be a way of rooting the reader in time and space. In Iversen’s case, every one of her personal scenes has to, in some way, serve the story of Rocky Flats, whether directly or indirectly. We find out about friends she grew up with only to discover later their connection with the plant, or diseases they develop, or how their parents were connected. There is no reason to go into great lengths about her marriage and subsequent divorce except to state that it happened, she had two kids, and then jumps right back into Rocky Flats. Years, YEARS have gone by, but I don’t miss any of that information. Too much tangential information and I would have been wondering, “So what? How does this relate to the bigger narrative?”

In this way, Iversen is able to cover a tremendous span of time. With just the right amount of personal information to carry us through, we’re able to understand the arc and scope of Rocky Flats, its impact on the community from a personal level to a national/international level, and the degree of secrecy permeating the community—again, on a personal level and national level.

Another reason I appreciate Iversen’s story line is that without it, I would have felt lost as to when all of the events with Rocky Flats were taking place. Even with Iversen’s personal narrative, I often found myself thinking, “Wait, when did this happen?” It was also challenging for me to keep track of the different names of families and workers, which is often a problem for me in real life let alone in books. There were so many people impacted and so many people to include in the story. And yet, Kristen is able to make many of them into dynamic characters on the page, so that we see their personal stories right alongside her own.

Structurally, I thought Iversen’s technique of separating the Rocky Flats material (history, etc.) from her own personal storyline by white space and clear breaks in tone—the Rocky Flats material is all written in the style of reportage, concise and fact-driven, void of many personal references or first-person narration until she switches gears into her own story. Then, when her personal timeline merges with the Rocky Flats timeline, what we learn about Rocky Flats is naturally woven with what’s going on in her personal life, because Rocky Flats IS her personal life.

Outside of the timeline and names confusion, I found this book to be impressively written and researched. I was captivated (and frankly, horrified) by the level of secrecy, denial, and human error in environmental health as it relates locally in Colorado, nationally, and globally. It’s terrifying and eye-opening. I am grateful for this kind of work by such a strong writer. It is an important book.

Grace Notes by Brian Doyle

I JUST finished Grace Notes by Brian Doyle, literally just finished the last page and set it down on my desk and sat back in my chair and sighed that long, contented, choked up sigh of YES.  This!  

"...after fifty years, I am absolutely sure what I am supposed to do: sense stories, catch some by their brilliant tails as they rocket by, carve and sculpt them into arrows, and fire them into the hearts of as many people as I can reach on this bruised and blessed planet. That's all. That's enough."

Yes.

I've also read Leaping by Doyle, which was also SO GOOD.  These are the sorts of books and Doyle is the sort of author that makes you want to return to page one as soon as you've finished page 148.  The prose is lively and unexpected.  Conversational and intimate.  And most importantly, these short essays fire arrows into the hearts of readers.

That's all.  That's enough.

Book Seven 2012: Townie by Andre Dubus III

Townie by Andre Dubus III is the kind of book you can't help thinking about when you aren't reading it.  You live in its scenes while you are eating dinner with your kids or riding in the car, thinking about the narrator, wondering what is going to happen next, considering the plot development and the foreshadowing and how successfully the author ends chapters.  You find yourself missing what your husband said because you are still lost in the mill town bar fights, the father/son storyline, and the coming-of-age hunt for identity.

I was hooked from beginning to end, couldn't fall asleep last night until I finished it off.  What a book.

On top of the thrill of a great read, Dubus is going to be here for the Ashland University summer residency at the end of July.  And, a piece by him about writing memoir will be included in the next issue of River Teeth. I am one lucky gal.

I'm not sure what I'm reading next off of my 30th year book list.  After reading such a great book, it is hard to jump into another memoir, so I think I'm going to read some poetry for a bit.  I'm also reading a manuscript for a friend and want to dedicate some time to it this week while I am off of work. 

In the back of my mind is the hope that I'll also find time to write this week, maybe in the evenings after the kids are in bed, but I'm also aware of the kids laughing in the backyard pool, painting projects here and elsewhere, and the need to clean - laundry, dusting, bathrooms and all of the other chores that fall to the wayside for too long.  At the end of the week, BW and I are going out of town for a weekend, alone, by ourselves, without children.  Maybe then?  Probably not.  I have plenty of other things in mind for a weekend alone with my husband.

I might not be able to get the words on the page this week, but I am promising myself to at least think about the next essay, and maybe jump in next week, when we're back to the normal schedule.

For now, I'm going outside in my bathing suit with the kids to enjoy the non-writing hours.

Book 6, 2012: Beautiful and Pointless by David Orr

I just finished Beautiful & Pointless: A Guide to Modern Poetry by David Orr, and now I am sad.  It isn't often that I come across a person who cares so much about poetry but is equally as honest about the state of contemporary poetry, and that willingness to illuminate the reality of modern poetry and call it like it is was refreshing, humbling, and entertaining.  I'm not sad because of his honesty or the bleak portrait of modern poetry.  I'm sad because he was light, funny, and accessible, and now it is over, and now I must go back to actually reading contemporary poetry (ha ha ha).

Y'all know that I love poetry (really, I love poetry, not just like).  I come to poetry mostly from Dr. Seuss and Shel Silverstein and the simple pleasure of the way words felt in my mouth as I learned to read.  The music of poetry and the written word is unlike lyrics in that the rhythm resides solely in the words-- it cannot be buttressed by notes and chords, by percussion or strings.  That's where my love of poetry starts-- in play and in joy.  Plus, I am tone deaf, and while I will sing (badly), singing is a distinctly different kind of pleasure that involves high notes, low notes and all that fall between, while one focus of poetry is on the way the words rub up against each other, in stresses and unstressed syllables, in alliterations and rhyme. It sings without vocal range (thank God for that).

Next I find the poems I like most offer a magnified glimpse.  At something.  Anything, really.  Like a photographer, the poet zooms in and says, look what I found.  Or, listen to this experience I had once.  Or, doesn't this remind you of this other thing?  I love the metaphor.  I love the hidden truth revealed.  I love the "ah ha!" moment when I discover what the writer discovered, and I love to be on the writing end of that "ah ha!" moment, experiencing the surprise, too.  I like poems that invite me over for a cup of tea.

But I also like poems with depth and feeling, poems that struggle with questions-- big and little ones--poems that make demands, poems that are so personal they fold in on themselves and become universal.  I love poems rich in detail and rooted in scene.  I love storytelling and narrative, form and freeverse.  I even love the poems that require several run-throughs before the meaning reveals itself, if at all, poems with complex syntax that I have to cut into small pieces and digest slowly before I have any idea what's really going on besides initial awe.

So these are some of the reasons why I love poetry.  What is brilliant about Beautiful & Pointless is that Orr does not set out to defend poetry as the Art of Arts.  He shares with the reader a panoramic shot of the world of modern poetry, and he nails it, all of it-- the ego, the rubbing of elbows, the academic world, the private world, the public poet, the business of endorsements, the poem about the poem, and, most importantly, the reality that is so often forgotten in poetic circles, the fact that all of the people who actually read and value poetry could comfortably fit into one large athletic complex. 

This reality, for me, isn't discouraging.  There are plenty of niche groups in the world who are passionate about interests I have no desire to pursue (i.e., Star Trek. Basket Weaving. Hot Air Ballooning. Rowing. Etc.), and none of them are bemoaning the state of the world, the general neglect of their Art, or why collecting stamps hasn't entered the realm of popular culture. 

At the end of the century, maybe a dozen dead poets will find their work in the Norton Anthology tortured college freshman will read and be confused by.  The likelihood that I am one of those dead poets by 2100 is pretty, pretty slim (the likelihood that I AM a dead poet by 2100 is almost guaranteed, unless I live to be 118), SO, I think I will write whatever the heck I want to write, however the heck I want to write it, and I better darn well have a good time doing it, because chances are me and a handful of my closest friends and family will read the things, and then just two or three will actually care, so if I'm not having fun along the way, then why, why keep it up? 

I love poetry.

Read Beautiful & Pointless: A Guide to Modern Poetry by David Orr.  You might not walk away wanting to jump into the latest issue of Poetry Magazine or jump online to order a subscription for Rattle, but you will have a fresh perspective on the wild and crazy world of the contemporary poet, you will laugh a little-- mostly at yourself, if you are a poet.

(Chiseling away at my book goal for 2012! Have you read any good poets lately?  Or good books about poetry?)

Books 4 & 5, 2012: A Double Life and Bring Down the Little Birds

In the quiet hours after my children fall asleep, after the whining and the bickering, after the requests for snacks and meals and drinks and games and puzzles and cars and hold me and carry me and tuck me in and sing me a song and just one more song, after all of that, I am the mother in Bring Down the Little Birds by Carmen Gimenez Smith.  All I want is me for a minute.  Me.  Who is that?  Separate from mother, distinct, other-- is there such a division?  Can there exist such a division?  Bring Down the Little Birds is a quick and unsettled memoir searching for identity, balance, and some kind of reconciliation... or perhaps at least a handshake... between the many roles, wants, and needs of a mother who is also a daughter who has a mother who had a mother once too, who all had other selves they protected or neglected or hid or buried or dissolved entirely from their lives as mother.

I hear Edna Pontellier.  In those quiet hours alone, sometimes I hear myself.

---

Tonight I rolled on our bed with Henry, blew raspberries on his belly and he laughed and squirmed and laughed. He patted my face with his pudgy palm.  He concentrated on the blank screen of my phone and pushed with all his might to make it do something.

Earlier, I watched Miss Lydia kick a soccer ball and felt my heart swell with pride and wonder at how she's gotten so tall and fast, how determined she is, and I wondered at the complicated blending of personality and skill sets and talents and looks and how similar and different she is from her brother, and how much alike and different the boys are from each other, and so on.  How we are a unit.

I was frustrated to be standing out in 40 degree weather watching a soccer game with my kids and also proud of myself for managing all three kids, proud of her competitive drive, proud of my boys under blankets in the wagon, proud to give this to them, this part of myself, this time.

The more I give of myself the more I seem to get back.  The more I give of myself while retaining my self, my identity, the fuller I experience my life.  It is not this or this or this, not one piece of myself exchanged for another without negotiation.  It is this and this and this and this.  And all of these things make me.  This is the reality echoed in Lisa Catherine Harper's book, A Double Life.  In it, she celebrates with awe and wonder the changing self, the changing sense of who she is as writer, wife, and now mother, how each feeds the other, and how both home and self/career are good and important places.  She shares with the reader the transition of becoming mother and what that can look like.  It is a memoir that celebrates a relatively normal pregnancy, a relatively normal delivery, and a relatively normal first year.  It is a memoir that celebrates.

Two memoirs about motherhood.  Two vastly different approaches, both real and true and beautiful.  I recommend both.

Book Three 2012: Pitch by Todd Boss

So, I finished another book toward my thirtieth year goal to read ten books, A Double Life by Lisa Catherine Harper, but I just started Bring Down the Little Birds by Carmen Gimenez Smith, and I think it'll be fun to blog about those two together, since they are both on mothering.  Instead, let me tell you about Pitch, the second collection of poems by Todd Boss.

I love Todd's work.  There are not many poets paying as close attention to the music of poetry as Todd. Because I have so much fun reading his poems, it seems clear to me that he had to have had a blast writing them.  They are tight, twisting, leaping little things, short lines jammed and enjambed with rhythms that drive you through the poems and straight on through the book.  There's nothing laborious about this collection - every page makes me want to find out what fun Todd is going to have in the next piece.

This is not to say that the poems are all sunshine and butterflies; Todd's subject matter is deeply felt, familial poems, subjects familiar to any reader who has ever had a father or mother, or been a father or mother, or had a childhood, or bore a child.  They ricochet off each other like marbles, as in "Marble Tumble Toys," and they consider the commonplace right alongside the cosmos, as in "Lordship."  There are really too many good and lively poems that seem to be jumping on a trampolene to cite them all here.  In fact, I think I'll leave you with the words of Robert Root, whose endorsement I just discovered on the inner jacket of the book:

"A poem by Todd Boss will often delight me, amuse me, stir me, surprise me, and startle me. All that from a single poem, from almost any poem. What seems to promise something commonplace ends up offering something profound, an unexpected insight in the slightest turn of phrase."

There it is. I aspire to that kind of writing. For me, a great collection of poems makes me want to try to write great poetry, compels me to my computer or my notebook or the back of a random receipt.  Like a wild-haired conductor, Todd's work spurs along the desire to draft my own music.