Newbery Post: Crispin the Cross of Lead and Walk Two Moons

Yes, it's another entry in my slow-and-irregular Newbery Medal series - I hope no one was holding their breath. 

Last year when I was subbing in various libraries around the city, I would scan the shelves for Newbery books and read them at breaks. I found these two at Mutchmor Elementary School.

Crispin, the Cross of Lead by Avi (Newbery Medal Winner 2003): Synopsis from Goodreads:

"Asta's Son" is all he's ever been called. The lack of a name is appropriate, because he and his mother are but poor peasants in 14th century medieval England. But this thirteen-year-old boy who thought he had little to lose soon finds himself with even less - no home, no family, or possessions. Accused of a crime he did not commit, he may be killed on sight, by anyone. If he wishes to remain alive, he must flee his tiny village. All the boy takes with him is a newly revealed name - Crispin - and his mother's cross of lead.

This was probably one of the best examples of a book targeted at the exact audience meant for the Newbery Medal books - middle-grade readers. There's not a whole lot of nuance, but for younger readers there is pathos, excitement, adventure, a suitably sympathetic and entertaining adult figure, and a big payoff of a plot reveal. There's enough history that you could write a paper on it and pull out a few impressive details about the period, as well as some good "compare your life to Crispin's" type of deal. 

So yeah, I wasn't blown away by this, but I think as a third-or-fourth-grader it would have held my interest. There were five Honor books that year (runners-up, essentially) and the only one I've read is Surviving the Applewhites. It's more contemporary and I probably liked it slightly more, but there's nothing wrong with getting kids to ingest a little historical knowledge with their fiction.

Walk Two Moons, by Sharon Creech (Newbery Medal Winner 1995): Synopsis from Goodreads: "How about a story? Spin us a yarn."

Instantly, Phoebe Winterbottom came to mind. "I could tell you an extensively strange story," I warned.
"Oh, good!" Gram said. "Delicious!"
And that is how I happened to tell them about Phoebe, her disappearing mother, and the lunatic.

As Sal entertains her grandparents with Phoebe's outrageous story, her own story begins to unfold — the story of a thirteen-year-old girl whose only wish is to be reunited with her missing mother.

In her own award-winning style, Sharon Creech intricately weaves together two tales, one funny, one bittersweet, to create a heartwarming, compelling, and utterly moving story of love, loss, and the complexity of human emotion.

I really liked this one, pretty much from the beginning. It was not at all what I was expecting. As with many of the Newbery books, I'd been aware of the title for years, and I always assumed it was about an indigenous girl quite far in the past. Instead it's contemporary, about a girl named Salamanca tree whose mother has some Indigenous blood, and truthfully the borrowing/mashing up/mutilating of Indigenous themes has not aged well and is quite painful at times. There is something right about the expression "Never judge a man until you've walked two moons in his moccasins", though (I think I read that the author found it in a fortune cookie). Sal's voice is strong and affecting and the dynamic between the two grandparents is really lovely. The author doesn't shy away from themes of loss and deep sadness, which I always think shows respect for young readers, who can often handle more than adults think they can. This was just a really great story - I cried at the end. Oh, but I have to mention that the teacher, Mr. Birkway, who is supposed to be a pivotal adult figure? He assigns journal writing to the class and then reads out embarrassing journal entries that are supposed to be private. It's all supposed to be in the name of revelation and empathy and shit, but if he did that to me, or my daughter? Heads would ROLL, people. Ahem. 

I also read a book called Firegirl by Tony Abbott from this library (the cover called out to me) and it was excellent. A girl disfigured by burn scars joins the middle-school class of Tom, the narrator, and predictably causes a stir. The author pitches the story just right, and I felt viscerally Tom's fear, discomfort, sympathy and torment as he tries to navigate reassessing his relationship with a selfish and opportunistic 'best friend' and being a friend to Jessica, facing customary fears about being accepted. It's not quite Wonder, but while I always appreciate a young readers' book that works on a lot of levels, there's something to be said for a book that addresses ten-to-twelve-year olds exactly where they are. 

Geez, book review posts are exhausting. On the other hand, I'm going to my awesome neighbour's birthday party tomorrow so expect a blurry picture of a margarita glass at best. Happy week-end. 

How Much Can No Blo?

I apologize heartily for saying that blogging was dead, particularly because Swistle is still busy KILLING it. I think it's safe to say that NaBloPoMo is kind of dead, at least in its original incarnation, since BlogHer doesn't seem to be running it anymore. This matters not a whit to me, since when I started doing it I was just copying a fellow blogger and didn't even really KNOW what the deal was, I just thought it was a cool (and terrifying and horrible and stupid) idea. I've done it every year since, even when I think I'm not going to, even when I've been a completely slothful waste of space leading up to it, and I am nothing if not a creature of (usually bad) habit. It also brings something hopeful to November, that damp stale dishrag of a month, so here we go.

Please be advised that my habitual disclaimer stands: there will be a post every day. Not a good post. Not a long post. Just a post. I will pontificate on the minutest of minutiae. I will post about things that I should have posted about six months ago and in all fairness should have lost my chance to post about. I will pimp out my children and friends ruthlessly (not really ruthlessly. There will be a modicum of ruth. Damn, it would be really cool if I had a friend named Ruth).

Let's talk about Halloween. Where are you in the Halloween arc? I am mostly out of it regarding my children. Angus is away (we texted him and asked what he was going as and he said "a Canadian"). Eve dressed up for our friends' annual Halloween party and for school, made her costumes and slayed it, but just went over to a friend's house for the evening and handed out candy. Halloween used to really stress me out when I had to figure out who my kids were going trick-or-treating with and if I had to go and feel like a schmuck walking along not-too-close not-too-far, often in the rain or snow. Matt was often away so I had to figure out how to deal with trick-or-treating and handing out candy here. It was just a big logistics nightmare. Last night he was home and did most of the handing out, just calling me to the door if there were particularly cute costumes. It was kind of nice. I felt like maybe I SHOULD miss the kids going out, but didn't really.

She still carves the pumpkins.

Doll from Coraline

Moth and lamp. (I know, I know, properly speaking the expression is "like a moth to a flame" but apparently there's a meme right now and it had to be a lamp. I thought it was a pretty good repurposing of her old purple fairy wings).

My Terrible, Horrible, Not-that-bad, Still-Kind-of-Good Day at Work

So this was a few weeks ago - my third shift, I think. To backtrack a bit, I had gone in to talk to the office administrator after my first shift and she had told me a place I could park where you're technically not supposed to park (by the dumpsters) because I'm out by 2:30. The second week I drove in and saw the spot I thought she meant, but it really looked like you shouldn't park there, so I parked on the street again and DOUBLE-CHECKED with her that it was the spot she meant. So today, I parked there.

I went into the library. Did I mention that the learn-to-play-ukulele club meets in the library at the recess that is just before my shift? So the environment is less-than-serene at the best of times? But today when I went to log in to the computer, it was stuck in an update. This means I can't check books in or out or look up whether anyone has books out. Did I mention that my first classes are all of the autism unit? Where routine is, shall we say, key?

So, okay. I will roll with it. The younger two classes come in and fortunately the teachers have a record of who brought their book back, so I just write down everybody's name and the bar code of the book they take - the autism classes are small, so it's not overwhelming. This all goes swimmingly. Then the older two classes come in. In the middle of the same routine, an announcement goes out that a black SUV is parked in front of the dumpsters and needs to be moved.

That was me. In front of the dumpsters. Where the office manager told me TWICE to park (I thought). So I tell the teachers I'll be right back and go out and the maintenance guy is standing there looking annoyed and I apologize profusely and say that I was told to park by the dumpsters, and he points to the back of the lot and says "she probably meant THOSE dumpsters", and honestly, as my friend Hannah says, how many dumpsters does it take to run a school ANYWAY?

So I rush back to the library, only to discover that the morning librarian has left and locked me out of the back room, where my purse is, with my key. Fortunately I realized I could beg to borrow one of the teachers' keys instead of having to go to the office and further humiliate myself (yes, I did go home and order a lanyard forthwith).

THEN, during the next class, another secretary asked over the speaker if "The Librarian" was there. I gaped for a minute until the teacher said (to me) "she can hear you" and (to her) "yes, she is". The secretary said there was a call for me on line 2. I went to to the phone. There were no buttons with line numbers. I stood there for a minute waiting for further instructions until the secretary came in and told me I had to come take the call in the office.

THEN, during the NEXT class, I have to throw down with some grade 3 chick over Amulet books. The other librarian who has been at the school for twenty years, has a shelf of more mature books and graphic novels that are only accessible to grade four and up. Did I mention that I have one class that's a grade three-four split? I had more or less determined to stick to the policy, but I haven't gotten entirely comfortable with just saying "because I said so". So one grade three girl tells me she's allowed to read Amulet books (graphic novel series) but she only has them at her dad's, so she'd like to borrow one to read at her mom's. So I say yes, like an idiot, partly because I'm wishy-washy and partly because I know what it's like to be a kid who reads above your perceived reading level - my dad used to have to come approve my books at the local library. Then this other grade three girl gets up in my face because if R. gets to take one then she should too. And I argue (again, like an idiot) that her parents have said she's allowed to read them and she has them at home. And the girl says "well if she has them at home, why does she need to borrow one?" (okay, solid point), so I blurt out (like an idiot, probably violating some kind of confidentiality rules), "only at her dad's!" And the girl says "oh, okay" and skips away happily.

Then there was another incident where a boy checked out an Amulet book, flipped through it and then brought it back in high dudgeon and insisted that I check it back in because of the naked blue man. So I said "oh, okay."

The good news is, ten to twenty years ago this would have sent me screaming from the building, never to be heard from again. Now? Meh. A lot of things went wrong and I handled them with varying degrees of skill, the lowest level being Very Low Indeed. Won't be the last time. I made stupid mistakes doing this kind of work for years as a volunteer. This time I made stupid mistakes and got paid.

Inarticulate Grunt of Exasperation

Why do I keep not blogging? Why? I don't want to stop blogging. I don't care that blogging is dead. I think of things to blog about daily. Then I go to bed and remember that I didn't blog. Then I  think that I'll just write a new post without mentioning the hitherto lack of blogging, but I can't seem to help myself there either. Also, as soon as I started writing this I realized the other problem - I have forgotten to upload pictures relevant to things I meant to post about, but if I go upload the pictures now, well we all know what will happen, right?

So I got a tiny little job. A tiny little job that is perfect for me in location, description and mostly duration (I could probably stand a few more hours, but whatever). For the past years while I've been home with the kids (and, increasingly, without them), I marveled at people with depression or difficult life events who said they liked having to go to work because it distracted them from their problems. I thought if I was having a bad stretch that having to go to work would make things worse.

And now I totally get it. Again, the hours I have to work are few, but whether I'm having a bad week or not, I LOVE going to work. I love doing the work. It makes me feel normal and productive and, wonder of wonders, it distracts me from my problems, real-world or head-type. Even the day where absolutely everything - EVERYTHING - went wrong (actually, I'll type that up and schedule it for tomorrow, for your collective amusement), I was glad to have been there.

Angus is settling in amazingly well at college. Well, okay, not amazingly well, but maybe a tiny bit surprisingly well. I thought he might be a little more homesick. I'm really glad he isn't. Matt and Eve and I went down with my parents for Family Week-end, which was on Canadian Thanksgiving, to watch an exhibition scrimmage game which was basically the team split into Freshmen/Sophomores and Upperclassmen. He was obviously on the younger half of the team, and they lost every game but not always by much, and he played really well.

Obviously we hit the bookstore to outfit the squad in team colours. Eve got a sweatshirt and fuzzy Elmira socks with actual little Soaring Eagles on them. She insisted on posing for a picture with her clothes on holding Matt's mug and sending it to Angus because "he will LOVE it, he will feel SO SUPPORTED."

I'm sure this brought a tear to his eye.

The next week-end he had a break so I drove down to get him and bring him home for a few days. We had a nice drive with some conversation and music discussion - we were playing music off my phone, which has every song downloaded by anyone on our family account ever, on shuffle. This means it's entirely possible to hear Billy Joel, Jay-Z, The Wiggles, Hannah Montana and Yo-Yo Ma within any given half hour. We each had veto power over whatever played next, but we could also ask each other to listen if we thought the song was worthwhile. It was fun. I still maintain that The Wiggles are nothing without Greg.
It was nice and a little weird having him home for a few days. Matt's in Asia for most of October, so Eve and I had settled into a nice little girly groove. I had to cook more stuff. There were Angus clothes in the wash. I had to see Venom (it wasn't that bad).

The kids spending quality time together.

They hated this. Hated it.

Then I drove him back. Didn't even get to use my well-rehearsed "no sir, I have never tried marijuana ever" answer, which is, I don't know, maybe a little insulting? I did declare my Red Velvet Oreos. 

There. That wasn't that hard. Why do I keep not doing it? Sigh. It's the Circle of Blog Life. 

Short and... Short

I went to bed exhausted and had vivid dreams about the kids being small again (and Matt wearing pink shorts, for some reason), and right now I don't feel like being rational and adult and phlegmatic about the whole thing - I feel like life has played a giant mean prank on me - here, have these tiny people, they're awesome and funny and will make you see whole new worlds, but they're also a giant pain in the ass so you won't be all that sad to see them go. NICE ONE, LIFE.

I've been trying really hard to live in the moment, realize that tomorrow is not promised, embrace the chaos - all your standard clichés. Being at this age where celebrities die and I'm surprised at how old they are and how young they still seem, seeing my parents getting older, feeling more and more mortal - I know how fast things can go if you don't pay attention. The thing is, they go fast even if you DO pay attention. And it's hard to know exactly HOW you're supposed to embrace the moment. I keep looking up from my book, seeing Lucy disappearing into Eve's room and trying to capture that moment - Eve still living here, Lucy still being alive, being halfway through this book instead of through five more - and then what do I do with it? I'm perimenopausal, I can't remember why I walked into this room, how am I going to keep all these moments? And then the moment you've captured the moment, you're into the next moment. It makes me start to feel panicky and weird. And panicky and weird is my default, I don't need to be piling on addition panic and weirdness.

Also, my allergies are turbo-charged and tyrannical right now. Wednesday as I was trying to get ready for my new job, about which I am ecstatic and excited, my right eye was watering so much it was like trying to stick a contact lens on a waterfall. I went through half a box of kleenex before stepping out the door. Is it possible to be mindful and grateful while also being unbelievably snotful? Well, yes - but it's a little less poetic.

Sometimes the Universe is a Dick. Occasionally She is Kind.

So my blog post last year on this day was complaining that I was overwhelmed about starting to look for a job and Angus was getting screwed around by the guidance office at school.

This week Eve is getting screwed around by the guidance office at school but today I had a job interview for a job - a very small job, a microscopic job, like a job that can barely be seen by the naked eye, but still, a job - and by the time I got home and texted by reference they had already called her, and then before lunch they called me and offered it to me.

I told Eve I was sorry if I sucked up all the luck this week.

I was determined not to get my hopes up, not because I thought I wasn't qualified, but because the job is so absurdly, stupidly perfect for me at this point in my life that it just seemed impossible that I would actually get it. (I don't mean by this that it pays a whole lot or anything, you get that, right? I mean it's close by, and a few hours in the middle of the week so I can manage it even when my brain is broken, and at a really lovely school where I love all the people I've met so far). I still don't really believe it.

So Eve's situation is that she got both of her easy electives first semester, making her semesters wildly unbalanced. A few of her friends were in the same situation, so guidance told them to make appointments and then we they got to their appointment they were all told that everything was full and nothing could be done. This was doubly disappointing for Eve because she has cooking with Chef V. this semester, and Chef C., who she had last year and adored, is teaching cooking next semester and said he would make room in his class for her, so she would have had better balance and the preferred teacher. It's frustrating, because obviously it's hard to balance a billion courses between a billion students and have everyone be satisfied, but in our experience the school seems to be exceptionally bad at it.

She's handling it really well, though. She made her own guidance appointment, talked to all the teachers, and when she found out it wasn't possible she started looking for positives in leaving the situation the way it is. Also, Chef V. is the 'mean chef', but by the end of the first day she said they were already 'kind of buddies' because she got 'Angus points'.

Matt and I are in an extremely petty battle of seeing who can hold off from texting Angus for the longest, and making fun of each other when we cave. The first day I said I wasn't going to text him at all he texted me first, which made Matt very bitter. Yesterday I said "did you text him?" and Matt said "yes, but I had to get him to--" and I yelled "IT DOESN'T MATTER, YOU FAIL".

And now I'm experiencing extreme adrenaline withdrawal from an early interview and a celebratory happy hour with my parents, and I might need a nap.

Roller Coaster of Emotions

A couple of weeks ago, two friends and I took our younger kids to Canada's Wonderland. We went down to Toronto on Monday, went to Ripley's Aquarium (it was magical, would go back in a heartbeat), walked around, had dinner at the Old Spaghetti Factory, spent the night in a weird hotel in Richmond Hill, and hit CW early on Tuesday. A rainy, rainy Tuesday. Like, the forecast started out rainy and got rainier, with multiple chances for thunderstorms. But we were committed, and, like Eve's friend Rachel said, hey, no lines.

So we marched into the (totally empty) park (every person at every checkpoint kept saying "you know there are no refunds, right?")  got sorted with lockers and rain ponchos, marched up to the Leviathan, filed on immediately (because no lines) and started chugging up the long, long, high hill. This was my thought process: "Hang on. I just got on. I wasn't sure I was going to get on. I'm just here because Eve wanted to come. Do I even like roller coasters? Did I ever like roller coasters? Did I just go on them to impress my boyfriend? Am I just doing this to impress my daughter? Or Collette? Perhaps I could have thought about this BEFORE I SAT DOWN IN THE FRONT ROW OF THE BIGGEST FREAKING ROLLER COASTER IN THE PARK?" Regrets, people. I had so many regrets.

So all summer we were preparing for Angus to move to Elmira New York for college. We washed stuff, we ordered stuff, we packed stuff. We went to all the summer action movies (that new Mission Impossible movie was way better than I expected). We went camping with all our friends and had a really great time. We went out for dinner with my parents. We assembled an assload of paperwork.

Then suddenly, here it was. We packed the van. We drove across the border (fairly smooth process that my husband stressed about for two months. The guy at the next desk with his 'simple assault charge' was having a way worse time). We unpacked and carried a bunch of crap up to the third floor of a residence in incredibly sweaty weather. We bought a bunch of stuff at Target (which has so many more different flavours of Oreos than we do, it's SO not fair).

And then... wait. Now we leave him here? He just lives here now? He doesn't live with us? Am I okay with this? Is this what I agreed to? This is the natural order of things. Right. Fine. It's good. It's right. It sucks a little bit. It's a little bit frightening. It makes your stomach feel a little bit weird. But it's also exciting. And hey, we're on this ride now. Might as well throw our hands in the air and embrace it.

(Metaphorically, I mean. Not on the actual roller coaster. There I was clutching that bar for dear life the entire time. Those things are really, really scary.)