Jeannine Atkins

Yesterday I gave a talk called Once Upon a Time: A History of Children’s Literature to a group of about forty seniors at Greenfield Community College. http://www.gcc.mass.edu/community_education/senior_symposia.html
It was sort of my semester course shrunk down to about an hour and a half. We began with fairy tales



And horn books



And Mother Goose



We took swift looks at Alice in Wonderland, Beatrix Potter, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Winnie-the-Pooh, The Hobbit, then scrambled through Little Golden Books, Dick and Jane, and The Cat and the Hat.

Of course we looked at picture books, most lucky children’s introduction to literature, though I resisted the temptation to just pull a few out and read. People seemed happy to see images of old friends – Wanda Gag’s cats and McCloskey’s ducks --and meet new ones: Brian Selznick's The Invention of Hugo Cabret got a lot of oohs and ahs. And yay, my fifty plus powerpoint images went off without a hitch. Afterward, a couple introduced themselves as Dick and Jane. I also saw two old friends and Nancy Frazier, who’d been my husband’s boss when I met him, overseeing black and white illustrations for the local newspaper. She said, “We had a lot of fun.”

I spoke on the invitation of Margo Culley, who currently oversees the senior symposia program, and years ago was my professor for a class called Lost New England Women Writers, a course which ignited my passion for research. I was so lucky to have her as a professor, and am so lucky to be friends with her all these years later.

Last night I went to the Odyssey Bookshop http://www.odysseybks.com/ to hear Harriet Reisen talk about her new biography for adults: Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind Little Women. Like many of us, Harriet Reisen’s passion began as a girl reading her way through Louisa’s novels, and grew during the past twenty years of writing this biography and co-producing a film biography which will be aired Dec. 28 as part of American Masters on PBS. She talked about conversations with costume designers about making the linen outfits the family wore on the utopian farm, Fruitlands. There were visitors, many of whom wrote journals, but while Henry David Thoreau, for example, might lavish pages on a tree, there’s no written description of the tunics and bloomers. The costumers did their best with this period when the Louisa was ten and her family avoided cotton, because it was based on slave labor, and wool, since it relied upon unconsenting sheep, and leather: though practical Mrs. Alcott surely insisted on shoes once the weather got cold. As authors we can do our best with words, but costumers and illustrators have to get more specific. Here’s what illustrator Jean-Paul Tibbles did with the cover of my book (Putnam 2001).



Like Harriet Reisen, the topic of the Alcotts is one I could go on and on about. I liked that the quote from the diary Louisa wrote when she was ten – how she and her older sister Anna were called to a meeting to see if the family should stay together -- which inspired my novel also kind of broke her heart. I loved hearing a few research stories: the unanswered phone calls, the plodding, the serendipity of a letter that fell out from a volume at a used book store with a phone number at the end. Harriet Reisen read two excerpts, and it’s clear she worked hard not only to elegantly and truthfully show Louisa, but put her vividly into the context of her time and place. Harriet Reisen loves a material world both for its clues and color. And she shows Louisa as a runner. Often twenty miles a day.

She cited authors who have been influenced by Louisa Alcott including Simone de Beauvoir, Cynthia Ozick, and J.K. Rowling. I might add more than half the the writers I know. I look forward to reading the biography and seeing the television documentary, with a script that is all quotes, many from Louisa’s diaries and letters, with some commentary by scholars.

I know it’s been a banner year for pine cones, since I’ve been stumbling over them in the woods, and I know there’s some scientific explanation about the cycles in which they grow, but I can’t tell you what that is. Yesterday Tamra Wight tamra_wight mentioned on Facebook that scientists say it’s impossible to be sad while looking at the sky.

Add a tree, and you can be ecstatic. Here’s what I saw looking up through a pine and an oak. Thanks, Tami! And there look like more blue skies today.




And a little later in the afternoon.

I just saw the just slightly edited copy of an article about Margarita Engle’s verse novels and histories I wrote for Book Links magazine, to appear in their January issue. It’s called Green Paths and Open Views: The Poet Slave of Cuba, The Surrender Tree, and Tropical Secrets. The editor was so sweet, as was Margarita, who I interviewed by email. Book Links will print that interview with the article, and I’m happy others will get to be inspired by Margarita’s wonderful vision and imagination. I can't say the article was fast to write, still, compared to a book, not so much, and it's satisfying to see something complete.

And I got some possibly fun news about my book, Girls Who Looked Under Rocks. A big movie company wants to feature the book on the set and asked for rights to do so. I would be a proud mom in the audience if this happens. And hope the movie is a good one! Hey, the love interest is a woman naturalist.

Yesterday morning I enjoyed a walk seeing yellow leaves, red sumac, milkweed fluff, winterberry, West Brook, and an intrepid bit of blue someone planted on a bent tree intent on survival.



This morning I’m working hard on revisions, and in the afternoon tackling a presentation, so please join me if you can. Lorraine, I’m happy to hear you pushed past your stuck point yesterday, hanging out with Amy! And I’m ready to roll, after having the pleasure of witnessing Jo – in person! -- finish a draft in Esselon café yesterday. It’s not a myth after all. Even if one draft rolls into another, coming to an end is possible.

Also yesterday I came home with a bag of local apples, as did my husband. So apple crisp might have to be made. Cinnamon, nutmeg, a bit of maple syrup: maybe the smell will coax the muse.

I had a great afternoon talking about books at Smith Campus School in Northampton, MA. Thank you Sabra Aquadro and other organizers! And I got to listen to Patricia MacLachlan, author of Sarah, Plain and Tall, as well as many other books, read poems about dogs. Here she is holding a picture of herself when she was young.



Richard Michelson read from Did You Say Ghosts? while authors Heidi Stemple (back) and Corinne Demas listened, waiting for their turn to read.



What a thrill to hear Grace Lin read from Where the Mountain Meets the Moon. It’s exciting to see such a gorgeously illustrated novel.



Librarian Nancy Brady took this picture of me, Grace Lin, Anna Alter, Diane deGroat, and Shelley Rotner.



There was a lot of professional talent in that room, but the students, oh my gosh. We were given gift bags where I found, besides really good chocolate, cards the children had made on the theme of Great Changers. Here are two inspired by my picture books. Inside one card Abby wrote about Mary Anning. An excerpt: “She loved the sea as much as a lion loves his dinner. She loved her work.” I think you can see that from the beautiful grin she gave Mary. Hey, prying out a seventeen foot long ichthyosaur fossil has got to be some fun.



And Lila wrote, “…Aani made a great change in the seventies.
Whenever someone said, ‘Can I cut down some trees?’
She would say, ‘No.'
… She was peaceful
She was as peaceful as one tiny leaf falling
Were you scared, Aani?"

Excuse me while I go try to write another book that might be worthy of these readers.

Slow writers can be friends with fast writers, yes? I’m rooting for friends who are trying to write a novel in a month. Cheering and amazed, even when the goal is for a very rough draft, or getting in the habit of sprinting past internal censors. And in my area, Leslea Newman http://www.lesleakids.com/, who is currently the very active and imaginative poet laureate of Northampton, MA, was inspired by NaNoWriMo to start a 30 poems in 30 days project.
You can read about it here: http://www.northamptonartscouncil.org/view/web/id/7746/title/30_Poems_in_30_Days_Project_

Leslea has done wonderful things for our community, such as getting poems in the local newspaper and poetry books into doctor’s offices. Now money raised by this project – she suggests anything from a nickel to a dollar a poem --will benefit the Center for New Americans, http://www.cnam.org/ which supports literacy and education for people new to our part of Massachusetts. From what I’ve read, many who’ve learned language and computer skills here go on to help others, making this agency both cost-efficient and friendly to those who might arrive with trepidation.

I know myself. I’d be beating myself on the head trying to write a poem a day, and would be left in the dust, tinkering, though Leslea says they just have to be poems, not good poems. But I’m going for the bystander role, sponsoring Dina Friedman d_dina_friedman who’s in my writing group. Dina writes:. “I'm seeing it as a goal to be disciplined and use the form to pay closer attention to language. I find that focusing on poetry from time to time really helps my fiction writing.” Other participants include published poets such as Leslea, Jane Yolen, Corinne Demas, Katha Pollitt, and Amy Dryansky, while others may be writing some of their first poems, or first poems in years. And all sorts of poets in between, with everyone welcome. It’s about having fun for a great cause.

Have you written a poem today? Go! if you can. And cheer on our friends if you can’t.

This Monday, November 2, from 3 to 5 I’ll be talking about and signing books at the Smith College Campus School on 33 Prospect St, Northampton, MA.

I’ll be in great company. Other authors and illustrators include Patricia MacLachlan, Grace Lin, Anna Alter, Marguerite Davol, Diane deGroat, Barbara Diamond Goldin, Brooke Dyer, Jane Dyer, Jeff Mack, Rich Michelson, Michael Nelson, Shelley Rotner, Heidi E. Y. Stemple, Mo Willems and Kevin Markey.

Please come if you can! The event is free and open to the public. For more information, see

http://www.smith.edu/newsoffice/releases/NewsOffice09-050.html

I'll try to get some pictures!

If you know jbknowles at all, you can imagine how many times Jo thanked me for offering to show up at her writing for children class while she stayed home with tea and too many tissues. I assured her it would be fun, and of course it was. What a wonderful group of people, who missed Jo, and praised her, but were ready to hear about ways to experiment with nonfiction. They had so many good questions that I never got to my notes, but I think we covered enough. Ronnie asked if nonfiction writing had a voice in the same way that fiction does. “Let’s look,” I said, glad I’d hauled in a small suitcase full of books. They each chose a picture book biography and read the first few sentences. Ann began with Barbara Cooney’s Eleanor: “From the beginning the baby was a disappointment to her mother. She was born red and wrinkled, an ugly little thing. And she was not a boy.”

They all nodded: yes, this was not the kind of writing you’d find in a newspaper or textbook.

I urged them to check out INK: Interesting Nonfiction for Kids http://inkrethink.blogspot.com/
And I would have loved to do a whole class just on poetry that draws from history, my current obsession, but mostly just pointed to another pile, and left them with a quote from Marilyn Nelson, author of Carver and other great collections: “What I do most and best is track, like a good hound, with my nose to the ground, gathering information and impressions, and piecing together a story shaped like a poem, and with a poem’s ambition.” (interview in September’s Writer’s Chronicle)

Yesterday was social, eating and writing with friends before class, then getting an always-coveted phone call from my daughter, and hearing about Halloween adventures already begun. Tomorrow I’m reading not-too-spooky stories at the library. Today it’s gray again, the dogs are sleepy, and I’m hunkering in to creep toward the end of my long-long-revision. I’m always happy for quiet company, so whether you’re sick or well, I hope you can join me. And don’t mind if I break for a bit of knitting.

My friend Jo-Ann read my recent report about her amazing pumpkin in my blog, then about the Thursday morning walkers, so decided to join us last week. Our default plan is to head left or right from the library where this time of year we walk under yellow maple trees. Jo-Ann has raised her girls in town, but she said this was the first time, except for one Halloween, that she’d walked along the road. Of course you see a lot more than you do from a car, and it’s beatuful.

We headed past houses and meadows, turning toward Mill Brook and an abandoned farmhouse that had moved to make room for the highway. The brook had been changed, too: this is where about two hundred years ago a lot of pottery was made. Now it’s mostly fields of squash. When we headed back, Jo-Ann and I climbed a hill ahead of Bill and Jeanne, but turned when a car stopped beside them. The driver leaned over with a question we learned was: Have you seen two horses?

Hers had escaped, Jeanne told us. Bill added, Though she said the gate had been shut and locked.

The car turned into a driveway before they'd finished recapping the problem. Apparently the horses had just come to see what might be good to eat in a neighbor’s yard. I tentatively asked if I could help, and was relieved when Anita just asked me to hold the lead of one horse while she corralled the other, and thankfully both seemed happy enough to see her. She left her car to pick up later, while leading the horses home.




So was the gate really shut? What kind of horses are these? It could be the beginning of a story, which we may also find more on foot than in a car.

The hydrangeas I planted a few years ago because they’re one of my daughter’s favorite flowers first turn cream-colored, then rosy, and finally a golden-brown. If the deer don’t eat off their tips, they’ll bloom again next year. This I can count on. Though we notice that “if.” So often it follows “always.”



I’ve been writing and complaining all summer and fall about my pace, the small steps forward, the awkward ones back. I’m still doing that shuffling. But the gaps between good sentences are smaller. The characters are showing rather intriguing faces, and speaking up. Even the arc is starting to look sturdy.

I hope I’m finding a place here between self-frustration and bragging. I’m trying to stay true to how I feel as I creep a little farther forward. Sometimes, like hiking through the woods today with Mary and the dogs, I whine about my pace. But the good news is that I like what’s behind me and the small surprises that keep coming. I’ve got to accept my pace because, well, as with most acceptance issues, I don’t have a choice. And besides, without too many side looks at calendars and clocks, it’s getting me to a place where I’m starting to feel proud.

Thank you for keeping me company along the way!

I’ve always liked books in which not a lot happens, and action is what I find hardest to write. That’s not all bad, but while I’m happy with the characters and details in the novel I’m revising, I need a stronger arc going through it all. An arc any reader can see.

Many many years ago, I took a dance class that the teacher touted as inspired by African, Caribbean, jazz, modern dance, and her cat’s stretches. I remember a class when Diana yanked up my leg, stretched my arms, tipped me almost over, and said, “You think you’re moving far when you aren’t.”

The words stuck not because I was to go on with dance – I was there for the fun and exercise – but because they summed me up. I love what’s subtle, which has its charms and uses, but sometimes, yeah, I think I’m moving when no one else can see a change. Some of this is just part of me, like the sound of my voice and a taste for gardens without placards. I’m not going to write something that keeps people on the edge of their seat, but I’d like to keep readers turning pages.

So I try to stretch. There’s Diana, laughing, leaping, reminding me I can bound a little further and hold the pace.

Thanks to those writers who joined me wielding sharp revision tools on Monday. Yesterday I started to clear some of the wreckage and look for ways to fill in holes I left in the first few chapters, work I’ll continue with today. Please join me if you like – Vivian? I know you were sorry to miss Monday -- whether with hatchets or brooms or simply quiet hands. I’m putting on more Irish Breakfast tea, and if we’re lucky, Lorraine has some banana bread leftover. I picked up a loaf of sourdough, and my friend Margaret gave me a jar of crabapple jelly her husband made. (Thanks, Jim!) So pretty I hate to break it open, but I will for you.

And I expect I’ll break from time to time to join my husband in some nostalgia and some forward-thinking as he just sold a business begun twenty-five years ago. We weren’t long married and I was in grad school, paying rent by teaching freshman comp, when Peter and a buddy wrote and drew a comic book called Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. It became way more successful than any of us dreamed – you know I was the one who worried if we’d ever lose the cartons in the dining room-turned-studio – and so much of the past years has been great. But without the pressure of running the business it became, Peter looks forward to new creative ventures. We plan to celebrate by seeing Where the Wild Things.

Today’s work is about patching in notes scribbled in plot-brainstorming and seeing how they fit. Yesterday I learned how to correct holes with knitting: tug, tug, tug, and weave. Tricky, but possible. Now it's about putting in the right words. Pouring tea.

Lovely Melodye newport2newport pulled up soft chairs, put on tea, and invited us to join her while revising this weekend. And when Lorraine lorrainemt and I showed up in hip boots and hauling axes this remarkable hostess let us in. Though gently suggesting the axes might go in the closet, lest the gunk on them scare away fledgling ideas.

She’s right: there’s a time for axes and a time to stash them. I had to wait very quietly and patiently for all the ideas on my pages: now many need to be cut, but some I’m very happy to have. And the sight of that axe indeed would have meant some would never have seen the light of day.

But now it’s time for lumberjack work. I make it gentler by saving a draft. Telling myself these sentences, paragraphs, chapters are not totally gone. Just stored. Like clothes I know will never fit again, but maybe…

Last Thursday my writing group told me what I kind of knew: I’ve got characters, details, history, even some plot, but not the overriding arc. So I’m cutting much of what’s there, trying to clear a path for something that rises and falls and ends in a satisfying way. I’m working today, and those with or without axes are welcome. Just expect to smell some rough fresh-cut thatch along with the pot of Irish Breakfast. You can wear a dress or plaid flannel, a fancy hat or something with a net to protect you from storms of insects we might disturb with our hacking. Hey storming insects: could they be what I need? What’s that sting on my neck? Let’s begin.

Yesterday I saw my glowing niece Kelly at her baby shower, her organized sisters, my sisters-in-laws (good catch up on news), and one very cute four-year-old expert at ooohs and awws pulling tiny clothes and other merchandise of babyhood from gift bags. Kelly and Ben are expecting a boy in five weeks and I was told they have a name in mind but wisely aren’t about to reveal it. A friend used this strategy with her four children, as she said people feel free to tell you what’s wrong with the name of one in utereo, but if you’re holding the baby, may keep their opinions to themselves. (Family, I took photos I will try to figure out how to post on Facebook!)

Then I drove to Albany, where Debbi Michiko Florence d_michiko_f
was doing a book signing with Coleen Murtagh Paratore http://www.coleenparatore.com at The Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza http://www.bhny.com/ Great store! They draped the table with a lovely Asian themed red cloth which I thought Debbi should pack up, but she is too honest. Here she is signing while Coleen chats with Eric Luper eluper.



We made Debbi pose with her earlier book about China, (Japan sold out!) by the cool statue outside the store.



Debbi, Coleen, Nancy Castaldo naturespeak, Jen Groffjenlibrarian, and I enjoyed dinner afterwards: We got to hear a real-life love story, discuss libraries and reading what our daughters are reading, and cheer each other on about current projects. We ended in the too cold parking lot – Debbi, wrapped tight in her wool coat, couldn’t believe she once lived here – while looking forward to a time when we’d all meet again: maybe SCBWI conference in LA next summer? I’ve never been, but with a daughter in LA….



I brought home a few books and inspiration. So this afternoon, do I read, write, knit, convince my husband to see Wild Things with me, or all of the above?

It was wonderful to have my twenty-year-old tucked at home, or racing about with her friends, for a few days. We ate at their favorite Indian restaurant with Aliza and Zach and his parents, who asked Em about her job. As she opened her mouth, the waitress pouring water burst out, “You have a job?!” We laughed, and she said, “I was just used to you being a student.” They came here a lot. (Liz, we missed you so much!)



Em got her dad to see that Zombie movie, and was pleased that he liked the previews for New Moon and said he’d take me. We had a long conversation sitting in the early morning hours on the floor by the door, instead of watching Glee on her computer. There were some tears over people we missed.

Zach touched me saying he checked my blog every day. So here’s a shout out to him and a picture with Em and our dog.



And here they are with Aliza:



I’m on the final chapters of my novel, so will be working hard this week and doing some knitting, too. My friend Sue, a friend since high school, asked me to join her in a class which is fun. There’s a grandmother and her young-mom granddaughter, as well as three other women all with a sense of humor. Which I’m reminded you need when learning anything. Em occasionally passed me, glanced at the knitting, and commented the length looked pretty much the same. Once I pulled everything out and began again – a technique a nurse took to my friend Mary’s blind 94 year old aunt to save on the cost of yarn and to keep the project from getting mangled. I stopped starting over, since our homework is to complete four inches. Now I’m considering giving my piece, riddled with tiny holes and knots, a little stretch.

Blue Plate Special is a novel for mature teens told in the voices of three girls dealing with the beauty and difficulty of what they inherit. I began sinking into each girl’s separate story, and felt there was just enough discovery and action to keep me there, without feeling too torn as I began the next section about the life of a girl in another decade. I marveled at how Michelle enticed me to become absorbed in each distinctive and urgent voice, while deftly leading me to another. Gradually, gracefully, connecting themes and images came together.

Madeline’s life is shaped by first love, then huge disappointments, Desiree’s by careless parenting, and Ariel by family secrets. In various ways, these girls face the too realities of sexual and emotional coercion, violence, unplanned pregnancies, and rough mothering. We see ways these shape and scar, though there’s always hope for tenderness, fragile connections, hard-won wisdom, and courage, especially in the form of speaking up for oneself. Beautiful language also redeems, particularly for Desiree, whose sections are written in free verse.

I met Michelle Kwasney http://www.michelledkwasney.com years ago in the basement of the Hatfield MA library where I also first heard Jo Knowles jbknowles read her work. It’s been great to share cups of tea and an occasional celebratory glass of champagne – the miracle of manuscripts to books -- over the years. Blue Plate Special is generous, brilliant (okay so I like her) Michelle’s third novel, after BABY BLUE and ITCH (both Holt) and the first YA novel from Chronicle who did an amazing job in giving us a book we want to hold in our hands. The slightly wide pages offer a welcoming space for the three sections, and the paper seems particularly soft. The end papers are brilliant blue, and the cover evokes the theme – of broken pieces perhaps coming together, though never completely.

It’s not a read for those who seek escape, but I can imagine girls who desperately need reflections of themselves or friends reading this novel as if could save their lives. It might.For more information, to hear an excerpt of BLUE PLATE SPECIAL, or download reading group questions, go to:
http://www.chroniclebooks.com/index/main,book-info/store,kids/products_id,8242/path,2-13-116/title,Blue-Plate-Special/

Vogue, especially in its bulky September issue, has more pages of nothing I want to read than most other magazines. I went to this documentary about its production partly in honor of my daughter who loves fashion, though happily in a forgiving way. She encourages me, say, to break away from black and gray, but she respects my limits: she’s never advocated I try a hairstyle that might require maintenance or try my balance beyond a chunky half inch heel. I went to this movie feeling a bit out of my element, and indeed in Amherst, MA, renowned for much but not fashion, I was one of two in the theater.

I loved September Issue http://www.theseptemberissue.com/#/home. Editor-in-chief Anna Wintour was pretty much what I expected from Meryl Streep’s version in The Devil Wears Prada: there were the Starbucks she seemed to exist on, the decisive eyebrows, the terrible silences, the sizing up of a dress with a pinch of her fingers. But what structured the documentary, besides the forward movement of putting out the 2007 issue weighing almost five pounds, was an implicit comparision between Wintour and creative director Grace Coddington. We learned some of the history of both, including how they began at American Vogue around the same time. Grace was warm to Wintour’s cool, daring to her famous and editorially useful judgements.

While Wintour mentioned more than once the need for fashion to charge forward, Grace apologized for her love of the romantic past that shaped her artistic vision. We saw her face turn rapt as she stood in a Paris garden, and watched her keep her eyes open everywhere. She pored through books of old photographs, and admired the beauty of an old woman’s “fat leg.” She set up a shot of a photographer jumping next to a model. Wintour coolly eyed this spirited photograph, and while accepting its charm, noted the photographer needed to go to the gym. Hearing of this afterward, Grace assured the photographer he looked fine, that it was enough that models were perfect – eyebrows lifting on that word. Then she got on the phone to make sure the belly wasn’t edited out, as was happening with Sienna Miller’s teeth fillings and something about her neck.

It was a great movie about tension between creative and editorial forces, and there were poignant glimpses throughout. It was hard to watch Grace see her work dismissed in seconds, and speak about how seeing such it was hard to go on to the next thing: though she did.

Interviewers asked Wintour’s daughter if she ever might edit the magazine, and when she said No, the edges of her mother’s mouth tightened as if she’d just seen a very terrible dress. The daughter clearly saw this too, and went for peacekeeping: Well right now I’m concentrating on college. But when she was interviewed alone, she said, and I paraphrase: the people there think fashion is the world and really there’s so much more. She shook her imperfect hair, laughed, waved her hands beautifully, much like the young and talented designer Thakoon as he talked about his work; then kept them still when he was graced at a party by a swift step back from Wintour, allowing a burst of flashbulbs as they stood together.

Last Tuesday night was warm enough to enjoy sitting on steps waiting for my friend Margaret, watching people in actual droves head to John Green Hall to hear poetry. Back bents from the climb up Elm Street, intentness seared the autumn air. Mary Oliver did not disappoint her 2000 plus admirers. She read from several of her twenty-six books, along with some yet-to-be-published poems. There were a lot of ponds, otters, wild geese, pines, ferns, and, from her newest poems, an adored little dog. Afterward, my friend and I wondered if this was her first dog: the poems had that first romance air about them.



Mary Oliver talked some about the ethic that’s formed her life’s work: to pay attention, to be amazed, and to tell about it. She said that in her Provincetown home, people tease about what makes a good walk for Mary: she starts out in a small blaze, gradually slows down, then ends up standing perfectly still. And she introduced a poem telling of how an editor offered to publish it if she took out the word, “beautiful.” She said no. Many cheered this short story, but I kept my hands in my lap. Mary Oliver reveres the world and seems like a happy poet, words that don’t always go together. Fine, but I’m not always excited to find the word “beauty” in a poem any more than I’d think the poet would love a tree with such a sign hanging from a branch. I want to see what she sees, and make an assessment myself.

Well, one quibble, and why not join her in seeing a poet as a performing artist: one who performs admiration? What a pleasure to leave with many people looking radiant, and speaking of red birds and purple iris. Our local women’s colleges, Smith and Mount Holyoke, have a lovely tradition of pairing older alums with students, and, when I walked the packed sidewalks to my car, I expect it was this kind of match I witnessed between two young women by a white-haired women with a cane keeping out of the crowd. The three women stood on a lawn bending their heads for a good view of the moon.


It's Poetry Friday! To read more blog posts about poetry or poems, visit Crossover http://crossoverbooks.blogspot.com/2009/10/poetry-friday.html

The other night in a restaurant, three children and their too-loud dad were seated next to me. After dabbling in math about whether they’d be better off with kids’ meals or splitting adult plates, the dad began talking about his sadness that no one seemed to listen to him and that the family was losing all their traditions. “For example,” he said, “I think a good tradition would be for you to call me every night. And maybe stay over at my house on Tuesdays. It’s not really fair that Mom gets to have you most nights while I get every other weekend. I’m not saying we should have say thirteen and thirteen days a month, but four out of the twenty-six isn’t right. Is anyone listening? What did I just say?”

The oldest daughter said, “You think there should be more traditions in the world.”

I got my rice cakes and tofu and was grateful I’d never had to do math re nights for my daughter. And I liked this eldest girl. The world could use more traditions, and my favorite new one for fall are the Thursday lunches and semi-silent writing Jo established before heading off to teach. There are pots of tea, lattes, avocado salads, hearing the latest re book banning, and loving thoughts of friends who aren’t at the table for good or sad or simply distance-related reasons.

And while I can’t cheer a daily word count, I notice that week by week, I’m seeing edges of new chapters on those wooden tables.

Our Massachusetts town has some pretty cool agricultural triumphs. Two hundred watermelons from Harvest Farm recently went Hollywood, appearing in Taking Woodstock. Farmer Gary Gemme gave the movie two thumbs up and said his watermelons did a good job. “They were in character.”

The Chang Farm sends organic vegetables and bean sprouts to stores around New England, and is now trying to market schizandra berries, source of an energizing supplement,long used in China, with the more user friendly name of ChiBerry.




My friend artist Jo-Ann Denehy made her first attempt to grow an enormous pumpkin this summer at Quonquont Farm. Despite all the rain, her pumpkin came in at 396 pounds. If you want to see how a pumpkin gets weighed, and its competitors – Jo-Ann’s came in tenth at the Big E fair in Springfield, but the rivals had been growing pumpkins for years if not decades, and truly, some are .. pale -- you can watch this You Tube story.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGBt-Bn1Z8w

Jo-Ann offered me a seed to try next spring. Um, I don’t think my thumb is quite that green.