What a Difference a Day Makes

One Tuesday, December 13, our daughter got a call at work telling her that a former roommate in Montana had dropped dead while snowboarding in Colorado the day before. 25 years old and his heart just stopped. She was devastated and called us crying heart wrenchingly.

We never met this boy but he was one of the first people she met when she started Freshman year at MSU in Bozeman. Within the first few weeks of school she emailed me pix of new friends and scenes. One was of her dancing and laughing hysterically with a husky blond boy with impossibly beautiful blue eyes. I wrote back and among my comments was how much I loved them. When we talked several days later she said he'd laughed when she told him since they were contact lenses.

By the end of Sophomore year she decided to move off campus and join him in the apartment he'd rented at the start of the year. She left her things there and came home for the summer but several times he called to chat and when she wasn't here he was happy to chat with me. He loved to cook, steaks in particular, so at Christmas I sent him some Elijah Craig marinade and basting sauce. He loved it. When she was getting her first cell phone he assured me that working at Verizon he would make sure she got a good and not horribly expensive plan. There was absolutely no romantic involvement between them but they were really close friends. Sometime during that year, another girl and her boyfriend moved in with them to further reduce the rent and expenses. The boyfriend was unemployed and non-contributing so eventually he was invited to leave. And then many months later some disagreement erupted among the remaining three and our daughter and the other girl departed to a new apartment and the friendship was ended.

She never shared with us what had happened only that she was never speaking to him again. I was sad because we were going to visit Bozeman and I'd hoped to meet him at last. Considering the rift and the fact that he was her friend, after all, we didn't press to meet him. Especially, not knowing the circumstances, the meeting may have been uncomfortable for him.  But friendships come and friendships go and it is part of life that some friends are lifelong and others are transitory, no matter how strong they may have once been.

Several years past, graduation came and went and she returned to Vermont for a year. Then she returned to Montana and they ran into each other and at least resumed speaking though the friendship never regained its former strength. At least the air was cleared and they were happy to see each other when their paths crossed. We never had contact with him again but were glad that such a happy go lucky guy had been returned to her circle, if only peripherally.  She returned once more to Vermont in October and this was the first she'd heard of him since then. His heart stopped while snowboarding in Colorado!  What a tragic end to such a young man. Even her parents grieve for the loss of one so young. At this time of year.

Thinking of his plans to go home to Montana, the gifts he may have bought for his family, those for him. All the holiday excitement and anticipation of family gathering. It is beyond the imagination. The devastation at a time meant to be joyful and happy. How sad for all concerned.

And then on Wednesday, Dec 14 and again today two articles in our paper about another 24 year old young man snowboarding in Colorado. He was making his runs at the same time our girl was receiving the bad news. Was he on the same slopes less than 24 hours later? Kevin Pierce, a boy from our area, returning to the snowboarding world two years almost to the day of having suffered a severe brain injury preparing for the Winter Olympics.  How bittersweet in light of our news.  How we wish our friend could have been there watching Kevin regain some of his ability. But then, maybe he was.

Christmas Cards and Other Correspondence

I'm pacing myself this season and may not have everything done by the big day. After almost 50 years of having my own home and, therefore, decorating, shopping, wrapping, getting dinner ready and writing cards pretty much single-handed, I've passed some of the chores on to the daughter and others I've scaled back. A LOT.  One  thing I've always enjoyed is sending and receiving beautiful Christmas cards.

I grew up in a family where birthdays were always remembered with a lovely card, almost always Hallmark, and definitely specific: To my Mom, For a Special Daughter, To the Best Sister Ever, etc, etc. I've continued that within my own small circle of three and to my one Aunt remaining of seven and my Sister. I had extended it to the in-laws but, except for one, it isn't anything they have the time or inclination to do.

But I digress. Today, I was home alone for much of the day. The daughter and husband having gone to do their shopping for me. So, I decided it was perfect time to do my favorite thing. I got out the special Snowman box in which I keep my cards, return labels and lists of what cards I sent to whom last year. I hate repeating them since I have a selection of beauties and I like to vary them. I write just a one line personal greeting and our name and off they go.

Cards go to relatives: the aforementioned Aunt and Sister and their children, one sister-in-law and her husband ( the other two and the brother-in-law don't send cards ), cousins on both sides of the family. One cousin beats me to it every year--she writes the cards on Thanksgiving Day and mails them on Friday. We've laughed about it for years--I've told her she will ALWAYS beat me--I like to write when I'm in more of the Christmas spirit. With hot chocolate and Bing Crosby crooning by my side.

Next come the friends: Some have been in my life for 40 years or more, others are more recent and a few are former students who have now grown up, started families of their own and call me by my first name, now. I use my address book to make sure I have all the kids names right ( I put their names in the space reserved for email addresses! ) and that I'm using the most current address. There is always a pang of sadness as I move from one letter to the next---the relatives and friends who are no longer with us and won't be sending a card this year. That list gets longer each year but the list of new friends and acquaintances also grows, though not at the same pace or number.

Today, though I knew last year that I needed more cards, I ran out at the G's. Darn! Like my Mom before me, I always buy Christmas cards in January, when they are half price. Buy them now and pay full price?? Well, yes, because I love to send cards and love to send beautiful ones. So off to the web. Neither the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, nor the Metropolitan in New York City had yet lowered their prices. Too many procrastinators out there--so they know these cards are still going to sell. Besides, there are always dummies who forgot to buy them cheaper last January,too, and they will run out. Well, I think not.

 So off I went to the Lang site. Ah, look---some cards already half price and 40% off the whole order besides!! Fill up that shopping cart, girl and so I did. Buying cards is almost as much fun as sending cards. Oh, the selections!! Snowmen galore, Santas of every shape and size from Woodland Santa to Peppermint Candy Santa, Country Scenes from Barnyard to Bringing Home the Tree, Snowy Driveways leading to Log Cabins, White Clapboards, Elegant Bricks, Angels, Nativities, Poinsettias, Kitties, Puppies, Candles, Churches, large and small!!!!  You go, Girl!  Fill up that Cart!!! And so I did. But then reason prevailed. Just how many more years will I be around to send Christmas cards?  And what about that deminishing recipient list? So, back to the cart and culling. Out went those that I really, really liked But Did NOT Love. Then on to checkout and payment. And waiting. Hopefully, they'll get here in time for me to mail the rest before the actual day.

After that flurry of excitement I found that Bing had finished and my hot chocolate was gone. With time on my hands I found myself thinking about Christmas cards and letter writing. Before the days of " free " long distance calling and email my family, friends and I were prolific letter writers.  Stationery was an important purchase and it was always selected so carefully. The color, the embossing or border, the weight and feel. There was always a box of white or beige linen texture for business letters.  I loved setting time aside to get out my stationery and sit down to write a long newsy letter to someone. My hand was usually cramped up but it felt so great to correspond.

Then the anticipation of the response would carry one through the next week or two. If the wait was any longer, patience would start to fray but oh, the joy of finding an envelope with the return address of someone dear. Sometimes, frenzied, the flap would be torn raggedly to get to the news immediately. Other times, the letter would be placed tantalizingly on the table or in one's purse ( does anyone carry them anymore??) to be read when there was time to leisurely peruse it. And then, as they say, the ball was in your court.

I wasn't always a prompt responder--though frequently I'd put pen to paper immediately upon finishing. Many times, though, my response began with a heartfelt apology for being so long in answering.

I wish I had some of the correspondence now, especially the letters I exchanged with my Mother. I have only one and it is a single page saying not very much. There were none of mine amongst her things. She knew she was dying of cancer and so she destroyed letters and pictures since she didn't think anyone else would want them. She chose to throw them away herself. I wish she'd told me--I would have loved to have them.

When I look at the sole note from her and see her familiar handwriting, it brings her back to my mind's eye and as I read her words I hear her voice in my head. There is a book about things that have been used as bookmarks and some of the things are letters. What a clever use for a special note. It would be so nice to have some of mine to show my daughter.


She has only written me, perhaps, three or four letters so far. She calls frequently and we used to IM when she was away in school. I wrote letters to her but she never answered them in writing. Friends email now all the time but never are there letters. Some friends don't send Christmas cards at all. For awhile I continued sending to them but somehow the lack of response in kind made it less enjoyable. A let down, if you will,like calling someone with the excitement of speaking to them and getting no answer, or worse, a generic machine message asking for your number and name. If I don't just hang up, I just say, hi, thought I'd chat for a bit and then hang up. Sometimes, if they aren't too busy, they call back. More often I get an email. Grrrr.

I can't decide what to do with the stationery in the desk drawer that is faded and dusty with age. All the cute note cards. The stationery folder that my Mom gave me, beautiful red leather, with the blotter that was my Gram's and the fountain pen. Parker, you know. Can you still get INK for that? Oh, well, at least at Christmas the excitement of a personal letter in the box returns. Sometimes it requires me to respond and sometimes it is a response. Either way, I love it.

The beautiful card, the handwriting, the gorgeous stamp and the feel of the envelope. And I imagine the sender sitting and writing just to me and my family and I am happy and thankful for that moment in time.

Louis Who??

Before Versailles: A Novel of Louis XIV by Karleen Koen
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This was a goodreads giveaway that took several months to arrive so the review is much later than the would normally be the case. I loved this book on so many levels. I'll start with the setting. Having gone to France about 20 years ago, it was a joy to revisit several majestic places through Koen's eyes. My guide, a friend, who is head of a school in Sevres, started out by taking me to Fountainebleau, which as I remember was huge but in sad need of repair--wings were totally devoid of any furnishings, the windows were filthy and bare and in places broken. I don't know how much of the then on-going renovation has been completed since then but even in its horrendous state it was an impressive place. I remember there were quite a few peacocks and peahens strutting among the ruins and I thought how they must have looked when the gardens and buildings were in their glory and the humans strutted right along with them. Our next stop was Vaux-le-Vicompte---what a jewel! Words cannot express, or at least mine cannot, the incredible beauty of the place and the impact it has in every way on the visitor. Koen's description of the awe in which the guests beheld it when Nicholas Fourget opened it to them is exactly the reaction today's guests have upon seeing it. My friend told me then the story of Louis' finance minister, his increasing power culminating in this masterpiece, and the reaction of Louis to this perceived threat to his own power. The arrest of Fourget was inevitable and the takeover of Vaux by Louis not unexpected. Finally,she took me to Versailles and Vaux, that magnificent statement of one man's power, became a mere country estate in comparison! All of this was reiterated in Koen's beautiful prose throughout her narrative, which covered merely four months in the life of the newly crowned King of France, Louis XIV.

These four months, however, are spent primarily at Fountainebleau. Vaux was under construction at the time and Versailles was merely a hunting lodge out beyond the forests that have for the most part disappeared today. The intrigues of court, the struggles of a new monarch,who is only 22 years old,to establish himself in the eyes of his court and even in his own eyes are compelling. Throw into the mix, a brother, who is, to say the least scandalous and several women of varying personal strengths and weaknesses, with whom Louis also must deal and the plot, as they say, thickens.

A subplot, a legend never fully authenticated, involving a boy in an iron mask, possibly a royal prince, has been treated in many other books and movies. Here the characters involved are more thoroughly limned--from the musketeer who cares for him, to the monks in whose monastery he is initially housed, and the mother who refuses to visit him. The story is as sad here as at any time it has been told. Could Louis have had an idiot brother,possibly a bastard brother, who was secreted away for whatever reason? A threat to Louis' own legitimacy and therefore a threat to the throne and he who held it? Or perhaps, merely an embarrassment to the royal blood? Who knows. But as I read this I could not help but think of the present Queen Elizabeth's uncle who was kept hidden, unvisited for the most part by his mother, the Queen and his father, the King, primarily because he was epileptic. How much more embarrassing must idiocy have been to the French royal family?

Lastly, though a Francophile, I often got Louis XIV and Louis XVI mixed up. I cannot explain it--they were certainly light years apart, chronologically and politically to say nothing of the times in which they lived or the way in which they died. After this book, that is not likely to happen again!

All in all a delightful, interesting read with settings and characters thoroughly developed. If there is any criticism at all, and it is a small one, I had to check back to the front a few times to ascertain who a certain character was when the formal title, rather than the actual name, was used. This happened most ofter when there was more than one formal title involved for the same person--another practice that continues amongst the royals today. Just so confusing--let's just call them all Mack!



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More Action, Less Introspection, Please!

Fragile: A Novel by Lisa Unger
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

This book, along with a copy of The Night Strangers, was sent to me by the marketing manager of Crown Publishing. I had won the Goodreads giveaway for Before Versailles and after almost two months I had not received it. It was a pleasant surprise and a very generous gesture, especially since the original giveaway book arrived shortly thereafter. Theoretically, then, it probably isn't necessary to review the book but feel it is appropriate.

I faithfully read page by page to Ch 19, page 190, almost halfway through the book before, out of sheer boredom and impatience, I flipped to the back of the book to find out how it ended. The first chapters introduced the reader to a mishmash of characters, mostly the classmates of the main character, the Police Chief, and his wife, a psychotherapist in a small town, The Hollows, not far from New York City. I couldn't decide if it was in the Hudson River Valley, New Jersey or Connecticut--it was sort of a indistinct any small town, but not really. I've lived in several very small places in NYS and in Vt and could not get a feel for this fictional place, there was no atmosphere.

The characters, except, perhaps the teens were very one dimensional as well. Even the former school principal with whom I should have been able to relate, having been in secondary education all my life, was colorless.

The missing teen girl, sexually assaulted, was presented in triplicate and felt too contrived and artificial. I could not really feel an urgency or empathy to any of the situations. There were some twists and turns but again they seemed too drawn out. I did go back and finish the book but wasn't moved by any of the neatly resolved issues.

In fact, I'm still not sure what purpose Charlie and Wanda served in the story at all. Perhaps, Charlie was Unger's alter ego giving voice to her purpose in writing the book.

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Required: A Lapse of Logical Thinking

A Bitter Truth: A Bess Crawford Mystery by Charles Todd
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

At the outset it is necessary to say that I have not read the first two Bess Crawford Mysteries so Bess' background and her relationship to Simon, who seems to appear anytime Bess is in dire straits, is not familiar to me. As a result I found the relationship confusing. But, even it I understood that aspect of the story, I would be hard-pressed to believe the whole basis of the book. That a war-time nursing sister would take in an abused woman in the middle of the night in London was a stretch for me, when the woman was a total stranger. But I put that aside and said to myself -- it is Christmas time, so therefore cold and dark and deserted and Bess is, after all, in the humanitarian business--so maybe. BUT, she then forgoes her visit to her worried parents on a holiday leave to travel with this stranger to the home of the woman's abusive spouse? And the spouse and his mother and grandmother and sister and brother-in-law to say nothing of the town's rector and doctor greet this stranger with open arms and reveal all kinds of family secrets seemingly easily was really stretching my ability to accept.

We are speaking upper society here, with a son who has supposedly swatted his wife in the face! A scandal if ever there was one. Nevermind, that Bess seems to have some pedigree of her own--she is a total stranger. This would never happen. Needless to say, having found this all very difficult to accept the multiple murders and the mystery of who dunnit was really secondary. About the only part that rang true for me was Bess' experiences in France, her meeting the Australian and maybe the nuns and the orphans for whom they were caring.

Since Charles Todd was lauded prominently on the dust cover as a New York Times Bestselling Author I stuck it out but won't run out to buy another of this authors' works any time soon. It wasn't horrible but it wasn't gripping either and I found I don't much care what happens to the characters.

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The Second Time is NOT the Charm!

Deadly Defiance by William Manchee
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

The opening sentence of this book was almost enough to make me put it aside. " One of the most difficult events in a parent's life is when....." A noun cannot be an adverb!! Occurs when perhaps but is NOT when. I battled this sentence structure for 30 years teaching and correcting term papers--but I guess I just have to accept it along with run-on sentences since Manchee and my students refuse to listen. If Mr Manchee would put a period instead of a comma everytime he wanted to use the word " so " and then black out " so " and start a new sentence his writing would be so much better. Also, during conversation it is totally unnecessary to insert, he said, she replied, he laughed, she giggled. And where are the editors? On one page two characters are speaking and all at once a third character replies--a dead one at that! I re-read the page twice to make sure it wasn't me--but no, glaringly, a dead person is given the response.

So, the book is not great literature and the editing is a disaster. Yet, although, certainly NOT the next Grisham, Manchee's book keeps you involved. Three mysteries going at once and all of them neatly tied up by the end. Most of the characters are pretty flat though Jodie comes across with some potential. Stan is a disaster, lackluster though supposedly attractive to women. Or at least, to Paula, who hops into bed with just about anyone for just about any reason. Bart is just there for dinner and backrubs apparently. Poor Rebeckah is just ill.

It was an okay foray--" read " one other that was a giveaway on MP3 and was glad to have won this one. I'm not a good candidate to review recorded books and said so in my review. Nevertheless, I cannot give this hard copy any greater words of praise. This is Manchee's 10th book in the series so somebody out there likes him. I won't be returning for any more installments, however.

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Do You Remember the Horror of Jonestown?

A Thousand Lives: The Untold Story of Hope, Deception, and Survival at Jonestown by Julia Scheeres
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This was a GoodReads first reads giveaway. The writing style was easy enough to read, though the subject matter required breaking away periodically. I remember the murder-suicide event and at the time was overwhelmed by the number of people who were gulled by Jim Jones and who willingly took their own lives for him. The book in no way alleviated that awe though the biographical sketches of some of the followers clarified Jones' attraction. Many of these people were society's throw aways and in Jones they found a leader who seemingly cared for them and gave their lives meaning. Other of the followers were socialistic idealists who thought his message of equality and tolerance and communal living would lead to a new Utopia. It would have been helpful to have had more insight into the backgrounds of some of the top officials who found it so easy to abuse in the name of discipline their fellow Peoples Temple members and who were able to devise unbelieveable torture methods and suicide scenarios. I kept finding myself comparing these people to the educated experimenters of the Third Reich.

As a matter of fact, much like Hitler, Manson and others of that ilk, including Ida Amin, Jim Jones was a megalomaniac who lived well, used his position to have sex with whomever appealed to him and through drugs managed to lose all mental and emotional control of himself if not of his followers. This book in no way helped me to get my own mind around the type of person who falls prey to such a leader and find that these folks are missing some vital piece of humanity that allows them to become robotic followers, unable to function as loving parents, spouses or neighbors. It is frightening to know that there will always be men such as Jones and always be minions to do his bidding without thought.

Pictures of the places and people would have enhanced the story.

View all my reviews When I sent this review to Simon and Schuster, the editor replied with a link to the author's website, on which pictures of some of the followers could be found. http://www.juliascheeres.com