A note on the Parenthood abortion storyline

Just because the show let Drew have his own opinion and didn't spend much time on Amy's POV doesn't mean she looks like the "bad" person in the situation. Lots of stories are told from the woman's side, but this time, we get to see it through a (very important) secondary character. Values are not necessarily ascribed just because they didn't tell the story the way we've always seen it before. Just because Drew was mourning the loss of a baby doesn't mean NBC was throwing angry "values" viewers a bone. Amy is not wrong, and Drew is not wrong either. And damn, he does everything he can to support her. And yes she is distant, but she's sad and scared too.

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2010: January to June Favorite Reads

The best books I’ve read between January and June of 2010: Dandelion Wine , Ray Bradbury. First time I’ve read this an adult. It’s not quite cohesive as a novel, but wallops a double-dose of nostalgia: Bradbury’s for his childhood, and mine, for reconnecting with an old beloved book. Brooklyn , by Colm Toibin. Love this simple, rich story of a young woman’s maturation-through-immigration. Caution: there is one section that will make you cry buckets of salty, sad tears. I knew when I was in the middle of this tender novel that I wished it were three times as long. It's quiet and understated and elegant, this story of a young Irish woman who comes to America and finds her own strength and self. Reminiscent of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn , and an immersible world unto itself. Underworld by Don DeLillo. Epic monster of a story that seems to presuppose the horrors of the 2000s by looking at the less-but-still horrific 1950s through the 1990s.* True Grit by Charles Po...

2016 Reading Notes

My reading came to a screeching halt after the election and I've been having trouble resuming it since. But I did have a good reading year before that day. White Noise by Don DeLillo. First read in 1998, re-read in 2016. I remembered that White Noise is about supermarkets and Hitler studies. I remember loving it in 1998, but little else. What I rediscovered is that this novel is full of anxiety, dread, distrust of systems and data, environmental waste, precocious children, familial and romantic loves, and the repression of our fundamental fear of death. It's satirical but also mildly terrifying. I am happy to say that it's still a five-star read. I also read DeLillo's Zero K, which was fine but unexceptional and probably very close to the future as elites hoard all the money and try to preserve themselves past death, waiting out the demise of most of mankind. I was happy to discover three Louise Erdrich novels: Love Medicine; The Round House; and LaRose . Loved the...

Colwin, Mr. Parker, #3

Laurie Colwin "Mr. Parker" Published 1973 From the New Yorker Short Story Podcast, airdate 8/1/12 Read by Maile Meloy #3 Short Story Project, 300 in 2013 This is a coming-of-age story about a young girl who takes piano lessons from a teacher in the neighborhood. His wife dies, and that death marks a transformation in the girl, her relationship to her mother, and to her own understanding of what it means to perform well enough, through practice, to make real music. It's a simple story really, but the language used carefully describes the fading process that life deals out to older people. There's also a running theme of innocence vs. knowing. It's not funny, like Colwin's novel Happy All the Time, but in a small number of words, the reader is let in on the girl's inner life.

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