today I spent the day in my Jammies ...
reading The Turn of the Screw by Henry James ...
because my 15 year old asked me to ...
he just finished reading it ...
for no particular reason, just because it sounded interesting, it's a ghost story, he bought it awhile ago and hadn't gotten around to reading it yet, take your pick ...
he wanted to discuss its ambiguousness ...
a very nice way to spend the day ...
yep ...
having "grown up" kids is good for this mom's heart.
This is the mess that I woke up to this morning... and yes it was a beautiful mess and it made me smile. For you see, the mess was created last night with my oldest daughter. The daughter who I haven't seen very often since she moved into her own little apartment a month or so ago. She stopped by last night though and we talked as we always do which then led to us watching a couple of episodes of Julia Childs, The French Chef from the PBS website because of course we have been talking about Julie Powell and Julia Child and French cooking and France and blogs among so many other things.
What better and more appropriate way for me to resume posting with something written about a book... about a story... for books and stories have been a part of my life, a part of what happened in between for, well, for always.
Every once in awhile, a book will, in reading, become such a part of you that it will take your breath away. Last night this happened to me. The book ... Nothing but Ghosts by Beth Kephart.
It involves a mystery and young love, but mostly it spoke to me, personally, as a story about a young girl learning to live with the loss of her mother. I say personally because with every page, I became Katie, and she, me. No matter that I am 49 and she is 16. No matter that Katie's loss is recent while mine happened almost 17 years ago. Katie's words were mine the day I lost my own mother to cancer and at times still are.
Reading my borrowed copy from the library, I found myself breaking my #1 rule. I couldn't help myself. I have so many pages "dog-earred", it will take me quite awhile to copy into my book journal the lines that for me just had to be recorded. There were so many words, and I was afraid I would lose them if I didn't mark them in some way, right as I read them. And I couldn't lose the very things that made me feel as if someone understood...understood the darkness in losing the very center of your life to something so hideous and sinister and yet also understood the light that begins to shine little by little.
There is so much good in this book. So much for young and older readers.
The language is pure poetry and touches in unexpected ways.
I am writing this post as a way to thank the author, Beth Kephart. Thank you for such beautiful prose, prose that speaks directly to the heart. Thank you for sharing this book with others, like myself, young and old. But mostly, thank you for understanding.
I end this post with a quote from the book:
"Things disappear and vanish. That's the fact. Before you're ready for them to go, they go, and after that all you can do is keep the idea of them bright inside yourself."
It was a dark and stormy night ... oh wait that is someone else's story ... well, for me it's been kind of a dark and stormy family season... hence the absence from the blog.
Lately though, I have had a pulling to be here in this place again and since this blog is really about recording our lives and telling all about "what happened in between", I thought I had best get busy posting again and the heck with the "storminess". I'll post around, under, over, and beside it ;)
Looks like our homeschooling journey included a little detour of public schooling for all of one semester. We will be oficially withdrawing Josh tomorrow and then have ten days to make it legal and official... sooo, you'll be able to call us homeschoolers yet once again ;)
The photo above is of my youngest, Joshua, who is 14 (soon to be 15). It was taken during the Obama campaign rally here in Vegas before the election. Joshua was homeschooled through 8th grade and is currently a freshman at a local high school. The freshman "enjoying" his year that I spoke of in one of my first posts here. Seems that is not the case. It also seems things will be changing next year.
Here in Nevada the Education budget has been slashed and slashed yet again. As a result, his school is losing their block scheduling and moving back to a six subject day. They are also losing 17+ teachers. With the six subject day the number of electives you can take has been reduced. Josh would not be able to take any extra electives next year as his foreign language already counts as an elective and yet is a required subject for sophomores, as they need at least two years of a foreign language to graduate.
All this is background really to a talk I have been having with myself since last week and one my husband and I have been having together. My talk to myself tends to be filled with questioning of my capablities to "homeschool" Joshua's high school years. My daughter graduated last year from the school Joshua attends and was able to take six AP courses. Because of those classes and their amazing teachers, she started college this year a semester ahead. This was one of the bgigest reasons I had for having Joshua attend school. I worried that I was not qualified to teach such classes to him and as a mature young man, advanced beyond his mom in thinking and intellectual skills, I felt he needed more than I thought I had to offer him.
Going through his papers yet again yesterday, I realized that at least through this year I could have done as well, if not better, than what the school has done for him! I am not impressed by far with what he is learning and how he is learning it.
There have been a couple incidents also which have proven to be situations to navigate through with a young man that has a very sensitive heart and soul. I have some people offer, that these experiences are a part of "getting tough", to "be able to make it out in the world". I do not agree with this.
So here I sit, researching and contemplating what to do about all of this. I will continue to do so but I do know one thing for sure, he will be returning home for the rest of his high school years and I will find a way to educate him during this journey... at home.
I am currently re-reading my favorite novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, for the umpteenth time. Yesterday I came across this line from Scout (who is my favorite character of the novel) and had to smile.
"...Grown folks don't have hidin' places..."
Ah... you're wrong there Scout. This "grown up" lady has more than one ;)
It is not often that you find a writer that touches your soul. Jenny of She Sells Seashells does just this each and every time I visit her blog. Her words reach deep and affect me in ways that linger for days.
.... when I heard this song.
You can find the full lyrics here. "...Sometimes I want a book to break loose with a bunch of hooptedoodle. The guy's writing it, give him a chance to do a little hooptedoodle. Spin up some pretty words maybe, or sing a little song with language. That's nice. But I wish it was set aside so I don't have to read it. I don't want hooptedoodle to get mixed up in the story. So if the guy that's writing it wants hooptedoodle, he ought to put it right at first. Then I can skip it if I want to, or maybe go back to it after I know how the story come out."
This is Mack speaking. Mack is a favorite character of mine from John Steinbeck's novel, Sweet Thursday, one of my all-time favorite novels. Sweet Thursday is the sequel to Steinbeck's more famous, Cannery Row.
This post is my first "hooptedoodle". A little explanation of this, my uhmmm let's see... 4th ? blog, I think ;) My last two blogs, Life's Daily Avenue and Book of Days were mostly concerned with a major part of my life at that time, homeschooling my youngest son.
This blog's title, what happened in between, is taken from the first chapter title of Sweet Thursday and as my first, short but sweet post inferred, well.... Life happened. Big changes along with small changes. One of the biggest was my homeschooled son is no longer at home but is enjoying his freshman year of high school in the same high school his sister graduated from last year. And mom? Well, she is taking a hiatus for just a bit.
This hiatus has included much knitting, sewing, and crafting in general. It has also included reading for myself, both for pleasure and for knowledge. Regular chores, cleaning, and grocery shopping etc are still part of all this too, as well as all the myriad of things associated with having my last child in school now. Oh yeah, and I couldn't forget, it has included "enduring hot flashes" as my 6 word bio states, and too, dealing with having a freshman in college as well as high school. A freshman who spent her first semester at college in Ohio but has now transferred to a college much closer to back here at home. Mom is happy having her closer , even with all the chaos of getting her there and then back home again ;)
I hope you'll come along with me as I record parts of my "new" life and fill you in on what happens in between.
