Memorial Day Weekend

Greetings!  Today I went to the Padres game (they won after 18 innings!) and later to see friends and family at the beach, so I'm getting to my blog on the late side.   It's been a lovely Memorial Day weekend so far, with a mix of clouds and sun, and weather on the cool side for May.  My mother-in-law showed me her "new toy" again, a Kindle, which she absolutely loves. It's compact and light, and the words on the screen are easy to read.  It would be great for travel or to throw in your purse for times when you have a few spare minutes to read.

I'm finished with West from Home. (Thanks for lending it to me, Lori!) The book features some recipes that I will have to try someday.   It's always fun to try recipes found in stories and books other than cookbooks.  Another friend, Sandie, lent me a copy of The Hidden Target to read (thanks, Sandie!).  This book will be a real departure for me.  According to Sandie, it's a great way to escape.  I can't wait!

Pioneers

The Cowardly Lion in the Wizard of Oz sought courage and went to great lengths to find it. It seems to me that both Laura Ingalls Wilder and her daughter, Rose Wilder Lane, must have been born with a large amount of courage. Even though these women were not expected to do much outside of traditional work, both chose to write, and were independent, adventurous, and above all else perhaps, courageous. They wrote because it was important to them, and they also performed their more traditional roles as well as wives and mothers. In West from Home, along with vivid descriptions of the World's Fair, San Francisco, and other sights, Laura gives her husband, Manly, precise directions about managing this and that on the farm. The farm stays in her thoughts and letters throughout her trip to San Francisco and the World's Fair. Laura does not forget her responsibility to Manly and the farm. Laura and Rose, a mother-daughter team, were "super women" of the early 1900's! Reading their letters is a joy, and foretells the achievements of the future--Laura writing the Little House books, and Rose editing them. These courageous women captured the essence of life in frontier America in nine classic volumes. They were true pioneers.

(P.S. I keep these "English lessons" short so they won't get too boring! I'm interested in your thoughts, and would like to turn this into conversations rather than essays. Can't relate to Little House on the Prairie type stories? This is our history! Perhaps I yearn for simpler times. . . .)

Writer's Block

A case of dreaded "writer's block" is not what prevented me from posting earlier today. I've been gone the whole day, with only a few minutes to start a post (to then be finished after 10 pm). However, I've wondered what I'll do when writer's block does strike. What's the best advice to follow when ideas and words are few and far between? In West from Home, Laura's daughter, Rose, a journalist for the San Francisco Bulletin, writes to her mother to persuade her to make the trip west to San Francisco. She suggests that the trip will be good specifically for Laura's writing:

"I think that by getting away from it all for awhile, and playing around with a bunch of people who are writing and drawing and otherwise being near-artists, you will get an entirely new viewpoint on things there, and be able to see a lot of new things to write when you go back."
~West From Home, Rose and Laura Ingalls Wilder

So you have Laura's daughter, also a writer, encouraging her mother to take the trip west to San Francisco in order to aid her writing career. Two points are important here, the change in scenery and experiences, and being with other creative people. This is nothing radical, but it's well expressed, and the trip did seem to ignite Laura's creativity, almost instantly, as she wrote many letters, full of detail, which are still brimming with vitality today. And, of course, Laura Ingalls Wilder wrote the Little House series of books in the years that followed her trip!

How do you nurture your creative muse? (Why aren't you commenting--got writer's block?)

Laura's Letters

Laura Ingalls Wilder promises to be her husband's eyes as she rides the train from Missouri to San Francisco in 1915 to visit with her daughter, Rose, and attend the great World's Fair, called the Panama-Pacific Exposition (to celebrate the completion of the canal through Panama). Her words, written with a soft pencil on plain paper, paint a picture for us as well. An extremely prolific letter writer, she describes everything to Manly in great detail, and even writes letters to him while on the train! After arriving in San Francisco Laura rests, then sees the Pacific Ocean for the first time:

"At Land's End I had my first view of the Pacific Ocean. To say it is beautiful does not express it. It is simply beyond words. The water is such a deep wonderful blue and the sound of the waves breaking on the beach and their whisper as they flow back is something to dream about."
~West From Home, Laura Ingalls Wilder

And, after wading:

"The salt water tingled my feet and made them feel so good all the rest of the day, and just think, the same water that bathes the shores of China and Japan came clear across the ocean and bathed my feet. In other words, I have washed my feet in the Pacific Ocean."
~West From Home, Laura Ingalls Wilder

Laura's very impressed by San Francisco and the abundance of beauty she finds everywhere, described in West From Home.  She even says it's almost too much for her!  Her husband did not travel with her because the farm needed tending, but Laura shares her adventures with Manly and with us through her descriptive letters.   She was a gifted writer and an incidental historian.

West From Home

Today I finished The Catcher in the Rye! I could then begin West from Home with a clear conscience (one book at a time). Like Holden in The Catcher in the Rye, who yearns for a more innocent world, I'm somewhat relieved to now read about a world more innocent and promising. Don't get me wrong, The Catcher in the Rye is an incredible book--it's boundless honesty is very engaging--but I'm eager for something more uplifting.

I spent nearly an hour outside with West From Home, something I can't normally do during the week but today I was very lucky. It was great to sit out in the sun. Even though I had a small basal cell skin cancer removed almost two years ago, I'm no solar-phobe. I still believe that some sun is beneficial for Vitamin D production (and who knows what else). With my hat and sunglasses on I sat out in a sunny spot with my book and it was so pleasant! By the fragrant orange tree is my favorite place to sit, but unfortunately the bees agree with me, so I had to move away a bit.

West From Home is a compilation of the letters that author Laura Ingalls Wilder wrote to her journalist daughter, Rose, and to Laura's husband, Almanzo, affectionately called, "Manly". Rose's letters to her mom, who's called "Bessie" and "Mama Bess", are also part of this collection.

Lori's Comments

Today's post will be an easy one to write!  I'll simply respond to Lori's comments.  For some reason, she couldn't comment directly on the blog, so she sent me an email as follows:

"It has been too long since I read The Catcher in the Rye for me to comfortably comment on it. When I am ready for another serious book I might return to that. I will tell you, though, that I have frequently read two books at one time when one of those requires a lot of deep thought (or translating into current phrases). I have been reading Dicken's Bleak House. When I am tired or under the weather, I find myself putting it down for much lighter reading. The danger is sometimes I don't go back to it soon enough and have to reread the past chapter. Books, such as West From Home, I find are enjoyable to keep in the car when I am waiting for kids since each passage is small and simple. They can easily be interrupted without losing the train of thought. I find that I am more likely to share with the kids a fun fact or quote at that time. Most of my serious reading is at night and I find I don't share that as often. I read late into the night last night so could finish my current book because I am so excited to start the Mulvaney book. (And yes, feel free to call me Lori in your blog.)"

Thanks for taking the time to comment and share your thoughts, Lori!

Last night I tried to finish The Catcher in the Rye but my eyes just wouldn't cooperate--I was too tired. (This is a recurring problem; by the time I'm finally able to read, I'm ready for sleep.) I'm also excited to start reading something "lighter". West From Home is next on my list. I often bring a book in my car, too, to read while I'm waiting for my kids. It's a great way to do a little reading.