Why do we do what we do?

I found myself asking this question as I read this book.

I have worked in a public library branch for about as long as Mr. Borchert, and from what I could tell, in a similar (paraprofessional) job. And the waiting list for our libraries’ copies of “Free for All” is made up largely of my fellow workers.

To Borchert’s credit, most of all of his experience as a library employee rings true. The problem/quirky/belligerent patrons, the latchkey kids, the machinations of a public library system, even the foul deposit in their book drop (unfortunately) — none of this was news to me. These experiences and others like them make up the bulk of the book, accompanied by the author’s pithy comments. Only a couple of chapters talk about people or situations that have touched his heart.

Which brings me back to my original question.

For me, the answers are easy, although it took me a long time to discover them. First of all, I love books, facts, and details. My mind just seems to be hard-wired that way, and a library is a great place to be able to use those skills. Second, heaven help me, I like people. I have enjoyed some really great working relationships. And I like helping people, for the most part, especially when something I’ve done has made a difference for them, even in a small way. When I left retail a dozen years ago I took a pay cut to work in the library. The number of sincere thanks I received that first year (which has somewhat diminished over the years) more than made up for the smaller income.

In an interview with USA Today, Mr. Borchert is quoted as saying that the library can be the “dullest place in the world — 91% of the time,” and that it’s the other 9% of the time that “Free for All” deals with. What I would love to ask the author is why, if your job is boring most of the time and loony the rest, do you continue to do it? That was the part of the book I think I really missed …

I grew up in (& still live in) an area that has generally lived close to the land. Fly over us in an airplane and we look like a patchwork quilt of cropland. So I pretty much grew up having an idea where some of my food came from

And after reading Kingsolver’s “Animal, Vegetable, Miracle,” I had some knowledge about the benefits of sustainable living and community-supported agriculture.

Now Pollan’s book has given me much more to think about. The idea, for instance, that some food is “food” and some food that looks “normal” has been processed beyond anything our great-grandparents would recognize. Another new concept for me is nutritionism, which according to Wikipedia “is an ideology that assumes that it is the scientifically identified nutrients in foods that determine their value in the diet.” Seemingly this idea alone has created a western food culture that has made us not healthier, but fatter. And reading that our diet has shifted from leaf-based to largely nut-based was a radical idea to me. We have basically excluded one set of vital nutrient sources in favor of another, perhaps less beneficial, one, to our apparent detriment.

I would recommend perhaps reading this book instead of listening. Like many informational books, there are a lot of facts to be gleaned, and reading would allow you to take them at your own pace. In addition, there was something about the reader’s voice—the pitch, the inflection, something—that was a bit grating at times.

Will “In Defense of Food” cause me to completely change my diet? That remains to be seen. I agree with many of the principles Pollan puts forth; a few of them are already near to my heart. But I have ordered this book for my husband, in the hope that maybe we can make a concerted effort to change the way our family eats. Letting go of decades of eating habits won’t be easy, but ya gotta start somewhere …

By Faith Alone is more than the story of Bill Griffeth’s genealogy. Though religion runs as an underlying theme throughout the book, this is also the story of the journey to and founding of the early United States. Reading of the hardships of 16th- and 17th-century people, and especially about the Salem witch trials, was eye-opening, and not a little tragic at times. I have an avid interest in genealogy, and to see Griffeth’s family’s story laid out against the backdrops of religion and history was engrossing. Speaking of his ancestors about to embark on their voyage to a “New World,” Griffeth says:
“As they saw it, this journey, risks and all, was to be approached with hope. Without hope, there would have been no point.”

Someone recommended this book in a book group, and it was wonderful. Weighing in at just under 130 pages it’s a quick read, with a lot to think about – how might reading change the reader?

What I didn’t write below was that once the Queen finds the bookmobile & the books, she develops a passionate love of reading. She spends every free minute she has reading, and she reads everything. Her royal duties become less important as her reading helps her start actually seeing people. Her staff is in an uproar, the Royal Family is upset, the public is bewildered.

Lots of British humor, lots of funny stuff, and a priceless ending. This is definitely a book I want to add to my library.

It’s ironic that I finished this right after “An Uncommon Reader,” which to me posed the question of how books (or reading) can effect the reader. In this case the person effected was the seamstress mentioned in the title. I found her response to what was read to her a lot less satisfying than Queen Elizabeth’s.

Didn’t find the visceral descriptions of life in rural China very pleasant, either. :-P

In this book descendants of a New England family, whose wealth was built almost entirely on importing Africans as slaves, come together to explore their history and try to resolve their feelings about the matter. Their journey takes them to Rhode Island, where the family shipping business was located; to Ghana, the Africans’ home, where the author and his cousins actually experience a darkened slave pen; and Cuba, where their ancestors had plantations and held slaves.

The background work the author has done is amazing. Especially interesting to me was the history of Cuba and its part in the slave trade, about which I knew next to nothing at all.

At times discussions between the “family of 10” that participated in this quest were divisive and contentious. One point that came up repeatedly in these conversations is reparations, restitution for the victims of slavery. The author seemed a bit ambivalent about this in the beginning. In the end, I believe the author and perhaps other of the participants seemed to reach closure on this and other issues that troubled them, an important part of the process.

Though I found the arguments a bit tedious, I enjoyed the book, especially the research the author put into it. That alone is worth the read. Slavery is an evil, no doubt. I’d like to think on the reparations issue a bit more, though.

This was a unique book, with a lot of irons in the fire. The premise here is that Ann-Marie, the narrator’s (Penny) mom, for some unexplained reason, has a connection with the heroines of great literature, and when these ladies reach key crises or plot points in their books, they pop in for a visit. Characters like Franny Glass, Madame Bovary, Scarlett O’Hara, and Catherine Linton appear, and Ann-Marie lavishes all her attentions on them, at the expense of her relationship with her daughter. Real complications in both mother’s and daughter’s lives occur when the heroes of these books occasionally appear in pursuit of their ladies. As a result of one of these visits Penny is placed in a psychiatric institution of the times (the 1970s).

One of the draws for me here was Scarlett O’Hara, who makes a very brief visit in typical manic fashion. The parallel stories of mother and daughter as defiant teenagers were also interesting, though I found the stint in the psychiatric institution a little disturbing. Most of all, I enjoyed the injection of classic literature (& the accompanying research involved) into a contemporary story. I haven’t read many of the classics, and this was a refreshing way to learn a bit about them.

So one Wednesday, Queen Elizabeth II discovers a “bookmobile” parked outside the palace, and she goes inside to take a peek. Already I’m hooked!

Don’t know if it was the abridgement or the book itself, but I just couldn’t get into this—really hard to make sense of.

This is one of the most enjoyable movies I’ve watched in a long time. It’s gentle, and it’s real. In some ways it’s a lot like “Like Water for Chocolate.” Our heroine, Jenna (Keri Russell), is a pie-making genius and her daydreams take the form of visualizing creating delicious-looking pies based on her current situation. She’s also a small-town waitress in a bad marriage, unhappily pregnant, and having an affair with her gyneocologist. Andy Griffith gives a memorable performance as an old curmudgeon with a gift for insight, and an unexpected friend to Jenna. This is a movie I could watch again and again.