There There by Tommy Orange: A review

The title comes from Gertrude Stein's famous assessment of Oakland, her home town: "There is no there there." As one of the characters in this book discovers the statement was not really a putdown of the city; it was simply her way of stating that the place where she had grown up didn't really exist any more. Everything had changed, as, in fact, everything does over time. But in Tommy Orange's telling there is plenty of "there there" in Oakland.

It's the town where Orange grew up as well and where there is apparently a thriving community of Native Americans. They are "Urban Indians" in Orange's (who is himself an enrolled member of the Cherokee and Arapaho tribes) characterization. In his prologue he says, "We know the sound of the freeway better than we do rivers, the howl of distant trains better than wolf howls, we know the smell of gas and freshly wet concrete and burned rubber better than we do the smell of cedar or sage or even fry bread."

That same searing prologue gives a catalog of atrocities committed against Natives since the coming of Europeans to the continent. It makes for very tough reading but it gives context to the present day people and to the psychological and pathological effects of centuries of abuse and degradation.

Orange describes his "urban Indians" as "present tense" people. It is sometimes difficult for them to see themselves as connected to their history. As one character says, "I feel bad sometimes even saying I'm Native. Mostly I just feel I'm from Oakland."

Orange writes about a dozen Natives who live in or are connected to the city and who are moving toward the Big Oakland Powwow to be held at the Oakland Coliseum. He uses the multiple perspective, telling the story as seen and experienced by each of his characters. The chapters are short vignettes from each character.

At first, I had a difficult time with the story in that I could not see how all these different people and their experiences were connected except by the city. I decided to read some reviews to perhaps find guidance. Luckily, I found a review by Colm Toibin in The New York Times Book Review and in that review, I found this paragraph:

"Within the cacophony of voices in this book and the many short chapters each told from the perspective of one of the characters, the structure is not only dictated by the sense of identity these characters share, but by the fact that many of them will meet at a great powwow to be held in Oakland. Thus they are all, as in Chaucer, pilgrims on their way to a shrine, or as in Faulkner's As I Lay Dying, an extended family crossing the landscape." (My emphasis.)

And with that, the figurative lightbulb lit up over my head. Having only recently reread As I Lay Dying, I could easily see these people as the Bundren family writ large. After that I didn't worry about establishing relationships; I knew everything would link up eventually.

And so we follow each character as he or she looks toward the powwow and prepares to participate or to attend as an observer. One woman looks forward to seeing her three grandsons who she had given up to her sister because she realized her addiction made her unable to properly care for them. A man is hoping to meet his father whom he has never seen. A woman who was adopted by white people may meet both her parents whom she does not know. A young man who learned to dance by watching YouTube videos plans to dance at the powwow and hopefully win a prize. And then there are the criminals who are hoping to rob the powwow. They will all come together in a dazzling denouement and none of their lives, if they survive, will ever be the same. All of these lives are touched in some way by alcoholism or addiction and by the lack of a father.

I don't know how to even begin to do justice to this book. It is subtle and complex and powerful, just as are the lives of the people it describes. Even when he is relating the most mundane events, the writer gives the narrative a timelessness and feeling of authenticity that one only finds in great literature. This is an amazing book and I hope it will be widely read. 

The most amazing thing of all about the book may be that this is Tommy Orange's first.

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Mid-summer in the backyard

It has not been a good year for butterflies in my backyard, a backyard that in previous years has teemed with the colorful insects. I blame the weather primarily for this absence. We've had relatively wet conditions throughout much of the year. Not that we've had heavy, torrential rains except on a couple of occasions but in most weeks we have had at least some rain. That may have made it difficult for some butterflies to reproduce. Even the butterflies that are normally ubiquitous in my yard have been scarce this year.

That includes beauties like the Gulf Fritillary, usually one of the most numerous of its kind here throughout the summer.

It also includes the little yellow butterflies called sulphurs, such as this Dogface Sulphur. In the past, they've been so omnipresent that we take them for granted and stop noticing. Until they aren't there.

Last year, throughout the year, I had a constant stream of Monarchs passing through and uncountable caterpillars on my milkweed plants like the one this female is enjoying. This year, until recently, I've seen very few Monarchs and none of their caterpillars.

And of the Monarch's cousin, the Queen, I don't recall seeing one all year.

In the last couple of weeks, the numbers have picked up a bit with fritillaries and sulphurs leading the way. I'm seeing quite a few swallowtails and skippers and more of the Monarchs now, so I have hopes that the year will end on a more positive note for butterflies.

Meantime, some other critters are having good years.

Dragonflies, for example. They seem to thrive on the weather we've had this year. Every time I step outdoors I encounter one or more.

And cicadas, of course. Nothing ever seems to slow them down. Their "songs" are the background music for a hot August afternoon.

But maybe the happiest of all critters this year have been the frogs, like this Southern Leopard Frog sitting on a lilypad in my goldfish pond. The frogs have expressed their happiness by reproducing. Prolifically!

These are just a few of the thousands of tadpoles currently inhabiting my little pond. I assume they are progeny of the leopard frogs, but there are other species of amphibians around the yard and some may be their offspring.

If you look a little closer, you may be able to see that some of these tadpoles have minuscule rear legs. They are on their way to becoming froglets. It takes several weeks from their hatching to actually becoming froglets able to live outside of the pond. 

If all the tadpoles in my pond actually become frogs, my backyard is going to be knee deep in frogs!

Poetry Sunday: The Second Coming by W. B. Yeats

William Butler Yeats was an Irish poet who was a giant on the literary scene of the 20th century. He won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1923. This is one of his most famous, most quoted poems. It seems particularly apt in a time when there is uncertainty as to whether the center will hold and "the worst are full of passionate intensity."

The Second Coming

by W. B. Yeats (1865 - 1939)

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun, 
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

This week in birds - #316

A roundup of the week's news of birds and the environment:

There hasn't been much hummingbird activity around the yard this summer. In recent years, we've generally had a Ruby-throated Hummingbird nesting here but apparently not this year. But fall migration has started and the first wave came through this week. Early in the week, I saw three of the tiny birds tussling over the Hamelias (Mexican firebush) and other flowers in the backyard. There were probably more around, but I was able to count three. By the end of the week, they appeared to have moved on. I saw only one in the yard on Friday, but I expect more will be coming through soon.

*~*~*~*

Exposure to air pollution, especially particulate matter, is a leading driver of heart disease and stroke, lung cancer, and respiratory infections the world over. It is the sixth highest risk factor for death and contributes to up to seven million deaths each year.

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Another week and another extreme weather event. In the southern state of Kerala in India, well over 300 people have died already as a result of the worst monsoon flooding in nearly a century.

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And in regard to another extreme event, the raging wildfires in California, Interior Secretary Zinke assured us this week that, contrary to scientific opinion, global climate change had nothing to do with the fires. Instead, he said the fires have been worsened by environmentalists fighting against more logging of forests. Simple solution: Cut down all the trees and there won't be any fires.

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The Great Black Hawk is a neotropical raptor that normally ranges from coastal Mexico down to eastern Argentina, but earlier this year one was documented on South Padre Island in Texas and now another one has turned up in Maine. Most astonishingly, a careful examination of pictures of the birds has convinced at least some ornithologists that it is the same bird. Obviously, this bird has a yen to see the world.

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Voters in the State of Washington will have an opportunity to decide whether to institute a carbon tax in this fall's election. Alaska, surprisingly enough, is also considering whether to implement such a tax to help offset loss of income from fossil fuel extraction.

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Coelacanth photograph from The Guardian.

Coelacanths, a fish that existed before dinosaurs, were thought to be extinct until a living specimen was caught off the African coast in 1938. Today, only 30 of the fish are known to exist off the east coast of South Africa and there are fears that a new oil exploration venture in the area could jeopardize their continued existence. 

*~*~*~*

In 2013, a chemical explosion at a plant in West, Texas, killed thirteen people. In the wake of that disaster, rules were strengthened and made stricter for operators' risk management plans. The current EPA was trying to delay implementation of those rules for at least two years, but an appeals court in Washington, DC ruled this week that the EPA must enforce the strengthened rules.

*~*~*~*

The toxic "red tide" algae bloom continues to kill Florida wildlife and threaten tourism in the state. This year 267 tons of marine life have washed up on the shores of the state, killed by the toxic algae.

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A survey of birds in northern New Mexico has found declining population of many species. The birds are being affected mainly by loss of habitat due to prolonged drought, hotter temperatures, and bark beetle outbreaks that kill the piñon-juniper forests that the birds depend on.

*~*~*~*

Under a court order and settlement in New York, New York State Parks will move a feral cat colony from Jones Beach State Park where it imperiled endangered Piping Plovers that nest in the area.

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A federal judge in Montana has ordered the U.S. State Department to do a full environmental review of a revised route for the Keystone XL oil pipeline that was approved by the current administration, possibly delaying its construction and dealing another setback to TransCanada Corp.

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The orca mother that had carried her stillborn baby with her in the waters off Washington state for more than two weeks finally relinquished the body this week and returned to her pod. It has been three years since an orca in the area has birthed a surviving calf. 

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As animals adapt to life in cities, are they becoming smarter? They are certainly learning new strategies for survival. A prime example is the wild fishing cats of Colombo, Sri Lanka.

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Native North Americans kept and bred Macaws more than 1000 years ago as far north as New Mexico.

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Speaking of smart animals, a French historical theme park has been training Rooks, a member of the Crow family, to retrieve litter at the park. The birds will be rewarded whenever they bring bits of litter to their handlers.

Mr. Churchill's Secretary by Susan Elia MacNeal: A review

This series was recommended to me since I enjoy historical mysteries and I decided to give it a whirl.

Maggie (Margaret) Hope is the daughter of English parents who was raised in America after both her parents (presumably) were killed in an auto accident. She had an English grandmother, mother of her aunt and her father, whom she only knew when she was a baby and whom she didn't remember. But when the grandmother died in the late 1930s, she left everything to Maggie, who by then was a college graduate and looking forward to continuing her education in graduate school. She was forced to delay her plans when she had to go to England to sort out the estate.

Two years later, it is 1940 and England is on the brink of war. Maggie is living in the old family home with some other young women as renters. One of the young women is an American named Paige whom she knew in college. The estate still is not settled and Maggie is slowly making a life for herself in England.

Winston Churchill becomes prime minister. The young woman - of course it is a woman - who is assigned as his typist is brutally murdered as she is going home one night during blackout. A new typist is needed and Maggie Hope gets the job, even though she is supremely overqualified and is a mathematician not a typist/stenographer.

At some point, Maggie feels the need to visit the graves of her parents. (Yes, she's been there for a couple of years and hasn't felt this need before.) She goes to the cemetery and easily found the grave of her mother. But there was none for her father. She asked a groundskeeper who told her no one by that name was buried there, but that a mysterious man used to bring flowers to her mother's grave, although he hasn't been there for some time. Could it be that her father, the brilliant mathematician, is still alive? And if so, why has he not contacted her in all these years? Maggie is determined to find the answer and that eventually leads her into all kinds of peril. 

In an afterword, the writer explains that her character of Maggie is actually informed by memoirs of women who served in that role during the war. Perhaps it is because of this that the narrative is filled with historical details which make for interesting reading. (For example, I learned what "barrage balloons" were.) 

The book actually started out quite strongly and I was enjoying the read, but then the writer just kept throwing in more and more complications. It's not just Nazis, it's also the IRA. Maybe Maggie's father is alive but he's crazy. No, he's just pretending to be crazy; it's his MI-5 cover story. More and more characters are added to the mix until it is almost impossible to keep up with who's who. And if both of her children are actually alive, why did Maggie's grandmother leave her entire estate to Maggie? We have coders and codebreakers, Bletchley Circle and MI-5 on every street corner and through it all, including the falling bombs, the ordinary Englishman/woman "Keeps Plodding On."

Then came the climax which turned out to actually not be the climax. In fact, the book went on and on and on after the original denouement until I wanted to say, "Yes, we know all that. Now wrap it up already!" 

Knowing when and how to end a narrative is an art and one that a lot of very good writers struggle with. It's particularly common, I think, with first books which this one is. In the end, the long goodbye caused me to reassess what I had originally thought would be a four-star read. I subtracted a star and if I had been brutally honest, I probably should have subtracted two.

My rating: 3 of 5 stars    

A natural woman

Carole King by way of the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin, 1942 - 2018.



Thank you, your majesty. I needed that. RIP.

Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day - August 2018

Welcome to my zone 9a garden in Southeast Texas. Here are some of my plants that are blooming this month. If you visited my garden on July Bloom Day, you will have seen many of them before.

 Tropical milkweed.

 Texas sage. Its blooms are triggered by rainfall and since we've had a fairly wet summer, this large shrub has been in bloom for much of the season.

 Butterfly ginger.

 Portulaca, aka moss rose.

 Feverfew.

 Evergreen wisteria, a late summer to early fall bloomer. 

 Blue plumbago, usually one of my most dependable bloomers, has not done as well this year. I don't think it has liked our weather.

 The muscadine vines have been very happy and are full of grapes.

 Gaillardia.

 This is a pale pink gomphrena called 'Pinball.' It has carried a profuse load of blooms right through the summer.

 Four o'clock.

 Rudbeckia 'Goldstrum,' aka black-eyed Susan.

 The beautyberry shrubs are loaded with berries - both the traditional purple... 

 ...and the white cultivar.

 The large almond verbena shrub is covered in these unpretentious but wonderfully scented blossoms. They perfume the entire side of the garden where they live.

 A few of the daylilies are reblooming.

 Pentas, a butterfly favorite.

 Native sunflowers.

 I have these little marigolds in beds scattered all around the garden.

 The summer phlox is well past its prime but some of the plants are still blooming.

 The pomegranate tree is full of these fruits.

 Justicia orange flame.

 The basil flowers are still nourishing the bees.

 Coral vine. Its heaviest bloom is in the fall.

 Joe Pye weed, a native plant that I love to grow.

 The purple coneflowers have been disappointing this year, perhaps due to the weather. They were glorious last year.

 Anisacanthus (flame acanthus) with bee.

 Duranta erecta, aka golden dewdrop, so called for the yellow berries it develops after the blooms are done.

 Hamelia patens, Mexican flame bush, a hummingbird favorite.

These dinner plate-sized hibiscus blossoms only last for one day, but they are spectacular while they do.

That's it for this Bloom Day. I hope you enjoyed your visit. Don't forget to visit our host, Carol at May Dreams Gardens and see a list of all the other gardens that are participating in this month's meme.

Happy gardening and happy Bloom Day to all.