Getting to know your own library

From Susan Hill’s new book Howards End Is On the Landing:

"It began like this. I went to the shelves on the landing to look for a book I knew was there. It was not. But plenty of others were and among them I noticed at least a dozen I realised I had never read.

I pursued the elusive book through several rooms and did not find it in any of them, but each time I did find at least a dozen, perhaps two dozen, perhaps two hundred, that I had never read.

And then I picked out a book I had read but had forgotten I owned. And another and another. After that came the books I had read, knew I owned and realised that I wanted to read again.

I found the book I was looking for in the end, but by then it had become far more than a book. It marked the start of a journey through my own library.

I really should do something like this. I don't think I've read even a quarter of the books I own...and yet I still check books out from the library."

Knowledge and the wild things

I had a very strange dream a couple nights ago. It was amusing, bizarre, and beautiful in the way that only dreams can be. It illustrates how dreams can be the brain's creative way of sorting through all the information we cram into it, consciously or subconsciously.

I dreamt that the wild things were the caretakers of the trees of knowledge. All I remember of the dream is this: I am deep in the bowels of what I initially think is the earth, yet I soon realize that we are in a different place, like the Wood between the Worlds from the Narnia books. We are in a cavernous space, looking up at the giant roots of trees, pushing through the ceiling. They are unbelievably large, like mountains, beyond the scale of comprehension, and I feel impossibly small while looking up at them. This sense of scale does not bother me.

As is the way of dreams, I never see the wild things, though I know they are present. While it’s funny that the creatures from Sendak’s book “Where the Wild Things Are” should show up in my dream, as the caretakers of these ponderous trees, no less!, somehow they added a sense of gravitas to my dream. Their wildness meant they were dangerous, and I should take care in this place where the trees of knowledge reside.

I never find out what the wild things do to trespassers. All I am left with is the image of those giant roots suspended in a vast space, and the profound sense of awe I felt while gazing at those ponderous roots far above me, and a niggling sense of foreboding, an intuition that I should not tarry long in this place, no matter how heartbreakingly beautiful the trees are.

And that was the dream. There's no hidden meaning behind it, no suppressed emotions trying to get out. Just the hint of a story.

I like those kinds of dreams.

Color wheel of nature

Colors of the Smoky Mountains.

Nature abhors a vacuum

We didn't have too many "views" as the Smoky Mountains were living up to their name.

But without that fog, the light coming through the trees wouldn't be quite so charming...

And moss wouldn't grow so rampantly...

(I love moss.)

Nothing can make decay look as lovely

or interesting

as nature does.

Importance of little things

As always, J. and I had a wonderful time in the Smoky Mountains, where we went for 3 1/2 days. We hiked a section of the Appalachian Trail, from Newfound Gap to Cosby Knob. It was roughly 36 miles.

I kept up with J. on all of those miles--even on that 15 mile day I mentioned in my previous post. No more stopping every 10 minutes on a climb to let my racing heart calm down. I just kept going and going. I was the energizer bunny. I finally understood what J. meant when he said, "It never gets easier--just less hard." My legs were working--oh, I felt it!--but that ache just faded into the background, and I was able to let my mind wander as I took in the beauty of the Smokies around me.

This is an important accomplishment, you know. If I was a hobbit in Middle Earth, this means I would be able to keep up with Aragorn.

Home again

Status for the day (because my readers really care, I know):

Laura wandered through some clouds, met the nearly tame guinea fowl of Tricorner Shelter, unleashed billions of spores, nearly flew off the side of Mount Cammerer, and for the first time in her life kept up with J., even during a 15 mile day, while hiking in the always lovely Smokies!

Climbing is hard

elevation chart for AT around Mount Rogers

When I first started hiking, I had a perverse relationship with elevation charts, those things that show you how high and low the trail goes within so many miles. I hated looking at them because it always seemed that whenever J. pulled the elevation chart out, we were at the bottom of a huge climb that the chart helpfully illustrated as a steep slash. Never at the top. At the same time, I wanted to look at them because I had to see how many more miles we had, and how many more climbs were in store.

I guess J. has toughened me enough so that I no longer want to cry when I see that we have just one more climb to make before we reach the shelter at the end of a long day. Now I can coolly assess the elevation chart and mentally prepare my legs for how much more I will ask of them.

Of course, it helps if you are hiking through open space (like the balds of Mount Rogers). There's more to distract you. I always get grumpy if we're climbing up the side of a tree-covered mountain. Trees tend to blur into one monotonous scene as you hike, so it seems as if you are watching a continuous loop of one image. It gets old if you're tired and hungry.

Food is never far from the hiker's mind

Low fat and low calorie is not an option when you go hiking.

I always feel slightly guilty when we go shopping for food for one of our hiking trips, since we're stockpiling on nutty, chocolate-y trail mix, Snickers and PayDay candy bars, and zeroing in on dehydrated milk that's 20% fat. Moderation is not the key during this time.

Rather than carefully regulating our caloric intake, we revel in it. You have to. I can remember times when I did not have enough food while hiking. Your brain develops a curiously keen sense of focus--the opposite of the light-headedness I feel when I've pushed my lunchtime too far. The gaping maw of your stomach is never far from your thoughts. Any food you eat during this time disappears into a black hole and you derive no satisfaction from it, no sense of your body storing anything for fuel. It's like your hunger is a separate entity that won't give your body anything until it's been satisfied.

Have you met Mr. Edwards' wife?

It's always amusing to meet J.'s students. They always exclaim, with that profuse enthusiasm endemic to young teenagers, "You're so pretty!" and stare wide-eyed at me while J. makes chitchat. Once we move on, they start furiously whispering to each other.

While this is flattering, I think it's more to do with the surprise of encountering the outside life of a teacher, plus just some plain 'ole curiosity about who on earth would possibly want to be married to the big bad chemistry teacher. I think their exclamations of my "prettiness" is a gloss over what they're really thinking: "Wow, she's young and has no warts!" That, and the fact that I don't wear penny loafers or Mom jeans (my preferences running more towards Sauconys and dark wash jeans), combines to completely disrupt their preconceived notions of what "Mr. Edwards' wife" is like.

J. told me about an exchange between two of his students that he overheard earlier that week. One of the boys whispered something to another boy, whose face swiftly adopted a perplexed expression as he wasn't sure he heard his friend correctly, "Have I smelled Mr. Edwards' wife?"

Seeing as I thought "loan" sounded like "markers" while I was working at the reference desk the other week, it's quite plausible that "seen" could be confused with "smelled," especially considering the tendencies of young people to mumble and slur their words.

Scenes from a house

A typical evening at the house.

As soon as I step in the door, the cats materialize from wherever they sequester themselves during the day and wrap themselves around my legs, crying for attention and leaving great quantities of fur on my person.

Pope is like a dog--he comes when called. Sasha is more cat-like in that you never know what she's going to do next.

Front porch guardians

We have some residents on and near our front porch. For some time now, a spider has been spinning a web between the edge of the front porch and the nearby barberry bush and growing fat and happy off the doomed insects caught in her snare. While she normally hides when we come near, I was able to get an up-close view while she caught a loopworm, deftly wrapping it in a ribbon of silk flowing out of her nether regions.

A tree-bark colored praying mantis, a little longer than my middle finger, has been hanging out on our front door. We think she is heavy with eggs. She cocks her head to gaze at me with her bulbous eyes whenever I stoop to examine her.


The other night we spied a toad hopping along the walkway leading to the front porch. We have already christened him "Mr. Toad," even though we don't know whether he has domestic leanings or was just passing through. I hope he sticks around.

The earth shrugged

Delicate Arch

Landscape Arch

Private Arch

an arch somewhere

Another arch that shall remain nameless

Sandstone fins and other outrageous features of the earth

While in Arches National Park, we hiked the Devils Garden trail, which took us past Landscape Arch and other stunningly beautiful arches, sandstone fins, and rock formations of all shapes and sizes.

At the start of the trail, when we spied the sandstone fins from afar (above), we each of us exclaimed, "Oh, I want to go over there!" and found that our wishes were granted. To give you a sense of scale, look at the sandstone fins in the picture above. Now look at the three of us on a sandstone fin below.

It was worth it, even if I had to scoot down some steep and slick sandstone at one point. The picture below does not show the the steep drop to our left into a pool of still water.

Joining the ancient tree hunt

Another stop on our United Kingdom trip: the Fortingall yew tree, which is somewhere between 2,000 and 5,000 years old.

More information about it, and the "Ancient Tree Hunt" can be found here.

"I startled a weasel who startled me, and we exchanged a long glance..."**

I had an Annie Dillard weasel moment with a sagebrush lizard in Arches National Park, outside Moab, Utah.

These lizards were everywhere, but you wouldn't know it unless you were looking (and how many of us really look at things?). These finger-length lizards blended neatly into the sandstone even as they darted to and fro within the blink of an eye. I came across one perched on a shelf of sloping red rock along the trail, and rather than fleeing, it turned and looked at me. Cocking its head, it regarded me with all the temerity it could muster, and we stared at each other.

And that was that. I stared at a lizard, and it stared right back at me. Such reciprocal acknowledgment was unnerving in a way: what was it thinking? Is that what living in the desert does to you--slough off your weak parts so all that's left is a sinewy boldness? While I enjoyed my time in the desert, the openness of the terrain and the ever-present fierce sun was overwhelming. I simultaneously felt as though I was pinned beneath a microscope and lost in a universe of sand and stars. Perhaps being bold is a way to combat this feeling of smallness that the desert imposes on you.

When I stood up, the lizard scampered a few feet away then looked back at me. It bobbed its head and did several push-ups in a display of dominance, in spite of the fact that I towered over it, a boulder to its pebble. I stepped back, respecting the boldness of its actions.

**from "Living Like Weasels," by Annie Dillard.

You can't have my ants

My facebook status for today:

Laura "scrambled up a rock fin, was postured at by numerous tiny lizards defending their territory, observed numerous gorgeous arches, poured red sand out of her shoes, and attended an absolutely lovely wedding while in Moab, Utah"

Walking in the footsteps of obscure TV stars

I am a fan of the BBC series Monarch of the Glen, which is about Glenbogle, a ramshackle estate in the Scottish highlands, and the bumbling efforts of the MacDonald family as they try to maintain it. Imagine my surprise when I found out that Kingussie, one of the towns that we plan on using as a base for our expeditions in Scotland, was the site of the village scenes filmed for this series.

Art and life and what statistical probabilities have to do with it all

These are the kinds of random things J. and I debate at 6:30 in the morning at Starbucks on Saturdays.

Here's how this one started...I mentioned off-hand to J. that the book I was reading, "Age of Wonder: how the Romantic Generation Discovered the Beauty and Terror of Science," was surprisingly engrossing. He asked what exactly it was about, and when I mentioned that the Romantic Generation referred to the age in which Wordsworth and Coleridge, Byron and Shelley lived, he wondered whether Coleridge should get the credit for that strange poem of his, "Kubla Khan," which was written while he was under the influence of opium.

So J. and I started debating whether artists should get credit for the work they've done if they were under the influence (drugs, alcohol, whatever). J. said no, because the artist had no say in the making of art, it was just the drugs. In other words, they did not have the inborn talent to produce their art; it was just the byproduct of flights of fancy they undertook while under the influence. I said yes, because even if the artist was under the influence, s/he still had the talent necessary to produce art (this is not true of all people that claim to be artists). I used a Chesterton quote to back me up: "Jane Austen was not inflamed or inspired or even moved to be a genius; she simply was a genius."

I didn't come close to convincing J. until I pointed out the statistical improbability of an artist continually churning out masterpieces while high, if there was no inherent "genius" or spark of true talent to make such consistently high quality works.

J. and I have a long-standing good-natured antagonism over art.

Psyche in the north

The mention of "arctic wilderness" on the Cairngorms inspired the title of my previous post. "East of the sun, west of the moon," is my favorite fairy tale. It tells the story of a young lady who sets off to rescue a prince who has been bewitched by trolls, who live "east of the sun, west of the moon," in the far reaches of some frozen wasteland. Similar to the tale of Cupid and Psyche, that old old story of long ago, it involves shapeshifting and insurmountable tasks and a determined protagonist who is aided by various supernatural beings. Some people may see similarities with "Beauty and the Beast," as well.

I have written about beasts and beauties and the strange tale of Cupid and Psyche before, especially as C.S. Lewis retold it in his book "Till We Have Faces," which is one of the most powerful books I have ever read and I'm still trying to think of ways to verbalize why.

Going back into the archives (is this something only a librarian enjoys?), here's what I've written before:

Till We Have Faces
Strange Dreams Haunting Us Today
Beautiful Ugly
Thinking on the Beast

East of the sun, west of the moon

J. and I have fallen under the spell of the Scottish Highlands. While browsing some Lonely Planet guides for Scotland, he looked at me and asked, "Are we going to want to move to Scotland?"

The latest addition to our itinerary are the Cairngorms, located southeast of Inverness. The Cairngorms are home to Scotland's only herd of reindeer, which are allowed to range freely. Much of the Cairngorms are considered an arctic wilderness (they're not that far from the Arctic Circle) and contains tundra. J. and I are very excited about seeing tundra.