Reading, writing...that's what I do.

I Can Do The Tricky Stuff

We all plan our lives to some degree. Plan our children’s lives. We are not gifted with seeing into the future, but as we age we often THINK we know best. And thankfully, we are often right. 

And yet there are also surprises. One of my favorites involves my own dear mother, Jinni, a widow with we three children, who often would show us the thumb on her left hand, indicating that it was not easy to move her dictates to us, not easy for us to have our way….but sometimes. Because….

My younger brother Bill wanted to get into the music business right after college, Jinni finally agreeing to part of his goal….flying to LA. Because yes, her brother Chuck and her sister-in-law Imelda lived there. So Bill could try to get into the music business, and then later simply fly back home.

But later never happened. Imelda had a neighbor, right across the street on Clump Avenue (the street name always drove her crazy) who worked in the LA music business. A meeting was set up, Bill got an entry level position, and then because he was Bill who knew what he wanted, and because he worked like crazy in that first position, and then the second etc, he soon could claim and exceed every aspect of his dream. AND THE REST IS HISTORY, Bill’s history.

I think all of us, if we tried, could look back on our lives and find that opening, that mentor, even the words of ONE UNDERSTANDING PERSON who helped our goals, put air in the balloon of our dreams.

But we also know that being a parent about to help a child make that major choice, can be like standing by  Captain Hook’s plank…can our son or daughter walk the plank of his or her choice safely? Or is he or she going to fall off…and to complete the analogy, where is Tinker Bell? Or who is Tinker Bell?

BUT YES, WE JUST KEEP LISTENING ….to our own hearts and always to our children…their ideas, goals and longings. And we will not regret that.

And despite Bill’s connected neighbor, I am certain my brother would have become a success in the music business. And despite my having a toddler and having left a solid teaching career, I was determined to go back to school and become a Labor and Delivery RN. First there was the fact that I had never studied medicine. Then there was the fact that I was seeking a particular, coveted position as an older, brand-new RN: You will never get that position, so many told me. BUT I DID. And yes, I had a long drive into the city, but I loved Mercy Hospital, and I loved all the people there and my work. 

SO FINAL THOUGHT….Watch what you say or dream or create in front of your own children.

TRUE STORY: my daughter Christie and I are in her car, she driving us to dance class for her firstborn Adeline, then three going on four, riding in the backseat, amusing herself, while Christie lists for me all the options for this amazing child, referring to the pressure that even young children can experience as the world opens up for them: pre-school, gym, this dance class…and my daughter suddenly wonders aloud if it is all just too much, and how will it go….

while in the back seat, safe in her carseat where she has been looking out the window, Adeline suddenly reveals the direction SHE is heading, saying, I CAN DO THE TRICKY STUFF. 

Of course! And I, her grandmother, will never forget this…Adeline now in the depth of college study, preparing for a career in research and aspects of medicine. OF COURSE SHE IS!!   She can do the tricky stuff, and so can so many of those we love and encourage.

So please remember to take a deep breath, and then slowly let it out….when YOUR CHILD makes that amazing announcement. Because he or she certainly will…and thanks for reading. 

10055 South Wood Street, The Story of a Family

In the late sixties, I became a latchkey child who didn’t mind walking two plus miles from Longwood High School to my home in Beverly Hills, a Chicago neighborhood far south of the city. Through the soft breezes of spring and the freezing cold winds of winter, I walked the same cracked sidewalks and the same streets, avoiding the whoosh of traffic, and depending on the time of day, waiting to hear the faraway horns of the Rock Island Trains bringing commuters to and from the city.  

Beverly, a place of parks and treed streets, older homes and churches, my mile plus walk taking me by shops, two-flats, train-tracks, buses—and depending on my mood when I left school late because of chorus or working on our newspaper, I’d walk south to 99^th street, turning right and heading west to Wood…or I’d walk west on 95^th to Wood, turning left through familiar neighborhoods…because these pathways, despite cold winds or hot sun, were my way home.

Later, when struggling to find the key to our grey frame house, I rarely realized my good fortune…this place of green lawns, neatly kept homes, so different from the descriptions of city life I’d read about in books, seen in photos in Life Magazine. Beverly, like a small town, easy to navigate–city blocks with north-south streets bearing elegant names, east-west streets using numbers to indicate their distance from Chicago’s city center. Beverly, with nature’s gifts lining our streets…stately elms shaped like wine glasses reaching out to maples, oaks…all forming arches of spinning leaves.

And so begins my book…thanks for reading…soon to be available on Amazon. 

PS. Many of you who still follow me and read my work, know that after living in Park Forest, Homewood, Des Moines, Iowa, and West Lake Village California….my husband and I are now back in Chicago, in Beverly.

But I wrote this book years ago, eager to preserve my memories of growing up in an amazing place, being raised by my giving and wonderful mother after my father died in 1950 of a major heart attack. Medicine could not save him at that time. And as I grew, married my forever love, John Havey, taught high school English at Bloom Township High School, later to be blessed with three amazing children, I then went back to school to become an RN, work in Labor and Delivery at Mercy Hospital in downtown Chicago.

All of this before moving to Des Moines, Iowa, after John got a phone call…a growing company needed his skills. And so we moved, I working for Meredith Books and then the Des Moines Health Care Center during H1N1. But the best part, I had time to write. This book is my second Amazon Publication. Last year I gave you: AFTER PAPER LEFT. So as always, I thank you for reading, for being here, Beth  

REVIEW OF THE CORRESPONDENT by VIRGINIA EVANS

Novel writing is always about human joy, human grief. And novels often use tropes to organize content and please the reader. Definition: A trope is a common or recurring motif, theme, or device in storytelling. It also refers to any figurative use of language—such as a metaphor, simile, or irony—where words express a meaning different from their literal sense.

Reading Virginia Evan’s THE CORRESPONDENT, the cover quotes Ann Patchett: “A cause for celebration.” In my humble opinion…that depends. It took me a long time to read and finish this novel. I read another (Elizabeth Strout’s THE THINGS WE NEVER SAY) during that time.

But yes, I finally did get to the end of the correspondent, a series of letter shared by the main character, Sybil Van Antwerp, who is the correspondent, with various other letter writers who come and go.

All writers use tropes. In fact, you might be creating a novel right now and not realize that the amazing plot  line you are working with contains a trope, one that has been used for centuries by other writers. Examples…the long, lost parent, the dead child, the secret lover, the dying major character. 

And what is a motif or theme…basically it is human experience. When you sit down to write a novel, you are writing about love and grief, surprise and longing. These are human qualities and they surface in our lives when we encounter love, death, abuse, abandonment, success, and unforgivable pain.

It would be wrong of me to state right out what the major TROPE in The Correspondent is. You have to read much of the novel to find it, which is interesting, because many writers use a trope at the very beginning, and then expand on it to bring the novel to a its close. Evans reveals this almost at the conclusion of her work. It’s as if she is driving us down a twisting highway, allowing us to meet so many people in her life, when the one person she longs for who we know nothing about is finally revealed.

Maybe that is why Evan’s Sybil is THE CORRESPONDENT, her name another interesting choice: Sybil is of Greek origin and translates to “prophetess” or “oracle”. In ancient Greek and Roman mythology, sibyls were prophetic women believed to interpret messages from the gods and possess divine knowledge of the future.

The Correspondent is 281 pages of letters, characters and indecision, the major cause of all being revealed at the end. Different? Useful? It worked for this new and now admired writer. Let me know if it works for you. 

Info On Supporting the Celiac Safety Act

A friend online asked that we call our representatives in Washington, regarding the CELIAC SAFETY ACT. I immediately offered to write about this condition. 

DEFINITION: Celiac disease is an autoimmune disorder. When a person with this disease eats gluten, which is a protein found in wheat, barley and rye, the small intestine is often damaged. Such damage causes malabsorption, leading to symptoms such as diarrhea, bloating, and fatigue. The basic treatment is a strict, lifelong gluten-free diet. 

 Though symptoms can vary widely, they often include digestive issues, unexplained anemia, osteoporosis, or an itchy rash (dermatitis herpetiformis). In children, the condition may cause stunted growth and delayed puberty. Left untreated, it can lead to malnutrition and other autoimmune conditions.

DIAGNOSIS: How Is Celiac Disease Diagnosed? 

To insure physical safely and accurate results, a diagnosis usually means that two medical procedures have been completed before the diagnosis is definite, and before the patient starts a gluten-free diet.  

• Blood Tests: Screening for specific antibodies (such as the tTG-IgA test).

• Endoscopy: If blood tests are positive, a gastroenterologist performs an endoscopy to take a tissue sample (biopsy) from the clients’s small intestine to confirm the damage and thus the condition: Celiac Disease. . 

Health Issues that indicate a need to testing:

• Digestive: Abdominal pain, bloating, chronic diarrhea, constipation, nausea, and vomiting.
• Nutrient deficiencies: Malabsorption can lead to iron-deficiency anemia, low vitamin B12, and calcium deficiencies. Thus weight loss.  
• Bone and joint pain: Long-term poor absorption can lead to weak bones, osteopenia, or osteoporosis.
• herpetiformis dermatitis: an intensely itchy, blistering skin rash that often appears on the elbows, knees, and buttocks.
• Systemic and mental symptoms: chronic fatigue, headaches, depression, anxiety, and in some cases, infertility

MANAGEMENT: How to manage Celiac Disease

Managing celiac disease requires eliminating all sources of gluten from one’s diet. Even trace amounts can trigger an immune response. 

Currently, the only gluten ingredient required to be listed on labels is wheat, because it’s also a major food allergy.

But people with Celiac (which is a condition that can severely damage the small intestine) are sensitive to all gluten — so not only wheat, but also barley and rye, and a long list of ingredients derived from those things (e.g. brewer’s yeast, malt, farro, graham flour, some soy sauce and “natural flavors”).

If the SAFETY ACT passes, it would mean all gluten would have to be declared — a real game-changer for folks with Celiac. Everyone should be able to EAT without worrying the food is destroying their body.

Please read and consider helping. Look up your reps and write to them. And thanks for reading, because when this reaction occurs, patients frequently experience a wide range of gastrointestinal and non-digestive problems, including

• Digestive issues: Abdominal pain, bloating, chronic diarrhea, constipation, nausea, and vomiting.
• Nutrient deficiencies: Malabsorption can lead to iron-deficiency anemia, low vitamin B12, and calcium deficiencies.
• Bone and joint pain: Long-term poor absorption can lead to weak bones, osteopenia, or osteoporosis.
• Dermatitis herpetiformis: An intensely itchy, blistering skin rash that often appears on the elbows, knees, and buttocks.
• Systemic and mental symptoms: Chronic fatigue, headaches, depression, anxiety, and in some cases, infertility

Also, here are some resources, recipes, and guidance on navigating a gluten-free lifestyle that you can consult:

• Beyond Celiac

• Celiac Disease Foundation

Elizabeth Strout’s Latest Novel: THE THINGS WE NEVER SAY

Elizabeth Strout is ONE AMAZING WRITER. Starting with her novels, AMY and ISABLE, ABIDE WITH ME, she went on to create OLIVE KITTERIDGE, which won her the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 2009. But even if she had not had that prestigious start, Strout would have forged ahead, a village of her characters constantly speaking to her, enabling her to keep writing one amazing book after another. I have read all of them.

Her most recent award, THE STORY PRIZE, was given for her novel: ANYTHING IS POSSIBLE…a collection of interconnected short stories set in Amgash, Illinois—the imagined rural, impoverished hometown of imagined author Lucy Barton from Strout’s, MY NAME IS LUCY BARTON. 

The book introduces us to new characters, revealing why Lucy left the town and its confining culture to move to New York, where she created a new life and began to write stories analyzing and revealing the memories of these people and their circumstances. When Strout writes from the point of view of Lucy Barton, there is a sadness and loss of connection that Strout might have experienced in her own life. Those novels include: MY NAME IS LUCY BARTON, and TELL ME EVERYTHING, LUCY BY THE SEA, THE BURGESS BOYS. But with the love of her older characters still fresh and alive, Stout then gave us: OLIVE AGAIN, and OH,WILLIAM.

Now in this latest book, she is exploring and developing characters in a totally different environment, but with the same interior writing. We truly KNOW Strout’s characters, because she slowly peels away the elements they are hiding: their fears, mistakes, longings, and confusions. And so…

THE THINGS WE NEVER SAY 

A brief summary: The novel’s main character is Arti Dam, a history teacher, liked and honored by his students, who lives and works in costal Massachusetts, but who secretly fights his personal fears, brought on by feelings of isolation, despair and the occasional desire for suicide. We gradually learn that these events are related to past sorrows in his life. Arti might be named for the “art” of finding one’s way through sorrow and worry, through memories that create confusion. Because what is life? What is MY LIFE? And most particularly, how can Arti get closer to his estranged son, after an accident that caused a death?

And yes, we might admire a character who approaches each day with the desire to communicate with his students. But that cannot heal the worries and the fears that Artie is struggling with. Secrets make people fearful. Secrets make people lonely. Maybe this amazing writer is speaking to many of us….how are you doing in life today? What fears are you forced to hide? What truths are you denying? And if you are denying your individual truths…why are you doing so?

Reading always helps us SEE our own true selves. At least I believe this. Thus, maybe Elizabeth Strout has a message for all of us….because this novel is also set against the backdrop of the 2024 election. Wow! 

Let’s ask ourselves…what things do we need to say, do we need to share with those we love? And do we need to share them NOW?  A question to consider. 

Thanks for reading.