The Bookity Book & Tall Grass Salon

Maryn, good for you. Willows are lovely.

And here, very late, is today's almanac,

The Writer's Almanac for September 13, 2014

about which I will say very little except that I took delight in Maxine Kumin's poem, featured today, about chambermaids in hotels.

Something struck me as off and shallow, almost insulting actually, about today's poem. I think it's the sense I get that the poet has only just now noticed menial laboreres, and has written a poem to honor them based on her imagining of what their home lives are like. I wonder if she would have written a different poem had she sat down and talked with these women during their lunch breaks, or better yet spent the night as one of their guests at their home. If I showed the poem to my cousin, who does do housekeeping at a hotel, I have a feeling she'd laugh and say "well, whatever. How are we different than anyone else?"

Dunno, maybe I missed something.

Hmm. Well, I re-read it with that in mind, and I have to say (as someone who has done all sorts of menial labor most of my life, including cleaning though not in hotels) that I didn't find anything except interest, in the poet's attitude. I can imagine the listening and the gathering of impressions, behind a do-not-disturb sign, quite easily.

YMMV of course!

I guess that's one of the beauties of poetry: we each get something different out of it, even if we don't agree on what that something is.

I've always thought that any analysis of art that ignores the variable reactions of the audience both at any given time and over time as well misses the most important part. Good art will affect different people to the same degree in different ways. I guess thatmakes this poem good

Good morning.

The Writer's Almanac for September 14, 2014

The poem today is enough of a direct counterpoint to the one yesterday, I feel sure it's intentional, and maybe in response to similar reactions as yours, Chris.

And today marks the writing of the poem that became The Star Spangled Banner. I once "celebrated" the 4th of July at Fort McHenry, in Baltimore. Fireworks shot off from boats out in the bay; vast crowds of people; traffic there and back as you might imagine. Oh well.

And that tune everyone finds so hard to sing was a drinking song, it says here. Huh.

Also today marks the completion of Handel's Messiah, a similarly seasonal and familiar piece of music and one I prefer though it's done to death. Still glorious though. Easier to sing than the Star Spangled Banner, too. (I say, having sung it, or the soprano and alto parts of it, often.)

You're right, Kyla, I'll bet today's poem was intentionally placed after yesterday's. But now it's insulting to corner office executives Just kidding, of course.

The Star Spangled Banner is also one of the longest national anthems. I saw the flag at the Smithsonian several years ago when it was being restored. It's surprisingly thin, but that might also be from 200 years of eough handling.

Trivia question (no Googling, now!): What was the War of 1812 called in Britian?

Answer: The War of 1812?



After all, it was the same year there as here. (obv. I didn't google.)

Kylabelle said:

Answer: The War of 1812?



After all, it was the same year there as here. (obv. I didn't google.)

Click to expand...

Hahaha! I thought I knew, but it turns out it's a harder question than I thought once I Googled it just to be sure.

Hey Shakey: I'm in your neck of the woods. Saw Dodge City yesterday, and going to the Eisenhower museum today. I'm enjoying the wide open spaces and colors.of the maturing corn and sorghum (or is that milo I'm seeing? Looks awfully short to be sorghum and seed heads are too large for millet). I think people say they hate Kansas jusr because it's cool to hate Kansas. There's nothing at all wrong with the place.

More trivia/historical facts: The American taste for coffee over tea stems not from the Boston Tea Party in 1773 but from the embargo Britain placed on the US in response to the Revolution. Britain controlled all the tea producing regions of the world, but we were able to trade with Spain, whose colonies in Latin America produced plenty of coffee. The embargo wasn't lifted until 1815, at the end of the war of 1812.

You have to start low or you can't jump high enoguh later on. Yankee Doodle is much easier.

The first line of the Ugandan national anthem.is "Oh, Uganda!" Whenever parliament, the president, or even average Ugandans did something weird, which was quite often, we'd do a facepalm with a heavy sigh and say "Oh, Uganda!"

Chris, when you go to the Eisenhower museum there is a fantastic place to eat just off i-70. It is called Brookville and it has its own exit--it used to be an old hotel and there is a lot of history with it. The food is the best ever, served family style and always the same menu: relish plate, cole slaw, fried chicken, churned butter, home made biscuits, creamed corn, hand cranked vanilla ice cream. It is a simple menu but like Kansas it never gets monotonous, the small things make all the difference. Fort Scott is close--home of Gordon Parks. The crop is probably milo. --s6

My grandparents lived in Enterprise Kansas so we got to go to the Eisenhower museum. That wasn't nearly as interesting to me as the dressmaker's shop we'd pass when we drove to Salina. My sisters and I played a game, guessing the color of the dress in the window. Don't remember that there was a prize, per se.

And yes Chris, I love Kansas, even the flat part to the west although I prefer the Flint Hills. Still have cousins there.

Chris: What DID the British call the War of 1812?

*doesn't want to google at all*

Shakey, unfortunately I'm.with a tour bus and we're doing lunch in Topeka. The museum was incredible.

To the British, the War of 1812 was just one theater of the Napoleonic Wars, so it doesn't have it's own name. Although we consider it a victory, it was more officially a draw because no territory changed hands. It did, however, establish the US's preeminence in North America.

apropos of the chambermaids, I have a short story over in literary share your work with one as the main character...
http://absolutewrite.com/forums/showthread.php?t=296297
Years ago I worked as one for a few weeks up in Banff when I ran out of money.

I didn't care for either of the poems.

I used to be a food stamp/adc worker and many of my clients worked as chambermaids at the local motels. I saw them as gutsy, hard working single mothers. Didn't think much of the chambermaid poem either. I think because the pov was aloof, amused, almost superior. Any woman can let a man screw up her life. She doesn't have to work a pink collar job to be a victim.

My chambermaid friends did live with soap opera drama in their personal lives. The drama was almost always due to lovers, children, exes or bosses. There were scrappy stories, wise stories, funny stories, cautionary stories, tragic stories, always brave stories. One had a boyfriend tie her to a chair and set the house on fire. Luckily the landlord came by to bitch about the unpaid rent and rescued her instead. It was a hilarious story when she told it.

I started a novel about the stories once--kind of a Spoon River/Peyton Place/ Zora Neale Hurston hybrid. It was based on a series of ADC interviews that began on the Tuesday before Christmas--Tuesday was intake day-- then ended on Sunday, Christmas Eve.

It was flawed from the first, mainly no action because i didn't see the action, only heard about it in the interview room. And my co-workers were as screwy as the clients, so I couldn't figure how to include them in the story. Too much backstory. I was trying to work the backstory in like Joseph Heller but, as you may have noticed, I am no Heller. It finally became hopelessly tangled so I filed it away--sixteen legal tablets scribbled front to back in Bic fine point accountant pen. They are in a Rubbermaid storage box at the back of my closet, crowding dress shoes, step ladder and Mazzy's Hot Wheels Track.

My work partner in those days was a dope smoking, ex-homecoming queen who was well on her way to realizing that she was a lesbian. She had it bad for this big, red haired lady cop who was always on the verge of busting her for possession but giving her lectures on sobriety instead. They were achingly cute together, really belonged together in my opinion, and in my husband's too, but in those days--early 80s --there was no hope for a same sex relationship in a small town with both parties dependent on a public servant's paycheck. It didn't end well. The cop got married. My friend drifted out of town. --s6

shakeysix said:

My work partner in those days was a dope smoking, ex-homecoming queen who was well on her way to realizing that she was a lesbian. She had it bad for this big, red haired lady cop who was always on the verge of busting her for possession but giving her lectures on sobriety instead. They were achingly cute together, really belonged together in my opinion, and in my husband's too, but in those days--early 80s --there was no hope for a same sex relationship in a small town with both parties dependent on a public servant's paycheck. It didn't end well. The cop got married. My friend drifted out of town. --s6

Click to expand...

That one's the story to write.

Thanks for the encouragement. I am thinking about tackling it again. But, Kuwi, our boss at the time was a lying shirker, the big boss was a bible thumping hypocrite and one of my co-workers was a creepy misogynist with a three year gap in his personal history. How can I not write about them? In some twisted way they are part of the story too. The story follows a timeline and the thing ends up with a sad little office party. I have a full week of teaching in front of me... the last time I was writing without an outline. Maybe I can scratch out an outline in the mornings. Thanks again--s6

Well, here it is 5:30 and no sign of the almanac yet today.

I got tangled up in life events and forgot all about it, but I just checked my inbox, and, nope, not there.

No doubt it will arrive at some point. Or there is always tomorrow.

Shakey, another vote for your stories. And why would you need to leave the other colleagues out? Go for it...(I'm not an outliner either, but I'm trying to on my next opus. The last one was historical about real people so I had an enforced outline of events - I wrote it in record time...for me.)

Yeah, I wondered too why you had to leave them.out, but of course I could see it getting too messy. But other writers pull it off, so I'm sure you can too.

Speaking of historicals, I made a comment in another thread that cutting the cord to current events (he was writing a contemporary) can give you the freedom to let the story go where it needs to. But on reflection, I'm having a blast working on my WWI scifi and fitting the story in to the events. The historical facts have actuallly opened up story possibilities, not limited them. What do the rest of you think? Have I talked out of my a-fifty-five (a55 or ass) in my reply in that thread?

Chris, isn't it like all the questions? It depends? I mean, I think your advice was excellent and your experience right now, using actual events, just says that that's also a good way to go under the right circumstances.

And, Shakes, I agree with everybody that you really ought to revisit that old story. So much rich material there! Good luck with it.

Yesterday's bloody almanac was delivered right on time by them but my email sat on it until after midnight. And as we know if I post it, it will just be today's link that will appear, so here is today's and if you want that yesterday one (which was probably better) you'll have to fetch it yourselves. (Refrain from old folk songs: The saddle and bridle are on the shelf, mm-hm. If you want any more, you can sing it yourself, mm-hm. )

The Writer's Almanac for September 16, 2014

The poem today doesn't speak to me, much, though the last stanza has poignance.e

Steinway's first American-made piano was sold on this date. Railroad tycoon James Hill was born, as was H.A. Rey, author of Curious George, James Cash Penney, Jr., the department store founder, and Anne Bradstreet, America's first published poet.

Chris, I found the dates and events I had to follow were very freeing. Sort of like those prompts you sometimes see - my mind had a point to focus on and spread out from. It was a blast.

Read yesterday's poem - ugh. Same to today's. Obvious and sentimental (not to be too harsh). Each redeemed by one good image. Lacy, the renowned critic of poetry...