The Secret History of Food

 The Secret History of Food (The Tribute Series) by Susan Tomnay and Nadine Wickenden
1998
Weight: 14 oz
Method of Disposal: Donating

This was a small, quick and fun read about food.  It has an English focus, but it covers food all over the world.  There are interesting tidbits all throughout, such as the first English Wedding Cake.  It was broken over the bride's head to represent the ending of her maidenhood.  An unmarried woman might sleep with a slice of the wedding cake underneath her pillow in hopes it would help her get married.  For awhile in history, the French thought you could get leprosy from potatoes and would not grow them.  All sorts.

Today, I ate an egg and cheese croissant, blueberry beignets, grits, and later chili.  Surely, trying to eat away my sorrows and worries, much to my later dismay.  I would like to do the usual resolution and make a vow of good health, but 2021 is already off to such an odd start that I have not even considered making or disavowing any resolutions.

With the exception of making sure that Harriet knows how much I love her on a daily basis.  While this is something I have always strived to do, I feel it even more important now after someone intentionally and directly threatened her life with a gun on the first of January.  I was at once so grateful to still have the love of my life in my life, not injured, and safe, while also despairing the fact I knew she would suffer trauma and cringing at the fear she must have experienced.  She was flitting about, trying to do nice things for everyone that morning and, yet, just like that, she was forced into a situation where she had to make fast decisions and hope for the best.  Thank God, she found her way back to me.  I force myself to stop thinking of what could have happened the second I start thinking it, but I start thinking about it all the time.

Dear Martin

Dear Martin by Nic Stone
2018
Weight: 6. 4 oz
Method of Disposal: Leaving in Lending Library

Harriet bought me Dear Martin as a surprise, and I am glad she did.  It is a young adult book about racism, being a teenager, being a black teenager among white teenagers, and police shootings.  It is important that we have books like these for young adults.  Young people are seeing young black men being killed by police in the news.  Black teenagers are in between being kids and adults, but they are so often seen as adults by authority figures and not just adults, but also as a threat just by being in a random place (their home/the sidewalk/the train station/the car/etc) at the wrong time (a time where someone with power is feeling scared or angry). 

Today, I watched "When They See Us."  I think I have written about the Central Park Five here before.  It is a story that never gets less heartbreaking and, honestly, just gets worse the more you know.  The people who made this series did a great job.  For any white people who cannot see black teenagers as children, you should watch this and do not look away.  I do not even have children but, if you do, can we please all just open our hearts to what it would feel like to be the parents of these boys?  For everyone else, the siblings, friends, girlfriends.  Whiteness has been constructed.  There is no going back.  We can only go forward. We do not want to keep ruining lives and embracing an embarrassing and incredibly cruel history or acting like it did not happen.  That helps no one.  We have got to do the hard work.

Go With Me

Go With Me by Castle Freeman Jr.

2009

Weight: 5.6 oz

Method of Disposal: Leaving in Coralville, Iowa

I went to Prairie Lights in Iowa City for the first time this weekend. I let myself go a little, and I bought some books I probably should not have. This was one of them. It was a definite splurge to get this book and then leave it somewhere just a couple days later. Financially, it was really stupid, but in the spirit of the moment it was the right thing.

Go With Me is a quick read, and there some fine things about it, but overall it is not one of my favorites. The typography in this edition is disgraceful. It can really pull you out of the story, but that is not the author's fault. The skill of the story probably lies in the very thing I did not enjoy about it. It is not that it is bad, but that it is not really my type. It is the story of a woman trying to escape the threats and abuse of the town criminal. She seeks the help of the police and is directed to a group of local men. Two of which agree to go after him and take care of him for good. They were men of few words, and they did not show a lot of excitement or energy whether they were in danger, relaxing, or traveling to a fight. The woman was desperate for help but resentful of the type of men who were willing to help her. The only ones who will do anything. She lacks respect for them and fights them almost the whole way. The beauty of the story is in these relationships and that big, dramatic moves like murder are actually shown to be small, mundane acts of violence.

I am leaving this small book in Iowa instead of packing it in with all the other stuff I picked up along the way. I hope someone else finds it and enjoys it. I found it on a display at Prairie Lights and now it will be given away for free somewhere nearby. That bookstore, by the by, was great. I really like the quality of the books on display and that there's a decent selection of literary journals. I like that there is a tie between the bookstore and the university. Just two days before I flew in my past college professor had done a reading there. I adore that professor and was glad to see she had been there, right across from one of the universities she attended and has led workshops at. My trip to Iowa has been fun. I have enjoyed exploring downtown and checking out the school.