December 2024 Books

 I wasn't planning to read an even hundred books this year, but as December got underway, and I had read a few books, I realized that if I read eight books this month, it would make it 100 for the year. And so I did that! 

1. Skipping Christmas (2001) by John Grisham. This was my first ever John Grisham book. His books are thick and just never were something I wanted to read. But this was my neighborhood book group's choice for this month, and so I read it. I liked it--it was short and sweet! For those who have seen the movie Christmas with the Kranks, this is the book upon which that movie was based. With their daughter not coming home for Christmas, the Kranks decide to skip their regular traditions and go on a cruise. Life has other plans for them...

2. On the brink of everything (2018) by Parker J. Palmer. My friend Lynn asked me to look for this book for her, which had been recommended by another friend. Our library didn't have it, so I ILL'd it for her, and then read two chapters before I gave it to her, and finished it very quickly when she returned it to me two days before it was due! (It is not a big book, so it was do-able.) It is a book written specifically for us people who are growing old--what now? Hence the title--on the brink of we know not what, but it's going to be good, right? Nice philosophical read.

3. Here one moment (2024) by Liane Moriarty. Susanne read this last month, and seeing her post reminded me to look for this book, because as I have said before, I do like to read the Moriarty sisters! This book was great, and interestingly enough, the phrase "on the brink of everything" also appears in this book, as many people, of all ages, ponder their mortality. Moriarty ties up so many threads so neatly! Elegantly written.

4. The Florabama Ladies' Auxiliary & Sewing Circle (2001) by Lois Battle. I can't remember how I found this book, which I also borrowed through ILL, but it was really good. The Cherished Lady (lingerie) factory has closed suddenly, and all the seamstresses are out of work. Bonnie Duke Cullman is hired to run a re-entry program at the local college, with some federal grant funding for one academic year. 

5. All the little liars (2016) by Charlaine Harris. In this Aurora Teagarden mystery, Roe's brother Phillip and his best friends and other random teens have disappeared. Were they kidnapped? Did they run away? Are any of the other teens and preteens telling the truth about what they "know" about it?  (No. They are not. At least not some of them.)

6. Foul Play (1978) by James Cass Rogers, based on the screenplay by Colin Higgins. Huh. I wonder what it would be like to read this book if I had not seen the movie a bajillion times. I love this movie!! It was weird: since it is a novelization of a screenplay, and not the other way around, this was like reading a movie. I could skim over description because I would "see" the scenes in my mind, having already seen them. The dialogue was exactly the script. I could say the lines because I knew them already. 

7. Delicious! (2014) by Ruth Reichl. I read this book because it was recommended by someone in the library book club at the November (food-themed) meeting. It started so food-filled that I wasn't sure I wanted to keep with it, but then I got sucked into the story, and it was pretty deep and multi-layered, told partly through letters found that dated to WWII. Very interesting how she drew all the characters together and made a compelling story (also very, very, full of food.)

8. Beasts of extraordinary circumstance (2017) by Ruth Emmie Lang. I was working at the 5th floor reference desk on December 23, and it was super boring because nobody was in the library, really, and it isn't my desk or computer, and the log-ins are weird, so I had nothing to do. I spied this book on the "staff picks" display, and so I began to enact the cliché of the librarian who has nothing to do except sit at the desk and read. A very compelling wolf/nature/human nature read! 

In other December news, I "attended" Kallie Glass's funeral virtually yesterday. Very tender but with fabulous music! Her parents spoke, her brother, our student, Carter spoke. I was proud of him. That was hard to do. Her bishop and stake president were both barely holding it together--it is very hard to deal with the seemingly pointless death of a lovely young person. (They were, of course, seated on the stand, so I had a visual of their cycles of stoicism and tears.)

And of course, one more death to round out the month: Lloyd Miller died on December 27. Let me quote from our mutual friend, Jeremy Grimshaw here:

My friend Lloyd Miller passed away this morning. Lloyd was a marvelous jazz musician as well as an ardent advocate for music of the Middle East. In fact, just last night I was grinning ear to ear and feeling gratitude for Lloyd as I graded my students’ world music end-of-semester projects, several of which involved learning to play one of the many Persian, Arabic, Turkish, and other instruments Lloyd donated to BYU over the years, and which we recently made available for students to borrow. I wish he could see the delightful videos they made as they explored these instruments.
It may seem impossible now, given the current state of that region of the world, but in the 1970s, before the Iranian revolution that ousted the Pahlavi monarchy and put the Ayatollah in power, Lloyd lived in Iran and even produced a variety show on NIRTV in Tehran. The surviving footage available on YouTube is really mind-blowing. Please enjoy this clip in Lloyd’s memory. Love and condolences to his wife, Katherine St. John.
https://youtu.be/eGgbgJwN03o?feature=share

I was the steward over those musical instruments, and was so HAPPY to repatriate them to the School of Music after they were wasting away in the library for two decades. (Some were on display, but most were just in cupboards and closets doing nobody any good for far too long.) 

Once, some people in England, some Iranian expats, were making a documentary about Lloyd's life, and they came and filmed in the library, and I was in it, talking about the instruments. Only then that project bit the dust. But later, someone did make a documentary about Lloyd's life, and Janet and I went to the premiere. I wonder what became of that documentary--I looked and found what is called a documentary of his life on YouTube. So here you go! But this is not the same thing as the documentary that we watched at the premiere. 

This video is a great demonstration of the Lloyd I know. Three of my kids were fortunate to have classes from Lloyd. He was a little zany, a little crazy, but unforgettable!!! 

Oh wait!! Here is the trailer for the actual film that we saw at the premiere. And a link to the IMDB profile for the documentary, Sufi, Saint and Swinger. 

Christmas 2024

 We did a family Zoom call. Thanks to Nancy for arranging it! After I took this picture, Allen joined, and then Rosie and her little family joined. I did not take another screen capture though, because I don't know how to do more than one!

Honestly, having so many people on a Zoom call is a bit overwhelming for me, BUT at the same time, I am very grateful that we have the technology to do this, and it was awfully nice to gather together in this virtual way!

Wait!! Nancy had a picture of all participants!

Meals:

Christmas Adam - Bruce made ham and cheese omelets. Yum!

Christmas Eve - Leftovers from Sunday (potatoes, carrots, onions in gravy with chicken) plus cornbread stuffing. (I was the cook.)

Christmas Evening - perogies with bacon and asparagus prepared by Josie. Also yum!

We each took a turn to cook!

See: December is hard

We got a new, bigger screen at our help desk! We were expecting it early next year, but it came at the end of last week. Compare to the picture in the earlier post to see the difference. 

To demonstrate that December is hard, instead of a funeral this weekend, one of our student employees had a tragic death occur in his family. His younger sister, also a BYU student, was killed in a car accident while traveling home for the holidays. The funeral is still in the future. Here is what her mother wrote about her in a Facebook post:

Kallie was a force for good in this world and loved everyone she met. We have decided to honor her and continue her legacy of love with a scholarship fund in her name. If you would like to donate in lieu of flowers, donations can be made through Venmo.

December is hard

 Well, December is halfway over! On to January (which normally I look forward to, but this year, not so much...but at least it will be lighter again, right? So there is that!)

I do not like to write when I am not feeling happy, but that is probably a time that I need to write, maybe.

So, there have been two Saturdays in December, and the first one, I went to a funeral for the mother of one of my BYU students from 23 years ago. Like, I hired him 23 years ago. It was a non-traditional funeral, kind of more like a wake--that was what she wanted. I didn't stay for the whole thing, because my old friend and former student, Josh, was not there. He has generally poor health. Poor guy! He is so young, only 48, but disabled. That is not the future we envisioned for him 23 years ago!

And then yesterday, I also went to a funeral, this one for my husband's cousin Ron. Ron was such a nice guy, but I was surprised to realize that he is younger than me! He always seemed older to me. He was very nice with Nancy's little children at family reunions. His funeral was really good--the Duggar Family Choir was amazing, I thought. It takes a while to die of brain cancer, and so Ron had time to plan for this funeral, the way he wanted it to be. It was full of tears and laughter. His sister Denise, just 14 months younger than him, was relegated to reading family memories of him, About the song the choir sang, "If you could hie to Kolob," Denise said that once he was sitting beside her and while the "there is no end to" part of the song was going on he leaned over and whispered, "there is no end to this song..." so she didn't know why he chose it for the funeral! But he did. He also chose the opening song, "Called to serve" because he wanted the funeral to be more like a mission farewell--since he was called to move on, apparently.

Weirdly, another of Bruce's cousins, Rick, is also in the process of dying of brain cancer. And Jolene's husband, Greg, also died of brain cancer. He is not genetically related, but it is kind of unusual to see this pattern of brain cancer in the extended family.

Here is a cousin group from the funeral. We were all talking, and I saw that Missy and her husband were standing close by, and I saw Jolene where we could grab her for the picture, and my mother raised me to always take pictures--we are so lucky that everyone always has a camera!--so I said we needed to take a picture, and Bruce's cousin Pam said we all needed to take off our coats, and she is the second oldest cousin, so we all obeyed her.

We took a picture without Jolene first, but I don't have it on my phone. I told everyone to hold their pose, and Missy's husband went and grabbed Jolene to be in our picture. Without her, we only represented four of the five siblings that made up the family that made us cousins. With Jolene, all five were represented. 

So Jolene (representing the Leonard Duggar family of which Ron was a part), me (representing Bruce and Evon's family), Debbie (daughter of Uncle Tom), Pam (daughter of Uncle Buck, and she is the sister of Rick who also has brain cancer), Ken (Bruce's brother so also representing Evon's family), Diane and Suzanne (also daughters of Uncle Tom) and Judy (daughter of Uncle Glen). In case you want to know, Judy is the oldest cousin (daughter of the oldest brother) and Pam is the second oldest (daughter of the second oldest brother). Then next was David (Leonard's son--the third oldest brother) and then Bob (the oldest son of Evon)--look how those siblings took turns having children in the order of their birth!! Although after that, the order gets messed up, with Evon taking turn after turn after turn! (I am kidding--other people had more children, too, but less rapid-fire!) And Uncle Tom starting having children at some point. Debbie is his oldest daughter, and I believe she is 69, so Evon had four children before she was born. 

The Duggars are lovely people. I wish we knew them better. 

I am so glad that back in 2000, Jolene was assigned to work with us to plan the 2001 Duggar reunion. I do not remember that anyone particularly liked our plan--and I don't even remember what it was!--but they reverted to not delegating the planning to us after that, so I don't think it was a hit. BUT it did give us the opportunity to get to know Jolene and Greg and their kids, and I am so thankful for that friendship. Our kids got to know their kids, and I always feel so seen and welcomed by those children. Which is why, when in November (November 9th, specifically) Kelli did some driving for a high school band and ended up at the state championship, Patrick told her to look for Jordan Hope. And Kelli said she was trying to find Patrick's friend, and we reminded her that he is actually Patrick's cousin, and so therefore also HER cousin. Jordan is the band director at Lone Peak High School. And she found him, and they took this picture:

Well, I did not take a picture with Jordan yesterday, though I did talk to him, and hug him, and meet his girlfriend--and I think in this picture with Kelli his (very luxuriant) hair is in a pony tail, but yesterday it was loose, and his beard has also bloomed. He looked like a younger version of Santa Claus, with the thick, wavy, long hair and beard!

At work, my office is now a literal island of not-deconstructed in a sea of deconstruction.

Our student Anna A. is the one who is in charge of our holiday decor. We had a student, Suah, who is now a missionary in Mongolia, started this tradition of making posters by cutting poster paper. I do not know if there is a word for it. Here is what Anna did for Christmas:

Those four figures are cats hanging on for dear life to the Christmas tree after they have knocked it over.

Speaking of Christmas trees, Josie and I bought a real tree in a pot, which we will attempt to keep alive, and then plant it. We are not good at remembering to water it.

And Josie bought some lovely LED lights to put up in our window. I really appreciate her making the effort, because I really love Christmas lights, but I really dislike that putting them up has been all on me for decades. Like, I just don't want to bother anymore. (I understand my Grandma, who was of a different generation, and she just did not "get" all the fuss over Christmas. Like, she liked Christmas programs, and she was a fan of the concept of Christmas, but in her day, you put the tree up for one day, because candles, so it wasn't something you could keep going for an entire month, unless you wanted to burn your house down.) Anyways, they are very pretty, and help me to feel better.

In other December news, Olivia had a baby on December 8, a boy named Shiloh. We were not allowed pictures of him for a couple of days, but then we were. She doesn't want pictures posted, though.

And also on December 8, David's daughter Millie was very ill and hospitalized. Poor little sweetheart!

Instead of a favorite blanket, she has a favorite pillow-in-a-specific-pillowcase. (There are two, so they can wash it and switch them up!) So she took that comfort item to the hospital with her.

On December 12, it was my birthday and also Ethan's first birthday! Josie got me a cheesecake (small one) and Mi Ranchitos for dinner. It was perfect!! Nobody got me a present, and that made me very happy because presents stress me out. When I went to bed, I felt much less stressed, and thinking back on the day, it was because no presents!! I just have so much anxiety over presents, so it was wonderful not to have to worry about would I react wrong, which is my ever-present worry with presents.

Ethan was not happy on his birthday because Millie had shared with him the RSV that put her in the hospital, but he did not get as sick as she did, fortunately. Just sick enough to spend most of his birthday crying because he didn't feel good. But he is feeling better now!

Bruce's birthday was of course yesterday, the day of his cousin's funeral. He doesn't go to funerals, so it wasn't too bad for him. We did get him presents. I got him egg nog (gag!) and some chocolate filled cookie things. Josie got him an advent puzzle. I cooked a pot roast in the oven, and we had one of his favorite pies, strawberry rhubarb, instead of cake.

Bruce is playing catch-up with the advent puzzle, since it is assuming you will start on December 1, and he is starting on December 15. You are supposed to do one puzzle a day, and there are 1000 pieces total in 24 little boxes, that will all add up to make one puzzle. That is a cool puzzle idea!

Memories of Christmases Past: California

 Nancy sort of asked for Christmas memories from my perspective as a young and middle aged mother. I thought surely I had written about that already on this blog, but I can see that there are some slim pickings.

Like, my first Christmas as a mom was in 1980. (I did write about this--quoting from the journals I kept for the girls, but didn't really describe anything in detail!) We had moved to the San Diego area that summer, and were living in El Cajon. So that was my first not cold Christmas. (I had experienced no snow on Christmas before, but at cold Alberta temperatures!) Because of the weather and general ambience, it was a very different Christmas, but I loved it. I remember that we did go Christmas-light-looking--Grandpa Lund drove us to somewhere in maybe Spring Valley or Lemon Grove where there was a street known as Candy Cane Lane because it was so lit up. (I can find lots of Candy Cane Lanes out there but not in the same place any more!)

But my favorite Christmas-light-looking was at the harbor, where all the boats were decorated, and seeing the colored lights reflected off the water, and kind of foggy weather, was so beautiful! 

We had Christmas dinner at G & G Lund's house, with Arlene & Michael & Jenna, and us and our two girls. Maybe Susan was there, too. Probably for at least some of the time. Grandpa Lund would slip pieces of turkey to the dog, and Grandma Lund would fuss at him about that. 

And I remember that we went over to Aunt Nancy's (Kathleen Lund's older sister, who had children old enough to have children who were Michael and Susan's ages). For a Christmas tree, Aunt Nancy had  a living broad leaf tree (I don't know what kind of tree!) strung with colored lights, with Christmas elves in red and green decorating the branches. I thought it was delightful!!

I also wrote about Christmas 1981. We had moved into the little house on the Quicks' property on Anza Street, maybe in November? Not too long before. What was memorable about that Christmas was that Santa Claus "found" us even though we were at work and not at home!! (The girls were amazed!) Bruce and I both worked for Visutron, a home security company, which included 24/7 monitoring of the alarm systems. Someone else worked until midnight, and then Bruce covered midnight to 8 AM, and I covered 8 AM to 4 PM on Christmas Day, so we got permission from the owners to celebrate Christmas at work. We used the tree that was there on the premises, and spent the whole day there. Our house was tiny, so the space at work was fun for the kids to play with their new toys, and listen to Christmas music and dance. 

Christmas 1982, I was expecting David, who would be born two months later. And that was our last Christmas in El Cajon. That was the year that Arlene and I took our girls to be Christmas Day entertainment at La Mesa Convalescent Hospital, which was really nearby to Arlene's house. 

Each of our Christmases in California was different, but there were some things the same: Christmas light looking (both by car and at the harbor), Christmas programs sometimes in the days before Christmas, and in 1982, on Christmas Day itself. New pyjamas for the girls. Christmas was easier with only two small children who had no expectations, and were delighted by anything and everything!