Life and a New Book
I saw baby yesterday and I think he is going into the terrible twos early. He gives you the remote and wants you to change channels. I guess I picked something he didn't like because he threw his hands up in the air and back down and screamed at me. Then I changed channels again and he put his hands up in front of his face and turned around and threw the top half of himself over on the sofa and laid his head on it like I had really hurt his feelings. Oh my gosh! He is just like his momma. I always likened oggie to Sarah Bernhardt.
I am reading the best book I think I have ever read. At least so far and I am only on page 40. You know some books you read and you keep putting them down because you can't get into them? Well, this one I keep putting down because I don't ever want it to end.
I don't know about you but growing up I had slackers and coaches for English and never got anything literary in the course of English classes. The one I remember the most was an old woman who was as old as the school, waiting for retirement, wore a flower in a vial on her lapel. Huge, unattractive old woman to my young minds eye. Looked kind of like Mrs. Truman only not as kind. She wore the same kind of clothes anyway. Hateful, uninspiring, on the mean side. Had a couple of pets in class and the rest of us were like dog poopie under her size 12, black lace up old lady shoes. My friend and I learned sign language and signed all though class. We were always getting the death ray look from the teacher. I have no clue as to what she thought. I think we just irritated the hell out of her because we were young and having fun and she just wanted to squash that in us. Well, at least we weren't talking!
At least she was memorable if only in a bad way. I only remember one other teacher who was a coach. He taught a hard class and spent most of his time on diagramming a sentence. This was in high school and in my then growing appreciation of the opposite sex, he was quite the specimen. No wonder I still have trouble diagramming a sentence.
We have a book exchange in Tulsa on about 44th and Mingo. I took mom over and we took our old books and I got three novels for 7 dollars. What a bargain! This one that I like so well is called "Daisy Fay and the Miracle Man," by Fannie Flagg. She also wrote "Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe".
Anyway, about this book...I will write an excerpt and you can decide, if you haven't already read it what you think. It is starting out from the perspective of an 11 year old in the year 1952.
The Pettibones have very delicate nervous systems. That's true. momma is nervous all the time. She's worn a hole in the floor on the passenger's side of Daddy's car from putting on the brakes. Momma always looks like she is on the verge of a hissy fit, but that's mainly because when she was eighteen, she stuck her head in a gas oven looking at some biscuits and blew her eyebrows off. So she paints them on like little half-moons. People love to talk to her because she always looks interested, even if she isn't.
I am a second-year Brownie. I got a first-aid badge that really comes in handy. One time after school, Jimmy Lee got hit by a car and was bleeding all over the place. I remembered what to do. I sat down and put my head between my knees to keep from fainting.
Now this is about the 1950's South, so there is some prejudice in it but she tells it from an innocent 11 year old's point of view. As an observation of the world around her.
