The Jorge Sosa Story (Part One)

All right, the Yankees just won the World Series. What better time, then, to tell my Jorge Sosa story? I know. I know. Nobody in his or her right mind would associate pitcher Jorge Sosa with the New York Yankees, but bear with me, okay? We'll get to that. Today, though, is Part One: The Backstory. Here you go:

Back when Bob and I lived close(r) to (and in) New York City, we used to try to get to a Yankees game at least once a year. It's still odd for me to hear myself tell people that. You see, I grew up in North Carolina. We had no professional baseball teams in the state. I was sort of a lukewarm Atlanta Braves fan, if anything. Truth be told, though, I just didn't care much for baseball.

Anyone who has ever lived in North Carolina knows that there is one sport and one sport only. The rest are merely games. But basketball? Well, the mega Southern Baptist churches know who their competition is. And we're not talking pro basketball here (at least, not since Jordan left the Bulls). Charlotte had some team called the Bumblebees or something, didn't it? (Now, before I get a million emails from 21st-century American literalists with no sense of humor -- an invasive breed that does not understand words like "facetious" or "sarcasm" -- I will take the sting out of the humor: yes I do know that they were the Charlotte Hornets. And I hope that some of you are with it enough to have caught an intentional pun.) No, we are talking college hoops. Before you even learn to say "mama" or "dada", if you happen to be a baby born in North Carolina, you know how to say, "Go 'heels!" or "Go Wake!" or "Go Wolfpack!" (My omission here, for those in the know, will tell you where my loyalties lie.)

Yes, I was a basketball fan. I was also a football fan. I can still remember my father teaching me the rudiments of the game -- all about first downs and touchdowns -- as we watched The Washington Redskins lose, yet again, on our black and white TV. My football knowledge was furthered when my brother got an electronic football game (BTW, don't let the British boys fool you when it comes to American football. Ian took that thing to England with us when we went to live there, and we barely managed to get our hands on it with all the boys in our village passing it around, mesmerized by it, trying to outscore each other, while telling us out of the other sides of their mouths what a wimpy sport American football is).

So, I was a basketball fan and a football fan. Then I moved to Connecticut (in the days before the Internet) where all I could find in the local papers, papers that didn't seem to care less about the ACC (until March, of course), were UConn scores. Getting information about the teams I loved was suddenly nearly impossible. Thus, much to my surprise, my interest in basketball began to wane. My interest in football, which I had never liked as much as basketball, even more so, now that I had no one who wanted to watch it with me.

And then I met Bob: a sports fanatic all around. He'll tell you he's not, but he is. You just have to be able to intuit, somehow, that just because he will sit in front of a TV watching football for 2-3 hours doesn't mean he's really into it. In fact, despite the fact there is no leisure-time activity you're not that into that you would waste 2-3 hours of your precious time on (unless, you know, it's six months into a new relationship that seems to be going somewhere, and your new love thinks nothing is more fun than spending a Saturday train spotting with you), you're supposed to believe him when he tells you he's not that into football (despite the fact he played the sport in high school and coached it when he was a teacher).

Actually, though, it's easy to believe he's not that into football if you've ever seen how he relates to baseball. Most specifically: Yankees baseball. You can tell it's different because he has to sit a certain way while watching it. You can tell because, unless the Yankees are ahead by 8 in the bottom of the ninth, you will never be able to engage him in idle chatter. You can tell because, if it's the 6th game of the World Series, and the Yankees suddenly go ahead by 3 runs, you'd think someone had come along and told him he'd won the $70,000,000 jackpot.

It's infectious. I've long since lost interest in basketball. I've come, pretty much, to dislike football (such a stupid, violent sport that brings out the worst in men when there's so much of the best in men that needs attention). But baseball? Bob has taught me all about what an incredibly cool sport it is (and it is. It's truly the thinking man's -- and woman's -- sport). And Yankees baseball? Well, I'm all over that (except I have a hard time watching it, because I am convinced I am bad luck for the team). No, nobody likes Steinbrenner, and I'm not somebody, so I fall into that camp. However, I do like the majority of the players on the team and have ever since Bob infected me. (My favorite was Paul O'Neill, who has long since retired.)

And so, Bob and I used to go to Yankees Stadium (the old one) at least once a year, which is where this story that is to be continued really begins, and where you will meet Jorge Sosa. I'll see you in Part 2 (sometime next week) at Yankee stadium.

Oh What the Hell? Another Challenge. Let's Call It The Attacking the TBR Tome Challenge

I know. I know. I came up with three challenges earlier this year and almost immediately abandoned them, so can you really trust me when it comes to challenges? Probably not. However, a new year is on the horizon. I always become my most hopeful self when a new year is on the horizon. I'm the sort of person who if you're going to tell me I've got an incurable disease and only have six months to live, you should tell me in late November, with a new year right around the corner. I will respond with, "Ha! Incurable for most, but not for me Emily Barton, who can conquer anything come January. Just give me till January 1, and you'll see. I've got at least 50 more years in this old body." Tell me the same thing in March or May, and I'll be saying, "Six months, you say? You'd better start digging my grave now. I'm pretty sure it won't be more than two weeks."

2009 (and what disappointments it may or may not have) is already being swept under the carpet as I focus on how much better 2010 is going to be. And what's the first thing I want to attack in 2010? My TBR tome. I know, most of you only have a list, so this challenge is probably going to be a little easier for me than it is for you, given that I will have many, many more titles to choose from than you will. I also know that many of you refer to your TBR pile, an idea that just amazes me. To actually have nothing more than a mere pile (okay, some of you have piles but still) of books to read? I have a whole houseful of books to read, thanks to having married my husband, the former English teacher and pack rat (I hope those of you who have visited will attest to this fact). Not that I can blame it all on him. I didn't used to buy books at the alarming rate at which I buy them now, but I'm like a bulimic. The slightest excuse (broke a fingernail, it's raining/snowing/a brilliantly sunny day, I need a change of scenery...), and I'm off to the nearest bookstore to purchase at least five books, eyes too big for stomach, finding the need to purge (or at least set aside for months on end) after reading only two.

So, here is how this challenge works. It begins December 1, 2009 (because I always believe in challenges that give you more than one year to complete) and ends no later than December 31, 2010, but it really ends whenever you manage to complete it. Here are the rules:

1. Choose 20 books from your TBR list (or tome, if you are like me), and post them on December 1, 2009. If you'd like, you can tell us why you chose each book (I'm sure you can guess what I'd "like").

2. Read those 20 books.

3. Oh, did I mention? You are not allowed to buy any of them. If you don't already own them, you must beg, borrow, or steal them in order to read them.

4. Oh, I guess I forgot the other difficult part: you are not allowed to buy any new (or used. No, you can't get around it that way) books until you have read (or attempted to read at least 30+ pages) of all the books on your list.

5. There is one exception to the rules (because I am a fair kinda gal and belong to 2 book discussion groups): you may buy books you have to read for book discussion groups before you have read all 20 on your list, if you can't get them any other way (i.e. your library system doesn't have them and employs the Sloth Express to deliver all interlibrary loans). However, I highly recommend that you encourage your book discussion groups to read books from your list of 20.

6. And then that final thing: write a blog post about each book as you finish (or decide you can't finish) it.

That's it. Who's joining me?

(And now I'm off to flip through the pages of the TBR tome and start narrowing down my list.)

The Mysterious Madame of the Manse

Well, I didn't get around to getting one of my ghost stories in good enough shape this year that I felt like sharing it with anyone (although, buoyed by reading a few ghost story collections, the best being the Dover edition of the Collected Stories of Oliver Onions, I've come up with about eight new ideas for stories, so maybe by next Halloween, I'll have something good to share with everyone. Meanwhile, if you love ghost stories, read Oliver Onions), but I do have a "real-life" ghost story to share today. Or, I should say, a "ghost story of sorts." Hope you enjoy it, and Happy Halloween.

The Mysterious Madame of the Manse

I have mentioned a couple of times since Bob and I moved into the manse that it is supposedly haunted. Of course, that means absolutely nothing. I'm convinced that if you happen to live in any house in America that is over 100 years old, you can guarantee people are going to tell you that it's haunted. This house most definitely is not haunted. We've lived here for two years, and it has never behaved like a haunted house.

You see, I've read enough (and even actually talked to people who've lived in purportedly haunted houses) to know that a truly haunted house repeats itself. Lights in the attic don't mysteriously turn themselves on once and then never do so again. No, the lights come on by themselves every night, or once a month, or on the anniversary of the night the poor maid hung herself from the rafters because the master of the house didn't love her. Doors that have been double-bolted and checked multiple times, do not come unlocked and leave themselves open once every fifty years. No, they do so with hair-raising frequency. Likewise rocking horses that rock all by themselves in lonely corners of the old nursery where the beloved 4-year-old child was murdered by a jealous older brother.

I'm not going to say that the previous residents of this house are lying when they claim it's haunted. Apparently, the wife and daughter both saw some figure, dressed in what looked like an old night shirt, ascend the stairs. They swear they were sober at the time. I've come to the conclusion that maybe, occasionally, a ghost will revisit some favorite or not-so-favorite spot from his or her life and accidentally allow one of us mortals to get a glimpse of an unfamiliar, gauzy figure, ascending stairs or reaching out for something or falling from a castle tower.

This thought conjures up for me a whole other parallel ghost world, in which ghost children sit around campfires telling "human stories." Here they recount the horror of being seen by a human child when they were creeping around the basement of their old house, looking to see if the old lucky horseshoe they buried in a hole in the wall 175 years ago is still there. (There goes my imagination, off digressing again. I’ve given it a snack-size packet of Skittles, so let’s hope it shuts up long enough for me to get through this tale.)

Since I don’t live in a haunted house, but I do live in one that has housed many different families over the past 100+ years, I have to console myself with the fact that perhaps a ghost will show up here one day and accidentally let me get a glimpse of it. I’ve explained in the past that I don’t want this to be some vengeful, headless or bloody sort of ghost, showing up with evil intent. After all, this is a manse. I’d like some kindly, wise, previous minister to show up and make me feel good. (I know, I know. Nineteenth-century ministers with their fire-and-brimstone attitudes were a very scary lot, but allow me to pretend.) If it can’t be a minister, perhaps it will be a minister’s wife, someone who looks at me with complete understanding, knowing how tough this job can sometimes be.

So, there I was about a week ago, sitting in my favorite over-stuffed chair in the library. I was reading Oliver Onions and was so engrossed that had a ghost floated by the doorway that leads out into the hall, or hovered in the pocket doorway that leads from the library into the living room, I probably wouldn’t have noticed. I did, however, notice an unfamiliar scent.

Even I couldn’t ignore this delicious-smelling perfume. But where was it coming from? I wasn’t wearing perfume. I hadn’t taken a bath. Bob had gone up to bed, and he is not the sort of man who douses himself with perfume before doing so. It had to be a ghost, didn’t it? It was my minister’s wife come to visit me, the old Madame of the Manse, perhaps here to impart some words of wisdom. Or maybe she'd come to calm me down for the upcoming, very stressful Advent and Christmas seasons, which are right around the corner. I looked up but saw nothing, no kindly woman dressed in 19th-century garb hovering near my chair or even sitting calmly on the living room couch. I didn’t hear anything, either. But I could still smell something that reminded me of the gardens we visited in Hawai’i.

I’m not one of those who tends to do too much investigative work when confronted with this sort of mystery. Half of me thinks it might be a ghost. The other half is worried that some human has managed to break into the house and is hiding out somewhere nearby (or that serial killer I mentioned in a blog post some time back is down in my basement with his latest victim, a prostitute who has a thing for strong perfume). Seeing no ghost, I decided the best place to be was upstairs with Bob, so I turned off the light and headed up.

The smell got stronger as I climbed the stairs and was quite overpowering by the time I reached the bedroom door, and then it finally dawned on me. Bob loves incense. He burns it almost every night before going to bed. Most of his incense has a very “incensy” sort of smell – undertones, even when it claims it’s “lilac” of musk or myrrh or sandalwood -- but this was some new incense he’d just got and it had none of that.

So, as usual, no ghost for me, but a funny story. (Bob thought it was quite funny.) Perhaps I need to start feeding my imagination some Skittles every evening before I settle down like that.

Halloween Meme II

It's October, which means it must be time for some sort of spooky meme. Last year, I did the horror meme, but one of my all-time favorite memes was the Halloween meme someone else created the first year I had this blog. That was three years ago. I say it's about time for a sequel, no? So where is it? Why hasn't someone created it yet? I guess that means the old Queen o' Memes is just going to have to make it herself (on a very small budget, so hang onto your popcorn and expect Blair Witch sort of camera antics). Here we go.

Rules:

1. Answer the questions on your own blog.
2. Tag 13 others to answer the questions on their blogs and link to them.


1). Which urban legend ghost scared the bejeezus out of you when you were a kid?


Any of the many who showed up to get the girlfriend after the boyfriend's car ran out of gas somewhere out near Lover's Lane, and he, oh-so-gallantly, left her out there on that country road, all alone, while he hiked the ten miles and back to the gas station with his gas can.


2). Which horror movie has the best premise?

Is there anything better than Psycho? Crazy man? Mother's skeleton in the attic? Woman attacked while naked and vulnerable in the shower? A close second would be Nightmare on Elm Street: your nightmares become real; you keep thinking you're awake when you're not; and the only way to stop a killer is to stay awake.

3). What is the most disappointing "treat" to receive in your bag on Halloween night?

Apples or mints or non-candy items like packages of crackers.


4). What's the best non-candy item to receive?

I don't know if it was true, but my father used to tell a story of someone he knew whose cat had 8 kittens right before Halloween. Apparently, the first 8 trick-or-treaters at his house that Halloween received a kitten in their bags. I wished fervently, all throughout my childhood, that I would get so lucky as to have a kitten dropped into my trick-or-treat bag.

5). Did a monster live in your closet when you were a child?

Yes, and under the bed, too. If your legs or arms stuck out from under the covers, the monster in the closet would come out and eat them. If a leg or arm hung over the side of the bed, a monster would grab it, pull you under the bed, and eat you. (Aren't older siblings who inform you of such things just grand?)

6). Which supernatural creature sent chills up your spine when you were ten and still does?

I hate to be so trendy, but vampires. In fact, I hate the fact that they've become so trendy. They're mine. I was loving Dracula when I was in third grade, people. That was long before many of you were born. I had to go to friends' houses to see him, because my parents wouldn't allow him in our house (a true Victorian romance).


7). Which supernatural creature makes you yawn?

Werewolves. Ho hum. You're human. Every so often you turn into a wolf? So what? Look at Dracula. He can do that wolf bit and that bat thing. And he's sexy. (Okay, if you are American and in London, I'll give you sexy, but still. You can't hold a candle to Dracula.)


8). What's your favorite Halloween decoration?

I like those little "ghosties" that people hang from their trees. I also like fake spider webs with spiders in them. Real spider webs would be better, but it's hard to get the spiders to cooperate.


9). If you could be anywhere on Halloween night, where would you be?

Transylvania. In a castle.


10). What's the scariest book you've read so far this year?

John Connolly's The Killing Kind. He certainly has a knack for creating some really scary bad guys.

11). Haunted houses or haunted hayrides?

Oh, haunted houses. Especially if the locked doors won't open and something is brushing the back of your neck.

12). Which Stephen King novel/movie would you least like to find yourself trapped in?

Christine. I don't like cars much to begin with, but a haunted one? And that radio was just so creepy, wasn't it?

13). Which are creepiest: evil dolls, evil pets, or evil children?

Evil dolls. Creepiest of all are evil children with evil dolls (oooo, that just might have to be turned into some sort of story).

I'm tagging the following thirteen (quick. Answer the questions, or the monster will come out of the closet and eat you):

Courtney

Ms. Musings

Zoe's Mom

Sara

Stefanie

Hobs

Nigel

Susan

Danny

Charlotte

Cam

Bloglily

Ms. Misfit Salon

Cringing Away the Pounds

So, now that every other woman on the planet has discovered Wii fit, I'm finally walking away the pounds with Leslie Sansone. My mother and sisters liked this video workout, and my nieces gave me the DVD for Christmas a couple of years ago, but I Jane Fonda-ed and Richard Simmons-ed myself out a number of years ago and have been somewhat wary of exercise videos ever since. (Note: this does not mean I haven't bought things I've found on sale at -- where else? -- super bookstores with the best of intent. Belly-dancing-that's-impossible-without-a-real-instructor, anyone? Yoga-that's-likewise, oh, and requires you to keep your eyes on a video while closing them in your various poses? Not to mention hosts who are extraordinarily annoying?)

All right, that last sentence should not be parenthetical. The problem with every single exercise video I've ever watched is annoying hosts (even Jane Fonda, whom I enjoy as an actor, was an extremely annoying exercise video host). Those that may not be so annoying in the beginning manage to become so after multiple viewings. That joke that really wasn't funny the first time, becomes (upon the 20th retelling of it), one that makes me want to hurl dumb bells at the TV screen, as it predictably pops up at exactly the same moment, in exactly the same voice, that chipper voice that is encouraging me to keep it up for a mere 1002 more agonizing repetitions, as it did last time. (At least when your Uncle Fred tells the same joke over and over again, the context changes, and his expression probably does, too.)

Walk Away the Pounds, so far, is tolerable. It will be something I can do if Lancaster County presents me with real winter weather this year, and I can't get out to walk and jog. I'm familiarizing myself with it. Maybe I will soon be at a point at which I can mute it (take that, you annoying jokes) and just do the moves while listening to my own music on our CD player, and I won't get sick of it.

Then again, maybe not. Is anyone else out there familiar with exercise videos? Could you please verify for me whether or not it's my imagination or if the "class members" are just recycled androids who've been used over and over since the 1980s (with updated hair and clothes, of course). First of all, there is the woman who looks like a female Adonis. We're supposed to believe that doing this little 45-minute workout with 1-lb weights has given her those biceps and that stomach. When questioned by our Happy Host, she earnestly tells us (while nodding her head in time to the music) how wonderful all these repetitions are for building muscle.

Speaking of earnest, there's Ms. Earnest. She nods knowingly and oh-so-seriously at everything Happy Host has to say while squatting and kicking and r-e-a-c-hing. She might volunteer the information that she can really feel her thighs burning. What she won't do is disagree with anything anyone says. Occasionally, she remembers this is supposed to be fun and shines us her pearly whites (amazing how they all have exactly the same pearly-white, perfectly straight smile, isn't it?).

Then there is Token Mother. She just gave birth two days ago, and look at her, keeping it up, keeping those muscles so firm. Can you believe she just gave birth? Let's give it up for her. And now we can all discuss our children and talk about how important it is to keep fit, so we can keep up with them (in fact, so important is it to keep fit that maybe we should ignore our kids in order to do so).

Perhaps Token Mother is working out beside Token Everywoman. Token Everywoman is the only one in the video who doesn't look like she's anorexic (well, besides Ms. Female Adonis, who looks like she's on steroids). In other words, she looks like you and me. She's got normal-sized thighs. Her stomach is roomy enough that you wouldn't think she was pregnant were she to swallow a blueberry. She's a bit shorter than the others (perhaps jokes are cracked about her height). She's the one chosen to demonstrate modified versions of all the moves (you know, less taxing moves, because we normal women probably can't handle this vigorous workout). There's one way she differs from you and me, though. She's not cynical, nor is she sarcastic. She is chipper -- her head flaunting a bright headband or bandana or some such thing -- as she, taking a cue from Ms. Earnest and nodding her head, assures us that these modified versions of the exercises will still burn calories. (We other Everywomen might cynically question that claim, but then we might get a chipper little smack, so we keep quiet.)

I musn't forget Token Male. He's there, you know, somewhere, most likely in the back. Don't worry. He isn't an Adonis. He doesn't distract you as you step to the side for the 500th time, while wondering when that 1-mile marker, or 20-minute or whatever it happens to be, is going to flash across the bottom of the screen. No, he's there to put up happily with all the female cracks, maybe to make fun of his buddies who are sitting on couches working on their beer belllies while he works on his muscles. Perhaps he's in the back so he can keep an eye on Ms. Female Adonis's tight little butt.

Still, with this particular video, I'm managing to put up with all these people. I mean, live classes have annoying people in them, too, people I've wished had never seen me sweat. At least these people smiling and nodding at me can't see me when I lose my balance and go crashing into the couch. The exercises, for the most part, aren't too horrendous, and I can ignore the bits of the video that make me cringe, as they never last too long. I can probably keep doing it. I've been doing it twice a week for three weeks and have yet to give up on it.

Buoyed by the fact that I'm sort of sticking to this one, I decide to check out some of the other exercise videos I have in my buy-and-never-watch collection. Besides the aforementioned belly dancing and yoga, there's "Denise Austin's Shrink Your Female Fat Zones." I slip it into the DVD player and press "play."

Okay, you very well might disagree with me if you happen to know me (or happen to have been paying attention while reading this post), but I tend to think that I'm at least somewhat mellow when it comes to other people, accepting them as they are; that I have extremely high rates of tolerance and forgiveness; that my annoyance rate is somewere close to zero. Oh. My. God. Am I ever wrong about myself if this little exercise video is any indication. Quick. Someone create The Golden Annoying Awards and let me be a judge. Denise Austin would win hands down. Trust me. Anyone who could last through this entire video -- all that "target your tough spots" and "shrinking that fat for a beautiful body" in her breathy voice while she insists you engage in movements I'm positive our bodies were never made to attempt (at least, not over and over again like that), acting as though she is doing nothing more taxing than breathing -- deserves to win the Golden Mellow Award. I didn't last ten minutes.

Lesson learned? Not all exercise videos (despite employing the same androids) are created equal. The best a person can do is to find one that's not too obnoxious to help get her through the winter months. Someone, please tell me: will things improve if I ever take the time machine to the 21st-century and discover Wii fit?

Music Monday/Lyric Lundi

I love to listen to music while I cook. The two go so very nicely together, the way a delicious aged wine goes with a delicious aged cheese. Recently, I was busy cooking up a chicken and mushroom stir fry and decided Fred Astaire would go nicely with that -- some very light dance steps (in my imagination. I would never pretend to be able to mimic Astaire's light feet) to go with a nice light meal.

I know there are those who think Astaire couldn't sing (they've told me so, while surmising that I'm too enamored of him to be any sort of judge), but who are they kidding? They must not have ever paid attention to the way he is able to add such meaning to the words he sings (and they must never have seen the movie Daddy Long Legs). If you want a perfect example of that, just listen to the way he sings "A Fine Romance," one of my all-time favorites no matter who's singing it, but listen to him, with that wonderfully edgy and perfect mix between sarcasm and longing. I love it -- enough to press the "replay" button over, and over, and over again.

I'm giving you the lyrics, but really, you must hear him sing it. He'll make you long for the days, despite the fact that Cole Porter had come along and insisted "Anything Goes," when women were a little more mysterious and a little harder to get and gentlemen were a little more frustrated and a little more persistent (okay, maybe he won't. But he certainly makes me, the hopelessly incurable, old-fashioned romantic, do so). We will ignore the fact that those were also the days that when, once the man got the woman, she was, more likely than not, doomed to being tied to never-ending housework that bored her out of her mind and a bundle of kids with never-ending needs and an inability to communicate with her husband (not sure what the man was tied to in those days, except maybe 3-martini lunches, golf on the weekends, and extraordinarily unhappy wives who might have -- surprise, surprise -- taken it out on them. Gentlemen, care to enlighten me, if I'm wrong?)

Of course, Astaire doesn't get credit for the brilliant lyrics written by Dorothy Fields (yes, I had to look that up on Wikipedia. I had no idea who wrote this song). Her lines are priceless. I especially love the ones about the Ile de France and the seals in the Arctic Ocean who at least flap their fins. Still, he gets credit for brilliantly interpreting their meaning.


A Fine Romance
by Fred Astaire

A fine romance with no kisses
A fine romance, my friend this is
We should be like a couple of hot tomatoes
But you're as cold as yesterday's mashed
potatoes.

A fine romance, you won't nestle
A fine romance, you won't wrestle
You're just as hard to land as the Ile de France
I haven't got a chance, this is a fine romance.

A fine romance, my good woman
My strong, aged-in-the-wood woman
You're calmer than the seals in the Arctic Ocean
At least they flap their fins to express emotion.

A fine romance with no clinches
A fine romance with no pinches
You never give the orchids I send a glance
No, you like cactus plants, this is a fine
romance
Oh boy, what a romance

(Long-Winded) Coda to my Black Angel Post

Okay, so I thought I didn't like The Black Angel by Cornell Woolrich, and in case you missed it, I told everyone exactly why here. And I didn't. However, it's one of those books that proves the theory that there is a fine line between love and hate (that line being made up of the letters p-a-s-s-i-o-n, all in a row, saluting their sergeant). No, I didn't like it at all. However, unlike something about which I might have said, "Oh, I don't know. I kind of thought it was okay. Well, no, maybe I didn't like it too much..." this one has stuck with me, and I've been thinking about it a lot. Dammit! I wish I'd been at the live discussion and had been able to talk about it with others.

The closest thing I came to that was Ms. Musing's comments on my post and Dorr's post on it. And then there was the email from one of those friends of mine who does not comment on my blog but will email a response to me when I write about familiar books and authors. That email read as follows:

Too bad you didn't like the Woolrich. I've read a smattering of his books, and no one does anxiety like him. Of course, he knew nothing about women. Look up his bio: he lived a reclusive life with his mother in a hotel room, for God's sake. It's all in the style, sugar: you think Chandler's plots make any sense? The best way to read him is with a bottle of scotch and a headcold.

So, a million thoughts ran through my brain after reading this email, not the least of which was, "Maybe I ought to look up a little something about the author and the book before writing my posts." But no. I've told everyone before why I don't do that. I want to write about books the same way I want to read them: knowing absolutely nothing. When I decide to read a book, I try not to read too many reviews, and I will not read anything that warns that it contains spoilers. In fact, I get very annoyed if anyone (book reviewer, blogger, well-meaning friend...) tells me too much about a book I have decided to read. Call me independent, but I want to draw my own conclusions. When I write and talk about a book, I want what I write to be pure, simple, gut reaction. I do not want it to be influenced by knowing too much about the author or how the book was received by the public or by critics. I was not an English major. Literary analysis is not my thing. I just happen to be someone who loves to read and who responds to books on a visceral level.

Then again, I also happen to be someone whose parents ought to have named her Insecurity (a very pretty name, no?). That means I can easily be found splashing around in waves of doubt, wondering if my instincts and gut reactions are way off base. I mean, if Woolrich is someone who obviously knew nothing about women, then it stands to reason that he was not trying to write a real character here. He must have, as Ms. Musings mused, been digging at something much deeper. I gave this book far too superficial a reading. I should not have been expecting this character to be the least bit believable. That was not her purpose. Her purpose was to give us far bigger truths than I'd given her credit for understanding.

But then, naturally, the piece of me who is always off partying with movie stars and other well-known figures and never has much time to stop back in at home to remind the others hanging out in my brain that she is a member of the family, and who resents the fact that her bedroom is now a huge walk-in closet, in other words, Ms. Secure as Fort Knox, decides to come home. She takes one look at the thoughts strewn all over my brain and decides they need to be kicked around some. Suddenly, some new thoughts begin to emerge. One of these is the oh-so-obvious,

"If Woolrich knew nothing about women, then why on earth did he decide to make a woman the main protagonist of his tale and proceed to tell the whole thing from her point of view?"

I mean, good question, right? I am a writer. No matter what sort of point I am trying to make, there is no way on earth I would decide that I need to make it using the voice of a gay, sixteen-year-old Brazilian boy. I mean, I know absolutely nothing about being a gay, sixteen-year-old Brazilian boy. How could I possibly write such a work? My ego would have to be far larger than it is for me to do decide to do that.

I stick to my guns, then. I don't mind an absurd plot if it's being carried out by real characters, characters that not only do things that make sense, but characters with whom I could have a conversation without wondering if they are some sort of visitors from another planet pretending to be Earthlings. I do not, however, want an absurd plot that becomes insanely absurd because the characters are not the least bit believable. Dorr was correct to point out that I was probably wrong to state that women aren't likely to stand by their men in such a way. It's true; some do (I read Wally Lamb's edited collection of stories written by women in prison only to discover that almost all of them were in prison because they happened to be accomplices to crimes that were actually committed by lovers), so it's believable that Alberta seemed to be willing to do anything for her husband. It's believable that a woman might break the law in order to prove her husband's innocence. However, it is not believable that a woman would meet a very creepy doctor; decide to come back to his place at night, all alone with no protection (especially since she already suspected he could be a murderer before she met him); and follow him into his unlit house. Maybe young women on other planets do such things, but certainly not women living in New York City (in any era). Like the idiot girls in Michael and Jason Take Freddy's Nightmare, who hear an odd noise and decide to go down to the basement to see what it is, instead of leaving the house as fast as their beautiful long legs can carry them, she lost all credibility at that point. That means I lost my interest (which is okay when watching a slasher movie, because there will always be some scene to jolt the interest back -- like those unbelievable girls being stabbed to death by an unbelievable masked mad man everyone was sure was dead, while the one character who will survive has been smart enough to get out of the house and is busy trying to start the car with the engine that seems to have died -- but is not okay when reading a book).

If Woolrich wanted to encourage me to explore some deeper issues, he should have done so by giving me characters who made sense. That means, since he doesn't seem to have known anything about women, he should have given me a man who was trying to prove his wife's innocence. Now, that might have been both an interesting philosophical exploration and a believable book. And if he weren't trying to do that, if all he was trying to do was give me a fun, thrilling yarn, well, then, he failed miserably. However, I do still think that the story, if in the hands of the right writers, directors, and producers (a creepy doctor who follows her instead of her coming to his place, anyone?) could have been improved tremendously and made into a great movie. If I ever get around to watching the movie, I'll let you know.