Ciao Everyone!
As I literally tossed and turned last night due to an oversized Panera Bread coffee and Barb’s mindful words from last night’s meeting to “send out the email as soon as you get home,” I’m writing this strung out on sleep apnea and giving all of you a full two month start toward reading our next book. At our Wednesday, June 22 meeting we selected The Paris Wife: a Novel by Paula McLain as our August title. We will meet on Tuesday, August 23, at my house at 6:30 pm to discuss the book. If everyone can bring a French dish or appetizer, it will make for a thematic evening!
Members in attendance at our June meeting were Barb, Becky, Sharon, Lori, and me. Our title The Dirty Life by Kristin Kimball provided us with ample fodder for discussion. We were baffled by this author and narrator as she shared her story of giving up a professional lifestyle in the big city in exchange for the daily toil and hardship of farm living. We decided that her relationship with a man like Mark was an oxymoron and could only be due to an overabundance of charm and male magnetism on his part, and a self-sacrificing and credulous personality on her part. Kimball, however, writes with such honesty and insight, she succeeds in selling the reader on the rationales for her radical decision.
The Dirty Life conjured up the wholesome farm memories of our youth. Barb and Becky remembered drinking fresh raw milk; the taste as our author puts it “is a warm, sugary, proteinaceous substance that “would be cruel to taste it once and not have access to it again.” Becky recalled afterschool visits to her friend’s barn to help her feed her horses. Like Kimball, Becky struggled to carry the heavy buckets weighted with a scrumptious mix of fresh oats and molasses. Lori and I added our memories of buying fresh eggs from the Nyeberg’s, our neighbors who raised chickens. Very interesting, however, was Barb’s connection with Butler’s local farm history. Her dad, we learned, ran Sunnyview Farms, which was located on the property of the present Sunnyview Nursing Home in Butler. She shared with us an amusing anecdote about the farm animals she came to love while working with her father. Through our memories, we were reminded of a past that didn’t seem at all that dirty, but, rather, a past that was marked as much more wholesome and clean in many ways than the lives we lead today.
An easy read, Kimball’s book is compiled of many short vignettes relating her attempts at farm work and farm living. Becky acknowledged it as a handbook of sorts which identifies all aspects of self sufficiency. From producing milk, meat, and poultry products to harvesting vegetables, grain, maple sugar, and honey, Kimball is transformed through farming. She says that once you roll up your sleeves and dig into it, “it seeps into your skin along with the dirt.” The beautiful imagery Kimball uses to describe her first taste of fresh spring maple sap clearly exposes her radiant affection for her new life, “I jumped on the sled and plunged my mouth directly into a full bucket. Whole poems,” she adds, “could be written about the taste of the first run’s sap, icy and sweet and redolent of wood.”
Kimball learns through her attempts at farming to value people whom she previously viewed as dumb; those whom she once thought missed the meaning of abstract ideas and who were only capable of manual labor in the physical world. Her efforts at interpreting nonfiction manuals on every aspect of farming, she says, put her in her place. She admits “there’s no better cure for snobbery than a good ass kicking.”
Although easy to follow, The Dirty Life is without a doubt abundant with the lost wisdom of a self sustaining lifestyle; and like our May book, Water for Elephants, it has just enough demanding vocabulary to keep the reader challenged:
·
verisimilitude: “His full beard and ungroomed hair,” for the role of Joseph, “added a touch of verisimilitude.” Meaning the appearance of being true, realism
· diffidence: “Neal’s great size was counterbalanced by and aura of diffidence.” Meaning shyness, timidity
· concupiscent: “This book is the story of a love affair with farming, that dirty, concupiscent art.” Meaning powerful feelings of physical desire or lust
Sorry, Becky and Barb, I know we discussed one word in particular, but I couldn’t remember it! But many other words like hegemony, clevis, zerk, and loquacious can also put the reader to the test.
As I will be leaving for Italy on Monday, I intend to keep one last insightful quote from our book in mind. On page 253, Kimball so wisely points out “Travel tends to grant clarity. Remove all that distracting context and you find yourself staring at chunks of truth.” I hope my journey is cathartic, and I hope all of you find, too, in your summer travels and experiences an opportunity to reflect. I look forward to seeing you all again on August 23 to discuss The Paris Wife and to share amusing anecdotes of Napoli and my other destinations in Italia!
Arrivederci,
Tammy
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