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Archive for November, 2019

An Old Broad’s Thanksgiving Thoughts

Posted in Journeys, Nature, tagged on November 28, 2019| 1 Comment »

I am thankful that I once got to float across the Serengeti in a hot air balloon. — Photo by Pat Bean of the balloon ahead of the one she was riding in.  

          I am thankful the most important key in history was invented. It’s not the key to your house, your car, your goat, your safety deposit box, your bike lock or your private community. It’s the key to order, sanity and peace of mind. The key is Delete. – Elayne Boosler

A Slower Pace is Good

          Boosler’s quote reminded me of one of the many, many things I’m thankful for Laughter. Not only does it bring joy to my life, it lightens the load when the going gets tough, like when my 80-year-old back decides to act its age.

I’m thankful for every sunrise and sunset in my past — and future. — Photo by Pat Bean

I’m thankful that the years have not diminished my zest for life, although these days that’s more likely to be enjoying a good book than getting dumped out of a raft at the bottom of the Grand Canyon.

I’m thankful for my large family, blood and heart-related equally, a few of whom worry about me these days. I’m very thankful they show their love for this imperfect Mom and Nana, but also take a perverse delight because I once worried a lot about the comings and goings of my children. But I do try to keep my guardian angel among them informed of my whereabouts as she kept track of me during my RV roaming days. Besides she’s a daughter-in-law whose youthful ways worried her parents, not me.

I’m thankful for my slower pace these days. I see more, take time to enjoy more and enjoy using my mind to connect the dots of my life. In earlier days, I ran instead of walked through life. Both travel modes have their season, but this slower pace is quite enjoyable.

I’m thankful for Scamp. I drove a thousand miles, roundtrip, to get him and this is a picture of our first meeting. — Photo by my dear friend Kim Perrin, who rescued him for me. .

I’m thankful for my canine companion Scamp, although he is turning out to be more of a wolfhound-mix than the schnauzer-mix the shelter claimed. He is closing onto 40 pounds, but he and my third-floor walk-up apartment are my alarm clock and exercise plan. I can’t imagine not having him my by side during the day, or curled up beside me at night. I’m finally even getting around to convincing him I‘m his alpha. It takes a quiet voice and a staredown. Scamp’s saving grace is that he doesn’t have a mean bone in his body, and he has yet to meet another person or dog he doesn’t like on sight. Every 80-year-old needs a challenge in life – and currently, he’s mine.

I’m thankful for books, and the actual time these days as a retired being to read more of them than in my younger years.

I’m thankful for the friends I’ve accumulated over the years and the new ones I’ve made since moving to Tucson. They daily bring joy to my life.

I’m thankful for butterflies and flowers, and all other miracles of Mother Nature. — {hoto by Pat Bean.

I’m thankful for the journals I have kept over the years. They remind me that I’ve lived a full life. I’m also thankful that there is still more life in me and more journals out there for me to fill.

I’m thankful for the joy and peace Nature still brings into my heart with its majestic mountains, awesome trees, winding canyons, desert landscapes, and colorful sunrises and sunsets. Mother Nature keeps my soul sane in these chaotic, polarized days.

Pat Bean is a retired journalist who lives in Tucson with her canine companion, Scamp. She is a wondering-wanderer, avid reader, enthusiastic birder, Lonely Planet Community Pathfinder, Story Circle Network board member, author of Travels with Maggie available on Amazon, and is always searching for life’s silver lining

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Books Everyone Should Read

Posted in Books, Journeys, Writing, tagged , , , , , on November 16, 2019| 5 Comments »

“I needed a drink, I needed a lot of life insurance, I needed a vacation, I needed a home in the country. What I had was a coat, a hat and a gun. I put them on and went out of the room.” — Philip Marlow as created by Raymond Chandler in Farewell, My Lovely

Crows: Their flock name is A Murder. — Watercolor by Pat Bean

So Many Lists, So Little Time

I frequently come across lists of recommended books to read, from 1,000 Books to Read Before You Die to The 50 Best Travel Books. There is even a book about book lists, aptly titled A Book of Book Lists: A Bibliophile’s Compendium,

Raymond Chandler

Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep was on one of these lists, so I checked it out of the Library. The book, published the year I was born, with its cynical private eye Philip Marlow, was made into a movie in 1946 starring Humphrey Bogart as Marlow and Lauren Bacall as the leading lady.

As a sample of Chandler’s Marlow character, here are a few bits of his dialog:

“She gave me a smile I could feel in my hip pocket.”

“It was a blonde. A blonde to make a bishop kick a hole in a stained-glass window.”

Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall in The Big Sleep.

           “A really good detective never gets married.”

           “The kind of lawyer you hope the other fellow has.”

           “When in doubt, have a man come through the door with a gun in his hand.”

“The streets were dark with something more than night.”

Chandler wrote seven and a half Marlow novels with the eighth finished by Robert B. Parker (whose Spenser books I also love) after Chandler’s death. Parker died in 2010.

Perhaps because I picked up Sue Grafton’s D is for Deadbeat (published 1987) to read right after I finished The Big Sleep, I decided Grafton probably had might have been influenced by Chandler’s books because I saw similarities between Grafton’s protagonist Kinsey Millhome and Philip Marlow. Both are no-nonsense characters with a strong sense of morals, their own if not society’s, and fiercely independent.

Says Kinsey in V is for Vengence: “I know there are people who believe you should forgive and forget. For the record, I’d like to say I’m a big fan of forgiveness as long as I’m given the opportunity to get even first.” And in F is for Forgiveness: I pictured a section of the ladies’ auxiliary cookbook for Sudden Death Quick Snacks… Using ingredients one could keep on the pantry shelf in the event of tragedy.”

Grafton, meanwhile, was more prolific than Chandler, getting all the way up to Y in her alphabetical murder series before she died two years ago. But even she wasn’t as prolific as another of my favorite dead mystery authors, Agatha Christi. Her characters, the egotistical Hercule Poirot (“Hercule Poirot’s methods are his own. Order and method, and ‘the little gray cells.” – The Big Four), and the old pussy Miss Marple (“Everybody in St. Mary Mead knew Miss Marple; fluffy and dithery in appearance, but inwardly as sharp and as shrewd as they make them.” — 4:50 from Paddington) have enthralled me almost as long as I’ve been reading, which is well over half a century.

So, what are you reading?

Bean Pat: To all the authors, dead and alive, whose characters and thoughts and knowledge have enriched my life. Thank you!

Pat Bean is a retired journalist who lives in Tucson with her canine companion, Scamp. She is a wondering-wanderer, avid reader, enthusiastic birder, Lonely Planet Community Pathfinder, Story Circle Network board member, author of Travels with Maggie available on Amazon, and is always searching for life’s silver lining.

 

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No One Right Way: For Life – Or Writing

Posted in Birds, Books, Journeys, The Write Words, Writing, tagged , , , on November 6, 2019| Leave a Comment »

Western Kingbird: Along with reading books on writing, I also love to read books on birding. Kenn Kaufman’s Kingbird Highway is one of my favorites.

“Good advice is always certain to be ignored, but that’s no reason not to give it.” – Agatha Christie

Morning Chat

          I’m a big fan of books about writing and the writing life, beginning with E.B. White’s 100-year-old classic The Elements of Style.

Among my favorites are Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life; On Writing by Stephen King; Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg: and The Art of Memoir by Mary Karr.

These writers have offered me some very good advice, but also lots of other advice that doesn’t work for me. I thought about this as I finished reading Dani Shapiro’s book, Still Writing. It was full of good writing tips, but as one who has been writing for the past 55 years, I know only about half of her advice would work for me.

For one thing, she’s a lock yourself in the room and stay there and write kind of person. I’m more like Barbara Kingsolver, who calls herself a writer who does other things. Staying active and busy, but with some time for thinking and writing, works best for me.

Even so, the best writing advice of all times is simply: Butt in chair. Well, unless you write standing up.

What’s your favorite book on writing? Inquiring minds want to know.

Bean Pat: A blog about a western kingbird http://www.10000birds.com/a-western-kingbird-at-jones-beach. If you’re a birder, check out Kenn Kaufman’s Kingbird Highway. I once birded with Kenn (at the Great Salt Lake Bird Festival) and the first bird of the day was a western kingbird.

Pat Bean is a retired journalist who lives in Tucson with her canine companion, Scamp. She is a wondering-wanderer, avid reader, enthusiastic birder, Lonely Planet Community Pathfinder, Story Circle Network board member, author of Travels with Maggie available on Amazon, and is always searching for life’s silver lining.

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