A.M.’s Comments (group member since Jul 09, 2020)

A.M.’s comments from the DUCKS reading support group group.

Stopping at "the fact that he survives that fall though, which is another kind of cartoony idea, the fact that only Bugs Bunny could live through that," which follows A BUNCH OF TOMMY LEE JONES MENTIONS: honestly, you can't miss it.

Cannelloni
(Bear in mind this recipe is no good)

METHOD

Make your own pasta
Cut into rectangles
Put ricotta cheese on each rectangle
Roll into tubes and seal, somehow
Drop into 8 quarts of gently boiling water, ensuring that the ricotta does not come out, somehow

Scoop out cooked pasta whenever you think you should.
Put into oven with tomato sauce and basil
Bake for 10 minutes

Serve with Romano cheese

Shrimp Bisque

INGREDIENTS

Salt pork
Shallots
Celery
Potatoes
Clam juice
Parsley
Thyme
Bay leaf
White wine for the stock
1 1/2 lbs shrimp, s&d
Cooked rice

METHOD
You're going to have to figure this one out on your own, but I'll give you a hint: "s&d" means "shelled and diced." Bon appetit!

Witness
Beetlejuice
Houseboat
Speed
The Accidental Tourist
North By Northwest
Seven Brides for Seven Brothers
Mr Deeds Goes to Town
Mr Smith goes to Washington

Happy Monday! This one’s a doozy . . . and probably not one to read first if you are interested in avoiding spoilers.

In answer to my previous question: James has not come for the playdate, but his mother Fresia has come to inspect the house, ostensibly for lint, which James is allergic to—but Narrator caught her looking in Narrator’s underwear drawer! And then Fresia stormed out! Good lord! But then . . . was Fresia checking for guns? And maybe that makes it a little better?

At the beginning of this section, I’m immediately interested in the metaphorical implications of “it’s safer to let your kids get eaten by a lion at recess than lose your home” in today’s coronaclimate, where the lion eating your kids at recess is a virus that will come home with them and eat you too, hmmm. Lions will be eating my kids at recess come September, according to the moral imperative set by both our government and its opposition.

The lion also gets the blame for everything now: school closures, foreclosures, food shortages, etc (and a potential baby boom). OK BUT CONSIDER COVID-19, again, metaphorically. Of course Ellmann didn’t have this virus to refer to then, so it’s accidental—so the other thing that the lion equates to is mothers/motherhood, right? And mothers get the blame for e.v.e.r.y.t.h.i.n.g. (including having too many babies).

Relatedly, Freedom From Fear, a fictional group devoted to eradicating “all predators, both human and animal,” seems all too real to me; I feel like I know those people. AND those people are often arrant misogynists, and plenty in this book talks about violence men perpetrate against woman. It almost feels like Ellmann is pointing out that there isn’t a lot holding our society together; that men, given the chance, will happily kill, maim, rape, and pillage. (A man even drives his car into a Walmart because of a late mattress, and others opened fire on a McDonald’s because there were no Chicken McMuffins!) I’m fully aware that I’m reading this book alongside the best of men, but I feel it would be intellectually dishonest to pretend this subtext hasn’t become brutally clear to me, and moreso later in this section . . .

Speaking of men, though, we hear a lot more about Daddy in this section. Narrator adored him, really, even if he did scare her sometimes, and he had a lot that was loveable about him: his storytelling, his tone-deaf singing, his love of delicatessens, and so on. And Leo encouraged Narrator to give up the work she hated and instead do work she loves, even though it means he has to work harder (the fact that she is still stressed out about domesticity is a separate but probably very important fact).

We learn that if a cougar cub is orphaned under nine months old it doesn’t usually survive. WHAT IS GOING TO HAPPEN TO THE BABIES? WHAT IS GOING TO HAPPEN TO STACY?!

That’s right, we’ve got more about the kids here: a recollection of when Ben drowned his phone at Fallingwater; a note that Gillian wants to get a subscription to Highlights (which I always loved at the dentist’s office). And Stacy . . .

STACY HAS RUN AWAY! HOLY MACARONI (though I guess I was expecting it really). SHE HAS RUN AWAY TO ARIZONA maybe, just “taken off”! WHAT! Narrator is like, I have to go now, I have to get the kids in the car, Ben and Jake and the other one, what’s her name . . . poor old Gillian. It’s interesting what happens in Narrator’s thoughts: lots of grim images interspersed with milk. She thinks she has to call the police, but she hesitates because she can’t trust them. These are true thoughts!

She calls Leo, who says stay put, she may come back, and he’s coming home now. “but are we losing precious time, police, rape, murder, bears”—it’s a tough call, to be sure.

Then, a lion interlude.

The lioness is looking desperately for her babies, and she has found a kind of zoo, filled with very sad animals that repulse her. This seems to be the zoo in Zanesville that Narrator mentions, where “hundreds” of lions and tigers have been let out and are now eating the other animals, and the police are shooting them. It turns out that the zoo isn’t really a zoo at all; it’s just some guy who has been keeping exotic animals at his home and they’ve finally got out of his control. (Everyone, of course, blames the guy’s mother.)

After the interlude it’s several days later. Stacy is home, and the family has rescued a little traumatized dog called Jim. Narrator keeps wishing and dreaming that she could go back to 10 years before and make life better for Stacy. The police, of course, did not help them. Stacy came back on her own, after Narrator had called all of Stacy’s friends and their mothers and revealed more of herself to them than she had ever wanted to. She had tried to hitchhike to Arizona but got absolutely nowhere.

Stacy told Narrator that she wanted to leave because a guy she had been dating a bit (whom Narrator knew nothing about) threatened to kill her cat because she didn’t want to get serious. She also says all of the boys in her class have the potential to be vicious. Narrator thinks surely part of it has to be that Stacy hates her, too, but for now Stacy says it’s all about Willy.

A lot, a lot, a lot about shootings in general in this second part of this section. School shooters, accidental shooters, police violence, police shooting escaped animals, kids shooting their parents, parents shooting their kids. It’s a reflection of Narrator’s anxiety about all the horrible things that could have happened to Stacy.

Phew! After all that, it feels a little humdrum to mention this, but the “Omnes tenebrae” school motto comes up again early in the section. I asked a classicist what it means, and he said it’s an odd one. He said it’s something like “I can’t see everything in the darkness” but it’s not quite right because of [something I don’t fully understand about how Latin works]. He said that it might be an apt motto for a school, in the sense that you have to learn things by shining a light on them (metaphorically, as everything is). So if you know anything about Latin feel free to pitch in here about what "omnes tenebrae videre non possum" might indicate. (When I google it I get only one other hit, which is “omnes tenebrae videre non possum expectare”—apparently translating to “I can not wait to see all the darkness.”)

Ending at "the fact that Jim only liked the ducks in the park, 'Ducky! Ducky!'," which follows a discussion about a new dog they seem to have, ooh, spoilers (and this seems to be the Jim that is referenced).

I know that "days" and "weeks" have now lost a little meaning thanks to my unfortunately-timed holiday, but if we start this final week on Monday 17th, we can finish the book on Thursday and then put more in-depth discussion (plus anything we want to say about the end matter) in Friday's discussion post.

Poached Egg

INGREDIENTS
One fresh egg, room temperature
Vinegar or salt

METHOD
Bring a pan of water to just under simmering. Add a touch of vinegar or salt.
Take a room-temperature egg and crack it into a cup, then carefully ease it from the cup into the simmering water.
Simmer until the egg is cooked to your liking.

Clean-up tip: When you are finished, empty the hot water, then let the pan soak in cold water.

Samson et Dalila
Aida
Madama Butterfly
La bohème
Rigoletto
The Barber of Seville

Bringing Up Baby
It’s Complicated
Now, Voyager
Fantastic Voyage
Casablanca
Deception
Cape Fear
Seven Brides for Seven Brothers
The Aviator
South Pacific
Groundhod Day
Witness
Shane
The Bridge

What is the Disney film where an escaped lion gets shot?!

This one I'm calling “Fire Jam for Julia Roberts.”

This section starts off talking about the huge thankless task that is “being a mother” (traumatized, shell-shocked, damaged, starved, downtrodden) and, well, yes. The whole pandemic situation has brought a lot of that into stark relief, too, as I mentioned a few days ago.

It turns out the kids aren’t just traumatized by terrible mothering, though: there has been a COUGAR SIGHTING that has sent them home from school, dun dun duuuuunnnnnnnnnn. I’m sure Laura Ingalls Wilder wouldn’t have been allowed to leave her slate and dinner-pail behind because of a little old cougar, but that’s by the by. Anyway, Narrator reflects that the cops and the drinking water are the real dangers, but what can you do? Later we see that a bunch of local guys have formed a neighborhood anti-cougar patrol.

At the same time, there is a gunman running around Cleveland just shooting people and posting videos of himself doing so. (Like many? all? of Narrator’s true crime thoughts, this really did happen, in April 2017. Narrator thinks that “he” could be outside her house—the shooter, not Trump, she hopes—which made me laugh out loud.

She’s running a little late on her pies so calls Cathy to let her know. Cathy says that’s fine, but also somehow ends up mentioning a shooting from 20 years before where a friend of hers died and Cathy was herself imperiled. Cathy was trying to help her friend Blanche leave her abusive husband. Naturally, this revelation shocks Narrator, and she ends up crying alone in the bathroom.

A small ray of light seems to appear when Stacy comes to help Narrator peel apples without being asked. Then we get the whooooole plot of Now, Voyager, which I guess makes sense if Narrator is actually paying attention to the film. Narrator then thinks back to her own mother and decides she (Narrator) literally did nothing for her mother ever, nor did she ever try to make her happy, which I don’t think can be true. But then Stacy cuts it all down later by saying she watches musicals to show herself that she isn’t white, which is quite a thing!

As mentioned, the kids are home from school today (because of the lion), so they are very present on Narrator’s mind, but also physically present (watching films she doesn’t like, fighting and bickering, leaving their toys for her to step on).

I adore Ben for trying to get his family to go see the eclipse, planning out the various routes and the cost and everything. I once tried something similar to get my family to take me from Arkansas to see the Proms in London (it didn’t work either). I’m also delighted with Stacy for participating in peaceful protest through the medium of t-shirt slogans.

There’s a horrible bit about a baby dolphin getting separated from its mother and subsequently dying, which very shortly thereafter leads into a lion interlude, where the lioness, still searching for her cubs, happens upon a man who has hanged himself after killing several members of his family.

After the interlude, we find the narrator out in her yard, hopefully safe from the mountain lion as there have been no sightings in several days. She is enjoying the warm spring weather and reading an Anne Tyler book that Cathy has lent to her—well, trying to. Her thoughts give her away as being a little distracted by, well, everything, from her cat Frederick to her neighbors’ plants. She seems in a pretty good mood, thinking about the interconnectedness of all life.

There’s a little meta-discussion about unambitious characters in Anne Tyler’s books, making a living out of things as unlikely as “making pies” where “it’s all pretty pleasant, though some of her characters can get irritable over the least little thing” (tee hee!).

At the very end Narrator mentions Fresia again. I wonder, did her kid ever come over for that playdate?

Ok, we are home! It was probably a mistake to start this group with a plan to end the reading process while I knew I was going to be on holiday, but I thought it was all going to be a little different than it was . . .

Anyway, more tonight from me.

Star Wars
When Harry Met Sally
Seven Brides for Seven Brothers

Does Claude Rains call Bette Davis “my ewe lamb” in Now, Voyager?

Again Lee, thanks so much for taking over. I'll just do a quick paste of some specific/personal notes I took, since you did such a brilliant and thorough job on the recap!

Sex is on Narrator’s mind a lot in this section, though she doesn’t seem as freaked out about finding porn on Ben’s laptop as I would be if I saw it on my daughter’s iPad. (I say my daughter and not my son because she is close to Ben’s age; my son is only 6.)

I’m worried about the fate of the little lions now that I learn that the wood pigeon egg didn’t hatch—and this seems perhaps tied in with Stacy’s plans to move all the way to Arizona, omg!

She gets very poetic about the inner life of trees—and, I have to say, I can’t disagree with her. I’m glad to hear that Leo reminds her that she is “loved and capable of happiness” because she does get rather morose in this section.

Narrator notes that “Tuesday is the hardest day”—now, this has for a long time been precisely what I say. You can kind of float through Monday in a fog, and Wednesday is a little celebratory for being “hump day,” but Tuesday is THE WORST.

Oh, Donny is getting married—wait who is Donny? Also shocking to hear about the suicide-by-car escapade that happened in Amy and Andy’s restaurant.

BRIT WATCH: Narrator says she can’t go back to bed after the kids go to school because the neighbors might think she’s a slut. This usage of the word “slut” is 100% a tell that the person writing this book is British. Americans simply do not use “slut” to mean “lazy.” (The first time I encountered the term in that sense was when I read Bridget Jones’s Diary, where she says “Check plates and cutlery for tell-tale signs of sluttish washing up”—which was a shock for me, so much that I remember it 20 years later.) Narrator does go on to think of “slut” in the promiscuous sense, but initially it is absolutely the lazy sense she means.

Stopping at "the fact that Fresia is in her own time zone, or time warp," which is just after a short conversation about anti-microbial kitchen countertops.

Thank you so much to Lee for stepping in on, um "yesterday's" entry. I know I'm a week behind now. The problem, you see, is that my family is on holiday, but it's the kind of holiday where my husband works through the whole thing. This is not to say that I haven't been reading (I have certainly been reading) but I have not had the energy to read anything with an eye to dissection. I think, though, that I am now back in the saddle.

Oh you ABSOLUTE SUPERSTAR!!!

Aaaahhh! I am not dead—I am just having fun!

Stopping at "the fact that it's really Abby I wish I'd hugged more, rag rugs, CC and ginger, and she would have let me, unlike these characters,"

(Time has ceased to have all meaning, as I will probably read and discuss "Week 3, Day 4" on what really should be "Week 4, Day 1" ie Sunday 2 August—but that's school holidays for you. Anyway, in the UK they say the week starts on Monday, so . . .)

I know! It’s very distressing, the little kidnapped cubs.

I think Narrator is depressed.

La traviata
Rigoletto
Il trovatore
La bohème

Nothing new!

State Fair
The Apartment
The Odd Couple
The Graduate