ever-fixed mark

I had to go to San Antonio last week, which is not a straight hop from here (what is?) so I had lots of plane time to catch up on my reading. By some gross miscalculation, I finished Our Mutual Friend a full half-hour before my second flight landed in San An, and I had no backup reading material. That hasn’t happened to me in ages, and I spent the final minutes in a minor panic, reading the endnotes, the introduction, and the biographical notes in an effort to fill the time.

I was determined not to let that happen on the return flights, so I bought two books: Little Children by Tom Perrotta, and Suite Française by Irene Nemirovsky. Good forethought, there, because I finished Little Children just as the first leg was touching down.

I chose Little Children because the author is speaking at our town’s literary festival this weekend, on the process of adapting a book to a screenplay, and I would like to attend his session. Also, I have a practically meaningless Brush-with-Celebrity as far as Tom Perrotta is concerned: A friend of a friend of mine is his neighbor, and she beaded a necklace that his wife wore to the Academy Awards. I know! We’re practically BFFs!

Anyway, not having seen the movie, I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I did enjoy the book despite its being a lightning-fast read and therefore, based on the time spent entertaining me, a poor return on investment. The story is a kind of suburban reworking of Madame Bovary, the characters a bunch of stay-at-home parents and their spouses. One of the stay-at-homes is a dad, and he and one of the moms embark on an affair. A rather sad pedophile hovers on the sidelines. He is played in the film by Jackie Earle Haley, formerly of The Bad News Bears, one of the seminal films of my childhood. For this reason alone, I’m dying to see it.

One of the passel of SAHMs, Mary Ann, was a stereotypical perfect pearls-wearing life-sacrificing Martha-Stewart-channeling mom, and she was the one major fault I found in the characterizations. She’s the type of woman who chides her four-year-old to keep his sights on Harvard, and she criticizes the slacker mom of the group for forgetting a snack for her daughter at the playground: “That’s the second time this week.” My hackles went up at that because I am always forgetting snacks and I don’t know anyone who would make that kind of comment. But that’s irrelevant; the point is that Deluded Super SAHM and her evil twin, Bitchy Career Mom, are just cliches spawned by marketers to sell us stuff: goods, services, social agendas.

It’s not only the conservative media who pushes these stereotypes. In today’s New York Times editorial page, in fact, Linda Hirshman trotted out the image of the upper-middle-class SAHM losing brain cells, respect, and earning potential by taking a few years off to be with her kids. Her point was to exhort mothers to get back into the workforce, and she wasn’t just concerned about the women who would prefer to work but can’t swing the day care. She thinks it’s just as important to change attitudes of educated, potentially high-earning women who elect to stay home, because “participation in public life allows women to use their talents and to powerfully affect society.And once they leave, they usually cannot regain the income or status they had.” Although highly educated, you SAHMs are apparently not bright enough to know what’s good for you, but she does. Then she gets in these zingers:

That the most educated have opted out the most should raise questions about how our society allocates scarce educational resources. The next generation of girls will have a greatly reduced pool of role models.

What the hell? Is she suggesting that women who want to stay at home for any length of time should be banned from the university?! Ouch. I’m glad I chose to work. Until I see the opposite stereotype, that is: the ambitious harridan whose decision to have “other people raise her kids” results in increased behavior problems for the kids as they grow up.

The stereotypes in the media are here to stay, but stereotypes in a novel are just lazy writing. I’m sure Mr. Perrotta will be grateful for my notes when I see him on Saturday.

One of my favorite short stories of all time is Philip Roth’s “The Conversion of the Jews,” which is part of the Goodbye, Columbus collection. In fact, that story started me down the path to atheism, if you don’t count the short detour to Christianity prompted by my unrequited crush on a hunky but strait-laced Born Again.

Anyway, in the story the main character, Ozzie, is struggling with his religious faith. A number of things about Judaism confuse and irritate him; among them, he mentions his parents’ tendency to read the newspaper and evaluate every story on the basis of whether it is “good for the Jews” or “not good for the Jews.” If a disaster occurs and there are Jewish names among the victims, it’s Not Good for the Jews. If a Jewish person commits a crime, it’s Not Good for the Jews, and so on.

I thought of this the other day when news of the Virginia Tech shooting began to emerge. When I heard the shooter was Asian I was surprised, since my knee-jerk reaction was “But Asians are not violent!” (As I noted here, the tendency to stereotype is part of the human condition, and I am not immune.) My next thought was, “Well, I hope he’s not Korean” — this was uncharitable, as it is tantamount to hoping that some other ethnicity gets to take the heat for his actions. Then, when I found out he was Korean, I thought, “This is Not Good for the Koreans.”

Reading and watching the news coverage today, I’m struck by the number of Koreans who had the same thought. All over the country, Koreans are telling each other to keep their heads down, stay indoors, lie low. A number are expressing shame and sorrow that a Korean man committed these atrocities. The director of our adoption agency wrote an e-mail advising us on how to broach the topic with our children to help them handle any negative comments from their friends.

I hope their fears are unfounded. I hope that the American public would not condemn ethnic Koreans for the actions of one mentally disturbed man. But even if everyone behaves well, I think the Korean people will still feel that it was a terrible day for their people. It’s the flip side of the coin of national pride: national shame. I think as proud as we are of our own country, Americans almost never feel that.

Try this:

Sit cross-legged on the floor.

Now uncross your legs so that the sides of your ankles are pressed on the floor and the soles of your feet are facing each other.

Raise your arms in the air.

Now, using your abdominal and thigh muscles, propel yourself forward, sliding your butt on the floor.

Come on, use those abs. Try to get a little air between your butt and the floor.

Until yesterday, this was Minor’s primary means of locomotion. I posted a video of him when he was just learning this maneuver, but since then he’s really perfected it. I mean, this kid can scoot almost as fast as I can walk. If he and I both spot the dog’s unguarded water dish on the floor from the same distance at the same time, it’s a total toss-up as to whether I’ll reach it in enough time to save us from a flood.

Minor’s scooting excites a lot of comment when we are out in public. I took him to Florida last weekend, and people were pointing and laughing at him as he scooted through the terminal in the airport, down the aisle of the plane, and in the sand on the beach (leaving a rather interesting-looking trail). And by “pointing and laughing at him” I don’t mean “paying a lot of attention to him.” I mean POINTING with OUTSTRETCHED FINGERS. And LAUGHING THEIR HEADS OFF. I always feel compelled to explain that Minor scoots because he can’t crawl, and I’m getting kind of tired of having that conversation.

When Minor first starting scooting in lieu of crawling, our friends all told us that meant he would be an early walker. But to walk, you have to cruise; to cruise, you have to stand; to stand, you have to kneel; and to kneel you have to bear weight on your knees. This is something that Minor has steadfastly refused to do. When I say he has never crawled, I don’t mean he prefers scooting to crawling; I mean I have NEVER seen this kid on his knees. Sometimes, if he wants to retrieve a toy under a low table, he hunches over in the attitude of Christina’s World and kind of drags himself along with his hands, but he never actually moves forward on all fours. Sometimes I wonder if he has pediatric Osgood-Schlatter’s disease, the minor deformity that has (mercifully) stood between me and a career as a scullery maid.

Consequently, Minor couldn’t stand until he developed the ability to launch himself airborne from a sitting position, gaining enough momentum to grasp an ottoman or low table and pull himself up. The height he gets is amazing — he’s like one of those flying yogis. This kid must have the abs of a bodybuilder under all that chub.

So at long last, Minor is walking. The same people that told us he would be an early walker have said that he will slim down a bit once he’s ambulatory. Fathers, lock up your daughters!

As I was reading the New York Times this weekend, my eye was drawn to an anime-style cartoon and the accompanying article about a new animated series on Nick Jr., “Ni Hao, Kai-Lan!” The creator, Karen Chao, is an American of Chinese ancestry, and she based the characters on her childhood experiences.

The executive producer of the show, Mary Harrington, was interviewed for the article. “‘I loved her artwork,’ said Ms. Harrington, now the executive producer of Ms. Chao’s show…. ‘We connected creatively and decided to take the plunge. I tease her that when we go out on the streets, people think she’s my adopted Chinese daughter.’”

Holy non-sequitur! Where did that last sentence come from? Why “tease”? Why “adopted”? Why “Chinese”? What does it have to do with the woman’s artwork or their creative connection?

After reading that paragraph ten or twelve times, I decided that what Ms. Harrington meant to say was this: “I loved her artwork…we connected creatively to such an extent that I feel as close to her as if we were related.”

Unfortunately, an ugly potential subtext is this: “I loved her artwork and we connected creatively. Therefore, when we’re out in public together people must think she’s my adopted daughter, because what other context could anyone possibly imagine for a young Asian woman except in relationship to a white person?”

Don’t get me wrong; I’m not saying that this woman intended anything negative, or that she should be Imused from her job at Nickelodeon. As the song indicates, the tendency to stereotype is part and parcel of the human condition, and the only difference between this woman’s underlying racism and mine is that some reporter is capturing hers on paper.

If I had been in the room when she said it though, I might have asked her, “What did you mean by that? What impressions do you have of Chinese adoption? Of Asian women? Where do you think you get those impressions?” And as the (mis)interpreter of her statement, I would have to ask myself the same questions.

So I guess this is what you with a B.A. in English.

Our court appointment to finalize Minor’s adoption was scheduled for last Tuesday morning. I have often marveled at the photos posted on the Holt bulletin board marking finalization celebrations: siblings decked out in matching red, white and blue outfits, and relatives numbering in the double digits posing with the judge while holding American flags. Ours was a bit more prosaic. As I may have mentioned before, Husband and I are not overly sentimental people; or, rather, we can be sentimental about our own children, but not on command. So during the classic adoption moments that are supposed to unfold like a Hallmark card, all soft focus and sweet words, we tend to seize up.

On Tuesday this meant spending most of the morning grumbling about the impossibility of getting four humans up, fed, bathed, dressed, and out before 7:30 a.m., especially when one of the four still poops explosively and had to be given his second bath in twelve hours. Really, it should be an Olympic event: the quintathlon! Unlike the biathlon, no guns are allowed, no matter how they might ease the transitions.

The courthouse is about an hour away, given traffic. We passed through the metal detectors and up to the second floor lobby, where the docket was posted. I did not see our names, just one divorce case after another. Our attorney found us quickly, though, and handed me the adoption decree. With Minor clinging to my leg, I stood in the middle of the foyer, held the paper as steady as I could, and signed…something. I hope it was the paper to keep him, and not the one to give him away. Then I went chasing after Minor while Husband signed the same paper.

They ushered us into the judge’s chambers. While I was struggling with Minor, my purse, the baby backpack, and my camera, he recited a few words — I heard Minor’s Korean name, pronounced oddly, and his new name — and then it was over. The judge asked if he could hold the guest of honor. Minor does not always go to strangers willingly, but he melted into the judge’s arms and snuggled right into his shoulder.

Is it just me, or does the judge look a little startled by Minor’s enthusiastic response?

As we left, Husband apologized for the drool stain on the judge’s robe. He was nice about it and, probably thinking ahead to all the divorce cases, said it was still the best part of his day.

Jesus is not the only one jogging. Inspired by lengthening days and Doctor Mama, I have (re)started a regular running regimen, vowing to hit the pavement at least thrice a week. Unfortunately my newly-found zeal corresponded with a spring snowstorm, so two of my three sessions last week were conducted on a treadmill, where I was once again exposed to waaay too much CNN. But now I’m in Florida for the weekend, and I’m once again able to run outside.

The weather has been perfect: sunny but cool, no bugs but plenty of other fauna. Since Friday I’ve spotted the following during walks and runs:

• A parrot on a telephone wire. This is, apparently, not an escaped pet, but a wild parrot.
• A turkey vulture trying to menace an owl out of his breakfast.
• A bunch of small egret/stork-like things I haven’t been able to identify. I’ve seen these on the beach before, but these were well inland.
• A bird that appeared to be the love-child of a duck and a turkey, also unidentifiable.

I was pretty excited about my bird-spotting, because Husband and I have a kind of informal wildlife-spotting competition. Wouldn’t you know it — when I called Husband tonight, he said he and Aitch saw a seal cub on the beach. He allegedly has some video to prove it, but it hasn’t shown up in my e-mail yet.

At any rate, I can now add the foregoing fowl to the turkey, deer, jackrabbit, seal, shark, warblers, bat, and, uh, ladybug to my list.

Ye Gods, there are a lot of boring animal-watching posts on this blog.

The post title comes courtesy of the metaphysical poet George Herbert— click if you are in the mood for a beautiful holiday-appropriate poem. I really wanted to write a parody in the form of a snowman, but couldn’t get it together in time.

Early in our marriage, about 3 B.C., Husband and I decided we would each show an active interest in the other’s pursuits by reading one book from the other’s favored genre. (Weren’t we so cute back then? Assigning each other reading material?) Husband read about five pages of Pride and Prejudice. I read Connie Willis’s The Doomsday Book, an amazing time-travel adventure set during the Black Plague.

I won’t say that the experience converted me to sci-fi, but it definitely opened my mind a little bit to try new things. I went on to enjoy a few more Willis books (Passage, Bellwether, and To Say Nothing of the Dog in particular). I endured, rather than enjoyed, the Lord of the Rings trilogy (books and films). (Husband will say this is fantasy, rather than sci-fi. Whatever.) I expected to like the Thursday Next series (Jane Eyre and sci-fi!), but was horribly bored by them instead. But “Firefly” and its movie sequel, Serenity permanently won me over to the sub-genre known as “space opera.”

I discovered that the science fiction I love has something in common with the nineteenth-century English novels I love: the characters must navigate through a world with very different, but very defined, social rules. The tension between the social strictures and the characters’ actions is what makes these relatively simple plots so enjoyable. The trouble with contemporary Western fiction, in my opinion, is that conventions have become so loose that for most characters, there’s nothing to bump up against. That’s why most re-settings of nineteenth century plots are set in environments with artificial social hierarchies, like high school (Clueless, for example). And the trouble with bad science fiction is that the social or physical parameters are so ill-defined or changeable that I can’t perceive anything as tension. The Thursday Next novels, for example; if there are an infinite number of dei ex machina that can turn the plot on its ear in a moment, then why bother becoming invested in it?

With all the “Firefly” episodes exhausted, my current obsession is “Battlestar Galactica.” I have just started season 2.0, and I am enraptured even though all the male leads are teeeeeeny-tiny little guys. Apollo is the size of wedding-cake groom, and Gaius, while hugely entertaining, is obviously a gay elf. (Not that there’s anything wrong with being an elf.) Starbuck is the most strapping of the lot, but of course she’s a girl. Adama and Tigh are normal-sized, but I can’t get over how they look older in their flashbacks than they do in the present. Lords of Kobol, those are some funny flashbacks.

The great thing about BSG (as we call it) is that the parameters of that world are so well-defined. The futuristic elements were mostly set up during the first miniseries, with the main conflict being Cylons vs. humans. There’s just enough new plot being revealed to keep you interested, but not so much that you feel like the writers are making it up as they go along. There are no Space Aliens of the Week or Plot-Saving Technology Surprises. It feels like a knowable world, as much as any world can be knowable.

Of course, I would like to see them branch out just a little bit beyond the toaster-hunts and address the psychological impact of the near-demolition of the human race. I mean, there are fewer than 50,000 of them left, and yet whenever the Cylons are defeated everyone walks around like they don’t have a care in the world. Wouldn’t some human religious groups have tried to abolish birth control or at least encourage breeding? And speaking of breeding, why is everyone so sexually circumspect? You’re the last humans in the universe, people, and you’re in constant danger of annihilation; now is not the time to wonder whether you’re really ready for a relationship. The only ones getting any action out there are the Cylons and the humans they’re seducing.

Since my part of the original book-sharing experiment was so successful, I think Husband should have to go back and finish Pride and Prejudice What do you think?

So say we all.