Life in Abundance

I am an Australian wandering the world for a couple of months, chivvied out of my house by my travel-loving husband. A few weeks ago, in Glasgow, I found a tiny second hand bookshop in an alleyway off a nondescript side street. While my six- and three-year-olds chatted to the owner and played with the resident cats, I negotiated the poky aisles. It was one of those stores with books shelved to the ceiling, books stacked 30 high in front of the shelves, and books stacked 20 high in front of the stacks in front of the shelves. I spent most of the time saying 'excuse me' to the other customers as we squeezed past each other, arching over stacks and bending our bodies around one another like a literary form of twister.

The shop was intriguing. And in one teetering pile, a slim purple book caught my eye. I slid it out, opened it up, began to read, and immediately experienced that electrical jolt you get when you pick up the exact book you need, the book you know you will read time and again until you die.

Local Wonders: Seasons in the Bohemian Alps (American Lives), by Ted Kooser, is an account of daily life in rural Nebraska. It is not a linear telling, nor a story as such, but instead a collection of observations and memories grouped by season. I mean no disrespect when I say that it reads like an unusually beautiful blog, the posts lovingly crafted. Individually, each piece stands alone, whether a paragraph or three pages, and provides much to reflect on. Together, the pieces create an intimate portrait of place, person and community.

The notes are suffused with gentle humour and tinged with sadness. This is the writing of a man aware of his mortality and our frailty, who yet sees that life is good. He uses the stories of fields and families, small towns and tools, to create something strong and good. The writing drew me in so that I, too, smelled the wild plums in the hedgerow and saw the beer cans nestled in the undergrowth; lay in his son's tree house and listened to the breeze rustle the branches; sat on his outdoor toilet in the early morning watching the sunrise; experienced the theatre of a garage sale; sniffed the cloves from his mother's ancient can; and longed to see a fox. And I too felt frustration at the louts spraying herbicide, the school board which closes the schools and busses the kids for miles, the farmer who dumps insecticide into the water in his irrigation well. Kooser takes the reader on a ramble through his observations and memories such that, by the benediction – the only way to describe the final piece – I felt I had come to know him.

Local Wonders has taken its place on my mental shelf of all time favourites, along with works by Annie Dillard, Kathleen Norris, Marilynne Robinson and Robert Farrar Capon – all writers who cherish the mundane. Like these authors, Kooser has written a book about the everyday, to read slowly and savour, to dip into again and again, to draw nourishment from.

My life's thesis is this: if we could learn to see and cherish the gifts of the daily – the sight of a spider web as we walk down the street, the thread of song that comes to mind as we wash dishes, a baby's smile – then we would have a means to counter the gnawing insatiable appetite for more which dominates our culture: more clothes, more food, more sex, more experience, more power, more money, more thrills. This book invites the reader to step back, take a breath, and look around. By reading such a book, and learning to paying attention to our own lives, we might discover a deep and joyful truth: that all of us have not only enough, but riches and life in abundance.

> Ted Kooser Local Wonders: Seasons in the Bohemian Alps (American Lives) (Lincoln and London: University of Nebraska Press, 2002).

The daily round

Half a lifetime ago, long before I had any kids or had even met my husband, I picked up The Quotidian Mysteries, a slender book by Kathleen Norris. I was on an extended lazy holiday, and remember devouring the book in one gulp, along with a few too many coffees, deep in an armchair at a coffee shop as heavy rain pounded the footpath outside.

The book was a turning point. I had always thought of lives as measured by big projects: achievements, awards, titles, publications. And yet I was most of the way through a university course that I wasn't enjoying, working in administration which I never loved, and had no idea what to do next. According to my own ideals, my life was quickly becoming a failure or, at the very least, nothing to write home about.

Yet this little book suggested that every action, no matter how mundane or domestic, might have significance. Even the most repetitive tasks of running a household could be performed graciously, as the necessary and concrete acts which enable a household to function and bind its members together in love. We need to eat, to clean, to do the washing; this work is not mere drudgery to be escaped, but part of a daily ritual which includes work, play and worship. Even more, Norris suggested that we could perform these tasks attentively. We could watch for God's presence with us in even the most everyday tasks; we could perform them as an act of worship; we could use the mindlessness to achieve the meditative state into which God's voice might speak.

Housework and worship have much in common, she claims. They can both be tedious and boring, something to get through - and yet both affect us even when we perform them in the most perfunctory manner. They are both part of the daily round, particularly in monastic circles. And they both reflect serious commitment, the sort of commitment that one makes without understanding the depth of the promise. We have a baby without any concept of what is involved; we become Christian without understanding what will be required of us. Both work and worship, she argues, are about transformation, and transformation is only possible for humans in the daily round.

These ideas have stayed with me ever since, and sustained me through the neverending demands of parenting and housework. But after six years, I thought it was time to revisit the book, to take a refresher course so to speak.

What was interesting this time was to read it with three kids in the background, one still in nappies, toys all over the floor, laundry on the line waiting to be brought in and folded, dinner needing to be cooked - and knowing that Norris is childless.

Ah, those pre-child days. I could sit in an armchair and read a book in a gulp; we ate out for lunch and dinner most days; nobody dropped their breakfast cereal on the floor or rubbed it in their hair. I recall groaning at having to sweep the floor once a month. We're neat people, we ate out a lot, we had no pets; the only thing that happened to our floor was that it got a little dusty sometimes. And now... well, now I sweep the floor twice a day, sometimes more, and it's still usually crunchy underfoot. I do loads of washing every week, and fold washing every afternoon. My bathroom is putrid, especially since my three year old decided to clean the mirror with a soapy toothpasty sponge and I can't be bothered scrubbing it all off; and someone has managed to smear a little poo on the toilet pedestal. When I finish writing this, I'll go clean it.

The other night as I was tidying up prior to family coming over for dinner, someone emptied all the plastic containers onto the floor THREE TIMES in an hour, and dumped all the Duplo out too for good measure. In between picking up several hundred small plastic objects, I cooked dinner for nine. (Yes, I am a goddess.) I have a theory that if you can't tidy it up, you can't play with it, but it doesn't work with a highly inquisitive fifteen month old. She can reach high, and climbs to reach even higher, and she leaves a trail of scattered books and papers and pens and toys and clean nappies and shoes and colanders and leaves and raisins wherever she goes. And when she's not doing that, she's sitting, plump down on the kitchen step beaming at me, and I can hardly get cross at her for being a messy curious baby.

Anyway... let's just say that it's rather vexing to have a childless woman, WHOSE HUSBAND COOKS (yes, I shouted that), suggest that I find dignity in the daily round, and go on to comment that "young parents juggling child-rearing and making a living" should, "if they are wise... treasure the rare moments of solitude and silence that come their way, and use them not to escape, to distract themselves with television and the like." Well, if I wasn't completely and utterly exhausted two nights out of three - having prepared, served and cleaned away three meals and one or two snacks, much of which dropped onto the floor and some of which was subsequently stepped on - I probably wouldn't watch any television; but I am, and I do, and I'm unapologetic.

And yet, I have to admit that she's right, of course. I am infinitely happier and more refreshed when I spend quiet time just being quiet, or reading, writing or making something; and when I have the energy, I do just that.

And overall, I am still grateful for the book. Her words have rippled through the eleven years since I first read it, and have sustained me through the chaos of raising three young children thus far. Norris reminds me of my love of laundry, even if my laundry is a mountain compared to hers; I hang it on a line outside above the lavender bushes, and when I bring it in, the scent of lavender and sunlight thread through the house. And her insights into worship were part of my journey to a church congregation which focuses on liturgy, which has enriched my life immeasurably; I carry the words and songs of the liturgy with me in whatever I do.

Living attentively, and understanding the daily round as an act of loving service and an opportunity for reflection, is vitally important if those of us who perform it are not to go right out of our minds. This little book lends drudgery a little dignity, and even helps us find joy in it; it is a great gift. Those of us with young children might just have to be gracious enough not to snarl at the writer when she makes suggestions about parenting that grate.

> Kathleen Norris The Quotidian Mysteries. Laundry, Liturgy and 'Women's Work'. 1998 Madaleva Lecture in Spirituality. (New York/Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1998).

Living in America

When I was 14, my family moved to Washington, DC. Boy, was that a strange time of my life. I'd always been a bookish introvert in Australia; in the milieu of a typical American high school, I was now bookish, weird and AUSTRALIAN!!! Being invisible was not an option. Witty teenagers would bounce towards me like kangaroos, quoting Crocodile Dundee. Other kids wanted to know whether I had a pet koala, or did I ride a kangaroo to school. Seemingly intelligent adults would tell me how much they loved my country - ever since they saw The Sound of Music. I became so sick of it that I made up a pack of lies about my home; I even managed to convince one kid that I'd never seen a light bulb before.

So it was with a sense of painful recognition that I read Special Topics in Calamity Physics. In this novel, Blue moves to a new school and finds herself completely adrift. Although she pretends to be happy enough spending much of her time alone, Hannah, a teacher, takes Blue under her wing and inserts her into her group of proteges, who are most unwilling to accept her. When Hannah is found hanged, the group falls apart. The story begins with the hanging, then backtracks over the previous year to tell the story leading up to it.

While my experience did not involve death, the novel unfolds a familiar story of adolescent awkwardness, disconnection and cruelty. The adolescent is so often an observer, analysing the actions of themselves and others. This is captured in the novel: we see the story through Blue's eyes, and, like her, we are never quite sure what is going on and even what is real. This gives the novel an authentic voice; like Blue, when I moved countries I was never quite sure whether people were teasing me, or were just ignorant; whether they liked me, and whether I wanted them to; whether I should take on a superior persona, or whether I should grovel to be accepted. Blue goes through all these shifts, and my heart aches for her.

On another note, Blue is the daughter of an academic. The novel is set up as a collegiate reading guide; each chapter is named after and refers to a work of literature, and she peppers her story with allusions and references to other works as well. It makes for interesting reading; and one day I plan to read all the books in her reading guide that I have so far missed.

Another book which takes me back to my adolescence is Sarah Vowell's collection of essays, Take the Cannoli: Stories from the New World. Vowell writes for This American Life, and many of these essays appeared first on radio. The subjects are varied: growing up fundamentalist; living around guns; being part Cherokee; loving Frank Sinatra; learning to drive; making mix tapes; going to Disneyland; drinking coffee. Her writing is hilarious and self-deprecating - her essay on fighting insomnia, wherein she moves all her furniture, gives up caffeine and watches a very soporific Jay Leno, is cheerfully ridiculous. And the essay 'Music Lessons' strongly reminds me of my sister's school band. In it, Vowell writes about all the things she inadvertently learned through high school music: Marxism, transvesticism, biology, popularity, carrying heavy instruments, and how to do what you like; in doing so, she evokes the whole high school experience, nemesis and all.

Living in the States wasn't just about high school. We belonged to a large inner city church, radically different to any church I had attended previously. The sanctuary was built on Gothic lines, with vast stone columns, ornate carvings and slippery slate floors. Robe-wearing acolytes, musicians and preachers processed down the centre aisle. The church ran an adults' choir, a children's choir, and a handbell choir, and we were expected to participate in at least one of them. The organ was magnificent, and I can still remember the thrill of hearing the organist blast glory to the skies. Every year or two, the church would perform Handel's Messiah or similar, and choirs and musicians from around the city would descend on the church for hours of rehearsal. Choir directors would wave their hands in the air, shepherding lost sopranos, and music filled the space.

The church was more than formal worship and music. Homeless men slept on the steps and participated in church life. The church buildings were multi-story, and, as well as the church offices, housed an elementary school, a child care centre and a small library. Security guards and cleaning staff were ever present; and the buildings even had their own engineer. Church members were forever ducking in for projects, meetings, or to wrangle. As might be expected in a political city, church politics were a complex and constant part of life.

Jane Langton's Divine Inspiration, based in a similar church in Boston, could have been written about our church. This murder mystery, featuring Homer Kelly, stars church organists and building engineers; hopeless secretaries and hen-pecked ministers; a choir and musicians preparing to perform Bach's Magnificat; a child care centre, wealthy benefactors, and church politics galore. And it is also about the city of Boston, which, like Washington, has extreme wealth and dire poverty forever rubbing shoulders. It begins when the protaganist, Alan Starr, finds a young boy crawling up the church steps. The boy's mother is missing, and it is up to Alan and Homer Kelly to find her.

Like all Langton's Homer Kelly mysteries, and Pessl's Special Topics, Divine Inspiration draws from particular themes. Each section begins with a piece from Bach's Magnificat, and each chapter with a quote from Martin Luther. It adds to the richness and dimensions of the novel. Overall, it's great fun, a wonderful book to read in a few big gulps.

Thinking about my DC church recalls the members of the church. To a young Australian teenager, having grown up in a suburb of plumbers and builders and nurses, many of them were very exotic indeed. Members included an African ambassador whose government had been deposed and who was now stranded in the States; a man who was instrumental in introducing those yellow school buses across America; the most senior journalist at the White House; a paymaster at the CIA; an engineer at NASA; an advisor to the President; members of the Cosmos Club; people who wrote books; people who had maids, and lived in five storey houses, and went away to the mountains every summer; people who worked in New York and lived in Washington; and of course the homeless guys.

And, quietly mingling, were various intelligence agents. One man would disappear periodically, then reappear some months later. We'd ask him where he'd been. I can't tell you, he'd say, then he'd quickly change the subject. This same man would regularly stop his car to make calls from public phone boxes (he'd say his mobile phone didn't work), and would drop in on colonels in forts around Washington when he was taking us out to lunch. Questions were cut short, and it was all very odd.

Reading Cobweb, by Neal Stephenson and Frederick George (originally published under the pen name of Stephen Bury), takes me right back. It's a prescient thriller set alternately in the Midwest and in Washington. The premise of the story is that terrorists use American training and equipment to plan an attack on American soil - this was written in 1997, well before 9/11. A local deputy sheriff, Clyde Banks, picks up on what might, or might not, be happening, even as DC-based policy makers are trying to close down any investigation. On the one hand, the book is a real nail biter as Clyde tries to work out what is going on. On the other, it's a fascinating satire on American intelligence agencies as low level operatives are controlled and muffled by policy makers on high. Throw in some high grade wrestling, a young mother serving in Iraq, gloriously drunken Russian smugglers, a young Mormon CIA analyst, and a few murders, and you have a highly entertaining read.

> Marisha Pessl Special Topics in Calamity Physics; Sarah Vowell Take the Cannoli: Stories from the New World; Jane Langton Divine Inspiration; Neal Stephenson & Frederick George Cobweb.