The Gerson Therapy: The Proven Nutritional Program for Cancer and Other Illnesses

The Gerson Therapy: The Proven Nutritional Program for Cancer and Other Illnesses

The Wild Trees: A Story of Passion and Daring by Richard Preston. rating: 2 stars

The Wild Trees: A Story of Passion and Daring by Richard Preston

MEH- I thought this book would actually be about the trees (!), but most of it seemed to be about the people who climb/study them. It seemed like a kaleidoscopic series of mini-biographies which rather bored me. (I am weirder than all of them put together. Also, I couldn't see that the author made any real choices while writing- seemed to just write about everything because he could. Not interesting.)

Basically, I couldn't see the forest for the people.

Watership Down, by Richard Adams

Watership Down by Richard Adams

Still one of the best books I have ever, ever read.
(Last read August 2008)

Some of the quotes that mean the most to me:

"I don't know what it is," answered Fiver wretchedly. There isn't any danger here, at this moment. But it's coming- it's coming. Oh, Hazel, look! The field! It's covered with blood!" (p.14)

And Frith called after him, “El-ahrairah, your people cannot rule the world, for I will not have it so. All the world will be your enemy, Prince with a Thousand Enemies, and whenever they catch you, they will kill you. But first they must catch you, digger, listener, runner, prince with the swift warning. Be cunning and full of tricks and your people shall never be destroyed.” And El-ahrairah knew then that although he would not be mocked, yet Frith was his friend. And every evening, when Frith has done his day’s work and lies calm and easy in the red sky, El-ahrairah and his children and his children’s children come out of their holes and feed and play in his sight, for they are his friends and he has promised them that they can never be destroyed. (p. 37)

Just as a battle begins in a state of equilibrium between the two sides, which gradually alters one way of the other until it is clear that the balance has tilted so far that the issue can no longer be in doubt- so this gathering of rabbits in the dark, beginning with hesitant approaches, silences, pauses, movements, crouchings side by side and all manner of tentative appraisals, slowly moved, like a hemisphere of the world into summer, to a warmer, brighter region of mutual liking and approval, until they all felt sure that they had nothing to fear. (p.82)

They knew well enough what was happening. But even to themselves they pretended that all was well, for the food was good, they were protected, and they had nothing to fear but the one fear; and that struck here and there, never enough at a time to drive them away. They forgot the ways of wild rabbits. They found out other marvelous arts to take the place of tricks and old stories... and though these could not help them at all, yet they passed the time and enabled them to tell themselves that they were splendid fellows, the very flower of Rabbitry, cleverer than magpies. They had no Chief Rabbit- no, how could they?- for a Chief Rabbit must be El-ahrairah to his warren and keep them from death: and here there was no death but one, and what Chief Rabbit could have an answer to that? (p. 123)

^Tokenism

Human beings say, "It never rains but it pours." This is not very apt, for it frequently does rain without pouring. The rabbits' proverb is better expressed. They say, "One cloud feels lonely": and indeed it is true that the appearance of a single cloud often means that the sky will soon be overcast. (p. 184)

When Marco Polo came at last to Cathay, seven hundred years ago, did he not feel- and did his heart not falter as he realized- that this great and splendid capital of an empire had had its being all the years of his life and far longer, and that he had been ignorant of it? That it was in need of nothing from him, from Venice, from Europe? That it was full of wonders beyond his understanding? That his arrival was a matter of no importance whatever? We know that he felt these things, and so has many a traveler in foreign parts who did not know what he was going to find. There is nothing that cuts you down to size like coming to some strange and marvelous place where no one even stops to notice that you stare about you. (p. 297)

Many human beings say that they enjoy the winter, but what they really enjoy is feeling proof against it. For them there is no winter food problem. They have fires and warm clothes. The winter cannot hurt them and therefore increases their sense of cleverness and security. For birds and animals, as for poor men, winter is another matter.
....
For rabbits, winter remains what it was for men in the middle ages- hard, but bearable by the resourceful and not altogether without compensations. (p. 465-6)

Since the night of the siege, Fiver had spent much time alone and even in the Honeycomb, or at morning and evening silflay, was often silent and preoccupied. No one resented this- "He looks right through you in such a nice, friendly way," as Bluebell put it- (p. 466)

Finished Dec 24th

James and the Giant Peach, by Roald Dahl

James and the Giant Peach, by Roald Dahl

Just finished reading this (on December 17th) to the kids. This is the first (real) chapter book that we’ve used for bedtime stories. :D

The Blind Assassin, by Margaret Atwood: 4-1/2 stars

Read December 10th- 15th.

Iris starts with her sister Laura's death. The narrative of Iris' memoirs cover her present life as well as her past- and this is juxtaposed with the novel that Laura wrote, and the story within that novel. Gradually, inevitably, you realize that nothing is what it seems, and that everything is coiled together.

This is a beautifully executed social commentary as well as a wonderfully told story. Atwood has a brilliant way of wording and presenting things.

The dynamics between the sexes are rather brutal and sometimes hard to read, even between loved ones, but still the portrayals ring true. I find the peach women particularly disturbing, as it reveals such disturbing thinking, and is purportedly told to be more or less amusing. What happens to Iris and Laura is especially upsetting as well.

That kind of thing doesn't run in her family: her mother Reenie never went in much for God. There was mutual respect, and if you were in trouble naturally you'd call on him, as with lawyers; but as with lawyers, it would have to be bad trouble. Otherwise it didn't pay to get too mixed up with him. Certainly she didn't want him in her kitchen, as she had enough on her hands as it was. (p. 52)

Standing there with the jar in one hand and my finger in my mouth, I had the feeling that someone was about to walk into the room- some other woman, the unseen, valid owner- and ask me what in hell I was doing in her kitchen. I've had it before, the sense that even in the course of my most legitimate and daily actions- peeling a banana, brushing my teeth- I am trespassing. (p. 56)

All around them were the snow-covered rocks and white icicles- everything white. Under their feet was the ice, which was white also, and under that the river water, with its eddies and undertows, dark but unseen. This how I pictured that time, the time before Laura and I were born- so blank, so innocent, so solid to all appearances, but thin ice all the same. (p. 69)

The picture in the book is of a leaping man covered in flames- wings of fire coming from his heels and shoulders, little fiery horns sprouting from his head. He's looking over his shoulder with a mischievous, enticing smile, and he has no clothes on. The fire can't hurt him, nothing can hurt him. I am in love with him for this reason. I've added extra flames with my crayons. (p. 82)
&
This messenger appeared to him in the guise of a flame, with numerous eyes and wings of fire shooting out. (p. 117)

(What fabrications they are, mothers. Scarecrows, wax dolls for us to stick pins into, crude diagrams. We deny them an existence of their own, we make them up to suit ourselves- our own hungers, our own wishes, our own deficiencies. Now that I've been one myself, I know.) (p. 94)

She began to fret about God's exact location. It was the Sunday-school teacher's fault: God is everywhere, she'd said, and Laura wanted to know: was God in the sun, was God in the moon, was God in the kitchen, the bathroom, was he under the bed? ("I'd like to wring that woman's neck," said Reenie,) Laura didn't want God popping out at her unexpectedly, not hard to understand considering his recent behavior. Open your mouth and close your eyes and I'll give you a big surprise, Reenie used to say, holding a cookie behind her back, but Laura would no longer do it. She wanted her eyes open. It wasn't that she distrusted Reenie, only that she feared surprises.
Probably God was in the broom closet. It seemed the most likely place. He was lurking in there like some eccentric and possibly dangerous uncle, but she couldn't be certain whether he was there at any given moment because she was afraid to open the door. "God is in your heart," said the Sunday-school teacher, and that was even worse. If in the broom closet, something might have been possible, such as locking the door. (pp. 137-8)

More and more I feel like a letter- deposited here, collected there. But a letter addressed to no one. (p. 169)

Cookery means the knowledge of Medea and of Circe and of Helen and of the Queen of Sheba. It means the knowledge of all herbs and fruits and balms and spices, and all that is healing and sweet in the fields and groves and savory in meats. It means carefulness and inventiveness and willingness and readiness of appliances. It means the economy of your grandmothers and the science of the modern chemist;it means testing and no wasting; it means English thoroughness and French and Arabian hospitality; and, in fine, it means that you are to be perfectly and always ladies - loaf givers. (This, and the following commentary- p. 181)

Water is nebulous, it has no shape, you can pass your hand right through it; yet it can kill you. The force of such a thing is its momentum, its trajectory. What it collides with, and how fast. (p. 270)

[What is] More powerful than God, more evil than the Devil; the poor have it, the rich lack it, and if you eat it you die?
That's a new one.
Take a guess.
I give up.
Nothing. (p. 271)

Into the plastic basket went my selections, and off I set, step by step, sideways down the stairs, like Little Red Riding Hood on her way to Granny's house via the underworld. Except that I myself am Granny, and I contain my own bad wolf. Gnawing away, gnawing away. (p. 366)

But why bother about the end of the world? It's the end of the world every day, for someone. Time rises and rises, and when it reaches the level of your eyes, you drown. (p. 478)

We weren't prepared for it, but at the same time we knew we'd been there before. It was the same chill, the chill that rolled in like a fog, the chill into which I was born. As then, everything took on a shimmering anxiety- the chairs, the tables, the streets and the street lights, the sky, the air. Overnight, whole portions of what had been acknowledged as reality simply vanished. This is what happens when there's a war. (p. 478)

ET 101: The Cosmic Instruction Manual for Planetary Evolution, by Zoev Jho

ET 101: The Cosmic Instruction Manual for Planetary Evolution by Zoev Jho

(Also, here.)

Definitely a trip. But then again, any manual for dealing with life on this planet would have to be. I'm glad I'm not the only one who felt the need for such a manual!

Here are some of my favorite quotes (from the e-edition, hence the lack of page numbers):

Getting out of here is not the point. Getting more light into here is. Remember?/

The Second Coming is imminent, and you may as well get ready. This is a particularly good idea because you’re it. You are the Second Coming. Mission Control does not wish to stay on this topic very long because we are aware of the charge that surrounds it due to 2,000 years of organized denial. For this reason, we will give you only one more helpful hint: Become your own Messiah—why wait?

That statement is not only not heretical, it is the entire point. /

Nothing you do or say is an acceptable substitute for becoming who you truly are./

The temptation to remain dysfunctional arises from the fact that it has been such a thorough and arduous journey getting there; somehow, it feels wasteful to just chuck it. Because of this illusion of waste, you may find yourself clinging to false identities or co-dependent relationships that prolong the recovery act. These double-dealing relationships, whether with yourself or others, are based on a dysfunctional complicity that thrives on an unstated request. That request can best be expressed as, “Please don’t disturb my sense of limitation. It may be Auschwitz, but it’s home.”/

Come Hell or High Water: A Handbook on Collective Process Gone Awry, by Delfina Vannucci and Richard Singer

Come Hell or High Water: A Handbook on Collective Process Gone Awry, by Delfina Vannucci and Richard Singer (AK Press)

This would have come in very handy dealing with IEP meetings and all. It gave me a better perspective on group dynamics in general and on several instances in my life when group dynamics went to hell in particular. It certainly clarified to some things and opened my eyes- I had at least one distinct "aha" moment.

Lines that got my attention for mostly personal reasons:

Capitalism has been built and developed over the course of its long and bloody history in a way that keeps us continually at odds with one another, and yet, at the same time, discourages any real independent thought amongst the masses. (p.13)

Not everybody has the same skill at navigating interpersonal exchanges. Some people are not good at recognizing that split second when someone has finished talking and it's okay to jump in. They are the ones who are most likely to interrupt, and be reprimanded for it, while they also, ironically, are the least likely to get a word out and have their opinions heard. (p. 70)

Regardless of the merits or faults present in each situation, it's not okay for us to inflict emotional pain on one another. That should be a basic tenet.
A commitment to compassion and justice and against cruelty (yes, that's what it is) needs to be overtly stated as the basis for an egalitarian group operates. (p. 100)

The end result of a project that has been produced collectively is an uneven patchwork of viewpoints and ability levels. Making room for everybody to contribute, even when ability is not equal, is a strength, not a weakness; so is letting the process show. We are accustomed to valuing a slick, polished presentation, but if we let the seams show, this will empower others with information about how something was put together. If we accept a heterogeneous, bumpy outcome as a given, before the work even begins, we will avoid a lot of head-butting further down the road.
Because groups based on equality presuppose mutual trust and a shared sense of mission, many of us may expect solidarity, harmony, and kindness to permeate such groups. On the contrary, adhering to egalitarian, anti-authoritarian principles means applying minimal interference to one another, or letting people be who they are- including the annoying, the trying, and the obnoxious- and accepting the outcomes as well. (p. 111)

What an empowering little book! I will have to hunt down a couple of reads they recommended.

The Judgement, and In The Penal Colony, by Franz Kafka

The Judgement and In The Penal Colony, by Franz Kafka

read on December 3rd. The transition from Hellboy (especially Del Toro) to Kafka is nonexistent.

placeholder- I am currently digesting the stories. Then I will reread. And then I will start sorting out the words for what I want to say.

It's Kafka.

Hellboy II: The Golden Army (The Official Novelization), by Robert Greenberger

Hellboy II: The Golden Army (The Official Novelization), by Robert Greenberger

Read November 30th through December 2nd.

It's a novelization. The writing is nothing special. As far as books go, it's basically candy. But at least it's not cheese.

"How on earth can they blame me for cheese," he asked and stopped as the anchor finished her report. (p. 205)

(Hellboy itself, though, is conceptual genius.)

Not much to say, really, since I already knew the story. Several of the scenes were different, however, seeing as the screenplay changed and evolved in the movie after they handed it over to this author to novelize. One such scene is the Can't Smile Without You scene, which is my favorite from the movie, and which I'm quite glad they did change from the original concept.

(After having just read Mary Daly, the concept of a hole in man's heart and of the forest god- the Elemental- took on much richer levels.)