OS BOOK CLUB's Open Salon Blog

Finding REFUGE: OS BOOK CLUB

Wed, 5 Aug 2009 10:08:07 -0400

This is how I find refuge. Saturday, migraines were threatening, but Rob and I took off for Six Mile Creek, found a rock far downstream from the teenagers frolicking under the falls, and hung out. We lay in the sunshine, we made out on the warm rock, and, when things got too hot, we sat in the just-below-tepid water and cooled off.

You can't float in Six Mile Creek. While it smells of sulfur, it isn't nearly the salt dish that comprises the Great Salt Lake. And yet, in reading Terry Tempest Williams' Refuge, I am reminded of all the ways that I have found nature to be my haven when the world feels like it's going mad.

So many parts of this book call to me. I recommend it constantly, and this semester, I've assigned it to my class.

Rather than open with a series of questions, I want to to open with a series of quotations from the book.

I don't know what your reactions to the book are going to be, so I'm simply going to point out to you those moments of prose where I stopped reading and had to think for a while.

Tell me what made you think. What you thought. What you want this book to do for you.
And let's, as always, chat.

I want to emphasize that I don't always agree with the passages that I cite: but I recognize that some of them are provocative enough that entire discussions could take off simply from them.

---

Most of the women in my family are dead. Cancer. At thirty-four, I became the matriarch of my family. The losses I encountered at the Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge as Great Salt Lake was rising helped me to face the losses within my family. When most people had given up on the Refuge, saying the birds were gone, I was drawn further into its essence. In the same way that when someone is dying many retreat, I chose to stay.

--
We spoke of rage. Of women and landscape. How our bodies and the body of the earth have been mined.

"It has everything to do with intimacy," I said. "Men define intimacy through their bodies. It is physical. They define intimacy with the land in the same with the land in the same way.

"Many men have forgotten what they are connected to," my friend added. "Subjugation of women and nature may be a loss of intimacy within themselves."

---

It is strange to feel change coming. It's easy to ignore. An underlying restlessness seems to accompany it like birds flocking before a storm. We go about our business witht the usual alacrity, while in the pit of our stomach there is a sense of something tenuous.

These moments of peripheral perceptions are short, sharp flashes of insight we tend to discount like seeing the movement of an animal from the corner of our eye. We turn and there is nothing there. They are the strong and subtle impressions we allow to slip away.

I had been feeling fey for months.

---

I know the solitude my mother speaks of. It is what sustains me and protects me from my min. It renders me fully present. I am desert. I am mountains. I am Great Salt Lake. There are other languages being spoken by wind, water, and wings. There are other lives to consider: avocets, stilts, and stones. Peace is the perspective found in patterns. When I see ring-billed gulls picking on the flesh of of decaying carp, I am less afraid of death. We are no more and no less than the life that surrounds us. My fears surface in my isolation. My serenity surfaces in my solitude.

---

The cancer process is not unlike the creative process. Ideas emerge slowly, quietly, invisibly at first. They are most often abnormal thoughts, thoughts that disrupt the quotidian, the accustomed. They divide and multiply, become invasive. With time, they congeal, consolidate, and make themselves conscious. An idea surfaces and demands total attention. I take it from my body and give it away.

---

Tonight I watch the sun sink behind the lake. The clouds looked like rainbow trout swimming in a lapis sky. I can honor its beauty or resent the smog in this valley which makes it possible. Either way, I am deceiving myself.

These are all thoughts that have stayed with me. We can pick up on one of these, or talk about what has affected you. Either way, I'm eager to explore this extraordinary book with you all.

Reminder: REFUGE on August 5

Sun, 2 Aug 2009 09:08:46 -0400

I know the solitude my mother speaks of. It is what sustains me and protects me from my mind. It renders me fully present. I am desert. I am mountains. I am Great Salt Lake. There are other languages being spoken by wind, water, and wings. There are other lives to consider: avocets, stilts, and stones. Peace is the perspective found in patterns. When I see ring-billed gulls picking on the flesh of decaying carp, I am less afraid of death. We are no more and no less than the life that surrounds us. My fears surface in my isolation. My serenity surfaces in my solitude. pg. 29

Remember: First discussion of Refuge is August 5.

SO MUCH to talk about. I hope that you'll join us for this chance to chat about a book.

TINKERS: Final Discussion

Tue, 28 Jul 2009 00:07:11 -0400

Shaggylocks here. Sorry I went MIA there for a bit, but I was called out of town unexpectedly and forgot--in the rush of coordinating my absence with work, school, CSA share pick up, pet care, etc.--that I also had to finish up the book discussion here. Apologies for my sudden absence.* Thanks to everyone who reached out to make sure I was okay.

That said, Tinkers, eh? I'm glad to hear people have been enjoying the book. I'm still playing catch-up after my prolonged weekend away, so I don't really have a good lead-off question in mind,but perhaps we can start off by talking about our impressions of the book, and a discussion can develop from there.

*_{Nothing bad, just needed to get to a friend's wedding a couple days earlier to help with some of the preparations, since the best man was seriously ill. (He recovered in time for the ceremony.)}

OS BOOK CLUB ANNOUNCES NEW BOOK SELECTION!!!!

Fri, 24 Jul 2009 14:07:57 -0400

I have never been anywhere more beautiful than the Utah desert. Just thinking of those red rocks brings me such a sense of peace.

I am not sure where Shaggylocks is. Truth be told, I'm worried about him. We were supposed to finish discussing Tinkers this past week, and we didn't, so the first thing I want to make sure of is to know if anyone knows: is he okay? (The same goes for Persephone 13: she has disappeared. Is she okay? Did I miss something when I was in the hospital?)

Okay. People have indicated that we want to keep our book club going, even if it is small. I have elected myself grand master funk of the next book discussion (and I'm always looking for volunteers to do it after this, so don't be shy). As such, I've chosen for us a book that I love. That I've read at least three times. And that I'll be teaching again in the fall, so this will be good for me to discuss it with you all before discussing it with my students.

The book is Refuge by Terry Tempest Williams. It has been out for years, so it's available in paperback, in used bookstores, online, audiobook, in libraries--you name it--it shouldn't be difficult to find.

In order to give folks people time to get hold of copies and to be prepared to discuss it, I'm setting our next book discussion date for WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 5. Please read to page 140, the end of the chapter entitled "Magpies."

What is Refuge about? Well, many things. And I don't really want to spoil it. But let's say there's plenty of things to discuss: religion, nature, family, how disease affects a family, gender, and what it means to belong to a piec of land.

I hope that you will treasure this book as much as I do.

I can't find any of my photos of the Utah desert. I think they are all at my ex-husband's house. But here are a few that I've stolen from the web.

And if you're interested, here's an interview with TTW from 2005.

Happy Reading.

Oh, and Freaky has promised some kind of special cake.

OS Book Club: Moving Forward

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 10:07:57 -0400

Alrighty, bookworms, I hope you've been enjoying Tinkers. We'll be having our final discussion a week from today, and then we'll be starting our next book.

Our next book? Yes, we need a next book. What should we read next, Book Clubbers? Please leave your suggestions in the comments.