Today, when Kendell pulled into the driveway, he noticed an entire family of quail, walking across my neighbor's yard and into ours. The mom led the way, then the babies, and the dad swept the back. They walked into the wild mess of daylilies, weedy violets, and spent bleeding heart stems that is my west flowerbed, and Kaleb and I sat on the grass, far enough away not to disturb them, but close enough to admire the cuteness of those little balls of fluff.

The mom kept leading her little train of babies in and out of the flowerbed.

I don't know why. They'd call and chirp and chortle to each other, and some would come out on the grass and others would stay hidden. A little crowd of neighborhood kids gathered around us, and perhaps that made them nervous, but soon the weaving and the searching ended. The dad hustled out of the flowers and about halfway across the grass, and then he started chirping, and babies started flying. One, two, three, four, five, six.

The mom hooted; the dad started leading the babies back into my neighbor's yard. But he stopped at their bush, gathered the babies around him, and squawked back. I swear: they were communicating.

The mom rushed out of my flowerbed and over to the neighbor's bush; more squawking and hooting, and then mom went back to the daylilies and hooted again, a softer yet more urgent sound.

Dad squawked.

Mom hooted. 

She came out of the daylilies and went back in.

And I decided this was their conversation:

"We have these six babies over here, honey! What are you waiting for!" hooted the dad.

"These other two babies over here! Remember them? They won't get out of the flowers!" squawked the mom.

"Oh no! We have these six babies and those two babies! What will we do?"

"I'll try again. Come on, little ones. Let's go. Let's go. Let's go!" 

"Are they coming? Is everything OK?" chirped the dad.

"No! not OK! Definitely not OK!" squawked the mom.

And then I thought...really: why is the mom staying over there? Why aren't the last two babies flying out like the others? So, on one of the mom's excursions to discuss with the dad, I tiptoed over. And quickly discovered the problem: the two missing babies had fallen into the window well behind the greenery.

They were trying to flutter out, but they were too young and the well was too deep.

Well, I couldn't just leave them there! So I put on my gardening gloves and I hopped, carefully, into the well, making sure not to land on them. They were almost the same color as the stones at the bottom, except for the slight texture to their wings and the puff of their bodies.

I crouched down, and I tried to catch them, one at a time.

It took awhile. They didn't trust me, of course, and my presence made them even more agitated. Mom was fluttering and swooping around, right where my head would be if I stood up. But I just stayed crouched, murmuring, waiting. I didn't want to hurt them in the process of saving them.

As I waited for the right opportunity, I thought about how often, lately, I feel just like that mom. My babies are starting to flutter out into the world on their own, and it's hard to keep track of them all. It's a large world with so many ways to fall. And I guess you just have to hope that you can trust the people who try to help them, and flutter protectively, and squawk at them.

(Even though I know you're not supposed to flutter too close. I'll try.)

Finally I managed to cup (carefully) one of the babies. I lifted it up to the dirt, and the mom immediately squawked. The baby flew into the grass, and then I tried to catch the last one. I was being so careful, as it seemed so fragile, and I finally got it into my cupped hands. But I didn't keep them tight enough, as just as I almost had it to the surface, it flew out and fell back down.

So I crouched again, and I murmured. Something about knowing it was afraid, but I was really trying to help it, and its dad and mom were waiting and not to worry and then at last I got it again, and put it in the dirt. The mom stopped fluttering around my head; she chirped that "get going!" chirp, and the last baby flew to its family.

They'd vanished back into my neighbor's yard before I could get out of the window well. (Which, by the way, was not a graceful exit.)

I looked for them for a very short minute, thinking about the book Are You My Mother, which I can't read without crying. I was probably very Snort-ish to those baby birds. I wasn't their mother. But I managed to help them all the same, and I think I have to trust that. Trust that there will be other people who will help my little fledglings.

And hope that sometimes they'll want to fly back to me.

Whenever I go on a trip, I pick out the book I take with me very carefully. I want something that will fit with where I am going, without being too similar. So when I was in Cabo last year, I read Ann Patchett's State of Wonder; set in the Brazilian rainforest, it was only a very little bit like the desert in Mexico but it still had a similar feel. And when I took the boys to Disneyland, I brought Tigana along; Mickey Mouse and a fantasy set in a sort-of Italian landscape might not seem to connect. But that trip felt like a sort-of personal journey, which Tigana's characters also take.

Slant connections are perfect for books to read on a trip.

I've been wanting to read the book Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail ever since it came out last year. I just hadn't found the right time, but last week's trip to southern Utah seemed perfect. Short day hikes in national parks are, of course, only vaguely related to a thousand-mile solo hike along the PCT. But, there was hiking. And boots, and backpacks. And a little bit of wilderness. And there was also this idea, which I read the night before we went to Zion:

Fear, to a great extent, is born of a story we tell ourselves. . . Fear begets fear. Power begets power. I willed myself to beget power.

Fear is something I've been thinking about lately. How much of what I choose is based on fear of what I don't know? There are things in my life I want to change, but choosing to change them requires me to face the fear of not knowing. When something is hard, and it's been hard for a long time, it also becomes comfortable. Not in the sense of actual comfort, but in the sense that it is known. At least I know the parameters of my hard things. I know what makes them harder and what softens them. Choosing to change the hard things would mean I would face new hard things—ones with unknown landscapes.  

And deep down, I know I am afraid of walking that unknown path.

Fear is a story we tell ourselves.

I want to tell myself a different story because I want to not let my choices be influenced by fear.

In Zion, I stood on a cliff. We'd hiked up a short canyon through a stream, across and around sandstone boulders. The water wasn't very deep—until the cliff. Someone swam to the bottom of the pool underneath the cliff, to make sure there weren't any hidden ledges or boulders, and then the kids started jumping off the cliff, into the water.

When I was a kid in Lake Powell, we did this a lot. Off of cliffs higher than the one in that canyon in Zion. But it's been years—two decades at least—since I jumped off a cliff. It seemed terrifying. But then that idea from Wild came back to me.

Being afraid is just a story.

So I decided to change the story I was telling myself. I decided this as I climbed up the curved side of the cliff—scarier, almost, than the cliff, because I was hiking in water shoes and the stone was wet and I didn't want to fall. But Jake helped me up and it wasn't as slippery as I thought. 

I stood back from the edge for a minute, just looking. Thinking about fear. Thinking about my son standing beside me, about how often I've let him down. How often he's seen fear take hold of me. He wanted to see me jump—needed to, in fact, although I don't know he would've said that.

I needed it, too. Needed to let him see me be brave.

So I shrugged off my backback. I handed my sunglasses, my orange hiking hat, and my watch to someone else. I stood on the edge of the cliff and I let it fill me up: the fear. The story that made me afraid, what if I hit something, what if the water isn't deep enough, what if I break a bone? And then I said a different story: what if I love it? The pounding in my heart changed from fear to that feeling of I-can-do-this.

And then I jumped.

It wasn't a long fall. It wasn't graceful, my jump. The water wasn't deep like Lake Powell. But it was exhilarating. The water and the sandstone. The falling and the splash, that cool shock of water on a hot, sandy body. More, it was the fact that I did it: I jumped even though I was afraid.

I want to do that more often.

It seems that all I can write lately is book reviews and weekly reviews. I think summer has something to do with it. And my general sense of a frustration I can't explain yet. Can't explain because words about almost anything won't come.

I'm just going to sit with it.

Things will feel better eventually. Right? Yes. Of course they will. But until then: yet another week in review! Try to contain your excitement!

I spent a long, lovely Monday working in my yard. It needs a ton of work, but I am still researching what to do. My trees have gotten so big that everything is in nearly-constant shade. I need to pull out a bunch of plants and start over. It's just that the options for shade? So boring. I love the color, texture, scent, and experience of flowers—waiting for them to bloom, seeing the buds open, deadheading and feeding and mulching. Ferns and hostas and greenery (which seem to be my only choices) don't feel the same. I did find a few other things to plant (whose names I've promptly forgotten). We'll see how they do under my maple tree.

This was the week of fifty different directions. Kaleb was in Seattle with his aunt Cindy. I think he had fun. They went to the beach several times, and into the city where they went to the aquarium and Pike Street Market, and rode the ferry. He had fun with his favorite cousin, Jace, and  had a great adventure away from home.

On Wednesday, Jake left for a scout camp out at a place in southern Utah called Entrada. He went river rafting on the Green River, hiked, rappelled, and rode bikes. He came home exhausted, sunburned, bug bitten, and thoroughly happy, with that happiness only physical exhaustion can bring.

Nathan also went on a camp out; his started on Thursday. His troop went to Goblin Valley, where they hiked one day. The next day they hiked in a slot canyon called Little Wildhorse. 

Here's the thing with boys going on scout camp outs (aside from me being terrified the entire time that something bad will happen) : they go to these cool places and have all these fun experiences, and I never have any pictures. It makes me nuts!

On Wednesday, Haley and I drove to Logan so she could have her university orientation at Utah State University. Once we got there, we checked out the campus and found her dorm, and then we drove around to as many pharmacies as the GPS could locate so she could drop off her resume. No one was hiring yet, but hopefully she'll find something eventually. My friend Sophia graciously put us up at her house for the evening. Her daughter had just had surgery, so she extended hospitality when she was already spread thin, which I appreciated so much!

On Thursday (you know: the day Kendell was home without anyone else! That never happens!) we went to her orientation. I had a moment of sheer, heart-pounding anxiety for her: all the planning and the time managing and the work she has to do! But I also thought (and said) about 1,000 times "I wish I was 18 and just starting college!" I am so happy for her that she gets to have a real college experience, and not only because it's something my choices didn't allow me to have. She worked hard to earn her scholarship and I think she will have a good experience there. I hope she makes friends, meets people who influence her in positive ways, and begins to learn who she really is.

On Friday, I spent some time online trying to find some reasonable restaurants in Jackson Hole. We're going there in August to visit Kendell's mom's grave (she and his dad are buried in Driggs, Idaho, which is a little town on the west slope of the Tetons) and I wanted to be prepared. Apparently a not-hideously-expensive restaurant is impossible to find in Jackson Hole (remember...I'm feeding five people with adult-sized appetites), but I did read a lot about food. I found myself craving something very specific: a peppercorn burger from Chili's. So Kendell and I went there for our Friday-night date. I was bummed to discover that the peppercorn is no longer on Chili's menu...but then the waitress told me they could still make it for me anyway. Despite the gajillion calories it was exactly what I wanted.

By Saturday, everyone started trickling in, and now we're all home. I missed my kids, each of them, while they were gone, but I suspect that this is just the start of my time of scattered kids. 

My life feels so weird right now! How about yours?

After I read The Lover's Dictionary, I decided I wanted to read more of David Levithan's work. And then I forgot about him until I read a review of his new(ish) teen novel, Every Day. It tells the story of A, who every day wakes up to find him/herself living inside someone else's body. It reminded me vividly of a time in my life when I did not want to make a decision I knew I needed to make; I was sitting on the floor in a busy hall at UVU during a class change and I wished desperately that I could just change lives with someone else. How would that feel---to just become someone else?

So I was intrigued, and hoping to love the book. And honestly: I did enjoy the story. On the day we first meet A, he's inside the body of a teenager named Jason, who's sort of a jerk to his girlfriend Rhiannon. Since A is in control of whatever body he's occupying that day, he can do whatever he wants; luckily, he seems to be a good soul, as he tries to not influence too many actions, decisions, and experiences of his host body. But when he sees Rhiannon, he has an instant attraction, and so he does something he doesn't often do: takes the body out if its usual routine. He and Rhiannon ditch school and go to the beach, where they spend a long and sweet day together.

Of course, A wakes up in a different body the next day, so now he must decide: pursue Rhiannon in his seemingly-impossible situation? or just let the day go? The story unfolds as he/she decides how to interact with Rhiannon. Other bodies and lives get constripted into their adventures, raising the question: when we love someone, can we separate the person from the appearance?

Ultimately, two things dissuaded me from absolutely loving this story. First, it's an intriguing concept—that sort of gets bogged down in the romance. I wanted it to be something larger than it was. And second, it felt weighted down by the author's philosophies on gender, religion, appearance, and parenting. Gender especially. And it is something to think about, how much of our identity is bound to our gender? But that's what I mean about the concept not being big enough in the book. Part of gender is constructed, not inherent.  And while A professes to be neither male nor female, he feels male. Especially when he's (I keep using that pronoun because, see, it's how it felt) living in a girl's body. He seems to know what to do (the make-up, the cute outfits) but he sort of thinks it's a big waste of time. Plus, A seems just a little bit too wise, despite what he would've had to have learned through his lifestyle. A feels, to me, like the author's voice instead of a character's.

At any rate, my underwhelmed-ness aside, it was an interesting book that gave me some things to think about. Plus, there's this quote, which I think is just lovely:

"There is a part of childhood that is childish, and a part that is sacred. Suddenly we are touching the sacred part—running to the shoreline, feeling the first cold burst of water on our ankles, reaching into the tide to catch at shells before they ebb away from our fingers. We have returned to a world that is capable of glistening."

(I believe you'll see that on a scrapbook layout soon.)

Right after I finished Sweet Tooth, I picked up the book I'd been dying to read all along, Ruth Ozeki's A Tale for the Time Being. My connection to Ozeki's work is sweet but tenuous, possibly because she's only written three novels, and it's been an entire decade since the last one, All Over Creation. I read that book during the summer before I started teaching; I read it, actually, during the brief three weeks when I was avoiding applying to and interviewing for the teaching job I most desperately did not want to land. I didn't want to go back to work; I wanted to stay home and have another baby, and during those three weeks I talked myself into believing that I actually could get what I wanted.

I didn't, as you know, because whatever my desperate desires were, reality interfered.

But those sweet three weeks of thinking I could have what I wanted? Infused with Ozeki's writing. She does this thing that is so powerful to me: she takes hard subjects, and she doesn't dilute them of their hardness, or meanness, or strangeness. But she also, somehow, makes them bearable; she makes the story around them a gentle one. (Except, by "gentle" I don't really mean "appropriate for older ladies.") It was one of those experiences, engineered by whatever deity is in charge of reading, when a book and the time I read it were perfectly matched.

And while my heart isn't in quite so much turmoil now as it was during the summer a decade ago, I've still been feeling a little battered and bruised. So that hard stuff + gentleness thing she does so well was, again, something I needed. A Tale for the Time Being tells four different stories: two whole (ish) ones and two in parts. The first is Ruth's, a writer living on a small island in Canada, who is struggling with writer's block. On a walk on the beach one day, she finds a Hello Kitty lunch box that's washed ashore; inside of it, carefully wrapped, are a stack of letters written in French, an old watch, and a journal.

The journal is the second story: it belongs to Nao Yasutani.  Nao lives in Tokyo with her parents, but she was born in California; the dotcom bubble cost her dad his programming job and then his work visa, so they had to travel back to Japan. Nao doesn't fit in Tokyo; she looks Japanese but acts American, and this contradiction brings her intense bullying at school. Add to her troubles the fact that her dad can't find work and keeps trying to commit suicide; she's fairly unhappy. She decides that if her dad wants to kill himself, then so does she—but first she wants to tell the story of her great grandmother, Jiko, who is a 104-year-old Buddhist nun.

Jiko's story is the first partial one; in trying to write about her great grandmother, Jiko must write about herself instead. She ends up going to stay with Jiko at her temple for the summer, where she is guided by her great-grandmother to discover her own superpower in order to overcome the bullying at school. She also learns a little bit about Jiko's history, but nothing that develops the little bit she already knows (her great-grandmother was a famous revolutionary for peace, and wrote a Japanese I-novel). Mostly she learns about her great uncle, Haruki, who was a suicide bomber during World War II.

Haruki's story is the second fragment, told in both the letters he wrote home to his mother and the secret journal he kept (in French) during his days preparing for war. Haruki was a gentle man, a philosopher rather than a soldier, but he didn't have many choices; he couldn't choose not to become a suicide bomber. In a sense, his story is about finding a way to make peace with the things you cannot change—and more about how that process changes your perspective and your ability to cope with the unchangeable things.

My favorite university professor used to say that all contemporary literature is eventually about one thing: writing. A Tale for the Time Being is a story about writing: Nao's, and how it plays a part in saving her, Ruth's, and how she cannot find her fictional stream anymore; Haruki's, and how it helped him figure out the best of the limited choices he had to make. It is also about reading, about how we create story from marks on a page, the way we immerse ourselves in someone else's world and then go along with what happens—the way we, as readers, create the novel as much as the writer did.

This is my favorite book I've read so far this year. I loved the layers of story, the structure, and the language. Ruth, Jiko, Nao, Haruki. I loved that I learned a little bit of Buddhist thought and practice, especially as Zen is a state I strive for (even though my version of "zen" is fairly inaccurate). I read about the Rape of Nanking and learned about the Typhoon of Steel, the Japanese I-novel, the Turtle Gyre and great garbage patches. I wept over Japanese burial customs, which involve the family sifting through the bones that are left after cremation and arranging them in the urn starting with the feet bones and working upward to the skull and, finally, the hyoid on top. I think this is beautiful: an act of service for the deceased loved one. (I might even be a little bit obsessed with this idea now, as I am terribly afraid of caskets and cement crypts and being stuck alone in the dark.) I loved the way it wrapped up, not exactly neatly, but with a discussion of quantum physics, Schrodinger's Cat, a dream sequence that might have influenced a fifty-year-old story. You never find out why Nao wrapped those things in layers of waxed paper and ziplock bags and then put it in a lunch box and tossed it all in the ocean. Not everything is answered, and some people know answers that other people wish they had.

In the end, ultimately (and strangely enough), it is a book that looks at a similar question as Sweet Tooth: how do reading and writing, how does story, influence the lives we are living, except in Ozeki's book I didn't feel manipulated or like I was being dragged through a writerly exercise. Instead I felt like I was inside a readerly experience, and I came out of it agitated, wiser, calmed, and happier despite the crying. Which is all (and everything) I can ask for a book anyway.

My favorite thing about this past week? The rain. We usually get summer thunderstorms, but not until later in the season, so four days with rain (and cooler temps!) have been such a nice change. Is there anything better than waking up at 3:47 a.m. to the sound of rain on your roof?

Some other highlights of June 30-July 6:

On Monday, Kaleb and I went to Target together. Which is hardly noteworthy, except it's rare these days we do things with just him and me. He picked out snacks for his cub scout day camp the next day and looked at toys for awhile (he loves wandering the Lego aisle!). When we got home, I took Nathan and his friends to the top of the PRT so they could long board down the canyon, then I drove to the bottom of the trail and went for a walk while I waited for them. Walking? Not as physically taxing as running. Sigh.

On Tuesday morning, I started making a lemon cake before work. But I ran out of time to frost it...holy cow. Kids (and one grown up!) were soooo anxious for me to get home and frost that cake!

We started the Independence Day celebrations a little bit early by going out to lunch on Wednesday (Burgers Supreme for you locals!) and then went to the colonial fair. The kids were relectant to go, and one teenager especially made it known that it was not fun. But it was still fun! I love historical stuff. Replicas of the Mayflower...a broom-making shop...antique baskets....even the guns are interesting. One tent had a few sets of period-authentic armor which Nathan and Kaleb both got to try on.

On the fourth, we went to my sister Suzette's house to swim and eat. I didn't swim much, but it was so nice to hang out and talk to my sisters and mom! Then back to our house for fireworks with the neighbors.

On Thursday we went to Kendell's sister's house to watch her daughter Hilary open her mission call. She's going to Mexico!

Friday was the wedding of one of my friend's daughters. Kendell, Jake, Nathan, and I, along with some other neighborhood boys, spent the afternoon setting up the tables and chairs at the park they'd reserved for the wedding. When we went back a few hours later for the party, it was pouring rain on the other side of the lake...and it took about thirty minutes to make it across to our side. Just as the bride & groom arrived it started to rain. So everyone gathered up the decorations and we moved it all to a church. I was impressed with how well both families handled this—no anger or recriminations or weeping or gnashing of teeth! I also remembered...as happy as I am for the bride, I still don't love weddings. It's not that I'm anti-wedding.It's always fun to see the bride and eat some cake and celebrate. But they stir up all sorts of difficult stuff in me. And the older I get, the less I enjoy them (which is a problem because there are more and more weddings as I get older), because I am starting to really realize what it must feel like for the mom of the bride or groom. Weddings are a beginning but they also signal the end of something. I might've cried more than was allowed for a friend of the bride's mom...

Saturday's big news was that Kaleb was invited to go to Seattle with his cousin Jace. Since I was working, Kendell mostly got him ready. Well...Kendell took him to get some new shoes, which he desperately needed, and ended up coming home with some for Jake and Nathan, too. (They all got Vans.) I got him packed (luckily I'd been doing laundry for most of the week so there wasn't a last-minute scramble for clean clothes!) and we took him to Target for some water shoes. I confess: I'm super nervous about sending my littlest away without me. I miss him already!

How do you feel about weddings?

Somehow (Ragnar exhaustion and then the reading-all-Sunday-afternoon thing) I missed doing my weekly round up for two weeks. And here it is, half way into the third week, but I’m just going to play catch up and then move forward. Here’s a recap of June 16-28, 2013:

Nathan spent a week at scout camp. He loves hanging out with friends so this was a long, perfect week for him! He got five merit badges: wilderness survival, rifle shooting, chess, emergency preparedness, and soil & water conservation. The also learned about whittling a little bit. Last Thursday he started a whittling project (after sharpening a knife that his grandpa Kent had given him and he’d forgotten about and then found in his sock drawer that morning) which was quickly derailed by the knife slipping. He cut two fingers, one of them deep enough that it needed stitches. The pediatrician (it was one of the rare times we needed stitches during the time we could make a regular appointment) glued it instead of stitching it—which I will NEVER do again. It looks awful.

After much waiting and many phone calls, Haley finally got her pharmacy technician certification. Which means now she can apply for a pharm tech job or two. She needs to save more money for college so we’re desperately hoping she finds something! She also had a job interview at Zurcher’s, a party-supply store here. I don’t think she got the job, but it was still encouraging that she at least got a call back! I think the thing that’s holding her back from landing a job is that she only needs it for the summer. Wanting to work but not being able to find a job: frustrating! (I know that plenty of people are feeling the same frustration.)

Jake worked two extra shifts. I’m so glad he has his job! He is much happier, even though all his money is going into the bank. We went to eat at the restaurant where he works with my sister-in-law and her family, and the owner came over and told us that Jake is one of his best workers. Ahhh, moms love to hear stuff like that!

Kaleb lost a tooth, one of his top little incisors. I’ll be SO glad when the permanent ones push through, just so I can finally see if they are dwarf ones or not. Haley’s are dwarf, which means they’re really, really small, so we had to have them capped. I’m hoping that Kaleb’s come out the normal size, but even if they are dwarf, at least I can stop worrying about it. (And saving to get them capped!) This is his first tooth that he wiggled out all on his own! I put the money together (I fold a dollar bill around the coins into a little packet) but Nathan slid the money under his pillow.

Last Saturday, Kendell and I drove up to Salt Lake. I need some new shorts desperately, but alas: my combination of freakishly large thighs, regular-sized waist, and the need for long shorts means that it’s just about impossible to find anything that works. Shorts=one of the reasons summer is not my favorite season. I did hit up the Dillard’s sale (love a good extra percentage off sale at Dillards!) and at least found some short-sleeve shirts I liked, as I seem to have gotten rid of everything I wore last summer. After the mall, we ate at a little dive of a taqueria in Salt Lake called Lone Star. Oh, my. I had a tamale and it was delicious! We also hit up the new outlet mall. It was nice to spend some time together.

Our old friend Paul, who used to live here and then moved to North Carolina, came back to Utah for some work training. It was so nice to see him again!

And...so far we are all surviving the triple-digit heat. But only barely. Because, you know...I'm still wearing pants. How are things at your house?

Back when I was young and imagined being married, one of my favorite fantasies involved lying in bed with my future husband—reading. Sharing bits of our books, or just flipping pages in companionable silence. 

Date nights at the book store.

Trips to the library.

But, alas, I married a man who is many good things—"reader" not among them. While I read, he does other stuff. And it highly annoys him when I lie in bed, reading, when he's trying to sleep. So that fantasy of married life was soon shattered and I left it behind as one of my unreachable moments. A fantasy indeed.

Except, this past Sunday afternoon. Where, if you'd've showed up in my bedroom, you would've found me reading on my side—and Kendell reading on his. Someone at work had challenged him to read Killing Floor, the first book in the Jack Reacher series. And he took her up on it. And: he is enjoying it.

It was seriously one of the most blissful afternoons of my married life. We ate chocolate-coconut almonds and read our books.

Thank goodness the book I was reading was one I loved. You know: to make the moment even more perfect. So I'm afraid I can't be objective about Neil Gaiman's The Ocean at the End of the Lane, because the memory of reading it (short enough to read in a blissful afternoon with your spouse if you so desire) will always be associated with that particular happiness.

But let's be honest: I probably wouldn't be objective about a new Neil Gaiman novel anyway. I know not everyone loves him, but the fact that he is best friends with one of my favorite musicians (Tori Amos) and he writes with a style that is perfectly attuned to my reading tastes—not to neglect the way he uses myth in new ways to tell a story—I just, gah. I like him a lot.

The Ocean at the End of the Lane tells the story of an unnamed narrator who returns to his small hometown in Surrey, England, for a funeral. (One of his parent's, I assume, but it is never said.) In the hour he has between the funeral and a family gathering, he feels pulled to drive toward the street where he used to live—even though his childhood home isn't there anymore—all the way down to where the lane ends at the Hempstock farm. He has a vague memory of once being friends with the girl who lived there, until he finds the pond and, slowly, like a story, remembers what happened there during the spring he was seven. The lodger living at his house commits suicide on the Hempstock's farm, setting of a series of dreams and discoveries that seem beneficial but are anything but benign. His death there woke an ancient malevolent being (she reminded me a little bit of the Sleer in The Graveyard Book, a sort of malice that is hard to name because you don't find it in any of the usual stories) who manages to hitch a ride back to the narrator's home, via a hole in his foot.

The part where the boy tries to remove the seemingly-enormous pink and grey worm in his foot? I was captivated, in that I-am-thoroughly-disturbed way.

This is a story of friendship, courage, fear, and sacrifice. It is about the terror of children. It's about knowing who you are; "Nobody actually looks like what they really are on the inside," Lettie explains, which is why the being can look like so many different things. Reality, too, is called into question "the reality I knew," the narrator learns, "was a thin layer of icing on a great dark birthday cake writhing with grubs and nightmares and hunger. . .there were patterns and gates and paths beyond the real." (I have felt that knowledge, too, but not in those words.) It is also a story about memory and how experiences we've forgotten continue to influence us anyway. I'm being vague on the details because honestly: this is a short book, and its magic is seeing the story as the narrator remembers it; it is the remembering that fascinated me the most. When he first arrives at the farmhouse, he realizes he's forgotten it even existed, and as he moves across the yard toward the duck pond, he remembers, as he walks, which way to go. And when he remembers that Lettie Hempstock called it her ocean, he then remembers everything.

When I was in second grade—when I was seven—I went to a slumber party for my schoolmate Lori's eighth birthday. Here is what I remember about the party: walking up the stairs of her split-level house. Eating pizza and ice cream. Going downstairs to roll out our sleeping bags, and that was when someone decided to tell scary stories. I don't remember the stories at all; I have a tiny memory of doing that scary-story thing where you stare in the mirror with the lights off and say something (bloody Mary?) and then you're supposed to see something other than your reflection in the mirror. And that is the end of my memory of Lori's eighth birthday party.

Except for the terror part. Even just writing about it, thirty-something years later, my belly gets hot and my heart quivers and my neck breaks out in red blotches. Whatever happened that night, I've forgotten. I do remember the next day, and the day after that, and the next month or so, when I refused to go to school because I had a stomach ache. I never, ever told my mom what was really wrong. Maybe because I couldn't say it, even then. Because I was forgetting.

It's strange. I was only seven. I was innocent and naive and I believed in fairy tales. I lived in my imagination more than the real world, which is perhaps why the stories and whatever else happened that night changed me. But they did. They let darkness in, and when I found darkness again, later, I recognized it even though I didn't remember it, and it was easier to let in more.

When I read the narrator standing by Lettie Hempstock's pond, remembering, I wished for my own pond—my own key. I wish (part of me does) that I knew what happened that night. Even if, like the narrator, when I left the pond I forgot again. Maybe that would be even better. Away from the pond and the childhood trauma, the narrator is an artist, and one would imagine that this forgotten story is the thing that feeds the creativity. Maybe knowing about my own little dark trauma would change my relationship to it too drastically; would change me. 

At any rate, even though it is a short book (my only complaint, really, is that it is not long enough), it is a story I will remember and continue to think about, especially as it entwines with the way I read it: the lovely, light-filled summer Sunday afternoon I spent reading with my husband.