in transit

I haven't been able to write here in a while because I've been a) packing, b) cleaning, c) moving my stuff 500-some miles, d) searching for a new place etc., etc.

But, I did want to announce that I have officially registered for my first semester in grad school. I'll be taking:

Managing Collections & Access
Course Description: Selection of materials for libraries and information agencies, policies for collection management, freedom and diversity of information, access to information and evaluation of collections and access.

Special Libraries
Course Description: Goals of special librarianship including information provision, management styles. Library functions as performed in special libraries. Contributions of special libraries, such as information analysis centers, information brokering, and accountability for and evaluation of services.

I'm so excited and I nerdily can't wait for the book lists to be announced.

Now I just need to find an apartment so I can get settled and get started!

. . . the good life

In my previous blog, I declared at the beginning of this year that I intended to read at least two books a month and that each month would have a theme.
Well, the year is almost over and I can say that I have neither read two books a month nor has each month had a theme, BUT I have so far this year read 33 books. Which, as of this month is an average of three books, not two.

Anyway, the point of this is that I intend to do some mini-reviews about the books I've read this year on this blog at some point before 2008 ends and I begin a new goal (maybe the same goal) for 2009 but first, I want to talk about the last two books I read in November.

Feeling compelled to become more acquainted with the literary works of my home state and the state I'm moving back to in two weeks(!), I finally read "Willa Cather's "My Ántonia" and Ted Kooser's "Local Wonders: Seasons in the Bohemian Alps." Granted, the latter is not necessarily known as a staple for Nebraskan literature, but it was collecting dust on my bookshelf for three years so I figured it was time to give it a whirl.

Both of these books center on Bohemian Nebraskan pioneers and their ways of life. My ancestors were Northern German Nebraskan pioneers ... close enough, right?

Both carry with them descriptions of the idyllic landscapes that I've come to grow fond of and connected to more so in the last three years as I've driven back and forth on I-80 to get from one side of the state to the other. Interstate 80 is what most people consider boring, or, if you're a big city kid forced to drive through on a family vacation, "absolute hell.” I however, have found myself defending its beauty. (Especially compared to the Eastern plains of Colorado. Snoozefest.)

And both really bring forth what it is to live in Nebraska – where “home” means close family, strong communities and simple living.

Now, had I not actually lived in the state when I read these and were I not, because of that, a bit homesick for some of the folksy atmosphere (the good aspects of the folksiness, that is) that populates Nebraska, I might not have enjoyed these quite as much. If I'd never been to Nebraska or lived there, I know these books would not have been as meaningful to me as they were and I most likely never would have read them. In any case, just six pages in to "My Ántonia" I could tell Cather had it right when I read this:

"I do not remember crossing the Missouri River, or anything about the long day’s journey through Nebraska. Probably by that time I had crossed so many rivers that I was dull to them. The only thing very noticeable about Nebraska was that it was still, all day long, Nebraska."

Ántonia's story includes her moving to Denver for a while while she is in her 20s, but that quickly turns out to not work out for her and she moves back to Nebraska. That's probably where the similarities between us end, because I, fortunately, am not returning under the same conditions that she did. (SPOILER ALERT: She got knocked up!) But it was comforting, in a way, to know that a character from Nebraska in the early 1900s tried out Denver for a while only to return, as well.

“Local Wonders” is a series of essays by 2004-06 Poet Laureate Ted Kooser about life in the Bohemian Alps of southeastern Nebraska, which are located just a few miles away from Lincoln, where I went to college.

Kooser finds meaning and humor in the little things - hand sewn shirts lasting for 40 years, garage sales that evoke a sense of the theater and he even has a take on public libraries:

"A library is like an airport; if you wait long enough, everybody in the world will walk past. And in a library there are a lot of people who seem to be waiting for something like that to happen. The anticipation makes some of them very sleepy, and they nod off in their chairs, some of them peeing their pants."

Reading his essays, it's hard not to think of my grandparents. No, my grandparents do not pee their pants in libraries, but they do help me see more of the world around me and they help me see the beauty in a consistent, well-respected life.

The part that struck me hardest was the poem he wrote (that includes the title of the book) based on George Ault's painting "August Night at Russel's Corners."



"If you can awaken
inside the familiar
and discover it new
you need never
leave home.

Local wonders."



Here’s hoping that while I continue my journey into this wonderland, I'll be surrounded by many local wonders that will continue to make me see the beauty that these two authors found in my state.

***
As I was doing a bit of Googling for this, I stumbled upon this literary guide to Nebraska. Czech it out HERE if you'd like (Get it Czech ... Bohemian ... OK, sorry, I had to do it.)

***
P.S. Wish me luck, this month, I'm finally going to attempt to get through "Anna Karenina."