No fan of LBJ, but I gotta say…

Posted on May 10, 2012 by sheilawill

Some folks are really, really happy that President Obama emerged from his evolution closet today to support same-sex marriage. Fine by me. If gays and lesbians want to marry, it’s their business, not mine. For me it’s equality. My beloved 14th Amendment says that all Americans have “equal protection under the law.” Period.

I like to see happy people, like when the Celtics win in Boston. I believe that Barack Obama is a decent human being who cares about people, who’d like to see more Americans happy, or at least get a paycheck, have health care and be able to go to a movie once in a while. I believe that most Americans care about others.

When CEOs of major corporations have their income going up up up, while so many average Americans don’t even have jobs, something is rotten in Denmark. 

On my way to work the other day, I was listening to the Diane Rehm show on NPR. Her guests were talking about our “permanent political campaign.” No kidding!

Remember when Republicans began taunting Obama immediately after the 2008 election, insisting they would do anything to make him a one-term president? But that’s another story.

On Tuesday the Gallup Poll reported survey results of Independents on same-sex marriage: 57 percent approved; 40 percent didn’t. I hope that Michelle Obama, the president’s heartfelt sense of fairness, and his constitutional lawyer’s reasoning contributed to his decision. But c’mon, do you think the poll hastened the outcome?

I’ve been a political junkie since I was 6 years old. Public opinion matters. I’m not a fan of LBJ. But former president Bill Clinton’s NYT Book Review piece on “The Passage of Power: The Years of Lyndon Johnson” by  Robert A. Caro grabbed me.

Southern Democrats were staunch obstructionists, kinda like Republicans in Congress today. LBJ was advised “against using the political capital he’d inherited as a result of the [horrible JFK] assassination on such a hopeless cause” as civil rights, writes Wild Bill.

“According to Caro, Johnson responded, ‘Well, what the hell’s the presidency for?'”

For Johnson, toward the end of awful 1963, the presidency was for two things: “Passing a civil rights bill with teeth…and launching the War on Poverty.”

President Obama, it’s past time to push the power of the presidency, to do what you know is right. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but listen to LBJ.

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Strange to have two homes

Posted on May 6, 2012 by sheilawill

I’m not talking about being in the wrong economic class to have a summer home in Maine. I couldn’t make myself sign the papers to sell my house during the real estate boom, then I imagined never selling because of the capital gains tax (geez, like a 1 percenter).

What’s strange is that whoosh of time passing even though nothing looks very different when I return to Southwest Harbor every July. Has it become common for regular 99 percenters to live in two places?

I’ve already missed the lilacs bursting into purple in my Southwest Harbor backyard. Some springs are cold and rainy. The lupines arrive late and I get to see fields covered with  the great-grandparents of the much smaller Texas bluebonnets that bloom in Tucson.

I still have many friends there. After about five minutes of getting together it feels like I’ve never left. I’ve missed the ocean more this year, not that I want to hear the howling winter wind. Nope.

A month or two before returning to Southwest Harbor, I feel both physically and psychologically closer to the island I lived on for 24 years — through ice and snow, children being born and going off to college, teaching and divorce, opening and closing Oz Books, going from gray hair to dark brown (and returning again), and from one season of lilacs to the next.

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Crash, smash, get going again

Posted on May 5, 2012 by sheilawill

Wednesday morning around 9:15 a.m.: Hmm…another iced coffee with soy milk? But then I would have to drive up Dodge, wait at that long light crossing River on my way to work. Alvernon is faster. Weekday mundane thoughts as I approached Country Club, stopped and was ready to turn left.

A motorcycle heading north. An older man wearing a wide-brimmed straw hat, no helmet. He tries to cut across the busy street from the sidewalk. The motorcyclist focuses on the road ahead, going fast.

Crash, smash! In slow motion I notice the bicyclist rising off his seat. Both men are lying in the street. I’m the first one there. I can’t believe I’m seeing what I’m seeing. “Oh my god,” I repeat, opening the car door. I’m not sure what happened next. Two men appeared in the street and had stopped traffic.

“I’ll call 911!” I yell to no one in particular. I’m afraid the bicyclist is dead. He isn’t moving. The other guy hollers, “my knee hurts.” Meanwhile, I’m fiddling with my new iPhone. Can’t find the keyboard. This time I yell, “who called 911?”

“You did,” one of the men, who’s obviously more with it than I am, responds. The bicyclist sits up; he has blood streaming down the side of his head. In spite of the momentary delay reaching 911, the police arrived very quickly.

We took the free bike safety classes sponsored by Pima County this week. I learned a lot, including how to change a tire, why it’s important to ride 4-5 feet from the curb, I shouldn’t bike on the right side of the University of Arizona mall, and  the mango tango eegee’s is really good.

Now I feel more confident about bicycling. When I was around 10 I fell off my bike, was knocked unconscious (wrote a blog post about it on May 7 last year!). 

I  recently bought a new bike, a more elegant one. No more purple and white streamers flying. Maybe I don’t need them anymore.

I’ll still avoid big streets. If I have to cross any, I’ll do a box turn instead of crossing three lanes of traffic. Too scary for me. When I first came to Tucson 10 years ago I couldn’t imagine riding a bike. But here I am.

Our teacher Jim told me today to practice riding like a slalom skier so I could experience the leaning necessary for some cycling maneuvers. How very Zen. Being one with my bike. Some of the fear I’ve carried with me all these years feels released.

 

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Celebrations: The Precious, the Pretty and the Purple

Posted on April 30, 2012 by sheilawill

I’ve collected the entire set. Last year I got my Part A Medicare card but that wasn’t enough of a birthday present so I bought myself a Macbook Air — The Precious. Last month, hearing that I had won a Rockower Award from the American Jewish Press Association, I got a new bike. A Fuji pretty one, same elegant flat gray color as my laptop.

And yesterday — ta da ta da — drumroll please, was iPhone day. We went to the Verizon store to buy a new battery for my dumb phone. Really, that’s all I had in mind. But $40 for a battery? For just another $160 I could have a whole new phone (not to mention a monthly $30 charge for the data plan).

Then I saw the perfect purple cover for said phone. I was hooked. For those of you who remember my techno-peasant stage, I’ve already spoken to Siri. She sent my first email announcing my purchase to Brook and Ethan.

Let’s backtrack a minute: “I don’t need a smartphone. I would be addicted to checking my email every second”; that’s what I’ve been saying. But I sorta knew when I walked into the store that I was in denial.

So I downloaded the app and played Whirly Words a few times last night. Nothing addictive. I’m okay. Years ago, I attended a booksellers’ convention in Las Vegas. All my colleagues were gambling like crazy, maybe even forgetting to attend authors’ panels.

Me, I dropped one quarter in the slot machine and won nada. That’s it, I figured. No winning no gambling. I don’t have time for this stuff.

Makes me think that I know the way. Also makes me wonder, what else have I been in denial about?

 

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Ice cream and revolution

Posted on April 21, 2012 by sheilawill

Swirly chocolate & vanilla, rocky road, bourbon crunch homemade at the Hub, even weird flavors like licorice conjured up at the aggie school when I was in college. An ice cream cone can change the world.

How many families got off their tushes this morning, hopped on their bikes for Tucson’s Ride to the Zoo day? Not only do you get free admission to the zoo; you get a free ice cream cone! Smooth, creamy, swirly chocolate and vanilla on a 95-degree day, watching little kids holding their precious cones in one hand and mom or dad’s hand, strolling by the lion family on their way to the silly screeching monkeys. What could be better than sparking memories of a happy childhood 30 years from now?

(Ok, my friend Penny points out that she’s one of the few “Adult Children of  Normal Parents” at parties.)

Adults who’ve stored reasonably happy childhoods in their psyches generally don’t beat up people, experience road rage or are mean to their own kids, which I’ll bet studies would prove. I wonder how many content adults belong to the NRA or feel an intense need to protect themselves?

Then there’s Ben Cohen, now in his 60s, one of the founders of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream. He’s riding around the country in a van called “The Illuminator,” having left his home in Burlington, Vermont, on Oct. 12. His destination — with a freezer full of ice cream — was New York’s Zuccotti Park, home of the Occupy Wall St. movement.

Now that Ben & Jerry’s is owned by a corporation, some protesters boycotted the van. “I understand [their] point of view,” said Cohen. “All I can say is: the line for ice cream did not get any shorter.”

Ben & Jerry’s released a new flavor called “Yes Pecan!” to celebrate President Obama’s inauguration. Cohen has had an idea for another new flavor, “Choccupy, and it would be all vanilla with one big chunk of chocolate on top. You could just eat the chocolate and pretend you’re part of the one percent,” he said, “or you could break it up and mix it with the rest of the 99 percent, and make chocolate chip.”

My advice to politicians: forget making meaningless speeches, the ludicrous notions of privatizing Social Security or rolling back women’s rights. Bring ice cream to the people! Not only will you get their vote; you’ll make them happy.

 

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A life of words

Posted on April 16, 2012 by sheilawill

Sometimes I forget that I owned a bookstore. People came into Oz Books because they trusted our reading suggestions, our “homey knowledge,” as the Oz bookmark said. There was the parent who followed me around the store wanting to know if it was okay for his kid to read so much fantasy (booksellers are often seen as therapists).

“I’d like him to read more nonfiction. Don’t you think he should read books that he’ll learn something from?”

“Imagination is more important than knowledge,” I replied, quoting Albert Einstein, assuring the dad that innovators, scientists and entrepreneurs often read fantasy and science fiction as kids.

What did I read when I was young? The now boring “Happy Hollisters” series, that’s what I remember. I regret not tracking all the books I’ve read during my reading life, a gazillion words.

In today’s New York Times Book Review there’s a piece, “My Life With Bob” (Book of Books) by one of the editors  who’s noted all the books she’s read since 1988. Wow.

A friend recently told me that my reading history, at least since I’ve been in Tucson, would be on the Pima Tucson Public Library’s website. I dashed to my computer but nope, no reading history. Damn. I hadn’t hit the request button that the library required. Ten years of book titles lost.

Knowing what books I’ve read, beyond looking at what’s in our bookcases, might have revealed  something I didn’t know about myself. Wouldn’t it be fun to line up, at least virtually, hundreds, thousands of books in order of when I read them, a kind of self-therapy project? Tonight I turned on the library’s accounting of my reading history.

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Anonymous benefactor continued: OZ Literacy Fund

Posted on April 13, 2012 by sheilawill

Oz Books closed on March 17, 1997. My still unknown anonymous benefactor decided to set up a nonprofit for me to run so I could continue providing literacy programs on Mount Desert Island, Maine.

I found out my “guardian angel” was around 70 at the time, a quiet woman who visited the bookstore every summer. She wanted to help me make the transition from being “the Oz lady” to regular life. She paid me a larger salary for three years than I ever made running Oz. What a joy it must have been for her to be a mystery-woman philanthropist.

The Oz Literacy Fund was born. No more bookstore but other treats were in store for the MDI community — and me.

The Oz Literacy Fund was administered through Harbor House Recreation Center in Southwest Harbor. After “The Soul of a Business: Managing for Profit and the Public Good” by Tom Chappell of Tom’s of Maine came out, we sponsored a business breakfast/talk that drew more than 200 people.

The fund brought children’s authors like Vera B. Williams (“Chair for my Mother”), Ashley Bryan (“Beautiful Blackbird” and many more), Margy Burns Knight and Anne Sibley O’Brien (“Talking Walls”) and then Maine Poet Laureate Baron Wormser to schools around the island.

It was a joy for me to continue bringing such talent to our local schools. I returned to my first career, teaching social studies, at MDI High School. I’ll never forget when Baron visited my Honors U.S. History class. I had given my students the somewhat nebulous assignment of writing a history poem. Baron and I were blown away by the passion and creativity in the room that day. So were the kids.

Their enthusiasm was partly due to knowing Baron would really listen, that he believed in the power of poetry to make history come alive. And it was a different kind of assignment; I think they appreciated that. I was never a teacher for answering the questions at the end of the chapter; guess I wasn’t even one for reading the quotidian chapter (always wanted to use that word!).

Back to my second career. Oh the places I went (Thank you, Dr. Seuss) during the years of Oz Books. I’ll never forget the summer of 1990, when Judy Blume came to town. I wasn’t a fan of her books, but was gracious when I spotted her in the store trying to remain incognito, wearing a kerchief over her head and big sunglasses.

I invited her to lunch. We debated the worth of “Blubber,” one of her books that turned me off. She made some valid points. We became friends that summer.

Wait, here’s her inscription in my copy of “Fudge-A-Mania”:

“To the best “Sheila” in Southwest Harbor! (even though I had to rename you “Dorothy” for this book). Thanks for your friendship, which made a cold summer warmer.”

I haven’t seen Judy and her husband, George, in years. They never returned to Southwest Harbor — because, uh, it was too cold — but I visited them in New York City. I learned that she too was a caring philanthropist.

Wish I knew who my benefactor was.

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No more crapola

Posted on April 8, 2012 by sheilawill

Last year’s birthday present to myself was a MacBook Air. I had lusted after one since they first came out — the sleekness, the silverness, the speed. Dan only had to watch me with my new toy for a day or two before dubbing it “The Precious.”

It was expensive. Dan and his son — both avid Apple aficionados — couldn’t fathom why I didn’t get a PowerBook, which can do a whole lot more. I didn’t care. Brook loved her MacBook Air, and like her, I wanted something portable with a keyboard for writing. Besides, “The Precious” is a work of art. 

This year it’s “The Pretty.” Last week, after discovering I had won a Rockower Award — clever Dan dubbed it “The Jewlitzer” — from the American Jewish Press Association (Jan. 8, 2011 Gabrielle Giffords shooting), I bought a new bike. 

The Fuji Absolute 2.0 was also expensive. It’s smooth, it’s fast, it’s quiet.

I start collecting Social Security this month, but who knows when I’ll be able to retire. “The Pretty” matches my MacBook Air in color, a muted silver, with lovely lines that somehow remind me of the archway to the tiny purple-carpeted reading nook at Oz Books.

Ah, the sheer beauty of purple and/or silver.

The discarding of crapola started with the purchase of a new windbreaker at REI a few years ago. I didn’t have that essential article of clothing for heading to Mt. Lemmon on a windy day. Dan encouraged me to buy a decent one, not look in Savers or another local thrift store. I’m grateful to him.

It’s time to get rid of the crapola. I want to bicycle more, keep up with Dan better when we do ride together,  and not be burdened by an old clunker bike that has a mind of its own.

“Holy shit,” I often blurted out as the clunker decided to shift gears moments after I did.

No more crapola means knowing when I can afford what I really want and not settling for less. So let some University of Arizona coed thrill to the clunker’s purple and white streamers flying in the breeze. I’m moving on.

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Hip brasserie vs. pollo feliz (happy chicken)?

Posted on April 6, 2012 by sheilawill

Wednesdays are half-price days at Pollo Feliz, the home of Mexican grilled chicken here in Tucson. A big white truck with a  trailer full of prickly pear pods, rakes strewn everywhere, pulled in front of me while I waited to turn left on Broadway Blvd. But that was it. No long lines waiting to approach the take-out window for the bargain of the century.

I had picked up a new Tucson Weekly to read just in case. I took it from the passenger seat, discovering that “A Dangerous Method” will be at the cheap movies starting tomorrow.

That’s all I had time for waiting for dinner, which would be accompanied by a big salad, serving five back at home. Our friend Karen brought a yummy bottle of red wine that tasted like flowers and cost more than the entire already cooked dinner.

Yes, I’m a proud commercial for Pollo Feliz. 

My culinary tastes extend to newly opened Tucson restaurants (I like to be in the know). Tuesday night was young women’s happy hour — the youngest among us just turned 32 and is pregnant with her first baby. Guess who’s the oldest? 

The just opened Augustin Brasserie advertised P.E.I. mussels. I figure they would have those slightly crispy Parisian pommes frites, like I had with my kids at a Belgian mussel restaurant in NYC. Alas, the Tucson attempt at a brasserie was off the mark. The place was all woody and airy and smart looking, but the menu was sparse.

Mussels tasted fresh. Our server said they’re flown in almost daily from one of Canada’s two island provinces (quick, who can name the other? You win the fur-lined earmuffs, as my father always said). 

The broth was pretty amateurish, not enough butter, missing garlic and fresh herbs. The fries were tasty but the portion was small, and as Erica pointed out they’re not as good as at Bob Dobbs, our neighborhood bar/burger joint. 

I wish the brasserie well. Let them get their act together. The young women’s happy hour celebrants will return when they have an actual happy hour. Oh, did I tell you that the cheapest glass of red wine was $9?

Epiphany: It’s worth buying a flowery bottle of wine for twice the cost of one glass, and showering your friends with goodies from Pollo Feliz.

 

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Going forward, remembering my anonymous benefactor

Posted on April 2, 2012 by sheilawill

It’s been a while. I’m starting a big writing project, no, continuing a project I’ve been working on my whole life.

Here’s my request: if I tell snippets of a story will you let me know what questions you have, what confuses you or what you’d like to know more about? A little online workshopping since I’m not about to apply for an MFA program.

Here goes: When I opened Oz Books in 1982 my dream was to have a real business, one that provided an ongoing income. My bigger dream was to make a difference, bring great books to kids, share a love of reading in my community. That happened.

Anybody ever seen the old TV show “The Millionaire?” The anonymous benefactor’s bearer of good news (his name was something like James Jay Fertipton) comes to the door of some poor shlump’s home, hands her  check for $1 million.

Nobody gave me $1 million, but I didn’t need that.

It was 1997. I saw the writing on the wall. With a new Borders Books an hour away, money-grubber landlords who had me paying the brunt of all the tenant’s rent, and my being an orderholic who didn’t have the heart to reduce employee hours, I had no choice but to close Oz after 15 years.

It was heartbreaking. I had already returned to teaching part-time at Mt. Desert Island High School. I don’t remember what the season was. Was the sun shining, ice bearing down on tree branches? Was I talking about the Supreme Court or were my U.S. history students working on their Bill of Rights Amendment projects, hovering over each other in small groups?

The intercom phone buzzed loudly. Picking it up, I figured one of my students needed to go to the office.

“Sheila, you have a phone call,” the office assistant said. “Oh, please get a number and I’ll call back,” replied, thinking it was a credit card company telling me my payment was overdue.”

“You better take this. It’s from the Fiduciary Trust Company in Boston.”

“Uh, oh. This is really bad,” I told her.

I was so wrong. On the phone was the trustee of my anonymous benefactor, a summertime philanthropist who loved my bookstore, appreciated all I had done for reading, for kids, he said. There had been a recent story in the Bar Harbor Times about Oz closing. She had read it. This quiet woman, a real-life philanthropist in her 70s, wanted to help.

I walked back down the hall to my classroom in a daze. The Cox twins, Rachel and Kate, were heading toward me. I think Ethan was with them. “Someone wants to save OZ,” I blurted, letting it sink in. We put our arms around each other, started jumping up and down, not being at all quiet in the hallway but who cared. “She wants to save Oz! She wants to save Oz! Woo hoo,” we hollered.

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