God’s Money, The PMG and Honest Abe

Yesterday, the four new stamps chronicling Abraham Lincoln’s life were dedicated at the Old State Capital Building in Springfield, Illinois.  My boss asked me to assist with the postal operations that were planned for the day.  This consisted of selling the new stamp, commemorative first-day covers and various Abraham Lincoln memorabilia including tote bags, mouse pads and note cards.  I also did a brief stint in the philatelic room applying the special cancellation to various items brought in by philatelists.

It was a very busy day.  There is definitely not a recession when it comes to Abraham Lincoln memorabilia!  One man spent over $700 – he got 10 of everything! 

For the most part the customers were friendly and fun to talk to during lulls.  But every large group of people has a few strange ducks.  Most memorably was the woman who wanted the special cancellation on some envelopes she bought from the Historical Society.  She kept insisting that I make the ink darker.  I did as she instructed and ended up with a mess.  Then she made a huge scene and the postal service had to replace three of her envelopes and stamps.  Her husband was so mortified that he wandered away during all of the commotion.  She waited at least 30 minutes for the philatelic clerk to return from lunch, all the while complaining about my poor postmarking skills.  During this interaction she made me so upset I had to walk away from her in order to remain professional.  This is very unusual for me.  I can deal with any manner of customer, from the woman who had changed her address 33 times in six months and couldn’t figure out why she wasn’t getting her correspondence to the man who tried to pay for postage with soda can tabs. 

My mood brightened when I encountered a certain customer who wanted to purchase a sheet of the Abraham Lincoln stamps.  I told him they would be $8.40.  At that point he took a small notebook out of his breast pocket and consulted his scribblings.  He informed me that all he had left was “God’s money”.  He had spent all of his own money and couldn’t afford the stamps.  He wandered away.

After the ceremony, the Postmaster General approached all of the employees working in the retail area and thanked us for helping out.  He shook our hands and autographed our ceremony programs.  As a Postmaster, it meant a lot to me that the leader of my organization was so personable. 

On a side note, I had lunch at a great restaurant.  The Feed Store is just across the street from the Old State Capital Building.  Their menu offers a variety of soups, salads, sandwiches and desserts.  I had the cheese soup and a turkey sandwich (it came with sprouts – yum – sprouts are why I love Jimmy John’s so much!).  If you are ever doing the downtown Springfield touristy thing, The Feed Store is a great place to stop for lunch.

#8 – Marya: A Life by Joyce Carol Oates

I have long been a fan of Joyce Carol Oates and have read many of her works.  When reviewing Boxall’s suggestions of 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die I wasn’t surprised to see that four of Oates’ books made the list.  I was surprised that I have read none of the four.  When making a list of books to check out from the library, I was sure to add Oates’ works to the list.

Marya: A Life was available when I last visited the library.  Written in 1986, this is the tale of Marya Knauer’s life from early childhood to her mid-thirties.  It follows as she grows from an abandoned child to an accomplished adult. 

Although I enjoyed this book, it is not, in my opinion, one of Oates’ best works.  Certainly she has grown as a writer since 1986.  Marya: A Life holds a glimpse of the wonderful author Oates will evolve into.  It is worth reading, but if you haven’t read Oates before pick up We Were The Mulvaneys or The Falls instead.

In Which Someone I Know Is Effected By The Economic Downturn – Me

My husband was permanently laid off on Friday.  Although it is not the end of the world, it is unpleasant.  Hopefully the expansion of this economic cycle will start soon and the recession will be over.

We are trying to look at this in a positive manner.  Craig wasn’t altogether pleased with his job, so this is an opportunity for him to get a job that he really likes.  He also has often thought about becoming an ebayer, so while he is looking for a job it is a good time for him to explore this avenue.  Also, we will probably move in the next year or so, so we will be able to get some minor home repairs done – things we already purchased the supplies for but have never gotten around for doing.

This situation makes me think of the things that I am grateful for:

• I have a very good job due to years of hard work.  Although it will not be fun, we can live on my salary without having to make any major lifestyle changes. 
• My husband is hardworking and has a lot of experience in his field.  He has made a lot of contacts and should be able to put them to use to find a new job. 
• Unemployment benefits make it possible for him to search for a job he likes and not have to take the first thing that is offered to him.  Illinois gives benefits for 33 weeks.  That is over 7 months.  The economic stimulus package is rumored to be adding an additional 33 weeks to unemployment benefits. 
• We do not live beyond our means.  We don’t have any credit card debts.  We only have our house payment and a small car payment.  I am very grateful that I don’t have to worry about losing my house. 

I will try not to drive my husband crazy.  I trust him and I know he will find a job.  He has already put his resume on several job sites and has sent it to many different companies. 

This too will pass.

#7 – Franny and Zooey by J.D. Salinger

I picked up Franny and Zooey by J.D. Salinger at the recommendation of my friend and fellow book club member, Ms. PH. 

An interrelated compilation of two stories from Salinger’s Glass series, Franny and Zooey is a short read. I had previously enjoyed reading Catcher in the Rye and Nine Stories, both works of Salinger. 

The much shorter Frannyrevolves around a weekend outing of the title character and her boyfriend.  Her behavior grows more erratic as the story unfolds.  She reveals that she has recently read a book called The Way of the Pilgrim and that it has inspired her to attempt to pray without ceasing as it is recommended in scripture.  Saying the “Jesus Prayer” constantly is a sure path to enlightenment.  At the end of the story she faints and returns to her family.  Zooeyis the story of Franny’s nervous breakdown and her family’s reaction to it.  At the urging of their mother, Zooey (Franny’s older brother) attempts to break through to Franny.  Much of the family’s background is revealed through their conversations, as well as some insight in to the purpose behind Franny’s actions.

One thing I noticed about Salinger’s writing in  Franny and Zooey is that the majority of the plot is revealed through conversation.  This is an unique technique and nothing is lost in the telling of the story.

I haven’t decided yet how I feel about this book.  I didn’t dislike it, but I didn’t love it.  Like some great literature, the value of this book may not have been in the reading but in the lesson it imparts.

Declare The Pennies On Your Eyes (Taxman)

Getting a tax refund is like giving the government an interest-free loan on your money.  That being said, I am always slightly disappointed not to get some money back. 

This year, we owe the federal government $267 and we will receive a $184 refund from the state of Illinois.  I have no problem paying up to $500 a year (then I am the one getting the interst-free loan from the government). 

Last year, we owed the shocking amount of $1730!  April 15, 2008 was an extremely sad day for me. 

My dad has additional money withheld from his paycheck so that my parents will get a large enough refund to pay their property taxes.  They own their house and their cars and have no bills.  I am dumbfounded as to why they use the IRS as a savings account.  Unlike an account at a bank or credit union, they have have absolutely no access to this money until they do their tax return the following year.  There is no interest paid on this money.  They could have gotten at least 1% from a money market account. 

If they get $3000 back this year, that is $250 a month too much that they paid the IRS.  Personally, I would rather have the additional income each month and save for my own property taxes (I am also anti-escrow accounts). 

For those of you who would rather have extra money in your pocket each paycheck than getting a lump sum in 2010, check the tax tables and change your deductions accordingly.

A thought from Warren Buffett…

“Only when the tide goes out do you discover who’s been swimming naked.”

#6 – The Reader by Bernhard Schlink

Ten years ago, The Readerby Bernhard Schlink was featured in Oprah’s book club.  This was the first of her selections that I was unable to finish.  Although I knew that I found it distasteful, I couldn’t remember why.  With the current popularity of the movie adaption and the rave reviews the book has gotten from many different sources – Oprah, 1001 Books To Read Before You Die, and from readers of this blog – I decided to give it another try. 

This autobiographical novel is a quick read; I was able to finish it in a few hours.  The two main characters, Michael and Hanna, embark upon a sexual relationship when he is fifteen and she is thirty-six.  The relationship becomes formulaic.  First they bathe together, then he reads aloud to her, then they have sex.  She reveals nothing to him of her past.  After a few months she quits her job and disappears.   The relationship haunts him for the rest of his life.   

Two of my best friends have fifteen year old sons.  If I found out either of these boys were involved in a sexual relationship with a thirty-six year old woman, I would be appalled and hope that the woman would be arrested.  Because of my disgust at this relationship, I was never able to sympathize with Hanna’s plight. 

Michael later encounters Hanna during his legal studies.  During one of his classes, he observes a war crimes trial.  He is surprised to find Hanna as one of the defendants.  She had served as a guard at a concentration camp during the Holocaust. 

It is revealed that Hanna had favorites in the camp who read to her. She is accused by her fellow defendants of  having written reports that covered up the heinous crimes that occurred at the camp.  Instead of having a handwriting analysis done that would prove her innocence, she falsely admits to having written the reports.  As the trial progresses, Michael realizes that she is illiterate.   

After Hanna goes to prison, Michael reads books aloud and sends her the tapes in the mail.  She learns to read by following along in the books.  She then teaches herself to write. 

Perhaps the reason so many others laud this book is that they feel Hanna is a victim of her illiteracy.  She becomes a Nazi guard because in order to do the alternative job she has been offered at Siemens she would need to read and write.  Later she ends up with a life sentence because she is to ashamed to admit she is illiterate.  If this were the only storyline in the novel, I probably would have felt sorry for Hanna as well.  But I just couldn’t get over the fact that she knowingly had an intimate relationship with a fifteen year old boy. 

Despite Kate Winslet’s Screen Actor’s Guild Award for Best Actress, I will not be seeing the film adaptation of The Reader.

#5 – An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser

At 856 pages, An American Tragedy is by no means a fast read.  It took me over two weeks of diligent reading to finish.  At times, I found the prose to be ponderous.  But, Dresier drew me into his story early on and I became invested in finding out what would become of Clyde Griffiths.   

An American Tragedy is based on the Chester Gillette murder case of 1906.  Comparatively the OJ Simpson trial of the early 20th century, it is studied as a model case of getting a conviction via circumstantial evidence. Dresider models his protagonist, Clyde Griffiths, on Chester Gillette. 

Griffiths endures an impoverished childhood with his evangelical street-preacher parents.  As a teenager he goes to work as a bellhop at the Green-Davison Hotel in Kansas City.  Here he interacts with travellers of a much greater means than himself and the reader sees the beginnings of his aspirations to attain a much higher social class for himself.

After a tragic incident, Clyde travels about the country for the next few years in order to evade the law.  Settling in Chicago and securing a position at a high class hotel, he comes into contact with his wealthy uncle who agrees to give him a position at his collar company.  He moves to New York where he starts out in the lowest position in order to learn the company from top to bottom.  A few months later he is given an important position as a department head.  There he falls in love with his subordinate, Roberta. 

Due to a strict company rule against dating employees they keep their love secret.  Clyde uses emotional blackmail to pressure Roberta into having sexual intercourse with him.  The act is secured with his promise that he will help her “get out of it” or marry her if she becomes pregnant. 

Months later, Clyde meets Sondra, the beautiful socialite daughter of an extremely wealthy family.  Other than a few trysts, he abandons Roberta and focuses on making Sondra fall in love with him.  Despite her parents’ objections to their relationship, she agrees to secretly elope with him as soon as she reaches her majority. 

Roberta turns up pregnant and remains so despite attempts at causing a miscarriage and obtaining an abortion.  Clyde grudgling agrees to run away with Roberta after she threatens to expose him, but keeps putting the ceremony off by telling her that he needs to earn a little more money first. 

Clyde reads a newspaper article about a couple who drowned during a boat trip and formulates an elaborate scheme to get rid of Roberta and their unborn child.  He takes Roberta on a pre-wedding trip to a secluded lake.  Although he has a change of heart at the last minute, she drowns due to an accident.  He flees the scene and takes up with Sondra at her summer retreat. 

The police apprehend Clyde and the trial ensues.  The trial was one of my favorite parts of the book.  Dreiser covers it from jury selection to the carrying out of the sentence.  Every aspect is shown from several different points of view making it even more interesting to the reader.

An American Tragedy provides a social commentary on many scandalous topics.  Dreiser was an extremely forward and liberal thinker for his time. 

Dreiser addresses the uneven way society treats the parents of unwed children during the early parts of the twentieth century.  The mother was viewed as a pariah.  People believed that it was the mother’s fault that the pregnancy occurred, since she should have behaved in a more virtuous manner.  In current society, I have noted that it is frowned upon for a woman to be free with her sexuality, but men that have a lot of lovers are almost revered. 

In his introduction, Richard Lingeman notes: 

“Dreiser regarded the dominant religious morality that condemned to disgrace a young woman who was pregnant out of wedlock as harsh and unnatural, a puritanical punishment for expressing normal and natural urges.”

Clyde’s mother, Mrs. Griffiths, is one of the most tragic characters that I have encountered in American literature.  She devotes her life to spreading the word of God, yet she is unable to instill lasting values in her own children.  Like a true Christian, she stands by her children when they are in trouble. 

Religion and the motives of its followers always fascinate me.  Dreiser addresses religion both as an entity forced upon one during childhood and as an entity found upon ones deathbed.  The below paragraph helped to draw me into the story.    

“The truth in regard to Esta was that in spite of her guarded up-bringing, and the seeming religious and moral fervor which at times appeared to characterize her, she was just a sensuous, weak girl who did not by any means know yet what she thought.  Despite the atmosphere in which she moved, essentially she was not of it.  Like the majority of those who profess and daily repeat the dogmas and creeds of the world, she had come into her practices and imagined attitude so insensibly from her earliest childhood on, that up to this time, and even later, she did not know the meaning of it all.  For the necessity of thought had been obviated by advice and law, or “revealed” truth, and so long as other theories or situations and impulses of an external or even internal, character did not arise to clash with these, she was safe enough.  Once they did, however, it was a foregone conclusion that her religious notions, not being grounded on any conviction or temperamental bias of her own, were not likely to withstand the shock.”

Another thought-proking theme in An American Tragedy is social class.  Clyde’s problems come about because he is trying to make his life something that it is not.  He has a lot more in common with Roberta than he does with Sondra.  While Roberta seems intelligent and kind; Sondra is vapid and verging on annoying.  Clyde only likes Sondra because he thinks that marrying her will bring him wealth and power.  In my opinion, the current economic climate is vastly due to the need of people to “keep up with Joneses”, causing them to live beyond their means.  As Clyde proves, this may not be the wisest path to take. 

Although an extremely long novel, I did become engrossed in An American Tragedy.  I definitely recommend putting this book on your to-be-read list.  A Place In The Sunstarring Elizabeth Taylor and Montgomery Clift was based on Dreiser’s novel.  I have added this film to my Netflix queue.

#1 – Where The Lake Becomes The River by Kate Betterton

Finally, for the throngs of fans of this blog, the long awaited review of Where the Lake Becomes the River by Kate Betterton. 

I previously mentioned that I won ten copies of this book from bookmovement.com.  This was my book club’s book for January.  The author was gracious enough to call us for a question and answer session this past Sunday evening. 

Were I browsing for books, this is not one that I would have chosen to purchase for myself.  For the most part, I dislike science fiction.  My personal definition of science fiction is extremely broad and would include anything that has the word ghost in the synopsis.  But, we won the book.  I read it and found it to be enjoyable. 

The novel is made up of interwoven short stories about the life of the McCullough family.  Betterton covers a broad range of topics – the Ku Klux Klan and the civil rights movement, life in Japan after WWII, kamikazes, ghosts, patricide, suicide, molestation, reincarnation, returning from the dead.  She ties them together well. 

The book made me think about how I would cope if faced with the death of my husband.  I cannot imagine anything more devastating.  Certainly it would be very hard to accept.

Betterton was wonderful to talk to.  She thoughtfully answered the questions that the book club members posed and expanded on our comments. 

After the call, the meeting turned to food (Monical’s pizza and wonderful baked goods) and girl talk as it always does.  We welcomed a new member.  Hopefully she will stay, as I think she makes a good addition to the group.

Jealous bobbitry, couponing obesity and the boy parts of the recent POTUS

It is hard to imagine what information the persons using the following keywords to find my blog were actually looking for:

• jealous bobbitry – Isn’t “bobbitry” in and of itself a jealous act?
• couponing obesity – Fat people that use coupons to buy more food?  Or, a plethora of coupons?
• pee hug - I thought I had coined this term after a person who swam in a baby pool that had been urinated in woke me up to give me a hug.
• Charlie Blackwell’s penis in American Wife – Charlie Blackwell is the George Bush character in American Wifeby Curtis Sittenfeld.  Perhaps she has some inside knowledge about the former President’s member.
• bowling ball designed butt – A bowling ball that is shaped like a butt?  Sir Mix A Lot would love this.
• flogging fat girls – So now we deserve to be harmed for our love of food?  Or is this some type of fetishist?
• best rolling pin  – Ha!  There’s no cooking information here. 

What are some of your own recent favorites from your blog?