Long Way Down
YA fiction in verse
"AFTER THE SHOTS
me and Tony
waited like we always do
for the rumble to stop
before picking our heads up
and poking our heads out
to count the bodies.
This time there was only one."
If the above excerpt from Jason Reynolds' Long Way Down doesn't
chill you I don't know what will. It succinctly portrays a place
where unexpected violent deaths are so common even kids know the
drill. This is also a place where, when the victim is one of your
own, there are three rules: you don't cry; you don't snitch, and you
kill the person who killed your loved one.
Narrator Will has just lost his older brother, Shawn. He didn't
see the shooter, but he's sure he knows his identity. Shawn's gun in
his jeans waistband, he steps into an elevator, setting off to
accomplish his grim mandate.
At each floor a new passenger gets on. But this crew does not
hail from the land of the living. His uncle and father, a childhood
friend...all victims of violence and vengeance.
What's going on?
Ya gotta read the book to find out.
On a personal note, the day after Valentines Day was amazing too. It
was very social at UMaine. I went to a pancake breakfast in the
morning and a multicultural social with spririted conversation and
scrumptious Chinese food for lunch. Since I wasn't working I didn't
have to wear jeans. I wore my new cat shirt, a black skirt with pink
polka dots, a pink long sweater, leggings, and cat earrings. Everyone
was telling me how pretty I was and what a cool outfit I'd put
together. Some had never seen me in anything but my uniform. But
what really made my day, my week, my month was that my manager whom I
totally look up to gave me the sweetest teddy bear. I felt like
champagne (not blood) ran through my veins. J.J. (the bear) has a
place of honor in my studio.
A great big shout out goes out to Jodi.
jules hathaway
Sent from my iPod
Sunday, February 17, 2019
Comics for Choice
Comics for Choice
YA/adult graphic novel
"Comics for Choice was sparked by my outrage at the clinic
closures and suffocating restrictions on abortion rights in states
like Texas. It is not enough for abortion to remain technically
legal: it is a moral imperative for abortion care to be accessible to
all who need and want it. The right to abortion is the right to bodily
autonomy and to determine one's own life path.
Our aim with Comics for Choice was to create a book that would
educate readers about many facets of the history of abortion in
America, the incredible diversity of reasons people choose it, and
what we can do to protect this crucial right. We wanted to make a
book that would help our many readers who've had abortions feel
understood and supported."
Editors Hazel Newlevant, Whit Taylor, O. K. Fox, and the many
talented people who helped them flesh out their vision achieved their
objectives and then some. Comic artists teamed up with reproductive
justice experts to create dozens of succinct pieces that are highly
authentic and original while united around an important larger issue.
For instance:
*Do It Yourself Abortion Horror Stories provides a much needed
reminder that in the days before abortion was legal often an unwanted
pregnancy would result in two deaths: fetus and mother.
*My Voice, My Choice tells the story of a woman who gets pregnant
while struggling to raise three beloved daughters on a part time job
and realizes she can't afford another child at that time.
*Born and Forgotten exposes the restrictive rules such as options
counseling (including misinformation) and manditory waiting periods
that can make obtaining an abortion unnecessarily difficult and
painful (sometimes impossible) for a woman. I really appreciate the
line "Dang. I wish people worked this hard to protect living
children" because many of the most vocal antiabortion people are also
against funding programs that would help already born children get
food, shelter, and decent educations.
Whether you choose the narratives that most appeal to you or
devour the whole book as I did (warning: I was so engrossed I nearly
missed my bus stop) Comics for Choice is a very powerful read that
belongs in all public and college and university libraries. Words and
images are processed by different parts of the brain. The combination
of both is far more powerful than either alone. And the pictures are
worth gazillions of words in their ability to create real empathy.
I wish this book had been around when I had my abortion. It
would have saved me a lot of grief and guilt.
On a personal note, Valentines Day was amazing. It started off when I
woke up and discovered a lovely vase of flowers in the kitchen. At
UMaine there was a free pancake breakfast. Two plate size blueberry
pancakes topped with real maple syrup and whipped cream! School and
work went well. Eugene took me to Ruby Tuesdays for supper. On the
way back home we stopped at Goodwill and he got me a cat shirt and a
darling teddy bear. At home he gave me a card and put romantic music
on instead of his scary tv shows. That was a Valentines Day to
remember!
A great big shout out goes out to Eugene.
jules hathaway
Sent from my iPod
YA/adult graphic novel
"Comics for Choice was sparked by my outrage at the clinic
closures and suffocating restrictions on abortion rights in states
like Texas. It is not enough for abortion to remain technically
legal: it is a moral imperative for abortion care to be accessible to
all who need and want it. The right to abortion is the right to bodily
autonomy and to determine one's own life path.
Our aim with Comics for Choice was to create a book that would
educate readers about many facets of the history of abortion in
America, the incredible diversity of reasons people choose it, and
what we can do to protect this crucial right. We wanted to make a
book that would help our many readers who've had abortions feel
understood and supported."
Editors Hazel Newlevant, Whit Taylor, O. K. Fox, and the many
talented people who helped them flesh out their vision achieved their
objectives and then some. Comic artists teamed up with reproductive
justice experts to create dozens of succinct pieces that are highly
authentic and original while united around an important larger issue.
For instance:
*Do It Yourself Abortion Horror Stories provides a much needed
reminder that in the days before abortion was legal often an unwanted
pregnancy would result in two deaths: fetus and mother.
*My Voice, My Choice tells the story of a woman who gets pregnant
while struggling to raise three beloved daughters on a part time job
and realizes she can't afford another child at that time.
*Born and Forgotten exposes the restrictive rules such as options
counseling (including misinformation) and manditory waiting periods
that can make obtaining an abortion unnecessarily difficult and
painful (sometimes impossible) for a woman. I really appreciate the
line "Dang. I wish people worked this hard to protect living
children" because many of the most vocal antiabortion people are also
against funding programs that would help already born children get
food, shelter, and decent educations.
Whether you choose the narratives that most appeal to you or
devour the whole book as I did (warning: I was so engrossed I nearly
missed my bus stop) Comics for Choice is a very powerful read that
belongs in all public and college and university libraries. Words and
images are processed by different parts of the brain. The combination
of both is far more powerful than either alone. And the pictures are
worth gazillions of words in their ability to create real empathy.
I wish this book had been around when I had my abortion. It
would have saved me a lot of grief and guilt.
On a personal note, Valentines Day was amazing. It started off when I
woke up and discovered a lovely vase of flowers in the kitchen. At
UMaine there was a free pancake breakfast. Two plate size blueberry
pancakes topped with real maple syrup and whipped cream! School and
work went well. Eugene took me to Ruby Tuesdays for supper. On the
way back home we stopped at Goodwill and he got me a cat shirt and a
darling teddy bear. At home he gave me a card and put romantic music
on instead of his scary tv shows. That was a Valentines Day to
remember!
A great big shout out goes out to Eugene.
jules hathaway
Sent from my iPod
A Land Of Permanent Goodbyes
A Land Of Permanent Goodbyes
YA/adult fiction
"Tareq went to lay his sister down next to his mother when he
spotted the red car still clutched in her hand, Salim's toy that was
passed down from Tareq. A Matchbox sedan that would live in Tareq's
dreams and memories forever, connecting him to his days here and a
life that no longer existed."
Have you ever started a book, only to find out it's nearly too
heartbreaking to keep reading? That was my experience with Atia
Abawi's A Land Of Permanent Goodbyes. Of course I didn't have the
luxury of putting it down. I had to review it. All I can do for
people in war torn lands is keep my readers aware of their plight.
It's really on the edge of YA/adult. Read it yourself before
recommending it to any of the middle or high school crowd.
In a split second Tariq's life has been shattered. A bomb has
blown his home apart. His mother and grandmother, a little sister,
and twin baby brothers are known to be dead. The brother closest to
him in age, Salim, has disappeared. No one can say whether he escaped
or was pulverized beyond recognition.
Fayed, Tareq's father, decides to get his two surviving
children, Tareq and little Susan, out of Syria. The first stop on
their journey is the house of Fayed's older brother who has promised
to lend money for the trip. En route they behold human heads on metal
spikes. The next day Tareq and his cousin, Musa, are forced to
witness a public exacution.
Musa is sent with Tareq and his family. In Turkey the two boys
go ahead to Istanbul, leaving Fayed and Susan in a village near the
coast. Somehow, in a land where they cannot get work permits, they
must cobble enough money together from under the table odd jobs to get
their family to safety in Europe.
Please read the book if you can and help me to spread its
message. Syrian lives matter immensely. The United States needs to
do do much more on their behalf.
In homage to the sadness of this book there will be no personal note.
A great big shout out goes out to all who do their best to help
innocent war victims.
jules hathaway
Sent from my iPod
YA/adult fiction
"Tareq went to lay his sister down next to his mother when he
spotted the red car still clutched in her hand, Salim's toy that was
passed down from Tareq. A Matchbox sedan that would live in Tareq's
dreams and memories forever, connecting him to his days here and a
life that no longer existed."
Have you ever started a book, only to find out it's nearly too
heartbreaking to keep reading? That was my experience with Atia
Abawi's A Land Of Permanent Goodbyes. Of course I didn't have the
luxury of putting it down. I had to review it. All I can do for
people in war torn lands is keep my readers aware of their plight.
It's really on the edge of YA/adult. Read it yourself before
recommending it to any of the middle or high school crowd.
In a split second Tariq's life has been shattered. A bomb has
blown his home apart. His mother and grandmother, a little sister,
and twin baby brothers are known to be dead. The brother closest to
him in age, Salim, has disappeared. No one can say whether he escaped
or was pulverized beyond recognition.
Fayed, Tareq's father, decides to get his two surviving
children, Tareq and little Susan, out of Syria. The first stop on
their journey is the house of Fayed's older brother who has promised
to lend money for the trip. En route they behold human heads on metal
spikes. The next day Tareq and his cousin, Musa, are forced to
witness a public exacution.
Musa is sent with Tareq and his family. In Turkey the two boys
go ahead to Istanbul, leaving Fayed and Susan in a village near the
coast. Somehow, in a land where they cannot get work permits, they
must cobble enough money together from under the table odd jobs to get
their family to safety in Europe.
Please read the book if you can and help me to spread its
message. Syrian lives matter immensely. The United States needs to
do do much more on their behalf.
In homage to the sadness of this book there will be no personal note.
A great big shout out goes out to all who do their best to help
innocent war victims.
jules hathaway
Sent from my iPod
White Kids
White Kids
Adult nonfiction
"Often researchers focus on the experiences and conditions of
marginalized groups in order to understand inequality...this book is
instead an ethnographic study of an aspect of inequality from the
vantage point of the privileged, of families and children at the top
of race and class hierarchies. This book focuses intently on
questions related to how comprehensive racial learning operates for
white children growing up in affluent families. But this discussion
is rooted in a broader sociological question: how do ideologies get
reproduced by children who benefit the most from the maintenance of
these ideologies, and how do ideological positions themselves shape
choices involved it raising a child?"
If you don't know what ethnographic study (in the above quote
from Margaret A. Hagerman's White Kids: Growing Up With Privilege In
A Racially Divided America) is, please don't let that deter you from
reading this most excellent book. It means that Hagerman went out in
the field and conducted qualitative research using methods such as
observations and open ended discussions rather than handing out
surveys or conducting experiments under clinical conditions and
wrapping it all up neatly with statistics. For almost two years she
spent a lot of time with 36 middle school children and their families
in three affluent but otherwise different communities. She was able
to totally immerse herself in the communities, observing her subjects
in everything from the privacy of the home to more public venues like
school and sports events. "...I spent countless hours watching video-
game playing, preparing food and eating with kids, monitoring play
dates, hearing phone calls with peers, listening to kids talk about
friendships and fights at school, playing board games, playing
backyard sports, painting nails, practicing the violin, and struggling
through homework assignments..." Because of the depth and breadth of
her investigation, she was able to learn that her topic is a lot more
complex than most of us suspect. Among the themes that she discusses
are:
*A lot of children's exposure to ideas concerning racism and privilege
(including whether they exist in today's world) stems not from
parental discourse and modeling but from decisions they make (such as
where to live and send their kids to school) and subtle behaviors
(such as what neighborhoods they avoid or act more fearful in).
*Communities can cultivate quite different attitudes in kids rocking
very similar advantages--anything from a total belief in meritocracy
and laziness on the part of the poor to percetions of and desire to
change structural inequalities.
*Children don't just absorb parental attitudes. They also are
impacted by peers, siblings, influential adults, media, and their own
agency in actively interpreting and evaluating what they take in.
Again, don't be put off by the fact that the book is sociology
research. Hagerman's blend of observation and interpretation make it
highly readable. In a world in which so much privilege and power are
passed down through generations we need to know what is actually going
on (rather than what our slants lead us to believe) if we are ever
going to change things.
On a personal note, this past week has been highly eventful. Starting
with Wednesday. It had started snowing before I went to bed Tuesday
night. Wednesday I woke up to full on blizzard. I had a mile to walk
down Route 2 to catch my bus. Blasts of wind kept whipping sleet in
my face. A snow plow driver told me I was a tiger to be out in that
mess. The whole scene was eerie. There were so few vehicles it was
like a rapture movie after the "righteous" have been swooped up to
heaven and everyone else left to face tribulations. I was so glad to
see the bus. It would have been a much longer walk if it had been
cancelled. The supervisors were very glad to see everyone who showed
up to work. We were essential personnel because even though school
was cancelled the dorm students needed to eat. For one day at a
research university student workers were more essential than faculty.
I enjoyed working and wishing all our clients a happy snow day. Still
after I made the reverse commute I was happy to be in my cozy home and
revert from tiger to a more house cat persona.
A great big shout out goes out to all who blizzard battled to make
streets and parking spaces safer for all of us and the drivers who
kept the buses running in all the mess.
jules hathaway
Sent from my iPod
Adult nonfiction
"Often researchers focus on the experiences and conditions of
marginalized groups in order to understand inequality...this book is
instead an ethnographic study of an aspect of inequality from the
vantage point of the privileged, of families and children at the top
of race and class hierarchies. This book focuses intently on
questions related to how comprehensive racial learning operates for
white children growing up in affluent families. But this discussion
is rooted in a broader sociological question: how do ideologies get
reproduced by children who benefit the most from the maintenance of
these ideologies, and how do ideological positions themselves shape
choices involved it raising a child?"
If you don't know what ethnographic study (in the above quote
from Margaret A. Hagerman's White Kids: Growing Up With Privilege In
A Racially Divided America) is, please don't let that deter you from
reading this most excellent book. It means that Hagerman went out in
the field and conducted qualitative research using methods such as
observations and open ended discussions rather than handing out
surveys or conducting experiments under clinical conditions and
wrapping it all up neatly with statistics. For almost two years she
spent a lot of time with 36 middle school children and their families
in three affluent but otherwise different communities. She was able
to totally immerse herself in the communities, observing her subjects
in everything from the privacy of the home to more public venues like
school and sports events. "...I spent countless hours watching video-
game playing, preparing food and eating with kids, monitoring play
dates, hearing phone calls with peers, listening to kids talk about
friendships and fights at school, playing board games, playing
backyard sports, painting nails, practicing the violin, and struggling
through homework assignments..." Because of the depth and breadth of
her investigation, she was able to learn that her topic is a lot more
complex than most of us suspect. Among the themes that she discusses
are:
*A lot of children's exposure to ideas concerning racism and privilege
(including whether they exist in today's world) stems not from
parental discourse and modeling but from decisions they make (such as
where to live and send their kids to school) and subtle behaviors
(such as what neighborhoods they avoid or act more fearful in).
*Communities can cultivate quite different attitudes in kids rocking
very similar advantages--anything from a total belief in meritocracy
and laziness on the part of the poor to percetions of and desire to
change structural inequalities.
*Children don't just absorb parental attitudes. They also are
impacted by peers, siblings, influential adults, media, and their own
agency in actively interpreting and evaluating what they take in.
Again, don't be put off by the fact that the book is sociology
research. Hagerman's blend of observation and interpretation make it
highly readable. In a world in which so much privilege and power are
passed down through generations we need to know what is actually going
on (rather than what our slants lead us to believe) if we are ever
going to change things.
On a personal note, this past week has been highly eventful. Starting
with Wednesday. It had started snowing before I went to bed Tuesday
night. Wednesday I woke up to full on blizzard. I had a mile to walk
down Route 2 to catch my bus. Blasts of wind kept whipping sleet in
my face. A snow plow driver told me I was a tiger to be out in that
mess. The whole scene was eerie. There were so few vehicles it was
like a rapture movie after the "righteous" have been swooped up to
heaven and everyone else left to face tribulations. I was so glad to
see the bus. It would have been a much longer walk if it had been
cancelled. The supervisors were very glad to see everyone who showed
up to work. We were essential personnel because even though school
was cancelled the dorm students needed to eat. For one day at a
research university student workers were more essential than faculty.
I enjoyed working and wishing all our clients a happy snow day. Still
after I made the reverse commute I was happy to be in my cozy home and
revert from tiger to a more house cat persona.
A great big shout out goes out to all who blizzard battled to make
streets and parking spaces safer for all of us and the drivers who
kept the buses running in all the mess.
jules hathaway
Sent from my iPod
Thursday, February 14, 2019
You got invoice from DocuSign Electronic Service
|
Wednesday, February 13, 2019
You've got efax Notice
 |
| Fax Message ID: 4383 865 6382,
|
|
|
This is eFax Notice
|
| Fax Message Caller-ID: 8697 465 6859,
|
|
|
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)