Richard W. Brown March 26, 2024
Meandering Morning Meditation

Meandering Morning Meditation

Estimated reading time: 0 minutes, 32 seconds

During my morning walks, I allow my mind to wander, and I can think clearly about the issues that burden my soul. Meditating with a clear head in the cooler early hours has proven to be the key to my healing and growth after losing Jan. Sometimes, I can understand life lessons that we should have learned in kindergarten. Today, I thought about how much I have learned from grief, specifically that the worst things in our lives lead to the best things that will ever happen to us. When I returned home, someone sent me the image featured on tinybudda.com, reinforcing my daily meditative meanderings.

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Grief is a Great Teacher

Estimated reading time: 0 minutes, 32 seconds
Grief is a great teacher

Grief is a Great Teacher

As I pray every week at Temple Sha'arey Shalom, when we remember those we lost in this passage, one of our readings is: "Grief is a great teacher when it sends us back to serve and bless the living. We learn how to counsel and comfort those who, like ourselves, are bowed with sorrow. We learn when to keep silent in their presence and when a word will assure them of our love and concern."

Richard W. Brown December 10, 2022

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Meandering Morning Meditation
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When We Cease to Understand the World

Read: September 2024

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When We Cease to Understand the World

by Benjamín Labatut

Today, I began reading When We Cease to Understand the World by Benjamín Labatut, translated by Adrian Nathan West. This book, listed on The New York Times 100 Best Books of the 21st Century, promises to be thought-provoking as it delves into the intricate connections between scientific and mathematical discovery, madness, and destruction.

In a world where scientific advancements often involve ethical dilemmas and societal implications, this book offers a unique perspective on the lives of scientists who have shaped our understanding of the world. Fritz Haber, Alexander Grothendieck, Werner Heisenberg, and Erwin Schrödinger are some of the luminaries whose troubled lives Benjamín Labatut deeply explores in his fictional examination. Labatut shows how these scientists and thinkers grappled with profound questions of existence, experiencing strokes of unparalleled genius, alienating friends and lovers, and descending into isolation and insanity. Their discoveries, some of which significantly improved human life, while others led to chaos and unimaginable suffering, continue to shape our world.

With a breakneck pace and a wealth of disturbing detail, Labatut uses fiction’s imaginative resources to tell the stories of the scientists and mathematicians who expanded our notions of the possible.

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Intimacies: A Novel

Read: March 2022

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Intimacies: A Novel

by Katie Kitamura

Intimacies: A Novel by Katie Kitamura is about an interpreter who has come to The Hague to escape New York and work at the International Court. A woman of many languages and identities is finally looking for a place to call home.

Intimacies: A Novel is the second book by Ms. Kitamura that I have read this year. The multiple intimacies of the novel overlap and at times seem confusing, but in the end, it makes sense even if it is unclear how or where she will live the next phase of her life. A Separation is also written hypnotic, making it difficult to stop reading.

I not only highly recommend Intimacies: A Novel but have become a fan of Katie Kitamura and look forward to reading more of her books.

Goodreads summary provides a good overview.

She’s drawn into simmering personal dramas: her lover, Adriaan, is separated from his wife but still entangled in his marriage. Her friend Jana witnesses a seemingly random act of violence, a crime the interpreter becomes increasingly obsessed with as she befriends the victim’s sister. And she’s pulled into explosive political fires: her work interpreting for a former president accused of war crimes becomes precarious as their relationship is unbound by shifting language and meaning.

This woman is the voice in the ear of many, but what command does that give her, and how vulnerable does that leave her? Her coolly impassioned views on power, love, and violence, are tested, both in her personal intimacies and in her role at the Court. She is soon pushed to the precipice, where betrayal and heartbreak threaten to overwhelm her; it is her drive towards truth, and love, that throws into stark relief what she wants from her life.

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Zenith Man

Read: February 2023

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Zenith Man, Inheritance #4

by Jennifer Haigh

Tonight I read Zenith Man by Jennifer Haigh. A 911 call begins the story. A man reports his wife had died, but no one knew he had a wife. For thirty-two years, they had been married, and only one person had seen her, but only for a minute when she said: “supper was ready.” I read the first page and immediately found myself with a short page-turner that I could not stop reading. I recommend Zenith Man.

Actual events inspired this story. For many decades, many acquaintances of Jan and mine had no idea we were married. Once they found out, the response was, “we should have known as the two of you are perfect for each other.” But they knew we were married and had met both of us.

Being a widow, I found this phrase in the story emotional and very moving.

“She was a good woman,” Harold told Cob Krug. “I was lucky to have her. I promised to keep her in sickness and in health, and that’s what I did.”

Is there anything more that can summarize the love between two people?

I highly recommend Zenith Man, part of Inheritance, a collection of five stories about secrets, unspoken desires, and dangerous revelations between loved ones. Each Inheritance piece can be read or listened to in a single setting. By yourself, behind closed doors, or shared with someone you trust. Zenith Man is the fourth one in the series I have read. The previous three were Everything My Mother Taught Me, Can You Feel This?, and The Lion’s Den.

I have enjoyed all four and look forward to reading the final one.

Now that I have read Ms. Haigh’s short story, I have added her newest novel, Mercy Street, to my queue.

The Goodreads summary provides an overview,

Whatever had been going on inside the shuttered old house, the couple who lived there kept it to themselves. Among the locals, there’s only chilling speculation.

Neighbors are shocked when Harold Pardee reports his wife dead. No one even knew the eccentric TV repairman was married. Within hours, horrible rumors spread about what that poor woman must have endured for thirty years. Until the Pardees’ carefully guarded world is exposed. New York Times bestselling author Jennifer Haigh delivers an endearing short story about our misguided perception of strangers, the nature of love, and the need for secrets.

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The Night Swim

Read: January 2022

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The Night Swim

by Megan Goldin

The Night Swim by Megan Goldin is a book that I thought would be different from the last two books – Sarah’s Key and Send for Me – that I had read. Both of those were directly or indirectly about the Holocaust. I often selected this book from the e-library based on reviews and reading the sample section.

The Night Swim was a page-turner, but it also was about numerous social issues that Jan ad I had spent our lives working to resolve.

Among these are male violence and its impact directly and indirectly on women. Rachel Krall, a podcaster, spoke about how male violence had impacted her. Two of the other female characters were either a victim or the sister of a victim. Having spent my life trying not to exhibit male violence, I was reminded while reading his novel of how painful it can be and the impact of micro-aggressions.

I knew that the author had done her research when I realized that. Ms. Goldin set the story in Neapolis, a fictional town on the outer banks of North Carolina. Neapolis, which in Latin means “New Town,” is also the old Roman name for the biblical city of Sheechem, where the rape of Dinah took place.

I missed the role of the Nightingale as it appears more as a background piece and not a primary role. Of course, this is a subtle reference by the author to Greek mythology and the rape of Philomela by her sisters’ husband. Her assailant cut out her tongue to prevent her from speaking of the crime. She was turned into a nightingale to escape. That is why female nightingales cannot sing. The one in the novel never sings and is rescued by Rachel at the end of the book.

Rachel narrates two sections of the novel, first with her on-the-ground work at the trial and second with her podcasts.

Hannah’s narrative is initially only in letters and then emails.

This format helped move the story along and make the story unfold in unique ways.

The following is a summary from Goodreads.

After the first season of her true-crime podcast became an overnight sensation and set an innocent man free, Rachel Krall is now a household name―and the last hope for thousands of people seeking justice. But she’s used to being recognized for her voice, not her face. Which makes it all the more unsettling when she finds a note on her car windshield, addressed to her, begging for help.

The small town of Neapolis is being torn apart by a devastating rape trial. The town’s golden boy, a swimmer, destined for Olympic greatness, has been accused of raping a high school student, the beloved granddaughter of the police chief. Under pressure to make Season Three a success, Rachel throws herself into interviewing and investigating―but the mysterious letters keep showing up in unexpected places. Someone is following her, and she won’t stop until Rachel finds out what happened to her sister twenty-five years ago. Officially, Jenny Stills tragically drowned, but the letters insist she was murdered―and when Rachel starts asking questions, nobody seems to want to answer. The past and present start to collide as Rachel uncovers startling connections between the two cases that will change the course of the trial and the lives of everyone involved.

Electrifying and propulsive, The Night Swim asks: What is the price of a reputation? Can a small town ever right the wrongs of its past? And what happened to Jenny?

I highly recommend this novel and look forward to reading more of Ms. Goldin’s work.

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Parable of the Sower.

Read: January 2024

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Parable of the Sower

by Octavia E. Butler

Today, I started reading Octavia E. Butler‘s acclaimed post-apocalyptic novel, “Parable of the Sower.” The book depicts a world in which global climate change and economic crises have led to social chaos, particularly in California. The state is plagued by dangers such as pervasive water shortages and masses of vagabonds who are willing to do whatever it takes to survive.

The novel provides a message of hope even in a gloomy environment. It tells the story of Lauren Olamina, a fifteen-year-old girl who lives with her preacher father, family, and neighbors in a gated community. They are protected from the chaos happening around them. However, in a society where everyone is at risk, Lauren suffers from hyperempathy, a condition that makes her highly sensitive to the emotions of others.

Lauren is a young girl who is wise beyond her years and acutely aware of the dangers that her community refuses to acknowledge. She must speak up to protect her loved ones from the impending disasters that could otherwise harm them. However, her fight for survival leads to something much bigger—the emergence of a new faith and a profound insight into humanity’s destiny.

The Jan Lilien Education Fund sponsors ongoing sustainability and environmental awareness programs. Gifts made this month; I will match dollar-for-dollar. All donations are tax-deductible.

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The Fire and the Ore

Read: September 2022

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The Fire and the Ore

by Olivia Hawker

The Fire and the Ore by Olivia Hawker is a novel set in 1856 when three women—once strangers—come together in unpredictable Utah Territory. Hopeful, desperate, and willful, they’ll allow nothing on earth or Heaven to stand in their way. I have always enjoyed the history of the movement of people across the plains. Tamar, Jane, and Tabitha, along with their shared husband, Thomas Ricks, were real people, and Olivia Hawker compellingly describes them as people living in difficult times.

Olivia Hawker is a descendant of Jane and a former Mormon. She writes eloquently about the unnecessary Utah War (AKA Buchanan’s Blunder) and how the sister-wives grow to love and support each other. Tamar’s sister Patience, although a minor character, wrote a memoir of the time that the author used as a resource.

Reading a compelling historical fiction novel about family, sisterhood, and survival about three women like Jan was an easy choice. It was a page-turner from the first page to the last.

The Washington Post bestselling author of One for the Blackbird, One for the Crow is a compelling novel of family, sisterhood, and survival.

The Goodreads summary provides a good overview,

Following the call of their newfound Mormon faith, Tamar Loader and her family weather a brutal pilgrimage from England to Utah, where Tamar is united with her destined husband, Thomas Ricks. Clinging to a promise for the future, she abides a surprise: Thomas is already wedded to one woman—Tabitha, a local healer—and betrothed to another.

Orphaned by tragedy and stranded in the Salt Lake Valley, Jane Shupe struggles to provide for herself and her younger sister. Out of necessity, with no love lost, she too must bear the trials of a sister-wife. She is no member of the Mormon migration, yet Jane agrees to marry Thomas.

But when the US Army’s invasion brings the rebellious Mormon community to heel, Tamar, Jane, and Tabitha are forced to retreat into the hostile desert wilderness with little in common but the same man—and the resolve to keep themselves and their children alive. What they discover, as one, is redemption, a new definition of family, and a bond stronger than matrimony that is tested like never before.

The Jan Lilien Education Fund sponsors ongoing sustainability and environmental awareness programs. Gifts made this month; I will match dollar-for-dollar. All donations are tax-deductible.

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