Five favorite books

 

My five favorite books, read over and over, are: Sacajawea by Anna Lee Waldo (who grew up in my home town of Whitefish, Montana), Swiss Family Robinson by Johann David Wyss, Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell, Savages by Shirley Conran, and Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand.

 

 

All of them, interestingly, are about survival. Sacajawea, of course, is about the famous Indian woman who guided Lewis and Clark. This is big book-- thick as a brick --  and is fascinating. Inspired as a child picking up Indian spearheads from along the shores of Whitefish Lake, it took Waldo 10 years to write it this marvelous book.

 

 

I love Swiss Family Robinson, especially the ways and means by which they survive and thrive after their shipwreck. I've always had a small smattering of skill in making something out of nothing and this is what, in this book, makes my heart flutter -- building shelter from salvaged boards and crafting bowls and utensils and using wits and skill to flourish and survive. Part of me has always embraced a bit of "pioneer woman," matching wits against whatever life throws at me.   

 

 

Gone with the Wind! Has there ever been a more marvelous book printed (well, except for the Bible)? What an amazing story this is. This book captured my heart with the first read and enlightens me with each additional read.

 

 

I have probably read Savages six times or more. In the past I've bought this book half dozen at a time to give to friends. It is the story of a band of spoiled wives who go with their corporate husbands on a junket to a tiny tropical country. When a catastrophe occurs the women are left to fend for themselves. This is truly a book of survival -- about a band of disparate, and desperate, women wandering the jungle and trying to stay alive.

 

 

I first read Atlas Shrugged just after high school and I still remember that feeling of despair and fear that a government could be so obtuse and terrifying in using its power to rid the country of capital enterprise. Everyone is urged to work for socialistic ventures, saving this or that helping these and those. The inventors, entrepreneurs, brilliant businessmen and their ilk are stifled and despised -- although their money isn't. They assuage their helplessness by going on strike.

 

 

 In this book, rules and regulations -- while touted to promote fairness and equality -- are geared to stop and inhibit progress. No one can own more than one business. If a person manufactures, say, shoes, he can't make more shoes than any other company making shoes. Production comes to a standstill as, one by one, the nations greatest minds and innovators disappear, leaving the country in chaos. And what happens next? Can't tell you, you have to read the book -- or watch the movie.

 

 

Even though I was so very young the first time I read this book it took days to shake the incredible alarm it set off in me. It was an urge to get ready for the apocalypse, to stock up and start preparing for the end of life as we know it. It was an unsettling sort of terror that the government could so stifle the very basic compulsion of man -- the ability to create and invent and build. That the government could steer a country into sneering at the basic human nature of wanting to excel and improve and succeed. For individuals to achieve!

I read Atlas Shrugged several times in my early years, each time haunted by its message. But, how many years ago did I last read this book? Twenty, maybe? At least that long ago. And when we watched the movie recently I was stunned to realize that so much of what frightened me originally has come to pass in actuality. Our government is making these changes. Capitalism is being stifled and regulated to the point of collapse. In some cases social programs are gaining while free enterprise is waning. Monetary success is scorned by those who demand government coddling and alarming things are rearing their heads continually -- such as the upcoming Supreme Court decision on whether we can sell our belongings.

 

 

 A belligerent, ugly, powerful book that didn't receive great accolades when it came out in 1957, Atlas Shrugged the movie came out a couple of years ago and, as a movie, doesn't carry the same power as the book to cause fear. Maybe this is because so many movies these days, with their horrific villains and vampires and Satanists overwhelm any frail and seemingly feeble fear of government as downright silly. Despite that, Atlas Shrugged Part 2 will be released this month and I can't wait!

Even though I was so very young the first time I read this book it took days to shake the incredible alarm it set off in me. It was an urge to get ready for the apocalypse, to stock up and start preparing for the end of life as we know it. It was an unsettling sort of terror that the government could so stifle the very basic compulsion of man -- the ability to create and invent and build. That the government could steer a country into sneering at the basic human nature of wanting to excel and improve and succeed. For individuals to achieve!

I read Atlas Shrugged several times in my early years, each time haunted by its message. But, how many years ago did I last read this book? Twenty, maybe? At least that long ago. And when we watched the movie recently I was stunned to realize that so much of what frightened me originally has come to pass in actuality. Our government is making these changes. Capitalism is being stifled and regulated to the point of collapse. In some cases social programs are gaining while free enterprise is waning. Monetary success is scorned by those who demand government coddling and alarming things are rearing their heads continually -- such as the upcoming Supreme Court decision on whether we can sell our belongings.

A belligerent, (sort of) ugly, powerful book that didn't receive great accolades when it came out in 1957, Atlas Shrugged the movie came out a couple of years ago and, as a movie, doesn't carry the same power as the book to cause fear. Maybe this is because so many movies these days, with their horrific villains and vampires and Satanists overwhelm any frail and seemingly feeble fear of government as downright silly. Despite that, Atlas Shrugged Part 2 will be released this month and I can't wait!

Finding the Easy Way Out

One summer evening many years ago we were having a barbecue at my Mom and Dad’s house.  The kids were romping in the yard and Mom and I were puttering in the kitchen, hauling out bowls of potato salad, piles of cantaloupe, and a still-warm chocolate cake lathered with oozing fudge frosting. Through all this activity Dad was attempting to start the barbecue.

We didn’t pay him much attention at first but as time went on his grumbling turned to ranting, which turned to raving. He’d piled on the briquettes and dumped on the starter but it refused to light. He gave up on matches and tried a burning stick. (This was before those automatic lighters.) He poured on more fluid. It still wouldn’t light.

By now the getting-ready chores were done and we were all waiting patiently, hungrily, for the barbecue so we could toss on the steaks. Mom and I sprawled in the lounge chairs to watch the Dad and Grill Show. Since he was an Archie Bunker wannabe, it was really quite entertaining.

Finally, he stomped off to his shop. A few minutes later he reappeared, dragging across the driveway his monstrously huge welder behind him. With a great flourish he shooed the kids to safety at the other side of the yard, donned his welder’s hood and gloves, and fired the thing up. It was like killing a fly with a machine gun. Within seconds the paint had melted off the grill and the little briquettes were glowing. They were so fired up they were dancing and singing. It was one of those little family moments that will always be etched into memory, especially the moment when the little dancing briquettes tumbled to the ground when the bottom of the grill fell out.

I don’t think my dad was ever happier than when faced with a puzzle or a problem. He loved finding a solution.

I’m sort of like that. I love a challenge. I thoroughly enjoy making something of nothing. Some of my happiest years were those when we didn’t have a nickel to our names and our three kids always seemed to be in need of new shoes and a dentist. And the car always needed tires.

Those were challenging years and our house was oddly, but creatively, decorated. I had 500 recipes for hamburger. We were poor but we were gleefully happy. Part of my happiness came from the necessity of being resourceful and creative. Remember when Scarlet O’Hara made the ball gown from the green silk drapes? I was that kind of woman.

It’s a wonderful thing to stretch our minds and come up with solutions. When a woman I know was pondering with her husband the easiest way to fix an electrical problem in the house, he, typical male, wanted to call in an electrician. She, after a bit of practical thinking, said, “Why don’t we try doing this...” and offered a perfectly ingenious solution. She’s still walking proud.

Ingenious solutions are harder to come by than simple solutions. But sometimes they flood our minds with glowing revelation. Maybe that’s why inventors never quit with just one invention. They have minds that are constantly whirling and whirring, that continually ponder new devices and gadgets. My Dad was like that. You could almost hear the wheels turning and he wrote and plotted continually. Almost every morning there would be a napkin of doodles next to his empty coffee cup. His shop was filled with tools he’d adapted for this need or that.

There is that old saying that if you want to find the easiest way to do something, give the task to a lazy man.

There should also be a saying that if you want to find the cheapest way to do something, give the task to a poor man.

I love this story about the government. It took place back in the days when we were spending oodles of money on the space program. When NASA first started sending up astronauts, they quickly discovered that ballpoint pens wouldn’t work in zero gravity.

It sent the NASA scientists into a dither. This illustrious group spent a decade and $12 billion, ($12 BILLION DOLLARS!), but they eventually developed a pen that would write in zero gravity, upside down, underwater, on almost any surface including glass, and at temperatures ranging from below freezing to over 300° C.
           
The Russians used a pencil.
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