Spotlight on George Takei, APAHM 2024

The downside of having this pause between the other Asian-American and Pacific Islander Heritage month and the George Takei spotlight is that I have come up with so many more thoughts than I expected. 

Waiting was a matter of necessity. In addition to wanting to catch up on daily song posts, two of the books were only available through Inter-Library loan and it took a while for the requests to come through.

Therefore (in a big departure for me) this post may wander.

After reading his graphic novel account, They Called Us Enemy (2019), and his children's book, My Lost Freedom (2024), I started wondering what else there was:

To the Stars: The Autobiography of George Takei, Star Trek's Mr. Sulu by Geoge Takei (1994)

Oh Myyy! by George Takei (2012)

Lions and Tigers and Bears: The Internet Strikes Back by George Takei (2013)

To Be Takei (2014)

Allegiance (Original Broadway Cast Recording) (2016)

I don't usually include years for books, but timing is somewhat relevant here.

First of all, for the regular autobiography, To the Stars, there is a big gap between it and the other writings. 

It is such a big gap that he was not publicly out yet. It was a really entertaining book and there is so much that was interesting, but it is also weird because he is so publicly out now that you keep waiting for a mention; it just doesn't happen.

Then, at some point, he starts having a real social media presence. That inspired the two books and the documentary, which is largely about his activism and awareness raising. A lot of that is for LGBT issues, but it is also for issues of racism and remembering Japanese internment, so also the genesis of the stage play, Allegiance. 

It is after that when we get the books related to internment but geared toward younger audiences. 

That is all a logical progression. I also discovered a couple of other movies that will relate to the Pride month reading, so in fact Sulu is the bridge.

Here is where my thoughts become somewhat messy. 

First of all, the two books about internet use are not great. Part of that is simply that they are outdated; that is a thing that happens with technology. An older person figuring out the internet is likely to be more interesting to him than to almost anyone else. 

The books are not as amusing as his posts, though he does replicate many of them.

There is also one point of frustration for me.

When I first became aware of his posting, it related to a clip of a person in a store getting up from a wheelchair to get something off of a shelf, and people were mocking that person for using a wheelchair when they didn't need it.

Many people who use wheelchairs and other mobility devices can stand and even walk. They may not be able to do it for extended periods without heart strain or dizziness, or perhaps they are at high risk of dislocation. There may be a lot of pain involved, but there are lots of types of disabilities and health issues. Thinking that every person in a wheelchair is totally paralyzed at least from the waist down is ignorant. Mocking that is cruel.

He got some push back. I don't think he handled it quite as badly as William Shatner, but he didn't come around either. In the books he talks about offending people. He defends humor and freedom of speech, but he got why mocking Japan after the tsunami was wrong. 

It doesn't make him different from many other celebrities. I don't think he's a bad person and I don't dislike him, but I do wish he was better in that way.

The next point of messiness is about Allegiance, though he didn't write that. 

Admittedly, I have not seen it; I have only read about it and listened to the soundtrack.

You have a very close brother and sister falling on different sides of the loyalty question, where the sister resists and marries another resister, and the brother joins the army and serves heroically, but the white woman he fell in love with is killed in a scuffle.The brother and sister are estranged for sixty years until her death.

There are a lot of things that are unrealistic with that. First of all, there was one person shot in an internment camp, and it was an old Japanese man. I don't think it makes sense to make the martyr a white woman. 

Most families seemed to stay close. There are a lot of different experiences, and I don't know them all, but that didn't seem right.

Also, they make a real person the villain, but in what seems to be an exaggerated way. That feels irresponsible and wrong.

I did find some other thoughts on that issue, from people who actually saw it and are closer to the issues, so I am going to let them comment:

https://www.nichibei.org/2015/11/a-jaclers-perspective-of-allegiance/

I'm sure some of it is for dramatic effect, but I still think there could have been a better story there. Maybe it would have better if it were based more on the Takei family.

For more about the internee experience, They Called Us Enemy really is excellent. 

I also recommend We Are Not Free by Traci Chee. She came from a large family, and maybe that made it easier for her to depict multiple different attitudes but where connections persisted.

Finally, in reading about Takei's early acting career, the same names kept popping up. This was fun in a way, because I have my own fondness for Keye Luke and Nobu McCarthy. Then it was a reminder of how much their ethnicity limited their roles, and they were relatively lucky in terms of finding work. 

That reminded me of Nancy Wang Yuen's Reel Inequality, but other things as well. 

There is still a long way to go.

Intro to Pride Month: gender identity

This is something I have had in mind to do for a long time: going through and exploring my gender identity, my sexual orientation, and my sexuality, terms that get conflated a lot.

The necessary spoiler alert is that I remain CIS, straight, and chaste. Nothing is going to be that exciting. It may still be valuable.

The seeds of the idea were planted long ago by pop culture journalist Brett White talking about connecting with his masculinity as a gay man. There were visions of masculinity that did not work, but there were others that did. Bob Newhart became an influence for him.

My underlying theme throughout all of this is going to be that we need to quit dictating how others should act. So, if a gay man wants to be understated rather than flamboyant, that should be allowed. (I mean, being gay is sexual orientation, not gender, and not personality.)

I have not been particularly feminine in many ways.

There were two frustrations (at least) for my mother when I was a child. One was that I had very thick, hard to manage hair. I also underwent a change at around 5 or 6 where I only ever wanted to wear jeans.

It was specifically my introduction to denim. Previously every pair of pants that I had was scratchy polyester, so I only wanted to wear skirts. Mom preferred skirts, so she related to this. 

Jeans felt great, and then that was all I wanted. (Variety in dress has never been a big deal for me.)

One vivid memory is Mom getting my hair cut into a pixie cut, which was much easier to comb, but between that and the jeans I was mistaken for a little boy and mortified.

I still cut my hair short many times in the future, but that was always that was always more of a practical thing. I always hated what salons did, and started cutting my own hair. When you can't really see the back... anyway, once I started it usually just ended up short. Now my hair has its own preferred length, I like wearing it in a ponytail, and that's just how it goes.

I also generally can't stand wearing makeup. I guess it's a texture thing, but I feel it on me and don't like it.

So that feels like a lot of the hallmarks of femininity are things that I ended up ignoring for various reasons, not really playing around with appearance and prettiness. There is a darker side to that.

I did completely buy that girls were supposed to be pretty and attractive; that we owed that to the world.

Learning early on that I was fat and therefore undesirable, the way I survived that was separating myself from it. Someday I would lose weight and then everything would be all right, but until then, just keep your head down. (I have used that strategy in other areas.)

Yes, I would periodically try and fail to lose weight. Yes, sometimes there would be some kind of event and I would try shopping for something nice, and those were the moments when I was most filled with despair. 

Did I get into that "I'm not like other girls" mindset? I don't think so. I knew a lot of girls who were really mean, but I also had good friends of varying levels of attractiveness. I mean, I knew we weren't a monolith, and it wasn't just me who had this problem, but it didn't quite free me from believing that as a girl I should be attractive and this was a painful failure.

Looking at all of that, it seems like I could have had some doubts about whether I even worked as a girl. The thing that saved me, though, was that I knew I was smart, and boys were so infernally stupid.

That is another gender stereotype, which I don't really approve of. It was also because boys acted in ways that were crude and cruel that was based on other gender constructs and what they were told they should be, but I found it repellent, even with some attraction to it (but that's next week).

Ultimately, I am okay with whom I am. It took letting go of a lot of perceived expectations, but it is a good place to be. 

I can't rule out that shopping for a formal gown would still be very hard on me, but that doesn't come up so much now, and I will take that.

Perhaps a better point is a lot of the ugliness and meanness in life comes from telling people how to be with very flawed ideas, much of which is based around gender.

Let people be who they are.

Daily songs, 1973 - 1970 +

I am continuing gradually working my way back through the years, though there were some unexpected twists.

It is always interesting to see that there are songs you knew, but not by name. One interesting thing was finding that I did know some Steely Dan songs. 

That encouraged me to listen to some other bands where the names were familiar but my impressions were fuzzy, just to get things clarified. I have a better idea now of Joni Mitchell, Joan Baez, Judy Collins, and Jethro Tull now, though those are not necessarily for this time period.

Ultimately, I really like knowing stuff.

The other thing that was interesting was how songs off of the Bread album, Baby I'm-a Want You, kept showing up on the charts for 1971 and 1972, but the title track didn't. Had that not charted, but become popular later? No, it charted higher.

The song was released late in 1971. That spread its performance over the two years, keeping it out of either Top 100. In it's own time it reached the number 3 spot.

For that reason I have included it between the two years with an asterisk. 

Then, even though it was released in May, I did the same thing for The Grass Roots' "Sooner or Later", which reached number 9, but did not hold the position long enough to make the end of year lists or something.

It's not a perfect system.

After finding ten songs from 1970, I wasn't quite ready to start the next thing, but I had been to see ELO and they didn't play three of the songs that I wanted. It was a great show anyway, but I put a little section of ELO as well as an A-ha song to commemorate our whale watching excursion (check the travel blog tomorrow for that!).

Then, because we were doing a lot of cool things in September, and it's an awesome song that I think about far more than I mention, I played that too. 

It was nice having a little section reflecting my life. Perhaps in October I will have a brief section of songs reflecting firefighting, pirates, vampires, and Halloween fun.

1973 – 1970

1973

8/1 “Will It Go Round in Circles” by Billy Preston
8/2 “Little Willy” by Sweet
8/3 “Dancing in the Moonlight” by King Harvest
8/4 “Sing” by The Carpenters
8/5 “Midnight Train to Georgia” by Gladys Knight & the Pips
8/6 “Dueling Banjos” by Eric Weissberg & Steve Mandell
8/7 “Reelin’ in the Years” by Steely Dan
8/8 “Stuck in the Middle with You” by Stealers Wheel 
8/9 “Smoke on the Water” by Deep Purple
8/10 “Higher Ground” by Stevie Wonder

1972

8/11 “Vincent” by Don McLean
8/12 “Alone Again (Naturally)” by Gilbert O’Sullivan
8/13 “Last Night I Didn’t Get to Sleep At All” by The Fifth Dimension
8/14 “Let’s Stay Together” by Al Green
8/15 “I Saw the Light” by Todd Rundgren
8/16 “Back Stabbers” by The O’Jays
8/17 “Doctor My Eyes” by Jackson Browne
8/18 “I’ll Take You There” by The Staple Singers
8/19 “Precious and Few” by Climax
8/20 “Too Late to Turn Back Now” by Cornelius Brothers & Sister Rose

*8/21 ”Baby I’m-a Want You” by Bread
*8/22 ”Sooner or Later” by The Grass Roots

1971

8/23 “Joy to the World” by Three Dog Night
8/24 “Knock Three Times” by Tony Orlando and Dawn
8/25 “What’s Going On” by Marvin Gaye
8/26 “Don’t Pull Your Love” by Hamilton, Joe Frank & Reynolds
8/27 “Theme from Shaft” by Isaac Hayes
8/28 “Stick-Up” by Honey Cone
8/29 “Me and Bobby McGee” by Janis Joplin
8/30 “Love Her Madly” by The Doors
8/31 “I Just Want To Celebrate” by Rare Earth
9/1 “It Don’t Come Easy” by Ringo Starr

1970

9/2 “Bridge Over Troubled Water” by Simon & Garfunkel
9/3 “Hitchin’ A Ride” by Vanity Fare
9/4 “Love Grows (Where My Rosemary Goes)” by Edison Lighthouse
9/5 “All Right Now” by Free
9/6 “Arizona” by Mark Lindsay
9/7 “Fire and Rain” by James Taylor
9/8 “United We Stand” by The Brotherhood of Man
9/9 “I’ll Never Fall In Love Again” by Dionne Warwick
9/10 “Up the Ladder to the Roof” by The Supremes
9/11 “Yellow River” by Christie

+

9/12 “Hold On Tight” by ELO
9/13 “So Serious” by ELO
9/14 “Calling America” by ELO

9/15 “We’re Looking for the Whales” by A-ha

9/16 “September” by Earth, Wind, and Fire

Related posts:

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2024/05/back-to-70s-daily-songs-for-march-and.html 

Unplanned

As I have been reviewing this phase of my life, I keep looking for an organized plan of action for how I am going to contribute to the world: this is what I can do and I am going to do it!

It just isn't gelling.

It could be worse. I mentioned trying to organize keeping in better touch with people. I do not have a plan for that, but I keep making contacts. I see someone's birthday is coming up or a thought crosses my mind. I am probably doing pretty well at staying connected right now.

I also did have one very strong thought regarding working on things for my mother, in that it is important that I don't stop thinking about senior health care when it stops being a personal worry. Someday I will not need to worry about her anymore, but other people will be dealing with the same issues that I have dealt with. I will need to remember that and be a voice regarding that.

(Though I then had a dream where I was yelling at a legislator about children's health care, so I am not sure how broad a scope it will be.)

I am interested in a lot of different issues, and it would not be realistic to work on all of them. I had been hoping that there would be more focus. Maybe it is health care, or maybe it will be more like contacting people, where I will research things and write letters as ideas pop into my head. 

Does that even sound effective?

With days counting down until the election, it seems more important to have a plan and a timeline. If there is any possibility of me exerting a positive influence on that, I should not delay, but is that a possibility?

One thing I do know is that making a better world requires constant effort. Yes, the Democrats have considerable moral high ground over Republicans, but they still essentially adhere to capitalism and corporate interests and supporting institutional power. Not being viciously anti-social is important, but it's not enough.

Thinking about writing letters and pressuring legislators and following information is important, but it only has a chance if Harris wins, and there's a deadline on that. 

It all feels so critical, and here I am not sure what to do. 

I think my problem is that I don't know the future. It will still come. 

Dances of the day, July songs

It started with Tap.

I saw a reference to the movie and looked it up. I knew Gregory Hines was in it, but not that it also had Sammy Davis Jr. and Savion Glover. What an amazing link between generations of tap dancing!

More than I knew.

The challenge scene brings in six other dancers between the ages of 62 and 71, and they are amazing. 

There were also pictures on the walls and in the credits of classic dancers. I was sure the Nicholas Brothers were in those pictures, but did not realize that was Harold Nicholas sliding into and springing up from splits as if no time had passed. I was thinking Stormy Weather was older than it was. It was "only" from 1943.

Harold Nicholas was 68 years old in Tap, 1989. I checked to see and his brother Fayard was still alive. Maybe he wasn't dancing? Well, there is a tribute to dance from 1990 that shows them dancing together, except that Harold tells Fayard to do the splits and Fayard says he won't because it hurts.

I believe him, but based on the level at which he was still moving, if you are a dancer, keep it up. Maybe even try starting now. It seems to do wonders.

Anyway, I started thinking about all of these amazing dance numbers, and decided that would be July's theme. 

There were some difficulties. I couldn't always find the clips that I wanted, of course, but also, choreography can be a tricky thing.

For example, in Stormy Weather, the choreographer is listed as Katherine Dunham. Well, that's fine; I know she choreographed at least one of the numbers and possibly two. I don't believe she choreographed "Jumpin' Jive". I suspect that was mainly the Nicholas brothers themselves, probably with some collaboration with the director and the set. 

In fact, Hines has an "improvographer" credit on Tap, because he was making up some stuff as he went along. That was definitely for himself, but maybe also for others in the Sounds of the Street sequence (for which I really wanted to find a good clip).

Also, with A Chorus Line, the movie choreographer was not the Broadway choreographer, but I have to believe there was an influence. It makes sense to adjust for having a camera; I just wonder about the process.

I wrote notes, sometimes copious, on almost every day... there is too much to say about them, except that I love dance.

Well, I love it when it's good. I was excited around 2006 when two new movies (Take the Lead and Step Up) came out, but they didn't make me want to dance or even buy the soundtracks. A little musicality, please! 

(That is one reason I have no interest in the Magic Mike franchise, though not the only one.)

When it works, it's magic.

Anyway, when a dancer or choreographer or song comes up more than once, I have underlined it. It covers such a wide time period that there aren't a lot of repeats.

Movies are mostly in chronological order, but Strictly Ballroom gave me such difficulty finding clips it ended up out of place. I hated the way the scenes on Youtube were cut, but how can you leave it out?

7/1
“Got a Feeling You're Fooling” from Broadway Melody of 1936 (1935), with choreography by Dave Gould and Albertina Rasch. Performed by Robert Taylor, June Knight, Nick Long Jr., and ensemble
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t29pGYd_X30

7/2
“You Are My Lucky Star” from Broadway Melody of 1936 (1935), with choreography by Dave Gould and Albertina Rasch. Performed by Eleanor Powell, with Roger Edens on piano.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1G9aQEmfyQ

7/3
“Jumpin' Jive” by Cab Calloway from Stormy Weather (1943), with choreography by Katherine Dunham. Performed by the Nicholas Brothers, Fayard and Harold Nicholas.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fNKRm6H-qOU

7/4
Audition scene featuring “Largo Al Factotum” and others from Tonight and Every Night (1945), with choreography by Jack Cole. Danced by Marc Platt.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VSx4fbSUWQ8

7/5
“Good Morning” from Singin' in the Rain (1952), with choreography by Gene Kelly and Stanley Donen. Performed by Gene Kelly, Debbie Reynolds, and Donald O' Connor.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pyMU8O2B2Vs

7/6
“Saturday Afternoon Before the Game” from I Love Melvin (1953), with choreography by Robert Alton. Performed by Debbie Reynolds and ensemble.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NoqdzT95wc4

7/7
“The Barn Dance” from Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (1954), with choreography by Michael Kidd. Performed by ensemble, including Mark Platt.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QbzJtP75NqM

7/8
“Zip” from Pal Joey (1957), with choreography by Robert Alton. Performed by Rita Hayworth.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXr2rbI-qYg

7/9
“Step in Time” from Mary Poppins (1964), with choreography by Marc Breaux. Performed by Julie Andrews, Dick Van Dyke, and ensemble.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSCdFVc6DoY

7/10
“The Laendler” from The Sound of Music (1965), with choreography by Marc Breaux. Performed by Julie Andrews, Christopher Plummer, and Duane Chase.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUFBOC6lQoo

7/11
“Everything Old Is New Again” by Peter Allen from All That Jazz (1979), with choreography by Bob Fosse. Performed by Ann Reinking and Erzsebet Foldi.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRVv2b-hL_0

7/12
“The First Time It Happens” from The Great Muppet Caper (1981), with choreography by Anita Mann. Performed by Miss Piggy, Kermit, and ensemble.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wWSba6qTTGk

7/13
“Footloose” by Kenny Loggins from Footloose (1984), with choreography by Lynne Taylor-Corbett. Performed by ensemble.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-OG0EyJyV8

7/14
“I Can Do That” from A Chorus Line (1985), with choreography by Jeffrey Hornaday (presumably inspired by Michael Bennett). Performed by Charles McGowan (and Greg Burge).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nZRjGKIbfM

7/15
“One” from A Chorus Line (1985), with choreography by Jeffrey Hornaday (presumably inspired by Michael Bennett). Performed by ensemble, including Charles McGowan and Greg Burge.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BrLcbi68R_A

7/16
“Prove Me Wrong” by Robert Plant from White Nights (1985), with choreography by Twyla Tharp. Performed by Gregory Hines and Mikhail Baryshnikov.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImzkWZkaIIM

7/17
“Hands Off” by Maria Vidal, from Once Bitten  (1985), with choreography by Joanne DiVito. Danced by Lauren Hutton, Karen Kopins, and Jim Carrey.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MyPc-1QdzSE

7/18
“Try a Little Tenderness” by Otis Redding from Pretty In Pink (1986), with choreography by Kenny Ortega. Danced by Jon Cryer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CmKckJTwwzs

7/19
“(I’ve Had) The Time Of My Life, by Bill Medley and Jennifer Warnes, from Dirty Dancing (1987), with choreography by Kenny Ortega. Danced by Patrick Swayze, Jennifer Grey, and ensemble.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpmILPAcRQo

7/20
“Challenge Scene” with stop-time piano being played by Henry LeTang from Tap (1989), with choreography from Henry LeTang and Chester A. Whitmore. Danced by Arthur Duncan (64), Bunny Briggs (67), Jimmy Slyde (62), Steve Condos (71), Harold Nicholas (68), Sandman Sims (71), Sammy Davis Jr. (64), and Gregory Hines (43).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Zd6GnFCfck

7/21
“Shall We Dance” sung by Taeko Ônuki, from Shall We Dansu? (1996), with choreography by Toshio Watari. Danced by ensemble.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=487Ps-TBKN0

7/22
“Fiesta Pa'Los Rumberos” by Albita from Dance With Me (1998), with choreography by Daryl Matthews. Danced by Vanessa Williams, Chayanne, and ensemble.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-gMGPbPCoo

7/23
“Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps” by Doris Day, from Strictly Ballroom (1992), with choreography by John “Cha Cha” O’Connell. Danced by Paul Mercurio and Tara Morice.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IzOtTXOVc9A

7/24
“Tango a Trio”, from Tango (1998), with choreography by Carlos Rivarola and Ana Maria Stekelman. Danced by Cecilia Narova, Mia Maestro, and Juan Carlos Copes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sP8I8NIoAqI

7/25
Final dance, with excerpts from “The Way You Make Me Feel” by Michael Jackson; Mendelssohn’s “Symphony No. 4 in A, Opus 90”; “If I Was the One” by Ruff Endz; Tchaikovsky’s “The Nutcracker” and “Sleeping Beauty, Opus 66”; “We’re Dancing” by P.Y.T.; and “Canned Heat” by Jamiroquai; from Center Stage (2000), with choreography by Susan Stroman. Danced by Amanda Schull, Ethan Stiefel, Sascha Radetsky, and ensemble.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uywJ9hNa0fs

7/26
“Canned Heat” by Jamiroquai from Napoleon Dynamite (2004). Choreographed and danced by Jon Heder.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BiAwpYIkRmU

7/27
“You Can’t Stop the Beat” from Hairspray (2009) with choreography by Adam Shankman. Danced by ensemble including Zac Efron.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZnt-0fEiT0

7/28
“You Make My Dreams Come True” by Hall & Oates from 500 Days of Summer (2009), with choreography by Michael Rooney. Danced by Joseph Gordon-Levitt and ensemble
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2VGpqq2-I8

7/29
“Dirty Tap Dancing” from The Artist (2011), with choreography by Fabien Ruiz. Performed by Jean Dujardin and Bérénice Bejo.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EC20KdIDiEY

7/30
“Rewrite the Stars” from The Greatest Showman (2017), with choreography by Ashley Wallen. Performed by Zac Efron and Zendaya
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yO28Z5_Eyls

7/31
“Rain on the Roof” from Paddington 2 (2017), with choreography by Craig Revel Horwood. Sung and danced by Hugh Grant and ensemble.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=reyeX6ajeUw
 

Student overachiever

I tend to impose a lot on myself; I always know that there is more that can be done, and I can think of ways to move things to a higher level.

It is no surprise that I am doing this with school. Naturally, I think my ways of being extra make perfect sense and are quite wise.

It really comes down to three things in general (though as I make decisions on prepping for my first proctored examination, there may be some extra-ness there too).

The first thing to know that may help all of this make sense is that my degree plan consists of twelve classes, taken consecutively. (I have passed the first class, and have scheduled the final assessment for the second class for Thursday). 

My goals are basically focused around those twelve classes. Obviously I want (and need) to pass each class. In addition, for each class I am thinking of three things.

Interview one person connected with the industry (Education and Instructional Design).

Almost as soon as I announced that I was pursuing this degree, friends were letting me know contacts they had that did training. I also know many teachers, whom I believe will  have good insight.

I have interviewed one person. She was previously unknown to me, and is probably a good contact to have.

Now, is the more important part of this goal getting insights from other people or making new contacts so that I will have a network in place by the time I am a recent college graduate?

I don't know. I mean, I suppose I could add some contacts without interviewing them.

Either way, I need to make my second contact soon.

Read additional material.

From my undergraduate work, I can think of at least three textbooks where we were only assigned some of the chapters but I read all of them.

I am not saying I will do that with everything we read a portion of; that would be completely impractical. However, sometimes there are books that are referenced that seem like they could be valuable. Reading books comes very naturally to me.

For Learning Technology, it was Metaphors We Live By, by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson. It was a bit repetitive (as philosophical works of language tend to be) but the ideas were pretty interesting.

Now, for Assessment and Learning Analytics, I have requested Universal Design for Learning: Theory and Practice, by Anne Meyer.

It seems like a safe bet that each class will mention at least one title that I will think is interesting. Of course, that will tend to put me further behind on my other intended reading, but I want to know that I am really getting this material, and not just scraping by.

Building a portfolio.

This was a suggestion from my first interview, so that I have a body of work demonstrating that I can do things. 

In this case, I am not planning on one per class, which I suspect will not be practical. Well, if some of the position papers will count, then maybe I will have twelve, but this is the area where my ideas are the least solid. Some of the coming classes will have projects that lend themselves very well. I will need to see as I go.

Right now my main project is cleaning my room. For the proctored exam, there is an extent to which it needs to be clear you are not trying to cheat by leaving notes and reminders around. I am almost certainly taking it to neurotic extremes.

Plus, there is this other area. I will get to that next Tuesday. 

Summer Reading Challenges!

On the same day I found summer reading challenges from both the local library (Aloha) and the local book store (Powell's). 

I have a hard time resisting a challenge. I also had lots of other things to read, but there were some of them that I could make fit.

I completed both, though a lot of the books were disappointing.

Powell's challenge was set up like a Bingo card: 25 spaces with different requirements, though the middle space was free. Well, "free" meant that that it could be any type of book, not that a blackout was really only 24 books. 

The library had three rows of four books. Combined that would have been a total of 37, but some did double duty. I also read some books that didn't fit anywhere. (There were about twenty of those, though most of them were children's books and some comics.)

They are all listed below with some notes, and I have underlined the books that did double duty.

The most important thing came up with reading a friend's favorite book. I put out an open call on Facebook, sure that I was going to get Outlander. (I did not.)

Nine friends responded. Most of them responded with multiple books, though that wasn't a surprise. 

Remember, I am trying to connect more. I picked a book (the shortest one), but it did not feel like enough. 

Anyway, my Book Sections document has a new column: Friends. 

I will get to them all. Will we then meet and discuss the book? What if I didn't like it? I don't know. I am just reading more books, knowing that they have meaning to people I know.

As always, you can find more on Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/1734486-gina?shelf=read

Aloha Community Library Adult Summer Reading Challenge

Read a non-fiction book: Fevered Lives: Tuberculosis in American Culture since 1870 by Katharine Ott (6/18-6/22)

This was referenced in a book from my 2017 Native American Heritage Month reading, Separate Beds by Maureen Lux. I felt like there was a lot more to know about tuberculosis, but not from this book, which meanders painfully and inconclusively.

Read a book adapted into movie or TV show: The Egg and I by Betty McDonald (7/10-7/12)

I originally got this because it was a Pacific Northwest author, and I liked Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle. I kind of don't anymore, which is sad. I tried watching the movie, and it was even worse.

Read a book by an Oregon author: Before They Were Artists: Famous Illustrators As Kids by Elizabeth Haidle (8/4-8/7)

This was just luck. I am slowly working my way through the works of illustrator Jerry Pinkney. This was pretty well-done, and gave me a new illustrator to look up (Yuyi Morales), but also Haidle is based in Portland.

Read a book of poetry: Tripas Poems by Brandon Som (7/14-7/15)

Som could fit into two different heritage months, but when I needed a prize-winner for Powell's, I found him as this year's winner of the Pulitzer for Poetry.

Read a book set in another country (Denmark and Australia): The Seven Skins of Esther Wilding by Holly Ringland (8/4-8/7)

This had struck my interest for a mention of grief, but it was overly precious bloviating with some really unhealthy relationships. It did show me how much easier it is to write expound on what you don't like about a book, which is a little disappointing.

Read a book with a one-word title: Rifqa by Mohammed El-Kurd (8/5-8/8)

This is from https://images.dawn.com/news/1192543, 20 books for you to read about Palestine. I am only at 4. Feelings run deep.

Read a book by an indigenous author: Becoming Kin: An Indigenous Call to Unforgetting the Past and Reimagining the Future by Patty Krawec (8/20-8/21)

This was one of my favorites from the challenge. It was one of three books that Julie got off of a list and wanted to read herself, but assumed I would too. This added extra pressure to my reading goals, but two of them met challenge requirements, and this one was good. Recommended.

Read a book translated from its original language (from German): Heidi by Johanna Spyri (8/26-8/27)

This is an old favorite, my equivalent of a "cozy" book. The other option was Jane of Lantern Hill, but that was written in English.

Read a book recommended by a friend or family member (my friend Cathy): An Italian Education by Tim Parks (7/4-7/10) 

Parks is more unaware of his sense of British superiority than I can be, which was annoying. However, it was set in places that were familiar to me, which was interesting. It had also been on my Italy reading list.

Read a book with a color in its title: Acting White: The Curious History of a Racial Slur by Ron Christie (7/20-7/24)

This was on my Black History month reading list. I wish I could remember why I added it, because it was terrible. He starts with Maxine Waters criticizing his political choices, leaving him grievously martyred for his principles, which makes me love her more. For all the cherry picking of what to include, he should have been able to make a point that at least looked stronger.

Read a book with an unreliable narrator: We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson (8/9-8/10)

I could not think of anything with an unreliable narrator on my existing reading list, but an internet search brought this up. Shirley Jackson is a good writer, generally about unpleasant things. I may decide to just read everything I haven't read by her someday, maybe next October.

Read a book by a debut author: The Viral Underclass: The Human Toll When Inequality and Disease Collide by Steven W. Thrasher (6/17-6/21)

This was mentioned in my spotlight on Alice Wong, but also really well-written with important things to know. Recommended. 

Powell's Summer Reading Challenge

Banned/Challenged: On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong (6/29-7/2)

This could go with my Pride reading and it was mentioned with my APAHM reading. His prose is poetic, but it is also bleak. 

Award Winner (2024 Pulitzer Prize Winner in Poetry): Tripas Poems by Brandon Som (7/14-7/15)  

Also under the library challenge. I should mention it's pretty good too. In some ways it reminds me of Gloria Anzaldúa's writing.

Released in 2024: My Black Country: A Journey Through Country Music's Black Past, Present, and Future by Alice Randall (6/10-6/17)

This really enriched my Black Music Month listening and taught me a lot. Recommended.

Funny: Yellowface by R.F. Kuang (8/22-8/23)

Maria saw this recommended and requested it for me, even though I had decided not to read it. It is well-written, and I guess it's funny in a dark way, but it makes me glad I am not trying to publish anymore, and think even worse of Yale.

BIPOC Author/Protagonist: The Viral Underclass: The Human Toll When Inequality and Disease Collide by Steven W. Thrasher (6/17-6/21)

Also under the library challenge. Recommended.

An old favorite: Heidi by Johanna Spyri (8/26-8/27)

See under the library challenge.

Graphic Novel: The Magic Fish by Trung Le Nguyen (6/22-6/23)

This came up as a suggestion under some things for Pride reading. The art is beautiful, and looking at traditional tales with their similarities and differences was interesting. I did want to slap a priest.

Non-Human Protagonist: School for Extraterrestrial Girls #1: Girl On Fire by Jeremy Whitley and Jamie Noguchi (7/26-7/27)

This was from https://bookriot.com/underrated-graphic-novels/ and really good. I may check out the rest of the series. (Although this list also recommended Cosmic Pizza Party and that was just really for kids. Sometimes when they say for kids AND adults, they are wrong.)

Disabled Author/Protagonist: Say Hello by Carly Findlay (6/23-6/27)

Findlay has ichthyosis. A lot of my reading this was remembering this girl I knew in the dorms, and realizing I had not known much about her condition. I hope she is doing well.

PNW Author: The Egg and I by Betty McDonald (7/10-7/12)

Can see under library challenge, but it was not great.

Not "Your Style": Acting White: The Curious History of a Racial Slur by Ron Christie (7/20-7/24)

Can see under library challenge, but it was not great. 

Poetry: Rifqa by Mohammed El-Kurd (8/5-8/8)

Can see under library challenge. It was good, and it is important to know more about Palestine. 

Your Choice: We Are Not Free by Traci Chee (6/22-6/24)

This came up as a suggestion looking at things related to interment of Japanese-Americans in WWII. It was really good. 

A Friend's Favorite Book (Casey): Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck (8/12-8/13)

There are things I don't like about it, but it gave me another view on Steinbeck that helped clarify some things for me about other works I have read.

Set in the Summer: The Seven Skins of Esther Wilding by Holly Ringland (8/4-8/7)

Can see under library challenge, but it was not great. 

Written before you were born (1951): The Sea Around Us by Rachel Carson (7/12-8/2)        

I wanted to love this, but it was a bit too ponderous. That could be easy to blame on the ocean itself for being so vast and mysterious. There is some of the beauty of Silent Spring, but it gets weighed down.

Nonfiction/Based on true events: Fevered Lives: Tuberculosis in American Culture since 1870 by Katharine Ott (6/18-6/22)

Can see under library challenge, but it was not great. 

Book with red on the cover: Clockwork Curandera #1: The Witch Owl Parliament by David Bowles, Raúl the III, Stacey Robinson (7/2-7/3)

This was from a different list of comic recommendations, https://bookriot.com/most-underrated-comics-according-to-goodreads/?utm_source=pocket-newtab-en-us. While I am sure I will read more on the list, I thought this one sucked. Unbelievable characters and dialogue and too much telling instead of showing. For all of the steampunk/magic/alternative history, it really shouldn't be so flat.

Set in Oregon: The Enduring Legacy of Portland's Black Panthers: The Roots of Free Healthcare, Free Breakfast, and Neighborhood Control in Portland by Joe Biel (8/15-8/22)

I read an article about this and bought the book, but hadn't gotten around to reading it yet. It's a little amateurish, but there were some good sources listed, including a graphic novel about the Black Panthers that I will probably read this weekend.

Mystery/Adventure: Escape from Camp 14: One Man's Remarkable Odyssey from  North Korea to Freedom in the West by Blaine Harden (8/23-8/25)

I have had this on my APAHM reading list for quite a while, but decided to get to it before writing up this last round because of another book, A River in Darkness. That was also about an escape from North Korea. That escapee had not been in a prison, except to the extent that the entire country is a prison which it kind of is. Harden's book is pretty good but also frustrating.

Memoir/Biography: Gentle on my Mind: In Sickness and Health with Glen Campbell by Kim Campbell (8/25-8/29)

I stumbled across a music video that led to a documentary that led to this book, due to my very personal interest in dementia. An easy (and very religious) read about a hard subject.

Has magic in it: The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna (7/16-7/18)

This was the library's September selection for their Shameless Romance Book Club. Given that, it was pretty fun and only a little annoying. Faint praise, but praise nonetheless.

About love or friendship: Three Keys: A Front Desk Novel by Kelly Yang (7/28-7/29)

A sequel to a book that came from reading challenged books, but also fit with APAHM reading. I enjoy Yang's writing in general, and sometimes when something seems unrealistic, it turns out it really happened.

Set in a place you've never been to (Bhutan): Radio Shangri-La: What I Learned in Bhutan, the Happiest Kingdom on Earth by Lisa Napoli (8/8-8/11) 

Pretty interesting, but a smidge self-satisfied, and didn't really tell me as much about Bhutan as I'd hoped when I put it on my APAHM list.

 A how-to book: The Intersectional Environmentalist: How to Dismantle Systems of Oppression to Protect People + Planet by Leah Thomas (8/13-8/15)

This was from the same list as Becoming Kin. The problem was that it (and the one that didn't fit, Emergent Strategy, Brown) is that it seems to be written for the Tumblr/oral history generation, where things shift back and forth and repeat and might even have a strobe effect. It makes some good points, but it probably makes them better to someone younger than me.

More aware

Over the last two weeks I have sent cards and Facebook messages and texts and made a phone call. It was more social contact than than usual, but it didn't happen in any organized manner. I kept remembering different people and things I wanted to say, then doing it.

My caring about people isn't new, but there is something that has changed. It's a culmination of a few things.

On the last weekend in July, my sisters and I went to Bend to see the Stray Cats concert. This story branches in two directions.

First of all, we loved the concert. I have always liked the band, but going to concerts was a really big deal when I was young. I went to a total of three before I turned 18. I absolutely needed to see Charlie Sexton, A-ha, and the Monkees, and was lucky they came here.

I have seen many bands from the 80s later, but they are getting older now (so have I). A few are too frail, or have developed conditions like tinnitus, or have died. When we look at different bands coming, we have to keep in mind that this may be the last chance to see them. Maybe there will be other chances, but we don't know. I had tickets to Modern English a while back, but it was canceled when one of the band members needed surgery.

One drawback with the concert was that the air was very smoky. It was getting worse, and there had been some talk of evacuations. If the concert had been a few days later, I can imagine it being canceled or at least postponed. It's not just the health of the band, but of the planet.

Nonetheless, this concert happened, and it turns out I had a friend there. We ran into each other the next morning. I realized I had not seen her in person since around 2012, when we saw the Gin Blossoms together.

I had been thinking about all of these things, and then the other thing happened.

A different friend holds a get-together at the beach every year. It was the same weekend as the concert. 

I obviously couldn't go, but if I am not going somewhere with my sisters and it's not easily accessible by Trimet, I probably can't go. Getting other rides might be possible, but it's embarrassing not driving and hard depending on other people and I just don't.

Another friend who generally does go died right before, but I found out right after. I don't know if anyone else was expecting it, but I sure wasn't. 

Two days after I learned that, a different person from school died, though not one I had known.

I remember years ago thinking that when someone my age dies it feels wrong, but there will probably come a time when it becomes more normal, and you are more aware of your own mortality. 

This might be an in-between stage. These deaths do still feel wrong, but not as shockingly wrong. I am not feeling death creeping closer to me, but there is a growing awareness that I just don't know how long I have with anyone.

It is easy to put things off anyway. I am tired all of the time, and I still have this tendency to hunker down for the difficult times to pass, and then it will be easier to reach out. 

For example, I had chatted with someone about getting together, and was going to suggest a date, but then the thing with trying to find a new PCP for Mom happened and that was really distracting me.

The problem is that the difficult times don't pass. They shift into different difficult times, but there is always going to be some reason to wait. 

My big change is a new awareness not to wait.

APAHM 2024 Hodgepodge

This is mostly a conclusion, with two clarifications.

Even though one of the great things about catching up this year has been clearing out columns, I am leaving the books that relate to difficult parental relationships. I don't seem to be done with that yet, or it is not done with me. 

I don't know if I will put it off all the way until next May, but I hope to have it done by Father's Day 2025 for sure.

In addition, I am going to get a few one-off posts out of the way before doing the spotlight on George Takei, which I want to do right before I start blogging about the Pride reading. 

So other than those two exceptions, this is what was left in my Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month reading.

Fiction I didn't like very much:

The Book of M by Peng Shepherd
Yellowface by R. F. Kuang
The Descendants by Kaui Hart Hemmings

It's probably me, and maybe it's fiction, though I used to read so much of it. 

Of them, The Book of M was the most gripping, I have to admit that Yellowface was entertaining (though also bleak), and whatever weaknesses the movie version of The Descendents had, the book was worse.

I may just not fit into contemporary fiction, and I may be okay with that.

Getting out of North Korea:

A River in Darkness: One Man's Escape From North Korea by Masaji Ishikawa
Escape From Camp 14: One Man's Remarkable Odyssey from North Korea to Freedom in the West by Blaine Harden

I resent bleakness more in fiction, because then it's a choice, though there are times when it is important for what needs to be said. In non-fiction, it can be very powerful.

Looking inside North Korea is horrifying, but it's important to know, even if it feels like an area where there is not much that outsiders can do. For both escapees, one of the key indicators that they had crossed into China was the presence of dogs; pets can exist when everyone is not starving.

I toyed with the idea of putting these with immigration, but it feels like a very different focus, and with different results. The source of Harden's books spends a lot of time in China and South Korea before coming to the States. Ishikawa had been in Japan, then his Korean family went back after being recruited, which later turned out to be a bad idea. After getting out, Ishikawa returned to Japan.

Doing things differently:

The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo 
The One-Straw Revolution: An Introduction to Natural Farming by Masanobu Fukuoka  

I have referenced Kondo's writing a lot (though more from when I read the manga). I'll link to a couple at the end.

Fukuoka was new to me. I had read related things, but this was the first with an Eastern focus. It was really interesting, especially his path to natural farming. 

I was horrified that he killed an entire orchard his first year, but it is kind of a testament that you can recover, even from massive failure. The land can recover too. (Those specific trees may not.)

Memoir and Biography:

I am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban by Malala Yousafzhai and Christina Lamb
Radio Shangri-La: What I Learned in Bhutan, the Happiest Kingdom on Earth by Lisa Napoli
Heartbeat of Struggle: The Revolutionary Life of Yuri Kochiyama by Diane Fujino

There was also a children's book about Fujino, but it is worth reading the full biography. I read this close to when I also read a short bio on Dolores Huerta. As different as their lives were, there were ways in which they reminded me of each other.

History:

The Great Divergence: China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy by Kenneth Pomeranz
The Comfort Women: Japan's Brutal Regime of Enforced Prostitution in the Second World War  by George L. Hicks
Reel Inequality: Hollywood Actors and Racism by Nancy Wang Yuen

The Great Divergence is an attempt to bring together a large body of scholarship on economics. This may sound boring. It kind of is. However, if you are the kind of person that would read such a thing, knowing that there will be significant dry patches, it does a good job.

The other two are interesting because they are both about things that are unpleasant, where people will often be uncomfortable with the subject matter and try to avoid having the conversation. They are two wildly different conversations, but ones where prejudice and dehumanization play a role.

I always want to know, and then I want to fight it.

And now we move on, though it is not impossible that I will reference some of these books as I write about myself on Tuesday posts.

Related posts:

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2021/09/books-come-together.html

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2021/09/expanding-gratitude.html

Regrouping

I thought I was going to write about healthcare, but I am having a hard time concentrating on it. 

My state of mind is kind of off and I am trying to get back on track.

Part of it is that there were three big weights on me. 

I was giving a talk in church, and thinking about that a lot in the time leading up to it. That was resolved about two weeks ago.. 

I also found that as a returning student, getting back into the swing of writing papers was harder than I thought. I admit overthinking was a part of that, which is such a core part of me.

I had to write four papers for the first class. For the first one, just getting started was a struggle. Eventually I got it submitted and it passed. 

A lot of photos and video clips get captioned that someone "understood the assignment". 

It took me longer than it should have to understand the second assignment. First I missed that we had switched from writing about types of technology to specific tools. Then, once I got that down and made my recommendation, I did not give reasons for it. I thought that from the paragraphs leading up to it the choice was obvious; that is so me! However, when they are grading you on your ability to make a reasoned argument, you need to complete the argument. 

Actually, the third went pretty well, but then I struggled with the fourth, possibly because of the third weight.

It was really difficult finding a new PCP for Mom.

That is something else healthcare related, so you can see how that would be on my mind. At that point, it was just one more thing. Finding someone who could meet her specific needs in the near future, rather than 4-6 months out, was not easy. 

There had been on potential solution that seemed like it was going to work, and then it fell apart a few days before the first appointment. There are a lot of ways in which being a senior works better, because there are good things about Medicare. For the things that don't work well, there is a lot of regulation surrounding it. 

Anyway, for a few weeks I was struggling with those three things and getting really frustrated with myself for not concentrating better or just being able to get these stupid things done. 

Then they got done, and now I am kind of dazed.

There's plenty of other things to do, but I still need to refocus. 

(Also, I am tired, but at this point that's a personality trait.)

For some things, I know I just need to keep plugging along. For others I need to change habits, which is difficult, but I at least know what I need to do; it is just a matter of doing it.

Then there are other things where I really don't know.

The Immigrant Experience: APAHM 2024

As mentioned in the overview, there is blurring of the categories; that is especially true with immigration. 

From movies, YA and graphic novels, Picture Bride, Front Desk, Children of the River, Family Style, and The Best We Could Do contain details of coming over, while many others at least reference aspects that relate to being here after that move.

For example, in the To All the Boys movies, Laura Jean and her sisters have all been born in the United States. Their Korean-American mother is dead, but they still participate in traditional celebrations and they visit Korea in the final movie.

It makes sense that immigration comes up. It does seem like it was a little more this year, but that may just be due to the extended time period. There was also a lot of variety.

Here are the books intended for an adult audience that dealt with immigration. While all are to the Americas, that does not necessarily mean the United States.

Coolie Woman: The Odyssey of Indenture by Gaiutra Bahadur

Bahadur's great-grandmother went from India to Guiana as an indentured servant. This is a story about one family, but also the other women who came alone, and the experiences they had.

Unfortunately there are many questions that Bahadur raises but cannot answer. Sometimes starting that research can lead to other people getting farther, so it is worth the effort, but there are some frustrations because of that.

The Concubine's Children by Denise Chong

This one was a little more satisfying, though you do get a real idea of the difficulty of immigration and family separation. 

In this case, Chong's grandfather came from China to Canada, leaving his first wife there to tend the home, and taking a concubine to help as he earned money. On one trip back to China he took his two elder daughters, and they remained in China with their half-brother. The third daughter born after remained in Canada. There was a separation between those children that lasted for decades, along with additional issues with their mother's disappointment in them all being girls.

Fresh Off the Boat: A Memoir by Eddie Huang

This one almost went into the complicated parental relationships category. It is pretty entertaining, but there is a lot of anger and things to be disturbed about. I suspect that was less of a factor in the sitcom.

On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong

Night Sky With Exit Wounds by Ocean Vuong 

Night Sky is poetry and On Earth is very poetic prose, and they are both powerful and very painful. 

I preferred the poems, as sometimes the fiction in On Earth feels too depressingly real.

The thing that might make sense to write about as well are the differences in being a refuge from other types of immigration, which can be very hard. Vuong seems to locate so much misery, often locally grown, that it's like it all flows together.

He declares himself a monster, along with his mother, but they are really only human. 

Things that worked

Finally, right? I know.

When I was laid off in 2016, it was because my work was being outsourced to India (even though they said they were only going to send overflow there, and that we were safe).

Because of that, I was eligible for training through the Trade Act. I could go back to school. Unfortunately, that was just at the point in our mother's dementia where she was still better off staying in the home but could not be left alone.

That had come up through regular job hunting, as leaving for job interviews required getting other people to stay with Mom. I had thought that if I could find another telecommuting job maybe I could make it work, but it was clear that was going to be unworkable by the time I was contacted about the Trade Act.

Getting my school paid for felt like it should be a dream come true, but it would have required spending hours away at a time. I couldn't do it.

One of the most comforting things about Mom's disease is that we have consistently done the right thing for her, and we have known what to do as that has changed. It takes frequent adjustments and we are trying to figure out a new situation now, but overall, I can live with myself on that count. That's really important. 

It was still a little disappointing then. 

Among the options I had down to investigate after quitting, one of them was whether I still had any Trade Act eligibility. 

That was more important in light of my results in checking out one of the things I had looked into: school.

That thing where I kind of want to know and understand everything (while acknowledging its impossibility) has been around for a while, but it had shifted in the past few years. 

As I found that knowing some things helped me understand other things better, and discovered interesting connections between different areas, I started thinking about how to facilitate knowledge. 

It wasn't just about academics, but also the world around us. There is science in personal hygiene and cooking and cleaning. Things that people used to learn at home weren't necessarily being taught there anymore. Or learning things about other countries can teach a lot about democracy and what is bad for it and what is good for it, but often we only learn out own history and government. Then if you focus on standardized testing, there may be a limit to how much students engage with that.

A lot of current reading problems kind of make kids hate reading.

So I would keep making mental notes on things and ruminating on that. In my mind it was becoming an interest in curriculum design. I didn't really have any concrete plans for it yet, figuring that would be easier to pursue when I was further along in my quest for more (but not really "all") knowledge. 

Then a friend mentioned that Western Governors has a program for that.

It was just one of the ideas that I had down to investigate, but I did go through the application process and someone actually called me while I was filling it out.

Sure, that seems a little aggressive, but then it ended up being very supportive. 

I was admitted and Trade Act came through and is paying my tuition. I will complete my Masters in Education and Instructional Design in early 2026.

That feels pretty cool.

It doesn't solve everything, because I still need to figure out living expenses during that time period, but it is the one thing that really feels like progress.

The other thing that works out is that I have health care through the Oregon Health Plan.

Now, I could not get it started online and needed to call, but nonetheless it worked. That is really important.

There are many issues with health care that I have alluded to in reference to my job, and that may be its own post, but I'll tell you one thing that helps is that OHP actually wants people to have health care. They know it ultimately costs more to withhold it, while causing irreparable harm.

There might be things we can learn from that. 

Children's books for APAHM 2024

As with the graphic novels, the extended time period led to a lot of books with no evident theme. I have broken these down into categories that mostly make sense.

For the upcoming (September 17th) Mid-Autumn Festival:

Mooncakes by Loretta Seto and Renné Benoit 

The Moon Lady by Amy Tan and Gretchen Shields

These were both fine. I didn't want to read them again and again or anything. However, both give different looks at the festival, both in different eras and locations but also in terms of size. In this case, we are only a month away, so it is something to think about. 

I would say for appreciating the festival, I got more out of the Mooncakes graphic novel by Suzanne Walker, but that's a different age group and focus.

Prominent figures:

Brush of the Gods by Lenore Look and Meilo So 

Shapes, Lines, and Light: My Grandfather's American Journey by Katie Yamasaki

The Bridges Yuri Built: How Yuri Kochiyama Marched Across Movements by Kai Naima Williams and Anastasia M. Williams

The best of these was probably Brush of the Gods.

There is a lot more to learn about Yuri Kochiyama, but the nice thing about this book is that it can provide an early introduction.

This is perhaps a minor quibble for Shapes, Lines, and Light, but the art needed to be a little stronger and it would have really helped. That being said, it could make a good companion to Curve & Flow, about Black architect Paul R. Williams. Both Williams and Yamasaki persevered and excelled, and how many children's books about architects are there?

Stories of World War II:

My Lost Freedom: A Japanese American World War II Story by George Takei and Michelle Lee

Yukie's Island: My Family's World War II Story by Yukie Kimura, Kodo Kimura, and Steve Sheinkin

Write to Me: Letters from Japanese American Children to the Librarian They Left Behind by Cynthia Grady and Amika Hirao

So Far From the Sea by Eve Bunting and Chris K. Soentpiet

Yukie's Island is actually set in Japan, so that's an interesting perspective. 

Write to Me was my favorite. It features kindness and reminds us that there can be many ways to help if we will care.

With My Lost Freedom, again, the graphic novel is better, but it's got a different target.

Older stories:

The Fire Keeper's Son by Linda Sue Park and Julie Downing

The Runaway Dosa by Suma Subramaniam and Parvati Pillai

These are completely different, giving a look at the military alert system in imperial China in one and many characters from the lore of India in the other.

In case it is not obvious, The Runaway Dosa is very much like The Gingerbread Man. I have also seen a version with tortillas, but generally these stories will give you rhymes and motivation to try different foods.

Stories to help:

Eyes that Kiss in the Corners by Joanna Ho and Dung Ho

The Phone Booth in Mr. Hirota's Garden by Heather Smith and Rachel Wada

Eyes that Kiss is a very gentle look at differences. It doesn't start with teasing or anything; just a noticing of a difference, treated poetically and with love.

The Phone Booth is a grief book; like most of them, it hurts. They are also sometimes very necessary.

Like some other stories, a physical item helps with the emotional pain.

Even worse

This next experience was the least personal, but also the most discouraging.

Back in June, I saw a flier about a Free Food Market:

https://www.hillsboro-oregon.gov/Home/Components/News/News/14606/4300 

I thought it was a great thing, especially in not requesting ID or means testing. 

Do a search at https://foodfinder.oregonfoodbank.org/ and you will find many places that have severely limited hours or require appointments or that specify limited selection. I don't want to knock anyone's efforts, but the closer you are to the edge, the fewer obstacles you can navigate.

This seemed like a good addition (especially being so close to the train) but not one that applied to me.

I got a strong sense that I needed to check it out.

I didn't want to. We were fine for food; this should be for people that had an actual need.

My not wanting to go was increased by a lively discussion we'd recently had about needs and resources.

Someone who complains a lot complained about rising grocery costs to someone solution-oriented, so was offered a grocery order filled by our church. They wondered if we would want part of it, though they phrased it in such a convoluted matter that it was not immediately clear what was being asked. No! What is wrong with you?

That made the thought of visiting any food bank feel even more wrong, but the thought wouldn't go away.

I hemmed and hawed about it until it was actually too late to go to the June date. The feeling did not go away, and now I needed to wait a month.

Fine, I was committed to going to the July one. It ended up being a very hot day. Did I really need to see it so much I needed to ride Tri-met in that weather? There was at least a solution for that, in that Julie agreed to drive me. 

As we were leaving, Maria called on her lunch break. I referred back to my attempts to explore...

"How the system screws you?"

"Well, this is supposed to be about how it helps you," I replied, but not as confidently as one would hope.

I was still worrying about taking something someone else needed, but how in some ways just going and looking could be even worse and make people feel scrutinized. In truth, I did not need to worry.

On the way I kept looking at people waiting for buses and walking in the heat. The high was forecast for 103 degrees. It wasn't there yet, but it was on the way.

Missing the June date gave me much worse weather. The other thing I did wrong was I had not written down the address. I was fairly familiar with those offices from some training I had taken. Of course, there is more than one office, but I had not worried about it too much. Two mistakes, perhaps, but I think I got a fuller picture.

It made sense to me that it would be the entry that handled food stamps. There were two workers, but one was doing something on her computer and said I could go to the other window or wait. At the other window, a woman was trying to help a non-native English speaker, and it was going to take a while.

I looked for signage, or people coming and going with bags, but didn't see anything. 

Finally, the woman who was not on the computer was done. I asked her where the Free Food Market was.

"Oh. Is that today?"

Well, it was the second Tuesday...

That was in another building in the next parking lot, but she did point the right direction.

Let me just say, if this is where people needing food assistance go, that could be helpful information to have on signs and to have the staff up-to-date on details.

Let me also say that it was not the next parking lot, but two over. However, the actual "next" parking lot was clearly under construction, so that was not a big deal.

Let us also remember that the market runs from 1:30 to 3:30. When I got back to the car the second time, it was 1:59. That part did not take very long, because before I reached the doorway someone leaving told me that they were out of food. They only had diapers and some other non-food item that I didn't quite hear.

As we were pulling in, I did see one couple walking away with one bag; that might have been the last of the food.

Perhaps I should have gone inside anyway, but I felt like I had seen what I needed to see.

We were fortunate. I was returning to an air-conditioned car where we could quickly drive to our air-conditioned home, that did have plenty of food, even though I am unemployed. I imagined someone busing there in the high heat, and enduring because they did have empty cupboards, and then finding nothing. 

I know that we need to do better.

But also, for the people who believe that there are all these programs that put lazy people on easy street, and that there are programs to help everyone except white men... all of the racist, sexist, hateful lies that get told are just that: Lies.

You know the main factor that makes things easy? Money. A system that keeps consolidating wealth will continue spreading misery. A scattering of people with good intentions is insufficient for that. 

Graphic novels for APAHM 2024

Remember, the reading for this round mostly goes back to 2021. Over that time period, I came across a lot of graphic novels. I liked most of them. Well, I guess it was really just the one that I didn't.

Golden Kamuy by Satoru Noda

I read this one because of a reference to an Ainu character, Asirpa. I don't generally hear much about indigenous Japanese, so that seemed worth checking out.

While it would be easy to root for Asirpa herself, really the series is about blood, revenge, and tattoos leading to treasure, which is just the motivation that some people need to kill and skin other people. There is a gory ruthlessness that I can't enjoy. I may read more about Ainu people, but I won't be this way.

Shadow of the Batgirl, by Sarah Kuhn and Nicole Goux, is very much a good but normal offering in terms of the Bat-family. That's not an insult. As it was, I think I read it because Cassandra Cain was featured in the Birds of Prey movie, and it is how I found I Love You So Mochi, so that was a good service to me. However, one's feelings about superhero comics will probably have a bigger impact on desire to read this than anything I can say. This includes feelings about DC versus Marvel and specific feelings about the Bat-family.

Hungry Ghost by Victoria Yang led me to even more books when I was searching for it at the library, which led to some Halloween-themed reading. That's because "hungry ghost" is a thing, but it is not what this book is about.

Instead, it was an uncomfortable but ultimately affirming story about a girl struggling with an eating disorder, largely due to her mother's obsession. The grace she is able to find for her mother surprised me, but may have been part of what made it feel so hopeful.

For other books geared toward teenagers, Mooncakes by Suzanne Walker, Wendy Xu, and Joamette Gil gives you the magical and possibly sweeter, but Himawari House by Harmony Becker is a bit more bittersweet and realistic, as various transplanted students try and find their way.

It's okay; it's not like you have to choose.

Speaking of difficult realism, Talk To My Back by Yamada Murasaki kind of takes the issues of The Feminine Mystique to '80s Tokyo. There are no easy solutions for Chiharu, but I remember one of the points that stuck with me -- and nothing has changed my mind -- is that the deference and coddling that goes to men does not make them happier or better.

The Only Child by Guojing has its own magic, but it is based in a harsh reality, that the one child policy and the Chinese economy left a lot of lonely children. It is still a beautiful, practically wordless book. In that way it reminds me of The Arrival, but is its own, beautiful, thing.

I had mentioned earlier that across the categories of types of books, there were many about the immigrant experience.

Papaya Salad by Elisa Macellari may be the least obviously so. The granddaughter could easily be simply Italian, as that is where she and her parents live. Her grandfather even spent time in Europe, but family visits keep the connection across countries.

Much of the narration is built around meals, for both the sharing and the preparation. That is also a pattern in Family Style by Thien Pham.

Here the food is strongly associated with memories of escaping Vietnam, running a cooking stand in the refugee camp, and with American milestones, including briefly running a bakery. 

One of the story points is Pham having wavered on getting citizenship until feeling the need to vote during the rise of Trump. It is good to remember that what is horrifying when it is not targeted at you is worse when you are the target. 

That was also very present in Messy Roots: A Graphic Memoir of a Wuhanese American by Laura Gao. In this case, much of the animosity is driven by COVID, and feels worse because of Gao's connection to Wuhan. 

There is also a thread of that in The American Dream? A Journey on Route 66 by Shing Yin Kor, relating to feelings of safety on the road. There is enough to worry about on a long road trip without having to worry about xenophobia.   

The Best We Could Do by Thi Bui is the one that takes the hardest look at intergenerational trauma, and that is not something that is unique to Vietnamese refugees. This one might be helpful for people from various types of families.

The Magic Fish by Trung Le Nguyen gets us back to magic, again, and tells us it is doing so. 

Some stories that may sound very familiar, but a little different, get updated with very thoughtful imagery. That art is very interesting and beautiful, but ultimately the biggest, most helpful magic, is love and friendship.

We end with Dragon Hoops by Gene Luen Yang (who also made a cameo in Family Style). 

There is a story about sports and a story about choosing change, but one of the most touching things for me was a brief story of kindness shown to an ailing and disgraced coach, except because of how things were handled it was never investigated whether he actually deserved the disgrace, so people just assumed they should shun him. A legal resolution might have cemented that, but it might also have exonerated him.

It just reminded me of how much I believe in the importance of investigation.

It was minor, but sometimes small things are very important.