Stories

Earlier this year, I found a book at the library's perpetual used book sale in the basement. Though I had little time to read, being busy with my own school work and my children's school year activities, I looked forward to reading time in the summer. So, a very battered copy of Pearl S. Buck's The Exile was added to a rising stack of books "to be read." These past few days, I have immersed myself in that book whenever life allowed.

At first, I thought I was reading another of Pearl Buck's brilliant novels, set in China. As I read on, I felt that I was reading of a real life. This story did not follow the predictable plot patterns that I've come to expect after almost 40 years as a reader. Real life is not so neatly scripted, and this book read like real life. Further in, I began to suspect that I was reading the biography of Pearl Buck's mother, though no child named Pearl was ever born into the Christian missionary family about which I was reading. Could this little girl named Comfort be Pearl? With no book jacket to refer to, I sought information on the Internet. The Exile is indeed the story of Pearl's Comfort Buck's mother, Caroline, who lived most of her life in China surrounded by a culture that treated its women with disregard, surrounded by heat and disease, suffering and sorrow. Yet despite these dismal surroundings, there was in Carie, as she was called, a vital resilient spirit, both generous and compassionate.

As one expects from Pearl Buck, the writing is both intelligent and lyrical. In this passage, Buck describes her mothers perception of her environment, when they lived for a summer on a mountain top in two rented rooms of a temple:

"When the children lay sleeping and Carie fanned them as they slept, she pondered on the strangeness of her life, she whose room and home had looked out over sweeping meadows and clear country roadsides, over windswept, distant hills and wide skies - she sat here with her two children in a dark room in a Chinese temple, where through the round window she could look down a flagged path to the vast incense urn that stood outlined against the dense green of the bamboos. All through the night and day at long, regular intervals the temple bell reverberated its solitary, resonant note and echoed from the hillsides - a strange, mystic music filled with human sadness."

Tears streamed down my face as I read through some of the pages. I could understand this woman's spirit so well, as she lived with a determination to connect with others, to know them and hear their stories. As one paragraph explains, "There was always someone telling her story to Carie. The very chambermaids in the hotels were confiding in her by the end of the second day of her stay anywhere."

Our stories are important, but perhaps more important is being able to share them. Pearl S. Buck shared her stories through writing. Her mother told her own stories of growing up in America to her children as she raised them far away across the seas, but more importantly, she was the eager, caring listener to the stories of many broken Chinese women who thought their stories did not matter... until they met Carie. The way Carie lived her life reminds me of another favorite quote about stories, to go along with those I have on my right side bar:

"The universe is made of stories, not atoms." ~ Muriel Rukeyser.

photo by Haiku, June 19, 2008 pink dianthus against a blue sky

Teacup-a-story

La-tea-dah of Gracious Hospitality is having a blogging event revolving around tea. Once upon a teapot, I had afternoon tea several times a week, in our "homeschooling days" when my daughters were at home with me. Now they are both in high school, and though my little boys love a "cuppa" tea once in a while, it doesn't have the same feeling of girly elegance that it once had! This week, participants of the Gracious Hospital-i-tea Blog-a-thon are asked to share the story of a favorite tea cup.

When I was a young woman, my maternal grandmother let me know that one day I would inherit her china set. The pieces were lovely: white with a ring of gold and black at the edge. At first, when I received them, I kept them in boxes on a storage shelf. I wanted to display them, but I didn't have a china hutch. On a couple of occasions per year, I would pull them out, wash them and serve a holiday meal... and then, sadly, back into the boxes they would go.

For several summers in a row, I babysat a sweet friend's little daughter. We had the most fun with her: making hollyhock dolls, picnicking in the yard, and playing dress-up. At the end of one summer, because I had not accepted payment for watching our little friend, her mother paid me by giving me the empty china hutch sitting in her basement. It was quite lovely, but she couldn't fit it into her dining room because of windows, doors and an open floor plan.

Finally, I could display my Grandmother's china! I washed it all and placed it in the hutch gently. I burned the ugly cardboard boxes in the yard. Some time later, we discovered that two of the tea cups were still in one of the cardboard boxes at the time they were burned. We found the two cups amid the ashes.

At first, I was devastated. I stood at the sink scrubbing them furiously. Despite my best efforts, each formerly lovely white cup was mottled with brown and black scorch marks. As I stood, blinking back tears, I could almost hear my grandmother chuckle. With a sigh, I decided to keep them. As I set them into the china hutch amid the elegant white china, I thought, "Now they have a story."

"There are so many different ways lives work out, so many stories, and every one of them is precious: full of joy and heartbreak, and a fair amount of situation comedy." ~ Sean Steward, Perfect Circle, 2004

photos by Aisling, March 17, 2008

A Winter Memory - Revisited

Since I am trying to devote much of my blogging to Stories this year, I have decided to repost one of my favorite winter stories. This is a simple story, without a lot of plot twists or fancy literary devices, but one I think of often... whenever sunlight glitters on the snow of our hills and fields. If you missed it last year, or even if you are reading it again, I hope you enjoy this winter memory.

Our first winter in the Quiet Country House was a real "up north" winter, with lots of snowfall and cold enough weather for the snow to stick around. Senryu was in first grade that year, and Haiku not yet in school. Haiku was a wonderful little Mother's Helper during Senryu's school hours. It is true that she made quite a mess with the mixtures and potions that she would churn up in the kitchen, playing at either scientist or chef, depending on her mood. But, she was also very willing to dust, or run toys to the bedroom, or offer thoughtful, carefully-considered decorating advice.

Late in the afternoon, we would look at the clock and realize that Sissy would soon be home from school. No matter how much snow was on the ground... no matter how cold the air... if the skies were clear and blue, Haiku and I would put on our snow gear and trudge a quarter of a mile up the narrow, steep lane to meet Senryu's school bus.

On the first such snowy day, I pulled the sled up behind us as we climbed the hill. When Senryu got off the bus, she settled her little sister on the sled with her and they shoved off down the long, steep slope of our little country lane. As they flew over the glittering surface of the snow, I ran downhill trying to keep up with the sled. We laughed the whole way down the hill, filled with wonder at the beauty and sparkle of a January afternoon.

photo by Haiku, January 2006