Posted in A&I

A Profile of Author Daniel Mason

by Anne Newins

 

Anne Newins

One of the pleasures of volunteering in the RVM library is the opportunity to discover new authors.  About six months ago, I encountered Daniel Mason and quickly became entranced by his writing.  The New York Times Magazine states that Mason “has quietly emerged as one of the finest prose stylists in American fiction.”

Mason’s background is almost as interesting as his writing.  After graduating from Harvard, he spent a year studying malaria around Thailand and Myanmar.   This experience informed his first novel, The Piano Tuner, which was published by the time he was 26 years old and then turned into an opera.   He attended medical school at the University of California San Francisco, eventually becoming a psychiatrist.  He now is on the faculty of Stanford University, both teaching and practicing medicine.

Not an especially prolific writer, Mason’s complex fiction cannot be easily defined.  Most of his writing to date has accurate historical components.  His descriptions of the natural world are both precise and poetic.  He incorporates vivid and occasionally appalling, descriptions of early medical practices.  Asked how being a psychiatrist relates to his writing, Mason stated in an interview with ZYZZYVA, that “If there is a connection, I think it is this sense that human beings are mysteries.  Since I was young, human beings have always been puzzling to me.  If anything, this interest drove me to both fields.”

Below are synopses of three of his books:

The Piano Tuner (2002) is the journey of a middle-aged piano tuner summoned from England to tune an English army surgeon’s Erard grand piano in the jungles of Burma.  Taking place in 1886, the British Empire is attempting to quell native insurgencies and repel French incursions in the Mekong Delta.  Although not perfect, this was a powerful first novel.  Fellow author Andrea Barrett praised “his ability to embrace history, politics, nature and medicine within a fully imagined 19th-century fictional world.”

The Winter Soldier tells of a Viennese medical student, Lucius.  “Resentful of hierarchy, impatient for his training to come to an end,” Lucius joins the army when World War I begins.  To his surprise, he is sent to a field hospital in the Carpathian Mountains, where he is the only physician, depending on a mysterious nursing sister to help when the multitudes of injured soldiers arrive.  Having never held a scalpel, it is left to Sister Margarete to teach him field surgery.  Lucius’s story is contained within the tides of war, as well a tale of love and atonement.  As in The Piano Tuner, the historical detail will be appreciated by those unfamiliar with these particular events in history.

A Registry of My Passage on the Earth (2020) is the title of one of nine of highly varied short stories.  Each of the tales has some seed of historical fact, but they go grow into wildly different creations.    The characters include naturalist Alfred Russell Wallace, pugilists, a women balloonist, telegraph operators, an amnesic, and more.  All are chronicles of exploration, internal and external.  My favorite was The Miraculous Discovery of Psammtetichus I, a darkly humorous yarn of an Egyptian pharaoh’s efforts to develop scientific methods. The collection was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and won several other prizes.

The Winter Solder and A Registry of My Passage on the Earth now are available at the Manor library.  The Piano Tuner will be added to the collection in late February. All of Mason’s books are held at the county library in various formats.

February Library Display

by Anne Newins

Anne Newins

Since Valentine’s Day is approaching, it only seems appropriate for the library to celebrate books about love during February.  But, as one library volunteer said, “Almost all books are about love.”  This certainly may be true if one assumes that the author has a passion for their subject.

How then to narrow the theme so that the books can fit on a single round table?  One solution was to include books about three aspects of love:  1) romantic love, 2) love of family, and 3) love of critters.  Below are a few sample titles.

Romance

     The Paris Wife, by Paula McClain
      Peony in Love, by Lisa See
       Life Mask, by Emma Donoghue

Love of Family

      Homegoing, by Y’a’a Gyasi
      Spool of Blue Thread, by Anne Tyler
 
      The Mountains Sing, by Nguyen Phan Que Mai

Personal Thing

 

Note — Liz Argall is a feelance cartoonist (https://lizargall.com/about/); I contribute to her website as a “patron” and am thereby entitled to download and use her cartoons — Bob Buddemeier

Breeding Mini-Cats

by Eleanor Lippman

There was a time in our lives that we were cat-less. That wouldn’t do at all, so husband and I saw an ad for Siamese kittens. It was hard not to want to adopt the entire litter. They weren’t purebreds but from a litter that was a mixture of chocolate and lilac point babies, each one more adorable than the other. Although we initially agreed on adopting a single cat, the temptation was too great and we went home with a lilac point male and a chocolate point female.

What a delight to watch these little guys play and grow and adapt to their new home. But something was becoming very obvious. Our male lilac point kitty (named Toki-Cat the Second) was growing faster than his chocolate point sister, Skoshi. At first we assumed that this was normal for male cats to grow bigger and faster than females, but we soon had to acknowledge that Skoshi along with her brother was losing her kittenish looks and turning into a mature, although very, very small, adult cat but kitten size. Interesting.  A mini-cat. We were the owners of one full sized male cat and one mini female cat, a cat as cute as pie.

The Real Skoshi

We agreed to have our male cat altered. We agreed that once she was able, we would try to breed Skoshi. Rag doll cats were a relatively new thing and we felt we would turn the world on fire with mini-cats. What was not to like? One evening, we found our mini-cat waiting by the sliding glass door leading to the back yard crying piteously to be let out. This was unusual because we had trained both cats to be indoor cats and neither one ever expressed an interest in leaving the house.

Once Skoshi realized we were not going to open the door, she started the strangest behavior: pulling herself forward by dragging her backside on the carpet, back and forth for hours. Obviously, she had come into heat and was anxious to mate. Lucky for us, Toki-cat was altered and had no interest in his sister’s shenanigans. So we endured her first heat, her crying, her butt dragging, her desire to go out in the world and secure a mate. When it all ended, we made an appointment with our vet to ask for advice about breeding her.

As everyone probably realizes, there is no such thing as a variety of mini-cat. There are Persians, Siamese, Manx, Ragdolls, and probably a handful of other types. But no mini-cats. We listened to the veterinarian tell us that our dear, sweet Skoshi cat was diagnosed with feline leukemia and there was no cure and no hope for her. Her future was that of declining health, dental problems, infections and so forth.

Crushed by the prediction, we took precious Skoshi home, our perfect little mini cat, still the size of a kitten, and vowed to love her and take care of her until the end. As the vet told us, her problems multiplied as time passed, and one morning as she lay quietly on the folded towel that was her bed, she looked up at me and her eyes, instead of being sapphire blue, were emerald green. I took this as the sign she was ready.

So there are no breeds of mini-cats, defined as adult cats the size of a kitten. Dreams dashed, we greeted the news years later that a vaccine against the disease had become available. We’ll never know whether Skoshi never grew in size because of her leukemia or whether, had the vaccine been available in her lifetime, and she grew up healthy mini-cats would have been a popular breed.

How to Train a Cat

by Eleanor Lippman

He adopted us, my husband and me.

We found him loitering around our house in southern California so we started leaving a bowl of fresh water and some nibbles by the back door. This encouraged him to visit us more often.

He seemed rather feral, had no tags and no apparent home.

Being city dwellers, we knew nothing about cats or dogs as no one in our neighborhood growing up in the late 1950s, owned pets. Large families and small crowded houses did not make a good combination for furry companions.

Gradually, he allowed himself to be petted – carefully. Over time, he became a regular visitor in the morning as we prepared breakfast and dawdled over coffee. We’d hear him before we saw him, a mournful meowing, him crying out to us that he arrived and was hungry, probably lured by the aroma of bacon and eggs frying on the stove.

One winter, we awoke to the sound of pounding rain on the roof. Chilly, we stumbled out of bed and turned up the furnace to make the house comfortable. Soon the coffee was perking and the bacon was sizzling, but no sign of Cat. We ate breakfast in silence and wondered what feral cats did to avoid such bad weather. The rain began to let up and we peered out of the back door window hoping to catch sight of him. Nothing.

Then we became involved in the rituals of preparing to start our day. My husband in suit, shirt and tie, checked his briefcase and searched for an umbrella before pulling the car out of the garage to head for work. I watched as he stopped the car in the driveway and opened the car door. Then I could see what caught his attention. Under our neighbor’s car parked in their drive way, was Cat furiously licking away at his shoulder. I think we both realized at about the same time that Cat sought shelter from the downpour under the car, unaware that the car’s engine was slowly dripping oil onto his fur while he slept.

This called for immediate action on our part. We had to become the Cat Rescue Team. My husband called in sick and quickly changed into clothes more suitable to the task at hand.

We were able to coax Cat out from under the car. Luckily he trusted us and allowed himself to be covered with a bath towel and, for the first time, be brought into our house. It didn’t take long for us to realize that we couldn’t possibly remove the filthy oil from his fur by just rubbing with the towel. And we worried that by licking himself clean he would poison himself or become very sick. Only a bath using shampoo would clean him.

This was unknown territory for both of us. Neither of us knew that one didn’t bathe a cat. They took care of their own grooming using their very rough tongues. But, as they say, ignorance is bliss.

Cat didn’t put up any resistance as cold, hunger, and oil coating made him too weak to fight. We gently shampooed his fur and rinsed him in soothing warm water until we felt that he was clean. It was a shock to us to see him standing in the tub, soaking wet and several sizes smaller than usual. Did we shrink him in the wash?! In fact, he looked quite rat-like, just a bag of bones. We had no idea how much actual cat had been hiding under all of that fur!

We dried him as best we could, and before we could do anything more, he ran out of the bathroom with an amazing streak of energy.

Later we found him sitting on our desk in the living room calming licking himself clean(er). He stayed there all day and all night, licking, licking and watching us warily. Attracted by the sizzling of bacon the next morning, he ambled into the kitchen, once again his old self, his regular size, his coat clean, and hungry for a real meal.

That’s when he officially became “Toki” our cat, the keeper of the house, the boss of things. And the training began – turning a feral cat into a much loved pet who didn’t scratch furniture, who came and went at will, and became one of the family. He learned to sit on our laps while we read, to rub against our leg when he needed to be petted, and to meow for attention.

I began pestering my friend at work about cats as she had two beautiful Siamese cats living with her. My education as a pet owner was increasing by leaps and bounds – but with a grain of salt. She related her most recent cat experience with great reluctance. It seems as if one of her cats had taken to sleeping on one of the cushioned chairs in her living room and also began using the chair as a claw sharpening device. Soon the seat of the chair was covered with cat fur and the back of the chair was scratched to the point where the upholstery stuffing was falling out.

Something had to be done. Her veterinarian suggested she use a spray designed to deter cats, to discourage them from scratching or leaping up on furniture. So my friend had her chair hauled off to be repaired and recovered and to be returned once again to be part of the living room decor. Before she brought the chair back into her house, she sprayed it all over with the recommended cat avoiding spray, confident the problem had been solved. The upholsterer delivered her newly covered chair well sprayed, collected his money and left. The pair of cats entered the living room curious and circled the chair, round and round. One cat leaped up on the seat probably expecting the usual resting spot. Instead, with terror in his eyes, he looked at my friend, turned his back on her and viciously attacked the back of the chair, clawing and scratching until it was totally destroyed once again. Time lapsed between delivery and destruction: probably two minutes.

Our Toki-Cat would never do anything like that. He never was interested in using furniture as a scratching post. He never slept on our bed or on our upholstered chairs. He didn’t leap up on the table while we were eating. His domain was ground level except when it was lap time, cuddling time.

The kitchen sink in our house had a window overlooking the back yard where I often kept on the window sill small potted plants to keep me company as I washed dishes or prepared meals. After a while, I realized that the window sill needed a bit of freshening up so I decided to repaint it. So one night after dinner was over and the kitchen cleaned up, I carefully repainted the window sill. Toki-cat left for the evening using his newly installed cat door and husband and I went to bed.

As I was filling the coffee pot with water in the morning, I saw it. The equivalent of my friend’s chair. The evidence of cat superiority. Embedded in the newly painted window sill were paw prints from one end of the window sill to the other. Someone had been exploring during the night.

That’s when I realized that there were two Toki-cats in my house. The Toki-cat on best behavior when we were in the room, and the real Toki-cat, the explorer, the bird and mouse hunter, the tamed tiger who lived here when we were not around. The dual Toki-Cat, my husband, and I eventually just accepted things as they were. Who were we to interfere with Mother Nature?

Toki-cat uses up one of his nine lives

For a long time, I drove one of the early Volkswagen Beetles, the tiny car (compared to what Detroit was selling at the time), bright red, innovative in style and design, with its tiny engine in the trunk and the trunk storage space under the hood. It was usually parked in our driveway or in front of the house, leaving the garage to be the home of our other car.

One morning, my husband decided to drive the Volkswagen, and as he approached the car, he saw Toki-Cat asleep on the roof. Opening the door startled and woke up Toki, and due to the design of the car, he started sliding forward, down past the windshield and down past the hood of the car. Husband drove off and as he slowly maneuvered his way out of the neighborhood, pedestrians would point at him and laugh. Before driving onto the main thoroughfare, he pulled over and stopped the car thinking perhaps he had a flat tire and it would be wise to check. Much to his surprise, pinned between the front bumper of the car and the fancy grillwork, was Toki-cat. Apparently as he slid forward from his sleeping spot on top of the car, he got caught and was unable to free himself from his spot between the front bumper and the sloping front of the car. Caught, he endured the ride without uttering a sound. Freed from his confinement by my husband, Toki-cat was safely brought back home and husband wondered for the rest of his life what he would have done if he arrived at work in a car with a large black and white cat trapped in the front grillwork.

(Toki is performed by Gabby Rugg who lives with Carol and David)

 

Minding Your Manor Manners (sort of)

  NIT WIT NEWZ

 

 

(Nit Wit Newz is an unauthorized, often unreliable, on-line news source designed to keep Manor residents abreast of the inconsequential, unverified and trifling events that dramatically shape and inform our everyday lives here at Rogue Valley Manor)

 

                                    MINDING YOUR MANOR MANNERS (sort of)

Residents pose questions and concerns regarding Rogue Valley Manor living to Nit Wit Newz. When these issues are deemed of interest to our community, they are printed in this space.

This month, a reader wrote:

                Dear Nit Wit Newz,

Although our Bistro is temporarily closed, I have this on-going question: Is there anything that can be done about the Bistro’s dinnerware? The irregular shapes of the bowls and the plates with their wing-like edges make it difficult to balance utensils on the bowl or plate edges when not in use. The utensils either clank nosily to the table or worse, slip into my Meatball Marinara or my Roasted Beet Salad. That, of course, necessitates repeatedly wiping the utensil handles with my napkin before proceeding with my meal.  When finished, my hands are sticky, the napkin is a mess, and my clothes are ready for the cleaners.  Help!

I.M. Peeved

Dear Mr. Peeved,

Nit Wit Newz has looked into your issue with the Bistro dinnerware. Our findings:

–The dinnerware was replicated from the remnants of ancient pottery excavated from a post-Ice Age archeological dig in what is now Denmark.

–Contemporary Danish artisans have pieced together bowls and plates which revealed this distinctive wing-cornered design.

–Archeologists speculate that the pottery pre-dated the use of utensils and the unusual design enabled the early inhabitants to easily hold and raise the dish to their mouths.

–Inspired by this uniqueness, modern artisans have fashioned a line of dinnerware. That is the line used in the Bistro today. It’s called Danish Antiquity.

–It is unclear to archeologists whether or not finger bowls were to be found in the pantries of this ancient, post-Ice Age settlement. Nonetheless, we are pleased to report that finger bowls are included in the Bistro collection.

–Upon the re-opening of the restaurant, you—and other residents beset by this “sticky finger” grievance— may ask your wait-staff person to provide a Danish Antiquity finger bowl.

 To those who may find the use of finger bowls unsettlingly fastidious, another option is available:  Bistro management invites you and your tablemates to indulge your latent impulses. Use the dinnerware as it was originally intended. Set aside fork, spoon, knife and superficial inhibitions. Grasp your bowl or plate as it was designed to be held and boldly raise it to your lips—SKOL!

–With that, Mr. Peeved, we hope NWN’s research has provided you with a new-found appreciation of the Bistro’s dinnerware.

Your friends at Nit Wit Newz.

 —A. Looney

Critter of the Month

by Connie Kent, photos by Fran Yates

Uncommon bird alert! Not rare, like the Costa’s Hummingbird, but still, uncommon. Fran Yates first began seeing the Red-shouldered hawk last November, first in the Plaza Parking lot, later in the parking area behind the Manor, and finally, just this last month, once again in the Plaza parking lot, perched on a street light (the photo with the moon).

In both John Kemper’s Southern Oregon’s Bird Life (2002) and The Sibley Field Guide to Birds of Western North America (2003), the bird is listed as rare in this area. The Rogue Valley Audubon Society’s 2001 Birds of Jackson County, Oregon, shows them as present, though not common, during the winter months and rare and irregular during the summer. Of course, these three publications are all twenty years old.

But Kemper observes that, while they are common in California, Red-shouldered hawks seem to be expanding their range. And that may explain why we’re seeing them more now. In the last four years, 32 sightings have been reported on the RVM campus, starting with Kay Wylie’s report in October of 2018.

Carolyn Auker, of the RVM birding group, says Red-shouldered Hawks are year round residents in the valley now. If Kemper is correct, we may begin seeing them more regularly. Look for them at this time of year. You’re not likely to see them in the summer.

January Library Display

by Anne Newins

By this time of the year, I begin to develop cabin fever.  With no cure in sight, a selection of travel books might provide vicarious relief for me and perhaps for fellow sufferers.  A quick subject review of our in-house search engine revealed that the RVM library has at least 225 travel related books, proving that it is a popular genre.
But books cannot be simply labeled as “travel.”  They often are far more than simple accounts of places that people have visited or explored.  The best of them are studies of internal and moral exploration, coming of age tales, as well as physical challenges, which is why so many  have become literary classics.  Below is a sampling of the many books that will be displayed this month.
First, several Manor authors have written travel books, some more than one.  A few of them are:
Among the Maya Ruins, by Ann and Myron Sutton
Only in Iceland: a quirky chronicle, by Asifa Kanji
Two Women in Africa: the ultimate adventure, by J.R. (aka Jean) Dunham
There are a couple of humorous titles:
Beauty Tips from Moose Jaw: travel in search of Canada, by Will Ferguson
When You Look Like Your Passport Photo, it’s Time to Go Home, by Erma Bombeck
Bestsellers and classic fiction include:
The Bean Trees, by Barbara Kingsolver
The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek, by Kim Michele Richardson
The Giver of Stars, by JoJo Moyes
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, by Mark Twain
Finally, I can’t resist listing a few of my personal favorites:
Anything travel related by Bill Bryson
Anything travel related by Paul Theroux
Humboldt’s Cosmos:  Alexander von Humboldt and the Latin American Journey that changed the way we see the world, by Gerard Helferic
Kingbird Highway:  The biggest year in the life of an extreme birder, by Kenn Kaufman
The River of Doubt:  Theodore Roosevelts’s Darkest Journey, by Candace Millard
The RVM library volunteers wish you happy trails and a year full of good reading.

Romantic Valentine’s Day Entertainment Set

NIT WIT NEWZ

 

 

(Nit Wit Newz is an unauthorized, often unreliable, on-line news source designed to keep Manor residents abreast of the inconsequential, trifling, and superficial events that dramatically shape and inform our everyday lives here at Rogue Valley Manor.)

 

ROMANTIC VALENTINE’S DAY ENTERTAINMENT SET

 

Manor Entertainment Committee inks famed romance poetess for extended engagement.

In month-long Valentine’s Day celebration, Gladys Hummingthorpe, to be on stage at Manor auditorium each weekday evening during February—the “Month of Love.”

Ms. Hummingthorpe will be reading selections from her book-length, epic poem, “Meet Me ‘Neath the Rose Arbor When Vesper Bells Ring.”

Incidental music by husband, Myron, on his 18th century Venetian lute, will accompany these rapturous, ninety minute recitations.

Early reservations recommended (ticket clamor certain to swell as February nears.).

To insure all residents are able to attend, please limit your reservations to just six performances during the month.

Should Covid protocols prevent in-person auditorium attendance in February, Ms. Hummingthorpe’s performances will be telecast live each evening on Channel 900.  Streaming will be available to accommodate your viewing schedule as well as your binge-watching pleasure.

Fill your February with love, wonder and awe.

Join the Hummingthorpes in a packed-month of enchanted evenings.

 

—A. Looney

Winter Wonderland

photo collage by Reina LopezWinter Wonderland Dec 2021