Two books I love

Last night when I stepped outside with the dogs, it was just dark, and the woods were lit up with fireflies, hundreds of them, from near the ground to head-high, as though someone had just turned on a light show. I think of this phenomenon as happening in the spring, and it's something I am newly delighted by every year, having forgotten it each time. There must have been a hatch of fireflies, I'm guessing, to have this sudden display. It's moments like this that remind me of the capacity of every moment to surprise, and of the possibilities of sacredness in everyday life. In the past year I've found two books, both published by the Princeton Architectural Press, that, each in their particular way, remind me to slow down, look around, breathe, and notice. I found The Day-to-Day Life of Albert Hastings on a sale table at Barnes and Noble in Little Rock last Christmas. The cover is apricot-colored with a hand-lettered title and looks kind of like a journal. The book consists of photographs by Kaylynn Deveney and text by Albert Hastings, 91 at the time of the book's publication. Bert Hastings was a neighbor of Deveney's in Wales, and her photos of him around his house, in his garden, making scones, even taking the sun in his driveway, with his captions, are both ordinary and beautiful, saying--without outright saying it--that each life matters immensely. The other book I've recently fallen in love with is A Year of Mornings: 3191 Miles Apart, a photographic collaboration between Maria Alexandra Vettese and Stephanie Congdon Barnes, who both live in towns called Portland, one on the east coast, one on the west. They each took a photo just about every morning for a year and posted it to a website,http://3191.visualblogging.com. The scenes are all domestic, from fruit to toast to socks to windows. The photos were taken without consulting one another, and it's extraordinary how often the two women's photos seem to converse with or mirror each other. Again, it's a reminder that, as Georgia O'Keeffe said, "Nobody sees a flower - really - it is so small it takes time - we haven't time - and to see takes time, like to have a friend takes time." Less is the new more.

To Kill a Mockingbird--and I--turn 50

I'm just back from the 50th anniversary publication party for To Kill a Mockingbird" in Monroeville, Alabama. It was hot, and we all sweated together on the courthouse lawn (I skipped the "Tequila Mockingbird" and went for a gin and tonic) and had a grand time talking about this specific book, books in general, and whether Katie Couric was going to show, and if the Jimmy Buffett concert at Gulf Shores would come off. I got to participate in the marathon reading of the book, seated in the judge's seat in the courtroom, and to hear my husband, Don Noble, read the final chapter from the courthouse steps and then toast the book with the assembled crowd. A highlight of the event was seeing a rough cut of Sandy Jaffe's film Our Mockingbird with a full (court)house of viewers. Sandy asked how many people there were not from Alabama, and at least half the room raised their hands. The rest of us applauded. People were there from Canada, San Diego, and who knows where else, not on the way somewhere else but because they felt moved to come to Monroeville and pay tribute to the book and its author. They were moved by the film, as well--and I think everyone felt a little astonished and happy at the power of literature and of this book in particular to bring people together.
There was, of course, a little buzz about whether Harper Lee might be present at some point, but I think just about everyone there knew it was unlikely, and didn't mind. It's exciting to see or meet the author of a book you love, but as Mary McDonough Murphy said on the piece Katie Couric did for CBS' "Sunday Morning," it's not about the person, it's about the book. I've even had the experience of meeting an author and wishing I hadn't. Writers put their best selves into their work and don't always measure up in person--and who could, on a day to day basis, be the ideal writer, any more than we, as readers, can always be the person the best books make us want to be?
The people of Monroeville obvously worked hard, and worked together, to make the event happen--and I hope they enjoyed themselves as much as I did.
Growing up with a lawyer father of my own who taught me the importance of respecting the dignity of every person, I can relate to Scout's--and Harper Lee's--admiration for their fathers. My dad started practicing law three days after I was born, and he remembers reading the book around the time it came out. Those were days of change, days of beginnings, and it's good to be here to look back on it all, and look forward to what's to come.