Paula McLain effectively foreshadows stormy weather between Ernest and Hadley (Ernest was later married to three other wives), and the initial reaction to his firstborn was not positive. The Canadian sojourn was brief and the Hemingways returned to Paris and an increasingly wealthy and eccentric set of friends and associates. McLain's canvas is filled with interesting details, irresistible to put down! I wonder how many times son John had to explain that his third name was for a famous bullfighter!
***
I got through the exercise routine, but my "800" on the elliptical took the added push of the beat of the Beach Boys' hit song, Kokomo, on "endless repeat" -- slower than I usually go on the iron beast, but I was able to keep a steady pace, and if that's what it takes to get the job done, fine with me. Besides, the carefree lyrics conjure up a more pleasant mental image than watching rivulets of sweat rolling down my torso! Funny, when the Beach Boys first came out I didn't have much use for them. My best female friend (but not girlfriend), in high school, Pamela Miller, was ga ga about the Beach Boys and I guess it was her gentle influence that led me to be less harsh in my judgment about them.
***
I was feeling a bit shaggy, so headed off to my barber (Larry) for a haircut after breakfast. I donned my comfortable Wolverine boots for the walk over, not knowing whether the forecast rain would materialize (it didn't). As I was walking I ran into one of the librarians I had hired at Ferris State. She, her husband and I chatted for about fifteen minutes, but then I had to hurry on, as the barber shop closes early on Saturday.
Larry is a nice fellow, does a lot of fishing and hunting in season, works as a taxodermist when he's not attending to human skulls. One article of abuse I'd never heap on Larry: "stuff it!" Otherwise I might end up as an exemplar of his work that occasionally shows up in his shop.
***
The title of this entry refers to a mantra learned at the feet of my 5th Grade teacher, Nancy (Welpton) Arter Faris. I was a pupil of hers at Lincoln Elementary School (photos of that school appear in an earlier blog entry), in Prescott, Arizona. Saying "rabbit" the first thing on the first day of the month was supposed to bring good luck. She was a remarkably kind and intelligent woman. I'll never forget the citizens of Prescott she brought to class to talk to us -- Mary, the only blind person we ever knew, who made up our names in Braille; Gale Gardner, a true cowboy poet who graduated from Yale and was a frequent contributor of "cowboy verse" to Arizona Highways and other magazines; and Mary Martin, at least her on the soundtrack of the Broadway play, The Sound of Music. Life with Nancy Arter was always an adventure.
I had the privilege of introducing my older son, Ric, to her in the 1970's when we lived in South Bend, Indiana and she lived in Wilmette, Illinois, with her second husband. Some years ago I ran across this article by former Arizona Senator Barry Goldwater which celebrated Nancy's talent with children.
When Ric and I visited Nancy, we went on an expedition through bookstores in the north side of Chicago. Knowing my interest in poetry, Nancy purchased and gave me an autographed copy of the complete poems of Carl Sandburg, a book I still treasure. Nancy eventually returned to Arizona and died there of cancer on November 5, 2000 -- a great loss to her hundreds of students who very likely still utter "rabbit" on the first of every month.
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