Pumpkinvine People, I Heart You.
June 21, 2009 by Julia King · 3 Comments
Good-for-nothing Blogger Gets Actual Job
June 19, 2009 by Julia King · 6 Comments
A couple of people (Okay… ONE. One person.) expressed concern about the lack of new content on my site. It’s true. It’s been a while. I recently took a job and haven’t found (or made) the time to write. Thank you for noticing, One Person. I like that about you!
I don’t know about all of you (“all of you,” apparently meaning One Person’s entire self), but my mind is on health care. I just haven’t figured out a way to write about it without using lots of swear words, so I’m pondering for now…
In the meantime, do your part and make some noise out there about the need for a national health care plan. Single Payer is the way to go, but at the very least we need a public option. It is SO past time for this. Read HERE to be convinced.
Okay, bye. Write to you later, One Person. Hey — I’m working on something about MOTORCYCLES. What do you think of THAT? 
T’was a Time Before Twitter…
March 9, 2009 by Julia King · 5 Comments
Twitter is like lip piercings or a thong peeking out of a pair of jeans. It makes me feel old-fashioned, like I should be making meatloaf and wearing a house coat (not a Snuggie, but a house coat — the kind my grandmother used to wear with little buttons to keep it closed).
“Even I know that Twitter is weird,” writes a blogger who Twitters. That’s encouraging, because we all do things we know are weird (for instance, I sometimes watch America’s Next Top Model). Normalcy (if there is such a thing) requires that we at least know when we’re being weird (as in, “I know it’s weird, but I have to stand on my hands every time I see a cow”).
The fact is, it’s all strange: blogging, Facebook, MySpace, texting, tweeting, tooting (I made that last one up, but it’ll happen).
If computers have made bad writing too easy (and they totally, really, completely have), applications like Twitter have made co-dependence too easy. No one should know what someone else is doing at all times (as in, Julia is shaving her ankles and clipping her toenails for spring!). Personal information sharing is fine, but if the group of people who get to hear it ALL can’t fit into a minivan, it’s too big.
Togetherness. Community. Right on. We are the world. We are the children. We are the ones who make a brighter day, so let’s start giving (that’s a song from the olden days, when we talked to each other with our voices). But surely there are limits (please let there be limits!) to the healthy exchange of information between people. And when I say between “people,” I mean between Person A and Persons B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, and so forth. Small numbers of people are designed for genuine friendship and daily minutia. Big numbers are made for traffic jams and riots and Publisher’s Clearing House.
“It keeps me connected to people,” is the prevailing claim from those who routinely use an array of technologies to communicate with people out of view while people in view wait for a turn to “connect.” It’s as though we’re all Paris Hilton, distractingly popular and struggling to dole out small (and not so small) servings of ourselves to satisfy our many admirers.
It’s easy to get sucked into the frenzy, to “friend” everyone and her sister, to live each day (each hour?) with a new one-liner for the world, to upload cute profile pictures and clever homemade videos. Actually, that’s not true. It’s hard!
Three Cups of Tea
January 31, 2009 by Julia King · Leave a Comment
On the cover of the book, in small print at the bottom of the page, is a quote from Tom Brokaw: “Thrilling…proof,” it reads, “that one ordinary person, with the right combination of character and determination, really can change the world.”
It’s a reassuring thought, this notion that an average person can change the world, but it’s not exactly the story that unfolds in Three Cups of Tea, the New York Times bestseller by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin. Instead, Three Cups of Tea tells the story of an extraordinary man (Mortenson), one willing to endure almost anything to accomplish his mission.
Mortenson’s mission is peace, and his strategy is to provide education for the poorest children in some of the poorest parts of Pakistan and Afghanistan, far-flung villages that despite their remoteness are desperately intertwined with modern Western life.
I read much of the book sweaty and out of breath, pedaling my stationary bike alone in my living room, exerting energy for no one’s benefit but my own — as if to punctuate the fact of my existential stinginess. Mortenson’s life is one of sacrifice and tremendous effort spent for others (although that’s not his claim; he would say that in the end his work benefits everyone, including him).
The beauty of this story is that it never appears easy. Too frequently, those who accomplish amazing things carry out their tasks with what looks like effortlessness. Not here. Three Cups of Tea is a journey into rugged land and harsh conditions. And it is a story of contrast, of a man straddling two different worlds (one week he’s walking the shiny marble floors of the Pentagon, and the next week he’s bouncing along dusty, craggy mountain roads in a beat-up jeep). Ironically, it is the thorny details of Mortenson’s projects — and of his exhausting schedule — that make it all so believable, so possible.
Like many Americans, I hadn’t paid much attention to places like Afghanistan until September 11. Since then, however, I’ve developed a strong appetite (possibly an unhealthy one) for dismal Middle Eastern focused literature (both fiction and non-fiction) like The Kite Runner, A Thousand Splendid Suns, Reading Lolita in Tehran, Iran Awakening, etc. – my desire to solve the puzzle of Islamic extremist repression forever nudging me back to the page.
Three Cups of Tea doesn’t shy away from the darker aspects of these regions, but neither does it define such places (and the myriad people who inhabit them) by the least common human denominator, by anti-western jihadists, or by beheaders. Mortenson and Relin take us across the globe and introduce us to men and women we can relate to, men and women – and children – who are on “our” side, meaning the side of compassion and tolerance and mutual understanding.
In short: read it. If you’re looking for something that makes sense amidst the chaos and the jumble we’ve come to know as the “Middle East” (however imperfect the term), here is a place to start. Here is a way. I’m late to this book (it was published in 2006), but the work it represents is still in its infancy.
Jury Duty
January 15, 2009 by Julia King · Leave a Comment
I know the line I’m supposed to tow: The system sucks! Tear the whole thing down and start over! (Etc. etc.)
And yet… here I sit with a full heart and a satisfied mind having just completed the most famous (or is it the most infamous?) of civic duties. For two days this week, I was a juror. Technically, I was the alternate, an understudy of sorts, watching and waiting in the jury box just in case someone was struck with appendicitis before the verdict was rendered. With no medical emergencies to speak of, I remained an observer during the final deliberations.
It was both simple and difficult, the trial. Simple in that when all was said and done it was apparent that the accused was guilty; but difficult in that the case — and therefore all the testimony — was about child molestation. It was not a light-hearted two days.
But at the end of our task, one man summed up all our feelings when he said, “You know, if I’m ever accused of anything — I want you all to be the jury. You guys are great.”
Of course, the truth is that — as individuals — we were probably much closer to “average” than to “great,” but together, with the help of an ideal, maybe we did achieve “great.”
More later….
Simple and Beautiful Holiday Recipes
November 24, 2008 by Julia King · 11 Comments
4 people PLUS 5 hours EQUALS this cake.
NOTE TO SELF: The freezer does not act as a chilling microwave. For heaven’s sake, give the frosting the time it needs to THICKEN.
Winter Word to the Wise
November 17, 2008 by Julia King · Leave a Comment
Seasonal tip: if you are too lazy (…busy, disorganized, undisciplined…) to make room for your car in the garage, you will probably not get the full benefit of a product that requires you to cover your car the night BEFORE a snowfall.
