Welcome to the weekend.
It’s been a full week, and I’m glad for the break and time with family. My parents are still in town and David’s birthday is coming up, so there’s a lot of celebration and shared meals. The days, though, have been intense. We’re navigating busy schedules and commitments, but it feels like we’re getting calls from daycare or preschool a few times a week to come pick up a sick kid, either throwing up or feverish. Looking back, I shouldn’t be surprised: Charlotte started a new preschool last month, so it makes sense that there’s a flurry of new germs and exposures, and it sounds like there’s a nasty summer cold going around in general. I’m so grateful for the help of my parents: while I’m sure it’s not how they envisioned their trip playing out, it’s been an enormous help.
Here’s what I’m eating and reading this week:
WEEKLY MENU PLAN
Sunday: Steak tips, leftover orzo, and tomato salad
Monday: Take-out dumplings and noodles
Tuesday: BLT sandwiches
Wednesday: Leftovers
Thursday: Chicken sausage, corn, and tomato pasta
Friday: Leftovers
Saturday: Out to dinner for a birthday celebration at Parsnip
WHAT I’M READING AND ENJOYING THIS WEEK:
A quiz just for fun: Which Star Wars Heroine are you? (I was Leia: yay! Though I wonder if everyone gets that one…?). And if you’re in to Star Wars, a head’s up/reminder that the latest movie is now available on Netflix.
Write fast and edit slow because “it’s so much easier to turn something into something better than to turn nothing into something.”
Reading FOMO
Several interesting and timely snippets from Brain Pickings
BOOK REVIEW
Title: Barracoon: The Story of the Last “Black Cargo”
Author: Zora Neale Hurston
Date: published in 2018
Format: audiobook
This was a bit of a complex experience for me this week. When I first heard about Barracoon, and that it was written by Zora Neale Hurston, I was confused about how she could have a new release (she died in the 1960s), and I’m not quite sure what all came about to have this published now. So while this is a new release in 2018, the text is actually closer to 100 years old.
It’s an interesting narrative, though it feels incredibly short. Hurston is a novelist and folklorist, and this telling of a first-person account of being ensnared in the slave trade falls more on the folk lore side (the novelist in her doesn’t expand on detail), so much so that it feels too brief at times. She interviews Kossula (also called Cudjo, but he states his true name is Kossula), who is 86 at the time of their conversations, about his life. Born in Africa, Kossula was captured and transported to the Alabama as a slave. He lives as a free black man in the South after the Civil War. There is so much to tell, 200 pages doesn’t seem to be nearly enough.
In reading (listening) to his story, a few points jumped out at me. Kossula tells his story starting with the story of his relatives, whose own stories are inextricably wound in with his own. The details around the capture and transportation and his time as a slave were short, though he spends a bit more time describing his family life and the challenges of living in the post-war South as a black man including the violence and loss experienced by his children (which feels very relevant and resonating for our current reality). Finally, Hurston’s details about their conversations together include frequent references to his tears, weeping, and emotional overwhelm. These details, rather than the details of Kossula’s life itself, convey the depth and extent of trauma in his life.
