June 2021 Monthly Motif Reading Challenge: The Great Outdoors

June's monthly reading motif was "The Great Outdoors," which required reading "a book featuring a garden, nature, country, or harvest setting or plot. I belong to a Facebook group for children's books (partly because I have a kid, and partly because I just enjoy children's books), and they had recently been talking about The Secret Garden, by Frances Hodgson Burnett. I realized it had been so long since I'd read it that I didn't really remember it all that well. Thus, when I saw this prompt, I decided it would fit the bill perfectly. (Yes, I read two middle grade books in a row.) I remember really enjoying it when I was a child, and I still enjoyed it, though the book, having been written in 1911, definitely shows its age in some ways.

This book is all about magic, and not the Harry Potter kind. It's about the magic of being a child and discovering the way things grow and how the natural world works. It's about how caring for something and someone other than yourself can make you grow in ways you didn't expect. Mary Lennox, the main character, through caring for a garden, spending time outdoors, and learning to care about two other children around her age, grows from a sickly little child into a healthy young lady. The book definitely insinuates that it is the running around outdoors and the English countryside air that brings about this change, but I would argue that learning to care for things other than herself are part of that change as well. Obviously, that's an emotional and temperamental change, but I firmly believe that emotional and temperamental changes can affect us physically as well. At any rate, it really is delightful to watch the children in the book learn to love one another and the magic of the garden and remember what it was like to see magic in all sorts of things. For anyone who has ever been into gardening, they will also recognize the excitement the chilren felt of watching the garden awaken from its winter sleep. That is definitely one of my favorite parts of spring - going out and seeing which little bulbs are going to sprout first and which perennial plants are sticking up some new leaf stalks.

Now I guess I'll touch on the whole concept of "cancel culture" here for a minute or two. There are definitely books, movies, music, and television that contain themes we consider unacceptable today, most obviously, and possibly significantly, overtly racist terms and viewpoints. The Secret Garden does indeed have some of that content in it. Here's the thing, though: the fact that these ideas are in these various types of media does not mean that we need to erase these things from history. There is valuable stuff in them; otherwise, they wouldn't have become classics in the first place. Even beyond the stories that made certain books classics, though, the themes that don't fit with our current thinking provide opportunities for discussion with one another and our children.

Most of the terms used to describe darker skinned people (generally referring to people from the Indian subcontinent, where Mary was born) in The Secret Garden are not really acceptable nowadays, but if/when I let Junior Mate read the book, we can (and hopefully will) have discussions about why that thinking is out of date and unacceptable now. The answer to these issues is not to erase them or pretend they don't (and never have) exist. The answer is to have conversations with your children about how and why some of these ideas were acceptable in whatever time the media is set and why we don't think the same way now. We give our kids a chance to make the world better by letting them understand the mistakes of our past, as well as the good parts of our past. I mean, running around outside and loving nature are definitely worthwhile things, that many of us may have lost in our currently tech-heavy society. Parenting, and being a good human, honestly, requires work. It's easy to just get rid of things that don't work with our current values, but it's more enriching and valuable to examine them and figure out their place.

Anyway, I think this book is a worthwhile read, and if you are concerned about some of the classist and racist expressions in it, give it a read yourself and decide if you feel comfortable letting your child read it. You can always have the discussions about why we don't think the same way anymore, and you can also have delightful discussions about which flowers pop up first in the spring and the joys of watching the earth come alive year after year.

(This is my copy of the book from when I was a child!)
Buy it on Amazon here

Captain's Log Stardate March 2016: 12 Book Reading Challenge - Book You Previously Abandoned

This month's book is The Knitting Sutra: Craft as a Spiritual Practice, by Susan Gordon Lydon. It is a book I previously abandoned and does not really fit into any other category.
(Image links to Amazon's book page)

To be honest, I had two or three other books I probably would have preferred to read for this category, but it was more important to me to stick to my goal of reading only women authors. Thus, I ended up pulling a book out of my donate pile to pick back up and finish. In fact, I never really read much of this book at all. I read bits and pieces of it for a research paper I did in seminary about the meditative aspects of knitting and crocheting. (Looking back through the paper, it appears I didn't even end up using it in the paper.) There were a few good quotes that I liked, but it didn't really meet my need at that time.

I have to admit that it wasn't exactly what I was expecting. To be fair, I've realized that I was sort of hoping for something a bit more academic, which is unfair, considering that this is basically a popular book. It is more of a memoir type book than a discussion of how craft can be used as a spiritual practice. Lydon discusses her own spiritual journey and the important role that knitting played in that journey. It is interesting to hear how craft became an integral part of her spiritual life, but, especially considering that I had already written a paper on the contemplative aspects of knitting and crocheting, I guess I was just disappointed that there wasn't more detail. She does have a lot of knowledge of traditional crafts and their importance in the spiritual lives of the people groups who do them, and she intersperses this information with her own story. However, there is not a ton of detail about each of these groups and the specific spiritual aspects of their crafts.

All in all, it's a pretty good book; it just wasn't exactly what I was expecting from the title. If you are interested in spirituality and how other people incorporate it into their lives, it is a good read. If you are interested in how other people use craft to enhance their spiritual lives, it is a good read. If you are looking for an academic treatment of how craft is used as a spiritual practice or in the spiritual lives of people, it doesn't really fit the bill. It is one person's specific story and not a general study of craft and spirituality.

Here are a couple of quotes I particularly liked and why I liked them:
"And is it possible that female spirituality through the ages may have been concealed in the minutiae of domestic life rather than expressed in the grandiosity and pomposity of churches and sermons?" (p. 10)
~~I think this is especially pertinent to me right now, as I am currently a stay-at-home mom. Every day can feel so monotonous taking care of a baby and a household. This quote reminds me that the simple (or actually quite complex and difficult) business of raising a baby and keeping a house in order are spiritual acts. We forget that everyday living has its own spiritual aspects because we have a tendency to assign deep spiritual significance only to worship services and those who lead them. I have been in seminary with pastors in training (and some who were already pastoring and finishing up the credentials). I can tell you that your pastors have the same mundane aspects in their lives. Part of seminary, actually, is learning to see the holy and spiritual in every aspect of life. And remember that "spirituality" is the job of a pastor, so sometimes that everyday spirituality is even more important to a pastor. At any rate, I like that Lydon recognizes the importance of domestic life to spirituality, especially for women, as we have so often been relegated to these tasks, while men have traditionally been given the privilege of spiritual leadership.

"I learned while writing this book that the purpose of the craft is not so much to make beautiful things as it is to become beautiful inside while you are making those things." (p. 137)
~~This really struck me as I was reading it. It is a great summation of her description of her spiritual journey and knitting. It also reminds us that craft has value and is not just a useless hobby. We make beautiful things for ourselves and others, but the time we use to create those items has its own important role in shaping us. Whether it is a craft that involves intense concentration or one that is repetitive and lends itself to mindfulness meditation, it gives us the opportunity to grow our brains and inner selves. I love this because it is beautiful, but also because it gives me permission not to feel guilty when I choose to craft rather than sweep the floor, for example. Obviously, there has to be balance among crafting and my other duties, but this gives me permission to let crafting help me center in order to be a better mom and housekeeper.