When I'm 64: A Study in Red High-Tops

Day 64 of the "What are you reading, and why?" project. Today I am tying up some loose ends, because if I don't, I might forget, trip over them, and fall over.

Tony is still reading In Cold Blood and is not very far into the book as life keeps him pretty busy. He is in fact on page 19, if we are to respect the evidence of the bookmark, a former grocery list.

The loose end I am tying up here is that, yes, he is reading it because he recently viewed the film Capote, not the film In Cold Blood, which he has never seen. I fear that Robert Blake, who played murderer Perry Smith in that film, is still a loose end, or a loose cannon. Life has creepy little ironies, in that Blake was tried and acquitted for the murder of his wife, in real life, in still mysterious circumstances, and called "a miserable human being" by the district attorney. Blake certainly played Perry Smith as a miserable human being, one inspiring pity as well as revulsion, in In Cold Blood.

Speaking of bookmarks, Andrew Hudgins recommends their use in a funny little essay, "Dummies Book for Dummies," in the current issue of River Styx, the 35th anniversary issue. It also has "killer" poems in it by Loren Graham, Jennifer Perrine, and Mather Schneider, to list just the first 3 writers. Mather Schneider is my favorite taxi driver/poet ever, and I was in Tucson once, waiting for a van at the airport, half wishing he'd come along and I'd get to meet him, half scared to get into the cab, but that isn't what happened, anyway. Every poem I read by him punches me in the heart.

Speaking of Tony, I have acquired his birthday present! It is a signed copy of Outcasts United, about the Fugees soccer team and resettling refugees in a small southern community, by Warren St. John, briefly discussed twice before in this blog, as the Tale for Two Cities in this area, and also being read by several communities across the country in the "big read" and "one book, one city" programs going on to encourage reading, thinking, and conversation.

I got to hear the author speak on Monday night, and my blue ticket won me a door prize! I shouted "Yay!" (much to the author's delight) as I had returned my copy to the library but really, really wanted Tony to read it, as he is both a coach and a refugee! (Don't worry. Tony, though my husband, does not read my blog, not even, I trust, if I post it at Facebook, so his birthday present is still a surprise! It is hidden in my closet. I am telling you where I have put it, so you can tell me when I forget this little loose end....)

Now to the high-tops. My daughter has outgrown her everyday shoes (retired volleyball shoes, as she has a new pair of those, only for the gym floor), and needed some new ones: Converse All Stars, gray. I needed some new ones, too, as I walk a lot, and had worn holes through the soles of all my tennis shoes. She was horrified that I might choose the same style and color as hers, so I said, "What about red high-tops?" which I have always wanted.

There was eye-rolling and dismay. I was viewed lovingly as a miserable human being.

But now I have some.