Eat, Read, and Be Mommy

That’s still occupied and preoccupied, if that wasn’t clear (it mightn’t have been). This is the first morning this week that I haven’t had to be ready to go, more or less, when I left with the littles for school; the first two mornings I took my oldest to appointments, while yesterday I had PTA responsibilities at the school before heading off to Costco for necessities. And I’ve been worried enough about that same oldest that I haven’t had an ounce of mental or emotional energy to spare for blog posts by dinner time. Hence, another gap.

I’m trying.

This morning, however, I finished the last 20 pages of Andrea Cheng’s The Bear Makers, which I got through inter-library loan and which I’ve had renewed twice already (a more difficult process than with regular library titles). I read Cheng’s Anna Wang novels years ago–they’re lovely, you should read them–but The Bear Makers is quite different; according to the book flap, it’s based on a family story originally told to Andrea by her grandmother. (Cheng’s parents [Cheng was her married name] were Hungarian immigrants–she actually grew up speaking Hungarian as well as English.) The idea of it being a family story and based in truth made me that much more excited to read the book; as interesting as it was, however, it wasn’t actually as engrossing as I was thinking it would be. The slice of life in postwar Hungary it provided was completely interesting, but it was just that–a slice of life. Kata’s brother’s escape to the west provides, more than anything else at least, the dimensions of the plot, but that happens offstage and we only see Kata’s reaction to it all. The rest of the book is, as the flap says, “one family’s story of survival during a tumultuous time period,” and while the history lover in me was completely interested, I don’t know how large an audience is going to share that interest.

In other news, my youngest turns 8 tomorrow and my oldest has another appointment in a few weeks, while today is the third day of parent/teacher conferences this week. Good times! The night of the elementary SEPs I also took the three younger kids to shop at the book fair AND worked there an hour myself, which made the entire night a little tricky. I’m seriously looking forward to a quieter week next week! In the meantime, I’m incredibly grateful for friends and family; I am abundantly blessed with both, and they are a never-ending support when life gets difficult.

And that, ultimately, is the theme of The Bear Makers.