A typical October

Classic fall weather again – on the whole, a good thing. Leaves have been coming down in earnest and the lawn is thick with them. We don’t own a rake. I’ve read that it’s OK to mow over the dead leaves so as to “mulch” them, and that’s what I’ve been doing. The grass grows so slowly now that I keep telling myself, “One last mowing for the season”; and then, after one or two weeks, I mow again.

And now, my reading report.

(1) Patrick Allitt’s I’m the Teacher, You’re the Student: A Semester in the University Classroom describes several tantalizing U.S. history books, a few of which I’ve acquired. The golden discovery has been California: The Great Exception – the assigned text Allitt’s students loathed the most – written for that state’s centennial by Carey McWilliams, with lovely phrasing, apt detail, and shrewd analysis. Even in 1950, California’s growth was cause for wonderment. A boom in mining led to booms in farming, oil drilling, manufacturing, what have you. The mining boom was relatively egalitarian: claim sizes were restricted, and individual miners could prosper without capital. Then, the wealth gained by mining in California funded the mining elsewhere in the Far West, but this was company mining, adhering to other methods and rules. That’s what I’ve read so far. Agriculture, etc., will be discussed later. Allitt told his students to read the chapters about rivers and irrigation – the subject matter of Chinatown. They were bored to tears. I already look forward to reading McWilliams’s Factories in the Field: The Story of Migratory Farm Labor in California and North from Mexico: The Spanish-Speaking People of the United States.

(2) I liked Allitt well enough that I’ve begun another of his books: The Conservatives: Ideas & Personalities throughout American History.

(3) Also: Bertrand Russell, The Problems of Philosophy, which I read so long ago I hardly remember it. I’m not even sure I read all of it before.

(4) Some Gothic things for the fall:

• Agatha Christie, Endless Night (excellent, just excellent)
• Hilary Mantel, Fludd
• Ghost stories by Edith Wharton and M.R. James

(5) The Masters, the fifth and most famous book in C.P. Snow’s Strangers and Brothers series. It’s about the politics of an unnamed Cambridge college. Sure enough, it’s good; it might be THE ONE in the series to read, if that’s all you have time for; but it’s no better than the others.

Portage

On the 3A and the 3B, the Portage Avenue routes, the bus makes many stops. Some are planned; others occur when necessary, e.g. when there’s too much swearing. “Profanity is not acceptable,” says the driver into his microphone.

Grizzled men protest their innocence.

“My bad,” says an old lady. “I said fuck.”

The bus starts up again; the bantering is resumed; the bus stops. “If you continue using that language,” says the driver, “I’ll throw you off the bus.” The crowd giggles. Camaraderie.

Two men sit down next to me. “Relax,” says one. “It’s OK to be seated next to a black man.” (On the bus I’m not unused to this sort of challenge.) I glare. They laugh. “Just messin’,” they say. We fist-bump.

“I don’t care if you make fun of me,” I tell them. They pretend not to hear.

“What are you reading?” they ask. I show them An Experiment in Love by Hilary Mantel, who’s twice won the Man Booker.

Solemnly, they nod. Respect.

Some drivers are less patient than others, and so I always make sure to thank them; this has put me into their good graces. Still, it’s not surprising that the driver who’s kindest to me is another puny white guy. When I disembark, I thank him, and he warmly says: “Take care.”

As I step out onto the pavement, I have a vision: a banquet hall (a warehouse) with many tables at which are seated the passengers and drivers. I hear my name called out: I’m summoned to the podium. I’ve been chosen as the MVP. The MVP of riding the bus.