Stan “The Man” Musial and life stories of everyday legends

Posted on January 21, 2013 by moonbridgebooks

Even I, a transplant to St. Louis and not much of a sports fan, knew who Stan “The Man” Musial was and what he represented. Cardinal Nation and many others mourn his passing on Sunday. As sportwriter Bernie Miklasz said in today’s St. Louis Post Dispatch, “…his death is a loss for civility, sportsmanship and character.”

The St. Louis Post Dispatch put together a beautiful special section in Sunday’s paper as a tribute to Stan. I learned how Stan’s father, a Polish immigrant, had to be persuaded to allow his firstborn son to join a Cardinals affiliate league instead of going to college. Stan’s mother, a daughter of Czechoslovakian immigrants, also wanted her son to attend college and escape the Pittsburgh steel mills and mines, but saw how much he yearned to play ball. The story goes that Mary, arm around her crying son, told her husband, “In America, a boy is free NOT to go to college if he doesn’t want to.”

There are plenty of books about Stan that tell his stories—he was a legend, after all. Since I don’t care much about sports, for me his biggest legacy was as a kind man unaffected by fame, a family man who loved his wife for 71 years, the son of struggling immigrants who escaped a life in the mines. I think even if Stan hadn’t been famous, he would have had a good story.

In one of the online groups I follow, a woman posted what her grand-nephew had written about his father as a tribute marking what would have been his 46th birthday. This young Marine said he was glad he had had almost twenty years with his dad and that his dad knew he loved him. But, he wished he knew his dad’s stories, his history. “I know who you left us as, but what I long for the most is to know the path you traveled to become the man, the myth, the legend, and most important, the father I knew you as.”

Everyday legends are important, too.

Stan Musial

Latest news: for anyone wanting a copy of the St. Louis Post Dispatch Stan Musial special section, you can buy one. Not sure how long the offer will last.

Posted in capturing memories | 3 Comments

Memories lost in the changes

Posted on January 13, 2013 by moonbridgebooks

Yesterday my husband and I visited our daughter who is starting grad school at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, our old alma mater. I haven’t seen it much since I graduated in 198x (long ago!) and the area has changed a lot with tear downs and new construction. The two houses I had lived in, very near to each other, were gone—the whole block replaced by a massive new fire station and a tidy strip of restaurants and little shops. We had to drive by twice trying to find where those houses used to be.

We called this "Deppe Palace" and you can see why it was torn down!

We called this “Deppe Palace” and you can see why it was torn down

We recognized a handful of landmarks; the stately Quad was the same. From my horticulture classes, I recognized only Mumford Hall. There was the old cemetery where a friend (now my husband) had taken me one night to see the tombstones rising from the fog–cheap thrills, and yes, I love old cemeteries. On the northern end of campus my husband pointed out big new halls for engineering (nanotechnology!) and computer science and the awesome Beckman Institute. We did find the dark wood apartment building he had lived in, looking small and out-of-place sandwiched among newer complexes.

The Quad is still lovely

The Quad is still lovely

Only a few places, like Follett’s and Busey Bank, were the same around Green Street, where the fun was. No more Garcia’s Flying Tomato Brothers pizza! We had lunch at Legends which used be a joint with lots of pool tables but now there’s two. Legends has The Chief in a box. I loved Chief Illiniwek (not a real tribe), the most respectful and respectable mascot of any major university, who was deemed too offensive to be allowed (Florida State Chief Osceola and the Washington Redskins are fine), but seeing a life-sized human in a plastic exhibit box was weird to me.

I was lost among ghosts of memories. Trying to find them was a challenge, but there was the little corner bar (then Treno’s) where my equally poor roommate and I would go on Friday nights for free hotdogs and quarter beers. We’d stuff a hotdog or two under our shirts or jackets and carry them home for lunch the next day. Across the street was Krannert Center for Performing Arts where I got to see dress rehearsals for the plays because one of my roommates was a theatre major. I walked out at the intermission of Carmen because I didn’t understand what they were singing and thought it was over. I heard William Warfield boom out “Ol’ Man River” and croon “Summertime” there, and after my babies were born I sang  “Summertime” to them as a lullaby (note the lyric and your daddy’s rich and your ma good-lookin’!).

Green Street in the 1980s. The theater on the left is gone. Sadly, so is our friend.

Green Street in the 1980s. The theater on the left is gone. Sadly, so is our friend.

Going back in time is not always a good thing. I was disappointed, almost as badly as when I visited the house I grew up in and found the owners had chopped all the trees down. I didn’t find the tree-lined charm of the old U of I in the midst of modern monster buildings, even though the new university buildings kept the same style as the old, for the most part. All was impressive, just too new, too much, too jarring for my old memories. Unlike for my childhood home, though, I will return to look at the university, at least while our daughter attends. I like the Alma Mater statue’s message, “To thy happy children of the future, those of the past send greetings.”

My advice to everyone: take photos to document your home, your school, your town. You’ll be glad you did.

(Alma Mater the statue is out getting cleaned)

(Alma Mater the statue is out getting cleaned)

Here's Alma from the old days, with friends Labor and Learning

Here’s Alma from the old days, with friends Labor and Learning

Posted in capturing memories, memories, photos | Tagged | 5 Comments

Where to find my book reviews if Amazon dumps me

Posted on January 6, 2013 by moonbridgebooks

Taking a break today, sort of, from writing about memoirs to address the recent controversy with Amazon book reviews. You may have heard Amazon is cracking down on “promotional” reviews, which include reviews by authors’ family members, fellow genre writers or anyone who might gain anything from writing Amazon book reviews. So far I have escaped the “new” policy, and posted a memoir review the other day of The Only Woman in the Room by Beate Sirota Gordon, a historical icon who passed away December 30th. Hope I’m not jinxing myself talking about this.

Here’s a clip from what is actually the same old policy against promotional content Amazon has always had:

What’s not allowed

• Sentiments by or on behalf of a person or company with a financial interest in the product or a directly competing product (including reviews by publishers, manufacturers, or third-party merchants selling the product)
• Reviews written for any form of compensation other than a free copy of the product. This includes reviews that are a part of a paid publicity package
• Solicitations for helpful votes

Examples listed of what’s not allowed:

A customer posts a review in exchange for $5
A family member of the product creator posts a five-star customer review to help boost sales
A seller posts negative reviews on his competitor’s product
An artist posts a positive review on a peer’s album in exchange for receiving a positive review from them

Plenty of people game the review system using the above methods – I often see authors, mostly new ones, asking to swap reviews or Likes. Probably due to ever-louder complaints (the latest being over “sock puppets” – ugh), Amazon is reportedly cracking down with a bullwhip, not a ruler smack. I understand because I don’t like the gaming either (I mostly read only 2-4-star reviews when considering a book purchase), but think Amazon has gone overboard. Some authors say many of their good reviews have disappeared, even totally legit ones.

I find it a bit scary that Amazon knows who your family and friends are. I don’t think family members should write reviews for the author, but not sure I like Amazon ham-fistedly deleting well-written reviews just because someone knows the author (only best friends, or online aquaintances, too?) or writes in the same genre while leaving up 5-star reviews from people who haven’t even read the book. Will Amazon’s crackdown include those who post bad reviews merely for shipping problems, or reviews that say nothing except that the book was stupid, or those by an author’s friends out to destroy a competitor? And what about those hard-to-find sock puppets? I think readers just need to realize that 1-star and 5-star reviews should be taken with a grain of salt.

I review a lot of memoirs because that’s about all I read in my little free time. I avoid celeb memoirs and prefer to read about everyday lives, particularly if they involve history and culture. I like to help little-known authors by leaving reviews for their new books, but I won’t read anything where the writing isn’t at least 3-star quality – and the editing had better be good. Yes, I’m miffed I might have to quit reviewing on Amazon, the necessary platform for authors. If my reviews there of memoirs eventually do disappear, you can still find them on my Goodreads profile. (Some are on clunky B&N.com, but you can’t easily find them). And, of course, I’ll keep posting on this blog (click on the book review or book talk categories, bottom right column on this home page).

New authors really need your reviews

New authors really need your reviews

Posted in book reviews, book talk | 8 Comments