ODDS AND ENDS (AND THEY ARE ODD)
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
I watched the debate between Palin and Biden at the Albany Library with George Lakoff and Susan Griffin. They had been scheduled to talk about their new books, Susan’s Wrestling with the Angel of Democracy: On Being an American Citizen, and Lakoff’s The Political Mind: Why You Can't Understand
MAKING BOMBS
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Over and over, people express surprise when they learn that my mother worked in a bomb casing factory during World War II. Being Jewish, Communist and female influenced her taking that job in several ways. With her newly-acquired doctorate in English (1938), she hoped to get a college teaching
NO BAILOUT FOR RECKLESS BANKERS
Thursday, September 25, 2008
I went to a little demonstration this evening with my new friend from the writers’
retreat. She hadn’t been to a demonstration in a while and she had a blast. It was one
of the demos True Majority organized online against Paulson’s proposed bailout of
“reckless bankers” as the sign I made
THE RED ARMY CHORUS SINGS “SWEET HOME ALABAMA”
Monday, September 22, 2008
Ellie Bluestein, an old friend of my mother’s, sends out interesting articles and tidbits to her e-mail list, which I am on. Recently she sent a YouTube URL for a video of a Finnish rock band performing an American song in Russia with the Red Army Chorus singing backup. It’s pretty weird, but if
ON RETREAT
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
I didn’t realize my MacBook makes a little papery noise until I went on a retreat at St. Dorothy’s Rest in Camp Meeker. When the refrigerator in the studio apartment where I’m staying stops, it’s so quiet you can hear a laptop run. I’m looking out on a mixed forest of evergreens and oaks (some
writing malvina
Name: Nancy Schimmel
Hometown: Berkeley, California, USA
What I do: write songs, sing them and tell stories (as a volunteer at my neighborhood elementary school and for a fee elsewhere), read, swim, garden, run a tiny publishing company, Sisters’ Choice. Once in a blue moon I draw something, like the guitar case in this blog’s heading.
What I stopped doing to clear time to write the book: substituting at Berkeley Public Library, buying crossword puzzle books, singing in the Threshold Choir
Current favorite quote: “...perfectionism is the voice of the oppressor.”
—Anne Lamott
New Reading: Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life by Anne Lamott. 1491: New revelations of the Americas by Charles Mann. Widening the Circle: The power of inclusive classrooms by Mara Sapon-Shevin,
Favorite Movies: All-time: My Dinner with Andre, Born Yesterday, Wings of Desire, Fargo, The Iron Giant, The Triplets of Belleville, The Sting, Chicago, Roman Holiday. Lately: The Visitor, Pete Seeger: The Power of Song
Welcome to my blog: It’s about my mother, Malvina Reynolds, about writing a biography of her, and a little about what I do when I’m not writing the biography (most of the time I’m not). Here’s a song of Malvina’s from the sixties that works right now: “We Hate to See Them Go.”
