history – Page 3 – The Hermits' Rest

Book Report: In the Shadow of Liberty

My friend Phyllis loaned me this book after a conversation we had about how history’s narrative differs depending on who’s version is being told. In the Shadow of Liberty, by Kenneth C. Davis (2016), is one of many books that have come out in the past few years that provide perspectives on events in North America from people who aren’t white, male, Christian, or wealthy. As one of those non-priviledged people, I appreciate these insights! (Of course I have plenty of priviledge, just not as much as I would have were I male or a declared Christian).

The book is not about me, though, it’s about people who were witnesses to a lot of the early history of the USA, though they were only 3/4 of a person legally and also enslaved to a wealthy landowner who happened to also be a President of the USA. Because of their proximity to people who wrote a lot and got written about a lot, they managed to get at least glimpses into their lives recorded for people in the future to learn from. As Davis points out there were thousands of people who toiled in the fields anonymously who never got to share their side of life in the 1700s-1800s.

Davis makes it clear that the history of slavery and slave-ownership isn’t as black and white as we make it out to be. Slave owners were known to change their minds over time or treated some enslaved people way differently than others. Some were cruel and some were more humane (a relative term, of course. I found it interesting to see how each group viewed the other and how differently their lives played out.

I’m not going to detail each chapter of the book, which has lots of interesting photographs, timelines, and illustrations to help us understand the times when the protagonists lived. What I do want to point out is how well Davis conveys the whole context of the Presidents and their families, as well as the families of enslaved people around them. It becomes very clear, for example, that George Washington both admired and trusted Bille Lee, who accompanied him on most of his battles and campaigns, yet he always referred to him as “his mulatto man, Billy.” I guess that’s just how people talked back then, but it made me sad.

You’ll find lots of information you may not have heard about before when you read this book, which isn’t very long and is more of a popular book than a scholarly investigation. Some of the people focused on are now pretty famous, but some have faded into the shadows (of liberty).

Reading this book now in 2024 will remind you of how important it is to not backslide on the freedoms we have fought long and hard for in the US. There are still people who would be happy to go back to a time where people could own each other (and it still occurs in the shadows, just a little differently). We all deserve to live our lives safely, with our families, and with meaningful paid work. No “but not these people…” should be allowed.

Favorite Flower, Least Favorite Word

If you could permanently ban a word from general usage, which one would it be? Why?

I’m gonna make random readers learn about my encounter with a new favorite flower and some historical land before telling you what word I’d ban. I want to share happy things.

Anyone who’s known me a long time probably knows my favorite flower in the pansy. I love their colors and their happy faces. I had no clue that there are wild pansies in the US, since I only knew them from flats in the garden store. But there are!

Hello! I’m the American field pansy – *Viola rafinesquei*

There’s no info on it in iNaturalist, which surprised me. But it apparently grows all through the eastern US. Have you ever seen it?

I was quite entranced by these tiny mini-pansies, which I encountered in Southeastern Milam County today on a hike with friends and their sons along the old El Camino Real de Los Tejas trail, leading to the panoramic views at the top of a hill, where Native American settlements at the Ranchería Grande were located. It’s gorgeous, with 360° views of the area. (Fellow Master Naturalists own the property and with the help of volunteers will make it accessible to the public.)

I found another new plant, called smallflower fumewort (Corydalis micrantha). They were all over the field, too. It has a charming, yellow flower shaped like tubes. I never saw anything like it before!

We had three young boys with us who were very new to the concept of observing and preserving nature. One young man was very proud to have cut apart the snail shell I gave him. Another one really enjoyed hitting things with sticks to see the sounds they made. They took great glee at destroying any animal tracks they found, but we convinced them to leave the cool leaf cutter ants to their business. I think ant lions sounded scary so their holes were safe, too.

Spider wort didn’t scare anyone. I was pleased my friend found one blooming!

I hope the younger hikers learned some things, though, and it was fun listening to them and hearing how they think. I’ll have a lot more boys next week, as we take Cub Scouts along the trail. Here are some things the boys found interesting.

We adults had fun, probably more than the kids. I was happy to have a chance to hang out with my friend, her spouse, and my fellow Master Naturalist. Next week I’m on my own with no backup naturalist.

This photo shows a huge leaf cutter ant colony. Dozens of connected nests.

So, what word would I like to make go away? I find the word “libtard” especially offensive and disrespectful. It insults people with more progressive ideas by using “-tard” which is something people try not to use to refer to those who have mental disabilities. I guess the word helps me remember to do my best to avoid name calling and pejorative labels when talking about the new far, far right factions in the US.

Hurling insults is a time-honored tradition in politics, I know. That doesn’t make it any less distasteful.

I Like the Internet but Also Horses

The most important invention in your lifetime is…

I was going to say something silly about this question, then I thought about how many friendships and connections I’ve made since I got online back in the olden days of the 1980s. So, thanks, Al Gore, for inventing the internet. (I was at the University of Illinois at the right time, so I do sorta know how it all really went down.) Yes, the internet was important to me, the good and bad aspects!

Still, the parts of my life that are in person are much of what’s made my life good. I’m feeling a little better about my living, breathing horse buddies today. Apache and Drew must be exhausted from all their adventures the last few days. And to top it off, I wormed them! (Well, Tarrin wormed Droodles, because I was worried he’d chomp on me.)

So, today was supposed to be a one-horse lesson with Lee driving, since Sara is unavailable. Instead I loaded both my dysfunctional steeds in the trailer to see what could be done with them.

Drew started the day not letting me groom him, so that saved some time. When Tarrin looked at him, his neck was better, but his poll (top of head) was a mess. She spent a long time working on it, then his legs. His whole spine must hurt, which is why I couldn’t brush his tail. Tarrin’s convinced he hurt himself and pulled a lot of muscles, plus may have been kicked on his side. I think that’s likely, from observation.

Once she did all that, he did all kinds of yawning and releasing, like his did after his trim yesterday. And when she was leading him to the lesson area, he kept rubbing his nose along the ground.

He did okay doing some ground work, so maybe he’s feeling better. My job is to exercise him first, then try to groom him. I have ways to stop him from biting, too, so we’re hoping he will heal.

Apache is a happier story. The fancy boots seem to have done the trick, and he was able to do ground work just fine. We may get to ride in Friday. I’m so relieved. It’s hard with both horses being broken.

Apache is also taking his medication well now, and was easy to worm. And the best news? He’s starting to shed! Maybe he’ll be more comfortable soon!

That’s enough blah blah about horses. I really should start writing in my horse journal again so I don’t fill the blog with all horses all the time. Here’s a bird. It was trying to escape.

How to Keep Up Online

In what ways do you communicate online?

Greetings from the Polar Vortex where it finally got cold, even way down here in Texas.

We’ve been busy keeping ourselves and the dogs warm

Today’s question is harder than it seems. It forces me to admit something that kind of makes me sad: I’m no longer an internet pioneer. Y’all, I’m even in a couple of books for being an early feminist voice on the ‘net. I made websites before color monitors existed. I had email way before most people did, thanks to being at the University of Illinois.

I helped make online communities before Facebook. So what? Yep. That’s the past. Zzz.

I no longer keep up with things. Twitter bored me, I have to admit. I also don’t enjoy watching videos for very long (amusing since I create them every day at work). So I’m not on YouTube for hours. And I cannot tell you how annoying and boring I find Tik Tok and Reels and social media influencers.

Please enjoy them and tell me about it, though. I am fine experiencing those things second hand.

So. Boring senior citizen Suna communicates online mainly in Facebook and communities there, and by reading and writing blogs.

I text friends and family a lot, and enjoy my text groups with them. Certainly I’m up on Cameron news thanks to that! I also really enjoy online Zoom meetings that started in the pandemic but are now just nice ways to keep in touch with people I used to email a lot. I feel so close to friends all over the place!

Email is there still, but mostly for work or nonprofit stuff. The few email lists I’m still on don’t get much of my attention these days, because I run out of time.

For what it’s worth, that’s that. I enjoy the online communities as much as the in-person ones, though. I like blog comments and interacting with readers, a lot. So thanks to you commenters and silent readers. You know who you are!

It’s too cold to have a daily bird, though I did enjoy looking at puffy sparrows today. It’s supposed to snow tomorrow. I know the chickens are enjoying their heat lamps and the horses appreciate the new shelter. I tested both of them out today!

Our heater is still working, so us humans are coping well with 19° F weather. The heat pump unit got wrapped in insulation, so it’s not failing when it got into the 20s like it used to. We are getting stuff figured out, thanks to the brain power of the ranch commune.

The far left square is today. That’s the coldest day I’ve recorded!

It may snow tomorrow! I bet I take pictures. What do you think?

Reading? Of Course!

What book are you reading right now?

It’s a good time for that question, because I started a new book a few days ago, The Invention of Nature (2015). It’s about Alexander von Humboldt, whose work was very important for people like me.

I have it because folks were discussing naturalists and people who have a lot of species named after them. It became apparent that I wasn’t very familiar with von Humboldt, compared to Aldo Leopold. So, my friend “JC Maxwell” (a pseudonym) said she’d send me a book.

Sure enough, it showed up, along with a book called Regretsy, a humorous look at awful things sold on Etsy. I admit I read that first. It made me laugh aloud.

The author tells funny stories about herself, too.

Back to Humboldt. So far he’s still pretty young, but he’s been running all over Prussia and its neighbors being an eccentric genius and meeting famous people. I guess that’s what you did back then. He seems to have had a lot of time off from his job looking at rocks in mines.

Right now he’s hanging out with Goethe and the king of some small chiefdom or whatever it was before countries emerged in central Europe. They eat a lot and discuss poetry and new ideas about how the natural world works. Plus, of course he knows Charles Darwin.

I’ll get to the parts where he goes off and identifies lots of plants and animals soon enough. Right now he’s just way over-studious and energetic.

Did you know in the 1800s he was the most famous person in the world? That’s what the book says.

Today was full of chores, but Anita and I had fun grocery shopping for Thanksgiving at her favorite H-E-B store. We also visited Target and a couple of other places.

I still got home in time to horse around with Drew, who calmed down a bit today. All good.

Daily Bird

Today I went out on my usual morning walk and animal inspection. I heard an interesting hoot/honk sound. I looked down at the Merlin app and it said snow geese! Sure enough, they were flying over.

These guys are only here during migration, so I was lucky to get a glimpse. We saw tons at Bosque del Apache wildlife refuge in New Mexico when we went there. Beautiful birds.

Book Report: Mother Tongue

I’ve let this book marinate in my mind for a few days before writing about it. That’s because Mother Tongue: The Surprising History of Women’s Words, by Jenni Nuttall (2023), left me conflicted.

It’s a good book to review on Samhain/Halloween, since it has an entire chapter on witches, and there’s a good deal of discussion of how all kinds of words became derogatory terms for old women, the kind you see depicted in Halloween decorations. And who can complain about a book about etymology? Not me, that’s for sure.

Nuttall is an expert on Old and Middle English, so it’s fun to read her easy translations of old phrases (and to try to figure them out before she translates). I’m inclined to be sympathetic to fellow linguists, of course, and to fellow feminists as well, but dang, this woman comes across as grumpy. She also comes across as defensive about her life choices. I don’t think parenting is her favorite stage of life and she certainly doesn’t have much good to say about breastfeeding and hanging out with your baby. I think she’d have liked one of those wet nurses she talks about in the mothering chapter.

The other small complaint I have is probably just me. Since I spent a lot of my early adulthood reading (and writing) about how women use language in more recent times, I was hoping for a lot more detail, more examples, and more juicy stories about the language of and about women in early English. She doesn’t seem to have many other choices than Chaucer. It does occur to me that there may not be many written sources for her to draw from, so I’ll grant that.

I have a lot of books on women’s language and sexuality. Some of them are here. Others are still in a box.

One of the fun things about Women’s Words is that it’s written in British English, so I got to learn some new modern slang. That was a real bonus. But since she’s English, I wish she could have added some words about women from former British colonies like India and the Caribbean.

Honestly, though, I wouldn’t discourage anyone who has an interest in the English language through history and cares about all English speakers, not just the ones who fancy themselves to be in charge. You’ll find out some interesting derivations, like the fact that the history of “girl” is shrouded in mystery. You’ll learn about words for childbirth, marital states, and the work women do. Go ahead and check it out. Don’t listen to grumpy Suna.

PS: if you write a book about women and language, don’t name it Mother Tongue. There are lots of books called that, so you’ll need a good subtitle.

Good night, moon. Hello, ancestral spirits.

I’m Punting Again (and a salt lake)

What have you been putting off doing? Why?

Ha ha, I thought to myself when I saw this prompt. It’s perfect! I’ve been putting off sharing some cool stuff I learned and saw at the Master Naturalist Annual Meeting. And I have to put things off again after taking 12 hours to get home today. I’m zonked.

Don’t get me wrong! It was because I was having a wonderful time that we took so long! Oh, yes, my smile muscles were hurting.

Because nature is beautiful, says the Couch’s kingbird.

We skipped the end of the conference to go to one of the places I’d learned about in one of my sessions, La Sal Del Rey (the king’s salt). It’s near Edinburgh or San Manuel Linn, Texas.

It’s really an amazing sight, so please visit the link above to read more. We saw animal tracks galore around the lake, and dozens of new birds and mating dragonflies around the nearby freshwater lagoons. Paradise.

My first javelina or ringed peccary. These are native. He was not bothered by us.

Everything sparkles in the sun there from the salt crystals. Awe inspiring. Because of deep exhaustion I’m not going to show you and name all the plants and other wildlife. Here are a few plants and birds, along with scenery of the lake, thorn scrub, and mesquite/prickly pear forest.

Blurry, but my first vermillion flycatcher

I’m so glad I got to finally see South Texas. It’s so different and interesting!

More details later.

Grown Up Time

When was the first time you really felt like a grown up (if ever)?

I’ll write about my day and viewing the eclipse tomorrow. For now…

I first felt like a grown-up was when I found out my first son was on the way and his dad and I had to put together a wedding in a few weeks, buy a house, and plan for parenting.

I was 32.

Dragonflies symbolize transformation. Becoming a parent transformed me.

Yes, I know that’s a damselfly.

Book Report: The Simple Art of Rice

Few things are as frustrating as reading a cookbook all about a specific ingredient, knowing full well that you are completely out of that ingredient. But I did it, I read this fascinating rice cookbook in one of the very few times in my adult life that I was out of rice.

I thought there was another giant bag of rice in the freezer, but there wasn’t. Luckily, Lee got me some Basmati rice today when he grocery shopped. But now that I’ve read The Simple Art of Rice, by JJ Johnson (with Danica Novgorodoff), I know I need more kinds of rice, like my beloved sushi rice, brown rice, and black rice.

I discovered this book the way I discover so many, on an NPR interview. It’s a good thing I’m not in the car listening as much as I used to, because I found two books in one day driving to and from College Station.

Anyway, this book is gorgeous, with lovely photos of the rice dishes from many cultures as well as elegant watercolor illustrations by the co-author. I love a substantial hardback book.

Most importantly, the content is interesting, with a nice mix of rice history, stories of cultural ties to rice, some science, and a well rounded collection of recipes that Johnson collected from workers at the many restaurants where he’s worked.

Now JJ Johnson is a famous rice chef, but I enjoyed how he didn’t re-do traditional recipes, just added a little to some. I enjoyed learning African, Asian, Caribbean, and American traditions and how they are interrelated, often due to the forced African diaspora to North America and the islands around it.

Most of the recipes would be easy to try for the average cook. They all sound very flavorful. Some call for special ingredients from cultures whose grocery stores are not near Milam County, Texas, but maybe I can get some in Austin. I expect I’d be the only one to eat some of the ones I’d like to try most, because they’re full of cilantro, very hot peppers, and the dreaded curry. But that would give me more leftovers!

I suspect my family would love some of the desserts, though. And dishes I know they love are in there…with so many variations of beans and rice! We eat that!

All in all, I had a blast reading the stories, interviews, and cultural nuggets in this book. The recipes are like a delicious bonus! This is a great addition to any collection of cookbooks, especially of home cooking.

This visitor to the ranch is glad there were no turtle gumbo recipes.

Issues with My Cultural Heritage

What aspects of your cultural heritage are you most proud of or interested in?

As a Euro-American white person, I’ve been learning a lot about the negative aspects of my ancestors. There’s a lot to tell, and I’m pleased that it’s not being swept under the rug anymore. But there are things to treasure, things to puzzle over, and things to horrify you no matter where your ancestors originated. That’s because people are talented, complex, and often cruel. Everywhere and throughout history.

So, today I’ve been thinking of my ancestry and what parts I’m proud of.

Oh look, Harvest Moon. slightly bigger than last night.

Most of my ancestors on my paternal line came from England. The Kendall family is very old, but I’m most proud of how the first father and son to come over in the 1600s took their indentured servitude and used it to do very well once they were free. That’s the Early American Dream. Then they fought on the winning side of the War of Independence and headed south. Then they lost the next big war and ended up sharecroppers living right along with former enslaved people. I also like that those folks came here to be able to feed themselves, not to foist weird religious beliefs on others.

I wonder if any of them were fascinated by tiny hover flies?

Now, on my grandmother’s side there were some French Huguenots. They were among the many religious fanatics to come to the US to escape persecution and promote their cause. The other bunch on that side were Scots-Irish. Yep. Getting away from religious stuff. Well, that and famines. They all ended up nice, Appalachians, some who did well and some who didn’t. Typical American white immigrant story.

Maybe some were herbalists and inspired my love for wildflowers.

I do love the folk tales, wisdom, and pre-Christian spiritual traditions of Great Britain and Ireland. They tie me to a much more distant past. And yes, I realize those people could be cruel as well as kind, just like the Romans and all that.

I was fascinated by the sun on flowers this morning.

I’ve written a lot about my mom’s ancestors being brought to Florida from Menorca to be slaves on sugar cane or rice plantations. It’s a fascinating little tale, and I’m really proud of the Canova folks for escaping and hanging out with the Native Americans until they could come back and become prosperous business owners in St. Augustine. Those were some strong Mediterranean people.

My maternal grandfather was Swedish. I like that his ancestors stayed together in the same villages for many generations. I’ve never experienced a community with such deep roots. Still, the Andersons finally headed out in the very early 1900s, again because they were hungry. Most of them went to Minnesota, but my grandfather was an adventurous guy. He left there to work on the Panama Canal as a surveyor and ended up in Florida, where I’m sure he seemed quite exotic on his fancy white horse. (Maybe he’s where my horse-loving genes came from.)

I guess I’m proud that my ancestors took big risks and got through hardship. No doubt we’re all descendants of the people who survived the risks and danger long enough to reproduce, huh?

Back then, they didn’t even have bad county roads to travel on.

And when you look at what they went through, the persecution, the ignorance, the huge changes, you can get some perspective to use on today’s challenges. Humans have never had it easy, and never has there been a time or culture without suffering and joy. I’m sure you already knew that.

I just like the swoopy lines in this one. Those are starlings, also European immigrants.

In summary, I don’t think my heritage is better or worse than anyone else’s. I’d like to think I’ve learned from some of their mistakes, and can benefit from some of their contributions to the world.

Now let us ponder the shoe on a fence post. It’s always there if someone needs it!