Deadfall - Generations of Logging in the Pacific NW - James Lemonds

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Category: Documentary Acquired: Christmas 2008 Read: February 2009 Briefly: 100 years of dramatic changes in Washington's logging industry - as experienced by four generations of the author's family, just trying to adapt and make a living.

Comments: Logging and the Pacific Northwest have always gone together - it's part of our history, it employs our friends and neighbors. You can't drive more than half an hour without passing either a sawmill or a log truck. However, if you've lived here for more than 10 years, you also know that the industry has shrunken dramatically as an element of our culture and economy. (It used to be only five minutes between log trucks).

That makes the story worth digging into. There are plenty of books and articles around that tell it from the forest's point of view, so to speak, and I've read my share. But this book is different - it's the story of four generations of loggers, relating their experiences and struggles in very human terms, often via first-person quotes.

It begins at the turn of the last century, painting vivid pictures of the difficulties and dangers of 'brute force' logging (my term) - old growth tree harvesting based on raw human and animal strength, augmented with ropes, pulleys and maybe a steam donkey here and there. It follows this thread through a century of improvements in working conditions, power machinery and forest management practices.

But there were other forces at work - competitive pressures to cut costs, insatiable foreign markets for limited old-growth timber, and constant intervention by the federal government, usually well-intentioned but often accomplishing little, at tremendous human cost. And don't forget our little volcanic episode in 1980, which created an urgent need to harvest almost a billion board feet of blown-down timber, causing a huge but very short-lived industry boom.

Against all of these forces, the loggers just try to stay afloat. They move constantly between jobs at major timber companies (OK, the major timber company), or independent logging contractors, or self-employment. Automation reduces the number of jobs available, competition reduces wages and decades of logging reduce the harvest size. By the end of the book, most of the characters are earning less money than 10-20 years ago, and have no idea where they'll be working this time next year. Retirement is a distant dream, and they're pleading with their children to look for other careers.

Along with this poignant history, the book presents a lot of gritty, earthy, interesting detail about life in the woods. The jargon is all there (with a glossary), the logging techniques, the descriptions of camp life, and insights into the kinds of people willing to put up with all the danger and grief.

My thinking is that this is the ideal book to read if you're frustrated about your job and your chances for career advancement. After reading about these folks, you'll thank your lucky stars that you weren't raised in a logging family and logging town, and weren't weaned on expectations that a job in the woods was all you needed for a comfortable, secure life.

Population: 485 - Michael Perry

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Category: Memoir. Acquired: Borrowed from Mary Beth, who borrowed it from her sister. Read: March 2009, while relaxing in Mesa, AZ Briefly: author/volunteer firefighter describes his adventures and muses about the nature of community in a tiny midwest town.

Comments: Don't you love it when you come across a book completely by accident, and end up really enjoying it? That was the case here, as I saw the book sitting on a friend's countertop, was intrigued enough by the subtitle ("Meeting Your Neighbors One Siren at a Time") to leaf through it, and then browse a chapter, and finally sit down on the patio (under the lemon tree) and start reading.

The subtitle sums it up well. Perry has returned to the town of his youth, and decides to join the volunteer fire department as his way of engaging with the local citizenry. He ends up serving alongside his mother and two brothers, plus a host of interesting characters.

On one level, it's a collection of stories and anecdotes. Perry is a keen observer of human nature, and has a clever sense of humor. He writes about Fire Awareness presentations at the local grade school, and says:

Before you go in too deeply for the idea that the world would be a better place if we were all more childlike, try sticking three kids in one room with two toys. You'll witness conflict-resolution techniques combining the very worst of the Marquis de Sade and the World Wrestling Federation. The world is like it is because, on the whole, we tend to act like children.

Interspersed with the anecdotes are his reflections about who he is, where he lives and what he does. He talks about the mystique that develops around emergency workers, and about hero worship. He observes that the act of entering a smoke-filled building isn't enough by itself to make you a hero - it only counts if there happens to be a person inside, something over which you actually have no control, or possibly even foreknowledge. It's all pretty arbitrary.

His observations about community strike home as a personal tragedy affects his life, and he's forced to depend on the care of others. As he later notes, the privilege of community is that, in such times, he can entrust the situation to long-time friends, and not to strangers. That sums it up nicely.

What to Listen for in Music - Aaron Copland

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Category: Non-fiction. Acquired: Christmas present Read: Jan/Feb 2009 Briefly: one of the great American composers describes the elements, structure, texture and fundamental forms of music.

Comments: I have always wanted to take a music appreciation course, having missed it during my school years (it's not part of most engineering curricula). While looking for a self-study book I found this one, which is apparently a classic in the field. It made sense to me that you'd want to learn music appreciation directly from a composer, i.e. to hear him talk about how he goes about creating art from the various elements available to him. So, I put it on my Amazon wish list for Christmas, and there it was.

The book was enjoyable reading, although the jargon got a little technical at times - it's definitely not a beginner's book. But the bigger issue was that you really can't do music appreciation without actually hearing examples of the concepts being explained (doh!). The book has plenty of examples, but they're simply given as musical scores, as if expecting the readers to stop and plunk them out on their pianos. Right.

So, at this point, I'd have to say that I'm no more music-appreciative than I was in the beginning. That means I'm still looking for a book, but this time I'm looking for one that includes an audio CD. Any recomendations?

It Must've Been Something I Ate - Jeffrey Steingarten

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Category: Non-fiction. Acquired: Christmas present Read: Jan/Feb 2009 Briefly: a collection of 38 columns by Vogue food editor and Iron Chef judge Jeffrey Steingarten, on topics ranging from the physics of grilling to the search for the ultimate hot chocolate.

Comments: What to say - this is totally enjoyable reading for anyone interested in food. Just a cookbook, you say? Not at all. Think of it as more like a diary, where Steingarten records his diverse adventures in foodology. He tracks down myths and rumors, experiments with cooking techniques, tries to reproduce dishes he's eaten, and gives the occasional lesson in science, sociology, politics or psychology - all as related to food topics. All are delivered with the dry sense of humor and semi-cynical attitude that Iron Chef viewers have come to expect and appreciate.

Some of my favorite chapters included:

• his first Turducken meal, followed by a description of his attempts to assemble his own.
  
• his search for a practical way to duplicate pizzeria baking techniques at home.
• the day he spent helping his French friends slaughter a hog and make blood sausage.
  
• his research into MSG - where it comes from, how it affects taste, plus some history behind the long- disproven "MSG headache" myth. (This informative chapter is entitled "How come everyone in China doesn't have a headache?")

This book is of essentially the same style as Steingarten's other title, The Man Who Ate Everything. I can recommend them both.