Love, loathe, like

And other "L" words

Photo by Zhen Hu on Unsplash

Before we begin…

• Think back on the week and share one thing that began with the letter “L” that  you loved, loathed, liked, laughed about, lost, put on a list, lifted you up, let you down – you get the idea. Share one encounter you had this week with something beginning with the letter “L.” 

• If you’re feeling literary, share a list of the books you’d like to read before the end of the year or take a pic of that book stack rising next to your bed or bath or wherever you like to read along with any commentary you’d like to include. Send photos by replying to this email or sending to elizabethmarro@substack.com. I’ll share these in upcoming editions of Spark because we all love book lists and photos, even if they are aspirational. 

• Finally, if you can offer survival tips (or good books) for two sleepless adults whose loving adolescent dog has nightmares, adores rolling in poop, and has no sense of proportion - we are all ears. 

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Lily, Loretta, and the Lakers

Turns out the highlights and lowlights of my week all began with the letter L. I love a good alliterative theme so here goes. 

Lily, The Teen-Age Mutant Ninja Howler

Lily came into our lives a few months ago, making us a two-dog household. We love Lily. Really, we love her. Even when she wakes us up around midnight with a bloodcurdling wail from a nightmare that ends only when we rise, turn on the light, and hold her. She immediately slips back to sleep. We, on the other hand, lie sleepless for the rest of the night. We thought the bad dreams were behind us after nearly a month of peaceful dreams but this week she has had a nightmare every single night. 

Lily, at rest (sort of)

We really do love her and she seems to love us more each day too except that some days, like this past Thursday, she decided she loved shit more. Within seconds of arriving at the dog park, she located a toxic turd dump and flung herself backwards into it. She lolled. She rolled. She tried to absorb it through her pores. In addition to being smelly, this turd pile seemed to contain some kind of adhesive that was so sticky and solid, its removal took hours and even then I was convinced I smelled it even after hours of sudsing, scrubbing, toweling, and tears. Hers and mine. 

Lily loves to surprise us. She can watch three dogs go by our house without a peep but then, usually when we take our first sip of morning coffee, erupts into a siren-like howl, runs along the length of the living room, twirls in a series of 360s, and howls with ever-ascending urgency that devolves into a sort of petulance when we fail to show sufficient interest. Think toddler having a melt-down in the grocery store. Or a teenager seething and surging with hormones. “You just don’t understand!” 

We were worried about all this until we read this brief column by Alexandra Horowitz about her dog in the throes of adolescence. It was a light-bulb moment. Lily is still a teenager – she won't’ be two years old until January and even then, she will still have two of her four feet in adolescence. Besides, we know she has some catching up to do. She was a mom before she was one. She nearly died during the subsequent spay because a tick infection made her blood thin. She avoided eye contact with us for two months or more, submitted to our caresses rather than sought them, and was not always sure who was boss when it came to our first little mutt, Frida. 

Frida, waiting for lunch

Lily and Frida: “I’ve got your back.”

These days, she seeks out our laps like a heat-seeking missile of affection. She looks for us and waits for us to meet her gaze. She and Frida have a private language all their own. We remind ourselves that she’s just making her way like we all do, and we like watching her open up, get comfortable in her own skin. Maybe it will be a while before she can shed whatever fears visit her in the middle of the night and we will wait it out with her. 

But next time she lolls in a pile of turd, I’m taking her to a laundromat. 

Losing Loretta

I did not love Loretta Lynn when I was growing up. She was one more country voice in the river of them flowing through the radios of my friends’ parents or the loud speakers at the annual Lancaster Fair. “My” music was one part Billie Holiday, another part Aerosmith, and the post-Beatles rockers: Cream, Allman Brothers, Led Zeppelin and others that FM stations or our older, cooler friends and relatives played for us. 

Loretta Lynn (from NPR obituary)

Loretta and the others were simply there, seeping into my memory without my knowledge until later, as an adult, I’d hear a snatch of song that brought me back and made me wonder why I’d never paid attention before. Then one day, Loretta Lynn made me laugh out loud by singing this song with Conway Twitty: “You’re The Reason Our Kids Are Ugly.”

Okay, it’s not her best work by a long shot and you won’t see it mentioned in any of the obituaries that flooded the newspapers in the wake of her death this week but, like much of her music and the woman herself, the song reflects self-knowledge, commitment, and resilience - qualities that shaped all her music and Lynn herself. 

Here are two books that I would like to read someday, a way of giving Loretta Lynn her full due after all these years. 

Legacies Aren’t Always What Daddy Intended

The best soap opera on television right now is the 10-part documentary Legacy: The True Story of the LA Lakers. Think of it as Succession California Style. The show has a charismatic, controlling father, children who seek his attention and approval as much as the fortune he created for them. It’s got glittery stars, ginormous egos – Magic Johnson, Kobe Bryant, Phil Jackson – not to mention head honcho Dr. Jerry Buss who comes with a powerful rags-to-riches story and a toupee.

Whether he intended to pit his kids against each other or not, that is the result and you soon find yourself with a choice: to root for Team Jeanie or Team Bros (Jimmy, Johnny, and outsider Mitch Kupchak). The winner gets to be boss of the Lakers organization and the losers get the consolation prize of income for life from one of the most successful franchises in NBA history. If you didn’t follow the real-life drama in the papers a few years back, I won’t spoil it for you now by telling you the outcome but even if you did follow it, it’s still fascinating to observe the devolution of a family who, despite the careful language they use in their interviews for this documentary, betray their feelings, antipathies, and hunger for that one thing that none of the Buss children ever seems to have truly received and, now never will. 

This is a show for those who love the Lakers, hate the Lakers, or live with someone who loves or hates the Lakers. Love or hate seem to be the only choices in Laker Land. This series also feeds those of us who are fascinated by familial train wrecks. The final episode in the series airs on Hulu on Monday evening but you’ll be able to stream all the episodes anytime. 

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L is for Laura Sackton’s Books & Bakes

Laura Sackton (who has just finished cataloging her entire book collection and offers it for your review here), bakes a little something into each book review. Here is her most recent post about the novel she thinks goes best with spiced chocolate pear cake. Recipes included!

Volume 2, No. 39: Writing for Our Lives + Spiced Chocolate Pear Cake

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That’s it for this week. Let me know you are and what you’re reading. If there’s an idea, book, or question you’d like to see in an upcoming issue of Spark, let us know! Use the comment button below or just hit reply to this email and send your message directly. 

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Ciao for now. 

Gratefully,

Betsy

Disclosure: I am an affiliate of Bookshop.org and I will earn a commission if you click through on any of the books mentioned here and make a purchase.

P.S. And now, your moment of Zen…Lola in the afternoon

That’s it. That’s all the “L’s” I’ve got unless you want to hear the Kinks sing Lola in which case, just click on the photo below.

Calling for Your Contribution to “Moment of Zen”

What is YOUR moment of Zen? Send me your photos, a video, a drawing, a song, a poem, or anything with a visual that moved you, thrilled you, calmed you. Or just cracked you up. This feature is wide open for your own personal interpretation.

Come on, go through your photos, your memories or just keep your eyes and ears to the ground and then share. Send your photos/links, etc. to me by replying to this email or simply by sending to: elizabethmarro@substack.com. The main guidelines are probably already obvious: don’t hurt anyone  -- don’t send anything that violates the privacy of someone you love or even someone you hate, don’t send anything divisive, or aimed at disparaging others. Our Zen moments are to help us connect, to bond, to learn, to wonder, to share -- to escape the world for a little bit and return refreshed.