The death of Fred Astaire : and other essays from a life outside the lines / Leslie Lawrence.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Lawrence, Leslie, 1950- author.

Series:

Excelsior Editions

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Lawrence, Leslie, 1950-.

Lawrence, Leslie.

Lawrence, Leslie, 1950---Family.

Lawrence, Leslie, 1950---Travel.

Women--United States--Biography.

Women.

Mothers--United States--Biography.

Mothers.

Lesbians--United States--Biography.

Lesbians.

Families--United States.

Families.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (286 p.)

Place of Publication:

Albany, New York : Excelsior Editions, 2016.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

When, in the late eighties, the author chooses to raise a child with her lesbian partner, she embraces a life outside the lines—one full of curious adventures as well as the usual catastrophes and everyday pleasures.Finalist for the 2016 Foreword INDIES Book of the Year Award in the Autobiography & Memoir category As a child of the sixties, Leslie Lawrence knew she didn't want to duplicate her parents' lives, yet she never imagined she'd stray so far outside the lines of their-and her own-expectations.The Death of Fred Astaire opens with the story, both wrenching and funny, of how Lawrence says her goodbyes to the iconic images she's held since her youth; she then proceeds to bear a child and raise him with her lesbian partner. Some essays in this debut collection reflect on legacies Lawrence inherited from her Jewish family and culture. In others, she searches gamely for a rich, authentic life-a voice, a vocation, a community, even a "god" she can call her own.Always a seeker, an adventurer resisting fear, Lawrence, a city girl, creates a summer home in the back woods of the "Live Free or Die" state. She attempts the flying trapeze and takes part in a cross-dressing workshop. Traveling alone to Morocco, she assists a veterinarian tending to an ailing donkey. Teaching in a vocational high school in Boston, she questions her methods and assumptions about race and class. With rare honesty, she confronts the complexities of motherhood, of caring for her ill partner, and of widowhood. In "Wonderlust," the collection's most ambitious piece, she explores the role of beauty and creativity in our spiritual lives, revealing how lifelong learning in dance, music, and the visual arts can make us all more alive even as we age.Ranging widely in length, subject, and style, these personal essays place Lawrence among today's most vital writers of creative nonfiction. Her warmth and wisdom, her distinctive blend of humor and pathos, her reverence for what sustains us-food and family, community and beauty-all make this a book you'll want to share with those you love.

Contents:

Contents; Acknowledgments; I; The Death of Fred Astaire; Becoming Jennie; King for a Day; Fits and Starts; Karl Will Bring a Picnic; Dogs and Children; II; Andee's Fiftieth and the Way We Live Now; Yard Sale; Always Someone!; Swinging; The Third Hottest Pepper in Honduras; III; On the Mowing; Enough Tupperware; Provincetown Breakfast; My June Wedding; IV; What Can You Do?; Wonderlust: Excursions through an Aesthetic Education; 1. Dancing Outside the Lines; 2. Braking for Beauty; 3. On Course(s); 4. A Want; 5. Plank; 6. Beauty, the Treacherous; 7. Wired for Beauty?

8. A More Modest View of the Power of Teachers9. Me and Georgia O'Keeffe; 10. On Beauty and Justice and Becoming a Horse; 11. The Good, the Bad, and the Pretty/Beautiful/ Wild/Disgusting; 12. Rediscovering the Goldbergs; 13. Crisscrossing; 14. How I Became an English Major; 15. Consider the Float, the Glide, the Slash, Dab, Wring; 16. Traveling in the Dark; 17. Rooms to Dwell In; 18. My Digital Age; 19. Changing Course Course; 20. My Story/Your Story; 21. On Beauty and Dying; 22. With Sam in Wonderland; 23. Like Art, Like Life; At the Donkey Hotel; Selected Bibliography

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9781438461052

1438461054

OCLC:

1511484071