I guess you’ll just have to come to the big city to see Chabon read. He’ll be reading right in my neighborhood this Thursday night. And I’d go with you…
http://michaelchabon.com/Michael_Chabon/Appearances.html

Yes, Chabon is up as my November essayist. And yes, I realize that he’s probably the sort of tech-savvy writer that might check out what people are writing about him. But he’s got four kids and he’s probably way too busy. Right?

i want to see michael chabon read! are you going to write about him in your essay series? he might read it, you know. just sayin’, haha.

It’s always those quirky experiences that redeem the interests that seem, at first glance, trivial. Because more often than not, my kids will take one of those predictable fascinations and put their own spin on it. For instance, the conversations we’ve been having about why Wolverine should lead the X-Men, rather than Cyclops, are really more than comic book discussions. They’re an exercise in making arguments, in using logic, in gathering evidence.

Who knew that comics would be such great prep for the debate team?

A proud mom and grammy

The one that was hard for me was My Little Pony (I am not sure plastic ponies qualify as culture at all, even pop). But they and their friends would gather at park day with their ponies and have a blast. Some of the ponies have magnets in their feet which allow them to cling to jungle gyms, which they had great fun with. Then they discovered that the ponies picked up iron bits from the sand and fell to using them as mining tools. A big gaggle of little girls on their hands and knees pushing ponies through the sand and then collecting the metal bits that clung to their hooves. You just never know where an interest might lead them.