Bootstrapper: From Broke To Badass On A Northern Michigan Farm (2013) - Plot & Excerpts
3.5 actually (goodreads, could you make 1/2 a possibility)"But snow days are supposed to be days off.""So they are. And refrigerators are supposed to be full, houses are supposed to be warm, and college educates mothers with half a brain in their heads are supposed to be able to figure all this shit out. Everything happens for a reason? Whatever." (153-154)Mardi Jo Link had a dream of a family and a farm with horses and she attained it. she then decided to divorce her husband and hoped that nothing would change.ha.What Ms. Link discovered was ...well sometimes things happen and you have to deal with it..with a combination of hard work and stubbornness. Does it get to her? Sure. Does she make mistakes. yup. but it is her stark honesty that wins the reader over.Life happens and you can ascribe any force you want to understanding why and wherefore, but your attitude and the diligence you use to move forward is what carry you through.Garrison Keillor wrote, "A heroic - comic saga of single motherhood, pure stubborness, and thr loyalty of three sons. And more than that, an honest account of the working poor ... (people) that don't need your sympathy. Just a break now and then." (Commerce rant)There seem to be a lot of judge-y comments about Ms. Link. it seemed very clear to me that Ms. Link had the kind of do-it-yourself-ness that we seem to say 'those living in the margins' *should* have if they want to get themselves out. She makes it quite clear that she felt she had gotten herself into the mess and she was determined to get herself out of it. I am quite certain that if her children were in mortal danger she would have asked her parents for help. The title provides a clue...as noted in Wikipedia " Bootstrap as a metaphor, meaning to better oneself by one's own unaided efforts, was in use in 1922.[6] This metaphor spawned additional metaphors for a series of self-sustaining processes that proceed without external help.[7]" This book is a fast read. As a divorced mother, I could relate to the author's stories and challenges very well, even though I don't live on a farm. I was a bit surprised, however, at the end when she gives away her meat chickens when she has been so financially strapped and desperate for meat. The action doesn't jibe with her previous motivations, no matter how annoying the chickens were. I also can't believe that she'd sleep with a guy in July and marry him in August. Although they had known each other for a while before that, it seems way too fast and makes me wonder if that part actually happened in that manner timewise. But the rest of it I liked very well, especially the chapter where she compares her family's fragile situation to the tear line on a ticket stub. That one got to me.
What do You think about Bootstrapper: From Broke To Badass On A Northern Michigan Farm (2013)?
really good.. I use to live in Northern Michigan.. I would read more of her books.
—kenzie
"They got stuffed animals in there," he whispers. "And they smell like pee."
—Pav
