Fire Shut Up in My Bones, Charles M. Blow (3.0)
You may recognize Charles Blow’s name as an Op/ed
columnist in the New York Times. He happens to hold the distinction as having
written the only op/ed to which I felt compelled to respond. His specialty is
using data and graphs to illustrate his various points. In one case, I felt he
had picked certain data in order to skew his results. As an engineer, I had to
call ‘foul’. Needless to say, my letter to the editor was not published, but
when I heard he had written a memoir I was curious to read it. Mr. Blow grew up
in rural Louisiana as the last of 4 boys born to a poor and principled mother.
His father reigns as the missing ingredient to much of his happiness. In
addition to getting kicked out of the house relatively early in Charles’s life,
he doesn’t seem capable of showing any love or attention to his children. The
author is a relatively young man, so the book mainly covers his childhood and
college years, as he explains their context to his ‘formative’ development. His
story is clear about what possible causes led to his issues with relationships
(of all types) and closeness. While I was disappointed in the quality of
writing (a bit stilted given the context), I appreciated the description he
brought to the times and people from the perspective of a black youth growing
up in rural Louisiana. His ability to overcome hardship and broken
relationships of his youth is heartening to read.
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