Sunday, May 30, 2010

The Little Things

It's amazing how little we pay attention to the tiny things that drive the modern world, how much we take them for granted.  This piece of jewelry from beadworkbyamanda on Etsy is made from a circuit board, and although it is basically the recycling of something that is scrap, waste, it is art, lovely, elegant, beautiful in its lines and colors.  Why don't we pay attention to the beauty that is beneath the surface of things?

I have always been curious about the inside.  Part of that undoubtedly comes from the fact that from the time I was small, I watched my father working on electronics, opening them up, pulling them apart and putting them back together again.  I have bits and pieces of them that I found pretty or fascinating around the house from old models. 

The interest about the inside, though, for me goes deeper than just the machines we use.  I am also fascinated by the interior of us.  I was a biological sciences major going into college because I wanted to know more and more about how life functioned.  The more I knew, the more I was in a state of constant humble wonder at the miraculous majesty of God's design.  Although my career ran more to words and their internal workings than nature's internal gearings ultimately, I still love to read about it on a layman's level.

We need to pay attention more.  Whether it's taking the time to read up on the latest natural phenomenon, to look at the inside of an old-fashioned pocket watch when the opportunity presents itself, or to try understand the complexities of our own health issues when we face them, I believe Bacon's old axiom, "Knowledge is power."  Even more importantly and equally true, though, Knowledge is profound enjoyment, and there's little enough of that in the world.  We should seize that with both hands anytime we see it glimmering before us. 

Saturday, May 29, 2010

Lightning Strikes

I went to the Old Place today to spend some restorative time away.  I checked on the blackberries, but other than one or two earlies which I popped in my mouth and happily devoured, they aren't quite ready yet.  Maybe in about another week, I'll have baskets of delicious juicy fruit, though.  The brambles are full this year.  Last year, I missed them all because of my knee. 


I spent the day reading and driving my parents' new RTV around the pastures.  They were up too working on some things and piddling around.  We finished the day by having dinner together on the porch at Red Field and watching the storm clouds gather.

As I was getting ready to leave, I walked back up the hill to where I'd parked my little car.  I can't drive all the way down to Red Field in the Cruiser because it's too low.  I came through the little path into the upper pasture, and when I looked up, the sky was exploding.

The lightning from a storm that was pounding some distance away, across the ridgetops from where I was, was striking straight down in those photograph-worthy bolts.  I drove my car to the gate and turned the engine off.  I just watched for awhile.  It was remarkable.  Whenever there is a thunderstorm at school, I always feel so exposed and afraid ever since that static charge popped blue sparks off my shelves, but I felt no fear at all tonight, just wonder. 

I wish there had been somebody there to share it with.  That was all it needed to make it utterly perfect.  I sat and marveled for a long time, and then I came on home through the beginnings of light rain.  It's a good memory, even it came from bad weather.

Monday, May 24, 2010

Very True

"The major difference between a thing that might go wrong and a thing that cannot possibly go wrong is that when a thing that cannot possibly go wrong goes wrong it usually turns out to be impossible to get at or repair."  Douglas Adams

Hints, Allegations, and Things Better Left Unsaid

(With all due props to Collective Soul)

My AP kids asked me point blank today if I was leaving.  It caught me off-guard, to say the least.  Apparently, there is a rumor going around to that effect.  That also caught me off-guard.  I can't imagine anything I do being rumor-worthy, for one.  I am the least conversation-worthy of people, so dull as to make watching paint dry look like a televised sport.

I know how it got started.  I haven't exactly been a cheery camper lately, and I haven't bothered to put on much of a false front.  I have, in fact, been vocal, grumpy, and irritable above and beyond my norm.  After the rather earthshattering revelations of last two or three weeks, though, I felt like somebody had put my soul through a cross-cut shredder, and I needed some time to think, to get myself back in a place where some things made some sense.  I think I might almost be getting there now.

The long and short of it is that I'm not going anywhere, at least not just yet.  My heart is still tied to where I am now.  There have been a couple of powerful reminders of why in the past two weeks in the form of students present and students past.  Maybe I needed that focus shift, too, of why I am there.  Ultimately, they are why I am there and what I'm there for.  The other crap, the stuff beyond my ability to control, needs to matter less to me.  I need to let it slide off me and focus on all that wonder that comes in to my classroom every day.  If I can just do that and keep the real heart of why I do what I do protected and secure, then I can keep doing it with the passion it deserves. 

Sunday, May 16, 2010

Liar, Liar

Figures often beguile me, particularly when I have the arranging of them myself; in which case the remark attributed to Disraeli would often apply with justice and force: "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and statistics."
- Mark Twain's Own Autobiography: The Chapters from the North American Review 

I hate lies.  I hate being lied to.  I am an easy dupe, constantly credulous, so I know it happens all the time.  I want to believe people, want to think they're all playing above the table, want to believe everyone is trying to do the right thing even when I know they're not.  I need to believe that there are people who want to play those rules, need to believe that people are basically good, or I can't even get out of the bed in the morning, actually.

Therefore, when I learn that I've been lied to for a very long time by somebody I really trusted, the betrayal I feel is profound.

I can understand why it happened.  The situation, I'm sure, felt like one that demanded it at the time.  However, who we are when nobody is looking is who we really are, right?  We all struggle with darkness.  We all have secret sins, flaws we hope nobody ever sees, pieces of ugliness that we fight every day, but embracing them, excusing them with situational ethics is not a way to make ourselves or any situation we find ourselves in better.  We refine nothing, solve nothing, bring forth no gold from the dross when we say, "I will do this wrong this time, in this crisis and call it good." All we do is stave off disaster until later, allow the wound to fester untended.

What are the results of this latest revelation for me?  Another person I can't quite look in the eye.  Another huge mess somebody is going to have to clean up.  Another nail in the coffin of the whole situation.  Another scar I have to carry internally.  Most crucially, I've been thinking lately, another reason I should just force myself not to trust anyone. 

Is this a way to live, though?  Do I need to close myself off because of the unfaithfulness of others?  Should I stop believing in the truth because others have?  Part of me very much wants to protect myself, become cynical, trust no one, but this is no way to go through life, is it?  At the same time, I don't think I can be the same person I was.  I don't think I should be.  It is equally unwise to learn nothing from a situation that has brought pain.

Maybe the best course of action is to follow Shakespeare's quote, "Love all, trust a few, do harm to none."  Maybe if I can keep this axiom in my mind, I can find a middle road between a hard shell that keeps everyone out and a heart so credulous that everyone can wipe their feet on it and walk away laughing.

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Tired

What do you do when somebody won't lift a hand to save themselves?  When they're perfectly content to go down for the third time, slip under the surface and disappear, maybe forever?  How many times do you swim out, try to grab them, drag them to the shore when they fight you, or worse still, when they laugh and sing, party and dance as the ship goes down?

My heart, my very soul hurt.  I don't know what to do anymore.  Everything I do feels useless.  I'm surrounded by pockets of indifference, gallows humor, crudeness, and outright cruelty in an emergency of epic proportions.  I feel like I'm trapped in this old, old nightmare I used to have where I was inside a burning building full of people who I was trying to alert to the danger but none of whom would listen.... 

As always, it's not every single thing in my day to day that is causing this.  I need to focus on those bright pockets, those shining stars, but I am so distressed over the other, the lost ones, right now, that I can't see anything else.  I'm so tired.  Just tired, tired, tired.  I wish this was just over for awhile.

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Sweet Shakespeare

I got such a surprise yesterday.  My AP students, stealthy little creatures that they are, had noticed me looking at busts of Shakespeare about a month ago and had gotten me one as a "happy."  I was caught completely off-guard. I've been wanting one of these for a very long time, but all of them, even the very small ones, have been impossible on my budget.  This one is lovely. I had them all take a fine-tip Sharpie and sign the bottom so I will have a permanent reminder of just who those sweet people are who gave it to me. Every time I look at it, I will be able to think of that good day and this good year and smile.

Oh, So, SO True.....

CNN is one of the participants in the war. I have a fantasy where Ted Turner is elected president but refuses because he doesn't want to give up power.
  - Arthur C. Clarke

Saturday, May 08, 2010

The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar WaoIt seems I start so many reviews out this way....

I've had this book on my "to read" shelf for a long time now, and I really, really wish I'd gotten to it sooner.  I can see why it got the Pulitzer.  I devoured it in two long Saturdays of reading, last and this, and it turned out to be one of those books that I regret being over. 

I loved the mix of Dominican history, something I first got curious about through Julia Alvarez, and the "Genres," stuff I've been reading for years.  The storylines of the different members of the Cabral family were so beautifully told.  I loved the narrative voice and its endless footnote digressions.  I found myself laughing hysterically and learning stuff, too.  Can you ask for more than that, really?

The book just moved me.  I am still turning bits of it over in my mind, and in time, I will definitely reread it.  Oscar himself reminds me of people I know, famous characters from other pieces of literature, and the whole thing is a bit like a horrifying fairy tale set in a place not imagined by too real to have been dreamed up.  I want to put it on my reading list for my course, but because of the strength of the content, I may have to forego that.  I will recommend it here, though.  It is one of the five best books I've read this year, hands down.  If you're interested, you can click the image of it above and go right to its listing on Amazon.

Thursday, May 06, 2010

Restoration of Balance

Today was my students' AP test (come on, College Board....hit my blog.  I dare you.  Hit my blog.  I know you're going to.  You do every single year.  I'm not saying a fee-freakin thing about the exam except "it was".), and I got up early, went and set up their "snack table" for the break, and took my jittery nerves on about my day.  I had done all I could for them: providing intensive review, even adding two afterschool sessions that I've never offered before to help prep them,  giving what I hope was solid instruction all year long, of course, and although I really, really wish we'd had that month we wound up missing because of school's late start, etc., etc., I felt fairly peaceful about it. They were so motivated and have worked so hard.  All I can do now is wait for the scores.  I can't wait until I get to see what the prompts were like this year. The waiting period is just cruel.

Test day for me is always the lifting of a huge burden.  This year because of all the added stress of everything else that's been going on, I don't think this has ever been more true.  I  used the extra class periods to get some serious catching-up done on grading and paperwork, so I had even more reason to feel good when I left the building today.  If I can get two or three more good work days in, I think I can get everything completely caught up. 

I recently finished up another big project I had hanging over me, too, and I got some news that resolved an issue that was causing me stress in another area, too, so things are slowly starting to even out.  There is still one big shoe waiting to drop, though.  I may know more about it after tomorrow.  I guess, though, if I can get my stressors down to one or two from four or five, I will be at such ridiculous leisure that I will just count myself lucky and complain to no one.

Wednesday, May 05, 2010

The RSC Hamlet

Hamlet (2009)As a person who loves and teaches Hamlet, I have seen more than my fair share of versions of Hamlet.  Prior to yesterday, I had three of them in my personal DVD collection: Olivier's, Zeferelli's, and Branaugh's.  There are things I like about all of them, strengths and weaknesses of them.  I use different versions to teach different scenes.

Yesterday, I got a long-awaited treat in a small brown box from Amazon, the new Royal Shakespeare Company production of Hamlet starring David Tennant as Hamlet and Patrick Stewart as Claudius.  It may just be the best version of the play I have ever seen all in all. 

I had been hearing of this production for about two years.  David Tennant, of course, has been playing Dr. Who for the last four years, and it was during his tenure as the Doctor that he started performing Hamlet with the RSC.  Patrick Stewart has been doing things with the RSC forever, I suppose, but putting the two of these actors into this production must have been a marketing coup beyond all coups for somebody.  I mean, how many people probably bought tickets because they wanted to see the Doctor face off against Jean Luc Picard? 

I'm not trying to denigrate either actor, believe me.  They are both superb.  I don't think I have ever seen Hamlet done so well.  The "mad" act is completely zany, great fun to watch, and as I came to appreciate with Tennant in his role as the Doctor, the scenes of emotional grief were capable of wringing the soul without being overacted.  Tennant is capable of expressing pain and suffering with expressions, movements of the eye.  It's restrained and elegant. 

Of course, what can I say about Patrick Stewart?  Just his voice makes him a better Claudius than all the rest, but that's the least of what makes him good in this.  His performance, too, is restrained.  The inherent cleverness and plotty complexity of the character is perfectly portrayed here as I've never once seen it before.  Since Stewart is playing the Ghost and Claudius, Gertrude's quick remarriage makes more sense, too, and his portrayal of Claudius is such that you actually find yourself liking him...until you look under the surface and know him....  I understand why he got the Olivier Award for this.

From the set to the portrayal of Gertrude, from the modernization of the costumes (Hamlet delivers "To Be or Not to Be" in jeans and barefooted) to the fact that dumb show is done by risque clowns, it's just a brand new beast.  This performance helped me look at this play that I love and know so well in new ways.  I love it.  If you like Hamlet at all, you should definitely check it out for yourself.  You can click the photo at the top and get it right from Amazon if you like.

Tuesday, May 04, 2010

(Un) Comfortably Numb

The migraine hit during second period as I was doing my usual frantic dance to finish my last full class day of preparations for this year's AP test.  I should have known it was coming.  One of my students called me over to look at something on the sheet they were working on, and although I can usually read stuff upside down, the symbols on the page made no sense.  They could have been Cyrillic for all the meaning I could wring from them.  I managed to force focus back into place, but a few minutes together, the pain struck, and it felt like someone was literally stabbing me through the inner corner of my right eye with an ice pick.  I could feel the little sliver of pain all the way through my brain, sharp, brutal.  Right behind it came the light sensitivity and the radiating broader pain.

So I did what I had to, I took a Maxalt.  Mercifully, I got to it early enough to stop the chain reaction and slow down the worst of the pain that would linger.  The rest of the day, I was just wrapped up in a horrible floating disconnected haze, wanting nothing more than to lay my head on my desk and sleep.

I had to go to Wal-Mart after school because I was out of every single thing in my house, and I found myself gravitating toward brightly-colored objects like an infant.  I hope I bought what I needed.  I may wake up tomorrow and find I brought home a whole carload of Fisher-Price toys....

On the drive home, the radio station I listen to most played "Comfortably Numb," and even though I am not, by and large, a huge Pink Floyd fan (I'm almost positive that this is because of "Another Brick in the Wall"), that song has always been one that I've loved.  Today, I actually lived it.  I spent my whole day in that freaking horrible numbness where my pain was separated from myself, where my whole self has been separated from me.  Of course, I do recognize their means of getting to this state was somewhat...less legal...than mine and that perhaps that numbness was apparently somehow appealing, but other than these minor differences, so many of the lyrics applied. 

Of course, too, this might just be the Maxalt talking....  Sigh.  I think I need a nap.

Monday, May 03, 2010

Sweet Jesus, If I Could Just Write Like This.....

9.  
by E. E. Cummings

there are so many tictoc
clocks everywhere telling people
what toctic time it is for
tictic instance five toc minutes toc
past six tic

Spring is not regulated and does
not get out of order nor do
its hands a little jerking move
over numbers slowly

   we do not
wind it up it has no weights
springs wheels inside of
its slender self no indeed dear
nothing of the kind.

(So,when kiss Spring comes
we'll kiss each kiss other on kiss the kiss
lips because tic clocks toc don't make
a toctic difference
to kisskiss you and to 
kiss me)
  

Saturday, May 01, 2010

Another Rainy Saturday

Storm clouds are rolling around us, and the house is creaking.  My windchimes outside have been clattering all morning. The dogs won't go outside except when I sort of shove them out the door, and then they run into the yard, run back, and stare into the porch door looking infinitely betrayed.  It's a good day to be inside.

I have gotten a lot done today on my project.  I have a little more to go, and I'll be done with it.  That feels so good.  With everything else basically going to hell in the proverbial handcart, it's nice for something to be resolving itself in a timely fashion.  I might push on through this afternoon or tonight and get it completely done, but it will be finished tomorrow in any case.  I will be able to take my mental fountain pen and cross it firmly off my list.  (Do other people have mental fountain pens?  I'll worry about that later...)

I spent a good portion of the morning reading, and I'm almost done with The Devil's Punchbowl.  It has, like the last book by Iles I tried to read, disturbed me more than entertained me.  I loved probably the first five books by him I read, but these last two have both attracted and repelled me.  I think the problems I'm having with this one are because it has so much to do with dogfighting.  I keep having to put the book down and grab Roux, hold her and pat her and be grateful that she wasn't one of those.  I loathe dogfighters.  I don't think there's a place in hell hot enough for them or anything that can be done here on earth that's too strong a punishment, really.  Maybe that's what Iles is trying to show.  I don't know.  It's hard to read, anyway.

I hope we don't get the really bad weather today.  Apparently, it's out there, ripping things to pieces again this weekend.  It seems this spring is going to be the year of the storm.  I find that somehow almost too Natural Law appropriate for words, but you really can't go by me, can you?  I am a literature freak, and we see signs and wonders under every rock and tree, a little like the shamans and druids of old, I suppose....