Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Places I Wish I Were

On my Tumblr, I have a tag: #places i wish i were.  I use it on photos of places I have been, places I want to go, these impossibly wonderful, breath-stealingly gorgeous places that roll through my dashboard periodically.  Oh God, how I wish I could reach out my hand, make a gesture graceful and arcane, and melt into the reality they represent.

Tonight it was Rome at dawn or dusk, a city that even in the harsh light of day can make that sweet, sharp pain well up under your heart, make you want to spin in little circles to take it all in, make you laugh because you know that if you lived there your whole life you would never, ever be able to....but it would be so fun to try....  Fun to delve into the depths of that history overlapping like the pages of a living book, waiting simply with near-eternal patience for all who are interested to uncover it layer by layer.

So often it's London and I reblog every image that comes through, every cliched St. Stephen's Tower, every angle of the Eye I'm given, and I think of beautiful, red-headed, Kerry-on-his-tongue I. every time I do.  My mind is back with him as we float through the sky in that tame soap bubble, watching all of London unfold in front of us...  London fascinates me.  Too many authors I love and teach have spun through it, lived in it, died in it.  It is the great sun in my universe, its awesome gravity spinning all the little satellites in their orbits or causing them to expend energy to create escape velocity.

And then there are the fragments of the me who used to be that come sailing along like ginkgo leaves drifting, snapshots of Japan, every one heartbreaking in its loveliness.  There is no such thing as a bad picture of Japan.  You can take your camera and point it randomly and come away with something of wonder.  And when she is really trying, when she garbs herself deliberately and with care, turns her eyes upon you with intent to charm, there is not another place in the world that can stand up to her.  Newness of cherry blossoms or red and gold autumn leaves against centuries-old tile, gardens whose carefully-sculpted emptiness invites you to walk in and lay down the tangle you carry in your mind, these commonly photographed things in Japan are only the tiniest corner of her graces.

Then there are the places I haven't been that I want to see.... India and Brazil leading the group, Germany and China coming hard on their heels, so many places in the world so lovely and enchanting, all the world full of beauty and knowledge.  There are pictures from places my friends have been recently that further whet my appetites, and I dream....

Oh, somebody, take me away from here.  Just for a little while.  Let's run away, not tell anybody, just take a passport and a camera, a change of clothes or two and get the hell out and roam until home feels exotic again, until the pictures I'm wanting to put up online are pictures of here instead.

Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Menagerie

I've had this poster since grad school, part of the decor of my living room.  I've begun to notice something sort of prophetic about it, though....  Except for the black and white spotted cat on her shoulder, this is me.  I have this menagerie currently living at my house.

Stay with me now....

The black cat with the devil eyes is Yoda, Queen of All She Surveys, Destroyer of All that Pisses Her Off.  Except for the tail, it is a very good likeness.  Behind her is grey Pearl looking grumpy because Yoda is getting attention.  To the back of the grouping is young Dillon, sitting where the others have sort of shoved her.

Down on the floor, you have Yelldo the beagle/dachshund  and Roux the brown dog.  I suppose that big white monster shoving them both out of the way is Chewie or rather Future Chewie when he gets his size on him.

I suppose this needs to have my name instead of Cheron.  Maybe I should have become a vet instead of a teacher.  It sure would have saved on the upkeep around here.

Great Pyrenees?!

I took Chewie to the vet this morning after my own doctor's appointment, and he does indeed have mange.  Mange and every form of intestinal parasite known to man.  Great.  Here we go vet bill deluxe....

I asked what type of dog or dogs might make up his illustrious pedigree, and I was expecting to hear some form of lab in there based on his head shape and paw size.

"Great Pyrenees.  If not pure bred, then almost."

Knock me down with a freaking feather.  That is a big, BIG, dog.  I mean BIG.  And unusual for these parts.  We don't herd sheep upon the mountains here, you know.  Somebody threw out bastard royalty on me.

Of course, this isn't the first time.  Britta, my first pit bull, was pure bred.  She was crazy as all get out, but she was 100% pit.  This little boy appears to be another little diamond in the rough.  Very, very rough, as it turns out, and maybe that's why somebody tossed him.   I suspect it has more to do with the general fecal nature of the composition of their souls, personally....

The vet told me that Great Pyrenees are herding dogs, gentle shepherds, good with protecting stock, loving and gentle with kids.  Chewie, then, should rehome easily.  He'll be somebody's gentle giant.  I hope I can find him a house full of kids to ride him like a big white horse.  I rather suspect, as he reaches that size, that he'll like that.  The thought of it makes me happy, too.

Gypsy Feet

Even though I'm back in the school-year swing, I'm restless.  I need to go somewhere, do something.  I wanted to go out with the Nikon this past weekend, but I thought someone was going to come and take a look at Chewie, the puppy that was thrown out on me last Thursday, to see if they wanted to adopt him, and so I was sort of trapped here all day.

Chewie continues to live here on the hill.  I'm taking him to the vet later today to start him on his shots and so forth.  He's a sweet little thing, a little less than fully healthy, I think, but our vet is amazing, so I know he'll be right as rain soon enough, and we'll find him a family who can keep him.  He just can't stay here.  I have more mammal than I can manage as it is...

I wish I knew of more places to go to take pictures that qualified as "day trips."  It's getting to the point that most of the things I think of that I'd like to shoot involve overnight stays.  I can't really afford that, and it seems a bit silly when really and truly what I'm doing is not shopping, dining in exotic restaurants, etc.  I am literally driving, getting out, taking a bunch of pictures, hanging out a bit, maybe grabbing a bite to eat, and leaving for another site.  The photography, the seeing of it, is the thing.  I guess that's a bizarre sort of travel, but when I get like this, it's what I want to do.

It's been suggested that Birmingham would be a good place to go, and maybe that's where I should aim for next.  I don't really know much about it except for the fast driving, though.  I haven't been back to Tuscaloosa's Moundville in YEARS, not since that last disastrous trip with D. (Good frakkin grief.  How many places in my life do I have to label that way?)  So yeah.  Maybe I should go back there, if for no other reason than to have a memory other than those blue eyes, that little smirk and those painful moments over by the picnic tables as he sort of jumped up and down on my heart...yet again.... I'm also told there might be some good stuff to shoot over around Clinton if I can ever find any of it.

I just need to make some quick escapes for myself.  Exit doors for my gypsy feet to run through, if you will.   If I can do that, I might not have to take the big escape over the river bridge and into Louisiana and parts west that I sometimes contemplate late in the evening on rough afternoons.

Monday, August 29, 2011

Comment

I checked in on the old blog this morning, and lo, there upon my dashboard, there in shades of orange was the indicator that I had a comment!  My blog got a comment!  I clicked upon it with a bit of trepidation....  Was it my old friend AC?  Had some heretofore unknown entity liked what I'd written?  Hated it? Was there a kindred soul out there yearning to commune? (excuse the hyperbole, I'm still having my first Diet Mountain Dew of the day.)   I get very little feedback here.  I'm usually just tossing this stuff off into the void, and even though I'm okay with that, the thought of actual interaction made little writer's heart nervously quiver.....  (okay.  it got away from me again.  I'm working on it.  I'm working on it.)

Yeah. You guessed it.  Spam.  BOO.

Well, there's a button for that, isn't there?

O_o

Sunday, August 28, 2011

Summer Lightning

Sometimes, I see things happen, and my first thought is that I should tell you about it.  There are little pieces of my day that I look at, tuck away, and wish I could share with you at the end.

I hope you understand that this isn't an every-moment-of-every-day thing.  You don't rule my thoughts or permeate my every waking moment.  You're not an obsession.  I don't do those anymore.  I'm not Juliet, and God knows I'm not looking for any sort of Romeo.

But sometimes you do cross my mind.  

I see things that I know you'd find amusing, and I wish I could bring them to you just to see you enjoy them, wish I could see that beautiful light of happiness dawn in those eyes, see that true smile, not your little clever restrained one, once in awhile.  Events occur that I want to bring to you just to talk with you about, just to know your thoughts, to bounce them back and forth between us for awhile.  

When these moments come to mind, I just let them flicker like the summer lightning, like the faerie fire they are, and they disappear.  What I dream of and what I actually have are very different, after all.  I will stay grounded in the real.  It's safer that way.

Saturday, August 27, 2011

Sniffling Along

Still sniffling and starting to cough a week later.  I hate this.  I have another doctor's appointment Tuesday, so I guess I'll just shuffle from Doctor A to Doctor B and get the inevitable shot and antibiotics that this is probably going to take to go away.  Joy beyond all describing.

I took a three-hour nap this afternoon, and my body soaked that up like rain on parched soil.  I don't know if that was because of the ever-present demands of the Topamax, because of regular fatigue from getting used to teaching life, or because I'm still sick.  Roux piled up in the bed with me quite joyously.  I think she's missed our summer sleep schedule.  Pit bulls make very good nap buddies.

The little dog, Chewie as I'm calling him for his Wookie-like appearance, followed me around the yard while I put bird feeders up and re-situated my bottle tree in a new flowerbed.  Everything that was moved for the roofing is almost reassembled.  Chewie is not a lot of help, but he tries.  Oh, how he tries.  I hope I can find him a good family soon.  He's a sweet and loving little creature.  He's going to be a very large loving dog.

Well, as the day ends, I've seen the new Doctor Who (more on that possibly later), and I'm watching Lost in Austen on my Roku.  Tomorrow will be a festival of grading.  Maybe the creeping crud will have abated by then.





Caravan

As I was taking Roux to the vet this morning for an allergy shot, I came upon a long string of Asplundh trucks slowly moving east on I-20.  I passed them, but I knew where they were headed.  They were an emergency clean-up crew headed for the Carolina coast and the damage Irene is due to leave in her wake.

The sight of that slow-moving caravan of out-of-state rescue workers made my eyes tear up.  I flashed back to our own post-Katrina days here in Mississippi when our local highways were full of power company crews and other heavy equipment from every state in the union trying to get our basic services restored and the debris and devastation cleared away.  I remember all the different logos and colors as they trekked up and down the interstates, trying to help us put our shattered lives back together.  They'd be gathered at truck stops and gas stations refueling themselves and their equipment.

I also remember after power returned finally and we all headed back to interrupted jobs, school years, lives, and we watched those people who helped us to do that packing their gear and turning their big trucks back toward Illinois, Indiana, Ohio once again....  I couldn't help but thinking that even though it was their job to come, even though they got paid by the power companies they represented to do that work, that they were heroes.  The battle that we were fighting to get to something like normal, as much as we were going to have after the hammer of the gods had hit us, anyway, was their battle, too.  Their work made it possible for us to recover, to survive.

I hope that Irene doesn't hold a candle to her older sister.  I hope that she's shy and stays away from society.  I hope that these slow and deliberate caravans headed toward the coast are just a sensible precaution.  Nobody should have to need those heroes in the heavy trucks, but it is a great comfort to know they're on the way.

Friday, August 26, 2011

Fragile Optimism

I have been called Pollyanna and a hopeless optimist.  The people who said those things were not complementing me.  I wonder if they have any idea how difficult it is to keep looking for good, to keep being hopeful.

People act like it's a weakness, a sin, a mark of stupidity, or an affront to them personally if I try to believe that change is possible, if I believe that things can be better, if I think that badness isn't everywhere.  Why is it so much more clever, so much more holy and right to see darkness than light?

All that sort of thinking does is poison everything.  If you believe that evil is everywhere, you will most certainly never find anything else.  If you maintain that nothing ever changes for the better, I'm sure that in your presence, it will always be exactly as you've always seen it.  Your attitude will crush out any tender new green shoot that manages to push its way through that rocky soil.  

And you know what?  Maybe that's the way you like it.  Maybe it validates something inside you when you shove and the world shoves you back.  It gives you a moment to hold up your hand and say, "I told you so.  I knew it.  THIS is what I was talking about.  I was right all along...."

However.

I know that there are monsters in the world, flaws in the manufacture, and that sometimes we're given orders that may lead us down paths that will take us to the edges of sanity.  I know that people are frequently savage and all too often give into instincts that do them harm instead of credit.  I am a dancing fool, but I am not oblivious to all reality. 

But you have to quit shoving my face in it; you have to quit kicking me down the stairs, especially about the things that I love most. Sometimes hope is all there is, the dream of the thing wanted, that thing made perfect, when the thing itself is not.   I respect that you may think that there is no good possible anywhere at any time.  It grieves my soul, but that's your belief.  So be it.  Get off of mine. 

You're hurting me with your constant negativity and I can't take it anymore.  I need this hope to get where I'm going.  I have to fan this little spark to keep the embers burning when the flames themselves are gone.  The day it dies completely (and it came so close last year...so very, very close) will be the day I have to stop altogether.  When I can't have a dream, a way to move forward, when the fire dies inside, then I'll just be a hollowed-out shell.



Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Connections

Every day, I watch the shifting masses of people around me, and I see some of them dealing with things that are lifechanging, crippling.  Major events pass through the lives of my colleagues, my friends.  I see and hear of things in places where I don't know a single soul.  People react to each other and to the events that beset them and those near them in ways that puzzle me.

Why don't we connect to each other better than we do?  Why are we seemingly so eternally so separated from each other?   I don't think the other species that we think of as "lower animals" are.  They seem aware of each other when another one of their kind is in distress or pain.  Depending on what sort of creature they are and how they are hardwired, they react in compassion and support or by attacking at those times, but they don't seem to be oblivious, walking by each other encased in little spheres of self-absorption or deliberate obtuseness.  If we're supposed to be the pinnacle of awareness and processing, how is that we so often miss all the little signs and signals when they're present?

This has been on my mind quite a bit today.  I have a couple of theories.  The first theory is that we are so inundated with woe that we build protective shells to keep it from dragging us under.  We block out to survive because we start to think we have to do that, that it's somehow necessary.  We are not unaware; we've simply built up a callus, a protective layer to keep our own hearts from being rubbed raw on the rough surface of life.

That theory might work, but I suspect another factor is at work, too.  If we don't see the pain in others, if we put our little hands over our little eyes and press down really, really tightly, then we're off the hook for giving assistance.  It's the old image of three monkeys sitting in a row, eyes covered, ears covered, mouth covered, all evil shut out.  It takes time and effort, resources both tangible and drawn from the wells of the heart to meet the needs of someone who is hurting, and in a world that is careless and rushing, demanding and brutal, the temptation too often is to cross to the other side of the road and pray that somebody else comes along to do the job.

So we gain a little measure of temporary breathing room.  So we don't have to carry that person's darkness or sorrow with us as we go.  We slip the "trap" and tell ourselves we've escaped.  What we really need to be asking ourselves as we are moving away alone in our little globes is what the trap really was, taking the time and effort to give a little to help somebody else out and possibly reach a new understanding and relationship with that person, heal something that was broken both in them and maybe even in ourselves, or continuing to stay in a shell that pushes everyone away in selfish fear.

I'm fairly sure I don't have this dynamic figured out yet.  I'll continue to tumble these pieces and ponder.

Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Now Panic and Freak Out

I randomly selected an AP prompt to use in class today for an activity.  It happened to be from 1993.  The year meant nothing to me.  I picked the prompt because it had the form I wanted, something easy to deal with for a first time breaking them down.  Suddenly in my last class, a student said, "Hmm.  1993.  A very good year," and the pieces clicked together giving me an extremely odd moment.

This class, by and large, was born in 1993/1994.  That means that they were busy coming into the world during my senior year of high school.  I was having the year they're having now when they were being blanket-wrapped and bottle-fed.  It's sort of messing with my head and not just a little.  I am a whole person older than they are.

This is not an "oh-God-I'm-so-old" post.  Well, in truth, the students probably perceive me that way.  (Actually, I have no idea how they perceive me.  I just assume they think of all their teachers that way.)  That doesn't bother me.  It's just that this realization is a bit of a shock, sort of an unexpected duality that snuck up on me.

This also means that they are the first class that are actually young enough to be my children.  I would have had to have started very, very early, it's true, but it's possible now.  That slammed me like a hammer.  I looked at those students sitting in those desks and thought about what it might be like to have a son or daughter that age.  It would not register.  Biologically possible, but not in any way, form, or fashion comprehensible.  Would my children be anything like them?  Would they be as bright and wonderful?  Would they be as full of potential and promise?  I often look at my friends' children and think about what it might be like to have a child of 3, of 5, of 7...what about a high school senior?

Of course, that started me down a road mentally that I will not pursue in writing here because of certain recent unpleasantness...the road of whether or not I will ever have any children of my own at all and what that means to me and my family.  One day, I will write that blog, but I cannot and will not right now.  I'm just going to ignore that just a bit longer, dance and sing and pretend it's not hovering in the corner with wings and claws.

Monday, August 22, 2011

Stubbornness

I dragged myself to school this morning for the simple reason that it's easier to battle through a day of feeling like crap there than it is to deal with getting stuff ready for a sub and deal with the aftermath of having one.  I really wish I hadn't.  All day long, I sniffled and sneezed.  I'm sure my students were thinking, "Oh God!  She's come to destroy us!"  Well, turn about is fair play...  One of them brought this stuff to me, after all.

In all reality, I made sure I wasn't running any fever before I went.  I was no danger to anyone but myself.  Between classes, I just wanted to slide down the cool brick wall into a little huddled ball and stay there.  I'd lean back and close my eyes.  It was amazing how time distorted during those intervals.

Tomorrow, if I feel this crappy, I'm not going.  I can't do today again tomorrow, even if it does put all my lesson plans off.  I'll hate it, but I just don't think I can endure another day of it.

Sunday, August 21, 2011

Sherlock

Oh, I do so love this show.  The new Sherlock Holmes is totally obnoxious and completely brilliant. Specific little quirks and oddities Moffat has built in that I adore are the way Holmes will tell people to shut up because they're thinking too loudly, the way he harasses people through text messages, and the relationship Holmes has with his brother Mycroft.  They're hilarious.  If I knew him, I would probably be torn between absolute wonder and slapping him around.  It's lovely.

 It is a perfect reinvention of the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle character.  It's all there.  The moods, the mind, the darkness.  Too often, people who try to do Holmes turn him into a caricature, play up the deer stalker and the pipe and play down the very real demons that were written into the man.  Moffat has not shied away from the obsessions, the addictions, or the compulsions that accompany the brilliance.  There's a fabulous scene in one episode where he gets bored, paints a smiley face on the wall of his living room in yellow spray paint, and then shoots at it with Watson's Browning.  Characterization perfected.

Watson, too, is right on.  He's a man of action and intelligence who needs what Holmes has, the fire and the bright sheer insanity, to pull him out of the pain of his own past.  He's also a normal man trying to keep up with a genius. You can see the strain of what that is like well-played.  It is not always easy to be the friend and the point of stability for someone like Holmes.  I like that this Watson isn't written as a hero-worshiper who is blind to all of the negative qualities.  He admires, but not without awareness.  He does serve as the steady foundation that Holmes needs to ground himself, though, something he can rely on to be there so he can dance on and over the edge and know that there is something to pull him in even though he would probably never admit to that concept or that need.  And then, of course, there is Holmes' need for an appreciative audience...

And then there is Moriarty....  Well.  If Holmes describes himself as a "high-functioning sociopath" and really is, imagine what this new Moriarty has been made.  I think it's going to be a grand series.  It seems Moffat cannot miss.

Saturday, August 20, 2011

Sick

What I thought yesterday was just a sore throat from too much lecture seems today to be something else.  I feel like I was hit by a truck.  I have spent all day on the couch watching movies and TV shows through the Roku, shuffling precariously to the washing machine to get a few loads of clothes done as I can.  

I hate being sick.  Other than migraines, it happens to me very rarely.  I feel pitiful when it does, like I want to put my head in somebody's lap, curl up into a little ball, and just be very still.  I hope this passes.  I'm treating myself with hot tea, lots of liquid, and rest.  I have to be in fighting form for Monday.  I can't do Beowulf if I still feel this icky.  

Thursday, August 18, 2011

Shake, Rattle, and Roll


Things are moving along, but periodically, I have the oddest feeling.  Have you ever dropped something and not had it shatter, but had instead a small piece break off somewhere inside?  Every time it moves or tilts, that little piece will rattle around, ricochet off the internal workings, skitter and tumble.

I feel that sometimes.

I'm still feeling the effects of last year.  There are still little rills, little jittery fragments of the horror of it fluttering around at odd moments inside me, and I have to wrap my fingers around the edges of my speaker's stand and take a deep quiet breath and remind myself that this is a new year.  That it's going to be okay.  That, by and large, the gates of hell have creaked closed with me on the good side of them.

When are the cracks going to heal?  Am I ever going to feel like myself again?  Is that person gone for good?  I don't relate to anything the way I used to, not my job, not my friends or family, not the things I enjoy, nothing.  It's unsettling.

I've never been in this place before.  I'm just feeling my way out of the darkness that swallowed me during the summer and the insanity that was last school year.  Maybe it's like a scar that's forming.  I don't know what it says that I find that image a little comforting.  Scar tissue is strong to protect the area of injury from further damage.  It may not be pretty, but at least it has that extra layer of strength. 

I hope that all of this is leading me to a place where I am not shaky anymore, where, if I'm not what I used to be, perhaps then I can be something better.  I look forward to the day I can stand up and feel all the cracks mended and everything sound once again.

Mad Scientists

"We live in a Newtonian world of Einsteinian physics ruled by Frankenstein logic." ~ David Russell

Exactly.

Song in the Head

Okay.  I love Josh Ritter and all, but I do NOT LOVE waking up with "The Temptation of Adam" stuck in my mind over...and over...and over...  It was quite literally the first thing in my mental soundscape this morning.  I might even have been dreaming it.  I've been walking around the house getting ready singing to myself, "If this was the Cold War, we could keep each other warm..."  I hate it when that happens to a song I really like.

He will have to be driven out.  What's the anti-Ritter?

For some reason, I'm thinking AC/DC.  Sigh.....  At least I'll get to work on time.  I always drive fast when I listen to them.

Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Roofs and Ring Pops

My house has a new roof at long last.  The shingles are darker than the old ones were, but I like the look of it.  Now that the trees have been pruned back, the old chimney taken down below the roofline, and all the repairs done, I feel that the house is sound again.  It's such a relief not to have to worry about it anymore.  There's some cleanup left to do, but it won't take long.

I gave my AP students Ring Pops today as a prize for their college application essays.  I wish you could have seen their faces when I brought the Ring Pops out from behind my desk.  That part of teaching never gets old.  They were so happy with that simple little treat.  They sort of fought over the watermelon ones making me wish I had more of those and then they sat there just as happy as little larks with the plastic rings on their fingers.  That was a very good thing indeed.

There's more to this day, some of it a little disturbing, but I'm not ready to put it in print, or at least not here.  I'm going to leave this day with the image of my dear little ones and their sugar-induced happiness.  I think that's a good way to go out for right now.

Monday, August 15, 2011

Silent Films

This is an intertitle from a silent film taken from the Tumblr Silent Films. What an amazing quote.  The whole Tumblr is amazing.  Silent movies are wonderful, and part of what I enjoy about them is this combination of text and image.  If you also enjoy silent films, or really, even if you've never seen them, check this site out.  It's a great archive showing some of the more interesting quotes and some of the fancier backgrounds from this now lost art form.

More Better(er)

I just wanted to do that to set your teeth on edge.  Sorry.  It crossed my mind, and I couldn't resist.

Today was a fair day despite a general lack of sleep last night.  I stayed up too late watching TV (curse you, Roku...okay, not literally.  I really love that thing...), had bizarre, TV-induced dreams, and woke up feeling a little less than rested.

The new school year continues to plod along.  I'm finding a rhythm with most classes.  There's a curious sense of isolation this year that's new.  I just try to keep my head down, do my job, and not worry about it.  Laugh, clown, laugh, right?

I'm feeling much better after the recent bout of migrainage.  Whatever internal or external trigger was moving through is done, and I am grateful.  The chaining ones like those were are terrible, especially when they linger, hovering just around the edges of perception to make me miserable.  Either I take a Maxalt and cannot function or I am in pain and it's pretty much the same situation.  Catch-22, indeed.

Well, I'm off to Dollar Tree, loved by teachers everywhere, to get some prizes for tomorrow's AP essay activity.  I have a date with the Roku or maybe even my Kindle later tonight.  Woo-woo!  My social calendar is just BURGEONING with excitement....

Sunday, August 14, 2011

Moonlight and Movies

The story unfolded, glorious technicolors just there in front of my windshield, an entertainment made of flickering bits of light and dark, and I was very happy.  I could lean my head out, stare up, and see stars glittering against that blue velvet vault.  The yellowed globe of the moon slowly lifted itself over the treeline, an extra decoration seen briefly before being obscured by the clouds that dotted the sky.  Everything was wonderful.

As always, the only thing missing was you.

I kept thinking about how much you would have liked the movie, how much the drive-in aspect of it would have amused you.  I kept seeing your long legs stretched out in that small space, your feet popped up on the dash next to mine.  We'd have made quite a tangle, but it would have been fun.

One day, it would be nice if these little simple moments weren't fragments of fiction, if we were really sharing the popcorn and the silver screen and the small spaces and the starlight together.  I am not sure, though, that I really believe that this will ever happen.

McLintock (Drive-In 2)

I went back to the drive-in tonight.  They were showing McLintock with John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara.  I had never seen it, but as my Nana was a huge John Wayne fan, and my dad has always loved his films, I wanted to see this one.  My interest increased when I heard it was based on Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew.

I gathered my provisions earlier and better this time and set off.  I had plenty of snacks, and I sprayed myself with OFF before the movie began, so except for the bug bites I'm still healing from Tuesday night's horse adventure, I am mosquito free.  That made a big difference.  So, too, did the cooler weather that's begun to return at last.  It was nice to be able to sit there and it not still be 90-something degrees.  Their next film is September, and it should be pleasantly cool then, possibly even requiring jeans.

I really loved McLintock. The whole movie is a joy.  I think if I can't get it streaming on the Roku, I'm pretty much going to have to own it.  It made me laugh too much not to.   It was very funny.  The fight scene in it might be one of my favorite fight scenes in any movie.  People keep falling down and it keeps being funny.  Even John Wayne, the great god of heroes, keeps falling down.  It's wonderful.  And I love Maureen O'Hara.  I want to be her when I grow up.  She's awesome.  She's right in the middle of it, stabbing people with this feather pin thing she takes off her hat.  Love, love, love it.

I will say that somebody somewhere will think that I probably should get all grumpy woman about him spanking her at the end, but...I feel about that like I feel about the stuff that happens in Atlas Shrugged and gets called sexist.  Would I tolerate it happening to me?  Oh HELLS NO.  He would die.  A LOT.  I'd break him into about forty-seven neat segments.  Did it work for them?  Apparently.  In that case, I don't really think it's anybody's business and we need to stay out of it.  The whole movie is incredibly violent.  She knocks him out with a bottle; people punch each other repeatedly in sort of casual, happy-go-lucky way.  I think getting wound up over the bit at the end without seeing it as a part of the larger whole would be a little of that camel/gnat syndrome that seems so prevalent in society.

Anyway, without delving more into philosophy of movies and relationships this late at night, I will just end this by saying that if you haven't seen it, you should.  For something that was as funny as it was, there were actually quite a few deep things going on in it, not the least of which was the treatment of social class and the issue of the Native American tribes being resettled.  For a western of its time, it caught me off guard with its tone there.  I think this is probably one of the reasons why it has lasted so long.  Treat yourself to it, and let me know what you think.  I'm curious to get your opinion.

Friday, August 12, 2011

The Crap Fairy Cometh

Bad day.  Really, really bad day.  I thought one of the new laptops was gone.  That kind of bad day. It turns out that there were never an even number in that cart.  Knowing that ahead of time or even being able to get somebody to come and give me that information after my repeated pleas for help would have saved a day that started with a migraine and ended with tears.  I feel like absolute hell.  I also feel ashamed of having caused a commotion unnecessarily as it turned out.  Now everybody undoubtedly thinks I'm even sillier than usual.  I hate looking foolish.  I was so afraid, though, that because I somehow hadn't managed to be careful enough, one of our new pieces of equipment that we'd waited so long for was gone, and I was heartsick.

I guess I'm just a useless damn fool.

Thursday, August 11, 2011

Things in Myself of Which I Am Not Sure I Approve

Another list....


  • I'm missing talking to somebody who doesn't miss me at all.  I think I hate that in myself.  If I'm a triviality to them, I need to make them less to me somehow.  I hate it when I'm sitting there, and that person comes to my mind, and I think, "Oh, I should tell ________ this..."  Then the reality kicks in.  It makes me feel small and somehow less when I suppose I should say, "I'm fabulous, and if they can't see it, screw them."  For some reason, I don't ever say that....  But also, I don't tell them the thing.  I at least manage not to be that person, I suppose.  Maybe that's something.
  • The eternal second-guessing of motive.  I don't take anything straight.  I am always looking for the hidden context.  I think somebody could walk up, hand me a piece of cheese, and say, "This is a piece of cheese," and walk away, and I would, twenty or thirty minutes later, still be digging for exactly what it was they meant.  Okay, that situation would be exceedingly odd and maybe I SHOULD be trying to figure out what the hell just happened there to make somebody walk up and shove cheese at me, but you see what I mean.  I think this is an English major thing.  I don't know that other types of people are constantly scanning for hidden things all the time, thinking, "Okay, you said this, but really, you meant....."
  • I smile to hide emotions that have nothing to do with happiness.  A small polite smile is my default expression.  I noticed this the other day, and I did a sharp internal double-take.  When did that Japanese Noh-mask get stuck on MY face?  That was unexpected....  When I don't want to tell you I think you're being an ass....little Noh smile.  Whenever you hurt me with your insensitivity and I can't bring myself to tell you....little Noh smile.   Whenever I need a minute to myself and I can't get it....little Noh smile.  Whenever I have decided that I'm not going to argue that point with you because there's no POINT to arguing...well, you know.  Did I learn that in Japan?  Because it is an exceptionally Japanese thing.  I don't remember myself before that time.  Maybe I've always done it and just not known.
I guess these three will be my work-on it list for the present.  Only...I don't know what to do about some of it.  I suspect I will continue to miss that person.  I am not sure how you stop that.  I will try to stop being so suspicious and second-guessing.  The little smile?  Well, it worked for Mona Lisa, and it stops a lot of fights and hurt feelings, so is it really a bad thing?  I'm just going to smile here, and let you draw your own conclusions about it.....

Tuesday, August 09, 2011

Just Your Average Tuesday (Plus Horse)

School was nothing remarkable.  It was a standard second day.  I'm starting to put a few names with faces.  We're finishing up the tedium of opening procedure.  Things continue to run smoothly.

At the end of the day, I had a knot between my shoulder blades that would have made the Gordian knot look like an amateur effort.  After standing almost thirty minutes of bus duty, I came in and put my aching head on my desk and closed my eyes for awhile.  I was just plain worn out.  Like any other major endeavor, it takes time to get back into the right physical condition for teaching all day.  As I have on many other days, I thought of the magic hands of that guy I knew at the Wesley at MSU and wished I could just sort of teleport him in to have him get that pain out of my neck and shoulders....

I came home at five and went to Mom and Dad's for supper, mostly wrapped in a zombie haze.  I came out of it some on the way home, which was a good thing as it turned out.  My day took a hard left turn about 7:00.

As I rounded the curve just after the one where a deer plowed into the side of my car so long ago, suddenly, there was a brown horse in the road frantically darting back and forth.  Of course, there was a truck in the other lane.  Both of us slowed and swerved on the wet pavement trying to avoid hitting the frightened animal, and we managed to get around it.  The truck kept going, but as the horse darted down a long road leading to a locked gate to somebody's property, I backed up and followed it, blocking it in.

Where I'm from, you don't just let somebody's stock animal run loose and hurt itself and other people if you can help it.  You try to prevent the injury to the animal the best you can.  You do it because it's right, right for the animal first of all, and also because it's right for others.  You also hope that if you happen to be a person with stock animals yourself that someone would do that for you if your own animals ever slipped the fence as they will inevitably at some point do.  Mississippi has some massively punitive laws about what people can do to you if they hit your livestock with their car because your cow or horse was somewhere it wasn't supposed to be.

I called Mom on my cellphone and told her what was going on and asked her to get a phone book and start finding out whose animal it was.  This took longer than you can imagine.  Everybody was either not home or didn't know.  Mom finally tracked down not the owner but somebody who could help us take care of it by driving to the owner's house and blowing the horn until somebody came, and they came with a key and opened a gate to get it back inside a fence.

In the interval, I just stood outside there in the gloaming with the horse watching it pull kudzu off the edges of the dirt tractor trail for an hour.  The horse was gentle and fairly small, thank God, but not very interested in me.  This was fine with me.  I just stayed near the car to expand the barrier I'd created with the PT Cruiser if I needed to and kept watch.

Sometime during the wait, Mom came back to let me know she'd found somebody, and a neighboring dog appeared, a big yellow lab.  He was SO HAPPY to see us ALL.  My first thought was overly enthusiastic dog + already nervous horse = disaster.  We managed to persuade happy dog to go away repeatedly until the people with the key could arrive, and thus a good time was had by all.

I finally got home about 8:00.  It felt wonderful to hit my couch.  Every fire ant and mosquito in the county has gnawed on me, but at least that poor horse has been fed and is no longer in danger of being struck by one of the road warriors racing the blacktop out front tonight.  Let no man say life in the country is dull until he has tried it for a little while.




Monday, August 08, 2011

New

We started back to school again today.  I think it was the best opening day we've ever had, the least nonsense, the least disruption, the least confusion.  It was done almost before I knew it.  If the whole year will run this smoothly, my broken soul has a chance to heal.

I wore my new dress today, and I felt it with every step.  That dress is just beautiful, and I felt beautiful wearing it.  I felt like a lady, as in, I felt as though I needed little white gloves to go with it.  It's a wonderful feeling.  I got lots of complements on it, and I didn't turn a single one away.  I just smiled and said thank you.  It was hard, but I did it.  Growth, I think.

I am tired, but it's manageable.  I will go to bed fairly soon and catch up on some of the sleep I inevitably missed last night.  I hope that things continue in this current vein.

Saturday, August 06, 2011

Yep-yep-yep-yep

It happened about a week ago.  I was minding my own business, and I sort of looked up and there he was.  He looked up and....wham.  I thought, "Oh my.  That is a good-looking guy."  I kept doing what I was doing (walking without falling down), but I also kept looking.  Then I remembered that this is not polite, and I looked away.

But I kept running into him.  Every time, that little voice in my head would say, "Yep.  Yep-yep-yep-yep-yep.  Uh-huh.  Uh-huh,"  just like those martians on Sesame Street used to do.  (Remember them?  The ones that used to freak out when the phone rang?  Yeah....)

I had a chance to talk to him briefly yesterday, just a quick conversation, but he's interesting, easy to talk to, that rare thing.  I know almost nothing about him other than that he is lovely to look at in a completely geekilicious way, tall as I am, educated in an unusual way.  For all I know, he has an apple-cheeked wife and fifteen happy children at home.  I assume I will find out in time as I will continue to run in to him on a fairly regular basis.

I just know that instant hyper-awareness is exceedingly rare for me.  That snap hasn't happened since J. moved to Florida, and before that, well, there was T.....

It's hard to believe anything will come from this.  It's just nice that there was someone to notice.  It certainly ought to be entertaining.  I don't think somebody as frankly skittish as I am when it comes to men will wind up with anything else, but a little entertainment is always a good thing.

Wednesday, August 03, 2011

Atlas Shrugged Deux

There's a moment in AS when the people running Dagny's company, the people who have been in a place of power to make decisions, choose to do something that causes the deaths of about 300 people and the destruction of a major and necessary feature of the infrastructure of the railroad.  You can see it coming from the minute that section of the book starts.  It is so preventable that a three-year old child with only a rudimentary understanding of how the world functions could have stopped it, would have told the folks running the show that they were going about the situation in such a way that they were bringing disaster down on themselves as fast as they could.  Dagny isn't able to stop it from happening, and it's one of the last great eye-opening things that happens for her as she watches the seemingly deliberate glee with which some people seem to race head-first into embracing things that are the opposite of life, the opposite of creation and preservation, the absolute glee with which they throw themselves into the grinding teeth of the destroyer.

Excuse my ramblings.  I guess I've just had AS on the mind today.