Kate Chopin and the Trip

No quote today, at least for this one. There will probably be several posts over the next few days as I sort out things from the trip.

I reread The Awakening by Kate Chopin right before I left for my trip. Perhaps that was a mistake.

I have come back a different person than when I left. Of course, this happens anytime a person travels, but it's very strong this time. I don't know if it's like an allergic reaction that will go away, or if I've finally gone off my rocker for good. All I know is that I'm different.

As I was on the trip, it seemed like my opinions and feelings were different from the other two leaders on almost every issue. Once, I would have bowed my head and said nothing. This trip, though, I thought, "Screw it. This, for better or worse, is what I really believe. Why should I feel ashamed of it?" These weren't huge moral issues. These were everyday life issues. What does it matter if I have a different view? Do I have to agree with everybody else?

Increasingly, I guess, I just don't fit in with the "genteel Southern lady" image. Once, I think I really wanted to be that, but now, I think I'd rather just be me. I'm happier that way, and it's so much more honest. I guess some people will always think me strange, but at least I will be true to myself. With my family and my group of friends, I don't think I'll ever have to face Edna's dilemma, but I can appreciate how suddenly the world can shift out from under your feet much better now.

Penryn Castle, or Chickens of the World Unite

"You must do the thing you think you cannot do." -- Eleanor Roosevelt

Today I literally took a leap of faith. I abseiled (aka rapelled, and no, I don't know the difference) down the side of a castle tower. Really.

I wasn't at all nervous going up. I knew I wouldn't be. I was actually sleepy from being so tired. The group I was with was singing the whole way up the tower. We went last, so it took a couple of hours for us to reach the top and the platform. The castle, Penryn, is here in North Wales, and is a showy castle rather than a defensive one. It was beautiful.

When we went out to the castle to start the abseiling, it was raining. We all got soaked. Again, another important moment in my life with rain. We stood outside in it anyway and yelled for everyone as they came to the top. It was such a supportive group of people.

When I got to the top, I could feel my pulse pick up. I knew that was going to happen. I'd been able to put in my "creative reality" until then and had mostly convinced myself that there was nothing to be afraid of. Try putting that over on yourself when you're looking down the side of a castle.

They harnessed me in and I stepped up on the metal platform from which I would descend....and I froze solid. I couldn't let go. I wanted to go, but I couldn't feel the harness supporting me, and images of Wile E. Coyote falling down the cliff face kept running through my head. The wonderful pro who was helping me finally talked me into leaning back far enough that my weight would be supported by the harness, I reached the "Point of No Return", and suddenly, against every better instinct I've ever had, I was dangling off the ground trying to get down the side of a stone tower. Without a doubt, it was one of those "is this my life?" moments.

To tell the truth, I'm not sure how much I remember about the trip down. I remember it being exhilarating and I remember my shoulder hurting from trying to control the line, but I didn't exactly look around a lot. My only thought, truly, was to get down the side of the stupid thing.

I did it. The long and short of it is, I did it. And now, I don't have to be afraid of that anymore. It was very liberating for me. I have been sort of dreading that ever since I first heard about it. I wasn't "too big". I was able to be harnessed and to get up and down all the ladders. They didn't have to pull in a crane to support me. I feel great!

The quote at the beginning from E. Roosevelt kept coming to me the entire time I was up on that tower. To be honest, I think it is the reason I didn't chicken out entirely. Ultimately, the possibility of falling was less scary that the self I'd have to live with if I went down the stairs rather than the line.

Westminster Abbey

I don't have a quote today because I'm on a pay terminal. I'll try to do better next time. :)

I've been traveling in England, Wales, and Ireland for the past two weeks, and it's been a great experience. I can't believe all the things I've been able to seen and experience. Since this is a pay by the minute type of place, I'll relate just one and catch up on others when I get a chance.

I got to see Westminster Abbey. I still can't believe it. How did a person from the rural South get to stand in Poet's Corner and see Chaucer's grave? It seemed utterly incredible to me, like a scene from a dream. I saw the graves of kings and queens, and architecture that was glorious, but nothing moved me like seeing the names of all those men and women whose words have inspired me my whole life.

I stood and just breathed in the air, and I prayed that some tiny portion of the power with which those word-saints expressed themselves could transfer itself to me. More than anything else, I want to write. I'll never be great like them, nor will Westminster ever make a place for me, but to be able to express the world and the feelings it gives me truly would be a blessing.

When I stepped out, I felt a difference in the world. I felt changed, and I wondered if my face glowed like Moses' when he came down the mountain. Once I have five minutes to myself when there are not people everywhere, I hope to be able to put some of this down on paper.

I suppose that should be all for today. More adventures await.

Walter Anderson

"We all get what we want. Each painter that paints a picture puts into it exactly what he wants. If he fails, it is because he did not want enough. Teach people to want the right things and they will get them. Teach them to want the wrong things and they will be ruined." -- Walter Inglis Anderson

While I was on the coast, I went over to Ocean Springs. I love Ocean Springs, and with Natchez, it's one of the only two other places in the state that I'd want to live. It has its ugly modern highway aspects, but with a simple turn toward the gulf's waters, it becomes old, preserved, and reflective.

Ocean Springs houses a museum containing the work of Walter Anderson. He was an amazing artist whom I won't attempt to biographize (is that a word?) here. Go see the website to learn more about him. The museum has a rotating collection of his work, and a portion of the cabin in which he lived when he was at home called "The Little Room". The walls and ceiling reflect the path of the sun across the room and woven into that are flowers, trees, animals, and birds. To see it all, one needs to sit in the middle of the floor and just absorb.

The museum also has one of my favorite sculptures in the world. Anderson was a productive artist in many media, including wood and ceramic arts. My favorite sculpture is called "The Swimmer" and was crafted, if I remember correctly, from a driftwood log. The color is a beautiful burnished brown, and the lines are so pure. It is, of course, one of those things you're not supposed to touch. I always yearn to run my hands across it, to feel the smoothness of it, to feel the grace and the movement. I don't know a lot of arty terms, that not having been a field I've ever studied formally, but the figure, although stylized, seems to have been lifted whole from the warm waters of the gulf instead of hewn from wood.

All his art is like that. He had what he referred to as his "public art", consisting of fabulous murals and linoleum block prints. I have several of the reprintings of the block prints all over the house. Some of his descendants started the company Realizations to make his public art available. You can see their stuff here.

He also had his "private art," which mostly consisted of watercolors. He spent extended periods of time living as naturally as possible, mostly without manmade shelter, on Horn Island in the MS Gulf. While he was there, he recorded every aspect of the natural world with his water colors. He was seeking the truth of it, the beauty of it. There is a power in his works that stuns. I wish I could see like he saw. When I stand and look at one of his watercolors, I can feel something inside me lift. I always think of a pelican spreading her wings and rising swiftly to the sun.

Whenever I go to the coast, I always try to go to his museum. This time, with the teacher conference being in Biloxi, there were many people in it. I like it better when I'm the only person there and I can walk around and stare without any other voice intruding. Sometimes, when it's quiet enough, I think I can almost feel his presence there.

Casinos on the Coast

No quote tonight.

I just returned from a week-long conference on the coast. It's changed a lot since I was a little kid and used to go down with my parents every summer for our vacation.

When I was young, the tackiest things there were the gift shops selling dolls made of shells, plastic snowglobes, and t-shirts saying, "My folks went to the Gulf Coast and all I got was this shirt." I remember there being seemingly hundreds of goofy golf courses, water slides, and go cart places. And then there was all that gorgeous sand. The water was always silty; being that close to the mouth of the Mississippi, I guess that's to be expected. The scariest thing I remember seeing was a dead manta ray drifting in the tide.

This time, things were cleaner, but a lot of the kitschy charm was gone. In place of the water slides and seafood shacks were slick, towering casinos. They cluster together in twos and threes as if they're afraid to stand on their own.

I wound up staying in one for the conference. I must say that I wasn't terribly impressed. The room was neither better nor worse than a Holiday Inn. The restaurants weren't fabulous, just expensive. I went to eat sushi and was so disappointed, I almost couldn't finish the meal. No green tea, no ume-shu, and no real sushi chef. To get to the restaurants, you had to navigate your way through a smoke-filled forest of slot machines that smelled horribly of spilt whiskey and was peopled with aging zombies who mechanically inserted credits or bills and pushed the buttons.

The materials that had been used were good. The lights and the sounds tried to make it festive. I just can't get over how few people I saw there who seemed to be having a good time. Most of them were mesmerized by the flashing lights of the machine in front of them. I did not see a single person win the entire time I was there, and heard almost no laugher or even conversation on the game floor.

I miss the tacky kitsch of the coast of my youth. I don't think I like these new casinos. I wrote a poem about it, so I guess the trip was good for that reason. I just wish there were fewer all you can eat buffets, and more actual entertainment.

Old

Old age is the most unexpected of all the things that happen to a man. ~Leon Trotsky (Lev Davidovich Bronstein), Diary in Exile, 1935

Tonight I went out with the remnants of our supper club. We've lost quite a few members to moving away for school or work and babies.

As I was paying for my food, I became acutely aware of how much older I am than most of the others in that group. The cashier offered them tickets about a college promotion, but I must look "too mature" for that now. As we talked, one of our group is headed for college, and conversation turned to tales of dorm days long past.

It struck me how on the brink of all those crazy memory-building experiences he is and how far past them I am now. I could feel every one of the gray hairs on the top of my head as though they had transmuted to stainless steel threads.

I am approaching 30 at light speed. I have never been too worried about my age. It's just a number, after all, and I've been blessed with a lot of wonderful things and people and it's all been crammed into these 29 short years. I can't complain.

It's just that lately, ever since I got home from Japan, I have felt things slowing down. I wonder if maybe they're supposed to.

I miss going to Wal-Mart in the middle of the night because my roommate and I needed a break from school. I miss sitting on the porch at the Wesley and talking to my friends, speaking with passion about everything and nothing. I miss getting together to do things.

I know life changes, and maybe, just maybe someday my life will change in this way, too, but right now, I hate these changes. Everyone I know, all the friends I used to have have been consumed by family and work and we never see each other. We never do anything. I guess everybody has broken off into self-contained units, and I don't have a unit of my own.

Maybe that's the problem. I just feel like the transmission on my life has been thrown into neutral and I don't know how to get it back in gear. I worry that I'm going to turn into the stereotypical "old maid" school teacher living alone except for cats. I'm almost there already. I haven't met anybody in a LONG time who interested me at all. Why is that? Why can't I do all my other friends did years ago and find somebody to spend my life with?

Age has snuck up on me. I don't mind the wrinkles (only a few...thank God and genetics for good bones), the aches in my hands and knees, or the gray streaks. However, I really, really do mind the being alone. That's the one thing that growing older hasn't taught me how to deal with gracefully.

Returning to Normal

No quote tonight. I just don't want to go look one up. Summer laziness.

The year ended well. I finally got all my kids done and all my grades in. I totally rearranged my classroom. I love it. It looks, for no readily apparent reason, about four times as large.

I also had some great news. I am going to get to teach AP English next year! I was so shocked. I had wanted AP, and was planning to take the training for the course this summer, but I never expected to be able to teach it for years and years. I am proud to have been chosen, and a little nervous, too.

It's exciting to be able to teach a class at the "college" level, or as close as you can get with HS students, again. But it's also kind of nervewracking. Am I good enough to do this? I think I can. I'll do my best. Gambate, ne?

In other trivia from my world, I just broke my DELL SUCKS rule and ordered a Dell DJ from them. I needed it for the upcoming summer trip, and I think it will work better with my computer than an IPod would. I paid with my regular bank account, so no more of the every month hassle with Dell. I hope this thing is going to be as spiffy as I think it is....

On Sunday, I had a chance to use my Spanish more. A man from Guatemala came to our church, and since I"m the only one who has any Spanish, they called me at 9: 30 to come down and talk to him. He was looking for a Spanish-speaking church, and I had to tell him there's only one, and it's not in our tiny town. A larger city, the city where I teach, has a church with Spanish services. We had a good discussion. He was the neatest guy.

As I was talking to him, I kept thinking about how little effort most of this state has put into creating services for the growing Spanish-speaking population. It's almost a sullen refusal. It's like they're saying, "If we don't make it easy, they won't come," and indeed, I've often heard sentiments of this kind expressed. There's plenty of, "Why don't they learn English if they're going to come here?" around.

If these people had ever had the experience of being a minority, of not being able to ask for toilet tissue in the store, or not being able to go to a doctor by yourself, then I think they would get off their prejudicial high horses a little. I have long stated that everybody ought to have to go spend two or three months in a foreign country, and one in which they don't speak the language. I think so much of people's blase callousness to the problems immigrants are having in our area stems from the fact that they've 1) stopped seeing the basic humanity of their fellow man, and 2) never had to scratch and survive themselves.

One of the most embarrassing things I've ever had to do was explain my menstrual cycle to my boss so he could document it on a Japanese medical form. At that point, I was really sick and running a fever, almost deaf in one ear from an infection that had gone on too long, and on top of all of that was heaped the shame of illiteracy. He was embarrassed to have to ask, I was mortified to have to answer, but thank God and the Japanese sense of saving face, we were able to move past that.

I came home from Japan with a keen sense of what it's like to be helpless because of language. I was a trained, educated professional, but so often, I know the people I was encountering though me of subnormal intelligence. It's a natural reaction, maybe, to think that the person who doesn't speak the language you've been babbling in since birth is somehow odd. I was frustrated and even when I took classes to learn, my progress was slow, and technical situations like the doctor were still beyond the grasp of my basic-greeting-color-number-directions Japanese.

It's wrong for there not to be more help for people in this area. I do what I can. I offer my little ESL classes, but I still feel it's too little. I hear stories from my students sometimes that make me aware that they're facing the same problems I faced in Japan, and I wish I knew how to do more to help them. I am hoping to find some like-minded people and get some serious help made available for them. God willing, we can cut off some of the hardship before it begins. Life in a new place when you've left family behind is hard enough without little things being stumbling blocks.

Oddness and Cheese

Not the kind of cheese that melts, either. No quote tonight.

Item One: I discovered today that my blog has been ruled "Tasteless/Obscene" by the internet filter that's on our school computers. I had to laugh. Me? Obscene? It's enough to make me feel like a stand-up comedian on Comedy Central. I think it was either the "run! bastard alert" or the "jackass" comment from earlier blogs. I just can't get over the fact that I now really do apparently have a PG-13 rating. How bizarre.

Item Two: In the flurry of crap that's come out for the new Star Wars movie, I found something I had to have. No, not the big Yoda that talks (creepy...creepy). Not the $400 lightsaber you can really kill your friends with (why? A walking stick does the job pretty well, right cuz?). I am the proud owner of Darth Tater, better known by his pre-Sith name, Mr. Potato Head. I love it. It's the perfect blending of sci-fi and tacky. He is now guarding my living room. It's great.

Item Three: The Burger King guy is back. Have you seen the latest commercial? He and Darth Vader are starting at each other. Both are breathing out of their big plastic masks. It was kind of cool. Now I'll probably have nightmares about that thing....

The Hands

"A sense of humor is a major defense against minor troubles. " -- Mignon McLaughlin

I am very bad with guys. Part of this is because of a basic disbelief in their sincerity. That's a long story that I won't go into here, but it's true. Additionally, I don't know how to flirt. Somehow, that part of southern girl upbringing missed me. I don't know how to handle it when a guy shows interest in me. I was always the least interesting of my friendship group. Guys always went for my friends, and I was always the tall, quiet one in the background. I've been lucky to have some really tremendous guy friends, but my romantic batting average is pitiful.

After an odd, but trauma-free day of school, I was looking forward to seeing my friends in our biweekly dinner club. We were going to my favorite Mexican restaurant and I always feel better when I know a cheese-laden plate is going to be laid before me at some point in the evening. Nothing is as nice as cheese. :)

Anyway, there is a guy at my favorite restaurant who always flirts with me. I don't know what to think about that. I get so embarrassed that I think I'm going to burst into flame. He's actually told me on more than one occasion how much he likes tall, pretty girls. (I suppose that's me...) He's asked at least two of my guyfriends I've been in the restaurant with if I'm their wife/girlfriend, etc., etc.

The thing is, he's not bad looking. I don't get the "RUN!! BASTARD ALERT!!" vibe off him. I just can't believe that his complements are personal toward me. I wonder how many other girls he says stuff like that to daily, and I flash back to the jerk from grad school who loved all women and told them so. If I thought his complements were related to some aspect of me other than the fact that have anatomical aspects opposite to his own, then I might feel differently about the guy.

Tonight, he came up behind me and placed his hands on my shoulders while he asked my cousin "who the pretty lady was." I, like most other modern American women, have a thing about that. I couldn't believe it! He just walked up and put his hands on me without permission. As I once told the guy from grad school, unless you'd like to lose those hands, don't put them on me without me saying it's okay.

I did the Southern Lady thing and just waited until he took his hands away. He wasn't trying to cop a feel. It was just strange. I don't know what to think about it. I don't know why I didn't break him into a half dozen small writhing pieces. I responded in the only way that seemed appropriate: I threw back my head and I laughed.

Walking on the Rooftop of Hell

There's a quote somewhere, I can't remember if it's Rumi or Basho, that says, "We're all walking on the roof of hell gazing at flowers." Today, I put a foot through the roof and shattered the illusion.

It didn't happen to me. It happened to one of my students. She came in early to ask about makeup work. She'd been out for four days, something that was out of character for her. She's one of my most diligent students. Her family background is, like so many of my kids lives, littered with the unimaginable. Although she's not yet seventeen, she's seen a close family member slain in cold blood by a former lover, members of her immediate family put in prison, and other members of her family following paths that will probably lead them to one of those two same destinations.

She's very strong. She's very steady. She has dreams and goals, and she works hard to get to them. She didn't do well in English last year, but has been very pleasantly surprised that she can do well in my class if she tries. I have been so proud of her this year, and so happy to be able to mark solid, strong B's for her almost every grading period.

This morning, after a brief discussion about makeup work, she told me that she'd probably be out again tomorrow. I never want to pry. Life is a personal thing, and it's full of crap that most people don't really want to have to explain over and over again. I could tell that something was wrong, though, and I gently asked her if there was anything I could do.

She started crying. My steady, strong student had silent tears running down her face, and my heart almost broke. I knew it had to be something terrible. I just went to her and hugged her. I didn't know what else to do. I got her some Kleenex, sat her down in a desk, and asked her what was wrong.

She had a baby three days ago, and her baby is dead. My sixteen-year old student miscarried, and the baby, premature by three months, wasn't strong enough to survive. She told me her story with tears streaming.

What do you even say? There are no words for grief that deep. There is no response. Anything that is said is too pale, too weak, too trite, too much a cliche to ever begin to be a response. What I wanted to say was that although I don't know what it's like to hold life inside me and lose it, my heart hurt for her. I wanted to rock back and forth and scream with her at the loss. These are not the done things, though.

So many people would just shut it out as a sad moment and go on. Too often, I've heard people insinuate that such things are either a punishment or somehow deserved because the girls are poor, or black, or too young to be having a baby, anyway. I'm sure some self-righteous jackass might even say it was better all the way around that the baby didn't make it. How anybody could look at another human being in pain and be that...un-human...is beyond my ability to comprehend. She is my student. She is a person. She is a girl child. Her heart was just cut out of her. How could anyone turn away from that?

This is the second time this year I've had a student face the unbearable. Another of my girls had a baby and lost her own mother in the space of 5 months. She, like my other one, is not yet seventeen years old. From mother to orphan in less than half a year. Again, there are no words.

I remember the day she came to tell me her mother was gone. She came to ask me for any work she'd need for the next few days. I figured something had happened and she'd gotten suspended, so I asked what happened. Her eyes couldn't focus. I will never forget. The day was so sunny. She looked out past me at the huge oaks that can be seen from the end of the hall windows and she said, "My mother just died. I have to go home." I almost fell down. Again, I grabbed her and hugged her. What else is there to do?

I wish I had the power to give these girls back their girlhood. I wish I had the power to give them a chance to be a teenager before they have to be adults. So many of my kids come from places where home is not a refuge, but another level of hell. So many of them have darkness chasing them.

I feel so useless to them. What good is pronoun/antecedent agreement when you've been up with a colicky baby all night? Is there anything other than prayer and a sympathetic ear I can give them? It rips my heart out to see them so young and in so much pain.

Tomorrow, my steady, solid student will go to bury the tiny body that is all that remains of the baby she'd looked forward to with such happiness. I'll be working on To Kill a Mockingbird with my classes. We'll all go on walking on the roof of hell and trying to focus on the flowers while avoiding the gaps and thin spots that will send us right back down again.

The Dancing Fool 

The Future

"And in today already walks tomorrow." ~Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Today two future possibilities presented themselves that made the thought of more years of teaching tolerable. The first was a suggestion about teaching AP English. Our wonderful AP teacher is starting to think about retirement, and it has been suggested that I might possibly be considered for that position when he goes. The more I think of it, the happier I am. AP is more like college than any other course I'd teach. Theoretically, although the actuality is frequently different, I'd also be teaching the most motivated of students in an AP course. I am going to start looking into what's necessary to get ready for that.

The other possibility comes through the retirement of another colleague. We will need a creative writing teacher next year, and possibly an oral communication teacher as well. Both those options sound wonderful. I just need something different to break up my day. If I had a class that wasn't the equivalent of a 4WD expedition into a bottomless mud pit, then I think I could endure some of the other better. Right now, I'm teaching the same thing 6 periods a day. Everybody needs a break. Maybe one of these options will be mine.

I'm especially excited by the possibility of teaching creative writing. I have always wanted to do that. I don't know if I'd be any good at it or not, but I think it will be so much fun to try. I think working like that would also inspire me to do more of my own writing.

We'll have to wait and see, ultimately. Things are changing very fast right now, so who knows?

Why We Do This

"In teaching you cannot see the fruit of a day's work. It is invisible and remains so, maybe for twenty years." ~Jacques Barzun

The end of school is the toughest time for teachers. It's harder than the first day when every teacher walks in to the great unknown with hopes, expectations, and a lesson plan to carry them. It's harder than the panic right before Christmas when high spirits and grading deadlines play havoc with holiday happiness. It's harder than testing season when adrenaline carries you through the big day twitching like a caffeine junkie in a bad overdose and you feel like a rubber band stretched right to the point of breakage.

It's hard because, in so many cases, there's no hope left. No hope that student X is going to wake up and try to make something out of this opportunity to learn. No hope for student Y that he will pass. No hope that seventh period is going to turn out to be anything other than silly and hyper.

After school, it's not uncommon for us to gather in the halls after the kids go to the buses. We blow off steam about the day. It's sort of a safety valve that helps us pick up the pieces and go on. Today, though, our conversation was more bitter than it's been at any other time so far.

All of us, 30-plus year veterans, teachers in mid-career, and rookie me, were asking why we bother to do this anymore. It's so discouraging to come into a class and face blatant disrespect and disobedience every day. Despite the fact that all of us would bend over backwards and do on a regular basis to help out a student in need, we're a caste of something less than human beings. The kids are selfish and rude. They put forth no effort and expect to "reap what they didn't sow," to borrow Biblical metaphors.

As I'm typing this, I feel 500 years old. I feel like a caricature of a teacher, the type of person I never thought I'd be. My friends and I always swore we'd be never be like this, and yet now, all my conversations with my teacher friends, no matter what school they're at, no matter what stage of their career they're in, sound the same. Same complaints, same frustrations, same worries.

So this is my question: Why the hell are we still doing this? (Oops...there goes the PG rating again...shame, shame) Additionally, all of us are teachers by nature as well as by vocation. What do we do when the thing that makes our hearts move and sing becomes a source of agony? Is this a "thorn in the flesh" we have to endure? Is this an age, a generation that will pass? Where do we go if we don't stay where we are? And the one that keeps me up at night...does all this heartsblood I pour into my work matter at all? Do I touch a life or make a difference at all?

Supposedly, teaching is one of those professions that requires a basically optimistic outlook. As the quote says, you do the best you can, sketch the sign of the cross over them, and send them out into the world. I feel like I'm folding origami boats and setting them adrift on the current. I don't know how seaworthy these little crafts are. My fingers feel less and less nimble as I make the folds. I don't know if I'm doing it right anymore.

Maybe this is just a part of the natural cycle of the school year. I don't know. All I know is the idea of 24 more years of this seems unimaginable. Who will I be after 24 more years of this? Will I be a twisted-up old maid school teacher who comes home to only cats for company? Will be be able to feel compassion for my students anymore, or will they all just be "idiots in the hall"?

Where did the joy go? I used to love going to school. Even earlier this year, I loved it. Right now, though, I just want to take a personal day or five and disappear.

Tomorrow, I'll rise and put on my professional face. I'll focus on the positive, look for the silver lining, and call the glass half full. Tonight, though, I'm an old maid school teacher who wants to escape.

Back again

"A good laugh and a long sleep are the best cures in the doctor's book. " ~Irish Proverb

After the testing was over, the week just flew by. I was so tired that I went to sleep early almost every night last week, and this week, I'm feeling slightly less like a dead teacher and slightly more like a real person.

Payday also helps. There is no day so precious in the paid once a month world as payday. I bought several books by Carolyn Haines. They're light mystery set in the Mississippi Delta. I'm on a Mississippi kick again right now, and I guess I'll probably write more about that in a forthcoming post.

There's nothing earthshattering to report, but as with so many things, I felt myself falling out of the habit of writing. This is sort of a blog space filler. Tomorrow, perhaps, real sentiment will be seen.

Old Houses and Wanderlust

"I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel's sake. The great affair is to move." ~Robert Louis Stevenson

I'm starting to get itchy feet again. I have been looking at other houses and other cities and wondering if the grass might be green there, too. I don't know why I do that. Maybe I inherited it from my grandmother. She moved about every 5 years. There was something within her that drove her from house to house, state to state.

There's this great old house very close to the school I work at. It's a three story Italianate. It has the tower and everything. Right now, it's almost hidden behind overgrown grounds, but it has a magnolia and azaleas, and with some love could be beyond beautiful. I imagine that the inside has hardwood floors, probably worn and scuffed, and tall ceilings. I imagine that the view from the tower window looks out across the rooftops of the other houses, and that I could probably just see my school from it. I look at the old hammock on the porch and imagine a summer afternoon with a book. I think I'm in love with that house.

Of course, this is house adultery. I also love the house I'm in right now. This is my family legacy and my family home. It sits on seven acres and has more space than I and another couple of families could use. It has a privacy that a town lot, no matter how large, could never give. Every time I walk through, I can feel the love of my grandparents surrounding me. This set of grandparents, my mother's parents, lived in the same house for more than 20 years. From them, I get the desire to nest.

One day, that great old Italianate will go on the market, and I'll have to make a choice. I'll have to either turn in and take a look or grip the wheel and come home. I don't know if the gypsy or the nester will win out in the end.

Natchez

"Welcome to Natchez, Mississippi - the oldest civilized settlement on the
Mississippi River!" -- Official Natchez Webpage

I spent Friday in Natchez. Natchez is amazing. I hadn't been there since our 5th grade Mississippi Trip, and all I remembered about it was Longwood.

This time, I got to walk around and appreciate the beauty of the town. I love river towns anyway. They all seem so calmly saturated with history. The downtown was sort of genteelly shabby. It seemed that it was impossible to turn without finding an interesting shop or a wonderful old house.

I also went back to Longwood. It's amazing. I kept thinking, "What would it have been had it been finished?" I could almost picture it in my mind as the docent described the marble that was to go on the floors. Looking up into that unfinished expanse stretching five floors above me, I was in awe of Haller Nutt's dream. He included so many revolutionary design elements. He must have been an amazingly smart man.

I had sort of a weird thing happen there, too. The house is one of those places that feels...I don't know...watchful. It, in the tradition of all old houses in the South, is supposed to be haunted. Supposedly, when the haunting is active, the lights flicker, the chandelier moves, and things move by themselves.

The whole time I was in the first room of the tour, the lights flickered, and the chandelier started to shimmy. Not like a puppet on a string, but enough to notice. The tour guide kept looking at it with a puzzled expression on her face, but she didn't say anything about it until we got into the next room. A candle had fallen from a three candle candelabra, and she laughingly said, "Oh, Dr. Nutt and Julia are playing with things again." She picked it up and shoved it, and I mean twisted it with FORCE, into the holder. She wiggled it with her fingers. It wasn't going anywhere.

It stayed in the holder until we moved into the next room. Then, suddenly, it leapt out of the holder, off the table, and into the middle of the floor. I don't see how it could have gotten off the table by itself. It was strange. Nothing that could be proven, but I don't think I'd want to be there after dark. None of us commented on it, and we moved on to the upstairs part of the tour soon thereafter. I don't know whether I had a brush with Dr. Haller Nutt, but I really enjoyed his house.

I loved Natchez, odd stuff and all. I found a really amazing potter, Connor Burns, whose stuff I will have to have more of. I am just learning about U.S. pottery and I have so much to find out. I also found a potter who works in the Native American style and bought a very nice cat shaped rattle head figure.

In the confines of that one small city, there was pottery, Thai food (thank GOD), good BBQ, shopping, a blues festival, old houses, and everything I love to be around. I think I want to move to Natchez. Maybe then Haller Nutt could throw things at me on a regular basis. :)

A Very Bad Day

"Never argue with a fool. People might not be able to tell the difference." -- Author unknown

Today, this quote saved me from turning into a frothing-at-the-mouth screaming idiot myself. A parent came for a conference that turned into a personal attack.

She sat there and accused me to my face of lying about her daughter and changing the attendance record. Her daughter is failing every single class. Her daughter's attitude is legendary. Yet, I am the villain. I am "picking on her" and apparently, have designed every aspect of my classroom management strategy, including other referrals for other students, with no other purpose than to frame her child.

I am offended to the core of my being. I could feel my blood pressure rise and I wanted to say and do so many things. This quote sprang to mind, and I suddenly just sat there and let her rage. It was clear to everybody what she was. I didn't have to defend myself. Everything is documented. The administration can tell when and if anything was changed in the system. I don't even know how to change stuff in the attendance program once it's entered.

She got so out of control that the administrator ended the conference. The crazy woman grabbed her papers and her child, tore down the hall screaming that her child needed a new class and a new teacher, and peeled rubber out of the parking lot. Everyone heard it. Everyone saw it. I was very proud that I managed not to leap across the table and rip her throat out with my teeth.

I know this isn't over. I know she or her mother is going to create a huge scene at least once more before the end of the year. As long as it doesn't harm my car or me personally, I'll consider it a good ending. I just want her gone. I'm tired of fighting her crap attitude and watching it infect my other students.

Mom brought me a carton of ice cream and I think I'm going to go dive into it. Today was a bad, bad day. Tomorrow, hopefully, will be better. I'll try to update tomorrow.

Tired

"I was too old for a paper route, too young for Social Security and too tired for an affair." -- Erma Bombeck

I am so tired. I would like to sleep for about a week. The combined stress of state testing, regular end-of-the-year insanity, and preparations for this summer trip are about to finish me off. I'm not sleeping much or well. As you can tell by the time of the post, I should be in bed, but I've just finished working on something I've got to have for a weekend meeting, and even though I'm exhausted, I don't think I could sleep.

Whenever I feel like this, I always wonder if I'm supposed to feel like this. Am I so tired because I'm doing the right thing well, or because I'm doing the wrong thing altogether? If I were in full-time ESL, would I be so tired? Is this a physical thing or an emotional one?

I love my kids. Most of them are a real joy. Watching them grow this year like seedlings breaking the surface of the garden soil has been an educational experience for me as well as them. Sometimes, though, it's just overwhelming. Right now, it's overwhelming.

The paperwork is endless. Today, one of my 7th period kids lost her mind and was sent out. All of them are acting nuts, and we still have 4 weeks of school left.

On top of all this, our lovely school board issued its new school calendar for next year. They've added more days to school and we now start back on Aug. 1. Why can't they see that more classroom days aren't the answer?

Anyway, I need to try to lay down and sleep. I have to take a trip tomorrow, and I guess driving and sleeping don't mix well. Maybe at some point I'm going to have 5 minutes for myself.

Who's Out There?

"A single rose can be my garden; a single friend, my world." -- Leo Buscaglia

I often wonder who is reading this little blog. I know my good friend DEG is out there. It's funny. He and I have communicated more through this blog than we have in years. Isn't that crazy?

I think several members of my family are reading it, too. Hello, assorted relatives.

I wonder who else sees it, or if anybody does. I don't necessarily put it out there to be read, but for some reason, when I noticed my counter had somehow broken 200, even though it advances every time I reload after an update, I was surprised.

Tonight's musing is short and largely pointless. If you're out there reading, you might leave me a post and let me know. Just to satisfy my catlike curiosity. ;)

I Won!

"To be a poet is a condition, not a profession." -- Robert Frost

When my dad and I went down to run and fold our church's bulletin today, he asked me if I'd checked my mail today. That may sound odd, but sometimes I go a couple of days without doing that. Nothing very important ever comes to me except bills. Who needs them on top of a long day?

As we were coming back, he stopped and picked up what was in the box. In the pile was a letter from the people who sponsored the literary contest I entered awhile back (see previous postings). I won first place! I was so happy.

It turns out my mother already knew. A former teacher of mine and colleague of hers was the judge for the competition. The entries were all anonymous, but when she found out who wrote the poem she'd chosen, she called my mom and told her. Mom had been keeping the secret for about a week.

It's an extra layer of happiness to me that this former teacher was the judge. It's actually the second time she's chosen me for a poetry contest, but I bet she doesn't remember the first one. I wrote for and won a "Roses are Red" variation contest in 9th grade. It was my first competition win.

I will go to an awards presentation in a couple of weeks to receive the prize. I had hoped I'd win with one of the three poems I entered, but I'm not sure if I believed it would really happen. It's so encouraging. I'm glad I entered because I started not to do so. I haven't had anyone who could help me refine my work since my undergraduate days, and I was hesitant to put anything out there without some polishing.

I wish I had somebody to help me refine my stuff. My college creative writing professor was so amazing for that. He never pulled punches, and as a result of his classes, I made so much progress as a writer. One of the pieces I wrote for him took first prize at a competition I entered during college.

I've often thought of writing to him with newer stuff, but that's such an imposition and presumption. He is a producing poet himself and has new classes every year to help. I would feel strange about asking him to help me, random student from years ago.

This was a much-needed encouragement. It renews my desire to write again. Not for the prizes. Not for any kind of victory. Rather, because, as the quote at the beginning says, the poetry is a part of who I am, and it's a part I've been keeping locked away since Japan. It's time to open the doors and see what happens.

Ask and Ye Shall Receive....

"Every moment of your life is infinitely creative and the universe is endlessly bountiful. Just put forth a clear enough request, and everything your heart desires must come to you." -- Mohandas Gandhi

Today was so weird. It was a constant tidal flow of the good and the stupid.

I started the day with the discovery that some of my students had swiped about 7 of the meager number of copies we have of TKaM. Of course, in my extremely literary mind, this action is rife with irony. Not that I don't appreciate the literary merits of the situation, but it pissed me off to the N-th degree. We have nothing. They know we have nothing. They steal bits of the nothing we have.

Anyway, after a diatribe and lots of guilt (I learned it at my grandmother's knee, and NOBODY was better than she), I retrieved most of the books. I anticipate the others trickling in tomorrow.

After dealing with that crap, I got some really good news. After the PowerPoint presentations mentioned in the last post, I decided to look around and see if I couldn't find some way of getting one for the classroom. I looked up manufacturers of LCD projectors, located a rep for Mitsubishi Electronics, and wrote him a letter. Yesterday, I talked to another rep for a company that does demos for them. Today, I got confirmation. They are making us a great deal on a used demonstrator. I felt like I was walking on air!

I didn't really expect anything to come of my requests. I was so happy! Now I can do PowerPoints for other things. I have so many ideas already. I plan to incorporate pictures from this summer's trip to England into a PP about Shakespeare.

The day swung back down with some of my later classes. Other stuff also happened. In my infinite dumbness, I put the wrong shipping address on a package I ordered. I was pretty low when school ended.

Then the up-wave came again. It's not a big event, but it was nice. A prescription that I need was accepted by my insurance, so it no longer costs me a million dollars a month. I also found out that I don't owe the government anything this year on taxes. Two big pluses for me. Tonight when I got home, the company I ordered the materials from wrote me back to say they'd gotten the package as a return and were sending it to the corrected address. I didn't lose my money/stuff after all.

Even though today was a day of gains, I hope tomorrow is a little more even keel. I need some peace. The weekend was almost non-existent, and this week is taking its toll. Whenever I get too tired, every little thing affects me more than normal. This weekend, I'm going to try to SLEEP!!!

A Taste of the Good Stuff

"Education's purpose is to replace an empty mind with an open one." -- Malcolm S. Forbes

I had the best day today. It started out stressful as I was trying to hook my laptop to my class TV for PowerPoint presentations. As usual in such situations, my laptop was uncooperative, and I was scrambling to fill the gaps with something while I worked. I finally borrowed the office's super projector thing, used the school's laptop (yes, we only have the one...we're a poor school), and got the presentation running. The kids were so into the presentations.

I gave a PP on the Civil Rights Movement and on the Jim Crow laws of the 30's to help them understand Mockingbird better. I had prepared the PPs for teaching Mockingbird in Japan, but the same material worked with my 10th graders.

I couldn't get over how involved they became. They were asking questions and all of them were awake and interested. For those of you unfamiliar with the world of modern secondary education, that in and of itself is a minor miracle. I encouraged them as much as possible to go home and talk to the people living in their own houses and communities who had lived through these events, and I saw some of them who probably never considered those people as anything except for "old" look consideringly.

After the PPs, they broke up into Reading Circle discussion groups where every person has a different facet of the material to present. I was unsure of how well they'd do or if they'd do the work involved, but all but 6 all day long did it, and by some miracle, even if it was only the miracle of the new, they enjoyed it. I felt almost reborn. It was almost like teaching in the college ESL programs in Indiana or Japan.

They left talking about the materials they'd seen. They left curious to read more. I have students who came to me with no interest in reading who are eagerly plowing their way through this book, and I'm so proud of them I could cry. It's not anything that I'm doing, but it's what they're discovering they're capable of themselves. It's what they are finally looking around and seeing in the world other than the trivialities of teenhood. I am so happy for them!

At the same time, I feel kind of like an anxious gardener with a tender new planting before me. I am worried that it won't take. I am worried that some harsh weather will come to shrivel it before its roots grow deep enough to support and nourish. I know not all of them will care, but to have some of them so interested is like a gift from God. Maybe I can make a small difference somehow.

Clowns and other scary things

"People don't buy from clowns." -- Claude C. Hopkins

I guess Ronald McDonald would be considered the ultimate refutation of this....

Is anyone else afraid of the clownish thing Burger King is using in their ads now? If you haven't seen it, you can see a pic and a short clip here. The King is beyond wacky. He's the kind of thing that shows up in nightmares. He moves far too fast and with a stealth that's not conducive to calm affection. Only nasty things scurry like that...cockroaches, rats, psychopaths in movies...

I particulary hate the one where the guy looks out his window and sees a far away speck. He turns to say something to his wife or look at something, and when he turns back, that big old freaky plastic head is filling up his window offering him a heart attack for breakfast. They both laugh and the sun shines blissfully on a "happy morning."

I can tell you right now that I wouldn't be laughing if that thing showed up outside my window. I'd be grabbing either my kendo shinai or a baseball bat. One of my friends (who will probably read this eventually) was reenacting the commercial as it might go if it happened here in the Deep South. I kind of like this version better.

Scene opens: Freaky guy is a dot on the horizon.
Guy appears. Looks out window. Stretches and turns away momentarily.
Freaky Burger King Thing is suddenly filling up the whole window. Regular guy turns.
Sound of shell being chambered in a shotgun. Boom. End of Freaky Burger King Thing menace.

Another friend of mine observed that part of what makes the thing so scary is that he has normal human hands. I think that may well be part of it. For me, it's the stop motion movement and that big old smiling shiny plastic head. It reminds me of the freaky rabbit in Donnie Darko, which if you haven't seen, you should really check out. I also think that next Halloween's best selling costume could well be the Burger King if they'll put it into production.

Probably, the worst part of it is the same thing I (and probably lots of other people) dislike about clowns. There is no movement in the face. It is impossible to get any readings or any of those subtle body language cues we rely on for communication. I believe this is the reasons clowns rank so high on phobia lists (there's a term for fear of clowns... coulrophobia) and on lists of things people just generally find disturbing. When the face is hidden, so too are the motivations and the clues we need to figure out whether something is amusing or a threat.

For me, creepy Burger dude is a mix. I suppose as long as he stays on his side of the TV, everything is okay. God help him if I ever look out my windows and see that huge plastic head outside offering me any form of BK breakfast though.

update

Short tonight, and no quote. Things are rocking along pretty well. Good Mockingbird discussion..more about it tomorrow. I'm, as a colleague says, "beat to my knees."

Why tea kettles Whistle

"Patience: A minor form of despair disguised as a virtue." -- Ambrose Bierce

Actually, I value patience very highly. It's a very important part of my job. I pray for more all the time. Patience and wisdom are hard-won, though. Today and yesterday have been trying my patience in the extreme. I've figured out that it's not the heat under the kettle that causes the scream. It's the inability to vent in any other way.

Not the kids, first of all. They've not been worse than is normal. It's been a week of administrative mandates that have completely wrecked my lesson plans. We had to give a practice test for the big state test coming up later in the month. It's the 3rd time around on this, and even the slowest of my kids were saying, "We are doing this AGAIN?!?!" I explained that its purpose is to show how they've grown over the year and to point out any particular skills for practice before the real thing, but none of us could scrape up much enthusiasm for it.

We got word that the change had to be made on Wednesday. No kidding. Less than 24 hrs. notice. My Type-A personality took the change with all the grace of a freight train suddenly derailed. I HATE it when somebody changes set plans at the last minute. If it's a casual thing, it doesn't matter, but when I put as much work into planning and pacing my lesson plans, it's a big slap in the face to have them so carelessly swept aside.

So, teakettle-like, I've sat in my room, mostly at my desk, for the past two days. I have filed piles of papers, graded and recorded others, set up my computerized gradebook and started working on entering grades for it, and even hung some posters that had fallen long ago and been shoved into a corner. Things are spic-and-span (where did that phrase come from, anyway?) and ready for parent-teacher day on Monday. I hated it. Every minute of it. I felt useless. I wasn't helping them learn. All I was doing was babysitting and cleaning. I could feel the steam building, and by 7th period today, I wanted to shriek with it.

This isn't what we're supposed to be doing. We're supposed to be talking about To Kill a Mockingbird. They're supposed to be discovering how wonderful it is on their own. Instead, we killed two days. I can't remember the quote, but it says something like, "As if we could kill time without injuring eternity." Today, I think we gave it a nasty bruise, at the very least.

One of the things I'm going to have to learn is more flexibility, especially with the stupid trivialities that are so much a part of public education. I will just have to find a way to let it roll off my back. One of my friends was having a problem of patience and tolerance with a family member, and she developed the habit of saying, "Quack, quack" to remind herself to do that. I think I'm going to print that off the computer and put it somewhere on my desk. I need to be more duck and less teakettle.

Reverse Psychology -- The Ultimate Educational Tool

"The teacher who is indeed wise does not bid you to enter the house of his wisdom but rather leads you to the threshold of your mind." -- Kahlil Gibran

I want to be this kind of teacher. I want my students to engage that mostly inactive lump of gray matter between their ears and figure out what they think about this world they live in. I'm afraid that if they don't, they will be herded like sheep for the rest of their lives: safe and warm in the pack, comfortably running in the general direction of the others until they are cut out of the flock by predators or until the entire flock plunges over the edge of the ravine.

Today, I started talking to my kids about banned books in preparation for teaching To Kill a Mockingbird (TKaM). TKaM is one of my all-time favorite books. The messages in it are so powerful and so relevant for any person who has ever walked this planet. It's not bound by time, race, gender, nationality, language, or culture. More than almost any other book I've read, it's a universal. We feel the struggles of the characters within ourselves because we have walked those paths ourselves.

I want my kids to engage this novel actively. I was really encouraged by how impassioned some of them became when we were talking about banning books. Most of them had no idea what sorts of books might become banned or why someone might want to ban a book. I forget how young they are. We listed several famous examples, Harry Potter, The Catcher in the Rye, Huckleberry Finn, and talked about what sorts of complaints groups have had about them over the years.

Then I told them TKaM is in that same list of commonly banned and challenged books. I knew they'd perk up for that. Controversy draws a teenager more quickly than roadkill draws buzzards (how's that for a gruesome, but apt, metaphor). We talked about why TKaM is on the list, and we'll finish that discussion up on Thursday. I'm interested to see if we can have a semi-involved conversation on the topic. I so want them to think! If I can get even a few of them to start thinking instead of just passively receiving or floating through life, maybe I'll have done something worthwhile this year.

Sock monkeys

Try as I might, I just cannot find a quote applicable to tonight's topic. I guess there's not a quote for everything, after all. That's okay. Tonight's post is short.

If you ever owned or liked the classic childhood toy, the sock monkey, check out this website. Make sure you go to the message board. I get a kick out of it. It makes me want to dig out my sewing supplies and make an army of them. Take a trip back to childhood (or sideways if you've never grown out of it) to the Red Heel Sock Monkey Shelter.

Storms

"The best thing one can do when it's raining is to let it rain." -- H.W. Longfellow

"Weather forecast for tonight: dark." -- George Carlin

Tonight strong storms are sweeping through our area. I'm compulsively listening to a local radio station waiting for...I don't know. Maybe for doom to fall upon me out of the sky. I don't fully understand why I become transfixed by the weather reports when bad weather comes in. It's almost a snake/mongoose thing. I know it's getting late and church tomorrow will be early. I know that my listening to the reports doesn't change what's happening outside. It doesn't even really give that all-important illusion of control we humans cherish so dearly.

I keep telling myself that I will get up, take a shower, and go to bed, but every time I reach for the remote to cut the stereo down, the ever-vigilant djs cut in with another report. I start tracking with them on my mental map of the area. I wonder if This Person who lives in This Area is okay, and suddenly, there's a tornado in That Area where That Person lives. Suddenly, it seems like I know people everywhere, and all of them are beset by Nature.

If it weren't for the tornados, I wouldn't mind the rain. I've always rather enjoyed thunderstorms. I remember watching them every summer at the camp our church went to on the coast. There are few things as impressive as a summer thunderstorm coming in off the Gulf. A shimmering gray wall of water slid across the silt-tinged waves. Silver threads of lightening traced messages that disappeared too fast to for my mortal eyes to read them. The wind, always a presence there, bent the palms like dancers performing a dangerous tango. Standing on the balconies and landings of the camp complex, I always felt as though I could fly into it and be dissolved into the magic of it.

Even though I'm nowhere near the coast now, I still enjoy thunderstorms. Now, instead of palms, pines dance, taller, less frantic. Half of my old house (see a previous post for more about this) has a metal roof, and the sound of rain on the roof is incredibly comforting.

While I was in Japan, I missed the rumble of summer thunderstorms. Their summer storms are typhoons. Typhoons are another kind of magic altogether, and not a terribly enjoyable type. Add this to the fact that they usually took several days to move through us, and all my groceries had to be transported by bike with me in semi-effective raingear, and you can understand my lack of enthusiasm. I was very fortunate that we never had a big one come in directly on top of us while I was there. They always steered enough north that we didn't catch the most damaging portions.

Although I don't mind the thunderstorms, I do mind even a tiny whiff of tornado. Suddenly, weather that had been highly conducive to reading and snuggling down into quilts with cats becomes a bleary-eyed radio vigil. The fact that they are horrifyingly unpredictable, destructive, and sudden aside, the primary cause of my tornado worries can be traced to two sources.

The first is a story my mom told me. When I was little, we lived in a trailer. Not a mobile home. Not a triple-wide with porch and spa tub. A trailer. One night the weather was particularly bad and Mom went out to listen for the freight-train rumble of an impending tornado. We're always told to listen for that in this part of the country. The tornado tiptoed up to the house closest to ours (my parents lived and continue to live out in the woods on about 40 acres of their own), ripped it up, and bounced over us without making a sound. A car horn from their house would have been heard, but not the total destruction of a house by a tornado. So much for an auditory warning.

The second is something I saw with my own eyes. There is a research station within driving distance where I live, and we'd have to pass it to go visit my grandparents when I was a child. As this research station, they had a huge equipment barn made from metal. Unfortunately, this station also sits in what we call a "tornado alley", meaning, for those of you unfamiliar with the joys of these storms, a place to which tornados seem to be drawn for some unfathomable reason. I can remember at least two separate times when a tornado came through the "alley" in which the station sits and blew the barn into pieces. For miles around, the tall pines had streamers of silvery metal woven through their branches, tied around their trunks like misshapen bows, and littering the ground beneath them. (BTW, every time the barn got/gets destroyed, they put it right back up again. Maybe they think the tornados will get tired of it eventually. I personally think I'd at least try to move it elsewhere on the property or SOMETHING.)

Every area has some sort of natural disaster they have to deal with. The area of Japan in which I lived was awaiting a massive earthquake/tidal wave. I'll never forget watching the far-too cheery NHK news girl gesture to a cardboard model of Nagoya and showing how far inland the wave was going to sweep. I can't tell you how comforted I was about *that* when I found out. Some areas have mudslides, volcanoes, or floods. A friend of mine from Brazil always told a joke concerning the lack of these types of natural disasters in Brazil. Apparently, according to the joke, the government more than makes up for it. It was a very clever joke, I thought. I guess we all just make the best of it we can no matter where we are. After all, what other choice is there?

It's time to take the remote by the horns (mixing metaphors along the way), and get some rest. There's nothing I can do about it anyway.

Things I Want to Learn

"I am learning all the time. My tombstone will be my diploma." -- Eartha Kitt

There are so many things I want to learn to do. I thought I'd record a few of them for the amusement of the thronging thousands (or tens) who read me.

1. Throw pottery on a wheel -- I have some practice with molded pieces from working for a decorative ceramics studio. What I want now is to throw pots, especially bowls and pitchers. I tried to learn some in Japan, but the language barrier was too great.

2. Weld better -- I finally got to take a welding class, but I need more practice. A MIG welder and a plasma cutter couldn't hurt, either.

3. Play Mah Jong -- The pieces fascinate me. I have ordered a book and found a few people around here who know how to play, so this one may get checked off my list soon.

4. Play the banjo -- There's something about the sound that I love. Ever since a friend of mine introduced me to Bela Fleck, I've wanted to learn how to play the banjo.

5. Make Green Tea bread -- This one sounds odd, but there was a coffee shop in Toyohashi that made green tea bread and it was some of the best stuff I've ever tasted. I wish I had the recipe.

6. Crochet correctly -- I need more practice and somebody to watch for this.

7. Control my foil better -- Fencing. How I miss it. How much more terrible I probably am now since there is no fencing in this area.

Short entry tonight. Nothing deep or meaningful. The full moon prohibits solemnity.

Spring Break

"In the spring, at the end of the day, you should smell like dirt." -- Margaret Atwood

This week is Spring Break for my school system. I have been taking care of all sorts of little jobs that have been piling up around the house. Many of those have been outdoor jobs.

I have never been much of a yard person. I am much more likely to be found sitting under a tree reading a book than digging and planting. That being said, since I finally came back home, I have been much more interested in gardening.

I'm still not into formal landscapes and heavy-duty earth moving, but for the last two days, I've been cleaning out overgrown flowerbeds and pruning shrubs. I have been designing flower beds in my mind and hauling topsoil. I have enjoyed it. One of the beds I reclaimed contains heirloom daylilies my grandmother planted. It still needs some work, but I planted some new ones to mix in, and the grass that had choked everything is no longer there.

I want to add some colorful trees later on. I want to add cherries and gingko to remind me of Japan. If I can find them, I also want to add a couple of dogwoods. They are some of my favorite spring trees.

Other old-fashioned plants I'd like to have are camellias and a gardenia. I think they are beautiful, and the gardenias are so fragrant.

I guess I am turning into a yard person after all. I never thought I would. I guess now that I have a place that is my own, I can see the point of the hard work. I'll still be found with a book under a tree, but now it will be a tree I put in the ground myself. :) Happy thought, indeed.

Friends -- Not the show

I'm starting without a quote tonight. I know that's unusual for this blog, and I also know as a quote fiend that one can't throw the proverbial rock on a quotes site or in Bartlett's without hitting a score of friendship quotes. Maybe I'll go back and add one later.

My friends are the greatest group of people on earth. For one thing, they consistently put up with my crap. I am not now, nor have I ever been, an easy person to get along with. I am often moody and am quite frequently not fit company for man or beast. I worry. I am classic Type-A personality, and God help you if you ever have to work on any kind of project with me. Despite these things, they are always around to help pick me up when I run out of strength from trying to do everything on my own. They are always there to bandage the wounds and mend the tears when I fall flat on my face.

I have been thinking about how friendships change as one gets older. I have been blessed in my life with a group of true, long-time friends. My best friend and I have known each other since kindergarten. She toddled up to me as I was screaming my head off after my mother's departure on my first day away from her and my grandmother and asked, "Why are you crying?" We managed to overcome that inauspicious beginning, and she and I passed through the trials of high school and the giddy happinesses of college before she married a great guy and went off to better things.

Another of my friends and I have gone to church together for years. She's the piano player; I play the organ. She's as vivacious as I am shy. She just had her first baby, and seeing her with that precious gift is one of the catalysts that started this reflection.

I don't see any of my friends as much as I used to. I don't guess anybody our age does. Life intrudes. It's hard to get up at 5:30 to go to work and then come home to an active social life later on, especially since, oddly enough, most of my friends are either teachers or are married to teachers, so we all have lesson plans and grading in the evenings. I have never felt disconnected from my friends, though. Even though I only get to see some of them a couple of times during the year, and there are a couple whom I only get to catch up with via email or a phone call, I still feel that bond that connects.

Some people would argue that it's not possible to maintain a friendship this way. I wonder how else it's done? With a few exceptions, we live at least 90 min. away from each other. Actually, several of my friends are scattered across the US, and at least one of my friends is on a different continent. I love them not one tiny bit less, but the active keeping up with things is hard.

The other thing that triggered this meandering is the fact that two of my friends announced I won't get to see them as often because they are going to leave our church. I can understand their reasons...I've pondered doing it myself often enough, but I can't help but be sad. I wanted to say something when the announcement was made, but what was there to say? Now, I just wonder when I will I ever see them. The only time I ever get to see them is on Sunday or when we have a get-together. I feel like I'm losing them.

That sadness brought in memories of other friendships that did just end. Everybody has relationships they are glad to see fade. Mine involve a girl from high school who turned out to be crazy and a guy from grad school who turned out to be an ass. (Oops...violated the PG-13 rating...) There have been other friendships that I really mourn, though. One in particular comes to me when it's quiet and gnaws at me. This friend and I met in graduate school and got along famously. She came to teach at the same school I was working at in Japan, and we had a fabulous time. I thought our friendship was a true thing, but soon after I left, she totally cut ties with me.

It's been two years now, but I still can't figure out what happened. I guess I must have done something that she considered an insult or a betrayal. Maybe she had been waiting for me to leave. I just can't understand how something that seemed so true could have turned out to be so empty. I have tried to find out how she's doing through other friends we share, but, probably out of politeness, nobody knows anything.

I just wish I knew what it was that I had done. I never meant any insult, and I had thought she knew me well enough to at least ask if she thought I'd done something offensive or wrong. I turn the problem over again and again, but I never find any closure on it. If I had an email from her saying, "I hate you. Die, b****, die!" then I could probably move on. I will never know if she's having a good life, if something happened and she is having a hard time, if I offended or was just oblivious when I thought our friendship was true, or anything else. And, I have to live with that. There is no other choice.

The last two days have been a real rollercoaster as I watch life change around me. I am so happy on one hand for the joy of a long-awaited new life. On the other, I'm sad because two more of my friends seem to be slipping away. Bitter and sweet together. I guess that's the nature of life.

Jane Austen

"Let other pens dwell on guilt and misery." -- Jane Austen

I am the perfect cliche of a high school English teacher. One of my favorite books of all time is Pride and Prejudice. I love, love, love it. I have read it more times than I can count. Everytime I come back to it, it's fresh and new. It's totally charming. I always want to be Elizabeth and find my Darcy, my foil.

I have two pieces of jewelry with JA quotes on them. I wear them almost every day. They say words you wear next to your skin have "special powers." Funny...I don't feel like a super hero... :)

I have read several of the other Austen novels, although by no means all of them, but P and P is my favorite. Lately, I've been on an absolute binge of reading sequels, some of them well-done, some of them not, to the original story. The best ones I've found so far are Mr. Darcy Takes a Wife and the Fitzwilliam Darcy, Gentleman series.

What is it about this story that draws hopeless romantics? I realized how many sisters I probably have in my Darcy worship when I saw You've Got Mail for the first time. If it's widespread enough to have made it into a semi-smarmy movie like that, there must be a lot of us.

I think the draw is watching those two perfectly matched characters square off. How rare is it to find a person who balances you? Although the two of them have some marked differences, the core elements are complementary.

I love the verbal fencing matches they have, but I would have to feel a very strong connection with somebody before I could be that forthright with my opinions. Once, a long, long time ago, I was told that I was judgmental. Even though the person who told me that was mad at the time, it's stuck with me. This has made me very hesitant to give strong opinions to any person I don't know well. Elizabeth Bennet I'm not.

Maybe some day I'll find my balance. It's a nice thought. I don't know if there will be a "merry chase" like the novel, but I look forward to finding someone who will walk beside me, not be dominated by my own strength or try to crush it with his own.

Salsa...not the dance

"Only real friends will tell you when your face is dirty." -- Sicilian Proverb

Last night after church I went out with some of my friends. We went to our favorite Mexican restaurant and were laughing, talking, and carrying on.

Then something that has never happened to me before in any restaurant happened. The waiter was bringing us a fresh bowl of salsa, and suddenly, I was liberally anointed with it from the shoulder to the waist. Never in any place I've ever been have I had food spilled on me by a person other than myself, especially by a person who puts food on tables for a living.

I just started laughing. I had no idea what else to do. I couldn't get angry. The poor little guy didn't do it on purpose. The guy I was sitting with also caught part of the salsa flood, and all four of us were about to fall over we were laughing so hard. I think the waitstaff thought we were going to make a huge scene, but why do that? If it wasn't deliberate and it wasn't on-fire-hot, why fuss at somebody who was already upset over it?

It was the perfect ending to a long day of being rained on and hailed on while hunting for my insane cat outside. After we swabbed ourselves off with towels, we moved to a new table. Every thing the guy brought a dish to the table, we all flinched and looked at each other, then burst out laughing. It was a good memory, I think.

T Day Cometh

"Good teaching is one-fourth preparation and three-fourths theater." -- Gail Godwin

Tomorrow my kids will take the English II writing test. I have mixed emotions about it. Part of me, a very big part of me, is just so glad that the stupid thing is finally here. It has been ruling all our lives for the last two weeks. Another part of me is nervous for the kids. I have done the best I can for them, and all I can do now is sit back and wait for the results.

For the most part, I think they're ready. I just hope they don't get in to the testing room and freak out.

I can't believe how important these stupid tests are. Every facet of high school has been tarnished and sullied by the almighty testing agenda. I suppose there are arguments to be made in their favor. They have increased "accountability", whatever that is. I just hate seeing my kids shaking in their desks when they're told that they can't graduate without them.

There's a whole focus in education that "more is always better," and only the PTB's opinion of what "more" should be is valid. For the most part, I think education "experts" (my, there are so many quotation marks tonight) have been in their ivory towers too long. I wonder how many of them could last a full week in a real classroom. In theory, in the perfect environment, their ideas might be workable. When you've got kids who, for the most part, have never been taught the value of education and who are struggling with monumental survival issues as a matter of daily routine, some of the gilding gets knocked off those shiny golden dreams.

Tomorrow is another day of "theater" and education. I guess I need some sleep to prepare. I hope my kids are resting, too. Too much has to ride on tomorrow's essays.

PEZ 

Ebay

"What if nothing was ever lost?" -- Ebay

I love Ebay. I am such a junkie, and that can be taken as either "addict" or "junk lover." There's more to my love of it than just the stuff though. The recent ad campaigns have been surprisingly touching to me, especially the one with the guy and his long-lost toy boat. The first time I saw it, I actually teared up. Granted, I was tired, it was late, and I was running a fever at the time, but....

There is such a sense of community on Ebay. It's like a huge garage sale that just goes on and on. With one exception, everyone I've dealt with has been so cordial and polite. They've answered questions, been as careful with their shipping as they might have been with a gift being sent to a far away relative, and sent personable, even chatty emails. Everyone has seemed to care tremendously about maintaining that Saturday garage sale feel, and most go to great extremes to make sure their items are described in painstaking detail to avoid any kind of disappointment on the part of the buyer.

It's funny that you can become connected in this way, even briefly, to people from all over the world in the name of commerce. I'm not sure if this kind of contact is a point for those who argue that technology connects us or serves to distance us from each other. I guess you could argue for both.

I also find it comforting that no matter what a person might like, be it salt shakers, Elvis memorabilia, porcelain dogs, or PEZ, there are about a jillion other people on Ebay who will be into the same thing and have cool stuff you've never seen to add to your collection. I, personally, love PEZ, vintage tablecloths, and old brooches.

Ebay brings up another interesting facet of humanity for me: collecting. It seems that almost every person I've ever met collects something. I wonder what makes us choose one item and then compulsively keep buying variations on the same theme. I wonder what the things we choose to surround ourselves with say about us as people? I guess there is probably some deep psychological reason why this person collects holsteins for the kitchen, Barbies, or clocks. Some psychologist should write a book about that, perhaps. There's probably already an annoying email forward about it. :)

Well, I guess I've probably exhaused this topic, but I just wanted to throw it out there.

Wide Open Spaces

"The poetry of the earth is never dead." -- John Keats

Today, I had a dark epiphany about myself. I won't go into the details, but I learned something unpleasant about my personality. I am still processing the information, but I suddenly want to run away. I want to find a place where there is nothing but me and some trees until I get this dealt with.

I use Webshots for my screensaver and wallpaper on my computer. I have put it on every computer I've ever had. I love the scenic nature shots. They remind me there are so many beautiful places in the world to see.

I wish I could just dive into the screen like a figure in a surrealist painting or a cartoon character. Wouldn't it be amazing to escape like that? There are two pictures in particular that call to me. One is this avenue of oaks and the light streaming through them is golden. I want so much to be walking beneath those oaks and hear the sound of wind rustling their leaves.

Another is a beach somewhere in Costa Rica. As a general rule, I am not a beach person, but this shot is at sunset and the purples and reds make it look like a scene from another world. I want to go sit there in that twilight and let the waves gradually eat away this problem like a sandcastle at high tide.

I think I'm going to go take a long, hot shower and walk on my beach and down my tree-lined path in my mind. Perhaps the solace of nature can be gained vicariously.

Poetry

"Poetry is a packsack of invisible keepsakes." -- Carl Sandburg

I submitted three poems to a local literary contest. It's been a long, long time since I've submitted anything for competition. I'm not sure how polished they are. I wish more than I can say that I still had a mentor to help me revise. My college creative writing teacher was amazing. Everyone probably thinks theirs was wonderful, but this professor didn't pull any punches, and he helped me burn away the dross.

It's a local contest, and most of the things I've written are NOT local material, so they might go over like the proverbial lead balloon. I don't know. I'll throw them out and see if they survive.

I haven't written anything new since I left Japan. I have often thought that poetry has to live on pain, and I decided a long time ago that I'd rather be happier than a great poet. I'm not going to chase the knife's blade to fill my bottle with heart's blood ink.

Still, I have ideas in my head, and I need to channel them. Maybe this will revive the juices. My best poems are about my travels. For some reason, I draw a lot of inspiration from the places I go. I guess the travel poems become the souvenirs I'll never break, sell, or give away.

I have to keep it short tonight because I'm so tired. Maybe there will be more tomorrow.

Shakespeare

"Education is a better safeguard of liberty than a standing army." -- Edward Everett

I am trying to make some 80-odd tenth graders see the beauty and power of Shakespeare. It's hard to convince kids who have trouble with the slippery subtleties of Standard English that it's worth hacking through the archaic vocabulary to get to the character and plot gems beneath. I honestly can't blame them for their reluctance. For them, it's like studying a foreign language. We're approaching it in that way. I think in another two generations, a total re-evaluation of our high school teaching canon is going to be necessary, or a new way of approaching this material is going to have to be developed. We don't expect regular students to approach Chaucer or the Pearl Poet in their original idiom. I don't know how much longer Shakespeare is going to work that way, either.

I will probably get about a million responses to this attacking me for not taking the "intellectual high road" that maintains the almost holy virtue with which some people try to endow Shakespeare. To stave some of that off, I want to say how much I enjoy his works. I find his puns funny. I love the fact that so much of his humor is earthy and aimed at the common man. I love his flawed heroes and heroines. I love the freshness of his plots, even after 400 years of badly-done performance, adaptation, and reinvention. I love the originality of his images, his comparisons, and his poetry. I think my students should be exposed to him to open their minds and make them consider some of those immortal issues he uses as themes. All that being said, Shakespeare, while inspired, is not divine, and many of my kids really, really hate him.

When there's a language barrier of the magnitude I'm talking about, no comprehension happens. Granted, there needs to be more effort on the part of many of my students. That would help. However, many are trying very hard and are running up against language so complex and incomprehensible that it might as well be Latin or Provencal. It's not just Shakespeare. Other, later works have defeated my kids. Poe was problematic. His syllable heavy prose needed translation for them. I can't imagine trying to get through Hawthorne, yet I know they'll have to meet him next year in eleventh grade. It's not a fault of the work. I refuse to call it a "fault" in my kids. They simply aren't ready for this stuff.

This brings me to the core of my dilemma, and the dilemma all the English teachers I've spoken with lately have also expressed. Do we try to find readings that are on their level, or do we press on, knowing that much of what we do will have to be simplified and stripped down to be comprehensible? When my kids came to me, many of them were reading 3 or more grade levels behind. (Shocked gasp--for shame--bad teachers--poor educational system) Regardless of the whys, which I ABSOLUTELY am not getting into tonight, I have to try to figure out what to do with them where they are. I'm taking the strip it down and do the best we can approach because I believe they can do it with help, but I can't say it's not a hard path.

Is it right to try to give them this stuff when it's so far above some of them? Am I trying to feed a bottle baby solid foods? They're not babies, and they are so conscious of being behind. I want them to keep reaching up and to see that although it might be hard, it's by no means out of their reach. I just have to keep reminding myself that their struggles are going to build proficiency. It's very hard.

Mostly, I want them to have a good experience with the work. One bad experience with literature is enough to turn these fragile new readers away from it for good. I want them to come away with a sense of control and (God help me for using edu-lingo) empowerment. They should never have to be afraid of the printed page. It should always be a source of pleasure and growth. So, we are carefully walking through the streets of ancient Rome hand-in-hand. I am doing the very best I can. I only hope it's going to be enough.

The Flu and The Birthday

"Eat right, exercise regularly, die anyway." -- Unknown

Two different kinds of flu have been going around school, and have managed to wipe out about half our students. I caught one strand of it myself last Wednesday, and it knocked me down for four days. I'm only just now beginning to get back on my feet again.

I haven't been sick like this since I had some kind of whacked out Asian flu in Japan. I came home from school when classes let out on Wednesday, and I'm kind of amazed and frightened to say that I have no recollection of the drive home except that I remember yelling along the way because the fever was making my legs ache so badly. Hmmm....hand of God, anyone? The next two days passed in the same sort of hazy, medicated and unconscious manner. I got a lot of good sleep, and my cats were thrilled beyond belief to have an overheated and totally supine presence in the bed twenty-four-seven.

I managed to come around for my birthday on Sunday. It wasn't bad. This is the first one in quite a long time that hasn't been total crap. I'm hoping this is the start of a new trend...sickness ends...birthday doesn't suck.... good things ahead.

Some of my friends in a class I teach brought me a huge birthday cake on Sunday. It was so sweet and unexpected. I was able to share it with several other people at the church, and it was really nice.

The weather today was so great and springy. I was able to open the windows of my room to let some of the contagion out. As I was driving home, I realized how comfortable I was with the world in general. Even though I am still rundown from the flu, for the first time in a long time, I felt good about being who I am and doing what I'm doing where I'm doing it. I don't know if my birthday gift from God was the wisdom to be at peace in my own skin AT LAST, or if this is just a sickness-induced lull, but I'm looking forward to the year ahead.

Dreams

"I am accustomed to sleep and in my dreams to imagine the same things that lunatics imagine when awake." -- Descartes

I have always had vivid dreams, and most of the time, they stay with me long past waking. I don't know why this is. I have one friend who almost never remembers any of her dreams. Maybe it has something to do with how deeply one sleeps. She always slept like a rock, and nothing, not even people pounding on the outside walls of our apartment (another story, dear reader, another story) would wake her. I, on the other hand, sleep fairly lightly, especially if I'm in a place I don't know well. Maybe that's why the dreams stay with me.

My dreams have always been odd. That's no doubt due to my reading tastes and my overactive imagination. I've never minded it, and frequently wished that I could just get the images on paper and into publication. I remember a friend of mine telling me he could make a fortune if he could just hook me up to a machine that would turn that stuff into print.

Lately, my dreams have been dark and wild in a way they haven't been in years. The last two nights have been especially strange. Maybe it's because I'm flirting with a sinus infection and my routine's been off. I wonder if it's not something to do with the phase of the moon or some other ambient factor, though, because one of my students told me about a weird dream he'd had, and there just seems to be "something" in the air.

Last night's dream took place, as dreams will, in several places, jumping around. The dominant image I remember was a platform-type tree house with fabric walls that was where I was staying for the summer. There was a storm coming in, but several people who I knew in the dream, but have no idea whom they might be in the real world, were in the tent, too. It was like some kind of summer camp/retreat. I remember the lushness of the color. Everything was too rich, like fruit just before it becomes overripe. The light flickered through the trees and traced patterns on the white fabric of the tree tent's walls. I remember everything. The beds were metal cots with squeaky springs. The linens were old, soft, and white. I had an old quilt on the bed like the one my great-grandmother made. There was a windchime we'd hung from a treebranch. That was one of the primary sounds in the dream. It played three notes over and over.

There were other platforms up in the trees. There were several together, and one of them had a Japanese-style tub. That part I can trace to the source. Hardly a shower goes past that I don't miss my deep tub from Japan. The other parts are a mystery.

My platform tent was on the outskirts of the camp. The others kept trying to get me to move in closer, but I liked the tent I had. They were worried that something was coming with the storm. The thing I remember most was knowing they were right, knowing I should have been scared, too, and knowing that I wanted to meet what was coming more than anything else I could think of.

When the storm came, the white fabric of the tent was magically waterproof. (How convenient.) I sat on the old quilt and waited for the something to arrive. The sound of the windchimes multiplied and another sound like 100s of bamboo windchimes joined them. The sounds were soft at first, and I remember hearing some of the others calling me to run because "he" was coming.

Suddenly, I saw him walking through the rain and trees. He was walking slowly and touching the leaves. The wet didn't seem to touch him. When I saw him, I knew him. I knew he was coming to see me, even though he was wondering around seemingly without purpose. I knew his face. He was beautiful. I knew his walk, graceful, silent, ground-eating without effort. More than anything, I wanted to talk to him. I had to hear his voice.

That, of course, was not to be. The strident pulse of my alarm clock went off before I he got further than the base of the tree in which my platform stood. I guess I'll never know what he sounds like. Maybe one day I'll write a voice for him and finish his story.

Random musings from a day out of school

"Day, n. A period of twenty-four hours, mostly misspent." -- Ambrose Bierce

I went to get my CPR certification renewed today. I had to take a full day off work to go do it, and I spent the better part of the day cooped up in a too-cold room around gray-speckled plastic folding tables watching students from the local community college nursing program rudely sleep through the presentation. If I'm ever really sick, I hope that none of them is ever in charge of keeping me alive. Everything I did could have been done in about 30 minutes, but par for the course, it went on for 4 hours instead.

I bought myself a new microwave today. On the global scale of indulgences, I'm sure it doesn't rate very high, but I love it. It's brushed stainless steel, and it looks so nice. My old microwave had gotten very scary. Paint was coming off the inside, and no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn't get it clean anymore. I microwaved a potato in it tonight for its inaugural run. It cooked the whole potato. That combined with the lack of the bright orange glow coming out of the back.... just kidding. It's great. Now, though, I want the refridgerator that matches.

I have gotten very deeply into my kitchen. For the first time in a long time, I feel like cooking and taking care of the house. I have been looking around on eBay for brightly colored 50's tablecloths, and I recently bought the cutest dropleaf table that I'm trying to refinish. I wish I knew more about tools and such so I could make some big changes, but that's not an option right now.

The house we were in for the CPR training was fabulous. It's a turn-of-the-century two story in an area with a lot of historic, but slightly run-down, houses that are being reclaimed by dentists and other businesses. The Red Cross just got this one and is still in the process of finishing things. The ceilings were about 20 ft, and coffered. The window hardware, the light switches, and even the fireplace lamps were all original. I know I was drooling. What would it be like to live in one of those wonderful old palaces? Even the downstairs, off the kitchen bathroom was amazing. It had a pedestal sink with some of the neatest hardware I've ever seen, modern or vintage. I wish I could have stuck it the whole thing in my purse and walked out. Since the sink stood about 3 1/2 feet tall, I don't think that would have worked. Someday, I hope I can find fixtures like that for my own house.

Now, even though I have huge, vast amounts of school work waiting, I'm going to take a shower and read for awhile. Of course, tomorrow I'll have to play catch-up, but I think it's worth it on a rainy night like tonight.