Zen Sundays

Day of the Dead

2011-11-01T11:46:00.004-05:00

(an excerpt from today's crawl)

My students and I are holding class in a cemetery today, honoring the dead in the best English major way possible - doing a writing crawl. Or, rather, most of us are doing a writing crawl. Some of them are chatting in a circle about special education. But the vast majority of people, I would guess, are wandering through the rows of graves and writing.

I didn't know how many old graves there would be here. Some of them are seriously around 150 years old. And it's interesting to look at the etchings of the names on the graves; for the youngest children, the graves track how many years and/or days they were alive. And some of the graves have flags brushing against them like lovers, gentle fluttering in the wind. Soldiers. Children. Couples. Families. They all rest here, in the cold, under the trees, with only each other and the sound of cars in the distance for company. It seems like it would be a lonely life, if only they still breathed.

The trees echo in their loneliness as they shed their skins for winter, preparing to brace for the long months ahead. Some of their hands reach down, toward the graves, as if to say, "I am here with you, brother, sister, child. I am in this with you." Extensions of God, of immortality, in a brashly mortal world.

Number 12

2011-10-31T16:32:00.004-05:00

Today, I start #12 on my life list.

Well. Okay. Officially, the program that I'm enrolling in starts on November 14th. But I'm making the transition - for the most part - over the next few days so that November 14th doesn't totally kick my ass.

And since the program that I'm doing (through Mayo - no worries!) is fairly strict re: getting my veggies/fruits in and eating only healthy (boxed) meals, this is what my groceries consisted of today.

Finding Atticus: my life list

2011-10-16T15:49:00.004-05:00

I'm making a life list. Mostly because life doesn't end after the PhD. Here we go...

1. buy a house - done, July 2008
2. pay off my debt
3. ride in a hot air balloon
4. write a book
5. swim with dolphins
6. update my passport
7. visit all 50 states
8. see the aurora borealis
9. donate blood
10. run a half-marathon
11. go whale-watching
12. lose weight. a lot of it.
13. find my Atticus Finch (AKA fall in love with a modern-day Atticus)
14. visit a rainforest
15. drive across the USA
16. scuba dive
17. have $100,000 in savings/investments
18. build a house with Habitat for Humanity
19. visit Machu Piccu
20. go on a spiritual/meditation/yoga retreat
21. ride a motorcycle
22. white water raft in Alaska and Colorado - in progress (Alaska, 1991)
23. be an extra in a movie
24. host a photography exhibit from my travels
25. live in a commune
26. learn to play 5 instruments (guitar, piano, other?)
27. write a song
28. visit a cemetery in Savannah
29. sleep in a castle in Scotland
30. create a nonprofit
31. listen to Jazz in a Mississippi juke joint
32. see a temple in Tibet
33. ride a streetcar in San Francisco - done, 2008
34. see Shakespeare in the Globe
35. see the Mona Lisa in the Louvre
36. be an extra in a movie
37. volunteer overseas
38. learn to knit
39. wear a sexy red dress to a black-tie event
40. make snow angels
41. lie under the stars with someone I love
42. kiss in the pouring rain
43. teach a child to read
44. learn cross-country skiing
46. learn how to change the oil in my car
47. make my own bread for a month
48. go for a sleigh ride
49. make my own preserves
50. learn all about investing money
51. live overseas for a year
52. write/publish 20 articles
53. be a vegetarian for one month
54. go on a roadtrip with my best friend
55. ride a horse on a beach
56. adopt a child/children
57. surf in Hawaii
58. go to New Orleans for Mardi Gras
59. go to Rio for Carnivale
60. hike the Appalachian Trail
61. be in the Polar Bear Club - done, 2005
62. earn my PhD - done, 2011
63. give a TED talk
64. play chess in Central Park
65. write a book about something that means a lot to me
66. go to Burning Man in the Black Rock Desert of Nevada
67. become a cheese connoisseur
68. make a quilt
69. volunteer at a homeless shelter
70. write NaNoWriMo
71. write a textbook
72. audition for a rock band
73. become a college professor - done, 2011
74. create a significant passive income
75. watch turtles hatch and run for the ocean
76. milk a cow
77. adopt a pet from an animal shelter - done, 2011
78. live in a house by a lake - done, 2011
79. go to an Ole Miss football game
80. go skinny dipping in a large body of water at midnight
81. take a shower under a waterfall
82. hike the Grand Canyon
83. design a child's library
84. sing my favorite song in front of an audience
85. plant a tree
86. go on a blind date
87. go backpacking in Europe
88. watch cherry blossoms and eat sushi in Japan
89. fly in a helicopter
90. plant a tree
91. fast one day/month for a year & donate the money saved to charity
92. learn the major constellations
93. cook with herbs from my own garden
94. attend a movie premiere
95. be a Big Sis w/ Big Brothers, Big Sisters
96. go camping - and enjoy it
97. be a foster mama - done, 2010-2011
98. swim in three oceans
99. train my dog to be a volunteer for retirement homes/hospitals (and then do that)
100. teach a child to sing

More to come...

this is my story, this is my song...

2011-09-18T11:47:00.003-05:00

Being the Change

2011-09-18T10:31:00.005-05:00

So, one of the goals in life coaching is to set up time to think about what changes you can enact in your life to get it more in balance. Richardson calls this time your "sacred date night," and I think it ties in pretty well with where I originally started this blog, which was the idea that my Sundays were MY days to recenter myself and get ready for the week ahead. Sometimes this means going to church and reconnecting with my faith and that community, and sometimes this means - like today - staying home and writing and thinking.

Zen Sundays are back in effect, as of today.

Taking care of myself on these recentering days will look something like this:

1. sleeping in
2. lazing around for a bit, enjoying the morning
3. maybe going to church
4. maybe going for a walk
5. definitely writing and thinking
6. doing some reading
7. physically pampering myself in some way
8. eating what my body wants (not my impulse foods)

life coaching

2011-09-18T10:23:00.003-05:00

My life is a little out of balance right now.

It's been this way for a while - at least the past five years of working on my doctorate. And now, after completing the doctorate (note the change in the adjectives above) and scoring my dream job at my dream university in my dream town, it's to rebalance things a bit.

In lieu of spending hundreds of dollars talking with a life coach when I think this is something I can figure out myself, I’m going to be using Cheryl Richardson’s Take Time for Your Life to work though finding balance again.

The easiest way for me to write and tag and have access to this in multiple locations is via the blog. While this is mostly my journey, feel free to comment and/or join in at will.

playing tag

2011-05-18T08:28:00.003-05:00

Yesterday was beautiful.

My mom and I went over to S-Baby's parents' house to drop off a couple of boxes and play for a little bit.

We got out of the car, and S-Baby and his mom were in the front yard. He saw me and ran across the yard and threw himself into my arms, snuggled into me.

We went inside with his family and my mom, and he was so excited to look at the boxes and see what I'd brought over. He was so excited to show his family how to turn the fish light off and on, and he wanted to walk it all around the living room (which, of course, unplugged it). We watched Willow Smith's video for "Whip My Hair" and kind of bounced around, all dancey-like. Then, S-Baby grabbed my hand and took me into the back yard so that I could see his toys; he pushed around one of his push-toys and we played tag. When we went back inside, we heard about how the last 10 days have been for him, what he and his brother like doing, how he's adjusting: it seems to be going well.

And then it was time to go. He wanted to come with us, but he was pretty good about going back to his mom when she asked him to.

It was a good visit. Good to see S-Baby bonding with his family. Good to see them bonding with him. Good to be a part of it.

The best part? They asked if I wanted to have him overnight this weekend. Sweet!

tomorrow...

2011-05-16T23:07:00.003-05:00

Tomorrow afternoon, Mom and I get to drop by S-Baby's new house and play with him for a while. Please, God, help me be strong enough to walk away when it's time to go.

This is going to get better, right?

walking with grace

2011-05-16T19:22:00.003-05:00

I took Grace for a walk tonight, just for kicks. All we did was walk around the block, but she got some of her crazy out, and I intentionally exercised. A year from now, I'm going to look back on this moment and remember that I did 10 minutes of exercise and felt good, and I'm going to be reminded that this was just the beginning of my path back to health.

plant therapy

2011-05-11T09:25:00.000-05:00

Life is good today.

I spent a solid portion of last night, post-family-dinner, planting a bunch of herbs that had been wilting in my jeep for the past three days. Just getting my hands dirty helped me to let go of some of the pain that I've been carrying around for the past month. I'm not really sure why that is, exactly, but container gardening seems to do that for me. And I'd actually scheduled some garden therapy on the calendar for last weekend, but I just couldn't make myself do it before last night.

Now if I could only get the strawberries to grow...

Contact

2011-05-10T22:33:00.003-05:00

I talked to S-Baby tonight on the phone while I was walking through WalMart; I had just texted his mom to see how he was doing, and she called me back to see if I wanted to talk to him.

So I talked nonsense at him for a few minutes while he listened. No words, just listened.

And then his mom and I chatted for a minute so that she could catch me up on what they'd been doing today: playing, eating applesauce and cake, having a cookout...

When we hung up, I cried in the middle of the aisle.

I miss him.

For the most part, I can distract myself with the packing. And the cleaning. And the dissertating. And the grading. Life is busy, which is GOOD for me right now. Sometimes I'm even happy and laughing.

But those quiet moments? Those suck.

reunification, part two

2011-05-06T15:56:00.003-05:00

This morning, I took S-Baby (and the majority of his toys and clothes, etc.) to his bio-family's house for the official reunification.

He was excited about being surrounded by all of his stuff in the car. And then he was confused as to why it was going into his family's house. And then he made the connection that I was leaving him and his stuff, and he started sobbing and ran over to me so that I could hold him. And, of course, I was crying too. Both of us were still crying when I left a few minutes later.

Walking away was the hardest thing I've ever done.

On the plus side, his bio-parents decided that it's okay for us to maintain a relationship, and they encouraged me to call whenever I want to pick him up for a few hours or take him out for lunch or play.

It's the best-case scenario for fostering, right?

That's what my head says. My heart? Not on board yet.

reunification

2011-05-06T11:25:00.001-05:00

This is the first time in almost a year that my car doesn't have a car-seat in it.

packing it in

2011-05-03T22:28:00.003-05:00

Some very kind person said to me, in passing, the other day, "You're so calm for being in the middle of your dissertation." Very kind. Very sweet. But wrong.

I am the Queen of Compartmentalization.

And everything that's boxed in right now is kind of eeking out along the edges whenever people I care about ask me how I'm doing.

Or when I'm folding S-Baby's clothes and realize that it's the last time I'll be doing his laundry.

Or when I'm driving.

Or when I listen to the wave machine through baby monitor.

Or when I have a moment of silence.

This is one of the reasons that I'm showing the house this week. If every moment is filled, then maybe I can get through the week without a massive meltdown.

Bittersweet

2011-04-27T18:57:00.002-05:00

S-Baby is being returned to his bios on the same day that the full draft of my dissertation is due.

Filter-Free

2011-04-18T12:19:00.004-05:00

I've given up my verbal filter for Lent. As of today.

Yes, I know that Easter is next weekend.

Some people may be surprised to find out that I actually have a filter at all. Sometimes I use it and sometimes I don't. Most of the time, in order to preserve relationships, I won't be quite as direct as I would like to be. Because I see the hurt/anger/betrayal in your eyes when I criticize things that A) you hold as fundamental truths that shape who you are and B) we're never going to agree on. So, I let it go, even if I compromise on what I'd like to say in response.

Fair warning: I might not do this over the next two weeks.

My "nice" is the only thing keeping me from crying all over the place all the time over S-Baby being returned to his bios during what is probably the most stressful two weeks of my academic career so far, from screaming in frustration about how I read the genre of dissertations in my field versus how my committee does, from wanting to pull my hair out about the uncertainty of this summer's financials, and from jumping in the car to join my family in Arkansas while my grandfather gets a pace-maker to try to keep his heart, well, going.

So, my "nice" is busy.

I'm going to hold it together for the next 18 days. Pure steel at the core, baby.

But... holy crap...

Making My Moves

2011-04-15T14:08:00.001-05:00

Have I mentioned yet that the next three weeks are huge transition weeks for S-Baby and me?

S-Baby is transitioning back to his bio family right now. This week, for example, he is spending three nights over there. Overnights. Not, say, just dinners. For the most part, this is going pretty well. We are just cuddling a lot when he is home. And I miss him when he's gone.

Luckily, I, too, have some pretty significant transitions going on right now. Te full draft of my dissertation is due on May 6th, which means that my brain and body are on overload trying to get that done. And I am getting the house ready to put on the market so that I can move up to Wisconsin at the end of the summer without the mortgage hanging over my head.

So it's kind of a crazy time. I find myself cursing more than usual. I should maybe, instead, look into getting pedicures more than usual instead...

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

joyful girl, revised

2011-04-09T12:44:00.003-05:00

i do it for the joy it brings
because i am a joyful girl
- ani difranco

A few years ago, it was hard to find much joy in anything. I was in an absolutely miserable school with a manipulative, vindictive administrator. My friends in this environment were few and far between, mostly because there was such a nasty tone to the place - syrupy sweet on the surface and controlled cruelty only one layer beneath.

During this year, I also learned that the man I was in love with had been cheating. On me. With me. All of the above.

It took me a while to bounce back from the hurt and anger in both situations.

Last year, I made some decisions that pissed off some people. Good friends. And I opted out of those friendships. Or they did. Both of the above.

I don't regret this, by the way. I'm comfortable with my decisions, and "breaking up" was the right decision for everybody involved. I have zero animosity toward my former friends; our paths just weren't meant to run in parallel right now.

This year, I've started to remember what it is to be strong and joyful again.

I'm living mindfully.
I have a great job lined up for next year.
My friends and family are amazing.
The puppy is learning what it is to go to the bathroom outside. Slowly.
My friends have stepped forward to be back-up homes for S-Baby, should this reunification with his family fall through.
I've started to reconnect with my physical self again. This means healthier, more intentional living.
I'm listening to more music and living in the sunshine. Metaphorically and literally.
And, even though I have roughly five weeks to finish a full draft of the dissertation, I'm insisting on balance in my life.

This is all good.

And, now, when I reference ani's "joyful girl" quote, I'm not wishing for something that feels out of reach.

Because I AM a joyful girl.

missing the orange pill...

2011-04-02T08:04:00.000-05:00

Can I just say that telling somebody with allergies not to use allergy meds for a week SUCKS? This could be a fairly miserable week... but at least it ends with an appointment with a specialist!

Fosterhood

2011-03-28T15:57:00.003-05:00

This fostermama's story rips my heart out.

Her kiddo's "transition" home involved a quick decision last week, one almost-immediate weekend visit, and then a full return today.

I have no words.

Wanted Poster to Come

2011-03-26T23:31:00.004-05:00

S-Baby hid my Kindle somewhere in the house last Sunday. I have searched everywhere that I can think of for it - no luck.

S-Baby?

He is a really, really great hider of things that interfere with his cuddle time.

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes...

2011-03-25T11:45:00.003-05:00

Can we talk for a minute?

S-Baby is transitioning home over the next month - at the same time that I'm scheduled for campus visits and interviews to try to line up a teaching gig for next year.

All of these interviews are a positive thing. I like choices, and it seems like the applications that I have out there are giving me choices between different departments and even different levels of instruction (graduate, undergraduate, high school).

Assuming that the transition is smooth and that his bios stay clean, S-Baby should be fine. He loves them. They love him. He and his brother get along like nobody's business.

But as I'm looking at going out of town on an interview trip next week for three days - the three days before his first overnight - all I can think about is how much I want to hold onto him and not let him go. And how much we're going to miss each other.

The next couple of months might be a little rocky. Because, you know, my heart is breaking.

holy cow...

2011-03-17T22:13:00.001-05:00

My favorite principal is hiring an English teacher for next year.

I am giddy with the excitement of all of the possibilities.

For real.

THAT would be an amazing gig.

Spiraling into It

2011-03-16T03:29:00.004-05:00

I try not to whine about this in public too much, but it's been an interesting five months.

I've been sick. With bronchitis(x2). Strep. Pink eye(x2). And this cough that doesn't quit.

I've been to four doctors, counting doc-in-the-box visits. Nobody has been able to fix the underlying cause of whatever this is.

This past week, however, has been kind of the icing on the cake.

In addition to the coughing, over the past five days, I had a pretty nasty case of the flu (and everything gross you could think of associated with it), sliced my foot on a nail (and had to get a tetanus booster), and jacked up a muscle in my back with all of my coughing (so now the coughing radiates pain throughout my back) WHILE I WAS DRIVING.

This will probably be funny in, oh, 10 years. Right now? Not so much.

Day #1: 15 Facts about Me

2011-03-11T15:16:00.000-06:00

1. When everything is in balance for me, I am - truly - a joyful girl.

2. Very little has been in balance this winter.

3. I'm a foster mom for a million reasons, mostly because the phrase "act locally" isn't just a catchphrase for me.

4. The best reason for me to stay a foster mama, however, sleeps across the hall from me.

5. I decided to push off my dissertation defense by a semester or two. Mostly because of my health and my incessantly whiny wish to get better. Since I made that decision, I've been more relaxed than I've been all year, and my body has actually started feeling stronger.

6. Having said that, I have no income-related plan beyond the fall semester of next year. This freaks me out.

7. My foster son is being returned to his bio-parents. This also freaks me out. And makes me happy. And sad. All at the same time.

8. I wonder what it would be like to learn a la The Matrix - just being plugged into something and having the information downloaded. It makes me curious about the place of the PhD in The Matrix.

9. The objects currently on my nightstand include (but are not limited to): The Element, Street Smarts and Critical Theory, SoulPancake, a tube of Burts Bees pomegranate lip gloss, Oprah magazine, and a baby monitor.

10. I like spring cleaning, but I kind of want to hire somebody to help me out with it.

11. I believe very firmly in asking the right people to do the right things with the right tools. I am not going to waste my time, energy, or money on mismatched situations. Me, installing the flat-screen tv on the wall with my little toolkit? Total mismatch.

12. I miss hanging out with my friends. So I'm reinstituting tv night/family dinners.

13. I miss exercising. (weird, right?) So I'm taking the dog for a walk today.

14. I'm practicing mindfulness. Sometimes it actually works.

15. I'm working on de-cluttering my life right now. So far? Bookshelves, extra books, and a tv are on the list of things to go. But be watching for other changes. This is good.

flu'd up

2011-03-11T13:38:00.003-06:00

I'm home sick today. I've been gross for about five months now, but today's twist is the flu. Ick.

And so, of course, I'm thinking about what I can get accomplished today before I pick up S-Baby at the bios' house.

- I washed the dishes. They'd been percolating for the past five days.
- I ordered the new iPad2, engraved with one of my favorite Ani DiFranco quotes: "i do it for the joy it brings/ because i am a joyful girl." I'm counting this in my chores list... but it's kind of like counting "getting a shower" or "making breakfast" - something that I really wanted to do, in addition to bettering my world.

And now I'm thinking about doing a top-down clean. Opening the windows and clearing out the air with a fresh spring breeze.

Think: laudry, washing the floor where the puppy has made messes, picking up said messes, taking the old bookshelves to the garage, moving one of the new tvs downstairs...

In the meantime, I'm watching Weeds, Season 6. Two more episodes to go, and then I'm going to be productive. I promise.

how to write your dissertation

2011-02-25T13:44:00.003-06:00

I've been invited to speak to our graduate students about how to write a dissertation.

This makes me laugh on many levels, but mostly it makes me laugh because I have NO idea how to answer that question.

How do I write my dissertation?

1. Set aside specific time each day (or every other day) to write. Commit to it. Do not interrupt said time unless there is blood involved.

2. Have an information organizational system that works for you. Mine? Books by topic on shelves near my desk; even though I only work with a handful of books at a time - usually in a coffeeshop across town - it helps to group them visually.

3. Have a writing organizational system that works for you. I stole this tip from a friend of mine, who color-codes her chapters. Each chapter, then, has everything in one color. I'm working on chapter four right now, so my chapter outlines are in neon green, as are my post-it notes, page-markers, highlights, and my document folder/active chapter draft on my laptop's desktop.

4. Map out your due dates - even if your advisor hasn't asked for them. Even if they're just for yourself.

5. Write where you need to write. One of my friends has to be in her home-office to write. I CANNOT be in my home-office.

That's all I know right now. More to come once I figure the rest of it out...

Dissertating

2011-02-11T14:15:00.003-06:00

So, I've been writing my dissertation for the past six months. It is sucking my brain dry, and it's taken my thought-filter away. So, let me apologize in advance if I offend you in some way over the next six weeks as I hit crunch time and draft out the rest of this bad-boy. I will - hopefully - be my charming self again by the end of the semester.

writing (down) the bones

2010-09-20T15:10:00.002-05:00

It turned out to be a fairly busy summer - hence the lack of posts for the past couple of months. So, a quick summary of the "bones" of my summer:

- Taught advanced composition to a pretty fun group of college students
- Taught College for Kids at our local community college - 7th through 10th graders (totally different vibe from the college students!)
- Thought about my dissertation chapters. A lot. Did not actually write much of anything.
- Played in Michigan for Independence Day
- Hung out with the J-Girls in Tennessee for my cousin's wedding
- Began a new position as the Writing Center Director at one of my favorite universities
- Started drafting chapter three for the diss

Okay, so it doesn't sound like a lot. But between this stuff and being all mamalicious, my summer was crazy busy. So crazy busy, in fact, that getting back to school this semester was almost like getting a fresh start on a less nutty lifestyle.

(rambly) temper tantrum

2010-07-01T22:04:00.009-05:00

I just told all of the animals to "go to hell" after one of them set off the smoke detector by pushing the bathroom door open after my shower. Stormed upstairs. Burst into tears. Ridiculous.

To be fair, I forgot to take my allergy meds this morning (and maybe yesterday? who can remember?), so I feel like crap - headache, bodyache, earache, scratchy eyes, sore throat from coughing... it's not pretty. Which means that I don't feel pretty. And my brain is functioning at about half-capacity, so now I feel stupid AND ugly.

In addition, the animals have been especially high-maintenance lately. Except for Marley, who is perfect.

Yesterday morning, my roommate called me to let me know that B-Dog was sick. Oh, boy, was he sick. I came home from dropping off S-Baby to check on B-Dog, who had puked all over the basement. And he must have emptied his entire stomach because there was a ton of it that NONE of the animals wanted to recycle. Of course, the night before, he had stolen six bagels and one wet diaper, so that may have contributed to the mess in the basement. However, cleaning up his mess? Also not an "I feel pretty" moment.

Coincidentally? None of the animals have ever cleaned up MY puke.

Not... that... I WANT to see their methods of cleaning it up in action. And, really, not that I puke. I can count the number of times that I've thrown up in the past decade on one hand.

The other thing that I'm going to blame this toddleresque temper tantrum on? Bella Swan.

I went to see Eclipse this afternoon. I know, I know... But it had been a while since I'd seen a movie, a friend wanted to go see it, and I knew that I would eventually watch it anyway (because it's kind of like a train wreck - everybody has to turn their heads to look, just to see if it's really as bad as it sounds).

And Bella. Oh, Bella.

What a waste.

Aside from clearly choosing the wrong person at the end of the movie - hello, did you not listen to your friend's graduation speech? the one where she says that this is the time to explore who YOU are as a person? - Bella just doesn't do it for me. She's no Hermione Granger. Or Ginny Weasley. Even the airhead who gave the aforementioned graduation speech would have been a more interesting character to place in the center of this film.

I can't really do justice to this argument (see above paragraph re: my brainwaves being sucked out by allergies), but here's a link to a great article that breaks down some of the ideological issues in Eclipse; check it out if you have a few minutes and get back to me with your thoughts.

In the meantime? I'm going to do what I probably should have done when I started acting like a sleepy toddler.

I'm going to bed.

piano man

2010-06-23T19:13:00.005-05:00

First, the mundane and, then, the fantastical.

The Mundane:

My basement is in the middle of a revamp (of sorts) in order to include a better family area for S-Baby and me and to house a kid-free space for B-Dog. The issue, of course, is that B-Dog shouldn't really be chilling out in the family area, and S-Baby and I have to go through DogWorld to get to FamilyZone. So, the logistics of this are a little bit complicated. But I think that I finally have it mostly figured out.

DogWorld is now the front part of the basement - the laundry room (which is pretty big) and the storage/boiler room. Altogether, it's probably the size of my bedroom... or maybe a little bigger... and it leads up the stairs to the backyard. I'll be moving his water dish and food bowl downstairs in the next day or so, and his crate is already set up - soon to have some padding in it. The goal here is to give him a space where he can be on his own, away from S-Baby (ie, safe from waddler hands that like to squeeze various doggie flesh). He'll be sleeping down here eventually, and I'm trying to make it relatively comfortable. DogWorld isn't, after all, a punishment.

FamilyZone (ie, the family room in the basement) is also being remodeled for life with a real child - as opposed to life with an anticipated small person. We now have a PackNPlay set up so that if S-Baby gets tired, he can go to sleep in the basement so that I don't have to go up two flights of stairs with a sleeping 22-pound weight in my arms. And since it's one of the only areas in the house with carpeting, we're taking advantage of that and putting the toys that encourage bold daredevil moves (I'm thinking of you, Mr. Push Walker) downstairs. I've also moved a couple of things to S-Baby level, including the keyboard, which he LOVES to play. And then, of course, I have the big TV (for the grown-ups) and my office space (which I, optimistically, hope to use more as FamilyZone becomes more kid-friendly).

The Fantastical (or at least, a little less mundane):

S-Baby's big accomplishment today came as we were playing in FamilyZone. He had kind of played around with the new push walker and was stalking one of the cats next to the keyboard when he realized that the keyboard was on. So, of course, techno-genius that he is, he hit the button to autoplay one of the songs stored in the keyboard's memory. I'm not sure exactly how he always finds the songs with the strong rhythm, but he does - and he loves them. So, he was on all fours, listening to this song, hitting the keyboard to play along, and bouncing up and down when he all of a sudden did a move that I've never seen him do.

He stood up without any help and without leaning on anything.

Once he was up, he stood there - kind of in shock - for about three seconds, made eye contact with me, laughed, and sat back down.

He did this again maybe four times in the next 45 minutes or so, each time checking to make sure that I'd seen him. And then proudly grinning at me and sitting down again.

Hysterical. Cheers all around for the growing boy.

Sweet Serenade

2010-06-22T23:01:00.005-05:00

Every night before he goes to bed, S-Baby and I have a routine. Usually, this routine involves a bath, a bottle, some rocking and reading boardbooks (Mem Fox's It's Time for Bed is a lovely addition to the night), some time spent listening to classical music... and then bed. It's a good routine, and S-Baby is generally ready and willing to hit the sack by 8 or so without any help on my part.

Recently, the CD player in S-Baby's room started acting up, so last night I just sang to him. The Beatles. "You Are My Sunshine." A little bit of Jimi. Pretty much anything that I could think of that had a relatively mellow vibe to it. After probably 10 mini-songs, I paused for a few seconds to cull the recesses of my brain for any other baby-friendly songs I could think of.

As I was culling, I heard a soft sound from my arms. In the silence of the moment, S-Baby had decided to sing back to me. Just a soft, multi-noted coo. But with intention ... and fairly good rhythm and tone.

That's my boy.

bookgirl's world views

2010-06-21T23:08:00.004-05:00

One of my friends posted a blog earlier today listing out some of the books that have shaped his world views over the years. Among his top reads were Life of Pi, Tuesdays with Morrie, Fahrenheit 451, The Assault on Reason, and The Audacity of Hope. In a truly English-teachery kind of way, I will admit to loving two of these, hating one of them, and never having read the other two (at least not all the way through). However I feel about the books themselves, I loved the idea of putting the books that helped to shape my worldview out there into the abyss to see if anything bounced back at me.

My top reads:

To Kill a Mockingbird - not only for the ideologies (racism/prejudice is bad), but also for the characterization of Scout and her daddy. I like that Harper Lee didn't hide from the ugliness of discrimination but put it out there and still insisted (via Atticus) that we should stand up against it.

Canterbury Tales - freaking hilarious. In a medieval, rhymey kind of way. Miller's Tale? Classic fart joke. And the Wife of Bath is quite possibly one of the first feminist characters I encountered in my high-school literature classes.

The Bible - Early on, I was especially enthralled by the story of Ruth. And then I loved the Psalms. And then, of course, Lazarus and other miracle-based stories. I've never been one to memorize the order of books or specific verses (that's just not in my personality), but it's one of those books that I've worshipped and argued my way through for years. Often at the same time.

A Walk in the Woods - Someday, I will hike (at least part of) the Appalachian Trail. I read Bryson's book after having gone on a youth trip through Appalachia, and it always seemed to me that if Bryson could walk as much of the Trail as he did, then I should be able to do at least a daytrip.

Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith - Anne Lamott really reshaped my perception of what it meant to be Christian at a time when it needed reshaping. There have definitely been moments when I've thought about walking away from the Church - and, Lord knows, I haven't been particularly consistent about attending as of late either - but Lamott's nonfiction works about being an unconventional Christian in a conventional world grew my faith in indescribable ways. I also really like Lamott's Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son's First Year. Oh, and Miller's Blue Like Jazz falls into this category too.

A Wrinkle in Time - Hands down, my favorite children's book. Hands down. Way better than Harry Potter or Percy Jackson (although I do enjoy both of those too). I wanted to BE Meg when I was young, and now that I'm older, I still adore Meg and wouldn't mind being her mom. This book was first published in 1962, and it still resonates with me today. Hello, a dog named FORTINBRAS? Witches? Tesseracts? An evil brain-alien? And they're all in a Christian allegory? Genius.

Monster at the End of the Book - Easily my second favorite children's book. Silly Grover and his horror that we were turning the pages despite his attempts to keep them closed so as to not find the monster at the end of the book, only to discover that HE was the monster and that there was nothing to be afraid of? Great message: be brave, be bold, and (unexpectedly) good things will (usually) happen.

I'm not going to argue that there's a direct, causal link between what we read and who we become; if that were the case, I would be involved in some weird Stephen King/Jennifer Crusie/Charlaine Harris mess right about now (funny/sexy/smart main character trapped on a crashing plane with vampires?). But I do think that the books we read - and are read - are important.

So now I'm curious - what's on your life list of books that have shaped - or are shaping - your world views?

sa(i)ling through summer

2010-06-18T22:13:00.004-05:00

One of my favorite things about the summer has to be the masses of garage sales. This morning, I made out like a bandit - well, S-Baby made out like a bandit.

Our list of loot:

8 pieces of (nice) clothing, 12-18 mo ($4)
baby bag ($1)
wooden toy ($1)
bag of balls ($.75)

$6.75 = four outfits, a new bag to haul his stuff, and at least an hour of entertainment this afternoon. All in all, not a bad deal.

Still on the list (ie, let me know if you see these things at local garage sales):

fun lamp for S-Baby's room
smallish bookshelf or table to put next to the rocker
board books and picture books
anything re: Eric Carle (books, decorations, etc.)
kiddo easel for S-Baby so he can paint with Lily
18 mo clothing for fall

In other (random) news, I've been reading a lot lately. Here's what's on my bedside table right now:

Always Looking Up - Michael J. Fox
I've been on a MJF kick lately. I just finished A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Future (which was cute), and I'm really enjoying the depth and optimism of Always Looking Up. Lucky Man is probably next on my list. So inspiring!

First Broccoli, Then Ice Cream - Tim Riley
This is pretty much common sense... and yet, I suspect that it's not enacted by a good chunk of parents. Funnier than I expected. Glad somebody is coming out and saying to parents, Hello, it's your job to be the grown-up.

Sh*t My Dad Says - Justin Halpern
Freaking hysterical. I read it straight through in one night. Couldn't put it down. And laughed harder than I've laughed in a long time. Brilliant. Had an unbelievably strong urge to recommend it to my preacher uncle. Somehow managed to refrain from putting the link on his Facebook page. Barely.

One Month to Live - Kerry & Chris Shook
I've barely started this one - was too busy laughing at Sh*t My Dad Says. And I was waiting for the companion book to come in. It came today, so I'll get to it relatively soon.

What about you? Any good reads so far this summer? Anything that you want to tackle?

walking the pancakes: a day in the life

2010-06-10T09:09:00.004-05:00

Now that it's summer, everything seems to be coming together for a pretty smooth transition into this new life o' S-Baby. Since I have some out-of-town family members who read this blog, I thought I'd take a few minutes to give a run-down of today, which is a pretty typical day in the life...

S-Baby slept through the night (again) last night, and woke up around 7 for a bottle, some cereal, and playtime. Around 8, we grabbed some pancakes at the 50s diner, then had some extra time to walk around the shopping center and look at the fresh fruits & veggies at the farmer's market. Then, after dropping some books off at the library, we hopped on over to daycare, where S-Baby was super exited to start playing with the other kids.

Over the next four hours or so, I'll spend some time at Panera - either grading for class or writing material for the dissertation. Today, it'll probably break out at about three hours of grading and an hour of developing ideas for the diss.

Then I'll pick up S-Baby at daycare, and we'll go hang out with G-Ma Lily, first in her classroom and then at the house, all afternoon. We'll probably listen to some Toddler Tunes on the tv, and when S-Baby goes down for his afternoon nap, I'll use the time to get some more commenting done on my students' papers.

Since today is Thursday, we'll do family dinner tonight, so S-Baby will have a chance to hang out with his Uncle R and G-Pa Bob too. After family dinner, we'll head home, and S-Baby will get a bath, read some board books (his favorite is Max the Minnow), and rock for a while before going to sleep by 8.

Sidebar:
Life is really good right now. It's a nice balance of school and teaching and family - all of which are important to me. It's funny to me how differently people function. Somebody that I know told me the other day that she thought I was taking on too much, that I would start to drown in my responsibilities. But she's clearly forgotten that I work differently than that. It's when my life is centered on one thing that I start to drown; it takes balance in my life to keep me afloat. What that means is that sometimes my life seems chaotic to people who need that intense focus... but, for me, that "chaos" is necessary for me to thrive. This is healthy, and I love it.

More adventures to come...

behavior modification

2010-06-04T12:50:00.004-05:00

S-Baby and B-Dog growl at each other on a fairly regular basis.

This is not okay with me.

After a particularly nasty encounter a couple of days ago that made me imagine S-Baby on the ground and bleeding from a B-Dog bite, I made the decision to adopt out B-Dog to one of my friends. I cried for two solid days - at home, in the aisle at Lowe's, in the car... I packed up all of his stuff, made the arrangements, and had even gassed up the car to drive to Bl-N to drop off B-Dog.

But I couldn't do it.

I WILL, if it comes to that, but right now I'm following my instincts. I've started implementing some behavior modification structures for both dog and boy. And next Friday, I have an appointment with our vet's behavioral guru to see about helping with this transition. After talking it through with my agency person (who sees these kinds of transitions all of the time), I'm pretty comfortable with this.

Having said that, this is kind of a hail-mary. If it doesn't work out within the next four to six weeks, the next step will be adopting out B-Dog.

wild ride

2010-06-03T11:06:00.003-05:00

A lot has changed in the past few weeks.

The semester ended. I got my first foster placement.

Okay, that doesn't sound like much. But trust me when I tell you that it is a LOT.

My foster-kiddo (who shall, from this point on, be referred to as "S-Baby") is amazing. He's 10 months old and just this ball of energy and joy and laughter. Over the past couple of weeks, we've become kind of the dynamic duo; this has a lot to do with the fact that it takes several weeks for the paperwork to go through for daycare, so I've become a full-time mom over the past three weeks. Good timing on that whole "end of the semester" thing.

S-Baby loves the music. Convenient that he was placed into a very musical home. Our morning routine almost always includes putting on the "Crazy Frog" playlist and dancing around the kitchen and living room after breakfast. Nothing like a 22# weight-ball to help a girl get into shape. And S-Baby has really good rhythm. One of the first things that made its way into our house after I figured this out was the Leap Frog Learn & Groove Alphabet Drum. It's one of his favorite toys... although it does seem to be stuck in Spanish mode.

Next week, S-Baby will start part-time daycare for the summer so that I can get some writing done in the mornings. Since I'm writing three chapters of the dissertation this summer, there's not really much of a choice here. And, honestly, even if I weren't trying to get so much done this summer, I probably would still opt to put him into daycare - especially this one - just for the socialization aspect. He'll be in a room with five other infants and two teachers, and there's music playing at all times in the room, even during "quiet/nap time." A few other things that I like: a strong developmental curriculum, a good staff that made us feel welcome immediately, and - get this - a locked front door. Can I just say that I never, ever thought that a locked front door would be a priority? But I have my reasons for preferring a secure facility, and I'm fairly comfortable in that decision.

Enough for today. S-Baby and I have lunch plans, and we need to shake a leg. But more adventures to come...

I Am

2010-04-15T23:25:00.006-05:00

Almost a week ago, I turned 33. Despite a day-long, incredibly fun celebration with many people that I love, the birthday itself was a little traumatic. There were tears. Mostly because I had to get a new license, and I had already used up my once-in-a-lifetime "good DMV picture" (the same one that they made me hand over). I know that's shallow and a little silly, but it is what it is.

But it got me thinking. Clearly, my self-definition is changing - I'm kicking and screaming here and there, but it's changing, nonetheless. So, who am I? How do I define myself in this moment?

I am trying to live my life as joyfully as possible.
I am learning that sometimes this is difficult.
I am quick to anger in defense of the people I love or feel responsible for.
I am getting older.
I am a romantic at heart - but am becoming more cynical about love.
I am as close to a neo-hippie as I can be.
I am a teacher.
I am curious-natured.
I am faithful and spiritual.
I am learning who I am every day.

on aging well

2010-03-08T19:49:00.006-06:00

I had the most interesting day today.

Did you know that the oldest living American died today? She was 114 years old - almost 115 - and was planning for her next birthday party.

So, I was reading about this at Barnes & Noble (instead of studying for my comps - BAD girl), and I found myself wondering what it would have been like to have been her.

At 114 years old, she would have been born within just a few decades of the Civil War, would have been an adult during WWI, WWII, and Korea, and she would have already been elderly during Vietnam and Gulf I. That's five wars. Not counting our current "we're-not-gonna-call-it-a-war" and however many others we've engaged in. That's a lot to see in one lifetime.

She had been a widow for 43 years. I can't even imagine that.

But her family said that she was joyful and forward-thinking. Active until she became sick two weeks ago.

All of this was going around in my head, and I was thinking deep-thoughts and all that, and kind of multitasking and reading this book, Go Green, Save Green (which combines a couple of my favorite topics: environmentalism and spirituality), and this random older woman sat down in the comfy chair next to me.

After a couple of minutes, she struck up a conversation with me. This conversation lasted two hours.

There's a snarky part of me that thinks I have an invisible sign that says, "Become my friend! Tell me your life story!" because this happens ALL. the. time.

But mostly I think it's kind of cool. This stranger-no-more woman is 71 years old and has been helping to get local homeless people off the streets for years. At 71 years old, she's starting a faith-based non-profit organization to expand what she has been doing on her own for most of her life. I learned about her family, the ways that she finds the people that she helps, how she became inspired to start the non-profit, what her plans are for it... It turned into a really cool conversation.

And, at the end of the day, I feel inspired to do great things.

All things considered, that's worth a couple of hours of chatting with a stranger at the local bookstore.

one down

2010-03-04T16:36:00.004-06:00

I took my first comprehensive exam today. And I don't want to jinx it by talking about the exam itself, so let me instead tell you about the physicality of the space.

Okay. So imagine a largish closet. Put a bunch of dissertations on shelves on the wall on the right and a row of filing cabinets on the left. In the wayyyy back of the largish closet, insert a small desk with a computer (sans internet or any real niceties). Maybe toss in a printer for kicks. And some random boxes to add to the "you're in the closet" feel.

This is the dissertation/comps room.

Now, people are allowed to take in personal touches to make the closet more "homey."

So here's what I took with me today:
My iPod, loaded with three comp-specific playlists, none of which were used. (I listened to Enya the whole time.)
Pink the Squeezie-Pig Ball
Pictures of the family
A lavender-vanilla candle
Wooden matches to light said candle
Some mint-scented "chill out" aromatherapy
Blank post-its
An assortment of pens and highlighters
A bag of chocolate
Iced tea

Just in case you were wondering. I mean, I would be wondering. =)

Two more to go!

life: on pause

2010-03-01T19:00:00.003-06:00

I officially start taking my comprehensive exams in three days.

What that means is that for the next three weeks, I'm basically going to be operating on radio silence. No Facebook. No blogging (not a huge change). No super-fun excursions to Chicago to celebrate a friend's birthday. No spring-break parties. Just me, reading and studying and playing Wii to get through. And maybe swimming and drinking.

This is such a weird process. I mean, the whole doctoral process is a weird gig in general, but the little milestones along the way are a little trippy too. And comping? Comping is a wild mixture of pure terror and panic attacks and total elation and zen-like reflection. And even though I'm having some of my best teaching days, my emotions and focus are both all over the place.

So, as to limit the number of bridges burned with people that I actually respect and enjoy, I'm on a social hiatus for a few weeks.

I'll see you on the flip side.

academic irony

2010-02-02T01:37:00.004-06:00

How's this for irony?

I posted a Craigslist ad for academic editing (as in, I can do some) - thinking that I would get requests for dissertations and theses, which is what I've BEEN editing - to earn a little bit of extra cash to help cover the summer months.

Instead, I got a request to edit manuscripts (articles, books) for an English ed professor at another university. This person - who just graduated last year - is one of only a few other people in the state (and one of maybe a couple of dozen or so in the entire US) whose research directly overlaps with mine. My dissertation-to-be and her work-in-progress are in direct conversation with each other.

Cool, right?

Except... she doesn't know me or my ethics, and we're in a fairly competitive field in which ideas are property... which means that she could just as easily find a reason to go with somebody else (or more easily, really) as to go with me. And maybe should, so as to not muddy the waters.

The flip side is that she MIGHT see it as a perk to work with me because I'm so familiar with the field and the conversations around her/our topic(s). And because, you know, this could prove to be a collaborative effort worth exploring.

We'll see... interesting, though. =)

What a weird twist.

Powerpuff Me

2010-01-22T17:21:00.005-06:00

I love my life. Love it.

But every so often, somebody will do or say something that makes me pause and wonder about the human condition.

Today, it was one of my students.

For class today, my students read an article (blatantly stolen from my friend, M) about the ways that the Powerpuff Girls were/are both reshaping the way that young female superheroes are portrayed and also conforming to very conservative ideas of femininity. It was a great article. So, they read the article, we talked about it for a while, and then I introduced the "Rowdyruff Boys" episode so that we could watch it and talk about a) whether or not the students bought her argument after watching the episode and b) how the article might be changed if the author were deconstructing masculinity.

It was supposed to be a fun, but still academic, activity that we could use as a springboard for discussion.

So, right after I finish saying that we're watching this episode, one of my students gets AS in my face as he can while still sitting down and says, "We're watching that? The whole episode? Are you serious?" in this really snarky tone.

And I lost it.

"Well, we are. But you're welcome to leave."

I am nice. I will be your advocate forever if you are my student. I will fight for you.

But I am, in no way, a pushover.

Kind of like... well, you know.

Holiday(s) Rule(s)

2009-11-28T00:37:00.009-06:00

As a general rule, I'm a pretty go-with-the-flow kind of girl. But people are starting to annoy me as of late. And, like I told one of my friends tonight, this seems to be the time of the year that people just start letting ALL of their "stupid" hang out. So, as a community service of sorts, here are my general guidelines for keeping friendships intact through the holidays*. Feel free to add your two cents.

1. Don't treat people - ANY people, from your best friend to the clerk at Walgreens - like your personal punching bag, no matter how frustrated you are with them or with life in general. This is part of being a decent human being, but it gets harder around the holidays. And, as such, people who follow this rule are much more appreciated during said time.

2. Tell people NO. There's so much pressure in December to be a joiner. I'm an extrovert, and it gets to be too much for me. If you need alone-time to recharge, then take it. I promise that we won't think less of you. In fact, we'll probably think MORE of you because you've set up some boundaries.

3. Don't be passive-aggressive. If you have an issue with somebody, either address it or move on. Grudges and holidays are a bad combination.

4. Realize that everybody around you is bringing their own experiences to the conversational table. Just because they don't think like you do doesn't mean that they're worth less (or that their ideas are worth less**) than you. See #1.

5. Play with animals and small children. Borrow them if needed.

6. Share your toys. Especially the ones that you love.

7. Sing along to the music in stores and on the radio. Be as obnoxious or as serious as you want.

8. Find joy. Wherever you can find it. Usually, this seems to go along with #5, #6, and #7.

* I'm not trying to lecture or - God forbid - change the world here. I need these rules just as much as, if not more than, everybody else.
** There are certain exceptions to this rule. If their thoughts involve blatant sexism, racism, etc. then their ideas ARE worth less than yours. Feel free to take a stand.

New Moon & Arrested Development

2009-11-21T12:46:00.008-06:00

So, I went to see New Moon with a couple of friends yesterday afternoon. Some context: I'm not a huge fan of the Twilight series, but I think that they're okay popcorn flicks. I love the vampire/werewolf dynamic, and watching it play out on screen is interesting - and Baby Jacob is, quite frankly, a hot little piece of jailbait (although I have to admit that I'm not part of the intended audience - I'm more of an Underworld kind of girl). Having said that, can we put aside the "Team Jacob" t-shirts and chat about this movie for a few minutes?*

Here are my issues:

1. Bella. I mean, BELLA. Seriously. She's almost always at the core of my issues with this franchise. She's so wrapped up in her undying, eternal love for Edward that she loses herself. Who IS she without him? Apparently, not much, as she spends some pretty significant time in the movie bemoaning the loss of her true love. And by "bemoaning," of course, I mean "screaming, sobbing, and clutching her stomach as if the huge hole that she alludes to has manifested and is eating away at her internal organs." And I wasn't the only one laughing during those scenes.

2. Bella and Edward. Why is it that whenever Bella and Edward kiss, Edward looks constipated? I know that he's supposed to be experiencing some pain because of the temptation to drink her sweet, sweet blood, but really?

3. Bella and Jacob. I may have some slight prejudice here, but when a guy - especially a guy like Jacob (read that: solid friend, "beautiful," and way into her) expresses an interest in maybe starting something with her, she walks away for el-douchebag? Sigh.

And can we also talk about the New Moon movie-watching etiquette? 40-year-olds... maybe consider leaving the New Moon/Team Jacob t-shirts at home and not talking through the movie. Similarly, parents, consider leaving your four-year-olds who scream for candy all the way through the lobby at home. It makes me wonder if the people MY age who are enthralled by this film - and there are plenty - are in a stage of arrested development. There's just something off about grown-ups who don't bring a sense of cultural critique to a viewing of this kind of film... I'm not saying that they shouldn't enjoy it (hell, there are parts of the movie that I enjoyed), but at the very least, we need to question the ideologies that are being pushed at our teenage girls through these types of texts.

* My friend, B, has a really great response to Twilight over on her blog, More Than a Love Interest. Check it out!

DIY List: Welcome to Winter

2009-11-18T07:13:00.002-06:00

It's not really a huge secret that I'm a little anti-winter. Something about having totaled my first SUV during a nasty snowstorm a few years ago (clearly, this was not a Jeep) and carrying the emotional scars from childhood frostbite (okay, not really - but I have a pretty strong aversion to deep cold) leads me to believe that I may not be dating winter for very long before I move on to warmer climates.

Having said that, there are certain things that I really enjoy about winter - and actively miss when I live in said warmer climates.

1. Feeling the cold air freeze the inside of my nose. Not sure why this is something I enjoy, but it's on the list anyway.
2. Drinking hot chocolate in front of a fire while reading a fun paperback. Even better with company.
3. Throwing snow at the dog and watching him catch it.
4. Feeling the 4x4 kick in as I drive through snow. This became especially important after the nastiness of sliding into oncoming traffic a few years ago.
5. Burrowing into the couch (or bed) and having a Firefly marathon over winter break. Insert any other fantastic tv series or movie here.
6. Playing Shrek racing games with friends during finals week. Enough said.
7. Walking in the door and smelling chili that's been simmering all day in the crockpot.
8. Sleeping in, cocooned in covers, with animals curled up around me.
9. Beginning a new semester... and, well, buying new school supplies.
10. Celebrating three holidays in six weeks with my favorite people.

So, all in all, maybe I'll keep on dating Old Man Winter... at least for now.

merry christmas

2009-11-13T06:58:00.006-06:00

Every year, I give myself something for Christmas - mostly as a "look at you, surviving the holiday season" self-congratulatory, coma-inducing artifact of zen. Usually, this gift involves watching a movie or reading a new book.

This year, I'm taking a different approach. This year, I'm giving myself the gift of health.

I'm going to lose at least 20 pounds in the next six weeks.

Here's why.

Three years ago, pre-doc program, pre-stupid-ex-boyfriend drama, pre-excessive-weight-gain, I had a runner's pulse. I was working out almost every day, eating healthy foods, and was pretty blissed out in general.

And then came the stress and drama, and all of that went away.

So now, three years later... stress is reduced, drama is gone, and I'm pretty stinkin happy again. Which means that it's time to kick everything else back into gear.

20 pounds is enough to get me started for the holiday season. I won't be stopping there - but it's enough to lose a size, to get me back to where I was last spring, and to push me into a better place, health-wise.

I'll keep you updated.

tidings of cheer

2009-11-10T00:19:00.002-06:00

So, the new remake of A Christmas Carol opened this past weekend. Aside from the almost-element of alliteration in the title, can I point something out?

We haven't even hit Thanksgiving yet.

Once upon a time, the idea of releasing a Christmas title the weekend after Halloween would have been seen as almost sacriligious. But now we've commodified the holiday so much that it's become en vogue to log onto Fandango and reserve your spot for the newest Halloween-Christmas mix.

I want to blame this:

But the fact of the matter is that it's not really Tim Burton's fault - God bless his warped little heart. In point of fact, it goes back much further than this.

Let's rewind to the back to the time when Scrooge first made his appearance on the scene. A couple of fun facts from my friend, M (who really should do a blog post about this in lieu of writing her dissertation):

1. Christmas, once upon a time, was a religious holiday. I know that's a shock.
2. Gifts were given - and massive parties were thrown - to celebrate the new year.
3. People took the week between Christmas and New Year's off, much to the chagrin of their employers.
4. There was an economic movement, of sorts, to get people back to work earlier by focusing the majority of the celebration on Christmas.
5. AND the idea of Scrooge giving away gifts on Christmas was played up to encourage consumers to do the same... and this text eventually, essentially, created a cultural shift from Christmas as a purely religious holiday to one that has commercial influence as well.

So, I guess it shouldn't come as a shock that, once again, A Christmas Carol is moving the holiday season up a bit more... and yet... it doesn't really inspire me to grab some chewy goodness at the concession stand and go wait in line quite yet.

Bah. Humbug.

And, on the other hand, there's this: the one reason that I would consider decorating my house early this year.

love and piracy

2009-11-08T21:04:00.003-06:00

I love...

... grading papers at One World while munching on a warm cinnamon roll.
... curling up under the covers to read the news on MSNBC.
... dancing in the Jeep while I drive down the highway.
... giggling in the middle of "very scary" horror flicks.
... chatting about "abstinence porn" with my mother.
... the sound of ocean waves brushing against the (real/imaginary) shore at night.
... the smell of laundry as it tumbles in the dryer.
... the feel of clean sheets, softened with Jasmine Vanilla mist.
... the taste of a chai frapp from Starbucks on a warm fall day.
... the knowledge that tomorrow is a new day and will always bring a fresh start.

This was my day today. It was beautiful.

life is good

2009-11-01T21:16:00.004-06:00

So, I have this bumper sticker on my Jeep - for those of you who know me, you might think that's an understatement, as I have many a bumper sticker on my Jeep. Anyway, the bumper sticker is one of those "Life is good" things that you've probably seen on hats, on t-shirts, etc. And I like this sticker... because it's fairly accurate, most of the time.

5 reasons that life is good today:

1. My roommate moved back in this weekend. This is a good situation for both of us. We get along really well, our animals like each other, and it makes life at home a little easier. Another perk? Moving boxes and furniture = automatic workout.

2. I've met a couple of fantastic people lately. I'm not sure how the relationships are going to develop, but I'm hanging on for the ride. And, you know, I'm really to the point in life where most of my relationships are defined like that. It's not about having a best friend forever with matching necklaces and whatnot or meeting "the one" - it's more about getting to know people and enjoying our time together and letting things evolve naturally, wherever they go.

3. And, on a similar note, I have rockstar friends, and my family is amazing. Period. I heart them all. Even the people who gave me the plague last week. You know who you are.

4. My dad and I tore down a shelving unit and put up some extra hooks in the garage today. Yes, Dad did most of the work. But I helped! As a result, the garage is 10 times more organized, and there's actually room to maneuver around this winter.

5. Because I've been moving boxes/furniture with the roomie and tearing apart the garage with Dad, my body is sore. Yes, it's a good sore. And I'm kind of looking forward to either swimming or doing tai chi tomorrow afternoon. Either one. That's what I'm willing to commit to for tomorrow. And the fact that I'm willing to commit to doing one of those things = my fifth reason that life is good today.

dracula's lament

2009-10-28T22:21:00.001-05:00

Love. This. Movie.

the little seed

2009-10-28T22:11:00.003-05:00

Almost all of my friends who are raising small children are interested in being eco-friendly. We know that raising your baby green helps to impact global change and environmental health. With that in mind, I found a new Amazon off-shoot called "The Little Seed," which is an interesting start to the greening of the American baby industry. Cool idea. Biggest issues that I see so far? The same ones that I see across the board - high cost, small selection, few multicultural products. But I guess we have to start somewhere. Right?

schooliness

2009-10-26T08:25:00.002-05:00

And I've fallen in love - yet again - with another blogger.

An Apple Distinguished Educator with the motto, "I hate schooliness. I love learning." This is a man after my own heart. He has a great blog that - gasp - made me think about not only where I've been, but also where I'm going as a teacher. As I move away from traditional education, frustrated with the mess that contains bits of NCLB, a focus on PR over learning, politics, etc., I'm beginning to discover connections with other educators who are in similar positions. It's a really fascinating journey.

Check out his post on "schooliness" here.

happiness is...

2009-10-23T08:13:00.004-05:00

... teaching at two universities that I adore with people that I enjoy.
... realizing that I only have one more class until I'm certified to be a foster parent.
... warm kitties, purring, near the dog that barks at them when they catch him off-guard.
... hot chai with new friends.
... listening to music while I get ready in the morning.
... sending out tutoring fliers to area principals and teachers.
... sleeping through the night without Tylenol PM.
... swimming laps in the quiet of the afternoon at the gym.
... trading in books at the used bookstore.
... setting up the home office again - by myself.
... dancing in the car to the song that's on the radio.
... watching "The Thong Song" on Glee with my friends.
... hanging out with my favorite brother and his roommates.
... bonfires at the parents' house.

It's all about the little things right now.

What makes you happy?

sharks in the water

2009-10-19T07:06:00.004-05:00

I try not to talk about finances too, too much - it's a little gauche to do so, I know - but I need to send out a warning for those of us who rely on credit cards to get us through the semester and then pay them down with financial aid money.

Don't do this. Let me tell you why.

My habit in grad school, because we earn, oh, little to nothing, was to put my conference expenses, books, etc. on credit cards and then pay them down/off with the large, lovely check at the beginning of each semester.

And, back in the day - pre-economic crisis - this was not a bad plan.

However, banks like their money. It would seem like they would like it when people paid them... but it appears that they prefer the interest on money that's owed right now.

Literally, EVERY card that I've paid down like this in the past nine months? Canceled within a month. I'm now down to one credit card. It might just be my banks that are enacting this policy, but I doubt it.

For the most part, I'm okay with having fewer cards, as I wasn't planning on using them anyway* - but other people may want to keep their credit cards, so I thought I'd pass on a warning.

*I'll cop to being slightly ticked off that banks are making what I would consider to be unethical decisions that could impact my finances, but I'm moving toward more of a "spend what you have" philosophy.

sigh

2009-10-08T23:09:00.001-05:00

Why is being healthy so freaking difficult sometimes?

I start back on plan tomorrow. Tracking and everything. I swear.

This. Is. Crap.

2009-10-08T00:15:00.004-05:00

So, our local newspaper posted a column tonight that heavily criticized the district's teachers for encouraging the new academic grading standards. These "standards" basically lowered the grading scale to 90-80-70-60 and made the lowest F a kid could receive a 50% - unless the teacher doesn't feel that the student was trying at all, at which point the student could receive a zero. It's a crap system. Absolutely bogish.

The only problem with the column? MANY teachers in the district are strongly against this new grading policy.

Our local columnist apparently only interviewed our school district representative, who gave him the party line: a committee of dedicated teachers and administrators worked together to create this new policy.

Which is crap.

I mean, sure, there was a committee. And they probably met. And it probably had teachers on it. But I can tell you which teachers weren't on it. And I can tell you which teachers have implemented it in their classrooms under extreme duress. And which ones are flying under the radar and grading in ways that they deem to be professionally ethical.

It was a bad column. It was bad reporting. And it needs a retraction - or at the very least, some balance.

Update: Rumor from the teachers who were on the committee? They never reached consensus about the grading policy - admin MAY HAVE manipulated reports to make it seem like that was the case (or they heard what they wanted to hear?). Hmm.

handlebars

2009-10-06T21:24:00.004-05:00

I know that this is a year or so old, but I've apparently been living under a rock and JUST now saw the video.

The visuals, the instrumentation, the lyrics? Genius. Pure genius.

why it matters

2009-10-05T22:21:00.003-05:00

A couple of years ago, a teenage girl created this documentary. As part of her research, she interviewed other African-American teenage girls about their self-images and the ways that they create their identity in relation to their ideas about beauty. Their responses are pretty powerful. Even more powerful? The recreation of the 1950s "doll test" with young black children.

I'm also reading NurtureShock: New Thinking about Children, and I was struck by the chapter on contemporary multiculturalism and the research that shows that it's NOT WORKING.

A quote from one of my new favorite books:

"To be effective, researchers have found, conversations about race have to be explicit, in unmistakable terms that children understand. A friend of mine repeatedly told her five-year-old son, 'Remember, everybody's equal." She thought she was getting the message across. Finally, after seven months of this, her boy asked, 'Mommy, what's "equal" mean?'" (NurtureShock, 63)

It's not enough to just read stories with diverse characters and tell your children that we're all the same underneath the skin. We have to be opening up dialogue about this with the next generation(s). We have a 200+ year-old legacy of racial discrimination and institutionalized racism to overcome. Doing so will take a pretty significant effort. Having said that, sometimes it's the most simple things that make the difference - an honest conversation, friendships across cultures, and using multicultural literature as a bridge into those open, honest discussions are probably at the top of my list. And music like this:

Thanks, B, for this reminder of why it matters that we talk to our children about race and racism and beauty and diversity.

drop it like it's hot

2009-10-04T10:02:00.006-05:00

In the tradition of Lego Indiana Jones and Lego Batman (where are our female Lego heroes - hello?), Lego Harry Potter, Years 1-4, will bring Hogwarts back to us sometime next year. Sweet!

And while the little kid in me is super excited about Lego Harry Potter - which will, inevitably, both distract me from and push me forward in the dissertating process - the scholar and book-geek in me is even more excited about this product dropping.

That's right, folks.

Remember how I said that I wanted to have an electronic reader that would allow me to highlight and write in the books that I was reading electronically?

Well, my friend, J, tells me that this technology? Not so far off.

Can I tell you how I wanted to do the happy dance right then and there in Panera?

God bless Apple and their drive for innovative technology for the masses. The cool thing about this product is that it's rumored to be more than a reader. Ultimately, this could be a huge move forward in interactive media platforms.

For somebody like me, who's writing a media-related dissertation, this kind of technology could change the whole look and feel of the process - and the end product. Imagine a dissertation that's an e-text with video clips and songs imbedded in the final product itself. Not as screen shots. Not as quotes. But the actual texts.

How freaking cool would that be? And, yes, yes, it would make the publishing and redistributing laws messy for a little bit. But, ultimately, it could be amazing.

unschooling the classroom

2009-10-01T08:10:00.006-05:00

I have a new book to read at some point relatively soon.

As disillusioned as I've become with our education system, both on a local and national level, the idea of unschooling - of letting children (and teenagers) learn in ways that are natural to them - appeals to me on several levels. I've always believed that homeschooling - when done RIGHT - has merit; with enough money and time, I could even imagine doing something wildly creative with it. After all, what better way to study art history than by visiting the Louvre for a week? How better to learn about literature than through small-book groups and/or individual studies?

It's an idealist's life, though, right? I mean, to do it right, you really would have to be in a good economic position. Part of this philosophy is that, in order to learn, we have to get out and experience the things that we want to know about. It's difficult to do that when your family is trying to make it on $8 an hour.

So, what do those of us who aren't set up financially to become independent, unschooling geniuses do? If we have a desire to not lock our children into an education system that sometimes squelches the creative spirit and intellectual curiosity?

I don't know.

But I think that it starts with education reform. A whole new approach to teaching and learning. And that can't necessarily be done in the classroom at this point - for a lot of reasons, but mostly because of the way that the legislation surrounding education is being enacted by state and federal governments and is being interpreted by school administrators.

We have to start questioning more. Publicly.

These behind-closed-door conversations that I know are happening - the ones in which teachers question why they're not striking a month after the union had indicated that they would strike, the ones where we indicate disapproval for the decisions being made by our administrators and BOE, the ones that involve us expressing our distaste for the incessant test prep that goes on year-round sometimes - MUST make it out into the open. If they don't, then board of ed members are going to continue to think that rabble-rousing former teacher's union presidents are in a very vocal minority, when that's not the case. And I'm using local examples, but I'm actually thinking about this on both a local and national scale.

I hear you talking. Mostly because you're talking TO me. I know that it's scary to go up against the people who provide job security. And I know that interrupted classes (which CAN be read as "uneducated children") go against every part of your core that longs to be teaching the children. But we have to figure out a way to voice our dissatisfaction with the status quo.

Other people are doing it. Civil disobedience? It's all the rage.

One Illinois elementary district is BOYCOTTING the NCLB testing in order to protect their students from a test that demands the same results from ELL students as it does from native English speakers.

Several states, including Utah, have also taken the stand that NCLB is unethical in its punitive approach to teaching and learning. Those states? Refusing federal money in order to make a point.

Last week, THOUSANDS of University of California faculty and students coordinated a walk-out in order to protest severe, program-impacting budget cuts.

The NEA is suing the federal government over NCLB.

And some parents are starting to keep their kids home on testing days in order to prove a point.

Something has to be done here. This system? It's a mess.

Speak up.

They can't hear you.

Dear Teacher's Union:

2009-09-30T07:07:00.002-05:00

We've been talking about a teacher's worth for the past few months as the district tries to get more for it's money. If you continue to work without a contract, you are, in essence, saying that it's okay for them to continue to close down schools, to ask you to work more for less, to give you 27, 29, 32 students in your classrooms, regardless of the effect on learning.

Why aren't you striking?

here's your sign

2009-09-30T06:35:00.002-05:00

If you come up to my mother & I when we're walking in the lazy river and ask HER what my name is and tell her that my being here - at the gym - today made your day, you're either WAY ballsy, crazy, or a little slow.

If, when she asks you what YOUR name is, you hesitate and stumble around for a minute before producing said name, I start to lean toward one of the latter two.

If you stand in the lazy river and stare at us walking for 30 minutes, my vote shifts into the crazy category.

If you then ask us for a ride home, I might go back to the "little slow" side of the spectrum.

But when we say no, and you continue to stare at us, stalk us around the lazy river, and then follow us to the hot tub to stare at us some more from your perch on the hot tub steps when we finally give up and get out to get away from you, I stop caring about which category you fit into. Because you have now become creepy.

It's not all about social graces, people, but I gotta say... sometimes they count.

morning rituals

2009-09-29T07:34:00.003-05:00

I've developed the "not so much interesting as it is a little disturbing" habit of waking up relatively early (6:30 AM) after going to bed, oh, relatively late (2AM). While I ultimately want to reverse this trend - maybe experiment with going to sleep by about 11PM and waking up around, say, 7AM - I find myself starting an additional new habit that will, possibly, get old pretty quickly... as I pack on extra "winter weight" in response to it.

So, after my 4.5 hours of sleep, I'll occasionally drag myself out of bed and over to the local 50's diner for their pancake special. Three pancakes, two eggs over hard, and two sausage links. Mmmm...

The perk? Well, aside from the divine breakfast (made by somebody else), I also get in some grading time. And I get to socialize and watch the old people interact with each other.

Now if I could just figure out how to counterbalance the pancake special...

falling into it

2009-09-28T22:02:00.003-05:00

I hate the fall. And the winter.

One of my friends posted on Facebook today that she's excited to finally be changing out her closet so that she gets to wear her sweaters. Two more friends chimed in throughout the day and were bubbly with excitement.

WHY?

Convince me.

As of right now, I'm not so much looking forward to the next six months of cold, snow, cold, sickness, snow, darkness, cold...

Give me something to look forward to.

Anything.

Other than the first spring thaw.

beach scenes

2009-09-27T23:01:00.012-05:00

I want to go to the beach. I crave the it - the sunshine, the sand between my toes, the smell of the waves as they crash into the shore...

Last year, my mom & I took this great trip to Chicago with one of our favorite friends. The whole trip was fantastic, but one of my favorite moments was when we went for a walk on the Lake Michigan beach. Something about standing in the water, listening the kids and parents play in the sand, watching the runners against the Chicago skyline, was almost magical.

The summer before that, I visited Hilton Head with one of my best friends and her family - who, really, feel pretty much like my family too. At dusk, we walked along the shore, laughing and chatting about the day and the future and the private houses we passed.

And, later, I watched the waves roll in the dark and thought deep thoughts. Like you do. At night, now, I go to sleep with the sound of the waves and the rain on my sound machine. It comforts me as the weather changes and the temperature drops and the leaves fall.

Something about the beach just does it for me.

Someday, somehow, I want to live in a place where I can smell the sand and the wind and the sun when I wake up in the morning. I don't even need to live there all the time - I'd be good with just a month or two a year. Maybe a summer place on the beach? I would settle for a cabin on a lake, even, as long as I could get to the beach every so often. Don't most people have summer houses? On the beach? For cheap?

Totally reasonable.

craigslist

2009-09-25T00:54:00.002-05:00

Posting this on Craigslist made me feel like a little bit of an academic prostitute. Nevertheless, it's out there for all of the weirdos and freaks - and, hopefully, some sweet parents who just want their children to do well in school or some struggling MA student who could graduate if he could just finish this one chapter - to read. And spend money on.

Professional English Teacher/Tutor

Certified English teacher with eight years of teaching experience at the high-school and college levels is now accepting students for ongoing or short-term tutoring in reading, writing, research strategies, English homework, or ACT prep. Six years of tutoring experience in both the local school systems and privately. Current university-level English instructor and doctoral candidate in English education. Active member of Illinois Association of Teachers of English, Illinois State Writing Project, National Council of Teachers of English, and National Writing Project.

Rates $30-50/hour, depending upon services requested. Tutoring space is available, or tutoring can provided in your home. References available upon request.

Professional/Academic Editor

Are you looking for a proofreader for your academic writing? Sometimes a second set of eyes makes all the difference!

Experienced editor/proofreader available to edit your thesis/dissertation draft(s).
Electronic or hardcopy submissions accepted.
$30-40/hour (roughly $1.50/page, depending upon how heavily edited the document needs to be).
Quick turnaround.
All disciplines welcome.

References available upon request.

stephan's quintet

2009-09-24T07:06:00.003-05:00

Hubble's been upgraded, and the pictures are gorgeous - especially of Stephan's Quintet, which is composed of several galaxies on the verge of colliding and one massive star on the cusp of being born. It. is. beautiful. I love the fact that we can see this - it's oh-so Star Trek.

electronic book readers

2009-09-22T22:52:00.003-05:00

I want to want to buy a Kindle or some other e-book reader.

But the technology just isn't there to justify the cost yet. That probably makes me sound a little freakish - after all, isn't enough to be able to save 3,500 books on one device? To be able to bookmark those texts effortlessly and have them read aloud to you if your eyes get tired? To listen to music while you read on the beach? And here's the kicker - to be able to take an entire library (or more) with you in the space of a magazine?

Well, yes and no.

All of those things sound really good, right? And I'm all over them. But I won't shell out the money until the e-book readers come with not only a touch screen, as some - like the Sony - do, but also with a way for me to both highlight passages IN COLOR and take notes on the pages. Preferably in my own handwriting.

The instant that technology becomes a part of the $400 or less e-book market, I'll make the switch over to e-books and start pushing them at my students.

Until then, I'll stick with my paperbacks.

no confidence vote

2009-09-21T21:08:00.003-05:00

I'm officially calling for a vote of "No Confidence" for Ken Hinton and the District 150 BOE from the staff, faculty, students, and community members who live and work in Peoria.

Despite consistent community requests for transparency, for a plan, for alternate options, the Board followed through on Hinton's recommendation to close Woodruff High School.

Despite repeated concerns about the negative impact of increased class sizes on student learning and about the safety issues involved with mixing the student bodies (because of the gang territory boundaries), they passed the decision, 4-3.

FAIL.

update: operation yellow room

2009-09-20T00:19:00.007-05:00

The yellow room is pretty much done until I finish my foster-parenting classes and become, officially, certified to take care of the kiddo(s). We're looking at possibly doing a kiddo shower toward the end of the semester at some point - more info to come - but this is what my parents and I have been up to lately:

The bottom-right picture is clearly not in a yellow room; that's the new reading nook in my bedroom.

foster-care update

2009-09-18T14:44:00.003-05:00

I'm now three weeks into our nine-week class schedule, and everything is on track for me to become a foster parent. We've done three home visits, so our next one is scheduled for the week after I finish classes (first week of November). During that meeting, we'll sign some papers and do the official home inspection. And, at that point, everything should be good to go with the "foster momming."

math games

2009-09-16T22:56:00.002-05:00

I visited my mom's class today to help her test them for the district's required math assessment (which she doesn't have time to do, really, since she has TWENTY-EIGHT children in her second grade class... yeesh.), and I got to meet her darlings.

Insert snark here.

No, really, they were okay. I enjoyed them very much as we were playing our "math game" where they did puzzles and the like, and I got a kick out of small children hugging me for hanging out with them.

But I made one girl cry, and it about broke my heart.

We ran out of time to do the remaining four assessments that I'd hoped to get done, and the girl who was next in line was so upset that she sobbed into her shirt, trying to hide her tears from her classmates. Then she came over to me and I hugged her and rocked her back and forth while she cried. No matter that I promised to visit again next week and asked her if she would be first in line to play math games with me. She had been next in line to be special.

Before she left for the day, the two of us did a special mini-math game just for her, and she got the problem right, which meant that she earned a Tootsie Roll pop. And I earned a teary smile.

I found out later on that she's a foster kid. Which explains some of the extreme disappointment with promises unfulfilled.

Sometimes the world is cruel.

Sigh.

motivation

2009-09-16T22:43:00.003-05:00

One of the people on a discussion board that I frequent posted these questions, and I liked them so much that I decided to steal them and answer them here.

When you wake up in the morning what is your first thought? It can be about WW or not, just curious what motivates you to get outta bed and start your day.
Okay, honestly, sometimes it's the paycheck. Meager as it is, that's what makes the difference on days that I would rather curl up and stay in bed all day. But most days, I'm genuinely excited to go to work and see what happens. I teach four classes right now - two on MWF and two on T/TH - and I really enjoy my students. And I appreciate being back on the college campus with people who generally like and respect me. It's a pretty good gig. On non-school days, I get up because I want to see people. I want to catch up with family and friends, get some healthy food, and exercise on my days off.

When you go to bed at night, what's your last thought??
"Please let me sleep through the night." I've had several bouts of insomnia lately, and I take Tylenol PM on a fairly regular basis, but it doesn't always guarantee a full night's rest. And without sleep, not only am I a cranky shrew, it's also incredibly difficult for me to stay on plan and to exercise. Who wants to work out when the muscles feel like jelly?

When you don't feel like exercising what makes you do it anyway??
I made a deal with myself four weeks ago that I would work out five times a week for 30 minutes at a time. If I screwed it up, I would start over. Not so much as a punishment to myself - more of a recommitment. So, lately, when I haven't felt like exercising, this plan has reminded me that exercise is one way that I show that I'm committed to myself, in addition to the people around me.

When you have sweets, or pizza, or whatever is your trigger in front of you what makes you say no??
Usually it's the exercise. Sometimes it's not. Sometimes it works the opposite way. But if I've just exercised, I'm much less likely to munch on Trefzger's cookies.

To Whom It May Concern

2009-09-11T22:28:00.004-05:00

Dear ManPlant:
I am not impressed with the quality of product that you have littered this town with. Please take all defective men in question and return them to the manufacturing plant. Send us new ones when the bugs have been worked out and quality control has done its damn job.

Dear Frantz Fanon:
I hope that you can appreciate the Happy Feet sticker that now decorates my copy of The Wretched of the Earth and not interpret it as a five-year-old's act of colonization.

Dear Mr. President:
Joe ~~Williams~~ Wilson = an idiot. Sorry that you had to take office during a time in which so many people are so insistent that we should turn our backs on our tired, our poor, our huddled masses... it's a crying shame that we let ourselves become so self-important over the past eight years that we feel righteous in our desire to turn away from those in need of a helping hand.

Dear Expanded Cable with the HBO/Showtime package:
One more date with True Blood, and then I'm afraid we'll have to start seeing other people. While I hate to say goodbye, I just can't justify your $150/month pricetag when I can still find our favorite shows online for a mere $40/month. I'll still be able to hang out with you once a week or so at the parents' house for our special Criminal Minds bonding time, but I can't deny that I'll be seeing more shows on the Internet. For free.

Dear Self:
You are a rock in the waves. You let things slide off of you. Oh, wait. Maybe you're a rock with edges. Maybe the kelp and whatnot gets stuck on you and pounded in with the tide... What a crap metaphor! You are a baby seal. Who survives the nasty walruses and seal-hunters and... Sigh. Suck it up. Deal. And then let it go.

an open letter on health care

2009-09-09T21:18:00.003-05:00

To our State representatives:

I am a former high-school teacher and current university instructor.

As a high-school teacher, I worked in predominantly low-income schools. I saw my students often struggle to come to school through sickness in the winter because they could not afford a doctor's visit. They squinted at the chalkboard because they couldn't afford glasses or contacts. And both teenage pregnancy rates and the spread of STDs in my schools were very high.

These are simple issues that could be taken care of if we cared to level the playing field for the people who find the current conditions rocky at best. The quality of our health-care system affects us on every level - educational, financial, social - in addition to just our simple physical well-being.

Please, please consider supporting this plan. I honestly think that this is the most ethical approach in terms of providing a decent quality of life for American citizens.

cfa

nobody's home

2009-09-09T20:35:00.003-05:00

I tried to go home twice today before I finally made it into the driveway. This was only a big deal because I was exhausted and really wanted nothing more than to go home and take a nap.

Lap #1 - I drove by the house to find that the lawn guys were mowing and blowing grass away and blocking the driveway. So I drove away and ran a couple of errands.

Lap #2 - I drove by the house (again) and this time there were missionaries standing in the doorway, waiting for somebody to come to the door. I'm not sure who they were waiting for, as there were no cars in the driveway, but they looked pretty determined to convert somebody. So I kept driving and went to the bakery for a couple of cookies.

Another Kind of Lap

In other news, I had a really good night. I woke up from my nap and drove to the gym, where I got to do a water-aerobics class with my mom - this class was a little different, though, because the instructor was way into kickboxing and dancing, so we got to do two of my favorite out-of-water exercises too.

And then I did some lap-swimming, and it was like being home again. Something about feeling my body move through the water is just the ultimate freedom to me.

But it made me think about how I've done without swimming for the past couple of years and how rocky that time has been. I'm not correlating the two, but I do wonder if I would have responded differently to certain situations if I had been allowing myself the peace that the water brings.

I hardly ever stop moving in my day-to-day life. Being in the water, especially when I'm doing laps, forces me to slow down. My world becomes just the push and pull of my body, the give and take of my breath. The water is the one place that I stop thinking and start to focus on what it means to just exist.

stagnant

2009-09-08T20:28:00.002-05:00

I'm feeling a little locked into the mire this week.

It started with a general feeling of grossness on Sunday night, morphed into a day-long headache on Monday, and has pretty much settled into apathy today.

Blarg.

I'm frustrated with a couple of situations that I don't really have any control over. And I need to just let them go and move on. But I'm still frustrated.

I've been working out five days a week for at least 30 minutes a day, and I've been on plan for the past couple of weeks. And I'm only 4 years older than I was last time I dropped the poundage, but it seems like it's just slowly trickling off this time.

And the dog bit me yesterday, hard enough to break the skin and leave a bruise, when he thought I was going to hit him. When do I EVER hit him? I swear, this dog is traumatized over something that NEVER happened. It's like he goes crazy when he A) feels threatened or B) feels like I might take his food, garbage, catpoop away from him. Aren't beagles supposed to be smart?

And speaking of smart, I'm not really feeling it right now. My grading is getting away from me. We're barely into the school year, and grading and responding to drafts are taking over my life.

Sigh. I'm ready for summer.

on the side

2009-09-03T09:01:00.002-05:00

Foster-parenting/adoption class starts tonight. I'm beyond excited. I think that this is going to be a really. good. thing.

to run or not to run?

2009-09-02T16:19:00.005-05:00

I've been whiny about the school board for the past few years. I don't think they're particularly effective, and I question their ability to be actively involved in the schools in anything except for a follow-the-King way. So, when this possible school-board position was announced, I actually started thinking about running for it. Because, really, I'm annoyed to the point of wanting to keep my (hypothetical) children out of the district. Is there a better way to make a change than to step up and have a voice in it? I do, after all, live in the district that's potentially being vacated by a man that I deeply respect, despite our D150-related differences of opinion.

It's a debate.

Part of me wants, very much, to step up.

The other part - the sane part - insists that I'm way too busy and that I need to take care of the things already on my plate before anything else.

Help me think this out.

fire insurance

2009-08-29T08:34:00.000-05:00

a teacher's worth

2009-08-19T23:48:00.007-05:00

There's a big hubbub in our community about the number of hours that teachers are contracted to work each day. The blogger who wrote about this - who was (hypothetically) the same blogger listening to a certain school-board member spout off at my favorite restaurant the other day - generally acts a little less like a direct mouthpiece for the D150 school board member that he was meeting with.

Nevertheless, it's an interesting debate, right?

Contractually, most of our teachers in D150 are required to be at school for 6.5 hours each day. Now, on the surface, that seems like it's a pretty shallow requirement for 180 days of 'learnin the children real good. Especially since a beginning teacher in the local district pulls in around $35,000.

But.

The average teacher puts in 8-12 hour days. Now, she (and I say she because, statistically, K-12 teaching is still a woman's profession, and we can't ignore that aspect of this argument that attempts to devalue women's contributions to society's production mill)... Now, she may or may not be doing this work at school. But when she's at school, she is "on," performing/entertaining/watching/assessing/negotiating/facilitating nonstop. It's not like a corporate job in which a person can take a quick restroom break and pick back up where he left off five minutes later. If there are kids in the classroom, the teacher is constantly juggling hats. And there are almost always masses of children in the classroom - especially since districts seem to be moving away from the "smaller is better" mentality about class sizes.

At the end of the day, sometimes a person needs to have the freedom to walk out the door. When I taught in a K-12 setting, I tended to leave school by about an hour after school ended. But I work best when I'm not in isolation; this is one of the many reasons that I choose to surround myself with students during my workdays. So, I would take my grading to my favorite coffeeshop or bookstore, grab an iced tea, and settle in for a few hours of work.* I did this so often, in fact, that the waitresses at my favorite hangouts often brought me my tea before I ordered it. I generally stayed until I was done grading, then headed home, where I would prep for the next day and try to fit in a few hours of mind-numbing TV to balance out the brain activity from the rest of the day.

Now, I love me some teaching. But, short of some kind of radical education reform, I will never work in a public K-12 school ever again. In addition, I'm hard pressed to imagine that my children will ever attend a public K-12 school, despite the fact that my family has generations of teaching and being administrators in those same schools and that my mom - whom I adore - continues to fight the good fight in the same district that I grew up in.

There's too much pressure involved in education. I can't even count the number of teachers I know who are on some kind of anti-anxiety medication for job-related stress.

And I'm not even going to place it at the feet of the children - although I'll admit to having a bit of a moment when some random ninth grader stabbed another one at my school last year.

Nope, this one goes back to the public belief that teachers can be scapegoated for a solid chunk of societal problems.

We put so much faith in a broken system, in the Christmas tree that died years ago and yet still holds our most precious ornaments. We say that the city students are failing the test, but we fail to understand the complexities of a test that linguistically discriminates against many Latino and African-American students - and others - who speak nonstandard dialects as their Mother Tongues and who should be recognized for learning how to codeswitch into the dominant dialect that many of us have been speaking since early childhood.**

We point at suburban schools, filled with mirror images of ourselves, and say, "These, these schools do it right. They passed the test." The truth of the matter is that some of the suburban teachers could have been standing on their heads all day and still had students with fantastic scores on the ACT.*** And then we point at city schools and imply that they're filled with burned-out teachers, with slackers. It's the biggest bunch of self-congratulatory BS I've ever seen. It enrages me.

And these businessmen (because, again, this is not a gender-neutral issue), these golf-club-toting, arrogantly beleaguered men who sit in their fully-supplied, air-conditioned offices making some fool money, counting their attendance at Rotary as part of their workdays? They want to say that teachers should be forced to attend useless meetings in 95 degree heat just to stretch their "at-work hours" to a full eight because teachers can't be trusted to work outside of the "office"?

HA.

* Please note, this was not my MO when I lived in Mississippi, as there were no coffeehouses in my little, itty-bitty town. Then, I went home and drank sweet tea in my living room with my roommate as we both graded.
** If you're interested in a linguistically-just test that's used to measure student progress, you might check out New Zealand's.
*** They're NOT standing on their heads. There are different pressures in the 'burb education. I'm not hating on 'burb teachers, so don't flood my in-box with hate-mail.

Dear Kiddo...

2009-08-18T08:23:00.007-05:00

Dear Kiddo,

You are an IKEA baby. I bet that you didn't know that, but it's true.

On Saturday, I drove three hours up to IKEA and found a crib, a dresser, and a ton of random colorful decorating goodies for your bedroom, which is now officially yellow with white trim. From the pictures, your new crib looks a little bit like a jail cell. I'm sorry for that. But we found some really cool crib decor to help it feel a little less, well, confining.

Also, I've decided that you will adore Eric Carle as much as I do, which is why I bought you this Brown Bear, Brown Bear quilt from Etsy. And you're going to want to cuddle (I suppose that would be okay), so I found a super-comfortable, deluxe rocking chair and a "baby blanket" to stash in my bedroom.

I hear rumors that you're going to need a lot of attention. Another doc student in the class that I'm auditing this semester was saying that she gets about three hours of sleep per night because she has two children under two years old. Your Aunt B and I gave each other a look when she said that because it seems like THAT might be a bit extreme. I function on about five or six, so could you work with me here?

I'm looking forward to meeting you, whenever that happens. We'll have fun.

Love,
me

back to school weight-loss challenge

2009-08-11T23:10:00.004-05:00

I love the start of school.

Now, before you start throwing rotten produce at me, hear me out.

I track the changes in my life by the school year. Last year? Sucked. This year? Has the potential to be SO MUCH BETTER.

And one of the things that I'm implementing this week with the start of back-to-school activities on Thursday is the return of healthy eating and exercise.

Steps That I'm Taking:
1. I'm packing my gym bag and sticking it in the car, and I'll exercise either on the way to work or on the way home from work.
2. I'm writing down everything I eat and I'm checking in with my roommate at the end of the day about whether or not I've gone over plan.
3. I'm eating my fruits and veggies.

Simple, right?

Here's my goal for the semester: I'm going to lose at least 40 pounds. Boo. Yah.

Anybody else want in? I'm hoping to get a lunch buddy or a walking buddy out of this...

it's a small (one) world

2009-08-11T15:38:00.007-05:00

Dear Mr. School-Board Member:

Hypothetically, when one is in a restaurant with one's cronies (or random city bloggers), discussing the potential closures of local schools, perhaps one should lower one's voice, as opposed to broadcasting certain prejudices against teachers' short work hours (WTF?) and lack of engagement with the children (again, have you even been in a classroom lately?) and your own personal hopes for introducing the charter school into a different high school and the effects of NCLB on the district. Maybe you should keep your closed-door gossip sessions behind closed doors. And not, say, at my favorite restaurant. Hypothetically.

Dear Ex-Boyfriend:

Thank you, thank you, thank you for finding a job. Elsewhere. Away from me.

Dear Foster-Care Caseworker:

Thank YOU for saying that you were excited about certifying me as a foster parent. After talking to you for an hour and a half, I think that you actually get me and the approach that I would probably take in parenting. After our conversation, I'm even more excited about becoming a foster parent.

Dear Baker-dog:

Stay out of the trash at 6AM. It is beneath you to dig around and make a mess of my garbage. And then poop in the family room. BAD DOG. Unless the tiny kitten has suddenly begun to deposit poos the size her legs. Viole(n)t the Tiny Kitten probably cannot do this as of yet, so you are in trouble. BAD DOG. But you were super cute during the foster-care interview when you ate your bone on the ottoman - as opposed to the Viole(n)t kitty who tried to shred the foster-care lady's leg with her tiny little claws.

Dear Mr. School-Board Member:

You're still talking. Hypothetically. WHY are you still talking? I kind of want to be in your conversation. Just to help you with a different perspective. One that includes some balance between your beliefs about the district's rabble-rousing former union president (who, contrary to your personal belief, does actually represent a lot of the teachers' perspectives) and your beliefs about what is and is not your responsibility as a board member and local district gossip. But, hey. Keep talking. I think that you're probably sincere in your desire to help improve the district, even if you do come off as somewhat, well, out of touch with classrooms down the hill. And I'm learning a lot from this conversation. Hypothetically.

wringing out the last vestiges of summer

2009-08-10T09:35:00.008-05:00

Okay, so, seriously, I'm down to three days before the back-to-school insanity starts, and this is where my to-do list stands. I've now pushed the deadline to Friday on just about everything.

Note: I'm crossing things off here as I get them done. Watch for changes!

1. ~~Proofread/edit ~ 100 pages of a cool dissertation.~~
4. ~~"Touch up" the old syllabi for the two classes I've taught before.~~
5. Finish drafting my second synthesis statement and send it off to my advisor.
7. ~~Do a second home-visit with the foster-care caseworker (the official application visit) on Tuesday.~~

Added:
8. ~~Hang blackout curtains in bedroom so that I can get more than four hours of sleep.~~
9. ~~Drop off teaching contract @ BU.~~
10. ~~Tidy up house for foster-care caseworker.~~
12. ~~Fix driver-side seatbelt in car - waiting on replacement seatbelt part.~~
13. ~~Watch eight episodes of Psych and Under the Tuscan Sun.~~
14. ~~Do a bunch of random shopping.~~
15. ~~Rearrange/clean the basement.~~
16. ~~Go see GI Joe (fantastic!) and The Orphan (eek!).~~

Postponed (until at least the weekend):
3. Create a new syllabus for my two new, non-computer lab, first-year composition classes.
2. Touch up the yellow room (should only take about 20 minutes or so).
6. ~~Help paint the rest of the exterior of the parents' house.~~
11. Take IKEA trip - maybe this weekend or next week?

Where did the summer go?

hit and run

2009-08-09T00:05:00.003-05:00

I went to Hobby Lobby to pick up a couple of crafty things yesterday and wound up (unintentionally) picking up a crafty man along the way.

Now I have a business card for a funny, handsome man who wants me to call him.

The debate: do I text him to ask him to meet me for coffee, call him and chat, or let it be?

babysitting blues

2009-08-08T23:22:00.002-05:00

I blame Abbie for not being able to get this song out of my head. Way to go, Dr. V. Good LORD, I loved this movie when I was younger.

to-do list: summer countdown

2009-08-07T08:00:00.001-05:00

Yesterday felt like an out-of-body experience. Which meant that I could laugh at the insanity of being the quiet biddy instead of the funny, outgoing girl that I try to be. Honestly. So, no worries, dear reader. I'm not quite over the edge yet.

But - as M and J point out - it often helps to have a plan.

Ergo. Over the next five days or so, here's what I need to get done:

1. Proofread/edit ~ 100 pages of a cool dissertation*
2. Touch up the yellow room (should only take about 20 minutes or so)
3. Create a new syllabus for my two new, non-computer lab, first-year composition classes
4. "Touch up" the old syllabi for the two classes I've taught before
5. Finish drafting my second synthesis statement and send it off to my advisor**
6. Help paint the rest of the exterior of the parents' house
7. Do a second home-visit with the foster-care caseworker (the official application visit)

And I'd like to throw in a trip to IKEA to pick up the crib and dresser (above) at some point before we get entrenched in the new semester.

Realistically, something may need to be deleted from the list. Since I don't have a working Time-Turner.

Any suggestions?

* This is the part-time summer gig, but I'm really enjoying reading this one, and it gives me a nice mental break from my own work (as does the painting of the parents' house).
** This is what's going to take the most time and brain energy.

sunshiny days

2009-08-07T07:45:00.008-05:00

Snapshots of the kiddo's yellow room, minus hypothetical kiddo and most of the furniture. I took these with the laptop's PhotoBooth program, so they're backwards, but you can do the math.

off-kilter

2009-08-06T23:30:00.005-05:00

I'm antsy these days. Restless.

And I feel like my brain is disconnected from my body, hanging on by a gossamer-thin string. I think that I may be flaking out a week before school starts back up.

Case in point:

I woke up late this morning and opted to skip the shower in favor of getting a jump-start on some editing that I've been dragging my feet on. So, I - in my yellow-paint-splatter and day-old clothes, greasy hair hidden under shiny product and tucked into a ponytail, no-make-up glory - hopped on over to B-Dub to get my editing on.

I found a nice, quiet table, ordered some naked tenders and onion rings (because they are DIVINE @ the BWW), and got to work. 20 minutes in, three standard-issue Northside teenagers came in, plopped down at the booth next to my table, and started loud-talking.

And cackling. Like hyenas.

Before I knew it, I had morphed into Cranky Old Woman and glared at them for disturbing my peace. It was a whisper-inducing glare. Not subtle at all.

Nevermind that a month ago, I was part of a group of friends, laughing and talking blissfully, loudly at the same restaurant/sports bar.

And, come on. It's a sports bar. Not a library.

Oh, but wait. There's more.

Fast-forward 30 minutes.

I passed a gorgeous man while shopping at Borders. Tall, wide-shouldered, light cocoa skin, great eyes. Gor.Geous. Drool-worthy. Truly. The kind of guy that a girl might could be convinced to keep around. And, as we passed each other, he gave me that look.

You know the one.

Normally, I would meet his eyes and smile and make light conversation. Because I can be that girl when I want to.

Today? I averted my eyes and became the quiet, shy type.

WHO IS THIS WOMAN AND WHY HAS SHE TAKEN OVER MY BODY?

I'm not the wallflower in the corner. Or the mean, old witch who glares at children.

And tomorrow? I'm kicking this biddy to the curb.

painting blues

2009-08-05T00:00:00.002-05:00

I am painting. Again.

It seems like I'm constantly painting right now. Between the exterior of my parents' house (which is on tap again this weekend) and the kiddo bedroom (the bare-bones of which I'm trying to get ready before school starts back up in a couple of weeks - painting and a visit to IKEA to pick up a crib and dresser are at the top of the list), I'm becoming quite the pro.

Or not. I might just be painting a lot. A LOT.

Tonight's (mis)adventure started with an impromptu stop at Lowe's at 8PM for some yellow paint. The "top of the line" yellow paint, guaranteed to go on in one coat.

Possibly, they didn't mean that it would go on in one coat when it was trying to cover blue walls.

Four hours and almost an entire gallon of paint later, I have three patchy walls that are still showing some traces of blue. Sigh.

I'm going to need another gallon.

VeggieSaurus Day

2009-08-02T22:34:00.005-05:00

"Nothing will benefit human health and increase the chances of survival of life on earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian diet."
- Albert Einstein

I am not a vegetarian.

Since I am concerned about the environment and the ways that we're impacting the world, finding a way to live more sustainably should be one of my priorities. And it is. I recycle, I compost my compostables, and I grow things like massive zucchinis in my garden. I try to eat my fruits and vegetables, even though I'm notoriously picky about which ones I actually put into my mouth.* But I still haven't been able to make the jump to full-time VeggieSaurus status. I wish that I could.

I feel a responsibilty to balance out my carnivorous, SUV-driving lifestyle with something beneficial to the earth. So I'm trying on vegetarianism at least once a week. That's what I'm willing to commit to right now. Today was my first intentionally successful VeggieSaurus Day. I started off with a PBJ sandwich for breakfast, pancakes for lunch, and a Morningstar faux-chicken sandwich/pasta for dinner. And some ice cream for desert. I stayed within my Points, and I'm feeling pretty darn good about it.

One of the questions that I'm constantly asking myself is "What am I willing to do today?"**

Today, I committed to taking care of myself***, to being a vegetarian for the day, and to editing the thesis that I'm reading for somebody.

What about you?

What are you willing to do today?

* I don't like carrots, raw tomatoes, or anything with a weird texture (anything squashy like... um... squash... or melons - blech!).
** This is actually something that one of the posters to the WW boards asks every day, and I've started to incorporate it into my way of thinking. I can handle commitments for the day (or the week) much better than I can handle long-term commitments, which tend to feel a little bit like shackles.
*** Yesterday's "paint the parents' house" adventure, while super fun and exciting, left me nauseous and migrainy until earlier tonight. Fumes and dehydration, we're thinking.

the long way around

2009-07-29T14:08:00.006-05:00

I've been a fan of the Dixie Chicks for a long time now. I respected them and appreciated their music before the big brouhaha in Germany*, and that respect and appreciation has increased tenfold in the past couple of years as they've come back from being shunned by the country music industry to release some amazing music.

This song, in particular, resonates with me. I used to wonder, sometimes, what my life would have been like had I married the man that I was dating when I was in college, had children, taught high-school English in Houston. In short, what would have happened had I followed the plan? You know the plan. The Prince Charming. The happily ever after. The 2.5 children and labrador retreiver in the fenced-in back yard.

I've been over the man - who was no Prince Charming - for almost a decade now, but it took a while longer to stop wondering about the life I chose to leave behind. Even as the Intellectual Self inside my head recognized that the fairy-tale was never reality, not even for the people who lived it, some part of me wondered.

But I took the long-way around, and I've lived a great life because of it. There's a lot to celebrate about the journey that I'm on right now. And not every moment is worthy of a fairy-tale, but many are. Car-dancing to Rehab's 1980 on the highway. Writing at Panera while sipping on raspberry tea. Playing with the beagle in the backyard. Chatting with friends over homemade zucchini bread. Walking in the pool with Mom. Window-shopping for "kiddo furniture." Watching True Blood and Weeds, curled up on the couch with kitties pouncing on each other nearby. Running the rapids at the gym. Napping in the sun. Losing weight. Teaching. Learning. Gardening. Traveling. Singing. Living.

blue skies

2009-07-25T21:10:00.006-05:00

This is where my head was all day.

Having said that, I also did some reading for comps. This is good. This means that I might not fail out of school and find myself sans job come next year. Today's readings: Paolo Freire's Pedagogy of Hope, bell hooks's Teaching to Transgress, and Lisa Delpit's Other People's Children. Of the three, bell hooks remains my favorite read. She's so much more direct than Freire, and I haven't gotten into Delpit's work enough to have a position on it yet.

A couple of today's Non-Scale Victories (NSVs): I went back to the gym for the first time in six months and "ran the rapids" in the lazy river for 80 minutes this morning. I'm having a much easier time with stairs since I started working out more. I didn't go to the local bakery for a cookie after my workout. And I made my dinner at home instead of running through the fast-food place up the street.

Not bad for a lazy Saturday.

and that's how I met your father...

2009-07-23T22:49:00.006-05:00

My dad's band played an outdoor venue tonight in a nearby town, and I was on hand at the swag table to sell the CD that they just released. After listening to the band for a couple of hours and watching small children hit the speakers with their tiny little fists and larger children using the sound cables as the finish line in dead-out races (and hearing my brother the sound guy yelling at them for doing so), I saw the concert come to a close and the park clear out. Except for the guy who engaged me in the following conversation:

"Dirty Old Man"(DOM): Hey. Hey. Are you married to one of the members of the band?*

Me: Nope, I'm the daughter of one of the men in the band.

DOM: Oh. I see that you don't have a ring on your finger.

Me (mentally): EEK!

DOM: Would you like to go out sometime?

Me: I'm not married, but I do have a boyfriend. (crap! LIE.)

DOM: Oh. That's too bad... Do you go to...?

And then he proceeded to talk to me about karaoke, theatre troops, and crying men at urinals for the next 15 minutes, until a friend came by and I could extricate myself. I'm not good at dislodging myself from socially awkward conversations, apparently, but I was about two seconds away from claiming either my brother or one of the other band members as my boyfriend.

And let me state for the record... EEEK!

* It's probably not fair to call him a Dirty Old Man, but he was pushing 60 at the very least. Way too old for me, unless there was something spectacular going on with him (think: "Batman" kind of spectacular). And there wasn't (refer back to the 15-minute socially awkward conversation above).

not in the car

2009-07-22T15:32:00.005-05:00

After a lovely lunch/study session at my favorite coffeeshop-turned-restaurant, I reached into my bright pink clutch/wallet for my debit card to pay the bill.

No card.

Turns out that when I picked up my prescriptions last night, they returned it to me in an envelope stapled to said prescriptions.

What did I do?

Threw it away in the kitchen trash.

When did I remember that I'd thrown it away?

After I'd already canceled the card.

Crud.

DIY List: 10 Reasons I Want to Lose Weight

2009-07-21T22:33:00.007-05:00

It doesn't seem like "Oh, I got caught in the downpour..." and "Well, I was stuck in deadlocked traffic on 1/8 a tank of gas for over 30 minutes..." would lead to "... and I had a great day." And yet... I had a great day. Traffic was absolute shit as I was coming home from my writing group this afternoon. And Baker-dog and I did indeed pull a Maryanne Dashwood and go for a walk in the pouring rain this evening. But it was still a great day. And since I weighed in this morning at a weight that I haven't seen for months, stayed on-plan points-wise, and ate all of my vegetables (this is a big deal), it got me thinking about why I want to get in shape. Mostly, of course, so that I can have more "great days."

But here are some bonus reasons:

1. I love the way my body feels when I find the rhythm of the stroke as I swim. And my stroke is off with extra flab.
2. I like to play tag with the small child who hangs out at my house sometimes and the dog who is always on-premises. I also eventually want to chase around a small child who doesn't go somewhere else at the end of the day.
3. I get more dates. I mean, we're being real here, right? And God bless Susan Bordo and problematizing/theorizing the body, but I like hanging out with my menfolk.
4. I hate, hate, hate flying on an airplane right now. It's tight and uncomfortable, and I sometimes (usually) have to wear a seat-belt extension. It sucks. This also means that I don't hop on a plane to visit some of my favorite relatives in Maryland or one of my favorite friends in California. Double suck!
5. I used to be able to drive with my foot on the dash. I miss that. (Don't worry, Mom, it was my left foot. The right foot was comfortably/safely on the pedal!)
6. I get a kick out of shopping where everybody else shops. I like variety in my clothing. It's harder to be the hippie girl when Lane Bryant's stockroom this season looks like corporate America meets Miss Teen USA.
7. I crave the ability to sit cross-legged in booths at restaurants. When you're "a big girl," you sometimes struggle to get into booths, period, much less to sit cross-legged in them. And don't even get me started on the wish to sit cross-legged on a straight-back chair. Yeesh, people.
8. I love yoga and pilates. It's easier to do both of those things when one is in better shape.
9. I love, love, love walking on the beach. And how much cooler is that when one's thighs aren't chaffing together so loudly that even the fish can hear them?
10. I like the way my body feels when it's getting enough vegetables and water and exercise. It is a happy body.

Whenever I talk about losing weight and getting healthier, there's always somebody in the crowd who objects - not to the loss of weight, necessarily, but to the possibility of my becoming a stick-figure. For cultural reasons, for personal reasons, etc. These people clearly do not know me very well.

Trust me. I'm not about to become a stick-figure.

Here's my ultimate healthy-girl goal:

I'll wear clothing that runs around a size 14. I'll exercise almost every day, even if it's "just" yoga before bed (but I'll be involved in other activities too - classes, swimming, etc.). I won't restrict what I eat, just the portions. And I'll eat when I'm hungry (as opposed to culturally-acceptable mealtimes, emotional meltdowns, and/or awkward social events). And I'll forgive myself and get back up when I slip.

Sound like a plan?

flower power

2009-07-21T19:45:00.006-05:00

When I returned from the NOLA trip, I found several delightful additions to my garden.

The first sunflower ever grown in my garden, this wasn't actually planned. It was a leftover from the birdfeeder that used to hang over the day-lilies. Sweet!

Said day-lilies.

Tiny Kitten facing off with Giant Zucchini.

rain dance

2009-07-20T22:36:00.005-05:00

The run-down of the things that are on my mind tonight:

Point #1: It needs to rain.

Not for my plants, which are growing just fine, thank you very much, or for the car, which could actually use a good soaking, but for me. I need it to rain. Very much. I made a promise to myself on Sunday that I was going to use the next two weeks to "cram" for comps - well, in that I would be reading/writing at least four hours per day - and workout and eat healthily. It's now Monday, and I am 0 for 2 so far on following through on those promises. So it needs to rain.

Because... if it rains, I will be forced to stay inside, where I am likely to use that time to work. I will not want to go out into the muck and mire to visit bookstore goodness or soak up outdoorsy atmospheres with puppies frolicking nearby.

Barring the sudden flourish of thunder in the distance, I need to get my butt in gear.

Point #2: The meds need to kick in.

Like an idiot, I left my prescription for the pills that keep my migraines away here, at home, when I went on vacation. This resulted in three migraines while on vacation. So, now I'm home and back on the medicine, but it takes a few days to kick in, which means that I'm still blessed with the every-other-day (no, wait. crap - daily) migraine as the meds slowly work their way back into my system. I am not impressed.*

Point #3: I need to get over it.

I was talking with one of my friends today about the foster-parenting shower that my mom's going to throw once I get a little bit further in the process.** And I'm probably just sensitive, but I felt like she was blowing the whole thing off. Like the subject wasn't really worth her time and/or attention. And it hurt my feelings and annoyed me*** (which is probably why this post is both whiny and bitchy), even though I know my friend is interested in the process and is supportive of my decision to become a foster parent, if for no other reason than it would give her child somebody to play with. So I need to get over it. And I will.

Point #4: I need to get on it.

My big-time-motivational-short-term-goals for myself (target date of Friday, July 31, 2009):
1. I will lose 5-10 pounds.
2. I will work out enough to walk/swim for 30 minutes without being exhausted.
3. I will draft all three synthesis statements and send them off to their respective reviewers.

For the next two weeks, I'm going to follow this basic schedule:
- work out (run the rapids, walk the dog, play water volleyball, etc.)
- make a healthy lunch
- spend the afternoon studying/reading/writing
- chill out/run errands
- make a healthy dinner
- do some night-time yoga to close out the day

That's right, baby. I'm going to the mattresses. Rain or no rain, it's time to dance.

I am a leaf on the wind.

* And I just realized that I forgot to pick up my refill today. Shit...
** Having never been a parent of any kind before, I have no kid stuff. A couple of lovely people came up with the idea of a "kid shower" to help out. I love it!
*** Quite honestly, a lot of things (and people) have been annoying me lately. This probably means that it's an issue with me, rather than with everybody else in my life. One more reason that I need to get over it.