swimming from dry land

Reading Between the Tines

2008-07-30T11:06:00.006-05:00

I've been thinking a lot today about perspective and distance, and also about whether small, random acts of kindness really matter. "Of course they do," we would almost all say hastily, and the whole "pay it forward" ideology/theology has been the subject of several movies (one of the same name) and at least one commercial. Honestly, I thought the movie was stupid and the whole idea frankly seems a little self-serving (i.e. we're always thinking about how our "deposits" will be returned). At the same time, like anyone else, I spend a lot of time trying to assess whether or not I am a good person and how I would know that. But the patterns just don't "make" up any quilt-like sense to me. Sometimes I feel sort of exhausted at trying to follow these lines to understand my own life (which I don't, let's be clear).

This morning I was reading through a journal called The American Scholar, mainly because I am supposed to be writing a book review about a novel whose main characters are a swimmer and a wrestler, and there is a GREAT article about swimming literature in it. But I digress. As I was reading through the magazine, I found an interesting poem called "It Cannot Be Said For Certain" by Kay Ryan.

It cannot be
said for certain
that imagining
a pattern is
self-flattery.
Our acts could
matter. At some
unfathomed distance
the random
could condense
to something -- say
a fork -- against
the velvet dark.
The silver shiver
that we get from
time to time
somewhere adding
up to silver. The
vacancies we suffer
the necessary black
between the tines.

I really like this poem because:
1. I would like to believe that even the random dark is a part of necessary design.
2. Sound is essential to the poem's way of making meaning (try reading it out loud!)
3. I spend a lot of time trying to "understand" life, and sometimes I need to be reminded that I can't necessarily have the perspective I would like.
4. It's short.
5. I think even a fork can be being meaningful (or not meaningful). This made me think of a particular random moment in Paris when I picked up a pen for a guy and he said something to me that I couldn't understand.

Thoughts?

August 1987

2008-05-27T12:04:00.004-05:00

This is a picture of my brother (blue Hawaiian get-up), sister (front row), and me (take a wild guess) with some friends of ours from St. Louis. I put it on here for no other reason than it makes me laugh. Cross-dressing, anyone?!

Hope Was Here, And Left When Things Got Stale

2008-05-22T16:11:00.019-05:00

Shelly's Self-Indulgent Book Review #1 (in which I make no attempt to really convey the plot or meaning of the novel, but instead write a poorly written and shamelessly meandering rant about the state of young adult novels in general. Also, I don't use but a few quotes to back up my argument, which would then give me a barely passing grade, if one were to think those things important).

I just read Hope Was Here, a Newbery Honor Book written by Joan Bauer and published in 2000. I bought it at The Conference on Christianity and Literature in Grand Rapids, MI, off a long table full of books, some with "Christian" themes and perspectives, some without. This, unfortunately, finds itself somewhere luke-warmy in the middle. I'm not glad I spent 7.99 on it, but I do like the front cover (go look it up yourself). It's a story about Hope, a spunky 14-year-old who moves with her aunt Addie to Mulhoney, Wisconsin, to work in the Welcome Staircase diner (which, of course, has two staircases leading up and down from the front door. Cue the symbolism). Her aunt is a goddess at the griddle, and Hope is the kind of waitress I fantasized about being when I was a teenager: able to think on her feet, chit-chat with customers and carry four plates of pancakes on one arm. Instead, I was more suited for lazing in the lifeguard's chair and occasionally dumping ice from my Sonic super-sized drink on the pool rats who irritated me. But I digress. In this book, the word hope (Hope, like I said, being the main character) is so over-used -- it's literal AND symbolic, get it?! -- I almost forgot what the plot centered around... oh right, the diner where Addie and Hope work is run by a man named G.T., who has terminal cancer and has just made the decision to run for mayor against the corrupt incumbent, Eli Millstone. Millstone has ties to the big, bad dairy plant that has been milking the town for centuries.

More importantly, hope is also blossoming in the form of romantic relationships between Addie and G.T., not to mention Hope and the line cook named Braverman, who apparently is very sweaty and dark-haired. But Braverman knows how to shake hands and solicit votes, so he's a real catch. Now, Hope has not always been hopeful, as one might guess. She was basically abandoned by her mother, Deena, who is also a waitress of the genius variety, and who sends her bits of insight (the best part of the novel, let's be honest) about waitressy things like keeping lemon wedges under the counter, a bottle of Tylenol in your pocket, and mentioning new salad dressings so customers will try new things. Now, some of you might know that I have a slight obsession with waitresses, especially those of a particular species, so these reminders were very helpful for my dream job, if I ever decide to leave the ivory tower (note to self: research the phrase "ivory tower").

In closing, the rest of the book is similar to a Hallmark Special. The Hope-isms and insight this 14-year-old delivers are overwrought with double-entendre and hokey observations like: "The rest of the morning went down like cold rolls with a hot meal" or this little gem of a conversation:
[I gave him the short-order truth (Hope to G.T.). "You look like a plate of cold fried eggs. No offense."
"Lost my appeal, huh?"
"It's best the customers don't see the food in that condition."
"You don't mince words."
"Just garlic," I reminded him and led him to the truck.]
Now, I am a fan of the well-placed metaphor, as well as creativity in description. But why the Newbury Honor committee decided to serve up the award for this cup of overbrewed coffee is beyond me. It's as if Bauer just let it sit too long, thinking, "I know I could come up with something better than this... hey, I could compare it to chicken fried steak." If there's one thing young adults cannot stand, it's forced sentimentality or preciousness disguised as "spunk." I will leave you with this quote from Hope's negligent mother to summarize the most important truth that comes early on:
"No matter what happens in the world, from war breaking out to computers taking over our minds and bodies, there's always going to be a need for a good waitress who can keep the coffee coming and add up the check in her head" (p. 29). Well, maybe that's a bit of wisdom I can say Amen to, as long as the coffee you're serving is fresh.

Bruce Almighty

2008-05-08T20:27:00.018-05:00

Here's something new with me: In addition to Top Chef, Stephen Colbert, swing dancing, my traveling pants and the talkative little boy named Alan who lives next door, I'm in love with Bruce Springsteen's music. I'm not an expert by any means; please don't ask me to list random facts about his concerts, covers or album marginalia. I only started to listen to his music about a year ago (thanks to all my friends who have sent me songs and encouraged this investigation), but I feel like I am having an awakening to what music can really DO and MEAN in people's lives. I guess I was waiting for the right kind of music to come along.
In my freshman English class, we ended the semester by talking about argument and story-telling in music, and I had them bring in their own music, and we read the lyrics and talked about boring Englishy things. My choice was to listen to this song ("Thunder Road" from VH1 Storytellers). I have to tell you that I cannot even watch the first couple of chords without my eyes filling with tears. The first stanza kills me every time. Have any of you ever felt that you didn't want to listen to someone's music because you would never hear that next song for the first time again?

My students' feedback: "That's creepy. Why would you want to get in the car with that guy?"
My reply: "Um, because it's Bruce. You'll understand when you're thirty."

Here's another really great recording from 1978, "Prove It All Night" (thanks Nathan's friend Jeff C.). And a list of some semi-cliched but still relevant lessons about life and writing I've learned from Bruce Almighty:
1. Do everything with passion.
2. Don't worry if your stories are simple. They're yours.
3. It's all about the details.
4. Be real.
5. Wearing bracelets can be cool for men and women.

Boston

2008-04-12T20:26:00.003-05:00

Writing Boston

At first there is no reason
to describe
a vacation in Boston,
no reason to recite lists of dishes
served at dusk
and carefully recorded in your notebook:
strip steak
artichoke hearts
tangerine flan.

No reason to relate a meal devoured
across from your brother
in a strange but familiar town
you lived in for just two years
(he says it like that, just…)

You try to forge stories from meals and memories,
and you drag him to that theater
with your name carved in the seat
and the magician’s dirty yellow robe
under plexiglass in the lobby.

But no amount of sitting
on the public garden bench
by the white gazebo
can transport you back
to those two years,
place the subway card in the reader,
conjure the smell of beer and newspaper
for the cuff of your sweater.

On the plane ride home, though,
storyless as a shopping list,
you think about tangerine flan
and waking up
on your brother’s busted air mattress
to children in blue hoodies
suspended on jungle gym bars.

Then suddenly you reach up
to push the tiny round button
with the light bulb in the center,
flounder for a pen
because you’ve remembered
the little blonde girl
with a crooked smile
who stood at the fence with a stick,
peeling back the layers
of leaf and stem
like so many words.

#5 in a series on Young Adult literature

2008-04-04T10:51:00.002-05:00

"Then I must have slipped into a sort of sleep for a few minutes before I was standing on a starting-block, then swimming around in the sea and between me and the shore was this gigantic surf, not the rolling kind which you could, with luck, ride to safety, but the evil dumping kind, which makes a point of hurling its victims head-first into the sand, breaking every bone before washing your body ashore, and now I have to choose between the surf and a school of sharks, I am Tinman again, crumpled silver tossed ashore, but look what else the surf throws up on to the moonlit sand, Miss Macrae in full costume as a witch from Macbeth, with blacked-out teeth, more skull than face, Andy in school uniform, but covered with blood and his handsome face set in a smiling death mask, terrifying in its smoothness and perfection, and a female body, broken and twisted by the force of the sea, which I recognize as myself..."

-- from Tessa Duder's In Lane Three, Alex Archer, pg. 235-236

#4 in a series on Young Adult literature

2008-03-26T13:15:00.001-05:00

"Right," Brother Leon answered, making the check against the name. Looking up, he called, "Renault."
The pause. The damn pause.
"No!"
The Goober felt as if his eyes were the lens for a television camera in one of those documentaries. He swung around in Jerry's direction and saw his friend's face, white, mouth half-open, his arms dangling at his sides. And then he swiveled to look at Brother Leon and saw the shock on the teacher's face, his mouth forming an oval of astonishment. It seemed almost as if Jerry and the teacher were reflections in a mirror.
Finally Brother Leon looked down.
"Renault," he said again, his voice like a whip.
"No. I'm not going to sell the chocolates."
Cities fell. Earth opened. Planets tilted. Stars plummeted. And the awful silence.

-- from Robert Cormier's The Chocolate War (1974), pg. 89

Oh, is that ha-ckey?! *

2008-03-13T10:38:00.013-05:00

So, I'm off to Boston tomorrow for a week of revisiting Emerson College haunts and hanging with my twin bro, whom I know is just chomping at the bit for me to unpack my gigantic suitcase in his living room. The green boots are ready to go! I wish N. could join me (tax season, etc. is preventing it and by etc. I mean his illness called March Madness -- ha!) but I'm looking forward to ordering lots of Dunkin' Donuts coffee and the donuts to complete, watching people doing something v. strange called "reading" on the T, sneaking into the Emerson library to fondle the New Yorker (nerd alert) and celebrating my Irish roots (not really) in Southie on St. Patty's Day. I also want to know if my initials are still carved in the movie seat in that old theater in Beverly by the beach and if the grocery store where I worked for a day (frightened by memorizing numbers associated with produce) is still in business. It will also be wicked cold so I plan on saying that alot. Look for photos and stories to come!

*Paige, that one was for you.

#3 in a series on Young Adult literature

2008-03-06T10:37:00.005-06:00

I thought this was particularly relevant today...

"And he could see, though his eyes were closed. He could see a bright, whirling torrent of crystals in the air around him, and he could see them gather on the backs of his hands, like cold fur.
His breath was visible.
Beyond, through the swirl of what he now, somehow, perceived was the thing the old man had spoken of -- snow -- he could look out and down a great distance. He was up high someplace. The ground was thick with the furry snow, but he sat slightly above it on a hard, flat object...
Comprehending all of those things as he sped downward, he was free to enjoy the breathless glee that overwhelmed him: the speed, the clear cold air, the total silence, the feeling of balance and excitement and peace."

-- Lois Lowry, The Giver

that darn comment

2008-03-02T16:35:00.009-06:00

At church Sunday, a friend of mine commented, "Hey the other day I was watching That Darn Cat! with my daughter, and Hayley Mills kept reminding me of you. I'm not sure why, but I think it was the facial expressions." I have to say that this really made my day. I have loved Mills' movies since I was a little girl. Though I'm not quite sure that I bear any resemblance to her, I now have a renewed interest in watching The Parent Trap, That Darn Cat!, Pollyanna and my absolute favorite, a lesser-known 1964 Disney film called The Moonspinners, a murder mystery set on the island of Crete. I've posted a little montage of Hayley moments below. Any thoughts?

Antarctica, here I come...

2008-02-22T17:58:00.017-06:00

So, we're moving! Monday! And here I am, Sunday night, blogging instead of packing. In my opinion, the least amount of time spent packing, the better. This, admittedly, does not always work out well for me. When it comes to travel, whether across town or across the globe, I tend to do one of two things: overpack or underpack. My theory has always been that opening a box or a suitcase should be a surprise! (Quick sidenote: When I was little, I used to spend a LOT of time going through the L.L. Bean catalog, hypothesizing what would happen if a person was only given 5 or 6 things -- say flannel-lined jeans, a down parka and 3 dog beds -- and sent to Antarctica. This memory may not seem related, but I assure you, it is.) So when a person has to pack everything in his/her entire house into boxes, and label those boxes, I get a little overwhelmed. But instead of Antarctica, we are moving to a great house 2.7 miles from our current one.

You know how lists make me feel better. So here are 10 things I would rather do than pack (also called The Packing Procrastinator's Checklist):

1. Watch Emeril fondle a lamb shank.
2. Drive to Austin. Revel in sunshine, Amy's ice cream and great friends.
3. Ogle at the Oscars.
4. Practice the Boston accent.
5. Sing/dance with drapes like Julie Andrews in "Sound of Music."
6. Mourn absence of girl scout cookies.
7. Staring contest with pet.
8. Watch lunar eclipse.
9. Organize email inbox. (1,919 and counting!)
10. Plan a trip to Antarctica.

The State Swim Meet

2008-02-19T08:44:00.004-06:00

This weekend N and I are going to Austin to meet some of our great friends, Hope and Chris, and Hope and I will attend the UIL State Swimming and Diving Championships. I am looking forward to going because Kingwood High School, my alma mater, always does well, and I love to watch competitive swimming. Anyway, the last time I went to the State Championships was two years ago, and I was deep in the midst of writing my dissertation. I thought you might like to read a little bit of it about that experience. I know this time it will probably be different and yet much the same. I'm glad Hope will be there to share it with me.

The State Meet

My husband Nathan and I went to the UIL 5A State Swim meet in Austin, Texas, during a weekend in February, a couple of months after the miscarriage, to get away from our sadness. I wanted to see if I could connect with that part of my life, if I could feel the same excitement of my youth, cheering for someone racing fast into the wall. On the way to the swim meet, my husband asked me how long I wanted to stay (he was looking forward to going to the UT basketball game against Kansas that night). I said a couple of hours, and that I was sure I would be ready to leave. I was excited about seeing the Kingwood team and knew that there was a good chance that my old coaches would be there. I wanted to find the rest of the parents and supporters in navy and white, our school colors. However, most of the seats at the Jamail Natatorium were filled long before the doors opened, and there were no open seats in the Kingwood section. Nathan thought it would be important to see the end of each race (the fingers actually hitting the touch pad at the end of the lane), so we sat at the top of the middle section next to some rival Houston Cy-Fair fans, whom I immediately disliked. I felt a surge of protectiveness towards the Kingwood swimmers and their families, as if I still belonged in their clique, and cheered quietly, although inside I was ecstatic whenever a Kingwood swimmer took a medal. The chlorine stank and the air was warm and muggy. It felt like home.
Popular rap music played loudly as we found our seats, and the lanes were full in all three pools (the 50-meter pool was divided into three 25-yard pools). The competitors swam in concentric circles, one almost on top of the other, and looking down on it from such a great height made me a little dizzy. I immediately felt a tightening in my chest, a pull towards the water as if a rope connected me down there. I felt nostalgia but also a very present sense of excitement, as if I were one of them and would be swimming a race in a couple of hours.

After we squashed ourselves into our white plastic chairs, I looked through the program to see where Kingwood’s swimmers were seeded. How they had swam in the semifinals would automatically place them in their lanes for the final race – in descending order – lane 4 being the fastest, followed by 5, 3, 6, 2, 7, 1, and 8 being the slowest-seeded time). For each race there was a consolation heat and a final heat. I went through my program in excitement, checking all of the names and looking for pool records set by the Kingwood team in the past. At the top of the page, where the records were listed, I saw many names I recognized – Olympic gold medalist Natalie Coughlin from California, Dana Vollmer from Granbury, Texas, and even a Janet Evans record from the 1980s still stood in the 500 and 1500 free. I also found that the 200 free in the Boys section was still unbroken from 1993, during my years at Kingwood. I remembered those boys, their bodies lean and tan and smooth. One of them committed suicide a couple of years ago. With that recollection, I suddenly felt like an impostor. I had never made it. I was never good enough to swim with the elite. I had gone to the State Meet in 1994, and it was the last thing I ever did in my swimming career, but the fact remained that I hadn’t qualified. I just rode the bus with the team. My 200 free time was close but not good enough. I swam the best 200 free of my career at the Regional meet at Humble High School, a 2:12. These swimmers were all qualifying in under two minutes. Not much had changed.

I looked down and saw my old coach, Lanny Landtroop, in the stands. I wanted to go talk to him, but I felt fat and insecure. What would I say to him? Would he remember me? I didn’t want to go. I didn’t want him to recognize me. He looked older; instead of a flat top of white blond hair, he was bald. His hands looked exactly the same, though – thick and white, with deep creases in the knuckles. I remembered his hands. I could imagine his feet, the light hairs crowning his toes. I felt nauseous. I had to get out of there.

On my way to the bathroom, I saw a girl I recognized from high school who swam on the Kingwood team with me. I remembered her name immediately -- Tanya. She was standing with a bunch of high school swimmers under the stairs. Maybe she was a coach. She looked exactly the same, too: permed hair, glasses, even the shape of her thighs – like Vienna sausages. I wondered if I looked very much the same, too. I felt a lot older. I wanted to be. Since we used to get ready for school in the locker room, I remembered that we used to make fun of her. I felt like I was back in high school again. I was old and then young, aging again and again. I remembered posing for our Varsity team picture my junior year. We wore men’s dress shirts and ties over our Speedos, creating three rows of magician’s assistants, smiling strangely and cut in half.
As I reminisced, I watched the bodies on deck as much as the swimming. I yearned to feel in shape again, to take the strength of my body for granted. These are the images that stay with me: a girl whipping her arms back and forth, shoulder blades swinging like a seesaw. A boy in a Speedo and white cap hunched over an I-Pod. Four girls with wet hair on a podium, smiling into the flash of light.

math

2008-02-09T16:20:00.000-06:00

#2 in a series on Young Adult literature

2008-02-05T14:37:00.000-06:00

When they were all gathered and Bridget stopped aerobicizing, Carmen began. "On the last night before the diaspora" -- she paused briefly so everyone could admire her use of the word -- "we discovered some magic." She felt an itchy tingle in the arches of her feet. "Magic comes in many forms. Tonight it comes to us in a pair of pants. I hereby propose that these Pants belong to us equally, that they will travel to all the places we're going, and they will keep us together when we're apart."

"Let's take the vow of the Traveling Pants." Bridget excitedly grabbed Lena's and Tibby's hands. Bridget and Carmen were always the ones who staged friendship ceremonies unabashedly. Tibby and Lena were the ones who acted like there was a camera crew in the room.

"Tonight we are Sisters of the Pants," Bridget intoned when they'd formed a ring. "Tonight we give the Pants the love of our Sisterhood so that we can take that love wherever we go."

-- Ann Brashares, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, pg. 20-21.

etiquette, or my new favorite reading material

2008-02-01T17:29:00.000-06:00

Recently, at an antiques store, I purchased a copy of Emily Post's (Mrs. Price Post) Etiquette, the New and Enlarged version, published in 1931. I can hear some of you laughing already at the thought of me poring over "The Blue Book of Social Usage," considering my tendency to treat animals like people, trip, awkwardly drop things, and, generally, make a gigantic fool of myself. My parents may have had a similar thought when they enrolled me in Modeling school when I was 13 (But that is a post for another time -- I seem to have misplaced my "portfolio").

Anyway, I would just like to say: this book is delightful. Amusing, yes. Sometimes ridiculous, yes. But I can't tear myself away. And many of the lessons on manners are really quite profound, in a nostalgic sort of way, though I am glad I don't carry a parasol in Abilene winds. The weighty tome, comprising almost 800 pages, and smelling a bit like moss, includes chapters on everything from Introductions, Greetings, Conversation, Cards and Visits, Dinner-Giving, Balls and Dances, Weddings, Funerals, Business and Politics to a very ironic last chapter called "The Growth of Good Taste in America." The word "etiquette" itself, by the way, is French, and it means "Keep off the grass."

So I tried to pick a few of my favorite gems I wanted to share. Thoughts?

"GUEST COURTESY:
Courtesy is especially necessary toward those whose hospitality you accept, and toward those to whom your hospitality is extended. Mrs. Climber, eagerly lunching with Mrs. Greymouse because she knows Mrs. Worldly to be there, and then having eyes and ears so obviously focused on Mrs. Worldly that she never addresses a word or an interested look in Mrs. Greymouse's direction, might as well have a placard "I am an upstart" hung around her neck. It is not only rude, but, from a purely worldly and calculating standpoint, a losing trick."

"HOW TO BREAK AN AWKWARD SILENCE:
Do not snatch at it. Let it go for a little while. Conversation is not a race that must be continued at break-neck pace lest the prize be lost. Far, far worse than the longest, most awkward pause, is the tongue which, without a thought to urge it, rattles ceaselessly."

"HOW A DINNER CAN BE BUNGLED"
This was quite a long section that I won't type here, but I personally think "bungled" is a hilarious word.

"SHOES AND SLIPPERS:
Sport shoes are naturally adapted to the sport for which they are intended. High-heeled slippers do not go with any country clothes, except organdie or muslins or other distinctly feminine "summer" dresses, such as are seen only at weddings, lawn parties, or at watering-places abroad."

"THE PERFECT SECRETARY:
The perfect secretary should forget that she is a human being, and be the most efficient machine that she can possibly make of herself -- in business hours."

I will skip THE COST OF BEING A BRIDESMAID, VULGAR CLOTHES, PRESENTATION AT ROYAL COURT, and FOR WHAT SHE REALLY IS, but I can tell you right now, that they are fascinating.

shelly's scrumptious skills, and samoas

2008-01-25T20:10:00.000-06:00

I think that when you are feeling the slightest bit intimidated, you should make a list of everything you are good at. It makes you feel thankful, no matter what. The best thing about making this list is that you don't ACTUALLY have to be good at the things on the list, you only have to THINK you are.
So here is a recent list I made on a Chili's napkin. I would have written it on my hand, but I was eating a tiny hamburger on a stick. (This is by no means all-inclusive or in order, btw. I'm not including "giving,""recycling," or "loving Jesus" because that is just obnoxious, and hopefully, obvious.) If some of these are repeats from earlier posts, I apologize.

Things I am Good At:
1. Writing on My Hand
2. Name That Girl Scout Cookie
3. Stealing Pens
4. Flip Turns (swimming)
5. Spying a Left-Handed Person From a Mile Away
6. Mocking Food-Network Hosts
7. Making Pancakes and Grilled Cheese Sandwiches While Wishing I Paid More Attention to Food-Network Hosts
8. Napping
9. Creating Interpretive Dances Using Sports Equipment (This requires explanation. My middle school gym teachers didn't actually TEACH us hockey or tennis -- we had to make up dances to "She's Drives Me Crazy" and "Jump" using cones, balls, hockey sticks and tennis rackets; also, there was a lot of flailing, bouncing and jazz hands involved. Not surprisingly, the gym teachers were also the cheerleading sponsors).
10. Incorporating "Seriously" and "Whatever" into everyday conversation.
11. Feigning Interest/Listening
12. Passing Shots (tennis)
13. Changing Hair
14. Using Dog as Pillow
15. Forgetting Directions
16. Thinking Up Funny Titles for Things, Namely Other People's Fantasy Food-Network Shows
17. Tripping Up Stairs
18. Revising Everything I Write
19. Inspecting Teeth
20. Embracing Silence and Respecting Vulnerability (technically two, but I don't want to go overboard).

I won't be sad if no one responds to this post; I just want you to do it for yourself.

#1 in a series on Young Adult literature

2008-01-22T21:29:00.000-06:00

"Why do daemons have to settle?" Lyra said. "I want Pantalaimon to be able to change forever. So does he."
"Ah, they always have settled, and they always will. That's part of growing up. There'll come a time when you'll be tired of his changing about, and you'll want a settled form for him."
"I never will!"
"Oh, you will. You'll want to grow up like all the other girls. Anyway, there's compensations for a settled form."
"What are they?"
"Knowing what kind of person you are. Take old Belisaria. She's a seagull, and that means I'm a seagull too. I'm not grand or splendid nor beautiful, but I'm a tough old thing and I can survive anywhere and always find a bit of food and company. That's worth knowing, that is. And when your daemon settles, you'll know the sort of person you are."
"But suppose your daemon settles in a shape you don't like?"
"Well, then you're discontented, en't you? There's plenty of folk as'd like to have a lion as a daemon and they end up with a poodle. And till they learn to be satisfied with what they are, they're going to be fretful about it. Waste of feeling, that is."
But it didn't seem to Lyra that she would ever grow up.

-- Philip Pullman, The Golden Compass, pg. 167-168

doppelgangers of the world, compete

2008-01-14T18:24:00.000-06:00

In what can only be described as a funny coincidence (okay, I was googling myself to avoid work), recently I came upon my (or one of my) doppelganger in The Tuscon Citizen. I don't know about you, but I rarely think about the fact that there are probably many people out there with my name. But when I do (don't try to pretend you haven't googled yourself), I wonder what kinds of lives those other "Shelly Sanders" are living, what they are doing, and what types of things they say. (I try to go with the most current version of my name, but I guess the possibilities are endless if I look for Michelle Weed, or Shelly Weed or Michelle Sanders or whatever). Anyway, it kind of cracks me up when I read quotes from these ghosts of myself. So, in case you were wondering, there is another Shelly Sanders out there who apparently loves her dog WAY more than me, is definitely more flexible and makes a lot more money. Sigh.

From "They're Dogged in Hunt For Perfect Gifts" by Ryn Gargulinski in The Tuscon Citizen, 12.22.07

"They have a whole wardrobe with all kinds of festive things," said owner Shelly Sanders. "Easter dresses, Halloween costumes, Christmas sweaters, biker wear. They have University of Arizona cheerleading outfits they wear to tailgating parties."
She said all the pampering is worth it to see the smiles in every eye that spies the doggie duo.
One of the most extravagant items Sanders bought was a $150 hand-knit sweater embroidered with Stella's name. That - and first class airplane tickets.
"They travel everywhere with us," said Sanders, a certified yoga instructor who makes frequent trips to Los Angeles and New York.

So... does anyone out there have any interesting "second self" stories?

a new semester

2008-01-14T09:01:00.000-06:00

MY LORD GOD, I have no idea where I am going.
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.
And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it.
Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.
I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.

- Thomas Merton, "Thoughts in Solitude"

one of the best last paragraphs EVER

2008-01-10T23:00:00.000-06:00

"Where language touches the earth there is the holy." -- N. Scott Momaday.

I recently reread House Made of Dawn by N. Scott Momaday, and I am just in awe of his writing. It is almost unbearably beautiful to read. If this last paragraph doesn't make you want to read the preceding 184 pages of Pulitzer-prize winning prose about an American Indian named Abel, then I don't know what you are doing reading my blog (Just kidding! Thanks for reading!). And THANK YOU, Mr. Momaday. You challenge me to be a better writer.

"The soft and sudden sound of their going, swift and breaking away all at once, startled him, and he began to run after them. He was running, and his body cracked open with pain, and he was running on. He was running and there was no reason to run but the running itself and the land and the dawn appearing. The sun rose up in the saddle and shone in shafts upon the road across the snow-covered valley and the hills, and the chill of the night fell away and it began to rain. He saw the slim black bodies of the runners in the distance, gliding away without sound through the slanting light and the rain. He was running and a cold sweat broke out upon him and his breath heaved with the pain of running. His legs buckled and he fell in the snow. The rain fell around him in the snow and he saw his broken hands, how the rain made streaks upon them and dripped soot upon the snow. And he got up and ran on. He was alone and running on. All of his being was concentrated in the sheer motion of running on, and he was past caring about the pain. Pure exhaustion laid hold of his mind, and he could see at last without having to think. He could see the canyon and the mountains and the sky. He could see the rain and the river and the fields beyond. He could see the dark hills at dawn. He was running and under his breath he began to sing. There was no sound, and he had no voice; he had only the words of a song. And he went on running on the rise of the song. House made of pollen, house made of dawn. Qtsedaba."

p.s. Oh, sorry to "ruin" the ending, but I figured it was worth it.

some thoughts about listening, and telling

2008-01-09T21:00:00.001-06:00

For the past couple of months, I have been given the opportunity to be a part of a church-sponsored group that meets once a week to talk about, well, let's just say that we talk about how we can help more people in our day-to-day interactions. We are attempting to talk to our church about helping people and developing relationships with people we wouldn't normally even look twice at. There are lots of acronyms involved and words like "missional" and "intersection" thrown about, but that's not really important, nor what this post is about. The thing is, I was hesitant about joining this group, wary of why I was being asked to be a part of it, and frustrated at the seeming initial lack of organization. I was thrown into a group of people of varying ages and asked to work together with them. I could see from the beginning that I would need to do a lot of listening in order to find my place, or to be in any way helpful to them.

Let me digress a little bit here to say that honestly I have been trying, for the last couple of months, anyway, not to think too hard about God. Thinking about God or talking about God inevitably made me sad, because it made me think about all of the unanswered questions that I have, and the grief that has been following me like a lost dog for the past couple of years.

What am I trying to say? Tonight's meeting made me think about God. And it was okay. I was thinking about how amazing it is when you really listen to people, though you may or may not agree with them or even understand them. I've just been reminded of the staggering multiplicity of stories that are out there, on people's tongues and unfolding in people's lives. I am not just talking from my "writer's" platform, either. The sheer enormity of stories, anecdotes, lessons, whatever you want to call them, were reflected to me in the stars on my drive home. Maybe that is cliche -- stories are like stars -- and suddenly I'm remembering the Bible verse that talks about how God knows each hair on our head, each grain of sand, each star in the sky, and I'm thinking about the giant web of intersection that is life. Yes, we never know who we are helping, and the ripple effect that kindness can produce. But what I want to say is this. I was humbled and comforted to know that my stories, the ones that have been told and cried and laughed over a hundred times, and the ones that are never told -- the stories that I will never tell and that I will never hear from others' lips -- those stories are still important. Those stories are, somehow, being reflected in what has happened in the past, and is happening in the present, and will happen in the future. Even stories about people who died too young, or were never even given the chance to take a first breath.

When this group I am meeting with finally comes up with a "game plan," that will be wonderful. But some of the amazing work that is being done is in that little conference room with a group of people that may or may not understand each other at every moment. Stories don't have to be ABOUT God or about faith to BE God or to BE faith. There is faith in each story that we start; to me, there is an element of the divine that we open our mouths or hold out our hands, and words are shared that SAY something. So maybe the most important thing is not necessarily that we are understanding everything, but that we recognize that the telling, or even the potential for telling, is enough.

samson by regina spektor

2008-01-03T22:08:00.000-06:00

I would just like to say that moving origami is always cool. Also, a little known fact about me is that I am not half bad at origami. Definitely plan to include it in my music video debut.

things I've learned from 2007 and some pictures from a disposable camera

2007-12-31T16:28:00.001-06:00

Hi Friends! Happy New Year! Welcome 2008! (Insert inspirational quote here). Here are my New Year's Faux/Real-Resolutions (the fun part is figuring out which ones I'm being serious about). Warning: this is an extremely sarcastic post. Those still high on "the Christmas spirit" should stop reading immediately and go trolling for leftover Christmas cookies.
Okay, here goes:

1. Make fewer resolutions; instead, tell people that, against all odds and with the help of last year's resolutions, I have crafted myself into the most perfect human specimen ever to grace the planet. And, also, that I have finally memorized the Bible.
2. Convince Nathan that Epcot Center does NOT count as traveling the world.
3. Always bet on Red 23 (Thanks, Cole!)
4. Learn to love the smell of dead crickets and freshmen body odor.
5. Begrudgingly agree to George Eads' restraining order.
6. Stop smelling my right hand and/or blogging about it.
7. Never use inspirational quotes. If quote is in stanza form, okay. Rhyming poems need not apply.
8. Start heavily drinking, smoking and get more tattoos.
9. Open tiny shop where I cut hair as well as selling button necklaces and the "perfect" grilled cheese sandwich.
10. Smile more.

What are you planning on doing differently in 2008? Only joke comments, please... Nobody wants to hear about your new diet/exercise/goodwill/"finding joy in the small things" garbage.

Here are some pictures from our crappy disposable camera to bring you tidings of comfort and joy.

The Weed "twins" who look nothing alike:
We like to pose by outdated modes of transportation used in the wild west.
Yes... another stagecoach.
Er... Paige and Philip, getting crazy.

Does anyone else wonder where my feet have gone?

My nephew Benjamin, whose smile makes me smile.

This is my friend Hope, who successfully ordered a drink that is like hot chocolate, but only with vanilla.

What I finally settled on after searching unsuccessfully for a Christmas poem that I liked.

2007-12-19T21:30:00.000-06:00

"Prayer" by Jorie Graham

Over a dock railing, I watch the minnows, thousands, swirl
themselves, each a minuscule muscle, but also, without the
way to create current, making of their unison (turning, re-
infolding,
entering and exiting their own unison in unison) making of themselves a
visual current, one that cannot freight or sway by
minutest fractions the water's downdrafts and upswirls, the
dockside cycles of finally-arriving boat-wakes, there where
they hit deeper resistance, water that seems to burst into
itself (it has those layers) a real current though mostly
invisible sending into the visible (minnows) arrowing
motion that forces change --
this is freedom. This is the force of faith. Nobody gets
what they want. Never again are you the same. The longing
is to be pure. What you get is to be changed. More and more by
each glistening minute, through which infinity threads itself,
also oblivion, of course, the aftershocks of something
at sea. Here, hands full of sand, letting it sift through
the wind, I look in and say take this, this is
what I have saved, take this, hurry. And if I listen
now? Listen, I was not saying anything. It was only
something I did. I could not choose words. I am free to go.
I cannot of course come back. Not to this. Never.
It is a ghost posed on my lips. Here: never.

beginnings, middles and ends

2007-12-15T17:28:00.000-06:00

A white van just delivered a Christmas present, boots from my twin brother Chris. They are green and made of soft suede, but I will not open the package yet. I am saving them for a trip to Boston in the Spring.

My last post was a poem about beginnings, middles and ends from my favorite poet, Billy Collins. I love the way he describes these stages in snapshots; the multiplicity of images for each word makes me think differently about our obsession with linearity, the idea that my life is going from a horizontal Point A to Point B to Point C, with spaces in the middle to signify each stage, and then it will be over. In contrast, all at the same time, I feel I am at the beginning, middle, and ends of many things. I tend to think of time as not linear, but more like a spirograph, or a repeating circle, except it is one of those spirographs that never turned out right: the center was always moving, and so the circles never exactly met in the middle, but it was close enough to make some things overlap. I recently read in an article about Dirk Nowitski (he went on a walkabout after last season) that Aborigines in Australia believe that the past and the future travel with you in the present. I really like that idea, and I can see that working with my spirograph. Crossings are so much more interesting if you can rely on things from the past to help you see the future clearly.

Like most of you reading this (I'm assuming), I like to take walks. Many famous writers have loved walking, including Pound and Hemingway. I just realized that I like to walk more in the winter than in the summer; there is something about walking in my street clothes in the cold that reminds me of my time in graduate school in Boston. I used to get off of the T (the subway) a couple of miles before the Boylston stop for Emerson and walk through Back Bay in the morning, just to walk early as the sun was rising and see Boston waking up as I went. I would usually stop and get a coffee, holding it carefully as my boots clomped on the red cobblestones and the bells jangled as the shopkeepers opened doors and hosed off the sidewalks. I remember striped green-and-white awnings and cursive sale signs. I remember white children's layettes and alphabet blocks in some windows and tiny chocolate cakes on trays in others. I smelled cinnamon and I smelled fish bones and I smelled snow. I smelled grease and paper and leather. I walked past courtyards and flower pots and ripe tomatoes. I walked past people sweeping and skulking and kissing in doorways. I walked through Boston on those early mornings, and I felt as if I walked through my whole life.

Though I enjoy my walks around campus and around my neighborhood, I miss those Back Bay streets. Sometimes I drive downtown just to walk on concrete, to feel the solidness of a city, even though some would scoff at that notion. I'm looking forward to the trip to Boston in March, and to walking and to walking and to walking. I know I will feel the past underneath my feet and the future pushing me onward to the public gardens, where the swans are swimming in lazy circles, and their wings make ripples in the dark water.

aristotle

2007-12-15T17:01:00.000-06:00

"Aristotle" by Billy Collins

This is the beginning.
Almost anything can happen.
This is where you find
the creation of light, a fish wriggling onto land,
the first word of Paradise Lost on an empty page.
Think of an egg, the letter A,
a woman ironing on a bare stage
as the heavy curtain rises.
This is the very beginning.
The first-person narrator introduces himself,
tells us about his lineage.
The mezzo-soprano stands in the wings.
Here the climbers are studying a map
or pulling on their long woolen socks.
This is early on, years before the Ark, dawn.
The profile of an animal is being smeared
on the walls of a cave,
and you have not yet learned to crawl.
This is the opening, the gambit,
a pawn moving forward an inch.
This is your first night with her,
your first night without her.
This is the first part
where the wheels begin to turn,
where the elevator begins its ascent,
before the doors lurch apart.

This is the middle.
Things have had time to get complicated,
messy, really. Nothing is simple anymore.
Cities have sprouted up along the rivers
teeming with people at cross-purposes --
a million schemes, a million wild looks.
Disappointment unshoulders his knapsack
here and pitches his ragged tent.
This is the sticky part where the plot congeals,
where the action suddenly reverses
or swerves off in an outrageous direction.
Here the narrator devotes a long paragraph
to why Miriam does not want Edward's child.
Someone hides a letter under a pillow.
Here the aria rises to a pitch,
a song of betrayal, salted with revenge.
And the climbing party is stuck on a ledge
halfway up the mountain.
This is the bridge, the painful modulation.
This is the thick of things.
So much is crowded into the middle --
the guitars of Spain, piles of ripe avacados,
Russian uniforms, noisy parties,
lakeside kisses, arguments heard through a wall --
too much to name, too much to think about.

And this is the end,
the car running out of road,
the river losing its name in an ocean,
the long nose of the photographed horse
touching the white electric line.
This is the colophon, the last elephant in the parade,
the empty wheelchair,
and pigeons floating down in the evening.
Here the stage is littered with bodies,
the narrator leads the characters to their cells,
and the climbers are in their graves.
It is me hitting the period
and you closing the book.
It is Sylvia Plath in the kitchen
and St. Clement with an anchor around his neck.
This is the final bit
thinning away to nothing.
This is the end, according to Aristotle,
what we have all been waiting for,
what everything comes down to,
the destination we cannot help imagining,
a streak of light in the sky,
a hat on a peg, and outside the cabin, falling leaves.

in absentia

2007-12-11T14:36:00.000-06:00

Hello friends,
I decided to come up with a list of things I will NEVER blog about because I was trying to think of things to write, and everything that came to mind sounded really boring. Making a list does not count as blogging. But if I do, in the future, blog about one of these things, then you can make me do something embarrassing, e.g., wear a retainer or make shadow puppets.

Okay, here's the list:
1. the most recent episode of "The Hills"
2. grading final exams
3. politics, or more specifically, any post in which I write, "And that is why the death penalty/abortion/gun control/tax is right/wrong."
4. why my right hand smells weird at this moment
5. why using a calculator makes me happy
6. dieting/overeating associated with the holidays
7. the weather, generally speaking (specific comments on nature/solar system/birds are okay)
8. "getting into the Christmas spirit"
9. the contents of my desk drawer
10. what "in absentia" technically means

praying in color, or doodling

2007-12-02T22:16:00.000-06:00

Tonight at a small group meeting of friends, we tried "praying in color." This is a prayer practice based on Sybil Macbeth's book of the same name. But you don't really need the book. All you need is a piece of paper and a pen or markers. She recommends keeping the doodling to abstract shapes, names, lines, squiggles and dots, but basically the point of the whole thing is to think of doodling as prayer; the drawing/coloring helps us to focus on our concerns, and then the right brain makes creative associations and connections. I love this practice, and I think it can help me listen, which is something I'm trying to do more of every day. I have been particularly thinking about people I know for whom the holidays are a sad or difficult time.

Also, you can learn a lot about a person from their doodlings. I flipped through a book of Presidential doodlings once, and they were fascinating: Nixon's were perverse, Clinton's boring; or was it the other way around? At this point, I can't remember, but I'm having fun typing the word "doodling." And now it sounds really weird.

On that note, here are some lingering questions from my week (please comment, by all means):
1. Why don't people wear ear muffs anymore?
2. Why is it so hard to know when to STOP decorating? (I'm particularly thinking of holiday lights and lawn ornaments, cakes, and hair dye).
3. When you call someone's cell phone, why does it take five minutes of listening to detailed instructions just to be able to leave a message? Don't we already know that "beep" means "start talking"? ("At the beep, please record your message. When you are finished with your message, you may either hang up, or push pound for more options.")
4. What is it about remembering our dreams that is so exciting and yet so disconcerting?
5. What is it about a person carving a gigantic roast beef at the end of every buffet that makes me lose my appetite?

p.s. Many thanks to Drs. Jaime Goff and Jackie Halstead for the "Praying in Color" idea.

the accident

2007-11-26T20:26:00.000-06:00

It was an accident,
your average fender bender
with a glacial blue van
that shimmered like fish scales
in the wet intersection.

It was like gently bumping
the boy in front of you
at the water fountain line,
except the boy turns,
droplets clinging to his snarling lips,
and he is an older man
wearing a black scarf and a camel coat
blooming blotchy as his face.

What were you thinking, he keeps saying.
It’s only a week old.
I count my husband’s apologies
through the windshield,
his hair spiking with the salty spray
of rain and rising frustration.

The words between them are choppy,
compressed as suddenly
as the space between
our bumper and his.

The scarfed man looks at me, darkly.
I am impassive and buoyant,
bobbing aimlessly as a bird
in the gray passenger sea.

His wife, in her matching camel boots,
emerges from the yawning whale’s mouth
and rounds behind the wheezing newborn,
a leviathan transport netted from the deep.

The whale and I sigh heavily under her scrutiny.
She runs her hand quickly
along the wet bumper, flinging a sheet of water
over our shared maritime misfortune,
and I can feel the fin smooth under her fingers,
as smooth as cerulean sea glass,
tumbled up on concrete shore.

p.s. I also wanted to title this "The Fin-der Bender" or "A Whale of a Tale" but decided it didn't quite go with the poem's tone. :)

days, or a poem disguising a note to my sister

2007-11-20T20:58:00.000-06:00

"Days" by Billy Collins

Each one is a gift, no doubt,
mysteriously placed in your waking hand
or set upon your forehead
moments before you open your eyes.

Today begins cold and bright,
the ground heavy with snow
and the thick masonry of ice,
the sun glinting off the turrets of clouds.

Through the calm eye of the window
everything in its place
but so precariously
this day might be resting somehow

on the one before it,
all the days of the past stacked high
like the impossible tower of dishes
entertainers used to build on stage.

No wonder you find yourself
perched on the top of a tall ladder
hoping to add one more.
Just another Wednesday,

you whisper,
then holding your breath,
place this cup on yesterday's saucer
without the slightest clink.

p.s. I hope that tomorrow will not be "just another Wednesday" for you. See you all next week.

p.p.s. Dear Paige, if you are reading this: DO NOT eat all of the marshmallow yum-yum salad before I get there. I know you are the one who makes it, but still... :)

happy thanksgiving

2007-11-19T17:37:00.000-06:00

10 things that I am thankful for besides my family, friends, students, dog and God:
1. words
2. those who read them
3. smiles
4. those who share them
5. kleenex
6. those who offer them
7. cows
8. those who milk them (and add chocolate)
9. trees
10. those who plant/climb/walk underneath them
I know my blog hasn't expressed this enough, and maybe it is passe to be thankful during Thanksgiving, but I am thankful for my life and the chance to share it with you all.

the eye doctor

2007-11-16T16:59:00.000-06:00

The eye doctor is gentle and always says please.
Please now, rest your chin on the black plastic disc,
center your forehead and stare straight ahead.

As if the word rest could bring comfort,
as if I could close my eyes
in this black plastic muzzle and snore.

I suddenly remember my eyes as round.

He is looking through, to the backs of my retinas,
at rods and cones and optic disks --
the pathways to reflection etched before I was born.

My eyes are watering from the sharp absence of blink,
but I don’t. And then I do. Blink.

I pretend that the flickering pulse of light
is a distant star, and I am only
one science fiction moment away from the milky way
splayed out around me --
all of that black cavernous space
instead of these tight elbows of robotic arms.

I am remembering how blind I have been, seeing
the succession of patting doctor’s hands,
the sharp bright light of bad news.
Sympathy makes space between vowels:
No, no, not this time.

I wonder why it is the very thing that we try not to think
when we don’t want to cry that makes us cry.

I find myself blurry at the eye-chart.

I can’t identify a single sculpted S,
and when the mustachioed man with the soft voice
asks if I’ve always had those scars deep
on the backside of my retinas,
I am still mute.
He continues asking the unanswerable questions.
Better? Or worse? Better? Or worse?

I do everything the eye doctor asks.
I even show him how his photograph of the eyeball,
a fiery explosion of lava, moon and dust,
looks exactly like a supernova.

And when he laughs,
softer still,
I realize that I’ve made him see something he couldn’t before.

Dry and dilated, I feel my way into the blinding sun.
I make sure, then, to remember that I have cried.
I have cried for one light year,
and twenty minutes of wet relief
have made me squint again.

a thin, albeit itchy place

2007-11-12T22:16:00.000-06:00

Today as I was laying between sun and grass in my backyard, here are some things I thought about:
1. Mike Cope's explanation on Sunday of "thin places." This idea appeals to me, but I am having trouble really identifying with it. Now, I may have not gotten this totally correct, what with my tendency to contemplate vampire teeth during sermons, but what I think I heard was that these are places where heaven and earth are collapsed; therefore, we go to or remember these places to feel God's presence or listen to him. Mike's main biblical example was the place where Jacob had his Dream. During service, we were asked to share our thin places with our neighbor.
The person sitting behind my friend had a brilliant, meaningful thin place, which I don't quite feel comfortable sharing, even though I'm not vain enough to think he will ever read this. However, it had to do with his late wife and our weekly recitation of the Lord's Prayer.
On the other hand, I made up a thin place, so I wouldn't be a bad Christian. Okay, so yes, I like the Boston Commons. And my parents' trees. And many different lakes, beaches and swimming pools. I used to have places where I could go to be in nature or water and be alone, and maybe I thought I was communing with God, but now I'm not so sure they were really "thin places," not like Jacob's. Maybe I'm just confused. Do we really need a "place" to commemorate those we've loved and lost? Or am I making this too hard? Maybe we do all need a place in our memory, a place of profound beauty or loss or change to help us understand who we are.
2. I really hate when people spread rumors in church about books/movies that they haven't read or seen, based upon internet research and/or hearsay. I believe that this is a form of Censorship. The latest young adult literature book to be crucified by non-reading parents everywhere: Philip Pullman's The Golden Compass series.
3. I should get my oil changed.
4. Maybe this is a thin place. And maybe you shouldn't try to discuss theological issues in your blog. You don't really pay attention enough to do that.
5. Yes, your dog is about to eat her own feces if you don't stop her.

lunch, with friends

2007-11-10T18:10:00.000-06:00

It was a day when I said everything was fine.
I was messy and put my feet on the dashboard.
I pulled at my bangs.
We drove until we saw them walking toward us on white gravel.
I pointed to the smokestack waving under clouds.
We squinted.
We ate chicken fried steak and were surprised.
Seven sat at the table, tasting friendship one bite at a time.
I pulled the child away at the last second.
He bowed his head when I tickled him.
He laughed in a striped shirt.
We made promises in the parking lot.
We only told a little because we were so happy to be there.

revenge of the nerds

2007-11-08T17:25:00.000-06:00

This may seem like a very strange subject for a blog, but I am irritated with my students for undervaluing and disparaging nerds. For the last two class periods of Freshman English, we have been watching a documentary called Spellbound, which won the Academy Award in 2001 for Best Doc. It basically chronicles the journey of 8 contestants in the National Spelling Bee. Several of the spellers' parents are immigrants and their teachers comment on how this affects their worldviews; however, wherever they are from, the spellers all value hard work, discipline and intelligence. Let me say that my students, who are watching the documentary, have shown me that most of them do NOT value these attributes. I can tell from their responses to the video that, for the most part, they think these kids are certifiably crazy. They scoff at statements like "I study 8 hours a day in the summer, and 5 during the school year." They laugh at the kids' nerdy glasses, speech impediments and awkward idiosyncrasies. This makes me furious. Especially at the ones who are failing my class. They just fail to see the connection between hard work and success. In fact, I have had several students come to me recently complaining about their lack of motivation. What I want to know is why these students were never taught to value these attributes, to understand that the "nerdier" you are, the more success, and the more opportunities for success, is available for you later on.

I grew up in a snobby/rich/privileged (however you want to say it) part of Houston. I was NOT what I would consider a "nerd," (too busy trying to get into trouble with my "bad" friends and/or swimming 2-5 hours a day), though I was in the Honors Society and made good grades. However, I always had a keen sense of the fact that the nerds would have the final say. So they're awkward or socially uncomfortable... but so what? It just really does not make sense to ridicule someone who can spell 40,000 more words than I can.
Lately, I have found myself apologizing for being a "nerd." When people asked me to explain my Halloween costume, and my answer was "poetry in motion," I apologized for my "nerdy" idea. When people ask me what I do, and I talk about my PhD in Literature or teaching at a university, I often apologize by saying, "I'm a giant nerd." This clears the air, and makes people (women and men) feel at ease. Maybe I shouldn't do that, but I find it helps to keep the conversation from sudden death. However, deep down inside, I am very proud of the fact that I can say that. I am a nerd. I am lover of learning and literature and words and poetry. It's so much better than the alternative. So, Student X, when I tell you we don't need the running commentary during the movie, what I'm really saying is, don't diss my peeps, dude. You could learn a lot from them.

I came home, and washed the day off my face.

2007-11-05T21:16:00.000-06:00

"Escapist -- Never" by Robert Frost

She is no fugitive -- escaped, escaping.
No one has seen her stumble looking back.
Her fear is not behind her but beside her
On either hand to make her course perhaps
A crooked straightness yet no less a straightness.
She runs face forward. She is a pursuer.
She seeks a seeker who in her turn seeks
Another still, lost far into the distance.
Any who seek her seek in her the seeker.
Her life is a pursuit of a pursuit forever.
It is the future that creates her present.
All is an interminable chain of longing.

p.s. I changed all the masculine pronouns to feminine ones, because it's my blog, and I can do what I want. This poem means something to me today, a day when I feel as if I have tried too hard at life. Meanwhile, I read three poems at the Shinnery poetry reading tonight. Then I ate some cherry pie with a plastic fork.

an ordinary day, or 10 miracles

2007-11-01T17:01:00.000-05:00

Okay, so a big thanks to those of you who filled out my questionnaire from last week (and to all who have read and/or commented). Your responses were informative and entertaining, though I was a little disappointed with your dreams. But maybe that is in comparison to the wacked-out stuff I seem to conjure every night. (Maybe next time... )

Anyway, like I said I would a while back, I tried to make a list of ordinary things (see "falling in love with carrots"), but everything "ordinary" ended up seeming amazing to me. My list of "ordinary" things was reduced to 2 things: coke cans and paperclips, and even those have an element of the divine. So NOT ordinary. So I decided not to try. (Though I would love lists from you all.)

Instead, I will list some "ordinary" things (read: amazing miracles) that happened to me today at ACU. Most of them have to do with my students, since I've been here since 7:30. Who knows what will happen when I step foot off campus!
These are in no particular order. Enjoy.
1. One of my students described a doctor taking two pins out of his hand. Two words from that conversation: "slippage" and "bone."
2. I opened a book to a poem about a cat. Then, I emailed the poem to a good friend.
3. Seven people commented on my zebra-striped shoes.
4. Five students laughed when I told another student that his journal entry (he asked to share) was the worst drawing I had ever seen in my entire life. It was.
5. I ate a really good chicken strip given to me by another good friend.
6. When I was "grading," I realized that people walking by my window were making beautiful shadows on the wall.
7. At 7:32 a.m., a David Gray song, listened to for the 5 millionth time, made me tear up. Me: sitting in my car, spilling coffee on myself. The lyric: "Say hello and wave goodbye."
8. Nathan called me and had good news.
9. Many books on the bookshelf to the left of me. My own private cheering section.
10. A memory of sitting on the garage roof when I was 10, with my brother. Swinging my legs over the gutter.

Well, I realize this entry might produce quite a yawn, but to me, these things matter.

my favorite sign, ever

2007-10-26T16:10:00.001-05:00

Every Sunday on my way to church, I pass this sign on Grape St. and it makes me laugh out loud. I REALLY want to go in!

2007-10-24T16:51:00.000-05:00

"In our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon our heart until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God."
--Aeschylus

2007-10-24T12:47:00.001-05:00

2007-10-24T12:41:00.001-05:00

sigh.

falling in love with carrots, or #2, on writing

2007-10-24T09:50:00.000-05:00

"Recently I moved to Santa Fe, and since there were few writing jobs here, I worked as a cook part-time in a local restaurant. Waking up at six a.m. on Sunday to cook brunch all day, I questioned my fate. At eight a.m. I was busy cutting carrots at a diagonal, noticing the orange of them and thinking to myself, "This is really very deep." I fell in love with carrots. I laughed. "So this is what has become of me! Too easily satisfied with so little."
Learn to write about the ordinary. Give homage to old coffee cups, sparrows, city buses, thin ham sandwiches. Make a list of everything ordinary you can think of. Keep adding to it. Promise yourself, before you leave the earth, to mention everything on your list at least once in a poem, short story, newspaper article."
-- from Writing Down the Bones, by Natalie Goldberg
(An "ordinary" list is forthcoming by the author of this blog who just this morning fell in love with the sound of laughter.)

the dreaded questionnaire

2007-10-22T20:21:00.000-05:00

You've seen them. The lists of questions asked of random celebrities, average Joes and working moms that are displayed in commercials, magazines and on television. Sometimes the subjects even fill out the forms themselves (with a pen!), and we're supposed to feel grateful to feel so close to them. All I feel is depressed. Our culture is obsessed with dreaming up series of questions in service of "getting to know" the people who populate the world around us. But are we really getting closer, or are we just distancing ourselves?
Honestly, I, too, love reading the answers to these questions, to knowing how Beyonce would finish the phrase "most unusual gift..." (the answer, if you must know, is "rhinestone studded pedicure spacers"). Ugh. But part of me is definitely annoyed by these "lists;" as if by filling in some arbitrary Mad Libs concocted by American Express or Nike or mass email, we can really find connection. Take for example, the eight questions from Real Simple magazine's "real life: meet a Real Simple reader." I would love to know the answers to these questions from my friends and family. Really. But what I would really like would be to sit down with my friend or family member and have a conversation with them in which the answers to these questions were made clear at least semi-organically. Why does our culture crave the filled-in blank? And why are THESE the questions "everyone" wants to know? I'm intrigued and yet perplexed.
Okay, so, because you are dying to know, here are Real Simple's questions this month.
1. What are you really good at?
2. If you could change places with anyone, living or dead, for one day, who would it be?
3. Would you rather be a little smarter, or a little sexier? (Jeez...)
4. The best decision I ever made was...
5. What was your mother right about?
6. What are you most proud of?
7. Something on my mind lately is...
8. Before I die, I'd like to...
And here are my top 5 questions I'd like to start asking all of you to fill out (and I wouldn't mind asking Beyonce, really):
1. What are you really bad at?
2. How many marshmallows can you fit in your mouth at one time?
3. What was the last dream you can remember?
4. Why do people insist on making shadow puppets on a white screen?
5. Are my ears a normal size for my height?

on writing, #1

2007-10-20T21:16:00.000-05:00

"As writers we are always seeking support. First we should notice that we are already supported every moment. There is the earth below our feet and there is the air, filling our lungs and emptying them. We should begin from this when we need support. There is the sunlight coming through the window and the silence of the morning. Begin from these. Then turn to face a friend and feel how good it is when she says, "I love your work." Believe her as you believe the floor will hold you up, the chair will let you sit."
-- from Writing Down the Bones, by Natalie Goldberg

Hair by Halsa

2007-10-18T18:43:00.000-05:00

I do not profess to have an amazing memory. Almost everyone I know has better retention of stories, poems and sayings than I do. It is an exceptional day when I remember a joke, a funny line from a sitcom, or a profound song lyric. I'm okay with that, though, because I'm really pretty good at remembering my students' names (even years later), and I never forget a face or a mannerism. For example, I can tell you whether almost every kid in my graduating class was right or left-handed. That said, I was blown away today by the memory of a tiny Korean woman named Halsa, who, by the way, is right-handed (Jaime, you better respond to this post). Halsa is the Halsa of Hair by Halsa, and I was there to get my ends trimmed (okay, I confess, I was getting highlights), but I must mention first that I have only been "cut" by Halsa once since I have lived in Abilene, a little more than a year ago.
I made today's appointment with little reference that I had seen her before, only saying, "It's been a while." (This odd behavior only makes sense if you understand that I have recently put my hair through several color processes/cuts of my own doing, and I feel guilty about it). So, to avoid further inquiry, I just asked for an appointment and made my best effort to act like I was a new client.
About halfway through the highlighting process, Halsa casually remarks, "Oh, I just remembered -- when you were here you talked about your Korean student, who said that Americans smell like cheese." I about fell out of my chair. I immediately flashed to my TCC student Sooyun Kim, who (also right-handed) had mentioned that very thing to me, during a conversation we had about cultural differences (Americans' diet=lactose, red meat/ Koreans' diet=fish, veggies, etc.) She was completely right -- she had just remembered a small but significant portion of a conversation I had with her more than a year ago, and then she hadn't seen me since. When I recovered from my stroke, all was soon revealed when Halsa told me that she "has a photo box memory," which I really liked the sound of. She also said that when she was younger, she could remember multiple pages of the Korean bible, though in English she says it's a bit harder. I am so in awe of this woman.
Besides being a great hairdresser who is not above shaming over the use of a flat iron (which, by the way, heats up to 450 degrees, FYI!) -- Halsa is also really funny. And I bet she knows more than anyone in the lower states about the latest mergers in salon-quality product corporations.
Other fun Halsa-isms from today:
1. "Your ears are really small for someone of your height."
2. "It's not just American girls who are frying their hair with flat irons, it's a global problem."
3. "Why are your bangs so short? Did you tell someone to do that?" (ahem, yes, I cut them myself...)
There were several more, but, well, you know.

seeing God in Antarctica

2007-10-16T17:42:00.000-05:00

"In Antarctica I experienced a certainty amidst the morass of thoughts and emotions and preoccupations seething inside my balaclavaed head. This is what I glimpsed out of the corner of my eye. It wasn't an answer, or the kind of respite offered by a bottle of calamine lotion on a sunburn. It was something that put everything else -- everything that wasn't Antarctica -- in true perspective. I felt as if I were realigning my vision of the world through the long lens of a telescope. The landscape was intact, complete and larger than my imagination could grasp. It was free of the diurnal cycle that locked us earthlings into the ineluctable routine of home. It didn't suffer famines or social unrest. It was sufficient unto itself, untainted by the tragedy of the human condition...
It wasn't a permanent diversion. I knew I would meet my demons again and again before my life ended. God didn't appear to me in any particular shape or form -- if anything he became even more nebulous. But I heard the still, small voice. I had never known certainty like it. I felt certain that a higher power exists, and that every soul constitutes part of a harmonious universe, and that the human imagination can raise itself beyond poverty, social condemnation and the crushing inevitability of death. For the first time in my life, I didn't sense fear prowling around behind a locked door inside my head, trying to find a way out. It was as if a light had gone on in that room, and I had looked the beast in the eye."
-- Sara Wheeler, from Terra Incognita: Travels in Antarctica

three words

2007-10-16T05:13:00.000-05:00

Spark, cinnamon, bone.
I woke with three words,
puzzled at what they meant
for dark morning outside my window.

I tried to put them together
cinnamon, spark, bone
in the right order
bone, cinnamon, spark

so you could hear signals
in white e announcing smoky c
fiery s after burning n, forcing k
to your closed throat.

Three words:
spark, cinnamon, bone
They brought me to morning.
I woke and sent them to you.

expectations

2007-10-15T23:38:00.000-05:00

I really want my blog to be funny, like my friend Susan's blog, (maybe she'll give me permission to post a link) but I have a feeling it is not to be. I really want to write about my current grievance with the FedEx guy, the strange talent I have for letting pots boil over, my addiction to hair coloring. These would all make funny stories. But I can't seem to conjure up the words to make you laugh.
I was thinking tonight about expectations; how there are lines of code for each relationship we have. I don't think expectations are always verbalized, nor should they be. Relationships, in many ways, should develop organically. I don't tell my dog, Abby, "when I come home I expect you to lay down with me on the floor and look cute for upwards of 20 minutes." She just knows what to do after having done it many, many times. Humans are the ones who perplex me, who keep me up at night wondering about expectations. All my life, people have told me that I have too high expectations. And there have been several of these "expectations" in my life (the word, expecting, for pregnant, says it all) that have not come to fruition. So why do I feel so guilty about my own expectations for people? Is it the fear of losing them? Why do I feel badly if I email or call a friend several times in one day? Why do we apologize for needing people? Recently, I needed to lean on friends and family during a time when my husband was ill. All of you opened yourselves up to me, and that weighs heavily on my heart. As an independent person who likes her space, I am surprised at how reliant I have become in the past couple of weeks on others. I almost feel that I have swung the other way -- to being "needy" -- but I hope I haven't. I know there is a time for everything, and that possibly I will get a chance to be there for you. And maybe that is just as good as ending world hunger. So just tell me when you need to be left alone. Believe me, I'll understand.

testing the waters

2007-10-15T20:42:00.001-05:00

The title of my blog comes from the chorus of the song "Dry Land" by Tara MacLean on the album Passenger. I saw her open for Dido when I was in grad school in Boston. I just thought some people might like to know. I'm listening to her now, and I think the memory of myself there is giving me courage to start this blog.
Many of the people I know have started a blog with bad news. I decided to write a dissertation about my bad news, and I just finished it in May. Well, really it was about young adult sport literature and feminist theory; but it was also about finding ways for women to write their bodies. I'm a doctor now; I'm supposed to know better, to have moved on. So, maybe I'm at a new starting point. But the ground behind me, as I dive in, is parched. I want nothing to do with it anymore. Dare I say I have been drowning? Forgive me for the swimming metaphors. If I knew better ways to understand, I would use them. But for me, being in the water has always been the place where everything makes sense. And by that I mean I don't have to know everything or write well. As I swim, I realize this simultaneous knowing and not-knowing of myself and my past is surrounded in mystery. And that is the closest I can get to answered prayer.
I was going to begin this blog with a rant on "the death of the conversation," but I figured it would be a little hypocritical. I do want all of the people in my life to know that writing this doesn't count for talking to you.

swimming from dry land

2007-10-15T18:42:00.000-05:00

Hi and welcome to my blog, swimming from dry land.