Happy Birthday, MBS

Today is my sister’s birthday.  This is for her.

My sister and I have not always been close.  Because I was a seemingly incurable tomboy, I spent far more time with my brother than with my sister.  This is not the blog about him, however, so suffice it to say that my tastes were much more in line with his than with hers.  In those years, I was more likely to be tagging along with him, picking on her, the middle child.  When I wasn’t the target as the youngest, that is.  One of the lasting memories from this time was when we took her huge stuffed panda and hung it from the ceiling.   I don’t think she was amused; in fact, she still complains about it from time to time.

As we grew older, things didn’t really change that much.  The timeline of our lives was such that we didn’t really cross paths very often.  I have only been half-joking when anyone has heard me say that while she was at the mall, I was climbing trees.  Despite these differences, or perhaps because of them, I know part of me always looked up to her, though I called it jealousy at the time.  My memory is not always the best when it comes to my childhood, but I do remember playing in her room when she was out; the shag orange carpet hiding a bee one afternoon, as I recall.  It was sunny that day and I don’t remember where she was or even what childhood game I was playing – I just know I wanted to be in her room.  It was special and somewhat off-limits, generally.  My big sister’s room.

I think at some level, part of me wanted to be like her because she was, in many ways, quintessentially feminine in ways that I was not and had no conscious desire to be.  I never thought I could live up to her anyway – she was popular and beautiful and socially skilled.  I have no delusions that her life was perfect by any stretch, but it looked a lot more perfect than mine.  Around her, I felt even more awkward and weird.  I enjoyed computers and poetry more than nail polish and make up; I lost myself in books and in melodramatic writing that makes me laugh today at the dire seriousness of my middle-school self.  In short, I was nothing like her; we didn’t really feel like we could be sisters and as I grew older, I found myself wishing more and more often that I was like her.  I was tired of being bookish and clumsy.

So, I slowly became aware of a need to become more outwardly feminine at least some of the time.  It surprised me that I wanted to be a girl, sort of, but what did not surprise me is where I turned for help with that.  I remember afternoons with curling irons mishaps and smeared mascara; I remember trying on her clothes and being told I could keep some of them.  Basically, I remember laughing and tentatively starting the friendship that I’ve come to value more than I can easily express.  I wore her senior prom dress to my junior prom.  I borrowed her make-up and experimented.  In short, I tried to figure out how to be less awkward and a little bit more graceful – and she was one of the best role models around.  I still hung out with my brother, but now there was another facet of myself to explore.

When she left to go to college, part of me was heartbroken.  I was just beginning to find a friend in her, and she went away.  I retreated back into my old loves, but I was not the same tomboy anymore.  When she came home, we would sometimes hang out and it was fun, but still a little awkward.   As my own high school graduation approached, I ended up applying to only one school – the one where she was.  I don’t remember how that came about, but I know that I was excited about having my RA sister close by as I got used to being a college student.  I had her there with me for a year before she graduated and moved on, and in that year we spent time together now and then.  I loved those times.  Though they were somewhat sparse as we moved in different circles, it was often enough to know that if I needed her, she was no longer far away.

From those days onward, her and I have done nothing but grow closer.  She is my best friend above all best friends – and there are so many memories that I cherish.  We’ve gone through heartaches and happiness, laughter and tears, heart-to-hearts and meaningful silences.  I remember reading at her wedding and making everyone cry – including myself.   I remember shopping trips and closet cleanings that felt like shopping.  I remember her with her infant sons and knowing that she was going to be a better mother than I could ever be and that she was doing yet another thing that I don’t think I could do.  But now there was no jealousy, there was just pride and admiration.

One of the most important moments for me over the last few years was my wedding and how I could finally ask her to be my maid of honor.  There were times when that awkward little girl inside me thought I would never find the right someone because there was still so much of that stubborn tomboy around.  So when I did find him, there was no hesitation about who to ask to stand with me.  I never really pointed this out at the time, but having her do my makeup was so beautifully surreal – suddenly I was 14 again and my big sister was helping me look as beautiful as I could for the high school dance.  This, though, was so much more – and what we have, now, is so much more.  I cherish those memories, but the memories I am making with her now, I would not trade for anything.  She is strong and beautiful, kind and funny, smart and accomplished.  It is women like her that inspire women like me to be more than perhaps they would have.

I may be a doctor and a professor, a wife and a daughter, a poet and a thinker…and there are countless whys and ways I have become those things; but, I can honestly say, I am the woman I am because of the woman she is…

Love you.

-T

Bright out of Dark...

I almost stopped being a writer a few years back.

Through a series of accidents and incidents, I lost a great deal of what I'd written due to, of all things, hardware failure and a healthy dose of human error.  It's the story I tell my students about why they should back up everything.  I should have known better, of course, but what it really boiled down to is a heartbreaking incident that nearly made me set aside my metaphorical pen for good.  The very thought of trying to refill the annals of my work (whether or not it was good work is largely beside the point) made my heart ache.  A keen sense of loss that is hard to explain.  But, this is not the story of that heartache...just the unintended positives that I never would have expected.

I'll use an incident or two to explain....

My dissertation was one of the things that was lost -- not that I don't have numerous hard copies, but the very thought of trying to turn that back into digital format made my fingers hurt.  Over 200 pages.  I felt exultation when I completed it and defended it, but that did not mean I wanted to have to recreate the whole thing so I could archive it digitally.  I would never be  able to transcribe my 30-year-old writing without my 37-year-old self editing and changing it.  So, I had to make do with the drafts and cobbled together chapters that I had saved, for some reason, somewhere else.  Fast forward a few years to a September afternoon of helping my brother move and I happened to mention that I wished I knew what had happened to the mini-disks I had with my dissertation on them (those, too, had vanished).  Imagine my joy when my brother casually mentioned that he had one of them.  There it was...a tiny silver disk with the culmination of 12 and a half years of college and countless late nights and desperate moments in neat, compact, preservable form.  It was like trying on a favorite sweater and finding it still fit.  Or pulling up the couch cushions and seeing that missing earring.  Joy.

More recently, over dinner, I was telling my parents about the "Bones in the Dirt" story I posted a few blogs ago and how my sister-in-law told me I needed to write more of it because she was hooked.  As I was talking about how I wasn't sure where I was going with the story next, my husband said something that reawakened the pangs of loss again.  He reminded me of a story that I have never truly forgotten since when I wrote it and then read to him early on in our relationship.  It was a good story, which is not something I am often comfortable saying (I dislike most of what I write most of the time).  Though, at this point, I'm honestly not sure if I think what I wrote is good (I remember little of it) or I simply like where the story came from.  It was inspired by a barn over in Pittsford.  Every time they put a "For Sale" sign on it, someone would spray paint 'Leave it Alone' on it.  My imagination took that and ran with it -- loving the mystery of it all.  Eventually it did sell and was put on the register of historic places and thus, I'm sure, the vandal was appeased.  The story I wrote started with the sale and the vandal and went from there.  Like "Bones in the Dirt," however, it was unfinished.

When I read it to my husband years ago, I seem to recall him actually getting frustrated because the story was incomplete and he wanted to know what happened.  He reiterated this at dinner the other night and I found myself amazed that he had remembered it and harbored that frustration over so many years.  I began wondering if, somehow, I still had the story somewhere.  I dared hope.  That level of emotional investment from an outside was worth exploring, I thought.  So, the next evening we looked and looked, but to no avail -- this was before Gmail, before the cloud, before I backed things up.  As far as I could tell, the story was gone. 

And I missed it.  I wasn't sure if I could recreate it.

Then, on a whim, I emailed a friend to whom I had been in the habit of sending things I had written.  His first reply was disheartening.  It doesn't sound familiar.  My heart sank and I sighed that deep sigh of resignation.  It was that moment when the heart knows that all hope is gone.  I wondered if I could recreate it.  I wondered....and then I got a second email....

"It wasn't a building that had aged well, standing stately and tall as the years wrapped it in coats of age.  It was merely a barn with barely the strength to stand and it looked out over one of the busiest roads in Glenville..."

That was the first line.  He found the hard copy and typed in just that first line.  At this moment I'm waiting for it to arrive in the mail.  My old friend.  That line of email was like getting a phone call from someone whom I thought had died.  It is such a powerful feeling and one that has been repeated from time to time over the years as things I had stowed away somewhere made their presence known again.  As the lost was found.  I may never find it all, but I love those moments when something is rediscovered.  If I could go back and save it all, I would in a heartbeat, but since I cannot, I will take these moments of joy with gratitude and joy.  And, perhaps more importantly, I will keep picking up that metaphorical pen and welcoming the Muse when she comes.

This writer has more to say, and will not let the lost words silence those not yet spoken...

-T

Two Days in the Life

Two Days in the Life of Me...

Today I woke up ten minutes before my alarm went off because my cat can’t seem to get into his furry head that I will get up in time for whatever it is he feels I need to be up to do.  So, I shut my alarm off so I wouldn’t be reminded that I wasn’t getting quite the amount of sleep I wanted, and got ready.  Half an hour later, I was heading out to my car and putting all my stuff in it, meanwhile trying to get the dog to realize it was me and stop barking.  He barks in spurts.  Once…then a pause long enough to make you relax and think he won’t bark again.  And then, bark.  Repeat.

On the way to work, I stopped at Tim Horton’s, with the entire rest of the waking population of the town.  I parked in the closed pharmacy parking lot so I didn’t have to wait in the drive thru line of taking your life in your hands, and went inside.  Much shorter line.  I was tired, so I got a large diet coke and got back on the road towards work.  Twenty minutes later, I was there.  It was now 1 hour after I got up in the first place, and three and a half hours before my first and only class.

I spent those hours making copies, planning activities, designing projects, fleshing out the brainstorm I had about class the previous night, answering email, recording attendance for the last class, checking in on my online courses, poking around Facebook, IM’ing with a friend, scheduling classes for the next three weeks, doing follow up on the two meetings I’ve had this week, assigning groups, answering more email, giving a student feedback on a draft, planning a meeting or two, cross-referencing meeting times to rule out any conflict, thinking about spring semester and potential courses, and generally doing approximately 42,000 different things.  I also had a snack.

When class-time came, I headed downstairs, booted up the technology, promptly confused my students by making my directions too convoluted, got them into groups and clarified, worked with them as they worked together, checked email so I wouldn’t over-satellite, and then listened as they held a fascinating discussion on various concepts relating to social networking:  accountability, responsibility, privacy, security, personal awareness.

I then answered a few straggler questions, headed out to my car and went to a friend’s house to grab some lunch.  After lunch, we went for a brisk 31 minute walk around his neighborhood where I saw no less than four squirrels and one yapper-type dog.  After the impromptu walking exercise, I got back in the car and headed to main campus for my 2:00 office hour that no students would go to.  Instead of talking to students who were not there, I checked my schedule and made sure the meetings I have this week don’t conflict, I found the books I’m supposed to be reading for the Steering Committee I’m on, answered more email, graded some student journals, peeked at the news, made babysitting arrangements with my sister, chatted a bit online, checked some Facebook, made sure I knew what I was doing in class tomorrow so I could later forget to bring home the materials, and added to/updated my to do list for the week.

Then, I left to put gas in my car, pick up the pizza, and head to my sister’s to babysit.  I spend a fun couple of hours playing with the youngest and trying to get him to say hi - which he finally did into a cell phone he was holding upside down and backwards.  My brother and his wife were there, too, so it was more like a family gathering than babysitting.  We watched Unnatural History with the Hero Who Randomly Does Flips.  We also play with around 65,000 toys that all make noise at the same time.  I arrive home at 8:30 or so and spend the next few hours relaxing, dabbling in my online class and in the online components of my face to face classes and finally retire about 11:00.  I try, for the 8th night, to get through the 'J' portion of a word game I play wherein I think of 10 words of 5 letters that start with each letter of the alphabet.  I have to do this or I won't stop thinking.  I think of 8 and fall asleep.

The next day I get up at 6:15 and go to work, stopping at Tim Horton’s to get some oatmeal and am not accompanied by the entire town, so I’m in my office and working on my 8:00 class work by 7:05.  I teach a class, grab a quick drink, teach another class, leave in the middle of both to make copies and have a random meeting in the hallway.  Then I go back to my office and work for awhile, being somewhat surprised that a student arrives at my office hours.  I help her and then am somewhat shocked when another student comes in.  I spend a few moments in a strange sort of haze as I talk one on one with this second student who wants to do better in my class,.  After this moment of Unnatural Office Hours, I head down to get lunch at noon.  I have a working lunch with a friend and head back to my office, grab a few things, then go to a meeting.  And realize as I get there that I was mistaken on when it started.  I attempt grace.  After the meeting, I run to class across the street, and arrive with moments to spare.  Class is interesting but mostly taught by the co-instructor so I feel a tad inadequate.  I attempt grace.

After class, I chat for a few moments and then head out to the mall to pick up my contacts and few other things.  Me time.  I get home about 7:15, spend time chatting with my husband and a friend of his who is visiting, and by 8:00 I’m in my home office playing a game and finishing this blog before grading an assignment submitted by a student who was granted an extension in a graduate course I taught last month, check in on the graduate class I’m teaching, and also my online courses.  I suspect I’ll be in bed around 11:00, but we shall see.  Tomorrow I’ll get up at the same time though I don’t teach and I’ll work in my office until the 2:00 meeting. 

Then, the weekend....which I will find time to rest in between working so that my head stays nicely above water where it should be.

Things I Don't Do Well...

I am not perfect.

No, really, it's true.  I'm flawed and full of shortcomings.  I don't think I necessarily have any more than anyone else, but I do have my share.  Sometimes they are annoying, and sometimes they serve me weirdly well.  I tend to consider the word 'flaws' to be a largely one-sided, black and white way of looking at it.  I'm not sure there are any traits that I possess that are always negative, all the time.  I'm over sensitive, for instance -- but that feeds my empathy.  I'm insecure about a lot of things -- but that keeps me humble.  It's a system of checks and balances.  Which doesn't mean there aren't things I would like to change.  Sometimes the balance is a little tippy in the wrong direction....and while I don't mean my weight, I wouldn't mind losing a few pounds, either.

So, what am I not good at?

Saying no.  This has shown up here and there in my life lately as a character trait possessed by a friend, and in her laughing at herself about it, I realized that I have the same problem.  I like to be helpful.  I like being busy.  I like to be useful.  I like accomplishing things and feeling like I'm making a difference.  But that ends up translating to having a LOT of things going on at once and occasionally panicking that I can't do it all.  The list at work alone is exhaustiv-e(-ng).  I teach an overload every semester.  I'm on a few planning boards and advisory committees.  I teach for another college and am in talks to teach for another.  I'm piloting programs, traveling between campuses, planning conferences, presenting at conferences, submitting proposals to conferences, writing mission and vision statements, co-chairing committees for things about which I only have a vague sense.  The list goes on.  This isn't always a bad thing.  If I get bored with something, there's always something else that needs my attention.  It got me promoted right out of the tenure starting gate and fresh off probation.  It teaches me about things that I wouldn't otherwise encounter.  It puts me in a good place to find the means and ways to do the things I want to do (I still want that computer science degree).  It gathers around me a supportive crew of people who know of what I am capable and are grateful I helped when I was needed.

But, my goodness, do I get tired.

The other thing I don't do very well is somewhat more troubling and that is friendship.  I have a very small circle of people I count as true friends and while I count them as blessings in every way possible, I sometimes wonder that there are not more.  Somewhat greedy, I suspect.  The only reason I'm thinking about this now is that I've found friends within the last 8 months and I was not even looking for them.  I'm not even sure why or how it happened -- just, I got invited to join a cadre of three for dinner and the three became four.  I am the fourth (a designation I adore for whatever reason).  But it is strange.  It is hard for me to break out of what I'm comfortable doing -- but the friends I have seem generally content to let me be who I am.  They know I'm busy and I spread myself too thin now and then.  They know I rarely sit still except in the evenings, and then I don't want to move at all.  They know I never stop thinking.  Ever.  They know my quirks and generally accept them.  Oh, there are attempts now and then to shake me out of whatever it is I need shaking out of -- but I do the same to them.  I told one of my dearest friends once, when our friendship was just learning that the soil was perfect for laying down roots, that I was high maintenance.  I remind him of that now and again and he just laughs.  He knows.  He's been putting up with me, as I like to say, for awhile now.

I could, incidentally, throw my family into this list as well -- since I count them as friends.  But, no matter how closely the roles of 'family' and 'friend' may mingle, there will always be a little something different about my siblings, for instance.  A lifetime of memories and shared experiences can't help but impact the definition of friend.  Perhaps one of these days I'll embarrass them by dedicating a blog to each.  Hmm...birthdays are coming.  But, that is a blog for another day...as is one about my wonderful husband.  This is the blog for friends....as inadequate as that word may be.

I'm not sure where I'm going with this, other than to acknowledge that I have wonderful friends, and sometimes I feel like I'm not living up to what I should be living up to because I don't always want to go somewhere at night, I cannot always be easily found, and sometimes, despite that they are my dear friends, I don't want to come out of my shell, my internal world where I'm thinking and dreaming and living.  I can't be found even when I'm right there because wherever it is I go is a place wholly separate from the world around me, regardless of where I might be at the time.  I have good people and part of me sometimes worries they will wander off (as many have).  Or that we will just wander off and not realize the other one isn't there until it is too late.  And sometimes I have this weird fear that I see more than is there.  Or that I will, somehow, mess it up.  I do that sometimes.  See blog title.

But, then there's that part of me that knows better despite that it should know better.  It reminds me gently of who I'm dealing with here.

There's a few out there whom I never or rarely met.  We talk a lot and then we rarely talk, and yet whenever we pick up the threads, there we are.  The longevity with which my life has been graced by a certain former Marine never ceases to amaze me, especially when taking into account that we occasionally drive each other quite bonkers (detail oriented person with bad memory meets sometimes off the cuff person who doesn't like being pinned down).  Then the uncanny speed with which The Three have found their way into my life and made me need them is both terrifying and exhilarating.   I feel very blessed to have them in my life and to be able to see and hear them laugh.

So..um....thanks?  Stick around if you would.  It is crucial to do some things well, even if history suggests you won't.

"Do you want to lose these friends" is one thing that I can say 'No' to.  Without hesitation.

No.

-T

"Bones in the Dirt"

Time to do something different.  Since I want to use this place as inspiration to start writing again, I thought it might be time to pull out something I worked on once and then set aside.  What you're about to read is part of a short story or a novel or something.  I'm not sure.  Jack interest me, the business deal going down interests me, but I'm not really sure where this is leading.  There's something powerful about bones in the dirt, it would seem...

In any event, read if you will, comment if you like, but above all...I hope you enjoy.

***

            Jack slid across the booth and leaned against the corner, feeling a cold draft on the back of his neck from the window.  From his seat, he could see the whole place, including the front entrance and the swinging door that led to the kitchen.  The place was crowded tonight – there was a stream of constant movement from families, couples, old folks, and groups of young friends.  There were even a few loners like himself.  As he watched, he stifled a yawn.  He was tired.  He’d spent much of the day getting ready for tonight, and he hadn’t slept more than a couple of hours the last two days.

            A perky blond came over and gave her eight-hour-shift smile and asked if he wanted to try the baked salmon.  He declined, but ordered a Jack and Coke.  His friends always laughed at this, ribbing him to order a “Me and Coke.”  He hadn’t thought this was funny the first time, or the 900th time they’d said it.  Then again, there was precious little to laugh at these days.

            As the waitress headed off, weaving between the coats and chairs, Jack ran a hand through his sandy brown hair and shifted in the booth, his jeans squeaking lightly on the vinyl seat.  He looked at his watch and then up at the door.  She was late.

            That stirred up a thousand misgivings and doubts about whether she’d show at all, but he pushed these dark thoughts aside.  Of course she’d come.  It was early, the place was crowded and well-lit.  No reason not to.  Everyone knew this was the busiest place in town and she said she lived nearby.  As he continued to look absently at the crowds around him, a woman walked in.  She shook off the cold as she looked around and for a moment, he thought it might be her.  But, she waved and smiled in recognition at a guy at the bar, moving quickly to join him.  Jack couldn’t quite suppress the sigh.

            The minutes ticked by.  The waitress returned with his drink and he sat sipping it slowly, alternatively watching the bubbles in the glass and the door each time the small bell caught his attention above the din.  About fifteen minutes after the hour, the door opened for the twelfth time and as soon as he looked up, the woman who had entered looked his way.  Somehow, he knew it was her.

            She was small; young looking.  She wore a long dark coat that must have been tailored, and dark gloves which she was absently-mindedly removing as she spoke to the maitre’d.  She unbuttoned her coat, and when he saw the red sweater he raised a hand and nodded to her.  She began to head towards him.  This was it.

            He stood as she approached and held out a hand.  She took it firmly in her own and shook it exactly the right number of times before releasing it and sliding into the booth opposite where he’d been sitting.  She said nothing.  He took his own seat and for a moment, the two merely observed one another.  She had reddish hair and dark eyes; her skin was the color of coffee with too much cream.  He idly wondered what she thought of his dark goatee and the thin rimmed glasses he’d just gotten.  He dismissed the thought and leaned back, waiting for her to break the silence.

            “Nice place,” she said in a voice deeper than he’d expected.  She looked around, her expression one of approval.

            “It serves,” he replied, realizing that her meaning of nice likely had little to do with the ambiance.  Then again, neither did his reply.

            The waitress came back at this moment and his companion ordered a gin and tonic on the rocks and the waitress bustled off to the bar.  They fell back into silence, still appraising, still waiting for the humming tension to break.  When it came, she sipped her drink thoughtfully and then took a deep breath and spoke.

            “The item which we discussed is of great value to more than myself.  You must realize that.”  This seemed half a plea and half an admonition.  He nodded.

            “Of course.  How could I not?  I’m no expert, but I know enough to realize we’re talking about more than just bones in the dirt.”  She coughed delicately and he swore her cheeks flushed faintly.  He wondered what he’d said, then mentally shrugged and waited for her to enter into what he knew would be a series of intense negotiations.  He did not intend to relinquish his find easily.  He cocked his head to one side as she inhaled slowly, as if picking her words carefully.

            “Bones, indeed.”  She was stalling.  He could almost see the gears turning in her head as she looked first at him, and then idly at the crowd around them.  When her eyes came back to him, he saw a resolve there.  “This is not the place to talk further.”

            He raised one eyebrow and looked at her thoughtfully, leaning back against the corner formed by the wall and the booth.  It was her who had been insistent that the initial meeting be in a public place.  He had been intrigued enough by her tone to forgo the usual channels.  As he watched her, Jack felt a vague sense of unease ripple through his awareness – the insistence that something here wasn’t right.  Maybe it was the resolute wariness now etched in her features.  Or maybe, he thought wryly, it’s nothing.

            “Sure,” he said, forcing himself to sound casual as he returned her gaze.  “What did you have in mind?”

            “Now,” she said, still with the clipped tone of having made a decision that she was now running with.  “You have a car?”

            He nodded, a faint amusement rapidly replacing the unease from just a moment before.  He threw a twenty from his money clip onto the table and reached for his distressed leather jacket.  She stood and pulled on her own jacket and waited for him to lead the way.

            It had snowed while he was inside and the swirling chill cut through the one drink he’d had while inside.  He shuddered once, then led them briskly to the black Jag parked across the quiet street.

Course Catalog I...

It's time for me to post something a little less heavy, and since it's going-back-to-school time, I thought it might be fun to share some teacher things.  Don't worry, if you're not a teacher or a student, or are one of those and don't want to be, this isn't heavy-handed with the pedagogy.  I love that word, though it gets used far too often throughout the course of my work...

Without further ado, I present to you a catalog of courses I would someday love to teach...

Gender Roles and MMOs - Some of you know me wholly through online games, and have often heard me talk about the fascinating experiences I've had as a 'bio girl'.  It seems that once someone figures out that I'm really a girl, I become their confidante, learning more than I ever really wanted to know about their relationships, their goals, and their failures.  Or I become instantly incapable of playing the very game in which I've out-leveled them on every character I've played.  Or I become a target for wooing.  Either way, I'm often over-protected, laden with gifts, and something of a curiosity.  Usually.  The strata of 'gamer chicks' is an interesting one and I would love to study, with a group of like-minded students, just who these 'girls' are and what their experiences have been.  I would also love to explore the psychology of gamers and gender.  What makes a male pay a female?  What draws that same male to see the revelation of his 'true' gender to be something akin to a confessional?  What is it about gender that is so (for lack of a better word) heavy in games that are, at some level, about role-playing?  What does this say about gender in society as a whole?

'Blasphemers: Depictions of Religion in Popular Culture' - This one is developed enough to have a name -- though I also like the colon-phrase of 'Irreverent Believers'.  There are a number of popular texts out there that offer a stolid belief in the core of religion but do so with such a fundamental shift in some important aspect of that religion so as to become the target of picketers and angry believers.  These are some of the texts I would consider including in such a course.

• Dogma directed by Kevin Smith - "He still digs humanity, but it bothers Him to see the s**t that gets carried out in His name - wars, bigotry, televangelism. But especially the factioning of all the religions. He said humanity took a good idea and, like always, built a belief structure on it."
• The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown - "Nothing in Christianity is original"
  
• Eddie Izzard - "“I think on the seventh day, God was running around, going, 'Oh, my God! What haven’t I…? Rwanda! I better create Rwanda!'
• Lamb:  The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore - ""It's very difficult to stay angry when a room full of bald guys in orange robes start giggling. Buddhism."
• American Gods by Neil Gaiman - "Religions are, by definition, metaphors, after all: God is a dream, a hope, a woman, an ironist, a father, a city, a house of many rooms, a watchmaker who left his prize chronometer in the desert, someone who loves you - even, perhaps, against all evidence, a celestial being whose only interest is to make sure your football team, army, business, or marriage thrives, prospers and triumphs overall opposition."
• Monty Python's Life of Brian - "I was hopping along, minding my own business, all of a sudden, up he comes, cures me! One minute I'm a leper with a trade, next minute my livelihood's gone. Not so much as a by-your-leave! 'You're cured, mate.' Bloody do-gooder."
• Monty Python and The Holy Grail - Where god himself says "Every time I try to talk to someone it's 'sorry this' and 'forgive me that' and 'I'm not worthy'..."
• "God Angrily Clarifies 'Don't Kill' Rule" - Published in The Onion right after 9/11- "'To be honest, there's some contradictory stuff in there, okay?' God said. 'So I can see how it could be pretty misleading. I admit it—My bad.'"
• South Park and the Muhammad debacle

Can you imagine the conversation in such a course?  Tricksters alive and well -- dancing in the realm of fiction but still causing waves.

The Medicine of Laughter:  Humor as a Tool of Healing -- This would be an honors course that explored the power of humor as a tool for coping and healing.  The role of the Trickster as a tension-breaker who gets us to laugh and think at the same time, who makes darkness more palatable, and gives us the momentum to move on in the face of tragedy.  It's also used as a coping mechanism by those faced with tragedy, addiction, and darkness all time - gallows humor, dark humor, morgue humor.  The horrible things said that aren't meant that just help us get through the everyday trials and tribulations of a difficult life.  I've talked about this with my friend Mary -- a co-taught course.  Humanities/English/Mythology and Chemical Dependency Counseling.  I love it.

Zombie Lit - Oh, wait...

"A Horrible End":  The Search for Meaning in the 21st Century - There has been, lately, a rash of long running (or sometimes not) television shows with endings that have frustrated many the viewers of said shows (though not all, of course). Shows like The Sopranos, Seinfeld, The X-Files, Battlestar Galactica, Firefly, and Lost have ended in ways that have raised questions, ire, and dissatisfaction for many.  Others have simply not even tried to end -- such as Millennium and Brimstone.  I haven't gone far with this one, but I've had a number of conversations with friends where I posited the idea that these shows were trying (consciously or not) to give us a unifying mythology and, as such, they could not easily be neatly ended to the satisfaction of the wide range of people who faithfully followed them.  We live in a time when many are seeking meaning -- a time when some of the old systems aren't working anymore.  Joseph Campbell summed up what I think these shows are trying to do.  Or what I think their followers wanted them to do:  "And what [the new myth] will have to deal with will be exactly what all myths have dealt with - the maturation of the individual, from dependency through adulthood, through maturity, and then to the exit; and then how to relate to this society and how to relate this society to the world of nature and the cosmos. That's what the myths have all talked about, and what this one's got to talk about. But the society that it's got to talk about is the society of the planet. And until that gets going, you don't have anything."  And so, the stories keep trying and the followers keep waiting...


Women Who Kill - Murder and the Role of Women - This one has just popped into my head.  It would be an exploration of the history of women who kill and how society placed them in a predicament wherein they felt there was no other option.  Infanticide, patricide, mariticide.  We would look at famous cases and not so famous, and look at some fiction as well like the play "Trifles" by Susan Glaspell and "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner.  I'd also use the book Women Who Kill:  A Vivid History of America's female murderers from Colonial Times to the Present" and explore the archetypal figure of the Mother and her negative image.  We would talk about Kali, Demeter, Medea, and others.

Courses change often and registration starts early, so please contact your adviser soon...

-T

Reluctant Remembering...

Tomorrow is August 11.

To most, it isn't really a big deal -- summer is in full swing, but there's a touch of autumn in the air. Just a touch, in the evenings, when the breeze comes in and the summer sun has set. It is the last weeks of freedom before school (or work) starts up again for those who have tied ourselves inexorably to education for the short or long term. It is the dog days of August....full of sun and surf, heat and happiness, blue skies and beautiful evenings.

For me, though, August 11 has another side to it. A dark and hazy side that I can't remember and yet can never forget. It is, in many ways, my own personal 9/11. Oh, no one died, but my life changed forever on that day and I cannot help but wonder at how life unfolds itself into the path it follows.

It was on August 11 -- at 6:38 in the evening -- that everything changed. Before that I was just another insecure graduate student trying to figure out how to get through school and life without ending up alone or jobless when the time came to pay up. I was home on summer break, working for my dad, and spending time with my recently married sister, my brother, and my folks. One way I was not typical, however, is that I had just gotten my license that June. I hadn't needed it before -- working with dad and my brother and going to college where there was no point to having a car.

So, a newly licensed graduate student driving her gently used, hers-for-only-ten-days car into the village to hang out with her brother. We would watch movies and play games much like we always did. I had a 6-pack of Mountain Dew on the passenger seat and a huge plant in the back seat. I don't remember why, other than it was going in my brother's place. Three quarters of a mile from home, I came on the same four way stop that I always came to when I drove that direction, which was 90% of the time. Sometimes I went straight, sometimes I turned. Both routes took about the same time and I honestly am not sure which one I was going to take that evening.

All I know is that I can't remember anything. Except for maybe one thing -- the deep metal groaning sound as they took the roof off my car some 45 minutes later. And even that I can't be sure of. I learned later what had happened and most of you know -- a drunk lawyer with a suspended license driving his wife's car slammed into my car at a right angle. He hadn't even slowed down for the stop sign and when my car came to a rest it was 20 feet away and in a ditch. The passenger side of my Ford Tempo was unmarked. The driver's side was mauled and dented and crushed. Any harder, it would have flipped and likely broken my spine. If my window had been closed, my head would have hit it.

But, none of those things happened and I carried on. I have carried on for fifteen years, now.

Fifteen years.

For fifteen years I've dealt with it and done the best I could. I had PT for awhile, I went to a chiropractor for awhile (she told me I had chronic whiplash and twisted hips), I take pain medication only when I can't stand it anymore, and I take hot baths and showers often.

Most of the people I spend any time around know about the accident, and they may not realize that I'm loathe to bring it up most of the time. It's just that it's such a part of my life and I often feel the need to explain why I move around a lot, why I sometimes limp, why I lose my bubbly nature here and there, why doing anything for any length of time is hard. I'm just in pain and tired. The recent breast reduction surgery was a direct result of this chronic pain. I've always been a little heavy up top, but I don't know as I would ever have done anything about it without the suggestion and support of my husband and the excellent insurance through work. It has helped. I still feel pain regularly, but it comes slower now (though feels more strong, but I may just be adjusting).

But, on August 11, I will still be remembering how my life changed. Over the years I've gotten angry and sad alternately at various times, but on this date, every year, I just get a little sad. I remember that I don't remember what it was like to not have pain. I remember being good at limbo. I remember carrying my sister around. I remember my first car. I am not depressed, by any means. I have so much in my life to be thankful for -- wonderfully vibrant friends, a loving and supportive family that is together in more ways than one, a beautiful home that I love filled with furry children who make me laugh. I have a great job, overall good health, good prospects. I have a wonderful husband who is always supportive. I live in a beautiful area that has so many fun things to do in it. And it just keeps getting better -- for even in the last six months, I have come to find close friends at work that have filled a void I didn't realize I had. In short, I love my life.

Just...forgive me a little sadness for what might have been if I had been left physically whole. If someone hadn't violently changed the course of my life through carelessness and addiction. If I could have moved on differently in that one tiny way. If, somehow, I could still limbo.

Just give me that moment and then, like a summer storm, the clouds will pass and the sun will shine again.

-T