Christmas

has pretty much been all about little Ellen.

But we're okay with that.

It burns, it BURNS!

During my sixth hour on Friday, some girl brought the mega sized pixi sticks--the ones made out of plastic and not paper because they're so big--to class for all the children.

In an effort to not completely kill the tangible sense of holiday cheer in the room, I looked the other way and let them suck down as much sugar as possible while taking their quiz on persuasive speaking. (For the record, there WAS a true/false question regarding the intelligence of all Asians.)

It's obvious now that I should have known better than to allow the mega pixis. I'm not sure how I missed the actual act of snorting, but when one of the boys in the back exclaimed, "It burns, it BURNS!" while blue colored snot poured out of his left nostril, eyes streaming with tears, stumbling towards me for a kleenex, I realized the complete and total error of my ways.

I did manage an almost straight faced "serves you right" before shoving the box of kleenex at him.

I'm laughing just thinking about it.

Happy happy holidays, friends.

We just can't make this stuff up

This afternoon we were talking about elements of persuasion and argument in Pubic Speaking. After about a ten minute discussion of logical fallacies and generalizations, one kid raised his hand and said:

"Well, actually, some of them are true. I mean, like, all Asians are smart."

After another five minutes of ridicule and yelling from the other members of the class, this kid backed down with, "Okay fine. Half then. Half of all Asians are smart."

There are days when it's clear that I'm not really making a difference.

It's over. So over.

What a big day.

I was a little worried at my defense when the first question one of the examining professors asked was if I could unpack "a bit" my "notion of third space" and expand on the ways in which I see teachers' monologic scripts butting up against students' counterscripts in class. At that point, the only option I felt available to me was to open my mouth and pray to God that something--anything, really-- would fly out of my mouth sounding smart.

65 minutes later, in what would prove to be the most anticlimactic moment of my graduate school career, I walked out of there with three passing signatures and a completed application to graduate. If all goes as it should, I'll officially graduate on January 31, 2008. I even turned in my library books and had the nice nerdy boy at the counter make sure I didn't have any outstanding books. Woot woot, people.

It's been a long, long road.

Tonight I got to babysit

Cyndy wasn't kidding about this one.

Welcome to the world, Baby Girl

Thursday night around 11:25, my very first niece was born. She weighed in at 7 lbs 11 ounces and was 20.5" long.

I managed to resist asking the nurse what her Apgar score was for about two minutes. I felt vindicated when Dad also asked what her score was and why she was deducted two points. Welcome to the Tholen family, little girl.

If I've learned anything in the last two days, it's that people easily wax poetic about babies and it's hard to keep from getting saccharine about this new little person in the world. The best teacher I ever had once said that babies are so beautiful because they're so fresh from heaven. The fact that the family's first grandchild was born one day after my late grandfather's birthday was lost on no one. We have been overly sentimental about little Ellen Rachel, but it's hard not to be. When you hold someone so little, so light, and so new, it's hard not to wonder at the (sorry about the cliche) complete miracle of her being.

At some point this morning when I was helping Cyndy and Dave pack up the hospital room to bring Ellen home for the first time, I looked at both of them--parents now, for the rest of their lives--and realized that if nothing else, one thing is certain: in the most beautiful way possible, life would never, ever be the same for them.

I was struck speechless, really.

It's no lie, I have excellent sophomores this year. For whatever reason, I struck the jackpot in the kid pool for my classes. They look smart, they act smart, they smile a lot, they thank me on their way out the door and say things about how they're "reading this really great book...not for school, just for fun" and generally, I couldn't be happier with them.

These last few days, the sophs have been researching topics for a class debate in the computer lab next door to my classroom. Any time spent in a computer lab is usually filled with me reminding students to stay on task (wonderful students or not) and redirecting kids back to their work and assignment. I like to fancy myself creative and kind in my redirections and reminders to get back to work. Only twice today did I have to say, "For the love of God, will you at least ACT like you're working on something."

But I was struck speechless, really, when I turned around today to find Molly wearing huge, white sunglasses with reflective lenses, swirling round and round and round and round in her chair while balancing a stuffed toy dragon on the top of her head.

"Molly!" I barked.

Her swirling chair came to a slow stop and honest to God, I could see my reflection in her sunglasses as she said, "What? Why are you LOOKING at me like that?!?"

"Are you kidding?"

"God...it's JUST a dragon."

W. T. F. people. I just did not have a response to that one.

Thanksgiving

All in all, there is much to be thankful for.

Photo credits: Rich

My sister is having a baby

Which mostly fascinates me, because I can't look at her without thinking about this cell-dividing, live, human thing growing and moving and pushing around inside of her. It's freakishly animal and entirely miraculous all at once. Because there's this person, this little girl, now, where there wasn't one before.

I'm having a hard time wrapping my brain around it.

It was pretty real, though, today, watching Cyndy open baby shower gifts and having all of these women ooh and aah over onesies, burp cloths, and rattles. I watched my mom put a burp cloth up on her shoulder and pat it as though the baby was already there like it was the most natural thing in the world.

Cyndy's due date is one month from today. Needless to say, we're ready any time now.

And this one made me cry

LOL

It's entirely possible that the grading hell that I'm enduring has put me in a slaphappy state, but really, this video made me laugh so hard I cried.

Oh yeah...and...

I finally emailed off the revisions on the thesis.

No, I hadn't done that yet.

Yes, I recognize how pathetic that is.

Not my best night

Last night I was nearly killed when a large buck bounded across the median on Highway 7. It ricocheted off the minivan in the right lane back into the left lane where I was slamming on my breaks, before finally scampering off the road.

The deer hunting opener, coincidentally, was this weekend.

About forty-five minutes post Deer Incident, the waiter knocked over the candle on the table, spilling hot wax all over my sweater. I was assured that the restaurant would pay for my dry cleaning if, by chance, I couldn't get the wax out with a "simple application of ice."

It wasn't my best night.

Week in Review

Last Saturday night, an old friend from CP got married.

Last night was the annual Halloween Party at Laura & John's:

The Pups

Yesterday, a girl in my first hour class told me about two 7 week old black lab puppies she rescued. She was desperately trying to find a home for the two of them and was wondering if I was interested.

Uh-huh.

She had a girl and a boy; the girl was all black and the boy had some white on his chest, the tips of his feet, and the end of his tail.

She brought them to my fourth hour prep so I could visit with them to see if I would "like them."

Yep.

Jim said no. KC said unequivocally no. I realize that all logic and reason and rational thought screams no. But really, what am I supposed to do, exactly, about how cute that little boy puppy was when he climbed into my lap, licked my chin, and fell asleep next to my cheek?

I've been pining away for them for over 24 hours. This could get ugly, people.

I'm just putting this out there

A few days ago I downloaded Ms. Pacman to my Blackberry. It's safe to say that I'm going through a Cyndy-like obsession phase. I'm having a hard time NOT playing Ms. Pacman. And, frankly, regular old Pacman online.

There's something about gobbling up those blue ghosts before time runs out (and earning serious points for killing and destroying them) that is working wonders on my psyche.

I'm just saying.

Mekhead, M.D.

Not to make a big deal out of it or anything, but Michael was offered admission to Creighton's med school on Monday.

So yeah. Whatever. I mean, it's just medical school. No biggie.

"But...you could have been ANYthing!"

Today the sophs were all about the standardized test talk. They had a million questions about the PLAN, the PSAT, the ACT, the SAT, the AP, the MCAs, the BSTs, and any other standardized test you can think of that can add to the acronym fest of education. Of all their questions, though, my favorite was this:

"Hey, what did YOU get on the ACT?"

Most of the time, I pretend I've long ago forgotten what my score was, even though it's burned into my brain as clear as day. But today, for the first time ever, I just told them. What the hell? I thought. So what if they know what I got?

Right.

This girl exclaims, "But...you could have been ANYthing! I mean, you could have been a DOCTOR! Why'd ya wanna be a teacher?"

Thanks, kid. It's nice to know that you think that all of your teachers chose education because they couldn't POSSIBLY be ANYthing "better" than that.

I wish I would have thought of something witty and clever to shoot back with right away, but I pretty much stared at her in silence and blinked rapidly a few times. The boy sitting next to her turned, gave her the look, and just said, "Nice. Really nice."

I heart him forever now.

Also, I'm reading this great book "Falling Man" by Don DeLillo. FYI.

Abby loves him more, but she's in Barbados

Grey Matter

Really, if you don't read the Grey's Anatomy writers' blog, you should definitely check it out.

The show, by the way, completely redeemed itself this past week.

Nicely played, Shonda. Nicely played.

Glutton for Punishment, circa 1990

The Week in Review

On Thursday, another teacher shuffled into my classroom looking entirely beaten down and destroyed. When I looked up, he said, "I hate all teenagers and want them all to die."

"Okay," I said, trying to be supportive.

"Is this a problem, do you think, with my job?"

I tried to console him with my own story from Tuesday, when a soph tried to tell me that I had "made up" the fewer/less grammar rule, that nobody cares about grammar rules, and it doesn't matter if he "speaks good" or not.

Oh, the irony.

When I tried to explain, you know, the fact that LANGUAGES have GRAMMARS so we can communicate with one another as opposed to blabber gibberish nonstop, he asked who made up the rules in the first place.

I should have known better than to spout off about the beginnings of language and communication in 500,000 B.C. with Homo Erectus standing up and grunting.

"Homo ERECTus?" he asked incredulously.

You can imagine how that went over.

Along those lines, today another colleague came into my room, proudly bearing a blue glass bottle with the words, "Bawls: High Caffeine Guarana Soda" etched into it. He handed it to me and said, "One of my senior boys just gave this to me in front of the class and said, 'Hey, Mr. K. Now you're holding my bawls.'"

Nice.

And that's just how the week has been going.

The Game

The Report

Fall TV has started and I'm watching a variety of new shows:

Journeyman: Verdict is still out on this one. I keep watching it wishing it would be just like the novel The Time Traveler's Wife, but it's not quite getting it right. Probably the best part of this show is when the main character moves fluidly through time, and you're left guessing the year he's in based on the pop music of the time that they play. Tonight I heard Smashing Pumpkin's "Today," Freedy Johnston's "Bad Reputation" and Blind Melon's "No Rain."

Hot Shots: The opening scene of this show had Dylan McDermott with his pants down around his ankles having sex with his ex-wife in a wine cellar at a swanky country club. Despite my love for Joshua Malina, Dylan McDermott, AND Michael Vartan (should be a hat trick of a good show), this one is a disappointment so far. Sorry guys, you just aren't Carrie, Samantha, Miranda, and Charlotte.

Dirty Sexy Money: Everything I wanted it to be, even though not much more. This show is exactly what it purports to be, which, frankly, is a little refreshing. If Passions had to go to Direct TV, I might as well fill the guilty pleasure void in other ways.

Grey's Anatomy: Last Friday in class, a sophomore girl asked me if I'd watched Grey's the night before. I grimaced, said I had, and asked what she thought of it. I couldn't put it better than she did: "It was bad...like, really bad...ER bad." Yes, the deer scenes with Izzie put me right over the edge. We know Izzie is a little odd and has poor judgement, but it's time now to let her back in the hospital to do real medicine. And Mer/Der? Not so over, apparently.

Brothers and Sisters: Probably my favorite show on TV right now. Ally McBeal and Sam Seaborn in the same show AND in love? What's not to enjoy about that?

And because I'm sure at least Cyndy is wondering:
The Young and the Restless: It just may be possible for Nick and Sharon to finally get back together, seeing as Phyllis is in jail for the next six years for extortion and Jack is waxing poetic over his hurt feelings over the kiss Nick and Sharon shared when locked in a bank vault together for hours. I will keep you posted. Obvi.

For the love

I was just reading down my blog and realized I'd written "Summer's off..." in my post about the dentist.

I believe it was just yesterday when I ripped into a kid for using an apostrophe to make something plural.

Go figure.

Taking On Too Much

I think I've officially reached the point where I can admit, even to myself, that I have a problem.

Just before leaving for college, Abby made me a packet of posters to hang on my desk. It was filled with inspirational quotes, pictures, nice sayings, and otherwise pleasing viewing material. The one not-so-subtle lesson she included in this packet was the full sized sheet of paper reading nothing more than the word "NO" in size 72 font. Like I said, not-so-subtle.

I have a hard time saying no. This was true then. This is true now. I have this issue with letting people down, and I agree to do things that I have absolutely no interest in doing, just to avoid that sense of letting them down after they've asked me to do them. So I agree. I tell myself it "won't be so bad" and that "it'll be worth it in the long run." And then it's terrible. I wonder what in all hell I was thinking agreeing to do this. And then the self-loathing begins.

The problem is that I agree to do things, despite the recommendations and suggestions and concerns of the people close to me, and then I complain about how horrific it is that I've agreed to do them to these very same people.

KC has been trying to help me move past this problem for the last few weeks. Kace, I think I'll refer you to Abby (among others) who've been trying to help me move past this problem for years. It's possible, though, just maybe possible, that I've finally reached my limit.

Hi. My name is Rachel. And I can't say no.

Shift Happens

At our back to school workshops, Scott McLeod (Iowa State University) showed us this video he and Karl Fisch created. If you have a second (or eight minutes), it's worth a viewing.

The Dentist

Nice Dental Hygienist: "So...you're STILL teaching...how's that going?"

Me (in the two seconds I had between cleaning): "Good. Really good. I love it."

Nice Dental Hygienist: "Yeah...summer's off...I just don't know how you do it."

Me: blank stare

NDH: "I mean, don't you get bored?"

Me: "Bored?"

NDH: "Yeah, day after day of nothing to do. Isn't it hard?"

Me: "No. It's unbelievably easy."

A teeth cleaning, flossing, and forty five minutes later:

NDH (reading my chart): "Wow...looks like the first time I saw you was in 1989. I wrote that you were such a nice little patient."

I just tried to smile and thank her and tried to get on my way, particularly since visions of what I looked like circa 1989 came dancing through my head...yet again.

Old Friends

Last night I had dinner with a group of friends who I have known longer than I haven't.

Tonight I went out with friends from Olaf who I lived with for four years.

There is much to be said for surrounding yourself with friends who know you that well--who know all your stories and all your quirks and all your annoying habits; who know what you're like every early morning and late night of the week. These people were good therapy for me.

Good friends, good wine, and some very good laughs, can remind you of who and what you really are.

The Highlight

I think the highlight of the first two days of school was when a particularly delightful and charming senior paused on his way out of my room after public speaking today.

He half turned, paused, and said, "I think this class is going to be good."

I looked up at him, "You think?"

And he grinned and said, "Yeah, you know, I really think it could be something special."

I'm not sure I agree with him--I mean, Public Speaking can be a lot of things, but "special" wouldn't be the first word I'd choose--but for the time being, he is SO my favorite student.

Cover me. I'm going in.

I felt like I should post to my blog tonight in honor of the upcoming school year and in fond remembrance of the summer gone by.

Instead, all I could bring myself to do was click around on other people's blogs.

This really says it all.

There is much to talk about

I know, I know, the ropes course. You're dying to know.

And I've been entirely absent from my blog for far too long. The problem with school starting is that it seems to consume my entire life--as though I have no recollection whatsoever of how to have both a job AND a life.

The fact that I really have no life came proof positive to me about five minutes ago, when my iPod shuffled randomly to "I'm a Lonely Jew" from South Park and I called KC in the room next door, held the phone up to the speaker, and laughed while she listened to that dumb song over the phone.

School starts in three short days, I barely have my syllabi and lesson plans done for day 1 (let alone 2 or 3 or 4 or 5), I have lists and lists of things left to do, I have boxes of unopened (and unbound, by the way) public speaking textbooks on my counter, and what am I doing? Calling KC to have her listen to my iPod with me over the phone.

For the love of God, people. I'm marking it as a new low.

Voting on the Sixth Horse

Do you think it's at all possible that if I don't mention on my blog going back to work tomorrow and another school year starting that it may just not happen at all and summer will blissfully continue on forever and ever and ever?

Yeah. Me neither.

p.s. The ropes course is on Friday. There will be blogging. If there is a God, there will be photos.

Cue the Hallelujah Chorus (I mean it)

One complete draft of The Damn Thesis is complete.

Call Me Maria Sharapova

I've decided to take up tennis.

That's about all I have to say about it at this point.

The Last Time

At some point during high school--probably when I was feeling literary and angst ridden--I read Sylvia Plath's journals. I copied down every great quote I could find, and while there were many, this one has really stuck with me:

"Remember, remember, this is now, and now, and now. Live it, feel it, cling to it. I want to become acutely aware of all that I have taken for granted. When you feel that this may be the goodbye, the last time, it hits you harder."

Those words haunt me at every painful goodbye I've ever had. Over the last few years, every time we go down to Hays to visit Grandma and Grandpa, it occurs to me that it may be the last. It's hard to walk away, to be so far away, and to wonder about how easy it is to take people, their lives, and their permanence in our lives, for granted.

God willing, this morning was not the last time I'll see Grandma. But it felt like it, more than any other.

Visiting

Today, Cyndy, Michael and I spent a couple of hours visiting old relatives with Mom. It's fair to say that we all pretty much hate The Visiting. The three of us line up on whatever old, floral couch is in the living room and probably look like spectators at a tennis match--all of our heads turning in unison following the conversation and catching up between Mom and the Great Aunt of the moment. Often we end up sitting in age order, which makes things all the more classic. We do our best to be pleasant, smile when we're supposed to, add something--anything--to the conversation when there's an opening, and generally make the best out of an awkward, painful situation. It's not that we don't like seeing these people. It's more that at 28, 25, and 22, we feel like we should be past that same feeling sitting on that couch. We might as well be 13, 10, and 7 all over again.

I suppose the best information I got out of the visiting today is that my Great Aunt Cilla (short for Cecilia and pronounced with a thick German accent as Szilla, emphasis on the Z) who never married said that the only way she'd get married is if she could have Joe DiMaggio.

So, this one's for you Cilla:

Hays has it!

I've been driving to Hays, Kansas for as long as I can remember. Literally, some of my earliest memories are of the long drive from Minnesota down to the All Star City and hanging out in the small town where Mom and Dad grew up. The drive was barely tolerable with my older sister, younger brother, and me all crammed into the back of whatever station wagon or minivan Mom was currently driving.

Funny thing about this drive is that twenty years later, it's still barely tolerable with the entire fam in such a small space for such a long amount of time.

It's the little stuff that really starts to get to you. The seat in front of you being just a little bit too far back and a little bit too reclined. The garbage piling around you in the back. The old guy in the huge Ford Expedition who swerved around you a few times, refused to let you pass him, and for twenty miles, tried to engage you in serious road rage after his wife flipped you the bird out the side window. Okay, so that last one was just today. But really, patience runs thin. I believe at one point today I sighed and said with utmost exasperation, "God, Cyndy, I can hear you BREATHING!"

What I love about the drive, though, is that about forty fives miles outside the city, the signs start appearing. There are the regular advertisements and billboards for the goods and services that Hays has to offer, but there's also the more general signs about the all-around greatness of the city. It's like an entire PR campaign to get people to love Hays. I think my favorite are the big ones that just say: "Hays Has It!"

And boy does it ever.

It has:

• The Historic Sternburg Museum, home of the Incredible Shrunken Head
• Fort Hays State University, alma mater of any good Hays kid (Dad included)
• 103 degree heat
• Statues of the Virgin Mary in almost every yard
• penned up buffalo
• Taco Grande, best tacos in the nation
• The Mall. The one and only.
• two movie theaters
• as many bars as there are churches

And the more personal:

• Grandma and Grandpa's house: both sets. Dad's dad is now buried here.
• "The Farm" (once the home of Great Uncle Jake, Great Uncle Harry, and Great Aunt Cilla, two brothers and a sister who lived on the farm together for most of their lives after Harry and Jake returned from World War II, the Battle of the Bulge, and laying railroad track)
• Home of Great Aunt Alice and her husband John Kundred, who scared us as children by asking us how to spell words like "Mississippi" and "Massachusetts" and telling us that we cried purple tears. They also had a yellow canary named Charlie that had a bad habit of flying into the freezer when the door was open, not to be discovered until long after rigor mortis had set in. I think they've had four or five birds by now, all named Charlie.
• A nightly whiskey seven with Grandma and Grandpa.

Yes, Hays most definitely has it. And it's pretty certain that I'll have about all I can take by the time we leave Thursday afternoon.

It undeniably has its charm, though. I never really lived here, but it's funny how you can feel tied to a place--how sometimes despite the fact that the only real connection you have with a place is through the histories, lives and memories of others, it can still feel a little bit like home.

The Noise

My car's been making a terrible squeaking/rubbing/honking noise for a number of months now. I've been avoiding bringing the car in for someone to look at it, because in my estimation, weird noise = lots of money to fix.

But I finally gave in last night since the noise has been getting increasingly worse and more noticeable. Turning up the radio to drown it out isn't really working anymore, and I'm getting tired of pretending not to notice the stares when I pass people.

So here's the scoop. The shock spring (number 11), is COMPLETELY BROKEN and rubbing up against my strut (number 13), making a bad noise every time I go around a curve, go over a bump, or at this point, drive over a flat surface.

Thanks to goodyear for their educational and helpful photo.

Nice Guy who's fixing my car tells me that this is a "pretty damn expensive" spring to replace, particularly if we have to order the part from Audi, who by principle, don't sell anything to their faithful customers for a "cheap" or even "reasonable" price.

So he's going to look around some junkyards for the piece, and then put the junk piece on my car.

Here's to junkyard searching, people.

The Crossing

Tonight as I was headed to finally get that weird noise the back of my car has been making for the last six months checked out, I nearly rear-ended the car ahead of me when it came to a screeching halt.

As I looked up from certain death spelled out in the rear bumper of the car ahead of me, I saw a string of nine geese blithely crossing the road at glacial speed.

It took only a couple of minutes for all of them to get across, but I was entirely struck by the whole situation while I sat there waiting. I guess it's the sheer humanity of it all, which may be a little absurd, but there really was this sense of common goodwill about five of us strangers, waiting in our cars in the middle of rush hour, refusing to move an inch until we were all damn sure that the last little guy had safely hopped up onto the curb.

Harry Potter and Healing

A couple of things:

1. I'm finally willing to cease and desist in my one woman struggle against Harry Potter. The craze began right as I was starting college, and, incidentally, right as I was starting my snotty English major at my snotty private liberal arts school. Needless to say, I took a snotty approach to the Rowling gang.

They weren't good enough for me. They were probably good enough for Oprah watching moms everywhere who hadn't read a worthwhile book in ages, but not for me. I was quite certain I wouldn't live long enough to read all the great literature humanity had produced, so there was no way I'd waste my time on this dumb thing. I would stand blissfully by and watch the Harry Potter craze die out in a few weeks time.

Yeah.

So I was wrong on that one and am duly embarrassed by the 17 year old attitude I was exhibiting there. Mea culpa.

My plan for next summer is to read the entire series, starting with book one. I'm already dreading my impulsive decision a few nights ago to read the summary of book 7 on wikipedia so I'd know what people were talking about.

2. I went to a Faith Healing tonight at my sister's church. Joe Schmoe Healing Man With Special Powers from God and Even More Importantly, Approval from the Vatican came to the church for a rosary, a mass, a personal faith testament, and a healing ceremony.

He came with instructions for strong male volunteers to be ready to catch people when they were slain in the spirit and fell to the ground in faithful healing.

I wanted dancing with snakes, writhing on the floor, speaking in tongues, doves descending in fire, people exclaiming and shouting, and general hoopla.

Frankly, I was sorely disappointed. A few people fell once in awhile, and I tried to bribe my brother-in-law to get up there and fall down, assuring him that it would probably "make my YEAR" if he did it, but Mom, Cyndy, Dave, and I all sat not-so-respectfully in the back row of the choir loft. Every once in awhile we'd mumble along to a decade of the rosary (come on, try to resist THAT impulse), but overall, I'd give the faith healing a big D+.

3. I beat my high score on the Bricks game on my cell phone somewhere in the middle of the personal faith testament.

Nothing says summer like Van Morrison

I think one of my favorite things about summer may be driving late at night with my sunroof open, windows down, and radio blaring. Jim says I listen to music in the car way too loud, but as far as I'm concerned, there's no other way to listen, particularly on a summer night and REM's "Losing My Religion" is on the radio.

I was having such a good time singing along (and thinking about that great scene from 90210 when Brenda is breaking up with Dylan after the big pregnancy scare and Losing My Religion is playing...didn't Cyndy blog about this moment?), I took the long way home to indulge in another one of my favorite things that Jim doesn't approve of: inordinately fast driving. So I took 494 to 394 to 101, and was rewarded when I hit the beautiful part of 101 with Van Morrison's "Into the Mystic." It only could have been better had "Mystery" by the Indigo Girls come on next.

Anyway, it was the kind of summer night you hope for, the kind of night that makes you feel like it's all just going to work itself out in the long run.

Even my master's thesis couldn't touch me. And let's be honest, that's really saying something.

Happy Birthday Mek-head

Also, today is my little brother's 22nd birthday. Here's to you, Mek.

My German-Catholic Grandmother

Tonight (in the unending quest to find something, ANYTHING to do besides my reading for the lit review) I paged through the Alumni magazine of my alma mater.

One of the top stories was about four faculty members who had received awards during the last all school mass of the year. One was an award chosen by parents, one by students, and the other two by faculty and staff. And yes, in high school I attended All School Masses.

Upon receiving the Apple Polisher Award from the student body, the lucky Spanish teacher said something to the effect of, "I'd like to thank my Lord Jesus who is responsible for all the great things about me."

At the risk of sounding cold, callous, angry, God-hating, Jesus-hating, and Christ (no pun intended), even a little jealous, I thought that was a lame-o acceptance speech. It doesn't really seem to have the right amount of humility--it affirms that yep, she's great, and while she won't take credit for it, dammit, she is. Also, while I'm a firm believer in the fact that some days in a classroom are in need of a little divine intervention, I don't ascribe to the belief that the Lord Jesus Himself is making me a mediocre, good, or great teacher, or for that matter, is all that particularly interested in my teaching.

So I'm thinking all of this to myself and realize, "God, Rach, you sound cold, callous, angry, God-hating, Jesus-hating, and frankly, a little jealous."

And then, I swear to God, I heard the voice of my German Catholic grandmother say, "You need to get your ass to church. Ach, aye Jesu."

Duly noted, Grandma. Duly noted.

Progress

Today Abby took me to Wilson Library to round up my last sources for The Thesis.

This is progress, people.

The Self Loathing

The great thing about finally working on something you've been avoiding like the plague is that all the self-loathing attached to the procrastination disappears, and you start to believe that you can actually complete the damn thing with sanity intact.

As a side note, I found this delightful bit about blogging today in my research: "In March 2003 the Oxford English Dictionary added blog (both noun and verb) and web log to its corpus, drawing from an eclectic set of definitional references. Their definition of blog notes that... 'To blog is to be part of a community of smart, tech-savvy people who want to be on the forefront of a new literary undertaking'" (Boyd 2006).

So, how about that? The OED considers us smart, tech-savvy, and on the forefront of a new literary undertaking.

Sounds good to me.

I heart the Target Express Lane

There are a number of things I like about the Target Express Lane.

1. The 15 year old this-is-obviously-my-first-job high school kid with bad acne who nervously checks out your things while hoping you aren't noticing his sticky name badge with "Charlie" scrawled on it since his "Official Team Member" name badge isn't finished yet.

2. Examining what other people have in their baskets--the items that they needed from Target so badly they had to make a special trip--the things that wouldn't hold off until the next regularly scheduled trip. Tonight, the fifty something man in front of me with long toenails but great hair had a loaf of white bread and some toothpaste. Not bad, but not as good as the twenty something guy behind me who had three CD's and deodorant.

3. Super Sour Cherry Blast Bubblicious gum. Enough said.

4. Teenagers that aren't students of mine and therefore are nothing to me usually avoid the Express Lane because...well, I don't really know why...I just don't usually have to run into them there. This is, apparently, just a bonus.

5. While it probably goes without saying since it's the intended purpose of the Express Lane, I do appreciate the speed with which I can pay for my things and get out of there. It belongs on the list.

This generally pleasing Target experience tonight was pretty well ruined when I walked out of the store and caught out of the corner of my eye a large silver Mercedes SUV moving into the pedestrian walkway. It's amazing I didn't hear it coming first, since the Gangsta rap pouring out of the unrolled windows had long ago passed "cool" and entered the "obnoxious" decibel level. What's worse, the blonde just-out-of-high-school girl--who has probably never been within 100 yards of a real "gangsta"--driving what must have been her daddy's car (this coming from a girl whose dad actually DID give her a car) didn't seem to acknowledge the fact that the mother with the over packed cart and screaming toddler two steps ahead of me and I clearly had the right of way in the pedestrian walk space and just kept on plowing into the walkway.

Unknown Mom who is apparently as stubborn as I am didn't seem bothered. She and I just kept walking in what seemed to be a slow motion battle of wills. Surely Eighteen Year Old Rich Girl in Mercedes wouldn't drive right into us. Surely she'd stop, realize the error in her ways, and turn down her damn music.

Well, she stopped. With not a lot of room to spare. But when she did, she honked at us. For a long time.

In an unusual display which I can only attribute to my own frustrations with myself for another day of complete and total procrastination and avoidance of The Thesis, I honest to God turned to her, threw out my arm and semi-shouted, "Oh give me a fucking break. We HAVE the right of way."

Oh God.

I think the record should reflect this new low: shouting at strangers, even when clearly in the right. (Which, by the way, is my preferred place to be.)

p.s. If you're wondering, I have actually managed to do SOME work on The Thesis, just probably not enough to merit mention on the blog yet. Stay tuned.

The iRack. Courtesy of MadTV

glumbert.com - The Apple iRack

The thing is, I'm having a hard time getting started

In May when I finished my coursework for my Master's Degree, I dreamed of long, beautiful summer days when I would earnestly and thoughtfully write my master's thesis.

When the students would ask what my plans were for the summer, I would wistfully imagine days spent in my office upstairs, articles and research journals on the floor around the desk, me with a ponytail, wearing my glasses, sipping some coffee, and tip tap typing away. The thought of The Thesis seemed distant, surreal, and far enough away that it couldn't hurt me yet. It seemed a scholarly, adult, professional, and dignified way to spend my summer.

At the end of the school year, the Whole Fricking Thing was getting too close for comfort, and I asked teaching pals Tim and KC if they thought it would be appropriate to hold off a "few days" (ie. weeks) and enjoy a little bit of summer before really digging into The Damn Thing. They wholeheartedly gave me permission to not start writing, working, or thinking about It until July 1st, at which time, I would knock that thing out, no problem.

The thing is, I'm having a hard time getting started.

It's July 3rd and so far every time I think I should work on It, I find something else to do. So far I've done three loads of laundry, finished watching Sports Night (both seasons--the show in its entirety), started reading Water for Elephants, gone for a walk, unloaded the dishwasher, gone to Target, and gone out for lunch. Twice.

So yeah. I'm having a hard time getting started.

Top Ten, in no particular order

Tonight when I was walking Piper, I was thinking about Susan Minot's novel Evening, which I finished reading today. I can't seem to shake this book. It was hauntingly sad, but not in the typical lugubrious, saccharine way. It ached in the places where you put away lost loves and relationships that will never, despite your best effort, actually work. I'm not sure the film adaptation will capture what made the book work, but whatever. God knows I'll see it.

Reading this book reminded me of my Moon Goddess of a sister Cyndy and the Top Ten lists on her blog. They started with the top ten "songs of her life" that she was playing to her stomach and unborn baby, and then she later carved out her top ten choral and orchestral pieces, and her top ten books.

Frankly, I loved reading these top ten lists, and would like to be the first to call for their return. In any shape or form, on any topic.

In that spirit, it seems a little absurd to not make a book list of my own.

I should say that this list is based on the presupposition that some books are too obvious to list. Those would be Salinger's Catcher in the Rye, Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five, Orwell's 1984, anything by Shakespeare (with the exception of a few of the histories), Bronte's Jane Eyre (sorry, but I'm still a little in love with Mr. Rochester...and what the hell, you might as well throw Pride and Prejudice in there because Mr. Darcy is about as good as they get in Victorian literature), Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men, and Huxley's Brave New World.

It also does not include the obvious drama choices, which would be Beckett's Waiting for Godot, Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey Into Night, and Wilder's Our Town.

Also, "Birches" by Robert Frost is my favorite poem.

In no particular order:

1. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith

I think every junior high girl should read this book. I honestly believe it would make them stand up straighter and love themselves more.

2. Lord of the Flies by William Golding

This was the first book that made me believe there was more to literature than a plotline. It's probably the book I would credit with turning me into an English teacher.

3. The Family of Man created by Edward Steichen

Okay, so this one isn't actually a book, but was an exhibition created by Edward Steichen in 1955. It consisted of 508 photographs from 68 countries. The professed aim of the exhibition was to mark "essential oneness of mankind throughout the world." I wasn't around in 1955, but I have it in book form.

4. The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway. I once made all of my high school friends read this on choir tour so we could discuss it. And my dad thought I was going to be a doctor. Right.

5. The Once and Future King by T.H. White. This book should be required reading for all ninth graders of the world. I loved it so much (and like Cyndy, loved the last chapter of it so much) that I typed the whole damn thing out for Abby my junior year of high school. God, I was destined for nerdiness.

6. The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien.

This book made me believe that not all great books were written by dead authors. Probably the best book in any high school curriculum.

7. Beach Music by Pat Conroy. I love this book and have read it more times than any other book (that I haven't taught). I don't know what else to say about it. It is wonderful in every way.

8. My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult. This was the first of many Picoult books that I've read. It was good enough to keep me glued to the pages while driving through the beautiful Swiss countryside. I think I put it down to look out the window when we got to the Alps, but I'm not entirely sure. This book made me weep in a humiliating, undignified way.

9. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald.
I think I love this book so much because I did NOT read it in high school. There's too much going on with this novel to not mention it on the top ten list. It should also be on a list of novels with great last sentences.

10. Last and painfully not least, I love a particular trilogy of books by Heather Graham that are historical romances about the Civil War. In no way am I proud of this choice or would I deem these selections "Great Literature." In fact, if in front of a room of sophomores, I would deny this selection to my dying breath. But as a junior high girl, I absolutely adored these books--I fell in love with the Cameron brothers, I admired the witty heroines with whom they fell in love, and I believed wholeheartedly in the beauty and lost glory of The South.

While I'm admitting things, I might as well admit that I also reread them on a trip to Mexico in college and found them equally entertaining.

Ugh, so, SO embarrassing. You can tell how embarrassing by their cover images and their titles: One Wore Blue, One Wore Gray, and And One Rode West.

You can borrow them if you'd like.

Etymology of Names

After looking up the etymology of "Lenny" for Laur and John's new puppy (don't miss the cute pics below), I spent a little time on the "Behind the Name" website. This would be a good opportunity to discuss the apparent inequity between the names of my siblings and me.

CYNTHEA (Cyndy):
Gender: Feminine
Usage: English, Greek Mythology (Latinized)
Pronounced: SIN-thee-a (English) [key]
Latinized form of Greek Κυνθια (Kynthia) which means "woman from Kynthos". This was an epithet of the Greek moon goddess Artemis, given because Kynthos was the mountain on Delos on which she and her twin brother Apollo were born.


MICHAEL
Gender: Masculine
Usage: English, German, Czech, Biblical
Pronounced: MIE-kul (English), MI-khah-el (German) [key]
From the Hebrew name מִיכָאֵל (Mika'el) which meant "who is like God?". This is the name of one of the seven archangels in Hebrew tradition and the only one identified as an archangel in the Bible. In the Book of Revelation in the New Testament he is portrayed as the leader of heaven's armies, and thus is considered the patron saint of soldiers. This was also the name of nine Byzantine emperors and a czar of Russia.


RACHEL
Gender: Feminine
Usage: English, Jewish, French, German, Biblical
Other Scripts: רָחֵל (Hebrew)
Pronounced: RAY-chel (English), ra-SHEL (French) [key]
Means "ewe" in Hebrew. She was the favourite wife of Jacob and the mother of Joseph and Benjamin in the Old Testament.


The abridged version:

Cyndy: Moon Goddess
Michael: One who is like God
Rachel: A sheep. Oh, and also a wife and mom.

Nice.

Welcome to the world, puppy

Laur and John stopped by tonight with their new little puppy, Lenny.

One. Cute. Puppy.

Aaron Sorkin, will you marry me?

Tonight I watched the most recent episode of Studio 60 which my Tivo (thankfully) recorded despite the long hiatus in the middle of the season.

I know that the show is getting canceled and has gotten terrible ratings, but God help me, I love it. Frankly, any show by Aaron Sorkin is worth watching. I've decided to start rewatching The West Wing this summer. I figure that should keep me good and distracted from the thesis writing.

In other news, James Van der Beek (Dawson of Dawson's Creek fame) was on Criminal Minds tonight playing a schizophrenic, Bible thumping, serial killer.

Weird?

Yes.

Summer summer summer time, summer time...

Summer officially started today at 1:30 when I walked out of school after our end of the year Tears and Cheers luncheon. (Yes, we call it that for real.)

However, the summer fun started a week ago. Here are some highlights:

A trip to St. Cloud last weekend for Jim's brother's 40th birthday:

Rach, Abby, Spud: The Nightlife of St. Cloud

Rach, Abby, and Mr. Hatten, the elder

Classic, classic Spud story moment

Abby playing the Big Buck Hunter. This game was as fun as it looks. Seriously.

The adult celebration of the end of the school year commenced immediately following commencement:

T Klob

Cyndy, Michael and I had a rare dinner outing together at Maynard's tonight. It helped that Michael's girlfriend works there and could swing us a table.

School's out for summer

For as long as I can remember, I've been bad at goodbyes. I can't manage to get through them without crying, and everything takes on this monumental significance and sense of poignancy.

The end of the school year is no different. I fall in the love with the students a little easier, the stupid things they say and do seem a little sweeter, and their earnest little faces during their final exam are pretty damn endearing.

This is not to say that they don't do things to make those goodbyes a little easier. I've never responded to so many stupid questions in my life as I did during the sophomores' final exam:

"I don't need a thesis statement for this second question, right?"

"Is this panel where these characters are talking a good example of silence?"

"Does spelling count?"

"Instead of writing an essay, can I just make a bullet point list?"

"Maybe you just want to cancel the test?"

And my personal favorite: "Can I come by after school to see my grade?"

Um, no.

But in all seriousness, here's what I love about the end of the school year: the sense of completion, of finality, of having completed something significant, profound, and important. Last night as I was walking in to graduation with one of our assitant principals, he turned to me and said, "I've done this a million times, but every time I still get a rush."

And he's right.

There really IS something to processing with colleagues in academic garb, with 500 some seniors who still have everything in front of them, with trumpets blaring, into a room so packed full of people their sense of pride is practically tangible.

The great thing about teaching high school, of course, is that as soon as you get swept away in these moments--swept away enough to ignore the 100 degree heat and the definitive sensation of sweat running down every part of your body--one of your students will pick you out of the crowd and bring you crashing back to earth by shouting at the top of his lungs:

"Hey Tholen! THOLEN! Did I frickin' PASS?!?"

It's the ups and downs, really, that make teaching so interesting. That's just how it is. You'll be in the middle of what you find to be the most enlightening discussion about the nature of our human existence as exhibited in this great text, and some kid will raise his hand and ask to "take a squirt."

Nice.

The bottom line, though, is that if you can find good friends to keep you laughing--to keep you sane, really--all you'll remember at the end of it all is the way that kid smiled when you assured him that yes, he did (amazingly) pass, the way they awkwardly hang around your classroom at the end of the day because they just want to talk, the way they shout your name in the hallway just to say hey, and the way they thank you sometimes on their way out of your classroom, and you'll think:

This is it. There is nothing I would rather do.