Fie Upon This Quiet Life: I Want Work

Okay - Sunday, bullet edition

2012-01-29T12:00:00.000-08:00

I'm too busy to be blogging, yet here we are. On the docket:

* Grading - STILL. I've gotten through about 30 something papers, and there are still just under 20 left. Just kill me.

* Finishing SAA paper. This is close, and quite exciting, but I still asked for an extension, hoping against hope that I can polish this bugger and not embarrass myself by turning in a rough draft on Tuesday. I'm hoping for an extra six days.

* Go see Jimmy Fallon tonight. This seems so clearly irresponsible because I have so much school work to do, but my mom bought us the tickets. I've also been told that my workaholic behavior is actually detrimental to my health and the health of my marriage. Pish posh. What's health?

* Figure out how to relax and have a good time without tapping my foot restlessly until the next time I can start working.

What's a father?

2012-01-28T11:42:00.001-08:00

I follow a blog called Project Unbreakable, which I discovered through a post on Bad Mommy Moments. Project Unbreakable is a photography project where victims of sex abuse and rape write down what their abusers said to them during the act, take a picture, and send it in to the blogger. I am astounded at the things that are revealed on this site. It must take so much courage to share the horrible things that these people have gone through.

The worst part to me is how many of the abusers/rapists were the victims' parents - occasionally moms (which completely surprised me), but mostly dads. In fact, a LOT of the poster pictures attribute abuser quotes to fathers. It outrages me. I just can't understand it - as a person and as a parent. How does this happen?

My mom was molested by her father over the course of many, many years. He was a hateful man - violent, alcoholic, sexually abusive. Even though he's dead, the scars he's left on my mom are still fresh, and they affected her ability to have relationships with her own children. She wasn't physically or sexually abusive to us, but she was mean. Sometimes I wish she would have just hit me instead of telling me what a dumb ass, good-for-nothing person I was. And even when she wasn't being mean, she was cold. I don't remember her ever saying "I love you" until I was an adult -- too late to believe her -- and we didn't hug or kiss. I thought moms who did that were gross.

Since my family was so affected by my mom's abusive parents (her mom beat and belittled her, too), I didn't really want to have children. I figured that I wouldn't have much to offer kids in the way of affection, and I worried that I might have a hidden violent streak or something -- inherited evil. But my hubby convinced me that I could choose what kind of parent I wanted to be, and that I didn't have to be like my mom or her father. So I went ahead and had kids. I'm glad I did. It's hard, but it's good. I love my kids. I have to remind myself to tell them I love them, and I have to remind myself to hug and kiss them, since none of that seems natural to me. But I do it, and it feels good most of the time (when I allow myself not to be so rigid), and I'm glad that they are a part of my life.

My hubby is a good dad. Yeah, sometimes he loses his temper - we all do - but he's generally great: involved, helpful, engaged. Awesome. My own dad was not involved, helpful, and engaged, but he was a good person and was the opposite of my mom in that he was generally loving to us when he was around. When he died in September 2009, I felt a major loss -- feeling like the one person I could count on in my family to love me was suddenly gone. That was a heavy thought. I miss him a lot.

Today is my dad's birthday. He would have been 66. My sisters and my mom and I are getting together with our families for dinner tonight. I guess that the question "What's a father?" has been spinning in my head a lot today since looking at the Project Unbreakable site and thinking about the despicable things that some fathers do. Several statistics I've seen state that 1 in 4 women are raped or molested and 1 in 6 men are. I wonder what percentage of that abuse was perpetrated by fathers of the victims. That group of men, to me, are not fathers. They're assholes. They're the worst kind of betrayers of humanity.

I guess I should thank my lucky stars that my father was one of the good guys and that my husband is, too. Contemplating all of this on my dad's birthday is, perhaps, as little odd. But it makes me feel grateful that I had a decent father.

These kids and their multi-font papers

2012-01-27T20:37:00.000-08:00

I am grading my first stack of papers, still. I got them a week ago, but since I have 53 students to grade in my intro classes, and a lot of other things on my plate, I've not gotten through them. I sat down to get through a few tonight, and the second one I graded was plagiarized.

You know how I know? Or at least, you know how I was tipped off? The second paragraph went from Times New Roman to Ariel in the middle of a sentence, and the student used a multi-word modifier correctly in the Ariel section. Ding - a bell rang in my head. I typed that paragraph into a Word doc and submitted it to turnitin.com. In seconds, I had evidence of a 43% plagiarized paragraph. You know, the Ariel part.

Seriously, students - give me a challenge. Sincerely, Dr. Fie.

Writing contest and hubby's lottery winner

2012-01-24T19:58:00.000-08:00

I'm sure you remember way back in 2010 when I spent 67 days of the summer writing a novel. Well, I haven't been doing anything with it lately because I don't have time. But today, I had coffee with my best writing friend, and he told me about a writing contest that I couldn't pass up. It's Amazon's Breakthrough Novel Contest, and it's - importantly - free. Sure, you have to set up an account with Amazon's self-publishing section, but whatever. You're under no obligation to publish with them or anything. The contest only accepts novels in two categories: YA and general fiction. They accept 5000 novels in each category, a total of 10K novels. The grand prize is that you get published by Penguin and get a 15K advance.

The point is that the odds are much better than winning the lottery, but only slightly worse than getting a tenure-track job in your academic field.

Since I gave up the agent search a while ago, I figure I might as well enter a contest. The free part was also motivating. A lot of contests want you to pay an entry fee, and for novels, that can be a lot of money. Anyway - it's worth a shot. And if nothing comes of it, I'm no worse off.

A lot of people have been bugging me lately, saying that I should self-publish the novel (e-publish). I might go that route eventually, but it would be cool to feel legitimized by the publishing industry by winning a contest or getting an agent. We all want to feel special and loved, after all.

That said, if I get to the semi-final round, I'll be pimping myself on every social network, blog, etc. to ask people to get on Amazon and vote for my novel. That would "out" me in the blogosphere, I guess, as I wasn't intelligent enough to use a pseudonym on the contest entry form. But hell, I guess it would be worth it to get a book deal. (Besides, half my readers know who I am anyway, so I'm told.)

So that's pretty much what's going on with me.

Hubby, on the other hand, hit the metaphorical lottery today, in that he got a job offer from a local company. The bad news - it's a pay cut. But we knew that he couldn't make California money forever in the heartland. This is a much better job for him, as far as how satisfied he'll be with it. And I think that he'll be able to negotiate the salary a little bit.

Another thing - I sat down with our finances over the weekend to see if we could afford for him to take a pay cut. We can. It's just that we'll have to be more careful about how we're spending. We're finally to a place where we're caught up from the long summer of me not getting paid and moving, etc. So I am hopeful that all this is toward the good.

The really nice thing to me is that hubby is finally going to have a shot at a job that is his dream. He's sacrificed a lot for me to chase rainbows, and now, he gets his chance. That, friends, is priceless.

Uninspiring

2012-01-23T18:32:00.000-08:00

I started teaching The Hunger Games to my intro students today. Let's see - this is probably the fifth time I've taught this book in the last two years. It's the first time I've taught it to freshmen, though. And you know freshmen - most of them don't read. Well, let's say half of them don't. I had lots of absence today because of the March for Life in Washington (don't even get me started...) and then there were a few people who missed for no apparent reason. All together, I had bad attendance and only about a quarter of the students had read the assignment. Those who had read the assignment (about 70 pages) had actually ended up reading most of the book over the weekend. Right on. But it's tough teaching with enthusiasm when it's clear that a lot of people have no idea what you're talking about. I gave it my best shot, though.

I have to say, this group of intro students is frankly uninspiring to me. This is sad because last semester the intro class was my very favorite. They were smart and with it - always read the assignments. Of course, when the class is small (8 students) and the teacher calls on you if you don't volunteer to talk (waves!) then you pretty much have to read. Or be humiliated.

I don't want to give myself more work, but I might have to start doing daily reading quizzes. Ugh. So insulting to everyone. I don't want this to be a lecture class, though. I tried group work on Friday with mixed results. I think I'm going to have to figure out something else to make them talk. Otherwise, this semester is going to drive me up the ever-loving wall.

At least my drama class appears to be on top of things. I teach Trifles in there tomorrow. I taught that in my intro class last week. I hope that the drama class is far more inspiring than the intro class had been. Meh.

Me in the middle of the night

2012-01-21T22:57:00.001-08:00

It's about 2:00 a.m., and I'm wide, wide awake. Like, six cups of coffee awake. I went to bed at about 11:00, and then baby woke up at 12:30. Hubby got up with him, but baby wanted me. Okay. I sat with him for a while, got him back to bed, and then went to lie down. Heartburn. Okay. I had to go downstairs to get antacid. Fine. Wide awake at that point, I sat down to read The Emerald Atlas, which my brother-in-law sent me last week. (It's my first obligation read of the year. Hmph.) It's an okay book, but I usually fall asleep reading it. Not tonight. But it bored me enough to put it down and try to relax. Can't relax. Can't sleep. Phooey.

This has been happening with a fair amount of frequency over the last several years. There will be weeks at a time when I sleep about three or so hours a night, and then, after lots of that, I crash for about three days and sleep twelve hours a night. I'm eagerly awaiting my crash at this point. The insomnia has been hellish since the new year began. I'm positive I haven't gotten a full night of sleep since before January 1. I know that a lot of it is stress related and that I've got a lot on my mind. It's just that I wish I could turn that off when I go to bed. It would probably help me cope with my real life more if I were rested, eh?

I don't know. I might try sleeping pills next. After all, how are you supposed to get to sleep when you're sitting here feeling angry about not being able to sleep? $%^&^%$@#$%$#@

First stack

2012-01-21T11:19:00.000-08:00

I think that I officially ended up with 53 intro students. (I managed to scare some away. Mwhahaha!) 53 is a lot more than 8, which is how many intro students I had last semester. I loved the class in the fall. Now? It's grueling. I feel like I'm an urban dog walker, and I'm dragging 53 separately leashed, uncooperative dogs behind me. The students are reluctant to talk, so I'm already putting them in groups and all that. I'm hoping that teaching The Hunger Games over the next two weeks will help them escape their shells and help them see how fun this class could be, even with minimal effort. Of course, this assumes they'll read the book. I'm positive only half the class is keeping up with the reading right now. Sucks to be them.

It also sucks to be me, since I just got my first stack of papers from these reluctant students. I know that a few people didn't turn in anything, which means they're already in danger of failing the class. As it states on my syllabus, turning in all assignments is a requirement, but not a guarantee, of passing the class. (I take late work with a hefty grading penalty.) Maybe I'll get some more kids to drop the class once I point that out. It would be nice to have a more manageable number of students when it comes to grading. This class is heavily writing intensive, so I have a ton of grading coming up. I guarantee the next time I teach this class I'm going to make it loads easier on myself.

Anyway, my weekend will be comprised of grading and more grading. Then, I think some laundry and errand running might be on the docket for tomorrow. I'm reluctant to leave the house, though, as there has been some nasty precipitation out here in the heartland. I'm not sure how the roads are. Still, braving the roads to go to Target sounds like a lovely alternative to reading poorly written papers.

Opinions matter

2012-01-19T13:09:00.000-08:00

I had a splendid time today in my women playwrights class. We were finishing up our discussion of A Man's World by Rachel Crothers, and I was focusing on doing some close reading of the male love interest, who comes off - to me - as the biggest a-hole, misogynist jerk in the world, but who comes off - to my students - as not half bad. So we discussed his character for much of the class.

I felt like the discussion was plentiful in insight. We did a really good job combing through the gray area between the binaries of "jerk" and "good guy." Initially, one of the students said, remorsefully, "I just didn't think of him that way!" The other students were sympathetic, as was I, and we talked and talked and talked. We looked at evidence. We honed in on details. We puzzled. It was great. Plus, I told the students that they never have to agree with me, but that we all (including me) have to consider each others' opinions. I think we all left class feeling good about it, and the students certainly had a lot of wonderful "light bulb" moments. We all bounced out into the snow with light hearts. Good times.

The irony to me is that I feel like I have to be very careful how I frame this class. Feminism is sort of a bad word at Heartland U (this will surprise few), and when I talk about feminist readings of these plays by women, I can feel the room get a little uncomfortable. (Like it shrivels in on itself.) So I'm trying to use a light touch. I don't feel like I should have to, but I also don't want to alienate students - many of whom are from conservative backgrounds. Ah well.

Anyway - I am happy that they are talking and digging into doing some close reading, as well as talking about performance matters. This is just so fun. I was really worried about this class, since women playwrights aren't my area of real expertise, but goodness - it's a ton of fun! And there is a LOT to mine in these plays. Hell, I could write a book about them. Maybe I will someday. :)

MLK for five year olds

2012-01-18T04:46:00.000-08:00

We looked at Eldest's folder this morning and saw that the kindergarteners had a lesson on Martin Luther King yesterday. I asked Eldest what they learned, and he said that we're not allowed to use weapons, but police can use weapons. I said, "uh, yep." And then he asked why police can use weapons. I said, "They can use weapons if there's an emergency when someone is trying to kill someone else." Hey, it was on the fly.

Then, I started to think about the kind of watered down, BS stuff they say to kids these days. Everything is "silly." "Oh, look - Billy just dumped water on his sister. Isn't that silly?" I started wondering how you teach race relations to kindergarteners, and wondered if something like "It used to be that white people thought black people weren't really human beings, so they owned them and treated them like dogs. Isn't that silly?"

Perhaps this is a gross underestimation of the abilities of our education system, but I'm not sure it is.

I don't really remember when I learned about slavery or the holocaust or any other atrocity of humankind, but I do remember thinking it was shocking that humans could be so horrible and cruel. I wonder how much more shocked my kids will be when they learn just how "silly" we humans can be. Sigh.

Oh the drama!

2012-01-17T17:29:00.000-08:00

Today was the first day that my women playwrights class officially dug into a primary text, and we started out with Rachel Crothers's play, A Man's World, written in 1909. It was a thoroughly enjoyable class, and for the first time since I started at Heartland U in the fall, I actually lost track of time in my class, and we stayed five minutes past the end. That's when I can tell that a decent discussion is going on. It was really nice!

One thing that I've been trying to do in this class, as opposed to my classes in the fall - and the past in general - is I'm trying to sit down more instead of pacing in the front like I normally do. I am finding that not being in that official position of "at the head of the class" is helping to spur conversation a bit more. We're not sitting in a circle, per se, but we are at least all seated, and I'm writing less on the board. Initially, I was opposed to leaving the board because I would use it as a way to keep my own thoughts organized. But then, I realized that writing on the board sometimes makes students think that what's up there is the "right" answer and that there is no need to add to it. Conversation was hard to drag out of my YA students last semester, despite the awesome material we covered, and I wondered if maybe sitting down and talking to students more "on their level" - eye level, that is - would help. So far, it has. Or maybe it's just that I have different students. Who knows? But it feels better than pretty much all my classes so far at HU. Then again, we're reading some really compelling plays that despite being over a hundred years old feel very contemporary. Pretty cool!

I predict this women playwrights class may be my favorite all year. It's definitely my favorite at the moment. Lovely!!

Interdisciplinary SLAC stuff

2012-01-15T18:16:00.000-08:00

I've been following feMOMhist's posts about working at a Quaint College with interest, as I'm in my first year TT at one myself. I've had a lot of positive experiences and a lot of disappointments over the first several months. Today, I'm focusing on a very positive thing: interdisciplinary opportunities.

One of the best things about teaching at a SLAC is that I can get involved in a lot of different activities both inside and outside my department. I've been volunteering in the theatre, and the performance club asked me to be a co-sponsor. Sure! Awesome! Then, there's a creative writing group, and they invited me to their meeting on Tuesday. Freaking cool! Yes, I want to hang with the CW folks. Another professor is taking some stus on a trip for model UN. Do I want to go, since I know San Francisco well? Hell yes! I adore politics! (However, I'm not sure that model UN will work out for me. I may have maxed out my travel expenses for the year already. But if the school will cover the cost, I'm totally there!)

All together, this is a lot of involvement -- I'm unsure that will likely count as official service for the school. You know, the stuff tenure's made of. However, it's stuff that I really want to do, and it's actually stuff I would have liked to have done as an undergrad, but I was too poor or too shy or too involved in other things. Mainly, too poor. Anything that involved travel involved money, of course, and my parents didn't pay for any of my college, so I didn't get to do a lot of the stuff I would have if I had money. So now? The opportunities I have are good fun for me, and I am excited about them. I'm not sure they'll help me get tenure, but maybe doing things like this will show I'm investing in the community. Maybe that will count.

One of the tough things for me at my SLAC is that tenure requirements are pretty wobbly. I have a (non-English) friend who is up for pre-tenure review, and even she is unsure of what's required. (I think it differs from department to department. Hell, none of us are sure.) Anyway, I hope that these investments that I'm making will pay off. Since the person I replaced refuses to give up anything she has run in the past, I am essentially a full-time adjunct for my department. I have nothing to do in the department, so I'm reaching out. Plus, the other person who is a British-y type is retiring in the next half decade or so, so I'll be taking over many of those classes. But until then, I'm teaching almost all gen-ed, and Shakespeare every other spring. (Not this spring, either.) I need something to do -- some way to use my talents, such as they are. Getting involved in student groups, going on trips, and doing some research (SAA paper is coming along), are, I guess, what I'm supposed to be doing.

So things are a little unclear for me about what I should be doing, but I'm forging a path nonetheless. I hope that counts to all the right people.

Insomniac's day

2012-01-13T03:11:00.000-08:00

Lately, I've been having a hard time sleeping. I think the beginning of the semester and having a lot of stress already are the culprits. Then again, I haven't really slept well since we had kids. I guess I got on that infant-night-feeding schedule and never quite shook it.

I went to bed at 10:20 and baby woke up at 2:00 with a poopy diaper. Okay. Fine. Diaper changed, and kiddo rocked to sleep. I went back to bed and lay there for two hours. Then I fell asleep, only to wake up an hour later from a weird dream in which George Clooney was living with a couple of my friends from California. So I got up. What the hell? Might as well read something or do some work. Or blog! But I have a long day today, and on only about 4.5 hours of sleep, it might be a real drag.

My grandfather used to be an insomniac, and my mom is, too. I think my mom frequently functions on about 4 hours of sleep. Maybe I inherited insomnia. Who knows? It sucks being muddy headed in the middle of the day from it, though. There's really not enough coffee in the world. Plus, I'm sure that coffee would exacerbate the problem.

I just wonder if I'm ever going to get a good night's sleep again.

The kids keep coming

2012-01-11T14:47:00.000-08:00

Since I'm teaching 3 intro classes this semester - the English requirement after 101 - it's no surprise that I've got a lot of students. But I didn't until Monday. I don't know if this is a peculiarity about spring, but a LOT of people are registering late. Could they not pay their bills? Did they not know if they were coming back? What happened to these students that made them wait until the first, second, and third day of classes to show up and declare, "I need a spot in your class"?

I was so annoyed by this afternoon -- after signing up the sixth or seventh person for my GE class -- that I almost had a melt down. The real problem is that each student who adds my class signifies a huge amount of grading. And this is problematic. I now have just about twice as many students this semester as I had last semester. I have no idea how I'm going to get all that grading done without a steady application of alcohol in my life.

The problem is that I can't send the students away until my classes are full -- or until Friday. (Friday is the last day to add.) So potentially, I could end up with 72 students, though I started the semester with 56. Currently, I have 66, I think. Last semester, I had 36.

I'm sure this qualifies as a first-world problem, or perhaps a golden-apple problem. But it feels miserable to me. Something will have to give this semester, because I can't imagine commenting as thoroughly as I normally do on every one of those papers. I guess I'll just have to be more efficient when I grade - or maybe I'll be harder on the students than I normally am in order to scare them away. I don't know. I'm completely stressed out, though.

Hold up, January!!

2012-01-10T17:51:00.000-08:00

It's the 10th already?? How does this happen? I pay my rent, and then suddenly, a third of the month is gone. This seems to happen more and more these days. I blink, and time has slipped away. What that means is I need to get or-gan-ized! After all, my SAA paper is due on the 31st, and lo, I only have three pages written.

Today, I had one class - drama! huzzah! - and then I met with some of my colleagues for about an hour and a half to talk about research. Three of us decided to start our own little writing group and try to help each other tease out our ideas. We'll be meeting on Tuesdays from 2-3:30. Since, of the three of us, I have the most pressing deadline, the colleagues generously decided to focus on me for the day. So we talked about my Shakespeare project, and as we talked, I started to get a much greater sense of clarity about my argument. Ah, it felt so good! And even though neither of these people are literature folk, they had really insightful things to say about Hamlet. Thank God for the ubiquity of Shakespeare, eh?

The funny thing is that I've always been reluctant to share my scholarship with my peers because I'm (still) insecure about it. But now I realize what I've been missing. These people are smart and helpful - just like I can be smart and helpful to them. So why not try to benefit from having smart, helpful people around me? Besides, I'm happy to give them my editorial help when they get their papers drafted. I'm not totally useless to them. I'm sure that bouncing ideas around with me will be just as helpful to their writing as they have been to mine. Plus, we're holding each other accountable. They want to see a draft of my paper a week from today.

One week! Eeek! Hold up, January! Everything is moving too fast at the moment. Before I know it, I'll have been on vacation and back. Then, the rest of the semester will just run through my fingers until SAA in April. Wow. I sure have a lot to do.

Well - I said I wanted work, didn't I?

Three for the trinity

2012-01-09T14:17:00.000-08:00

When I was in grade school, I remember that there was a nun who used to have us do certain tasks three times -- copying vocabulary, writing spelling words, or whatever. She used to say, "Three times, everyone! Three for the trinity!" (You know - the father, son, and holy ghost.) And so we did whatever it was three times.

This semester, I have three intro classes on MWF. Today was the first day, and everything went swimmingly. I was excited about classes starting, and last semester, I really loved my intro class. So I am happy to be teaching it again. However, teaching three intro classes, three days a week at 9, 10, and 12 is kind of brutal. I was happy, but exhausted and headachy by 1:00. I only have one class on Tues/Thursday, thankfully. But I teach during lunchtime every single day of the week. Gone are my awesome lunches with colleagues -- which I hope will result in losing some weight from not being at the horrible cafeteria daily. (Silver lining!?) Anyway - I feel like this semester is going to be one awesome kick in the ass, but a kick in the ass nonetheless.

When I was leaving my third class today, I thought to myself, "Three classes... three for the trinity." And then I started laughing. I hadn't thought of that for years and years. But here I am at a faith-based school, so I guess it was oddly appropriate. I don't really remember the trinity making me happily headachy in the past. I hope that this is just a fluke of the first day and that I'm able to cope better with having such busy MWFs.

Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow

2012-01-08T11:37:00.000-08:00

Spring semester starts tomorrow. Today, we got together with one of my colleagues who has little kids, and we all went to a train expo at the fair grounds. It was pretty cool. Model trains are hypnotic for my kiddos, so they seemed to enjoy it. My colleague asked, "So are you ready for tomorrow?" I said, "No." I meant, "No, I'm not mentally prepared. I can't believe it's spring semester already!" His response was, "I only have two of my four syllabi written," and then I felt like my answer to the initial question should be revised.

I'm lucky that I only have two preps this semester. I think my colleague has four. Plus, he's in theatre, so he's got two shows to do as well. And he's got two young kids - one an infant. Compared to him, I'm going to have a snap of a semester. And I felt really bad about that. But I'm going to try to help him out as much as I can. I'm going to be on the play selection committee, and I'm helping to plan the Stratford trip for the fall, which we are starting to plan now. Plus, I'll volunteer for box office again. I hope that I can take down his stress level a notch, but there are no guarantees. Sometimes trying to delegate can be just as stressful as doing something yourself. We'll see how it goes.

Anyway - tomorrow. Am I ready? Syllabi? Yes. Mentally? I'm a little intimidated. I have a lot more students this semester than I had last semester (Fall enrollment: 36; Spring enrollment: 56 -- this is still fewer students than I had as a TA when I was teaching in my master's program, so I should shut up.). Grading is going to be more intense than the fall. Fifty of those students are dispersed in my 3 intro classes; my drama class has only 6 students. Of course, I have the intro students write constantly. That'll be fun grading! Not. But I love how the class ran last semester, so I'm not changing it. (I will likely regret this, but that's my life, isn't it?) Besides, the syllabi have been done for about a week, and have been sitting on my desk, photocopied and everything. I do anticipate that the prep time involved for intro is going to be minimal, since I'm teaching almost exactly the same things, and any additions are things I've already taught in other classes. The only exception is Of Mice and Men, which I love anyway, so I think it'll be fine. The drama class will be more work, for sure. But at least I have the semester off from comp. That's pretty damn delightful.

There is a lot of travel to look forward to this spring: I get a vacation in February, a Boston conference in April, a possible trip to San Francisco with the history/poli-sci folk in April (depending on student recruitment), a trip in May, and then it's summer. It will very likely fly by.

In the meantime, tomorrow approacheth. Welcome spring!

This is the part where I take deep breaths

2012-01-07T13:26:00.001-08:00

I went shoe shopping earlier because I've been wanting to get some ankle-high black boots. I went to several places, got horrible customer service and couldn't find just the right pair. It was frustrating because I saw a pair I liked online, but of course they weren't in the store. I could order them, but I never buy shoes without trying them on, and I usually have had bad luck buying apparel online. So I decided against them. Besides, they were expensive, and it's a want, not a need. So I figured I'd just keep my eyes open.

Then, as I was walking back to my car, I reached into my jacket pocket and found a cigarette pack in it. I haven't worn this jacket for a month, easily, because it's been too cold to wear a light jacket. I opened the pack, and there was one cigarette in there. My immediate reaction was "score!" But then I remembered I quit smoking a week ago.

In the end, I threw it away at the next trash can. Still, it was a struggle not to smoke when I had a freebie right there in front of me.

Then, I called home and hubby snapped at me and I wished I hadn't thrown it away.

A sigh counts as a deep breath, right?

Referee

2012-01-05T14:22:00.000-08:00

I officially hate play dates right now. Eldest has been having regular play dates with neighbor kids, and he acts like a complete jerk every time someone comes over. (By the way - how come people only call and say "can my kid come over?" instead of inviting our kid over?? This is completely not reciprocal.) The kids want to play trains, for instance, and eldest wants to play something else. But unlike most kids who are inches away from six years old, eldest can't abide other people making different choices. He FREAKS out, has a tantrum, and cries for approximately an hour. We are in the midst of a play date right now, and he's only been calm for the last 5 minutes. The kid has been here for well over an hour. Two timeouts and a stern talking to later, eldest has finally relented to being a good host.

I try to let him work out these conflicts himself for a while - he asks the kid to play what he wants. The kid says no and wants to play something else. Eldest throws a fit. I intervene and ask if we can take turns. The kid says no. Eldest has more of a fit. And the cycle goes on.

Now that I'm writing this out, I think the neighbor kids are freaking jerks too. Why can't there be any compromise when I try to get them to compromise?

Ok. I think I just hate play dates. I know I freaking hate playing referee. Blerg. School can't start soon enough. And these kids can't go to college soon enough either.

And before I could even finish this post, the neighbor kid asked to go home. Fine. Total play date time = an hour and ten minutes. Total time enjoyed = approximately 8 minutes. This kid either needs better friends or I need to get somebody a shock collar.

A waste?

2012-01-04T09:01:00.000-08:00

I took baby to work with me today because I felt like hubby could use a break, and I thought that baby would want to play inside my (empty) cabinets and that it wouldn't be a big deal. Wrong. Daddy lets him mess with an old laptop of ours at home, so baby thinks that every computer is meant to be ~~abused~~ played with. Loudly. And it turns out that today was the day everyone came back to the department, which had been a ghost town throughout break. So I was constantly shhhhing baby and trying to distract him with something else. Thus, I knew I wouldn't be able to get anything "brainy" done with him there and boy, it pissed me off.

So I figured I'd rearrange the office.

This has been a long time coming. The maintenance guy told me that I needed to move two of my bookshelves because they were under a heating/cooling unit that could potentially leak. He said that, especially in the summer, condensation leaks out of those units, and it can (obviously) ruin books. So I've been meaning to move these books since October or so, but haven't had time.

Baby "helped" me move the bookcases by dumping books on the bottom shelves all over the floor. Mercifully, he only did this to the bookcases I pointed to and left the others alone. Once all the books were out, I dragged the bookcases to their new homes and then we put the books back. Well, I did. Baby decided to try being a bookend instead.

I guess it wasn't a total waste of time, since I did need to get those bookcases moved. But still, my SAA paper isn't going to write itself. Hmph.

Working through the pain

2012-01-03T20:51:00.000-08:00

I quit smoking again on January 1. I know. How did I start again? I feel like I've quit about 100 times in the last year, and all it took was one bad day (multiple times) to get me going again. Well, today is the third day of quitting. Usually day 3 is a pretty hard day for me. Day 4 is, too. I'm trying to avoid overeating as my solution to the problem of addiction pains, since every time I quit smoking I gain weight. Even just a couple of pounds is annoying, and I really don't need a single ounce more of weight to contend with. Chewing gum helps, but it gets to the point where my jaw starts killing me from chewing gum all day. So it's been a tough day, physically.

In addition to the physical discomfort, I had an emotionally uncomfortable day, too. I went to a funeral this morning -- my English teacher from my senior year of high school died recently, and the funeral was today. I hadn't been to a Catholic mass since my dad died (September 2009), and that wasn't very comfortable for me either. I was glad I went, though. This guy was one of two English teachers I had in high school that really inspired me to get into the profession. He was one of my heroes, and I was really sad to hear he'd died. He was only 62.

In order to try to avoid all of this discomfort and upheaval today, I've been working a lot. I got a proposal written up that took most of the day. I answered some pressing emails. I started writing my SAA paper (which is going to probably be more complicated than I thought. Hmph.) All in all, it was a productive day. Avoidance certainly is a motivator.

I've got the stupid

2012-01-02T14:00:00.000-08:00

Today has been a series of stupid mistakes. First, I bought plane tickets for my vacation to the bay area in February, but I bought the wrong outbound flight. I was trying to avoid canceling my T/Th class, but I forgot about that, and bought the earlier flight. Wrong. I had to call and get that changed. Fortunately I noticed it right away and I wasn't charged for the change. Then, I texted some friends to see if we could make plans for my trip, but I then told them the wrong time I was getting there, based on the wrong flight. Nice job, moron! So then, I had to manage three texting conversations at once, telling people I made a mistake and then tried to figure out times to meet everyone.

Then! I realized that, despite looking at my calendar on my computer, I scheduled the trip when we have a faculty meeting. BLERG! Apparently, my calendars aren't synced, as I thought they were. Fortunately, I'm allowed to miss one faculty meeting a year (or semester - can't remember), and I never say anything during these meetings, since they are about bigger issues than I'm a part of currently. So it's not a big loss. But I do like having perfect attendance, and I also hate it when I have oversights like this. It makes me feel like a dumb ass. I guess that's what I get for being over-eager.

Sigh.

And then! One of my friends in the bay area told me that she's adjuncting for Berkeley this year. I said, "Wow, that's quite a drive for you." She said, "yeah, but they pay 9500 per class, so it's worth it." Man. I could have stayed in the bay area, adjuncted for Berkeley, and made as much money as I make now. (And probably teach Shakespeare JUST AS OFTEN.) Sigh. I know that full-time is better for me than part-time, but sometimes, it feels like I'm a real sucker. Anyway - I'm glad that she's doing what she wants, and I'll be very happy to see her when I'm out in the BA.

In the meantime, I hope I've reached my "stupid quota" for the week. I have my syllabi done, but I need to write some assignments, read, and work on my SAA paper. Today's major task, besides being stupid, was getting the Xmas stuff put away. We did that, and it sure feels nice to have the living room back to normal. Tomorrow, Eldest goes to daycare, hubby goes back to work, and I will be in the office. I'm contemplating taking baby with me, since no one else will be in the office. We'll see.

What's up, 2012?

2012-01-01T15:10:00.000-08:00

When I was a kid, I couldn't imagine beyond the year 2000. It seemed like a far away time - one that was so remote that I shouldn't even bother imagining beyond it. When 2000 hit, I was newly engaged, back in school, and happy. I remember thinking that I had made it. 2000! Man, nothing could be better than that. I mean, what else could possibly happen to me in life?

What a jackass I was. Of course, I was only 24.

More happened to me in these last 12 years than ever happened to me in the first 24. The basics are well known - finished degrees, had kids, moved, moved, and moved again, got a job, worked, read... you know. But I also came to understand a lot of things differently. I started to feel some real compassion and empathy. I came to believe that wisdom is more important than knowledge. Some of that stuff I really, truly came to understand for the first time in 2011. How? By dealing with some of the darkest moments I've maybe ever felt.

And that's saying something.

I hope that I'll never be so naive again as to believe that I've made it, like I did 12 years ago. I think I won't. I've learned a lot over the course of this very particularly hard year. Many of these lessons can't be articulated. I've been grouchy and depressed much of the year and spouting a lot of pessimism. But I have to hope that all that I've suffered has made me a better person. It's a new year's cliché and all, but I hope it's a true one.

In the meantime, I'll try to cheer up a little. No promises, though. :)

What we reveal about ourselves

2011-12-31T12:56:00.000-08:00

It's funny watching people's New Year comments and statuses on FB. You know that they didn't have a good 2011. You were there for some of it, while everything was falling apart. And yet, you see, "Hope that 2012 will be just as great as 2011," or some such nonsense. Well, I, for one, know what's up with your 2011, and it was f-ed up. M'kay?

But how can I be so critical of people -- not just one person, because a ton of people are doing the same exact thing -- when I am not exactly my true self on the interwebs? None of us are, really. You'd expect a bit of a persona on an anonymous blog, maybe. But on FB (Twitter and the like), you'd expect some "real deal" because you "know" these people. But no. You have a FB persona, too. And what you'd tell people on FB is that 2011 was a fine year - one of the best - and you can't wait for more of the same in '12.

I'm calling BS on that.

I don't want another 2011. I had some great things happen - mainly getting a job - but I also had some horrible things happen, which nobody really wants to read about.

I don't know. Maybe my New Year's resolution should be to stop being so judgmental when people want to pretend like everything is fine even though you know it isn't. After all, I do that all the time. Denial isn't so bad, right? Right? If you pretend hard enough, maybe your fantasy can become reality. Isn't that what visualization is all about?

Okay - time to visualize a better future. 2012 - I dare you. Make my day.

2011 Round up

2011-12-30T17:26:00.000-08:00

I thought I'd take a look at what I've been up to this year. So I checked the first entry of every month of 2011. Here's what I learned:

January: I had a three-week class to teach, and I was hopeful that 2011 was going to be a better year, because my lucky number is four. Uh. It made sense at the time. And look! I got a job. That wasn't a half-bad prediction.

February: I was panicking about my teaching demo for my campus interview because I had no idea what the hell was going on and no one would tell me. Hm... That should have told me something...

March: I was still in limbo about whether or not I got the job, but I knew I wasn't the first choice. I was also contemplating whether or not I should be teaching since creative writing was giving me so much joy, if not a job or money.

April: I said goodbye to 34 on the event of my 35th birthday.

May: I was alternating between wanting to throw up and wanting to cry. I was terrified about my new job, moving, feeling like an imposter, and leaving my friends behind.

June: I found out that we got the house that we wanted, despite the fact that it meant living with my mom for an extra month.

July: I was in Mountain View, WY. The post is brief because I was quite heartsick at the moment for Mountain View, CA.

August: I had lunch with a colleague who claimed to be a conservative feminist and became afraid of the months and years to come, working with someone whose view of feminism is sort of like Hitler's fondness for the Jews.

September: Here, I'm happy for the first time in a long time, despite the fact that I was having a hard time getting my students to participate in class. Hey, at least I had a job and felt good about it.

October: I wrote a brief poem for the month of October, which I was, am, and always will be in love with, despite the fact that I had some very dark moments this past October.

November: We finally had an IEP meeting for eldest and found out that his troubles were fairly substantial from his school's perspective. Shortly after that, we started medication for him, and things got a lot better.

December: I saw the other side of the job market in the form of having a vote on the search committee for our new hire in y-ology. It was eye opening, for sure.

And that's my year. Looking through it, I think I learned a lot. It was also a very freaking hard year with lots of changes, lots of dark times. But that shouldn't diminish the fact that there were several good times, too. After all, I went to Disneyland for the first time in 2011. That was one magical day. I got a job. More magic. I tend to focus on the darkness more than the light. I don't think it's a habit I'll be breaking entirely in 2012. However, I do think that I need to give myself a break more often. After all, life is hard. It doesn't really get easier just because you have a job or a little (very little) more money. It's just hard no matter what. But that doesn't mean that it can't be a meaningful life, nonetheless.

One more day of 2011. Spring approacheth.

Progress

2011-12-30T13:37:00.000-08:00

I went to work again today - this time, for a much longer stint. I got my women playwrights class all scheduled. (Thanks for the comments on yesterday's post. I decided a play a week would do it, and just one day for the one-acts.) I have articles selected, too, some very short, some longer. I think that syllabus is in the bag. Now, I just need to write up their paper assignments. I don't really remember my professors doing it this way when I was an undergrad, but I like to give the students all the assignment sheets up front so they have a chance to plan appropriately for the semester. Students usually appreciate that, if evaluations are to be believed. But the paper assignments didn't need to be finished today. Today's task was just to get the damn class scheduled and finalize my list of plays. So - done, and done.

Next week, I'll tackle the assignments. Then, I'm on to my SAA paper, which I think will be pretty cool. I just need time to work on it.

But best, best, best of all (!!!) is that I talked to hubby last night and asked if he minded if I took a weekend trip alone. After all, I've been griping about needing alone time, so why not ask for it? It's settled. I'll be visiting my bay area peeps in February. An awesome element to this is that I still have a 200-dollar travel voucher from last year when I got stuck on my way home from my Heartland U interview. The voucher expires on February 15th, so I'm going to use it the previous weekend (the 9th-12th). It'll still be a somewhat expensive trip, but at 200 bucks off, I can't complain. I'm just glad that hubby is being supportive about me needing a break. He's a gentle soul.

So! Progress has been made in many areas in 24 hours. I have syllabi in the bag and something to look forward to in February! Huzzah! Now that's the way to start a new year, eh?

Working

2011-12-29T18:04:00.000-08:00

I went in to the office today. I was one of three people there -- me, the administrative assistant, and the dean, whose office is next door to mine. It was good to be there -- I don't think I had been in for a week. I sat down and got my syllabus ready for my intro class. (Three sections of intro on my schedule this semester.) There were only minor changes from last semester's syllabus, but it still took me a better part of three hours to finish it. I was rearranging things, taking out stories/poems/plays, and putting in new material. I'd say it's probably 75% the same because I felt like most of the material worked pretty well. But I took some advice from the evaluations and added/deleted a few things. I think that it'll be a great class. Still, changing 25% of a syllabus was a lot of time and effort. No wonder people will frequently teach the same schedule of readings over and over again.

My 300-level class is still not finished. I keep "previewing" plays for that class, and I have fallen in love with almost all of them. How can I not teach them all? And yet, of course, who wants to be in a class where you read 30 plays? Well, an undergrad class, anyway. (My first-year PhD Shakespeare class was actually a "Shakespeare and his contemporaries" class, in which we read 25 early modern plays in one semester. I am positive I'm the only person who read every single one of those plays.) I figure I should stop reading and just start assigning. Since all the plays are 20th century, I feel like they're fairly easy reading. Some of them are one-act plays. Do you think that 13 plays would be too much to read for this class? As I said, many of them are short. Some are long. All could be covered easily in one week per play. I guess that the answer to this question depends on whether I want to cover a lot of material or get deeply involved in each of the plays that we study.

For Shakespeare, I would never teach more than 8 plays in a semester. Seven is actually ideal, in my experience. But that's Shakespeare. That's "hard" reading. These plays really shouldn't take more than 3 hours to read. (This is not to suggest that these plays aren't "as deep" as Shakespeare's works. It's just that a lot of undergrads need at least a week to read Hamlet, but they could easily read these plays in a sitting. So there is less of a time commitment outside of class, even if we delve deeply into them in class.) I read The Vagina Monologues in an hour yesterday. (Of course, it wasn't the first time I was reading it, and I'm a fast reader.) The other thing, though, is that pretty much all of these plays are new to me in a scholarly way. Sure, I've read some of them before, but never to teach them. Many of them have similar themes of unfairness, lack of opportunity, difficult choices, politics, and personal relationships. I'm not sure if I should group them thematically or if I should simply pick one play per theme I want to cover. Hm. Decisions, decisions.

Well, I have to get this all figured out within a week, since school starts on January 9th. Of course, I have low enrollment for this class, so I'm not entirely sure it's even going to run. When will I know? Who knows?

Sigh. It'll be a lot of work getting this syllabus together if it doesn't run. I suppose that it's worth it, though. At least I've forced myself to read a lot of 20th century plays by women. And most of them are damn fine pieces of theatre! (Favorites include Machinal by Sophie Treadwell -- freaking phenomenal -- and A Man's World by Rachel Crothers.) Hell, I feel like I could write a book about the subject of women playwrights at this point. Maybe I will. After all, women have been ignored plenty. Does Shakespeare really need another monograph?

Speaking of writing about Shakespeare... I printed off a fistful of articles for my SAA paper today and read two of them. That was productive. Unfortunately, that reading was happening in 30-second intervals while hubby was at the mechanic and I was with the kids. I don't really know if I remember much of what I read, but I wrote some decent, efficient notes in the margins. I had hoped to have a draft of my SAA paper written by the end of break. But here we are with just over a week left, and I still have one syllabus to finalize. Bother. I don't know if my drafting goal is really all that reachable. I suppose I could just thrash out a few pages about what I think and then read some research and revise and revise and revise. That seems so undergrad, though, and it's typically not how I work. I don't know. I need to get something done with that paper, though, as it's due on January 31st, and I know that school is going to be a whirlwind once it starts.

Hmph. I'm stressed to the gills. I need to work, but while I'm on break, I feel extreme guilt when I work. You know what I need? I need a vacation. I need a vacation away from the family, the work, the stress, and the guilt that comes when I want to spend an hour reading instead of dealing with my kids. I need three days in a hotel room by myself, doing something that only I want to do without regard for any other human. It's selfish and bitchy, but it's what I want. Either that, or I need to work more. Hmph.

R1 hook up

2011-12-27T17:05:00.000-08:00

I was doing some hunting and gathering today for my SAA paper. My library doesn't have access to the World Shakespeare Bibliography. No problem. As an SAA member, I can buy a year subscription for under 70 dollars. Did that. I found several articles that I could really use. Then I looked them up in Heartland U's databases. Nothing. Our databases are bare bones. I tried using my old log-in info for two prior schools where I taught. I'm officially out of the system. Then, I thought of grad school friends. None of them are still in grad school. Hmph.

THEN, I remembered why it's so awesome to have a sister who is ten years younger than me. She's getting her masters at Big-Ten Research place. I called her and asked if she'd mind doing me an illegal favor. She said, "uh... what?" I asked for her UN and PW for her R1 library. She laughed and was happy to provide.

It was great being able to access all these articles I needed. But then, little sis is only going to be in her master's program for another year. What do I do after that?

Fret later, I suppose. But for today, I've got the research hook up. It's good to have friends at R1s.

We made it - sort of

2011-12-26T19:15:00.000-08:00

Our last Christmas celebration was tonight. We're done. Thank the universe - we're done. Now that that hot mess is finished, I should be concentrating on getting back to my school duties, which I've neglected for the last few days. But ah! That's the trap of "break." I don't really feel like doing anything.

But then, I feel restless. This evening, I felt like hopping on a plane and escaping from the madness that we've been through in the last couple of days. I don't know where I'd even go. Just away from here. Six months in the heartland, and I'm starting to get that horrible feeling that I always had when I was a kid. It was a pounding chorus that matched my heartbeat, and it said, "I gotta get out! I gotta get out!" I don't know if it's the location so much as the people. My immediate family is fine - great, even. It's everyone else -- extended family, mainly. Fortunately, I don't have to see them often, but still. It's hard.

I've felt surrounded over the last few days, to the point where I've had to tell people literally to back off. It makes me feel like a mean old hag. I just need some breathing room. I feel smothered and claustrophobic. So this has been a great few days -- giving out a bunch of hugs and all that. Argh. I feel like I want to peel my own skin off. That's how trapped I feel. Trapped! It's like I can hear my heart pounding in my ears all the time, and it's shouting, "Go away! On vacation! Immediately! Alone! Don't touch anyone or anything for a week!" While that's absurd and impossible, it's how I feel, nonetheless. Straightjacketed.

Speaking of the symbol for all things crazy, I don't have therapy this week because my therapist takes the week between Christmas and New Year's off. So this is going to be an awesome week. Fortunately, hubby has this week off from work, so I'm hoping that I can get some much-needed alone time. But boy, I sure wish I could hop on a plane instead of going to my local Starbucks. Hmph.

One thing I won't complain about

2011-12-24T05:56:00.000-08:00

I've been a total grinch this season, but one thing I can't complain about is the weather. For the six years that we lived in California, I never felt completely at ease during winter. The weather was entirely too nice. After living in Wisconsin for three years, I welcomed living someplace with better weather. But then, having Christmas in 60 degree weather ended up feeling very unnatural to me.

Being back in the heartland, I've really enjoyed the changing of the seasons. This morning, I went outside. It's 27 degrees, no wind, and lots of sunshine. Perfect. The high today is in the 40s, and to me, that couldn't be more perfect for Christmas. The winter weather so far has me in a good mood. Of course, if past is prologue, then by February I'll be sick of it. But that's because the weather is usually much worse from January through March around here. I think there were major ice storms last February. That will be no fun at all. But as long as there's no snow and ice on the ground, I'm very happy with temperatures near freezing. In fact, it feels perfect.

What do I need?

2011-12-23T14:12:00.000-08:00

We procrastinated substantially on Christmas shopping this year. For me, there were a lot of factors in the procrastinating: 1. being too busy at work, 2. having little brother's birthday on the 19th, 3. feeling like none of us really needed anything. When hubby asked what I'd like for Christmas, I sat and thought for a minute about what I need. Materially? Nothing.

I used to wish I had a minivan instead of a tiny, 4-person car that barely is big enough for car seats in the back. I used to wish I could have an even newer computer with a super-dooper hard drive. I didn't get those things. I just don't need them.

When we moved to the Midwest, we got rid of a bunch of things. Plus, almost everything we owned was in storage for a month. I started to wish we had gotten rid of MORE things. More toys, more clothes, more shoes, more junk. I had purged a bunch of stuff, sure. But we'd lived without the rest for so long, it didn't seem like we really needed anything at all, except what we'd brought in a few suitcases. It was really simple living with so little. I really liked it.

So when I finally went Christmas shopping this week, it was with a sullen heart. I didn't want to get more things. I wanted to GET RID OF more things. I feel like we should have been giving away half of everything we own instead of adding to the mass of useless crap. Purging would have made me feel better. More hopeful. And isn't that what Christmas is supposed to be about? Having hope?

Instead, I bought a few crappy toys that were probably made with slave labor, and something for hubby that I hope (but don't know if) he'll like. I don't know what he's gotten me. He's good at thoughtful gifts, though. So maybe I'll be surprised and chagrined that I was such a grouch about Christmas all these weeks. But if not, I'm totally cool with that, too. Honestly, I don't need a thing. I would be fine with nothing.

And now for your moment of zen.

The stockings were hung by the chimney (who cares?)

2011-12-21T14:28:00.000-08:00

I'm such a grinch this Christmas. Part of it may be due to my ambivalence about religion. Part of it may be the fact that I just finished my first semester of my first full-time job. I mean, I've been busy. So busy, in fact, that I haven't given a thought to Christmas at all, except by way of its inconvenience to me. I know that this is a poor attitude to have. My kids like Christmas an awful lot. So does hubby. And the tree is cheerful and all that. But me? Bah. Humbug.

I do hope that everyone has a better time (and a better attitude) than me.

So instead of indulging in Christmas cheer, today, I've been editing a novel for a former student of mine. It's short, mercifully, so I think I'll get it done by tomorrow. I'm learning a lot about my own writing while editing this piece, which is probably why I volunteered. I can see in this novel that there is not nearly enough conflict throughout. And motivation? What's that? While I think that my novel has more conflict and better motivation, I do think that it takes about 50 pages for that to get established. In reading this piece, that insight keeps popping into my head -- pull the conflict forward! Frankly, if I didn't feel obliged to finish reading/editing this novel, I'd stop and tell the student to revise substantially and get back to me. I'm sure that's not what the student was hoping to hear. This student feels ready to shop the novel to agents. I can already tell you that agents won't touch it. The writing is great, as far as sound, style, and technique. But the story doesn't do anything -- for a LONG time. I was halfway through the novel before anything interesting happened, and even that was only a little interesting.

I'm going to give him some strong feedback on it. I hope that he takes it as constructive criticism because I do think that he can be a successful writer. He has the style and technique down. But he really needs to work on pulling that conflict out -- make it more significant.

I guess what I'm thinking is that if no one is dying, considering suicide, or in serious peril, then the novel isn't going to work. My main character is suicidal and drowning herself in alcohol for a time, and I think her conflict is serious. But as I'm editing, it occurs to me that in the student's novel, while there are a couple of miniature conflicts, there isn't anything anyone would really care about. And the motivation to do something illegal when your main character is a very average Joe has to be something significant, too. Why cross that line and jeopardize everything if there's no meaningful reason to do it?

I guess my big Christmas gift this year will be dashing someone's hopes. But if I were him, I wouldn't look at it that way. I'd look at it as a way to become a better writer. Then again, not everyone is so happy to hear criticism as I am. I always want to know how to improve myself - in whatever way. Some people still have feelings about such things, though, and are not improvement robots with hearts encased in steel. I don't know, though... if you want to be a successful fiction writer, you need to take serious criticism in stride, right?

Happy birthday, little brother!

2011-12-20T06:03:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was little brother's birthday. He's 2. Can you believe it? Baby no more, methinks. He's a straight-up toddler, going on 6. Everything that eldest does is fair game for little brother, which means that he will grow up too fast and make me mourn his littleness. You know, times when he'd see himself in a mirror and his first reaction was this:

Or how everything he saw immediately became a hat:

His early impulse to deconstruct Shakespeare:

How he used to fit in a laundry basket:

And always wanted to be just as big as his brother:

Or just like his dad (in wearing shoes, if not wearing pants):

And ride in a wagon on Halloween:

And Santa's sleigh for Christmas:

And look at those cake-eating skills!

But no matter how big or small, I will always be grateful that I have little brother in my life.

Happy birthday, darling. You are more precious than you'll ever know. Mommy loves you.

The latest writing wrong

2011-12-18T16:04:00.000-08:00

I finished grading on Friday. (Huzzah! - Sort of. I don't really know what to do with my life now that I don't have to grade for a few weeks in a row.) While I was finishing up the last research papers, my colleague across the hall came into my office and asked how it was going. I said, "Fine. Just finishing up grading the last five research papers. How about you?" She said, "Okay, but you know we're not supposed to give grades on individual papers, right?"

Hunh?

According to her, we are supposed to give comments on their papers, but no grade. No grade - at all - should be given until the students turn in their final portfolios at the final exam period. (The rationale was that the students don't read the comments if you give them a grade. They just look at the grade and blow off the rest. This is completely contrary to everything my students have ever said in their feedback, which includes "I love your comments. They are so helpful.") Then, we should grade their "total effort." The department emphasizes multiple drafts, and the philosophy is that we should read and comment on drafts, then not comment on the final paper and just make sure they've done their touch ups. I, on the other hand, only require a rough draft, then a final draft. I comment on the final draft and give a grade. The rough draft is for peer review AND the students have the opportunity to come see me about their rough draft before turning in the final copy. Exactly three people took me up on that suggestion this semester - the motivated people.

Well, here's the deal. I'm not a rhet/comp PhD, and neither is my across-the-hall colleague. I've got more experience teaching writing than I have teaching Shakespeare, but I think I'm a better Shakespeare teacher. No surprise. But I also think I'm a damn fine writing teacher. No, it doesn't always go 100% fabulously, as this semester illustrates, but I still think that I can do a fine job at it. And I'm also flexible about changing methods to meet students' needs. I plan to do just that in the fall when I teach 101 again. But here's an honest confession: in my professional opinion, it does not one bit of fucking good to the students to withhold grades until the class is completely over.

According to the across-the-hall colleague, everyone in the department was supposed to follow the same method, and I was doing it wrong.

Here's what happened next:

I went outside and smoked a cigarette because I was furious. Then, still furious, I marched back to the department, to my chair's office, and did my signature move - shut the door while simultaneously saying, "Can we talk?" He's very good about that.

I told him everything: how I felt like, once again, the 101 class had a strangle hold on it; how I felt like the philosophy of the writing program was not something I could fit into if this "no-grades" philosophy was truly how I was required to teach; how I felt like "if gen-ed is going to be three-fourths of my job, then I need to have some academic freedom to teach it how I see fit, while meeting the basic writing guidelines for pages written, learning objectives, etc.," and finally, that I would not be able to stay in this job if I were going to be forced to teach like this.

He agreed with me.

Of course he did - he's not the writing chair. But he did say that I needed to have a conversation with the writing chair to see if this no-grades thing was seriously the philosophy of the department, or just something my across-the-hall colleague was doing. He said, "You need to call the writing chair at home. Right now. This isn't something that should wait until next semester when the writing chair comes back to campus."

So I called. We talked for a bit. It turns out that the no-grade philosophy was something the department tried for a while, but it didn't work, so it was abandoned as an all-department philosophy. The only person still doing it lives across the hall from me. However, the writing chair DID say that I'm not teaching 101 right. I need to emphasize portfolio work and revision more, rather than letting the students do drafting without evidence of multiple drafts.

Okay - here's my opinion on "evidence of multiple drafts": Students aren't doing multiple drafts in the same way as our typewriting colleagues did in the 80s. Here's what I hear from students -- they write a draft. They MIGHT print it to take it to the Writing Center. More likely, they won't. They'll dicker with it on the screen for days (or hours). They don't print it every time they make changes. (Save the trees, people!) They save over their original draft every five minutes so they don't lose the paper. They save it on a cloud, so it's not affected if the hard drive takes a dive. They move paragraphs, sentences, and whatever -- all on screen. They might have 55 drafts of the same paper, but they only have one file.

I do this myself.

To me, there's no way to get significant evidence of multiple drafts without it being emailed to the professor once an hour while the students work on the paper. And I don't have time to wade through all that. Besides, do I really care about each individual writer's process? Not really. Everyone works his or her own way. The writer has to figure that out for herself. What I care about is that the students try drafting and have something to show another pair of eyes before they turn it in to me. My interest is getting students comfortable with showing their work to others and getting opinions on it from peers. If I'm doing ALL of the evaluating, especially of rough drafts and telling them how to "fix it," then isn't that like me doing all the work for them? Isn't that like taking their critical thinking and tossing it out the window? Shouldn't writers have to struggle with their writing? Shouldn't they have to try to figure out something for themselves?

Now, don't get me wrong. I think that getting help from peers and the Writing Center is appropriate and good. I think getting opinions of friends and family is great. After all, I will only have those kids for a semester. They need to build their writing network for their lives. I won't always be there. They need to figure out how to create a community of trusted folks that can talk ideas with them. Then, when they do all the work of talking, thinking, reading, and finally, writing, THEN they are ready to give the writing to the final person at the end of the line: me. And then I evaluate how they did. If the person gets a B, what I'm saying is, "You did a good job. It isn't fantastic, but it's very reasonable." If the person gets an A, what I'm saying is, "Wow! You knocked it out of the park. You must have spent a long time thinking about this and working hard. You rock, student!"

To me, an A is evidence of multiple drafts. So is a B. A C, generally, is your middle-of-the-night romp through paper writing - little time, little effort. A D is a gift for someone who didn't plagiarize, but who only kind of met the requirements of the paper. An F is when the requirements aren't met or when the student plagiarized.

If the students don't get that information over the course of the semester, I don't know how they are supposed to strive to get better. The no-grades philosophy assumes that the students buy-in to the idea that writing is somehow "good for you." While I think it is, I would bet a thousand dollars that students don't. Not at first. Maybe not at all.

But that's for the across-the-hall person to deal with. I don't have to do that, officially.

Back to the writing chair -- the next thing I was told was this: "I need to mentor you more about how to teach the writing classes. I don't think that you agree with our philosophy about writing, so I need to show you some current scholarship on it."

Uh hunh. Because writers have gotten SO much better, not worse, over the last twenty years. Because writers have shown evidence that they are able to write across the curriculum. Because we have discovered the holy grail of how to teach writing.

Not.

Again and again, I am learning that I need to keep my door and mouth shut. I need to teach in a way that serves the students' needs. I need to smile and nod and be diplomatic, and then do my thing.

Otherwise, I will never quit smoking for real. And I will also not be able to stay at this job.

Think of it this way. I teach a 4/4. I teach Shakespeare once every two years. That means one-sixteenth of my teaching is in my field. Almost all the rest is gen-ed, and then a 300 level class thrown my way, maybe, once a semester, but surely once a year. And that's fine. That's what I signed up for. However, I didn't sign up to be one of the people chained in Plato's cave. And I'll be damned if I sit down in front of the fire willingly, and volunteer to let someone put the manacles on.

Fie upon that bullshit.

Here's how idiotic I am

2011-12-18T05:23:00.000-08:00

I went to the official Heartland U Christmas party last night -- the one where everyone is invited. It was lovely. Really good food. Very fancy. And I got to hang out with people outside my department whom I've met before and liked quite well.

So here's where the moron part comes in. A professor's wife, whom I like a lot, asked me about how my first year on the tenure track was going.

And I was honest.

Gasp!

Frequent readers will know that I love my job and that it's the best professional thing that ever happened to me. But I've also had some problems with dealing with the writing issues (the newest BS on that front deserves its own post), finding my place in the department (since the person I'm replacing has stuck around, emeritus-style), and trying to get some changes implemented. And the thing is -- I'm not even the one suggesting the changes be made, per se. My chair has asked me for some ideas, and then he presents them to the department in our meetings saying, "Fie had this idea, and I fully support it." And then the people in the department say, "Oh, that's a great idea. But I don't really think anything needs to change."

At our table of eight, there was no one from my department around. In fact, our dinner was so huge (all faculty, all staff), that I only saw a couple of people from my department as I was leaving. There were two professors besides me at our table, and they were engaged in conversation together, seeming not to listen to anything I was talking about with the professor's wife. The other people were at the dessert bar. So I felt free to say, discreetly, but I said it aloud nonetheless, that I thought it was going to take a long time for things to change in my department because the newest full-time, tenure-track hire besides me (and the new search we just ran) was well over eight years ago, and that was someone in the Y-ology field, not English. The last full-time, tenure-track hire in English before me was 12 years ago.

Let's just say, people are very set in their ways. Most of the people in my department started in the early 1990s, except the person I replaced, who started teaching at Heartland the year I was born -- 1976.

Granted, they have a lot of valuable experience. They are smart, wonderful people. But they are also teaching from a 1990s perspective. This is part of the reason why being at a school with minimal research requirements is sort of a bad thing. People get in a groove and stay there.

And I said that. Aloud. At the full-sized Christmas party.

I don't think that anyone heard me besides the professor's wife. And I know no one in my department heard me. But I keep forgetting that there's really no such thing as freedom of speech in a job. Opinions should be held closer to the chest, just in case. That's why I'm an idiot. I don't think that there will be any repercussions. I'm sure that even if the professor's wife tells her husband, he would nod in agreement -- he's a second year, tt, after all, with similar issues. So anyway. I feel safe, relatively. But I also think I should know better than to talk like that in front of the entire staff of the school.

I guess this is all a part of the learning process. But you'd think it would have been something I'd already know.

Last day

2011-12-16T04:55:00.000-08:00

Today's the last day of finals week. I didn't really have to be at school after Tuesday, but I've been going in anyway in order to get grading done. I have five more research papers to grade, and then I'm totally finished. Now that I've started using a computer-based grade book (why did I wait so long?), I don't even have to sit there and tally grades, which is usually nightmarish to me. So I anticipate that I'll be able to get grades done today, too, just in time for the weekend.

And just like that, my first semester on the tenure-track comes to a close. Man. It has been awesome and frustrating and delightful and messy and cool and awful and good. Pretty much what you'd expect.

What did I learn this semester?

1. There are politics in all departments. Don't let anyone tell you differently.

2. People you think you're going to get along with in your interview aren't necessarily who you end up eating lunch with by the end of the semester. The people you eat lunch with at work are your real friends.

3. The difference between being an adjunct and being full-time is that full-time people have more meetings to attend, generally get more respect (from colleagues and students alike, but even more so from colleagues), and can be a part of the long-term plan. So when I say I'd like to teach a special topics class sometime on XYZ, I know that I can plan on doing it sometime. Even if that time is not for a couple of years, at least I can rest assured that I'm part of the long-term plan. Not having to live semester to semester has been such a relief.

4. There's more to the full-time gig than what's stated in #3. Teaching is about half of what I do on a given day (including prep, grading, and actually teaching).

5. If you have a department chair who is not in your discipline, that could be a good thing, as he could be more open to new ideas than the other English people (who actually have a dog in the fight) are.

6. In general, the odds are against any and all current VAPs for full-time positions. (Another person outside my field didn't get the full-time job he applied for, so it seems like Heartland U doesn't hire their own.)

7. The search-committee side of things is really freaking complicated.

8. When everyone in your department is tenured except you, and very few people (3 out of 11 or so) do any substantial research, you start to feel like most things being taught are about 15 years past their expiration date. This is possibly why students find you so refreshing.

9. Because of #8, you want to do more research, so you don't start to become stale at age 35.

10. Students are afraid of taking a class with a new professor because they don't know your reputation. This is a wonderful thing in the first semester, since it means you have smaller classes and can do more one-on-one work. When spring enrollment starts, you learn that your reputation is gaining speed and that you'll have a lot more students signing up for your classes in spring than you did in fall. Well, for the gen ed classes anyway.
10.a - It's still a mystery whether my 300-level class will go, since the students who want to sign up for it are having trouble paying their bills.
10.b - Even at a SLAC, it's all about money. Bother.

Anyway, I had better get going. Since it's the last day, I feel obliged to show up and do some work. I think I'll take the weekend off and then Monday get on my SAA paper and spring syllabi.

11. Christmas break isn't really a break. Summer doesn't look like a good resting place either.

They say:

2011-12-15T12:25:00.002-08:00

Apologies for end-of-the-semester horn tooting, but I want a record of the end of this semester for days when I feel like I want to give up.

"I wanted to take some time to personally thank you, Dr. Fie for pushing me to do the best that I could on my writing. I also wanted to say thanks for grading the papers hard because without that I truly would not know where I stand. You are by far the most effective writing teacher that I have ever had; I am grateful for you having made an otherwise boring class interesting." Student A

"I feel like high school prepared me for English in college, but English in college has better prepared me for life." Student B

"I know I struggled with some papers, but without your honest feedback it would've only made my papers worse." Student C

"The most important concepts I learned from this class were that we cannot blindly believe everything we hear and that writing can be our outlet for pursuing and pondering the truth." Student D

Thanks for the D. No, seriously.

2011-12-14T18:14:00.000-08:00

Today, I spent a good part of the day grading portfolios for two of my classes. Now I just have my dastardly 101 class left to grade. (At last check, 9 out of 20 of those students are getting a C or lower: 2 Cs, 3 Ds, 4 Fs.) The final papers may or may not make a difference in some of those grades. The paper is worth 20% of their total grade, so we'll see if any miracles come to pass. It is that time of year, after all.

As I was grading today, I got a letter from one of my students in my intro to lit class. He wanted to write and say thank you - a sincere thank you - for being hard on him this semester. He said that he learned more in my class about writing and literature than he had in his whole life. Now that may very well be true, because the kid was just barely literate, in my humble opinion. He did piss poor work, but he tried. He did the reading, but when we talked in class, he had a very hard time discussing it. His writing was bad, but he tried. He tried. And he did improve over the course of the semester. Eventually, he gave his opinion on some of the literature. Sometimes it was dead wrong. But he tried.

This kid is getting a D in the class, overall. I'm not sure if that means he'll have to take it again or not. He knows his final grade, but he wanted to thank me anyway - for not letting him get away with substandard work, for challenging him to be better than that, and for expecting him to do the work. In closing he wrote, "Every time I write a sentence or a paragraph or an essay, I'll think, 'What would Dr. Fie think of this writing?' and I'll try to do better."

I literally burst into tears.

I really wish I could bump his grade, but at the beginning of the semester, he didn't turn in an assignment, and that really screwed him up. Then, he completely misunderstood the final assignment and screwed that up. See, he tried, but he didn't ask for help or anything, despite my many offers. So he frequently got in his own way of success. But the letter indicated to me that he knows that and that his plan includes figuring out a way to do better, to accept help when it's offered, and to be more thoughtful about things in general. But he's okay with a D. It's almost like a freaking badge of honor.

Besides, if I bumped his grade, I would be undermining the very integrity that he was thanking me for.

Sometimes it's really hard to maintain that integrity, but I don't believe in grade inflation. I don't believe that "feel-good" grades are going to make any of my students better writers or readers. I don't think the students disagree with me, mostly. I get a letter like this usually once a year, at least, and the students are very sincere about needing a challenge. Well, Fie provides!

Thanks, Dr. Fie? Nah, kid. Thank you.

Another day, another highly frustrating moment

2011-12-13T14:49:00.000-08:00

I had a meeting with my chair today about my 101 class. I got portfolios in today. Four people out of 20 didn't turn anything in at all. Three of those four were going to fail anyway. Another person is also going to fail, but at least he turned in something at the end. So potentially 5 out of 20 of my 101 students are going to fail. I asked my chair to brainstorm with me about the class because I've never had a quarter of the class fail before, and I wondered if it was me or them.

I have been frustrated with my 101 class all semester. I was trying to get them to think about big philosophical concepts and pull structure out of some essays I assigned as reading. Some problems I encountered were: 1. they weren't reading, 2. they weren't discussing, 3. they relied on me to lecture, 4. they couldn't understand the content, let alone figure out the structure of these essays. Their papers suffered as a result. Plus, many, many, many of them couldn't write a complete sentence, let alone use a comma, or whatever rule I felt was important. It was like I was asking them to write compositions in a foreign language or something. It was brutal.

So I talked to my chair (who is NOT the head of the writing program) about what I could do differently. I'm thinking about radically revising my syllabus to take out all the big concept readings and just make the class 95% workshop -- have the students' writing be the text book. This flies in the face of the writing program's requirements, though, which were devised by the head of the writing program -- the only person in our department with a PhD in rhet/comp. When I have brought up doing something different, the writing person has reacted with, "That is not conversant with current rhet/comp theory, so it won't work and is a waste of your time." Since I'm not a PhD in rhet/comp, I have felt a little shy about asserting myself more.

But I know how I had to learn about writing. I learned through the kind of writing boot camp that I am thinking about implementing in my class. It gets down to basics and rebuilds the foundation that should have been set in grade school and high school and then moves on to bigger concepts. My thought is: why not try this? It's very obvious that the 101 classes that we're teaching right now are NOT working. Everyone on campus laments that our students are crap writers. So why not do something that is, perhaps, old school -- like DRILLING grammar and commas -- since the "concept" teaching about philosophy and ideas and high-brow collegiate stuff isn't making our students into good (or even competent) writers? Most of them are functionally illiterate, in my opinion. Rather than continuing down this path, I would like to propose radical concept -- that every student who graduates from our college should be able to write in complete sentences.

I shouldn't have to arm wrestle anyone about this. My chair agrees. He thinks that our writing program could use an overhaul from people who - gasp! - actually do some good writing (WITHOUT an editor). To be frank, our writing center students and our writing tutors don't know shit about grammar/mechanics. They're all about the big ideas, which the students have also been getting in class. But how can students articulate ideas in their papers clearly without being able to write a complete sentence?? No one, in my opinion, should be hired by the writing center who can't use a comma. No one should be a tutor without being able to edit.

There will be resistance, though. There always is resistance when change is in the air. I don't know if putting myself into a potentially dangerous position is worth it. But then, how can I have any integrity as a writing teacher if I don't do what I think is right for my students? Ultimately, I think my responsibility is to the students, not to soothing the egos in the department. The people who have been around for a long time, though, aren't going to be with me on this.

...except my chair, who, in my opinion, is god-like in his integrity, dedication, and desire to make a difference -- all this despite being full-time at Heartland U for a good 8 years, which surely is long enough to become jaded. I hope that having his support will help me revamp my 101 class regardless of the egos in the department.

Fortunately, I don't have to teach 101 again until the fall. Spring will be rife with literature conflict, but the writing problem is going to be put off for a while. Still, next fall's 101 class is something to think about as I'm flipping through portfolios and submitting the worst 101 grades I've ever encountered. Something needs to change, and I'm just new enough and pissed enough to do it.

Need versus want versus it's none of your business

2011-12-12T16:04:00.000-08:00

Note: This post is about birth control, politics, working for a faith-based institution, and TMI. If you don't want to read it, I won't be offended.

I went through a lot of rigamarole this past week to get my birth control pill prescription filled. I went to a different pharmacy and to a new doctor, so I thought that was the problem. Eventually, after four days of fighting with Walgreens, I finally just said, "Look, I need to start this prescription today, so just let me pay for it and don't charge my insurance." It was 35 dollars, so I figured it wasn't worth the fight. Today, though, I called my insurance company to find out why I needed "prior authorization" for the pill that I've been taking for a couple of years. It turns out that my Catholic employer doesn't cover birth control - of any sort - under our insurance plan, unless it is considered medically necessary. Why? Because the faith-based institution I work for thinks that birth control is wrong.

I was absolutely, utterly, insanely angry. You might even say "hysterical." I explained to the insurance people that my husband has had a vasectomy, so technically, I don't need to use the "birth control" portion of the prescription. What I need is the hormone part that makes my periods regular. Otherwise, and here's where the TMI comes in, my period is absolutely off the hook. On one week, off one week, on one week, off one week. Then, I might not have it for 8 weeks, and then again, for 3 weeks solid. I begged my mother to put me on the pill as a teenager, but she refused, saying it was like giving me a license to have sex. So I suffered with that crazy, unpredictable cycle until I was 21 years old and heard that I could get pills from Planned Parenthood for cheap - or free - as a poor, barely working student. Ever since then, except for when I was planning to get pregnant, I've been on the pill and have had a much more manageable life as a woman.

But I shouldn't have to explain that to ANYONE, ever, except my doctor. I should have the option to use the pill for whatever use I deem to be medically necessary. And what does "necessary" mean? To a man, who has never been caught wearing light colored pants when menstruation unexpectedly commences and no remedy in sight except for an insanely uncomfortable, and unreliable, wad of toilet paper, maybe having a crazy period doesn't make the pill "necessary." After all, my menstruation cycle isn't a matter of life and death, so is controlling it "necessary"? Who the hell has the right to determine necessity in my life? Besides me, that is!?

I know that this has become a national issue. Christian colleges are refusing to cover this basic sort of prescription, unless necessary, and are trying to get some sort of exemption so they don't have to cover it at all. While I have always been against this sort of thing in principle, now that I'm personally affected, I am even more livid than usual.

And then. There are bigger implications to me. I'm teaching a women-centered class next semester, and I expect that it will come off as controversial. It's very feminist. As I wrote in my last post, it's very much going to be an emotional class for me. It's going to be about unfairness, progress, and the need for more work. This birth control issue proves we need more work in women's rights. A church that I have rejected (after years of making excuses for it) shouldn't be able to determine whether my pill is covered by my insurance. And yet, of course, since I work at a faith-based institution, I have no voice about this issue.

I am honestly worried. Am I going to be able to keep this job if I teach the way I want to teach - from a very feminist angle? Am I going to be able to live my life the way I want to at this job - making my own decisions about my body? Am I going to be able to stand the oppressiveness I feel right now?

Is this going to ruin the joy that the job has brought me?

How's that job market looking, folks?

Distance

2011-12-11T16:04:00.001-08:00

I just got done reading a play called Machinal, by Sophie Treadwell, which I'll be teaching in my spring class. (Spoiler alert. If you want to skip the plot, cut to the next paragraph.) Wow. What an amazing play. I had never read it before -- only read about it. It was first performed in 1928, and it's about a woman who gets married to a business man. He's her boss, and she feels socially coerced into marrying him. If she doesn't, she'll lose her job. If she does, she's trapped in a loveless (even repulsive) marriage. She ends up marrying him. Eventually, she has a child that she has no feeling for because it's his child. Later, she meets and has an affair with a man whom she immediately loves. And finally, she kills her husband to escape the marriage that makes her skin crawl. She's betrayed by her lover, confesses to the murder, is convicted, and goes to the electric chair. When asked in court why she killed her husband, she says that she wanted to be free. When asked why she didn't just divorce him, she said she couldn't -- she didn't want to hurt his feelings. The court laughs at her. Thing is -- many a marriage has survived hard times because one spouse didn't want to hurt the other's feelings by leaving. So I got that. Of course, it doesn't justify murder. But it does have a ring of truth to it. The woman simply felt so trapped that she crossed a line out of sheer and utter desperation. I identified with that in a milder way. (I'm not a murderer by any means, just a complainer.) And domestic strife, feeling trapped, and wanting more -- daring to want more -- is something that is as old as Stonehenge. It smacks of universality. It smacks of something I understand because I've been there.

The question I have in my mind is this: how am I going to teach these plays about "women's issues" with any sort of emotional distance? I've read five plays (from 1900-1930s) while considering my reading list. Each one has an issue that is specifically about unfairness in women's lives. I was talking to my mom about this, and said, "All of these plays are about unfairness. How am I going to keep this from being a male-bashing class?" She said, "Maybe the class should be about progress. In other words, the plays point out how far we've come."

Yes. But.

That would suggest to me that we've broken through the glass ceiling and that there's no need to progress any further. We've made it! We're free! We're equal.

Bollocks.

As I wrote recently, the first rule of patriarchy is there is no patriarchy. The minute women start to become complacent about our agency and power, the minute it will be swept away from us (always) again. So I don't know. These plays and the emotive reactions I get to them are something I'm wrestling with -- to the point where I actually talked about it in therapy for Christ's sake. I don't know how to get the distance that I need to be able to analyze these plays the way I would Shakespeare, for instance.

Then again, there are so many moving parts in the Bard's canon that I struggle with, too. When Gloucester doesn't die, despite his attempt at suicide in King Lear, I can barely contain myself. The first time I read that, I actually, literally burst into tears. When I taught that scene, I did it badly. It was one of those moments when you're teaching where you say, "Isn't that so, like, cool and clever and moving? Doesn't your heart burst smilingly at that?" That's not good teaching. And I worry about having an entire semester of that with this spring class.

The really good thing about this class, though, is that it's getting me to read a lot of new material and it is dynamite! Women playwrights, y'all. Look into them. Rachel Crothers, Sophie Treadwell, Susan Glaspell (of course!), and a couple of others from the early part of the 20th century are just knocking my socks off. Why haven't these women (besides Glaspell's Trifles) been taught before?

Oh right. Because the first rule of patriarchy is there is no patriarchy. Right...

Good times

2011-12-11T12:23:00.001-08:00

Yesterday's party was a success. Only about half the people who were invited showed up, but I think that's just the way that parties go. Anyway, it was a nice group -- including hubby and me, there were seven people. Everyone showed up at about 4:00 and stayed until 8:15. The food was great and the conversation even better. I'm surprised that people in my department don't have get togethers more often. We all really enjoy each others' company and have some great conversations. (And no one gave me any white glove treatment or insisted on going upstairs. All's well.)

Today, we took the kiddos to see Santa at the State Museum. There was a little kiddie train that the kids rode and then we got pictures. It was fun. This afternoon, I need to grade one paper, and then I'll be caught up on grading until Tuesday when the majority of my work comes in. Monday, I'll have essentially nothing to do. I think what I'll end up doing is reading a play or two for next semester's class.

What I'd really like to do right now is go to sleep. I'm exhausted from yesterday's preparations, and would love a nap. Maybe an early bedtime is in order.

What was I thinking?

2011-12-08T19:38:00.000-08:00

At the beginning of the year, I was surprised to learn that my department didn't have a beginning-of-the-year party. At all. No, we had meetings aplenty, and we were all in the department, talking and whatnot, but party? What party? I asked my chair about this, and he said that no one ever has a start-up party. I asked about Christmas, and he said that no one has had a Christmas party since he's been at the school.

I said, "Well, I'm going to. I'll have it at my house."

Said party is on Saturday. While I'm looking forward to having everyone over and having some down time together, I'm not looking forward to the monumental task of decluttering and cleaning my house. We JUST managed to get the Christmas tree up on Sunday, and it looks great. But then, there are all the other little things -- billions of papers from Eldest's school work, junk mail, toys, TOYS, TOOOOOOYS, and random electronic bits - like cords to iPhones and two or three laptops. And last but not least, the final box that needs to be unpacked. It's the random crap that we haven't needed the entire time we've lived here. I'm tempted to throw it away. But no, I need to make sure that it doesn't contain something vital like a birth certificate or our rental agreement.

I'm not a very, very organized person when it comes to home. My office at school is another thing entirely. I clean off my desk about once a week and file things. I don't want my colleagues and students to know the true clutterdom that is Chez Fie. Plus, it really is easier to work in a clean environment. (And don't get me wrong -- the house isn't what I'd call dirty. It's just cluttered. Things need to be put away, but the surfaces on which they sit are not dirty.) The challenge is finding time and energy to put away all this crap before Saturday's 4 p.m. party.

Fortunately, all my heavy-lifting grading comes in on Tuesday, so I'll grade five papers tomorrow and have the weekend cleared for take off. Then, the cleaning can begin.

Hmph. Why did I want to have a Christmas party again?

Book ambitions - but that's not my field!

2011-12-07T20:33:00.000-08:00

I just got done reading the papers that my YA class wrote about The Hunger Games. They were okay. Most of them had adequate arguments, but they were, for the most part, just an inch deeper than surface level. While I was reading them, I kept thinking to myself, "But christ, what about XXX?" or "How about those rhetorical moves that Gale makes in Mockingjay?" and so on. It got me a little riled up. And it made me think, "There's only one solution to this passion you feel about these books."

Write a damn book about them.

I mean, I have an entire book in my head already. Not kidding. The whole thing is sitting in my mind like chapters on a shelf. I know exactly how I'd write it, my methodology, and everything. It's clearer than any thought I'd ever had about Shakespeare.

But that's not my field. Young Adult lit is an interest, but not my research area. Would it be problematic for a Shakespearean to write an entire book about The Hunger Games? It would take some time, even for this prolific writer, and even with a solid idea in my head.

So I guess my question is - if I wrote a book outside of Shakespeare, would that be considered a bad idea for my career? I do have a Shakespeare paper in the works for SAA. I just turned in the abstract on Monday, and I think it's fantastic. I'm excited about it. But it's not keeping me up at night like the HG ideas are. Hmph.

Who has time for this crap anyway? One of my colleagues keeps complimenting me on "doing it all" -- kids, teaching, grading, and having a minor research agenda. I keep telling her, "I just work all the time and sleep as little as possible until I crash for two days." Would pursuing a book project OUTSIDE MY FIELD add to my inability to have any fun?

Probably. I might do it anyway -- maybe over the summer.

The first rule of patriarchy is there is no patriarchy

2011-12-06T19:25:00.001-08:00

I had my department meeting today in which we decided whom to hire for our Y-ology position. You might guess from my title that we decided to hire the man whom we interviewed, not the current VAP, who is a woman. The reason I allude to their genders at this point is because it makes a difference in how I view the future, which is with caution. My misgivings about the male candidate had nothing to do with his teaching, nothing to do with his research, and nothing to do with him in particular. My misgivings were mainly about how a couple of my male colleagues acted around him. That is, the colleagues I'm thinking of reduced themselves to junior high school boys. They were unprofessional and ridiculous. Now, the question I ask myself is this: should that candidate be held responsible for the behavior of my current colleagues?

I don't know. Probably not. Maybe so. Probably... not. I don't know. I just know that when these particular men got together to shoot the bull, something happened to them. They became unprofessional and immature 40-something-year-olds. (The newbie is in his early 30s.) Maybe I just hadn't witnessed this reduction of professionalism before and it was a problem about which I was blissfully unaware. Maybe. Who knows? I just don't want to start feeling like there's a pack of men who are all best buddies hanging out in our department, not working while at work, and somehow I and my female colleagues are all busting our asses to be good teachers, scholars, mentors, and committee members and these dudes are all dicking around the water cooler. Hey, I could be completely wrong. I hope I am. Besides, there's a time and place for dicking around. Everyone needs a break at times. But that's why I go to lunch with my colleagues that I'm friends with. That's the appropriate time to let off steam, or dare I say, goof off.

Anyway. I will say this - it was a hard decision to make on the search committee's part. Not really because there wasn't a clear "winner," but because everyone really likes the VAP as a person. What it came down to - at least, I hope - was the fact that the guy was a much, much better teacher, would add more to the program in the way of expertise, and had more experience. Plus, there had been some complaints about the current VAP from students. (One of my own students, a Y-ology major, mentioned this to me.) So I do feel at peace with the selection as far as who was the best candidate. I think we definitely picked the right person. I just think that the potential for dynamic change as a result is a little worrisome to me. I really, really hope I'm worrying over absolutely nothing.

After all, there's no patriarchy anymore. Right? Hmph.

Like a good neighbor

2011-12-04T16:12:00.001-08:00

I used to think that State Farm's marketing motto, "Like a good neighbor," was stupid. I had never really had a "good neighbor." Mostly, my neighbors kept to themselves and so did I. Today, though, was an excellent example of the way things have changed, and perhaps also an indicator of why Midwesterners have a reputation for being nice.

This morning, we went on a play date with our neighbors across the street. The youngest son there is in Eldest's class, so they are becoming buddies. We went to the Children's Museum for a few hours, and it was a blast. I grew up going to this museum, so it holds a lot of fond memories for me. I'm becoming good friends with the mom of the kid, and that's a relief. I've been wanting to have some out-of-the-office friends, and this woman and I have a lot in common. It's great.

Last night, our next door neighbors, a gay couple that we adore, had a party. We hung out there for a few hours and had a really wonderful dinner and good conversations. Then, today, they brought us a bunch of leftovers, and we had a ready-made dinner. Awesome. We routinely borrow things from each other, too. (They came over for eggs before the party yesterday. We've borrowed their air compressor.)

Others in the neighborhood are just as awesome. We had a huge play date on Halloween and got to know about twenty different people in the neighborhood. I have a feeling that this is the way neighborhoods used to be -- everyone knowing each other and hanging out together. I feel like this is a resurgence of an ancient tribal culture. The difference is that we all come from different places and different families, but we're creating our own tribe nonetheless. I like, too, that there's a good deal of diversity in the neighborhood -- mixed race couples, "traditional" families, gay families, and immigrants from Africa, Mexico, and other places. It's pretty damn cool -- just the sort of neighborhood I want my kiddos to grow up in.

Who knew the Heartland could be so cool?

And then, I also was a good "neighbor" yesterday. One of my not-in-my-department (but in a related department) colleagues' wife had a baby on Thursday, so I went to visit them in the hospital yesterday. We've become friends, and since this guy is the only full-time professor in his department, he gets no support. I've made it my business to help out wherever I can. Secretly, I've also started a collection for them in my department. He and his wife weren't planning on having any more children, so they got rid of all their baby stuff. I figured a gift card from Babies R Us might be helpful, so I emailed my department and told them the situation. People have responded very kindly. In fact, our dean, who is also an English prof, printed out the email and hand wrote a note to me, saying, "This is so thoughtful of you, Fie. Count me in for a donation."

Doing good feels good, doesn't it? This is the sort of neighborhood I never really had in California - both in a location sense and in a collegial sense. All this makes me feel like we're settling into something really precious and magical - feeling like we belong. Awesome.

O Holy Swamped

2011-12-02T19:39:00.001-08:00

I have so much work to do. I'm still grading 101 papers that I got well before break. They're horrible. So horrible, in fact, that I can only grade about three at a time without wanting to drink an entire bottle of wine. Then, I also have YA lit papers that I got right before break. I should be enthusiastic about them -- they're on The Hunger Games series -- but I can't bring myself to that stack until I'm done with the horrid 101s. Then, I have a set of journals for my intro class, and they're also turning in long papers on Wednesday. And finally, I get another stack of research papers from my 101 kids during finals week, and one more set of journals from my YA class.

Sigh.

When I write it all out, there seems to be an insurmountable amount of work to deal with all in the next 2-3 weeks. I'm not really sure when grades are due, but I will be so relieved when all of this is over. Something to think about for next semester -- don't make yourself insane at the end of the semester next time, Fie. Duh.

All this work is complicated by the fact that I've got a ton of social and work events going on in the meantime, too -- holiday parties, meetings, and such. I think I have something on my calendar every day until December 20th. Boy I'm glad that I have three intro classes next semester. That ended up being my easiest, most enjoyable class this semester, believe it or not, so I'm not changing it much for the spring. (I'm adding two short novels, since my students this semester thought that it would be fun to do more in fiction than just short stories.)

Then, I'm not sure that my 300-level class is going to make it. Current enrollment is at 3. One of my colleagues said that spring can be dicey because not everyone has the funds to enroll right away, and that screws up registration. All of the 300-level English classes are under-enrolled at this point. (The highest enrolled class has four people in it right now.) They can't cancel them all, can they?? Who knows. Anyway, if my 300 class doesn't make it, I wonder what will happen. Currently, all of the gen ed classes are covered.

Maybe they'd take a class away from an adjunct and give it to me. God, that would burn. I've had that done to me as an adjunct before, and it makes a huge difference in pay. But full-timers have to have classes, so I'm guessing that would happen. Sigh. It sucks to have the guilt of the other side on that. Plus, I don't really want my 300-level class to be canceled. Hmph.

In social news: We got together with a family tonight of a girl I went to kindergarten through high school with, but who I was never really friends with - just acquaintances. We reconnected on FB, and she suggested that since we live so close - within a mile of each other - that we should get the families together sometime. So tonight was the night. We had a ton of fun, and the kids loved playing together. It was great. It's ironic to me that someone who was always (only) in my peripheral vision in school is now a potential BFF. I guess that's what happens when you grow up and start seeing the world without blinders, eh?

Anyway - because of this fun social connection, I am exhausted and have not even a tiny bit of motivation to grade. I think I'll go to bed and try to carve out some time tomorrow to work before our next holiday party. Sigh. I think I might have to start declining invitations to anything until grades are done. It's a bummer though. Outside of school, I haven't really had much social engagement since we moved to the heartland. Now things are picking up, just at the wrong time.

Job market - from the search side

2011-12-01T16:34:00.000-08:00

In five days, we're having our department meeting to vote on our new hire in Y-ology. I went to the trouble of reading both candidates files, attending both teaching sessions and the department interviews. Since I'm in my first year on the tenure-track, this has all be very eye opening to me. I don't know how other schools do it - or even other departments - but my department has a search committee of four people who will recommend one person over the other and then the entire department gets to vote on whether or not we approve of the selection. There will be a discussion about the candidate the SC has chosen, with rationale about why they have chosen this particular candidate. Those of us who have attended all the sessions and read all the files might have a few thoughts to add as well. Then, we'll vote.

Being curious and wanting to be a responsible member of the department, even though we're not hiring in my field, I figured I should participate as much as possible. The first thing I did was I went to the provost's office and read the files. Person A's file was much more appealing than Person B's. The letter was 2 pages in a reasonable sized font with normal margins. The letter was clear, concise, professional, and said things like, "As my CV will show," and let the reviewer actually look at the CV as a meaningful document, instead of a redundant addition to the letter. Person B's letter was in tiny font, with tiny margins, and explained the CV to death, including every class ever taught by the candidate and every conference, etc. In my mind, Person A's concise letter won. Plus, there were ZERO comma errors in that letter. Person B's letter? Comma errors were all over the place. That annoyed me, even if the person wasn't an English major. Shouldn't an academic be able to punctuate? (Or at least find someone to edit that important letter?)

Next, I saw both candidates teach. Person A was far and away the better teacher: passionate, intelligent, and did a fun activity that was relevant to the topic and furthered understanding. Person B was a fairly ho-hum teacher and didn't use the board at all, despite the fact that new concepts were being introduced, defined, and the students were asked to comment on them. I found B's teaching hard to follow. It was also clear that the person was nervous. I totally get that. I was nervous during my Romeo and Juliet debacle, too. The Person B did an activity, too, but it was hard to follow and had no actual instructions on the handout. To me, that's a teaching fail.

Finally, I went to both candidates' department interviews. Person A, again, was winning, charming, and smart. Person B, finally, lit up and was a real gem. I liked both of them. Under normal circumstances, Person A would win the race by a long shot, though, because everything Person A did was great. The letter, the teaching, the interview all were consistently fantastic, and I was leaning toward that person, mightily. But then, one of my colleagues - the only one I really don't think I gel with - asked a question that Person A handled in a way that offended me. To be fair to Person A, the question was wildly inappropriate, misogynistic, and when the question was asked, my chair and I make eye contact with each other, and both our faces displayed horror. But Person A didn't handle the question well, in my opinion, and came off as misogynistic himself.

Then, after the interview, a group of us, including Person A, went out for a cigarette. I was the only woman in the group. One of my part-time colleagues told an inappropriate hotel room story about himself and Person A about throwing underpants around. (They were friends in college. 'Nuff said.) Under different circumstances, maybe I wouldn't have felt uncomfortable. I like the part-time guy, but he's the guy who has hit on me almost every day since August 15th. So there's a little angst there anyway. But then, the way that Person A handled that story, too, made me feel like I was suddenly witnessing a moment in the future -- a good ol' boys club that would form in our department and threaten to undermine the professional atmosphere that I have truly come to value at my school. I felt like I was in the middle of a group of adolescent boys who couldn't resist telling dick and fart jokes.

It was really disappointing.

But then - should that experience and the misguided question of the one weirdo colleague really mean that I don't vote for the person who, to that point, I'd thought had blown away the other candidate? Is it fair to not support Person A's candidacy because of the fact that my current colleagues acted like idiots?

The whole thing bothered me for 24 hours. When I got to the point where I was so upset that I could no longer grade papers, I slammed down my pen and marched down to my chair's office. I said, "Got a minute?" as I shut the door behind me. "I know I don't have any influence on this search, but I wanted to let you know what I've been thinking about for the last 24 hours."

My chair had witnessed the cigarette incident, but didn't participate, and in fact, again, looked at me in horror during the story telling. We talked about the inappropriate behavior of our current colleagues -- neither of whom are tenure-track, and I don't know why we keep them around with all the stories of inappropriate behavior that I've heard, witnessed, and been the B-side to. I said that I didn't think it was fair to have these feelings reflect negatively on the candidate but that that exchange with the cigarettes made me feel like the future could include a lack of professionalism if we hired Person A. Person B, on the other hand, was nothing but professional. Perhaps a bit uninspiring, but definitely crossed no lines, handled questions well, and maintained a feeling that Person B would be a good colleague.

My chair and I puzzled over these things for a while, and Chair said, "I'm so glad you came and talked to me about this. You gave me a lot to think about." I feel really bad though, all around. I think the teacher we'd want would be Person A. I think the teacher that the students would vote for would be Person A. But I don't know what's going to happen. I will be surprised as anyone when we have the department meeting and hear the search committee's recommendation.

The reason I'm telling this story, though, is that I felt like the job market was such a mystery when I was on it. And the thing that we're considering right now is the overall picture and how adding one person or another into the mix of our lovely (mostly) department is going to have lasting implications. This is a cautionary tale. You can hit all the right notes on the letter, the teaching, and the interview, but if you're a threat to the peace and balance of the department, then you might not get a job based on how your future colleagues would react and/or interact with you.

Doesn't that suck??

It does. But it's the truth. Honestly, if my colleagues had acted like mature professionals, I wouldn't be telling this story. And maybe if Person A had been a shade less eager to please my weirdo colleague and not gone down that subtly misogynistic road with him, then he would have had my admiration and respect for handling that asshat question with aplomb. But he didn't.

I guess the moral of the story is this: when you're interviewing, maybe the right thing to do is just be as true to your real beliefs and self as you can be if some asshat asks you a really bad question. And if someone asks if they can tell a story about a hotel room in college, you say, "No, I prefer you didn't," instead of, "Oh... okay." Eagerness to please may cost Person A the job. Unless, as I fear, Person A really is that clueless about professionalism, and so insecure and desperate that principles are sidelined for the purposes of edging into a job. Person A picked the wrong person to try to impress, methinks.

The problem at this point is that I don't know what the priorities of the search committee are. We'll find that out on Tuesday. Then, we'll get a recommendation. Then, we'll vote. No matter how it goes, I'm not sure I'm going to be happy with the decision. At least not initially.

I hope that I'm wrong about my misgivings about both candidates. I hope that whomever we hire will be as wonderful an addition to the department as we could wish for. The ironic thing to me is that I never thought, as I was filling out all those job applications, that the search committee's job could be more complicated than the nuisances I had to deal with every day. How wrong, very wrong, I was.

Soul Gone Home - a commentary

2011-11-28T07:06:00.000-08:00

I just got done teaching Langston Hughes's one-act play, "Soul Gone Home." If you don't know this play, I'd recommend you go find it on ebrary. It's only four pages long, but it's fantastic. The premise is this: a large, middle-aged black women, wearing a red sweater, is mourning over her 16-year-old dead son's body. He's been dead for an hour. The mother is described in the notes as "simulating grief." Simulating. The word choice is very precise, as one would expect from a poet.

The mother begs the son to wake up and talk to her, and oddly enough, he does. He accuses his mother of being a "hell of a mother," and he shares what he's learned in his one hour of death -- that he died because he was undernourished (a word the mother doesn't understand) and he had TB, so his immune system was unable to fight off infection. The son, Ronnie, is wearing a torn white t-shirt, and his hair is standing on end. He tells his mother that she never treated him right, never fed him right, and that they never had any of the necessities. He harps on milk and eggs - perhaps symbolizing the two basic things a mother provides in procreation: an egg that is fertilized by a man's sperm, and the milk from her breasts that would perfectly nourish an infant.

The loss of a child is one of the most horrific things a mother can go through. I haven't lost a child myself, but I almost did, and let me tell you, that was enough for me. It changed me unequivocally. So I feel a little sorry for this mother as I read the play. Then again, the son's appraisal of the mother's faults is also valid, and, frankly, hilarious. Hughes, himself, described the play as a tragicomedy. Had I not known that before I started reading it, I might have missed the point.

That is, Hughes reverses our expectations about death. Usually, we learn more about people after they die -- what's the point of keeping their secrets anymore? We talk about the dead and praise the dead, but we're also able to criticize the dead without worry of repercussions. After all, how will the dead possibly be offended? They're dead. In Hughes's play, however, the dead returns from the undiscovered country, much like King Hamlet's ghost. In effect, we learn more about the living in this play, because of the dead person's assessment of her. The son dies of malnourishment, despite the fact that the mother is described as being overweight. (This is not to say that she's eating a lot of nourishing foods. As we all know, it's cheaper -- and more fattening -- to eat unhealthily. But let's just say, she's got enough to eat.) The mother has become a hustler, which I interpret to be a prostitute, and yet, this sort of lifestyle has not been the undertaking of a woman desperate to provide for her son. Rather, the woman is a prostitute who does NOT provide for her child. It's a mystery why she should become a hooker, except that maybe she feels she has no other options.

I can't really criticize that feeling of helplessness. But I do think there could have been a better solution. The son was born healthy -- ten pounds -- but the mother describes him as always being a sickly burden on her. He was never useful to her, as she had hoped he might be. Because of him, she's been deprived of a happy life, the love of "good" men, and a life of (potentially more) privilege. Instead, she had Ronnie selling newspapers by the time he could walk, he says. When he's dead, she laments the fact that he died just when he could have been some use to her.

I asked my students what the usefulness of children was. They mentioned handing down your legacy -- like a crown or lands -- or providing chore labor as a slightly older child. I said, "Sure. But what use does an infant have?" Besides the potential for the above, infants are pretty useless. And yet! They are so awesome and loveable. They also teach (thinking) parents so much about the human experience and history and priorities and about themselves as children and their roles as daughters/sons.

I asked later, "What does the mother learn from the death of her child in this play?" They thought that over for a long moment, and one of the students screwed up his face in bewilderment. I said, "Your face says it all." The student said, "Nothing?" I said, "Exactly. She learns nothing." The ambulance comes to take the son away, and the mother puts on another good show of mourning. Then, she puts on makeup, lights a cigarette, and leaves, saying that if she makes any money today, she'll get a flower for her son. If! If?! This woman has learned nothing. But in the process, the audience has learned an awful lot.

What we've learned is that all mothers make sacrifices for their children, but just because you make a sacrifice doesn't mean you're a good parent. The kind of sacrifice you make is as important as the sacrifice itself. If the woman were a prostitute in order to get food, medicine, and an education for her son, we'd herald her as a saint. But instead, we have no idea what she spends the money on, but we do know that her son is dead and that he comes back from the dead -- not to console his poor mother, but to accuse her of being a bad mother. (Alas for mothers everywhere - is there a worse crime than being a bad mother?) Also, we learn a little bit about the unconditional love fallacy. Parents, it seems, do not unconditionally love their children simply because they are parents. And children, too, do not unconditionally love their parents. Rather, they are highly, extremely critical. We'd like to think that the opposite is true. Yet in this play, it's not. There is a hefty amount of resentment and accusation, and these qualities undermine the love we'd like to believe is present in human connections. Sometimes, it's just not there.

How disappointingly realistic.

As a feminist, I resist the urge to blame, blame, blame the mother, because mothers frequently get a bad rap. Nonetheless, I think that this particular mother is indicative of the kind of parent whose priorities are out of whack. It's not just parents under the microscope, though. It's people. Why aren't we human beings compassionate enough to provide the basics for children? The basics Hughes cites are morals, manners, food, and love. (To each his own, eh?) The "simulated" grief in the beginning of the play is an indictment of us all. We lament over ideas -- like children dying of undernourishment, or even more quotidian problems like children not being given good educations. We lament and lament. But do we really do anything? Do we? Some people do. More people don't. It's nice to think about, lament about, and philosophize about ideas. When the ideas become people - real people - dying or being pepper sprayed or having their hair pulled out by the police as they drag peaceful protestors to arrest, what do we do, then?

I'm guilty of doing nothing. A lot of people are. That doesn't really excuse it. It just is what it is.

In this play, "Soul Gone Home," Hughes asks us to stop pretending to care when we don't. Stop the lamentations over dead bodies and try, instead, to prevent deaths. It's a domestic call to arms, and I think that a lot of people really don't want to hear it. It requires actions. It requires the messy, icky business of attaching faces to real social problems and then dealing with the horror that humans face on a daily basis. If we put faces to those problems, suddenly we feel responsible for them.

And isn't that a nuisance?

Well, death solves it, I guess. It's clear in the play that the dead boy has finally, truly, found a home for the first time -- an afterlife where he has been educated more in an hour than he was his whole 16 years on Earth. He experiences love - or at least knows how it ought to be. He knows what has been deprived in his life. Ronnie has learned about the human experience and has undergone true enlightenment. Death provides in a way that life has not. I suppose that that soul really has gone home - for the first time.

To catch you up...

2011-11-27T19:13:00.000-08:00

* Tuesday had an unexpectedly high turn out in attendance. I was surprised that only three people missed my 101 class. One of them is now going to fail due to absences. Okay then.

* Thursday, I went to school to grade papers for about two hours. That's all the work I did over break. It's not that I didn't want to work. Well, I didn't want to do anything, frankly, but sleep and mope. (I kind of hate the holidays.) But now I am behind the eight ball, unmercifully, with grading. The next three weeks are going to be heinous. Thank the maker for winter break. I will need that and a double whiskey once this is all over.

* Friday, hubby's family was in town. We had a good dinner (hubby cooked! Hurray!) and bad dessert (mother-in-law provided. Boo!). It was good to see brother-in-law again. He's a cool cat.

* Saturday, we went to my mom's house, and it just sucked. I mean, nothing bad happened, but without my dad there, it just doesn't feel the same. Plus, my sisters haven't been talking to each other since May or June, so that was awkward. The tension was pudding-thick. I was glad to get out of there without drinking an entire bottle of wine to cope.

* Today, Sunday, hubby and I went to see Breaking Dawn in the theater. I know. What did I expect? I wasn't sure it was possible to get worse at acting with more practice and experience, but Kristen Stewart proved that wrong. Then again, that book is bad overall, too. So I knew I'd hate it, but I went anyway -- out of a sense of obligation to finish the series. And it's NOT over yet. Bah. Why do I bother? The next one is going to be a rental for sure.

The best thing about going to the theater was seeing the trailer for The Hunger Games on the big screen. If you haven't seen it, go here. It's very exciting! I'm going to teach this book in the spring just so I can gather up some students to go to the movie with me in March. Maybe that's lame to go to the movies with your teacher, but I think the discussion it would generate would be a lot of fun. Maybe, just maybe, I'll sprinkle in some extra credit. Generally, I'm against extra credit, but if you have to pay to go see a movie, maybe it's warranted.

* Tomorrow, hubby has a job interview. He's been unhappy with his current job for about three or four years, but he hasn't had many options since I was underemployed. Now that I've got insurance and all those crazy benefits, he has a little more wiggle room to look for something more interesting to him. So if you have extra good vibes to send anywhere, shoot them to the heartland tomorrow at 10:30 a.m. (EST).

* Also on Monday's agenda is the second candidate's campus interview for our position in Y-ology. It continues to be awkward for me, since I'm seeing the behind the scenes action of the campus interview process, and I'm friendly with the VAP, whom we have campus interviewed already. I definitely think that whoever is right for the job should get it, regardless of friendship, but it's still weird to have to make that vote in the first place. We'll see how it goes.

* The rest of this week is going to be one busy mess. I have meetings, interviews, doc appointments, etc., etc., etc. Hubby also had a flat tire today (it unseamed itself from the nave to the chops), so he needs to get a new one. We're going to be putting out fires every which way. I'm not going to lie -- I kind of like it that way sometimes. It helps me consider life not so deeply. And just after the holidays, I need that distraction for a little while in order to recover from the inherent disappointment and ramp up for the bigger bust that usually is Christmas.

* And now, I think we're up to date. Fie upon this quiet life, y'all. I've got so much work to do.

Low expectations for Tuesday

2011-11-21T18:58:00.000-08:00

Yeah, I have low expectations for turn out in my classes tomorrow - the day before break. Why people think they should take off a day early is beyond me, especially since we already have Wednesday off so people can travel. This just goes to show how long it's been since I was an undergrad. What an old fart I must seem to be - what with believing people should do work on the meager two days they technically need to be at school this week. One class has a paper due tomorrow, so I'm guessing most of those folks will show up. But my 101 class has nothing - no reading assignment, no paper. (Awesome planning on my part, eh?) We're supposed to talk about their research paper which is due in a couple of weeks, but I bet they won't care enough to come hear about that. Instead of letting this frustrate me, I'm going to set my expectations way lower than normal and wait and see what happens.

This actually could work in my favor. Six people in my 101 class are sitting on the attendance bubble, meaning if they miss the class one more time, they automatically fail, based on the department's rules and regulations. That would be six less research papers to grade if they end up not showing up tomorrow. And we all know less is more...

I had a great day today at work. I taught in the morning, read some stuff, graded a few papers, sent out an invitation for our department holiday party (which I'm hosting), had lunch with some colleagues, had coffee in the afternoon with a friend, then picked up eldest and did homework with him after dinner. All in all, it was a good day.

Tomorrow might suck. But I sure can't complain about my Monday.

No holiday for English teachers

2011-11-20T10:32:00.000-08:00

I have only two days to work this week, and then we're off Wednesday through Sunday for Thanksgiving. I'm guessing most colleges operate under the same schedule. I sort of forgot that Thanksgiving was coming this week -- I've been too busy to look at the calendar beyond the present, when I ask myself, "Okay - what fire do I have to put out today?"

My in-laws will be here on Friday night for Thanksgiving dinner, and then my own family will be here on Saturday for my side of the family's Thanksgiving. I have no idea why we can't actually have Thanksgiving on the real day, but whatever. The only thing I can think about is when I'll be able to slip away from company in order to get work done.

I don't know if other subjects (math, science, poli-sci, history, etc.) are the same, but ever since I started teaching, I've never really had much of a holiday on Thanksgiving break. Usually, that's the busiest time of the semester for me. I have two sets of papers in already and am getting a new set on Tuesday. Hubby and I spent some time this weekend cleaning, and of course, I had theater duties on Friday and Saturday night. So I haven't gotten any grading done. I've been reading the book that I need to teach on Tuesday, and that's it. I figure in the grand scheme of things it's probably more important to be prepared to teach on Tuesday than it is to get the papers back to the students immediately. I'm not going to be able to return those papers by tomorrow and Tuesday, anyway, so I'll just get the grading done as I can over the next week. I'll be grading every day, though. Lots and lots of grading.

The potential surprise here is that I totally don't care that I'll be grading for the next seven days and unable to participate in a major way with the holiday. I like Thanksgiving -- at least it's not a religious holiday that my mom can shame me for participating in, despite the fact that I don't go to church. (Of course, the Thanksgiving mythology is a little depressing for anyone who has a conscience.) But if I've got an excuse to minimize my interaction with my greater family at large, then I'll take it - and be, ironically, grateful.

So what are you thankful for this year? Me? I'll be counting my blessings that I have work to do and can't really take a day off completely to participate in the drama of the holiday. The rub is that everyone will be converging at my house. What a drastic change from six years in California -- when we were too far away to get involved. Hey - even if I can't sequester myself from these events entirely, maybe I can volunteer to do dishes and hide in the kitchen. See how I have a strategic plan all set? Thank God for planning.

Joy

2011-11-18T19:35:00.000-08:00

I worked the box office tonight for the current theater show at school. I told the (sole) theater prof that if he ever needed help running the box office that he should enlist me. So I worked the show in September and this show tonight. It's just one night out of my life -- students volunteer for the rest -- but I am the only other faculty person who is giving time to the theater.

Man, people are missing out by not being a part of the theater on campus. I was in theater in high school and undergrad, and I had no idea how much I missed being IN the theater. Of course, I teach plays all the time. I read them, too. But there's something so different about being in the black box, especially when you're doing something back stage or on stage. Even just running the box office feels special. I get to hang out with students who are creating something, who are excited about their work, who are fantastic performers. It's awesome. They are so excited, and their excitement is infectious. It makes me so happy to be a part of this school. At a big R1, I'd never have a chance to hang out with the theater crowd and be a part of productions, even in this tiny, not-so-significant way. This is just one more reason why I feel like I'm definitely in the right place at the right time.

You know what that feels like? It feels like joy. Utter and complete joy.

Now, I didn't get to see the show tonight because I was too busy handling things. But I have some complimentary tickets tomorrow, so hubby and I will go check it out. I can't wait. I heard a lot of laughing in the black box tonight. The show sounds like a hoot. And students that I know and love are in it. I can't wait to see them and support them. It's one of the greatest parts of my job.

Dude, where's your university?

2011-11-15T20:23:00.001-08:00

Spanish Prof tagged me in a post responding to Historian's post on Tony Grafton's response to several books that seek to discuss (and solve?) the problems in higher ed. (Is that enough link love, or what?)

Well, I'm in my first year in a tenure-track job. Heartland U is a religious SLAC that is seeking to expand and has had a lot of success with expansion, despite the financial crisis of the last several years. Much of that success is due to the addition of some sports, which draw attention to us, and our president, who is a fantastic fund raiser.

Now. The question is - how does my school stack up to the problems referenced by the bloggosphere, the books, and Grafton? This may be a case of "It's too soon to tell."

I have been making a lot of friends in my department and beyond. Problems that I hear from the peanut gallery are a lot of the usual stuff:

(1) Students are lazy and don't care about learning. They only care about getting certified to go out into the world as a college graduate. It's all about the job, baby. How can I maximize this degree and get the highest paying job possible? I don't encounter much of that, actually. Generally, I have found that the students are pretty good, when you can inspire them to do work. (They definitely demand inspiration, though.) I try to inspire the kiddos by challenging their principles. I hold them to high standards. (Not that that is something other teachers don't do. But a less experienced teacher who was brand new in a TT job might be reluctant to hold a firm line on late papers, plagiarism, or other nuisances you deal with as a teacher. It's all about the evals, baby! Wait. Did I just sound like a degree-grubbing student?) Our retention rate is in the 70-ish% area, which I think is great. So I, personally, don't have many complaints about them.

(2) The administration isn't supportive. From my limited experience, I think that's a reductive statement. So far, I've gotten a lot of administrative support, but maybe it's because I'm new. Still, I was impressed that our president and provost wanted to have meetings with the entire faculty -- ten faculty members at a time -- to talk about how Heartland U could improve. We had a great discussion, and I was encouraged to bring my ideas to the table, despite being new, not tenured, and not as familiar with the way things work at this university. I talked a lot, and the president told me at the end, "I'm so glad we hired you, Fie." I said, "Me, too!"

(3) There is not enough diversity. This, I feel, is true. Not only do most of our students come from the general metropolitan area around here, most of them are also white, middle-class, and Christian. It's tough to get that wide world-view in college when you're going to class with the same people you always went to class with, and not having your faith challenged.

The thing is: I challenge my students' faith a lot, actually. This is not a subversive move on my part. I'm trying to give them the tools to examine all of their commonly held beliefs in order to make them think critically about what has always just been "the truth" in their lives. And I feel completely supported by the faculty and administration alike in my stance -- that assumptions of all kinds must be examined, questioned, and either upheld with greater strength or disregarded as absurd. (Or something in between.)

In a lot of ways that people have mentioned on this blog and elsewhere, I am going against all conventional grains. Mainly because I've been encouraged to by everyone from the department chair to the dean (whose office is next door to mine). I speak in meetings. I am respectful to the higher ups, but I also treat them like people, not gods. I'm treated like a person, too - with dignity and respect. In fact, there's a lot of mutual respect going on. And maybe that's just because I'm new. Who knows?

What else can I NOT complain about?

Funding. The school is generous with its travel funds for conferences, and they make a lot of opportunities for students and faculty alike to go overseas. I'm having a meeting about getting involved in study abroad tomorrow, in fact. I didn't even present at the conference I went to recently, but the school happily paid for it nonetheless after I wrote a brief justification.

Faculty/Staff Support. Maybe I'm just happy not to be an adjunct anymore. But people have been so supportive of me and really respected me as a colleague. It's been a wonderful change of pace.

Office Space. It's a fluke, because I'm replacing someone who had a lot of clout, but I have the best faculty office in the department. My office is only slightly smaller than the dean's office, and it has awesome furniture. (This is sort of superficial, but it makes my life comfortable.)

Really, I love my job. I love my colleagues. I love the students. I feel like I hit the lottery every day when I go in to work. Yeah, I am busy. I'm in a 4/4 and am still expected to do a tad bit of research. But I am really satisfied with how things are going. Not just happy, but really satisfied. From what I hear, that's rare.

So there are problems in higher ed. I know. Right now, I'm too new to have discovered them at Heartland, I guess. But for the most part, people seem happy to be working at my school. Students seem to be happy to be there, too. There are exceptions to this statement, of course. There's a cynic everywhere you go (for faculty, it's mostly among the adjuncts, and who can blame them? Although, there are only three in my department -- the lowest number I've encountered in my entire teaching career.) I may be whistling a different tune in a few years, but for now, I feel like the most consistently positive thing in my life is my job. It's not that I don't love my family or anything. It's just that there are complications (money, bills, kids, etc.) that I don't run into while working. Work is my haven. What, if anything, is wrong with that?

Voter resignation

2011-11-14T12:46:00.000-08:00

My department is a two subject department -- you know, like The Department of X-ology and Y-ology. Let's say my part is X-ology. Well, the Y-ology part of my department is conducting a job search right now. There are two candidates that are going to be doing campus visits. One of the candidates is the current one-year VAP; the other candidate is an outsider. There were only 10 applicants for the job -- something I find hard to believe, but this ain't an MLA field, so maybe different disciplines are, well, different.

This is an odd situation for me. It's my first year on the job, and I have to vote on who gets a job. Weird. Weird. Weird. The VAP is nice, which makes it awkward for everyone. We all wish the VAP well, but what if the other person is better? If the other person is more qualified, I'll vote for him/her, and feel guilty. Plus, how am I supposed to make a judgment about whom to hire when this isn't my field? (ie, it's not English we're talking about, which I feel I could make an informed decision on, regardless of specialization.) I'll get to hear the arguments of the Y-ology folks, and perhaps just trust their judgment. But then, we'll make a decision and if the VAP is not the chosen one, then we're going to have the rest of the year to feel awkward around that person. (Or if he/she is the chosen one, we'll celebrate all year, which I guess is better, but still a little awkward.) Hmph. It's not pretty, that's sure.

Today, I had to go see one of the candidates teach as part of the campus visit. Since this isn't my field, I found it a bit hard to follow. I wondered, too, if our differences in teaching style were throwing me off. So I don't know. I feel like this vote is going to be hard to cast, but I'm resigned to try to make the best decision I can under the circumstances. Even though I feel like I'm not qualified to judge the field, I do think I can judge what makes a teacher effective or not. I'll be basing my vote on that judgment, comparing the two as teachers.

Just to be fair, I know that different teaching styles are often equally good. I think the best way that I can judge between "teacher 1" and "teacher 2" is to try to gauge the students' responses. Then again, that might not be fair, considering the class with the VAP is going to be more responsive, since the students already know that person. But the class is full of talkative students, so maybe it won't be hard to judge. I don't know. All I know is that if I have to vote for the new candidate and not the VAP, it will feel like a betrayal -- especially difficult for me since I know how tough the market is and just spent four years of my life begging the universe for a break. However, now that I've gotten that break, I often am thankful that it took so long for me to get it. I'm a seasoned teacher now and older, so I feel less insecure about myself. Instead of feeling like an imposter, I feel like a real colleague in my department. From what I've read on blogs, that's pretty rare for the first year on the tenure-track.

I'm interested to see how all this plays out. It's going to be difficult, no matter what the department decides. I can't wait to hear the debate over the candidates. It'll be like seeing the man behind the curtain after all these years of being on the other side. Heck - I'll be behind the curtain. Fascinating. And scary...

Priority? Eldest

2011-11-11T19:30:00.000-08:00

I went to therapy today, and my therapist, as is her practice, started out with, "Well? How's it going?" I said, "Bad. But let me think for a minute about how to prioritize the badness." Turns out, we spent most of the session talking about eldest.

We went to see a pediatric neurologist today because we decided that we'd try some medication for eldest's ADHD. I know. He's young. He'll be six in three months. So he's young. But things are going so badly at school that I feel like we need to give him a chance to get his impulses under control. I can tell that his teacher doesn't like him and considers him to be a problem kid. I know that the students in his class give him a hard time -- and that's just from the limited amount of knowledge we get from him each day. I ask him how his day was. I say, "How was your day? Good, bad, or so-so?" Most days he says, "Bad." And I ask why. His typical response as of late as been, "I got in trouble." I ask why. He says sadly, "Because I'm a bad boy."

Mother of god...

When we were in California, he was in a very good special ed class. There were seven kids in the class and FOUR adults -- one main teacher and three aids. The kids in his class all had speech delays or some other real problem with impulse control like ADHD. One kid had significant health problems and was on oxygen most of the time. These kids learned so much in one year -- how to write the alphabet, lots of pre-reading skills, yoga, patterns, art, music, and so, so, so much more. I can't even begin to describe the transformation in his skills in one short school year. No, he's not perfect, and he has tons of trouble with his attention span and communication. But he's smart, and he was able to have that gift recognized in his California class. In fact, he was the smartest kid in his class last year, and all the kids loved him and looked up to him. They were impressed with him, and his teacher frequently sent me notes about how well he was doing and how far he was coming. Now? He's just hearing that he's a bad kid. And he's starting to believe it.

Yeah, I have a great job. But my kid is suffering from my decision to accept it and move here. I'm really hoping that this medication can help his attention span so that he can calm down enough to do some desk work. He might start to feel successful again. And maybe the kids will start to like him more if he can chill out a bit. But in order to get that medication, we needed to go to a neurologist because he needs to be monitored for potential seizures. Since he had two seizures when he was two years old, there's a chance that being on stimulant medication will lower his seizure threshold. It upsets and scares me. I spent most of the therapy session crying.

I never thought that taking a job and moving away would feel like a mistake. And maybe it won't feel like that forever. But my decisions affect my kids, and boy is this one decision ever affecting eldest. That poor kid. I just keep telling him that I love him and that I am proud of him. That's more than my parents did when I was getting bullied constantly. I hope it's enough.

When we were driving home from the doc today, he asked me, "Where's Miss Cristina?" She was his teacher last year -- a brilliant, young teacher whom I had my doubts about initially. But she ended up being such a god send to eldest. I said, "She's back in California where we used to live." He said, "I miss Miss Cristina." I paused as my eyes filled up with tears -- the first of many times today -- and I said, "I know. Me, too."

Howdy, stalker! Or re-friending unfriended friends

2011-11-09T19:36:00.000-08:00

You might recall that I went through a massive unfriending phase a couple of weeks ago on FB. Well, one of the people I unfriended was a friend of my mom's - a real one - that I've never been 100% fond of. She's just kind of stern and negative and was mean to me and my sisters when we were kids. But she friended me on FB two years ago, and I thought it was harmless to friend her. She never posts and rarely comments on anything I post.

So I unfriended her recently, as I figured she wouldn't notice or pay attention. She fit my criteria for unfriending: she rarely posts, rarely corresponds, and I'm not "real" friends with her. It seemed like she was never on FB, so WTH? Unfriend.

Today, I got a friend request from her and a message saying, "What happened? I haven't seen anything from you in weeks. Where did you go?"

Bother.

I confirmed her as a friend, just so I wouldn't have to deal with the fallout that might occur as a result. I didn't reply to the message though.

I am a fairly prolific FB poster, so I'm guessing I'd be one of those people whose absence you'd notice. What I didn't realize is that a lot of people - from what I'm hearing - stalk my FB page and keep up with me in pure silence. They never reply to what I write or correspond with me. They just like me "being there." But what that means is this: when I unfriended people, they noticed.

Now, there were a couple of people I unfriended whom I haven't heard from, and I am guessing they are either hurt or hate me and won't ever talk to me again. Right on. I get that. Maybe that's sort of a necessary evil in my life. It's all part of the natural order of life -- things fading away. It's more natural than sending a WTF? message to your friend's grown kid, wondering where they went all of a sudden. Maybe I didn't care to be friends with that person. Even think of that??

Well, whatever. She's an old, old lady. If it makes her happy stalking me on FB, so be it. I guess it's not hurting me.

Home

2011-11-06T20:23:00.000-08:00

I got home late Saturday night. It was good to see hubby. I was really missing the family by the time my last session was over. When the kids got up this morning, eldest said, "Mom! You're here!" The joy in his voice was better than coffee. Made me feel fantastic. I said, "Come here and give me a kiss, mister!" He happily obliged.

We had a couple more reunions today, too. My little sister came over to visit, and I haven't seen her in ages. It felt like a reunion. We had lunch at a swanky place, just the two of us, and it was great to catch up. Then, the family and I went to my friend's house this afternoon to play with his kids and hang out. I haven't seen this friend since my dad's funeral, so it's been over two years. Anyway, it was nice to have a non-sad occasion to spend time together. It turns out that he doesn't work on Fridays, so I think we're going to try to get lunch some upcoming Friday. That would be fun. I've been friends with this guy since I was 6 years old, so almost 30 years. Isn't it great to have old friends? Things pick right back up where they left off.

In the time I was away, I managed to read two plays: A Man's World by Rachel Crothers and Miss Lulu Bett by Zona Gale. Both were good plays, but I think I liked the Crothers play better. It was performed in 1909, and boy was it ahead of its time! Massively. I might start my women playwrights class with it next semester. My first thought about this women playwrights class is that I'm going to have to be careful about not making it a man-bashing class. That's not really the point. But as I read Crothers's play, I thought to myself, "If my own bad experiences with men haven't turned me against all men, reading these plays just might..." Ugh. I need to be careful not to be too negative and emotive about this. It's just that the men in these two plays are such bastards. Ugh. Ugh. Must remind myself of good dudes - like Hubby and Harker and tamayn and our awesome neighbors and some of my cool colleagues. Not all men are d-bags. Not all.

I also read The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian on Thursday, which was a reread for this week's YA class. I must say - I adore that book. And in contrast to the drivel I taught last week (The Perks of Being a Wallflower), I'm extremely enthusiastic. I'm totally caught up on reading for the second, but I am getting dumped with papers tomorrow and Thursday. I'll be in grading jail a lot this week, methinks.

Tomorrow's class is going to be a bright and early lecture on irony and a discussion of "The Gift of the Magi," which I've thought of a new little ironic twist on. I have done no research on this story, so maybe someone else has thought of my idea before. But I think I could make an argument for O. Henry hinting that the husband and wife's gifts are even better and more important than the gifts of the wise men to the baby Jesus because they involve unconditional love and true sacrifice -- just like Jesus' sacrifice. The way the end of the story is worded, in my mind, calls into question whether the original magi were making a big sacrifice or not. I went back and read the nativity narratives in the Bible. (I swear, I've read more of the Bible in this semester than I have in the last ten years, just trying to get context for the literature I'm teaching.) I'm going to fool around with the idea tomorrow with the students and see what we think. Right now, it's just a bit of a theory. I have no knowledge of O. Henry, so maybe I'm dead wrong. Before class, I'll try to look up more info. But now, I need sleep. I'm a tired panda.

Ah... sleeping in my own bed. It's a delight. Hotels sure are fantastic sometimes. But man, I love my own bed.

And here we are

2011-11-04T19:53:00.000-07:00

I finally made it to STL after my fancy camping in Chicago last night. (Which, as it turns out, wasn't so bad. It was a beautiful place to be stranded.) I am not staying at the conference hotel because it was booked solid by the time I made plans, but I'm exactly one mile away. So I walked to the conference after checking in and dropping off my bag. It was a nice walk - about 45-50 degrees and overcast. My kind of day! St. Louis has some lovely, but strange architecture. Since I was walking, I took some time to stare at buildings. It was fun. Then, I got to the conference hotel and was blown away. What a lovely place. I wish I were staying there so I could soak up the grandeur some more.

The worst part about my late arrival is that I missed a Shakespeare panel I'd wanted to see this morning. But it could be worse. I got to see a panel on teaching writing, one on masculinity, one on "the personal in the classroom," scholarly publishing and new media, and finally ended the day with another Shakespeare panel. All's well that ends well for the day. Plus, one of my friends from my undergrad days lives here and was presenting at the conference, so we went and had dinner at a fancy French place. (Vin de Set, for those who might find themselves in St. Louis sometime soon. It was awesomely good food.) All in all, a good day. I was tired from getting very little sleep, but I intend to catch up tonight. I want to get back to the conference at 8 tomorrow morning, since I need to be back at the airport at around 3ish. I'll have limited options tomorrow, that means, and unfortunately, I think I'm going to miss the YA panel I really wanted to see, as it's later in the afternoon. Boo.

So this is a short trip. It feels weird being without the family right now. Usually when I travel I'm all about the alone time. I guess that recently I've been feeling extra down and extra lonely, so it would have been nice to have some company here. But it was good to see my friend, and I've talked to a few people at the conference, too. I do enjoy chatting with other academics! I bet, though, that I'll be ready to see my family again tomorrow night. Hope the flights don't get screwed up again!

A good day that ended badly

2011-11-03T21:47:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm supposed to be in St. Louis, but I'm in Chicago. Stuck. My flight got delayed, and then I missed my next flight by about a half an hour. The only good thing that comes of this is that I'm being put up in a hotel that may very well be the nicest I've ever stayed at. It's gorgeous. In comparison to the place where I stayed for the Shakespeare festival in September, it's a palace.

Why did I even bother to fly? I wouldn't have, except that this is for my job, and I thought that I would work on the plane and in the airport. You can't really work in the car. But had I driven, I would already be in St. Louis. Instead, I'm not going to sleep tonight, probably, and then I'll be half asleep during the conference tomorrow. Bah. This isn't going as planned. :(

But. Though the day is ending in a particularly annoying way, I did have a very good day today. You're going to laugh at me, but I taught my comp students some Kierkegaard today (Fear and Trembling). They actually stayed awake through the whole lecture. (I was teaching about revision, specificity, and making your argument deeper. Seemed to fit with Fear and Trembling, which I only had them read about 25 pages of.) A few people even asked questions and tried to engage. It was lovely.

Then, my department chair came to my YA class to observe my teaching. I thought he might stay for a half hour or something. Nope. He was there for the entire hour-and-fifteen-minute class. I was a little nervous beforehand, as I think most people would be. You know, being new and all. But my students were active in discussion, and I was brilliant - organized, detailed, insightful. (Ah, I do love to toot my own horn. It makes up for all the times when I feel like such a worthless piece of shit.) To be brief, the class went as well as a class can go, in my humble opinion. My chair and I are going to meet next week for his evaluation, but at the end, he came to me and said, "That was a great class. I really enjoyed it." It would seem I have nothing to worry about, then. But hey, if he wants to give me some pointers, I'm all for that, too.

If I were safely installed in St. Louis, I'd be one happy camper. As it is, I'm mainly an annoyed camper. But hey! These are great camping digs! I suppose I can be grateful for that -- AND the fact that I'm paying for none of this. Not the flight. Not this hotel or the next one. Not the food. Nothing. I suppose this inconvenience can be overlooked for the fact that I'm on an all-expenses paid work trip that actually feels like vacation. Really, the only part that sort of sucks is I'm alone. I have a lot of friends in Chicago, but they are all working in the morning. So I guess I'll just go to bed and try not to miss the next flight at 7:00 a.m. Sigh.

Slouching toward progress

2011-11-02T19:23:00.000-07:00

Today, we had eldest's official IEP meeting at school, and we learned a bit more about what's going on with him. We were given results of a bunch of testing that the special ed team did, and their findings were conclusive -- 1. He's not on the autism spectrum (duh. I could have told you that.), 2. He does have some social behavioral problems, but they're mainly due to his ADHD (like having trouble maintaining a conversation because he's too distracted), 3. He needs OT, PT, and Speech therapy in order to help with his motor skills, social skills, and language lag, 4. He's academically on par with his peers and if his attention span could get under control, he'd probably be doing great, 5. His ADHD is really holding him back in big ways -- socially, academically, and even physically, which I initially found hard to believe, but I think it's probably true.

I'm still kind of processing all of this because it seems like there are more problems than ever. But I'm also glad that he's getting more services offered to him under this new IEP than he previously had. What I really wanted was for him to have a full-time aid at his side every day, but I don't think that's going to happen. He does have people who work with him every day -- a special ed aid -- but it's for only part of the day. He has a student teacher that he's really latched onto, but she's going to be leaving the school in December. I know he's really going to miss her.

I like the student teacher, too. She told me a story today that made my heart burst smilingly. One day a couple weeks ago, eldest picked up a book from our bookshelves -- a Shakespeare book that contained the late romances. Without asking, he took the book to school. He unpacked his bag during one of his "sensory breaks," in which he's taken out of the class for an attention span refresher/breather. He brought the Shakespeare book to the student teacher and said, "Will you read this to me?" She said, "This is Shakespeare." He said, "I'm named after Shakespeare. Did you know that?" She said, "No, I didn't." He said, "Will you read me Shakespeare?" She said, "Uh, okay." So she started reading The Winter's Tale to him, and she said she felt kind of ridiculous, but he was sitting quietly and listening intently for about ten minutes. This is a big deal. Nothing makes my kid sit still for ten minutes. She stopped reading at some point and said, "We should probably get back in to class, okay?" And he said okay.

Maybe there's an argument to be made to get my kid into some kind of Shakespeare therapy.

I'm my own worst enemy

2011-10-31T18:19:00.000-07:00

I spent a good part of the day today, Halloween, being depressed about not being in the bay area. I was missing my friends that I've spent Halloween with over the last several years, and I started feeling sorry for myself. That's never good. I get into these deep pits of funk. It doesn't help that I'm sick -- still sporting a fancy cough that might pass as the plague.

But mommy guilty got the better of me this afternoon, and I figured I'd pick up the kiddos early. I got them home, so we could eat an early dinner and then meet up with some of our neighbors for trick-or-treating. Honestly, I wanted to stay home. Hubby was ready to lead the troops and let me hand out candy. I felt like crap - physically and mentally - but I saw how excited the kids were and figured I should probably tag along and take some pictures. As sick as I am, I was prepared for the experience to suck. But I took some cold medicine and told myself to be a grown up. Get over it, Fie.

Four hours later, I'm so glad I went. We met up with several of our neighbors on the street -- many of whom have kids that are in eldest's grade (if not his class). This was baby's first trick-or-treating outing, so it was cute watching him go up to the houses for candy, too. (And I might never have forgiven myself for missing that!) Eldest had a blast, screaming "trick-or-treat!" and the follow-up, "Thank you!!" with just as much enthusiasm. It pulled me out of my misery, watching my kids skip up and down the street with about a dozen other kids. Talking to the other parents, and meeting several of the neighbors that I'd never seen before, was like a tonic for me.

This good feeling I have right now proves to me that I need to get out more and have a better social life. When I'm around people, even if I'm sick, I feel better. I'm my own worst enemy in this regard. I get down, and then I don't want to be around people. But what I really need at these down times is PEOPLE. More connections. More talking. More putting myself out there. When I allow myself to stew, I am feeding the depression. (Apparently, depression likes stew for dinner.) I need to keep reminding myself that I need to be around people in order to feel good. It's a bad idea to be in isolation mode. It only makes things worse.

And seriously - who can wear a frown when these two kiddos are around?

It's so tempting

2011-10-30T18:06:00.000-07:00

November, as all good (and many bad) writers know, is National Novel Writing Month (henceforth nanowrimo). I participated in nanowrimo in 2006 when I was only teaching two classes and had an 8-month-old baby. I finished the novel, but it wasn't particularly good. Last year when I wrote my long novel, it took 67 days to write 511 pages. So 50K words in 30 days is totally possible, even when I'm a little busy. Right now, though, I'm pretty damn busy. This may very well be the busiest I've ever been. Nonetheless, the siren song of ever-put-off writing projects is hard to ignore. I always do better when I have limited time and word-count goals. I don't know. Maybe I'll write something.

I was thinking earlier about writing a personal manifesto instead of a novel for nanowrimo. I know that's not the point of nanowrimo, but I've got my reasons. All I do these days is run from one fire to the next -- we're metaphorical emergency responders here at Chez Fie. When you're accustomed to panic mode, you start to feel like nothing you're doing matters very, very much, unless it's in response to a crisis.

It got me thinking -- what is it that I really, truly care about? What gives me meaning in my life? I teach about this stuff all the time, but do I actually challenge myself to consider the truth? Of course, I have ready-made answers for my students -- the usual: family, work, and overcoming suffering. (That's pretty much Viktor Frankl's prescription for a meaningful life, and I regurgitate it with feeling.) But seriously. Without any holds barred, I'd like to spend some time thinking about exactly what I value, in very specific ways. I spend so much of my time feeling helpless and hopeless, letting that low-grade depression work its way into my marrow. Part of me wants to dig into that sickness and see if there's an exit path. If I really analyzed what it is that I feel, would I come out the other side a happier person? Or would this be a darker path than I really want to travel?

The book, as I'd sketch it, would be a series of essays about things that matter to me, or that I think I should consider more deeply. This is probably a very narcissistic enterprise, now that I think about it, but the goal would be to seek some self-healing and maybe some self-understanding. Those two things are probably worthwhile.

I don't know. I might do it. I might not. I suppose I'll have to decide in a couple of days. Already, November looks like a pretty full calendar. I've got something going on every day this week. Plus, I'm heading to a conference on Thursday night through Saturday. Then, the following week, I've already got several appointments, too. At that point, the month will be a third over, and where will my writing project be?

Hmph. Maybe it would be better to focus on some research instead of this amount of serious naval gazing. o_O

In the theater, in the classroom, in the home

2011-10-28T19:47:00.000-07:00

I went to a club theater show tonight that a bunch of students who went to Stratford with me were performing in. It was a fun show -- good little bit of comedy -- and it was fantastic seeing those students again. We haven't been running into each other a lot on campus, but when I walked out of the theater tonight, three of them yelled, "Fie!!" and wanted to hug me. It was sweet. We shot around some inside jokes from the Stratford festival, and I introduced them to hubby. All around, it was a nice night.

I needed a nice night. Today, I've been feeling like crap, coughing my lungs out and getting a headache from every subsequent cough. The day started out all right. I had to teach Fugard's Master Harold...and the Boys today, and I did some intertextual stuff with Henry IV, Part One, in addition to the biographical/apartheid elements to the play. I think it went well, but I have to say that I often feel a little idiotic when I talk about race in class. I want to be sensitive, and I mean well, but I have noticed that a lot of times people who mean well come off like morons when they talk about race. I hope I don't, but I probably do. Sigh. Oh well. I still felt like class went as well as it usually does -- which is to say quite well -- and we all learned a little bit about intertextuality. Lovely.

This weekend is going to be a-buzz with a bunch of Halloween stuff. Since I'm sick, I'm not really in the mood to be all sugar-highed out. I mainly want to sleep. I think we've got something going on almost every minute of the next three days, though. No rest for the wicked. I also have a couple of books to read, and I'll be teaching some existential philosophy next week -- to 101 students. (Smacking forehead for this brilliant idea, let me tell you...) So I need to get ready for that fiasco. Maybe I'll need something stronger than cold medicine to make it through that.

But hey - October is waning away. I'm seeing a light at the end of the semester. Only about six more weeks, and I'll be able to get a weekend off here and there. (Temporarily.) Huzzah!

Where's the line?

2011-10-27T17:07:00.000-07:00

Let's suppose you are new to a job and you are making friends with everyone and having a fantastic first year. Let's pretend there's a guy whose office is in the same building, but you're not in the same department. He's not a permanent employee, but he's been there for several years. You talk sometimes because you have similar schedules and happen to be around. You ask for his advice about a particularly bad incident that happened, because he's been there longer than you and -- well -- he happened to be around. You were grateful for his insight. You felt like you were becoming friends.

The guy stops by your office to say hi just about every day. After a particularly good conversation, he says, "If we were both single, I'd totally be in love with you." And you laugh because that's absurd. You're not single, and you're not interested in him. Thoroughly not interested. But you like him as a friend, so you laugh.

Days go by, and every day for a couple of weeks you hear a new version of "If we were both single..." Every day. The rest of the conversation is great until it ends with, "If we were both single..." You start to think that maybe you should avoid the guy. Perhaps being friendly with him and not saying, "cut that shit out," is the same as leading him on. But you like him as a friend. When he says these things, you laugh or shake your head or roll your eyes or say, "whatever," dismissively. He says you're sexy. You say, "Psh!"

If there were someone you hated, you'd go to HR immediately and say that this has crossed a line. But this is someone you like as a friend, so you sit on it until the next day. Then it happens again. And again. And again. Then, he calls your cell phone at 10:45 p.m. on a Sunday, "just to talk." This annoys your husband. This is when you start to ask, "uh... what do you do in this situation?"

If this were a true story, I'm not sure what advice I would give to this person. When you're friends with someone, where's the line?

It was cheaper in California

2011-10-24T20:03:00.000-07:00

I was complaining to a colleague (another first-year faculty member) today about the fact that our expenses have not gone down, despite living in a much lower cost of living. We pay too much in rent (1250 a month - 700 dollars less than we paid in CA, but still easily 300 dollars more than if we'd bought a house). We pay 1250 a month in childcare/kindergarten costs. (For the last year, my daycare cost was zero, since I worked at night.) So if you add up just the daycare cost plus our rent, we're paying more money (550 dollars more) for these things than we paid in rent in the bay area. Our other costs haven't gone down substantially because most of our other expenses is debt, which has only increased exponentially from having to move and replace a lot of things. We're drowning, financially -- worse than we ever were in the bay area. My take-home salary simply isn't much more than what I was making in CA. Only about 600 dollar more per month (eaten up by daycare, and the extra debt is completely unmanageable). However, I WILL be getting paid during the summer (and will not have daycare in the summer, very likely), whereas before, I wasn't getting paid at all when I wasn't teaching.

So when I was complaining to my first-year colleague, I said, "At least if I were still living in California, I could explain why I'm so broke. Here, we're supposed to be rich. But we're drowning, and I have no idea what to do about it. I'm never going to make more money. Hubby isn't either -- in fact, if he got a different job, it would be a pay cut, very likely." She suggested that we might talk to someone about our debt and try to get interest rates adjusted. Even if we did that, though, our student loans are coming due. What are we going to do about that? Hubby got a statement today for his first payment. 800 dollars. We're going in the hole every month at this point, and now we have another 800 dollars that we have to pay? My loan payments will be coming due shortly, too. They'll be 700 dollars. 1500 dollar altogether - for 30 years.

Well, there's that whole non-profit law about paying your loans for 10 years and then applying to have the rest cancelled. I'll do that, if I can. (Hubby doesn't work for a non-profit, though.) But it assumes you can afford to pay your loans for 10 years, even at a reduced rate. I have NO money. None. So what am I going to do?

Plus, I'm told that I've got a good salary. One of my friends is tenured and doesn't make as much money as me. But she also has no debt. None. Part of me wonders if bankruptcy isn't in our near future. But crap - we LOOK RICH. Can you declare bankruptcy if you appear, on paper, to make a shit load of money?

I don't know what to do. But I NEVER thought I'd say this -- my life was much, much, much cheaper in California. FML.

Plagiarism, as usual

2011-10-22T13:34:00.000-07:00

I just got my first case of copy-paste this semester. I think I'm just used to it by now. I've only had one semester in my teaching career when I didn't have plagiarism. So awesome. I feel all warm and broken in at Heartland U. Huzzah.

Let's talk

2011-10-20T14:16:00.000-07:00

Heartland U is holding "listening sessions" with its faculty, which means that the faculty is responding to a three-year strategic plan that the admins have put together. The admins are asking us, "What did we miss? What are we not seeing?" Moving forward, they want faculty to buy-in and to have an influence over what's going on at HU. It's a good idea, I think, if - and only if - we are actually being listened to. I'm new enough and (surprisingly) optimistic enough to give the admins the benefit of the doubt. Several of these sessions are being held so that small groups of faculty can talk to the president and provost and every faculty member's voice can be heard. It's nice to think that they care that much.

One of the things that the provost asked today at the brainstorming meeting was, "How do we sell the liberal arts?" I piped up with critical thinking skills being essential to what liberal arts "does." It sucks to have to defend the liberal arts so much these days, but that's just the world we live in now. Check any issue of The Chronicle of Higher Education, and you've got a "defense of liberal arts" article staring you in the face. You'd think it would be self-evident why we need the liberal arts, but it's just not anymore. At least, not when universities are being run like corporations.

Anyway, I felt good about the meeting. I like that our president and provost want to talk to the faculty and, at least, seem to care about our ideas and what we find valuable in the university. I also appreciated the fact that new faculty were asked not to keep quiet, but to bring our ideas to the table as well. One person who remained quiet during the bulk of the meeting was asked to contribute in a don't-be-shy kind of way. It felt like it was a sincere attempt to respect everyone's experience.

Now where the admins will either impress or fail to impress is by what they do with the information they've gathered. I hope that they listen to us. I'm new enough to the school to hold onto that naive hope. We'll see what happens.

In the meantime, I had conferences with my 101 students today and will continue with that next week. So far, they have been excellent conversations and very productive. I have very few students with As in comp, but they all seem to appreciate what we're doing in class and are rising to the challenges I'm presenting them with. Awesome!!

Facebook politics

2011-10-16T07:32:00.000-07:00

This morning, I went through and unfriended several people on Facebook -- I think about thirty or forty. I had well over three hundred friends and culled it down to 308. Mainly, I got rid of people who rarely post, I rarely talk to, don't really remember having a relationship with at all, or people who have ceased to be real friends. I could have gotten rid of a lot more, and I might still, but there's a lot of guilt and anxiety associated with permanently deleting someone from your e-life. It's utterly absurd. But I have been unfriended by people before whom I actually had relationships with -- my mother-in-law, for instance -- and it's ridiculously offensive and painful. For this reason, I hesitated to unfriend anyone at all. But then, I thought, "This is stupid. You don't have real relationships with these people -- or those you do know well, there are some painful bits of baggage there. Just get rid of them." So I did.

I'm waiting for there to be fall out. I don't want fall out. I don't want drama. But there comes a time when you have to examine who your real friends are. And to be honest, I don't have 308 friends. I have about ten. Why hold on to these pseudo friendships when, in real life, they make little-to-zero impact on me?

I thought about deactivating my account entirely. It feels to me like it would be better to live in the life that I actually have instead of living so much of my life online. I might still deactivate. It would force me to deal with my real existence in a way that I haven't for about three years. Part of me thinks that I'd really be missing something -- missing out on the goings on of my real friends. But honestly, if people want to be real friends with me, it would be nice if they'd make a specific effort to meet me, call me, or text me. Just browsing the updates of my life (and vice versa) doesn't seem to count as being a true friend.

I'm bad at keeping in contact with people. It's almost like FB was invented for bad friends like me. It's much easier just to log in instead of making an effort at maintaining friendships. But it's also less honest, less dignified.

I guess I have to ask myself: would I rather have ten really good, real friends or 308 "friends" that wouldn't really notice if I didn't show up? I know the answer to that question. But I'm afraid of offending 308 people by rejecting their virtual existence in my life. I don't need that many enemies. Making enemies is easy. Making friends? Real ones? Much harder.

Anyway. If there's fall out, well, let it happen. I'm sick of my on-screen presence acting like everything is okay and that everyone is my friend. Everyone isn't my friend. Some of those people have hurt me more than I can say. That kind of person - the kind who is self-serving, manipulative, and utterly lacking compassion - doesn't deserve to be my friend. In any capacity.

Perhaps I'm rolling the dice by being honest and true about that fact. But screw it. Losing touch with people is natural. There's a reason it happens. Part of it is so you can move on with your life and not just soak in the pain of failed connections. It's utterly unnatural to pretend that there is still a connection with someone whom you haven't seen for ten years, or who has made it impossible to stay friends because of their behavior, or who boils your blood. Fuck that person. That person needs to fade, permanently. I used to blame FB for making that impossible. I seemed to have forgotten that I was in control. It's as easy as clicking a button.

Spoiler Alert - The Ides of March

2011-10-15T06:10:00.001-07:00

I saw The Ides of March last night. Loved it. While there's no explicit Shakespeare connection, I do think that the characters and the structure are Shakespearean in a way. (Hubris. Lots of hubris.) The movie is mainly from the point of view of Stephen - the media guru of a political campaign. Just as Julius Caesar is less about Caesar than it is about Brutus, this movie's main character is a person who is not in power, but the person who supports the powerful man. In this case, the strength of the movie lies in Stephen's loss of faith and the hardening of the soul that accompanies it.

The trappings of the plot are familiar -- an idealized politician (running for the Democratic nomination in the presidential race) has an affair with an intern, and in order to cover it up, he has to compromise his principles. It's not highly original, but it definitely echos some of our own recent(ish) history. The politician's actions and responses are somewhat unsurprising. It should also be no surprise that Stephen ends up compromising his principles in order to save his own career. But the fall from grace he experiences and participates in, as well as its accompanying loss of faith, spoke to me powerfully. Having had many, many instances in my life where I've lost faith in things, I completely related to his disappointment, the hardening of his heart, and the resolve to carry on, despite the fact that you'd almost rather die.

The movie is focused so much on Stephen that the results of the election are not even revealed. This, to me, is a perfect way to end the movie. The election is beside the point. The point, rather, is that the political machine is corrupt and/or corruptible. Even the people most dedicated to principle are affected, and ultimately, destroyed. Even if you win, you're destroyed as a human being. It's a sobering point to absorb -- that winning means losing yourself. How are you supposed to run a country that way? How can you do anything with integrity?

Maybe integrity is what's on trial in this movie. It's clearly not good enough to seem to have integrity. Yet, that's all that many people can manage. We know, intellectually, what it takes to be good. But sometimes your life is more complicated than you'd like. So what do you do? Can you reform, a la Shakespeare's Henry V? Manufacture a reformation? Even that is totally dubious, totally Machiavellian, totally self-serving. The question this raises to me is this: once you've made a mistake, can you ever be good again? Truly good?

That's part of the Christian project, of course - to have erasure of all sins, a clean slate, and a new beginning. But I'm not sure I buy that - not because I have trouble with the supernatural (though that might be part of it), but because I have trouble reconciling with myself. It's cold comfort to think that a higher being has forgiven me if I can't even forgive myself.

But I digress. I think the movie will probably get an Oscar nod, and I think it deserves it. It's based on a play called Farragut North, by Beau Willimon. I'm interested in reading the play and seeing how different it is from the movie. One note I saw (on Wikipedia!! I suck.) is that the play is supposed to be loosely based on the Howard Dean campaign. Fascinating stuff.

I'm feeling inspired. I lost interest in politics after my dad died, since he was the person I always talked politics with. Maybe I'll start paying attention again. If I can find time.

Midterm evals

2011-10-14T13:10:00.000-07:00

I did more midterm evals today, and they were fantastic. I had an athlete tell me that even though he doesn't like to read much, he's really enjoying the class and that he's glad he took it. Another student said she took AP English, but has learned more in the first quarter of my class than she did in three years of high school English. Three students said this is the best English class they've ever had, and one said that this class is, hands down, her favorite.

It's good to hear these things. It always makes me feel like teaching really is what I'm meant to do. Good thing. I'm too old to change. :)

The daily rise and fall

2011-10-13T17:51:00.001-07:00

I'm taking the night off from working. I think I've earned it. It's been a really long week -- good, but long. I finished up teaching The Hunger Games series on Tuesday, got a slew of papers over the last couple of days, and had to start teaching The Hobbit today. I was nervous about starting that. It's not my strong suit -- not at all like The Hunger Games. But it went really well.

I also had the YA students do evals today, and they were rather glowing. So I felt great during and after class. The trouble is, I have a hard time holding on to happiness. I have these moments of triumph followed by an accompanying let down. It's like when you're in a play. After that last performance, there's a significant let down and post-show blues. But I feel like that after almost every class. I asked my therapist if that was normal. She said, "No." Unequivocally.

I don't think that I'm bi-polar. But I do think that I have this low-grade depression that sticks with me no matter what's going on. It sucks. I wish I could hold on to happiness. When things are good, they're good. It's just that nothing feels very good or very bad for very long. I had hoped that getting a job would resolve that. But since I've pretty much always been like this, I don't really know why I thought things would be different. Who knows? I'm working on it in therapy, though, and I'm back to going twice a week. It helps. Still, I find myself crying more than I have in a long time. I think I've just been pent up for a good, long while. I'm slowly emerging and letting things out. It's definitely no fun. And I'm stressed out with work. I love my job, but I'm also finding that time is short. There aren't enough hours in the year, let alone the day.

This weekend is fall break (weekend, plus Monday and Tuesday). I'm going to be working hard the whole time - so much grading to do. But tonight, I'm taking a night off to relax a little and play some guitar. I'm ready for class tomorrow, so I figure this will be my last little respite for, maybe, the rest of the semester. Might as well try to enjoy it.

Making friends, one crisis at a time

2011-10-06T17:30:00.001-07:00

I had an uncomfortable situation in my 101 class on Tuesday. To be vague, during the in-class discussion, one of the students became blatantly disrespectful, tense, and seemingly threatening. This student was already failing my class due to poor attendance and not turning in anything, so I emailed him after class and asked him to drop it because of his grade. I never heard back from him, but I notified all the proper authorities about his erratic behavior and his grade.

Today, there was a police officer stationed outside my classroom, along with the dean of students. Fortunately, nothing bad happened, but he was escorted away from the class before he could even open the door. The whole thing was very unsettling to me, but in the interest of safety and an excess of caution, I think that I did the right thing about notifying the administration.

Since I'm new, I asked one of my colleagues who has been around for a great deal longer about handling tense situations. So I spent a lot of time with this colleague today, talking over how to handle a myriad of different obstacles. Once the crisis part was settled, we were able to talk about regular ol' academic stuff. It was fun. I feel like I'm making good friends at Heartland U, and it is a comfort to feel, once again, that support that I've never felt before. It would have been nice never to have had to deal with this unsettling situation, but having gotten through it (hopefully this IS over), I feel like I've got a new ally in the department. Nice.

I also had lunch with our medievalist on Tuesday, and now that I'm getting to know her, I think that we can be friends. Initially, I thought she kind of hated me, but now I know that she's just a kind of dry personality. I generally like that in people, but sometimes it comes off a little cold.

Anyway. Things are going well, and with the exception of a few students who seem not to care if they flunk out (or, you know, get escorted away from class...), I feel like I've got a pretty decent group this semester. And hey! No plagiarism yet. Yet!!

It's so different

2011-10-03T18:54:00.001-07:00

It's so different being an actual faculty member. I'm going to a conference next month, and I requested travel funds for it today. The admin person for our college gave me all the info for the request and showed me how to fill out the forms and where to request a university credit card. I had to estimate my costs -- airfare, food, hotel, cab fare, and registration. All told, it was about 800 dollars. I sort of gasped at the price tag. The admin, on the other hand, said, "Yeah, that's about right." I knew I'd spent that much last year going to a conference in Chicago, but I didn't really think that the school would foot the bill for all of that. I was wrong. They will. Willingly.

It's so different feeling supported by my department. That 800 dollars they're spending on me feels like extra salary to me. It's money I'd have spent myself going to this conference if I were an adjunct. Instead, it's like I'm getting a week's worth of pay to go do something that I consider to be fun and educational for two days. It's one of the best feelings -- like a big "We believe in you, Fie!" being shouted from the rooftops. Damn near inspirational!

It's so different having friends who are interested in teaching and learning (in real life) who aren't in competition with you for a job and who don't resent your successes. I'm making good friends with my colleagues - most of them, anyway - and it's fantastic. We talk about teaching and give each other advice. It's fun. I was working at my office today, which is finally all put together and ship shape, and my department chair stopped by. He said, "Wow. This place looks so great. You really did a wonderful job putting it together." We talked about how I rearranged the furniture and put up a bunch of Shakespeare art. He thinks it looks great. Me, too! But it was cool that he was walking by and felt compelled to stop in and marvel over the difference I've made at the office -- like, he was doing a double-take. Awesome!

It's so different having students come by my office or talk to me after class and treat me like I'm a "real" faculty member. The respect factor has shot up without me doing anything different. It's both cool and sort of a shame. I feel bad for my previous 5-years-of-adjuncting self, as well as people who are still in that ever-sinking boat. It's just so, so different.

When I'm having a tough day, I should look back at this post and remember how good it felt to be different. When other things in my life are weighing me down, I need to remember just how lucky my academic life is turning out to be. Now? I need to figure out a way to get to London for something - a conference? Maybe. Performance research would be awesome, too. :)

What's up

2011-10-02T17:43:00.001-07:00

This week is going to be a little weird -- calm-before-the-storm weird. I have some papers to grade, but not many. I'm planning to work on them in the next couple of days. It just so happens that I have no reading for tomorrow, and then one of my classes on Tuesday has to be canceled due to some university function (attendance optional). So the work load for the next couple of days feels strangely light. (Yeah, that's why I'll be grading!)

After this week, I'm going to get a ton of papers in, and I'll be buried for a while. But that's all right. I'm happier when I'm working -- even grading.

Today, we briefly went to a Renaissance faire. We just went for a couple of hours, so the kiddos wouldn't get overwhelmed. Saw part of a Romeo and Juliet parody, ate some food, and walked around. We saw a joust. Eldest snaked through the crowd to get to the front. He wanted to sit on the ground and watch the knights fight. So I sat with him, and we watched the joust together. It was pretty awesome seeing him take an interest in the whole thing.

Other than that, there's not much going on. The spring schedule of classes just came out, and a few people from the Stratford trip said they really want to take my drama course. I hope they do; it's going to be a fun class.

And finally... I haven't been sleeping well as of late. (I don't need suggestions for a cure. Insomnia runs in the family, and I'm sort of resigned to my fate.) The worst part about it is that not sleeping well tends to ruin my day the next day. So, for instance, today - when we went to the Ren faire, I think I would have had more fun and would have been willing to stay longer if I had slept more than about 3 hours last night. Instead, I spent the day trying hard not to be a bitch, which doesn't really translate into lots of fun. Plus, when I don't sleep, I tend to be depressed over nothing. Or even the smallest things depress me. So I'm going to try to get to sleep by 10 tonight and hope that I don't wake up at 2 a.m. like usual.

Dear October

2011-10-02T10:57:00.000-07:00

You are the sweetest month to me.
You, who conjure wind-whipped leaves,
Soaring through covered bridges.
October, you hold in your hands dear memories -
Caramel apples, harvest festivals, pumpkins aplenty.
You promise to be the last lovely month.
You frolic before death settles in.

October, be my love.

Copping out, bullet-style

2011-09-28T17:10:00.000-07:00

There's really too much to update here in the fiefdom, so here are some disorganized, poorly written bullet points:

* Isn't it supposed to be less expensive here? We're really having a hard time, financially. I thought that moving would solve that issue instead of making it worse. Wrong. So wrong. Sure, our rent is about 700 dollars less a month, but we're also paying for two kids in daycare now, which we weren't doing before. So really, we're spending more money here than we did in California. And my salary is only somewhat better. Since I'm enrolled in just about every benefit under the sun, I don't know if we'll even be breaking even with what we used to spend in California. Hmph. This is very depressing.

* Speaking of depressing, should I quit therapy?? I've been going to therapy as much as possible, trying to deal with my many bullshit issues. It's been helpful - very - but it's also costing us an arm and a leg. Should I just quit therapy and resume smoking? It would be cheaper to smoke. Or maybe be an alcoholic. (It worked for my parents!) But I'd feel worse, physically. My sister told me today that I need to find a healthy outlet, like exercising, to help me feel better. I know she's right. But I wonder when there would be time.

* School is awesome, except when it isn't. I have a few students who, inexplicably, just refuse to turn in papers. WTF? I ask them about the papers and why they haven't turned them in. I have been getting a shrug-and-grin combination in response. They know I'm going to fail them, right? I've told them that. Oh well. I don't take it personally. It's just surprising.

Also under this bullet - I'm a little confused about my job. I'm wondering what my official role really should be (or is). The person I'm replacing still has fingers in many a pie around here and takes offense at many things I suggest doing. I was told today that this person only uses a computer for email and that this person uses a typewriter for syllabi. Right on. But I'm a shade more modern than that. Some of the things I want to do are, I'm told, great ideas (very modern!), but when I suggest them to my predecessor, there are problems. I feel like I need to lie low until this person is gone, officially, but since this person is an emeritus, that might be a til-death-do-us-part situation. It certainly made some aspects of the Stratford trip uncomfortable.

I talked to my mom about it, and she said, "well, it's clear that this person is mourning losing the job." Yes. I know. And I sympathize. But how am I supposed to do my job with all this hovering? This person is in my office (used to be the person's office) for a few hours a week, talking my ear off. At first, it was cool. Now? Tough. I actually do try to get as much work done at the office as possible, so I can spend some time with my family when I get home. But when I have a visitor who doesn't respect my time, it's really hard to get anything done. Meh... I feel like I should just shut the door half the day. But I've been told that my school has an open-door policy, so shutting myself up to work might be considered against "the heartland way." But how else am I to avoid hours of chats with a 75+-year-old emeritus?

* Thankfully, my husband understands me. When I told him today that part of my problem in life is that we never do anything fun, he totally agreed. We're in crisis-management mode about 99% of the time. We don't have fun. At all. We don't have much to look forward to. We took on thousands upon thousands of dollars of more debt to move here, and because of that, we can barely breathe.

* Then, there's eldest, whose troubles in school are too vast to enumerate. He's not having any fun either. We're trying to figure out some way for him, and us, to cope. I think eldest needs to be medicated, unfortunately. The school is having little success with him, and we're at our wits ends, too. (Everyone in the school that has anything to do with eldest is begging us to look into medication. Sigh.) His attention span is getting worse. It's harder to have a conversation that doesn't end in tears. It sucks. And everything with him seems like a disaster. I wish we had money to send him to a private school, but as you can guess, that's not even close to possible right now. Sometimes I just want to scream "fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!!!" into a pillow until I pass out. I feel like a failure as a parent, even though, intellectually, I know that I can't control the fact that my son has ADHD. Thankfully, baby is doing great and is still a very easy kid. But with all of us wound as tight as violin strings, I'm sure he's not having a ton of fun either.

* Now back to work. Since I had therapy today, I had a big interruption in the middle of my day. So now, I need to get some reading done for tomorrow's classes. I managed to grade several papers today, but I forgot how much reading I had to do. I'm sort of screwed. Fortunately, the kids are in bed, hubby is out with my cousin, and all's quiet. I'll sit down with Mockingjay in just a couple of minutes. At least the reading I'm doing is fun. Sheesh.

Interesting!

2011-09-23T18:18:00.000-07:00

I'm in Canada, eh, and thought I'd check in on ye old blog. So far, we've seen The Misanthrope and Twelfth Night. Both productions had a lot to love about them. Of course, the acting at Stratford is top notch and the costumes and sets are brilliant. I was inspired by many of the directorial choices in both plays. One thing I found the most compelling was that the man who played Alceste in The Misanthrope also played Feste in Twelfth Night. (He totally stole Twelfth Night, by the by.) I'd love to sit down with that actor and see what he thought about the parallels between the two characters -- if he thought anything about them at all. While I was watching Twelfth Night, that pairing of Alceste and Feste was in the forefront of my mind, and I was thinking about how the two characters could have a lot of intertextual play between them.

We've been getting together as a group to discuss the plays, and the main thing that I keep hearing over and over again was, "That was interesting." Oh those costumes? Interesting choice. The lighting? Cool, eh? Yeah, that was interesting. Interesting! INTERESTING.

If "Interesting!" is all you got out of the play, you might as well have never watched it. (Or read it, for that matter.)

I expect that sort of vapid response from students upon first reflection on something like the spectacle of a play. If you aren't an experienced theatergoer -- or an experienced critic -- that's sort of what you say when you're left with a feeling of inspiration that begs to be articulated, but you don't have the vocabulary to do it. What I find puzzling is the lack of articulacy among the veterans of this trip. I hear a lot of "interesting" from them, too. And then, if someone -- not saying who -- (all right, it was me) says that she is unconvinced by the love pairings at the end of Twelfth Night, she's accused of being... uh... vapid. Sigh.

I'm going to go ahead and say that I don't think my perspective is vapid at all. I think I'm challenging the conclusion of the play, which, to me, seems very much like everyone ends up with a consolation prize. Maybe that's what "real" relationships are all about -- having to take what you can get sometimes because idealization of a partner is not only a bad idea; it can be dangerous. So you take the good with the bad, and you compromise a lot. But, to me, the end of Twelfth Night is not some kind of unequivocal happy ending that inspires you to go out into the world to find that one true love. Meh. Instead, it's like, "you get what you get and you don't get upset."

The latter sentiment is what I can say about this trip, too. It's a gift to me to be here -- I'm only paying for meals and souvenirs -- but it's also a bit of a putting me in my place. I'm the new person on the trip, of course, and it feels very much like I'm the new person on the trip. Like there's some joke that I'm being left out of in the faculty camp, and because I'm not "in," I'm somehow "less than." The students and I are getting along swimmingly. I suppose that's what matters. The rest? Well, let's just say it's interesting. (Because that says nothing - and maybe everything - in a word.)

Sigh. Two more days.

I miss my family, too, and it sounds like they miss me.

I'm pretty much ready to be home and in the classroom again -- where I feel like I'm not being undermined constantly. This sort of trip shouldn't feel like a massive game of king of the hill, but it does.

Caught up - just in time

2011-09-19T17:45:00.000-07:00

I spent a goodly amount of hours working this weekend, and in two days, I accomplished about as much as I normally do in a week. I read three books, graded the rest of my comp essays, volunteered at the box office for the school play, and, uh, well, I think that's enough. Today, I also managed to get my professional development plan revised and turned in, had a meeting with my chair, did some curriculum research, and then basked in the warm glow of being *gasp* caught up. It won't last, of course. Wednesday, I get in a new set of papers from my intro class, so I only have a short grading reprieve. But then Thursday through Sunday, I go to Canada to the Stratford Festival. I have a feeling those papers will remain untouched until I return. (Against my better judgment. Nothing worse than coming home to a stack of work after a nice getaway.)

Anyway - it feels good to have gotten caught up before my trip. I'm looking forward to a couple of days of nonstop theater. Should be fun.

Also, just in time for my trip, I received my new iPhone case in the mail. It's a Shakespeare case. Can you believe it? I get a million nerd points for that, I'm sure. It's so cool; I just love it. Plus, I also bought a "Shakespeare's Women" clock to hang in my office. I'll have to take it over there tomorrow, for sure.

Ah, internet shopping!

The moral of this particular story is that I might have radio silence in the fiefdom until I return from Canada. (Or, hell, I might just write every day since I'm caught up. Who knows?) But if I'm absent, talk amongst yourselves and have a good time. As Arnold says, I'll be back. Now here's your moment of zen:

Anecdotal evidence - Pedagogy on trial

2011-09-17T15:40:00.000-07:00

I mentioned the other day that we had a roundtable discussion about an essay in our department. One of my colleagues mentioned the now-standard theory that marking every comma and every other error in an essay is bad pedagogy and that students see a sea of markings and shut down. They don't learn anything from that, she said.

I was thinking about that today as I was writing up a sea of markings on my 101 papers. I use a rubric, too, and I also write a goodly sized paragraph - sometimes a whole page - at the end of the paper. I spend a lot of time editing the papers, marking every error I see. I spend a lot of time on comments. I also spend some time on the rubric. In sum, I probably spend 20-30 minutes - sometimes more - on each paper.

These are 2-3 page papers.

As we move on in the semester, the students will be writing longer papers. At Impossible Comp program, where I taught for three years, I'd frequently spend up to 40 minutes on grading each of those papers. They had to be about 8-12 pages, so 40 minutes was making good time, compared to the 2-3 page papers I'm reading now.

I thought today that I should take a poll about this pedagogical phenomenon that is supposedly fact. I have 28 former students as Facebook friends. So I wrote a note to them and explained a bit about the theory and then cited my own practice. I asked them to tell me honestly if they were upset by my grammar/mechanics markings and how they felt about my comments and markings in general. Here are some of their responses:

Student A: "As far as I'm concerned, the feedback is the most important part of a paper. If one doesn't need to know how he/she performed, then he/she should not be in school. Is 12,000.00 + 10 the same as 12.000.00 + 10? Are the math teachers also asked not to correct every comma because the grade may discourage the student?"

Student B: "You should mark away. It does two things: makes people aware of their mistakes. Also, it makes them try harder not to repeat the mistakes."

Student C: "I loved reading your feedback on my papers--and not just the fabulous praise ;)! [...] How can you give feedback on correct punctuation without marking on the page? [...] If the assignment is analysis or supporting an argument, the instructor should explain why it's not working. This is what pissed me off about one instructor who gave me less than perfect grades (A-) without telling me what I could do to improve. I mean, no markings at all! She would only tell me, after the fact, face to face, what she didn't like."

Student D: "I think the answer depends on the student. If the student is a novice then I sort of agree with the teaching advice you are getting. If the student is a veteran, you should correct the paper, so they can see their mistakes.[...] To answer your question how did the grammar corrections make me feel: I appreciated that you cared, took the time to correct my grammar, and I learned from it."

Student D was the only person who made a distinction between beginning and more advanced students. My question is - how are beginning students going to advance if they don't know what they are doing wrong or how to fix it?

There were a few more responses, but you get the gist. I tagged all of the students I'm friends with on FB, so I'm hoping that I get some more responses. For now, I feel like I'm not wasting my time. And to be frank, I think that students need an honest assessment of their work. I'm not going to skip over errors to save someone's feelings. Or to save myself the labor, which may be what this is really about. If a student is overwhelmed by the amount of corrections on a page, it should tell them something -- their writing needs A LOT of work. A LOT. Thing is? Most people's writing needs a lot of work. A LOT. Even veteran writers. Even me. And I would hate a teacher who said, "You need to work on comma splices," but then only marked the first page of a 10-page paper. Sure, the idea is to get students to find these things on their own, but if, as one of my students wrote today, they've never heard of a comma splice before my class, then how are they going to find the rest of their errors?

Thing is - there are system-wide complaints all the time that writing programs aren't doing what they should be: teaching people how to write. If my colleagues here and at other universities are having no significant success in the writing class, then why should I adopt their theory? And another thing? I actually do see a lot of improvement over the course of a semester. I see improvement in commas, organization, and grammar. I see improvement in content, too. So what the hell? Who's right?

I suppose it could be one of those things where no one person has the absolute right answer. But I can tell you one thing: the non-traditional students I've had have ALL been better writers than my 18-year-old students. All of them. And people who are my age or older? They had their papers marked up from here to hell and back. And they're better writers. Is it a coincidence? Bloody hell. I don't think so.

I'm going to continue to hold my students accountable for their grammar and mechanics. If they don't learn anything from it, that's sad. But I'm not going to coddle an already entitled generation of students who think they should get a trophy for showing up. There are no trophies in English 101.

Edit: I wanted to add another comment from one of the most hard working students I've ever had: "A paper returned without any remarks or editing is useless to me. Yeah sure it feels good to get a couple of those and full points at the end, but it also shows me that some professors really don't spend the time to read what their students are writing. I always thought I could produce a well written paper, but with your guidance, feedback, and suggestions I've written some pretty excellent portfolio essays. The one paper you marked down like there was no tomorrow and ripped apart was my Arts Appreciation paper and I was butt hurt at first with the grade I received. But after making the changes you suggested and adding the content it was lacking, it was the first essay to get full credit - and this one was what I needed the most. I'll be honest that I went straight to the end first to see the grade, and then went back to read your comments. :)"

If students think we aren't even reading their papers, are we doing them any favors? Hell NO!

What I do well

2011-09-14T14:36:00.000-07:00

Today, one of my many responsibilities was to attend a roundtable discussion in our upper-level, something-or-other class. (See how I just anonymized there? I'm totally learning how to be cloak and dagger. Mah.) The point was to discuss a critical essay, show how it could be improved through revision and then field questions from the students about their own writing anxieties. There were, all together, four faculty members and a mid-sized class of students. I only had one hour to look at the essay in question before class, but I ripped it apart, knowing that the goal was to improve it and to show students how they should be thinking about revision.

I'm pretty sure that I had the most to say about the essay, although I was the second person to talk about it among the faculty. I had about five points that I outlined in my notes about critical problems in the essay. Now, to be fair, the essay was written for a sophomore-level class and was supposed to be revised for a senior-level portfolio. So I knew there would be some sophomore-style problems. But it occurs to me that the problems that students have in the undergrad years -- across the board -- are all about the same, no matter what year they're in: 1. lacking a clear thesis, 2. lacking concrete examples, 3. assuming the audience is on the same page with terminology (or making other naive assumptions), 4. inserting irrelevant information to make a paper longer. There were one or two more points that I had on my list, but I don't have it right in front of me.

The paper we were critiquing was about a book that is so rhetorically effective that pretty much everyone who has ever read it is moved to tears, and it's tough not to be persuaded by the message of the book. But I challenged the students to question it anyway. I said, "Just because you are moved by a book doesn't mean you should stop thinking about it critically. You need to question its rhetoric just as deeply as something you disagree with. Blind belief in a book's message is dangerous, even if the message is beneficial. So instead of filling out your paper with fluff, how about thinking about counterarguments to the message of the book? Maybe do more research and read more widely in the field so you know what other people are saying about this work." The discussion with the other faculty people was interspersed in there, too. I thought the discussion was great (and the paper was not very good. I probably would have given it a C+ out of charity.).

The whole experience made me feel really great. It felt so productive. I had some good advice for the students, and most of them were madly writing notes as we discussed the paper. It was fun -- and kind of no pressure since they weren't my students.

I ended up at Starbucks later in the afternoon, and it just so happened that one of the students in that class came in at the same time. We said hi, and I asked, "We didn't terrify you in that roundtable discussion did we?" She said, "Oh no! It was so great. I don't know why teachers don't talk about writing like that all the time."

*blink*

I smiled and shrugged, but what went through my head was: "We do. But students aren't always ready to listen."

Still, the experience was good, and I hope the students got a lot out of it. It occurred to me today that even though writing is not my expertise, technically, I do have a lot of good things to say about it. It's taken years to get to the point where I feel like I teach writing pretty well. And today, I was actually sort of impressed with myself with the things I noticed and pulled out of the paper. There's something to be said for having a lot of teaching experience.

As the flood gates of the job market open for another year, experience is on my mind. If I had gotten a job right out of grad school, I would not have been able to say all these meaningful things today. At least - not with as much confidence. I suppose the struggle to get a job was a good thing in the end. It helped shape me into a better teacher and a person with more awareness and confidence. I have very little "imposter syndrome" complex right now, but I expected to have a lot of it. Instead, I feel like a faculty member. What a great freaking feeling.

Hello, JIL

2011-09-13T21:07:00.000-07:00

I saw at Sisyphus's place that the JIL opened up Tuesday. I thought, "Hell, I'm not even going to look. I love my job, and why on earth would I bother?" But then, you know... curiosity and all.

Slim pickings, for sure. A search for Shakespeare reveals only 7 jobs. Expanding to the British Isles opens it up a lot - 90+ jobs. But I didn't want to take the time to scroll through them all. I did take a look, again, out of curiosity, at what's available on the west coast. UC Santa Cruz has a Shakespeare job open. I'm completely unqualified, but for one little heartbeat, I was tempted to apply. Just for kicks and because part of me really misses California -- irrationally. But who would want to be a slave to economic disasters in California? The position is, of course, pending budget approval. Nah. Temptation gone.

I feel so much relief at not having to be on the market this year, but I'm interested in watching it from this side of the fence. It's practically masochistic, I guess. I suppose I won't have "real" perspective on this until my department makes a new hire. But since I was the first new hire in many years, I might already be tenured before that happens.

The smell of rejection in the morning

2011-09-13T04:53:00.001-07:00

Just in case this blog has been a little too much sunshine and rainbows for people lately, I finally have some bad news to report. I know -- you've been waiting for it. After all, I am a train wreck, mostly.

Preamble aside, I checked email this morning to find a rejection notification for the conference that I applied to a couple of weeks ago. It was a standard form letter saying that they had an overwhelming response and that they couldn't place all the papers submitted. I hate to say it, but this is the first time I've ever been rejected for a conference before. It's also a time in my life where rejections are hard to swallow. After all, I'm in my first year on the TT. I feel a little more pressure to actually do something. The conference was at a big deal school, though, so maybe I shouldn't have felt so confident about my proposal being accepted.

The rejection doesn't sting, actually. Nor does it hurt my ego. I'm a writer, after all. I eat rejection for breakfast. The problem is that I need to have something on my plate for this year to show that I'm not just sitting on my laurels. Yes, I will be participating in the SAA conference -- so it seems. I don't know -- do they hand out rejections, too? Or is it a come-one-come-all conference? I'm going to attend MMLA, likely, because it's a drivable distance away. But I feel like I should be presenting something in the fall, too. Not just attending. I did a quicky search to see if there were any other conferences I could throw an abstract at for the fall, and there's one with a submission date of 9/15 -- two days from now. The conference is the same weekend as MMLA, though, which I really wanted to go to for the variety of panels. (My position feels pretty generalist in some ways, so it's nice to have the option of seeing more than just Shakespeare panels.) But if given the choice between a conference I can attend and a conference I can present at, I know which one I should choose. So I guess I'll submit an abstract and let fate decide.

Of course, I could always just work on a journal article. I saw a few CFPs for articles that I thought would be interesting and close enough to my research interests. I'm just disappointed because I love going to conferences. And hell - I thought that would be "easier" to do a conference paper -- more guaranteed acceptance -- than trying to submit an article. Turns out I was wrong! Lesson learned.

Other than that -- life continues at a hectic pace. I've discovered that as long as I have no grading to do, I'm keeping up just fine. It's when the papers come in that I'm suddenly giving an underwhelming performance. Not in class. In class, I'm at my absolute best. But I don't have enough time to read everything for my three preps AND grade. My comp papers came in a week ago today, and I've read exactly five of them (out of 22). But, hallelujah, two students decided not to turn in papers. (Why don't they just make a bonfire with their tuition money instead??) So really, I have 15 left. Still. 15 seems like a lot when I'm teaching the end of The Hunger Games, the beginning 130 pages of Catching Fire, Acts 1-3 of Henry IV, Part One, and Man's Search for Meaning all in the same week. Tsk, tsk, tsk. Welcome to academia, Fie. AS IF I have time for new research at this point. Hmph. Better dust off that dissertation, eh?

I suppose if I didn't waste time on Facebook, reading blogs, or talking to colleagues then maybe I could squeeze in one more thing. Sigh. I think it might be time to go "all in" and let the unnecessary things in life slide.

Speaking of... I should get to the office.

To do and details

2011-09-08T21:13:00.000-07:00

I did a comma exercise with my first years today, and I was all ready to jump their butts for improper punctuation. But actually, they were really great at it. I was surprised to see that most of them were using commas properly with conjunctions and intro phrases. (Gotta start out small. I'm just waiting for the comma splices to start popping up like dandelions.) It made me feel a tiny bit of hope. But hey - it's early in the semester, and I haven't really started grading their first set of papers. So yeah. I'm sure these people aren't complete anomalies. Nonetheless, I was impressed.

Also, I got some news today from my chair that there was a glitch in scheduling for the spring and one of my lit classes is actually supposed to be offered next spring. Right on. What that means is I have three intro classes -- still no comp -- and a lit class (this is a special topics class that I proposed in April). This is perfectly fine with me. Of the three classes I'm teaching now, my intro class is actually going the best, and I like its set-up the best. So that's cool. I don't know - it may get boring teaching three of the same classes in a semester. But having only two preps will be pretty nice. Overall, I don't think I could have asked for a better schedule in my first year. Plus, having a repeat class in the spring will make syllabus prep a lot easier, and I can focus on my special topics course over Xmas break. Good times.

I got some details taken care of today -- filling out insurance forms, paying bills, grading quizzes, signing up for SAA seminars (what IS the deal with this? I've never been to SAA and I'm confused. I think I just committed to writing a paper about potentially four different topics??), and completely online sexual harassment training. (Is it just me or does "sexual harassment training" sound like the goal at the end is to make you a sexual predator? No? Just me? Okay then.) Then, I did some reading for class. I'm exhausted (it's 12:30 Friday morning/Thursday evening), and I'm wondering how much work I'm going to need to do this weekend. Hm - probably some grading. Must keep on top of that...

Friday afternoon, we have another meeting at Eldest's school to discuss the next step in assessing him. Sigh. I'm really disheartened by what he's bringing home from school. There are notes consistently saying that he's not attending to tasks and that he's not completing work. Frankly, I think he's bored - in addition to the ADD. His preschool last year had him writing letters every single day -- his name, the alphabet, and so on; as well as writing numbers. They were sounding out words. In this class? They aren't even letting the kids write their names on the tops of their papers, which eldest definitely could do. Hmph. It's a giant step backward for him, and it makes me sad. So I feel like I'm going to go in there with guns blazing tomorrow. I just hope that I can be calm and rhetorically effective instead of letting mama bear instincts take over. ("Are you frothing at the mouth, or are you just happy to see me?")

Anyway. There's much to do. First thing's first. I need to get a couple of hours of sleep.

In it to win it

2011-09-06T17:17:00.000-07:00

I am so tired today. Sunday night, I had a hard time sleeping, so I was up from 2:30-4:30 a.m. Then, last night, I was up until 1:00 a.m. working on a syllabus to present to my colleagues today in our department meeting. Today, I was dragging, but I managed to get through my classes well enough. When I'm tired, I tend to lecture more than do discussion because I don't have the energy to constantly ask questions. Nonetheless, the lectures were fairly peppy and my enthusiasm for my texts shone through. All good. But tonight, it's 8:20, and I really want to go to bed. I'm afraid, though, that if I go to bed now that I'll be up at 2:30 again. And honestly, I gotta get out of this sleeping pattern. So I'm forcing myself to stay up for a little bit -- maybe until 9ish or 10ish. But boy, it's going to be a struggle.

So anyway. Today, I presented a syllabus for a new class I've developed at my department meeting, and it was very well received. I had done all the usual stuff -- made a reading list, tentative schedule, and so on -- but I also wrote up an argument for why we need the class beyond the course description and learning outcomes. Seemed like my presentation went very well. Everyone was complimentary and excited about the class. Awesome. I have never in my life felt so supported by peers. Seems like in grad school there's such weird competition going on. But at this job, everyone really wants me to succeed and do good things. That includes curriculum development, conferencing/research, and service. It's fantastic. I keep feeling like I'm going to wake up from this dream and be disappointed. But so far, pinching myself only supports the claim that all of this is real. Wow. Just wow. Everyone is on everyone's side. It feels so great.

I also got my spring teaching schedule today. It is going to be very busy. I'll be teaching three classes right in a row MWF (8, 9, 10) and then will have one class TH. I actually chose to do it that way. I was able to schedule two of the classes myself (the TH class and I chose an 8:00 a.m. MWF class. At some point, I will wonder what I was thinking, I'm sure.). Two of the classes are intro courses, which I'm teaching now. I'll repeat this syllabus, since I love that class. It's the best of all three I'm teaching right now. The other two classes for spring are related to my broader field, which is problematic only in that the classes will compete for students, and might have enrollment problems as a result. So if one gets canceled for under-enrollment, then I'll be picking up a third intro class. Still, I think, subject-wise, either way I win. I could teach two awesome upper-level lit classes and two intro to lit classes and be very happy, or I could teach three intro to lit and one upper-level lit and only have two preps. I think it's a total win/win. And not having comp for a semester? Win/win/win.

Still, it's going to be busy, busy, busy, and probably exhausting teaching three classes right in a row. But I'd rather teach in the morning than the afternoon, and I'd rather not have huge breaks in the day. So I figured I should schedule the two that I had influence over for early in the day. And heck - it's just one semester. How hard could it be?

(Who wants to bet I eat those words?)

Today's last happy thought is that I'm less than 24 hours away from my first adult paycheck ever. Seriously - I can't believe I get paid to be this giddy. I hope it never wears off.

This productive life

2011-09-05T21:45:00.000-07:00

Labor Day weekend was full of chee and !!!. I went to Chicago with my family to see a friend I hadn't seen for... oh... 12 years. We had a great time, though it was a quick, 24-hour trip. I also got some bookshelves finally. (The department and I gave up on waiting for facilities, so I bought some and put them together myself this weekend. I'm being reimbursed.) So my office is completely awesome now. Then, I had my cousin and his girlfriend, my mom, sister and her family over for dinner tonight. It was fantastic -- taco night. Yum. Then, I finished working on a preliminary syllabus for a course I'm proposing at the department meeting Tuesday (at the request of my chair). I got a lot done and had a good time. That almost doesn't compute with me. :)

I continue to feel pretty awesome. I had a little hiccup on Sunday, getting into a spat with hubby. But it was resolved in almost no time. So that's cool. I have a lot of work to do, with my first stack of grading having come in on Friday. (I only got to read through three sets of journals, but that's okay. They go fast.) I also get 101 papers tomorrow - first set there. Yeah. I'm going to be busy. But busy = happiness in the fiefdom.

Busy also equals light blogging. Apologies, friends.

Anyway. One important note was that I decided to rearrange my schedule a little bit in my literature class, so tomorrow I'm starting to teach The Hunger Games again. Exciting and fun! I'll be teaching the whole series right in a row, so I anticipate fantastic classes for the next few weeks there. Playing to my strengths, as I am learning to do.

All right. It's bedtime - 1:00 a.m. Tuesday. I have to be at the office in 7 hours, so I'd better get off the computer. Is it weird that I'm, like, too excited to sleep? I love my job.

Playing to strengths

2011-09-01T13:16:00.000-07:00

I like to run my classes with lots of discussion and student participation. To that end, I always have a somewhat substantial grade for participation in my classes, whether they're lit or writing. So far at Heartland U (my new pseudonym for my school), I have been having to drag responses out of my students. I'm not sure if it's because a majority of my students are first years and are unsure of what's expected at college or if it's because a lot of students are just used to being lectured to. But I'm trying all sorts of things. Group work was the first. Today, I had the lit kids write for 15 minutes at the beginning of class so they'd have something to contribute. The latter worked better than the former. Some people respond well to group work and some don't. Seems like these kids are better off if they have something in front of them to read off of. Fine. I can deal with that as long as they participate.

I also decided that I was going to rearrange my schedule in my lit class. It seemed like everyone, yours truly included, was struggling with Alice in Wonderland. It wasn't because I didn't like it. I did. It was because I am less familiar with it than I'd like to be, and that made for some insecurity on my part. Added to the fact that students simply weren't responding to my attempts at discussion, I felt like we were going to have some significant problems. Up next was The Hobbit -- another book I've never taught, and frankly, have never read until now. In talking to a colleague today, I decided that it would be better for all of us if I rearranged the schedule in order to teach The Hunger Games series before The Hobbit. I don't like doing that. It mucks up the schedule in a lot of ways and makes life more difficult, but I also feel like I need to play to my strengths if all of us are going to get more engaged in the class. And really, who can resist those books? In fact, one of my students told me after class that she started reading The Hunger Games (book 1) and couldn't put it down -- finished it in a day and a half. Now that's the kind of passion I like to hear about. I'm hoping the rest of the class will follow suit.

So I'm trying to be flexible. It only makes sense to me to do things that will make me (and the students) less crazy.

Tomorrow, I get my first mini-portfolios in from my Intro students, and I'm curious to see what they've come up with. I'll have a bunch of grading coming in over the next couple of days. 101 papers come on Tuesday. I'll have plenty to do. I also have to create a sample syllabus for a new Renaissance class I'm proposing and get it to my chair by Monday, so we can discuss it in our department meeting on Tuesday. I'm particularly excited about this class, so it's a pleasure to dig in. Gosh - it just feels so good to be able to create something for the department and have my opinion respected -- have it count, officially. It's such a change from being an adjunct. I can't really say how happy it makes me.

I asked hubby yesterday if he could tell that I was happier now since school started. His eyes got wide and his voice dropped an octave. "YES," he said. It's true. I've never been more professionally happy in my whole life. Sure, there's stress right now, but man. What a good problem to have. And I'm only six days away from my first big-girl paycheck. I can't wait.

All this feels fantastic. Perhaps the bloggosphere will tire of my shit-eating grin; it feels permanently attached right now. Huzzah!

Stop-and-go blogging and my plan for the year

2011-08-28T20:43:00.000-07:00

I feel like blogging is a stop-and-go venture for me right now. But I thought I'd pop in and say howdy. I've been doing a lot of work -- you know, reading and whatnot. I also started to feel a little self-induced pressure about trying to get a conference paper submitted for this semester (if possible!), so I hunted around on Friday and found something that would fit my interests. (Deadline? September 1. Awesome.) That night and intermittently this weekend, I managed to put together an abstract that sounds, to me, great! I actually got excited about doing a smidge of research! It was kind of cool.

Honestly, I realized that one of the big reasons why I've been down on conferences for the last several years is because I haven't had money to attend -- with the exception of one conference last year, for which I had no institutional support. (Yeah, that trip cost me a thousand bucks. No wonder I was a homebody for years.) Anywho... now? My school is pretty supportive. So I'm going to take advantage of that and let it motivate me to do some conference papers.

I've been working on my professional development plan, too, and I figure I should at least try to have something from my dissertation reworked and submitted for consideration by the end of the school year. It's a modest goal, but if I do a submission, a fall conference and a spring conference (I really want to go to SAA! I'm an SAA virgin), then I think that's plenty of scholarship for a first year on the tenure-track. Plus, I have courses to develop and departments to engage and a small committee membership and let's not forget the Stratford Festival. I'm fairly busy, and I'm trying to keep all the irons hot, hot, hot in the fire.

It's all very exciting -- this job business. Feeling supported and encouraged for the first time in my career is such a lovely, delightful, and almost freakish change. No, I don't have a book proposal I'm working on, but I'm doing things at my own speed, and it feels like my department is happy to support that speed -- as long as my teaching is my highest priority.

This balance feels just right to me. Here's hoping it will get me tenured eventually.

Setting the record straight

2011-08-23T20:50:00.001-07:00

When you're writing a blog, you're writing from your own perspective, so it's tough to keep readers "in" on context. I think I've done a disservice to hubby in my representation of how I (we) am (are) handling things with eldest. I usually use first person singular because I'm talking about my experiences in dealing with eldest, but honestly, hubby is right by my side most of the time. I really can't explain the amount of co-parenting and wonderful things that hubby does, but I know that he does TONS more than most modern dads/husbands, and that's saying a lot.

So because it seems like I do most of the care giving, let me count the ways in which hubby is better than many husbands/fathers.

1. He cooks. And he does it very, very well.
2. He cleans.
3. He does laundry.
4. He gets the kids out of bed, feeds them, and gets them dressed in the morning.
5. Before we moved, he let me sleep in about an hour longer than he did for about a year while he dealt with the kids.
6. He takes eldest and baby to school and daycare respectively so I can go to the office when I want to.
7. He makes eldest and me a sack lunch every day. (Don't make me fight you over the sandwiches. They're gourmet.)
8. When we were done living with my mom, he went over to her house and cleaned it top to bottom on a weekday while she was working and left her an orchid and a thank you card. (It honestly didn't occur to me to go all out like that. It was a surprise to both me and my mom. Except it shouldn't be because...)
9. Every time we eat dinner at my mom's, hubby does the dishes after.
10. When we stayed with our friends in CA, he cleaned their kitchen.
11. He changes diapers - poopy or not - without complaint; he even volunteers for it.
12. He is mainly responsible for bath time, while I do all the books-before-bed reading.
13. He lets me go out with the girls whenever I want, while he watches the kids.
14. He uncomplainingly supported my decision to get a PhD and then was my biggest cheerleader when I had to apply to jobs all over the country. When asked, he said, "hey, if you get a job in Alaska, we'll move to Alaska." The man would follow me to the ends of the earth. And he supported me and our family while I worked part-time and had shitty pay, despite the fact that he would have liked to have followed his dreams, too.
15. He puts up with my depression, anxiety, self-doubt, and family pathology, and still, unbelievably loves me.
16. He's doing most of the unpacking single-handedly while I have meetings and classes and reading to attend to.

This list could go on and on. But just in case anyone thought that hubby wasn't pulling his weight around here, I had to set the record straight. I'm the one who should be stepping up, probably. I'm just not used to working full-time, and it's just really exhausting. I'm hoping that having a routine will help me get to the point where I can be of more use. It's one of those things where I feel like I need to be in control of the situation with eldest, because I don't like not feeling involved. Yet, I also have no idea how much I can do, considering my overwhelming circumstances. Perhaps I'm just being a baby. It just feels like there's a hell of a lot going on right now, and I'm having trouble keeping track of it all. Sigh.

Anyway.

My therapist says that I talk about my hubby like he's a god and that when I compare myself to him, I always come up with this thought that I'm not good enough for him or that I don't deserve him. I often feel like that. I'm spoiled to death by this man, and in return, I can be cold and distant -- because that's the kind of relationship I grew up with. I struggle to be any other way and have to remind myself to be warm with hubby and the kids. (Isn't that sick? Shouldn't that be natural?) I just have a hard time with relationships, but hubby has been patient beyond reason. He loves me. He'd say, "That's what you do when you love someone -- you give them what they need."

It's just I've never really been good at that. Hubby is. And thank god. Thank god for people like him - but mostly, for him.

First day? Excellent well. Other stuff? Not so much

2011-08-22T19:09:00.001-07:00

I had a fantastic first day of school. Class was great. It was fun getting back into the teaching saddle. I've felt all along that the classroom part was going to be the most enjoyable, easiest thing about doing this job. And I was right.

However, having looked at my calendar and taken the time to merge all my syllabi and meetings into one (paper) calendar, I feel very overwhelmed. I've given my students a lot to do. Which means, I have a lot to do, too. Sure, I've read almost everything I've assigned to them. But then I've managed to put hard readings for my 2 Tu/Th classes on the same day. So, for instance, I'll have hard reading for my 9:30 class, then really, really hard reading for my 12:30 class - all in the same day. I guess I need to get a good reading rhythm worked out. I'm hoping that if I front load organization in the semester that I'll be able to keep on top of it all.

Thing is - you have no idea when you're an adjunct just how much work full-time faculty do that has very little to do with teaching. Yes, yes - I knew about the service, the professional development, the research, etc. But I didn't know that you have to fill out a form for just about everything. And I also didn't know that the prep for three classes and then all the stuff above was going to take about 60+ hours a week, while the teaching took up a tiny fraction of that. This is why the world has a skewed view of what it means to be a professor - or a teacher for that matter. No one, except those who do the work, understands how much there is to it.

Don't get me wrong. I am happy - not complaining. It feels good to have lots of things to do - big things. Things that matter on an intellectual level. But it is nonetheless overwhelming. I have to make a to-do list FOR my to-do list, I think. It's crazy just how much I need to do, and I keep feeling like I need to do everything immediately.

It's not going to help getting stressed out about my stress, though. This is good stress. I just need to go with it. (And dye my hair because it's going to go greyer much faster now.)

***

On another note - I'm super worried about eldest. He told us yesterday evening that some kids at the daycare were calling him an "idiot." Sigh. I wondered when the bullying would start. Since eldest has a speech delay and ADD, he's not really quick to defend himself, let alone engage in regular conversation. We had already decided to take him out of that daycare and put him in the aftercare program at his school in order to keep things more consistent for him. I asked him if the kids at school are nicer to him. He says yes, but eldest is the embodiment of an unreliable narrator. It's not that he's deceptive -- he just doesn't pick up on things because of his inability to attend, so he can't understand what's going on immediately.

Additionally, in his folder today, we got a note from the teacher saying that eldest didn't complete the cutting and pasting task that the kids were assigned. I looked at the papers that were sent home. It was clear he hadn't colored the picture himself, and of course, none of it was cut like the directions said. (They aren't expected to read the instructions, but they are expected to listen to them and then do what the teacher says. Eldest apparently didn't.)

So I don't know what to do about this. We have a meeting with the school on Friday to talk about his issues and to set up an IEP meeting. This is just a preliminary "moving in" meeting, but we get to meet with the speech therapist, eldest's teacher, and possibly some other people. I am seriously concerned about the fact that I will be working so much now that I really won't have time to do anything to help eldest. I'll be struggling to keep my head above water, and I don't want to take anyone down with me.

All this equals out to the potential for very light blogging this semester. That sucks, because I feel like I need to write. It helps me feel better. But something's got to give, right? Eldest is more important than the blog.

When am I supposed to help him, though? I got the kids today, and we were home by 5:15. That meant that we had time for dinner, a half-hour of TV so we could calm down from all the rushing, bath, and reading books. Then it was time for bed. (Baby went down at 7; eldest went down at 8.) I suppose I could cut the half-hour of TV, but holy crap - I needed a break. It was a long day. Good, but long. And I kind of feel like he needed a break. He was very obviously tired when he got home, and it's got to be stressful on him to go from a play-all-day environment to a school-all-day environment. But I don't really know how stressful it is, because the kid can't freaking talk to me about it. It's like he's locked inside his body half the time or he doesn't have the vocabulary to say what he's feeling. I, then, feel like I'm grilling him constantly - just trying to get him to tell me how he's feeling. It's awful. I wish there were something I could do to make it instantly better. Alas.

Poor kid. I'm not sure what we'll do moving forward, but I need to talk to the teacher about getting him the help he needs. Otherwise, we'll have failed eldest. No job in the world could make me happy enough to live with that guilt forever. We really have to do something. I hope that I'll feel like we've got some direction about what we should do on Friday after the meeting.

Long summer closes its doors and opens up the fall window

2011-08-21T20:32:00.000-07:00

It's closing time for summer. Tomorrow is the first day of school, and I am thrilled about it. I double checked that I have the right syllabi in place to go and print very early in the morning, hopefully before anyone else is around. I anticipate that waiting until the last minute could be a mistake. However. I didn't have tons of choice in the matter. There were a few late additions I needed to make that I'd forgotten. And I also don't have a clue where our home printer is. It's somewhere in this house. In a box. Just like everything else.

Today, we hung Shakespeare art in our dining room. I have been collecting Shakespeare art for about ten years or longer, and I think I have about 50 pieces, give or take a few. Some of my favorites are costume design sketches from the Stratford, ON, festival -- one of which is a sketch for Maggie Smith playing Lady Macbeth sometime in the 1970s. I have twelve of these character sketches, so we populated the room with them. Maybe I'll put up pics of the room on the blog sometime. Maybe not. We'll see. (Still trying to figure out the level of anonymity on this blog...) But take my word for it -- the room looks fantastic, and Shakespeare is well represented.

Another thing I'm doing tomorrow is taking some of the Shakespeare art to my office. I'm not sure if I'm "allowed" to hang it myself or not. I'll have to ask if there is some sort of protocol to follow about hanging things up. If I can do it myself, I'll have a hammer and some nails with me, and I'll start banging away. It will be so nice, continuing to personalize my office. I'm thrilled to be settling in and making the office my home away from home. I STILL don't have bookshelves. But whatever. I'll get some eventually, even if I have to go to some crazy basement and dig them up myself.

Tonight, I went to my mom's house for dinner and got to see my little sister for a while. It did my soul some good, seeing her. I love my little sis, and we've only been able to hang out a couple of times since we moved. (She lives an hour and a half away.) Anyway, I'm hoping we can get together again this coming weekend. We're talking about hitting a farmer's market and just hanging out. We'll see how much work I have to do!

I wonder if I'll sleep tonight. Do you remember that commercial from several years ago for Disneyland (or World?) and the kid is so excited that he can't sleep? That's kind of me tonight. Starting my teaching job equals going to Disneyland for me. Seriously.

I don't know -- maybe the cynicism will set in eventually. Or maybe this is just the sea change I've been hoping it would be. What I know right now is that I'm deliriously happy to meet my students tomorrow. I have a feeling it's going to be a great day.

Happy thoughts to everyone who starts teaching this week!

Considering

2011-08-20T22:15:00.001-07:00

I'm taking a couple of minutes break from my last syllabus to check in. I've got all but this one done. And really? It's basically done. But I'm doing something I've never done this year -- giving the students all of their assignment sheets for their upcoming papers along with the syllabus. The reason I'm doing this is because I anticipate being busier than normal, personally, so I might not have as much time to come up with assignments during the semester as I've had over the summer. Plus, there are some students who like to have all the information up front. I figured I'd do all of us a favor this way. I basically just need to get the last paper for my lit class nailed down, and then, I'm done. Until Monday -- you know -- when classes start.

I've been thinking a lot about the comments on my last post and about anonymity on this blog. I think the commenting people are right in that I've revealed too much of myself on this blog and that it's probably very easy to figure out who I am because of that. My impulse when I thought about it was to just kill the blog. Obviously, I haven't been posting much lately because, frankly, I'm just too busy. I'm up to my eyes in painting, unpacking, and syllabi creation, not to mention meetings. Oh, and I have kids. Right. Kids. So what would it hurt to kill the blog and move on with my real life? Not much.

Then again, there are a few people from my RL who read this blog and want to keep up with what I'm doing. And there are some blogging friends that I'm sure would like to keep in touch, too. (Me, too, y'all.) So I thought, maybe I should start another blog that's much more guarded and anonymous, or maybe even a password protected blog. Or maybe I shouldn't write about my professional life anymore at all and just make this about my kids and my own craziness. I put, probably, too much thought into this while I was doing manual labor these last few nights. I have a lot more to lose now -- a tt job -- so I don't want to shoot myself in the foot. But then, would I really want to work at a place that would fire me over a blog? Hmph.

All I know is that it's complicated. I might shut down Fie and start a new blog. I might do nothing. I might compromise and do something else. Don't know. But I will say - some of the advice I've been getting lately has been both right on and way off. A lot of the off-ness has to do with context. Anyway - I feel like I have to trust myself to do the right thing. That's the best I can do.

I will say though, without revealing too much, that Friday was probably the best day of my professional life so far. I had a short meeting in the morning that went well, and then a long meeting the rest of the day with a colleague, and it was FANTASTIC. Thursday was good too, but Friday? Friday topped everything academic I've ever experienced. I'm not going to tell you why because that would be revealing too much.

See? Aren't you pissed? Wouldn't you rather know? I know... I'd rather tell you, too. Which is why I'm not sure I'll be able to do this anymore. I'm an oversharer by nature, and I want to explain why everything is freaking great (except unpacking) and how I'm going to love this job and the challenges I'm going to tackle and overcome. But right now, I feel like I should say nothing. Maybe you should friend me on FB if you want to know the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

But then - you'd have to ask me my name. Do you really want to know? %#@$%$#@!

Full-time faculty life

2011-08-16T20:45:00.001-07:00

It's pretty strange to me, being on the other side of the faculty table. Today, we had a four-hour meeting with all the faculty, which included one ten-minute break. We were lectured about assessment and accreditation, and there was some surprising hostility from a few of the faculty members. I, of course, laid low on the issue. It's not my place to speak about something like that, being the inexperienced newb. So I just watched the goings on like a tennis match, and tried to hide my surprise at one particular member of my department acting with such open and complete disdain to what was going on. Really? It was uncomfortable. I actually found myself at one point thinking, "Okay, Fie. Go to a happy place," and I forced myself to think about something else for about two minutes. I'm pretty sure I didn't miss anything.

After that, I went to lunch with my new department chair, whom I really like, and the VAP. It was nice -- lots less awkward than yesterday. Then, when we were essentially done, the president of the university made his way over to us and asked if he could sit with us. Of course, we said yes. The president knows my mom, the priest who married me and hubby, and my dad's cousin, so we talked about my family a bit, and he asked about my kids. Really, it's kind of nice, and a little weird, to have all these interconnected bits and pieces with the president. I felt a little pressure about it, but then, I also kept reminding myself -- a person is a person, no matter how important to the bureaucracy. So I just tried to be myself, and it seemed perfectly fine. I even make a joke about letting donors win when he played golf with them. He genuinely laughed, so I felt like that went well.

But then.

There was an afternoon writing instructor's meeting that went a shade south. One of the adjuncts was saying that she got a lot of grief from students about their grades. I said that when I had that problem in the past, it made me do two things: use a rubric for grading essays and also stipulate on my syllabus that grades on papers were non-negotiable. I thought that was harmless. But then, the writing chair said that I should rethink the language I used about "non-negotiable grades" because there is an appeal process that students can go through, and they have a right to know about that. Another colleague said that she has reconsidered grades on papers in the past because maybe she had a bad day when grading it. I replied that if the student is required to give me a draft, then go to the writing center, then do peer review, and ONLY THEN turn in a final draft -- which is the policy at this school -- then I felt they had ample opportunity to talk to me about what was necessary to do well on the paper, and I didn't think arguing about the grade at the end of that revision process was reasonable. I think I offended the person who reconsidered grades.

Look - I'm just not a warm-and-fuzzy writing instructor. I'm not there to be your best friend. I'm there to teach you how to write. There's a lot of process to that, and I'm happy, delighted to be of assistance. Even as an adjunct, I made myself very available to students through office hours, cell phone, email, and IM programs. Did they use these times/resources? Rarely. But then, they want to complain about their grades when they don't use me as a resource? Come on, now. With the emphasis on revision in this program, I feel like students have built-in opportunities to use every resource in the world -- including me. So I'm going to be blunt -- I'm going to be extremely impatient with people who straight up complain about grades. People who come to me with a question about how they can do better?? Those people? I'd mentally kiss their feet. But the students who come in thinking they deserve an A because they always got an A or because they pay 25K a year to go to school? Those people can kiss my ass.

This also has something to do with the way I am as a student. I want criticism. I need it. I am a self-improvement junkie, and I always want to be a better writer. But then, writing is so precious to me -- much more so than it is to your average 101 student. For a non-major who is in the GE class because it's a must, not a desire, I understand that there is a different perspective. But I want to inspire the same ethic in my students that I have -- to want to improve , despite the fact that not it's easy. In fact, few good things in life are.

Sigh.

Another thing that I felt went poorly in that writing meeting was that the student essay we looked at used a word incorrectly, and I was the only person who pointed it out. And it wasn't used just once, but over and over again -- as part of the main point. The way the student used the word was completely made up. Not in the dictionary (I checked); not a part of theory as the word could possibly be defined (Googled it -- I know...). But no one else mentioned it when we were critiquing the essay. Is it just me, or should we be using words that mean what we say?? The real meaning? Totally not what the student meant. I actually wondered to myself whether or not the other faculty knew what the goddamn word meant. Seriously? It was ridiculous. And then, when I pointed it out, it was brushed off as the student coining a new construction of a word... possibly... I said, "But isn't it part of our job to get students to use words correctly? To make sure that they mean what they're saying?" The head of the writing program said, "Hell, I'd never talk then."

Hm.

Another thing that was tough was sitting there when the writing chair told one of the adjuncts that one of his three classes was being taken away and given to a full-timer. (Not me.) It probably should have been something he was told in private instead of in front of everyone. Know how I know that? The exact thing has happened to me before. Nothing sucks worse or is as humiliating as that "us-and-them" divide when you're an adjunct. I actually felt like crying for the dude, and it made me feel kind of bad that I had a full-time job. It's like job-market-survivor's guilt, knowing there's really nothing different between the two of us except luck and timing. Hmph.

But! There was a nice bright spot in the day. I finally got to meet the theater chair and talk to him a bit. We're supposed to be collaborating on interdisciplinary projects since my broader perspective is drama (emphasis on Renaissance drama and Shakespeare, obviously, but I tested in world drama from the Greeks to yesterday in my doctoral exams). It was great to meet him, and we had a brief, lovely chat with a promise to have lunch as soon as we can. He's going on the Stratford Festival trip, so I'll be able to talk to him a bunch that weekend, too. I really look forward to working with him more. Should be great.

Anyway. It was a kind of mixed day. Tomorrow (well, today, since it's after midnight) will be more meetings (do they ever end?) and also, eldest is starting kindergarten. So I'm going to get up early to do some kindergarten-y fun first day stuff with him. That means I should probably get to sleep.

Dude. How do people with full-time jobs not collapse at the end of every day? Yaaaawwnn...

601, Orientation, and Countdown to September 7 - payday

2011-08-15T21:02:00.000-07:00

I missed the ticking off of another century of posts once again. Last post was my 600th. As I look back at my 501st post, which included 5 predictions, I find that all came true except I didn't get an agent for my novel. Ah well. There's always the next 100 posts.

I predicted that I'd write 100 more posts before my job began -- true. I started, officially-officially, at my job today with two long meetings with lunch in between. One thing that I've noticed is that the people in my department talk a lot about how much they love each other, but they have a really hard time maintaining conversation in the big group. Why is that? There were several long, awkward (to me) pauses today, and I wondered why. All these people are teachers -- why can't they keep a discussion going? And they all had a hard time with sharing when the new chair tried doing some ice breakers. Of course, they probably felt the exercise was a little ridiculous since they've all been together for more than a dozen years and there were only two new people. Me and a VAP. I remembered during my campus interview that everyone was lovely one-on-one, but in groups, it was tougher to keep things going. I don't know... I guess that's the way it works here. I'll get used to it. I'm just more of a social and chatty person. Bet you'd never guess that! Perhaps I'll inspire my colleagues to be more chatty. (Dare to dream.)

So far the meetings haven't been very useful to me, but I think that's mainly because they concerned things that don't have much to do with me. I had to fight hard to stay awake during a session this afternoon. Isn't that sad? It occurred to me as I was stifling a yawn that every pedagogical theory in recent times is violated in these meetings. Do the presenters really expect us to gain anything out of two solid hours of lecture? Meh. I can't stand running a class that way. I need a lot more give and take. But for informational sessions like the ones coming up tomorrow, I'm not sure how that give and take could be accomplished. We need the information, obviously, but who wants to be lectured about it? Plus, I have a 20-40 page booklet to read (they didn't number the pages, and I'm not counting them), which is also informative, but dry, and difficult to absorb. It's one of those problems where you're so naive that you don't even know how this stuff applies to you because you just haven't been around enough to know. Plus, you don't know the right questions to ask because you've never had a full-time job before. There's a learning curve, for sure. I'm mainly just trying not to make myself look like a dumb ass.

On that front - so far so good. I made a suggestion in the department meeting today, actually, that was enthusiastically received. Made me feel good. It's possible that they just need some new blood in there to shake things up. As I said, I'm the first new full-time hire in a long time -- seriously, like, 12 years -- so it's entirely possible that people have gotten into their grooves and aren't budging. But a problem that they were discussing seemed very simple to me, and I put my idea out there. People acted like they'd never thought of that before -- in a good way. That's encouraging. They seem open to fresh thought, which is great; I just don't want to overstep my bounds right out of the gate. Still, I can't keep quiet when I feel like I have a good suggestion. Hm. It's a fine line.

As for moving/painting/unpacking -- we made some progress this weekend, but mainly on the painting. The kids' room is painted, although a friend is doing a large mural in there, and that's not done. The kitchen and dining room are totally done, as far as painting, but there is still MUCH to unpack. The living room only has one coat of paint, and we definitely need another. We bought a couch and loveseat this weekend -- they MATCH! That's a first in the fiefdom! Plus, we bought new dining chairs since ours totally broke before we even moved. We got warranties and fabric protection on all of this stuff for seven years. If the kids haven't grown out of their destructive tendencies by then, well, I'll probably be ready for a new sofa in 8 years. Who knows? However, it feels like a big step to have matching furniture and warranties. That's pretty damn adult, don't you think??

We'll be continuing to unpack and paint for, I don't know, a long time. And putting things together, too. We bought bookshelves, dressers and nightstands. We're replacing so, so much stuff that we left in CA and getting better stuff. It's expensive -- even just buying stuff at mid-range prices -- but I feel like I should dump the grad school furniture now that I've got a decent salary to look forward to. The first check is coming on September 7th, and I'm really looking forward to it. I should also get my reimbursement check for 3K of moving expenses sometime this week, I hope.

Moving right along. As the semester starts, I expect that I'll continue to have a sluggish posting period on the blog. It's just a lot of overwhelming stuff going on right now. A lot of good, but a lot of stress, too. Anyway - huzzah for 601 posts! Off to be an adult...

An update in five acts -- Every Silver Lining...

2011-08-10T12:52:00.000-07:00

It's been a long day, and I don't know if I've got the energy to write a well-composed post, but I do have some news:

Act 1. Interior, day. Had second weekly dose of therapy today. My therapist is awesome. She calls my family's pathology "Shakespearean in scope." I mentioned in our first meeting how affection is doled out in tiny scraps in my family and that the "person in power" in two-person relationships always withholds affection -- usually to remain in power or to make him/herself feel superior. We talked about this more today. That first meeting, I'd read the therapist the part from Midsummer Night's Dream, when Demetrius tells Helena he cannot love her. She replies:

And even for that do I love you the more.
I am your spaniel; and, Demetrius,
The more you beat me, I will fawn on you:
Use me but as your spaniel, spurn me, strike me,
Neglect me, lose me; only give me leave,
Unworthy as I am, to follow you.
What worser place can I beg in your love,--
And yet a place of high respect with me,--
Than to be used as you use your dog?

Ever since I brought this up, my therapist has been calling me "the spaniel." I don't know - I think it's funny. Sadly appropriate, but funny. The therapist pointed out to me that I sort of treat my husband with this same power dynamic, except HE's the spaniel in our relationship. It made me cry. I know how it feels to be the spaniel. I've been conditioned for it; he hasn't. I'm hoping that having a greater awareness of "spaniel-dom" will help me be a better, more compassionate person, wife, and mom. Ooo, boy, this stuff is really hard to face, though. Let's not even get into my analogies with King Lear, in which Lear is the villain and the girls are "acting out" from abuse. More sinned against than sinning, my arse.

Act 2. Interior, evening, flashback to previous night. Since it seemed like the movers weren't going to be here with our stuff for a very long time (I estimated Thursday), we decided to paint most of the rooms in our house. Pretty much the entire interior of the house. We started last night. It took two solid hours for hubby and me to paint the large kitchen. Then, we were exhausted. It was about 11:30 when we finished. (We really can't do much while the kids are there and/or awake, unless we want paint footprints everywhere. Eldest would probably be able to help, but baby? Not so much.) Today, I painted the dining room by myself. It took about two hours for one coat, and I didn't really do the greatest job. I'm guessing each room, regardless of how many people are working on it, is going to take two hours. It's exhausting doing all that painting. I had no idea how physically demanding it is. (I've never rented a place I could paint before, so I've never done this.) But it looks much better than it did, and eventually, we're going to have a warm, cheerful house. Yay!

Act 3.Interior, evening, doctor's office. Baby has an ear infection. He's usually a model child, but the last four days, he's been up all night with a fever, crying, generally uncomfortable. I thought this might be a teething thing. But even if it were, he also has an ear infection. Since we don't have a pediatrician yet (must find one!), I had to take him to one of those general clinic places. It was a zoo, and we were there for more than two hours this evening; baby screamed three-quarters of that time period. But now, we have a prescription. Of course, the kid just spits it out. Mother of god...

Act 4.Simultaneously in zooish clinic. Got a call tonight from the movers, and they will, indeed, be showing up on Thursday. I am very happy that this saga of not having our things is coming to a close, six weeks after packing it all up. It will be lovely to have all my clothes available, toys for the kids, a desk for hubby, etc. And let's not even get started on having our bed back. Oh - and being able to move out of my mom's house?? Awesome. I'm ready to have some privacy back. We all are, really.

Act 5. Interior, mother's house, everyone else is asleep, and I'm contemplating the last couple of days. I haven't had time to work on my Young Adult literature syllabus because of painting, the kids, and general mayhem. However, I did manage to get to the school's bookstore today and all of my books that I ordered are in stock. Wrong editions for the YA class, but at least they're available. Sigh. (Hubby says that all my silver linings have dark clouds. The therapist agrees.) I figure that I'll get on the YA class again tomorrow. There's just no way we could get all the painting done that we needed to do before the movers arrived. So we've asked some family members to help us this weekend. Thus, while I await the arrival of our stuff on Thursday, I'll work. There will be a couple of hours between dropping off the kiddos at daycare and the arrival of the movers. I think I can whip up something in that time since much of it is sketched out. (I found the paper I'd sketched the schedule on, thank dawg.) In the meantime, my calendar is exploding with meetings and orientation shenanigans. I look forward to it, but I must admit it's a little overwhelming. Hey - at least I'll have my business clothes available for all those meetings! Whew.

Finis!

Deja vu

2011-08-08T12:45:00.000-07:00

Today's task was to work on the YA literature class syllabus, which I'd worked on for a while at the beginning of July. I tried pulling up what I had on my Dropbox account, but lo and behold, I had not updated the file. No worries. I brought my laptop in with me. And lo and behold - uh... where's my file? I did work on this, right? Uh... hm. Oh right. I actually took the time to write this stuff on a piece of paper. Which is not something that can be uploaded on dropbox. Nor is it in my bag. It's at my mom's house, which is 40 minutes away.

Hmph.

So I spent the day looking at page numbers in the books for my YA class and trying to divide up readings. I realized -- not for the first time -- that this is going to be a lot of reading: about 100 pages per class if I end up teaching all the books. I am definitely considering using two of the books for out-of-class projects instead of "teaching" them in class. That would lower the reading load by probably 25 pages per class. It's more do-able, but will the students do it? That is the question.

Thing is, I've assigned books that are very, very quick reads and also quite enjoyable reads, if I do say so myself. The only thing I'm having a hard time getting through is The Hobbit, which for some reason feels like an absolute slog. I think it's Tolkien's style. Who knows? Anyway, I remember this one class during my PhD that had an unmanageable amount of reading every week. (700 pages was the goal.) Eventually, I just quit trying to read it all, and probably only read about 100 pages a week and then skipped around through the rest. I'm wondering if my undergrads will have a similar reaction to the amount of work I'm dumping on them. Hard telling.

Then again, so far, I only have 8 students signed up for this class. It might end up feeling more like a little book club that's lots of fun. Maybe everyone will be overeager to read and will love everything I hand them. Haha. Dare to dream!

Anyway. The major point is that I need to find the piece of paper whereupon I wrote notes for this class. (Hoping it hasn't been thrown away. Sigh.) And then, I need to figure out whether I'm going to teach all these novels (ten total). If I only have 8 people in the class, I might just split them into two groups of 4 and have them do group projects on two of the books so that "real" class time will be spent on fewer things and might not feel so rushed. Hm.

In other news, we're talking about painting inside the house this week, and I'm wondering how I'm going to get all of this stuff done. Maybe I should enlist my sister's help with painting. She loves home decoration. We also want to find a really lovely rug to "tie the room together," a la The Big Lebowski. There's much to be done, and I have little time to do it. But isn't that what this blog is all about? Off to work!

It gets worse

2011-08-06T20:11:00.000-07:00

I had called our California landlord a couple of times to make sure that he had our forwarding address, but he never called me back. Finally, I called him again yesterday, and he ended up calling me back at 11 p.m., eastern time. (Why is it so hard to figure out time zones, people? Seriously! I was in bed!) The main thing I wanted to talk to him about, really, was when we were going to get our deposit back.

He said, "I'm not returning your deposit."

Sink, heart. Go ahead.

His reasoning was that the carpet had to be replaced and we broke our lease. Okay - 1. The carpet was eight years old. It needed to be replaced when we moved in, but we didn't say anything. I think that there's some law in CA about how carpet in rentals should be replaced every three years whether it needs to be or not. I need to look into that further to make sure that's not just some crazy rumor. 2. Landlord knew I was looking for a job nation-wide for more than two years. He said he'd let us out of our lease with only 30 day's notice, which we provided. Our current lease would have ended on August 31, but we left on June 30. So we were out two months before the lease ended. 3. Our current lease, under the deposit section, says "Not applicable" since we didn't pay a deposit in the FIFTH year of our stay there. Five years we were there. We were excellent tenants. He was sad to see us go. And yet -- we get NONE of our 1400 dollar deposit back? None???

We could really use the money. Since I don't even know when I start getting paid (it's either August 26th or September 26th -- must find out!), we are living just on hubby's salary. Thing is, our "real" expenses are cheaper (rent, mainly), but we're also paying daycare, which we hadn't been doing. What we're paying in daycare, plus rent, is about 350 dollars MORE than we were paying in rent in CA. So I need a paycheck. Stat. OR! OR! OR! A returned deposit. That would help us get through August.

In the meantime -- I can't believe how difficult the little details of this move have been. And it's NOT OVER YET. (I estimate our furniture/moving truck will be here on Friday if we're lucky!) It all feels like a mistake. I hope that when I start working, really working that is, that it won't feel like a mistake anymore. :(

Unholy war

2011-08-05T04:16:00.000-07:00

It's August 5th and we're still living with my mom. We officially started paying rent on August 1, but our house isn't ready, as I mentioned. It's filthy and there were all sorts of plumbing issues (faucet detached from wall, water heater leak, toilet plugged). I complained to the landlord, who sent over his property manager. Then, since he didn't believe there were five pages of notes with complaints, he came to the house himself to look it over.

The landlord had inspected the place himself, but he hadn't paid much attention. Of course, he doesn't have to live there, so why would he? There were crayon markings on a door, finger smudges everywhere on the walls, stains all over the carpet, the bathrooms hadn't been cleaned (maybe ever), a drawer was missing its facade in the kitchen. The list went on and on. But my main problem was the cleanliness, which was absurd. He should have had a cleaning crew in there. I'd said to the landlord's wife that I wanted to have my cousin's girlfriend clean the place, and I'd like her to split the cost with me. She agreed.

But then, the wife said the cost to have her clean the place was too high, and that she'd have her own crew in there to clean for half the price. I started to think, "Well, hell -- they should have done this in the first place. I shouldn't have to pay to have this place cleaned if they never even had it cleaned to begin with. It should be move-in ready." So I got mad. When the landlord called last night to say that the plumbing issues had been fixed and that the cleaning crew would be in today, I told him that I was not eager to pay for half the cleaning, since, after further consideration, it occurred to me that the landlords were really responsible for having the place move-in ready. That wasn't my responsibility.

He got very angry with me and we went back and forth for a good fifteen minutes. I had only offered to pay for half the cleaning when the girlfriend was going to do it because she was expensive. But if they weren't going to use her, and they were going to use a service half as expensive, then I didn't really see why I should pay half. But mainly -- THE PLACE SHOULD ALREADY BE CLEAN. WHY ISN'T IT? That was the primary principle that I was standing for. But he thought I was just going back on my word.

I get that. I understand that it's not a great way to start a renting relationship. But I also felt like I was being taken advantage of. What would you have done?

At one point in the conversation, he said he was about ready to give us back our money and cancel the contract since I was being so difficult. We ended up leaving the conversation with neither of us happy. And when I got off the phone, hubby was, rightfully, flipping out (he'd been listening to my side of it). I mean, we've already got utilities in our name there. The cable is being set up today. And eldest is going to kindergarten based on this address. If we needed to find a new place, it would have to be in that same area of town, or we'd risk losing the awesome school for eldest. PLUS, the daycare where we have our kids? It's owned by the landlord's wife. Conflict of interest anyone?? Blerg.

I started to get panicky about all this, and decided to call back and try to smooth it over. After all, this was a fight over about 150 dollars. Was it really worth it to lose a good house in a great place for 150 dollars? I got voice mail. Hubby said, "Let me call back too," and he got voice mail. In a few minutes the landlord called back, got me, and said he wanted to talk to my husband. He said, "I mean, I'll talk to you, too, but I think I should talk to your husband." The landlord had talked to his wife and gotten her side of it, which corresponded to what I said. They decided to go ahead and pay for the whole cost of the cleaning.

I said "Let's call a truce and try to move on," and he agreed. But he still wanted to talk to my husband. They talked, and it became clear that the landlord doesn't want to deal with me anymore. Thing is - I handle all things financial and/or house-related. This fight might necessitate a change in our family dynamic, though. I don't like this guy. To me, he comes off as a slum-lord, and I'm afraid I'm not going to be able to stand dealing with him. What's worse? We have a THREE YEAR LEASE.**

Head, meet desk.

Maybe this will be something that will seem like no big deal in a couple of months. I have a feeling that we're going to be in an uncomfortable place for a good while.

**The reason I entered into a 3-year lease was because he said we could get out of it after the first year with 30-day's notice. So it seemed just like a year lease. Sigh. I should have kept my big mouth shut.

I knew I was screwed up...

2011-08-03T12:17:00.000-07:00

I started therapy on Monday, and at the end of the session, the lady asked if I could come again this week in order to continue talking about my "history." As I've mentioned before, I've got a fairly dysfunctional family-of-origin, so it's really no surprise that I couldn't fit in a comprehensive history into a 50-minute session. So I went back today and talked more about my parents, my extended family, and some other stuff. At the end of it, she scheduled two more sessions with me -- both next week.

I'm going to therapy twice a week. Twice a week!

Establishing your psychological history with a new therapist is always a drag. I know - I've done it several times. But this is the first time in my therapeutic history that I've been asked to come to therapy twice a week. Twice a week? Initially I wondered if this was about money. I asked if she did this with all her patients, and she said, "Not all of them, no." I guess I'm special. Ha. If this were about money, though, she'd probably do twice a week with all her clients. No, she says that we really need to talk more about all this history in order to set the stage for "real" therapy work to begin. Real therapy work? Yes, please.

Thankfully, I can afford twice a week for now. I'm not sure how long it will last -- if she's planning on twice a week indefinitely -- but it surprised me that she wanted to meet so often. I mean, I knew I was screwed up, but this sort of confirms it.

The hard part right now is trying not to dwell on all the negativity that's being plowed up by this. It's difficult. I think about some of the things that bring me to therapy, and I feel mighty sorry for myself. Argh. Must not dwell.

Ahem...

Got the keys to our house the other day, but I've only just had time to make it over there today. That place is a dusty, filthy mess. I don't really think the previous tenants took the time to do more than wipe things off with a dirty rag. But even if they did, the flooring has been replaced in the last two days, and I think that that kicked up a ton of dust. I'm going to try to get my cousin's girlfriend to clean the place before we move in. (She was the one who helped us clean our house in CA before we moved, and then helped my cousin drive hubby's car cross country.)

We have possession of the house, sure, but none of our stuff is here. (Don't get me started on the goddamn moving company... We might not have our furniture until the 17th at this point! GRRRR!) I figure that it would be best for the kids if we continued to stay at my mom's until the furniture gets here. (Hey, we've survived this long...) But I might revise that statement if I just can't take it anymore. We'd have to buy air mattresses, pots and pans, etc. in order to make the place livable. Sure, it could be some fun camping experiment, but FFS, I'm not sure how much more miserable we'd be making ourselves since we don't actually have anything. Maybe it would be fun. Maybe it would suck. Methinks I don't want to find out.

So I'm going to go try to get more work done and try not to mope. Cheers.

Just wow

2011-08-02T11:13:00.000-07:00

I just had lunch with a male colleague who claims to be a conservative feminist. Without getting too specific, I have to say that I was astounded at this man's views on feminism, homosexuality, and liberalism. I wasn't even sure people were allowed to have those sorts of medieval views anymore. And I further don't think he understands what a feminist is. Maybe he meant "misogynist" instead but just had a brain fart. Wow. Just wow.

We are NOT in the bay area anymore, folks. Wow.

Legacy of a student

2011-07-31T12:16:00.000-07:00

Last December, I wrote about a student in my writing class who had stage four cancer. Today, one of the students in that cohort emailed me to say that she had died yesterday.

Died.

I gasped when I read the email and tried hard not to cry. I was with my kids, and I try not to cry when I'm around them. It freaks them out. It wasn't until a little while later that I allowed myself a moment, and when it came, it came hard.

I had this student in a couple of classes -- a semester-long writing class, and one of the three-week seminars. She was one of the best students I'd ever had -- eager, tenacious, thoughtful. This particular class was truly an inspired class, and I have stayed friends with several of the students, including this lady. Honestly, I had no idea that she was so near the end. She wasn't in the hospital. It seemed like she was sick, but she was still getting out-patient treatment. It seemed like she'd be fighting cancer for a long time.

I saw her just before we left California. One of the students in the class had a party, and we saw each other then. She brought me a gift basket with stuff for the cross country trip for the kids, and we had a good talk. She didn't really seem that sick. It was just a month ago. A little month. And now she's gone.

I want to go to the funeral -- I'm not sure I can afford to go to the funeral. I don't know when the funeral is. Sigh. I am so sad for her kids and her whole family. I would really love to be there to let them know what she meant to me. She was my student, but she was also my teacher. My god, what I learned from her. The debt of gratitude I owe this woman is deep. She taught me an awful lot about life. And she was a good person and a generous friend.

As far as I'm concerned, she is leaving a legacy behind that is unmatched. I've never had a student touch me so deeply with her story and her intense desire to learn. I am lucky to have known her. Very lucky.