newenglandcross.com

when it snows heavy

Sun, 28 Feb 2010 15:03:28 -0500

. . .you can’t skate ski, ya gotta shoe it. Heather, Pete, JD and I met for breakfast then headed to Northfield Mt for some snowshoeing. I was down for about an hour of hoofing, but Heather and Pete? They don’t do anything for only an hour.

We started up the mountain on the most direct, thus most steep, trail. Pete and Heather took enormously large strides while I used leg turn over to try to keep up. JD started the day a little grumpy--poor sleep? bad dream? He didn’t know, but isn’t it amazing how once you start cranking the exercise, your mood lightens.

About half-way up, the beaten path stopped and the snow got deeper and softer.

I love my snowshoes. They just rock, and on the way down the hill I sought out the deep soft stuff off trail and just launched downhill running. Please not there was NO running uphill, just brutal quad- and ass-searing stomping. The roundtrip voyage was two hours, and JD was pretty cracked, but Momma had packed vegan cookies for her man, so his recovery was quick. Meow.

Here, the power couple survey their domain.

JD and I will be heading out to Moab with these two for spring break, and I have to admit I’m a little scared. . .okay, a lot scared.

time and space

Thu, 18 Feb 2010 20:22:39 -0500

I got some bad news this morning. My friend Josh decided to enter hospice two weeks ago, and he is sliding quickly. His beautiful lady asked that his friends email her letters to read to him, and I found some quiet time tonight after my trip to Dana Farber with my mother-in-law to pull together my thoughts.

First a note about cancer. It fucking sucks, and I feel like the medical community has sold us a pile of happy shit suggesting that if we wear pink and walk around a track for a few hours they will discover a cure. Maybe we should wear yellow bracelets and that will help us find a cure. Do I sound angry? I am angry--the kind of anger born of frustration. Of listening to people glad-handing cancer. Of pacifying us to think it’s not that bad a disease anymore. Or if we had a little more money we can cure it.

Nothing has helped my mother-in-law’s cancer. Nothing. Nothing helped Josh’s cancer. Nothing could help my Dad’s cancer. Three different kinds of cancer. Nothing.

I sat in Dana Farber today and watched the hundreds and hundreds of people--men, women, children--all sizes, shapes--with hair, without hair. I’m supposedly in the BEST place for fighting cancer, but I didn’t feel HOPE. I didn’t feel CURE. I felt sad. Sad for the people, their family, their friends all robbed of people they love, the life they want to live because NO ONE UNDERSTANDS HOW TO KILL CANCER. My sadness led to frustration. And my frustration wells into anger, then rage. Then the tears come, and what is left is helpless.

Helpless for Josh, for Doris, for my Dad, for my Mom. For everyone who has cancer that can’t be stopped. I resent feeling helpless. Do you hear that cancer? I fucking resent you and all the pain you cause.

My dear friend Josh,

I have been thinking of you lately, and I wonder sometimes how people can deny the connectiveness of the world. When I talked to Andrea today, I knew why I had been thinking about you, but thinking isn't always enough, and in this space and time, you need to know how very dear you are to me and the friendship we share.

You know, everyone makes fun of me because I'm not on Facebook, and while I toss off the usual response, "I don't want my students' image of me to be confused with my friends' image of me" there is another reason I'm not on Facebook. Did you ever read Catcher in the Rye? I still teach it every year, and every year I have to explain why Holden doesn't ever "give old Jane a buzz." It's because his memories of Jane are so perfect, he doesn't want to dilute and mix them with the ever chaotic present. I feel that way about my memories too.

I have such perfect images in my head of the first day of Astronomy class with you dropping the lecture hall desk back into the chair with a reverberating WOMP! and every head in the lecture hall turning around. I cherish the memory of you teaching me how to properly peg my jeans, and how to stand slightly disinterested at punk rock shows but still grooving on the beat, and you sending me letters during summer break---OMG friends wrote each other LETTERS???--The mixtapes, teaching me about harDCore, taking the train to Philly to see Fugazi play for free in a parking garage, except that we paid $75 for train fare, seeing the mouse on the train on the way home!

Of course you will never live down having the uncanny ability to show up at my dorm room when I was in a bathrobe, but then, who but me showers at, like, three in the afternoon?? Do you remember riding the Greenbelt loop in the rain because WE WERE HARDCORE BIKE RACERS, except we really weren't. I remember we talked about what kind of jersey you and Scott would create--I think it was a Digits-themed jersey--you two were really into your Sweet Sweet Satan kick then. Do you remember, too, coming to pick me up at what ungodly hour to do the Master Cylinder radio show? You and Scott made so much fun of my predictable nature--gee, I wonder if Meg will dedicate Lovesong by the Damned to whichever dude she's dating. . .and I will never apologize for loving Pop WIll Eat Itself. I can't help it if your musical taste isn't perfect. . .

These memories really aren't just memories. These memories are the vital experiences that made me who I am, and you were such a huge part of that. For that I thank you. I thank you for your kindness in befriending a dork like me. I thank you for your endless patience in listening to me. I thank you for being the kind of friend who is always there with me--even when I move away.

You have had such a battle my friend, and I honor you for that. You continue to show me what strength and love is. I'm so very happy you found Susan and that you had your perfect family of cats. You are a lucky man to have so many people love you--it's a testament to the kind of person I've always known you to be--and of course, my love and strength are with you now. With tears running down my face, I'll end my email. You already know how unfair cancer is, but you never talked about it that way--you protected your friends and family this whole time.

I wish I were in DC right now. I know Scott is coming over tonight, and I wish for one more time when we three were together again. Tonight Josh, I will put in one of your mix tapes. I will cry. I will drink a beer, and I will cry some more. I love you.

Meg

winter break

Wed, 17 Feb 2010 13:43:52 -0500

While winter break officially started Friday, right now, this instant is the first chunk of time I’ve had to myself. When I have a break I try to cram in all the normal activities of life and sometimes forget to take some time for me. Some time to think. To write.

I know that sounds all deep and shit. But what it really means is I have an ass ton of papers to grade, and I’ve run out of every other possible stalling tactic except blogging. So. Here I am.

The papers I have to grade are the result of a little experiment I did with my kids. I gave them time to write and be creative. Sounds funny, yes? An English teacher letting students be creative! The horror! But what about GRAMMAR? What about PUNCTUATION? What about debating the pros and cons of the SERIAL COMMA?

I decided that instead of giving a student midterm exam with stupid multiple choice questions and stupid essays that my students won’t study for, won’t care about and won’t perform well on that I would have them write a Medieval Romance that encompassed the Campellian Hero’s Journey in order to see if they actually learned anything this year.

I stole some ideas from the Youth Novel Writing Month folks and structured two weeks of class time for the activity--remember, this is three real weeks--my kids switch to their shops every-other week.

The first week I had each day be a set a goal for the kids to accomplish: describe the setting using sensory details and similes, create the protagonist, antagonist, sidekick and/or mentor, use the hero’s journey to map out the six points of plot, learn how to write dialogue, explode a moment to write a fight scene.

With those under their belt, my students actually had a lot of writing done, and they stopped asking, “how long does this have to be” b/c a) I never gave them a straight answer and b) most of them had already written 3-4 pages.

Once over the “hump” of basic composing, I set them free in the computer lab for the whole second week. Since our classes are 84 minutes long, this gave my lovelies a considerable amount of time to write. Some used GoogleDocs so that they could work at home too, some didn’t have computers at home, or a quiet time/space to work and thus could only write in school. They settled into their habits quickly--earbuds in, keyboards on laps with chairs ultra leaned back or huddled close to the screen, typing in 6 pt cursive font so no one else could read their stories. Clumps of students merged into writing groups, preferring to bounce ideas, word choices, character names off each other and engaging in hypothetical discussions about how far snot would fly if the trajectory of a punch was X and the force behind the punch was Y. They stopped relying on me for information and simply Googled it themselves, “What do houses in Spain look like?” “What modes of transportation would they have used in Europe in the 1600s.”

I wish I had a video camera to capture the discussion about what kind of animal should be the mentor to the group of unicorns fighting to save their world--a giraffe b/c he would be similar in structure to unicorns, but taller, thus lending him authority through height. You know, like Gandolf to the Hobbits.

I was awed by their excitement, their enthusiasm, their LOVE of writing. “Miss,” one young man said, “I never got any of this stuff before, but now that we have to use it, I get it. It’s not that hard is it?”

“Miss, we really need another week of work. I didn’t realize it would take me this long to do a good job. My story is done, but it needs some correcting and there is no time.”

I bought each of my three senior classes sheet cakes congratulating their achievements. And what achievements! One young lady not only turned in a 62 page story, she also used a fashion app on her iPod Touch to create the characters for her story, took a screen shot of them, pulled them onto her laptop, cropped them and pasted them into the chapters. Another boy wrote 32 pages--most wrote over 10 pages of double spaced, normal font sized. These are kids who, in general, hate English and hate writing. I have never been more proud.

Of course, the downside is now I have to grade them all, and yes, they need a lot of grammar work to make them truly readable. The upside? “This is the coolest thing I’ve ever done.” “I can’t believe I did this.” “I will never forget doing this school project.”

Sigh

I love teaching so much.

I just wished it paid a livable wage.

brewing and stewing

Fri, 29 Jan 2010 06:44:54 -0500

It’s cold this morning. Ass cold. As I sat in the car this morning music pumping, heat thumping, my phone vibrates in the cup holder cum change holder--it’s Steph, my co-teacher, letting me know we have a two-hour delay. Fuck. Car off. Back in the house. Brew a cup of coffee and stew about the extra sleep I could have gotten and really need.

I could be grading papers--grades are due Wednesday--but the folder with the papers is tucked into my briefcase in the back of the car. I throw in some laundry, love some cats and a sleepy husband and plunk down on the couch. I sync the phone and plug in the camera. Whoa, that’s a lot of photos I’ve never downloaded. Since Christmas? Damn slacker. Here is a recap of the past few months.

We got the Wii Fit for Christmas. Here JD’s Mii gets ready to shred some dirt.

I finally made it to a family dinner with Doug’s famous lobsters. I’ve been sick the past two times, and couldn’t risk passing a virus onto JD’s mom. The lobster was amazing.

Of course we came home that night to a massive mess. Our water line to the fridge burst and had dumped a ton of water into insulation and floorboards. I hate working with insulation.

The cleanup did inspire us to bang out a few home repairs over break. Our friends Heather and Pete came down to lend a hand with the scary stuff, but JD wanted to get a head start on fixing the potty.

Heather and I hiked up to where JD and I got married. It was icy as balls.

My friend Maggie spent a month in CO visiting her man. She would really rather move there so she can ski with her guns.

We’ve been hitting the snow trails a bit. But Mike’s bike makes it almost cheating.

I got a new crown, too. Dr. Modestow has a milling machine that makes it while you wait. I made some yummy Thai chicken soup, too--photo above.

This is the Jag that cut me off last night on slippery streets. Really nice, bitch.

And that’s the photo recap. If you follow me on Twitter, sorry for the boring repeats, but some people AREN’T ON TWITTER YET. Isn’t that funny?

I still have to blog about Salinger, my students’ awesomeness and the conflicting nature of my work, but that’s enough for now, I have to go switch the laundry.

Hey MidAtlantic, stop stealing our snow!! grrrrrrrrrr.

xo
m

weeeeeeeeeeeeee!

Mon, 25 Jan 2010 14:44:52 -0500

We had the opportunity to ride the Burgy Bullet snowmobile trails with a tour guide this weekend. Jeff Fowler, a Voke alum, took JD and I, Heather and Pete, Dr. Mike and a few others at the ungodly hour of 8 am on Sunday.

It was worth it.

These trails were a dizzy rollercoaster of up up up then swoooosh down then up up up, then weeeeeeeeeeee down. That wee little dot down there? That’s Heather. See the bridge she just crossed? The snowmobilers build and maintain them--awesome awesome work they do. So cool that they let us use the trail system they’ve developed.

The Williamsburg trails are more exposed then the Conway system, and the hills are bigger. Way bigger. We all trudged up a giant ass hill on the way out--the sherbertesque snow was too soft to ride, but on the way back the giant ass hill was a mere 8 second downhill.

I rode well for part of the ride, you know, the down part.

But the up part was pretty rough. You see, I’ve put on some winter weight. To put it bluntly. I’m fat. I look into the mirror, and I think, “I’m fat.” I can’t button my pants, and I don’t mean my skinny pants. I know lots of blogs are talking about weight and being fat, but those are dude blogs. I hate is when cyclist dudes complain about being fat. They bitch about it for a week, so a cleanse, ride four days in a row, run twice and BAM, they drop 23 pounds and are in race shape.

Chick fat isn’t like that.

Chick fat hangs on for quite some time. And it hangs on in visible places like muffin tops and asses. It’s not like I’ve stopped working out. In fact, I’ve been lifting twice a week, riding twice a week, doing a plyo session once a week and XC skiing once a week.

My fat is still there. Not budging. Just pudging.

I’d really like to be down five pounds. Is that too much to ask?

This was a 1700 kj ride, damnit!